I'm going to Hell

At boarding school I was the kid with the films. At the time hardly anyone had games consoles, I managed to get a PlayStation a bit late in the game. Quite a few people had N64s which we used to 'borrow' to play 4 player MarioKart or GoldenEye. However my main claim was my TV, then my TV/VCR combo. I used to live in Cyprus, where there was no such thing as copyright and I could get pirated videos of the latest blockbuster by walking to the NAAFI (the UK version of a US PX).

One of the weirdest examples I have of this is a young friend asking if I wanted to watch this new film his Dad had bought, it's called 'Jurassic Park' or something. I thought it was pretty good, but the guy on screen who's head was in the way was a little annoying. Afterwards I went home and walked in as the news was reporting how people had queued around the block to watch that very film back in England.

I kept buying videos, they were ridiculously cheap, and I had a case of them I would take to school, to watch and lend. My favourites at the time amongst me and my friends a few years later were:

1. The Rock (1996)
2. Pulp Fiction (1994)
3. Bad Boys (1995)
4. The Usual Suspects (1995)
5. White Men Can't Jump (1992)

We knew each of these films pretty much line by line. I had a fairly limited collection of videos so we used to watch them A LOT. Back then only a few people had their own PCs or laptops, and time available on someone else's was mostly spent playing Duke Nukem 3D or X-COM: Terror From The Deep. Internet connections were barely available in school buildings let alone boarding houses, so there was no Internet, no downloading, a feeble amount of digital porn and the occasional film brought in from home on multiple CDs. That was how I first saw The Phantom Menace, on 3 CDs before it had even been released.

I think one of my favourite moments was creeping down the dorm while eight people were sat in the dark after lights out watching House on Haunted Hill. I reached through the curtain and grabbed the closest shoulder at a particularly scary bit and then listened to the chain reaction of screams. Of course if you watch a bad film you can always forward to about 38:19mins into Wild Things and remove the bad memories. I recall having to do this after watching Animal Farm. Not the cartoon version.

Labels: films, friends, fun, teenagers, TV, UK

I recently read this article. In it the female author complains how men aren't growing up like they used to, how they're underachieving. Men should be less adolescent and do more mature activities, instead of playing Halo 3 with your buddies you should be 'packing leisure hours' with the following grown up pursuits:

1. Shopping
2. Traveling
3. Dining with friends
4. Getting your hair done
5. Having sleepovers

Of course these pastimes seem like infinitely more mature activities than 'playing basketball with your buddies, downloading music, playing on your xbox360, then going out to bars and parties', after all it's not like I haven't been doing her list of activities since I was 7 myself. Well except for the sleepovers, but I did use to have house mates. The list she's deriding is pretty much the same as hers, just a male equivalent, none of these activities are 'mature', surely by that she means something like visiting museums and art galleries, reading dusty books and wine tasting.

I suspect what she's really upset about is that men just don't want to get married and have children. Oh no, what a disaster, she can't find a man. This doesn't make them immature or in need of growing up. What are the advantages to getting married? Companionship? Men have friends, as she pointed out. Sex? Also as she herself said, men are capable of finding this without being married. A family? Men can have children later in life, so what's the rush. Basically men have no incentive to get married. Unless you call getting divorced, losing your kids, money, car and house like over 50% of marriages an incentive.

By the way I'm getting married in just under 8 months, I'm 25, I have a job, an apartment and four games consoles, how immature am I?

Update: Looks like this is becoming a trend, get some more gamer hate here.

Labels: assholes, family, friends, horror, rant, stupidity, wedding, women

It's been quite a while since I've had to try and pull a girl. I've been with the Wench for so long it seems like forever (Eight years, I didn't forget, it was a joke! Not the face!), so I've not had much use for chat up lines. Of course before I met the Wench I never had to resort to such vulgar tactics, being the suave lady killer that I am.

Below are a few of the worst chat up lines I've ever had the misfortune of hearing. And when I say hearing I don't mean they were tried on me, otherwise I may very well have not been single when the Wench came around. Here they are:

1. Fat Penguin? (It breaks the ice!)
2. If you were snot I'd pick you first.
3. You might not be the best looking girl here, but beauty is only a light switch away.
4. My love for you is like diarrhea, I just can't hold it in.
5. Does this rag smell like chloroform to you?

I did in fact lie before. Not about being a debonair casanova, that was all true, but about never using a chat up line. In my extensive experience it's always best to get the object of your affections on your good side, and this may involve getting her to smile. Of course this requires a certain amount of guess work as to whether or not you'll get a positive response, and which line to use. Even the tried and tested 'Can I buy you a drink?' is a chat up line, so most men at some point have used a line.

