"I think I'm beginning to lose my grip on the day"

The Knoll is back on his blog and that can only mean one thing - trouble. So here's where I'm at right now. Its 1 o'clock in the morning on the 28th December 2012 and I can't sleep. You can tell this is going to be good can't you?

We're in that weird limbo stage between Christmas and New Year when no-one quite knows what to do with themselves. Some people are busy, some people aren't. To re-phrase that, everyone I know is busy, I'm not. As a result I'm bored and going to stark-raving mad with no-one to turn to in order to come along and keep me sane. Anyone else know where I'm coming from with this?

Then there's the bad thing that happened. My number 1 idol and influence throughout my entire life, Gerry Anderson has sadly passed away due to Alzheimer's disease. Needless to say this news hit me like a ton of bricks and was absolute devastating.

As you can see from that video, the news has numbed and weakened me. Since hearing that news I've been losing sleep and started to worry about things I really don't need to worry about. With my childhood hero gone I feel vulnerable in a way that I don't think anyone could fully understand. But of course, its Christmas so almost everyone I know is too busy to help.

Basically, I want everything to go back to normal please, that would be absolutely lovely. I want to start fitting back in with civilization in the dis-functional way that I always have done and have people to stand by me in the amazing way that they always have done.

Who else knows what I am saying?

❤

Skype is a marvellous invention, as is the sonic screwdriver... put the two together... and I just can't handle it... lens flare... ftw.......

Lego Film Noir

So this might give away some plans for a future J3P Films Project, but here's some of my experiments with creating a film noir style, with lego figures. All the photos are completely unedited and the custom made figures were created by wonderfully talented girlfriend. I hope you enjoy the results of the experiment!

© Jack Knoll 2012

Positive Thinking

Hey y'all. It's been a while. Can you forgive me?

Well even if you can't, here's a little update on the life of Knoll, and I really mean little. AS-Level exams are done and dusted for the year and I'm currently facing boredom in the last few days of study leave. That's what we have South Park for. Also I've been chosen to be a head student at school, which is pretty neat. And you are now officially the last people on Earth that I've told. I'm such an egotistical maniac.

So considering the slightly sarcastic and cynical tone of this post already, you're probably wondering why on earth a title like 'Positive Thinking' comes from. Well practising what I preach, I do not.

BUT here's what I'm thinking should happen in an ideal world. If everyone thinks positively, rather than deliberately being miserable all the god darn time, then positive things will happen. So the next time you're having a strop about something tedious, think this - rather than being a pussy and whining to yourself, just do something else and either come to a productive solution to your problem, or simply live with it and try to make the best of it. Easier said than done right? Well that's why I said "in an ideal world". As you can tell I'm not really in the positive thinking mood right now, but I'm not letting that stop me get on with my life and talk to people perfectly normally. Just because you're pissed off about something, that doesn't mean you should try dragging everyone else down with you.

This may very well possibly be the most heartless thing I've ever written in my entire life. There is a better way of putting it. Shay and Colette Butler, stars of YouTube sensation the Shaytards, do a bi-weekly pod cast which is occasionally comes up with little gems like this: 

I hope it changes your life better than I have. See y'all around!

Everybody's Changing

I know, cheesy title, but you guys know I'm not good with that kind of thing. "The Young Adventures of Damon Dark" wasn't exactly catchy was it?

So, many changes have happened in my life since I last posted on this blog. And there are changes that are still to come. Strap yourself in, my life has gotten scary!

I'm now studying A-Levels at a different school. And when I say different, I mean DIFFERENT!!! I hope you can distinguish between the two. I've gone from a mixed sex Catholic school to a Girls' Grammar School. Two points to raise here:

1) I haven't had a sex change. They let guys into the Sixth Form to study A-Levels. Why would I cut off my gentleman parts just to change school?

2) Going to a Girls' Grammar School doesn't come with the advantages that you dirty internet users think. So just behave...

This blog is actually being written in the school library during a free period. The environment which surrounds me is an enormous contrast to what I was familiar with at my old school. People are actually using the library to do work! Shock horror!

I've been here for four weeks now, and already I feel right at home. The peaceful and academic nature of this school is going to do me the world of good over the next two years. Of course gaining A-Level qualifications comes with stress attached, however I'm guessing that I'll be having a lot less stress than the people who chose to struggle on in the pile of wreckage that is my old school.

Further attempts to reduce the stress of A-Levels have forced me to make a decision or two concerning my YouTube "career". On October 7th I will have completed one year of daily vlogs. Once this year is over, I will be completely over hauling the J3P Vlogs channel and starting a new weekly show which be of a better standard than the daily vlogs, and be less time consuming for me to work on. It's a flawless win-win situation!

Today's blog post has come about as a result of me evaluating my life and the changes that I have put, or am about to put, into operation. A few questions are in the process of being answered about the decisions I have made:

1) Were they good decisions?
2) Why were they good decisions?
3) How am I benefiting from these decisions now?
4) How will I benefit from these decisions in the future?

Before many of these questions can be answered, an even bigger one needs asking:

What am I doing?

By which I mean, what am I going to do with the rest of my life and how are the choices I make now affecting this?

Sometimes we don't think about how our decisions will affect us, and others, in the future. I suppose it all depends on whether you live for what's important right here and right now. I've been one of those people, just trying to satisfy my needs, wants and desires for this moment in time. It's a happy way to live. But then reality kicks in. Ignorance is no longer bliss. You're forced to look at the bigger picture. In order to do well, you have to think about where you'll be in ten or twenty years.

