The Day Approacheth...

The day will soon cometh...

I write this while listening to my ipod, it's 22:36, I've had a fairly relaxed day. The night prior though, I struggled to sleep for a little while, don't worry though I did get a good amount of sleep in the end, but I will let you know that the reason for my not sleeping was based upon this day I mentioned earlier in my Old English tones, I would have used runic letters...anyway that's going on off one and I can't afford to. The day in question, is that of exam results day and up until yesterday night I was pretty 'not worried' about it.

However, for whatever reason, more than likely a niggling feeling of doubt had made it's way slowly forward into my mind, just before I'm going to sleep helpful. The simple way of putting things is ALL the A levels I'm doing (and was doing) go towards my UCAS points (I need 260 of them to get into Bangor University). That's dandy for me. And makes the 'dream' of going to Bangor that much 'easier' (lack of a better word); despite that advantage I was unable to sleep the other night, you can probably see where this is going, due to me worrying about exam results.

I feel my actual exams went ok, nothing really really so awful that I wanted to cry - type thing. But as it's me, to be honest I'm sure this goes for a good spread of 18 year olds who are in the same position as me, I have come to worry. It's not made any better by the fact that there is such a wait until I know what is in my brown envelope of fate(that being August 20th). Literally ANYTHING could be within that mysterious brown envelope...well I say that, obviously within the grounds of how I performed on the exams, however I won't know that until I can see my actual results!

I don't know what felt worse, getting through the exams, or waiting?...I'll throw a curve ball here and say waiting. The fact is my exam-timetable wasn't too bad at any course, that isn't to say any exam was a piece of cake, just that I didn't have any jam packed days. So in theory I've done ok enough, but I just don't know!!


It's like a circle of torture...The good thing is that I know it will come to an end, but will that be a good thing after all? Still I best enjoy my Summer holidays while they last, the exam result thing wont play on my mind too much, what should I do tomorrow...?


I'll leave it here I suppose, I'm tired, and I think this could become more rambly if I don't stop now...

Hope you enjoyed what was here.

Callum

Twitter: The most friendly social networking site around!

Of course my opinion...nobody has confirmed this as of yet.



I will say though, once you get into it, it's a very nice thing to be part of, there's no real pressure to update, you could sit a whole day and just watch the comments go by. With other sites, Facebook, Myspace and so forth, there is a certain thing of people adding you for no real reason, and usually make no effort to contact you; some will just leave bit comments and some may not leave you alone, despite you never meeting them in real life. Whereas with Twitter, as your comments are out in the open, and everyone has access to them via some way (pre and post follow), and you know if someone adds you they must be reading your comments to some extent because the main premise of Twitter is 'micro-blogging', so you'll only want to add people you think are interesting/funny/nice and so forth.



Moreover everyone on Twitter is just themselves (from personal experience), there is no real 'pretentious' nature, for example people who just, on facebook/myspace. upload pictures of themselves done professionally and are only wanting comments on how good looking they are, or say ''new pics up, comments plz(please)'', to be honest I'd only notify people if pictures are up of a group event, like a prom, or a general day out. On Twitter, everyone is happy enough to use the rule of thumb 'What you see is what you get', obviously you're not getting to know anyone ''too personally'' on the whole, but you do get to know people to some degree, and usually that's seeing people 'RTing' and commenting on what you've said, it's a nice feeling when people, who you barely know, share your point of view, or think something you said is funny. Not that anyone is trying too hard to be funny, far from it.

Simply put Twitter has that nice vibe about it, as I aforementioned the thing of getting into it, I'll admit there were stages when I wasn't interested, mainly due to I wasn't following many and lost interest therefore. More recently, I've met some really cool people who are lovely to talk to. I should note, a lot of ''my school yard chums'' don't use Twitter, if they did I probably follow them, but that's a big ''if'' mind you...they are mainly over in facebook corner.

