Favourite Christmas Films 2012

After re-doing the favourite music list the other week, and due to watching quite a few christmas related films lately, I thought the next list I would re-do would be my list of favourite christmas films. The hasn't really been many changes from last year, apart from one major from that I cannot believe I forgot about last year and that is number three on the list. Apart from that addition the only real changes are in their ordering. Unlike the music list, this list will be ordered best to the least best.

1) The Nightmare Before Christmas
2) Jack Frost
3) The Grinch
4) Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone
5) Home Alone 1
6) The Santa Claus
7) Love Actually
8) The Polar Express
9) Miracle on 34th Street
10) The Muppet's Christmas Carol

I mentioned this last year, but for films like Harry Potter that aren't technically christmas films, they still feel very christmasy, and I'll associate them with this time of the year, either because they have brilliant christmas scenes in them, or because they're played each year around this time.

One thing I noticed when compiling this list again is that there hasn't really been any new christmas films over the last couple of years. In fact all of the amazing christmas related films that I can remember either came out when I was a child or in the early 2000's. I wonder if kids today see all of these classic christmas films as old films, and would rather have there own new films to grow up along side. Perhaps there are enough christmas films out now that they shouldn't make anymore, just stick with the ones we have.

After a long day of packing up my room and moving boxes around the house, and doing trips to the tip, I think its about time to grab a drink and put another film on. Saying that however I've just remembered that although I did manage to get all of my christmas shopping I still haven't actually wrapped anything yet, so maybe a quick film and then on to wrapping up the gifts.

As I don't think I'll be blogging tomorrow, or for the next few days, Merry Christmas to anyone that reads this.

Christmas Shopping

This will probably be a short blog again today, quite a lot of things going on at the moment, what with christmas fast approaching, the end of the world happening the other day, and packing up the house.

Today I wanted to talk about buying christmas presents, or any type of presents really. Every year I seem to have the same problem with buying gifts and that is I can never think of anything to buy, resulting in me asking the recipient what they would like and then buying them these things.

The reason I find this kind of annoying is because years ago, I remember my brother and sisters and parents all being able to go out with less money we have now and come back with loads of imaginative gifts, things we liked but never even thought to ask for, but now everything seems to be slightly more...predictable.

I know christmas isn't all about presents and I've definitely come to notice that more, especially due to the majority of my family living apart now, but who doesn't like getting some presents.

This problem has been especially annoying this year as I kind of left all of my xmas shopping pretty late, only getting the first present less than a week ago. This meaning that I've had to join the large amount of other people doing their late shopping, in the very busy shops.

Are there any tips on finding unique gifts for people, for future birthday/christmas's? Luckily once christmas is out the way I have about a month and a half before the next family members birthday comes along so shall give me some time to think.
Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device

Favourite Music: 2012 Edition

Due to doing this last year, I thought that I'd o it again this year, and that is making a list of my favourite songs for this year. Just quickly looking at last years post I noticed that coincidentally I wrote that blog on the 15th of December as well, most be a good time of the year to make lists.
Okay so this list is going to be a bit different from last years as it will in fact be two lists; one list of my favourite individual songs, and another list of my top bands/artists who's songs are all great but my or may not quite get an individual song on to the favourites list. Essentially I found it two hard to pick only my top songs and wanted to include other people who also have good songs, but are also brilliant artists.

Similarly to last year, I went through my MP3 library, whilst stuck at the library doing assignment work, and then narrowed down my choices after cutting the vast majority of songs. At this point I would quickly like to draw peoples attention back to I think its my last blog where I go over how easily I procrastinate, and should find better ways to keep focused on work. I'm going to class this listening to music as an exception however as it for the blog.

Again same as last year, the top songs list will be fifteen songs long, and again as it was difficult enough to narrow down all of my songs to fifteen, these will not be ordered best to fifteenth best, they are just all the top best. So my top songs are as follows:

1) Lindsey Stirling - Electric Daisy Violin,
2) The Lumineers - Ho Hey,
3) Train - Drive By,
4) Skrillex - Bangarang,
5) James Vincent - Sparrow and the Wolf,
6) Owl City - Alligator Sky,
7) Owl City - Fireflies,
8) Captain Sparklez's - Revenge,
9) Counting Crows - Accidentally in Love,
10) Chuck Berry - Johny B Good,
11) Steve Earle - The Galway Girl,
12) One Republic - Secrets,
13) Alexi Murdoch - All My Days,
14) Rusted Roots - Send me on my way,
15) The Jack Frost Band - Have a little faith.

Checking back on last years list it seems as if six songs have managed to stay the course of time and make it back on to the list this year also.

Now for the newly added favourite bands/artists/people whose music is always awesome and deserve to have their own list because some didn't quite make it on the the favourite songs list. Although I kind of have attempted to rank these I'm still slightly unsure about some of the placings and so am just going to mix them up, same as the top songs list. Unlike the previous list however, there will only be ten entry's.

1) Lindsey Sterling,
2) Mike Tompkins,
3) Lelia Broussard,
4) Can't Stop, Won't Stop,
5) Imagine Dragons,
6) Train,
7) The Lumineers,
8) Hugh Laurie,
9) Ben Howard,
10) Owl City.

There may be the odd one or two that I missed solely because there was alot of music to get through, and I often started and stopped and could have overlooked the odd track. Saying that however, I'm happy with how the lists stand now, and it'd have to be a really awesome track to change my mind.

Seeing as I've gone back and redone this list, I may go back over some of the other lists that I did last year, and redo them. I can't quite remember what lists I wrote last year, but I'll have a look over the next few days and see if there are any good ones I'd like to revive.

For anyone reading this: If theres any suggestions for other amazing songs or artists that I didn't mention, drop a comment as I'm always looking for new music or undiscovered artists.

Procrastination

This blog follows somewhat on from the one I did last week, and that's as the title suggests about procrastinating. I said last week how my house mate had been playing christmas music a few times around the house, and how by in a way embracing that it was christmas soon, I'd slow down on the work front and be craving the impending time off from university. Well that seems to have happened.

Around this time of year at university is when a lot of courses set their deadlines for coursework, and my course wasn't any different. I handed some work in a few weeks ago, and now have two deadlines fast approaching. However the problem is that I can't seem to get into that focused, get down to work kind of mood, and the days now slowly pass with little happening to the coursework I'm soon to hand in.

Although I think that christmas is slightly to blame for why I can't seem to get much work done, I tend to procrastinate a lot anyway as well, meaning that there's twice as much not getting done. In the past I've looked into ways to stop procrastinating, such as blocking certain websites on my laptop, doing short word sprints and other techniques however none really seem to work for me. For example, to block sites such as Facebook, and Youtube on my laptop I downloaded a plug-in which allowed me to choose the sites I wanted to block out and then input a password to keep them from being accessed. The obvious problem with this technique however is that I was the one that input the password, and so after a few attempts to discourage myself and get back to work, I just gave in and put the password back in, so I could go back on the sites.

For me, I've found, the best way to actually get on with work is to go to somewhere like say the library, a place where you don't have your xbox, or t.v, etc, somewhere that feels school/work like and you should get into a work type mood. However with this you have to motivate yourself to want to go to these places to do work. Its a very evil cycle, one that when it comes down to the wire I always break and get my work done, but annoying all the same.

