Anyone who has been following this Blog for any length of time will know that this year I have been doing a 365 Self-Portrait challenge – a self portrait every day for a year.

And anyone who has been following my Twitter will know that last night I discovered I had failed it. On the 8th November, I forgot to take a photograph.

I think “gutted” doesn’t even come close.

I remember that day. I had work in the morning, then I came home and dicked about on the computer, before heading to Garry’s and going to a firework display, then home to a film and then bed. I can’t remember taking a photo anywhere, but there are days where I can’t remember taking one but I have and it’s somewhere…but no. Nothing. No photo on my camera, my point and shoot, my laptop, my phone, the iPhone…nothing. No photo. I’ve failed my 365.
I don’t know how I feel about this. I know I feel absolutely awful about it. I feel pathetic that I can’t even get this right. I feel stupid and angry at myself.

I don’t know what to do about it. I’m keeping going with it – it was day 312, I don’t have long left – but what do I do after that?

The 365 has kind of sucked the joy out of photography for me now. Photography used to be fun and interesting, but now it just feels like a chore. I’m looking forward to December 31st when I can quit my project and start taking photos for fun again – or maybe not take any at all.

But I don’t know what to do with my account. My Flickr account has hit Explore (where good photos are put) 16 times. I have over 1000 photos, 49 sets, I’m members of so many groups, and have had some photos copy-catted because they’re good. But I’ve got a lot of crap on there too, and I’m torn between deleting the account completely or going through all my photos and deleting the bad ones – 365s included.

I really don’t know. All I know is that I feel really quite rubbish about myself right now, and stupid for feeling that way.

It’s a normal Sunday at work, and I am dancing round shop floor like a happy bunny. A tall man with a shaved man walks up to me and I smile widely at him.

“Hey, can I help at all?” I ask. He hands out a copy of the new Forza game, still in its cellophane wrapper.

“Yeah, I bought this with a console yesterday, they said I could come back and trade it in?”

“Sure, that’s absoloutely fine, it gets £25 I think”

“Can I trade it even if the cellophane is taken off?”

“Yes, you can trade anything in, whether it’s in the cellophane or not”

Before I’ve even finished talking, he’s taken his keys out and used them to rip the cellophane off. I think my puzzled-ness showed on my face, because he then said:

“I know what you people are like, you’d trade it in and then sell it like it was a new game to get the extra money”

…well, thanks for that. Thanks for thinking so little of me and the people I work with that we’d lie like that.

We managed to actually sort it so that he could just return the game rather than trade it, getting him £15 more than he should have had. He then said

“Have you had loads of new 360s bought this week?”

“A fair few. After all the illegally chipped ones don’t work, we’ve had a bit of a run on people getting new ones”

“Yeah, that’s why we’d got one. We’re gutted, we’d chipped ours and had loads of games we hadn’t paid for, brand new ones and everything”

So it seems his moral compass points north so fiercely that he’ll take steps to make sure other people can’t cheat and be immoral…but it’s a big wibbly on him, and he can steal games from companies with it being A-Ok.

Dick.

I’m not sure whether it was when I was asked to dress as a solider Monday night and Tuesday day or when I saw the parade march past our shop window, which was filled with posters full of a modern solider walking through a desert and others with various bits of army symbols and pictures, that I started to feel uneasy.

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 was released today. It’s a huge new release. We’ve had a charity raffle to win it going on, we’ve had posters up for months, a delivery of almost a thousand games, and huge interest in it. There’s been price wars, we had huge queues at the midnight launch last night, and there’s no doubt it’s a huge enormous game that thousands of people really want.

And I have no real problem with it, or games of its ilk. If you want to spend your evenings playing that you’re in a war, then carry on. I can’t understand why you’d want to, but if you do then it’s not my place to say anything.

I just wish, wish, WISH that Activision had thought more about the release date. Maybe it’s just me being overly sensitive, but releasing a war game the day before remembrance day seems a bit…sick.

You’d think that if you turned up to a seminar having not done the reading, you’d keep quiet and listen, wouldn’t you?

And you’d think that if you turned up the next week to a seminar having done the WRONG reading, you’d keep quiet and try to understand, wouldn’t you?

You WOULDN’T ask inane questions, make bold assertions on what Mackie and Moore are talking about, and argue with everything the seminar tutor is saying, would you?

Because you don’t know what they’re talking about. Your inane questions don’t relate to the text. Your bold assertions are actually the complete opposite of what the scholars are saying. The seminar tutor has studied this stuff for years and knows what he is talking about. You, you smelly, ignorant, lazy prick who hasn’t even bothered to prepare for the seminars have NO CLUE what you’re talking about.

