Okay if you read the last entry, you'll know what a FONMP section is. This entire post is a Fuck off non-magic player bit. There is very little interest in this entry to anyone outside of the gaming hobby unless you like reading my reading that is.

M11 Pre-release weekend review

I love pre-release weekends. Without a doubt they are the most fun you can have in a sanctioned event. There's a lot of reasons why. Firstly you get to crack open fresh packs that haven't even been released in the shops. You get to see the artwork of cards up close rather than just on website previews. Then of course, loads of characters pop out of the woodwork to see some new cards and sling some spells. There are some people that only ever play at pre-releases because they know how fun they can be. It's always good to know how people are doing and know that they're still up for a bit of the game of kings err.. planeswalkers.

Booster draft Friday

Usually the store in Belfast (Serenity) has midnight drafts on the Friday night. These function as a lock in the same fashion that a pub would whenever its open only to its staff or its regulars. Although anyone is allowed the door is locked so as ne'erdowells don't wander in on the way home from a night out and asking stupid drunken questions such as "whats that do? whats this?". Although we do let Gary play in the shop despite these issues.

On that Friday night I ended up turning up to said booster draft. Although this was after having a few pints with an Australian girl on a failed date, a session of muay thai and a few more drinks. Magic, beer and talking shite - the cornerstone of a Northern player. Anyway in that draft I ended up drafting a bit of a mess of a deck. Having opened nantuko shade and being passed Captivating Vampire I did my best to draft a mostly black deck with a splash of red for Act of Treasons, goblin tunneler and a few red cards with Chandra's something in their title - a slightly more costly searing blaze and a 1/3 flyer for 3 with a kiln fiend style ability. Now apart from the fact I could make the shade unblockable or attack with the opponents creature only to fling them or sacrifice them to bloodthrone vampire, the deck wasn't particularly good. I got beat by Dave Robinson, currently number two in Northern Ireland for beating kids in FNM every week for the last five years (or so the rumours go). Dave beat me soundly for the two games of the match though in the games that we played after my deck seemed to largely outperform his. That could be largely down to the fact he had little or no answer to the powerhouse that is nantuko shade but it didn't worry me too much. Third place in the pod still hit prizes, everything was to play for and if I won out I got a couple of packs.

Match 2 I come up against Conor McVarnock packing some kind of G/W stompy build. His deck ramps up impressively first game landing two aciding slimes off the back of a bird of paradise. He sets me back a land with each of the slimes, wrecking my tempo and forcing me to trade unfavourably to avoid taking four points of damage a turn. His deck also seemed to have a number of pacifisms and other gems. Second game becomes much more of a battle and here I got a glimpse of what a core set draft is like: typically back and forth removal spells, often piquing with moments where both sides of the field have no actual threats leading to a stalemate broken by the first creature. This is kind of how the second game went although with me refusing one of Conor's takebacks that might have given him the game. It was quite strongly settled by me equipping my warlord's axe to a bloodthrone vampire and laying the beats. The third game largely involved better board positions and effeciencys of creatures with nantuko shade living up to its bomb potential.

Third match was up against the Prince of Persia himself Niall Graham. Aside from being the guy that runs the shop and doing a good job at it, Niall is one of those good players who have always been cheated out of victory at big events by some bad bit of luck. Things like having the deck that beats 80% of the field but being paired against the other not so favourable 20% three matches in a row. This was a great match up until the third game. We had both put a considerable amount of pressure on each other with Niall using his Squadron Hawks and Honor the Pure to swarm out. I'm not so sure if I'd be bothered trying to grab multiples of Squadron Hawks. Without the aid of mass creature pumps having a 1/1 flyer is largely underwhelming where the hill giant has been a staple of the core set format. That being said one can't complain too much about multiple 2/2 flyers for little card disadvantage. Game two had me using nantuko shade and goblin tunneler to carve up Niall's life total and finish him with a fling. Game 3 had us both mulliganing to 5 and me being stuck on one land despite the constant pile shuffling, rifling and redrawing. A second swamp should have set me up for a decent go of things as I was packing Sign in Blood. Unfortunately it never came and Niall landed with tempo, kicking my tar in in less than six turns.

Trent and I played a few games after this and he consistently kicked my tar in with his blue/black deck. We found Jace's Ingenuity to be an unsurprisingly phenomenal card in this format. Having drafted ZEN/ZEN/WWK only a few times I never really got to see how mysteries of the deep was. Whilst I assumed it would be pretty good, the fact it relied on landfall meant usually playing it as a sorcery to get its full effect was a pretty limiting factor, particularly as zendikar was such a fast format with most decks relying on packing multiple 2 drops. With almost every colour having good removal or bounce spells games can spin out almost as long as they do in straight ROE drafts.

Pre-release Saturday

Having packed it in about 4 am, I got about seven hours to sleep before I had to get up and get my stuff together for the pre-release ahead of me. If you read my last tournament report, you'll know that I took a less than stellar sealed pool through to the finish GPT. On this occasion I wasn't required to play average packs at all. This time I was given -the nuts-. Whenever we sit down to draft or play sealed we are given the opportunity to pick what pile of boosters we are going to be ours. In a gaming kind of superstition sometimes you get a good feel for a pile of boosters. In my case I had a good feeling about the pile with the dragon on the first booster. To this Niall laughed at but when I popped a Baneslayer Angel, a Vengeance Archon, Conundrum Sphynx, Dragonskull Summit, Foil Haunting Echoes and Stormtide Leviathan.

Not only that but my commons and uncommons for blue and white looked like they had been selected for a pre-con deck.

8x Islands
8x Plains
1x Mistifying Maze

1x Stormfront Pegasus
2x Aether Adept
1x Maritime Guard
1x Palace Guard
1x Roc Egg
1x Cloud Elemental
1x Assault Griffin
2x Azure Drake
1x Conundrum Sphynx
1x Serra Angel
1x Baneslayer Angel
1x Tireless Missionaries
1x Vengeful Archon

1x Mana Leak
1x Ice Cage
1x Inspired Charge
1x Sleep
1x Foresee
1x Mind Control

1x Crystal Ball

So other than a few other cards (arguably sideboard options) this deck was the nuts. About half the non-land cards were bombs and I can only complain about a few of these cards could I complain about. Maritime Guards is pretty underwhelming as a two drop, I think I'd much rather have a bear such as Silvercoat Lion. Palace Guards was also a bit bland, however it could be argued that this is because of the defensive nature of the card when my opponent was usually too busy having to deal with my absolutely absurd threats. Lastly Tireless Missionaries is a watered down version of Angel of Mercy. Having started in Portal Second Age, I'm slightly disappointed not to see another reprinting of the 3/3 flyer/healing salve for 5 however this is perhaps a decision by R+D to avoid making white too strong in limited when they were doing the set design.

As you can imagine it was pretty awful sitting with me. I was like blastoise kid opening Baneslayer Angel, having made the money of the sealed back in one card. When the rest of the cards showed themselves my only fear was the ridicule I would be on the end of if I scrubbed out due to constant misplays. Indeed, I made a few throughout the day but thankfully the deck was so good it didn't really matter.

Without further ado I'll give you the breakdown of the match ups.

Conor Holmes: U/W
I tried taking a picture of the former Irish champ but in his tired and hungover state he wasn't having any of it. Indeed taking pictures of the whole thing was a bit of a joke. Our good friend Sherlock wasn't too happy with his sealed pool, from what I could see of his deck his only bomb was triskillion, which only became an issue in the third game. By his own admission to win the match up he needed me to get mana screwed, unfortunately for him he was the one that suffered the mana screw in the first game. The second game seemed to be running smoothly for my deck, whilst both of us were building up board position and trading blows Conor surprised me with a Mighty Leap, Armoured Ascension blow out. This meant I felt like a complete fool as I was left with a sleep in hand. Nice. The third game involved a board build up again but with me landing Baneslayer Angel. Conor almost killed it by mighty leaping a Cloud Crusader and using his last triskelion counter to do the damage. I countered this with an Inspired Charge, pretty much ending the game from that moment on. No skill involved ladies and gentleman just mythic rares.

Inbetween match ups I fix a kid's G/B deck for him, show him why Dark Tutelage is good in limited and that Cudgel Troll and Acidic Slime or brilliant in a deck with two Llanowar elves.

Cubby - R/W/B
Jokingly trying to persuade me into an ID before the match, Mr. Walker bragged about his deck having 5 mind controls and 6 Pacifisms. Of course it had none of these things and instead was a bit of a mesh of three colours in order to use its two mythics: Chandra and Grave Titan. Whilst the first game went pretty swiftly to me curving out and winning with flyers, Cubby landed the red planeswalker in the second game. Between this and a blinding mage slowed me down considerably as I fought to keep him from getting eight loyalty counters on Chandra. It meant mind controlling a three drop just to have another attacker, whilst holding back bigger threats that he could destroy by removing x counters and dealing x damage. With the help of Crystal Ball I was able to stack my deck and draw enough smaller threats to swarm out. Without the scry mechanic Cubby found himself drawing an abundance of lands by comparison and had to keep his ready for tapping down Baneslayer. After building up a board Cubby can't really compete with I do the dirty and reveal sleep. Utter bomb.

Alan - U/W
Last time I came up against Alan he was the one who had opened the bomb mythics as his ROE pool included Gideon, Sarkhan and Consuming Vapours. We had an interesting match up as both decks shared a few cards in common: Mistifying Maze, Ice Cage. These two plus what seemed like three Pacifisms meant that the game was going to be going into eight or nine land territory as I was often forced to use my Aether Adept to bounce Sphynx with a Pacifism. Once he was out there he really was MVP. Combined with Crystal Ball he netted me an extra card per turn whilst often moving Alan's bombs to the bottom of his deck. Eventually I see Alan's Leviathan but I chose just to fly over it and finish up with an Inspired Charge. I sideboarded out Maritime Guard for my copy of Leviathan seeing as this game went so late. Unfortunately I never saw it as Alan lands a combo of Air Servant and Leviathan. During this game I make a pityful mistake, bouncing Air Servant one turn then Ice Caging Leviathan. With a number of ground attackers and an Inspired Charge it was totally the wrong play. My failure to read the "no activated abilities" it on Ice Cage acts as my downfall and despite having gained about twelve life from Alan using Mistifying Maze on my Tireless Missionaries early on in the game, Alan keeps me locked down with Air Servant and beats me to death. Third game I just plain draw better and Conundrum Sphynx prevents him from the same Air Servant win by sending the card to the bottom of his deck and my Baneslayer too. That seemed to fix his cockyness for a bit.

