Ultimate Evening

While perhaps not the best night of my life, it was a crown upon my first year here at University, and certainly an evening I will not forget readily. You know how much I've been going on about Derren Brown, well, ultimately, Julia did decide not to go, leaving Dan with no choice but to take me. We left with plenty of time to spare, and stopped off to pick up the ticket from Julia's place, who didn't seem happy to see me, and grabbed a quick meal. We then arrived at Park Lane, the pick up point for the secret location. And they wanted it to be a secret. The coaches that picked us up were blacked out, no light coming in or going out, and the driver's section was especially blanketed. They didn't want us to know where we were. It turned out to be an abandoned cinema, and it was extremely creepy.

We were led to the foyer, offered free drink, but I just took water, and given sandwiches while we were allowed to mingle in this secret location. Dan was saying how there were specific groups selected for this, and we were the student group, and there were also cabbies, psychologists, teachers, lawyers, accountants and celebrities. After a little looking we saw the presenters of Channel 5's Monkey Magic. Well, they were pointed out to us and we weren't really interested. Suddenly people started entering with sunglasses on, and I realised they must have thought they were celebrities (I didn't recognise them) or were with celebrities. While Dan ran off to the toilet, I figured he'd probably meet someone cool in there, so I followed shortly, and as I walked in, I recognised Al Murray, "The Pub Landlord", not that I'm a fan of his work or have found him humourous really, but I was momentarily starstruck.

When I had been to the toilets previously, Dan had pointed out that you could see out of a tiny hole in the cubicle over rooftops in London. Other than we were in London, I had no idea where we were.

Anyway, I walked into the toilets, past an exiting Al Murray, and thought I recognised someone. None other than Simon Pegg. He asked me where we were, and I told him about the peep hole, but Dan came and saw him and shook his hand. His sidekick was there too Peter Serafinowicz, and I suddenly realised I was surrounded by famous people. I also saw Jonathan Ross in the flesh, which was cool, and saw someone from the League of Gentlemen and a Channel 4 news reader, who was later featured in the show. Anyway, one of the big highlights of the evening...



In order from left to right, in case you hadn't guessed, is me, then Dan, then Simon Pegg, then a Roehampton Student who I have forgotten the name of. But that... is so cool.

Well, the show wasn't what I was expecting, which was a dark and eerie show, similar to The Séance. It was more akin to a relaxed stage show with hypnosis. It was funny and clever, and will be broadcast Sunday 29th of May Channel 4 either 10:00PM or 10:30PM depending on the slot. Anyway, everyone must tune in bar none, because I suspect I will be quite visible. Despite a couple of errors, which made him seem more human and friendly than incapable, and a premature explosion that will probably be edited out, it went very smoothly, and I think I was hypnotised, slightly.

Anyway, you have to watch it, it will be brilliant, and will translate to TV very well. I will talk about it more after the show is on, and hopefully everyone reading will have seen it. I feel bad for Julia, because it was her place I was sitting in, but I am so grateful to her and Dan. Well, I shook Mr Pegg's hand and got a photo with him, so I am satisfied. Derren brown is a god.

But speaking honestly, when he came here on the 9th, the show was so much more personal and touched upon me deeper than tonight's show, which was more of an entertainment. He's an incredible man, who really is very talented.

My First Blog Test

Haha, I saw this on Carlos's blog and just had to. For some reason it gave me Sakaki, which weirded me out until I found the rogue question. This seems closer.



What Azumanga Daioh Character Are You?

Hosted by theOtaku.com: Anime. Done right.

Anyway, I had a good day.

It involved another exam, which I didn't pwn quite as much as the last one, but it still went well. And after that, immediately after that, I spent a wonderful seven hours working with the person I thought I didn't like anymore, and you know, ever feeling I thought was gone hit back with a vengeance. I had forgotten how wonderful it felt just to sit next to her, just to laugh with her. No wonder it took seven hours to do the work, we kept talking all the time. And she said I'd lost weight. You know, aaah, it just feels great. After I dropped her home, she texted me thanking me wishing me a good night. She never used to do that, and it felt so good, I've been on a natural high for ages.

That said, I still don't know what'll happen. That whole paradigm stuff, scrap that. Yeah, I still like this other girl, but man, I forgot how happy this one made me.

Template Change

So, I've just been updating the template, and I realise it looks pretty cheesy, but it fits with my green mushroom theme. There's some Mario visual code in that image if you look hard enough. You can just about see the "1UP" in the bottom right hand corner, but I made it pretty subtle. It replaces the premade template, which, while looking good, wasn't original, and I wanted something a little more green. After I take some Photoshop classes I will probably be better.

Anyway, and addition to the last blog: After seeing Nightmare on Elm Street, we all went to my kitchen to eat doughnuts, and while there, my ex-girlfriend returned from the bar and slammed up against the window from the outside, seemingly trying to scare everyone. After she left, Koji made the rather astute comparison to Freddy Krueger.

