Ah, the joy of a stealth update after a gap of about, uh...
Hrm.
About 10 months. Ok...
Well, at least a few things are still unchanged - still in the same job, although I'm starting to try to work out now what I'm going to move on to. Partly because this doesn't really feel like the kind of job to stay in for more than 2-3 years (in a 4-person company there isn't really much opportunity for vertical movement) and partly because a decent pay increase would be very helpful indeed. Not that a pay increase ever isn't welcome of course, but it would be specifically helpful at the moment.
As for other things... The writing has picked up again after a bit of a slow start to the year. The main driver for that was a friend of mine winning Pro Circuit San Francisco with a deck that I designed (although the tweaking and testing was a group effort.)
After that win, MetaGame.com published a two-part article (here and here that I'd written on the design process behind the deck, and apparently impressed them, as a couple of weeks later the editor (Toby Wachter) e-mailed to ask if I'd be interested in writing a Deck Clinic series, taking reader-submitted decks with problems and fixing them up, trying to give an insight into the design process and the steps you can take to improve a deck once you have the initial concept. It's good practice, and also proving to be quite interesting to write, which certainly should help sticking to deadline. Getting the chance to do event coverage for the M:tG English Nationals along with Tim Willoughby was also fun, and, again, more useful experience.
Going on holiday soon, and while it should be less interesting than last year's safari awesomeness (not exactly surprising) it should be a nice break, and a chance to recharge the Vitamin D batteries.
Overall things are pretty much as expected, which might be part of the problem - I feel stuck in a bit of a rut at the moment. Work is part of it, along with the time it's taking to work off the last bits of student overdraft - the writing should hopefully help with that, as the articles will pay cash money (even if it is dollar cash money) when the cheques arrive.
All I need to do now is find an interesting new job that pays more! Hopefully also a larger company - although the people here are great, the tiny size of the office means there isn't really scope for any kind of work-based socialising, so I'm not really meeting people.Current Mood:  pensive Today's Tune: The Automatic - Monster |
Sooooo...
Where to start? Well, following on from the last post, I've had three articles published now on StarCityVS (not yet actually been paid for any of them, but it's nice to be able to say I'm a published strategy writer.) Hopefully now that work is a little calmer I'll be able to find inspiration for a few more (ie, actually get to play some games.)
Links to the articles here.
As far as card games in general go, I've been on a bit of a break. Work has simply been too busy for anything but the occasional week-night comedown session.
So on to the Big Things that have been eating my time. Well, One Big Thing, one Smaller But Much More Fun Big Thing.
The One Big Thing.
The Creative Economy Conference. Nearly the full year I've been working at BSAC we've been getting this thing started, organising it, talking about it, planning it, trying to get sponsorship for it... And now it's happened. Over. Done. And boy does it feel weird. It went pretty well, after months of increasingly frantic buildup, a lot of extra work, and a handful of crises sprinkled liberally over the top. But now, we're done. We've submitted the recommendations from the Conference to the European Commission (the point of the Conference was to get all the 'Creative Industries', mainly film/TV, music and publishing together to recommend things like changes in policy and regulation to the Commission), we've sent out the thank-yous to sponsors, speakers and everyone else we could think of, and now I'm just kind of back to sitting here, in an eerily quiet office (people are, post-conference, taking it in turns to escape.)
The Smaller But Much More Fun Big Thing.
So the Conference is over, had a week of clean-up (the thank-you letters, for a start, and some of the other immediate aftermath tasks.) Then, off to the airport. One 11 hour flight later, I'm emerging blinking from months of unpredictable London weather to glorious sunshine in South Africa, and a week spent roaming around in Land Rovers gawping at animals that were variously; bizarre, cute, awesome, amusing, mischievous. The lions definitely fit into the awesome category, dirty great prides of the things. Generally they were lying around in the sun not doing anything, but quite often there'd be the remains of a dead something being gnawed on, and you could hear the bones going from 30 feet away. Elephants were pretty awesome as well, particularly when they were fighting, or when they were casually knocking trees over (apparently they eat the roots.)
