My little Mensa genius

Born to Run, Bruce Springsteen. 

Dear Rory,

Happy birthday for yesterday, you wonderful, sardonic, patronising, brilliant little ponce.

You were always the coolest person in the year, even if your handwriting did earn you a D in the English mock. Even if I did cheat off you and manage to get a higher grade. Even if you did kick Anya in the face when you were roleplaying Santiago. Even though your quiff is disappointingly flat compared to how it was before.

You're awesome and you inspire me.

And just so you know - I didn't forget.

Quote of the Day: You obviously don't pay enough attention. [Rozzer]

Try me

Bastard!

Angry! Bastard! Just wasted an hour of bastard worktime [because I know my priorities] stabbing at my bastard ear with a bastard hoop ring and foaming with fury at the bastard's stubborn refusal to clip into itself. Bastard! Now I'm left with not enough bastard time to do my psychology homework for my bastard teacher [she really is a cow, I'm not just saying that], a bright red, throbbing ear, a stupid ineffective hoop kicking around my bathroom cabinet when it should be decorating my body, and a sour mood to last me the rest of the year. Anyone know how to do these bastard cartilage hoops?

Bastard! Bastard! 

Jon Snow [best GoT character, like, ever] is always referred to as the "bastard". It's funny how words change with time. Like "bitch" used to mean a female dog. The N word used to be a shocking act of racism, but it's been reclaimed by the black community as a mild salutation. Back in the olden days, to be gay was to be happy. In the modern olden days, it meant to be attracted to the same gender. Today anything gay just isn't cool.

Oh yeah - Don't Look Back in Anger, Oasis. Only decent song they've ever done. That and Stop Crying Your Heart Out. Wonderwall is an embarrassment.

Quote of the Day: I have a tender spot in my heart for cripples, bastards and broken things. [Tyrion Lannister, Game of Thrones]

♥

Passive Melancholia

Fifteen Feet of Pure White Snow, Nick Cave.

I'm watching Stop My Stutter with mum, and it was something of a surprise to see my little Gareth Gates, ten years after Will "Underdog" Young beat him to win Pop Idol. It's almost saddening. What happened to all these figures from my childhood? I remember when Orlando Bloom was the best thing since Mini Milks. He hasn't done anything good since the first Pirates. Nostalgia isn't always the happiest emotion.

I wish I knew more about love. What it is, what it means, whether I've felt it, whether I already am. The only thing I know about it so far is how much it pisses me off when people [more often than not, those my own age] throw it around like it means nothing - if they're right to do so, if it really does mean nothing, then why is it drummed into all of us that we haven't lived until we've found it? It annoys me.

Quote of the Day: It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education. [Einstein]

Sunset

is now my favourite time of day.

To paraphrase, our good friend Hippy invited Anonymous, Curious and myself to her house on Thursday for a stayover, and in the evening the four of us walked to the beach [it never ceases to amaze me, how cool it is living so close to the seaside] in time to watch the sun set, and, in a nutshell, it was the most incredible, breathtaking, awe-inspiring thing I've ever been lucky enough to see. At that moment, stood between two of the most Brilliant people I've ever been lucky enough to meet and wondering how I'd return to routine after witnessing this totally Alien experience [my first proper sundown], I couldn't have found it in me to hate anything or anyone, even if I wanted to. There has never been a time I was more at ease than I was then.

It was beautiful. Electric orange, spilling through the clouds like paint from a pot, eclipsing the grey sky and reflecting over the water to give something polluted and ugly the most stunning edge. I wish, more than anything else, that I'd had my camera with me, so I could show you how damn pretty it was. Everyone knows I'm rarely without it any other time. Maybe it's a sign from God. 

"Quit living through yo camera, crazy fool!"

"But God! How will I remember the happiest moments of my life when I'm old and decrepit without the photographic prompts to remind me?"

"Quit yo jibber jabba!"

Forget Morgan Freeman, God is now Mr T. 

And that's not blaspheme, because I'm comparing Him to someone I think is awesome, as opposed to, say, Hitler. Joking about heiling God is a step too far.