In closing, no snobbishness, no nastiness, just Twitter-ness; a bliss Utopia for conversing with people over the internet, ok maybe ''bliss Utopia'' is over stating it a bit, still I hope you get my point.

Callum

''Loosing that acting buzz''

Rather that should be ''lost''.

Any who this tale is about my few years doing drama/acting, then the reason for stopping.

As a youngling, I was part of my local 'amateur drama group', and I remained in it until I was 17 or so. No problem there, I did such shows as ''Calamity Jane''(twice), ''Annie'', ''Cinderella'', ''Fiddler on the Roof'', and ''The Music Man''. The first three were with the youth section, and the other two were with the adult section.

So, I did a fair few shows with the society, which is all fine and well. As for parts, I was never a confident actor, that's to say I wasn't ever pushing to get any top parts, I was happy enough with getting what I got; after all I was it wasn't my idea to be part of the group, but I will admit I had a fair few years of fun. However, considering that I had been enthusiastic about doing shows for many years, there came a point when someone switched the ''enthusiastic'' off.

During the production of 'The Music Man', I didn't really feel as if I had been enjoying rehearsals, but using knowledge and experience assumed that the first night I would get that ''buzz'' from performing in front of an audience.... But, for whatever reason, I didn't get any sensation. I think I enjoyed the show, but not as much as any previous show. Sorry if this sounds all silly and things, but - it's hard to explain - I think for Music Man I was just set on auto-pilot, do what you need to do and go home. Part of that may be because a lot of people had said that the show wasn't a good one, in saying that I really enjoyed Fiddler on the Roof (I took part in L'Chaim...), and people say that's a depressing musical..each to their own I suppose.

Simply put, I don't think I was destined to do 'drama' for longer than I had done, some people may smerk at that, but hey it's just the way things go. As I said earlier, it wasn't my idea to join, so I think it makes sense that there would come a point that that might actually show itself. Unless you are the sort of person with songs, music, acting in your blood, you probably wont last too long, if you get me? All I'm trying to say is, for me at least, I had a good time, but it was my time to get off the drama-train.

In fairness, it probably made me more confident, although in the long run it's good I moved away. The main reason being the fact I had a feeling it would take some doing to do ''Exams'' and shows at the same time. After the Music Man (during the start of my A levels), I left, and had mentioned that it was a good move, I mean what would have the point been of continuing doing something (that the drama-based-friends wanted me to do) that I didn't truly enjoy at that time?... I'm probably just blogging the obvious here, but still that's not wrong.

It was better of me to drop out, than try and take it up as a profession, and be something that I had no real chance of being. Looking at it, I think it goes without saying that there are lots of people who think they've got ''it'', but in reality ''it'' isn't that good. I'm not saying don't go for your dreams, but really, with something like drama, you need to be sure as hell you are good enough, because it's very competitive. Of course do it as a hobby, past-time if you enjoy doing it, but if you think you're good enough to be on The West End, Broadway and so forth, well I'm no expert, but you need to have been told, and believe you are good enough to do it to go for the big time...it would be cruel to have your dreams broken and have nothing to fall back on.

Anyway that wraps that up as best as I can. I will admit this hasn't flowed very well, but I have done this on the spot, so I hope you've enjoyed some of what I've written.



Callum

A fun day out at Newcastle...like.

Today (15th/July/2009) I went with my girlfriend (Vivien) and her mother to Newcastle. Some of the day was spent at the Hancock History Museum, you may know of it, you may not, regardless fun was had; looking at the many artifacts from the Egyptians, Romans, and Greeks, all very interesting and whatnot.

