Amusing Events and Anecdotes

February Again

2007-02-23T12:14:00.000Z

Well, this is going to be my second post in one month. WOW!
I sit in the studio at uni just now very much looking forward to going and doing talk in a couple of hours. Ok, that's a massive lie, I don't look forward to it at all, and am hoping it will be over by half three, which means I can run to the station in plenty of time to get the ten to four train instead of the half five one. Actually, if it's not finished, I might just run away and make sure I get that train anyway.
In other news, I went to see SixStarHotel at Nice N Sleazys the other week, which was great. Loudness and smallness make for a good gig. Very good.
I've not actually been upto much else recently. How exceedingly dull. Off down to Dumfries for the weekend, and playing bass at Centrestage tomorrow evening. Bring on the ROCK!

February

2007-02-05T13:09:00.000Z

Ok, so my posts are slightly less regular than my brother's, who somehow manages to find time to post on his blog pretty much every single day. But none the less, here is a post from me, who knows what it's going to contain.
So once again it's that wonderul time of the year when the six nations is on, and therefore weekends are mostly devoted to watching three games of rugby on tv and shouting at it whenever england get any points. Stupid Wilkinson. Unfortunately I only managed to watch two of the games this past weekend, but these were the Scotland and Ireland games, which were good. Yesterday I even went and watched the Ireland game round at flat 44 on their massive screen projector thing. Good times. I ate a steak pie too. All in all, yesterday was a very good day.
Not much else has been happening of late. I played at a ceilidh on thursday night for the CU, which was great fun, but I was ridiculously sweaty and disgusting after it. I did record most of the songs though, and Jillian took some good photos of us while we were playing. These are the first known pictures of us playing at a ceilidh. Someone else out there may have some if they have been spying on us. Or if I've just not been paying attention, which isn't particularly unlikely.
Went to s birthday party on friday night for a short while too. There was much pudding - not really surprising seeing as it was a pudding party. Yet another chocolate fondue was there, but I was very restrained and managed not to eat to much of it. I did eat quite a few strawberries though. Mmmmmm. They were good.
Didn't stay at the party to late though, because the next day I had to get up at half six, to get the half seven megabus to the ever interesting DUNDEE!
At this point, I think I shall take the chance to go on a small rant, mostly aimed at Megabus. I don't like megabus. I don't see the big attraction. Ok, so they are better than the buses in Dumfries that you can get into the town, but they aren't that great. We sat upstairs once again, and once again when I was up the stairs and stood up properly, my head went very much into the ceiling of the bus, and I had to crouch down A LOT in order not to get carpet burn on my head. And why on earth do they have carpet on the ceiling? IT JUST DOESN'T MAKE SENSE. Stupid buses. They don't have nearly enough legroom either, which is really annoying when you're going to Dundee. My legs were really quite sore by the time we got off the stupid bus.
The day in Dundee was good though, we were at the last CU leaders training day of the year. It was a good day, and got to see leaders from the other CU's again, which was class. And then when we came back, we managed to get a lift in the mini-bus that Caley had with them. IT WAS GREAT! No stupid megabus to put up with on the way back. We only took one wrong turning too, which was very quickly rectified by our experienced minibus driver.
Then Sunday was pretty class, church, lunch at flat 44, watched the rugby at flat 44, had dinner at flat 44, back to church, then back to Dennistoun for tea and other such drinks at the girls flat. Good times.
So that pretty much brings you up to date with what I've been upto. Not many plans for the next couple of weeks, just got a ceilidh to play at, and I should probably do a bit of work for uni at some point too.
Anyway, off to do work!

January

2007-01-24T21:33:00.000Z

It's been a long time since I updated, and this post is only going to be short, as I'm going to start watching a film in roughly 4 minutes after I am finished listening to what can only be described as "angry-classical music". It's good.
Anyway, Christmas and New Year were good, dunno why I put all those capital letters in there though. Good relaxing time during the holidays, but also included a whole load of revision, a 5 hour visit to Glasgow, and working for 2 hours in the bookshop. I served three customers. It was fun.
Now I'm back at uni and am having a very easy first week back. It's wednesday, and I've had 7 hours so far this week. By the end of tomorrrow I will have had 9 hours. Then I have another six on Friday, which is a bit rubbish. But then I'm getting the train home for the weekend. So hoorah.
Anyway, that's three or four minutes, so it's film, time. Goodbye.

November

2006-11-29T21:48:00.000Z

It's been far to long since I last updated this thing. Something in the order of six and a half weeks I do believe, as this is the middle of week 10, and I last updated in week 3 if I remember correctly. It seems a long time, but it's flown by. It's hard to believe that I only have two and a bit weeks of classes left before the holidays. In that time I also have to finish 4 assignments, play at 5 ceilidhs, go to all my usual lectures, revise for a test, visit dumfries for a day, and find time to sleep somehow. Fun.
As I said about the ceilidhs, there are 5. 4 of them are next week, 4 nights in a row. Should be really good banter, and I'm sure we'll be really good by the end of them all. Lots of booking requests coming in too, including someone who asked if we would beable to play at their wedding, which was a bit mental. They hired someone more expensive though. Ha.
Not much else been happening, just lots and lots and lots and lots of work, trying to find time to relax, seeing friends, a bit more work, and some eating. I taught Colin to play risk one night too. I was impressed seeing as I had only played it once before then. It went surprisingly well.
So, only two and a half weeks until I return home for Christmas, which should be good. I've not been home in quite a while. I'm also getting to go paintballing on Saturday, which should be brilliant. Take out work-induced stress on people wearing boiler-suits and helmets. Sweet.
Anyway, that's all I can think of and be bothered to write just now, so I am in fact going to go to bed. At 10pm. Sweet.

Back at uni

2006-10-04T21:41:00.000Z

Ok, so I haven't actually updated properly since I've been back at uni. So here goes a quick guide to what I've been upto.

Fresher's Week

I moved in. My flat is so much better than last year. There was much partying and catching up with people, and messing about musically. An open mic night, a CU thing, and a ceilidh were the main musical things. The ceilidh was good. I played at it. Hire our band for stuff. We want to get hired.
Not much else really happened in fresher's week. Played a bit of pool. Moved PA equipment a lot. Messed about. Got my timetable for this year. It looked bad.

Week 1

The timetable looked a lot better after I had been to a couple of classes. It dropped from 26 hours a week to about 18 most weeks. Unfortunately lots of assignments to do this semester too. Had a couple of CU meetings too, which went quite well, and the music went well too. I had a massive band for the Thursday night, and it was good. Well, it was fun, and I enjoyed it. Whether or not it was good isn't really for me to judge. I saw Colin one day as well, but I can't remember which day it was. Perhaps Monday. Perhaps not. It was good anyway. Went for coffee. Heard abotu the many failings of his flat. It was fun.

Week 2

Not had many classes so far this week, and it's Wednesday night. And only got two hours tomorrow, but got a bit of work to do too. And need to make sure all the music for CU at night is fine. Got a couple of freshers helping with the music tomorrow, so hopefully that'll be ok. Sure it will be, one studied music. And isn't acutally a fresher. But I'm sure it'll be fine.
As for the rest of the week, I'm headed home for the weekend on Friday afternoon. It should be a nice wee trip. Then back up on Sunday afternoon, and a bit of praise and prayer at night in the west end. Should be good.

Update y'all soon. And hire our ceilidh band.
www.strathclydecu.co.uk/strings.htm

Strings Attached

2006-10-04T17:17:00.000Z

Just to let y'all know about Strings Attached, the ceilidh band that I be a part of. If you would happen to want to hire us for anything then just drop us an e-mail at strings_attached@hotmail.co.uk, or text me, or something. And we'll have a website at some point too.

Woot, a PC

2006-09-06T17:45:00.000Z

Wahey, guess who might be getting a PC? That's right, me!!
A rather old and cheap pc, but a pc all the same. Hopefully even with a 19" monitor!!
Oh yeah, bring it on!
And yes, I know I'm a Mac man, but who am I to turn down a very, very cheap pc?
It can always be done up to be good :o)

That is all for now.
Ariba.

Project20. Again.

2006-08-26T21:00:00.000Z

Ok, so Project20 is progressing nicely. Ish. It even has it's own website now, so go and pay it a visit here and tell me how good it looks/get in contact with me/have a listen. And then I'll have to let my brother know what you say seeing as he's the one that made the site for me. Thanks to him.
That is all for now.

Project20

2006-08-24T22:36:00.000Z

Ok, so I thought the other day that I would quite like to give myself a challenge. A good challenge at that. So I came up with one, and it's called Project20.
The basis of the project is this. I'm going to be 20 soon. Well, in about 8 months. So why not see if I can write and record 20 songs before I turn 20? You could say it's a celebration of my twentieth year. But I'd rather you didn't.
So yeah, that'll probably take up a lot of my time in the next few months. And I may even sell the stuff on cd when I'm finished depending how it goes.
You can keep up with my progress using the link on the left.

Wishlist

2006-08-16T20:40:00.000Z

On the offchance that any of you ever want to buy me anything, you can now find stuff I want with the link to my Amazon wishlist on the left <--
Don't be shy, give it a try :-)

A Nice Wee Trip

2006-08-11T20:02:00.000Z

Ok, so that was the view that greeted us when we got off the train at Corrour Station, Scotland's most isolated train stations. There are no roads to it. They only open one door of the train to let people on and off. There is no ticket office, and no ticket barriers. There is however a small restaurant that does a very good bacon sandwich, and a good venison burger. And also, surprisingly, in 2005, 19,000 people got off trains at Corrour. That's quite a lot of people I would say.
So Sandy and I got there, went for a quick bite to eat in the restaurant, and then met Chris off his train from Fort William. We only had two options now; wimp out, and wait three hours for the next train back to civilisation, or walk for three days to get back to anywhere resembling a town. We, of course, went for the second option.
So once we had our backpacks packed, repacked, and then waterproofed, and once we were all waterproofed, we set off. And just since we had all put on waterproofs, the rain stopped as soon as we left. Hoorah! It was a nice walk the first day, down to a nice loch, saw some diggers, and then up by a river. It would have been even better if the rain hadn't started again. Actually, even that would have been ok if the boots I had been wearing were actually waterproof. However, they weren't, so my feet were very, VERY wet by the time we reached the bothy we stayed in that night.
It was a nice bothy, and there a nice couple in the other half of it that Chris had been talking to on the train. They were also heading in our general direction, but not going up the big hills like us on day two. Had a fun night in the bothy, playing cards, and trying to light a fire with no dry wood, just a slightly damp newspaper.
So, day two. Due to the large amount of rain the day before, and through the night, the river we were walking along was rather swollen. We of course then had to cross this river after not to long. It proved to be quite difficult. In fact, the couple from the bothy, who had left like ten minutes before us in the morning, were still there when we got there. We looked up and down it for like ten minutes, then concluded that we would have to wade. But we didn't. Instead, we just jumped and threw our packs across to each other. We helped the other couple get across too. It went well for a while, then we got to yet another river we had to cross. This one wasn't really jump-able, so we had to wade. And it was well cold. Rest of the day was pretty uneventful. If uneventful by any chance means going up large hills, climbing very steep bits on all fours, and being scared of falling off the cliff next to us. Then having to go down a very large hill (which is harder than it sounds with a full pack), and seeing a herd of deer. That's right, a proper herd, on the side of a hill. Then we climed another big hill up by a waterfall to camp that night. In a nice saddle between two hills, at about 750 metres above sea level, where it rained for about 14 hours non-stop, and we fell asleep at 8pm. Apart from Sandy who was out for the count from 7pm. Ha.
The next morning we awoke to it still raining. But it soon stopped luckily, and it was nice for us having breakfast. We even got some nice pictures of the tent actually up in the clouds, as it was all night I'm pretty sure. After we finally got the tent all packed away and all our stuff on, it was time for some more walking downhill, which was fun again. Except this time it was even steeper than the day before, so it took us a very long time. And at the bottom, we were greeted by yet another fun river crossing, which was aided by my walking pole, and getting our feet slightly wet. Slightly. Ha.
Once we had crossed this river though, we were pretty much set. Not that much after that, we saw people. That's right, other people! It was so weird, seeing them on the Nevis tourist trail with their small day-packs and puny waterproofs. How we mocked them. And as we kept going, we kept seeing more and more people. Then we got to another river. Tsch.
This one wasn't to bad luckily, well, not compared to some of the others. We made it across relatively quickly, then got to the wire bridge which goes across the river. It looks something like this.