Anyway, I'm a little worried about not handing in that Telecommunications and Data Networks essay. I did the essay. Well, two thirds of it, but the course is so uninspiringly easy that I never considered it a real essay and it never went in. Well he can see that it was done, I can show him and I can hopefully resit the coursework to get an actual mark for it. Hopefully the resit won't interrupt my trip.

Anyway, I'm going in to Uni now to study for this exam. I had an exam yesterday as well, but it was really easy. I came top in the written part and the practical part went really well also, so I think I came top of that module, beating Dan by half a percent, but still, it's top.

Too Busy To Love

The past couple of days have been a bit of a nonstop rush. Friday: Koji's birthday. Writing his name in Kanji, I managed to impress him, but due to Kaori's presence, the evening proceeded as usual with doughnuts. Though this time, we have a variety box as well as the standard one. Nightmare on Elm Street didn't really phase anyone, though that upside down blood bed was a piece of horror artistry, which I'd like to see again. Also, I watched the end of 24 Season One again, and that's a beautiful piece of television right there. But since then, I have been pretty much setting up this extremely expensive A3 scanner to work. Until 6:00AM Sunday morning I was working on that thing. And then from 4:00PM Sunday until 2:00AM Monday morning, I was scanning on it. This should seriously make me about £100, and that will be very useful, especially for my trip coming up.

That sums up my few days. And while it is seeming less likely I will see Derren Brown, Julia suddenly deciding she wants to see him, I think I can manage to persuade her to not go and persuade Dan not to take her. Consider it a two pronged attack being fought on one front. Yes, complicated, but think of it like this. What action would make her kinder to me and make Dan angrier at her? Two advantages towards the ticket with only one action: a massage. And I think it worked. Here's hoping.

Anyhow, I really need to get my hours normal. I think a sleeping pill is in order at some point. And to think not long ago I managed to fall asleep at midnight. I hope I can make this 10AM start tomorrow. I will try. Goodnight.

Program Rush

Haha, these days have been amusing, to say the least.

I don't think I mentioned it before, but the student partitions of the server computers in the network went down for a few days recently, leading to Suzy Jagger telling us all that out Computing coursework deadlines had been extended by a week.

Finding out yesterday that Jim, our Programming Fundamentals lecturer had decided against this, we found out one day prior that it was not the case for out Programming Assignment 2, and resultantly, while we were relaxing, it was due in in about 24 hours, rather than the eight days we thought. So needless to say, a bustle and rustle of speed was ushered in for all the unlucky people who had left it until the last minute. Which included me, and most of my friends. One of whom actually started roughly 12 hours before the deadline, the deadline being 2PM earlier today.

Essentially, I wrote the whole program from 1PM yesterday to 3:30AM today, with a brief 4PM to 9PM break for a meet with friends, Pirates of the Caribbean and free pizza. In that time I also watched Chip and Dale Rescue Rangers, which seriously took me back, but enough on that.

So that's quite a few hours programming. I also wrote up test data and annotated it, and even a scrambled structure chart. It was all going swimmingly until not only did I fall short on printer credit by one penny, but the Microsoft Visio chart object completely failed to use correct fonts and gave me rubbish. This meant I had to get two prints with only about 10 minutes to go before the deadline. That gave me no time to run to the LRC to top up my printer credit, which allowed 5 of my 6 pages printing. Luckily, Dan had some credit, and went to print off my last page, returning with not the last page but page 3, meaning he'd wasted a credit on nothing. Printing my last page, we saw he only had enough for one more print, meaning my Visio chart had to be corrected by hand. The only real victims of this day were the shocked Taiwanese guy who was in the small room while I screamed obscenities, and the recycling bin that now has a new hole at foot level.

Luckily, a handwritten (scrawled) flow diagram and a beautiful program made their way into the letterbox roughly eight seconds before the deadline. The bewildered people, who saw a black blur flying up two flights of stairs towards the assignment letterboxes probably knew what was going on, which is more than I can say for my Business Skills lecturer, who saw my lying in the floor in a heap near the letterboxes at 2:01PM.

But I handed it in on time. That's a real high marker there, I can feel it. Which is better than I expect most people got, considering I needed to write most of their work before it was even near completion. And Snowman Helgi was late. My eightysomething percent for the last assignment handed it in late. Woo!

Well, I have one more episode of 24 left to watch with my sister before it's time for Season 2, and she's loving it. I can't wait to watch the end again.

And you remember Derren Brown? Of course. Dan was invited to go and be on his show, and while he wants to take his girlfriend, she doesn't want to go, and he'll probably take me, so things are working out.

And I'm getting the template for this website is about to get an overhaul. Should be good. Should be.