A film came out the other day that will be all but forgotten about within a month. There will be few people over the coming years who say "ah yeah, Friends with Benefits was the best film since Fight Club" but that doesn't mean it won't be good. As with most romantic comedies the aim will be to make everything look pretty, to have some laughs and to leave you feeling happy about life and the possibility of finding someone. Friends with Benefits won't do anything new and I doubt it will even take a place on the following list, but I'm pretty excited about seeing Justin Timerblake and Mila Kunis star in what should be a very enjoyable film.
Number 5 - 10 Things I Hate About You
Strip away my geek credentials and label me a teenage girl if you will, but this is a damn good film. While technically being a modernisation of Shakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew, the film had a large enough tongue in its cheek to get away with its flaws and lack of originality. It contained some of the finest young actors of a generation including Heath Ledger before the darkness and tragedy and Joseph Gordon-Levitt before the suits. 10 Things I Hate About You may not have been big or clever, it may signify the lack of ambition of the genre but it's just so much fun.
Number 4 - Definitely, Maybe
Before I say anything else, there's one thing that needs to be taken care of and that is that Ryan Reynolds is the new king of romantic comedy acting. He has an uncanny ability to play any role and make you wish you could be that person (although this feeling could be exclusive to me). In this example he plays a single father who is pretty disheartened with his job and yet still you can't hope to ever be as cool as he is. It helps that his daughter is played by Abigail Breslin and is as awesome as any parent could want their offspring to become.
What separates this from other rom-coms is that the conclusion isn't completely obvious until near the end of the film and there's even some light politics thrown in as a backing for all the romance. Overall, Definitely, Maybe manages to show half of what Reynolds does best (he is funny and compelling but doesn't take his shirt off and kill/insult anyone) and also shows off a great young actress while being unpredictable and loveable all the way along, which is far more than you could normally ask for in a film of its type.
Number 3 - Chasing Amy
Hand me back those geek credentials please because Kevin Smith is here. The film he created is one that is truly unique within this genre as it tells a genuinely heart-warming tale without collapsing in with clichés. Centred around a comic book artist, the lesbian he has fallen in love with, and his confused best friend, the story manages to find the feelings we all experience in our love lives despite its peculiar setting.
Smith has always been a director that gets the best out of his casts, and this is a shining of example of that fact as Ben Affleck gives the performance of his career. Even if the witty dialogue and wonderful on screen chemistries don't do it for you, Chasing Amy should be loved for building on a genre that so often settles for reusing old story lines and, mainly, for showing us that all problems, no matter how personal, can be solved with the use of a threesome.
Number 2 - (500) Days of Summer
This film has an awful lot going for it, the soundtrack is pretty much perfect, the direction is inspired and the story has a level of originality. However, what really makes it special is how realistic it all is, the depth of it's characters and the abilities of the actors who make them so excruciatingly believable. Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Zooey Deschanel portray characters that are so beautifully well developed and flawed that nothing that happens within the film seems unreal. Somewhere between the writing, the direction and the acting has been found the truest form of what relationships are like.
The heights this film reaches are so rarely found in any films, let alone those in such a restricting genre, that certain scenes have been burnt into my memory. The two that really show just how good the film is are Gordon-Levitt's celebration of sleeping with Deschanel for the first time, which gorgeously mimics the narcissism and gratuitous arrogance that exists in all men (but rarely gets admitted too), and the expectations against reality scene, which is harrowing in its realism.
If (500) Days of Summer does have two flaws they are clear. The first would be the final line (please, someone find whoever wrote that line and do whatever you can to make sure they have no place in great films any more) and just how familiar the whole thing is (I'm currently taking a break from watching it again in an attempt to maintain a level of mental stability).
Number 1 - High Fidelity
High Fidelity is one of those films that contains the greatest parts of each of the last four mentioned on the list, adds in my favourite book ever written as source material, and creates something completely wonderful. It takes a heart-warming ending, the original God of romantic comedies as a star, deep characterisation, an unbeatable soundtrack and the fiercest understanding of the male psyche that has ever been displayed. John Cusack's Rob Gordon may not be the nicest person in the world, but he displays so much of what every man sees in himself that we can't help but love him.
While High Fidelity may offer more in the way of a textbook into how men think than anything else for female viewers and could de accused of losing something in wrapping up the end in such a happy way, the journey that we are taking through with the narration is a work of art. Never have I seen such an honest portrayal of all the horrible, selfish, arrogant things men think of when we are in our own heads, but the fact that through all of his faults, you still want everything to work out for Gordon shows just how good Nick Hornby is at creating well rounded characters. Beyond that, the happy ending is a testament and a reminder to all of us that if we ever decide to grow up, a re-establishment of the perfect status quo is possible, and happiness can be found despite our flaws (or maybe I've just spent a bit too much time around pop culture).