In fact, it looked a lot like that. Three nice thick pieces of wire which swung nicely as you walked across them. Great fun. We sat at the other side and enjoyed lunch, eating pretty much all the food we had left, which made the packs quite light for the afternoon. After this we were surrounded by people, as we were on the proper Nevis Tourist Trail, but somehow even though we all had full packs, and had been walking three days, we were still passing pretty much everyone. And making many a sarcastic comment as we went. Some that deserved special mentions are the man in proper leather work shoes that would go with a suit, the man with the black day-sack, which was so new/unused that you could still see the folds from it being in it's bag, and also the lady who was wearing walking boots, but was still tip-toeing on the rocks for some reason. Not that there were very many rocks.
So we soon made it past everyone and onto the road up Glen Nevis. We also saw a very inconsiderately parked car, which someone had left an angry note on since it was so badly parked. We had slight problems walking along the road, as it was very sore on our legs. Marshes we could do, rivers we had by this time mastered, but a nice tarmac road had us defeated. So what do you do when you don't want to walk? That's right, hitch-hike!
It didn't go well at first, but eventually a very friendly man in a Volvo stopped and picked us up. All three of us, having not washed for a few days, and with all our stuff. We were very, very happy. He took us right to the campsite where we planned to stay that night, and we said our goodbyes to him as he headed back off the London where he lived. Weird.
So after getting the tent up, we headed into Fort William to end our adventure with a proper pub meal, and that's exactly what we got. A nice meal, followed by a trip to a pub where Sandy knew someone, and that meant only one thing; a free round of drinks. I like campsites too I might like to add. Very peaceful compared to the top of a big hill in the wind and rain. Very peaceful.
So the next day we just came home, pretty much. A quick wander around Fort William saw a couple of purchases, and then Morrisons to buy stuff for lunch on the train. A very big lunch. Very. Sandy left us in Crainlarich to go to Mull for a couple of days, while Chris and I just travelled home with lots of luggage, but we did have his car to come down in from Glasgow.

So, that pretty much is most of what happened while I was away. There are a couple of other funny stories that may be told at some point if I can remember them, but we shall see.
Anyway, hope you all enjoyed that and it wasn't to long.

Glen Nevis

2006-07-30T21:23:00.000Z

Just thought I aught to let anyone who actually reads this thing and knows me know that I'm gonna be off walking up at Glen Nevis for the next few days, so if anyone tries to contact me, it probably won't work, since I probably won't have a reception for the whole time.
Update you once I get back.

I had a day off today

2006-07-27T21:52:00.000Z

I thought I would start today's post with a picture.

That's right remember to smile.
However, I ain't been doing much smiling today. "Why is that?" I hear you ask, "You had a day off."
Well, that was the theory. Then I was going to be working from 12 - 2. Then 12 - 4. Then it finally turned into 12 - 6.
So today wasn't really a day off at all, it was just a really annoying day at work. Just a silly, busy day. And just for anyone who hasn't worked it out already, I don't like silly busy days. I like days off, when I get to relax and do things that I need to do, rather than just being stuck in one shop for far to many hours.
Anyway, that's enough of the ranting, because I noticed something interesting when I got home from work today. At the entrance to the driveway of the house at the top of my street, they have laid out a weird square of breezeblocks, which I can't work out the reason for. So far I have only come up witha couple of weird ideas.

1) They are building a raised flowerbed. Right at the end of their drive. And using breezeblocks.
2) They are building a raised water feature. Right at the end of their drive. And using breezeblocks.
3) They are building a gatehouse, and they are going to add a gate, and a small, old man shall live in it and ask who want's to enter.

Personally, I really hope that it is the third of my guesses, but I somehow feel that it isn't going to be. I may take a wander up someday though if I see the people about and ask them what it's for. And where they're hiding their little, old man who is going to live in their garden, or if he just hasn't arrived from little, old man land yet. Hopefully I shall find out soon. Maybe I could apply for a job as the little, old man who lives in it? I do already live nearby so accomodation certainly wouldn't be a problem.

Alive Radio

2006-07-26T20:57:00.000Z

So once again this year, Alive Radio is on the airwaves in the Dumfries area, on 87.7fm, and online at aliveradio.net
I would advise you to check it out, especially on Tuesday the 8th of August between 8pm and 10pm, as I shall be on the air at these times.
Hope you're all having a good one.

It's been a while

2006-07-14T21:47:00.000Z

So it's been quite a while since I last updated this thing, and now all that much has really been happening to be quite honest. The most exciting thing was getting asked to move onto the masters version of my course, so I of course accepted cos it should be great.
Apart from that, I've mostly just been working away, and being occasionally ill. Hoorah. Been for a few bbq's, climbed/ran/jumped over rocks, and generally had a bit of a laugh. It's been quite a good couple of weeks really.
Anyway, I would say more, but I don't have more to say. Oh well.

I passed my exams.

2006-06-29T18:16:00.000Z

I passed my exams. This makes me well happy.
That is all.

An evening at the beach

2006-06-27T21:53:00.000Z

An evening at the beach, with some rock climbing, and some cycling. Don't ask why we had a bike. Or where we got it.

Rain. A lot of it.

2006-06-21T08:35:00.000Z

Ok, so it's been raining quite a lot in the past couple of days, but that hasn't stopped Colin and I, as you can see.

It actually got a little out of hand and started to burn the grass around it, but it was all ok in the end. The one yesterday in the rain was ridiculously big too, and was still going three hours after we went inside after dousing it in water. Which was interesting.
Not much else been going on really, just messing about and relaxing, playing the guitar and watching football. What a life I lead. I may go away and actually try and do something in the rain today.

I'm so bored. So, so bored.

2006-06-16T21:07:00.000Z

I'm really bored. I'm alone, fending for myself for the next two weeks, which I hate. It's really dull. I thought that stuff was just for uni, but no, now I'm back and got to do it again.
Anyway, I've been watching far to much football in the last few days. The average is about two and half games a day. I really need stuff to do. It has been quite interesting in all honesty, but probably really bad for my eyes.
Also, tomorrow is Dumfries' Guid Nychburris (pronounced 'good neighbours') parade. Parading and all sorts of rubbish, which means it's impossible to go uptown with a car and actually beable to park. So instead I'm going to Colin's for general mayhem. The joy.
I thought I would give you a nice photo again in this post. This was taken when I was sitting on a very comfy inflatable sofa (I wonder whose that is?) at Stuart Aitken's leaving party. It's quite cool I think.

So not much else going on really. I was so bored I made up a new quiz on that evil time-consumer that is Bebo. Curse whoever finally convinced me to get it. And hopefully I shall manage to survive the next couple of weeks, and won't become to dull and depressed, or give myself food poisoning. Food poisoning hurts, I don't want to have it again :-(
So goodbye for now, and please feed me.
Rock on \,,/

Assorted stuff. And Frenzy.

2006-06-13T08:14:00.000Z

So it's been quite a while since I did one of these nice update things. Not that I've really been to busy to do it lately, I've just not bothered to as such.
So a couple of Fridays ago I was at the CU Ball. I actually looked smart for once, in kilt and all. And it was a fun night, which was then followed by a very early morning as I had to move out of my flat in Glasgow, so I currently don't live in Glasgow.
Then, last Monday to Friday, the whole CU committee were away retreating in Ayrshire. Was a good week, and got lots of stuff planned and discussed. And ate a lot. And sat in the sun a lot. And got slightly burnt. We went and played ultimate frisbee one day too, which is perhaps the most tiring sport ever, especially when it's very warm and you're wearing thick trousers.
Then on Saturday, it was Frenzy. Woot. It was a pretty amazing day, with some absolutely amazing music. Got up nice and close to the front for a while too, which was great. Right up the front for Hillsong United and the David Crowder Band. Excellent. Here's an example of just how close up front I was.

Yeah, so that was amazing. Since then I've not really been upto much, just unpacking and relaxing and the such, playing bass and guitar at church, watching lots of football and fixing/tweaking a couple of my electric guitar. The fun. And today includes such fun as getting a hair cut, having lunch in town, and buying a wall planner for next year.
Well, I must away now, as I have such a busy day ahead of me. HA, right. I just don't have anything else to write.
Ta-ra.

Bass

2006-05-25T21:52:00.000Z

I played bass today for the first time in ages. It went quite well, and i have blisters on my fingers now. Hopefully the music will go quite well on Saturday night.
Other news, was out at Colin's yesterday and today. Much work was done on the garden, and there shall be photos to follow soon, once I get them.
Had a chinese yesterday too. It was fun. Quite good too. According to the waitress Colin and I hadn't been in for two months. I'm not completely sure why she can remember that so well.
Also, the reason for the short sentences and stuff is that the blister on my finger is right on the end with the bit I use to type. Fun.
Anyway, bed calling.

A long week. And Christmas music.

2006-05-22T20:32:00.000Z

Ok, so my last post was pretty short, and it was really quite a while ago now. 10 days I do believe. Well, the run of me updating a lot had to end sooner or later. And it was mainly due to exams.
That's right, since then I have had two more exams and that is me now finished. I have been smiling a lot since the end of my last exam at about quarter past three this afternoon when I finished early and left :-)
So here's a quick update on the last week if I can remember it all.

Sunday

Church in the morning, followed by much revision in the afternoon. There was also some Grand Prix and golf watching. It was good. Went to Relevant in the evening and won Frustration. Then got very frustrated when we played it again afterwards.

Monday

Mostly revision I think. I can't really remember. I just know I didn't really leave the house much until the evening. Was out at a prayer group in the evening with the baptists. Food was consumed, and it was good. Italian Chris style I do believe.

Tuesday

Had to head back up to Glasgow for the impending doom of the Design exam on Wednesday morning. So some quick revision in the morning, then got a lift to the station with my brother. Got the super exciting train up, which was actually on time. Got to Glasgow and attempted to do some more revision for the exam. Also got given a free can of Irn Bru 32 on Cathedral Street because they were standing giving it out for some reason. Still not drank it as it makes me too awake.

Wednesday

Probably should have drank the Irn Bru 32 as was pretty tired heading to the exam for a half nine start. A one hour exam, and I left after about forty five minutes or so, and headed back to el flat. Everything was already repacked for heading back south, so I just sat and watched awful TV for a while. Headed for yet another fun train, but this time my mp3 player battery had died, so the journey proved to be very, very, very boring. I have now vowed to always make sure it is fully charged before taking train journeys. Got back to Dumfries, had a drink and a cookie in Kings and then ended up in Costa with Sharon after she finished work. Got home and had a nice lazy evening before the start of more revision.

Thursday

Revision. And some more revision. And I went uptown and bought a birthday present for Chris. And then some more revision. Then wasted the evening. It was a pretty boring day.

Friday

More revision was the order of the day. Then at night out at Pizzeria Il Fiume in el grande Dock Park for Chris' birthday. He's got some Italian genetics or something. And we went to an Italian. Wow.
No, it wasn't a coincidence.
Headed to the Bruce for drinks afterwards, then headed home. All in all, a good night.

