#oneaday Day 623: Crime and Punishment

It's been a while since I told a story from my past life at the chalkface, so I feel it's about time we fixed that with another real-life tale of What Teaching is Really Like.

I worked in three schools (not counting those I did supply teaching in) during the course of my teaching career — two secondary and one primary. One of the secondaries and the primary were in what could politely be termed "somewhat deprived areas" while the other secondary was right on the border of an aforementioned "somewhat deprived area" and a very middle-class town — the sort of place that has shops that sell nothing but fabric, and tearooms rather than branches of Starbucks, that sort of thing.

All three of them, regardless of location, and regardless of age group, had Problem Children. You could often preemptively tell a Problem Child from the names on the register — generally speaking, if a child was male and called Jordan, female and had some obscure misspelling of a relatively normal name (Kaylee, Abbygale, Rooth) or of either sex and in possession of a completely made-up stupid name (Peaches, Infographia, Cubblers) they were likely to be a Problem Child. Sometimes you were pleasantly surprised — girls named Jordan often ended up being quite nice, and when you got your hands on a new class you often didn't know the sexes of the pupils, particularly if they had stupid names — but more often than not you'd run into a Problem Child sooner or later.

One particular Problem Child I encountered in the primary school in which I taught had a relatively normal name and, ironically, was one of the brighter kids in the class. But my God he was an asshole. He'd answer back, he'd yell at the teacher, the teaching assistant and his peers, and he'd frequently storm out of the room if he was pulled up on any sort of inappropriate behaviour. When parents' evening came around, I spoke to his parents about his behaviour — particularly the violent side of things — and I was told that they had simply told him to react to anything he saw as "unfair treatment" by striking back. "If someone hits you," said the dad, "you hit them back."

There's not much you can say to that, really, even with all the Anti-Bullying Policies and Zero Tolerance Initiatives in the world.

Then there was a Problem Child I came into regular contact with during my time at the first secondary school at which I taught. He, too, was an asshole, and this time with no redeeming features whatsoever — i.e. he was a dimwit as well. Again, he'd be aggressive, sweary, belligerent and completely resistant to authority. And again, there was no support from the parents.

"My mum says I don't have to come to detentions," he told me upon receiving a detention for being a cunt (obviously not the exact wording I used on the form recording said inappropriate behaviour). "So I'm not coming."

He didn't come.

With many of these children — particularly in cases there was no parental support for whatever reason — it was pretty much impossible to instill any sort of discipline in them. There was nothing that they feared. They didn't fear detentions because they just wouldn't turn up. They didn't fear the wrath of the teachers or senior staff members. And they didn't fear exclusion because that just meant time away from the school they hated so much. There was little to nothing that could be done to discourage these little grotbags from acting like complete bellends.

The teacher training guides would say that punishment is not the way to go — that positive reinforcement is, in fact, the way in which they best learn what behaviours are appropriate and which are not. The trouble is, taken to the extreme, you end up with the ridiculous sight that many schools indulge in — primary schools in particular — which is the weekly Celebration Assembly. Here, the whole school gathers and a selection of children from each tutor group are called up one by one to come to the front and receive a certificate. These certificates aren't necessarily for academic achievement — and, indeed, usually aren't. No, these certificates are frequently awarded for "playing nicely with the other children" and "sitting in a chair for over half of the lesson" and "not hurting anyone". All of those are genuine examples, by the way, unlike the names I gave earlier, most of which were made up.

Now, while it's nice to celebrate the fact that little Cockbag, who never sits in his chair for more than 5 seconds and loves punching everyone in the neck, actually sat down and completed two maths questions in the last week, it completely devalues the entire concept of "rewards" for everyone — teacher and pupil. When I was at primary school in the late 80s and early 90s, we were rewarded for good work in class or special achievements. Go and colour in a square on your rocket. Have a gold star. Show the class what you've done. No-one got a square on their rocket, a gold star or the opportunity to show the class what they'd done for successfully sitting in their chair for more than fifteen seconds at once.

