Back In The Saddle

Well, today was my first day of training for my new job as bar staff at the Gun Barrels scream pub in Birmingham. It was probably the best training session I’ve ever experienced, and I hope it’s a reflection of things to come. Here’s a little breakdown of what I did

• Ice breaking session, including declaring most embarrasing moment.
• Introduction of all the drink products they sell. There was A LOT!
• Introduction to the range of food products. This included them actually bringing out some of the new dishes, which we GOT TO EAT! The Bulldog burger was especially good!
• Basic till training, which wasn’t too bad. Hardest part will be remembering where all the options are on the screen.
• How to pull my first pint. I went for strongbow, which I GOT TO DRINK AFTERWARDS. It was gooooood

All in all, it was a great day with some great people and I’m looking forward to my second session tomorrow.

On an unrelated note, I’m a little miffed at myself for doing something rather silly. While trying to organise some blog posts for cragcose that were to be moved over to my new dungeons and dragons blog, The D Twenty, I thought it would a good idea to do the following:

1. Load draft of story that was 75% complete, that has taken me several hours to read
2. Delete draft save file
3. Save open copy as draft under new blog with new file name

What I didn’t realise is that Windows Live Writer doesn’t work like word, you can’t delete a save file of a document while the document is open, and then just save the open document as something new. Instead, it deletes everything from in front of your very eyes! I was stunned and shocked, even resorting to a system restore to try and recover it (it was also to fix a software installation that went a bit wrong), but that didn’t work. I’m in too minds about rewriting it as I’m worried what I redo won’t be as good, but we’ll see.

In the coming days I’ll be wrapping up my training and possibly starting my first shift. I was meant to be going to a good friends birthday party down in Guildford, but due to limited budget and possible first shift, I’m affraid I’m going to have to give it a miss. But luckily my girlfriend will be around for her birthday, which means I can do what I do best; showering her with love and attention and making a big deal out of her. I’m going to look up Chinese birthday traditions seeing as she wants a family thing (she’s Chinese) and make it something special.

Vivs mum approves of the sofas

Project Lose An Olsen Twin Week……many?

Well, it would be fair to say that I haven’t made a serious post in at least over two weeks, possibly three. I think the only way I could discern the amount of time that’s passed since my last blog is based on my current number of sit ups. I have gone up to 100 a night, which is a reasonable amount to stay at for the foreseeable future, instead favouring to work on my upper body strength via push ups, which I find currently extremely challenging.

I have been reasonably busy in other endeavours durring the time since my last blog. I made a trip up (or down, I forget) to London to help my girlfriends mum and uncle move some furniture out the house of another uncle, who tragically passed away recently. It was a lot of work, we had to drive a tank of a van to carry all the stuff back. In the end, we took 2 large sofas, 1 television, 1 shelving unit, 1 cabinet, 1 dining table and a load of various smaller items. Basically any item that could be of use picked up. It seems disrespectful to let a passed relatives former possessions go to waste. Much better to re-use what you can, almost as a way of remembering them.
There was lots of heavy lifting, more so upon arrival at my girlfriends house. You see, 99% of what we brought back was from the ground floor of her uncles house, but the living room of her house is on the first floor (they live in a gorgeous 3 story house). As such, everything had to be very carefully carried up a narrow set of stairs and around a few tight bends. But eventually everything was in space and cleaned up (there was so much dust). For the first time in over 2 and half years my girlfriend has furniture in her families living room. It’s amazing the difference a sofa can make.
There was a funny revelation about the sofas. A few weeks back, soon after her uncle passed, the majority of the family was staying down at the house. She and her sister were sleeping on the two sofas in the living room, which as anyone who has done the same can testify, isn’t the most comfortable. What was the first thing I noticed about the sofas just before moving them? They both fold down into full size single beds! This proved to be great for me as when I stay over, I have a proper bed to sleep on, rather than on the living room floor (my girlfriends mum is very traditional, a chinese thing, so we can’t share a bed, or participate in any activity that might arrise from said bed sharing, lol).

The following day i got a phone call. I had been invited to a recruitment event at the bar I applied to; the Gun Barrels in Selly Oak/Edgbaston, near the University of Birmingham. It was scheduled for 6pm till 9pm on Wednesday and I was obviously a touch nervous.
Upon arriving, there was already over a dozen people there and we were divided up into one of eight colour coded teams. I was Team Green and made quick work of getting to know my team leader, a current member of staff, and my fellow team mates as they arrived. By the time everyone was there, there was 8 people in each team, meaning that over 60 people were attending! We were told that about 16 to 20 of the people there were going to be hired, so I had a 1/4 to 1/3 chance of nailing the job.
My group was a great bunch, with a mix of personalities. There was a quiet, nerdy girl called Poppy who liked Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, a qualified hairdresser called Amy Whitehouse (not Winehouse) who was very bubbly and an asian guy called Suki who was very chatty and enthusiastic. We had to perform two group activities, both of which seemingly aimed at finding out how much we’d be willing to make idiots of ourselves. The first of which involved marketing two fictional products from a list. We chose the one legged stool (The Monostool) and laxative chocolate (ChocoLog, Bang, and the Turd is gone!). The joke slogans went down well, as well as the awesome art work (courtesy of myself).
The second activity was an awards ceremony, Dudes and Dudds of the Year 2010. We were given a list of celebrities and ‘celebrities’ and had to act out the various winners and losers. I was Buzz Lighthyear for this event, so had great bright pink cheeks and a black spiral on my chin. After donning a jumpsuit, I truly looked the part.
Following these two entertaining tasks, there was a one on one interview with one of the staff, which went really well. After a couple of drinks, including a pint of rather nice strawberry beer, I headed home, to await a phonecall the next day if I got the job. This was probably the most anticipated phone call for a job I’ve ever waited for. Then at 1730 the next day, about half an hour after what I thought the cut off was for the call, I noticed a missed call on my phone. Recognising the number, I rang it back and it turned out I got the job! I was so happy! My training starts on Monday, two till five, and the same again on Tuesday, with final training five to six thirty on Wednesday, followed by a small party for the newbie's!

Well, that brings us up to date with what has happened in this past week. I’ve also made a small change to my blog with the addition of ad-sense adverts to see if I can bring in some pence. I’m also adding a logo and I’ve started a new blog. Called The D-Twenty, it’s a dungeons and dragons themed blog for a lot of stuff i realised wouldn’t really fit properly on this blog. Check it out! Also give those adds a click!

Review: Scott Pilgrim Vs. The World

This Tuesday gone, courtesy of the Total Film newsletter (and a little bit of cheeky multi-email amount manipulation) I manged to obtain 4 tickets for an advanced preview of the latest Edgar Wright movie, an adaption of of the Oni Press comic, penned by Brian Lee O’Malley, Scott Pilgrim Vs. The World.

Now before I begin to review in ‘earnest’ I have a confession to make. The first I heard of Scott Pilgrim Vs. The World (henceforth known as Scott Pilgrim) was when I saw the super advanced mega preview trailer from last years Comic Con (I think). It wasn’t until a few months later when I noticed one of my friends had posted on facebook that he was reading the 3rd volume of Scott Pilgrim that I discovered that Scott Pilgrim was a comic series. After a bit of hunting, I managed to procure the first few volumes.

And I promptly fell in lesbians.

I’m not a huge graphic novel fan, simply due to my reading pace. Now, don’t get me wrong, I absolutely love graphic novels, graphic media in general. I would read dozens of different mangas. I have many comic series’ that I desire to enjoy. The problem is the cost to duration ratio. You see, I can read a £8 graphic novel in a single evening, easily. Compare that to a similarly priced book which may last me a week or so, and it just doesn’t seem worth it. But recently I’ve circumvented this by two means. Firstly, I borrow a lot. I’ve been leant V For Vendetta and Watchment, both of which I massivly enjoyed. Secondly, and less legitimately, I’ve been downloading comic book series’ online and viewing them using Comic Rack. Now I know this may make you devout purchasers shudder and scream at me, but understand this, I can’t afford to buy all the volumes, so it’s either that or I don’t EVER read them. Which means that I will never purchase them in the future (I’m not going to spend money on a graphic novel I don’t love) I have purchased download titles, such as my prized 1st Edition Appleseed complete set and my first few volumes of Gundam 0083. But this is not about the ethics of piracy, not is it about comic books in general. This is about what I thought of Scott Pilgrim vs The World (the film). Lets get started with the good:

Lowest Common Denominator? Screw Em: When you have a film based on a previous piece of niche media, be it a comic book, a video game or a book, there is often the temptation to water down the original source material so those not indocrinated into the brotherhood don’t feel alienated. This happens mainly with video games, so seeing as Scott Pilgrim is heavily video game influenced, this was an ever present worry. But worry not my friends, Edgar Wright knows what he is doing. Just as he seemed to make Shuan of the Dead for zombie fans, he made Scott Pilgrim straight up for fans of the comic. That’s not to say that someone who hasn’t read the series won’t enjoy it. I went with my girlfriend, her sister and her cousin, none of which had read the comic, and they all thoroughly enjoyed themselves. In fact, her cousin laughed the loudest out of the whole theatre.

