Vanity is Only Fair

If I've crunched once I've crunched a thousand times. Well the fact of the matter is that I probably have done about that in the last week or so, and even more in the last 3 weeks. For whatever reason I've got myself addicted to working out again in the aforementioned period and I'm not quite sure why. Well I actually do know the reason (which I'm undecided as to whether I'm going to disclose it or not tonight) but I'm not sure if it is a particularly rational one. On the one hand, I could say that I'm doing it to keep myself in shape and to make sure that I'm doing a bit of physical exertion every day that isn't lifting my pen or typing. However, on the other hand I know that my reasons are purely narcissistic and whether or not that is healthy I just don't know.

Scottish Football on the Brink

I generally don't blog all that much about football (surprisingly) but I think that it is important to have my say on the current situation at Rangers FC. For those of you that don't know, one of Scotland's two biggest clubs went into administration recently, resulting in a 10 point deduction and the specter of being wound up looming large over Ibrox. Being a Livingston fan, I'm in no position to laugh or enjoy their current situation because my club have been in and out of administration twice in the last 8 years. That lead to many a sleepless night and the unnerving fear of losing one of the most important things in my life. I'm going to have my say on the matter though because I'm genuinely worried for the Scottish game at the moment.

My Morning Motivation Theory and the Most Important Decision of the Day

It's been a while since I've written about something that isn't about my relationship status or alcohol and therefore something needs to change. I've also not given a lot of thought to my last 4 or 5 posts for whatever reason - I'm going to say that they 'came from the heart'. Today's post has required thought though and it is something that I'm looking forward to sharing with you this evening. I hope that I've whetted your appetite with the title; although it doesn't roll off the tongue, it should get the punters in over the next few days. It has also been a while since I've used the word 'theory' in my blogging escapades and so it excites me to be able to bring you my 'Morning Motivation Theory' tonight! The rest will be explained in due course...

If I Only Had a Heart

I would like to open tonight's post with a line from my favourite song just now (Squealing Pigs by Admiral Fellow): "it's that sinking feeling of being alone". And as I write this post on Valentine's night itself I feel a little bit like I'm sinking. Last night's post holds firm with no exceptions but there is a distinct feeling of being left out that seem all the more potent at this time of year. I had a really good day today for whatever reason. I was happier than I usually am, fooling around and laughing more than I would usually on a normal Tuesday and I'm not really sure why. I think I was feeling good after getting last night's post off of my chest because it all had to be said but now I sit here on my own wondering if there is a single drop of passion left in me. I'm hopefully going to find that out in the next 20 minutes or so.

The Commercialised Day of the Love Giving Obligation

After successfully securing my solitude for another year I feel, more than ever, to be qualified to deliver this post to you tonight. For the purposes of the this article you should strive to think of me as a half-eaten Kit-Kat or an odd sock because it will help you put it in some kind of context. This time last year (less one day) I wrote a similar post lambasting the commercialised day of the love giving obligation that is Valentine's day. Here I am again, a year on, still with a bee in my bonnet about it. The only issue is that I'm tired of digging my heels into things all of the time so the master-plan for this week is to give both sides of this story. Tonight's post is going to be all about the heel pressure and then Wednesday's post should ease it off somewhat - it's only fair. The only caveat that I serve to you about this whole thing is that this post promises to be much like a red rose: beautiful to some but prickly to others. Look away now if you think you're in love.

Apologies Sent With Love

I'm here! It's a minor miracle that I'm writing tonight because I'm shattered and for another reason that I'm going to elaborate on momentarily. That reason is that I don't really have anything to write about tonight; well I haven't thought of anything to write about - that sounds better. I've not had any drunken antics since last week (and I'd like to keep it that way) and I'm not going to reference the girl again because people are getting bored of that. Just because she's attractive doesn't mean that I have to write about her. I mean, I'm attractive and I don't write about myself all of the time. Oh...wait...damn. Actually as the more seasoned readers of this blog will know, I think myself to be quite the opposite - that's the reason why I write about myself you see. So anyway I've not really got all that much to write about this evening and that actually feels kinda of good but I'll get on with it anyway.

Decaff Coffee and Other Stories From the Past Week

Britney Spears famously sang 'whoops I did it again' - and look at what happened to her. Yes, after two weeks of waxing lyrical about how things have changed for me and how I was going to change, things hit a new (but familiar) all time low for me last week. In today's post I'm going to summarise a few of the things that have happened since Ramblings of a Teenager was last published. I think that you should get yourself comfortable because this promises to be a lengthy post that should make you both laugh and cry in equal measure.

