I'm lying in the garden listening to Blondie

Mint.
I've finished work.
I've saved myself a long phone call to the job seeker allowance people by applying online, even though I do have to have a long phone call with them in a couple of days, but it'll be them paying for it! haha
It's still sunny.

It's sunny and it's my last day

Nothing much has happened today, but as I type it is still nigh on half 10 in the morning and the office printer is still broke.
It looks set to be another boring day. I'm not allowed to blog here but I don't care anymore, and it's not like I ever did before.
I'm still having no luck on getting a job so some help would be nice. I blame the government in all honesty, spending our money on rubbish and war.
Things to look forward to - Getting my NVQ signed off on Monday (which should have happened months ago), Music Live, hopefully getting a real job, moving to Newcastle, starting uni, The Cribs (again!), Franz Ferdinand and whatever else I get up to in Newcastle. Why am I so sad when there's all of that to happen!?

Save the Cheerleader, Save the World

That's it really, the one task to save us all.
I have watched 5 episodes of Heroes now and am starting to get drawn in. But I've made a silly time to pause watching, I've left it on a bit of a cliff hanger in all honesty.
And what is Mr Bennet's importance? He seems to have become involved with a few of the leads... I don't want to have to wait for another series to find out.
I'm STILL trying to figure out LOST!

Random thoughts blog 1

Old Buildings – One of the solicitors near where I work is in the old town hall building and occupies the first floor so access to it is via a grand set of stairs. Now, originally this building’s interior will have been stone but most of it has been covered over to keep the place up, presumeably.
Anyway, I had to go to the solicitors to deliver a letter so off I go and find myself climbing up these stairs when I suddenly feel all lop sided. It turns out it’s the original stone steps were a problem when trying to put boards over as the stairs were all wonky. They were extremely hard to climb and much worse when I was going back down as I thought I might trip up or something. Luckily I wouldn’t have had far to fall due to the corner the stairs went round, halving the staircase.

Hotmail – I just managed to fix my hotmail. For the past couple of days I’ve had a major problem loading it up at work and it’s really quite annoying. So today I ended up pulling out the wireless adapter thing for the computer and plugging it back in. I did that just now so I hope it continues to work.

IT Stuff – I’ve also been on the phone for most of the morning trying to set up an email account for the new staff member so now that’s sorted.

Windows Vista – Why or how are people finding stuff wrong with it? It works fine for me. And it looks good. The only problems I’m having are with my anti-virus software, it keeps managing to turn itself off. Strange.
I’ve seen screencaps of Windows 7. It looks like a cross between Vista and Mac, and I hate Macs. I really do. The toolbars are just images, open programs are kept in groups, similar to when you have so many IE windows open, for example, and you have that many that they won’t all fit across the toolbar so they form a group. It’s annoying when MSN does it, you’ve got to click on the full group just to see who’s messaged you.
So, basically, I don’t like the idea. A lot of people like XP, it performed well but I don’t like the layout. Vista looks classy, but a lot of people don’t think it’s as good and Windows 7 sounds like XP in a Vista coat crossed with a Mac.
I still have Windows Live Messenger 7, since then there have been 2 new versions out. I just like the older layout.
I suppose if I got something new I’d just get used to it. With stuff like Messenger and iTunes (I still have 7) it’s just really a program update, I could always override it with the older version if I wanted. With Windows 7 I have to pay for it and if I don’t like it then it means paying more to get Vista back.
I blogged about Internet Explorer 8 last week, my windows update automatically installed the new version and at first I thought it looked appalling to say the least. To start with it had added a new toolbar especially for the favourites menu, the rest of the bar was a grey block so I got rid of that and favourites went back to it’s original place next to the tabs. Instead of the two stars (one for favourites, one to add new) there was just a button that said favourites and it was from here you would add new which took a while getting used to. Also, the new version was very square. I was used to it looking quite ‘soft’. Now it reminds me of the way I like my MSN. Neat.

New Job Please? – I’m currently looking for a new job. If anyone can put me forward to some one, or give me work then just leave me a comment with an email and job info and I’ll get back to you. For a bit of extra info about me I enjoy music and whipping my camera out at a possible opportunity.

Films – Anyone know if there’s any good films out this week? I’d go and see Drag Me To Hell but I’m not allowed. Oh well.