Best Graphics Ever: I had my doubts that the film would be able to encapsulate the comic/video game art style of the original series. There were a lot of elements that work well in ink, but maybe not so well on screen. This wasn’t the case. From game style HUD moments to floating words to caption sound effects (watching Scott bang his head against a lampost with the words Thud, Thud, Thud hanging in the air above him was briliant) The fight scenes were beautifully choreographed and the effects really made them feel vibrant and suitably beat ‘em up!

Made From Concetrate…..d Win!: It’s often hard to distil a story that spans several volumes of graphic novel, over the course of months of even years. But Scott Pilgrim did this well, (but not without a few problems, see bellow). You have two choices in this situation 1) Put the plot on hyper speed to hit every point in 120 minutes, which can leave the audience confused and feeling rushed, or 2) Miss out some elements, which may be critical to side plots, don’t impact on the main story. Scott Pilgrim does a a little of both, which works really well in getting the story over, but does have some negative effects.

And now the Bad:

They Missed That Out: There were a few things missed from the film that were great parts of the comic. Clash at Demonheads drummers robot arm, Scotts 12 months moping about after Ramona leaves, Kim and Scotts history, and even Knives and Kims lesbian kiss! Although these plot points don’t contribute directly to the overall story of defeating 7 evil ex’s, they add flavour and a suitable environment. You don’t need salt and vinegar on your chips, but it’s nice to have it.
The biggest casualty was the ending, where it was revealed that the big band, Gideon Graves, had a collection of 7 ex girlfriends and planned to add Ramona to the collection. And everything was the result of his ability to mess with peoples heads and memories. That was all kind of glossed over in favour of a big bad mind control chip.
Oh yeah, they also forgot his samurai sword battle with Knives ninja father….

Hyperspeed Motion Blur: Sometimes accelerating a plot can make things seem a little rushed. For example, Scott seemed to transition from one Ex-Battle to the next in the space of 30 minutes (in film time) whereas in the comic the span was more like 3 month. This kept the pacing up in terms of visual stimulation, but the way the cast dealt with the pace seemed a little stilted. No one seemed to comment that Scott had fought one ex an hour ago and was now up against another.
But the biggest victim of the increased pace was our hero, Scott Pilgrim. In the comic, he falls in love with Ramona Flowers while he is still dating Knives Chau (who is very much in puppy love with him). Now although this is incredibly douchey, and he gets called out on this douche-bag behaviour, the pacing of the comic means that this issue is resolved, and Scott is punished for his actions, in suitable time. But this isn’t the case in the film. Scott seems to plunge into the full on Ramona relationship and defeating 7 evil exs before Knives name is even mentioned. My girlfriend commented multiple times that she was having trouble empathising with Scott because he was such a douche for cheating on Knives. And I had to agree that the pacing of the film made Scott into a giant douche.

Overall, I freaking loved this film and would definatly see if for a second time (paying to see it that time)

Faithfulness to Original: 7.5/10
Graphical Style: 8/10
Humour: 7/10
Awesomeness: 9/10

GamerPost #04 Assassins Creed 2 Review

Well, I’ve done it, I’ve finally fully completed a game. We’re talking 100% in game completion. We’re talking 1000/1000 gamer points. We’re talking EVERYTHING. As such, I feel I can offer my best possible review, breaking it down into what I loved and what I loathed.

LOVED IT

Some of the Old – This game took everything that was great about assassins creed and brought it back. The free running, the stealthy assassinations, they sick sense of pleasure you can get from using a throwing knife to send a guard toppling off a building. It was all there.

Something New – And it takes all these old classics and expands upon and adds to them. You now have access to poison blades which can be used to ‘indirectly’ kill guards. You can use the grab function in close combat to throw people off buildings. There’s a much wider selection of weapons, allowing you to choose between sword, spear or axe. The game adds so much to the experience it is simply fun to think up creative ways to off random guards.

Less Repetition – One thing Assassins Creed suffered from was being repetitive. AC2 does away with this. Each mission and side quest feels unique. I never once found myself thinking “Oh no, not this again” It was all fresh as a daisy.

Now He’s Got Character – The entire cast was well written and engaging, with a nice touch of dry, adult humour. You actually watch Ezio, the character you play as, grow and mature, from a rowdy teenager into a man, into an assassin.

Not Shying Away – The story doesn’t cut corners with plot. Ezio drinks, he has sex, he seeks revenge. It doesn’t gloss over anything. The best bit was a quick time event to take a girls top off (not that you actually saw anything).

LOATHED IT

Story? – I often at times found myself wondering ‘why?’ Why did I have to kill this man? Why was I listening to this person? There wasn’t a compelling story, which was a shame considering the wonderful characters that populated it.

Hmm, wonder what I can use that for? – The game also had a handful of items that just seemed tacked on. This includes two Da Vinci inventions, the wrist pistol and the flying machine. Apart from when you’re forced to use them, I found them inconvenient compared to the more ‘traditional’ hardware

Crystal Skull Syndrome – Spoiler Warning Right Here! The ending left something to be desired if I’m being honest. I think they gave away too much too quickly and have dimmed my interest in the third in the series. The alien/time travellers just leaves a bad taste in my mouth like at the end of the last Indiana Jones movie. I like my mysterious organisations surrounded in more, well, mystery.

Well, that’s convenient -  Some of the Puzzles just seemed a bit too conveniently set up. For example, you’d be expected to navigate a jumping puzzle that was supposedly set up when the building you’re in was first constructed, yet the puzzle would require  jumping to and from objects placed there during the renovation of the building. It just breaks the suspension of disbelief a little.

THE FINAL SCORE

Graphics – 8/10 – Nothing ground breaking, but still impressive and breath taking in places

Gameplay -  9/10 – A wonderful free running experience

Audio – 8/10 – I didn’t really notice the music much, although at times it did pick up quite nicely

Story – 6/10 – Like I said, I felt a little lost by the story at times and felt that I was just being dragged along for the ride.

OVERALL – 8/10

Project Lose An Olsen Twin Week 4 or….

So lets get the dull stuff out the way, my exercise crap. This week was a bit of what I’ll call a ‘blip’. On two separate days I ‘over indulged’ By over indulge, I mean one day where I partake in a large amount of funyuns and mountain dew, and another where I again consumed an excess of said funyuns, followed by KFC for dinner, which is never a good plan. But both these transgressions can be put into a suitable context, which I will do so later on.
On a more possitive context, my exercise and fruit consumption has greatly increased. I’m walking an average of 15+ miles a week minimum, with any journey of 2 miles or less being undertaken on foot. As for my sit up reps, I’m up to 50 reps a night, every night (that’s 350 a week!) and hopefully within the next week or so, I’ll be up to 60. I’ve found a devious method into tricking myself that I’m doing less than I am. I break my set down into ever decreasing groups of reps. For example, for 40 reps, I would do 20, rest for a few seconds and have a drink, 10 then rest, 5 then rest, 3, then 2. For my current 50, I’m doing 20, then 15, then 10, then 5. This works very well at helping me pace myself effectively.

