Friday: A New Specimen of Study

While Z left us for the weekend – he went to Manchester to pick up his diploma from last year, a new flatmate arrived. His name’s Sam(uel), he’s 16 and he’s from Ghana. His Masters will be in Oil and Energy (the same program as Edi). He’s very nice, but more taciturn than the rest of us. I think he’ll fit in well though. Since Edi has avoided shopping for food so far, I nailed him down Thursday night and got him to agree to go today. We agreed that since he had a group meeting at 10, he’d call me at noon and let me know if he was free to meet then or if we’d go after. I was going to be on campus anyways, doing my own work in the library, so meeting on campus was ideal. Well, noon rolled around and I heard nothing from Edi (this didn’t surprise me, but I at least held up my end of the agreement). One passed and nothing, same for two o’clock and three o’clock. At four, I’d finished all my work for a few weeks, and decided to head back to res. Edi called me (finally) at quarter to five and wanted to meet. I said I could meet him in 10 minutes and he told me where he’d be. I wasn’t dressed to go out (having changed into loungewear for my bedroom) but I did a quick-change routine and was at the designated meet point on time. Edi wasn’t there. I waited 5 minutes and when he still hadn’t showed up, I called him. He said he’d be there in another 5 minutes, as he hadn’t left wherever he was on campus yet. Well, 15 minutes after THAT call, he finally called me back and said “I’m here and I can’t see you.” Well, I told him he was full of bullshit because I was there and he wasn’t. He replied that he could now see me, and I found him too, he was still a block away. Once we’d met, we walked to Morrison’s and proceeded to by a few things. Edi wanted nothing while we were there – but I got some juices for us and some other basics. Edi complained about how he didn’t like them, how we didn’t need them, how expensive everything was, etc. The bill cost less than 13 quid and he ended up eating half of what I’d picked and he said he didn’t like. I really didn’t want to go with Edi, but Z’d asked me to, and I did as I said I would. Never again, though. That’s all someone else’s job to babysit the moron. I cooked supper again tonight, and I made something with meat in it so that everyone could get meat – I made mine separate because I didn’t fancy any meat, but the one who always cries about not having enough meat in his meals left without eating (or telling us he wasn’t eating supper with us. He therefore wanted his portion put aside for later). The meal was a success, everyone liked it (even Edi liked it, though he claimed there wasn’t enough salt – I’ve seen how much salt he adds to each meal, so I didn’t take it seriously). That evening, I’d arranged to meet with Carleigh and Natalie to go to the Blue Lamp pub for some sort of musical performance (I’m still not sure what it was, I think it was an open mic night). I was, as usual, running late, so I cut through Seaton Park to meet with them. That was a mistake. While the parks back home are pretty well lit, this park had no lights at all. I almost fell down a flight of stairs because I couldn’t see properly. The whole park was black as pitch, and even the full moon shining in the cleared areas was still of very little use. I can compare it to playing hide and seek in a cemetery at night. You know people are there, but you don’t know where, and the surroundings look both familiar and sinister at the same time. You are always tense, expecting one of the shadows to jump out at you. Either way, I got through the park (never going again at night). When I got to Carleigh’s dorm, some miscommunication caused it so that we never met up with her, but Natalie and I walked to the pub (where she is quite well known and openly adored by the veterans) The evening of music was an experience… some very good music, some very experimental music, and some music that was, quite frankly, terrifying. The first performance was a guy Natalie met and introduced to me as Kenny. He is a Scot with a love for Johnny Cash, Hank Williams, and that genre. He sang each of his songs with a twang, but the level of it was really forced and somewhat uncomfortable. He was followed by a little lady who sang (and played guitar) really well but was too soft to hear over the din of the pub. There were other good acts – a guy named Paul who played Spanish style guitar, Innes who played jazz on guitar, a lady named Anne (stage named Annie Lou) who – while sick as a dog – switched her song at the last minute to perform with a charming man named Mark (maybe Mike – it was all a blur, I could be getting his name wrong) on the piccolo. They were quite enjoyable. Natalie ended up joining Innes to play three Blues songs – her on her fiddle/violin and he on his guitar. I think they were my fave performance of the night. Some of the less stellar acts were a Scottish a Capella group who sang old 50s standards and an interpretation of “Mbube/Wimoweh (The Lion Sleeps Tonight)”. Natalie and I were in agreement; it was uncomfortable and didn’t make any sense. However, the Scots LOVED it. We (Nat and I) think that their understanding of North American culture is severely skewed and they need to, someday, be shown the real thing. Another less thrilling act was a Frenchman named Batiste, who sang the most ridiculous songs I’d ever heard. He wrote them himself, and were named “I want to take off my pants”, “Don’t Call Me Redhead”, and a third equally odd number. He peppered his numbers with snatches of French that didn’t make sense, but he was pretty well received. A third odd act was a heavy metal, screaming metal, rockabilly fusion artist who played amazing guitar but would randomly scream parts of the lyrics. The most memorable line of his, for me, is when he sang “I want to be your woooOOOMAAAAAAAAAAN!” (caps to indicate where he started screaming instead of singing). An odd day, but it’s over, and Natalie will now be my go-to person for all things entertaining and interesting. She and I seemed (to me at least) to click well and we agree on a wide range of issues. Expect to hear more about her here in the future.