The Black Star

A blog dedicated to the series of unfortunate events that always happen around me. Not so much unfortunate, more like funny.. but unfortunate sounds better.

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Saturday, March 04, 2006

If it keeps on raining the levee's gonna break

So I'm not feeling well at the moment, so instead of going through my whole day I'll just point out a few things. Although, I do have to say that I went to a casino for the first time today and it was quite an experience. Steve happens to be a bit of a gambler, so he talked me into going. I figured I'd just give it a try and see if I find yet another place where to throw my money away.

Steve has net winnings of 120 pounds. Or at least that's what he had. He always gambled 20 quid, nothing more and nothing less. So he does the same this time around, and he's feeling lucky (he had just predicted the score of two games correctly; two out of... two!). So well, the roulette is the gamble of choice. Fifteen minutes later we're outside because Steve's managed to lose the 20 pounds in four goes and I didn't let him take it any further... and we couldn't stay for drinks afterwards because 1.) he wasn't in the best of moods and 2.) he had just blown away his money. Hope that taught him a lesson. So, is Steve sounding more and more like Calabria?

We were on the metro the other day as we were taking a look at our possible home for next year. So it's all good, not much excitement (although it did start to snow... cool!) and then all of a sudden this unknown girl calls from behind "JIMMY!!!" I'm surprised, although I'm pretty sure it's not aimed at me, but I just tell the other Jimmy "hey, that's for you!" but then Steve yells back "Right here! Here's your guy!" and he points at me. I don't know what to do, so I just smile and wave back. They say a couple of things I can't understand and then one of them looks down to her mobile. "Ricky!" she yells next. "Ah, the bluetooth... that's me" says the other Jimmy. Good, not a shocker then. But then there was a shocker: "Johnny Bravo!" followed by obvious laughter. Who in the bloody world nicknames themselves Johnny Bravo? Only a fool!

Btw, thanks to Tiny for his sympathetic comments. I know I deserve them, but I'm still gonna destroy you in your blog... just you wait and see.

Friday, March 03, 2006

Paying the price

So today, Friday, is my busiest day of the week. Not something you look forward to when you're incredibly hung over. So when my alarm clock goes off at 8 in the morning and I can finally be arsed to get up (I think the alarm was going off for about a minute when it first woke me up, and then it went off for about half a minute while I got myself together) I turned it off, told myself I'd do fuck all today, and went back to bed. That wasn't necessarily the smartest move, as I've only missed two hours of class so far this year (and I'd be missing double that if I stayed in bed), but if I did attempt to go I'd be so out of it that it wouldn't even be worth it. So yeah, whatever.

The first thing that I notice when I wake up (that would be around 12 in the afternoon) is that I'm extremely thirsty (for no obvious reason...) so I get up and reach into my fridge to get out my water bottle. While I'm at it I notice something else--my ears are ringing so fucking loud that I can barely hear what's going on outside (and my flatmates usually yell). Great sign, ringing ears.

So after a few minutes of just putting myself together, I decide that the most sensible thing is to get something to eat--I'm starving. Just as I'm about to go out, I remember (yes, I remembered... I was so proud of myself that I remembered something at that point in time) that I've got makeup on my face. Hmm... I should probably take a shower before I make breakfast (or lunch?) or I'll be the target of many jokes to come. So yeah, I sneak into the bathroom and take a long shower when I almost tear my face apart trying to get rid of the marker. I succeed eventually and then make myself breakfast (my now famous bacon and sausage sandwich... mmm). While I'm eating it I remember that I have to hand in an assignment for Ryan, so well, I guess I'll just head of to my practical after doing that.

I get his school semi drunk but awake thanks to the cold. In order to hand in his thing I have to fill out a slip with all the details, most of which he gave to me yesterday while on the bus on a paper slip. So I take it out and start copying off my chuleta, but there are some things that aren't in there. So what am I supposed to do? I need to fill all that out correctly or it'll go somewhere else and he won't get any marks for it. Well, I figured it out. Let's just say that the lady that was there receiving the assignments must think that I'm a retard. But then, since I was posing for Ryan, she'll think he's a retard. but it got done, just not in the most subtle way--it got done the James way.