Hopefully next term I'll find a better way to get my work done quicker and not have the last minute dash to hand in work that I seem so familiar with these days.
Just as a last note, to quickly clarify, I am at the moment on the train writing this and not using it as another form of procrastination, however if I do put out quite a few blogs next week, then you'll know I probably should be doing work instead.
Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device

Day trip to London, and catching up with old friends

I'll preface this blog by quickly saying, today has been a long tiring day.

Today, as the title states, I came down to London for the day in order to meet up with my family and to go to the Winter Wonderland which is being held in Hyde Park.
As well as my mum, brother and sisters all being there today, an old friend of my mums who lives out in Germany, was also there as she flew in last night to stay with my mum and sister for a few days.

With my brother and older sister living away from home, and me being at university, its not very often now a days that we're all in the same place at one time. With Maxine, my mums friend, being with us too it was a really nice chance to chat and catch up, which we all together haven't really done in a while.

On the subject of catching up with people, yesterday afternoon I was also able to catch up with an old friend of mine, who even though lives in sheffield as well, we don't really get to see much of each other, and so was great to have a good catch up with her and hear about all the new things happening and going on. I'm also hoping that once everyone's back home for christmas I'll be able to see a few more people that I used to go to school with and get the chance to see and talk to and reminisce about old times with.

Back to the trip today, If you've ever read any of my other blogs concerning London, you'll know that I love coming down here and walking round, going on the tube and just being part of the hustle and bustle of everything. I still don't quite know what it is about London that draws me to it, however thinking that this time next year I could actually be living and studying in London, is an awesome thought.

The only problem we had today was with our judging of time and how long we'd be spent doing things. As a result of this we ended up back in Kings Cross a few hours early of when our trains were, with little to do. Due to it being so cold this weekend we seemed to get through looking at all of the Winter Wonderland stalls and events quicker than we'd anticipated, in an attempt to get somewhere warmer. This spare time however meant that we had plenty of time to go sit down and grab a drink and chat about stuff going on, so it wasn't all that bad.

Anyways, seeming as I've now got a few hours to kill on my train ride home and I've bought some more new books today, I think I'll get on with some more reading.
Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device

Minecon 2012 and Christmas

Good day people of the internet. I'm not sure if I've mentioned this in a previous blog or not but this weekend Minecon 2012 is going on in Disneyland Paris.

For people who don't know what Minecon 2012 is all about, its a convention in its second year, that is held to celebrate the game Minecraft. Last year it was held in Las Vegas, and this year it was decided to be held in Disneyland Paris. It comes as little surprise if you know me, that ever since I heard it was being held in Paris, a stones throw away compared to last year, I wanted to go.

Unfortunately, even with the convention only being in France, its was still a little too pricey for me to go. Luckily this year however their is a livestream covering of all the panels and all of the key events, so for anyone who also wasn't able to go, of which there are thousands, we don't have to fully miss out. Oh well perhaps if I'm lucky I'll make it to next years Minecon. I'll add that to the growing list of other conventions including Comic con, PAX and a few others.

The second thing I wanted to talk about today is about how quickly christmas is creeping up on us. A couple of weeks ago the coke cola advert came on t.v, the next day my house mate was playing christmas songs whilst we were all doing work.

Now a don't mind people saying its christmas soon, but whilst your at university, this time of year is full of revision and deadlines, and by accepting that its christmas soon, you don't often want to do all that work and you kind of give in to doing christmasy things instead. Once all of my essays have been handed in and university finished for the holidays, then I'll start getting all christmasy, until then however I'll take any motivation and help I can get to get all of my work done, without being distracted or procrastinating.

Saying that I probably should have finished off the bibliography today for the essay I've got to hand in on monday. With that, I best go finish my work
Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device

Thinking....Again

I wanted to write again today about something I've recently noticed about myself, and that is that I tend too think too much. What I mean by this is whenever my minds not concentrating on stuff I'm doing, it tends to wander, and I never really just shut off, and I don't know whether that's a good thing or not.

I'll tell you how I first noticed this and that's through the use of my MP3 player. Whenever I leave the house there are certain things I always have on me; my wallet, my phone, my keys...and my MP3 player. The reason why I think I do this, is A) because I really enjoy listening to music, and B) it keeps my mind focused on something on those long walks to the shops or coming back from university.
I also for a long time, up until several years ago, used to listen to music when heading off to sleep. Now I know some people will say that this won't actually help you sleep but instead keep you awake longer, but for me it did used to help.

Realising that I like to use music as a way of distracting myself, this also makes sense listening to music before sleep, as loads of people when laying there unable to get to sleep, just lay and ponder things, until they finally doze off.

When thinking about some of the subjects my mind often tends to wander to during these quiet periods where I'm not thinking/day-dreaming, I'd probably say that's its nicer to keep me distracted and focused on other stuff.

Out of all the things I talk about in these blogs, this probably does sound like one of the most odd topics to talk about, but I wanted to have my say. If nothing else I've learnt something new about myself, and now probably have a better reason to finally upgrade my MP3 player from this 4Gb player to something more modern.
Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device

Call Of Duty: Black Ops 2

This will again be a short blog, in order for me to vent a bit of rage, and also to quickly show my love for the new Call Of Duty.

Although a lot of people probably won't have much idea what I'm going on about, I'm going to talk about it anyway. Originally way back in the days of the PS2, when it came to first person shooter games, I was a fully fledged Medal Of Honour guy; I bought all of the games, completed every one, spent hours on them and I think I still actually own all of them today. During this time, I'd kind of heard of the Call Of Duty games, and think that I played a short amount of whichever was out at the time, but that was it. It wasn't until I'd gotten my Xbox that I fell in love with Call Of Duty, but not just any of them, specifically COD: Black Ops.

Since getting it a few years ago, my brother, sister and me have spent many hours on the campaign or running around on multiplayer, shooting up bots or whoever we could kill online. Since hearing that they were making a Black Ops 2, I wanting to get my hands on it as soon as possible and play it. I came very close when I went down to Eurogamer in london a few months ago, however due to the queue lengths, I didn't get chance to. This meant that I'd have to wait like everyone else to play on it on the day of its release, which is today.

Earlier on I mentioned that I'd be venting some rage, well here's where I begin. Back in September I went on to Amazon, pre-ordered the game, and payed extra post and packaging so that it would arrive today. However when the postman came around this morning, it wasn't there. Not only did this happen to me, but from what I gather its happened to a vast majority of other people in britain, who pre-ordered the game for today.

After speaking to someone at Amazon, they refunded me the money I spent on the first class delivery, due to the mess up with my delivery, and said that they weren't sure when it would arrive, however it should be delivered either tomorrow or thursday.

Usually this wouldn't be that much of a problem, they gave me the extra postage money back and it should arrive tomorrow. The problem I have is however that I'm now on a train headed back home to Scarborough and won't get back to Sheffield til late sunday evening. Again some people might say that this isn't really a problem, just wait a few days, other gamers would agree with me however when I say that although yes it is only til sunday/monday, I ordered it for today, and I'd really like to get my hands on it and play it now.

In addition to this, a perk of pre-ordering the game is that for all of this coming weekend, the people who pre-ordered the game get double XP when playing. Due to not having access to the game this weekend however, means that I will lose out on that perk.

I know I probably sound very nerdy, and also probably a bit childish, but at the end of the day, its a product that I bought from a company and they didn't hold up there end of the exchange. Whether it be that you've bought a car, a meal, a dvd, or a game, if the company doesn't deliver then you should be allowed to be slightly annoyed, and have a little rant.

