Month: July 2021

A day out to Intu Trafford Centre Manchester – New brands to consider

Posted on by T. Maxwell-Harrison

Yesterday I had the pleasure of travelling to the Manchester Trafford Center. The photo above is not mine, courtesy of Bing images. I haven’t been to the shopping center for maybe 3 years, not kidding, partly because of the pandemic. There has been closures of many shops. It was busy but I remained distant and wore my mask.

The first mission was to eat when arriving. The Tampopo eastern cuisine restaraunt was selected. The food chosen was a vegan share meal. I also had a side of noodles, cooked well and tasty. I also noticed that the restaurant offered 20% off for students, yes, you heard that correctly! I used that and it took roughly £6 off the total. There was also a queue to get in, but that was common at all restaraunts walked past. After your food you are given a small phone device to leave a review, I gave 5 stars in all categories, because again, the service was friendly, fast, efficient, tasty, it catered to vegans and had student discount. I would recommend checking this out.

Tampopo – eastern cuisine.

I want to tell you about two brands that are both new too me and relatively new in general. First we have Rituals. The shops specialises in well-being and beauty products.

“Rituals takes inspiration from the impressive power of natural ingredients, as well as ancient Eastern beauty and wellness traditions. At the brand’s core, is the belief that happiness can be found in the smallest of things. In a hectic and sometimes overwhelming world, simply taking the time to enjoy a warm bath, a cup of tea or a relaxing massage can take on a special significance. It is our passion to transform daily routines into meaningful moments. Rituals celebrates everyday luxury, sustainable measures and the art of slowing down. At Rituals, we go beyond just products, we live and breathe well-being through our insightful articles, yoga videos, delicious healthy recipes and guided meditations, shared via our social channels, magazine and app.”

Rituals in the Trafford Centre Manchester

I was in search of soap and instead discovered hand washes that smelt absolutely fantastic. I was treated kindly by staff and given multiple samples and could request samples of anything. What did I choose? After sampling many hand washes, hand balms and shower gels in a variety of ‘flavours’ including jasmine, sandalwood (not a fan) and rosemary, I ended up choosing eucalyptus and rosemary hand wash and the same scent hand balm. The image on the left of the white can was a FREE gift with my first purchase of a white rice and cherry blossom foaming shower gel. I had sampled some and had not been keen but as it was free I took it. I did have to sign up, but I had a pleasant experience in store and did not hesitate.

I will be returning as a shopper to Ritual. Great products that smell great, excellent customer service and treatment – how it should be, although that is why I love the Trafford Centre Manchester, all staff are lovely and friendly. It was also surprisingly cheap for the hand wash and balm, total just under £20.

Next we have The Couture Club. It sounds and looks expensive and I guess it is, but there was a sale on which I did not realise. I managed to buy joggers with the accompanying hoodie for £37 which included the current sale offer. Without a sale the price would of been around £45 for the hoodie and around £40 for the joggers, so total of £85 if the clothes weren’t on sale; a huge saving of £48. That is not too expensive in my opinion, because it looks good, and the quality is excellent. I went in hoping to find trousers as I’d had no luck finding my size in a few other shops. You know the average size for clothes has increased so those who are the correct weight have to struggle to find the right size. 40inch waist? Size 20 shoes? Seriously, it’s like they are preparing for giants.

Photo by: Tom Biddle (www.tombiddle.co.uk)

So, I found some white joggers with a very soft texture that look like night wear, sort of like pyjamas. I guess they can be worn everyday use, but I will use them to relax in. Sort of like a spa or sauna robe. The accompanying hoodie is likewise great. I didn’t need to try them on, they fit me fine and they are the small size, with options of xs, s, m, l, xl… basically normal sizes and none of this European number nonsense. The shops sells men and women clothing, another reason I enjoyed it, it isn’t obvious when you go in either, remaining rather gender neutral and being hip and modern at the same time.

A model wearing the set of clothes I bought. You can’t see, but there is bumpy and soft texture and it’s called ‘waffle’

The service in the shops was quick but not as personal. I don’t deduct points on this occasion. There were a few shops where being left alone was preferable and this is one of them. I don’t like help when choosing clothes or washing products unless it’s personal like Ritual.

I will return to the Couture Club in the future and recommend it to anyone wanting modern and high quality clothing. Despite the high cost, you should check it out, who knows, they could have another sale on.

