Friday, November 7
The Matrix!!!
I really, really want to wax lyrical about Revolutions, but I want to go home right now. I'll write something epic over the weekend, and post it here. Don't worry if you haven't seen the film yet, and don't want to know the end, I'll post it in spoiler form (i.e you can't see it normally, you have to click and drag over it to be able to read the text).
Suffice it to say that for me it was a hugely satisfying end to the trilogy.
In other news, I spent yesterday afternoon at my friend Laura's house down in "the ghetto" of Roehampton. Their flat is so cool, all Ikea-esque in every room. And her housemates are all gorgeous. I knew them already, from various nights out, but they are oh-so-fine. I want to live in that house.
Laura's also inspired me to start putting up a load of photos in my room. She's got loads from the past few years all over one wall, and I've decided to put a load of mine up covering one of the big white blocks that I have on my walls. Should look pretty good.
TTFN. (I used to love Winnie the Pooh, in a literary sense (ahem))
Wednesday, November 5
And Counting...
3 and a half hours to go until The Matrix: Revolutions. Hurrah!
Very, Very Excited
Why, pray tell?
Because in around 7 hours I will be watching The Matrix: Revolutions at the cinema! I am absolutely bursting at the seams with excitement for seeing this film, even if the BBC News review of it isn't particularly brilliant. I don't care! I sat and watched Reloaded again last night, and it blew me away once more. I hadn't seen it since the second time I saw it in the cinema, about 5 months ago, so it was just as fresh as the first time I saw it. And I picked up on a couple of subtleties that I missed out on in the cinema.
Christ, I am sooooo excited.
And speaking of the BBC News website, I came across this page yesterday. It's a daily round-up of the world's media reporting on certain big stories. It's very informative, and enables you to see what (for example) the Israeli newspapers are making of the recent spate of terrorist attacks in Iraq.
Incidentally, I read on that site about how the Chinese government is forcing all but two of the country's newspapers to be free from government financing. In essence, creating a free(ish) press for the country. Government departments are also no longer being forced to subscribe to certain periodicals. Whilst this means that some publishers will go out of business, due to a lack of subsidies, the creation of a free press in China is a huge step forward, and can only be a good thing.
And yes, that was a part of my blog which considered the world at large. Possibly the first of many, possibly not. It depends. If I read a news story which interests me, and I deem worthy of a wider (ahem) audience, I will probably post a reference here. I'm also going to start putting in more links to websites which are relevant to whatever it is that I'm on about, be it news, films, music, books, whatever.
Books-wise (damn my lack of planning a post, and being inspired by some random word to add another paragraph or two), I've almost finished reading Branded, by Alissa Quart. It's about the way in which teens and "tweens" are targeted incredibly aggresively by corporations and brands, and it makes for quite worrying reading. It's not just about brands per se, it also concentrates on the changes that have altered teenagers' lives irrevocably. These include the extreme pressure placed on teenagers (by their parents, peers and themselves) to get into an Ivy League college (it's an American book...), and the lengths to which some teenagers will go to get a place. These colleges are supposedly "branded" (there's the connection, right?), and teenagers aspire to be the brand, or at least to be part of the brand. It's not as good as No Logo, but it is a good read. Go have a gander.
And on that note, I end this sprawling, unstructured and downright random post. Leave me messages!
Monday, November 3
Hmmm....
That last post was pretty damn depressing, was it not? Ahhh well, we all get down from time to time. The subject of women is my biggest bugbear at the moment, so it was only fitting that I ranted about that for a little while. And yet still nothing changes. You'd think that I had at least got something out of my system, but nope, the same nagging feeling of being single still pervades. Fuck it, can't be arsed any more.
On a positive note, I texted my lovely, gorgeous, ultra-friendly friend Laura today. She's pretty much the only other person from back home who goes to uni in London, and I haven't seen her for a while. We're meeting up on Thursday, and probably going for a meal or something. Catch up on old times and all that. She walked a big chunk of the Great Wall of China a few weeks ago, for charity, so I want to hear all about that, as well as everything else going on in her life. Should be a good laugh.
