dirty pretty things...

Things I like about university:

• There are very few (if any) children here.
  
• Everyone is clever. Like. Everyone. This means you actually have to think about what you say in everyday conversation. Things said in Kidderminster might not make all that much sense here.
  
• The Guardian is half the regular price
• Contrary to popular belief, you can get away with not drinking all that much. When drunk, I am a pleb, so I haven't done it for a few months. It's a simpler life...
  
• There is a library of foreign cinema. This one pretty much explains itself.
• Ditto magazines.
• It's not far from home, so I can go back if I so choose (I don't, but I'm being hypothetical.)
• It's full of raving lefties. Last week, I stood for ten minutes while a man from the Socialist Worker Party told me that Communism was the way forward. He was so passionate, I didn't have the heart to disagree.
  
• When living on campus, everything is a five minute walk. Of course, it gets a little bit samey, but in theory, this is good. Also, there are ducks everywhere.
  
• My 'lecteur' who is named Thomas and is strangely appealing. Hard to say why...
  

In short, I could probably stay forever. I banned myself from updating during my first week, but as I have no television, I daresay you will be seeing much more from me. You lucky buggers...

EMO

Emo (pengucapan /ˈiːmoʊ/, singkatan untuk emotional music^[1]) adalah gaya musik rock dengan ciri khas musik yang melodius, disertai lirik yang ekspresif dan berisi pengakuan. Pada pertengahan 1980-an terdapat subbudaya hardcore punk di Washington, D.C.. Musik mereka disebut emotional hardcore atau emocore, perintisnya adalah Rites of Spring dan Embrace.^[2] Punk gaya baru yang dipelopori Rites of Spring juga disebut emotive hardcore.^[3] Sejalan dengan ditirunya gaya bermusik ini oleh grup-grup punk kontemporer Amerika, terjadi pergeseran dan perubahan bunyi musik dan arti, tercampur dengan pop punk dan indie rock, dan berpuncak pada awal tahun 1990-an dengan musik oleh Jawbreaker dan Sunny Day Real Estate. Pada pertengahan 1990-an grup-grup musik emo mulai bermunculan dari Amerika Serikat Tengah Barat dan Amerika Serikat Tengah, dan sejumlah label independen mulai menjadi spesialis emo. Emo mulai populer sebagai genre musik pada awal 2000-an mengikuti kesuksesan Jimmy Eat World dan Dashboard Confessional yang laris rekamannya hingga mendapat piringan platina, dan munculnya subgenre baru dari emo berupa screamo yang lebih agresif. Istilah emo dipakai oleh kritikus musik dan wartawan untuk menyebut musik yang dibawakan berbagai artis, termasuk Fall Out Boy dan My Chemical Romance, serta grup-grup yang unik seperti Coheed and Cambria dan Panic at the Disco.
Selain mengacu kepada musik, emo secara umum sering dipakai untuk menggambarkan hubungan khusus antara penggemar dan artis, dan menjelaskan unsur-unsur yang terkait seperti busana, budaya, dan tingkah laku .

a stash of blue ties...

I just spent half an hour sorting odd socks. Laugh all you want, but I found twenty pairs, so the joke's on you. Or maybe not on you, but on those lousy socks who just don't seem to want to stay together.

I have tomorrow in which to pack. I'm also getting my hair cut and going out in the evening, so the day will be pretty full, and I will be pretty stressed. Of course, I could have done it today but I went to the dentist and I bought a coat and I spent the evening in Stourbridge. With all the faffing that fell in-between, the day pretty much vanished. I did get as far as putting all my clothes haphazardly on my bed, but I couldn't get a case to put them in or anything because I'm always scared that if I go in the attic without somebody holding the ladder, it will slip and I will plunge down thirteen stairs to my death. It also means that my bed is occupied so I have nowhere to sleep. Troubling...

I went to the pub yesterday evening, but after I returned, I decided it would be fun to brush up on the ConDem cabinet (though I resent calling it this. 'Cabinet' implies a spirit of unity.) Aren't they a dismal lot? I pretty much googled each and every one and hated them all apart from William Hague and Vince Cable. Hague may be a big fat Tory, but he's intimidatingly bright, and that has to stand for something. Cable has a funny face, and I saw him at Cheltenham Literature Festival (he smiled at me as he was buying a hemp book bag). I do like him for other reasons besides his face, however. But not really. It's a good face.

George Osborne must be the worst. Just the very sight of him makes my skin crawl. He and Cameron both have this horrible smirk whenever they give an answer/lecture they are pleased with, and whenever they here the affirmative chorus of the back-benchers, most of whom seem to have barely changed since their days at public school. This is just speculation, of course. They might have come a long way since they were forced into that patriarchal, unnatural environment. But I doubt it...

Off to bed now.Where, I'm not quite sure, but I'm too tired to even drink my tea, let alone successfully ridicule our 'Government'. I might blog mid-pack tomorrow. Or would that be verging on sad/a waste of time? Sad/a waste of time could probably describe this whole blog Or life indeed. Wait, is that morbid?

eally eally fustating...

My 'R' key won't go down. I got that one by copying and pasting some female's facebook status. By consequence I have decided not to use it in this blog at all. This means changing each sentence so it isn't what is in my head. This bugs me. I think it's a stone in it. It might be something else. I apologise because a lot of sentences seem odd without the function of this key.

But I always like a challenge...

Helen just made the seat die.

Man, this is difficult.

Songs! I can embed videos and not type a thing. Excellent.