It was especially galling when last week he came out and boasted about having not read the reading, when I had spent seven hours preparing the presentation and had a minor mental breakdown over it, sobbing and contemplating quitting University. But seminar boy comes in and makes stupid comments and shows his ignorance of the text, but still tried to rule over the seminar and demonstrate his cleverness, which actually just leads the discussions away from what is actually relevant and what we need to know to pass our exams and stuff.

Seminar boy, you are a cock.

I’m sure you’ve read what I’m posting about already, but still. Just in case.

It’s found here. It’s an article by a woman called Jan Moir, who I have never heard of before but who I now firmly believe should be one of the people at the top of the list when The Revolution comes.

I’m sure I don’t need to tell you that the article is vicious, spiteful, bigoted, evil, homophobic, and generally everything you’d expect from the Daily Mail. The thing that surprised me was that this article was a particular kind of stupid too.

“Another real sadness about Gately’s death is that it strikes another blow to the happy-ever-after myth of civil partnerships”

There may be a happy-ever-after myth about civil partnerships, but surely it’s not different from the happy-ever-after myth surrounding the idea of marriage too. The kind that is shoved down our throats as soon as we are old enough to hear any fairy story or watch a Disney film, in fact.

“Gay activists are always calling for tolerance and understanding about same-sex relationships, arguing that they are just the same as heterosexual marriages. Not everyone, they say, is like George Michael. Of course, in many cases this may be true.“

Apart from that you have willies with willies, and lady bits with lady bits, they are the same. It’s two people who love each other, they just have the same sexual organs. You think that same-sex relationships are perverted compared to heterosexual relationships? Guess what. Straight people can be perverted too. Just look here. Or here. Or here. Hell, look here, here, here. And guess what, you sanctimonious bitch? Being perverted can be damn fun.

“Yet the recent death of Kevin McGee, the former husband of Little Britain star Matt Lucas, and now the dubious events of Gately’s last night raise troubling questions about what happened.”

Why? Because they’re both gay? What are you suggesting, that they were both indulging in some mystical ritual that only gay people know about that killed them both? Why does it raise troubling questions? Two famous people who happen to be gay have died recently. So obviously, it’s linked? So…by that logic, because both David Cameron’s son died and John Travolta’s son died, troubling questions should be raised about the immoral lifestyle about being a famous person’s son? Kevin McGee wasn’t even IN a civil partnership at the time, for Christ’s sake!

“It is important that the truth comes out about the exact circumstances of his strange and lonely death. As a gay rights champion, I am sure he would want to set an example to any impressionable young men who may want to emulate what they might see as his glamorous routine. For once again, under the carapace of glittering, hedonistic celebrity, the ooze of a very different and more dangerous lifestyle has seeped out for all to see.”

Whoah, whoah. Why was his lifestyle only going to be emulated by young gay men? He went out on an island with his partner to a party, smoked some cannabis, and brought a third party back to the relationship bed. That’s an ideal situation for a lot of young people, gay or straight (The ones that I know anyone, I can’t speak for all young people. And it doesn’t apply to me) And why is this any different from any other celebrity and their hi-jinks? This is of course assuming, as Jan has done, that the third party was brought back for sex – because obviously, all gay men are sluts, right?

All I’m going to point towards is this. News ARSE have injected a little humour into the situation, as always, but I’m genuinely flabbergasted by the sheer level of hate and ignorance this woman has displayed.

And I’ve just heard a guy on Radio One spell “choice” as “chouse”, sincerely as “sincee” and cemetery as “symatree”. I’m losing faith in the world.

I haven’t been ill for so long, in at least six months, so when Fresher’s Flu attacked me on Monday I was completely unprepared.

God, it was awful. A real “my body is aching, my head hurts, my throat hurts, my ears hurt, I’m so hot, I’m so cold, I’m dizzy, I’m weak” illness. I’m kind of riding the end now, with just a head, ear, and throat ache, which is bad enough. It was two truly horrible days, especially considering I went to work on Tuesday for fear I’d get fired otherwise. Plus, Garry got it too, so we both felt like death.

Still, done now. Time to get my head down and start doing Uni things properly, yes?

BTW, I’ve added a new widget to the webpage for my Twitter account, which I’m actually using now. If you want to find out such amazing things about me such as when I’m cold at University and when I accidentally burp loudly in embarrassing places, follow me

I’m a week into University so far, and have done very little actual work.

I started out with the best of intentions. I was going to come in early every day, do lots of work and reading, then stay late to do work.