Cheetahs... Now cheetahs were everything. Incredible animals. In a world of dusty browns and scrubby brush, they almost glow gold. By far the most graceful animals I've ever had the fortune to see, and the cubs are adorable. I could have watched the cubs playing all evening, if that particular sighting hadn't been interrupted by a huge thunderstorm (although we saw that group again, and a couple of other cheetahs during the week.) Other than the cats (sadly no sightings of the relatively much more elusive leopards) there were giraffe, rhino (black and white, like Michael Jackson yo), various antelope, hippos, a crocodile, infinite birds (including several different species of eagle and kite) and fun random stuff like mongooses, bush babies and a particularly inquisitive genet.
I got through about 5 & 1/2 hours of footage on the trip, which hopefully I'll be able to edit together into some kind of shape and stick on DVD (and maybe some lower-res MPEGs for 'net distribution.) I would say watch this space, but I know myself too well to recommend waiting for my next LJ post... I also should be able to get hold of some of the thousands of still images that my family took on the trip, some of which may find their way onto here in due course as well.Current Mood:  calm Today's Tune: Gorillaz feat. Roots Manuva - All Alone |
So yeah, one of the biggest strategy and community websites for Magic: the Gathering (http://www.starcitygames.com) just opened up a sister site for VS Marvel/DC strategy at http://www.starcityvs.com.
The site went live on Monday. Late yesterday afternoon I submitted an article about a deck I've been working on. This morning I get into work and check the site to see if they've started putting articles up yet. This is where the pleasant surprise part comes in.
http://www.starcityvs.com/article/29.html
Featured Writer. Hail to the King, baby. From 'never had anything published' to 'Featured Writer' in 3.7 seconds (well, more like 18 hours, but close enough.)Current Mood:  giddy Today's Tune: Dilated Peoples - Centre of Attention |
Long time no, uh, post. Of course, at this rate I'll be saying this -every- post, but hey...
Well, that's partly because there's not been a lot to say. By the numbers;
1) Work. Well, I'm still here. A little dull, but what can you do. Still getting paid, still slowly chipping away at the overdraft, still can't stand getting up in the morning. I need a holiday :< Oh well, only another 4 months or so before the next planned one...
2) Home. Nothing much going on. Looking for people to move into one empty room and one soon-to-be-empty room, and spent Sunday de-icing the freezer. Nothing quite as fun as pulling chunks of ice out of a cold box full of ice when you realise that the chunk of ice you just picked up was, at some point, half a wine bottle. Not cutting hand to ribbons on broken glass: Priceless.
3) Family. Still taking up a lot of time, as always (most weekends, it feels like.) This weekend I'm going to see my Dad for his birthday, and I have no idea what to get him (as always.) One of those very irritating people to buy for, in that he generally buys everything that he knows he wants.
Other than that, the dieting is going well. The combination of Christmas with various bits of family, a week in New York over New Year, and then another long weekend/short week in New York at the end of March conspired to play merry hell with my waistline. From 207 pounds I'm down to about 185 over the course of about 2 months. I'm not quite sure what my target weight is, maybe see how I feel in another 10-12 or so.
In more cheerful news, Sin City is the epitome of awesomeness.
Hell yeah.Current Mood:  bored Today's Tune: Positive Balance - Immortal Technique feat. Big Zoo |
So this Sunday was 10K London, a tournament for the (relatively) new Marvel/DC Comics card game, the '10K' part pointing to the total prize money of $10,000 (1st place gets $2,500, then down for the rest of the top 8 knockout, then places 9-20 pick up $200 each.) I've been practicing with a few other local players for a few weeks now, playing a relatively little-known deck and testing pretty thoroughly against the popular ones. I came into the day confident against the 'Tier 1' decks in the format (Curve Sentinels and Teen Titans) and knowing that I had a pretty good shot at taking down most random aggressive decks. 160 people turned up, more than double the numbers that were expected, and we ended up starting the 10 30-minute rounds before the Top 8 cut just before 11am. Round 10 finished around 9:30pm. After managing to finish Round Zero with a winning record (waking up in time, the tube not breaking down, finding the venue, not misregistering the decklist), ( the marathon began... )Current Mood:  disappointed |
| » Lightning Is My Girl |
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Monday. At work. Soooo bored.
So what can I do to alleviate the boredom? Well, I could do one of my infrequent LJ rambles. Maybe I can even go for a numbered list of stuff this time!
Woah.
[/keanu]
1: Started playing City of Heroes. 'An MMORPG with dial-up, are you mad?' I hear you cry. But lo! See point two!
2: Finally managed to get a decent connection sorted out! 4MB Broadband here I come... Another week or two before it's hooked up, but then...
