Great day, great place, great friends - what more could I ask for?

Well, my exams are FINALLY over! They seemed to go okay, but boy, I was glad to get them out of the way. And then came the one thing that I had been looking forward to for ages - a trip to Staffordshire to visit the United Kingdom's most popular theme park: Alton Towers! It just so happened that on the same day that we (me, Peter and our parents) were going, four of my friends from my old school were going as well! (Wednesday 29th June, for the record.) This is the report of our day...

We arrived at Alton Towers before 9:30, and soon got on the monorail train to head from the car park to the entrance. As soon as we got off the train, we were greeted by an unusual sight: two purple corkscrews with gold supports. These were from the park's first rollercoaster, Corkscrew, which was removed at the end of 2008 to make way for their newest ride, Thirteen (also stylised as Th13teen). It was truly a bizarre thing to see, but a monument to what put Alton Towers on the map, so it only seems fair that the signature element of that ride was kept and put on display for all to see. After buying the tickets, myself and Peter split off from our parents (and that's pretty much how it stayed for the rest of the day), and we ran down to the bottom of Towers Street, where hundreds of other people were waiting. At about 10am, the barriers were removed, and everybody poured through and ran to the rides. Annoyingly, parts of the park were closed off due to some concert thingy, and the Skyride was (and, as far as I'm aware, still is) out of action - allegedly due to the fact that the cable needs replacing, which can't be done until the closed season for issues of health and safety. This meant that a lot more walking than normal was going to happen.

The first ride we went on was Sonic Spinball - a rollercoaster which has cars that rotate independently of the track direction, depending on the weight of each rider. We only ended up waiting 10-15 minutes to get on it, but it was a good start to the day. Next was Oblivion. Opened in 1998, this rollercoaster was the first in the world to have a vertical drop (it's actually about 88.8°, because at the time, the technology didn't exist for a drop to be truly vertical). Only two criticisms of Oblivion. One is that it's a bit too short, but they only had a limited amount of space to work with in what was Fantasy World [now X-Sector], so that's expected). The second is that this year, the ride is sponsored by Fanta, and there are several rather garish-looking posters dotted around the queue lines and the station, and it detracts from the scary feel of the ride, making it seem more colourful and fun than it should be. Anyway, with Oblivion, it was basically a walk-on, as it was so early in the day. On Oblivion, there are two loading platforms, with four bays in each platform, despite there only being two rows on each train, but bear with me. They load two trains at a time (one behind the other). Each loading platform has four bays, as mentioned, named 'A1', A2', 'A3', and 'A4' for the first station, and 'B1', 'B2', 'B3', and 'B4' for the second. They load from two different loading bays each time - for example, in station A they load from bays A1 and A3 one time, then from A2 and A4 the following time, before going back to A1 and A3. The system works the same for the other station. When you think about it, it's actually quite a logical system. After getting into the trains and fastening the harnesses, the trains leave the station (the one from station B gets stopped at the bottom before the lift hill, because only one train is allowed on the lift hill at once - it would be too much weight on the chain otherwise!) and go up the lift hill before reaching the top and making a slow curve to the left. Then the train stops at the top of the drop for a few seconds, while you read a sign painted on the floor that says 'Don't Look Down'. (Can you see the blatantly obvious irony there?) You're only held there for a few seconds, but it feels like quite a while if it's your first time on it. The drop. You just plummet to the ground and enter the hole (no, this is NOT supposed to be dirty!), before levelling out underground. Eventually, you emerge into the daylight, before going around a massively overbanked turn, then up a short hill, before hitting the LONG brake run, then making a left, before arriving back in the station. Yes, it's short, but they had a limited amount of space to work with, and it was a prototype, so B&M (Bolliger & Mabillard, the manufacturers of Oblivion, as well as other famous rollercoasters across the world) probably wanted to do a fairly short first one, just to see how things went. And they've done well with the Dive Machine (the official model name)! After Oblivion, we walked over to the Dark Forest to ride Thirteen (the newest rollercoaster in the park), but we kinda cheated the queue a little bit - we went into the single rider queue, so we pretty much just walked straight onto the ride! Yes, we were on separate trains, but I didn't mind much, to be honest. The secret element to it is that after going into and around the forest, you enter the station building. But not the station itself. The crypt goes dark, and then with no warning, you just drop several feet onto another level, before the train goes backwards through a tunnel. I found it slightly tame, but it was a good ride. Then was Rita - a launched rollercoaster, first opened in 2005. I'd ridden it on my previous visit in 2007, but even so, I'd forgotten how fast it was! We then received a call from one of my friends to say that they were queuing for Nemesis, which was on the other side of the park. Annoyingly, the Skyride transportation system wasn't working, so we had to walk across the park to get to the other side. We went on the Rapids on our way there, which was a pretty good call, even if we did get a bit wet. After exiting the Rapids, we eventually got to Forbidden Valley, and we found my friends from school queuing for Air, but the queue was 70 minutes long. We joined the queue anyway, but it increased to 90 minutes, so we all left that. Stevie, Miles, Esther and Tim wanted to go on the Flume, and Peter wanted to go on Nemesis, so we decided that Peter and I would queue for Nemesis while the others went on the Flume. We were queuing for Nemesis for about 50 minutes, but it was definitely worth it. Nemesis was constructed in the mid-1990s, and opened in 1994. It was the first 'major' rollercoaster at Alton Towers, and thrills thousands of people every day. It was the first suspended rollercoaster in Europe. After exiting the station, the train climbs up the lift hill. After reaching the top, the track curves down and towards the left, before hitting the first inversion - a corkscrew, followed by a fast turn, then a zero-g roll over the station. After that, a 'stall turn' follows, then comes a vertical loop, and another corkscrew, followed by a turn back up to the station. From there, Peter and I walked back through the park to where The Flume was, but we got a bit bored, so we had a little bit of a wander, but not too far. When the others got off the flume, we just had to laugh at them, because they were so soaking wet!