Yeah. My half term, pre-sunset, was such good therapy! On Sunday night, Anonymous barged his way into my home, sneezed his illness all over the place, disrupted our quiet family life and demanded that we take him all the way to Northamptonshire. We managed to restrain him until the next morning, but we couldn't hold him off any longer; he was about to get violent when we eventually set off. Luckily the journey there was pretty good. I don't think any of us would have survived had there been any traffic to prolong the time spent without the love of his life.

Look at that face. Butter wouldn't melt.

An interesting fact - I ate at McDonalds for the first time in about... four years? Everything tastes so much better at those kind of places when you're a merciless carnivore. Damn ethics. Damn vegetarianism. Damn greasy chips. Damn misleading condiment dispensers. [There was a mixup with the ketchup and the barbecue sauce. My bad.] The Yorkie McFlurry, however... That was good. That was very good.

So we got to the meeting place, and Anonymous managed to bully Chicken Tits [or Vennie, or Blondie, or Violet], Big D and Darts into hanging out with us [I will admit to being a little unfair on my wonderful anonymous friend about now]. I can't tell you enough how great it was to see Chicken again. I didn't even realise how much I really missed her until we saw her coming towards us from the other end of the park, and had a serious mini-debate over whether to let her get to us before hugging her, or closing the distance and leaping on her. Guess which one we went for? ;) It was also really nice to see Big D - he was probably the first friend I made, as a tiny tiny ginger toddler, but as we grew up we talked less and less and, until Monday, I hadn't seen nor spoken to him for... probably 3 years. Which is shameful. When we were little, we used to hang out all the time. As well as a reunion for old friends, I met a new one; Darts joined the group after I moved away, and I'm really sorry I don't still go to my old school to get to know people like her. She's so lovely! I love how none of us were really daunted, because the afternoon so easily could have been awkward, but it was great! Long story short, we ended up huddled around an electric heater in the church I attended every week for the first 11 years of my life, which was a surreal experience. We played Anonymous's guitar, ate a crazy amount of sweets, caught up with/got to know each other and then, after a few hours, walked straight from the church to the pub, played darts [from which Darts earned her name] and pool [or tried to, on my part] and the eventual, inevitable truth or dare [which I didn't actually instigate this time:P]. You're better off reading Chicken's blog, or even Anonymous's if your mind is up for some blowing, if you want a more detailed version of events - you should read their blogs anyway, they're both very interesting people and I love reading what they have to say :)

A far more accurate account of Monday, told by someone way more likely to give a true overview as opposed to the irrelevant "AND THEN I SAW A TREE" details someone like me tends to provide

Another considerably more true summary, from the lion's mouth itself

Ok - it's 20 to 4, I have to be awake in 5 hours, school starts again on Monday, and I've typically left everything to the last day. There is more to blog about! I'm just... rubbish and unprepared and I don't know if I'll ever get around to doing it. Grah.

By the way - She's Always a Woman to me, Billy Joel. Because she always will be.

Quote of the Lifetime: Our beach. Our friend. Our sky. Our night.

PS, Chicken? You know what you should totally do? Dye your hair!

Missing Home

I'm lucky. My parents aren't bankrupt, or abusive, or divorced, or dead. The house I live in has a back garden, space to park a couple of cars, and central heating. I'm healthy, mentally and physically, as is my family. I can read. I have qualifications, opportunities. I have the wherewithal to take a shower every day and watch the Simpsons every night and eat three times a day. We go on holiday once a year. I have friends, who keep me going through the tiny, insignificant glitches in my otherwise technically perfect life I undoubtedly blow way out of proportion because I have nothing else with which to fill my empty existence. It's so frustrating; I annoy even myself, with my own abject selfishness and negativity and vanity and ability to find something in every situation to be dissatisfied with.

God. I miss you all so fucking much. Why did we all have to change? If I hadn't moved away, would things have turned out differently? If I could claim to be any good at all at utilising the internet to actually keep up with people, would I still be able to say I feel like any of you want me around? I'd do anything to go back to when I was still with you, even though I hated the school, because at the end of the day, it didn't matter - I had the best friends in the world and I didn't even know it yet. I still do. Like I said, I'm unbelievably lucky. I hope I've learned to give my new friends the appreciation and affection they deserve through regretting not giving enough of either to you guys back home. 

