Hope everyone had a merry christmas!

And hopefully you are all set for a happy new year. Sorry for the delay. You know what Christmas is like.

Hope you all got the presents you were looking for this Christmas. Amongst the presents Santa bought me are:

Football sweat bands
Egg poachers
Book on North Korea (That award winning one)
Chocs
Calender
Socks/Shirt
Simons cat book
Royksopp CD
Godfather Trilogy
Hat
Posh shower stuff

AND Bill Bailey tickets for the upcoming year. Love Bill Bailey. We have box seats, me and my dad. Should be a good show!

Amongst the gifts I bought were a comedy dvd for me Grandad, Jam and tea for my Grandma, Candle for mum, Book for sis and bath stuff for my dad. Isn't body shop amazing, if you are walking back defeated from anywhere having failed to get a good present of any sort, you can always pop in and buy something to make that tricky person smell nicer. Good times.

Going to get back to my book The Snowman by Jo Nesbo - highly recommend for a good thriller. Set in Norway and highly addictive. Last chapter I'm up to. Stopping me from focusing on languages but that's what new years resolutions are for!

Winter in London Part the Dos

Hoi Hoi,

Hope everyone here is well and ready for christmas time. I've got my stuff all hidden and ready to wrap tomorrow. Me dad lost his wallet but I thought that would be too obvious a gift so have opted for something different, and expensive.

I am getting old, not only is this the first year where the tree and time of year means nothing almost spiritually significant to me, but I'm starting to wish I had made a proper list of needs for xmas in order to recoup the monetary value of the things I have bought in the most efficient way possible. Thats a bit evil isn't it?

Now I need to buckle down and get good at french and spanish double quick. Only a few weeks til they start again, and £160 extra for the tests! The cheek..

Blog again soon, maybe xmas/boxing day(?) Off to see some friends in a pub for an xmas eve drink.

I leave you with a few of the best of my photos from central London whilst out xmas shopping, chat in a bit!

Good thing I don't work Mondays

Random mish-mash of blogging events here.

First I spend quite a bit of time worrying how I'm looking because its a bit hard trying to keep myself looking acceptable. To me, checking myself in the mirror before a night out is less making myself look good and more damage control. I don't really fancy myself as much of a looker.

So when I manage to stumble across a rare photo I like of myself I enjoy it muchly, I figure you only live once so try and get as many good photos of yourself as possible in this brief existence right?

Two photos I've managed to like for the first time in a while:

Won't be many more of these promise! Again, the way I see it my grand kids will get a good chuckle off these clearly narcissistic photos. But they'll also get to see me looking better then the many other photos taken on drunk nights out I wish hadn't survived. Life is short. Jump in. Look good. Jump out!

Other, mini-political blog statement - If 'out of service' trains cost the UK economy millions a day through lost sales, why doesn't the government install thousands of solar panels along railway/ outside underground tracks to heat the snow calling all of the disruption? Granted it will take millions and a lot time to complete but in the long term we might recuperate the losses in a few days of an improved economy!

In Russia, and many other stereotypically cold places you think of when trying to remember stereotypically cold places, public transport runs throughout bad snow. Airports are open consistently, how comes ours close? - Surely we should be taking much needed tips from experienced countries. as to how to deal with snow effectively. I assume snowy countries have brilliant ways of keeping airports open. Under-runway heaters to melt and snow/ice? We should be looking into this!

Speak to you soon blog readers.

Our Snow Witch

When life gives you lemons, make lemonade.
When life gives you crippling amounts of snow, grab a dad and make a snow witch.

Here are some photos of today's masterpiece made by me and Perry.

The great irony is I've just started reading a novel entitled "The Snowman" where the killer puts up a snowman facing the house of victims. Looks like I shall be having trouble sleeping til the thing melts...

Balls to later. Political blog now.

Yes three blogs in one day. Machine that I am. Well more like the other two were more diary-esk entries and I'd rather leaving on something of an interesting one to make you laugh or think. Preferably both.

I'm getting fat by the way. Haven't been the gym for a good few weeks and eating rubbish. Work does that. It is suddenly starting to hit me that 5 days of work + 2 evenings of 2 individual languages + guitar lesson + salsa dancing + hopefully 3/4 evenings of gym + 1/2 nights of football will = A whole lotta stress. In fact I may have to create a hole in the space/time continuum to make this work. Or like in that Harry Potter where Hermione gets that time changing thing to fit in more classes.

It will be done. I'm a machine remember?

Anyways - Political Blog Activate!

So should rich prisoners - those who have, say, more then £40,000 in the bank at the time of incarceration and/or had a high five figure / six figure salary job before they were naughty people and got locked up - pay for their enforced lodgings?

It was an idea that was brought to my attention in the comments section of the Evening Standard last week. Sounds like a good idea to me.

According to this article, there are 85,000 prisoners in the UK today, costing around £41,000 a year each to keep locked up. It looks like 10% of the prison population can afford £50 a week for the duration of their incarceration, which raises £23 million, which can be put into the economy, or used to pay for prisoner skills training.

I've been thinking over the pros and cons:

Pros

• Money. Costs ridiculous amounts keeping people inside prisons. Why should honest folk pay the full amount for a criminals food and lodgings, especially while some can afford to pay their own way? Should they lose the right to their own finances as well as their freedom? Haven't they done enough damage to society/ the economy?
• The money wouldn't (or shouldn't) be taken from all prisoners willy-nilly. The poorest prisoners, who stole when they had nothing in the first place, should be exempt. While it might seem unfair to the richer ones, surely lumping already broke prisoners with prison time bills will make them jump back into a life of crime even faster? Panels could be set up to discuss how much each prisoner should pay taking into account family, mental condition, chance of getting a job again outside and likelihood of re-offending, amongst other things. (However these panels probably would take a big chunk out of those millions raised to fund anyway.)

Cons

• It could do harm to families of victims. Certainly innocent relatives should not be fitted with a bill for the jail time of relatives.
• I'm no maths genius but high school maths gave me enough knowledge to be able to work out the following calculation - 85,000 X 41,000 = 3485,000,000. Now I think that article was slightly wrong with its figures because I like to think today we are not paying £3.5 Billion to keep prisoners locked up. An article I just found which is here, gives the same prisoner number, but says the cost per year is roughly 38,000, which still leaves the cost per year at 3230,000,000 or £3.2 Billion. £25 Million isn't really going to make much of a dent here..

Still, if the £25 million was collected in a separate fund and redistributed towards rehabilitation programs nationwide, surely the richer prisoners would be helping the poorer prisoners beat drug and alcohol addictions and teach them new skills to use when they get out? Here you see my socialist way of thinking.

I don't like money sitting in banks while there is injustice going on in the world and people need help. Especially if this money is sitting, waiting for rich criminals to go and collect. (Perhaps with interest whilst they've been in jail...So crime really does pay?)

Ken Clark, Secretary of State for Justice, has put forward another idea - making prisoners work 40 hours a week at minimum wage, with some of their profits going towards their victims. Work at recycling plants etc. This sounds interesting, although, as reports say, this should never effect companies outside. I'm not too sure about the giving of money to criminals either. I've applied to a hundred or two minimum wage jobs since I came out of uni (with no success as you know) and I'm definitely not alone. Plus, won't this encourage people to just live in prisons for profit long term?

