Bad news brigade.

I am not the first choice for people to have around in a crisis.
I'm trying though.
I'm really trying.

The Choice

If I could choose the hour in which
Death chooses me
And the way in which
It will make its arbitrary choice

I can think of nothing better than
To fall asleep near midnight
In a boat as it enters a new port,
In a boat with a clarity of stars
Above and below it;

And all around me
Bright music and voices
Laughing in a language
Not known to me.

Id like to go that way,
Tired and glad,
With all my future before me,
Hungry still
For the fat and visible globe.

- Brian Patten

Hams' new home

So I have two Roborovski hamsters which have to stay home during term time as I can't have them with me at uni. My Pa just texted me this picture - he put them in a fishtank and it looks like they love it! Can see them better too which is awesome. Really want to get a Pug puppy when I graduate, but I need to find a good paying job first...

I should probably go to Fest next year

Gainesville, Florida.

So many of my friends / acquaintances went this year. And last year, come to think of it.

Some of the lineup this year was:

12XU, 7 Seconds, A Wilhelm Scream, ANS, Above Them, Algernon Cadwallader, Alligator, Altercation Punk Comedy Tour, American Cheeseburger, Ampere, Anchor Arms, Annabel, Assassinate The Scientist, Assholeparade, Averkiou, Bad Friends, Bangers, Banner Pilot, Battle!, Ben Davis & The Jett$, Bible Children, Blacklist Royals, Bomb the Music Industry!, Brainworms, Bridge and Tunnel, Brothers, Caitlin Rose, Calvinball, Capsule, Cheap Girls, Cheeky, Chillerton, Chronic Youth, Cinemechanica, City of Ships, Clairmel, Cloak/Dagger, Coffee Project, Coffin Dancer, Coliseum, Comadre, Constrictor, Crash Burn Repeat, Crime In Stereo, Cruiserweight, Cutman, Dan Padilla, Daniel Striped Tiger, Dave Dondero, Dead Friends, Dead To Me, Dear Landlord, Deep Sleep, Die Hoffnung, Diet Cokeheads, Dillinger Four, Dirty Tactics, Eric Ayotte, Fiya, Failures' Union, Fellow Project, Field Day, Fleshies, Gatorface, Ghastly City Sleep, Git Some, Giving Chase, Good Luck, Grabass Charlestons, Hard Girls, Hawks and Doves, Hidden Spots, Hometeam, Honest Arrow, Hour of the Wolf, How Dare You, In Defence, In The Red, Iron Chic, Itchy Hearts, Japanther, Jonesin', Junior Battles, Kevin Seconds, Kylesa, Landmines, Lemuria, Less Than Jake, Liquid Limbs, Litany for the Whale, Little Lungs, Living with Lions, Look Mexico, Low Red Land, Madeline, Magrudergrind, Maruta, Mehkago NT, Mike Hale, Monikers, Mose Giganticus, Mouthbreather, Nervous Dogs, New Bruises, Ninja Gun, No Friends, No More, North Lincoln, Nothington, O Pioneers!!!, OK Pilot, Off with Their Heads, Old Growth, Only Thunder, Outbreak, Pezz, Polar Bear Club, Pretty Boy Thorson and the Falling Angels, Protagonist, Psyched to Die, Pulling Teeth, Pygmy Lush, Radon, Red City Radio, Rehasher, Religious as Fuck, Ringers, Ruiner, Russian Circles, Samiam, Savage Brewtality, Scum of the Earth, Shang-a-Lang, Shellshag, Shitstorm, Shook Ones, Sick Sick Birds, Sinaloa, Smalltown, Snacktruck, So Pastel, Spanish Gamble, Static Radio (NJ), Street Eaters, Stressface, Strike Anywhere, Strikeforce Diablo, The Arrivals, The Arteries, The Bomb, The Brokedowns, The Casting Out, The Catalyst, The Copyrights, The Disappeared, The Dopamines, The Emotron, The Flatliners, The Future Virgins, The Ghost, The Max Levin Ensemble, The Measure [SA], The Menzingers, The Ones To Blame, The Riot Before, The Shaking Hands, The Sidekicks, The Takers, The Thumbs, The Tim Version, The Tupolev Ghost, This Bike Is A Pipe Bomb, Thousandaires, Tiltwheel, Tim Barry, Tin Armor, Too Many Daves, Torche, Totally Michael, Towers of Hanoi, Toys That Kill, Trash Talk, Tubers, Underground Railroad to Candyland, Used Kids, Vaginasore Jr., Vena Cava, Vicious Fishes, Virgins, WORLDS, Watson, We Moderns, Whiskey and Co., Wormburner, Worn in Red, Young Livers, Young Widows, and Youth Brigade.

