Tuesday, 12 October 2010

Cutlery

I have often thought about the concept of Student Life, and I've long since decided that I'm not living it. I've never been drunk, and when I talk say that I'm going to town, I mean that I'll be in Spillers at about 3 in the afternoon buying a British Sea Power EP. Last year I lived in a proper student accommodation building; the latest I ever went to bed was 5.30am, after watching the extended version of Return of the King.

And I've not made any major changes this year. In fact, since Sarah's dad lent us the Town Called Eureka boxset, I've barely left the house at all. We have house parties occasionally, but I usually make myself fairly scarce, and will often slip off to bed before it's even past midnight.

So I'm really only a student insofar as I go to university and pay less at the cinema. But surely I'm the pale-skinned, seldom-seen recluse in a house otherwise full of drunken crazy people, right?

Man, I would hate that. But fortunately, I'm in very good company here. There were some rumours of a party on Sunday, but Gem is doing her best to squash those. Some of us have lectures on Monday morning. Gem is actually out on the town tonight, but after initiating a house-wide tidy on Saturday, she's earned it, bless 'er.

So who in this tidy, tidy house is living the Student Life? Cliffey was going out a lot, but now that JR and Andy have left, he seems to have lost his fresher's spirit. He's at work right now, but I'd wager that if he were at home he'd probably be watching Monsters Inc. then going to sleep. And more power to him for it. 

You might think that Pete is a more typical student, looking at the state of his room, but he's currently somewhere in Cornwall, probably dreaming about all the different rocks he'll be excavating tomorrow. And Pete never goes to clubs. He's more of a 'chicken burger at the pub quiz' kinda guy. 

Actually, I take that back. Pete did come to town with us that Saturday night a couple of weeks ago. But was that to experience some phat beats and dance himself into a K-hole? Were we there to bear witness to the sound of drum and bass? No. We were in CAI, waiting to see the Klezmer Kollectiv (which was awesome, by the way).

Soph...well Soph's not even a student. She likes a drink as much as anyone - probably a little more, in fact - but she almost always has to take her hangover to Boots with her the next day. Judging by the sounds that were coming through the wall, she and Alex were just catching up on The Inbetweeners, but I think they've gone to bed now. 

In case my stance on all this hasn't come across thus far, I love living here. It's awesome and exactly what I had hoped for. I don't want to drag myself around the stickier parts of central Cardiff until 4 in the morning; I want to have a chat with my friends, do the blog, and go to bed at a sensible hour. I may be old before my time, but to hell with Student Life - this is Joel Life.

Pete asked me a few weeks ago why I named this blog Cutlery. To be honest, there's no great backstory; I created this blog two days before moving into the house, and I didn't really know what sort of time I'd be having here yet. Having not even packed all of my stuff, all I knew about the house at that point was that it would contain me, several other people, and the things we brought with us. Our TVs, games consoles, guitars, glockenspiels, laptops, clothes, bedclothes, cuddly toys, pens, pencils, crockery, cutlery.

So that's all it was, and it wasn't easy turning it into a cheesy, faux-profound paragraph like that. But I have since discovered that cutlery has a surprisingly large bearing on life. Always on a knife-edge, trying to navigate forks in the road, and all the while trying to make time for some spooning.

And judging by the sounds now coming from the ceiling, Soph and Alex have just found time for a little forking. So before I tap out another cheesy, faux-profound paragraph, I shall sign off.

By the by, it's just gone 11pm and Sarah is asleep with her Mr. Bump plushie beside her as I type this. Obviously living in this house full of party animals has made no impression on her. 

Joel.

P.S. Sorry for the essay, I had intended today to just post a video here and leave it at that. But Blogger's video uploader failed me, so I had to improvise. Maybe tomorrow.

No comments:

Post a Comment