eternity112

26/5/09

 

 Seeing as I got bored of revision long ago, I should probably write the obligatory MCM Expo blog.

 It was a very, very, stressful Expo. With parents determined to make me feel miserable and useless the night before, when I already felt not that great anyway, I started off the weekend in a bad mood (I know I should blog about the last day of school too, but like most school days, there was feck all to blog about, perhaps besides finally seeing Scotty’s hair out of a pony tail... I’ve waited two years for that!). We all finally went to bed at 1 am after frantically trying to do everything, only to get up four hours later to catch the train.

 Almost nothing went right with public transport this weekend, starting off with the train. We were supposed to be getting a replacement bus to Stratford from Ipswich, but thankfully they sent us to Ingatestone instead, where we got a bus to London Liverpool. I suspect if we had been sent to Stratford, we would have been sent to Romford instead, where we went via on the way back. This way meant we got in half an hour early, which makes up sorta for getting on the wrong tube first thing. We finally got to Expo, and took up residence along with Michael and “Chii” (she was Cosplaying Chii, so shall forever be known that way :P) whom we had met on the train, on the hill for some lunch. Filled with Curry pasties and fruit, I left Lu and Rosie Cosplay watching on the hill (Sunstroke didn’t sound like my idea of fun...). When Me, Em, Michael and Chii got to the queue, we were horrified, they had an entire Expo hall for the queue. Michael and Chii then produced pre-ordered tickets out of Chii’s bag, which I didn’t even realise you could do. This filled me with much envy, as we then had to stand in the queue for an hour and a half. It has some perks, Cosplay watching and the dancing Doctor Who (She was awesome! I still regret not being a able to talk to her properly... But the one time I saw her, she was in Expo stress mode too, though I did overhear her saying she’d Cosplay him too next time :D). Once we had finally paid our £10 (yep, ticket prices have gone up *le sigh*) we went into the hall, to be bombarded by the hordes at the dealers stalls. At this point, I had Expo hate. I’d just queued for ages, only to be confronted by my idea of hell (but with added cosplay costumes which was partially cool, and partially quite annoying as then take up so much room). I was tired, stressed, felt like shit in my Costume, that I’d hated the idea of more and more through the making process (I’m not a Cosplayer... Sorry... I’d much rather just design my own outfits than copying someone elses), and was ready to go home. We went back out to the hall, and onto the hill, which only caused more rage for me, with it being rather too hot and sunny. After a bit, I decided to separate off from the others, and go back into the hall, if only to escape the sun. I managed to get a proper look at the Indie comics area (and bought far too many of them, but they’re only a pound or two each mostly!) and met some charming artists (including one that read me a story in a rather epic manner, I wish I’d filmed it!). Warren Ellis (FreakAngels) was there to meet, but I really couldn’t be bothered to queue up to meet him. I’m like that with most celebrities oddly, except Rogue, who gives awesome hugs and smells good :D

 After I finished in the comics area, I went over to the DDR area, passing the Tokyopop stall where I’d had much rage at the fact that earlier I’d bought the English Gothic Lolita Bible, only to find it cheaper on the Tokyopop stall later. The DDR area at MCM is awesome though. They have a few DDR machines, two of which are standard ones, that are in a few arcades around England, and then their custom one that has everything on it. From Malice Mizer, Dead Can Dance, Corvus Corax, to Bemani originals like Scotty D and Naoki. This is the one they bring to Tokonatsu (anime camp), so any guessed what I’ll be doing all weekend this Toko? They also have various drumming and/or DJ games (I didn’t see the DJ one this expo, but I was crap at it anyway) and Singstar (which me and Rosh had great fun with last time). And then of course, my favourite bit, ParaPara Paradise. A game which DDR:UK have told me there simply isn’t the demand for in England (it’s on the PS2 in Japan, which it what they bring to Expo). This makes no sense to me, as not only is it beyond awesome, but I know many people who have poured hundreds into the lone UK machine at Trocadero in Picadilly square, and there’s even a UK ParaPara nightclub (as in the style of dance without the machine, coordinated moves to each song that the whole club dances) called Roppongi street that runs on an unfortunately infrequent basis. Anyway... I played for ages on that, and got talking to a Para Para enthusiast who knew all the dances! I’m still learning L  I kept playing this until last games were called, when I left and met up with the others. My Expo love was definitely resparked, but I was ready to go home, and regretting the fact I’d been talked into a second day especially considering the incentive of having my accommodation paid for had been taken away without warning, and I was leaving early because I simply couldn’t afford not to. This means I’m going to have to magic even more money out of thin air for my summer plans *sigh*.

