Christmas! 2014

Where has the week gone?! This week feels like it gone very quickly as you could probably tell from that opening sentence. As chaotic as I predicted but still really fun, this week has been a really good week.

Christmas this year seemed to be slightly different from previous years, partially due to the fact that I was properly working (i.e not school or part time, not that those are 'proper work') very close up until Christmas. It also seemed to be due to the way we did Christmas.

This year my sister has had a more prominent role, she was the one to start getting the decorations out and decorating the house, she handed out the presents this year and she even did everyone their own individual stocking full of random sweets. Now this could just be her bossiness taking over a bit too much or the fact that, she is now older and that dynamic is coming out now. Saying this, in recent years Christmas has felt a lot more 'adult' due to the fact that we are all older and again that family dynamic has shifted with our ages.

At the moment when we think of having relatives over for Christmas, we mean grandparents etc. However it makes you think just how long it will be before relatives over means my brother or sisters. For years now we have all had Christmas together and its been the odd years when our grandparents weren't here, but when will it become time that some of the siblings aren't around?? Just something to start thinking about.

Another thing that's been creeping in in recent years has been the shift from buying gifts that are things we actually need rather then things we'd quite like to have. Again this is probably another thing related to age. We all made quite specific lists of presents this year and most of us made sure to include a number of these items that we need, and would have to buy anyway if we didn't get them at Christmas.

Weirdly by putting down these items, it has not only helped because we know don't have to spend our own money and we have things that will genuinely come in handy in everyday situations, but these items made the more luxury/I want items more special, as they were slightly rarer, if that makes sense.

As I said earlier between all if these random thoughts popping into my head, it has been quite a fun week. Off to try out my new squash racket tomorrow and burn off some of the many chocolates I've eaten over the past few days :).

Favourite Films: 2014

Time for another one of my favourite blogs, this time for my favourite films. I don't think I did this one last year for some reason but I thought that as I've been watching so many films recently, I'd quite like to do this one again and attempt to keep track of which ones I really like.

Similarly with the favourite music list, it is almost impossible to go through every film I've ever seen and narrow them all down to just 10. It's inevitable that I have missed quite a few, but I have tried to go back through my old libraries of films to rediscover those old great gems that I still love today.

As I've said, there will probably be some glaringly obvious film missing from this list but I'm happy as it is. So, not too drag this out any further, here is this years 2014 list of my favourite films:

1) Toy Story
2) The Three Musketeers (1993)
3) Ferris Buellers Day Off
4) The Italian Job (2003)
5) A Knights Tale
6) Van Helsing
7) Iron Man
8) Star Trek Nemesis
9) Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (1990)
10) Space Jam

Even though there are a number of older titles on this list such as Ferris Bueller's Day Off and the original film version of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, these are hands down far better then some of the million dollar CGI movies they make now a days, and can see them staying up on this list for many years to come.

With Christmas fast approaching I'll try my hardest to get another one of these favourite blogs out next week, however I can foresee things being a bit chaotic. If not next week, then I'll endeavor to get this years bunch done early next year. I really do like having this record so I will get them done, it just depend son when :)

Favourite Music: 2014

It's that time of year again when I decide to make several lists displaying my favourite things in a certain subject, so that hopefully in the future I can look back and see what I was thinking back then and how my taste has changed over time.

It's quite strange actually, having these records of your taste in things over time, they do actually show more of an insight then you'd think they would. Looking back at last years and then quickly at the couple of years before that, because yes I have been making these favorite lists for about four years now, there are definite songs that are repeatedly on this list. Which is a good thing I think, it means that some of my core music is standing the test of time but new tracks still keep popping in and out depending on how I am that year.

I have again this year, somehow managed to cut down my entire list of songs to my top 15, and I feel like I can say that doing that this year was even harder then last time. Unfortunately due to the difficulty of this task I have not like last year been able to rank them from most favourite to least most favourite.

And so without further a due, here is this years list of my top favourite songs of 2014:
1) Alexi Murdoch - All my days,
2) Owl City - Alligator Sky,
3) The Jack Frost Band - Have a little faith,
4) Robert Post - Got none,
5) One Republic - Secrets,
6) Skrillex - Bangarang,
7) HOGNI - Bow Down (to no man),
8) Imagine Dragons - On top of the world,
9) Steve Earle - The Galway Girl,
10) Counting Crows - Accidentally in love,
11) Astronaut - Champions,
12) Flo-Rida (feat David Guetta) - Club can't handle me,
13) Rolling Stones - You can't always get what you want,
14) Goo Goo Dolls - I'm still here,
15) Cinematic Orchestra - To build a home.

 As a way of cutting the list down, this year I have only included one song from an artist, as last year there were a few songs on the list with the same artist and I felt this took up a couple of valuable spaces. So basically to help me choice I'm going with the mindset, if the artist makes it on to the list theres no need to mention them again as they have already made the cut.

There once again are probably a few songs that I forgot about, or accidentally skipped over but as I'm happy with this final list, I don't really mind. 

Having gone through this process, actually properly listening to all of my songs again has somewhat rejuvenated my love of music again and would love to rediscover old favourites as well as completely new songs. And so if anyone ever reads this and has any recommendations then I'd be happy to hear them. Oddly only having just made this list, I'm strangely looking forward to next years already. We'll see how things have changed.

Turning a corner

This week I seemed to have had either some kind of revelation or mental breakthrough, raising my confidence and making me just generally happier.

Its quite hard to explain, but after all of the events over the last few years, I was left with very little self confidence, affecting how social I was and things would sometimes seem a little bit down. This year however, more specifically the last couple of months has completely broken that mould and seems to have turned things around.

The main reason why I think this has happened is because of the London Nerdfighters. A group of awesome people that I have been meeting up with and talking too since earlier this year and being with them has majorly helped to raise my confidence and allow me to be more myself.

Even though I do still have a few friends back up north near Scarborough, I would like to think that I've made a group of new nerdfighter friends too.

Fitting in more at work has also had a big impact on me this week too, especially after the initially terrifying announcement of our office Xmas party next week.

All of this has just lead to me feeling more passively happy recently, getting to interact with people more and have fun out in London, rather than locking myself up at home like I used to do throughout university.

I'm hoping this isn't just some Christmas season type effect, because it does feel like a long time coming and has been really nice to feel more comfortable and myself again.

New Movie Trailers

This week saw the release of two amazing and hugely anticipated movie trailers, the second one in particular. The trailers were for Jurassic Park 4/Jurassic World and Star Wars 7: The Force Awakens.

I saw the trailer for Jurassic Park 4 earlier this week, and had no idea that there was going to be another Jurassic Park, so was taken quite by surprise. After the first watch I thought that it looked fantastic, we finally get to see what the park would have been like if it were completed in the other films. Furthermore we get to see this island filled with human visitors rather than just a small group of people alone with an island full of dinosaurs. Which as we saw obviously didn't end too well.

After chatting with some guys at work about the trailer, I started to think more about whether this will actually be any good, due to one main reason, that it was the forth time these people in the film have tried to set up a dinosaur park, after three very dodgy failed attempts. 

Due to the fact that this film isn't a reboot and it does follow on from the previous events, there has to be a sequence in the film somewhere that answers the question "why are we still trying to do this after three failed attempts where people died and things went very bad?" And then after this lead on to answer the question, "with that answer in mind, why did we take it to the next level and make genetically modified carnivorous dinosaurs? Could we have just started off with the safer ones first?"

I'm sure as everyone now a days is very health and safety conscious, these questions will definitely be answered, perhaps in some kind of slideshow presentation, just to ease our nerves about the whole situation, but who knows. Honestly though, this is kind of common sense, please don't just skip over this point otherwise I don't think people will get what's going on.

Moving on to yesterday, I got an email from someone at work, whilst at work with the subject line 'Star Wars 7 Trailer'. Now I knew that this would be coming out at some point soon so I wasn't as surprised, but that didn't stop me from being taken aback by the trailer and how absolutely amazing it was. Even though very little was actually shown, what they did include looked brilliant.

The highlighted oddly for me was actually the clips of the X-wings and of the Millennium Falcon, not just because I love those ships but because of how modern the clips look, and how because of J. J Abrams involvement the scenes looked very similar to the latest Star Trek.

I did not think I would get this excited over this new set of Star Wars films but after having seen this trailer I cannot wait. The only problem with this being that the first film doesn't come out till sometime next December. Why do they have to release these trailers so early and makes us wait ages!

This is why I don't like to get involved in the hype and tend not to watch to many teasers/trailers. I cannot wait though, these films look so good. Hurry up next June and next December!

Updates: Presents, Work and Making Lists

I have a few things to talk about this week so I thought I'd go back and do one of my old general update style blogs, where I talk about a couple of things.

