What they don't tell you about Social 6 Braces

You can't eat solids. Simple as.

Finally accomplished a life dream and am getting teeth straightened using social 6 braces for the top row. Social 6 braces are basically normal braces but behind the teeth. In order to accomplish the feat of straightening your teeth without the braces being knocked out, I've had two bumps effectively plastered onto two of my back teeth.

The result being, I basically have two teeth to eat with. Solid foods are practically impossible for the next six months.

This isn't to put anyone off invisible braces, as far as I can gather they are cheaper then regular ones somehow, at least that's my experience. £3500 for the top and bottom teeth for me, normal braces seem to start at £5k.

This is just a heads up. I had very little outside info to go on besides the orthodonist website saying how amazing they are. Clear Strip braces I use for the bottom teeth. Clear strip seems to be better, although it can be hard to resist the urge to have a good chomp on them.

So there! Social 6. Invisible, and on for less time then regular braces I think. Which is good, presuming I don't starve to death.

Must Progress

Been a neutral couple weeks, hence not much to write about.

Isn't it weird when you are not required to do something anymore you do it more often and with more enthusiasm. Me and Ant used to say if university consisted of playing Xbox games every day we would probably slack off and do a couple essays on politics for no reason.

Plan to cycle to work soon. Waiting for the (And if the following words get picked up in a search by you Mr/Ms reader you must comment below and tell me you are waiting too) CS8 Cycle Super Highway to be completed. Been putting those words into google on a near daily basis waiting for Boris to announce that it's done so I can start cycling to work, saving £100+ a month!! Everyone should cycle. No fear of tube strikes, healthy, with only a slight chance of death by truck.

Need to string up guitar too and get playing. How am I going to be a superstar if I don't practice?

Will speak more when I have better things to say!

P.S. My stats tell me my Winter blog with all the photos is doing well. Hope people are liking the photos!

What's Love, then?

I think Love, true, proper Love, is the knowledge that somehow, you feel like you couldn't possibly care for someone more, and yet you are certain if you woke up next to them regularly, you would feel more affection for them every day, forever.

I don't understand those who cheat on their spouse. To take someones hand in marriage, you must cross that border of true Love, and know that there is no other who can fill the place that they do. Otherwise you're marrying your friend.

I think maybe only one person has meant that much to me in my life. Nothing can come of it, which is devastating, but I tried, which brings me some small comfort. Life seems less meaningful after, yet it has given me more drive to live somewhere in Europe.

Spanish has gone well, should be passing this year, French not so much, taking another year next term. My drive to learn Spanish has grown, this Summer I will attempt to set myself up well for both languages next term. Hung my Spanish poster up on the wall today:

 

"The Biggest Waste in the World is the Difference Between What We Are and What We Can Become"

Chose this poster because it uses some grammar I rarely stumble across (lo que somos) and its meaning, which I find particularly relevant.

I need change. Time to get Spanish under my belt so I can work in Spain or the EU/UN. Time to wake up to a different view out my window. I'm not going to be able to get over someone like that girl. But I can go make myself some experiences, and try and make myself impressive while I'm at it.

Tests are coming to an end next week. More blogs soon!

Chapel Club at New Slang on a Late January Thursday

Hello there,

Sorry for the lateness. Languages have been killing me and will continue to do so. 

I was however able to take a Thursday off to see Chapel Club at a quick gig so here be the review.

Lord Antonius aka Ant could no longer come to the gig he so wanted to see, so he gave me the tickets to put to good use and to gauge what I thought of the two main bands at Kingston. I went with Sam who I blogged about a while back and Stuart who is always down for a fun time.

Once we got inside, I paid for a £4.20 bottle, cursed the world at the expensiveness of Magners and soon band numero uno were on. 

Unfortunately they shall be named as that only as, hilariously, it was the least professional performance I have seen for a long time, with no intro hello and no au reviour goodbye. Songs were played one after the other to the voice of  the tautology that was the very depressed emo singer, who looked like she'd rather be off doing something else, which was pretty much confirmed when she walked off without so much as a look back with a good 30 seconds left of the final song.

                                     




                                      
                            (Wasn't a happy bunny.)

