I'm sorry Sir, I'm afraid it's a great deal worse...

Men, we're serial moaners, we pretend we don't enjoy it but there's a little bit of us that loves to vent a little steam by detailing the extent of our misery every time something small goes wrong. We don't cry, crying solves nothing, it's not because - as the common misconception goes - we're afraid of crying. It's just wholly unsatisfying & implies we don't know what to do, and us men are confident in our ability to know how to do pretty much anything - you name it and we have an allen key of the appropriate size for the job somewhere ("give me a minute"). It's common for us to moan when ill, if you're female you won't understand this need because you will never have experienced the torment of "man flu", imagine your girly flu and times it by at least 20, that's man flu. It's like the difference between smelling some off milk and witnessing 2girls1cup for the first time... while your grandma peers over your shoulder. The two are not comparable, something I hope to have illustrated in that comparison.

But for all our winging & complaining don't ignore the plight of one illness, a condition that affects nearly all men at some point in their life, it can last for many years, is debilitating, emasculating & of yet there is no known cure. I'm talking of course about "The Friend Zone".

To better understand how the friend zone affects men worldwide we must first understand the source of infection, women. A maze of ever morphing lumps glands & emotions, the woman is a complex creature of which we understand very little. We begin our journey learning about the fairer sex as mere casual observers before being sucked in further and further by their strange glow, until finally, a mixture of curiosity and wonder leads us to pledge our lives to the study of these fascinating beings until we are fully trained. A fully trained male understands roughly 17% of what a females features are for and is able to perform some basic rudimentary functions on them providing he doesn't become over-excited. We learn to hold conversations that are of interest, steering away from common pitfalls such as the offside trap, the inner workings of an engine & why the first matrix is better than the subsequent two... in detail. We bolster our vocabulary with words we have no idea why we need to understand, such as "mauve", in order that you might think we're coherent & perhaps suitable company. Some high-achievers have even claimed to understand the emotions women are feeling merely by reading their body language & adjusting their own behavior to avoid further mistakes, although this is largely considered to by myth and thought of by most to be poppycock and big-headedry.

Still, after years of study, training & learning to inhibit automatic responses (e.g. Taylor's Illusion*) most males successfully navigate their way to their goal of being "a suitable mate" capable of talking to a female without coming across as creepy, incomprehensible or a complete bastard. At this point the male may enter the world of women as a near equal, worthy of recognition, mostly suitable, occasionally correct or humorous but seldom enough to make the heart melt.

*Taylor's Illusion - A misunderstanding that occurs when a woman explains an emotional problem, males must learn to inhibit their natural "fix" response and opt instead for an appropriate length of cuddle or alternative moral support. Over-application of this unnatural rule is the primary reason why DIY jobs around the house do not get done.

Young males at this stage have often already selected a potential partner, the image of which has remained with them throughout training on those long dark nights practicing how to hold a phone conversation consisting of full sentences, whilst remaining able to remember relevant details for use later. At this stage the young males may begin - as my dear grandmother refers to it - "courting" the females, and it works... all of our training was not in vain, "she's written "LOL" at least 15 times now in texts and has agreed to meet up with me at the park tomorrow". While the young male grows ever more confident, he is cautious, he knows that declaring his interest too soon may destroy his carefully laid plans. Eventually however, he puts into practice what he has been taught by his elders & takes the risk to declare his feelings whilst everyone else has gone to the sweetshop to by raspberry millions and litre bottles of Bing. He is awash with nerves, but she begins to smile as he explains he has something to tell her. With a sudden surge of confidence he leaps for his prize, heart pounding & mind racing he explains... surely... she's still smiling. At last, her lips part, "awwww" his face now a mixture of confusion and hope "that's so cute, but I think of you more as a brother".

Suddenly he's transported back to his worst memories, a place cold and alone, his face sinks, his fingers still trembling, A BROTHER? but I hate my sister he thinks (probably out loud). "Like the brother I wish I'd had" she shouts down to him from the top of the deep pit he now finds himself in, those four unscalable walls with only one exit marked "get over her" in bold lettering, "that's cool" he replies "You'll make a good sister".

After some time the young man will give up hope of rescue and take the exit, up the steps back into the world of the the living. His amour there once again but surrounded by a polished glass box with a small plinth at the top of the side her face sits behind, engraved with the words "Darren" or "Kevin" or whatever, I didn't learn his name, I never liked the prick anyway. He will remain friends with her as ever, watching from a distance, but they'll drift apart in time, it's inevitable, he must move on. She will remain a sister, a relationship that just like the conventional sibling relationship - with genetics & that - he had no choice in.

