That’s so hot right now

So I went to the (not so) Secret Garden Party last weekend. I’ve never been before so had no idea what to expect.

I didn’t have particularly high hopes for the music in all honesty. If I were to be generous, I would say that the line up was passable. If I weren’t, I would say it was a big pile of wank. But we were going mainly for the atmosphere (which I repeatedly told everyone to excuse the shitty music – maybe I said it too much…) And in all fairness the atmosphere was very pleasant. It was far more serene than some of the festivals I’ve been to before. I didn’t at any stage feel that it was becoming a soul-zapping endurance that I simply had to get through – unlike EXIT for instance. But unfortunately, serene tends to come hand-in-hand with a less enjoyable bedfellow. Dickheads.

Now you know me, I’m never one to make rash judgements but there are a lot of arseholes at festivals. I appreciate that this isn’t a ground-breaking observation but as much as I anticipate it, I still find it annoying.  I struggle to embrace the spirit of the festival as a concept. And as a result, find a lot of the aspects of them simply cringe-worthy. I’ll look at people in their 'fancy dress’ and think;

‘Why is that guy dressed like that? Does he seriously think that looks cool? He must be a massive prick. Why does he have friends? I bet he’s unemployed.’

And so on and so on.

When I should be thinking;

‘Lalalalalalala festivals are cool. Lalalalalala acid is great. Wooooo.’

Or some other hippie crap.

But, despite this view I did have a very brief epiphany over the course of the 3 days. It was Saturday afternoon and the fancy dress was in full swing (obviously not mine because I hate fancy dress). Then suddenly I realised that by not embracing a costume – when everyone else had – I looked extremely boring. I could tut and grumble as much as I wanted about how much of a knob everyone looked but they didn’t even know, let alone care.

So I made a bold move.

Over the last couple of evenings I had accrued a selection of bits of other peoples costumes. There was absolutely nothing cohesive about them but I thought that if I wear everything, I’ll look like a dickhead – and therefore fit in. But it wasn’t enough. My friend suggested (as a joke) that I have ‘CUNT’ written across my forehead in eyeliner. I thought it was genius and promptly got her to do it!

I became an instant celebrity.

Revellers who had spent days making their costumes got less attention than I did. I must have had my photo taken with about 20 different people over the course of the evening. I was a legend.

So since then, I have come to conclude that in order to truly enjoy a festival, you don’t have to wear a silly costume and prance around like a moron.

You just need to be a massive cunt.

Damn you Amaretto!

So yesterday was one of the worst days of my life. It really was awful.

The morning didn’t start well. I woke up and was genuinely confused as to how I came to be in my own bed. That makes me sound like a whore but I assure you my actions were innocent. I had fully intended on staying at my friend’s house (whose party I had attended the night before) but had obviously decided at some point that that was a bad idea.

I do vaguely remember traipsing home at stupid o’clock. I had the standard array of dodgy text messages and phone calls as proof. Sorry to anyone I offended or weirded out. I blame the Amaretto. Such a mistake.

After about an hour of trying not to be sick I decided to get up.

That was my first mistake (well second if you include the Amaretto).

I thought I was ok. I even made a bacon sandwich! The bread was a struggle but I managed to eat the bacon. I then sat down to watch an episode of Columbo when the waves of nausea started hitting me like a massive tsunami. It was terrible. I was hoping not to see that bacon sandwich again but there it was. In the toilet. Dejected. Just like me.

I sympathised.

My second (or third) mistake was to initially believe that, now I’d been sick, I felt better. I did not. And to make it worse, the cat was being a right little prick. He’s been confused this weekend because I’m the only one in the house. Actually, I’m probably giving him a bit too much credit as he’s a little prick most of the time. But on Sunday he decided it would be a good idea to drag a half dead pigeon through the cat flap! There’s nothing like a bleeding, frantic pigeon clasped in the jaws of a demonic bastard cat to induce vomit when you’re feeling rough.

I guess I should be grateful that I got rid of it before he had a chance to decapitate it. That’s right. My cat likes eating pigeon’s heads. Just the heads. He’s a weirdo.

By now it was about 7 o’clock and I had done nothing with my day. I had started to feel a bit more human again and was readily preparing myself for a Top Gear, Apprentice, Apprentice Your Hired, Grand Designs Australia marathon (It had been the main focus of my day). Then I had a thought. I was fairly certain that the entire day had gone by and I hadn’t uttered a word. Certainly not to a person anyway. I’m pretty sure I told the cat to fuck off but that was it.

It’s bizarre how a whole day can go by with literally no interaction with another human being.