Saturday

Did some revision in the morning, but probably should have done more. Headed out to Colin's and finally got to fly my kite. It made me so happy you would hardly believe it. Didn't get any photos of it unfortunately, or else it would be appearing here.
Then did some work with Colin at the burn in his garden. We saw a deer too. And built a staircase in the side of a hill. Looks very professional, and I should probably have got a picture of it too.
Was out there in the evening too for the wonders of Eurovision!! It was pretty rocking this year, with the crazy Finnish bat people who used the word "a-rock-alypse", and the Lithuanians with their crazy football chants. Good night.

Sunday

Nearly there now. Did some revision in the morning, then had to get another train, (wooo), and arrived back in Glasgow. Should have done some revision, and I did. Then watched large amounts of TV in the evening, and laughed a lot at Top Gear. Not the single most exciting day in the history of the universe.

Today (Monday)

Got up and managed to do revision for most of the morning. Went to my exam, and the revision paid off. A two hour exam and I left after about an hour and a quarter having finished all the paper to satisfactory standards for me. So that left me the evening to waste, and I have managed to quite successfully. Chose some songs for CU tomorrow morning too, and that's the next thing on my agenda, followed by a train back to good ol' Dumfries tomorrow morning.

Well, that's the week that was. Hope you enjoyed it more than I did with all the revision in there. But now all the exams are finished so there should be a goodly amount of generally being a pie now :-)
Bye for now.

PS. I forgot to mention this, but as I'm having to fix this as I messed up and managed to underline the whole lot, I'm listening to Christmas Music. Wahey. The lesson to learn from this is that if you use HTML coding in the then make sure you use it properly! Hopefully it'll work now.

Scottish Cup Final

2006-05-13T17:21:00.000Z

So today was the Scottish Cup Final and local team Gretna made it to the final. Pretty impressive seeing as they were in the Second Division this past year. They are in the first now though.
So it started well, but then Hearts got the first goal. Not good. But they came back with a penalty in the second half. But it wasn't to be as it went to a penalty shoot out and they lost.
"The end of a fairy-tale" many people are calling it. Personally I'm looking forward to next season and seeing what they can do in the First Division and the UEFA Cup. It might actually be the first time I've been excited about football in a long time.
Hope you all had a good, sunny Saturday.

The Aftermath

2006-05-12T18:08:00.000Z

Thought I should probably let y'all know how the exam went. And the answer, surprisingly, is that it went quite well. It was a two hour paper, and I left after fifty minutes. Perhaps you think that is because it was going so badly I ran off crying or something, but no, it's because I was finished. Woooo!
So that went well, and my train back down this afternoon managed to be on time, and it wasn't to busy, and it was one of the trains that is slightly better than the one I got yesterday.
So now I get to spend the night relaxing before I start revising for my next exam. I also hope to get a chance to fly my kite sometime soon since I got it all fixed up. That would make me happy.
Anyway, that's all I have to say today.
Bye

Trains

2006-05-11T19:08:00.000Z

Ok, so there aren't that many things that I actually hate. Some things I dislike, many you might say, but very few push me that bit further. One of the things I do hate is chemistry, but you probably already knew that, so we won't go into it again here. And once again as a note to any chemists, I only don't like it because I don't understand it, I have nothing against any of you.
Now the other thing I truely hate. Trains.
I went for my train today to come up for tomorrows exam, and everything was fine. Arrived at the station in plenty of time to go and get a ticket, get a seat on a bench and wait for the train. I go in to get a ticket, and the ticket office is closed.
Now I'm sure many/some/one of you are thinking "well that's not really enough to make me hate something", and I agree with you there. I just thought I would go and wait on the platform, and get a ticket on the train instead. So I get to the platform, and no sooner have I sat down than a First Scotrail worker comes over and informs me and the other passengers that the train will be 'about twenty minutes late.'
Great, another brilliant train journey for me. But wait, it gets better.
So twenty minutes isn't that long, I had my mp3 player so that would be fine. I even phoned Scott and arranged for him to keep me some food at CU since I would be late. Then someone else came over.
"I heard someone say that the train's going to be forty minutes late now."
Forty? FORTY!! That's double what we were told about five minutes earlier. Not even twenty minutes had passed, so how could it be another twenty minutes late? Unbelievable. Then, I hear the bing-bong of the PA system.
"We regret to inform you that the train is now running forty-five minutes late. That is four five minutes late. Sorry for the inconvenience."
Inconvenience? I'm sitting on an uncomfortable purple bench in Dumfries station with a bunch of randoms waiting for a train which is getting later with every minute that passes. I was not happy.
I was also not happy when the train finally arrived and it was one of the rubbish ones, not the semi-decent ones we occasionally get. But I had to get to Glasgow, so I got on and got a table seat, got the whole table to myself so I could stretch my legs out too. It looked like the journey was maybe going to get better.
And it did actually start to go alright. I listened to some music, pondered life, and did some revision for my exam tomorrow. We then arrived at Kilmarnock station.
Bing-bong.
Oh no.
"We regret to inform you that the train will be delayed by another fifteen minutes since the track ahead is not clear. We are once again sorry for the inconvenience."
The track's not clear? Well it would have been if you hadn't been so late getting to Dumfries. So I read notes for the time that we were sitting there, and admired Kilmarnock station too. The admiring bit took all of about ten seconds.
So eventually, at quarter to six, we left there, and headed on. After stopping and starting several times, due both to signals and places such as Dunlop and Stewarton, we finally arrived in Glasgow. At half six. That's right, a whole hour after we were meant to arrive. Me? Happy? Oh no.
So I went outside, where it had decided that it would make my day worse and start raining. So a taxi was entered, and it headed off, where I got charged £3.40 to get to the Chaplaincy. 60p of this occured while sitting at one set of traffic lights. Still not happy.
So the end of my journey finally came, at quarter to seven, several hours after leaving the house in Dumfries. I got my food that Scott had kept for me, and it was very good. There was even ice-cream for pudding. Then I headed back here and spent some time talking to the other Alastair in my flat about our exam tomorrow. He isn't looking forward to it either. Maybe it's something about our name.

But there you have it, a terrible journey, which made it a terrible afternoon. Hopefully the exam tomorrow won't be terrible.
Wish me luck, and I'll let you know how it goes soon.

Another post...

2006-05-10T20:58:00.000Z

Another post in the same day, and this makes my 50th post. It's like a birthday, but I'm not going to have a party.
Instead I'm going to show you all a photo I took a while back of Colin. I feel this should embaress him suitably. Enjoy.

Here's to at least 50 more!

Sorry to offend many of you, but...

2006-05-10T19:10:00.000Z

I dislike chemistry a lot again. I'm very sorry to all you chemistry people, but I just don't like it. Metal for instance. I don't care if it has a body centred cubic structure or face centred cubic structure. It's hard, it can be used to build stuff, and to hit people if that's your inclination, and that's all I really need to know about it. I don't care how it looks when you magnify it 2000 times, and why it stays bent when you bend it.
Unfortunately, this is all stuff that I have had to learn for my exam on friday. Think I shall be forgetting it again pronto as soon as the exam finishes, and I mean as soon as. But what am I to do? Just try and pass so I don't have to resit the exam and relearn everything.
Well, also today I did some major messing up of my ps2, and managed to lose large amounts of saved data going back like a year. This did not make me happy. I also got hayfever because loads of people were out cutting their grass. This also did not make me happy.
However, something that did make me happy was that I finally got round to fixing my rocking sports kite. I got broken like a year ago when it hit the ground very hard and one of the poles kept going instead of stopping, and ripped a massive hole in the fabric. But now it's mostly fixed, so hopefully I'll get it up and flying sometime soon out at Colin's or somewhere of the sort :-)
I head back up to Glasgow tomorrow, leaving here about quarter to four, and arriving in Glasgow just in time to go to CU for dinner. Sweet. I also can't wait for 11:30 on friday. Unfortunately though, that means I first have to get to 9:30 on friday morning which is the start exam. Oh well. Bring on the 23rd though, and the end of my first year of uni. The following few weeks are going to be muchos fun. Ariba.
So wish me luck and big me well for my exam. I'm well going to need it.
Update soon.

It's sunny, sun is good

2006-05-09T17:18:00.000Z

So it's very sunny today. It always seems to be during the exam period, when all kids are stuck indoors studying (in theory). It's so nice and warm that I nearly went and studied outside, but I was using a computer, so I didn't.
So not much been going on today apart from the studying for brilliant chemistry. I'm actually managing to learn some stuff about metal and the like now. Today I was mostly learning about bonding of stuff, and that kind of stuff. My hatred of chemistry has actually relaxed slightly, as some of you may have noticed since my MSN name is no longer about me hating chemistry.
Oh yeah, I also made an attempt at re-arranging my room today. Didn't go to well, it just ended up looking really stupid, so after about five minutes I changed it back to what it was previously like. Fun times.
In other news, I hit 1500 texts today in my phone. Party.
Also, I worked out how o2 have managed to be stupid again. I signed up for their brilliant treat of 15 of free calls a month for three months. It's very good, and it saves me a lot of money. So it got to the end of the first month, and automatically re-started for the next month. However, when it re-started, it also re-started my free texts for another month. So it is now seven weeks since I topped up my phone, I'm still getting free texts and free phone calls, and I'm pretty sure I'll keep getting them free for another five or six weeks. Roughly £90 worth of free texts that comes to instead of £30. Nice.
Well, I would say I'm off to do revision or something, but I don't think that's all that likely to be honest. I'll probably just watch TV or try and find some cool pictures to put on my blog instead.
Tally-ho.

My phaser lives!

2006-05-08T10:16:00.000Z

So I got my guitar and stuff out for a while yesterday afternoon, and decided to get my two pedals out too. Now the last time I tried to use my phaser pedal it didn't work, but it's working now!! Hoorah!!
So yeah, that made me happy and it makes really cool noises.
Was away in Dundee on Saturday for a CU leaders training day. Good time, even if we did have to get up at like half six in the morning to get a half seven bus. I personally think we should have rented a plane or helicopter and it would have been much quicker, and much cooler too. But maybe a bit more expensive than Megabus.
So this week, the main thing to do is revision. I have a super fun Engineering Materials exam on friday, which is basically chemistry. This would be great if I had ever done chemistry at school or ever even tried to enjoy it in first and second year. But I didn't, I just dislike chemistry.
Oh well, back to do more revision now. See all you Glasgow folks on Thursday evening.

Crazy Weather and Glasgow

2006-05-04T23:07:00.000Z

Ok, so I went to CU this evening as planned, and ate as planned, saw people as planned, and then went to the union to play pool as was also planned. This is kind of where the stuff that was planned ends.
So we had been in the union since about seven o’clock, and it was probably about quarter past nine or so by this point. We thought it slightly odd that they put the lights out on one side of Gamezone, and moved everyone to our side. Then all of a sudden all the main lights came on all over the room, and several security guards appeared telling everyone that they had to leave immediately and university cards could be picked up at a later date. So we got all our stuff and went to leave, and it was at this point that we looked over and Jillian said “Look, the sprinkler system is on.”
Of course, at this point we didn’t know about all the rain. I did however notice that the water wasn’t coming out of the sprinklers, it was actually pouring out of the air conditioning ducts and from the lights.
So we left and walked down the stairs to leave, seeing as the rest of the union is pretty rubbish. It was only when we got to the door and saw the truly ridiculous amounts of rain that we worked out what had happened. We were also told that the rain was the lightest it had been in about an hour, and it was still pretty heavy.
So ran to the car, then we headed back here due to the rain still being so heavy. I made a video of it with my phone too, it looks pretty cool with all the sheet lightning. I shall show it to people sometime who may find that kind of thing interesting.
So, that pretty much describes my crazy last hour or so. The other thing that we worked out was that the union had ten levels or so. Three of these levels are directly above Gamezone. In order for water to make it down to Gamezone, we reckon that it must have caused ridiculous amounts of damage upstairs. Well, at least I do. Guess I’ll try to find out what happened tomorrow at some point in my free time.
Wish I could have got a photo of the lighting to put up here though, would have been pretty cool for looking at, you know.