3: Back on City of Heroes, I plan to capture screenshots of my various characters and stick them up here. So far I have a level 8 Katana/Regen Scrapper, a level 1 Claws/Invulnerability Scrapper, and a level 4 Fire/Devices Blaster. The costume designer is far too fun, even if I didn't understand fully how to work it while making my first character (the Katana scrapper.) I also managed, completely by accident, to set the difficulty level on maximum. How was I supposed to know that the random people you could pay to change your title were a difficulty setting? So I ended up on Invincible (the hardest setting), getting a mission to clear a building of warring gang members with a time limit. So I go in, and am slightly worried that all the bad guys are at least conning orange (basically they were higher level than me, the names show up in different colours based on relative level.) I methodically cleared out the first floor, went up to the second, cleared most of that, at which point I ran into a group of three guys all conning red. Red is 'don't fight these unless you have friends, chump'. I died. A lot. I went to try and recruit some help, found a Defender to come along, went back in... And the entire building had respawned with three times as many bad guys, all still reds and oranges. Talk about frowns. I gave up in disgust and started my Blaster, finding out by accident while researching the mission that I had accidentally changed the difficulty setting, which immediately explained why I was getting the shit kicked out of me by things I could barely hit.
4: Getting ready to go to New York again at the end of the month, long weekends-a-go-go. This one won't even cost anything! The fact that, if all goes according to plan, I'll be picking up a Sony PSP when I'm over there will not, I'm sure, help those who are battling envious murdering rage right now...
5: Housemates. Phone bills. Rage... building. Anger... rising.
Mar. 7th, 2005 @ 05:06 pm
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| » Human Behaviour |
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(The greek characters that represent the story functions described below didn't reproduce when I copy/pasted. The substitutes should be adequate for a casual reading, they'd just make referring back to Morphology of the Folktale more cumbersome.)
I wrote this report in my second year of university for a course entitled 'Introduction to Communications Research'. I took a look through a particular book, The Morphology of the Folktale, while reading up for class, and was interested enough to use it for my semester project (100% of the grade for the course.) Ended up getting the best grade in the year writing about something I loved watching with a method I found interesting. Probably my best (academic) memory from university.
A semiotic analysis of the television serial ‘Buffy: The Vampire Slayer’ on both the series and episode levels, incorporating an investigation into the relevance to a modern media text of the story functions described by Propp in his ‘Morphology of the Folktale’
Abstract:
Through the course of this project I attempted to provide a structural and semiotic analysis of the television show Buffy: The Vampire Slayer. My primary aim was to compare and contrast the structures of the narratives of both a full season of the show and a single episode, with reference to the story functions isolated by Vladimir Propp in his Morphology of the Folktale, with a brief semiotic analysis used to provide some insight into the meaning of some aspects of the individual episode studied. The first section of my analysis, demonstrated that the main story arc of the fourth season of Buffy: The Vampire Slayer and the single episode ‘Hush’ both exhibited structures comparable to the tales analysed by Propp, with differences attributable to the difference in format and scale between the three story forms (series, episode, and folktale.) The brief semiotic analysis was, I believe, successful in identifying some of the underlying influences and themes of the episode analysed previously.
( Curious? )
Feb. 19th, 2005 @ 01:05 am
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| » Burning Wheel |
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You are Shockwave. The fact that you don't have a
face says it all. No one really knows what your
true intentions are but you, and your
intentions are dictated totally by logic. You
approach everything with a cold and objective
approach. You think you should be in charge
because you believe it's only logical. It has
nothing to do with ambition. However, if you
are faced with anything emotional, you just
can't understand it. Rock on with your logical
and secretive self.
Transformers Generation One Personality Test
brought to you by Quizilla
Feb. 12th, 2005 @ 07:49 pm
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| » Time Travelin' (A Tribute to Fela) |
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So no updates for a long time... That means a stream-of-consciousness ramble to catch up... right?
As if you can avoid it. Pah! Pah I say!
So, what's been going on in the Wonderful World of Me©? Of course, that means I need to check back to my last entry and see what I was up to then. Ah, the fuming rage. Well, I'm sure you'll be thrilled to know that the situation is all cleared up, and it was just a quickly corrected error.
