Making amends...

...for having horrible posting habits. OK so yesterday I wasn't actually connected to the internet but the day before I was merely tired. However today I am awake so I shall attempt to do some catch-up!

Christmas Day: absolutely wonderful for the most part, apart from my aunt trying to kill me by enforced spacehopping. She decided that afternoon exercise was the perfect thing to follow up Christmas lunch. I thought it sounded like a nice idea until I noticed the spacehopper and by then it was too late! I fell over twice, I was so surprised it wasn't more! I felt like death afterwards - never again! Though I kept my cracker-hat on the whole way round, I was very proud! But I love seeing my family and it's been so great.

Boxing Day: my *real* aunt and uncle came over - I spent Christmas Day with step family - with their three girls and it was so good to see them all again. Ruth (my step-mum) had mentioned that the younger cousins often don't hang out with the two younger kids so they get a bit ignored. But that didn't really this time around. And as I mentioned we played Charades. One of my favourite games I should think, real good fun and when there's 11 people playing it's much more interesting!

Saturday: I went to the birthday party of a friend I've known since I was born. I mostly hung out with her crazy uni friends though 'cos she was playing a perfect hostess but they were good fun so it was a laugh :)

Sunday: hung out with Josh and his giiiiiiiiiiiiirlfriend. Finally discovered that Waterstones has surpassed Borders in my esteem. Borders has begun to fail me sadly, just before Christmas it had either no copies or not the right copies of books by three different authors and then on Sunday I found out that they've moved the Mind, Body and Spirit section from a really big section to about three bookshelves which are completely disorganised. It's so tempting to go in and sercretly organise them! We then went to Waterstones which had a nice big MBS section plus one of the books I wanted - and a whole girl/vampire section within the horror section! What more could you want?

OH! And I went to starbucks!!!!! And it was goooooooooooood :D

Monday: Did bugger all really, fell out with Dad because he's got leftover stress from dealing with my brother so I told him that wasn't fair and let slip that I hated Holland. Not good. But we patched things up as best you can when you have to leave in fifteen minutes to go to the other parent's house for three days. We also had "Christmas" at my mum's which was lovely, I got a shmexy camera bag :D:D And a whole bunch of cook books and some pagan books so I'm totally chuffed. My mum and her partner liked their presents too so I'm very glad!

Today: Went to see my Nan in Derby. She's fair crazy, in the not-actually-lost-any-sense way you know? We went to lunch at a nice restaurant and - for some reason - talked a helluva lot about Josh's sex life. Which was weird. Still it was a laugh and she took it all in her stride and now she's going to tell my Uncle Kevin that we talked about it and soon it'll go through the whole family mwahahaha. I also got to see pictures of my little baby cousin. She's just seven months old now and quite a cutie!

Can't guarantee a post tomorrow but we shall see! I think that is a fair round up, I do mean to get back into the swing of posting daily but I always knew it'd be tough to keep it up over Christmas so there we go.

Have lovely New Years everybody. Night night x

Merry Christmas! (Obviously)

So yeah, merry christmas. I've had mine by now and it was wonderful. I love having a big family, I really do, warms my heart it does. But yes good times. I hope everyone whose Christmas Days are over had fab ones and anyone who is just starting or in the middle of theirs has a good day too.

Tomorrow more family is coming so that's going to be hectic and fun!

Still ill sadly, some things are better but now my ears feel like they're filling up... which is weird.

Night night xx

365 sleeps till Christmas! ;) Hahaha

Round up

This will be, as mentioned, a review of the last 72 hours because I didn't post very interestingly on Saturday.

Ummm so, ferry ride was cool. I met a guy, well he came over to talk to me and we hung out for the better part of the journey. He had been driving around Europe in his motorhome for the last six months! He's visited 18 countries and apparently he and his friend are sick of the sight of each other! He's a recovering stammerer so we had a really interesting conversation about that, he knows Gareth Gates hehehe. We played cards and just chatted and it really passed the time.

Sunday I got some presents for my boyfriend and then went to my Mum's for her Christmas party. Will (my bf) came, it was so good to see him. I don't know when I will see him again though :( My friend Henry also came and it was great to see him too. The party was really good fun. As is the nature of "young 'uns" we soon found another room and started doing non-grown up talking things. Like playing card games. A very card filled weekend. Great fun!

Today I got up very late, did the last bit of my Christmas shopping, met some of my brother's weird friends, hugged my younger siblings (haven't seen them for four months) and decorated the Christmas tree. It was fab. Tomorrow is baby-sitting I think. *sigh* my brother is going to hang out with his gf in town and bring me back a frappuccino :D It might be my only starbucks of the season!

Night night guys.

THREE sleeps till Christmas! xx

The great outdoors...

OK, false adverstising, this isn't about the outdoors at all, well not from a nature perspective anyway. No, this is to pay homage to the fact that *I* am going out this week... THREE times. That's right ladies and gentlemen the recluse is leaving the belfry... or whatever. I say "out" I'm going to the movies tomorrow, going to hang out with Ewout and his friend at his friend's house and eat pizza and play XBox games and then also go to the work party. But seeing as, though it's a party, it's being held at the office so I'm not really going out to at all I'm not sure if it counts. Anyways, I will count it just... because. And actually I'm going out/partying four times this week 'cos my mum is having a party too. Hooray for interaction of an unforced nature! Also at my mum's party I get to see a uni friend of mine who is actually working in Cambridge and my boyfriend will be coming too!

