Scaramanga!

So, it’s been quite a while since I wrote on here, so I guess i should start by apologising to all the people who like to get a regular fix of my fat ass life [actually, that's not me being big headed either, a fair few people have told me it's quite a good read. My hits went over a thousand a few weeks ago, so cant be all that bad right?]

Anyway, apologies for my slackness in updating this thing, but i have two very good reasons. A) i’ve needed time to cool down after a few things that have gone off recently and 2) I’m lazy as fuck! [and yes, i know i said A) and 2), thats just how i roll...]

So, first and foremost, here’s a message to anyone who’s been wrote about in this thing, good or bad: I’m not going to apologise for anything i write in here. I’ve said all along that what i right in here is how i’m feeling at that particular time, and if i’m thinking your a twunt, then it gets wrote down. If i have an opinion on a situation that you disagree with, i guess it’s tough titty, cos i’m not gonna censor this anymore than i already have done. At the end of the day, it’s my diary that i’m writing, it’s just not as secret as keeping it locked and hidden under the matress like some little eleven year old kid. Welcome to the internet folks…

So, i’ve had a couple of people criticise me for what i’ve wrote about them. Ok, maybe i’ve not been nice about them or maybe i’ve wrote about stuff that’s made them seem a little shitty or whatever, but at the end of the day, it’s my own personal opinion. Doesn’t mean everyone’s gonna agree with me, and lets face it, if we all felt the same and had the same opinions, this world’d be a little bland wouldn’t it?

So, an update…

Right, well i’m no longer talking to Helen. It’s been a bit of a downward spiral since that night out a few weeks ago to be honest. That night, i found out one of her mates called Ashleigh likes me. Now don’t get me wrong, i really think she’s a lovely person and what not, but i’m just not interested. In all honesty, i dont think she’s even in the right place at the minute to handle a relationship…And lets face it, i really dont wanna have to say “sorry love, but i’m after ya mate…” cos that’d just be shitsville, USA.

So, fast forward a week and i’m dozing off on my sofa when my phone starts ringing. It’s helen, who i know is out drinking, so i’m already worried haha. So i answer the phone, and she starts pestering me to let her give Ashleigh my number. Now, she’s quite, quite drunk, and i’m tired and sober, so conversation was strained as it was, but i was trying to make it perfectly clear that i didn’t want my number given to anyone. By the end of the phone call, i’ve argued with helen about it [all be it, playfully] and had a conversation with Ashleigh thrust upon me. I sent a text as soon as the phone call was done, making sure she knew i didn’t want anyone having my number, but i guess she just didn’t listen, cos half an hour later, i get a text off of Ashleigh’s phone; “Just giving you Ashleigh’s number x”.

I went up the fucking wall, i mean seriously ballistic! I was fuming…so, i text her telling her how pissed off i was, then went to bed. I wake up to a handfull of missed calls and a text. So, understandably [i think] i’m pretty annoyed at Helen for quite a while, and we bicker on msn and then dont talk for a while. Then a few days ago [maybe longer, i've lost track of time now] she comes on msn and kicks off about my previous post and what i wrote about her.

We argue again, although me being the more argumentative, she doesn’t seem to do conflict. Anyway, the end result is me deciding i really cant be arsed with the entire shitty situation and severing ties completely [or as me and lightie would put it, serving an irradication order]

Not spoken to her since, save for a brief text conversation when she sent me her new number and that was only because i didn’t know who it was. I’m actually a little sad about it all, because we did connect pretty well, but, and it’s a pretty big but, if she wouldn’t listen then i dont think it’d be worth continuing the friendship and i definitely couldn’t be “involved” with someone who doesn’t listen to my wishes and stuff.

Anyway, in much better news, the bands demo is all but finished. Might do a recording blog actually, with some pics and stuff to show you all the process. We’ve got one more session of recording to do, to get jay’s vocals [lead and rhythm], my backing vocals and a couple of synth tracks done. Then it’s off to master, which should take a couple of weeks, depending how much time me and mick can find in common to sit down and produce the thing.

I’m actually quite excited about this, i mean, considering it’s only a five track e.p and it’s not been mastered yet, the tracks are sounding pretty good and i’m actually really proud of the stuff we’ve wrote. Some of it’s pretty funny, some of it’s pretty sweet and some of it’s just down right immature. I have a feeling this is a cd i’ll be playing to my grandkids when i’m old and grey haha. Is it sad to like your own music? Ah well, who cares =]

Went to see Dara O’Brain on thursday just gone. I was actually suprised at how funny he is live. I mean, i’ve seen him on Mock The Week, and he’s funny on that and all, but its scripted isn’t it. I appreciated that much of his stuff will be pre-rehearsed, but to me it seemed as if much of the first half was pretty much off the cuff and then the second half of the gig was the rehearsed stuff.

