November 2010 roundup

Well, this month has certainly been a more constructive one in comparison to last year. You know, 2009 wasn’t really a good year for myself but was 2010 any better? Yes it’s something that should be reserved for the end of the year but I think back and then I think at how quickly time flies and that a whole year comes and goes and finally what exactly is in store for next year.

It’s funny how life turns out the way it does especially the naive and ignorant times you spend in your youth, you never really expect it to turn out exactly like you want it to…unless you’ve achieved your dreams then congratulations there’s still another 999,999 people for every one of you who won’t. Some will have just enough so that not fulfilling their dreams is an acceptable loss, some won’t but ah well.

November is…was a pretty decent month but December is the month that will change everything. Everything.

So no-one told you life was gonna be this waaaaay…

I have to wonder whether it’s nostalgia or something but there are sometimes when you think “Oh the old ones were the best” or something similar along those lines and just the other day I thought that about Friends. Not friends as in chums, mates or buddies but Friends the TV show that’s constantly being played on E4 at every opportunity it gets. Personally I tend to eschew watching Friends if there’s anything else on, in fact I try to avoid watching it if it’s on television full stop, simply for the reasoning that I have probably seen all the episodes already if not at least twice. If I have missed any episodes then my guess would be that it’d be one of the later series but to me it’s not quite the same.

Watching it, I can’t help but notice the charm it has in comparison to the newer series, I thought lines were actually funny and better constructed. The characters were more interesting and it didn’t feel like a blatant comedy show. I don’t know how to describe that last point other than to say that there are times when shows are just simply played for laughs and have no point or purpose to it other than to get “hahahahaha”.

This isn’t exclusive to Friends but it applies to other TV shows and even other forms of media, I do understand why people lament today’s media, criticising everything from tired storylines, lack of originality, dumbed down or whatever have you but you also have to ask maybe it’s because you’re growing up and your perspective of the world changes and so does how you see things like music or films hence why we may believe that a certain time was better than another. Maybe we are just becoming more grumpier in life or maybe we are actually looking deeper than we used to into things. Whatever the reason for it is……

…damn, I had a good closing sentence but it’s just evaporated from my head as quick as it entered.  Plus I was in the zone too. Never mind.

Return to form?

SUCCESS! HURRAH! Finally a date has been given to me for my knee thing and that date is 15th December. It scary to think that after 3 years of this pain in my knee, it is this close to getting fixed, almost feel a bit scared to be excited or even to think about it. Or even to talk about it. Why? Because it’s hope…and the thing about hope is that if you take that away from someone, it hurts more than anything else ever could. Okay maybe that’s a bit of a hyperbole but the thing is, this is something that I want to get to a soon as possible. This is a bridge I want to cross as soon as I can and then and then do I want to reflect on my journey here and the possibilities that await.

Anyway, just reading Lullaby after finishing Invisible Monsters and yeah, while the book [Invisible Monsters] was interesting and full of twists, it probably will not be a favourite of mine.

That’s what’s up girl

Do you know sometimes you’ll mock me and all but do you know what’s difficult? Knowing stuff, understanding stuff, having a high need for cognition, wanting to understand why things work, how things work. Psychology and even a bit of sociology, I am so glad that I studied that. I can’t even tell if I was being a bit sarcastic with that last sentence there but maybe that’s because I don’t know.

You see, what happened today, or rather yesterday well, I don’t want to want to come across all smug and in an “I told you so” manner but I feel sort of justified and that my feelings and things that I thought would happen, well that they did. You see, I do feel that I know what I’m talking about when it comes to some stuff that people just see me as being negative, critical or whatever but if I didn’t feel that that then I would not be saying these things.

I’m not going to say “I told you so” or anything like that and there are times that I really wish people would listen and not just hear me, I mean actually listen to what I’m saying but I guess it’s just the nature of people isn’t it? They all want to open the box and see the cat for themselves.