A Short P.S. – My hotmail isn’t displaying correctly It's also causing me problems with sending mail. It's just this computer though, it's fine at home! Stupid PC. It's completely buggered up again now. I find I never have problems with Google Mail though. We've just had a load of scene kids sat on our window ledge. Lovely.
Hey, scenesters, hey, hey scenesters...
How aggrevating. I love The Cribs.

Hard times send me round the bendy

LEAVE THE BOURBON ON THE SHELF
AND I'LL DRINK IT BY MYSELF
AND I LOVE YOU ENDLESSLY
DARLING CAN'T YOU SEE
I'M NOT SATISFIED
UNTIL I HOLD YOU TIGHT
GIVE ME ONE MORE CHANCE TONIGHT
AND I SWEAR I'LL MAKE IT RIGHT
BUT YOU AIN'T GOT TIME FOR THIS

Things I just watched

Over the course of the weekend I watched A Clockwork Orange which we thought was going to be quite scary, which it wasn't, it was just really violent and I can understand why it was withdrawn. One thing I learnt: don't trust the government. Now I have to read the book.

Hello Daaave.
Papa Lazarou is one of the scariest people ever created for a TV show. But in a humourous way.
You're my wife now, Dave.

I just started to watch Heroes. I have so far watched the first two episodes of season 1 and am confused as to who is who really, it's a bit like figuring out Jacob in LOST again. Hiro is funny though.

As for LOST, it's ageeees until it's back on!

Why... ?

Weren't Eraserhead and Grandmother parodied in Scary Movie?
Weren't We Are The Physics asked to play Middlesbrough Music Live?
Weren't McDonald's and KFC ever any good?
Wasn't The Official UK Charts stopped for Christmas when who was going to be Christmas number one started getting too predictable?
Wasn't Big Brother ever ditched as being a waste of time and money, alongside other reality TV shows?
Weren't Traffic wardens for pedestrians ever invented because of people who walk too slow?
Weren't Cigarettes taken off the shelves instead of just putting a health warning on because it's not working and people are just going to keep smoking because they have the option to?

Autonomy Boy

Offices are amongst the most dangerous and bizarre places to work. Yesterday I ended up coming out with yellow hands after trying to change printer ink but because we're using compatibles instead of official cartridges so we have to mess around with these electronic chip things. So, once again, for a second time while I have been in the office, we are unable to make colour prints.
Today I end up with the office falling apart on me and giving my wrist a whack and a half! It's fine now but was bright red and stinging at the time.
At various times, cupboards and suspended file units have also managed to get in my way as I'm walking around therefore making me trip up.
The amount of files around is astounding and it's due to all the paperwork Abbey expect us to do. There is mess everywhere.
Oh well, not long to go now.
(Checks countdown) I even move out soon!
Even with all what's been going on, I have still got very close to hitting my target and that is to get double the playcount of We Are The Physics that Adam has got. I have less than 100 songs to go now.
Weekend is nigh, might write next on Monday when I get back home. Expect full listings for Middlesbrough Music Live.
Right, and I think that's it for now!

The Cribs - Live at the Brudenell

So I've just about finished watching everything in the boxset now, minus a couple of b-side sets and have some views now about the full thing. In cause of the Cystic Fibrosis Trust, The Cribs, with support from Kaiser Chiefs, Kate Nash and Franz Ferdinand, played a three night stand in which they played one album per night 'supporting' themselves also with a setlist of b-sides for the respective album.
19th, 20th and 21st December, 2007... the special 'Cribsmas' shows... with Cribs bingo, Jarman vs Barman and other fun and games including 'How to get The Cribs to play Another Number on the wrong night as the grand finale'... which they did due to the entire crowd singing the riff in joint harmony. All good fun.

So overall, a good few nights!
I'll be back tomorrow, with thoughts of the week past and maybe some 'fun facts'. Tatty bye kiddies.

'Missing link'?

Google has turned brown with skeletons on, so I clicked on the logo to find out why and apparently they've found the 'missing link' between early and modern humans. The 47-million year old fossils are lemur-like, showing that we're not just bananas.
Thought I'd write something factual for a change.

I'd like to do something special with my Saturday night

Staying in with a movie and chocolate sounds very nice.

It's coming up to the last weekend in my work placement and I don't know whether I want to celebrate leaving or cry because I feel like the full year has been a complete waste of time and I could have been doing something else instead.
Like learning how to play bass properly or writing so much that I can do that properly too. As well as learning more intelligent things. And being able to live through the week. This past year I have learnt...
not much.