So that concludes the two new brands that I recommend, not new to the market, but relatively new to the Trafford Centre Manchester and new to me. I really am glad to have found Rituals after discovering them on the Trafford Centre website.

Other shops I visited that are worth mentioning (not mentioning all of them) included a soap shop called Lush from which I bought a small but costly bar of soap for £5.50. I do consider that expensive when I could buy a pack of 4 Imperial Leather for £10. I also visited The Pen Shop, where I was gifted a lovely Cross turquoise fountain pen.

Soap shop, pen shop and fountain pen in centre durrr

I had a lovely day and it is long deserved given the last 18 months. I also consider it a day out to celebrate my recent graduation in law.

So, thank you for reading and I hope you enjoyed this post on my day out!

Stay safe, take care and lots of positivity to you all.

Blooming

Posted on by T. Maxwell-Harrison

Today I saw the sky from my living room window

Today I saw the clouds from my living room window

I, however, could not see a point in living… so I gave up.

Cold meat give me my strength back.

Oh, wicked cold meat

You are so dastardly to eat

I cannot comprehend such a feat.

Dear my house cleaner

Bonjour

Gracias

Now I feel like killing people

That is what my client said

My psychologist

The local bar

Price for a day to heaven

Two pounds.

Welcome to the start of my journey!

Posted on by T. Maxwell-Harrison

As some of you may know, I have just recently completed my LLB degree. As a recent graduate (unable to attend a graduation ceremony yet) I feel extremely glad to have achieved what I have up to now – a degree in law. Graduating with a 2.1 upper second class undergrad LLB is an honour, and I graduate with honours.

This is when the real journey starts. Granted, I could have recorded my progress on my LLB and I considered doing so many times. The time wasn’t right and at the end of the day, the journey starts now, not during a course when you have no clue as to the future.

Satan once said that… no quotes from the devil in the same post as the law! A honourable and age old profession, lawyers are one of the oldest professions in the world. The legal profession has its origin in ancient Greece and Rome. Not quite as old as toolmakers or tailors, but relatively. If a couple of thousand years counts. To this day, the barristers of England and Wales must be a member of one of the four Inns of Court. Namely, the Lincolns Inn, Grays Inn, Middle Temple and Inner Temple. The temples have roots in the knights templar and the original knights templar Temple Church is located within Inner Temple grounds. Hosting the yearly ‘crossing the bar’ ceremonies. Some would say that the general area of Temple, London, is one big elite showground where big money talks and large, costly infrastructure gentrifies you as soon as you enter the area. Notable for its historic buildings, including the Royal Courts of Justice building, a recognisable legal piece.

See the source image
Picture from Bing images.

The barristers of England and Wales also get a reputation for being paid a lot. I can assure you that with some research and general internet reading that this is not the case. Solicitors have the stability and high pay of prestigious law firms and they instruct barristers to work in court on their clients behalf. A steady income for many. Barristers on the other hand are self employed, earning from the work they do and not a penny more. They have chambers rent, overheads, accountant fees, clerk fees, travel costs, indemnity insurance and the list is rather extensive. Naturally the longer they practice the more of a reputation they have and more income. Trainee barristers completing their ‘pupillage’ – a year long apprenticeship with chambers, are given a lump sum of money at the start… and criminal law is abysmal both in terms of pupillage awards and general pay, probably being the lowest paid out of all areas coupled with public law.

So they don’t earn a lot off the bat. In fact, they have accumulated in the region of £50-£60,000 in debt to become a barrister. It’s a 3 part journey. First, the degree. I say degree, because you can complete any degree, yes any, and then complete a 1 year graduate diploma in law (GDL) before progressing to stage 2, the bar practice or vocational course (BPC). They have recently updated the courses and now there are more options when choosing this path, including splitting the course into two, but more on that later. So, the GDL is essentially a fast track course and to be honest, I do not accept that GDL students can possibly learn and comprehend 3 years of law study in a year, including exams.

Anyway, rage aside, from either the law degree or GDL you go onto the barrister training course. The course consists of theoretical and practical exams, mock trials, plenty of advocacy and courtroom practice, mooting, pro bono (if you want) and the possibility to combine a master of law (LLM) with the course.