Finished script extract 3 of 4 last week and sent it off to my tutor. He’s read it and marked it in the mid sixties out of seventy, like my other two pieces, so it seems i’m on a roll. Gotta buckle down and get my last one finished now, then i can concentrate on working on the film [which, amazingly, we're still planning on doing. Usually by now, we've lost interest in a project, so hopefully this one's gonna be a goer lol.]

Downloads on four weeks away now, proper cant wait. I love download, just because its a chance to get away with my mates and get wasted or even just chill away from home. The music is just a bonus to me. Having a bit of trouble with the tent, so might have to cough up a bitta cash to get some elastic for inside the poles, cos the old stuffs eroded, but other than that, we’re looking good.

Anyway, i think thats about it.

Remember, be excellent to each other

x

Jackanackanory!

Well, It’s been a while since I’ve added anything to this hasn’t it. Not that i’ve been off doing much to be honest, just a mixture of being lazy and…well not doing much, hence nowt to write about haha.

Last Thursday was quite interesting…went for a drink with Dickie, but met up with Numpty [Katy] and Helen later on too. Helen got quite drunk quite quickly, and if you ask me, it wouldn’t be an exaggeration to
say she was all over me.

Her boyfriend was out too, and he was definitely not impressed with how flirty she was being with me. To be fair, i wouldn’t be happy either if i was him and i’m not even a jealous person.

This whole situation is getting a bit ridiculous to be totally honest. I mean, the phrase “can’t have your cake and eat it” sorta springs to mind. It’s like, she can’t have me but wants to keep me just interested enough so that I don’t wander off and find someone else…I might be being a bit harsh here, but atm that’s what it’s feeling like.

Maybe it’s just me, maybe I’m bad at picking women? I mean, the ex was a bit nuts, there were soooo many reasons why me n Zoe wouldn’t/won’t work, and i can probably list another half a dozen different relationships/girls i’ve liked that were bad news if i wanted to.

Still, i still think that the relationship side of my life is the only part thats not going great at the minute. And being in a relationship isn’t the be all and end all of life is it? I mean, yeah it’s nice to have someone to snuggle up to at night n stuff, but it’s also nice having relative freedom to do what i want to do whenever i wanna do it.

Uni’s going ok, 3 scripts down, one to go. Can’t wait for summer though, gonna be a good one this year i think. Download’s not too far away now [next month] and if all goes to plan, by october i should have my motorbike too, so i’ll be a bit more independent, not having to rely on buses and lifts everywhere. Also looking forward to some nice weather this summer, cos after last years shitty weather, we’re due some weather that’s acceptable to just chill in clifton park, having a nice drink with friends.

The bands debut e.p’s coming along pretty well too. We’re almost done, got a couple of synth tracks, one bass track and the vocals to do, so should hopefully have the recording side of things finished by the end of next week. Then it’s time to produce the thing, which should take a couple of weeks max. Looking forward to getting it done, because i think it’s the best project i’ve been involved with so far and i wanna hear the finished product.

All in all, everything seems to be cool at the minute. Aside from the girl problems, if you can even call em probems, my lifes pretty peachy =]

Anywho, thats enough of an ‘update’ for now

Remember, be excellent to each other

x

Ah man…

I’ve got quite of a lot of stuff swimming round in my head at the minute, but the real shitty thing is i’m not allowed to talk about any of it on here for one reason or another.

There’s some Helen-related stuff that’s on my mind right now, but she’s asked me not to write about it all and although my diary/blog/thingy was meant to be open and honest, i’ve gotta respect her wishes…

Then there’s a boat load of other crap thats going on in my head right now, about stuff that friends are going through etc, and it’s really getting to me.

I try to be a happy person, i try to be upbeat and i try to be as possitive as possible for a pessimist, but for some reason, i’m feeling quite down right now…which is really odd, cos i’ve heard a few things tonight that should be making me smile…

Wouldn’t it be nice if everything in life was straight forward. A world where everything was black and white, a world where there were no grey areas at all. But i guess part of enjoying life and living life is struggling through the grey areas and just coping with being alive.

I think that might sound kinda pretencious, and that wasn’t what i was going for believe me, but i guess i’m in that sort of contemplatative mood about now. I’ve got a feeling tonights gonna be another night of getting little sleep while i try to digest the days events…

Maybe i read too deep into things? Maybe i need to say “fuck it” to myself a bit more often instead of dwelling on throw away comments and impossible situations, but there’s a part of me that wants to believe that the impossible is actually possible, no matter how unlikely…

Am i talking in riddles? I guess i’m kinda tired, but to me i’m making sense…i know this is a far cry away from my usual diary entry/bloggisode thing, but i’m trying to write down a thought process here and it’s kinda hard to do without actually writing down what you thinking [which, as i mentioned earlier, i'm not allowed to.]

