Wednesday 1 December 2010

10 things I love...

1. Ale.

Well that is a no brainer. You all know by now that I love Ale and everything about ale up to and including brewing. I have a separate blog just for my ale, find it in the sidebar. This all started sometime a few years ago when I realised that beer was actually drinkable because not all of it was horrible, like fosters or carlsberg. I had some dark ale this one time and was quite content. It then stemmed to asking for "whatever dark beer you have" at pubs and has now moved on to a deep-ish understanding of a variety of ales, ale types and breweries. Ale is great and everybody should drink it and nobody should drink lager. There, I said it, and yes I am rather opinionated about this.


2. Juggling and other circus skills.

Other than music and running I would say this is a big chunk of my talent and hobby time that spends itself quite freely. I learned to juggle three balls in about year ten and since then I have been slowly progressing in other things as well such as diabolo and unicycling. It got to the point where me and Alan were just known as "those diabolo guys who hang around outside juggling". Lots of the lower school knew me as "that circus guy". I am now pretty competent at most of these things, hence the title of this blog page. I specialise in unicycle gladiators, complex 3 ball tricks and balancing nowadays but I can do a little bit of almost anything like slackline, clubs, contact ball, devil sticks, card manipulation, and hat tricks. There are more but I will just show you some photos.




3. Corderoy?

I don't know why, but I just love corderoy at the moment. It doesn't seem to be for any particular reason either. I like a good pair of slacks, what can I say? Much to the disappointment of James Wade who would rather I actually looked cool and in a band with thin jeans. Well we have a compromise. I wear slacks when we are not on stage, and skinny jeans on stage. Thats cool. I NEED more slacks and corderoy things, it is the perfect material for looking rad and being comfortable.


4. The Rat Pack and their associates by timescale and similarity

By this I mean, I love the rat pack. I love the people that were also singing at the time in a similar genre that were not officially part of the rat pack (i.e. Bing Crosby, Andy Williams). I love anybody who still in this day dabbles in this genre and style of singing (i.e. Michael Buble, The Royal Crown Revue). This is my favourite music of all. Say what you like about the popular stuff, and I will bridge the gap between philistinism and ignorance and tell you that it is all not to my taste without a second thought. That is the reason I even started to listen to this stuff, just because music is not the same and has lost everything I ever liked about it.
As you know, I am also sort of part time a male solo vocalist, and these fantastic men serve as my source of inspiration and material. Each song tells a story and if you find the right ones you can turn a bad day good again.

5. My friends and by extension the band.

I love my friends. None of them are the same, and I know I can count on them. The band rocks and we are getting on well and practising hard. The key is laughing and in jokes. I say no more.

6. My Keytar

Yes, my prized possession. the most valuable thing I own. I wanted one of these for years and finally got one. No more is the humble piano player just a metaphorical sidecar in a band set up. Now I can have all the fun of being a lead instrument without the hassle of having to learn a new instrument such as guitar. I am not trying to be a lead guitarist, I just love the whole concept of a lead synth player! Obviously it has no cohabitation with the band which is a shame for me but not unexpected to be fair. But hey, there is always open mic nights and jam nights which would be fun.
It is such an awesome instrument, and a force to be reckoned with in the world of synthesisers!

7. Singing

It was never this way when I was young. But it just turned out that singing was something I picked up very quickly. I never realised that teaching yourself vocal control and tone was difficult for some people (honestly) so I took it for granted and did nothing with it of any significance.
Nowadays, I practice every day out of choice with no aid of a teacher, and I am seeing how far I get into Britains got talent. I have been told I have a very mature voice for my age, but once again I just take that for granted. I guess I just totally lucked out with this, but I love being able to sing to all the old songs that I love and to make (mostly old) people happy.

8. Pokemon, Sonic, Crash and Zelda.

Where would I be without these games. I genuinely believe that these 3 games actually shaped my personality, morals and habits and whathaveyou. Pokemon is the game that I have played the most. EVER. 100s and 100s of hours well spent! I am a well of knowledge for pokemon, but have in recent years been made redundant by bulbapedia. I love this game and to be it will never lose its lustre.


Crash Bandicoot 1, 2 and 3, Crash team racing and a few others. Fantastic games. They have since somewhat gone down the pan, but the old games are still dear to me. Crash 1 is the only game I have ever completed 100%.


Sonic the hedgehog was probably one of the first games I ever got addicted to just like you would drugs or something. The old Sega megadrive games rocked so hard because of... well everything. Gameplay, music and just the fact they were awesome ok?


The legend of Zelda. The music in this game just literally overwhelms me. Coupled with fantastic gameplay in all of its games this game is not unlike sex, to play. The latest installment of this series was a game I played from start to finish non stop for 37 hours- it was that good. I cried during parts when it became sad or just so emotionally powerful. You may say that is lame, but I now know what it takes to be a hero in real life.




9. Apple Crumble

It is my favourite food. Best served at room temperature, after having been left under foil for at least a day. I could just eat crumble after crumble until by body gave in somehow.

10.

I don't want to type anything for this. Some things are best not thinking about.

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