Ain't nobody got time for that!

Here we go. I'm once again moaning about how I can never find time to do this but here we are.
I had a rubbish day at work today. In fact, it wasn't rubbish, it just proved to be one of those days that highlights my inadequacies. It's happened a few times in the new job and well when you swap out the environment and the people this stuff becomes apparent.

The big inadequacy is I'm not very good at talking to people.

That may seem a shock if you are one of the "elite" I guess that know me quite well, and find me to be a but of a loudmouth goofball.
I think the thing that I find the most annoying is that if you were to make the binary decision then you would label me introvert and that means that you are happy enough to just be quiet in the corner. It almost certainly is not the same for introverts but I like the social interaction - I believe we are hardwired to crave social contact. Perhaps habit can suppress this and to some extent it has in me - I find it very awkward sharing close quarters with other people like in the kitchen when making tea. I have lived on my own for so long now that while the idea of living with someone else (a lodger in the new place perhaps) sounds cool but I fear or rather expect that I would get annoyed at sharing the space with them.
I do want to be involved in the conversation, believe me. I've said this on the last two work outings, Christmas last year and Neil and Jim's leaving do, I feel the layout of the office and where I am in relation to others mean it's easy for me to remain quiet but please listen to my quips!
On the work outings, Lesley has said both times that she loves when "I come out of my shell" but that person that they see after a couple of brews is much closer to what I feel is the real me. Lesley's comments, bless her are probably said during her famed "blackouts", make me feel good. I, for the most part, quite like myself but it's an area of my life which I would love to improve.
I did a little digging round the Internet and there is a Shropshire Speakers event that happens once a month for those that want to improve public speaking. I'm not sure if it's what we're after or if it would be any help but might be worth a look?

I've also been toying with the idea of doing video diary things in lieu of the blog. I figure it may improve my speaking and who doesn't like a good monologue?

I was thinking of wearing a hat for the lolz...

Read full post >>

Fine + 2 pints

A song by the pretty awesome Minus the Bear, and right now, after having a few beers (umbrella term for any kind of alcohol) it seems fitting for the post.
It's weird but I get some small enjoyment from drinking alone, getting merry, watching some shows and laughing in my own company.
I find it strange that I feel more like myself, even in my own company, after a couple of beers, hence the post title, but I feel it's true.
I've always held the opinion that drink doesn't truly change you as a person, your inhibitions will drop, your reactions will slow but you're still essentially the same person that you were at the start of the night, with all the same wants, needs and drives.
I will admit that I've driven home with probably too much alcohol in my system - an illegal amount, but guess what, I never crashed and I never got close to crashing because I am a careful driver, I don't tailgate and I like to think that my anticipation is very good, I'm always scanning the road ahead, slowing in time and like my driving instructor said to me, making the task of driving as easy as possible.

Read full post >>

Bottom Drinking Game

With the holiday festivities came the idea of playing drinking games to our favourite TV shows. First up was Red Dwarf and a debrief of all the clauses, requirements and a hastily drawn "H" on the forehead and we were having fun.

Next show up was Bottom and a quick search on the phone resulted in no matches - it seems no-one has thought to knock together some rules for the game. We took 5 minutes out of the evening to come up with some rules and I am penning them here in a hope that someone in the future will not be out of luck like we were...

Read full post >>

Where would you sit?...

I went to a house party that was being hosted by an old friend, Marsh, or as I had to teach myself to say Chris as noone in Worcester (where he's currently studying) know him by the old name we used back in school. Anyways, the house party was a lot of fun, although too much drinking led me to forget exactly how it all ended but good none the less. It had all the makings of a good party; drinking, drugs and a large number of strangers to meet.

One rather cool thing that happened which I felt needed to be blogged about was a little conversation I had with this guy Kwan (don't know how it's spelt sorry) about some behavioural psychology which I do find very interesting. Anyways, not sure how we got talking about it but I posed a scenario to him, which I will repeat here:

You get on a bus and there's an attractive girl (or guy, whatever works for you) sitting in one seat. Knowing this, where would you sit?