Oh well, I hope come September it will be better.

The end is nigh

Just watched the finale of LOST and what a cliffhanger of an ending! Now we've got to wait another year to find out what happens!
(Contains spoiler, don't read if not seen yet)
A strange man had visited each survivor at some point in their past. This man is Jacob and we see at the beginning of the episode he was on the island during the time the statue (which turned out to be of Anubis) was standing. Him and another were watching a ship coming towards the island and something tells me it is the Black Rock. Could Richard Alpert have arrived on this ship? We have had no insight to his history yet but everything is bound to be revealed next season. One very confusing thing is no one seems to be who they say... There was a box found in the cargo hold of the plane and for the two finale episodes the contents were kept very much a secret. We find at the very end that in the box is JOHN LOCKE!
'So who's in there?' Sun said upon the reveal, referring to 'Locke' who had taken Ben to see Jacob.
As for Jacob, it's still unclear as to who he actually is! The same applies to Richard.
And what lies in the shadow of the statue?
Ille qui nos omnes servabit.
Which translates to 'He who will protect/save us all'.
Who?!

And the Incident has occured. The drill on the Swan site drilled so far that it reached the electromagnetic energy and refused to withdraw. Also the bomb failed to blow. According to Sayid, it had been set to explode on impact only when dropped by Jack it didn't go off, possibly due to the electromagnetism. Things then started to get really bad. All metallic materials were drawn to the drill hole wreaking havoc and taking Juliet with it all! Despite Kate and Sawyer's attempts she fell. Gone forever. Or so it seems... flash to the bottom of the hole and she awakes and sees the bomb, unexploded. Pulling herself across to it she starts hitting the living daylights out of it and BANG.

End of series 5.

...

It's almost one in the morning, 17th of May 2009. I'm just come off RCT3 where I've been building a zoo on my park, it's almost complete now. How I haven't fallen asleep yet is beyond me.
Yesterday (Saturday) was brilliant, even if it did piss it down all day, but I guess being so in love with someone makes everything perfect. And it's a feeling that will never fade. I'm counting down to the day I move in with him, I'm going to try and do one of those widget things. Jeez, I'm excited...

LOST Parodies

With Season 5 coming to a close tomorrow I've spent the last so many minutes watching the parodies with the dolls featuring non-LOST characters. I also went to see Star Trek this afternoon, it was good but I got confused!
This parody combines the two and features a lot of genius Sawyer nicknames. It really is excellent (you'll get the pun once you've seen it).

I'm Christian Bale.

I found a new hobby!

Building street houses on RCT3. It's becoming an obssession. I also made The Cribs on there ages ago, and I happen to have photo points on the park which they used to photograph themselves. Well, Gary and Ross anyways...

Angry Baby

Is well mint.

Jacob? The Incident?

