exit_international at Barfly 21st Aug 2010

The night started well. I was going out with my gorgeous wife for the first time in ages. We were going to see a banging Welsh band. We were going out in Cardiff!

Then it all started going bad……
Started pissing it down with rain.
£6 for a pint and a bottle. Twice!
£4 to get into Barfly! “It said £3 on the email” I say. “Yeah Scott got it wrong”.
No free shot! “We’re one of the first 50!” I say. “Yeah Scott got it wrong”.

It seems Scott may have some answering to do. And still the night tried it’s hardest to get worse…..

Couple of weird looking blokes walking round in short trousers and deck shoes.
Big Dave drops his pint and makes a right mess.
The lead singer of All the Damn Vampires looks like the Irish guy from The IT Crowd…..

But then everything changed…….
Tracey is still smiling and having a good time.
Outside while she has a smoke I spot one of the band (no idea which one at the time as the website does put name to face!!!) and get all excited!
The music starts……..

……and all of my worries about a disaterous night melt away with the banging sound that is coming from the stage. All the Damn Vampires were brilliant. The noise they made was an instant joy to my ears. And as soon as our internet is back on at our new house I will be on youtube looking for them! I’m not one to instantly like new music but this lot I liked. Liked a lot.

Good Time Boys jumped on stage and we found the deck shoed men! Amazing energy from them, if a little to hardcore for our liking. The lead singer threw himself into the performance (and up on the floor!) to continue the great night.

And then they were there, gracing the stage like 2 scruffy homeless dudes and a little man with a backpack! I’d been listening to exit_international for the last couple of months and had been blown away by them. The sound, the lyrics (well the ones I could make out!), the emotion….and now they were playing. And I lost the fucking plot!!!! Luckily, my wife loves me and was in no way embarrassed by my drunken movements to the music, and for the first time in months I forgot all my problems and let the bass engulf me. I was mesmerized by the ferocious drumming from Adam Thomas (“But he’s tiny” said my wife, “how does he thrash those drums so brilliantly??”), a little bit scared by the stare from Fudge and amazed at the vocals from Scott.

And then it was over. I was dripping with sweat, my phone was covered in beer (as was my wife’s shoe!) and Scott, by this time forgiven for the price and shot error, was lying on the floor after an exhaustive set (hopefully he wasn’t in the sick left by the Good Time Boys lead singer!).


We left Barfly, slightly drunk and hoping to cadge a lift home with my Dad (some things never change with age!) and in a great mood. Adam was outside and we interrupted him chatting with a lovely lady to say thanks for a great show. If we’d had more money we would have stayed for the party afterwards but alas having kids limits that!

Hopefully we’ll be able to catch them again before they become big and every fucker and his dog loves them and we can’t wait for the album!

Speaking Welsh

Anyone that knows me, and anyone that reads this blog (hahahahaha, that made me laugh!!) will know that I'm Welsh. I used to take Welsh as a 2nd language in School until I was 14. Then I was advised to stick with French and I've regretted it since.

I've been trying to motivate myself to take it up again and also find a course that I can stick with. Recently I found a free course and it seems to work.

Say Something Welsh has a brilliant system of a series of mp3 files that you download and listen to. You basically say in Welsh what the bloke says in English! I was really skeptical at first but you know what? You pick it up really quickly. I've been doing it in the car on the way to work! I've only done the 1st lesson but I've been repeating it to make sure that I'm OK with it. I've started lesson 2. Now I just need to get a bit more organised. There's no reason why I can't do it every day......

Anyway, I fully recommend this site. It's free (which I couldn't believe when I found it) and there are loads of people on there who can help.

Log on and get speaking. I would sign out with something int Welsh but I'm only on the speaking part and not the writing part so far!!

World Cup on BBC

So the BBC spent Millions on renting their studio for the 2010 World Cup. A huge glass window behind the presenters with a wonderful view of....well, what looks like a shanty town and a mountain. Now I know that it is one of the great natural wonders of the world but is it worth it?

