Squeaky Clean - The Aftermath

Well that wasn't too bad, thankfully. I've never had this treatment before, but the overly-enthusiastic dentist decided to put a camera in my mouth so he could have a nose around. His excuse was that the camera was needed to 'check for anything bad' (which he found none of) but in reality I'm pretty certain he just wanted a new desktop wallpaper.

[Picture courtesy of www.chrisoconnorblog.com]

Unfortunately my dentist looks nothing like the picture above. That's purely for comedic value. Or not. You be the judge.

Breaking the Stereotype

Most teenage boys that sit at the back of the bus bop their heads to Drum n' Bass music. I, on the other hand, am reading a Jane Austin novel. Alone.

Parachuting

Me and a friend plan to go parachuting some time next year for a charity that we haven't decided on. If the parachute jump goes wrong, it's likely we'll use the money to nurse ourselves back to good health. I was looking today about organising the jump, and there's alot of planning. This is surprising seeing as at the end of the day all we need is a plane, some Dutch courage and an overly sized white duvet to stop us dying. If my last blog post is posted the day before the jump, you'll know the duvet wasn't too effective.

Universities

Now that Year 2 of college is here, most of the talk of the college is either about people crashing their new cars, or applying to University. Thankfully, if things don't work out for me in terms of getting the grades I want at A Level, I've got an internationally known, award-winning blog to fall back on.

Just Like Old Times

Back to college also means back to public transport. There's something depressingly uncool about being back here, knowing many of your friends are driving in, in their own cars. (Unless they're stolen, of course) You know that you're in an unfortunate situation when the only time the silence is broken is when the elderly couple sat behind you decide to compliment a bush that the bus passes by, by agreeing that it's "well looked after". As soon as I heard this statement, I closed my eyes and kept promising myself that the journey would ending soon. Thankfully, it did.

Shark vs Octopus

Ever wondered who would win in a fight between a golden-gate-bridge-sized shark and an unusually powerful octopus? If your answer is yes, then I recommend you have a go at watching a film called "Mega Shark vs Giant Octopus" I watched it at the weekend, and I have to say it was pretty horrendous. My personal favourite lines include,

'They don't rest, they just kill'
'It rises'
'I looked into it's eyes'
'In all this darkness, you were the one ray of light'
'Christ! he's coming faster than a jet!'
'Woo-Hoo! Who wants shark skin boots?'
'My god - what have we done?'

As you can probably tell from the above quotations, it wasn't a very intellectually stimulating piece of film. Memorable though. In a bad way.

It gets a generous 5/10. The hilariously terrible sub-plot about a romance between the 2 lead characters also gets a deserving mention.

Dreams

Do you ever have a dream so weird that you have to try and remember it? Yesterday, I had a dream that revolved around me being a dog breeder. Weird, right? Basically I lived on a farm and then this group of bad guys, all armed [!], came to the farm to try and nick the dogs. Naturally, I wasn't going to let this happen so I took care of them 1 by 1 with the help of gymnastic karate moves. If only I was that nimble at protecting dogs in real life. I could make a career out of that.

Sense and Sensibility Thoughts

Well; after watching 3 hours worth of the film about Jane Austins novel, I have to admit the film wasn't that bad. I was skeptical at first, but the film did hold my attention. However, I still stand by what I said about the book. It's very 'wordy'.

Chewed

One of the many downfalls of borrowing headphones from a family member is that they're often chewed to hell. I'm trying to listen to music right now using these uniquely shaped headphones, and the chewed section of the plastic is digging into the inside of my ear, making the whole process of listening to music agonising. Because of this pain, I've got into the habit of adjusting the headphone itself every 3 seconds. I look like I've got a nervous disposition.

Almost There

Remember that Extended Project thing I was talking about yonks ago? You probably won't. I've written alot today, and I'm only 1000 words away from the 5000 word target. My project is about defending teenagers and going against the medias view of all teens in England being thugs. Anyway, can't talk for too long. I'm off to do a drive-by.

Good film, Bad film

This evening I watched a film called The Island. I enjoyed it. I won't go into a page long review of why I liked it and such, because google and Youtube probably have that sorted out for me. I will instead talk about tomorrows plan. Tomorrow evening I will be watching Sense and Sensibility. Who knows, maybe the film will be an action packed adrenaline ride? We'll see.

Geese

I think geese are clever. Before today, my outlook was different, but after seeing them in flight formation during a family BBQ I developed a newly found respect for them. What surprises me is the whole kerfuffle they have to go through to migrate.