I wouldn't recommend using any of the gems above, although a variation of the first featuring a chubby polar bear did get me a smile once. As far as the others are concerned it's probably best to be complementary, even if the line is so cheesy it's funny. I'd steer clear of offering to let a girl sniff a rag in your hand, rape humour is never popular, you'll probably end up getting maced, and let me tell you, that stuff stings!

Labels: comedy, crap, drinking, friends, fun, stupidity, wench

I give the Wench a lot of shit on this blog, mostly in my whiny way where I whine and sound all whiny. Then whine. But she's been really good to me recently, and when I say recently I mean since I've known her. Although she has put in real effort in the last few weeks as I've been working late a lot and not exactly jumping with energy when I've gotten home. She picks me up from the station already, but now she's got a smile on her face.

Basically I don't think I give her enough praise (not that she gives me any), but I complain a lot as well, as I just demonstrated. Anyway, here's 5 reasons why she's awesome:

1. She always talks to anyone.
2. She's always up for getting wasted.
3. She's watched more of my porn than I have.
4. She's just as lazy as I am, which means she can't bug me about being lazy.
5. She's Hot.

I think the first point is very important. The Wench talks, she talks a lot, to anyone who will listen. And most of the time they do want to listen. When I first met her family all I got asked was 'How do you put up with her?', to which I just shrugged my shoulders and smiled, as I don't talk. At all. It seems a bit of a weird combination, but it kind of works. An example of why this is great comes from last week, where we went for a night out in Loughborough. There's now a smoking ban in the UK, which means if you smoke you have to do it outside of bars and clubs. We went for a fag and immediately made friends with the group standing next to us, and ended up exchanging high fives with them for the rest of the night (The Wench is on a mission to bring back the high five). This may seem insignificant as we were all drunk, but she can do this ANYWHERE. It's like a mutant superpower, she can just get anyone to like her and start talking. I used to get worried going out with her to a pub as she'd spend ages going to the bar or toilet as she'd immediately make 3 new friends on the way.

The last point The Wench will undoubtedly disagree with me on, but as a shallow male I have to say it's rather an important point. She is hot, and I feel I should tell everyone, her included, that she is hot. And that I like to do her, all the time, as much as possible.

Labels: cigarettes, drinking, friends, fun, laziness, UK, wench

I'm off to the Download Festival again this year. I'm leaving in about 30mins actually. The Wench's brother (let's call him Bitch for now) is already there, with his tent set up and waiting for us. This year Bitch supplied the tent, a £100 10-man mansion, for just 4 people: Me, the Wench, Bitch and his band mate Spider (not his real name, but he is a drummer).

I'm currently waiting to leave, I've got half an hour. the last 3 days have been the slowest of my life! I've been looking forward to the music I've got to listen to, alcohol to drink, fields to pass out in and all the rest. Here's who I'm looking forward to seeing:

1. Wolfmother
2. Korn
3. Iron Maiden
4. Marilyn Manson
5. Linkin Park

Of course they're not the only bands there I'll see. I'll also watch Mastodon, Megadeth, Slayer, Lamb of God and many other wholesome and family friendly bands. Last year was a great festival, hot, sunny, lots of friends, good music and women giving away free Snickers Ice Creams. I hope this year lives up to it. Even though the music isn't as good, and the weather is likely to be cloudy and not as many people I know are going, I'm sure I'll struggle through.

What am I talking about? It's going to be awesome, or off the hook as the kids say nowadays. I've got 4 litres of vodka for me and the Wench to get through, and a whole lot more which should add to the weekend as well. The Red Bull X-Fighters are there this year as well, hopefully brightening my day with some comedy crashes as they've stolen the only piece of shade in the entire arena. If I blister in the sun the least you could do is fall of your bike midway through a Superman Backflip to make me feel better.

Labels: downloadfestival, drinking, friends, fun, holiday, music, sun, UK, wench

Calling Shotgun is an ancient tradition, going back many decades to those pirate wannabes, the Cowboys. Back in the famous Cowboy Era people used to travel around by wagons and the person sitting next to the driver would carry a shotgun. The shotgun was mainly for show, as no one would be stupid enough to attack a Cowboy, and the mythical 'Indians' have since been debunked as Yankee propaganda.