It's at the end of October, so I've never been able to go before because of University. I don't know how Uni students from England can go, unless they're on a ridiculously slack course which means they can take a week off with no bother...

So according to Emily I need to save "Flights are like £350, fest ticket £40, hotel £120. That sorts fest then you just need to save for any parks you wanna do."

Dayum. It will totally be worth it though.

Posi

5th action from the 'posi list'.

I'm making these lists every week. They really work.

Peace out, bros.

Yum

Just went for dinner at Liddell. Emily is such a good cook: butternut squash and bacon risotto with basil and tomato salad / green bean and balsamic salad with chocolate pudding after.

I took some white chocolate and raspberry hearts from Hotel Chocolat - we put one of each on the puddings whilst they were still hot and they melted into a pink mess all over.

It was so nice to hang with those guys. I'd never really hung out with them beyond standard chit-chat around college. They have such a wonderful set-up in that little flat. It's so clean / tidy / there's a square meal every night / they bake / they cook / they watch tv together. Wonderful.

Gary [the] Glitter [reindeer]

Today I went for breakfast with my friend Lauren. Lauren was in my year (aka graduated last year) at New College. She's basically awesome. Now she's teaching English at Cheltenham Ladies College.
Anyway, we had a nice little catch up in Pret with Guy and Sarah, who I don't actually know too well. Lauren revealed that it was her aim to 'set up' Sarah and I, because she knew we'd like each other. Boy, was she right. Sarah's a pretty ace gal.

So anyway, we went to Primark because Lauren had seen that someone she knew had a glittery reindeer, and she wanted in. I actually haven't set foot in Primark for a long while. I've been boycotting it because, despite being well aware that they use the same horrid slave labour conditions as places like Topshop (who just stick on a bigger mark-up), I've just generally been trying to shop independently a bit more and am not into underpaid workers. That's why I've been getting a lot of clothes from American Apparel and other things from places in the indie-craft scene.

I ended up breaking this boycott so we could buy a reindeer each. I got dragged into some odd ornamental solidarity pact.

I had a good time. I was worried that there was nobody rad left in Oxford. I was so wrong.

Oh, I went to see 'Up' last night with a lovely lady called Harry, who used to be at Corpus a couple of years ago. That film is ace. I'd heard so many people say so and, I must admit I did think "Oh, not another Pixar film". It was lovely. Think I might get it on DVD when it comes out. I very much enjoyed hanging with Harry too. I regret not doing so more when she was at Corpus.

Right. I'm off for dinner at Liddell. Later gator.

x

I told you I was trying the Posi thing...

Continuing on the theme...

Continuing on the theme of AWK and being posi, if you don't chuckle at least a little bit at this video, you're defective.

Bonfire night

Who needs fireworks? - I have 19 articles from various medical journals to turn into an essay! Also - It's raining outside. Hard. So joke's on you, all o' y'all with a social life.

