Firstly, relax…I’m not talking about myself here. I’m a long way off from that.
I’ve been caught in a weird place these last few weeks. Recently I was on Facebook and noticed one of my friend’s status changed from ‘In a relationship’ to ‘Engaged’. Came as a bit of a surprise to me. I guess being over here in America removes you from the loop a little bit, and as much as you try to keep up with what’s going on at home, there’s still things you’ll miss.
It’s still a new thing for me to have a friend that’s engaged to be married. I know it happens all the time, but somewhere along the line I’ve slipped into that age group where your friends around you are getting married. Granted, the ones involved are older than me (well…actually the guy is around the same age) but still I feel like the whole world is changing around me and life never sits still.
So I’m busy musing all this over when I notice on Bebo that an ex-girlfriend of mine is now married too. And she was only six months older than me. Scary. For me, it seems too young but I suppose there’s no perfect age to get married. A lot of things can change so fast and you don’t even realise. In a way it’s sorta sad that I get most of my information from social networking sites these days.
Today, again I was on Facebook and there’s another status update. Two friends of mine from university, who I thought were just good friends, are now engaged too. Of course, my first flippant reaction was that the whole world is getting married and clearly I’ve missed something. It’s a huge step to get married, because you’re essentially sacrificing your own freedom for the happiness and benefits found with sharing life with someone you love. I know that my friends haven’t taken the decision to wed without serious thought first, yet it makes me feel both young and old at the same time.
I’m still young, and I know that marriage should be way down my list of priorities but I’m reminded of the old proverb that if you haven’t found the person for you by the time you leave university then it becomes much more difficult. When I come back home, my full time education will only last one more year so if this theory holds true then I’m short on time. Taking a risk and moving country was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done. But nothing worthwhile is easy, and I’m so glad I did it. As a friend of mine once said “I’m fed up with being safe and discontent. At least if I take a risk and it doesn’t work out, I can say I’ve tried”. I went through the same thing - at home I had it easy, but I was still discontent. I couldn’t have picked a better opportunity. I’m in the middle of California, I have a whole year and every day is different for me. My life here is totally different to back home and at the moment I wouldn’t trade it.
So congratulations to my friends that are taking (and have taken) the next step in theirs lives. I hope that will be me someday, but for now I’m happy being who I am, being where I am and doing what I’m doing.
I signed a few forms yesterday so I am now officially a volunteer crew member on board the Alma. It’s the same boat as I was on last week, and I had a good time and even learned a bit about sailing so I thought I may as well sign up. It’s a pretty good deal - just turn up for a few hours on a Saturday afternoon, do a bit of work on the boat then just keep an eye on the tourists and enjoy the view. Yesterday we had a three hour sail around the Golden Gate; the weather was beautiful and the passengers were for the most part easy going people.
My neighbour Gaelle’s boyfriend is visiting from France at the moment, so they rented a car for the weekend so they gave Valerie and me a ride up to Hyde St Pier to begin the day’s sailing. Captain Al was pleased to see us, and First Mate Alice was happy to have us on board too. There wasn’t too much to do, just raising the fore, staysail and other words I’m pretending to know. Usually the first 15 minutes of the voyage is everyone on board lending a hand, but a good proportion of the 27 tourists on board were seniors so they weren’t much help. In fact, I spent most of my time keeping them away from dangerous areas on the boat and dealing with an awkward French woman. I never noticed but the French can be very rude…
So once we got sailing, it was pretty easy going and the sun was out. I learned my lesson from last week and wore sunscreen. I actually felt a little cold at one point and had to put a jumper on. Perhaps I’m beginning to adjust to the warmer climate?! I got some cracking photos too. Definately the worst part was when we went under the bridge - the water got pretty rough and, to my delight, the auld French doll got a soaking.
My boat. Not bad eh? Sailing under the Golden Gate Bridge Valerie insisted on a picture with me. Spot the Damien Rice Irish hair. I’m actually quite impressed with this picture, given the usual quality of my camera.
