31/03/06 MOW!!

The Pirates vs. Deviants gig last night was sawesome. Despite concerns that hardly anyone would turn up (Frankie was worried that the Feud would affect things), loads of people arrived including many Deviants, pirates, forum types, and randoms who must have seen my posters. We ended up with a £58 profit. WIN!

We have decided to adopt Swabbin' the Decks as the official piratesoc band, because they are pirates and have a very funny performance, complete with tankards of ale / rum and full pirate costumes. MC Ipod was also brilliant.

A few photos from the evening may be found here. Frankie also filmed most of the evening so a DVD should be available soon.

Posted by Alex at 11:40 AM

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30/03/06 So much to do + Feud

I have so much stuff I need to do this week, and I haven't done enough of it yet. I need to finish my Java coursework (still an absolute ton of work left to do for that), sort out my unit choices for next year, sort out the delay with the piratesoc server upgrade, and finish work on the piratesoc website. I also need to go into town today to get more props for my pirate costume and a birthday present for Frankie. Plus we have the Pirates vs. Deviants gig this evening at the Ferryboat. Busy!

The Feud reared its ugly head again. I mediated between Frankie and Bil as they sniped back and forth, each trying to prove that the other was responsible for all the rumours and bad-feeling that has been going round recently. Bil provided a lot of evidence that Frankie "started it" but to be honest I don't believe him. Of course I am on Frankie's side. She's the one who is becoming very upset and depressed about the whole business. I tried to get Bil to drop the argument once and for all, but he won't let it go. There has also been vandalism on the wiki, and we believe he is responsible.

On the other front of the Feud, Overspawn is still being an offensive idiot, and appears to be directing the majority of his attacks towards Chris and Grace (who are in this by association, being friends of Frankie and myself). And a downright nasty thread was started on the forums this afternoon about their love life. It was deleted, but not before damage had been done.

This argument is getting really tiring. I sort of wish I hadn't got dragged into it, but I couldn't stand by and remain neutral while my friends were going through this. The thing that really frustrates me is that, despite my best efforts, I can't seem to make the situation better. =(

Posted by Alex at 12:50 PM

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28/03/06 One piece of coursework down, one to go!

We did the robotics presentation this afternoon, and I think it went really well! The little robot did everything it was supposed to do without a hickup, even making all the corners first-time, which is rare. Anton and I went down to the bar for a celebratory pint ... mmmm Adnams ... =D

I'm feeling pretty happy today what with one thing or another, despite teh evil Java coursework and looming maths revisions. The sun's shining and I've done loads of work to the new piratesoc website, which can be found here: www.pirate-society.co.uk.

Posted by Alex at 3:30 PM

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27/03/06 A hectic weekend

Yesterday afternoon was pretty manic. After I got back to UEA I started working on the pirate society server issue again: an upgrade has now been ordered which should come into effect by tomorrow. This will enable us to install the forum software on the server. I'm also in the process of designing a general website for the society, which is a lot of fun!

However all was not good news. Due to another disagreement with the admin, Eeevie left the Underground and her account has been deactivated. It was sad to see her go, especially as by that point I was pretty much the only person still standing up for her (except Chris and Grace), but I respect her decision and think it was the right one. One of the administrators has proven himself to be totally incompetent, but despite this has merely been given a warning, which just isn't acceptable. I can understand why Frankie felt she had to leave, given the circumstances.

Suddenly the forums aren't as fun anymore now that Eeevie has gone. She started the thing off and kept it going, and has put an awful lot of work into it ... seems a shame that she's been forced out like this. The thing I can't understand is why so few people seem to be on her side.

Anyway it's my coursework night tonight, and possibly tomorrow night as well, so no rest for the wicked!

