September’s Here & Summer’s Over.

Hey, hey, hey ladies and gents of the internet. Time for a quick blog post before I go back into work mode and today I wish to talk about the fact that the summer is over and how September has crept up on us so quickly.

This seems to happen a lot and every year still surprises me how quickly it happens. Summer is there, you’re in the thick of it, either enjoying yourself or you’re bored out of your mind for days on end. Whatever your scenario is, the summer feels long while you’re in it. But you never notice the days go by and sure enough, it is the last week or August and you’re like “Where the shag did the summer go?” And before you even have time to blink it is September and all those happy thoughts you had about your free time, holidays or hang sessions with your friends and family are pretty much dashed aside as the normality of life kicks in once again. For kids, teenagers or young adults, it pretty much means back to school, college or university, however, if you’re not in the education bubble, then it means nothing besides going to work, and if you’re old enough then you’ll probably have been doing that over the summer and way before that if you’re in full-time or part-time work. For me, I used to be in the education bubble and for the last 8 years since I always had the feeling of dread/excitement when I knew I had to return to college or uni, but now I don’t have that. Since I finished uni in June, I’ve technically become an adult and have been working over the summer. It is only just dawning on me that I have nothing to go back to in September, that my life really has nothing major to return to and it is a relief and yet kind of surreal at the same time. The only thing I never look forward to at this time of the year is the return of annoyingly load school children, uni Freshers and the football season as well (god I despise it, it takes up too much TV time at my house).

I dunno, September always represented the end of good times and the start of boring and dull routines (as the image above suggests), that being said, since I have no educational ties, I wonder where does life go for me now? I mean besides being a barman, I have no other regular commitments to tend to and it feels weird. That being said, there is much to look forward to on the horizon. TV is finally gonna get interesting again with the return of some of my favourite TV shows including, Castle, Boardwalk Empire, Parks and Recreation, Arrow and Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., and then there’s all the new TV that will appear including Gotham and The Flash among others. Then I’ll have the Tokyo Game Show coverage taking place in a few weeks where hopefully I’ll get some juicy video game announcements and footage too.

So yeah, while I’m gutted that the summer is over I know there is good stuff on the horizon. Now I only have one question to ask you lot:

Be sure to comment below and let me know yo. 😀

 

Those Super Lazy Summer Days…

Sup ladies and gents, today I come to you with a blog post out of boredom, again. It is the latter part of July, it is summer, it’s hot and I’m really, really, REALLY bored.

I’ve made blog posts about being bored and lazy before but today, once again I feel like the past is repeating itself and today especially I am feeling SUPER lazy. The recent hot days in the UK, while good for people who are doing things outside, for me it is just heats up my house makes me feel hot and tired. Ever since I moved into my current house around 10 years ago the summer has been the season for me to laze around the house and do nothing because of the heat sucking away my energy.

Today has been what feels like the longest day of my life. The heat has pretty much sucked out all of my energy and any inspiration I have for personal work is just not there any more. So what do I do in a moment of crisis like this? Watch stupid amounts of TV, play video games and lay on the couch watching for the hours to pass by. Luckily it gets pretty cool around this hour of the day so my movements get a little quicker again. Man I really need something to do haha, hopefully I can get a job over the summer or get a really good video game to hold me over during these super hot days. Thanks for reading lol. 😛

 

Surviving The Storm Known As University

Good day to you ladies and gents, today I blog to you as a person who is different from before, a person feels like the weight of the world has been lifted off his shoulders, a person who now can live a partially care-free life again. This is all because my time with education is well and truly over.

Honestly this is how I felt on Thursday morning this week, I was like “Thank you god!”

Now if you have followed this blog for a year or more you would have seen my many complaints, rants or unhappy blog posts relating to university and the problems it has given me in terms of how it affected me emotionally and how it conflicted with my blog-based activities. Heck at one point I was ready to throw in the towel last year and call it quits, but somehow I bared with it. The sleepless nights, all those days I procrastinated and danced the line between education and fun, that stuff doesn’t matter anymore, because I beat the system! Honestly the day I escaped the clutches of the education system has been something I’ve dreamed about for months and never thought the day would ever come so soon, but now all I can do is just raise a can of beer to the air and just go, “I have survived.”