Make them work for free? With all profits paying for their prison terms and the rest to victims? Maybe there should be a really crappy, poor quality prison section for those not working, literally boring hell, with nothing there. Then if you work, you can get a better quality cell, more essentials. Then if you work the most, you get prison life which is currently in effect today. Basically today's prisoners would only live as they do now if they worked/studied at least 40 hours a week, while the others would live in extremely cheap cells with cheap living conditions, at a lower cost to the tax payer.

That last idea sounds interesting to me but I fear I would fall against many human rights organisations for the first time. It is a harsh scenario. But hey, on the coach on the way back from the stag doo I watched Death Race, the movie where prisoners are forced to kill each other gruesomely for the public's entertainment on TV after the US economy has crashed and the prison population skyrockets. At least my idea isn't as evil as that one eh?

If prisoners today really are just sitting in their rooms all day watching cable, I think its definitely time we did something about it. ESPECIALLY since we are in a recession and everyone outside is feeling the squeeze. Surely it's madness to keep prison life as comfortable as it ever was while innocent people struggle to get jobs so they can pay for more comfortable prisons? Ideas need to be drawn up and prisoners need to be put to work. Work will be given to them, as if people outside jails would be so lucky..

Political Blog - Deactivate!

What think ye blog reader? Have an idea of your own?

New blog...NOW (again)

For those of you wondering aboot the title, see other blog below.

So yes, back home I am. Not much has happened since my return. Well:

1) My laptop died. Currently I'm on my mums. Well it died before I left but now I'm sure it is long term. Hardware problem unfortunately. After only appearing with a blank screen when switching on multiple times, I gave it a rough smack and it SPRANG INTO LIFE....only to tell me it was dead for good. Good ole dell, cheap as chips for a reason. I'm waiting for the never ending sales to hit so I can get another a bit more cheaply. Not sure how Dell sales work at Christmas however... will have to keep an eye out. Macs are £800+!! Never knew. I guess people buy them because they last for ages(?)..

2) Getting paid £100 a week which is pretty nice. After expenses it leaves me able to do a bit here and there. Hopefully the position I'm in now will be full time and paid in March I've been told... I'll keep you updated.

3) Had an interview today to be a parliamentary aide. Didn't do too well and apparently the MP in question had 270 applications for the position!! So I'm expecting a no. Ultra annoyingly I was asked questions on interesting topics like AV (alternate voting) and the Palestinian/Israeli conflict but knew nothing on them. Saying that, I work with the current vice chair of the Anti-AV campaign for all of the UK for our party. And STILL I gave a rubbish answer. Real dent to my confidence, I hear a lot about the con's to AV too. Still, I guess I need more practice. Hate needing more practice in anything. I'm getting too old. I should be good at everything by now.

Saying that, French and Spanish have disbanded for Xmas, I plan to work on them daily from this weekend. I'm boring like that. Also more guitar...

Anyways, I need sleep for work. I can assure you I will speak to thee before Christmas time. Stay tuned!

Cya Soon

P.S. I will do a political blog about a new policy I recently heard that I like the sound of - getting rich prisoners to pay for their time in prison.

New blog.....NOW

Hola.

Sorry it wasn't "tomorrow" per se. But I'm blogging now so we're cool aren't we homie? We are good are we not? Cut a brother some slack? That is what I am talking about! For shizzle my nizzle!
Ok I'll stop now, on with blog.

So where was I. I do believe I had put up some rather spiffing photographs of birdies since we last met. Since then there has been mucho happening. Most noticeably of course was my lovely friend Dan's stag weekend. Dan, Ben and Jason came round and we all had a curry and watched some hilarious family guy. But not before we went to Tescos at the end of my road and nearly got into some serious trouble. We walked along the freezing road and bought our supplies, but on our way out I accidentally bumped into a bloke who was pretty clearly shoplifting. At which point Dan said, a little too loudly, "he just shoplifted".

Scarily enough the guy seemed to briefly watch us to see what we would do, which made us fear for our lives all the way home. The ONE time I have friends down who I want to impress with my little suburb of London and we nearly get killed. Seriously.

Me, Ant, Ben, Dan and Jason all left early in the morning. Unfortunately this was also the very sad morning I was told by my mum that my nan had passed away in her sleep. My nan was someone special. We would share a cheeky wink when the all the room were laughing, we would chat in the kitchen of her house while she forced as much food as she could at us, she could always moan and laugh with us, she had one liners to crack up an entire room. She was the best nan I could have asked for. Her funerals on December 21st which will be hard. Fingers crossed shes up there keeping an eye on us. And still laughing.

Heading out that morning was hard but my nan would have wanted me to go. I damn well hope my grandson gets to go on his first stag doo when I head off too. The coach trip up was fun with the guys cracking jokes, sudoku and IPhone tv series'. We got to the place, had a few drinks and met all of Dan's other friends before heading out to the hotel. We got done up and went to the pub for some heavy drinking games which was lovely. The first of the stag challenges hit Dan as he was forced to drink baileys and beer. Unable to finish it all, the stags best man did the deed to the end like a champ.

Afterwards we headed out, grabbed a subway and found the strip bar the stag package included. Now my first experience of a strip club was so-so. It wasn't classy, but then it was almost a warehouse round a back alley someplace. The girls descended upon us from the start and bantered with us for a good 10 - 15 mins a time before asking if we wanted a dance. Most of the guys generally had a couple dances, some more then others. I was one of the few that abstained because 1) Didn't feel right what with nan passing, 2) It wasn't too hard to say no anyway. Something about fake chat in the hope of a dance is not appealing. One girl I told I had a girlfriend back home told me I was one of the few genuine guys in the place. Now granted I see what Ant told me in that they do try and make you feel 'special' as part of their job, still the way she said it with such a finality to the situation made me think she was genuine, she was cool.

Others found it a little harder to say no to the ladies. A few people I heard racked up 3 figure bills from the place. Me, Ben and Ant went wandering and briefly stumbled on a hardcore rock scream pub which was entertaining. Didn't stay for long on return, Jason was down by quite a sum and I offered to go back with him to stop him further hemorrhaging money. After briefly getting lost and having a hilarious trip back we arrived and slept.

Good thing about paintball being cancelled on Saturday was we could sleep in. We found a great sports bar in the afternoon and later returned there to watch the Newcastle game and gamble a bit. Lost £25 but it was fun. Good gambler and lucky bugger Ben won £130. He bought us drinks which was good compensation.

Later that evening we travelled to the Indian restaurant the package included - Rupali, home of the hottest curry in the world, literally. Official Guinness world record and everything. If you finish it you get it for free, get a certificate and have your photo on the restaurant website. The great Mike managed to do such a thing, albeit in a lot of pain, what a man he is.

After the restaurant things happened fast. We pretty much striped Dan half naked and duck taped him to a bench. Before throwing his shoes on a roof. I say 'we', us uni lads looked on while Dan's hardcore welsh mates did what they do best. Be hardcore welsh mates. We left for a club after and had a great night bar hopping. Dan, the man that he is, went back to the hotel and returned not too long later, something we all cheered too. Only other thing of mention is dancing for nearly half an hour with a street busker playing a drum. We were loving it. That and I nearly took out £4000 rather then £40 from a cash machine. Not so good.

