Heaven Smiles Above Me

Ten minutes ago, I was on Lowri's acoustic. And, for some reason, I started playing a chord, and singing the line I don't want to have a girlfriend. Don't ask why. I just did. Then started singing Anyway You Want It to a song that I wrote a while back, then came across a new thing that I shall stick in a song. And, I jsut realised this might be the longest opening paragraphs to a post in a while. Wey.

Anyways, Christmas has been. I think. To be fair it just felt like another day, really. Just another day of listening to pointless conversations (I mean, since when does saying 'I like cheese' been a conversation starter...), watching television that has the only objective to gain the most watchers, not forgetting the arguements in which makes me glad I just plod my life away in my room... Or something like that.

Yeah, happy days, eh?

To be fair, I must stop typing fiar when I try to type fair. Also, I really do want to get myself an electric drum kit. I only want an electric one because there's not a lot of room in my bedroom, and having a fuckoff acoustic kit... lets just say I'll end up sleeping on the toms, using the hihat as a pillow. I knew I wasn't going to get one for christmas - I'm not going to get my parents in debt over something I just hit - and to be fair I didn't really mind what I got, nor if I had anything for this mas of the chirst variety.

Anycahoots, I'm startinng to think that people are turning Christmas into a time where they can just brag about stuff. Bragging from what they got to how much they got and to be fair, who really cares? This year I haven't had much. I got a phone that's probably discontinued and some clothes. I'm not complaining. Neither am I going to ask anyone what they had. Not for them to say what expensive gifts they had. Grrr.

Another thing is that I really, really want to start a band. I've said it before, but it's kind of changed. I still want to be in a rock band. And the more I say rock band the more I cringe. Don't ask why. Anyways, I want to create music like what Muse, Smashing Pumpkins and Pearl Jam have created (well, not exactly like them... y'know what I mean), but now I want to start doing disco music, or disco-rock, if that's even a genre. The only problem is that I can only write either middle-of-the-road music (like the song Acoustination, in which shall stay forever as a GP5 file) or too scene. Shit, if only I knew someone who writes their own lyrics... =).

Yesterday, I went up to my sister's, to see Ricky open his presents and on the way back home, my mother put on the Amy Winehouse CD Lowri got her for Christmas, and as I listen, I thaught 'why can I imagine The Beatles sing this?'. Fuck, I need help.

Anyways, expect more posts soon. Well, since it's the school holidays and I don't go anywhere, the only contact I get with people is on the web. There might be one with a depressive tone to it round about New Year's time. And if there is I shall say sorry now. Ah well, that's it for now.

- I got a brand new pair of rollerskates, you've got a brand new FIN.

Pathetic

Yeah, lovely.

I'm A Celebrity... is on, and it's always sparked some hatred in me.

I mean, mother of the year(...??), Katie Price, walked out. And I'm thinking, and?... Everyone else (well, the media anyways) are going 'SHOCK HORROR!! JORDAN IS OUT!! ARRRGH' or something like that. I don't see the fuss about it really. I just see some attention seeker, just finding exactly what she gets paid for. And I can't see someone famous just for being famous - well, for showing some plastic jugs for some newspapers - as a proper job. Fucking hell, I mean. Jesus. It's pathetic.

Another pathetic thing. John and Edward.

No, I'm not going to go on about how they cannot sing, or shaite their performances are. I'm on about the bloody press coverage. Either it's people going 'AWWW THEYRE SOOOO SWEET LOL' or 'I FUCKING HATES THEM. I DO'. And the apparent 'shock exit'. To be fair, like. No matter how nice they might be, a singing competition is just that, a competition for singers.

But then again, that's what shows like X Factor and I'm a Celebrity. It's just about people (with, in the majority of the time, no talent) who just want to be on tellie. AND IT'S RATHER ANNOYING. EPIC GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR.

In other, more pointful news. I have to send off my UCAS application, and I've only have one of five choices available... sobsob. I have recently discovered a course that might be up my street... though I'm not sure. Ah well, that's the joys of being someone who doesn't even know if there's a point in going to University...

Shit... these are getting shorter by the day...

Ah well, less wasted time for you. =).

- Finication

One Down...

Well hello. Haven't seen you around here. You new?