In regards to you Emily, yes I really did see your point, I did understand, I did know your pain that you weren’t known and how it was affecting you, I wasn’t oblivious to it but you see, when you’re me and you think things out objectively and that you get put in a position where all the options you can take are going to be…messy ones, that no matter what you do the status quo will be affected in some way. When I can see the choices and it makes me feel a bit conflicted inside. This isn’t just in regards to yesterday but in other things that I deny you. I’m really sorry for all of it, sometimes I wish I didn’t have to make the choice but alas.

I hope you can understand a little of why I do certain things and not do others, perhaps you might feel I could go about it better or something, in a different way, but every single time I struggle which the choice of the best option to take, I try and do for the greater good sometimes.

Today is just a day in my journey

It really is overwhelming for me looking up courses to enrol on. As part of my quest for world domination, I need to start of small and do something in the meanwhile or at least until next year but I am just so overload with stuff that I feel caught in headlights. Plus there’s the fact that I don’t really know how to look them up but I’ll persist anyway.

After that talk from the Career Guidance thing, I thought doing a computer based course or something would be a good thing to do, you know, upgrade qualifications and all that but AHHHHHHHHH! Where do I go? Okay so I tried to do it the other way then, I’d look at a college and then see what course they had to offer but that wasn’t really much help, I’ll need to search a bit more in a second but AHHHHHH!

I also have to do a bit more thinking about stuff between me and Emily, I wrote some stuff, like my thoughts and all which will go up tomorrow but I still need to think some more about solutions or something, just something.

Finally I also need to sign in tomorrow at the Jobcentre and I got to thinking, did I need to apply for all the jobs now or what? I never really expected my life to go this way but do you know what’s in my very head at the moment? Journeys. Yeah, let me explain. In my head I have this picture of me still updating these entries and I’m talking about years and years from now, like when I’m disgustingly filthy rich and see the journey I’ve taken. Hopefully it’ll be one of improvement in whatever it is but it’ll be good for me to see how I’ve changed and the struggles and trials I’ve had to endure to getting there because I am going to be rich. Oh yes I am, that is a fact, I’m determined to get it, no matter the cost. If I can live the good life, never will I have to worry about certain things ever again.

See you on the other side.

My Album Choices

Albums. They can be so many things, whether it’s just a collection of songs put together by the artist, whether it,s a story trying to be told or whatever, album fulfil so many uses.

Nowadays with the ease that you can pull apart an album, sometimes a whole album isn’t really listened to. There are songs where sure it’s not good and to your own tastes it’s pretty poor and as an individual song it’s not up to much but what it does have is that it fits in with the rest of the album which can boost my liking of a song for me. I like to think of an album as a journey and that I allow the songs on it take me on that journey, a good album for me is one that takes me there successfully while I’ve heard albums that have good songs, as a whole it’s meh.

Anyway I got to thinking about albums and despite my never having favourites in anything really I attempted with a top albums I like, I wanted to really think about it, really listen to it and decide what were in fact my most loved albums and not what the critics and the fanbase deemed the best albums. Never really understood how you can do that really as people will have different experiences in life which meant they would look at an album in a different perspective to another but anyway here goes.

Outkast- Stankonia

This is actually the last physical copy of an album I have ever brought…ever. Even when it was preferred that I downloaded my music so it could go on my iPod I still brought this album. I remember the scene so well, I had gone in HMV in Newbury and I had a five pound note in my pocket and wasn’t really planning on buying anything, I was just browsing through really and this caught my eye and I thought, “Why not?”. I am so glad I made that decision.

There is not a single song I hate on this album, all the songs with the exception of We Luv Deez Hoes have a 4 star or more and it would be a 4 and half star if I could do that but I can’t. It actually has the most 5 star songs (9) on the album than any other album I have, they all have a sufficient number of plays on it and I just love it to bits.