The morning of our return, Ant annoyingly discovered he had booked a ticket for 1AM rather then the 1PM we had all booked for. He sprang into action and managed to bag a lucky national express coach for only £30 more. Good times. The coach back was funny, me Jason, Ben and Dan cracked jokes here and there. Me and Jason watched Dead Race on his Iphone. Ridiculous movie, but good for a coach ride. Towards the end we also looked up rather riskay world records including the longest ejaculation (roughly 18 ft) and the largest vagina (large enough to accommodate an American football)

Sadly it all ended and I'm back home. Dan survived, and is a stronger man for it. If my nan is watching she would have enjoyed every second. Dan's wedding is in February and promises to be a great one. I shall blog again in a separate article as I feel I have written a hell of a lot here...

Upcoming posts immanent

Sorry for the lack of posting. Tomorrow I will recount the next few days I hope! Involving the stag weekend, some family stuff and upcoming stuffs. (Also have I mentioned I'm getting paid around £100 a week now?)

Watching Matrix Reloaded before I head to sleep. The acting is so much worse then I remember. But then I did watch Patrick Stewart play a modern version of Macbeth on BBC Iplayer yesterday. Genius man.

Til tomorrow!

Winter in London

Those of us in the UK will know it has gotten bloody cold. For those of you not in the UK, it is bloody cold.

I've created an album on facebook full of Winter photos, I'll pick my personal top ones so far here, look forward to taking some more:

EDIT: Should probably say that I took these photos! Stupidly forgot to mention. First two were taken at Colliers Wood park and the following were at Wimbledon Park lake.

Out of the blocks

Today I came off the benefits. Went to the job centre as per usual and informed the lady I see that I would like to be taken off of the care of the state. She responded with usual indifference. She gave me a nice "good luck with it" and a lovely smile at the end but I shall not miss her in the slightest I fear. She was snappy. 

"How many hours do you volunteer?"
"Well I do 3 days at the moment..."
"No how many HO-urs..."

When I first went there I was told not to lay around at home watching Jeremy Kyle. Yes I'm sure the MA on my CV just screams lazy benefits scammer. Gah. She was good at heart.  
I can afford to keep up with the masters loan now as I'm working an extra day at the internship handling their social networking side. I get paid £65 for the day to blog, facebook and twitter. Joy! Still I'm on the lookout for other things, I went to the standard job agency near me on Thursday. I went on the first big day of snow which impressed the lady working my case no end.

While at the agency I had to do MS Word and Excel tests and a small spelling test on the sheet. I was told about (and prepared for) the Microsoft tests and got decent above average scores for them (28/30 for Word and 24/30 for Excel), but the spelling test was a bugger, got 13/20 and 15/20. I dislike spelling. Thank God for computer spell checkers. Now because of the bad spelling test, I can't be put forward for admin work at the Ministry of Health. Frustration!! GCSE's, A-Levels, three years on a BA degree, slaving over a hot MA degree and Finally!! - I can't get into my chosen field because I spelt Prejudice "PreDjudice" in a job agency. I'll never make that mistake again I tell ya.

Still its never that set in stone. This Christmas I'm going to be working damn hard on getting up to date with Spanish and French, two things that keep my hopes alive that someday I will be hard at work in Europe, or somewhere else in the world. Just writing about it makes me want to work on languages, must write more when my motivation is low.

I'm quite a left wing guy but one policy has occurred to me and it is quite the righty. Why, depending on how much a person has taken in job benefit, do we not have those who have taken a certain amount pay a portion back when they start earning over a certain amount? I've been on benefits for about 4 months, £51 a week (51x16) = £816. Now granted that's quite a bit (more then I thought before I started making that calculation), but after I start earning 20k a year, I should be fine paying back £5 - 10 a week for a while. Surely if we're not paying back anything now, an even smaller figure would be acceptable. Granted its another loan, just like tuition fees and we all hate tuition fees. Tricky one.

One things for sure, I'm not going to miss having to prove myself to the job centre every week by staying up late night job hunting.

Gah. Life.

Sometimes life gets you down. I still don't have a job after half a year. Jobs which a few years ago I would have at least gotten an interview for, those which I fit all the specifications for and spend a lot of time constructing personalised cover letters for, I end up not even getting a reply back from, given that there are 100 other guys out there with my stats but also a wealth of unique work experience positions. Its not nice. Especially as I hope to travel asap. I want this damn recession to be over with.
Thus ends the paragraph to which hundreds of thousands of others will reply "ditto".

It wouldn't matter so much except all I want to see lies outside the boarders of the UK. I can't wait until I can live abroad. Europe, America, Australia. It'll be brilliant. Make for better blogging too.

What brings me down most is the friend who I have spoken to in a year. She messaged me to ask if I could believe its been that long. I can't, I've been thinking that a lot recently. I can't believe someone I feel so strongly about is the only person in the world who doesn't want to remain in contact any more. Evil as it sounds I wish I heard I wasn't alone, but it increasingly feels like I am. Seems like people keep saying its time to find someone, although I'm not seeing these people find anyone, which is comforting, I like to think love happens at any age. I hate how I am when I'm attracted to someone; I told my friend I would move abroad for her, which at the time seemed like a smart thing to say, but I now realise made me seem like a weirdo. Pretty sure I've said that previously. Meh. Annoying. And depressing.

Life is short. And I've no idea what comes after. I like to think we all meet up but I'm not too sure about that. So separation in this life troubles me greatly. I really hope one day we're friends again.

Til then, it's time to alleviate the depression as much as possible. I've gotta get this job and save up for a world tour. I'm ever more set on a charity cycle to every state capitol of every state in the USA. Sometimes I doubt myself and whether or not I am really a good person. But I've seen enough cheezy movie blockbuster morals played out in real time to convince me that actions speak louder then words. I don't know how much a trip that stupid can raise but hopefully it'll be enough to make me feel like the good guy for once.

Rough Night

The aforementioned night out turned out to be a doozy.

We headed out after a lovely drink in Tooting to the place in Leicester Square. I should reiterate my desire to build an app in which everyone can rate a place they visit. Kind of like google maps when you zoom in and can get a review, but a more review-specific application, where you have to grade things such as atmosphere, service etc out of 10. Would be marvelous. The castle in Tooting had a lovely atmosphere (8.5/10) and the service was pretty good (8/10). I met the usual football superstars, Hitesh, Gau, Adam, Raj, Sandeep and Danny, along with a few lovely blokes I haven't seen in a while including Ritik and a few others. I also met a lovely pair, Hitesh's sister and her husband.

We arrived at Ruby Blue just in time to avoid a nasty 10 quid entrance fee and made our way to our private booth. Ruby Blue was pretty nice. Quite small in the bar section and it was stereotypically loud so you had to be next to the persons ear to be heard but it could've been a lot worse.

It became pretty obvious early on that hitesh's brother in law was plastered but we all were before long. Merriment was had, including a brilliant cake which I confess I had a great portion to myself.

Towards the end of the evening we were all chatting away and before long noticed a fight had broken out of the dance floor. No-one has any idea what happened but it turns out hitesh's brother in law and his wife were arrested and before long out in a police car outside! Dramatic stuff. In the middle of all the commotion and running about trying to find out what happened Sandeep went and got a McDonald's which made me laugh no end afterwards. Man is a legend.