I posed this to Kwan and I made a decision myself. Make yours and hit "read more" to see if there's some mutual thinking going on. I'd be curious to know what people chose.

It is was rather spooky, Kwan gave his answer: opposite and one row back. It was a proper woah moment, as I thought the exact same thing. I thought that was awesome and we tried to reason why - you wouldn't sit in front of the girl as you wouldn't be able to see her without obviously turning round. But why not directly behind her, or even opposite but on the same row?
It's no secret that I'm a big podcast nut and I would love to find a podcast that discusses this kind of stuff - unfortunately the couple I've tried haven't been that great.

That being said I did ask Chris later that evening, and he replied again opposite, but two rows back. The bubble had been burst but still he half agreed, so I'm clinging on to the victory.

Read full post >>

You're so pretty and I'm so stupid...

This was Reuben's lyric that was playing to me on the bus in to work on Monday morning, this first sober morning which could be spent reflecting on the drunken adventures into Liquid - premier nightclub in Shrewsbury. Described by this guy Simon it's "...a bit like a prison". In despite of that, I was fortunate enough to meet two attractive girls on Saturday eve and Reuben were giving possibly the most concise summation of all (and I mean all) my crushes to date.

The plan of the evening was to go out for drinks in celebration of my mate Fletch's recent birthday. Off into Shrewsbury we went and bumping into Simon and Mark who I met the last time I was back in Shropshire on a fun camping adventure. They mentioned that they were heading to Liquid and whilst we make a quick detour where I once again got my glasses knocked off my face (man, the argument for contacts has never looked stronger), we headed over to Liquid to join the masses.

A digital camera is either a dangerous thing or a source of cliched snaps, and there was probably a healthy amount of both. There are many pictures of the evening now circling facebook - all I know is that I must have been pretty wasted as a. I can't remember the majority of these pics or time spent in liquid and b. I was pretty much giving the same, muppet-nobend-"I want to demonstrate how much of a good time I'm having" poses i.e. either sticking my tongue out, giving the horns, or both.

Moving on to the meat of this post and back to the two crushes I gained that night - my only wish is that I remembered more of the time in Liquid, for the majority of it, all I have to go on are these pics on facebook. One in particular involves Kym, the first of the crushes I would like to discuss, pretty much exposing her breasts with me giving the tongue and horns to the camera (again). Now I wish I could remember if there was anything I did to motivate this pic or whether it was just, hey it's a camera, let's do something kerazee. There are many comments saying that she exposed a nipple and the evidence I would argue is pretty conclusive, bless them the people that commented saying "I think we can see your boob Kym" - what they actually meant to say was nipple plus the fact is you could see the majority of them for the whole evening, which is probably the main (possible read: only) reason I was crushing on her; that and maybe the fact she had red hair, I blame Diggnation for the potential brainwashing, it seems all red haired laydees are now v attractive. That, or as I'm going to attempt to rationally argue that having very brightly coloured hair is very eye-catching, much like if a girl is wearing bright colours in the gym, they more often than not catch my eye. (I may have got away with it...)

Some of the few memories I had did involve telling Kelly that she looked really cute in a photo I took - she dismissed it of course, which is also a shame. As I've already discussed with my good friend Wilson, I put all my eggs in what turned out to be the wrong basket, and concentrated on Kym. At one point I remember asking her if she was single, to which she made the inductive step and replied that she's not interested. Well, it stunned me a little (surprisingly) to which led to a swappage of messages entered into our phones - the terrible thing is I cannot remember her response, although it was cool that she felt the need to explain herself more. It was probably along the lines of you're not my type, you're a nice guy an' all, the same old BS. Basically the only thing we had to go on was the physical attraction, impossible to hold a proper conversation in Liquid. It was a simple conflict of interests - I was very much interested in her, but she did not reciprocate, it's a common situation, and strangely enough I was cool with it.

