I hate this new layout: It's badly cluttered and I can't seem to find anything. And where is the logic in reducing the list of friends' blogs to just five? And just what use to me is Pacific Time, exactly? I will learn to live with these (and other) irritations if the new site is quicker and less buggy than the old one, though (please don't laugh too hard ).

Actually, I've just had an idea: If anyone wants to get any frustrations about the new site of their chest, then please feel free to do so in the comments. *mischievous grin*

Wow, what a night Friday night was.

I went to visit my grandad as usual and picked up the local paper. To my utter astonishment, I read in the Gig Guide that Zero (a thrash metal band from Sunderland: I mentioned them a couple of blogs ago) were coming to play at a pub in Blackburn. Naturally, I turned into a gibbering mess and called the friend I was about to visit in order to persuade him to go down there with me.

There were three acts playing (all thrash metal acts that were obviously inspired by the likes of Pantera and Slayer), though by the time we got there, the first one (Chaos Dawn) had almost finished. A pity really, as they sounded pretty good (oh, and if there are any Metalocalypse fans reading this, there was a guy watching who was a dear ringer for Nathan Explosion ).

The second act to play were called ey Saw and they hailed from Manchester. We were both really impressed by how good they were and I was able to score a demo disk from the lead guitarist (for four pounds) after their set. It doesn't quite do their live sound justice, but is pretty good nonetheless (and I'm happy to share the files with anyone who's interested ). I also found out off there guitarist that they are still unsigned, which is an absolute travesty (especially given half the rubbish that seems to get signed these days ).

Something that really amused us both when ey Saw were playing was the sight of a guy slumped at a table: He was so wasted that he was completely out cold, which was no mean feat given just how loud the band were playing. Well it turned out that this guy was actually Zero's vocalist (who's known as "Slayer Dude" ), so he had to be roused before the band could actually take the stage. Well we went out for a short while so my friend could go and have a cigarette while ey Saw packed up their equipment and Zero set up theirs for their set and when we got back, Slayer Dude was conscious again, though he was quite obviously very drunk.

Well Zero's set was great fun. The band sound absolutely superb live: They're a dual-lead band and carry it off quite brilliantly. The antics of Slayer Dude were absolutely hilarious too: During the first song he berated the sound people (very colourfully ) for not knowing what they were doing (with some justification), during another he tripped over the edge of the stage and stumbled into the crowd, colliding with and flattening the Nathan Explosion lookalike. There was also an incident between songs when he dealt with a heckler in the most amusing fashion, though I'd undoubtedly get moderated if I went into detail here. He also stumbled backwards during another song and fell into one of the guitar amps, completely flattening it and finishing up spreadeagled backwards on top of it.

By this point, my sides were absolutely killing me because of how hard I'd been laughing, but sadly Zero's set was to be cut short: Slayer Dude had actually killed the guitar amp. The rest of the band did play a song while the other guitarist and ey Saw's guitarist tried to fix it, but it was to no avail and Zero's set was brought to a premature end.

All in all a fantastic night, though.

Oh, and after the set, I got talking to the guy that drove them over here and he promised me a copy of their new demo disk once they release it (again, I'll gladly share with anyone who's interested once I get it ).

...I just wanted to apologise for being so inactive at the moment. To be honest, I'm going to be pretty inactive here for the foreseeable future. I'm not planning on leaving GS indefinitely, but I certainly can't keep up with what all my friends are doing at the moment. This doesn't mean that I've forgotten about any of you, okay?

A lot has happened to me in the two months since I returned from Calgary. I was pretty depressed for a while and as a result I let a lot of jobs pile up and I'm still sorting some of the mess out now. I've had work done on my house (some is still ongoing) and I've bought a new(er) car.

A few weeks ago, I also started going to the gym. Not because I particularly care about my outward appearance, but I was sick of trying to find shirts that'd fit my neck (I'm 18 1/2" and I have a hard time finding anything bigger than 18" ). Things have changed since then, and I have become more obsessed with how many calories I'm burning and how many I'm consuming. In fact, I've completely changed my diet and I'm now eating a lot more healthily.

It's still early days yet, but in the three or four weeks I've been going, I've already lost 5 kg (11 lbs) from a starting point of 108 kg (around 238 lbs). For those of you that know me well enough, I put the extra 10-15 lbs on since I returned from Canada, though I didn't realise until I went to the gym for the first time.

To tell you the truth, I've not felt this good about myself in years, though I accept that all I've done so far is to make a good start and there's still a lot of hard work ahead of me.

Anyway, I'll try to keep you all posted on how I'm doing. Take care, okay?