Wednesday 19 May 2010
Saturday 15 May 2010
I want
There's so much music I want to buy. I've always found it really difficult to hold back from purchasing CDs when I go out, and at this very moment I am looking at several albums online I want now. Now. NOW. And I can get them for relatviely cheap. But unfortunately it all adds up. When I've written my budget I will buy some... or maybe I won't wait that long... it's just so EASY to press the little "one click" button next to a song on Amazon and to have it within seconds.
I watched Almodóvar's film Carne Trémula today. It was okay, I need to read about it so I may be able to reference it in my Spanish film exam this Thursday.
Today, well, yesterday now, I had my Catalan oral exam. And on Monday I will have my Spanish oral exam, it seems like I've spent so many weeks speaking Catalan and trying desperately to avoid slipping into Castilian that I can't make the switch to Castilian thinking. Hopefully by Monday I will be able to think properly in Castilian.
I've been on this amazing website recently, We7, it's like Spotify, except anyone can listen on it and you don't have to download anything. There's so much on there, so much I want to hear, but it's so hard for me to decide which album to listen to next... ♥ music actually is my life..!
P.S. If anyone wants to buy me any of the following albums, then feel free, I wouldn't mind in the slightest...
Loreena McKennitt - Live in Paris and Toronto
Maria del Mar Bonet - Amic, amat
Dolly Parton - Those Were the Days
Ivette Nadal - A l'esquena d'un elefant
Sanjosex - Viva
Janet Jackson - Janet Jackson's Rhythm Nation 1814
Dolly Parton - Backwoods Barbie
Loreena McKennitt - An Ancient Muse
Loreena McKennitt - Nights from the Alhambra
Kelis - Flesh Tone
Nina Simone - Original Album Classics (5CD box set)
Clara Schumann - Complete Piano Works
Donna Summer - Bad Girls
Kate Bush - The Dreaming
Nina Simone - Nina Simone and Piano!
And don't worry, if all those get bought for me, I want plenty more ^_^
I watched Almodóvar's film Carne Trémula today. It was okay, I need to read about it so I may be able to reference it in my Spanish film exam this Thursday.
Today, well, yesterday now, I had my Catalan oral exam. And on Monday I will have my Spanish oral exam, it seems like I've spent so many weeks speaking Catalan and trying desperately to avoid slipping into Castilian that I can't make the switch to Castilian thinking. Hopefully by Monday I will be able to think properly in Castilian.
I've been on this amazing website recently, We7, it's like Spotify, except anyone can listen on it and you don't have to download anything. There's so much on there, so much I want to hear, but it's so hard for me to decide which album to listen to next... ♥ music actually is my life..!
P.S. If anyone wants to buy me any of the following albums, then feel free, I wouldn't mind in the slightest...
Loreena McKennitt - Live in Paris and Toronto
Maria del Mar Bonet - Amic, amat
Dolly Parton - Those Were the Days
Ivette Nadal - A l'esquena d'un elefant
Sanjosex - Viva
Janet Jackson - Janet Jackson's Rhythm Nation 1814
Dolly Parton - Backwoods Barbie
Loreena McKennitt - An Ancient Muse
Loreena McKennitt - Nights from the Alhambra
Kelis - Flesh Tone
Nina Simone - Original Album Classics (5CD box set)
Clara Schumann - Complete Piano Works
Donna Summer - Bad Girls
Kate Bush - The Dreaming
Nina Simone - Nina Simone and Piano!
And don't worry, if all those get bought for me, I want plenty more ^_^
Tuesday 11 May 2010
Year of Independence
It's 4.45am and I'm awake, I have been all night. I'm singing along to Barbra Streisand's epic 8 minute song Make it Like a Memory. One good thing has come out of staying awake all night. I've realised I need to make some changes, because there are a few things with which I am unhappy, and while I can't change some of them, I can make an effort.
I've just noticed the sun is rising.
I've been reflecting a little over people and things that have caused be serious stress over the past unspecified length of time. My living situation this academic year has been so much better than that of last year. Although a housemate who is thick in the head and neither lifts the seat nor checks his aim before firing does irritate me, it is *so* much easier to deal with than what I had last year.
I've opened my window and I can hear birdsong.
Last year was awful, and maybe it wouldn't've been all that bad if a certain issue hadn't continued chasing me all year, and has only now begun to go away, though my bank balance still feels its effects.
***
Last (academic) year (September 2008) I moved away from home to a new city where I had no friends or family, you'd think that would be trial enough, and it was, for a while. However, independence was what I wanted so I grew used to it. I rented a room in a house near the northern outskirts of the city next door to a chip shop and a garage, with a bus to town only once every half hour, which was rather unreliable, because it came all the way from out in the countryside of Cumbria and North Yorkshire, and the way on foot was along the busy A6 which was particularly unpleasant in the rain.
In the beginning my only housemate (in this 6 bed house) was a rather deaf guy who was perfectly nice, so I could do pretty much whatever I wanted, play piano as loud as I wanted whenever and he didn't have a clue. My landlady was a 60 year old woman who had just finished a degree in Spanish and would shortly be off travelling round South America; her daughter would be looking after her houses in her absence. I walked an hour to ASDA so I could buy a cheese grater. Letters and phone calls from friends helped keep me sane. I had to stand on my desk to talk on the phone. Uni wasn't very welcoming, but that's another story. I got facebook.
