Neighbours... A popular topic it would seem

So it's the Easter holidays and we've been given a load of work to do. 5 weeks of going out drinking, making excuses not to do work, pretending to revise, and watching an unhealthy number of films and tv shows. Before however I head home for the holiday I've been getting some work done and plan to head home Friday morning/lunchtime. Now for some strange reason the complete pain in my arse that are the Chinese neighbours on the other side to the naked stalking Chinese neighbours, haven't gone home for Easter and continue to ruin my life day by day. The wall between my room and their house is genuinely about 5 cm's thick, you can literally push the wall in and it flexes. This doesn't provide the best soundproofing from house to house so therefore any sort of noise they make echos around my room at an almost amplified volume. At times it does infact sound (as i've said before) like they're attempting to raise a baby rhino in the room adjacent to mine. I can occasionally stop the noises by creating my own bit of noise and blasting out some sort of disco classic dance tune like Vengaboys - We like to party (Katie Slader Favourite), which normally gets the message across that I'm irritated. They do however like to continue their crashing around at the early hours of the morning, which is then accompanied by the church bells outside my bedroom window which for obvious reasons go off at about 02:30 every morning. So with the Naked viewings from one side, the Church bells outside, the Rhino raising from the attached house, and occasional School Disco memories... I'm looking forward to a break at home for Easter. I'm intrigued as to what living in China would actually be like, I mean this is like Chinatown... Beijing is probably full of nosey loud people... 


In bed, watching films, home alone, wishing I had company. 

Metabolism, Sounding Cool and More from our Chinese correspondants

I've been in bed most of the day, apart from the 5 minutes my housemate said it was sunny outside which turned out to be a complete lie. This isn't meant to take any credit away from Cardiff in the last week though, incredible sunshine a few days and that's a complete miracle for Wales believe me. Now to the subject. I've decided that over Easter I'm going to get my body back to it's former glory... It's been fairly neglected over the last 3 years with university lifestyle taking priority, despite the occasional hockey I do think it's my unpredictable metabolism keeping me out of the obese population. So I'm going to get massive, surprisingly I've got quite a good will power and I'll more than likely stick to doing some sort of exercise every morning considering I've got pretty much nothing else to do with my days for 5 weeks. I make jokes about being huge already, and I know I'm not actually big, but I've managed to get caught between a decent physique and skinny, not either one of them. However everyone wants to have a good body, no matter what they say.... the only people who say they don't care about their bodies are either too embarrassed to admit they're not how they'd like to be, or are too lazy to do anything about it. So I'll see how things go and will probably be modelling soon... (another way I could get famous... *may require plastic surgery*). Now the second thing is my current music situation, It's a nice sunny day so the window is open and the blinds are up, I'd sit in the garden but it's not actually that warm and I can't see my laptop to pretend to do work. I've got some nice speakers playing some incredible music, but every now and then a song comes on that really makes me panic and wonder what the neighbours will think if they hear it. Something like Daniel Beddingfield or old school Lemar (both make regular appearances). I got so paranoid last year that I actually made a playlist called "The neighbours are out and I'm trying to sound cool".

I saw the chinese folk again this morning in a similar situation as I've described before. I brushed my teeth and undressed coming out of the bathroom in my boxers ready to shower, but was faced with the dilemma of whether I'd already showered this morning.... Instead of moving to cover (from the gunfire and grenades), I decided to stand there and ponder for about 3 minutes.... After much deliberation I realised I had actually showered already and was going slightly mad, however not as mad as I was portraying to the Chinese neighbours who were standing in their garden doing something with plants, gazing confused in through the window at my half naked body for a few minutes in which time I stood there staring at a closed shower cubicle cupboard door, until putting my clothes back on and heating up last nights pizza. I'm going to miss the Chinese neighbours...