My favourite in terms of play count is Toilet Tisha but as I looked at that I thought wait…this doesn’t actually count the amount of times I listened to B.O.B on the CD’s, previous iPods and video games it featured in but that really would be another of my favourites on this album if not all time favourite song.

The whole album is just simply amazing, whether it’s the duo going back and forth on Spaghetti Junction, members of the Goodie Mobb also getting in on the action on Gangster Shit or whether it’s the final song Stankonia (Stank Love), this is just an amazing album to listen to and one I will never ever get bored of listening to at all.

To You

Hmm…hmm. How do I feel?

How can I best express what it is that I’m feeling?

How can I get points out of my head? Things that stick with me but I have no words to describe it. Just the emotions.

Where do I even begin? How do I even begin to structure this?

You see, the thing is the past few weeks we’ve been arguing more and more.Things have just gotten less and less pleasant between us. Why?

My song choices

Yes yes, I’m years late to the party but every once in a while I will listen to a song and it will just grab me and I love it, this happens a lot of the times for all sorts of different reason which I probably explained in one of my earlier posts but anyway Between Me, You & Liberation by Common featuring Cee-Lo Green is a song that a few days ago I rated it five stars on my iPod and there it’ll stay. I guess for the first time I had the chance to really listen to the song and I mean really listen to it and you know what I love it. In the song he talks about sexual abuse, losing someone to cancer and his own homophobia and it’s an incredibly deep song which is always refreshing for me to listen to.

Thoughts of mine

Yesterday was an eventful day for me, it started off full of promise really then went spiralling of into despair…maybe that was a bit too far but anyway I started with some phone calls to make, of course one being to the Royal Free hospital to see if they’ll DO SOMETHING ABOUT MY FRICKING KNEE! But alas, they’ve yet to look at my case and they’ll call me back as soon as they do. Oh goody(!) Asides that, I have sorted out an interview to sort out my jobseekers which means I can get a bit more professional help with looking for a job and have a bit of income coming in which no doubt will help me fund my addiction to cocaine and alcohol. No I’m kidding I do not have an addiction to them but it would be nice to have a bit of extra income coming in while I’m also searching for jobs.

Slip ups

And so a weekend comes and goes with Arsenal squandering a two-nil lead at home no less which was really disappointing. I suppose the defeat means the Premier League is more open especially with Chelsea also losing and the top positioned teams only being a few points away from each other but the thing is, for me it’s only exciting if this was in February or something. I personally would rather not a Man United or a Chelsea title (again) and would at least like to see Arsenal win the thing and if not Arsenal then someone else, I wouldn’t even mind seeing Tottenham win it if only for a bit of variety.

The thing is I wasn’t even that they lost to their rivals that makes it so disappointing it was just the fact that the never seem to take advantage of slip ups of their rivals and during the latter end of the season they are usually trailing the leaders and just fizzle out and have a pretty underwhelming end to the season.

Anyway the winter schedule now so this will be an important test for them to see if they can complete and be genuine title challengers. Manchester City I am hoping finishes in a Champions League spot, again for a bit of variety in the top of the table and Champions League spots. The problem with the league is that for the majority of the times it is quite predictable, sure things may change a bit but you can sort of tell exactly who is going to finish where at the end of the season.

As for my life, this week I’m hoping things swing in my direction and that fate blows me a favour or something. I could do with a little boost especially in the winter where I feel that times are going to be hard ahead.

Delays and some more delays

A major setback to my return to sport occurred yesterday. Frustrated with the lack of information regarding my status on the waiting list for keyhole surgery on my knee I called up the Royal Free Hospital in order to gain more information and for my efforts I was rewarded with the information that I hadn’t even been put on the waiting list yet. So the last few months, complete waste, an absolute complete waste. I should have been on it since August 16th but nope, I have not so now they’ll call me back after looking at my details to see what is going to be done but I don’t really have that much faith that they’ll even call me back to be honest, either way I’ll leave it until Monday to do something about it.