Now on to the more awesome parts of my last week. Firstly we have dungeons and dragons on Sunday. Postponed from the previous week due to illness, this session was a prime example in the importance in feedback. By working with my players, I managed to iron out some minor problems they had been having.
There was a hilarious exchange between the five of us about an hour into the session, towards the end of the last encounter. One of my players had received an update to her Magic Missile attack. It now was an instant hit, set damage attack, meaning that minions (high defence, 1 hp monsters) would fall like dominoes before her. She was getting a little drunk with power and in the very last room, she walked in and saw a man in the corner. Literally the first thing she said after I put down the mini was ‘I shoot him with magic missile’ to which the following exchanged took place:

“I use magic missile!”
”Are you sure?”
”Yeah! Blast him with magic missile!”
”Are you really sure?”
”Um, yes? [to other players] Am I sure?”
”What was your quest?”
”Um, kill zombies?!”
Other Player “No, wait, it was to save some guy…..oh! Don’t magic missile him Wessie!”

This lead to a running joke about the groups Wizard using her magic missile to solve every possible problem. Slight cough? Magic missile to prevent spread of infection. Can’t open a jar? Magic missile! Drops her wallet? Magic Missile! It was a running joke for the whole day!

Onto Monday, my girlfriends dad bought us all some really tasty cuts of steak, which combined with tasty chips and long beans, made an amazing dinner. I hadn’t had a rare steak in so long, so it was amazingly tasty!

Then came Tuesday, and the best day of the week by far. You see, I’m signed up with a website that sends people free tickets for advanced screenings of films. And I managed to score a handful of tickets to go see Scott Pilgrim vs. The World! I’ve been psyched about this film for months, since reading the comics and I wasn’t disappointed! I’m not going to spoil it for anyone who hasn’t seen it, but if you ever played an 8bit game, or played video games full stop, or just ever felt awkward and useless in life, this film is for you. I can best describe it as Wayne's World for bitpunk generation! They nailed the casting, the key plot points, everything! SEE THIS FILM!

THAT IS ALL

Project Lose An Olsen Twin Week 3

Or “My Most Productive Week in a While, With A Few Complaints Thrown in For Fun”

First off, lets start with PLOT. I’ve noticed 3 major things with my weight loss ‘program’

1. I’m finding exercise progressively easier. I’m currently doing 40 sit ups a night and happily walking/cycling at least 4 miles a day. I’ve noticed a steady decrease in how tired I am after each bought of exercise. Now the obvious result of this is that I’m going to have to increase the amount of exercise in order to keep the benefit up.

2. People have begun to comment on my appearance, in a positive way I may add. I had to laugh when Viv told me that her aunt commented that I looked like I had lost weight and Viv was worried that I’d be offended by that. The only way I could have been offended was if her aunt had instead said “Davyd isn’t looking as fat any more” which would have still be encouraging. I’m finding this kind of feedback much more motivating that looking at scales every morning.

3. I’m not losing fat from the desire areas of my body in the order I’d prefer. In order to illustrate this, let me refer you an diagram.

This is me:

Or, more accurately, this is me:

 

Ideally this is how I’d like to lose weight, with red areas being most urgent, orange being second most, yellow being third most and green being least urgent:

Now this is how I’m currently losing weight:

As you can see, I’ve got much thinner/less flabby arms, but not much change in my stomach, sides and chest. My face is the only area that I’m currently happy with. As I am now, I have knobbly wrists and stringy arms, lol. But it’s still weight loss and I’m going to keep working at it.

Now for something different. This week has been pleasantly productive for me. I’ve finally managed to sort out my job seekers allowance. As some of you may know, I’m currently unemployed and as such have had to resort to claiming benefits. The first of these was job seekers allowance, a not insubstantial sum of £50 a week, which goes a long way when you know how to shop sensibly and eat healthily. After claiming several weeks ago, I received my first payment today, meaning I don’t have to stress over phone and internet bills, which is a weight off my mind.
Secondly there’s housing benefits, in order to help pay my rent. Now I’ve been even more stressed about this simply because it’s taking so long and I’m already behind on this months rent. But today I got a great phone call. My landlord had received my email about needing a proof of tenancy letter and a break down of inclusive bills. Not only is he not annoyed over the delay, he also said that he would make my share of the bills (in other words, how much of my all inclusive rent goes towards said bills) less. Officially this is because I rent the smallest room. What this does mean is that I will receive more towards my rent. Once I’ve got this letter and all my proof is sent off, hopefully it will all finally be sorted.

On a more recreational note, I’ve finally finished writing my second Dungeons and Dragons campaign; volume 2: Evil in the Dark. As some of you know, I dungeon master for a group of my friends and my girlfriend, and as part of this I’m writing a series of custom campaigns. Now these aren’t short little dungeon delves, they’re full on stories. The last volume, The Clockwork Quest, was 3 chapters (a chapter being roughly equal to one in game day) spread over 40 pages. This volume that I’ve just finished is 5 chapters over 55 pages with more monsters and loot than I’ve ever had before. Thankfully my group has scheduled to play fortnightly on a Sunday, which is working out really well, with the next meet up this coming Sunday. I’m currently working on a fictionalised account of the players adventures which I’m going to try and publish on here shortly.

Finally, I’ve managed to fix my adobe CS3 master collection. To add a dash of context, a few months ago, thankfully just after I finished uni, I got a rather unpleasant message about serial authentication server errors when I booted up Photoshop cs3. Since then, no matter how many times I tried to install master collection, none of the programs would successfully install, meaning I was stuck using Photoshop 7! I mean considering that we’re on CS5, using cs3 is pretty dated (Photoshop CS3 was released in April 2007, Photoshop 7 in 2002!) I had all but given up, resigned to the fact that my install file was damaged some how. Then I had an idea, I would install it on my girlfriends computer to check it worked. And it did! So I now knew that I needed to fix the problem on my computer. After a bit of research, I found out the adobe clean script, used to remove all tracers of adobe cs3, had a ‘secret’ level 3 clean mode. Normally you’re only given two levels of clean, with the second being the most thorough. Previously this hadn’t worked for me. On discovering there was a third level, I thought hell, I’d give it a shot. And after a few restarts, a chkdsk scan and a long install, I finally had a working copy of adobe master suite cs3! Spectacular! The main motivation for this was the news that I might be getting a small inheritance sum from my gran, who passed away last year. This made me think about what would be the best way to spend this, and one of the first things that came to mind was investing in an Intuos4 Large graphics tablet by Wacom. Now, I’m not going to bore you with specs, let me just say this thing is a beauty! OLED buttons, touch wheel with 4 modes for zoom, opacity or layer scrolling, 2048 levels of pressure sensitivity as well as tilt sensitivity and a widescreen work area bigger than A4 all means this is the device I need to start producing some serious portfolio work. Now this money is definite, but if it does come through, I will hopefully be able to start publishing some sketches and digi-paintings to my deviant art.

Well that’s all for this longer than average blog. Look after yourself internet peoples!

Project Lose An Olsen Twin Week 2

So, week 2 of my ‘exercise’ routine has rolled around and how am I doing I hear you all scream so very, very loud. Well, mixed I would say. Because I spent a lot time at Vivs, I wasn’t able to do my usual cardio, but kept doing my sit-ups. As I currently stand, I can do 40/40 (that’s 40 minutes of cardio, 40 sit ups). The sit-ups are getting easier surprisingly quickly. But yes, no cardio for a lot of this week, which wasn’t bothering me too much, because I was under the impression, that my previous impression, that doing reps didn’t burn much fat, just built muscle, was a wrong impression. But it later turned out that I had the wrong impression about having the wrong impression (but both impressions were still wrong). Long story short, reps don’t burn as much fat as cardio, but the still burn fat and help maintain core muscle. So I was a bit disappointed that I’d let my cardio slip. But there I found out something (not really that) surprising; walking and running burn roughly the same calories per mile.

You see, I usually calculated my cardio burn based on calories per hour, which is a very deceptive measurement scale. If you think about it, it would be much easier to walk for an hour than maybe run at a solid pace for 30 minutes, but running burns more calories per hour than walking, so walking isn’t the best option. But then I discovered/realised that if I look at calories per mile rather than per hour, they’re both the same, and it’s all due to thermodynamics. You see, calories are a measurement of energy, and work is the amount of energy (foodies) expended/transferred by moving a mass (fatty me) through a distance (the walk to shops). This is independent of velocity, and as such, a walk to the shops one mile away burns as many calories as a run to the same shop. Obviously the power (work done over time) is much higher for running, but when time isn’t a concern, walking is much better an option.

