Jason's Daily Notes

Yesterday I woke up with the worst stomachache of my life. It felt completely different from any kind of pain I had felt before. And the weird thing was that I didn't eat much the night before - just some peanuts and a few beers. (I wasn't hungover, though; my head felt fine.) It was surreal to say the least. I couldn't even sit down comfortably, and I felt too fragile to move around much, so I was just pacing around my room, groaning, for maybe a couple hours. I thought that maybe it was just really (really) bad gas, but even after dropping my brownies into the pool the pain persisted! I watched some Breaking Bad and played the guitar to try to soothe myself, which at least got my mind off my stomach for a little bit. Finally, I forced myself out to Tesco, where I bought an array of drugs for indigestion and pain relief. I took one, labelled "recovery," and within half an hour I was feeling better. Not fully better, but at least marginally functional. Oh, and this all happened early. My stomach woke me up at like 6am, and I couldn't go back to bed. I was back from Tesco by 11. Well, I needed to get out of the house. And I couldn't focus on doing any research for my dissertation, so I decided, fuck it, I'm going out. I chose a tube station arbitrarily - Paddington - and headed there. The afternoon crowds were about. I then took a bus to Regent's Park and walked through the park. It was a warm, sunny afternoon - only the 2nd day of what I would call "summer" in London! I walked up Primrose Hill, soaking up the sun while listening to my iPod. I had put on my alternative/emo playlist (my stomach problems somehow forced me to think about my mortality and what people would say about me if I died today... emo right?! But don't worry, I'm not dying anymore; although in a sense, aren't we all dying?). I texted Thomas to see what he was up to - work sucks, but he at least found a flat. I tried to meet with him, but going on the tube, I missed his texts, and by the time I returned, he had already left. D'oh. I had also texted Felipe, who had had a full day of sightseeing with his family. They were having dinner, so I headed home. I was exhausted and so I slept. ...and I slept really well! 10 hours, and I woke up feeling rested and with energy for once! I stir-fried some vegetables so they wouldn't go bad, and had that for breakfast. Now I'm back on campus, "working" on my dissertation. Haha.

Today, I tried to get myself up an out early, but yet again I failed. I was distracted in the morning by continued research for my business and my dissertation. And Swag was in the shower when I tried to shower, so instead I just washed my hair in the kitchen and left. It was like 11:30, and I didn't even get to brush my teeth.

I got to the NAB and proceeded to continue reading this book - Wikinomics - for my dissertation. I was about 3/4 of the way through when I just couldn't concentrate anymore. That's my life now, reading and research for my dissertation, punctuated by bursts of inspiration for my business (but few actions being taken to take my business forward). In the evenings I've been watching Breaking Bad for my unwinding. This has been fine, but repetitive and un-exciting, especially considering how exciting everything is now (and that the Olympics will be starting in exactly 1 week)!

In the news today, 12 people were killed in Colorado when a guy fired a gun into the audience at a midnight screening of The Dark Knight Rises. Sad, yeah, but I couldn't help but feel "meh" because so many thousands of people are dying everyday in the world and not getting nearly as much attention as these people will, only because they're American. Tsk tsk.

I went for lunch today to a vegetarian South Indian buffet near Euston. I had seen some good reviews of it online, but by the time I was there, it was 2pm and the buffet food had gone stale. Meh, I won't recommend it.

It had rained, then there were moments of sunshine, then it rained again. London in the summer.

I returned to the NAB and tried to get work done, but I couldn't help but get distracted.

I've discovered the convenience of using my iPhone as an iPod. No longer have to carry around 2 devices all the time!

And yeah, I totally thought today was Thursday. Oh well, like it matters...

I just came back from an entrepreneurs networking event. It was great. I was a little nervous to go, as I knew absolutely no one there, but I just dove right in and spoke with some really engaging people. I shared with them my business idea, and I got almost unanimously positive feedback! The message is clear: I need to start this business. And I need to do it well. And soon!

Awesome. I love the idea of running a business. And exchanging business cards, networking and all that, how cool?!

