magictreehouse | Entries tagged with my crap body parts

After the success of Wednesday, James decided to have the day off with me on Thursday so we could head out somewhere. The weather wasn't great so we didn't go out until later but when we did we went to the Royal Armouries. I've not been completely ok with museums ever since I fainted in one in June and think I have anxiety issues related back to that. So we didn't do the whole thing as it wasn't making me feel great. I'm so terrified of fainting in public, I think it has an adverse effect on me. The thing is, I never do, but I do get headahces because of it. It's pissing me off no end. But I will conquer this. Anyway, it's a large museum anyway so doing half of it wasn't such a bad idea. It's a funny place. It still seems very new even though it's about 12 years old now and it's laid out really well. It's not in cronological order though which we weren't sure if we liked. Sometimes it's good to see the development of things across time but this would probably just means a whole floor full of boring armour if they didn that. There are a lot of things vieing for your attention too, probably to keep the kids interested but still, it can be a bit much sometimes. The best bit were the interpretations which we saw two of. They solo pieces based on memoires or real accounts. We saw a Falklands soldier and Anne Boleyn and it really helped to put historical events in context.

After work on Friday we went bowling for Bev Spence's birthday. This was only the second time I'd ever been remember and I now without barriers. In fact, I came third in my lane which I was very pleased with. My arm still aches now which is really some indication of how much I need to work on my guns. It was a full house out I think so it was good to see everyone. I didn't get to chat to half of them though as we had to head off at 8 to the Cockpit (yes, again) as we had another gig to see.

This time it was VV Brown. Out of Alphabeat, Frankmusik and her she was the cheapest so I expected it to be, not more amaturish especially, but perhaps less confident. Not so. She was absolutely stunning, and from the Grace Jones like mask she came on with to the absolutely brilliant big black man of a bassist it was just brilliant. I can't find an ordered set list online but she did the following:

Quick Fix
Game Over
Leave!
Bottles
Crying Blood (acoustic)
Crying Blood (reggae version)
Viva La Vida (Coldplay cover)
Somewhere Over The Rainbow
Back In Time
I Love You
Caroline (new song)
L.O.V.E
Everybody
Travelling Like The Light
Shark In The Water
-------------
Sex On Fire (Kings Of Leon cover)

The covers I could have done without obviously but my favourite was probably the new song, Caroline which was just stunning, it really blew me away. The whole set was brilliant though. She did all the album apart from one track so kerching - value for money too. Everyone seemed really into it all, including myself. So, so good.

We've had a slow weekend. Yesterday evening we went out for a meal though, to Chaophraya, a Thai place not far from us. It was really nice inside. It's a little hidden away but we were surprised to find it quite full when we got there and by the time we left it was bursting! The staff bring you cake and sing to you if it's your birthday. We know this because we heard the same thing three times! Drinking a lovely fruit cocktail, I had a duck stir fry with a fruity sauce. I'm not a spicy fan and some people are funny about fruity stuff with meat but I love it. My duck had a peach sauce and had grapes and apples in it along with peppers and onions. So tasty. I then copped out with coconut ice-cream but James had chilled tapioca with melon ice. Weird but tasty, I suppose it's like cold rice pudding right? James paid which was very nice but really, it's how a Master of Science should be treated right? :p

We've watched a lot of TV stuff over the weekend and I don't often write about. However, over the past few days we've been watching:

Doctor Who (this really shook me up actually and has easily been the best of the specials. Lindsey Duncan is a brilliant actor)
Farscape (Just started, I've been missing Sci-Fi)
Medium
Have I Got News For You
The Thick Of It
Beautiful People (Like Gimme Gimme Gimme it often suggers from a weak script off-set by great performances, but it's set in 1997/8 so I can relate to so much).

Work is hell at the moment, today was just awful. But it's that time of year. What's that you say? Why yes, time to get a new job.

Current Mood: tired
Current Music: Republica - Republica

Well I haven't updated for a bit because I've been ill. Again. This time I managed to catch whatever James had the week before. This may or may not have been swine flu. I seem to have had it in a more concentrated form though. Whereas James had it for over a week I had all the symptoms possible in the space of two days. On Wednesday night I went to bed at 4pm and didn't get out again until 9am the next day having had a permanent headache. Then I had aching muscles, other flu type stuff and then I've been left with a cough that I still had. Rubbish. It meant that my family had to postpone their visit too which was very annoying.

On the Wednesday I went to bed James went to his last LGBT group in Skipton. There was a party and the insanely hyperactive gays from the Bradford group went to as did a few from the Scarborough one. He's not safe to let out alone honestly. As per usual he got a few phone numbers thrust at him (as long as that was the only thing thrust at him). It's shameless! Hilariously one of the Bradford group didn't go because they would have had to have gone straight from work and they didn't want james to see him in his work clothes! Also, Chris who I've met a few times apparently never stops talking about James! Brilliant. I have to say that although I never ever consider myself not good enough for James but when he came home and was telling me about gays fawning over him I did wonder why such a hot guy was with me instead. In my defense though, I wasn't at my best what with me being at death's door. I am very lucky though. I think James is a bit glad of the group finishing. He won't have to travel to Skipton anymore and there aren't always a lot of people there. It's a shame though, he's met some nice people through it.

On Monday my brother came to visit. We had a nice time. On Tuesday we both went to the Eurogamer Expo event at Clarance dock which had loads of games that are coming out for Xmas and talks and stuff on. Most of the games were playable and we got to try out some good stuff. I really want to be able to play the Uncharted games! Boo to that. The new one look stunning. I was talking about motion capture with james today and he said how it doesn't work for film but that game is a perfect example of where it does work. Mario Brothers for the Wii was also great, so much fun. We went to one of the talks - the one for Brink. It was mostly just a demo but the lead games designer was giving the talk and it was interesting to hear what went into the making of a game. It's crazy, there are so many people working on a game, it's just like a film.