We then had to do the massive trek to the hostel. This would have normally been extremely simple, with only one change to get onto the jubille and straight to our hostel. Instead, it took 6 changes and nearly 2 hours, stupid TFL... Once we got there, the others collapsed, and human Duracell bunny me went to Sainsbury’s. It took longer than I remember to get there, probably because last time I walked it with Creep, and everything seems to go slower when you’re alone. I even got a call from Em who must have thought I’d been kidnapped or something. My card got refused at the checkout, as I had forgotten that my payment for my Hull accommodation deposit was going out, and I’d forgotten to pick up cash that morning, so I had to sort that which left me with £3.54 in my bank account... And another day of Expo to go... Great... I got back to the Hostel, and made some food for everyone, which went down very well, and then we collapsed to try and catch up on some sleep (especially Em, who was rather ill, hope you’re feeling better! And somewhat especially me, I had twisted my ankle on the way back from shopping, and was hoping it wouldn’t be swollen and painful by the next day, which it was then).

 The next morni ng, we all got ready for another day of Expo, with Em a little bit better for a good night’s sleep, and my ankle better but not perfect. The others were in Cosplay (not sure what from...) and me feeling much cuter in my Lolita (it will be that or Steampunk for pretty much every Expo from now on, I repeat, I am not a Cosplayer. Though Shilo may be a possibility, as it wouldn’t really involve buying anything, and I’d still feel like me somewhat). The tube was much simpler that day, with the jubilee line up and running and the only replacement bus being to Custom House which was a short journey. Once we got to Expo, the others went to the hill, but I went straight in, wanting to at least get my money’s worth seeing as I was forced to stay an extra night (I had intended to go to Beltane Bash instead, but decided it’d be easier just to play arcade games all day). I met up with Bakura to meet Urahara (a MegaTen buddy of mine) and get some money she owed me to pay my entrance fee, seeing as I scarcely had £4 to my name. I then got in the queue (or lack thereof more like...) for my ticket. I went in, claimed some various freebies (though I missed out on a free bag, they were awesome, so it makes me sad, I did get a T-shirt from the same stall mind). I then played Dofus for a bit, another MMO that I will probably get addicted to... When I have internet again. I got talking to another gamer, who had been playing Dofus for about a year. I took her username so we could chat later. After this I intended to go and waste the day in the DDR area, but never actually got there... I got distracted by the Trading Cards area. Firstly, I got distracted by a new game called Huntik, which is absolutely awesome! It very different to most games I’ve played, as it includes the idea of quests. You play it either as someone trying to complete the quiest, and the other trying to prevent it, or as both of you competing to complete the quest. Once I’d played a practice game, they gave me a free “evil” starter deck and let me sign up for a beginner’s tournament at 3. I went away from this and other to the other side of the Upper Deck stand to play the new World of Warcraft table top game. It’s not played like Warhammer (which is a good thing... As an army of Warhammer figures can cost in excess of £100 just for the figures, sans paint, flock and terrain, which is a shame, because it’s an awesome game). It played with around two figures each, and a board with hexagonal squares. I won’t go into the whole rules, but I started playing a game against a very pretty member of the Upper Deck team. Later in the game, someone else took him over, so he could be taught how to play too, with the watchful eye of the pretty Upper Deck guy over us, telling us what to do. He sent us off with some free figures, and I went for a wander again. I went to the Magic the Gathering stall, and managed to blag some free cards, despite the fact I’ve been playing for years (I tried to get the other to get me some free decks too, but it didn’t work out *pouty face*). After a bit, it was time to go back to the Huntik stall for the beginners tournament. They gave us each 5 unreleased boosters with which to make a deck out of, and gave us 20 minutes to build a deck. I managed to get the rather rare Araknos legendary hero card (it’s a fecking giant Spider! How perfect is that!!), and the person I was meant to be battling was kind enough to give me the amulet of Araknos you use to