Like fuck it was. They (ebookers, never book a ticket with them again kids!) continued to mess me around until Boxing Day, at which point I booked another flight and notified them that I'd be claiming the cost of that second flight from them. Which is where I'm at at the moment; written them a very firm letter notfifying them of my claim, their breach of contract, Small Claims Court, all the fun stuff. They've acknowledged receipt of the letter and are "investigating". Or, for those of you not cynical enough to read the quote marks properly, stalling for time while they try to work out if it's going to be more expensive to wait for me to sue them.
Of course, more than that has happened. Christmas, New Year, and a whole lot of stuff at work, for example. Christmas was, for a nice change, fairly guilt-trip free. Finished work on the 23rd, train out to Dad's on Christmas Eve, step-Dad picked me up there Boxing Day, went from my Mum and step-Dad's to the airport on the 29th, and then off to New York for a week to stay with my next-older half-brother (I have another, older, half-brother, and one younger. No sisters or, y'know, actual straightforward siblings in this family thankyouverymuch.)
Which was all fun. Christmas presents were, as always, gratefully received, although for someone who is (in a nice way) aware of the fact that I put some weight on over the Christmas period, I received an awful lot of ultra-high-calorie presents from my Mum... Not that I'm complaining, I'm just trying to ration them out for the survival of my cardio-vascular system.
New Year was a lot more fun. I'm a big fan of New York, and a week there without anyone vaguely parent-like was fantastic. Met up with ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) platytog, which was great, as we got to hang out and eat Indian food (well, she watched me eat) and be cutely awkward a lot. Shopped a lot (helped immensely by the considerable quantities of vouchers for cool stores I didn't know about from my brother) and, thanks to the feeble dollar, still ended up spending less in December than other months, helped also by a Christmas bonus from work. Slightly amusing being handed an envelope full of slightly crumpled £20 notes (£500 in all) by my very upper-middle-class boss, but given the overdraft situation, and especially considering I'd only been there since late September, it was a huge, huge help. When we all got back from the holidays she even took the office out to see Cirque de Soleil (Dralion, for the interested.) Definitely landed on my feet with this job.
So the job... Well, still doing some of the same stuff I was. Organising our Council Meetings, admin stuff, organising things. Also, though, organizing events. Some private interviews for our Members, and, yesterday, a half-day seminar on the games industry and its convergence with film, TV and other sectors. Most of our membership is film, TV, other broadcast and AV industries, so a lot of the people there were new to us as an organization. But hey, we had Ian Livingstone there. Which was cool. (Anyone else who grew up as an introverted kid/teen with Fighting Fantasy and GW to retreat to should have an idea as to why.) Aleks Krotoski was also speaking, someone a lot less well-known, but equally fun to have as she co-presented a rather fun UK TV show called Bits which was, while it lasted, probably the most fun (and most obviously gamer-friendly) show of it's type. For those of you lucky enough to have the delectable Morgan Webb adorning your screens on X-Play, think X-Play but infinitely more anarchic and surreal, and fronted by a trio of variously unhinged women. Aleks is a journalist and, recently, academic, and for contrast Emily Booth who also presented has been in an amusing array of low budget schlock films involving varying degrees of, uh, almost-clothedness. It was a blatant cult hit, and thus obviously couldn't last.
Plus I'm also involved in organising, in October, a 300-person plus, European, probably multi-language conference in Westminster (around the corner from the Houses of Parliament) to mark the UK Presidency of the European Union. Bit of a change of scale, and it's apparently going to involve heinous amounts of work and stress, but "should be enormous fun". To which I can only look somewhat askance, smile, and nod. From professionally-slacking student to European Conference Organiser in one easy step, who'd have thought it.
Personal and social life, other than NY, has pretty much ground to a halt. Still keeping in touch with a couple of people from Uni, although a lot of people I simply couldn't get in contact with after my phone was stolen. Who knows, maybe one day I'll find the piece of paper I wrote all my numbers on when I changed networks, and I'll suddenly burst into an orgy of phone-calling and text-messaging a bunch of people I haven't spoken to in a year and who'd forgotten I exist.
I should probably do some kind of mention of music, films and so on that I've seen and heartily recommend, so I'll now retreat into my shell for a couple of minutes.