Posted by Alex at 9:40 AM

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24/03/06 More piratey matters

We're currently in the process of organising the Pirates vs. Deviants gig next Thursday at the Ferryboat, which is both an important Piratesoc-presented event and also Frankie's birthday party. For a while this morning it looked as if it would have to be cancelled because a headline band couldn't be found; however one was picked up at the last minute and their name added to the posters, which were still literally hot from the printers when I presented them to the rest of the committee! I'll start distributing them around campus tomorrow morning (plus Richie is going to rope the Deviants in, because he's their Secretary). It'll be fun sticking up posters again. Sometimes I miss our revolutionary days. =)

I also spent the last hour or so helping Frankie to sort out some technical glitches with her webserver, which is where the Piratesoc forums will eventually go. After battling through permissions problems, file-eating directories, and a bloody useless technical support system, I eventually concluded that the server is dead. I've drafted a letter for her that she's hopefully going to send to the company, because apparently she was charged twice for the webspace and was assured that it would have full SQL software ... which it didn't. And it doesn't even work. *sigh* I will set up a new server if we can't get this one to behave.

We have adopted Flying Spaghetti Monsterism as the official religion of the pirate society, because according to Monsterism all natural disasters are the direct result of the decline in the number of pirates since the 19th Century, which I agree with entirely. =D

Posted by Alex at 1:00 AM

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23/03/06 Another fun evening

Frankie, Richie, Chris, Grace and myself went to the Riverside this evening, did some bowling (I lost, although it was a close thing between me and Frankie in the first match!), went to the Old Orleans for a drink, then headed off to the cinema afterwards. Frankie and Richie are pretty skint at the moment so couldn't afford the cinema, but the other three of us went ahead and enjoyed the film.

We chose V for Vendetta, which turned out to be amazing. A dark and gloomy setting, some excellent casting (Hugo Weaving, Natalie Portman, John Hurt among others), and a stirring story of revolution all characterise this film. The part where the Houses of Parliament blow up to the accompaniment of the 1812 Overture is particularly inspiring!

After the cinema I felt rather smug when a complete stranger recognised me ("Hey ... it's Rodders from the forum!"), and also when the drinks machine in the station spat out no less than THREE bottles of Coke for only £1! SCORE!!

It was disappointing that only five of us turned up, but I guess we're the people who turn up pretty much every time anyway. Part of the problem is Overspawn. He had said he was coming, so of course this put everyone off, because he's an offensive tosser who has said and done some downright nasty things in the past (especially to Frankie, who just doesn't deserve his abuse). I personally hate the guy and will probably be rude to him next time I see him. However we cunningly set the meeting-up time fifteen minutes earlier than expected, at very short notice, so he made an excuse about eating his dinner or something equally lame. He's a paranoid coward with no life, so it's not surprising he didn't turn up when he knew who else was coming ... it's just a shame he puts other people off as well.

Anyway hopefully he will be banned soon, so then we won't have anything more to do with him!

Posted by Alex at 1:55 AM

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22/03/06 Never seen so many pirates!

Went to the first official PirateSoc event last night. It coincided roughly with the pirate party in the LCR, which I did not attend because I'm still feeling ill. As it turned out only four members of the pirate society turned up: three of the committee (Frankie, Richie, and myself), and Mikey (who is a very dedicated pirate!) Rather poor attendance when a large number of others promised they'd be there ...

Anyway apparently half of the 170 emails Frankie obtained during Socmart II don't work, so a large number of recruits don't even know that the society is starting up properly. We did however see a few other pirates during the evening who came over to us and said "are you the Pirate Society?" ... turns out they were on the mailing list and wanted to join the crew. =) But as it was the pirate LCR anyway, more and more people dressed as pirates came into the bar so it became impossible to tell the real pirates from the false ones.

I thought I'd missed the documentary filming, which took place at 1PM when I was in the lab, but the film crew came back at about 8 o'clock and did a number of interviews, concentrating on Mikey, who had the best costume, complete with a small toy chicken intended to represent a pirate parrot! Frankie and I then wandered over to the front of the bar, where she spent an entire hour saying "I want a prize", and later singing "I wanna prize I wanna prize I wanna prize I wanna PRIZE!!!!" at the DJ. =D Mikey got the first one in an epic clash between the two most hardcore pirates in piratesoc, but apparently she eventually got a prize after I left. I daresay the person doing the judging was getting sick and tired of it!