I didn't last much in my practical. I think in total I was only there for like 20 minutes when I decided to call it quits. I just wasn't functioning. I knew what I had to do (which is a really good sign because just a week ago I had no clue what I was doing) but I just couldn't get myself to do it. Since I knew what I had to do, I decided I'd do that work tomorrow afternoon when I'm recovered from the trip. So yes, my busiest day of the week turned out to be my shortest day of the week, with only 20 minutes of time. I feel I'm going to regret that later on, but hey, Manchester was so much better! So what did I do for the rest of the day? Sleep.

Now all I've got to do is hope the ringing goes away... which hopefully it will. At the time of writing it's still there, not as loud but still present. The thing is, I'm not sure if the volume has gone down because I've grown used to it or because it just has. I really hope it's the latter.

Thursday, March 02, 2006

Manc for a night!

So today was the big day--the day when I finally got to go to Manchester. First thing I have to say is that Manchester is an amazing city--very big and incredibly nice. I repeat fucking amazing. Not just because of the huge city centre (which included but was not limited to waterfountains, trams and music venues), but because of the vibe it gave out. Ryan gave me a personal tour of the city centre and I was so close to regretting coming to Newcastle instead of Manchester, but in the end it was a good choice, because of reasons I won't expand on here. But, had I visited both cities before choosing and had to make a decision based on the way they looked (and reputation as well) I would've gone for Manchester. I'm pretty sure I would've fit right in.

So well, there are things I'm sure happened and things which I'm not to sure of (and things that happened but I don't know how...). I don't remember too many things, but I can't write down all the ones I do because the entry would go on forever.

What I do remember for sure is the way there. It took us about 3 hours and a half to get there. We went by countless towns and cities, one of which was Halifax. That's right, the real Halifax, not that shit in Canada (lol, only joking, Rod). On the way we watched Team America (if you haven't watched it you must, it's a class film especially if you want to mock Americans). Not much happened on the bus (on the way there), people just kept a low profile and just laughed at the film or listened to their music. There were some times when it did get a bit eventful, like the time when we just started chanting one of the guys names (Wedge) just for the hell of it and when the two sides of the bus had a light race. For those of you who haven't heard about light races, basically you see what side can turn all their lights on the quickest and in an ordered way. For example, if the lights are all off, you start at the back and you turn the first light on, then the second, then the third and so on. Once the lit lights reach the front, they reverse in the opposite way. Whoever wins the race gets the bragging rights. Harder to explain than to do...

Prior to the light races, everyone wanted the lights turned off so they could either watch the film or sleep, but there were a couple of people who wouldn't turn them off (presumably they were asleep) so they got big boos until they did. When a person turned a light off they got a cheer. So, in order to fuck with the concept I decide to turn mine on. I get a boo. The next logical move would be to turn it off so that I could get a cheer, but I decided that as usual I would go against the system and do the unpredictable thing. So I turned Ryan's light on. There was confusion on the bus, and I got a combination of booing and laughter (and one cheer, I think).

We did stop once on the way to Manchester but I'm not sure where. Well, I don't think anybody knew where, but then I don't think they gave a fuck. Ryan was starving and I was a bit hungry, so the logical move was to get some food. I saw a Burger King advert when we were entering the place, but once inside there was no sign of the "Kong my Whopper" place. It makes me wonder. Then one of the lads has a fit because he can't find Burger King either, so we embark on a journey to find the damned place. Ryan decides to follow as he'd rather not eat at KFC. So we see that we have to cross the footbridge. Interesting. So we follow a dark path that could've taken us to a serial killer and we find the footbridge. We run across it and as expected Burger King's there. Victory. But wait, we see some of the guys coming back with crisps and chocolates and that kind of stuff. Burger King is closed. The guy the led us has a mini panic atack and decides to go check it out for himself. About 20 seconds go by and he hasn't come back, so I figure it might be closed and these guys are just retarded. But no, then a distant but clear "nooooooooooooo!!!" is heard. Yep, closed. We wait for him to come back so we can all walk back together and the first thing he says is "they wouldn't open it for me, the bastards" which gave me the idea that if we all riot outside we might get some service. But it probably won't be worth the trouble, as they probably weren't serving burgers at that time. By the time we make it back it's time to leave, so we all get on the bus hungry.

