It was there. I was there. We were all there.

As I walked to work, accompanied by the rainy winter chill, I stared onwards for a bit longer than normal when I got to the end of the burned out road. 

The modern age affords us more and more luxuries on a daily basis but one that we take for granted is music.

What started as an intimate art form between groups of the like minded has quickly become yet another air bound currency. 

Why shouldn’t we be able to listen to the complete works of everything and anyone whilst traversing wastelands to our various 9-5 haunts?

There’s very little consequence to skipping eras that changed millions just to get what we want a little quicker. It’s hard to believe that anything could be more temporal than the throwaway culture that envelops us on a daily basis.

As the thought of strolling down another cold road became a grim reality I stopped for a brief second as warm sounding synthesiser bypassed my ears and swam straight into attention.

It was there. I was there. We were all there.

I stared up into the rain as beauty resonated and a voice negotiated me through empty rooms and corridors with an almost surgical clarity and precision.

I've got my life in a suitcase,
I'm ready to run, run, run away..
I've got no time, 'cause I'm always trying to run, run, run away
'Cause everyday in here feels like it's only a game.
I've got my life in a suitcase, a suitcase, a suitcase...

I could have stood there forever.

If you live at 100 miles an hour, you lose the sensation of speed that you craved all along.

For every time I drove across the country in the middle of the night, every story I listened to for the fourteenth time, every cliché I saw ticked and every heart I saw broken. Every shirt that was three sizes too small and every ego that was three hundred sizes too big. It all became worth it; every single second of it.

Cage Warriors 51 - The Lost Vikings

29 shows.

That's unreal isn't it?

The crazy thing is that it's not even the most I've ever done in a year but it's undoubtedly the biggest. I did 34 shows in 2011 but I was writing a lot more. It's not that I don't write as much now but it's different.

I realised quite quickly that, when I started judging a lot more fights, there'd be a clear conflict of interest if I wrote in the way I loved writing. It's not to say I still don't have opinions but there's a time and a place for voicing them and a certain fashion.

Fighters Only is a perfect avenue for me to write about video gaming and other such things because of the angles I can take.

The 29th show this year was Cage Warriors 51 in Dublin on New Year's Eve. The last Dublin show was pretty nuts for several different reasons.

Fights were insane, venue was awesome but the crowd were some of the most passionate mma fans that I've seen for a very long time. Conor McGregor's sprint into the audience after he subbed Dave Hill was anarchy and I got another sense of that collective adrenaline from the moment the first bell rang for this show.

It was awesome to be back at the Helix and, after a day that involved watching War Games whilst falling asleep and eating Toblerone,  I was ready to judge some fights.

• No Thin Lizzy? Really? I thought that was a law? I thought that, if you put on an mma show in Ireland, they did a draw backstage if nobody was planning to walk out to Thin Lizzy. 
• You can't beat a bit of screaming Scandi metalcore to truly confuse an Irish crowd. 
• Another flawless night from the men in charge inside the cage. Take a bow Messrs Mitchell, and Goddard. Consistently high level refereeing has been a hallmark of the show this year.

Take Care
Ben

Cage Warriors 50 - Landmine

I'm not running out of games.

I'll never run out of games.

This month's been a great one for gaming to be honest. Sony finally pulled their fingers out and put Castlevania: Symphony of the Night on the PSN and I won auctions on Sunset Riders, Parodius and Megaman X for my SNES.

It's good, it's always been good.

I've also ordered a few shirts from Meatbun.us as well. Insert Coin is cool in places but is quickly becoming a bit redundant somehow. That being said I rocked a Viva King shirt this past weekend.

This Saturday I worked my 11th Cage Warriors show this year and it began, as they all do, with a voyage.

Myself and Lethaby hopped on the 9:17 train from Stoke station and, after a quick change in Crewe, settled in for the 250 mile voyage with my Blackberry playbook and a boat load of mid 2000's mma to watch.

I had all kinds of Pride on there but it was Cage Rage that inevitably drew my attention somehow. It was cool looking back at that era where I was such a fan and seeing all the people I regularly chat to at shows now. I even saw a young looking Marc Goddard walking out with Ross Mason.

Dave's opening tack of "Hello Marc, I saw you on an old Cage Rage show on the trip here; you looked about half the size," didn't go as well as he thought it would in his head I imagine but that's another story.

The trip was really relaxing and a nice contrast to the usual marathon drives I've become so used to. I watched as the bustling countryside eventually became a snowy wilderness as we moved towards the highlands. As the train pulled into the final station before Glasgow I became more aware of the people outside, enthralled in the truly everyday.

For a brief few minutes I felt the most overwhelming sense of the Debord as I sat in the perfectly contained warmth and watched society tick over in front of my eyes. I couldn't have stopped anything from happening or purveyed my sense of attachment to these people running up and down and making decisions. It was empowering a funny kind of way. It's kind of romantic to watch the world go by from a safe place and, as much as I was aware of the way in which this spectacle mirrored most of our waking minutes, it filled me with many questions.

There's always many questions. Before I could ask any of them though, the train pulled into Glasgow Station and we went out for a wander before the show. On arriving in city centre, Dave and I grabbed an all you can eat Indian Buffet for 6 quid each, when in Rome and all that, and then made our way to the venue. It's nice to roll into a strange place and see familiar faces. Everything seems fine at that point. I was ready to judge some truly amazing scraps and I wasn't disappointed.

