Michael Clarke

When I was about 7 or 8 I remember wanting desperately to have guitar lessons. My parents, being the very kind folk that they are, bought me a guitar and I started having lessons. I remember my guitar teacher having an arrangement with the school, and so once a week I’d get to skip ‘real lessons’ to have my guitar lesson - along with two other people who were also learning the guitar. However, at this age I found it incredibly boring playing Jingle Bells over and over and over again to the point where I can now pick up a guitar and play, from memory after all these years, that damn song. All I wanted to do was play real songs, I wanted to learn strumming - non of that picking nonsense. After a not so long while, for better or worse - but definitely due to boredom, I gave up my guitar lessons.

Around January this year I decided that I wanted to play again, but this time I wanted to learn ‘properly’. This time I was uninterested in songs, or strumming… I wanted to know the techniques, the picking patterns, the reason why an A chord is the shape that it is - I wanted to know everything there is to know about guitars. I stole (or rather borrowed) my brothers guitar - he never uses it anyway and began with a few online tutorials piecing things together with the help of one of my house mates (Mike) who was always willing to give me some advice on my playing, or teach me a new scale or some other trick. However, I quickly realised that although I was getting to the stage where I could play simple songs - I wasn’t  really learning everything I wanted to. So, knowing that one of my mum’s friends used to teach guitar, I arranged for lessons.

I’ve now been at it for just over 6 months and, as I approach my 22nd birthday (16th July), I decided it was time to stop borrowing my brothers guitar and get one of my own, and so, although a little early for my birthday, my Adam Black O-7CE guitar arrived this weekend. It sounds (and looks) beautiful and I have to admit that I’ve hardly put it down today.

 
(Click on the ol’ images to get full sized ones what not!)

So, apart from playing my new guitar, what else have I been up to? Well first of all, although I had amazing and cunning plans to have finished my dissertation for next year by now (okay, a slight exaggeration) I have yet to do any work on that yet.  However, I have not been lazy (much). I’ve been busy working for Sun sorting out the campus ambassador program for next year - it’s good to have finally sorted that out as it has taken quite a large chunk of time this last couple of weeks.

I’ve also been pretty busy doing bits and pieces for the move in August - and that is something I ought to mention too. We were moving in July, the 11th to be exact. We then put the date back to the 20th July due to numerous reasons, work being done on the house, removal firms, packing etc. However, we’ve now pushed the moving date back further and it is now the 21st August. But it’s all good as we’re getting a complete new kitchen and right now (or well, not right now, but this week) we’ve got electricians in re-wiring the whole place and all that good stuff. Then I’ll be able to move in all the networking and TV gear and wire the house up. I managed to get really cheap back plates for network sockets from Wilkinson’s of all places - I’ve found them to be one of the best places to go for odd things you might need - for example I always get my windscreen wipers for the car from there - £1.49 per wiper and it literally takes me ten seconds to fit them, in a car-park with no tools, at that price you simply can’t go wrong!

Anyway, I’ve now pontificated for long enough. So, until my next exciting and invigorating update (even if I do say so myself).

Yesterday I went looking for a new car. After some time browsing Auto Trader I found a truly amazing car. It was a 2.0L P’ Reg Vectra Saloon in Black with Electric Mirrors, Electric Windows, Air Con, CD Multi Changer, Traction Control, Factory Alarm and Immobiliser, Power Steering and only 80,000 miles on the clock. The most amazing thing though was the price - £695!

So, off I went to Flint (about 50 minutes drive from home) to test drive this car. My initial inspection revealed no faults and everything was looking good. The car was in immaculate condition inside and out - could this be too good to be true? Unfortunately the answer to this question was - yes, it was.

After the inspection I got ready for the test drive. At first the car needed to be jump-started because the battery was a little low (fair enough - it has obviously been standing for a while). As I left the garage the car felt a little jerky - initially I suspected this was simply because I wasn’t used to the clutch, however it very quickly became apparent that it was something more serious when after about 2 minutes into the drive the car broke down!

My first thoughts were - oh it’ll just be low on petrol - no, it had almost a quarter of a tank. Perhaps the battery was the problem still. After a few attempts to push start it, it became quite apparent that I needed to call the garage so they could bring their battery pack and get the car going again. So 5 minutes later the guy from the garage arrived… could he get it going? No. I’m still not entirely sure what was wrong with it, but I suspect it’s probably a fault with the immobiliser or the starter motor - either way, I ended up going home without a new car… never mind! It just shows how important a test drive is when buying a car.

So, I’m still on the lookout for a 1.8/2.0 litre Vectra/Mondeo with reasonable mileage if anyone’s got one that they’re selling. Even better would be a MG ZT if anyone has one of them? No? Ah well, pity. For the moment I’m going to borrow one of my parents cars that they’re not using at the moment - a Fiat Marea Weekend, not quite what I was looking for - but never the less a car that is big enough for my needs

As many of you will know, in June 2007 I was unfortunate enough to have a quite bad car crash. We were on our way to Go Karting as a end of exams trip and a guy in a red Fiesta drifted across the road and hit my car head on at a combined speed of about 100MPH. Fortunately everyone was (is now) okay from the accident. This accident in turn caused a smaller shunt further down the road. I promised in my old blog that I’d put up some photos of my car after the incident, however I never did - so I’ve included them now.

Ever since then there have been legal battles between a whole host of people who all claimed that it wasn’t their fault. At the same time, the police investigation (which had six months allowance to be concluded) was crawling along. At the end of November (26th to be precise) I was informed at last that the guy in the red Fiesta was to be taken to court on the charge of ‘driving without due care and attention’.

This court hearing took place on the 19th December at 9.30am at Aberystwyth Magistrates Court and I’ve finally heard from the Police that he pleaded guilty! This is excellent news as it now means two things:

• His claim that I was the cause of the accident to his insurance company is invalid (otherwise why would be plead guilty?)
• My insurance company will finally pay out my excess and give me back my no claims.

Overall a pretty good day.