My Comma Crisis

OK, so, this is, on the grand scheme of problems, about as serious as that time I asked for spicy cheese on my subway and they gave me american cheese. That time I decided not to say anything, because, y'know, the decision had been made and since it was trivial, there was little left for me to waste my time on.

See, this here, is about as serious as that, because, this is the crisis I am going through right now, and it is all about abusing commas. Of course, here I am playing it up for emphasis, (EMPHASIS!), but nonetheless, it is something I want to cut down on. Mainly because I have to write an essay by hand, again, this summer, for my final exams, which is something I haven't had to do since, oh I dunno, this time last year, in those exams.

See, the first time I write any essay it always ends up being a jumble of loosely formed thoughts, sometimes with an actual academic point, other times involving words that have been misspelled and misstyped, and then, during my second stage of essay writing, I tidy everything up and it starts to look like, totally, some actual, real, academic thoughts instead of the demented livejournal twilight fanfiction of a thirteen year old girl living in California.

And one of the reasons for this is my use of commas when I don't actually have an end for a sentence planned. And it makes my work read amateur. And I, totally, hate that. I am definitely the sort of person who begins a sentence and then thinks up where it will end whilst speaking. It almost always works out fine... although sometimes it means that... I end up trailing off... as I realise.. I have nothing left to say... because... of...

Damn, did it again.

Long story rapidly coming to an end, while reaching the point where it can't be called a 'short story', I want to avoid this this summer. And so I have been paying more attention to how I use commas in my essays. I will probably dump the spare ones over here, so consider yourself warned.

Soz for the delay

Well, I have now moved back to Exeter. Moving to a new house has had a big impact. Getting used to a new place takes a while. For example, it takes time to get used to how the shower takes the longest second to react to being turned on or off. But most of all, it is not really until you get internet that things start to feel like home.

Soon we will have internet. Soon it will be a new home.

And then I can continue my quest to watch more television. So bear with me...

The Day I Became "Not Young"

Dawson for England

Birthday!

So that was being a teenager. It was not as much wacky fun as the sitcoms they used to show on nickelodeon used to suggest. I never even got one wacky money making scheme of the ground, and I can't think of a single time when mistaken identity led to hilarity. Not that it wasn't awesome, because it was, it's just I was never able to sue a multinational corporation because I found a screw in my can of tuna. The most exciting thing I ever found in a can of tuna was tuna. But that was OK, because it led to a pretty exceptional sandwich.

So I guess what I am saying to myself, is... may my twenties involve many more great sandwiches.

Time Management

So, what things have I accomplished in my big "weekend-of-work"... what with this big essay due tomorrow morning...

+Started watching season 4 of How I Met Your Mother. (Barney in old man make-up!)
+Watched the (live!) anniversary episode of Eastenders, where the muderer was revealed.
+Did some (white!) laundry.
+Saw Manchester United lose to Everton. (Save us Rooney!)
+Spent longer cooking (and washing up!) than was wise.
+Watched The Hurt Locker. (Epic film!)
+Started a game of GalCiv. (Slowly winning an inter-galactic war of attrition!)
+Played football (It was cold!) for about two hours, up on campus.
+Went to the pub. (Yay!)
+Watched Community. (It was the Xmas special!)
+Slept in far later than planned. (I regret nothing!)
+Wrote this...

Avatar

So, I went to see Avatar. Y'know, that movie with those blue aliens. It was most awesome, but more on that later. See, the big thing they have been pushing for this movie is the 3D element. Hollywood likes 3D. You can't pirate a 3D film, and cinemas have an excuse to charge you more money, for the glasses, yet it doesn't cost them any extra. That immediately gets me riled; if I am paying almost double the price, it better be double to awesome. So they like to tell us 3D is amazing, that it is gonna be a revolution in film, (*sigh*), and you know what, it is kinda cool, but not nearly cool enough.

I mean, OK, so I have now seen Up in 3D and Avatar in 3D, and both films, were I given the chance to see them again, I would watch in regular old 2D. There are some nice things about 3D: every now and again you see a 3D shot which has depth, and you feel like you are looking through a window onto the movie set, as opposed to a screen, and that is all kinds of cool. Those shots are sometimes incredible. Then there the 3D people think of when they imagine "3D": y'know, a rocket firing out of the screen and into the audience, or people pointing out of the screen and into the audience. Things coming out at you. Both of those are all kinds of awesome, but truth be told, I am not sure if they actually can make a film much better. And a 3D film, bear in mind, is not constant 3D. It is a 2D film with occasional 3D shots. That is very important to remember.