summon it (which was actually his downfall, but neither of us were actually bothered about winning, really, it was all just for fun). We then started to play a game, with us pitted against each other to have a bag of Amulets equipped in zone 3 by the end of round 5 or 7. I had forgotten the geekish thrill these games bought as I haven’t even been able to play Magic properly in ages (even the sessions at Battlenet clash with BLAH L). I got both Araknos and the Amulet quite early on in the game, so I tried to lull him into a false sense of security in the first four rounds to lay Araknos in the 5^th, with a line of defence built up before him so I was guaranteed to win. I had major fear the turn before I was due to lay Araknos when he said “How many cards do you have ?”. Usually if someone says this in a Magic game, it’s reasonable to assume they have some horrid card like Mind Rot, which makes you discard two cards. For about a minute, I was so nervous with only Araknos and the Amulet in my hand! But it came to my turn with the 2 cards still in my hand, and I played them. I brought Araknos forward, to claim the Amulets. I can’t remember how (probably some odd free action), but he mananged to delay his fate for this round by stopping me claiming the amulets until round 7. We kept playing till round 7, when I claimed the amulets. After a turn or two, he just gave in, there was actually nothing he could do. All this took an hour and a half, leaving only half an hour of expo left, and only the first round played. This wasn’t very well organised. With the prize only being a T-shirt (I already had another design, I was all that fussed) and a proper playmat (which be useless for me anyway, as it’s really nor portable, whereas the paper version I have is), I decided to drop out and go and explore the last couple of stalls. I played a bit of a game called Chaotic, which was fun, but I wasn’t overly impressed. Plus they weren’t giving out free decks or anything, which means I’d actually have to pay to get a basic deck behind me. Huntik had given me a started deck and 5 boosters... Once I’ve found someone to play with (it’s a new game, so Battlenet hasn’t picked it up yet it appears, which is a shame, but we’ll see!), I will have to buy a small pack of quest cards, or redeem the online codes I have for a few free ones, and I’ll be ready to play. Lastly, I went to the WoW stall to play the card game. I didn’t get to play a proper game, only watch someone elses (I got chatting to the 2 playing afterwards, as well as the pretty Scottish Upper Deck guy too); but I was sent away with 2 started decks and a disc on how to play. It seems such an awesome game, and with the wide availability of this one, the fact that it’s pretty well established, and it’s World of Warcraft, which is stupidly popular (though I’ve never played out of fear of getting addicted, perhaps when exams are over). I traded contact details with the two girls I met, who were both awesome (one was even dressed up as Shilo! Awesome! She thought I was awesome as I was the first one to recognise her!). On the way out, the girl dressed up as Shilo said she loved Expo, because where else could you be taught to play WoW games (she loves WoW the computer game) by a cute Scottish guy. She said it was a shame she had a boyfriend lol! I was thinking more “Shame he has a penis...” which kinds of makes anything else irrelevant anyway, but he really was a lovely guy.

  After this, we started the journey home, and lucky we had 3 hours to get to the train station, because instead of getting the one change on the DLR to Stratford route as it would normally be, went went fecking everywhere. Not trains from Custom House, so we got the bus to Canary Wharf (after much panic because Bakura was so slow getting there, and they kept calling “LAST 3 BUSES!!!!” “LAST BUS IN 5 MINUTES!!!”), only to discover there was no tubes to Stratford until 19:30. So we went to Bank, then back onto the central line to Stratford. From Stratford, we were then told replacement buses had been cancelled, and that we were to get the train from Romford. This involved getting back on the tube, to Newbury park, then getting a replacement bus to Romford. This journey caused us much lols, simply for the fact that the man in front had a cat on his shoulder... We got there in plenty of time though, and got the train to Ipswich, where we changed, and managed to blag our way onto an earlier train, despite the fact we were on fixed tickets, getting us home 45 minutes early, which was a good thing, as all I wanted was sleep and to not be around people. Dropped everyone off home when we got back, went home and collapsed.