In general, i suppose my life is going about as well as its ever gone right now. I’ve got good, reliable friends, my jobs not too bad, i’m doing well at uni, the bands going well, i’m starting to learn to ride a motorbike in time for the start of my second year at uni, the only thing missing is a gf, but i could quite happilly stay single at the minute.

I’m just feeling a little off tonight, and i guess thats normal. I mean, there was a time when i’d go through pretty serious mood swings every couple of months, but now i’m happy most of the time and that’s good, because i like who i am these days. It’s important to be happy with your lot, because it sucks to be constantly wanting something more, especially when that something isn’t reachable.

Anyway, i think i’ve rambled on enough for now, so i’d better try go to sleep.

Remember, be excellent to each other

x

WTF!

I’m never amazed at life’s ability to mess around with my head…

In my last post, I was talking about a girl called Helen, who I met at snafu on a night out. After talking on msn, I decided that it was more than the beer goggles, and I actually did quite like her.

Was one of them moments, where you meet someone and instantly know that they’re fantastic…

I was sorta picking up on vibes that she liked me too, and I thought it was all gonna end well…

Unfortunately for me, in the time between us meeting and finding each other on myspace, she got back with her ex. We carried on talking, but I just knew that it was gonna be one of them situations where I’m forever gonna be wanting more, and because she was with her bf, it couldn’t happen.

Eventually, she made the decision to decide that she couldn’t have anything to do with me, and to be honest, although I was upset I knew it was the right thing because she didn’t need me being around when she was trying to make it work with her fella, and I dont think i’d be able to cope being just friends, because I thought there was a connection between us, and to watch her with Alex [the bf] would just hurt.

Tonight, I’d just got into bed after coming in from band practice when I got a text message from a number I didn’t know that just said “msn? x”.

I went on msn, and Helen started talking to me. She was appologising for telling me she couldn’t speak to me anymore, because I seem like I’m a nice guy and stuff, and I started feeling really bad because she was being so nice about me, and I have to try and be a bastard about it all, because I don’t think I can take getting close to someone who I know I can’t be with.

I guess I’m writing all this down because I don’t really know how to deal with this. She’s a fantastic person, and I’d be a fool not to wanna be friends with her, but at the same time, I don’t think being friends could ever be enough…

Feelings that aren’t mutual are not good, and I don’t wanna end up waiting around, hoping and wishing for something that’s never gonna happen. It’s not fair for me to put that pressure on her, because she loves her bf, but it’s not fair on me either, because I’d be left hanging.

I dont even know if any of this makes sense to you…

I guess I don’t really know where my head is at right now. Everything in my life is actually going quite well apart from my love life, because I’m struggling to find ‘mrs right now’ nevermind ‘mrs right.’

Anywho, steve’s pirate party on saturday, so i’ll have a few drinks and maybe forget who I am for a while =]

Remember, be excellent to each other

x

Yes, another rant about being single…

Well, it’s good to say that in an ever changing world, some things just dont change…

My ability to sort out the conundrum of my own love life has never been, shall we say, all that great but I think my radar’s even further off form than usual lately. Lets look at the evidence shall we:

The Ex:
We don’t talk anymore, which admitedly is of my own doing as I thought that it got so messy towards the end that it’d be much easier if I severed all ties completely, but even when we were together, it was never plain sailing. We argued quite a lot, and because she had quite a few issues, it was hard work just to be happy.

Zoe:
Ok, she’s still an amazing person and all that jazz [and she is, we're still good friends] but it’s yet another prime example of me barking up the wrong tree. It’s those dreaded words yet again…["i see you as a friend"]

Helen:
Well, this one is retarded [the situation, not the person.] I’d only been speaking to her for about 2 weeks and already she’s cut me out of her life completely. I mean, lets face it, when I met her, she was single and i was out my face. I was chatting her up, and I thought she liked me too. Then she gets back with her ex and expects me to just forget everything she’s told me and i’ve told her…if she can’t handle being mates, fine by me, but just goes to prove I can’t have pick em…

Nah don’t get me wrong folks, i’m not saying i’m not happy being single, cos I am. I’m actually really loving my life right now, it’s fantastic…i just miss having someone to cuddle ya know. It’s nice being in a relationship when it’s all going well, although certain evens with friends relationships lately have been showing me the harsher side of being in love, and at least a small part of me is happy i’m single.

In other events, we started working on the demo again on wednesday. Mick’s laptop balls’d up so he lost all the old recordings, so we had to start again from scratch. This time, we managed to get drum tracks for all five of our songs done in one night. I was quite suprised, because even as flat recordings, they sounded pretty good, so i’m looking forward to hearing the mastered versions…Mick should be coming here after work today to have a go at doing some of my guitar parts through the tone port, to see if we can get a decent sound. I’m looking forward to putting the cd out, cos I’m genuinely proud of some of the songs we’ve wrote.

