Christmas Update

Hello, first of all I want to apologise for the lack of updates, I have had some ideas for things to write about but to be honest I haven't really been in the mood. I've been working away at my PhD since the last update, I think I've settled in a bit better and I'm now a bit more confident about what I'm doing. It was quite a short semester so after Christmas the real work begins including lab work, planning field work, carrying out field work to collect samples as well as continuing to do lots of reading and working on my thesis. Before finishing for Christmas I had to do a presentation (as did all the other first year PhD students) on my project and the work I had done so far. It was to be 10 minutes long with questions afterwards. I have to admit I was rather nervous but I think overall it went well despite rushing slightly at the end and maybe asking too many rhetorical questions" What is the problem? what is the current plan? what am I doing? etc." My friend said that I seemed much more relaxed than in my project presentation in the final year of my degree which is a good thing, I was also able to answer the questions that people asked me.

Another reason for my lack of updates is that the last few weeks have been rather busy with the PhD presentation, I went to see both Kasabian (amazing) and Embrace (decent) live as well as attending a gig organised by my brother for his website featuring three local bands. I also attended a Christmas party for PhD students and staff members as well as catching up with one of my friends who I haven't seen for a while. I've got one more night out with people from my lab to go to which I'm looking forward to as well as Christmas itself with a chance to relax without having to worry about work.

Merry Christmas and thanks for reading.

Superhero Madness-Part 3

There has been some pretty big news in terms of movies lately but first I want to talk about TV shows. First Agents of SHIELD, I wasn't fussed on it at the start but thankfully as it has gone on it has improved. That said it still could be better, the problem is that it is part of the Marvel universe on a TV show budget so even though it ties in with the Winter Soldier for example (unlucky for anyone who hadn't seen it before watching the show) it feels a bit disjointed and limited. That said the first two episodes of season 2 have been much improved, they've made some tweaks in terms of characters, there has been some pretty cool effects, a cool bad guy and interesting plots and mysteries set up. They have teased some pretty cool things since the start of season 1, it will just be interesting to see how they all pay off. 

Arrow season 2 continued the progress of the second half of season 1 to be great, managing to balance numerous plot lines with great acting and great fight scenes not to mention a great villain. Stephen Amell deserves special praise for successfully portraying three characters, Oliver in the present, Oliver in the flashbacks as well as the Arrow. The writers also deserve praise for not going down cliche routes, there have been a number of times over the course of the show when I've expected something cliche to happen only for them to do something better or unexpected. My only criticism of season 2 is that at times it felt like there were maybe too many characters and some were being neglected as a result but that has improved as the season went on. The first episode of season 3 was good although it had to fit a lot in.

The first episode of the Flash (which is in the same tv universe as Arrow) was good, I like Grant Gustin as Barry, hopefully the side characters will be more developed as the show goes on. The special effects are decent but obviously not as good as a high budget movie. My only criticism is that it packs a lot in so it seems a bit rushed but its good to get the origin out of the way and the tease at the end of the episode is very interesting indeed.

If three superhero shows a week wasn't enough we also have Gotham (and Constantine though I haven't watched it yet and its only available on amazon instant in the UK). To be honest I was very skeptical about this show, a Batman prequel, not connected to the Arrowverse nor a prequel to Ben Affleck's Batman, not to mention hearing about all the villains that were apparently going to show up before Batman even existed. That said I've quite enjoyed watching it so far, its not amazing or anything. It could do with being a bit more subtle for one thing (yes we get it Bruce will one day become Batman, Selina will become Catwoman etc.) but it is a decent start and it will be interesting to see if it improves with time. 

Where's Jim's moustache?

I also want to praise two animated shows, Young Justice and Spectacular Spider-man, two great shows that were cancelled after their second seasons for stupid reasons and from what I've seen are miles better than the current Marvel and DC cartoons. Spectacular Spider-man although it looks a bit childish is actually a very good modern take on the Spider-man story. It was cancelled because the animated rights reverted back to Marvel from Sony who replaced it with the awful Ultimate Spider-man which is nothing like the comic of the same name. Young Justice is set in a world where the Justice League have been around for quite a while and are well established. The show focuses on a group of sidekicks who are not ready to join the League yet but who want to form their own team and go on missions. Do not let the fact that the show is focused on a team of sidekicks dissuade you from watching it as it is amazing. There is great action, drama, tragedy, comedy, there are appearances from a vast range of DC characters both good and bad, there are androids, aliens, clones, betrayals, double agents and time travel, not to mention strong female characters which made the show popular with girls as well. Apparently they base a show's success on toy sales and apparently girls don't buy toys, and this was one of the reasons they cancelled it, it wasn't the fact that they put it on at weird times, had large gaps between episodes or that the toys/merchandise for the show was mostly rubbish. There have been social media campaigns to bring it back but it doesn't look likely we will get a third and final season, the writers must have thought they would since the final episode of season 2 sets up the story for a third season. I still highly recommend it though and I hope even if it does remain cancelled that they take inspiration from it for their movie universe as it does so many things very well.

How was this replaced by Teen Titans Go?!