To be honest, a lot of the stuff isn't that interesting to me. A lot of same-y FPS games and racing stuff which concentrate on realism as opposed to actual innovation. It especially showed in the over-18 sections that they had. the games there were the most boring! i do wonder if, while the technology of gaming increases, the rest of the gaming industry stays still. Storytelling certainly isn't getting better, nor is script writing. The only place that this is really pushed is in RPGs, especially Japanese games like Final Fantasy. It's for this reaosn that a lot of games just leave me behind. Don't get me wrong, I like playing games but I have to supplement some of my gaming needs with retro gaming, no bad thing. Anyway, moaning aside it was a good day and the tickets were only £6 each. They had a tonne of games there on two sites as well. I've never seen Clarance Dock so busy! jonather had a good day overall too and it was nice to see him.

We watched a few things over the past few days. 'Cockles and Muscles' was a French film which was funny. Apparently it got mixed reviews when it came out but I really enjoyed it, but then I like a lot of French films. I liked it's take of sexuality and humour and classic misunderstandings, a good film. We watched Abigail's Party last night. We've been meaning to watch it for ages after hearing so much about it, and it was very good. Very play like, but then it was a play. But it was all so subtley done and very funny. I really enjoyed it. The ending takes you by surprise though, and I do want to know what happens to Abigail!

I finished reading my QI book about animals. It was very interesting, obviously. I learnt a fair bit actually. I'm not sure what to read next although I have a few magazines and bits to catch up on so maybe I'll do that for a bit.

Today James booked the day off and we went for an unplanned visit to York. York really is lovely in the autumn and it's been ages since we went there. We had a potter around the shops and had our dinner by the river. It was surprisingly busy. I don't even think it was because it was half term, it was probably just because it was York. I bought a jumper from H+M and BBC Wildlife magazine and it comes with the photographer of the year photos which I always love. I don't think I bought much else!

Tonight we carved out a pumpkin. I'm very pleased with him, he's very cute. We haven't thought of a name for him yet though. I'll put a picture up when I load them on here. He's on the balcony and looks in when we have the blinds up, bless him. I actually really like Hallowe'en. Mostly because of the colours though, all dark blues and oranges, my favourite. I love autumn.

I have to mention how good the new Annie album is! I've waited for it for 18 months and it's finally out! A miracle. It's really good though. There's a bit more to it than Anniemal I think, and it's all fun pop stuff done extremely well. I seem to be the only person who likes the Breakfast Song :(

Music

Current Mood: cheerful

I keep going back to Facebook to look at people I went to school with. I've done it before of course but I'm becoming a bit obsessed by it at the moment. I'm just fascinated by what that look like. My old colleague Liz used to go to a lot of her school reunions (she's twenty years older than me) and she always said that 'people turn out exactly like you think they will' and I agree. That rough-looking, ginger bully who pick on you at school? Well, he's still a rough-looking ginger (and I assume) bully too. An amazing number of people have never left Crewe either which probably explains why I'm not in contact with them any more really. There are also a fair number of people who are either married or have kids, like loads of them! I guess at 25 that's not as weird as it could be but to me and my life, it's all very strange. It all just feels so distant from me. I'm loath to say that I transcended to be middle class because that would be twattish but I guess as a liberal person who went to Uni I'm bound to have picked up some middle class elements. It's just, the things I do, the life I lead, I could never go back and live and Crewe and just be me. I'd go mad. I used to make my old colleague Stella laugh when I said that Crewe people all have the same look on their face - that slightly grimacing, face-like-a-smacked-arse face. I dunno why I'm writing all this down. It just feels like I've come so far in a way, and I should be quite proud of it, because nearly all of the people I went to school with, including my old friends were, well, let's just say that I'm better off for no longer knowing them. I may not have many (any?) close friends but I do have friends and get out and about because of them.

I guess the main thing that's been going on of late is part 112 of my body being crap. The funny turns have continued and I had my third one on Saturday, in the cinema of all places! It's getting ridiculous. We went to see The Hangover and thankfully I managed to make it through. I'm not really into films like that but it was really funny, I did enjoy it, albeit not as much as I would have done had I not been scared of passing out. I was fine when I got out into the fresh air though.

I've felt a bit rubbish about not being well this weekend as we had a busy one, and I hate having to concentrate on not having an attack instead of not being myself. I was a bit worried that Julia and Amy thought me miserable/anti-social when this really isn't the case. Anyway, I went to the doctors on Monday in a desperate bid to find out what's wrong with me and despite waiting for an hour, and me stressing to the doctor that I have NOT been having panic attacks and that what I feel is like a panic attack except I have illness rather than anxiety, seemed to think that there was nothing to worry about. He said that I've got to learn to control the attacks when they happen because the deep breathing is causing the pins and needles, subsequent dizziness and loss of appetite. That I can accept but you're not slightly dizzy for days after a panic attack are you? I've always been sympathetic to mental health sufferers who struggle to describe their condition but on Monday I totally got it. I couldn't say that 'it hurts here' or 'I have a cut here' so what I was being told by the doctor really wasn't really satisfying me. Yesterday I had this awful pressure in my neck which moved up into my head in the evening though. It was weird as it didn't hurt.

I do think that this is the key to it all though. Neural problems are in my family although it's nothing diagnosable. My great Auntie had back problems, not aching ones, but trouble bending, those kind of problems. My Mum has a slight tick in head/neck and all three of us had/have awful eyesight. My uncle also has awful nerves. So while there's no pattern as such, I can totally see why I would have problems of this nature. I guess I'll just have to deal with it unless I have another attack happens or something else does. The doctor did say that if it does happen again then they can run simple tests. Better than nowt I guess. It just worries me really as I'm only 25 and should be perfectly healthy. The irony though? I've been exercising more lately in order to get fitter! But I've had to stop for a bit as I' terrified I'll kill myself!

