This is my 2nd last day at home before I bugger off North again to face my doom (ie exams). Then, after a blissful week and a half of rest, it's back to the familiar routine of late nights for no reason, endless procrastination when supposedly doing work, and rushing down to lectures having slept through my alarm.

Although rushing down to lectures is not pleasant in itself, it at least affords me ten-fifteen minutes or so in which to spend quality time with my iriver.


I love my iriver. It isn't very big (4GB) but holds enough sweet music to power me down the hill and, as such devices seem adept at doing, seems to bypass the random shuffle feature in order to play exactly the right songs to suit my current state of mind. Seriously, even if the lecture is a complete waste of time, I feel it's worth it just for the journey there and back if the right song is singing in my ears.

The problem here, however, is that there are hundreds of other students all heading down to campus at the same time. Thankfully, most of these are people I don't know and can therefore happily ignore; however, there are also a good handful of people I do know, and may even be friends with, who don't understand that it's iriver and I's private time, and thus engage me in conversation. It's terrible. I'm not the friendliest person in the mornings anyway, and having to interrupt the best-song-in-the-world-ever-at-that-exact-moment does not improve my mood. It's not that I hate people- well, not all people- I just like some private time with my music. It's got to the stage where I'm actually trying to set off for lectures early, so the chances of my bumping into someone and having to talk to them are lowered. I sneak glances both ways as I leave my Halls, so if anyone I know is coming my way, I can adjust my pace and direction in order to avoid them. My people avoidance techniques, unfortunately, are only successful about 50% of the time, meaning I am frequently forced to turn my darling iriver off, swallow my angry words about intruding on a couple's alone time, and act like a normal person who enjoys regular human contact.

This is why I want a pair of Big Fuck-Off Headphones.

Any idiot and his nan can have little wimpy bud earphones, as any idiot and his nan has an ipod these days. (Case in point: my friend's younger brother has one, despite a musical collection consisting only of 'Now That's What I Call Music!' compilations, two Busted albums and charity football singles.) Big Fuck-Off Headphones are on a whole other level. They send a message out to the world that says, 'Do not bother me. I am a serious listener of music with no time for your petty concerns.' People would see me, open their mouths in order to wish me salutations, then see the Big Fuck-Off Headphones. They would then close their mouths, opting instead for a friendly wave, and thus allow me to walk swiftly on by, with a spring in my step and a song in my heart. It would be amazing.

The other week I had the perfect opportunity to allow this beautiful scenario to come to frutition, as my stupid wimpy headphones decided to break. No apparent damage appeared to have befallen them; the right headphone just decided to stop working. That's the 2nd pair of dead headphones in about 6 months, which is a bit annoying, as a decent pair that actually fit on my head are hard to find. (That makes it sound like I have a massive/abnormally-shaped head; I don't, but I do have abnormally-shaped ears. The left ear, anyway: a little bit of flesh is missing such that normal bud earphones just won't stay in. My brother has the same problem and, after scrutinising the ears of our parents, we deduced that my father is the carrier of this defective ear gene. We gave him a right telling off.) I knew I should have ordered a new pair from the 'net, in order that a whole beautiful array of Big Fuck-Off Headphones would be at my fingertips, but I wanted a new pair immediately. I'm a very impatient person. Delivery takes time, and the thought of being without proper usage of my iriver for more than a day makes me twitchy. So, against my better judgement, I set out the next day to see what Oxford city centre would have to offer me.

Oxford city centre is rubbish. I didn't get my pair of Big Fuck-Off Headphones. I ended up with a pair of retarded neck-band headphones that disagree with the size of my head and therefore like to fall off it. I suppose they're slightly better than the ones I had before, but it's just not the same as what I was after. Come term-time, people will still expect me to talk to them as I walk down the hill. I lead a tragic life, and I bring it upon myself.