It really looks like such an awesome game. Its times like this when I wish I didn't have things like YouTube and Twitter, places where people are saying how amazing it is, and uploading videos of all the different levels and easter eggs. Half the fun is playing it and discovering those things for yourself.

Hopefully for others in the same situation as me, you'll get your copies of the game soon, and get your postage money refunded in due course. For the people however, who have gallantly managed to read to the end of this blog but still have barely any idea what I'm on about, thankyou for reading this. Also go out and buy Call Of Duty: Black Ops, one or two, it is one of the best games out there.

Okay, rant over. I know I said in the last blog, that my next blog would be 'back to normal' but who'd have known this would happen today. Will try get all back to normal for next week.
Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device

Quickie update: Moving house and Essays

This will most likely be a short blog post this week. Due to nothing much really happening because of illness and approaching deadlines, so I thought I'd just write up a quick update on things happening in my life at the moment.

So what's been happening... With regards to selling our family house back in scarborough, after months of no interest at all, things have suddenly been moving really quickly. In the space of two days we had two offers to buy the house, one of which we accepted, at the start of this week we had someone come do a survey on the house, and next week we're off searching for a new house.

Although it is kind of good that everything is moving quickly, it has raised a problem when it comes too packing everything up in the house and finding a new place to move it all into.

It seems very weird to think that in the next few weeks I'm going to have to start packing up all of my things back at home. It was bad enough getting all of the things together that I needed for university, I've know idea what it'll be like digging out everything in my room, deciding between things to throw out and what to keep.

Even with all of this moving, house hunting business going on, I can always rely on uni work to pile on the pressure and keep me busy. As I said at the beginning of this blog I've been very busy this week due to an impending essay deadline.
Due to being in my second year now, it is probably best that I be a bit more responsible and get my essays done in good time, instead of leaving things til last minute again.

Sorry this blogs been quite rushed and all over the place, will get back to normal next week. Today has been a good, but tiring day, early night I think.
Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device

Train stations: What sad/happy/surprising places

I'm pretty sure I heard about this from a film, or t.v programme, but have you ever noticed what unique places train stations are? When you think about it, this will also work for airports and potentially bus stations.

What I mean about being unique places, is that they are very emotional places, where so many different things can happen to you.

Waiting at York station last week, waiting for my train, I witnessed a number of parents, children, couples, friends all saying goodbye to each other, hugging and waving as they left that person until the next time they returned.
Saying this there were also numerous moments of the complete opposite, children arriving back home to their parents, couples being reunited, and old friends meeting up once more.

The reason I'm talking about this is because it's something I guess people never really consider. How many times have you gone to the train station and left it feeling either completely happy that someone is back in your life, or sad because someone has just left?

As well as being happy and sad places, they are also places of utter surprise, from the good to the bad. Starting with the bad, in recent years there have been several problems occurring in train stations with regards to suspicious packages, police being called out, etc... All of which if they happened to me I'm sure would take me very much by surprise.

Moving quickly on to the good type of surprises train stations hold, starting small, how many times have you gone to the train station after a busy day at work expecting the train to be packed and having to stand up all the way back home? Although I think that this will happen to me quite a lot of the time, such as right this second whilst I'm stood up in-between train carriages, you will occasionally find that the train is surprisingly almost empty. During these times you don't now have to stand up, and you have a surprisingly enjoyable journey home.

To the bigger, probably less often good surprises, I wonder how many people have met on a train or in a station. How many people are now friends or couples because one day they decided to strike up a conversation with someone stood up or sat next to them. Makes you wonder.

If your reading this and you never really noticed all of these things before, next time your at a train station take a good look round, and see what new things you can see.
Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device

Perceptions

Fore warning, this blog may be a bit for a downer type serious blog.
Up until roughly two years ago my family was what I thought to be your typical average family, we had a nice house big enough for all of us, we never seemed to have what I'd consider money problems, and us kids had both of our parents intact and married. Just over two years ago however this perception/reality changed dramatically, and very quickly.

We found out that my parents we're splitting up for reasons I've mentioned in earlier blogs, and also that we did have quite bad money problems, of which I'm not going to go into. Shortly before this point in time however several months before, this shattering of perception also happened to one of my best friends.

The reason I bring this up today, is because earlier on this week I received the news that some old family friends of my family were going through the same thing; things occurred, and the parents split up. Due to this being my old friends parents, I thought it only right to see if he was alright, and offer some kind of advice.
The moment I started to type the message to my friend offering advice however, my perception changed again, from this event/thing is happening to me also, to this event/thing has happened to me. Since that day when I think of the situation of my parents, it now doesn't feel as if its still happening, but instead that it's happened and is now happening to someone else. Weirdly like splitting up is a turn based thing, that the most recent takes precedent.

In a way this new perception of things actually feels better than the last though, like I've been through something and I now have knowledge and experience gained from it.

I guess I don't really have a point to this blog, other than the fact that, perceptions, whether they be about a person, an event that's happened, or in viewing a way of life, can be sometimes misleading, can sometimes have a large effect and can sometimes can change in the blink of an eye.

Perception, now ranked up there with Hindsight, on my list of annoying thoughts and feelings.
Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device

Looking for a new job

As most people will know, students traditionally don't have much money to their names and often pay things like value food in supermarkets in order to save money. Although I'd say I'm quite good when it comes to money and keeping a check on it, its always nice to have a bit more coming in each month.

The easiest way to get this extra bit of money is getting a new job. So far I've sent off about half a dozen or so applications and I've currently got one that I'm waiting to hear back from, which I'm really hoping I get.

The main problem with getting a job during university is fitting it in around your lectures and seminars. If you get an evening job this usually isn't to much of a problem, however for jobs like call centres, shops, daytime jobs... You have to find a job with shifts that fit into your schedule.
As I said I applied for a job the other day suited towards students and as an added bonus is also in the gaming/technology industry. Hopefully even though the closing date isn't for a little while, I'll hear something good back from them.

Having already heard from several people that christmas is fast approaching, getting a few hours paid work will definitely help in paying for christmas this year. If anyone is in sheffield, and either needs a new member of staff or currently knows of a few hours going somewhere, please drop a comment, thanks.
Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device

University magazine and America update.

I know I keep saying each week that the following week will be chaotic and busy because I'll have loads of uni work to do, however that point still oddly hasn't arrived. This week I again got more reading to do and some prep work for seminars but not as much as I seemed to have this time last year, perhaps it'll happen next week.

Something I did again this week that I did last week was go to a meeting for the university magazine. I spoke very briefly about this last week, so I thought I'd say a bit more today. Having gotten quite interested in writing over the summer, and having submitted a few reviews into a site online, I thought my next best step would be to get involved in the uni magazine.
With regards to this, this week I went to their second meeting where they talked more about the content in their next issue, and asked other people if they had any ideas for what they wanted to write about. After hearing some really good ideas for some of the sections I was interested in, I spoke with one of the sub-editor type people and got an idea for my own article I can write about.

I never really thought of myself as someone who could write or was that interested in writing, however over the last few months, its become quite an attractive prospect to do and get involved in. Hopefully I'll be able to get started on writing this article next week, and find out a little bit more about things like putting in photos, and word limits etc....