Anyway, that was a bit lengthy and boring so on to better things. We had James' sister Julia come to stay over the weekend as we'd managed to get her a ticket for Party In The Park on Sunday. So on Saturday we went to Bella Italia and then the cinema and then the three of us plus Amy went to the Party In The Park. Getting there was a bit of a nightmare as we went to get the free bus, only to find that the queu was literally streets long. So we gave up and Amy drove us! Traffic was obviously bad but we got there eventually. After 2 though so we missed the start. It wasn't like a normal festival thing where the bigger acts are higher up the bill. It was all over the place, and there were acts we didn't know about. So annoyingly we missed Sophie-Ellis Bextor who I really wanted to see, I do love her so. We got there just as VV Brown was on which was a nice surprise as I really like her album at the moment. Sadly though, she only did 'Shark In The Water' and left before we could even sit down! The stage area was great though. It was in a dip so you got a great view wherever you sat. So the acts we did see were in order:

Blazing Squad - Yes, you read that right. We were not expecting this for obvious reasons. Still, they didn't win me over and Kenzie's strange muscular body does not fit his head. Just wrong.
Frankmusik - Very good! I can't make my mind up if I'm a fan yet but live he was very good. He did 'Better Off As Two' and 'Confusion Girl'
IronikI - Alright. Tonnes better when he was doing 'Tiny Dancer' though!
Girls Can't Catch - We saw these as support for The Saturdays and didn't like them. They've got better though.
Taio Cruz - i can't remember anything about him! Not really my thing :s
Little Boots - Amazing! She did 'Stuck On Repeat', ' Remedy' and 'New In Town' which are probably my three favourites. Very glad to have seen her as her album is one of my favourites at the moment.
Alesha Dixon - I like Alesha, who doesn't? Her album is good, I like it. However, I was not prepared for how awesome she really was. The woman is a force of nature and she deserves to be a proper star...just not when she's booting Arlene Philips off Strictly Come Dancing obviously. She did 'Let's Get Excited', 'Breathe Slow' and 'The Boy Does Nothing'. Just, amazing.
Beverley Knight - Ms Knight is one of these people (like Alicia Keys) whose songs never quite match the fact that they have stunning vocals. However, she did 'Keep This Fire Burning' which as a Robyn cover I obviously love. Shame she did 'Shoulda Woulda Coulda' though as 'Come As You Are' would have been much more appreciated.
Agnes - What will she sing other than 'Release Me'? we asked. Will she do 'Release Me' the remix?! And then 'Release Me' the acoustic version to round it off? No. She did 'Release Me' and pissed off. Bye Agnes!
Preston - Worryingly, I like his solo song. However, he was very grumpy, did his song and then disappeared again.
Tinchy Stryder - Again not my thing but he was brilliant! I dont know his stuff apart from 'Number 1' but it was really good!
N-Dubz - Started with 'Number 1' obviously and then got the biggest set. They got five songs! And they were bloody awful.
Pixie Lott - Oh fuck off.
JLS - JLS were being billed as the big draw it seemed. Optimistic I thought. However, loads of people left after their set. Idiots! They were terrible though. They mimed 'Umbrella' and then mimed their rubbish-with-whiff-of-the-90s new single 'Beat Again'. In a music world which has moved on from the miming shite pop acts of the 90s, where Britney gets lynched for miming, and which has seen Girls bands move into the 21st century, JLS managed to make us feel like it is still 1997 when pop was awful and boynads flashed six packs in order to shift units. Die.
Calvin Harris - I'm not realy a fan but he was good. Obviously better when the followup joined him on-stage:
Dizzee Rascal - The man came on to a changed version of 'That's Not My Name' which included lyrics such as 'they call me rudeboy' and 'they say the N-word like it's ok'. He did 'Dance Wiv Me'. The man is amazing. Ended with 'Bonkers', I came in my pants.

So a good day all in all. Getting back was not fun. Getting out of the car park was just awful and it took us two hours to get home. Still, we had a laugh, even if the weather was terrible. I still can't believe they do it for free though. I'd have paid a fiver to go and I'm sure others would have done too.

James was in London yesterday as it was the national staff awards and he was nominated. He got the runner-up prize for his catagory and got £100! I'm very proud, especially as he was the only person to be a solo person rather than a team nomination in his catagory. He deserves it though, he's doing amazingly well at work. He's getting a bigger pay rise than anyone on his team because he's so good and his boss keeps saying that if their place stays open then they will definitely move him up. Shame the future is uncertain with it though. For some reason it's only recently that I've realised that James is one of these annoying people that are good at everything. I think it's ever since I went bowling with him that it dawned on me. He's even good at sporting events! He's good at being pretty too! Amy calls him WikiJames because he knows lots. Makes you sick doesn't it? (NB: he is mine!)

Oh, while James was in London he went to see the fourth plinth. It's no secret that I love it and I was very jealous. Turned out that yesterday was a great day for nutjobs too. Anyway, he rang me at work and looked at the live stream and I could see him waving! Amazing! Also on the plinth yesterday - an amazing gay man that dressed up in drag complete with feathers, then dressed as the Angel of the North and then got stark bollock naked. Great. Also of note - a woman who brought four other wman along with her and did a performance piece where they pretended to be pigeons. Nuts.

We watched Dorian Blues the other day which was quite a good, gay, TV film. It felt quite real in a way and while it was funny it was also quite serious. A nice portrayal of leaving home, coming to terms with your sexuality, and fatherly relations, especially from a US point of view.

