I hate to be the bearer of bad news but unfrotunately my girlfriend and myself are no more. It was a long distance thing and it was tough but due to the fact I couldn't see much of her, Ashley decided to terminate us as of yesterday...via facebook!

Now personally, I would have preferred it if she actually had the guts to ring me or even text me (I can't believe I'm saying that!) but that's the way it goes, then so be it.

I'd be lying if I said I wasn't hurt by this and to be honest she just didn't understand the fact that I was living on my own, not with my parents so I have to get things done on my weekends otherwise everything caves in. You could argue that I'm still adjusting to being on my own and I haven't found it easy. Thus I couldn't just drop anything to go and see her on a whim. It would be a 220 mile round trip and I don't have a car which could sustain prolonged periods of driving without blowing up! She still lives with her parents and has never lived away from home which is why I'm just ignoring the fact that she can't contemplate how tougher the world is when you're on your own.

The note she sent me was more like an essay, detailing all the points she didn't like about me, basically trying to make me feel guilty that she hadn't seen me. To put it in perspective, she doesn't have a job and thus no commitment to where she is and accusing me of not having time to see her is just puerile. I would if I could, but that just wasn't feasible.

Well anyways, I gave it a lot of thought last night and to avoid the inevitable hassle I decided to delete her from my facebook and myspace accounts. This is the way I've decided to walk away and to reiterate, it was her idea for us to go our separate ways.

What I wasn't expecting is an email, degrading my level of maturity for deleting her and of course the obligatory cheap shot of "I thought you were better than this, I guess I was wrong" was unneccesary. Surely an attack on my maturity is a bit rich coming from someone who unleashed an arsenal of insults upon my character and integrity is hardly someone who questions my maturity!

I think I've done the right thing by trying to achieve a clean break, after all xmas is round the corner and the last thing I need is an ex telling me what a loser I am. My question to all of you who have taken the time to read this is, is trying to get a clean break the mature thing to do? I think it is but I need to gauge other people's perspectives before I decide in my head whether I've been a numpty about this.

Thanks again,

Liam

Hi All,

Today's motion which is making me mad is one which shocked me last week. An old friend (lets call her friend X) whom I have not been in contact with in a long time, sent me a very nasty text message on tuesday night. Fortunately I have a very understanding girlfriend who took the best part of three hours to stop me going on a sledgehammer rampage! Anyways the history behind this message is that this was a girl I was good friends with but unfortunately sided with my former best friend when me and him went our separate ways. I basically didn't like the fact that he manipulates people by telling them what they want to hear and uses them as puppets for his sick enjoyment. Basically a year on, he's still slandering me and now he's using her (friend X) to do his dirty work methinks. Well without further ado, here's the content of the message:

"Liam just heard about that delightful blog you wrote on myspace... Grow up and move on with your life you sad little boy! And next time you gutless pr*ck say it to my face! It's really sad that you have to carry on bitching after a year... And next time jen snook shows me a picture of your small p*nis expect it in your myspace blog!"

Now there's something very wrong with that in the first instance....no such blog existed! Feel free to look at my myspace blog (www.myspace.com/synyster_graves) as there is nothing written about her whatsoever. I can't understand why provoked her to say that but certainly that's not the vocabulary or the attitude acceptable for a 19 year old girl who's training to be a teacher! The fact that she said she heard about it implies she hasn't actually seen it, so she's shooting from the hip about something that she has no proof of as it simply never existed! I'm one of those people who would say something to someone's face if I had a problem and such an attack on my integrity is simply not on. Those of you who know me on here know I'm an honest person and being spoken to like that is completely out of order.

My question to everyone who reads it is should I just ignore it, after all she is still an immature teenager who is still being influenced by a manipulative loser, or should I not let this go quietly and set her straight despite the fact I know she wouldn't listen?

Any comments would be greatly appreciated.

End of rant.

