London Calling…

So I’ve eventually calmed down after the incident with the bus, here’s an update.

Last Sunday I went to take photos at the Lickey hills with Adam, it was pretty cold and I didn’t take that many photos due to my camera deciding not to work anymore, the shutter wouldn’t release and when it eventually did work all the shutter speeds were longer than they should be, which also means that my photos of the cigarette ends might not have worked so I’d have to do them again.

I got a text off Jo, she was back for the weekend and wanted to know if I could go to the pub quiz that night, but it was my uncles 50th so I had to go to that because he’s moving down to Weston with my aunt soon.

When I got home I was more or less ready to go to the party despite my mum telling me that I looked a complete mess. We walked down to my Nan’s house and got a taxi which not only reversed into a cable box but set off a speed camera on the way.

The party was at my aunt and uncle’s house in Walsall, I have always imagined Walsall as a bit of a shit hole from what I’ve heard about it but it didn’t seem like a bad place to me.

When we got to the party most of my family were there as well as a few people that we are related to but nobody is quite sure how. They all say the usual thing and ask how my college work is coming on. We also met the newest member of the family - 10 month old Oliver who can scream for England.

My aunt and uncle are rather well off, he was until recently working at Quaker with quite a good job but now buys and sells china and she is a manager of one of the floors at Rackhams. They had a buffet, most of the food looked too good to eat, instead of the usual sausage rolls and volauvents they had lobster and duck.

My mum started to freak out at one point as I was eating after seeing a whole prawn on my plate…

“Oh god! Don’t eat they eyes!”
“…Chicken nuggets don’t have eyes…”

All in all it was a good night and it was good to see the family again, although there is something disturbing about a 5 year old singing Babycakes.

Tuesday I had college, I took my cigarette photos again which worked this time, I‘ve noticed that as I‘ve been drinking less just lately I‘ve been able to get more work done, maybe this is a good thing.

Came into college (late) on Wednesday morning during the middle of a presentation on flash blur, us second years couldn’t have made much of an impression on the first years because the 3 of us that bothered coming in were all at least an hour late.

On Thursday we had a trip to London, the original plan was to go to Vision 2004 and meet the photographer Martin Parr, then to do some flash blur, however personally I don’t like Martin Parr’s work and neither did anyone else on the course.

We all had to be at the college for 7:30 am, I was up at 5:00 am, got ready really quickly and ate my breakfast in a rush, when I got to college I was starting to feel rather nauseous and was trying my best to keep it all in, the coach came and we all got on it, I started feeling worse and didn’t want to make any sudden moves, luckily in the end I started to feel better and we got to London chunk-free.

We got off the coach by Earl’s Court underground station, we then and caught the tube to Embankment where me, Jazz and Ashley left Jo and Claire and caught the tube to Camden Town, as soon as we were off the tube we headed straight to KFC, this was my first KFC since I was 15, I kept having images in my head of something I read about someone who was eating chicken nuggets from KFC and found ‘something’ inside.

After our KFC’s we had a look round the shops, in Camden people are selling magic mushrooms on the street and stare at you directly in the face in the hope that you might buy some crack off them to save having your face smashed in.

It was raining quite badly as we were looking round the market, I got soaked, strangely everything in the market was £10 and was sold be a Chinese person, if you looked at anything you would hear…

“You like? You like?”
“Um…it’s ok”
“10 pound, 10 pound”
“I don’t know, maybe next…”
“Try on, go on, try on…egg fried rice”

After meeting up with Jo and Claire again we went to this pub which I cant remember the name of, as I was about to order a pint of Carling I stopped and ordered a Coke instead, I’d officially quit drinking and I even made a point of mentioning it to everyone, I was quite pleased with myself.

We then headed back to Camden Town tube station and (after losing my day pass twice) got the tube to Leicester Square and then Covent Garden while watching the dull nobodies staring vacantly into their newspapers. When we got to Covent Garden we had to get out of the station so we walked up these stairs, trouble was the stairs went on forever and we were all knackered by the time we got to the top.

After having a quick look around the market there we went to the Punch and Judy pub to meet the others and I almost fell down the stairs. We’d only been in there a few minutes and I had a pint put into my hand, not only had I quit drinking but I’d be needing a piss all the way home.

We walked to Trafalgar Square to get back on the coach, some ‘bad boi’ graphics students were smoking some naughty stuff like the gangsters they are and then we had to listen to them bragging to their friends about it all the way back on the coach.

Unfortunately we were caught in traffic all the way back and it took 4 and a half hours, Ashley got a text from her Nan saying there was snow back in Birmingham, so that was something to look forward to as I wait for the bus home, and as predicted I did need a piss, I had to use the smelly coach toilet and ended up cutting my finger on my belt while I was in there too so I came out covered in blood.

I was so glad to get back from London, it’s a stupidly big place and the people there have no manners at all, it makes me proud to be from Birmingham.

Random photo of the day:


Pen

currently listening to: Drugstore - El President
Gemma is currently listening to: Babycakes
Mr High-Speed Garage is currently listening to: Some N.E.R.D. S.H.I.T.