With this ‘new’ found knowledge in hand, I decided to sort out some errands I had to run. Now, a 4 mph walk speed burns 114 calories per mile, slower than this burns slightly less. With this in mind, I came up with a clever little plan:

1. Using Google maps, I planned my route to where I was going, choosing the longest route I could feasibly do (just under two miles). The trick is to not pick a route that is inanely longer, just say the longest out of your usual two or three routes.
2. Again using the googly maps, I made a note of 1/2 mile way point landmarks along the route. This worked out really well.
3. Knowing that I wanted to average 4mph, I set myself of reaching each waypoint at 7m30s intervals.
4. I left, stop watch running to help me keep pace. 4mph is a little faster than most peoples walking speed, think ‘the train is pulling into the station, you’re almost at the platform, ticket in hand, don’t want to run so you’ll just walk fast’ It’s sustainable
5. Much to my surprise, I made it to my destination within a minute (under actually) of my target and my return journey was bang on.

After working out how far I’d walked today (about 10 miles) I calculated I’d burnt just over 900 calories! I did two forty minute round trips (had to take something back to the shop two hours after purchasing it) and one thirty minute round trip.

Having learnt that walking can be a very viable way of burning the pounds, I’m planning to do it more. Obviously 4mph might not be feasible if you’re walking with others, but even 3mph burns 90 calories a mile!

I found the majority of my information from this article on the interwebnettubes. I haven’t managed to weigh myself yet (I’m still assuming I’m pretty close to my starting 200lb) but I’ve noticed that my wrists are looking thinner, lol!

Project Lose An Olsen Twin Week 1

So, I’ve managed one whole week of better eating and conscientious exercise. And I’m already seeing the benefits! What a great start! It’s all part of the Philip DeFranco inspired project ‘Lose An Olsen Twin’. In other words, lose 65lbs. This may seem like a lofty goal, but I always like to aim high. My starting weight for this is 200lbs (14.5 stones), whereas for my height, my ideal weight is somewhere in the region of 155lbs (11 stones). This is something I really want, so I’m going to go for it!

Now to clarify, this isn’t some kind of fad diet, where I’m only allowed to eat watermelon, orange peel and cabbage leaves steamed under a full moon. Rather, I’m simply counting my calories while reducing my intake of negative dietary components. You see, the crux of losing weight is consuming less calories than you expend. You do that and your body begins burning your stores of fat, thus you lose weight. Additionally, eating slow burning carbohydrates (long sugar chains) gives you energy that keeps you going and doesn’t get immediately stored as fat. Conversely, avoiding simple sugars (short sugar chains) means you don’t have to worry about doing exercise straight after eating a mouthful. The same goes for swapping out saturated fats (hard to break down, thus more readily stored as fat deposits) for unsaturated fats (easily broken down into fat acids, thus not stored as fatty deposits) helps. I’m still getting to eat what I like, including the occasional burger, or even kebab. I’m just eating in moderation.

As for exercise, I have a simple routine. I do a period of cardiovascular exercise, good for getting up heart rate, followed by reps, one rep for every minute of cardio. This mix of endurance and intense exercise covers all bases and is more enjoyable than just running or just lifting weights.

Now for my progress. When I started out a week ago, I was doing 10 minutes of cardio and 10 reps. Within a week, I’m up to 30 minutes of continuous cardio and 30 reps, in my case, 30 sit ups. I’m hoping to reach 60/60 by the end of the month and maintain that for the long run, adding some additional routines or varying my reps to including push ups, once I’ve got my upper body strength up a bit more. The fact that I’m doing 30 sit ups a night daily is amazing me, I never thought I’d be able to do that.

In real terms, I’ve not been able to monitor my weight due a lack of bathroom scales. Instead I’m monitoring my progress in three ways. Firstly, as I mentioned above, I’m tracking the improvement in my stamina and endurance, which is very encouraging. I’m also starting to enjoy that sense of being worn out afterwards, which is very satisfying.

Secondly I’m observing my appearance, which is the primary motivation. I want to look healthier, and already it seems to be working. I’ve lost a bit of weight from my face and arms and my ‘love handles’ are beginning to reduce.

Finally, I’m using my wardrobe to see how well I’m doing. As I’m sure a lot of people do, I have a few articles of clothing that range from ‘snug’ to just damn well don’t fit. My goal is to not have to buy new clothes, just fit into the stuff I haven’t worn in a while. And it’s working already. A shirt I bought about a year ago that got to tight for me to comfortably wear around Christmas is already fitting better. I have a scale of various tops that will let me gauge my progress in real, practical terms and also serve as excellent motivation.

I plan on keeping a photographic record (which won’t be posted on here you’ll be glad to know) so I can make better comparisons of my progress. This is a long term thing for me, so I’m not expecting to hit my ideal weight any time soon. Wish me luck!

What? He’s Back? (I honestly didn’t care)

Hello all 3 people that read this. As you’ve probably not been caring about, I haven’t posted a blog entry in fucking ages! This is because…..

dum dum dum

…I really couldn’t be arsed. It was mainly due to the fact I started doing these 365 Da(v)y(d)s, monthly summaries of last year. It seemed like such a great idea at first and I was enjoying myself. But I have this horrible mentality that the moment I’m ‘forced’ to do something, I immediately hate doing it with a passion. That’s the main reason why I don’t play games like Resident Evil. The whole mentality of playing between save points makes me feel ‘forced’ to play, so I just stop playing. Today I was going to get a book out of the library, but it was on 7 day loan only. Now I knew I could read not only this book, but the book I’m currently reading, easily within the week, but being forced to would mean I’d absolutely hate it. Well back to the blog. So I was feeling very forced to complete each entry, but I also felt that it would be a terrible sin to publish any other blog entries before I completed my 2009 summary, ‘breaking’ the chronological recap of my year. So my blog became covered in digital dust as I tried to recapture the desire to finish my ‘09 recap. In the mean time, half finished blogs on other subjects built up in my drafts column, until today. Today I decided that I just needed to blog what I felt like. I’ve been dying to blog some of my dungeons and dragons exploits because I know at least 1 person who reads this (I’m talking about you Will!) will find that interesting. So sorry if you were remotely interested in my coverage of last year, that’s old news!

So what will be happening in the blogs to come? Well first off, I’m gonna talk more about personal stuff. I don’t really have anywhere to vent that’s as good as here. Secondly, there’ll be more dnd stuff. I’m gonna try my hand at summarising the adventures of my friends party in literary form, along with talking about my design process. And finally, whatever else comes to mind. For example, I’ve started a more conscientious weight loss ‘program’ called ‘Project Lose an Olsen Twin’. Inspired by my favourite Youtuber, Phillip DeFranco, the goal is to lose 65lbs (a little over 4 stone or 30kg) It’s a hell of a big target, but will put me in a much healthier weight bracket (borderline obese/overweight to ideal)
My game plan is the following: walk any distance 30 mins or less on foot, unless raining (I don’t want to get ill), 20 sit ups a night, increasing by 5 sit ups a week minimum, eat less than 1800 calories a day. Fingers crossed this should help me shed some pounds. I’m currently at about 200lb (14.5 stone/90kg), but don’t have any scales atm to keep track of my progress.

I think the next post will be my dnd post, so laters.

Scott Pilgrim in cubeecraft form. Ramona Flowers and Knives Chau to follow

365 Da(v)y(d)s - July

This month was the month of being made unemployed, two weddings, a funeral and a theme park, so a bit uppity downy for me (literally). It got off to a mixed start with my last day of work. I haven’t mentioned my work up until now really, so let me explain. I worked, up until this month, in a bureau de change in WH Smiths in Solihul. It was hardly a sensible business choice in opening it there, seeing as opposite/adjacent the store was 4 other bureau de changes. Needless to say, business was sloooooooooow, to the point where I’d take a book from the book department upstairs and read it in one shift ¬¬. So yeah, after working there for little over a year, they decided to close the branch.
It wasn’t all bad though. I got some nice redundancy pay and also would be getting student loan for my final year, so I wouldn’t need to work, although an income would be beneficial.