Scientists are still yet to understand what sequence of events lead to "The Friend Zone", it is presumably one of life's mysteries serving as a reminder that the universe is boss. In time males do - through a series of trials - learn to minimise the risk of landing in the friend zone. However even the most highly sought after males are still unaware of what they did in order to get to the girl they displayed an interest in, and are unwilling to risk it all in the name of science. As for the young man, he will learn to mock the friend zone, as we do with all things we don't fully understand. And he too will - in time - avoid the friend zone, make it to the other side successfully and for the first time be at peace with it.

The Noble Opponent
The Unsolvable Riddle
The Kick In The Nuts

I hate you friend zone, I hate you so very much... but I respect you.

I signed away my body parts today, and it made me feel terrible...

Today I saw an advert on the tele whilst I was downstairs, it was from the NHS and it was asking for people to sign up for organ donation. It was pretty good – in so far as it made me go and do it – even if it was done in a bit of a morbid grim reaper kind of way that the NHS seem to have become particularly good at of late. As for the process I went through, brilliant, everything you'd want, top search hit for “organ donation” on google (UK), online sign up form with as many as 10 or so boxes, bish bash bosh 5 minutes later and I can close the tab safe in the knowledge that my coffin is going to be a little bit easier for those nice funeral chaps to carry when I eventually kick the metaphorical bucket – providing of course my death doesn't involve falling from a microlight, multi-organ failure or anything involving carnivorous animals – excellent.

So why this horrible feeling in the pit of my stomach? Was it the “thank you for signing up” page heartlessly confirming my fears that I was mortal? Had my frivolity with last night's alcohol of choice finally caught up with me? Did I check the use by date on that chicken I'd just cooked and eaten? It didn't taste funny, and my house mate had assured me from across the room that it would be fine.

No, in fact it was a different feeling entirely, it was guilt that caused my insides to turn and knot up, I felt bad. “But why?” I worryingly hear you cry inside my head, you've just done a good thing, you're helping others, passing on your brilliant organs so others can have another shot at life. And with one of your kidneys they'll probably win a Nobel prize or something, and you'll be thanked in their speech. No the reason was it made me confront everything that I should've and hadn't done which I thought I would.

This was simple, a baby step, 5 minutes of a lazy Sunday that I'd lovingly dedicated to something that wasn't really going to affect me at any point in my life time, what about the other stuff I'd told myself I'd do – The Bone Marrow Register, Blood Donations, A little bit for Haiti – Surely that wasn't much harder to do. It wasn't, I knew it was only a few clicks away to find when the next blood donation station would be around in an area I'm in. There was probably a online registration form for bone marrow too which I could've done, I didn't, Why not? Here are some reasons I came up with why people would not donate bits of themselves to help others.

1. They have some kind of belief that their body is sacred and they shouldn't give any of it away, it's not just flesh that gets replaced throughout their life ultimately changing every single particle in it's course. There is something innately sacred about their flesh and bones, popping out a kidney would change their soul irrevocably, let alone the soul of the poor bugger receiving it. The patient probably wouldn't believe in organ donation either after receiving a bit of that person's kidney and would rip it straight back out again, wasting a kidney, some more NHS time and creating a massive mess. No-one's a winner in that scenario are they? Donations are a waste of time, or those people are idiots, I'll let you decide.
   
   

2. They are a 'bat sh*t crazy' Racist. “Bloody immigrants, coming over here, taking our blood, ought ta be locked up. Bloody Paki's got one eye on my job and the other on my spleen. Theiving b*stards, why don't they get their organs from their own f*ckin country, I bet you I would have been seen a lot quicker for me broken fingers after punching that little asian fella for lookin' at my bird if there weren't all these immigrants. Come to think of it, they probably don't have the same blood thingy as me do they, cos they're brown and I'm white, yeah that makes sense. Ah, I'll do it in a bit, Noel's HQ is about to start.”
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
3. They are a narcissist. “My body is far too good for other people, I'd explain why, but you wouldn't understand, your inferior brain would crumble under the weight of my intellect. Being this good is a curse you know not a blessing.”
   
   
   
   
   
4. They are a pessimist. “Who would want my organs, seriously, I mean, look at me. I'm like the soggy cornflake stuck to the bottom of your spoon, you won't notice me, but even if you did you wouldn't want me.”
   
   
   
   
   
5. They have a disease that prevents them from donating. There's nothing funny about this, but it is a reason I thought of.
   
   
   
   
   
6. They are incredibly lazy. “You have to what? Fill in a form? What's the website? What do you mean I'll have to google for it? Ah, I can't be bothered sounds like a lot of effort.
   
   
   
   
   
7. They're an angsty teenager. A bit like the pessimist except they hate everyone else too, especially you. Oh, and they write poetry, no it doesn't rhyme, it's deep and about emotions and stuff, you wouldn't understand.
   
