Spring Adventures

Last Tuesday saw the arrival of my one and only Mark (as well as the release of Portal two). Since then we have been on a couple of crazy adventures, as well as some not so crazy ones:

London
On Thursday, Mark, Hayley and I journeyed into London on the train. The journey itself is one of over an hour, but we came prepared with Uno cards and managed to get a table.

We arrived in London shortly after eleven am, and headed to the destination of the Tate Modern. Our outing was supposedly to see art and gain a little culture, but after realising that the majority of the art (even in the Tate) was paintings, we decided that our boredom was not about to be remedied by the type of art you hang on walls. To be perfectly honest, when I think of the kind of Art I enjoy the most, I think of sculpture. I guess I find more interest in something that I can walk around and potentially interact with than something that I'm not even allowed to photograph. Aside from the photo to the left, I found very little interesting there.

Instead of going with the plan of visiting two more galleries, we decided to head to the sea-life centre in London near the London eye, which meant jumping on the tube and heading back to Waterloo and walking from there. The London Eye was jam packed with people, it was such a lovely day, so I guess it wasn't surprising.

The sea life centre was pleasantly cool, and well worth the money. From turtles to familiar finned tropical specimens, every second inside that dark cool building was enjoyed. I got this especially nice picture of a zebra turkyfish (right).

The way back was fairly uneventful, except for the presence of sushi (perhaps a bit ironic looking back on it) and more Uno.


A day out with Ash
Yesterday we went on another adventure with Ash. It was the original plan to go and see a film, but after looking at the schedule and deciding that we actually didn't want to see anything playing, we decided to go swimming instead. And we would've done... if we had actually felt like it at the time. As it was though, we thought that a shake-a-way was far more called for than a chlorine filled pool full of kids. I ended up with a double peach, Mark a double raspberry and Ash a double milky-bar.

After that we decided that we could go to Ikea and walk around. The massiveness of the place was probably what drew us to it. And the idea of decking out yet more of our lives with flat-pack works of genius. As we were walking around I snapped this shot of Ash sitting in the cushion box with mark attacking him with cushions (left).

After Ikea we headed back to Ash's where we spent a good portion of the evening playing Mariokart Wii and watching The Forty Year Old Virgin, a film I hadn't seen until last night. It was a good film, it has to be said.

Soon afterwards we headed out for fish and chips, a delight to say the least, and then home.

In the coming week there are sure to be more adventures, so stay tuned. :)

What Should I Say?

Relationships can be tough, I know that much, but sometimes friendships can be even tougher. When you're close to someone but they're blind to what they're doing, how do you tell them? How do you let them know that the things they say and do get an audience of shared glances from those listening, and that whenever they say anything about a subject, that they don't actually know about, the rest of the group just nod and smile because they've learnt not to contradict. And if you do tell them, how do you do so without getting a backlash of nasty words shot in your direction.

I remember a particularly ugly moment in one of the relationships I had where the guy I was seeing, when confronted by his mother, told her that I had done something that he had done to get himself out of trouble. To be honest I should've left right then. People who can't take the blame for their own mistakes, now there's a subject. I could probably harp on for hours about them, but I won't, I'll just say this: it's an unattractive quality and in my opinion one that needs to be squashed. It's almost the same as not admitting you're wrong.

I wonder, sometimes, if people examine their own actions in hindsight like I examine mine. I see myself in a neutral light when I do, and anything that I did wrong gets apologised for and wiped clean. I know that I have no right to judge someone else's relationship, so I try not to. There are always two sides to every story, and when you look at both it often becomes clear that whatever happened was a joint effort, whether you like it or not.

Recently I remember a particularly volatile conversation in which the other person blamed everyone except themselves for the news I had just given them. They called it backhanded, and yelled a lot. If they'd got their act together in the beginning we probably wouldn't have had that moment when they yelled and I sat and took it. Let's face it, we'd been talking about it since last summer when Mark came over the first time. But you didn't suggest it then. We talked about it in more depth at Christmas, but you didn't do anything about it then. And now you claim it's too late, but someone else has found flights, and I'm not even sure you wanted to come in the first place. You ask what his problem is with you, but I think it's you who has a problem with him. He doesn't say bad things about you, yet you blame him for my mistakes, and your own too. Blame me and you. Leave him out of it.

Rant over. That's it. Later guys.

