Holiday time

So, I'm going on holiday and I won't be here for perhaps a week.

Just letting you know.

Don't die while I'm away.

I've asked the neighbours to keep you fed and watered.

Bye!

Everybody needs a cushtie for a pillow!

This is a lie. An awful, insidious misrepresentation of how the world actually is. No on needs a cushtie for a pillow, but some do it anyway. Why, you ask? Because they're AWESOME, that's why.

A cushtie, as you may have gathered, is a device for cushioning your head/face/testicles when the situation provides such necessity. However, more often than not, you will just end up squeezing the darn thing.

However, it's wonderful cushioning effects and intensly satisfying malliability come at a price. In most cases that price is pretty amiable, it's £9.00 for a travel cushtie and a mere £6.50 for the revamped cushtie too.

I, however, did a silly thing.

On going into the local city centre for my eratically regular hair-cutting afair I happened into a quite posh place called "Bennetts", which I just misspelled horribly. In here I found a wide selection of squidgy little bags of fun.

This time, I actually mean "breasts" when I say that.

However, after having found breasts, I happened upon a fair amount of cushtie's, and, I tell you hand on heart, I just went nuts.

I dove around and squidged and squeezed and frolliced with a gaity unheard of to the classy patrons of this shop. Unfortunately, at this point, I did something stupid.

I bought one. To be specific, a "cushtie dreamz", resplendant in its fleecey, removable, and above all machine washable, exterior and lovely erogenous interior. Ok, so it wasn't erogenous, but I couldn't think of a word for "pertaining to having lots of little beads in". I was overjoyed!

Then I got home. I got it out, I looked at the thing and hugged it a bit. It's nice, but very small and quite devoutly smelly. I'm sure it will air out, but for now its too nasty to sleep on. Infact, I rarely plan to sleep on it! I will probably take it to sleepovers in lieu of a real pillow only to have it stolen by attractive women who i cannot say no to. It's not it's underuse that worries me though.I just feel a bit daft for spending £12.99 on a pillow.

Actually, I'm not sure which is more stupid, the fact that I spent £12.99 on a pillow, or that i bought a pillow.

--

In other news, shout-outs to Spenny for being awesome and an entertaining writer and maker of shaken milk. Booyah.

A reprisal.

Alright V. I listened to Dusk and Summer again.

You were right, I was wrong.

I, if I'm honest, have no idea why I didn't like it on first listening, but I'm glad that, by force of your comment, I went and listened again. I was going to give the CD away! Oh the injustice, oh the depravity!

Thank you V.

Thank you.

--

I have nothing else to type. Nothing. Nothing. Nothingnothing. Nothingnothingnothing.

Well, nothing but "nothing".

... I am so sorry. That joke was so bad I almost had a fatal haemorrhage. If it had been any worse than this post would never be published. I'm hanging on in there for your guys, not that you'll enjoy this in the least.

Bah.

Goodnight.

Boobies

New research has shown that lightbulbs cause booby cancer. As well as this, so do neon signs!

AND I LOVE NEON SIGNS!

This news upsets me.

OMGWTFBBQ?!

Yes, that's right folks: BBQ.

I went to one last night, and a wonderfully raucous time was had by all and sundry! I nearly went and got in the neighbour's pond thinking it was a hot tub.

I also drank far too much. I mean WAY too much. It could have been something like 7 bottles of Stella Artois and some various other stuff. Oh goodness, I am certainly regretting that now!

Just consider for a moment that Stella tastes like vomit while you're drinking it. Consider it making a reappearance. All the wonderful vomituous flavours squared. That's disgusting to the power 2!

I'm gonna go lie down T_T

Dusk and Summer

Hey, you like Chris Carrabba, right? I mean, y'know, Dashboard Confessional and Further Seems Forever (well, their first outing anyway, for the purpose of this we don't need to consider their later lead singers)? What'd you say if I told you that Dashboard have gone pseudo-FSF? You'd be stoked?

DON'T BE.

Dashboard Confessional's latest offering to all and sundry, "Dusk and Summer", is, to quote Heckler Spray, something that could not be any more "middle of the road if it bought a pneumatic drill and a set of traffic cones". It sounds like Keane and Embrace collided with Chris on a busy junction one warm day and, in the ensuing madness, they somehow managed to melt together and form something horrible bland.