Getting a taxi back were me, Adam, Danny, Sandeep, Ritik and a girl called Aarti. We all had a good time trying to piece together exactly what happened on the way back. The kebab shop at 4am was like a feast, food always tastes better when drunk as it is but we were able to have a great chin-wag about the night as well. I do love the word chin-wag.

So there you go, random, but a memorable night. God knows what will happen next time. A death might be on the cards at this rate.

Why is it the more things you have on a list to complete, the more you end up not doing any of them?

The Flashguns: 5.9
The Good Shoes: 7.5

I have French homework, Spanish homework, mandatory job hunting as per the job seekers benefits rules, guitar practice and other minor chores. And have no desire to do any. I'd love to do Spanish and French but I doubt I'll learn much. I'm hoping when I find paid full time employment I'll have more stability and keep a regular diary on things to complete daily. But logically I'll have less time then now. Hopefully concentration rises in line with earnings. A lot of the rich do have high concentration levels...

I went with Antus Dius to see the Good Shoes on the 18th, they were lovely and enjoyable.

More detail you say? Ok.

We turned up with lovely fliers in order to get £1 off and entered the great Hippodrome, increasingly filled with people younger then me, but a lovely place, probably my fav in Kingston.

The show began with a warm-up called the Flashguns. As Ant pointed out, it's a tad unusual for so many American bands to come to Kingston to play in front of 20 or so random English boys and girls but if you're going to come to London to play at all and are relatively small, New Slang in the Hippodrome would be a top choice I suppose. The people are nice and the place is very hospitable.

The band were "pretty ok". A perfect way to sum them up. They bashed out a few ok songs which were good enough to sway to. I remember none and if I had a video of them I probably wouldn't post, too much hassle. Still if you enjoy a laid-back indie band then keep an eye out for them, they played long, melodramatic notes and tunes, something of an indie fast paced coldplay. "Flashguns"! Apparently on a European tour so someone somewhere with money think they're pretty good. And with all that concentration they must know what's best right?


We moved on for drinks and met a guy we met last during the wombats gig. He took a photo for us which I posted on fb, the only one with me Ant and Caroline in at the same time for your reference. He's a damn nice guy and a good laugh. He was absolutely nothing like what I remembered during the Wombats gig but I was wasted. We had a brief chin-wag before those Shoes that are Good came to the stage and we ran to observe.

It was my first time viewing and heard mixed reviews. Bursting onto the scene like some wild thang, they took massive strides with their first album and were initially pretty brilliant. Unfortunately album number two was a pile of poo. It bombed and calls from the band that they were playing a song from their "latest album" is met with a chorus of "oo-er"s.

That said my first experience with the Good Shoes was rather pleasant. The band played a mix of old and new stuff and the old stuff was definitely better. Smacked of local brilliant songs and the failed encroachment of new, more mass-appealing songs which turned sour. The band are originally from Morden which is roughly 2-3 miles I'd say from where we live.

What let the band down most I'd say was the lead singers lack of enthusiasm. Banter from the front was pretty much brushed off or ignored and he seemed to be in a 'lets get it over with' mood.

Here's a video of one of their songs. It was an old hit. I also have a vid of their finale but the quality is poorer and the leader sounds a lot more off-key then I remember. It also had more viewage of the the chavs in front of us acting like dicks which is never good. Why do people throw bottles onto the stage. It boggles belief. (I sound so old!)

If you desire to see the finale it's on my facebook. Its a good song which many an Englishman (and woman) will probably recognise off of sitcoms and dramas off of Channel 4 and the BBC. (I'm thinking of Skins.)

After the performance we sat for a few hours with our friend, I mainly observed the conversation, feeling tired as hell. All of this non-work is affecting my sleeping patterns. An enjoyable time it was though.

Final News!: The unpaid internship has offered me £65 a week for one extra day a week working on their Social Networking section. Mainly twitter. Annoyingly there are TWO rather large facebook groups for them, completely splitting the support. I'm either going to try to be an admin on one or make my own, although splitting it three ways seems rather stupid. Would give an official aspect to it though.

Tonight I'm off to the central London birthday bash of two footy mates. Expect to read a blog and see photos of the night soon! An old friend has appeared in the profile picture of another friend on my facebook. Took my breath away, she's always been pretty stunning. Time to attempt to be as stunning as possible eh.

Hope all you Yanks have a great Thanksgiving!!

Til later.

Review: Being Sellers

8.2/10

Shortest review ever. Just to say I went to see the show "Being Sellers" this Wednesday at the Waterloo East Theatre. The Theatre has literally been open 2 months. It was actually pretty nice, nice bar, nice staff and damn nice aero hot chocolate.

Being Sellers is a one man show about a guy acting essentially the life of Peter Sellers, one of our greatest comics. When walking in, the seats were on the stage, along with a restless actor in a hospital bed. Once up and running the show was pretty well put together. The solo actor had done pretty much everything from acting to directing and had taught drama in Australia for 2 decades so I knew experience was with us.

He pulled off some pretty brilliant impersonations of the great Sellers and the story was compelling. It was set in Seller's head during one of his serious heart attacks, or perhaps it was an interpretation after Sellers died of his final heart attack. Either way, the show was Seller's coming to terms with death, trying to fight his way out of purgatory and searching through his past to come up with the clues to escape. Of course this lead to all number of impressions which were very good indeed. My favourite of his works is the goons and the actor pulled off his goon show impression damn well considering he did the whole cast and the whole cast of the goons were brilliant actors in their own right.

The one qualm about the whole show was the noise. The theatre is literally just under Waterloo Station, one of, the busiest train stations in London. What sounded like 4 tracks were above the theatre, and the rumbles of trains passing overhead was pretty off putting. At one point I was trying to guess which train was coming next, as all 4 had varying pitches of noise. I also felt sorry for this obviously talented actor having to do emotional quiet scenes when the 9:15 to Chelmsford was moving just above us.

Still the show was good, the location was the only problem I had really. Cept for maybe when the actor did a falling scene and nearly crushed my feet!

Wow this review turned out to be long after all. Who knew. Not me that's who.
Tomorrow I'll do the last of the modern new stories about the Good Shoes who I saw this wed, as I'm knackered now.

Till then!

Jeremy Hardy performing stand-up

Turns out I've omitted a few small things, I should probably clear up in chronological order before continuing.

Jeremy Hardy on Stage: 7.3/10

Uno) A week before my birthday I went to see Jeremy Hardy perform his stand-up at Richmond Theatre, nice place, it was full, a few hundred people I'd say. Birthday present from Mi Padre. Using his typical 'Dad' sense of humour, he got me, him, his boyfriend and his ex seats on the front row. Typical, because I hate the front row. I like to go out to a show and be safe in the knowledge that I will be be a spectator only. Being within conversing range of the stand-up/comedy show makes me nervous, I'm not a particularly big fan of being pointed out and made a part of the act.

We got there in good time and ole Hardy came on. Being a BBC Radio 4 regular he used very political high brow humour, talking about the Richmond area, rich vs poor, socialism (his fav) the war, and getting old.
The getting old part was where the trouble started; Radio 4 caters for the older, more politically inclined Londoner, and I was the youngest person I saw by about a decade. So I get picked on, am designated the 'young one'. Things were going fine until he asked the obvious question: "How old are you?"

