A Blank Canvas

New Blog

2007-06-17T19:24:00.001+01:00

This blog is dead. Go to the new one...

http://logic-gate.blogspot.com

2007-05-24T14:57:00.000+01:00

I know I said I wouldn't post anymore until after the exams, but the temptation really was too great and there have been certain developments since the last post.

The good news is that my body overcame the flu virus and I was in top-notch shape for my English literature and ICT exam. Both went fine (although I wrote twice as much as everyone else for the English paper, which is worrying me slightly...). For all those that commented, thanks for the good advice.

Torquer got us tickets to see Russell Howard and possible Rob Rouse (if he can be bothered to buy them) for £5 each.

I've also got a ten day break before my next exam (geography).

The bad news is that Liverpool lost the champions league final to AC Milan and I'm absolutely gutted. There'll be no parade around Liverpool this time around (which is a shame since the last one started right next to my house).

Hopefully, because Liverpool lost, I'll do well on my GCSEs. Karma works like that right?

Now I'm officially going on hiatus and I won't come back until after my exam are over (in three weeks), and this time I mean it. Honest. When I return there'll be some major changes to this blog.

Just My Luck...

2007-05-21T17:42:00.000+01:00

I swear I must be allergic to examinations.

Last year, I was struck down by chicken pox during my french mocks (thank god it wasn't the real thing. I would have been really screwed if it was). I complained about flu-like symptons on the day (which my friends mocked, calling me a pansy and other far worse derogatory terms), and woke up the next day with itchy red scabs all over my body.

My Dad, being the sensitive guy he is, told me to "stop making excuses to get off school" and to "take it like a man". I ended up bed-ridden for two weeks with chamomile lotion encrusted over my skin.

This year, during my mocks, I had spontaneous neumothorax. It's spontaneous because it randomly occurs (just my luck I know...) and it was bloody painful as well, so I was stuck in a dreary hospital for three days until the pain subsided.

And now, during the REAL GCSEs, I have been battling some sort of cold/flu virus that has infected me at the worst time ever. Two important exams tomorrow and I feel sick and my head is splitting.

My body is usually a fortress, so why must my immune system fail whenever I'm about to sit an exam? I can just imagine the conversation between my white blood cells: "Jingo's about to take an exam... T-CELLS, STAND DOWN. I REPEAT: T-CELLS STAND DOWN. LET ALL PATHOGENS THROUGH. I REPEAT: LET ALL PATHOGENS THROUGH... Let's see him take his exam now!" Or something along those lines...

I think God is conspiring against me.

Anyway, I've decided to put this blog on hiatus, mainly because I need to be focused for my exams and this is unfortunately a distraction. Also, the blog has degenerated somewhat since I'm lacking the will to write (something to do with impeding doom of exams).

Once my exams are over, I'll have time to properly improve this blog.

I'll be back in three weeks.

A Revision Update

2007-05-15T23:18:00.000+01:00

Forgive me for the lack of detail in my last post about citizenship - Had I the time and concentration, I would have properly ranted about this blended and diluted politics/history/media studies joke of a subject that citizenship is.

However, my time and concentration is somewhat divided at the moment since my GCSEs kick off in a few days time. A lot rides on the fact I do well - a cushy future, not feeling like shit during the holidays and a Nintendo Wii (maybe...) are all up for grabs.

In the next two weeks, I will be sitting my Citizenship, English Literature and ICT exams (in that order). Therefore, you may not hear from me any time soon. Citizenship and ICT are not a problem (I've already mentioned how easy the Cit. exam is, and I'm going into the ICT exam with a B grade - so shouldn't be too difficult), it's the English Lit. exam I'm worried about.

English Lit. is the toughest of the two English subjects (much harder than English language). It requires you to have memorised about 20 different poems, the entire "Of Mice and Men" novel, and is the most analytically challenging of the two. To put it bluntly, I am shitting one.

In a desperate attempt to intellectualise myself, I have decided to listen only to Classic FM (and the occasional Radio 4 comedy). I've also started praying - Not to any God in particular, I do it just to make myself feel better.

Hopefully I'll come out of this victorious. My next update will probably be during the half-term, when I've finished my first three exams.

In other news, I can't believe that weird looking girl won the Eurovision for Serbia. I really wanted that Dr. Evil look-a-like for France to win, or those drum-beating Hungarians (they had attitude!). Ireland, in true Father Ted fashion, came last which was pretty funny. I'm just glad England didn't end up with nil points.

And I watched "Scientology and Me" as well. How can anyone buy into that crap? It's not even a religion! I don't see why celebrities are so attracted to it, it doesn't seem to have any benefits whatsoever. You don't see people paying a hundred grand to read the next chapter of the Bible.

And finally, I'm looking forward to the Champions League Final. I can't wait until Liverpool kick AC Milan's arse, just like before!

That's it. I can't wait until these GCSEs are over.

Citizenship

2007-05-11T17:47:00.000+01:00

What does it take to be a good citizen? An A* in GCSE Citizenship that's what.

Last year, I was offered the chance to take this extra subject, which would increase my GCSE tally to 11 and give me a chance to add another shiny A* to my currently small collection (it'll be bolstered in a months time I hope).

Having "studied" (I use the term very loosely) the subject for a year, it's hard to take it seriously. The course mainly deals with human rights, diluted politics and current affairs; topics that can be learnt from simply watching the news. As long as I can still recognise Tony Blair, the exams shouldn't pose a problem.

Here is a sample question from one of the citizenship past papers:

You have found a caterpillar in a sandwich you have bought. Who do you complain to?

A. The government
B. The police
C. The supermarket

Apart from being ridiculously simple, citizenship is only a half course so if I should achieve an A* grade, it would only count for a C grade's worth of UCAS points (these precious points are needed to qualify for further education). So basically, citizenship is micky mouse.

And I've done fuck all in lessons. The teacher has been on leave since having a mental breakdown so I've just been sleeping and playing cards every lesson.

Oh well. It's only citizenship. My exam is a week today.

Le Francais

2007-05-07T23:11:00.000+01:00

Remember when I said I'd do a post for every subject I will be sitting this year? To start, I thought I'd do a post about French, a subject I did a year early and miraculously got an A* for.

Next week some of my friends will go for their french orals - They'll experience the same dread, the same fear, the same pain I went through. And I won't be sympathetic - I'll laugh, and make inappropriate jokes, and I'll fill them with horror stories (I'm not fucking with you! They made me translate french passages of Jules Verne into english I swear!). I'll do exactly what they did to me a year ago. Oh how revenge is sweet.

There was a time when I was afraid French. I was afraid it's subtle accents and gendered nouns, afraid to read out passages of TriColore, afraid of the embarrassment generated from calling a friend copine instead of amie (or vice-versa, which one meant girlfriend again?). But what I feared most of all were the French Orals.

You probably find it amusing that a language can have such an effect on me, and you're probably thinking up jokes involving the French and orals as we speak. But laugh all you want, the mere thought of French reminds me of that day. The day of my dreaded GCSE French Speaking.

Instead of doing some frantic last minute preparation, I came into school and just sat in a corner pondering. Why oh why did I have to take French? Sure, the language sounds damn sexy but was it worth three precious years of my life to learn?

I could of learnt Spanish (a lot easier) or Latin (a whole lot more useful) but instead I chose this! A language spoken by a bunch of baguette wielding anglo-hating beret-wearers who wouldn't even give me directions to the Louvre! (I had to learn the hard way - being stranded in a Parisian street filled with hobos). And what made me choose to take this a year early? I'm too young and stupid! I'm not ready yet to face the cruel rigours of examination, I want to frolic in the Sun without a care in the world!

I waited in the corridor for what seemed like an eternity, with those doubts racing through my mind - I entered the room, I did my oral, and I can out a changed man.

Whenever I recall those moments in that room, I sound like a Vietnam veteran: "you weren't there man! The silence, the flickering lights, that disconcerting smile... Oh God! In those split seconds your mind goes blank, and you can feel the pressure build and you're sweating like a pig... Never again! Never again... *incoherent mumbling*..." I would gladly face the might of Xerxe's Persian army rather than go through that ordeal again.

But I got A* so I can't have been that bad.

Getting Better?

2007-05-02T23:16:00.000+01:00

I knew I wasn't on blistering form in terms of maths results, but I must have been on crack or somethin' when I took that test. I won't post the results since I don't want you all to think of me as some kind of mathematically-challenged, numerically-braindead cretin, so let's just use the euphemism "could have done better".

I feel bitter - like a former beauty queen who's grown too old. I can't quite come to terms with the fact that I'm no longer number one and I'm ever hopeful of clawing my way back to where I truly belong, and that's at the top.

These are dark days indeed. The Gods of calculus are fickle beings - As soon as you start believing you are Blaise Pascal and can solve every Millennium Prize problem, they taketh away and you are left with nothing more than an empty feeling and a half factorised quadratic equation. I wish the Gods would restore me to my former glory, especially since my actual additional maths exam is in a few weeks time.

But it's not all doom and gloom. Things are getting better.

My English abilities have improved tenfold - I know the blog doesn't quite show this, but my English results beg to differ. I think it's because I now know "Of Mice and Men" off by heart, and my poetry analysing skills have vastly improved. The only thing holding me back now is my essay structures (which can be easily remedied).

I suppose I should be glad, since it's not hard to improve maths (it's all about practise and memorising equations) but how on earth does a person go about improving their English? The only way is to read a lot of books, or have the natural ability. Both can't be done the night before, which makes me feel somewhat better after screwing up the maths exam.

So whilst Maths ability has fallen, English ability has risen. Since English counts for 2 GCSEs, and Maths is some kind of post- GCSE, pre- A-level qualification thingy, perhaps this is for the best. Nevertheless, I will be working night and day to improve those maths results.

As I come nearer and nearer to the GCSE exams, I'll probably do a post on every subject I'll be sitting for. There's two weeks to go before things kick off with my Citizenship exam (just to ease into things).

Stick around. Things are soon to get exciting.

300

2007-04-28T15:01:00.000+01:00

I can't believe how poor this film is.

You don't need to have read Sun Tzu's "The Art of War", Machiavelli's "Dell'arte della guerra" or even played on Rome Total War to realise that the warefare in 300 had no tactics whatsoever. This is totally unsatisfactory, considering this is an adaptation of the Battle of Thermopylaie, when vastly out-numbered Spartan hopilites out-manouvred the Persians in one of the most famous last stands in history.

I'm no film connosseur, and I don't watch innovative indie art films. I was prepared to overlook the pathetic dialogue and boring plot as long as it redeemed itself with the "Lord of the Rings"/"Kingdom of Heaven" style epic battles scenes I had expected when I watched the trailer.

Instead it was just close-up filming of Leonidas and (at most) ten other Spartans slashing at ethnic minorities, and making "hwargh" sounds whenever they reach a milestone of kills (that's the level of dialogue you should expect when watching this film).

This gets repetitive after awhile

And I know that a great deal has been made about how the film misrepresents the Persians in history, and how it's propaganda for the war in Iraq. At the time, I thought: "That's a load of bollocks". But having watched the film, I have to admit, they have a point.

I saw nothing wrong with King Leonidas hacking at waves of Iraqi insurgent look-a-likes, but Xerxe's special guard (The Immortals) were taking the piss a bit.

Wait until you see what's underneath those masks

They looked like Taliban wearing mongol masks carrying samurai swords. I mean that's pretty far-fetched to begin with, but when they took off their masks, they looked like extras from Resident Evil (You see them in the trailer, but not their zombie faces). Although they look like your Asian stereotype of super-warriors, underneath it all they are bloodthirsty zombies. I can see how associating Asians with pure evil can be a tad insulting.

Not as exciting as it looks

And let's not forget the monsters, and African animals (it was a joke how little they featured, and how unexciting they were). And Xerxes himself who's a 7-foot freaky homosexual with a very camp voice synthesised so that it's deep.

I can't see how anyone could be so shallow as to like this film (unless you enjoy looking at chiselled abs. In which case, this film must have been incredibly enjoyable).

Add. Maths

2007-04-25T23:03:00.000+01:00

My brain felt like it had just endured several bottles of German schnapps. My neck hurt, my back hurt, my wrist hurt, my eyes could no longer focus properly. I felt like collapsing on the cold concrete and wait for the numbness in my mind to subside, or at least until I got my vision back.

As I walked home, I kept asking myself: "What the fuck happened?"

Having been left to squint at a ridiculously hard test paper in a darkened room for over two hours, I can be fairly certain it was maths. I mean, there were numbers and x's and y's and stuff, but it asked me crazy questions about binomial expansion and kinematics and crap I can't even begin to contemplate.

To say I was overwhelmed would be a bit of an understatement - Binomial expansion seems to need about a tree's worth of paper just to fit it all in and kinematics... I didn't even know such a term existed until last week.

What happened to the Jingo of old who beat 120 people in his year in the KS3 Maths SATs and basically owned everyone in the subject? Ah, those were the days when I was sharp as a knife and algebra would solve itself right in front of my eyes...

But now-a-days, I'm so confused I don't even know whether to differentiate or to integrate anymore. People walk past me, watching me slave over an equation, probably thinking to themselves: "That poor bastard, if only he knew you have to differentiate to find the gradient..."

So it's a fall from grace. I put it down to naivety, lack of revision and overconfidence (being a cocky bastard).

I have made a vow to myself that I'll revise 3 hours every night. Honest. This time I'll actually stick to it instead of procrastinating in front of the computer.

Actually, I haven't even got my results back so we'll wait and see.

Let The Music Do The Talking

2007-04-21T18:32:00.000+01:00

Since I no longer have to worry about coursework, and have badly over-estimated the amount of time I'll revising, I have freed up quite a bit of time.

So I thought I might as well do this music tag of my top 10 songs. I tend to "acquire" hundreds of albums, and I've got about twenty gigabytes of music, so choosing just ten to list here proved quite tough.

My taste also changes every few weeks, so I can never stick to one band or one song. Since the collection is so massive, I occasionally discover hidden gems in my own collection, or I re-listen to old albums and realise the songs have grown on me. Sometimes I just get albums for the sake of getting albums, and only listen to them months later, Or even not at all.

So anyway, here's the list:

1. Ignoreland - R.E.M
One of my favourite bands. A friend gave me "Automatic For The People" and every song on it is pure class.

2. Cosmic Girl - Jamiroquai
This was the first song I heard by Jamiroquai, and it's clearly his best (although his best album is Dynamite). I then became a massive fan of his, even his earlier acid jazz stuff, which has grown on me lately.

3. Reason is Treason - Kasabian
When I first got the album off Torquer, I hated it. I didn't even listen to it. I gave it a chance months later and found their electronic rock quite psychedelic - it was like listening to music on drugs. Definitely not your conventional boy band.

4. Love In An Elevator - Aerosmith
Another one of those bands I loved when I was younger (I've moved on from them since then). They are one of the few glam rock bands I actually like.

5. You Got The Style - Athlete
Britpop at its finest. Will I ever get tired of Athlete? Although not a big band, these guys are fantastic.

6. Manchester - The Beautiful South
That's right, I like old music as well. I doubt anyone outside the UK will have heard of them, but their witty lyrics and mellow tunes are brilliant.

7. Big Yellow Taxi - Counting Crows
An American indie band (I think). I was bored at a party watching a music channel when this song popped up. Based on that one song, I got their Films About Ghosts (their greatest hits).

8. 19-2000 (Soulchild remix) - Gorillaz
This is the best remix I've ever heard - All remixes should sound like this. I also recommend Gorillaz - Their electronic tunes are perfect for parties.

9. Living For The Weekend - Hard-Fi
I discovered them whilst in London, and I saw a big poster advertising their "Stars of CCTV". Very catchy tunes.

10. Rooftops (A Liberation Broadcast) - Lostprophets
Don't let their emo look fool you, they are an excellent metal band. Rooftops in particular is very inspiration and I can imagine it being played in the stadiums.

This list will probably change in a couple of weeks time. To finish off, I'll list the albums I acquired this month:

Cassadega - Bright Eyes
Dreams: Ultimate Collection - The Corrs (ah the nostalgia...)
Yes, Virginia - The Dresden Dolls
The Remote Part - Idlewild
Get Born - JET

If I carry on at this rate, I'll have no space on my computer anymore.

I tag anyone who can be bothered.

No More Coursework

2007-04-19T19:46:00.000+01:00

Oh the relief...

Over the Easter Holidays, I have been fretting for many an hour about the marks of my coursework. If I do well then I've got a head start for my GCSEs, and it'll boost my chances of a high grade. Do poorly and I'll have condemned myself to shit grades before I've even sat the test.

I'm not sure if they have a similar system in other countries, but the UK assesses their students with GCSEs at the end of Key Stage 4 (I'll be sixteen when I sit my exams, so just think the equivalent). Part of the assessment is coursework, which contributes to a percentage of the grade (the percentage depends on the subject. At the moment I'm not even sure the exact percentages for each subject).

Coursework was the governments idea of getting students to think in a different way and experience what "real life" is all about - Normally the coursework involves some kind of large project that then needs to be documented like a kind of extremely diluted thesis or somethin'. It's stupid because marks are determined by the amount of effort the school/teacher is willing to put in, and how willing they are to "bend the rules". It's also incredibly easy to plagiarise since there's a million resources on the Internet.

That's why the government has decided to scrap it. My year will be the last to ever do it.

So anyway, I'm really rubbish at coursework for some strange reason. Something to do with my lack of ability to write reams and reams of waffle. I have spent hours and hours re-writing and correcting coursework, only to have it handed back to me with even more agitated scribbles and red pen. To have finally put coursework behind me is like a weight off my shoulders.

But there's still the actual GCSE exams to think about, so it'll be a stressful two months ahead...

I probably won't be able to blog as much, so don't cry for me if I'm not as active online as the date approaches (apologies in advance if I don't comment on your blogs).

In other news, I had my mock interview today. I'll probably do a post on that later. I also realise I've been tagged twice and haven't gotten round to doing them - I apologise. I've been incredibly busy.

Last thing to add - Go to Torquer's blog. Find out about the guy I constantly slag off.

High Street

2007-04-13T12:00:00.000+01:00

After scrutinising the contents of my rather sparse wardrobe, it dawned on me that I was a growing boy and couldn't keep wearing clothes I've owned for over five years. It's not that I don't care about my image, I actually care about it a great deal - It's just I'm such an incredibly lazy and busy person that I can't spare the time to go to town and do a little shopping.

If I were to burn all the clothes I deem to be uncool, and ignored all my cold weather clothing, I would be left with practically nothing to wear. Therefore I made some hasty phone calls to get some of my mates into town to accompany me whilst I get kitted up for the Summer.

I was glad I brought Torquer with me, who despite dragging me into a "Tesco Metro" to buy one tube of toothpaste (to earn club card points and use up club card vouchers) and a "Boots" to buy some Dead Sea facial scrub, seems to possess unrivalled knowledge of every clothing retailer in Liverpool.

I don't normally shop in any of the fashionable outlets (or shop at all) so it was slightly intimidating when we entered shops like "Topman", "Burton" and "GAP" where the doors are flanked by emos clad in black with various bits of metal nailed to their faces. Topman in particular was some kind of grungefest, where a hybrid species of Surfer/Emo had evolved.

I also noticed that stripes seem to be incredibly fashionable right now, especially stripey hoodies (to cater to the chav community no doubt). Burton had nothing but stripes and I left when I couldn't find a single fleece with a zip (not in season apparently).

And GAP - £40 for a pair of jeans? Are you having a laugh? Just because it's multi-tonal and has a couple of fashionable rips doesn't mean I'm gonna fork out an extra £30 for a pair. Torquer told me that Marks & Spencers do jeans that look exactly the same as GAP for half the price which made me feel somewhat better (he's a wealth of information that lad. Don't know what I'd do without him).