Back to the stockings, breaking news that it is, I have just bent the seams slightly and now it fits huzzah! I'm almost done - squee! That's a noise of happiness by the way.

So I'm going to see The Day The Earth Stood Still tomorrow - look here for my non-technical, was-it-good-fun? review tomorrow night :D

Night night xx

10 sleeps till Christmas!!!

I made a new anti-recluse tag for all the posts detailing the fact that I went outside ;) I'm not actually *that* bad but it seemed like a lark!

Nada mucho ha pasando

Sorry, it felt like a spanish title day. For those of you who don't read/understand spanish - nothing much has happened. I stayed in bed late of course, finished the lining for my grandmother's stocking, found it was too big and my mother called.

Mothers, wonderful, fabulous, stressful. "You will email Will won't you?" "Yes mum." "Because I need to know soon" "I will do it" "It's important that you do" Bless her. I love her, I really do but it's like - yes, you asked me to do it, either I will forget or I won't but asking me to do it more than once isn't going to guarantee that I won't. But in this situation, seeing as it was about my boyfriend and, more importantly, about *seeing* my boyfriend, it's unlikely that I would forget... Never mind, we love them eh?

I'm rather annoyed about the lining thing though. This is what happens when they tell you to use the same pattern for the lining as for the stocking! *sigh* But I'm too inexperienced to think that I could cut out a smaller piece of fabric that was exactly the right shape so I copied what I was supposed to do and - lo and behold! - it was too big. I'm not entirely sure how I'm going to fix it. It's a shame though because the stitching is really quite neat - for me anyways! Which might be one of the reasons it doesn't fit... Because it's actually the proper shape! But it's not the entire reason so never mind.

Anyway, as my friend Pokey would say "tootles" Night night.

11 sleeps till Christmas!

Mmmmmmm Saturday

Well as per usual Saturday was my doing nothing day. If you're a regular here you'll realise that last Saturday was a freak occurrence in that I went out, I went shopping, I went clothes shopping and I had fun. OK you might not completely know my issues with clothes shopping or at least I've probably mentioned that I dislike clothes shops. But today I'm back on form with the whole getting out of bed at one thing!

It's interesting actually. I have epilepsy due to over-tiredness as I mentioned on Wednesday I think. And yet, unfortunately, I do not sleep well. Seriously, I don't. I rarely sleep through the night (again I think I mentioned this way back when) and I used to never be able to sleep late. Ever. It used to be that I couldn't sleep past ten even on a Saturday/Sunday. When I was uni in the first year this didn't really change, even with the later nights I kept I woke up at the same time and got *more* tired. The second year I was able to sleep later but now being in Holland, I can sleep till three! Which probably isn't healthy but it's such a novelty hehehe. I wonder why though. The depressed person in me says it's because then I spend less time in Holland if I'm asleep and it's a defence mechanism but I'm almost entirely sure that's not the answer!

Speaking of lack of sleep though, it's happened a lot this week. Whoops. I keep staying up late for no particular reason, except today when I watched a movie. It's almost like the end of term actually when all your good habits - going to lectures on time, doing school work - just kinda fall apart in the whole happiness of Christmas coming up. Maybe that's just me though!

So, Saturday movie review time. I just watched Premonition. It was one of those DVDs that I bought when I was compulsory shopping for other things - or just forcing myself out of the flat - and so I went to the movie store and bought three for 25 euros or something. So far I haven't done too badly - My Sassy Girl was another of these and as I've said, it's awesome! So Premonition could have gone either way given the situation I bought it in; not knowing what the hell it was about 'cos the blurb was in Dutch. But my luck held. It was a very interesting movie, very nicely done I felt, even if it was about a woman who thought her husband was dead... But yes, I thought it was great actually. Sandra Bullock played it very well, really portraying what the situation would be like - she does crazy/disbelieving/paranoid and scared brilliantly. I would like to point out at this juncture, if I haven't before, that I am crap at deciding which movies were good or bad. Well, I know a truly awful movie when I see it and I know a fabulous movie too. But unless it bummed out big time mostly I think most movies are OK to great. So if you ever disagree with a review feel free to say so as I probably have poor taste and you'll be more likely to tell me a movie was crap than that it was unseen excellence!

I started making the lining for my grandmother's stocking today. I had bought some more golden coloured material that wasn't actually lining material a couple of weeks ago and it's somewhat fray-crazy. It's one of those ones where the edges just start falling apart but so far it's staying together so let's all hope that continues. Otherwise it'll have to be gone over with a real sewing machine which will just take all my pride out of it. Yes, the stitching's not great and yes, they're slightly wonky but I made them all by hand and damnit I'm proud of myself - yay me! Or something.

Anyways it's five to one (see??) so I'm off to bed!

12 sleeps till Christmas!

Weird cheesecake

So today I made a white chocolate cheesecake and it didn't mention a base, I didn't think about this till I was prepping the cake tin at which point I was like: "Whoa... what!?" Seriously, biscuit-baseless cheesecake? Unfortunately I didn't have enough biscuits so baseless it will be, I'm still surprised though. I mean I know that it's possible, in theory, maybe even yummy - but why *not* have a biscuit base? We shall see tomorrow. It looks naked somehow though...