Of course not... or if you are actually someone that I've never met and it's your first time to glance at my musings... then hello there. But, since it's a Sunday, no chance of that happening.

And for most of that intro, I've had David Mitchell's voice saying it. Damn, I've wathced too many Peep Show's in a matter of days...

Thank fuck for Channel 4 On Demand...

Anyways, enough of the three full stops in a row.

For (not) the first time ever, Movie Maker is being an arse to me. The new one (Windows Live Movie Maker) not only doesn't work, but made my screen turn blue - which nicely told me, in a roundabout way, that the computer's fucked - and then decided to restart. Bloody hell. But lo and behold, I've still got the normal Movie Maker.

But, not only that, for some bizzare reason, you cannot use MP4 files in it. It's like an industry standard, I thaught. I know that MPEG's are native(ish) to Windows, while AVI's and the like are native to the Mac. Ah well, I've got to wait a bit to do Burt's video of the Physics lesson of the dancing flames (link there for people who didn't know Burt had a blog). Actually, I do have a MPEG file of it, but with no audio. Movie Maker's fucking with me, and by the looks of things, I'm the one that's bent over and tied to a lamppost dressed like someone from Rocky Horror Picture Show. Happy days.

Elsewhere, and is linked to the last section, I tried to download a demo of Adobe Premiere Elements 8. That also placed a horrible feeling of shame and misfortune in both my heart and my laptop's hard drive. Man, if only I had After Effects working... or at all.

But, word to the wise, if you need a good video editing software, don't get Premiere Elements, get After Effects or Premiere Pro. Anyways.

A sense of achievement, disbelieve and bone-shattering patheticness has also been presented to me. All three, opened by the drumkit from Guitar Hero World Tour. Yesterday, whilst playing on the newest one (Guitar Hero 5, to you and me... and your teddy bear... don't deny it, I know you have one), I decided to go on Expert, to play some of the less-hard Expert songs (y'know, the ones that are slightly harder than the hardest songs on Hard, which I cannot do most of them). So what was the song?

I chose Muse's Plug In Baby.

And, for the first time... I've FC'd it. I've fully completed (meaning hit all the notes without overhitting or losing the combo) an expert song on drums. Now that deserves three rounds of two hips and a horrey soon after, don't you think? So yeah, achievement because I've finally cracked an FC on drums on Expert. Disbelieve because I (still) cannot believe I've done it. And the patheticness is that it's only a stupid computer game. It's nothing to brag about, right? I'm just basically saying that I can keep in time with some notes that are scrolling down towards me. Nothing special.

And that, is kinda how I think about real drums. I mean, like I've started actually playing the real drums a couple o' months back. But I kinda feel that some people (maybe all) see me on the drums and think "look at him, just because he can do some songs on the drums on Guitar Hero, doesn't mean he can play real drums" or something along those lines. Ah well, as long as they don't think that the only reason I started cricket was because I played on Brian Lara Cricket for three hours a day. Because that would be wrong. It was because I was interested in how Shane Warne and Ashley Giles spun the ball so goodly.

Ah well, if in doubt, have it off with a kestril.

Half term's coming. The first holiday that will hopefully be less shaite than any other. This time, I might actually do something. Some of the boys might do a snooker tournament, and I'll end up probably losing all the matches. Man, I suck at that game. Maybe it's because I feel awkward staring at balls on the table. Maybe it's because I'm a Londoner. Such is life.

So the moral of this post... never play with strangers.

If you can see where this message is in this post... then you're reading a different post.

- Fin. And Then Some.

Re-Education Through Labor.

I believe, that this is my first post in September.

Yeah, I feel the same way too.

There's two days until I land on the final step of the secondary education ladder. Ah well, I'm not going to go into that much.

And as you sigh the biggest sigh of relief, I carry on. Sorry and all that.

It's a basic reflection on the summer. Six weeks. Fourty-two-ish days...

Wasted.

Seriously. There's nothing in this summer that nobody would say that I haven't wasted. All I've done was play on the XBox 360, make up some riffs on the bass and guitar, and move my room around so I have more space on my wall to write on. I'll post some pictures up when I have lost all sense of what 'fresh air' and 'socializing' means and feels. Though, if someone came into my room there's a good possibility that they'd ask me for my chest size so they can buy a straight-jacket for me. And it all started by writing my scores of Free Bird on Hard was... yeah, sad, I know.