However with everything there's always a niggle in there somewhere..this such niggle came about when Vivien's mother decided to sit down, which she has every right to do, Vivien and I joined her; as we were getting up one of the staff came over looking horrified and said,
''Please don't sit on the displays'', which is fair enough she is doing her job, although I'd like to say that we weren't really sat on any display, or at least in such a way that we would be causing damage. The set up was of Hadrian's Wall, and was fairly long and placed in the the middle of this particular room, basically we were sitting on a surface that wasn't in any way going to cause harm; that's all that needs to be made clear. So Vivien's mother makes the point that there are no chairs in this room; hence why we chose to sit where we did, not because we were trying to be cool. The staff member then proceeds to go on in one of the strangest manners I've ever seen, I'll try and quote to my best here,
''Ohh well, right, right em, well when you go out, right? When you go out you can get a purple form and write that down and then if enough people say they want chairs in this room, we can do that, we can put some folding chairs in this room..ok then? Good''. The fact she told us they could do that, install the chairs, led me to think, well surely wouldn't it be appreciated if you just put them in, without the fuss of people needing to put it down in written form. Not that the museum doesn't have 'any' seating, but you might as well just put the seats there to make everyone happy. Maybe she was just trying to make her job a bit more exciting, I'm sure she's a good worker really.

Fun was had for the most part. The thing is, do you ever feel that you must buy something to remember your day out?...Or maybe you have graced ''X'' city's grounds therefore you must invest in its future by spending something. Ok, point is, I left today having not spent any money, and it felt somewhat empty, good thing was what I didn't spend I kept, so that's all good. The thing is it would have been nice to maybe not go away empty-handed, be it a book, DVD, whatever, it would have been a nice little treat for myself. Not that I'm a shop-o-holic, or an impulse buyer, but hey-ho I did have my chances, there is always next time as they say...

As for yesterday, I spent part of the day watching two Marx brothers films (Duck Soup and Animal Crackers) they are fantastic without doubt...but that goes without saying. So I'm able to keep my french up, I put French subtitles on (yes it was a DVD), the thing I find amusing is that when you translate jokes (the words which make them up) they clearly don't work in other languages, an obvious point perhaps but still funny, adds to the whole entertainment of it. An example of one is, there's a joke where ''Taxes'' is repeated as ''Texas'', I'll not delve into the joke...anyway...the French for taxes is ''(les) impots'', so the word-play doesn't work in French. The ''vice-versa'' also is true, a I was told once there was a joke lost in (English subtitle) translation, you may (or may not) know that 'pierre' is both the word for 'stone' and a name (links into the English 'Peter') in French, and that on a film someone plays on that fact, but the joke doesn't work in English, yes you guessed it, we don't go calling stones 'Peter'.


That about wraps it up for now, if I get sorted, I'll be doing Blogs possibly called, 'Bob Dylan - why is he following me? No not on twitter.'' and ''Loosing that acting buzz''. Those are for later though, I hope you enjoyed this slice into what I get up to.

Thanks for reading.

Callum

Late at night, lost for words...

I sit here in a similar fashion to how I've been doing other blogs, at night. For whatever reason, I get the inspiration to write a blog during the time when I should maybe have chosen sleep. No worry readers as I seem to have a habit of getting up at a reasonable time.

Anyway, how are you doing ? *your answer* Ah well that's *appropriate response*....hmm, it's odd I've got a mental block for a task I'm not required to complete, whether this gets published or not is truly my choice, and too be honest there is no real demand for me to get this published; as I have but two followers. I'm doing this simply for fun, as I may have stated in previous blogs.

(Ok, ok, Callum pick a point, topic, theme, subject, anything, just focus. You must have lost many readers by this stage...) Sleep, let's go with that as a focus-point.

Right ok, sleep, an odd subject for me to stumble upon, although appropriate considering it's nearly midnight. From the ages after seeing ''nap/sleep time'' as a nice treat, we have a disagreement with sleep; we are instructed of bed times, different for many of us, yet when push comes to shove we like to stay up late. In the end though heavy eyelids usually will catch us off guard and finally drop down without warning. Obviously, nowadays, anyone 15 + will want to stay up to be texting/MSN'ing/or even Twittering friends, they don't want to fall asleep and miss out on something big, but usually nothing really does happen, ''that'' person doesn't come online, ''that'' person doesn't text you back (probably because they are asleep) and so forth, you probably know your own experiences better.

