So I had planned to continue with the blogging after that one but I’ve had a lot on, mostly trying to edit Galaxy Raceway on a laptop that (although works well) isn’t really up to the job if i want to produce videos in HD.
Lots have things have changed since christmas. I’ve left the Cinema job. After working nearly two years I’d left because of… a few reasons really. One was that I was feeling under valued. I was told that I would be able to progress in my new job quickly, but it didn’t materialize.
I’m still quite upset about it. There was no acknowledgement or response to my notice. No thank you, or sorry to hear. I said I’d be willing to discuss my reasons with them, but seemed to not be interested.
One factor was the lack of understanding of me. I have Dyslexia and Dyspraxia and anxiety, so forgetting things, time estimation and getting used to new processes can regularly happen. Getting used to new things can effect me greatly. Things like a new bus system is the worst, especially when just as you het used to one, they change it and they never come anyway. There was some leeway, and one supervisor who is amazing got it. I was trying to get down a coping mechanism to reduce the issues, but because of what I was promised… i figured it would only be a short time before I’d go back to do what I was doing something I was stronger at.
What topped it off though was when a senior manager said I wouldn’t be allowed to progress for 6 months rather rudely. It was the first time they had spoken to me and it was fucking rude. I had to apparently to fix the issues I had. Basically it felt like he was telling a disabled person to stop being disabled. It was such a big deal because I was relying on that to get more hours. There are people who work for the company who are consistantly late, consistanly absent with bad attitudes being allowed to join the progression scheme, so i took it personally.
I left the office and fought off an anxiety attack for the rest of the busy shift. A few days later I colapsed at home and had to call an ambulance.
So, I looked for something different. I actually got the admin job, but I was told 3 days later I’d have to wait a month longer to start due to a training problem. With the worry I went for a job in another cinema which I got, but they mived the training for the admin one sooner in the end.
I’ve been there for a few weeks now. I will miss the cinema but i think I’m better off without it.
We are growing as a family. We have a Pug called George, Finn started at his new school in January and thanks to the new job I get evenings and weekends to have some family time.
I didn’t get chance to do the 2019 predictions so im going to do a half year one instead. That will be out in July 🙂
I’m working this Christmas period. As mentioned before, I work in a Cinema… not saying which one for… reasons. I have Christmas day off, and new year period off.
But one thing I’m bound to hear from a customer, which I heard last year… “Oh, you’re busy, I thought it would be quiet today”.
Clearly though, others had the same thought. I actually don’t know why people would think that… I mean along with pubs and restaurants, we’re still open. It’s also weird because big supermarkets close at certain times and a multiplex cinema is basically a supermarket version of a cinema.
Christmas is the busiest times. I’m working until the cinema closes on Christmas Eve and Boxing day… so I wont get home till after midnight. I’m not complaining by any means, but I don’t think people actually know that Christmas eve and Boxing day is always heaving.
So I’ll be running up and down getting popcorn and Iceblasts until at least 9pm on these days. People will be frustrated, even if I wear a tiny Christmas tree on my head and a lovely Christmas jumper.
But the Phrase “I thought you wouldn’t be this busy today… you’d think people have homes to go to” just amuses me 🙂
If my calculations are correct, you will receive this letter immediately after you saw the DeLorean struck by lightning. First, let me assure you that I’m alive and well. I’ve been living happily these past 8 months in the year 1885.
Actually I’ve been happily living Manchester for the last 8 WEEKS, and I don’t own a DeLorean, however I am alive and well. It’s nearly 2am and I’ve been really nostalgic recently. I’m not sure whether it’s because it’s Christmas, or whether being this far away again is putting my old life into prospective. I thought I should blog about it though because… well I used to blog about this stuff all the time. In fact I feel like my online presence in recent years has been a bit rubbishy.
The thing I think that makes me think it’s been like that is… well me doing this stuff, writing for fun and having that online presence is a big part of me that I’ve kind of just pushed aside to do other things, and not really given myself time to reflect on it.
Obviously things have changed over the years. I was looking on my Facebook and also on this blog, going back 5 years I was actually writing things that made sense with real words – where if u go bak 10 years ago I wrote mostly in txt spk and was mostly about how depressed I felt,
I think I just didn’t really think or wasn’t really bothered about what I wrote, just so I could moan and tell you about how stupid my life was and hope you laughed at me. That was basically how I lived life. Did silly stuff in the hope someone would find it funny. I know it might have made me look stupid, but I didn’t mind… There was thought behind it. Since going to uni though, I felt like in some respects I needed to come across like I knew what i was on about, but wanted to keep my trademark quirky-ness, and was able to do that by being creative.
Nowadays I only get away with acting like a wally when I walk around Tesco making jokes and getting told off… It drives Aphre furious because I spend ages walking around the store and she’s got shopping in mind. The kids love it but I should be more considerate tbh. You can guess how I felt when I saw LadBaby doing the exact thing and posting it online… Why did i not do this before?!