First things first, I've been talking about Christmas quite a bit over the last couple of weeks and even though I've been dismissing it quite a but so far, its about time now that I feel I should stop ignoring it and start preparing for this chaotic holiday.

Nicely segwaying from Christmas chaos :). I realised this week, after my initial early flurry of buying presents, that I have started to fall behind once again like I normally do.

I went through my list of who I've bought presents for so far and noticed that I actually had quite a few gaps and really should get back to figuring out what to get and ordering them pretty soon, otherwise I'm going to be very late and joining others in the Christmas eve shopping rush.

Next thing, I was pleasantly surprised at work this week to be getting more involved with the community management aspect of our social network accounts. I'm now taking over more with regards to Facebook as well as just twitter and I've started to create more informal content that is hopefully geared more towards getting people talking and and communicating with us.

Community manager was a job title that I applied for numerous times over the summer and is something I'd love to do as a full time job, so this new aspect of work is obvious something I've really enjoyed doing and look forward to doing more of.

Last of all, for the past few years I have created a series of favourite lists displaying things like my favourite games and songs of the year. Having created this little tradition I feel like I'd quite like to do these lists again, and so from next week will start to short list my lists and try to narrow down this years favourites.

I actually have quite a bit of fun making these, although they do often take quite a bit of time to do. Hopefully because of my previous experience of favourite list making, this year the lists won't take as long to do and I should be able to get them out before Christmas. Fingers crossed.

I strangely look forward to reading them once they're done and comparing them to previous years to see how things have changed and what's still topping the list.

Family get together

Today a number of my family members descended upon the Broadway hotel in Letchworth to celebrate my Grandads 80th birthday.

Every time there's one of these big family get together we always say that we won't wait until the next big gathering to meet up, but life and things always happen. Because of this, these gatherings always tend stray away from what the event is actually meant to be, in this instance a surprise birthday party and becomes a place where everyone catches up and recalls everything that happened since the last meet up.

These family gatherings, on most occasions also tend to have moments of family drama, which as long as it doesn't involve you, can be very entertaining.

Within the last few of these gatherings, when my cousins have come with there other halves and children, my mum has started to 'subtly' hint at my sister about the idea of also getting married and potential producing grand kids, and to me about getting together with someone. Our responses to these have so far been, nod and say yes, while thinking in my own time.

The festivities started off slightly rocky due to things getting a bit chaotic and people running late, but when everything settled down, everyone seemed to have a really nice time.

It is slightly awkward, that we don't actually see quite a few members of our family, and then when these gatherings come around we have to go through the whole what have you been up to since we last spoke. Its not particularly awkward in a bad way, just that we're not all random people meeting up, we're family members, we just don't get to see each other much and we're useless at keeping in regular contact.

As I said it was a nice afternoon, and something a bit different from the usual weekend schedule.

Time to head back into London again tomorrow, to go meet up with some other people and spend some time exploring the British Museum.

Christmas is coming too early!

Last week was Halloween, and this week it was Bonfire Night, two days that several years ago would have acted as a reminder that Christmas was coming up soon.

Although the 'countdown to christmas' period has been getting earlier and earlier each year, this year it was about the middle of October when I first saw advent calendars going on sale and shops swapping over their seasonal isles to Christmas related stock

It seemed this year as though most shops just wanted to gloss over Halloween and Bonfire night and go straight to the main event that is Christmas. In my local Morrison's, as I said about mid to late October, the seasonal isle was half Halloween stock and half Christmas, in October!

Honestly, I love Christmas, it's and amazing time of the year, but October is way too early to start thinking about Christmas. This isn't just because Christmas is still quite far off, but as I mentioned we still technically have two holidays to go in between October and December, and they are now just getting swept aside.

Initially I just put this down to shops just being shops and trying to get in early, get people buying, and stuff like that, but other annual signs of Christmas have also started earlier such as the Christmas adverts. Everyone always looks forward to these adverts, and loads if people use these as a definitive way to officially recognise that Christmas is coming.

How many people do you know freak out when they first see the John Lewis advert or Coke Cola advert? Because they know these are signs of the things to come!

Due to this advance in Christmas things, I have for some reason now been forced to write up several Xmas lists of presents I would like and been taken out on several shopping trips to go and buy presents. I'm never this organised!

The only real problem I have with things approaching this early is because although its nice to get into the Christmas spirit, things do have to go on as usual, school and work still go on, and we now have to wait longer before we can throw those aside and enjoy Christmas.

The epic journey to the fireworks display

I'm not entirely sure whether this is just a British thing, or completely universal, however I have myself only experienced this at British events.

So a couple of hours ago my family and I headed off to the train station because we were coming to the annual Alexandra Palace fireworks display. Being a Saturday evening the trains were quite busy as you'd expect.

Upon arriving at Finsbury Park, where the majority of people were changing to get on to the Alexandra Palace line, busy became a massive understatement. The guards at the station seemed to be under strict orders to cram as many people onto the train as possible. In true British fashion though everyone felt they deserved to be on that train, meaning that no one wanted to budge, causing a kind of stand off between the people on the train and the people wanting to get on the train.

Why I say that I feel this is mainly a British trait is because this is a very similar experience to getting on the tube. Everyone knows that another tube will be along in one minute, but because they are there they are determined to get on even if it kills them rather than waiting the one minute for a less crowded train.

Now that everyone was getting quite riled up due to the crowding on the train and the odd comments by people passively expressing their annoyance, we all then headed off the train to queue to get out of the station and on to the queue to get into Alexandra Palace.

Both of these proceeding events occurred in much the same manner as the train incident, lading to the air of tension surrounding me now as I sit on a hill outside Alexandra Palace, with thousands of other people as we wait for the fireworks display to begin.

I do fully understand the irony of my "passively expressing their annoyance" comment to just made as this post is completely me letting out steam, but it is also something I'd like to note down, and find out whether this is a universal thing. Just like when people say their version of family time at Christmas is everyone fighting, do big holiday events such as this have the same effect; everyone needs to get in quickly, or have the best space,  and feel kind of like they have the right to that because they purchased tickets for it.

Even though I've just said all of this, I have literally just experienced the complete upside to this trait, when a women over the speaker system announced "due to technical problems, the fireworks display will be delayed til 8" and everyone as one united group started booing.

Even though all of these same people had been forced in to train carriages crammed up against each over, shoving each other to get ahead in the queue and to get better seats, when a common enemy appeared all those differences were but aside and we all banded together.

I had a feeling this post would end on a slightly ranty depressing note, but that little moment has definitely turned things round. Everything has its pro's and con's I guess.

Coincidence or just sheer luck

Following on from my last post, this week was my first full week working as an intern for a games company in London. Having gotten past the initial new guy period and getting stuck in more this week, it became strangely obvious how specifically tailored job this internship is to me.

You'd probably be able to tell from these blogs that I am very into my video games, not just playing them but learning about how they are made, reading all the news surrounding the industry.... So working for a games company is brilliant. Furthermore a games company that partners with museums to make educational historical games, when I went to do a degree in History at university, just adds to the tailor made job-ness of the job.

This week I have spent quite a few hours working on the company's social media accounts, creating content, gaining followers, advertising the company, and becoming a community manager/social media manager was the job I was most applying for and hoping to get into.

To top everything off, I have always been a computer guy, fixing gadgets and computers for my family, creating things, solving tech related problems, etc... And this week one of my main tasks has been to create the press/media section for the company's website. As they currently don't have a press section on the site, I have had to go through the website builder, and using the tools and all of their assets create this new section from scratch, which has been great. Taking me back to my days doing ICT when you'd be given a new project and would run with it.

There just seem to be loads of little things popping up that are oddly coincidental. Not at all complaining , just slightly freaked out a bit.

Looking forward to next week, as we are visiting one of the historical attractions that we're partnered with, to launch a game, talk with journalists and take photos of the event. It should be a really cool, and fun day.

My first week as an intern

This weekend marks the end of my first week as an intern. After that dilemma I was facing last week, I think I can now pretty confidently say, I made the right choice.

Although it took me a few days to settle in, as it does with anything really, I feel like I'm starting to ask the right questions, and beginning to think like a PR/marketing guy. Yes I know I've only been there a week, but I like to get stuck into things. I also know that I've attached only just stretched the surface, and in three months time will look back on this blog thinking you don't know the half of it.

The place where I'm interning is honestly a great place to work though, with a great group of people who like what they are doing, in a relaxed and light hearted atmosphere. Even though everyone  is only meant to work until 5:30, I don't think I've seen anyone leave earlier than 5:50 at the earliest because they want to finish something off, or want to go over and check something.