So what have I done with my newfound freedom? Well that should be obvious, I went right back to the cinema haha. After only being able to go there for the major film releases like Amazing Spider-Man 2 and Godzilla and missing how many films for the last month, I started by watching experience properly with X-Men: Days of Future Past which was awesome and then on Friday I re-watched Godzilla in IMAX and had a hella good time. So now I’m gonna chase up a few films at my local Cineworld while I’m back at home in the south-east of England again.

So expect a lot more blog posts from me in the coming weeks, I’m coming back to this blog with a vengeance! 😀

 

Lazy Days Are Taking Over

Hello to all who may be reading this blog post, now its time for me to talk about the random stuff going on in my life or should I say that lack of it. Fact is I am lazy and since the summer that chilled out demeanour hasn’t left me just yet which isn’t doing me any favours when it comes to my uni work and social endeavours.

Yep, that’s me nearly all the time these days yo.

I think I should explain why I am in the position that I am. Let’s rewind back to summer, the season of the year where if you’re not in full-time work warrants you to be as chilled out and lazy as you want. For the last few years I’ve abused the lazy nature that the summer time gives me, this year was no different and to a degree it was one of my worst summer’s for being lazy. But then the uni season kicked in again at the end of September I’ve had to get back into work mode, but here’s the thing… I can’t do it.

You see summer had such a massive effect on me, that when we got given all our modules to start doing for this semester I just couldn’t get into the groove, those moments when you’re meant to go home and spend time developing your ideas and drawing (because I’m on an animation course), I’d much rather go to the cinema, play video games or sleep in until I can be arsed to rise from my bed. Point is I am back at uni where work has gotta be done and it’s not getting done because I’m totally in the wrong mindset.

Problem is I can’t shift it.

Now a lot people would just say, “Get off your lazy ass and do something!” and believe me I would like to, but I’m a guy that needs a hell of a lot of motivation to get myself in check. I normally work off of a goal or need some killer inspiration to get myself in a creative mood and right now in life I haven’t found that groove.

So to conclude I hope I find that creative spark sometime soon because I am a third year student and final projects don’t do themselves. 😛 Until next time people, thanks for reading and I’ll catch ya later!

 

September is here… And my summer’s over.

So it is finally September, the month when all forms of educational things start up again and anyone who was on holiday or had time off has to start up the boring portion of their lives again. But most importantly, with the introduction of this month comes the cruel realisation that the summer is well and truly over.

This picture perfectly represents what its like when the summer comes to an end.

Now I wouldn’t say that my summer was a total waste, far from it, I did have a lot of fun. I went to a Zelda concert, went to 2 music festivals, saw the majority of my summer films in the cinema and moved out of my old shitty house and into a WAY better one and I even got a job. I’d say that I’ve done a fair about this summer. That being said, there still was a great deal of stuff I wanted to do this summer that I never got around to tackling. I was meant to have so many summer adventures not only on my own, but with my friends too, but nothing materialized the way I thought it would. And this leads me to the conclusion that there just wasn’t enough time this summer.

I say this all the time, but I totally believe that its true, time never seems to be on my side.

This seem to happen each year; I look forward to the summer, it happens, and then I end up feeling like I wasted it. It’s been like this for the last 3-4 years. Again its not like I purposely waste my time, but somehow the time just gets away from me and I feel like there was so many things I could have done beforehand. I think I can really blame this on the fact that I got a job recently, since the start of August I’ve had job training to take care of which has been eating up my time which meant all the TV shows, films and other hang time sessions I wanted to have with my friends and family have been compromised.