Ok, so that’s all the thunder and rain stuff dealt with, now for the bits about the rest of the stuff that I did today. Did my packing, and got my stuff all into my cool new rucksack. Had a pretty uneventful train journey up, just sat and listened to music and read my paper. Also, this may not make much sense to most of you people out there, but my train came in at platform 1 today!! That has never happened to me before, I felt like royalty or something.
Apart from that, just walked back to my flat, and did a couple of things, chose my electives for next year, and then talked to my flatmate Dave for a while, watching Futurama throughout.
And after that, I headed to CU and caught up with many a person that I hadn’t seen for like a whole week. Was a good night. Thanks for the food Katie :-)
Anyway, that was all the stuff that led up to the visit to the union that is described above.

Well, hope you all sleep well through the thunder tonight

Another assignment finished in plenty time

2006-05-03T19:08:00.000Z

Well, once again I have managed to complete an assignment in plenty of time. Finished it at about quarter to eight or so on Wednesday night, and it's not due in until Friday at midday. That makes me happy. So in honour of me managing to get this done, I thought I'd let y'all have a look at it before my tutor even sees it. So here it is.

Well, I hope you all enjoyed that. I think it's quite good if I may say so myself.
Today was my last full day in Dumfries for a fwe days, heading back up to Glasgow tomorrow to hand in said assignment, and then having a couple of days in Glasgow and a day in Dundee too. Should be a good weekend.
So for anyone in the general Glasgow area, I'll probably see you tomorrow evening at CU for food, and maybe some pool afterwards? Let me know if you guys are up for it. Anyone in Dumfries, I should be back down on Sunday afternoon sometime, and shall turn up at Relevant no doubt, where I plan to have many a chocolately drink :-)
Well, I'm off to waste an evening now.

A bit late, but, you know...

2006-05-02T18:56:00.000Z

It was suggested to me a little over a month ago now that I should post a couple of pictures of a 5'3" snowball that was made when we had all that snow. So here are a couple as I should have posted a while ago.

Yeah, so that is the massive snowball, nearly as tall as Sharon, and with Ali sitting on it.
Also, I just realised this is the first time I have published two posts on the same day. To the best of my recollection anyway.
Well, hope everyones enjoying the rain :-(

Happy Tuesday!

2006-05-02T09:55:00.000Z

Good morning and a happy Tuesday to you all. It is a merry day of being up early even though I am in Dumfries, and getting some work done. I get to do a presentation on cars. How distraught am I about having to do that?!?
Not at all is the answer to that question. I am actually quite enjoying doing the project, and it is going well. And it shall be finished in plenty of time for it's Friday hand in. Ooo, maybe I could even try and get it finished early like I did with my logbooks. Hoorah.
I get to go out for lunch today, and I'm sure that it shall be muchos enjoyable. And then back here to do some more work. Oh the fun of having to hand stuff in.
I bought a new game for my ps2 yesterday. Much enjoyable, and much destruction. Most of it mindless, but all the less it's still fun.
Well, I better be off and do more work now, pictures of cars can't stick themselves to a page.

The exciting world of Dumfries

2006-04-29T21:22:00.000Z

Today marks my triumphant and heraldic return to Dumfries. It's such a place. I bought a rucksack.
So yeah, what an amazing days it's been. Got home at about 1 this afternoon. Unpacked. Unpacked some more. Continued unpacking for a while actually. Watched some tv, went uptown to get my rucksack, had a drink in Kings (cheer), had a shower, and went to Centrestage, a youth event at church.
It was good, saw Colin, Catherine and Claire and Mel and other assorted people again. A good way to start my return to Dumfries until thursday when I leave again.
In other news, I need to do a lot of work this week. Then take the work to Glasgow to hand it in. I also get to go to Dundee next saturday for a CU committee training day. Should be good, and hopefully very inciteful and useful.
Anyway, I'm away to watch tonights Doctor Who that I taped. Wooooo.
Bye for now.

19

2006-04-27T10:13:00.000Z

So I am now officially 19, and have been for like an entire day. Wow.
To be honest, it doesn't feel all that much different. I still like to play pool, drink Irn-Bru, and sleep. Messing about and wasting time is still more appealing than doing work. I still dislike neds, and boy racers to an extent. So all in all, I'm the same as I was when I was 18, but I might get ID'd less now, who knows.
So, my new mp3 player rocks. Over 2000 songs and it can fit in my pocket. How great is that? I had it with me last night when I was at the union, and it goes well loud. Such fun. And yeah, I was out at the union last night with a few folk taking in a few games of pool in the near-empty gamezone. It was good, and I won most of my games. Maybe I'm getting better at pool now that I'm older?
I watched Narnia on dvd yesterday too. I should really have been doing some work in the afternoon, but it was my birthday, so that wasn't going to happen. I did however do some work in the evening before I went out, and got my logbooks finished. I in fact handed them in this morning, a whole 35 hours before they were due. That must be some sort of record, it is for me anyway.
So not much happening today, except got to revise for the exam I have tomorrow. ARGH!!! Hopefully it will all go fine, and I won't have to sit the exam in May for that class. Here's hoping. CU barbeque tonight too. Hopefully make it along for a while, even if not for the whole thing, once again due to the exam.
Only one lecture and one exam to go and then the semester is finished!! Hoorah!!

Quiet days and free time

2006-04-24T21:30:00.000Z

Today was a lovely quiet day. I only had one class, from 2 until 4. So I filled my morning with food shopping, and a visit to WHSmiths to buy a Mac magazine. Many free games and programmes followed. Did some revision, headed to class, came home, was fed by my flatmate, and then spent the evening playing with lego.
This was no ordinary lego though. Oh no. This lego is on my computer. Every piece you could ever want, and you can arrange it however you want. So I started by doing a model of the buggy I built at uni. And then moved on to a full model of my room. In 3D. And it's colour co-ordinated. It's so cool.
And also, tomorrow sees the racing of my groups buggy as competition day has finally come. It starts at 9am, but I don't care. I just hope to either win, or go out first so I can leave and come home for a nap. Either would do me fine, but I would prefer to win.
As a thought, if anyone would like to buy me iLife '06 for Mac, or even just iWeb, it would be appreciated.
Ta for now.

A Bit Risky

2006-04-23T12:28:00.000Z

Last night, I played Risk for the first time ever. I was the first person to lose everything out of the six people playing. I think of that as being quite impressive. Good game though.
It's very sunny today. So I am spending the day inside. It's nice and cool with my window open, I'm getting some work done, and I'm not too tired for once. Score.
Don't think I have any funny stories to share today, hopefully more funny stuff shall happen soon.
In terms of other general stuff, there is a new link to the left to Six Star Hotel's MySpace. Go check it out if you have some spare time.

Genuinely Insulted

2006-04-21T12:40:00.000Z

Today, I was genuinely insulted. After a quick trip down to Wesley Owen to spend a voucher I had (I bought a metal bible), I thought I would pop into MacCormacks music shop to see if they bought second hand guitars. They do. So I asked for an estimate on how much I would get for it. I told them the make. I told them how much I paid for it. They insulted me by saying they would only give me "£50 at the most" for it.
I left the shop after this. Now, not many of you may know much about guitars, but mine is quite rare. Guitars without heads generally are quite rare. I have never even met someone else that owns one. So I wasn't happy.
Anyway, I am now finished for the week, and had a very enjoyable lunch that contained bacon. Now a lazy afternoon lies ahead of me, then a party tonight. Should be good.
I shall endeavour to update again over the weekend, but you know how these things go, especially with me. It'll probably end up being two weeks again or something before you hear from me.
Anywho, by for now.

My great wonderful blog

2006-04-19T21:20:00.000Z

My blog has finally received recognition from an outside source. Ok, so the outside source was my brother on his blog, but he did write something along the lines of "my brother's blog is more amusing, and he actually bothers to post on it unlike me."
And now I have mentioned his blog too.
Today was a long day, but one of great jubilation. It started at 8am, a whole hour later than yesterday did. I started doing work at 8:15am, and finished my group project by 9:30am. It got handed in. I did other university related stuff I needed to do. I went to Buchanan Galleries, which was empty at that time of the morning on a Wednesday. I met Louise in the Chaplaincy, and wasted about three hours there. I also bought a yoghurt and some post it notes for a lecture tomorrow. What is going to happen in the lecture scares me slightly.
After our committee meeting, Louise and I headed to Dennistoun to have a jam. Once guitars were eventually tuned and restrung, it went well. I also got accomodation sorted for next year. Hoorah.
Pizza hut tonight too. A lot of pizza was eaten. A lot of laughing was had. And Kirsty went to put sprinkles on her ice cream, but the lid fell off and she emptied pretty much the entire contained over her ice cream, the counter, and the floor. Mightily impressive, and mightily amusing.
And on the subject of amusing things...
While I was at Louise's flat, she received a phone call from Jamie, who's website link can be found to the left. He had got locked out of his flat, and only Louise has a spare key. Just as well she was back from Northern Ireland today really. So we headed out to Partick on the train, and she phoned him as we were walking towards his flat. "You can come and meet us half way" she said. "I can't actually, as I'm not only locked out of my flat, I'm locked inside the courtyard of my block of flats and can't get out" he replied. This led to much, much laughing. Especially when we arrived and found that since he had been stuck, he had started doing some gardening. Mostly by shoving his hands in the soil and pulling out weeds. His hands were absolutely coated in mud. So what did he do? Put his hand in his trouser pocket and answered his phone when it rang. Genius.
He did however say thank you very much to us, and offered us drinks and food. Louise also proceeded to cook him dinner, which he then proceeded to eat.
Anyway, that's been my day. Tomorrow is hopefully going to be as relaxed as today, and is apparently going to include cake at CU. Score.

The Exciting and Wonderful World of Me

2006-04-18T16:40:00.000Z

I had one class today. It was at 4pm. I also had a group talk to do. It was at 2pm. So what time did I get up?
That's right, you guessed it, 7am. CU followed by preparing for the talk for about three hours. Fun. Especially when a member of your group doesn't turn up. Good times.
But anyway, the talk went ok, and my computer worked the best out of all the ones that were used with the projector. Hoorah. So now all that has to be done is finishing the project for tomorrow, handing it in, and going for dinner at small group tonight. Hoorah for the Jackie (and the Gary if he helps cook it)!
For all that I called this the exciting and wonderful world of me, not much else has been happening in the last couple of days. I reside in Glasgow again. But most of you could probably have guessed that. And I'm going to Pizza Hut tomorrow night for tea. I don't think I'm going to be doing to much cooking this week, which, on reflection, is probably a good thing health-wise. I might actually eat vegetables in Glasgow for once. I think the first instance of this was when Louise and Alison cooked me tea a few weeks ago. Apart from that, it doesn't happen often.
Well, now that you know I don't eat vegetables much, I must bid thee all a fond farewell, and go and do work before I go out tonight.

P.S Veggietales is one of the better things in life that involves vegetables. Veggietales, and throwing carrots at people are the only two good things I can think of with them generally.
P.P.S Don't you think that it's ironic that the two lead characters in Veggietales are both techincally pieces of fruit? Mull it over.

Happy Easter to all, and to all goodnight

2006-04-16T14:07:00.000Z

Happy Easter to you all. Hope that you're having a good holidays, and haven't eaten to many Easter eggs.
I have had a very fruitful weekend, reminiscent of those from last year. Colin and I had a Chinese for lunch on Saturday, and the waitress actually said "It's good to see you two back here again". That makes me worry about how much we used to be there.
We also had a massive rocking bonfire. After it had been burning for over three hours, it was still to hot to stand right next to for any length of time. Good times.
We also performed experiments in the kitchen involving grapes and a microwave, and red cabbage, boiling water, vinegar and bicarbonate of soda. Good times.
So tomorrow sees my return to Glasgow for a couple of weeks. I have just finished my packing, and now just need to finish my work and prepare a talk, and then I can acutally relax for a while. It shall be good.
Have a happy Easter Monday all.