Admittedly I have set them up badly but you will see what I mean here: 

 

We soon heard enough of them and thankfully it wasn't much longer before the far superior Summer Camp arrived. Whilst being only two of them, they had more presence on stage then the five of the first band. They were pretty funny and clearly had a good sense of humour. 

Things looked down at first as the chavs next to us shouted 'suck my cock', only to stare sheepishly at the floor as the female vocalist called round to see who shouted. Unfortunately despite this skillful put down, we had to endure the chavs singing 'cock' multiple times in future when a good beat came on. Annoying to the extreme.

They were pretty good, Summer Camp, made the night worthwhile. I shall apologise for horrible out of focus recording - I think the people in front were to blame. Music makes up for it though. I must get Ant to tell me this songs name. 

(Like this one, looks like a cardboard cut out)

(Stupidly deleted all photos with them on stage together in one shot. These ones will have to do.)

 

To round it off we saw Chapel Club at the end. I was expecting more from the live performance but unfortunately there was only one song which really stood out for me. Here be the second half of it:

 

(Watch for the hilarous crowd surf fail at 1.25 in. She was fine I promise.)

Gotta say I enjoyed Summer Camp more. I've since heard some Chapel Club on Spotify though and am pleasantly surprised at how good it sounded. Stuart did say that they omitted playing his favourite / their best song for some reason. Confusing. 

Still, it was an enjoyable night. 

Apologies for the reviewing nature of the article. When I am done with work later in the week I will get back to you about other stuffs.

Til then!

Rob Skipper once more forces me into a night out

The Hares and their line ups: 8.0

Hola. This be a blog about Thursday, in which me and Ant went to a gig up in the Old Queens Head pub near Angel in northern central London. Ant had become aware of its existence in the afternoon, which thus led to me coming home to only a quick wash before we headed out.

The pub is fairly tiny. About the size of a rich mans living room, but it had a high ceiling which gave it a more grandiose feeling, you will see from following pictures. The drinks were fairly extortionate but not too badly priced for the area and we were only having the one anyway, what with work the next day for me, and some attempted job hunting for Ant.

We passed the legendary Skipper on the way in, who seemed to be checking up on the attendance, I'm pretty sure he gave Ant a familiar smile but I cannot confirm. Skipper was organising the shindig and the acts appeared to be close friends who he was giving a chance to perform. Lovely man that he is.

We found a seat at the back and commenced watching, having come just in time for the first act which was apparently 45 mins behind anyway. Glorious.

1) Jay Brown was the opener. She was a pretty cool act, seemed very fresh and at ease on stage. Her songs were unorthodox and caught the attention straight away while at the same time being within the bounds of the mainstream indie. She also had a lovely voice:

Photogenic

At ease

View of the venue. Pretty cool place.

The last photo should give an idea of the look of the place. Looked very much like a Tudor room which had started to decay. Post modern the right words?

A vid of the last third of one of her songs is available for you to check out:

2) Next up were the Itchy Teeth, who were talented musicians to be sure, but definitely had a whiff of Ant and Dec about them. If Ant and Dec are your cup of tea, then you missed out. Their act seemed quite short, definitely more of a fun amateur band then up and coming methinks.

Yep

3) Sissi was act #3. Definitely appeared to be her first ever performance in front of a crowd and she handled it pretty well. She has a pretty amazing voice and she didn't falter in both her keyboard and guitar playing.

Observe le chic trainers

Ant pointed out (and I tend to agree) that the lyrics weren't amazing, but at her first gig I think quite a bit of talent otherwise shone through. You can see what I mean by the lyrics in this song which uses coffee a little too powerfully for my liking:

Here final song was a mellow one where she sat on the stage, I was quite impressed how the room quietened down for her to sing clearly.

4) The Lost Brothers were fourth and had flown in from Ireland especially for the gig. They played pretty mellow indie and played it well.

It was hot in the place and even hotter on  the stage. The guy in the hat must have been roasting.

Out of a choice of two videos of them I shall choose the shorter but more interesting one, as they invited Mr Skipper onto the stage to jam with them before playing a song he clearly had never heard before. It's a pretty cool test of his skill that he managed to play along with them despite not knowing anything about the tune:

5) Before the appearance there was enough time to see the final act - Babeshadow, who unfortunately I took only blurry photos of:

Blurry

Babeshadow were the most exciting band up to that point, the guy on the right of the photo looked about 6'8 and had a sense of humour. Their songs were catchy and upbeat.