After that we were back on our way to Manchester. I can't say anything wacky happened from that time until when we were at the club (although I do recall a chugging competition that I lost miserably, but that's not something I want to remember). The club (Jilly's) was truly amazing. Five rooms, one for every different taste in music. I personally stayed in the rock/metal portion of the room, where I did many things I don't remember and probably even more that I'll be ashamed of if I do. I just remember that my drink of choice was the Newcastle Brown Ale, just for some Geordie pride. And well, like I said, I don't remember exactly what went on in the club, I just know that my body really hurts and that it was fun as hell. Some really good music as well as me losing my glasses for a while and some stumbling and lots of yelling...

What I do remember, though, was that the girl I was after kept hitting on Ryan (like the other night)... and by hitting I don't mean just a few words here and there, but she was pounding him. He, of course, didn't reciprocate as he's got a girlfriend (and she was actually in the same city that day, so he couldn't do anything) but she still kept pounding and pounding even harder. There's nothing worse than the girl you like hitting on your mate, but hey, what are you going to do? I just took off for a while because I couldn't take it--I just went to talk to some other people and to insult the guy that led us to Burger King. Anyway, Ryan tried to use my escape as an excuse to escape, because he seemed to be trying to follow me. Of course, she followed as well so it was uncomfortable as hell, to say the least. But well, eventually he managed to shrug her off and that's when we went for the Manchester city centre tour. He almost took me to the university so that I could see what I missed out on, but it was very dark and it was quite a long walk away, so a city centre tour seemed more appropriate.

By the time the night was over, I was exhausted and drunk. I was a tad annoyed as well, but the night had been too good to give any importance to that, so that was in the back of my mind. Drunk and exhausted is an understatement, because as soon as I got on the bus I went to sleep and I only woke up once we were in Newcastle. A few seconds after I opened my eyes they were closed by a flash. Then another one. What the hell? They were taking pictures of me! Fucking hell, well, whatever, I got some pictures taken of me last trip when I slept on the way back. So well, then I have to walk home from the uni at 6 in the morning, and it's fucking freezing so I manage to walk the walk in about 5 mins (yep, this time I did speed up, don't know how) and well, as soon as I got into my flat I had to go for a piss, so I do. On the way out of the bathroom I catch something odd on the mirror, so I go back and look. My face was all scribbled on with black marker, the fuckers! No wonder they were taking pictures... but well, I really didn't give a shit at that point in time, so I just headed into my room and crashed.

So in conclusion, my night at Manchester was amazing, and the main reason why I know that is because I don't remember much of what happened while I was there. That's always a good sign (a good sign of an alcohol problem, maybe?). I just know one thing now, though, and that's that I'll definitely be going to Manchester in Easter, there's no way that I won't go. There's loads of potential for a great break there and I know that that time around I won't end up with black marker all over my face.

Wednesday, March 01, 2006

Clean Sheet

So there's been an ongoing debate in our flat on what cleaners actually do. The uni is responsible for providing a cleaner once a week to clean our flat, although as of late it seems like she's more of a supervisor. We've recently got memos telling us to tidy up the common room and to wash the dishes and everything. Yesterday we got a note saying that if we didn't tidy up the common room and did all our dishes she wouldn't clean anything. So this begs the question: if we clean up the common room and do all the dishes, what exactly will she do? I understand the dishes part, that's not her job, but the common room? It's not like it's in a terrible state. I personally gave it a quick clean yesterday evening (just picking up stuff from the ground, throwing away the trash, et al) and that's not good enough.