Do you have a phobia of Hospitals? No, I'm just ill

So it's been a while since the last post. However alot has happened since then. Dissertation finished, and managed to lose that massive hockey game but life most certainly goes on. Followed it up with a huge wednesday night out, and I'll just go into a bit of detail as to what that night entailed. Began with a pre-lash at a friend's house and that got slightly out of hand, in the way that by the time everyone else arrived to start drinking we were absolutely car parked. So that started well, no idea what happened on the night out itself, some recollection of time with a few friends but nothing definitive. I do however remember going outside to find a friend unable to walk/talk/drink anymore (disappointing) and decided to help her out. The police were already on scene and called an ambulance which to be fair turned up incredibly quickly. Jumped in there with her to look after her and make sure she got home ok after the A&E trip. So got there and she had a great sleep for a few hours during which time I sobered up quite nicely and made a few friends. This unfortunately took a turn for the worse when I had a sit down, and the most pathetic cups of water you'll ever see, of which you have to have about 6 to get a mouthful. I began to actually pour with sweat, went completely ghost white and maybe fainted, don't actually remember. I'm sure I was unconscious at some point because theres a big blank spot. The great line from a nurse of "Do you have a phobia of Hospitals?" , with my reply "No.... I'm just ill". I'll carry out my own diagnosis don't worry love. They then checked me in, gave me a wristband and put me in my own hospital bed so I was no longer sharing my friend's. I was being fed liquid glucose and had a couple of blood tests, did a bit of sleeping and tried to walk around a bit which was quite unsuccessful. I saw a girl in the A&E waiting room who was there with her brother or boyfriend, I knew her.. but no longer remember who she was, so if that was you, let me know. They eventually found me a section to put me, and I was hooked up to a drip by about lunchtime on the Thursday, 2 hours on the drip, a plain cheese sandwich and a terrible cup of tea later, and they discharged me :) The only souvenirs I have is the wristband they admitted me with, and an unbelievably sore throat which comes and goes depending on how many strepsils I can fit in my mouth at once. I don't make a habit of going to hospital, but considering I wasn't ill when I got there, I have to say it's a convenient place to be if you do have something wrong with you! For all you "wasting the NHS' time" people, it was more down to the half a bowl of pasta and bottle of lucozade I had all day as opposed to the alcohol I drank, although that may not have helped. So an eventful time, the sun is out, and I'm going to try not to waste my day!

Sitting on my bed playing guitar, This is the life.... more work soon

Delusional or Incredibly Good Looking

First of all, I handed in my dissertation today. Thank f**k for that. Although I can't be that happy until I get the grade back, a 3rd would be fairly embarassing, and a serious possibility. Now onto the subject. Delusional or Just Hot. It's on the glorious domain of a night out, which tomorrow night will be an amazing thought and it's been a long time. Now, I'm potentially the only person who thinks this on a night out, but I'd guarantee I'm not. Now I generally go out with my housemates and end up making an absolute disgrace of myself, making it home somehow (without companionship) and falling asleep in every part of the house other than my bed. So on this night out I'll usually get absolutely bungalowed about an hour into the night then live off this feeling for most of the night, occasionally seeing off drinks because if I try and walk with them I end up wasting money on the drinks I've just bought that I spill down my front. As many people experience when intoxicated, I get quite confident/cocky when I drink. Now I wouldn't class myself as the best looking guy in the world however this definitely changes once I've had a few double vodka and cokes. The most innocent of glances from something with a pulse (any girl) means that they've noticed my perfectly sculpted hair (which by this point looks more like something from an 80s boyband video), I'm dressed unbelievably well, I can dance like a cross between Billy Elliot and Michael Jackson (unusual), and I'm possibly the most stunning human being they've ever seen. There wouldn't normally be a problem with this however the girls are often incredibly good looking and massively out of my league (don't try this, "there's no such thing as out of your league", because there is." I've often noticed the wandering eyes of a certain Miss Domonique Latham and decided we're in love and she wants my babies (other way around?). However generally I'll decide that every 9 out of 10 girl wants me, and I will often attempt to buy drinks for these people, then once they slap me/turn me down I convince myself it's because they've either got a boyfriend or are in some way visually impaired. I'll then wake up in the morning and wonder just why I bothered trying to tell the Cheryl Cole lookalike that I'm an Astronaut (not a cheryl cole lookalike but a true story), and have saved at least 8 children from a burning building in the past week. I'm honestly sure that one day it'll pay off and I'll take some model home, only to find out she only wants me for my unbelievable body, and not just my personality and facial features, Absolute Tragedy.

Sitting on the sofa.

