I think I must be getting old.
Just put stuff on my wishlist for christmas.
It has 14 different loose leaf teas!
6 different tea caddies (Some of which come with tea! bonus!)
1 tea infuser (On top of the 2 that I bought today!)
And 1 tea scoop!


See, it's not all rock & roll!

I need to take a long hard look at myself! lol

EDIT - Erm, I've just added another 9 different teas and another tea scoop. Must... Put... Laptop... Down

What's it all about?
We spend our lives in a bubble.
We go out to our jobs, we come home from work, we veg out.
At the weekend we may go for a few drinks with mates.

You know, when I started working here back in March I thought I was the luckiest man alive. Here's me, a long haired hippy kid who got dragged up on the wrong side of town, being taken in to work in Switzerland!
I may put on a happy facade when I get back home, but it's not all fun.
Far from it!
There's times I'm over here when I feel low as hell.
Sat at a computer coding shit and designing shit for sometimes over 12 hours a day all week.
Then I pick up my music collection and headphones on a Friday and it's off across Switzerland to DJ for the weekend.

I may have told this story, but please, hear me out...
I remember back in late February. I was fed up with DJing. Fed up to the point where after a gig I would do nothing but moan and cry all the way home, much to my girlfriends pleasure /sarcasm.
It got to the point where I had a heart to heart with a friend one weekend and I made a promise to myself, and him… I'm getting out of the business, and getting a 9-5 job.
I went and woke my girlfriend up (this was probably about 4:30am) and told her all this. She said she would support me in whatever my decisions, but to not make any choices until I had auditioned over here in Switzerland.
Well, I came, I played, I conquered!
The time away abroad and the money persuaded me to take the offer.

So that's why we do it!
MONEY!
Does it matter that we make ourselves unhappy for it?
Does it matter that we put ourselves in a situation where we spend most of the week away from our partners?
Does it matter that we physically and mentally exhaust ourselves for it?

In my eyes it does!
The way I feel right this second I want to pack it in over here.
I know that would be stupid because I need the money. There it is again! MONEY!
Why do I need the money?
Well my and Laura are trying to save for a place of our own and a wedding. And the money over here is GOOD!

But does it matter that I put myself through this?
I have problems.
I have issues.
Confidence issues mostly.
Which then manifest themselves in different ways. Ways that I don't like.
Paranoia being the main one.
Paranoia that I'm not a good enough partner for Laura.
Paranoia that people are actually just stringing me along.
Paranoia that Laura will meet someone else whilst I'm out here.
I guess that stems down to my fear of being alone as well.

Last week sometime (well, the night I made my last blog post here) was another low day, but after pouring my heart out to Laura over Skype and email about all my issues and shit I've been fine.
Today though?
Back to square one!
And it's getting worse as the day goes on.

I can't wait to pack up my gear in the morning and get the train to Basel so I can chill out for a couple of days on my own in my apartment there before coming home on Sunday.

We keep telling ourselves we can make a difference to our lives and the lives of those around us. What is everyone doing about it though? I know for a fact I'm putting myself through hell to make a difference!

There's gonna be some major changes to my life from 1st October. For the better hopefully. No smoking, less drinking, and a mostly vegetarian diet. I need to get fit again!
Lol
I like how I wrote the word again at the end of that last sentence, like I've EVER been fit!

Oh well, I'm starting to ramble, so I'm just gonna leave now and go sulk. Looking at my laptop screen, looking at my iPad screen, looking at my phone screen, just waiting, and waiting…
What for?
Well, who knows!

xx

So that's the work trip almost over. I'm back in the uk, and about half an hour away from my final destination on the train. Spent the majority of the day travelling around, and all of it sitting around.
You never really realise how tiring it is just being sat on your arse until you spend the day doing it.