 Since, it’s been rather uneventful. Mostly recovering from Expo, being very Geeky and doing things like deck building with all my new TCG cards, failing to meet up with Emily (though I get to see her tomorrow :D) and attempting to tidy my room. I’ve rather enjoyed some time by myself to be honest, a rare thing in my life it seems. I’ve actually watched some TV, mostly Doctor Who though, and the second episode of Dollhouse, which is definitely worthy TV. I sniggered today at the fact that Huntik has a TV show, it’s really crap! But I like the game, so I won’t complain. I just hope I can actually find someone to play it with...

 Here marks the end of another one of Spider’s epic blogs.

 See, I’m even worse if you take my internet access away, gives me too much time to do stuff like this...

 Me, Min and Creep got back from London last night, after being diverted through Harwich International (It's a fecking port!!! We're still not sure where mind... *googles* Essex apparently), then to Manningtree, then to Norwich, making 4 hours out of a 2 hour trip. Ironically though, it was rather fun! As some of you may know, it was Fuck You Friday yesterday (Creep only noticed how inappropriate this was after sending out Facebook invitations, being Good Friday. We then completely forgot this and decided to name today shitting Christ Saturday...). I think this was very fitting with how many Fuck Yous we said. Mainly "FUCK YOU NATIONAL EXPRESS!!!!!". But there was some very fun bits on the train back. One being Creep asking me if something could be considered Vegan and Cruelty free (inspired by my lovely tattoo lotion that I want to eat) if the person making it simply punched a cow every few minutes while it was being made (WTF!?!?!?). Min suggested they'd have little moving pictures on them depicting this. She then proceeded to punch the air, which left me in a fit of giggles. Fist+imaginary cow= A Spider in fits of laughter.

 Friday in London was a half fail. We went to the British museum, which was awesome. We looked at Mummies, bits of the Pathenon, and
lots of pretty jewellery! Shame about all the people! Especially horrid Spanish who proceeded to stare at Min and me evily, assuming that because we speak English, we wouldn't be able to understand. Grrrggg!!! Actually all day I received more odd looks than I usually do in Norwich, which is a shame as I always considered London to be more of an open minded city than Norwich. That'll teach us for going to more mainstream tourist areas!!! The second half of the day was a fail. Covent garden isn't nearly as fab as I imagined it would be. It's expensive and full of tourists. I'd been to the bit near the jubilee market before, and hated it, but assumed once we got out a bit, it would be nicer. Not really. Neal's yard was tiny!! And the only nice thing it seemed to have was a decent restaurant. Pretty expensive mind, and I'd choose Greenhouse food over theirs any day, not just because of the price. We found the street with Coffee, Cake and Kink on, as well as a good sex shop called Liberation. Both however, were closed... Grrg! Cybercandy which I love in Covent Garden was a fail. They were out of Oreos, and nothing else was sufficiently interesting (or had crappy American food labelling). But I did get a very yummy tofu and spinach quiche! And some cute Hello Kitty beads. Oddly, the best thing about yesterday was breakfast! Scrambled tofu (which me and Creep had had much fun finding the day before!!) with peppers, mushrooms, onion, and Jack Daniel's BBQ sauce. We stumbled across that sauce in Sainsbury's, sooo yummy!!! It going on everything! We had beans (with added Jack Daniel's of course) and toast too. Yum!!

 On Thursday we went to see the Sisters of Mercy. You'll notice a lack of enthusiasm in this statement. They were ok on some of the later songs, but especially the earlier song, sucked! The first few songs, I couldn't actually decipher what they were. One song seemed to start off with the lyrics for Long train, and end in ones for Detenation Boulevard, with the tune for neither. I took a lack of pictures at the gig, as they used so much smoke you couldn't see fuck all anyway! To hide the fact they're old and not so pretty now perhaps... Also, the guy doing guitar and back vocals was chronically annoying! Bring back a woman to sing! Creep even shouted "You're doing it wrong!" when they sang Temple of Love, 'cause they really were. The vocals remained on the backing track of the original song, if only we could have shut Eldritch up for a song, it might have actually been good! The support band were awful too, but me and Min had fun taking the piss out them singing "Woah!!!" in every song. I counted how long it would take them to sing it in one song. 21 seconds, fail! And we also had fun shouting "NO!!" when they kept asking us if we believed in rock and roll. After seeing them, no, no I don't. *sigh*

 Anyway! Min and Creep are coming to mine to watch movies soon! Yay hiding from humanity! Goth month continues! Roll on Whitby!!