PhD

Apologies, I know it has been over a month since my last update but I've been a lot busier now that I've started my PhD. Its been rather strange getting into a regular routine after not having one for so long, have to say I haven't been enjoying having to get up so early. I haven't really done much lab work yet its been mostly reading and refreshing my memory on the theory behind the stuff I'm working on. I've also had to spend a fair bit of time at induction/introduction seminars  as well as a training course for being a practical demonstrator. Basically PhD students are expected to help out with undergraduate practicals. The lecturer is in charge and he or she goes through what the students are meant to be doing and then the demonstrators go around the room and help anyone who needs it during the practical. We get paid for it which is great and we get paid extra if we have to do marking on top the practical. I'm glad I'm only scheduled for one a week though as they are quite draining and they can last up slightly over 3 hours or longer if you are marking so you have less time for other work.

I had my first practical demonstrating session last week. It was rather surreal as I did the exact same practical in the first year of my degree. The lecturer did things a bit differently in that he assigned each of us to a group of students. It was a bit awkward at first, obviously they were nervous as it was their first practical and I was nervous as it was my first time demonstrating but once things got started it was fine. I did have to repeat myself a few times as they weren't used to me and maybe didn't understand me that clearly, I also had to ask them to repeat some of their questions as it can get quite noisy during a practical.  It was an introduction to microscopes practical and to be honest I hadn't used a microscope since the second year of my degree, that said I think a bit of muscle memory kicked in and I was able to help them find what they were meant to be looking at on the microscope slides and answer their questions. I also got my first taste of marking which was interesting. I had my second session this week, it was a different lecturer who just let the students sit wherever they wanted which was slightly annoying as it meant you were dealing with a lot of different students. I got the impression that some of them were reluctant to get help from me, they'd look uncertain but after I walk past they'd put their hand up and get help from one of the other demonstrators, which is a bit disappointing. Despite this I do think it has been a good experience for me so far and hopefully over time they will see that I'm happy and able to help.

Thanks for reading.

How do I use one of these again?

Mallorca, movies and music

Well I can hardly complain about my summer being boring.. I went on holiday to Mallorca with my family for 12 days. The weather was glorious, very hot but with a bit of a breeze. Our apartment whilst a bit smaller and with lots more people around it than previous years was very nice. We had our own private garden for sun lounging and there was a large shared pool just a few steps away. I thought the food was a lot better than last year, though I think the meal I maybe enjoyed most was the barbeque we had in our own patio/garden. It was a very lazy holiday but it was nice to just relax and not have to think about anything really, of course I read through a lot of books as I usually do on holiday. The travelling both to and from was fine apart from having to get up at 4am to get our flight there but it meant we arrived early in the day and not at night which is often confusing and not that nice. We were also able to fly back early on our last day which was fantastic as unlike other years we didn’t have to hang about and change appartments etc.

After going for long periods without really going to the cinema I've been four times in recent weeks. The first movie I saw was Dawn of the planet of the apes. I really enjoyed the first movie and the second is definitely bigger and arguably better. The cgi/motioncapture for the apes is amazing, they look so real. The actors who portrayed them definitely deserve major props especially Andy Serkis and Toby Kebbel. There is plenty of action but there is also some quieter moments which is good.

Hail Cesar!

The second film I saw was the Inbetweeners 2. For those outside of the UK who do not know, the inbetweeners started off originally as a TV show following the exploits of four teenagers who aren't nerds but who aren't popular either hence the name inbetweeners. The TV show was three seasons (6 episodes each season).  It is a very funny show but also rather crude with many very awkward moments. I had enjoyed the first movie and I can say the same about the second. Its very crude and I wouldn't watch it with my parents but it made me laugh out loud. Its not perfect but if you like the show its definitely worth a watch.

I also saw Guardians of the galaxy, the latest film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Unlike the Avengers they aren't exactly well known outside of comic book fans and even then they aren't that well known so it seems like Marvel took a risk making this movie. Thankfully the risk has paid off. Granted it feels a bit strange to go from Captain America: The Winter Soldier to this and there is some needed exposition at the start but you soon understand who's who and what's happening. It quickly becomes clear that this is quite a quirky film, a bit different from other comic book movies. Its part space opera, part comic book movie part comedy. All the actors have been cast well and all have their moments. I have to admit I was a bit skeptical of Bradley Cooper and Vin Diesel being cast as Rocket and Groot but both do a great job. The soundtrack is full of  awesome songs from the 70s and 80s and is actually a part of the story.  Of course the action is fantastic as are the effects. My only criticism is that Marvel seem intent on sticking to the 2 hour length on these movies, this means that as with Thor: The Dark World the villain isn't quite as developed as he could be. Of course this is a small criticism for a movie which is very entertaining.

A female assassin, a talking racoon, a human renegade, a walking tree and a warrior walk into a bar... 

Most recently I saw Lucy starring Scarlet Johansson. It is simillar to Limitless that it is based on the premise that we only use 10% of our brains (this is wrong). Its definitely not as grounded as Limitless so you have to suspend your disbelief but it is exciting and it looks great.

As well as seeing four movies recently, I've been to three concerts. The first was Biffy Clyro at Belsonic festival (a series of concerts held in Belfast). This was the fourth time I've seen them live and they were brilliant as always. The support acts were Little Matador the side group of Snow Patrol’s guitarist-Johnny McDaid. They are a lot heavier than Snow Patrol, they have some decent tunes. The main support was Twin Atlantic, they are often compared to Biffy but tbh I am not that fussed about them.

I also saw Queens Of The Stone Age for the second time, they were also playing Belsonic on a different night. I think I enjoyed them a bit more this time due to the better atmosphere, though have to admit I'm not mad about being in such energeic crowds. They were supported by The Minutes who were ok and Brody Dalle (QOTSA singer's wife) who was pretty good.