I also feel as though I'm not seen as an intern in this company, but as someone who is willing to learn, who is open to being taught about how the world of game development, PR, and marketing work. My love of history also give a me a great a advantage within the company as no one else comes from a historical background, and when making educational games tailored to historical attractions, it can be handy to have someone with my insight.

At the end of the week when I expected to pack up and head home, I discovered that the team there will often stay late have a few drinks in the office, eat a few snacks and play this game called tagpro that they usually play. It was a great, unexpected end to the work week and nicely once again solidified my choice to take up this role and work for these guys.

A Big Dilemma

The phrase 'I was waiting for a bus for ages, and then two turned up at once' seems like a very adequate way to sum up my week this week.

Spending Monday searching for and applying to various jobs, I decided to apply for several internships, as well as the normal jobs, and within a few days I had two interviews. This is however where the dilemma occurred.

The first internship was for a games company who make educational games for museums, offering a full time position, without pay but they'd cover my travel expenses. The second internship was for a software company who make business related software, however their internship was paid and also covered travel expenses.

Internship one would be right up my street as its a games company making games in the field I spent three years studying at university; history, however it doesn't pay. Internship two is vaguely relevant, a lot more formal businessy but it pays.

That is the dilemma then, spend several months in a position that I'd really enjoy and is similar to what I hope to do down the line, or spend several months longer in a position that isn't really my field of expertise but pays for the work I do??

Obviously I'm currently more swayed towards the games company as the experience I feel would be more useful and relevant and it'd be more enjoyable to do, however there is still a part of me that thinks money is important, especially as the Christmas holidays are soon upon us and perhaps I should be paid for the work I'd do.

If only one of these places got back to me, this decision would be so much easier.

How I'd change if I won the lottery

I think I recall talking about this subject a few years ago, however that was more about what I'd buy and do with the money if I won the lottery, this time I quickly want to talk about how that money would change me.

This subject came up on a car journey back from London earlier and whilst we were all coming up with all the things we'd buy, it didn't seem to affect us in the sense of how Froogle we are or the fact that we wouldn't hire drivers because we'd like to drive ourselves and other such normal things.

So yeah, if I were to win millions in the lottery, I'm kind of proud to say that I would still be as Froogle as before, I wouldn't pay out massive amounts for things if they are over priced, I don't think I'd go buy really expensive top of the range cars, or buy a private jet, or have a driver to taxi me around. Is this weird? Do other people feel the same.

To me if I were to win the lottery, I don't think much would actually change in my life, I might travel more and find our things to do than have a fill time job and my house might be a little bit bigger, but other then that the only real change would be that I don't have to worry about money, and I could buy stuff and do things without having to think "can I afford this?"

I'd hope that this would actually be how I'd turn out, as the alternate would be that becoming slightly power hungry and let the money go to head and I don't see that turning out well.

Saying all of this, that I wouldn't change, I would also not like to publicise that i 'd won, as I feel that that would probably be another horrible thing and even though you wouldn't have changed, other people will certainly interact with you differently.

How does everyone reading this feel they would react or change if they were to suddenly have millions of pounds now in your bank account?

EGX/Eurogamer 2014

The past few days have been some of the busiest and most exhausting days in recent memory for me, and ironically the majority of it has been me just standing around in queues.

My plans for this week were essentially, really early Thursday morning head down to London, spend all day at EGX, then come home in the evening. Friday, rest up a bit, write up some stuff for a new article, then in the afternoon/evening head down to London to meet up with some people, then come back. And finally today, do the same as Thursday.

All of that did kind of go according to that schedule, however I feel I significantly underestimated how tired I'd get during the day whilst in London. Moving on from that little rant though.

This years EGX was even better than last years, and the years before combined, mainly because for the first time ever I went as a member of the press, meaning I could get into the press area. No other real benefits other then that but that's still awesome.

One of the best parts of the whole expo had to be when I interviewed Mike Bithell, a British game creator, with a new game called Volume soon to come out. I did get a little bit flustered at times, however it was really fun and I actually learnt quite a bit that didn't come up in my research.

Along the same lines as this, I also went to a press only event held by Square Enix, in a pub around the corner from the expo hall, where we were treated to an exclusive look at a new game, as well as our own private demos we could play without any queuing.

This year was also a really good year for getting a load of free t-shirts/goodies/swag. There was also tonnes of stuff there that I would happily have taken home if I had the money. Hopefully next year I'll be able to return with more goodies, both free and bought.

Even though there was lotsss of people there on both days that I went, I did manage to play quite a few games and not have to queue up to too long, especially compared to Tue amount of queueing I had to do last year. Definite game highlights had to be Evolve, the AC Unity trailer and demo, Alien Isolation, which was very creepy, and Life Is Strange.

Even though there's still one day left, which I'm not off too, I know can't wait for next years EGX.

The run up to EGX/Eurogamer

There is now less than a week before this years Eurogamer, my third consecutive Eurogamer, and the run up this year has been quite different from the other two, thanks once again to my work with Culturefly.co.uk.

Whereas for the previous two years all I would have to do is just wait, and then turn up on the day and play games, this year I have been receiving press releases about the games and companies going to the event. Through these releases I have also been able to arrange several interviews with game days, and manage to secure an invite to a small press only event happening a short distance from Earl's Court.

Even though I could actually arrange several more interviews, I have never actually done an in person interview before and so thought I'd ease myself into things, figure out how best to record the interview and such...

I think i may have already have mentioned this before but this year will also be the first time that I am going as press instead of just a paying participant, meaning I can get into the press area of the expo, unfortunately I doesn't allow me to jump queues :).

This year will also be the first time that I am going for two days, up until now I've just gone on the Thursday, but I will also be going on the Saturday this time too, which even though will be really busy, should still be fun.
A few early mornings ahead of me this week then so to make sure I get close to the front of the queue and don't have to wait for ages to get in. I'm sure the sacrifice will be worth it.

An unexpected journey to Brighton

This week has been a very surprising week, full of very unexpected events.

The week started out like most weeks recently, doing things around the house , catching up on some TV, and surfing the web going through a load of new job specs, applying to the ones that fit with me.

On Tuesday, about 5 o'clock, just about when everyone's starting to think about leaving work, I came across a job spec for a recruitment role, recruiting people for gaming industry positions. The big difference with this position compared to all the rest was that the location of this position, as you can provably guess from the title, was in Brighton. Even though this was the case, Brighton isn't the furthest place in the world and I didn't know how likely it would be that I'd get it so I decided to apply.

Literally about 15 minutes later after sending off this application I got a call from the company who was offering the role, saying that they were really excited to speak to me after having read my CV and were even keener to get me down to their HQ and have me come interview for the role.

About an hour or so after this phone conversation occurred, I found myself online booking tickets to go down to Brighton two days later on Thursday.

Usually I'm the kind of person who likes to do a bit of prep work before going to important interviews and who also gets pretty nervous about going to interviews. In this case however there wasn't really much time for either of these things, which is good I guess on one hand and not so good on the other.

Thursday then rolls around, and after a kind of long journey, with some delayed trains and timing issues, I am in Brighton, sat in a conference room waiting for the guy to come in and start the interview. In the end I was there for just under three hours so I'll bypass the majority of what went on, however I quickly came to learn that the people there were actually extremely friendly, very honest, unusually forth coming (if you believe the recruiter stereotype) and went into a lot of depth about the job and what they'd expect from their ideal candidate.

Even though they were awesome guys, the company seemed like a great place to work at and it would be a gaming industry job, I left feeling slightly unsure.

Friday morning, I wake up, turn my phone on and discover a voicemail message saying the guys from Brighton would like to chat about my thought on the previous day.

To cut the story short, as I feel I am now starting to ramble, they were prepared to offer me the recruitment position at their company, however with some time to think and my head now clear, I unfortunately decided that I was not the best fit for that role, and would have to decline. The main reason being that even though I feel I could have learnt how to do a lot of the sales side of the job, I wouldn't have the instincts and approach to sales that they were looking for, and in a target driven, commission based role, that is pretty crucial.

The fact that the role was in Brighton was also a slight concern, however if I was sure about the role and certain that I could do it then that would have been a move I'd have been willing to make.

All in all, not your standard week, a great experience definitely and I got to meet some awesome people, plus I got to see some of Brighton. I wonder how next week will play out :)

How much do TV programmes teach and influence us

For the last few weeks I have been marathoning the TV series 'House' starring Hugh Laurie. For those who haven't seen it before and don't know what the programmes about, it is basically a hospital drama where Dr House and his team have to diagnose a unique patient with strange symptoms each week. There is more too it then that but that's the basic jist.

Having now watched several series of House, with all these doctors using all of this technical medical jargon, you start to pick up little things and feel like it is actually teaching you something, something that is factual and can be used in real world situations.