Lost in Translation

This evening provided me with an excellent subject to talk about. Ordering takeaways and talking to foreign people. I decided after a busy hockey day in which I did a lot of running for mostly no reason, and getting a fair amount of work done, I deserved a takeaway. Now, we live about 9 seconds walk (maybe 8.. or 10) from a cash-point. Throughout nearly all of last year this cash point was free to withdraw money from (glorious), but without being able to specify an exact date, they started charging 99p to withdraw money. First of all what an absolute outrage, it's attached to a shop called K&C stores which seems to be open about 20 hours a day, and stocks more variety of stuff than Tesco, so we'd pop round to the cashpoint and go in to buy a tub of Ben & Jerrys Ice Cream. However it's not a great deal paying £1 to take out £10 for ice cream, so it's either take out a decent amount to make it worth while, pay by card which is £5 minimum (Ben & Jerrys £4.50 ish), or walk the extra 6 minute round trip to the other cashpoint which is still free (probably not for long, I blame the government). Back to takeaways, so I have no cash, which means I'll need to order through a website that takes card payment. Just.eat is a fairly well known takeaway service thing that lets you order from all sorts of places with easy ordering and easy payment, unfortunately what they do well in order and payment, they completely cock up in delivery and order accuracy. They've missed out so much food we've ordered I think next time the driver will just turn up and expect payment for the smell of curry inside the bag that we apparently ordered. Today however it took it to a whole new level. I ordered from a chinese takeaway called Silver Palace or something like that, never ordered from there before and never will again (Ouch). As an overview, it took 2 hours 20 minutes to get to me, and to be fair it was delicious, but I wouldn't wait that long if Jamie Oliver had cooked it (even though he is gorgeous... hmmm). I rang the restaurant/hostel/burger van 4 times in total, the first time they told me the driver was running late and it would be on it's way soon, the second was similar saying the driver had my order and was on his way, the third consisted of the "Lost in Translation" moment. The fourth was my free stuff negotiation, but in the third... In my best Chinese accent I tried to explain that 2 hours was not an acceptable amount of time to wait for food, in the Chinese woman's best Chinese accent (not as good as mine) she managed to find out the order hadn't even gone through, so it turns out the guy probably was going to deliver a bag of air. By telling the rubbish accented Chinese woman that it was for house number 85, she deduced that the meal had cost £8.50 or I had ordered at 8:05 and the meal wasn't actually 2 hours late after all (I didn't think steam could come out of ears in real life but it did). I managed to speak to a nice Welsh chap who turned out to be the delivery driver, who chucked in a free bottle of coke and prawn crackers, Result. My housemates and I have some issues with ordering quite often, I'm normally the prime candidate for ordering Chinese, because I'm quite well travelled, it means I can speak to the Chinese people better (not the case despite my unbelievable accent), so we have limited success with takeaways. I'll leave you with a memory, from France on a ski trip, where I wasn't so lost in translation. I had just come off the slopes (ski slopes, with snow on), and went into the cafe for a drink. In my best French I said to the waitress, Bonjour, Je voudrais une chocolat chaux si'l vous plait (Hello, I would like one hot chocolate please). The woman stared at me with an incredibly blank look on her face (If what I just wrote actually means, I've killed your grandmother and she makes a great hatstand, then please let me know).. but the answer I got confused me despite the language it came in. She answered my perfect French with.. "Yeah mate the hot chocolate is absolute diiiiamond, do you want cream wiv it?". No word of a lie, in better English than I speak.

Out of the chair, in bed.

Shored Bitless

I almost forgot to write today, tragic I know. I've been playing hockey and writing my dissertation most of the day. The rest of it has been filled to the brim with pure uncensored boredom. Now, as all of my friends know I'm potentially the most irritating person in the world when I'm bored. Like a child. I look enough like one so why not act it. There are a few things that I like to do when I'm bored, mainly to provoke some sort of excitement in my life. The first is make noises, I'll make strange noises until someone acknowledges I'm making those noises, then make the noises for a little longer so it doesn't seem like I was only doing it for the attention. The second is hitting people, another excellent way to get attention, usually aimed at my house mate Ron (Ross, Dominic). Nothing too vicious, like a friendly jab to the arm as if to say, find me something to do or I'll scream until you pat my head. The third is jump around. I manage to store up a lot of energy lying in bed all day, and the outlet seems to result in bouncing around for a while and swinging my arms, this may seem strange (it is strange), but it's mainly another way to get attention. I'll leave you with another way I thought i'd get rich. I thought I could find parents who were expecting, or who wanted to be prepared for children with some sort of hyperactive disorders, you could rent me out for a week and I'd live with you acting completely normally, and this would prepare you for the shit storm of a child you had coming.