One reason I just can't love 3D, is the glasses. They mess with your immersion. I get repeatedly brought out of the movie to adjust them - their one size fits all design is suprisingly fine on me for a while, but it still annoys if you wear them for too long. And their coloured lenses deaden the colours on screen, making the film seem darker and blander.

But the biggest problem 3D faces is that I start to ignore it. Yes, every now and again, an establishing shot of the scenery in 3D is very impressive, and yes, every now and again, an action scene is given a nice shot as an arrow, or something, flies out of the screen. But for the most part, I am ignoring 3D, and just trying to watch the movie. That is why I went to see Avatar. That was why I went to see Up. I wanted to watch the film.

I guess what I am trying to say is that 3D is a kinda cool idea, but that, truth be told, I still just want to see my movies in 2D. The glasses are not worth the occasional 3D shot. But most of all, 3D is not an immersive element. When I see a 3D shot, it is distracting me from the movie; for the most time my brain is just trying to ignore the 3D so I can watch the movie. It was worth seeing Avatar in 3D at the cinema, but if I don't think I am gonna seek out a 3D movie again any time soon. I have given it a fair chance, and it just doesn't seem to be better.

Oh, and Avatar. That was really, really, very good. Honestly. Except that it is far too long, has a stupidly over-the-top environmental, spiritual, theme forced upon us, and is the most predictable and under-written story ever put to celluloid. Apart from that, it is one of the most fun films I have seen in a long time.

Why I Hate Dell

OK, so my Dell printer has been of great annoyance for quite a while. Ever since the last one got fried by the crazy electricity of Northernhay, things have not been simple. I phoned Dell got, got a new one delivered, and all that. But the last few months have been driven by a need for printer ink. After a fair bit of searching, I discovered that Dell will only let you buy printer ink directly from them. Which sucks. So, I bought a black ink cartridge, and when it arrived things were looking good.

But no.

The Dell printer wont work without a colour cartridge detected. Even tho' I have no desire to print in colour. And I can't use the old colour cartridge because, for complex reasons, I dont have it anymore.

*sigh*

So, unless someone knows of a workaround, I am gonna have to spend money on a colour ink cartidge. Which sucks.

Paris Hitch-Hike

So, just came back after hitchhiking to Paris. For charity! The opportunity came about, and so I teamed up with Tom Baker to try and make it to Paris.

We started off at 9am on thrusday, with the weather helpfully not rainiing, and made our way to exeter services. We were there for quite a while until we found someone to give us our first hitch. It was a lady who worked for BP. She was driving back to swindon, so she was able to take us as far as swindon servies. We were not there for very long, as we quickly found a guy who was willing to take further down the road. He was, to be honest, quite strange. At one stage he was quietly praying while driving like a madman on the motorway. Then he pulled over to the hard shoulder, telling us how he knew a great spot to hitchhike from. He seemed very impressed that we were doing this for charity, and very enthused about getting us to a prime location. As he was fairly insitent he take us there, we decided to trust him. Turned out, his great place was a petrol station just stones throw from heathrow airport! It had not been part of our plan to get stuck inside london, and it took us quite a while to get back to plan, onto the M25. We were able to convince an off duty minicab driver to give us a lift, and he dropped us at some traffic lights next to a roundabout, which was another not so great spot. We were there for probably just over an hour, before we were picked up by an engineering consultant who had been working on the fuel economy project at heathrow. He was either incredibly well connected or loved to spin tall tales, as virtually every bridge or building we passed he knew the architect of. He said he had hitchhiked in his youth, and gave us a couple of tips. The most useful of which, was that when not at services the most important thing was to have a place where drivers could pull over after seeing you. Which made sense as soon as swe stopped to think about it. He dropped us in a far better spot, just by a laybuy on a road leading to the M25. The problem was we were running out of sunlight, and we were still there when it got dark. This was when things started to look bleakest, as the later it got, the slimmer our chances of getting a lift seemed. And we did not want to be stuck on the side of the road all night. But eventually a van driver pulled over. Not that he had seen us, he had pulled over in order to phone his wife, but since he was going the right way, he was willing to give us a lift. He was a pretty interesting bloke, as he had driven vans all around europe, and he dropped us at some services about 40miles from Dover. This was a far better place to be, as it not only had a place where we could buy some food, but also as we spotted some fellow exeter-paris hitchhikers. We tried our luck at the services petrol station for about an hour, and a buissnessman on his way home gave us a lift the final stretch to Dover.