I grew out of deliberately being silly for fun… I mean other than being properly depressed for 2 years I kind of just shook it off. I know I still come across these days like I don’t know what I’m talking about. More than anything it’s confidence nowadays. I know things but I’m not always able to express it so well.
Recently whilst I’ve been walking back home after taking Finn to school (mostly in the rain) I’ve had my headphones on. I got some Sony ones a few weeks back because I need to get my good Behringer ones fixed. I don’t know if it’s the Sony logo in fast love…
… or the quality… or just that I’m just very reflective recently… but I’ve had loads of thoughts whilst listing to my music again recently, whatever the reason is… it’s had one result… I’ve realised I’ve lost touch.
It got me thinking about the relationships I built up as a kid, and experiences, and I’ve realised that I’ve burried some memories. Not sure why… but I know there was a lot of shit going on then and I think I’ve covered over some good stuff… My most memorable years of my life are just… well… a blur really.
This has made me think a lot about my school years. I’m going to rewind a bit now to 1997. Here’s a song to get you in the mood… Now there’s a point to all this… just roll with it (as Oasis once said)…
Now if there’s a song to travel back in time to it’s that right?
It’s January-ish 1996… Happy new year! Christmas has just happened. The christmas just gone must have been the one when I got a plastic mouse in my Christmas Cracker that I got in my stocking, and whilst on the top bunk I dropped it on the floor and shouted for my Mum. Me and my brother Ben shouting “MUMMY! MOUSE! MOUSE”. She comes in and asks what the noise is (Steve, her husband to be is cross that we’re up at 6am at Christmas day… fucking idiot) and then we shout “MOUSE” She looses her shit and jumps onto our bunk bed and then we reveal it’s plastic. Best prank on my mum ever. Anyway… She got married on her birthday so I’m sure there was a lot of interesting times I’ve hidden away.
My room has a picture of Snoop Dogg on the wall (because Steve decided that he wanted to put it on the wall for some reason). I have no idea who Snoop Dogg is at this point… but I watch a lot of MTV so doesn’t take me long. I watch a lot of Bevis And Butthead. I’ve just transferred secondary schools because I was at Hreod Park Way. I live in Swindon – Middleleaze in West Swindon. I didn’t go to Greendown because there’s some kids on my street who were dickheads, so sending me there would be like sending me to bully grand central. I wanted to go to Braydon Forest but Steve (Fucking Idiot) wanted me to go to Hreod because he used to go there. It’s in fucking Morden, which from Middleleaze is a ball ache to get to. It’s a 45 minute walk according to google maps.
So where was the next logical place to go? Well my dad lived in Walcot, in a 1 bed, and offered me to stay over on some of the weekdays. He lived not far from Oakfield Secondary. I’d go there some lunch times just to have some cheap mini pizzas instead of the optional nothing. I liked staying at my dads. I spend my NYE 1995-1996 watching L!VE TV with him. L!VE TV was a corny little channel you could get on cable that had a new bunny, topless darts, dwarf weather and a couple of other “Classic” programming
Going to Oakfield was strange because when I was a kid, I lived in Park North and went to Park North Infants (Changed to Goddard Park not long after I’d left) and a lot of the kids I’d left at the age of 6 were all 11 and 12.
I started to gain some friends at the school. The ones that stuck out were Paul L, and Luke, later to be joined by another Paul (Paul G), and a guy called Graham. Paul G was cousins with my good friends Andrew and Anthony who went to school with my brothers. Their mum would look after us when we moved to my dads… that’s later.
My break times at school were usually spent doing a small number of things.
Hanging around with the Pauls and Luke.
going to the library
Going to my dads
Hanging around with Sarah
Now a lot of rubbish home stuff went on in ’96. The long and short of it is that we ended up at my dads and moved into a house together in 1997. My mum and Steve ended, we went to this dodgy house in Whitworth Road, and for a short time lived with a man who drove an Austin Princess who had a dog that was constantly sick in the car.
This stuff may be why I don’t have much memories about late 1996, 1997 and 1998…but what has been bugging me the most is what I did in school. I had a problem with routines that I found to be boring… along with having difficulty learning in certain lessons. Turns out I had dyslexia and am a visual learner so was in bottom set in a lot of classes.
But I know it wasn’t all bad. There’s a few songs that I associate with school. Donna Lewis – I love you always forever is one… but one reminds me of someone.
Pulp – Disco 2000. It’s a great song. Remember my Number 4 on the lunchtime list? I remember when this song was in the charts, and talking to Sarah about this song and because we’d finish school in the year 2000, it was a bit weird. It stuck with me. Turns out that I left the school in 1999 after being expelled for truancy.
I spent a lot of time with Sarah in school. I wouldn’t say she was a popular girl in school, I wasn’t popular either, but it never mattered to me. We sat together in most classes. She showed me her t-shirt in Maths once under her normal shirt. She was good company, and I remember times with her being fun, but I don’t know the kind of person I was… Was I a total dickhead? Was I kind of smart? Was I an idiot? Does she have good memories of us mucking about in lessons? To be honest none of us knew it but she was my best friend at school, and I didn’t know that until I didn’t get to see her any more. Recently after listening to that Pulp song I’ve wondered how she is. I know she didn’t have the best times either growing up, but I was lucky and recently it’s bothered me that she might not be OK… but I dunno why.