   

I am none of the above – although I'm dangerously close to #6 – I should be doing more really, it's part of who I want to be, on the whole I'm a good person who likes to help others, that's what I thought anyway. I was raised being told (and shown) that doing this was a good thing. As a child I did things for charity because I knew it was good and it usually involved some kind of fun challenge, making some cakes or going on a long bike ride. I could never really remember what charity I was doing it for, or the work they did, but I was having fun collecting sponsors & the next door neighbour would smile at me and tell me I was doing a good thing, and give me back that football I'd kicked over yesterday. Then I got baffled by the politics of it all, there's “good charities” causing me to believe that somewhere there must be some bad ones that fund the hunting of millions of kittens to make into fur coats for crazed dictators. Also, there are millions of them, every person whose been on television for more than 12 minutes is affiliated with one or another, who should I give to, I can't give to all of them, I'm not rich like an investment banker, and if I was one of those I wouldn't give my millions away anyway, because I wouldn't have a heart, which subsequently would cause me to not donate blood, organs, bone marrow etc... as well.

Luckily there is a way around even this problem, donate to ones that either speak to you on a personal level or you come across for one reason or another. The ones that speak to you on a personal level are usually the ones you'll want to set up a periodic donation to, whilst the one's that you come across in day-to-day life – these are often noticed after some disaster in a far torn part of the world – usually invoke the one off payment. There's nothing wrong with this, in fact if everyone did it distribution of wealth would probably be a lot better and it could bring about some real changes. I don't want to sound like some kind of charity prophet, as if I'm the first person to ever have this thought and my job is to spread the word rather than getting my hands dirty actually giving. No, I'm rubbish at this whole giving thing and I still haven't got to the root of why.

I've thought of some pretty poor excuses for why I haven't given when I should have on some occasions. Haiti, for example, I found out I could text a number and it would automatically donate £5, “genius, that was easy”. Wrong, I didn't do it because I thought I'd forget I'd done it and when my bill came out of my account it could potentially push me over the limit of my overdraft and into the dreaded “unplanned overdraft” and that incurs silly charges. I don't think any bank – even the lovely one I bank with – would let me off because I did it for charity, that's just not how they work. So for this relatively poor reason I delayed it, saying I'd donate another time, in another way, I didn't of course, I didn't get round to it. I watched the news in mild-mannered middle class horror and saw a woman forced to give birth outdoors because the hospital building was too dangerous to be in. It was genuinely horrible, I knew it was, but still I did nothing!

The thought did pass through my mind – as I'm sure it has yours at some point – that this isn't the only place in need of aid, there's thousands, why should I give to this one just because it's getting news coverage. I'm sure the faux-cynic in you has condescendingly reminded you of this at the time of one disaster. This will lead you back to step 1, staring bewildered at a never ending list of charities not knowing where to put your money. Ignore the voice anyway, he's a twat, it's a stupid flawed argument that only seems like it has some merit because it's palatable, the money stays in your bank and you have some kind of excuse on your side.

The good news is, there are still some fine examples out there – people, charities, websites, all sorts... – looking to to make the act of giving easier. The “just giving” website is a faster more streamlined modern equivalent of the old sponsor form enabling people from all over the world to sponsor someone. They can raise small sums or considerably more, I read a story today about a boy who managed to raise £100,000 for Haiti by doing a bike ride. That's incredible really, and he took an approach to the whole thing that I wish I still had, he just did it, he knew it was a good thing to do so he went right ahead. It wouldn't have mattered if he'd raised 50p he would have done what he pledged to, he saw something bad and did what he could to help. I also saw a story on the television about a professor of ethics who pledged over half his life's wages to charity, unlike the boy with his bike, this man knew an awful lot about charities I imagine, and yet he still arrived at the same conclusion. I can help here and I'm going to, brilliant. Another guy I'm following on Twitter has decided to ride his bike to all York City's home and away games this season to raise money for an Alzheimer's charity, an effort that sees him miss a year of work, not to mention all the pedalling.

These people are not fundamentally different to me, at least I don't think they are, I'm sure if we all sat down together we'd have much the same opinion with regard to giving and yet they're out their doing it and I'm sat here writing about it. Why?, I don't really know and perhaps it's time I start doing something about it, you're going to have to guess whether I actually put this into practice or whether I forgot about it all again because I'm going to stop writing now and try to get some sleep. I won't let you know how I do, because that's not the point of me writing this. I'm not sure what the point of this is really, but that funny feeling has started to subside, maybe this is the first small step on the road to my new charitable lifestyle, maybe it's just another 2 hours wasted on a blog I probably shouldn't be writing in my final year of university. I'm not sure, but I hope it's the former, it would be great to do my bit for charity, it would be great to be able to justify writing this too.