The others wanted to go on Thirteen, so we then went and did that, but queued for over an hour to get on it. It was worth it, though, especially seeing as Peter and I forgot to tell the others about the drop in the middle, and it was brilliant to see the looks on their faces afterwards! Oblivion followed, and we were on in about 20 minutes, which was pretty good. The best bit was seeing how mad and crazy Miles' hair was after getting off! We were rather hungry after this, so we went to try and find some food, before finally getting some stuff in Mutiny Bay (I went for Burger King). Seeing as we hadn't ridden Air earlier in the day, we wandered back over to the far end of Forbidden Valley and rode it. A fantastic ride, and we just managed to get two rides on it in a row before the queues closed. We couldn't be bothered to take the shortest route back to the main entrance, so we walked through the Gardens, which made a nice change. Miles, for some bizarre reason, decided that he wanted to buy a Merlin Annual Pass. Peter and I then decided, after buying some stuff in the gift shop, that we really needed to get back to Mum & Dad, so we entered the queue for the monorail. We were queuing for quite a while, but we got on eventually, after saying goodbye to Miles, Stevie, Esther and Tim, and Miles had to drive back down to Cornwall. (Stupidly, they went up from Cornwall and back in one day - they had to leave Cornwall at about 4am!) The ride queues closed at 6, but we didn't get back to Mum and Dad until gone 7. To be honest, we didn't care at all, and Mum & Dad didn't seem all that bothered, either.

So, there it is - the trip report from a fantastic day out at Alton Towers. The weather was fantastic, the location was fantastic, and the fact that some friends of mine were there on the same day made it even better - what more could I have asked for?

AV or FPTP?

Today, the country is going to the polls. Local elections are happening in most local authorities. Mayoral elections are also taking place. Leicestershire South is having a by-election. But, perhaps the most important vote that is taking place is the referendum on whether to change how our MPs are elected to the Houses of Parliament. This is the first nationwide referendum since 1975, when a referendum took place on Britain's membership of the EU, which it had joined previously. Today's referendum is only the second nationwide referendum on record. But what is it? Well, I'll explain.

The UK currently elects MPs under a system known as 'first past the post' (FPTP). With FPTP, you vote by putting a cross next to the candidate you want to vote for, and the person who gets the most votes wins, regardless of how many people have voted against him/her. For example, my MP received 42.7% of votes cast in the 2010 election. This meant that 57.3% of those who voted in my constituency didn't want the candidate who won. How can this be fair? Also, the last election in which the party who won the most number of seats AND received an absolute majority of the votes cast took place in, er, 1931. So in every general election since then, the party who gained the most seats has not received an absolute majority of the votes cast. This is not fair, it is not just, and it should not happen again.