I had another one of those days that makes you go "Only X more days/weeks/months/years before I'm out of here forever!" One of the senior guys asked me why I had various data in a certain place, why I hadn't asked my sysadmin to put them in. I didn't even know I had a sysadmin... I'm basically making this up as I go along so I didn't know not to put something there or that I should have duplicates of this - 'cos no-one has told me! So I was just sitting there as he was asking me questions going "I DON'T KNOW!" (in my head). Luckily Matthias was assigned to help me so we're fixed AND deployed! That's right. We're live. www.visiblelogistics.com kids, for all your order management needs. Or something!

Turns out *I* am my sysadmin ¬_¬

I finished my grandmother's stocking! But I can't find my camera cable so I'll look it up at the weekend and will *finally* post the photos. And I need to get lining!

14 sleeps till Christmas! xx

Books and Norse Gods, amongst other things

I just rented the Italian Job - the new one. I think it's an excellent movie. I need to get a copy all of my own but the delivery is crap this time of year so rental it is.

Yet another Sunday has come and gone when I did bugger all. Good fun really, I started making my Grandma's stocking but it's not done yet so I won't take photos till all three are finished. I'm going to take a picture of them next to some regular sized socks so you can see the difference.

They're pretty frigging big to be honest. If they do turn out to be loads bigger than the kids then, well actually I'll probably giggle, but it's not like I expect more or anything. Hell, I'm 20 years old, I shouldn't be getting stocking presents by rights! But we do get stocking presents, or at least I hope we do - by we I mean me and my brother 20 and 18 respectively. My brother probably can expect stocking pressies as he's only technically an adult so I can't be the only one left out! It'd be unfair! Besides, it'd ruin Christmas!

Lol, anyway less pretend whinging. They are big though, I should have gotten a smaller pattern - they'd take me less long to make! I'm starting to worry about whether or not they're gonna hold anything, whether they're strong enough. As I've said before I don't sew much so I have no illusions about how good it is, but I've never had the strength tested so this is gonna be interesting. I'm gonna line them first then fill them with stuff till I get worried, if they turn out to be a bit flimsy then maybe I'll go over the stitching with my step-mother's sewing machine at home. Hopefully that'll help.

I came up with a simple but ingenious solution to my curtain problem. My curtains - if you sewed them together down the middle, turned them on their side and then cut them back up the new middle - would fit my windows perfectly. However the person who made them obviously cut the wrong part of the material; they are too narrow and too long. As such my computer chair was always getting scrunched up in them, because my desk is by the window. By window I mean french doors, only less glamourous/pretty/nice. And so, after months of being completely pissed off at whoever made the bloody things (and who put one on back to front ¬_¬ ) I realised that if I just safety pinned up the bottom the problem would go away! Which made me feel pretty daft for not thinking of it about five months ago, but there we go.

Books then, I finished 'Barking' it had some more twists and turns, still pretty good, still not my favourite.

Then I was telling my friend what I thought of Beedle the Bard and I told him that despite what I'd said he still needed to own it, like owning the Silmarillion even if you can't understand the bloody thing. In theory just owning things because you should doesn't make sense to me but when it comes to books it's a whole different story - besides I'm a collections person. I have all the Harry Potter books. But I also want to collect them in as many foreign languages as I can theoretically read - so I won't get them in Dutch or German or Swedish - but I do want them in French, Spanish, Italian and... Latin and Greek, I'm a nerd, I admit it. And so I have the sexy black matching set of the Lord of the Rings including The Hobbit and The Silmarillion. I already own the Hobbit and the Silmarillion (sort of, I accidentally nicked it from the school library) but it was a birthday present and I think they're simply beautiful. If I were never going to read The Silmarillion then I probably wouldn't have asked for it but I have tried and I'll probably try again thus justifying owning it.

So, on to Norse Gods, when I mentioned the Silmarillion he said he couldn't understand it either - I didn't try hard I admit - we couldn't get our heads round all the names. And I said it reminded me of the Ring Cycle - the one by Wagner. Before you get into your heads that I'm a cultured opera goer I'll clear that up. I have read a book, Tom Holt incidentally, to do with various Norse Gods and the ring and belt of Brunnhilde. It was very interesting and, being written by Tom Holt, very funny. I'm kind of an admirer of people who know more about various other religions, the Norse ones, Celtic, Roman, Greek etc. I'm quite interested in them myself, but in that easily distracted way or the "I'd love to buy a book and learn more about that, maybe when I have more money..." rather than actually getting down and doing something about it. Luckily for me I manage to read books whereby I accumulate vague knowledge of the matters of interest to me - through fiction of course. And so I read that book (Odds and Gods I believe) and then I read The Whale Rider much more recently, I don't remember if I mentioned it on here, if I did I probably said something like: very interesting, kinda dull. But it had more about the Norse people and about the Huns, really cool stuff too. I'm rambling, I just realised, oh well.

Anyway, I was reading about the Ring Cycle on wikipedia because I knew my friend wouldn't know what it was so I thought I'd read up on it so I could pretend to be vaguely more knowledgeable ;) And it seems I was right, in a way. Though the Silmarillion, and indeed the Lord of the Rings, is probably influenced by the *actual* Norse gods rather than the opera, I wasn't far off the mark. A cursed ring and all that jazz. Plus a full complement of dragons + treasure, people with lots of names, lots of people with similar names and probably great amounts of drinking along the way. That encompasses all of Tolkein's stuff by the way, well the similarities between them anyway. Of course, dragons + treasure is a well established myth, before or after Fafnir (the norse one) I'm not sure. So Tolkein probably didn't borrow that specifically, the ring stuff might have been more influenced, who knows. I would like to say that I'm not bashing him for taking the idea from somewhere else or any such nonsense. He was a legendary writer and all writers are influenced by most things, in fact a lot of sci-fi/fantasy apparently can be passed off as reproducing one of about four classic works, one of which is - of course - the Lord of the Rings.

