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The Grimoire of SezanI am Sez, hear me ROAR! |
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| Jan. 1st, 2009 @ 05:37 am "I'm a spy!" "Then why are you covered in mince?" "I'm a mince-spy!" "A merry Christmas!" | |||
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Current Feelings...:
What did you get in your stockings? I got legs in mine. tired...what else?Current Music...: Pachelbel's canon First things first, allow me to wish everyone a happy new year, and possibly a slightly belated merry Christmas. I have been somewhat absent from the world of livejournal recently and there is honestly no good reason save that i've been busy with life. This is not to say that I have not been writing, in fact I have but it has just never got to a stage of posting. Having returned from the public houses of Oxford on this most merry of new years and sobered up in the transitional period of bussing and strolling I have for some unknown reason come to the conclusion that you deserve everything i've not posted since my return to university as some kind of horrible present. This amazing sample of madness contains a pictutre of me in a very poor costume and that most famous essay: 'P&G's lovely weekend amidst the fey folk'. With unusual forethought I have actually decided to cut this as it's somewhat expansive and there's something incoming which will put it and quite a lot else to shame. But more of that later. For now, I can only presume that the sheer depression and stress of casting off the old year like an ungainly coat and donning the new one like a fine silken shawl has led you to some kind of unparalleled insanity which will make you click on the link below, though I must admit that as per usual this is very much more for me than anyone else...possibly moreso than per usual. Therefore without delay, withdraw your decrepit fingers from your ears, eyes or possibly even trouserings and press down hard on your left mouse button below. I would bother to advise against it, but then I fear everyone is too sensible to bother with such things nowerdays. I can only hope that 2009 will lead us to some kind of mass stupidity epidemic. This is not some kind of political comedy (as we all know how that usually goes) but rather a solemn hope so that I can use you all as furniture. No matter though. Presenting linkedge: ( Click hither for rambling. ) As for the slightly ominous earlier comment, there is indeed something approaching. Something of a new year's present from yours truly. I must first admit that I suspect that I am the only one who will get any of it, but this is the price I pay for being me: i.e. failure so bad that only I can comprehend it. It will be somewhat lengthy, and as a result of it's vast expansion rate, I am having to somewhat extend my deadline to next year or so. We'll just see when its finally finished. But in exchange for a really horrible fountain of words which has just been spewed forth from my fingertips upon the  Wasn't that fun children? Anyhow, that's all for now. There will be that incoming hopefully soon, and with any luck i'll be able to write something sentient. It is almost 6am. I would just like to extend my best (and unexpected) wishes to everyone, wherever you may be in the world, from Oxfordshire to a certain gathering in Canada and even to Exeter, although perhaps not Pennsylvania Court. I raise a glass to you all and wish you the best possible 2009 before the robots rise up and we are forced to do their unending bidding. And on that dystopian note, farewell. Sez - circa 2009. |
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| Sep. 6th, 2008 @ 08:28 pm Most decidedly an unfortunate event. | |||
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Current Feelings...:
Greetings to all of you. As i'm sure everyone who occasionally happens to mistakenly glance over at this catastrophe of a journal is now aware, my tendency is to write long and horrible streams of needless words about nothing. If anything this is what my massive rant on Leeds should have demonstrated. As a result it is time for a brief spot of relief in that this will not be an over-long ramble about the social conditions in the ghetto of Wendle or why I need to become the 100th emperor of Britannia and why this involves the murder of people with two fancy eyes. Instead I present some pleasant light listening, of the sort that one might find on our most fine radio station: Radio 4. Consider this your one respite before I once again take it into my head that people enjoy reading massive paragraphs about nothing.  Need you ask?Current Music...: The Offspring - Why Don't You Get A Job? Allow me, if I may, to explain the situation. Some time ago I was introduced to a series of books which probably have some kind of name binding them together but I am unaware of it. I realise this is a tremendous amount of help, but given that I am so very lazy I cannot even be bothered to go look it up on the Internet. Anyhow, the first book is called Twilight, it is by Some Woman(?) and is all about vampires being fancy-dancy little fairy children and prancing about having romance because they are oh so beautiful and sad. It was thus, in my mind, oh so much fail. This much I had gleaned/fabricated before having a serious conversation on the matter in Borders and finally getting some of one of the books read to me. As the words were dictated to me, I am happy to say that my opinions of the book completely and utterly stayed exactly the same, if not headed even further downwards into the pits of hell. Admittedly I may be judging the books unfairly having only heard a few paragraphs and offending several people, but frankly, I have never cared much about being a nice person, so to hells with you. I'm going to rage. Anyhow, with this firmly in mind I attempted to work out exactly why they were so popular. The only thing I had been told about their inexplicable popularity was that they were revolutionary in portraying the vampire as a sympathetic and positive character, as opposed to in Bram Stoker's Dracula...and not much else. Dracula is one of the few literary examples I can actually think of nowerdays in which vampires are actually completely bad, what is so revolutionary about something which has been going on for longer than I can remember, possibly ever since whoever thought up Alucard thought him up. Buffy, Castlevania, Hellsing and even (for all that I feel somewhat dirty for using this) Darren Shan to name examples from my main forms of media (Television/Film, Gaming, Anime, and Literature) have been doing it for a while now so what is the big deal? Is it just because the vampires are pretty and sad?...and does this really justify terrible writing? Sorry Some Woman but from what I heard it really wasn't very persuasive. This later inspired a conversation about why people liked the vampires in the books, and indeed it did seem to be basically because they were pretty. This sparked a thought in the horrible tangle of briars that is my brain. 'Why are there no more mean, ugly vampires?' I pondered to myself. It was at this point that I chose to seize the moment and gain the monopoly on writing a tale about a thoroughly unpleasant vampire in defiance of anti-heroes. Clearly he must be based on the best vampire ever (bar Dracula) Dio Brando from Jojo's Bizzare Adventure, simply so he could shoot lasers out of his eyes and say 'WRY(x20)'. For the moment he would probably not be able to use 'Za Warudo' due to technical errors, but it was only a matter of time. As a result, I wrote the instant classic known as 'Not Quite Daytime' followed by an equally successful recording of the audio book, read by the author. This not only succeeded in tearing my throat to ribbons, but also proving that I really cannot do accents without considerable forethought and not on the spur of the moment, realising I only have around two seconds to think them up. As I result I present you (un)lucky people with the premium package of terror including the original two page novella, authors recording and out-takes (a.k.a. Ultimate Failures), and now, for the first time ever, a Lemony Snicketesque introduction. Dear Reader, If you enjoy tales about elegant and fanciful vampires then you are most definitely in quite the worst paragraph you could ever hope to see. In this terror struck tale there are no lace-clad romantic denizens of darkness to tempt your fancy. I would suggest that you simply click on the button near the top of your screen marked 'back' and continue with your life of velvet and seduction. If however you are somewhat more adventurous and have perhaps an already grey view of the world then there may well be something here for you, though given the contents of this depressing grimoire, it seems unlikely. There are no depressingly beautiful bloodsuckers contained within, there is however an expansive harlot, some heroic cowboys, and a citadel with an obscenely long name. Should your iron constitution not fail you, then perhaps you will see the end of this sickening tale, but do not count on it. Should you wish to enter the realm of true darkness and terror then you may wish to nervously point your mouse in this general direction and eventually point its quivering tip here. Though it is advisable, on the testimony of your physician, parents and local police force, that you simply walk away, hopefully never to return. You should also be advised that the tale, although it has never been officially reviewed (for it is too terrifying for any number of censors to even draw near to its munificent horror) it must clearly be rated as an 18 for extreme violence, horrific language such as not even the captain of a merchant-navy vessel would utter, a frustrating beeping noise in the extras, and the use of the word 'bosom' frankly an absurd number of times. You have been warned. Yours,  |
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| Aug. 30th, 2008 @ 04:18 am Is he Leedsish? Nah mate, he's just...rubbish. Quinn's Epic Leeds recap (TLtFiL) part 3 of 3 | |||
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Current Feelings...:
Attentzion, attentzion (to quote the rhythm master), parts 1 and 2 lie below, this is part 3. Unless you are quite as much of an idiot as me or have some kind of control over time travel, I would advise you read part 1 first and then part 2. Actually I would advise you not to read any of this at all and do something constructive, but then you just love to be tempted don't you. Why So Serious?Current Music...: The Offspring - Original Prankster Well fine here I am. Once again I am post production writing although this time it is at the top rather than the bottom. You might see this before the rest of it so I shall warn you to heed the above warning and not read this part until last. There aren't really spoilers per say but it's more fun to read my slide into madness in order rather than simply dipping in and out. What has happened is that both Semagic and Livejournal have lied to me and i'm trying to sort it out as best I can. Apparently the original 10,000 words which Semagic limited to me is simply a brazen lie and in reality livejournal permits far fewer in an entry, therefore I have had to split what was originally intended to be a one part tale, into a two part tale, into a three part tale and it seems liable that I will soon have to split it into four if this goes on. It is at times like this that I curse my pressing need to rant and ramble. Still, there is only so much I can say about my own failure as it is now 4am and I am getting increasingly tired given that I have now been writing this thing for around three days (with breaks). I doubt i'll read it for some time as looking back on it now will just cause me pain, and frankly it will only be of interest once it has fallen out of my memory. Perhaps in exchange for my mockery of them, my two noble companions will tell anyone who asks about Leeds simply to read this account of my failures therein and thus clinically embarrass me. Still, I have succeeded in writing a singularly biast and boring account of Leeds and I do in a small way hope that someone manages to get all the way through it without having a stroke (even if it is only me). On that note, if anyone does leave a comment...please don't make it about how needlessly long the whole thing is...as trust me...I am WELL AWARE. Insults are quite welcome however. I realise that in writing this I am being part of the problem of length rather than the solution, but in my mind it is worth if for the time travelling aspect. In that respect, here is a continuation of the tale which will work this time, if not, you'll be able to trace my irritation when the next entry splitting shows up. As it has turned out (and this is post posting) it did work and we are all fine and dandy, therefore my attempt to preempt time itself has failed, alas. Still, let us begin regardless: Once again the story will continue from where it left off. ( Oh dear lord it's another cut, you people don't realise just how much pain this is causing me. Click here to win a free ipod! ) |
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| Aug. 30th, 2008 @ 04:18 am Is he Leedsish? Nah mate, he's just...rubbish. Quinn's Epic Leeds recap (TLtFiL) part 2 of 3 | |||
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Current Feelings...:
Attentzion, attentzion (to quote the rhythm master), part 1 lies below, this is part 2. Unless you are quite as much of an idiot as me or have some kind of control over time travel, I would advise you read part 1 first. Actually I would advise you not to read any of this at all and do something constructive, but then you just love to be tempted don't you. Why So Serious?Current Music...: Billy Joel - Only The Good Die Young Good lord, I had no idea that it was actually possible to overload LJ with words but apparently I have defied the system and written too much to be contained in a single entry. I frankly think this means I win. In any case, this report has now been dubbed 'Too Long to Fit in Livejournal' thus (TLtFiL). I just want to explain about the cuts as they are a somewhat confusing matter to anyone who knows my hatred of the things. As many may know, I do it to spurn those who dare to have thin journals, as well as to give my mouse wheel finger some exercise. At the same time, I am not a monster. Admittedly I may be a cruel, malevolent beast of what can only be just about called a human being because I have hair in the right places, but I am not a monster (because they have hair in the wrong places)...and frankly, my scrolling finger does not require THAT much bloody exercise. I think 10,000 words may be the limit...so...yeah, inflicting that on the unsuspecting world of uncut journals would create a backlash so large that I would be instantly killed. I did want to split the days into individual cuts with a little blurb for each one, but I have only just discovered the 10,000 word limit...so that plan is foiled, especially as I cannot even fit 2 days into a single entry. Ah dear me, I fail so much I probably deserve to be murdered. I also question the point of me making obscure references when I know people won't get them...for some vile self amusement most likely...and also in some kind of feeble hope that someone will send me an e-mail saying that they enjoy both Gurren Lagann and Ski Free and that I am not alone. I then hope they will give me money, but you know, what can you do? I assure you that i'm ever so cold and lonely in my dank pit of needlessly over-eccentric wordery and only write ever so much to torment the rest of the world. As it happens that's mostly a lie and i'm quite comfortable in my dressing gown, but it is pretty dark...and I wish I had some cake. This is an appeal to anyone who cares and gets it: Regardless of who you are, where you are or even when you are, please do this deep-sea life form a favour and if you get one of my horrible combinations of references, send me some virtual cake, I would appreciate it ever so. In fact, send me virtual cake regardless, we'll start a trend. And now that I am fortified with breakfast (The bread knife being marmiteier than the sword) I think it is just about time for me to resume this epic power ballad of tradgedy and disaster (and that's just the grammar). I have no intention to recap, heaven knows, it's long enough as it is, so once more into the breach my [what I am now sure are no longer] friends! ( It is inadvisable to click here unless you have no value for several hours of your life...you could get drunk in that time. ) |
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| Aug. 30th, 2008 @ 04:17 am Is he Leedsish? Nah mate, he's just...rubbish. Quinn's Epic Leeds recap (TLtFiL) part 1 of 3 | |||
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Current Feelings...:
It is instantly obvious and important to point out to those who happen to misclick, or absent mindedly glance at this entry before reeling into a stupor which somehow induces them to read on, that the following is in no way relevant to anything of interest. My travelling companions and fellow Leeds endurees have already demonstrated their more than admirable livejournaling skills by presenting their commentary with regards to Leeds festival long before I could even engage my brain as to the task. On being informed of this and reading both of their entries on the subject, I was instantly struck by the bizzare idea that clearly I was being instigated into some kind of devilish competition, and in no way was my overbearing paranoia springing upon me like some kind of metaphorical panther. Clearly these relentless harridans (cough) had decided to up the ante by presenting two articles of exceeding quality and taste to goad me into a fit of envy which left me feeling like a ripe cabbage, such was the grenliness of my mood. Having seizured for a few hours in the bath about the situation, it became clear to me that the only thing possible for me to do was to play into their respectively long and short nailed hands and write my own entry on the past few days. Fuelled with vengeance inspired vehemism I descended on the keyboard like an early film style vampire for unknown reasons moving in upon an unsuspecting and already considerably flattened sea-slug. I then remembered that I couldn't remember many of the bands who had actually played and in respect for the rules of visual slapstick, fell off my chair backwards. The resulting crash not only brought a stack of CDs down upon my head like so much sharp-cornered rain, but also made realisation dawn like a malevolent cloud. What did it matter that I couldn't really remember many band names? It's not as if I can ever remember anything relevant that happens anyway, which is why my writing tends to dwell in great detail on the things which I either find needlessly interesting, or I think will make anyone who foolishly embarks on the deadly an journalistic voyage that is my gibbering get exceedingly angry. It is therefore my intention at this point to spend as much time and effort as possible in describing the things which are utterly needless, but at the same time will go on at such length that it will seem important. And with my cunning plan explained, in a way which would, but for circumstances, let Mr. Bond escape and feed me to my sharks (as it is, you shall just have to defy me by stopping reading and hurling me to my pronouns), I shall begin this unearthly cataclysm of the English language. Why So Serious?Current Music...: The Killers - Read My Mind ( I don't normally cut, but this is unnervingly long...am I the only one who misses ladybirds? ) |
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| Jul. 16th, 2008 @ 01:22 am We're waiting for the chirp, chirp, chirp of MOMMAAAAAAAAAAAAA! (look sharp) | |||
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Current Feelings...:
So as always it has been a while but this time it's alright because I have a reason. I was drawing something for my re-emergence, but it's gone somewhat on hiatus as I realised that it didn't make any sense to anyone except me, and then I got somewhat confused as I was unsure that even I understood it any more. So that's my excuse, not that it's a very good one but alas it is the only one I have. boringCurrent Music...: Jackson Browne - The Night Inside Me So, Uni's over for the year and apparently I'm going back next year much to my dismay, it being my intention to fail miserably and then fall over a large pile of gold lying on the ground. Still, it looks as if i'll have to go for plan B. It seems odd that plan B always tends to be the one to work out and one has to wonder why it was not plan A to begin with. Still, i'm sure many people have made that point and it has probably been answered over and over again so I shall not press it. Anyway, down to business and such. Yes, i'm back at the old homestead and it's all rather good save the hunt for employment which fails as people have not been responding promptly which causes me great annoyance and will doubtless mean I will get all of the letters on the same day or something similar. I begin to suspect internal sabotage. But no matter, for a strange fancy place has just opened near Bicester which I applied for today and I now have hopes of going there instead of working somewhere dull. Still, I am actually quite glad that there is no working at the moment as i've been in a particularly creative mood recently. I'm somewhat unsure what's fuelling it. Much as I would like to say something along the lines of it being the steady fire of passion's flames or something equally arty and fancy, I figure it's just return to isolation which has made me once again seize pen and drop it on paper or alternatively needless amounts of singing and even banging about on the piano. Writing and drawing are both in full on scribbling mode as I have found my little pocket book which I can finally start carrying around with me and writing/drawing things in whenever I feel the need which is often. And thus that has given me new lease on life as it means no longer do I have to carry around bits of paper in my pockets which are foolish and tend to fall everywhere. As for singing, I noticed that i've started to lose my range through lack of practice so am trying to expand it again. I pity anyone who accidentally walks in on me warbling out whatever the hell it is I tend to sing, which is ridiculous and varied. The only problem is that I can only sing at what I would consider as 'my best' when i'm alone or i'm doing it for a direct purpose. I don't know why but I find it very difficult to sing well unless I know either i'm alone so no one is expecting anything of me, or I know I can meet the expectation. As for Piano, it just tends to be me trying to work out chord series for singing work or playing by ear. I've completely lost whatever little talent I had at sight reading, but it matters not as i'm far more comfortable in playing what I want for all that it may be wrong. It makes me more content that way as I feel as it i'm learning rather than just poking dot-represented-ivory. Also it means I don't have to pay for sheet music. Oh Mr. Quinn, you have no romance in your soul. Writing is an interesting little side note, as i've realised that there are many things which I tend to notice by never really comment upon because i'm some kind of bottler of information, and although I do ramble, it tends to be about needless things rather than things which I should say but just don't due to distraction, embarrassment, boredom or whatever so i've somewhat taken to writing them down as well as things which I just feel I want to remember like little rhymes or reminders of insignificant acts which I feel merit worth remembering. There is of course my usual dross of horrible stories which generally end with everyone in the local vicinity being obliterated as I can think of no better way to end them as well as scribbley pictures of flies with profuse apologies to Aldous Huxley next to them and rather nebulous lines about mescaline. Still, that is the kind of thing my brain is made up of so pages end up looking across between something by Da Vinci and a small child with a horrible array of wax crayons. I pity the mind of anyone who steals it and attempts to read it. I might fear, if I had any semblance of a positive reputation it might be crushed. There is the promise of some writing in that me and the other two members of my nebulous triumvirate are plotting to create a parodical offence which no one will ever be able to even watch as it will be banned from everywhere including the Internet on release. Well, either that or it will be quite good. It really depends on which way our sensibilities swing. I would also quite like to get to work actually penning down some ideas for the bloody musical before I forget everything, bah. So all in all it looks like this is going to be quite the creative few months, and it's likely quite a lot will fall by the wayside. In the interests of interlude, Pictorial dump:  He is probably gleefully informing Adams of another one of his needless sexual innuendos before singing a song about poultry while a horse rides around in the background and Lee has some kind seizure (LEE-zure?) in the corner as Mr. Rode Island drinks himself under the table. And then SALTPETRE and PINS rain from the skies. It's something of a busy scene. And yes, I expect everyone to understand EXACTLY what this is all about, as there are ever so many references going on here. I've been gaming a lot too, given the amount of great games coming out at the moment, or being announced what with the arrival of E3, there's been quite a lot to catch up on, replay or just discover anew. My DS has been occupied almost entirely by Final Fantasy Tactics advance two which is just as addictive as the previous two games in the tactics series and once again lives up to the claim of requiring to be played at every spare moment and/or traffic light. I'm glad the Judging system has been toned down a bit as the imprisonment system in A1 was frankly infuriating, although I am somewhat annoyed by the location judging rules of A2 rather than the date judging as that gave more flexibility, although I suppose this way makes it more tactical. I'm not overly sure that I like the protagonist Luso as he frankly looks like a cretin, but I have made up for this by making him needlessly powerful. The Bazaar system is also a tad annoying although makes more sense than the previous A1 system of new areas meaning new weapons. I thought the Auctioning system would be madly irritating, but as it happens land can be bought outright so I am quite content on that front. I would highly commend it to anyone in short, although i've been playing it with the keys rather than stylus as i'm used to it from the previous ones, it's a fantastic game very much made for the DS and would say it's something of a must, especially for those who've not ventured into the FFT genre before. Oh, and it's doing something of an overlap with post Revenant wings FFXII with appearances from at least Vaan and Penelope so far in my game. Mind you, it's only to be expected, after all FFT is responsible for Ivalice (and FFTA for the races) in the first place so it's only to be expected. So I have nothing to say about SSB:Brawl save that it's just as excellent as Melee, if not better as it really should be. It's nice to see some new-old faces and frankly...Snake is Snake, and thus is godly. The campaign is a bit short and does unlock everything which is really something of a positive and a negative. I've not tried it online as of yet but may do in a while. As for PC, i've been using it to run some older classics such as American McGee's Alice, Psychonauts, FFXI, Black and White II, Silent hill 3 and MGS2. Most of these have had some purpose or are replays (or both) such as Silent Hill 3 being one of my favourites in what I regard as a glorious series which, while admittedly having one of the weaker plots, has one of the best atmospheres. MGS2 was in celebration of MGS4's release, as it's somewhat more important plot wise than 1. FFXI i'm getting back into for the umpteenth time and will doubtless be fun for a while before I put it away again. Alice is a game i've never truly played before but have always been fascinated in so I thought i'd give it a shot and it was enjoyable although repetitive. Psychonauts is fantastic and quite an overlooked masterpiece with an exceedingly brilliant plot and array of characters and abilities. Black and White 2 was just to stave off boredom, but will never really be as good as 1 in my opinion. Oh, and i'm on a new private server on RO celebrating my 5 year anniversary which is vaguely horrible. That's about it for games as far as I can think of apart from some messing around with the spore creature creator and DMC4 demo. I fear that this is probably a very monotonous paragraph for those who aren't interested in games. How dull. Oh, and Sony has failed to keep FFXIII to itself, i'm not sure if I should be happy or sad. That's not to say there haven't been any unusual events thus far either. One which happened a few days ago springs to mind, and I am still trying to wrap my head around. I don't know if anyone has ever read Vladimir Nabokov's short story 'Terror' because that's the only thing I can relate it to but upon walking home from the bus stop with no feasible reasoning or explanation I had one of those feelings which I believe is commonly referred to as having someone walk over your grave but with far more strength than i'm used to. There was nothing to instigate it but I was just filled with an absolutely crushing despair and panic. You know when you put something very important in your bag/pocket/wallet or whatever and upon arriving somewhere you feel the need to use it for whatever purpose and root around in your carrier of choice without success, and then can't find it and begin a frantic scrabble as horror rises in your throat? It was somewhat like that except much worse as there as nothing to inspire it. Nabokov's character talks in 'Terror' with constant reference to paralysis and I could never quite understand what was meant until then. I presumed it meant the traditional lack of movement, but I think far more now that it's a sense of an entire halting of time, not only of yourself but of the world around you also as nothing seemed to be moving or making any sound around me. I keep thinking of it as what it must be like in the last few seconds of drowning, just as you begin to realise that there's no way you are going to reach the surface and soon the air is going to force its way out of your mouth but I can't really say that I have any experience in that department. I guess it's somewhat impossible to describe the feelings which I had at the time because they're somewhat impossible to put into words, and as memory serves Nabokov describes them using the environment around the character rather than the feelings of the character himself. In any case, I don't think i've ever felt so inexplicably lost and terrified. I won't say the clichéd 'Minutes seemed like hours, as frankly they didn't, but there seemed to be such a lot going on while nothing was happening, i'm not entirely sure how long it lasted but I think around 3 or 4 seconds and about half a minute to recover and pick up my bag which I had dropped. In all honesty I never want it to happen again, as it's not so much how it felt...which was frankly horrible, as the lack of understanding as to why it happened at all given that there was nothing at all to inspire it. As I say, I can't really describe it in any great detail, but I wonder if anyone else has had anything at all like it. To break the dread and shadowy gloom a bit i'd just like to mention a movie which I really can't praise enough (and some are probably starting to wish I could) which is 'The Girl Who Leapt Through Time' which is by far the most moving and beautiful piece of cinema i've seen in a long while. I have no idea when/if it will be localised so if anyone wants to watch it it will require quite a bit of Internet trawling. I just love everything about it, everything is just so...complete. Also I have an incredible love of anything which puts an interesting spin on time travel so this has definitely become one of my new favourites. Bahh, everyone should watch it and such but I won't press anyone unless I really think they need to see it for whatever reason. Identifiable characters! Huzzah! Also i've gotten my hands on the Sweeney Todd DVD so i've been watching that again recently, not quite as fun as on the big screen but I had completely failed to notice until now that Anthony Stewart Head was in it which makes me highly amused inside. Another interval, this time to continue the theme of terror, I present you with the following: Do not watch if you have small animals/children around as frankly i'm having multiple heart attacks. In other news, I am everything and I hate the moon (not really). Anyone who is still clinging to the vestiges of sanity at this point will probably have noticed that I really haven't talked about any specific events which have happened with other people for the reason that I just don't really feel the need. There have been quite a lot of them recently and frankly I just fail to keep up with everything. In any case quite a lot of them have already been reported by other people who have probably included pictures and other far more interesting things than I could ever muster. I guess i'm just far more interested in talking about horribly dull stuff at great length. I'm sorry, this has been very rambley and I shall save talking about the torment that rages within my mortal soul and how I bested a tiger in a boxing match (as well as other such thrilling things) until next time as well as hopefully a comic or two. It will doubtless be far more entertaining than this heap of jargon which is once again somewhat selfishly for me to look back on. But there you go. Yours Sincere-Lee Sez |