Other than that, not a whole lot’s gone off in my life recently…been steadilly plodding away writing my scripts for uni, done a bit more tidying up on the ‘Pizza’ script, which is gettin’ funnier by the day [even if i do say so my self.]

Went to see Drillbit Taylor last week, which was co-wrote by Seth Rogen. Man, the more I find out about that guy, the more talented he seems. He’s a really funny guy in the films he’s in, and he’s a talented writer too. Someone to look up to maybe, other than Kevin Smith? [NB: I'm really looking forward to Smith's latest film; 'Zack and Miri make a Porno' - not only is it a new Kevin Smith film, but it's got Seth Rogen in it!]

Anyway, i’ve got work to do, so remember…be excellent to each other

x

Alcahol, Earlies and Italian Resteraunts.

If anyone needed yet further proof that i’m quite a lazy fucker, then let this be it. When I started this blog/diary/whatever it is, I intended to write in it as often as I could…turns out that’s not very often haha. I’m not sure whether I’m just allowing for interesting occurences to happen to me so I have stuff to write about or whethr I’m just to lazy to update regularly…

Anyway it’s once again been just over a week since my last confession…wait, that’s not right! I’ll start again.

Take Two: Anyway, it’s once again been just over a week since my last bloggisode, and to be honest, the only reason I actually decided to write now was because Miss Helen Veale is pestering me to update so she has something to read instead of doing her work.

So, lets think about whats happened to me since I last wrote on here. Last thursday, was the first thursday after pay day and as such, means only one thing…Snafu!

Myself and Ant were in snafu for 4ish, for a bit of a chinwag about current events unfolding at work. After a bit of a chat, he now agree’s that a certain meadowhall employee is a complete cunt-sack and that another one is a bit of a silly sod. Lightie and dickie filtered in sometime before 6 and by 7 i was alreay quite drunk. It wasn’t long after this that I suggested we play a drinking game. The rules of which are this:

Between o’clock and half past, you must drink with your right hand. Between half past and o’clock, you must drink with your left. You’re not allowed to say the word ‘drink’ or any other varient of such as drunk, drank, dringking etc and you are not allowed to swear. Every time one of these rules is broken, you must consume a shot of your choice.

We started at 8 and after the first fifteen minutes, lightie had already consumed about ten shots…I was doing quite well until I forgot to swap hands at half 8. Lightie pointed this out, and my imediate reaction was “bollocks” followed quickly by “shit” as i realised i’d swore…three shots for me then!

By nine o’clock, lightie was nearly dead [he threw up about 30 minutes later, and had to be taken home to the afformention Miss Helen Veale, who was lovely to us all despite us being stupidly and drunkedly ill hehe.] Dickie, the bastard, didn’t mess up once and only did a shot in the spirit of things because we were all so munted haha. By 10ish, I was completely out of it. Apparently I was having quite long conversations with people that I didn’t even know about haha.

One thing I do remember, is nipping out for a fag and talking to this guy with EXTREMELY bright blond hair. I gave him a menthol fag, and he told me he loved me cos hardly anyone smokes menthols haha. Then one of his friends turned up, and my jaw hit the floor haha. The only thing I really remember is that she had dark hair, was stunning and I was attempting to flirt lol.

An hour later, i’ve thrown up and left snafu and by 12 i’m in bed, asleep.

I woke up at 5 o’clock, sitting bolt upright in bed, knowing full well i’m gonna puke. I reached out for an empty glass from my bed side table, and threw up, completely filling the glass in one, then rushed to the bathroom again. As i run through the door, i projectile vomited into the sink, miraculously not missing. An hour later, i’ve just about finished cleaning up the splashback intime for mi mum to complain that she needs to wash her hair before work. I went back to bed and woke up around 10 feeling fresh as a daisy…god blees sleep and water haha.

So friday, i’m frantically searching myspace, trying to find the girl from the night before, but gave up after about an hour of no success. I’m just starting to do some work, when the house phone starts ringing. It turns out that the traywash machines at work had packed in, and they needed people to do over time going in to help clean trays by hand. I went in to do a four hour shift, gettin home about seven, and just chilled the rest of the night, going to bed reletively early.

Saturday, i was on earlies at work, so mum took me in. Because the weather was spectuacularly shite, everyone and their aunty’s seemed to come to meadowhall. By half 4, i was sooo glad to finish cos i was knackered. Had another early night, because the clocks went forward at midnight, and I wasn’t prepared to lose an hours sleep haha.
Was on my usual shift on sunday, and it was dead, which takes the piss from how busy it was the day before.