Note the people watching from the appartments

Finally I was at the first day of Tennants Vital 2014. For whatever reason there was only three bands this time around. The first was Go Wolf, a local band who sounded great but not many people there knew them. The second was Bastille who were put on a good show but I'm not sure I would go to one of their own concerts. The headliners were the Killers returning to Northern Ireland and this was the third time I've seen them now. It was the last date on their tour and they seemed to be having a great time and  so we did as well. They even did two Northern Irish covers, teenage kicks and brown eyed girl. I think I definitely enjoyed it a bit more than the last time I saw them.

Whilst Bastille were on, was a lot fuller by the time the Killers were on

Thanks for reading.

Reintroduction

I thought whilst doing the previous post that I should probably reintroduce myself since it has been several years since I started this blog. I also thought it was about time I shared some proper pictures of myself so people can see what I actually look like.

Out collecting leaf samples for my PhD

Hello, my name is James, I am 22 years old and I have Treacher Collins Syndrome. I have what I would consider a medium case of TCS in that I am affected by it and it is noticeable but it is not severe. I wear a bone conducting hearing aid in order to hear properly. Over my life I've had to have several operations such as to fix the hole in the roof of my mouth, a jaw distraction, insertion of a trach and feeding tube. (which was removed many many years ago) I currently live at home with my parents, my older brother and my cat and I'm about to start a 3 year PhD research project looking at the population genetics of native Irish trees.  My hobbies include playing guitar, playing video-games, watching tv, reading (books and graphic novels/comics) and football (both watching and playing). 

Malta

This me dressed up for my university graduation

This is me just before Tennants Vital 2012 standing in front of a poster

5000 views!

Well I've been thinking of doing this post for a while but I wanted to make sure I definitely had 5000 views since google/blogger seems to like signing me out and forgetting that I ticked the "do not track your own page views" option. It's hard to believe that I set this blog up over three years ago. I decided to set up a blog in the first place since I had started to look more into my condition including personal accounts/websites/blogs on the internet. I noticed that there weren't really many blogs out there especially not written by people of my age and those blogs/websites that were there hadn't been updated in quite a while. I guess I wanted (and still do) to raise awareness of TCS, hence why I did the reddit question and answer session a year ago. I hope I have and will continue to raise awareness not only that Treacher Collins Syndrome exists but that those who have it are people like everyone else with emotions, opinions, hobbies, friends, families etc.

Since I've started this blog I've had a number of people contact me about certain opportunities. I had a woman asking if I wanted to do a magazine interview sharing my life story in one of those tabloid magazines. I've also had someone ask me to essentially advertise their disability dating show for them hence doing their work which I refused. As I have stated before (I think) I'm not enabling ads on my blog  even though it would make me a bit of money so I'm not going to start doing someone else's advertising for them. Last year I was contacted by someone who was also working for a disability dating show possibly the same one and asked if I was single and if so would I be interested, I politely declined this offer as well. As much as I want to raise awareness I am not comfortable going on TV or doing an interview with some stranger, this blog lets me do things on my terms and at a pace of my choosing.

Thankfully it hasn't all been offers of dating shows and magazine interviews. Thanks to this blog I've become friends with someone with a lot of similarities and we have been able to share experiences. We also discovered that by coincidence our mums exchanged letters with each other when we were very young (my mum exchanged letters with other parents who had kids with TCS, obviously there was no Facebook in those days). I've also had some nice comments about my blog as well as some disagreeing with my opinions on things which is to be expected, it is the internet after all.

Whilst separate from my blog I think I should mention the Facebook group I set up-A group for people who have Treacher Collins Syndrome. It was the success and positive responses to this blog that gave me the confidence to set it up along with speaking with another person who has TCS about the groups that at that time existed on Facebook. It was on these groups that I first brought up the idea of setting up a group only for those who have it due to the large ratio of parents to people who actually have it posting. There was some definitely opposition to it, people didn't seem to like the idea of excluding parents/relatives etc. despite my reasoning that it would exist alongside those groups which do accept everybody. I decided to go ahead and in 2012 I set up the group, it now has 142 members and there have been numerous great discussions, debates and sharing of experiences. Granted it is sometimes frustrating being the admin of this group, despite having an explanation at the top of the group explaining that it is only for those who have it and providing a link to the main TCS group those who don't have it still join. This is frustrating especially when they do not say anything but don't remove themselves or they make a comment about how they know someone with TCS and ask for an exception to be made or for me to remove them from the group instead of them taking the two seconds to do it themselves. Still despite these minor frustrations I remain truly glad that I created this group and hope it continues to grow.

It's hard to believe that I've been writing this blog since 2011,  I am quite proud of it, hopefully I have raised awareness and maybe even challenged perceptions of people with TCS and similar conditions. Thank you to all those who have read my blog and will hopefully continue to do so, thank you to those who have shared it or commented on it and thanks especially to those people who encouraged me from the start. Here's to another 5000 views!

A strange year

Well due to all the graduation pictures I've seen on Facebook recently I've been reminded that its been a year since I myself graduated from university in fact its probably over a year now. Its hard to believe that so much time has passed/ Since my graduation I've volunteered in two different labs, decided that I wanted to apply for a PhD, did my first proper interview, was awarded the studentship and have been out doing fieldwork collecting samples for my PhD. Whilst I have been in the labs and out sampling, it has been very strange not having to go to lectures/classes or having do exams (though that's a very nice kind of strange). I still find it hard to believe that my degree is all over.

