The Joys of Wii Ownership

This man talks sense

All I want is to be able to play on my lovely new Wii! Without a new remote, I can't get the TV into AV mode. I bought a new one, and unsurprisingly it's going straight back

Music: Kings of Leon - Revelry
Socks: None today :)

This Weekend

The plan for the last year was to spend this weekend sleeping on the floor in a tent, spending most nights in something that resembles a war zone and generally turning into a dirty festival goer at none other than the quite frankly fantastic Reading Festival. I'm now typing this from the comfort of my bed in rather wet Wales. The big glaringly obvious difference is that I'm not in a tent, I'm not in Reading and I'm not at a festival. This is down to a number of reasons, but mainly the fact that I'd have missed a whole day's worth of music due to a particularly evil exam I had yesterday (which, by the way, I'm fairly convinced I failed due to a migraine). Money also had a small part to play in this but if I hadn't had the exam I'd have put up with that.

Bands I'm missing that I was planning on seeing:
Day 1 - Blood Red Shoes, byoP, Florence and the Machine, Biffy Clyro, Ida Maria, Friendly Fires, MGMT, Vampire Weekend, The Wombats, Rage Against The Machine
Day 2 - Collapsing Cities, The Subways, Mystery Jets, Los Campesinos!, Editors, Justice, Bloc Party, Manics (Clash of the festival for me, I'd be so tempted to see The Killers instead, but have a feeling I'd have been dragged to see the Manics. Not that I'd have complained)
Day 3 - Adam Green, Holy Fuck, Johnny Foreigner, Lethal Bizzle, Pendulum, Tenacious D, Wiley, The Cribs

When I realised I'd definitely have to miss Friday, most people reacted by saying something along the lines of "Oh well, at least it's the weak day". Not for me it wasn't. Bands I love, plus no clashes. Saturday was the 'bands I like and a few I love' day, but with a few clashes, and Sunday was, to be honest, fairly meh-some. A catastrophic clash between Holy Fuck and JoFo, nothing much worth seeing for 2 hours, and everyone seemingly bumming headliners I have no interest in whatsoever.

Actually putting it like that, it's probably just as well I ended up not going. I'm feeling a bit better about not being there. I'm missing some bands I'd love to see live, but of the 26 I'd have planned on seeing at least some of, I've seen 10/11 and will be seeing another in a few weeks.

At least I'll be buying next year's ticket on Tuesday :D

Music: Friendly Fires - Paris
Socks: I'm not wearing any :P

2-0

I've been on the Waverider at The LC twice.
I've been to the pool first aid room twice.

I was bodyboarding it just fine, even if the water was a bit too strong for me, when I fell off, smashed my face on the side and now have a nasty graze and cut on my chin.

Ouch

Music: Patrick Wolf - Accident and Emergency (not overly keen on it)
Socks: Grey spotty and yellow spotty

Super Busy

The past few weeks have been a total blur really. I've been so busy and I just haven't had time to sit and update. I've hardly been online at all.

On the 27th I failed my EU exam, and to de-stress went on this. It didn't exactly work. I ripped my toenail in half backwards and had to spend 3 hours having it sorted/pushed back into place in A&E, sending my stress levels through the roof. So much for a fun surfing session.
Wednesday and Thursday were revision and do very little due to pain days. Friday however was much better. It started with a 3 hour Criminal exam, that I think I failed, but at least it was better than I expected. From there it was food, nap and tidying before Lowri arrived. A quick trip to Siro's was had before we popped home to change and get ready for the big night out. Seeing as Danielle and Rachel were visiting, and quite a few of us finished exams that day, it always was going to be a drunken affair. Starting at Siro's then heading to all you can drink at Jak's and finishing at Monkey made it really good fun. The only downside was the awful queues at Jak's for the first half of the night. They really need to get more staff and open both bars on nights like that. With the amount of pain I was in (toe is more painful than it sounds) I really didn't want to be queuing for ages. Luckily they eventually died down somewhat as most people moved towards the dancefloor, having drunk as much as they could early on. This left me the opportunity to grab as much to drink as I could. The tiny amounts of lemonade used allowed me to down an Archers & lemonade without it even touching the sides and going straight back for another. This = fairly drunk Amie. You know it's been a good night when you're totally hyperdrunk and hobbling down the road at 4.30am as it gets light.

The weekend started with a café breakfast before Lowri and I headed to Swindon. It was nice to see everyone for the first time in 8 weeks. Having relatives visiting from Melbourne was good too. I haven't seen them in 5 years so it was nice to go out for a big family meal. I'll definitely be heading out to see them next Summer. The weekend was fairly quiet really, but gave us all a good opportunity to catch up. I spent a few days recharging before coming back to uni for the madness that is the end of year.