Following that final weekend of paid employment, me and Viv made our way south, to the sleep realm of Devon, home of farmers and hobbits! It was my dads wedding, third times the charm, and me and Viv had been invited.

We first made our way to Bicester, where my brother would give us a lift down to Devon. Viv enjoys big sofa + big TV whenever we are down.

The journey down was a bit hecktic, as on the way, my brother had a prang with another car. It looked a lot worse than it was and my bro was a bit shook up. It didn’t help that the husband of the driver in the other car kept getting up in Chris’ face, which was really intimidating for him.

We finally made it down to my dads. As is a tradition there, we made a fire and blew stuff up!

I’m not kidding. Whenever I go down to my dads, we always start a little fire in the garden burner and drop a can of something into it to watch it explode. I think this time it was a tin of kidney beans, which sprayed burning beans all over his (and his neighbours) garden with one helluva bang!

For all the isolation, the view was quite nice

When it came to the actual ceremony, all in all, it was quite a nice little affair. The whole thing was held at a post restaurant by the side of a river, and I have to say, I scrubbed up okay. My brother was best man/photographer, two responsibilities I was glad not to burdened with. I had to laugh at my dads reaction when trying to get round explaining that he’d asked Chris to be his best man, I interrupted and explained that a) I expected him too, as Chris spends more time down with my him than I do and b) I HATE speeches. I’ve never given one, but I don’t EVER plan to.

Chris gets his photography on while my dad posses.

Seeing as we were down for a few days, my dad paid for ‘us kids’ (me and Viv included) to visit Crealy Park. Think of it as a kiddy theme park combined with a petting zoo. It was a bit immature, but still fun. Viv had a lot of fun in the petting zoo part, especially around the rabbits, as this facial expression will testify:

Following our little day trip, me and Viv had one good nights sleep before the journey back to brum, for the following day, we would be travelling into London for a CHINESE WEDDING!

A CHINESE WEDDING is worthy of ALL CAPS for one simple reason; the food! We were only going to the banquet, which is simply the best part.
I can’t remember all the courses we had, but there was easily more than six! I had roast piglet, fish, crabs, prawns, beef, sticky rice, *drools* and it was all so good. I think the piglet was my favourite, prooving the following graph true

Viv and I had a lot fun in London and at the banquet, but we were both glad to get back and relax a bit from travelling. Well, my relaxation would be short lived. A little over a week later, my gran passed away. She had been suffering from cancer and to be perfectly honest, it was a blessing for the suffering to be over. I’m not really the kind of person that dwells on or is bothered by death. My approach to mourning is that you shouldn’t. Celebrate the persons life instead. So, back down to Devon, this time for much less cheerful reasons than my previous visit.

Just to prove that this truly was my month of epic travellings, the day after getting back up from Devon, me and Viv were heading down south again, this time to Guildford for Viv’s resits. I was going because it would be a chance to hang out with some cool peoples and offer Viv moral support (not that she’d need it. Viv is most awesome with exams) Little did I know what awaited me!

You see, Will and Hannah were planning and driving to Thorpe Park! And I had some BOGOF vouchers courtesy of my mum! So me and Viv got to go to Thorpe Park with Will, Hannah and Annie, for free! And it was AMAZING! I’ve been to Alton Towers before, but there was something better about Thorpe Park. It had similar rides to Alton Towers, but they were bigger, fasted and higher. Here’s a little summary of the rides we went on:

Samurai – A three on three spoked ride with chairs on each arm and the arms swivelled. Not very long or fast, but quite dizzy making.

Colossus – A long, standard type rollercoaster featuring the most number of loops of any coaster in the UK. This was definitely lot of fun and a good description would be Quiddich as a ride.

Nemesis Inferno – Much like Nemesis famous at Alton Towers, a feet loose coaster, but faster and higher, and long I think.

X:/No Way Out – A backwards facing rollercoaster, in the dark. This one wasn’t too fast, but very disorientating.

Vortex – 6 sets of inward facing seats on an arm that swings through an almost 360 degree arc, this was the first ride we went on, and a bloody good start to the day.

Stealth – This was an incredible thrill of a ride. Basically, you accelerate STUPIDLY fast (0-80mph in 2 seconds), then travel straight up (over 200 feet). After that, you pass over the outside of the arc at the top and plummet downwards. I had to close my eyes for this one, only to open them at the top and all I saw was sky, until the car when further round the arc and I saw the whole park!

SAW – This was a ride based on the popular film series and was probably the best ride there. It featured stops, starts, loops and vertical drops. At one point it looks like you’re going to drop straight into some blades, but the car dips just underneath them. A great ride.

All in all, the 5 of us had an amazing time. Annie didn’t like Stealth so much, actually turning green in the queue as we waited to get on, but she loved the other rides.
All things considered, I think this was a really great month, even with my Gran dying. But in a way, that was a good thing too, because it meant she didn’t had to suffer the cancer any more, so there’s always a silver lining.

Number of Updates: 28

First Update: “Davyd last weekend of work is fast approaching (Thu, 02 Jul 2009 10:46:06 GMT)”

Last Update: “Davyd is tired (Fri, 31 Jul 2009 23:43:13 GMT)”

Favourite Update: “Davyd is bittorrent an example of quantum mechanics? The speed seems to drop whenever I observe it! (Fri, 17 Jul 2009 07:56:29 GMT)”

365 Da(v)y(d)s - June

So, here we are, or were more accurately, in June, the start of summer. And it was a true start to summer as Viv and I were both completely done with university for the year. Now was time to chillax and enjoy ourselves. And we got off to a great start, with one of the first days out a trip to the cinema with my Viv. We saw Terminator Salvation which was better than Terminator 3 (not saying much), but not as good as Terminator 2 (again, not really saying much).

On Thursday something happened that I have been dreaming of for years! I saw Blue October live for the first time ever! It was easily one of the best gigs I’ve ever been to. It was a very intimate affair with a great set list and Justin built up a brilliant rapport with the crowd. It was also another first, it was Viv’s first live music gig and she really enjoyed it!
I would’ve brought back some pictures from this amazing experience, but I decided not to take my phone (which doubles as my camera) so I had no way to take pictures. This is normal for me as I generally don’t like to risk my phone getting damaged, lost or stolen for the sake of taking some pictures.

The next day, me and Viv made an epic trip to the ice cream paradise that is Morelli’s! Let me make this is as clear as possible. They make the Best Ice Cream In The UK (if not the world!). I will demonstrate with pictures:

I’ll explain what you’re looking at. That is vanilla ice cream. That is chocolate ice cream. That is REAL HAZELNUT ice cream. That is a cup of chocolate hazelnut sauce, with real hazelnuts SERVED IN A CHOCOLATE CUP! And it’s topped with real whipped cream.

Here’s another picture that really gets the point across. This is honestly the only ice cream I would pay £10 for and feel I’ve got a massive bargain. If you ever come to Birmingham, UK, you have to go to the bullring, visit Selfridges, and buy something from Morelli’s in the food court. It’ll be the best ice cream experience ever!

Little note of interest, Saturday the 6th of June this year gone was the 25th birthday of Tetris! Now you have the Tetris theme in your head!

Exactly one week into the year, I got my second semester grades and was really pleased to know I got a high 2.1. For those of you not familiar with the university grading system, it is a bit weird. The highest grade is a 1st, followed by a 2.1, then a 2.2 (known as a Desmond) and finally a 3rd. A 2.1 is effectively a B, which is quite good IMHO.

There weren’t many highlights until the middle of the month, when me and Viv travelled south to the barren wasteland that is Bicester (it isn’t that bad I guess) to visit for my brothers birthday.

OMG Train

We were only there for the weekend, and went to what Bicester passes as an ‘all you can eat’'. Now let me explain the ‘’ marks. You see, in Birmingham, all you can eat means fuck loads of food that you approach with the singular intent of creating a pile as big as possible on the biggest plate you can find. You then proceed to insert said food into your mouth, regardless of your actual level of hunger.
Now in Bicester they do things a little differently. They have a menu of say 20 items (a third of the Birmingham AYCE menu). You then proceed to order up to 3 items each or something like that. Once you’ve ordered, they cook the food and bring it to you, which you then eat in a civilized fashion. Once finished, you may order another serving of different items, should you be so inclined.
Needless to say, me and Viv, who are seasoned AYCE veterans found this all rather quant and amusing. The food was of a better quality than what you usually get in a brum restaurant, but the selection was where it was lacking.
Oh god, now I want Big Wok (the best chinese AYCE in brum, IMHO)
It was quite nice visiting my brother and meeting his girlfriend for the first time. All in all, it was a nice weekend and a bit of break from things.