New Guy with Glasses - G/W
I do have to apologize to this guy as I have completely forgotten his name. This guy was playing a pretty good build of Green White stompy, with Fauna Shaman, multiple copies of Cudgel Troll and Serra Angel. Pretty impressive considering he hasn't been playing for too long. Unfortunately for him I took a Roc Egg start both games meaning that to push any damage through at all he would have to give me a 3/3 flyer token. Mean while I pushed on through with Azure Drakes and Cloud Elemental. Game two was much the same. This time showing how Sphynx was almost more of a game winner than Baneslayer.

Irish/American guy - U/B
With us both sitting on twelve points, we're only playing for a bit of pride, DCI points and me wanting to keep the OP of those that I had played. In fairness this guy has a pretty good deck. No rares, no mythics but it's well constructed and packs Two Air Servants, Multiple Lilliana's Specter, Gargoyle Sentinel and a pretty nice removal base in the form of Diminishs and Doom Blades. After a fairly lengthy Aerial Battle and me having to discard cards I really wish I got to play I cast Forsee and grab Vengeful Archon. After the turn after it attacks, he plays Sleep, intent on finishing me off but he makes the mistake of attacking into me whilst I have open mana for Archon's ability and I retaliate viciously. Game two sees him control the board successfully with Air Servant, something which is futile to put an Ice Cage on as he controls a Warlord's Axe. With no spot removal and no good ground threats he puts the beatdown with the 7/5 flyer and wraps the game up. Game three I'm mana screwed but not too concerned as I'm through to the top 8.

With the top 8 booster draft starting at about half four and my shift starting at six, I figured the only point in playing was to rare draft. And rare draft I did, I managed to pick up an Ajani Goldmane, my second Dragonskull Summit of the day, foil Silence, Birds of Paradise and Dark Tutelage. When I went about picking cards for the actual deck I originally was planning on some sort of green deck that could utilize the BOP. When I got passed a Jace's Ingenuity on the second pick, I figured DJ on the right of me was going to keep blue open for me so he could use whatever bomb rare he drafted. However Blue dried up and I began taking multiple cultivates and any random bits of green fat along the way. Late Garruk's Companions were great picks and I moved into Red as I got a fifth pick lightning bolt. What was in that pack I do not know but never one to look a gift horse in the mouth I took it and went into red. To be honest my draft felt like I was almost picking random cards. Random cards that I liked but I didn't expect the deck to be any good.

What was ironic about the top 8 was that apart from Conor everyone I played managed to make top 8. I'd like to think that's down to my near perfect OP but I don't want to brag about that, the deck was the one that did the work.

What I ended up with was a messy mesh of Green, Red and Blue.

3x Island
9x Forest
6x Mountain

1x Birds of Paradise
2x Garruk's Companion
2x Augury Owl
1x Awakener Druid
1x Manic Vandal
1x Brindle Boar
1x Giant Spider
1x Canyon Minotaur
1x Vulshok Beserker
1x Azure Drake
1x Garruk's Packleader
1x Yavimaya Wurm
1x Earth Servant

3x Cultivate
1x Lava Axe

1x Thunder Strike
1x Lightning Bolt
1x Unsummon

1x Volcanic Strength

As you can see it's not too great and whilst it was never a problem on the day there is little point having scry mechanics from cards such as Augury Owls when you are running multiple deck-shuffling Cultivates. I ran 41 cards for some strange reason and I possibly could have ran the Jace's Ingenuity but I thought it would be stretching myself thin. I'll have to learn to draft this for nationals, no doubt.

First game I come up against the father of the guy that came top of the Swiss after beating me. Seemed like a very intelligent man, a lecturer of English in the states apparently. Had a lot of respect for Lancaster University too. Good to know I didn't go to a useless hole after all. He was a little burned out by this point and had been surprised to make the top 8. He said his sealed deck was better than he played it and he hadn't drafted in years. Anyway, Game one I cultivate and play Garruk's Packmaster, followed by Yavimaya Wurm and Canyon Minotaur. He's playing R/W and his board is mostly made up of smaller critters, I quickly overrun him with the fatties and we go to game two. Game two seems like a pretty sure for me as I've built up an arsenal of big creatures again but he declares "If I get a land on my turn this could get interesting" and I point out he'd need to pop his terramorphic expanse on my end step so his basic isn't tapped the turn he needs it. Thanking me for my advice and chuckling about his oversight he does so, shuffles and draws his land. Boom. The board is wiped after he casts the new Wildfire: Destructive Force. Now if I had sacrificed the right lands I might still have stood a shot of taking the game but I sacrificed down to a forest and a mountain thinking that I wouldn't hit any more blue spells. Unfortunately the next card I drew was Azure Drake which would have been a perfect counter to the Silvercoat Lion he dropped the next turn. My six points of life total quickly disappeared and we went to game three. This game was going pretty much like the first game until Platinum Angel was cast on the other side of the table. With an Azure Drake and a Giant Spider under my control he wasn't attacking with his angel. I used Garruk's Packmaster and the multitude of power 3 or greater creatures in my deck to cycle through and grab the answer to the angel. Slapping a volcanic strength on Yavimaya Wurm meant that with a couple of swings, his life total was in the negative. Casting Manic Vandal got rid of that "Opponents can't win the game" clause pretty well.

With a shake of a hand it was onto a much quicker round two.

At this point I was dangerously close to being late for work and I decided I was going to feign ignorance as to when my shift was supposed to start and show up an hour late. Due to the fact it was the weekend of the twelfth and a ridiculous heavy bout of rain there were very few customers about. DJ was also trying to avoid being late for his bingo calling job so we shook hands shuffled and drew.

Game one consisted of me casting an early cultivate, following up with a Vulshok Beserker and a Canyon Minotaur consecutively. DJ also had to answer my Awakener Druid with a Bee Sting. I soon slapped a volcanic strength on the minotaur and went to town, ending the game with a Lava Axe. Game two went much the same though this time I'm playing Packmaster on turn 4. DJ answers this by attacking with the very gay looking Prized Unicorn, utilizing the allure ability and employing a Giant Growth to dispatch the Packmaster. I was slightly sad about this - Packmaster is an absolute beast of a card and I think will define

DJ tries to race with a Shiv's Embrace on an Ember Hauler but I Unsummon the Goblin in response to the aura. Minotaur + Volcanic Strength combo materializes and Lava Axe fixes the remaining five points after three swings of the minotaur. DJ goes to work and the final is on.

For the third match I'm paired up against the same guy who was on twelve at the end of the swiss. Before we play we agree to split the boosters with the winner getting the remaining booster, the t-shirt and pre-release champion title. Again he's playing U/B so there won't be any easy victories with Volcanic Strength. In fact for me there would be no victories at all. First game I kept an awful hand. At that point I couldn't really give a damn, I could hardly be bothered mulliganing. In the second game I create some problems with fat creatures such as Yavimaya Wurm and spend a turn Lava Axing with no other relevant plays. My big creatures quickly become irrelevant as he develops his board with two Azure Drakes. He also clones his Captivating Vampire and begins amassing an army of minions. As soon as he hits five that's pretty much game over, I scoop and he reveals a Doom Blade and an Unsummon. I was pretty happy with the shared booster pile and I get ready for work, looking like a sexy bastard in a white shirt black tie combo.

Moral of the story: U/B is pretty good in M11 limited and try and open a good sealed pool.

Q-Con 2010

Now that I've discussed being a geek, I want to discuss the motherload of geekdom: Q-Con. As a friend described it, Dorkcentral.

For one weekend every year, Queen's Dragonslayers put on the UK's most highly attended gaming convention in Queen's Student Union. If you're wondering what a games convention is. Sadly it's not a showcase of the biggest and best new games. It's sort of more of a meet up for people to play all sorts of computer games, roleplaying games, card games and board games. Where traders come to sell their wares and for the best in the country to come and battle it out in Street Fighter IV or Call of Duty tournaments. Whilst I've been playing computer games since I got my master system at the age of five, I opted not to get involved. The reasons are two fold: firstly I'm a terrible loser. Ask any of my friends and they will tell you that I will scream and howl at the set or slam my controller into the ground if I lose. Playing games I've never played before against people that are just far too good is not something I want to get involved in, not in public anyway. Second of all I could not be bothered joining queues for any length of time.

Despite these queues there are scores of people that will show up for a crack at being king of Super Smash Brothers. This event has got so big that in order to go you need to pre-book your tickets several months in advance otherwise you can't even get in. Whilst I wasn't keen enough on going to fork out £20 ahead of time, I was lucky enough to be playing Magic on a Thursday night in my favourite gaming store on a night that two free passes were available to whoever was taking part in a minor event.

Having to work Friday night meant that I landed at the event on Saturday afternoon. The turn out was pretty impressive if not worrying. As I make the point in my last post, I'm a dice rolling, card drawing geek. I've wikipedia-ed my way through obscure comic book character's backgrounds multiple times and go on forums to discuss whether or not Thor could beat Superman. However my level of geekiness pales in comparison to many of those that attend Q-Con.

Like most major conventions of this kind there's a huge number of people who come dressed in all sorts of ridiculous costumes. Ever wanted to get dressed up as Solid Snake? Go to Q-Con. Have a thing for fourteen year olds dressed as Sailor Moon, well then you're in paedophile paradise.