Now, how does the 'alternative vote' (AV) system work? Despite claims made by the 'NO' campaign, it's actually very simple. You have a list of candidates, and you rank as few or as many of them as you like in order of preference. The first preference votes are counted, and if a candidate has at least 50% of the votes, then he or she is elected. If, however, no candidate has a majority, then the candidate with the lowest number of votes is eliminated, and his/her second preference votes (if there are any) are distributed among the other candidates. This carries on until one candidate has at least 50% of the votes, and he/she is duly elected.

So, which system is better? FPTP is simple to use, and it has been used in this country for years. But, as I mentioned previously, governments have been elected with less than 50% of the popular vote. It's a flawed system, and MPs can get elected into safe seats for life without having to do sod-all. AV means that instead of focusing on a select group of voters, candidates will have to work harder in order to gain 50% of the votes of the electorate, which is surely a good thing.

The campaigns have been bitter at times, but one thing I want to draw your attention to is this. The 'NO' campaign claim that AV is too difficult for people to understand. How dare they insult so many people! Yes, AV does take a little bit more work in writing numbers instead of inserting a cross into one box, but surely, to improve our democracy, it's a price worth paying! Also, the 'NO' campaign claim that Australia, one country that uses AV, wishes to abolish it, but several Australians have said that there is no intention to abolish it, and many support it! The 'NO' campaign have said that to have new voting machines will cost at least £250m. Machines to vote? I'm sorry. All you need to use to vote under AV is a pencil! That's all you need! Oh, and to be on the electoral register, but that's another matter. David Cameron wants to keep FPTP. BUT (you'll like this) he was elected under a form of AV! All three of the main party leaders were elected under forms of AV! So how can Cameron criticise a system under which he was elected as leader of the Tories? I may not know much about politics, but surely this means that he's criticising how he was elected, meaning he think he shouldn't have been elected? Confused? So am I! The 'NO' campaign state that AV will mean more votes for extremist parties, such as the BNP. It won't. Many people dislike the BNP, and it is very likely that under AV, they'd fare even worse. Nick Griffin, the leader of the BNP, has come out in staunch criticism of AV. He wants proportional representation (PR), which is when people cast one vote for a party (who issue a list of candidates), and the number of winners per party is decided by the share of the vote that they received. Why does Nick Griffin want PR? Well, put it this way. In the 2009 European Parliament elections, the BNP got 2 seats. And what system was used for the European elections? PR! And, in the 2010 UK election, they received 563,743 votes in 338 constituencies - 1.9% of the vote, and the fifth highest amount of votes cast - but failed to win any seats. Of course Griffin wants PR - he wants his pathetic, racist policies to worm their way into the British public. But they're not going to. Millions of people know what the BNP stand for. Their official Facebook group has hundreds of thousands less members than one of the largest groups against them!

I've detailed why you shouldn't vote to keep FPTP (and if you have already voted to keep FPTP, then shame on you!), but why do I believe that you should vote for AV? I may have stated this already, but candidates will have to work harder to gain voter approval. With AV, you won't have to vote tactically in order to try and keep a certain party out of power (another criticism of FPTP) - you can vote for who you really want in power, and put those you don't want at the bottom of your preference list (or not rank them at all, but I VERY strongly advise that you rank all candidates available to you). You can vote for as many or as few candidates as you like. AV is NOT confusing! It's a simple system, but one that will bring big changes to the political landscape for years to come. The 'YES!' campaign state on their website that "Some people have a very low estimation of the British public." - and how true that is! AV won't, as stated, help the BNP. Under AV, a broad support base is needed, and the BNP don't have this in the vast majority of areas. Yes, FPTP is tried and tested, but so is AV. It's used in national elections in Australia, Fiji and another country that I can't remember the name of. People use it in businesses, charities, trade unions. It's used to elect political leaders. The Speaker of the House of Commons is elected by a form of AV. Highly important roles in the Houses of Parliament use AV. You still have one vote, but you have more of a say with that vote in who your MP is. The link between elector and MP is kept, perhaps even strengthened, because candidates have to reach out to more voters, in the hope that they will get a wider base for support. Do you want to know how they vote for the Best Picture award for the Oscars? They use AV! FPTP may be a British tradition, but it is important that we change politics. Think of when ballots became secret (in the past, you had to openly declare who you voted for. Now, you can still tell people who you voted for if you want to, but that choice is at YOUR discretion). Think of when normal, working-class people got the vote. Think of when women finally got the vote in the 1900s! These changes were necessary to improve how we do politics. I want an improvement on the current system, and AV is, I believe, a step in the right direction. Oh, and there's the small matter of the fact that the 'NO' campaign have not published a list of all their donors, but the 'YES' campaign have. Why? I don't know for certain, but transparency in politics is key. This is one reason why people are disillusioned with politics, and especially since the expenses scandal in the summer of 2009.

