For the benefit of anyone who hasn’t seen me constantly sharing the link all over the internet of this clip that they recorded, here are Jedward doing what Jedward clearly do best 
* NB – content is age restricted, so you may need to double-click to view on YouTube / sign in.
Not at all a Jedward fan, but it’s good to see they’ve finally exposed their true talent… 
For those who were fans of the discs (which have finally left my blog after 4 years and a lot of people protesting to save them, ha!) – you’ll be pleased to hear that on Christmas Day 2011, I went out and took an updated picture of them.
Apologies for Max’s grainy camera work, and my terrible appearance (it was 7am, ha!) I have genuinely never seen my camera take such a bad image, ha!
Here’s the (much much better!) original… :P
This HAS to be the best National Rail tweet in the history of mankind!
Passengers are currently unable to alight from trains at Shepley due to reports by police of a lion in the area.—
National Rail (@nationalrailenq) November 06, 2011
Apparently a train operator received information from West Yorkshire police and passed it on. On reflection, it does appear to have been a hoax call (as you’d expect), however National Rail had no choice, and went along with the advice from the police, and the rest, is twistory!
An artist's impression?
I think that most people on the planet probably know that I am a huge Queen / Freddie fan! (they’re both very separate things, incidentally ) – I certainly shout out about it often enough hehe!
I LOVE the epic and geeky Google Doodle that has been put together to celebrate what would have been the late, great, Freddie Mercury’s 65th birthday:
This marks the first time that Google have done a Doodle as involved as this, and they’re getting increasingly more complex and beautiful, so it’s great that, even now, Freddie is helping to drive creativity forward! It’s also fantastic to know that everyone in the World today (with the exception of the US, who get it tomorrow, due to today being Labor Day) woke up to this on the Google homepage today.
One of the comments on the YouTube video that I posted above made me chuckle:
Only Freddie can have 301 views but 2551 likes.
Too true, too true! 
Been a bit of a while since I last posted an update, and this was a totally unscheduled one, if I am honest, but I have just had a moment of absolute clarity; the kind that probably only comes around a few times in a lifetime…
Just said goodbye to Max, after spending pretty much all of our time together since Wednesday afternoon, we went to see Batman Live, and then I took him up to Manchester to meet the family and to show him around my hometown and to also take him to Pride.
I have realised just how much I like our relationship. Unlike relationships that I have had in the past, which have more often than not proved rather stormy in places, four months in, Max and I are still getting along amazingly well, there’s no drama, no arguments, no silly mind-games, no illusions – we’re just simply two chaps who love each other heaps, and enjoy snuggling up and doing geeky things! To say that it is ‘effortless’ would be a bad word, as of course we both put effort in to the relationship (arguably he more than I, as I, as I am sure many people already figure, am an absolute pain in the arse to try to keep reigned in; I get FAR too hyper and excitable hehe!!), but you get the drift!
Due to distance, we tend to spend a lot of time together in large blocks of time, such as long weekends, and the like – however, if you can find yourself missing someone not 30 seconds after they have left your space, having spent a continuous 100 hours together, then I really think that says something. I am very excited and chuft, and I am looking forward to seeing how this all pans out – but I have a very good feeling about this one, way more so than any other lad I’ve had a long-term relationship with in the past! 
Spending time in Manchester has really helped me to focus on my longer term goals too. Long time friends, and online contacts, may remember that this time last year, I threw a huge wobbler and was pretty much ready to move my life back to Manchester, thwarted only by my inability to transfer my job back up North!
On reflection, after a fantastic few days back on my home turf, I have realised that I DO still, very much, want to end up back in Manchester, however, I have also now totally reconciled the fact that London is a means to an end, and that I may have to stick it out for the short-to-medium term future…. and hey, that’s totally manageable/do-able!
Going back home just as Manchester was in the grips of the I LOVE MCR campaign was absolutely THE best thing I could ever have done. Partly due to this outpouring of love across the city, and also as Max and I revisited a lot of places that used to be important to me, I totally fell in love with my city all over again, and the proud Mancunian surfaced so much, I cannot even begin to explain. It was like finding my identity again!