The following is what happened in my head within the space of 0.1 seconds:

"Holy Crap. Question time. How old am I? Easy, I'm..... . Wtf. I should know my bloody age by now, I've had over two decades to learn it. Man, theres loads of people in this room. Where was I? Ahh my age. Yes. Age. Age age age. Erm, well I'm more then 21, that was a good while ago. Not 25 yet am I? No that's way too old surely. God theres so many people here. How old am I?? Ok not cool. I need to answer. This is stand-up. If I don't answer within the second he's clearly going to take the piss. And in front of all these people. Probably a good million in this room. Well I'm here for my birthday right? So its probably a year less then the age I've been thinking about recently which will be what I'm going to become. So minus a year right? Right??? Quick say something. Tell him your age, Quick! Quick!!!!! Before its too late! Last chance. Go for it. Take your best shot. Do it, DO IT!!!!"

"I'm 22."

SHIT. I'm 23. Well 24 really. I spent the next 15 minutes of the show constructing my new 22 year old life in my mind. Telling myself I was born in 1987, not 1986. Just in case he came back with a pop quiz for some random entertainment. The bad thing is this show was apparently recorded for Radio 4. I was initially quite happy at the thought of being part of the crowd in a packed show. Shame I was the only guy in the room to tell the audience I WASN'T there.

"Hey I was on the radio the other day, I was at the Jeremy Hardy gig, I was the one he picked on, it was cool!"
"Ahh yeah, you're the 22 year old right!?"
"Well I just turned 24 actually..."
"Ahhh..ok..."
"It was me though! You believe me right!?"
"Yeah...sure....(nutcase).."

Brilliant. The show was very good otherwise. The humour was interesting and on the whole, pretty funny. I liked his over the top 'left-wing-ism' and he had the necessary confidence to pull it all off. There were a couple of lulls in the laughter but I suppose it's to be expected considering he seemed to make a lot of it off the cuff. And in that respect it was pretty impressive. His anti-war tirade came off a bit disrespectful to the men out there, despite him saying he respected them intensely, but on the whole it was on the right side of acceptable.

So meh, deserved a good but not remarkable score. Seemed like a nice guy though. I would see him again for a good price..

Early November = Birthday time

For some reason the 6 million or so people who had seen this rap video of Bert and Ernie chose not to inform me.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=21OH0wlkfbc

Well then, that's 6 million or so people who WON'T be getting Christmas cards from me next month. To be honest its kind of a let off, I'm still without paid employment and thus cannot afford 6 million Christmas cards.

Anyways, early November brings along with it a reminder that 24 years ago I was yanked kicking and screaming from the womb of a pregnant lady. And kick and scream we should. Its amazing we all grow up to be sane thinking about it. Stories abound of people who are traumatised at a young age and have trouble fitting in later in life.
Surely having to be told at age 0 that we must now breathe, eat, and drink through the mouth rather then through the belly button, that we must interact with hundreds of other people and not even have the ability to tell the ones we don't like to fuck off just yet, that we have entered into a world where crime, drugs, war and X-factor exist, would turn us all into homicidal maniacs shortly after hitting puberty. But it doesn't. Strange that isn't it.

I digress. My birthday was lovely, family friends came to the house and we ate, drank and had merriment. A small amount of cack fireworks were lit in celebration of that great dude Guy Fawkes who failed to blow up parliament back in 1605. I do like how my birthday falls on bonfire night, something pretty special about fireworks and bonfires on your birthday.
My lovely grandma also made me a brilliant cake in the shape of a hedgehog. Its just spectacular.

Grans make the best cakes. Despite what the old lady in the movie production of Matilda made us believe. Actually that cake looked good to, the lady was just nasty. MY gran filled my cake with loving awesomeness. And for your reference loving awesomeness tastes like chocolate cake with a strong element of coffee and some chocolate buttons thrown into the mix. 

At le party I received the following; some awesome (and probably expensive) aftershave from the lovely McDonaghs, a pair of jeans from my sister, some forrero roccer from my godfather, some new trainers from mum and a slab of chocolate numminess from my dads boyfriend. All in all was loovely. The night was full of socialising and ended in a big talk about the Labour Party and the potential for a book group.

Most of the presents I got from others, including me dad turned out to be money which is just what the doctor ordered as I am off to the stag doo of my lovely ex-roommate Daniel who gets married next feb. December 10th - 12th will see me in Newcastle where I will participate in a grand lads weekend out. The lineup includes, in order, a strip club, paint balling, free Indian meal and a night on the town at some VIP clubs. Controversial as it may seem to say, the strip club I believe will probably be a let down without some careful going. Being male, I am lumped with the stereotype that I must enjoy and should actively seek out the opportunity to plant myself in front of naked ladies and follow their privates with my eyes like I'm taking some sort of perverted test for concussion. And don't get me wrong, it'll be nice for a few minutes. Unfortunately for the remaining few hours I will be intensely aware of the fact that I'm surrounded by seedy drooling men with erections. It won't be pretty. Fingers crossed they'll actually be normal folks on stag doos like us, we'll have a laugh at a table somewhere then get the betrothed one a lap dance.

Paint balling will be fun but painful, the Indian will be tasty and the night out will be hilarious. Cannot wait.

Last to say that I've changed my CV and Cover Letter a lot recently, I'm more optimistic then I have been in the past so things aren't so bad!

Allow me to leave you with the quote from my favourite happy birthday song by the Arrogant Worms (mainly to test the quote option)

Happy birthday!
Now you're one year older
Happy birthday!
Your life still isn't over
Happy birthday!
You did not accomplish much
But you didn't die this year
I guess that's good enough

Till next time!

Breaking the Cardinal Rule - The Wombats Review (Plus A night at New Slang)

10/10

Soooooooooo two reviews in and I'm going to break the only rule I made before I started making reviews.

Of course that is, to NOT give anything a 10/10. But I can't help it. I just can't.

Surely the ONLY thing that CAN ONLY BE a 10/10 is something that forces itself on you. That explodes in your face and says "THIS IS AS GOOD AS IT GETS". And it was.

I left with the Anthony and Carolina relatively late for the gig at 10pm. The gig would roughly be starting around 10:30 - 11. Traffic was fast and we even had a pint in a nearby place beforehand. What followed was a journey only the dedicated music fan can appreciate:

Firstly, after getting in, we proceeded to grab a drink, at which point me and Ant headed to the dance floor. We started at the back, and The Wombats began with such safe songs as "Laura" et al. Brilliant tunes, but leaving an aura of anticipation as to where they would go from there.Very soon into the gig things got inevitably rough, but the songs were too good to resist. In the average gig the casual music fan keeps close to the back and lets the morons shoving do their thing. THIS though, was no ordinary gig. The first few songs turned out to be first album glory tunes and soon I was swept in. I passed the threshold point and launched into Chav-city. I was on the attack.

At the centre of the crowd things were bumpy to say the least. I was one of the bunch. But with every shove I took 3 steps forward and one back and within one song I had managed to get from the back to 2-3 rows from the front. Victory!

Some new songs were laid down, all were damn good. I had reservations about some I heard online but at this gig they turned out to be audio gold. What was important was the guy in front of me didn't mind I was using him for support and jumping like crazy. At the front the shoving was surprisingly less bad then the middle, but being more left-ish it was easy to prepare for shoving in two directions then four.