So even if he did pilfer the Ring, as it were, doesn't matter, he's created a whole following of his own - who gives a damn? But it *is* interesting to actually locate where influences came from. I have loooooooads in my book, just little things that I've picked up here and there, most writers I've read will have a tiny mark or so on it somewhere. Not that people can necessarily see it, but I know it's there and I'm not ashamed. I think what's more shameful would be to say that what you've written is 100% completely original, no influence from anyone. Partly 'cos it's a lie. The only person who can say that is someone who grew up completely alone. Then their only influence is themselves. Because even if other authors haven't influenced you, the world has, society has, your mother has. Fact of life.

Umm, I have a headache and I'm out of musings. Night night. 18 sleeps till Christmas

Shopping, writing and podcasting?

OK, so only one of those activities is actually completed. Shopping I don't actually object to but today, horror of horrors, it was clothes shopping to be done. My step-mother wants me to look nice on Christmas day, which is theoretically not hard but I don't have many nice clothes really, or at least not matching ones so I had to go shopping. I had looked in the windows of Esprit on Wednesday and there were some nice things so I went in today. To be honest I get scared in clothes shops. I generally dress kinda lazily, unfitting jeans and a jumper and I'm cool, so when I go in clothes shops I feel like the nice clean pretty assistants are looking down their noses at me. So I panic. I couldn't really find the nice things I'd seen in the window, or if I did I couldn't tell they were the same. But then I found that they sold black cords. It was so comforting that I calmed right down! And I have some nice stuff... I might even go back next week. I bought about five things and the expense scared me out of buying anything else but there's a pair of sexy looking jeans and maybe - shock! - a skirt.

Today I have done some more writing, over my 100 words I think but it's kind of in flux as to when/whether I'm going to continue tonight. We may or may not be podcasting in a bit and even if we're not I may well be falling sleep!

Podcasting! Today could be the actual big, real first one. Fun stuff! But one of the guys is in NY this week so he only finished work about forty minutes ago so we'll see what happens. (No podcast today *sigh*)

Other news: I bought The Tales of Beedle the Bard today. I'd already read all the stories off Amazon of course but I obviously *had* to have the actual book. The 'commentary' by Dumbledore wasn't *quite* what I had expected. Especially because it shows no sign of his own quest for the Deathly Hallows, in fact he rather poo-poohs them and all who search for them/believe the legends. Now this was "written" approximately 18 months before he was killed. I presume, but I'm not sure, that he was already in possession of the Elder Wand at this time, he knew of Harry's father's Invisibility Cloak (and had done for 18 years) and at least 11 months before he died he possessed the Stone of Resurrection. Not to mention the fact that he'd believed in the Hallows since he was a young man (about 18 or so). The fact that he would be so condescending about the whole thing seemed out of character I felt. He may well have seen the error of his ways and realised that his quest had been in vain but that doesn't mean that he didn't believe in them. Anyway, I *had* to own it, just because, and the money's going to charity so it's all good. Maybe I'll read them to my kids along with other fairy stories lol!

I'm also currently reading "Barking" by Tom Holt. I do love Tom Holt, he's very witty and writes great stories though this one is not my favourite. All his stories are amusing, all the way though, and they always have laugh out loud moments. The best one so far is a vegetarian-becoming-an-omnivore being given salami and not being told what it was but when he saw a ...log(?)... of salami believing he was eating daschund. Very very funny, classic Tom Holt. But yes not my *favourite* thus far. There are lots of excellent little tie-ins between books though, not between actually characters but with made up characters, or little cameo roles. Great stuff. Actually I've just realised that I've waxed lyrical about Tom Holt before while reading Earth, Air, Fire and Custard. This book is better than that, which sounds harsh... Whoops, any way it is. Tom Holt if you're reading this I really do love your work, just those ones less so. I'm nice really! Lol.

I also bought 'Nation' by Terry Pratchett. I shouldn't be allowed money, it just gets turned into books. And disappears even more quickly in this wretched country where books are incredibly expensive - extra tax or something I'm told. A hardback copy of InkHeart will be 35 odd euros compare with £13!!!! OK so they have to import them I guess but that's just extortionate!

Anyway, I have books! And clothes to make my stepmother happy! And some new material to make my grandma a stocking - it's got Christmas trees on it. I'm not a person who goes in for big patterns generally but this one really appealed to me so hopefully it will appeal to her too! Maybe I actually take some photos of the as-yet unlined stockings tomorrow and post them. Once I've made my grandma's of course. I bought some new fabric that felt like lining but isn't and so is probably going to fray more and make a mess, but it's more golden so should match better. We'll see.

19 sleeps till christmas ;)

Talking... and more talking

Todaaaaay, we finished the video - we did it! We fricking did it! *AND* we did the voiceover! We're so cool. And finished, thank crap. I do think I sounded weird though but I know everyone thinks that! I'm also doing a podcast later - in the next twenty minutes or so, crazy! It should be lots of fun, it's with a couple of wacky friends of mine so it's all good.

