Purdyful!

Look what I've found!

There are loads of stunning pictures here, check them out.

B t B t

Ok ok ok I know, terribly slack of me, but I'm here now and ready to bore you senseless with more beatbox-related shenanigans!

Last Friday (the 8th), I went up to London to witness the 2007 UK Beatboxing Championships. I got collected in Portsmouth by the incredibly sweet Fat Tony, who came and looked after me even though trains are evil, and whom I've been wanting to meet for ... oooh, weeks. Months. Once in London, we picked up Philippic (who is an absolute sweetie) and wandered around Angel Islington trying to find Grace (Bellatrix's friend). Bear with me, the names might get confusing, especially since everyone has two. We found Grace in the end, and went back to loitering outside the venue.

Y'see, everyone was going to arrive at 5, so we got there early. Quite early. Well, very. And we waited outside as people pointed and whispered (Tony was dressed as Russell Brand, it's a look that certainly gets a lot of attention!) After a while, BeatMuppet, YasSon, etc. all turned up from booking a room at the Generator (the hostel we were to spend the night in). Then everyone turned up.
Everyone.
All the people I had been so nervous of meeting, and a few it hadn't even occurred to me I might meet! Shlomo, the Petebox, TyTe, Bellatrix, Hobbit, some incredibly talented people. I don't think I was too star-struck, maybe I went a bit quiet at first but it soon passed, simply because they're all such awesome people.

The London finals started two hours later than expected, which was cool as I got bonus time to talk to people and get hugs ;) and they rocked. I could honestly not believe the skill in that room. I was hanging around with Phil and Tony feeling way less awkward than I expected to, and loving every minute of it!

Then came the UK finals, held in a packed club. Shlomo's set was every bit as good as Tony had promised it would be. Scratch's was awful, there was some pretty heavy distortion, but after that came the finals...

Fozzie shouldn't have gone out that early if he's as good as BM swears he is. He paced himself wrong, held a lot back for the next rounds which sadly never came. BM was not a happy bunny. Or indeed a happy mammal of any description.

The semifinals between Bella and Beardyman were absolutely genius, very entertaining dynamics going on there! (Bella's 18, win the for?! Truly amazing skill.)

Now, don't get me wrong, the championships were legendary (Beardyman won, naturally), but that wasn't the best part. The best part started afterwards. BM was trying to round up everyone so that we could get back to the Generator, but leaving is never that easy, especially when a few members of the party have been drinking. He had to physically carry Brown out of the club twice while YasSon looked for his bag and fished some Tea Tree oil out of his pint.

The journey back was entertaining to say the least, I alternated between shepherding along the slightly unsteadier people and talking to BM and TyTe.

Ok, all of you know how much I've been going on about TyTe. Well don't expect to hear the end of it any time soon because he's LOVELY, a truly stellar man and a legend in the flesh. Good hugger too. And friendly. He TALKED to me. (And I talked back, don't get the impression I was just stood there going "Heehee... you're TyTe, you are", no, I was just fine thankyou.) Then he left, because he had to be alive for the next day...
And as for BeatMuppet... well. He's a Christian, the most physical beatboxer I've seen, he likes Discworld, and recommended Velvet Elvis to me, and threatened to improve my vocabulary (can you believe it!) AS WELL as being a computer geek. So, you know, it was good to talk to him.
UPDATE! Enough time has now passed that I can clarify: "it was good to talk to him" means "he is My Type in every way that matters, and I developed a fun crush on him more or less instantly."

We got to the Generator at about 4am, it was getting light already and we were all knackered... especially poor Hobbit. He'd been performing on stage, and had to be up at 7, so he was quite keen to get to sleep. Nobody else was. It just wasn't happening. The constant stream of innuendo regarding bottles, cucumbers, and even Zippy (who never sounded that perverted before) were enough to keep me laughing till I cried. A truly awesome night.

I'm missing out so much here but I'll try to keep it short. The next day we got kicked out at 10 and all went our separate ways by tube and train; Yas, Yas's friend whose name I feel bad for not remembering, Tony and I caught the same train back and talked all the way. Yas is a sweetheart. In the end, I hugged Tony goodbye, and went home... knackered, but happy.