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| May. 31st, 2008 @ 07:04 pm Razor blade child! It will give you veritable palpitations! | |||
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Current Feelings...:
You wouldn't think, would you, that drawing two terrible comics in the space of about 5 minutes, neither of which make pretty much any sense except to me, and then spinning on a chair for several minutes post this scholarly endeavour would be any grounds to then claim that one was a genius, shortly before falling over. The problem with this whole scenario is that I appear to have just carried it out, and what is more worrying: to no one in particular. But anyway, there it is, I can think of few ways better to start a long and doubtless meaningless ramble than to state that I've just driven of the long wooden pier of insanity into the dark and treacherous waters of nonsensicalness. My reasons for claiming this outrageous feature I see, to now be convinced I possess lies in the pathetic scrawls which now lie to one side of me. while my normal comics are indeed no great artistic efforts on my part, the general motive being 'Finish the damn thing' rather than 'Do lovely pictures with great detail and whatnot', these really surpass the level of bad art i've somewhat previously captured (even on paint). Stick figures are not really my thing, as I tend to overdo them, what with having a bizzare lust for detail and everything. Still, these are stick figures at their most simple form...as far as I can tell. I suppose a stick man in essence is just a stick. But still! These ones at least have arms, legs and heads, but no faces, as that would just be flamboyant. In any case, it is rather needless to continue this tack of thought, as it was some days ago since I started this and the point is that the aforementioned drawings are now high upon my wall of garbage. lurking away. I suppose in essence what i'm attempting to say is that: The comics were pretty terrible and only made sense to me and thus they were probably not grounds for me to claim genius, but I did anyway because i'm a) probably not one, and b) have been sipping a little too much from the tea cup of insanity, little finger pointed. moroseCurrent Music...: The Hunchback of Notre Dame - Heaven's Light / Hellfire In any case, as should be obvious, it's been a few days since I started...thus there's something of a time lapse and so I intend to switch topics like frogger. For anyone who remembers, or rather doesn't...frogger was a little game where one had to leap across a road and some logs until you reached a hole in the wall. Of course you were a frog, that's why the game was called frogger. Anyway, my point is that my usual method of hopping from topic to another is much like frogger hopping from one side of the road to the other. Of course there's always a risk of being crushed by a large truck...or in my case a rambling phrase which keeps me occupied like this bloody one, see as I am utterly destroyed beneath the weight of paragraphs about early video games. What am I doing? Probably just filling space. Ah well. I have this problem which involves writing at night. I tend to do most of my internety things at night what with me being some kind of reverse time creature who sleeps in the day and does things at night. In any case, I always put writing this thing off until the last minute and therefore i'm rather tired by the time it actually gets going. I can't think straight at 7am when the sun comes up and starts stabbing my eyes with it's pointy rays and so I end up blithering now quod erat demonstrandum. (Said he, the literary devil that he is) And then I start watching something in another window and can't concentrate on the text. As a result everything goes wrong and I end up writing essentially nothing for a long long time. But for the fact that it infuriates the thin LJ users I might consider doing smaller and more regular LJ updates. But then that's no fun, but perhaps a little less tiresome. So it's nigh on summertime, that oppressive season when everyone in Britain grumbles about how hot it is. I fail to understand the whole obsession which people in this country have with the temperature. In the winter it's too cold, in the summer it's too hot, or too raining, too snowing, too windy etc. etc. ad nauseam. It's a bit tiresome to be honest. Admittedly I am some kind of freak who doesn't really notice the temporal changes I must admit, but honestly...it's really not that hot or cold to keep complaining about it with such ridiculous vehemence. In any case, this means the rather irksome changes of clothing with everyone. Admittedly I do tend to start wearing short sleeved clothes, but that's about it. There's something apparently horrific to me about wearing shorts, so none of them for me. Also why bother changing colours for summer? It really doesn't make that much difference if I keep wearing black, i'm hardly going to explode from heat. In any case, other people seem to feel the need to change clothes. Thus we see an emergence of aviators, crop tops, stupid surf shorts and hot pants. Also is it just me or is it now shirtless o'clock every hour of the day? Admittedly it may be where I live which somewhat stands out in the field of rahery which means people seem to have far too much money to spend on ridiculous clothes. Still, who am I, who have no sense of fashion per say to judge other people. Me, that's who, and I stand by my judging gaze. Boo to such fashion things. But by all means people can wear them, i'll just glare in a vaguely disapproving manner from the sidelines and not bother going to the open air barbecues. Shirtless men playing volleyball isn't really my idea of an entertaining spectacle thanks. Sorry to disappoint. So how is life? Yes that's vaguely important, after all it's somewhat the entire point of this thing, so in years to come, i'll be able to pinpoint exactly where things went so wrong, and what with the free distribution of time machines in this strange dystopian future I shall come back and put everything to rights, and live a life of luxury. It is unfortunate to say however that things have not gone wrong enough for this to occur yet so I shall have to keep plodding along awaiting the inevitable explosion which blows my arms off or whatever thrilling calamity I have yet to face. Admittedly it may be a little challenging to operate a time machine sans armés (not clever) but we shall see. I don't intend to die just yet in any case...or at all but that's another story. But death might put something of a damper on my plans. So that's not going to happen, it's not on the proverbial cards...unless they're tarot cards...in which case there is a death one. I'm told that it doesn't mean death but rather change, although I am a tad suspicious that this is only what gets told to those who actually pick it, as tarot dealers are probably clever enough to realise that someone who is told such negative news as a portent of death probably isn't going to pay up as well as someone who receives happy news. Kind of puts question into the point of even having the death card in the deck, but still. In any case, I seem to be having a lot of death related dreams recently which is a little odd as normally I don't have flocks of dreams. The most bizzare one was probably the one where I got stabbed through the chest with a sabre but then carried on regardless and periodically unsheathed it from my ribcage. Still, what can you do. I fear I might be being a tad morbid, but it's probably part of the human condition to have at least a passing interest in the imminent demise. I don't think I would like to be eaten by anything though, when the time finally does roll around...if ever. After all, when I reach 120, it'll probably be the new 60. But to roll around again to the main point: Life is going reasonably well at the moment. Work is for the most part over except for one rather meaningless exam. I've got to start thinking about summer jobs again soon. For now however, i'm fine with enjoying a nice week of vague laziness. Admitt- Wow...imagine having a robotic arm, wouldn't that be fun- edly it is somewhat dull at times, but then again i've got plenty of things which I haven't done yet but intend to do. And there is now a seagull outside my window making a rather irksome noise, but still. I think i've realised one of the things I like about being up at very late...or rather early hours. It's got something to do with the silence and the sound. Admittedly I do tend to fill the silence by listening to music on headphones, but it's kind of when they get taken off and you just hear how quiet the world is, and pick up on even the most basic of sounds. I got told a few days ago that the sound of rain on a window is something to be desired, and but for that I probably wouldn't have listened last night when the rain came down. It really is a lovely sound and although it's been keeping me up at night for however many years now, i'd never really noticed it properly. I kind of like it when people open my eyes to something which has been there all along but i've never really noticed. Rain kind of feels nice too, when you know you can go back inside when you want. It's not nice to be stuck in, but it's just kind of...pleasant. People have something of an obsession with putting a hand out of the window to feel the rain...even when it's obviously there, so I don't think it's just me. There's something about feeling it. Perhaps i'm getting a little bit poetical about the whole situation. Biscuits are tasty. Yes, that's more like me. M&S do make rather good biscuits I must say (plug) although I do prefer home made over every other kind. But still, any kind of biscuits with tea, green or no is very good, particularly at around 5am. Yes, yes I am insane. And it will be a good few hours before I actually go to bed, because it is do things at night, sleep during the daytime. Makes me wonder how long it'll be before someone comes after me with a stake, but still. I'm a special sunflower, which is probably not the wisest flora to specify, given my apparently nocturnal ways. Speaking of which, such vampiric things: There seem to be far too few neutral vampires in book/film. They're either far too good or far too evil. What's wrong with just having some who sit around drinking tea and talking about the latest films, rather than saving the world from other 'evil' vampires for some predesignated reason/murdering the innocent with pointy things and rocket launchers. I guess my point is that there doesn't really seem to be a place for boring vampires. They always seem to be up to something. Maybe there is need for a slightly lazier species...like a wampire or something similar. After all, if we can have wodka, why not wampires. I guess it says something about me that it's taken me several days to write this and it's several thousand words long, and yet i've said nothing of any particular relevance or interest. Mind you, there's no reason that it has to stay that way, or to make it change either in all fairness. I will mention that expo was fun stuff although getting there was rather tricky due to irksome subway station closure and as a result the queue was about several hundred people long by the time we arrived. Such things are of course a tad irksome, but the queue was fun as queues go I suppose. It was a shame that we didn't get to see very much of Didcot people, but what can you do. That's what you get if you buy fast track tickets Didcot people, you don't get to see me for very long, i'm sure you must all be heartbroken, or profoundly thanking your stars. Still, it was good and I caught up with some people from last time which was rather nice. I have no intention of doing an in depth report again because, lets face it, one was bad enough. Pictures are lurking about somewhere, mostly on other people's cameras. Ominous cosplay looms. Still, it was a good day, and there was pizza. And train tickets are surprisingly cheap when you book only a week in advance which made me reasonably content. I kind of want a pinstripe Jacket/Shirt, there's something intrinsically evil about them. So, since I started writing this a lot has happened, i've started "revision" for one, hah, that's a laugh. I've written two more comics, both of which are probably better than the one I rambled about at the beginning (one certainly is). I've eaten some ice cream and probably done quite a lot besides (excluding con and London). I've also been home, which was nice, though a bit dull, still, it has it's uses in downloading rubbish to keep me entertained until this term comes to an abrupt end. Still, the post exam 'nothing to do' period will doubtless prove interesting and allow me to get on with quite a few things which I've not had the time to do while working. I need to talk to a certain Jesta about a cunning plan, so if she succeeds in not bleeding out of the eyes enough to make it thus far do tell as I have tricksy things to tell you. In other news, there are some good films out at the moment, go and see them rather than sex and the city, which I don't hugely approve of, but then I've not seen it, the series or anything to do with it. Go and see iron man or Indiana Jones instead. They both amused me. Clearly you take all of your film recommendations from me now, so you will do as I command. Or not, up to you. (do it). I seem to be revisiting Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei and Ergo Proxy too for some reason, possibly because they're both so GOOD and after rewatching Vandread i've been after something of similar quality which i've not seen in a while. There's some good stuff out at the moment too, namely Code Geass R2, Soul Eater and Shigofumi to name but a few. I know it's only a matter of time before I once again dig out the old Mai-Hime disks and watch that again, because it always has been one of my favourite series and so I'd like to remind myself what all the fuss was about. Also, Elfen Lied complete collection has made me deeply happy since it's release, I was considering buying all of the vectors, but the complete release has made me deeply happy. ...and I now own the Evangelion Platinum Perfect Collection which is very pretty indeed. That makes me deeply happy in myself, and the commentaries are fun stuff. But enough blithering, I really think this has gone on long enough, and I don't think anyone wants an ending ramble. Therefore there shall be needless cutting off, much like your Internet shall be if you're found torrenting at Exeter. Beware. Sez |
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| Apr. 18th, 2008 @ 11:38 pm A tale nigh on as epic as one which is slightly more epic (part ridiculous of ridiculous) | |||
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Current Feelings...:
I had an idea about what I was going to do today. It was a bloody good idea and I should probably do it anyway, but I don't think i'm going to. In fact, i've already failed. The plan was essentially to write just 'Blah blah blah blah' over and over until the screen was full, occasionally insert the words 'Jamie Bamber' and call it a day. The reason for this is of course that I presumed no one would actually be able to tell the difference from one of my normal entries. The reason that I didn't was that people may well get suspicious as to why the writing quality has improved exponentially. That would be enough to make me suspicious, so I decided against it. My apologies to you poor creatures who've decided to read it anyway. As I said previously, i'm not going to dawdle around too much and in an uncharacteristically non-Quinnian way going to cut out the vast paragraph of opening ramble and try and carry on somewhere near where I left off. I realise i'm somewhat shooting myself in the foot with this, but never mind. It's shorter than usual. Still, where were we? Oh yes. relaxedCurrent Music...: Edwin Starr - War "God! There're everywhere!" cried Jamie Bamber, swinging wildly from the chandelier his towel flapping in a slightly worrying fashion. "Look out! the siege towers over there are getting close to the third ironblock wall." shouted Max, staring at the scanner. "No matter, group four will take them" came the reply, which was barely audible over the crashing of the barricades. "Four coming in the south door" I shouted, on seeing them slither through the narrow opening "We could use some backup here Max!" The creatures chittered as they saw us with their bulbous eyes, and began to scramble over the ruined tables and chairs. Max finished his reloading and opened fire, bringing one down as it fell burbling and guttering beneath the claws of its fellows. "Let's go Lakers!" Howled Ron Glass as he charged, wielding his mighty battle axe, making short work of the others. "How we coming along Sarah?" I shouted "Not too long now," she replied "If we can just hold them off for a bit longer then I think I can bring him back." The group nodded in grim satisfaction. The doors buckled as- wait wait. I'm getting ahead of myself here. Sorry, rewind a bit. I thought something was wrong. We'd just arrived hadn't we. Or near enough, Max was beset by pirate dressed con goers and was overly concerned. Oh, and he succeeded in finding the two most normal people at the con, which is possibly going against the spirit of the whole thing, but still. We arrived just in time for the opening announcement of the guests, some of whom we knew would be there, and some who we didn't. Sean Harry really had done well for himself this time given the prior cancellations. Or that could have just been because Ron Glass was there and I was being overly obsessive about him at the time. Still am of course, but hey, at least it's better than Nigel Planer, but that's another story. Yes, I do realise that i'm burbling madly here, but what can you do. My mind then springs to the horror of con dancing including the dread star trek dance which we somehow got dragged into and involved people falling over and others pointing at them, I laughed at them which i'm not entirely sure I was supposed to, but still. I think I may have ruined the star treckian ethic by shouting 'Sparta' at one point too, but still, I never was a fan of trek, so meh. Less said about the Dr. Who dance, the better. Apparently you're not allowed to get drive through food if you've not got a car, because you'll be run over. Of course they can only tell you this once you're at the window which somewhat defeats the purpose. We weren't run over, but we didn't get any food either, until we had to order it through a very small window at a newsagents, which involved wild pointing through the window as we weren't actually allowed to go in. I realise that they need to protect against thieves, but really. After saying 'The chicken ones' eight thousand times, it gets a bit irritating, and you just want to say 'Just let us in, do we look like malevolent teens? We're at a geek con for goodness sake.'. Another slightly irksome thing is planes flying over your room in the small hours of the morning, still, it's Heathrow, what are you going to do? Asides from cry slowly into the mattress and just hope madly that everyone around you is fast asleep. Needless to say the bed was comfy, and thoroughly absorbent. Huzzah, up bright and early for a new day, as I sprang out of bed with a smile on my face, all of nature chirruped a cheery good morning, 'good morning mr. sun' I said, staring out of the window at the brand new day before me. No. It was more like: Ugh, infernal bleeping signifies a new day, as I crawled out of bed with a grimace of despair on my face, a large plane flew overhead deafening me, 'Grshf fiedn AHRFNNNNN' I groaned, and failed to stare out of the window as there was a mysterious curtain on the other side of the glass and I was still in bed anyway. Admittedly, I'm not a morning person, I don't think any of us were to be honest (Unless we're going to meet a certain Bamber...damn you) even Mr. Medic didn't seem very content to get up. Stilll, we did...eventually. In all fairness we had to given that there were photos to be had. Photos involved queueing and foolishly high amounts of money, still, it's a con. It's what you do. That's the FUN part. I shall now desperately attempt to avoid discussing the queueing process in grand detail, it's boring and even I can recognise that. Still, you meet people, especially when certain Baldwins are signing things, but more on that later. But photos were gotten. I fear I don't have the talent or looks to scan photos like certain individuals. I would say go look at that individual's pictures, but for the most part you can't. In any case, some people have seen mine already, and others doubtfully will in the future, so it all works out. As memory serves I then had a shower. This is clearly vital information so it really needs to be mentioned. Actually that was before photos, but time paradoxes are still rampant. The only reason I mention this is to once again lower the tone to base boredom. And now for a little experiment. Blah BlahBlah Blah BlahBlahBlah Blah Blah BlahBlah Blah BlahBlah Blah BlahBlah. We'll just wait and see if anyone notices that. Wait? we? I seem to be developing multiple personalities again. Ah well, no matter. I shall continue to juggernaut onwards. The thing about cons though is that you somewhat have to be there to appreciate them. I can't blither endlessly about the nature of queueing because frankly it's interesting for no one. Photos can't be described because unless you've actually shaken Adam Baldwin's hand, I can't describe how horribly strong his grip is and how odd it is to see him sans beard, for all that I did watch Chuck. I guess basically, what i'm saying is i'm going to stop dwelling on needless detail and just say the vaguely interesting things (to me at least). Ron Glass is insane, I think that's pretty important. We really learned that from his talk with Brooks where he sprung around the stage and blithered endlessly about the Lakers. I guess the endless gibbering somewhat made me feel he was a man of my own heart. I must admit I do like people who menace the audience, provided they don't menace me. Mark Sheppard is also special, but he'll get his own bit later given that we listened to him talk for....3 hours or something in the small hours of the morning. Adam Baldwin is also an amusing person, for all of his death grip handshake and menacing smile (there's hope for me yet). Richard Brooks is also special in his own way, although looks constantly bemused. But he sings rather well. That about covers firefly people. I would talk about battlestar people too, but I don't know enough about them to give an authoritative report. Needless to say, everyone seems utterly confused about what their call-signs actually mean. But then everyone is a robot, so it's excusable. Also, there were strange question asking people. I could specify European director man with strange graffiti shirt, Exceedingly camp Mediterranean man with hands fused to hips, French woman with hat and Stalker voice man with the universe's biggest sideburns. I dread to think what would happen if they all got together to have a conversation, but needless to say it would go on for roughly an eon or so and probably involve a miasma of doom which would instantly reduce anyone around it to a cloud of sci-fi flavoured ash. There was a rather beautiful moment at around seven o'clock or so when the main area was vacated when all of the happy congregated geekery (including ourselves) drifted back to their rooms to watch Dr. Who. I'm trying to think of a good way to describe it. Unfortunately all that keeps coming into my head is the phrase 'bomb scare' as the movement away was executed with the same agility as if someone had just pointed out that Sean Harry was harbouring a nuke somewhere on his person (and try not to think too hard about that one). The only problem with this is that it was in reverse, in that people were trying to get to something rather than away from something. Right, that'll do. Imagine your favourite thing ever. For your sake it had better be expensive (And if it's 'my boy/girlfriend then please do yourself a favour and fall in a well). Imagine that you've wanted to buy one for ages (which presumably you have if it's your favourite thing) and then a shop has suddenly started handing them out for free. The only problem is that everyone else wants one as well. And it's all the shops giving them out, not just one. Also, you at this point realise what an unoriginal cretin you are in your tastes and give up on ever owning one (after all if everyone else has one, what's the point) and just sit down in the middle of the shopping mall (which you ARE IN) and watch everyone else filter away. Essentially, that is what it looked like, only without a massive supply of fantastic things...and I wasn't there, because I was in our room watching the bloody thing. That however is what it WOULD have looked like. Then I suppose came the ULTIMATE moment for everyone (apparently) when we discovered that Jamie Bamber had arrived. Jamie Bamber is apparently the love of women (and Max) everywhere who swoon at his towel clad form...or something, i'm not quite certain on it still. He looked a tad mustellidic to me, but still. I am neither a woman nor am I Max, so I guess I don't get it. Joy is denied to me. Allow me to explain that we didn't know he was coming and plays the sun god in Battlestar Galactica, which led me briefly to believe that it was about ancient Greece, but I was wrong and it was all a lie. Still, this is what I get for thinking things should start at episode one. While i'm on the subject: Atlantis does NOT belong in space. It is in the sea. Leave it at that Stargate, leave it at that. I'm going to put on the pretence of being vaguely modest about the incident which followed, but let me just say that FAFFING ABOUT like an awkward bundle of hedgehogs is needless. Then Mark Sheppard talked for hours on end about why people should all vote because it makes a difference but it doesn't because no one can make a difference. Confusing? Yes. What with the Jamie Bamber having been arrived, said Mr. Quinn, finally getting some use out of the latin subjunctive...I think, we realised that everyone simply MUST have a photo with the man because he was so mind meltingly gorgeous that everyone would shamelessly beat us into a liquid pulp for having missed our only opportunity to appear within an inch of the man (the night before being uncounted because there is no photo evidence...I hope) There was something of a mix up involving tickets to see the feather haired Buddha but it all got sorted out with a little extra queuing. This day had quite a bit of queuing thinking about it. Therefore, instead of talking about such things, I shall intermittently write a short story about a lovely little rabbit called Flopsy. Flopsy was a delightful rabbit, she had great big ears and a wiffley little nose. Having eventually arrived to see the cherished hairdo himself, the photo was had and we all toddled down to grab some more food from the Mercdonaldes (this being the only bloody place within walking distance which didn't cost over nine thousand pounds sterling and actually existed. As it turned out we were wrong, Heathrow has billions of places, but all of them must be invisible or something because we never ran into anything else. As we queued for foo- wait, no. One day Flopsy realised she was very hungry and decided to go and look for a carrot, but where could she find one? As we ate out food and discussed just how splendidly beautiful Bamber was (not a very good combination for the nauseous community) we- oh wait, that's more interesting. We didn't win anything, because the McDonalds monopoly game is utterly stupid and the only thing of value anyone can ever win is MORE FOOD because you just end up getting the same houses over and over again, which is useless as you can't actually sell them for real money. That over we went back into the hotel and listened to assorted people talking more, it was all good fun and Ron Glass recieves womens' undergarments, possibly on a regular basis, while Adam Baldwin shoots Mulder and Scully in large caves. We occasionally had to hop outside to check if the pictures had appeared yet, and when they did it was once again time for is that my carrot? said Flopsy, no Flopsy, that's a chicken's egg. 