Dear Blog

Dear Blog,

Sorry Blog. You see, Blog, I've neglected you. You've become merely a place for me to text how horrid I feel because I don't want to tell anyone. This is because I both fear being a burden and have nobody here in Oxford to be a burden on.
I'm sorry Blog. I'm going to change my ways. I know nobody reads you apart from me, and that's fine, but looking back on all the sad things I've felt recently isn't nice. So I'm going to write more nice and interesting things.
So I actually dragged myself out of bed this morning. I was spurred on because, having checked my Facebook on my phone, I saw that someone lovely in my college had invited me over for dinner. We don't know each other very well at all, but she'd seen from my statuses (stati?) that I had been staying in my room / feeling lonely. This random act of kindness spurred me on a little. I started writing my essay and went to my lecture on development of motion perception. When I came back (via Pret - oh yes, I've been making an effort to eat now after going from Sunday to Wednesday with an empty tummy), I saw that another lovely lady who used to be at Corpus had commented on my negi blog post inviting me to the cinema tomorrow. How lovely. Truly. Yes.
It's been very hard being here with no firm friends, all of my year having graduated last year. Combined with the fact I decided to taper off my antidepressants again in the summer, this was a prime opportunity for my depressive tendencies to creep back. I'm being proactive though. I promise. Not too long ago I could have let such an episode drag me further down, but I'm getting good at seeing the warning signs and jumping off before the ship sinks.

Whilst out, I bought 'I Had A Black Dog' and 'Living With A Black Dog' today by Matthew Johnstone on recommendation from my illustrator friend Sally, from home in Manchester. I'm excited to settle down and read it tonight. I've never ventured to the 'Self Help' section in Blackwells before, but I very much enjoy graphic novels and comics, so thought I'd give them a go. According to The Times, "Johnstone describes I Had a Black Dog as a “drawbridge” book. “Depression is complex, but what I think I have achieved is a way of communicating some of the feelings in simple terms.” He remembers showing it to a friend, “the sort of woman who claimed to never have understood what all the fuss was about. She read it and burst into tears. That has happened with a lot of people. Everyone who has seen it has got their own story.” " I might write a few thoughts on them tomorrow. It's not something I like to define myself by, but I'm glad I only let myself slip deeply into it for a couple of days. I'm learning to recognise the warning signs and make a really concerted effort to pull myself out before I fall in any deeper. I guess I'm kind of proud of myself for that, though I just need to work out how not to let it affect Dave...

On a more positive note, I forgot to mention through all my negi blogging that I got Tubelord's album, 'Our First American Friends' and it's wondiferous. Truly. I have been waiting for this for what feels like forever. They're definitely in my top 5 UK bands (probably along with Tellison, The Steal (RIP), Dartz (RIP), The Sam Isaac Band (RIP)). I'll just put my two pence in now thought and say I'm pretty devestated that a) there's RIPs applicable to 3/5 of those bands, and b) Sean has left Tubelord. Sean is a great bass player and knows how to move. I was gutted when I found out he left.

Still, the album is fucking rad, and they should all be bloody proud of themselves. They're playing Oxford on November 29th at The Bullingdon with Future of The Left. So I am mega stoked on that.

Talking of 'Rad', I got 'Raditude'; Weezer's new album in the post today. I'm saving it as something to look forward to listening to tonight. How cool is that for a front cover, though?


Another entertainment type thing I've been digging lately is Mad Men. I've been watching it here, via surfthechannel.com, because I've been investing in megaupload membership lately. So useful. I initially tried watching it last year but chose to start watching it late at night when I was still dating Pete. I woke up half way through asleep on his tummy in a pool of dribble. I took that as a sign that it was a boring show and abandoned it. Could not have been more wrong.

To top off my list of the few things that have been keeping me posi, I have to give a mention to Pret. I've been finding it quite hard to eat lately, and have been living on their crayfish and avocado salad, and also this chicken salad thing with pine nuts and tomatoes. I've been known lately to have one for lunch and one for dinner. They're the same price as a jacket potato from Ahmed's, so that's ok right? Seeing as I don't have a cooker here, it's better than a microwave meal.