Do they really think that football fans really give a shit about the back drop to the pundits? Most of them are in the pub and use the analysis part of the coverage as a chance to go to toilet or the bar! They may as well have had Caerphilly Mountain as the backdrop, or the Black Mountains...just as beautiful....minus the shanty town obvioulsly!!

Or they could have all stayed in London and had a huge projection of the backdrop instead. The image would have probably been better than what you see now. Also the evening coverage has the reflection of the studio in the glass. Quality as always from the BBC.

Can't believe I'm forced to pay for the rubbish the channel produces and pays.

While I'm on one, do they not realise that if you want to watch their matches you HAVE to watch the BBC coverage? They may as well have had a minimum wage student presenting it and use a crappy little studio in the UK as they don't have any competition for the coverage.

Arses!

ITV Football Coverage is.....

.....fucking awful! Aside from their HD channel breaking up at times and then showing Adverts just as Steven Gerrard scored, the titles are crap and the commentators talk an absolute pile of shit! Just tell me who's got the ball. Your opinions are not worth the air used to say them!!!
If only those vuva-thingy-la horns were loud enough to drown out the commentary......

Play off final

Big day today. Cardiff City take on Blackpool City in the play off final. Winner goes into the Premiership. The Premiership!!!! Can't believe how close we are (I don't like using 'we' when talking about Cardiff but you know what I don't care today!! ). It's where the club needs to be. It's what South Wales needs.
Watching all the coverage and I'm sick of all the Blackpool loving. "Fairy Tale story if they get there...", "Holloway would be great in the Premiership...", "it's been 31 years since Blackpool have been in the top flight", blah-de-blah-de-blah!!! Sick of it! They only want them in there so that they can have a laugh at there misfortune, so that they can be on the end of a couple of 8 nil drubbings, so that the big teams can point at the simpletons from the North West.......Nothing about wanting Cardiff there. Think it's because they think we could stay up. Because we have the structure to establish ourselves there. They worry!!!

Anyway, now that's off my chest, I'm off to "enjoy" the match. I'm cacking my pants!! Wish I was able to afford to see them more. Hopefully new job and I can see lots of them next season. Hopefully in the Premiership.......COME ON CARDIFF!!!!

KEIR HARDIE: How does he do it?

KEIR HARDIE: How does he do it?

Must be hung like a donkey!!!

Women of Nottingham

My God there were some gorgeous women in Nottingham today. Sun was out, low cut tops were on, legs were out.....stunning.....well not ALL of them.
While I may have been seen to be admiring some of the stunners I was also seen to be gawping at some of the absolute munters that were walking around as well!! Who tells them that they looks good in those clothes???? Crop tops are great...SO LONG AS YOUR GUT ISN'T OVERHANGING YOUR TROUSERS!!!!
You get the idea. Beauty and the beasts. The contrast was unbelievable.

Think Bike....Think get the f**k out of my way then!

I need to state something before this post. I don't hate all motorcyclists. I certainly don't hate motorcycles; I think they are beautiful machines.

However......

This morning, as I was being let out onto Radcliffe Road (a main road in Nottingham) by a car I had to brake to avoid the fucking twat on a motorbike that was tear arsing up the inside off the cars and then shot past me into the middle of the road without battering an eyelid!

Then about 3 seconds after that a fucking idiot on a lawnmower engined gay scooter shot past my inside into the bus lane like a twat!

And then on the Colwick Loop Road as I came off the roundabout by Nottingham Racecourse ANOTHER one overtook me and proceeded to overtake the rest of the traffic by flying down the other side of the road which was busy with traffic!!!!!

WHAT IS IT WITH THESE ARSEHOLES???!???!!? They want motorists to give them respect and look twice and keep an eye out for them and then they clearly break every rule of the road. If I'd even slightly jerked the car to the right and caused him to crash in someway I would have been the one who would have been demonised yet he was the one being a fucking tool!