That is one of the major problems with any convention. There are generally three types of people that should not wear provocative clothing. The first group are those who have a ridiculously high BMI. Morbidly obese people wearing skimpy clothing is not a good thing. The second group and it's for a very similar reason is the chronically androgynous. If it's completely impossible to tell your gender then it's probably not a good look. The third group are thirteen year old girls. Even if they are well developed for I should not be given an eyeful of a barely pubescent girl's rack. Police sirens are blaring in my head as soon as I so much as catch a glimpse. Don't get me wrong, if I was fourteen again I'd probably have absolutely loved it. I would have been turning my baseball cap backwards all over the place, quite happy to play the Ash Ketchum to some girl's Misty but there was just a tad too much Elf queen business going on. I'm all for cracking grass on the pitch and old enough to bleed puns but jail is a place middle class white boys like me do not survive.

Perhaps also I've become too much of a norm to be seen in costume for anything that doesn't involve alcohol or narcotics. I'm telling you though, I reckon going to some event where it involves dressing like an orc, camping in a forest and drinking buckfast for two days sounds brilliant. What could be more fun than wearing armour and throwing rocks yelling lightning bolt whenever you're blootered.

Having arrived at 1 PM, my first port of call was playing Magic the Gathering. If you've never heard of it, Magic the Gathering is a collectable card game akin to a grown up pokemon. My magic playing friend Niall and I explained it to a group of friends not in the know in a few sentences:

Me: You have twenty life. I have twenty life. I've got to reduce you to zero before you reduce me to zero.

Niall: And how do you do this?

Me: With a sixty card deck.

If only I had caught on camera Niall's description of the game, I don't think anything will ever be as impressive as his declaration to a group of people who are either drunk or off their tree on acid that

"You.. are a planeswalker"

He then elaborated to those there that that meant casting spells, summoning creatures and doing battle in the multiverse. Kind of mind blowing whilst one is tripping balls.

Whilst most of us players don't really pay too much attention about the storyline or the fantasy theme, enjoying more the thrill of the chess meets poker mechanics which the game provides. Seeing as it engages both the mathematical parts of your brain, your ability to think startegically and read people, it's one of the hardest games in the world to get good at. A professional scene does exist, with some players having earned several million dollars playing. Whilst there's a lot more money playing poker (and indeed many of the top magic players are poker geniuses), I find magic a heck of a lot more fun. I like going head to head with another player in a battle of wits exercise. One of the game's tag lines is:

In here there is no twitch, no reflex that can save you from the power of my mind.

Whilst there is a huge luck element of the game, with experince you get better and better at learning how to play around bad luck and utilizing your good luck.

No surprises then that I say that the first thing I did at 1 PM on Saturday was sit down to play in a Magic the Gathering tournament. The prize: a shit ton of cards and three byes (automatic match wins) in a big tournament in Goteborg (Sweden) where there's a real chance of making money or making it on to the pro circuit where the money is obscene.

Whilst I'm certainly not fantastic at the game I'd say I'm a little bit above average and there was a relatively low turn out for the event. This was in part due to a lot of magic players neglecting Q-Con or through pig ignorance. Those that turned up tended to be a little bit rusty in their understanding of the game - they hadn't played in a while or not quite as much as me. This gave me a fairly distinct advantage since I've been playing online like crazy recently, spending far too much money on imaginary cards. This meant that over the course of four and a half hours I managed to take the three byes and should hopefully be heading to Sweden.

At this point I'm going to tell you how I did it but there's absolutely no point for anyone to read after this point. Back in the old days, I called this the "Fuck off non-magic players section" or FONMP. This isn't out of rudeness in fact it's out of respect for those that don't play. I just don't want to be wasting your time with gobledeegook.

*** FONMP SECTION BEGINS ***

Okay so the format was ROE sealed. In the six boosters popped, I got very few bombs. It was quite tempting to play black because of Nirkhama Revenant as was it tempting to play blue for Sphynx of Magosi and Corralheim commander. Unfortunately out of the playble blue and black, I was still seven cards short of a sealed deck. That meant I was running off a base of green and white commons and uncommons with a splash of black for double vendetta.

Deck list

8 Forest
7 Plains
2 Swamp

Joraga Treespeaker
Bramblesnap
Lone Missionary
Beastbreaker of Bala Ged
Aura Gnarlid
Daggerback Basilisk
Dawnglare Invoker
Wildheart Invoker
Ondu Giant
Stomper Cub
Totem Guide Hartebeest
Artisan of Kozilek

Guard Duty
2x Vendetta
Smite
Puncturing Light
2x Growth Spasm
Repel the Darkness
Survival Cache
Boar Umbra
Mammoth Umbra

Yeap, classic G/W stompy.

Matchups
Decky - G/B
For some reason Decky isn't too big a fan of this format, despite the fact he won a pre-release. We have a fairly good match, blowing up each other's creatures and getting big digs in with Beastbreaker of Bala Ged. Ultimately it comes down to Dawnglare Invoker and an umbra on it.

Brock
Actually called Gavin Carville, he's had the nickname Brock since he was about 14 for having a Brock Lesnar stature to him (or at least for his age)since then.
I can't really remember what Brock's deck consisted of but I go 2-0 against him in pretty much the same fashion as Decky - Dawnglare Invoker + umbra = win. Brock and I played a casual game three that went backwards and forwards for sometime. Having to deal with his early level up creatures meant I was seeing all his big eldrazi dudes come out to play. We both called it a day as the third round was about to begin.

Cubby
Ian Walker has been playing the game off and on since the dawn of time. When he does well he does great but his being in London for the last year has meant he hasn't had the same amount of time to devote to the game and probably wasn't at his best. In the first game he makes the unfortunate misplay of attacking into my bramblesnap with his unlevelled zulaport enforcer, failing to realize I can tap the bramblesnap to pump itself. He tries to take it back but being the dick I am, I don't let it netting me some card advantage and avoiding a possibly heinous threat mid game. The second game saw Magic's luck element was playing out big time in the second game. For the first five or six turns I generally ramped with growth spasm and played stomper cubs using them for creature trades. I got out artisan of kozilek early and was able to swing for the win. If Cubby had drawn his second forest he'd have played Haze Frog, dropped a vengevine on his turn and ended the game in devastating fashion for me.

During that break, Cubby and I went to get some food so I chomped on a nice fat chicken salad roll. Dems some good eatins.

Matt Leebody
Again Matt Leebody is great whenever he plays a lot but he hasn't had that much time for the game as of recent. His G/B deck was packing some nice punches - Consume the Meek had been taking games off a number of people whilst Mull Daya Channellers was a fairly constant annoyance. Double Boar Umbra was also a constant threat with his black levellers to which I had little answer to except creature trade, tap down with repel the darkness and guard duty so I could stall out to the good old Dawnglare Invoker + Umbra finish. Vendetta was pretty cute in this match up for the 2 for 1s it was providing with his green creatures whilst the umbras were on the stack. He takes a game off me as I fail to deal with zulaport enforcer swinging as a 5/5 with fear. At this point we could have ID-d into the top 4 but we were both playing for high standings on the swiss.

Top 4
Alan J Warnock
Alan regularly impresses me with his ability in pretty much any card game. At 15 he shows promise way beyond his years, I often find him a tough match up, despite the fact I play way more magic than he does. Whilst I don't play Yu-gi-oh myself (I'm not -that- sad!), I hear he cleans up all the time. I believed his deck to be absolutely bonkers, as he popped Gideon Jura, Sarkhan the Mad and Consuming Vapors and he offers me the bye for this match if I give him four of my boosters. This is as much as I want to say I've won a GPT than to get the byes but we play it out anyway. The first game his deck graps out on him and I'm generally winning with a card he doesn't see as a win condition - Beastbreaker of Bala Ged. After taking some hefty swings he's forced to dump some removal at it leaving nothing around to deal with Dawnglare Invoker. The second game he acts like a jackass, deliberaltely making misplays in order to wind me up - sticking lust for war on aura gnlarid and sacking eldrazi spawn during my upkeep for no reason. Whether or not his hand was crap or he was playing bad from the start I'm not so sure but he sarcastically ran about declaring me the champion for the rest of the day. All in good humour I think but a degree of sportsmanship could be learned.

Matt Leebody (again)
I face up against Matt again. He's not too worried about getting the Byes and I'm not about to be blackmailed into parting with the remaining three boosters I got for being top of the swiss. I'm quite happy to keep them for draft. He's not too worried about either the byes or the boosters at this point he's playing for pride and fun which he gets out of this match in spades. After a fairly resounding win for me in the first game, I think I'm about to take the second. Turn 9 he swings with his ulamog crusher into my boar umbra'd and mammoth umbra'd up bramblesnap. I tap two creatures to make it a 9/9 thinking he'd made a mistake in casting it in the first place. On the block he momentous falls to sac his big guy then induce dispairs revealing some high cost eldrazi to make sure the bramblesnap goes down like a sack of shit, netting himself a 3 for one in the process. My loss of tempo, his life gain and card draw means I don't stand a chance of finishing him. The third game I take a nice 8 life off him from beastbreaker of bala ged but the game slows as I have to deal with boar umbra'd creatures. They almost kill me around turn five, turn six but I play lone missionary and survival cache which ends up netting me two cards over its resolution and the rebound. With him having fatties on the table and me having a multitude of chump blockers out means that we're both biding our time until we have a good opportunity in some more fat or a removal piece. I eventually draw repel the darkness and swing with enough creatures to seal his fate big time. We both agreed we'd played some great games and that was the stuff feature matches were made of.


*** FONMP SECTION OVER ***


Having taken the GPT I take a break, have drink a couple of pints of Guiness and head to work for an 8 o'clock start. The next day I'm back on the scene for a bit of multiplayer madness, a nice big lunch at Springsteens with some of the magic players and after that caught a bit of the England match.

Speaking of which GO ON THE KRAUTS!

During our meal at Springsteens we were being informed by a friendly waiter what the scores were for the match and about the disallowed goal which we felt would be something that England would whine about for years to come if it was the goal that mattered. Thankfully it didn't.