Current Mood: okay

Well I haven't updated because I've been ill - again. I had a total relapse on Tuesday of what happened on the train two weeks ago and it's been worse as I've felt generally crap and achey. It's been difficult to describe and although I don't feel 100% still, I do feel tonnes better than I have been. Oh, it's not been swine flu. That's reared its ugly head at work though as Debbie has it. Because she was always going to get it, she's just that type of person. Anything that she can have to get her some attention, it's hers. Plus she emailed our Head of Estates to tell him so he'd impliment our 'pandemic plans'. Thankfully he knew what an attention seeking mental case she is and has proceded with caution. God I'd better get this job at York Uni. Another reason I need to move on is the tweaked structure. People are starting to jump ship what with it being the end of the academic year, so I could end up with a horrendous line manager. Still, things have softened a little today as we're being given our 5% pay rise next month, the one that was promised us earlier in the year before the money had been pissed away.

I had to make myself better for today anyway as my work team went out to lunch at Little Tokyo, my favourite restaurant. Much fun, although my appetite isn't fully back, which is a shame. Still, I do feel better for going somewhere, the last three days have basically involved me at home, not doing a lot. I have realised though, that I haven't written about the books I've read recently. Actually, I've only read two. I read Alan Carr's autobiography which was great. Nothing revolutionary but it's fascinating reading about how comedians make it. Especially learning how much comedians have to pay to perform at the Edinburgh Festival! As ever with Alan there were two or three bits that had me in stitches. The best one being the 'phantom shitter' who worked at the call centre. Imagine working with someone who left massive shits in the corridors! Awful. The other book I've read is Christopher Rice's 'Density of Souls'. I do love fiction with a good gay character in it. The back describes as a mix between Donna Tartt and Stephen King which is spot on, especially on account of the large cast of well rounded characters. There's a slightly odd twist at the end though which I'm not sure was necessary. I didn enjoy it though. I'm now reading 'And We Came To The End' which is set in an office. I expected it to be like Dilbert but it's a tiny bit more serious than that. It's very funny though so far. I'm determined to read more, I might take a few books on holiday with me to really get into it.

Game-wise, I've just finished Broken Sword for the DS which was excellent, even if I did miss the voices. I spoke to my sister before I played it the other week and she couldn't believe I had trouble with the goat bit in the original. She'd only played it on the DS. Well, no wonder she didn't believe it, they've changed it make it easier! And I'm sure they've changed some other bits as well. Nico's side-mission is a welcome addition though. I've finished the special edition of Monkey Island as well whcih was ace. I wish I didn't know it as well though, I'm far too familiar with it for it to have the same puzzly, wow factor it did when I'd only played it once or twice. Hearing the characters talk is great though I have to say and it's still very funny. i wish they produced more point and click adventures. Still, I'm happy to play the old ones for now. Also on the Xbox360 I've finished Beautiful Katamari which is wonderfully bonkers, now I'm on to Mass Effect which is turning out to be very deep, but very interesting. It's like playing a massive book!

I got VV Brown and Florance and the Machine's albums the other day and both are very good in different ways. James did make a comment about how everyone around is a solo female but I don't care as they're all pretty good, and they're not all the same I think. Tis Party In The Park on Sunday and it turns out that they've added to the line-up so it looks like this:

Sugababes
Dizzee Rascal
Sophie Ellis-Bextor
Alesha Dixon
Beverley Knight
N-Dubz
JLS
Booty Luv
Little Boots
Pixie Lott
Tinchy Strider
Ironik
Agnes
Girls Can't Catch
Raygun
Steve Appleton
Dolly Rockers

Actually, that's quite a lot when I look at it. The show is only four hours so I'm guessing it'll be one song each which is a shame! All the ones I want to see are a little high up though so they might get a few songs. Mind you, I'll be pissed by the time Pixie Lott comes on, alcohol is the only thing that'll get me through that woman! I can't complain though, it is free after all.

The only other thing I've done of note is watch Wall:E on DVD. I do love it so, although something in the back of my mind wishes that the humans in it could be 'real' people, especially because the first half an hour looks so stunning without them. Oh, on the DVD is the story of Pixar which is well worth it as it's a 90 minute long documentary, very interesting.

Current Mood: ditzy

I go home for my dinner nowadays and the way back out I bumped into our new neighbours. They seem very lovely even though I have deduced this from saying hello to each of them as they walked past my door. Mind you, I've also deduced that the male half of the couple is quite a tasty piece, also from the same hello. Sadly my mind has gone wandering and I keep thinking that our flats are going to be like 'Friends'. This is probably an indication that I would make quite a good stalker really. Still, it would be quite nice if we could make friends with the people opposite. I'm determined to make an effort though, even though I'm rubbish at this sort of thing.

Plinth update - Charlie Brooker has called the fourth plinth 'Big Brother for Guardian readers' but I remain undeterred! Highlights so far include a man dressed as a gorilla, a man giving first aid lessons, a woman doing topiary, and a woman making a bread sculpture! It also turns out that all of my ideas have now been done. Dress as a pigeon and strut up and down - done. Balloon animals - done. Bubbles - done. Paper airplanes - done. Hitting tennis balls off the plinth - being done as I type this! My only other idea was to get stark bollock naked and I have a feeling that by week ten that might be the only original idea left. There have been some nice charity ones. There was even a woman promoting her library! It wasn't very inventive though :(

That reminds me, I've found a job to apply for, it's quite actually because it's a library assistant at York Uni but it's the other side as it were. It's more about cataloguing and logging books rather than shelving so it would expand areas I don't know about and allow me to put my MSc skills into practice. there's travel costs and time sure, but I'm, desperate quite frankly and this is too good to miss. I also suit the job spec so I'll be applying for that tomorrow I think. James has recently applied for a job too so hopefully the next few months will involve us both getting brilliant jobs! We can but dream.