So monday was technically date number three with Zoe. We went for a meal at this little Italian place called Mamas and Leonies near the crucible. From the outside, it looks like a little greasy spoon and on the inside it doesn’t look much different, BUT the service was great and the food was fantastic! I had this ravioli dish but it was so much more! It was essentially ravioli in tomato sause, but there was also mince meat in the sauce and a bit blob of melted cheese right in the middle, oh it was heaven haha…i wanna go again, my mouths actually watering as i write this! I’m still quite confused as to where i stand with Zoe to be honest. I mean, sometimes I get the feeling that she might ‘like me’ like me, then at other times I think she just see’s me as a friend, and to be fair, it’s awefully bloody confusing haha. Ah well…

So yesterday, me n jonni went to sheffield so i could pick up this battered old guitar that some guy on a forum was selling. its in a rate fucking state, but im gonna do it up to look like a charvel san dimas custom haha. Had a rate laugh with Jonni randomly wandering round sheff. When i get paid next, i’m deffo going back to sheff because I saw a Hat that i RATE want, and in CeX they had a shit load of cd’s that I want!

So, today, the girl i met at snafu added me on myspace!!! How’s that for a slice of fried gold huh? I spent an hour trying to find her, but without knowing her name or anything about her it was an impossible task. Then, randomly, she spots me on her friends profile and add’s me. She’s actually really cool, and indeed incredibly hot! I’m optimistic haha…

Tonight at band practice, we finished off an amazing song. Jay and Joe swap over, Jay on guitar and Joe on synth. Jay even takes lead vocals on it too, and i just do a bit of backing on the choruses haha, it’s rate good. Possibly the best song of our set yet [or at least in my opinion.]

So yeah, that just about brings you all up to speed. Sorry about the essay length post, but it’s been an interesting week haha.

So remember, be excellent to each other

x

The Circle is complete…

I’ve been a lazy fuck again haven’t I? I’m sorry, I am, but it seems i’m actually having a life lately haha…well that and yes, I am indeed a lazy fuck. So anyway, it’s been just over a week since I wrote my last entry, and I’ve been out more than I’ve been in lol. First things first, the date I went on…God it was awful!

Seriously, it was shoddy recurring! I hate it when the other person is a complete dullard, conversation is like trying to get blood from a stone. Ok so I might sound like i’m being a bit cruel, but I felt like gonna sleep in the pics, although admitedly that might have been down to how god awful Meet The Spartans is lol.

I can’t decide if I am being harsh though…I mean, it could be a case of she really was dull, but at the same time it couldnt be something different. Have you ever met that person who you think is perfect? I think my problem might be that I was comparing the girl on the date with the girl I really want…Zoe.

I still don’t have a clue where I stand with her, but hopefully I’m seeing her next week, so maybe I’ll get a clue haha. Failing that, she’s gonna Steve’s birthday bash next month, so might be able to talk to her then [alcahol lowers inhibitions right?]

Anywho, college is out for easter, and I should really be writing my scripts, or at least getting on with them haha. I’ve started both, and I think i’ll be ok when I get into it. Think I need to get inside the mind of Frank Gallagher to write my shameless script [fuck me a bet that's a scary place to be!]

Got my new tattoo today, i’ve got “The Circle” on my left wrist. Probably won’t make sense to a fair few people, but to me, lightie and glyn it makes perfect sense.

Anywho, i think that’s about all the important stuff right now, so I’ll sign off here.

Remember, be excellent to each other!

x

Kiss My Face!

I know, I know, it’s been quite a while since I last wrote in my diary, but I’ve been rather being doing lots of things that are not very exciting. So, for the purposes of catch up, I shall write about some of the more interesting things that I can remember from the last week or so.

First off, I wanna say congratulations to my good friend Andrew who had some good news last week. I can’t say what yet, because it’s not public knowledge, but just wanted to say congratulations.

Right, I want you all to have a butchers at the title of this little bloggisode. It’s an Alan Partridge quote. What does everyone think of it as the title of my bands demo? We started recording our demo on wednesday. Mick brought his recording equipment and laptop to our rehearsal room, and we started working on the drums. We got the drum tracks for Track One, Ex Girlfriends Suck and Girl At Work down and ready. It was quite cool actually, because the quality of the drums was pretty good and that was before any mixing and mastering. All being well, we’ll be starting the guitars next week, and it should be finished the week after.

So saturday at work was a bit stressfull for a few reasons. First off, there were only 2 of us on the bins, and with the shitty wheather, a lot of people decided to pack themselves into meadowhall. Strangely enough though, i was actually in a working mood on saturday, so we didn’t actually struggle. However, around 4pm a commotion started on the security channel on the radio. Now, we’re not supposed to listen to channel 2, but as it had quietened down, i decided to see what was going off. By half four, It became apparent that there had been some kind of bomb scare over at the bus station.