Take Care
Ben

That night we'll never re-live

I think I need to stop writing these at work. You can't see what this office looks like but believe me it's hardly Club Tropicana.

Imagine the set of a terrible sitcom set in the 1970's featuring a load of belligerent and disgruntled factory workers and their out of touch boss. The walls are white woodchip and the shelves are full of nonsense.

I share it with a gentleman called Matt Spooner. He, like myself, is a cynical Samaritan.

We both want to help people but, in the modern workplace, that really isn't enough anymore. It's about ticking boxes and jumping through hoops to ensure that people I'll never meet make more money than I'll ever see in a lifetime.

I think that's the problem with teaching in this kind of training provider context.

Everything is done to make money, not to help people out. I'm pretty sure that my cynical side has flourished more in two years here than it did during six years teaching young offenders.

Anyhow what's the point of this one?

There isn't a point I don't think. Writing just stops me thinking. I think that's why I'm doing it. I've not got a point or a message but sometimes I wonder if there always has to be one.

When I first started writing I would ponder for hours over drafts of different text. I'm not saying I don't edit things now but I often find that when I switch off a little bit that the best stuff happens. It's hard to define best . I think I mean writing that's a more accurate reflection of where I currently am.

It's Friday and

As I was writing this my boss walked in and gave me something menial to do so I look busy. It's the inference that I'm somehow mutinous that I resent the most I think.

Anyhow I digress.

I hope you people have a great weekend.
Thanks for taking the time
Speak soon
Take Care
Ben

Cage Warriors 49 - King of the Monsters

Sucks to be back at work again.

Everyone says that on these things right?

Well we can't all be wrong. Unless you are lucky enough to do something you love for a living.

Maybe even then it starts becoming like work somehow like it did when I was writing more for a living. I guess it's the human condition.

We just find it really sad, we thought being in a band would be so brilliant and yet it just becomes a routine like anything else. 

You know, whatever you choose to do in life, even if you love it, within a few months of doing it it's just the same thing every day but now it's just - wake up, travel, sound check, gig, wake up, travel, sound check, gig. 

When we first started that was brilliant and now it's just the same. There's something about human nature that just reduces life down to a routine.
Richey Edwards

This week's bundle of shiny violence came courtesy of Cage Warriors. I've been lucky enough to judge 10 of their events this year and every single one has been special in some way or another.

There's been no shortage of great fights, awesome company and phenomenal tea to be had throughout 2012 but I already knew that this show in Wales was going to be an amazing experience.

Cage Warriors 49 marked the organizational judging debut of my long time mma comrade Mr. David Lethaby who, after slogging away judging fights for years just like myself, got the call to head to Wales and make sense of it all.

The trips would include a flask of tea, S-Express, a long discussion about the Eastern front of the Second World War and some shortbread. Our hotel was out of the way but luckily enough we jumped in a cab with the usual suspects to get to the venue.

The evening was a cacophony of local heartache and close fought battles which I shall attempt to recount.

• Welsh fans love a bit of a singalong don't they. Yes that's obvious but it's a true spectacle to behold when you look up into the crowd to see hundreds of Welsh types singing "You Jack Bastard" as anyone from Swansea walks in.
• If you're sitting at a table with sweets that are yours and somebody says "What's that up there?", it's always a trap. Always. Damn you people.
• Once again a quick shout out to the likely lads who made the after show event such a civilised do. There's something magical about that first cup of tea after an mma event. That's some of my favourite stuff right there.

KING OF THE MONSTERS

It's obvious ain't it?

I'm off to for the first walk home in the dark of 2012 so, if I make it home, I'll speak to you good people very soon.

Take Care

Love Always

Ben

UCMMA 30 - Shinobi

This week I commandeered a teapot at work that was sitting in a drawer doing nothing.
I cleaned it up, disinfected it, washed it again and then went home to contemplate how righteous this all was.
This morning I walked to work and bought some sugar cubes and a small bottle of milk.
There's no way this decadence lasts forever but, while it does, it's truly glorious.

UCMMA you say?

Oh yeah I knew I'd started writing for a reason. I just got excited when I began to type and all I saw over the desk was my beloved teapot.

The event was full of the surreal excellence that I've come to expect from the Troxy on a Saturday night and as I strolled back to the hotel, I was amazed to think that I've been fortunate enough to commentate the show for the last two years. I can't tell you where all the time has gone.

These are the things I noticed from watching mixed martial arts this week:

SHINOBI

I've always loved the Shinobi games.

As a kid I used to pretend I was Joe Musashi and jump over things while dressed in an ill fitting headscarf that I found in a box full of linen. I didn't get injured either which is probably more of a miracle.

I think the thing I liked the most about Shinobi was the fact that he was faceless. In victory or defeat he adopted the same steel eyed determination to move forward and keep moving forward.

I like the fact that he just used to turn up, throw down and then leave.


Until next time
Speak soon
Take Care
Ben

Sometimes

You don't really need a lot of words when a picture holds a waterfall of memories.

If life is a treasure hunt then these pages are my map somehow.

I always said instruction manuals were for people who were scared of getting electrocuted.

Guess I was wrong.

Speak soon
Take Care
Ben