You can tell that I don't have much to say can't you? This week has been pretty slow all told. Oh, we booked our holiday! That's exciting. We're going to Mayrhofen in Austria which seems like a lovely alpine town. You get a free walking guide book when you go so we'll be doing plenty of that. I'd really like to walk the two hours to the Italian alps, that'd be good. We'll be going up the mountain in a cable car at least. We've also got our eye on taking day trips to Munich and Innsbruck. All very exciting. I love exploring new places. It's not until the very end of August though which is ages away. I'm off the week before though.

Other news is that I went to the opticians last week. As usual my eyes have got worse so I bought a new pair of glasses, they're a little different from usual and I'm quite pleased with them. However, the woman who did the fitting was unintentionally terrible:

"Your eyes are quite bad, they're an (insert dire number here)". Yes, I'm aware that my eyes are fucked, they're really really bad, please stop making me feel bad about it.

"Your lenses will be quite thick and we can thin them for an extra charge. The £60 option is the one that contact lens wearers usually go for and it'll mean that non-one will know any different" So what you're saying is that I should be ashamed of my poor eyesight and embarassed to let anyone know that my eyes are in need of transplantation? Cheers.

So I left feeling like I should be ashamed of something I have no control over and conned out of £115. I hope that I feel better tomorrow when I go to pick them up. I'm pleased that I've picked something different. James was making me try on 'Gok Wan recommends' range but anything that isn't quite plain makes me look like a drag queen. I hate my eyes. I'm quite happy with my body in general but I hate my eyes and I hate my hair. I've always hated going to the hairdressers but always quite liked the opticians on account of the interesting tests. Now I can look forward to some pointed comment about having embarassing eyesight and being milked dry over something I can't help. If any of you have good eyesight don't take it for granted!

The rest of the week has involved Megadrive games, Broken Sword on the DS and watching telly. Oh, and we made flapjacks last night. OMNOMNOM! Tis all good.

Current Mood: bored

Apparently I haven't updated in a week. I have a feeling that my entries will now become a little more frequent as a new web filtering system has come into effect at work and the onyl website I can not get onto is the Popjustice forums. They were the only thing getting me through the day! God forbid that I should actually do some proper work. Things are desperate people, and there are no jobs out there *weeps* and that library job I applied for has come to nothing even though I had all of the essential and desirable criteria *double weeps*.

It isn't all bad though. Last Thursday I headed to Uni to return some library. Because things are never easy with Leeds Met it turned out that my library account had been stopped as my course end date was down as June. It was a blessing in disguise though as in talking to the admin lady in the postgrad offices I not only got my final result, but I was also told that there would be no November graduation. So I won't be graduating until next July! Very weird as I'm sure I'll have forgotten about the whole thing by then. Anyway, my final mark was for a management essay - 67 which I was very pleased with and leaves me with my total PG Dip marks as follws: 56, 63, 63, 65, 66, 68 so I'm doing pretty well. I can't seem to find out how much my dissertation counts for though. It's odd that I'm at this point, two years down the line. Soon I will be done and dusted and I can forget about it. I'm very pleased with it all though (even though writing down six marks doesn't look like a lot!). It's been difficult studying and working and it's been a long time coming. Now I just need the sodding job to go with it.

On Saturday we had one of our trips out with Bev and Charlotte. We went to the Thackray museum which is all about the history of medicine. It's quite fascinating although a bit grim. So grim in fact that I, errrr, fainted. It was very odd as I'm not usually squeamish. I can watch gore on the TV or at the cinema and I'm fine, but I think that the whole place was a bit unrelenting for me. We got past the gential impliments and we just reached the section called 'pus' and I just couldn't take anymore. It was odd, I've only ever fainted once before but this time I could tell it was coming, and then I was on the floor. I was prepared so I went down quite lightly. Very embarassing, especially in front of Charlotte and Bev. Thankfully Bev knew first aid so she looked after me. Annoyingly it turned out that 'pus' was the last historical horrible bit and we were nearly at the end! The whole thing was forgotten about pretty quickly and it was quiet day in there. Just as well. Honestly, I am useless sometimes.

Apart from that it was a good day. Dinner was nice and we got to play in the kiddie section. Giant board games ahoy! Maybe next time's trip out could be somewhere a little less gory! The weekend was fairly quiet otherwise. I watched bits of the Wimbledon finals. I was rooting for Roddick in the men's although I didn't watch the whole thing as it was long and they were fairly evenly match. Despite that though, I didn't think it was all that exciting so I just kept flicking back to it.

We watched Midnight Run over the weekend as well which was really good. Very funny. They don't do films like that anymore as I do like 80s buddy films. That reminds me, I need to do Lucy's poll! I always feel like the 00s has been a bit of a lull for films. I mean, there have been plenty of good ones, but every film seems to derive from a comic (although there have been plenty of those done well) and comedy has been reduced to the 'Movie' franchise (Scary Movie, Date Movie etc, ad nausum). It just seems like films have got lazier somehow.

I've recently sold a load of DS games on eBay and I sold 6 games for £70! I was very surprised by this and I've been itching to sell other stuff since. I don't really have a lot of stuff to get rid of though, especially not stuff that's worth its value! Still, I've been spending a little of the money on new games. I'm awaiting the Sega Megadrive Collection which I'm very excited about. I dunno, it's 2009 and I'm excited about a bunch of Sonic games from 1991! The thing is, I never had a Megadrive the first time round so I missed out on playing a lot of the famous games from around then and I'm one of these people who enjoys games no matter what their age. Speaking of 1991, next Friday marks the updated release of the orignal Monkey Island. I've been awaiting this for a while and I'm very excited. So yeah for that.