And as I said, I can't remember a lot else at Liquid, except visiting the bar several times with Fletch to consume more shots with him, only for it to backfire and cause me to not be able to remember anything, really regretting that. That being said, it can't have been *too* bad, a lot of people I met there have since befriended me on facebook, so that's all cool. Actually, Kelly friended me and not the other way round. After being a little nosy checking out her profile, turns out that all the music she has listed I also like, so I actually have more in common with her, plus she's facially more attractive than Kym, and that's probably the largest check box of mine (to be rational and slightly cold for a moment).

Anyways, I need to message up Kelly if I can just put aside five minutes where I'm not getting completely distracted with something else. To bring it full circle, Reuben chanting away "You're so pretty and I'm so stupid", just reminded me like a sobering slap across the face, I've never (and I mean, never) have been properly intimate with a crush of mine, and that sucks, I mean, that really sucks.
I ask myself, perhaps these girls are only crushes as I determine them to be out of my league, and/or I get a serious case of bad nerves/hesitation (speaking of which, how is everyone enjoying the podcast? Oh no wait, I still haven't started recording any eps arg!)

I could go on, but it's late and I don't quite feel up to unravelling my inadequacies here. I'm sure there will be another time, but until then I'll be occasionally visiting places like Liquid doing my mock-dancing thang where noone understands it's done to be ironic, waiting for you to give me a smile.

Read full post >>

I'm a drug user f*ck the police!

The above is of course a quote from the simply awesome Peep Show, the episode where Mark smokes Pot in the toilets at the bowling alley. For those not familiar with the show, OMG! Where have you been all this time?! It's simply a great show, Mitchell and Webb, both the stars and creative geniuses (should that be geniui?) behind the show are finally getting the recognition they deserve. Anyways, we're getting off topic so to bring us back I will start with a simple statement - I have smoked weed. Now, that shouldn't be that big a statement in itself, and it's probably not, but the perception is that I should now be cooler than I was, or at least that's what the World tells me.
I think it all starts with smoking in School, it's seen as a very rebellious act and we all know that rebels are cool, right? Possibly I'm given the impression that people that smoke weed are cooler is that I've known many people that have and it is regarded as something truly special and there's almost an elitism to it. Take University and there were some people on my corridor who would often go "on walks" as they put it, and I was grudgingly never asked to go. There's some thought process on their part going on - I was never deemed "worthy" to join them. Let's actually return to my experience, and heading back home for Easter to see the family as well as some friends. I've texted my good buddy Carl about possibly meeting up for a pint, nothing OTT, just something low-key where we could catch up and have a laugh, the usual. Anyways, thanks to some rail scheduling I happened to get the train back with him and he mentioned a gathering that I should come to. Now I'm usually wary of going to parties/gatherings with all strangers, I wouldn't call myself a people person, and could easily see myself wishing I was somewhere else, knowing I'd be having a better time. Recently I've been taken the more laid-back approach with social gatherings and going-with-the-flow, not getting stressed about meeting up times and just doing whatever, so I said sure "why not, could be fun". 

On to the gathering itself and me and Carl stocked up on the beer before heading over to Kevin's (the host of the party). We boozed up, got chatting and generally having a laugh - having a few beers with friends with nothing on the agenda is a relaxing venture, and something I don't do enough anymore. At one point we got a little heated debate on Macs and how they are in fact now marketing towards the dumb customer, that just wants a stylish bit of kit but no actual substance - that got me worried as I am more and more interested in Mac products - I always thought it was more an elitist thing - you've tried the Every Joe desktop, now you want to try something a little better, a little different. It was later revealed that they were having a delivery, and planning to smoke the rest of the night away. I was asked if I had ever smoked weed before, to which I replied I've never smoked anything before except the odd attempt at a cigar. I must make something very clear, I did not feel pressured into trying weed at any point. Like spending a night camping with a bottle of vodka, it's a very social thing - you take your few sips and then pass it on, knowing that you'll see it again soon enough, and the same applies here. I was offered a couple of times, the first few I passed, but ceasing my chance to become "one of the cool" - one of those people who I couldn't stand for looking down on me but yet yearned to be one of their circle so badly, I accepted the joint. A quick crash-course of smoking later and I was initiated. I was asked a few times if I could feel it's effects but to be honest I was pretty merry from the beer at the time so it was difficult to say if it was the beer, the weed or the fact that I was in a relaxed environment as well that was crucial to the relaxing times.