Abysmal. I can only apologise. I will now spend my evening attempting to fix my laptop. Night night!

open wide, here comes original sin.

Hello there. It's Tuesday and I thought I'd write a blog. As yet, I'm not sure what I'm going to talk about, but that doesn't usually stop me.

Right now I'm in the sort of mood where I'd like nothing more than to curl up in a ball and forget about the world, but instead I'm opting for listening to pretty music on headphones so I don't annoy everyone else. I've been working for probably the last time today. It was pleasant but tiring, and I got a really odd night's sleep last night, so I'm a little bit dazed.

At some point this week, I'm going to need to pack; a daunting and unpleasant task which I am not looking forward to in the slightest.

Sometimes I act like a twat. It's usually covering up the fact that I am in fact incredibly shy. Bear with me, I'll try to be a more rounded, nicer person. I mumble too, apparently. Again, it's the shy thing.

These are my favourite songs of all time (right now):

• First Day of My Life - Bright Eyes

• No Children - The Mountain Goats

• Lover, You Should Have Come Over - Jeff Buckley

• Flux - Bloc Party

• Burning Benches - Morning Runner

• If You Can't Sleep - She & Him

• Expectations - Belle and Sebastian

• Eskimo - Damien Rice

• Heartbeats - Jose Gonzalez

• Unfinished Sympathy - Massive Attack

• There is a Light that never goes out - The Smiths

• Boys don't cry - The Cure

• Street Spirit - Radiohead

That will do for now. I will probably delete this post later when I am in a more rational/alive mood.

Just because I think it's beautiful. I think Mr Burton still has my dvd...

Just because I think it's cool.

moving on...

Well it's been a good weekend. My brand new iPod arrived, the Labour Party was saved and I went to Surrey to a silver wedding celebration/renewal of vows/apparent excuse for old people to get drunk. I also discovered that a maroon chunky knit beret is a brilliant way to cover up shit hair. Which I definitely have at the moment...

So we'll start with the lovely Ed, shall we? Finally, a genuine socialist has taken the reigns, and things are going to change. It's not like we can underestimate the impact of such a disappointing election, but the shiny veneer of the coalition is starting to crack, and now we are in opposition, the left is cool again. I really liked David Miliband, but I voted for Ed because his values are the closest to my own. In May, I must have heard the phrase "well they're all the same, aren't they?" about fifteen hundred times, and even though this is really quite untrue, Ed is definitely different. And he's fairly young and punchy, and with Harman beside him, I feel like the party's in good hands.

Today was the twenty-fifth wedding anniversary of my uncle's stepson and his wife (yes that's right). They are only in their early forties, so they must have got married incredibly young, but in fairness, they seem very happy. To celebrate the longevity of their relationship, we got up at five and drove down to Surrey to make it to the church service on time (incidentally, today is 'back to church Sunday'. Fairly fitting as this was the first time I had set foot in a church in months.) The vows were renewed and rings were exchanged (again) during a fairly bog standard service. The vicar did manage, however to centre the entire thing around the importance of commitment and love and not murdering one's spouse. He also mentioned something about Lazarus and a rich guy, but I think this was unrelated. Next, we went to a pub-type place where the champagne flowed (although I drank lime and soda because I had enough trouble staying awake without the interference of alcohol) and there was food. Lots of food. I gritted my teeth while many distant un-relatives grilled me on my lack of a male escort. At least two people asked me whether wedding bells were on the horizon for me. The exasperated response "I'm eighteen!" did not seem sufficient to quell their disapproval. Coupled with the fact that my mum kept telling everyone that I hate men, I'm not sure I gave off a great impression, but I probably shouldn't look into it too much. They probably just thought I was a friendly lesbian.

And the thing is, it's not even true! To say I hate men would be a grossly unfair generalisation. There are several men I like including Stephen Merchant, Conor Oberst and Gordon Brown. See? My mother also fails to bear in mind that far from hating only men, I don't like women all that much either, and as such, I am probably a pretty poor excuse for a feminist. So all in all, it is more of a general dislike of humanity than of males in particular. And I'm sure one day, there will be a man who will sweep me off my feet and with whom I shall fall uncontrollably in love, etc, but until that day, it just doesn't seem worth the bother, and as such, I'll have to deal with the prying questions for a little while longer.

sweet disposition...

It's amazing how from one day to the next, we see the world completely differently. Sometimes (for example when working in a twee little shop/deli/café in a twee little place like Wolverley), this life isn't quite so shite. Polite people come in and make polite conversation while sipping their organic ginger beer and chobbling on home made cake. On these days, music is lovely and friends are gracious, technology works in our favour and we are glad when we get home. Other days (when really nothing has changed), it hails and the fridge smells funny and we take criticism to heart and there is no cake. On these days, we hear news of the sorry state of our planet; of wars and drought and Justin Bieber. On these days, we cannot be helped, and even a glimpse of the ones we love or the ones who give us butterflies won't make us feel better. I think my mood is predetermined the moment I wake up. I wake up a miserable cow and that is how I will be all day. Terrible isn't it?

Of course, I'm sure there are some people with naturally sunny dispositions who never have the aforementioned days and are never miserable cows. Perhaps if I try, I can become like these people, the ones with nice hair and rosy cheeks who look good in floral aprons and make good pastry, or even entire pies with apples and blackberries. Wait, I think this could be classed as a tangent...

So yes, I wonder whether you can alter your mindset, or whether I will be stuck like this forever. I'm sure university will bring changes, but whether good or bad, it's impossible to know.

These pictures are incredible, but if you are Jess Carvlin, please don't click on the link.