Rumours soon started flying, and people started to panic. All of the traffic lights around the centre we’re turned to red to stop cars leaving the car parks and no one was allowed to leave the centre. Certain members of staff who had finished their shift had to hang around, either working overtime or simply just hanging around. As time went on, reports started to come through that perhaps things weren’t as serious as we first thought…It was all eventually sorted out, and by 7pm everything was back to normal. It turns out that actually happened was that someone who was travelling on a coach from either Bradford or Birmingham had started arguing with the driver and in the heat of the argument had threatened to “blow the bus up.”

So the bus driver paniced/over-reacted and had phoned the police telling them that someone had threatened to blow up their bus and it all escalated from there…it’s a sorry state that of affairs when something like an idle threat leads to a full scale ‘situation’ like we had on saturday. Still, i guess that’s the world we live in huh?

Thursday night we had our first production meeting round at Ant’s flat, to go over the script make suggestions for changes and come up with some new ideas for scenes. We had a pretty productive session [aided by the chinese take away and beers supplied by Dickie!] and some good ideas were thrown about.

Last night [Sunday night] lightie dragged me to the pictures. We went to see George A. Romero’s Diary Of The Dead, which I have to say, is rather bloody good. For me it’s a fitting end to a fantastic series of films [with the exception of Land of the Dead, which by all acounts is rather shoddy!] It was gory enough to satisfy a die hard horror fan, bruitaly honest in it’s message and thinking about it, it’s probably a pretty acurate account of what a zombie infestation would be like. if you get chance, go see it!

I’m off to the pics again on friday [i've got a date haha] so i’ll let you know what i think of the next film, whatever i decide to see lol.

Thats about it for now, so remember…be excellent to each other

x

What a week!

So, once again I’ve neglected to keep up to date with my woeful excuse of an online diary, and haven’t written in here in a week! Well, I suppose it does help to let the news add up instead of stretching out each bit of stuff that happens in my sorry excuse for a cranium haha.

Anywho, here’s a short version of the past week:

So, last saturday I come to work in my usual, chipper mood only to discover some information about the supervisors meating last week. Now, a lot of this could be bullshit, because gossip at our place can be, and often is a load of horseshit, but apparently the new cleaning manager wants to shake everything up a little, putting his mark on the place so to speak. Acording to my sources, which will remain nameless [I always wanted to say that haha!], he wants to put the bin team and tray wash team on a four week rota, which will essentially mean that my role becomes redundent in the company, as well as Denham’s, Ashley’s and Richard’s…now this doesn’t mean I’d get the sack straight away, because they’d legally have to offer me another position, which would almost certainately be a job on the tables. But if I was to turn this down, then they could legally tell me I’m no longer needed and that’s that, i’m on my way out of the door.

But, there’s more! Apparently, certain individuals [once again, no names mentioned] have been complaining about emptying black bins because they “don’t get paid to empty black bins” as “it’s a bin man’s job”. First off, in EVERYONES meadowhall contract, it clearly states along with out job description, “and any other requirements,” which is esentially a catch all term for making us do what ever the fuck the supervisors tell us to do [within reason of course haha.] Secondly, the reason we get 15p extra [that's right, their bitching about an extra 15p an hour for fuck sake!] is because we have to opperate machinary, shove our hands into bin waste and CLEAN the damn bins too, so for what we have to do, it really doesn’t hurt to empty a fuckin swing bin from time to time does it? I mean, when I see table staff are busy, I help out by emptying a few tables for them, and do I complain that its not in MY job description? Jesus christ some people are just a waste of oxygen, I swear to god!

Anywho, after learning all this on saturday, I was determined that I needed to give my self a kick up the arse for motivation. I’ve been back at meadowhall now for almost 3 years [it'll be three years in June i belive] and if you add that to the year I did the first time I worked for Meadowhall Centre Limited, i’ve done four long years. Ya get away with less for manslaughter these days! I’ve seen people get sucked into meadowhall, people who swore it’d be a part time thing until they decide what they want to do, and BAM before they knew it, their a wage slave for MCL.

So saturday night, I went home and starting putting together my cv. I adapted some templates of good cv’s that i’d found on the net so that i’d at least have a decent format, before starting to write about my self. It’s an incredibly hard thing to do, writing a cv! I mean, it’s hard to decide what to write, and you don’t wanna come accross as though you don’t care or that you love yourself. When i’d finished the cv, I checked out what jobs we’re available on the frenchgate and meadowhall websites. The only job that a) i was qualified for or b) i actually wanted to do was a sales assistant at lush, so I made a cover letter and sealed them up in an envelope and handed them in on sunday.

