Mobile: Sport Based Nationalism

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This is a test, just to see how mobile posting goes. I'm in my living room, on my phone, sending this message to my new blog. Wimbledon, my home town and the centre of the world's biggest Tennis Tournament, is on television.

What I cannot understand, is all the fuss over national pride. Everyone is cheering for Andy Murray. Because he's British. And if he wins, then what? Why will people be happy? It doesn't prove anything about them, and proves very little about their nationality, and all the faith put in British sport stars is misplaced. It leads to disappointment and everyone is always surprised. Well, it's just a game. But even outside games I hardly think that national pride is worth anything. It leads to nationalism and eliteism. Countries are controlled by governments, and I don't think it coincidence that members of those states follow so eagerly in the decisions that the governments make. Ultimately, national pride is a form of selfishness. It's just baseless pride, but still people cry and cheer depending entirely on how one guy is hitting a ball.

I'm just not a huge fan of sport spectating. Playing sport is great, especially solo games. I love playing Tennis but my favourite is and always has been Squash. Well, for the past six years or so. I need to play more.

I am going to try and contact friends to go and see Sin City, because it's worth seeing a few times before I download it. If I download it. I'm running out of hard drive space rapidly. I've deleted half downloaded movies and almost completed ISOs in favour of seeing Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy again. I'll leave this message there. It's painful on the thumbs. I might do this more, but we'll see how it looks.

And Murray JUST lost.

The New Location

Well, if you're reading this, then you have followed your way to the new site. I have different hosting, which isn't better than my previous one, it's just larger (unlimited), and it comes with free domains, so I now have quasiblog.net, which is easier to remember, and pretty cool. Some politically minded yet infrequent poster took quasiblog.com. But if it frees up, I'll grab it. Anyway, welcome to the new site. Hopefully the archive links will work now.

It's been a couple of days since I updated, and I realise that it's less than usual, but that's mainly because: nothing's happening. It's too hot for activity, and computer activity has mainly been downloading torrents (which include some awesome new albums), and chatting to friends. I managed to do some stuff, but it's uninteresting. I picked up my passport from the Merton Council yesterday, and that was the extent of my activities. Today was, luckily, slightly different. I went out with Emma to an Italian restaurant, as tomorrow morning she leaves for Wales for 10 days. It's only 10 days, but still, she's an important enough part of my life to make an impact. But on her return, we will move into the new house. Which I want to do soon, because it's a house, and living in it makes the most of it.

We spent the rest of the evening after the meal watching wacky Japanese television. Very wacky. But just after eleven, I decided I needed to approach bed, and as I drove home, I neared a complete roadblock. Seeing a fire engine, I assumed a fire, but on bypassing it in a smaller road, I saw a silver Ford Ka: upside down. With a blonde woman inside, alive. It was a very frightening image, but I was comforted by seeing her move. It had only happened recently as they were still setting up releasing her, and still lying on the ground talking to her. She was in the driver's seat, and the other side of the car seemed pretty crushed. Any passenger would have been pretty mauled. Oddly, there was an unrelated crash that had just happened (I believe unrelated) a few hundred metres up the road where someone just crashed into a post. Not a good time to be driving on Danebury Avenue.

Anyway, with the subliminal horror-of-crashing images aside, I have had at last a relaxing few days. I helped Jenny move to Whitelands earlier, and hopefully I can take her and Yukina on a driving lesson tomorrow, which would be a bad idea if I pay attention to the highly graphic omens portrayed to me earlier, but I have no belief in that, so I'll be fine.

I'm coming to the closing tracks of X&Y, the new Coldplay album, courtesy of torrentspy.com. I would not have bought it, and if I find I like it enough, I will buy it. But I'm enjoying it free, as I feel, as a long term ripped off customer, I should be. I'll be updating the design in the next few weeks, but for now I like it as is. I'm coordinating with all my forum presence and messenger services, so it'll wait until I can make it all unify. I wish more people would use Skype. Anyway, for now, I'll be heading bedward, and making an attempt at sleep. I have early morning shopping. Goodnight.

Smile Like You Mean It

Well, this is the first time I have listened to The Killers' album properly, and it's good so far. I know it's been a few days since my update, and a lot has happened, meaning that not only do I have too much to write, but I have no time to write it in. It's kind of a painful circuit, if you know what I mean.