I wonder what on Earth the solution could be. It's pretty clear from what I saw that the one and only thing that the Problem Children feared was humiliation in front of their friends and peers — something that undermined their "authority", for want of a better word. So perhaps some sort of Inverse Celebration Assembly would be warranted, where the headmaster solemnly called out the names of the worst offenders each week, brought them onto the stage and forced them to do the Dance of Shame while everyone else pointed and laughed. Anyone who refused to do the Dance of Shame would be fed to the goldfish kept by Class 2, who had developed a taste for human flesh ever since Barry Jenkins kept his hand in there for an entire period for a bet.

But then that's probably some sort of human rights violation, isn't it?

#oneaday Day 622: Party Smart

I may be voluntarily indicting myself into the "I am an old man now" club but I have come to the irrefutable conclusion that You Do Not Need Alcohol to Have a Good Time.

Well, duh, you might say. We've been told that for years. But how many people really believe it?

I'm speaking purely from my own perspective here as I'm more than aware that plenty of people use booze as a form of social lubricant prior to slipping their conversational penis into the Vagina of Meaningful Interactions. I'm saying it doesn't really work for me.

I thought it did for a while. At University, as most people tend to do, I drank a lot, mostly out of a desire to be sociable and fit in — even with seeing a close friend suffer from (and, thankfully, subsequently beat) a drinking problem. I quickly confirmed my early suspicions that I didn't like beer at all, which precluded me from most Student Night promotions, and instead opted for spirits or alcopops.

Even with those, however, I found I had an obvious "line" which, if crossed, would switch the night from being "entertainingly blurry" to "unpleasantly blurry". Sometimes I crossed this line by accident with just one sip too many; others I was goaded and cajoled into it by the company I was with at the time; others still I, like a child in some ways, wanted to "test my limits". The result was always the same, however; a kebab on the way home, a longer-than-average dump during which I'd often almost-but-not-quite fall asleep, a night of disturbed sleep wondering whether or not I'd be sick (to which the answer was usually "yes") followed by a morning of being sick, barely being able to move and always taking a bin into the bathroom with me in case disaster struck while I was the wrong way around to puke in a manner which didn't require cleaning up.

Despite the inevitability of the above scenario, I still continued to do it. Drinks of choice changed — vodka and Red Bull being a favourite for probably the longest, despite its ludicrous cost — but the presence of social occasions did not. Drinks down the pub after a session with a club. Monday nights at the local grotty nightclub following Theatre Club rehearsals. And, of course, the occasional house party.

I used to hate house parties, but I'd still go. Most of them tended to devolve into me finding my "line", stopping just short of it and then spending the rest of the evening looking longingly across the room at some girl I'd arbitrarily decided that night that I fancied, and then didn't go and talk to for fear of her thinking I was a dick, a perv or quite simply just someone she didn't want to talk to.

In short, then, in a good 8-9 cases out of 10, alcohol didn't particularly work as the social lubricant it's sold as. A few half-hearted "woo, I'm so drunk!"s do not make for meaningful friendships and relationships, and as such I'm pretty sure that most of my aforementioned meaningful relationships and friendships started and were best cultivated when sober. Sure, there were times when I'd gone out, got drunk and had a great time with said people — but as time passed, these got less and less frequent, and the booze became less and less important.

When I finally left university and started work as a teacher, the demands of the job meant that for the most part I didn't have time to drink, let alone the inclination. I dabbled with having a stiff G&T upon coming home from the first school in which I worked — which was a nightmarish shithole conjured up from between Satan's very buttocks — but it didn't particularly help with the growing feelings of stress and depression I had, and nor was I expecting it to. I had an occasional G&T because it was a nice drink in the summer, and it happened to be one of the few alcoholic beverages which I didn't hate the taste of.

Fast forward to now and I haven't drunk for quite some time, and I don't miss it. The last few times I drank wine or vodka or gin, the taste was not something I enjoyed, and it felt like it "burned" on the way down, leaving me with a slight lingering feeling of unpleasantness after just one sip in many cases. Certainly it was enough to put me off a university-style binge, but it's also pretty much enough to put me off it altogether. It's unnecessary for me, it doesn't particularly help me open up to people — though it does help me act like a dick, but then, I'm in no hurry to be the butt of everyone's jokes for being wasted — and, in more cases than one, I've seen what it can do to people, and that's not pleasant.