The sailing was fun, but afterwards we were all pretty tired, and Gaelle was moving to Berkeley so I gave them a hand to get their stuff packed into the car and had a doze for a few hours. Valerie and I headed out to the Metreon later to see The Nightmare Before Christmas, in 3D at the IMAX theater. It wasn’t pretty, you get those nerdy specs and the 3d was quite impressive in places.
Ice Skating
I took Valerie ice-skating on Friday night. I told her I was crap. She told me she was probably even more crap, so it sounded like it would be a blast. I was slightly dissappointed that they gave me rubbish skates that were a horrible pigeon sick colour. My disdain is evident in this pic: Horrible skates, and solely to blame for my poor performance
In total I only fell once, and in my defence it’s because she pulled me down with her. In total Valerie fell 6 times I think. She was right, she was worse than me. Even worse I had to listen to her guerning about her sore arm for the rest of the night. After the skating, we went to the top of the Hilton Towers hotel where they have their ‘nightclub’. It wasn’t the best place for talent, mostly old people so we didn’t stay long.
Today was much more boring. I went to work and am considering going to the gym then getting to bed early. I start work at 7am again tomorrow. Starting next week I’ll be doing a 60-hour week to make up for the days I take off for my Grand Canyon trip. Stupid America.
I’m not 100% sure of the circumstances surrounding the situation, but from what I read in the comments the kids Pluto is chasing kicked him in the nuts. I needn’t say any more, the video on it’s own is hilarious!
So it’s the big one, the one we’ve all been waiting to see for years. I went to see it last night, and what a show it is!
I’m beginning to really enjoy going to the movies over here. You can always rely on Americans to be over the top. And in typical American style not only did security have to control the crowd at the theater, we had to turn up an hour before the movie started to get a decent seat. And funniest thing of all, some hardcore fan came dressed as Duffman. Ooooh yeah! He was the minor celebrity of the night getting photos taken and everything.
It was very amusing to hear everyone booing the previews, all eager to get to the main feature. There were a few heckles of “Spiderpig!” and “Get to the movie” - needless to say there was rapturous applause when the movie actually started. So on to the movie itself.
The Movie
Without giving away too much of the plot, it’s basically an extended Simpsons episode with some jazzed up animation and production. The start has a revamped Springfield fly-thru with Bart’s blackboard lines reading “I will not illegally download this movie”. That self-parodying theme is paramount throughout the movie.
One thing that was surprising to see is some mildly adult humour. There’s nudity, mild swearing and even a hint at a sex scene. It’s like all of Matt Groening’s ideas that he wasn’t allowed to show on TV suddenly released! The movie is highly referential of the American culture too, which I’m not sure would be as funny if I saw it back home.
Also, it’s weird to see the Simpsons up on the big screen. All the characters that are so familiar seem like movie stars when you see them on screen, and it’s as if it’s an old series that has suddenly come back 20 years later. Very bizarre.
All in all the movie was all it could be. It’s not going to please everybody, and it’s certainly not one of the best movies I’ve ever seen but it is very entertaining and won’t disappoint die-hard Simpsons fans. Doesn’t beat the TV show though, it’s still vastly superior. But definitely a must see for anyone who does the daily 6 o’clock suppertime on Channel 4.
The Fratellis were magic, absolute quality! Didn’t care much for the support band (who’s name unsurprisingly I’ve forgotton). I tried to take some photos, but my camera is so crap it’s unbelievable (Connor you owe me a D40!). I did however get a video of Whistle for the Choir, which didn’t turn out that great. Crowd went nuts when they played the iPod ad music (apparently they did the music for an ad campaign here). Finished, rather predictably, with Chelsea Dagger and the place just exploded. The ground actually went up and down. All in all, a short 1 hour set but worth every penny of the $18 to get in. Sold out too which was surprising. Nice venue too.