Where better to begin than with the aftermath of last Wednesday's post. I'm not going to lie and say that I regret writing it because I don't. There have been only a few moments in the life of this blog where I felt I was writing something so personal and it felt nice to get it off of my chest. It was a post that was written in a style that I'm not used to writing away from my journal and for me to lay a part of myself bare like that took a little bit of self-encouragement on my part. In fact, 'Just a Glance' could easily be a blurb for a large chunk of what I write about in my journal and therefore you might think yourselves to be the luckiest people on the Internet - you decide. I realised the next day that I had been a bad law student/blog writer when I failed to put in a disclaimer saying that I didn't want any questions as to the identity of this girl. Suffice to say I've been bombarded since by questions and for that I feel a little daft - think before you publish in future has to be the moral of this story.

So anyway the whole thing has brought some level of jocularity to my days because every time I see her I think back to the words that I used last week and chuckle to myself. She'll never know of the frivolities of this blog and I'm sure she wouldn't care if she did - that's what makes me laugh. I might even go as far to say that she is naively attractive but that might be pushing the boat out too far. I stumbled across her Facebook page (which will happen when you spend the amount of time on that thing as I do) and tampered with the idea of 'adding' her. Never have I felt like a stalker before and never again do I want to feel like one and so that was the end of that. It's funny how these things play out in my head sometimes but I'm almost certain that similar stuff goes on in the heads of lots of guys (and probably girls) across the world. In no way is this situation unique.

Since I'm a fan of continuity I'll use the above tale to lead this post on to that low point that I referred to above. Thursday night was the pub quiz again and after the week before you would have thought that I would have taken the drinking a bit more easily. However, I guess I must have drank too much again because half way through my lecture the morning after it was time for me to leave and for everyone else to stay - that is all I'm saying on the matter. The reason why there is continuity (although having to explain this possibly takes the edge off a bit) is that as I was leaving the lecture theatre with about 150 pairs of eyes on me, I caught her out of the corner of mine. My misery was compounded with this and off I slumped with my tail (that being my last shred of Friday morning dignity) between my legs - not cool. 

So I more or less spent the rest of Friday feeling sorry for myself. The folk that were with me during the day will know that I kept hitting myself on my head in frustration as to the state I was in and spent every moment in between looking awful. I went home in the afternoon and told this story to my parents. They called me daft and suggested (in the way that parents do) to try and ease off a little. It shouldn't have taken that but I always do as they say and will be doing a lot of 'easing off' over the coming weeks.

After nursing my misery for a whole day I woke up on Saturday morning to find that my exam results were up - finally. It was in the following hour that I felt that something was back; I wasn't sure what but it was back. After finding out how I had done there was a lot of fist-pumping and (for some reason) a lot of chest beating mixed with sheer adrenaline flowing through every part of my body. I sit here now looking back on Saturday morning with fondness and now I feel like I'm riding a wave that I feel could carry me anywhere - what a difference a day can make.

So here we are the week after all of that fun and, as I sit drinking my umpteenth cup of decaff coffee (because I can) I feel slightly wiser than I did this time last week. The last 3 weeks of my life have been some of the toughest for reasons that I didn't know before. I now know that my head was in the wrong place and that there was only one thing to fix that. The weight that has been lifted off my with the release of the exam results is almost palpable and now I feel ready to charge on with the rest of the year. I'm not perfect (and I never thought I was) because I'll always have vices such as being attracted to girls I can't have but there is something much higher than that which I will always believe in - my brains and my ability.

If you got down to this paragraph then thanks for sticking with me tonight. I understand it's been a bit of a bore for a lot of you but if anything reading something like this should trigger you to think about yourself. A little bit of soul searching now and again is often needed and I feel better for it.

Thanks for reading,

Martin

Just a Glance

It has been a rarity recently for me to write on a Wednesday since I started playing 5s after university. Tonight was very close to being no different really because I'm pretty tired and it hurts to sit still for a prolonged period - suffice to say that tonight's post is going to be brief. I have been withering about producing this post for a wee while now because of the repercussions that I might suffer as a result. I'm not worried that I'll annoy anyone but I am slightly concerned about the effect that this might have on me when I publish in about half an hour's time. It will either go well or it will end up in a foot-in-mouth situation so read on to find out what the outcome will be.