I fell so hard, and broke my wings, and I cant remember how to fly

[scouseneon]

So as I promised in the last entry, here's a longer update complete with pictures and stuffs. Been pretty damned busy recently what with work etc. recently, to go for manager training at Hamburger University (Oh how i wish i was joking about that name). Travelled down to London Euston on the Sunday, and it was pretty uneventful for a change, except I was surrounded on all sides by 10 Cockney hair dressing students that appeared to be denser than depleted U238. I don't really like the really exaggerated cockney accent at the best of times, after 4 hours sleep and sitting on a cramped Virgin trains across half the country... oh my. Anyways it was fine getting down there, no bloodshed, no delays or anything. Oh my karma sense is tingling.

Got to the hotel and booked into my room, met my roommate who appeared to be Ronald McDonald's illegitimate love-child, as he seemed to take the whole McSperience far too seriously, grabbed some grub and headed to bed. Why is all hotel beds suffer this kind of inverse comfyness problem? Lie down on top of it during the day, its like sleeping on air, so incredibly comfy and even if your not tired you'll nod off within a few minutes. But if you wanna get into bed at night-time, then *poof* like Cinderellas carriage your bed turns into a lumpy pumpkin and there's no hope in hell of a decent nights sleep. And then your room-mate decides to get up an HOUR before you need to, just so he can have a shower and do last minute revision for an exam that people who had English as their 3rd or 4th language and who did no revision for passed with no problems. Argh.

The course itself wasn't as bad as I feared, too many crappy 'team building' exercises for my liking, but least there were some decent people on the course, though its a real shame Dickie wasn't sent with me, after the memorable events of Manchester im sure this trip to the capital would of been a million times more interesting with his company. This trip was far far FAR less surreal, no pygmies, pink bins or Elvis in his Cadillac. On the Tuesday night I went down to Wimbledon and met up with MadDave and Irish and we went for a drink, food and a chat. Irish is still his normal, perfectly sane, usual self. Unfortunately due to Dave being shit Irish couldn't stay for long as he hadn't been told I was coming down and the Welsh tarts had already gone home. Had a nice night though, and discovered the who it was I lent my copy of The Art Of War too, that thieving Irish bastard! (You know I love you man) I made an unscheduled stop over on the Thursday night back in Wimbledon whilst on the way to Guildford to collect the book, and had a brief natter with Dave and Irish, and Danny came out representing for one half of the Welsh Massive, as Gareth was busy with work. Seems that Danny has been going the gym to bulk up, whilst flirting with random Internet floozies and meeting up with them for casual sex and recording it on his phone, while Gareth has been learning to bake bread. -_-

After that jumped the train down the oh-so-familiar train route back to the Big G, which provided some interesting brain experiences, as on the way I realised that I had been feeling homesick all the time I was in London, yet it was going back to Guildford that felt more like going home than going home did, and I hadn't realised how much id missed it. Was pretty hectic, got ambushed at the station by Alex and taken to Quarks, where we played games for a few hours, oh-what-a-shame-well-if-you-insist, before taking on Alex's flat mate Adam and Angela who works there in a 2 on 2 for CS: Source that the Swedish computer virus turned up for to join in towards the end. Surprisingly enough as me and Alex don't really like or even play it, and both Adam and Angela do play it regular, me and Alex cleaned up, winning all but 1 map, so we were pretty pleased with that, and there may have been some happy dancing at some point, but I cannot confirm nor deny. Got home late and crashed out on the couch, but then ended up sitting up talking to another of Alex's flatmates till some stupid o'clock in the morning discussing the current state of game design, the consoles coming out soon etc. and stuff like that.

Was up fairly early the next day, to head into town to meet McDougall and Boris for lunch, and then pub food. Was really good to see Boris again, she seems to be doing well so that's good. Had a nice long catch up in the pub, heard two new penis stories (0_o) before Alex arrived and me and him met up with Adam and the 3 of us went round to Angela's for a Chinese meal that Angela was prepared, and it roxored my box0rs and possibly even roffled my woffles while it was at it. From there we ventured forth into the night, and ended up in Rileys Pool Hall, where I played possibly the single greatest game of pool of my life, totally destroying Adam, who only got 4 shots bless him. I was potting 2 or 3 balls per turn, every turn, and every shot I made sent a ball down perfectly, its just a shame it wasn't generally the hole I was actually aiming for. Ah well. A fair bit of vodka had been drunk by the time we got to Rileys, but luckily it didn't seem to be affecting Alex at all. Danny arrived later on in the evening again after work, and received a very warm welcome. Poor guy. As the evening wore on the alcohol seemed to take effect slowing each game down, and alas Alex played Angela and made a foolish mistake and got crushed into 2 noobie cubes as he managed to pot the black on a game he was comfortably winning. As well as affecting the level of Pool play, as time and alcohol went on several worrying questions about Adam began to emerge. And they're probably best left unanswered. From there we went to a 70's disco club called Flares which was.... interesting, though the image of Adam poll dancing to I Need A Hero will haunt me for longer than I care to imagine. Then home and up early for long trek back to Liverpool, where I had planned to go out in the evening to the Krazyhouse, but I was too tired by the time I got home so I just went home to bed instead.