Maybe I shouldn't be so quick to spend my money though as I need it to pay off the package I got this morning. Yes people, my Girls Aloud boxset came! And my God it's good. There's so much stuff on it it'll take me ages to get through it all. And there's a brilliant book which comments on each single. It's amusingly called 'You Can't Mistake Our Anthology' and considering I thought that the Best Of should have been called 'You Can't Mistake Our Discography' I'm very pleased with this. this kind of thing is very novel for me. I'm not a traditional pop fan as such so I've never had the joy of collecting memorabilia really. Still, with the trend of Deluxe Editions I'm benefitting more than most at the moment. And while I'm here - the La Roux album - good but flags towards the end, and not as good as the Little Boots album. So there.

Yes sir, music and computer games, that is my life. Which explains why I'll be watching The Saturdays in Manchester tonight. Finally!

PS - Torchwood was very good last night. They've finally made it good!

Current Mood: bored

Christmas has been mostly good. For most of it we seem to have been watching stuff we've taped, even though there doesn't appear to have been much on TV worth watching. However, on Christmas Eve I did make two white and two red mulled wines and a mincemeat tart which I'm very pleased with. On Christmas Day we opened our presents from each other. I got quite a good haul all told. I got a pirate T-shirt, a cow on a spring, some books, Xtina's Best Of, and lots of other bits of stuff. I was pleased anyway :D James seemed pleased with what I got him too. That High School Musical has seen some action anyway as has Lego Batman on the PS2. At around half 10 we headed to James' family and I opened more presents including some wildlife DVDs off Julia.

Then there was a lot of food! We had a fish salad starter with prawns and salmon, then the usual for Christmas dinner and Christmas pudding for dessert followed by cheese and chocolates. Not surprisingly I was very full at the end of it but it was all very nice and James' Mum did a good job overall. We only stayed until about half 4 when we came home and then watched stuff on TV for the rest of the evening. Oh, and I gave my family a ring too. We watched Wallace and Gromit, The Royal Family and I skipped through Christmas Top of the Pops. Despite me being pleased that they've revived it for Christmas I found it was mostly crap so I sped through it in no time. Girls Aloud were good but they seemed to have missed out some of the more interesting (and obvious) hits of the year. No Pink?

Here's where it starts to go a bit downhill as at half 6 in the morning I woke up with a real bad pain in my abdomen. So bad that James called an ambulance for me! It seems a little surreal thinking about but it was slightly less amusing at the time. It took forever for them to arrive and by the time two paramedics did come into the bedroom the pain had gone. The advised not going to A+E since it had gone so we agreed to just have a quick few tests done so I headed out to the ambulance outside the house. God it was freezing! They tested my blood sugar and blood pressure and all was fine so I went back inside. The pain returned about an hour later but after that went it didn't return, even though there was a little uncomfortableness for quite some time after. I'm back to normal now though. I'm still puzzled as to what it was and it wasn't nice at all. I'm just glad I'm alright now. I did feel a guilty for putting James through this again though, so much so that I burst into tears while we waited for the paramedics. Not good.

On to more pleasant things now. The past few days we've been watching DVDs, including The Muppets Take Manhattan (good stuff!), playing DS and PS2 (Lego Batman obviously), finishing off my latest great Jasper Fford book (The Big Over Easy) and just relaxing really. Today we ventured out to the sales which really just meant picking over Woolworths corpse. The Skipton closes in two days and there isn't much left although I did get 4 CDs and a DVD for £13 which is pretty good all told. It was a little weird though. Some of the shop was condoned off, like a bomb site, and you could even buy the shelves if you wanted. People are quite nostalgically attached to Woolworths and I get why. Crewe never had one so when we went to Nantwich or on holiday to St Ives we always used to go, if not just for the toys. But with Crewe being a good town you could get other things that Woolworths sold elsewhere apart from toys. Now I'm in Skipton though not having a Woolworths will have quite a big effect (not only because our local toy shop closed recently either) and I think that small towns will be worse off by them all closing. For stuff like games, and silly stuff like baking stuff I don't really have much option apart from going to Leeds. And with Zavvi on its way down too I do wonder what will happen to the high street in the near future.

Tomorrow we're off to spend New Year with my family. I've planned nice stuff to get us out and about so it should be good :) Better get on with that review of the year hadn't I?!

Current Mood: chipper
Current Music: Timbaland - Shock Value

Well I am at uni today and yes, I actually made it in. I'm feeling a lot better about the whole thing in general really, especially because I've made connections regarding my first essay thingy. Hey, it's only one day a week after all. I have to say that I'm feeling much better in general as the illness got the better of me. I haven't been in work all week. I shall be in tomorrow though. I'm glad to feel better although I still have a cold. It was a proper nasty cold earlier in the week though. I ached all over and my head felt like it was going to explode, complete with intermittant ear ache. Fun stuff. I don't usually get ill but I have to say that this year I've been more ill than ever. I've had to take three different periods off off work since I started which is terrible for me! Maybe it's this Yorkshire air :s

So as I've been ill there isn't really a lot to update. We're off to see Madame Butterfly tonight which should be good. Oh, and because of the illness I missed my first book group meeting! I'm slightly annoyed but at the same time, I was finding it difficult to think of anything to say about F Scott Fitzgerald's 'Tender Is The Night', not because I didn't enjoy it, I did, it's just that I find it harder to engage with older literature. The next book is Sarah Waters' 'The Night Watch' which I loved so I'll feel better about going to that session.