It's the 4th of July and I'm in London. Nothing new here, really. Last year I celebrated (if you could call it that) the 4th of July while couchsurfing in York. For the past few days I thought that I might be able to have a bigger celebration here in London too, but it seems like, once again on schedule, everything is aligning against me (and frankly it's making today a bad day for me):

• I woke up early so that I could call home (it had been a while since I had called, so I thought it prudent to catch up). It's actually pretty remarkable that I woke up, because for the first night in a long time, I wore my ear plugs to bed and closed all the curtains. This shut out all the street noise from outside, which really helped me sleep better - I had a vibrant dream and felt well-rested.
• So at 6:30 I was up and connected to home. Shortly thereafter I had taken a quick shower (actually more of a rinse) and proceeded to work on my startup business (idea). I posted online, asking for advice about starting a business.
• Made breakfast. My latest (and really delicious) addiction is to cook an omelet of sorts with grilled onions and peppers and a dash of curry powder to really bring out the flavor. It's amazing. Today I made it with potatoes, which were good but cooked too long so they became mushy. This all took almost an hour in total.
• Since it's the 4th of July, I wanted to customize my facebook to look cool with an Independence Day themed cover photo; however, I couldn't find any that satisfied me (one of my friends already has the aliens blowing up the White House, and I don't want to copy him). Instead, I posted a quote from President Bill Pullman on my wall. I also distracted myself searching for things to do in London for the 4th of July, and came up mostly empty-handed. There's only one vaguely American thing going on tonight, and it's at a bar that is sponsoring a hot dog eating contest. C'mon!
• Oh yeah, and all of this "research" took up a couple hours of my morning.
• For some reason I've been having a weird headache. It feels like blood is rushing to my head and making me feel flushed. It's not "ache-y" as I'm used to, slightly more "throbby" if anything, as if I'm wearing my glasses too tightly, but I'm not really wearing my glasses. I suspect that it may be due to staring at a computer screen for too many hours.
• My plan for the afternoon was to have a 4th of July barbecue in our yard. This was dependent on the weather being nice and sunny. Around 11am it began to rain (the weather forecast had only called for clouds). Looks like no barbecue today.
• Finally around 12:30 I headed to campus. The Jubilee Line was part suspended between Waterloo and Finchley Road, and my train was moving very slow. At Bermondsey it seemed like it'd be sitting there for a while, so I got off and took the bus to campus.
• The computer lab that I liked to work in was closed. I had to walk to the NAB (where you have to swipe with you ID to enter) to find a computer.
• Ugh. Small things really make or break your day. And today I feel like I'm breaking.

I've shyed away from blogging recently. I just didn't feel like doing it. I guess the novelty has worn off. It seems that the novelty has worn off of many things in my life. In the past month I've spent more time dwelling on the frustrations and inconveniences of living in London than on the benefits and excitement here. But maybe if I reflect on the past month in London, it'll seem better. Maybe.

Quick summary: Jubilee, persistent cold and rain, one exam, naked people, Euro 2012, Stonehenge, France?, Wimbledon, "so call me maybe"!

The month started off with the Queen's Jubilee weekend, celebrating Her Majesty being queen for 60 years. London was festooned with the Union Jack. Swag went to Berlin for the long weekend, using up his Schengen visa the best he could. I listed many recommendations for him to visit (and eat) in Berlin. I hosted Ria, a friend of Swag, who was visiting London for the weekend from Oxford. She has traveled thoroughly, from Japan to Slovakia to Nepal and Africa. She dumpster dives when she can, and she made some simple but delicious mushroom soup for us. My friend Phil was also visiting from Austria, along with his girlfriend Assma. They were very nice, but (as always when a guy friend becomes committed to a girl) he wasn't nearly as crazy or excited as he was before. They arrived at Gatwick in the evening, and their train took them to London Bridge just as the tube stopped running. On the night bus home a girl vomited on the floor.

1 June. Friday. When I'm bored in London, I go exploring, and today was one of those days. I headed west, ending up in Acton Town, which is a pleasant area of London that could easily play any suburban British area (and which I think it did on some TV shows or movies, maybe?)... Either way, there's nothing particularly glamourous about it on the surface.

2 June. Saturday. It was the start of the Jubilee weekend and it was pleasant, not raining for once. While Phil and Assma explored Oxford Street, I bought guitar strings (for my new guitar) on Denmark Street and walked around Soho, discovering a cool festival at Carnaby Street, where I took them afterwards. We had some meat pies at a pleasant pub (the Windmill), then checked out Hamley's (mega toy store) before returning to Carnaby Street to enjoy the free strawberries and cream and juice spritzers they were giving out.