I then had another thought.

This had been the best day of my life ever.

Google+ crap

Ever dreamt of a platform that enables you to share photos, videos and comments with all your friends in an online web space?

Well you’re in luck!

The boffins down at Google HQ have been busying themselves with the launch of such a platform called ‘Google+’. A truly innovative social media tool that facilitates a whole new means of interaction between you and your peers across the globe.

Oh no wait…

Isn’t that Facebook?

Yes, the geniuses down at Google have created something which is sure to be hailed as a revolution in social networking… by the 12 people who join it.

I have to admit that I am one of the 12. Mainly because everyone at my work is trendy and I would be soooo out of the loop if I didn’t.  But so far, I’m thoroughly underwhelmed.

Where they seem to have particularly missed the mark is by not providing any means to stalk people. I’m not a massive stalker but it’s nice to know that I can. With Google+, you can only follow your ‘friends’ and no offence but that’s boring. I can see my ‘friends’ in real life so where’s the fun?

Sorry, I realise I keep putting ‘friends’ in inverted commas. I can’t help it. It’s my tourettes.

Sure, you can split your ‘friends’ up into groups (sorry, ‘circles’) like ‘family’, ‘colleagues’ etc etc blah blah blah boring. But if that is the only difference then where’s the incentive? You can create groups on Facebook. Granted it may not be the most intuitive system in the world but it’s certainly not bad enough for me to consider switching entirely. And that’s where I think they’re going to struggle. It may be slightly better than Facebook at certain things (which it should be after 7 years!) but it’s not better enough. It’s a slight improvement but simply not worth the hassle.

Maybe I’m not the target audience for this tool (surely not!) Maybe some people want a social networking profile but don’t like Farmville? Again, I refuse to believe this. Maybe they’ll succeed by encouraging people who don’t already have a Facebook account to get involved in social networking. I guess that’s a good thing but who cares?

Perhaps I’ll eat my words in a few months when Google+ becomes the next big thing.
Stranger things have happened. If it does, please don’t put me in your ‘Dickheads’ circle. I’ve been in one of those before and it wasn’t great. Officially it was called Wallington County Grammar School but you get the point.

P.S I didn’t win the Euromillions. So annoying!

If I won the Euromillions…

I would love to win the Euromillions. £154,000,000 is lots of money. An overwhelming amount of money in fact. Could you ever even spend it all?

However, I fear that if I were to win it (which I will tonight), I would view spending it all as a challenge. No one would ever expect it and I would have a great time! They would all say, “How did he spend it all? He had so much!” and I would say “Yeh it was awesome!” Actually I probably wouldn’t say that because I imagine I’d be dead. But I’d definitely have died happy!

A colleague and I were discussing the first thing we would do if we won and she gave me an interesting insight into her disturbed mind. Sabrina (I know right!) appeared genuinely concerned that if she won £154,000,000, she would immediately go out and spend it on something completely pointless and wasteful. When I probed her as to what these things might be she said, “I might go to the train station and buy 100,000,000 one day travelcards just because I could.” She then went onto say, “What if I went out and spent it all on peaches?! They would rot and then I’d have nothing to show for my £154,000,000!”

We’ve now made an arangement that, if she wins, she will employ me on a daily rate of £20,000 to ensure she doesn’t spend all her money on travelcards and peaches. Pretty sweet deal I think. She’s a bit retarded so I could easily steal more from her.

I then thought about the stupid ways that I could spend the money. There are the obvious standard things that I would do:

Buy 10 houses
Buy 100 cars
Take up a ridiculous cocaine habit
Buy lots of attractive friends (no offense)
Release my own album

You know, standard stuff.

But then I thought about ways that I could spend it AND annoy people. One good idea I had was a variation on Orange Wednesdays. It’s called Alex Mondays/Tuesdays/Thursdays/Fridays/Saturdays/Sundays and instead of being half price, everywhere costs double. It will be great for two reasons. Firstly, I won’t care because I’ll be loaded and secondly, I wont have to share the restaurant/cinema with any plebs. I guess there must be some other people who could afford it but there would be a rota in place so we didn’t clash.

I’m not sure how much it would cost though…

I then thought about how funny it would be to rebrand Oyster cards as ‘Gay cards’. Then people would have to say “I’ve just got to top up my gay card” and “You’ve dropped your gay card” and oh how I’d laugh as I drove past in one of my 100 cars.

Again, cost may be an issue…

So if you’re like me and have awesome ideas about how you would spend £154,000,000 then why not enter the Euromillions tonight?

After all, it could be you…(But it won’t because it will be me).