Anyway that's all I have the energy for now, I'll post this in the morning along with some links to stuff I mentioned in here.

Boy raises 100k for charity
Bicycle Kicks (cycling to York City games) - Just Giving Page
NHS Organ Donation Online Registration
Dr. Toby Ord (Ethics Professor)

A Short Message to Time

Stop all the clocks,

No really, I'm not ready,

You're trying to push me fast

When what I need is to go steady.

They can't see me like this

They won't understand,

My head needs some fixing

This was not what I planned.

I've examined myself

And I'm found to be wanting

More life, More vitality,

More of just something.

My edge,

This is what I'm lacking.

I never felt prepared,

It'll look like I'm not bothered

It'll seem like I don't care,

I won't make an appearance because it won't be me that's there.

I can hide,

better than you can imagine.

I've spent time on my own before

I've stayed awake for fear of waking

upon a new day with tears and shaking,

This isn't who I am,

I'm strong.

I've been like that from day one

and I believe I'll carry on

but not now,

not right now,

not on this hour of this day

I need some time alone to say to myself,

"Hey!", "You can do this, you were meant to"

"and you've come along all of this way"

But not today.

For now stop the clocks, I need to rest my eyes

I need some time to focus,

I need some time to wake myself to make me feel alive.

To make me feel myself again

please don't leave me behind.

I'm asking you this time.

Snow Problem...

It's the 22^nd of December or if you have been watching South-East today as I have, the 5^th day of chaos. Yeah, take that advent, you haven't got a patch on BBC local weather news. On the fifth day of chaos South-Eastern Trains gave to me, 5 hour longer journey, 4 revised service routes, 3 stations closed, 2 press statements, and a rail service unable to cope when things get icy. I don't care about this of course, as I'm safe and sound back home with no real need for an efficient public transport system, in fact the most of my worries is how poorly my 5 days of chaos poem scanned. But this would be a whole different matter if I was in West Kent, then I'd have a much bigger problem. This problem would be angry commuters, second only to Londoners in their perceived right to have a huge moan about things beyond our control. Lines of them queueing up on station platforms looking cold, bedraggled and bewildered, unable to function without a double shot latte, stood around confusedly staring at screens pondering the implications of the delay to the 7:36 service to Charing X.

I'm unaware of how many of these commuters understand the finer workings of a rail network, but I'm guessing it's not all too many, and I'm guessing the ones who do possess such knowledge are probably rather cleverly keeping their mouths shut. You see, I am among the majority, in that I know very little about the rail network and the inner workings of a modern day train. But humour me for a minute if you will and let me outline what I do know about such things, and then in turn the reason why I would not have been queueing up to tell the news cameras how “ridiculous” this whole thing is. Firstly I know that rails are made of metal, metal which has a low latent heat and therefore in winter weather is likely to get rather cold. Secondly I know that in cold and wet conditions, it is possible that snow will fall, I know snow too is cold. I know that in consistently cold weather this snow can often turn to ice, particularly on surfaces which don't lend themselves to absorbing things, e.g. metal (stop me if you see where I'm going with this). Thirdly, I've seen videos as a school child urging me not to run across train tracks not only because of the potential zillions of vaults which could fry me in an instant but also because because trains are big and heavy and can be travelling at high speeds. This whole size thing is brilliant for transporting large quantities of people and the speed thing helps the train achieve this quickly. However, as with many things in life, this poses a problem, that is braking, slowing hundreds of tons of train down, with only a relatively small surface area on metal rails. However this feat is achievable, hence the birth of the train, Hooray!

When you throw ice into the mix though, things get a little more tricky, I've had the joy of being chauffeured around in a few cars in this recent spate of snow, and it's been tricky for cars to maintain control on icy roads. It's all a great deal of fun when you're young and on holiday. The potential for a car to become stuck in a snow drift and for you to have to push it out sounds more of a exciting challenge than a nasty threat, like one of those adventure holidays and I didn't spend a penny. But this is genuinely a problem for many people with cars, cars and snow on the whole do not mix. Now, trains are much much bigger that cars, and they have a much harder task when it comes to braking on rails, I can only imagine this job would be made much harder by ice on the rails (ice is slippery, I know that too). Trains much like cars have to share the same rails as other trains, those trains could be going slower than them, faster than them or even in a different direction to them. This is why trains have timetables, so that they don't accidentally bump into each other somewhere along the way. As a reminder, and a fail-safe mechanism, there are also a series of signals, much like traffic lights. Trains are required to stop at these when they are red (or double orange), which is fine. Providing they are travelling at the correct speed (pre-agreed on for that service on that route) they should be able to stop in plenty of time at these lights and avoid crashing. Unless of course there's something which hinders the brakes performance, for arguments sake, let's call this “ice”.

