Of choices and rumours

What do you do if you want something but are too scared to go after it?

Even though you know you should live each day as if it's your last.

What do you do when you've been told your thoughts aren't in vain,

And yet there's no word from the one person you want to hear it from?

What do you do when you love what you have,

But somehow you still want more?

Do you stay safe, or do you take a gamble and follow your heart?

Peace & Love

Of songs and friendships

Do you have a song?

A song that you had no part in writing but that somehow speaks to you? I was talking to my friend Georgie about this, and we came up with two different reasons why a song might speak to you.

Georgie's song is I'm Not Okay by My Chemical Romance. This is because she heard the song, and it gave her the incentive to change everything about her life to something she could like about herself. She feels that she owes a lot to the song, so that's why it's "her" song.

My song is Escapist by Nightwish, but not because it's changed me in any way. What Escapist does is takes what my life is already like and puts it into music. I'm a bit of a dreamer, and I don't like being stuck in the never ending loop of things. So that's "my" song.

Peace & Love

Of winter chills and longing

I think it's fair to say that summer's on it's way out. Or at least it is here in Kent. Yeah the skies are blue and clear, but it's absolutely freezing. I like summer, but I think I like winter more.

What I don't like is autumn and spring. The in between stages. I prefer the two extremes.

I miss the weirdest things about winter.

I miss the cold air whipping around my face.

I miss the smell of the rain and the artifical shine of the streetlamps when it's dark at half past four.

I miss that one frail bit of hope that we might actually have a white Christmas.

I miss the Doctor Who specials!

I miss the unbelievably long chat I have with Emi on Christmas day, and the marginally shorter one I have with Hayley,

I miss that one glorious week of doing fuck-all at school, and watching the upper sixth make a fool of the teachers on the last day. They said they might ban it, but if not, that's me in 2010!

I miss the weird things you find in Christmas Bazaars like a table full of sushi. And spending stupid amounts of money on raffle tickets knowing that I have no hope in hell of winning anything.

I miss wandering around town in the freezing cold, and only being able to afford one hot chocolate between us, resulting in us drinking it with three staws.

I miss the feel of the fire when the central heating just doesn't make the grade, so to speak.

I miss the coca-cola adverts and the things you always find on TV.

I miss it when the teachers at school let certain secrets about certain Christmas traditions slip and we all pretend to be shocked and upset when actually we've known for ages.

I miss how in primary school we used to pack things up into shoeboxes and send them as Christmas presents to children in less economically developed countries.

I miss the meal we have with Hayley's family where we play drunken board games and my brother gets pissed off because everyone picks on him.

I miss the unbelievably tacky light-up santas people have popping in and out of their chimneys.

And I miss all the Christmas raves I have with my friends.

Today's music reminds me of winter. Plus Nightwish are awesome.

Nightwish - Walking in the Air live at Hartwall Areena

Peace & Love

Of drunkeness and suprises

I have a bit of a cold, headache and a funny taste in my mouth. Worst, I have a sore throat. Two of the things I love doing the most are talking and singing, so you can imaginesore throats make me a little depressed. that

Went to Hayley's mum's birthday party last night, along with Hayley and Emi (who by the end of the night had been re-christened Jerk and Dipshit.) Everyone got REALLYthe one who doesn't drink. I got offered loads, but I kept on saying no. The drunk... except me, only good personality trait I have is that I don't give in to peer pressure. I wasn't about to give it up! Anyway, it was the most fun I've had in ages despite feeling ill, so many thanks to Hayley's family for organising it. And Emi, please don't eat the ceiling, I can imagine it tastes like crap.

(Drunk & Lovely)

Last night was also the last gig of the Nightwish tour, and needless to say, there is video evidence of how incredible it was.

Their most recent album, Dark Passion Play, has two tracks on it called Amaranth and For The Heart I Once Had. Apparently these were supposed to be bonus tracks, but ended up on the album, one because a later B-Side Escapist wasn't finished in time. The other song was meant to be a kind of Nightwish-esque take on Michael Nyman's The Heart Asks Pleasure First, which, being a cover of sorts, they had to get permission to release. Which they didn't. Anyhow, this is the original.

Michael Nyman - The Heart Asks Pleasure First

I absolutely LOVE this piece of music, and, despite being a massive Nightwish fan, kind of assumed that their version wouldn't be all that great, just because... well... Nightwish don't really do simplicity. Anyway, they don't have permission to release the thing, but they're still allowed to play the recording at shows, which they did for the outro last night.

OH. MY. GOD. It's incredible.

Yeah it's not all that true to the original, but still! I'd been expecting that it would be bad, and then I got the most pleasant surprise ever! So the moral of the story is, if you expect the worst, everything good will always feel even better!

Nightwish - The Heart Asks Pleasure First

You can't hear it all that well, but you get the general idea. Minä rakastan sinua!