You may gather from all this that I don't go shopping often. The most I've spent on one piece of clothing was a pair of trainers for £40. The idea of spending more than £5 for a shirt or £10 for a pair of jeans makes me hyperventilate.

So we rounded off the day with a trip to the MetQuarter - where the most fashionable shops are situated (Gucci Exchange, Prada etc.). We didn't buy anything (far too expensive), but we did see Mikel Arteta and Tim Cahill shopping there.

People who watched the 2006 World Cup or are fans of the Australia national team may be familiar with Tim Cahill, who scored twice against Japan in the World Cup finals and was part of the team that nearly beat the eventual winners Italy - So he's pretty damn famous. I wanted to get my picture taken with him but my friends wouldn't allow it - they claimed that since we were Liverpool fans, it would be like fraternising with the enemy.

A shame really. Later on we watched a crappy Horror film.

I plan to go on another shopping expedition after my GCSEs. Hopefully then I'll actually buy something.

Horror Films and The Truth About Torquer

2007-04-07T20:40:00.000+01:00

Have I become really desensitised, or have horror films become really un-scary of late? I went to town last Saturday with a few friends in the hope of buying some new clothes but ended up loitering until six, then being forced to watch "The Messengers" at the shitty Odeon (which cost me £8.30 in total - almost the same price I paid for the two sexy T-shirts I bought that day).

After watching "The Messengers", I have decided: a.) to never go to the rip-off Odeon ever again b.) never watch a rated 15 horror film ever again. I sat through the film bored out of my mind, trying to scare my mates by proving commentary (which didn't go down too well).

Horror films have no creativity these days - they all seem to follow the same rules. For example, the little pale blue ghost boy that looks like it's been rotting in a stagnated lake for months. I remember seeing the same thing in the Grudge (except the one in the Grudge was less CGI'd) so I got a distinct feeling of deja vu (both were about families moving into derelict houses, only to be freaked out by the ghost kid who happens to haunt the place) when watching this. The idea of the creepy little kid has been so over-used it's about as scary as Casper.

The resemblance is uncanny
And the boring shock tactics - I see no point in something jumping at me unless it's really unexpected. They build it up with slow movement and dramatic music but when it comes to the actual shock part it's just so anti-climatic. Perhaps I'm just nit-picking but horror films have become so samey and boring.

So if I ever watch a horror film ever again, it'll be an 18. None of that namby-pamby 15 rated stuff for me.

Afterwards, I was a little concerned about Torquer who had been impassive throughout the film - he hadn't moved a muscle and looked like he had been in a coma.

Only then did it dawn on me - Torquer's house was haunted.

It made so much sense: his exploding television, his mum hurling herself off a flight of stairs in the night, his shelves flying off his wall (I'm not making this up, Torquer told me himself)... Hilarious calamities that are completely unconnected? Or something more sinister?

And I've just remembered - his family bought the house cheap after the previous residents died in "mysterious circumstances". I wouldn't be surprised if his walls dripped with blood in the night and ghouls flied out of his cellar (I assume he has a cellar. It's probably boarded up to hide the hidden Indian burial ground the house was built on).

No wonder Torquer is so weird and charges people for pencils. The paranormal activities in his house must have addled his brain, causing him to persue such unusual past times such as lemon-growing, Formula 1 watching and Ikea assembling.

As soon as he comes back from Nottingham, I'll quiz him on this.

In other news, I met Mikel Arteta and Tim Cahill whilst shopping in the Met Quarter! But I'll save that for another post.

Sefton Park

2007-04-04T15:16:00.000+01:00

The phone starts ringing.

Oh God no, not again. I really should have learnt from the last time I left my cordless phone in my room. The room was basked in a golden glow as I groped for the phone.

Robin: Can you make to Sefton Park today?
Jingo: What? At this hour?
Robin: It's half ten, Jingo. It's hardly the early hours of the morning.
Jingo: (checks watch) Oh right... So what's this talk about going to the park? It's 6 weeks before the GCSEs! I'm not jeopardising my future just to have a frivolous game of football.
Robin: So? Stop being a loser.
Jingo: I have a study routine going on here, I can't abandon it! I have a future to work towards!
Robin: Seriously dude... You're beginning to sound like Torquer...
Jingo: What? No!
Robin: Even he's showing up...

As I was on the phone, I drew back the curtains to reveal a perfect spring morning - The radiant shimmering sun-drenched landscape of the outside world a perfect contrast to my depressingly dingy bedroom. I realised it would be criminal not to capitalise on such a fine day.

So I had no choice - I went to Sefton Park. We spent hours there kicking the ball around until the point where we couldn't move because of cramp.

I also learnt a valuable lesson - never wear glasses when playing football. Torquer somehow managed to smack the ball at my face from point-blank range, and my glasses managed to somehow dig into my eyes and fly off my face simultaneously. I stumbled around on the glass groping for them while he laughed in my face, feigning concern.

I was on my hattrick as well, the bastard.

So all thoughts of revision flew out of my mind. I may fail my GCSEs but atleast I got a decent game of football.

Thank God It Is Easter (Part 2)

2007-03-31T02:21:00.000+01:00

This goes beyond all common sense, but it seems like I’ll be pulling another all-nighter. What now Jingo, more important coursework that needs to be handed in tomorrow morning or you’ll have fail your course and die of shame? No. This time I’m keeping myself awake because I’m trying to prove a point by spending the entire night completing a chemistry revision guide. A Chemistry Revision Guide 127 pages long that’s stuffed with challenging questions and I intend to complete it, even if it takes the whole night. And I’m doing this, to prove a point - To myself. I think I’m going insane.

(I’ve just spent half an hour sitting in the dark mulling over my thoughts. That can’t be normal.)

And I’m doing this on the start of the Easter holidays, the English equivalent of the infamous Spring Break. Whenever I think “Spring Break”, I picture girls in small bikinis playing volleyball and basking in the sun whilst drinking pina coladas, or house parties where everyone is falling over and laughing and making out with each other (yes, I do realise I watch too many American teen movies) – so basically, people having excessive amounts of fun. Therefore it depresses me to be alone in the dark, trying to figure out the empirical formula of calcium carbonate while people half a world away are living it up without a care in the world. It sickens me how cruel life is.

So why don’t you stop subjecting yourself to this mental torture and get some sleep, you may ask. It’s not even like this remotely matters, or will have any impact on me at all – I won’t magically understand chemistry by doing this.

Since I'll have no study leave, this will be my only chance to revise properly before the exams begin in 6 weeks time. I intend to make the most of it, even if it damages my health.

So basically, my Easter won’t exactly be chocolate eggs and fluffy bunnies. At least that party-animal, wild-child Torquer will come round during the holidays – he’ll probably bring his lemon plant photo collection and rant about the benefits of a Mac, as he sneers at my pathetic Windows powered laptop. He’ll probably bore me into submission so I’ll have no choice but to study and revise.

And why the hell does no one buy me chocolate? It seems the school tradition of buying each other Easter eggs is restricted to just the girls. It’s either that or I’m incredibly unpopular/my friends are stingy bastards/no one is willing to spend money on me.

So anyway, I’m really looking forward to this relaxing break from school. Now if you excuse me, I have chemicals to calculate.

Note: I do realise I've repeated a lot of stuff from my last post. The last one didn't really express how I felt (and was kinda crap) so this one makes up for it.

Thank God Easter's Here

2007-03-30T19:58:00.000+01:00

This week has really drained the life out of me - I've been chasing coursework deadlines, depriving myself of sleep and generally fretting over the GCSEs that loom over me like a dark cloud. At this rate, my health will slowly deteriorate and I'll waste away as I walk further down the road to self-destruction. Will there be any respite?

Thank God Easter has come. It really couldn't have come sooner. I think the American equivilent is Spring break, which has always conjured up thoughts of bikinis and beaches and excessive fun (I have been watching too many American teen movies). It's depressing to know that I'll be spending "Spring break" sleeping, procrastinating and doing casual revision - so there'll be not an ounce of fun.

(I'll probably invite that party-animal wild-child Torquer to mine sometime in the holidays. He'll probably bring his potted plant photo collection to ease the boredom or somethin')

The Easter holidays gives me two weeks to recuperate, then there'll be just a month before I start sitting my GCSEs, something I've been working towards in the last few months. These two weeks will be devoted to working towards not screwing up.

In other news, I badly want a Nintendo Wii. Since I can't afford a PS3 and I hate all things Microsoft, I'll probably save up for one of these in the Summer.

4am

2007-03-27T17:37:00.000+01:00

The phone is ringing.

I stumble out of bed, groping for the cordless phone I had inadvertantly left in my room. It's dark but I can hear birds twittering.

It takes an eternity for me to answer it, and when I do I hear this: "Oh shit. I forgot to dial 141..." I hear some laughter in the background. They then put down the phone.

Oh fuck. It took me some time to register what was happening. I glance to the clock and it tells me it's 4am. Before I can even dial 1471 to trace the number, they redial.

I put the phone down. They call again. I unplug the phone.

I was up till fucking 12 doing fucking coursework and I was absolutely fucking shattered. I can't deal with this shit. Needless to say, I was not a happy bunny next morning.

I made some enquiries back at school and found the culprit. I then went on MSN and gave him a right bollocking (apparently he was drunk at the time). After giving him a piece of my mind, I doubt he'll ever try that shit ever again.

Anyway, there is more to this gripping tale... which I'll tell you about when I'm not inundated with coursework. I'm also not getting enough sleep.

The Great Coursework Panic

2007-03-22T00:54:00.000Z

At the time, I made a vow to myself that I'd stay ahead of the game; that I'd keep on top of my coursework; and I won't piss about and wait until the end then panic and stay up till 3am when I'm absolutely shattered and have a twitch in my eye. Fast forward to now - it's 1am on a weekday and I'm typing away in semi-darkness, overwhelmed by the massive stacks of coursework that surround me as I try to meet the hundreds of deadlines.

Yes, I have a sense of deja vu. But this time, instead of a relaxed atmosphere of beer drinking and cherry tomato eating, I'm vaguely listening to Radio 4 comedy whilst half-reading the Budget for 2007 in The Guardian. I like to think of it as intellectual stimulant. Oh and I'm completely wound up, and have this horrible twitch that makes it impossible for me to look at the screen.

And to think I laughed at Torquer when he decided to sacrifice the first episode of the new series of House MD in favour of redrafting his english coursework. I watched it (and thought it was great) but now I pay the price; he's probably snug in his bed dreaming away while I'm in a mad rush to complete chemistry coursework. I blame Channel 5. Why would you put the first episode of House MD and Shark on the same day?

To make matters worse, the school has announced there will be no study leave this year. NO STUDY LEAVE. This means I'll be in school before and after these massively important exams. Not only will I not be able to concentrate, but I'll also feel like shit as well. Great.

And another thing, I'm just not getting enough sleep these days because of workload and this is making me incredibly tired. It's like the sleep version of oxygen debt, but instead of lactic acid my body is producing grouchiness.

And I'll finish off there. This post has probably degenerated into inane ramblings but I'm just too tired to read over, or put in the links to Wikipedia so you know what the hell I'm talking about. I'll probably regret ever writing this in the morning...

Edit: Does anyone know how you can possibly collect carbon dioxide (which is heavier than air) in a test tube to measure it, after producing it from calcium carbonate marble chips when reacted with hydrochloric acid? Now that I think about it, does that even produce carbon dioxide? This is what happens when you work in the early hours of the morning...

Grand Theft Plagarismo

2007-03-19T20:00:00.000Z

The panic has set in. I've decided to barracade myself in my own room, with nothing more than a Budweiser, some Danone Activia apricot yoghurt and a brioche to keep me through the long night ahead. Desperate times call for desperate measures, I might even have to cancel watching Prison Break tonight.

Yes, I'm willing to make sacrifices. All for the sake of a few extra marks on my coursework. Is it even worth it? Would I do just as well in my GCSEs without a few measly extra percent? Unfortunately, this may have a massive effect on my future and I'm not willing to take any risks.

If only I had Torquer for guidance. He is a coursework-writing genius and seems to be able to achieve 100%s effortlessly, while I on the other hand toil night and day, writing reams and reams of the stuff only to have it sent back to me covered in red pen with little yellow post-it notes that read: "This is pure drivel and has all the literary value of a Harry Potter novel." or something along those lines.

Alas, it seems the only way I'll get 100% in my Business Studies coursework is if I commit an act of Grand Theft Pagarismo and ransack his computer harddrive, making copies of the Business Studies coursework he has worked so hard on.

Or I could just work hard on my own. Maybe I should do that instead of contemplating ways of stealing Torquer's work and getting distracted by this blog.

I've just noticed my Budweiser has been replaced by a bowl of cherry tomatoes. How very strange...

A Buffet is a Buffet is a Buffet

2007-03-15T22:14:00.000Z

Imagine me striding through the darkness in Liverpool city centre; Uni students stumble out of pubs vomitting or cackling inanely as I stare in awe at the neon lights and gaudy nightclubs. In all my years living in Liverpool, this is the first time I've been to this part of town; perhaps it's because of the unsavoury rabble that seem to loiter around this area, or the high likelihood that i'll get mugged if I walk around, looking dazed, by myself in the dark.

Did I mention I was wearing my school uniform? So there I was, walking through Liverpool in my blazer looking a total ponce, as students of varying levels of drunkeness give me odd looks.

So why was I risking my life amist the bustle of Liverpool nightlife? Well, for some unknown reason, my Dad was taking some business colleagues to some swanky new buffet that had just opened and he suggested I join him. Since there'd be no one at home to cook I had the difficult choice of deciding whether to go home and starve, or navigate through Liverpool's drunk quarter then endure my dad's boring company for an hour.

I managed to make it through the city without being knifed and when I reached the buffet, I was quite impressed. The place was huge and the food smelt good and the waitresses were all very pretty.

But when I went up to get some food, I realised that a buffet is a buffet is a buffet. As swanky as this place was, it was still a buffet and that meant generic anglo-chinese food that you have to get yourself and bring back to your small table that too close to the other tables and so you can hear everyone else's boring conversation. I don't like using stereotypes, but I was surrounded by thieving scousers; whole tables were stuffed with them as they traded stories about thuggery and drunkeness and the number of ASBOs they had "won".

Nevertheless, I ate until I was bursting and look forward to going back there to stuff my face.

It's The Start. Of Something New...

2007-03-11T15:20:00.000Z

It's weird how the A-level results coincide with my options deadline.

All around me Year 12's were experiencing the joys and pains of results day. Most clutched their results paper with a look of relief or disappointment, wandering around trying to make themselves feel better by comparing results with others in the hope that they didn't do as bad as they thought (whilst pretending they weren't too bothered about their results when actually it was eating away at their insides).

You can always tell the ones who get the multiple 100%s by the way they swagger around and deliberately not boast, even though they emit an aura of smugness, the bastards (who I secretly admire).

And you can't help feeling sorry for those that have failed completely, but are still enquiring about their chances to Oxbridge. Or the ones that are crying in the corner somewhere. I have a terrible feeling every time I see them that it's foreshadowing...

It certainly made me think twice which was why Torquer and I talked about our options a great deal before deadline day:

Torquer: "So what about Geography? Apparently it's the bridge between social sciences and real sciences. Surely that'd be useful?"

Jingo: "Don't get me started on Geography. If the 'Green Revolution' gets mentioned one more time I'll hurl myself into a biogas container with a lighted match... If I wanted to be bored I'd talk to you more often."

Torquer: "Economics then? That's kinda interesting..."

Jingo: "Only for someone as boring as you. It's just general knowledge and watered down maths! I really can't endure another year of analysing cash-flow forecasts..."

Torquer: "ICT?"

Jingo: "What makes you think I'd want to sit in front of a screen being taught visual basic by a boring middle-aged man?"

Torquer: "How about French? We both did that a year early, we both got A*s, surely it'll be a breeze?"

Jingo: "I think you forget the amount of effort we put in to get those A*s Torquer, and as you know I'm a really lazy person. And besides, I've forgotten it all by now. The only french phrase I remember is 'voulez-vous couchez avec-moi, ce soir?' and I learnt that off a Christina Agulera video."

(I then start singing the Moulin Rouge song Christina Agulera did, whatever it's called. You know the one. I only know a few lines.)

Torquer: "Oh I know! English. We're cool blog-writing people, it can't be that hard?"

Jingo: "Firstly, you're about as cool as James Blunt. And secondly, there's too much analysing poetry involved... I'd do it if we didn't have to annotate every Simon Armitage poem ever written. Seriously, if I ever meet Simon Armitage I'll punch him in the face for the misery I've suffered reading his works. If I have to analyse another Simon Armitage poem, I'll impale myself with a rusty pencil..."

Torquer: Damn it Jingo! Why must there be a snide reply to everything I say? I have feelings! And emotional needs!

Jingo: Oh shut your face, Torquer. And don't forget to make me that GCSE timetable you lazy moron.

So there you go, a fascinating insight into a phone call between Torquer and I. It didn't take long for me to make my choices, since there are so many subjects I can't wait to drop.

My final decision was:
Biology
Chemistry
Physics
Mathematics
reserve: Further Mathematics

Could it be any more scientific? It was actually tough deciding which reserve I should pick since Maths is the only subject I'm naturally gifted at, yet three sciences would make me a far better candidate for Medicine. I know it's possible to take 6 A-levels (including General Studies) but then would I have a social life? I think I'll wait until my GCSE results before such drastic decisions.

Hopefully I'll be celebrating some kickass results and not contemplating suicide, come this time next year.

A Blank Canvas

2007-03-08T19:40:00.001Z

What was jingoistic? It definitely wasn't me; if anything, I'm turning more and more into a liberal. Only last week, I switched newspapers from The Times (read by right-wing old people) to The Independent (read by left-wing, dynamic young people). Although not because of any change in political view, simply because The Times is as dull as dishwater. I don't think I've posted anything vaguely right-wing or nationalist so the name really doesn't make any sense.

So in an effort to be taken more seriously (and not to be labelled as a BNP member), I've decided to completely redesign the blog.

I think the most difficult part of the switch was the naming process. I wanted something that was witty, hilarious and deep. This proved quite a challenge. I skimmed through various different books (including my GCSE poetry anthology) and spent many days thinking up the perfect blog name, but my mind was blank.

My house is littered with canvasses; some hanging off the walls and the rest stuffed under my bed. It seemed fitting to call the blog "A Blank Canvas", since my future is so malleable at this moment in time. Who knows what will become of me in couple of years? Like a blank canvas, this is a fresh start. Hopefully It'll turn out to be a masterpiece and not some idle doodle.

(And whilst searching Wikipedia, they described a canvas as "artistic material". Well that's me alright.)

Like Smirnoff ice, this blog has been filtered for a richer, smoother taste. I hope you enjoy.

A Beautiful Day To Pick Litter...

2007-03-04T19:39:00.000Z

It's March? That could only mean another session of my favourite activity, picking litter at Prince's Park! Hurrah, it means I get another chance to spend my precious time trudging through mud, navigating through parklands that seem to have been bombed by litter when I could be sleeping in and recuperating. And did I mention I get to spend time with this charming fellow? Oh joy.

The things I will do to bolster my CV...

I've already told you enough anecdotes involving Torquer and I so I shan't bother this time. The truth is nothing embarrassing or amusing happened on our third litter-picking session.

The sun was shining, the birds were singing, the dogs were yapping... Instead of just picking litter, I decided to piss around taking photos while Torquer and Rob struggled with their big binbags (100% un-photoshopped!) :

This tree was probably struck by lightning.

I found this amusing. You might not.

Amongst the disgusting debris, there was beauty... I'm surprised swans can live in such squalor

Back at Rob's, I head straight over to his pond when he informed me of the frog orgy that takes place around this time of month. With these pics, I could become a frog pornographer...