Last night I was at the pub quiz with my friends. I like to do this on wednesday nights as it's a good change from just sitting around a pub talking about crap. Now most of you who know me understand that I'm quite a competitive character, there's no denying that. However, I did have an altercation with my friend Simone over one of the answers. It's not the fact that we had differing answers to the question, it was the fact that she proclaimed that if we had got it right, we had to "kiss her arse" I quote. Well I'm sorry but I lost my temper. The way I see it in a quiz team is it doesn't matter who gets it right, the team as a whole achieve something. Everytime we get a football question, the paper is passed to me and I certainly don't seek some form of immense gratitude if I get it right, this is the reason I got angry.

Anyways, I did retorted after being told to kiss her arse that it's a team effort and I certainly don't expect people to kow-tow to me if I get something right. Seems like a fair retort to being commanded doesn't it? Well Simone used the waterworks technique and stormed out and sat in her car. I let her cool off for about five minutes before going outside to see if she was ok.

Well she was still in floods of tears and even after I apologised for making her cry (of which I feel she overreacted) I was lambasted because she said that because she's a woman, I can't shout at her and I'm not allowed to get angry with her. Apparently I also launched a personal attack on her which was designed to embarrass her. Um no. This really wound me up further for several reasons:

1. Just because she's a woman, it irrespective whether I raise my voice or not. It doesn't matter on gender, creed, colour or favourite pokemon, you can't say "I can't stand up to her because she's female". The whole "I'm a weak defenceless woman" act doesn't work with me because everyone is equal. I don't classify my friends as male, female, tall, short, etc...
2. Turning on the waterworks in order to get attention is pathetic. I know from hanging out with us that she isn't the sort to cry at the drop of a hat. However I know she is an attention grabber. For this reason I fail to have any sympathy towards someone who uses such methods to attain people's attention.
3. If I wanted to launch a personal attack, I certainly would have been a lot more evil and nasty. But I didn't. I just stated the facts and some people seem to use to "meek and mild" card as a get out clause.
   

My point is that just because she's female, does that mean she can dish me a load of crap and I can't retaliate because of her gender? Maybe its because my best friend Gemma and my sister are both females who will stand up for themselves and not resort to tears to get their own way. I personally don't see women as this callow and yielding gender, and for that reason I certainly don't pussy foot around so I don't upset anyone because what I said certainly was fair and equal.

My question is, was I being harsh?

It's me again, probably throwing more stuff up on here which makes me mad, because lets face it, what's the point of sitting back and watching everything get the better of you?

Today's subject is something that I have fallen foul of several times, especially in the last half a year. It's about people who masquerade as your close friends, yet their real agenda does not involve anyone's best interests except their own. Many of my real mates have always said to me that karma will bite them in the proverbial backside sooner or later but sometimes I struggle to see that.

If I think about what my life was like a year ago, I had two friends in tow of which I shared a lot of things with, you know, the sort of friends who practically constitute being referred to as family. Well they say your true colours emerge eventually, I just never saw it coming. So here are the two case studies that justify why I find it hard to trust most people now:

Case I: N*** (mates with Liam, Sept 2001 - Sept 2006)
We were the best of friends for five years. We did everything together and always stuck by each other, that's what I thought. The truth is that I was his friend/taxi driver for all those five years and he only got hold of me whenever it suited him. For five years I was his lapdog in essence and I was so oblivious to the situation that I just followed willingly and blindly. The turning point was when I caught wind of his many double standards. The story is he was seeing this girl at the start of 2006. She was great, really nice girl and I became really good friends with her. When they broke up he told me that under no circumstance was I to talk to her, had to delete her number and had to delete her from MSN. Out of respect for my friend, I duly obliged. When the roles were reversed, i.e. the girl I was seeing (whom I really fell for) went wrong, did he do the same? Nope. He in fact got even more chummy with her and he knew full well how I felt about her because I confided in him. When I confronted him about it he demanded an apology off me, saying I should regard his judgement all the time. Well I didn't want to kick off about it so I did what I usually did and took him out to the pub with the rest of my friends. He ignored us all evening, played on his phone the whole night and babbled some shit about being a helicopter pilot. When I dropped him off he jumped out the car before I'd even stopped. I decided then that if he wanted me, he'd have to get in contact with me first. That was last september, I'm still waiting....and he still owes me £30 for the holiday we went on last year. So he managed to get a free holiday out of it... Half the people I was friends with now don't talk to me anymore because he's turned them all against me all because I won't let him use me anymore. Now he's left surrounded with people who suck up to him because he's fiendishly good at telling people what they want to hear. I can't stand people like that. I do get frustrated that me and only a few others can see what he's really like. Everyone else falls for his insincere flattery, and I just wish he'd get his come uppance.

