The Emo Song

This made me very happy indeed!



Enjoy, me loves.

7 things I approve of

I have been tagged by the boy! It is now my sworn duty as a blogger to perpetrate this meme, because if I don't they'll take my crayons. It's true.

Fortunately I've been feeling quite positive lately, so here we go! These are my seven things!

1) God. An obvious answer, usually, but lately I've been struggling. Fortunately, however big and scary and beyond my understanding He is, He's still there and still awesome and still loves me in all my pantsness, thank Him for that!

2) Strawberry splits. Ice lollies with ice cream in, what genius invented these... and then had the brainwave at selling 20 for £2 at the co-op?! I've been offering them to anyone who stands still long enough, which made my housemates happy, which made me happy. Yay for strawberry splits.

3) SPRING!! Any day now, I swear it!! The days are getting longer and daffodils are getting ready to bloom the second it warms up a little. It makes me happy, and fills me with hope, hence the positive mood... I definitely approve of spring.

4) Cardiff. I may live in Plymouth but Cardiff is my home. It's where the heart is and all that, so wish me luck / pray for me regarding this transfer! Going up there again this weekend to get my hair cut and go swimming and eat sushi and watch rugby and have cuddles. how can you NOT approve of a place that has all that, when I do absolutely eff-all in Plymouth all week!

5) Gmail. If you don't have it, get it. The spam filter is superb, the layout is ideal, the tagging and archiving and searching is an INFINITE improvement on outlook express and its folder system. I'll also add to this, iGoogle. I can check my gmail and the news and my hotmail and the weather and such all on my homepage, which given how often I need Google itself, gets used fairly regularly.

6) Adventures!! Oh man it's been so long since I've been on an adventure, I might have forgotten how! Back home I used to go for a walk in the woods at full moon in the middle of the night with my friends. Or I'd climb a cliff in high-heeled boots. Or we'd catch the bus out to the middle of nowhere and walk for an hour down a long road with the stars spread out above us like glitter. I miss adventures.
My boy's gearing up for an epic one :) I'm so proud!

7) My diary. Yes, I've started keeping a diary again for the first time in over a year. Sorry guys, I just need to write some things you can't read! ;) It's a beautiful one, not sold in England, I bought it in a charity shop for £3.50 and I loooove it.

So, in the fine tradition of meme-spreading, I tag: djchallis and Ben!

Interesting thing of the day: bunny game!

Various stuff and things!

Mouse #5 is a fast little blighter. Dark brown fur, and apparently uninterested in the food on the traps. I'm thinking of investing in a) an anvil or b) some black paint; (fake mouseholes of course! It'll run into the wall and concuss itself!) but I can't work out if the ACME website do deliveries.

There's been actual genuine sunshine today! I ventured, bleary-eyed, into the big wide world in less than a jumper for the first time in what feels like forever. I bought ice-lollies for all my housemates to celebrate the occasion.

"Some women wear foundation... other wear a sensation!" Adverts SUCK. I mean seriously. I dreamed a better advert last night. It involves an incredibly long twisty straw, and two colours of slushy liquid, carefully alternated to spell the company name when it's all been sucked through the contraption. Genius.

And, to complete the quartet of things that very few people are interested in, I'm currently watching Forrest Gump. Yay!

Mobular Telephonium - aka Phone Rage

In a letter to the Independent last week, Ashley Martin wrote: “Congratulations to the scientists who have developed technology that enables mobile phones to be used under water. Perhaps they could now invent technology that enables mobile phones to be used in north Norfolk.”

I'd like to propose the same technology to be trialled in Plymouth. Please. I'm remarkably patient about the terrible signal, considering what it does. Which is the following.

Incoming calls:
It rings, I answer the phone. I can't hear you. The signal cuts out. You ring again, and again, and again, until finally I have some signal and the call connects. Then it's (mostly) fine.

Outgoing calls:
Oh, it didn't work. No signal.
Oh, it didn't work again. Wait until I have signal.
ONE BAR!! GO GO GO!
...
No bars. Dammit.
Repeat until it finally goes through and pray to God that it holds while I get the Very Important Information / soothing noises that I so sorely need.

My service provider, three, actually called me once, miraculously getting through for long enough to ask how happy I was with their service. You can bet the signal got 'mentioned'.

Honestly though I think it's harder on other people than it is on me. Months and months of a crash-happy laptop have taught me to be supremely patient with flaky technology.

And while I'm complaining about this, because heavens help me I'm getting so good at complaining that it seems a shame to stop now, my phone's camera is broken. Every time I try to take a picture or video, it crashes my phone and I have to turn it off and on again. That would never have happened to my 3310 (for the obvious reasons that it only has two buttons, "stop" and "go"). I honestly think I'll get one of those fabulously retro beauties next time I buy a phone.

Interesting thing of the day: Spy Phones. Utter genius. Highly immoral of course.