If the opportunity to lose my mind and live forevermore in my own utopian, imaginary dreamworld ever comes my way, I hope you'll forgive me for leaving you. I need you all too badly.

Good craic ☺

Sunshine Song, Jason Mraz - and if you're up for listening to the most disconcertingly filthy song in the universe, try Butterfly. The word is never going to mean the same thing to me ever again.

I have a wee cousin [well, not all that wee, she's only a year younger than I am], for the purposes of this, called E, who's living way up in the highlands, and there're a few things she needs to know:

1. Her smile is infectious;
2. As is her laugh;
3. Some of the best times of my life I've been lucky enough to spend with her;
4. Her willingness to make a friend of anyone, no matter who they are, will always make her special;
5. I envy her musical instinct, and seemingly-endless talent;
6. She is one of the most original, funny, clever, inspirational people I've ever had the pleasure of meeting;
7. She's beautiful. In every way;
8. Any guy who can say they've met her and hasn't fallen completely in love with her is a closet homosexual.

Hey, lil' cuz. I miss you. I know I don't always show it, because I'm a rubbish cousin, but that text you sent me a couple of days after my birthday... It's the sweetest thing anyone's ever said to me. I didn't reply because I didn't know how to - and I'm sorry. You're brilliant, and I wish I could match your brilliance. You think you've messed up and done people wrong and, while I don't know the full story, I know it's going to be okay in the end, because you're going to keep growing and learning and developing into a beautiful, mature, incredible young woman, and I can't wait to see you in five, ten, fifteen years, on your wedding day, getting married to the man you deserve, still making everyone around you smile with your little jokes and remarks and stories and facts and dances and songs, still being the amazing person you are. If it's not okay, it's not the end yet. I love you, E ♥

I was meant to be going out tonight and the sudden influx of snow over England has made getting any vehicle in or out of my village a suicide mission. I'm... really bummed. I was looking forward to it.

On the upside, the sudden snow has allowed for some relatively pretty pictures to be taken, like the... half-arsed camera fiend I am:

Subject focus! Yes!

Quote of the Day: Families are like fudge; mostly sweet with a few nuts.

PS - Something to cheer everyone up. Ahh, there's nothing quite like a drunk man dancing. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d05_al-IA3A

Feeling like an aubergine

Purple Rain, Prince; one of my favourite songs of all time, and linking firmly to the theme of this post.

The colour purple is pretty immortal, I think. Everyone likes purple, but not many people say it's their favourite [with the exception of the kind of girls who mentally reside somewhere between girly and tomboy]. I wouldn't say it's my favourite colour, fo sho. It's got staying power over the others, though. Purple's been a consistent friend for a long time, and I think I'll always have time for it. 

[I am aware that I'm talking about a colour as if it was a person, but colours are the base elements of everything we see, and they're the visual manifestations of everything we feel, and so I think they deserve the same respect as art - which is, after all, just colours {or lack thereof, for effect} carved and shaped and sculpted into a manageable form to make something beautiful and thought-provoking.]

Even before I thought to Google the supposed "official" meanings of it, the colour purple has always been very comforting. It reminds me of being wrapped up in a warm house with a bowl of Heinz tomato soup, looking outside to the rain hammering down on the world as if it's pissed off at someone. It doesn't make me happy, exactly; just calm. Yellow brings a smile to my face; blue reminds me of times curled up listening to a crackly radio; red, with all it's passionate connotations, has a typically Katherine effect on me; purple just chills me out. It's like chocolate spread. A jacuzzi. Morgan Freeman's voice.

All this has been inspired by my latest attempt at colouring my hair - though I'm pleased to say, this one's been successful; I have managed to dye my hair! And my scalp. And my neck. And my ears. And my hands. And the bathroom. But my hair is finally purple!

Quote of the Day: This donut has purple in the middle, purple's a fruit. [Homer Simpson]