Was straight back in work the next night running shifts from the off, so its been pretty hectic now this last week, with only a break long enough to go see Trivium and Iron Maiden in Manchester on the 14th. Was a good gig, Trivium were good, and Maiden were there normal selves, alas they've decided to play their new album start to finish on this tour before doing any of their classic stuff, and as I thought the new album was pants it did kind of drag a little towards the end. Though they did bring out Eddy in a tank which was cool, before he came out and fought with the guitarists. Then they did a few classic songs before they were off. Shame about them needing to play the entire new album through, but im sure that to those that loved it it was an amazing set.

Oh and to Irish, Mike and whoever, did you get chance to see Hogfather? I enjoyed it, thought it was pretty good, though I don't think it got across the Pratchettness of his work, it was mostly funny one liners, but I couldn't think of a way you could accurately portray anything he's written on screen, so I was pretty impressed with what they got right. I liked the way they did Death, but im still very confused as to what actually happened to the Hogfather. It seems that Teatime breaks into the Tooth Fairy's castle to perform the ritual, and the Hogfather vanishes before they do anything, and Death is already working as the Hogfathers replacement before Teatime and Co actually get anywhere, so I was kinda lost, and its been aaaaages since I read the book so I cant remember if its the same. But overall it was enjoyable, I thought Death, Teatime, Susan and Albert were all really well done. At the other end, the voices for the Auditors were horrible, they scare me in the books, they were laughable in this, and I didn't like Nobby Nobbs too much either, he was far to clean, talked politely, and just generally didn't look like someone who needed a doctors certificate to prove he's a member of the human race.

"All right," said Susan, "I'm not stupid. You're saying humans need ... fantasies to make life bearable."
NO. HUMANS NEED FANTASY TO BE HUMAN. TO BE THE PLACE WHERE THE FALLING ANGEL MEETS THE RISING APE.
"Tooth fairies? Hogfathers?"
YES. AS PRACTICE. YOU HAVE TO START OUT LEARNING TO BELIEVE THE LITTLE LIES.
"So we can believe the big ones?"
YES. JUSTICE. MERCY. DUTY. THAT SORT OF THING.
"They're not the same at all!"
TAKE THE UNIVERSE AND GRIND IT DOWN TO THE FINEST POWDER AND SIEVE IT THROUGH WITH THE FINEST SIEVE AND THEN SHOW ME ONE ATOM OF JUSTICE, ONE MOLECULE OF MERCY. AND YET YOU ACT AS IF THERE WERE SOME SORT OF RIGHTNESS IN THE UNIVERSE BY WHICH IS MAY BE JUDGED.
"Yes. But people have got to believe that or what's the point-"
MY POINT EXACTLY.

Well this is a pretty damned big update so far, most of it waffle. Other than this ive mostly just been trying to sort my head out. Don't want to be here anymore, im just tired of the whole place. Really miss living back down in Guildford, but don't think I could ever go back there for far too many reasons, money not being the least. Been using work and tidying the house to distract my brain to see me through to the new year, hoping all this 'New start' bollocks people are going on about is true this time.

For the first time ever I think life is winning.

"I cannot leave here, I cannot stay,
Forever haunted, more than afraid,
Asphyxiate on words I would say,
I'm drawn to a blackened sky as I turn blue,

There are no flowers, no not this time,
There'll be no angels gracing the lines,
Just these stark words, I find,
I'd show a smile, but I'm too weak,
I'd share with you could I only speak,
Just how much this, hurts me,

I cannot stay here, I cannot leave,
Just like all I loved, I'm make-believe,
Imagined heart, I disappear,
Seems...no one will appear here and make me real,

There are no flowers, no, not this time,
There will be no angels gracing the lines,
Just these stark words I find,
I'd show a smile, but I'm too weak,
I'd share with you could I only speak,
Just how much this hurts me."