Speaking of which, was it my fault? Should I have checked or something? Maybe I shouldn’t of had that much faith it the system because at the end of the day the system is massive let-down. But what could I do? I was told after seeing a doctor about it that they’ll add me onto it and I should hear from them within that timeframe. I even gave them a week or two just in case it was delayed or something but enough was enough and this quite frankly was a kick in the balls.

I had hoped to be back in football around December, January at the very latest but it seems I might have to start all over again with the waiting and even then I don’t really have a clue when I can be back and what sucks the most about it is that, it’s the only thing I can really do, the thing that I enjoy and without that…I don’t know. I even put on weight, I attribute that to lack of football and even then if I wasn’t doing football I would just go for a morning run most days to keep in shape but I can even do that because the pressure it puts on my knee so I’d like to thank the NHS really but I don’t want to be too critical especially in matters where I might not have the full story but this has sort of been hell. I miss football. I miss having a football at my feet. I miss going to training to work on becoming a better player. I miss getting up 9-10 in the morning on a cold and windy Saturday in order to travel on trains and buses in order to play a game of football. I miss coming back home all sweaty and tired but satisfied because no matter what match it was I tried hard and felt it was worth it. I miss thinking about the match I had and thinking on what I could have done better and everything. I miss having that routine.

I can’t help but think things actively conspire against me at times but I hope things resolve for the better for me soon. I don’t want to fall that far from grace just yet.

It's all about the presents

Christmas. The time of sharing and togethern- blah blah blah. Now, presents, the question that is sometimes asked is 'What do you get the man who has everything?' Good question and sometimes I can really feel like that person. No, not because I have everything but because well, I can convince myself that I don't really need whatever if someone were to ask me what do I want as a present. I would like a lot of things that I see in shops really, I've seen new games and thought I wouldn't mind that and then while I'm thinking that I immediately convince myself that I don't need it. It's worked well for me throughout the years really especially when it came to games consoles, I got my PS2 late as I convinced myself I didn't need it and then got a Gamecube as it was much cheaper at the time and had many a good time with that. Then the PS2 got really cheap and that's when I decided to get in on it and it saved me a lot of money, plus I didn't really miss out on the games on the PS2 as I simply just played on Lee's one. Come the next generation and I did exactly the same thing with the Wii and I was originally going to purchase a Playstation but I decided to get a 360 and it was worth it. Right after I was doing with the Wii (still have it though).

Anyway, not just games consoles but with things such as mobile phones, I do not need to upgrade my phone every month even if there's a 'better' version of it or whatever, nor am I in need of the latest must have phone like the iPhone or whatnot, I'm happy with the phone that I have and will be for a long long time, the only reason I got it was because my previous Nokia phone was actually just unusable so a new phone was needed.

So when I'm asked what do I want for Christmas? Seriously, I could list about a million things I'd want and be interested in...whether I need it though is a different matter.

It doesn't help matters that if I do have to choose, I find it very hard to pick one above another, one that I want more than the others, no favourites and all that and then no doubt I'll end up disappointed, but not because of the gift but because I'll spend my time thinking 'should I have chosen something else instead?'

So when Emily asks me what do I want for Christmas, I really many ideas and have no ideas at the same time. Ohh what to choose, what to choooooose?

Decision time...

Tried it, tried it, tried it, haven’t tried, want to try, tried it, tried it, will try it next week, tried it

Variety is the spice of life right? I certainly think so, I think this world has many things to offer, so many challenges that trying out everything becomes a challenge in itself. I suppose it does depend on the person but for me personally in some areas I need to try a lot of things and the after a while the same things over and over will bore me or I’ll get frustrated with the lack of variety.