Yep, so we spent the evening with some beer, some weed, having some chats and generally chilling to music. I can't say if the weed was the ultimate factor on what I would label a good night looking back, or merely a combination of all these things. The one thing I know that it was a good evening and positive reinforcement will tell me an equally good evening can be achieved with those things again. It reminds me of part of one of Bill Hick's routines and how he wished they would report on someone having a good experience on drugs. I will admit here that I had a positive experience on drugs and would be quite pumped to go it again.

Other highlights of my Easter break include almost getting run over by a pony, thanks to Eric and Karlie for letting me crash one night, and of course stuffing my face full of chocolate whilst I watched the F1 at my Nan's. Overall a very good weekend - they always are if they are filled with varied activities - it's so easy I find to simply do nothing after a busy week at work.

Read full post >>

Week 1 (actually it's week 3 now :S)

Very overdue but it seems any free time I've got so far has spent in front of the TV like a zombie, or down the pub with a pint, err... like a zombie.

I did try and write this at the end of week 1, and then again at the end of week 2, and now I'm here on the Monday of week 3 and still nothing, oh dear. I think it's now best to make a number of small(er) entries rather than try and do a catchup of everything that's happened so far.

So, here we are, might as well make this a kind of overviewy exercise. I've started on a course which should train me up with the powers of performing desktop and/or network support in a professional capacity. Along with the lecture and the study towards certification, there's also the help with making my CV better and making a better interviewee of myself as well. That's been one of my probs, so along with the skills, we should hopefully get there.

Along with the course, they've given me a place to live for the couple of weeks. I am currently living in Earlsdon Ave South, quite literally a stone's throw away from where the Red Faction house was when I was back at Uni. Living with 5 others, and they're a pretty good bunch and surprisingly of all different ages.

There's this guy called Dave from South Wales. His surname is actually Hughes which is again a surprise, but then again it's a pretty common name in the land of Wales, so it's time to get over that. He is 32 and has recently graduated from a Music Technology degree and is a bit of a classic rock/metal fan - in particular Guns 'N' Roses. Then there's Aman, a recent graduate of a Computer Science degree and is 24. His twin brother has luckily got himself a job quite recently so Aman's hoping to sort something out pretty sharpish. There's Julian, 29, who currently works at Amazon in Milton Keynes as a problem solver. He's originally from South Africa but is very cool, if a little hard to understand at times (I'm sorry). We then Peter, although that's not the correct spelling - he is fact a Pole national and it's spelt (and pronounced) a little differently, but that's the English equivalent. And finally there's Dal (full name Dalber - remember Dal and "beer" - easy!) who as Julian described him perfectly and concisely as a "party animal" - he is 25, also a computer science graduate, and is often out all night, or gaining points on his licence, usually not at the same time.

So that's the guys, and it's not that surprising that there are no girls living in the house, although there is a single girl in her course - Aeyeisha (sp) who seems nice enough, not really spoken to her much, and unsurprisingly, Dal has made it a bit of a mission to lay her - to his credit he did invite her back to the house late one night, not sure what came of that, she wasn't in our house in the morning, and now Dal has moved out because of Asthma problems into her house, she better watch out lol.