So if you haven't voted yet, then I urge you to do so as soon as possible. Our current electoral system is flawed, and AV fixes the vast majority of those flaws. Vote YES, and you will have a greater say in who your MP is. Vote YES, and MPs will have to work harder. Vote YES, and electoral reform will continue. If you vote NO, then our chance for electoral reform will be gone, and there probably won't be another chance for a generation.

Make the right choice. Vote YES today.

Memories

I've recently decided to go through some our photograph albums. There's several of them in the hall, and so far, I've gone from 1992 (my birth year) up until sometime in 2008. Why? Well, there's one simple reason: memories. Photographs are so important for recalling memories of what happened in the past. The journey has been an interesting one, seeing how fashions have changed, seeing people as they have grown older, and seeing how they have changed. But they're also tinged with some sadness, especially when I see photos of my late grandparents (Mum's parents). Yes, we had lost the Grandad we knew in August 2007, despite him dying in February 2010, and Grandma suddenly dying two days after Dan and Louise's wedding. What makes it even more upsetting is that we have a photo of her that was taken the morning before she died, and it was probably the last photo anybody had of her when she was still alive. In a way, I suppose that's one way in which photographs are so important - they also help us remember people that we've lost over the years, people that we hold so closely to, people we don't want to let go.

A few months ago, I also watched all our old home videos, remembering even more about what life was like in years gone by. Many videos, many years, many memories. Home videos can be even more important than photos - they show us how we used to talk, how we used to act, as well as what we looked like. Memories are so precious to us, and if we don't take photos, record videos, and suchlike, how on earth are we going to be able to remember people? Photos and home videos are so vital in recalling those that we held dear to us that we cannot afford to lose them.

I'm alive - the car isn't!

Well, the time has come. I have had my first car accident. I hoped it would never come, but it did. I would like to re-iterate that I am fine, but I think that the car is a write-off.

I was on my way from St Dennis to Indian Queens to pick my brother up from work on Monday evening when it happened. I went round a corner, and the car suddenly went further to the right than I expected. I thought I had hit a patch of ice, and I decided that the best course of action to take would be to counter this by trying opposite lock. The car hit a metal barrier at the side of the road, span round a couple of times, before coming to rest in the middle of the road. I was a bit dazed and confused by what had just happened - who wouldn't be? Mercifully, the car was still on its wheels, and hadn't overturned, so I managed to get out of the car without any problems, before ringing my brother to let him know that I wouldn't be picking him up from work because I had, erm, crashed the car. During this, someone stopped to offer their assistance, for which I am very grateful. I then called the police, which was necessary, as the car was in the middle of the road, and there was debris over the road. Following this, I had to make the phone call to my parents informing them of what had happened. It wouldn't have been very easy for them to come and find me because they were in Leicester sorting through more of Mum's parents' things, including bringing down my Grandad's piano, which is now my mother's, as it was left to her in the will. I can't remember whether my brother and his boss arrived first or whether the police did, but I was so glad to see both sets of people! I felt even better when my brother and his wife arrived, but I must confess that I didn't call them. My other brother did. The fire brigade came to tow the car out of the middle of the road, before (I think) going to attend another incident about 200yds closer to St Dennis. There was also an accident somewhere on the A30 near Roche that night. Fun, fun, fun! What I thought was slightly strange was the fact that the policewoman who attended the accident didn't breathalyse me, whereas I thought that it was common practice to breathalyse anybody involved in a road accident if they were able to do so. For the record, though, I hadn't had a drop of alcohol all evening, and hadn't touched any since the day before New Year's Eve 2010, so it wouldn't have been a problem. I'm not complaining at all! We got everything out of the Micra before it was towed out of the middle of the road and before it was towed away. And after the breakdown truck arrived, we all went back home for hot chocolate, which I needed, I'm telling you!

Dad went to Bodmin today to try and do some shopping, and guess what? He found the Micra, and he hadn't seen how bad the damage was, so he took some photos and then showed them to me after he got back. Even now, it surprised me how much damage I had done to the car, and even more so that I had walked away from it with only a couple of bruises! I just guess that I'm a very lucky kid.