In short, then, I think I'm knocking it on the head. This isn't a strict teetotal policy or anything but I'm certainly not going to seek out alcohol or feel pressured into it on social occasions.

I've been away this weekend and heard the phrases "you need to be drunk" or "you need to drink more" uttered several times. No you don't. Or, more accurately, Idon't. No-one needs to be drunk. No-one needs to drink "more". You should be free to enjoy a drink if you enjoy it, but it should not be a necessity.

If this has come across as in any way sanctimonious, that certainly wasn't the intention and I apologise — I'm simply saying how I feel about it and what works for me in this instance. I'm certainly not judging those who do enjoy a drink and know their limits — and equally, I'm not judging those who have a genuine problem and are taking steps to deal with it. Everyone's different, after all. All I'm saying is this: if you're socialising with me or at a party I'm throwing (haha, yeah, right) then have a drink or two by all means — just don't expect (or, worse, demand) than I join you.

And don't throw up on my carpet.

#oneaday Day 621: Fun, Fun, Fun in the Sun, Sun, Sun

It's October, and it's very sunny. Temperatures have been up around the 30 degrees mark (Celsius, obviously) and the sun has been beating down like an army made up entirely of marching bands.

As I remember it, this has happened for the last few years. As difficult as it may be to think back on my wedding day now, the one thing I do remember is that it was a lovely day, and in October too.

The sun is something of a double-edged sword. Beautiful sunshiney days such as today are lovely to look at and ideal to go and visit outdoor attractions such as the zoo or the gardens of an old stately home (the latter of which we did today). It's nice to be out in the sun, and lying on some green grass in the shade as the bright sunshine warms the air is super-nice.

Problem is, last couple of times I've had a lovely day like that out in the sun I've promptly spent the afternoon and evening suffering with the mother of all headaches thanks to (presumably) mild sunstroke, or possibly brain AIDS. But more likely the sunstroke thing.

Memo to self, then: wear a hat. Supplementary memo to self: buy a hat. Because as a kid you can just about get away with wearing some awful hand me down trucker hat that your parents dredged up from somewhere. But as an adult, wearing an inappropriate hat that doesn't suit you just makes you look a bit special needs.

I've asked for book and music recommendations in the past; I wonder, will the Internet be able to recommend me a hat that doesn't make me look like a dick, a chav or both?

#oneaday Day 620: Country House

Andie and I are staying in an old country house. It's her sister's 30th, so a bunch of her friends (including us) are in attendance for the festivities.

Country houses are cool. I'm not talking about houses that are just in villages, since increasingly as villages become hotbeds for pretentious commuter relocation, more and more generic brick houses are springing up. I'm talking about proper country houses that might have once been part of a farm — or in some cases still are.

There's something special about a house with rooms you have to duck to get into; a house with mysterious hobbit-size doors in the bedrooms and bathroom with an inexplicably small crawlspace behind; a house with a basement; in short, a house from which you could fend off (or at least survive) a zombie invasion.

That said, the olde-worlde nature of the building materials in most of the house would inevitably lead to Resident Evil-style situations with zombies bursting through wooden walls and punching their way into your room. And God help you if they find their way into that crawlspace. Although if they did they'd have to be hobbit-size zombies or midgets, which would be mildly terrifying.

Hmm. Not sure I can sleep now.

#oneaday Day 617: Phase 1 Complete

I've beaten Phase 1 of EA Sports Active 2 and while I may not be all buff and ting just yet, I like to think it's helping. Of course, measuring actual results is more tricky, though a big part of the challenge in getting fitter is the psychological barrier of getting into it in the first place.

I could just step on the scales, but 1) we don't have any and 2) I hate stepping on the scales as it's embarrassing, even when no-one else is around. In my adult life I've never been a slight fellow (ironic, since I was skin and bones as a young kid) and it's always been a bit of a hangup of mine — and all the more frustrating if the good habits you've made a specific effort to get yourself into (exercise, trying not to have KFC every lunchtime, that sort of thing) doesn't appear to have an effect.