We returned just in time for the second half, got ourselves a couple of pints and admire the slaughter put on by the White shirts. With Q-Con winding down, I went home to a nice big fillet steak and stayed in to watch some TV. All in all a good weekend even if I had to work whenever everybody else was partying.

On being a geek

There's a debate thats existed for sometime about the differences between a nerd and a geek. To be honest, I'm not quite sure which is which. From what I gather, the nerd is supposed to the super intelligent, estudious type that has pseudo (or in some cases full blown) aspergers syndrome like symptoms. This is your scientist type that gets hired by NASA to design a new satellite or your computer programmer genius. Geeks on the other hand are the Star Trek/Star Wars loving roleplayer that spends too many hours on Halo. Of course the two often mix and match, hence the characters we see in shows like the Big Bang theory end up being both.

Recently, it kind of became cool to be a geek. With Superhero films, Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter taking off in the 00s, women got as sucked into a pop culture that was usually aimed at men. Whilst perhaps the majority of women would have boy band members, sport stars or actors as pin ups, all traditionally "buff" and well put together, another proportion of women have began to take interest in the geek. Stars like Adam Brody of The O.C. fame and Tobey Maguire are now seen as attractive and a lot of niche hobbies such as playing computer games, reading comics, watching Star Trek and roleplaying (okay maybe not just yet) have become more acceptable. Indeed a lot of it can be tied with the growth of indie music and the amount of time the Average Joe spends on the internet these days.

As a geek I appreciate this big time. I've been a card carrying geek since I was a kid. From the ages of 10-13 I was playing Warhammer and reading comics. Between 12 and fifteen I was regularly roleplaying and I (in true geek fashion)elected myself president of a magic the gathering club at school. Whether my lack of athleticism as a teenager encouraged this behaviour the behaviour encouraged the lack of athleticism I do not know but back then I had no interest in doing anything physical that wasn't sword fighting with latex swords or backyard wrestling. Whilst this geekiness caused some scorn to be dished out by peers throught those pubescent years, I furthered the level of this scorn in my immaturity by adopting the belief I was the victim and almost promoted that idea by saying and doing things that would have me ridiculed. When I initially started this blog when I was 17 and letting people know about it, I knew full well I was going to be laughed at by about half the school, a self sabotaging part of myself almost wanting this to happen whilst the better part of me grew angry about this outcast status I had brought upon myself, trying to act as if I didn't spend my Saturday afternoons tapping forests for green mana in the back of a dusty old comic shop.

Nowadays I don't have to do that. I can freely admit that whilst I write this I'm watching Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan (though I don't have a clue what's going on) and not worry that I'm going to end up a social reject. Perhaps this is due to wisdom and confidence coming over time and age but I find it funny though how the fears of the past leave their mark upon the human psyche and also how as a member of the white middle class I've never had to be too concerned about my survival but can spend hours fretting about my social acceptance.

If I could go back in time to when I was worrying about how I could be seen as "cool" or whinging about the fact I wasn't, I'd tell myself that the truly cool are those that don't give a shit about how they are viewed. Even if this geek chic culture dies I'll not ashamed of my "uncool" hobbies. I've learned that these hobbies can be a source of intrigue about your character. Although these days my geekiness lies mainly with playing Magic the Gathering, spending too much time on the internet/playing computer games and hanging about with the crowds that do these best, I've learned I can make these seem interesting to other people with colourful explanation, confidence and passion. Some of the most successful, social and interesting people I know are geeks who aren't afraid to play a grown up version of pokemon cards whilst supping a pint. And whilst I've never played geeky games to enhance my pulling potential, I'll never fear that I won't be getting laid for being a geek.

Apart from being superheroes what have Silver Surfer, Iron Man, Batman and Ghost Rider got in common? I've pulled girls wearing t-shirts of them. Shame I couldn't do that when I was 16..


Next time: Q-Con 2010 review

Ultimate Fighting Championship

If you haven't at least heard of the UFC you've probably been living under a rock. Started in the mid 90s as a spectacle for comparing martial arts against each other, the UFC has gradually developed into a bit of a phenomena across the world by spawning a sport in its own right; Mixed Martial Arts. MMA pits two fighters against each other in a cage who must win in three five minute rounds by knock out, technical knock out, submission or judge's decision. There are some rules mind, these are all fouls:

1. Butting with the head.
2. Eye gouging of any kind.
3. Biting.
4. Hair pulling.
5. Fish hooking.
6. Groin attacks of any kind.
7. Putting a finger into any orifice or into any cut or laceration on an opponent.
8. Small joint manipulation.
9. Striking to the spine or the back of the head.
10. Striking downward using the point of the elbow.
11. Throat strikes of any kind, including, without limitation, grabbing the trachea.
12. Clawing, pinching or twisting the flesh.
13. Grabbing the clavicle.
14. Kicking the head of a grounded opponent.
15. Kneeing the head of a grounded opponent.
16. Stomping a grounded opponent.
17. Kicking to the kidney with the heel.
18. Spiking an opponent to the canvas on his head or neck.
19. Throwing an opponent out of the ring or fenced area.
20. Holding the shorts or gloves of an opponent.
21. Spitting at an opponent.
22. Engaging in an unsportsmanlike conduct that causes an injury to an opponent.
23. Holding the ropes or the fence.
24. Using abusive language in the ring or fenced area.
25. Attacking an opponent on or during the break.
26. Attacking an opponent who is under the care of the referee.
27. Attacking an opponent after the bell has sounded the end of the period of unarmed combat.
28. Flagrantly disregarding the instructions of the referee.
29. Timidity, including, without limitation, avoiding contact with an opponent, intentionally or consistently dropping the mouthpiece or faking an injury.
30. Interference by the corner.
31. Throwing in the towel during competition.


Even with the rules present, the sport ends up looking completely brutal from a casual spectator's view for Ground and Pound being allowed; a fighter can attack an opponent who has already been knocked off their feet by a strike or kick or rugby tackle-like take down.

In its defence, ground and pound either leads to a quick knock out or by a referee calling Technical Knock out from a multitude of undefended punches. A quick out is probably much better for your brain than fifteen rounds of being punched by a big black guy wearing 16 OZ gloves.

So why do I like the UFC? Well the show is presented kind of like WWE for big boys. Instead of yelling our support for some loud mouthed American redneck roid lover, we're crossing our fingers for some quiet spoken Brazillian like karate expert Lyoto Machida or Muay Thai superstar Mauricio "Shogun" Rua. Instead of looking for the power bomb finish, we're egging on two technically gifted athletes who place punches right inside the pocket or put a perfect rear naked choke on their opponent. For those that understand it, ground game isn't always boring - we're looking for that perfect moment when someone finds just the right moment and technique to inflict punishment on their opponent. Of course two half naked men hugging each other looks just a little gay, which puts a lot of people off but once you are comfortable in knowing they're actually trying to hurt each other by a means other than buggery or by giving their opponent a hicky you might appreciate it more.

Another great thing about UFC Is that it's always on at silly o'clock in the morning on a Saturday night. That means you can either stay up drinking and watching it or you can streamed the day after in order to provide entertainment when one has a raging hangover.

In my next post I'm going to talk the upcoming UFC fight and the status of the light heavyweight division.

Clash of the Titans

A brief(ish) note on my moving reviewing system
At the minute when I review films they are only movies in the cinema. The rating I give to a movie in the cinema refers to the cinema viewing experience. By that I mean that some films were made to be big screen blockbusters and when done right they can be truly entertaining. Sometimes one of these films is so cheesy they are good. Other films were never meant in that fashion and are good because they utilize good film making technique. Michael Bay's Transformers was a terrible film; cheesy writing, mediocre acting and a paper-thin plot but yet if you watch it in the cinema guzzling down a gallon of carbonated suagar water and tossing high quantities of e-numbers into your mouth, you can break the nasty spell of a hangover pretty successfully.

Obviously this means that a rating I would give to a movie is not the same as I would give to a piece of good film. The original Terminator is in many ways groundbreaking. The use of suspense, fear and action are brilliant. It's a film I can watch multiple times over. The fourth film in the franchise, Terminator Salvation is nothing special. There is nothing new about it. Christian Bale plays Batman.. sorry, himself - an angry young Welsh man who yells at people on set with a husky voice. That doesn't mean it isn't a half decent download-from-piratebay-get-high-and-watch-on-a-midweek-night movie. It just can't compare. I might rate them 4 stars each based on the viewing experience I had at the time but they may still mean different things.

Again, if I were reviewing DVDs, the rating system would be entirely different. A DVD has to have longevity, replay value, excellent film craftsmanship. I've got to want to spend money and space on my shelf for it to be worth it. For that reason City of God gets ***** whilst Bad Boys II gets **. If I went to the cinema to see either of them, the scores might be swapped. That being said Cidade de Deus will always be a treat. With no more confusing mumble to get through, here's my review of Clash of the Titans.

--
Movie Conditions: One joint smoked between three people, pick n' mix to the balls, pain meds to handle the circumcision (more on that in a later post), film was in 3D

Synopsis: Greek legend Perseus seeks revenge for the demise of his family at the hands of the dark God Hades and must go on an epic quest with a band of warriors who must stop the Kraken before it destroys Argost (the Greek city, not the catalogue based retail chain)

First off if you're looking for depth, look elsewhere. Just as Avatar was Ferngully in Space (or Ocarina of Time meets the Matrix), this is Gladiator meets Hercules. Yes, I am well aware that it is a remake of a 1981 film, but I never saw that so I prefer to draw comparisons from films I actually have seen. You kind of know what to expect with this kind of film. It's very much of the fantasy genre. You already know the soundtrack - dramatic bassy strings and the occasional clash of cymbal when somebody swings a sword. It's no Lord of the Rings - it's more like like live action Heroquest. If that reference is too early 90s for you then it's God of War the movie. If you've played Dungeons and Dragons, roll some percentile dice and you've found out pretty much the monsters the characters end up fighting.