Just because they have 2 wheels they think they have the right to overtake whenever they like.

Fucking pricks.

I know it's not all of them. I know the majority are very good riders. Unfortunately the actions of a few cause many of us to form our views about the rest. So to all you careful, sensible motorcyclists please ignore the above rant!

FIFA Staff Holidays

I see it's holiday sesaon soon for FIFA staff. Yes, that's right, they off on the "Country Inspections" for the World Cup Host Nations for 2018 and 2022. These are due to start in December so I imagine it will be the Southern Hemisphere Nations first and then the Northern ones later in 2011 when it warms up a bit north of the Equator.

So corrupt they may as well be an African Government. Sick of them deciding who gets tournaments based on how nice they were treated.

Football has nothing to do with it. These people have no right to be running it.

World Cups should only be staged by countries that already have the infrastructure in place; stadiums, transport, hotels etc.. And if this was the case there would be no need for the fat, freeloading, rich pigs who supposedly run world football to get as much out of all these bidding countries as they would have all the information they need without going there.

That's what I think anyway

Cardiff City are on the way to Wembley!!!

GET IN!!!! We're in the play off final! One match to go until the Premiership!!!
Great game from the Cardiff players....I think.....games a bit hazy now as I was feeling sick all the way through it.....we won anyway!!!

Human Rights and Big Brother...my ass!!!!

I've decided that people are just stupid. I think it's why I play video games and watch...er..stuff instead of talking to people. I know what you're thinking; "but Sharif you always have been like this, why tell us now?". Well it came about this lunchtime. My lunch buddy, Lindsey, has been off sick for a few days. So without her to talk to I have had to read the Nottingham Evening Post. And even worse I've actually read most of it in detail! So back to why I think people are stupid. The letters page. Why do I do it to myself? WHY???

A couple of points that I feel I need to make to the imbeciles that write into the Evening Post:

1. Having your car photographed to see how long you have been parked somewhere is NOT an infringement on your human rights! For fucks sake get a fucking life! They have every right to take a photo as proof. No doubt it is land owned by someone else so in future DON'T PARK THERE YOU TWAT!!!
2. If you didn't get a fine for something illegal or if you paid the damn thing on time then they wouldn't have to send the Bailiffs round to your house. I got a fine for not having a TV License. I didn't agree with it but tough. Laws are laws. So I paid it. No Bailiffs kicking my door in legally while I was out to catalogue stuff to take. No problem. PAY THE FUCKING FINE ON TIME AND STOP COMPLAINING! DON'T BREAK THE LAW IN THE FIRST PLACE!

From the letters in the paper there does seem to be the general feeling that we are being spied on and tracked. Please, how important do you think you are? THEY are not watching you unless you do something to make them want to watch you. I'm pretty sure they can't be bothered to watch you either. Stop being twats and get on with it. If you don't like it try to make a change via your MP. If nothing happens they try and overthrow the Government. Then They will watch you and you can feel justified.

Disclaimer: Not all readers of the Evening Post are Twats. Just some of them!

ConLib or LabLib?

Looks like Mr Clegg might not be a Power Hungry Whore after all!
Seems he's off to have talks with Labour now. He's like a teenager who's been given free access to all the porn sites on the Net!!!
I'm a bit sorry that Gordon and his weird jaw movement is going but I imagine that is one of the clauses in Clegg's wish list. I think it's because the dialogue of the meeings go something like this:

Mr Cameron : Hi Nick. What do you want so that you'll join our team and I can be Ruler! Mwahahahahaha!!
Mr Clegg (In a Cartman voice): Why don't you suck my balls.....Mr Cameron!

Now I can't see him wanting Mr Brown to do the same can you??? Now Mr Miliband is a nice pretty public school type.....

DISCLAIMER: I'm sure that didn't happen and I do not want anyone to think that I am implying that the party leaders are in anyway engaged or do they practice in ball licking

Anyway, I'm off to call my Politically minded genius of a brother and find out what the hell is going on in the country!!