I think there are two reasons for this. One, I’m still not really very comfortable at Uni – it’s still a bit of a maze to me, the only thing I really know are the Arts Centre, the rooms where all the events go on, and my lectures.

The library, for example, is a huge, five floor labyrinth of a building that I ventured into once, panicked, and left. I’m sure that there will be rooms for me to work in, but I’m really not sure where they are. I probably should go in now, leave now so that I can have forty five minutes before my lecture to explore the library. I am fully aware that this would be a Very Sensible Idea.

Instead, I’m sitting in my pants on my bed listening to Radio One.

I need to stop being so lazy.

I am listening to a LOT of Radio One recently. It’s roughly a forty minute drive into University, and I have the radio on both ways. Usually it falls on Radio One, because I’m usually in the mood for a good sing song and…well, singing to Classic FM is just too darn difficult.

But it’s more than that. I listen to Radio One in the morning too, purely because I have a love affair with all of the members of the Chris Moyles team who aren’t Chris Moyles. I’d quite like to stick a pin in him, and squeeze him until all the goo comes out. So for 1 to 2 hours whilst I’m pottering round my room getting ready or reading to kill time, Radio One is on in the background. Occasionally it spills over on to Fearne Cotton, which makes me want to hit things, but apart from that…

And then, of course, I’ll be listening to it on the way home and think “Ooo, I just want to see what happens with that feature they mentioned…” and put it on whilst I’m taking a photograph or doing some work.

Fancying a change from all this Radio One listenage, I decided to check out the Warwick Radio Station at the societies fair today, with half a mind to sign up and help out. Instead, I got a leaflet about RAdio Warwick (or RAW) that had a condom stuck to the back.

…

Two very random things to put together. What are they saying – use this when you get bored of the radio? Or vica versa? Maybe you’re supposed to listen to the radio whilst using the condom, but I can’t imagine having someone’s voice breaking in and telling you the news whilst you’re going at it is going to be particularly pleasant.

I’ve had a deep and passionate love of Ikea for about a year or so now. I think it was probably the main thing that signified my ascent into adult life – my desire to spend an afternoon wandering round the little rooms, running my hands over the smooth, clean surfaces, feeling a little furniture-broody over the amazing cabinets that would frame the television so prettily, and that were just begging to be filled with DVDs (for the cupboards) and photo frames (for the open cabinets).

Wednesday, I finally bought my first piece of Ikea furniture for my bedroom. I’d been wanting to give it a  bit of a make-over for a while, mainly because I’ve been a bit down over the fact that all my friends and acquaintances got/are getting nice new bedrooms to decorate whilst I’ve been stuck with the same one I’ve had for years. Cue lots of sorting out and re-arranging. Also, I needed a lot of new storage space for all the crap I’ve accumulated over the past gap year, and so my MALM six drawer chest seemed perfect. It’s this, but in black:

However, being an Ikea virgin, I had no idea what a pain in the fucking arse it was going to be to put together. I started to assemble it at roughly 8:30pm on Friday night, despite Garry’s lethargy. He knew it was going to be a bitch. I’m not sure even he was aware quite how much of a bitch it was going to be.

I finally finished it today, at about 3pm. Admittedly I was out all yesterday, but still. Three fucking days to put one piece of furniture together.

That being said, it is possibly the most beautiful piece of furniture known to mankind, and I would have toiled for longer just to see its smooth lines, the gleaming dark wood, the satisfying “whooosh-dink” sound of the drawers opening and closing, and the sheer convenience of having somewhere to hide my sex toys that doesn’t get them covered with under-the-bed fluff.

I don’t understand why members of the public appear perfectly happy to abuse people in shops.

Sam was at work yesterday, and was threatened by a big scary man who told her he was going to cut her up, called her a slag, a fucking bitch, and threatened to rape her. All because she refused to buy his PS2 as it was in unsellable and therefore -un-buyable condition.

On Thursday, a woman told me that the fact I had to take her name and address when she returned an item was ridiculous, and that she shouldn’t have to give details because it was my fault for not supplying a booklet with her second hand game. She shouted at me so much it made me cry.

A few Sundays ago, a seven year old boy with wide innocent eyes came up to the counter and said “I don’t like this music, turn it off or I’m going to blow your face off and kill your children too”. The boy was seven. His parents laughed, didn’t apologise, and then proceeded to spend £70 on him, including buying him Grand THeft Auto IV, an 18 rated game filled with violence, drugs, and prostitution.

What is it about entering a shop that makes me such pricks? Discuss.