The biggest thing that's happened to me this week actually happened to me today. Although I haven't said anything, since April, May time I've been planning to go abroad to study in America for my third year. Having researched universities, grants, tuition fees and all of the important things over the summer, I finally managed to get in touch with the humanities coordinator today to ask them whether it was possible.
To my surprise within about 20 seconds of dialling the number, my coordinator said that it wouldn't be possible, and there is no way that I'd now be able to do a year abroad and have it count towards my degree.

If I think about it, since I came up with this idea, I did kind of put all my hopes on it, and didn't plan for anything else. Having those plans taken away so quickly has really annoyed me and shocked me in a way, but I guess I'll now have to start my new plans for next year.

It just feels soo weird, I'd had all of these plans in mind, things I wanted to do, and now when I think of next year its just blank. Anyone else felt this way before?

Luckily I called up this early in the year and I have plenty of time to sort new things out. I would have loved to study out in america though.
Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device

First week back at university

First week of year two at uni has finally finished, although it has only actually been one week, it feels as tho several weeks have gone by and we're back in the thick of things again.

In this first week I've already had an early morning start, a cancelled seminar, been almost late for a lecture, and plenty of reading to be getting on with. Saying all of this I am quite glad to finally be back doing things and having work to do again, especially after the very unproductive summer that seemed to go on forever.

Something different that I decided to do this year however was to go down to a meeting for the university newspaper, to see if I'd be able to get involved writing for them. Although I've been blogging for over a year and a half now, its only been since the beginning of summer that I've become really interested in writing and wanted to do more in that field. Due to this I thought that joining the university newspaper would be the best way forward.

Aswell as this move into writing I have also for a few months now been writing up film, book and t.v reviews and sending them in to a newly set up website that posts things on a range of cultural topics.

I'm not quite sure why I've recently gotten into writing or why so far I've wanted to write things specifically about books and films, but hopefully this could lead to something good.
Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device

Eurogamer Expo

What a day I've had, a very early start and what's looking like quite a late finish. Today I went to my first ever convention/expo called Eurogamer, down in London. I don't really think I can put into words how awesome and amazing today was but I'll give it a go.

For several years now, due to getting back into gaming and discovering people on Youtube, I've wanted to go to a convention, to be surrounded by like minded people, and to experience what these events are like, and I finally got to do this today.

Often in everyday life when I talk about video games or computing I receive blank faces. Walking into the exhibition hall earlier on today however, I found people of all ages, genders etc...talking techno babble like me, getting excited about new games, running round trying to get all the game related freebies, and queuing up for ages just for the chance to spend a few minutes trying out new games.

There was so much to do and very little time to do it in. I got round almost everything I set out to play on, plus a few others I didn't think I'd be interested in. The main game I didn't have chance to play on that I really wanted to play was Call Of Duty: Black Ops 2. This was due to the length of the queue, and me thinking that in the time it would take to queue up and play this game, I could play atleast five others.

There were a few games that surprised me today, namely Crysis 3, and Company of Heroes 2, both of which I'm now really interested in and am sure will buy in the future once released. Although there were these games that surprised me in a positive way, there was something that I found wasn't as good as I'd hoped and that was the Wii U. I've always been a nintendo fan boy, owning many of their devices in the past, however this one didn't seem to sit right with me when I was playing it. Although I was a bit disappointed, I will quickly add that I did only get to play a few minutes on the Wii U and so this is only a quick first impression. Perhaps if I had more time, I could have got to grips with it more, for now I'm going to reserve judgement on it.

The only downside I discovered about today is that within the exhibition hall you see all these people and you just know they are gamers, either through the amazing cosplay costumes, the numerous amounts of t-shirts featuring popular gaming characters, or in how they speak and their ability to play the games. The downside is that once back in school, university, at work, in everyday life, these people tend not to dress and act quite the same as they do for these events, making it harder for gamers to find other gamers.

As I said at the beginning, I can't say just how fantastic today was, definitely cannot wait til next time. I even got to meet some YouTube celebs and watch them shooting it out in a few rounds of team death match, can't get much better then that.

I'll have to finish here for today, as I'm about to get off my train and run to catch the connecting train. First day in university tomorrow, back to real life. Today was nice whilst it lasted, hopefully I'll be able to do this again soon.
Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device

First week in the new house, and Eurogamer

Okay, so the first week didn't quite go as I'd envisioned it would. Also all the things I said about not being aprehensive or slightly worried about uni this year, yeah I was wrong about that too.

I'm not really sure why I thought it would be the best idea to come back to sheffield early. The majority of this in retrospect was been...wasted, because there is nothing really to do. Having gotten all my timetables and everything through I found I don't actually start until the 2nd, I believe, apart from needing to go in for an hour next friday.

Having also seen my timetable for the whole of this year, I found out that similar to last year I'm only in about 5 days every fortnight, and so even during term times am likely to have a lot of free time.
After realising I have all this time this year, I was actually able to do something productive this week, and that was job hunting.

Having updated my c.v, sent an application off, and still keeping my eyes open, I'm hoping to find something quite soon.

Now on to the non-boring portion of this blog... Eurogamer. For those of you unformiliar with Eurogamer, it is a gaming expo held in London every year, where people within the gaming industry can show off their new games, consoles, etc...
As of about two weeks ago I wasn't intending to go, however finding that I had free time, I decided, why not, and booked the tickets.

Eurogamer will be my first ever convention, and I cannot wait, although I am off on my own and only for the afternoon portion, it'll be amazing. Gaming is something that I've really gotten into over the last year or two, following more of the creation and release of games, not just how good they are once released. Hopefully, there'll be more expo's soon, can't wait!

I'll try next thursday when I'm there to jot a few things down, and perhaps write a blog about what it's like and what I find out when I'm there.
Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device

Saying Goodbye

This week has been quite jam packed, not just because of the packing and prep for moving back to uni, but because of the number of get together's with relatives.

Having taken the majority of my stuff to my new house several weeks ago, there wasn't a hugh amount of things left to pack. However this did cause a problem, as I had to try to remember if I'd taken stuff already or whether I'd taken enough and should pack more. For most people I'm guessing packing stuff into a bag wouldn't be too much of a problem, however due to my need to be very organised and ready for unexpected situations, it can sometimes take me a bit longer then usual.

Putting aside the whole packing situation, the rest of this week consisted of meeting up with some relatives of mine, some that live nearby, some that live a few hours away but drove up to see us and some that live really far away but coincidentally where in the area on holiday.

This process of essentially saying goodbye to everyone actually felt kind of odd. The reason I say this is because even though my brother is leaving to start uni tomorrow, I started a year ago, and have already been living away from home for a year, and so I've kind of already left. I know that I went back home over the summer but to me, I've technically moved out already, and during the summer I was just back temporarily. I'm not quite sure if I'm getting down how I mean, but hopefully you can understand the jist of it.

Heading back to uni this time around definitely does feel so much different from last year, I'm on my own taking the train for starters, but also there's less worry and confusion, and I'm looking forward to it so much more. Hopefully this year will go just like I en-vision it will.

To all the students starting university this year, including my brother, good luck, remember your probably in completely new surroundings so be safe, don't drink too much, and most importantly have fun.
Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device

Foreign students and observations

I don't think I mentioned it at all last week but on sunday we had two italian students arrive to stay with us for two weeks. So far this year we've had about 10ish students staying with us, and many more others throughout the years, so we're pretty used to the whole process by now. Saying that however, I'm constantly surprised at how different all of the students are.

What I mean by this is, how shy they are, how talkative, how much they interact with us outside of having dinner etc... Why I'm constantly surprised is because every time I think, 'Oh we've had all types of students stay with us, these can't be much different' and yet most tend to act differently or do things differently to the previous ones.