Nottingham missing from Google!

If you want directions from Nottingham to any other city in the UK and you typw this into Google Maps you get that it cannot be calculated! Quite funny I think!
However this tiny anomaly has been turned into an entire page news story, with images, in our local newspaper The Nottingham Evening Post. A WHOLE PAGE!!!! Does it really matter? Google don't hate Nottingham. Who do you think you are, China???? Now, unfortuantely all their simplier readers will take it personally and the local chip on the shoulder will appear and everyone will say how rude this is and there'll be a follow up story, probably involving street interviews.....dear God local papers are shit!

Martin Gillingham column Evening Post 29/4/10

Now, in the past I may have said a nasty thing about this lovely journalist. Something along the lines of "Don't ever read his column if you are in Nottingham" may have been written. For that I apologise mainly because I have had to agree with soem of the stuff he has written lately.
And today he has written an absolute blinder of an article! For 2 reasons:
1. It had a go at Liverpool FC
2. It had a go at overpaid, celebraties that we call Premiership footballers!
I to was wound up with news reports of "Liverpool's epic journey" to Sapin last week. Get a life! Anyone would think they had to hitch a ride there or go in some sort of battered coach from some company in Merthyr!
It was great publicity for the club, and wouldn't have bothered them. Just get on with it!
Please read the article here:
http://www.thisisnottingham.co.uk/sport/Gillingham-Spare-thought-Liverpool-s-epic-journey/article-2083211-detail/article.html

Thanks Martin for taking the time to point this out to the world!! Well Nottinghamshire anyway!

Sharif

Loser Ferrari driver!

Saw the funniest thing yesterday. Nice Ferrari convertable pulls up at the traffic lights and is revving his engine. Little Mini Cooper is behind it. Lights change and he pulls off then as he readies to shoot off.....crunches the gears!! hahahahaha!! So funny. The Mini nearly went into the back of it! Then, obviously massively embarrased, puts his foot down and speeds to the next set of lights!
Poor man. Probably has small dick syndrome and then trys to show off and just proves that he can handle his car!!
Brilliant. Had me laughing all down the street!

Bloody polls!!!

No, I don't mean those hard working Europeans, I mean those damn political polls that are being done every fucking minute of the day!!! Apparently all three major parties are going to get a third of the vote. NOT GOING TO MATTER! If I say that I'll vote for Labour my vote does not matter as the Tory MP is going to win my seat. My vote for Labour is wasted.

Now if these polls are more complicated than that and take into account your area and calculate how many seats they will win then that would be better. But do you really think so? The Sun being that in depth? Online polls calculating where your IP address is from?

Bullshit comes to mind. I've started watching Fox News to avoid all this political news over here. Sky News keep going on about how good the "Sky News" debate was. The "Sky News" Debate got some great poll results. "The Sky News" debate.....blah blah blah.....Advertising and product placement are now King. Bladerunner here we come. These polls only matter because it gives the news channels and papers something to talk about as they have nothing else to manufacture and really aren't that good at getting stories.

It's the damn media!!!!

St George's Day

Some of you may be aware that it is St George's Day today, 23rd April. St. George is the patron saint of England. And Georgia. And Catalonia. And Ethiopia. And Greece. And Lithuania......and several other countries and cities.
Now the reason I'm writing about this is because I'm Welsh. The patron saint of my country is St David. Every year for as long as I can remember I have celebrated St David's Day on 1st March. While at school this normally involved some form of eisteddfod and art/cultural type competition thing. I'm sure it's a bit more boozey now back home on 1st March but we do still seem to respect the fact that St David was a scholar and teacher.
So it seemed apt/ironic that, while walking through Nottingham City Centre on the way home today, there were dozens and dozens of people dressed up as St George as a knight all getting drunk. Or just pissed up and wearing the cross of St George wrapped round them (most of the flags with a alcoholic drink logo on it). You see St George was effectively a soldier for the Christian faith who went round killing pagans and converting people. I'm not criticising him for this but it annoys me that if you ask any one of these people getting drunk who he was they'll come out with something about him killing a dragon! This of course refers to the legend of George and the Dragon. But these people have no idea about what it means or what else he did. And what's worse they have no intention of ever learning! Now I'm not saying that all the Welsh are St David experts but at least we've been celebrating it since children (well most of us).
These people think that wearing a flag and getting drunk on St George's Day means that you're a true Englishmen and patriotic through and through.
I'm going to stop now because I can feel my anger rising with regard to these louts who pretty much embarass true Englishmen and bring a bad name to the country that I live in.