Click here for a short video of Frankie doing a funny pirate dance (or pretending to be an air drummer ... not sure which!) That's my voice in the background. It's gone all high-pitched and squeaky because of the flu. =(

Posted by Alex at 2:15 PM

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20/03/06 A bit better today

My cold / flu / whatever it is doesn't seem quite so bad this morning, but my throat is still very sore and I'm coughing pretty much all the time. Had a complete rest from everything over the weekend so that has helped. However I'm still not greatly looking forward to my trip into town this morning ... ah well it must be done!

Scarily, one of our flatmates (Dariush) had his laptop stolen from his room last night, while he'd popped into the kitchen for fifteen minutes. I was asleep at the time but apparently the culprit is a stranger not known from our floor, who probably got in due to the defective locks. From now on everyone is going to double-lock their doors whenever they leave their rooms.

Posted by Alex at 9:45 AM

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19/03/06 Feeling rotten

Bleh. I'd had a bit of a cold for several days, but when I woke up yesterday afternoon it was about a thousand times worse. Couldn't have been a hangover because I didn't have a headache. It got worse throughout the day and I went to bed early, at about eleven, only to sleep extremely fitfully with some very strange dreams. I think I may have had a slight temperature last night because I was feeling very cold despite being covered by the duvet (and my room is usually too warm).

Am feeling even worse this morning. For some reason I have no energy, a headache, and a backache. Will have something substantial to eat for lunch I think to see if that helps. I had intended to go into town in search of piratey props but to be honest I don't think I have the energy: even getting out of bed was a challenge this morning. =(

Anyway I hope I'm feeling better by Tuesday, otherwise facing the cameras for the piratesoc documentary will be difficult!

Posted by Alex at 11:35 AM

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18/03/06 If this bottle wasn't empty ... no, wait, if this bottle WAS empty, I'd throw it at you!

A timeless quote from Gaz there, courtesy of several pints of beer and the White Card Game back at 31 Highland Road. We started off in the Red Bar at 7:30 as planned. As it turned out Chris and Grace were able to come for a little while before we headed off, which was fun, but as usual Grace refused to let me take her picture. I swear she is a vampire really. =D

Anyway our first pub for the night was the Lily Langtrie just off Unthank Road, which will be pretty close to where I'm living next year. It's a cracking little pub although it is somewhat lacking in decent ales. Eeevie soon produced her video camera and began filming everything: apparently at a later date a fully edited and produced version of the Great Pub Crawl will be published for all to see. Richie also had his camera so consequently I took fewer pictures than usual.

We also visited the Garden House pub, but ended up in the Mitre on Earlham Road. I stuck to things like Adnams Explorer & Bitter, IPA, and Guinness ... time-honoured typically Roddiesque drinks. =) I was also pleased when I got a free Guinness hat after my very first pint in the Mitre! On the second one they gave me a free shot of something extremely strong, which Eeevie ended up drinking because I am devoutly abstaining from spirits for the time being. And she is my personal alcohol monitor, after all!

We had a little trouble from chavs at closing time (one of them called Richie a poodle), but soon made our way to Dan's house on Highland Road, where Eeevie and I will be living next year. We spent a couple of hours playing the White Card Game, a legendary challenge involving a deck of white cards, each printed with a statement such as "You fall off a cliff and die -500 points" or "Choose: Truth or Dare, or lose 1000 points". Everyone invariably chose "truth". We've heard too many rumours about the occasions when someone says "dare" by accident. =D

I am also now fully signed up as the Treasurer for the Pirate Society, and really must get some sort of piratical costume together this weekend for the documentary filming on Tuesday ... apparently we are already famous! =P Plus Eeevie has given the official seal of approval to my plan for a forum social next week, which will take place on Wednesday afternoon. Next week will be a good one methinks.