Old Friends

Sometimes I wonder what drives the need for us to make friends and connect with people. Is it peer pressure? I mean we're pushed from a young age to make and keep friends, to play together nicely, and to learn to share with them. Or is it a deep-seated need, a need to be understood and feel we're worth the time?

I don't have many friends, I've never been very good at keeping them, though I'm told I make them easily. I tend to treat most people I meet as friends, it's true, but the majority of them only ever get labelled as acquaintances. If I were to put a number on how many good friends I have I would say three (four if you count my sister Lizzie). I guess when I open up to people I do it slowly, though I'll give insight to everyone, I won't give just anyone the pieces of me though.

After Hayley and Ash broke up, I was unsure about whether we could all still be friends. I listened to Hayley talking about things a lot in the month after and me and Ash didn't talk all that much. Recently, though (actually since my computer broke), me and Ash have been talking a lot more. I enjoy playing guild wars with him, probably for the first time ever, and all in all it feels like I'm reconnecting with an old friend.

In college, me and Ash were very good friends. We talked every day, saw each other every day, and we had a genuine friendship. We talked a lot from random stuff to relationship stuff, even in the year that we hardly saw each other we remained friends.

I think, though, that when he and Hayley got together I moved away a bit, emotionally and mentally. I didn't want to get in the way, and I am very aware that I flirt... a lot. When I say this I don't mean that I lead men on or anything, I am always clear about my intentions. The reason I withdraw is because I don't want to be "that girl who flirts with you" as labelled by the girlfriend, because girls never trust the intentions of other girls, even if they're best friends. I don't want to be the one who she brings up every time you fight, or whatever. So I withdraw.

Now that me and Ash have reconnected though, I feel as if our friendship has more staying power. We've fallen straight back into the way we used to be. We have strange conversations involving the world domination of hamsters and how Thor (my guinea pig - see a few photos page) is the chosen one who will lead the guinea pigs to victory.

I'm looking forward to spending much time with Mark and Ash while Mark is over (and Hayley if she doesn't need to spend the time on her FYP).

I hope we will do many awesome things this Easter.

Dust and Bunnies

Ever had one of those days when you feel like everything you touch just turns to dust and falls apart? I seriously feel like I'm having an entire week like that. Until now I didn't really realise how reliant I am on being able to game. It may sound strange to some of you, but without Guild Wars I find myself unable to concentrate on anything else. I hesitate to say bored because I reply to anyone complaining of boredom: "only boring people get bored".

It started with the graphics card: sadly, my 9800 GX2 is dead. As is Ash's 8800 ultra. I have my fingers crossed that the Radeon that I bought won't also fail. But it's not that that reinforces the dust thing, it's the fact that now my computer isn't detecting my ethernet cable.

It's times like these I'm glad that I have geeky friends.

In other news, I made a bunny out of an old sock today. It's cute, but it did take a couple of socks to get right. Thankfully my sewing machine didn't turn to metaphorical dust, and nor did the needle I used to finish it off.

I've been thinking recently about determination. Seeing my niece learning to walk is what has sparked these thoughts, when she falls down she just gets straight back up. She's determined to learn to walk, but recently my determination has been draining, especially with the computer thing. I confess, at this moment, that I know very little about computers, and at this stage I can only make educated guesses and that's just not good enough when it comes to fixing things, and to be honest, looking at my computer when she's ill makes me think that she's really delicate.

Graphics Cards

It's been a while since I've even looked at my blog. I guess at the moment it's just not one of the things on my mind.

Mainly this week has been consumed with thoughts of computer hardware. My graphics card failed on Wednesday just before a mid-week dungeon. It annoyed me to say the least, especially since the others decided against doing it because I was the primary monk.

Thankfully, though, I have good friends. Ash in particular has become a saviour to my computer, and has put a hell of an effort into seeing my computer come out of this in several working pieces if not one complete piece. At the moment I am waiting on a graphics card that I know won't arrive until tomorrow. But while I wait Ash has lent me his spare gaming laptop so that I can do the same stuff I would normally. So I'd just like to say thank you, Ash, once again you have proved yourself a true friend.

In other news, Mark's trip over for Easter is beginning to get close: sixteen days, so I'm told, and I'm looking forward to it greatly. There remains much organising to be done, however, trips to London to date, possibly even a trip to Lego land.

As well as that, I really do need to get my FYP rationale down on paper. I seem to have hit a wall of books with it, but I plan to sit down for a good portion of time (when this computer crisis is sorted) and get the word count. At least I'm not doing as badly as some people.

Just a short post today I guess.