Anyway, Monday rolls around, and it’s time for Uni. I was up and out of the house on time this week, which is always a bonus haha. This weeks lesson wasn’t actually that bad, we read a short childrens play, sort of half acting it out, then we split up into pairs and discussed how we would stage it, considering lighting, sets, space, costume etc etc. The play was about a flood in a mine, where several children died, so it was important that we got the feel of the piece write. Mysef and Vitas, my partner, decided that we would use lighting as not only a creator of mood and atmosphere, but also in a stylistic fashion, almost turning the lights into a kind of dance. It was quite a usefull exercise actually, because it got us to think about the theatre space and all the posibilities of theatre, something we’re going to have to do when we come to write our own scripts. I’ve not really put as much thought into my idea for theatre as I have into adaptations [my tuesday lesosn] but i’ve started to formulate an idea in my head, which i hope will be fleshed out a little more by next mondays lesson.

Monday night was spent, round at Andrew and Kevin’s just chilling and watching episodes of Family Guy. However, on the bus on the way over to A&K’s, I had a sort of sudden realisation [which sort of ties in with the whole 'making a film' thing too.] I’m never going to be the master of my own destiny while i sit back and wait for things to happen…I need to chase my dreams, go after my desires, and not just sat back and hope that everything will fall into my lap. I’ve got to try and apply this to several aspects of my life, such as my job, my future career and maybe even my love life [maybe a more pro-active approach may benefit me?]

I had a bit of a lie in on tuesday, as I dont have an early start. I jumped in the shower around half 10, leaving for uni about half 11. Popped into the hairdressers on my way to the bus stop to book an appointment for a cut and colour, then caught the bus into town. After the second bus ride from town to High Melton, I had my first proper Adaptations lesson. We read a short story called “A Job For A Silversmith” which told a tale about a man, who was blissfully in love with his wife, but eventually learns that she is having an affair, or at least it suggests that she is. Our task was to then decide how we would adapt the play into a script, and for which medium [screen, stage or radio.] I came up with a sequence of shots that i’d want to use, even though we didn’t actually have to but i’m glad i did, because it turned out, our homework was to start writing the script for an adaptaiton of the story.

Tuesday night is shameless night, and like most tuesday nights, thats pretty much all I did.

Wednesday, I woke up around half 8 and got dressed. I headed downstairs for breakfast, the dashed out of the house at twenty five past nine, hitting the cash point on the way to the hair dressers. 2 hours and change later, i’m walking back home, my hair a lot shorter and my wallet a lot lighter. I doss around the house for a few hours, playing guitar, going on my ps3 and talking on msn, before I have to get ready, and put my ass on a bus to sheffield to meet Zoe. Wednesday was the night we went to the theatre to see a production of The Elephant Man…it was FANTASTIC!

Now, I’ve seen amateur productions before, and some of them we’re rather bloody good, but at the end of the day, they are amatuer productions. This was quite an expensive productions, with sem-pro’s, on a big stage. Now, like most people, all I knew about the elephant man, is that it is based around a man with a hideously disfiguring skin and bone condition. However, within the first 10 minutes, i was already hooked [even though the first couple of minutes worried me, because it felt like the cast we're going to burst into a modern dance piece - thankfully I was wrong!]

The cast were fantastic, especially the man playing Joseph Merrick [the elephant man,] who was exceptional in the role. I do believe it has convinced me to go to the theatre more often, although I understand that this is down to the fact that we saw a good production.

It was also great to spend more time with Zoe, because, well yeah…nuff said really…

Which brings us to today. I got up around 10, taking my laptop downstairs intending to do some writing on the script, but i ended up playing on football manager instead haha. Spent most the day sat downstairs on my laptop, watchig The Hogfather with mi mum n dad, before having tea. Around half 6, mi mum decided that she was gonna go to Meadowhall, so I asked if she minded if I tagged along, because it’d get me out the house. We got there for around quart past 7, parking outside the Upper Atrium. Mum had a wander round Marks and Sparks, then we made our way to Burton but there wasnt much in. We went down the lanes, where I bought some fags from GT and mi mum bought a book on learning to play the banjo [which we're both going to attempt to do, which is good because i've had my banjo for over a year and still can't play it properly.] We then went to next, where I got the transformers t-shirt that I’d seen a few days earlier in Doncaster. After that, we hit marks and spencers again so mum could get a couple of t-shirts, before coming home so that I could watch the second half of the Spurs vs PSV match on tv, which i wish i didn’t bother with, because we lost 1:0.

Anywho, that just about brings me up to now…After all this typing, I think I really should writing in this daily haha, my fingers are killing me!

So, remember…be excellent to each other!

x

SMELL MY CHEESE YOU MOTHER!