'Have you seen my carrot?' Flopsy asked Madam Hen. 'Yes, I think it's near the barn' Then there was the delight of autograph, due to the unusually high number on my tickety thing we couldn't go into the main room to Get Baldwin, Glass and Brooks' autographs so had to start with Mark Sheppard and Jamie von Heartthrob. 'Have you seen my carrot?' Flopsy asked Dr. Goat MD in the barn 'No I have not, but you might want to ask Mrs. Hare, she might know.' Replied Dr. Goat MD 'Thank you Dr. Goat MD' said Flopsy and scampered off towards the meadow. Got Bamber's autograph and a cheeky smile. 'Have you seen my carrot Mrs. Hare?' said Flopsy 'Ooh no dearie' replied Mrs. Hare 'But you might want to check the forest.' 'Ok then, off I go' said Flopsy, and off she went. Got Mark Sheppard's autograph and he had apparently been up until 4am contradicting himself the night before. Then came the joy of going for more autographs. Flopsy hopped towards the wood and looked around for her carrot. It wasn't behind the treestump. It wasn't behind the bra- then I got bumped to the front of the queue as I needed brooks' autograph. The logic isn't really there. But it was at the time. Apparently 'We cool' according to Brooks, I couldn't really see it myself, not from my end anyway. Apparently we could be a 'posse'...of what I'm unclear. But still, the sentiment was appreciated. -cken. 'Where could it be?' thought Flopsy. 'Have you seen my carrot Mr. Bird?' asked Flopsy 'Caw, no Flopsy, i've not seen it, sorry.' said Mr. Bird flying off. 'Hmm' said Flopsy. Ron Glass and I had a little chat during which I pledged to go to a Lakers game at some point in the future (thankfully unspecified). He doesn't have vast hair any more, it's a bit of a shame, but he's splendid anyway. In order to describe the Adam Baldwin queue in the form of short and irrelevant stories, I would have to pretty much reproduce the entire words of Tolstoy. It was rather lengthy and slow moving, due to Baldwin moving at his own pace and talking/stealing people onto balconies/drinking with assorted people. It was marvelous but slow. He also took regular breaks to do...things. Probably retreat back to the star studded guest room and eat caviar and truffles, or whatever it was they did there. Still, I guess i'll finish the story anyway, but it won't do the length justice. 'Have you seen my carrot Prof. Fox?' asked Flopsy 'Now let me see' said the absent minded Prof. Fox 'I think I did see...but where.' 'Oh do remember' said Flopsy excitedly. Prof. Fox thought for a long time 'Aha!' he said suddenly. 'I remember where it was! It in the fern just over there' 'Yay!' said Flopsy excitedly 'I can't wait to eat it!' 'Oh, well it doesn't really matter anyway' said Prof. Fox. 'Why's that?' asked Flopsy curiously. 'Because i'm a goddamn fox.' said Prof. Fox and ate Flopsy. The end. Finally I arrived 'Hey, it's you, the guy with the hair.' Said Adam Baldwin, which kind of made it worth it, even if I did have to put up with three more bone eviscerating handshakes. Anyway, all was signed, Max, having been alone for about three hours was slowly going insane in a corner, and we had to get ready to go, our bags were returned to us with the porter seemingly glad that we were all beginning to leave. Must be rather irritating in the hotel with all the geekery in all fairness. Stopping only for a final trip to McDonalds we got on the bus back to the main terminal and then it was the time of parting. Apparently Sarah and Max had a lovely little adventure, but I just ended up the moral of the story is that you shouldn't be a rabbit and talk to foxes. If you're that stupid you deserve everything you get. for a coach which got me back to Oxford. how lovely. So that was my terrible account of the con. It doesn't even have any pictures. So just google 'Jamie Bamber' and you'll find an assortment of pictures of him in various states of undress or so i'm told. That should foot the bill. As for since then, i've seen some members of the Didcot brigade which was as always infinitely pleasurable and involved pizza and me saying many stupid things which were noted down not at all subtlety in the quotes book. Be more cunning Sara. Alas it was rather short lived, but I had a pleasing stroll with Jo which was nice. Also, what has happened to MCS since I left it. Rather than the school of Pride and Dignity which I attended, it now seems to be filled with shirtless boys tossing a frisbee at each other. If you're seeing vaguely homoerotic undertones in this GOOD because I did too. What has occurred. Oh alas. I shall be having words. Alas, I fear i'm too tired to go into the events which transpired in great detail, but it was a nice day which was good indeed. This reminds me. I've been meaning to put this somewhere for ages, as it was something I was working on for quite some time. It's not brilliant but was quite good fun to do for a computer picture. It's big...too big to put here so it has linkery. Click hither For those who don't know...don't ask. Anyhow, I guess that's all from me. Two large and nigh on endless rambles in two days. I think i've done pretty well at annoying the friends page community so am pretty chuffed with myself, and will continue to do so until people start hitting me with lead pipes...again. Given my infrequency and inconsistency of posting nowerdays you'll either get another long and horrible message tomorrow or in about four years. You can even have a bet on it if you want, i'll get in on that, what with being the one controlling it I suspect I might just be able to win some money. I like competitions when they're slanted to me winning pretty much definitely. On a side note, i've been playing quite a lot of assassin's creed recently, which is grand fun, if a bit of a grind. But jumping off things is always good fun, and if there's added stabbing, all the better. Still, I promised I would do it within the day, and thus, here it is, all of it. The adventure of Starfury 2008. I hope it's as enjoyable to read as it wasn't to write. No rabbits were harmed in the making of this entry...except 3. (And my pride for having to say that) Sez. Let's go Lakers. |
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| Apr. 17th, 2008 @ 11:53 pm A tale nigh on as epic as one which is slightly more epic (part I of ridiculous) | |||
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Current Feelings...:
Ugh, i'm utterly starving and feel like an assortment of snails are, at this moment, slowly crawling through my sinuses leaving their viscus trails ever present behind them. Or, to use slightly less graphic terms: I've got a cold, and it's irksome. Therefore (logic) I sit here at my desk with the intention to blither away madly until either the monumental task of chronicling my lack of adventures reaches an end, or my arms fall off. I'm quite glad i'm not a monk, chastity, lack of hair and such aside I would very much not like to have to illuminate everything. Being a detail monger it would probably have taken me around five days just to write up to here. I think my stomach might be devouring itself, it wouldn't be the first time, and before you say 'Oh Mr. Quinn, why do you not eat something' consider these three points: a) I can't hear you, so it's useless. b) You're probably reading this some time later and therefore the situation no longer applies. c) If I could, don't you think I would have done. But still, hungry or not, I shall attempt to sally onwards, like some kind of noble (hah) literary knight on his steed of the typewriter attempting to banish the evils of this blank window armed with all the letters of the alphabet and a complete misunderstanding of grammar. In order to do this in what my deformed brain interprets as a vaguely sensible manner (while the rest of the world bays in denial therof) I will simply ignore the most part of the last five weeks in my traditional manner and just focus on the last three main events. I know what you're thinking: 'Quinn you handsome stallion, how can you deny us the pleasure of your adventures, delivered with such style and panache, literary colossus that you are'. I only say this because as always I assume no one will actually read this bloody thing and therefore it can do me no harm. But my intention as always is just to block up people's friends pages with vast rectangles of text purely designed to make you work that scroll finger extra hard. It'll benefit you one day I assure you, but then i'm lying, so who knows. Admittedly I can remember quite a bit of what happened in the time before the last few days but the facts of the matter are (as always) that I simply can't be bothered. So sorry everyone with whom I had magical adventures with prior to whatever I write about but you'll just have to deal with being lost to history much like my deeds in the American civil war, but I'm not allowed to talk about that...or so the man tells me. Thinking about it there are going to be a lot of time gaps in this thing, of course there already are. I think at one point I skip about a year, I forget. Mind you, all of this is just needless anyway so one might as well presume I just do nothing of value with my life, which admittedly is quite accurate. But then again, i'm content with that, it just means I don't have to get up quite so early. Thinking about it, if I do somehow (through luck I presume) become vastly rich and important and am called upon to write my autobiography, asides from the fact i'll say 'no' up until the point when I am offered enough, it's going to be somewhat problematic. I have high suspicions that it may well simply read: 'I don't fully remember what happened between the years of 2008 and 2017 as I was asleep for most of it. I was drunk from 2018 to 2025 so don't really have much recollection of that period and then felt the need to sober up which took up most of my time for the next 30 or 40 years, so I didn't really have much time to do anything'. Or something like that anyway. Actually, in thinking about it, i'll probably just ramble on and on about assorted things which didn't happen to me but would have been nice. I can think of quite a few nice things which could have happened here and there and would have been far more interesting than anything I can actually offer from experience. But as always, like an over-large marble in an extremely elaborate marble run, I spiral off down the wrong track and end up rolling off the side of the banister to become lodged under the table and uncovered when it blocks the vacuum 2 years later. I'm getting off the point. The point being that in attempting to reduce work and space taken up with words, i'm creating more of it for myself. I fear this may well be one of those where the whole page is not enough.  grumpyCurrent Music...: Eagles - Long Road Out Of Eden Let's see, let's see. Repetition aside, I think a good event to begin at would probably be the trip to London. Although it's not the most favourable remembrance given my performance, it's somewhere to start. Much as I would like to write about my fun adventure to see Wicked, which i'm far more proud of, it's too far in the past and would add another vast leaden weight onto the scale that is the volume of this entry. Needless to say, London is always interesting, except tubes. Tubes are not interesting and somewhat unnerving in a way I don't want to go into. People in tubes are often described as 'packed like sardines' and if you think about it, they're really not. Sardines are arranged carefully head to tail so to fit them all in with enough room. Tubes are not designed thusly, they're just like boxes with people crammed in. No careful arrangement of bodies, it's just cramming. Not to be negative, but if you think about it it's really quite an inhuman way of moving people. Mind you, we humans are after all best at being inhuman to humans. Mind you, you can't really be inhuman to anything else properly. Still, it seems somewhat darkly ironic. I really dislike tubes. I don't mind riding in them or anything, but I just hate the feeling that everywhere around you are people who feel exactly as uncomfortable as you do, and are feeling the same feelings, yet despite being in such close proximity and all feeling negative and knowing that everyone else feels negative, everyone stand or sits in grim silence. You'd think it would be a place to meet people and be sympathetic in shared lack of comfort. But no, everyone just sits, grey and unhappy. Again, it's darkly ironic that you can feel most isolated when there are thousands of people around you. Perhaps i'm being a little negative, but it's not a day I look back on with particular fondness. Really just a case of bad timing, and with only myself to blame I suppose. It would have been a fantastic day but for a rather troublesome call I got about midway through the day which put me on a downward spiral for the rest of the day. I don't particularly want to talk about it even now as human mortality is always something concerning to deal with, and the less I have to do with it the better. It doesn't really concern anyone here, as people involved are far too sensible to have LJ. But still, regardless, i'm still kicking myself over how I acted throughout the most of of that day. I don't like showing it when i've got a particularly strong emotion running through me, and most of them I can cover pretty well: anger, sorrow and the like are all pretty easy, but i've never been able to overcome worry. I guess having a very vivid imagination probably has something to do with that as I get overly concerned, and i'll admit I did have something to worry about, but I really wish I didn't react to it so much, particularly then, as I brought the mood down. For that i'm deeply sorry and would ask forgiveness, but it's somewhat inexcusable nonetheless. I get very bad when I have to dwell on things. I guess i'm just particularly annoyed with myself as I like to be there to help other people when something's wrong, but hate showing other people when there's something wrong with me. Ugh, self sufficiency complex again. It was one of the few times in my life when i've felt utterly helpless. Still, Les Mis is as always glorious, and was able to distract me for a good few hours. During the performance I got a message on my phone which deeply cheered me up and put my worry to rest. I just wish it had been sooner and people hadn't been pestering me with calls throughout the day. I did feel at several points that I should have just gone back to Oxford and been of use to people, but i'm glad I didn't as I had a good time. Ugh, pressure is irritating though, particularly when I don't actually know what to do but people assume I do...somehow. I wasn't there, I'm not there now, why am I in charge suddenly? It makes little sense. Sorry, that's my rant over. I wrote it for me really, it's something I may well need to reflect on in future. What can I say? I'm into self improvement...in the mental sense. On a slightly lighter although more worrying note, despite the fact that two beds together can probably contain as many as 6 people, even with fewer, mad thrashing and unusual noises during the night is unnerving, especially when you can't see what's going on. The following day was a marked improvement, at least from my end. For one thing it involved pizza. Pizza procured from pizza hut involves ice cream from a factory. Ice cream factory (as I think I mentioned at the time) is a bloody stupid name, as everyone only gets it for the toppings and such. 'Candy factory with small amount of ice cream' would possibly be a better name but perhaps not a s catchy. Even so, it's not exactly a factory in any case. More of a machine really. But then as always I dilute the rare essence of important information with the bucket of water-like blithering. But then that's basically how it works around here so get used to it. Anyhow, sugar-highs were had as you do, and the national gallery is probably not the wisest of places to go while in such a state, still, however many years of art I've done kicked in and I slipped into gallery mode. This involves me strolling round very slowly with a look of bemused pleasure on my face and occasionally muttering expressionist movement' to myself. It also involves flirting with Asian schoolgirls, but there were none, and that's phase two in any case, which can only be achieved in certain museums. It's something of a sight to see. It was at about this time that con kicked in in the first majority significant way. One has to presume that it can't be that hard to understand that people are meeting in London rather than Heathrow. But still, what can one do? Mad tube getting on was had with all of the affair of saying goodbye to some and heading towards hello from others, others who are now abandoned at their first con, surrounded by geekish people in pirate costumes without a clue as to what is really going on. Poor lad, we were most concerned for him as we sped towards our merry destination on yet another tube. I think it says something about us that we succeeded in getting lost after about two seconds since we left our original destination, but we made it to the tube and thence to Heathrow. Sorry, something of a time reversal there, but still, with so many people doing the Dr. Who con dance, who can blame such fluxes. I was unaware that there actually was a London -> Heathrow tube, but still, it seems sensible enough, if rather lengthy. There followed a long wait for the bus, too long for some (need I cite a certain noise which was endlessly repeated and discussed?), but still, it came in time. As you can see, what i'm doing in my traditional style (he said as if the word style could be competently applied to him) is building up a huge arsenal of utterly useless gibbering. Who on earth cares about how fast the bus was? 'Quinn' you say 'Quinn, you paragon of humanity, why do you bore us with such needless detail?' The answer is of course that I have nothing of value to actually say and therefore since everything is worth nothing then I can quite contentedly talk about the bus times, fully knowing that it is equally as interesting as me telling of how I seized the rabid marmot by the jugular and hurled it to the ground, saving Mariza, the Princess of the Grand Duchy of Ironbread (as well as the following story of why a Grand Duchy even had a princess). I should probably mention what con it was for those who don't know. It was a Serenity/Firefly con with hints of Battlestar Galactica, although the process seems to have become inverse somewhere along the way. Still. I know my firefly, i'll be the first to admit that but back then was less knowledgeable about Battlestar, due somewhat to my attempt to watch the first episode first, which apparently is the wrong way to go about things. Admittedly, i've never really been one for logic but this somewhat defies it all. Still, having been to a con and now having watched some of it I think it's safe to say that I am the expert and know everything there ever will be to know about it. As far as I can tell, the most important points can be laid out as follows: Differences between Battlestar and Firefly: Battlestar has: a) Cast of millions b) Episodes of millions c) Robots of millions d) 'Darkness' of millions e) Relevance to culture of millions f) Jamie Bamber - Whoever he may be g) A severe lack of horses h) Everyone...ever is probably a robot These seem to be the main things which separate it from all other forms of sci-fi. It does however, for all that it looks highly competent and promising have a severe logic flaw. If I might explain the problem with a very clever diagram.  As you can clearly see, something is going on here, and I don't quite get it. Still, that is what time is for. Actually, thinking about it, it makes perfect sense. Why on earth did I even question it. There is nothing even vaguely odd about that. It occurs to me however that I might well be very very annoying now and just leave off here, right when we arrive at the con. The reason being that people will be on my tail for uberlong entries again, and my friends page clogging is probably quite sufficient for now. Tomorrow with any luck I shall continue this blathering. But for now I think I may actually do things which have slightly more of a point than this. It's going to very soon get to the stage where I just ramble on and on about meaningless things (which of course i've done for the whole of this entry) and not actually get anywhere. I'll save it for when i'm a bit more fresh methinks. I guess then this is an entry to demonstrate i'm still alive and maintain dexterity in my talons (or should that be nimble fingers?) I have no doubt that people would hardly be tremendously concerned if I were to burst into flames, but still. I would, and as Mark Sheppard has taught me: 'It's all about me'. With that philosophy firmly in mind I shall give these tired fingers a rest and go and do something important...like drink tea or something, I don't know. I'll be sure not to write about it tomorrow though, it'll be straight to business (a hollow promise). Still, have a nice evening all, I know I will. Sez |
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| Mar. 23rd, 2008 @ 04:50 pm This is the point of no return *dramatic chord* to Baker Street, you want the circle line for that. | |||
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Current Feelings...:
My my, well it looks like i'm home again. Of course i've been home for a few days now, but then i'm just too lazy to post anything until now...and also I have a suspicion that it doesn't really make much difference in the grand scheme of things. Hmm, in thinking about it the grand scheme of things is so very large that I doubt anyone really has much of an effect upon it. Well, maybe the occasional individual, but it depends on how large you go. If you think that we're just one small chunk of rock in the great vastness of creation, it would seem that nothing which goes on on this...reasonably small planet really matters. Maybe nothing will particularly matter until we start conquering galaxies, provided that that ever happens. Mind you, isn't the universe supposed to be infinite in size, and as Douglas Adams said Any finite number divided by infinity is as near to nothing as makes no odds.' and although he was talking about planets and i'm on about galaxies, there must still be a finite number of galaxies &tc. to quote many of the irksome English books i've had to do, but as it is a rather fun use of the ampersand, I think I may have to start, etc. just isn't as fun. I suppose the point i'm orbiting like a particularly directionally challenged moth to a light bulb (which nowerdays of course is probably one of those slow lighting ones to save energy...yes, this is a green journal. Well, purple...but you get the picture) is that in terms of the grand universal scheme, nothing anyone ever does will affect the grand plan in the slightest. UNLESS they end the universe, which I would rather like to be responsible to myself. I doubt there's much of a chance of that, but I shall just keep pressing big shiny red buttons until something drastic happens. Still, having established that nothing really matters any more in terms of the grand universal scheme, I shall utterly move away from it and say that for me, moving home is rather nice. Also interesting. And annoying. The reasons for this badly punctuated failure at two sentences is of course that I am glad to be back and can once again see all of my fine, fine Oxfordian companions, but as for the latter: I had to bring everything home, which was infinitely annoying. There's some...scrabble tournament or something going on in our rooms which prevents us from actually living in them. It all seems remotely silly, but what am I going to do about it. Admittedly I could have probably complained and made excuses until I was allowed to leave my stuff behind, but meh, from the evidence currently littering my briefly clean room, it didn't quite pan out that way and I just emptied my entire room. What a sweet young man I am.  The melancholy of Haruhi SezumiyaCurrent Music...: Eagles - Get Over It So what's happened to me now? Well I just seem to have strolled around in a dressing gown for most of the time. In my humble opinion the dressing gown is one of the finest pieces of clothing ever created, from a kimono to the traditional woolly thing which I am currently sporting, they have to be one of the most comfortable and fantastically swishy things in the entirety of creation. Not really being much of a greatcoat man...for some reason, I probably should be given my obsessions with being dramatic in a vaguely nebulous way, I feel a dressing gown is close enough for me to swish in an insane fashion. Therefore here I sit, with a vast blue dressing gown and equally vast hair. In all honesty I think I may be moving out of the eccentric librarian look and further into the insane writer uncle in the attic classification of appearance. Indeed my hair is utterly large and more perambulating bush like nowerdays than it has possibly ever been. However it is my sad duty to announce that it's getting shorn next Friday, not that anyone but me cares, but you know, it's kind of becoming quite a rare event now so, meh, probably deserves a mention as it's the only real thing on my social calendar for quite a while. I'm somewhat leaving the rest up to...well i'd like to say fate, but that would probably end up with hilarious though highly dubious consequences for me. In other words, I would probably get shot tomorrow...right in the diary. I suppose though that's rather how I like to live my life, I seldom plan ahead and any bears which want to eat me alive can freely do so without appointment, they just have to turn up. Admittedly this may not be the best of situations, but the same applies to things like gold, mind you, gold doesn't have to or probably isn't able to eat me. So that's alright. Anyway, it's Easter now, so happy Easter to everyone. You have my profound hope that you receive a munificent quantity of chocloated treats and devour them all within the first few seconds, as this is after all what one is supposed to do. Asides from the obvious and more significant religious ideals which Easter invokes, there seems to be little to do on such days as these save sit around with the family and as they slowly bore you into the ground devour more and more chocolate until you sink into some kind of cocoa induced seizure and have to be wheeled from the room on a large gurney. This having been done you instantly leap from the trolley and make a speedy escape to a more quiet part of the house in which you barricade yourself with fortifications far more effective than any French resistance's attempts. And yes, you can sing assorted patriotic songs from Les Mis if you really want, i'm sure that will appeal to some people, [you know who you are]. Anyway, i've made a little Easter picture, just a small scribble so nothing hugely thrilling. Here is my Eastertide picture to everyone who occasionally looks at this drivel. It was reasonably amusing to make, although quick and easy, which I highly approve of. Behold:  Now isn't that nice? He has an egg and everything. It's enough to make one say 'Hmm, he has found an egg, isn't that aesthetically pleasing, I think I will be a better person from now on.' or at least I hope it is. And I suppose all right reserved Zelda etc. etc. not my own character blah blah is probably required here, although why I don't really know. Anyway, in between Easter lunch breaks I scribbled him down and I think it came out quite well for something which only took me a few minutes. Ah, it's been quite a while since I drew in that style though, Wind Waker style has always had a bizzare attraction for me, but then I'm a bizzarely large fan of the whole cell shading thing so perhaps it's not a surprising as it should be. I'm a big fan of the amount of expression it allows, as well as the sort of soft and slightly speckled nature of the colours. Ah, it's been a while since i've been able to use such simplistic and thick likes, I tend, even when on a computer to go in for quite thin lines when comparing to scale in terms of drawing things, and on paper then the thinner the better, at least that's how it works in my book. Simple is often quite fun though, or at least compared with doing vast pictures of space and such. Bleh, I should probably put that up here at some point, but then i'm lazy and such. Ah well, never mind. Also I should probably get the permission of those who are included in it and such...it took me long enough after all, but i'm still not entirely sure why I black lined it, works well though...my appologies for those who currently have no idea what i'm blithering about, all will be made clear soon though...I would hope. Hmm, to as usual spiral off on a different tangent, the end of uni was quite interesting from an essaying perspective, as I succeeded in writing a reasonably well researched paper *shock* on The Importance of Being Earnest and Jane Eyre so I was reasonably proud of myself for actually doing decentish work for once. Admittedly it was hardly as researched as I would have liked it to be, but it was reasonably well done I feel, I guess i'll just have to wait and see what the marks will tell, and if there's any success there I may have to keep trying...or not. More importantly, it had the best title of any essay I think i've ever written. I really don't think you can argue with an essay called 'Sofas, Sandwiches, Servants and Social Status.' because a) it's made of paper so won't put up much of a defence for itself, and b) that much alliteration utterly obliterates anything you wish to submit against it, unless it has even more alliteration in the criticism in such a short passage of text. I don't think i've ever devoted an entire paragraph to the nature of sofas in the first page of a text, but I constantly surprise myself. Ah well, what can one do. Nor sandwiches for that matter, but then as I seem to have now reached the precipice of clinical insanity, what can one do. In all fairness I think this is probably best demonstrated by my statement of (now with added capitalization - for as we should all know capitalization is cruise control for awesome) 'this inherently demonstrates the HEDONISTIC NATURE OF CUCUMBER SANDWICHES.' I'm still not entirely sure about the fact that Earnest did demonstrate cucumber sandwiches were hedonistic, let alone inherently so, but still, with a sentence like that, it's essentially impossible not to include. Admittedly I did give evidence thereof, but that was the last line of the paragraph and I just seem to have been briefly filled with some kind of bizzare rage with regards to all forms of bread and buttered life. Ah rage fuelled creativity, where would I be without you. It does occur that I should really start being more creative, and yes, I know there's a deviantart account with my name on it which i've never actually put anything up on. It's all my fault. There's also the looming threat of writeitbaby and the like which I can doubtless submit to when it inevitably goes back up, chugging forwards like a nebulous locomotive. In fact, for anyone who ever played FF6 (III) just think of that infernal ghost train, for all that that was an awesome battle, that's essentially the struggle we sometimes faced in keeping the moon from crashing into the earth, but it inevitably moved closer. For those who are fans of the newer FF (and therefore clearly missing out) think demon wall, only more train like and awesome. Demon wall being in...mmm 4, 7 and 12 as memory serves. It's also generally irksome. But enough FFuelled (see what I did there) similes for now. I guess i'm just in something of a gaming mood. Probably due to continued interruptive texts during lunch with regards to Fable. Ah well, such things aside, and getting back to the creativity, I want to do things but then once I start I get so infernally bored or it all goes horribly wrong. It's just getting over that little first bridge and then I can commit myself, but it's tiring. Also the fact that my best stuff is off computer and I don't have a scanner doesn't really help things much, ah well. Maybe i'll finally kick off my deviantart when I do something really worthwhile and am able to scan it. Then all will be well. I may have to start pen and inking again, for I do love it so and I produce my best stuff with it. I just need something really elaborate to do first. I guess I could also start writing again, but meh, writing is a bit less fun than inane drawery. As for the next few weeks, it's pretty much free running for me. I'm going to do the best I can in the old grand tradition of taking things as they come. I'll be seeing old friends, new friends and with any luck friends I didn't know I had. Cons and such are upcoming, but they can wait. I've got to go up to London several times and am trying to get things together to get tickets for phantom. Ugh, Ah well, I somewhat like the system of taking life as it comes, and then attempting to wrestle it to the ground only to realise i'm built like a stick insect and being thoroughly battered into a tree with the velocity of a speeding lemur. Thinking about it, the noun which is speeding can really be anything, as long as it's speeding. Ah well. I shall once again attempt to seize life by it's horrible horns (which are long and pointy) and fail utterly to steer it into the direction I want to go. I don't really care at the moment which is nice, i'm sort of heading towards something in a vague manner, but the way I get there doesn't really matter, even if it takes me several years and many many hard detours which are filled with bandits, ogres and oh hell i'm going into sir Gawain and the green knight, it's all going wrong again curse you English Literature for turning me into this. Green his face and green his thighs, green his beard and green his hams &ct. etc. and such and so forth ad nauseam...which is probably green. You'd have thought that all this English might have taught me some grammar, but then it's me so who cares, not me...and that's all that matters. Well, to me anyway. Anyway, i'd better be getting off, as I say relatives have descended on the house as is per usual so I should apparently go and entertain them. How i'm supposed to do this i'm not entirely sure, maybe I should dance before them or perhaps perform some light opera. As it is I think i'll just lounge on a sofa and pretend to be interested in chiropractics or whatever they happen to be talking about now, given the flow of conversation, it's probably still on that subject, or perhaps it's moved on to horrible skin diseases, but only if i'm lucky. Anyhow, live well all and drink of mead and whatnot. Watch out for the white whale otherwise i'll have to do the rhyme again, and if you're unaware of what i'm talking about, consider yourself lucky. If you ask me, then you bring it upon yourself...multiple times, or I may just do it at random, that's the fun. Or not. Sez |
