I went to the Stop the War demo yesterday in Glasgow. The turnout was not massive. I'm not really sure why. I remeber the march before the invasion of Iraq and the crowds were massive. I remember being at the top of St Vincent Street and when you looked down you could just the massive line of protesters leading down to George Square and by the city chambers as far as the eye could see. It was such an amazing feeling, so much better than any high from drink or drugs. So often it seems like people just don't care and at times like that it shows that some still do. Of course you got the fuckers who say you can protest all you like but it won't make a difference but in a way it does. It makes a statment. I think however the statement made yesterday in, Glasgow at least, is that there's not many people bothered. My dad wanted to come along and he's been protesting all his life and there was only a couple of the old timers left that he used to know. I wonder if people have just become totally disillusioned? Most of my family were active in the Labour party in the 70's and 80's and now they aren't even members. Who could blame them though. On the whole though there doesn't seem to be as much outrage at whats happeing in Palestine as there was over the Iraq invasion. The whole world sits back and lets it happen and no one says a word, I mean some idiots were actually looking at us and shaking their heads as we walked by on the march. I really enjoyed it anyway though. There we're a few young folk there and that was good to see. None of my mates are interested to the point of wanting to go demo's or anything so it was refreshing to see some other folk that are. When I found out I had got into uni I hoped there might be opportunitys to get involved in activism through gorups or whatever but there doesn't seem to be much happening. You can make these things happen I guees but you have to find out if there are any interested parties.

I'm not massive fan of Christmas to be honest. I always find it quite a boring time. New Year I enjoy but it's not so different from other nights anymore. It's what you make of it really though. If you just go to the dancing then it will be the same as normal except much busier. Going to a ceilidh or hiring a cottage up north or something could be good.

I currently writing from a wee village in Yorkshire. I decided to come down at the last minute. My aunt has a house here and it's quite picturesque. I got the bus down on Christmas eve and the despipcable little prick of a bus driver held us up. Apparently these things happen at this time of year. The road was clear the whole way down. it happened cos he was being a dick! Plain and simple. He took his full 45min break at the service station when normally they only take twenty and push on. This meant by the time we reached Manchester city centre he had worked over the legal amount of time so the bus had to be terminated. All the passengers trying to get to the airport had to be sent by taxi. Everyone else who was trying to get trains to their destination were left stranded cos the trains finished early. I was trying to get to Huddersfield to get picked up but because of that arsehole from hell I missed the train by 5mins. Another guy had to get to Nottingham and he had missed his train aswell. I was lucky that I managed to get a train to Halifax and get picked up from there eventually. What a start to Christmas.

Coming back up to Glasgow tomorrow. It's strange when you come down to Yorkshire cos it just feels like a totally different world, a different time even. It's so old fashioned. All the houses are cottages that are hundreds of years old and everyone goes to the wee village pub etc. It's not so good in other ways I guess , like how all the men get to go the pub after work every night but the women are stuck in with the kids unless they can get a babysitter at the weekend. People are quite friendly though they think your being cheeky when I think it's just a difference in humour also there's the language barrier. I mean fair do's my own mother struggles to understand me sometimes but down here the main reaction when I speak is a startled expression. I don't understand who V-O-D-K-A and C-O-K-E is so difficult to understand.

I'm off from uni now for a few weeks and I've been off work ill as well today. Feel pure sick which I hate. I can cope with feeling rotten and cold and shivery etc but feeling squeamish just does my box in. Anyway having time off is quite weird actually cos I feel like I've been on the go and thinking constantly about design and all the new folk I've met and working etc and now today, sitting in and just been thinking about other stuff. I mean I put myself down for over-time over Christmas and New year but the bosses saw fit to give some people plenty of shifts, some people very and little and soley with me none. It pisses me off and I could go to the union about it but to be honest that's just giving the whole thing to much importance. After six years working in a place I just feel like it's not going to change, just get consistantly worse. I think in a situation like that it's better to try and find something better and focus my energies on that rather than trying to change the place from the inside and getting nowhere no matter how many times you go to the union. Working in that place has taken up so much time and aye it used to be a good laugh but I wonder about all the other things I could have done while I wasted years in there. A lot of folk in the uni have worked in theatre or television or been away working abroad. I think for the past few years I was so into partying and bumming about that I maybe didn't look for opportunitys to do other things. So that's going to change. Next year I'm not spending another summer getting treated like a primary school kid in the kitchen. I'm not sure what to do. Ideally I would love to get either a van or tent and travel about the country a bit, take in the festivals etc. Financially that could be tricky though. A van would be dear for insurance and fuel. I suppose I could get a decent tent and go about by car. I was also looking on this site http://www.wwoof.org/ which stands for "worldwilde opportunitys in organic farming". It's something I'm interested in and after months being stuck in the design room it would be brilliant to work outdoors. There's some really interesting communitys registered with the orginisation and it could be rewarding. Basically you work for your keep which is good but I'd miss my deep fried pizza's if I'm being honest. In the past I've tried to organise to do things with my mates. Now I'm pretty hopless and disorganised but they're even worse so our plans never really get off the ground. I've always been put off doing things by myself but if I don't and wait on my mates then it's not going to happen and then chances pass you by. I mean I met an old friend the other day and he's heading off to India for fourteen weeks and then over to Canada. The freedom of just doing that and getting makes feel so envious. I hate feeling trapped in situations. Not being tied down or held back is so important. At last now, I'm lucky that I'm on a course I'm loving and want to be good at. In the past I've never cared if I do well at college or not because I didn't really want to be there. That's changed now but I still amn't entirley comfortable with the thought of being tied to one place for three years. The way to look at it I guess though is that I'm not tied down or trapped at all; I'll stay for three years cos I want to. Thats fine. One of the reason's I'm doing this course in the first place is actually to open up doors. I want to be able to travel and work in different places and have something that I can actually work thats not just bar work etc. Anyway I'm rambling like a weirdo now. I found this picture on a blog today which I thought was quite cool and kind got me thinking about all these things anyway.

Had a class this morning which I thought would have been in the computer lab all day. I was pleased to discover we would actually be walking about Glasgow City Centre and finding a wee cafe and sitting sketching it, taking notes on it. We ended up in the Trans Europe Cafe down in the Trongate beside the theatre. It was quite a cool wee cafe, not too posh and not too greasy a bit too pricey for me though. I've got exactly 25pence until Friday which is so annoying cos I'm constantly starving and can't afford to eat. Anyway these are some sketches I took of the cafe, inside and out. We had wandered for a fair amount of time looking at the plethora of cafes in and around the city centre. One thing I noticed is how many Starbucks and Costa coffee's there are. At one point you could turn 180 degrees and see about three different Starbucks. It's a shame because a lot of the other wee loose out cos there are so many of these places and I think eventually people get bombarded by so many of these big chains that it stops occurring to them that they can actually visit somewhere else. The chain cafes are never that special anyway so mediocrity becomes the main thing on offer.