You're used to a passionate Chris? You thought A Mark, A Mission, A Brand, A Scar was a sellout? Atleast it tried to make up for that with a bit of passion and sincerity and it was a genuinely enjoyable experience. Dusk and Summer, however, is melancholically non-deviant shit. The only saving graces that it is possessive of would be the tracks "Dusk and Summer", reminiscent of The Places You Have Come to Fear the Most (apart from the bleached-clean production) and The Swiss Army Romance (which I could recomment to everyone and anyone); and the fact that the album has Vindicated (of Spiderman 2 infamy) has been slapped on as a bonus track, and it is a track which reminds me happily of first receiving "A Mark, A Mission...", with its sweet, punchy guitar and what appears to be genuine empathy.

To summarise: Dusk and Summer is like, figuratively speaking, walking back to your happy wedded home to find your wife sleeping with another man, shooting up on heroine and beating your child all that the same time, by which I mean "very disappointing".

Chris: try harder next time.

The propensities of summer

I have this feeling I would very much like to go and throw cold water all over scantily clad women.

--

Ok, so that was the link with the title sorted and explained after a fashion, on to the meat of the matter!

Over the previous few weeks I have blogged little, despite having so much free time. Perhaps it is because of this that I am blogging so little. Nothing really happens in Borrowash; it's just a dingy little town covered in hard baked and thoroughly dead grass with skies devoid of cloud and horizons plentiful in their distribution of heat.

Recently I did buy a new camera though. Recently Emily went to Ecuador, as did Heather. Gareth has gone to Wales. Sophie is too busy to come and mess around. Alex has invited us to his house for a barbeque. There's another barbeque for the former 6th form students at college. There's a college party on friday. It's all a bit much.

I am very sad that Emily and Sheepy (Heather) have gone half way across the world. Not so much the distance, more the fact is that they'll be gone for about a month. Ok, 3 weeks now, but it's still a very long time, even if it grows shorter by the day. I just miss them a lot, they are good friends afterall, and it feels as though we never do anything without them here.

Gareth, being in Wales, means we have no other real catalyst for going out and doing anything, although I think he might be back today, so that's not everso bad.

Sophie will be here sometime, I'm just worried because she keeps putting it off.

Alex's barbeque; now this, I am quite dubious of. I'm not sure what he's planning, whether he's being genuinely friendly and amiable (and this is quite odd, as he managed to ostracize himself from our clique, as it were, and i'm not sure whether he's regretting it and wants to come back, is just being a nice guy or is going to invite us along, let us meet all his cool new friends and then rub it in our faces). I think I'll still be going, but I think the result of that is that i'm not gonna bother with the alumni barbeque.

The college party I am not too sure about either. Grace has asked me to come just to keep her sane and also in the event that Brett, a hulking neolithic brute of a man, comes along and decides to make a nuissance of himself then I ought to be around for physical protection. Ok, so she didn't broach it to me quite like that, but i think that is the jist.

I really oughtn't say that life is boring, it's just, maybe, a little too much for me to handle.

What kind of soul I possess

You Are a Seeker Soul

You are on a quest for knowledge and life challenges. You love to be curious and ask a ton of questions. Since you know so much, you make for an interesting conversationalist. Mentally alert, you can outwit almost anyone (and have fun doing it!). Very introspective, you can be silently critical of others. And your quiet nature makes it difficult for people to get to know you. You see yourself as a philosopher, and you take everything philosophically. Your main talent is expressing and communicating ideas. Souls you are most compatible with: Hunter Soul and Visionary Soul

What Kind of Soul Are You?

The Shanghai Restoration Project

I stumbled across The Shanghai Restoration Project a few days ago when I was checking the iTunes music store for any updates (I usually just download the free single of the week and this, along with my subscriptions to Indiefeed.com Alternative/Modern Rock, Indiefeed.com Folk/Americana and KEXP Radio's Song of the Day podcasts tends to keep me sorted for new and intriguing music).

However, this stunning piece of album art caught my eye. Ok, so I lied. It was actually this:
but the two are very similar, and, as the music of "Reinterpretations" is to that of "The Shanghai Restoration Project" (the original album), one is a remix of the other.

So, what did I do? I listened to the snippets of tracks that iTunes would let me and got very excited as a result. Infact, if memory serves, I think I made a bit of a mess. So, I scraped together £4.74 (which, as far as I know, is still the price of this fantastic, 8-track-long EP, resplendid with all its sumptuous audio bonuses) and got down to some fraught and anxious downloading.

I certainly wasn't disappointed! I feel that this album is something ephemerally impressive, like watching a duck work a trapeze with all the grace and allacrity of a Russian schoolgirl, stolen away from her family in the night to work the carnivals of Moscow.