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| Mar. 5th, 2008 @ 07:33 pm Who would have thought the princess was Robert Mack all along? | |||
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Current Feelings...:
Hmm, well, in exchange for my rather ranty entry as of yesterday, i've decided to do a happy little comic for today.  creativeCurrent Music...: Arcade Fire - Intervention I just decided to do some really, really quick scribbling. Bleh, in the absence of our favourite speed creative community writeitbaby I guess i'll just have to put it here. Admittedly i've not really gone into great detail with the art or anything as it's just quick and relatively painless (ironic) and just something I started thinking of while my brain was off. You know when you wake up at around 4am and just some random idea springs into focus? Well this was mine for the day. I descided to give myself just two hours to do the whole thing, and knowing by obsessive desire for detail, I think i've done reasonably well. I fear i'm not one of those people who obsessively times themselves, so it probably took around that. Could have taken more, could have taken less. Meh, it was just a bit of fun for me I suppose and I enjoyed doing it. Ok, so it's maybe a bit randomly violent, and in some way inspired by a certain aspect of the final episode of a specific show (although I fear I may have been the only one to watch it), just the idea of a galaxy cutting something like a circular saw. As I say it's just a bit of fun and is in no way supposed to be taken as a grand masterwork or anything serious. I just felt the need for a creative outlet so went for it. Also this is in no way the grand artistic project I was talking about, just a bit of fun. Hope you enjoy its sheer bizzarity, because I did while drawing it. The essential premise is a metaphorical one. Don't try to understand the universe, you see me holding the universe is representa- ah yeh don't want to know. It's got a very small and triangular Mr. Quinn:  And quite a gratuitous amount of blood and gore as well as happy swirly things. Do enjoy it, it doesn't make sense...probably. If anyone can get deep meaning out of it, please by all means do. But it's probably just got something to do with me going insane again, as per usual. I've actually descided to cut this, as it's rather a long image, despite my usual obsession with doing long long things, I do sometimes cut images would you believe it. Therefore without much further ado, I present to you a cautionary tale: ( Click HERE! ) And with that, I shall with great speed bid adieu, as all this inane artworkery has made me a sleepy fellow and I think i'll have a nice read before I embark upon the joy that is Torchwood night where there are people to entertain and the like. I do of course enjoy all of this greatly, but then it is all rather tiring, so I should have a little rest first at the very least. Do watch out for lazers everyone, Sez. |
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| Mar. 4th, 2008 @ 07:32 pm Roses...Violets...Rake. | |||
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Current Feelings...:
Oh no...oh no no no, it's happening again. Oh look, it's some nicely constructed warning signs to alert you to the horror that's on it's merry way.  cynical (as always)Current Music...: Dire Straits - Walk of Life  It seems odd that despite the world being so horribly, horribly vast, and having such a vile and frankly rude number of people in it, there is such a great number of bizzare coincidences which seem to string certain groups of people together. It could just be a cliquish thing, or perhaps just the influence of luck but there is certainly something to be said for coincidental meetings. This is somewhat obscure but vaguely along my chain of thoughts with thinking about people so often know each other...sometimes by pseudonyms and then then meet someone who knows them, either by another pseudonym (or the same one) or in real life and so the great chain advances, people meeting each other through each other. It all seems a bit confusing, but I suppose that with an age when you can know someone living at the other end of the world better than you know your next door neighbour, it's only to be expected. Anyway, the world seems to be reducing itself via exclusion. The Internet is such a pretty thing with so many advantages and benefits that much of our culture seems to have become rather fixated on it and if you don't have this, or that then you're out of the loop. Facebook is a prime example, if you don't have it, you're really out of the social scene, and I speak from experience when I say that everyone will pester you every day unless you subscribe yourself to the bloody thing, then you do nothing and people just seem to ignore you. Thank heavens that now they can add pictures of you which you'll never even look at. Facebook is kind of odd though, as rather than giving yourself a pseudonym (which one would presume might attract even more people to the place) you are yourself. But then again perhaps that's the appeal. I realise as always, i'm going on a ramble here, but that's excuse enough for me to banter on about the assorted communities which we have on the Internet which we know and love. I've always wondered why Facebook succeeded so much when other similar projects failed. The "make your own web page about you" theme has been going for years prior to things like myspace, which is infuriatingly recognised as the first of such things due to its infuriating simplicity and the fact that people who use it to make themselves a "site" seem needlessly smug. Perhaps i'm just annoyed at the principle that there was a point in time when people with myspace were considered the height of Internet cool as they could have pictures on their backgrounds and things which played music. Wow, such marvels have never been seen on a real web page. Perhaps i'm just irked (as always) because the construction of the DSRO site was so long and irritatingly complex and I had something of a large part in it, the result was fabulous, and we made a real functioning creation, but myspace claims to be able to do all that in a matter of seconds, but fails. Oh, look at me, i'm an elitist snob, ah well, I guess we'll all have to deal with it. What was I saying anyway? Oh yes, Facebook, why did it succeed so badly? I know little about the world of such things my interest being only mild, but it seems to have powered forwards while other, earlier creations such as Bebo have fallen by the wayside. Corporate backing? Luck? Or maybe it's a black swan...though I never did really read that book, it seemed interesting though. Anyway, I stray away from my point with my usual vivacity, like a peasant spotting a berry bush but being faced with the sudden realization that there is a bear behind it, or maybe a wendigo. Bizzare metaphors aside, it seems to me that we can't really split personal contribution sites very evenly, but if they had to be put into three categories then they can be possibly defined by the degree at which the authors of information can present an identity. Clearly with such a vast thing as the internet there's no real way of saying that all of these are true and I can certainly think of examples against each, but the point is that it's just me questioning what my brain is thinking and transferring it to...well, not paper...but liquid crystals or whatever the hell screens are made of. Thinking about it, I should probably know this, but ah well, never mind. Here are my schools: 1: The unconcealed school. Here we have things like facebook, myspace as well as personal websites I guess. I guess the reason for this would be that you want to be identified as you so people you know, or not can meet you as you are rather than as someone who you're not. In all fairness, there's nothing on facebook which says that you have to be you, but as far as I can tell people seem to be led by blind faith. Actually, thinking about it, I guess the point is that you tend to know people who you communicate with on such things and as a result they want to know you as you. Ah, maybe we're all just getting so bored of looking at each other that we are heading even more into the realm of not bothering to actually meet people but talking via letters on a screen. This is not to say that anonymity doesn't exist in such places. I remember, back in the days of Bebo -how was that pronounced anyway? I never did find a definite answer-, I was constantly told by certain of my friends as to how they were 'friends' with Optimus Prime, or Dr. Evil on Bebo. Clearly the point in such cases is to make a persona for the sake of humour rather than concealing your real identity. I guess the point after all of such places is to be who you are, putting on a persona on facebook tends to make people think you are who you say. There's a bizzare degree of trust. Thinking about it, the term 'friends' is also somewhat warped by the things. I for one can think of many many people on what I would call my 'friends' list who I wouldn't really classify as friends, have only met once, and in some rare cases would deny I even liked. I guess it's somewhat to make people not feel offended or whatnot. The fact is that i'm sure there are some people on the aforementioned list who are equally antagonized by me as I am with them, and yet we're still 'friends'. Ah well, at least I can say they added me, rather than the other way round, as I never add people on facebook, being a lazy, lazy thing. There's also a sort of factor of forced replies which occurs to more than this. You behave properly because you know everyone is 'watching you' to a degree. I.e. If someone sends me a message, even if I don't feel obliged to talk to them I still have to respond. It's an odd system, but I have to respond sooner or later for the following reasons. I could do a diagram for this which would make it simpler to understand, but that would make it too easy for both me and anyone who is actually bothered to read this horribly delivered dross. Right, so first let's say someone I don't particularly want to talk to sends me a happy message asking me how I am and possibly something more specific. I can reply or not reply. If I reply, all's fine and dandy and i'm a polite gent who probably deserves some kind of vast medal bigger than my head. But i've replied, possibly because it's expected of me and I know what might happen if I don't rather than because I want to. Right, so, advancement, what happens if I don't? Well, there are a number of actions I can take here. I can ignore it, which is the most probably course of action. What inevitably happens here is that the person is some kind of freaky stalker (which is clearly proven by the fact they would send me a message in the first place...it's me after all) and so, after the advancement of about an hour/day/week you get another message saying 'AVAUNT! Where is your reply you scurrilous knave, behold as the whole of facebook sees your infidelity' or words to that effect, implied or not. Now the path splits again, either you can just reply so that your reputation isn't tarnished further, which is clearly the pansy way out, but the world is watching so clearly you don't want to get into more trouble, or you can be AWESOME and fight back. This can be done in a number of ways. Either you can keep ignoring which can have mixed effects. Either the person will stop messaging you, realise you don't really care for them and carry on with their lives in a normal way, else wise just cry in a corner until they expire, or they can keep going which can either be advantageous to you or them depending on who has the more friends. If it's you then the world will know they're a creepy stalker, if them, then the world will view you as an unresponsive meanie and denounce you. Failing the desire to do this and being an exceedingly angry person you can respond in rage telling them that they are a creepy stalker and should just leave you alone or you will simply tear them up and use them as some kind of confetti. This is generally unwise as the entirety of facebook will judge you on this. Oddly, people tend to look less favourably on this positive action than they do on the waiting game so, meh, use it carefully. If everything goes wrong either after this or before, you can simply take the drastic action of deleting everything the person has ever said as well as them from your list of 'friends'. The problem with this is that they will doubtless have contacts, who will inevitably be linked to you (as stated by my opening gibbering.) As a result you will eventually get messages of complaint from somewhere, which is only the tip of the iceberg of abuse which is doubtless to follow. Of course the other thing about facebook which is irritating is that you tend to know the people in real life, and so it is only so long after such things that you can avoid someone until they just sit on you and repeatedly bludgeon you in the face until you look like some kind of delightful panda. I don't speak from experience of course, and this doesn't really apply to anyone, just my thoughts on the matter. As a result, they're probably wrong. 2: The pseudonym school. It's hard to know where this actually begins, but essentially, a supreme example of this is something like a forum or the like. Livejournal can also be here, particularly with things such as DF and the like, although clearly LJ and similar blogs are somewhat hard to place as there is the division between writing as yourself as one would in a journal and writing as a persona. It's all rather confusing. I guess I could also put MMOs in here, as depending on the play style, you can either be Fred Biggins, A greengrocer from Hammersmith, or Zeltzar, the mighty WIZARD(!) (possibly a level 60 black mage) from Andurin-fel or whatever random stream of letters you choose to define your identity. Or like me you can be some kind of horrible fusion between the two and just be yourself but with a fancy name and shiny sword/staff/bow/whatnot and become increasingly angry at everyone around you until you feel the need to cast magic missile at the darkness, all your companions having been reduced to smouldering heaps of ash many hours ago. Then of course you get jolted back from the realms of imagination by some cretin asking for whatever bizarrely named currency the game employs/mountain dew. I guess this fusion between being yourself but having no one know who you really are is quite powerful, as it often leads to friendships where you know people as well as someone in real life, and then of course the great and proud ceremony of learning someone's real name (ooh gosh, how thrilling) and then realising that they know everyone around you and have in fact known all about you for about 36 years as told by others etc. etc. or not. Again there's an element of trust and such about things, because you can of course play a character completely contrary to your nature, but then there's far more of a realization and acceptance of this than on something like facebook, so I guess people learn far more to not talk to you as a person, but as the thing you represent. All this falsity is a bit unnerving I guess, but then it's somewhat what you come to expect from such things. If someone claims to be Cloud Strife, I don't instantly think 'Wow! the whole of FFVII was real, I wish to meet this person now so I can see his spiky hair and admire the way he lifts his VAST and possibly over compensatory sword without trouble, yet at the same time maintaining a relatively low muscle mass and com- actually, i'm getting a bit to into this and somewhat disproving my point. I think 'This person has played FFVII and wishes to pretend to be one of the characters...however in real life they are probably a person with no original ideas.' The less said about Drizz't Roleplayers in BG/BGII and NWN the better in this case. But the point is, people can (to a degree) be what they like but still be recognized as something, even if it's not what they really are (although clearly you can be yourself too, although I must say if I were a greengrocer called Fred Biggins, combined with the nature of Hammersmith, I think I would want to be as far away from me as possible). This is probably the worst kind of place to make a vast chain of pseudomymical friends and then realise they all know each other as I think is all too obvious at times. I guess this is also the kind I most approve of, plus the added advantage of being a level 60 wizard can hardly be denied. Dammit, I want to get back into RO (having just come across a slightly worrying reference to my character being rather fabulous and such while randomly browsing...I'll be honest, I felt a bit dirty but special at the same time, ah, it's moments like this which I suppose one has to play for.) I guess I somewhat miss the people, as well as the rich history of gaming we've shared, ah well, some day. 3. The anonymous school. The epitome of anonymity, what could be a better example than the chans? I don't really have much to say about these ones, save that the lack of being recognised, either as a person or as a character makes people run amok with no fellow feeling to others or really anyone. Such is the power of the anonymous voice. While I heartily approve of all of this free speech and whatnot, as well as the boisterous (if often offensive) humour thereof, it does seem very odd that once willingly stripped of identities, people feel free to say what they want to say and degenerate into racism, sexism etc. etc. Admittedly, reading it all is something of a guilty pleasure, but the humour is just so bad in places that i'd say it could raise amusement in almost anyone, as all humour seems to be in some way based on insulting others. Well, all good humour that is. I may well be wrong, but meh. I'll maintain that mockery tends to be quite a large factor in amusing people. I guess the ideal of having no fear of being discovered by anyone leads to the ability to laugh at anything as well as the ability to make jokes about anything too. Oh, anarchy, how bizarrely brilliant thou art. Not a fan of 4chan though, boo to it (sorry, i'm biast via 7). I suppose I mainly disaprove of the idea of imposing rules on what is supposed to be a free discussion board. Meh, but whatever floats the proverbial boat, be it porcupines or Fanta. Well I guess that's enough blithering on what can only very loosely be described as an issue. I had intended on this being something relatively interesting and entertaining to read, but alas i've failed on both fronts. In a vague attempt to salvage this from the pit of despair I shall madly attempt to write something vaguely interesting below this. I'm not even sure what i'm talking about before this point in fact. From my viewpoint it just looks like a long and pointless ramble, probably best not to read it, but then if you're reading this you've probably read the rest so it's probably self defeating. Alas, go and stab yourself randomly in the head with a thin pointed thing in an attempt to destroy the memories, just watch out for the whole...killing yourself thing. I should probably try and think of a more logical way of writing these things...as if that will ever happen.  Well wasn't that nice. Hmm, what else to say really? I'd like to do something really positive here, but what? There has to be something merry which I can reference. Hmm, I guess i'm arting again, although the project is somewhat secretive for now, but all is going well and it may appear here in a few days, at least I hope so, if I ever finish it, but it's looking good if I say so myself. More of that to come I suppose. On another topic, a keyboard made of chocolate would be the most delightfully useless construction in the history of mankind. I really want a bath as showers infuriate me. This is all save my desire to once again leap on a table and shout 'WRYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY' but there is a time and a place for that, and that is not now or here. The desire is growing though. I guess that's all I can really offer. It's kind of quiet around here at the moment, as everyone is focusing on work and such, and I have artistic things to distract me when i'm not busy, as well as the occasional roll of virtual dice. Oh wait, I do however have a happy assortment of books, which include those from Henry James to Haruki Murakami and form 8 in total, but I had better not blither any more as i'm quite sure that this is quite long enough without me dwelling on them. Perhaps something for next time, as doubtless i'll have nothing worthwhile to talk about then. Hmm, I guess this is one of those entries which is for me rather than anybody else, as sad as it might be, I do like to read the workings of my mind at times in the future, possibly only so that I can pinpoint the exact moment that I actually went insane. And you never know, it could be right here. Ah well, nothing else to say really, as i'm sure that'll do the job well enough for my purposes. I'm sure i've said too much anyway. Sez. |
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| Feb. 22nd, 2008 @ 07:05 am A mist, of mistunderstanding. Luckily this mist was a metaphor and wouldn't affect things that much | |||
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Current Music...: Gotou Yuuko - Koiji Romanesque
Hmm well I guess I should start in a traditionally arrogant/meish way by saying 'Happy birthday Mr. Quinn'. Admittedly it's a bit late now, what with it being a whole 10 days after the event and all, not that it's really much of an event but I guess i'm one year older and such. Admittedly it's hardly a vast blip on the universal scale, doubtless not even a very small sandcastle on the great big beach that is life. Not that i'm attempting to imply that life's a beach and then you die, but metaphor has always served me reasonably well. Anyway, I might as well start with it as it was quite an interesting event. I guess that after a certain age birthdays lose meaning somewhat and just become something of a day of fun with friends rather than the whole presents with family routine. Now that this has fully manifested itself, nigh on as far as it can go, I'm glad to say it was quite the merry day. Asides from assorted kidnap attempts, it was reasonably normal as far as working days go. Lectures drone on in the usual fashion and I didn't really feel that it was any different from a normal day until the evening. I was quite sleepy as memory serves and ended up taking an afternoon nap, but that's not really very interesting and it would be somewhat hard to go into great detail about a period I spent unconscious anyway. Unless I was to write some kind of long and elaborate poetical musings about the nature of sleep and darkness behind the soul, hells I don't know. It's probably been done. Anyway, the point is that I don't intend to write about an uneventful sleep when there's the question of my kidnapping to deal with. I don't know if it's possible to be kidnapped with vague willingness, anyway, it succeeded. As a result of all of this I was somewhat transported, or perhaps 'frogmarched' would be a more appropriate word, except whatever equivalent there is there for a casual stroll...a 'frogsaunter' maybe. Anyway, I was removed from my lodgings and strolled down into town where I was given bounteous gifts...including for some reason a T-shirt with a unicorn on, another cruel joke from the makers of 'Give him unicorn posters VI' all because I was insistent that a fantasy film with no unicorn just wasn't quite as fun. God bless stardust once again for proving me right. Anyway, then we went out for a Chinese, which I wasn't expecting, especially it being paid for. I'm not entirely keen on meals being paid for by others, but I guess I approve when it's to celebrate something or to help cheer up someone etc. etc. When there's a time of need and whatnot. Anyway, apparently I wouldn't have had to pay for it anyway as in an unexpected twist of fate it was buy one get one free on meals and mine happened to be free. Anyway, I appreciate the sentiment, as do I all of those who wished me a merry birthday time. Thanks be to you and the like, I guess in many ways it's the little things like that which sometimes are the most welcome part of a birthday, not that big things aren't appreciated of course, but quite often you tend to remember little things which seemed unimportant at the time. Oh and cake. I love cake. Not only did I get the most delectable red cakes from dear people, but also a golden box of weird cupcakes from my good parent. Anyway, there were quite a great deal of the things, and they only lasted for four days, I ask you. As a result I had to eat most of them before they went off as some people didn't seem to like them enough to eat that many. Anyway, I ended up having to eat most of them which was not my original plan. But they were tasty, so all was well. Let me point out that I very seldom will reject cake. Anyway, I had quite the fun day is the point I guess i'm trying to make. As you may have guessed by now, this isn't one of my traditional grumpy faced blithering rambles. I guess the point is that I've not really had much to be grumpy about recently. Apart from one or two minor and maybe major incidents, life on the whole has been pretty reasonable to me for the past few weeks, and the only faults don't really require looking in to. I guess it's all part of being a pessimistical type. If you look at everything in a bad light, only the truly good things show up with any great vivacity. While this result is hardly going to be filled with jubilation and joy because, let's face it, I don't think anything I ever write will be, it will at least have some note of goodness within it. I alas have not gone through some mystical transformation into a flower child and seen the error of my ways. I'm sure all will be overjoyed to hear i'm still the same old smug, arrogant and mean little beastie I always was. The change in age has alas not changed anything about me save perhaps a vague sense of confusion about things which has pounced upon me once again, and recently for some reason a decision that i've reached enlightenment. While this is in no way Buddhist enlightenment, it's Quinnish enlightenment, which I hope is equally good. Of course i'm no Buddha, but i'm me, and I guess a step towards understanding myself is a step forwards, or perhaps sideways, i'm not really sure. I tend to kind of walk in circles, like some kind of horrible, mane sporting humanoid crab. Which reminds me, I need a haircut...I think. I may have to consult people as it's getting to about bitable length, which tends to be a negative thing in the world of hairdom (in my case at least). I need to kind of get the balance right between satisfactory length to not make it look foolish, and satisfactory length