The next blog will be in a similar fashion as Captain America is being released on Friday and I will be in fan boy heaven so will write my Top 5 Comic Book Films list.
Wednesday, 27 July 2011
Monday, 25 July 2011
My Favourite Post Secret of the Week
Most of the people reading this blog already know what Post Secret is but, just in case you don't, it is a website that shows postcards people have sent in with their secrets on. At worst it can be pretentious, self-involved and passive aggressive (kind of like blogging) but it can occasionally be thought provoking and inspiring.
This is my favourite Post Secret from this week's selection because it is something I expect to feel in fifteen to twenty years time.
Stephen King wrote a great piece on all the dreams and ambitions you can have when you're young in the introduction to The Gunslinger. When considering how unrealistic these things are, he asked: "If you don't start out too big for your britches, how are you gonna fill 'em when you grow up?"
When you're young you set yourself goals and you give yourself ideals but as you get older the goals start to seem more unattainable and the ideals are lost to the struggles of the real world. It is my understanding that few lives go according to their original plans. More commonly people wake up one morning in their late thirties and realise "Wow, this is my life." When you do wake up that morning with the memories of the dreams you once had and the ideals that were bargained away, it is the person you wake up to and all the other people in your life who make the sacrifices worthwhile.
When you accept the fact you will never play for a professional sports team, never star in the film which defines your generation and occasionally vote for a political party who sit so far away from the left that the eighteen year old version of you would cry, it is the relationships you have with people that will get you through. Your friends, your partner, your children and your siblings will be the people to let you know, while you never set the world alight, you honestly improved their lives.
While part of me will always hang onto the dream of owning the last successful independent record store in London, I know it will probably never happen. What makes that knowledge bearable is an image I have. An image of sitting at a dinner table on a Saturday night after a stressful week with a drink in hand. I'll look around the table and see the wife I love, the friends I have had for decades and the children I am proud of. On that night I will think to myself "Fuck (because my vocabulary won't have improved). I made it, my life is awesome."
Stephen King is right, aim high when you're young, aim for the impossible. If you're mighty enough you might even make it happen but if not, the place you find yourself when you're lost will still be pretty incredible and the people who are there with you will be the people you love (as long as you're not a douche pirate).
My next blog will be called In Defence of the Genre: Top 5 Romantic Comedy Films to celebrate the release of Friends with Benefits, which looks pretty funny and just all round pretty.
Stephen King wrote a great piece on all the dreams and ambitions you can have when you're young in the introduction to The Gunslinger. When considering how unrealistic these things are, he asked: "If you don't start out too big for your britches, how are you gonna fill 'em when you grow up?"
When you're young you set yourself goals and you give yourself ideals but as you get older the goals start to seem more unattainable and the ideals are lost to the struggles of the real world. It is my understanding that few lives go according to their original plans. More commonly people wake up one morning in their late thirties and realise "Wow, this is my life." When you do wake up that morning with the memories of the dreams you once had and the ideals that were bargained away, it is the person you wake up to and all the other people in your life who make the sacrifices worthwhile.
When you accept the fact you will never play for a professional sports team, never star in the film which defines your generation and occasionally vote for a political party who sit so far away from the left that the eighteen year old version of you would cry, it is the relationships you have with people that will get you through. Your friends, your partner, your children and your siblings will be the people to let you know, while you never set the world alight, you honestly improved their lives.
While part of me will always hang onto the dream of owning the last successful independent record store in London, I know it will probably never happen. What makes that knowledge bearable is an image I have. An image of sitting at a dinner table on a Saturday night after a stressful week with a drink in hand. I'll look around the table and see the wife I love, the friends I have had for decades and the children I am proud of. On that night I will think to myself "Fuck (because my vocabulary won't have improved). I made it, my life is awesome."
Stephen King is right, aim high when you're young, aim for the impossible. If you're mighty enough you might even make it happen but if not, the place you find yourself when you're lost will still be pretty incredible and the people who are there with you will be the people you love (as long as you're not a douche pirate).
My next blog will be called In Defence of the Genre: Top 5 Romantic Comedy Films to celebrate the release of Friends with Benefits, which looks pretty funny and just all round pretty.
Saturday, 23 July 2011
Britain Wanted No Alternative To Whining
To start off, I'll admit this is an out dated blog. The issue closed months ago and it probably achieves nothing to write about it now, but the truth is I wasn't writing a blog when it happened and leaving it any later will only make it more out dated. Therefore, I suppose this is the best possible time for me to write it.