I guess it all comes down to this:

If you want to live happily, think for now. If you want to live successfully, think for the future.

And I bet you were expecting a conclusion as deep as that were you? 

The Procrastination Curse

The last time we spoke I was about to be thrown into the murky depths of exams. Fun fun fun. But it is now 3 months later and I feel it is time we got back together and had a good old natter about how things went, and indeed how things are going now. So let's dive in.

Exams were okay. Nothing spectacular, just okay. The simple fact of the matter is I could have done better. On the other had I can't really see myself doing any worse. It was average. So whilst telling fibs about revising didn't exactly benefit me, I don't think doing any more revision than what I ended up doing would have helped.

The fact of the matter is, if I do badly in any of my subjects, it wasn't my fault. You see examiners have this thing of getting rather bored with writing the same types of exam papers every year. So what they do is every so often, they take on a different approach to spice up their otherwise dull and futile lives. This year was one of those years where they tried to be a little bit too clever. The questions in many exam papers this year were highly unorthodox and unusually put to the point where even the person asking the question didn't understand it. How do I know this? Because 2011 saw more proven errors and trick questions in exam papers than ever before. So it wasn't just me not getting it.

Then exams ended. Wonderful! Celebration and joy!

Well actually no. You see, I met up with an old friend. Before the exams started I was getting to know a person called Mr Procrastination. He was an absolute bastard who distracted me from all my exam revision and made me do absolutely pointless things that didn't need doing, despite the number of times I told him I needed to revise. Mr Procrastination just kept on insisting that what he was making me do was a lot more entertaining.

By the time exam season had come to an end I thought that Mr Procrastination had popped off to live in the Bahamas or something. He deserved a break. He had been making every teenager in the country not revise for their exams so I imagined he'd be pretty tired out.

I was wrong. Ever since exam season finished, I have been persistently visited by Mr Procrastination and his good friend and colleague Mr Sitonyourarseallday.

This summer was meant to be full of productivity. I was going to start writing scripts again, I was going to do a billion and one films and I was even going to attempt some weight loss in time for starting a new school in September.

But Mr Procrastination and Mr Sitonyourarseallday insisted that I sat around and did nothing all the time. Which is why I am writing this blog entry now. You see I don't actually want to be doing this right now. I would much rather be editing the Space Station 5 II film which was shot before Mr Procrastination came to my house for a summer holiday. But the truth is that for some reason, I am being forced to write this blog entry because it was the only thing to do other than edit that film. And I want to edit the film. But Mr Procrastination thinks it is a very difficult job and doesn't know where I should start, whereas writing a blog is much easier, but is a lot less productive.

So there you have it. Procrastination is the thing that makes you do things you don't want to do instead of things you do want to do but require a little more effort. So if procrastination (who actually isn't a person but a state of mind) is stopping us from doing the things we do want to do, why don't we just ignore whatever procrastination says and do the productive things that we're meant to be doing?

And there we have a great big slobbery wet issue. If anyone can work out how procrastination can be stopped for good, not only will the world be a better place, but whoever works it out will get whatever prize they desire from me. Why am I able to make that offer? Well mainly because no-one will ever find the answer.

For the rest of eternity, humanity is gripped by this plague of not doing the things they actually want and need to do. How stupid is that?

Thanks procrastination, thanks a bunch.

Well now that my blog post for today is over, maybe I'll get on with editing Space Station 5 II... or maybe I'll arrange my DVD's in alphabetical order like Mr Procrastination is suggesting...

Revision: The Greatest Lie

Oops... okay... so I might have left The Blog of Knoll to fend for itself a little bit there. But if its anything like me it probably just enjoyed a bit of time to itself.

So guys, we have reached crunch time. In just over a week from now my exams start... well I say start... its more sort of the beginning of the end of one set which will then allow me to begin another... you've gotta love the British educational system.

Thing is, I actually quite like exams. Extended periods of sitting down to complete a specific task is a good work out for the brain. And that's why I hate revising for these exams. Because when it comes to revision, there is no specific task to complete. You just have to get a lot of stuff in your noggin'. And I dunno what's in there and what isn't. So I end up spending all of my revision time doing something I know how to do which rather defeats the point. Because I quite simply don't know how to revise without wanting to shoot myself...

This whole time when I was supposed to be revising, I have in fact been making myself into a worse person - a liar. Lying about the fact that I've obviously not done any work. That can't be a good thing. Lying is evil, revision is making me lie, therefore revision is evil... think about it people!

So basically, any time I have ever said, "yeah I might not be able to do that because I'm revising", what has in fact happened is I have thought about doing that exact thing I said I couldn't do, then realise I shouldn't do it because I said I was revising and I wouldn't want people to think I was lying. And so the lying continues!

What am I saying here? Well I guess it's advice for all you revisees out there. The long and short of it is, if you're going to revise, do it. If you're not, and are therefore dedicating yourself to failing your exams, don't lie about it to make yourself feel better. Because when you get those exam results, the truth will be there in black and white. Except it won't; because like every other lucky bastard on results day, you won't revise and you'll do really well. Either that or the person who marked your exam was really drunk at the time. But that's still pretty lucky and its the only way I must have passed Geography.

All right folks, time for me to head off now. Maybe I'll do some revision, or maybe I'll ride a pink unicorn... both are as plausible as each other...