On the 3rd I spent 4 hours on trains. Or at least that was the plan. Two lots of delays and a broken train pushed it to over 5. I would have got quite pissy about it, but I saw Black Kids so that made everything good. Grabbing my usual spot at Clwb Ifor Bach helped as I could lean on an unused speaker stack, but wearing shoes for the first time in a week HURT. A fantastic set by them and a surprisingly good opener in Collapsing Cities (who were better live than on myspace) made me smile. I was in the perfect position to sing and half-dance and grab my first setlist at the end. Spending the nightmare journey home on a train full of hyperactive Girls Aloud fans was...interesting.

The 5th was Playzone! After going there for the CIN Dance social, I'd been looking forward to going back, even with an injury. As long as I didn't overdo it with the toe and start it bleeding again I thought I'd be fine. Thought being the key word there. James came running towards me, we collided and I flew through the air. In true Amie style, I was left in a ball on the floor, half struggling to breathe and half trying not to laugh and make it worse. Being badly winded is not fun. Whoever thought of opening a kids play area to adults is a genius though. Loads of drunk students, some sober students and a kids play area is a recipe for organised mayhem. It's quite tempting to do something there for my birthday party. I'm v proud of myself too. I overcame my severe dislike of heights and went down the big red slide. I was too scared to do it the first time I went, but this time I was determined and got on with it. I'm so glad I did, just so that I can say I did it. It really wasn't as bad as I thought it'd be, but then again things like that never are.

The 7th was the yearly village carnival. Going back to where I lived last year was slightly surreal, and I knew it could never be as good as it was last year, when i could run in and out of my house for supplies all day. It was still a good day though. There was a bouncy castle, drunk students (when are there not in Swansea!), sun, some semi-decent bands, a doughnut stand, general fun stuff... If it had rained it wouldn't have been anywhere nearly as good, but luckily the weather was kind to us for the day.

Monday 9th for everyone else was spent on the beach, in most cases getting sunburnt. Seeing as I have PLE and Lowri was arriving that night I thought it would be a good idea to stay out of the blazing sun and tidy my room. I swear my room has never been so tidy. After picking Lowri up from the train station, we had a fab beach BBQ. I love living so close to the beach. I also love taking pictures of fire. I'm quite proud of some of them. There are far worse ways to spend a Monday night than with food, a fire and friends.

Tuesday was chilling in town, getting nails done, last minute ball shopping and drinking wine on the beach. Luckily the heat had dropped since the day before so I could enjoy it a lot more. Sunbathing on the beach in the late afternoon with a bottle of wine is a good way to do things.

Wednesday was THE day...Ball day. I always love getting dressed up for a big event with my friends. Sadly it poured. I got some good photos before the rain started, but nowhere near as many as I'd have liked. I ended up very cold and very wet. Luckily I'm happy with the photos I got of me in my dress. I did my first spot of drink-driving on the dodgems and proved that I am definitely better at driving than Paul. We had a good few goes on there. By the time it had been raining an hour I was bored and ventured out to the main stage. Killa Kela was surprisingly good. It's not my sort of music at all but he was definitely worth seeing. The announcement that Mutya Buena was on next instead of The Vengaboys was time for a toilet/jagermeister bar run, and I arrived back at the front of the stage a couple of songs into her set. By this time most people had disappeared as everyone fought for space inside the tents. I braved it out with Matt, James and Emily right to the end. Dancing to The Wombats in pouring rain is probably even more fun than doing it in the sun. I was quite surprised by the number of crowdsurfers, even girls in dresses. There's no way I'd have done it in mine. It was bad enough being on the barrier in a silk dress.

Since then I've just been chilling really. This update has been somewhat delayed by the fact that I've just been busy doing not much so I've not massively been online and the laptop has been off for repair. Yes, even this one has problems. My phone is away at the moment too, but I've been borrowing one, so that's not been so much of a problem.

The "Joys" of Exams

It doesn't seem like 2 minutes ago that I was about to sit my January exams, and now here I am all ready to do it again. Well, maybe not ready...definitely not ready, but either way come 9.30 I'll be sat in Dining Hall C about to start a 2hr paper on the joys of family law in England and Wales.
Topics on this paper cover:

• Family Law Act 1996
• Parenthood and Child Autonomy
• The Legal Response to Private Disputes Over Children
• Child Protection
• Surrogacy

So far I know only surrogacy. The exam starts in almost 9 hours and I can't remember 4/5 of it at all. Oh hell.