On the 5th of May 2011 the UK was given the opportunity to change their political system, and a resounding 70% of the voting populace (around 15% of the actual population) showed that they were happy a First Past The Post system rather than changing to Alternative Voting . Now, my views on this are easy to state, this was a mistake. The voting people of Britain were giving a once in a life time chance to change politics in their country, and they decided to stick with what they had, despite us being a country renowned for complaining about politics. I don't want this blog to sound overly preachy (although I know that it will) so I am going to give this some kind of structure. Luckily, I found that my structure has three parts that all start with the same letter. Stuff like that is cool, right? First up I will give a Reason for this blog, then a Reminder about something before ending with a Request.
Reason
There are a lot of reasons why I supported the campaign for AV, I could write about Arrow's Theorem of Voting or the terrible correlation between votes and power under FPTP, but the first is boring and the second is something that everybody already knows about. Instead I'll go with this, my main reason for supporting YES2AV was...
Over the past generations (I have no real idea when it started, I wasn't there) the people of Britain created a mind state for their political system. Somewhere along the line, most people gave up on the idea of voting for what they actually believed in or wanted for the country and started voting against whichever one of the two biggest parties they hated more.
There was a time when this made slightly more sense than it currently does. There was a time when Labour actually existed on the left side of politics and could've even been described as socialist (occasionally). However, things have changed. New Labour didn't just bring with it a massive budget deficit and deaths around the world but also a move to the right that landed themselves snugly next to views of the Conservatives. This means that Britain now has two centre-right parties that try to get votes by slagging off the other. Despite this, if people want to believe they aren't horrible, free-market, homophobes, they vote New Labour, and if people want to think they aren't communists, they vote Conservative.
This mind state will get us nowhere as both parties currently represent the same ideals and if you have a conversation with anyone, we all seem to hate those ideals. So my main reason for supporting AV was for the chance to change this. Under the Alternative Voting system people could happily vote for whatever crazy ideals they truly believed in, safe in the knowledge that if that party failed, they could vote for their least hated big boy second.
If the vote on the 5th of May had gone a different way, we could have finally seen what the people of this country actually want and what they actually believe in. But it didn't and we have cursed ourselves to generations of hanging on to outdated views of parties who used to have real values and voting to stop those dirty socialists (despite New Labour having next to no socialism in their politics) or nasty Tories (despite their most hated policies being forced by New Labour's greatest fuck ups) getting into power. Sure, there was a chance we would discover the majority of this country supports the BNP, but if that's what the country wants then give it to them. I would be out of here quicker than anyone else, but if the BNP are the party the British people want, then it is the one they deserve and I would happily leave them to turn even more sour in their own pathetic juices.
Reminder
Onto the second part of this blog, a reminder (which is a great song by The Perishers, if anyone cares). I'm not sure how many people know about this, but the NO2AV campaign was one run by propaganda and lies. The fact that the population of Britain fell for the stories they were throwing around is something that truly makes me question whether I can live in this country for the rest of my life.
First up, there is no evidence that an AV system would actually give the BNP more power, that was just something given out to get the nice people of middle Britain all outraged. However, the more important lies can be seen by the following picture.
The statistics the NO2AV side put out were incredibly full of holes, but the most true showing of this came on the 4th of May when David Blunkett came out and admitted the huge number you see at the top of that leaflet was entirely made up. The people who feared for their jobs under a new system got together and thought of a big number that would anger people into voting for their side and Britain fell for it because we still trust these people despite being shown time and time again that most current politicians will lie and deceive daily to get what they want.
So, this is the reminder. If you're ever in an argument with someone about anything to do with politics and they bring up something along the lines of New Labour or the Conservatives having too much power, people not standing up for what they believe in, or having no power in their votes, ask them which way they voted on the 5th of May, or if they even did vote. If their answer is they didn't vote, or they voted No, they have no right to be making those arguments and, more importantly than that, remind them that they sided with a group of people who used propaganda to hold Britain's progress back for their own interests.
Request
And here's my request, if there is anyone out there who voted No, or didn't vote at all, please tell me why. If you didn't vote, I understand it may have just been through bad planning or apathy, but if you voted No, please comment with your argument for why First Past The Post is a better system than Alternative Voting. I'm asking this because to date I haven't seen a single viable argument for FPTP and I think I'd be able to move on if someone could give me one. I feel like a dumped teenager who was never given a reason for why things had to end. I know AV isn't the perfect system, and I am a supporter of Proportional Representation, but if you are reading this and have a defence of FPTP, please state it. It could really help me get over this and, if nothing else, I'm sure my friends would thank you for that.
That's my preaching over for now, the next blog will be the My Favourite Post Secret of the Week.