The costs for the bar course and a masters is going to set you back between £13,000 to £20,000, depending on study location and university or institute offering it. Passing the course is hard like anything else, more so for law students as its tons of reading and stressful work hours. There is also no guarantee of passing nor of going on to successfully get a pupillage. Many graduates work as paralegals during their courses to gain invaluable experience. I am completing pro bono voluntary work currently with an ‘environmental’ law firm. Don’t worry, I won’t blame the course fees on the environment.

So there you have it. I hope this post is of interest to someone out there. I also hope you enjoyed reading it. I will be posting things on this page, including photos when I get a camera phone again, so that you can follow my journey. It might be a weekly post, it may be a monthly post. All I know is, I can’t wait to sip that cold mojito on that warm beach.

Peace.

Guns Akimbo : Movie Review!

Posted on by T. Maxwell-Harrison

A action, thriller, comedy starring Daniel Radcliffe. On Amazon Prime. Great and hilarious entertainment. I really enjoyed the humour in this film.

6.3 from IMDB. 95 mins runtime. Starring Daniel Radcliffe, Samara Weaving, Ned Dennehy.

“In an alternative near future, an underground fight club and a criminal organization known as Skizm has achieved massive popularity by live-streaming real death matches between criminals and psychos. Ordinary computer programmer Miles Lee Harris, who gets his kicks by trolling online trolls, logs into Skizm’s forum to insult viewers who turn murder into entertainment. Riktor, the criminal kingpin and psychopath who runs Skizm, breaks into Miles’ apartment with his henchmen Dane, Effie, and Fuckface. After being beaten and drugged, Miles wakes up to find guns bloodily bolted into both of his hands. Miles learns that he has been forced to participate in Skizm by being pitted against Nix, the game’s deadliest and craziest killer; she wants out but Riktor requires she kill one last opponent – Miles.”

I watched this movie last night. It continually appeared on my home page on Amazon Prime. I took a chance and really enjoyed this film.

With pistols bolted to his hands, Miles, the good guy, is forced to fight for his life in a sick live stream deathmatch which usually sees ex cons face off against each other until one kills the other. After a night in, when Miles decided to troll in the comments of the illegal tournament, that is how they find him. They also track him during the fight.

What was good: there was good action, dark humour and acting. The storyline was good and easy to follow and allowed you as the viewer to sit back and just let it sink in without too much thinking. An easy going movie.

Of course, Miles becomes the most popular contestant on the show and then has to save his girlfriend who has been abducted by the shows hosts as he wasn’t killing or attempting to kill his opponent. He struggles and fight and we enjoy watching that, and so does his audience. Learning to use pistols for hands is no easy feat and that is the biggest feature of the character, which fits perfectly into the character, like a chalk cheese. As a nerdy game developer his life before was mostly virtual.

Does he save his ex-girlfriend? Does it matter? It was great to watch a movie and genuinely laugh. That is the biggest selling point for me. I recommend if you like violent no brainers. Daniel Radcliffe has starred in some rather surprisingly good movies over the last few years.

RATING: GOOD DARK FUTURISTIC COMEDY

Rating: 5 out of 5.
From Kickboxer, featuring in the ending scene in Guns Akimbo.

Black & Red

Posted on by T. Maxwell-Harrison

If I recall correctly, under Blair they abolished the ‘habeas corpus’ right of detained individuals because of the actual and suspected terrorist activity at the time.
I fear if we go down this road then the human rights act will become a thing of the past and allow the dictatorship to reign.

Following the appointment of Adolf Hitler as Chancellor in 1933, this black and red flag was adopted as one of the nation’s dual national flags, the other being the black-white-red horizontal tricolour of the German Empire.

Young unaware seed
Growing boy
Electric soul
Big heart
Dark forces conspire
To kill him
Protected by angels
Guided by Christ
Rising through hell
To become
A hero.

Model of the week – Monday Winner

Posted on by T. Maxwell-Harrison

Hi there, if you have followed me this far then thank you. Staying safe? Good. You are here to witness the start of a new blog post, I’ll be posting this type of post every Monday. It’s called model of the week. I choose a playboy model out of the thousands who will have their photos (some of them) shown here for you all.

Why am I doing this? Because Psychedelicwizard is a controversial site and I am aiming to give something back to the audience. You’ve seen all the sex blogs, the erotic writers and so on, and you want less, whilst getting your weekly hit.

*CONTENT FOR ADULTS ONLY* (WARNING: NUDES)

This weeks model is Jasmine Davis. I actually knew a girl with the same name… such a small world.