Second example, kind of similar to this but is to do with the TV series called 'Lie To Me'. The basic premise with this series is that the main protagonist is an expert at reading people and knows when people are lying. He is then called upon as a consultant sometime by lawyers, companies or the cops to help find the truth.

Similarly to house, in Lie To Me they often talk through the process of how they know people are lying, learning to read tells, body language, the language they say and many other aspects. Once again after you have watched quite a few of the episodes you feel like you could start to see if people are lying, like you have been taught the skills they are portraying on TV.

Last example and probably the easiest to see just how influential TV programmes can be, CSI. I'm sure most people have heard of this programme, however again if you haven't, the basic premise is each week one or several crimes have been committed and its the teams job to figure out what happened and who did what.

Again I'm almost 100% that anyone you has watched even just a few seasons of CSI will say that they now know how to commit a crime and get away with it, of at least have picked up tips on how to not get caught, because of what they have seen on that show.

Its kind of nice when you think about it, especially using these three examples. Its not particularly being influenced its more just being taught something, medical knowledge, psychological skills, forensic skills and how to kill someone and get away with it. Okay the last one might fall into the grey area of what people should be taught but you still puck things up when you don't mean to, just from watching a 45 minute programme.

I might start using this as a method of choosing TV programmes to watch in the future; I get yo watch to co series and learn something at the same time, best of both worlds.

Has anyone else watched a TV programme of film and come away feeling they have learnt a new skill or something along those lines?

A new level of being a Games Journalist

Several weeks ago my editor for the website i contribute towards, decided to set me up my own personal 'company' email address. The purpose of this was so that I could access many of the big games companies press areas and to allow me to have a more professional contact address, which was tied to the website.

Before having this new email address, o would have to wait for my editor to send through any relevant press releases, or information sent through by gaming developers. Although this way did work very well to begin with, when your an editor managing various sections of a website and numerous writers, it can sometimes take time to get round to sifting through and sending out information.

Having now gotten this address and gained access to all of these big, generally restricted press areas, I'm now experiencing a whole new side to gaming journalism that I haven't really touched on too much before. This new side is to do with talking first hand with PR companies, gaming studios directly, and gaining insider info quicker than the general public.

Up until this point, the majority of the news I have reported on, has come from hearing about it through other news outlets. Apart from when i have reported on gaming conventions, when announcements are made publically direct from the gaming companies,  my work is often released later than the bigger news sites.

It was a great feeling the other week to have gotten a press release through, which was about the release of the new World of Warcraft expansion, and to have written up an article sent it through to my editor and have it published before a number of the popular gaming news sources.

With all of these new experiences coming my way it does really make me wish that I could turn this into an actual full time paid job rather than a volunteering position that I do in my spare time. It's also really strange to think about how I kind of fell into this position, after initially getting in contact with Culturefly.co.uk about writing film and book reviews.

However this happened and how I managed to end up where I am, it has been really awesome writing for Culturefly.co.uk, and even better I can write down gaming journalist on my CV. I know I'm still very small time compared to many other journalists out there but I think I've done enough to earn that title.

Dr Who - Deep Breath

Today I spent another full day down in London, meeting up with some more awesome Nerdfighters, enjoying the last remnants of the summer, before the rain and snow engulf the country.

After the meet up, a group of us headed off to another part of London, to go and see the first episode in the newest series of Dr Who live in a cinema. As much as I was worried about the future of Dr Who after it was announced that Matt Smith was leaving, I am now really happy and almost 100% sure that things are going to be fine.

The first episode was an extended episode unlike most of the previous episode we've seen, and we all came out of it thinking that it was far better then we could have imagined. It was really funny, slightly dark, with some twists and some new/old baddies causing the usual chaos and mayhem. Basically it was a really good episode.

I don't just yet want to say wholeheartedly that I am confident about the future of Dr Who, however I am reassured and am really looking forward to see the direction they go in.

The cinema experience was finished off nicely with some behind the scenes extra footage about how the episode was made and Peter Capaldi's first few days as the Doctor. We were also treated to the live Q&A going on at Leicester square Odeon, as they streamed it into the cinema. That to say was also brilliant to watch and rounded off the evening very nicely.

Today has been a good day, and my hope in the Dr Who series and been for the most part restored. I now cannot wait to see next weeks episode!

Gamescom coverage

This week out in Cologne, Germany was Europe's biggest gaming trade show, Gamescom. Wanting to continue with my gaming journalism writing for culturefly.co.uk I decided to take some time off of job hunting and cover this event.

Similar to the E3 event that took place in LA back in June I think it was, I noted down when the company conferences were, such as Microsoft and Sony, so I could watch them live online and then write up articles about the news as and when it was coming out.

Unfortunately life still gets in the way, and I didn't have as much free time as I did surrounding E3, but I was still able to watch some of it live and get some articles written up and online in quite a short space of time, rivalling the time it took some of the more well known news sources to got their articles up, which is always nice.

It seems very strange at the moment being able to do this writing on this scale, to take a day or two off when I need to and devote my attention to one thing. I know that as soon as I'm back working,the writing will unfortunately have to take a back seat. Unless I am extremely luck enough to find somewhere where that would be my job.

I guess the point I'm trying very long to get to in a very long winded manner is that it has been nice to have those few months at uni and these months over the summer to dedicate my time to something new, something that I enjoy and would like to take on further, without too much worry as to how things would keep ticking over. I'm very fortunate to have had that time.

Saying all of this, I am slowly reaching that point where it would be nice to have something full time again, and preferably get paid also. Can't hold off being an adult much longer :)

Summer holiday week

As I mentioned in last weeks post, last weekend kicked off the beginning of our families summer holiday week, where instead of going away on a holiday/trip we came up with a variety of things to do in the local area.

Along with the various ideas we came up with to do this week, we were also invited to attend my uncles wedding which we went to on Thursday.

With the holiday week now at an end, I can honestly say that my feet have never felt so tired and I think I'll be having a few early nights over the coming days to catch up on some sleep and recuperate.

This week has been a really fun week, even with all of the walking and hot weather. In the end we managed to go all around London doing that A to Z route thing, we had a nice early morning at Top Golf, we did a murder scavenger hunt around a small village, went bowling and played a few rounds, went swimming, had a not so prosperous evening at the Harlow greyhound racing, and then lastly we went to the wedding.

Weddings are still a new experience to me, with this wedding being the second one that I have ever been too. Still trying to pick up the order of how things are meant to play out, and the roles of the people involved in the wedding party. As much as I have picked up from watching TV programmes and films, real life weddings are entirely what I expected them to be.

This week has been a really fun week, despite the amount of walking and the hot weather. However as much as I have enjoyed this week, the unfortunate news that I just missed out on the gaming studio job, that I went to an interview for last week, means that I will have to go back and start sifting through all of the job sites and start writing out applications again. Back to work it is then next week, wish me luck on getting another interview.

London A to Z Scavenger Hunt

Yesterday evening officially marked the beginning of my family's summer holiday week off. Instead of going camping again like last year we have decided to stay around home and have instead come up with a load of ideas for things to do this week.

The one main idea that we all came up with and have spent quite a lot of time figuring out and preparing for is a sort of race/scavenger hunt that will take place in London.

With there being six of us, we have split up into three teams of two people, and our mission will be to travel around London to visit and photo a set of predesignated roads/buildings/landmarks beginning with one of the letters of the alphabet; A-Abbey Road, B-BBC Headquarters, etc...

To make things more interesting we have set a time limit to visit all of the locations and a finish point where we all need to meet. Furthermore we have given each location a point score, the higher points going to the furthest locations, then once we have all finished we will add up all of our points to see who won.
We did spend a very long time coming up with the points and the rules and it does go into a bit more detail but for sake of explaining it that's the basic jist of things.

We also came up with a number of tasks that have to be accomplished throughout the day, such as to take a photo with a stranger, just to make things even harder.

Due to the complexity of this scavenger hunt, the time it will take to complete and the distance we will be travelling, we have all spent time coming up with routes and back up alternate routes to get us around in the quickest way possible and in case certain tube lines are closed.

I have a feeling tomorrow is going to be a long day with a lot of walking and travelling involved, but wish me and my brother luck for our team to win. This should be a great start to our holiday week.

My first telephone interview

I don't want to keep going on about finding a job and sending out applications and all that stuff, so I'll try to keep things brief.

Yesterday afternoon, completely out of the blue, I got a phone call from a company I had applied to several days before, asking whether I would be available for a telephone interview early next week.

Obviously I said yes, but this will be my first ever over the phone interview and even though initially I thought it would be great, so much better than an in-person interview, i'm starting to get a bit worried.