As for now ... I need to get some sleep!

Posted by Alex at 03:55 AM

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17/03/06 Happy St Paddy's day!

Since virtually everyone I know seems to come from Ireland, or at least have Irish blood somewhere, this week's forum social event will be a St Patrick's Day pub crawl. Eeevie, empowered with her new role as official Socials Officer, is organising everything. We're starting off in the Union Pub at 7:30 this evening and later moving into some of the other pubs in Norwich. I had suggested visiting the Farmhosue, which will be our local next year, but according to Fitz (who lives near there now) it's a rather dingy place, so I suspect we will be avoiding it this time.

In an amazing coincidence I saw Emily, a friend of mine from back home, no less than TWICE this afternoon on campus. First was a fleeting glimpse through the window of Paston as I was trying to get into my flat ... I thought "eh up, I recognise her ..." but was too busy trying to figure out why my key wouldn't work. I then dashed down to the Street to get into the Accomodation Office before it shut and saw her again, talking to a friend of hers who apparently lives here. We said hello and had a brief chat but I had to dash to get into Acc. before it shut. Eventually I obtained a shiny new key which works fine. =)

Anyway Eeevie is currently uber-busy organising the new Pirate Society, and amazingly I have been promoted to both web moderator and Treasurer, which is a bit daunting but cool nevertheless. We're going up to Union House sometime next week to get committee training (she is going to be the President of the society). Note to self: I must also remember to suggest to her that idea for a forum meet next week ... V for Vendetta is on at the UCI and it would be cool to organise a social around that methinks ...

It seems as if I've been coasting on a high all week. I've been in a good mood pretty much all the time. Let's hope the week goes out with a bang! ... But not too much of a bang, after the *cough*Incident*cough* last week I will be avoiding spirits entirely. =D

Posted by Alex at 01:50 AM

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16/03/06 That's more like it! =D

It seems that people have finally given up on all the bad vibes recently. Today has been amazing. Haven't felt this happy in ages! It was a sunny and warm morning for a change, and I went into town to do a little shopping. I met Sean/Shamus at the bus stop and we had a chat on the way into town. Ended up buying a couple of DVDs from Borders: Serenity, and the first two seasons of Last of the Summer Wine. The first three episodes of Summer Wine made me laugh when I watched them this afternoon (errr, yesterday by now actually). I have missed my comedy since I've lived here. =)

And then, all of a sudden, everyone online seemed to forget about the Argument. Or, at least, most people. A couple were still moaning but they were ignored, and later on (during the manic high period) they were complaining that everyone being deliriously happy was even worse than the Argument. But we ignored 'em! I'd rather be happy any day of the week. It's hard to tell exactly what triggered it but it started off on the Things that Make Me Happy Today thread, and (inexplicably) spread to the Things That Make Me Mad Today thread, which led to some complaints because the "angry thread" was being userped by happy people! *chortle*

I drank almost a litre of lucozade, which definitely helped things along. Plus Eeevie photoshopped an absolutely adorable picture of Chris and Grace together which could possibly be described as sickeningly sweet in less euphoric circumstances! I think there was also a picture of Richie feeding Eeevie popcorn which was later modified so that it appeared she was eating a bear. Strange.

Even better, Grace signed into MSN for the first time in aaaaages and we had a good proper natter, although not quite as long as usual ... I do actually want to get some sleep tonight. =D

I then watched Serenity, which is the best science fiction film I have since seen the original Star Wars trilogy. Definitely set to become a modern classic I think. All in all it has been a fantastic day (with no work!!) and my irrationally good mood seems to have rubbed off on my friends, which made me happy. Forum love is so much more fun than forum arguing. =D

And as Chris said, we didn't even have to smoke anything! lol!