 Spidey xxx

 Me and (L: ooohh, the grammar...) Leila *rolls eyes*, have been baking brownies! We did start off with a proper recipe, this one in fact: allrecipes.co.uk/recipe/6036/vegan-brownies.aspx . However, it didn't stay like that for long! We added some extra flour as it was very, very gooky! It wasn't sticking to the side like most cake mixes do (or according to Leila, it was sucking its bits back in). About 3/4 cup. We then went crazy adding everything in the cupboard including:

Chopped dried apricots
Barley malt extract
Chopped (or more precisely bashed) walnuts
Raisins
Maya Gold chocolate
Ground almonds
Orange Extract

 And probably some more stuff we've forgotten...

Quotes from various times:

"Polygamy for Dummies?"

"Protect it from crawling artists in the airing cupboard"

"It sucked all its bits back in... I know my little brother can do that, but still!"

"Naked malt extraqt!"

"Are you removing them from their nest?"

"Yum, bird entrails!"

"Sutff, aww!"

 I cooked some scrambled tofu which Leila kept stealing! We now have another concoction, bread rising. There may be another blog post soon so we don't forget what we put in that one too if it's yummy.
 

L here now. I've taken over as Spider wandered off to retrieve the bread. Which hasn't done very well in terms of rising (tsk) but at least seems to be... probably edible. Or will be, anyway.
It was a basic bread mix at first, until I wanted to add barley malt extract instead of normal (well, normal for Spider) sugar... Added quite a bit of that, actually. And some Marmite. ...And reduced-salt soy sauce. Yep, normal bread. Of course it is. Then we added chopped/crumbled walnut bits and some of the herb-type Food Doctor seed concoctions (which may be discontinued, but may not. Look out for it. Fun stuff). Not sure what else went into it... I mostly remember thumping it for a bit and being surprised that I hadn't been thinking of anyone in particular at the time. Hmm.
Apparently the warm oven is helping the rising of the bread, at least. It was a bit pathetic earlier.


I'm not actually sure when I got here. About half 8, I think. PM. I'm still here and it's almost quarter past 1 in the morning... Not sure if I'll be sleeping. In general, I mean, not necessarily here... wow, I do tend to ramble. Ah well.
Have decided that I need to acquire tofu. Didn't look like the creepy silken stuff.
The music is making me amused... so did something else, which... was important but has been forgotten. Bah.
Ah. I think she may be cleaning up. I should be helping, probably, though we've made surprisingly little mess, considering. And they have a dishwasher, so I'm thoroughly envious.
Bread is going bakeybakey, I think.
I also think one of us will post an update once we've tried the bread, but for now... I think it shall be posted before I witter much more.

 I got my tattoo a few days ago after staring longily at the featherless patch of my back where Ashs beautiful art was due to be. I wasn't sure what to expect pain wise, but Caitlin had me a little worried. It wasn't too bad though. The outline hurt a fair bit, but not unbearably so, and I could have fallen asleep in the colouring. The rush afterwards was great fun! I really do want more, but I'm not going to rush into anything. Anyway, here are some pictures (bear in mind it's still healing, and is probably a little shiny from the lotion stuff):



 The Cruxshadows shirt with the wing was purely a happy coincidence, though I may as well face the fact that this tattoo will probably turn into wings at least one day, but I want mine to be more bird like than the ones on my shirt.




I love it so much!

 Next for me is some new piercings I think. Right nostril and Tragus (partially so I can wear a Labret stud before my surgery on my jaw, after I will get a labret piercing, especially if I lose feeling in my lower lip from the surgery!). I'm even considering a navel piercing after LaughingBloodyMurder changed my mind about them being a somewhat tacky piercing by looking fantastic with one.

 Thank you again Min for coming to the studio with me!

So... Hellooooo ^^

:P Ello

Right, what shall we talk about?

Rodgers? ^^

¬_¬ No...

But he's hiding behind my curtain! 0__0

...