The thing is, I know what we were like but can’t actually remember certain events. Like sitting at the front in most classes, always being science partners. Things come back every so often, usually with stuff from home creeping in that I’d rather forget. I just feel sad that we lost touch and has gotten to me recently. I hope she’s not dead or something.
Ok maybe death is a bit deep. I don’t even have any pictures from those days. Anyway the thing is, I feel like I have some gaps to fill in.
Hi blog fans (I know there’s at least 3). So it’s been 9 months since the last update and I actually have something worth writing about.
Like the bad title of a good film, the title of this post gives it all away. Yes there has been a big move, but just how big? Where have I moved? What am I doing? What what WHAT?
I have moved to Manchester with Aphre and the boy! So yeah, it was a fairly big move. About 130 miles apart. And for people who don’t drive, it’s been an expensive and tiring for us all, except Finn who has just enjoyed coming along for our exciting new adventure.
How did it all come about? Well the main thing was we were missing Ruby. The plan had always been to move to Manchester at some point to be able to get to see her more, but Aphre and I were very much like “Let’s just do this now”.
Aphre has a new job, and I got a transfer from the Cinema, so I now work in one in the Manchester Area. I’m not admin there… even though I enjoyed doing it at the last one, they already have that covered, so I’m back on the tills selling popcorn and frozen drinks. I’m also looking around for some radio projects, but still sorting out the house at the moment.
The move was… well… annoying. We were going to have other people driving us and doing it ourselves but it turned out that they were not available through nobody’s fault… so we go a company to move us. All I will say is that it was expensive, a bunch of our stuff got broken and we had to pay extra for another van to bring some stuff up that we now need to get rid off because it won’t fit up the stairs.
The house is nice. We viewed it online and got Aphre’s brother to video chat on Facebook to check it out. There are a couple of niggles we need to sort out in the house, but nothing mega.
I’m still trying to figure out how to get back from work, because the busses in Manchester are weird compared to Gloucester. This has involved a fair bit of walking after my shifts at work so far. I’ve been very tired though because everything needs to be put away in the house, so there’s a lot of house Tetris in a small amount of time, as well as trying to keep it reasonable which is a never ending thing. We till have a lot of pictures to put up, and shelves to fill, but the other than that, things are starting to come together. Our dining room/play area is looking a lot clearer than it did since we moved in. You couldn’t navigate it.
I’ve been collecting Hot Wheels with Finn and together we have a quite big collection coming together, so we have been racing them and called it “The Galaxy Raceway”. We have some videos on here. We have a load recorded but with the move, I’ve not had time to edit any more yet… but I can tell you that there’s a few exciting twists before the end!
Anyway I need to get Finn dressed now and get on with some stuff. Laters yooo!
Very important news now about my ribs… very important. This is not a date with my ribs though… as fitting as it would be on Valentine’s day.
Today have felt improvement with the movement situation and movingbaround alot faster. I can move without pain getting in the way, still can’t lift stuff yet and my arm is a bit tender. I’ve been making animations with Finn today which I will post online at some point. Since being at home since Monday I’ve been trying to tame my creative energy that is going through the roof even though my actual energy has been running on half power.
Making Aphre a valentines card has helped though. I have a lot of sharpies and i love any chance I get to use them. I should learn to draw because I’d be lethal. I might do that with my remaining days off work. I got a how to draw marvel comics book a few years ago that I’ve been meaning to do something with.
I was having a think earlier about how the ribs thing is probably the most serious injury ive ever had in my life. So far I’ve had no broken bones, I’ve never been left writhing on the floor in pain. I mean the worst stuff so far was 1) When i fell in the snow a few years ago and landed on my knee (got cartilage damage) and Kopperberg nearly landed on my head. 2) I was about 6 i fell in the snow and my glasses went into my eyebrow and bled everywhere. 3) Age 9 I cut my hand open during an argument when an adult launched a broken toy at my head and i blocked it (tbh this was to no suprise at the time thanks to the funs of an abusive stepfather but I will leave that there) I bled everywhere that time too. 4) When I was unable to function due to a tooth that needed to come out that was hell. The next day i was boasting that I got shot 9 times like 50 cent. This is the worst if not on par,which is weird because when it happened it only felt like I twinged it.
Anyway, I will fix hopefully by Monday. Today I had a nice evening with my lovely one. This year will be our 5th year anniversary on Finns birthday. We watched a Jane Austin film which I managed to stifle any jokes sobi didn’t ruin her enjoyment (i did quietly mention if the Heyters (?) were gon hate).
I have enjoyed my evening though. Just like I put in my dating profile those many years ago, snuggles, icecream and a film. I am the happiest.