HTML

I've been learning html lately, using these oh-so-handy tutorials, and it's going well for me. It reassures me to know that I can learn something entirely new to me, something that might conceivably be useful one day. And I'll be honest, I do really, genuinely enjoy it!

I had my suspicions when my boy started teaching me the occasional bit of techie info, and I'd actually remember it, understand it, and be able to apply it to other techie things the next day. So I've started educating myself in the hopes of working up to CSS and making my blog a bit more unique, a bit more presentable. There are some very attractive blogs out there and I think mine feels left out.

Interesting thing of the day: Crackbook. Click around, it's a reet laff.

Shouting at a train and chasing universities

Can somebody please tell me why everything has to be so frikkin' hard?!?!

Those of you who know me from pre-gap year times will know how much trouble I have galvanising myself to do anything constructive. Those of you who know me from post-gap year times, and especially the past couple of weeks, will know how much I've been striving to kick myself out of that groove and get some things done.

I've been writing emails about late trains and university transfers, buying books I need for my course, doing university work, collecting coursework from university, getting my umbrella from lost property, buying food and eating healthily, etc, etc, etc...

And it feels like I haven't made a DENT. The train company isn't having any of it, which is utterly ridiculous as they've said themselves I'm entitled to compensation. I can't get into Cardiff university, making the future once again a very scary and uncertain place. I still need to do loads more reading, I'm feeling absolutely exhausted as I always do when I've been crying, and I just want to be home with my boy.

Stupid crappy real world getting in the way of cuddles. I feel like this kitty.

So, I'm going through the ever-wonderful UCAS system again, and remembering why it made me want to gnaw my own face off in frustration last time. But I'm also realising that I've grown a lot since then. Instead of putting it to the back of my mind and stalling for as long as I can, I'm gritting my teeth and refusing to be such an all-out lamer.

This will not defeat me, I will move to Cardiff, and I have emailed First Great Western saying "excuse me, what do you think you're playing at." Not in so many words.

Character development FTW :)

I want

...Told him my story. Told him about being laid off in Chicago. Told him about this new job I got in New York. Told him I only knew I got the job officially 5 days before Christmas- only about a week previously. Asked him how he was liking New York.

"It's great," he said. "Everybody's insane with loneliness, but that's OK. After a while you realize that's part of the edge."...
- Hugh McLeod, www.gapingvoid.com

"Imagine a city where graffiti wasn't illegal, a city where everybody could draw wherever they liked. Where every street was awash with a million colours and little phrases. Where standing at a bus stop was never boring. A city that felt like a living breathing thing which belonged to everybody, not just the estate agents and barons of big business. Imagine a city like that and stop leaning against the wall -- it's wet."
- Banksy, www.banksy.co.uk

I want to go to New York and talk to a lonely person.
I want to be happy, and healthy, and helpful, in an environment where those things are positively discouraged.
I want to be able to pick out a busker's guitar chords over the roar of the traffic.
I want to paint beautiful things on ugly walls.
I want to see the adverts for what they are, and to choose to rise above it.

The other day, I was wandering around Bristol train station. It had been dark for hours, and I had a long journey ahead of me. Normally I'd sink into myself, try to avoid any human contact, like anybody would. But for some reason, I was excited. I was interested, curious about everything I saw. I took dozens of photos of the most insignificant things, just happy to be doing something slightly unusual because anybody could ask me about it without feeling uncomfortable. If anyone wanted someone to talk to, they could do a lot worse than starting with "why are you taking all those photos?"

Nobody did, though.

Trains, Aliens, and Nirvana in the bath.

Stupid trains.

I should have been suspicious when every train around us was being delayed and having platform changes, but our faithful little train to Cardiff stayed rock steady... I should have realised then. It was cancelled. And the next train to Cardiff was half an hour late. Grrrr, stupid trains... so I missed the concert we were going to see, which I feel bad about because my boy could have gone but instead he was cooking for me and such.
(Side note: the 'insert picture' button didn't work, so I did that with my newfound knowledge of HTML. That's how badass I am.)

I had so much fun dancing with my boy... I haven't done that since that festival (vaguely referred to here, it was wonderful). There's a lovely picture of us doing the aforementioned here, YAY!

Saturday was similarly awesome, we saw Alien vs. Predator: Requiem which was pretty much new territory for me, but I actually really enjoyed it! (It was my idea, he didn't bully me into it.) Then we went out to a gorgeous Italian restaurant that he's been wanting to show me for ages, which was absolutely amazing (although sushi still wins).

On Sunday, we were both too tired for church in the morning, which was really a shame. Never mind, next time. And he showed me how to do interesting techie things with a nitfy little firefox addon called Firebug. I was surprisingly clued up :) SMUG.

Everything got a bit chaotic towards the end, stupid taxi company sent me two so I thought it was about to drive off without me, meh anyway.

It was about time too, hadn't seen my boy in weeks.