The reason I thought about writing this today is because the two italian girls staying with us offered to cook dinner last night, and none of the students previously had asked to do this. I won't go too much into how the dinner went, let's just say it was a good attempt, especially due to the fact that they were using food foreign to them and cooking in someone else's kitchen.

I think what I'm trying to get at in this blog is that know matter how much you think you know people, whether it be a specific person or a group in general, they'll always surprise you with something new.
Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device

Doctor Who Review - Episode one - Asylum of the Daleks

Season 7, Episode 1 – ‘Asylum of the Daleks’

‘Kidnapped by his oldest foe, the Doctor is forced on an impossible mission - to a place even the Daleks are too terrified to enter...’ 

The long wait is finally over, as the new series of Doctor Who returns to our screens in the form of ‘Episode one –Asylum of the Daleks’.

Reading that short episode description what more could you ask for from the opening episode to season seven? After all of the answering of questions and the River Song plot line from last season it was very refreshing to see the Doctor back in action in a completely new setting. With the promise of Daleks in this season’s summer trailer, I was initially worried that this episode would fall short, however I was pleasantly surprised.

Over the last couple of seasons the Daleks have become less of a foe and more of an annoyance. People saw them as less scary and easier to defeat. With the introduction of the Asylum and the human housed Daleks, this episode delivered everything that was needed to strike fear back into the viewers, and restore the Daleks back to their rightful place as the Doctor’s arch-rivals. Although the evolution of the Daleks has been done previously in other seasons, the Human Daleks added an exciting new twist and added to the fear factor of the Daleks locked within the Asylum. For me the “Egg…Egg…Egg…” of the powering up insane Daleks has to be one of the scariest moments within this episode, as well as the tense moment earlier on when Rory decides to touch the rusted Dalek to check whether it was alive.

We can’t overlook however what certainly must have been the scariest moment this episode, seeing Rory presenting Amy with the divorce papers. Having seen Rory being thrown out by Amy earlier on this week in the last episode of the online web-series ‘The Pond Life’, it seemed inevitable that Mr and Mrs Pond where no more and this would be the start of Amy and Rory’s exiting off the show.  Who were we to doubt though that Rory the Roman and Young Amy Pond would not work things out in the end, with a little help from the Doctor. This crafty separation plot twist not only shocked viewers, but also brought to light one of the unanswered questions associated with Doctor Who, What happens to the companions when the Doctor is not there? Knowing that both Amy and Rory will soon be leaving the Doctors side, this was an opportune moment for the writers to delve into this question and give us a glimpse into life without the Doctor. 

Another surprise we were presented with this episode was the surprise arrival of Jenna-Louise Coleman, several months ahead of when viewers were lead to believe her character would appear. Previously Jenna-Louise’s character was scheduled to debut in this seasons Christmas special, so why are we seeing her now? Whatever the answer this teaser provided viewers just enough to show what to expect from this new companion. Stephen Moffat claimed "It's not often the Doctor meets someone who can talk even faster than he does, but it's about to happen. Jenna is going to lead him on his merriest dance yet.” The frequent quirky comments, hilarious remarks about soufflés and bisexual partners, and a genius intellect that seems to surpass even the Doctor indicates that the Doctor truly has meet his match. With the performance Jenna-Louise provided this episode it’s clear that any questions regarding living up to the role of the Doctors companion will be put to rest, even following the high standards of Karen Gillian.

Even after all of the questions we had answered at the end of last season, when  we finally felt we knew what was in store, the writers could not help but to throw a whole bunch of new questions in this episode to keep us on our toes, such as: 

•  Is the new companion really a Dalek?
• Will Amy and Rory stay together in the end?
• Will the Daleks ever remember who the Doctor is? 
•  And finally, Doctor Who…?

As we know, silence will fall when the question is asked, but could this last question be what we’ve all been waiting for or another deceptive ploy to throw viewers off before the real struggle finally begins.

Next week:  A spaceship hurtling towards certain destruction, Dinosaur’s and Rory’s Dad…. Can the Doctor save the ship and uncover the mystery of the prehistoric cargo?

The trials of renting a House

Following on from my last blog, we did last sunday manage to get all of my things moved into my new house. I also at the same time got to take a more thorough look around, and had time to move some of the furniture around in my new room.
What I'd put out of my mind about renting a house this year though, were the bills.

By going into student accommodation in my first year, my rent included all of my bills, from the heating to internet and so I didn't have to worry about it. This year however all of the bills had to be researched, to see which had the best deals, and then each had to be set-up individually.

Before this week I never know just how complicated bills were. Up until know, I thought that bills for the most part were the same each time around, you'd set up a contract and then every month or three months or every year on the dot you'd pay what you owe. To my surprise however, I found out this week that that isn't the case. Bills will come 'roughly' every one/three/twelve months and not on the same day you took it out, prices under certain circumstances can change, and you have a few weeks to pay your bill not just the one day.

If I was on my own in the house and I had all the bills in my name, it'd probably be a bit easier to organise and understand, however with three people contributing to each individual bill, I can foresee the bill days being quite hectic.

Even with all of these unknown factors, about renting a house appearing my house mates and I are still really looking forward to fully moving in. With anything new though, we'll probably for sure encounter some problems, however we'll then know how to do it right the next time round.
Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device

Moving into the new house & changing up the blogs

The times finally come, come tomorrow evening I will have officially moved my stuff in to my new house which I'm staying in this year at uni.

I say the times finally come, as me and some of my friends went to see this house last november, and have been waiting since then to be able to move in. After the experience of living in student accommodation in my first year, it'll be a very nice change to have a house where I actually know the people living there, where there won't be a bar immediately next door keeping me awake all night, and to just have somewhere that feels less 'studenty'.

The only problem I have with moving my stuff in tomorrow is deciding what things I actually want to move in. What I mean by this is that I'm obviously moving things like clothes, computer, t.v etc in, its the things like dvds and cables and adaptors, the things you potentially might want to use, but the likelihood is you won't.
The reason this is a problem is because quite a few times last year I needed things like wires and paperwork and stationary, which if I was at home I could find easily in the house, however because I was at uni and had limited room I didn't think to bring them, and so would have to get people to make duplicates and email them through to me, or go out and buy new stuff to have in my flat.
It's always the way (Sod's Law), even if I take everything I own to the new house, there'll still be something I need that I don't have.

Moving on from my moving problems, I have noticed recently that for whatever the reason, I seem to have been neglecting my blogging somewhat. After the first few months of blogging, I made it a kind of goal of mine to blog atleast once a week. However I've gotten into a sort of pattern where I leave writing the blog really late. The reason I've done this is because it means I have the chance to see what happens during the week and then can choose out of all that's happened what I want to write about. Although I don't particularly mind doing this, it does mean that I'm leaving writing these blogs quite late and they tend more or less to be summary blogs of the week just gone.

Even after noticing all this this week, I've still managed to leave writing this weeks blog really late. I am from now on however going to try and make more of an effort to get these blogs back to how I used to do them. Hopefully with getting back to uni soon, I'll have more of a structure again, and also more to blog about. Saying that there are a few things I want to write about, but I want to wait a bit longer until I know more and have things all sorted out before I blog about them. Until then however I'll do my best to write less ranting and more interesting blogs.
Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device

Unpacking from holiday + Book list update

Having gotten back from holiday this week, it wasn't long before I felt the need to tackle the untouched suitcase full of dirty/used but not dirty clothes.