So now we’re here with September, the month that confirms that all your free time and fun is practically over and the crappy times are approaching soon. For me education is around the corner as I had into my third and final year of university, my last 2 years of my animation course have been questionable, so I don’t have much hope for this year especially since its supposed to be the hardest one. But hell I guess we’ll see what happens, though I am missing the summertime already. 😦

 

Prepare for a change of pace on this blog…

Hi friends, followers and people of the internet! Today I just wanted to let you know in advance that there may be a significant slow down in the amount of blogging I’ll be doing over the next few weeks. Why? Well allow me to explain…

 

While I hope I won’t be moving at a turtle’s pace, I will be slowing down production on this blog in the near future.

So yeah basically over the last two weeks I’ve been going through job training and with each week it’s been getting more and more time-consuming. In the first week I along with the rest of the staff went on a trip to London. Last week we were at a hotel receiving handbooks and Powerpoint presentations about heath and safety. And this week we’ve been practising setting the work place up and getting to grips with the routines that we’d have to go through on a regular basis. This in turn has meant that my usual lazy persona has been replaced with a more active person who has to travel to work daily walking to and from the train station. Bloody hell this is different! 😛

But what this mainly means is that my blogging will be slowing down due to the amount of hours I have at work. This will also mean that going to watch films at the cinema will be reduced by a great deal AND it looks like the remainder of my summer will be spent working rather than me lazing around.

From now on I’ll be speeding up at work and slowing down on here, but don’t worry I won’t slow down to the point of death (like this picture above suggests lol)

In the end I just wanted to let you lot know what the deal is and keep you in the loop about my crazy life so you don’t end up missing me too much when I’m not around haha. 😀 Anyways I’m off to scan the web again, I’ll see you lot in a bit yo! 😀

 

Random Blog 07: Nosebleed Attack!

Howdy ladies and gentlemen, time for another random blog instalment. Today I’m talking about a crazy nosebleed attack that went down just around an hour ago, it was such a crazy event that I had to blog about it! 🙂

Normally nosebleed are funny especially when it involves Master Roshi here, but in real life it can get messy!

So yeah let me tell you the story. Basically I was on my way back home from work and was going to make a trip into Sainsbury’s because I wanted some food, as soon as I walked in I felt something coming out of my nose. I naturally thought it was just snot so I went to wipe it away, I then looked at my hand and it was blood! I then turned away from the shop and headed home. I was continuously trying to wipe the blood from my nose, but it just kept coming like a landslide, it was all over my hands, lips, chin and on my jacket. I was actually just in a state of shock and it didn’t help that there was several people in the street watching me as I ran home bleeding everywhere.

While I’m not gonna show ya a picture of my blood, I think its fair to say that my hands looked pretty similar to this picture above.

Now I’m no stranger to blood in my nose, however this is the first time I’ve had a proper full-on bloody nose with no sign of it ending. It was so weird that this has happened to me out of the blue like it did, the worst things I ever get in the summer is snotty noses or colds, but this was something new and unexpected. It was both shocking but also exciting at the same time haha.

Anyways to conclude I’m basically saying that nosebleeds are weird and can be troublesome when you’re out in the street and everyone can see ya. 😀

 

Random Blog 06: The Summer Makes Me SO Lazy

Howdy ladies and gentlemen, time for another random blog instalment. Today I’m doing another blog post relating to the summertime season again, but this one has a little more sprinkled into it; my lazy nature.

Yeah that’s pretty much me in a nutshell.

So right now it’s August, yeah bloody August! Where the hell did the last 2 months go? Now I’ve practically only got 1 month of summer fun left before the whole education academic year bull starts up again and ruins my happy, feel-good groove. I mean summertime is made for being lazy right? Sure you can go on holiday, travel, get a job or work experience or take up a new hobby or try out sports, but honestly none of that compares to just lazing around in your own company enjoying the freedom of life.

That cat has the right idea, though I’m not keen on the concept of hammocks, I can honestly tell ya I know exactly what that kind of relaxation feels like.