This “ice” means that trains must travel more slowly in order to brake for the lights, which makes train's journey times longer and also means they arrive less regularly at stations. This in turn makes commuters begin to speculate about the state of the nation, something they are only too good at, as any eves dropper on train journeys will tell you. The problem with their speculative efforts to improve things is, they are unwilling to ever arrive at the conclusion “This is nobody's fault, it's just one of those things that happens, There's nothing we can do and some people seem to be enjoying it so maybe I should just give it a rest”. This is much the same way as I feel about Big Brother or The Daily Mail. OK, so maybe I do think there are things that can be done about those two things, but they are at least under human control, the weather however, most certainly isn't.

So really, there's no scape goat for this problem of snow I'm afraid, you can try linking it the government, the rail services or join a wacky cult and pin it all on full body waxes and homosexuals, but it's not gonna make the blindest bit of difference. So this chaos, wait no, this mild problem that comes around maybe once every year for about a week, is something we largely just have to bloody well grow up and live with. I am aware that in countries like Germany, France, Austria etc... the public transport continues to run through tough weather conditions, but this is something that they experience every year, for months on end, and something which costs millions and millions of euros to deal with. It's going to be cheaper and easier in the long run for us to just wait the week out with a smile on our faces and try to remember that some people at least enjoy the snow. Whether it's a senile grandparent confusing song lyrics with what winter's were generally like all those years ago, or a school boy excited by the potential of missing double maths to smother snow in the face of his unknowing and now unhappy crush. There is an upside to snow isn't there? And listening to Christmas songs on your iPod at a chilly station a few days a year has to be better than standing around moaning to television cameras about someone or something that may or may not be linked to the snow, isn't it? Maybe I'm wrong, and moaning is just one of those guilty British pleasures, like queuing or... ah... well... moaning at the weather.

Seems I've been wrong all along then, as you were. But if it really is such a pleasure, could I ask that you crack a little smile or wink at the camera from now on please, just so we all know, it'd make the whole thing a lot more bearable.

Thanks.

So This Is Christmas...

...and what have you done? Well not very much to be honest, because as seems to be custom I've let other things get in the way. "Let" other things get in the way? I hear you ask - well I hear myself ask (split personality works well in monologues) - You shouldn't let a silly festival get in the way of the important things in your life, like work, hobbies and basic essentials. And you'd (I'd) be right there are things I 'need' to do and they should be the focus of my life at the moment. Anyway, Christmas tends to lose most of it's excitement when you want for more in your life than a new lego model. The streets are jammed with worried parents and relatives frantically working their way through lists trying to figure out just exactly what a their 15 year old god son they haven't seen in 3 years would want for Christmas, heaven forbid forgetting them, it's a middle class nightmare. For everyone trying to continue with their everyday life, well, they get caught up in all this muddle, parking spaces become scarce, short-cuts through shopping centres become just as long winded as the route you gave up doing 2 years ago and going for a lunchtime coffee becomes a futile task what with the hundreds of new stressed out customers littering the place with bags and small children. Then there's anybody who works in the retail industry, and that really is quite a lot of people. It becomes quite tricky trying to serve twice as many customers whilst there's an oversized Santa hat slowly working it's way down your forehead and itchy tinsel adorning every edge of clothing, not to mention the extra hours and having to navigate around that Christmas tree that there wasn't really any room for. It's enough to get anyone down really, no-one enjoys Christmas, we just go through the motions, or at least that's what I'm being told.

Every year the first Christmas advert hits the telly more prematurely than the last in a desperate bid to break the news first, as if the first place we see advertising Christmas deals is where we will go to buy everything we need. Anyone who has been or known a teenage boy will know it's usually closer to the reverse, if it's still got things left on Christmas Eve then it's getting business. The adverts are always filled with cheery shelf-stackers itching to fulfil their destiny of selling as many Bosch Power Drills as they can before the low low prices run out. Or the perfect housewife, who's left the creepy vanish lady at home babysitting the kids and laughing at stains in order to stock up on the joy that she can only find in spending vast amounts of money on the perfect offspring she's created, and the man with the face 10x smoother than that of every other. And it really doesn't matter how many celebrities want to be our best mate all of a sudden or how much time and effort has gone into creating an advert filled with merriment, it generally only elicits one response from people. "Oh no B&Q are wishing us glad tidings, it's that time again, there's no way we're re-tiling the bathroom this year then". It really is a stark reminder that the end of the year is coming and there's a million things (well a short list of things anyway) that you planned for that year that haven't been done, deadlines you haven't met and goals that weren't achieved.