Don't worry, as soon as I start doing other interesting things I'll blog about them as well!

Curiosity

Those of you know know me well know that I'm cursed with an epic curiosity. The kind of curiosity that could wipe out the entire feline race, God forbid. Those who know me very well know that this is apparently very amusing to exploit, by letting me know that there's something to know... and then not telling me it.

My boy did this to me last night, curse his smug sockses, by very pointedly telling me he was emailing someone, and then laughing until I entered "Curiosity mode". Which goes sort of like this: "Oh go on, tell me! Please tell me? Fine then, don't tell me, I don't care anyway.

...

YOU'RE SO FREAKIN' MEAN!"

He was even more exasperating today (which I don't mind, some exasperation can actually be fun), laughing - no, giggling - while I begged him to tell me what was going on. Turns out the email was to a friend asking if we could borrow an apartment in the Spring... so... apparently we're flying to Paris. Actual Paris, the actual Paris in France.

So, y'know. I let him off this time.

The Little Book of Little Gavin Stories

"As for what he got me... that deserves its own entry. I'll tell you later, if you're good."

High time I told you what it actually was, really. Here are some pictures of the absolutely beautiful book my boy made.



The Title Page


One of the secrets :) He hid things under some of the stories.


There was ribbon, bubblewrap, stickers and gems... lots of lovely feelies!


Photos from his childhood, promotional material from various bands and gigs he was involved in...


And some of my poems that he combined with photos I've taken.

That's just some of the less personal stuff. I got properly emotional when I opened it, it's absolutely the best present he could possibly have got me. It took him three days of careful scrapbooking, and it's absolutely a treasured possession now... beautiful.

Back troubles and spiritual stuff

I should be writing my essay.
I know, I know, I'm always writing an essay when I blog... this is one of my preferred procrastination methods. I'll get back to work in a minute.

I'm back at university, and very pensive. Things have drifted a bit with God and I'm trying to put my finger on why... the one thing that has been brought to my attention is that it's absolutely crucial I get it sorted.

Last night was a bit of an odd one... I was worried sick about my boy because he's got a bad back. It completely threw me off. I was being asked some difficult questions (by him, by myself), and one of them was "Why aren't you relying on God?"
Truth is, He isn't the support to me He used to be.

It's only temporary (it better be!) but it's difficult. I miss Him. And Spring and Summer won't be nearly as awesome if I don't have someone to thank. It's sad, I spent so much time wishing I had someone to share it all with, and now that I have I'm forgetting to share it with the one who made it all.

So, if you're that way inclined, pray for me and my boy. If you're not, thanks for reading.

Health, and a lack thereof

I'm going back to university tomorrow, and pretty soon after that I'm going to start looking into transferring to Cardiff university. I know it's a big decision, but I've been praying about it; and every time I pray I get more sure that it's a good thing to do. Also, I really really want to!

In other news, I always get a bit wheezy when I have a cold, and this time it got so bad that I was out of breath after I went downstairs. That's not on, so I've been to the doctor and he's given me some comedy pills that look like something out of Doctor Mario.

Quite large, aren't they. Still, I never have any trouble swallowing, so nothing to worry about there. I'm also back on an inhaler, which feels very much like a step backwards as I haven't used one in about 8 years.

Yesterday, before I went to the doctor's, myself and my younger brother and sister braved the icy wind to go to the Co-op and get some FROOTS AND VEJ. Our house being lacking in both. I just got a bit vexed the other night when we went to the chippy for the 2nd time in the brief time I've been home. The chippy had ran out of salad so I asked my parents if we have any... of course not.

SO. Tonight I am making the world's best salad, with eggs and grapes and lettuce and brie and red onion and... other things too!

Recovering from Christmas

Christmas was wonderful! Gavin got on GREAT with my family, made friends for life in my younger siblings, made a great impression and so forth. I loved getting to know his friends and family; his parents gave me an utterly gorgeous scarf that I've fallen in love with. It's soft and purple and has spangly bits! Success!



This is Gavin and his mate John wearing their stylish yet practical rain ponchos. I was offered one, but unwisely decided that it wasn't worth the embarrassment. I arrived at the pub absolutely drenched, and it's therefore most likely my fault that everyone in the world has a cold. *coughs pathetically*

It was wonderful though, I got to see my boy's old school. We saw I Am Legend at the cinema (very good), and the Darjeeling Limited (also very good).

New year's was similarly splendid, had a great time in Cardiff, aside from the, you know, DYING. I feel terrible for making my boy ill, but there you go, it was preferable to isolating me in a germ-proof bubble! That would have been lame.

This is what I bought him for Christmas - a t-qualizer, they're called. Very ace indeed!
As for what he got me... that deserves its own entry. I'll tell you later, if you're good.

I'm now back home with my family for a few days to recover from the festive season.

I hope you've all had a wonderful time with your loved ones, sorry I've been so terrible at updating! Must try harder.