This summer I haven’t really done too much in the way activities. I mean in a way I have but I also haven’t. I’ve been to one music concert, two music festivals in Guildford and Standon and I’ve been to the cinema a fair about too. But then I also have to remember that I haven’t been to the cinema as much as I usually do, I also haven’t gone on holiday with my sister like I was meant to, I also haven’t had that many adventures with my friends and I haven’t been exploring Sheffield as much as I would have liked to. I blame it mainly on my laziness creating my lack of movement.

This picture sums up how I feel about the concept of laziness haha.

I do hate how terribly lazy I’ve become after leaving uni. I mean after I found out I had no reason to leave the house, I really took advantage of that fact. This firstly affected my attendance at the cinema, some days I just put off going or couldn’t be arsed to leave the house. And this in turn messed with work on YouTube and caused me to miss reviewing several of the major film releases this year. My proactive nature just fell apart, and for the last few weeks I’ve been trying to rectify that.

This is how I envision my simple version of the summer. Looks like fun XD

As I said before I’m trying to change. I’ve got plans for new live-action and animation projects I want to put into action in the next few weeks or at least before I start up uni again. It’s gonna be some cool YouTube video stuff that I think you lot will like, it’s a crazy project and I’d love to talk about it now but I’ll reveal a little more about it nearer the time of its completion.

Anyways to conclude I’m basically saying that I’ve been lazy this summer, but that’s about to change with the next few weeks so look out for more updates in weeks to comes. 😀

 

The Longest Night of My Life

Howdy ladies and gentlemen. Today I wish to tell you another dramatic tale from my life journeys. Now I know I tend to talk about a lot of dramatic stuff on blog from love to friendship and the hardships of life especially with recent posts like “Living The Rough Days” and “A Day of Endurance“. But From Saturday night into early Sunday morning I went through the definition of a travelling nightmare and I feel compelled to tell my story on the internet just because of how ridiculous it was.

Travelling around the UK normally isn’t hard, but sometimes it can be one of the most frustrating experiences ever.

So let’s go back to the beginning. Basically I was meant to be working as a bar steward at the Standon Calling music festival. So I had to travel from Luton to Standon by coach, that part went well, and I had a fairly good day at work and getting to know people even if some of it was very tedious… The problems however began when I tried to get home.

I finished my shift at 11pm and had to make it back to the bus stop from the festival site. It was almost impossible to make it back to the main road because I was running on a narrow road in the forest, I had to use the light on my phone to make it back. So then I got to the bus stop and waited for my coach to take be back to Luton, but it never arrived. The National Express website lied to me a few days beforehand. So there I was in a town I barely knew, with no means of travelling home and a phone low battery. I was in the shit.

Bloody National Express, the website is so questionable and it likes to give out false information!

So then I attempted to walk down an unknown path but there didn’t look like there was any civilization anywhere, it was at this point where I started to panic and the chorus to Alexisonfire’s “Crisis” really started to sink in: I feel like this could be the end, And there’s not sign of hope, We’ve got a crisis on our hands.

Luckily I ran into a man on the same path who was kind enough to help me out, The man not only called someone to get a local taxi number, but he even called the number and sorted me a place to be picked up from. He was truly a good Samaritan who saved my life and is prove that there are some good people in this world. 🙂

After waiting a few minutes after midnight the taxi came to pick me up and take me to Ware train station (I went there because there was meant to be a train there I could get to get me back to Luton). I got to Ware and the town was pretty barren, so I went to the train station and waited for the train. Besides the one train heading in the opposite direction my actual train never arrived, typical shit for me. I then bought a burger and chips and proceeded to walk around Ware town, lost and looking for a local cab service, but I couldn’t see one anywhere. There really wasn’t much in the way of civilization and the only people around were drunk people, after around an hour of walking around in circles I asked someone if there was a place to get taxis and he pointed out a spot behind the train station (trust the taxis area to be behind the place I first started at!).