Two Weeks

2006-04-11T21:17:00.000Z

Today marks two weeks since I last posted. I have excuses. I was in Inverness for a week. I was busy in the last week of uni before the holidays. I couldn't be bothered thinking of anything to write because I am generally quite a lazy person. A small raccoon stole the part of my brain that contained my password so I couldn't log in to update anything.
I think the lazy one is quite obviously the main one there.
However, it is also true that I spent a week rocking out in Inverness. WOOHOO!!! Lots of films, good food, driving, late nights, early mornings, and general fun. Much of this fun also included a wheelchair and Andrew falling over in it. Good times.
Well, I was actually planning to make this a reasonably long post, but it would appear that I really haven't done very much in the last couple of weeks. I'm sure I could bore you with every little detail, but I shall restrain myself.
I think that I may finish this post with some ramblings about raccoons. These may be better suited for my random blog, but what you gonna do? It's free, and it's your time I'm wasting, not mine. I think they are frankly quite remarkable creatures. They have cool little rings around their eyes. And on their tales. In general, they just rock quite a lot. C'mon the raccoons!!
I also feel I should finish with some sort of thought-for-the-last-two-weeks. But I don't have many thoughts, but if I do have one, I'll be sure to let you know. But for now....
Rock on blogstars!

So they fixed stuff

2006-03-28T10:52:00.000Z

So, everything is working in our flat again. The toilet door has been re-attached, and now has special wooden bits to stop it getting broken for a third time since we have lived here. The oven works again too. But not only does it work, it works twice as well as it used to, and now only takes about twenty minutes to heat about to any useful temperature, rather than the forty-five that it used to take.
So bascially our flat is whole again, which is rubbish in a way, as it means I don't have anything left to complain about. I'm sure something will come up in the next few weeks before I leave though.
As you may have noticed, this post is being written at midday. This is because I only have one class today, and it is from four till five pm. "Why are you up then?" I hear you ask. The answer is that I was at CU this morning. Good way to start the day, especially when afterwards you don't have to run off to class, and can instead hang about in the chaplaincy until eleven.
However, I do actually have some work to do the rest of the day, and hence should probably do it. Partly because once I do it, it shall be done, and that shall make me happy.
Small group tonight, with biscuits and all. And not many days until I go home now, and then head up to Inverness. Bring on the Chung's is all I can say.

Some General Thoughts

2006-03-25T12:44:00.000Z

Ok, so life in our flat is quite interesting just now. Our oven doesn't work. It hasn't done since Tuesday, and it still hasn't been fixed. Our sliding toilet door also started to break again the other day, meaning you occasionally got stuck inside. However, as you can see from the below picture, this problem has now been fixed.

Yes, that's right, the door is no longer connected to the bit it slides along in any way, shape or form. As a word of advice to anyone who would ever be fitting a toilet door, never use a sliding one. They don't work, and are just generally quite rubbish. I wonder how long it will take them to fix it?
In other news, I was ceilidhing last night. Great time, much dancing, not too much feeling ill. Fun train rides as well, which are always good.
Off into town now, and get more free texts on my phone. I am also getting 4 free sim cards from o2 for some reason, which will be handy in case I ever manage to go on a rampage of sim card destroying. The fun.
Now, a closing thought. The Swiss army are great. They are only part time, and if there is ever a war, they can just grab their guns and swiss army knives and march off to be good and neutral.
Have a good Saturday.

Ireland, Ireland!!

2006-03-18T23:38:00.000Z

"Ireland, Ireland, together standing tall. Shoulder to shoulder to answer Ireland's call"
Ok, so technically, I'm not Irish. More precisely, I'm just not Irish at all, although I do have a feeling my second name originates from that great island. The reason that I say this is that as well as Scotland beating Italy at the rugby today (hoorah), Ireland beat England!!!! I witnessed this from the wonders of Waxy O'Connors. An Irish pub full of Irish people, and me, screaming and celebrating and not being able to bear to look at the screen. But they won!!! It was so good.
That was the highlight of today. Other stuff in the week since I last updated is as follows. I did about 16 hours of work on a group design project. 7 and a half of these occured in the same day. It was not a good day. I am now once again feeling better, I was last weekend too, but now I'm hopefully feeling better for good. I registered with a doctors too. Had a meal with the rest of the CU committee, which was very good. Celebrated St. Patricks night by playing card games a lot, wearing a massive Guiness hat and singing like an absolute idiot. Did some work on a Saturday. A quarter of a project if you want to be really precise. I watched the Last Samurai too. Good film, and it was even better this time, because last time I watched it my dvd player overheated half way through and I couldn't watch the end. Ever so slightly annoying.
Also, if you would be interested in learning the guitar, let me know, I seem to be going to be teaching a few folk. And if you want to pay me for it, that would be even better. It would mean I could buy food. And food is good.
Anyway, blog on rockstars!!

A lazy weekend

2006-03-12T11:55:00.000Z

This has been a pretty lazy weekend, not much been happening really. The main reason for me actually being home this weekend was going out for dinner for my dad's and cousin's birthdays. However, we are not going to be-able to go tonight. See if you can guess why from these pictures.

That's right, just like the rest of the country, we have masses and masses of snow. At least six inches I would say probably. So church is cancelled, meal tonight is looking most unlikely, and my room is nice and warm compared to outside. It's fun to go out and walk/sink in though.

A quick update

2006-03-08T19:29:00.000Z

Ok, so as most of you probably know, im not well. Although now I am getting better, and hope to be completely better by the end of the week. Due to this fact, I dont have much to update you about. Apart from the fact that the CU Leaders Training weekend was good. And snow is fun. Also, note the new links on the left <- to sean's blog and the CU website.
Erm, what else. Buy oxfam donkeys, they are for a good cause. And Eu Natural is a very good place for picking up cheap plates and mugs and cups. I now own four more mugs than I used to. None are quite as big as Louise's massive Ireland one though.
Apart from that, not much been happening. I sleep quite a lot. I am also going to venture into town to meet my family for lunch tomorrow, but doubt I will eat much.
Anyway, hopefully I'll be back up in Glasgow soon for more fun and shenanigans.

I like short books

2006-03-01T22:36:00.000Z

I like reading books. I don't seem to do it all that often, but I do enjoy it. I especially enjoy reading short books, because I always seem to find more time to read them. The latest of these short books that I have read is "Blessed Be Your Name" by Matt and Beth Redman. I borrowed it last night. I gave it back to Alison this afternoon. And it was a very good read, with very good points in it. I can honestly say I am glad that I have read it.
In other news, I got told I had to hand in something today. This was something that I had actually handed in several months ago, but apparently it hadn't been seen. This is not true, as I have it on my shelf, and it has comments written on it by the person that saw and marked it. So basically, it just proved to be an annoyance that meant I had to go up to the fifth floor of the James Weir building. It wasted time that could have been better spent too.
Much work also got done today. Maths revision. Mechanics. Some design. And stuff for CU. All in all, quite a busy day, which for some reason is only translating into quite a short post.
Oh, we had pancakes yesterday too. Many a pancake, and many, many a choice of toppings, which is always good. Also, we played cheat, but with three packs of cards. It gets interesting when you are trying to hold two whole packs of cards in your hands. So yeah, yesterday consisted of much pancakes, chocolate eating and card holding. I've got to say, it's quite a good combination.
Anyways, I feel that bed it calling now. Either that, or I just want to go to bed, and sleep for a long, long, long time. Of course, it will only be until like eight because I need to revise some more. Hoorah. Ta-ra.

Thoughts concerning music and other such things

2006-02-27T21:54:00.000Z

I got thinking the other day. Actually, more precisely, I got thinking earlier on today when my mind was wandering yet again instead of concentrating on the work I was trying to do. Anyway, I realised that it is now almost exactly three years since I started playing the guitar. I then realised just how much I have learned about the guitar in that time. Then, my brain working as it does, this led to another thought/challenge. If I can learn to play the guitar well in that amount of time, could the same go for the piano?
Now obviously, there are some slight differences between the piano and the guitar. Mainly, the piano has keys that you press, and you don't strum it. Also, the fact that I own four guitars and not a single piano. All the same, I have decided that over the next three years I would like to learn how to play the piano. Maybe not learn to play it really, really well, but play it all the same. I feel it would come in useful at some time or another.
Well, apart from those thoughts, its been a pretty uneventful day. Five hours of classes, and doing work either on my laptop or in A3 pads the rest of the time. I even tried to do work as I was sitting having lunch in the chaplaincy earlier. I also still have some design work to do tonight, but that shall come after ER I think.
Anyways, not much else went on over the weekend apart from Scotland winning the rugby!! That definitely deserves a big HOORAH!!! Ireland also won, which I view as quite a good thing, but not as good as Scotland winning. It shall no doubt continue to make me happy for a few days yet.
Well, that's all my thoughts for today. If you want to buy me a piano, let me know.

I'm home!

2006-02-24T19:39:00.000Z

Once again I have decided to take a trip home for the weekend. A trip home on the train, which was so fun, you can't begin to imagine how much I enjoyed it. It brings in the end of a busy week. Between all the work I've been doing this week and the organisational stuff for CU, I have been very busy, and would liked to have slept more.

Last night was the great CU pub quiz 2006. 70 questions. One night. Seven teams. One prize. So yeah, the quiz concocted by Louise and myself seemed to go down well. Jillian may correct me about this later, but you never know, it seemed to go pretty well. I had fun too, especially looking at the ever-increasing name of one of the teams. I can remember that it involved beef, and offices somewhere, but thats about as much of it as I can remember.

So after that last night, I had a nice lecture at nine o'clock this morning. This was after I had packed for coming home too. Three hours of class, all of them involving numbers and the such, with mechanics and maths. Oh the joys. So then I went back to my flat, ate, and headed to the train. A fun trip home, and then some slight unpacking. Just the general getting-home stuff.

So now, ahead of me I have a fun weekend planned. Apart from going for some coffee/tea/irn-bru tomorrow, I have a lot of work to do. And I mean a lot. Hopefully I'll still find time for some general television watching, guitar playing and messing about. I plan to take many more guitars back to Glasgow this time too. And hopefully this week I'll get more sleeping time, as I like sleeping time. It makes me happy.

Anyway, off for a nice relaxing evening now. Hope you have a good evening too.

Whyfort singeth the birds?

2006-02-22T19:47:00.000Z

Have you ever noticed that if you get home really late at night/early in the morning, the birds are still singing? I had never noticed this until a couple of weeks ago, but since then I just keep hearing them whenever I get back late. It's quite extraordinary.
Other things that have been happening since I last posted have been equally exciting. I had a lecture yesterday. One whole lecture. Yet I still spent the entire day either at CU things or working. It felt good to get so much work done actually. Today was also almost completely work based. I have done maths, integrating studies, introduction to design and other assorted pieces of work. I made a pretty graph too =)
And this evening is to be more of the same. After the success of my curry earlier, (it was great, I bought poppadoms too and it was really nice. Mmm.) I have managed to successfully complete my maths assignment for tomorrow, sort out all my lecture notes from this semester so far, start some more design work, and I still even found time to play the guitar for a few minutes.
Tomorrow will also prove to be as busy I feel. Start the today as you plan to continue - with a committee meeting at 8am. Bright and early start before a good day of getting lots of work done. It should be good.
Anyway, back to more work. Also, thanks to anyone who replied to the survey thing I emailed them. Much appreciation to you all.
Bye.