I woke up this morning to voices outside my room (no, not those voices, there were real ones for a change). I could make up the voice of the supervisor and I assumed the other was the cleaner. So I hear the supervisor saying "well, don't do that... nor that. Just do this." What a bitch. So after a while I go out and I see the common room, and although it's not perfectly clean, it's in a very acceptable state. But that's not good enough, is it? In order for her to clean it it has to be perfectly clean (see what I'm getting to?). I just don't understand what her bloody job is!

Rant over. We're all watching the England match in the common room and Peter-Fucking-Crouch comes on the pitch. Tom personally loves him because he's a Liverpool supporter, but everyone else in the country thinks he's a waste of space (to say it in the nicest possible way). So well, whatever, Steph all of a sudden says "hmm... he must have the biggest cock in the world... he's huge!" and all us guys look at each other and ignore that comment. Then he's standing next to Shaun Wright-Phillips (possibly the smallest non-miget person in the world) and she says "Crouch is 6'7, and Shaun Wright is about 5 feet... he can probably suck his cock standing up." Can you tell she was horny?

Talking about football, it so happens that today an ex-Chelsea player passed away. He was attending a funeral and he just dropped right there and then. What are the odds of that, two for one...

Tuesday, February 28, 2006

A pocket full of gold

So today was the day that it was supposed to snow. I woke up in the morning and the sun was out, which I can't say was much of a surprise as the predictions had been for snow. So I go on about my business and all of a sudden (this is in the afternoon now) one of my flatmates calls out "it's snowing!" I look out the window and indeed it's snowing. I come out to the shared room and open the window and start doing all kinds of weird stuff and I'm all happy... so I decide I'm going to go out in the snow. I go in my room, put my shoes on, get my coat on and come out. By this time the heavy snow has turned into sprinkles of snow, but I decide I'm still going to go to Londis to get myself some bread (more to walk on snow, but hey, whatever) and when I'm halfway through the trip to Londis (that's about a minute and a half) the snow stops. Great. I go in, get my bread, and when I come out the sun is shining. Bloody hell, you don't know how disappointed I was.

I was at the Union with James grabbing some lunch, and we're talking when all of a sudden I look beyong and see two girls kissing. I'm well amused--shocked if you want. I just keep starring. Lesbians in action in the middle of the day, wicked! Then when they stop kissing (make it 10 seconds) one of them turns towards my direction. I look away, obviously, not wanting her to see that I was spying on them. But I was caught... not only was I caught, but it turns out the one that looked at me was a fucking guy! Ick! Bloody hell, you don't know how disappointed I was.

In the evening I'm in my flat with Ryan and we're just watching a film. When it finishes I start throwing some darts, and as I'm shuffling a dart from my left hand to my right hand (for no obvious reason) I manage to drop it. Not just drop it, though, but drop it on my foot. I tried to move my foot away as fast as possible, but it still got my toe. Damn, that hurt. I hope about for a minute and then sit down to examine it. No blood, but a small hole. Hmm... I guess thatit was so cold that my blood had frozen. I then went to sleep, hoping for that nympho girl to come into my room to make me feel better. She never did. Bloody hell, you don't know how disappointed I was!

Monday, February 27, 2006

Jailbreak

So I don't think there's much to tell. I'm really becoming a boring person, I guess. But what do you expect when you don't go out for ages in order to keep in good health? Bloody hell, something's got to be done. In fact, I've gone as far as to thinking about staying in my flat until the temperature goes up to around 7 degrees. It's just been bloody freezing as of late--not reaching negatives, but very strong winds and the rain hasn't helped much. Yes, the weather is turning on me, but there could be a plus for this. If weather reports are to be believed (which they're not, but for the sake of this entry let's say they're somewhat reliable) then tomorrow I'll experience my first snowy day. It has snowed on one previous occassion, but it was really light snow, so it doesn't really count. If it were to snow then I would definitely go out. Like James said, it might be colder, but you won't notice because you'll be amused by the snow and all... so yeah, I'm looking forward to that. But having said that, odds are that I won't get my white day tomorrow.