And, just because I haven't mentioned them yet, I'd like to say how great it was to meet Bevis, Typerite, Vig, Skitz, Magda, and argh I've forgotten her name, the one with the gorgeous hair.

They were all lovely, I will most definitely be meeting them again, and I've been staying in touch with BM because he's way awesome.

So that is it! That is what I did with my weekend! That is what I've been hyped about ever since! And five gold reader stars if you actually got this far, well done you.

Roffle. I'm a geek.

Dude... site recommendation. This has had me laughing for ages! A few of my favourites:

Cthon98> hey, if you type in your pw, it will show as stars
Cthon98> ********* see!
AzureDiamond> hunter2
AzureDiamond> doesnt look like stars to me
Cthon98> *******
Cthon98> thats what I see
AzureDiamond> oh, really?
Cthon98> Absolutely
AzureDiamond> you can go hunter2 my hunter2-ing hunter2
AzureDiamond> haha, does that look funny to you?
Cthon98> lol, yes. See, when YOU type hunter2, it shows to us as *******
AzureDiamond> thats neat, I didnt know IRC did that
Cthon98> yep, no matter how many times you type hunter2, it will show to us as *******
AzureDiamond> awesome!
AzureDiamond> wait, how do you know my pw?
Cthon98> er, I just copy pasted YOUR ******'s and it appears to YOU as hunter2 cause its your pw
AzureDiamond> oh, ok.

_________

*** Now talking in #christian
-Word_of_God- Welcome Abstruse to #christian I am a Bible Bot. For more info type: /msg Word_of_God !info
Abstruse> !kjv numbers 22:21
Word_of_God> Numbers 22:21 -- And Balaam rose up in the morning, and saddled his ass, and went with the princes of Moab. - (KJV)
*** SageRider sets mode: +b *!*@c211-30-208-111.rivrw3.nsw.optusnet.com.au
*** Word_of_God was kicked from #christian by SageRider (Please dont Swear)
Abstruse> I know I'm never going to be able to come back in this channel again after this, but damn was it worth it to see that...

__________


tag> Ouroboros: lets play Pong
Ouroboros> Ok.
tag> | .
Ouroboros> . |
tag> | .
Ouroboros> . |
tag> | .
Ouroboros> | .
Ouroboros> Whoops

__________

kow`> "There are 10 types of people in the world... those who understand binary and those who don't."
SpaceRain> That's only 2 types of people, kow.
SpaceRain> STUPID

__________

P.S. Let's hear it for men who dance, yowza. o.O

Oxford, Sleepover, Pub, and Dirty Dancing.

See the title for this post? See what happens when I'm gone for three days? DO YOU SEE?!

Some of you have been expecting me to talk about Tuesday for some time now, and I'm very sorry for not updating you all sooner, but as you see things have been fairly hectic.

So! Oxford. I went (all by myself) on the ferry and then the train (like a big girl) to Oxford, and I was freaking TERRIFIED. The train would take only two minutes between stations until we got near my stop, then suddenly it was draaaagging ooouut... and then the train inexplicably started going BACKWARDS.
As I got closer to my destination I got jumpier, edgier, fidgetier - fortunately not enough to become too conspicuous, I hope. At one point I started worrying because I'd gone so pale that my skin was actually blue, before realising that the train's windows were actually tinted slightly; that was a relief.

SO ANYWAY after that I actually went out of the station and saw him. Right there. Dave. Without a screen between us, or indeed anywhere in sight, there he was and there I was and... what now?
Well what happened next was we talked, and hugged (which he'd told me not to do straight away but changed his mind about), we got food, we went for a walk, sat in the park, talked, hugged (slightly awkwardly at first, then I relaxed a bit). We caught the bus back to his house, blur, blur, hugging, cat, blur, watched memento, blur, hugging (uhgahbuh), blur, dinner, home...

Yes, yes, I know. I can't remember a lot of it, not in detail anyway, because of the combination of nerves and excitement and hugging and not having a fantastic memory anyway. But I hope it's enough to say that it was truly awesome, that everybody I met was lovely and fun and generally great. In fact while I'm here, thank you, guys, you made me feel really welcome. Everybody go ahhhhh.

It wasn't until I was headed home that I started to worry about the fact that I'm an emotionally stunted wreck who may not even be capable of entering a real relationship, let alone sustaining one, but we'll brush over that.

