The great Year 3 moveout begins

... And I have far too much to do in what seems like not nearly enough time. We have to be out of this place by Sunday, and we still have walls to paint, carpets to clean, stuff to move out (not in that order) - why is it we always leave moveouts until the very last possible moment? Urgh.

Never mind, I'm currently sifting through my detritus and working out what I need to keep and what I can afford not to - and listening to Beauty Of Uncertainty by KT Tunstall while I do it. That track is absolutely sublime.

Only a couple of months until my final year starts! And I'm so ill-prepared. Oh dear. :(

Flippin 'eck, where did May go?

Blimey, we're into June already. I've finished my mandatory placement weeks, and I'm now working for the boss on an ad-hoc basis (for real money!) until the end of June . In other news, we're getting ready to move out of one house and into another at the beginning of July. Here's hoping that all works out ok (there's a five day overlap between us having to move out and being able to move into our next place) but, of course, there's so many things that could go wrong.

Urk.

Last year of uni coming up soon - and I still haven't picked a final choice for my Final Year Project! Aaaaaaaaaargh. Help, someone!

Right, back to the old web design (to earn some more money to squirrel away in the savings account)

Inside the mind of a messy student

Want to know what it's like being me? I took this back in July last year, but not much has changed (different mess, different places, same floor though)... Take a look at this:



Now, that might look bad, but there's order within the madness. Go to the image's Flickr page and you'll see (quite literally) LOADS of Notes. Mouse over the image to see (and read) them, you'll have a fun five minutes if nothing else.

I'm back in the UK now... Midem was very interesting, but I have a few stories to tell... Those coming soon.

2008 rolls in, and I'm still going.

This is what happens when someone doesn't dangle a carrot in front of you - you get lazy. Laziness breeds bad blogging habits, so sorry to anyone who's been expecting updates. Slap on the wrist for me.


So, 2008 has usurped 2007. Bet it didn't see that coming. Anyway, what's been going on since November? Well, I'm still working at Revolver - good times! I'm also stressing out over what's going to happen house-wise next year (six tenant lease + four tenants = two gaps = eviction!) and that niggling thought in the back of my head telling me that I have to choose a firm title for my final year project is really starting to wind me up.


It was a nice peaceful new year for me this time around - no shit having to deal with Tesco over Christmas (they still owe me money from the summer - due to their incompetence, they can't even print a P45 correctly!) and two new little kittens to look after. The parents went away to see their friends, my sister was at house parties with her boyfriend, so it was a nice quiet new year's eve with the kittehs. Yay <3


I'm still going though, which is a lot more than can be said for some people - I'm watching someone I've only actually known for six months slowly succumb to lung cancer, and it's breaking my heart.

But never mind, life goes on for the rest of us I suppose, and with that, I have to get back to work.

I hope it snows this month.

All work and no updates makes Christopher a lazy blogger!

Wow, I've been bad! Bad Christopher, naughty Christopher. No updates from Christopher for too long, so apologies if you've been expecting a quality read.

If you're expecting a quality read from here, you may be sadly disappointed. ;)

So, what's going on in my life at the moment? Well, I'm now two-and-a-bit months into my placement at Revolver in Wolverhampton, and I think I've just about got used to regular getups and 7pm finishes (wow, just like the rest of the working population!) Going to Indycom next week at the BPI HQ (Westminster, just by the London Eye, and I'm really looking forward to that - I love getting the real insight into the machinations of the music industry, and I'm really, REALLY looking forward to MIDEM too, that's going to be absolutely brilliant (potentially a once in a lifetime opportunity!) so I really want to make the most of that when it comes around.

Oh and thanks to the boss, I'm now also fully (self) trained in SIP VoIP phone system installations - you wouldn't think it'd be as complicated as our install turned out to be, but bloody hell, it wasn't half tough! You can ring me direct on 0121 2700 878 now, and it goes straight over the interwebs to my handset (how cool is that!)

This whole year-out-in-industry malarkey still feels a bit odd to me though, seeing my housemates doing their final year work and keeping more usual student hours (getting up at the crack of noon, staying up until 5am...), while academically I'm almost on hiatus - and what really worries me is the fact that I'm going to have to find new digs to live in next year, because all my other housemates are in their final year now. Uh oh... I hate change. But change is inevitable, one of the only other things you can be sure of besides death and taxes (if you aren't taxed to death, that is!) We have new kittehs at home, two lovely little black kittehs, and they are teh cuet! So I've been using them as an excuse to go home at the weekends recently ;) The free food and clothes washing is also a benefit, but teh kittehs are tehwin.

You'll excuse me if I go all soppy and act like a 6 year old, I just lurrrrve little kittens. :D
Anyway, at present I'm currently working on the revamp of the Revolver site. We're moving our hosting to the TIC (my faculty and where I also go to uni, incidentally!) and so I'm knee deep in server transitions, audio digitisation, metadata, iTunes synchronisation and I'm also fixing computers. I seem to have become the Revolver IT Department, but at least it's something I'm good at. Hopefully when all this transitional stuff is sorted out, I can get my hands dirty with something a little different, but this stuff takes time so I'm going to put up with it until it's all sorted for the time being.

It snowed the other day! That was really weird... Oh, and I got my HC2 form through the post again, so I can get free NHS prescriptions, free dental treatment, and discounted specs and free eyetests for another 12 months! Woohoo! If you want an HC2, here's what you do: get in touch with the NHS' Prescriptions Pricing Authority (the PPA), give them a ring on 01912 035 555 (the 0845 number just puts you through to the same people anyway) - request an HC1 and they send it to you in the post. You fill it out, providing any required documentation (bank statements or payslips if you're doing paid work, or proof of student status along with any financial awards such as student loans you might be receiving) and send it back to them. You're then income assessed and sent your HC2 in the post if you qualify - but unlike many aspects of the NHS, if there's a problem you don't have to chase them, they'll ring you! They even give you a postage paid envelope to send it back in, how nice is that.

So yeah, at the moment I'm generally in a good mood! Maybe it's because I've just had lunch, mmm food. Oh, and I'm doing some other blogs - my Beta Test Blog has become Into The Unknown, and I'm getting warmed up now for About Brum. My Dad and I were discussing blogging versus old-skool paper diaries the other day, and he expressed his bemusement with how so many people blog and why he doesn't think it's really worth that much effort given that if you wanted to write a diary you're better off writing in a diary proper... Which raises an interesting question - why do so many people blog? I'd never keep a diary (I'm not disciplined enough), but I really enjoy writing a good blog entry. Odd, isn't it... If you're reading this and you have a blog, besides from possible financial rewards, what are your reasons for blogging?

Back to the grindstone for Christopher

Well, it's been a while since I added to this thing. What's going on with me?

• I worked for a month at my local Tesco over summer (I was let go after a month because they couldn't afford to employ me any more!)


• I've been engaged in an ongoing battle with Tesco head office because as a result of their incompetency in sorting out my pay, I was charged over £110 by Natwest as Tesco, in a nutshell, cashed a cheque they shouldn't have and as a result made my account overdrawn!


• I've started my placement at Revolver Records, in Wolverhampton


• It's my 22nd birthday tomorrow! (October the 13th... and I tell you what, I don't feel 22)


• I've been busy designing web sites, some of which haven't been used and some of which have


• I'm thinking of changing web hosts, and buying another 1Tb hard drive for my fileserver (such a geek.)

That's the briefest summary, but I thought that I should put in an update given that I've neglected my blog somewhat. I'll most likely write a longer entry this weekend from the comfort of my house, after I've been fed and watered for free by my parents ;)