On the 5th of May 2011 the UK was given the opportunity to change their political system, and a resounding 70% of the voting populace (around 15% of the actual population) showed that they were happy a First Past The Post system rather than changing to Alternative Voting . Now, my views on this are easy to state, this was a mistake. The voting people of Britain were giving a once in a life time chance to change politics in their country, and they decided to stick with what they had, despite us being a country renowned for complaining about politics. I don't want this blog to sound overly preachy (although I know that it will) so I am going to give this some kind of structure. Luckily, I found that my structure has three parts that all start with the same letter. Stuff like that is cool, right? First up I will give a Reason for this blog, then a Reminder about something before ending with a Request.
Reason
There are a lot of reasons why I supported the campaign for AV, I could write about Arrow's Theorem of Voting or the terrible correlation between votes and power under FPTP, but the first is boring and the second is something that everybody already knows about. Instead I'll go with this, my main reason for supporting YES2AV was...
Over the past generations (I have no real idea when it started, I wasn't there) the people of Britain created a mind state for their political system. Somewhere along the line, most people gave up on the idea of voting for what they actually believed in or wanted for the country and started voting against whichever one of the two biggest parties they hated more.
There was a time when this made slightly more sense than it currently does. There was a time when Labour actually existed on the left side of politics and could've even been described as socialist (occasionally). However, things have changed. New Labour didn't just bring with it a massive budget deficit and deaths around the world but also a move to the right that landed themselves snugly next to views of the Conservatives. This means that Britain now has two centre-right parties that try to get votes by slagging off the other. Despite this, if people want to believe they aren't horrible, free-market, homophobes, they vote New Labour, and if people want to think they aren't communists, they vote Conservative.
This mind state will get us nowhere as both parties currently represent the same ideals and if you have a conversation with anyone, we all seem to hate those ideals. So my main reason for supporting AV was for the chance to change this. Under the Alternative Voting system people could happily vote for whatever crazy ideals they truly believed in, safe in the knowledge that if that party failed, they could vote for their least hated big boy second.
If the vote on the 5th of May had gone a different way, we could have finally seen what the people of this country actually want and what they actually believe in. But it didn't and we have cursed ourselves to generations of hanging on to outdated views of parties who used to have real values and voting to stop those dirty socialists (despite New Labour having next to no socialism in their politics) or nasty Tories (despite their most hated policies being forced by New Labour's greatest fuck ups) getting into power. Sure, there was a chance we would discover the majority of this country supports the BNP, but if that's what the country wants then give it to them. I would be out of here quicker than anyone else, but if the BNP are the party the British people want, then it is the one they deserve and I would happily leave them to turn even more sour in their own pathetic juices.
Reminder
Onto the second part of this blog, a reminder (which is a great song by The Perishers, if anyone cares). I'm not sure how many people know about this, but the NO2AV campaign was one run by propaganda and lies. The fact that the population of Britain fell for the stories they were throwing around is something that truly makes me question whether I can live in this country for the rest of my life.
First up, there is no evidence that an AV system would actually give the BNP more power, that was just something given out to get the nice people of middle Britain all outraged. However, the more important lies can be seen by the following picture.
So, this is the reminder. If you're ever in an argument with someone about anything to do with politics and they bring up something along the lines of New Labour or the Conservatives having too much power, people not standing up for what they believe in, or having no power in their votes, ask them which way they voted on the 5th of May, or if they even did vote. If their answer is they didn't vote, or they voted No, they have no right to be making those arguments and, more importantly than that, remind them that they sided with a group of people who used propaganda to hold Britain's progress back for their own interests.
Request
And here's my request, if there is anyone out there who voted No, or didn't vote at all, please tell me why. If you didn't vote, I understand it may have just been through bad planning or apathy, but if you voted No, please comment with your argument for why First Past The Post is a better system than Alternative Voting. I'm asking this because to date I haven't seen a single viable argument for FPTP and I think I'd be able to move on if someone could give me one. I feel like a dumped teenager who was never given a reason for why things had to end. I know AV isn't the perfect system, and I am a supporter of Proportional Representation, but if you are reading this and have a defence of FPTP, please state it. It could really help me get over this and, if nothing else, I'm sure my friends would thank you for that.
That's my preaching over for now, the next blog will be the My Favourite Post Secret of the Week.
Thursday, 21 July 2011
Top 5 Things I'll Miss About University - Part 2
Moving swiftly on from where I left off, we are at...
Number 3 - Basketball
I've loved basketball since I first saw my dad play with some friends while I was still a kid. I loved it so much that, even during my exile from physical activity, I agreed to play in the singular match of the unbeaten Davenant Sixth Form Basketball Team, set up by Demos Averkiou. Although I quickly retreated back my life of distancing myself from the sports types of the world, I still remembered the simple pleasure of throwing a sphere through a cylinder and as I spent my time sitting in living rooms watching One Tree Hill, I never let myself forget how much I wanted to play again.