But this gig was 10/10 and as such certain things which usually matter when watching the bog-standard gig have no place here. Stepping on shoes and the fact that within an hour I was dripping from head to foot in sweat that wasn't mine. A swarm of pushers every 40 seconds or so are zoned out by the fact that the view and the sounds are so good that others are rebuffed and forgotten. In fact, the only annoyance during the hour (if it was that long, time flew) were the chavs behind drunkenly calling for the Wombats to get on with it. Clearly the simpletons had no manners or taste considering the men a few feet ahead of them on stage were geniuses who would DAMN WELL GET ON WITH IT WHEN THEY WERE GOOD AND READY! Dicks.

The night has come onto youtube in several stages, this is the finale clip: http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_profilepage&v=SMMRvNksqgk - Awesome stuff

So all that remains to be said is the new songs were crackers, and they ended predictably, but not in an unwelcome fashion with the best songs in the Wombats repertoire: Moving to New York and Joy Division, which were played flawlessly and had everyone jumping like loonies. A gig to remember!

I missed getting a set list at the end because I was helping a stranger find her shoe but nonetheless I managed to have fun after with the lovely Ant and Caroline. Just enough alcohol was consumed and fun was had and, strangely, great pictures were taken even in our wasted states.

None of those pictures are in the order I want them to be in but blogger needs to improve its picture moving abilities. I suppose I should explain the Pinata. I should but I can't, because what the hell was happening there I have no idea. Having said that it was a fun idea by New Slang. Got the crowd jumping for it, never did see if it was filled with anything sadly.

The photo of the girl reaching for it I love for being overly dramatic. Remember that clip in Constantine when Keanu Reeves jumps for the hospital band when he's in hell and all those demons are trying to claw him down as hes jumping for it? If you can't don't worry. The movie wasn't the best. Still, the pic reminds me of that. Photos of those here plus many more can be found on my facebook under the boringly titled "The Wombats at New Slang 29/10/10". I had brilliant plans for an awe inspiring album name but the titles "The Greatest Gig Ever" and "The Night of Awesome Photos" seem to lose their appeal the more sober you get.

Anyway, we staggered to the bus stop, taking two "Queue here signs" as we went. (I chose the non-ticket holders queue whilst ant took the ticket holders one) Mine is currently on my door looking fine.

All in all it was the perfect night, in so far as the gig was brilliant, we had exactly the right amount to drink to get drunk but not too drunk (although I hear the others were worse for wear!) and I spent very little. The bus home was quick and I was in bed by 3. Can't complain!

So there you go. The perfect gig is unlike any other. It is not a 'good night out' but a quest, a campaign. Even then, the quest can go sour, you can be shot down or merely run into some bumps that slow you down.

EVERY ONE OF MY AMERICAN FRIENDS HAVE YOURSELF A MERRY LITTLE HALLOWEEN.

Party your socks off and enjoy yourselves. You deserve it for being so awesome it hurts.

A fond farewell for now!

One of those 'sigh' Sundays

Dear Blog Readers,

Hope you're well. I figure my highly opinionated and egotistical reviews don't count as proper blogging so I feel compelled to continue.

What do you guys think of highly attentive restaurant managers? I ask because at a birthday dinner in a South Wimbledon restaurant I attended on Friday, the manager came over repeatedly and joked, grinning widely with the birthday lady and the other close friends and even, I heard, offered one of her disabled friends a free meal. Now at the risk of sounding pompous and downbeat, I dislike the approach. I find it akin to overly-aggressive advertising.

One day a few months ago I went out for a birthday meal with my dad and nan. Close to leaving, my dad enquired as to if the manager knew one of his friends, a man who recently died, who had attended the restaurant a few times. Judging by the responses, which were very generalised and picked off of my dads descriptions, I got the feeling the manager only said yes in order to gain familiarity and thus, more possible business. This, I thought, was nasty.

So I don't know. I don't want to go on much about it, as I'd imagine she could very well have entered the restaurant business with the aim to make customers happy and to laugh and joke with them. I guess I just find business transactions more opaque then others. After all, working at Debenhams showed me how dedicated but often soulless managers tried to squeeze all they could out of employees. Customers were there to be drained.

Anyway, on to proper fun, went to Thorpe Park yesterday. For those of you not familiar with Thorpe Park, I would say that it is amongst the top 3 best theme parks in the UK, I'd say #1 but I haven't been to many outside London. It was Fright Night season, so there was a spooky theme prevalent. Me and me mates Danny and Adam drove up earlier and got in the queue for the new Saw ride, only for it to break down once and then pause for thunder a short time after. All in all we waited around 2 an a quarter hours for it but it was pretty worth it, a vertical rise then a 100 degree angle drop started what was a pretty amazing ride, twists and turns galore. And the queues are always so much easier to handle when you have mates to joke around with.

We met up with more friends later and went on such infamous rides such as Nemesis, Stealth, Vortex, Detonator and No way out. Stealth as usual was the scariest, 0 - 80 MPH in about 1.7 seconds, a MASSIVE rise of what I read is 204 feet and then the slow-then-fast plummet and return. All in all lasts about 10 seconds but its just the most incredible rush that the wait is so worth it. Fastest roller coaster in Europe and I'd damn well put money on it being the most intense too. Detanator is my least favourite. Basically involves being taken up a vertical post and dropped about 100 feet or so. Nerve racking and I always clench so hard I end up hearding my unmentionables. I fear I may have said too much..

Next week holds a comedy show on Tuesday and the Wombats on Thurs. Also I have just realised I turn 24 in 2 Fridays time. More scary then all the rides at Thorpe Park put together. Haven't really talked about this sigh Sunday, but it was, well, Sigh. Gym in the morning and little else, language revision needs to be stepped up if I'm to be a masterful international 'Gregory House-esk' traveller, solving crimes in Spanish and French worldwide. I'll keep you posted.

A question that's been bugging me today; does the postal service have an all weekend service that sorts out post even on Sundays or do even the backstage workers get the day off?

Cya soon.

TV Review: Film 2010

I was nonplussed about a change in commentators for Film 2010, Jonathan Ross was classy, but not irreplaceable I thought. However not only has his replacement made me realise Jonathan Ross was probably more talented then I gave him credit for, but it has also brought with it what I should have realised would be inevitable; the arrival of the ever-so-bollocks 'makeover'.

I'm in the middle of watching the second episode and I'm probably not alone in saying the following; I just about give two craps about what Claudia Winkleman thinks. But not by much. Jonathan's witty banter was both informative and funny but you were also wrapped in the comforting safety net that was the fact that Mr Ross was a talented and smart reviewer whose word should be heeded. Don't get me wrong, I think his 6 million a year salary was a scandal and I was mostly against him when it came to antics which quite rightly made him appear to be quite the tit, but his research seemed to revolve around a lot of hard work and a general passion to give the right balance of opinion and unbiased facts.

Claudia Winkleman and the bloke she bounces off of make what appear to be solid judgements, especially at the start of their reviews. But when the words "I think" creep into the mix I find my concentration waining. I see two chat show hosts having a natter about one film or another rather then the technical in-depth discussion about the pros and cons of a film which will effect whether or not I will pay to view it.