to warrant actually getting it cut. Anyway, I shall poke around, as my opinion of haircuts is seldom even nearly correct. I guess I shall have to ask people who know what it looks like at the moment. Now there is some time for utterly irrelevant for side notes. I once again reach into the realm of the obscure to pull out things which I vaguely care about but no one else does. This pretty much means some kind of sci-fi fest for me, and me pointing out things which people have realised for ages but I for some unknown feel the need to say something about. Ah well, never mind. It's more for me to just try and work silly answers out for myself than anything else. I just don't feel they're really worth a full ramble on, as fun as that always is. Knowing me of course it will turn into one the instant I start typing, so be prepared for this being obscurely long. And I don't even mean obscurely. I've just been kind of messing with words recently, some are just fun to say out of context. While i'm on the subject, I seem to have created the word 'Euphemany'...at least I think so. To my knowledge it's not already in existence. It has something to do with balance but it somewhat needs a definition. Ah well. Pretty words are pretty, just as longcat is long. Anyhow, this is probably likely to get spoilerific, so I guess I shall have to once again delve into the realm of spoilermajigs. It's going to be something of a flowing blither, so i'm not quite sure what it'll be on yet. We shall see anyway. ( Stab here for TW/Buffy stuffs ) Well, with that long ramble out of the way, and yes it did turn out to be one, especially on the subject of torchwood, I guess i'll get back to life. So I had quite the adventure this past weekend. Essentially it involved a round trip from dear old Exeter to Oxfordshire, then York and finally Sheffield before heading back home. Each had interesting parts, although one somewhat dominated as I spent most time in Sheffield. But to begin at the beginning, I had decided that my dear parent was probably suffering from some kind of extreme madness that I was not actually home on my birthday, so descided to pay a visit on the weekend after. In all fairness it was not the most thrilling of trips, but it was nice to see people again. I do hope it pacified her as I wouldn't want such malevolence. Still, i'm sure my little visit was appreciated. I then headed off to York on the train. Now, the most relevant thing about York is that it is made of concrete and Geese, there are just so many. Any way, after the initial horror I somewhat forgot about them. Having drunken quite a bit and then while being driven around in a car I was more worried about proclaiming that we were in bat country. I don't exactly know why (save the obvious reason) but there were bats everywhere. Beware. Geese, Bats and Concrete. That's the word on York. Sheffield is significantly prettier than York, I had gone to visit Sarah and ended up having a thoroughly pleasant visit which incorporated the horrors/brilliance of Suicide-death (possibly not as menacing as it sounds), mad poking, Rather depressive websites, Scary boxes of doom, Red fasteners which were impossible to clip on yet with cunning were defied and fastened, Bill Bailey spiders, Alphabetically ordered DVDs, Obsessive Whedonism (from more than one side), Complex views on witchcraft, Jane Eyre and all of it's horror, A rather uninformative and dull lecture, Consistent molestation by assorted individuals, A ridiculous number of ribbons, Failure to tie people up, Pub Quizzes, Strange green diamond shaped lights in relation to the former, Tray stealing conveyor belts, Subways, A rather interesting series of shops which were not fully investigated, Me doing what were most likely annoying things and being generously put up with, fire drills which froze your feet off, Yoghurt all over the floor, An impressive lack of space castles, Piling things into big piles, Well needed breaks, Tasty music, British banks, Monty Python, Falling asleep too in the middle thereof...several times, Jeeves clock, Minted toothpaste (alas), Survival without tea, Coffee chocolates (evil), Carrying a bloody dance mat around for CERTAIN INDIVIDUALS, Laser spewing hamster balls, A hamstertopian future, A halo 3 shirt which I made no comment on, Hair, Specially positioned long coats, short coats, scarves, and a strategically hung umbrella, Hiding in a cupboard, The big move, A shockingly nice corridor, The stealing of screws, Putting blankets in binbags, and a silly bus. That's about as far as I can summarise it without reducing it to nothingness, oh and it's no order at all. I'm sure i've missed bits out, so if a certain individual can remember anything of particular significance, feel free to add. My thanks to the same for putting up with me as well as putting me up (oho - and it's that kind of joke which makes me thankful for people who do put up with me, as I can see why anyone wouldn't want to...). I had the most incredibly ridiculous journey back which is long, complex and full of madness. There was also Jack Daniels...and rats...and farmers. Much as I would like to talk about it, I figure this is actually getting quite far too long. Maybe a story for another time, or maybe one for those already in the know. We shall have to see. Anyway, that's doubtless quite enough from me. I've ranted too much as usual. Easily Accessible entries are not really my thing after all and I went on more about spoilers and such than I had intended to. Anyway, I guess i'm off to bed. This has somewhat been written on and off between reading and writing assorted things, so it's rather early in the morning. As always I fail at the whole idea of timekeeping. Ah well, nothing on today anyway so I don't really need to get up, but i'm told there's some kind of pub Quiz going on this evening, so doubtless I will need my brain in good working order for that if i've got to think and such. It should with any luck be good although without perhaps the technological mumbo technology of Sheffield (i.e. TVs, mikes, electronic conveyor belts etc.). Ah well, before I speed off on another tangent like a runaway juggernaut...I shall close. The end (of the world?) |
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| Jan. 25th, 2008 @ 08:50 pm Then John was a LiveJournal post. | |||
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Current Feelings...:
And now for another long and doubtless rambling...well ramble about assorted things including exams, work, and finally finishing off France with minimum effort. I realise that I finished the whole passage on France with something of a dramatic and goosebumpsesque ending therefore similarly the opening of this little segment on France should open with a similar style. As memory serves, though I never did read any of the books as a child, and only in the last few years ended up 'acquiring' a copy of that suitably titled epic 'Say cheese and die' did I finally realise what everyone had been talking about with regards to the dramatic cliff hangers. I'm going to blame everything which was negative in my childhood on lack of these moral fables to guide me in not entering the spooky house etc. Why I never read one of them I'm unsure, with a title like 'say cheese and die' how on earth could I have avoided it? It boggles the mind. Although by about the tender age of 6 or so, I was already being given the Hobbit and such to read or be read therefore it's possible that such tales were considered to childish. Once again parents, you're wrong. 'The scarecrow walks at midnight' how on EARTH can that be viewed as a bad book? 'Say cheese and die -AGAIN!' 'Attack of the lawn gnomes' and as for 'The cuckoo-clock of doom' well, need I say more? The point which i'm so obviously avoiding with about as much skill and devotion as man avoiding opening something called the cuckoo-clock of doom is that how could these books possibly go wrong? The title sells me, I want to read every one of them. Anyway, the point i'm crawling towards is that each book consisted of many chapters and R.L.Stein, the genius that he was, came up with the brilliant idea of ending each and every chapter with a DRAMATIC and thrilling cliff hanger which would leave the reader dying for more, thus turning the page would unveil the grand mystery which we were so eagerly awaiting, but it was inevitably a let down, as nothing ever really happened in the books, it was just made 'scary'...or hilarious rather, by just how horribly each chapter begun and ended. I can't really explain this without resorting to the horror that is examples, so here we go: thoughtfulCurrent Music...: Taku Iwasaki - In the Beginning Roars the Electric Genius A chapter would end with the frankly thrilling sentence along the lines of: But as Bobby turned around, a hideous beast leapt from the undergrowth, long fingers waving and a look of madness gleaming in the vast whites of it's eyes, fangs bloodstained and slavering as froth drooled from it's bubbling lips. Crunching the bones of it's latest victim the vile monstrosity hauled itself towards him, long talons reaching out and grabbing him round the waist as it pulled him towards the vile mouth, it seemed all was lost!!! Shocking stuff eh? what will happen to bobby? I'm pretty sure multiple exclamation marks were used too. It's this kind of thing which really demonstrates Stein's literary genius. Anyway, and now for the let down, let the page be turned and the next horrifying chapter begin: Chapter 295thousand: And it was his sister wearing a mask. 'Hey Bobby,' she said 'Let's play some baseball' Utterly terrifying stuff to be honest, and it did this chapter after chapter. Every chapter it would go from excitement to let down in the blink of a page turn. I don't know if it had to do with horror not actually being allowed to be horror when it was for children, just seemingly horrible but then revealed to be thoroughly tame, so the children wouldn't get scared or something, but that's what happened. Anyway, the point of all this juddering and blithering is that as the more astute of me, as i'm the only one who reads this rambling, may guess is that I ended my France post with talk of such thrilling things. 'But a BEAST LEAPT FROM THE SHADOWS AND FLUNG ITSELF AT OUR HEROES!...' was the line, as memory...or rather reality serves. The purpose of this should by now be clear. I intended to be like that greatest of authors, Mr. Stein himself. Therefore, as one can now work out from the aforesaid blithering, i'm going to carry on with something of a let down, but what a let down it shall be. Here we go then... It was a door. And so our heroes opened it and went into the flat. Now, France is big, really big. You simply won't believe how big it is. I'd go on in this fashion but i'd probably get sued, which while a doubtless fascinating experience would probably not be particularly financially profitable. Anyway, the truth of the matter is that it was far too big and therefore we had far too many experiences in it. When this is combined with the horrible truth that i'm really, really lazy, we reach the following terrifying conclusion: I can't be bothered to write all about France/too many other things have happened and therefore I can't talk about both them and France without creating some kind of horrible mammoth post which would proceed to trample me into oblivion. Although I'm quite a fan of mammoths, the idea of being crushed beneath one's mighty feet doesn't really appeal, therefore I plan to utterly reduce my workload through cunning and guile. Clearly the way in which quite a few people do this is by using bullet points, but I plan to take it even further. 5 randomised bullet points will sum up 5 seemingly, and probably really unconnected events which happened in France yet which were all quite memorable, as here I am, several weeks later, remembering them. Although my memory is still reasonably clear as to what went on in many cases, most of them are too irrelevant, uninteresting or just not worth talking about to put here. It's not a top 5 for France or anything, but just some things which I would like to remember. Therefore here is a warning: These events are from a horribly me sided perspective and may be uninteresting, arrogant, unknown, strange or several other words to anyone else. Got that? No? Oh well. To be honest, if you can even glean the slightest bit of information from this then consider yourself lucky/to have been in France. I'm unclear at the best of times. Therefore I present the uselessness that is my trip to France in 5 points. This is not in any order either, just in case you were wondering: 1. Sweeney Todd Posters: A fine film in all, and one I saw upon my return to England, a few nights ago in fact. The thing is though, that if one travels via the underground metro thing in France, the walls are inevitably plastered with pictures of J. Depp wielding razors like there's no tomorrow and with his hair done up as if he's playing a surprised and ageing Rogue from x-men. I should point out at this juncture that I am not a teenage girl and therefore have no need to talk about Depp ad nauseam. Instead, I shall talk about what he, or rather Mr. Sweeney Todd of fleet street ivres. This is namely, and in a word: Vengeance. The phrase on the posters simply read (as memory serves, though I could be wrong) 'Sweeney Todd ivres de la VENGEANCE', which apparently implies that he is drunk on vengeance. While he never seemed to be particularly drunk on this mysterious cocktail in the film, can't say i've ever had one myself, these posters did inspire us to constantly shout 'VENGEANCE' at assorted objects and people as some of us still do today. It wasn't helped by the fact that every poster, be it about Sweeney Todd or not in France seems to have something about VENGEANCE on it. It certainly seemed that Vengeance was the watchword for France. 2. Spoon Hurling Waitresses: If you go to France, it seems that everyone there either hates you, or stares at you. These are probably two parts of the same biscuit, but in our grand trip there was no one who clearly hated us with such raw aggression as the mad waitress. We had decided (for once) to eat out and for this purpose collected what small amounts of money we had before setting out (we had originally gone to find the Bubble tea place...but that failed like the PS3 (behold, gaming and topical humour)) onto the streets of Paris and after much strolling around, reached a medium sized restaurant which seemed cheap enough to afford. Now all would have gone well had it not been for our waitress who clearly hated us from the reckless way she flung the menus (cartes) down on the table and flounced around, waiting several millennia to get our bill etc. But the fury was utterly demonstrated by the way, when two of our party ordered soup, she flung soup spoons at them as if they were ninja stars or something similar. Admittedly my memory may be a bit lax here, but I believe they were razor edged and spun, cutting about 9 inches into the table which was made of titanium. She was an angry woman. 3. Wodka: In France, although vodka does exist, there also exists Wodka. No one quite knows what Wodka is, but it is expensive and comes in a suspicious blue bottle. We therefore did not buy it. Probably this was due more to the expense than the blue bottle, although this may have been a contributing factor. Also, Emma clenches her fists in rage when in proximity to Wodka...possibly. 4. On being on a metro, I saw some small and demure female person clutching a DN bag standing next to me, and upon leaving the train whispered 'Je suis Kira' in their ear before dismounting. You'll either get this or not. Probably not. I think I only told Jess about this at the time, and she didn't quite get it, but now i've managed to get her onto DN, maybe one day she will. 5. Hakuna Matata: How on earth could I refrain from what could possibly be the greatest human being in all of creation. His name was Hakuna Matata and he talked to us shortly after we descended from Montmatre. While normally I'm not a huge fan of street traders, the fact that he was called Hakuna Matata was enough to lure me in and talk to him. Even if it wasn't his name, he deserved it for having what is possibly the greatest marketing strategy ever. He deserved his two euros, and I got a rather fancy thing made of string which he described as being 'In Jamaican colours' and with the promise it would 'Make me happy and keep me safe from Juju'. I'm not entirely sure what Juju he was referring to (Emma?) but so far I seem to be being kept pretty safe from it, so it's probable that it works. I will wear it until it melts or whatever, for he was a person worth remembering. Wherever you may be Hakuna Matata from Kenya, you are a hero to me sir, and I will never forget your brilliance. Well, I will, but not for a while, and that won't be until the fancy Juju-warder-offer has been eviscerated. Therefore, the next time you're coming down from Montmatre on your way to go and photograph the windmill of the Moulin Rouge and you see an African gentleman hurrying towards you wielding brightly coloured string, think again before walking on, it could well be Hakuna Matata, and he deserves some time. Well, there you go, that's what France is all about. I've finally got it all out of the way, until people start asking questions, which they doubtless will. Actually, the real risk is that i'll remember something very significant and important and end up ranting at length about it, as is my way. As for uni and such, it's just been a long and somewhat irritating stream of work (see fairy murdering in the previous entry) and then an exam up until Monday of this week, where it then all ground to a halt and i've had the rest of the week off. As a result i've pretty much gone into hibernation, only waking up to eat and do things in the evenings. These have included assorted uninteresting things, which were interesting at the time, however would prove boring in description, therefore needless to say that i've not visited the hedge maze this term. I did however see Sweeney Todd as previously alluded to, which was made a much less menacing film when the person sitting next to you insists on turning every single line of the entire movie into a sexual metaphor, especially when Alan Rickman and sailors are involved. I have been trying to make up my mind for over a week as to what to go to a fancy dress party as, it's anything goes but I may well have to go clubbing in it so it can't be to bizzare, which is something of a shame...as you may have guessed from the Halloween disguise, elaboration is something to be desired. I do have an idea of what to go as, something which may well make someone exceedingly happy, but more of that later. As the week is not yet over, we have yet another lazy activity planned for tonight, which is a PotC marathon, with the slight problem that no one owns the middle film, therefore we might have to act it out. Will this work? Probably not. And, as another cup of tea is drained to the dregs, I realize once more that i've written far too much about nothing at all. Still, it would be unfortunate of me to change my style now, although, looking back on older entries, they do get steadily longer and more abstract...also more enraged as time progresses. I don't know what it really says about me, but it does mean that I can begin to pinpoint the time at which I stopped being a happy little flower child and descended into the pits of literary eccentricity and irritation. I seem to jump around in rage and jo- well, never joy but just kind of mild irritation/arrogance as the words go on, but there is definitely some point at which I stopped saying how pleased I was with everything and began to blither at random about how x,y and even z as well as the rest of the alphabet did not work correctly and how when I ruled the world we would have so many letters nothing would work any more, but would at least be mildly amusing. The odd thing is that nothing of any relevance seems to have happened around this time. I've always been horribly cynical, but then something happened to make my hyper cynical. I probably got stabbed in the head or something and just don't remember. Ah well, I guess i'd better go and make myself some more tea, for without it I don't think I would still be alive, for it seems to be fuelling my power cells currently. Odd thing is that it doesn't mix with red fanta stuff, which as i've mentioned is another fuel source. They have some kind of bizzare reaction which makes the tea go all odd and flaky, try it yourself (as Neil from Art Attack would say) as I can't really describe it, it works with lemon too. Anyway, i'll be off and such, as tea won't make itself...yet...but soon. SOON. S*water boiling noises overtake all sound in the volume meter and begin to damage the ears* |
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| Jan. 18th, 2008 @ 10:08 am I'm so glad I live in a mirror factory... | |||
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Current Feelings...:
Ok...ok...ok, so, I've been up all night having mainly utilised it to talk to a friend about nothing in particular, and then finally at 6.10 I think, wow, I should really finish off my essay which is due in by four today. So after considerable all encompassing essay writing, I look at the clock and realise it's nigh on 8am. Now, there are two ways this could go. The essay sits there having been printed off, and lurks in it's brown paper envelope like some kind of horribly flattened and rectangularized toad. Perhaps it's just the lack of sleep but it's probably mocking me. Anyway, either I can go to sleep now and the wake up at midday and pootle over to hand it in, the difficulty with this being that I will almost certainly miss my alarm, oversleep and have the whole of creation descend upon me like some kind of vast organic wall telling me it was late and therefore I will not only receive any marks but will also be thrown off a tall cliff and devoured by ravenous...ravenous brown paper envelopes. Dammit, it is watching me. The other option is to wait until nine when i'm told the English office reopens and I can hand in the horrible document. Clearly this is better, nothing can possibly go wrong with this plan, but I know it will. The office won't be open until midday and i'll fall into a bear trap or something. The risk of imminent doom is clear. Still, minus a limb and some time wasted or eviscerated by the jagged fangs of brown paper envelopes. The former clearly. Brown paper envelopes probably drool letter sealing glue and it would get everywhere. What would happen to my hair hardly bears thinking about. As a result I now realise that I have to do something to pass the time between eight and nine, and this is combined with the consideration that I've pulled an all nighter. Not a true one as i've been doing different things, and being up until 9 for me is like a normal humanoid being up until midnight. It would be honestly more shocking if I went to bed at 9pm and got up at a sentient hour. Ridiculous. Therefore as I sit here with the gimlet flaps if the envelope leering at me and sparkling with malevolence...or shiny papery bits, I decide what to do. Having forced my quivering hands to operate the kettle and pour myself a soothing teapot of earl grey, I take a single sip and instantly the world flows back from the black and white film noir of the nearly-closed-lids and once again glorious technicolour resumes. That strange buzzing noise stops and I can actually feel my fingers again. Huzzah, what a splendid world it to contain such wonders as stamps, graphics tablets and kittens. Truly god is in it and all must therefore be right with it, quod erat demonstrandum (said Quinn, the literary cretin that he is).  Utterly insane from sleep deprivation and caffineCurrent Music...: The birds wittering to each other Having consumed 60,000 more gallons of what i've now come to think of as 'life juice' neurons in my brain stop attempting to pick up the pretty colours and decide that something needs to be done with the next hour, and it had damn well better be creative or they are going to attempt to escape via the ears. Caffeine is now more prevalent in the body than blood and is beginning to seep into the bone marrow creating hyperactive T-cells, capable of stopping even the most virulent if ailments i.e. Dropsy. A biscuit is the only thing worth stopping for, do we have any biscuits left? probably, but they're at least an inch further away than the keyboard, so it's probably not worth trying to reach them until my stomach begins to devour itself. I should probably point out at this juncture that i'm hardly in the sanest of moods, as the more alive of me may have picked up on. This may well have something to do with the fact i've spent the last hour and a half writing about how gloriously foppish faeries are, and how much they fail when compared to...pretty much anything epic. I seem to have somehow grasped whatever the essay title originally was and mercilessly twisted it until it drops to the ground horribly misshapen but has some horrible twisted relationship to the wonderful kingdom of fairyland. In my now utterly demented mind, the act of writing about them seemed to have summoned them into being as I wrote as they burbled round my head stabbing me with their wings and whatnot. I don't know, i'm no fairy expert, they've probably got barbs somewhere. Instead of taking the logical step of returning to the wonderful land of sanity, I decided it would be a far more sentient idea to use the flying damnations to my advantage in some sort of horrible poetic justice, so stabbed them with my pen and impaled them onto the crisp white paper like some sort of obscene butterfly collection. Somehow I thought this would give me extra marks. Now, clearly there are three things wrong here. Firstly, I'm writing on Microsoft Word, so where the hell am I going to get paper from to impale faeries onto. Secondly, impaling faeries?, or rather sylphs, yes let's skip the damnable formality. Stabbing fluttery little insect men/women onto paper, what the hell is wrong with me. I have nothing against faeries, so clearly i'm just going beyond the magical line that separates those people who are perfectly comfortable painting and those who think art would be so much better if they had slightly less ear, a.k.a the border of sanity. Finally, why extra marks? What kind of examiner would look at the splattered corpse of a fairy, neatly mounted on a piece of paper with a large fountain pen hole right through it and think 'aha, this lad deserves credit where it's due', myself excepted of course, as apparently i'm some sort of subconscious fairy sadist. With the sylphs having been pacified and banished back to the realm of imaginationland, the gnomes having been allowed to escape on account of being under-represented in fantasy fiction, I jerk back to reality like it's some kind of unpleasant slap from the fish of sanity and realise that the bloody sylphs don't actually exist and i've just briefly strolled on down the spiralling path towards sleep deprived inanity. I also notice that the essay seems to have somehow completed itself and there are no sylph bodies nailed to the screen so all is well. This brings us back to why i'm writing this. The neurones, now swimming around the brain matter in some kind of fevered frenzy descide 'Aha, he's not written in that horrible purple journal of his for a little while has he' 'No. What of it?' 'Well, he clearly hates it with heart and soul and therefore let's make him do it for making us swim so fast, I don't like it, we normally get to be so lazy.' 'Brilliant.' And thus my body once again moves against me and i'm forced to double click the Semagic icon and once again prattle away like some crack-fuelled-pen-wielding-dervish. Why? Because my brain hates me and wants me to suffer by reading this later. Therefore as my stupidly long fingers hammer down on the keys like i'm attempting to play some vast theatre organ but have no concept of pressure based volume (though as it's an organ, this doesn't really matter...but organs are just too splendid to miss out on) and some kind of horrible techno remix of Rick Astley pumps through my head as blood vessels provide the beat. I should point out that this song probably doesn't exist, but my brain is attempting to confuse me into thinking that this is upbeat and fun, but really in my heart of hearts, it's just annoying as hell. Bizzare purple stars explode in front of my eyes as I attempt to drink earl grey and pomegranate juice at the same time, unhindered by the fact that one's in a mug and the other is in a bottle. The universe seems to be being carted off in some kind of magical flying steam train around me as my room rearranges itself, smacking my head repeatedly in the process. What the devil is going on and why are time and space trying to stop me? Space is a given, but I though time and I had gotten quite a relationship going. Somewhere before my brain chose to implode I had this bizzare idea that maybe i'd write about what actually happened in France here but this is really, really not the time for it. Grammar and spelling have no meaning now, as if they ever did for me. I also had another thought that I would ramble on about the red desert, as there was another red desert dream recently. But no, instead I resort to the old standard of ranting my head off at everything under the sun in a ridiculously over elaborate manner. For the record the envelope is still looking at me. The phrase 'drunk on sleep' takes on new meaning when you spin it on it's head, twizzle it a few times and then punch it and demand it's money. The phrase 'drunk on tiredness' is perhaps more appropriate here, but I think I may have undergone some kind of ubersobriety of sleep, and have gone so far cold turkey that i've essentially reached anti-drunk which is even worse. I now start thinking i'm seeing things for what they really are but it's all some kind of horrible lie. It's possible that at this point, if I were the hero of some kind of sci-fi drama i'd start ranting about it all being a conspiracy and i'm the only one who's not mad, but that's not really my style. Come to think of it I don't have a style, it's like putting a large word...sheet through a word...mangle and then a word...mincer, putting the horribly shredded scraps into a loosely bound suitcase and flying them to Moscow before ignoring them completely and asking some idiot to devour the entire contents of the medicine cabinet and then go on some kind of speech to text reader thing. Not that I use those of course, can't stand them. For one thing, they don't seem to realise that people in England do actually speak like Disney villains. Admittedly not all of us do, but some, namely me can hardly help blithing away in the horrible yet dulcet tones of the Oxfordian. There should also be some kind of filter for manic laughter, as the number of time's i've accidentally submitted a document which contains the line 'Therefore as Freud clearly shows, the id is underappreciat-MWAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAH! SOON YOU WILL BE MINE!