With in-person interviews I always tend to get a bit flustered and nervous, mainly because you always get asked really random questions and you never know whether what your saying is good or bad. Ironically its this face to face interaction that probably makes in-person interviews better than over the phone ones, speaking over the phone you have no way of gaging the persons response.

Even though you do lose this in-person interaction, you do gain the opportunity to prepare some answers beforehand, and to perhaps have some scenarios already written down that you can look over as the interview is being conducted.

Hopefully everything will go well on Monday, even if I have never done one of these things before, this jobs does look really good though, so fingers crossed.

Dota 2 - The International 4

As I said last week I'm not the biggest football/world cup fan or supporter of Wimbledon. What I am a fan of however are e-sports, specifically watching Dota 2, Call of Duty and Battlefield 3 and 4 matches.

E-sports for anyone that doesn't know is basically the video game equivalent of normal sports competitions. Reading that sentence you'll most likely have one of two reactions, either; that's stupid video games can't be a sport, or that's amazing how do I get involved and where can I watch those competitions.

This first reaction seems to be the most prominent currently for many reasons; because people believe that games are antisocial, unhealthy, cause mental problems, etc... Just to address this reaction quickly Dota 2 players and StarCraft 2 players in places like South Korea are seen as celebrities, video game rock stars. I even heard that I popular Korean Dota 2 team was asked to go give a pep talk to the South Korean football team because they are seen as bigger and more important celebrities than even footballers.

Still unsure whether e-sports are legit? The winner of Wimbledon wins a million or two in prize money along with the cup. The winning team of The Dota 2 International, which is currently going on, will win just over five million, along with the aegis shield. For added validity The International 4 is also available to watch on ESPN.

For me, even though I still don't really follow teams other than when they are in these tournaments, I do try and get behind a team and watch their progression and support them. Even if they are knocked out, watching e-sports just seems far more interesting, and when you actually understand what's going on, you discover the sport is very complex and tactical.

I'm not too sure where I was going with this post, I mainly just wanted to talk about e-sports as I'm currently sat watching the Dota tournament, and would love for more people to know that these things exist. It's also a little addition to last weeks post, displaying another example of how myself and others are slightly different with regards to what sports we like to watch and support.

Has anyone heard of e-sports before? Willing to give them a watch or want to know more? The best part about e-sports, it basically lives on the internet.

Am I Weird? - Part 2

I wrote a blog post titled 'Am I Weird?' perhaps a year/ a year and a half ago, in which I talked about several everyday traits and routines that I noticed I have, and thought I'd put them out there and ask whether these things were normal compared to other people. Feeling similar to how I did back then I thought I'd write down some more observation and once again ask that question.

To kick things off we'll jump straight into a popular subject and that is sports. The world cup and Wimbledon have both just been on, and  both events have been watched quite intensely by members of my family for the last few weeks. In both cases my family had their favourites teams/players, as well as supporting England or English players and got very into the activity of watching these sports.

When it comes to sports though I'm very rarely interested in watching them or following specific teams, apart from one or two exceptions. I'm not entirely sure why, I've always been like this, perhaps its a lack of attention thing, or that I'd rather play that sport then just sit and watch it, id not sure.

I have recently discovered others who also aren't that interested in religiously following these sports, but it still seems that when these events come around, your doing something wrong if you don't know what's going on.

The next thing, which doesn't really affect as a wide an audience as the last topic, is gardening. In our new house we are lucky enough to have quite a large back garden where we can sit outside and chat, have bbq's...the problem comes when I am asked to now the lawn and cut the hedges. Now I don't particularly mind doing these things, its just that for some reason the grass and leaves seem to grew very quickly in our back garden and some I'm having to do these thongs ever few weeks. I know people like to have a nice garden but does it really matter that much if the grass is an inch too tall or is left an extra few weeks growth time. Perhaps this is me being a bit lazy but still does that male sense to some people,grass will always grow, I'm fighting a losing battle :).

Lastly, i wanted to talk about the topic of getting a tan. As a person who is more a fan of winter, I find the concept of wanting to get a tan I bit confusing. My sisters will lie outside on the grass, listening to music or just laying there looking like they're about to fall asleep all in the hope of getting a tan. I know some people look slightly healthier with a tan, put again I don't really see the need for one, for looking less pale. Once again during this time of the year, if you say your happy not to be out getting a tan or you want to go inside for a bit out of the heat, you regarded as slightly strange for not taking advantage of the weather.

Does anyone else feel the same way about any of these things, or is able to provide me with some deeper insight into these topics. Am I just weird?

The time of Marriage

I have noticed quite a bit recently that I seem to have entered a new societal stage, I guess you could say.

Even though this has become predominantly apparent through the leaving of university etc... It has also become apparent through the growing number of old school friends who are becoming engaged, who are getting out mortgages, and who are starting to seriously think about the idea of having children.

Although I knew this stage was approaching and people would be getting married at some point, I thought this stage was still a good 4/5 years off.

Up until now I have only ever been to one wedding which was for a friend of my sisters, so its strange to think that this number could significantly increase over the next few years.

Its really great to hear all of this news coming in, and again to be honest we had already been placing bets on who would get married and when that would happen, however it feels like a completely different thing for those jokey chats to actually come to fruition.

Even though these announcements do kind of reflect upon you and ultimately place you along this metaphorical timeline, its quite nice to be taking things at my own pace, to be focusing on one thing at a time, and to not have some of the chaos that inevitably ensues from things like weddings, mortgages and children. Saying all of this, I could meet someone tomorrow and have my mind completely changed with regards to that point, but who knows.

P.S I feel like I want to quickly tack this on that I am once again sat writing this on the train on my way home, after having a very enjoyable day hanging out with some awesome Nerdfighters and regardless of my social anxieties I'm really looking forward to the next gathering and getting to chat to them and other new people.

Applying for jobs

Although I have spent time applying for jobs before, its usually been looking for vacancies in shop windows or hearing from friends that they know somewhere that hiring. Now that I'm looking for a proper full time career starting job, searching seems to have gotten incredibly harder, not helped by the fact that we now live down south close to London, where the job market is very competitive.

In my epic quest so far, the biggest problem I  face, which is strangely basic and simple, is finding the correct key words to search to display the relevant jobs I'm looking for. I never really saw this as being a problem to begin with because you'd think if you wanted to search for teaching jobs you'd just search teacher etc...however this doesn't always work.

I don't know if its always been the case but people seem to receive very grandeur sounding job titles like cash machine operative, instead of cashier and so these titles throw off my searches.

Luckily I have been able to apply for quite a few jobs, its just receaching that point now when I have to wait for the deadlines to run out and the companies start to make their decisions. Having only heard back from two  companies so far out of the few dozen I've applied for, I'm hopeful that I'll hear back from some of the others soon. Let's just hope its good news.

If anyone else happens to read this and is also currently in this process of job hunting, I'd love to get some tips on things like where  your looking for vacancies, or decent recruitment agencies etc...

Going to see The Fault In Our Stars

Ever since I heard the announcement that John Greens book The Fault In Our Stars was going to be made into a movie, I had been counting the days till I could go and see it.

Finally that day came. Yesterday evening I headed down to the O2 in London to meet up with a group of nerdfighter and we all headed in to the cinema to go watch the film.

Even though I so eagerly anticipated seeing the film, there was a small part of me that was worried about seeing it. I'm sure most people know by now that more often then not films adapted from books tend not to live up to expectation. This was my fear for this film, that they'd take liberties that affected the story or add in new scenes or do something that ultimately would taint my memories of the book.

After several hours we emerged from the cinema, and were all surprisingly shocked at how amazing it actually was. We all thought that it would be brilliant but they actually seemed to have taken on the concerns of the fans, the advice given by John and produced something that portrays not just the written story but the thoughts and feelings produced from that story.

What's more is that the film seemed to be more than a film for us, it portrays an image of young people that isn't displayed that often now a days, an image that many of us hanging around on the internet feel we share, but people don't see. Its a film that also makes you think, about people, about life, and just about how you act and how you deal with things, and to me any film that makes you ponder over what you have just seen is a success.

Knowing much of the background of the book, and the making of the film from the insight provided by John Green we all felt as though it was more personal to us, having queued up on day one to read the book and through being connected through the virtual community that is the Nerdfighters. It's not like a hipster thing, like we were there from the beginning thing, its just that its something as a community and me personally got invested in and it was awesome to see that the story was done justice.

This isn't a review, or even me saying that people should rush out and see it, (even though you really should) I just wanted, as always, a place to write down my thoughts and some feelings that I was left with yesterday, that I pondered on during the train home.