So there's a selection of photos I took whilst litter-picking. There were lots more but unfortunately Torquer featured in them, the disgusting git.

Physics Showdown

2007-03-02T17:31:00.000Z

Physics Challenge... Over the past few days I have come to despise it.

I hate the way the school has decided to enter the "physics elite" (59 students out of 120...) to face a such a fiendishly insanely difficult test. I hate how the grades are Bronze, Silver and Gold; and if I get a "Participation", I needn't have bothered. I hate how the grade boundary is 70% for a Gold, yet most of us won't even achieve 30% (a Bronze). I hate how the test is not a qualification, yet means more than any qualification I have done to date.

But most of all, I hate how important it is to me. Succeed and I can silence my critics and it'll look awesome on the Uni applications. Fail and there aren't any serious implications... (apart from losing all respect and having a shattered self-esteem. I've already suffered enough from my poor Chemistry result)

And having done the test today, I regret being so ill-prepared. The day before the exam, the only preparation I did was take a shower with "Herbal Essence's Fruit Fusion" (The ads on TV enticed me so I bought the product, and it did wonders for my hair. Afterwards I felt somewhat emasculated...). On the morning of the exam, I ate a pain-au-chocolate in the hope that the energy I gained from this little french pastry would convert into some kind of mental stimulant. I did very little actual studying.

So with that in mind, I realised I probably won't achieve my set target of Gold. Even Bronze would be a struggle. As I waited for my exam paper, I realised I should probably have revised more.

Nick: Face it Jingo, God's on my side. He'll guide me through this test no problem.
Jingo: God's on my side. How else did I get A* in French when I can't speak a word of it?

(at this point Nick begins mumbling a prayer)

Nick: Dear God, see everyone through this except Jingo... See everyone through this except Jingo...
Jingo: Glad to know I'm in your prayers Nick...

Before we could exchange further banter, the test had begun and I screwed it up. But anyway, it's over now. Results are on Monday.

So a stressful weak is over. I've just ran 5km and watched Pan's Labyrinth whilst eating a Big Mac. Therefore I'm extremely confused/disorientated/frightened at this moment in time. All I want to do is sleep...

Master of Pens

2007-02-27T17:53:00.000Z

Entrepreneurial genius? Or just a sad little person obsessed with pens? As I watch Torquer pick up a broken biro, scrutinise it, and then finally pocket it; I really can't decide. All I can be certain of is that the cold-hearted bastard will never lend me one, unless I rent it for the day.

That's right, rent a pen. I'm sure if he had his way he'd make me sign a written contract, and force me to buy warranty and insurance. Only yesterday, I had to pay 7p for a pen (including 24 hour warranty apparently) which he found on the floor. I've still got the pen now, so it's only a matter of time before Torquer calls out the pen mafia to break my legs.

I also know for a fact that Torquer has some kind of bizarre pen refurbishing set up in his room. Plus a big cardboard box full of old recycled pens he has restored, ready to flog to hapless punters like me. His room is probably littered with nibs, springs and the empty plastic shells of pens. I can just picture him, toiling late into the night, trying to make some kind of Frankenstein pen (or whatever other pen-related activities he gets up to).

I used to think it annoying and sad, but now beginning to appreciate it for what it is: Pure Entrepreneurial Genius. Torquer shows incredible business sense in navigating his niche market and building up his reputation as the leading seller of writing implements (which does nothing for his popularity, but I don't think he cares). Therefore I want in.

I'm currently trying to persuade him to form a partnership with me, and dive into the confectionery market. "Cans and chocolate bars are where the big money is Torq. There are bigger fish to fry!", I keep telling him, but he's unsure. If we moved into these uncharted waters we would face stiff competition and Torquer's just happy with his little niche, despite the incredibly low profit margins (and girls laughing at him).

If there are any developments, I'll let you know. One things for certain, if me and Torquer ever do Young Enterprise, we'd kick arse.

Oh, and Physics Challenge on Friday. Hopefully we'll kick arse in that as well.

The Ultimate Playlist

2007-02-23T16:46:00.000Z

Over the past few days, I have been deprived of internet because the wireless on my laptop mysteriously failed. After many hours spent figuring out how a year old £1,500 laptop could just spontaneously malfunction, with the "help" of Microsoft's trouble-shooter (a total nightmare), and consulting various different tech-heads over the phone; It was discovered that I am, as my mum put it: "a total moron" as I had simply switched off the wireless inadvertantly somehow.

So to occupy those boring internet-less days, I began sorting through and listening to all the music in my iTunes library.

Since I have over 1500 songs (and an 80GB iPod video), most of the music is deprived of my attention since I favour artists I know that are good (and with over 1500 songs, I can't really remember all the tunes to them if they aren't incrediby catchy).

The solution, I realised, was to make playlists. I used to think them a waste of time, prefering to listen to albums instead. But now I'm listening to the stuff I don't usually listen, judging whether they are any good, and then sticking them in the playlist that corresponds their genre. (And if it's emo deleting it.)

I've now compiled the ultimate Electronica/Acid Jazz/Synthesised Playlist ever (Jamiroquai, Kasabian etc.). And also quite a good Alternative Mellow Rock playlist (200ish songs and a lot of R.E.M.). No longer will people laugh at my poor music selection whenever I host a party, instead admiring my awesome arsenal of kickass tunes.

It was with these potential parties in mind that I reluctantly asked Torquer for some of his music (He has maybe the worst music taste ever. It's all techno trash and Brit pop):

"That Live Lounge album is pretty good, bring that in for tomorrow," I said casually.
"If you want a copy you can buy it off me for 50p. If not piss off," Torquer replies.

Half an hour of bartering ensues. I want it for nothing, citing: "That's what friends are for!" but he won't lower the price, defending his position with: "Stop freeloading off me you hobo". Eventually we agree that if I bring in an album (I never do) he'll trade it for his.

You should see what he's like when I lose one of his pens.

"Why do you even want it? You never host any parties and it's not like you have any friends to listen to it." Torquer said.

It was at that point I ran out of the class sobbing.

Torquer Teaches Me How To Bank

2007-02-19T17:29:00.001Z

Despite Torquer being a total bore, I felt the urge to phone him last night. I rarely call the boring git, but when I do these phone calls span hours, and last night’s was pretty damn long (around two hours). What could I possibly be talking about for two hours? Especially with a person who’s idea of fun would be to admire his IKEA furniture and alphabetically sort his Formula 1 magazines?

We could have been talking about the many numerous subjects our fellow peers like to talk about: football, girls, exams, anything remotely interesting. Instead, we were discussing finance, and how best I should invest my money.

What started out as a casual question about credit cards soon had Torquer telling me everything he knew about banking. I felt like I was talking to a financial consultant:

Torquer: I suggest you set yourself a Right Track current account at HSBC, and then set up an ISA. But make sure you do it before the end of the financial year! That way you’ll be able to put in £3000 before the end and then immediately after so you’ll get £6000’s worth of interest at HSBC’s awesome offer of 5.3% APR! Do you know how much money you’ll get through interest this way? That’s a lot of mullah!

Jingo: Why HSBC? Can’t I just go to Barclays and get a Mini Cash ISA for less interest? I can’t be bothered hauling myself off to HSBC, I’ve already got a child saver account at Barclays.
(Torquer then laughs at my pitiful child saver account)

Torquer: Are you a fucking idiot or something? 0.1% of APR might not seem like much to someone as financially braindead as you but that 0.1% is worth that extra effort! You'll thank me when you have an extra £5 at the end of the year.

And this is coming from the person who, early today, refused to sell me one stick of chewing gum for 2 pence (He was holding out for 3 pence, citing that he had a family to feed. After much groveling, he did eventually take the 2 pence. But who on Earth charges for chewing gum?).

I really couldn't understand a thing he was talking about. But on his sound advice, I have set up a current account and am now the proud owner of a shiny HSBC debit card. Now if only I knew what to do with it...

We then spent an hour talking about Miss Congeniality, which I watched last night. Torquer said it was a "load of Bullock". Oh how I laughed.

Book Tag

2007-02-16T18:36:00.000Z

What I really should be doing is understanding this complicated Calculus (Integration, Differentiation, which one's which again?). Instead, ShouFarn has cruelly decided to tag me. Therefore duty calls.

Rules are simple:

1) Grab the closest book to you.

"The Writer's Presence" compiled by Donald McQuade and Robert Atwin

2) Open to page 123, go down to the 4th sentence.
3) Post the text of the following 3 sentences on your blog.

"The mother was acting on her own, I think: That was her way of being cruel and competitive under the guise of being helpful and maternal. You have small breasts, she was saying; therefore you will never make him as happy as I have. Or you have small breasts; therefore you are less of a woman than I am."

The book is a collection of essays and extracts of books which were put together for the purpose of teaching students the different styles authors use. The three sentences were from the article "A Few Words about Breasts" (which seems like quite an interesting read).

I bought the book for $50, back when I was in America studying at John Hopkins (or Baltimore. I can't remember which) on an exchange programme. Ah, fond memories.

Back then I was short and fat but popular. Oh how the Americans love a Brit amongst them. It was in America where I wore a dress, discovered my love for R.E.M and drank a drink that was a mixture of Coke and Ice-cream (America! What a country!)

The book is huge; almost 1000 pages of font size 8. Which is why it's been sitting on my desk, unread, gathering dust.

And I tag whoever who wants to do this little meme.

It Seems I Have Been Tagged...

2007-02-13T18:10:00.000Z

It was bound to happen sooner of later. I have been officially "tagged" by Gaz and I'm now under some kind of obligation to provide everyone with a list of "five things you did not know about me". I'm actually surprised I didn't get tagged by someone sooner, but I guess it's something to do with the company I keep. I tend to stay away from blogs that have "Half-Naked Thurdays" or "Picture Wednesdays" or whatever other memes bloggers must use when they lack creativity to come up with original posts and must resort to posting pictures of their own naked flesh.

(Having said that, some memes are very interesting.)

And why on earth am I doing this? Instead of writing this meme, I should be writing a literary essay comparing four different poems as practise for my GCSE english. Damn you Duffy! Damn you Armatage! Children all over the country are suffering thanks to those two; It borders on impossible trying to make sense what Simon Armitage is waffling on about in his poem "Homecoming" (which I'm currently analysing). I mean I don't mind reading poetry, but if you're gonna ask me to annotate it, then write a massive essay on it...

OK, so things you did not know about me:

My life is terribly mundane. I get up late, I revise, I go back to bed. There's nothing of interest happening in my life at this moment in time other than exam related anxieties. Take what I'm doing right now: I'm reading up on Differentiation and Integration. And later, I intend to phone Torquer. Both very boring activities. I really can't stress enough how boring my life is.
I'm a real stingy bastard. The mere thought of spending money makes me cry, which is strange considering I have no fiscal reponsibilities whatsoever. At my age, I should be screaming for more X-Boxes, Bratz dolls, Gucci underwear and generally being a spoilt brat. I'm currently in need of a new pair of slippers but I'd rather my feet go cold than spend £2.50.
I cross-dressed in America. Now before you start jumping to conclusions that I'm some kind of deranged, sexually-confused, transvestite, hear me out! I blame those perverted Americans! Now that I think about it, is there even such a thing as Transvestites Day? And it was only a skirt! (I can now understand why girls wear them, I was overcome with an urge to twirl...) I simply grabbed a skirt (borrowed it) and put it over my perfectly normal, sports casual, male clothing! I won't go into further detail, it was too traumatising... (I really shouldn't have told my friends about it)
I support Liverpool Football Club. But I haven't been to a game since Michael Owen, Emile Heskey, Milan Baros and Diouf made up the strike force, and that was with Torquer about 4 years ago. I just can't bring myself to buy a ticket...
I'm a Mac lover, but have yet to own a Mac. I despise Windows with their crappy Vista upgrade (that's blatantly ripped off the Mac OSX, and downgrades media files, and has like 5 new features that aren't even new...). As soon as I've mustered up the £1.5 grand I'm off to buy a Macbook Pro.

That's it. I tag:

Miao
Gneake
and Mutley (I'd be interested to see what he writes)
and anyone else who wants to do it.

Strange Snowy Substance

2007-02-09T18:43:00.000Z

What is this strange substance? It's white, it's cold, and as I look out of the window; the entire neighbourhood is covered with the stuff as if God had thrown his shit-stained blanket over Liverpool.

It's been over two years since that wonderful Christmas Day back in 2004 and I've almost forgotten what snow actually looks like. Everything was was so picturesque back then: A carpet of white under a star-strewn sky, the houses powdered like cakes and children frolicking and laughing everywhere you turned.

Fast-forward to now. The snow is a pathetic inch at most and has been reduced to a disgusting brownish sludge; how it had managed to evade the acid rain and carbon emissions to reach the ground is anyones guess. If this was God's attempt at making up for two snowless years then it was nothing more than an insult. As I looked out from my window early that morning, I treated it with cold indifference. This wasn't snow you could make snowmen and ice forts out of, this was the annoying, disgusting kind that you try to tip-toe around and used rock salt to destroy.

I used to regard snow as something fantastically fun and treated it like white gold. Now-a-days it's just a cold nuisance that needs to be scraped off the car.

But this depressing bleakness did not last. Whilst in school, staring wistfully out of the window (it was Religious Studies), a blizzard formed and the clouds dumped their load of snowy goodness all over the playground. It was a Godsend. The atmosphere soon reached fever pitch as we waited for Break, which would give us a good ten minutes for us to hurl this precious substance at one another.

When the bell rang, we burst from our classrooms and hurled ourselves at the glass doors only to discover something was horribly amiss: We were in here, and the snow was out there, and a glass barrier separated us from that pearly white Heaven. What resulted was a massive crush as students tried to force the doors back in vain.

The school decided, for health and safety reasons, that locking us all in the school would be the best course of action. Since snow is such a dangerous substance, and in all likelihood someone could have suffered immense trauma from an unsuspecting snowball, therefore I respect their decision. But it was a catch 22: Keep us locked inside and face health and safety over fire risk, or let us out and face health and safety over ice and snow. Either way we were extremely pissed off.

As lessons resumed, the fire alarm went off (we later learnt a gang of lads in hoodies triggered it) and the teachers were powerless to stop us. Soon snowballs began to fly. And anarchy was rife.

I spied Torquer weaving through the crowds of snowball-hurling people as if dodging shells. Sneaking up on him, I dealt a fatal blow to the back of his head and he crumpled to the ground. Before he could even mutter "What the fuck" I'd picked up another and smashed it into his face. I laughed as he struggled helplessly on the ground, wimpering in shock.

Oh how I love snow!

P.S. I've been informed by Torquer that I must link to his post on Taster Sessions, since he's holding my business studies coursework at ransom. Go to his blog and read it; his grammar is vastly superior to mine.

Physics Challenge!

2007-02-07T17:01:00.000Z

Lately my interest in physics has sparked (no pun intended), and as if on cue the school announced that they would be entering the top physicists, the creme-de-la-creme of Year 11 in the highly esteemed, much sought-after, CV-boosting, nationwide physics competition that is The Physics Challenge.

The Physics Challenge consists of just a 1 hour test paper; nothing more, nothing less. Anyone who scores above 20/50 gets a commendation, but those that score above 35/50 get their papers sent to a mysterious place in Oxford where they are evaluated and given either bronze, silver or gold award. Last year only one person (out of many) managed a bronze, which proves why it's called "challenge".

No doubt those that get Gold are the uber-geek Jedi Masters with IQs past 200 who will later be head-hunted for the International Physics Olympiad. This is no piss-easy, I-Could-Sleep-Through-This-And-Still-Get-An-A* GCSE, Hell no. This is the real deal.

If you still can't grasp the difficulty of the paper, then think University Challenge but with Physics for every round.

Now the school only offered this fantastic opportunity to those who had scored 70% (an A) in the mock, but this basically meant that everyone (even the complete morons) who take physics could enter if they wish.

Of course some won't even consider entering (we are talking about students from Liverpool after all), but I think my year group stands a chance of doing extremely well (relatively that is, compared to the other Y11s of years past). This is because this is the first Year 11 group that is not single sex and it's common knowledge that female students are vastly superior academically compared to their male counter-parts (there's no denying it, boys are lazy).

But anyway, I tried doing a past paper last night and it was, to put it mildly, impossible. I'm one of more intelligent (and modest) people in my school and I had no clue, no fucking clue. I do Further Maths which is pretty damn hard but at least I understand what needs to be done, for this I had no idea.

Even with their combined efforts, I doubt they could score more than 40/50. If you know who all three are I'd be impressed (I've got no idea why I included the one on the right, shows how few famous physicists I know).

This is something I want to do extremely well in considering how CV-driven I am. Makes me glad my dad teaches mechanical engineering.

There's also added incentive to do well on this test: my arrogant friends. Nick and Rob did extremely well in their Chemistry mocks and think they can lord it over the rest of us and developing ideas above their station. There's been a lot of banter as to who will do well in the sciences for GCSE and they've already written off my chances (my chances? wtf?). This will provide the perfect opportunity for me to burst their over-inflated egos on a higher plateau of thinking.

But, I'm now beginning to feel the pressure (again, no pun intended). I'm becoming overwhelmed by my increasing workload and it's become quite an act juggling the revision time for 9 GCSEs, 1 Further Maths and now this. By the end of it all I'll be so stressed out those that are stressed out will seem laid back compared to me. But still, if I succeed it'll blow litter-picking out of the water in terms of CV-ability.

I better get gold.

Litter Picking - Part 2

2007-02-04T11:04:00.000Z

Another month, another session of litter picking. If you need reminding as to why I go to Prince's Park on a Saturday morning, deprived of sleep and bereft of joy, this is the reason:

I care about the environment, and I care about the local community. Sure there are scumbags who live round here that are incapable of disposing their disease-ridden syringes and empty cans of beer, but someone's go to clean their mess and I care about them enough to waste my Saturday morning doing it. God will smile at my acts of charity, and hopefully award me bonus points for the afterlife. When parents see me striding purposefully through the mud and rain, picking litter, they'll point to me and say to their young children: "There's a hero, a role model, a saint." Oh yes, it's just one small step on the road to Sainthood.

For the real reason, click here to read the first instalment of litter picking.

So to start off me and Torquer were dropped off at the entrance to Princes Park where we were joined by Rob to complete our trio.

Last time we had simply been handed our equipment and forced into the harsh terrain to fend for ourselves (and collect litter). This time however, we followed a procession of middle-aged people who also claimed to be "friends of the park" but while we had the simple task of picking litter, they had the difficult and infinitely more challenging task of observing architecture.

As we were given our litter-pickers (the poles with the grabbing thing at the end) and big black plastic bag, the organiser shamed us all by announcing to all the "friends of the park" the services we had done and how awesome we were. They all smiled and clapped (one woman even filmed us), we smiled and felt embarrassed.

During our expedition, we discovered two syringes and a beer can with beer that had congealed disgustingly. There was even a tree that had roots which had grown around a piece of pipe; we spent a good ten minutes trying to remove it until we realised that the tree and the pipe had become one.

And only last week, someone had actually died in the park (probably drank too much congealed beer). For all we knew we could have been tampering with key evidence, stuffing it into our big plastic bags never to see the light of day. They only told us this after we had finished.

After being overwhelmed by the fragile beauty of it all, I decided to take this picture (Notice how litter free it is). Had I known there could have been a mass murderer on the loose I would have thought twice.

But there was a dark side to what we were doing, a dark side not shown by the photographic evidence we took. Every act of charity was done to look good in front of the camera; once the cameras were no longer pointing we went back to our selfish, careless ways.

We took a picture of Torquer putting up a bird feeder that had fallen to the ground, but as soon as it had been taken he slung it back in the mud looking for the next photo opportunity. And on one occasion I snapped a young sapling for no apparent reason (after taking a pic of us righting a fallen tree), and trod all over some sprouting daffodils (Torquer dived to protect them).