-ed in comparison to the ego.' is simply to many to even contemplate. To be honest, i'm not entirely sure why i'm writing this. I somewhat blame 'A Journal of the Plague Year' for influencing me to journalistic style, which clearly means I have to relate my life and experiences. I have of course got it utterly wrong, but then I doubt that Defoe was in quite the same condition I currently am. I've actually just seen myself in the bathroom mirror and I do look like I have the plague, so there's a coincidence. Perhaps I should write a very short book entitled 'A Journal of Quinn's experiences at 9am having written an essay on fairies' however knowing me it wouldn't be brief at all and would probably rival if not utterly overcome Defoe's work in volume. I swear, I could talk about a mark on the wall for over 1000 words and still have more to say, although i'm not so far gone that I plan to attempt it, the crazy laughing will probably happen slightly before that, and this may not be wise given that people seem to be waking up around me, having had a good night's sleep while I sit like some kind of lebitinous eel, lurking in wait to hand in the evil brown envelope, which, yes, still watching. Why eels have anything to do with this whole scenario i'm not 100% certain, but in comparisson to a lot of this it probably makes sense. Ach, Beelzebub, I wish I had some bananas. I would really, really like one about now. Bananas are good. Oh dear. The cracks are starting. Having failed to get the governmentally advised amount of sleep for several days before staying up all night and menacing the online community with your presence there is always the danger of starting to see things. While for some people these may manifest themselves as moving objects such as BROWN PAPER ENVELOPES WHICH STARE WITH UNMITIGATED HATRED AT YOU, for me the whole bizzarity tends to start with cracks appearing on everything, starting at the corner of my vision. Far from being as mad as a turbot who has taken up sunbathing, I actually do have some kind of sane reasoning for this, although my attempts to justify it just make it seem all the more suspect. Anyone who has ever had an optometry exam will know about the magical fun which is had when the happy/menacing optician shines a big shiny light into your eye with some kind of grin plastered on their face designed to make you feel reassured or terrified depending on what kind of optician you've got (see prior) and asks you to look in various directions. I'm pretty sure i'm not alone in seeing the veins and such on the back of my eyeball, or something, i'm no medical student, I just make things sound fancy. Anyway, it's either horrific and scarring if you're someone normal or great fun it you're me, for I have sort of a morbid fascination with being able to look at things which I can never normally see. Anyhow, if you've got 20/20 vision then you'll never get to experience this glorious mastery of fun and see the back of your eyes, so hah. Serves you right for being able to see. The point i'm failing to get across here as I judder forwards like a square wheeled car...with no engine...being pulled by a small goat...with only 2 legs...is that I think that after hours of staring at the screen or reading or doing whatever, I can just about see the veiny things due to light entering my eye, but only near the edges. How this works i'm not sure but it with any luck makes me sound less as if I need to be put in a magical white wraparound jacket and sent to a room with bouncy walls. Although if you weren't under this impression already, then clearly you don't know me well enough. Haha! Nine! now to hand the blessed essay in, will it work? you'll find out in exactly one full stop. Yes. I'm back with a jingle in my step and I think my heart is beating out the drum solo in...some very fast thing...with drums. Possibly the sound of drums...da da da dum. Endless loops. Fun stuff. Anyway, it's done, i'm going through some kind of crazy caffine withdrawal symptoms and I think my arms may be unscrewing themselves. It's very hard to walk up a steep hill when it seems to be melting, although i'm glad I didn't go through the strange melty phase like last time. That was odd. Anyway, the envelope cannot look at me anymore with it's evil eyes and a grand sense of peace has descended over the room. No more are those horrible papery eyes looking at me like the shadow of...eyelike things. It did try and struggle when I put it in the magic essay box, but I forced it, and, against its will it was pushed mercilessly into the cabinet of no return, well, until I get it back, horrific mark, splattered sylphs, menacing envelope and all. What a day it will be. But none of that for a while, now I just need to write this stupid exam thing and all will be well, flowers will bloom, birds will fly around and I shall glare at them all with vehement loathing. Unless they're orchids and owls, both of which are awesome. There are probably more awesome flora and...birda? avia? who knows, but I have as yet to uncover any more awesome than those. I think my eyes are making a spirited attempt to evade the rest of my body and have a thrilling little adventure of their own as they seem to be trying to escape through the front of my skullington. Oh alas and alack the tulgy wood came tithing back etc. etc. the point being that i've now been awake for over 24 hours and therefore probably deserve some kind of rest. Well, not so much deserve as need, Well, not so much need as will forcibly murder anyone who tries to deny it me. Sweet dreams unto me I suppose, although they'll probably be about sylphs jumping rhythmicly up and down on my head...curses. Mmph. Curses. |
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| Jan. 5th, 2008 @ 12:36 am I wish the following rant was written in machine code. | |||
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Current Feelings...:
Once again the dreadful demon that for some reason seems to inhabit my existence has surfaced and decided to stab me with it's pitchfork until I get out of the foetid bed i'm sleeping in and suggests (suggests here meaning bodily lifting me out of aforementioned bed and hurling me into my computer chair at a vast rate of knots) that I go and update my life. This is of course utterly figmentational, my life will not end if I don't write about it, although with the impeding bullet of writeitbaby speeding back into the small scope of my vision ready to once again rivet itself into my brain and force me to save the world with agonizing regularity. However hopefully there will be more productiveCurrent Music...: Iwasaki Taku -"/Libera Me/" From Hell Also, Miss Purssell, if you have found this without any of my help, do get in touch as I guess I owe you a drink for beating me at my own game (not hard). I guess I'll try to carry on where I left off, which is somewhere around the M&S era, of course there was the whole con thing too, but I refuse to backtrack that far, as writing about something like that would be utterly inane as my head would probably implode as I attempted to clutch onto the failing strands of remembrance and everyone who read it would probably undergo similar symptoms due to the incredible dullness of the rant against assorted things, as if that's not going to happen anyway. Far be it from me devoting an entire entry to how much I fail at writing in general *ahem* I have no desire to now, as life has been far too confusing which for some reason people tend to mistake as interesting and therefore I shall probably have my hands full with just blithering about that for the next few hours/days/weeks as I attempt to write this all down. Can I do it all in one sitting? we'll have to see. Anyway, to spin back to the tangent I was so happily spamming away from: M&S is somewhat dull now. The novelty of smiling insanely at people has somewhat worn off and although shelf stacking is doubtless akin to the works of Shakespeare in it's brilliance and thrillingness to the right person, I fear this person is not me. Anyhow, i've been carrying on with the job as you do and passed my bizzare evaluation a.k.a. LIES TEST with flying colours, where the point seems to be simply to say how brilliant you are or you fail. You had to get 3/3 for everything. It's just pointless really. This means I can be re-employed apparently which I suppose is a good thing, as although I currently seem to be focusing on the bad things like some kind of errant fail seeking missile it really is much better than i'm making it out to be. Also, money. So very important do do all sorts of thrilling things, like go on magical adventures to assorted places, but this shall be talked about later. But I shall be happy to be back at uni where I don't have to work. The next thing on the social calendar was of course ZZ's party which I pulled the strings of the M&S system to change my hours to ridiculously early so I could escape for the afternoon. It was all rather complex and utterly tiring but it was worth it to see all of the old gang and of course attend the legend that is that particular social event. Truly it has been so long since I was last pounced upon by a rabid ZC, Exchanged Orchids with ZZ, Called Jo a witch and prattled to Jes about some film she 'Must see'. There are of course many other things which occur at these gatherings, and this is just a small selection but I must once again thank ZZ for her brilliance and various others for putting up with me and my rambling. The thing did eventually develop into the world's longest game of werewolves and I eventually lay sprawled on the ground as exhaustion overcame me attempting to keep up the humble fascade of being the narrator (ha). I didn't originally think it would take the 9 billion years that it did to finish the game, but as I began to hand out professions (Witch, Hairdresser, Gypsy...) I realised that time and space had been defied to allow half the global population to fit into the space of several meters cubed. It's hard to think of however many billion jobs are required. Anyway, I had quite the enjoyable time despite my vague sleepiness and ZC's maddened Bleachery, but then I love it really (clearly and sincerely). Clearly i'm stuck in rhyming mode. Alas I can't remember lots of magical quotes as they are for other people to write down while I attempt to remember them but fail in misery. Bah, I really feel that I could add more to this section as there was actually quite a lo- wait, i've just remembered the marvels of twister, huzzah, now I don't have to fail on account of memory. Having originally played it on a single mat with a few people, the magnificent tag-team that was myself and Arjun (who failed) we later somehow attached several mats together for a larger twister experience which didn't entirely work, but who cares, twister is always fun even when it's going horribly wrong. Anyway, Arjun may have no points as he fell over. None at all. Well, now that this part is still insufficiently long enough, it's all I can really remember as all I did at the time was done in a tiredness induced haze. It's a shame though, for it would doubtless have been even more magnificent had I been fully awake at the time. Christmas was the usual family deal with grandparents swarming in from the north and descending upon my innocent little life. Still, it's always nice to have a quiet Christmas which is what I seem to have been doing for the past several years. I think the only time we've had more than about 5 people for Christmas was when we were in Arizona, but that was many years ago and I can't really remember much about it...save that I think that was the year I discovered Tekken. Anyway, it's nice to see people who you haven't seen for several months even if they do just fall asleep in front of the TV. Of course this is quite acceptable for grandparents, to be fair they do deserve a rest and it's easier for me without me being asked if i'm o.k. every 4 minutes. Still, we played such fine games as monopoly which I had to dredge the deepest chasms of the game drawers fully equipped in a brass diving suit, I saw terrible things, skeletons of dinosaurs were probably the least disturbing of these. Pictionary and monopoly always seem to be the favourites although I managed to escape from the dread game of Ludo. Board games are kind of odd. Rather than breeding the fun which they are supposed to, they seem designed to get every player as tense and annoyed as possible before they get betrayed by another player resulting in a burning rage and hatred inside them which is left to simmer for vast periods of time. Ludo is of course the champion of this, monopoly comes in a near second. Pictionary is one of the few games I still find genuinely fun. Christmas day itself was the usual present opening fest before going back to bed and sleeping for several more hours, although I must say i'm quite the annoying present opener as my family continually tells me. After actually having to be woken up for Christmas day (a nightmare of all children under the age of about 13 or so) I insist on neatly stacking anything I get (including the coal) into a neat pyramid. This is helped by everyone thinking it would be a brilliant idea to buy many small and cheap things which serve little purpose and end up in a drawer somewhere. I appreciate the sentiment, but very few of them actually get used. Oh, and more bloody book tokens. I'm not going to do the usual rant against the things, no, you'll have to find that for yourself, i'm sure it's back there somewhere in the horrible clutter of words that is my livejournal. Although to be honest I wouldn't blame you if you just didn't look. The heart of the Tardis is less complex than the strings of blithering which flimsily bind this thing together. This does of course remind me of the Doctor Who Christmas episode which was delivered delightfully by RTD with a side order of cheese, the problem being that cheese was the main dish. Still, it is Christmas and so we can't expect an entirely serious episode, therefore donning the hat of non-seriousness I enjoyed the episode. Besides, the whole set was very...shiny (i've been hearing that word too much recently) so I approved, although some bits were about as cliché as you can get in this cynical land which we inhabit. Ah British television, when will you get good again? Besides the occasional stroke of genius, it's just not nearly what it used to be. I blame the world of reality television, but maybe that's just me. I suppose this brings me to that feature which somewhat overshadows the rest of this blithering. This is of course my new year in France which proved a delightful use for all my hard earned money in M&S. Still, I can think of worse uses. We could have gone to Spain for one. That would have meant money for housing too, but this was delightfully free. I should probably blither that later, but for now I guess I can explain all about joyous France and how much everyone there wants the vengeance. France is an odd place, I had decided this before I went there, but having spent three days there, I can honestly say that my opinion has utterly stayed completely the same. Yes, if you were expecting me to go through some unholy transformation and emerge from my hideous cocoon as some kind of beret wearing fancy man, I fear that there is something horribly wrong with you, you don't know me at all and you're horribly, horribly mistaken. The combination of these three factors indicate (like some kind of cynicism detecting compass) that I have remained exactly the same twisted wreck of a creature that I always am who has just been kidnapped from England and forced to stalk the streets of Paris for a few days like a jacket wearing skeleton with all together too much hair, feeding on the baguettes and onions of the innocent, although there's something somewhat suspicious about many of the French people we saw. It's probably got something to do with my innate theory that all French people really speak English and just have a microchip in their heads which lets them know when English people are coming so they can jabber away in a made up language. That's my take on it anyway. It would explain how everyone knew we were English before anyone said anything though. So there we go, I seem to have created some kind of theory of evil frenchness. Admittedly it doesn't exactly have the most backing to it, but then to quote: 'It's a fact, there's no evidence, but it's a fact.' But once again I swim away from the subject I originally attempted to start on like a furry trout. (The fur trout is awesome by the by). So anyway, Now to talk about France. It was a glorious summer day in fair England, and Mr. Quinn skipped amongst the summer trees brandishing a copy of Keats and singing Blake's songs of joy. Animals from far and wide flocked near to hear his joyous songs and he rubbed the backs of deer and patted rabbits on their heads. Birds whistled overhead and skimmed through the air in elaborate patterns. The flowers bloomed beneath his feet and the sun smiled down upon the jovial scene. Grass whispered in the wind and crickets chirped out merry tunes. Sunlight glistened off a silver pond, it's lilly pads teaming with croaking frogs and the ripples gently moving the water lilies in an elegant dance through the shining water. In other words it was a beautiful day. Mr. Quinn sat beneath the shade of a tree and prepared to talk to his animal friends, when a dark, clammy shadow blotted out the sun spreading tendrils of darkness like ink in water and making all the birds and beasts flee in fear. Three shadows in fact, their crooked smiles leered at the somewhat confused Mr. Quinn. As they stretched out taloned claws, the glade grew silent in fear. 'Come on Quinn' said Jess 'We're off to France' The magic of italics indicates sarcasm because of course this is not how it happened. Oddly enough I don't skip around woodland glades, nor do I have magical animal friends (well, save the cats, but to them i'm just some kind of gangly stroking machine) and the only reason I would carry a copy of Blake or Keats would be to jump on it in rage at their romantic ideals. Of course, there is nothing horrible about the three relentless harridans (or not) with who I spent my merry adventures. Their teeth are not crooked either, I should probably make that clear in case of blackmail. All exceedingly nice and lovely etc. etc. not a word against them etc. Anyway, having rendered myself a shield of cringing I shall proceed to hide behind it and continue (Emma does have a CLAW hand when holding her bag though). I shall not go into details, but for the sake of my own convenience we have the following characters in this grotesque charade: Miss Jessica - A young lady of considerable houses in France Miss Sarah - A young lady of considerable length in scarves and coats Miss Emma - A young lady of considerable swellings in her foot Mr Quinn - The French - Are many though they are one Anyway, events did not unfold quite as I described, After considerable wheedling I managed to persuade the parent to give Sarah (a fellow Oxfordian) and myself a lift to Luton where the magical silver bird lived. This did of course mean the strife of having to put up with the parent as she rambled on madly about things and pried information from the poor girl. Alas, my mother is quite the nosy creature. Having been suitably embarrassed by my mother's rambling, I eventually persuaded her to turn the radio on so we could have sentient conversations without her listening in on evil plans. Having failed to buy sandwiches at Tescos, partially due to the fact that there was but a single cheese sandwich left on the shelf, we decided to feed at the airport, so when we arrived, having fled from the parent's embraces as she attempted to mother both of us, we met up with Jess (who was wearing what I suspect may have been a fabulous coat) and went to the joyous land of airport M&S where I glared at the failure to stack things properly. As I moaned and moped around the store other people bought food so I thought it would be wise to do the same. +1 sandwich for Mr. Quinn. Having won this bounteous feast we met up with Miss Emma, who considered herself very suave in having pre-checked-in. I think we put our stuff through the check in at that point and then went through the rigmarole of security to head to a bookshop where we found all sorts of 'travel' books. By this I don't mean books about travel, but those books which are sold to people who like to sit on beaches and have nothing to do. They have titles like 'Blood will tell' and 'She's a sinner'. We lurked and laughed at them and their foolish titles. It was some time around here that I learned of Sarah's lust for sprite. She must drink it all the time or her power cells run down and she stops moving or something, I don't know. Or maybe she explodes. I may have to try and steal it next time I see her just to see what happens. Such exploding matters aside, I'll skip the most part of the airport as this is clearly quite dull. Needless to say that we had already gotten lost before we even left it, a theme which was to follow us for quite a great deal of the trip. I'll move onto the plane which was a bit more interesting, this is of course presuming that you haven't yet hung yourself, welded yourself to a wall or whatever. Actually, it's not more interesting, I lied. However I did get to carry out needless revenge on a foolish curly haired moron. He wanted me to move seats so he could 'Sit next to his gahlfriend' and I let him, what he did not realise however was that there was a large spike under the fabric of the seat which had been bothering me, I therefore leapt at the chance and smirked at him as he failed to get comfortable. Then I fell asleep. When I woke up, France had appeared under us like some kind of malevolent baguette loving whale. There was some madness with tickets when we had gotten off the plane, collected our belongings and attempted to get a train into central Paris. mainly due to some STUPID RULE ABOUT EXACT CHANGE. However with l337 hacking skills we hacked into the machine and emptied every bank account in France into our pockets. Or just paid with a card. I forget. On a side note, i've rediscovered how to access coke machine's info. Useless but amusing. Anyway, from the merry train to the metro and then to the street, and getting lost about 5 meters from the flat. We literally stood there for about 10 minutes trying to work out where we were on one of the maps we had which seemed to be designed for ANTS with some kind of MICROSCOPES DESIGNED FOR SEEING ANT ATOMS because it was so small...before noticing a street map of slightly more significant size. We then worked out that we were a few meters from the flat, and after fiddling around with the code, we eventually got in. But a BEAST LEAPT FROM THE SHADOWS AND FLUNG ITSELF AT OUR HEROES!... And, like a Goosebumps book, this first bit ends. I would go on, but I really can't be bothered to write any more now. Maybe tomorrow i'll regain my muse (Rei will fuel me) and I can carry on, but this is reaching considerable length. Also it's getting boring and there's not nearly enough METAPHOR AND SIMILE to spice it up. But then no one can read this because they're already welded to the wall. I win whatever happens. Ha. Therefore with much sadness (not really) I must depart to recover from this vast rant of doom lest it engulf the world. Thus that is all from me for now... Sezfgeruuiii....*expires from lack of happy good make feel nice...aka that reddish fanta which is my equivalent of Sarah's sprite* *BANG* |
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| Dec. 15th, 2007 @ 05:22 am THIS UNION JACK IS A JACK THAT WILL PIERCE THE HEAVENS! | |||
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Current Feelings...:
Right, I'm back from the mooniversity. Actually I was back on the Saturday, but i've been horribly busy ever since. And this isn't my typical 'oh, i'm so lazy' busy, this is actually the horror that is being forced to work for money. I mean i'm all for money, but work is a miserable stain on the otherwise clean slate that is holidays. But where may you (right well) ask, what kind of establishment would possibly employ something like me? Well, apparently Marks and Spencer Bicester would, much to my confusion as I got about 8000 calls on my phone. They most certainly are very eager, almost too eager, i'm a tad suspicious. Anyway, today was my first actual day of working, and Monday and Tuesday were both the GRUELLING training process. I somehow succeeded in passing this, possibly by plastering a fake smile all over my face in the vague hope I wouldn't be seen as the morose creature that I am. Anyway, the training involved lots of moving around and writing things and whatnot, there was a quiz at one point, which I got 10/10 in I might add mind you, given the questions were things like: 'How would you lift a box': 1) Bend legs, back straight, hold box tight to chest OR 2) Bend back 360 degrees and lift box in a jerking twisting motion which dislocates your spine. Ok, so, not quite that, but close enough. One of the questions really was: 'Which of the following might be a risk in the workplace?' 1) A pregnant employee. 2) A Spanish employee. The answer was clearly 2...for they will be doing all sorts of crazy Spanish things with the food and whatnot, however, against my better judgement I put 1) (as a joke) and got it right. Who would have thought a pregnant employee would be so much bother. I ask you. Anyway, the point of this is that I would have thought it quite hard to fail this test, yet some people still succeeded in doing so. Ah well, each to their own, they'll just have to take the lifting things up class again. Twitching slightlyCurrent Music...: Ilan Eshkeri - Septimus Anyway, it seems that none of that really matters in the commercial world anyway so long as you stroll around like some kind of demented mannequin with a grin rivalling a crescent moon on your face. It's more than a bit unnerving. This was the main (only?) thing we were supposed to take away with us from the training it would seem. So While in training I wandered around looking like some kind of deranged hyena. Of course, this was before I actually even had to meet the shoppers, and once I actually got out onto one of the tills, the inane grin became more wide and threatening until I felt as if my head might just fall off from the weight of it. I can't really keep saying this kind of thing without some kind of visual prompt, therefore, by the powers of speedy illustration (alas, for I would have liked to spend more than the mere hour I did) for your viewing pleasure, I present: Sez: When a customer asks him for a refund.  Actually, in thinking about it, that's what I generally look like while i'm working, regardless of what mood i'm in. Hmm, anyway, work is interesting though I can see it getting very dull. The timing is good for a critter of the night like m'self though, as it means I can maintain my usual schedule of not sleeping until the early hours and then getting up in the early afternoon. Ah, the bliss of being lazy. Then I have to stroll over to Bicester and begin the laborious process of stacking shelves or whatever other horror they have in store for me. I like working at the tills, at least I get to smile more madly, more often there. Stacking shelves is kind of dull. Still, it's the price I pay for doing the evening shift (not that I really had a choice) as we close up shop and have to stack things and whatnot, it's really not much fun, but it's not too hard either. Anyhow, the main and pretty much only risk, besides being crushed underneath a mountain of Christmas foodstuffs is paper cuts, they are irksomely common. In the single 6 hours I've been there, I received about...4 cuts on my hands, several of which I have no idea where they were procured from. Still, they pay is good and I will be able to fund my trip to Paris for new years. Yes, Paris, someone I now know thanks to university has a flat there so I'm joining them and various others for a new years party French style. It should be lots of fun, though i'm not the hugest fan of Paris in the world, still. It will be fun, even for cynical old me. I've now been at M&S for another day, it was better as I worked on the tills again and smiled more madly at people than usual. (This thing has taken 2 days to complete). I suppose now is as good a time as any to talk about the CONVENTION which happened, what...several months ago? yeah, i've sort of been putting it off. To sum it up, I went to MCM expo, which is a sci-fi/anime con, and had fun. And now for a slightly more long winded description. It's always a good sign when you get on a bus in Oxford which is headed to London and see someone in cosplay even there. (for those who are not in the know, cosplay is essentially dressing up as characters from...things). There was an asian girl at the back of the bus dressed as Haruhi Suzumiya which is of course the ever popular star of 'The melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya' an anime which I have long loved, and has spawned the most irksome dance ever, but more on that later. I would have gone and laughed madly at her and pointed was it not for the fact she was with some MAN or other. It's not nearly as fun to torment people when they're with others. Anyhow, as the bus went it's merry way to London I lurked in silent glee doing the whole fingertips plotting thing. You know, where you put your hands in a prayer like position and hit your fingertips together in order? No..? Meh, who cares. I did it. Anyhow, we arrived at Victoria and I leapt off the bus and PRANCED towards the subway chuckling in fiendish glee. At some points on the subway people were looking at me, this may have been a combination of my hair being utterly mad that day as I had in no way attempted to tame it, and the fact I was grinning madly to myself. I may have laughed manically at one point too, i'm not sure how much of it was in my head. As I drew closer and closer to the excel center in London, I saw greater and greater swarms of strange looking people and lurked in corners. When I finally arrived at the blasted destination, which involved taking a series of trains which was tantamount to travelling across Europe in it's complexity. I was greeted by some pirates. That pretty much sums up how mad this experience was going to be. I got off the train, and two people dressed as pirates leapt out and shouted 'ARR'. Not one to be put upon, I simply stated 'Actually, I believe it's YARR! Farmers say Arr.' And smiled to myself as I sauntered off. Truly, I was king of this land, and all that lay in it. As I drew closer there was a swarm of people lurking around in various costumes doing ridiculous things to each other. I, sans any form of costume just glared at them. I then went to meet Jamie, phoning him and simply stating 'Hello idiot, why are you not here?' It was eventually ascertained that he was indeed there, just not at my location, this was not good enough. It should be pointed out here that Jamie is in no way the same level of Anime knowledge database I am. His knowledge is somewhat limited. We walked into a vast...storeroom thing, filled with a big snake of people, many of whom were dressed as strange people. As we took our place at the end of the line, Jamie whispered to me 'See, we're not the only ones not in costume' and pointed to a lad in front of us. But his looks could not deceive MY SHARP EYES. From the blue jeans, to the white shirt...to the no shoes. It was L. Thus the L count rose to 1. Back to the main story. At this point, I first saw the dance being performed. Make no mistake, i'm a veteran(ish) con goer, so the dance is nothing new. However, 5 minutes in, and already the dance is being performed. This, like the Internet is a serious business. For those who don't know, the dance (also from Haruhi) has been featured on here before, and although brilliant in it's own way, when people at cons start performing it horribly, after about the 7000th time, it gets slightly irksome. However the dance has caught on so much that it's being done EVERYWHERE. I had a link somewhere of it being done in a prison. Let's see if I can find it. Oop. I can. Here's the original, again: And, this is now what happens in some bizzare prison. Instead of doing PUNISHMENT for their most EVIL CRIMES, they do the dance instead: It's enough to drive one insane. Anyway, everyone was doing the dance, 5 minutes in. But I didn't care, I just mentally murdered them all and glared madly at everyone. They were all in costumes after all. Having committed a mental massacre, it was finally time to get the tickets. Having grasped them from the sweaty hand of the retailer, it was finally time to enter. On entering, I was given a most curious bag which was filled with things. 