Taking Carlos to the airport was an official end of an era, and though dealing with it, I was sad about it. I spoke to him today, it's almost as if he hasn't left, but still. Next year is another year, and we'll meet new people, and we'll make new friends, and we'll have new groups. But I will still mourn for missing friends, and the days that I will miss. I listened to my official coming home from Heathrowe album, The Colour and the Shape, and despite what it says in my previous entry, it was not followed by picnic or Nabe. Emma and Mizuki and Kaori and I did go to Tesco's and we did have a good day in Froebel field, where we still ran, and we kicked the same ball that I had kicked with Carlos and Yukina and Jenny a couple of nights previously. We had mini pizzas and drinks while we talked and raced, and that field, out of nowhere, is now a location of memories. After we realised we didn't have a good volleyball or a frisbee, we made another trip to Tesco's, which meant we bought a frisbee and a badminton/volleyball set for very little.

Despite getting to sleep at midnight that evening, I slept until 11:45AM the next day, meaning I missed my appointment to meet Kaori, Emma and Mizuki at 11AM, and met them at 1PM instead, where Katou was waiting, and where Yoko appeared shortly after. At that point, the 70 sit-ups that I did with Jenny nights previously caused me excrutiating pain, which is a shame, because it meant I couldn't do the "crab" (or at least that is my excuse). We played volleyball and badminton by the lake, as well as frisbee, and had a perfect picnic with fried chicken and tuna salad. After this, another sixty courses of Nabe. It seems there is a neverending supply of it when it's cooked, and some people can eat a lot more than me. I found that, driving my car onto Froebel sports field, high-beam-headlights and doors-open/loud-stereo makes a partymobile even in the dark. Following a short lived game, Kaori, Emma, Katou and I sat in the field where I star gazed at Sirius and considered light traveling from wherever the star was, however far away that was. We played language games, and then we toured the University with a novel game of "It", that involved deception, double-crossing and screaming, and then home.

Today, aside from giving my father a lift to Heathrowe for his trip to Holland, and listening to a different album on the way back (Electric, disc 2), and purchasing a guitar case from eBay (which just about fits), I had a relaxing day with Dan, where we looked at his place, watched Mr and Mrs Smith (which I was pleasantly surprised with, while he hated it), and went stationary shopping, where I finally got some DVD+RWs, so I can start emptying my HDD. He bought a desk, and from there I went home, and decided to write a blog entry.

That's a summary. I realise it's short on my insight and personal feelings and is more of a log of what has happened, the more in depth entries will resume when it isn't too hot to think. But you know, I'm going to get something off my chest right now:

I'd like to thank every single one of my friends, every person who has had a positive influence on me since I started University, because as of mid/late June, this has been so far the best year of my life. My smiles have been genuine, I have had real reason to be happy, and I'm very glad of all of you. Thank you. By September, I'm sure the year will have improved, but as of now, I am happy enough with it to class it as my happiest.

This album is getting a little samey, and not as impressive as the beginning, but I still like it. I will listen to Demon Days soon, comprising the two albums I downloaded today. Hooray for resumed illegal files, I am happy with P2P once more.

Still Too Hot

No matter what the reports say, it isn't cooler. Maybe they said it was hotter. I don't know. It still feels like a permanent veil of sweat.

After yesterday's entry I proceeded to the Nabe party, lovingly cooked by Yukina with input from Shun and others, which was delicious. I had forgotten how good Nabe was. I'm having it again tomorrow, which should be fun, but it's with Emma and Mizuki and Kaori, and I think it'll be more early evening. This is after a picnic, which will come after Tesco's, which we will go to after I drop Carlos off at Heathrowe. He's returning to Mexico, and that's going to be sad for all, as he's an awesome guy, and we'll all miss him. But he's coming back, and that's good, which lessens the sadness of saying goodbye to everyone else.

I have found the difficulty of this blog is that knowing the intended audience means I attempt to be tactful with words as so not to make people uncomfortable or upset in any way. However, this can be limiting, as it means I am less open than with a diary, and therefore can be cryptic and limited. To combat this, I am going to try and be a little more open and free about my feelings, but as long as the readers can take this as more of a flow of consciousness, and not be upset or feel guilty or have any negative feelings in any way.

After the Nabe last night, and after a brief stint dancing with Yukina, Shun and Erin went home, leaving me, Jenny, Yukina and Carlos to whittle away the evening into the early hours. We spent most of it running around the Froebel field, either racing, punching or wrestling each other, with spells of reaction games and sit ups. It ended around 5AM, when I managed to get to bed. That was the latest I had been to bed in a while, so it wasn't good. But it was so much fun, and we proved that three-against-one, we could all take down Carlos if we needed to.

