Mark J. Brown

Continuing from my birthday post, I have decided to go over my past year. Not entirely of coarse, that would take ages, and some of it will stay where it belongs, in my head, or indeed  heart.

Several key events happened from the 22nd of July 2008 to the 22nd of July 2009. The first, obviously, been my 15th Birthday. It was a decent enough day starting with a game of football with my friends, and then a small party at my house. My nice shiny new EEE PC was my present, and we were playing around with it, most notably on MSN. (Compare to my 16th)

Things were on and off after that, I went on holiday visiting my Uncle in England, a semi-entertaining trip which the highlights were the local swimming pool and shopping centre. Butlins, in all seriousness, that place wasn’t justified by the £65 entry fee. But all in all a decent ending to a long summer which saw the transaction from 3rd year to 4th year, and the dawn of GCSE’s (Which I will be doing next year. Owies.).

4th year began slowly, mostly due to personal reasons. My school work wasn’t affected too badly, justified by a decent Christmas exam result.

(26/04/2012: I never finished this but have decided to publish it for old time’s sake. Mark)

Airsofting is one of my smaller, but enjoyable pass-times. It is a sport similar to paintball which your primary objective is to eliminate members of the opposing team with your gun.

My involvement is somewhat limited now, mostly due to a “slight” fault with my Airsoft gun. Ah, my gun, the amazing JG M4 CQB. A decent replica of the M4 Carbine, used by the US armed forces and British SAS alike. When I was airsofting on Monday, this fault became apparent. Here is the result of it:

Some assembly may be required.

No, I don’t have the number of the car that went over it. OK, OK, the picture was taken after I disassembled my gun. But the real problem was that the stock just snapped from the receiver. What? Oh, I mean it snapped in two. You can be fairly confident my future airsoft guns will be metal. My advice to kiddies: BB guns are fun, but never let your friend’s younger brother poke with it. And certainly never let him unscrew a screw which you later find out, the hard way, that holds two key parts of the gun together.

Yay! It was my birthday again on the Wednesday 22nd of July, I am writing this post 4 days later as I have had no access to a computer since.

I believe it is the 3rd post regarding my birthdays since this blog opened.

A lot has happened since I became 15, and I could go on for ages on it. But to summarise, I think it was a great year, it had as many ups as downs but that’s life. I threw a birthday party with my mates on the day, starting with football at 1 and then at my house, at 2.00, we had a BBQ. Cooked by yours truly. It was a success, with only 2 burgers burned and the semi-needed assistance of only one female comrade! We ate and got entertained by the likes of Guitar Hero and Call of Duty. It was the biggest party ever in our house, with around 15 people present- and it’s all on video.

After the party, I went down to Portrush (the local beach/seaside “resort”) with some of my friends and had a good time. I stayed for 3 days, swam in the sea, went to a “theme park” (Barrys amusements), ran around a kiddies water fountain display half naked, yep, I did it all.

That’s the best I can summarise my day.

To summarise the year would take much more. I might do a “Review of 15″ later, but for now it’s late on a Sunday and I value my sleep. Night all.

You heard me. Coldplay have released a free album on their website, which has a number of their best songs recorded live, all legal and free to download.
I’m listening now, and one thing is Coldplay are awesome live (unlike some other bands). Definitely a keepsake for the iPod.

One day, when I went to buy some music for my iPod, I saw that the iTunes Music Store had increased the price of some music to 99p. I felt like spitting on my computer monitor. Looks like the old promise, “79p songs, as always” has been killed stone dead.

Whatever is the reason Apple? Are you trying to force more to the pirate file sharing sites? It’s almost double the US price (99c), which equals about 59p per song over here!

Research discovered that apparently Apple are charging more for popular singles, and reducing the price on less popular singles, to “boost sales” and “bring better value”. I beg to differ. The only single I saw at 59p was the third or so track on the “Rick Astley – The Ultimate Collection” album.

So, after getting fed up with this rip-off service, I defected to the Amazon Music Store. It may not be as streamlined or as simple as the iTunes Music Store, but who can argue with 69p music and albums which are considerably cheaper than iTunes or CD in cases. As I am a fan of Christian music, I am pleased to see they have a wide selection of it. With over 2 million claimed songs online, Amazon is a worthy competitor and alternative to the iTunes music store. I think I’ll be staying for a while, at least until Apple wises up.