I did more story writing today, only 200 words or so but that's 'cos I got disrupted, by the people I'm doing the podcast with. But that's OK 'cos means I have some actual structure for tomorrow. This was another new scene 'cos last night's one has some good ideas but ones that need thought and as I promised writing not thinking I shall sort out those thoughts at the weekend so I can finish the scene. This new one comes a few days/weeks after the other one. I'm back on my happy writing wave now.

Sometimes it's easy to get down and then everything feels like too much work and that first kick in the arse is the hardest. But then it's great when you get past it. I was the same a few weeks ago with being social. I was really down and antisocial and it was just easier to avoid everyone and pretend I wasn't around. But I slipped up I think and someone found me online - one of my best friends actually - and so we talked and I remembered that actually social interaction isn't terrible! I still mostly hide away but I talk to my friend and my brother and one of my podcasting friends and that's more 'cos they're the only people that I'm interested in than because I'm still 100% antisocial - honest!

It snowed today, *lots* it was amazing. It didn't stick much but in a couple of places it did and it had that magic crushing/crunching feeling beneath your feet, it was so great.

I broke the no-chocolate ban again this weekend. The video making was becoming stressful and my colleague was needing some too. I got my favourite Milka Amavel praline god-made conoction and some Cote D'Or milk chocolate which was surprisingly not great. I haven't that brand in a while but I remember it being fairly good but I was kinda disappointed. Oh well, it did the job and I will endeavour not to have chocolate at the weekend but I can't make any promises!

21 more sleeps till Christmas!

Chocolates...

Happy first of December my dears - it's almost Christmas time! I love Christmas and I will have no groaning about it in the comments if you please :D

I found out I got my student loan in yesterday so I have spent lots of money :S On other people's Christmas presents - in my defence. I may have spent a bit on me but... well it's my money and I don't care. I did put a big lump in my savings accounts before I started spending so it's not *wasting* per se ;)

I've done 4 and 2 halves worth of Christmas shopping already which I'm very proud of! I just bought my best friend what may just be the most amazing present in the world. Or at least, we thought so. Thorntons now do Alphabet Truffles you can write your own message in truffles. Mess around with it - the letters are actually photos of truffles so you can see what your message will be like. It's amazing! Well, fairly simple really but seeing as I am sending my friend a fun christmas message we think it's hilarious!

I also came across this website a little while ago: http://www.iloveyoumorethanchocolate.co.uk/Default.aspx which I think you'll agree is quite the best name for a chocolate web site you could imagine! They have great looking chocolate, cute creations and some chocolately phrases ranging from the simple: 'Mine Mine Mine Mine Mine Yours' to 'Feeling Stressed? Indulge'.

Anyway yes, lots of chocolate and despite, accidentally, breaking my no-chocolate-during-the-week ban (someone put it in my hand and it went in my mouth before I remembered) I intend to keep a calm head about all this chocolate and merely buy it for other people - aren't I good?

In light of what I said yesterday about enforced writing I have decided it will be the next activity to be phased into the regime. I can manage (normally) no chocolate on weekdays and so now we need something else to manage.

At least five days a week I will do some writing. I will write at least 100 words every one of those five days. More is, of course, allowed.

I know I know, it's only 100 words but at the rate I'm going it's better than nothing - literally. And hopefully that'll get me back into it and I can up the amount. And it's to be five separate days mind. No storing it up for the weekend - no no no. Not allowed.

There are probably other things I should say but I can't think what they are and it's half eleven so I'm offskiing which is obviously the present participle of 'offski'...

Failure

Unfortunately but somewhat unsurprisingly I have done no writing. It's not going very well really, everytime I tried to think about what to write next I started thinking about other books - not good. I think I'm going to have to be strict with myself. Set aside a slot of time everyday in which I have to do some writing and have a goal X number of words in said time slot. It's the only way. Well, probably not the only way, but the most efficient way that I can see.

I started making my brother's stocking today so it's ready to be lined too. I was thinking about giving it a little turnover at the top but I have to make sure that the lining doesn't clash too much with the gold on the fabric. Also I need to learn how to read patterns better. I just had to do a demonstration to myself so I could understand the instructions perfectly, I couldn't understand why I needed a slipstich opening for the lining. But now I do, although I don't need it 'cos the lining is the same on both sides so I needn't bother with all that complicated stuff - yay!

I finished my book this morning so yet again I'm down to having nothing to read, *dies* Oooh but I've just found out that the good bookstore in Rotterdam is open till nine from Wednesday - yippee! I can buy that PHP book and some interesting fiction ones too with any luck. I was considering leaving work early but now I can just go straight after huzzah.

I love book shops. I could spend ages in them, I have in fact, and not just in the Starbucks. That's why I like the Borders in Cambridge: it has a starbucks *and* they obviously don't pay their staff enough so they don't come round and bother you 'cos they just don't care. Or maybe Borders knows that people don't like to be bothered in bookshops. This might hold true for other shops but I don't generally go in to other shops. I actually don't... how worrying is that? But then, I don't really buy anything except books. Though I do hate it when, on the few times I go into clothes stores, the staff are always so pushy, if you've been there longer than five minutes they come and ask if they can help. It's like No if I needed help I would a) look lost/confused and/or b) have come looking for you. Since I am still in the trouser section, you have twenty racks of trousers and I'm not looking lost it's probably a safe bet that I do *not* need help.