So with the ever receding adverts comes the ever receding antidote, cynacism, the art of laughing about something whilst admitting defeat. Don't get me wrong I love it as much as the next person, better to laugh at these things than let them get you down, it's just, well they're getting earlier too. The first cynical article I read this year came out less than a week after I'd seen the first Christmas advert, it took the article to make me register that all this was going on. So I was sat at my desk reading this (and admittedly enjoying it) on the 18th of November, and the problem is, I wasn't even thinking about Christmas at that point. It was like a present that came too early, and so when Christmas does come round and I could do with a healthy dose of cynicism it will all have already gone. I should have saved it, I should refuse to look at anything relating to Christmas until it's within at least a few weeks of the actual event.

I didn't always think like this of course, I stopped enjoying Christmas as much in my late teens, because there was so much more that I had to do before I could be allowed to feel 'Christmassy'. There were the aptly named 'Christmas exams' to revise for, higher education's gift at this time of year, those and the coursework deadlines I got in a stocking. Thinking about Christmas then would be a distraction from what was important, it was a distraction from getting on with what I needed to do. By the time I was finished with all my work I had to schedule in a few late carol services, tune into every music channel available and generally flood myself with all things Christmas for the last few days in the lead up to the big day. However, I did get there, my blitzkrieg approach to Christmas worked, I've had consistently fun Christmas days as far back as I can remember. So I thought I had the solution, this was my approach to Christmas, a new and functional approach for the new and functional me, a way to fit in an enjoyable Christmas and deal with my responsibilities as well.

But this year something started to bother me about this, it was November and I was going through something I've come to call in recent years 'The November Blues'. You see, November has become the worst month of the year for me, I'm a student and it's around this point that everything starts getting very tense, my work load increases and my spare time and available money decreases. This year it was going to be worse than ever, the coursework deadlines I had were more important than those of previous years, money was tighter and the prospect of finding a job over the holiday's was getting slimmer and slimmer. I retreated to my room to start the inevitable and unavoidable climb towards the summit of the work mountain. Now, I could continue my mountain analogy by talking about how I was climbing solo, how I had no support line and the incoming blizzard meant I couldn't see past the ground in front of me. But this wouldn't be right, it would make it sound like I was left no choice in the matter, like I'd been abandoned and left to tackle all of this on my own. Truth is I was the one who'd cut the support ropes and I was too busy looking at the ground in front of me to check if anyone else was around. I thought this was what I needed to do, whereas in fact it just made work a slow and arduous task and it took one good day to stop me from giving up entirely, to stop me from saying "Christmas be damned, you're nothing but nonsense, a Capitalist ceremony to help companies reach their sales targets". It was on this day that I had a mini-eureka moment and decided on a new approach to the Christmas period.

The thing is, I'm afraid my first sentence was a little bit of a half lie, it's true that I haven't done much in terms of shopping etc... and I have been getting on with other things but it hasn't "got in the way" of Christmas at all, quite the reverse. You see, the decision I made late in November was that I could be as cynical about Christmas and all that entails until December, that would be my guilty pleasure, something to help me through the month and stop me from going bitter. But when December came round, I was going to leave the adverts alone, stop laughing at the silliness of it all and just enjoy it. I know it sounds crazy to just decide to enjoy something, but it's been a lot easier than I thought it would be. I've drunk mulled wine to warm me up, I've stopped to watch the street performers, I've smiled at the display of lights around the town centre. I've allowed all of these things to help "get me in the Christmas spirit" and it's worked, I feel more positive about the season now than I have done in years.

I still have a lot to do, I have a deadline coming up next week which I still have to do work for, then there's my ongoing research project, I have a last food shop to do and I haven't made a start to Christmas shopping yet. It's not going to break my back admittedly but it's still there nagging away at the back of my mind. But for the first time in years this doesn't bother me, I'm always going to have work to do and I'm always going to have various chores and upkeep to deal with, but now I'm in a Christmassy mood. I know that in a few weeks I'm going to be able to put my feet up in a warm house and spend time with friends and family, I'm going to have a real holiday, one where for just a bit I really forget about my responsibilities and enjoy myself. The thought of that is what's keeping me going, it's what now helps me work through my essays with a smile on my face.

I found what had been missing from Christmas these last few years and it was nothing external, it was me, I had been absent. I hadn't realised that "Tis the season to be jolly" was an instruction not an observation, it was a reminder for something I was actually meant to be doing. So I smile at the lady in the coffee shop wearing the flashing Santa hat and stop to applaud the magician in the shopping centre because being jolly makes things easier, and we need that at what's otherwise a very difficult time of year. So boo to the Humbuggery of the whole thing and screw the cynics because Christmas is what you make it and mine is going to be great.