We were trying to take a picture of me in the process of stepping on the shoots, but Rob preventing me (which would have shown how conscientious were were of the environment). However I inadvertently trod all over them once the picture had been taken.

It was all a sham! The pictures didn't tell the truth of it all! (I would post some of them, but that would compromise my anonymity)

Once we finished, we strode through the fog back to Rob's house (Did I mention it was so foggy I couldn't see my own hands? It was also damn cold as well and Torquer refused to give me his spare gloves. His SPARE gloves! Something about me infecting them...). Had anyone been filming us, it would have looked very impressive; the three of us, striding across the lawn, appearing through the mist and fog, imaginary atmospheric background music playing in the background...

It was at Rob's house that we were re-vitalised with a hot mug of tea and listened to the Liverpool vs Everton match. Later on, I took Torquer to Tesco to enquiry about job opportunities (They took one look at Torquer and said No).

Another month, another litter picking session. I look forward to the next; The time will just fly by.

(Now go over to Torquer's blog and read his account of the events. DO IT!)

Academic Choices

2007-02-02T20:03:00.000Z

Sooner or later, there comes a time when we must choices. Inevitable, career-defining choices. The kind of choices that would shape your life forever and would determine your happiness for the next twenty years.

Now with this in mind, imagine the roller coaster of emotions I went through as I sat through my taster sessions (the education equivalent of pitching products to sceptical punters. Except instead of products, think subjects. And instead of punters, think students).

Just to give some background info, I have come to the stage in my academic life when I must make the agonising choice of what subjects to take for 6th form college. It is mandatory to take four subjects at A-level, and I am taking 11 GCSEs. Therefore it leaves me with much to think about.

For the taster sessions, I had already picked five subjects I was considering: Maths, Physics, Chemistry, Biology and History (spot the odd one out?). So the purpose of today was for me to attend these sessions, listen to their feeble pitch and laugh at their pathetic attempts at convincing me their subject is the best thing since illegal downloads.

So here's my summary of the five tasters:

Biology
Went there. Sat there. Got bored.

Throughout the whole thirty minutes, the teacher couldn't stress enough the fact that people shouldn't take the subject course just for the 3-day ecological expedition.

Would anyone want to go on an expensive trip to Yorkshire (of all places) just so they can spend three nights in a shoddy YMCA and observe ecology? Pu-lease. If I wanted to wade in mud, count grass or stand in the rain I'd simply play football, or roll round in my garden when it's flooded.

Chemistry
The subject itself seemed less appealing than biology although the information given was far more useful. I'll probably end up taking it since I want to do medicine (and go to many tequila fuelled house parties like those in Grey's Anatomy).

When asked how many people in the room wanted to do Medicine, almost everyone indicated that they too shared my alcohol fueled dreams. I eyed up all the competition, and felt concerned all day.

Maths
Trust the maths session to be done by numbers! I was quoted facts, figures and percentage. Just like this paragraph, the teacher was ruthlessly efficient in delivering the details and there was time to spare. I sat for the remaining five minutes pondering my future.

History
I've got no idea why I picked this, I think I did it on impulse. The room was filled with people who had done GCSE History and I was extremely intimidated by the ginger catholic social-sciences freak sitting next to me (Torquer knows who I'm talking about!) ranting on about how the school pressurises people to take sciences.

That's all I can remember from the History taster session, which is probably why I won't take it next year.

Physics
And so we come to the last taster session.

This was the only subject that did not make any attempt to convince us to take it. The teacher said something along the lines of: "If you're not 100% committed to the course then fuck off! This course is oversubscribed as it is so I don't give a shit if you take it or not. Last year we failed a whole class of students. That's more than the number of people who subscribed for Art, failing all them was like a drop in the ocean. A drop in the fucking ocean!"

For some reason that just made me want to take Physics even more.

So that was a summary of my taster sessions. I have another litter-picking session this week-end and an options evening on Monday. Hopefully they'll make more interesting posts than this.

HSM

2007-01-29T21:10:00.000Z

I'm so glad my last lesson on a Friday is IT. The class is always warm, stuffy and filled with girls ready to be impressed by my vast intellect. Usually I'll be playing online games, taking a nap or being "forced" to take the CosmoGirl quiz.

And on the subject of Cosmogirl, those tests are so demeaning! Why on Earth do girls do them? I couldn't care less if my inner girl is a total slut or my dream hunk will have blue eyes... (perhaps I do care a little...)

I digress. Last weeks IT lesson was different; a transaction was taking place.

"Have you brought it?"

Robin sits beside me in the corner of the room, he fidgets and his eyes dart from side to side. I'm playing an incredibly stupid flash game.

"The what?"

"Don't play games with me Jingo. Have you got the HSM?"

A smile flickers across my face. He's ashamed. I on the other hand have nothing to be ashamed of. Sure it was illegal, and quite frankly disturbing, but this was how I did business.

And on the subject of business, Torquer dominates the school stationery market. He sells shoddy crap at inflated prices and is known as: "The man who can locate certain things". It's a shame he doesn't deal with the illegal stuff or he'd make a killing.

"Why are you afraid of saying High Sch-"

"Shut up! I don't want anyone to know I like this shit!"

"Fine, fine... Have you brought the Cash?"

"Yeah it's right here" he says, patting his blazer pocket.

We exchange memory sticks. I take the Johnny Cash off him, he takes the High School Musical album (what a loser). Transaction complete. He skulks off to listen to his bootlegged music.

And so we come to the point of this post: High School Musical. Sure the plot is cliched and it's aimed at 9-12 year olds but damn those tunes are catchy! If I wasn't so ashamed I'd buy the encore edition right now and learn all those dance moves.

I tried to get Torquer to listen to the stuff but he threw away the headphone is disgust.

I was going to make this a massive post about my own musical tastes (varied) and my tendancy to sing in public (which freaks people out) but I can't, I have potato chip molarities to write about. Instead I suggest you buy the High School Musical Album, it's very good.

A Crazy Notion

2007-01-25T19:53:00.000Z

Whilst clearing out my memory stick, I came across a Word file I forgot existed. The Word file contained the beginning of a story I co-wrote with a friend, two years ago; when I was young, naive and dreamed that one day I would become a novelist like Terry Pratchett or Neil Gaiman...

I was filled with such fanciful notions back then. We held the belief that the story would eventually manifest itself into Nobel prize-winning literature.

After writing a few pages, the story was abandoned and stuffed into a memory stick, never to see the light of day.

So after such a long time I read the story. And I thought parts of the story were damn good which is why I've decided to post an extract for you to read:

He stumbled awkwardly through the blackened streets of Dvirkivschyna, his mind as uncertain as the fluctuating MICEX. All his life he had lived a secluded life of religion but after reading the Book, he had been inspired like a Russian peasant to change his life.

The book had changed his life. It had given him a new start. It had inspired him to start a new adventure and release him from the shackles of religion.

He followed the path to the harbour and approached the sand-strewn beach. But the tranquil place he used to know was filled with commotion. He watched a great dark mass of capitalist Russian scum approach the rabble of discontent Ukrainian townspeople. The megaphone blared,

“The Russian Authority does not accept the Ukraine as a legitimate state. Swear your allegiance to Russia or be crushed like the pitiful Ukrainian stink-worm under the proud borsch-eating bear of Russian inequality.”

“As the pitiful spineless Ukrainian people we submit to our Russian Oppressors. Praise be to our borsch eating neighbours!” The townspeople began to walk away donning fur hats. Boris ran in front of them and blocked their path.

“How can you cast away your Ukrainian nationalism so easily? Comrades, you have let me down…” He pointed accusingly to each one of them. This took some time but when he was finished he continued his speech.

“We shall go on to the end, we shall fight in Ukraine, we shall fight on the borsch ponds of our motherland, we shall fight with growing nonsensical oil referendums and economic treaties of catastrophic proportions, we shall defend our fishing potential, whatever the cost may be, we shall fight in the gas plantations and in the poor quality wheat fields of woe. And we shall never suspend inflation!”

Boris struck a noble pose with a hale of Kalashnikov fire. A ragged cheer went round. His heart welled up with pride at the sight of his Ukrainian comrades spurring him on until he realised that his bodily fluids were pouring from a bullet wound to his chest. He watched his Ukrainian comrades hug their Russian oppressors. He collapsed on the floor, alone, pitiful and lacking in blood.

So to summarise the story: It's about the struggle of one politically minded individual as he tries to prevent Russia seizing control of Ukraine. The plot is weak because it's humour (and it wasn't really thought through)

And I know parts of it are awful and make you want to cringe... I was only 14 when I wrote it.

The reason I'm posting this is because I'd like some feedback on the story, from what you've read of that extract (I would include the whole thing but it's far too long and parts of it are shit).

And the reason for the asking of feedback is because I'm filled with a desire to rewrite and finish the story now that I'm a more mature and capable writer.

Naturally, Torquer has already informed me this crazy notion of mine is destined for failure.

Battling The Elements

2007-01-19T17:22:00.000Z

"Are you sure you want to be dropped off here?"

It was 8:30. The air was crisp, the Sun was shining and I was in the car to school. Having not had much sleep the previous night (too much hardcore gaming), I was still too bleary-eyed to realise the distance he had dropped me off from the main entrance.

"Yeah whatever," I replied groggily.

As soon as I got out the car, I realised just how big a mistake I had made. As I looked up ahead, a dark, rumbling behemoth of a cloud hung in the air and seemed to be consuming the sky. By the time I reached the path the cloud had displaced the Sun and cast the street in an ominous semi-darkness.

Then the rain came. It felt like I had walked through a waterfall, or mistakenly walked into a lake. The drops beat down upon me like God himself was machine-gunning me with bullets made of H20. I floundered helplessly as the horizontal rain slowly paralysed me with cold, drawing out every ounce of warmth from my body. I tried to run but my limbs were weary, and my blazer felt like a lead jacket.

Had the rain not stopped, I might of drowned. But thankfully it did.

When I told my mate Dave about what had happened, he laughed uncontrollably at my misfortune. In retaliation I shed water all over his bag. That showed him.

"Was it raining outside?" asked another friend, who seemed unaware that I looked like a wet dog.

"No... My boat capsized and I swam my way to school." I replied.

Some people...

***
It's 12:30 and I'm outside playing football for the P.E lesson. Once again there's torrential rain, and once again there's mind-numbing cold. But this time, I have to endure it for a full hour.

And we're 7-0 down. The only thing that will warm me remotely is if I score a goal, but the wind is against us and every time we kick the ball upfield it ends up in the back of our net as if God himself wanted us to lose.

Will this rain ever stop? I thought as Neumonia set in.

But the rain did stop (huzzah!) to be replaced by hail (damn.) and what began as a monsoon turned into a blizzard. I couldn't see a thing as icy winds cut through me like a scythe. It was like God himself was throwing daggers made of ice at my eyes (which I need to see).

It felt like The Day After Tommorrow, except everyone was in shorts. Who likes short shorts? I certainly fucking don't.

But despite the overwhelming odds, a wild kick miraculously lofts the ball over the defense and right into my path. I blink at the ball.

"Run! Jingo! Run!" Someone screams.

And so I'm hurtling down the left wing, muttering obscenities and taking the ball past player after player as I transformed into an incredibly cold and unnattractive version of Cristiano Ronaldo. The cold bit at my hands and face, the hail induced semi-blindness, but I was completely focussed on the goal at the end of the pitch.

And the goal was empty! The goalkeeper had come out! My pace had left the defense for dead and I surged forward towards the empty goalmouth. I hit the ball sweetly and the ball soared majestically through the air. There could only be one outcome!

Now that I think about it, I really should have scored.

I collapsed to the ground a broken man. A humiliated broken man. A humiliate broken man who couldn't get back up because of cramp.

***
Two stories of pain and humiliation, both at the hands of the elements. Both events happened in the last week and I thought it relevant to share with you, considering the amount of weird weather England has been experiencing of late.

Only yesterday, walking home from school, I believed I could fly... It really was that windy! I felt like Keanu Reeves in The Matrix.

I'm sure some humiliating Mary-Poppins/Wizard-of-Oz-esque tale will emerge with these windy conditions. Hopefully it'll be Torquer for a change and not me.

Bowling

2007-01-16T16:45:00.000Z

You know how everyone's got that sport which they are naturally good at? Take me, I'm Chinese so I kick ass at table tennis (and I'm also a decent swimmer). Now Torquer (the co-author who never posts - what a dick), is generally considered a laughing stock amongst my friends due to his poor physique and has yet to find his natural sport. (Although to give him credit, he's at times a cat in goal and always beats me in cross-country. My excuse is that muscle weighs more than bone - it must feel like walking on air every time he runs)

But Torquer shocked us last week when we decided to go bowling and unbelievably, he beat us all. OK, so Bowling is arguably not a sport but that doesn't take anything away from the fact that he humiliated us all, and in front of girls. AND I WAS THE WORST.

We watched in disbelief as Torquer transformed from nerd to king-pin, getting strike after strike, oozing in confidence and strutting round like he owned the lanes.

"Another gutter ball Jingo? Tough luck. Try knocking down some pins next time."

It made no sense... How could someone with so little arm strength be so good at bowling?

When it was his turn, he'd saunter up, cool as you like and pick the pink ball. We were foolish enough to laugh at this choice since it was the lightest ball the bowling alley had to offer. Little did we know that the pink ball proved deadly, and Torquer was a sniper. Not only that but the colour matched his thin black jumper and for those brief ball-rolling moments he was a famboyant, iconic, pin-bashing God. I had to admit, the kid had style.

When I stumbled up to bowl, people would take out their camera phones and film me; that's how bad I was. Thankfully, apart from some sporadic gutter balls and a ridiculously low score, I managed not to tranform into a laughing stock. I shan't give you the score incase you think worse of me, but to put it in perspective, you'd have to square my score for it to be anywhere near his.

Unfortunately, his glory was short-lived. Afterwards, as Torquer let the new-found respect of his peers wash over him, the unexpected happened. An actual, real-life girl approached him.

While this was happening I was with some friends shooting zombies on House of the Dead III (he was pulling birds and I was playing video games...). But from what I heard, the girl gave him a paper napkin with the details (name, msn, email et al) of another girl. Torquer then went incredibly red as the girl literally ran off. Aww bless.

My friends had a right old laugh and Torquer lost all the respect he had won. It was obvious to them that the girls did it as a joke to humiliate their friend, but I'm not so sure. I'm still of the opinion that the girls must have been wooed by his sexy bowling ability.

Poor Torquer. What makes it worse is that he kept that paper napkin and has probably framed it or something.

Beckham To Pursue American Dream

2007-01-14T20:03:00.000Z

Normally when I get home, I like to relax and watch a little SkySports News. Imagine my shock when the top story was David Beckham's move to LA Galaxy, in America. On hearing this shocking revelation I rushed up stairs, switched on my laptop and read up on the story on BBC News.

If you're American and not quite sure of who this David Beckham fella is, think soccer superstar. Think Real Madrid. Think former England captain. And if you still don't know who he is, think husband of Posh Spice and "Bend It Like Beckham".

Beckham had a choice between staying at arguably the most famous club in the world (Real Madrid) and living life as an overrated, over-paid and over-indulged Galatico (also known as "world-beater"); moving to Europe and proving to his critics that he's still got it, whilst trying to reclaim his place in the England squad (who quite frankly miss him); or do the unthinkable and move to America where he'll play mediocre football on a ridiculous wage packet in a league no one respects.

Beckham loves money. He'll endorse anything.

And yet, he chose America over the respect of his peers and the footballing world. He has chosen to throw his career away and become an A-list Hollywood Celebrity rather than a footballer. Admittedly, he is getting £127 million out of the move (which would motivate anyone really) but Major League Soccer? I can really see him forcing his way back into the England set-up there.

But he's made it clear he's not motivated by money. Sure he'll be earning $80 dollars a second, but it's difficult mingling with beautiful celebrities and lounging in the Los Angeles Sun. When you put it like that, you can really feel sympathy for the guy.

Being rich isn't easy. Look at all the money he has to count

I really can't see the Americans buying into this. I doubt his arrival will trigger a mass interest in football, a revitalisation of Major League Soccer or cause an influx of top quality players to arrive in America. I doubt the Americans are fickle enough to throw down their baseball bats and hockey sticks just because Beckham's in town.

Still, if it makes "soccer" more mainstream then I suppose it's worth it.

The Blog is Dead... Long Live the Blog!

2007-01-12T19:42:00.000Z

As you may have noticed, the blog is slightly different to how it was a few days ago. The reason for this was because the blogger template was boring me, and one of my resolutions was to overhaul the blog to bring it into the New Year.

The decision was not a whim. I had been thinking about a new template for some time and had come up with a meticulously calculated plan to transfer the blog to a new template with minimum effort and distress. Alas, as with most of my plans, it failed horribly.

What went wrong was:

I lost all my widgets in the transfer. All the colourful buttons gone. All gone. Now the blog is nothing more than a boring block of text.

The blog title image is a disaster; it's mundane and uninteresting and my attempts at emulating Miao's blog failed. And the colour scheme, as Torquer (the co-author who never posts) put it: "It looks like someone vomitted up mustard".

However, one person did give a positive comment about the new design. Those hours writing and re-writing HTML were not in vain after all.

But there were some improvements. I've reorganised the labels so that they are slightly less irrelevant.

I also separated my links section so that the friends of the blog get the recognition they deserve. The criteria I set was the following:

Comments occasionally on the blog
Links to me
I like that blogger

Unfortunately, under that criteria, I realised I don't have that many blogging friends. It made me so depressed I even added Mutley to the list (who surprising met most of the criteria).

Now that I think about it what was the point in me doing this? The problems outweigh the improvements massively.

Still, it was time the blog had some change. Feel free to leave feedback on the new layout.

Total War

2007-01-10T17:24:00.000Z

I feel compelled to write a post about Medieval 2 Total War.

I own three other computer games: Sim City 4000, The Sims 2, Football Manager 2007 but it is the addition of an online feature which has made Medieval such a rivetting game and it has me hooked.

Me and my friends bought the game a while back and started playing battles online. Before I knew it I was caught up in the excitement, formed a clan and became a hardcore gamer. Instead of organising dates to go to the cinema we now organise when to go online... how sad have we become?

The process of online battling involves a lot of waiting. First we would wait until all the "clan" (we set up a clan to gain respect amongst the other gamers) were online, then we would wait for a person to host a battle. We then wait until everyone joins the battle. And then we wait for opponents. We then choose our armies and wait for everyone to finish. Once we are all ready the battle loads and we wait. Only then do we begin the battle, knowing that our prides are at stake.

At any point in the waiting the network might fail and we would need to restart the whole process. I like to think the anticipation heightens the gaming experience.

And afterwards, there'd be much banter about who beat who and who's better than who. All good, healthy fun. (Admittedly, I have been using a lot of l33t speak lately. I'll have to fight the urge to write words like n00b and pwned.)

This is what it's like every time I go online. I escape to a fantasy world of trebuchets and feudal knights and longbowmen.

And who can blame us for liking such a game? The battles are immense and friends who don't have the game often protest about how we obsess over it, how we talk nothing but tactics, how every conversation leads on to Total War.

But they've never tried the game. They don't understand. Seeing us talk about it, they don't want to understand. And a rift is forming that is splitting my friends into two groups.

So to summarise, Medieval is having a detrimental effect my social life. But if it's the price I pay then so be it!

And let's no get started about what effects its having on my education...

You may be wondering why I haven't posted too much on current affairs. Well, it's been a slow news week (nothing of real interest for me to write about). I may do a post on the hybrid embyro scandal... In the mean time, I direct you to one of my earlier posts on the subject.