Oh and here's one for the official quotes page: "Don't smack your head honey, last time you did that we were given a brain damage leaflet!" (Grace to me when I was talking about hitting my head on the desk to try and get my sugar-high brain in gear!) This of course refers to the notorious last Tuesday, when I apparently hit my head against the wall several times. Rather hard. And the first aid people apparently insisted on giving us a brain damage leaflet just in case I went mental. Strangely, my head felt fine the next morning, I didn't even have any bruises or lumps or anything ...

... I am immmmortal!!

Posted by Alex at 01:30 AM

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15/03/06 Why can't people be nice for a change?

The Argument (it deserves a capital letter by now) between Eeevie, Sarah and a few others blew up on the Underground this evening, apparently triggered by some big-headed drunken articles posted on the Underground Wiki Project. I really wish people would quit going on about this ... it's getting tiring. And when certain people vandalise articles about others on the wiki it's beyond the joke. Running the wiki is my job, and it took me ages to track down all the unwanted changes and put them right again.

It seems to stem from a number of people being jealous of Eeevie and Richie, but to be honest it's gone beyond that now and people just seem to be sniping at each other from no reason. I just wish people would respect each other and be civil for a change! I don't want to issue warnings and bannings on the wikipedia but if this sort of thing continues then I will have to. It's just bad for everyone involved. /rant

On a happier note, I have done a huge amount on my coursework over the past couple of days, and went to the LCR this evening with Grace and one of her friends to unwind. We also met Francis, the legend who won the post of Communications Officer in the recent Union election. He has a number of excellent plans he intends to implement in the future, notable among them being a complete redesign of the Union website, wifi in the Hive (yay!), and reliable delivery of Concrete (the independant UEA newspaper) to all the halls on campus. He's a great guy and I'm glad I voted for him!

Anyway it was also fun to see Grace again. She fed me leftover pizza yesterday while I was snowed under with coursework, bless 'er, and of course played a role in my recovery this time last week. Unfortunately Chris couldn't join us this time because he was busy with some of our other flatmates. I'm hoping they'll both be able to come on Friday for St Patrick's Day ... rumour has it that there will be a pub crawl, although Eeevie is going to be carefully rationing my alcohol consumption this time. =D

Posted by Alex at 01:50 AM

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13/03/06 Pirate Society stuff

Frankie has finally got round to organising the UEA Pirate Society, and the first step is to set up the internet forum for members. I was given the honour of designing the title banner (I designed the one for the Underground), and came up with a number of designs. This is my favourite (click for the full version):

Two events are being planned this month as far as I know, most notably Frankie's birthday party on the 30th which will be combined with a "Pirates vs. Deviants" event (many of the Pirates are also members of DeviantSoc). Apparently you get extra points if you bring her a present, and even stand a chance of winning a Richie Award for Awesomeness. I want one of those. =D

We made some progress on the lego coursework today. The robot now follows the edge of the black track very accurately, although I'm still completely stumped as to how you're supposed to get it to turn corners it can't see. The task appears to be impossible without adding another light sensor (one to sense the black surface, another to sense the white). Will ask the teacher tomorrow I think.

Urgh. And I have to make a start on teh evil Java tonight, too.

Posted by Alex at 17:50 PM

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12/03/06 Planning the next trip

There's only four weeks left before the end of the semester, and that means only four weeks until my first big hill event of the year: the April Great Langdale expedition! It was originally scheduled for the New Year, but due to bad weather and cock-ups with the rail network we were forced to postpone it. I haven't been to Langdale since last October and I'm really looking forward to going back there for an entire week. The mountains aren't as high or impressive as the Wasdale fells, but all-round I think it's probably my favourite valley nevertheless.

Most of our gear is sorted. We're going to be carrying an absolute ton of stuff with us. On top of the usual camping and hillwalking gear, we are also taking a large proportion of our winter mountaineering equipment, plus several kilos of rock gear. The problem with April is that you can never be sure what the weather's going to be like. I'm hoping for decent weather for a change, but chances are it will be cold and wet, so of course that means more gear. =(

I am very much looking forward to climbing Bowfell for a third time (hopefully in clear weather!), and also to attempting a number of rock routes on the Langdale Pikes, especially Jack's Rake (which I chickened out of last May), and Harrison Stickle Main Face, a serious 200m Grade 2 route which will probably have to be pitched for part of its length. Of course, we can't attempt the more technical routes if the rock is wet, but that's the beauty of Langdale: there's so much to do, no matter how the weather turns out!