So it's Monday morning. I have been in London for a month and 10 days now. Also, it's six months to Christmas. For the past week I've been hosting a French girl, Alice, who is on her way home from a 1-year adventure - mostly in Australia but bits in Southeast Asia. She's the hitchhiking, free-spirited type, which I quite admire. Since Friday Alice's friend, Solen also stayed with us. The housing transition. On the 21st (Thursday) started another quarter of our apartment lease. It also meant that Kristina was to move out. Thus, Swag and I have been (at different levels of franticness) looking for a new flatmate to move in. Gumtree was not very effective, and neither was Craigslist. We got a couple responses from CouchSurfing, and even more from Spareroom.co.uk. Nevertheless, by Thursday we still had no flatmate. But I advanced the money to make the rent payment. There was one guy from Switzerland who was interested, and was willing to commit to the room sight unseen but he only wanted the room for 2 months, which wasn't best for us. (We wanted someone for either 1 month, so we could sublease during the Olympics, or 3 months.) I have a habit of imagining the worst things possible to happen. Weird, I know. But I guess it makes real life seem much less... horrible?

Why does this always happen to me? I'm not enjoying myself in London. I did my laundry today, then hung my clothes out to dry. A few hours later, in the evening, it starts to rain! My clothes will take 3 days to dry in this weather! And now they're gonna smell bad. I wasted all day playing Civ V and watching YouTube videos of "Call Me Maybe". All I ate was a can of beans & sausage and a can of lentil & bacon soup. Yum. Not. My new desk chair arrived today (and which was the reason I stayed at home all day). I starte to assemble it, then realized that I don't have a screwdriver so I dinka just gave up halfway. We don't have a replacement flatmate for Kristina yet. She moves out next Friday. And we have to pay rent. I'm feeling like I'm getting sick. I saw a picture of myself with my shirt off. God, I have an ugly body. And I'm fat. This makes me sad. Which makes me want to eat more. Dammit. 5 friends have their birthday today. Too bad I don't feel like celebrating. Ugh, now my eyes hurt from starting at the computer screen all day. Yuck.

Short week. What have I been doing? Pretty much nothing. You'd think it feels good to be completely done with exams and everything... and it does. But I don't really have anything to make me get up in the morning. And I don't have many other connections in London to meet up with either. Life just seems really dull. Today I woke up at 8:30am and instead of going for a job, I decided to go out [I had decided that the earlier I do things, the more productive each day would be.]. I wanted to explore more parts of London, so I headed to Westminster at 9am. It wasn't too crowded, and I walked around the Houses of Parliament to Lambeth bridge and further south to the Tate Britain. But it was closed. So much for that plan. So I walked over to Vauxhall, and it began to rain. Sidebar: The weather has been absolutely horrible the last week or so. It's been raining almost everyday, and chilly and windy too. Today, it was especially windy and rain would spurt on every 30 minutes or so. Umbrellas were useless. I took a bus from Vauxhall to Peckham, with a goal of going to Primark to buy a couple things. Sitting behind me on the bus were two loud, shallow sounding American girls, they seemed to be around my age, and they were talking about all of their friends who were now getting married. I resisted the urge to talk to them and just pretended that I wasn't American. I made it to Peckham, and it was still cold and raining. I walked over to Primark, making sure to check in on Foursquare (I was doing that the whole morning. Guess I'm going through that overuse/addiction phase with it now. And it's a way to satisfy my urge to constantly use my iPhone while trying to limit the amount of data I use [I'm still on data roaming in the UK]. The Primark wasn't very crowded, not surprising considering it was 10:30am, and I was able to find some cheap undershirts easily. I also bought a cheap long-sleeve shirt, just because. [And also partially because I feel really underdressed in London. I'm trying to not let the peer pressure get to me, but it's hard. They have a different style here and you can't help but notice. I miss the really casual laid-back attitude of Americans in general.] Anyway, I had noticed that the P12 bus stopped right there in Peckham, so I waited for a few minutes for it, getting pelted with a strong wind and waves of rain showers that soaked my Primark shopping bag. The bus was filled mainly with older people and it took me all the way home in 20 minutes.