When I started doing the running a while back that, combined with some pressups and situps, had a noticeable impact on my body. I'm not sure if I actually lost weight or not (for the aforementioned reason) but my body certainly changed shape. I had a noticeable waist for the first time in ages, and while I still had a horrible big wobbly gut, down the sides it was more noticeable that some of the bulk had gone.

When I started working every day again, the timing meant it was more difficult to squeeze in exercise, so following my 10K run in London back in May (May? I think.) I kind of fell out of the habit, which is why I picked up EA Sports Active 2. I already had the first one on Wii, but I'd heard the second one was much better in terms of how the programme was designed as well as having motion sensors you couldn't accidentally garotte yourself with, unlike the previous game's Wii Remote and Nunchuk combo.

It's challenging — and I'm working on the "Medium" intensity level at present — and there are some exercises which I dread coming up (particularly: foot fires, stride jumps and mountain climbers, aka to other fitness types, inexplicably, "burpees") but doing the activities 4 days a week (sometimes more) is making me feel a bit better about taking positive steps to improve myself, or something. As I say, specific progress is somewhat difficult to measure when you don't like stepping on the scales, but psychological progress is still progress, too — and while I still dread the loading screen for mountain climbers, I find I can get through a set of them without wanting to die quite as much as I used to.

Plus, of course, there's trophies. While in a lot of contexts trophies and achievements bug me, here they're used well to mark milestones in your training, as well as some "fun" ones marking good performance over the long term in some of the minigames. EA Sports Active 2 also really loves progress bars, and as any social game developer will tell you, progress bars are an excellent motivational system. As such, you have a progress bar for how far through the whole programme you are, a progress bar for an individual workout, progress bars for all the trophies, progress bars for your personal goals — it may sound silly but it's one way of tracking progress that you can see — even if it's mostly measuring dedication rather than improvement in your fitness.

From Thursday, I move on to Phase 2 of the 9 Week Program(me). I'm not sure what to expect. Phase 1 was pretty tough at times — I'm wondering what Phase 2 offers over and above this. Perhaps longer workouts? I hope it's not longer sets. 55 mountain climbers in a row is enough to give me a headrush and make me want to lie on the floor for quite a while.

#oneaday Day 616: Characterisation

What makes a good character? It's not necessarily one you can engage with and sympathise with because some of the most memorable characters there are are villains. A tragic villain who has some sort of dark past that led him to his evildoing is often the most interesting, but sometimes villains who are just plain evil in a variety of creative ways can be memorable, too.

On the "good" side of the spectrum, distinctive, likable characters are fun to "hang out" with. Even slightly irritating characters can be memorable in their own way — though perhaps not for the reasons their creator intended. They don't necessarily have to "do" much, but they have to be more than a sounding board delivering lines in a flat, dry sort of way.

In the world of video games, characterisation may be frequently exaggerated, but it often leads to memorable encounters — particularly if you spend a protracted amount of time with said characters, as you frequently tend to do in RPGs. JRPGs, for all their faults and linearity, often present the strongest characters in all of gaming, even though many of them tend to fall into the cliché trap. Despite this, though, if you've engaged with the gameplay sufficiently over the course of the 20/40/50/90/100 hours it takes to beat whatever RPG you're playing then you'll probably find yourself missing those characters when the time comes to leave them behind.

On the Western front, BioWare are often regarded as masters of characterisation, and indeed characters such as Mordin in Mass Effect 2 and Shale in Dragon Age: Origins are pretty memorable. But very often when I beat a BioWare game, I don't find myself wishing I could spend more time with those characters in quite the same way I do when I beat a Persona game, or as I anticipate I'm going to feel when Xenoblade Chronicles eventually comes to an end.

Video games are, in some ways, a more unrefined medium than other formats. Technical limitations often get in the way of being able to make use of techniques used in, say, film or writing. Writing in particular allows the author to explore a character in a level of detail arguably unrivalled by any other medium. Of course, said author has to be careful not to give away too much too soon, otherwise the pacing of the character's story is thrown out of whack and the reader might not feel inclined to go on. Getting to know a character should be a gradual process — that doesn't necessarily mean that a chapter of their "dark past" comes to light at a time, since a character doesn't need a dark past to be interesting — but each hour the audience spends in the company of that character should be like getting to know a real person. You start to recognise that character's traits, their likes, dislikes, foibles, weaknesses and the forms of adversity in which they find they can stand the strongest.