Litter Picking

2007-01-06T16:04:00.000Z

Instead of sleeping till half twelve, I had to pull myself up in the early hours of the morning (10:30) and trudge to Princes Park, the most run-down park in all of Liverpool (and where all the junkies go at night) to pick litter.

Have a committed some heinous anti-social crime that has landed me community service? No! Far from it.

I was with some friends (we were a group of three), helping out a local charitable organisation which looked after the shoddy park.

Now before you start thinkig I'm some kind of Good Samaritan that goes and does random deeds beneficial to the local community this is not the case. I did this for two selfish reasons:

It's my Citizenship Coursework Project
Something to add to the CV

Since the three of us were working on the same project we needed to find something we could do as a team and picking litter was the easiest we could come up with. Not only did I complete the coursework for the easiest GCSE available, I also got extra CV brownie points to boot (and Uni's love this kinda thing).

The litter picking itself was unspectacular. We got a health and safety talk and were given our equipment (one litter picker and big black plastic bag each) and negotiated turf with the other litter picking teams present.

As we navigated our terrain, we came across two needles and a variety of condom wrappers (but alas no condoms). The place was pouring with rain and I was glad I was wearing an old pair of trainers; unfortunately, I regret choosing my best pair of jeans which irritated me somewhat, considering we had to walk through swamps of mud to get to the patches of the most sought-after litter.

Despite the rain, and despite the mud, and despite having to deal with disease-ridden needles, it was vaguely enjoyable.

I look forward to the next litter-picking session (for the CV of course).

Resolutions

2007-01-01T20:41:00.000Z

It's the start of 2007 and you know what that means: People begin writing (and breaking) their New Year Resolutions for the year ahead. Normally, I don't bother with such yearly targets but this year is different. This year I have a blog.

I'm a bit hazy on this subject but I'm sure there's some unwritten rule that states bloggers must post their New Year Resolutions. Or maybe I've just made that up. Either way, here are my resolutions:

1. Achieve academic success
It's an important year ahead and it is vital I get good GCSEs. So basically this year I will need to up the tempo in terms of study to achieve those top grade boundaries or I can kiss that career in Medicine goodbye. Need to get my act together etc. etc.

2. Get work experience
You may not know this but work experience is vital when Unis consider applicants for Medicine so I'll probably end up doing shifts at the local hospital, handing out meals or whatever. Time not well spent but vital for the future. The things I will do for medicine...

3. Get a paid job
You can always count on MacDonalds to provide jobs for people with no qualifications such as I (Well actually I do have some but unless I'm working in the French branch they aren't worth mentioning). I can finally put that National Insurance card to some use.

4. Learn to drive
There's a snowballs chance in Hell I'll get a car but it's a cool, babe-magnet (or so I'm told) skill to have and will keep me occupied over the long Summer once I get my provisional license.

5. Keep my Laptop clean
You be shocked to learn that since buying my £1500 Quosmio laptop I have failed to properly clean it once. So as I looked upon the layer of crap that had accumulated on top of it in disgust, I spent a good half hour polishing it (as if it were a Ferrari) and vowed to keep it in the squeaky clean state it is in now for the whole year at least.

6. Learn to shuffle
These resolutions are getting a bit trivial aren't they? But being such a good cards player (and very modest), not being able to shuffle a pack of cards brings shame and allows my fellows to question my card-playing abilities. That needs to be rectified.

7. Update the blog
Certain aspects of this blog need improvement (and no, it's not the content). My priority for this blog is to find a new layout; one that is clear and easy to read and not a boring blogger layout. Secondly, I need to update the labels; they are getting far to cluttered and overlapping. If anyone can give me any ideas (about the layout) your help will be greatly appreciated.

And that's it. Not as specific or as interesting as I hoped it would be. I don't care.

It will be interesting reading what other peoples' resolutions will be. I would tag some people to write theirs but that seems just too much hard work.

Discovered this cool site: FutureMe. Might write something on it in the future. Should be good.

Christmas Is Over

2006-12-30T15:01:00.000Z

What I hate most about Christmas is the parties.

I have no complaints about attending any parties (after all, I'm getting free food and it's a break from the usual monotony of life), however over the past few years they have lost their excitement and appeal. I think it's the knowlege that my family must host an equal number of parties to the number we attend. This raises the question, is it worth it? Do I seriously enjoy them?

The type of parties I go to are actually more parents social gatherings; my family go to the houses of friends families and we basically do a round-robin system of partying so everyone (in the group of friends) eventually hosts a party.

This may be the reason why it has become so tedious; the parties of parents are usually never too interesting for their offspring. I'm good friends with the kids of the other parents so boredom never used to be an issue in years past. However, I've become more mature now and the things that interested me in the past no longer interest me now; I've got Uni and A-levels on my mind while they're still into arcade games and the like.

It's a shame my friends don't organise anything on a grand scale (e.g. parties). I wish it was like America where people throw alcohol fuelled house parties on a whim...

But I digress. The worst thing about these gatherings is the gossiping. All the parents ever do is boast about the achievements to date of their children and their chances of Oxbridge (mine at the moment are very slim but it's early days).

I'm so glad it's all over for another year. Will keep this brief since there's still the New Year's Eve party to go before it's completely over, then the academic year begins.

Not Another Harry Potter Book...

2006-12-23T14:18:00.001Z

OMFG!

I've just found out the new Harry Potter book is called "Harry Potter and the Dealthly Hallows"!

This revelation makes me want to inundate the fan forums with lively discussion about the philosophical undercurrent of Harry's world, discuss and map out the entire plot of the 7th book with fellow fans and have heated arguments with 14 year old girls about Harry's sexuality. Perhaps I should stalk JK Rowling until she gives me another titbit of plot.

And to wile away the dull days until the book is published, I'll draw some portraits of what I think the characters should look like and post them on Mugglenet or write a series of homo-erotic fan-fiction featuring the boy wizard.

As you no doubt gather, I'm not a big fan of JK Rowling or her books.

But my relationship with Harry Potter wasn't always like this; I used to be a massive fan. Don't laugh, but when I was around ten (and with a lot of time on my hands) I set up a relatively popular Hogwarts Role-Playing website (I cringe writing this, I'm so ashamed) on Expage.com.

Whilst writing this post, I tried revisiting Expage. It's been six years since I last visited it and it hasn't changed at all since then. Funnily enough, I was introduced to it by a paedophile (I assume it was a paedophile... it seemed a bit unlikely that I should happen to play online chess with someone similar in age who wanted to be my "friend" and send emails to eachother).

But anyway, this isn't about me... This is about Harry Potter.

As I got older, I realised that Harry Potter books were stupid and had no literary value. Not only that but what irritated me the most was how JK Rowling would reveal tiny bits of info about the plot and that would attract world wide coverage... What other author has that kind of publicity?

And she's shamelessly sold out: The crap merchandise, the rubbish games, the films... Don't get me started on the films...

It makes me sick when people say Harry Potter inspires children to read other literature. It's true that people who haven't touched a book in their life will queue up in the early hours of the morning for the books, I have nothing against that. But will reading Harry Potter lead on to classics? Or boring chic books written by Jaqueline Wilson (don't get me started on her...)? You decide.

The worst thing about Harry Potter is the legions of obsessed fan-girls it has spawned. Seriously, don't they have anything better to do than discuss the books and defend their beloved Rowling?

Pottermania doesn't just warp your mind, it makes you short-sighted as well.
I refer you to this article.

I remember visiting Potter forums at the time and despite how wrong her comments were, the fans were slagging off Terry Pratchett, saying how he was a bitter old fart who was just jealous of Rowling's success.

It makes me sick it really does. Painful memories were brought by the latest Potter news and I had to get this rant out of my system. It's really spoiled my Christmas.

Christmas Assembly

2006-12-23T13:53:00.000Z

The weather may be showing no signs of snow and the neighbouring houses may be dark and depressing; however, an indication that Christmas has begun for me is when the school finally breaks up for half-term (a week-long holiday).

The school always try to end the term on a high-note, especially so near Christmas which is why it is compulsory for all of us (the student body) to attend the dreaded "Christmas Assemby". An hour of Christmassy entertainment and jovial music that the teachers have cooked up in the spirit of the season.

Take assemblies. Normally taking place in the morning, when most students aren't yet functioning correctly due to lack of sleep. The teachers begin by giving long and pointless anecdotes and speeches about the topic of the week (forgiveness, love thy neighbour, exams are important. The usual motivating crap) which no one pays attention to. Occasionally, we are even forced to sing Christian hymns. On rare occasions a charity speaker comes and gives us a talk, which compounds the boredom and we all give polite applause at the end.

Fifteen minutes it usually takes and these precious fifteen minutes of my life are wasted every day with this mind-numbing routine.

So imagine the horror of it all when you take all this and add Christmas to it. Imagine a stunted Christmas tree with tacky decorations on stage; imagine amateur musicians playing tunes out of key; imagine one thousand two hundred students cramped in a confined space, all bored out of their minds.

Pretty bad huh? Well it gets worse.

What happens when one thousand two hundred teenagers are bored? Do they sit there with blank expressions on their faces? Hell no. Do they sit there and make a valiant attempt to enjoy themselves? Kind of. Do they create alternative entertainment? Oh yes.

What sort of "alternative" entertainment was this? People sang songs deliberately out of tune for a laugh (the crazy stuff we do...), others tried to inflict pain to the people surrounding them. I had my schoolbag passed around several rows in some kind of warped pass-the-parcel game my peers had concocted. A friend of mine was wrapped in cellotape (how that was managed in an assemby is anybody's guess) and another was hoisted by many of us and locked in a cupboard (done after the assembly with the boredom of it all still lingering).

So there I was, sitting in hot and cramped conditions sans schoolbag, listening to the teachers singing "Winter Wonder", trying to dodge the various items hurled around around the hall (whilst keeping an eye out that it wasn't my bag being hurled around).

After the assembly, I was reunited with my bag. I found it hidden behind some doors.

This post may be portraying me as some kind of bully victim, but this kind of behaviour is commonplace amongst friends and enemies alike (Many get it far worse than this). Oh well, that's the educational system for ya, don't think of me any differently because of it.

I'm so glad school is over. To sum up the academic term:

I'm cautiously optimistic about my GCSEs (end of year exams. Important stuff). Not looking forward to next term (but who does?). Need to start thinking about work experience (for future career in medicine) and what As Levels (even more important exams) to take next year.

I may write a post about my uneventful/unorthodox Christmas later on. Although frankly, I can't see why anyone would care.

The CSI Effect

2006-12-19T18:46:00.000Z

Whilst I was reading my copy of The Times, This headline grabbed me:

'CSI effect' is teaching criminals to cover tracks

This was referring to the recent 'Jack the Ripper' style prostitute killings in Suffolk and how TV series such as CSI were teaching the public all about murder investigations and the ways forensics solves them (The headline was self-explanatory really).

Forensic science professionals, police departments and criminal prosecution lawyers are now complaining that these shows have educated criminals about the best way to cover their tracks.

Now I'm not a big fan of CSI but I have seen a few episodes with Horacio, the red haired git (so is that CSI New York? Miami or what?) and I can't say I agree with what the article is saying. It suggests that CSI has taught many would-be murderers what clues are left behind and how to avoid them.

Horacio and his team have already convinced people that Forensic Sciences are actually exciting. Now he is also responsible for most (if not all) crime in the UK. Is there anything this man isn't capable of?

If the law think that CSI is contributing to the education of criminals in the art of law-dodging then they are sadly mistaken. Have any of them ever watched CSI? Why would any law-breaker wish to induce such torture as to watch through hours of this awful detective series, just to gain some tricks of the trade? It's not even clever like Sherlock Holmes or Poirot style. All they do is collect evidence and grill the suspects until forensics comes back with the answers to everything.

And CSI doesn't teach us anything we don't already know. If I wished to break the law watching CSI wouldn't teach me anything new; Don't leave evidence, have a good alibi, try not to get caught. That's just about everything CSI has to offer and what decent criminal does not know this? The law must badly underestimate criminals if CSI is being blamed.

What I think everyone should be worried about is a show on BBC 3 called "The Real Hustle". It shows viewers the various different tricks hustlers use to con people out of their precious hard-earned money. Not only do people fall for the cons but it shows them as highly lucrative and extremely successful.

The BBC pays these hustlers to con people and film it. Is it me, or does that guy on the left look American?

The show is basically a training program for the more criminally-inclined individuals to learn a few new tricks. I have to admit, even I was tempted to try out some of the cons.

So in conclusion: "CSI" poor, "the Real Hustle" very good.

Religious Hostile Takeover

2006-12-16T17:04:00.000Z

I know I've been writing a fair few posts about my school (and more importantly, the people in it) but this shocking piece of news came totally out of the blue and the first time I've ever heard of such an example occuring.

I got a letter yesterday that my school is to be converted to Church of England, against the will of all the school governers, and the government is powerless to stop them. All because of a loophole in a 17th century text.

The church claims that the purpose for which the school was established (1708) incorporated the following statement:

Religious instruction shall be given in the school in accordance with the doctrines of the Church of England

Basically, when the school was formed every educational body in the country had to be CoE, but over the years the school turned grammar and no longer followed the religion of the state, instead choosing to select students on academical ability rather than belief.

The funny thing is, they "assume" that line was written, there is no proof anywhere that such a line exists. Unfortunately, the government requires proof that the line wasn't written in order to overrule the CoE takeover. Bearing in mind that the document had to have been drawn up in the 17th century, the school had no idea where the document is.

And once again, the government has failed us by doing nothing. The school will of couse put up a fight but unless they find the precious document the governers will be powerless to prevent a CoE takeover. You hear the government waffling on about the falling standards but they refuse to halt the dissolution of the only school in Liverpool that allows entrance through academic excellence (others ask for massive yearly fees).

You may be wondering why this is such a big deal; the takeover won't affect me. It won't affect anyone in the school for the time being. But will affect the city.

Entrance into the school will greatly change. Everyone part of the CoE will have preference over the academically gifted. So a stupid CoE Christian would be chosen ahead of a intelligent muslim. Since my school is the only Grammar school in the whole of Liverpool (it is the only school that has an entrance exam and no fees) only the academically gifted are allowed through. The CoE's intention is to revamp the entrance system (to benefit the church) or possibly even remove it. Then where would the academically gifted go? There would be nowhere to provide them with a competitive atmospere and grades will suffer because of it.

Plus Religious Studies would be compulsory. Morally I have nothing against this; it just that it's an incredibly boring subject and most people despise it. (I don't really mind it since it's an easy GCSE)

Who knew the Church was capable of such acts of such cunning? Clearly I will need to rethink my views that the church is nothing more than an outdated system; this takeover was well-thought out and meticulously planned. Makes you wonder what really goes on at CoE HQ.

Harmless old monk or ruthless religious businessman?

England Lacks Skills...

2006-12-13T18:43:00.000Z

It was in the news recently that the UK workforce was lacking in skills, and skill levels need to be raised to compete with rapidly developing countries such as China or India.

This does not surprise me remotely. Even in my school, arguably the best in Liverpool, there is a degenerate culture which prevents people from learning anything of any kind. People prefer to laze around, do nothing and pressurise others to do the same rather than taking full advantage of the abundant opportunities that surround them.

This doesn't just apply to lessons and homework, it applies to anything vaguely intellectual.

Torquer, a contributor to this blog (you won't have seen him around, he rarely posts) is a bit of a whizz with computers. He seems to nack for getting computers to work when others have failed. In fact, he's developed quite a reputation for it.

But people don't see it as a talent, people see it as an unfortunate affliction. They use it against him as if it's something to be ashamed of.

And I like to read. Except whenever I mention it people say things like: "Why read? It's so boring. Only gimps read." This kind of negative atmosphere would make anyone uncomfortable to discuss anything of intellect. Peer pressure alone is contributing to the lack of skills England is suffering of late.

Also, the naive share the belief that they can achieve massive success through minimum effort. Prince Charles made the point some time ago when he said children were being brought up with expectations that were far too high. Despite the backlash of the comment, I totally agree.

For example, I know someone who is convinced they will win a Nobel Prize for Physics. Another is determined she will become an astronaut. I would take them more seriously if they actually weren't stupid and work towards their goals. They expect it all to be handed to them on a platter.

Simply setting up more vocational courses and more opportunities just won't work. Although it'd be a lot more work changing the mentalities of the students. Trust Labour to take the easy route for Education.

Intelligent Design: Should It Be Taught?

2006-12-09T16:07:00.000Z

Note: I am so pissed off right now, not because of Intelligent design but because of Blogger. I wrote one of the longest posts I have ever written (with thorough research and everything) and what does Blogger do? It completely fucks up the whole post and deletes half of it. All that time... lost. Now I have to write this post again... What motivation do I have now? How could I possibly match the quality of the deleted post? Shitty Blogger...

But anyway, to the post:

Despite being a man of science, I am very tolerant of religion. I respect what religion can do to peoples' lives and the purpose it brings. However, there are many aspects of religion too far-fetched to ignore and one of these is Intelligent Design.

There is a teacher in my school who is one of those crazy religious nutcases. Except he is armed with science and has been brainwashing all the students with tripe about Intelligent Design with scientific justifications for years.

It began with Christian Union, he would preach every week to an average audience of three about religion and science and how they are linked. He once declared that anyone was allowed to argue against his beliefs on Intelligent Design. My and my friends decided one day to ask him "How can you believe in Intelligent Design with the evidence around you?"

We were bored at the time and he had practically invited us to have an argument with him (when would we get another opportunity to do that with a teacher?). Before we knew it we were stuck in Christian Union listening to an hour lecture on how religion explains science or some other shit along those lines.

At first I was enticed by the idea of intelligent design, even though I still believed in evolution no matter what it all seemed to make sense. But later, when some thought was applied, it was a load of bullshit.

An example of such bullshit was: "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was without form and void, and darkness was upon the face of the deep."

Apparently this refers to the Big Bang theory. It seems to make sense, after all, the Big Bang theory explains that the Universe was created and that time, space, everything was created in that one moment and began existing. Is that not what the first line of Genesis says? That God created everything (the Heavens and the Earth) at once?

Of course anything can interpreted as anything. The Bible was created by the Vatican (who picked and chose Gospels which benefited the them) and the Big Bang theory is just a theory and subject to change. If the Big Bang theory was disproved what then? New interpretations would be found no doubt.

But anyway that was just one example. Most of you are no doubt thinking, you stick to your beliefs I stick to mine. This post wasn't written to criticise Religious people (most of whom accept Evolution). It was the fact that my teacher went to the BBC and lobbying for Intelligent Design that sparked this post.

Now to the point of this post, should Intelligent Design be taught in schools? Is there any educational value?

The answer is no.

Firstly, Intelligent design is all based on faith while Evolution is based on something more substantial (e.g. DNA, Natural selection etc.). Most people (even the religious) accept Evolution and there is overwhelming evidence for it.

As The Now Show put it, any students fortunate enough to get Intelligent Design for A-level would get remarkable results:

Q. What happened during the Big Bang?
A. Something we do not understand caused by a thing we don't know.

Q. How did organic molecules develop the ability to self-replicate?
A. By some unknown force doing a thing we cannot understand.

Q. Explain the mechanisms by which species develop through random
mutation?
A. By the interference by some intelligent thing that is more complex than anything we know and yet, can never know.

As you see, if Intelligent design were put in place we wouldn't learn anything. Teaching Intelligent Design is such a waste of time and would just contribute to science in this country going backwards.

Secondly, there are a lot of clever, but impressionable, young people in my school. The influence my chemistry teacher has over them is massive. He has converted a fair few to Intelligent Design and they are not even religious. How can you believe in it if you don't believe in a creator? Most people don't understand and those that "teach" it are highly persuasive.