'What is this?' I thought to myself, 'Surely not...FREE THINGS!' My passion for free things not nearly sated by the bag, which did admittedly contain free things, just not enough of them, I wandered into the big hall thingumy and glared madly at things which could be stolen or procured for free. The number of people already in there was quite large, but as people can't really be stolen, I ignored the most of them and plunged on into the centre being hit by errant wings, tails and spiky hair all the while. Halting my progress only long enough to snatch a few leaflets from a table I continued into the throng, Jamie trailing somewhere behind. I think my main thought at this moment was: 'I KNOW WHO EVERYONE IS...AAHAHAHAHAHAH' as the light of madness once more came into my eyes and I gazed inanely at things. This is hardly a new thing at cons, as, being a creature which feeds off emotions, I was absorbing quite a lot of mad exuberant excitement. Having scouted round the compound several times and absorbing the surroundings, as well as bumping into about 50 billion more Ls, some chained slightly provocatively to their respective Raitos, I actually stopped strolling around like a madman and made a concentrated effort to look at things. There was much on sale as per usual, but it was slightly more focused on the more animeical community than normal. Going with the general rule of cons, which is: 'Don't buy anything for two hours' which must be obeyed for various reasons (most good stock is brought out after 3 hours, expensive stuff comes down in price, people give you more free things etc.) I strolled happily around while Jamie wandered off and became engrossed in the transformers posters. After I had ventured about 5 meters from him, a curious thing happened. A random girl leapt on me from behind and hugged me. As I screamed in primordial rage, and whirled round to finish her off with one blow of my GIANT ENEMY CRAB like claws, she stuck her tongue out at me and ran off. I noticed as she vanished into the crowd she was wearing a 'free hugs' shirt and couldn't be bothered to chase her. I would have thought little more of the matter but were it not for the fact that the very next time Jamie moved away from me, two random females leapt upon me crushing me in vicelike grips. As curious as it sounds, this happened five times during the day, all of which only occurred when Jamie had moved away from me. Either he's a ward against rabid women (which wouldn't surprise me) or he was somehow employing them. The etiquette of hugging at cons is always questionable, i'm not a huge fan of being de-oxygenated myself but some seem to enjoy it. I don't hugely care about being hugged, just so long as they don't expect me to do anything back, like look at them. Anyway, now I know it's all a conspiracy so...boo. As memory serves we then chased a small child dressed as No Face from Spirited away around the con floor, but he didn't notice this, probably looking for food or a face or something. Having satisfied ourselves that he was not going to eat anyone we went to briefly view the feature on 'Heroes' which featured the ethnic gentleman from the show, who's name I can't quite recall. He can phase through objects and stuff, J.D.? something like that. No matter, he just hugged children and smiled a lot. I don't know if they had denied him from talking or something, because he didn't really seem to speak very much, or maybe I just didn't hear him as I kept strolling off to stare at things. To be honest, the entire con can be summed up in a few pictures, as talking about it so much is just wearing me out. Both shall include Jamie being happy, as I am grimacing and being forced to point the camera. Here we go: There's going to be some kind of clever cut thing here to save space and interweb etc. ( Click here for the horrible photos ) Right, if that worked...which it did, then we're fine. You'll notice (if you're in the know) that none of these are anime characters, because Jamie's knowledge of anime is low, and it was his camera. Boo. I would have been menacing them in photos and it would have been exceedingly awesome. I then ate lunch whilst exchanging casual conversation with a girl dressed as a robot (a chobit, to be technical). The tables in the place seemed designed so that you were forced to talk to others. Shocking stuff really. Anyway, the thing which I think was intended to be Cho twittered on at me like some kind of massive giant thrush and constantly persisted that I was dressed as someone. I was not, but it kept claiming I was. When I, in a perfectly reasonable attempt to discover who I was supposed to be portraying, asked who I was then, It simply told me to guess. This was slightly irksome, I had a stab and uncovered, on the first guess that I was somehow disguised as Zetsubou Sensei who I may have remarked before I bear a passing resemblance to. It didn't help that my hair was still sticking up at mad angles. Having established that I was not in fact dressed as anyone, (but confiding I love Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei with a passion) I was constantly badgered that I should dress up the next year. While the idea of publicly displaying my insanity on such a large scale doesn't really appeal (as if I don't do it enough anyway) the ideas of a) dressing up and b) making a ridiculously elaborate costume and laughing at others does. Therefore we shall see. Perhaps going as someone ridiculously conspicuous and then punching anyone who guesses who I am might not be a bad idea, especially if I can be someone obscure with a vast weapon with which to hit with, ah well, we shall see. Bleach seemed to be the big dress theme this year, and it's not surprising given it's new-found popularity in the UK. There was of course the usual Naruto crowd, but as always, One Piece was sadly under-represented. ah well, one day one piece, one day. I did see a Luffy though, but it was terrible. I then actually went on a purchasing spree and bought several things, including a Rei Ayanami model, which has now become my muse for the writing of long long English essays as it lurks in corners and gives me ideas. There was a drawee place, but I couldn't really be bothered while there were things to do, and most of the poeple's drawing was either horrible, copied or generic. Not that I'm saying i'm not those things, but I would have gotten irked by others. One of the few things I didn't actually do which I intended to was leap on a table and shout "WRYYYYYYYYYY!!!" As a homage to Jojo, but alas this was not to be, as there were no free tables. A steamroller would have been better, but there were none in sight. I might have done the whole thing had I had the knives, saying 'Za Wurado' is fun. For those who have no idea what i'm going on about yet again, here is a short hint in videomatic format. You'll have to watch all the way to the end for it though, which is a sad shame. And then it was escape time, hounded to the door by people giving out free stuff (as if I could ever have enough) and stopping only to watch Robot Wars....which was live there for some reason, and both of the robots had flippers, but were unfippable...so it was rubbish...but we went out into the glorious sunlight at 6pm, having had a day of much fulfilment. I then got the train to Exeter and glee-d over my prizes. And that's about all I can remember, there were probably about seven thousand things I didn't mention. But they can be ignored...for now, if anyone wants to SPRING random questions on me, do. In other news, I still love stardust, it's most glorious, and the OST is glorious too. If you've not seen it, shame on you. But it's too late now, or is it? Septimus is not only a hero but has the best theme i've heard in a long, long while. You, and that means YOU JESS! Listen to Septimus' theme or have things hurled at you when next we meet, namely an ipod with the song on. Ilan Eshkeri is rather good as a film composer. I may have to hurl DVDs at people for christmas too. And with that, I reach the end of this labour of hate. There will be no real concluding paragraph as I just REFUSE to do one. That is all. Oh, and batman beyond was surprisingly good...and adult. Ah, old cartoons, will you ever fail me? Sez. Behold, Our new flag:  ROW! ROW! FIGHT THE POWER! |
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| Nov. 19th, 2007 @ 04:11 am I really, really advise against reading this. Seriously. It's a bad idea. | |||
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Current Feelings...:
What? What? Yes...yes, i'm still here. I know that I...wait, none of that, i'm going off on the traditional tangent of blithering on about how I always start entries in a specific way, which is re- GAH! no! NO! I will not fall into my own traps. I should probably blither madly about something today, as it's been too long since I last wrote anything, and that wasn't anything substantial, that was just me looking like i'd disguised myself as a dairy cow in some bizzare, sinister and twisted attempt to sabotage a creamery. Or whatever. So here I am sitting in my room at 2am waiting for...well, something to happen I suppose. actually, I'm waiting for something specific. I'm not just sitting here on my own waiting for one of my curtain...sorry, that should be my only curtain to explode or evaporate. No, alas I am waiting for something specific. What that is, I won't say, as I like to maintain some bizzare sense of mystery, as those people who actually bother to read this drivel will be driven steadily insane by curiosity as they sit in front of the screen, one hand raised to stroke their bearded chin (even women) and thinking 'hmm, could he be awaiting the arrival of the forest king, or mayhap a small van carrying a basket of radishes?' I suppose I could just write gibberish from now on and no one will even notice, as it's such a perplexing mystery that no one will be able to burrow any deeper into this tunnel of wisdom. Ha, wisdom? from me? my, how unlikely. I've only said one even vaguely wise thing in the past 7 years, and that was by accident. Anyhow, to maintain some vestige of sense I shall vaguely attempt to cling to the subject like an alcoholic clinging to the bottle. I know it's bad for me, but I have to maintain my image...whatever that may be. I think an alcoholic may be a step...nay, several steps up from me. I am of course talking about social status. Not the evolutionary ladder, mind you, I can't really get very high there too. I'm at least a portion of shrub with a pinch of cat and possibly some badger thrown in there for good measure. Which reminds me. Does anyone else remember the animals of farthing wood? In particular the - and behold as the maddened spiralling out of control begins, my attempts to tame the subject having been reduced to some kind of horrific stage show as I walk on stage and glare at the audience for 4 hours before strolling up and consuming a stiff drink. I mean look at me, I can even start a torrent of rambling from myself pointing out how I can't stick to a subject. but never fear, i'll get back to it. Which reminds me, who likes those pink wafer biscuits? I love them, and wagon wheels too. I thought both were dead, but I was wrong. Oh how I love it here, it's like having gone back in time several years to a land where there were no concerns about how many chemicals a food contained. As long as you could eat it without dying in 2 hours and if it was slightly squashy, you would devour it without a hint of shame. - so... badgers, anyway. Oh yes, that's what I was talking about. The badger. I remembered it, only the other day. Just the specific scene where the weasel and the badger were stuck in the wine cellar? yes? is it all coming back?...not that I care, I remember, and that's all that really matters, to me at least. To you...if anyone is actually reading this...you may mind quite a lot. Mind you, if you don't understand at this point, I don't really know why. It's quite obvious that i'm just some maddened cynic who's essentially just vomiting up a torrent of abuse, as bad as this would be of course, it's against himself...which just makes it worse. Good lord i'm practically self abusing, in a verbal sense. Ah well, so long as we know that i'm just really cynical about everything, and me is just a minor blip in the vast sea of existential rage. In any case, that badger...and I realise, that a) by interrupting myself to say this is some sort of cruel irony, and b) I'm going to keep doing this so I might as well just keep interrupting myself. In fact, I don't really even see a point in talking about the badger. I'll just say badger every now and again so you...whoever 'you' are...don't forget and are simply left with a vague sense of dissatisfaction as you realise that this really isn't going anywhere. it's just going to be me laughing manically as I torment you in an incalculably cruel way for my masterly amusement. You can see it now. badger. Me, sitting here with this horrible concoction I seem to have contrived of some kind of cheese flavoured miniature cracker and cashew nuts...wait, are they even cashew...I don't know. Anyway, the point is, I'm here, eating this...thing...gah! distractions distractions. Sorry. I feel the need to describe this thing to you...and/or me. Essentially they're like these cracker things in a barrel of pistachios...the nuts are not they by the by, I ate them all. They came in this little barrel thing, go out now and buy some...M&S oven roasted and salted pistachios. Please denote that I didn't actually buy them. badger. I'm far, far too poor, student's money? mm. No, it came in a sort of care package thing. I of course felt slightly insulted by this. I feel like i'm dying or something so people feel the need to send me things to make them feel better. It's most bizzare and I dont' quite understand it. It's like that whole thing about sending people book tokens to make it seem as if you've gone to the effort of choosing something. WHAT?! NO! Surely it would have made far more sense to send someone some money, because it shows you have thought 'AHA! I'm not going to send someone something which is essentially money BUT WORSE because it's more limited, i'll send them MONEY instead, because then they can use it WHEN THEY NEED IT...and not only on BOOKS'. Don't get me wrong, I love books (he said, having embarked upon a course which requires reading around 4 books a week.) but how many times have you had to say 'Ah, sorry Mr. Taxi driver' but I can't pay your fare, but on the other hand...would you like this limited edition copy of 'sense and sensibility' I purchased earlier today thanks to a kind gift from an aunt?'. badger. 'Burr...Oi don' know abou' thaaaa'' he would respond, sorry, that's an in joke. But you'll probably never know the punchline. bit like the whole badger thing really. What a sad shame. I must say, I love bad jokes. 'Knock Knock' 'Who's there?' 'TV licensing agency, we've detected you're using a TV without a licence and have come to deliver a 1.5 thousand pound fine.' 'TV licensing agen- oh...'.There's one. In any case, here I am with this tin thing of these crackers. badger. And they're most oddly shaped. They're hexagonal and look like something out of one of those scientific diagrams where you join up the lines and it becomes more and more complex until you have some kind of vast web of deceit and chemicals, all blowing up here there and in your face leading you to go into a life of crime and/or defending opera houses from evil due to your horrible disfigurement. That's a reference, see I can do topical things. What do you mean it's not topical?...it's still on isn't it? Anyway. Having resisted the urge to create some kind of hideous tower of these things, mainly because I wanted to eat them, I thought 'wow'. Of course this wasn't all I thought. Badger. I probably thought about lots of separate things at the same time, such as how to keep living, you know, the whole breathing thing going on etc. But then, i've been getting good at not having to think about that, nowerdays it just happens. I don't have to actually think 'beat beat' every few seconds to my heart. It just kind of does it for me. 'wow,' I thought...for one 'I have a pot, some snacks in a bag...what to do' and so I put them in the pot. As you do. Badger. It's just occurred to me, that while this divine slice of cake-like writing has got a horrible, horrible amount of full stops, there isn't a single paragraph break as of yet. I personally don't mind, as I thrive on this kind of thing, I mean, why the devil would you want to split it up? it doesn't make it any easier to read now does it? although some would have you believe it does. If anything it makes it harder as you have to scroll more often. Ugh, some people with their ideas of grammar. What were they thinking when saying 'Hmm, why yes Curruthers, Capital idea about having little line things in the middle of a pile of words. When they get around to invent the computulator (someone may be working on it in the next few hundred years) and then the interweb (...yet later) then it'll jolly well stickle their pickle when they have to scroll that little bit further, tweaking them away from their screens of wonder and back into the realm of reality, giving exercise and carpal tunnel to the masses. what joy! Cheery ho!'. Still, much as I object to this kind of thing, I know that some people find lumps of text larger than their own head rather daunting, so I guess i'd better space it out now. badger. So here is a space. I'm thinking of getting a sponsor so i'd have something I could put in it. My brain has implodedCurrent Music...: Ootsuki Kenji feat. Nonaka Ai & Inoue Marina & Kobayashi Yuu & Sawashiro Miyuki & Shintani Ryouko - [Here's your space, isn't it delightful. Oh wait, i've ruined it by writing more words in it, but then, it's mine. Copyright ME. So deal with it. Incidentally, if you steal it, then it's likely i'll never find out so go ahead. I'd love it if in 60 years, someone came up to me and just slipped something i'd said in this entry into a conversation. I wouldn't remember of course but that's beside the point. And time travel will be there by then so...we'll see. Anyway, I realise this is all taking up space, so here's another free space for you to stare at for a while as your heart rate readjusts.] I suppose that part of this writing so much in such an intimidating way is that it's some kind of subconscious fear of people reading it. Badger. Of course, people can read it, and I don't mind so much if they know me. They'll just think 'he's off again' and go off to make pancakes, or French toast or whatever you do to avoid me. But no, it's the unknown reader I fear. After someone does read this rant they have this irksome habit of attempting to befriend me and then...what happens, my writing appears on their friends page. As a result it gets exposed to more people. 'How can I avoid this?' I think to myself as I sit resplendent in a cape made of failed script drafts. Why of course! I shall write it in such VAST blocks that anyone who even dares to look at it will simply think 'GOOD LORD...there must be something wrong with this breadbasket, I can't possibly be bothered to read it all'. badger. Then as a result of this they don't befriend me, don't put me on their friends page, and then, soon enough, all forms of communication are cut off. I become isolated in my own little world. The only blot on my life orientated canvas...which by the by has a rather good picture of a pine marten resplendent on a box of tea...is that some complete maniac may hate themselves enough to browse livejournal for the longest and most confusing entry they can find and then come across this one, read it with the intention of self harm, and then tell some of their masochistic friends. Then i'll have some kind of bizzare underground cult going. I'll get out of bed one day and find them all standing outside my door. What will I say then? ...probably 'Ugh.' or 'Go away.' I imagine, although I would probably first have to work out who they were. Badger. Of course, that's not it, there's also the blot of the constant threat of being run over by a tram. only the gentle ringing of it's bell waylaying it's silent...but deadly journey. But in relation to this, it's only that one fear. Well, that's a lie. there's other things, like having to make friends with people and having the whole horrible cycle begin anew. I can see it now, as some horrible nemesis sits in the dark, adds me to their friends list and then, as the friend requests pour in simply states 'the circle is complete' or some similar gibberish. I mean...what's that about? what circle...and who's to say it wasn't a triangle eh Vader? EH!? In any case, this theory also explains why I make few friends, don't join communities and have a general fear of any language which doesn't have an equivalent for 'Q'. Especially the last one. That makes perfect sense. I see these people with 7 billion friends (about 90% of people who claim they're an elf or something) and think...'WHY!?, how the hell are you expected to remember who they all are? 70 million communities? how...HOW can you POSSIBLE put a valuable contribution into each of them. Humanity confounds me. This would be a fine place to put a paragraph break, but then, i'm denying it, and that's the thing, paragraphs are supposed to have something about splitting up subjects or some ridiculous claim like that. Well in that case it's NO WONDER I can't use them. I don't separate subjects when i'm in full flow. It's all just one long stream of abuse where each subject somehow contrives to link with another. It's like one of those 365 days of nature/vegetables/flamingoes etc. books, where there's one thing for every day of the year, and then at the bottom it says 'can be linked to... lemming/bean/another flamingo p.13/256/147 and then that links to something too. When you start at kitten, you're soon onto the Geneva convention. It's essentially like that. I can somehow link the ideas of a small Mexican village called 'Tethke' with a small and badly carved wooden shrew, merely in the space of a few lines. I've sort of just done it there. badger. but that doesn't really count. I think that I can really separate my entries in this way. There are those about life, where I do tend to paragraph a bit more, or at least use the enter key more than once. This is because i'm reporting fact, well, generally, I mean I do tend to start blithering away and conjecturing on how awesome it would be to go to Dixons as a shrew or whatever. The other type is this type of bizzare and slightly surreal rambling where I actually do make not a grain of sense nor do I actually get anywhere. What have you learned from this?...ok, probably quite a lot...mostly about how much my mental condition has gone downhill since I came to uni...but then how much of it will you ever actually need to use?...nothing. You might as well take something away with you from this, so I might as well make a point. You know those owls which live in cacti? the little tiny ones? yeah...never try and put one of them in a pillowcase, even when you need a weapon and that's all you have to hand. It's a REALLY bad idea. trust me. NO...do NOT go out and find one of each to work out why. It's a TERRIBLE idea. Just trust me on that. Badger. As I was saying. All this discussion of friends is utterly redundant, as no one would want to even vaguely be associated with me anyway. You might be used as a witness. It is an utterly ridiculous idea though, I get this idea of people who are associated with me orbiting around me like some sort of Quinnian satellite. I'd have a terrible problem getting through doorways. Ugh, it would be HORRIBLE. From above...I honestly don't know what it would look like. I usually go for my perambulating bush thing here, but I just can't this time as the image is so utterly ridiculous, I can't bring myself to picture it. Like a blonde man with a long beard. In any case. As you can clearly see, my sanity has waned completely and i'm even more cynical than before. I mean, how can this even be done? before it was just everything...now...now i'm maybe moving into the realm of anticynicism, where I criticise antimatter and such. Or maybe I should investigate some sort of metaphysical cynicism. Yes, I've just made a new school of criticism. It's called metacynicism and it's fantastic. If you pay me, you can have a certificate officially proclaiming you're a metacynic. i'll even sign it so you can remember that however cynical you are, i'll always be that one thousand eight hundred and ninety seven steps (or more) ahead. If you try and deny this, you'll get hit by a large broom. I won't be the one to do it of course. I'll use the money I make from certificate purchases to buy myself a very strong servant who will do it for me. Then the revolution will begin and i'll go and claim some island and make it my own country. It'll be just like England, but worse, and everyone will hate each other even more than normal. Anyway. About this badger. The weasel was drunk and it laughed a lot, like so: 'EEEEEHEHEHEHEHEHEHE' and then the badger would simply state in his gruff voice: 'Oh...shut up weasel.'. That's it...that's all it was. Aren't you glad you stuck around to find out the truth? It was so worth it. Just that one line. Oh, and with regards to the crackers, they were mixed with some nuts which I also poured in the barrel thing, as a result there's now some kind of horrible cocktail in there, but not any more as i've finished pretty much all of them. Now you'll never hear about it again. Doesn't it just bring a tear to your eye? No? Good...because i'd probably have to clean it up. Yours, in infinite cynicism, Sez. If you actually even read more than four lines of that...I have a mixture of shame, envy and above all pity for you. Now go to sleep, I don't care if it's 3pm...just go. Now. |
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| Nov. 1st, 2007 @ 05:26 pm Live in fear children, lest uncle Sez come from under the bed and hit you with his cane. | |||
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Current Feelings...:
weirdCurrent Music...: Michael Jackson - Thriller  This has just surfaced from the depths of facebook, cursed object that it is. Behold...Mr. Sez and some associates on All Hallows Eve. I had a cane, but you cannot see it alas. It was taken in a chip shop... I am scary. Fear. Har har de har har¬ Oh, and i'm not supposed to be anything, just generally freaky. Sez (wooooo¬) This entry is blessedly short, and I still have to write about the con...drat. |
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| Oct. 26th, 2007 @ 05:01 am This is simply entitled: Cutting is for idiots. | |||
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Current Feelings...:
