My extraordinary journey home from work

I finished work last night at 12:30am. I was cold, tired, didn't have a fabulous evening and was suffering from an injured thumb (which is currently causing me an awkard time typing). I just wanted to get some pain killers from the 24 hour garage and get to bed.

Except this was not to be. Now as a former student myself and a friend to many I am usually pro-student. But not last night. Not when a certain drunk civil-engineering scholar attracts my attention as I walk home. At first I thought he wanted a light or perhaps even directions. But no. He wanted to walk with me. I politely declined his request but he insisted. I explained how I preferred to walk alone but he insisted.

I was surprised how quickly my politeness expired. I began to get annoyed, my sentences now blunt and to the point. Soon I was making gestures and raising my voice. I shouted a profanity at him and walked away. But, like an idiot puppy, he failed to comprehend the distress he was causing and started to follow me. He began to quiz me and started to reveal information about himself. It became apparent that my moronic tormentor was studying civil-engineering at the University of Plymouth where I myself once studied.

Mike was his name. I exclaimed in an alarming amount of fury that I couldn't have cared less if he was Jesus. I really didn't want anyone walking with me. Before I knew it, true condensed anger was being displayed. I never realised I could blow my lid like that. His incessant chatter and irritating presence resulted in a Vesuvian explosion of expletives and hand gestures. Exasperated pleas for him to leave me alone. I impressed myself that I could scream near poetic insults from the top of my head and I swear he suppressed a snigger when I referred to myself as 'irate'.

I told him I had a bad day. He said it could not have been as bad as his. Unfortunately for him my heart towards him was colder than the night itself and I would have continued to shout at him regardless of what he said. To me he had lost all credibility by simply not leaving me alone. I don't know why he couldn't annoy some other poor sap. Eventually I shoved my headphones into my ears and drowned him out with Big Band Jazz. It had a remarkable calming effect, almost presenting a comic edge to my situation. He continued to talk at me stopping every now and again to put his shoe back on. We reached the end of the road and I heard him promise he'd leave me alone as long as I shook his hand. I yanked the right headphone out of my ear and jutted my hand out.

"Thank you," he said, "you have no idea how much that means to me." I bid him good night with next to no emotion. I was simply glad to be rid of him. I don't know what it is he needed. Probably just company. I'm normally good at that sort of thing but he caught me on the wrong night. Any other night I could have made a new friend.

Little Ball of Feline Fluff

My mother recently received a present from my step-father. A small black and white kitten with faint Bengal stripes.

She is so cute! Friendly, fearless and smart too. She's affectionate and knows where the litter tray and food is. She'll grow up to be a great mouse catcher as well the way she attacks things so enthusiastically.

The parents have settled on the name Rani due to her connection with India (what with having Bengal heritage). The little thing has cheered me up greatly as my life is currently a poverty smeared one.

The Furry Fandom

I've been a slef-identified furry since the age of 15. I never really properly expressed it to anyone else until I was about 20. The Furry Fandom carries a lot of bad press and the media tends to focus on the extreme aspects of it.

For me being a furry is about being a fan of anthropomorphic animals and art and literature. It's also about expressing yourself through that medium. I also treat it as a hobby. Not something that my life revolves around.

For anyone unclear about what the Furry Fandom is perhaps this will help give a rough idea: Wikipedia's entry on The Furry Fandom.

Look Mum! I made arts!

I have recently been drawing. Really basic stuff at the moment. Soon I'll experiment more with my pencils. My medium has been Photoshop of late.

I really enjoy drawing and creating an image from my mind. If gives me great satisfaction. Being able to express my imagination not just in writing but also in drawing is quite liberating. I look forward to enhancing my skills and refining my technique.

Take a look at my creations on my Fur Affinity account: Dieselcat's Profile

Everyday Appearence

Now that my internet access is back on my desk and not in the hallway I am able to comfortably add more to my blog.

Anyone who knows me or has met me in person will know that I tend to overdress. I enjoy wearing smart clothing. Suits, waistcoats, ties etc. It makes me feel like I've made some small effort.

What fascinates me most is how I am treated. When I am wearing my work uniform I am treated like an idiot. When I wear my beach bum clothes on a hot day I am treated like just another member of the public. When I wear my smart clothing people smile, are helpful and thoroughly pleasant. Little do they know how cheap it is to look so good.