So to conclude, Intelligent design contributes nothing to education and it doesn't even count as a science, it's not in the curriculum for a reason. If we bow down to these evangelical lobbyists we'd become more and more like America. Does anyone want that?

Into the Bowells of the NHS... Part 2

2006-12-04T21:37:00.000Z

Before reading the second instalment of my near death experience, I suggest you read part 1.

So there I was, stuck in a hospital bed against my will with nothing to keep me company expect the throbbing pain in my chest and the disease-ridden patients that surrounded me. I slept fitfully that night, plagued by bad dreams and the persistent coughing of the critically ill.

In the morning I was filled with a renewed vigour. The chest pain had subsided and if I were to be discharged early I might just make it for the Citizenship test (I later discovered the test to be incredibly easy. Even if I wrote with my eyes closed and took a nap midway I would still have aced it). This feeling of hope carried me through the morning, at least until around 9 am when I realised no doctor was coming anytime soon.

When a doctor did come, he explained to me I had suffered from a "spontaneous neumothorax".

"What that means is," the doctor explained helpfully, "air has gotten between your rib cage and your lungs. So this air pushed against your lungs which is why it hurt. Do you understand or should I repeat to you again?"

The doctor maintained his patronising tone for the duration of my stay.

"We call it spontaneous because it just happened. We don't know the cause."

Oh thanks Doc. Tell me something I don't know.

He then checked my breathing and started muttering "that's odd...". It must have slipped his mind to explain to me because he quickly hastened out the door, leaving me thoroughly bewildered and worried. He came back with a troupe of doctors to examine me.

"Listen to what's odd with his chest," the main doctor proclaimed. It was at that point I realised that my doctor was a consultant (a post I aspire to obtain one day) and the other doctors were his registrars (the trainee consultants). So basically the case was so fascinating/disturbing that the consultant dragged three other doctors from their precious life-saving work just to take a look at me. This did not bode well for my health and I was beginning to feel like a circus freak.

After much frantic discussion and standing around in my hospital nightgown, feeling like a fool, they decided it was best I stay for a CT scan.

The news was a real sucker punch and I was becoming frantic. What if I were to stay another day? Then another? Who knew how long I would need to wait for this CT scan. And what about my missed exams? Would I need to frantically revise to fit them into the remaining days of my exam timetable or not do them at all and not get the confidence boost I badly needed?

The place was resembling a prison more and more everyday; The food was barely edible, the people were miserable, there was no freedom or entertainment... In fact, it was worse then prison. At least there you'd be able to exercise and have a shower every now and then. I was confined to my bed and hadn't washed in days. Of my stay in hospital not one person brushed their teeth or washed in any way whatsoever.

As I waited for my CT scan that day, the long hours of boredom were really getting to me. If it weren't for The Religion (the book not the belief), a copy of The Times and the senile fellow who kept engaging me in incoherent conversation I would have gone insane. I spent many hours playing Snake II on my mobile, trying to beat the high score my friend set five years ago (that's what boredom reduced me to).

When the doctors finally came back to check up on me, after an eight hour wait, it was decided that I wasn't to have the CT scan. Instead I was to be "under surveillance" for another night.

When I heard the news I almost burst into tears.

Not Funny

2006-12-02T20:59:00.000Z

Instead of writing part 2 of my adventures through our country's national health service (what happened after I was hospitalised? Ooh the suspense!), I thought I'd tell you all about how I became a contributor for Canadian humour site, notfunny.ca.

Canadians? Humour? An oxymoron surely? (I'm sure I've used that joke somewhere. Oh right, here) The site wasn't bad and I was flattered when they didn't snub me in my attempts to leech traffic and offered me the position of contributor.

The site itself is... decent. There's some funny stuff and not-so-funny stuff (which might be because I'm contributing to it).

Some articles seemed to have been taken from Uncyclopedia's waste bin, contrived by teenagers who think stringing nonsense together is funny. It might work for the Americans (who, in my opinion, have the worst comedy ever) but not for us British, we want more from our humour.

Having said that, there is some great stuff on there so I insist you check it out. If the thought of Canadians writing humour freaks you out then keep away ( I could never understand Canadian stereotypes. So are Canadians meant to be polite and boring or something?).

On the subject of comedy, I seem to find little funny. There is hardly anything that will get me laughing out loud (only Never Mind the Buzzcocks, and this dude). Maybe that's why I'm so critical. It's not like I'm incredibly funny so I shouldn't be complaining really.

I was going to announce my new position earlier, but more interesting topics pushed it aside and I just don't have the time to write that much. So anyway, I now contribute some of my material from the blog to their site in exchange for some traffic and gratitude.

Into the Bowells of the NHS... Part 1

2006-11-30T21:29:00.000Z

On Tuesday the 28th of November, I embarked on a journey filled with anguish and pain and despair. This journey was of course metaphoric; it was more an 'experience' (maybe involuntary confinement would be a better way to describe it) and it led me into the inner bowells of the England's failing National Health Service; a topic that has sparked much controversy over the past few years.

Before I begin my tale of enlightenment, I must admit that I have never been hospitalised before in my life. I have never had the pleasure of spending time in a dreary hospital so imagine my surprise when the doctors told me I wouldn't be going home that night (or the night after). I did not know what to expect and was curious of my first hand experience with the notorious NHS.

So anyway, to the story...

It all began at school. What started out as nothing turned into laboured breathing and a dull pain spreading through my chest. It was endurable but left me extremely worried; What disease could inflict chest pains but no coughing? I thought of Pneumonia, Tuboculosis, AIDS (don't ask me why. I eventually associate every inexplicable disease to AIDS). I made sure all my friends knew just how much I was suffering.

"You're such a hypercondriac!" Robin complained, before hitting me on the back (to 'relieve' the pain apparently). "If it really hurts so much go to the Office. Atleast then you'd stop bothering me."

I admit, I am a hypercondriac at times. But because I know I'm a hypercondriac, any inexplicable pains are attributed to hypercondria. This pain was horribly real and ominously in the area of my chest. I couldn't take any chances with this.

I excused myself from my maths lesson and went to the Office. The secretaries there were totally unsympathetic and they didn't show the least bit concerned when they told me to wait and I was struggling to breathe. My dad ferried me to the Liverpool Royal Hospital (I was too old for Alder Hay, Liverpool childrens hospital and leading infant organ harvester). This is where my story really begins.

I was admitted into the the emergency unit and told to wait. There were three people waiting with me; Two men and a woman.

Both men were tracksuited and one looked like the father of the other. Occasionally the younger would cry and his father would reassure him (as if he'd just been diagnosed with cancer). The boy was treated like a ten year old and was told to leave his fathers side by the doctors (for reasons I will never know). The woman (I assume) was an alcoholic. Her speech was slurred, her reactions were slow and at times she would just stare blankly, even when the doctor talked to her. The doctor was unimpressed when she claimed she suffered a heart attack and he threatened to call security. Eventually the woman ambled off, possibly in a drunken stupor. I pitied them but I pitied myself more.

Already I'd encountered these two cases they both depressed me immensely. It didn't help that every now and then, crying relatives were ushered past me into a room (I never saw a single person leave).

Eventually, the doctor got to me and I was given a temporary bed where they could examine me. I waited for about three hours. I asked for a sandwich twice and the nurses promised me it would be delivered. I never saw a single sandwich that night.

When the doctor came, he delivered the devastating new that I was to stay the night, "under surveillence". I'd probably have registered less shock if you were to tell me God was real, the apocalyse is next week or that LFC had won the treble.

"I can't. I've got GCSE mocks!" I protested weakly. I knew it was in vain. Since I wasn't old enough to discharge myself, and my condition was serious enough to stay the night, the only people who had control of my situation were the doctors. They were to decide when I was to leave and when not. It was like prison (except with less luxuries).

As I was wheeled to my bed (I had waited three hours and I was put in a room with four free beds. I couldn't understand why I needed to wait so long for an empty room.) The idea of staying the night filled me with dread. I tried to console myself but it was no use. In fact, the only things that kept me going was the guilt my friends would be feeling at this moment, and that I would be able to write about my experiences as soon as I was discharged. Those alone gave me strength to endure the night.

Stay tuned for Part 2.

Scotland: Independant Country?

2006-11-27T21:24:00.000Z

For some unknown reason, I decided to watch Braveheart sometime ago (there was nothing else on, I swear). Having endured Mel Gibson and his poor Scottish accent long enough I began wondering, if the Scots hate England so much, why be part of the UK?

And now recently, Gordon Brown (a scot) has told the Scottish Labour party independance isn't such a good idea, reiterating what Tony Blair has said about a vote of independance for Scotland and responding to criticism that he is responsible for "Scottish economic underperformance".

Not meaning to sound jingoistic, but if they're going to pin all their problems on England then they can bloody well piss off. What is the point of the United Kingdom if Scotland will just be vying for independance? They wouldn't even agree to a Great Britain football team! How unsupportive can you get?

The only reason Blair/Brown want Scotland to stay is the large share of Labour voters that keep the duo in power. They gave Scottish politicians the right to vote on matters that will not affect their constituencies, how is that fair? Blair gave Scotland its own Parliament and now he's feeling the consequences.

Reasons for Scottish independance:

Hatred of the English
The English love a joke at Scotlands expense
Not in support of GB football team
Celtic and Rangers (the dreaded Old Firm)
Braveheart
Scottish Nationalist Party
The country is full of sheep
It's a wet and cold place (despite what the "Visit Scotland" advert says)

Strong arguments I think you will find.

How does Scotland actually benefit England? Other than provide Labour with valuable voters? If Scotland wants to become a minor European country than so be it. Give the Scottish a chance to run their own country; Blair gave them a government so why not?

There are two outcomes if independance is given:

Country fails
Scotland is no longer supported by England and fails miserably at the running of their country. Trade and economy become stagnant and basically the whole country goes to pot. Every Englishman laughs. Scottish become butt of all jokes.

Country succeeds
Scotland becomes prosperous and does an Ireland (3rd richest country in the world after independance). Every Englishman becomes incredibly jealous and anti-Scottish sentement rises. But the Scottish have the last laugh as England is left in a dire state (NHS, rising crime etc.)

But to be honest nothing's going to change. All I know is that Braveheart is an awful movie and that Scottish football is dire. If the country can't sort out its football how can it sort out its politics?

Casino Royale - A Review

2006-11-24T17:49:00.000Z

I have put off writing a review for the new James Bond movie, mainly because I have mixed feelings about the film and I'm not sure whether I like it or not. Or whether Daniel Craig deserved the highly prestigious Bond role.

Having said that, the new Bond film was a vast improvement to the previous James Bond portrayed by Pierce Brosnan (who looks more like an office manager than a tough British agent). Casino Royale has broken from the stereotype of Bond as some womanising, smarmy git with the powers of invincibility; choosing instead to explore Bond's earlier days when he was young and reckless, and most importantly, someone who is indeed vulnerable.

We no longer see the Bond of old, who could cartwheel through an army of machine-gunners, karate chop them all and still look impeccable enough to order a martinee and seduce the fabulously attractive girl sitting opposite. Daniel Craig's Bond shows weaknesses, misjudgements and gets bruised a lot (when has Pierce Brosnan ever had a cut lip let alone a bruise?), he even suffers emotional damage which makes the whole film more interesting and enjoyable.

We won't be seeing this smarmy git anytime soon

Having pointed out the new improvements to Bond, we come the negative aspects of the film.

Despite Daniel Craig's decent portrayal of a more human Bond, I still have my doubts about him. Firstly, he just seems to old. Considering this is a remake of the first Bond movie (and he has just been made 007) he looks remarkably old, which seemed to annoy me a great deal (but most people will get over it I guess).

Secondly, some of his dialogue was totally uninspiring. At times he just droned on and on in his monotone drawl which sickened me greatly. The guy has proved he can do action but I feel that he should give his mouth a rest from time to time, especially when there's dialogue as boring as shown in Casino Royale.

Also, the plot was weak until the end where it became badly cluttered and confusing. They seemed to cram all the twists into the end and none of it was to be expected; the plot gave no clues whatsoever which was a letdown.

Having said that, Casino Royale marks a new era for Bond films and I look forward to the next one. I have no regrets about booting Pierce Brosnan.

On a side note, I actually expected my co-author to write a post on this topic (he is Bond-crazy and probably fantasises about Bond or being Bond). Unfortunately, he was meant to watch it but his dad stood him up, the poor bastard.

A lucrative scheme

2006-11-22T19:50:00.000Z

After what seems like hundreds of rejections, PayPerPost have finally admitted defeat and accepted me into their amazing lucrative system. Therefore I will start shilling links as soon as possible.

Why have I done this? Am I not selling my soul? Will I be condemned to Blogging Hell for misinforming my readers and posting untruthful comments about the awesomeness of certain products and services? The whole point of this blog was to vent out my hatred for the system and inform the world, how can I do this now if my judgement is clouded with fiscal incentives?

I fear the retribution of my fellow bloggers... What will they think if I shill a link like this: viral marketing ? Will they no longer respect me?

But before you judge me for shamelessly selling out, remember this. I have University to think about.

The measly $10 I get from this post means that:

I can put off finding a job for about an hour
It will contribute to 1/10000 of the funds needed for Uni
I could use it to motivate the blog's co-author, Torquer (or atleast buy a stick to beat him with.)
my livelihood is supported
Contributes to my inevitable departure of this "fair" city Liverpool (help me get the hell outta here)

And what do you care anyway? PayPerPost are paying for this blog, something I don't see you doing.

So go to PayPerPost if you wan't to get paid for writing your blog. I love it because it pays me.

Cruel and Unusual Names

2006-11-19T15:24:00.000Z

The cruelest thing a parent can do, and the easiest way of alienating your child for the rest of their life, is by giving them an unusual name. It is guarenteed that once the child is literate and old enough to understand their parents silly notions, they will attribute every miserable moment of their life to the day their parents decided: "We have ideas above our station, let's name our kids after sci-fi characters and cities and other crazy things just to be different" . Do parents ever consider this, when naming their children "Gandalf"?

Of course, it's not always to be different; it's totally acceptable to name you children after your idols (e.g. calling your child Steven because you are a fan of LFC and like Steven Gerrard). But what happen if your hero has an odd name that people could make fun of? For example Nwankwo Kanu, I love the guy but I wouldn't name any of my kids after him; kids would chase after him chanting n-WANK-wo, n-WANK-wo.

A friend of mine was walking through Toxteth once (how he came out alive I'll never know) and he had overheard a mother, who called to her two girls: "Come back Beyonce! Shakira!" He found it hilarious and when I heard the story I found it vaguely funny as well. Naming one of them after a superstar would be ok, but two.... It just conjures up funny images in peoples minds.

Peaches Honeyblossom Pixie Frou-Frou, Fifi Trixiebell, Heavenly Hiraani Tiger Lily... What was Bob Geldof thinking? They're not yappy little dogs, their your children!

Personally, I blame the celebrities for this naming phenomenon (Gwyneth Paltrow and Chris Martin's daughter Apple... wtf?). These people should be setting an example in naming their children, instead of trying to be different. Surely they must know that whatever they name their children, others will copy it in blind idol worship?

Orlando Bloom... fine I guess. Lourdes Leon (Mad-onna's daughter)... pushing it. What next? Liverpool Johnson?

Sarah Malone, of findmypast.com had this to say about the subject:

"It seems that many of us are happy to take hero worship to a while new level, naming our children adter the stars we admire. It would appear that the British sense of humour is alive and well with Gandalf, Harry Potter and Superman"

Parents should try and exercise this "British humour" more often. I'd love to meet a few Harry Potters (I can just about imagine the fangirls-cum-mothers...). What a laugh that would be!

But the funniest name was that of a James Bond fan (who inspired this post), who recently and officially changed his name to:

James Dr No From Russia With Love Goldfinger Thunderball You Only Live Twice On Her Majesty's Secret Service Diamonds Are Forever Live And Let Die The Man With The Golden Gun The Spy Who Loved Me Moonraker For Your Eyes Only Octopussy A View To A Kill The Living Daylights Licence To Kill Golden Eye Tomorrow Never Dies The World Is Not Enough Die Another Day Casino Royale Bond
How much of a kick could he possibly get from from introducing himself as "Bond, James Bond"? Everyone would think he's a gimp and it'd be a bugger to fill out tax forms.

In conclusion, when I have children I'll give them good, unmockable names. I'll leave the weird names for my pets.

Junkies sent to prison paid for not getting drugs

2006-11-17T20:38:00.000Z

In what seems to be a momentary lapse of sanity, The British government has decided to to settle out of court by giving drug addicts forced to go 'Cold Turkey' in prison payouts of around £750,000 because of a breach of human rights. Apparently, this will cost the taxpayer less if it weren't drawn out in court.

Correct me if i'm wrong, but did they not forfeit their human rights once they broke the law and took drugs? They can't possibly expect us to treat them humanely if they're in prison. If prison was such a wonderful place; free food, accomodation, drug addiction treatment, library (or so I am told) then we'd be queuing to go there.

The problem is we are spending too much taxpayers money turning our prisons into luxury hotels. Prisoners shouldn't expect to be pampered, they should be reminded that what they did was morally wrong and should therefore be punished. If refusing them of the drugs they so crave (which is what got them in jail in the first pace) is painful for the individual then so be it; you can't say they didn't warn them when they took the drugs in the first place.

These recent events make us question the whole legal system really. Why should they have had the right to take to court something so trivial? Why does it cost so much to tackle the case in court? It seems like the only people benefiting from the human rights acts are criminals and their legal teams.

If you ask me, I should be the one getting the compensation. Valuable money has been spent on these degenerate junkies and I haven't benefited one bit from it (other than the increase in drug related crime and the chavs roaming our streets; which are both associated with drugs and have directly affected me at one point or another). Compensation for all that taxpayer money that has been wasted on losers who take drugs, and the rehab clinics to treat them.

It's time we re-thought the whole human rights act. It seems the only people that benefit from it are the guilty, while the money of the innocent is being spent.

A progess report (that you should probably ignore)

2006-11-16T21:05:00.004Z

It's been a few months now and the blog certainly seems to be going places. Impressive traffic, rave ratings, a loyal and massive fan base (notice the exaggeration). It seems meaningless just to alert the world of my lacklustre achievements with this blog; however, there was another reason why I wrote this dull post.

the truth is dear bloggers, I have been neglected the main duty of being a blogger, which is to enlighten the world with meaningless gibberish about my loser life. Admittedly, it's hardly worth anything in terms of entertainment value (it fills me with more excitement than watching Newsnight, but only just), but several important events are coming up that are impossible for me to avoid, so I had no choice but to write it all down.

So several events are going to occur in the near future which might render me unable to write, or motivate me to write more (I'm not sure how it's going to turn out at the moment). Here are the several factors that will prevent me writing often from now on:

As you may or may not know, the blog has a guess writer. The lazy bastard hardly wrie anything at all (2 posts in like a month) which has dissapointed me greatly. He clearly does not share the vision I possess so this has depressed me greatly. (I'm not sure what relevance this has the the post but it had to be mentioned, just to shame the lazy git)

The GCSE Mocks are looming. This will probably tie me up for a few weeks time due to revision. Before that time, I will probably put up a half-decent post and keep that on for a about a week. (I may write a post about the Mocks now that I think about it)

PayPerPost have rejected me for the umptienth time... What motivation do I have to write if I'm not getting paid for it?

Medieval 2: Total War - The game has consumed my life. I have lost all will to write and have instead found it far more entertaining to go online and pwn n00bs. Usual service will resume once I get bored of the game.

I'm still not quite sure what the point of this post was, since no one will be interested enough (or have enough understanding) to bother reading it. It reminds me why I post on current affairs and stuff and not my fun-filled life; because no one cares and it's shit.