That's partly because the characters are pretty much the same throughout the film. There's a benevolent princess that cares for the people and is wiser than her God angering parents, there's the warriors out of 300 who thankfully have decided to get dressed this time round, then there's some Turkish guys who go around hunting beasts and make kebabs. As for the Gods, Liam Neeson does his "I'm so wise and shiny" bit and the bad guy may as well have been referred to as "He who must not be named" Fucking Voldemort.

From what you've read, I may not sound too enthusiastic about the film but that's because there's nothing about this film that will blow you away. Once it gets over the slow start it ends up being damned good fun.

I like sword and sorcerey tales and this film gives one with gusto and solid pace. Character development is not long and drawn out; you get about three lines of backstory to each face and that's it. You're not looked upon to identify with the characters. There's no complex message about the nature of morality hidden in some dispute between Smeagol and the hobits's's's and you can't relly apply the religious themes of the film to real life. It's just Star Wars in AncieNT Greece with Chewbacca made out of wood.

My one bit of advice about this is that unlike Avatar seeing this film in 3D has no benefit to your viewing experience. In fact at times I felt that it made the film look more 2D. Ever seen one of those Christmas cards where the background is on the card itself then other stuff is stuck onto the foreground to make it look 3D. That's what this film looks like in 3D sometimes. It's as if you can see the projection of the blue screen background then there's moving pieces of paper. You can see the edge of people in a way.

I'm gonna give it a decent 3 and a half muffs out of 5.

In my next blog entry I'm going to talk more about that crazy operation of mine, show you some VLOGs and maybe review Kick Ass (which actually just plain kicks ass).

Stop faffing, just write
Currently listening to: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qShN16Rs4GU

“Perhaps it sounds ridiculous, but the best thing that young filmmakers should do is to get hold of a camera and some film and make a movie of any kind at all.”
- Stanley Kubrick

In the early 90s, Sportswear giant Nike ran a massive advertising campaign on the back of the slogan 'Just do it'.

As corporate as it is, this simple but effective phrase has a motivational appeal that could applied to just about everything - in the Nike sense, saying "fuck it, I will go for a run" (and thereby buying sportswear) to the Vattican "don't use condoms", its psychological appeal holds a lot of value. I could easily write an essay on how good this campaign was, or even how just how good this phrase is in general. Ever liked the idea of doing something but made up reasons why you shouldn't or "can't". Are you the type of person that talks themselves out of their goals easily? Then don't self-analyse too much; just do it.

That's what's taken me to write again. Having nothing worth writing about is hardly an excuse for me to fall out of practice. I'm going to fire off on herbally-encouraged tangents, with the whole "Just do it" as a kind of theme fitting somewhere in there.

I was walking through the centre of Belfast the other day and kept seeing white stickers stuck on lamp posts, traffic lights and railings with a website address on them. It wasn't the first time I've seen these stickers but it was the first time I could be bothered making a note of the url to check later. If you want it, it's

www.duderay.blogspot.com

Another Belfast blogger, the type of guy that writes a brief few paragraphs more or less daily on what he's done in his life. A lot of people find that shit boring.

"Why would I want to read what happened in somebody else's life when I could be living my own"

But to a lot of people that's popular. Soaps are hardly popular for the amazing acting appeal of its stars. Good looks might generate interest in an audience but the thing that sells soaps most is the fact you can watch it and turn off. The predominantly female audiences can get absorbed in some absolute mush about poorly developed fictional characters who have so much more excitement than the viewer does but that vague sense of the real world so we can kind of relate to the charcters.

Now you can try and argue otherwise. You might say:

"Oh but Hollyoaks deals with real life issues, like drugs!"

But face it, Hollyoaks deal's with real life issues with as much depth as a vole's vagina.

From what I gather what I've read of Duderay's blog, most of the stuff seems to involve either shoplifting or being on the dole. I could sit here and mock the guy's pitiful attempts to live life at the max but I get this cold feeling that the writer isn't some West Belfast spide but some vaguely artistic bum still living in a student gaff and unable to find a worthwhile job. Somebody who isn't going to settle for some call centre bullshit like I have and would rather stay at home spending the dole and housing benefit on rent, bags of grass and tins of baked beans to fuel the all night halo sessions. In fact he's probably someone I know.

Now don't worry, I'm not adocating a life of living off the government, I'm just not going to judge you for it if that's what you want to do. Sometimes doing no job is better than doing a job that you hate because for most of us there is only so much crap you can take.

I did my fair share of being on the dole in the Summer. For the first Summer in three years I wasn't able to grab a job straight away. I didn't have the hook ups and due to the recession there wasn't such a superfluous supply of jobs. Recruitment agencies for a while didn't get you signed up because unlike previous years where they were crying out for just about anybody, they had to be selective. I had to admit I had the odd adventure on the dole.

Sure I had some good times; barbeques in meadows, road accidents, hardcore drug raves but at the end of the day a lot of time was spent in the house looking for jobs and watching day time television. Somehow I got it inside my head that it would be more constructive to spend the time working, so I ended up taking the first jobs I was offered. This started with sporadic kitchen porter work. This wasn't too bad if a kitchen had craic, or eye candy but the majority of the kitchens I worked in didn't have a fun environment. They were the type of people that said "Works not meant to be fun" and lived by it.

I can't stand that kind of mentality. You spend around a third of your life working from the moment you start working to the day you die. That's a heck of a lot of time not to be enjoying yourself. What if you hate it and have to take the bitterness from doing it home. That's no way to live.

Thats why I'm glad I did the next temp job: Late night stock replenisher in Sainsburys. Basically for two weeks I stacked shelves between the hours of 22:00 and 08:00 (10 pm and 8 am to those too spastic to understand 24 hour clock - yes, they do exist!). Why was this a good job? Well partly this was because I got a taste for being a night person for a while, because there was temp staff you could have a laugh with and thirdly because the job wasn't one where you were under some sort of strict time constraint to get things done. I mean on some nights I worked by plumbs off, merely because with a little help from my 4th gen iPod I'd tuned my brain into the Prodigy and aggressive but (in my head) stylish shelf stacking dealt with a vicious hangover that was caused from the Saturday night/Sunday morning drinking sessions. On top of that the pay was good and I had two of my friends signed up to the agency working alongside me on the second week of the job, meaning we could have bread fights and just general banter. The full time staff came to love us as we were friendly, knew where everything belonged and spoke the same language. It got to the point where I had a sitcom writen in my head about the place.

It'd be called the temp staff.

Those two weeks were basically the opening weeks of a new Sainsburys branch up West Belfast (where Curlys used to be) and the excitement it had attracted was far more than expected. People showed up in droves to buy their edible produce from a British supermarket chain in the middle of Nationalist territory. Go figure, as American teenagers might put it. So the agencies called in loads of us and paid us a tidy £7.00-£7.50 an hour (depending on agency) plus holiday hours to do the overnight shift. By loads of us I mean a huge mix of people. There were your dependable Eastern European workers, who take any job and do it well, to your undependable East Belfast smick who spends most of the time skiving playing with his phone in the cubicle. Then you had some semi-retired folks who were doing this and that here and there to save for Christmas. You had students girls who just bumbled around working at a slow but steady speed. It was just a place of funny interactions and alcohol drank from thermoflasks on 3:30 AM lunch breaks. Those were a fun two weeks. I even asked a girl out sober at like 6 in the morning. Though she kind of thought I was asking her and her friends out for sociable drinks. Ahhh dear. My romantic shapings were for naught.

About a week after the temp staff were no longer needed I decided I'd quiz the recruitment agencies again. Upon asking, Brook Street gave me an outbound courtesy call job in my old call centre. It'd be easy. Montonous in that I had to ring a bare minimum of 30 people an hour to ask if they'd received their furniture, but still easy enough. I almost got fired from doing it about three times in the first month because it was that easy I believed I could afford to fuck around. I had to talk the boss into not firing me on the first hour because I was doing dumb accents. Imagine Borat ringing you at 10:30 AM asking you had you received your bed from Dreams and making sure it was "Very nice!" or some wierdo from Cork (Southern Ireland, where they say tirty tree). Then a few times I was late, scruffy, hungover, making personal calls for twenty minutes at the time.. Yet they liked me so much they decided when that work dried up they would take me on to customer service. Back in my old job.

Now I could deal with this job if they kept it simple. They kept it Customer Service, in which you're taking an average between 60-90 calls a day. Yet they couldn't do that, they had to add more and more skill sets on. So within 4 months my work load had exceeded the quota'd 90 calls to 150. That's non-stop calls on a temp staff wage. I'm a graduate, we're supposed to aspire to something a little more than £6 an hour to mentally shovel a company's shit all day. That's what customer service is for the most part, menial little tasks to keep customers happy and the company look good but peddling the company line all the while. So if a customer has incurred four years compound interest at a rate of 29.8% APR or not given the customer to change the Direct Debit Date to some system issue, you just had to tell them straight "Sorry Mrs Peasoup but I cannot do this, therefore you incur a £30 charge". The average call is someone ringing up to pay the bill. Each time they pay by credit card its 4% of the payment and £3 for debit card. I'd be fuming if I had to pay £3 to pay a bill, it's like Ryanair who just plain take the piss by slapping £20 onto your ticket because it suits them on a whim. I said just do it whenever I took the job, now I'm saying "Just do it" to quit.

Because I'm not enjoying it and there are other things in my life I have to deal with and what I've gained from doing that job has been slight. Despite living in the parents house I've saved a measily £800 from working since September. Apart from allowing me to meet some characters (more about them at a later date), there were only two things worth keeping that job for.

The first one is I was able to stay home and do stuff around the house when my parents need me most. Don't give yourself a chance to regret this in later life. If you have family that need help, at least be around them, do a little here and there. Try and absorb their loneliness in dark times. I don't want to get into anymore about it, so I won't. Here's the second thing:

Developing hobbies. If a job is a waste of your time, talent and soul then it becomes very easy to spend your money drinking and having other hobbys to forget you're spending that third of your life in hell.

