Vibrators and blood clots.

And our freedom's consuming itself,
What we've become is contrary to what we want,
Take a bow ..

I've been getting a shitload of spam email lately. Most of it makes no sense, but every once in a while a subject line comes across and makes me giggle like a small child.

The current favourite was "Did you get blood clots while on birth control?", but that was replaced yesterday with this absolute gem:- "For your wife's last b-day you gave her a vibrator because of your hopeless Erectile Dysfunction".

This got me wondering if that somewhere in the world, this was the truth. Some poor weedy bloke, probably sitting at his computer in the small hours of the morning in his underpants while his wife lay in the bedroom spooning the vibrator. Cast your mind to that previous birthday. He would probably be wearing a paper party hat, his wife had just blown out the candles on her cake, then she opened up her gift, her face falling.

"Oh James, this is awkward. Why would you get me this?"

Then he would sigh, bow his head and say, "It's because of my hopeless Erectile Dysfunction. Please note that the E and D should be capitalized. I love you."

It's all a gamble, really.

I fly like paper, get high like planes,
If you catch me at the border I got visas in my name,
If you come around here, I make 'em all day,
I get one down in a second if you wait ..

I saw Avatar for the 2nd time in 3D today, sadly not at the IMAX, but it was still as ruddy epic the second time round, and I left with the same feeling as before, the one of 'I dearly wish I had a huge fuck-off orange dragon that I could control with my thoughts'.

This second viewing was my successful attempt to avoid ice skating with the German Society, much as I love them, as I consider ice skating (or Eislaufen as they say in Deutschland) to be a sport for the sado-masochistic and the mentally ill. Unless you have Torvill and Dean-esque aspirations, then you're essentially paying to either glide round a slippery surface for a couple of hours, the novelty of which wears off fast, or cause yourself needless injury. Ice skating is bad times, end of.

No.

We've started lectures too; we had our first Bertolt Brecht one today. In-keeping with a rising tradition, we seem to have chosen Brecht because he's complicated and utterly depressing, another German novel of that type to add to the growing pile. There's that, and a lecture about gender roles in Weimar Germany (oh god why? Why?).

My elective course this semester is entitled "How children learn and communicate and how adults can help them". I expected this to be a fairly 'hands-on' sort of carryonsky, where we're taught how children learn and how we can help them. It seems sadly to be based around the more psychological aspects of growing up and learning, a topic which I thought I'd seen the end of when I turned my back on Freud's silly theories. Not yet apparently. Gah.

I'm also struggling for money at the moment; not that I'm lacking in it, but that for the 2nd time a Natwest cashpoint has conked out at the moment when I enter the amount of money, and eaten my card. So now I have the prospect, every time I need some money, of trekking down to the HSBC in town and drawing out said money with the aid of a little slip of paper. The first time, the cashier woman didn't have a goddamn clue how to use the computer, so I stood for half an hour while she faffed and distracted colleagues and generally sent the whole thing tits up. The second time I got a grumpy oriental girl, who didn't seem to understand that I didn't have a chequebook, and that I had no money in the world. Luckily, we managed to reach an understanding, and she thrust a £20 note resentfully through the little glass door and sent me on my way.

It's been a tough 4 days.

I've just got back from the Faversham, home of loud music and sticky floors, and eaten an ungodly amount of pasta. Its ten to 4, but not even this bothers me because I found out a short while ago that my only seminar tomorrow, a dreaded 9am, is cancelled. Get in.

Pimp my wheelchair

Now I've heard there was a secret chord,
That David played, and it pleased the Lord,
But you don't really care for music, do you?

In my ongoing attempt to become the stupidest person on the planet, I watched part of another episode of the flamboyant abomination that is Gok Wan. In a latest ratings-grabbing idea, Gok forsakes his apparently outdated hordes of naked fatties and turns his attention to - wait for it - disabled people! Yes, people in wheelchairs and with missing limbs are the new focus of dross telly.

Now, you might say "Max, lots of people probably watched that programme. It wasn't that bad - it raised awareness and suppressed prejudices. It was actually a bold, eye-opening and interesting insight into modern fashion".

I would then reply, after a hearty laugh at your childlike innocence, "Oh, my child. Do shut up."

It's all about the confidence, apparently.

I've never really been into crappy fashion shows, least of all the ones headed by Gok Wan. If he ever tried that stuff in China, country of his heritage, he'd probably disappear and never be heard from again within the week. (Gok, take note: potential career move in China?) I would probably never have watched it, but my housemates were watching and it felt right, lest I become a reclusive wanker.