Anyway, click the links and educate yourself!

NFL Draft Day

You've gotta love it. Bunch of freshly graduated students all lined up against the imaginary schoolyard wall waiting to be picked for a team! Only difference being is that they get multi-million dollar contracts and the last man picked isn't the worst but the luckiest as even he gets a massive contract!
Thing is most of them will hardly play in their rookie year, so you'll hardly see them. I'm of the opinion that you should trade your draft picks for more experienced players. Look at the Jets......just watch them next season!
Only question now is do I stay up until gone midnight to watch the 1st pick......

We are pathetic!

HAve you seen these people on TV at the moment? It's a bloody debate between our party leaders.

IT DOESN'T MATTER WHAT THEY SAY IN THE DEBATE!

It's like a circus and that's how people are commenting on it. A bunch of women on BBC News who would be more suited to Loose Women. Dear God!
What a waste of time and money. Our system doesn't support this sort of PR. It's great for the USA but not here. It's irrelevant what they say as you have to vote for YOUR MP. Not the Prime Minister. Your MP.

I think I'll go watch something more factual. The football

Happy UEFA

My God, I bet Platini, Blata and Co. are happy after the Quarter Finals of the European Champions League! No English teams in the semi-finals, Special one (Mouriniho) vs the Magic One (Messi) playing each other and probably some Germans in the Final!
No if only they could re-instate Real Madrid......

Coach Crash in Scotland

Not sure if any of you are aware but there was a tragic accident in Scotland on Thursday 1st April 2010. A coach with a load of teenage kids skidded off the road in Scotland on their way to Alton Towers. One of the teenagers was killed and many more were critically injured. There is no punchline to this.
I was just annoyed by the reaction. I want to state, right now, that I am aware of the enormity of something like this impacting people. However to start turning round and blaming the school for allowing this trip to take place because of the weather conditions is just wrong. The only person who can make this argument is the parent who refused to let their child onto the bus. I imagine that if the school had cancelled the trip then all the parents would have complained about it and saying that they then had to look after their children and that there wouldn't have been any problems.
If you don't feel safe about something then don't do it. If you are responsible for someone and don't feel safe about something going ahead involving them, then don't let them do it.
I hope to God that this tragic lesson causes all parents to take responsibility in situations like this. I know that I would not have stopped my children going on that trip. I now know that in future, even if it upsets my children, I have to take a stand.
My condolenses to the family who lost a daughter.
My praises to the family who didn't allow their child on the bus.
Sharif

Forward this on or DIE!!!!

Just had an email forwarded to me of some bizarre picture of Jesus telling me to forward it onto 10 people as some bloke in Argentia died because he didn't and some blokes PA lost her family because she forgot to when he asked and then he died......HOW GULLIABLE ARE YOU ALL?????
Even if these people did have this bad luck do you realise how many people get these emails and don't forward it on? Millions? And how many people die? These people would have the same thing happen to them even if they didn't get the email.
It's no wonder the rich get richer and the poor get poorer...it's because they aren't as stupid!