I've finally got round to doing a write up on the recent episode of Lost in which Jack and Kate had to continue with Daniel Faraday's task after he was shot by his mother Eloise Hawking in the previous episode and this was to detonate the hydrogen bomb. This one task would prevent a pocket of electromagnetic energy from the Swan station site escaping which would ultimately cause the crash of Oceanic Flight 815. The release of the energy meant every 108 minutes a button had to be pressed to prevent any further disasters. Jack, Eloise, Richard Alpert and Sayid have all gone to detonate the bomb which is buried under the same village where the Dharma Initiative call home, most of which are now by this point boarding the submarine to escape the 'incident' which we still aren't sure as to what it is but my theory, and probably most people's, is that the incident was caused by the electromagnetism leak. Daniel Faraday's theory was that if the hydrogen bomb was detonated this energy would be destroyed, therefore the plane crash wouldn't happen and I imagine this is how the final series will end: Oceanic Flight 815 arriving in Los Angeles.
Back in 2007... John Locke has a plan. And his plan is to kill Jacob. Why? Because why take orders from someone you've never seen? So in next week's double episode we finally find out who the mysterious Jacob is and it's more than likely to be a Jacob-centric episode. There's been hundred's of theories as to who he is, the strangest being the Spanish guy who Jack couldn't save; this one being just because he had a similar profile to what we saw of Jacob. I read a theory of Jacob being Vincent, Walt's dog. There was dog pictures in Jacob's cabin, yes, but it's quite unlikely that he is a dog. The statue had four toes, however, but who's to say it's a statue of Jacob? And what lies in the shadow? Will we find this out? It could be the way of finding Jacob; his cabin. Other Jacob theories were Daniel Faraday, this one I thought quite likely even though he now has been shot. But is he really dead?
Claire's baby, Aaron. This was quite an early one and it could quite possibly be right. Christian Shephard (grandfather) and Claire (mother) were both in his cabin at one point, Christian declaring he spoke on behalf of Jacob and Claire just saying she was with him.
There's been much speculation on the identity of Jacob, I wouldn't be surprised if he just turned out as either not real or a completely new character who has had something to do with all the 'Losties'. Ben's face showed fear to a great extent when John revealed what his plan was. Ben claims to 'know' Jacob and personally taken orders from him although Jacob doesn't seem to have been revealed to anyone else. Perhaps he is just a vehicle Ben is using to scare everyone into doing what he wants. Which probably wouldn't surprise me in the slightest.
Back in '77 and Juliet, Kate and Sawyer have all be taken hostage by the DI and are all on the submarine back to the mainland! Which is of course in 1977 with the island! They wouldn't be able to find Eloise for help to get back to 2007 because she is with the Hostiles on the island. Maybe by some stroke of luck that submarine will stay in the boundaries of the Island for just the right amount of time.
Dr Chang finally decided to send everyone off the island after quizzing Hurley with time related questions. He failed. So Chang believed that they were from the future and they knew what was going to happen and all he could do was try and prevent it. But whether or not he goes as far as stopping the drilling at the Swan site we've still to know. Daniel had given him a time limit of six hours before the drilling went deep enough to cause a 'disaster'. His advice was to stop the drilling and get everyone off the island as soon as possible. Obviously Chang didn't believe him when he explained how he knew; Faraday's only other proof was in the form of Miles, also Chang's son, who denied being from the future.
So now we know how Chang knew to get everyone off the island. After episode 13, Some Like It Hoth, it seemed Miles had done the deed, after seeing his father read a younger Miles a book, acting like a father who loves his son acts. Miles had been brought up to believe his father had deserted himself and his mother, 'throwing them out of their home'.
Back to 2007 and Sun is showing Richard a picture of the DI new recruits from '77, given to her by Christian Shephard. The picture showed her where everyone else was in time and she was enquiring with Richard as to what happened to them, in particular her husband Jin, to which he replied 'I watched them all die'. Was this a result of the incident? Did they get caught in Ben's gas attack in which he killed off the entire DI including his father? Whatever happens in the finale will affect the future of the survivors, be this good or bad. And, for once, even Eloise doesn't know what will happen. In episode 14 after Desmond had been shot obviously Penelope Widmore, Desmond's wife, wanted to know if he'd be okay to which she replied 'For once I don't know'. Which is a hell of a lot of use because she's the only one that does seem to have 'knowledge'! So who are they going to get help from now? Perhaps Charles Widmore knows a lot more than he's letting on. We know that he lived amongst the Hostiles, with 'Ellie', he was on the island as a 17 year old in 1954 when Faraday and the others turned up and demanded they bury the hydrogen bomb, which the US Army were going to blow up the Island with. He was also there in 1977 when little Ben Linus was taken to the Hostiles to save him after Sayid shot him. Sometime after the DI was killed off he was banished for 'breaking the rules'. He regularly left the island as well as having 'a daughter with an outsider'.
Centric episodes on both Widmore, as well as Alpert, would be a help to solve some more of the mystery that shrouds the Island. Why does Alpert never age? Juliet just stated him as being 'Very old' so we are unaware as to just how long he has been on the island. He may have been there since the time the statue was in full glory. As to what the Statue represents could be anything, more than likely an Egyptian God which would make sense because of all the hieroglyphics in the temple. But I'm sure as to what that is will be revealed.
So there's at least two things we will find out before the end of Series five; what was the incident and will Richard be able to prevent it? But most importantly, who is Jacob? Who is this strange man that is causing Ben to become fearful after he learns of Locke's primary aim?
All will be revealed in the Season finale, next Sunday at 9pm.

Help?

Will someone employ me? Please?

The Cribs Live

For those who can't see, the dates are as follows:
September
24th Norwich UEA
25th Cambridge Junction
28th Hull University
29th Glasgow Barrowlands
30th Newcastle University
October
2nd Manchester Apollo
3rd Lincoln Engine Shed
4th Leeds Academy
6th Exeter Lemon Grove
7th Southampton Guildhall
8th Leamington Spa Assembly Rooms
10th Bristol Anson Rooms
15th London HMV Forum

Tickets go on sale this Friday.