Film first, as I've been terribly lax and have seen sod all. Went to a BAFTA (the UK version of the Academy) screening of Closer before Christmas, which was, in my not-even-faintly-humble opinion, a fantastic film. Brutal, wince-inducing, unflinching, and, at times, hilarious. The set-up for the first meeting between Clive Owen and Julia Roberts' characters had me struggling not to get thrown out. Pretty much everyone, in addition, acted very, very well indeed. Clive Owen was astonishing, Jude Law is a lot better than some people will probably give him credit for, Julia Roberts is surprisingly good, and Natalie Portman is pretty much the only thing stopping Clive Owen literally walking off with the entire film. Which given how good he is, is a pretty damn big compliment. Those who've seen Attack of the Clones but not Leon are well advised to catch her in this (and, well, BUY LEON, YOU DAMN DIRTY APES.)
Music I've heard a lot more of, aided and abetted by the weak dollar and the high proportion of good hip-hop available in NY compared to the places I know well in London (which basically means 'I haven't thought seriously about where the good independent stores to buy hip-hop CDs in London are'.) Talib Kweli, Mos Def, Common all get the highest praise, but then that didn't entirely surprise me. What did surprise me was something I picked up on impulse. Ugly Duckling's "Taste the Secret" is the most bizarre concept album I've come across from an artist that is at least vaguely peripheral to the modern mainstream. Hip-hop concept album based around a fast-food joint that includes meat as an ingredient in everything it sells. The fact that it's called Meatshake (available in Chicken, Pork, Beef or Turkey Jerky if I remember right) should give you an idea. But despite the off-the-wall recurring theme, the album also has some seriously, seriously fine hip-hop. Top-notch production, great tunes, and socially aware without ever preaching. Disarming the uncouth and the testosterone-addled with humour and wit, in fact. Plus the obligatory party joints, but without the need for Lil Jon or lyrics about getting so drunk you can't see.
Oh, and Handsome Boy Modelling School. Album is called White People. You will listen to it. This is not a request, this is a statement of fact. Stemming from that, if anyone can recommend any Cat Power to me, I'd appreciate it, as the track she guests on is one of the most quietly, slow-burning, sexiest songs I've heard in months.
Feb. 4th, 2005 @ 01:28 am
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| » Confide In Me |
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I am Jack's impotent rage.
My power animal's a damn sight cooler than a fucking penguin though. Some kind of big scaled thing with huge claws feels about right at the moment. You can have dinosaurs as a power animal right? Allosaurus or something would fit.
So I am, supposedly, going to New York for New Year. Last night I went to check up on my flight times so my brother knows when to pick me up at Newark when I arrive... And, apparently, my booking is cancelled. At the moment the people I booked the flight with are scrabbling around in the couple-of-day grace period before I start ripping limbs off.
In other news, I'm not doing too bad. The pulled muscle in my neck that took me out of commission for 3-4 days has pretty much cleared up, I'm... not completely bankrupt yet, I still have a lot of Christmas shopping to do, things are kind of coasting along on autopilot really. From Thursday for five days I'll have the house to myself, which will be awsum.
On the actual, non-'apart from...' plus side, picked up the new Nas double-album, along with (finally) the Killers.
And there was much rejoicing.
But yeah, I'm still Jack's impotent rage.
Dec. 6th, 2004 @ 11:24 pm
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| » Kill All Hippies |
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Hell yeah. I can almost taste the Everlasting Gobstopper. But watch out for the Square Sweets That Look Round!
In other news, I attended the Royal Film Performance (and World Premiere) of Ladies in Lavender, starring Dames Judi Dench and Maggie Smith, and attended by them, the Writer/Director (Charles Dance, yes the actor) and, natch, the Queen. Yes, the one with the crown, not Brian May.
Although I had to wear a tux, fun was still had by all. Good film too. More maybe later, you lucky things you (both of you.)
Nov. 8th, 2004 @ 11:52 pm
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| » Star/Pointro |
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Nov. 4th, 2004 @ 06:12 pm
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| » Snake |
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Soooo... Not updated in, uh, a while.
But then, not a huge amount has been happening. I've been working (or, more accurately, drafting on Magic Online, chatting on IRC, e-mailing/websurfing, and getting paid for it, in between the odd bit of work.)
This weekend should be fun. platytog is coming to stay for a weekend before she goes back to stay with crazy random europeans. So that should be happyfuntimes, do the London tourist thing etc.
Finally bought myself a copy of Watchmen, reading it again to remind myself how good it is. Picked up Volume One of League of Extraordinary Gentlemen as well, so I have that to look forward to when I finish Watchmen. At some point I may even finish my Sandman collection...