Finally there were the mighty Hares. They were the headliners but nobly spent as much time on stage as the rest, which wasn't too long. By this time my battery was dying repeatedly so I couldn't take a video but my personal favourite and their final song was Barb Wire which ya can listen to on their myspace: http://www.myspace.com/haresband. Pink Radio is also a great one.

They lacked the fantastic bassist they had when I saw them for the first time in Camden a few months ago. They were also without the lead female singer. However the performance they put in was excellent and had the steadily growing crowd on their feet for the first time all night.

The Hares

Substitute lead female vocalist did a stand up job

They're worth checking out are ze Hares. They have lively upbeat songs that can't fail to turn a good night into a great one. I would thoroughly recommend!

P.S. Remembered I owed you a large video of 4MP singing Beatles songs but unfortunately it was on my laptop that crashed! :( Apologies!

A picture tells 1000 words

Or a picture is worth 1000 words? Old saying.

Uploading a few phone photos. My blackberry photos, while of poor quality, are usually interesting, interesting enough to blog about I hope. Taking a photo on your phone is usually a sign you don't have a camera but need to take a photo to capture the moment asap. Hence the importance. None of these are quite drastic but they'll be worth a look-see.

 1) The fireworks at parliament. Not content with taking half a thousand photos of these brilliant fireworks on my camera, I for some reason whipped out my phone to take another few snaps in a much lower quality. Don't ask me why. I was high on red wine and Ross Kemp/ John Bercow action.

2) Channel 4 studios. They're right next to the internship where I work. This cleaver illusion was identical to the adverts they show - walking to the right sees you looking at a random construction but from this angle its a 4. Great piece of art, if a bit pointless in this climate. I imagine they could have saved a lot more money with something cheaper. Still, I'm glad they made it.

3) Face made into my calzone at a posh pizza place in Central London. Was with my dad, can't quite remember why we were there. Moving on:

4) I do love a good sunset photo wherever I am. This was on my road walking somewhere. If only my camera was with me I could have taken one with much less light pollution.

5) Wimbledon Park. I have better ones on my facebook but this was a nice day.

 6) The Shard. Set to become Europe's tallest building. Took a photo when out with me dad I think.

7) Some Parliament photos. Big Ben with the London Eye in the background. Lower one has Big Ben in full but I like the top one too.

8) Fox on my road. I always wonder how they survive, especially with our coldest December since records began. Prefer to have a good quality one but my camera is never on me when I get a good sight of a fox.

9) My garden at the height of the snow.

 

10) Flowers at my nans funeral. She would have loved all the affection!
 

11) The box seats for the Bill Bailey performance at the Wyndhams theatre. From the box EVERYONE could see you. It was a little unnerving. Bill had a good banter with the front of  the crowd though, turned out to be a great show to watch from a box seat.

And that is all for now. Tune in again soon when I will put up more photos of hopefully more fun times on the way. Wedding next month of my former great roommates Dan and Steph, should make for some great photos!

Saturday

Uneventful name to go with an uneventful blog. Remembered another Bill Bailey joke though; he complains about the warnings on the side of pill bottles being too derogatory for the middle classes. "Don't use when operating heavy machinery? How dare you.. Why not don't use when doing pilates?"

So my future job at the internship place has been made official! Yay! Paid employment in the next few weeks. Looking forward to it ever so. 

One of the top things on my mind recently has been the offer of part time work from a family friend who knows someone. The work would be part time in the evening, 1 - 2 days a week, consisting of phoning people and asking about their opinions on organisations and companies.

The upside - a tad more money but mainly what would be a very impressive piece of work to have on a CV for any future work involving politics.

The downside - evening taken away but mainly the shear level of abuse I can expect to get when calling people in the middle of X-Factor.

The work would be unpleasant but that's the main reason its valued in a CV. Given that my work hours have me finishing at 6 it would also make getting to the place in time problematic. I'm 50/50 as to whether I will go for it. As I've said in the past, a good career and travelling are the main things on the agenda, but will the abuse be worth it? Seems like it should be... we will have to see.

I'm off to sleep, rest up compadres.