Today I spent sweltering in my room, reading Manga and watching Tsubasa Chronicle, which has such a stunning first scene that I had to watch it a few times. I then met up with Emma and Mizuki for some take away (I discovered chicken Chop Suey, which was not what I expected, but really good all the same). We chatted for a while, and I am still at the conclusion that I will love her forever, unless she changes unexpectedly as we discussed today, or I change unexpectedly enough to not find her interesting. We also discussed my reference to her as a crossword. After this I hobbled around to Yukina's flat to listen to her flatmate Ihab talk about his family and his country. People kept asking me if I was tired or if I was ok, but it wasn't that, it was just I had absolutely no interest in his family. He has a lovely family and a wonderful culture surrounding his family, but I have no interest in it. I just couldn't take my mind off other things ("other things" ref. paragraph 3), and I felt emotional about them. The new Foo Fighters' album is very solid, and is very emotional. I am enjoying it (disc one so far) more than I expected. It really is shaping how I channel my feelings right now, which is usually through speed on the roads and music to accompany it. It's just a short phase I will grow out if. But I am glad I have the confidence to speed near police cars now. Thank God this is not America where that would warrant an immediate siren blip and flashing lights.

I have to sleep now, that is important. I need to be up at 7:30AM tomorrow, so, you know. I just wanted to say that last night, the running in the field, was a perfect night, and one I will honestly remember for a very long time. It was the last time in I-don't-know-how-long that the four of us will be together, and I will miss that a lot.

Welcome to Mt Clare

Ah, it's a perfectly cool summer day, the sun shining gently and a cool breeze is making it feel like a sky of happy faces is smiling down upon us.

Actually, I'm lying. God has turned on the microwave and accidently set it to 'apocalypse'. The trees are perfectly still as all the heat sits on us, with absolutely no breeze taking any heat away from out already overheated and painfully clammy bodies. This is why I hate the summer, I hate the heat, and I hate this entire half of the year, because even in England, there are days where the heat is unbearable and horribly uncomfortable, meaning that I cannot even sit in a dark room alone at a computer as it is too hot, and I am practically forced to go outside, meaning the donning of sunglasses just so my eyes aren't totally closed while driving.

I hate hot. Hate. I put 'hate' in a new sentence because it needed a capital letter and I wanted to remain grammatical.

I am now in Mount Clare, another version of Hell. In fact, I can think of very little worse than being in Mount Clare on a hot day. But to ease my pain, I'm with Mizuki, Kaori and Emma. They're getting up from their computers now, so now I feel I must end my blog horribly prematurely. But let me just let you know that had it not been for those three these past few days would have been intolerable enough for me to not actually leave my house at all. The combination of heat and general dampening of emotions, coupled with the sudden introduction of a £540 loan repayment, means that things hadn't been too peachy for the past few days. But it's been good to spend time with them again.

I haven't seen Jenny or Carlos properly for a few days. Maybe it's because I'm not nocturnal anymore, but I miss seeing them. Days should be longer. I have been getting up at a good hour again, except for today, when I had a lie in until 10AM. Wow, rebel, look at me go.

I haven't had the chance to train so much the past few days. Today has been the first day we didn't see Shouty and Katou (it turns out his name was this, rather than Katto). Shouty flew home yesterday, but we waved him off from Hammersmith tube station. It was really sad to see him go. We'll still see Katou a lot though, and I'm sure we'll keep learning each other's language.
After saying goodbye yesterday, I went shopping with the everyone and Yukina bought all the Nabe food. Green Day is on Sunday, rather than Saturday, so I can go to the Nabe on Saturday, which I hope isn't inconvenient to the amount of food purchased. Sunday is set to be 31°C, and that's 3 degrees worse than today, being only 28°C. Wonderful. Apparently, in a few days it will by muggy. The day after, it will be tuggy. After that, weggy and thurggy. Etc. That's one of my father's oldest jokes.

Today we went to pay the first month of our rent and the deposit, which for me was about £860, but at least I get a lot of that back later. I should be getting my Whitelands damage deposit back in July, which should help me out, at least a little, for my trip.

Speaking of my trip, it's looking like it will be something like eight million degrees or something. Hooray. I'll have to survive. Speaking of surviving, I rediscovered BitTorrents, which are my rediscovered lifeblood. Unblocked ports means that I can download as much illegal stuff as I want. I love it. Tsubasa Chronicle is my first port of call, as well as The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy film, though I have the TV show and the radio show available to me as well, which I might go for.

Anyway, it's good to be watching 24 with Becky again. It's so great. Series two is getting exciting again after a very brief lapse after the key event in the middle of the show.