So, guess what. I'm not dead. Shame isn't it? Still, enough of that. I don't think anyone wants me dead, or at least I hope not, but then murder always adds spice to life. Anyhow, I guess a combination of guilt, boredom and hunger finally prompted me to start writing something, 3 weeks into uni term. In thinking about it it should probably have been a great deal sooner, but then I'm a lazy fellow and always will be. So, anyway, there is no need for a manic opening rant this time for I have so very much to write about *grumble grumble* Now I need to think of some cunning literary trick to compress 3 weeks of literary experiences into about 3 lines or so. Ah well, I swore an oath on my bottle of ribena that I would get through this, come on Quinn. You have the power.  energeticCurrent Music...: Hirano Aya - God knows What with having the power, as I have just stated I do, I shall now attempt to remember just what happened three weeks ago. I certainly remember being wrenched out of my bed at some ungodly hour of the morning and driven down to sunny Exeter for about 8000 hours, or at least it seemed so. It certainly is sunny here, much warmer than Oxford, still, more about that later. Having been transported to my new lodgings, which are rather splendid I must admit, and somewhat hotelish in their style, being the social animal I am, I decided it was far wiser to unpack everything first rather than meeting people, because who needs people and human contact when you have boxes of stuff to open. This having been accomplished I proceeded to venture out into my hall and knock on doors and whatnot. I should point out I arrived on the Sunday which was the later of the two days, so some people had met the day before, this made it a bit trickier, but I thrive on challenge. Having introduced myself as some sort of door knocking lunatic with an insane smile (which I find comes from not smiling a lot, it was a very fake smile) I pootled back to my room to connect to the Internet and work out what I was supposed to be doing. This of course led to me standing on my spiny chair and shouting "AHAHA! THE POWER! IT IS MINE!" and the like, on seeing myself having a 1500k download speed. I then proceeded to go and explore before realising it was time for food. Thinking that it could be no worse than school food had been, before I swore off it and lived off a diet of Tesco value sandwiches back in my school days. As it turned out, I was correct, it wasn't worse, admittedly it wasn't much better, but there is the option of having 5 apples, which I have exploited more than once so far, filling myself with more acid than usual. After such affairs, I was invited by various hall mates to explore the night life of the university. This resulted in me somehow ending up on my own in the middle of a hedge maze. Having navigated out of the maze, I realised I didn't know where the devil I was, so I walked in random directions until I worked out where I was. Or rather didn't, I just ended up in my room by a random set of coincidences. I didn't know I was at my building until I was around 5 steps away from it. All in all it took over an hour for me to get back, including me wondering into a farm, consulting a map upside down, 3 maps the right way up and walking into a hedge. I realise if I keep up this pace i'll be here for several hours. And i'm not having that. therefore, through the mastery of wordsmithery, I shall shorten it a tad. Let us see. Hmm, as the first week panned out, there are various events which I suppose stand out. I would list these in some sort of sentient order, however I like to make people work for information, and therefore it will all be horribly crushed together. So ha ha to you dear reader, i.e. me. I've reached a new level in antagonism, where i'm actually fighting myself. Ah well. Day two panned out to be a reasonably interesting one with me going to lunch in Exeter in a small, and slightly scary coffee shop in Exeter with two of my floor mates. The lunch was small but pleasant. I should point out that we have to do our own lunches, despite being in catered, which later inspired me to purchase a vast thing of Branston pickle, and the horror known as the 'turkey log' but more on that later. The rest of the day was spent in the traditional way of mooching around and exploring until the evening where we went to one of Exeter's fine clubs, known as 'Mambos' for some ridiculous reason, dressed as school children. This struck me as cruelly ironic as I had burned my school things on a vast pyre instantly after leaving, or I would have done...fine, I did it merely in my mind. It's the thought that counts. Anyway, as a result I just went as me, but as I seem to now be sporting the eccentric librarian look this year, I fitted in reasonably well, despite my lack of tie. But then I dislike ties. To hell with them. Mambos is in the middle of Exeter, that sprawling metropolis, so on leaving, once again I found myself hopelessly lost. Huzzah! Madly wandering in what I assumed was uphill I eventually found I was probably going the wrong way, as there were signs to Bristol. I therefore began to walk in a straight line, and turned left whenever I hit something. Oddly, this worked, and I found myself once again, back at my lodgings. In a bizzare twist of fate, it took me less time to walk the mile and a half back from mambos than it did to walk about the two hundred meters I had to go to reach my dorm room (if I had been going in a straight line) on the first night. Still, one lives and learns, and i'm now fairly good about navigating in Exeter. I've found that when in doubt, asking someone for directions in an Irish accent never fails. Everyone here likes the Irish, possibly because they make beer, i've not decided yet. Having realised that that was just as long as the previous paragraph, I launch into speed mode. This is possibly because I can't remember everything else which happened in great detail. Still, I shall try. Wednesday was quite significant, in that it was on this day that I made my first two out of hall proper friends. It happened purely by accident, I happened to be talking to someone called Olly in the queue for dinner, as one does, and doing the whole 'what are you doing, where are you from and who are you' routine. Having grabbed food and such, I proceeded to sit down with Olly and continue the conversation. An ominous shadow loomed across the table. "Hello" it said "Mind if I sit here?" Enter one 'Jamie'. Jamie, in a few words is utterly insane. His eyes terrify everyone and his mad raving could probably raise the dead. Somehow the conversation that night shifted to gaming and I instantly found respect for a fellow gamer. Olly too, but his hair scared me slightly at this point. To cut a long story short, they were both (by coincidence) going to a showing of Lord of the rings (the cartoon from...whenever it was) that evening and asked me if I wanted to come. I was however too keen to go on another mad adventure that night so opted out, but then later decided to go, but got lost and ended up in a field. It later turned out that what I was looking for was about 30 paces away from my doorstep. Ho hum. The next night was also important. Once again I met Jamie and Olly at the dinner table, and it turned out that the 'sci-if' club was meeting on the Friday for a showing of...what was it? battlestar galactica the movie or something, Being not too keen on whatever...no wait, it was stargate, anyway, being not that keen on stargate, I was thinking of not attending on the friday but said I might. As it turned out I did, half way during some kind of interval through I sauntered in, having actually located the building this time. I received the fright of my life when someone in a space uniform and with a vast beard leapt out from behind a door and dragged me in, he was joined by almost the archetypical nerd and I thought to myself "Crivens, (for I have taken to Scottish expressions of surprise) I've just wondered into possibly the most nerdy society ever." I have nothing against nerdish people mind you, i'm something of one myself I have to admit, although in a sort of different way. But when you're accosted by someone wearing space captain's uniform and talked to by a lisping person with a set square and mechanical pencil poking out of their shirt pocket, you do get concerned. Anyhow, I was trapped, so thought I should make the best of it. "I AM QUINN" I said, shooting my arm out like some robotic angle making device. "I WISH TO SEE YOUR MOVIE." I was then brought up to date with the plot, which I didn't understand a word of, but thought that I should go and hide in a corner somewhere. As it turned out no one saw me, and I lurked in the shadows for the rest of the movie, which was rather good I have to admit, if a tad odd. Still, who am I to doubt the ancient Egyptians were aliens. With the movie over I looked around for Jamie, who I saw heading out the door with a group of people. Scouting carefully round the seemingly hardcore group I ran off into the night. It was at this point that I made what is now known as the "Great appearance of Quinn, 2007" which involved me appearing like a ghost out of the shadows and madly leaping into the conversation with the line "I do hope you're not talking about the Goofy movie again Mr. [Jamie] McMeekin, otherwise I shall have to break your spine." As you can see, I don't believe in introductions, those are for other people. Jamie, leaping in the air and screaming girlishly, probably at any rate, was rather stunned for about 10 seconds, while all in the group looked at me in my brown jacket and fingerless gloves, before saying "Where the HELL did you come from Quinn?!" Having explained I had actually been in the film, I sauntered back to the fine hall of Lydford, where many of my new friends were to turn out to live, where we entered, and taking advantage of the self catered facilitates, ate and drunk things. After several hundred more minutes had passed, I finally decided I should probably say who I was, and introduced myself as "Quinn" as has become a sort of habit, I think I also said something along the lines of "but I've got various other names too, I just can't be bothered with them right now." There was then a long conversation about...almost everything at which point I realised that these were my people. It was then more friendships were formed, Mainly at this time with Phoebe and Caz, but they shall be explained later. Sauntering back to my room, a happy man, and realising that in this story, I seem to saunter everywhere, I sat in a tree outside for a while, thinking about things, before heading to sleep. The next day, plans were made for the Sunday, soon to become the infamous "Bad movie night" where all would congregate to watch terrible films, courtesy of Jamie. I should point out that most people I know have a film obsession, 2 have memorised seemingly the entire IMDB database, and one is doing film. It is for this reason I feel very safe about doing the film pub quiz tomorrow. I plan to just order people around and help with anything involving books. I can also eat things, which is good, and i'm the best at thinking up creative ways to cheat. But to move back to Bad movie night, We started with Peter Jackson's "Dead Alive" which is possibly the most ridiculously overblooded zombie comedy ever, it makes Kill bill's ridiculous level of gore look like a performance of 'The sound of music' That was amusing, but then came the film of the night. Simply entitled 'Hard Rock Zombies' it is possibly the greatest film I have ever seen with the exception of Robo Vampire. Not only does it contain a murderous family, undead rockstars and comic traps, but also Hitler, undead Hitler, and a mad sheriff. There was something else too, we planned to watch Turkish star wars too, but alas it didn't work. Sunday was also time for the freshers squash where we choose clubs. I just nicked lots of free things and didn't pay any membership fees. Thus was fresher's week. The work began in the next week, or rather didn't for instead we got "TEAM SKILLS" which was a ridiculous set of exercises designed to force us, at risk of failing English, to make friends with fellow members of the English department. Because of my profound hatred of most of the human race, this was a seeming hell for me. Things began to look up however, when I worked out that I was in the smallest group. Clearly, I thought to myself, I shall be able to conquer this group, today, group W, tomorrow the English department, and by Friday...the WORLD! and possibly a light snack on Saturday before SPACE on Sunday. As it turned out, I was wrong. My group was very pleasant, which made me come to one profound realisation, that I didn't actually like many people in my hall, They were mostly pleasant, but often quite...preppy so to speak. And many of them were orange from fake tan. I disapprove, as sometimes they keep me awake with mad noises and the like, this shall be touched on later. Still, to hell with them. Anyhow, at my instigation, having already for some reason forced myself in charge of our group, I suggested we split up into teams of 2, so each pair could carry out a task to save time. It was also at around this time we realised that this was not a one day team skills thing, it was designed to last until the end of the week. Alas, said we, for we have to do work. Instantly choosing the task which required sitting down and hardly any movement at all, I paired up with Hannah, who has since become another fine friend, to begin the task of browsing the online library for snippets of information. We also had to be a bit creative and write a sonnet. Here it is: The amazing sonnet concerning the sea, waves and other thrilling aspects of the Costa Del Sol. The breakers crash upon the shores of Spain, A surge of surf against the cliffs of stone, On which there falls a great amount of rain, Round parasols the wind begins to groan. A lone yellow lilo upon the sea, Much like a lost banana on the waves. The thunder rolls and seagulls wheel and flee, Into the howling mouths of gloomy caves. The tide sweeps down onto the sandy shore, And echoes through the shells of long dead crabs. The rocks are changed for now and ever more, And at my frozen coat-tails the wind grabs. The fact it’s on the sea is quite insane, For rain in Spain falls mainly on the plain. As i'm sure you will agree, it's Oscar winning stuff. Having completed our epic task in record time, due to clicking instantly (which I later discovered probably had something to do with final fantasy, despite the fact I didn't know this until Monday of this week) we went down to The Ram, which is the university's pub and at the local delicacy 'cheesy chips' which are...oddly enough, chips with cheese on. It seems these are a food only eaten in the north and south of the country. Anyway, it was just the right time for them, so all was well. We then went our separate ways and I sauntered off to the imperial, where I planned to meet people from Lydford, as it is a local pub of vast size with many oddities to it. One of these being they serve pomegranate juice. From there it was the first Sci-fi club meeting, which, contrary to my expectations that it was just going to be a sensible discussion of 'star trek' which I would have hated, it was merely a mad free for all argument about nothing in particular, often not even focusing on sci-fi at all. It was a good day. It was also on this day that I met Rosie and Veronica. They are mad in different ways. It was also around this time I discovered I had a son. Mike is apparently my son, I know this because it says it on facebook. I should point out I was forced at gunpoint to join the wretched thing, and now seem to get 10,000 emails a day about it, WHICH IS WHAT I SAID WOULD HAPPEN. Apparently, and this is very confusing, but in the future, I married a broom, who was in disguise as a horse, in disguise as a man in disguise as a woman. The wretched offspring of this relationship was 'Mike' who looks across between shaggy from scooby doo and Haldir. Who could have shot you in the dark by the by. Anyway, if you turn him upside down he looks like a mop, so that's the broom genetics. I travelled back in time to try and undo this mistake but ended up in a younger body of myself growing up with my son. This was also influenced deeply by the two finest zelda games ever, namely 'Wand of Gamelon' and 'Faces of evil' in particular their opening videos, which contain the phrase "MY BOY, this peace is what ALL true warriors strive for" and for several days I was calling various people "MY BOY" and it seems to have been the truth in at least one case. If you haven't seen the opening videos, watch them on youtube. they're fantastic...to quote Christopher Eccleston. Thursday was yet another day of TEAM SKILLS, this time we actually had to move, which was a great blow for Hannah and myself, as she's almost as lazy as me, and our movement required custard creams and tea. We had to go and solve various riddles on a big metal spike sculpture in Exeter. We were helped in this by Dave, who is also in the group of W, who was doing a nearby task. The riddles were all terrible, one claiming that magpie was spelt GAEWRYG or something similar, it was utterly ridiculous, still, I solved 2 so, huzzah. We then sat in Starbucks and realised we had to write our own riddle. After much thought, we came up with the following: Everyone knows my name Some see me every day And some see me once in a lifetime I have many tongues but seldom speak And when I do it’s only a whisper I am deaf but I know the words of many And also the secrets of past and present Whatever you ask you’ll never know All that I know I have many spines but you can’t break my back And many leaves though I’m no tree Those who meet me take something of me away with them And sometimes pass it on to others I’m a generous creature But always on time And expect this in others Or there’s a price to pay The answer is clearly a library. It was a bit obvious, but meh. I dislike Starbucks so it was the best I could do. Having completed yet another task, I had food and then went over to Tolkien society, which I was somehow a member of, something to do with having worked out the connection between melon and friends. I was utterly terrified to discover that it should have been named 'The LoTR clothes making society who obsess over Aragorn' but it was too late, I was trapped, When the mad people came to ask me who I was going to dress up as, I flung my arms in the air and shouted 'A black rider' and ran off, or tried to before I was stopped and a mad woman said with a crazed look on her face "Are you sure you don't want to cross dress?" I went and hid in a corner. Everyone else was quite afeared too. Nothing really happened on Friday, save the handing on of our vast scripture of paper for the TEAM SKILLS thingumy, and me working out how to use the printers, which involves madly swiping cards and me laughing madly. To be fair we probably watched a film or something that night too, I just forgot about it, I tend to do that a lot when it's been over a week since it happened. I'm quite shocked that i'm writing in such a sensical way, given that it's nearing 4am. Still, I don't have to get up tomorrow so HA HA HA. Anyway, team skills was concluded and we had a little chat amongst group W as to various things. I also met my personal tutor who seems a nice fellow, but I don't like his hair. It's odd. Oh wait! now I remember, On Friday we watched a fine film in the Exeter cinema, entitled 'The lives of others' which was spectacular. I'd say it was one of the best films i've seen all year, not THE best, that is yet to come. well, maybe it's not THE best, but UP THERE, wait for it with baited breath dear reader, the wait will be all the sweeter. It was a serious film about Germany before the wall came down, moving stuff, well, not for me with my heart of stone and whatnot, but tears were shed elsewhere. The only other night I can think of remarking on was the Saturday, as the events of the Saturday daytime elude me completely. Possibly because I spend half of my Saturdays asleep. Anyhow, the Saturday night was HIGHLY IMPORTANT. This is for one very simple reason, which resulted in my return at 6am. We had got back at about 1am from something or other, Oh, that's right, we had just watched the mask and howl's moving castle at Rosie's house. I had also declared Rosie an alchemist due to her doing biochemistry. I went to Lydford with Phoebe for a quick cup of tea before going back to my own place in Pennsylvania Court to sleep, when something quite incredible happened. Tim entered. Tim is a bit like a bear in that he is short and hairy. I didn't know him very well at this point, so I was sipping my tea when I heard him humming a tune. Possibly the most famous tune from the anime multiverse, and one close to my heart. Cruel Angel's Thesis - the opening to Neon Genesis Evangelion. I wasn't quite sure if I could believe my ears. I casually slipped a subtle Evangelion reference into a conversation Phoebe and I were having and then watched as Tim dropped a cup and turned to face me. "What was that?" he said again, I repeated myself. "Have you...perchance..." he hazarded "heard of something called Evangelion?". I smiled possibly my largest smile in a good long while. What followed was a similar experience to when I attempted to run around the entire Louvre in 5 minutes and see everything. There was much high fiving, slapping of backs and maddened jumping in the air. It was then decided that merely talking about Evangelion WAS NOT ENOUGH, and we should WATCH THE WHOLE THING NOW...so at 4am, 2 grown men downloaded Evangelion episode by episode and watched them with childish glee. Well, the first 4 episodes anyway. It was by then 6am and I was semi passing out from all the adrenaline and dancing. We also forced Phoebe to watch several episodes, which traumatised her deeply. Evangelion is the greatest thing ever...possibly. I danced back at 6am, waving to birds, squirrels, of which Exeter has thousands and other things. It was deeply shocking. I'm sure the birds/squirrels found it so too. Over the course of the next week began work. Work is generally bad, although it has been quite reasonable here. I shall not dwell on it as such things are needless. I can now tell you all you will ever need to know about formalism, but it probably wouldn't make a jot of difference to you. I could tell you that Genesis is all about incest. But would you care? no! actually...if you've read this far you're probably willing to read everything i'll ever say, so, you're essentially my word slave. Ha! Another plan forms in my mind. But no time for that now. I think it was in this week that I met Jess, Jess is another utterly insane English student who I realised i'd met at Sci-fi before but had failed to fully register the presence of. I like mad but awesome people. Therefore there is the triumvirate of mad englishness, Myself, Hannah and Jess...and sometimes Dave, but he has silly hair now. I just realised that I made a cup of tea about an hour ago but didn't drink it as I was writing this. Curses. Now it's cold, and i'm hooked. Once we had explained to the world that Sci-Fi wasn't actually about star trek, but actually about Jamie shouting about how great he was, everyone we knew started turning up to it, and so it now takes place in the downstairs bar of the postgraduate centre. So drink and cheesy chips now fuel the arguments yet further, it's fantastic. I don't thing we've mentioned anything even vaguely about sci-fi in about 2 weeks prior to this one. We also have to go through the hedge maze I got lost in on the first night to get there, this clearly results in someone stealing Jamie's stupid hat and running off into the shrubbery. There follows a chase to rival Indiana Jones, which ironically is what the hat is an official product of. Tolkien club has been somewhat abandoned however, but we will return to it at some point, once I come out of my coma whenever the word 'cross dressing' is mentioned, i'm having a lot of therapy for it. We've been having bad movie nights instead. The movie's which have been seen, include 'Troll 2' which was brilliant, and began in almost exactly the same way as the princess bride. It's laughably bad, especially a certain scene involving popcorn which I don't even want to delve into. Oh wait, yes I do. Here it is: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v0pk_wm9o This was also the week were Jamie attempted to cook in Lydford, attempting to tempt us with culinary delights and forcing me to skip dinner so I would have room. Let us simply say that he's a better film obsessive than a cook. We did have a very nice meal on the Wednesday evening though, prepared lovingly by the members of Lydford for themselves with myself, Jamie, Rosie and Veronica as special guests. It also involved SHOPPING which was rather mad. Exeter has many fine shops, INCLUDING...AND WHY HAVE I NOT MENTIONED THIS BEFORE...be calm. Well, not only a shop which sells pirate toasters, but ALSO the BEST CLOTHES SHOP EVER. It's called the real McCoy, and not only does it sell Top hats, Ruffs, Velvet waistcoats, Fine trench coats, pirate shirts and many more but also CAPES, masks and just thoroughly ridiculous things. All for very cheap...or in most cases, prices. Jamie, who seems to have infinite money, bought all of the most foppish clothing in the shop and has not been seen wearing most of it yet, he is now therefore 'Jamie the Fop' to me. I need to buy some stuff there for Halloween come to think of it. It's BRILLIANT. If there is a shop god, it is this one. There are many other fantazmical shops too, but this is possibly the finest. It was also on Wednesday I bought the dreaded turkey log for sandwiches, it was very scary and I hid it away before having to throw it away when it went out of date. Now I just eat cereal. All day. And biscuits. That week went past quite fast (rhyme) and the weekend was again another fine one. Jamie had a 'decent film night' and we watched things about presidents on planes, gangsters and such while everyone didn't watch and just talked. Veronica tried to steal my socks, Olly murdered people with his mind and Jamie went mad. It was very unusual and I ended up watching the whole of Citizen Kaine with phoebe for her film studies class afterwards, well, I just played on my DS and stared at the screen occasionally making comments on how stupid the characters were. We then talked of bizzarity late into the morning and so once again I trundled back to bed at 6amish, not skipping as merrily this time though, for there had been no Evangelion. The Sunday night was also unusual. Jamie and I decided to head round to Lydford to mess around and game for a bit. We were told by mike that he and Tim were going on a pub crawl dressed as golfers, for such is the nature of Lydford events, so would we mind the kitchen for them, why they thought it would need minding i'm unsure. Still, we did things in there until Mike and Tim...also Caz for some reason entered utterly smashed, especially Mike, who demonstrated his now most famous quotes: 'You- You can crash in my room...ALL- ALL NIGHT, I don't care, LIVE HERE' forgetting we live about 10 meters from them, and then 'tomorrow, tomorrow we'll play SOUUUUUUULLLLLLLLLLL CALLLLLIBURRRRR 2 ALLLLLLL DAYYYYY LOONNNNNNGGGGG!!!!" This was made even madder by the fact he was sporting a flower boa, a pith helmet and a long blonde pigtailed wig which Jamie promptly stole. Tim started jumping up and down and comparing everything he could see to moments in Evangelion and mike attempted to kiss everyone, he missed me but managed to get Jamie, which resulted in him almost jumping out of a window. Ah, everyone loves Mike when he gets drunk, as his father I approve. I somehow procured a top hat for the evening. The next week went by in a blur, for there was something at the end which meant that I could not wait for the weekend. this was the MCM expo. It will be done soon. This week I studied Odysseus and did more formalism, it wasn't too astonishing work wise, and doing mad things wise it was pretty tame too, although we did visit the imperial and go in the SUN ROOM, which has a vast window, which you can sit in front of and drink pomegranate juice. Over this week 2 rumours surfaced about me in my hall because I was absent from it so often. The first was that I was dealing crack, however this was soon replaced with the idea I fight crime at night...in a dressing gown. Sci-Fi and film nights were just as mad as always, and we did various things throughout the week, I forget most of them, but they involved the combination of my English friends encountering my Lydford friends and Jamie with grand results. I am clearly some kind of puppet master pulling strings madly, to no real purpouse...yet. I went home for the weekend, and saw parent + cats. Meow they said. I got the train down on Friday afternoon, which wasn't too bad, although the journey is quite long and expensive even with a reduction card. I arrived at around 8pm or so and had a lazy Saturday with much loafing around and washing of clothes which was easier than the uni machines. boo to them and their infernal complexity. I woke up WILLINGLY at 6.30 on Sunday however, for the MCM expo...that alone shall show just how thrillified I was for it. Alas, I shall not talk about it here, as this is long enough already and there is so much to say. It shall have a later entry all of it's own. Needless to say, it was incredible. I met the power rangers. Oddly enough, I spent more money in the 3 day weekend than I had in the 3 weeks before it. To break up the text a bit, here is a lovely picture  That's me lurking in the background in the brown jacket. I wanted to kick the child but they wouldn't let me. I was forced to go to the station as soon as i've got back from London and walked all the way back to the uni, as Pheobe had just dropped of her Boyfriend there and for some reason required me to show her the way back, I don't quite understand this, as she got there. Still, nevermind. Because I feed on human emotions, I had fed on excitement and over the top happiness that day so animatedly explained the events which had occurred before leaping around madly and waving my arms in all directions. I slept very well that night. So this week there's been quite a lot going on. Not only have we been studying Beowulf, on which I had to do a presentation which involved me explaining why Beowulf was like a bear due to his love of honey. More than that clearly, but that I felt was the main point. I helped Hannah find the post office of infinite concealment on Monday, and there were biscuits, I was still hyper from the previous day's emotional meal so did another animated description, with more arm waving. The high wore off at around 8pm, so I started having withdrawal symptoms and became even more sarcastic and cynical. We had a Disney night on Tuesday, which I was dragged to, although there was Robin Hood which I love. Lady Cluck is a personal hero, as is Prince John with his 'You EEEEEEL in snake's clothing!'. Oh ho ho. I also got one of my fingers shut in a door, but I managed to avoid most of it, so not too much harm done. Jamie and I watched 'Death race 2000' and American Ninja on the Wednesday, both of which were excellent. Then, on Thursday, which was today at one point, but is now yesterday...we saw a BRILLIANT FILM. Before seeing this film, I stated the following: "There had better be unicorns in this film, or i'll kill everyone within a 10 mile radius." There were. That's why i'm not going to be in the papers today. I am of course talking about Stardust, which has to be the most brilliant film i've seen in a good long while. I can honestly say there is no other film I have ever witnessed which contains unicorns, ferret attacks and Robert De Niro playing a gay pirate who loves pink dresses. It was epic, the music was epic, the story was epic...if odd. I love films which are kind of childish but contain lots of dark humour and go against the norm, I also love fairy tales - dark ones. I would particularly advise seeing it if you're someone doing music at Bristol and your first name starts with an S, second with L, and last with G. No more hints, if you've not seen it Jes, you must. Now. You will obsess. Everyone else should see it too. And after madly zooming back from that, I drew a spooky tree, finished an essay and then sat down and wrote this monstrosity. And still am. Not that I want to prolong this more than needed (heaven knows it's long enough) but I feel I must mention Tarquin. Tarquin is the scariest person i've ever met. He's about 6 foot 4 and as thin as a rake, he has a mane of red hair, great staring eyes and a moustache and beard. He wears scary shirts and is obsessed with any film which involves people exploding, or being eaten. Tarquin scares me. Do not concern yourself with this paragraph. It's about Tarquin, if you don't know who he is, you don't have to worry. He can't get you...yet. Therefore I shall end here. I should sleep now, for it is sleepy time. If you've read all of this...you're at least a demi god, if you've just skipped it all and read this...you're not, don't flatter yourself. My hands hurt now. I shall write about MCM some other time. I'm enjoying this new life. I hope you are too. This was long. Too long. Sezan Draws spooky trees... |
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