I didn't get home until gone midnight, and by then I was too tired to blog, sorry guys. I should have done it the next morning, but I hadn't anticipated just how mad the next few days were going to be...

Wednesday: I went over to Dom's and played Kingdom Hearts 2. Awesome game. Haven't played it in months because her rabbit ate the wire. Steve (my honorary big brother) came over. Dave was sad. That made me sad, and worried, and guilty, but things got better. I think.

Thursday: Played Kingdom Hearts. Steve came over. I went to the pub for open mic night, which was awesome, and came back to Dom's smelling of smoke (so I refused to inflict that smell on her and slept in the living room that night).

Friday: Dom ran me a bubbly bubble bath! Hooray! Played KH. (Okay, maybe it was less manic than it felt, but I still had a truly awesome time. Dom is lovely.) Thennnn we went to a girly night with some of the cell group girls, we watched Dirty Dancing and had snacks, painted nails, etc. while the guys did guy things.
What guy things? Well, we found them running around outside Naomi's house with clingfilm, sellotape and beer.

In conclusion: much awesomeness has occurred. Much of which I'm sure I've forgotten just at the moment, but never mind.

Ooh, also I've dyed my eyelashes black for some reason, which I didn't know you could do. Apparently you can. *Flutters eyelashes*

I am pleased with you

Ok, so I thought I'd post again just to give you wonderful crazies who read my blog somewhere else to natter! By the way, you're all so truly awesome I can't even express it in words, so instead here is a picture.



That is for being good readers.

I've spent most of today in Guildford visiting my new baby cousin Josie, she's adorable and I'll get a photo up soon. Yay.

I was talking to Dave on the phone earlier, and right before I hung up I said "I'll see you tomorrow."

I'll see you tomorrow.

"I'll see you tomorrow"...

EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE.

Unwanted recognition

I saw Pirates of the Caribbean 3 today. That is not, in my eyes, the most interesting thing that happened. I got the CDs I sent the money off for two months ago, but that's not the most interesting thing either. I bought a present for someone at an insanely reduced price, but that's not it either.

The most interesting, embarrassing thing that happened to me today was when I was paying for the aforementioned gift. I was with my mum, my brother and my little sister. The guy behind the till, (pretty attractive, blond hair, nice eyes) looked up at me as he was handing the card back and said

"You are the one who was on Small Talk, aren't you?"

Many of you know that I blush quite easily. Well it was a prize-winner this time, I looked down and silently died while my brother and mum laughed. (Esther would have only been a baby at the time so she was a bit bemused by it all.)

I got out of there fairly quickly, extremely distressed and laughing at myself, before having the presence of mind to actually talk to the poor guy. I thought he looked like Sean, a kid I went to primary school with, and the receipt confirmed that.

I don't talk about my brief brush with fame, mostly because my 8-year-old self was an idiot, and having that idiocy broadcast to the nation isn't much to be proud of.

But yes. Here, on my blog, where I am loved and accepted by all three of my regular readers, I am finally coming clean: I was on TV once. And I am not ashamed.

Well, I am slightly ashamed. Just don't tell people, yeah?

Various people and other such miscellany

Oh, I don't know what to say, I don't know what to say! I could tell you not much has been going on, really, but that's blatantly not true. They're just all very mini-subjects.

So! Things I am thinking about, in no particular order.

1) I'm meeting Dave ON TUESDAY

2) I'm meeting Tony, going to London, meeting Hobbit, watching the beatboxing championships, sleeping there on the 8TH JUNE

3) Last night my suspicions were confirmed, a rather friendly guy told me that the reason he was talking to me is that he's been going through one heck of a dry patch, and when he asked James to be introduced to some new people, our helpful mutual friend pointed him my way. Thanks, James.
(No, actually it's ok, he's a lovely guy and we've had some interesting conversations. It's a weird one though, going to the pub with no intention of sleeping with ANY of them. Confusing or what!)

4) I got lovely hugs from lovely somebodies! Drunk guys give awesome hugs, I'm very sorry that this is the case, but it is. And they seem impressed by my hugs too, you know girls usually do quite pathetic hugs? Like they're afraid they're going to snap? My female friends, I love you, but you must work on that. Seriously.