In terms of my fieldwork I've been to quite a few places across Northern Ireland so far and still have a lot to go. I have to collect individual leaves from trees for genetic analysis as well as recording their gps coordinates. The first two times we went out there were four of us and it was great, we got sites done on both days and I got my species collected and helped out collecting other peoples' species as well. Unfortunately the next time I went out there was only the two of us and a lot of species/samples to collect. It was three days in a row only one site each day. The first day was the worst, unfortunately it was a blazing hot day and it involved a lot of climbing up and down the side of a very steep hill through undergrowth. Of course due to the heat I didn't even think of putting a long sleeved shirt on but that meant that my arms ended up being scratched all over. It got worse when we ended up taking a wrong turn and climbed a very steep path up to the top of a hill which we then had to go back down again. Thankfully other people arrived to help out but I had to sit in the car for the final part of the day as I was so exhausted. The other two days were much better but still long and physically demanding, something I will have to get used to.

This was taken on my second day of sampling

View from the top of the very steep hill

In terms of other physical activity I went paintballing for the second time which was a lot of fun despite there only being six of us (see my previous post). My friend has also organised regular five a side football matches which are good fun and a great full body exercise. After not really playing any football during my degree after playing it most lunchtimes and in PE/games classes at my high school its been nice to play again. I recently took part in a charity football tournament along with my brother and some friends which was good fun. I do try and get out for a walk most days if I'm at home and the weather is good and I've also started going out on my bike to try and get fitter.

A picture I took on the beach near my house whilst out walking

 Its also been about a year since my last guitar lesson after I decided to take a break and to be honest whilst I know I still have a lot to learn, I haven't really missed them. I have just been enjoying messing about and having fun rather than feeling obligated to practice grade pieces or scales etc. I've attempted to teach myself some piano/keyboard but that definitely needs more work. I also had my first ever jam session with a friend and his friends which was a lot of fun. I have recorded various riffs and things but I should probably try and sit down and write a song properly.

So overall it has been a strange but good year. I've worked hard but I've also had much needed relaxation time after an intensive three year degree. I'm looking forward to the rest of the summer as well as seeing lots more of Northern Ireland collecting samples before I start my PhD properly.

Thanks for reading.

Belfast Comic Con

Well if you've read my blog before you probably know that I'm into superheroes and comic books etc. as are some of my friends. A few of us ended up going to comic con which was being held in Belfast for the first time. To be honest, it was a bit of a disappointment. We had gotten priority weekend tickets which were £20 each, given the name it means that we got in much quicker than those who were buying their tickets on the day. Despite being there after the doors were meant to open we ended up having to stand in the queue for quite a while, this on a day with heavy rain. We eventually made it in and we were immediately met with the sight of stalls selling stuff, it turned out that the majority of the space was given over to selling stuff. The problem was that in my opinion most of the stuff would be what I would call impulse purchases and you could see the exact same stuff being sold at different stalls which seemed a bit pointless. The rest of the con wasn't that great either, there were some special guests, none of them really interested me I only knew James Cosmo from GoT and the guy who played Winston Churchill in Doctor Who. That said even if I was interested I don't think I'd have bothered waiting in a long queue to pay £15 for an autograph and a few seconds talking to them. The "next-generation gaming" bit was just a few PS4s, the only games I saw people playing were Lego Hobbit or Fifa not exactly inspiring. There were some talks but we didn't go to any. Despite the name I barely saw any actual comics being sold, I think I saw one stall selling some but it was too awkward to see what was there due to how cramped it was, it was too small a venue for the event and it ended up being quite hot and uncomfortable. The comics village section had a number of comics/graphic novel artists selling completed work and commissions while I probably wouldn't have bought anything anyway it would've been nice if the artists had actually looked up or initiated conversation rather than just sitting there while we looked at their work.

I understand that its the first year and they maybe didn't realise how popular it would be but I wasn't impressed and didn't bother going back on the sunday, I think only one of our group did. It seemed like an exercise in making money, you pay to get in and then are immediately met with stalls of stuff to buy, as well as the cost of food and drink. A lot of the reviews on the official facebook page give it five stars because they had a fun time dressing up and seeing all the other people dressed up as famous characters. As much as that was cool and probably wouldn't have happened without comic con, the event itself was not up to scratch in my opinion. It is apparently returning next year but it would need to be much better in my opinion.

Thanks for reading.

Suphero madness-Part 2

People are probably fed up with me talking about superheroes but I love them and going by the amount of money the movies are making, so do a lot of people. Firstly I want to talk about Captain America: The Winter Soldier, probably my favorite film out of Marvel's phase 2. As with Thor: The Dark World it improves on the first film by a fair bit and as with all of the Marvel movies (i.e. those in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, not including X-men and Spider-man) it is action packed and humorous. Don't get me wrong these films are never going to get any serious awards other than for special effects but they are seriously entertaining and seem to appeal to all ages. One of the things I loved the most about it was seeing Cap's super soldier abilities portrayed a lot better than in the first film. The fight choreography in this movie is really well done especially the hand to hand combat. It is more of a small team movie than a solo movie but Scarlett Johansson is great once again as Black Widow and Anthony Mackie plays a great new character who becomes known as the hero Falcon.