3 October I hear my landlady showing somebody round the house, I don't like the sound of them, but am informed later that he shall be moving in the next day. I beg my journal that it won't be an awful person. It didn't do so much good.
The problems begin, but they start off small: TV left on, and back door left unlocked, etc. We sort out the paying of the bills, and my and my problematic housemate's names (we'll call him James) are decided to go on the bills. I discover James is on probation, and hear him talking on the phone mentioning something about a girl and grabbing her by the throat, among other things. I wrote in my journal "I don't think he's a nice guy". Understatement.
The problems continue. Being woken up at 4.30 in the morning, getting an earful of crap when I say anything, loud late-night parties, urinating at the back of the house, leaving the gas cooker on, scary african drug dealer guy, not giving me any money for bills. The list goes on. I was terrified to leave my room most of the time, and I was quite sad for some time. He always seemed to be in trouble with the police. One Sunday morning they were hammering on the door for a good 45 minutes while James and his friend lay low in the front room. One day the police broke into our house (I was out at the time) and into our rooms looking for him, we had to get new doors, but my landlady had to ask for temporary locks while we were waiting for them, because the lovely police weren't going to give us anything, so we would have open rooms. Open to our dear criminal housemate.
As I mentioned, I wasn't getting any money from him for the bills, I was paying them alone, and they were expensive, as he thought nothing of leaving the heating perpetually on. One quarter, the gas bill was almost £400. My first term I had comfortably within my means, but money problems were starting to weigh down on me.
Eventually we get to evict James, this takes a while. We have to write statements about him, which the police kindly photocopy and send back to James, so he knows everything we said about him, and he still lives with us, because they take their sweet time doing anything about it. One night I come home to find James and his scary african drug dealer friend in the living room, they had been drinking. James is rather drunk (remember he is a violent criminal). He greets me in his own special, drunk, not-very-nice way and talks about the statement, telling African guy all about it, thrusting it into my hand and telling me to read it aloud, I hand it back to him, tell him all I want is a quiet life and to go upstairs to my room, however he wouldn't let me past. He wasn't very happy and I was absolutely terrified... luckily I managed to escape out the back door and run away down the road, he didn't chase me. So in floods of tears I called my best friend and asked her to come and pick me up. I stayed with her that night. Never mentioned that night again with James.
After a while, he was finally evicted, and I never wanted to hear from him again. He didn't want us getting in touch with him either, which was rather convenient for him because it meant that I could not get any money out of him. He owed me a few hundred pounds, which is an awful lot when you are a student, and this hole in my finances made me lose control a little. It came to the time when I was to move out so I requested final bills from the gas and electric companies. I paid half of these and told them to chase James for the other halves, and gave them an address which was all I had as to where he might possibly be. I thought I may have heard the last of the issue.
But no. No I hadn't. They kept chasing me for the debt, which I couldn't pay, and I had already paid half so I thought I shouldn't have to pay the rest as well. So I ignored them. Eventually the debt was sold, then sold again to Buchanan Clark and Wells (who specialise in making people's lives a misery) and fees were added to it. At one point I was receiving phone calls from them every single day, demanding payment. It all made me quite distressed.
Eventually it got to December 2009 and I sought help from the Citizens Advice Bureau, with whose help I discovered that because James and I were jointly liable for the debts, the collectors of the debt were within their rights to chase whomever they pleased for the debt, and as they couldn't find James, it fell to me. After a few weeks I managed to agree a weekly payment plan with them. Unfortunately I ran completely out of credit by the end of the Lent term so couldn't keep up with my payments, and couldn't afford to live so had to borrow money from friends in order that I could live and pay for the things I needed.
Only a couple of weeks ago, I finally paid the debt off in full, and I need never hear from them again. The hole in my finances is still there though, I used up all my £200 of meagre savings paying the bills in 2009 as well as all of my credit. My credit rating is runied, I am unable to obtain credit, and I don't believe that this is something that will go away, that is why I had to borrow money from friends. I couldn't extend my overdraft. If only none of this had ever happened... I wouldn't even be in my overdraft.
***
So there you have the story of what made me very sad for some time.
"Oh well. I gained life experience" is what I say when I talk about this whole saga.
It's now twenty past six in the morning.
I've just noticed the sun is rising.
I've been reflecting a little over people and things that have caused be serious stress over the past unspecified length of time. My living situation this academic year has been so much better than that of last year. Although a housemate who is thick in the head and neither lifts the seat nor checks his aim before firing does irritate me, it is *so* much easier to deal with than what I had last year.
I've opened my window and I can hear birdsong.
Last year was awful, and maybe it wouldn't've been all that bad if a certain issue hadn't continued chasing me all year, and has only now begun to go away, though my bank balance still feels its effects.