5) I've just spent too much time doing some insane google-sleuthing to find out who drew a random picture. On the plus side I've educated myself in the process, I now know the difference between Jean Grey, Phoenix, Dark Phoenix and Madelyne Pryor; not to mention the plots involving all of them, the names of many of Marvel's comic artists, and so on and so forth. Heck, it might come in handy if I ever need to impress a comic geek (which between Northern Tom and Adam is a very real possibility).

6) Yes, Northern Tom. Toms have adjectives here. When I used to hang out with Jamez (with a Z) he was always telling me about his adventures with Small Tom, Tall Tom, Big Tom, Medium-sized Tom (seriously), I think there was a Welsh Tom too... maybe Northern Tom was one of them.

7) K that's all thanks bye!

Innocent whistling

As I saunter embarrassedly back on to my blog, hoping nobody minds my two-week absence terribly (c'mon, forgive me, you know you want to!), I can't help but marvel at how much has happened.

If only I could remember some of it.

Ah! Dave has given birth, or his wife has if you want to be picky about it. Welcome to the world, Seth!

Jamez is pregnant - his girlfriend, must I spell it out every time? - but the baby was moving too much for the scan to show the gender, so that'll be a lovely surprise for them. Well, not too much of a surprise probably. It's not as if they'll be saying "A what?! A boy?! What the heck... sorry, I think I need to sit down." No. There are only two main options, neither terribly surprising.

Things are going rather splendidly on the old religion front, woo for that. I've spent most of the evening with my good buddy Dominique praying and talking and reading the Bible and whatnot, and we're both feeling rather positive about everything. We're both very much looking forward to Lucy coming back from Africa, but I'm terrified what she'll think of what's happened in her absence...

We have a team from India working with us at YFC this week. Despite my self-esteem crash when they turned up on Monday, they actually turned out to be very lovely girls indeed. Girls and boy.

One of my readers is sad. This is very unfortunate. I'm praying for you, sweetie, and I hope you and him sort things out as quickly as is divinely possible.

You know, I ordered some CDs from Jay Foreman two months ago and they still haven't turned up? Slacker. Granted, he's not in the country, but really. It's just not good customer service.

I'm reading a book called Slick by Daniel Price, about the people who manipulate the media (not just adverts - all the media, news included). Very enlightening stuff, although my already-low BS limit has been strengthened once again - I can't stand to watch adverts at the moment, they're all so utterly transparent. Yes, this product will get me sex, I believe you.

I should be asleep, we're setting up for Catalyst Vibe in the morning (which I had forgotten). Should be a good one.

Aww... it happened again...

Every time. Every damn time. *sigh*

Open Mic Night last night was good, as always, with the added bonus of free pop-up hats from the bar - mine is a lime-green cowboy hat. How can you not love that?! But the reason I'm frustrated with myself is that I suddenly missed CQ, which led me to his MySpace page, which led me to listen to Calliope again, which led to me playing it again. And again. AND AGAIN. Last time this happened, I racked up a fair few plays before I dragged myself away from it... I just love this song so much!! Out of the 1050 plays it's had, I reckon about half of them are me, no exaggeration. I looooove it.

Listen to it because it is awesome.

I've been writing so much poetry lately, in a desperate attempt to find something I could read out in public without being ashamed of myself. I'll keep you posted.

Soooo... how is everyone?

I'm such a girl!

I've been fighting it for years, but it seems some traces of femininity escaped the purge.

I went to a charity fashion show last night. It was all for a good cause, St. Luke's Leprosarium, and after the catwalky bit (my friend Amy was a model, and very gorgeous she is too), we were let loose to buy designer clothes at half price. It must have gone to my head. I was very good, I must say, I only bought two things:

A floaty, yellow, slightly translucent skirt that reminds me of a daffodil,

And a dress... yeah, I bought a dress. A little black one. A little black fairly revealing one.

I wore the skirt today, loving it, even if I have to remember not to stand in front of bright lights. Then I wore the dress over jeans to go to Dominique's, which in retrospect was a mistake because we usually lie down on a double bed / floor sofa thing in the living room to talk, and this dress was not designed for horizontal wearing (things don't stay where they're put, if you see what I mean) but I still love it.

So, yes, I am now apparently female. Hooray for me.