But maybe that's just me.

I probably have more to say but I can't think what it is except: we had snow today! And: 25 days till Christmas! And: good night.

The Covenant or Why I'm annoyed at Blogger

I wrote a nice long post yesterday and I'm so sure it was posted - apparently not. I'm more than a little miffed, if only because now I have a black mark on my record for posting everyday - at least the other times: no internet, were valid reasons and now! *sigh*

So I did just watch the Covenant, it wasn't at all scary but it wasn't supposed to be. It was an interesting story but not as well explained as it could have been. They mentioned 'Darklings' a couple of times but there's no real explanation of what one is except that people who use magic can make them out of dead people. And that's all deduced. They seemed like a really cool idea for giving the good guys the idea that something odd was going on but there wasn't enough depth which kinda wasted it. There's some internal battles between the four members of the good gang, just your average jealous/over emotional/sparring type stuff but again it could have been explained better or just not been there. On the whole though it was interesting. Although I'm biased, any movie about paganism that isn't slanderous or crap I'm sure to like. And not only was it about paganism, it was also about Salem paganism. I love Salem, the witchcraft stuff always intrigued me, even before I became a pagan and it was there that I bought the book that put me on this path. I have a soft spot for Salem. So yeah, Salem and Massachusetts witchcraft is right up my street, as it were.

I want to go back there, I haven't been for, oh, only four years which given that I live in England isn't really that long a time. But I want to go back with money and possibly by myself or rather not with my mum's friend and her kids, lovely as they are. But then if I go with money I'd be tempted to buy far too many things! Bumper stickers for my non-existent car, cool throws for my non-existent sofa etc. etc. Money slips through my fingers like you wouldn't believe.

Speaking of money and ways to get it... I emailed one of my lecturers at uni a month or so ago, maybe longer, to ask if they had any jobs going - for my internship. They said no at the time but apparently he mentioned it to a company manager who was at their annual 'let's give the kids proper interview practice' outward bound weekend. The guy got back to them wanting to know if I still wanted a job so my supervisor called me up at work yesterday to see how I was doing. It sounds great but at first I wasn't sure, no reason why I wasn't sure but anyway. Now the more I think about it the more I want to go, I realised the only thing that I really care about in this country is my project and now that I've got it to a finish as it were - there's expansion and improvements that can happen but it's reached its first goal - I don't mind leaving it behind. We've got the lovely new intern who could theoretically pick up the ropes. I just feel bad 'cos Peter (my job supervisor) is my dad's friend and that by leaving I'll be failing him, and my dad to a certain extent. The other thing is that I'm not as unhappy as I was then, I've, I dunno, become used to the situation. I still don't much like it here and when you realise that aside from your project the things you're going to miss are the stationery shop, the fabric shop and the movie store perhaps you should start worrying. But does being able to tolerate the hole in which you live enough justification not to leave? I don't think so, and even if my flat is worse, even if my job is worse I'll still be closer to home, closer to my friends and closer to my boyfriend. I doubt the place I'd live would be worse - this place is a hole. And it's not so much my job that I hate, it's some of the people, so I guess the people could be as bad/worse but I have to believe they won't be. I used to be in two minds about leaving; I knew I couldn't leave to go back to uni, that'd be quitting but I wasn't sure what moving to another job might mean, on that side of things. I think I've said this before but I'm a quitter by nature and so I wanted to stick this out to prove to myself that I could. That's one of the reasons I didn't want to go back to uni - that and I had *no* idea what to do for my dissertation (I definitely need another eight months to figure that out) but moving on to another job? Is that quitting? I'm not sure. I'm sticking out the industrial year but I haven't put up with the job. But then when the job starts to make you feel like shit, is it worth sticking to? are you still a coward and a wimp if you run away? Tough questions.

Well in the light of those decisions plus the fact that I spent two hours distracting my brother trying to persuade him not to leave home on of which I also spent on the phone to my mother talking to her about my brother's issues. I didn't tell all of them, I'm not a taddle-tale, but when it comes to desperate situations I told them enough of what he was feeling. To be honest he's brought most of this upon himself and my parents couldn't *be* more supportive. More than that he knows he's brought it on himself. Which is why he wants to leave of course: it's not getting better and he's only hurting them by staying. It's only a couple of steps away from "maybe if I left completely, forever, they'd be happier" and other morbid thoughts, but luckily he's too lazy to jump off a bridge and I don't think he's nearly that depressed so we should be good. But I'm a fairly empathetic person I like to think, and I've been told, and Josh and I get on well, he always listens to me. Most of what I say goes in one ear and out the other, but he does listen. And I can get away with saying things simply because I'm not a parent - some things are just harder to take from parents, including piano lessons. But because I'm on the same level as him, family tree wise, we've a different bond and I get frustrated in a different way which means I can have some distance from the situation which improves perspective. So I can talk to my mum and be completely sympathetic all the while gaining clues as to what to tell my brother how he can improve the situation. He's completely unmotivated - about everything. And I think that's what's currently getting to my parents most. He's not working hard enough at school which is always irritating but he can't get off his arse to look for a saturday job either, it's almost like he's zombified from what I can tell. It's gotten to the point that if he even offered to do the washing up or feed the cats my mum would be overjoyed. I only learnt this last night and duly passed on the message in such a way that he wouldn't know I'd talked to her about him! I then talked to my dad on skype today, about unimportant things mostly and then I said I had to go and he said OK and then said "I'm sorry about the stress from Josh last night" and I said it was OK, he's my brother bla bla bla. But then he has a despairing moment, they're really at a loss with him. And I don't mind in the slightest, anything I can say or do to help, I will, but it just seemed amusing that this despair and need to talk about it came straight after he apologised about the stress I just endured from Josh! Parents eh? Who'd have 'em? I can't wait till I'm back for Christmas, I'm going to drag Josh round town and get him to apply to some jobs (I'll feed him Starbucks hot chocolate to make up for the dragging) and I'll talk to him and hope that some of it stays in his brain! And maybe things will get a tiny bit better.