Since then the practice has extended to cars, with the rules of Shotgun becoming loosely defined. A lot of House Rules have been created over time, with many regional variations and changes being applied. Here are what I consider to be some of the most important Shotgun Rules:

1. Shotgun can only be called when in sight of the car.
2. If two people call shotgun at the same time, whoever reaches the car first wins.
3. Shotgun can only be called if you are on the way to the car.
4. Shotgun can be called for all seats in the car, so the last person to call Shotgun gets the Bitch Seat (middle seat).
5. Women can't call Shotgun.

Most of these rules were picked up or originated while I was at university. Before that neither me nor any of my friends really had cars, so the topic never came up. But at uni there were lots of lifts given to groups of mates, so some kind of system needed to be enforced. Rule #3 was important as calling Shotgun became ridiculous: before an event was even announced, weeks in advance or before someone even had a car. Rule #4 originated as no one ever wanted to sit in the Bitch Seat.

The most important rule is rule #5. Girls seemed unable to grasp the intricacies of calling Shotgun, they were constantly losing Shotgun rights because of poor choices of music, breaking calling rules and sulking when they lost the race to the car. To solve this problem it was decided that girls should lose the right to call Shotgun. Don't look at me like that, they had their chance. They can still vote, what more do you want?

Labels: comedy, driving, friends, fun, women

That's right, a new low. I will today be discussing the many different types of shit people take. I feel that this a much ignored topic, even by blokes. Men tend to make comments when they come back from the toilet, but full on dump orientated conversations are fairly rare.

To start things off, here's a few definition's that I've come across during those rare moments when the topic of releasing the chocolate hostage arises:

1. The Ghost - You've pinched off a loaf, but when you go to wipe, there's nothing there.
2. The Neverending - No matter how many times you wipe, there's still more poop to remove.
3. The Shotgun - It comes out so quick with a bit of gas, leading to a lovely pebbledash effect on the bowl.
4. The Ring Burn - After eating spicy food, mainly curries, you get a nasty burn around your balloon knot.
5. The Guinness - The nastiest, blackest, most foul smelling turd made by man or beast.

Of course there's plenty more out there such as The Train, The Behemoth, and The Rollercoaster to name a few. A few friends of mine at university had a tally running in the toilet of their shared house. Every time someone went to drop the kids off at the pool you had to mark how it went on the chart. The chart was conveniently located on the back of the toilet door, with a pen taped to it.

The Guinness is an oft overlooked style of butt fudge. I became aware of it in the worst possible way I could imagine. The Wench's Dad was getting remarried, and I went on his stag night. During the course of the night out of sixteen of us, fifteen were drinking Guinness all night. We were all sleeping in the same house, sharing the same toilet. It was my bad luck to be one of the last to use the toilet the next morning. By that point the smell had become a living thing, solid and angry, looking for a way to take revenge for the abomination it had become. They found me unconscious in the hallway, after I'd managed to escape it I'd blacked out. Sometimes at night I can still hear the screaming...

Labels: crap, drinking, friends, hangover, horror, wench

I've never had that much of a problem paying my rent. I know it's a common complaint amongst students and the like, but I was lucky enough to get help in that department. While I was at university my parents covered my rent for me for the first two years while I was in halls. My third year I was working 'in the industry', and the in the final year I was supposed to have saved enough money to pay it myself. Since then I've been working and it's not really been a problem.

So from my experience, and that of some of my less fortunate friends, here's my Top 5 ways to pay your rent:

1. Don't
2. Perform 'favours' for your landlord
3. Sell your computer
4. Get the Devil to pay it by challenging him to an elaborate Rock Off
5. Direct Debit

That's right, No.1 was 'Don't'. While this may seem like a stupid suggestion you'd be surprised how often this works. A mate of mine got away with nearly 8 months rent simply by not paying. Of course you need a landlord who is either stupid, lazy or threatened enough by you he is afraid to bring it up.

I've also had mates perform 'favours' in exchange for a months rent. Most of these 'favours' were in the form of 'work', where my friend would have to 'service' the landlord's 'equipment' using various 'skills' he had 'picked up' during his time at university. I don't know why I put all those quote marks in there, it was perfectly innocent. He just sorted out computer stuff for her every know and then. Oh yeah, and they were boning.

Labels: bills, devil, friends, work

When I was at boarding school I was the only kid there who had a video player, and a decent collection of videos as well. I was at school at around the time DVDs were coming out, so there were a lot of sales on at the time, and my video collection was pretty large. Unfortunately since then my video player has died so I now have to try and replace them all.