In the same chair, not in bed, bed soon.

A Bit Nutty

I've not said much about myself in these posts so far, and it might be difficult for people who don't know me who might read this in years to come to understand half the stuff I go on about. So I'll split this into sections and work from there.

Home - Home for me is a wonderful place called Cornwall. Cornwall has been portrayed quite differently to how it actually is... for example -
Cornwall is always sunny (massive lie)
Cornish people are friendly and say hello to strangers (lie)
You can leave your house and car unlocked in Cornwall and noone will break in/steal anything (lie)
Everyone speaks like a farmer (partly true... I'm joking it's a lie)
Despite all this rubbish that's been made up I still absolutely love Cornwall, and it's the sort of place everyone wants to live, apart from people in Devon, but why you'd want to live in Devon I do not know, maybe you'd fit in better with your 3rd arm... (inbred joke, note the intensity).

Family - My sister works in London doing something to do with people on crack getting jobs, quite interesting if you can be bothered to listen to her. My brother lives and works in Hanoi, Vietnam. He was involved in a restaurant but now he does some managerial stuff, or that's what he tells my Mum to keep her sane. My Mum has just retired (early.. slacker), and went to Egypt with my Stepdad (also slacker) within about 2 weeks of retiring, so it's a hard life all round... remember Instant Noodles from Tesco, I doubt they're part of the all inclusive cruise meal, living the high life whilst I suffer. and my Faja (Dad), he's always moving around, he was in 'Nam with my Brother, hence why my brother is there, not your first choice destination unless there's work. He's now in KL (Kuala Lumpur for people who want to pretend they've been there alot), and that's in Malaysia, more work there, he manages mining projects all over the world, so big money. You're probably expecting me to say I mix my noodles with caviar... but Dad wants me to work hard to earn money (he's failing I'm at Uwic).

Me - I possess an amazing/useless ability to remember song lyrics, I don't know why or how but I can sing along to pretty much any song as long as I've heard it two or three times. I can walk on my hands which I taught myself to do in the month I should have been revising for 1st year exams. I taught myself to play the guitar over last summer and picked it up really quite quickly, I'm no Eric Clapton but I could definitely keep everyone entertained around a fire on a beach in the summer (I cannot wait to do this). Although I was told by a nice chap called Jamie Snook that all the girls love you for it, but you're hated by every boy there (tragic). I play hockey and have more little injuries than Jonny Wilkinson and Ledley King put together. Metabolism is high at the moment which means I eat what I want and don't get fat, that'll soon leave me... I will end up something along the lines of Rik Waller crossed with Jack Johnson crossed with Richie Rich (from the film) crossed with someone who can walk on their hands as their only talent...

For all of you who think I take up hours writing this stuff, I once did a typing test on the internet (because that's exactly what cool people do with their time) and calculated I can type about 85 words a minute, which meant I should really have finished my dissertation within about 2 hours of starting.. not the case.

Sitting in a chair, not in bed!

Fame Imminent

It's morning on the Friday and to be completely honest it could end up being about as productive as Thursday... however I'm determined to get out of bed at least twice today which is an improvement. I'm not entirely sure what I'm going to do for breakfast, although brunch is a better suited term, considering most students don't wake up until about 11, and don't eat until 1... I say most students like it happens at all universities, I can't quite see an Oxford or Cambridge student stumbling out of their room at 2 in the afternoon and having tesco value chicken flavoured (as if there's any real chicken) instant noodles for breakfast. More on the noodles, my flatmates and I bought these noodles every time we went shopping, they dropped to a price of about 6p at one point, it was like a staple diet. The only issue though is that one pack of instant noodles could probably feed an African child for 2 weeks, but keeps a student's hunger suppressed for around 26 seconds. You can always put two of the instant noodles in but that means you've just consumed a meal worth at least 12p and you probably can't finish the whole meal... now the things that 12p can buy for a student, it just isn't worth the extra noodle. Less on the noodles, more on the fame. I've had some great comments about the blog, and I've even managed to adopt a so called fan club consisting of two slightly eccentric friends, Melanie Golding & Kathryn Elizabeth Barley (Katy will love me for that). Over 100 views which is basically the population of my home county Cornwall. I'm already sharking around trying to get people to have a read and everyone's been quite willing, so I'll more than likely be famous next week. I'd feel a bit less weird typing like I'm preaching to the masses if more people were reading so I'll work on the fan club/groupies. In bed, but not for long.