There's an occasionally-mentioned piece of writers' wisdom that states that to make the best stories, you have to be as mean as possible to your main character. While following a protagonist's struggles is often entertaining, it doesn't necessarily have to involve them being kidnapped, tortured, raped, mutilated and all manner of other things. Psychological torment can be profoundly affecting, too — and different characters have different triggers by which they can be psychologically traumatised. For one strong-stomached character, it might only be the most depraved and horrendous images imaginable that could torment their mind and keep them awake at night. For another, it could be something as simple as the fact that the guy at the coffee shop didn't pay them as much attention as they would have liked. Characters are people, after all — and like people, they're all different.

Inventing your characters is one of the most fun parts of creative writing. Figuring out what to do with these characters is the challenging bit that comes afterwards. Get your head around that and you've got yourself a story.

#oneaday Day 614: Joining the Fold

It's with some pleasure that I welcome a very good friend of mine to the blogging fold. A big hand, if you please, for Mr Kalam Abul. Kalam's a good buddy from my days working for a certain fruit-based computer manufacturer's retail outlet, and we both have plenty of unpleasant experiences to talk about from our time there, but now's not the time for that.

Kalam plans on using his shiny new blog as a form of free therapy — and that, to me, sounds like an excellent idea. After all, at times, it's what I do here. Talking about stuff is good. If you don't have anyone to talk to, though — or no-one you feel comfortable talking to, or if you don't necessarily need to "talk", more just "get things off your chest" — then writing is an excellent outlet. I know that the last 614 days of writing something every day — though it's been a struggle sometimes — have provided me with a means to vent my inner frustrations into something vaguely productive rather than sitting around moping, being upset, crying, punching sofas (apparently) or stabbing badgers. This is good.

Self-proclaimed social media experts and people who read Mashable would probably come along right now and say that blogging's not about the individual person, it should be about your audience, your community, the blogosphere and other pretentious-sounding phrases. You know what I say to those people? Sod off. Your own personal space on the Web is yours to do with as you please. You can vent your frustrations, or you can attempt to provide a "service". You can express yourself, or you can inform. You can even do all of the above. You don't necessarily have to have a particular "structure" or theme in mind (though it sometimes helps) — sometimes all you need to do is write.

If I had to pigeonhole this blog, I'd be pretty hard-pushed to do so. The most frequently-occurring topic is likely video games, of course, and that's probably unsurprising. It's something that's in my blood and that I've been involved with for almost as long as I can remember — and it's something I'm involved with professionally now, too. But I certainly wouldn't describe this place as a video games blog. There's all manner of other nonsense amidst the rampant enthusings regarding Xenoblade Chronicles and Deadly Premonition. There's honest stuff, creative stuff, weird stuff, experimental stuff, stuff that didn't quite work, stuff that I'm incredibly pleased with and stuff that makes me sad to think back on. All of it's important, and, particularly since I started this daily posting business, all of it reminds me where I've come from and — maybe, anyway — where I'm going.

I can certainly say for a fact that this time last year I wouldn't have imagined that I'd be sitting here right now — though it's probably fair to say that this time the year before I wouldn't have imagined that I'd have been sitting where I was this time last year, if you see what I mean. Sometimes things that you take for granted are more fragile than you think — but sometimes the reverse is true, too.

I'm in a reasonably good place right now. I can't complain too much. There are things I want to achieve and things that I could do better, but after surviving a year best described as "traumatic", I'm happy to take things a bit at a time and let this place track my progress — either directly or indirectly.

As for Kalam, well, buddy, I hope your site helps you find the same sort of inner calm that writing here has done for me. And if not, don't hold back. Everyone loves a good rant.