Thanks for reading and stay safe!

Believe

Posted on by T. Maxwell-Harrison

Some choose to believe. Some choose to blindly follow others. Some choose not to believe. Well, here are the facts:

Believe me when I say this, that after the 2008 banking crash, 2021 is one of the biggest years for one of the biggest wealth transfers in the history of modern society.

Where is all that increased funding going? Where are they sending that money? Can you really see a benefit from so called increased investment? The shops are showing empty shelves again, where is all the food? Why would the government be in the business of forcing people to get a vaccine when the chances of dying on the toilet are higher than covid-19?

“All that is required for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing”

Believe.

American Psycho : Movie Review

Posted on by T. Maxwell-Harrison

“A wealthy New York City investment banking executive, Patrick Bateman, hides his alternate psychopathic ego from his co-workers and friends as he delves deeper into his violent, hedonistic fantasies.”

Lion Gate Films – American Psycho (2000)

IMDB rate American Psycho at 7.6 / 10. Total run time of 1 hour 40 mins approx. Christian Bale portrays Patrick Bateman in this instant cult classic horror flick from 2000. Bale is 26 when he stars in this movie, and it remains one of his most iconic roles. Not only is this a frightening film, but it is acted so brilliantly. Bale won an award for best actor in a leading role*

American Psycho – call me crazy – is in fact a movie that falls under multiple genre headings. Notably, comedy, albeit it is not easy to understand for some. However, not to sound big headed, I found it easy to pick up on this humour. It’s a black satirical comedy at the end of the day! It falls under drama, thriller and possibly romance as well.

So, here we have a young rich wall street banker in the 80’s. He’s living a rich lifestyle, hanging with rich friends at his private clubs, doing cocaine at nightclubs, sleeping with prostitutes on a regular basis as well as his beautiful girlfriend (Reece Witherspoon). The film opens by giving us this insight, I say insight because actually, we are quickly realising how big this guys ego is, and how full of himself he is. He is so sure of himself, so confident. We quickly learn his beauty routine, workout routine and general life routine. We know that he is of a higher societal class and is going far in his career with friends who kind of look out for him.

We also start to see how minor and insignificant things cause him inconsolable rage. The design of a business card by Paul Allen? Check. His fascination with music, in particular, Genesis and Phil Collins? Later he adapts his murderous personality so that he’s listening to his victims music, embodying their lives and fooling people into believing he’s someone he isn’t. Paul Allen so happens to be the first victim we see. A brutal axe killing, pre planned. Bateman is cold and calculating. He has all his furniture covered, covers himself and then unleashes the inner… psycho. He’ completely self-obsessed and mad.

Later on as he continues his killing spree whilst avoiding officer Willem Dafoe he is ******* street walkers while flexing muscles in the mirror. Going on dinner dates, becoming generally more murderous and the craziness doesn’t stop there. It’s funny, because he is so obsessed with himself and we know this.

It’s a good movie, and the acting is great. The story line is not too unbelievable either. The part that confuses everyone is the ending. Patrick Bateman knows he’s gone too far after killing dozens of people, stuffing their bodies in other peoples apartments and the like whilst lying to his friends. The end is the nail on the head. Bateman, on a murderous spree, kills police, multiple guards and citizens and then hides in his office to call his lawyer and confess all his sins.

We expect that the police will be there to arrest him. Instead, the apartment with the bodies has been recently re-painted, and the bodies gone. The woman hosting an open viewing of said apartment says this, ‘it’s best if you don’t come back,’ to which Bateman replies ‘I won’t.’ What is going on here? Is she a part of some clean up crew that is covering up his murders? Has his lawyer sorted all this out? After all, he’s being paid by Bateman.

Bateman is on edge, scared and heads to the club where his rich friends are. He meets his lawyer, tells him the truth again, and the lawyer thinks it is a joke. In fact, not one person in the club has anything to say when Bateman confesses out loud what he has done.

He sits down with his friends… we learn and understand a dark secret about this club and the people in it. Take away what you will, but Bateman is not alone. In fact, his lawyer even says that Paul Allen is alive and well and that he is fed up with this sick joke now.

I recently re-watched American Psycho, and you know what? I am going to watch it again, because it really is a great movie, a staple of American film making and acting. In the top 5 of Christian Bale films.

RATING: Watch this classic horror movie!

Rating: 5 out of 5.