OK, I have to go write my essay but today's message is KEEP POSI. On that note actually, I must mention Andrew WK's twitter as something that has been keeping me posi. Here's a selection of his 'tweets'. If you're not following him already, do it now. Seeing these pop on my blackberry throughout the day make me crack a smile:

PARTY TIP: Your life is a movie. You're the writer, director, & star. What plot are you giving yourself to live? Script it well.

Wow, I'm SO partying right now! Just pissed like a race-horse all over my hand. It felt incredible! Life is AWESOME.

PARTY TIP: Today, whenever you use the bathroom, I want you to think about me... You can be psyched on the bathroom! PARTY HARD!

PARTY TIP: Think how amazing it is that life exists at all! It's a total miracle that we get to be here! PARTY out of respect!

PARTY TIP: Wherever you are, find a mirror and smile BIG at yourself for 30 seconds. Force it if you have to.

PARTY TIP OF THE DAY: Look at EVERYTHING today as extremely RIDICULOUS. Then celebrate the absurdity of it all by PARTYING HARD!

PARTY MINDSET OF THE DAY: Remember that even when life feels hard or scary, I am here cheering you on, and you will KEEP GOING!

If you don't know who Andrew WK is, look at this. You must remember this. Surely?

God, I love him. If my hair's long enough I might go as him for Halloween next year.

One last thing - and I swear to God this is the last, but if you want ultimate lulz, look at these videos of the Gwar frontman on Red Eye. AWK is in one and he is looking fiiiiiine...but that's not the point. Peace out, bros.

Rsvp to my pity party.

I feel wretched. I haven't left my room in 2 days and cannot contemplate doing so. I cannot concentrate. Work is woefully boring. I'm desperately lonely. All I want are some good friends who live near me. Someone to ring me up and say "Hey, let's go to the pub / park / cinema/ cafe". I have nobody here. Not a single person. I never thought I'd be that person.

Fuck.

I love you / I love you

...but it's for the best.

Bambi's muh.

I went as Bambi's dead mum for Halloween. Went to Bristol to see Dave. Unfortunately saw other people who I'd rather get shot in the head irl than hang out with, but ho hum.

Wore my 'tranny shoes' that I got in the post too. I have size 9 feet so got a 9.5. Comfiest things ever. Totally buying more. I swear to God they're for Drag Queens.

I LOVE ginger!

Went for a haircut today. Trying to grow it, but it was getting a bit mullet-esque. The colour hasn't shown up well on the old Blackberry, but it's a nice golden ginger colour. Going to take it up gradually back to blonde - not the white hair I had before but something more reasonable. Maybe like when I looked like this?

Home

I came home for a haircut. Completely last minute...and a lame excuse to see my cats and my parents I guess. I wish I could have stayed another night.
I love my hairdresser, Dominique. We chat, and I read her texts and try to decipher what the men in her life mean. I have no clue, but I like trying.

What the fuck.

Funny how rumours spread with absolutely no factual basis.

HAHAHA.

Welcome to my life.

I kind of enjoy it.

Sorry I have nothing interesting to write - this really has been all I've been doing lately.

Fw: I love sleepy thoughts.

------ SMS ------
From: Wilcox
Sent: 20 Oct 2009 23:24
Subject: I love sleepy thoughts.

I love sleepy thoughts. You know that numbers go on forever? Well surely any random selection of letter will be at least one number. I think faridah is my favourite number, closely followed by wintrog x
Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device

Oxford Tube

How many times have I been on this thing? It makes me think of sneaking out of the boarding house when I was 16. I feel so naughty.
So I'm heading to see Niall who's doing a masters at Goldsmiths in something erudite. I forget. Then tomorrow is Alexisonfire, Four Year Strong, Anti-Flag etc etc with Sian hangs during the day.
Dissertation is going ok - currently reading lots of reviews of the neurodevelopmental evidence for Schizophrenia in a hope of coming up with an original title. Rad.
Peace out, bros. X
Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device

Bloody cannot wait for Wednesday...