Viv looked STUNNING for the meal btw!

Apart from a few ‘witty’' tweets and status updates (Animals have rights: Animals have the right to be TASTY), there wasn’t much eventful happenings until me and Viv went to the cinema for the second time that month to see Transformers 2.

Now I want to say something. Transformers has never been the most interlectual of concepts. I can imagine the design meeting back in the day going something like this:

Guy 1 “Well, what do boys like?”
Guy 2 “Hmmm, cars and planes and guns”
Guy 1 “True, but what else do they like”
Guy 2 “Giant robots?”
Guy 1 “So how can we get these two together? Giant robots racing cars?”
Guy 2 “How about giant robots that turn into cars?”
Guy 1 “Brilliant, start designing the toys”

So when it comes to watch a film about giant robots, well nothing goes better than giant explosions and giant boobs, I mean Megan Fox! I really enjoyed the more global setting and the bigger, badder robots. Overall, it was an amazing film and I really have enjoyed both films.

Following this cinematic experience, I didn’t really do much else during the month. I did though pick up two brilliant photos.

Giant metal Freddy Mercury will ROCK YOUR WORLD

Legs 1, a strip joint for amputee fetishist

So overall, a brilliant and busy month and as such, less status updates. It’s always a good sign when you’re doing too much about to actually comment on it. Here are there statistics.

Number of Updates: 18, that’s almost half as much as previous months.

First Update: “Davyd is looking forward to cinema 2moro and then BLUE OCTOBER ON THURSDAY!!! WOOOOOOO! (Tue, 02 Jun 2009 15:47:33 GMT)”

Last Update: “Davyd can't wait to get the N97 (aka the iPhone killer) (Sun, 28 Jun 2009 21:42:10 GMT)”

Favourite Update: “Davyd If you ever think "everyone is shit but me" than you're a double bacon shit with fries, Mr Shit-Face (Wed, 17 Jun 2009 22:59:27 GMT)” A tough pick again this month, but this brilliant Yatzee quote wins hands down.

365 Da(v)y(d)s – May

There are two key themes that dominated this month – pokemon and raging at people (and things). I will begin with the evil that is pokemon!

It all started with some left over birthday money and a certain offer on Game.co.uk. Basically they were offering pokemon diamond AND pokemon pearl together for £35. Considering their individual RRP’s were £25 each, that seemed like a good deal. I’d have one myself and give one game to Viv and we could play together
And it started out innocently enough, but soon I was racking up some scary playtime hours. Now this wasn’t a new addiction for me. Several years ago, I got the poke-virus BAD. We’re talking the first six games, all 251 pokemon (including mew), the entire first series of pokemon cards. I had it baaaaad. And now I was relapsing.
But I wasn’t the only one, Viv was also getting into it in a big way, which made me glad. She was more attached to her pokemon than me which was cute. She wasn’t trying to min/max her ‘mons like me, she was keeping the ones she thought were cute or she had grown attached to. It was such a great approach and was pleasantly refreshing to see.

I had another computer crash this month, I can’t even remember how many I’ve had with this system. Luckily when this happened, I had a second computer ready to receive my hard drive so I could back up all my music, videos and documents, so all was not lost. It was a tiresome experience reinstalling everything but it did mean a nice, smooth running computer afterwards. This really made me rage, but not as much as the following:

• People smoking in public. These people are douche bags, and doubly so for those who think they’re so fucking special that they can smoke where it’s illegal to do so, such metro stops, on busses etc.
• Homeless people who have dogs. I’m sorry but where the fuck do they get these animals? Does one come free with their first stack of big issues? “Hi, here’s 20 copies of Big Issue and your sympathy dog….” I think it’s so cruel that these animals have to be subjected to the same conditions as the homeless that ‘own’ them. Sometimes I want to give a can of dog food to the dog and nothing to the owners.
• Knives – I cut my hand pretty badly by trying to be too manly. I was cutting electrical tape, with a box cutter, one handed, while on the phone. It all when badly and I had to bandage my hand with a pair of boxers! Needless to say I now have a sweet scar!

It was around the middle of the month that my two flat mates/close friends; Paul and Aaron moved out. You see, one of my flat mates is frequently a prick. He gets very aggressive, acts like he owns the whole house and barely lets anyone use the living room. This got too much for Paul and Aaron, so they found a nice place really nearby to move into with a third mutual friend. Now this would be a sad situation in anyone's books, but for me it was even more so. You see, apart from Paul and Aaron (henceforth PA), I have no friends in Birmingham. In fact, I’d go to say I have no friends, ie people I share a common interest or interests with and have a mutual exchange of respect with, in the entire west midlands, lol. ‘But why is this a big deal? You said they were moving nearby?” Well it all comes down to the mutual friend they’d be living with, or more accurately, his family. You see, he happens to be the brother of a girl I went out with for a not-inconsequential amount of time, the end of which was quite messy, due to her actions. Now this was many years ago and I couldn’t give a damn about what he or his sister thinks, I’d go hang with PA anyway. The problem would be that if they were handing out awards for maturity and consideration, I doubt this girl would even be entered into the nominations ¬¬ Basically I was banned from even coming over to say hi if she was there, something I could not, and still cannot, comprehend, seeing as it was so long in the past, why would it be a deal? Ah, never mind, I was sure that me and PA would still get to hang out (and if you keep reading the blog, you’ll find out that we did. See, happy ending!)

Towards the end of the month, I headed down to Guildford to help my Vivvy get back from uni. And this is were the fun pictures come in.
You see, there is something important you should ALWAYS remember: Never fall asleep in the same room as people who played Buckaroo as a kid!

Ooh, good score so far

Lets Get Serious

Ooooooh, how high CAN we go?

Not any higher apparently. Lol

Seeing as this was the end of semester (and the year) for Viv, everyone was getting excited and there was a lot of drinking. Well, a lot more drinking. And some of it was even at parties.

The end of my time at Guildford was truly epic. We went out onto the beautiful area by the lake, started drinking, and kept drinking ALMOST ALL NIGHT! There was even an all night music performance!

The next day, we made the slightly hung over journey back to Wolverhampton. And so would begin me and Viv’s first full summer as a couple ^_^

Number of Updates: 32 (I seem to averaging this number)

First Update: “Davyd is loving pokemon diamond. takes me back! (Fri, 01 May 2009 15:15:19 GMT)”

Last Update: “Davyd has his Vivvy back in brum! Shame I have to work today tho (Sun, 31 May 2009 06:54:25 GMT)”

Favourite Update: Okay, straight up disclaimer, I don’t have 1 single favourite for this month, so I’m having 3! Ha!

1. “Davyd In america everybody wants to be the best, and if they can't be the best, then they make some fucking shit up to be the best at (wiki Cupstacking) (Sun, 03 May 2009 17:09:39 GMT)”
2. “Davyd It should be legal to squirt smokers in the face with super soakers (Sat, 09 May 2009 07:26:56 GMT)”
3. “Davyd rose mcgowen, as a one legged stripper, with a machine gun for a leg......guess the film (Wed, 20 May 2009 20:46:20 GMT)”

And that is the month of the May! Woooo

365 Da(v)y(d)s – April

April, otherwise known as Davetober (at least to me) is the month where everyone cool commemorates my monumental birth! Combined with the fact Viv and I celebrate our anniversary on the third of this month, it is pretty much a given that this fact would make April ‘09 a busy and eventful month. Well let us see, shall we?

I started the month playing what most would say is my favourite game; Rock Band 2! I do love this game, simply for it’s replay value. The constant dlc means that game constantly grows and expands. I love waiting for Friday to come around to find out if a song I love is going to be available on my favourite game.