***
Last (academic) year (September 2008) I moved away from home to a new city where I had no friends or family, you'd think that would be trial enough, and it was, for a while. However, independence was what I wanted so I grew used to it. I rented a room in a house near the northern outskirts of the city next door to a chip shop and a garage, with a bus to town only once every half hour, which was rather unreliable, because it came all the way from out in the countryside of Cumbria and North Yorkshire, and the way on foot was along the busy A6 which was particularly unpleasant in the rain.
In the beginning my only housemate (in this 6 bed house) was a rather deaf guy who was perfectly nice, so I could do pretty much whatever I wanted, play piano as loud as I wanted whenever and he didn't have a clue. My landlady was a 60 year old woman who had just finished a degree in Spanish and would shortly be off travelling round South America; her daughter would be looking after her houses in her absence. I walked an hour to ASDA so I could buy a cheese grater. Letters and phone calls from friends helped keep me sane. I had to stand on my desk to talk on the phone. Uni wasn't very welcoming, but that's another story. I got facebook.
3 October I hear my landlady showing somebody round the house, I don't like the sound of them, but am informed later that he shall be moving in the next day. I beg my journal that it won't be an awful person. It didn't do so much good.
The problems begin, but they start off small: TV left on, and back door left unlocked, etc. We sort out the paying of the bills, and my and my problematic housemate's names (we'll call him James) are decided to go on the bills. I discover James is on probation, and hear him talking on the phone mentioning something about a girl and grabbing her by the throat, among other things. I wrote in my journal "I don't think he's a nice guy". Understatement.
The problems continue. Being woken up at 4.30 in the morning, getting an earful of crap when I say anything, loud late-night parties, urinating at the back of the house, leaving the gas cooker on, scary african drug dealer guy, not giving me any money for bills. The list goes on. I was terrified to leave my room most of the time, and I was quite sad for some time. He always seemed to be in trouble with the police. One Sunday morning they were hammering on the door for a good 45 minutes while James and his friend lay low in the front room. One day the police broke into our house (I was out at the time) and into our rooms looking for him, we had to get new doors, but my landlady had to ask for temporary locks while we were waiting for them, because the lovely police weren't going to give us anything, so we would have open rooms. Open to our dear criminal housemate.
As I mentioned, I wasn't getting any money from him for the bills, I was paying them alone, and they were expensive, as he thought nothing of leaving the heating perpetually on. One quarter, the gas bill was almost £400. My first term I had comfortably within my means, but money problems were starting to weigh down on me.
Eventually we get to evict James, this takes a while. We have to write statements about him, which the police kindly photocopy and send back to James, so he knows everything we said about him, and he still lives with us, because they take their sweet time doing anything about it. One night I come home to find James and his scary african drug dealer friend in the living room, they had been drinking. James is rather drunk (remember he is a violent criminal). He greets me in his own special, drunk, not-very-nice way and talks about the statement, telling African guy all about it, thrusting it into my hand and telling me to read it aloud, I hand it back to him, tell him all I want is a quiet life and to go upstairs to my room, however he wouldn't let me past. He wasn't very happy and I was absolutely terrified... luckily I managed to escape out the back door and run away down the road, he didn't chase me. So in floods of tears I called my best friend and asked her to come and pick me up. I stayed with her that night. Never mentioned that night again with James.
After a while, he was finally evicted, and I never wanted to hear from him again. He didn't want us getting in touch with him either, which was rather convenient for him because it meant that I could not get any money out of him. He owed me a few hundred pounds, which is an awful lot when you are a student, and this hole in my finances made me lose control a little. It came to the time when I was to move out so I requested final bills from the gas and electric companies. I paid half of these and told them to chase James for the other halves, and gave them an address which was all I had as to where he might possibly be. I thought I may have heard the last of the issue.
But no. No I hadn't. They kept chasing me for the debt, which I couldn't pay, and I had already paid half so I thought I shouldn't have to pay the rest as well. So I ignored them. Eventually the debt was sold, then sold again to Buchanan Clark and Wells (who specialise in making people's lives a misery) and fees were added to it. At one point I was receiving phone calls from them every single day, demanding payment. It all made me quite distressed.
Eventually it got to December 2009 and I sought help from the Citizens Advice Bureau, with whose help I discovered that because James and I were jointly liable for the debts, the collectors of the debt were within their rights to chase whomever they pleased for the debt, and as they couldn't find James, it fell to me. After a few weeks I managed to agree a weekly payment plan with them. Unfortunately I ran completely out of credit by the end of the Lent term so couldn't keep up with my payments, and couldn't afford to live so had to borrow money from friends in order that I could live and pay for the things I needed.
Only a couple of weeks ago, I finally paid the debt off in full, and I need never hear from them again. The hole in my finances is still there though, I used up all my £200 of meagre savings paying the bills in 2009 as well as all of my credit. My credit rating is runied, I am unable to obtain credit, and I don't believe that this is something that will go away, that is why I had to borrow money from friends. I couldn't extend my overdraft. If only none of this had ever happened... I wouldn't even be in my overdraft.
***
So there you have the story of what made me very sad for some time.
"Oh well. I gained life experience" is what I say when I talk about this whole saga.
It's now twenty past six in the morning.
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