Nothing much exciting happened in the last week or so, except working on paperwork and programming all hours god sends!
Well I say nothing exciting, but I'm now a legend around Basel for willingly getting sprayed in the eyes with pepper spray and videoing it lol. And I met someone who djed on radio Caroline and radio Veronica. Was a fun time. Sad to say goodbye this morning

Won't be back for 3 weeks now

Ho well, must plod along. Gonna have a night out in brew dog with a few mates
Sadly, due to work and/or hobnobbing arrangements I can't go out to have fun until Monday night

It's a hard life lol

I decided against going back to media markt yesterday and claiming my iPad was scratched when I unpacked it. Mainly because they were closed lol. 
I went there this morning and bought a groovy red back cover plate for it which matches the smart cover on the front. The scratch will serve as a constant reminder of my idiocy and carelessness. 

I also bought myself yet another external hard drive! Mainly because the one I bought specifically for over here, I left at home
I have my main 1TB DJ drive, which has less than 2GB storage space left, and to be fair, in a country where BitTorrent and usenet is legal, I think I may need more storage space! Plus, I've just unpacked it, I realised it was a USB3.0 device, but I never realised that USB3.0 was a different shape! USB1.0 and USB2.0 were exactly the same. Why change it now?

Spoke to the wife for a bit yesterday afternoon. Was good. Was nice to speak to someone
Like I say, I don't get much conversation over here, what with me not even speaking basic schoolboy German anymore
Good thing is though that I'm gonna be learning it, well, I've already started, but there's not many times that "he is eating a sandwich" or "the girl is drinking milk" crops up in conversation to be fair!

What the fucks up with the weather? Was out shopping about 10/15 minutes ago and it was glorious. Was sweating my tits off in my big jacket, so to come across the road from my apartment to the club I left my jacket, now it's raining!

Hope everyone is fine and dandy. 

I can't wait for the Internet to be connected up in my apartment. Should be on this week I think. That'll save me going over to the night club and sitting in there all hours just so I have Internet access whilst I'm working on stuff!

Just looked at the packaging the back cover plate for my ipad came in... "scratch resistant coating. Featuring our revolutionary ultra durable scratch resistant coating, your coverbuddy will continue to look great day after day"
Yea, I bet I scratch the fucker by the end of the day!
I seem to have this knack with stuff like that!

Anyway, I'm gonna shut up now. Speak to y'all soon 

Jeffaz

So, that's another weekend DJing here in Basel over.

Nothing really exciting has happened since my last blog. That I remember

Wednesday, arrived here. Was possibly the scariest landing ever. Loads and loads of turbulence during the decent
Went straight to the club. Sat there till god know what time drinking beer, then left and went to the bar 2 down from my apartment, which is open till 10:30 the next day (I love Switzerland lol) I sat there and drank an obscene amount of Jack Daniels

Thursday was spent in bed till late afternoon, at which point I decided to go and sort out my Swiss phone. I went to the phone shop opposite my apartment. It's weird, as you go in there's a computer screen displaying something in German (which I know very very little) and it turns out that you press the screen and take a numbered ticket. This shop runs on a more advanced,but similar idea to all deli counters in supermarkets around the world lol
I stood for 40-45 minutes waiting to be served, at which point I was told I needed I.d. So had to return to my apartment for it then back to the shop. Probably a 3 minute trip... I had to que again! 20 minutes at least this time!
Went over to the club for a few drinks and charge my phone I was gonna use for my Swiss number. Turns out the bastard is sim locked to a network back home in England can't get it unlocked plan of action instead? Get drunk!

Friday I had to do a bit of shopping for cablage and other techy things. Whilst I was in the shop they had a huge basket of old nokia phones for 5 Swiss francs. And it came with 5 francs credit on it lol. Thought "ah, I'll just put the sim card in I bought yesterday, with 20 francs on it"
So I stand in the que for 10 minutes only to be told I need to go to another department to register the phone. Bloody Swiss! Annoyingly the phone was another network to the sim card I bought on Thursday, but I'm so desperate that I decided to buy it anyway. At which point I'm told I can't as "the lady who deals with the sunrise network is not in for another hour!" AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGHHHHH!!!!!
I gave in and decided to go and get myself ready for work
I DJ in the club from 10pm-5am. Long by the standards I'm used to back home, but it's just so much better in every way! Atmosphere, customers, less pissheads, intact NO pissheads! The Swiss may take a while to get warmed to the idea of a party (even when out drinking) but hey, once they do, it's incredible!
Friday, out of all the gigs I've done here was the best night I've had here yet

