Axver (axver) wrote,

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Boredom, lawnmowers, U2, writing, school ... yeah, most of this is pretty much the usual.

I've complained about this before and I'll complain about it again: lawnmowers are hateful, loathsome devices that just shouldn't be allowed. Speaking of 'allowed', people, please, do not confuse 'allowed' with 'aloud', they are two very separate words with very different meanings. Some days I just want to give the entire world a dictionary ... speaking of that, Mum's taken mine and hasn't returned it. I hate it when people take my stuff and don't return it. But now I have my dictionary back. All is good in the world.

I'm so bored. Boredboredbored. Damn, I go back to school in two days; I'm not overly pleased about that. It's rather crept up on me. I can't believe that it's 2004 already. I've been thinking about how I'm going into my last year of high school, but now it's just hit me that it's just about to happen and yes, it really is late January, not that comfortable January 9 that I've been living with. I don't want to spend the last couple of days of holidays bored, but yet I'm actually happy just sitting here at my computer ... though people being online and good discussions on messageboards do help make things more interesting.

My father bugs and saddens me sometimes. If he can be called my father, that is.

Some say The Fly is the sound of four men cutting down The Joshua Tree. Others say it's Until The End Of The World. Others still say it's Achtung Baby. DON'T BELIEVE THE HYPE. The sound of four men cutting down The Joshua Tree is ... GONE. One of the best songs ever made. And even if anything from AB is the sound of four men cutting down The Joshua Tree, that doesn't mean Gone isn't either. It's such an awesome song. Whoever said Pop was incomplete? It's one of the best CDs ever made. Flogs the crap out of most of what's out there. How anyone could not love Gone is beyond me. This is the song that made me a fanatic. The Best Of 1990-2000 made me a fanatic, yes, but specifically this song. I fell in love with it. It's so flaming AWESOME. Here's my list of U2 songs that are candidates for the title of best song of all time, plus the winner.

Best song ever made: 11 O'clock Tick Tock
The rest;
- Gloria
- Sunday Bloody Sunday
- New Year's Day
- Surrender
- 40 (the ultimate closing song, there is absolutely no competition, and I'm not saying that out of U2 bias)
- A Sort Of Homecoming
- Pride (In The Name Of Love)
- Bad
- Where The Streets Have No Name
- With Or Without You
- I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For
- Bullet The Blue Sky
- Running To Stand Still
- One Tree Hill
- Heartland
- One
- Until The End Of The World
- Acrobat
- Love Is Blindness
- Stay (Faraway, So Close!)
- Mofo
- Last Night On Earth
- Gone
- Please
- Wake Up Dead Man
- Walk On
- Kite

I just rediscovered ATYCLB and The Hands That Built America. Let me just tell you all, Grace is a lovely song, not the throwaway song some make it out to be. And The Ground Beneath Her Feet is simply awesome and should've been on every copy of ATYCLB, not just the Australian, Japanese, and British copies.

One thing I'm concerned about this year is my writing. The reason I'm annoyed at myself for not doing much over the holidays is that going back to school cuts down my writing time and kills my creativity. That's also why I want a laptop - if I have one to carry around at school, I'll be able to work on it over lunch and everything will be good. I'll get a lot more writing done if I have a laptop. Then I could also go do writing at places I feel really inspired, like that beautiful park a few minutes from where I lived five years ago. Wow, has it been that long already? Time does fly. I just wish I could drive, because then I could head down there in the early evening, sit at the river junction, and just write and write and write. I remember one day I was down there, and it was so inspiring. I hope it's still the same, I haven't been there in so long. It's one of my favourite places on earth.

We're going to go and see how cheap we can get a laptop in a few days. An old secondhand one shouldn't be very much, all I want is to be able to write and play music on it. I can't write on paper, it's slower and there's no backspace, and I need music. It really helps to keep the intensity up. Heavy music during action scenes works so well, and never underestimate the power of a playlist full of performances of The Electric Co. and 11 O'clock Tick Tock. U2 better bring The Electric Co. back on the next tour because it's just so bloody awesome. Though I'm not sure Bono's voice still suits the "somebody cry" part any more ...

Somebody cry, somebody cry, somebody cry
Well somebody try, somebody try, somebody try something quick
Don't you look back, don't you look back, don't you look back
Well somebody cry, somebody cry, somebody cry
Well I can't see why or
What for!
What for!
What for!

It's just so angry and fired up, and Edge could still play the angry guitar to it, but I don't think Bono could do the vocals right any more. He's not a young, angry campaigner any more, he's a passionate, reasoned campaigner. But damn, The Electric Co. ruled in its day. I wish I'd been alive to see U2 in the early days. I wish I'd been at the concerts where, during Sunday Bloody Sunday, Bono would position the white flag so that he could climb from the stage, up it, to the upper deck of the theatre, and then sing - and dance! - on the balcony railing. I wish I'd been at the 4 November 1981 Berlin concert where people actually ran on stage during 11 O'clock Tick Tock and the band had no problem with it. I can wish.

--- 7:50pm ---

You know you live in Australia when the Person of the Year is a sporting star. Steve Waugh, the just-retired Australian cricket captain and sporting legend, won Australian of the Year. No real surprises there. This nation is obsessed with sport and cricket is the only true national sport, so it was to be expected.

Yeah, it was Australia Day today. I rather struggled to care, and indeed the fact of the matter didn't actually dawn on me until I put the cricket on this afternoon. Zimbabwe's currently doing a good job of losing to Australia; hopefully they'll stage a miraculous recovery and beat Australia on their national day, haha. But as I was saying, I wasn't that fussed about it being the national day, and when the Kiwi one rolls around soon, I won't be very fussed either. National days don't really interest me, it's just a good excuse to have a day off, or make the holidays slightly longer. If it weren't for Australia Day, I would've gone back tomorrow, but as it is, tomorrow's a pupil free day.

Hey deadlydenial, you know how I told you that Popmart was the third highest grossing tour in history but didn't have anything to prove it? Well, I was slightly off. Here's a quote from a guy on a U2 messageboard. I know it's not official, but there's some people there who spend a good deal of time studying charts and statistics and I trust what they say.

"Also, at 171 million dollars in total GROSS, POPMART is the 4th highest Grossing tour in history WORLDWIDE. Only the past 3 Rolling Stone Tours surpass it in total Gross Worldwide."

--- 10:06pm ---

Hooray, another 11 O'clock Tick Tock to add to the list, one I've been searching for for ages. Irving Plaza, 5 December 2000. It was the first time they played the song for over ten years (the last performance was on 10 January 1990 at Rotterdam). Squeeness.
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