Music: Mystery Jets - Metal Soul
Socks: Still wearing flip-flops

Adventuring

I ran out of aniseed balls :(

The past few days have been busy but really good fun. Thursday was "Fake North" adventuring day. It started with a train to Crewe, then another to Stoke. Almost 5 hours on a train is a lot more enjoyable if its a FGW and is generally nicer but at least we weren't delayed. This is where things could have gone very wrong.

I trekked all that way to see The Wombats. I first saw them last June and then again in December, and they cannot be described as anything other than fun. Thursday night was the biggest venue I've seen them in by a long way. We got there during the first support. I've no idea who they were, but they were a local band who were well known by quite a lot of the crowd. It was first time I've ever seen a pit and crowdsurfing before 8pm. Half the time I think they were just acting like it because they could. I could tell already that there were going to be a lot of annoying people. I was later proved right. The band weren't bad and played quite well, but would be liked by fans of The Enemy/The Twang.
It then got worse. We worked our way forwards and were almost at the front when I Was A Cub Scout came on. I now have another band to add to the "Oh Dear God That Was Awful" list. I felt sorry for the drummer really. It looked like he was stuck in a band of idiots. There was a Keyboard player who went AWOL during every other song and a fat guy at the back who didn't seem to do much. He spent half of it with a trombone in his hand walking about the stage, looking at a keyboard and walking off again. I think he played in about half a song. By the end it was just the guitarist and drummer left with backing tracks. The music wasn't good either. I'd love to know who told them they were good or who gave them a record deal. If I never see them live again it will be too soon. As usual the crowd were going mental, but then got worse and started the football chants. Yes, your football team are doing well and are going up. Good for you. Now shut the hell up.
By the time The Wombats were due on stage it was a contender for gig from hell. Half the crowd looked under 12, including the girls in front of me on the barrier, who could only just see over it. The other half probably couldn't have passed a GCSE between them. Annoying was an understatement. Luckily the band were fab. The first time I saw them was in a pub with about 150 other people. When it was announced that they'd be playing an arena by the end of the year I thought it was seriously over ambitious. After Thursday I'm not so sure. I've now seen how they've adapted to 3 totally different sized venues and they done each with ease. If anything they put in an arena performance at a theatre. They played pretty much what they were expected to, but didn't play any of their older songs as the have in the past. The only additions were a new song they wrote at new year, and 'Girls, Boys & Marsupials', which they played the first time I saw them, but not in Cardiff. Highlights were going mental to 'Moving To New York' and 'Let's Dance To Joy Division'. It was worth going just for those alone.

The trip home was...notable. As far as Crewe it was fine. Nice, even. Arriva Trains Wales should note that halving the number of carriages on a Friday before a bank holiday is not a good idea. Not everyone fitted, even standing. By then I was tired, hungry, thirsty, bored and squashed. After a stop or two enough people had got off for me to sit on the floor in the bike rack, but that's not exactly the best way of reading the Guardian, let alone attempting Sudoku or Kakuro puzzles. Eventually I got a seat and it even turned into a train party with 3 groups of Rugby fans and a group on a hen weekend all heading to Cardiff leading to banter flying across the carriage. Not something I'd do again in a hurry though.

Last night was the drunken BBQ/Tooters trip that I'm surprised so many people can remember. For some reason it seems a lot easier to get drunk there than anywhere else. After a busy few days I could do with a night in to recharge but no...I'm off to see Mystery Jets in Cardiff in 10 mins. Woot!

Music: Mystery Jets - Two Doors Down
Socks: 2 different sailor ones.

Sadness

I'm really upset at the moment. I love my laptop to bits. It's the one thing I'd save from a burning building. I've had some amazing times and some horrible times since I started uni, and my laptop has got me through them. I was so excited when I got it. The 2 days that it sat in a box in my bedroom before I was allowed to open it once I got my A level results were horrible, but I have loved it dearly since.

8 hours time may be the last time I ever see it.

It's sad, but fingers crossed I'm getting a new one on my insurance. They're picking it up to have a look at it, and if the laptop person who looks at it is as nice as the one I spoke to on the phone, they'll write it off. It's broken so many times now, and after the serious system errors i've had over the last few days, I've had enough. It's so unreliable. I'm excited that i might be getting a new one, because shiny and new is always good, but at the same time I'm going to really miss it, and it might be a while before I can get a new one. The thought of my precious laptop being trashed is horrible. I can't see them being nice to it :(

A sad day indeed

In other news, I watched Juno for the 10th time while I can

Socks of the day: One Snoopy, one Penelope Pitstop