Anycow. Since I have an obligation to write essays rather than blogs, I shall dig further into my gaming 'achievements' (well, not of any worth anyways). First up, is finally beating Raining Blood on Expert on both Guitar Hero III and Greatest Hits. I can now complete it 75% of the time, usually scraping through for a three star performance. I've achieved more five star performances on GHIII also, and on GHII. I managed to win the Ashes with England, after making a legspinner to take the place of Panesar (who they stuck in the team). Yeah, I was the pinnacle of sadness as I called the bowler G. John. It's wrong for many things, the first is that my names actually Gareth Aled John. Second, I'm a pace bowler, though I only really do offspin (most probably you don't know the difference, I'll say so after I finnish this paragraph). And third, I had short hair. I also managed to win a couple of majors in Tiger Woods 09, and managed to kill a boss on Prototype that took me five goes to do (bastard). Anyways... sadness (temporarily) over.

By the way, legspin is when the ball turns from the legside to the offside (to a right-handed batsman), while offspin is when the ball turns from offside to legside (again to a right-handed batsman). Offside is the open side of the batsman, while the legside's the side where your legs are. Right hand batsmen's offside is to their right, with their legside to their left, and vice versa to left-handed batsman. Hope that's clear for you. Actually I hope it's right. If not, please correct me? =).

I hope that's right, because cricket is the only sport that I've got a good grasp of knowledge of. Then it's rugby, and then (dare I say) football. Cricket, even though it takes five days to see who won (in test matches), has more ups, downs and turnarounds than I've had punch-ups (which, is none). I mean, in football, a turn of events only really happens when there's a penalty conceded, or when the losing side scores a goal. In cricket, it's all a matter of the turn of the ball. That's how I've been out three times. Three clean-bowled stumpage-ness. First time I batted I was out first ball. Second time, I was out second ball duck (aka no runs scored), which was deceiving, since (I thought) I hit the ball and scored a run, though it hit my pad instead, meaning it counted as a bye, or legbye. The third and final match, I scored five runs. Both times I hit the ball, they were caught-out oppertunaties. But alas, I managed to hit it high enough to get three off the first ball, and two off the second. Then I was out the third or fourth ball. I've bowled in three matches also, and in all I've managed a wicket in all three matches. The first one I believe was LBW. Second was clean bowl. The third one was a catch by the captain. That was also my first time I had a maiden over (no runs conceded), and the first ball of the second over, that was the caught-out wicket.

I did have some insults about me. Mainly because of my bowling action. I looked like a morris dancer, apparently. Or an Irish dancer. Or it looked like I was going to kick the umpire. But that was the way I felt comfy bowling with. It helped with two things though, speed and swing. I can't believe how much inswing I managed to get, let alone the offcut (same as offspin) I got after.

And I just realised how pointless the last few paragraghs are.

Random thing for you. On my results day (joy), my Aunt called the house to ask how I did. Though my dad probably knows how much I hate talking to people I don't talk to much on the phone, he still put me on.

She asked me what I got.

And I told her what I got.

And the next sentence she said, basically in her tone of voice, said it all...

'So, is that enough for you to go into uni?'

Is that enough? Is it?

That single question, made me feel like the thickest person in this families generation. So fucking what, if two D's and a C are more attainable for me than the shining lights and stardom that is straight A's? Seriously, who gives a shit that I'm basically, an average person academically? No well done, no 'are you pleased with your results?'. Just a 'you in college then? Or did you fail miserably, and have to work for less than the minimal wage, to earn a living?'.

Seriously?

Fuck you.

I should've said everything I had. Y'know, 'Oh, that's not half of it. I managed a U in one of the Chemistry papers AND got kicked out of the Art exam right before the coursework was supposed to be sent a week after... I oculd go on, deaest auntie that I haven't seen in ages...'

Oh, it would've cracked her up, knowing I started doing five subjects in September 2008 and dropped out of one due to sheer boredomness (that's Media Studies) and kicked out due to sheer shiteness (that's Art).

Ah well, I should end.

Let's hope I manage to get three B's for my lovely course in Music Technology, where I have to get 300 points.

Noice.

I'm off to watch something funny on YouTube.

- Fin.