It was Gareth Barker who helped me bring it all together. He convinced me to book a court and after we spoke to our house-mates and sent a few Facebook messages, it actually happened, a collection of geeks played basketball and from the very first game it was something that I loved. Finally, after years of participating in team sports in this country with aggressive, testosterone driven douche bags, I could play an amazing sport with friends who were willing to have fun. Playing with friends also meant one other crucial factor, my own competitive nature which had led to problems in the past could be kept under control (most of the time, as long as someone didn't throw a ball at certain areas of my body with force).
The other reason that playing again really made my last few months at uni different was that it was nice to remember that, when I'm not surrounded by people I hate, I'm actually not the worst athlete in the world. I wish we had started earlier and had more time for it, but all of it will be a truly great memory to take from uni, and the thing on this list I most look forward to doing again when I visit my friends who are still there.
Number 2 - Game Soc + No Wave
I loved societies at Surrey and its only recently that I really figured out why. I thought about all the things I loved about uni, and all the people I'll miss now I'm gone and I realised that they all came one of these two places. Either Game Soc or No Wave, the alternative music society, provided me with every friend and every night I enjoyed while in Guildford. Except for the gym, every item on this list came about because of these societies and, with only one notable exception, every girl I met and horrendously messed things up with while in Surrey came from these places too.
I spent three years as the secretary of Game Soc, a position that didn't require a whole lot after the first few months of being elected, and had more of an on again/off again relationship with the ever changing No Wave but I will be eternally grateful to both societies for giving me the friends, the stories, and even the name that I have taken from them. I'm going to miss the pure escapism that is found in DnD and I'll miss the opportunities to DJ at alternative nights at the university, but more than that I'll miss the people who made the societies great and hope that they both manage to survive long after I have left.
Number 1 - Milhouse
I hugely doubt that this will be a surprise to anyone who has known me over the last year, but there really could be no other end to this list. For those that don't know, Milhouse is the house I lived in for my final year, and if the societies above are what gave me the greatest things about university, this house was the result of that. I got the chance to live with four (basically five) guys who just made everything fun.
Between Brian Fraser, Alex Dale, Tom Pritchard, Richard Vickerstaff and the sixth member, Gareth Barker I loved everything about the house. From the parties we threw to the trips to friend's houses and our final, awesome, trip to Alton Towers, everything just worked. But in all honesty, the best thing about the house was that I could spend a night in there, just watching Buffy or Arrested Development and playing Mario Kart and it would be as fun as any night where I would've had to spend stupid amounts of money, go outside, or at least get out of my stretchy pants.
The in jokes, rules and traditions that we created within that house will stay with me forever, and I do really believe that I will still be friends with these guys when I am old and sitting on a front porch. I have an image of sitting in my house as an old man on a Sunday afternoon and one of these guys walking in and taking their tops of with a declaration that it is Topless Sunday.
I'll stop soon as I don't want to bore you with how much the house meant to me but I just want to make one last point to show how much I will miss it. From knowing me, or reading what I write, it isn't hard to work out what is the most important thing to me, the friends that have been with me for years. I went to university with a pretty bad mind state that I didn't need anyone else, because I had such incredible friends at home, however all of that went out of the window when the guys of Milhouse showed me that I can find incredible friends anywhere, and it will be my life long goal to steal them to London and have them join my front porch plan.
So, thank you to all five other members of Milhouse, as well as the people in stayed in our house so much and helped make it great, such as Travis Wren and Rosh Sellehewa. It's you guys who gave me what I will miss most about university. You put up with my whining and argumentative nature and made my final year everything I had wanted university to be. Milhouse is something that will stay with me for the rest of my life, and I will always miss the happiness I found in that decrepit old house.
Well, there it is. That's what I'll miss now that I've come home and am getting on with life. I know I'll go back and visit a lot, but it is good to feel as though things are moving somewhere. The next blog is going to be the first of the, out dated, argument type ones and will be called something along the lines of Britain Wanted No Alternative To Whining.
Number 3 - Basketball
I've loved basketball since I first saw my dad play with some friends while I was still a kid. I loved it so much that, even during my exile from physical activity, I agreed to play in the singular match of the unbeaten Davenant Sixth Form Basketball Team, set up by Demos Averkiou. Although I quickly retreated back my life of distancing myself from the sports types of the world, I still remembered the simple pleasure of throwing a sphere through a cylinder and as I spent my time sitting in living rooms watching One Tree Hill, I never let myself forget how much I wanted to play again.
