This morning I had a nose-bleed, which I haven't experienced since I was a wee nipper, so naturally I freaked out and told my girlfriend that I thought I was coming down with brain cancer or something.

She reassured me that it's probably just stress related, and she might be right; every time I open Pages and look at the essay I'm supposed to be writing my mind does this weird thing that makes me feel like I'm trapped in a small box with Piers Morgan, and he's swallowed the key to make sure neither of us ever escape. So instead I'll write on here, it's easier than critiquing consumerism in late 20th Century American literature.

The thing is though...she might be wrong, maybe I'm having a brain aneurysm? I don't have any other symptoms but perhaps it's just a slow developing aneurysm? Do they even happen?

I think I just need to face facts and realise that I'm a colossal hypochondriac - any tiny ailment that strikes makes me think that I've got cancer immediately; sore in my mouth? probably cancer. Pain in my back? also, probably cancer. If I ever win the lottery or get a real job and end up having a huge disposable income I'm going to start a clinic for people like me to go and get full body cancer checks & blood tests, and employ motherly looking women in nurse outfits (not in a sexual way before this gets all Freudian) to reassure patients that they'll be absolutely fine.

Quitting cigarettes.

Lasted all of three hours, until I realised I've only done 400 words of my 4000 word essay. Gawd, uni can be lame.

Why a guy crush is way better than a normal crush (no homo).

I don't know if it's the huge influx of bromance films in the last few years, or the fact that I've left school and don't care if my peers call me gay anymore, but recently I've been super in to crushing on cool guys. Of course they're all entirely platonic crushes, I'm not saying I want to get to know these guys sexually, I just want to be their friend (even if that last sentence makes me sound like a completely emotional needy loser). Also, just to clarify - there's a difference between guy crushes and guys you just naturally become friends with; you get all the same nervous, awkward hiccups that you do with girls that you're in to with the guy crushes. Natural friends just like, happen. Here's a few reasons why the phenomenon hitting young men around the globe (or maybe just me?) is better than it's dried up, wrinkly precursor; the girl crush.

The potential of a great nickname is just around the corner.

With girls the best that you're gonna get is something like 'babes' or 'puffin' (or something as equally emasculating) but what we really want is killer, status symbol nicknames like 'J-Magic' or 'The Jambonator'. Obviously you'd have to become friends with a bunch of rugby LADS for names like those to materialise, but I'll bet your guy crush will come up with something achingly hip and awesome for you (probably referencing a cult show from the mid 90s or something).

You can start a band together.

Or at least talk about starting a band together for, like, three years, and maybe go practise twice. I'm not saying you can't start bands with girls obviously, just stay away from rocking out with your girlfriend. Other than Tennis and Fleetwood Mac, the majority of husband & wife/ boyfriend & girlfriend bands (The Subways anyone?) have been shit.

You can talk openly about whatever you want.

With normal friends you're never quite sure where the boundary between appropriate banter and 'omigod you're so gay for saying that' lies. With your bromance, male crush, M-mance, or whatever the kids are calling it these days, you don't even have to worry about those niggling little details; you can talk openly about whatever you want - that time you couldn't get it up, how your parents divorce is making you feel, or even how you thought the video of the monkey riding backwards on a pig was mega cute.

Bodily functions don't matter!

In fact I'm sure some of the strongest male bonds in history have started from a mere fart in the classroom or a pronounced burp in the the hallway. *FACT* Costanza and Seinfeld bonded over a particularly wet one that Jerry let out on the first day of filming. Of course this territory is more the stomping ground of natural friendship formation, but hey, it's still hella cool being able to burp and fart around people you have a crush on and not care that they won't want to fuck you.

p.s. that wasn't a fact, don't put it on wikipedia.

You might end up becoming a power-duo.

Like Bill & Ted or Beavis & Butthead. Imagine being the two guys that Mike Judge based B & B on, it would be awesome (only for them clearly, I'm not really on spending all of my time watching Jane's Addiction videos).

Your girlfriend doesn't get jealous when you check out their facebook page.

Girlfriend's eh? Always making snide little quips about how you've been lingering on that girl's 'HOT SUMMER BIKINI PARTY' photo album for far too long. Not really, my girlfriend's not an insane, envious deekazoid, but I'm sure some are. Even with those psychos though you can still peruse the facebook page of your guy crush for however long you wish, in the secure knowledge that no-ones going to tell you to stop it.

The ultimate satisfaction is far greater.

Sure, maybe the culmination of a huge crush on girl will end up in you getting your dick wet, but what's that one-stop pony saying when you could be spending all that time bro-ing out over old video-games, grime MCs and that new band that Pitchfork hasn't even found out about yet. Also, once you've finally nailed that bromance for good you know that they're there to stay. Unless they find out that you were basically stalking them on facebook for a while before you met.

I just found out that the scientific name of this (according to wikipedia) is homosociality. So go cop some of dat shit.

Reasons why I hate twitter.

I was way way behind on the whole twitter flex - when David Cameron infamously uttered, "too many twits make a twat" I had no idea what he was talking about, I just chortled along with everyone else because I didn't want to seem like a neek. After a bit more living however - and countless days wasting my time on the internet with erotic cake websites and Japanese fashion blogs (that I couldn't understand) - I thought I might as well check out the new online fad that was rocking cyber-space. Mind you, that fad started like three years ago now and it's still bigger than Dennis Rodman's dick. And I still have no idea why - I mean, what does twitter have that bebo didn't? These are a few of the things that have pissed me off over the course of my tumultuous relationship with twitter.

How everyone's all like, 'yeah I'm on twitter now'

In a totally, 'yeah, I mean I don't really agree with like, people being able to see what you're doing the whole time, but like, I just thought that it was about time to start self-promoting a bit more y'know?" Bullshit. You joined twitter because the hot girl in the office got one, and you thought that if you tweeted at her you'd have something to talk about on your lunch break.

It's sur sur confusing

Facebook: easy layout, pretty quick to pick up. Myspace: easy to navigate, not too many weird things going on. Flickr: Not quite the same I guess, but sure, I can get with that too. Twitter: WTF? What does doing that little hash key thing do? (I can't even find the button on my keyboard) And why does it not tell you when someones tweeted at you? Or does it? AAAARGHH IT'S SHIT.

Celebrity tweeters

I heard recently that Lady Gaga, Ryan Seacrest and Kim Kardashian (amongst others) are quitting twitter and facebook entirely until Alicia Key's charity raises $1,000,000. Now, that's a noble cause and everything - keeping kids alive and such, but what happened to massive charity singalong christmas hits, and bands playing 3 minute medleys of their biggest tunes at a concert in Hyde Park hosted by Midge Ure? (yeah fuck you Geldof) They're doing literally NOTHING to help, in fact they're doing even less than they usually do, and everyone's making out like they're the good guys. Also, what-the-fucking-hell am I going to do without my hourly Seacrest update?

You can only write 140 characters

Ok, Ok, I know it's supposed to be a concise update of what you're thinking/doing, because we live in such a fast-paced, disposable world nowadays - but 140 characters is less than a text, which means that even Stephen Fry has to resort to nonsensical sms language.