For mine and Viv’s anniversary, we decided to have a nice, hand cooked three course meal. It was a most delicious success! For our starter, we had Thai salmon fish cakes with rocket salad. This started my love of Thai red curry paste as a wonder-ingredient.
For our main course, we had rare rump steak with breaded mushrooms and cheesy-mash potato. The steak wasn’t the best cut seeing as we got a slightly incompetent butcher, but as a meal, it was amazing.
For the desert, we had pecan brownies a la mode! (i.e. with ice cream) I love the brownie recipe that I used for this because it produces beautifully gooey brownies with crunchy outsides! We made a fair bit of brownies, but they were all gone by the end of the night!

One of the amazing random things that happened when we all went into Wolverhampton. There were FUCKING OWLS!

Fluffy white barn owl! Viv wanted to take him home!

Three days later, I heard news that almost literally blew my mind! Blue October were playing in Birmingham Carling Academy later in the year. I was so excited that I even started hyperventilating a little and came running down the stairs!
The following day I was up stupidly early, took the metro into Birmingham from Wolverhampton and bought myself two tickets for me and Viv to see my favourite band on the 4th of June.

As well as purchasing tickets for Blue October, we decided to do some window (and possibly real) shopping. We had a lot of fun as these photo’s are testament to.

Viv found a hat that, in her own words ‘makes me look like a pink jellyfish”

 
Oh yea, I’m so cool

Viv freaking loves giant tea cup!

Am I doing it right?

We even found a place that does Japanese style photo stickers! And in the top right is our Blue October Tickets!

While out and about, we visited Urban Outfitters, a store that in my opinion, tries far too hard to be hip and alternative, and just seems fake. Their worst flaw is that everything is OVERpriced! I’ve seen headphones that are £30 in Dixons being sold for £50 and £10 necklaces for £20. But this is what made me rage the most. I was almost incandescent with tangible WTF-ery

 

In case you can’t quite make it out, that price tag says £50! That’s £50 for a watch that looks exactly like the kind you can get out of £1 toy vending machines in supermarkets. I spent about 5 minutes looking at trying to decipher what made it worth £50, but I failed. Sure, it had an alarm and told the time and pretty much the standard features found on watches 1/10 the price, but nothing else. It didn’t set the time automatically by radio. It didn’t have a pulse monitor or gps for sport tracking. It didn’t have Bluetooth (Bluetooth always makes things better). I just couldn’t figure it out. It wasn’t even stylish. I mean, if it WAS in fashion to wear watches like this, why by fake overpriced ones? Why not buy the real naff watch for a literal fraction? Davyd’s brain hurts!
Overpriced watches aside, me and Viv had an awesome time in town

There was more rock band playing as the month progressed towards my birthday, and as it did, I grew more and more ambivalent towards the idea of celebrating. This was partly due to the fact I found no significance in my 23rd birthday and partly due to the fact I felt the actual fact it was my birthday was being sidelined. I know this sounds selfish but everyone was like “oh, it’ll be a great chance for you to do this” or “I can pick this up and do this”. I am aware of how selfish this sounds, but I didn’t just want people to sit around and praise me, I wanted people simply to come together with only the intention of having a good time, not thinking about running errands and the like.

In the end though, things worked out well for everyone I think. I had a quiet day which was what I was more hoping for to be honest. I believe everyone is allowed to throw one birthday wobbly every once in a while, and that was mine.
I spent my birthday with Viv at her place and there was cake. Not just any cake, but Chinese cream and fruit cake, the best cake in the world IMHO. For lunch we had fish and chips, with me having a really nice fishcake! It was a nice day in the end.

 
Nom Nom Nom Nom cake, it even has my name in on it!

I want it now!

I need no spoon!

 

 

 

 

I even shared some!

Three days later, me, Viv, Vince and Wessie decided we’d try something amazing and possibly suicidal. We would attempt the get the Rock Band 2 achievement ‘Bladder of Steel’.
For those of you who haven’t heard of this achievement, I shall explain for you. Rock Band 2 features something called the ‘Endless Set list’. While not actually endless, it does involve playing every song that comes on the Rock Band 2 disc. That is 84 songs ranging in difficulty from “playable on expert with your eyes close” to “on easy but is still raping my fingers”. There is an achievement for completing this, depending on the difficulty at which you do it; Silver Artist for Medium, Gold Artist for Hard and Platinum Artist for Expert. Bladder of Steel takes this and turns it up to eleven! You must do the endless set list, on an difficulty thankfully, but you cannot take any breaks at all! No pausing, no pressing the Xbox guide button, no disconnecting instruments, no having instruments run out of battery, no failing. If you do anything that interrupts the continuous set list, you fail the achievement. That’s over 6 consecutive hours of fake plastic rocking out. This would be epic. This would be hard! And so began the first attempt!

And we failed a song! In the first 20! OMG. I threw a big tweeted wobbly, but thanks due to the awesomeness of Viv and her family, we attempted again.

And failed again. This time a guide button got accidentally pressed, meaning we wouldn’t get the achievement. But seeing as a couple of us were hyped on energy drinks, we went for a third try.

And failed for a third time, due to me striking the drum kit guide button with a drumstick. It was at this point, realising we wouldn’t finished until midnight if we restarted here, that maybe we should leave it for another time. It was probably for the best as there’s a good chance it would’ve been very bad for our health! Lol!

Later that day, I came to a funny revelation. My dad had actually forgotten my birthday. Now I’m going to cut him some slack with this because my Gran was very ill with cancer at the time, and in all fairness, it took me a week to realise that he had forgotten, so we’ll call that even.

The next day, Viv went home and I was left all lonely with work to do. So I did what anyone would do, I sat down with some ice cream and Jack Daniels and got to work. This proved to be a surprisingly productive combination and within a week and half I had all my work done and submitted! There was some Rock Band 2, computer crashes, printer smudges and even a bobble head of Viv in the intervening time, but it all got done.

Overall I think April was really good looking back on it. I do regret being so immature with regards to my birthday, but we’ll forget about that. Shall we look at some statistics?

Number of Updates: 33 (That’s more than 1 a day)

First Update: “Davyd is playing ROCK BAND 2 (Wed, 01 Apr 2009 01:02:58 GMT)”

Last Update: “Davyd HAS HANDED IN EVERY BIT OF WORK! (Thu, 30 Apr 2009 17:39:50 GMT)”

Favourite Update: “Davyd "chinese people don't dunk their babies in water unless they're making soup out of them!" - Viv's responce to being asked if she's been baptised (Sat, 04 Apr 2009 23:30:12 GMT)”
That is an actual quote and how could it NOT be my favourite for the month? There were some close contenders but this one wins out!

365 Da(v)y(d)s - March

This month started off with me feeding my current SF IV addiction, starting with my love of the Hadouken! I don’t know why I developed such an adoration for this game over other beat ‘em ups, but needless to say, I was hooked (I’m really looking forward to to Super Street Fighter IV in spring 2010).
At the start of this month was the release of Tom Clancy’s H.A.W.X, an arcade/sim combat flight game from the Tom Clancy series. Technically the game was a sequel to the 2008 title Tom Clancy’s EndWar which was a 80% voice controlled RTS game. H.A.W.X toned down the focus on voice control, using for key functions such as weapon switching, missile launching and activating the HUD guidance system know as ECS. It was a very fun and fast game, featuring an ‘assistance off’ mode which enables intentional (and unintentional) stalling of your craft.
I found this game really fun and addictive, especially the online multiplayer which has a system of weapon and plane unlocks. The dog fights could get really hectic and overall, it was a good game for the month of march.

A few days after getting HAWX (I’m dropping the full stops), I headed off to Vivs for some love and attention, and to go her chemistry society ball. It was a most awesome chance to doll ourselves up and have some posh nosh.

Viv looking stunning as usual

I look equal parts surprised and menacing

I was only down for a few days, which makes the fact that I took my Xbox all the way there all the more ridiculous! I almost got Will addicted to HAWX!

After coming back to Birmingham, I settled down to do some uni work while enjoying the new Blue October album, Approaching Normal. Looking back now, I cannot understand why I was so apprehensive that it would be a good album. Currently it’s my most listened to album in my whole music collection.

It was also in this month that I got my first internet connection that was ALL MINE, MWHAHAHAHA! I did share it with one other flat mate, simply because I couldn’t be bothered to make up a reason why not. Looking back I really should have, seeing as how frequently he slowed it down by downloading porn. What was worse was when he would constantly ask me why the porn was slow downloading. I was not impressed so eventually I changed the password and kept him off!