So I waited at this place, but it technically wasn’t a taxi place, it was just a point where taxis drive by and you have to be lucky to catch their attention as they move by. I waited for around 30-40 minutes while some drunk people got taxis before me and then sat there as there was a lack of taxis for around 30 minutes. After that I said fuck it and started walking around town again and it was at this point I thought I was actually gonna stranded there until morning, I totally thinking of the song “Stranded” by Alien Ant Farm. While this was going on I was texting my sister on my dying phone as she was telling me what my options were (at this point I was just waiting for my phone to die). I eventually came back to the taxi spot again and I got talking to these 3 people who were heading towards London, one of which was a very drunk lady who asked me what race I was when she could clearly see that I was a black guy! It was ridiculous but hilarious at the same time.

Dunno what Ware is like in the daytime but at night the place is practically a ghost town yo.

After that I luckily got a taxi that would take me to Luton if I gave him £60 upfront, it was a hefty price but at this point I just wanted to get home so I paid the guy and I was FINALLY on my way home. While in the cab I found out that the cab man was from Luton and the same area too so he said he’d drop nearby, what a legend! The radio was on in the background and the song “I’m Still Standing” by Elton John came on and felt that was a fitting song as after all my dramas I was still emotionally intact and still ready to keep going. I got back into Luton around 2:50am and walked home with a bit of Coheed and Cambria’s “Welcome Home“, an appropriate song considering I just gotten back to my home town and was heading back to my house. When I got home just after 3am I had a short chat with my sister and then crashed out.

It seems like for every travel journey that I get right, there are at least a few that go horribly wrong. I mean look at my history:

• At New Years 2011/12 me and my mates got stranded in St Albans after coming from London and had to haggle with a taxi man to get us back to Luton.
• I got lost in Sheffield on the other side of town and had to walk and had to walk around 7 miles back to my uni accommodation
• I had to travel 4 hours from Sheffield to Luton where my ticket got denied in Derby, had to buy a new one, travel to London, buy another ticket and then get back home
• Or the time I got my train delayed by almost an hour when heading to London

And then there’s a good few occasions when I’ve been lost or had to deal with travelling delays. Now I can add this recent adventure from Standon/Ware to my collection. And to think if I hadn’t run into that man in Standon or got that specific taxi in Ware I basically would have been fucked, man life is a frigging random adventure yo!

I seriously can’t understand why this stupid shit keeps happening to me but it seems like for whatever reason life wants to test me and make me suffer. Well what I’ve taken away from this experience is 1) Don’t trust travel information on the internet. 2) I doubt I’ll ever do coach travelling in the near future. And 3) Never go to a town that doesn’t have a train station!

Well that’s it for another life journal experience I’ve relayed upon you lot. Hopefully you’ve enjoyed reading about my dramas and all that jazz and feel free to comment too. Until the next time peeps, laters. 😀

 

My Memories From Magic Summer Live 2013

Howdy ladies and gents of the north, south, east and west. Today I’m gonna be talking about arguably the best Saturday I have experienced in recent memory. On Saturday July 13th I embarked on a trip to Stoke Park in Guildford to attend the Magic Summer Live festival, while all of the musicians on the main stage had something special to show off, I was mainly going because I was FINALLY going to see Jamiroquai live for the first time! So I was proper excited. So now it’s obviously Monday and I still say that I haven’t gotten over what I saw… Ladies and gents this was quite simply the best day of my life for AGES!

So now I’m going to talk about the different people I saw so be prepared!

Soul II Soul

Unfortunately due to me being late on the train I only caught the last few minutes of this act, but they sounded great. I got to hear their classic single “Back to Life (However Do You Want Me)” and it was beautiful, Caron Wheeler’s voice was still wonderful and very similar to how she sounds on the original track so that was a plus.

Beverly Knight

Alrighty then, from here this is where my day started to get interesting. Now I don’t have anything against Beverly Knight, she is a great singer, but not of her more recent material has been as memorable or as catchy as her earlier work. So with that in mind I was expecting something decent, but her act on-stage was nothing short of incredible and I really was impressed. When she was introduced she walked onto the stage singing in a high-pitched and soulful fashion, it was a very dramatic entrance. Then from there she sang a few of her old songs along with a few covers too. I loved how in between songs she talked to the audience in a very laid back and London-like fashion, it was funny. My personal highlights was when she incorporated Daft Punk’s “Get Lucky” lyrics into one of her songs and when she did a great cover of the Brave New Heavies’ song “Apparently Nothing“.