Being British

This is a topic that I've heard being discussed quite a bit lately, for a multitude of reasons and I thought I'd have my say on things as well. This has also been a topic I was thinking about today as my family and some friends went down to the trooping of the colours at Buckingham palace today.

Whilst we were stood at the side of the mall early this morning, making jokes about stuff we probably shouldn't have with quite a lot of cops around, and getting a bit tired with all of the standing around and 'queuing', it hit me.

Personally, it feels like,  to be British is to not openly acknowledge that you are patriotically British. Does that make sense?  It seems like only with really big nationwide occasions do you find people being overly, actively patriotic.

Also going down the more stereotypical route, the British love to polite but secretly annoyed, like if people push in near to where your queuing. Now in that instance we may not say much but you can be 100% sure that in our heads we are coming up with whole conversations and witty come backs that we really want to say.

Last but not least, queuing. Again personally I feel British people don't have strong feelings one way or the other, its just some innate instinct we have as a society that if there's a queue you join it and if there isn't one you start it.

These are just my quick rambling thoughts but it would be nice to hear what other people think, whether British or not.

Macbeth

My brother is currently a week away from finishing his second year of university doing an acting degree. Before his class could finish for the year they had to do a performance at the Durngate theatre in Northampton.

Several months ago they chose to settle on acting out Macbeth, as the title suggests, and after months of work, spending hours in university rehearsing, painting sets, creating costumes, etc...we finally got to see them act it out this afternoon.

After coming out of the theatre, I can say that I thought it was really great, as a modern twist on the original I did get kind of confuses at certain points, and with the AC out in the theatre everyone seemed to be quite hot and flustered by the end but it was still really good.

Sitting next to my sister who hasn't really heard of or read Macbeth before, I had to explain certain things to her during the interval, however their performance actually showed me that I had forgotten quite a few of the little details of the play, and needed some help distinguishing between what they added in themselves and what I'd forgotten.

Although i'm still not the biggest fan of theatre performances, and not 100% up to date on all of the rules and etiquette surrounding the theatre, today's performance was a nice experience.

First full-time job interview

Today has been one of those days, a day that you know is coming, you know what is going to happen but you just aren't prepared for.

I know that people say your first few big interviews can be quite nerve racking, and you can only really over come this with experience, and I quite clearly found this out today.

After two and a half hours, I emerged from the building where I was having the chat and interview and I was thoroughly drained at the end of it. Besides just my normal anxiety, I'm not really the kind of person who likes to big themselves up or feels the need to bend the truth when it comes to things on my CV etc... Not doing these things however doesn't really help you with regards to getting the job though, the reason your there is to sell yourself, to show them why you should be hired instead of other people.

I feel most interviews won't last that long, this one was more of an exception because they wanted to go through the ins and outs of the business to fully explain what the job consisted off and what role I would have within that system.

Upon leaving the interview, strangely my first thought wasn't I hope I get this job but in fact was whether I myself, actually wanted the job. I know especially know a days people should be lucky with what jobs they get, but coming straight out of university I feel now if ever is the time I have to choose what I want to do to hold out for something better and to not take the first thing that comes my way because its a job and it pays.

In an ideal world I would rather get something I was fully interested in, that challenged me and that doesn't necessarily feel like a nine to five day in day out type job. If something like that were to come along I'd be happy to start off lower and to work my way up through the ranks.

Maybe I should instead be happy with what I get and not be too picky, saying this though I still feel if ever now is the time I can be choosy and hold out for something else. Should I take something just because it means it will get the money flowing quicker?

Getting a new pet

Ever since we moved down south from our house in Scarborough my mum and little sister have been desperate to get a new dog. To this end they have been going through adverts and searching sites online to research different breeds and how much they cost and all those kind of things.

With the goal of getting a dog seemingly still a while off it was a bit of a surprise for my older sister and me to find out early today that this evening my mum was going to look at a dog that she would almost certainly be bringing home.

After a seven hour round drop up to Cheshire and back we now seem to have a new dog. With it being quite a spur of the moment kind of deal, unfortunately it doesn't yet have things like a bed or lead and such but I'm sure those are all things that can be picked up quite quickly.

What I found quite strange about this experience is kind of related to that saying 'a dogs not just for Christmas', having just gotten back from university and discovered all of this dog research was going on and then out of the blue we now have a dog, it shows you just how much preparation is needed and how much work and responsibility having a dog is.

I know things have to change with regards to taking it for walks and spending time with it, its more the things like all the shots they have to have at a young age, rules when interacting with other dogs, and i never really knew just how much dogs actually cost and how much some of the 'better/rarer' breeds actually go for.

Having not had a dog for a long time now this will be something to get used to again, its just slightly strange being on the adult side of getting a dog now rather than them just appearing one day and you being able to play with it whilst your parents take care of all the other less fun stuff.

Also, how hard is it to choose a name?! How parents are able to name their children and then stick to it I'll never know.

Unpacking my life

Another over the top title this week it seems, couldn't really think of another way to phrase it.

What I am trying to adequately summarise in this title is how over the last two fays I have packed up everything I own from my flat into what ended up being far more boxes them I predicted, packed all of these boxes into a car, drove them back to my families home, unloaded them and for the most part unpacked them all.

The hardest thing about all of this process wasn't the constant nagging thought that I've forgotten something but was moving from my own reasonably sized en-suite bedroom to a make shift type bedroom with little storage space or floor space. The reason this was difficult was basically because I have too much stuff to fit in this room so I have been having to choice out of everything what has priority in the new room and what can be stored away in the attic.

As with any type of move it has been quite stressful, as I have just depicted within that example but it has also been nice to have a new space which you can do stuff with and move things around and make into your own space.

I haven't unfortunately managed to unpack all of the bags and boxes just yet or totally decide what will be going into the attic but I have managed to get the essentials all sorted. Hopefully in a few days I'll have everything sorted or as close to as I can for the moment. At least with things put away and pictures up etc...its feeling more like my own room, which was something I had worried about with regards to the whole moving back home into the back room situation.

Now I'm back home and university is all done with I guess the next big thing will be to start the daunting task of searching for a new job. Perhaps I might take just a few days off before that though, just to recuperate a bit and as a little treat to myself for finishing university and all my work.

Trouble sleeping...

I have always been a night person. When I was young I would find myself still awake in the early hours of the morning watching the most random programmes on channels like TNT if anyone can remember that. Even when I had to get up at seven for secondary school having only had about four or five hours sleep, I was always able to function through the tiredness with no problem.

Recently however I've been having a problem actually trying to get to sleep, finding the only way I could actually get to sleep is to just stay up, keep myself busy and wait until I nod off. I don't particularly think there is anything behind this apart from a messed up sleeping pattern and slightly off lifestyle at the moment, but it is a bit of an annoyance.

I also didn't release until recently how many different illnesses/conditions can cause sleeping problems or have them as symptoms. This was all information I read on the internet early in the morning so it could all be lies, or stuff that I imagined in a sleepy haze.

This time has atleast given me the opportunity to catch up on movies that I've been meaning to watch, to marathon through some tv shows and get on with some reading. It is also as I am finding an alright time to do some blogging. However similarly to the early morning medical research I'm sure when I read this back in the morning it wont sound as well put or make as much sense.

With this being said I should probably end this here and get back to trying to get to sleep, as my last piece of coursework still needs to be finished off before my deadline next week. Wish me luck.

Quotes from places...

I've had these in my head for quite a while now, and that's kind of where they have stayed. I've been meaning to write them down mainly through fear of forgetting some of them or messing up the wording. Plus its just nice to have them in a little collection together. Hopefully in the future I'll come back here and edit this post adding more as I find them.

As always when people like certain quotes, some may have certain meanings and reasons behind them specific to that person, and others may just be really good quotes.

“Maybe our favorite quotations say more about us than about the stories and people we're quoting.” 
 - John Green

“Happiness can be found, even in the darkest of times, if one only remembers to turn on the light.” 

 - Albus Dumbledore

"Life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it." 

 - Ferris Bueller 

Annie: In the end she gave up. 

Chris: There's nothing wrong with that. 

Annie: Her husband didn't think so. 

Chris: He was a coward! Being strong, not giving up, it was just his place to hide. He pushed away the pain so hard he disconnected himself from the person he loved most. [pause] Sometimes when you win, you lose.

 - What Dreams May Come

“My thoughts are stars I cannot fathom into constellations.”
 - John Green, The Fault in Our Stars 

"I fell in love the way you fall asleep: slowly, and then all at once.”

  - John Green, The Fault in Our Stars 

 “Why, sometimes I've believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast.”
 - Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland

Mad Hatter: “Why is a raven like a writing-desk?” “Have you guessed the riddle yet?” 