Other than that, I've been, uh, eating sandwiches? Drinking unfeasibly large quantities of Diet Coke w. Vanilla? Planning New Years in New York? Oh, wait, might not have mentioned that... Going to be staying with my brother and his girlfriend in their new place in Hoboken from the 29th to the 4th, which should be all sorts of good. I do less than three NYC, it has to be said (although I don't own the T-shirt, despite having been there and done it.)
Oooh, movies. Saw the Donnie Darko director's cut... I'm glad the original was released as-is, I think the added SFX were largely extraneous. Some of the imagery was cool (the eye-shots with the various elements), some was pointless, and some was 'Uh, sure' (like the computer-style screen overlay on the 'rewind the tangent universe' section.) Some of the added exposition was cool though, the Watership Down section exposing a crack in Donnie's intellectual armour as he tries to dissociate his own experiences from Fiver's visions ('they're only rabbits.') Only to have the 'it's a metaphor, stupid' point be made by his girlfriend. Pwnd. So definitely interesting, but glad of the original. Fingers crossed that it does well in the States in the cinema this time, it really deserves it. Some of the changes in the music were a shame, as well, the halloween party in particular lost some of its punch.
Oct. 28th, 2004 @ 11:53 am
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| » Novocaine For The Soul |
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Obligatory Movie Reviews Time! Of course, I'm not going to be writing full reviews, more random comments and thoughts on films I've seen recently. Starting with the film I went to last night with dawnkitten, Saw.
Saw is a psychological horror film in the vein of Se7en or Cube, that asks the question of just what we are prepared to do to save our own lives; we want to live, sure, but how much?
Summed up in a single word, Saw was... Frustrating. It was full of interesting ideas, was at times well acted, built up some serious tension at various points, and had what should have been a fantastic twist. Even after the various jarring disappointments, that twist still hit pretty hard, and if it weren't for the problems, it would have been a serious kick in the teeth. This film is, in a word, crying out for a cleaned-up 'Director's Cut' with some of the clumsiness neatly excised and some of the editing decisions completely rethought. There were some patchily acted scenes, but overall nothing too bad. The main tension-killers, though, were the flashbacks to the scenes of the killer's previous set-ups. Ingenious, horrifying, stomach-churning, traumatic... And then ruined by choppy fast-cutting to heavy metal music as the various victims struggled against their fate. What should have been almost unbearable to watch was rendered uncomfortably close to comic, particularly since up until that point the use of incidental music had been impressively restrained. The occassional spots of jet-black humour were well-played, but sadly overshadowed by occasional unintentional slices of well-cured ham, particularly as Cary Elwes' Lawrence succumbs to shock and blood loss.
So worth watching? Yes, if you aren't put off by gore and scares. The ideas are good enough, the twist ingenious enough, the set-up strong enough to save it, but don't be surprised if you walk out thinking 'Damn... That could have been so good.'
On an 'And Now For Something Completely Different' note, last week I finally went to see Hero. I think it's pretty much common knowledge now how good Hero is, but I think it needs emphasising that it is such a good looking film. It's liberally dripping with style, and some of the settings for the set-piece duels are incredible. The chess parlour, all glistening grey stone and water was an early standout, but I'm hard-pressed to think of a bad-looking scene. And yes, Zhang Ziyi is still super-super-hot, and Jet Li is still one of the coolest men alive.
Now on my list of films I still need to see, Collateral, Fahrenheit 9/11, Layer Cake, and that's just the 'in the cinemas right now' list. The DVD list is as infinitely long as ever.
Oh, watched Flatliners on DVD the other night with my housemates. Good film. Kiefer Sutherland going utterly batshit insane always good to see, and Kevin Bacon's always good value.
Oct. 9th, 2004 @ 07:47 pm
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| » Music: Response |
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Well, I've survived the week. All limbs present and correct, no missing organs, not been fired. Of course, not been paid yet either, but that's bearable for now... Into the routine of ironing and washing things, and getting up in the morning. Still haven't shaken this cough, which is irritating, as I need to be able to speak on the phone without collapsing into hacking fits of incomprehensibility on Monday.
The new Talib Kweli album, Beautiful Struggle, is amazing. Anyone with even the slightest interest in hip-hop should definitely check it out ASAP. I'm still listening to the Modest Mouse one as well, and listened to the Damien Rice album earlier that I got off the strength of Cannonball, which is a fantastically gorgeous song. Didn't really pay enough attention to it to say much about it though, have to listen to it properly again.