We've been watching a lot of stuff at the moment and I haven't really mentioned that because I tend to talk about something after the run has finished, also, we're constantly trying to catch up with stuff we've been taping. It's getting worse too because everything seems to be coming back. I think it might be a good idea to have a catch-up session this weekend at some point and get through as much stuff as we can! We've just finished watching the first season of Brothers and Sisters which I enjoyed. There's always a lot to look at when it comes to families and although it took a while to find it's feet it did get really good and venture away from the soppiness it sometimes pushes towards. Good, funny stuff :D Other things we're working our way through:

QI
Have I Got News For You
The Tudors (not sure what I make of this yet)
Rome (Season 2)
Ugly Betty (Season 2 - oh so good)
My Name Is Earl (Season 2 - which is turning out to be funnier than the first one. Love it!)
Heroes
Dragon's Den (what did they do with Richard?!)

Along with other bits of things. Oh, and we're taping Without a Trace for now. I really want to finish off Alias to because I was loving it before TV stuff got in the way!

Anyway, I've waffled enough for now!

Current Mood: recovering
Current Location: Uni

Right, welln I haven't updated for several reasons. The first being that I went ot visit my family at the weekend so on Friday I headed off to jolly Crewe. It was good to see the family again. Nearly everyone in my family has a DS so we end up having crazy tournaments on Mario Kart, and most amusingly, Brain Training. I don't think I've met anyone who can make me laugh like my family, especially Jonathan. It was a shame that the whole weekend felt a bit rushed really but I suppose it's not long until Xmas so I'll see them a lot then. I don't know why it felt like such a rush. I suppose because I was doing a lot.

I went to see both my Grandmas. Nanna Oakes was ok considering. She still has a lot of Nanna Curzon's stuff to sort out and she said herself that she was 'up and down'. She seemed ok though. I thought that she'd only looked after Nanna Curzon for about 7 years but it's actually 10 so no wonder she's finding it difficult to re-adjust. It was good to talk to her though. We ended up talking about gay rights which was slightly bizarre. She even told me she knew I was gay before I came out - I do hate it when people say that, it's utterly embarassing. Nobody tells you how embarassing it is being a gay man sometimes.

I also went to see Nanna Connie. She's a bit fed up really but still herself. It's funny how old she looks now though, it's sad, especially because I know how much she hates being old. It doesn't help that you have to shout everything at her because she's going deaf, which causes much amusement when I'm with my Mum around her. I see a lot of myself in her though, especially the ability to laugh at most things. I'm so thankfully that an ability to laugh at life runs through my whole family, I'm so lucky that way.

Anyway, the trip wasn't as depressing as I make out really, it's just circumstances that made it a bit melancholy. On Saturday night me and my Mum went to the theatre. I hadn't been to the Crewe Lyceum for many many years so it was good to finally go. It was a weird experience. Crewe theatre goers are as you expect really, but hey, we were second row so I can't complain too much. We went to see 'The Business of Murder' which only had three characters in and one of them was played by Todd Carthy. But don't let you put you off. I enjoyed it actually. It was a dark clever plot and the other two characters were good in it. Todd Carthy played himself. I'm not sure my Mum was as keen on this one as some of the others she'd seen.

Hmm, what else. Oh yes, my Mum had been to convention thing for Boots types and she came back with a suitcase full of freebies. It's great. I haven't paid for smelly stuff for years! She said that the convention was amazing and she showed me a picture of her, Doreen and a gay man behind bars with some policemen/stripper types. Honestly, you can't take her anywhere. My Dad and sister went footballing on Saturday and my sister actually won a game. Wonders will never cease.

On Sunday I left at 4 and planned to back by half 7 but because the trains were so shit I actually got home at 9.30pm. That's five and a half hours folks. Now I don't maon about the trains as much as I did because I don't do the Crewe-Skipton route so often now but I think it's awful how we all take the shitness of our trains lying down. It's fucking disgraceful.

In other news, I am ill. I fell a bit silly because it basically boils down to it being a cold but it's not your average one. I had a crappy night's sleep on Sunday night because the cold hadn't fully come out yet so I felt rough and had ear ache too. Now my sinuses hurt and I'm all snotty. Lovely. The idea of getting on a train this morning made me want ot die. Liz says that lots of people are off with it though, including Eleanor, so I'm not being a wuss!

I have spent the day productively finishing the fourth Broken Sword game and listening the the new Roisin Murphy album, very good it is too. I heard Kylie's new song '2 Hearts' last night too for the first time. It's so odd, especially witht the video. It's all a blatant Goldfrapp rip-off though. Speaking of which, they've finished their new album and apparently it's very different to Supernature. I wonder how.

James was making obscene gestures at Deborah Meaden during Dragons' Den last night. That's the last thing I need when I'm ill isn't it? Where is he anyway? He's meant to be coming home from work for dinner. Oh! I forgot to say! The man has got a new job and I'm really pleased for him. He's working for a legal place in Leeds so we'll both be communters now. I'm especially pleased for him because I know how sick he is of his current workplace and this new job sounds like an excellent opportunity.

Current Mood: sick
Current Location: Recovering at Home
Current Music: Roisin Murphy - Overpowered

Is it really been since Wednesday that I last updated?! The shame. I’m getting lazy at this LJ lark. Last Wednesday sparked the beginning of Big Brother! Hurrah I hear you cry! Oh, wait, that would be a cry of pain I hear. I can’t say that I hated as many of them going in as I usually do and I did take heart that the useless, jobless, arrogant ones got a booing from the crowd. However, maybe I’m naïve but I just don’t remember previous years contestants wanting to strive for fame as much as this lot do. It’s really impressive. I made the mistake of watching it again since and I had to endure some tramp banging on about how great it’d be to be a WAG. Yeah, you silly cow, why don’t you kick Emmeline Pankhurst in the face while you’re at it. Honestly, I can’t decide whether the general feminism engrained in our culture is really going backwards or if Big Brother really as just picked a stupid bunch of people. James says he likes watching Big Brother with me because I rant all the way through it, but I don’t like the effect it has on me and would much rather remain oblivious to people stupidity. Must. Not. Get. Sucked. In. Even if Carol break dancing was brilliant.