Everyone has surely had to do this in their lifetime: you go on holiday, come back and their it is, the suitcase full of dirty scrumpled up clothes, food wrappers likely from the airport, small gifts for the family/friends, and other stuff you never knew you'd packed. It is then your quest to deal with this remnant of the holiday you've just be forced to come back from.

Usually for me this is quite an easy task as I'd just tip everything into the washing pile and be done with it. However due to all of my other clothes being in the wash, I was very low on wearable clothes, and so this time I actually had to deal with it and sift through my suitcase properly to find the stuff I hadn't used, and get rid of all the wrappers etc, that seemed to find their way in their.

I'm sorry I know at this point I'm probably sounding quite boring, I know no one really wants to hear about my washing. Having just gotten back this week though, I really haven't had the chance to do much in-between catching up on sleep and getting back to my normal non holiday self. Due to that this was the only point that kind of stuck out this week that I wanted to talk about.

Saying that however I did want to also quickly write down the new books that I've gotten since I last update my book page. I will get round to sorting out that page very soon, as well as updating my Goodreads page.

Max Brallier - Can you survive a zombie apocalypse?
Keri Smith - Wreck this journal,
Douglas Coupland - Player One,
Ransom Riggs - Miss Peregrine's Home for peculiar children,
Lewis Carroll - Alice's adventures in Wonderland & Through the looking-glass,
Alexandre Dumas - The Three Musketeers,
Jesse Petersen - Married with Zombies,

So far I've only read a few but am working on the rest. I really need to stop buying so many books.
Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device

Holiday: Tenerife

This weeks blog comes from the very hot island of Tenerife. As I write this I'm sat on the side of the pool, trying to cool down, whilst watching my brother and sister cannonballing into the water.

Since we arrived here on tuesday evening, I've been thinking about how varied people are when it comes to their ideal holiday. Although I've enjoyed the holiday so far, there has been one significant factor that's hindered my enjoyment, and that's the heat. People always have a favourite, whether warmth or cold is best, and for me cold, snow, windy breezes will always beat sitting in the boiling sun. I don't mind the heat usually, its just once the temperature hits a certain level I'd rather go inside or flock to the shade in order to cool down. As I always say "You can put more clothes on in the cold, but in the heat there's a limit to what you can take off".

Looking at my family within regards to the type of holiday goers they are, I'd definitely say they are more the hang out by the pool, reading a book, getting a tan type of people. Compared to that I'd say I'm more the cooler temperature, museum, activity goer type.

With all this time sat by the pool I did start to think more in depth about people and what the idea of a holiday would be for different people. I never really considered until now how many types of holiday goers there actually are. As I said just whether your more into hot or cold places immediately cuts down the large list of places you'd want to go to. After your preference in weather there's whether or not your the typical tourist, wanting to visit all the tourist hot spots, or whether you want to see the more behind the scenes, quieter non touristy spots. Whether your an adrenaline junky, sporty, a lover of the arts, etc all has an effect also on what you'd desire from a holiday.

Luckily this week. When the suns gotten a bit too much for me, I've had the Olympics to fall back on and have been able to catch up on some of the recent events. I'm not quite sure what it is about the Olympics, but whether it be in Sydney, Beijing or London, I really get into the sports and enjoy watching the matches. Usually I don't really like watching sports. In a typical year, I may watch a handful or football matches, a tennis match or two and that's about it. Due to this I do look forward to the Olympics and try to watch as much as I can in the short time that it's on.

Enough of my rambling malarky for now. We've still got a few more days of holiday left before we get back on a plane and head home, not sure what we have planned for these last for days, but I'm sure we'll have a great time. As its starting to heat up again, I think I may go for another swim.
Plans for tonight: BBQ and the Jamaican team in the 4 x 100m relay, should be a good evening.
Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device

The Olympic Opening Ceremony

Up until this point I've chosen not to write about the Olympics, mainly to see how others would react, but also to give myself time to decide what my opinions on it were.

Within the last week I have heard a variety of opinions on the opening ceremony calling it everything from the worst in history, to the best there has ever been. One of the biggest criticism that came out was about other countries not being able to understand certain aspects of the display. I do understand to a degree what these critics mean, however they don't seem to understand that it would be impossible to create a show solely of elements that every country in the world would recognise. Furthermore the opening ceremony was Great Britain's ceremony, its main role was to show off our culture and history, to entertain and educate other countries, not to simply put on a show that would please people for two hours.

I will be honest and say that I did think the ceremony was outstanding, absolutely amazing, however it was not as I had originally imagined it. From what I'd heard of the ceremony prior to last friday, I thought that the ceremony would have had more fictional elements to it, more film like scenes and choreography, due to Danny Boyle's involvement.
With regards to that, the main thing I wanted to bring up was about how much the opening ceremony looked like a scene out of Lord Of The Rings. I'm pretty sure that this wasn't the intended outcome, however i did enjoy it more because of this. Felt that an early trailer for the Hobbit during the first few minutes. Did anyone else see the comparisons to LOTR...the shire, the ring??
Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device

How To Survive On A Student Budget

With a holiday fast approaching, and the start of university drawing close not long after that, the topic of money and budgeting has popped up many times in conversation recently. From noticing this and due to the fact that my brother is beginning his first year of university this year, I thought I'd note down a few helpful tips and tricks on how to survive on a student budget.

Its about this time of year that students all over the country will be awaiting the dreaded A-level results and discovering whether or not they will be advancing on to university or rethinking their plans for next year. After finding

By now you should have gone through the rigorous process that is student finance, and will be expecting large sums of money to be appearing in your bank account come September. For any student this will be your first university challenge, not to spend all of this money during the first few weeks. It will be very tempting to go on a small shopping spree or get a few luxury items for your new student accommodation, but remember that this money has to last, once its gone its gone.
Tip number one: Enjoy freshers, its a great time to meet people and get to know your new course mates, but keep in mind freshers only lasts for a week or two, make sure you don't spend all your money in this short space of time, you may regret it in a few months.

Once you have received your results and secured your university place, it won't be long til a package arrives with details on accommodation and a long list of books that you'll need for your course. At this point you need to start remembering that you are now a university student, so do not expect luxury; this included lots of spare money, a big house, flat screen t.vs, dishwashers, en-suite bathrooms....The lucky ones may receive some of these luxuries but they will be paying for them.
Tip number two: Go for the slightly cheaper accommodation, it may be more basic, but washing the dishes by hand will cost you the price of a cloth and some soap rather then £15+ more every week.

After having gone through the accommodation, you should next take a look at your reading list. When it comes to university books there are a few things you should know: it is very rare that you will need ever book on the list, and also the books do not have to be brand new.
Tip number three: If possible wait until you get to university to see which books you do and do not need. Once there you can get a better view of which are actually necessary and which just have a few useful pages.
Tip number four: Make sure to check independent book shops near your university, or search online for websites that sell second hand books, such as Amazon. By looking in these places you will be able to find books of good quality, for far cheaper prices.

The weekly shop, for those of you already used to doing your shopping in Tesco's or Aldi then this shouldn't affect you too much, however for the people used to Waitrose or used to buying the more expensive branded products, this may take some time to get used to.
Buying and cooking your own meals is one of the biggest changes that university students go through, and the fact that it costs you money means it can also be expensive if you don't change quickly. Don't feel the need to do all your shopping in one place for the sake of convenience, by finding out which shops have deals on and which have the cheapest items will save you a lot of money in the long run.