I just realised I meant to start that paragraph with "In the light of those decisions and all the family stress, I gave up my chocolate veto and had ice cream at dinner" but instead I did my rambling thing. So yes, ice cream for tea, that doesn't mean the chocolate veto is off, oh no, back on again from, well, now. But as long as lapses are lapses and don't become the norm, then you know you're in control.

I got a card from my grandma today, she said she'd love to have a stocking, that it'd be good fun. Which is great only now I've realised that the colours of my current stocking are perfect for her but the pattern on the material for Josh's is also perfect for her. So I'm thinking that I will go to the fabric shop, buy that combined colour/pattern fabric (which they had when I was there) and probably buy myself so different fabric - 'cos I can't possibly have the same colour as my grandma. Josh and she will have different style stockings so it doesn't matter that the pattern is the same (hopefully).

So I'm going to make up Josh's stocking tomorrow and DO SOME WRITING! Oh and buy a book on PHP so that I'm vaguely knowledge 'ere I have an interview with that guy from the company.

Good night.

Coyotes and snow

It snowed today! At least... I think it did. I was outside when it was hailing and I heard it rain but when I went out later there was snow on all the cars. But that could still be the leftover hail... Never mind - I love snow! Love love love. And we're due real snow tomorrow, yippee!

I went shopping today, I bought some fabric from the fabric shop and am now the proud owner (maker) of half a christmas stocking - woop! That is, it's a whole stocking but I have to line it yet so it's only half done. It's so pretty, hand stitched and everything, only took me four hours... When it's all done maybe I'll take a picture. I'm very proud of my sewing on this occasion because I don't sew much, at all, except for making a pair of wings once... It was for an art project - he's very handsome no? Well it's only a back, based on my handsome little brother. Whose photoshopped, tattoed, back is in the art section too.

I just watched Coyote Ugly today, I've seen it before a looooooooong time ago, which is probably why I don't remember the huge sex scene in the middle! What is with that!? Still, it was good fun as I remember :) It had lots of trailers - including Pirates of the Caribbean. I'm going to have a pirates marathon tomorrow methinks. How yummy is Johnny Depp? *melts* I remember when I went to see the first Pirates movie, at the cinema, I was fifteen and I was sitting there with my dad and my brother looking up at Johnny Depp thinking "This guy must be as old as my dad. Plus he's got dreadlocks and is dirty and stuff. Why do I think he'd goddamn gorgeous, this isn't right, it's too weird. But look how pretty..." Lol. He's five years younger than my dad so I guess that makes it OK right? I have lots and lots of DVDs a fair few of which have Johnny Depp in them. My DVD collection, when organised, is sorted by genre where each genre sort of flows into the next. There's a Johnny Depp section. Finding Neverland and Chocolat on one end, Pirates in the middle merging into Johnny Depp and Tim Burton, then just Tim Burton and out the other side into animation. But yes, an actual Johnny Depp section. I'm debating whether or not to get a calendar but I think that would be too weird. Give me faeries and kittens instead :D

I bought yet more movies today. I'm very very bad, I buy too many movies. The selection today just proves how odd my housemates last year thought I was. I had moved all my DVDs in and was going to get more stuff and they sneaked a look at my movies to guage what kind of person I was and they were thoroughly bewildered - I had chick flicks next to action movies (this was before they were sorted). They decided I was cool :D So today I bought Coyote Ugly, Love Actually and The Covenant. It looked interesting and by that I mean I looked at the picture and saw it was made by the people who made Underworld - my third and fourth favourite films. I would have read the back but it's all in Dutch but I looked it up on IMDB, sounds pretty fun :) So yes, a rom com, a fantasy scary dramatic type and Coyote Ugly which I can't really define!

Nothing much else interesting happened. I got stood up for a stay at home dinner making with my house mate. How sad can you get? I asked him this morning if he wanted to make cauliflower cheese with me later (he has the hugest block of Grana Padano to use up) and he said "maybe" that he'd like to say yes but it might change to a no. I thought, fair enough, he'll come tell me later. It's half past eight when I finally give up. *sigh* So I made up for it with B&J low-fat Strawberry Cheesecake 'cos I couldn't see their regular Peace of Cake one. It's nasty. Well, it's made with oatmeal cookies which aren't offensive in themselves it just means you have chewy flakey bits and it doesn't soften properly either. Not good. Which surprised me, I didn't think they could make bad ice cream, they have flavours I don't approve of but this was icky. Their low-fat chocolate fudge brownie on the other hand may actually be better than the regular version. I shall have a taste test and post the results ;)

That's all really, I have stocking lining and creation lined up for tomorrow as well as the Pirates marathon - woop! Hehehehe, I just decided to create a Johnny Depp label - for the hell of it.