Why I Love This City But I Couldn't Stay

 

I'm currently sat in my room in the vibrant heart of Plymouth, curtains shut, sat at a crudely lit desk with a half cup of orange juice beside me. I've switched to the orange juice since realising that my excessively late coffee drinking is why I find it hard to get to sleep before 5am - not because my house is haunted as some were suggesting - anyway tonight I'm aiming for 3. However, my coffee abuse aside for a minute, there is one other thing that is worrying me about the impending deadline that is 'my new bedtime'. For that I need to explain a little something about the Plymouth nightlife.

Plymouth essentially has three nightlife centres dotted around the city. There's Union Street; a parade of clubs that stretches from the town centre in search of the river Tamar, The Barbican; a slice of old town Plymouth with winding cobbled streets, old houses and an assortment of ever so slightly differing quaint pubs and trendy bars dotted along the Quayside, and North Hill; the student capital that runs alongside the university down towards the city centre and has a series of small to medium sized clubs all churning out more-or-less the same thing - student friendly drinks at student friendly prices. The former two are rarely visited by students, and as a student therefore rarely visited by me. Union St. has large clubs and can be good fun if you're in the mood for that kind of thing and there's a student night on in one of the clubs down there, but principally it is visited by Plymouth residents and Navy Crew. To understand why this becomes a problem you need to understand the not-so-complex relationship between the main 3 groups in the Plymouth area, (Janners, Navy Boys & Students) something I will come to shortly. The Barbican is too far for Navy types to venture to and typically too expensive for the students - "£3.00 for a vodka coke, you're having a fucking laugh, come on let's go to the SU" - or something along those lines. This leaves space for your more discerning local, in the fertile soils left untouched by the likes of "pound-a-pint" and "mobile burger vendors", comedy clubs, jazz cafes and restaurant-come-bars have sprung up. It is occasionally less reserved - Bank Holiday Sunday's have the reputation for leaving no stone, flower box or litter bin unturned - but on the whole this is a safe haven from the likes of the other two night scenes. Then finally just down the road there is North Hill, a stretch running from the student saturated neighbourhood of Mutley down past the University Campus and into the City Centre. As far as I'm aware this area is dominated entirely by by students, perhaps some young locals and a few navy boys in disguise occasionally sneak in early unnoticed to the student population, but this is certainly the students' stomping ground.

This is where I live, more precisely I live a few houses down from a club called Cuba, a club with two main selling points; 1. It has thin platforms with poles attached around the ground floor walls on which drunk girls (and perhaps just as commonly, drunk boys dressed up as girls) can be seen gyrating on. 2. It stays open till 5am. It's this second reason coupled with my single glazed window with a small hole in the frame (allowing 24 hour ventilation) which is worrying me about my task of falling asleep by 3am. Students may not be the rowdiest of drunks, but they sure are persistent and even a Sunday night/Monday morning is orchestrated with the faint sound of distant shouting, laughing and arguing (not to mention the wheely bins which as a result, spend most of their life lying on their back thinking of England while the perpetrators carry on unfazed up the road.) This brings me neatly back to a point I promised I would cover earlier, the 3 main groups of people living in Plymouth, so here's how it works.

Janner is the colloquial term for a Plymothian, they are typically born in Plymouth or the surrounding area and have subsequently spent most of their lives there - Plymouth, not unlike my own hometown is not typically somewhere you leave. Wikipedia tells me there are a good 250,000 Janners currently living within the city limits and, like people from most places, they are a mixed bunch. On the whole they are not as well off as their nearest neighbours, Exeter, and more-or-less untouched by immigration into the UK, but there's still plenty of variation within the City. Plymouth has been a Naval base and a port for a very long time indeed and while Janners don't always see eye-to-eye with Navy types they certainly have learnt to share their city with them and tolerate them. In turn, the navy respect the residents' right to call the city home and use this neutral standpoint to trade for the goods that seafarers have for thousands of years, alcohol and women. Students however are different, Plymouth University has only existed in it's current state (as a University) for 17 years and is now one of the largest in the country (currently ranked 5th with a student population of 30,000). This means that your average Janner can remember a time before the University and certainly can remember a time when it was not such a large part of the city. In typical human fashion, nostalgia paints a beautiful portrait of "the old days" leaving today's problems however petty and unavoidable as a perceived product of 'change'. Students who now colonise the City centre are certainly part of this change and this probably explains a large part of the animosity towards them from the more long-standing factions. This is by no means the only reason, a walk down North Hill on a Saturday/Sunday morning, or worse still, in the wake of a Fresher's week can show another key reason for this clash between the old and the new, students are generally messy and disrespectful of the city. While the old Plymouth streets were never paved with gold, I doubt that they were adorned with last night's half digested kebab, or the shoe that didn't quite make it home either - respect is earned, not given, something which your average student knows all too well but is still a way from learning.