Lyrics go something like:

"Silent nights surrounding me

On the shore of wistful sea

My kindest heart made me believe

The promise I wish it to be

We´ll bear the wait

Years for your heart

Little hideaways for a lonely heart

Cast away into the sea

The good in me, the child within

The cruelest heart made me forget

In moments I wish it to be

Hold inside my last fire

You will conquer death by dawn

Slave to the toil, this mortal coil

Risked by the siren that voyage

We'll bear the wait

Years for your heart

An end for winter morn

Calling us, the sirens of the dark

Frozen moments in time

Little hideaways, the meadow of life

Little hideaways for a lonely heart

We'll bear the wait

Years for your heart

Little hideaways for a lonely heart

Silent nights surrounding me

On the shore of wistful sea

My kindest heart made me believe

The promise I wish it to be"

Peace & Love

Of epic battles and devastation

Our tale begins on the eve of the eighth of September, 2009, in a girls grammar school.

The teachers have noticed something fishy.

"Something appears to be wrong with the toilets!" cried one. "They won't flush!" Baffled slowly and methodically went through a copy of the yellow pages in order to find some plumbers. by this revelation, the head teacher. Eventually, they arrived, clad in... errr... what plumbers usually wear. They shut themselves in the room where they believed the problem to be, while the head teacher peered frantically through a small window in the door. After several hours of painstaking work, the chief plumber emerged. "You might want to sit down." he explained to the head. "It isn't good news..."

At exactly 9:45 the following morning, the head's army of teachers were forced to grimly make their way up to their form rooms and deliver the news to the eagerly waiting students. One in particular wanted to put off the news for as long as possible. She walked into her form room - a hi-tech area (the computer room), which was filled with sixth formers. She handed out the letters, which had been "lovingly" prepared by the head, face down. "Now." she said, solemnly, when everybody had recieved one, "Turn them over and try not to scream."

The letters read that due to an unforseen collapsing main water pipe, there were not enough facilities to accomodate the students, and thus, they would have to be sent home. The students, needless to say, were absolutely devastated.

So, the line of students wound up from the school toward the high street, tramping their way up to Starbucks, and, inevitably, to home.

Meanwhile, the headteacher had decided that enough was enough. She called her secret base and requested an epic crack team of plumbers to come to the school and rectify the problem. After around five minutes, the plumbers burst into the room containing the rogue pipe, and began to work...

After a painstaking night of trying to contol the water supply, the (very wet) plumbers left the room, looking tired and glum. The headteacher frantically asked their commander "what is it?! WHAT'S WRONG??!!" The plumber said "I'm sorry. We did everything we could."

It was by this time early morning, and the head teacher was forced to make an announcement over the school website. It read:

"I write to advise you that unfortunately we have not been able to reinstate the water supply. As a result the school will be closed on Thursday 10 September. The updated position regarding closure will be posted on the website and you are advised to check this regularly. I should like to take this opportunity to thank you all for your help and support during the closure."

To make a long story short: I have a day off today!

Peace & Love

Of a return to the school

Music - Same old, only harder :) we have set pieces to learn and some of them are AWESOME (though we're apparently supposed to be able to play these within an hour... oh dearie me... )

English - WE ARE STUDYING MACBETH. Again, but I actually like Shakespeare now whereas in Year Eight I LOATHED it :D Not sure what else we're doing as of yet.

Japanese - NEED. TO. LEARN. THOSE. KANJI. MUST. GET. OFF. INTERNET. It's cool though, it's nice being in a class of seven people, just have to try not to get distracted this year. Back to the year 7 reigime!

Media - Possibly the most awesome subject ever! Yeah it's confusing in some ways, but our homework is basically to use the internet and watch telly and films... so far anyway, I know it's going to get waaaay more hectic.

In short - I love being in the sixth form.

Peace & Love

Of winter cravings and carniverous deer

Yesterday I went for a picnic for Carmen's very belated birthday party. It was fun, we listened to panpipes being played, got gatecrashed by some randomers who were in the park, and Carmen got attacked by a deer. The deer then called all it's friends and we were soon surrounded. Dan managed to scare them all off by running at them and yelling something that sounded like "FLOBALOBALOB!" but not before Amanda had managed to adopt one and insisted that Jodie was the father. So all in all, a great day.

I have this sudden craving for it to be winter again, even though I know it won't snow. I miss freezing days loitering in town and wet autumn wind and it getting dark early so you can see all the streetlights, and above all I miss Christmas!

Peace & Love

Of close encounters and Somerfields pasta

Went to my sixth form enrollment day today. This involved close encounters of the third kind Jon Bovi, being thankful that my ID card picture is so dark you can't see my face, and being annoyed that I had to sign up for Japanese without actually consulting the teacher first, due to her being in a meeting.

After that went swimming with Hayley (and ate some more of that AMAZING pasta from Somerfields, it's cheese and tomato but it tastes like pickled onion monster munch!). Then we went back home and had a look at her audition piece for a drama club she's in. She has to sing Wishing You Were Somehow Here Again from Phantom Of The Opera, and I'm helping her since I did it for my GCSE music performance. Well, that and an acoustic version of Let It Be by the Beatles with Emi. Only dropped one mark :)

Peace & Love