It's probs best to save anything else for another post, but it's worth adding that some of the material in the course has been covered in my previous academic pursuits of computing, whether that be at A-level level (err..) or at degree level, so that's a bonus, although I think the most useful stuff will be the practical stuff plus proprietary hardware/software like Cisco and Windows Server 2003 etc. Also it's worth noting that a couple of the lecturers (Andy and Alex) are also party animals, pissheads at the least, and they are often out on the lash. I actually managed to make it out once so far with them, but that's another post right there.

I will finish up by saying that I've signed up for random free photo hosting accounts (photobucket and flickr actually) and mean to get snapping with my mobile phone with pictures of the room, this Strongbow glass I managed to swipe (another post), random shots of Cov and if you're lucky, me in my formal robes (read: shirt and tie).

Here's spending another night decomposing in front of the TV.

Read full post >>

Rhythms of the World, come forth! (backdated 23/07/07)

Hey, overdue post here, last weekend I was invited by my good friend Will to the Rhythms of the World festival in his own backyard, Hitchin.  Now due to the way the trains work, if I was to solo the trip, it would mean travelling into the centre of London, going via the Underground to another hub in London, and then back out and northwards to Hitchin.  Will offered to pick me up (and drop me off) at Milton Keynes Central, one of the main stops towards London.  This was very advantageous as it cut the journey effectively in half so I was all in favour.  The festival fell on the weekend of the 14th July, so the (revised) plan was to head down on Saturday morn and return back on the Monday, just before Will went off to work.

Trains were fine, and after a bit of traffic getting out of Milton Keynes, Will getting slightly annoyed at the sheer volume of the number of roundabouts, we were on our way to the festival and the alcoholic oblivion beyond :D.  Will stressed getting the earlier train to allow for more drinking, and well we arrived in Hitchin with about half an hour before the festival officially started LOL.  We went via his sister's flat, currently unoccupied, to fill up cooler bags with beverages and then we were on our way.

First stop was off to see a band on one of the main stages that was promised to be in the same mould as Enter Shakiri.  Unfortunately that was not so, the band that actually turned up produced nothing greater than watered-down 3 minute emo songs.  A promised highlight (thanks Will) was their completely unexperimental cover of the dance hit "Castles in the Sky", which when the rest of the band kicked in created nothing more than shapeless noise - nice one guys, you were so good, I can't even remember the name of your band.

Next stop was the other main stage for the Chris Phillips Band which many held in high regard, the band forming after the split of former local band Ardent Kicks, and Tom, one of Will's mates, was brother to the Chris from which the band drew their name.  By this time a bit of a crowd was forming, and front man Chris milked it for all it was worth, and the set was genuinely enjoyable - their stuff being quite folksy thanks to Chris' acoustic, but also some electronic and synth elements included to deepen the sound.  One for the future here hopes, the guys were extremely good, very tight - Dan the drummer is held in exceptionally high regard for his skills although the set didn't allow the freedom for him to show off, plus speaking with Chris later that night was pretty cool, a stand up guy - I wish you guys the best.  As I mentioned to Chris in the little chat I had with him, the band coped very well the technical difficulties that struck Dan's kit a couple of times throughout the set.  Rather than feigning excuses and mass shrugging, it was inspiring to see Chris take the initiative, and get the crowd involved.  That involved the classic sing-along and clapping with the instruments dropped out.  Another bit of fun was the Mexican wave that was sent back through the crowd which actually made it back to the front a couple of times, which was quite smart.

With the early highlight of the day already over, it seemed appropriate to take a breath (and get more beer) so we headed over to the acoustic stage to chill out (if memory serves me correctly, it gets a bit hazy from here on in, thanks to the copious amounts of alcohol that we were drinking).  The absolute name escapes me but next highlight was an Orchestra that did classical covers of modern songs - it couldn't fail to be entertaining so we all set about being there.  Some food later and we headed back to the first main stage in what was already an impressive crowd but the sound seemed screwed up.  There didn't seem to be any amplification going on, so it was very hard to hear them over the general hubbub of the crowd.  It was a shame as they promised to be very good, so we took our leave -  I can't remember if we went back to the acoustic stage or perhaps even the George for the first time.