Right… time to completely fail on catchphrase guesses. 🙂
Ok so maybe not as many updates as I’d hoped but still more than last year so far… maybe we can call it a gradual return.
This week though has been a bit of a dick though, thanks week. The first thing was that my computer died for some unknown reason. It shorted the electric out so now i have to investigate what happened. The second thing this week is that I slipped over and as you can imagine the first reaction is that people will laugh… even if they weren’t there… like I did something to deserve it.
Basically I’d mopped the floor and had no other choice to walk on the floor, but as soon as I stepped foot on it I went down and I’ve clearly done something to my ribs. It’s not fun and at the moment as every movement equals pain. I’m doing the ibuprofen and paracetamol thing which isn’t having the desired effect but hoping it will help sort stuff enough for me to sleep.
What else is going down? Well not loads reallt. We had a hectic period and crap year last year and things compaired to now… well it’s a sleepy patch. Not really any other blog friendly stuff comes to mind but if it does then I will mention it. I should do things deliberatly for this blog.
So this week I am a sicky one. Not quite really sure what it is whether cold or flu is more accurate but it’s been rubishy. Things started on Saturday night when I came back from helping out with something in Weston-super-Mare and felt ill and was trying to get some links recorded for my radio show which gradually gave up on as i felt worse and managed to muster up enough energy for the staff meeting on Monday. Anyway since then I’ve had to have 3 days off and have been in bed for two of those. I went out for the first time in 3 days and it felt alright. Still feel pretty ill but atleast its subsiding.
I’ve been meaning to blog for a while about making a connection with friends and stuff… the idea of that slightly ruined when I no-showed to a small uni reunion… but that was mainly because of work but it was somethung that caused the thought and with the various deaths going on it was shelved.
Last year we went on a family holiday to Gran Canaria.
Our journey back from Birmingham airport was nearly a nightmare but Fred (my uni friend) offered to take us back. Finn was very interested in talking to Fred, where as Fred wasn’t totally sure how to converse with a 3 year old at 1am… but did well. It made me think though that I need to make more of an effort with friends and bother making some new ones. There are people I gravitate towards but don’t tend to go the next step recently so I might give it a try soon.
I’ve dropped in a few things there… Holiday was lovely and had a great relax. There were loads of cats. I did wonder if they were there to control the canary population. Lots of time playing in the pool with Finn. Oh and the side info my show is on Total Star on DAB in Gloucestershire on Sundays.
So I was looking on my Facebook feed recently and found a thing about “The secrets movie theatre workers don’t want you to know” and it leads to an article named “36 Movie Theatre Secrets They Don’t Want You To know” and it got me thinking. The things that might be slightly different to the article only is in the basis of this is an American article but you’d think most of it was relevant to the UK… Actually I think it’s completely balls.
Firstly, yes… I work in a Cinema now. I’m still doing media bits and bobs but when I’m not at home being a fantastic dad and rock to the love of my life, or being a radio genius, I am working in a Cinema, which is pretty fun. I might not get into specifics like the company I work for… nor are my views are that of the company I work for or my colleagues. You can find the original article here.
Finding things in cinemas has been a subject on Prick Up Your Ears podcast but I can’t be bothered to find it right now.
1) An alarming amount of moms leaving dirty nappies under seats
In my 8 months of working in a cinema I have NEVER found a nappy under a seat, clean or dirty. You do find interesting and questionable things though, such as an empty ham packet. Someone clearly has eaten sliced ham by it’s self. I did find that someone had decided to not leave the auditorium to have a wee during the anniversary screening of Terminator 2 – which is mind boggling because they were found in the front row and the person would clearly have had to get up and pee… so their choice was to pee in front of a bunch of people instead of walking to the toilet and having some dignity. They’d have missed about 1 minute of a film THAT WAS RELEASED 20 YEARS AGO!
2) Employees don’t mind if you want to make it a double feature
We don’t mind… IF YOU ACTUALLY PAY! The article suggests that cinema employees don’t mind you skipping screens to see something else. There are a lot of people who do pay to see two films, so im not going to let in a few free ones. Personally I think some cinemas are not built with this possibility in mind and should have a walk through system that makes sense, but this isn’t possible all the time. In some older placed they used to have what film was on outside it, but in the one I work in this doesn’t happen and to find out what’s on where you have to go into the kiosk, which will require you to go past the “Drop Box” which is where they rip your ticket or scan your digital ticket. So many people are involved with making films and personally I feel responsible when people sneak into films, or do pirate copies.
3) Manages will give you a free pass if you share a screening with a crying child.
Nope… or at least not a given thing. Basically the films that are shown have age ratings, so the chances of s screaming child during something like “all The Money In The World” which is a 15 film is not likely. It’s possible in a 12A or PG film but the likelihood that the people coming to watch those films wont want to bring their young child because it’s a hassle for them and they want to watch the film, not settle their baby. People tend to get embarrassed with that sort of thing anyway. We didn’t take Finn into the cinema until we were sure there was something he wouldn’t do that in and embarrass us. Plus when you go into a U rated film (Universal – for everyone) it’s inevitable that there will be little kids in there. Fun fact, under 8s need accompanying by an adult. People tend to use their common sense more than not.