Everyone was kung-fu fighting!

I think Marvel deserve credit for taking risks with their movie, apparently they had to take out a very large loan to finance the  Iron Man and The Incredible Hulk movies which started the movie universe, a risk that has certainly paid off. Iron Man was risky prospect as he wasn't exactly a well-known character before and he wasn't even that popular a character in the comics and now he’s probably a lot of people's favourite (though that is probably due to Robert Downey Junior). With all their success Marvel now have the confidence to release a Guardians of the Galaxy movie,  characters who aren't exactly well known even among comics fans and are pretty out there with a talking racoon and a tree dude as well as planning to release an ant man movie which sounds pretty ridiculous. This is in contrast to DC who have only released Batman and Superman movies (not exactly a risk due to the popularity of the characters) as well as the one Green Lantern movie which was a disaster and of course the awful Catwoman movie. The Man of Steel sequel featuring Batman has been pushed back to 2016 so to put things in perspective we are getting a Guardians of the Galaxy movie before a movie featuring both Superman and Batman, before a Wonder Woman movie, before a Flash movie and before a Justice League movie which is pretty crazy. DC/Warner Brothers seem to be trying to add as many heroes as possible to the Batman and Superman movie, as well as Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman they've announced that Cyborg or at least Victor Stone before he becomes Cyborg will be in the movie. They've now officially announced that it is called Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, making it sound like it is definitely going to be a Justice League prequel/set-up. I hope they know what they are doing.

Ben Affleck does look pretty awesome as Batman, I like the new suit   based on the Dark Knight Returns.

Now those who have read my previous posts will know that I wasn't that fussed on The Amazing Spider-man. Thankfully TASM 2 improves on many of the things that were wrong with the first movie. I liked Andrew Garfield more in this one, he is less annoyingly awkward, and when he is Spidey he is actually funny rather than coming off as a douche as he did in the first film (he also has some funny moments as Peter). He is also much more of a hero in this movie who inspires people rather than a vigilante. The web swinging and acrobatics in this movie are much better as well, they tried to make it too grounded in the first film but I had a big grin on my face during the first scene with him as Spider-man swinging through New York. One of the best things about the movie is the Peter and Gwen relationship due to the great chemistry they have (probably helped by Andrew and Emma dating in real life) and its nice that Gwen isn't just a damsel in distress.  Overall the movie was a bit different than I expected from the trailers and in some parts scenes from the trailers weren't even in the movie which was pretty strange. Whilst it doesn't suffer like spider-man 3 from too many villains it does seem a bit rushed at times and I found the scene changes to be a bit choppy. I think I would actually remove some things from the movie to improve it as well as adding some things that were missing namely Peter's juggling act of being Spider-man with his other responsibilities that was done so well in the original Spider-man trilogy. It does seem to be setting up future movies and in some cases things didn't get as much time as they maybe needed to.  I do still wonder how Marvel would have done Spider-man if they had the rights and it makes me sad that in all likelihood we will never see him interact with Tony Stark or the other Avengers.

Evian have made a pretty cool advert to tie in to the movie, better than the American adverts I've seen which have various X-men advertising fast -food:

Most recently I watched X-men Days of Future Past, the seventh film in the X-men franchise, I’ve seen all of them apart from X-men Origins-Wolverine which is meant to be awful and doesn’t seem to be part of continuity any more.  This movie uses time travel to tie together the First Class prequel with the old X-men trilogy.  It’s pretty cool seeing the old and new cast in the same movie. It’s well-acted, it’s visually stunning, we get to see a wide range of mutant powers in great fight scenes and it manages to fix the mistakes made mainly in X-men 3.  Fox should be praised that they have stuck with the franchise rather than go down the reboot route even if the continuity is a bit unclear now.  They  made the bold choice of including Quicksilver a character who is also going to be appearing in Avengers: Age of Ultron , a different version played by a different actor (movie rights belong to both Fox and Marvel since he is both a mutant and a member of the Avengers). Despite his goofy outfit he is one of the highlights of the movie, it’s just a shame he doesn't get more screen time.  Overall it is a great movie despite some small niggles (one character having a new power that is never explained, the fact that another character simply being alive is never explained either and as I have mentioned the sometimes confusing continuity). It is definitely worth checking it out although if you haven’t seen the other films you may be a bit confused.

Apparently showing fictional characters eating food makes it more desirable

Thanks for reading!

Volume control

I have talked in the past about how I've upgraded from an analog to digital hearing aid and the quality definitely is better. I actually wore my analog one for paintball and noticed how different it was right up until the battery died and I had to spend the last two matches unable to hear my teammates telling me where the other team were! As much as the digital is an improvement it is not perfect. One thing I have struggled with is watching TV, obviously the trend with TVs now days is that they are very slim, the problem with this is that it means that their sound quality isn't as good. We ended up buying a surround sound system in the hope that it would be better. The system is great but unfortunately it doesn't solve the problem that many TV shows have which is that the dialogue isn't particularly clear. There was a lot of controversy  recently around the BBC's Jamaica  Inn program with the dialogue being impossible to understand. There is also the problem that many shows have such big difference in volume between dialogue and action. I love game of thrones and the dialogue is one of the main reasons, the problem is you have to turn the volume way up to hear the dialogue and then you have to turn it way down whenever it switches to a sword fight or people riding horses etc. I understand that action scenes will be louder than dialogue but there shouldn't be such a big difference. Its fine when everyone is in the room watching it and if its a bit loud its not a problem but when you are trying to watch a program by yourself it can be annoying for other people.

