The Angry E-mail to Sky

Oh. My. Jebus.

So, I gets home after a cruddy day that's pretty much killed me and what's this? Sky's gone and downgraded my viewing experience while still managing to steal money from my family?

Uhm, not on.

So, here's the angry e-mail I want to send to them. Sadly, I have to cut it down by another 250 characters before they'll accept it.


"Sky,

Today I returned home to find my Sky+ HD TV services had been 'upgraded'.

Frankly, I am appalled. Not only was I not given the option to retain the original layout for changing the channel and accessing the TV Guide (+ other options) but, even more frustrating, the layout is confusing and laggy.

To tell you the truth, Sky, I would have expected something far more customer-friendly from an organisation that implies such a quality through its advertising efforts. If I had wanted a visual-downgrade (contrary to whatever you may be calling it), I would have asked for one.

What's even MORE shocking is the fact that you seem to have closed the gap even further to why a person shouldn't get Virgin TV. The new design implemented is far from different and, as such, seems shoddy, poorly-crafted and zealously over-complicated.

To summarise, I am infuriated with both this update AND the fact that on no occasion did you ask ME whether I'd like to change what *I* see.

So, Sky, either promptly give me the information on how I can revert my layout to the user-friendly one you previously implemented or give me a damn good reason why I should continue using this god-almighty one instead of finding another, more attractive television provider."

Grr. To be completely frank, I wouldn't be so frakked off with them if they had just gone and asked me whether or not I wanted to have this o-so-fantastic 'upgrade'. However, deciding to change what I see on my television and making me feel trapped while watching something is not my idea of a decent upgrade.

Hope.

So, basically, I've been sat here for the past 25 minutes listening to bits and bobs strewn across the internet desperately trying to organise my thoughts into some form of coherent way of getting across what's going on inside Matt.

With today being one of these really long days where time seems to deliberately put on the brakes and has to be, quite literally, dragged through the day, my fears over my Spanish Oral Exam took great delight. I've never been much of a fan of fear. So much so, in fact, that fear was the reason I became a vegetarian (after the time I was a vegetarian because of a 'dare') the second time.


If you're new to reading my blog, what I like to do is talk about something quite 'mundane' and then link it to a deeper meaning which has 'revealed' itself to me.


So, as previously alluded to, today was the day that I had my Spanish Oral Exam. Have you ever had an experience when you do something for a bit and it just turns into one of those massive blur moments when everything seems to mold into one big time-space paradox thing? Yeah. That happened.

I'm sure you'll understand when I say that, as prepared as I might have been with my linking phrases and my subjunctive phrases (the subjunctive doesn't really exist in english like in other languages; if you're bothered, look it up!) and my god-knows-what-else phrases, I still feel very much unfinished.

--

Thankfully -- or perhaps not -- my response to the exam seemed to coincide with that of the other 2 of my classmates that I got to chat with. We all felt that:

1) we wanted to do it again; and,
2) we wanted to actually get what we wanted to say, said!

I feel undone. 'At a loose end'.

To be completely honest, not just at a 'loose end' but, really, a bit scared. While I can't actually know properly how my Spanol friends did in the exam, I do know how I performed. The term 'less than expected' fits. And no, that isn't some form of post-exam self-bullying. Considering the amount of home practice I did with myself over easter and each night post that break -- incessant rambling which I'd go over again and again until I got the right pronunciation and syntax -- I'm sure you can, again, understand my... disappointment.

Not, 'OMGWTFIH8YOUMATTHOWCOULDYOUDOTHIS?!', disappointment but, '*Le sigh* Why didn't I just breathe?', disappointment.

--

Regardless of all of this, though, it is my belief that spilt milk, however much has been spilt on the table, is spilt and all you can do is clear it up. A bit of 'gah' interspersed, but spilt-milk clearage nonetheless.

With my 'epic' love of films, I decided therefore to take one out from my school library (I know! Libraries with films?! ON DVD?!). Of course, I just had to take one of my favourites: The Matrix

So, I get home and I watch and, once done, I ponder. The Matrix always forces me to assess whether in the future I should study Philosophy. Knowing that there are so many intermingling philosophical, spiritual and religious ideas simmering throughout the film, it forces me to ponder whether I want to be like the people in all of those pods: going about their daily lives without every thinking. Without ever realising their true existence.

--

And so, as I sit here in my bedroom pondering my future, the Matrix and my exam, this ever-so-poignant need to have some hope for the future seemed necessary.

Because what else can we have? We can discuss and we can talk and we can reason but, at the end of it all, all we can do is hope. And, it seems ironic that I am having to make a decision between whether to 'drop' Spanish or my Philosophy courses when I reach the 'A2' level of my A-levels. I *can* hope that there's a G-d, or that there's an afterlife, or that (more mundanely) my Spanish result will be fine.

Really, though, what can I, or anyone else, do?

Do we really need to do anything else?