So I found a couple of destressing hobbies, one was trading card gaming, which I can get into more depth later but the main one I shall give you an overview of the other; Muay Thai.

Muay Thai if you haven't heard about it is otherwise known as Thai boxing. The deadly art of 8 limbs consists of punches, kicks, elbow strikes, knees and clinching. Its history dates hundreds of years back but it has continued to evolve over time, incorporating elements of Western boxing alongside the traditional style Muay Boran still used by the Thai army. It's used brutally in Mixed Martial Arts tournaments such as the UFC and is this decades physical craze. Early 00s you had Parkour/Free Running, late 00s/early 10s is all about fighting again.

I mean check this guy out:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dkZkgcwn42I

That's Anderson Silva. Look at the headkicks, look at the clinches and the knees. That's what I'm learning to do. In terms of "Just Do It", Muay Thai is what I drag my hungover ass to after work on a Monday afteroon. The thing that allows me to put the undiluted rage built up over 8 hours in the debt factory into a punch bag and leave me fresh enough to go to Monday club.

I'd video myself training, but I think its better to leave that to this guy:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w7gPoU8TFcE

I am Fighter is huge in Norn Iron because it not only mocks the MMA craze (on that note, as someone who trains in muay thai, there is nothing I enjoy more than kicking the guy wearing a t-shirt with Chuck Liddell's face on it right in the ribs) but does a brilliant send up of less than smart Ballymena folks. The main character "Barry the Blender" Henderson is played by Colin Geddis, who on one of his previous videos delivered the Kubrick quote I have at the beginning.

As film students they figured they can make a viral video more influentual than a dog humping a teddy bear and in a way it has. Whilst I'm sure millions have people may have seen stupid shit like dogs trying to hump legs its not going to be as culturally defining as I AM FIGHTER.

I remember when Norn Irish sitcom "Give My Head Peace" before they went into seven seasons of the same crap. Back then they had two really entertaining seasons. Everyone in Northern Ireland quoted the show on a day to day basis, or made reference to it in some respect. It's the same for I Am Fighter. If the rest of the world doesn't get it, we really don't care. If anything that strengthens our local cultural identity - it's something we all share in common. Which is why I might say it in irony but secretly mean it..

RA-RA-WHADDABOUTCHE?!

Anyway, the place I'm going with this is that I still intend on making some viral videos. Maybe 5-10 minute pieces but I'd be looking for a crew to help me put them together. Anyone interested, please feel free to comment on this post. In an entirely non-sexual way, lets just do it.

In the next posted expect a review of Clash of the Titans and my first few attempts at making videos with an exceedingly shite webcam.

District 9 Review
Prawn. Its either something you eat or something you stay the hell away from because the ghastly seafood smell repulses you. Well actually now, it's a racist term.

District 9 is almost undoubtedly the best mainstream Sci-fi action film of this year. Whilst I haven't yet seen "Gamer" where Gerrard Butler plays a convict that must compete in a series of gladiatorial combat battles controlled by a kid playing a computer game (or rather it's Arny's The Running Man meets Counter Strike), I'm not hearing a lot of good things. That and District 9 is generally streaks ahead of the abysmal Transformers sequel that was only ever good whilst Optimus Prime was on screen and an enjoyable but ultimately lackluster Terminator Salvation.

Over the last few years, film producers have aimed at showing epic scenes in their trailers to try and draw in audiences. Unfortunately this often leads at viewers being disappointed that the trailer was better than the film, or that they'd seen all the best bits. District 9 on the other hand never attempted to do that. It worked on intrigue and was potentially rather confusing. I thought the film was going to culminate in an alien virus wiping out most of human life and so a small bunch of rebels were going to have to fight against their bug like overlords, to which I'd be yawning and poo-pooing it as a 50s b-movie wannabe. I didn't think it'd be a film with as much depth. Almost as a result, I want to tell you very little about the plot and might be better off making a few comparisons with the other blockbusters.

Where Revenge of the Fallen suffered from being aimed at eleven year olds with little or no effort in character development, misguided attempts at comedy (script writers take note: A) token black robots weren't funny in the first one B) there is only so many times we can laugh at dogs having sex C) Robot bollocks?) and scenes that had so much slow motion they almost went backwards, District 9 is crisp, believably written and contains depth to the scenario.

Where gaping plot holes might have deterred some viewer's enjoyment of Terminator Salvation, District 9 is about as water tight as can be for a sci-fi film. One could nitpick over bits and pieces but generally they can be overlooked if your prepared to suspend your sense of disbelief enough to watch a film about aliens living as refugees in Johannesburg.

Whilst both of these films got caught up in the standard Hollywood "destined one", what's refreshing about District 9 is that everything feels accidental. The protagonist, Wikus isn't your standard action hero; he's almost like a nervous but nice civil servant character. Whats great about this is we empathize with him as he faces the trials and tribulatons that he endures. Actor Sharloto Copley does a great job of working with the extensive blue screen being employed and the excellent CGI has its own sort of character. The prawn-like aliens have an interesting design to them and move in an intelligent way. The special effects of the weapons are also hugely entertaining and we're left wishing we had the ability to fire them ourselves even if it did mean being a little bit more extra-terrestrial than usual. From
imaginative and well thought out sci-fi universes, cult followings often bloom and I suspect District 9 will be do different due to the depth of the story and the variety of ideas being employed within it. Mixing voodoo and gang warfare into an "aliens come to earth" movie was borderline genius. One might try and say the film tries to be too smart for its own good because of it at times seems to have an underlying moral message and a broader comment on racism, politics, money and corporations (mixing apartide and aliens may also offend a few)and perhaps this is true at times but its hard to be vicious about it. District 9 is a film you will talk about after watching and you will want to watch a second time to pick up the things you missed.

For his first film, Blompkamp has ultimately done a great job. The variety in camera angles and effects adds to the intrigue and build of the film. By starting it as a documentary, using webcams, camcorders and helicopter gun sights we initially feel detached from the story and it whets our appetite. One could say that the transition from this style to traditional movie style is a bit clunky and if something similar were attempted again could be done smoother and with more gusto but at least its something new.

One other flaw you could complain about is the now almost bog standard use of orchestra used to score the film. Whilst it fits, it is almost an overly-standard Peter Jackson manuever. And therein lies my only other major gripe with this film is because of this new trend in big name directors "presenting" a film to bring in a crowd i.e. they say "yeah, I've watched it and I'll say it was good if you give me a cut". Fuck you Tarrintino for starting that.

Anyway, there you have it. On estimation, I'll say 2/3 people who watch this will enjoy it for at least something. There'll always be a snob who picks apart little things and there will always be some chav who doesn't enjoy it because it's got aliens in it. Fuck them, the film will probably win an oscar or two along the way for special effects, lighting or make-up. Go see it and worse case scenario you'll have an interesting debate on your hands afterwards.

**** (out of 5)

Film Review: Inglorious Basterds

If you read the last post, this one really should be a continuation of me proposing where my future may or may not lie. However, I haven't been arsed doing that for a bit and I might get back to it. Job hunting, getting fucked and going to the gym have been a slightly higher priority (although not necessarily in that order). I've also had a bit of criticism about the blog, which I'm quite happy to take on the chin. I'm not 16 any more, the stuff I write on an online soap box isn't going to get me laughed at on a day-to-day basis although pointless overthinking of my own psychology is going to have to end.

Anyway, saw Inglorious Basterds last night and I'm about to give you a wee bit of a review on it. If you haven't heard anything about it recently then I'm surprised you've got the internet connection to access this blog. Here's a clip showing a bit of a few scenes:



The primary plot is Aldo Raine (Brad Pitt) leads the "Basterds", a bunch of Jewish G.I.s into occupied France to kill off as many Nazis as possible with their primary objective being the destruction of a German film that almost all of the Nazi administration are intent on seeing. Meanwhile the female French-Jewish cinema owner Shosanna (Mélanie) is planning the same thing. Both Shosanna and the Basterds are also trying to avoid German detection and the villanous "Jew-hunter" Col. Hans Landa (Cristoph Waltz).

Being a history graduate, I sometimes get irritated whenever films have an attempt at portraying historic events and doing them badly. I sat and laughed through Sean "ya bleedin' French twat!" Bean's Sharpe series for the fact that it's not only badly choreographed, ridiculously scriped but it's full of mistakes. With Basterds, I knew not to expect accuracy. Not only is it a Tarrintino film, but it's inspired by another fictional but war-time film Inglorious BastArds. Other influences that pop up through the film are Sergio Leone's Spaghetti Westerns, with an Ennio Moricone style riff playing in one of the early scenes. It put me in the mood for watching 'The Good the Bad and the Ugly' again.

Whilst most audience members will go without any hangups about the history shown, it could understandably be a sore point for some. The opening scene where French farmer LaPadite (brilliantly acted by Denis Menochet) is interrogated, culminates in the machine gun execution of a Jewish family. Due to the emotional nature of this scene and the fact it draws upon the audience's understanding of the atrocities committed during the war, it makes the rest of the film seems almost farcical in comparison. Especially as Tarrintino's tongue-in-cheek style of direction rarely has you develop an emotional commitment to any of the main characters, the nameless silent innocents who we only catch a few glimpses of are more important than those that actually play a speaking role.

In true Tarrintino style the film is written as a number of different character's stories that come together in the end, all with their own witty dialogue. Whilst I had naively hoped for an action-packed, high octane, fun driven movie where Nazis get splattered right across the French countryside, the film relied more on tense build ups and exchange of words between characters kind of similar to the "Kahuna burger" scene of Pulp Fiction. Of course there is the odd moment of gratuitous violence where we can draw a sadistic sense of glee from (two words; baseball bat) but sadly some of these dialogues end in non-sensical flashes of gunfire more akin to Guy Ritchie's work than Tarrintino's which end up proving anti-climactic and rather disappointing than the smirk raising that we hoped for.