#oneaday Day 612: Good Night

I love the night. Some may argue that this is proof that I'm a vampire (though a sparkly one rather than a "catch fire in sunlight" one, given my ability to go outside in the daytime) but I simply explain it away as being a time when you can truly enjoy the world in a way that it's easy to forget about — peacefully.

Going outside at night-time is a pleasant experience (assuming you remembered your keys) because it somehow feels "forbidden". It's not, of course — though naturally anyone who happened to be looking out of their window at the time might be wondering exactly why you're wandering around aimlessly in the dead of night if you're not Up To No Good –but to some extent, lingering feelings of childhood enter your mind, reminding you that you're "supposed" to be in bed, but instead, you're out in the darkness and cool air of the night.

It's a good time to think, too. Whether this is because your brain has had enough of daytime thoughts (such as what you're going to cook for dinner, whether you've paid the council tax and wondering whether you left the oven on) and just wants to indulge in flights of fancy is an unknown. But the night-time is the time to think about things, to be creative and to let your imagination run wild.

This doesn't always work to your advantage, of course. Having something weighing heavily on your mind and then allowing your brain to get into that curiously imaginative late-night state will often get you into a relentless cycle of negative thoughts, at times even preventing you from sleeping. But what you need to remember in this situation is that if your brain is feeling imaginative enough to think about what might happen if you don't send that Really Important Letter tomorrow, then it can imagine something stronger, too.

When I was younger, I used to try and influence my dreams by lying in bed with my eyes closed, imagining the opening for some sort of narrative in which I was the star. It would inevitably end up being some sort of heroic fantasy (not necessarily of the "swords and orcs" variety) in which I fantasised about a particular person and how I would interact with them if I had the opportunity to rescue them from the depths of an underground tunnel network/a spaceship/a civilisation that lived inside a tree/a world made of strawberry mousse. I'm not sure if imagining these narratives ever successfully influenced my dreams — everyone reading this is likely aware that their unconscious mind is capable of coming up with far more bizarre material than your waking mind can — but it was always fun to try. I'm not sure at what age it became more difficult to do that, but it's certainly a lot more challenging to maintain concentration on a specific fantasy now when trying to get to sleep. Perhaps this isn't necessarily a side-effect of age, but more other factors such as mental state, a greater number of additional considerations over and above what you had when you were a child, or simply that your concentration span is shot for whatever reason.

Despite good intentions, I somehow always end up writing these posts in the dead of night — sometimes later than others. The vast majority of any creative writing I've done over the years, too, has often been composed during the midnight hours. And for a while last year when everything was going tits-up, I found friendship on the other side of the world in the dead of night. (The latter ended up fucking up my body clock beyond all recognition for a considerable period of time, however, so more practical solutions have had to be found.)

This rambling load of old nonsense may have had a point somewhere along the way, but it's escaping me somewhat right now. I'll just say it's the fact that "the night is awesome" and leave it at that — before bidding you, of course, a very good night.

#oneaday Day 611: That Happened: "...Oil and Poo"

When struggling for things to talk about, or indeed write about, any creative shortcoming can usually be quickly rectified by a nostalgic trip into something which happened in the near (or distant) past. Some people base their entire blogs on this, and, of course, the lucrative autobiography industry uses this approach as a fundamental basis for a bajillion books all called "Celebrity Name: My Story".

So I thought I'd start an occasional series based on bizarre incidents which have occurred throughout the course of my life that probably aren't that bizarre in reality, but certainly amuse me if no-one else. These will not be presented in anything even remotely approaching chronological order — they will simply turn up as I think of them and when I feel like it. Much like the inspiration for the vast majority of other entries in this increasingly-lengthy blog, in fact (for which I salute you if you've been reading since the beginning).

Preamble over, I shall begin. Are you sitting comfortably? Here we go.

At university (the University of Southampton, UK, to be precise, if you're picky about that sort of detail) I was a member of the university theatre group, which underwent a number of name changes during my time with them. Initially it was the "Blow Up Theatre Group" (I, to this day, don't know why), then simply "Theatre Group" and later "Rattlesnake! Theatre Group" (the reasoning for which I now, sadly, can't remember).

The point of this story is not the name of the theatre group, however, but rather the shenanigans which I and the other participants got up to.