4) In Korea they have fried cuttlefish with popcorn.
This is no suprise. The cinema is a great place to find weird things. We once had Cheese popcorn which was gross apparently. We recently had Strawberry cheesecake.
5) The history of popcorn
I think the person who figured out how to make popcorn is a genius. I always wondered how they figured it. Was it just really hot one day and all the dried corn just popping in a field?
6) Employees Playing Xbox on the big screen after hours
Although this would be possible, you need to stop and think about how this would actually happen. You would need a lot of wires to do this, and even it it was wireless would the remotes actually reach that far? You’d need to connect it to the projection room and if you were to play in there you’d have to see it through a small window… it’s a lot of effort. Doable, but too much effort. You’d also have to get managers permission to go into the projection room, or at least for the chain I work for. Everything is connected digitally including how the films play. More on this later.
7) Cup Holders were not a thing until 1981
Well that’s news to me.certain seats have movable arm rests and atleast in the cinema i work in they have cup holders on both sides at the front. This is not the case for other seats.
8) The average amount of popcorn Americans eat
70 Quarts apparently… not totally sure what that means but that’s what the article says, which I gather is a lot.
9) You’re better off going for a dinner than snacking during the show.
This depends if you’re wanting to actually go to the cinema for snacks and a film in the first place, or whether you’re up for a day out. Personally when I go to the cinema I enjoy getting the pick’n’mix or a massive Ice Blast or Slush drink. It’s part of the fun, but if you want food then go to the many near by restaurants that will have opened off the back of a cinema being located near-by. We sell Hotdogs, Nachos, Popcorn and loads of different sweets. They are snacks not meals. The reason for this is probably because if you have something too smelly like a McDonalds or chips with lots of vinegar it can be distracting to others in the screening and be rather unpleasant.
10) There’s a reason why popcorn smells so good
This article suggests there are tricks to make it more irresistible to buy popcorn and one of those is adding oils or chemicals to it. I can categorically confirm that in the chain I work for, it has online training that is rolled out to all of it’s employees, and the popcorn contains Corn, Oil and Salt or Sugar depending on which one you want. One fun fact though is that our popper is based in the back, and it’s pretty rare that you see those popcorn machines in the Kiosk in modern cinemas, however the smell of it is it’s USP… and cinemas have always smelt of popcorn, they were just smaller and in a closer proximity of the machine. These days they hook the air vent to the air that comes from the popcorn machine into the air conditioning. I did have a dream the other night based on this which is that it snowed popcorn through the air conditioning, but this is not a thing.
11) Theatres rarely control what they show
Just like the radio, the cinemas are owned by large companies and they are told what to do. Radio stations are told what to play. Heart for instance shares a music library across the UK, and all the local breakfast shows are given the same content and music, the difference is that the local presenters can take local calls and can mention local places. In the cinema there are local interests, but these tend to be things for special events, and local groups can book a screen out.
12) It’s easier for the crew cleaning up to leave your rubbish on your seats
No. This is not true. It’s easier if you take your rubbish with you and put it in the bin outside or give it to the person with the rubbish bag. This is a fact. If you’re not going to pick it up then it doesn’t matter where you leave it. If you leave popcorn bags on the seat there is a chance that it will spill all over the floor and create more mess. If you’re going to leave a mess then just leave it in a tidy pile and not all over the place.
13) You May be in luck if you’re not into blockbusters
I’m not totally up on the whole indie movie scene locally so there’s not much I can say on this, but the chain I work for tends to have blockbusters. They have new releases every Friday (Unless they have a release in the week for some reason) and we don’t generally know as staff what is happening sometimes until it comes out. It’s just the nature of how it works. I guess it’s like having a baby that you know is coming, and the person having it isn’t in agonising pain.
14) Many midnight screenings were banned because of the Aurora shootings.
This is certainly not the case in the UK We have midnight screenings here, and we had spooky clowns come to the midnight screening of IT earlier this year. We recently had loads of Jedi knights and storm troopers at the recent midnight screening of Star Wars.
15) Films often start late but finish on time.
They do sometimes start late, but they don’t always finish on time if they start late. This also can impact the next showing in the screen as we need time to do a quick tidy up. A late start is usually because of a technical problem which happens sometimes. Depending on the problem we might play the ads and trails, or might skip them. There tends to not be anyone in the projection room and staff come in regularly to check that things are all good and everyone is behaving, but if something is wrong, like the 3D doesn’t seem right or something is out of focus, or someone is acting like an idiot, they you just need to grab a member of staff and tell them what the problem is. We’re always happy to talk about whatever. We have regular customers who come in just to talk about a film franchise or something.
16) There’s rarely anybody in the projection booth
This is correct. There only tends to be anyone in there if there’s a problem and that tends to be a manager. This doesn’t stop people from shouting to the projectionist when the wrong film comes on which happens sometimes.