Still haven't seen Hero. Might try to get out tomorrow (or later today, as it's technically Sunday) to see it now I have my Oyster card so I don't need to faff around getting bus passes.
Still waiting on a decent phone. Sigh. Growing to loathe the David Beckham shirt cover on the one I've borrowed from The Link.
Oct. 3rd, 2004 @ 04:28 am
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| » Tender |
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One day left. Tomorrow, I enter the world of work, besuited, behair-cutted, beanythingelsethatcomestominded. I seem to be on the tail-end of this cold, thankfully. A few days of staying at my Mum's, being fed and getting decent amounts of sleep (and, shock, seeing sunlight) seem to have helped out a bit. So now, I wait... And do laundry, obviously. Life can't let you get in a decent 'So now, I wait...' without something as tedious as laundry loudly intruding. So I'm eating apples, drinking orange juice, trying not to OD on paracetamol (damn liver) and considering ironing a shirt for tomorrow. Ironing. Wow. Ick.
With that disturbing thought, I'm signing off for now.
Sep. 26th, 2004 @ 01:17 pm
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| » Supervixen |
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Mmm, phlegm. Seems to be varying between fluorescent orange and green, which is at least interesting, if a little worrying. Ah well. Hopefully I'll dose up with vitamin C and paracetamol and it'll be gone by the time I start work on Monday.
Start work on Monday. Hmmm. Feels weird saying that. Ah well... Picked up my suits today, so Monday morning will see my effortless, Bananaman-style transition from endlessly Jeans/T-shirt-equipped student to dapper man-about-town. That's the plan anyway.
Of course, the main thing that this means is that I get to spend the next month waiting in increasingly anxious desperation for my first paycheck, at which point my overdraft finally starts going down.
Sep. 22nd, 2004 @ 06:23 pm
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| » Inbetweener |
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Today was one of those days where nothing seemed to go right. Not catastrophic, but just-bad-enough-to-be-irritating, without being bad enough to justify full-blown bitching and violent catharsis. Went to meet a friend, who didn't show up, which was more of a problem than normal due to the lack of phone. Then I went to my normal Friday night CCG group, to be told that the venue was closed tonight. Sigh. So after much hanging around as people trickled in (and some trickled right back out,) we're told that there's been a change of venue. To somewhere we'd just been to to check, and found empty.
{headbutts wall}
SO. We head back there, and there aren't enough people to play VS, so I have to draft M:tG. Which wouldn't normally be a problem, except that there's a new set coming out tomorrow, and I'm sick and tired of the current draft format. My total lack of enthusiasm, coupled with tiredness, conspires to give the unloved format the 0-2-bye performance it deserves.
Although, I just realised I do in fact have some good news to relate.
I got a job!
It's the one I posted about before, heard about it yesterday and it took today's bland unpleasantness to finally take the edge off the 'giddy teenager' vibe. Start on the 27th, so have a week to get into normal sleeping patterns, get clothes, haircut, fret about overdraft, all the fun stuff. Then I get to sit in an office all day for money. w00t.
Sep. 18th, 2004 @ 01:07 am
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Another quiet day. Called one of my old work placements at the end of last week, trying to get a reference for the job I'm applying to... Still not heard from them, the recruitment agency's going to try calling them tomorrow direct. Sigh. If this, of all things, is the deciding factor then someone's getting smeared all over the pavement.
No word on the phone yet, hopefully the forms will be here by tomorrow so I can get them fired off. Our washing machine, having now given up the ghost in a tantrum of soapy-water-vomiting thrashing, has been replaced, and I can now wash clothes in something younger than I am.
Sep. 14th, 2004 @ 11:46 pm
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Now I have that dilemna that I'm sure every LJer has had; a day where you've done literally jack shit, and feel like writing something. That probably means random web trawling. Which, of course, just ends up making you hungry.
I could take it ¬_¬
So here I sit, 1am, thinking of 9lb burgers, drinking my Diet Coke with Vanilla straight from the 2ltr bottle. Listening to the radio, randomly caught a decent hip-hop show on. Bonus. Hmm. Just heard a great track and hoping that they'll tell me what it is after the ad break :<
So I've e-mailed the radio station asking them what it is. Check back tomorrow, or the day after, or some other time, for the next thrilling instalment of 'Name that Tune!'
Sep. 12th, 2004 @ 12:39 am
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