It was Gareth Barker who helped me bring it all together. He convinced me to book a court and after we spoke to our house-mates and sent a few Facebook messages, it actually happened, a collection of geeks played basketball and from the very first game it was something that I loved. Finally, after years of participating in team sports in this country with aggressive, testosterone driven douche bags, I could play an amazing sport with friends who were willing to have fun. Playing with friends also meant one other crucial factor, my own competitive nature which had led to problems in the past could be kept under control (most of the time, as long as someone didn't throw a ball at certain areas of my body with force).
The other reason that playing again really made my last few months at uni different was that it was nice to remember that, when I'm not surrounded by people I hate, I'm actually not the worst athlete in the world. I wish we had started earlier and had more time for it, but all of it will be a truly great memory to take from uni, and the thing on this list I most look forward to doing again when I visit my friends who are still there.
Number 2 - Game Soc + No Wave
I loved societies at Surrey and its only recently that I really figured out why. I thought about all the things I loved about uni, and all the people I'll miss now I'm gone and I realised that they all came one of these two places. Either Game Soc or No Wave, the alternative music society, provided me with every friend and every night I enjoyed while in Guildford. Except for the gym, every item on this list came about because of these societies and, with only one notable exception, every girl I met and horrendously messed things up with while in Surrey came from these places too.
I spent three years as the secretary of Game Soc, a position that didn't require a whole lot after the first few months of being elected, and had more of an on again/off again relationship with the ever changing No Wave but I will be eternally grateful to both societies for giving me the friends, the stories, and even the name that I have taken from them. I'm going to miss the pure escapism that is found in DnD and I'll miss the opportunities to DJ at alternative nights at the university, but more than that I'll miss the people who made the societies great and hope that they both manage to survive long after I have left.
Number 1 - Milhouse
I hugely doubt that this will be a surprise to anyone who has known me over the last year, but there really could be no other end to this list. For those that don't know, Milhouse is the house I lived in for my final year, and if the societies above are what gave me the greatest things about university, this house was the result of that. I got the chance to live with four (basically five) guys who just made everything fun.
 |
| Milhouse at our greatest party. |
 |
| Milhouse at Alton Towers. |
I'll stop soon as I don't want to bore you with how much the house meant to me but I just want to make one last point to show how much I will miss it. From knowing me, or reading what I write, it isn't hard to work out what is the most important thing to me, the friends that have been with me for years. I went to university with a pretty bad mind state that I didn't need anyone else, because I had such incredible friends at home, however all of that went out of the window when the guys of Milhouse showed me that I can find incredible friends anywhere, and it will be my life long goal to steal them to London and have them join my front porch plan.
So, thank you to all five other members of Milhouse, as well as the people in stayed in our house so much and helped make it great, such as Travis Wren and Rosh Sellehewa. It's you guys who gave me what I will miss most about university. You put up with my whining and argumentative nature and made my final year everything I had wanted university to be. Milhouse is something that will stay with me for the rest of my life, and I will always miss the happiness I found in that decrepit old house.
Well, there it is. That's what I'll miss now that I've come home and am getting on with life. I know I'll go back and visit a lot, but it is good to feel as though things are moving somewhere. The next blog is going to be the first of the, out dated, argument type ones and will be called something along the lines of Britain Wanted No Alternative To Whining.
Tuesday, 19 July 2011
Top 5 Things I'll Miss About University - Part 1
As I said in the last blog, I recently left my uni home for the last time and it has made me all kinds of nostalgic. I had three very different years in Guildford. The first was incredibly fun but consisted of ignoring a lot of issues that had been building up for some time. The second was a more difficult year where I dealt with at least some of those issues and after that everything really came together for my final year and it was one of the greatest I have ever had.
On the following Top 5 you won't see any points dedicated towards drinking or "the freedom of university" because the things I'll miss were more personal than that. I can drink with friends anywhere, and freedom can be found in any place if you look hard enough. These are the five things that really made university for me, the things that I won't be able to have in my life any more and the things I'll truly miss.
Number 5 - The Gym
This may sound like an odd place to start a list of things that I'll miss about university but I really loved that gym. To say that before I went to university I was a skinny kid would be a pretty big understatement. In a different life I loved sport, back when I lived in New Zealand, but when I got back to England I had a few bad experiences with it. These came either through my own competitive nature making me act like an idiot, or the pathetic mentality of most teenage boys making me want to distance myself from them as much as possible. And so I became a dedicated follower of the path of laziness, except for brief but enjoyable bouts of squash with the dad and brother (I know, we are horribly middle-class). I looked like Peter-Parker pre spider bite or Steve Rogers pre super soldier serum, I'm not saying I look like Captain America now, but if you looked at me you could be tricked into believing that I didn't spend all of my alone time as a teenager reading comics and playing RPGs.