It seems like I've seen quite a lot of movies at the cinema already this year (Inside Llewyn Davis, The Grand Budapest Hotel, Dallas Buyers Club and Captain America: The Winter Soldier) without any problems but most recently I went to The Amazing Spider-man 2 and it was LOUD! I don't know if it was because we went to a cinema that I haven't been to in years or if it was just an overly loud movie but I could hear it perfectly with my hearing aid muted. It may have been a one off but the fact is movies do not need to be that loud!

I also mute my hearing aid at concerts and my brother wears ear plugs in order to protect our hearing. I get that live music is meant to be loud but it seems crazy that you have to wear ear plugs or risk tinnitus to see bands/artists live. Obviously at large venues or outdoor concerts it needs to be loud so everyone can hear it properly but I've been to some fairly small venues where I've felt that even with my hearing aid muted that I needed to move back as it was THAT loud. Probably the worst concert experience that I've had sound wise was seeing Modestep support Lostprophets (before everybody knew about their singer being a paedophile). I'm not sure if it was their fault or if the sound guy could have done more but every time the bass note hit it was like being vibrated like a tuning fork. It made for a most unpleasant experience. Live music should be loud but sometimes less is more, I just wonder how many people are going to suffer from hearing problems due to overly loud concerts.

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Success!

Well I found out that I've been awarded the PhD studentship. I'm very relieved that I got it after the hard work I've put in from getting experience in the labs to preparing for the interview and of course the interview itself which as I've said previously was my first proper interview. It's a weight off my shoulders now that I know what I'll be doing for the next three years. The official start isn't until the beginning of October but due to the fact I'm working on trees I will need to collect samples in the summer before the leaves start turning. It's going to be a lot of hard work but I'm looking forward to the challenge.

Interview

So last week I had my first ever proper interview, technically it wasn't a job interview it was an interview for a PhD studentship but it was my first experience of that sort of thing. I had taken part in mock interviews before, once in high school at a career day and once at university. The career day was a special day organised by the school where we came in dressed for a job interview (though of course I ended up being the only guy who didn't already have a suit and who didn't rush out to get one just for this one day) and then we were split into groups and assigned to a professional from the local area who interviewed each of us individually. I was in a group with two other girls, one who wanted to be a speech therapist (slightly ironic) and I'm not sure what the other one wanted to be, this was back when i wanted to be a vet. It went really well and I was complimented on how calm I was but that may have been because I knew it was a mock interview so I didn't feel under pressure. My mock interview at university did not go as well in fact it was pretty awful. In my defense my supervisor only let me know about it the day before and given that I had plenty else on my plate I didn't exactly prepare for it.

The interview I had on Tuesday was a bit different again since it was a four person panel. Along with the other references we let them know about my hearing and speech issues and whenever I was invited to interview they suggested bringing someone along. I ended up deciding that my mum would be the best person to bring, in my head I thought that she would be there just in case. I forgot due to people I know being used to me and being able to understand me for the majority of the time that I am hard to understand if you aren't used to me. This meant my confidence was knocked a bit whenever I started to answer the first question only to be stopped and told that they were struggling to understand me and asked could my mum help out. It ended up with my mum essentially "translating" everything I said. This meant that I didn't get as much across as I would have liked in the first section but thankfully I managed to recover and I think the rest of the interview went pretty well. It was a good experience and hopefully I will get the studentship but it makes me nervous about future interviews in terms of communication obviously I can't always or I won't always be allowed to bring my mum or another person in with me.

Quite a strange experience especially since it was my first time

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What a fun week!

Well last week was certainly fun, to start off with me and my brother went down to Dublin to see Fall Out Boy a band who I've wanted to see for a long time but they have never come to Northern Ireland. We drove down on the day but despite getting a bit lost we made it in plenty of time to get a bite to eat and get to the venue in plenty of time.The show was in the Olympia Theatre which was quite surprising as it isn't the biggest venue but it added to the atmosphere.  They sounded great that said I wasn't that fussed on Joe's (the lead guitarist) solo spot, would much rather they had played another song and just have him shred the same for the drummers solo spot. People love to hate them but they are definitely one of my favourite bands and I'm really glad I got to see them live.

This is a picture that the band got taken at the concert, me and my brother were at the back on the ground floor so you can't see us

The second thing I did last week which is now a weekly thing was play five a side football (soccer to my American readers). I've always been a fan of playing and watching football and its really nice playing again. I probably played football the majority of lunchtimes and a fair amount of break times at high school. The leisure centre we go to has eight separate artificial five a side pitches which are fantastic  and you don't have to worry about the ball going out unless you hit it really high. It's a great workout and its fairly cheap.

This is the type of pitch we play on

And finally on Sunday I went paintballing for the second time, my friend decided to organise an outing to the same place we went last time. Unfortunately a lot of people who said they would go changed their minds or dropped out at short notice so it ended up only being six of us. It still ended up being great fun and three vs three is still pretty intense. It is also a great workout but it can be quite painful, the place we go to lets you rent padding for your torso but I ended up getting shot mostly on my arms and legs and the paintballs can leave a mark. The place we go to is called Escarmouche and I highly recommend it if you want to go paintballing in Northern Ireland, I can't link to their site at the moment as it is down but I will whenever it is up again. They are really professional and a pleasure to deal with and the site they have is pretty epic with a number of game zones from simple open areas with tires for cover to larger ones with wooden huts and towers. We are planning to go back in a few weeks with a larger number of people hopefully.