I finally got round to some serious guitar practise. I had managed to procure off my mum a nice acoustic guitar, which I had finally figured out how to tune. You see, the problem is that I’m tone deaf, so tuning by ear is a real pain. But using a piece of PC software that records and analyses the string you play using your pc’s microphone, I was able to tune it properly, and thus begin so practise. I actually practised to the point my fingertips stung. Come on those guitarists callous’.

Only ten days after coming back from Viv’s, I was on my way back. I was understandably annoyed that while trying to sleep in the quiet zone of the train, an area I had specifically booked, I was being kept awake by a child that could only be described as noisy as sin! Why anyone would bring a winey child into the quiet zone I do not know. ‘Oh, I wanted a quiet place for my baby to sleep, but if he doesn’t sleep and decides to cry instead, well fuck everyone else!’

The highlight of this month had to be the epic phail on my part in booking the return ticket to bring Viv back to Wolverhampton. You see, there are two routes from Guildford to Wolverhampton. Either you change at Reading, or you go through London. Guess what I did? I bought Viv a single via the London Route, but my return ticket was via Reading. We didn’t realise that we were travelling through London until we actually crossed the Thames. I spent the next few hours panicking that I’d get my ticket checked and get a huge fine. Fortunately for me, no one checked my ticket and we made into the travel west midlands railcard zone with no trouble. I have never been so paranoid and nervous in my life! Lol.

Overall I have to say this was a busy little month. Travelling to and from Guildford twice (that’s almost 400 miles travelling overall) and managing to take the exactly wrong train is lol-worthy. A good month me thinks. Now for the science part!

Number of Status Updates: 24

First Update: “Davyd HADOKEN!!!!! (Sun, 01 Mar 2009 19:11:34 GMT)”

Last Update: “Davyd half 6 ish fine, we can meet you at new street, pick up some drinkies then head back? (Mon, 30 Mar 2009 19:37:57 GMT)”
This one makes no sense at all. Maybe I tweeted something by mistake. lol

Favourite Update: “Davyd wasn't supposed to get a train through london. Well crossing the thames might be a giveaway that i've got the wrong train. (Mon, 30 Mar 2009 08:46:05 GMT)”
Kinda says it all, doesn’t it? lol!

365 Da(v)y(d)s - Febuary

Well I have to say, February was one of my most eventful months and probably one of the best. The month got off to a great start with some most awesome snow! Now in my infinite wisdom, I didn’t photograph any of it, but I assure you, it was worth of this status update:

“Davyd has snowsnowsnowsnowsnow (Mon, 02 Feb 2009 18:40:53 GMT)”

The following few days of Feb were a mixed bag. I dyed my hair a nice mix of red and blue/black which I have to say looked quite good (oh, those days before I shaved my head). But following that day, my computer decided to through another EPIC wobbly. Starting with problems with internet explorer, which I personally have never experienced before, things just went down hill :( But I had more important things on my mind than unstable computer tantrums. I was going to see my Viv! And see her I did, for we had most epic Valentines Day plans; we were going to London!

I arrived at Viv’s dorm on the 11th of Feb, Xbox in tow. We wanted to catch up on some Left4Dead and I wanted to show her Tom Clancy’s HAWX. HAWX went down well with Will and he was suitably distracted!

Before our trip out for valentines, me, Viv and Anne went into town where Anne found something like, hard, made of metal and covered in bumps that she found absolutely amazing!

I think if they actually made a sex toy in the style of a Dalek, Anne would own it regardless! They could call it a DilDalek!

After this little diversion (I think Anne may have bought a book between fondling the poor things plunger) we headed off to some clothes shop, I think New Look. This is where Viv found the only hat I’ve ever seen her like!

It looks so good on her, so cute! Following this amazing purchase, we all headed home

The next day me and Viv went to scavenge for food. We came across a place we had never been before; Wagamama! Here we ate noodles and drank peach tea! Amazing!

After we were sated, we ventured back to the university, where the evening held more food, some work, and more Xbox (Left4Dead is a great distraction)

The next day was the big day! V-day! London here we come!

It was quite an experience for me seeing as I had never really been round London properly before, only ever on school trips etc! So we just went wild! We did museums, the Trocadero, Forbidden Planet, manga stores and CAMDEN FUCKING MARKET! That was where Viv bought me my favourite jacket EVAR!!! I had crab claws and we saw loads of cool gothic/alternative stalls. It was amazing

OMG LONDONING

Awesome London Escalator (I was easily impressed)

In Tokyo Toys I made Viv wear silly hats!

Big Spider at the Tate Modern!

Picadilly CIrcus
(pretty crappy circus if you ask me, not even any clowns)

Me sporting the new jacket Viv got me! Woo

A few days later, while cooking, this guy was born:

Happy potato is happy!

Following Valentines day, me and Viv prepared to head back to Wolverhampton. There was a pleasant convergence of events as Viv had a reading week at the same time as her mums birthday, so we headed back to celebrate in the best possible way, with food!

We went to Around the World in 80 Dishes, a well priced restaurant that serves dishes from India, China, America, Italy and Mexico, all of which was all you can eat! Me and Viv had been before and knew that due to how salty the food could be (to make you buy more drinks) that we should steer clear of the lasagne! But that didn’t stop Viv from eating so much that she needed to ‘purge’. Even Viv can eat too much!

Three Lee’s and a Pang on the way to EAT!

Viv with sexy black hair enjoying her meal.

After the meal, we all headed (very slowly) home, where more food awaited, in the form of the best type of cake ever. CHINESE CREAM CAKE OMG OM NOM NOM NOM!

They were all telling me to hurry up with the damn photo so they could eat the cake!

That was the end of a very fun day! The next day we were planning to go to Telford so Viv’s younger sister Vinki could go to a craft fair. I’m fairly ambivalent to craft stuff so I was up for it, something different.
When we arrived, me and Viv immediately thought something was weird when we saw a girl dressed as a fairy heading into the exhibition centre. Weird, but maybe she always goes to craft fairs in fancy dress. Then we saw someone dressed as Link, and then a Narutard! Me and Viv looked at each other, both thinking the same thing, and I said it “If there’s an anime convention going on, we are SO FUCKING GOING!”
And omg there was! It was the MCM midlands anime expo, which while not an amazingly huge event, was still a brilliant anime convention with a Tardis, the DeLorian from back to the future and loads of anime, manga and video game stalls. Viv even bought me an Evangelion NERV mug! Unfortunately I didn’t have my phone with me as the battery had died so we couldn’t get any photos, but it was still awesome and there were many good costumes, my favourite being Chell from Portal!

After spending many hours at the convention and meeting back up with Vinki and Lychi (my nickname for Viv’s mum) we decided to head into the town centre in order to do some shopping. This is where I made a purchase that my thumbs would hate me for! STREET FIGHTER IV!!! I had been thinking about getting it, as I’ve always preferred the street fighter series over other beat ‘em ups, perhaps with the exception of Super Smash Bros, and when I saw the limited edition cheap in HMV I had to get it.

The next day, we went out and had some dim sum at a really nice resturant in china town in Birmingham. For those of you that don’t know where china town is, let me draw you a map!

It was nice to have a good meal out, because the next day I had to see Viv off home, which I wasn’t happy about, but I knew I’d see her soon!

To console myself, I decided to play some Street Fighter IV. It went from a short play to TWENTY TWO CONSECUTIVE HOURS OMG! It took me 18 hours alone to beat the end boss. By the end of it I literally had blisters on me fingers!

February was definitely MOST AWESOME, and here are a few statistics from said month.

Number of Status Updates: 28 (average of 1 per day!)

First Update: “Davyd has snowsnowsnowsnowsnow (Mon, 02 Feb 2009 18:40:53 GMT)”

Last Update: “Davyd dreams of making his own SF IV arcade stick, from sanwa parts and steel, and brawn! (Sat, 28 Feb 2009 23:59:20 GMT)”

Favourite Update: “Davyd is disgusted at himself for playing Street Fighter IV for TWENTY TWO HOURS! (Thu, 26 Feb 2009 15:01:45 GMT)”
I really can’t believe I let myself commit that much consecutive time to one game, to the point of actually injuring myself!