Rolls and chocolate spread

2006-02-20T19:17:00.000Z

The answer - rolls and chocolate spread. The question - what did I own in the way of food before I went to buy some more earlier. Now I own more, which is good, and I like food. Anyway, much has been happening since I last posted. Not all of it has been happening to me, but some has so I shall fill you in on that stuff.
The morning after the ceilidh I did not feel good. At all. So the lectures had to be neglected in favour of not being sick and trying to feel better. It worked, and I was feeling better by the afternoon. I was feeling even better still by the evening, so went round to watch films at Katie's flat. Aladdin, Clueless and Bring It On. Two of those are films that I would not generally watch, but they weren't as bad as I thought they were going to be, which was good. Also, did you know cheap violins do not enjoy staying in tune? I know now, after Louise tried to tune hers at about half one in the morning. Bet the folk upstairs loved that.
Saturday consisted of slight doing work, going into the city centre to top up my phone, and then yet another ceilidh. It was good, there was food, and ceilidhing, and a raffle that I didn't win anything in, but it was still good. I ended up getting home at about half two, which would be fine and well if it wasn't a saturday night. I then proceeded to get stuck in our toilet once again and it took five minutes to get out. This made me annoyed. What made me even more annoyed was the person that started pressing our door buzzer constantly at about six in the morning. Eventually I got up to let them in, pressed the button, and no-one came in. This made me even more annoyed. Sometimes I think about removing our phone thing from the wall so noone can buzz us. But I won't. So then, after another three hours sleep, I headed over to the West End Vineyard church and met Louise there, and her friend Jamie. It was a good church, with a good speaker, and especially amazing music. This was followed by a curry, which was also good. I ended up in a shoe shop too so Jamie could buy shoes without holes in them. I also ended up buying new shoes. They are cool, but I think I am now going to have to buy new trousers to go with them. Oh well. I played guitar at Dennistoun Baptist in the evening too, but that was rather uneventful, as was the rest of my evening.
Today was also rather uneventful, with a few classes, most of which were really boring, and I got an assignment that is due in on Thursday. It should be interesting, especially since it concerns hard maths. I shall manage though. The other exciting thing from today is.............our toilet door got fixed!!! No more getting stuck in it, and having to get people to help me get out, or having to help other people get out. That deserves a hoorah I think. Hoorah!!
Anyway, I have to do some work tonight, so I better get on with it. Update y'all soon.

Things I have learned today

2006-02-17T00:31:00.000Z

Wow, a second post on technically the same day as the last one, since I havent been to bed yet. This post is generally focused on things I have learned today. The first was that I failed to work out how to spell a word that I made up. Anyone who has been to the CU forum will see this word, and no doubt comment hence forth.
The second thing is that my design group can really get a lot of work done when we try, and still have a massive laugh. We got a lot done today, AND even managed to organise a meeting for next tuesday to get more work done.
Another thing, if you go to the village office and tell them your toilet door is broken, then wait a couple of hours, a brand new green Henry the hoover will appear in your flat. The door however still does now work, and the hoover is yet to be tried, because we only ever hoover when people are coming to visit or we have inspections. Even then it sometimes doesn't happen.
A fourth thing is that there are a number of words to describe me at a ceilidh. Here are a selection; enthusiastic, hyper, crazy, mad, maniacal, energy-ful, tired, knackered, out-of-breath, and being in the state of something resembling a zombie. Hoorah.
Wow, looks like I've learned a lot in the past day. Four things. If I learned that many things every day, I would lose the useful facts I know about such things as guitars. Or the bible. And we wouldn't want that to happen now, would we?
The correct answer is 'no'.
Anyway, bed is a-calling, as is my nine oclock lecture tomorrow morning. The joys.

Well and truely knackered

2006-02-16T09:04:00.000Z

The title does not refer to me. Although I had short amounts of sleep on sunday and monday nights, I have since then managed to catch up somewhat. No, the title refers to the wonders of our sliding toilet door in the flat. The main problem being that you can close it when you are inside, but when you try to open it again, it doesn't slide. So basically you are stuck in the toilet and shout for someone else to come and help you get the door open from the outside by lifting it up off the ground. How fun.
Anyway, it's been a busy old week so far, with classes (occasionaly), meetings, small group, sleeping and eating. Small group even led to the creation of a new phrase on tuesday: "Love is a present, like a dog or an ice-cream cone, only better." I drew a picture of a christmas tree too =)
And today, even though I actually have three classes, I'm well excited cos we have a ceilidh tonight! I may even go so far as to say "hoorah!"
I now realise I have run out of stuff to talk about. Maybe I haven't actually been that busy since sunday. Maybe I will just go and eat more all-you-can-eat chinese food and then tell you about that all over again.
I won't do that, but I will say that Dennistoun Baptist church was very good on sunday when I went. Friendly people, good teaching, and tea or coffee and biscuits after the service too =)
Anyway, that really is me done now. Breakfast is calling me, and then maths unfortunately. Somehow I only got 60% in the last maths test when I thought I was going to get 70 or 80%, so I now like maths even less than I did previous to getting the results, but oh well, what you gonna do.
Ciao for now.

It's that time of night

2006-02-12T00:13:00.000Z

It's that time of night when I'm not sure if it's saturday or sunday. Technically, it is Sunday, and has been for fifteen minutes. But I haven't slept yet, so it is like it is still saturday. It's just one of those things I wonder about some times.
Anyway, it's been very busy since I last posted. As you can read about on Jillians blog (see left <-), after the CU agm on thursday we ended up in dennistoun after an invite from alison and louise, (louises blog on left also <-). It was fun. I got to sit on an inflatable sofa, and decided I want to get one next year for wherever I live, along with a beanbag and a drumkit.
Friday was also muchos busy. After my whole three hours of lectures, I met Alison, Louise and Catherine (anyone know how to actually spell her name? please let me know) for ALL YOU CAN EAT chinese food. Half price as well. It was great. So great that I didn't feel like moving afterwards. Alison, Louise and I also went to see Walk the Line at the Glasgow Film Theatre. It's a great cinema, but not much legroom, and I'm not even that tall. I then ended up in Dennistoun again, and spent the night on the worlds comfiest sofa. T'was great. As was the rugby today, although Ireland should have won I felt after that amazing comeback, but not much can be done about that now.
This week also promises to be busy, with meetings and everything. I'm not used to having meetings, but there you go. I'm starting some church-crawling tomorrow too, just to visit some other places. Starting with Dennistoun Baptist, since it is relatively close, and I know at least one person that goes there. I am told it is good, and I'm sure it shall be.
Well, I now notice the grammatical and capital letter errors in this post. But I'm not going to fix them, because it's late, and I want to watch Scrubs before I go to bed, because it makes me laugh. And laughing is good. Hahahahaha. You should try it sometime =)
Anyway, until next-os blog-os, muchos gracias senors and senoritas.

Bow, for you are in the presence of royalty!

2006-02-08T18:46:00.000Z

Ok, so the title is a slight mis-truth. That is, unless the titles and positions of CU committee members have changed drastically and no-one has yet notified me of this. I somehow doubt that though, although it would be quite cool to have people bow in your presence. Would probably give you a bit of a complex of somekind, but I can't remember the term for it. All answers addressed to my comments section would be much appreciated.
Anyway, at one point yesterday during my very much CU-based day, I was thinking. It was CU based due to the morning meeting, the alpha prayer meeting, the committee meeting, and small group at night. And technically toastie bar too, but I really just went to eat toasties rather than help, and then I left again. Anyways, I was thinking about things that annoy me, and I came up with a surprisingly large amount, which I don't think is good. So here is a sample of those things. One of them is people who aren't flexible about things, like meetings, and such things. Luckily I don't know many people like this. Another thing is people who don't turn up for stuff like meetings when they are quite important meetings, and they have said they will turn up. People who say they are ill so can't meet you, and then go out to the union that night are under this category too I suppose, but that is slightly specific to part of yesterday which annoyed me a lot. People who use a lot of exclamation marks slightly annoy me. Obviously this one doesn't apply when speaking to people, but I still get irritated by it for some reason. Maybe I am just so good at english that I know they shouldn't be used so often. But then again, and this is much more likely, I'm not. A final thing I can recall is people that are incredibly disorganised. I don't encounter this particularly often, and I sometimes am slightly disorganised, but I just don't like it.
Well, that was quite a rant. Tonight's blog is being written between me cleaning the flat for it's inspection tomorrow, and starting some research for a class on introduction to design for tomorrow. Tomorrow should be quite a good day, with four hours of classes, then the CU agm, and then perhaps playing pool in the union, seeing as that often happens after CU these days. Then on friday, I am going for lunch/dinner at an all you can eat chinese restaurant in the city centre with Alison and Louise. It could be seen as a bonding outing for the new committee, but really it's just half price all you can eat chinese seeing as the three of us already know each other. So that should be good. And if you happen to see anyone rolling through the city centre afterwards, that will most likely be me, due to me always making the most of all-you-can eat buffets. I can usually still walk after them though, which is a slight victory suppose. And I only feel ill for a few hours afterwards generally, so it's all good.
Well, I better go actually get some work done now. And make sure the flat is clean too, you never know what can happen in an hour in this flat. Ciao.

Colour the mess

2006-02-02T00:27:00.000Z

A great title for a great song. Colour the mess. Tonight was the SixStarHotel gig, supported by non-zero and mexico. It was very loud. It was a small room. And it was brilliant. I even bought a t-shirt, sporting the title of this post none the less. For anyone who sees me tomorrow, I shall be wearing it. So yeah, it was great, and you should all go and see SixStar if you ever get a chance. You may come back slightly deaf, as I am now, but it is more than worth it. Especially since most of the stuff they were playing isn't out on cd yet, so there is no other way to hear it.
In other news, my day was average. No classes, did my washing, met some people for coffee, where I had orange juice instead, then went and played pool in the union. Plus, I even got some work done for my maths tutorial tomorrow.
Well, thats all the ranting you are getting for tonight, as I am very tired. I shall update you soon though.

"Heaven is my home"

2006-01-31T23:01:00.000Z

Today, for the first time ever, I listened to Mezzamorphis by Delirious. And I now think it is absolutely brilliant. The title of this blog comes from the second song called Heaven, and the words are just great. As is the music. As is everything about the song, apart from the fact that its only like four minutes long. I have far to many contenders for favourite song. Oh well.
I'm just home from small group which was a good laugh as always. And, kind of unfortunately, I have just been asked to go and help at the toastie bar. Since I was up at half six this morning, I am only going to go for a little while, but if any of you see me tomorrow to talk to, dont expect me to be awake, or in any sort of good mood. Cos I just wont be.
In other news, theres a big accident scene at the junction of high street/george street/duke street. Police, numbered stuff on the road, possibly fatal, guess I wont know until something appears on the bbc website, but ill be sure to avoid that area tonight.
Basically, thing to take away from this blog are 1) Mezzamorphis is a great album, 2) I live in a dodgy area apparently, and 3) I want hot chocolate and malteser cake. Will have to try and go for some this weekend, if not before.
Oh, other excitingly stuff-ness, I am going to see six star hotel tomorrow. How great is that? I suppose thats what happens when you know someone that knows them. So role on tomorrow night, hopefully I'll manage to actually be awake.

It's pretty late

2006-01-30T01:03:00.000Z

It's pretty late, and yet I still feel as awake as I did when I first woke up this morning. Perhaps this is because I only woke up and about midday. Perhaps it is because I didn't eat my dinner until 9pm. I don't really know why to be quite honest, but it's quite annoying, as I have five or six hours of lectures in the morning, and then the Alpha launch night in the evening, which I plan to turn up to and support.
So I thought I would update y'all with the goings on in my world. I was out on thursday night, friday night and saturday night. The earliest I got to bed was 2am. The latest was about half three. This made me rather tired in my nine oclock lecture on friday morning, but what you going to do about it? I spent most of friday afternoon, and all of saturday, relaxing and doing nothing. It's a good life before assignments start getting handed out and work starts to need to be done. So basically I just sat and vegitated on our very uncomfortable sofa a lot. And ate a lot of Philadelphia and chilli-fried-bacon bagels. I like eating. Eating is good. Last night I was also part of one of the best games of monopoly ever. Me and Jillian ended up with about twelve thousand pounds, the other player owed us eleven thousand, plus we had about nine thousand pounds of hotels. We nearly actually ran the back out of money. Which was fun.
Anyway, I think I'll go and try and sleep again so I can actually pay attention in lectures tomorrow. First thing in the morning: Mechanics. All I can say is "bring it on!!!!!!"