The things I know this applies to me involve music as I currently have over 8000 songs on my iPod and I like it like that as I will always find music to suit my mood whatever it is. Some people don’t have a lot of songs but I could never do that, I mean, I understand why some might not have loads and loads as if you just have the songs you really like then it makes sense in some way and that there’s no point in having songs you don’t like on it but me…I like all the songs or I should say most of the songs on it and the ones I truly dislike I just get rid but all in all I’m happy with the collection of songs I have on my iPod as I like to listen to a lot of different songs and genres.

Films, of course I try to watch as many different films as possible as each one is a different story and it usually takes me a long while before I can watch the same story again, usually when I’ve forgotten about it or something. On my Lovefilm account I have over 300 titles queued up which I don’t think it’s that much but considering that I’m only allowed 2 a month I end up adding to the list faster than it goes down. I must remember to upgrade my package for these winter nights as such seeing as it’ll be darker earlier (should have done this a while ago to be honest) so that I get unlimited discs an all as there’s nothing like settling down to watch a film while the coldness blows outside.

Food, despite what some people who know me may think I don’t actually have a favourite food and that something you see me eat a lot of at one point could simply just be my craving for that month, it’ll be something else another month.

I also like the fact that there are a lot of foods that I like so I can try a fair amount of things and won’t really be that fussy when it comes down to it.

I’m sure there are other things that I’ve forgotten to mention but really what I’m trying to say is that this is why I like the fact that I have such an eclectic taste as it just means I get to experience more things, of course there is a downside to it all but that’s for another day…or have I already moaned about that already? Ah well, it’s all gooood.

The Facial Bookcase

Watched The Social Network with Emily and Megan in the cinemas the other day and I found it to be quite an enjoyable film and one I’m glad I watched. Okay yes maybe when I first heard that they were making a film about Facebook, I couldn’t help but laugh and wonder exactly how it would turn out but I’m glad that it turned out to be a good film to watch even if they took some liberties with the truth in how it started and everything but hey, you’ve got to entertain haven’t you.

I definitely prefer the albums with a lot more songs on them...depends really

Wow, music is changing and it reflects the times as well. I've noticed it especially recently though it has been happening for a while but albums are just getting shorter and shorter. There are many reasons for this and many that have been heard before so I'm probably not exactly going to contribute any new ideas to this but here goes anyway.

The MP3 format and the fact we can now pick and choose what songs we want and then discard the rest in the metaphorical digital bin from places like iTunes and that that I guess it makes no more sense for artists to create an album with 'fillers' but for me those 'fillers' was what made the album as well and one person's idea of filler doesn't necessarily equate to another. I have many 4 and 5 star songs that a lot of people would consider to be crap tunes and rubbish but I say the same thing every single time, music is always going to be heavily subjective. I suppose people have fooled themselves into thinking you can have a 'good' and 'bad' song and there are certain qualities which make that so but for me, music is all about what is appealing to your ears. That ear worm of a pop tune that nobody you know seems to like but you yourself gets to number one on the charts yet no matter where you go or the reviews you read everyone slates it as a bad song but hang on, what defines a bad song? Surely the fact that it got to number one alone means enough people liked it to send it there? (Of course this is not counting the overexposure of certain songs or because it was featured or associated with a certain show/film/etc).

Do something will you!

Okaay so as I type this I am on my way to Kingsway College to pick up a prospectus and have a look around really. This is the next part of my life? Again I do question whether I will stick to this...well not stick to it but more, if I do this will I seriously know what direction I want my life to head in?

I always said that I'd want to be rich and I am not kidding when I say do actually feel I can do anything. See, the thing is with me is that I really do believe I can do anything if given the time and resources and the way I see the reasons for past failures in my life, it wasn't because I wasn't capable of doing it or that I didn't understand things really, they were more a combination of events out of my control and my own personal mentality. Now I'm not offering excuses and I hate it when people say "excuses, excuses" or any variation of that because it's not, I'm telling it like it is. You ask someone what the reason for failure is and they give you an answer, don't be so quick to dismiss it as an excuse.