At one point late in my university career, I got together with a friend with whom I was a member of the group and we decided that we were going to put on a production of Shakespeare's Twelfth Night. As was fashionable at the time, we decided to set it in the 1920s era. (I say "fashionable" — my sole basis for this assumption is that my secondary school also set its production of Twelfth Night, in which I played the role of Malvolio, in the 1920s) We were all set to begin rehearsals when my friend and co-director decided that now would be a really good time to go on a lengthy skiing trip. (She came from a family with money and was somewhat prone to flights of fancy.)

I wasn't sure what was going on until I got a gushing, apologetic email from her announcing that she didn't feel she could be responsible for the show and decided to leave me in the sole role as director. I, of course, had never directed a show before and had not a fucking clue how to lead a ragtag group of wannabe actors into producing a show. Fortunately, the remainder of the crew rallied behind me and helped out, and I was enormously grateful for their assistance — even if the stress of carrying out the project gave me both a spectacularly tramp-like beard and more than a few nosebleeds, somehow and inexplicably earning me the nickname "Beast Man" in the process.

The show went well. It ended up being somewhat farcical in its execution, but this, in fact, worked in its favour and helped make the typically obtuse Shakespearean humour somewhat more digestible to a modern audience. We were all pretty pleased with how the whole thing turned out, but by far the most memorable thing about the whole fiasco was the aftershow party.

I can't even remember whose house the aftershow party was at, just that it was quite an event. Several key events from that evening stick in my mind, however, starting with a member of the cast sitting in a wicker chair that he thought looked rather comfortable and then discovering that it was not, in fact, as pleasing to sit on as it looked. Said chair was consequently dubbed "The Chair of Eternal Disappointment" and became a focal point for the evening, helped in part by the amount of drink and weed which was in circulation throughout the course of the celebrations.

At some point after midnight, a small splinter group of partygoers decided that it was time to leave our generous hosts' house behind and go and seek adventure elsewhere. Thus followed one of those journeys across town which meandered so much you ended up completely lost, but somewhere cool.

In our case, we found ourselves on the banks of the river Itchen (I think) on a makeshift beach covered in gravel and some unpleasantly dirty-looking seaweed. There, we indulged in what all good luvvies should do at approximately 4am in the morning — improvisatory theatre. We laughed and giggled until the sun started to peek its head over the horizon, at which point things took something of a turn for the bizarre.

One of our number, who already had a particularly loud, bellowing voice, was somewhat intoxicated through a cocktail of various chemical substances coursing through the pleasure centres of his brain, and thus became even louder than usual. As such, we were unsurprised when he proudly announced that he was going to go for a wee in the river. He took off his shoes and socks and paddled into the water, then happily stood in profile to us, got his (clearly visible) cock out and started to piss into the Itchen. (It's nothing worse than the filthy river was usually full of.)

Following this display, which he was not at all abashed about, he decided that now would be a really good time to see what the dirty seaweed on the beach tasted like. Stomachs in throat, we watched him pick up a piece of the filthy, slimy crap from the floor and gleefully stuff it into his mouth.

What followed was the kind of facial expression you get from anyone who puts something they find distasteful into their mouth but doesn't quite want to spit it out. He chewed on it for an alarmingly long period of time before letting the mangled remains of the goopy crap spill forth from his mouth.

"Ugh," he cried. "It tastes like oil and poo!"

Despite the hilarity that statement caused, the fact that one of our number was reduced to eating seaweed tipped the rest of us off to the fact that it was probably time to head homewards. Of course, we had no fucking idea where we were, so again followed a meandering course through the back streets of the city until we eventually found ourselves on familiar territory and, bizarrely, craving Jaffa Cakes.

Unfortunately, the era of 24 hour shopping had not made a big impact on Southampton by this point, and so we found ourselves stranded outside a closed and shuttered newsagents' store begging to whatever gods we did (or didn't) believe in for them to let us in for Jaffa Cakes.