Tip number five: Cheap doesn't always mean bad, in fact you may wonder why you've been paying those high prices up until now. As a student you may have to sacrifice your Heinz tomato sauce for regular Tesco's own, it may taste a little different but remember those small savings add up.

Whilst shopping you may now find yourself looking for meals for one, buying small amounts of food can often be costly and is in fact better value to buy large servings that you can prepare all at once and can be used at a later date.
Tip number six: Buy a handful of food containers and try to buy large portions of food instead of one person servings, such as mince. Having these food containers will allow you to cook all of the food in one go and then store the left overs in the fridge or freezer to be used as another meal.

These are just a few tips that will help you to adapt to your new life in university and save you money whilst doing it. Part of the fun however is discovering new tips and tricks of your own as you encounter problems throughout your university life. For anymore assistance on budgeting, preparing and cooking food, accommodation, etc......their will be people within your university dedicated to helping with these issues. Other then that a quick search on Google will always bring up some useful site that can help. I hope everyone has a great year at university.

The Unthinkable

This weeks, as the title suggests, the unthinkable happened. Something very dear to me, that I rely on, that I need to function, that i use to contain all my important info and knowledge on, was taken from me this week. I wonder if you can guess what it is I'm talking about?

For most people out there this probably won't make sense, but there are the few like me that will understand when I say, that I'm talking about my laptop.

I know that I probably sound quite strange but this did come as a massive disappointment to me this week. I've had my laptop for just over three years now with no problems whatsoever, and on tuesday night it just died. Completely out of no where, it just died.
After diagnosing the problem I discovered that the laptops hard drive had fried and everything that was on my computer had gone.

To all those out there who rely on their computer as much as I do will understand how I felt. If instead you have something like a phone, or car... Just think about how it'd feel to not be able to use them, for them to be taken from you and you'll begin to feel how us computer nerds feel.

At this point I will say, we all get told that backing up is important, and usually we just think that it'll never happen to me, but trust me you'll regret it if ever this happens to you. Back everything up, as often as you can.

The reason why this was such a terrible thing is not because my laptop broke, as I was able to get it repaired, its because of the amount of data that I lost. Unfortunately I'd not backed up my files in quite a few months, meaning the last several days have consisted of me trying to remember every little thing that got deleted so I could get them back.

Five days on after this 'catastrophe' happened I'm beginning to reach the stage where things are looking normal again. There's still a few things though that struggling to find again, and a few files like my C.V that need to be typed up from scratch. Hopefully I'll have things back to normal soon, feels so glad to have my computer back.
I'm such a nerd :)
Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device

Organising a night out

I know lately the majority of my blogs have seemed quite ranty, if that's even a word. Having said that this blog is also going to be kind of ranty but I will try to move away from these types of blogs.

What I want to talk about today is organising get together's with friends. The reason I want to talk about this is because about two weeks ago I put out a facebook event for my friends and me to meet up, grab a few drinks and catch up. Although I did this two weeks ago to get in early and get things planned, things were still being changed and planned the morning of the day we were meeting.

For years now, me and my friends have faced certain challenges in regards to meeting up, the biggest being where we all live. Due to all the small villages and the distances in between them, we do to a degree have to plan meet ups, in order for people to work out train times, figure out getting lifts or booking taxi's...
With the end of university, figuring out times when people aren't working is now also another big issue.

We did eventually manage to sort things out and came to the decision on meeting up last night. In the end everyone did have a great time and most of us ended up leaving the night with more money then we started with, due to a little trip to the casino.

I can't say how frustrated I was at times trying to get people to reply and figure out what was going on. You'd think getting 11ish people to one location for a certain time would be easy, but factoring in all the location and schedule problems turned out to be really annoying.

Just really glad the end result was worth the hassle. Now to organise a few more before we all leave and go back to uni.
Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device

Update! Foreign students and Vidcon

For the past few years now, on and off we've had foreign students staying with us whilst they come over on educational trips. We currently as of an hour ago have three students now staying, with that number going up to four next weekend.I'll make my position clear now, because I'm not sure where I'll head with this. I do think having students stay is a good idea, they get to learn more about local people and stay in an environment which will help them to learn the language, whilst at the same time we get to learn more about where that student has come from, plus we do also get paid to take them in, which at this time helps out a lot.
However, saying all that the initial meeting and showing them around the house always seems to be one of the most awkward moments ever. I'm not quite sure why, perhaps its just the fact that your saying 'hello, make yourself at home, were here if you need anything' basically to a complete stranger. After a few days this does change as you get to know them a bit, but initially, at least in my experience, it does feel fairly awkward and like your walking on egg shells to make sure they're alright.

The next thing I want to talk about today is Vidcon. I thought to leave talking about Vidcon till this week because I couldn't go and so could only see what happened by watching peoples vlogs, which for the most part weren't uploaded until after it had ended. If you've never heard of Vidcon before, it's basically the largest Youtube gathering in the world, with panels discussing the evolving internet video industry to popular web series, and where subscribers/fans/followers are able to meet their favourite Youtube personalities and hang out and have an awesome time.

This has been the second Vidcon, out of three since I discovered vloggers and that whole side of Youtube and ever since I found out that this convention was being held I've wanted to go, unfortunately due to being held in America and spanning several days it would be a very costly trip. I'm hoping with the potential move abroad for my third year of university, that I'll be able to make either the forth or fifth annual Vidcon. Really want to go, been watching it through videos for two years now and I think its time I try to make it out there, would be awesome to actually meet my favourite Youtubers too, instead of just seeing them through their vlogs and videos.

Hopefully I'll get all my travel plans for my third year sorted quickly so I'll know if I can go or not.Hopefully this time next year I'll be in America enjoying an awesome Vidcon weekend.

The impact of moving house

We haven't as of yet sold our house, however the people who came to view our house last week, came again yesterday for a more thorough look round. From the attitude whilst walking round we got the feeling that they were quite keen on the house and would potentially put in an offer. It was then that it hit me, we could be moving out really soon and my mum and sister would have to quickly look for somewhere to live.

Its really weird to think that sometime this week I could get a call from my mum saying that the house has been sold and we need to start packing. We've lived in this house for over ten years now, and we never really expected we'd be selling it. The thought of not being able to come back here during holidays, feels kind of unreal.

The weirdest part of all this is that come september I'll have moved out almost permanently, apart from the odd weekend and holiday. Due to this I can only guess that visiting my mum and sister will feel very foreign and not like going home but as I've sad more just like 'visiting' family.

So far this is all guess work and I won't know how any of this feels until it all happens, so I won't worry myself about it now. Best to just go with the flow.
Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device

Preparing for a House Viewing

People say that moving house is the most stressful thing you can do, so far however I'd disagree with that and say that selling your house is more stressful. We found out the other day that a couple were coming to view our house today and like most people, we left the tidying up til last night and today. Obviously meaning that the house is now in chaos with my mum running round saying what thin gs need to be done, what needs to be re-done, where things should go.......

The reason today seems to be so stressful, is not just because we are so busy cleaning up, and need to get things just right, its the added fact that once one room has been completed, your not really allowed to go back into it and do anything, in fear of messing things up again. Imagine how this works with the kitchen, being one of the first rooms to be completed this morning and then four people constantly popping in and out to get drinks, food, cleaning products, etc....as you can guess cups and plates have started to appear and it will have to be looked at again.