Anyway our final piece of coursework is being set this week, and will be running alongside the lego robot coursework for the other module. The lego coursework is due in three week's time and doesn't look too hard, but I've taken a look at the programming assignment and it's huge. I am not looking forward to this at all. I suspect I won't understand any of it until about the last three days, and then nearly kill myself trying to do it all before the deadline--like last time. Twenty hours of work in two days = a very ratty and slightly demented Alex.

I'm going to try to start the work early, but there's no telling how long that effort will last!

Posted by Alex at 16:15 PM

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10/03/06 Raining again

Meh it's done nothing but rain for days now. I'm starting to get sick and tired of it, especially after the amazing weather we had last week. It looks as if almost all of the snow has melted in the hills by now, except on Cairngorm and in patches on some of the other Scottish and Welsh mountains. So much for one of the best seasons in years!

Nothing else exciting has happened over the past couple of days, so I am being forced back on the time-honoured tactic of talking about the weather. =D Although Chris is attempting his 25-mile charity walk on Sunday, which should be interesting. I have promised to buy him a pint if he completes it in less than six and a half hours.

Anyway I'm off to Suffolk for the weekend, although I think next weekend I'll probably stay in Norwich. See you Monday!

Posted by Alex at 11:50 AM

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09/03/06 Fully recovered!

I have now fully recovered from the night before last, thanks to some food, lots of water, eight hours of sleep, and Grace filling me in on the things I missed while I was lost to the world. My friends are going to carefully monitor my alcohol consumption in future, so this sort of thing won't happen again. In fact Frankie has let it be known that I am limited to two glasses of whisky per night, and she will enforce this rule rigorously. =D

Anyway I'm keen to put this behind me, so I'll say no more about it!

In a way it's a good thing that I didn't sign up for the Snowdonia trip. I already know the area and have an independant trip planned there over the summer, and probably another one with Fell in November, so it isn't as if I won't be going back there this year. And now that I have missed two consecutive trips (and have been on the reserve list once) I am far more likely to get on the list for the next trip, to Glencoe in June, which is the one I really want to go on. I have no idea when the next chance to go to Glencoe will come up. So maybe it turned out for the best after all!

Posted by Alex at 12:15 PM

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08/03/06 Oh my God

I feel awful this morning. Apparently Grace and Chris got me back to my room last night, but I don't remember anything after about midninght ... apparently I passed out, which is probably why I woke fully clothed in my bed. :O to be perfectly honest I can't face going down to put my name on the signup list for the nesxt Fell trip. Ah well, Snowdonia can wait, I'll be back there soon enough!

Anyway big thanks to Grace and Chris and anyone else who helped me last night, you're true friends!

Later

More embarassing evidence emerges. I have to conclude that I am a complete and utter idiot. The bottle, which contained an entire litre of whisky at the start of the night, is empty, although I suspect I may have spilled it. There are also some confusing pictures on my camera, in one case of some people I don't recall having seen in my entire life ... and apparently Gaz was there, but I don't remember seeing him. Straaaange.

After making a complete and utter fool of myself, I have promised never to be so stupid ever again! =)

Posted by Alex at 12:50 PM

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07/03/06 Deposit for the house paid!

Went down to the estate agents this morning to get the forms signed and the deposits paid, although apparently the contracts themselves won't be ready for several months yet. Nevertheless, I've paid my £240 deposit (Eeevie needs to get her parents to pay hers), and we're signed in as the future tenants of the house, so it's now definite! We went down to the Adam & Eve pub for a celebratory pint. They have Old Peculier on tap, which made me happy. Will have to go back there again! =)

Got our next bit of 1C22 coursework today, which is based on programming LEGO robots. The programming language is a no-brainer really, and we've already got the little guy to follow a painted track on the desk, so it should be a welcome break from thousands of lines of manic Java code. However I ended up missing my Java workshop today, because I couldn't find the room! Will send the teaching assistant an email ... not a good idea to slip behind on that module. I suspect I'll be catching up for some days.