17) Some theatres are experimenting with Alcohol
This has been a thing happening for years…
In fact other cinemas in the chain have full on bars and historically the older chains when cinemas had 1 or 2 auditoriums had bars in them. In our cinema we have a small fridge with stuff like cider or Vodka and Coke in a can. People are always surprised.
18) Noise levels can be dangerous
Yeah they probably could. I don’t know much about the volume right now but what I know is that if it’s too loud for us then it will be to loud for our customers, and if we have complaints it’s something I’d speak to the manager about and they’d do something about it.
19) Combos don’t always save you money
I guess this depends on what company the cinema is. For instance the one I work for, if you get a small size popcorn, it’s actually small and if you go the next size up (Roughly about 70p difference) it’s double the size when you go up. Same for drinks, but it’s 50p… it is like £4 for a large though so I always think if you’re spending the money you might as well… and that’s probably the reasoning for the price.
20) It’s possible to get blacklisted from a cinema
Yeah, I guess it is… if you’re like… a cereal… whatever… wanker… thief… kind of thing. If you are caught filming even just a little bit that can get you into serious shit… it can also earn me some cash by getting my managers attention, especially if you’re convicted.
21) Employees get to see the films before the public
This isn’t always the case. We have staff showings and on occasion they do have a screening on the same day as release, but it’s usually when it’s been out for a while
22) Its pointless to complain to an employee about a film – There’s not much we can do
Well… yeah there’s not a lot we can do. I’ve had people demanding a refund or a comp after the film or half way through. That’s not a thing though… you went to watch a film… if it’s crap it’s not our problem. It’s nice to hear when someone has or hasn’t enjoyed a film, it’s actually one of the best bits of working there (Other than pouring Iceblasts). I once had an elderly man who went in to watch “Girls Trip” last year, and he came out traumatised, and couldn’t believe that he went to book that film. There was a woman who came out of “Mother” half way through who said it’s the biggest ball of shite she’d ever seen and couldn’t take much more of it. Same for a good review though, but we don’t have as many of those. An angry voice is a louder voice, but for me it’s all about the cinema experience. I just wish that there was a way of making more of an effort on that.
23) Sometimes you can get free tickets if your friend works in a cinema
Yep, well… sort of. If you go on a trip with 2 people we have a card that gets you discount on snacks and also free films. However the only way you can get your friend into a screening is if you win a comp from an incentive. These are things you get when you do something like sell a certain amount of things.
24) You can get arrested for filming a movie
Hell yeah you can. We have something called VRAs… Vulnerable Release Alerts. These are all about new films we need to keep a special eye on to ensure there’s nobody filming whether with a camera or phone or whatever, or even the audio on a recording device. It can get you banned not from just one cinema but all the bloody cinemas. Recently people have been adapting caps to record films.
25) Sneeking into films that are not your age rating (If you’re a kid)
The article says about getting another ticket for a film. Thing is, there is a few problems with that. The first is that every seat is allocated and you have to sit in the seat, because that seat may be already sold. We also go into films to make sure everything is OK. We can challenge anyone in the screen if we suspect they shouldn’t be there. There’s a few ways to get tickets that people try and get away with it too. Kids try and buy online, but they get asked for I.D (Yeah! we actually do this) when they get to the drop box (It’s a podium where we take tickets). They also try and get their ticket from the machines downstairs, which again we can ask for I.D or some sort of age confirmation. The other one is from the box office or concessions stand where they could face a gauntlet of questions there, and on the drop box.. Even if you’re accepted by one you might not be by the other. What sort of I.D though? Well this is kind of subjective, however you kind of have to use your best judgement and question any doubts. I tend to go with the following.
Ask how old they are. If they are under 8 their parent tends to buy their ticket so I ask them how old they are. If I think it’s true or plausible then I’ll go with that, but I tend to ask them how old rather then “are they over the age of 8?”.
If they are alone I will ask them how old they are. For a 12A film where you have to be accompanied by an adult if you’re under 12 I will ask for a date of birth and basically judge whether the way they have conducted themselves has been relatively what I’d expect from someone who was at least 12 . I will do this to anyone who asks for a child or student ticket. If they ask for an adult ticket I will tend to follow the below.
For a 15 film, I’ll ask for either a student pass, passport, driving licence (you can get these from age 16) or a pass card. They need to be 15 to get in so In my head I will ask anyone who I suspect to be 13 or under and if they fail they don’t get in . This is a safety for a few reasons, but the person on the drop box could also turn them down so I’d want to be sure. A photo of these would also be acceptable. I’d advise anyone who is under 20 take some sort of I.D whether that’s physically or a picture on your phone.
For an 18 film I ask anyone who looks under 20 for I.D and will accept a student I.D, or I might look for an indication that they are over 18 before asking such as a professional tattoo or piercing. It’s also about how they conduct themselves. They need to be 18 to get in so In my head I will ask anyone who I suspect to be 15 or under and if they fail they don’t get in.