Should we explain?

No... That was just me being a fail... *is embarrassed cos of random Rodgers impression* <- There was just the one... *shifty eyes*

Well, how about the park earlier?

TWISTY THING?!!!!! *coughtitdesucough*

Yiss :3 I couldn't walk in a straight line... ^^ And horse-humping...

... ^^

Seriously, why put in a toy that looks like a horse that you have to thrust on to get it to move?!

0.o I'd never actually thought of it like that.... *is afeared of the inventor*

But Spidey-swing is love ^^

And painful ¬_¬ My legs still hurt from trying to jump off it... <- Fail

You know, it's quite worrying that we're Sixth Formers who're going to Uni at the end of the year (September OMG) and we still love our playground!

You make it sound like we're some sort of 'perverted freaks'... ¬_¬

^^  Ho ho ho...

0.o

*is still laughing* Oh! Oh! and TREE FIGHT!!!

Lu: I will stroke you with my tree penis! :3
Rosie: OMFG 0.o
Lewis: Do not want :O
Em: .... wah!
Sarah: *cackle*

I loved my Szayel/Yumichika/Mayuri feary zanpakutou penis stick thing <3

'Tree desu'

*is embarrassed again* I keep trying to forget that ¬_¬

Alright then... HARE HARE YUKAI ON A HILL!!!! *dances*

... XD

And then we had to join reality again... Oh, and what was it? 'Can I lick your pussy, Hannah?' on the bench? XD

¬_¬ *cannot think of a reply*

:P

But yeah, reality in the form of impending German essays... grrr

Damn you Le Brun *shakes fist*

.... But it's not even Le Brun's essay... *is thinking that sh*t is brown... ^^*

Lmfao

^^ Perhaps back to something useful? *feels blasphemous*

Grrr ¬_¬

I know, it sucks. But I dunwanna get eaten :O

... *hahahahaha*

¬_¬ Stfu

... This is going to be a stupidly long blog... <- 'blong' lmao

I know... Can it even be called a blog? It's just a rather demented conversation between two otakus... And with no acual topic... Fhooo~ *insert Hard Gay Hump (TM) here*

XD

Randomly, I feel like mentioning Sato Yuichi/Dave Green...

Hahahaha... WE SHALL SPREAD THE DAVE GREEN LOVE!!! HUZZAH!!!

X3

He has a fan club you know...

... omg ... Yuichiiiiiii~ *squee*

*Lu and Saz have disappeared into random japanese actor love...*

You know... We really should get back to doing that essay...

Yeah... ¬_¬

You can come 'blog' with me again anytime ^^

WOOO~ XD

Right then, byes ^^

Spider and Lu-chan (and Rodgers... 0.o)

 Recently, despite gaining more free time in which to enjoy it, I've been attending the theatre less than the time should allow. My faith in it had been gradually worn by seeing many performances that were simply "entertaining". To me, theatre should be more. It should excite, inspire, entertain, knock your world out of kilter and leave you feeling a little lost when you have to return to the real world. This is what separates it from television, which is often mindless entertainment. I like theatre which sucks you in, and makes you feel part of its world for a while (which is why I prefer black box theatres to Proscenium Arch, as an Arch disconnects the audience, creating a fourth wall, and a closed in performance space. Also why I prefer Brechtian theatre, as one of its main aims is to break down the fourth wall).