Anyway, I'm off to watch more Matrix: Revolutions trailers online, whilst putting off doing an essay that I need to do by the end of today. Meh, it can wait. Especially for the Matrix. Why can't Wednesday come any quicker?!
Sunday, November 2
I Wrote This.
Loneliness is the worst feeling. Feeling alone when you’re amongst people is even worse. BEING alone when you’re amongst people is definitely the worst feeling.
It is with that in mind that I choose to tell the tale of an evening spent at home. Home. My home. The single place in the world where I should feel wanted and secure. The biggest single lie ever told.
To put it in simple terms, tonight was a house party that we were hosting in honour of Pete’s (one of my housemates) 21st birthday. Well, in any case it turned out to be more of a “sitting around drinking social event” than a party, but it was okay, I suppose. I had / have had a fair few beers, but I’m generally feeling none the worse for wear. A little double vision, from time to time, but I know what I’m doing and what I’m typing.
As per usual at one of these bashes, I had my momentary (read “15 minutes”) pause where I felt totally and utterly alone. I get this way every so often, especially when all around me I see everybody being happy in each other’s company. This isn’t to say that I felt as if I didn’t know anybody, because I knew a shitload of people who were there. I just felt weird, probably because everybody who I knew there (that wasn’t one of my housemates) was a friend of a friend. I knew them well enough to be at least amicable, and at most very friendly with, but they weren’t quite MY friends.
I felt let down, because a few of my friends who’d promised that they’d come to the party didn’t come, which in turn led to my being (relatively) friendless throughout. Add to this my annoyance about (or, resignation to) the fact that I am still single, and probably will be for a while to come, and I’m sure that it is clear just how crap I was feeling. Especially considering that there were a load of couples around.
I fucking hate how just about everywhere I go at the moment there are always couples around. Always, and always displaying their mutual love (lust?) through physical reassurances to each other, such as kissing and so forth. Are they particularly insecure, insomuch as they need to constantly display to the world (each other) that they are in love (lust)? I had a pair of friends who were like that. They were so insecure that they just had to be all over each other at every single opportunity, just to reassure each other that they were wanted and appreciated.
I can’t be doing with any of that shit. I’m very (sort of) secure with myself, especially when it comes to having any kind of relationship with the opposite sex that goes beyond friendship. He says, being a virgin and without a girlfriend for over three (three!) years…
I reckon that I am one of those people who expects the world to fall into his lap. A degree, a job, a career, a woman, a relationship, a family, absolutely everything. I don’t want to go out into the big wide world and hunt for these things. I don’t want to be rejected. Ever. I guess that I’m scared of rejection. Big deal. Who isn’t? Everybody wants to be accepted, everybody wants to conform to some extent. We all do, it’s human nature. So why do I feel so weird to be this way?
Perhaps as an illustration of this point, I should draw attention to my methods of action whilst in a club (etc). I’ve been going to pubs, clubs and bars for about three to four years, and in all of that time, I’ve only ever asked one girl who I didn’t know to dance. One! In about hundreds of times that I’ve gone out, it’s only ever been one girl that I’ve asked to dance. I like dancing, I really do, but I feel so scared of rejection (at least subconsciously, at any rate) that I never ever ask a girl to dance. Incidentally, the one time I did ask a girl to dance, it didn’t get me anywhere. So, 0% success rate then. Brilliant.
And just what am I going to do to change all of this? Absolutely fuck all. Being scared of rejection doesn’t go away with time, and without facing that fear. And yet I’m too scared to even face the fear. I’m too scared to go out and just try to get girls to dance with me (as an example). The fear of being rejected even overwhelms common sense, and even the deep-down chivalrous nature that requires men to be the one to risk everything by being the ones who initiate conversation, etc. I have that chivalrous nature (hey, so I’m middle class. Fuck you), and that also fucks me over in this aspect of life (existence?).
What a pointless and nihilistic way of existing, you might say. Well, so be it. Every (most) other aspects of my life are tootling along just fine, so why risk them for the possibility of acceptance unconditionally by another? Majority rule. It works, even if the minority is right.