In the end I never did get bitten by a spider, as far as I know, and no weird scientist ever gave me some formula to make women want to touch my pecks, it was just a devastating event that filled me with equal amounts of self-loathing and anger that pushed me to get back into activities. A first year house-mate saw how angry I was and suggested that I go to the gym to work off some stress and from there it all happened very quickly. Before I knew it I was going every day, and on slow days I would even consider going twice. It helped. It made me feel better about my self and gave me less time to think about other things. For the first time in my life I was in a situation where talking to my friends couldn't make me feel completely better, and in the end it was an old, dusty building that got me through it.
However its not that old, dusty building that takes a place on this list. It's a new, shiny building. When Surrey Sports Park was built I finally learnt to enjoy the gym without it being about taking out aggression. I was happier again and my reasons from lifting heavy things had changed from a desperate need to concentrate on something to regular, run of the mill stress relief as well as a begrudging vanity and enjoyment of having a better body. With happiness came a lesser attendance to the gym, but it was always there to give me time alone when things got intense. I've found a gym at home, but it just isn't the same. At Surrey Sports Park there was state of the art technology, a climbing centre, swimming pool, squash, tennis, badminton and basketball courts, the latter of which will be coming back later. There was also a nice bar and a Starbucks standing as a wonderful salute to capitalism along with the two others on our campus. So I will miss the Sports Park for the equipment and opportunities, but mainly I will miss it as it was the place where I rediscovered a love of physical activity and later a place where working out changed from something to get me through, to something I could just enjoy.
Number 4 - The Music
4.a. Strangers on a Train - Farenheit 55
The live music scene around Surrey University is hardly something to sing about but the best of what does exist can be attributed to one person and the few others who help him out. Andy Panpipe Vale has done more for the quest to bring great music to Guildford than anyone else I've seen and the best of this is undoubtedly the night that he has run at the Farenheit 55 bar in town with the help of Byron Johnston and others.
I was still in my first year when I started to occasionally tag along with a group of people I was slowly becoming a part of to see the musical excellence that was being displayed in the bar. The group continued to go every week for the next two years, and as often as possible once money had been drained and work got harder in final year. It was a brilliant chance to see the most exciting and unique examples of live music. From incredible acoustic guitar players such as Declan Zapala, Byron himself or, my personal favourite Mark Aaron James, to beat boxing harmonica players and other things I didn't even know existed as well as great bands like Love. Stop. Repeat..
What separated Strangers on a Train from other music nights for me was how friendly nearly all the people who played there were. Over the years we got to know a lot of the musicians involved and MAJ even ended up playing an amazing gig in our house during a party. The night is an incredible testament to what can be achieved when people are dedicated to something and I would recommend anyone who can get to Guildford on a Wednesday night should check it out. Andy Vale will be moving on to other ventures after his last night on September 7th with the astounding Two Fingers of Firewater playing. After that, the night will definitely miss his input.
4.b. Conspiracy - The Boileroom
It feels like a break of etiquette to break up a point like this in my first Top 5 on the blog, but what Strangers on a Train offered in live music, the Conspiracy night managed to match in the fun of a club night. DJs Dan Manthorpe, Adam Burgess and especially Tree managed to create the most friendly and enjoyable environment I've ever seen in a club.
The music was always fun, varying from brilliant heavy stuff to hilarious covers and mash-ups with random theme tune and jazz bits dropped in near the end of the nights. Conspiracy was another place to meet great people and enjoy music. In a similar fashion to Strangers on a Train, head DJ Tree is leaving the night as he moves to London with his girlfriend to pursue awesome jobs so I won't be the only one missing the Conspiracy nights.
It was the final Conspiracy night where I celebrated my last night staying at the house, and it was a fitting end with so many of the people who made university for me being there. I know there will be great club nights in and around London, but I doubt any of them will be as enjoyable and relaxing as the Conspiracy nights over the last year.
As I'm new to this whole blogging thing I'm not really sure of the length one of these can be before people just stop reading. That's why I'm going to take a break here and finish the list of in the next blog that will be coming soon. Feel free to take guesses at what the Top 3 Things I'll Miss About Uni are. If you've known me over the past three years, and especially this year, they probably won't be hard to work out.
On the following Top 5 you won't see any points dedicated towards drinking or "the freedom of university" because the things I'll miss were more personal than that. I can drink with friends anywhere, and freedom can be found in any place if you look hard enough. These are the five things that really made university for me, the things that I won't be able to have in my life any more and the things I'll truly miss.
Number 5 - The Gym
This may sound like an odd place to start a list of things that I'll miss about university but I really loved that gym. To say that before I went to university I was a skinny kid would be a pretty big understatement. In a different life I loved sport, back when I lived in New Zealand, but when I got back to England I had a few bad experiences with it. These came either through my own competitive nature making me act like an idiot, or the pathetic mentality of most teenage boys making me want to distance myself from them as much as possible. And so I became a dedicated follower of the path of laziness, except for brief but enjoyable bouts of squash with the dad and brother (I know, we are horribly middle-class). I looked like Peter-Parker pre spider bite or Steve Rogers pre super soldier serum, I'm not saying I look like Captain America now, but if you looked at me you could be tricked into believing that I didn't spend all of my alone time as a teenager reading comics and playing RPGs.