The programme culminated in our wheelchair bound leading lady appearing bollock naked on Gok's famous catwalk in a shopping centre somewhere. I had to laugh at the inevitable trauma that will surely catch up with the woman's 10 year old son standing in the crowd, watching his naked mother. I wonder what Freud would make of that.

I blame the French.

People talking without speaking,
People hearing without listening,
People writing songs that voices never share,
and no one dare disturb the sound of silence ..

I walked back through the pouring rain by Hyde Park corner this afternoon in a semi-hungover state when a gust of wind blew something into my eye. My initial thought was the classic 'oh shit, there's something in my eye, I'll rub it for a while and blink ferociously and it will go away and be fine'.

This however was no ordinary thing, and it had no intention of leaving anytime soon. It seemed in fact to be making a little fort under my eyelid, complete with turrets. The amount of tears that were streaming at this point gave it it's own little moat as well. It's was then also that the feeling of 'darn, I look a retard' was kicking in, especially as Hyde Park corner is in full view of every bus, car and pedestrian for about 50 metres in 4 directions, and crying and semi-flailing seems to attract attention.

I managed to amble to one side of the road near the giant billboards. Whatever was in my eye had crawled into the top, under the lid. It was obviously trying to get into my brain to lay its eggs.

After a short while I literally just stuck my thumb into my eye into a place I didn't think was physically possible and managed to coax a tiny speck of nothing out of my eye. I don't know what the hell it was, but it looks like I'm able to take part in staring competitions again. It was a fairly traumatic experience. Nobody even stopped to help; that poor kid stumbling about with his finger jammed in his eye socket.

Reading that account back, it becomes clear not only that I need to start wearing goggles, but to try and stop using the word 'retard' in all it's shapes and forms. This is annoying however, as it's a very handy word/phrase for a plethora of everyday situations, such as 'that's retarded'. I still can't decide though whether or not to keep using it and incur the wrath of the political correctness Nazis outright, or try and be tactful and risk potentially more wrath.

I could try such alternatives as 'That's mentally slow' or 'that's partially paralysed from the neck down' or maybe 'that's so easily amused by things like biscuits and scared of loud noises'.

Hit me, bartender.

Billie Jean is not my lover,
She's just a girl who claims that I am the one,
But the kid is not my son ..

The last of the exams have been done, meaning that I can now devote less posts to updating you with exam related stresses. We were at the pub last night in celebration - I drank to the health of the non-sentient being that I mentioned in one of my last posts, the one who helped me through exams. I have another night out coming up shortly, and theres a couple more lined up for friday and saturday. January will probably prove to be an expensive month. Our behaviour yesterday - frequently checking our watches to see if it was 11am yet and that the bar would thus be serving proper drinks - seems to herald an early descent into alcoholism. Huzzah!

Epische Fehler.

So what do you say?
You can't give me the dreams that are mine anyway,
You're half the world away ..
Half the world away ..

I had my third and penultimate exam today and Christ almighty, this one pretty much kicked me in the balls and walked off. Looking back, there was an ungodly amount of material that I don't recall ever learning, let alone revising. There was also the question of why this particular module is assessed in German rather than English like the others. That would have probably helped, especially when that sinking feeling sinks in after only reading the questions, none of which I understood. Barring revision, it's actually been a while since I actually did any proper German practice, neither speaking nor writing, and although I could visualise and rationalise this exam in my head, in terms of actual application, this foray back into the thick of it wasn't a promising messenger of hope for the future.

Once I'd decided on a question there remained the minor point often encountered during exams of getting your shit together and scrawling some coherent answer. Uninspiringly, my writing was legible almost to the point of being neat and tidy, which suggests I sat for long periods inbetween writing slowly. The question was something about the 'new' Berlin. I honestly couldn't tell you more than that, even after writing an answer on it. After translating some of the question words online this afternoon, I was still unsure as to what the question had asked, but I'm fairly confident that it sure as hell wasn't what I was waffling about. My confidence sinks and bursts into flames, like the Hindenburg. I sense August resits.

Language degree? Oh the humanity.

In non-exam related events that can only warrant curiosity, an assault rifle arrived for me in the post yesterday, an order from a couple of months or so back which I thought had been cancelled due to some mixup with money in my account and whatnot. It seems not, so my loss was their loss. Ha. It's only a bb gun, but for the somewhat low price I paid for it (£25-30 I believe) the thing is fucking powerful. I'm sporting two bruises, one slightly bloody, through my 'testing' of the weapon. So yeah, that was unexpected.

