Shoppípolla

Heh, check my Sigur Rós referencing skills. Can't touch dis.

So yeah, this blog is about shops, boutiques, markets, vendors, etc, and since when I went into town today, it was raining like hell, and there were loads and loads of puddles, and as everyone and their postman knows, Hoppípolla means 'jumping in puddles' in Icelandic, I have crafted an amazing pun. Go me.

I'd like to write about the independent type shops you get in Brighton, the trendy places in the North Laine and The Lanes, so I will. Do they intimidate anyone else? First of all, they look expensive, and the people who run them look too cool to even think I was a customer, which is probably beneficial to shoplifting, but not for my self-esteem. I kind of just look longingly in the windows, imagining myself wearing some chic ironic t-shirt, or a Hoodie with a magic-eye picture on it, and sigh. The only independent shops I can really stomach are Comic Shops (because wherever I go, the comic shop is my spiritual home, being surrounded by all the sequential goodness calms me, go to Dave's Comics in the North Laine bitches) and record shops, for the same reason, that and bargains. But both often suffer from too-trendy-clerkitis, how I admire people who talk to record shop employees at the counter, so brave!

So yeah, trendy shops scare me, so I must admit a cardinal young person sin, in that I often prefer chains, ooh, what a globalising, carbon footprint making bastard I am. But I just love Virgin Megastores (I refuse to call it Zavvi, REFUSE) and Borders, I could spend days in there, looking at things, and deciding not to by them because of my accursed conscience (of course, with all the chairs in Borders, you don't have to buy! wahey). I like HMV back in Leeds, but the one in Brighton is kind of shit, too messy, and carpeted floor, eeww, it needs 2 floors.

As for clothes, I'm a TK Maxx fan, the prices of say, Matalan, but with brand names, so I look like at least have a clue about fashion (which I don't). Primark, too is a cheapskate's dream.

Hooray for Consumerism, and hooray for me.

Witness my artistic glory.

Time to showcase some of my computery made stuff and that from the course.

First up, a Photoshop job of Darth Vader in some fire, I think I did a good job making this look quite good when it's really very simple, I am particularly proud of how the cape looks all burnt away, and the subtle red tint and blur on Darth and the background. I imagine he's not a big fan of the stuff after the end of Episode 3, painful stuff.



Second of all, the Illustrator Octopus. This reminds me of either the logo of the fictional Marvel Comics terrorist organisatio Hydra, which looks like this, Or a weird octopus logo from one of the many Demon Headmaster sequels, where it was a method of hypnosis. Anyway, here is my Octopus;



Deadly Sea Creatures indeed.

I'm on the Bus!

Today, I'd like to talk about Buses.

Now, I'm not a big fan of Buses, more of a train man myself, but since Buses are so ubiquitous in Brighton, I feel I should discuss them. Not so much the act of using the Bus, since I've only tooken them 3 times since I've been here (But compared to the fact that I took the Bus the same amount of times in 5 years in Leeds, and only because I desperately had to, makes it seem like I'm a bus addict or something else completely ridiculous), although what's the deal with those TV screens inside the Bus? They just show random shots of inside and out, and when you're drunk, it's quite unsettling.

No, I'm more interested in what's plastered on the sides of the Bus, those massive photos of supposed Brighton residents and they're reason for being 'ON THE BUS', as I like to walk into town, and there's literally 8 buses a minute, I have seen loads of these, and have become so sad as to have chosen a favourite (It's Stephanie Starlet, not that I'm into that sort of thing, but it just sums up this city perfectly, where else would emblazon their public transport with giant pictures of Transvestites? You wouldn't get that in Bradford), but I have began to regard these with suspicion, I reckon they are all actors, I have never seen one of them around town, and if they supposedly get the bus so much, I'm bound to have recognised them.

But maybe the pressure of fame that comes from being a Bus Mascot has ruined these poor people's lives? And they are forced to remain indoors, scared to go out, lest some berk bellows 'OI! AINTCHU SPOSED TA BE ONNABUS?'

The poor, poor, souls.


It serves them right for selling out and becoming slaves for a corporate fatcat Bus company owner! Or something else student cliche.

Just don't get me started on the oh so clever slogans on the back of the bus. Ugh, they must run on Smug.

Clubbing (wahey, have it large, woot woot! Mentaaaaaal Woooo!)