Next performance we couldn't miss was the Easy Star All Stars (I think that's what they were called, where is my programme?..), and we didn't miss them.  This goup were responsible for remixing popular albums like Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon and Radiohead's OK Computer in a reggae inspired fashion.  Properly liquored up the crowd were really starting to enjoy it, lots of people dancing, our substantial group as well and even I showed off some of my moves towards the end.

It was after those guys that I met one of the Irish girls (I want to say her name was Fiona oh dear :s), and in my merriness I got her to say lots of things, practically anything that came into my head, starting with all the cliches like "Top of the morning to ya laddie!"  I'm afraid I got quite smitten pretty quickly, and that is quite worrying that I can get like that after such a short space of time. It actually got me thinking about certain voices, or perhaps accents can, just on their own, be very hot.  I actually thought of Koel, particularly one of the times when I went up to Cov to see everyone and she left this incredibly long answer phone message, but it was cool to listen to her voice a couple of times hehe.  Anyways, back to the festival...

Later on in the day, we were back in the George (I'm pretty sure) for the performance of another person that Tom plus others knew (it seemed Tom knew the majority of Hitchin) and his band at the back of the beer garden.  They were fine without being particularly exciting but it was at this point that I discovered that, upon reflection, quite naturally, that they had a Ceilidh (look up spelling) on in the town hall.  I tried to persuade at least one person including this girl I've never met, who it turned out to be the girlfriend of the guy whose band we were watching LOL.  A little disappointed that noone would join me for a ceilidh, I decided to go check it out on my own, and hoped that I would find another odd person over who would be my partner (for those not in the know, Ceilidh's are dances that generally operate in groups of 2 or 4).  Hanging about on the fringes didn't seem to help much, and I didn't feel bold enough to ask a stranger to dance, so after what was a probably short time, I headed back dejected that it didn't work out *mimes sad expression with fingers on face*.

 

The final act we had to see on day 1 was this very large, latin-inspired percussive act which amongst its lineup had one of Will's friends, Dave's dad.  They were also a lot of fun and with that sealing the end of the day, we promptly headed over to the George and the other pubs closeby.  Some more drinks later, and a trip to the loo and I lost people, which was very scary, I was thinking oh crap oh crap oh crap, I actually left this one pub and then joined the queue to get back in just in case I missed some ppl despite me having a big look. Fortunately, Will randomly turned up so it was all good. We went inside the pub and played some fuseball which I lost after taking a promising early lead - shame.

 

We returned back to Will's pretty knackered and pretty much went straight to bed.  The next day was going to be more of the same, but we chilled for a lot of the waking day playing Call of duty 2 and Forza 2 on Will's 360.  We went down at about 8 to have the rest of the group attack us for not being more prompt and not getting into town at 12 like they all did.  The pub had a hardcore chiller set up outside cooling some beer cans which could be ours for just a £1 each -bonus! We got some of those and then got into the live drum 'n' bass that was on at the end of the beer garden.  Enjoying that as much as it's physically possible we thought it was best to leave and headed over to Club 85, the "indie stage" but in fact a club - the clue's in the title.  We were off to the see the last act of the festival, the Eagles I believe was what they were called.  Yeah, they were pretty cool, had essentially a young lineup, with this older guy doing a lot of spoken word which was pretty cool.  They also had a fair few guests come up on stage including a 2nd drummer which Will met at the bar just before, and a woman singer to do a song.  We then met back up with the group to finish off the beer supplies which were a little low on the ground.

 

The next day I only just made the train, the timing being very tight.  It is very strange that I am always tired and/or hungover when making these commutes back to Wem, why is that?  Overall a pretty good weekend, spent a lot of money, and got a bit sunburnt on my neck, but it was a lot of fun.