Right, other stuff then. On Friday, Sarah, my supervisor and so one of the reasons I got the job I did left work. So we had a little party in the staff room which was nice, and later we drank the champagne that both me and Sarah had been given for getting the College through OfSTED. Good times :D I’d been having a general feeling of being rubbish at the end of last week so it was a nice way to end the week. I dunno what it was really. I’ve just been feeling like I’m good at anything I do. There have been some issues with a set of minutes I wrote, when I covered for another member of staff, that have errors in it (I must say that because I was covering for someone else I didn’t really have up-to-date knowledge of the stuff being said. I have little to do with admissions). But, the thing is that nobody’s said anything to me. This kind of make me thinks that it’s something to do with one of the Directors (who checks the minutes first) been put on as the new chair of the Committee and less to do with my uselessness. But still.

I was also feeling pretty crap about theatre. I’m not the best light and sound guy ever, I know that and I was getting on my own nerves about me being rubbish on Thursday. Weirdly though, on Thursday and Friday it was said at work and at theatre how great I was at both so there you go, I’m just being insecure.

I’ll tell you what some of it is to do with though. It’s crazy that I haven’t mentioned this yet, but I’ve been having problems with my eyes. Yes, more so than usual :p Well, actually it’s more to do with my contact lenses which have been being really uncomfortable of late, so much so that I’ve been wearing my glasses to work. Now I rarely wear my glasses outside of the house and they’re a bit old now and the paint is coming off them (most un-buff) so having to wear them out and about has made me feel crap and self-conscience, which probably has something to do with me feeling rubbish last week.

Thankfully Saturday brought an eye test and it’s a coincidence that I was due for one what with the crapness of my eyes. I was actually pretty worried because when I’d take them out after irritating me my eye would be red. Not bloodshot red really, but around the iris. Weird. So I explained my problem to my lovely new optician and he seemed to think that it has something to do with me moving to Skipton, which would make a bit of sense. He said that the Skipton Specsavers is three years old now and he’s been there that long after moving from Preston. Having had no problems in the North West he was surprised to find that in Skipton, contact lens wearers go mad around May/June time and he gets no end of people coming in with problems. He thinks it’s something to do with them cutting something in the fields. Bizarre though! However, he’s put me on a different make of lens and I’m a new man! I’m back to my old self so today I’m feeling confident and much happier in myself.

My prescription has changed to so I got to pick out some new glasses, a big dent on the budget which is never welcome. They have a great range of designer ones there which I was trying on and it’s really upsetting that I look like Damn Edna in EVERY SINGLE PAIR! There were great ones too, in many different styles and colours. It’s perhaps quite good that I was forced to buy some ones similar to my other ones as they were cheaper. I can’t really remember what they look like though as I don’t get to pick up them up until the weekend but they’re nice, dark framed ones. I have a feeling my eyes are worse though, so much so that when the letters that you have to read were reset to the start I was tempted to go – ‘Oh my God! I can see that one!’ at the massive letter ‘E’ that was on the screen. I hate my eyes.

On Saturday, aside form the eye trauma my Mum and my sister came to Skipton which was good as they could give me advice on which glasses to pick! We did nice things like go for dinner at Wetherspoons and the four of us (including James) went on a canal boat ride which was especially good due to the sunny weather. We got to take in fields of mini-sheep, men’s pants drying on a canal boat and a fatty in an ice-cream van. What more could you want? I think the enjoyed the day though and it was nice to just catch up with goings-on. I think my Mum might try and come and see the play when it’s on in a few weeks too.

After we saw the pair of them on to the train, me and James went to the supermarket and picked up some wine and chips and dip for the evening which was spent watching ‘Doctor Who’, ‘Joseph’ and ‘Have I Got News For You?’. I think this season of Doctor Who is the best yet. They just seem to be playing around with the formula a lot more and Martha is much better than Rose as she’s not so useless. As for Joseph, well I have to say that I really want to hit Louis in the face with something hard and I really, really don’t want Lee to win, even if he will. It’s terrible how into it I am :s Moira Stewart was on HIGNFGY, brilliant!

Sunday was good. A much needed day off doing nothing. I couldn’t be bothered to leave the house even though I think that James wanted to but I did productive stuff like hovering, sorting my papers out and putting stuff away. We also watched ‘Pirates of the Caribbean 2: Dead Man’s Chest’ which was a lot better than I thought it’d be. It looked fantastic (including Davy Jones’ crew which were amazing) and the action scenes were both fun and interesting. Plus, a good dark ending too. There was a lot to like about it, even with the over-complicated non-plot. I think me and James are going to see the third one at Skipton’s Ye Olde Cinema tonight.

Current Mood: chipper

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'What do you want? Whadda you want for BREAKFAST?!'
Mostly boring and rambling. I'm sorry!
July - month of pestilence
Ramblings
'Up is where we go from here'
Christmas and all the trimmings
TV or not TV, that is the question
You Know Me Better
Arg and Eye

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The Secret Life of Andrew

Entries tagged with my crap body parts

(no subject)

'What do you want? Whadda you want for BREAKFAST?!'

Mostly boring and rambling. I'm sorry!

July - month of pestilence

Ramblings

'Up is where we go from here'

Christmas and all the trimmings

TV or not TV, that is the question

You Know Me Better

Arg and Eye