The other day I made some pancakes. I put some flour on a bowl, an egg, and then incrementally added milk and mixed. Not much to it. But something didn't look right, so I kept on adding milk, more and more... and more (perhaps I put too much flour to start with?) and I finally stopped when the bowl was virtually full. Hmm. Well, I still cook them and eat them and they taste well nice. The first seven, anyway... after that I felt like I was killing myself. Ryan gave me a hand and had the remaining three pancakes (yes, I made 10 bloody pancakes... who does that!?). It's safe to say that I won't be eating pancakes anytme soon... but at least I know I can make them now. The only problem is that I won't be able to make them in the morning (as I had planned) because of the amount of work and effort (and time) they require. So now I really have nothing to eat for breakfast. Oh, I don't know if I've mentioned this or not, but I'm pretty certain I've made myself semi lactose intolerant. How? By eating cereal every morning from September to December. What? The term "semi lactose intolerant" means that my stomach gets upset when I drink milk, to the point where I get excessive gasses... but nothing happens when I have other dairly products (cheese has no effect on me, for example). Odd, I know, but somebody had to be the first one, right?

On the plus side, I'm almost sure that I'll be watching Thin Lizzy later this month. I've already found people to go with (James and Steve were both very keen on the idea, Ryan didn't seem very convinced) and it's just a matter of buying the tickets. I know, that's a huge part of it, but in theory there are still tickets available according the the website. If i weren't so stingy I'd buy them online, but not only do they have a booking fee of 3 pounds, but they also have a handling fee of 5 odd quid and then 2 more pounds for something else. That's 50% of the ticket's face value! So I'll walk over to the venue on Wednesday and get them myself for the face value. Hey, you know you'd do the same!

Sunday, February 26, 2006

Lost Vagueness

So I can't say that today's been my most eventful day ever, because it wasn't... so I won't say it was. Oh, boy, I'm bored. You can tell, can't you?

So this week's mostly been inactive, as you can tell by the entries. I've been nursing my health in order to make sure I'm 100 percent for Manchester where I'll undo all my curing. That's the price I have to pay. So well, not that I do much on Sundays, but I woke up quite late, and decided to go to the city centre just because. I found a few albums at very reasonable prices so I got those to add to my collection, and after that I headed to the pub to watch the Carling Cup final, which Man Utd won by destroying Wigan (yeah, I know, how low have we sunk...).

And that's pretty much it. After that I came back and just listened to music (I've gotten "bored" with my music, so I've been getting some new stuff... whatever that means). Yes, I should've been typing some coursenotes and writing a seminar diary and trying to figure out how to write my webpage and my program, but I really can't be arsed. It's funny that we just finished looking over motivation in my business class... the final conclusion was that we really don't know where it comes from. According to my personality description it comes from my inner sense of duty, which must've gone on holiday as of late. That's one of the points I made in my essay... I actually enjoyed writing that essay, even if I did write it at the last moment.

Something that I discovered is that people really can't change. They are who they are and they stay that way. It is possible to change for some time, but that's not really change--more like fakeing--as they'll always go back to their usual selves. Why am I saying this? Well, one reason is because I promised myself that I would become a good student for this semester,--do my work early and put more effort and that kind of bullshite. Well, I did for a while, but I finally reverted to leaving everything to the last minute and doing just enough to get the grade I want. And it sort of happens without you noticing, but then once you've fully reverted you do notice that you're back to how you used to be. But my grades are still good, and to be honest, they were always good, and they didn't improve that much when I was doing my work ahead of time... so yeah, I guess I am who I am and I won't try to change myself.

Oh, I thought I'd let you guys know that my afro is back--to the extent that I'm being addressed as "the person beneath the hair." It's been 5 months since I last cut it, and it took me 6 months to have it he longest it's ever been. However, in between I had two "trimmings" and so far I've had none, so I guess it is bigger than it was before. In fact, it's so massive I can hide a pen on my sides... I wonder how many I can fit on the top. I don't have enough pens to test, but I guess the point I'm trying to make is that I can fit quite a few. I'll see if I can get a picture and put it up here (or better just email it to people who leave comments).