The crappy "upgrades" (and I can't stress those quotation marks strongly enough) include the 'Top 5' part of the show. Somewhere along the line someone at the BBC decided it would be good to bring complete randoms onto the show to express their love of the top 5 'somethings' from any movie in their repertoire. I need this addition about as much as a drowning nun needs a hamburger. To make matters worse, the first episode drew on the knowledge of some plucky young pre-pubescent pillock who proceeded to give his top 5 inclusions of the moon in films. And then not mention E.T. I mean really. I'm not a big E.T fan myself, but to start the already-wobbly new series of a film review show with a top 5 list of moons and not include the lovable extra-terrestrial is just plain awful. Whether Winkleman mentions it at the end or not. Tweets from viewers were also used and (no offense to you at home) once more I did not care. At all.

I shall be generous and say one thing; it does look like the team have pounced on the majority of the 'iffy' parts of the first Film 2010 with ole Winkleman and have adapted the following episode to meet those challenges rather successfully. The presenters seem more focused on providing quality reviews at the expense of the other cack parts of the show thus far. Conversation is streamlined, focusing more on movie content and describing their views with a 'step-back', more in-depth approach. Aka, The Jonathan Ross effect. The Top 5 section was pointless once more, but not cringingly awful and the dreaded crappy tweets were not even mentioned apart from at the start. Pointless jokes were at a minimum and the banter was much improved as a result; bouncing views between one another actually produced some intelligent insight.

So thar she goes. It's not great, but its already improving after one show which is pretty impressive. Of course this could all be reversed. Maybe I misconstrued their actions and no progress has been made, I could have just seen the best the series is going to get. Maybe time issues meant tweets had to be cut from only this episode and next weeks show will include 'Maud' with her Top 5 uses of cheese in black and while cinema. I sincerely hope not.

I shall have to put my faith in the team and hope I can continue to get solid criticism on what I may potentially be seeing. Either way, RIP Jonathan Ross' film reviewing career, you shall be missed.

Hello Hello Blog.

Hello again, I should probably blog before I forget some of the stuff that might be of interest. If I forget anything I'll put them in a series of edits at the end.

Not much has occurred but I shall list the following:

Had a job interview with London Empire Academy. From the name and the well kept website I envisioned a rather large glass building with a few classrooms, perhaps a library, small quad, you know, school stuff. What I found, (after rushing like a sweaty lunatic between streets trying to find the location) was a very small 2-3 level building with little in the way of windows or general beauty, sat squat in the middle of a car park just off the entrance to the M4 motorway. Alarm bells were already ringing as I circled the building hoping beyond hope that the rusty entrance door at the front was a poorly situated back door, hiding the fact that a lush glass automatic door complete with flowers and polished signs to boot were waiting for me round the back. They weren't.

That said the staff were fairly lovely. The secretary guy was nice and the billboard at the entrance showed some lovely class road trips and some generally smiling staff members. The interviewer lady who I believe was the deputy was pretty nice too, although it was hard to keep focused when the cars on the M4 were whooshing passed right behind her head. The position was for an Admin job, 9 - 6 for £7 an hour. Not bad, and there's a lot of responsibility that comes with the job including regularly ringing the Home Office to check for updates. The place wasn't pretty but it was certainly legit and pretty friendly. It's been a week since I went and I've had no response. My opinion of them will be significantly lowered if I get rejected without so much as a 'too bad' email but I'm still holding out for some luck.

Also, do you guys choose to ask questions in an interview? I have here-to-for been told by smart people that to do so is bad as it shows you haven't done enough research and you lack basic knowledge. However I got the impression here that a question or two would have provided some much needed banter. My "I've read all I need to know on the website" remark got a smile but I doubt I stood out in any way. We'll have to see won't we.

Also there has been a charity 5 a side football tournament which happened yesterday, all the proceeds going towards helping those hit by the Pakistan floods. As I expected being the outsider in the group of us that went, I got lumped with the older team that needed an extra player. Being that it was all for a good cause I went with the flow and had a lot of fun with the guys, they were pretty cool. By far the highlight was match 2 of 4 in which I scraped us a win. We were 2 - 0 down against the best team in our group who had brushed aside my mates team. Somehow I pulled a goal back from a loose ball up front. 2 - 1. A few minutes after I was tapped a ball from the left which I hoofed into the left side from a few metres away, 2 - 2, we were well pleased. Finally, in the dying seconds we were locked in a tense mid-pitch battle. I was slid the ball. At this point I was knackered from running laps of the pitch and the sweat was stinging my eyes but I tried to keep my focus. I saw a gap and shot from half way and managed to slip it in the left side hard. I went NUTS! As did the team. But I found myself shouting "COME ON!" a good 4 - 5 times in the rush. Looking back I must have appeared quite the loony. But you're only young once, and that was a game to remember. We ended up just missing out on qualifying but it was a superb tourny none the less.

Not much else to say currently except it was lovely ALIA GANT'S birthday this week. Broke and unable to secure a present to top my family guy series I sent her last year, I have opted to send her a card and promises that future birthdays and celebrations will be met with superior present giving as soon as I get some dosh. I will tell you about my card after she receives it. Sufficed to say I love it so. She deserves it, she keeps me sane sometimes and the fact that she puts up with me at all is praiseworthy indeed. Happy Birthday Alia.

Spanish and French are going well, I have my lovely Spanish teacher from last year back in the driving seat which is nice, and french is surviving which is a bonus. Getting fairly hard to separate the two now. Now that I'm getting job hunting under control I should be able to focus a lot more on them.

My wombats ticket and poster have arrived; can't wait til the 28th to see them. I also possibly am going to Thorpe Park on Saturday which will be awesome. Rides galore. Also a comedian act next Tuesday and then the little case of my Birthday in early November. I'm not joking, by little I mean little. I asked for an early birthday present to be my family paying for french/Spanish as I am broke. How life changes, not a decade ago I was working towards the dreaded GCSE's and wishing for Xmas break to get presents. Now I PAY for 2 GCSE courses with my Xmas credits and look FORWARD to getting more work for dosh. Crazy switcharoony.

Anyways not much to go on as I say. But in the next 2 - 3 weeks there shall inevitably be fun tales to tell you of. I already have my wombats promotional poster on the wall winking at me. Things are looking promising.

Till next time,

Toodles.

Review: Made in Dagenham

7.2/10

Decided to spice things up a bit by doing movie reviews. Went to see Made in Dagenham at the HMV Curzon in Wimbledon, which turns out to be a pretty alright cinema. More expensive in the evenings then the odeon but you get to take in booze and other hot drinks which are actually at normal prices as opposed to complete rip off odeon prices. The seats are pretty comfy too, small screens but definitely a comfortable watch in more ways then one.

The movie pretty much plays out like every other BBC funded movie ever made which makes it fairly predictable. Life is as it is; iffy. Bring in a group of zainy but well meaning good guys and some bad guys with power and the status quo on their side, struggle struggle struggle, will they hold together to the end? Will good triumph over bad? Will their be a cheesy group hug and cry? Yes yes and yes.

Those of you fearing I've given away the ending - its a movie about how women working in a factory in Dagenham managed to get equal pay throughout England; its hardly going to end in doom and gloom.