Saturday? Went out and bought myself an iPad
Then spent the rest of the day in bed mostly. 
Popped over to the club about 7pm to get a few things sorted and install a few apps on my iPad. I'm quite annoyed about this bit... There's the tiniest of teeny tiny screws sticking up in the DJ booth. In less than 24 hours, I have a huge scratch on the back of my brand new iPad
Which incidentally isn't as bad as all the scratches on the base of my MacBook Pro :,(,,
Last night some football club here in Switzerland won some kind of cup (I'm not big on English football and know nothing, I know less about European football lol) the team and a lot of fans turned up to the club last night with the cup and partied all night. 
Despite hating football, I felt the need to take a photo of a player with the cup lol
But even worse than that, I completely sold out and got my photo taken with 2 of the players and the cup lol
Anyway, you know how I said Friday was the best night I've had here? Scrap that! Saturday was an absolute belter! Truly an amazing night!
But it gets better, not only was I amazed at the party that happened and the fun that was in the club... The managers were amazed as well at the end of the night... Last night was the MOST the bar has taken in a hell of a long time, and without going into figures in detail, we took over FOUR TIMES that which we took on Friday night! I'd like to think I had a part in that, being the DJ

That brings me to Sunday. It's currently 14:05 and I'm sat wrapped up in bed writing this. Annoyingly I don't have the Internet here till later in the week, so I'm going to have to either go across the road to the Irish bar and upload this (plus it would be rude not to have a gorgeous cooked breakfast lol) or pop over to the club I work in and upload it there, downloading loads of stuff as well
Don't think I could manage a full cooked breakfast at the minute though, as annoyingly I ate a huge kebab when I rolled in at 7am this morning. Kebabs here are to die for!

I'm not DJing now till Friday. May be heading over to Lucerne for a few days

Anyway, I truly have waffled on. I'm sorry. I blame the fact that I'm here in Switzerland and don't really get to have full on conversations with people in English lol

If you're still awake, well done!

Speak to you all soon

My life has changed a hell of a lot since I've been away from this site.

Some bits for the good.
Some bits for the bad.
Some bits kind of indifferent.

Back at the beginning of March I got pretty pissed off with everything and was ready to jack in DJing and get a real 9-5 job (Yea, that's how pissed off I was lol) I had been booked to play 2 nights in Switzerland and decided that after I got back, I would give my local residency 2 weeks, then that was it!
Anyway, to cut a long story short, I went over to Switzerland with the wife, fell in love with the place, and I'm now resident geek and DJ for the club I played! I spend half my time over there DJing! The money is way better than over here in England so it has taken a bit of pressure off me for the time being. I really enjoy DJing over in Switzerland as well
The drinking culture over there makes it a hell of a lot more pleasant than DJing here in England!

Near the end of April I lost my dog
We had to get her put down sadly.
She was a good age though - 12!
She had something similar to a stroke when me and Laura went away for 4 days to see Steel Panther. Initially we just thought she was in a huff with me as we had been away to Switzerland for nearly 2 weeks, came home for 2 nights, then went away again for 4 nights.
She spent 3 nights in doggy hospital, but was never really the same when she came back out
I think getting her put down was possibly the hardest and most upsetting thing I've ever done. It was for the best though. We buried her up at Laura's mam & dad's holiday cottage in the garden. It's way out in the country overlooking the cheviot hills, she loved it up there.



Anyway, I haven't really got time to sit around blethering on
I need to get packed, as I'm leaving for Switzerland in a couple of hours.
Makes it a long day
Leave the house at 8:30am
Travel up to Edinburgh by train
Waste a few hours in Edinburgh/the airport
Leave Edinburgh 14:50
Arrive in Basel 18:00ish
Bus into town
Walk to my apartment
Crash out
Go for beers

Anyway, I'm off for a smoke
Speak to you all soon

Think that's people replied to that need to be replied to.
Sorry if you had sent me a message in my absence and I've missed you

Sat here with my Macbook Pro on my lap and a huge glass of gin balanced on it

Still so much to do before bed... Maybe I shouldn't have wasted the past few hours on here, ho well!