The initial attraction, I have to admit, was the album cover, but, after getting over that I realised that there was something really stirring about it. I love "traditional oriental" music, or that which we are subject to in the UK, and am also quite the fan of J-pop and J-rock, hints of which are very apparent on the EP.

This isn't really getting us anywhere though, you have no idea what The Shanghai Restoration Project actually sounds like at all! Well, think of it like this: The Postal Service is to lo-fi indie-pop as The Shanghai Restoration Project is to Japanese pop. So yes, it's chilled out, classical Chinese techno with overtones of hip-hop, R&B and jazz, and it's not bad at all!

From what I can tell though, some tracks have suffered in comparison to their original, raw counterparts from the original album, but that is not to say that these are bad remixes, they just pale slightly when put beside their aural breatheren, the original "Miss Shanghai" being one such example. Some tracks, on the otherhand, such as "Babylon of the Occident", excel in their reproductions and are, in fact, far better than their originals!

I do not, however, think I have done much good in talking about my opinions of it, so I will paste their biography from the website they call home.

"About the Artist:


In 2003, producer and songwriter Dave Liang launched his career with impressive force, producing for artists on major labels such as Bad Boy, Motown, and Universal Records. These successful forays into the realm of commercial music have earned him high credibility and recognition within the industry. With The Shanghai Restoration Project, his first complete album, Liang inventively marries traditional Chinese instruments with modern hip-hop and electronic production, bringing the ancient world to life in the 21st century.

"There is a void of Chinese American music given all the recent political and commercial attention on China," he says. "My aim with this project is to capture and reflect that tension while introducing new sounds that result from the fusion of the two cultures."

Liang's music has been featured in films such as Red Doors (Winner TriBeCa Film Festival '05), on programs such as KCRW's "Morning Becomes Eclectic", and in clubs and lounges the world over. In 2005, he signed a deal with Outernational Music, the licensing division of Thievery Corporation’s label, ESL Music.

About the Project:

The Shanghai Restoration Project draws its creative inspiration from the old 1930s Shanghai jazz bands, an early combination of East and West that has become an international legend. Today’s Shanghai is a chessboard of similar tensions and dichotomies: exotic versus familiar, lore versus technology, and most importantly, traditional Chinese philosophy versus contemporary life. The Shanghai Restoration Project captures and explores these tensions by introducing Eastern instruments and rhythms to the Western sounds of hip-hop, jazz, and pop.

As a Chinese-American, Liang aims to revive the exotic blend of the original Shanghai Jazz bands in a modern context: "Like the rest of the world,” he says, “China is changing so much, but it's doing so on an entirely different level from the rest of us. It's time to explore that idea musically."

About Reinterpretations:

Reinterpretations is more than a remix. The spirit of the Shanghai Restoration Project has been preserved, but the chords have been rewritten, the tempos have been recalibrated, and the styles have been altered.

Producer Dave Liang reintroduces the listener to the project through a series of eight experimental lenses, each portraying Shanghai in a different light. Whereas the original Shanghai Restoration Project drew its inspiration from the 1930s Shanghai jazz bands, Reinterpretations looks to the transformative pulse of modern day Shanghai. Staying faithful to its predecessor, Reinrepretations incorporates elements from each of the original 15 tracks, paralleling Shanghai’s own reinvention. Listen closely."

-- lifted from http://shanghairestorationproject.com

The Days Go By Oh So Slow

*singing*and I'm yours if you want!

*sigh*

What is it about this blistering heat that leaves me so detestably garullous in my activity? If waffling was something you did with the whole of your body rather than just your mouth then that is what I would be doing right now.

WOAH, HOLD THE PHONE.

Half way through writing this I got a little bored and wandered over to Ytmnd.com to watch something hilarious. I found this, which terrified me deeply, and this, which gave me some vague semblance of hope for mankind.

I urge all of you who read this to go out there and fight against scientology (to the point of not being killed horribly) and cast out this evil from the world.

My friend Matt hastens to add that most organised religion is similar to this, but is not quite so piss poor at covering it all up.

I also found this on Your The Man Now Dog [dot] com, the Tori Amos Zebra Sing-Along, which is the most beautiful thing I've ever seen.

And Eevee, no, it was not ye who christened me thus, it was my good friend Spenniford [Rebecca Spencer]. I am also known in some circles as "Julio", like Mr. Inglesias.

Victoria: miniatures are so totally available [if you make them yourself]. It may be a nice idea to create a "Joe Beaver in your pocket!", along the lines of the "Mr. T in your pocket!" which is available on wider retail. My version would regurgitate such useful phrases as:

"Crikey!"