However my 7.2 score should indicate how this movie is a pretty good watch in a few ways. First off the acting is pretty top notch. The characters are passionate, downtrodden and determined, all of which comes through in good measure. It also does fairly good work of coming across as a historical documentary as well as, above all, a feel good drama. The long struggle is shortened pretty impressively into a two hour movie, both encapsulating the major aspects as well as not making the time drag.

So with memorable characters, historical relevance and an enjoyable, feel good plot which doesn't seem to groan, I'd say the film provides a pretty cool watch. You could complain about the BBC's predictability when it comes to its movies, but hey, its not an original story, its a real life tale of the strength of some women from Dagenham which made England a fairer place to live in for half its inhabitants. And to that end I say Made in Dagenham has been made with some care and attention to detail. Not outstanding, but a lovely entertaining feel good quest.

End note: HMV Curzon does a bloody good hot chocolate for £2.50, which I'm sure is about 10 quid cheaper then the evil Odeon corporation would do hot chocolates if they did, which they don't to my knowledge. Fancy a fairly tipsy, comfortable, lounge-esk watch; Curzon is the way forward, even if it is £2 more expensive. I'd probably say £2 well spent. Or I will when I have income.

Nothing much happened today, had a gym sesh in the morning where I managed to get a free desk and a picture off my mate austin. The pic is a classic beach vista shot, must be 3 foot wide and wont fit anywhere. I'll make some space, love vista shots. Spanish was CANCELLED after I walked for 50 mins to get there and 50 mins back which was unfortuante BUT I was informed of a footy game later in the evening which I attended and which we won which is rather spendid I think you'll agree.

Anyways I am in the process of going back on my word on getting more sleep so, until next time,

Au Revior!

Bloggius Updatius

Lo all,

Hope all is well with you. Update you I will, informed you will be, speak like Yoda anymore I will not.

Spanish on Monday was alright, the teacher was away with some surgery so we had what looked like her friend teaching us. The people are all nice, a few from the old gang are back which is cool. The class was packed, hopefully they will split us into two classes.

French on Tuesday was also good, however only 8 people are signed up and what I shall term "Bastard government cuts" mean 11 are now needed for a class to continue. Fortunately the teacher seems to be a stalwart character and I get the impression that if anyone can keep the class on, its her. Unfortunately the uncertainty of it all has meant I haven't revised that much, I'll get onto it soon, promise, after this weeks upcoming lessons.

Besides that it has mainly been much ado about the internship this week, getting contacts for the database from the US, Canada and Australia. Makes me happy to know I'm having a fairly important impact on possibly the largest human rights org dealing specifically with Sri Lanka.

Oooo also the Ed Miliband is in the driving seat of the Labour Party. Initially I was sceptical but the more I read about him, the more I like him. He's very left wing, promises a new start for us and seems to have a vision. He's all about keeping the rich-poor gap low and is environmentally conscious. And he can complete a Rubik cube puzzle in 90 seconds. What a stud.

Today's fact is that he taught Economics at Harvard for 18 months (!). I'm increasingly impressed.

Currently watching 'Stephen Hawking's Universe', another Stephen Hawking programme telling us where we came from, where we're going, and how we're probably all buggered if we don't colonise mars and other galaxies soonish. Turns out we have to worry about asteroids, radiation and weird collapsing stars that fire laser beams. Joy.

The cost of constructing an interstellar spaceship is huge and offers no payback so it must be funded by a massive charity fund or by rich ass travellers. Even then it will take 73 years to get to the nearest cool planet. So basically money will screw us all. More Joy.

Finally I've been feeling guilty about stuff in my recent past. This, combined with the fact I so often hear about charitable doings of friends, has made me think I need to give back to society. I've also given up thinking that its ridiculous to feel guilty about doing charitable work to make myself feel better; I've got to jump into this with making people better in mind. I've considered doing something along the lines of the Samaritans, my friend Caroline does something similar at Essex uni which sounds pretty rewarding, trouble is I'm not a phone lover by any means. I've been thinking about maybe a soup kitchen somewhere, sounds very bog standard but, again, rewarding. I'll do more research into it when I get a job and can afford to think on my own time.

Going to start working on this fast track civil service thingamajig which I will almost certainly not get. But you've gotta try hey.

Hope you're having a sweet weekend, til next post,

Done.

I want to take you to a Gay bar, Gay bar Gay bar....and watch Topping and Butch

Hello all,

These entries are coming thick and fast. Won't keep it up, this weeks had some exciting events and its looking a bit more lax over the next week or so. Still can tell you about Spanish tomorrow and French on Tuesday, classes begin then. Looking forward to getting back on the wagon.

Also I apologise if the latest blog entries you find here have spelling/grammatical errors, I have a tendency to make such things. I always re-read my stuff before making the next entry however so if you wish to check my old entries you will find that my work has been brought to an impeccable standard.
Go ahead, check, I'll wait.

But of course you're probably just too lazy and uninterested to re-check which is fine as you may now read the latest entry which involves the review of my favourite Gay comedy duo Topping and Butch.

Yes slightly more interesting this time no?

I went with my dad and his boyfriend to Central Station, a gay bar at Kings Cross which turned out to be so-so. Wasn't the nicest of atmospheres but then me being of the heterosexual persuasion it wasn't really geared for an audience such as myself. Most gay clubs I've been to however have slightly nicer vibes. Not that I regularly frequent the gay scene, just stuck my head in here and there. Moving swiftly on...

We waited for a good 2 hours for Topping and Butch to saunter it a few minutes late but in brilliant style, descending from the stairs, Butch in a priests costume, Topping in a nun's attire.

The number of Anti-Catholic jokes was funny in itself

These were quickly discarded to reveal their plastic spandex underwear and, in Toppings case, a lovely skirt. Those of you who don't feel that that picture will be as lovely in reality as it is in your minds may wish to quickly scroll over the following picture:

Well you can't see Toppings skirt but its probably for the best..

They proceeded to pull off quite a funny evening. This is despite:

1) At the very start a drunk who was annoyingly right next to me getting taken to the back for rubbish yelling

2) An extremely unfunny and over-zealous fan at the back giving rubbish banter

3) The two 50 year olds dressed in school uniforms at the front being on and off funny and throwing mood swings when not appreciated. (One of them owned the bar!)

Butch (on the right of the picture) is one of the wittiest men you will see for free on stage and took it all in his stride. The bar wasn't that full which annoyed me but it was a sizable crowd and they had us all laughing. I wish I could remember some of the funny one liners I tried furiously to etch into my mind. One was "It's nice to be here, as I told William Hague at his hotel that night..." and other included a rant about the costs of us hosting the pope and how its getting more expensive ending with "Ah well the Catholics always knew how to manipulate small figures..." Gah I should have recorded the rest. Funny stuff tho. 

Songs they sang included one about wanting to shag David Miliband, a song about Viagra and its benefits and my personal favourite, the I Hate You song where they describe in many many metaphors what their company is like to one another, each description more vile then the last. Awesome. 

They are definitely worth a watch. Didn't even mind that much coming home on two night buses and getting back at 2. Was a good night I recommend. 

I think the next big night after this might very well be the WOMBATS who I hopefully will buy a ticket with what little money I have this week. Their show is in late October, I look forward to it ever so. 

Hope you guys are all well and happy, chat to ya soon,

Finito!