Another reason why today is quite stressful is due to my families different opinions on whats 'clean' and to what extent the house should be cleaned. My brother, sister and me being the children tend to feel that if you can see the floor and things are organized then we'd consider a room clean, however thats not how my mum see's it. Everything should be organized and nothing should be on the floor, but also everything should be dusted thoroughly, anything unnecessarily on sight shouldn't be on sight, the house should be heated up so that it feels more 'homely', and it goes on. The main problem I have with this, which is more of a personal objection, is that yes everything will then look neat and tidy, but if I was coming to look at the house, I'd expect some mess and I'd like to see the house as though it was lived in. Especially as our house is quite big and is a house for a large family, if I was coming to look at it I'd get a better sense of the house by seeing things having been used and out of place.

That brings me on to my final grievous of the day, and that is that we now are very restricted in what we do until the people come to visit. If we get a drink, as soon as you've finished the glass needs to be washed up and put back, if we sit down anywhere we need to make sure the covers don't get messed up, and I think we've been banned from playing on the xbox until they're gone, because you know we'd have to get the controllers out, turn the t.v up, and the sight of us killing zombies might scare them off just a bit.

I'm sorry if I' rambled on a bit, just needed to have rant, and take a break from cleaning. Hopefully everything will all go well and they'll buy it straight away. Anyways, the dusters calling so I'll end that off here today, until next time.

P.s Isn't it odd how by cleaning up so much, you only seem to get more dirty.

Technology: Development or Dependency

Over the past few weeks, especially with all of the technology conventions going on, I've been noticing all the different changes going on as a result of technology that we now have. I don't necessarily mean all the big worldly changes that have occurred due to technology, but more basic everyday level changes.
An example of this is mobile phones. My mobile phone at the moment has a battery that isn't holding its charge as much as it's meant to, and due to this is lasting only a few hours a day, or will only let me call or text for a short while before dying.

The conclusion of this new 'dependency' (not sure if that's the best word) on technology hit me yesterday when I needed to quickly call someone whilst at home. Like any other time I went immediately to my mobile only to discovered that it had died again. After this I then went looking for our home phone, to discover this time that it had in fact been disconnected for a while and put away somewhere because no one ever used it anymore due to everyone having their mobiles.
As well as basically replacing normal landlines phones for me, my mobile has also become my main method of communicating with people, whether it be texting, instant messaging, emailing, or even on things like facebook chat. By packing so many different features into mobiles, people now don't have to go very far in order to do loads of the daily tasks they'd usually have needed loads of different things in order to do.
Another example of this is my Mum. Her iPhone 4 now contains spreadsheets with weekly spending's, credit card information, exercise information, documents for work, and the list goes on.

The other big change that I've noticed, is how little t.v I watch now a days, and how thats been replaced by watching programmes and web series's on my laptop. Through this whole first year of university I didn't watch t.v once, anything that I did watch was through websites or streaming programmes, movies, etc...
For those that read my blog on Youtube not too long ago, this kind of adds to that. Through Youtube I've discovered several awesome web series, shows that upload new content everyday, and it's now even the place where I get the bulk of my news from. I've also read several new articles lately that have come to this conclusion too, that content uploaded to the internet could slowly be replacing the traditional medium of television programmes.

Having come to these conclusion that people are becoming more dependent on technology and new technology could slowly be replacing the traditional older technology, makes me feel quite divided. I do see now that there is more and more internet content being produced everyday, or higher and higher quality and originality and could be where television is heading. However on the other hand, I to this day insist on having a separate MP3 player rather then just playing music through my phone. Oddly I have been really stubborn on this point, never really caring whether my phone can hold loads of songs, or seeing if the battery could handle it, even if carrying both things around with me takes up more space, I just like having the two things separate.
This is one thing I don't see changing very quickly, I'll spearhead new technological developments any day, but I don't think I'm ready to give over to this dependency just yet.

Half Term, The Royal Jubilee and E3

This week for all of the younger students in primary/secondary school and collage it has been half term. What a packed week this week seems to have been.

At the beginning of this week, you could see a large number of bunting and flags appearing in peoples gardens and on their cars, and the town got extremely busy, all in preparation for the Royal Jubilee Celebrations.
With the Jubilee being on the tuesday, not a great deal in terms of parties and celebrations happened over the weekend where I live, mainly just people shopping in order to prepare. Although there were events occurring in London over the weekend, I didn't happen to see much due to being busy, being out and about in the sun.

Once tuesday came around you could definitely feel a sense of 'pride/patriotism' in the air. Living in quite a big countryside area, there were lots of different things going on, with every village having some kind party, BBQ, or fair. In scarborough, being a town rather then small village, many streets instead decided to put on their own street parties.

Overall the celebrations everywhere did look really good, and people seemed to enjoy a few days off to have fun and spend some time out in the nice sunny weather with friends.

The second half of this week turned out to be the complete opposite of the beginning. As soon as wednesday hit, the weather turned from warm and sunny with the Jubilee celebrations, to chilly thunder storms with the happenings at E3.

Now for anyone who doesn't know what E3 is, it's an annual gaming convention where the big names in the gaming industry reveal new consoles and show off their latest games. Ever since I discovered E3 I thought it would be absolutely amazing to be able to go. The main problem with this however being that it's held over in america, so it'd be quite a big and expensive trek just for the few days its on.

I won't go into too much about what happened this year at E3, but I will say there were a number of games talked about that I cannot wait to get my hands on and play, a few being Assassin Creed 3, Star Wars 1313 and Black Ops 2. For any gamers out there who haven't yet heard of E3, check it out, it's definitely the place to be for all the new major gaming news.
Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device

The Great Gatsby

The other day I finished reading the book 'The Great Gatsby', and even though I do think its a great book, something about it has been nagging me for the past few days. For people who haven't yet read this book, I'm going to try make this blog as spoiler free as possible so I don't ruin anything.

I finally managed today to figure out just what it was that felt different in this book, and that was the ending. I'm going to try explain this as best I can without spoilers but hopefully it'll make sense.
The reason that this particular ending felt so different was because it seemed so real, not just another fairy tale ending. Now you may be thinking 'why does that make this book so different? Many others feel real.' Well perhaps, however when I thought back over past books I've read, there weren't very many at all that I could think of that ended in such a realistic way, a way that you didn't want it to end in, but when you think about it actually seemed like the most plausible way to end.

Saying all of this, I actually found this characteristic of the book to be very refreshing, and was actually what made me enjoy the book even more. I do often like reading about how the main characters at the end of a book either get what they set out for or pull something seemingly impossible out of the hat last minute. However its also sooo refreshing to read a book that feels realistic and feels as though it has happened, and doesn't just take that 'way out' of going for the happy ending.

I'll be honest and say that before reading The Great Gatsby, I'd never really heard much about it, or what the story was about. Now having finished it though I think that it really is a brilliant book, and I'm glad I picked it up. Studying history and it being something I love, I'm also kind of a sucker for books set in historical periods, the roaring american twenties especially, making this book even more appealing to me.
Although at times I did have to concentrate a little harder to decipher some of the older terms used, to make sure I understood what was being said, there isn't anything else negative I can really say.

I can definitely see why this is such a classic book. All I'll say about this book, to conclude, is that if you haven't yet read it you should, and that this book is amazing and has definitely gained a permanent place on my bookshelf from now on.
Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device