Then there's the thing of not so much waking up, but actually getting up. If we say lying-in is being in bed on any given morning, you can be sleeping, or fully awake; yet as humans we seem not to like getting out of bed. With some people that may be down to not doing homework/revision (we've all been there). With others it's almost if, more correct to say is, that sense of, ''I went to bed, and I realised it's quite snugly, now do you mind leaving me for a few more minutes to appreciate this new found snugly sensation''. That's what you're thinking, but as you are tired it'll come out as a annoyed grunt, throw of a pillow, or (if you have one) beating your alarm clock to death; even though it was only doing it's job.

That's why I've asked people, ''Which do you prefer, staying up late, ?or lying in?''. ''Helpfully'', a lot of responses were 'boths', this was of a demographic of teenagers, so again helpful data. The point though is, it seems, we value avoiding sleep where we should be getting it, and then trying to catch up on it when we shouldn't be. In a sense it's like trying to change our sleeping patterns, but doesn't actually work.

Final point of note, to denote sleep in cartoons (as an example) you'll usually find this one letter combination, ''Zzzzzzzzz...'', there are many variations, but these are only to do with the number of letters used. My question is, why is ''Zzzzzzzz...'' used? Is it because of the sound of snoring, although if that is the case when you see a 'bumblebee cartoon' and next to that the written ''Buzzzzzzzzz'', in saying that, it's probably more linked with that breathing sound people make, still that comes across to me as a ''Ssss...ssss'' type thing. As a suggestion, could it be anything to do with, Z being the final letter of the alphabet, and therefore denotes sleep the final thing of the day?...it's possible.

Goodnight..or good day, depending...


Callum.

Enjoying the peace and quiet, but not the pain.

Hello readers, hope you are enjoying the season we know as Summer, and of course hope you enjoy this entry.

Well as the title suggests, yes you guessed it, my Summer is a splendid one so far, and I can't see it getting too bad. I kept myself entertained so far by writing blogs, dog walking, reading here and there, playing on the XBOX 360, and of course Twittering and so forth. At this stage I've met up with a few people and had a few delightful days with them; although I will say it's been more a time to try and relax by being quiet. I've chosen to take a more relaxed approach, to the vast number of weeks at my disposal, simply because after my A levels I wanted just to take it slow for a few weeks, getting up late on a morning makes a real change from a constant getting up at 6 o'clock every morning for two years.

The simple fact that with regards to Sixth Form, as fun as it most certainly was, it does take a mental strain on you. It would be nearer the truth to say that A level (exams) are 50% knowledge of the subject and 50% handling of personal conditions, this includes stress of actually doing an exam, the build up towards that, and so forth. By no-means am I saying, ''ooh but it was too hard, A levels should be easier'', of course they are hard, but it's more how you cope with the challenge, hence as to why some people do better than others, because you can know everything in the world, but if you have a tendency to panic during exams, well my friend ''life sucks'' as they say.

Back to the main theme, the mental strain caused by doing three A levels, can cause you to go nuts if you don't take a step back after the exams and relax while you can, of course the odd night out is ok, and every Friday works for some people apparently. I'm happy though sitting in my house writing blogs, or doing laps of the (F1 style) Nurburgring on the old XBOX, as well as being happy just to have a nice day out with who ever may be on the cards that day, ''today'' it's my girlfriend's turn - Hurrah!

The problem with where I live, and have lived for the majority of my life, is that my nearest and dearest friends (including the girlfriend) live quiet far from where I live, so I haven't been able to go out on a night for years because of this. I did, at one point, have friends where I live, however the age where you choose sitting and getting drunk vs getting an education came up, the majority went one way, and I (thanking my lucky stars) went the 'right' way.

So yes, being by myself in one respect can be a lonely thing, but I grown up not to mind it, plus I have the option of seeing my friends it's not like I've been barred from entering the walls of society. I'm happy.