Anyhoo, before going off there, basically, law is the next direction of life really. I'll be honest, I don't want to do it, I think the subject for me is dry, text heavy and not much excitement for somebody like me, but as I've figured out really from life, that's not the way world works, so what then? Well simple, if getting a law degree is going to get me higher then that's what I've got to do. If getting a law degree is going to tip the scales of life in my favour then that's really what I have to do. I may be interested in other things and want to do that but the world doesn't want that, they want this and so this I shall do. So yeah Emily, I guess you are right, I have given up on myself but to be honest, what else can I do, left to my own devices I would most likely achieve nothing and that would just be worse for you to be honest.

Anyway, enough with the downer stuff, here's something positive...umm, err, hmm, don't actually know, maybe next time I'll have something positive to say or maybe it'll be more ranting oh well, we'll see.

Just a little odd

Oooookay, so enough pussyfooting around and let me just jump straight into my grievance today and that would be with society's perception of what weird is.

Ask anyone what it means to be a bit weird and they will tell you that it's something strange, odd, different or basically against expectations. But you see, what exactly is expected of us as humans? There isn't really a guidebook on how to live or anything such as that in fact if anything the only rules really I think are the rules that keep you alive...that's if you are wanting to stay alive. You know, stuff like eating, drinking, sleeping. Don't get that, you die, simple as that, everything else is just a bonus really, how to speak? Not necessary for survival, what music to listen to? Your choice affects not how alive you are. Who to love? Again, just add ons.

Now another thing also is that everyone has a life, that is their own and that live is yours to do with it what you choose. No-one asks to be born, no-one choose when they wish to be alive but seeing as you cannot affect or choose that, you may as well choose and affect how you want to live your life, keyword being 'your'.

I don't know, maybe it's just me but I tend to notice there's a lot of interference in your lives as you live it, I am not talking about like when parents tell you not to touch that thing or you'll burn yourself or when they choose what school you go to and that...although...Anyway, I was thinking more about society and what it means to be 'cool' and 'weird' and other such labels. This also goes with expectations and such because why should other people dictate what music you like, what shows you watch, how you dress, who you like, when in fact it's actually you life? If they want someone that is so and so then why can't they just be that person themselves rather than wanting someone else to do so?.

Now, about the who you love thing, this is an especially annoying thing for me as there is a stigma around certain aspects of it such as who you are attracted to, what gender you're attracted to and so forth.

It's not the hate for them that I dislike intensely as people are free to hate who they want to hate, who am I to tell someone what they should like and dislike, who is anybody to do that really. What galls me is that I quite frankly find the logic of some people's reasoning of hating people like that shocking.

In case it hasn't been figured out, this is really about people attracted to the same sex especially males really, can't really say much about females to comment that much about it. Anywa- in fact, that's another thing, some of the males that are hugely homophobic have absolutely no problem with lesbians and rather find them a turn on but hold on...isn't that just hypocritical? No-one is saying you have to enjoy two men kissing but it just seems rather foolish to be homophobic in that way when you get the same enjoyment if it were two women.

"Ohhh, but it's not right". Yeah, who are you to judge what's not right or not, who are you to decide the factors on all this? The world just simply does not work like that, things are what things are, that's what I say, a green square is a green square, its meaning only changes depending on the observer, that being said, the same apply to two people of the same sex kissing or whatever, it is what it is, nothing more nothing less, some will see it as being right, some will see it as being wrong.

I'm sure there are many other reasons why people may not like gay people and I'm not complaining about that as people can hate who they want to hate but to me the reasons I hear for some doing so are hypocritical and do not really make any sense.

While I’m still sane

It’s been a year and you really have to ask yourself, what’s changed? The amount of times you say to yourself that you’ll do this and you’ll do that and your life begins now but really what’s changed? Everything is pretty much the same in ways, guess you just don’t have the mentality to really further yourself as that’s all that is stopping you. Guess you know the true meaning to brilliant but lazy.