With all the ages I tend to I.D anyone if I think they are the age just to make sure they are the correct age. Basically 2 years each way.
26) Theatre staff interrupt sexy time once a week.
Sexy time happens, but it doesn’t tend to be as frequent than that. If it does we can tell them to leave.
28) The cost of digital projectors has driven smaller cinemas out of business
Actually in this country the cinemas were already owned by other bigger companies. Even going back to the days of ABC Cinemas, these were closed mainly due to being bought by nightclubs and converted. There are smaller cinemas that exist that wouldn’t be able to house an old style projector, and in some cases a smaller projector does just as good a job. At uni I once put a double showing on in a lecture hall with sweets and snacks.
29) Pretzels may not be your best bet of snack
I wish we had pretzels. We don’t sell any sort of crisps or anything other than nachos.
30) You should have your order ready at the counter.
This isn’t a biggie for me as long as you don’t walk off and get pick and mix half way through your order or that you don’t decide that you’re going to swap your large coke for a bottle. If you have vouchers, you need to tell us first because every time you get something wrong we have to cancel it on our tills and it’s recorded as a mistake. Purchase your film first, and if you have vouchers tell us these, don’t say “Two adults and a child” and let us put this into the till as two adults and a child because we have to cancel your order and put it in as vouchers.
Don’t stand at an empty till… It’s probably closed… It does say on the till. Also don’t assume that just because someone is in that area at that time, that you can hang around and be served next. When when we say “Sorry this till is closed, you can join one of my colleges over there” don’t say that you’ve been there 15 minutes… because I’ve been here for 3 making an ice cream and you just came here because you were in another cue. Don’t move cues because you think it would be quicker unless you are called over.
31) The Cleaning schedule doesn’t allow for the most thorough cleaning.
Most of the time we don’t need to do this, but we have around 20-30 mins to clean a screen and depending how busy it might take a few more than 2 people to do screens. Any floors that are sticky will have a quick mop.
32) The popcorn may not be as fresh as you’d like to think.
Popcorn may be popped on a different day at times, just because we go through loads of the stuff. It will most likely have been popped a couple of days before, and is totally fine for it to go into the warmers.
36) Adverts
Ads have always been there since forever. These days the ads and trails last about 20 minutes in the chain I work for.
Maybe this will shed some light on the subject. Any questions? Give e a shout and I may be able to address it
Ohh look! After, what, 9 months I’ve decided to do a blog! What goes on? Well…
(How about that as a nod to the old blog)
I’ll be doing a proper blog either later or in a few days but basically this year has been a ball bag of sh*t. Not all of it, but majority has been so rubbishy – the highlights include being evicted for no reason other than the landlord was a cock… Our first Hedgehog died, financial struggles (which I’m glad to report are sorting out) and there has been a bunch of unfortunate family events in between. I’m sure I will do more blogging on this as I’m going to make an effort on it this year.
So each year (other than last year… I seemed to skip that one for some reason so technically they carried over) I do a prediction of events for the coming year. So far unsuccessful predictions included:
Take that and Five will join forces to create Take Five, and will go on tour for 6 months (2016)
Beaker from the Muppets will be knighted (2014)
Ronnie Corbet sneezes out his sense of humour and a number of other defunct organs during a massive sneeze attack at a slipper shop (2011)
Danni Harmer (Off Tracy Beaker) will have a slot on top gear.
Bay City Rollers will get another number 1 this year. (2016)
Aliens make contact with a girl. She thinks it is her dolly talking (2014)
John Lithgow (Dick Soloman Soloman in “Third Rock From The Sun” and Lord Farquar from Shrek) stars in a new BBC sitcom “Harry and the Devil”. Lithgow plays ‘The Devil’ on her shoulder that only co-star Dani Harmer (Off Tracy Beaker) , can see and hear. (2011)
One Direction will have the number 1 at Christmas (2016) (It was Clean Bandit)
And Successfully:
Another celebrity that everyone loves is charged with a bad sexual thing (2016)
Someone very famous will unexpectedly die (2014) – Bob Hoskins, Rik Mayhall, Richard Attenborough
And forgot to post this video in regards to one of the predictions. (2016)
So what are this years predictions?
1) Famous Flipped
A famous will be outed as actually doing something good, and the right wing newspapers flip it around to sound like something bad.
2) Real Americans
Donald Trump causes more of a stur by ensuring all the “genuine” Americans are the only ones that stay in america and anyone else who were not born in America or anyone who has a mother or father, or grand parents born in america in the last 70 years will be told to go back to their own country. Hulk Hogan will also join Trump’s cabinet to show what a real American can do.
3) Bling Ben
So Big Ben is in the process of being pimped out… or at least that is what is REALLY happening. Big Ben was set to have some restoration work done to it but due to a mistake by one of the decorators made and because of an over ambitious work experience kid keen to impress, they made some booboos that couldn’t be hidden. This inspired other artists to get involved and Improve the monument. The clock face was sold to Apple and they converted it into a giant apple watch. The features include the Queens Speech being broadcast on the clock face, regular messages during unimportant times and a smart way of making the bells inside the clock tower being used as speakers. The tower will be fully lit with blue and pink neon lights, along with being fitted with chrome stripes.
