BioBlog travel log - 11/01/09

So, I figured that since I'll be on the train for a while, so let's take a book or something.
But hello! This train has a plug for laptops and phones! So, rather than a story or a peculiar little observation on life, let's write this as I'm experiencing things. Innovation, redefining the idea of what a blog is, that's the ticket!

So here I am, sat in Leeds city station on the 17:05 to King's Cross with my good friends laptop and Starbucks. I'm finally going to the big city for the first time in my life and I must admit to being a little excited. I mean, I've been away from home before, sure, but I've never done it completely alone. I've always either known someone I was with or have been on my way to meet someone I knew.
Trains are an amusing idea. I haven't been on one in some 16 years but I'm happy about the concept. It's not quite the same as the car, sure, but that's perhaps not a bad thing. It reminds me of travelling to Europe in a lot of ways. Dark night, bright lights...
This is really nostalgic.
Life really has been taking some amusing turns of late. This is certainly quite a laugh, listening to the kid in the next aisle. Not entirely unlike the kids in Paris. There was something impossibly charming about hearing rapid French being spoken by a 3 year old girl.
But life's been a fairly rapid string of adventures, lately. I guess that's the nature of life, really, you have more experiences, you meet more people, it all opens doors. Gives you the confidence to wander out on a whim, to go and see the world. I could get used to travelling, in many ways. It's crazy addictive, that's the trouble. I mean, I've had the wanderlust now since I got back from my last trip to the south. I guess we need this kind of thing sometimes. To get out there, escape from the predictability of our comfort zones and such, but it's intimidating at the same time. The knowledge that you're so very far from everything you know, your own bed, a predictable kettle and the corner shop, you get used to all the old home comforts. Maybe that's why travel is tiring, it's something of an emotional drain. Heaven knows it's not too physically gruelling, once you've found a way to shift the luggage around. This place is pretty comfy, Got to hand them that. Shame I can't take a nap.
Silly to think that less than 6 years ago I was scared to even go on the motorway. But then, I guess the only thing I've retained from those days is a strange taste in music.

This world's amazing, the more I see of it. People get seperated by landmasses, oceans and such to the point where you can take one person from two different countries and be able to see next to no similarities. That's crazy, if you think about it, we're all the same species, we all function the same, but yet here we are eating different foods, having different standard of behaviour and different methods of communication. Different cultural taboos, different religions, different attitudes and approaches to fulfilling the most absolutely base human needs. I suppose that explains racism, it's just people doing things in a way you can't understand and don't much care to accept. Not that that justifies racism (although admittedly I'm in favour of it on a good-natured ribbing level. Like how we tend to poke a little fun at Americans and they give us a little back. Nothing mean spirited), but I suppose you have to feel sorry for people that aren't able to let themselves even be civil to people just because they were brought up in a different kind of environment. But yeah, you stick 200 miles of countryside between people and all of a sudden they start doing crazy things like wrapping eggs up in sausages and coating them in breadcrumbs. I mean I'm sorry, I like scotch eggs a lot, but if you stuck some bacon in that sucker, you'd have something pretending to be a full english breakfast.
Actually... that's a bloody good idea. Anyone reading this who's feeling like a kitchen adventure, please consider it. I'll love you forever if it actually works and we can get the world to accept it. Or I'll buy you a pint or something. Bacon treats are perhaps not a suitable foundation for any kind of relationship. They're not a bad start, though.
And now darkness has fallen, my ipod has decided to dispense Japanese lounge music and it's really striking my how ridiculously beautiful this land is at night. Thousands of twinkling lights, each one with a story behind them. Each one someone living their life, a set of hopes, fears and achievements that I'll never know of. Y'know, this world really is far too large. I'm not sure what's better, really, to go and meet as many people as you can, to bomb around the world at a frenzied pace and see everything you can or to sit back and try to do a few things PROPERLY. Make really good friends, settle down, make a nice home for yourself, get a proper career and just be comfortable. People ask about the meaning of life as if they need one singular purpose, one goal to dedicate themselves to, but I don't reckon such a thing exists. Life doesn't have to be justified, it's too unpredictable to direct like that. Always thought myself that the only thing anyone should ever strive for is to find what they really love, what makes them the happiest and just do it.
I guess that's my calling then, if you will. I've got a job now, a little place to call my own, good friends and the drive and means to do most anything now, with a little planning. Perhaps I'll spend the next few years thinking on what makes us tick, writing about why I find human nature so compelling but simultaneously very peculiar. Maybe nobody will ever really read this stuff outside of the few of you who browse these pages on occasion, but that hardly matters. If I've amused anybody, maybe altered someone's perspective on life at all, I'm pretty happy.
I wonder if this thing would have read any differently if I'd been listening to, say, radio shows or trance music as I wrote it. Looks like the slow slushy stuff makes me feel at peace with everything. I guess I'd better listen to speed metal when I finally get around to rigging up the blueprints for my vast robot horde.
That sorta guarantees that I'll never conquer the world, at least not that way. I can't abide speed metal, sometimes.
We're now about an hour away from London. The coffee is but a distant, creamy memory, but at least my tickets have apparently worked. And they've been stamped with pretty stars, too.