First Post of 2012 !!
The Boys of Benetton Treviso Rugby. On January Friday the 13th me and two friends ventured from Oxford all the way across the country to Swansea, a trip which lasted a good few hours via train, and strangely enough, the moment the train crossed the boarder I undoubtedly noticed a shift in accent, not sure if the welsh decided to stay silent until we crossed into their home land or if I was imaging it, but all of a sudden the welsh dialect was thick in the air. But that didn’t matter, as although surrounded by welshman i was proudly sporting my Italian rugby world cup jersey. Upon arriving in Swansea we checked in at our place of stay and headed off to the Liberty Stadium to watch a Heineken Cup match between Ospreys and Treviso. Of Cause I was chanting Treviso / Leone while my Welsh friend was cheering for his local side the Ospreys, I wasn’t too sure who the third friend was supporting as he’s Scottish :P. Treviso put up a good fight, but in the end succumbed to the Ospreys attack.
After the match we ventured into the supporters club and met Ryan Jones, the best welsh No.8 in my opinion, following this we half circled the stadium in order to wait for the Treviso players to leave and enter the coach, whilst waiting I got to meet one of my rugby heroes, Alessandro Zanni. The stature of the man is impressive, shaking hands was like trying to arm wrestle a bear, and attempting to put one arm over his shoulder in an affectionate greeting was almost impossible. I also met familiar rugby names such as, Ludovico Nitoglia, Kris Burton, Edoardo Gori (who seemed over joyed at the presence of an Italian fan being in Swansea and greeted me with a full embrance) Paul Derbyshire, Fabio Semenzato, Alberto Sgarbi, Valerio Bernabo, Ignacio Fernadez-Royet, and the head coach Franco Smith (this was truly one of my most memorable encounters of my life). after which we suited up and hit Swansea’s famous Wind Street for the clubbing scene, the day after resulted in a earlyish rise, a long train journey and a return to work, I would gladly do it again.
Happy Christmas !!! late as this may be I thought that I ought to wish people well this time of year (not that I’m wishing discontent and pain throughout the rest of the year, but being in a festive mood and with a new year fast approaching it seems like an optimum time) For me this was as good a Christmas as ever, free food, free drink, and free money and gifts …. and of cause the company of family and good friends is always vastly appreciated. This year two particular gifts I was lucky enough to receive were of particular importance to me, firstly:
Drinks, these being a create of Peroni beer and a free bottle of Prosecco white sparkling wine from my place of work (I have a job as a part-time Barman)
and Secondly but most worthy of distinction is a pair of tickets to see the Red Hot Chili Peppers live in 2012, needles to say I’m overjoyed by the gift and Immensely looking forward to the occasion (especially as the gig falls near my birthday, well one day short to be precise)
I hope you had a good Christmas also and that you got what you wanted, whether it be material or personal. Best of wishes to you and all your collaborations and embrace the new year with ‘joie de vivre’ or the ‘enjoyment of life’
Been a long time since last post I know :P, but just a quick shout to say, am now on Myspace :O, excitement all around I know I know, it does now mean you can listen to three demo tracks, have more on the sidelines and I’m currently contemplating uploading them so you amiable beings can indulge in them. (enjoy :P)
http://www.myspace.com/georgestrivens
Please do drop by and let me know what you think
Happy Birthday to Jimmy Carr ! He’s 38 or 37…. hes old
This, at the moment is undoubtably my favourite song in existence. It’s Called Song to the Siren. It was originally written / recorded by Tim Buckley (Jeff Buckley’s Dad - just think hallelujah ‘the song’) but this is a cover of that song. By what i believe to be a talented British artist called, David Gray. Although this song has been covered by people like, Candy, The Chemical Brothers, Robert Plant (Zeppelin singer), George Michael, Some italian guy (;P), John Frusciante of the Red Hot Chili Peppers and more, this is my joint favourite version of it. (It’s a three way favouritism for me between Tim Buckley, David Gray and John Frusciante.) And no ……. not that sort of three way
Found this too funny not to ‘reblog’
With thanks to, This-is-not-me.tumblr.com
(Source: this-is-not-me)
Derren Brown
Just watched his new show, Hero at 30,000 feet. For the first time in any of his shows a scene or two seemed fake, the camera’s didn’t match up (if you know what i mean), At some moments it felt more like a TV Drama, rather than a show based on Magic ,Suggestion ,Psychology ,Misdirection and Showmanship. But in all fairness it did get much more interesting when he put a straight jacket on the participant and placed him on a train track, with a train approaching of cause (otherwise it would be no fun), needless to say the participant was ok and came out of the experience with all working limbs. But to be honest when Derren is involved you do expect it to work and go smoothly, and so when it does go right than the ‘trick’ losses some of its ‘magic’. Still, love the guy, he’s not at all a psychic (because they do not exist, nor do people who can read auras or star signs or meridian lines, these people are either lying or mentally ill) he’s just very very clever, or know’s how to get away with things.