Ok, I’m not a weirdo I swear…the name of this ‘blogisode’ or whatever it’s called, is an Alan Partridge quote. It seems the band is becoming quite obsessed with the guy. Still, s’all good, he’s hillarious!

So, what a week it’s been. I was so exausted from the weekends events that I slept a whole 12 hours, completely sleeping through my lessons at uni on Monday. Of course, I didn’t tell the parents that, because I’d have just got a lecture for it haha. I did a little more writing on the old script during the day, before going over to Andrew and Kevin’s monday night. We watched the last couple of episodes of Torchwood, so that I could play catch up [I hate not having all the extra channels like e4, bbc3 etc, I miss out on so much!] Had a good chat with Kevin in the car on the way home. He was a bit amused by my statement that “I don’t understand women.” He told me that my problem is, I’m trying to understand women [as a 'species'] rather than trying to understand woman [as in the person I like.] This, when I thought about it, makes a hell of a lot of sense. I mean, we’re all different right!?

So, maybe where i’ve been going wrong is just that. Maybe I’ve been trying to generalise in my understanding, which just doesn’t work at all. I’m gonna try and understand the person i’m into instead of trying to get my head round the mind of women in general…

Tuesday, i had a one to one tutorial with my tutor at uni to talk about the two scripts I’ve already finished, that are gonna be marked in the next week or so, as well as ideas for my next two pieces. Apparently the top mark for first year is 70, and both of my pieces are high end 60′s [equivolent to an A apparently]. I think my tutor is finally coming round to understanding how I seem to work. I think after reading my first two pieces, he’s got an understanding of what kinda stuff I can do. He likes the idea I have for my adaptations module, but i’ve not really got anything concrete for my theatre module, so he couldnt really comment on that.
Didn’t really do anything on thursday night, just stayed in and watched Shameless, which was a more serious episode tonight, dealing with the issues of alzheimers, but also had a couple of pretty funny sub-plots [little Liam, twocing cars for Shane and Mickey Maguire and Stan and Yvone having a fling.] I love the way Shameless manages to deal with serious issues but still maintain the comedy element that we’ve come to know and love…

Wednesday…the night of the first R*D*A gig since we kicked Kim out of the band and brought in Steve and Jay. We’ve had a total of like, four practices with everyone there due to steve’s shifts and illness and stuff, and with three new songs thrown into the set, one of them that was only written about 2 weeks before the gig, we were expecting the worst. I mean, to say the gig was shoddily organised would be a bit of an understatement. I virtually organised the entire thing, getting all the bands, sorting out who was bringing what, what time for people to show up, time the doors opened, the lot. In the run up to the gig, we had 2 different bands pull out for one reason or another, which didn’t help. The finished line up ended up being Carboard Cutouts [a young conisbrough based band,] Bleed Your Idol [Mexborough based band] and us headlining it.

I was really impressed with Cardboard Cutouts. Their second guitarist fucked them over at the last minute, saying he couldn’t make the gig, and reeling of a list of excuses, none of which were that important, and they still played the gig [even playing a longer set than Bleed Your Idol, who were ALL there.]

Bleed Your Idol annoyed the hell out of me that night. We didn’t have to ask them to play the gig, we could have asked any number of other reasonably local bands to play, but we asked them because they wanted gigs, and what do they do, they turn up, play then fuck off straight after they’ve been on. Now I’m not saying I was pissed off because they didn’t stay to watch my band, that’s irrelevent, I’m pissed off with them because that’s just bad manners! They all mumbled about not being able to stay out too late, but the gig finished at half fucking ten. I mean, 2 members of Cardboard Cutouts stayed even though they knew they would get grounded for doing so!

Anyway, aside from some people being arses, the gig went rather well. We played a mixture of old and new songs, and had quite a laugh doing it. The new stuff seemed to go over pretty well to be honest, and quite a few people told me afterwards that our songs are rather catchy and stuff, so it’s all good.

Thursday did very little, but went out for some much needed alcoholic beverages with Ant, RACHEL [good god, Rachel actually came out drinking with us for like, the first time in forever!] Ashley and Dickie. Was a good laugh actualy. Some good conversation with good company.

Today, Jay came over to work on new material. We wrote an absolutely kick ass song called “If My Girlfriend Was An Animal [She'd be a cheater]“. It’s possibly the best out of the new songs we’re got so far, it’s deff going on the e.p when we get round to recording it!

It was mums birthday today [yep, 29th of February, born on the leapyear day!] so we had a chinese and now, after helping her figure out how to work her new mp3 player that I got her, i’m through at Andrew and Kevin’s, which brinds me right up to now. So there we have it, 4 days of my life compacted into just over a thousand words. I’m gonna shut up now, cos i’m being rather anti-social

Remember, be excellent to each other

x