I feel it also highlights the shallow attitude many have (I myself have been guilty of it) and one should never judge another human being purely by appearance. Wait until they've proven themselves to be lovely or downright awful.

Sweet Sweet Internet

I fling up my arms in glorious praise to the gods of the wires! For I now am reconnected with the rest of the civilised world! This may or may not be a good thing.

My lack of internet did make me think back to the '90s where things were just kicking off. Radio advertisements would scream "Get online now!" and to have home internet was a thing of wealth and the height of modern technological achievement in your own living space.

Now of course we take it for granted as we do mobile phones. There was once a day where I had to use a house phone with a cord forcing me to stay in one spot whilst I spoke to someone. Once I had to walk around a department store fifty times before I found my friends and/or family.

Communication is stronger than it ever was and this is not a bad thing. I have kept in touch with people it would be so easy to loose if it weren't for websites that constantly remind me they exist. It would be tragic to loose contact with the many splendid people I've met along the way.

So yes, internet! Hurrah!

Home Internet on the Horizon

Hurrah! Soon my readers I will return to the aethernets to talk once again about my askew thoughts on the world! The incompetent internet provider has finally recognised the fact we have an active phone line, despite the fact we had already told us this. It'll be another 5 - 10 working days.

Stay tuned!

My Lack of Recent Posts

My apologies for my absence. I have had no household internet since moving house. Expect to see more from me very soon as I have much to add to this blog.

Watch this space.

The BBC iPlayer

Quite possibly the greatest thing to happen to the British Broadcasting Corporation since the television. I find it immensely useful as I don't watch television everyday and often I like to busy myself with something constructive on my PC. Watching something can be more an annoyance than something to add to the Photoshopping or my latest Thief II fan mission. As such I find myself listening to the radio and when I do wish to watch something, I can at my leisure.

My only issue with the iPlayer is something that cannot be helped. The BBC cannot store everything they have ever produced on it and I long for the day when the technology improves and at any given time I can watch an old Doctor Who or an episode of Blakes 7. Perhaps even a news broadcast closest to the time of my birth. I'd love to watch that. What a handy resource that would be! Think of the educational capabilties it holds. Being able to watch a news report from as far back as the very first new the BBC ever broadcast! I look forward to the future when such things are so freely available.

Until then I'll just watch and listen to the things that are available.

Mystery Science Theater 3000

Many of my British readers will not have heard of Mystery Science Theater 3000. I'm a big fan of it myself and always appreciated an episode I haven't seen. A friend introduced it to me a while back and at first I didn't know what to make of it. After watching a few episodes I began to understand that it was in fact pure genius!

To save a lengthy read here is its Wikipedia page: Mystery Science Theater 3000 on Wikipedia

There are ten series of it in total and each episode covers an old B-movie. The heckling and commentary is hilarious. Sometimes they make highly specific cultural references meaning that some jokes are lost on one person but another person would find such a joke very amusing.

It's difficult to discribe unless you sit and watch a few episodes. I just wanted to raise a little awareness of the show. Unfortantly it was only in production during the 90s and has finished.

Link to: The Official Mystery Science Theater 3000 website

Dereliction

Ever since I was a child I have been fascinated by derelict and abandoned places. Something about them appeals to both my historical interest and my appreciation for the Gothic and Noir. I love that chill when I spy an old building boarded up with grass growing high around it. What's inside? What was it like in its prime? There is also a sad loneliness about such places. A lost era.

Plymouth has many derelict or unused buildings. Most notably Union Street with the Art Deco theatre recently the Millennium Discotheque and Dance Academy the old Victorian 'New Palace Theatre'. In Greenbank there stands a sinister church and on Grenville Road a boarded up chapel. They look like vampire dens worthy of a black and white horror film.

In the early hours of this morning I discovered a fantastic forum called "Derelict Places" and registered today. It is full of constructions and spaces that have seen neglect either recently or for decades and even centuries. My favourite so far has to be St Joseph's Seminary in Upholland, Lancashire. It's a divine Gothic Revival building and is remarkably well intact. It fell into disuse simply because being a Roman Catholic priest just isn't as hip as it used to be. Its chapel is splendid and the hallways and rooms have a haunting touch. The library interests me greatly with its religious books scattered all around the room. I'd love to pick one up and read some of it.