After a 6 month absence from music (this includes playing, writing and i even dramatically reduced how much music i listened to) I’ve finally returned to it with great joy and excitement for the art once more. With this great profundity for music i came out from recording today with an almost entirely finished song in one sitting, the only thing that needs to be added to the track is vocals, which is no doubt my weak point. But hopefully in ten days i’ll be that one song closer to the finish line of a complete debut album
This is Anthony Kiedis, he is somewhat of an idol to me, even though he probably shouldn’t be for many various reasons. But when some people would be thinking, what would jesus do, i’d be thinking, what would kiedis do?…
Most guys will do one of three things past midnight in their shed (yes i have a shed, not like a scabby tool shed, but a shed with electricity, heating, TV, PC, PS3, a bed!!, etc)
This would commonly consist of
1. Game (PC or PS3)
2. Watch TV
3. Use the internet… and not for Ebay
I’ve opted for none of the above and gone for the more obscure, remembering a deck of cards, on average people can remember 5-9 items of information in their short term memory, i managed to recall all 52 cards forwards and 51 cards backwards, thats 103 items of information if you count backwards and forwards separately. On average thats 18.5x better than usual memory (to be honest i was using a memory ‘trick’ or technique), but i’m still happy, at least it kept me busy for about 15 minutes
One Liner’s
If we are all God’s children, what’s so special about Jesus?.
The reason old man use Viagra is not that they are impotent. It’s that old women are so very ugly.
Boxers don’t have sex before a fight, do you know why that is? They don’t fancy each other.
No matter how much you give a homeless person for tea… you never get that tea.
In the pursuit of scientific answers, animals have been tortured for the past 100 years. They’re still not talking. I’m starting to think they don’t know anything.
Saw Toy Story 3 recently (as the title may suggest, in fact none of this needed to be said)
But after an 11 year wait i must say, it was so worth it. The adults seemed to enjoy it more than the kids, as we didn’t have any kids (unsurprisingly) i wonder how weird we looked, a group of teen’s in a kids film, hopefully the cinema people expected this. Came out feeling refreshed and renewed, like an imaginary weight of anticipation had lifted off my shoulders.
ITALIA ! ITALIA ! ITALIA!
if you haven’t figured this out yet, i have an italian heritage. And this was a chance for me to tell 72,000 people this :P. Can’t remember the exact date but this was from the Wales Vs Italy rugby match at Millennium Stadium in Cardiff 2010, as usual italy got raped at rugby :P, but two guaranteed things happened that day, The atmosphere was outstanding, and italy got a try!!!, what i want to know is, why does it seem to be the fact that italy only get one try a match?, if they win (rare) or loose (most likely) it’s always one try
This is me …
In a suit …
The photo was taken from the year 12 ball, one of my memories of the night would be completely murdering everyone at the blackjack table, by far, i mean by a huge majority, i was amazing. But then again it is just counting to 21 with a bit of luck :P, that is unless u start to ‘follow’ the cards