Anyway, we used to say a lot of lines from the films we watched, and I was known for being able to name the films they were from. Here's 5 to test your film knowledge:

1. "I hope I give you the shits, you fucking wimp."
2. "Nobody makes me bleed my own blood. NOBODY."
3. "You want to be a big cop in a small town, fuck off to the Model Village."
4. "You can put a cat in an oven, but that don't make it a biscuit."
5. "What if a customer comes in and my jerkin' off gets him all sex nuts and retard strong"

I'm not sure many will get number 3, as it's a new film and I don't know if it's been released in the US yet. The rest are out on DVD, so you've got a fair chance of getting them.

I'm a bit of a dork at heart, not a geek or a nerd, well maybe a little bit. There is a fine line between the two. It seems that dorks are a bit more socially active, so they're allowed their geeky habits, they have friends and girlfriends. My main interests include movies and videogames, and I'm a programmer by trade, but I also have quite a few friends and get out a lot, making me an acceptable geek, or a dork. The Wench was horrified to find out I considered myself a bit geeky. I am a bit of geek though, look, I'm writing in my blog.

Labels: films, friends, fun, history, quiz, wench

Sooner or later at some point in everyone's life they take the time to become properly intoxicated and then spend the night with their significant other, or a group of close friends, and sit about setting the world to rights. Or in my case, asking stupid questions and thinking how great your answers are.

In the past couple of weeks there have been quite a few Friday and Saturday nights spent in this fashion, and while the large majority of things we talked about are either boring or I've forgotten about them, here's five that I can remember:

1. Would it be better to have a pound note than a pound coin?
2. Are music, films, sport and games justifiable items to list as your interests?
3. Does playing Wii sports really make you fitter?
4. What is the sweatier sport: Basketball or Squash?
5. Is Frankenstein's Monster also the abominable snowman?

A few of these are quite hard to decide on. For example Squash, similar to racquetball in the US, is possibly the most physically demanding sport I've ever played, but the games are short. When I played basketball, especially inside, it's the sweatiest I've ever been, but then the games are much longer. So which is the sweatiest?

As for the monetary issue, I've been to America and used notes, and also live in the UK and used coins. Personally I prefer notes, having a pocket full of change is annoying, and it makes going to Strip Bars expensive as the smallest note over here is £5, and you can't tuck coins into a strippers thong. Perhaps they could wear coin purses, maybe attached to garters or something...

Labels: drinking, friends, home, stupidity, wench

Yeah, you knew it had to be coming...

While York is a really nice place to live, it's not without it's downsides. It may be a city, but it's pretty small. While this is a plus point, after all, I don't like busy cities, it can be negative at times. It means that there's fewer jobs, and less room in the centre at busy times. Here's my top 5 reasons that I don't like living in York:

1. There's not many jobs in my sector so I have to work in Leeds
2. I hate the buses
3. I hate the trains
4. I hate the tourists
5. It's far away from all my old friends

I went to boarding school in south England, but York is in the north, making it hard to see my old friends. While I now have new friends I think it's a shame to be so far away from the mates I grew up with. We meet up a few times a year and try to keep in touch, but there can be a long time between visits.

The main things I hate about York have to do with travel, and mostly commuting. I'm new to the whole commuting thing, and it's not one of my favourite pastimes. I've done a few posts about this before, mainly whining about the buses and trains, if I worked in York this would be less of a problem.

Finally the tourists... Oh my god the tourists... It would be fine if there weren't so many of them and they weren't so stupid. It's great that your visiting and learning about our history, but could you not take up the whole street when I'm rushing to the bank with a huge hangover, sweating and tired on a freezing Saturday morning? Thanks.

Labels: friends, hangover, suckage, tourists, york

When I was younger we moved around a lot. My Dad was in the military so we moved every 2 years. I've lived in a few different places in England, a few in Germany and even in Cyprus. I really liked moving around a lot, it never got boring, as I always got to see the best bits of wherever we went. As I went to boarding school as well it really made the holidays feel like holidays, as I was always somewhere new.

However as I got older I used to get bored not being at school. While I had school friends, I had few friends at home and hoped we could stay somewhere long enough for me to make some. My Dad's final posting was to York, and he liked the area so much we stayed here. Here's 5 reasons why I like York:

1. I'm not a city person, York is a city, but it's small
2. It's the longest I've ever lived anywhere
3. There's lots of history
4. My family is here
5. I have some very good friends here

As I've been in York for around 10 years now I've gotten to know it better than anywhere I've lived. I have some great friends and I see my family more. I love the history of York, after all it's the city New York wants to be when it grows up. Finally I've stayed somewhere longer than 2 years and it's nice to be able to say I'm from somewhere, whereas before I was just 'from all over' or, as I liked to say, I was omnipresent.

Labels: friends, history, nice, york