What I did on my holidays

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By John Hillan, aged 22 1/4

Yesterday and today, I have mainly been doing the very blatent touristy things.

  • I have learned to curse loudly at the mention of the Immigration and Naturalization Servce (2 and a half hours queuing to get through immigration in Dulles. Bastards.).
  • I have learned never to believe it when a pilot says that the minor problem will be fixed when they start the No.2 engine (2 and a half hours spent on the tarmac in Dulles while they replaced a pressure valve on the water system).
  • I have learned to curse the choice of inflight entertainment on United Airlines (when BBC hardtalk is the highlight in about 18 hours of viewing, you know it’s bad).
  • I have learned to curse the mention of Washington Dulles airport, which I shall now refer to by it’s actual name: That fucking inept excuse for an airport near the city that was formerly a malarial swamp. Oh, and did anyone consider fixing the air con? I mean, malarial swamps tend to be a little FUCKING HOT in August, you know?

On the other hand, I have learned to appreciate the seats on United. It may be the lowest class, but they are still spacious enough for me not to have chewed my own leg off during the flight, which was a worry the last time I flew to the States.

San Francisco seems to be a good place. Alcatraz is pretty cool, as is Angel Island. Have yet to do the tram cars and that, but have been thrown about a bus on the roads that Bullitt, the Rock, etc were filmed on. Which is nice.

And I’m now in a State that may soon have the Terminator as it’s Govenor. How cool is that?

And now I’m away to bed some sleep. Because I’ve slept something like six hours in the last sixty two. ‘Night all.

26 thoughts on “What I did on my holidays”

  1. You’re that old?? Alreay? I’m still 20!!

    Hang on a sec, they actually let you in the country?? I figured with the crackdown on terrorism they’d have kicked you out! Hmm.. maybe the Cov IRA isn’t up to it anymore ;)

  2. couldnt you have waited 45 seconds to post that? who would you have hurt? Oh and we’re supposed to feel sorry for you are we? I dont think so mate!!

  3. Welcome, everyone, to Ed’s comments. I’ll be your host here for a while. At least till Ed get’s back or logs on and finds out I’ve hijacked his page!

    My page, is.. oh, click the url thingy by my name. If you’re interested. Anyhoo, on with the show..

  4. I know it’s saturday, but just so there is actually something here, I’m going to start with the Friday Five!

    1. How much time do you spend on line each day?

    Four to five hours I suppose. Depends on what day of the week it is. If I’m out it’ll only be a couple of hours as I read e-mails and weblogs.

    2. What is your browser homepage set to?

    Nothing. The first page I visit is always different, and I don’t fancy having some advertising space shoved in my face. If I care enough about the page, I’ll go visit anyway.

    3. Do you use any instant messaging programs? If so, which one(s)?

    ICQ and MSN rolled into Trillan Pro.

    4. Where was your first webpage located?

    My very first one? God knows. It was some wizard-built thing and I didn’t actually have anything to put on it. As soon as I made it I lost the URL. My first proper one was at Geoshities.

    5. How long have you had your current website?

    Since the end of February. I saw Ed’s blog and decided I wanted to play. I still haven’t received any hate mail.

  5. Anyone who comes over from my blog, is of course, more than welcome to leave a comment of some sort. You know, a “hi I’m me” thing, like we all did a couple of weeks ago on my blog. It could be quite funny to see Ed’s facehe sees the number of comments on this post…

  6. By the way, Joe, I don’t think we’ve met. I’m Chez, I was at Warwick Uni with Ed. Despite a rocky start when I insisted on calling him Ted (as in father Ted) because I thought it was funny and he didn’t, he’s bought me many a pint… so long as I bought him one back, the ungrateful bugger.

  7. Has anyone played America’s Army? I downloaded it yesterday, and will be giving it a bash when I can be arsed. Will let you know what I think of it when I do. I know you’re all dying to hear my opinion.

  8. I did some shopping today. Bought two v good t-shirts. One has a tank on the front with a yellow guy standing in the turret and saying “To the pub!”. As someone who regularly gets called a tank, I found this very amusing. The second has a beaver on it saying “I’m gonna kick the badger’s ass, man!”

    Well, they amused me!

  9. I’ve been downloading MP3s through Kazaa recently (oh for the days of DC++ and the campus network). However, a few seconds into the song, it goes squiffy. It beeps and crackles. If you move the slider to change the position in the song, it goes back to normal, then after a few seconds it goes to pot again. It’s not a corrupted file, I think, because you can get the same segment to play normal as crackled, but it just can’t sustain it.

    Does anyone know what is going on?

  10. Correction, adjusting the slider doesn’t really change much, it still happens at exactly the same point. But why??? It’s really f-ing annoying!

  11. Well, I just got in from a rather good night out. Good, that is, except for the part where my back decided to go into spasm so I had to leave early.

    That and the part where some absolute fuckwit decided to do a shit on the floor of the men’s toilets in town, so I now have – not dog – but human shit on my shoe.

    Thank you.

    No really.

    You fuck!

  13. Waht a total retard. I can’t express how much pain I want to cause that toal idiot. I wish I was loaded so I could pay some lab to DNA test his (literal) ass! Then I’d send the boys round with a dose of rough justice…

  17. Yup. mostly did nothing. Went down to the beach for a bit, sat round a pool… life is gooood.. apart from the bit where all my friends are working. What’s the point in that?

  20. blogging in the comments is so much easier. I can post whatever is on my mind – and I don’t feel compelled to make a decent post out of it.

  21. How to feel like a muppet in the morning: have a first few minutes that go like this..

    Dad: Morning. The Insurance company have phoned, apparently you paid the wrong excess, it’s 650 not 150.

    Me: Er. No. I think not.

    [phone call to insurance company ensues. result: 350 not 650]

    [walk into room harbouring my litte brother]

    Me: Do you want the bad news or the worse news?

    Brother: neither [surly].

    Me: well, you’re getting both. Bad news: you still owe me £250. Worse news: The garage charged the wrong excess. You owe them £200 as well.

    Brother: what?!

    [‘lively’ conversation ensues where I explain the principles of “young” and “inexperienced” driver to him]

    Brother: oh. ok [surly]

    [I go back to kitchen]

    Dad: Oh, by the way, have you heard Alick’s bad news?

    Me: [getting the feeling of foot firmly wedged in my mouth] no…?

    Dad: one his girlfriends from school was in a car crash. She’s been parallised from the waist down. *

    Me: oh. crap.

    —
    * At this point in writing Dad informed me that said Brother also got turned down by his first choice university.

    Has anyone seen my other foot? I’d call for help but my mouth seems rather full.

  24. Ok, I just received one of the world’s stupidest Spam messages:

    “sick of receiving spam? We have a spam killer!”

    Let me guess! Register my e-mail address perhaps? Hmm. Whatever.

  25. Also, I have a cold. And I am not fucking impressed. Blocked nose, eye streaming, ears playing silly buggers, neck hurting. Arrgh. It’s summer! Leave me be!

  26. hi Chez!

    Someone at work has a cold too and I thought he was perhaps the only person in the whole of the UK that has one. You sure you’re names not matt?