In the end I never did get bitten by a spider, as far as I know, and no weird scientist ever gave me some formula to make women want to touch my pecks, it was just a devastating event that filled me with equal amounts of self-loathing and anger that pushed me to get back into activities. A first year house-mate saw how angry I was and suggested that I go to the gym to work off some stress and from there it all happened very quickly. Before I knew it I was going every day, and on slow days I would even consider going twice. It helped. It made me feel better about my self and gave me less time to think about other things. For the first time in my life I was in a situation where talking to my friends couldn't make me feel completely better, and in the end it was an old, dusty building that got me through it.
However its not that old, dusty building that takes a place on this list. It's a new, shiny building. When Surrey Sports Park was built I finally learnt to enjoy the gym without it being about taking out aggression. I was happier again and my reasons from lifting heavy things had changed from a desperate need to concentrate on something to regular, run of the mill stress relief as well as a begrudging vanity and enjoyment of having a better body. With happiness came a lesser attendance to the gym, but it was always there to give me time alone when things got intense. I've found a gym at home, but it just isn't the same. At Surrey Sports Park there was state of the art technology, a climbing centre, swimming pool, squash, tennis, badminton and basketball courts, the latter of which will be coming back later. There was also a nice bar and a Starbucks standing as a wonderful salute to capitalism along with the two others on our campus. So I will miss the Sports Park for the equipment and opportunities, but mainly I will miss it as it was the place where I rediscovered a love of physical activity and later a place where working out changed from something to get me through, to something I could just enjoy.
Number 4 - The Music
4.a. Strangers on a Train - Farenheit 55
The live music scene around Surrey University is hardly something to sing about but the best of what does exist can be attributed to one person and the few others who help him out. Andy Panpipe Vale has done more for the quest to bring great music to Guildford than anyone else I've seen and the best of this is undoubtedly the night that he has run at the Farenheit 55 bar in town with the help of Byron Johnston and others.
I was still in my first year when I started to occasionally tag along with a group of people I was slowly becoming a part of to see the musical excellence that was being displayed in the bar. The group continued to go every week for the next two years, and as often as possible once money had been drained and work got harder in final year. It was a brilliant chance to see the most exciting and unique examples of live music. From incredible acoustic guitar players such as Declan Zapala, Byron himself or, my personal favourite Mark Aaron James, to beat boxing harmonica players and other things I didn't even know existed as well as great bands like Love. Stop. Repeat..
 |
| Mark Aaron James playing at Strangers on a Train. Photo provided by Gareth Barker, AKA Hot Fudge. |
What separated Strangers on a Train from other music nights for me was how friendly nearly all the people who played there were. Over the years we got to know a lot of the musicians involved and MAJ even ended up playing an amazing gig in our house during a party. The night is an incredible testament to what can be achieved when people are dedicated to something and I would recommend anyone who can get to Guildford on a Wednesday night should check it out. Andy Vale will be moving on to other ventures after his last night on September 7th with the astounding Two Fingers of Firewater playing. After that, the night will definitely miss his input.
4.b. Conspiracy - The Boileroom
It feels like a break of etiquette to break up a point like this in my first Top 5 on the blog, but what Strangers on a Train offered in live music, the Conspiracy night managed to match in the fun of a club night. DJs Dan Manthorpe, Adam Burgess and especially Tree managed to create the most friendly and enjoyable environment I've ever seen in a club.
The music was always fun, varying from brilliant heavy stuff to hilarious covers and mash-ups with random theme tune and jazz bits dropped in near the end of the nights. Conspiracy was another place to meet great people and enjoy music. In a similar fashion to Strangers on a Train, head DJ Tree is leaving the night as he moves to London with his girlfriend to pursue awesome jobs so I won't be the only one missing the Conspiracy nights.
It was the final Conspiracy night where I celebrated my last night staying at the house, and it was a fitting end with so many of the people who made university for me being there. I know there will be great club nights in and around London, but I doubt any of them will be as enjoyable and relaxing as the Conspiracy nights over the last year.
As I'm new to this whole blogging thing I'm not really sure of the length one of these can be before people just stop reading. That's why I'm going to take a break here and finish the list of in the next blog that will be coming soon. Feel free to take guesses at what the Top 3 Things I'll Miss About Uni are. If you've known me over the past three years, and especially this year, they probably won't be hard to work out.
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