Union Leaders

Or should I say "Wannabe politicians who were probably not accepted into the community as they are big useless losers with inferiority complexes, small dicks and fat stomachs and were picked on at school and now love the position of power".
Unions. The bane of Capitalism. If you don't like your working conditions then GET A NEW JOB! Stop expecting a pay rise. Better yourself. Stop expecting people to make your life better by giving you more money. There are always people more grateful than you for that job.
BA should sack the lot of them and hire anyone willing to serve food and deal with abuse on a plane.
Oh yeah, that's where this came from. The whole BA dispute. And stop asking for a reaction fromthe Government. IT'S A PRIVATE BUSINESS THEY SHOULDN'T HAVE TO HAVE A VIEW!
Unions. Get rid of the fuckers

So amny topics that I've missed out ranting about....kidnapped sailors.....child killing kids grown up and released....The weather.....oooo don't kick me I play for Arsenal.....But I'll make sure that whenever anything pops into my head I'll get it down here!

Hello world....

Found a way to post to my blog while at work!! Yeah! I can bore you all and rant while I wait for internet to be restored to my home!!

Still offline

Sorry Bloggers but I'm still offline at home. I know you're missing my rants!

THere's so much as well! Crap Winter Olympic coverage by the BBC (At least use attractive women to present the show and not a horse and some Scottish bird!), grit everywhere (any council need some they can get it from every nook and cranny in my house! Thanks Rushcliffe. You going to pay to replace the scratched floor boards? It's not my fault there's so many half-witted, clumsy twats out there!), the weather (yes it's there, deal with it!) and many, many other things!

I will try and get more on here soon. We're still very, very poor :-(

Sharif

Lostprophets

I fulfilled a dream on the 7th February 2010. It's not often that this can be said but I did.
Everyone has ridiculous dreams, like winning the lottery, living in a mansion, supermodel orgies....then there are the ones that may happen should things work out right.
I have several of these. Be in America to watch a Superbowl on TV, own a nice car, have a job I want.....then each of these may have an even harder sub section......get tickets to see the Superbowl, own an Autin Martin, work for a major video game company.....
Well I have acheived a few of these goals already. The most notable are:
-Not only getting married but marrying a sexy stunner
-Not only having kids but having 2 beautiful, healthy daughters
-Not only seeing Wales win a Grand Slam but seeing them live at Millenium Stadium

So, back to the 7th Feb. I'm not a live music person. However I would like to see 3 bands (having seen Faith No More inmy teens!); Foo Fighters, Aerosmith and, for most of this decade, Lostprohets. The additional sub section for this is to see them at the mighty Rock City. I'd given up the ghost on the Rock City part as I thought they'd all be too big to play there.
Then They came (turns out it was the 4th time they'd played there but I'm not an up-to-date music person so didn't realise!!).
The Prophets at Rock City! I risked everything in October and used our last £50 to get tickets. I kept the secret from my lovely wife until Christmas (which was so hard as she is obsessed with them as well!). Then we went.
Aside from the fact that it was the first time in over a year that we'd been able to go out together (thanks sexy Jen for baby sitting) this night was amazing. Queueing was exciting. Seeing the mix of people was amazing. Even catching a glimpse of the Hexes guitarist with fag in mouth getting a bag from the ex-Royal Mail van (even thought we had no idea who he was!) was great!
I'm not going to go into details about the gig, but the support acts were brilliant (The Hexes and Kids in Glass Houses) and the Lostprophets were...well perfect. It bettered anything I thought possible. The show was amazing. Some songs nearly brought tears to my eyes. Funny in places ("What's that? The fucking universal hand signal for Godzilla?)" Genius!) and musically just FUCKING GREAT!!!!

One other point. Seeing nearly 3,000 people in the Rock capital of the world, worshipping 5 Welshmen like that reminded me how proud I am to be Welsh. We rule the world!!

I'm now trying to raise money for the newly instated CIA gig on 1st May. Am I allowed to sell children on ebay? £54 seems like a million!

Anyway, guys if you happen to stumble across this blog, I want to thank you for a great night and hope to see you play again soon. My wife wants to profess her love for you all and she's yours if I can have tickets and backstage passes and a few drinks with you all!!!

Lostprophets. Rock Gods!!!!