Boom headshot!

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My gear

Hello just thought I would show you guys the various pieces of equipment that I use on a daily basis including my current hearing aid, old hearing aids I used to wear and my mic/radio system among other things.

This is my current hearing aid:

It's a bit sleeker than previous versions, also they have replaced the switch and volume scroller with buttons. The single button changes which mode it is in. It automatically turns on whenever the battery section is closed shut with a battery in it. One press of the button lets me use my mic system as well as all the normal sounds it picks up, A second press of the button mutes the hearing aid so I only get whatever is coming through the receiver hence allowing me to listen to music without all the background noise. A third press of the button mutes the hearing aid completely which is useful for loud places like concerts or bars. A fourth press causes it to go back to its original mode. The other button is for changing the volume, press up to increase the volume and down to decrease it but it only goes up/down so far. I do not know what the green stuff is, I think it is to do with moisture but nobody has said anything or made any comment when its been looked at or older ones have been sent for repair so presumably its not a problem. My mum makes the fabric band herself and it works really well and is a lot more comfortable than the rigid hair band things that they originally came on.

This is my most recent hearing aid before my current one:

It is analog and has different settings rather than different digital programs. It has three settings, off, middle setting (i.e. just the receiver) and normal hearing aid. It does not automatically turn on when the battery section it closed. Unlike the digital aid, the receiver has to be plugged into a "shoe" before it can be connected to the hearing aid.

Here is the shoe and receiver separate:

Here are the batteries I use:

Here is an old analog aid I have:

Here is my current microphone/radio system on the top and the old system that I used to use on the bottom:

As you can see my current one is a lot more complex, with a screen and options an always attached microphone, charged by usb etc. The old system is powered by one AA battery, it has an on off switch and you can change between a microphone cable and an audio cable for connecting with an mp3 etc.


Here is my alarm clock, along with the vibrating pad which goes under my pillow:

Here is the docking station for the system which I currently only use with the smoke alarm along with its own vibrating pad which also goes under my pillow:

Thanks for reading, hope you found it informative and interesting!

Superhero madness

As I've said before I've only gotten into comic books/graphic novels in recent years but I've been a fan of superhero movies since the first spider-man. The fact is now we are really spoilt for choice in terms of superhero movies with some people complaining that there are too many but I don't think this is the case, if people were tired of them they would stop going to the cinema to see them. Although the Avengers was great and it definitely deserved its success it has resulted in other studios seemingly rushing to create their own shared universes.

Marvel are still showing how everyone else it is done, they had a plan and they've stuck to it, Iron Man was basically unknown outside of the comics and yet it is one of the best Marvel movies to date and jump started phase one.  The Avengers movie was something that had never been done before, having a group of superheros who had each had featured in individual movies appear in one movie together and it was a huge success. We are already two movies into Phase 2 with Iron Man 3 and Thor: The Dark World. Captain America: The Winter soldier is up next and it looks great. Surprisingly Marvel have gone with Guardians of the Galaxy as their final movie before the Avengers 2, again they are a group that are virtually unknown outside of the comics. They are definitely a bit more out there with a tree alien and a talking racoon on the team but the first trailer has definitely gotten me excited for it. Personally I thought that some of the Phase 1 movies were missing something and Iron Man 2 was just ok but they were still great movies and they didn't exactly have much competition. I think Phase 2 has been pretty awesome so far. They've already announced that Ant-man will start Phase 3 again a character who isn't well known. In terms of TV well I haven't watched Agents of SHIELD in ages since channel 4 have decided to delay showing the second half of the season so UK viewers don't have to endure another gap later on...Its improved slightly but its still just ok. Marvel have also announced a bunch of netflix exclusive shows: Dardevil, Luke Cage, Iron Fist and Jessica Jones who will then team up in a Defenders series. This could be pretty awesome but netflix exclusivity is annoying.

Cosmic Avengers aka the Guardians of the Galaxy

DC on the other hand despite being Marvel's main "rival" have only just started to build a shared universe with Man of Steel. They were short sighted in that they let Nolan make a closed Batman trilogy (albeit a very successful one) which was a bit too grounded i.e. no killer croc, mr freeze, joker just wore makeup etc. so it wasn't exactly a world which you could imagine guys like superman and green lantern fitting in. Also they released the abomination that is Green Lantern, a movie with almost no redeeming qualities and one not fit to start or even be part of a shared movie universe. I really enjoyed Man of Steel and I think a lot of the criticism against it was groundless, especially with a lot of people seemingly unable to get over the fact that it was not like the Christopher Reeve movies, conveniently forgetting that Superman 3 and 4 weren't that great and Superman Returns tried to do the same thing and was poor. The problem is now they seem to be rushing with the sequel to Man of Steel not only featuring Batman but Wonder Woman and potentially other members of the Justice League as well. Instead of building up to a Justice League movie from individual movies they seem to be doing the opposite with this next movie apparently leading into a Justice League movie and then individual movies. They also seem to be going the unconvential route in terms of casting, of course Ben Affleck was not exactly a popular choice for Batman, then Gal Gadot who looks in need of a good square meal as Wonder Woman, most recently they've cast Jessie Eisenberg as Lex Luthor. He wouldn't exactly be my first choice for Lex I just hope he is a bit more complex than Kevin Spacey's Lex in Superman Returns who was just boring. DC are doing better on the TV side of things, Arrow season 2 has definitely been a step up from season 1. They have really ramped things up, it will be interesting to see if the Flash spin-off can be just as good.