Case II: P****** (mates with Liam, Sept 2002 - August 2005, July 2006 - February 2007)
I had a friend whom I worked with at Tesco. He was a little bit slow but still we shared the same goofy sense of humour. At work however he was picked on by the rest of the lads. I defended him and told them to leave him alone. Many people couldn't stand him but I'd convinced everyone that he was alright and to give him a chance. He was another friend I realyl considered close to so much to that fact that I shared lots of private stuff with him. In the summer of 2005, he went and told all my other mates on who went to Tenerife that I'd been mouthing off about all their debauched exploits whilst they were on holiday. I didn't know any details so why he tried to villify me is anyone's guess. I left him to it for about a year but we let by gones be by gones and I got back in constant contact in the following July. This was his last chance I thought. Last february I broke with a girl called Lesley. She was nice but it kinda went wrong and I was left gutted that despite me treating really well for the three weeks we were together, she'd found someone else. I found out two weeks later that person was my friend, who told me via email to repsect him for telling me they were already a couple and I should understand with immenent effect. That was the last straw. Someone whom I had protected and shielded from ridicule can turn around and do that to me? I couldn't take it. I want nothing more to do with him.
The worst part is it was him who told me to leave it and not try and keep her in my life, when the whole time it was him she was seeing.

The word friend to me has become diluted now and the friends I'm with now are the one's I'm sticking with. I consider myself a loyal friend but time and time again I've been walked all over. It hurts more when it's people you trust and they majorly let you down. Since both of these idiots have walked out my life, I've felt so much better. I can smile again. But I won't want anything more to do with these two as long as I draw breath.

End of rant.

This is a bizzarre phenomenon I've always thought. I was watching some program a while back going on about obesity in kids. They seem to blame the foods they give them at schools according to report. This got me thinking, what was so different in the diet I had at school ot now? Nothing! If anything there's probably less "E-numbers" in their food than when I was at school.

Now don't get me wrong, I'm quite thin (not sickly thin, just toned-ish without being particularly big) and I ate all the rubbish like "Top Secrets" (remember them?), Smarties and those grotesquely unhealthy iced buns. Not to mention the extravagantly coloured "Panda Pops" which masqueraded as refreshment, when the amount of chemicals inside them would be more suited to killing germs in a public toilet. Yet despite this gross sugar intake, my generation of kids at school were not shaped like The Death Star.

So why is it? One answer? Laziness. You never see kids playing football down the park (ah the old "jumpers for goalposts" scenario) or riding bikes like we used to. They're inside playing on Playstations or watching TV, every waking hour when they're not at school. Now don't get me wrong, I play a lot of playstation myself but I don't camp on it when I'm either not eating or on the loo.

Some parents these days are more than happy just to throw their kids in front of an idiot box that actually interact with their kids. And when the child call differentiate between right and wrong (in the case of the game "manhunt" being blamed for a murder), they blame the game. For a start, that said game is an "18", implying only people over the age of 18 can purchase it... so can a young teenager purchase a title like that? Computer games in this instance are a scapegoat for crap parenting. My parents limited me a lot when I first purchased a SEGA Mega-Drive (or Genesis to my friends across the pond) so that I wouldn't become dependent on it. I know now the games are more interactive and realistic but still I grew up playing Mortal Kombat and I'm still to eviscerate someone else as a "fatality".

So in conclusion, I understand that some cases of obsety are genetic or medical...I'm not poking fun at that at all. What I am saying is because kids these days are so bloody lazy, they gain weight and blame it on diets. Prevention is better than cure, and I for one will never let my kids (one day when I have some) become video game zombies, who are unable to kick a football.

End of rant