The contents of those parentheses are meant to be disparaging by the way

I dislike clubbing, I dislike nightclubs, the reasons are many and lengthy, and I won't go into them here, (there's a Charlie Brooker column from the Guardian G2 supplement here which I pretty much agree with completely and probably unconsciously stole to form my own hatred), but thankfully, now that the smiley smiley nicey nicey day-glo party that is fresher's week is over, I haven't had to go to any nightclubs, because no-one here knows me well enough to be able to lie to/convince me that it might, actually be fun, and I am free to continue my misanthropic existence unabated.

So why then did I go to a club on friday, with none of my housemates? Because it was a free gig (Unitaur, with The Teenagers (good, but unintelligable), These New Puritans (dull) and Crystal Castles (raucous mentalness, the best)), and I may hate clubs, but I love freebies, I was conflicted, but my love of a deal won out. And there's one thing about Brighton clubs which actually makes them fairly bearable, the sea. The club I went to (the much hyped Digital) and many others, is right on the sea, which means when you pop outside amongst the smokers to escape a)the heat and b)the twattish angular haircutted Nathan Barley prongs you don't end up facing grimy streets and puking women like you do in Leeds on a friday night (we inspired I Predict A Riot! Get in!) you see the furious romance of the sea (and puking women). And when I'm drunk, there's nothing more fascinating than just staring at the sea, and breathing in the supposedly wholesome air.

I think there's another blog in here about the sea, and how we often take it for granted here (well at least I do), but I'll save that for later, I've already got one in mind about Buses, and one on shops to come, hold on to your hats you monkeys!

Sundays

I think Sundays may be my favourite day of the week. Not Friday, Sunday. This is because there's no pressure to do anything at all on a Sunday. On a weekday, you have to go to school, work, uni, whatever, and on Friday and Saturday evenings, you're expected to go out, and if you don't, you always end up feeling like a bit of a loser, even if you quite like staying in really, you always feel left out. And no-one except hardened alcoholics goes out for more than one or 2 pints on a Sunday.

But on Sundays, you can do whatever the heck you like, and for me, that now normally involves going for a nice stroll around Brighton lazily looking in shops, I like going shopping at odd times (ie, not Saturdays, waay too busy), I used to go into Leeds every Thurday after school, for... nerd reasons, and now, for those same reasons, I go in on Thursday midmornings, and wander around, much like I do on Sundays.

Cities, and Brighton especially, are a much more pleasant place at 11 O'Clock in the morning on a Sundays, because all though you get a lot of terribly middle class parents with children being pushed in massive buggies blocking up the streets, it's better than 'hooded youths' (I'm only 18 and already I hate most young people). Plus, whoever heard of getting mugged on a Sunday?

Also, some of the North Laine streets are closed to traffic on Sundays, which is nice, cars are disruptive to the unattentive wanderer.

So that's why I like Sundays, just wandering around with no real purpose, of course, this all depends on whether I get upon in time, I'm afraid today I bolstered the cliche of students not getting up before midday and rose at half one, meaning that I had missed the optimum sunday shopping time.

So I stayed in, not feeling left out because everyone else is in, and listened to the excellent Stephen Merchant show on BBC 6Music (another Sunday joy, along with Top Gear, because even though I don't care about cars, I do like Top Gear).

So that's it, 2 blogs, and this one didn't really say much about Brighton life... oh well.

First Post!

This here is just a post to start up my blog, I'm not really sure about which of the topics suggested I'm going to blog about yet, probably just my experiences in the glorious technicolour dreamworld that is Brighton, which I'm sure will mostly consist of me grousing about how much things are cheaper and better back home 'Up North', but I'll need to get a flat cap first.

I think to start this off in a blogtastic style, I'll discuss a phenomenon which I haven't really experienced in Leeds, that of spotting famous people in the street, all nonchalant-like. Back home the only famous person I saw in the street (I've seen musicians at gigs and all that, shook Willy Mason's hand) was Jeremy Dyson, the one from the League Of Gentlemen who doesn't actually act or appear in the show at all (apart from a cameo as a lighter salesman) which hardly counts, since only hardcore dvd extra-watching spods like me will know him.

But in Brighton, In the space of a little over 5 weeks, I have seen 3 famous people, and curiously enough, all on the same street, I saw Jimmy Carr and Simon Amstell within the space of about a minute on a saturday morning, and last thursday, on my way to Virgin Megastores (or 'Zavvi' as it is now putridly known) I saw the actor Tom Conti.

Amaazing.

Except they were all doing comedy gigs or plays in town, and the street I saw them on just happened to be one up from the street with all the theatres on, you know, near the Pavilion, so it's not really surprising, maybe if I had hung around the theatres in Leeds I would have seen some.

But who knows?

That's a nice evocative way to end my inaugural blog, so yeah, keep on rockin' in the free world!