A new Bible is required

2006-11-14T17:43:00.000Z

Yesterday, Sir Elton John revealed the shocking revelation that he wanted all organised religions to be banned. When I read the headline, the first thing that went through my mind was: "Is he for real? What new complaint does the loser have now?"

With a face like that, how can you not feel sorry for him?

But having read through the articles, I feel some sympathy towards him.

I know sir Elton is loony and a few pies short of a picnic but for once he has a point. As I was listening to the 5Live phone-in they had some insanely religious fundamentalist Christian woman (you know the type) who was just spreading what can only be described as anti-homosexual propaganda through the airwaves.

What is it with America and their dangerously high number of crazy religious people that follow the bible to each exact word? There's something not right about someone (who's not a priest) who can quote every line from the bible.

I digress. Elton John's idea of banning all religions is ridiculous. It's not like homophobia will go away if there was no religion. Religion is the justification and not the cause, it's crazy right-wing people (from the southern states no doubt) that are the cause (sorry to stereotype... but you have to admit. That's where they all seem to be from). If the last episode of South Park has taught us anything it's that there will always be hatred/violence etc. even without religion. It's human nature.

And the Bible's outdated; we just can't relate to it anymore. The bible preaches to love your neighbour but what if he's gay? A paradox is it not?

My solution to making Elton John shut up and solving the problems of America's fanatic religious population would be to publish a new updated bible.

It'd need to be shorter, easier to interpret and filled with a lot less confusing crap. Also cut out all the genesis crap, can't be just come to a compromise and say God created evolution? Let's be cool about this people.

We could change it gradually, so no one notices.

If it'll make American zealots shut up, isn't it worth it?

Mid-Term Elections: A British Perspective

2006-11-12T17:10:00.000Z

I'll be frank, I could find nothing satirical about the Mid-Term elections to write about. But being such a huge topic at the moment, it seemed impossible to ignore (what with the landmark victory for the Democrats, new era for America etc.). But also, being British, I know huge amounts about the negative aspects of American politics and very little about the positive aspects of it.

Therefore imagine my shock when something seemingly good for American politics actually occurs.

I use the word seemingly because there are a number of things that don't seem quite right. It makes no sense that Bush should still be President after the elections. He lost didn't he? So why aren't the Democrats in power? It doesn't seem logical. And if the Democrats own both the House and the Senate, does that mean Bush and his cronies face an army of liberals when making policies?

Then there's foreign policy. What will this do to Anglo-American relations? Will we see less arse-licking from Blair? I vaguely remember someone saying something about the Democrats changing the Iraq policy. I'm not sure if that's a good or bad thing; on one hand it might mean the beginning of the end of American occupation, on the other hand it could mean England are left to deal with the shit-storm of unrest by themselves.

The Democrats aren't exactly a bundle of joy either. The thought of Nancy Pelosi, Ted Kennedy and John "Couldn't Beat Bush" Kerry in positions of power do not fill me with much enthusiasm. They are all extremely boring people, atleast with Bush he'd give the world something to laugh at (and take the heat from America), while John Kerry is a boring twat with the personality of stale cheese.

So to summarise... the nasty evil right-wing Republican bastards have been replaced with the kickass super awesome right-wing Democrats... Somehow I don't envisage much change in the future.

It kinda reminds me of British politics really.

Which is the one on the right?

Poppy: Red or White?

2006-11-09T16:44:00.000Z

Apparently a question that has been raging for years. A religious think-tank has recently claimed that that red poppies sold to commemorate those who died in WWI are "less religious" to the white poppies being sold and that people should be able to choose between white and red ones. This has added fuel to the fire of the debate over wearing religion items (veils/crosses etc.).

The director of Ekklesia, Jonathan Bartley, said people should be able to choose between red or white ones.

He added red poppies implied redemption through war, but Christianity seeks redemption through non-violence. White ones were created to symbolise peace.

I didn't even know that white poppies existed and even if I did, I would still choose the red poppy. Not because of any religious implications but because the red poppies grew on Flanders fields and inspired Rememberance Day.

John Bartley clearly does not know what he's talking about. Red was the colour of the poppies on Flanders field, it has nothing to do with redemption whatsoever. The poppy has never been religious symbol (this is the first time I've heard of anyone considering it as one). It seems like Mr. Bartley has completely plucked this idea out of the air.

We would be missing the point if we read anything into the colour. The poppy has always been a reminder of the war so what does the colour matter? Mr. Bartley seems to be forgetting that the poppy is to help those that fought in the war and not some religious item to flaunt. The white poppy promotes peace but raises no money for those that fought in the war so why should people be wearing it for a day that remembers the soldiers that fought in the war?

If the colour of the poppy is why we wear it then we have definitely lost our way. From what I understand of the white poppy, it was created as an anti-war symbol to divert money from the veterans; which is totally inappropriate and immoral, especially since it will be for Rememberance Day. The white poppy is totally ridiculous and it would be a mockery to the veterans if it were sold.

Less globally, my school had a Rememberance Day assembly. Like the white poppy, it was incredibly stupid. Had any veterans turned up to watch they would be seething with rage at the disrespect my school showed with its lack of effort. No one sang or bothered to look as if they cared. Not that my school doesn't like war veterans; they just hate assemblies.

Human-Cow Embryos

2006-11-08T19:30:00.000Z

Scientists from Newcastle (of all places) have recently applied for permission to develop stem cell research and fuse human DNA with Cow eggs. Since there's so much controversy over stem cells as it is, was it really such a good idea to bring up plans to create living things (if only for a few days) that are half-human half-cow?

At first, the idea horrified me. It all made sense once I had soaked in the facts and reassured myself that the world will not be taken over by armies of mutant humanoid-bovine freaks enslaving the human populance.

But what if the research were to fall into the hands of some crazy scientics who were to develop the cells further? Before you know it we'll have modern day minotaurs floating in sealed glass containers filled with luminous green liquids. They'll have the strength of an oxe, the intelligence of a chimp (we are being realistic here) and horns to gorge us with (and win head-butting competitions).

We'll think we have them under our control then before you know it they'll have burst out of their transparent cages, killed their makers and escape, leaving a path of distruction in their wake.

Then we'll have a Frankensteinesque situation on our hands. The new creations won't understand why we have brought them into society and once they find out our purpose for them was simply to harvest their stem cells to cure our incurable diseases, they'll be extremely pissed and start smashing things. Be warned, these things are known to happen (in movies) so if the situation does occur, you heard it here first.

If you think the idea of cow-men a bit too unrealistic, you must agree there is a possibility of unknown diseases developing. Since we are harvesting the bovine-human stem cells and eventually implanting them into humans is it not possible that people with the cells begin developing bovine traits? If you don't believe me click here.

And what about Bovine Flu? I heard it has the potential to be ten times as deadly as avian bird flu with the added edge of mad cow disease and/or foot and mouth disease. Since bird flu caused such mass hysteria why not bovine flu? It does exist doesn't it?

If you want evidence of the devastating effects of hydrid diseases you should watch Mission Impossible III.

But perhaps, as far-fetched as it sounds, the cells will function just as normal as any other stem cells do and won't create monsters capable of taking over the world. Since the cells are in such short supply, I think we can risk developing hybrid supercows for now.

Social Degeneration: Chavs

2006-11-07T19:08:00.000Z

Definition of Chav: Burberry-wearing, bling-loving, Lacoste-tracksuited degenerate tossers. (If you're American, think a wigga obsessed with Burberry and fake tan)

It was only a few years ago when Chavs did not roam the earth and we were free to walk down dark back-alleys, hold our heads up high and not be intimidated by gangs of youths with nothing better to do than chain-smoke, vandalise and procreate in the streets before binge-drinking and passing out on the curb. Then when morning breaks, society will pick their disgusting forms out of the gutter and fix them up again for another night filled with violence and vices.

So it is definitely fair to say these low-lifes are the scum of the earth, and deserve to be forced to work camps to repay society for the damage caused by their random acts of violence and vandalism. However, what seems like an incredibly simple solution (lock them up and make pay back their debt to us) has been horribly dealt with by the government. So much so that the Chav population is actually rising.

But have no fear. Our saviour, David Cameron has reacted to protest at rising young offenders:

Young offenders should be shown "a lot more love" in an effort to encourage good behaviour, Conservative leader David Cameron has said.

He called for a more understanding approach as to why youths committed crimes in the first place. They must have counselling, education and training, he told the Youth Justice Board's annual convention in Cardiff.

The Tory leader suggested that children should receive "tough love" and, in turn, have "high standards" asked of them.

This was not the same as "sentimental, childish love which sees no wrong in anyone", he added.

Handing out anti-social behaviour orders (Asbos) to young people or putting them in custody was "reacting" to crime, not "reducing" it, Mr Cameron said, and many institutions had become "social dustbins".

Oh I see... We should go around loving and embracing the Chavs! It seems ridiculous to pour taxpayers money into more counselling and education for a bunch of degenerates who clearly do not appreciate our help, and would rather be drinking cheap cider and vomitting on the pavement. It'd be a bigger money-waster than the NHS Blackhole.

But then again, I'm just a kid, what would I know about issues like politics and stuff? Dave Cameron clearly understands these things better than I do because he's such a "hip" and "cool" Tory.

If you ask me, the problem would be easily solved if there was a revamp in the youth justice system. If Chavs really think a ASBO was like a knighthood then the only solution is to scrap a system that doesn't work and replace it with a system that does. What I suggest is that anyone found passed out wearing Burberry should be rounded up and sent to a Brat Camp/juvenile delinquency center to work until they show some sense and willing to contribute to society (instead of dropping out of school and living off the dole). And if that doesn't work, use them as an alternative fuel to burn.

But at the moment, the situation will only worsen before it gets any better. Hopefully there will be a day when people can walk down the street without fear of being mugged by a twerp in a hoodie at knife point or happy-slapped on a double-decker bus. Until then, I shall think twice about walking walking alone in the dark.

Craven Cottage Prison?

2006-11-06T20:37:00.000Z

Last weekend's Premiership game between Fulham and Everton was unfortunately marred by the throwing of a 10 pence piece by a member of the crowd at Claus Jensen when he was due to take a corner. Incidentally, the match ended 1:0 in Fulham's favour and they took all three points. After the match, Fulham coach Chris Coleman spoke out against fans who lob stuff onto the pitch, calling them to be immediately identified, fined and sent to prison.

Chris Coleman warns people to stop wasting their money on his cash-strapped club

Similarly, although with no link to the 'beautiful' game, an independent think-tank (blast their hides, always stirring up controversy) complained of the lack of life skills pupils get during their secondary education. They claimed that teenagers left to their own devices when leaving school could be at risk due to not being able to prepare simple food and complete menial household tasks. How hard can it be to open a tin of beans, or, for the more culinarily advanced such as myself, whack up a quick risotto. As for household tasks, there can only be one way to hold a vacuum cleaner, surely? This panel of so-called 'experts' also expressed their heart-felt concerns that children are being left without the necessary communication skills in an increasingly global environment. In my view, the Internet, MSN, mobile phones and email have left us increasingly communicative. Not necessarily a good thing if you like a bit of peace and quiet. This think-tank pushed for the introduction of longer school days with more of an emphasis on skills rather than qualifications. Not exactly what you need when faced with an increasingly ignorant nation.

Alarmingly, they also suggested that any parent or guardian who does not wish their child attend these after school 'lessons' should be fined and imprisoned. With the current jail overcrowding and pressure on the Home Office, this is probably not the best way to alleviate the problems of poor communication and 'bored' teenagers with more ASBOs than years. Alternatively, perhaps John Reid is considering converting Craven Cottage in a new super-prison for vicious coin-throwers and deadly after-school club avoiders? This would solve three problems with one extensively delayed and expensive contracted mess. On the positive side, it would have a capacity of nearly 40,000 and as for the criminals, surely the best exercise yard in the whole of Europe?

Saddam: Death Sentence Unfair?

2006-11-05T16:48:00.000Z

Another day, another tyrant brought to justice by the Americans. Only this morning, the BBC announced that Saddam Hussien was guilty for crimes against humanity and was sentenced to death by hanging. Although he was a dictator and killed hundreds of his people (but the Americans have killed more), the whole trial was a fiasco and he was convicted for totally the wrong reasons.

First the Americans, in fear of communism, "assisted" the Ba'ath Party who overthrew the Quassim's party in a military coup. Saddam Hussien had been part of an assasination attempt on Prime Minister Quassim, backed by (who else but) the Americans. If anything it should be the Americans that should be punished for putting the Iraqi people under Saddam and the Ba'ath Party's regime.

In 2003, after 9/11 America wanted a foothold in the Middle East so accused Saddam of links with Al-Quaeda (although we later found out Saddam was too snobbish to collaborate with them) and accused the country of developing weapons of mass destruction. The mission, suitably codenamed "Operation Iraqi Freedom" (ironic considering it was the Americans that took it away) was to bring down Saddam Hussein and strip him of the massive stash of biological and chemical weapons he possessed.

So after lots of bombing of innocent people, lots of deaths of British/American soldiers the Americans find Saddam hiding out in a cave and drag him out to face true American justice.

The US then set up a court with no credibility whatsoever (anyone found sympathetic towards Saddam was taken off the court). Saddam himself claimed he had been tortured but this was denied by the Americans who claimed there was no evidence (but of course).

And that brings us to today. Saddam has been convicted, conveniently just before the mid-term elections. Huzzah and hurrah to the Republicans who brought him to justice!

Double Standard: Tyrant convicted of crimes against humanity sentenced to hanging, a crime against humanity.

Saddam did commit many atrocities in his time but he did not recieve a fair trail. The Americans went into Iraq and arrested him on trumped up charges (to this day no weapons of mass distruction were ever discovered. Except for a few bags of fertiliser), put infront of a kangaroo court and convicted solely for the Republican election campaign.

But Iraq is now in turmoil without Saddam, the only one who can control them. Democracy has really triumphed over there, with looting, violence, no law and order. The Americans cared too much about Iraq's precious oil to be bothered to set up a system to keep the peace.

If I remember correctly, the Americans dismantled the police in Iraq and also the military. So no law and order but lots of angry Iraqis with access to military weapons? Great idea Bush.

But as the Americans will say. Justice has been done. They've got their precious oil and a boost in the mid-term elections, no one will care when they bugger off and leave Iraq in the state it's in now. So who will pick up the pieces?

Helium and PayPerPost

2006-11-04T20:57:00.001Z

What are Helium and PayPerPost? What do they have in common with me?

Both claim to be able to pay me to write which is probably the closest I will ever get to becoming a journalist (so am I a freelance journalist now?). This is how it should be really since the thought of a life long career in journalism does not have me jumping for joy, considering how much I love to write.

I guess this is the perfect compromise: Since few people frequent this blog anyway it wouldn't really matter if I sold out and started shilling links. I get motivated and paid while you occasionally get to read something good.

So why do I feel so bad about doing it? Helium is perfectly fine since I'm posting on another website so doesn't affect this one (unless I post something really good and link to it) but it's PayPerPost that's the problem.

PayPerPost works in the way that bloggers are paid to write articles on their blog advertising products/services etc. The problem I have with this is would I be selling out and losing the soul of the blog? For a (relatively) lucrative salary would I be forsaking everything I stand for? Would I no longer be able to command the respect of my fellow bloggers?

But then I thought, who cares? What's the point of having a popular blog if I'm not going to make any money out of it? All great TV channels have ads (except the BBC but then there's TV license, I can't exactly charge all my readers to read this blog. It isn't good enough yet) and I've got University to think about.

So expect some extremely biased posts in the future. A word of warning, I would give any post a miss that has the label "product".

BitTorrent - The Modern Day Robin Hood

2006-11-02T16:49:00.000Z

Probably the best invention after the Internet. Taker from the rich and giver to the poor, BitTorrent has enriched everyone's life with free entertainment. Mostly poor quality mp3's that cause your speakers to explode and your ipod inplode, or perhaps shaky footage films with shadows of people walking out of the cinema. My personal favourite are the games that are five gigabites and wouldn't occupy anyones interest for more than five minutes.

Let's not forget the risk of a computer riddled with viruses; subscribing you to endless pornographic sites, emailing your billing information to Nigeria and setting fire to your hardware. But like Robin Hood there are risks to what they do.

It's a tough world, peddling illegal goods over cyberspace. It seems strange that total strangers would risk life and limb (with no benefits to themselves other than thousand pound fines) to give ungrateful bastards like us the chance to swindle musicians, actors, game developers out of their livelihood.

You might get the impression I am against theft over the internet such as this. Well you're wrong.

It seems unfair that we should pay for the mediocrity produced by the entertainment industry, most of whom are incredibly rich and famous. Who cares if Bono can't afford another diamond studded guitar if I download "How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb"? Or if Madonna can't buy herself another baby if I don't buy one of her shitty songs?

These people don't need your money. Infact, the only people I do feel slight sympathy towards are the game developers (who do not lead superstar lifestyles. If anything I pity their lonely nerdy lives). But the feeling quickly passes.

But many people don't want us to enjoy the wonders of this uncontrollable, illegal, and possibly dangerous system so that money stays with the industry and lines the pockets of the fat cats (and funds a new Armarni suit for Jay-Z).

These people have clearly never enjoyed the wonders of enjoying mediocre stuff without the regret of paying for something so ordinary. Had there been no BitTorrent, I would not be playing Football Manager 2007 right now.

So if you excuse me, I have some files to download.

The Secret Policemans' Ball

2006-11-01T19:49:00.000Z

Yesterday Amnesty International revived The Secret Policemans' Ball... How could it live up to the standard set by Cleese and co.? The truth is it didn't.

The show started off strong with a good performance of stand up from Eddie Izzard. Jon Culshaw and Ronny Ancora did some excellent impressions (as usual) and a cameo performance from Natalie Imbruglia in a routine with Dave Armand was surprisingly entertaining. New-comer Andrew Maxwell was incredibly funny although his stand-up was sadly short-lived.

But who ever cares about the things that go right? The following acts were a serious let-down:

Al Murray - He performed his very British (shitty) Pub Landlord act but added a pantomine twist to it. Since he's a crap comedian to begin with it doesn't really matter.

Russel Brand - I grudgingly admit that his stand-up was pretty decent last night. However, he still sounds like a prat and looks like a prat.

There was also a really poor manor houses sketch where they basically paraded some semi-famous British comedians and some no-mark actors (mostly from Greenwing).

But it was the Americans that were the real let-down:

Chevy Chase - What's he famous for? His sketch was a total dissapointment, especially since it was meant to be one of the highlights of the show. Even Seth Green couldn't improve it.

Jimmy Falon - Another no-mark American loser. After watching Jon Culshaw and Ronni Ancora, his impressions were unimpressive. Even Barry off Eastenders was funnier (and he only got about 5 lines).

Sarah Silverman - Highly anticipated act gone horribly wrong (another "famous" name I've never heard of). Her stand-up probably generated the least laughs, mainly because she failed when talking about controversial issues like racism, rape, abuse (some of the easiest topics to make funny). If she wants to succeed at stand-up she should take lessons from Eddie Izzard.

What Silverman thought of her act last night

Since all the American acts sucked, this could only mean American humour is shit (which is a relief since Britain are finally good at something).

Oh and the musical acts were surprising. They weren't bad but the Zutons and Magic Numbers? You would expect U2, oasis or some other big name bands to grace the show.

So The Secret Policemans' Ball was an utter letdown. But also American comedians are rubbish.

Halloween

2006-10-31T20:01:00.000Z

It stikes me rather odd that the so called 'Mischief Night' is directly before the actual Halloween festivities. The object of Mischeif Night is to buy lots of eggs, toilet paper, flour etc and throw them at small cats and at people's doors. Then, the next night the same people go round to the same houses and actually demand confectionary from them, such as sweets and other edible delights.