Anyway the LCR this evening is a themed event, so everyone is meant to be dressing up as a character from a movie. I don't have a costume as such, so of course the easy option is to put on all my mountain gear and go as Joe Simpson from Touching the Void. I suspect there have been bets placed among certain people, eg. whether or not I bring the ice axe, crampons etc (I won't be, because otherwise the doorkeepers won't let me in!) I have also filled my Sigg up with an ENTIRE LITRE of Glen Rossie ... not that I intend to drink it all myself, of course!

Chris, Fitz, Dan and Eeevie are definitely coming, and I think I've pursuaded Grace and Cat as well. So should be a lot of fun!

p.s. I have to be up at 8:30 tomorrow for the next Fell trip sign-up, but after that I suspect I will sleep until late in the afternoon, so don't be surprised if I don't post tomorrow! ;-)

Posted by Alex at 17:30 PM

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06/03/06 Differences of opinions ... *sigh*

Have just spent the last couple of hours trying to sort out an argument on the Underground. Basically, Eeevie was being bullied by several people (won't mention any names), she had reported the incident to Fitz, but unfortunately he'd been offline for the large part of the day so hadn't been able to do anything. A rather nasty argument broke out on the Things Which Make Me Happy Today Thread, leading Eeevie to threaten to leave again ... rightly so in my opinion, given the things a few members were saying about her.

As we were talking stuff through on MSN, Fitz came online. These two aren't speaking to each other so I ended up mediating between them, passing messages (and eventually entire chatlogs) back and forth. The problem seemed to be that Fitz hadn't read all the posts so didn't understand what Eeevie was getting worked up about, and Eeevie was convinced Fitz hated her. After an hour or so things started to settle down, and Fitz warned several users and posted a message asking people to calm down. Eeevie also took back her threat to leave the forum for good. Mission accomplished! =)

I think the lesson to be learned here is that, in a situation like this were some of the people involved haven't even met each other in real life, good communication is essential. The fact that Fitz and Eeevie had both blocked each other on MSN didn't help matters. I'm just glad I was there to help things along ... although I can't deny it was a nasty situation to be in, right in the middle of an argument between two of my friends. It felt dishonest siding with either of them. The best I could do was try to occupy the neutral ground, because there were valid points on both sides.

Meh. I just hope there won't be any tension at the social tomorrow.

NOTICE: Comments are now working again! Apparently they haven't been working for a week or more. :S

Posted by Alex at 20:45 PM

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Update on last week

Headed back home last Tuesday for a complete break over Reading week, although I had to return to Norwich for a couple of hours on Friday for my other lecture. Got back here for good yesterday evening. As it turned out, I went to the bowling alley with Chris, Grace and a few others, and despite the fact that I'm a complete novice at bowling, I beat the lot of them for the first two rounds! Although that may have something to do with the fact that the bumpers were up ... well at least I proved that I could accurately hit stuff at the end of the lane by bouncing the ball off the bumpers. =) I did get several first-class clean runs in as well. Beginner's luck, no doubt!

Still no letter from the property letting agency about the house, although I'm meeting up with Eeevie tomorrow so we can talk to the landlord and sign the contract. I think her boyfriend is driving us down at about eleven. I'm also getting my next piece of coursework tomorrow, and everyone's meeting up for the Night at the Movies LCR in the evening, so it looks set to be a busy day.

The superb winter mountaineering conditions in Scotland and Wales continue to amaze me--apparently this has been one of the best seasons in years, which is annoying because by the time I (hopefully) get to Wales in two week's time, the snow will all have gone. Not fair!

Posted by Alex at 04:05 AM

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