We got to Dover about 1am, and managed to get some sleep while waiting for the ticket office to re-open the next morning. We woke early for the first ferry across the channel, but it turned out to be incredibly hard to find a lift whilst on the ferry. There were about 6 pairs of us hitchers, all trying to head to Paris, and there just weren't enough people heading that way. So we arrived at Calais with those fair few other hitchers from Exeter, and found another bunch of people who had been in Calais overnight. Turns out Calais is one of the most depressing places on earth. One pair who had gone into town to look for a lift had been shooed back to the port, being told it was not safe. Then it started to rain, and so we decided to get the train to Paris with our felow hitchhikers. It was about 6pm by the time we got to Paris, and we had to make it to our meeting point, which was the Eiffel Tower, in order to meet up with even more exeter hitchikers. By the time we had found that, we then had to turn about and try to find our way to the hotel, which turned out to be harder than we had first thought. But we managed it, and were able to get to our room and get some sleep.

Saturday was spent wandering around the centre of paris. Saw the Arche de Triumph, walked along looking at some of the shops, and went up the the Eiffel Tower. Then, in the evening, we went out to a parisian nightclub, which was good fun, but we were there for a long time, as we needed to wait it out until the metro re-opened so we could get the subway back to the hotel. So it was morning before we made it back to the hotel. After waking on sunday, we went to get some food, before making it onto the coach for the long ride back to Exeter. Slept a bit during that, and made it home on monday. Took a couple of days to recover the sleep that students requier, and now things are settling pretty much back to normal.

Paris was great fun, and hitchhiking turned out to be a pretty awesome experience. Win!

Searching for Call of Duty

So, I dunno if you have heard, but there is this new videogame out. There has been a bit of fanfare for the new Call of Duty game, Modern Warfare 2. Seems that when you make a sequel to one of the best selling games of all time you want people to know it is coming.

"11.10.09" they chanted, confusing everyone in Britain with their Americanised date stamp, and so I looked forwards to November 10th. So when I found I had 6000 words of essay to give in on the same day I was slightly disheartened. But no problem, I thought, I shall just get my work out of the way, ahead of time.

Turns out that was not the case. Instead of running down to my local videogame retailer for the midnight launch, which I have long awaited, and running home to be one of the first people to play this game, I was stuck, my face lit by the glow of my laptop in a cold house, trying to find intelligible things to say about the 1911 National Health Insurance Act. So I missed out on being one of the first person to play.

But, don't you know, being the first to play had already been broken. Online retailers shipped the game last wednesday, so as not to lose face if customers received the game late I expect, but this meant people were already playing this game last weekend. At the same time, supermarket retailers responded by slashing their prices and selling the game at a loss. From the RRP of £55, you can find the game for as low as £25, if you are willing to sink as low as to shop at ASDA.

But I had pre-ordered this in GAME months ago, in anticipation of a midnight launch. And being the loyal customer I am, I was going to stick to my pre-order and get my double reward points, buying the game for the not unreasonable £45. So I walked into Exeter high street only to find that the GAME store had closed down! And reopened at a new location! A location they seemed to want to keep secret, giving only the toughest of riddle-esque clues as to its location. I kid you not people.

So I had to go and find the new GAME store. This led to a rather uneventful 15 minutes as I stumbled about the Princesshay shopping district, suffering from the cold and hunger, while I tried to find the new location of the Exeter branch of GAME.

But, success! I found it! I was done. There, in the front shelf for all to see, where millions of copies of Call of Duty. So I ran to the desk, and presented my pre-order receipt to the cashier. Who turned aorund, and took a mint condition copy of Call of Duty down from the shelf behind her. She scanned it, I had money in hand... and then she looked at me, and asked if I was over 18.

I was slightly startled. I have not been asked my age when buying a videogame for.... well, since I had braces and was still choosing which GCSEs to study. So I produced my university ID. And was told that just would not do. I remained calm, and logical, like Spock. I asked if she could check the birthdate on my GAME loyalty card. That would not do. Hmm... if I was Spock that Vulcan Nerve Pinch would be useful about now. I offered to show her the birthdate on my debit card. That would not do. It had to be a driving licence. Which I had left, in my drawer, at home. And so I was forced to leave GAME without Call of Duty.