As a result, the film drags in places. The unusual camera angles and interesting shots that we expect from the big T are there. We can appreciate them at the time but occasionally it interrupts the pace of the movie when all we want is the pay off of Nazis getting shot. As expected we do get a laugh here and there from the jovial use of language - especially since French, English and German are interwoven within the script. Without a doubt some of the acting in this film is marvellous. Although I found Brad Pitt's performance to be a slight let down on the grounds that his line delivery was often flat and uninspiring and at times seemed to focus far too much on getting his awkward Southern state accent right, Waltz's SS commander is brilliantly loathsome and the whole way through the film we're craving the opportunity to shoot him ourselves. Along with this we almost get to like Daniel Bruhl's shining example of the third Reich and German actor Til Schweiger's vicious ex-Nazi, delivering that cheeky spot of knife violence we were hoping to see. Lastly an honourable has to go out to Diane Kruger who not only was incredibly attractive whenever she was covered in her own blood, but really enjoyable to watch as a glamarous movie starlet/spy.

Despite the drag, the ending was perhaps exactly what we wanted, without saying too much it was a little do-over of history that must have seemed almost pornographic to Jewish actor Eli Roth*.

Overall: ***

Here's a little almost related treat:



*To steal a line off the Nev

My future, part one

Okay, I’ll be the first to admit: if you don’t know me, chances are this entry won’t be interesting. It’s a look at my future with some questions being raised.

Well now, aren’t I the one eating his words? If you read my last entry, you may have found me try to be cool, reassuring and confident that we can all find jobs and there’s no worry there.
Tomorrow my first dole payment is coming through. Now, hopefully it’s backdated eight weeks, but we’ll see if that application goes through. The grounds for it are a bit shakey to say the least.
It’s funny. I’ve never really found that much difficulty finding work during the Summer when I’m back in Belfast, but here we are in 2009 and I’m more qualified than I ever was. With a big fat 2.1 under my belt (sorry, I just feel the need to brag about the fact I got away with three years of ridiculous behaviour and still landed a half-way decent degree out of the equation) and a number of different jobs, getting work shouldn’t be any problem. Yet, it is. Last week I applied to fifty odd jobs, jobs that I have worked before or done similar jobs to, yet the competition is destroying me. I can’t even get a retail job, something that I hated doing when I was 17.

Perhaps I should be looking at this from another angle and declare myself “overqualified” and take the rejections as a sign that I should be looking for graduate employment or work over seas. We’ll see.

It is however early days. Whilst I am fearing that I’m letting the best days of my life slip by, panicking does nothing.
More and more often I’m getting ridiculous ideas.
Firstly, I’m thinking about making money off of youtube videos.
How you ask?

Not everybody uploads youtube videos purely to share the hilarity of their mates dancing around to Britney Speares.
Shock horror, some youtube users make piles of loot with their own channels.

They usually to this one of two ways:

1) They become a youtube partner and take a share in the advertising revenue. For every 1,000 hits you get around $2.50 - $5.00.
2) They post links to their website which has its fair share of ads, some merchandise, premium content or just a big ol’ paypal donate button.

I might be wrong but I suspect 1,000 hits are a lot easier to achieve if you have a video that grabs a little bit of attention. Something that raises a smile, makes you chuckle, gives you an erection, pleases your ears, gives you the need to take a dump or just generally something you can watch without clawing your eyes out. A quick search on the internet will show you the most popular youtube videos

http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/top_10_youtube_videos_of_all_time.php

Most of these are professional music videos, but every so often something amateur with a catchy name (like guitar) or just plain
entertaining will garner a lot of attention.

However to have any real staying power, you need to be reasonably consistent with the videos you’re sticking out and you need to have a fan base.

Ever wonder why people say “please subscribe”? It’s because the more subscribers they have, the more people they have watching new content, the more views they have, the more money they make.
I’d say the tricky thing is making something watchable, but that’s something I’m yearning to do. Besides, you have little pricks like this guy making videos that attract viewers in their thousands:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X_oCyzja0sg&feature=fvw
Now I don’t know if that is a chipmonk voice (like him sped up) but I fully cannot deal with either of the things he says or the noise that’s made when it is said. Now here is a guy I’m a big fan of:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hG2otLyvuCQ&feature=channel_page

If you’ve never heard of him, he’s the Angry Video Game Nerd.

Whilst he’s expanded into doing different things (Now that's bullshit, cinemassacre etc.), he’s most famous for the AVGN series, where he reviews a ton of crap games for the NES, SNES, Mega Drive and Atari and yells at them constantly. Sometimes he’s funny, sometimes you’ve played the game and you remember just how awful it really was, how they really were a “Shitload of fuck”.

On average, these guy’s videos get about 300,000 views. Some of them have had millions of views.

That’s right. Millions.

Work that one out
1 000 000 / 1000 = 1000
1000 * 3 (for arguments sake) = 3000

For reviewing old computer games, he’s earned himself 3,000 dollars with one video. On top of that, he’s got the merchandise, his own website with more advertising revenue. For having a bit of fun and making a product people like, he’s got himself a healthy income.

What’s more is that he gets invited out to big gaming events to interview people and make a documentary out of it. Whilst James Rolfe isn’t famous in the conventional house-hold name sense, he’s got fans all over the world. Fans that cover his theme tune. He could probably find a couch to sleep on in pretty much any city he wants all over the world. Dare I say it, he could probably get laid with a hot nerdy chick off the back of his videos. I mean come on; if I got laid off giving flyers out to people on campus, I’m sure this guy can get laid from being in videos with millions of hits on youtube, even if they are about him drinking generic American beer and yelling abuse at nonsensical Atari games. For Yanks that’s probably what they consider bad boy charm.
Lastly, for AVGN he’s got a lot of flatterers. By flatterers, I mean imitators, hacks even.

There’s the Irate Gamer, Microsoft Sam voiced IGSRJ and even a Happy Video Game Nerd (who goes more for good retro games and admits his inspiration). Whilst the Irate Gamer has more people irate about him than actually like him - because of his charisma-less delivery, awful jokes, blatant theft of material from AVGN and an overzealous policing of the comments on his videos, he still has hundreds of thousands of hits.

Now just for a second, I’m going to go on about videos that get a lot of viewers. VLOGS.

Think of the diary room in big brother but real people all over the world showing you a glimpse of their life or professing an opinion of something. Not everyone’s cup of tea, I am aware but I’ve been looking through a few of them for “market research”.
Typically the ones that have a lot of money feature reasonably hot girls. I’m assuming that’s because a parents are putting child-lock filters on little fourteen year old Timmy’s computer, meaning he can’t access redtube like the rest of us and prefers to beat off to some Japanese/American girl whilst she explains her choice in fashion. If that isn’t the case it’s because women are interested. There are VLOGs that probably only garner the attention of pervy old men, wierd internet trawling chicks, or people clicking through randomly. I don’t know, youtubers are wierd, this guy gets results and all he does is point out why other youtubers and ninja turtles are “douchebags”:
http://www.youtube.com/user/TheArchfiend
So that raises a few questions? Will I make some VLogs? Perhaps. I’d rather be creative, do visual some tours of Belfast, go to places that mean a lot to me. Even do things like film buskers as part of the journey. I could film comedy skits written by me and my friends in the big ‘fast one. However VLogs could go hand in hand with this blog of mine, pointing towards my own website and some other gems on that in terms of writing and maybe some random comic strips/art.

I wouldn’t want to do this youtube thing full time unless I was churning out great videos every time. If I’m going to be in Belfast for any length of time I want a job with around 20-30 hours so I can work on these projects. If I did it full time, my nature of being a perfectionist who says “fuck it, I’ll post it anyway”, would kick in and there’d be tons of videos I’d have created that I wasn’t happy with floating around t’internets. For that reason I wouldn’t want to dedicate every waking hour to videos. Even if I had a cool website with some cool merchandise, it’d be a hollow victory. I’ll not deny the fact I’ve spent a helluva lot of time in the last month on youtube, facebook, redtube, zoklet, Wikipedia and google because when I’m bored I don’t even notice. The internet somehow has bestowed itself a sense of belonging into me since I was ten because I felt like I have been doing more and learning more than simply watching bland TV shows. Really, I should have been out doing exercise or learning to play musical instruments but laziness and obsession has somehow been ingrained my personality from as long as I can remember. As has the internet.

Whilst being creative with internet submissions definitely eliminates some laziness, it also gives something back to the internet. It continues the endless cycle of bullshit videos and pointless wads of text. I’m adding to the addiction.

Time for a tangent.

Holy fucking series of tangents batman, aren’t you supposed to be talking about your future?


http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/08/03/bishop_on_networking/

The bishop of Westminister as high, pompous and pious as he probably is, made a reasonably valid comment recently. He basically pointed out the gaping flaws with the internet and social networking.

Admit it, something has struck a chord with you about how much I use the internet. You, or at least somebody else that you know spends far too much time on the internet. I’m not the only poor sap. Whilst I do spend a good bit of time with my friends IRL, so often am I keeping up with friends that I haven’t seen in so long by txt or facebook. Sometimes it’s unavoidable. Just because I’m not in Denmark right now doesn’t mean that my Danish friends didn’t mean a lot to me when I’m there. Sure, we don’t make daily impacts on each other’s lives but if you fall into a group of friends and form what feel like tight bonds, you don’t want to let geographical distance separate you. Friends in England are exactly the same and when I’m away the Northern Irish ones become the ones that I speak to long distance. It’s just a way of keeping in touch with each other. Things might move on without you realizing and people may change, but there’s still a good chance if you get on well online/txt after a successful relationship/friendship offline people can appreciate that you’re both staying in touch.

What the archbishop was lampooning is the number of friends thing on myfacebotwit. How a lot of people stress about how many friends you have. We all know that we don’t talk to about half the people in our facebook friends. Sometimes when people add us, we chose to accept them. Rather than ignore, it’s easier to accept them out of politeness, or because we fear we are committing some kind of modern day social faux pas. Inevitably, you’ll end up randomly clicking through barely known friend’s pictures and getting some sort of false sense of knowing them. They might make you laugh with a witty status update and you think “wow he/she is really cool”, only to realize that in real life you just have no real bond.