A break in work

2006-01-25T21:12:00.000Z

Tonight's post is being written during a break in putting together a rather stressful materials project. Materials is basically chemistry. I never did chemistry. Hence, I do not really have an idea what I am talking about, but I am trying my hardest, and it doesnt seem to going to badly so far. I was also amused earlier when someone in my group said that a material would not be suitable for use in the human body because it melted at 170 Celsius. I dont think this person realises that the human body is only about 37.5 Celsius. I know that and I never did chemistry or biology. So once I get this finished, which it nearly is, I just have to learn how to pass my maths test tomorrow, and then I can sleep. Which should be nice.
Not much really happened today, apart from doing our materials project, and going for coffee with some first years. Except I, as expected by those who know me, actually had hot chocolate, since I still only drink coffee when I am incredibly tired and have work to do. Even then I still prefer a good old Irn-bru.
Also, in response to a question about knights, cavaliers and horses, we finish it by just keeping going until one of the last two pairs is out because they are obviously the slowest. We were much faster when we won on saturday =)
Now, back to work for me. I don't have any good quotes for you today, so here's a bad one instead: "Try something new every day, and you'll never be bored." Sorry it's not as good as yesterdays quote, and technically I dont think it's true either, I'm sure I could still find time to be bored even with a new thing added to my schedule every day.
Blog soon.

It's been a long day

2006-01-24T23:22:00.000Z

Someone wise once said to me "Is this the real life, or is this just fantasy? Stuck in a landslide, escape from reality. Open your eyes, look up to the skies and see." In all honesty, that person was Freddie Mercury. And in all honesty, he actually sang it at me, since I have never met him or talked to him. But today I did look up at the sky, and it looked good. It was actually still dark when I set off to CU this morning, but when I came out of the library for a bite of lunch and a prayer meeting, I looked up and it was glorious. It was actually sunny in Glasgow. T'was truely amazing.
And on a separate thought, I have been pondering my recent feelings about leaving Dumfries again, and then this morning at CU I saw Philippians 3:13-14, which talks about forgetting about what is behind, and straining towards what lies ahead. This got me to thinking if missing home wasn't just because I hadn't wanted things to change when I left. I enjoyed working last year, had good friends and messed about a lot in the evening, generally having a good time. But of course, this changed when I came to uni. So now, I am going to try and put the past in the past, and look forward to what is ahead. Obviously, I shall still keep in touch with people at home, and friends who are away at uni, but I am going to look less at the past, and more at the future.
And I shall leave you with a quote - "Be holy; God wants you to, and I want you to, and I figure you'll listen to one of us."
Speak to you soon persons.

Was at a ceilidh tonight

2006-01-21T23:42:00.000Z

As the title slightly suggests, I was at a ceilidh tonight. It was the annual Scripture Union one. And it was good. It was in my old secondary school, which was kinda weird to be back in, but it was good. Lots of people were there, including a lot of people that I hadn't seen for a quite a while, what with being at uni and all. Was good to see them, and get some crazy fast dancing. I even won a game of knights, caveliers and horses. In all fairness, me and my partner were up against two other sets of teenagers and a lot of little kids. But we still won. And got some chocolate. Also discovered that since one of my friends is so light, I could just spin and she came up off the ground, which made it even faster. I got laughed at by a girl called Robert too.
Anyway, all of the dancing and playing games and seeing people again made me realise just how much I miss Dumfries when I am away in Glasgow. It is quite weird, because when I am away, I don't really seem to miss it, but when I come back, I don't want to leave again for some reason. It's very weird. I have started to get the feeling that it is because I don't get to see people as much as I used to, and since MSN doesn't work on my computer when I am in my flat, I don't get as much chance to talk to them either. On that subject Colin, I may visit your flat with my computer to make use of your internet for MSN based purposes. And to talk to you I suppose.
Anyway, after all that thoughful rubbish, a round up of the weeks events since the burning. I sat my mechanics exam, left half an hour before the end, and even think that I did well. I didn't leave because I was useless and couldn't do it, but because I had actually finished, which made me happy. Then got a train home, and headed out to Colin's house, for a night of messing about and playing my ps2. I took it with me, we didn't have controllers with long cables. So we had much fun. We ended up watching Black Books at one in the morning too. Brilliant quote: "It's such a hard decision, I'll just have to hope that when I flip a coin to decide, it explodes into a million pieces and kills me." It honestly is such a funny program. We then finally slept, and went into town. Visited Kings (Coffee, Books, Life), had some lunch, wandered about, then Colin was meeting someone, so I left. Just as well really since I needed to pack for returning to Glasgow tomorrow with all my stuff. And that was pretty much my day, since I've already described the ceilidh. Just need to sleep now before church, and my return to Glasgow.
Update Y'all soon.

A short stay in Glasgow

2006-01-19T19:05:00.000Z

Ok, so I made it to Glasgow on the train alright. It even came in at platform 1 at Central Station, which has never happened when I've been on it before. It's usually something more along the lines of platform 200, which is another thing about taking the train that annoys me, but I neglected to mention yesterday. So anyway, got to Glasgow fine, and it wasnt even raining, so I could walk to my flat instead of having to pay incredible amounts of money for a taxi. I almost put 'again' at the end of the last sentence, but I never have before. Even last time when it actually was raining, I just walked because I didn't want to pay. What can I say, I'm a true Scot when it comes to spending money.
So I walked, even got food at the co-op for dinner and breakfast before exam tomorrow. It was going excellently. Sat and talked to two of my flatmates, put my pizza in the oven and waited for it to be ready. This is when things started going downhill. I don't quite know why, maybe because of the litre and a half of Irn-Bru I had drank since getting to the flat, but then again, more likely not. When I took the pizza out, I used a tea-towel, and lifted the metal tray out carefully. Then, for some reason, grabbed it with my other hand too. So now I have three burnt fingers on my left hand. As I type this, with one hand, the burnt fingers are sitting in a glass of cold water. Luckily it's my left hand, since I am right handed and have an exam tomorrow that I need to be-able to write for. The basic lesson from this is: Don't touch metal that's just out of the oven. It hurts. A lot. I knew something would happen since the train journey went so well.
In other news, my friend Colin from Dumfries who is at Glasgow Uni has started a blog (which means I get a new reader, hoorah!). It's very interesting, if not slightly, (and by that I mean 'very') odd. There's a link to it on the left <---. I would encourage you visit it, but since when do people listen to me?
Well, I better go revise more now so I can pass this exam tomorrow well. Prayers would be appreciated. They aren't manditory, but they would be helpful. 10am to midday tomorrow. And I'll see you in the afternoon Colin. Ta for now.

Holidays. Exams. Trains.

2006-01-18T19:14:00.000Z

Technically, I am still on holiday. Although more technically, and correctly, it's the exam period. Which means having to revise for stuff. And doing design projects and critiques. And being on trains far more often than I am used to. And the train is so, so boring. It's always either really quiet, or relaly busy. And they always announce which platform it's at in Central Station either two minutes or twenty before it's about to leave. There is no consistency. Well, actually, saying that, there is always either a ned, or someone else i would never want to sit next to on a train. Instead, I always seem to end up sitting just across the aisle from them. For example, last Friday morning, there was a guy who couldnt sit still. He sat down, stood up, took off his coat, sat down, stood up, took off his jumper, put his coat on, sat down, stood up, took his change out, took his ticket out, sat down, stood up, put his change away again, took his hat off, sat down, put his hat back on, and then read his newspapers. I was quite amazed that the guy had that much energy since the train was at 9:53am. 'Twas amazing. Not looking forward to getting the train tomorrow or on Friday. I'm sure something will manage to go wrong.
So I shall watch Black Books on the train, which shall be my next point of rant. It's just such a good program. Mind you, I don't know how something starring both Bill Bailey and Dylan Moran couldn't be funny. I think side splittingly hilarious might be a better description actually. Perhaps because me and my flatmate started watching it at midnight last week, even though we both had early trains to catch the next day. Ended up watching about five episodes and going to bed about two in the morning. Which was fun.
And a ceilidh. That's the other exciting point in the not so distant future. Saturday in fact, and it's the highlight of Dumfries' Christian social calendar. And as many (do many of you read this?) of you will know, I love a good ceilidh. The last one was during freshers week, and was such a hoot/hootenany/rocking occasion. And before that I don't think I had really been to one since I was at Frenzy in July. A massive barn type building, and a whole lot of people ceilidhing. Kinda like a mosh pit, but ceilidhing.
And that's pretty much everything interesting that's inside my head. Not much else been happening really. Bought a new cd the other day. It's by the David Crowder Band. It's called A Collision. And it's very good. I've not had any run ins with the peopel from o2 recently either. It's been very stress free recently phone wise. They haven't tried to cancel my sim card, they havent sent me texts telling me lies, and I haven't had to visit their shop, which always makes me happy. I bought a folder the other day too. A ringbinder none the less. It's a beast, and it's blue. Wow, I must be really scraping the barrel that is my head now if I am talking abotu ringbinders. Oh well, I suppose you get what you pay for, and since none of you pay me for this, don't expect quality. However, if you pay me, I'm sure I could do something about it....

Long time, no blog

2006-01-05T23:09:00.000Z

Well, it's been about a week since I last updated y'all. I made an attempt to the other day, but gave up since I was getting no-where, and needed to do more studying. So here is my next attempt. Hopefully I'll actually manage to finish it.
New Year was pretty interesting. Colin and I spent hours building a massive bonfire. It was to be a mightily impressive one. But then it didn't really work. Was a very poor attempt seeing as Colin and I are the self-crowned Kings of Fire. We aren't really, but we have had many impressive bonfires in the past. The wood was even wet once. So we made another attempt tonight. And it didn't work again. The wood pile is just getting ever so slightly smaller each time.
Not much else been doing of late. Work, sleep, going up town. Haven't even got annoyed at o2 lately. It might be the longest I haven't been annoyed with them for a long time.
Not much else to rant about actually, which makes a change. So I think I might have to leave it at that, and try and prepare for my exams more. And finish my design project, which will be an absolute hoot. Not. Anyway, bye for now.

SNOW!!

2005-12-30T00:09:00.000Z

It's thursday. But more technically, and actually, it's friday. It's snowing outside, and it's actually lying on the ground. The kids who were out playing in the snow in the street in the dark have finally gone in. And I want to use the word ambiguous. Ambiguous.
The snow is really very nice. Could be especially fun if I go out driving later. Maybe dent my car like Jillian did to hers the other day. Teeheehee. I have also decided since tomorrow shall be very cold, I am going to start compiling a file of music for songs. Should come in useful.......sometime, who knows when.
On other notes, the wonderful people of o2 finally managed to figure out that they gave me to many texts. It only took them another 48 hours since they told me. Maybe they found out by reading my blog. I know it's unlikely, but you never know. Maybe someday they will actually manage to give me the right number of free texts, and for the right amount of time. However I find this as likely as the people from o2 reading my blog, so I don't see it happening any time soon.
Anyway, it's late, and apparently sleep is actually good for you, so that's your lot for just now. Like it or lump it.