So student's have learnt to live in the city but not with it, certain areas are free for everyone to enjoy, while other's become available on certain days. This is quickly learnt by new students and they soon become aware that living within these boundaries is not only possible, but easily achieved and likely to result in an enjoyable university experience. And so (apologies to my year 2 teacher for using 'and' to start a sentence. But notice how I haven't started any with 'but'.) the whole thing perpetuates itself, each year in turn passing on the guidelines to the years below slowly etching away at the divide that exists between the students and the rest of the city.

This, is the first reason I love and yet could never stay in this city. I've only ever lived in a bit of it. The city I've met and enjoyed time in is not the city I would live in after leaving the University. I have no experience of what it's like to live in an outer suburb, shoulder to shoulder with local residents, I haven't even caught a bus here yet. I know very little of the geography of the city despite my efforts to learn all the place names on google maps and seeing the city from the safe distance of a friend's car seat whenever possible. It doesn't make sense to me yet and I'm not sure that it ever will, not because I think it would be a particularly complicated place to understand (it seems far from it) but because I don't think I will ever make the effort to understand it, and the reason for this lies not within it's local geography, but within it's geography over a broader area, in relation to the rest of the country.

My first visit to Plymouth was not in the winter of 2006/2007 when I came to look at the University for the first time but in fact many years earlier, as a day trip, as part of a family holiday to Cornwall. For those of you who are unable to place Plymouth accurately on a map (don't worry I couldn't before I came here) it lies on the border of Devon and Cornwall on the peninsula that juts out below Wales into the far south-west of the UK. It is as I like to call it, the gateway city to the end of the earth, slow down now or your liable to simply fall off the edge of the jagged cornish rocks that mark the end of the road. Of course this is a complete lie, the cornish rocks don't mark the end of the road, the roads stop as soon as you pass Plymouth and are replaced with small tracks which are strangely large enough for farm vehicles but too small for cars. Some would argue the roads stop even earlier than that, the last motorway was gone a hundred miles back as you passed Exeter and this should have given you a sign of what was to come. The point that Highway Maintenance were trying to make to you as you left the last blue line on the map was that you were escaping mainland UK. You're leaving all of that behind and entering a new place, and what's more you didn't even have to bring a passport.

It's for this reason that the far South-West has become such a popular holiday destination for British residents hell-bent on escaping for a week or two but unable, unwilling or uninterested in travelling abroad. Some would argue that it's the beautiful moors, long sandy beaches with excellent surf and numerous campsites and holiday parks that swathe across the region that make it such a tourist hot spot, and they'd have a point, I mean, it's certainly why my parents took me as a child. But there are other parts of the UK with equally picturesque landscapes. As a young child I would often go to beaches in Bournemouth and Poole and to the New Forest to see wild horses and attack invisible soldiers with sticks. I'm sure the same is true for a lot of children across the UK and so, for me the defining feature of the south-west and what makes it so different from any other area is it's separateness. It's the conservatory that the UK built when it tired of everyday life and wanted somewhere nice to sit in the summer months, and when winter comes around it goes quiet again. I can't live in the quiet, a fact I've been reminded of frequently in recent months as I remind my brother of every travelling musician that stops for the night in his city, who I've convinced myself I would have gone to see if they came to mine. And (sorry again miss) I wouldn't go see them all, far from it, I know this deep down but I don't think it's really this that bothers me, it's being so far away from it all. In the last two years I've entertained thoughts of travelling to Bristol to see some live music, an expensive 300 mile round trip, which truth be told is never going to be worth the time and money I spend on it. And so in these winter months I feel like the cold feet at the end of the bed, so far from the heartbeat that drives the country, alone, peeping out of the end of the duvet waiting for the summer.

I know that all sounded very gloomy for a minute and I don't see it like that all the time, I still live in the centre of a city with lots of people around me and plenty of things to be getting on with - an undergraduate degree should keep you busy at least part of the time otherwise it's not really doing it's job. Some people would thrive on this lifestyle, living in a city with all the benefits of a 24h superstore and a reasonable public transport system but with the quiet that comes from a place which for most of the year isn't a half-way-house or another stop on a tour around the UK. Hooray for them, if nothing else I've found your Mecca, a city nestled away in amongst a beautiful landscape with a rich history and a bright future, and all this in a place that you'd be hard-pressed to come across by accident. But (that's it I've blown it now, 6/10) it's not for me thanks, like crocs, I've tried them, they were comfortable and I'm all for saving the environment, but I'll never buy a pair.

In short, this city has a place in my heart, but not in my future. I've no doubt I'll come back to visit it again, perhaps even with a family of my own, and I'll remember it fondly, talk about it with a smile on my face and remember all the good memories I have of it. That's all it can be for me though, a fond memory.