NBPM 22: Joy

Despite this month being the month of gigs* I've bought absolutely no CDs to listen to. Except I have just received a CD in the post that I had ordered, but can't listen to until next month.

Of course I'm referring to Sufjan Stevens' Songs for Christmas box set. I have no problems in recommending it as Sufjan has never let me down in the past. The other reason why I'd recommend it is the sheer amount of stuff you get with it.

The list goes like this:

• 5 CDs with 42 songs
• A CD liner with lots of Christmassy stuff (photos, notes, lyrics & chords)
• A Quicktime video on one of the CDs
• A comic strip
• Stickers
• Lots of Christmas cheer

Just by this CD arriving in the post has made me very excited for Christmas next month. And I don't think I've been excited about Chrimble since last millenium.

Also it smells amazing.


* I even decided not to go to see the New Pornographers, the Warlocks and Scout Niblett because I've spent too much seeing bands in November

List me do

My blogging skills (if you could ever call them that) have completely vanished. I also need an ability to write a CV that will make CIMA think that I've had enough experience as an accountant to become fully qualified. I expect even a blank piece of paper will make CIMA think this as the yearly membership fees pretty much double once you're fully qualified.

Anyway, seeing how I've run out of things to say I'm going to the lazy guide to blogging and see if they have any ideas for... Hmmm, no not really had any interesting food, nothing funny happened at work*, ah this one sounds easy enough to do.

New things I have bought this week

• Scott Pilgrim 2. Seeing how play didn't have this in stock when I ordered it, I got it from my local comic shop. Which took two weeks to arrive. It's very good though & is the only comic book that Freya likes. Sorry Gillen I tried.
• An Optimus Prime mask that makes me sound like a very camp robot. I still love it though.
• The latest SFX came through the post. It looks alright, but I'm really starting to like DeathRay. Except that it has about five highly self indulgent pages and very poor page design.

That's all I can think of. Cheerio!

* Although I did make someone laugh by saying "A lot of people have been born in Germany". I foolishly left out an important word "A lot of English people..."

Time for a change...

...no more lyrics as titles

Not much to report, which is why I haven't reported.

Got annoyed with a supermarket chain which will be familar to readers of this blog as they didn't deliver the frozen food I ordered. I know, you're thinking "that's a bit lazy of you Ben and, urgh, this spot on my elbow's getting bigger should I squeeze it or not?".

Well you're wrong on both counts, you should never squeeze a spot (as the big scab on my forehead testifies) and because it costs five pounds for Freya & I to get a bus up to the Tesco's but only four quid for it to be delivered.

However we still needed the frozen stuff so I walked all the way there (thirty minutes). I'm such a hero.

How sweet...

...to be an idiot

Right, I'm tired and I should have been in bed about an hour ago. But due to a dodgy tummy I stayed up. If I hadn't done that I would have wasted about fifty quid buying stuff on ebay and itunes that I don't want, and the main reason I bought them was because I was tired & couldn't think straight. Man, I really am stupid and should just do what Freya says for the rest of my life.

And now for some reason my pc doesn't recognise it's CD drive. What the? Hopefully a quick reboot will get it working again.

Teach him stuff...

...although he's looking rough

And after saying blogger beta hasn't appeared to change anything I've found out that almost all the comments that people have made over the course over NaBloPoMo have been turned to anonymous. Doing detective work I think I've uncovered the blog addresses for the people who did this, but let me know if I mucked it up.

One thing I did notice from digging around blogger whilst trying to get this fixed is that I can actually blog via e-mail. So all the time I was bored at work thinking of stuff to do I could actually be composing a blog saying how bored I was at work. So this has been composed via e-mail in a trial attempt before I do a proper blog tomorrow.

Yesterday I actually had to do some proper man work. Well, ok, it was just replacing a fluorescent tube in the kitchen (because it kept flicking on and off) but this is one of the few areas of fixing stuff that I actually know anything about. See I was a part-time caretaker at my old school where my Dad was a teacher. Pretty much all my job involved was being the butt of the main caretaker's (Nobby Noble) jokes and helping him out with the crappy jobs he didn't want to do.

So I spent my break from Uni doing weed killing (even though the brand of weed killer we were using was (I think) illegal in Germany), emptying the bins out, getting the seats out for lunchtime in the dining hall and fixing the lights. That's how I know that fluorescent lights have a starter as well as the tube.

Of course something Freya & I mucked up on was measuring the tube. We did it in centimetres and then when we got to the hardware shop in town we found out they didn't say on the tube how long they were (and the only measurements to hand were in feet). Very frustrating. Particularly as everyone in Yorkshire appeared to be in town yesterday so the place was rammed. I hate when places are busy. I think I have a kind of claustraphobia but it heightens more when I can't walk or move anywhere because there are too many people. Freya feels the same way so she was getting rather grumpy as well.

Luckily we managed to get away and we felt much better after getting a sandwich. But we only had a starter for the light and trying that actually didn't help - the tube had gone.

I had to go back into town to find a tube. Perhaps asking for help. But then I called into a shop on the way into town on the off chance that they had one. And they did. We got stressed out in town for absolutely no reason. Gach.

EDIT: Just tried sending this via e-mail and it didn't actually work. CURSE YOU BLOGGER BETA!