Final point:- "Robogeisha" has been licensed for a US release, which should mean its making it's way over here shortly after. To this I say 'God help us all'. YouTube it. It's the first result. Does one laugh .. or cry?

Hugging babies, party policies and other recent occurences.

And as time goes by,
I will always be in a club with you
in 1973 ..
Singing here we go again ..

David Cameron has rekindled his annoying habit of talking about happy happy families, in all his Tory smarmyness. Annoyingly, so has Nick Clegg, the Lib-Dem leader with some good policies but a lost cause. Even more annoyingly, these new developments are making them slightly harder to tell apart: two southern blokes, similarly aged, expensively educated, and seemingly both in touch with their feminine side; that is, the one that likes hugging babies.

Please, call me Tony.

In this sense they are becoming unwitting heirs of Tony Blair, who, in a move never really seen before, swept into Downing Street in 1997 to display his family to all. Before that, feminine sides had never really been on the political agenda. Churchill, Thatcher - a feminine side? Gordon Brown has a kid as well but everything about his public appearances and general demeanour just kinda scream that he is a pre-Blair dad, a pre-Blair politician. He is doubtless a caring father, but unfortunately he's fallen into that slot of 'classic Prime Minister' role, the one where Prime Ministers aren't real people but names in well cut blue suits. Leader's inability to pass themselves off as human beings is much more of a problem these days than before.

One is an ordinary chap.

So yes, Nick Clegg has been hugging babies and talking about hugging babies, which, given the Lib Dems record may as well end up as official party policy for all the difference it will make. He seems quickly to be jumping onto the David Cameron bandwagon, which places family values smack bang in the middle of everything, though he'd be unlikely to use the word smack himself. There was a classic Cameron quote recently from BBC news - "What matters most to a child's life chances is not the wealth of their upbringing but the warmth of their parenting". Nice one Dave, but wealth does help though, eh mate? This could have been a pretty effective policy pronouncement if Cameron hadn't been to Eton and be one of the smarmiest guys alive. That, and if we knew what the fuck he actually meant. What is "life chances"? If it implied emotional wellbeing, that would work and be a nice message, but it's fairly clear that it's about educational, financial and career success. Basically, a return of the old Tory sentiment 'the better off are better placed'.

I declare babies!

Government intervention in family life is only gonna stick around I reckon. It's pretty cocky to presume that you need a politician to tell you how to bring up your children, or use them as political weapons to gain votes. But, since the economy's still going to pot and touchy-feely political correctness has become a big part of politics, it seems as though the family is here to stay as part of our political battlefield. Joy.

Shit, shit, shit ..

Rant finished, there isn't a great deal of source material under the 'other recent occurences' heading. I've only been working this weekend, which mainly involved dropping glasses and doing sweeps behind the sofas in the bar to see if customers had dropped any money. I'm oh so poor. I'm also filled with dread and a weird sense of pre-determined failure for the upcoming tuesday exam, which will ask me about the German political system in German of all languages, in response to which I will probably cry and slam my fists on my tiny exam table. They say its unhealthy to go in feeling negative, but fuck, it'll take more than the classic 'n'awwww, it'll be fine, people always think they're gonna fail but never do' to convince me. Ruddy German. It's far easier to rant about the British political system than it is to blag an essay about the German one.

2 down.

And do you believe in rock and roll?
Can music save your mortal soul?
Can you teach me how to dance real slow?

Blitzed my second German exam at 2pm today with all the force and vigour of Jabba the Hutt on ecstasy. I managed a good 3 pages on Metropolis, hopefully without inventing any scenes, but lost a bit of altitude when faced with analysing references to Freud in Kafka's literature. I can't help but thinking, when sitting in lectures and seminars and listening to many weird and wondrous interpretations of literature and film, that some of the material discussed simply cannot have been going through the mind of it's creator.

"When Kafka wrote his nightmarish short story, Ein Landarzt, the raping of the maid is a clear reference to the doctors subconscious will to have sex with her! Because she's a maid, she encapsulates motherly aspects such as looking after him, so its a nod to the Oedipus complex! It all makes sense now!"

It's a bit of a mindfuck.

No! He was just writing a weird story! I don't want to appear closed-minded at this point, as I quite enjoy Kafka, but the ungodly amount of stuff that we're forced to infer really gets on my tits. Having said that, I could have down with some more of it today, as I only managed about 2 pages on him. And this time, I remembered to scribble out my essay plan and crappy jottings, so I don't get marked down for senseless illegibility, like I probably will for the one yesterday. Ho hum.