Anne Widdecombe joins the festivities

How can a minority of arseholes get away with things like that? Ah well, atleast the distribution of free sweets will be finished for another year after tonight. Now we can wake up to full blown firework displays at 2am. I can hardly wait.

Kanu Believe It?: The Ultimate Comeback in Football

2006-10-31T17:37:00.000Z

When talking about modern world-class footballers, people think Zidane, Figo, Ronaldo (and other galaticos). Now in my opinion (and I doubt many would share my opinion) that if you were to search for a World Class player you had only to look at the Portsmouth team.

The player I am talking about is Nwankwo "Padillo" Kanu; founder of the Kanu Heart Foundation, Nigerian superstar, wife of Igbo Beauty Pride, African Footballer of the Year (ten times) and a nice guy to boot (no pun intended). He is also, in my opinion, the ultimate comeback king.

The Highs
He began his career kicking arse at Ajax with his silky ball skills and flamboyant moves; accumulating medals, African footballer of the year awards and captaining the Nigerian Team (for his efforts he won Gold at Atlanta 1996 Olympics). Then he moved on to a higher platform. And that platform was Arsenal.

Now being a Liverpool fan, I was never very fond of Arsenal. And until recently, Nwankwo Kanu was just a decent player with an unfortunate name. However, I think his achievements there speak for themselves:

The Double in 2002
FA Cup in 2003
Premier League in 2004
African Footballer of the Year (Again. The Man has won more of these than I will take GCSEs)

The Lows
But despite his efforts, he soon found himself pushed to the side by emerging star Thierry Henry. Everything went downhill from there.

After a season on the bench, Arsenal decided he was not worth a new contract. Therefore they sold him for around 3 million (a mere pittance. Definitely a price tag that did not do him justice) to West Bromich Albion, who were Premiership no-hopers and destined to relegation; a career dead end for any player of any ambition.

Kanu was an instant hit and his contribution saved them from relegation that season (despite an ominous warning of the season ahead when he missed an absolute sitter in the first game). Second season was poor and the club were relegated (as expected). Many blamed the manager (Brian Robson) for not utilizing Kanu to the best of his abilities. Despite this, they were promoted in season 05/06.

When Robson offered Kanu a new contract for his part in lifting the club back into the Premiership, Kanu refused and became a free agent (good thing too since West Brom’s season was a distaster and they crashed to relegation).

The Comeback (or... When Padillo met Harry)
At the time, Portsmouth was going under a revival just like Kanu would soon do. They were now backed by a filthy rich Russian and Pompey had become the poor man’s Chelsea. With their vast wealth they bought a host of players (mostly rejects from Tottenham. The most famous being Pedro Mendes) that just couldn’t gel. It was during the 05/06 season that they signed Kanu on a free transfer.

It seemed insane for Harry Rednapp (Portsmouth manager) to sign a no-mark striker like Kanu when he had such riches at his disposal. But this was exactly the chance Kanu needed and he is now top scorer in the Premiership with 6 goals to his name.

And thus ends the ultimate comeback story. You probably don’t care so I’m just gonna go off to watch the Liverpool vs. Bordeaux match now.

All Torque, No Walk

2006-10-30T20:20:00.000Z

It has come to my attention that a certain web-log (to use the original phrase) is in dire need of a reputable writer to inundate its pixels with an orgy of texts, both appropriate and unsuitable. Unfortunately for him, Jingo here failed to secure the services of either Jeremy Paxman or his personal friend Terry Prachett. Fortunately for me, I was next on his list. Me, up there with the likes of Paxo and TP? Unlikely; the poor man only knows three people.

Therefore, I will attempt to fill the unworn boots of these two great men and hope to gather enough momentum to carry me into my own column in the Daily Express. Hallelujah.

Back to School

2006-10-30T18:01:00.000Z

Alas half term is over and we are condemned to another month or so of tedious, tedious learning. At the moment I feel totally demotivated; Y11 seems such a repetitive and useless year, the only thing of note being GCSEs.

Having learnt roughly the same subjects for around 4 and a half years now I'm sick to death of subjects I know would not benefit me in the future whatsoever. Having got over the fear of GCSE results last year (2 A*s in Maths and French oh yeah) there is just nothing new or interesting to look forward to or even anticipate this year I hadn't done the last. And on top of that, the school I go to is absolutely shambolic and seems to have no funding whatsoever.

So here are just a few other reasons why I did not look forward to the new school term:

Tricentinary Appeal
Schools half-arsed attempt at raising money for a state-of-the-art outdoor field to celebrate Bluecoat's 300 years of educating scousers has backfired horribly. The school was planning on raising 2 million until it realised that was impossible. So they lower it to just 1 million. It's been half a year and the school has raised just over 400k. I expect to be constantly harangued for my preciously earned money over the next year or so.

Physics and Chemistry
Both subjects I will definitely be taking for A-Levels. Both utterly boring with pathetic teachers who have taught me very little. Both subjects I will definitely need to do Medicine. I'm growing more and more frustrated over the inadequate teaching I have received and these subjects are difficult enough as it is. Therefore I'll have to make up for lost ground and do extra work (scandalous I know) if I'm to receive even decent grades (and I want so much more).

French
Having revised night and day for my hard-earned A*, the school promised to make my french lessons a kind of "free" where I can do other things such as talk, revise etc. with others like me (and Torque) who were capable of completing the course early.

I soon discovered at the start of this academic year that these were lies. Filthy lies.

I now have to do work for a subject I never liked and I earn no qualifications for doing it. To make matters worse I must even be subjected to talking to the French Assistant Momo. It's all so tedious and unnecessary.

The Library
Full of Catch 22's and bureaucracy. And I am never allowed to print coursework. Oh and all the books are shit (and aimed for an audience of 10 year olds - Peter Pan, I mean wtf?).

Coursework
It seems never ending and consumes learning time.

So expect my life to be pretty miserable over the next term. Oh and I have mocks to look forward to. There is a silver lining after all.

BBC Falling Standards: Robin Hood, Spooks and Torchwood

2006-10-24T23:28:00.000+01:00

Having always considered the BBC a pinacle in TV drama, I was both shocked and alarmed by the amount of rubbish they have been airing lately. Standards have definitely dropped over the past few months. The level of entertainment we can expect is highlighted by these three shows:

Spooks
If MI5 was really that interesting, we'd all be queueing up to join. Are we really likely to believe that MI5's top spy department consists of just 5 people, 2 of which have no experience whatsoever? The plots are repetitive and filled with disinteresting dialogue, not to mention the lack of any "fit birds" (as us scousers like to say). And it's all Al-Quaeda this, Al-Quaeda that... Every episode seems to be about muslim extremists (and the one episode that was not featured Israelis posing as mulsim extremists).

Actually, I'm a bit to harsh on it. It can be rivetting on (rare) occasions and it's one of the better BBC shows at the moment.

Torchwood
This show was so bad they put it on Freeview. Not only does it have a no-mark cast and terrible dialogue, it makes no sense whatsoever. From the brief few minutes I have watched it (it was so bad I had to change the channel midway) it seemed to be a Doctor Who spin-off expect with a raunchy twist. To give you a taste of the inexplicable and baffling plot the last episode was about some sex-crazed alien (why a sex-crazed alien would want humans is anyones guess).

Robin Hood
But the creme of the crop in terms of sheer awfulness has to go to Robin Hood. I know it's got a 7.30 time slot but they made it ridiculously PC. For example:

The Sheriff's Squire was black (how on earth could a black man in Medieval England ever rise to a such a high position? Infact, was it even likely that there was a black man in Medieval England? Who on earth would believe that?)
Robin Hood refused to actually harm anyone (He's a trained killer! It comepletely takes the edge out of Robin Hood)
And there is never any blood or pain (It's like a Medieval version of the A-Team. You'd think all that prancing around with swords someone should atleast get hurt.)
It was incredibly cringeworthy and melodramatic. At time it got so embaressing I had to look away
There only ever seems to be 5 sets used in the entirely filming of the show (castle, castle wall, village of Locksley, hanging square and forest).
Last episode the only decent character (apart from the Sheriff) was killed off in some ridiculously gallant deed.

Hopefully the BBC will pick up soon and show something decent for a change. If it gets any worse I must just start revising.

New Dawn. New Writer.

2006-10-04T21:51:00.000+01:00

I have often wondered why my attempts at blogging failed... After about 5 minutes thought, I can sum up why:

I lack motivation. It's just a tad depressing once I realise (despite the long hours I spend on these posts and the comic genius I fill them with *cough*) that I still remain unheard in the blogging community and that, despite my best efforts, no one reads my blogs. Ever.

But what about my friends you may ask? Surely they read my blogs. Indeed they do but I want to do so much more with this blog, achieve things I can only dream of (for now anyway). And how will I ever accomplish this?

With help of course.

I have enlisted the help of literary mercenary, photoshop expert and sex hound Torquer who I had to beg and plead to consider contributing on my humble blog.

Hopefully, with our conbined expertise, we will run havok in cyberspace and become damn popular in the process.

This is the start of great things... great things.

Such a long time...

2006-09-12T12:45:00.000+01:00

It's been such a long time since I posted on this blog. One thing led to another and the truth is I realised I would never achieve my goal of internet-based popularity I so craved for so (like every other internet project I have attempted) I just decided to give up.

And giving up was so easy that I eventually forgot about this blog. So why an unexpected return you may ask?

The story is a short one and inspiration came from the most unexpected of places.

It was a couple of days ago and I was extremely busy (preparing for mock gcses). For some inexplicable reason my msn was on and I noticed the screen name of a friend of mine from a far-away place.

His screen name proclaimed that he had set up a new blog. So I went on his new blog.

I read it and I realised it was good. Really good. Ten times more eloquent than anything I could ever write. You might even say it was inspirationally good. So I bookmarked it.

Then it hit me. Didn't I own a blog? So after a tedious search for username/password etc. from the depths of my mind (and Yahoo inbox) I signed onto Blogger and started writing this very post.

So anyway, the point of this post is, I have decided to ressurect this blog. I'm a year older and wiser and (judging by my past posts) a lot less angry and sarcastic. Maybe this blog will fail again but atleast its worth a try.

Oh yes, and visit Daltervia's blog. It's good stuff.

Things you might want to know about us...

2006-08-28T21:58:00.000+01:00

Having stumbled upon this blog someway or another, curiosity has gotten the better of you and you feel compelled to know a little more about us. After all, who is behind these awesomely funny and totally interesting (or so we like to think) posts? What goes on behind the scenes of this legendary blog?

It is people like you this blog loves, and I implore you to bookmark us. Because we need the love.

Jingoistic's literary team consists of two kickass writers:

Me (Jingoistic) -
Chinese and British with a pessimistic and cynical outlook on life. Constantly angry, hate the north (especially Liverpool) and loaded with sarcasm.

Most posts will be written on a whim and filled with emotion and vulgarity. Despite the title of the blog, I am unpatriotic, like commenting on shallow politics and mocking Britain. Expect quite a few posts concerning China (and a lot of text in brackets).

Having lives in Liverpool for years, life goals are to get the hell out of Liverpool, see Liverpool Football Club win the Treble and pursue a career in Medicine. The rest of my life is exceptionally uninteresting.

Torquer -
A profound writer born in the slums of Manchester. Witty, satirical, debonair; all qualities we make do without. However, his writing style is much more thought-out and methodical than mine (not hard) which makes it perfectly suited to satire. He also takes much pleasure in constantly critisising his grammar.

If you thought my life was boring, his is unbearably worse. Interests include: Rallying support for Macs, organising his stationary meticulously and feeding his cat Hugo.

Since he's an incredibly lazy bastard don't expect more than a post a month. As a guest writer he doesn't really pull his weight around the place which makes me wonder sometimes why I ever pay him (oh wait... I don't).

OUR MISSION
What is the purpose of this blog? Why does this blog read like a poorly written humour magazine? Why do we act like our heads are stuck up our own arses?

All very reasonable questions to ask.

When I started this blog it was created for the purpose of venting my hatred for the injustice we face everyday. Somewhere to rant and rave without drawing odd looks. From there is progressed to the point where we realised we had the potential to make this blog great, which is exactly what we're trying to achieve at the moment.

Sure, this blog may have been created on a whim and an idle fancy but I really do believe I can reach out to a wider audience and entertain the masses. Call it ambitious, a silly notion but it can be achieved.

If we don't we won't lose sleep over it.

So if you feel sympathetic towards our cause or like what you read then bookmark or blogroll us. Help us on the long windy road to success.

RECENTLY
I found a massive flaw in this page; everything is subject to change. It's been a while since I wrote this post and things have certainly changed.

I now write for notfunny.ca, a Canadian humour website (Canadians? Humour? An oxymoron surely?). It's a start and I'm now one step closer to that elusive job as The Times Editor. These things take time.

I started this blog to post about my loser life and things of interest. Unfortunately, things of interest have taken over and I haven't written anything about my life really. I now seem to post mainly on current affairs (with a twist of controversial commentary) which seems to please the masses. Hopefully it'll stay that way.

The Secret to Success at GCSE English

2006-08-11T16:26:00.000+01:00

What an English lesson! I didn't even care that I had to watch the shitty 1996 version of Romeo and Juliet with that git Leonardo Di Capprio in it. I didn't even care when I mis-pronounced melancholy so that it sounded like an italian pasta.

The fact is, I got an A*. For my first draft. Only me and Robin managed such a feat. Life is now perfect... for the day anyway.

The Essay was on Frankenstein and is now adorned with pleasing comments down the margins like: "fantastic!" and "very good point". I might keep the crumpled essay as a trophy of accomplishment so that in later life, I can tell everyone how kickass at english I was.

But the thing that irritates me the most is that I completely bullshitted through it. The result completely undermines my opinion of english analysis because I was just taking the piss at times. I don't think there's a chance in hell that Mary Shelley meant half the stuff I wrote about.

As if Victor suffered Post-Natal Depression. As if Teen Pregnancy relates to Frankenstein.

But to be honest, I couldn't care less because I now have an A*. And I've discovered the secret to success at English:

No matter how irrelevant the point, how absurd the opinion, how ridiculous the links. Write it and back it up. This is what we call "original interpretations". Teachers dig that shit and give A*s for that kind of radical thinking.

NHS...It's a Conspiracy!

2006-07-14T16:27:00.000+01:00

I was reading 'The Times' last night and was not even mildly shocked when I found out how screwed the National Health Service has become thanks to Blair and his shitty policies. Of course, I knew all along that our free health service was shite when I had to wait a year and a half just to be put on the waiting list for braces and I still haven't had them fitted yet. That just about sums up the NHS blackhole, it's either that or I was subject to institutional racism, the bastards.

How on earth could Labour fuck up so badly as to lose billions every year? Either Labour are filled with incompetants or it's all a fucking conspiracy and the money is going into swiss banks to line the pockets of Mr. Blair.

The only solution is health insurance. We've got no choice but to scrap the stupid notion of giving everyone "free healthcare" and loosen the burden on taxpayers by forcing them to take on health insurance, at least this way they don't have to pay for the healthcare of fat lazy sods who can't be bothered to work. Just look how great it is in America.

This all seems a bit right wing for a socialist like me but this country is so fucked up it needs to be said.

Energy Resources...We're Screwed

2006-06-21T17:22:00.000+01:00

I thought physics today would be the same old tired affair, either do nothing for the whole lesson watching old man Ghettle walk in and out of the classroom occassionally or listen to him drone on about resistance or whatever the fuck we're supposed to be learning about. But anyway, todays lesson was different, today we were (and I use this lightly) learning about energy resources.

Big deal, you may say. We learn this kinda crap in Geography all the time. However, unlike our Geography teacher Frost, Gettle uses his "dynamic" youthful charm to really captivate his target audience of bored and hormone-driven teenagers.

I already knew most of the stuff he told us but to have it consolodated like that... wow.

So our worlds resources are running out. In 40 years time we will have used up all our gas and oil. In 200 years time we will have used up all our coal. Basically we're screwed but I knew all this. Apparently someof the most important things in the world are made from oil (clothes, tupperware, ikea furniture etc.) we will be in shitstreet without it.

Which is why there's so much pressure on the Middle East from America. Should all our oil finally deplete then it would trigger a WWIII with the superpowers fighting it out for that precious liquid. America are planning to stockpile it all so the can sit it out should any war spark. Unfortunately for them, there is also China.

China might not seem too great at the moment but its economic growth is increasing by 250% and will overtake Britain and America by 2025. Roughly around the time we start panicking over resources. So when China comes knocking at the doors of America (with its kickass economy and massive population) I doubt they'd take a polite no for an answer.

To cut to the chase there'd be a nuclear winter where there'd be no food or fuel. Soon we'll resort to Soylent Green to survive and people don't want to know what that's made of.

Apparently, Yellowstone Park will also explode around that time (I watched SuperVolcano on ITV so don't question me) and there won't even be an America.

So China inherits the world and survives off soylent green until the nuclear winter dies down. Then they'll start thinking about fuel. Maybe they'll even think of improving China's football team (who couldn't even qualify for the World Cup)

All this isn't certain. What is certain is that I won't get my pension and Labour will screw us over just like it has done a thousand times. It'll start with the 12 year olds forced to vote for Labour then our pension packages will be replaced with the pill. I haven't even taken into account what will happen should cyanide start running low.

To summarise: There's nothing to look forward to in 40 years time.

So yeah, the future's pretty grim.

The Popularity Project

2006-05-07T16:59:00.000+01:00

I've realised, what is the point of venting out your hatred if there isn't anyone to hear what you've got to say? Sure, it's a kickass blog but now it is time for me to discover that audience I crave so much.

To achieve the desired result, I can choose any of these three options:

A.) Post as much spam as I possibly can in the hope that someone, in their blind fury, comes onto this blog and deems it worthy to revisit. Possibly using a message along these lines:

I find your blog intriguing. Visit my blog about my humourous attempts at Oxbridge and gain insight into my hate-filled world. This is not spam.

B.) Post this blog on every blog directory site I can find. Living in deperate hope that people actually surf such directories.

C.) Make some sympathetic blogging friends who would take pity and link to a wretched soul like I.

This isn't going to be something that will happen overnight. Rome wasn't built in a day as they say. I have a long, arduous journey ahead of me and not one of my posts has been to do with Oxbridge. Oh well.

Aesthetically dull

2006-04-19T22:45:00.000+01:00

At the moment, the blog isn't exactly artistically captivating (despite my love for the colour green) therefore something needs to be done about.

You'd think that a webmaster with eight years worth of experience would be able to liven up this sorry excuse of a blog.

I could put up a picture of myself but that might draw a couple of paedos (being such a handsome and suave individual something like that is bound to happen) and I don't want my friends to find out I've got a blog. I'd lose all respeckt amongst my hommies fool.

Maybe I should put on some random funny pictures or some phychadelic flashing thingies to hyponotise people into bookmarking this blog (LMAO). If that fails I'll just upload some pornography.

I'll have to sleep on it.

So it begins...

2006-04-09T22:10:00.000+01:00

I've realised, writing the first post of a blog is the hardest thing I've ever had to try and do. It is the reason why I have sleepless nights trying to summon every ounce of wit and sarcasm to conjure up a post so mesmerising fantastic that I feel it worthy to continue to write for. First impressions are everything and that is definitely the case with blogs but why must this be so difficult?

Therefore I've come up with a simple solution. Cut the crap and write some shit that vaguely fills the empty space. Every other post can build upon this one.

Now a summary. What is the purpose of this blog? Ideally, it is to "chart the attempts of a China-born British student trying to grasp an alusive place in Oxbridge Medicine" but that's not exactly gonna draw the masses.

so...

I shall also report on current events (mostly in the UK) and then moan about them like the sarcastic, hate-filled little scamp I am.

Now all I need is an appreciative audience... What I'll do now is write some crappy posts and show enough potential for the big boys of the blogging world to link to me. How difficult can that be eh?