4) Celebrity Escalator death
The BBC air a new TV show for saturday nights and one of the ideas was to do a Generation game type celebrity activity game. On one occasion live on TV though, tragedy strikes. One challenge was to do a dance using escalators, however when it was time for a former bake off contestant’s go, the escalator falls into itself leaving the contestent hanging on to the side, being chewed up and the judges screaming saying it’s not part if the show.
5) A proper famous will join the Shadow Cabinet
I know Eddie Izzard technically is involved with Labour and consider him a proper famous, but he was against Corbyn. This addition will be a full on Corbyn supporter and SHE will end up being one of the major players in Corbyn’s (and then Emily Thornberry’s) government. (Corbyn will take power at some point over the next 5 years but will ensure stuff has started and retire on a high)
6) We really want to see that Danni
After taking a break from entertainment to focus on family and ting… Danni returns to the TV screens as team captain on a new series of Shooting Stars. This will also return Vic and Bob as the hosts and Ed Gamble as a new team Captain.
7) 24 hour cinemas
As someone who works in a cinema (this will be news to you… I will explain later) i can see the impracticalities of certain things. For instance the opening and closing of shops and it’s equipment can get rather monotonous, especially when you have to say, close a cinema at 12pm or some cases at 3am, to open at 9am again. Plus not everyone can catch a showing of Star Wars at 8:45pm… the solution? The 6am showing for those early risers. You could watch a flick before work or school and would be fuel to water cooler conversations.
8) Donald Trumped
US president Donald Trump will be impeached… and the evidence will be very interesting. Some of it will be that Trump has a very unique smell when HE trumps. It’s down to the amount of gold he eats with his dinner prepared by world famous chefs and his trademark smell, which turns out to be 30% old spice, 60% stale Brut, and the rest is piss. It turns out that his smell was detected by smell detectors held by spies in Russia, and because his smell hangs around for so long thanks to the piss, his pungent smell was still smellable in various rooms at the Kremlin.
9) Tony Blair in for a dare
Tony Blair, the political wank stain that just won’t wash off announces that he will be launching a new political party and nicks off with some old friends and big names from his old times. This will turn out to be one big rubishy thing that comes of nothing and everyone retires from it, but it’s one of the ploys to try and stop Corbyn from getting into government.
10) Camay makes a comeback
The oldskool soap becomes some what of an iconic bathroom essential in 2018. It’s not really known why but this along with some other shitty things comes back.
11) (YEAH A BONUS ONE!!!) Channel 4 – The new home of classic gameshows
Give Us A clue and other classic game shows start finding a new home on Channel 4. These include the Wheel of Fortune, and that big game where it’s a big computer screen hosted by David “Diddy” Hamleton. This comes after the success of “The Price Is Right” being on the channel for the new year.
Right… So I’m planning on doing this more often. Maybe not daily but near on daily. Happy new yearrr!!!
Ooh look, it took telly to get me writing again. I will go on about this in a minute but first a quick update.
I got a new job today. I had one job and i did it well, but it finished because it was on a temp contract anf they didn’t need me. This started about a monh ago, hence why there’s not been any weekend edition. Hopefully now i will be able to do it again because the hours were craxy before, 4 days a week, but it was 12 hours a night it was working for a book company and dealing with mostly people who don’t have the books they ordered.
the end of it came as a shock to be honest and I was pretty down, especially after the agency was all “they are looking for someone who wants to progress” and made an effort to show that. I was pretty down and Aphre was amazing and propped me up for the night 🙂
In the day i saw the job going so I thought i should go for it, and the guy gave me an interview.
That means this week i will be training as a sales… thing. Bascally its selling advertising space in a paper. It’s 5 days a week but at least the hours are bareable… right… topic
The nightly show
I watched three of last week’s show, and if you follow this blog and have heard my podcast (weekend edition) you’ll know im a fan of last week tonight and the daily show. When i heard this would be happening I was excited, turns out i shouldn’t have been. It’s supposed to be baswd on the american ones including the tonight show, but it’s standard ITV. They’ve been really banging on about doing something different, while doing something not different. They need a new plan basically. A great director and some great writers. David Walliams hosting was alright, but not really that funny. He’s alright at hosting but not edgy enough. John Bishop was better with the jokes tonight but not really a host. I think they shouod aim for people like Jimmy Carr and Russel Brand, maybe someone who is great with pop culture who is funny but not necessarily a comedian, or even a comedian thats really funny.
To be honest though I think they’ve gone around it the wrong way host wise, they should have had one host, done some proper practicing and (see above ain regards to directors writers and host) because they aren’t hitting their inspiration shows. And some real games. Have the news at 10, then cheer the nation up at 10.30 or even 11.
Anyway i would write more but I’m tired. Maybe more tomorrowwwww!
The Whole Affair 