"What do you mean I have to share my next movie with Batman and Wonder Woman?"

Now I previously made my dissatisfaction with the amazing spider-man clear but after watching it for a second time I enjoyed it slightly more but I still think it has a lot of things wrong with it. Unfortunately the trailer for the sequel doesn't excite me either, for one thing it looks to have too many bad guys, the effects don't look that great and the first trailer effectively spoils the plot of the movie which is rather annoying. Sony have already announced two more sequels as well as Venom and sinister six spin-offs, at least they are being slightly original by having a movie featuring a group of villains as the main characters. Frankly I'm annoyed at Sony for rushing the first amazing spider-man reboot rather than letting the movie rights revert to Marvel, on the other hand I'm annoyed at Marvel for ever selling the rights in the first place and/or not buying them back or doing a deal with Sony so that they could have Spider-man as part of the Marvel movie universe.

Doesn't look like a video game at all....

Marvel also sold the rights to X-men and Fantastic Four to Fox which I don't mind so much. I haven't seen the Wolverine or X-men origins:Wolverine (which is meant to be pretty bad) but I have seen all the other X-men films. The next film is called Days of Future Past and will combine the cast from X-men First Class and the old X-men trilogy which is pretty cool. People seem to think it is great that Bryan Singer is back to direct it but tbh I thought the first two X-men movies were just ok and he left to do Superman Returns resulting in a new director giving us the mess that was X-men 3. He also cast the actor who plays Cyclops in Superman Returns meaning that he had to be messily killed off in of X-men 3 despite being one of the main characters. Despite the fact that this next movie isn't even out yet they have already announced a sequel as well as adding the Fantastic Four into the X-men movie universe with their new reboot.

On one hand the sentinels look stupid, on the other it features Peter Dinklage of GoT fame rocking a handle bar mustache

It doesn't look like superhero movies/shows will go away anytime soon and I think its great that high profile actors are getting involved even in smaller roles though this is mainly noticeable with Marvel. Robert Redford is in Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Bradley Cooper is the voice of Rocket Racoon and Vin Diesel is the voice of Groot in GoTG and Michael Douglas will be in the Ant-man movie.

Is it too much to ask?

Right this is yet another bit of a rant about technology. I can't remember if I have talked about this before but since I take my hearing aid off at night I can't really use a conventional alarm clock instead I use one with a pad that vibrates under my pillow to wake me up. This is all fine and dandy and it works pretty well, the problem is that it is seemingly designed for people with poor vision as well. This means that it has quite a large screen to show the time(it looks like a conventional alarm clock but is connected by a cable to a round pad which goes under the pillow), this wouldn't bother me if not for the fact that it is extremely bright even on the dim setting. I've had to resort to putting it face down on my bedside table otherwise my room is partially lit up in a green glow that makes it hard to sleep. Just makes you wonder why nobody thought to install an off switch for the light.

An even more illogical piece of technology I've come across is a doorbell which is for deaf or partially deaf people....which makes no sound. Now I understand why that might make sense for someone who lives alone and who is deaf but for someone who lives with other people who aren't deaf then it is pretty stupid. I first found this out when we got a new smoke alarm which works normally but also is connected wirelessly to this remote device which is connected to another round pad under my bed. This means that if the smoke alarm goes off the pad should vibrate and wake me up. This system can also be connected to baby alarms and door bells which is how we found out that we couldn't get a dual function doorbell. The problem is that I can hear the doorbell fine when i'm awake and have my hearing aid on but if we got the doorbell then I or whoever is in the house would have to make sure to carry the remote thing around with them. Also I don't know what it is with these devices and stupidly bright lights but the holder for the device/remote has a light on it as well which makes sense as it shows you that it is connected properly but I've had to put a piece of blu-tack over it as it was so distracting.

Spock agrees with my assesment

No exams

For the past 5 years Christmas  has not been great for due to having exams in January, usually I would give myself 3 days off Christmas Eve, Christmas Day and Boxing day This year having finished university I was able to enjoy my Christmas properly without thinking that as soon as the 26th (or as it is known in the UK boxing day) was over I would be back spending my days in my room revising. I really can't understand why they think exams in January is a good idea, I would have much rather started university earlier in the year, done exams before Christmas and then had a proper break before starting the next semester. Last year I think I only had a few proper days off before starting the next semester due to the way my exams were scheduled.

As much as it has been nice to be off for a fair while it feels good to have an idea of what I want to do next. I ended up deciding that I would apply for a PhD with the supervisor of the lab I've worked in most recently. I've started work on the application and once it has been submitted I will also have to go to an interview which I'm nervous about. If you had told me before I started this degree that I would end up applying for a PhD in plant genetics I probably wouldn't have believed you but I've found it interesting. It's similar to my honours project work except on plants instead of fish, the supervisor seems a lot more helpful than my honours project one and the other people in the lab are great. I'm hoping that my application will be successful, I know the PhD will be a lot of hard work but I'm sure I can pull it off.

Wish me luck