Edinburgh trip - May 2009

I arrived back in Newcastle from Edinburgh last night and had a blast at Rock Band which involved a pair of 3D glasses and jumping around. The night before we were stood in a bar chatting with my new best friends, We Are The Physics, who we'd specially travelled up to Edinburgh to see. Michael Drum promised me and Adam he'd do us a shout out during the show but forgot unfortunately. Oh well. Michael M gave me his Red Bull Cola because he didn't like it. Michael Guitar said he liked it until he found out there wasn't actually any Red Bull in it. He was stood with Michael M but we didn't recognise him at first because his hair wasn't spiky. He hadn't had it cut since before Christmas so I just kept randomly spiking his hair for him, hehe. Had a chat with Chris at the merch stand and he gave us guitar picks.
The drummer of one of the support bands was Mexican. He was selling t-shirts.
The WATP van is a mess at the minute because they kind of crashed it (oops). I expected it to be more like the mystery machine, with the WATP logo on the side.

Great set, got my hands on another of their setlists, written by hand on a sheet of lined notepaper.
Small crowd, they did say they don't go down too well in Edinburgh so we were surprised at how many people actually stayed.
Have uploaded to youtube a video from their King Tut's show in Glasgow.

Went to the Camera Obscura museum in Edinburgh and that was fun, the views from the top were amazing. Edinburgh was a great photo oppurtunity.

Much fun.

PS Take someone who can talk Italian to an Italian restaurant.

This afternoon

Just as I predicted it was a waste of time but at least I got out of work which is never a bad thing. I'm now off for the rest of the week! Couldn't have picked a better time to be off if I'm honest.
I've been checking out the 'Reviews' section of the We Are Scientists website in which random items are reviewed. I remember one from ages ago in which a time machine was reviewed. (It doesn't work) A recent one I have just found myself laughing at is about a sink in a club. Weirdos...
Here's to the weekend.

The advice blog

For those of you that don't already then I advise you NOT to open an account with Abbey. The system is pants and doesn't work properly so doing a task takes 10 times as long as it should. It's useless and a waste of time and tomorrow I have to go across the river to do some training for it. Which is quite pointless really. And I leave in like 2 months or so now. So that's my advice for the day: don't open an account with Abbey.
Great...

Lolz of the day

I am drinking vodka this bank holiday Monday and it's great. I just finished watching Bill And Teds's Excellent Adventure which was most excellent. Now I am having a rave, which was incidently caused by the Eurovision Song Contest 2009, and we're going to lose again because we're useless. 2007 was a good show, Ukraine, Sweden and France made me wee myself. Here is a parody of Ukraine...
MORE VODKA PLEASE!

The Boat That Rocked

Just got back from my second viewing as this film. Went to see it again because it's mint!

All the keys make <3

This week's going to be much fun. I'm in work for two days, my shortest working week ever! Then after that I'm paying my old college a visit, rewarding them with the sight of my face (poor, poor people). Then after that I'm up in Newcastle and I'll be depriving you all from my writing for a few days.
I'm going to see The Boat That Rocked again tonight, meaning I'll be missing LOST, so I don't want to know what happens! I'll do a usual program synopsis and theory blog after I've watched the Tuesday night repeat.
Anyway, going to be getting off...

M&S Burgers are nice

I wish I could relive today. It was very nice. And not just for the burgers. The sun was shining which made a lovely change after such a grey week of rain. Listening to Oh Yeah by Ash, brings back memories of the start of last summer... awww...

Hoping to get to the cinema again tomorrow to see The Boat That Rocked again as I enjoyed it so much last time. Influenced me to put the 60s smart playlist on iTunes as it wasn't already on for some reason...
A nice song to leave you with...

May the 1st

It's May. Already! The first third of the year has just flown by. I still remember building the end of year show at college and starting my apprenticeship last June, also the start of the bast part of my life some far - thanks to dear Adam, that was the end of July... mine and Adam's first trip to Glasgow in September, along with various other memorable events. And now it's almost a year since! Where's all the time gone?! My apprenticeship's almost over... I'm off to uni in September... and I'm moving out!

I'm still listening out for more announcements for Middlesbrough Music Live. Hopefully there'll be as good a selection of bands as last year. Keep your ears peeled...