Pictures!

Whoa I just got worried because I knew I had posted yesterday but Blogger was telling me I last posted on the 18th and I'm looking at my computer clock and it's telling me it's the 20th... And then I realised it's past midnight - doh!

I finally did some work on my story - I've written a proper story board. Normally I start writing one and go too in depth into one section, but now I really have a proper outline (plus all those in depth bits) so that's good.

As to the title, my friend invited me to join this facebook group. I don't know if anyone reading this has facebook but hey if you do, join and upload your pictures from around the world. I think it's a really neat idea and I shall be spamming my friends into joining. Actually that's not true, I hate group invite spam, I specifically pick people who I think might actually respond! Or get a kick out of it or w/e. Anyway so I got to look at lots of old photos which is always great - I should take more! And I should also get them put on CD, I am retro and have a film camera which means if I want pictures on my laptop I have to pay much more *sigh* or buy tons of batteries for my digital camera which eats them.

In fact I'm even more retro, I still have and use a sony CD walkman INSTEAD of an MP3 player. Although it might be time to retire the walkman (I've had it ten or so years) because I like to listen to music on the way to and from work and the CD keeps skipping *sigh*

What else happened today? I'm still desperately trying to fill up my day while not knowing actually what the hell I'm supposed to be doing. Actually that's not true, I'm supposed to be working on expanding my project but I don't have any test data so I can't really do that, the intern I'm supposed to be grooming still has 'flu, but believes he'll be back tomorrow - which will fill up my day, explaining all my code etc. But thereafter I'm at a loss. I'm going to have to 'fess up soon I can tell.

Oh! I booked my journey home for Christmas - I'm going hoooome *does happy dance* and I'm going for two weeks which cuts the duration of my stay in Holland down from 7 1/2 months to just 7 - whoopdefrickindoo.

My dad does this Christmas newsletter thing every year and for the last couple of years - ever since he wrote in my section "Kate didn't do well in her exams but hopefully she'll still get into uni" (git) - I've been writing my own section and having to provide a photo which, seeing as I was at work, meant trawling through facebook photos... Never a good thing, facebook photos are ones that other people put up of you, when do they take them? on trips out. When you're at uni and you're going out where are you going? to the pub. So what are you like in these photos? drunk... Luckily I don't do many *embarassing* things when I'm drunk but it's just not the face you want to show dozens of foreign cousins if you know what I mean? But I did find a couple of very good ones (among a huge amount of average to bad ones) and now I get extra chocolate for having finished my section and providing a photo first - yippee! Anyway that was the second bit of photo stuff.

I love photography, I'm hopefully getting camera kit for Christmas - a flash gun and a lush camera bag. I'm so chuffed. And when I go back to Aber I can start up the black and white photography courses again - yay! It's not photography so much as developing films and photos - which is the best bit in some ways. Every time I develop a picture it makes me happy! Lol, so easily amused. Tell me about you favourite photo/photo taking experience/place to take photos of :) I'd love to know.

Night night.

Moooooovies

So today was a fairly nice day, I managed to not get up till half twelve which is weird for me, no matter how tired I am I normally can't sleep past ten. Naturally I managed to still feel tired when I woke up - don't you hate that? So I didn't manage to do anything constructive till three when I went food shopping. Yay for me... Or something.

Than I came back and my boyfriend was online, yippee! So we talked lots and then I watched Ella Enchanted and ate ice cream. All in all, very good. I do love that movie, it's so wonderful and simple. I like the Princess Diaries movies too :) I haven't read the books though which are completely different I believe. Michael continues in the story rather than being forgotten like in the movies. But still, good, easy fun.

Amazon sent me an email today, they often do, but this one I paid attention to, ummm for no particular reason lol. It was just an advert one about Christmas ideas for movies or something, it seemed worth looking at even if only briefly. There were some good movies on there, lots of rom-coms. I feel the need to stock up on those. I think one of the problems with people my age is that we hear about all of the real classics: Pretty Woman, When Harry met Sally, While You were Sleeping etc. but I don't really know anyone who's watched them, anyone my age anyways. So I think I shall ask for lots of them for christmas i.e. put them onmy amazon wishlist. Because quite frankly, you can never have too many chick flicks. Even if they are simple and trashy, doesn't matter!

But I was shocked, for all their three or four pages of Christmas kids movies they didn't have "Santa Clause: the movie" which is not one of those crappy ones with Tim Allen in. No, the best Santa movie of all time, the one with Dudley Moore from 1985. It's the best one and next to nobody has seen it. And the santa is a proper santa. My favourite Christmas movie ever, better even than the Muppet's Christmas Carol but it's a close run thing ;) My kids will be watching that movie every Christmas, for as long as they're in my house! Once they exist of course. And then, when they leave but come back for Christmas they will still have to watch it! I say "have to" I will probably be watching it so if they're in the house no doubt they will watch it. I won't force them of course. But yes it's the best and I really don't know anyone who's seen it. It has Dudley Moore as an elf and John Lithgow as a heartless, money-loving, toy making crazy man. What more could you want? There's also flying reindeer, spoilt children making friends with poor children, lack of belief and a bemused Santa. If that doesn't make it a fab Christmas movie I don't know what will!

Night all.