Quest for Fame

So I've been sitting in bed near enough all day, pondering upon how I am to go about my rise to fame. I've been doing a bit of work on my dissertation just incase the whole fame in a day thing doesn't go to plan and I actually have to get a job, but realistically I'm nearly a celebrity already, what with my 50 views or so (about 40 are me I think). I thought about inventing some sort of networking site where people could write on walls and talk on a Chat feature which occasionally decides all of your friends have abandoned you and noone's online to talk... but I realised someone came up with that already. I actually once thought I'd start to manufacture a headrest for cars that held your head in place so you could sleep on long journeys without banging your head against the window (dogging accessory also it would seem), but I don't think I could go on Dragons Den with an idea like that without immediately insulting Debra Meaden... realistically security run on after every episode to stop her taking the money off the table, and we all know it. Winning the lottery seems an unlikely prospect considering I don't really play it, if by some chance someone buys a winning ticket in my name, with my money, and gives it to me, I will probably accept it... however until then I need a better idea. I've thought many a time about running off to somewhere like Monaco or LA, subtly making friends with a celebrity and hanging around with them 24/7.. but again, a fairly large margin for error/arrest/restraining orders. I'm going to keep on thinking about how I'll get famous and comment occasionally on my progress. Still in bed...

Trying not to fall asleep

There was a very small chance that I'd actually go to my lectures today. Mainly because I've got a dissertation to write, partly because about 15 people turned up to Mondays lectures, and a little bit because my bed is ever so slightly more comfortable than the lecture room seats. There's also the factor that the lecturer for some unknown reason (maybe payment or student torture), has to make the lecture last the full hour or however long it's scheduled. This is understandable, but what is not is the one or sometimes two people who turn up with every bit of "background reading" you could possibly do... wearing some sort of jack wills gillet and joggers combo, sometimes wearing glasses but not essential, writing every single word down, but still feeling the need.. despite the rest of the population having a disgusting hangover/indescribable urge to get back to their own houses... to actually respond when the torturer at the front asks " Ok that's it for today. Does anyone have any questions?". Even the lecturer asking the question seems quite irritated that someone pipes up to keep the whole group there just a few minutes longer. Maybe they've already finished their Battlestar Galactica box set and want to hang around, but for the sanity of everyone else they should probably just keep schtum. Rant over... still in bed.

Students wash occasionally

Everyday I go downstairs, say hello to my housemates sitting in the front room, and head to the shower. Now, we technically have two showers, one is in the bathroom which is ok because there's enough room to undress etc. The other shower is in it's own cubicle/cupboard, call it what you want. However because of how our house is positioned, the lovely chinese neighbours have a fairly good view of the cubicle cupboard with a shower in it. As the name suggests it's quite difficult to get changed in the cubicle cupboard so you do basically get down to as little clothing as possible and make a dash for it from cover (if for some reason there was gunfire we'd be prepared, that sort of dash). Occasionally you do look over your shoulder and it's always pleasant to see the chinese couple next door smiling at your near nakedness. The house along from them is home to a group of students (girls), we've yet to encounter spying on their part... which begs the question do I really look that bad without clothes on? I'm not sure whether I'd like them to acknowledge my dash to the shower and potentially wet themselves laughing, or just not look at all. Either way I'm back in bed.. fully clothed

Spending time in bed and trying to become famous without much effort

I've decided instead of working hard towards a career I'd become rich and famous through other means, a bit like winning the lottery but I can't be doing with spending money on getting rich, it defeats the object. It's 15:20 on a Thursday afternoon and I haven't actually left the bed yet, infact that's a lie, I made a sandwich.. Ham and cream cheese to be exact, on white bread, I can't be doing with this healthy brown soily tasting stuff at the moment. Working on the dissertation that's due in a week today, holy s**t. A friend suggested I start writing a blog because I have a remotely interesting life but I'm quite good at making the most boring of things exciting. For example I'd put money on the fact after you read the brown bread description you wanted to tell all of your friends (that's complete rubbish). I've attempted to make my work more productive by putting my dissertation results section on the tv and have the discussion on my laptop so I can look at both.... The current situation involves Facebook on the tv and writing this on the laptop so progress is steady!