The brilliance of between Christmas and new year

2005-12-27T23:00:00.000Z

I always think it's a weird time of year, the week between Christmas and new year. Don't know why, but it just seems like a bit of a filler. It's good though. Time to laze about. Even though I should have been doing a whole lot more work than I have been. But that is going to start tomorrow.
Well, since I last posted, it's been pretty hectic. Christmas Eve. Uptown, shopping, coffee. Main Christmas dinner. Carol service at church. Talking to many, many people after it. Then Sunday, and CHRISTMAS!!! Santa was pretty good this year, lots of good presents. Got part one of series one of Lost, and have already watched all 12 episodes. But more technically I finished them yesterday. Church as well. Was good to see everyone. And I ate far, far to much that day.
Well since then, I've been pretty lazy. TV, ps2, dvds. It's a good life.
And that's my last few days. Up until I was writing this. I got a text from o2 saying I hadn't used all my texts this month and they had run out. Then I sent a message, and it was still free. o2 just appear to be rubbish at telling you when things are happening. If I use all 300 texts up, then about two days later it finally tells me about this. Stupid. So stupid.
In other news, welcome to my first overseas reader. Even if you do just know my friend and not me.
Hope y'all enjoyed that.

Friday

2005-12-23T21:27:00.000Z

That's right. It's a dull title for a post, but I don't really care. Even though my course does involve being imaginative and all that sort of stuff. But then this is the holidays, and my brain is pretty much on vacation. How American of me, saying vacation. Ha.
Anyway, my last two days have been pretty dull. Yesterday I left the house for a total of less than two hours. To go and see my churches kids club's christmas thing. It was good. I got a free chocolate bar afterwards too. There was a lot of lying around, lazing, being a pie, and any other phrase implying the same thing. It's good to be home.
Today, I was out of the house for an hour. Even better than yesterday. Was uptown, and finally found nice christmas cards to give to my family. Most of them were just the most rubbish things you have ever seen. Was unbelievable. I went into about nine different card shops in the last three days. Nine. Some I only just discovered we had here, and they were all rubbish. Apart from WHSmith where I finally found some. I bought some Plectros today too. Great invention. Makes playing the guitar even easier. They're round plectrums with a hole in the middle for anyone who doesn't know. Spent the rest of the day doing some guitar playing, some Scrubs watching (which happens very often), and a lot of guitar playing and tv watching in the evening. Much fun.
Well, it's only two days until Christmas now. Food. Presents. Jesus. What a day. One of the best in the year I would wager. Or say to be more precise. Always love the food.
Anyway, I was wondering at some point in the last couple of days, how cool would it been if you walked through your wardrobe and entered a Narnia like land. Would be great. I could be a King. And rich. And have many, many servants. But it ain't real. I think I've just had to much coke today, and hence to much sugar and caffiene. So I shall go now before I start rambling some more.
And remember, MERRY CHRISTMAS!!

It's here at last, the wonders of Mini-Christmas!

2005-12-21T23:36:00.000Z

Well, it's been almost a year since the last one, but Mini-Christmas has once again arrived. That day we, (well, me and my friends anyway), look forward to each year. The exchanging of presents between us, and the watching of a Christmas based film. This years choice of film was Elf. I first saw this only a few weeks ago when I had a weekend in Aberdeen visiting friends. And my instant decision was that I loved it. This time I laughed pretty much the entire way through. So good. If you've never seen it before, then you definitely should. On the present front, one friend got me a microscope, which is quite cool, and another got me two remote control subaru impreza rally cars, which are amazing fun, tried them already. That was all the presents for this year, due to the slight lack of money, which is also due to the fact that I am at uni, and also have to buy other important things, such as notepads. And food. And Irn-bru of course. All round, a very enjoyable night.
Now working in reverse, the rest of my day. Up good and early, about half seven. And it was deliberate too. Mainly because I had to go into town, and couldn't be bothered walking in for the third day in a row. So I got a lift into town with my mum instead. I bought a couple of things uptown, some super exciting graph paper and some rolls, and had a drink and a scone in Kings before getting the bus home, as I really am that lazy. Did a bit of work once I got home, and watched a small amount of tv too as I was having lunch. It's good to have food that I don't have to buy. Still have to defrost the bread though. Played some guitar this afternoon, with some good distortion. Turns out Hark the Herald Angels is very easy to play as a rock song, and sounds quite good too. Might try and play it somewhere next Christmas. Maybe rock church when I get home from uni for the holidays. It's reminiscent of Rock Power Praise for any people who have heard it, which is not likely to be many people outside of my cu small group. Then went round to a friends house and watched yet more Scrubs. It really is such a good show. I ate a satsuma/clementine/whatever-it-was too, and it was very good. Proved to be a good way to put in a couple of hours before tea.
Well, that pretty much describes my day. Sounds quite busy when I type it out like that actually. But that may well be because a lot of it is rambling. But then what are you gonna do? It's free for you to read, and it's your choice. Ta for now.

My hair is now in a bin.

2005-12-20T23:13:00.000Z

I say "my hair", but really it's only some of it. I'm not stupid enough to let them take it all. Although my fringe is now short enough that I can actually see without hair getting in the way.
Feel I'd better fill you in on the last couple of days too. Church on Sunday was good. Got to play the guitar again, and everyone was asking how uni was going. Met a couple of friends up town in Costa for a drink. I of course opted for Irn-Bru, as anything is yet to beat it. Church again in the evening, and then went to KFC with the same friends I had been at Costa with. What a busy day.
Monday. Montag. Long-lie-day. This involved a bit of work in the morning, before walking into town. Saw one of my neighbours who is 16 trying to act hard in front of his friends, and picking up and moving a traffic cone. Wow. Rebel. He then saw me, and looked kind of scared. Ha. I got some new trousers too. They are black. I don't own any black trousers that weren't bought for work. Headed out to a friends house in the afternoon. We tried to have a bonfire, but the wood was rather wet, mainly cos it had been in a burn just that morning. The paper and firelighters burned well though. Bit of a disappointment all round. In the evening I watched TV. It was really very dull.
Rest of today, tuesday, was alround mediocre. Did some work. Ate some lunch. Drove home. Watched some Scrubs with a friend. Watched some TV. Ate. Lay and watched TV for the whole evening. What a life.
Now, the main point of todays ramblings. Earlier on I was watching "Dragon's Den" on BBC2, that program where people with ideas go and ask a group of overly rich people for money and most of the time they say no. When we were in a management lecture one day, the lecturer recommended that we watch it for some reason or another that I forget. I have seen it once or twice before, but was paying more attention tonight, and I realised something. The people who go on it just haven't thought things through. Well, most of them anyway. There were massive holes in their ideas, and things that just made them totally unrealistic. This amused me, and made me wonder if I could do any better. Well, if I come up with an idea, maybe I'll find out some day.
Hope you enjoyed that. Wasn't overly exciting for me.

The first full day of being home

2005-12-17T23:26:00.000Z

Well, my first full day back home is over, and what a day it's been. A long lie, followed by meeting a friend in King's for lunch and a drink. It was good. And very busy, but yet I still didnt feel bad about sitting with just a can of Irn-Bru at one point, mainly because I used to work there.
Then it was on to shopping. The ice rink which I mentioned yesterday was in fact not even ice, just some rubbish stuff you can almost skate on, and it is really, really, really small. I laughed because I went at George Square. Visited the good old wonders of Poundland too so my friend could buy a new saw. He broke the old one, which is interesting because I always used to make fun of him for how he couldnt use it properly. Maybe thats why he broke it I suppose.
Went to my churchs Christmas celebration too. As soon as I was in the door, three people appeared and asked how I had been getting on at uni. It was nice, and the christmas celebration went well.
After that, just had a nice quiet evening, went round to a friends house and watched nothing in particular on tv, just like old times. It was fun, and relaxing, and was great. And now I am tired, and bed beckons.
So here's looking to tomorrow. Church, meeting friends for coffee, more church, and then messing about in the evening. Get to play guitar at church too. Well, bye.

I'm home!!! Wahey!!

2005-12-17T00:10:00.000Z

Well, I am finally home, for just the second time since the start of the first semester, and roughly nine weeks since I was last home. And it's amazing. Well, technically its still the same as it always was, but its good to be home. And I found out that we have here an ice-skating rink roughly a sixth of the size of the one in george square in glasgow. Its so pathetic its unbelievable. I laughed quite a lot.
I took a visit to where I used to work too. Had a hot chocolate. And a spiced hot chocolate. Both were nice. It's good to be back and get good hot chocolate at a reasonable price again. Viva la Kings!!
Well, that's about it for my day, just say about for the whole evening watching the wonders of Family Guy. What a life I lead. Here's looking forward to the next three weeks of fun. Bring it on!!!!

Nearly the holidays!!!

2005-12-15T10:19:00.000Z

It's nearly the holidays, and how excited am I? The correct answer to that is "very", or even "very, very". I only have one more class and one more christmas party to attend, and then home!! Hoorah!

Anyway, in the last week, many exciting things have been happening. On saturday night I was helping at the CU toastie bar, and saw Rachel Stevens leaving the all nighter, and she is very very very small. I also saw Edith Bowman. She is not as small, and is also much friendlier than Rachel Stevens. And this toastie outgiving continued until about five in the morning when i wimped out and went to sleep. But others went on till eight am. Applause is deserved. This was followed by much sleeping on Sunday to recover.

Monday, didnt have many classes, so a group of us went to see Narnia at 10.40am. Earliest I've ever been to the cinema. It is a very good film, I recommend going to see it. Tuesday, I actually had classes and lectures, but did virtually nothing, and then went and partied in Dennistoun without getting attacked!! Wahey!! Small group partying at Alison and Louises flat. There was much merriment and Christmas rock music. Wednesday, had no classes whatsoever, so I did my Christmas shopping in its entirity, which was good. Then in at the deep end at the chaplaincy, which Olu didn't make it to as she was asleep. I later told her it was a very poor excuse. Back at the flat, me and flatmates ordered an indian for our christmas meal, which was good. Then I went to the carol service at the tron, which was very good, and was followed by mince pies and hot chocolate. I now have 12 mince pies in my flat too, since they bought far more than they needed.

And now for today. I actually have a class this afternoon, preceded by mulled wine and mince pies in our DMEM studio, which is nice. Then after that, the biggest christmas party of the year, the Christmas Twee, at the flat of our CU's first lady. Should be good. I envisage much partying into the night. Followed by being very tired tomorrow when I have to pack and then go home!!!!!

Well, hope you enjoyed my last week as much as I did. Bye for now.

A most excellent of days

2005-12-07T20:22:00.000Z

Well, what a day this has been. Since the nice people at the uni decided to cancel my one class today, I had a whole day to waste. Which was nice. This was very useful, and resulted in me not evening getting up until roughly quarter to twelve. What a life.
And things got even better. Not only did I get to eat a pie and beans for my breakfast/lunch combination meal, and drink that most wonderful of drink that is Irn-Bru, I got to go ice-skating in George Square. And what's even more impressive is that I didn't fall over. Not once. Unlike Peter, who tried to hit me and ended up falling over most spectacularly and rolling along the ice. And unlike Chris, who tried to go fast, and ended up spinning through the air, before landing on his back. Such fun. There was a crazy santa too, whom Alix claims pulled her over when she was skating along. I think she just didn't like him. Perhaps she has some sort of grudge against jolly red men, who knows.
I visited my local Co-op too, where one of only two cashiers, serving a queue of fifteen people, seemed to have forgotten how to work the credit card machine, and then, much to my amusement, appeared to not know how to use a pen. Ah, the joys of shopping.

Quite apart from all these goings on, I have been trying to think of something fun to do to make life interesting. After thinking of several quite poor ideas, such as not using anyones name for a week and trying to speak in a foreign language for a while, I think I might be coming closer to something. I am thinking of calling myself a different name for a week, such as 'Sam', and not responding unless people call me that. Either that or I'm just gonna speak with a Northern Irish accent for a while and see if anyone notices. Still going to try and come up with something better though.

Well, that's all my happenings from today, so you can all get back to your busy lives now.

Wow, my first post!

2005-12-06T22:45:00.000Z

Inspired by the blogging of many people that I know, I have decided to start recording my own happenings and doings. Should be quite fun. Now I just have to wait for some doings and happenings to happen.