Now, I can understand why they would do this. They don't want to get into trouble for selling little Timmy a videogame with some shooty bits. But I am not little Timmy. I am 6 foot 2. I hadn't shaved this morning, so have stubble under my chin. And so I left, feeling... what is that word that means the opposite of happy?

So I left, a solitary tear trickling down my eye. I gave into hunger. I had not eaten lunch yet, so I stumbled towards the nearby sandwich shop. Then I stumbled homewards, to the internet, to rage against this injustice. Thinking of how, if the world was a better place, I would be skipping home to get shot at in a computer simulation. This is all just not fair...

Quiz

So, just got back from the History Society Quiz. It was great fun, and with a score of 80/100, our team came in second! A pretty sweet result, if I do say so myself, and resulting in a sweet box of chocolates as a prize. A couple of thoughts:

1. The Jacket Tom Cruise wore in War of the Worlds looks confusingly like the one he wore in Jerry Maguire. This is a problem in picture rounds.

2. Which song Bill Murray repeatedly wakes up to in Groundhog Day is really hard to remember. (I Got You Babe.)

3. I have a great memory for Top Cat. I remembered that the policeman was Officer Dibble.

4. An Alligator Pear is an Avacado.

My Day

Good thing about this week is I get to wake up slowly. I had time to watch an episode of House with my cheerios, and there was no huge hurry to have my shower. Then I tidied up the publicity posters, an' stuff, for History Society; we want a big push to get freshers in for the Prague Trip in January. After this I realised I was hungry again, and that it was lunchtime. I went downstairs and was goin' to do myself some sausages, when I realised I don't know how to work our gas oven!

See, tho' I have been here in my new house for a week now, I have not had to cook any meals in my own gas oven. Friends' house has an oven, and I would more often cook and eat over there. They also have a gas oven, but they have a button that clicks an' makes a spark (I assume) which lights the gas. Our gas rings are lit by one of those lighters with a long neck, an' I figured the oven was lit in the same way, by putting the lighter-flame to the gas at the back... but then I decided I couldn't be bothered with sausages and so had a sandwich instead.

I had bought an unsliced half-loaf, and had some of that. I didn't find the need to slice my own bread quite so barbaric as expected. Anyhow, once bread had met ham, cheese and pickle, that was that. I also took a swig from some orange juice (no bits means easier washing up) and it was then back to my laptop to take the His Soc posters up to campus for printing.

I ♥ The Poseidon remake

"Now we're not sure exactly what happened here, but our best guess is that we were struck by what is known as a rogue wave. They are rare, they are unpredictable, and they are lethal."


"Thank you, gorgeous!"
"My name.... is Valentine."
"I love that name."


"Conor! How did you get in there?"
"I don't know but the water's really high!"


"You were mayor? You know, I forgot. Big hero. Rescued all those women and children from the fires. Got elected. Man of the people. But you're not the boss anymore. Hm? You quit. Couldn't hack it. If I recall correctly, you couldn't even hang onto your wife. Come on."


[walks to poker table] "We're going downstairs now."
"Ok, have fun... Hey Jen..."
[looks down at her cleavage] "The twins? Dad..."
"Just one more button."

Now Back in Exeter

So, I am now back in Exeter.

Proof I am an Idiot.

OK, so about a week ago I decided to order a couple o' books of the internet. Reading for the plane and stuff when on holiday. So I order the books, fill in the address, pay for it, and wait for the mail every day to see what comes.

'Bout a week passes and still no books. I check the internet, see that they were dispatched, and look at the dispatch details. "Huh," I say to myself, "that address is odd."

Seems I managed to fill in my Uni halls address, where I no longer live, instead of my home. Doh!

Good news is I emailed my old halls, and they were fine about it, said it happens a lot, an' they were gonna forward my books to me.

Still, proof I am an idiot.

Home

So I have now finished my first year at University - moved out of Student Halls. I am back in London for the next few months.

Oh, and it is insanely hot at the moment.

Contact Lenses

Anyways, I recently decided to take up the opticians on their offer of a free trial on contact lenses. I normally don't even think about my glasses while I am wearing them, but sometimes it would be far easier to be spectacle-free. When playing football for example, or whilst out for the evening. Also, glasses have a habit of getting blurry in the rain, so contact lenses would be practical in many ways.