Unsurprisingly, the gods in question did not yield and the shutters remained firmly closed. This, it seemed, was the final straw — it was time, once and for all, to go home. We all went our separate ways — walking, naturally, using that bizarre amount of stamina that total intoxication gives you — and found ourselves back in our own houses, safe and sound, ready for bed just as the rest of the world was waking up.

The following day was, naturally, a complete writeoff. But I'm almost certain that if I spoke to anyone else who was there that night, they'd remember the events as clearly as I do. It was, to paraphrase one Mr Stinson, legendary.

#oneaday Day 609: Five a Day

"Healthy eating" is often misinterpreted by many (including myself) to mean "eating things that taste like pieces of wood that you found on the forest floor". And yet it doesn't have to be that way, it seems. Sweet treats are all very well and good, but firstly, they get pretty dull after a while (once you've had one chocolate bar, there are very few variations on the theme besides what the crunchy bits are made out of/taste of) and secondly, of course, they'll turn you into the sort of person who requires a crane to get them out of your house.

This is an exaggeration, of course. Unless you eat, like, nothing but chocolate bars all the time, in which case heart disease will probably take you long before any cranes have to be involved.

But anyway. Since starting my EA Sports Active 2 workouts (which I'm still keeping up with, FYI) I've been looking a little more carefully at the things I eat each day — largely because of the nagging woman who gently reminds you that you should be eating [x] number of fruit and veg portions per day, and [y] number of glasses of water. As a result of a little investigation and exploration, I'm doing quite well on [x] though [y] often still eludes me, because water is pretty boring.

It seems there's quite a wide variety of things that actually taste reasonably nice while actually being healthy, too, particularly on the fruity side of things. There's a snacky thing called "Fruit Flakes", for example, which is basically a little bag of fruity sweets, only they're actually made of fruit instead of E-numbers and enough sugar to send a hyperactive five year old to the moon without the aid of a rocket. Today, too, I tried some things called "YoYos" from a company called "Bear" — they're basically fruit rollups, but all-natural and, bizarrely, made using sweet potato as well as the fruits in question. They don't look quite as appealing as more sugary variations on the fruit rollup theme — they have the look and texture of fruit jerky — but they taste all right, and apparently each one is one of your Five a Day. I've had two today. Check me out.

Crisps are a thing that the reformed glutton often misses, as crisps are tasty. While they're not quite the same thing, I've found Snack-a-Jacks to be a perfectly acceptable substitute. Some people aren't a fan of rice cakes, believing them to actually be pieces of packing polystyrene rebranded as a lightweight snack, but the addition of a little flavour to the mix with Snack-a-Jacks makes them more than acceptable — and without having to cover them in cheese, jam and any combination thereof, either.

One thing that does irritate me a little about healthy eating, however, is advertising. I'm thinking particularly of the Special K adverts here. Now, as a breakfast cereal, I quite like Special K. It's moderately tasty, supposedly good for you and doesn't taste like lumps of chipboard. There's also about a bajillion different varieties of it nowadays — some with fruit, some with other variations. It should be a cereal for which everyone can find an acceptable variation.

So why, then, is it marketed exclusively towards women? That's not an exaggeration, either — there hasn't been a man in a Special K advert for as long as I can remember, and it's almost constantly marketed as the cereal that will make you look good in a one-piece swimsuit/figure-hugging red dress. I don't particularly want to wear either of those things, and I have far too much penis to ever be called a woman, but I like Special K. Now, to be perfectly honest, I have absolutely no shame whatsoever in walking into a shop and purchasing a box of Special K, much as I would have absolutely no shame whatsoever in walking into a shop and purchasing sanitary towels for a female friend who needed them. But the fact I even have to make that comparison is at least a little objectionable — is the assumption that men are only interested in eating some sort of protein-packed Meat Flakes for breakfast and sprinkling them with bacon, while the women virtuously crunch on their Special K?

Who knows? Regardless, the main thrust of this self-indulgent ramble is that EA Sports Active 2 has, among other things, succeeded in getting me to be a bit more conscious of what I put in my mouth. This is, I believe, a good thing — and another check mark in favour of a fitness and health programme that I'm having increasing amounts of respect towards. We'll see how I feel in 9 weeks time when the programme I'm following is supposedly set to finish!