"Is this infact true, or an elaborate ruse?!"

"You're quite the asshat, you know."

"What's Eff?"

"Dear Mr. Exam writer man, I would have no greater pleasure than knowing that, as a result of writing this, your unholy entrails were gouged out by ravenous badgers and your slowly cooling corpse was then used as a hobo for warmth on a cool November eve."

and

"Monkeh!?"

I hope you all enjoyed the reprieve

"As the name implies, this is a place of tranquility and respite

- Welcome to The Roost"

Oh lord, I have feel in love with Animal Crossing T_T

For those of you who do not know, Animal Crossing is a game with no goals whatsoever and just focusses on you wandering around, making friends, buying furniture for your house, and turning you town into a leafy Eden, of sorts.

"But," I hear you cry, "this is a rubbish introduction, get on with it!"

And being the conscientious fellow that I am, I will heed your call and respond duly!

The reason I've been away so long? Well, exams, naturally, but I have returned to this hallowed place once more, after your respite, to sanctify it with the words of the lord of this land (well.. the intarweb equivalent of land), Sir Joseph of Beaver, champion jouster and winner of the "sexiest man this side of David Tennant" award (a belated thank you to they who decided to bestow this on me. You know who you are!).

But what, on my return, do I have to say? Well *moves to sip from his iced water*- HOLYCRATHAT'SASTICKYCOASTER!!

Ahem, excuse me, but as I write this, the BBC Weather Centre informs me that I'm sheltering from blistering 29 degree Celsius heat, and, in a bid to retain sanity and not be reduced to a concentrated pulp, like soup left to simmer for too long, my dad brought my an undeniably beautiful sight to behold, a panacea that cures all wounds on days such as today: a pint of iced water. Water. Ice. Wait, water is ice... Erm... Water with lumps of much colder water in it. Yes.

What was I talking about? Oh lord, who knows.

So, exams. What do I have to say about them? Well, physics appeared satisfyingly difficult; that is to say, "challenging but enjoyably so"; maths was brain blisteringly painful and RS was a waffle-a-thon. To elaborate I'll give you an example. For the three RS exams I took this examination period, I wrote 42 pages. That's A4 size. Well, ok, not "pages", but 42 "sides", so 21 pages. That's the size of a small book! Or a large pamphlet. I feel that, in writing this very specific number of pages, I am on to a winning strategy. In writing 42 pages worth of tat, I have been given a sign, a sign of good things. For those of you who aren't in the know and cannot be bothered to click on my links, 42 is, famously, the answer to Life, the Universe and Everything, as perported by the universes second greatest computer, Deep Thought. Many felt this, however, was not acceptable, so a second computer, designed by Deep Thought, was constructed in order to give us the original question posed by Life, the Universe and Everything. Plot spoilers ensue, but ne'ermind! The question was never actually given, but it is believed that, having the protagonist of the story, Arthur Dent, pull scrabble tiles from a scrabble bag in a random order to produce the sentence "what do you get if you pultiply six by nine", relinquishes to us the answer.

This speaks of a variety of things (as six multiplied by nine is actually fifty four), such as the inherently confusing and flawed nature of the universe, or that the original computer was a flawed machine. However, it also may point to the idea that the universe works in base 13, rather than base 10, and that we've misunderstood it all along! For, working in base 13, 6 by 9 is 42.

In rebuttle, Douglas Adams, writer of the series, is quoted as saying,

"nobody writes jokes in base 13 [...] I may be a pretty sad person, but I don't make jokes in base 13."

It is further claimed, by a character called "Prak" from an offshoot of the series, that the question and answer cannot be known in the same universe, otherwise bad things will happen. But we needn't worry about the bad things, because it is actually impossible to know both in the same universe. Apparently, this seems to work nicely with Pauli's Exclusion Principle and Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle. These state, in order, that two identical fermions cannot exist in the same quantum state simultaneously, and that you cannot know how fast a particle is moving and where it is at the same time, just one or the other.

That was a detour and a half wasn't it!

Erm... so... I think, in saying that, I was just intending to say that I kicked ass in the RS exam.

I am very tired in learning all these intriguing things and reporting them back to you. So, I would like to end this by thanking the kind people at Wikipedia and then telling you that i'll be back soon.

Oh, and by the way Miss Eevee, Fiona Tennant, as far as I know, is in no way related to Davo. Sorry. Oh, and congratulations on getting this far down the page.