Alice: “No, I give it up...What’s the answer?”
Hatter: “I haven’t the slightest idea”

 - Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland

“You used to be much more..."muchier." You've lost your muchness.”
 - Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland

The end is nye...

I've just noticed that I have somewhat of a over dramatisation when it comes to naming these posts. Although what I have to say may not actually be that dramatic or unique, it is fairly important, to me at least and I guess to those in the same situation.

Whilst sat in my flat earlier, contemplating doing some more work I quickly had a check to see when my last deadline was, a was slightly shocked to see that it is in three weeks time from yesterday. Now I say I was shocked partly because I still have a lot of work to do a that to me isn't that long away. The other reason I was shocked though is because that isn't just my last deadline, its my last piece of university work and technically once handed in I'm then all done with education.

As much as I really cannot wait to hand all of this work in and not worry about having to do random essays anymore or feel the stress that they can bring, I have this small feeling that I'm actually going to miss it. This doesn't just apply to essays though, I'm sure in a few months time I'll be doing whatever I am doing and I'll be wishing I was back in school.

If I'm being honest here, even though you go through a lot of stress and you have all of these random assignments and deadlines, and vast amounts of books to read, we actually get it kind of easy. No longer children or young adults at this point.

Time to put everything I've learnt over these past 22 years to good use. Know idea how I'll do that just get, but hopefully I'll figure it out in due time.

Summer has arrived??

It seems as though that time of year is upon us once again, where families are making long drives to the coast, the smell of barbeque is in the air and people become brave enough to go out in shorts and T-shirt.

Is it just me or does this sunny summer weather come around earlier and earlier each year? What's even weirder is that, in Britain anyway, we have several weeks of really sunny weather early on, then it goes back to gloomy windy weather then summer comes back again. Its because of this that I think British people get enthusiastic really quickly when they see nice weather and try to plan outings and such as soon as they can because they know that the weather can change really quickly and that it could be a few months before its back again.

As someone who is more in favour of winter, I think thats a good way to put it, I quite like having these few early sunny days and then the return to normal weather until proper summer comes around. As it is nice to have some good weather days where you can go out, but you know that it will go back to normal for a while afterwards, instead of just having an extended summer where it can often stay very hot for a long time.

Saying all of this about how British people react, i'll just add that me and my family were also among these ranks of people, getting the BBQ out of hibernation last week to have our first BBQ of the year.

Thinking about this subject does make me think, what would happen if it actually was sunny and hot for long periods of the year in Britain? As I said because at the moment it's quite rare to have this weather and we tend to go all out and enjoy it whilst it lasts, what would we be like if it was always sunny, would we just get bored of it? Do people in Fluoride or Spain get tired of the sun and look forward to it raining?

Just a few little thoughts I had circling my head as I don't really have much to write about this week, as its the holidays and we've been at home most of the time finishing up work and such. I saying finishing up work, I mean to say attempting to finish work whilst instead watching multiple series of Lost. Still not entirely sure about what's going on in that programme.

Chaos ensues

Since it is the Easter holidays, a short break before my last few weeks at university, I decided to come back home and spend the holidays here.

Currently, I'm kind of regretting this decision, primarily because I have gotten very little work done because I don't have a table or work environment to stop and spend several hours doing research and writing. The second minor reason, is that it seems to be a sample of how things will be when I move back after university and it doesn't seem too good so far.

Although i live in a flat with other people, and I am conscious about being too loud etc... I'm otherwise entirely independent and can do almost whatever I want, whenever I want. Even though I've been told that that won't change when I come home, i do think that it naturally will be somewhat different, and less of an independent situation. For example, whilst at university if I want to go out somewhere I just go, at home though, I may need to check to see if I can so it doesn't clash with anyone else's plans and I may need to give details like where I'll be when I'm back, etc...

Hopefully things have gone the way they have this week because my brother is home also and because its the holidays. Its just another change that has to happen and you have to learn to adapt to. Will be strange coming back to live in the family home full time again.

Just reading this back, I don't mean for this to sound bad at all, its as I said a big change, something that I'll just have to get used to again.

The future of TV

This may sound like one of those 'in my day moments' but I want to talk about it anyway. Whilst back in secondary school, I was an enormous fan of the TV show Stargate, I'd tune in every week on the same day at the same time, for months and months. I did this so that I was up to date, so I knew what was going on with regards to the story, and most importantly because episodes weren't available on the internet so people couldn't save them up and marathon them.

Now a days marathoning TV series seems to be the normal way to go, primarily because it means that you don't have to wait ages to find out what happens next, instead you can just chuck the next episode on.

If you read my previous post, it was that that brought about this thought, about whether or not TV networks are keeping up with the internet and this new way of doing things. Due to the fact that British TV channels are quite slow to bring over American programmes, the only real resort if we want to watch them is to watch them online. Currently it takes about a year or so for American programmes to appear on British TV, perhaps a bit quicker if its particularly popular.

With regards to my last post, networks don't see to have a true representation anymore of who is watching their programmes because either people are watching them in countries that they aren't yet being aired, or because people are waiting til after the series has ended to be able to marathon all of the episodes. When the life of new seasons of shows are still dependent solely on TV ratings then its no wonder so many have been cancelled recently.

With TV programmes now becoming features within the internet is about time networks caught up and adapted to that fact. With companies like Netflix creating their own TV shows that are never aired on TV channels but solely online, and with the number of web series being created, it makes you wonder how long TV shows and more so networks will last.

Why do people cancel TV programmes?

I'm afraid the majority of this post will probably consist of me ranting again, however this time with good reason I feel. It may also inform somewhat informative and enlightening, so don't be too deterred.

So...upon waking up and getting out of bed this morning I did my daily checking of emails, internet stuff and Facebook posts, and to my horror I discovered a post that said that the american network ABC, were cancelling a programme I've been really enjoying lately called Once Upon A Time In Wonderland. The sister show to the Once Upon A Time series.

This is not the first time a series I've liked has been cancelled after its first season and I'm sure it won't be the last, its just very annoying when it happens. The problem, how I see it, is that these network seem to make decisions completely and solely based on money and ratings. Now I'm not particularly naive, I know that for these big companies those are what's important and they are big incentives, it would just be nice though if for once they just listened to the fans of the show and continued to make the shows because there are still people out there who want to watch it, even if that number doesn't quite hit their targets.

The other problem seems to be whether you can really judge a shows popularity after just one season, essentially after eleven or twelve weeks. I didn't realise that this show even existed until about its eighth episode and so I went back to the beginning and caught up. Even if you have a massive ad campaign, which I don't believe this show had, it still sometimes takes a bit of time for news to circulate and to gain more followers. Surely one season isn't enough and most should now start planning for at least two, to provide enough time and to allow people to get more involved and get more immersed in the story or with the characters or the setting of the show...it doesn't seem as though one season is enough time to portray a good TV idea to an audience.

Ironically, when I went on to the shows Facebook fan page earlier on to check if this news was real, I noticed that there were 1.5 million people who had liked the page. Now if even a half, or two-thirds of those people watched the show that's still a lot of people, surely that's pretty good ratings for a network show. I also discovered upon going to this Facebook page that there are now several petitions circling, in an attempt to force the network to listen to the fans and to rethink their decision to cancel the show.

Although I'm pretty sure they won't change their minds, now that its been publicly announced, I'm still holding out for that sliver of hope, that they will give the fans what they want. Otherwise if they don't, they are potentially letting down approximately 1.5 million fans, for the sake of some money, money that could be made up in future seasons, through the loyalty and support of these fans. Only time will tell.

Looking forward

I've mentioned this a couple of times before, but I wanted to expand on it a little further, and that is the ending of university and the beginning of working life.

With this day very quickly approaching its been causing me to seriously think at length about what I want to do, where I want work, where I want to live... Many things that from a long way off don't seem that big am issue or seem to stressful to figure out. Up until this point my go to process of thinking has been to spend a few minutes of deep concentration on the matter and then say to myself, I'll worry about this tomorrow. As I said though there are very few tomorrows left.

This is something that everyone will go through at one point or another, and even with all the the information and advice out on the internet and in universities etc...it still doesn't seem to do that much in the way of preparing you for all of these choices and decisions.

What's worse about this period of decision making however, is that whilst in education your feed a sort of timeline of the way things are meant to play out; you go to primary school, them secondary, then do your GCSE's, then your A-levels, then you go to university, and often it will end with the vague phrase, 'then you go out and use all of that to get yourself a good job'.

Throughout our childhoods and young adulthood were are lead with this series of events, and even though getting a job is on that timeline, along with other major events such as getting married, there is no guidelines or rules for these things.

I am now taking things a bit more seriously And giving this subject a lot more thought, but I guess only time will tell how things play out. Hopefully things will all turn out pretty well in the end and you never know i may even pick up a few tips and tricks along the way to pass along to others who are in the same place as I find myself now.