The forum is a goldmine of eerie photos and interesting delights ranging from ancient council building boilers to decaying cinema projectors. If such things spark the more curious side of your nature then I recommend taking a look. The abandoned asylums are my favourite as they are just too creepy to describe.

Link to Derelict Places

Architecture

Buildings fascinate me. They shape settlements and give them character. Every building projects an image which may inspire or depress. Take the Houses of Parliament, a palace of the people. Majestic Gothic Revival standing proud provoking images of power and beauty; Its clocktower iconic rising high and handsome. Then take the Empire State Building, towering so tall and bold with its geometric art deco look. Even 78 years later it manages to look modern with its smart design. An excellent example of a 20th Century building.

I love being able to guess the age of a building just by looking at it. Being able to tell the difference between a Victorian house and a 1930s one. As a great fan of history it's only natural to have an interest in architecture.

It used to be a thing of pride and status. Look at our nation! Look at our cities and our quaint villages! Are they not beautiful? Even after the devastating First World War art deco prevailed a new streamlined look of the future. So I cannot understand why after the Second World War architecture took a downturn. Suddenly concrete was fashionable. The Civic Centre, built in the early 1960s, is an excellent example of the stark grey grimness that was deemed to be a groovy statement of the times. Its beauty is purely its monstrosity.

Architecture today is either generic or over-the-top arty. I long for a day when style and decoration returns to our construction sites. Or even the simple geometric design of art deco. Perhaps styles such as Classical Revival and New Deco will grace our cityscapes and wouldn't it be nice to see Faux Tudor return to the walls of suburban and village buildings.

Whatever the future has in store architecturally I hope it's something that inspires and makes a stylish statement. Buildings that look appropiate for our brave new world.

Ross Noble

Last night I had the good fortune to be able to see Ross Noble at the Plymouth Pavilions.

He has to be the most dynamic stand-up comedian I have ever seen. Before last night I had watched two of his DVDs. Both were very entertaining but did not compare with seeing him live.

The stage was bare apart from a huge inflatable hydra-like monster with four heads of Ross Noble leering over the audience. Members of the audience had placed little gifts for him at the front of the stage. It reminded me of an elder god from an H.P. Lovecraft story.

When he came on he was bouncing around and full of energy and the audience were ruptured by his presence. He selected his usual few targets at the front of the audience which is part of his act and ridiculed them and found out more about them. These included a man with a negative outlook on life judging by his responses of 'shit' and 'crap' leading Ross to assume the man was poo obsessed much to the hilarity of the audience. Another was a skinhead in a string vest who liked Disney films and a fairly ordinary looking lady with the children's skulls tattooed on her feet. Ahh... the Plymouth Populace.

The evening's entertainment covered topics such as elephant rape, poo babies, bodily fluids and Our Lord Jesus Christ having his testicles trapped in an IKEA computer desk. Primarily his act is unscripted resulting in his responses and jokes being triggered by the general comments of the audience of the night. I wonder what he'd have made of me if I had been sat on the front row and caught his attention.

It was a fantastic and throughly entertaining night all in all and I should very much like to see him perform again one day.

Ross Noble's Website

Death

I know it's one of the grizzliest topics I could've started my blog with, but I felt it was something that has been on my mind that I wanted to write down.

Death has been haunting me recently. Not directly but around me. Friends have been attending funerals. A chap I'd not seen for a long time bumped into me on the street and revealed he was a victim of cancer. I have even lost a friend to grief, he hides away and does not communicate with his friends to an unhealthy level.

And yet, when I sit in the local cemetery, I feel a great sense of peace. A sense of rest. And I came to question what death was. For me it is a concept. I believe there is an afterlife. I've experienced a lot of inexplicable things when growing up and it makes one get the impression that there's more to life than meets the eye. Perhaps a science not yet discovered or maybe something beyond the capabilities of the scientist. So... death. What is it? I don't know. I would see it as a passage to another form. But many see it as an end.

Is death an end? Physically it can be. The body is burnt or rots back into the earth. Spiritually? That depends if you believe in such things. I believe in the spirit, the soul. Why not? If it doesn't exist then it doesn't matter. But assuming it does exist then it is something to care about.

So I came to a conclusion.

Death is what you think it is.

I think it's one hell of a relief from life. But I am far from ready to die.