That’s the issue. False bonds. False bonds are even stronger with randomers on the internet. Through forums, youtube comments etc. I’ve got the odd “online friend”. Some I have the intention to meet because I’ve done it before and it was interesting. Admittedly, you have mixed results.

On one occasion the person dealt to us and was a bit of a weirdo that’s reasonably well known in Lancaster as being just that. However, just don’t tell the person your address or real name and it should work out okay. Meet in public. If you’re a woman, don’t get raped.

To divulge a little bit more truth, the willingness to plug myself into the matrix we call the internet for hours upon hours without achieving much is regrettable. The only thing I think I’ve improved by spending long hours on the internet is my writing skill. This brings me to the two other paths in my future:
writing and martial arts.

Find out more next week.

I can’t believe it’s all over. Apart from graduation, there is nothing left for me uni-wise. I keep thinking I’ll have classes to go to in September or October, but I have to remind myself that unless I want to mope around my parents house from now until the end of days, I have to go and face the big bad world. I’m going to have to sober up a little too. I may have managed to last three years being a wreck-head and still end up with a 2:1, but I’m left with a lethargy and a curiousness that I need to replace with energy and just going out and doing things. After all, a man who has too much time to think will think far too much. I could write about my plans for the future, save for the fact I do not know what they are. Teaching English around the world; perhaps.

Writing a book or a novel would also be great save for the risk factor in struggling to get it published and the potential that it could be absolute jank. I’m sure a lot of us uni-grads are in the same frame of mind. We believed that over the three or four years of doing a degree (and especially those doing humanities) we’d know what to do with our time but as it turns out we’re even more confused than we were before we began. What we need to realize is that unlike our parents time, or our grandparents time before them we have a lot more time to decide what we want to do. Yes, the world economy might be in a right state and we might live in a state such as rip off Britain where every service available to the public seems geared to overcharging us and fining us with incredulous small print (here’s a big fuck you to the landlords, the campus accommodation, BT and the National Rail who perverted the miniscule student finances of all of us) but it’ll bounce back eventually and we can drift between this and that for a few years. Unless we have mad ambitions of making lots of money, of saving the world or becoming an incredible artist/musician/actor/Ultimate Fighting Championship brawler, we have time. Not time to waste though. If you don’t enjoy this time, then that’s exactly what you are doing; wasting the time you have. A lot of us worry that the words of Pink Floyd’s Time will come true. If you don’t know the song I refer to, go out and buy yourself a copy of Dark Side of the Moon, potentially the most complete album ever made, here’s a bit of Time’s poetry:
“Tired of lying in the sunshine staying home to watch the rain
You are young and life is long and there is time to kill today
And then one day you find ten years have got behind you
No one told you when to run, you missed the starting gun

And you run and you run to catch up with the sun, but its sinking
And racing around to come up behind you again
The sun is the same in the relative way, but youre older
Shorter of breath and one day closer to death”
I reckon this is a pretty good way of summing up a lot of people’s fears, at least I do but you can’t life with this fear. You just have to go out and live it. All being well, it’ll all click into place. I hope.

Anyway, enough amateur philosophising and acting like a guru of life, I’ve got completely sidetracked talking about one thing when I’m meant to be talking about another: the pros and cons of Lancaster. Basically this will act as a guide for those thinking of going to university and a piece of truth for those who have been.

The cons are basically the cons. There are those who will try and con money out of you. £90 for campus accommodation is pretty expensive and like I explained in an earlier article, UPP can be a right scheming organization that knows the ins and outs of the law to the point that they can scam a whole £90 off of you for stains in a mattress that would cost about £25. They probably haven’t even replaced it.. Then you might be landed with a knifing Birmingham-Pakistani (I’m not being racist, but our landlord played up to every stereotype that British people have of these type of characters) landlord who fixes every problem badly with duct tape.

Then you have the fact that the campus bars and the student union nightclub charge £2.40 on average per pint. Whilst all of that money goes back into student stuff and is imperative to keep the university running, it’s still considerably expensive for a student bar.

The reason to these high costs is, and I’ll quote an old tutor of mine
“Everything on the campus has to make profit”
During the 90s, the university ran into massive debt to the point that they could no longer afford to pay tutors wages. Even if you don’t like your tutor, you have to give them credit that they deserve pay just as much as the next working person does and really, the uni can’t run if nobody is around to teach. Still the prices seem a bit over-zealous, but you learn to live with them unless you’re scandalously poor.

Money price problems aside, another issue with the uni lies with the nightlife and the music. A lot of people can go out in Lancaster and have a good time. For another bunch of us we can go out and have a good time, provided we’re blind drunk. I can listen to cheese and laugh at it, but to really enjoy it I need to have consumed a metric fuck gallon of alcohol. Even then, some songs will have me running to the bar requiring another drink. For some reason, I have always hated Summer of ’69 by Bryan Adams and to counteract its audio rape upon my ears, I must assault my liver with excess alcohol. Usually balances me out in some respect.

I like a lot of different types of music. When I’m in my favourite pub back home (Laverys), we get treated to either live music or reggae/rock, well chosen from the 60s/70s/80s. You don’t get that sort of treatment in Lancaster too often. When I go out, I usually want to hear the latest electronic stuff. I’m slowly developing a taste for dubstep, drum and bass, electro, techno and house. Nights for this kind of stuff is few and far between. Occasionally N-Type or Rusko will appear on the scene, dropping the dubstep bomb. Occasionally you’ll get a DJ such as DJ Dirty Dan O’Donnell (cheeky shout out to my old housemate), or the guys from Muddled will put on a minimal set at Mint. Sometimes, there’s a secret illegal rave in a forest right under their noses, paused only by the police looking for some crazed suicidal girl. Like I said though, these nights don’t happen too often.

Likewise, there aren’t too many live band nights. When they do happen, they’re in some bar or old man pub that none of your friends want to be bothered with, so unless you have the money and time to go drinking on your own whilst your friends are having a good time without you. If you live on campus, this would be slightly more aggravating as transport becomes an issue. However If you look though, you will find a gem from time to time. The Robert Gillow and The John O’Gaunts are both quite good for this. Metal heads and rockers might be better off looking in the Yorkshire House or the aptly named The Pub.

The extravs though can be fantastic. For those that don’t understand, each college in Lancaster runs a concert at the end of June featuring a bunch of different acts. Whilst Pendle often sucks as a college, it has a great reputation for good music at their extrav. In first year the talented but often forgot about Nizlopi played for a good hour or so and this year had an excellent line up of old school rockers and reggae artists, closing with a great DNB/Dubstep set. Despite the lack of greatness in the year, at least you have something to look forward to at the end of it, even it does involve stumbling around a bar wearing a bed sheet as a toga because it’s a Roman theme.



Lastly, there is the drug scene, which compared to Belfast is usually great but compared to the rest of the country is perhaps quite lacking.

Now, I’m aware I should treat this discussion with some sensitivity, after all not everybody gets high and some would consider a town with fewer drugs a nicer place to live but I am fully aware that drugs will always be part of some student cultures, whether openly flaunted or underground.

To get any Class A, one has to know the right people from the get-go. Rather than Manchester where it is a lot easier to figure out how one acquires these substances, contacts are key. Ringing and ordering well in advance is a must. With weed the situation is similar, though there is rarely a day when there isn’t at least one dealer holding. The problem is the bags are rarely anywhere near the accepted 3.5 for £20 and you’re often likely to be a gram short and the tree being wet. Believe you me though, when it’s good, it’s star-seeing phenomenal.

Back to the pros:
Well for one, the university is ranked pretty highly within the UCAS tables. When you get a degree from Lancaster it’s supposedly going to hold some weight with employers. Now I can’t say the same for every course but the history course is excellent. The tuition is excellent and there are a wide variety of time periods on offer to study. I did everything from the 1300 years of Islam through to the crack epidemic of the 1980s. Pretty impressive I thought.

Secondly you’re right in the countryside, if you want to you can utilize those beautiful Summer days to walk up by the canal, traipse into surrounding forests or start a camp fire in a field. Heck, a train ride would get you into the Lake District. It’s an amazing feeling sometimes knowing that you can just breath in some fresh air. The town itself isn’t too bad and whilst simple has a few great things about it. The indoor markets are usually pretty amusing and there are enough shops to supply you with everything you will realistically need.
Thirdly and finally, the most important thing though is the friends you make.
Unlike Manchester Metropolitan, where my friend suffered from a poor social life, in Lancaster it is so easy to meet new people. The college system and relative openness means that you can meet people from different flats and befriend them easily. You can also meet loads of people on campus and it’s not unusual to start conversations with randommers and get on with them well. Most of the societies are easy to join, so if any sport or wierd hobby takes your interest, they will usually encourage you to make an appearance if you speak to them long enough.

I met my friends and housemates through random parties in kitchens and a love of similar things and I’m glad I did. I’ve had a damn good three years with them and a messy three years at that. I’ll probably behave myself a lot more now that I’ve left university but I’m glad I did my misbehaving with those guys and they know who they are. I’ll be thankful that I got pissed up a field with them and smoked the reefer till the sun rose and I hope that others like me get to experience the same kind of excellent characters as I did. They were the ones that influenced me into liking new movies, new music and new games. I think in some ways we all grew as people throughout the three years, influencing each other in different ways and showing how there is more than one way to catch a cat (catting requires a whole other article I feel).
Soppy I know, but I’m a sentimental old fool when I want to be.
There you have it: easy ways of making friends with excellent people, average drug scene and not such a bad academic reputation. If you’re looking for somewhere to study, consider Lancaster. If you’re half way through your degree, enjoy it; work hard, but play damn well hard. Then of course, if you’ve just finished it, remember the good times and don’t worry too much about the future. Think with your hopes, ambitions and intelligence, using only your fear when you have to.

Here's to attempting to take your own advice.