Nile Rodgers featuring Chic

Now honestly before Jamiroquai came on this was the highlight of the day. Nile Rodgers and Chic were nothing short of astonishing. Trying to describe their set would be like trying to describe why food is so addictive to a fat person. You can’t explain it, but when you have it, IT’S SO DAMN GOOD! I knew that Nile Rodgers was a great guitarist but I never knew that his skills were so badass. Also along with Chic it made for one of the most impressive live acts I have seen in my life. They performed several of their hits including “Dance, Dance, Dance (Yowsah, Yowsah, Yowsah)”, “Everybody Dance”, “La Freak”, “I Want Your Love” and “Good Times“. And then they even included some of Nile Rodgers’ other singles through his guitar work by other artists like Sister Sledge’s “We Are Family“, Diana Ross’ “Upside Down” and my personal favourite David Bowie’s “Let’s Dance“. Honestly it was the best thing ever, there was so much power, style and a good groove in the air that you couldn’t help but fall in love. Everything about it was perfect and besides Rodgers, the bassist Jerry Barnes was such a beast! His playing skills were incredible and I think he was doing a bit of slap bass and it was beautiful!

Ocean Colour Scene

Now this band is one I am familiar with from the 90s but never been an avid fan or known too many of their song, but I decided to stick around and have a listen. I actually really liked their material, they came on and started their set with a song I hadn’t heard in years “The Riverboat Song“, it was intense and sounded amazing. After that the group played a few new songs and more classics of which I wasn’t aware of. But at the end they played the song I had waited for, “The Day We Caught The Train“, that is a song I’ve known since I was like 6 or 7 years old and the only Ocean Colour Scene song I know very well, so I enjoyed that a lot.

Joss Stone

Knowing that there was only this act standing between me and Jamiroquai was hard, but I decided, hell I’m gonna be good at check out Joss Stone first. Now I can’t say I’ve ever been a fan of hers, not to say that she’s a bad singer, far from it. It’s just that her music is just my cup of tea. But I have to say her performance was pretty damn impressive, the songs she did were a set of her own singles with some covers too and I really liked her vocals along with the cool musicians accompanying her.

Jamiroquai

Now it’s time to talk about the big one, the band I’d waited all day to see, Jamiroquai. The anticipation after seeing Joss Stone was incredibly high and I couldn’t stand the wait, but then, without any introduction, members of the band just started coming onto the stage and playing a song and next thing you know Jay Kay jumps out and starts the tune. HOLY CHRIST IT WAS A BEAUTIFUL INTRODUCTION! There were so many singles from Jamiroquai’s discography that were played that night, most of them were old classics like “High Times”, “Alright”, “When You Gonna Learn?” and “Canned Heat” to name a few. But it was the way in which they were done which was special, all the songs had new arrangements and some even transitioned from one to the next and it all sounded so gorgeous and I was stand right at the front of the stage singing me heart out and dancing away. It was the best thing ever. The highlight songs were “Travelling Without Moving“, “Runaway” and “White Knuckle Ride” for sure.

In conclusion Magic Summer Live was one of the best events I have ever attended in my life. I haven’t felt so much happiness and satisfaction since the first or second time I went to the London MCM Expo back in 2008/9. While I think it would have been better I had someone to share the magic with, honestly I still had a great time on my own. The music acts were incredible and will stay with me for a lifetime so yeah I can’t complain at all. I just wanna live it all over again. 😀

Okay so that was my review of Magic Summer Live 2013 hope you enjoyed it. Also if you attended the festival too I’d love to hear your thoughts on it too, just drop them in the comments below. Alrighty then I’m off, peace out people! 😀