But yeah, its the language exams next week, so wish me luck.

Ich habe super-fantastisch!

Are you lonesome tonight?
Do you miss me tonight?
Are you sorry we drifted apart?

The first exam has been done, which means 3 more to go. It wasn't as bad as it could have been, which I'm grateful for, but it was one of those questions that you have all the knowledge to answer, but with one of those really awkward spins on it that makes you freeze up for a few moments every time you think of the question before starting a new sentence.

I have similar confidence for my next one on thursday, but the following two involve a godawful amount of written German, which they tell me has to be grammatically correct, apparently. Inventing words in German is much easier when talking at speed with a bit of mumbling than it is when its written clearly on a computer. Fuck.

I also did a couple of hours of clothes shopping after the exam, under that special guise of 'winding down, having a break' post-exam, but which was in fact just a barely hidden excuse to avoid the revision. For those who don't know me, I'm not a shopping person and my shopping trips are virtually always out of necessity than pleasure, but when faced with the prospect of re-reading a text in German that you hated and didn't understand the first time, anything looks fun. Hell, I'd attempt a DIY job on our shitty toilet if it meant that Nietzsche and Freud would fuck off for a day or two.

So yes, I bought a nice pair of those fingerless gloves which are being revised from Hobo must-have's to items of indy fashion. I'm into these things in a big way; my hands are warm - but I can still get cash out of my wallet and stuff? Thankyou, topman. Other than that, I continue in my mission of being the flagboy of H&M and Primark. How I love you both with your cheap cheap clothes. I have a new long sleeve T-shirt which is a rather epic shade of blue, and I'm wearing them all now. Huzzah.

Anyway I'll round off this rather gay sounding post (oooh, look at me and me new clothes) and go and eat something. And then maybe revise. If I survive all these exams, I'll buy whatever helped me through it a pint. If it's a non sentient thing, then I'll drink the pint myself, just out of respect.

We need more anti shit-smeller.

All along the watchtower,
Princes kept the view,
While all the woman came and went,
Barefoot servants too ..

Our toilet and shower are buggered again. The brown stuff is seeping ever closer to the seat and to the edge of the shower rim, and the basement smells like an open sewer. Also, we forgot to ring the landlord again.

Its time for pasta.

Bugger

Now this looks like a job for me
So everybody just follow me,
'Cause we need a little controversy,
'Cause it feels so empty without me ..

A happy happy virus has hijacked my search engines, just in time for revision and essay time. Now everytime I need to find something that could save me when i'm sitting in an exam room in 3 weeks time, I'm redirected to some business site. I'm in the process of downloading some stuff that should help to rectify the situation, which took a while to find given that all search engines are down. Windows Vista is also offering another of its classic helping hands by turning off my firewall and not letting me boot it up again. Fuck you, vista; you're the bane of my life. The fact that Eminem was todays current 'what Max is listening to as he writes' only helps to demonstrate the desperation of this carryonsky.

Tastelessness of a whole new level

Somewhere, beyond the sea,
Somewhere, waiting for me,
My lover stands on golden sands
And watches the ships that go sailing ..

During long periods of sifting through the incomprehensible amount of crap that exist on the Internet, I discovered something so poorly thought through it was almost untrue. Ladies and gents, I give you the T-shirt of the 21st century:

People who wear shirts like this, or ones such as "I survived the blackout of 2003" which I don't have a picture of unfortunately, are typically the ones who shouldn't have survived it. Someone please explain the mentality behind this. Especially the one pictured above. I'd imagine if you go for a walk in New York today, you're very likely to run into someone who has a friend or relative who didn't survive 9/11. This is nothing though compared to the aforementioned 'blackout' T-shirts. Considering that only 11 or so people died in the blackout, the only serious ones fire related, it clearly wasn't the toughest thing to survive. I'm going to start wearing a shirt that says "I went 24 hours without power and bitched about it afterwards".

These items of clothing extend further to hats with stuff like "Ground Zero." on them. Why the fuck would you want to wear a hat endorsing a place where 3,000 people were murdered? Are hats that say "Pentagon" or "Field by a wood in Pennsylvania." in production yet or what? Maybe theres a market in Germany or Israel for hats with "I survived Auschwitz." Fucks sake. Its worrying to think what the 9/11 memorial will actually turn into. 9/11 itself is already a product. It's been used to sell everything from t-shirts and hats, all the way to a full scale war with a country that had nothing to do with it. Nothing sells like national tragedy it seems.

HAPPY NEW YEAR.