Week full of firsts and surprises

For anyone who has read these blogs for a long time, you may remember that way back in late 2012, I started to write up some reviews for a news/culture website called Culturefly.

After having written a handful of reviews over the course of a couple of months, this slowly started to fizzle out as i got distracted by university work and other such things. Although since then I haven't submitted any work, I still kept up to date with what was being uploaded to the site and still received the emails sent out to the website contributors.

It was to my surprise last week that in one of the emails sent out, the website editor put out the idea of branching into gaming news and reviews and asked if anyone would be interested in writing some of these articles for the site. As this is the predominant subject I have been writing about on my second blog I sent back an email saying that I would be up for contributing.

Fast forward to the start of this week, I received an email back asking if I would like to look over two press articles sent in by gaming companies and write up an article on each one. That evening I had two brand new articles submitted and published on the site. Since then I have submitted two more articles, making four in one week.

Needless to say this did come at the cost of neglecting my coursework somewhat, however this for me was something I never expected to happen and is probably the most amount of 'journalistic' style writing I have ever done in a week. Furthermore I was able to created new kinds of articles that I had never written before and I was actually given real press releases to study and write from like some kind of actual writer.
Don't get me wrong, I do understand that these 'press releases' were probably sent out to loads of people and were from quite small starter companies, and I do know that i am not writing for any kind of major news and cultural publication, but its a step in the right direction.

A week of many firsts and surprises then. The only downside to all of this, apart from as I said the neglect to my coursework, is that I now may not have as much time to write many completely original pieces for my second blog. That blog however was meant to act as a portfolio of sorts though, so you could make the argument that writing for this site is in fact a better move, as it will still display my work and people may actually seen it now.

Hopefully I will be able to get my coursework and dissertation completed ahead of schedule, so that I can put more effort in and create more articles such as these.

Getting started blogging and what I've learnt

Since starting up my second blog a few months ago, I've been trying to expand my knowledge around blogging/bloggers, how to make then look better, and I've been trying to find other peoples blogs to see what other people are writing about.

During the week this search lead me to find the r/blogger subreddit, where along with loads of get rich quick, get lots of followers type posts, there were also a lot of normal beginner bloggers posting up there blog addresses and asking for tips on how to blog and constructive criticism on the look of their blogs. These posts got me thinking; both about what I was like when I first started off and what makes a good blogger and blog.

When I first started to blog, I had no real intention of writing for anyone but myself. My blog and my writing was for me, it was kind of like an online journal, that I didn't mind being out in the middle of the internet. Due to this, I've never been that fussed about the number of visitors or directing traffic to my blog and other such things. In this sense I wouldn't really class myself as a standard blogger, who began blogging for the more standard reasons and so i'm origins are a bit different from those on Reddit.

Since my writing has changed however and since starting this new blog, my feelings have begun to change and I would quite like to see more people reading my work, and to gain feedback on it to see if it has improved and if it is actually worth reading.

The second question was a lot more complex, there are some tips and tricks but there is no real cut and dry answer. It also all depends on your definition of a good successful blog, is it the amount of views you get, or followers, or comments that are made, or quality of the writing, etc...

When think about this, and whilst looking at some of the redditors blogs, the only real thing I could think of that is mainly universal is this; to write because you want to, and to write what you want to write about. There seem now to be a lot of bloggers emerging who start blogging because they see it as a short cut of shorts, to make them easy money or to use to get ahead in some way. The problem with this however is that most often than not people can tell when your faking it.

I know this blog has been a bit random and probably doesn't appeal to that many people, but in fact this one conclusive thought can be applied to almost anything. Don't try and be fake, do things because you want to do them and not because someone else says so. I know this isn't always the case and sometimes you don't have a choice or the luxury, but whenever you can try to take that option. For me so far it seems like the better choice and you'll feel better about it in the long run.

Just something for people to think about. If you are thinking of starting up a blog or are starting to wrote in any other sense please feel free to share in the comments down below.

My second blog

Last week towards the end of my last blog I began to talk about a second blog that I have set up. This week I thought I'd finally expand on this and talk about why I now have this second blog, the purpose of it, and how that blog will affect what goes on here.

Back in early January, I set up this new blog titled 'The Culture Repository'. The purpose of this blog is to give me a dedicated place where I can upload more formal posts, talking about films, books, games, and perhaps other cultural interests.

There were two reasons that lead me towards creating this second blog. Firstly I wanted to write more reviews and articles surrounding these subjects, and having a separate blog keeps things more organised and pushes me to write more. Secondly, this blog can hopefully act as somewhat of a portfolio, a place that shows off examples of what I can write. Its partly due to this second reason that I haven't yet mentioned this blog before, because I wanted to experiment a bit, get a few articles uploaded and just see how the first few weeks went.

So far everything seems to be going well, I've had several views and gained a couple of followers, and more importantly I've found other people writing articles on similar topics. As with this blog I intend to upload at least one blog a week, if not more, but as I said they should hopefully be written in a more formal/journalistic way, as examples of my writing and a way to practice further.

With regards to how The Repository will affect this blog, the short answer really is it won't. There will still be a blog a week here, they will still be about any and all random things, written in my informal, stream of consciousness type writing. The only difference will be that there won't be any more reviews or such posts on here anymore but instead posted to The Repository. This isn't that big of an impact though as I haven't uploaded one of those in quite a while.

If anyone does want to go check out this second site, you can find it over at: www.culturerepository.wordpress.com.
Any suggestions for improvements or feedback on the articles is always welcome so please feel free to leave a comment.

Who knew when I started this blog however many years ago, that I'd take such a liking to blogging and writing.

A Quiet Week

As the title suggested its been quite a non-eventful week this week, and I haven't really had any of my odd and abstract thoughts that usually inspire a number of these blogs.

The only recurring thing that has happened to me this week is searching online for university book. This has taken as long as it has partly because I am quite, we'll say 'froogle' when it comes to money and partly because these books they want us to buy are so expensive, honestly £45 for a text book that we're only going to use a handful of times. I know that after i'm done with it I can resell it but I'll be lucky to get even half my money back. Its due to this that i've been trawling Ebay daily and Amazon's second hand market place to try get a cheap copy.

What's worse is that the book they want us to buy is the third edition, just released this year that cost twice the price of the second edition but only has a few differences. It'll be sods law though that we will study in depth a section that is not included in the previous editions meaning we definitely have to get this new copy.

Apart from that very timely pursuit of hunting for books, there as I said hasn't been that much happening, just a quiet, normal, average week. Hopefully there will be more to write back about next week.

Oh and whilst I remember...my other blog. I'm now starting to build up somewhat of a foundation so I'll probably write about that soon, just explaining what it is and why I decided to start it up. More about that soon.

Before I go, if your wanting some 'new' music to listen to, check out: Project 46 - Reasons, and Pharrell Williams - Happy, also any song by Keane. I've been going back through their songs for nostalgia's sake and there's so many good songs I'd forgotten about. Definitely check these people out.

Valentines day...

So...it was valentines day yesterday, and unsurprisingly not much happened with regards to my day personally, the internet was a buzz with what seemed to be this silent war however, between the happy loved up people all for valentines day and the people slightly less happy, perhaps single people who aren't so keen on valentines day.

Although individual people were making themselves heard pretty clearly, on things like Facebook, Reddit or the comment section of YouTube, what I thought was funny were the companies who were getting involved and choosing sides in this war. I say this was funny because you do get certain people saying its just one big commercial thing to get people to buy valentines cards and gifts and stuff, and here are some companies being smart taking advantage of the anti-valentines people. Dating websites must have been having a field day yesterday.

This little war did get me thinking though, you know me always mulling over the big important subjects in life. When it comes to Valentines day there are only really two different kinds of people: those who get it, and those who don't, and by 'it' I mean the meaning of the day. The people who get it, whether they are in a relationship or single and regardless of commercialism, get that it is a day dedicated to doing something a bit special and expressing how you feel.
The people who don't get it, again whether single or not, tend to feel it's some kind of pressure, like they are being forced by some big corporations to give loved ones gifts or such, and rebel in some way against that.

An argument that gets thrown around a lot is that you shouldn't need a specific day to express how you feel or do something special for someone, and because you've said that makes you a person that doesn't get it, and your sort of right but stuff sometimes gets in the way, people are busy, life happens, so its nice to have a day put aside for that sole purpose.

What I find slightly ironic, is that in my experience, you find that more of the people in the group who don't get it, are people in relationships.

Well all in all I had quite a nice day yesterday, coming off of a really productive day on Thursday which is always good. Hopefully everyone else out there had a nice day too.