I spent in excess of £80 today. This not something I normally do, so I’m a little shocked by it.
£20 was on presents for my Mum, as her birthday is tomorrow. I got the usual stuff, bath salts, chocolate, a card etc - it was a bit more difficult choosing which bath salt this year because I had to remember to 2 years ago if I had bought those bath salts before (last year I got her Russell Brand’s Booky Wook) - the same with the card. I hate buying cards only to find out that the person you’re giving it to already received that exact same card with the exact same message last year (Once, this happened with my Grandma; she had kept the old card so it was even more embarassing >.>).
Anyway, the other £60 was on Vista for my new laptop (which is arriving tomorrow after six weeks of waiting) … unfortunately that doesn’t arrive until next week so I’ll have to install Linux and then install vista again just so I can use it. Great, three hours of my life wasted.
Why would a simple argument about Advance Wars Tactics between a moderator and a lesser member provoke the lesser member into flying over 1000 miles, going into his home, and stabbing him? Was he that angry, that he didn’t cool down in the five or six hours it took to get there?
Seriously, some people, are fucked up.
And, no doubt some of the media are going to completely misunderstand this and blame in on the ‘violence in the games of today.’ I’ve already heard BBC news infer that Advance Wars was a violent game, calling it a ‘war game’, and showing scenes of the trailer which show vehicles exploding and infantry flying back… Advance Wars is basically chess. Just as violent, just as tactical. Are the media blaming knife crime and murders on chess? No. I don’t understand why the focus is on games specifically - the guns etc found in games are exactly the same as those traditionally given to small boys playing ‘war’.
I don’t get it.
RIP Matt Pyke - I never knew you, but I kinda wish I had.
UPDATE:
Apparently the guy was jealous of Matt’s girlfriend. I suppose this makes more sense… but still.
I lost my iPod. Thursday at breaktime, I think. I was putting it into my pocket, and that was the last time I remember I had it. I suppose someone could have taken it from my jacket when I was in the sports hall, but… anyway, it’s unlikely I’m going to find it.
I have asked everyoneI could possibly ask… but nothing. One teacher did say he’d found an iPod but it wasn’t mine.
WEB DESIGN
I made a web design site, and I’m making custom designs. the link is sorrelmedia.co.cc, if you’re interested. I’ve emailed a couple of local businesses to see if they want a website… hopefully they do and I can start saving for a new iPod.
I also redesigned rikkit.co.uk, if you haven’t noticed… as well as changing the layout of the VOX archive. My next thing to do is customise the layout of this here blog, to match it.
HOMEWORK
Graaah. I’m doing Further Maths for A levels - it’s split into mechanics, pure and statistics. I’m finding mechanics quite easy, and pure is ok too… but statistics is mind boggling. It doesn’t help that I have a teacher who teaches at twice the speed of light, and shouts at/embarrases you if you ask a question. At least I’m not planning to do economics or accounting.
ENGINEERING
There’s this thing called the Engineering Education Scheme at my school - basically, you are put into a group of four and are partnered with an engineer from a local company (such as e.on, or British Gas), in order to solve a porblem they have. At the moment, there are about twenty people who want to do this - so I have to fill in a form online and sit a couple of interviews… the first real interviews I’ll have ever done, so I’m a bit nervous.
The reason I’m doing this is because I’m interested in engineering (obv.), but this would generally look good on a UCAS form. I chose my subjects to cater for either engineering, architecture or physics at uni (maths, physics, art), so for now, I don’t have to decide.
GENERAL SCHOOL
I’m doing five AS levels. That’s one extra than most people in my school - I’m doing Italian as an extra subject. I have to do it before school though, so I only get 1 1/2 hours a week; I get about five in my other subjects. >.>
Hmm. I just rang my grandma… she’s 82, and my grandad died a couple of years ago, so she gets a bit lonely. She just told me that her friend, who usually calls her every toher day, hasn’t rang for a while, and how she was so bored sitting around the house, and wandering around Fosse Park. She said that she hadn’t spoken to anyone since last sunday (when I went round). I felt a bit guilty then, because I hadn’t even thought about calling her this week.
Again, I am up late. I don’t have trouble sleeping - it’s just that I don’t even feel like sleeping. My body clock is completely out of sync: it’s like I’m nocturnal. This xkcd cartoon sums it up better than I can:
Waking at 4pm and sleeping at dawn can’t be good for me. That’s why I’ve resolved to go to sleep no later than 3am. And it’s 2.42am right now. D:
Seeing as I’m up this late, I decided to post something.
Shitty opening sentence, I know, but I always have trouble with starting posts - I suppose it’s because blogging gives a sense that I’m talking to myself, a well known sign of madness; but I guess that’s the risk I took when I set this thing up. ^_^
Anyway.
Like most internet savvy people, I use torrents to get stuff for free - this was all well and good when I thought that the internet was anonymous; however, since I have now realised that whatever I do on the internet is not secret (my ISP is Virgin Media), I’ve decided to use torrents a bit less illegally and start to attempt to legalise my (fairly large) music collection. eBay is a good place to get CDs - though it is a bit frustrating that I don’t actually have a working CD drive to rip the tracks from them - and iTunes is a good place for downloads and stuff. It’s just that MUSIC IS SO FUCKING EXPENSIVE. Of course, things like Keane giving away their new song for free helps - and it’s quite a good one too (only available until 11am today though :O), but it’s putting a bit of a strain on my bank balance. I may just have to start torrenting again. *shock horror*
To the title: You may know of an Australian Electronica band called Cut Copy. Then again, you probably don’t.
Electronic-y music happens to be my favourite kind, along with more folky, rocky and poppy stuff, so naturally, Cut Copy is one of my most played bands at the moment. It started when iTunes put one of their singles, Lights & Music, up for free download. At first I didn’t like it - I was probably in a bad mood - but it sat on my iPod for a while, not being played. Then, one day, I was watching random Trackmania videos on YouTube, and I came across this video:
Apart being in awe of the AMAZING Trackmania skills on display, I also liked the music. I liked it enough to go and find out what it was, anyway. It turned out to be Cut Copy - this prompted me to ‘get’ their album, In Ghost Colours, and I have to say it is one of my all time favourites. It may just be that I’m slightly obsessed with it at the moment, but I think the way one track blends into another, whilst still keeping a great hook, is fantastic. Feel The Love and Hearts on Fire (from the video) are two of the best from the album. As well as Lights & Music, which I came round to after a few more listens.
I then discovered that Cut Copy had made another album previously, in 2005, called Bright Like Neon Love. The name intrigues me, so I decided to get that as well. Hmm. In my opinion anyway, it isn’t as good as In Ghost Colours - rather than having sophisticated rhythms which merge into one another, you get repetetive loops which grate after a while. Even though I like them all. I hate this album, but I also love it at the same time. It’s confusing, to say the least.
Bright Like Neon Love.
Anyway, there is one song which I don’t hate at all. In fact, I quite like it, even though it’s a bit slow. It suits it though. It’s called Future…
It is a pretty odd video, but I like it for that.
Anyway, I’ve spent far too long on this post, so I’m going to leave it there.
Soo… yesterday, I got back from a week long scout camp, in Chelwood, Somerset. Unfortunately for me, I was a PL, and I got lumbered with the worst patrol. THEY DID NOTHING. EVER. Gah. More after the ‘jump’…