Here's pencilling in the weekend for next year.

Read full post >>

From Brum to fatherhood (...is my ticket still valid?)

Hey all, got some more scary news to share with the intermaweb.  A week last Sunday (my how time flies :S) I met up with Wilson in Brum for some catching-upness and general merriment.  After going to a few of the regular haunts like the nicer of the two Spoons and getting some grub, possibly fueled by the harder drink, we thought it would be cool to try out a few new and random watering holes.

Well we didn't get that far in all fairness.  We went to O'Neill's which I believe is a part of a chain of bars, a franchise if you will, but it wasn't too bad.  Following that we went down the road about 50 metres to find a new bar called "Walkabout".  Encouraged by the promise of a cider festival which as it happened started that very same day, we popped in to check it out.  Confronted with two Australians behind the bar it prompted the question, "Do you have to be an Australian to work here?" to which the reply was, "No, but it helps...".  One random fruit of the forests cider and some Australian rugby later, it was time to move on again.  It was at this point, that the evening was starting to draw to a close, and I thought best to be off, it was a Sunday, and the trains get really bad late on in the evening. 

We checked in at New Street, realising we had some time to grab another, although good ol' Wilson reckoned we have time for two rounds, mmmm.  Anyways, as it turned out we went to the other Spoons, although it was for a pint of Old Rosie, which is slowly building up the rep it held when I was back at Uni - which is pretty awesome.

That single pint of Old Rosie was proving tougher than originally planned, so had to develop some speed drinking, and bless, I had to help Wilson finish his.  Realising that we had to really go, as in leave about 3 or 4 mins ago, we left at a brisk pace back towards New Street.  I got to my platform and did a little jogging to my train, which was not needed as the train sat there for about another 10mins, grrr, it's so undignified to run for public transport, but I thought I had no choice, alas.

 

So there I sat on the train on my way back home, beer slowly digesting, and feeling pretty good about the brief hours spent in Brum, when uh oh! thanks to breaking the seal in one of the earlier bars, I had to go on the train itself.  Now that is a challenge all on it's own, especially on the older carriages, where it is incredibly bumpy and rickety - would people understand if I had made a mess of myself?  Anyways, on the way down to the train loo, I spotted an old friend John Jones from school.  Once I got back I grabbed my bag and sat with him to catch up on what was happening at his end, which I have not done at all properly - I've seen John getting off the train I get on to get home from work, but that's about it.

 

Anyways, so I got chatting with John, and the reason why he's on the train comes up.  As he tells me, he's on his way back from Kent, which as he stresses is an 8 hour trip and not an enjoyable one.  He continues, and as it turns out, he met a girl when absolutely wasted down in London some time ago, and all he remembers is waking up in this girl's house in Kent.  But the first bombshell is that he has only gone and got this girl pregnant, so she is now with child. I'm not actually sure of the timings and John wasn't completely specific but it seems that the wasted adventure John had in London could well have led to the conception of this child.

I actually asked John, "so do you love this girl?" to which he was especially non-committing and kinda shrugged it off, "Yeah, I gotta" or words to that effect, it was late, and I was liquored up remember.

Scary stuff, so another old friend has joined the list of people who have, or about to start a family.  I was probably in shock for a lot of the rest of the journey.  I often get worried that I'm not growing up like I should, and hearing of people having children does nothing to dissuade that view on my life.  I'm 22 now and although I do believe I have changed considerably in the last year, I still do not feel anywhere near mature enough to raise a child - the question to throw out there is, will I ever feel mature enough?  That's probably how it would all end up, me winging it and potentially screwing up the child's life.  Ah well, it won't be the only one hey? :D  Adding to that, I don't feel the want or need for raising a child right now, so even if I did achieve the maturity, there's no way I'd be up for a child, the whole thing scares me :S

 

Here's waiting for them to invent maturity pills...

Read full post >>