So, as I was saying, a few weeks ago I decided to try contact lenses. The biggest problem is that I hate anything having anything close to my eye - and the idea of putting things in my eye definitely seemed unappealing. So when I went in for the trial, and was shown how to put them in, the biggest barrier was that everytime my finger, with a lens balanced on my fingertip, got close, I would blink. It took me quite a few goes to get the hang of it. About half an hour passed before I managed to get the first one in, but as soon as I had the technique for one - and found that it did not hurt in the slightest - I was able to put the second one in with half the attempts. Happily, contact lenses want to sit on your eye, and so getting them in position is no trouble at all. And taking them out is no bother either. Additionally, they are incredibly painless! I can easily forget about them when they are in. I had feared they would be uncomfortable, but this has not turned out to be the case at all.

For those of you who don't know, the technique for contact lenses is this: to put them in, you balance the lens on you index finger, and holding you eyelid out of the way with the other hand, touch the lens to your pupil. You then gently blink and it slides into position naturally. To take a lens out you slide it with your finger to the edge of your eye, which allows you to simply pluck it out. Simple! And I can now do these first time! Yay!

Since the trial was such a success I signed up for 10 (pairs) a month, of single-use daily disposables; I am happy with how this entire adventure has worked out.

Northernhay House Review

So I have just finished my first year at Exeter University, and moved out of student halls. I was put in Northernhay House, a privately owned self-catered accommodation. Being self-catered has some huge perks: you can eat whenever you want, meaning you don’t have to get up ridiculously early for breakfast or have to be home at a certain time for dinner. You also get to eat whatever you want, which is nice. Tho' if you are in catered halls, you get all your meals cooked for you, which is an extra worry taken care of. But the worst thing about being self-catered is how communal dining is such a more social experience.

The best, and worst, thing about Northernhay is the location. It is not on Campus like many halls, but instead it is right behind the high street. This is fantastic in many ways, being only a few yards from shops and bars and clubs and cinemas and everything is wonderful. It means that you can go to the high street on a whim. The only drawback is that does give it a fair walk to campus, about 20mins to the bottom of the hill, and puts it even further away from all the other student halls. Also it can sometimes be unbearably loud with traffic, if you have a window on the side of the building I was on.

Northernhay also suffers from being privately owned. The free internet we were promised at the beginning of the year turned into paid internet and the promised parcel collection service was stopped. The building also suffered from electrical problems while I was staying there, meaning we lost power for days - and no power meant everything in the kitchen was offline, there were no lights, no water, and no heat, for a long stretch of a cold winter. This sucked. But I guess then there is an upside to being privately owned, that you are left alone for much of the time.

My room in Northernhay was actually quite nice. It had a shared bathroom, but that was never a problem, and it was only a single bed, but then that is normal is most places. It had a nice and big desk, with a decent chair, and a large cupboard. The room had an odd shaped wall that prevented me from putting my bed flat against the wall, which was inconvenient, but I got used to it. The room was actually pretty big, and once I had everything set up, it was a really nice place to be. Tho' I should mention, Northernhay has incredibly thin walls. You do hear almost every word of anything the person in the next room says.

Anyway, Northernhay was not brilliant. There were big electrical problems while I was there, the long walk to campus was inconvenient, and opening the window was unbearable due to the noise of traffic. But then again, being so close to the city centre was wonderful, plus it was nicer than some of the other halls I saw, and my room was larger than expected. I enjoyed my stay there, and I will miss it, despite its flaws.

Beach

Went to the beach today. Exmouth is only about 15mins on the train, and is like, £1.50 return. And the sand is fantastic! Still a pain as it get in hair/room/bed/food/eyes/nose/ears/etc, but worth it when the weather is this good. Today was brilliant, it got just the right level of hot and sunny without being sweltering. Sat around most of the time while there; also got burger and chips from cute ice cream lady, with the coldest lemon fanta ever, and played some beach cricket - which is entirely unlike regular cricket as their is no intention to run, or really to get people out. Since there is no bounce on the sand, the bowler has to go underarm, so the batsman can just whack it and watch the fielders go for spectacular dives and catches 'most every time. Yay!

Exams Over!

Yaaaaaaaaaaaay!