 The performance I saw this evening gave me hope again, that theatre can be amazing. I went to the theatre Royal to see a production from the Watermill Theatre on Tour performed by an all male theatre group called Propeller. I have been to the Watermill theatre (which is in Newbury), and it is truly a lovely theatre which makes me regret not being able to see it there. I remember last time I went; it was a perfect summer’s day. The theatre is surrounded by a beautiful garden, with a small river running through. It is a little bit away from civilisation, so wonderfully quiet. The theatre itself is a mix of original features, tastefully mixed with modern features, and even has the original watermill still in operation. The theatre itself is a black box, which I feel this performance would have been more suited to, as right from the outset; the actors addressed the audience’s presence, with the actors on the stage in neutral costume gazing into the audience. I hope I can return there someday. The performance itself was rather far from traditional. I have seen this play 3 times before, with the most notable being a RSC performance in London which was more traditional in acting, but with a truly beautiful, almost Gothic set. The faeries wore tattered lace, and Titania and Oberon, sweeping gowns in black for Titania, and brown for Oberon. The set was projected on to make the forest look alive, although the forest was not made of trees, but rubbish, obviously cast aside by the humans who ruled the day, spray painted black to give the illusion of darkness. The set for the Propeller production was draped in white camo nets, with sprayed white chairs creating a platform about 6 feet above the stage, all the way around the edge. This set gave the feel of a dilapidated dollhouse, a dream world in which the realms of fairy could come alive. The actors at first, all wore the same costume, a white jump suit with a white corset (which was often tightened during the play when women characters were played), except for Puck, who wore stripy stockings, and a tutu, to make him stand out as our guide into this strange new world. This neutral costume allowed them to dance in a chaotic chorus, like flying insects, casting our minds into the world of fantasy, while not letting us associate these "insects" with characters. As the play continued, the players added layers of clothing to represent each character they played. Furs, fine brocade skirts and tailcoats denoted the rich family of athens, while mismatched tutus and sweeping robes separated those of the world of Faery, the mechanicals wore long brown coats and work belts. This clear divide made the story easy to follow, even to those who unlike me can't recite most of the play by now. Unlike many performances, I could not point out many weak performers. Emmanuel Idowu though, who played Hippolyta seemed rather weak, with his facial expression and tone of voice not matching the intended message of his lines. Richard Frame who played Hermia, played a sufficiently annoying character, who out of the context of this play, I would have despised, but to me, Hermia is an immature, Princess like character who is very much prone to hissy fits. He also played Snug the Joiner, who he played as a timid fellow, and was totally charming.

 A Midsummer Night's Dream, essentially contains three plays in one. In previous productions of this I have seen, the transitions have sometimes been awkward, pulled off in a simple, high school-esque "black-out to next scene" kind of way. They seemed to manage this mostly seamlessly, with one scene buzzing into each other in a playful, insect like way. The scenes of the mechanicals created much hilarity. It takes a strong acting ability to be able to play Bottom, who leads the humour of the workers. In the first production I saw of this play, Malcolm Storry played Bottom with a particularly strong performance, and in the other two performances of it I have seen since, neither have matched his interpretation, with both relying mostly on the comic effect of the costume for humour (including one costume which used a butternut squash to represent his penis, which was popular among the young school students in the theatre). I would not say that Bob Barrett, who played Bottom in today's show was superior to Malcolm Storry, but his style was more slapstick, and reminiscent of the style of Frost and Pegg. He had me in fits of laughter, along with his fellow players in the performance of The Most Lamentable Comedy and Most Cruel Death of Pyramus and Thisbe, which itself could be seen as a parody of Romeo and Juliet, which was written around a similar time. This scene did go wrong in a somewhat obvious way, with Bottom's sword breaking, and part of it flying into the audience, and this disturbance distracting him, making him come out of character in a rather unprofessional way t say in modern language that he had forgotten his lines. However, in context, this wasn't as bad as it could be. as they had already included a lot of modern language, and had broken down the fourth wall even before they play had started.

 Another thing that way lovely about this evening was being able to see my Dad. As we no longer live together, this is a rare occurrence. We got to discuss many things, including the nature of performance, my future plans and politics. This makes a refreshing break from conversations with my mum, because as much as I love her, conversations with her are rather anecdotal, and are often to do with simple subject matter. Also my Dad doesn't seem to underestimate my intelligence. As an 18 year old, I am often typecast as the young one and patronised. While I admit those who have lived longer than me, may (although not always) have picked up more experience and knowledge along their way, I despise people using this as an excuse to talk to me like I have no mind of my own. I suppose I am guilty as much of playing on this attitude though. I will sometimes act young, playing on this stereotype. A psychologist may put this down to trying to reclaim a childhood lost to bullying and depression. But I enjoy the energy it allows me to express, and have no intention of trying to stop these childlike moments, and the renewed awe and wonder of the world around me they ensue. After all, to lose the sense of amazement at everything around me, would to me, be akin to that of the experience of death.

 Spider xxx