Humans have technology. When we go on holiday, we usually travel through the air in a sealed metal tube with staff that dish out bags of nuts. Geese have to fly over a span of absolutely miles in the hope they'll find some place warmer than where they're flying from. It's a risky business. What if they just can't be bothered half way through the process? Another thing that I noticed is that there's always a leader with these geese formations. How do the geese kingdom elect leaders? Polls? Fights? General knowledge quizzes?

Newbies

Just finished my first week of second year college. College has gotten busy all of a sudden, because the 1st year students have started, which means navigating to the next lesson now involves scuffles and bruised shoulders.

The Opticians

Went to the opticians last week. Yes, I hear you cry, "why not tell us sooner then Tom?". Well my reply to you is that "It's OK readers, you don't have to pretend to be interested in what I have to say / see".

So anyway, off I toodle to the opticians for a regular eye checkup. Before I know it I'm carted off to a dark room, sat into a contraption that looks like a trap from the SAW films, and told to look at the wall in front of me and answer some questions and read things out. It's quite an odd place, the opticians, because the people doing the eye tests have to look at your eye with a special scope, and this usually ends with them being less than an inch away from your face, making the whole process particularly awkward.

After the 1-inch-away-from-face test there was one final test I had to do, which involved what I can only describe as having to equip the worlds biggest pair of binoculars and then being told to 'count the white circles'. After that was sorted, I was free to go. My next checkup is in 3 months. Should be fun. Hopefully my optician then won't have had garlic bread for lunch. I can't imagine the 1-inch-away-from-face test being fun under those circumstances.

"You like, yes?"

Today was an interesting afternoon. Ok, I'll set the scene. I'm home alone. So I hear a knock on the door, and I go to investigate. I open the door, and a man stares back at me, eyes as large as a rabbit about to be hit by a car. He says to me, "You like fish?". In my head I say to myself, "No you don't Tom. You hate fish. You haven't had fish in years. Unless this guy is flogging Captain Birdseye products the chances are you aren't going to be interested in what he has to sell". Out loud I reply, "Yes - I love fish". That was mistake number 1.

So I'm then led to the back of his white van, with the driver of the van modelling a white stained shirt. The van doors are flung open, and the horrible smell of fish floats up my nostrils. I tried to remain interested in the fish the whole time, as the man showed me a crate of prawns, cuttlefish, and salmon, whilst ensuring he explained as much as possible about each crate. In an attempt to make sure I looked interested in what my new fishy friend was saying, I jotted down the telephone number of the company, said thank you, and walked back into the house. I threw the number in the bin.

Sense and Stupidity

Right now I'm reading Sense and Sensibility. Why? Because I was tasked with the job of reading the whole book during the summer holidays by my English teacher. With it being an old-fashioned book, some of the sentences can get very lengthy. For example:

"Mrs. Dashwood remained at Norland several months; not from any disinclination to move when the sight of every well known spot ceased to raise the violent emotion which it produced for a while; for when her spirits began to revive, and her mind became capable of some other exertion than that of heightening its affliction by melancholy remembrances, she was impatient to be gone, and indefatigable in her inquiries for a suitable dwelling in the neighbourhood of Norland; for to remove far from that beloved spot was impossible."

That's one sentence. One sentence. Why is there so much 'beating around the bush' in Victorian literature? I'm not an author by any means, but I'm pretty sure I could sum up what's written there in about 2 or 3 lines. Back to reading I go, then!

The Teen Squad

Well it's been a while since I went on Blogspot. Unfortunately I don't think I can explain with the help of a poor excuse, because I don't have one. I guess it's just because I haven't gotten around to posting. That's odd. After reading what I've just typed it turns out I've just completely contradicted myself. Maybe this is why I left for so long. Nothing I say makes intellectual sense. I think that's the beauty of having a blog, though. Most of the stuff published onto the interwebs is shite anyway. I might as well contribute.

So what have I been doing? Went to a BBQ the other evening for a catch up with some people I haven't seen in a while. It was one of those BBQs where every generation was accounted for. You had the toddlers hopping about and every so often dipping their bogey-ridden fingers into the chocolate fountain, the middle aged men and women talking on the patio about work, and the teenagers slumped around the BBQ watching pieces of meat cook whilst complaining about exams and education in general. It's weird to think that one day I'll be part of middle age group. This time around though, I was a proud member of the teen squad.