But Callum, what is this pain that you speak?...I hear you ask (just for the sake of asking)...well that tooth that came out seems to have had the last laugh, as it were, the area where the tooth was, has been rather ...wait for it... painful for the past few days, and I've been taking pain-killers for it, however these only last as a short term aid, the sooner this pain goes the better, that goes without saying.

Hope you've liked this edition of my blogs, I'm glad I've kept it going, therefore there should be more to come in the next few weeks and months.

Callum.

Just for socialising...

Internet socialising. Interesting thing that, getting to know people you already know better, and meeting people you've never met before. Oh the joy. I'm one of the many people who have done the aforementioned. But, in my view, it can be all a bit passive and empty. Maybe that's over stating it, but I feel there is far more to the Internet than simply commenting pictures and ''liking'' comments.

Thus as to why I do things such as blog every so often, and make videos (for YouTube), and to some extent Photo shop ( But don't really see that as Internet based, personally, I know for others it is...Devin Art). I think it's a good way of getting over your opinions and such, a good variety of media for people to argue, discuss your point of view..rather than the ever mundane ''you look nice'', ''WUU2?'', ''LMAO''. Social-networking does have its place, before anyone thinks this is me just having a big swipe at ''Facebook'' etc, it is a good way to quickly catch up, confirm you're not dead (if you haven't updated in the last hour), and show yourself having fun; pictures etc. Simply put it only takes a few minutes to do something of this nature and you don't need to talk on the major news stories, something as simple as just saying what you did last week for example... that can go for videos as well.

Personally, I prefer doing this at the moment to videos, because 1) I can think about what I want to write better than thinking what I want to say...2) my laptop is low on memory, and videos can take up a fair chunk of what's left on my laptop. 3) It's just so fun and easy.

In turn,I think it's nice to read up on what you're friend(s) has been doing, which nicely brings me to my next point. That being the fact that a lot of my ''school yard chums'' ( quoting Mr Burns there I believe) don't make videos, write blogs and so, therefore I'm going alone with it for the most part. The sweet thing is that I've got two followers, who in fact are people I've met over the Internet, in saying that I yearn for the day when my friends are following my blog, and writing their own...it might be the case when I go to University.

Anyway I'll wrap it up here, it's currently '00.04' in the morning, so if I've made any errors then I can fix them at a later stage...over and out then.

Callum

Who's afraid of the big bad Dentist?...

Not me.

However I do sympathise with those that are. I think it's possibly the thing of when you are young you don't really understand/consider the risks of oh let's say getting injections, you have not yet made the connection between ''needles and pain'', until you get your first injection - if the first experience is an 'ok' one, then you'll probably be ok after that, unless you at some point have a really awful experience, or even know someone who has, it can be off putting.

I have noticed, personally, that the older I get, the more scary the whole thing becomes. Now I say personally, and before anyone shouts ''hypocrite'' as I said I wasn't afraid, well if we look at a hypothetical scale where; 1 is not at all scary, and 10 is AHHH HELP ME NOW! I've probs gone from 1.5 to 2.5 (ish). When I was younger I had to get operations for my various scolds/burns to be worked on, I recall one of these times I had got a needle in my arm to send me to sleep and I said ''I wont fall asleep'', however 10 seconds past and didn't stick to my word- I was out like a light. I know I've somewhat strayed off topic of Dentists, but still I thnk it's this whole thing of needles more than anything...

i seemed to have failed to mention how I had my tooth out today (Saturday), after waiting an hour to be ''served'' eventually I was ready to go, three injections to numb the area which were ok, bar one right in the palette (roof) of my mouth. Following this nothing really to speak of, a tooth was worked on so it could be removed...and so it was. I still have a fairly numb area as I type this...Hopefully I'll regain the feeling at some point...haha.

Anyway hope you enjoyed this...over and out

Callum.