I am also really comfortable with my online presence at the moment too; I feel that I have a really good bunch of online friends at present, and some of the bad eggs have finally been weeded out. It’s hard to explain really, but I do inadvertently put so much of my life online, largely due to force of habit (I was social networking before most of you had even turned on an Acorn Computer, and I’m still only just 26 years old hehe!), and so, given I don’t seem to be the most popular person in real life (something I am trying to work on, and thanks to pals IRL who put up with me hehe!), it’s really amazing to have a whole mixed web of people online that I can relate to, and have fun with!
Hopefully, with this new-found clarity, direction and focus, I will take this and apply it to real life. Maybe set myself some goals and aims, and ensure that I am much more proactive in working toward these – as realistically, there is nothing that I cannot accomplish! (well, except teleport, but I’m totally working on this right now!! hehe).
Thank you for reading, and sorry if this sounded like some kind of ‘I want to convert you to my church’ thing – it’s not, but I would like to convert you to The Book Of Mormon-ism! hehe! (this musical remains swell, very much looking forward to a West End transfer heh).
Gari xx
WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!
Although statistics for my blog are not overly important to me, as I choose not to monetize etc, what does matter to me is all the people who take time to visit my site! Whether it’s a quick look at some half-naked totty, or if you’re here to read a theatre review, or a dedicated blog subscriber, then I offer you a HUGE thank you!
This post marks that the most conservative of the stats counters that I use has now just topped the half a million mark; a remarkable achievement for what is essentially a blog that I really just keep for myself to look back on when I’m old and grey, with no real agenda or marketing pull behind it. It also is nice to hit this mark at last, given that this blog represents several years of my life, and so it’s fab to be able to feel like it’s achieved something hehe.
I’ve met some AWESOME people via my writing this blog, and I genuinely want to thank everyone who has ever taken even a second of interest in my ramblings, you’re all awesome!!!
And now to celebrate, and toast the next half million, with an iced bun!
Gari xxx
Totally AMAZEBALLS!!!! Best advert I’ve seen in a jolly long time!
Time and time again, it’s proven that the T-Mobile marketing guys really know how to put together a viral advert!!
Everybody in the House of Love!!
Regular readers of this blog will know that I am a HUGE fan of internet music sensations Sam Tsui and Kurt Hugo Schneider – their rearrangements and covers of many of the popular songs of the day are always phenomenal, with Schneider providing the excellent production and composition skills (along with making appearances in the videos playing instruments) and Tsui lending his vocals to the tracks.
This morning, they have just released their pretty fckn EPIC cover of Lady Gaga’s Born This Way!
I defy you not to have this on repeat ALL morning with the speakers cranked right up!
The stats helper monkeys at WordPress.com mulled over how this blog did in 2010, and here’s a high level summary of its overall blog health:
The Blog-Health-o-Meter™ reads Wow.
The Louvre Museum has 8.5 million visitors per year. This blog was viewed about 200,000 times in 2010. If it were an exhibit at The Louvre Museum, it would take 9 days for that many people to see it.
In 2010, there were 232 new posts, growing the total archive of this blog to 760 posts. There were 415 pictures uploaded, taking up a total of 300mb. That’s about 1 pictures per day.
The busiest day of the year was January 2nd with 2,626 views. The most popular post that day was Aaron Johnson.
The top referring sites in 2010 were twitter.com, facebook.com, en.wordpress.com, google.co.uk, and zimbio.com.
Some visitors came searching, mostly for aaron johnson, ben adams, colin morgan, bradley james, and asher book.
These are the posts and pages that got the most views in 2010.
Aaron Johnson November 2009
13 comments
Attitude – The Naked Issue May 2009
5 comments
Bradley James and Colin Morgan (Merlin) November 2009
6 comments
OM-freakin-G, this is absolutely off the wall crazy, I fckn LOVE IT!!!!!!!!!
This display was from last year, and over 29,000 computer animated lights were used. It goes without saying, the McNamara family from Arizona are very well known for their awesome light displays.
Their official website is: http://www.gilbertlights.com/
They also get much Kudos for using the song Wizards in Winter by Trans-Siberian Orchestra – I absolutely adore this piece of music, so it’s very good to see it getting put to awesome use! (though this song was first used for exactly the same thing by a chap called Carson Williams in 2005).
Trans-Siberian Orchestra are also playing the Hammersmith Apollo on Monday 28th March 2011, and tickets are onsale now!
