Best Day/Worst Day

These last few days I read a book called "Looking For Alaska" by John Green (AMAZING.) I'm probably going to write about it a lot in the next week or so, so do your homework if you want to... or I'll just be relatable. Sorry if I'm being too niche recently, but in short having read "Looking For Alaska" isn't really relevent to today's post. But you still should, because I really recommend it. It isn't hardgoing at all, but still provoked me to think about so many things.

They play a game Alaska spontaneously invents, called "Best Day/Worst Day" - everyone tells the story of first their best day every, and then their worst. It's also a drinking game, but I don't have anybody to drink with and getting drunk alone for the entertainment of an empty space on the internet seems stupid.

But I'm still going to play it. Though instead of choosing one I picked multiple for each, because I'm painfully indecisive.

BEST DAYS
(in no chronological order)

1. Going to Camelot Theme Park with my dad, I think I was about aged ten. I think my mum was writing her dissertation or something, so we had to do something to get out of the house so went her. It was grey and it rained, and my dad went on at me to go on a rollercoaster called The Whirlwind. I was in about a two year phase (eight-then, I love them now) when I was scared of rollercoasters, and I planned to pretend I was going to do it then get to the queue and chicken out. But I just didn't, and we got in the cart and I shut my eyes tight the whole time and that was the point I realised I quite like being thrown around over and over again.

2. Royal Albert Hall Day, 2010. I did write a post about this. Seeing my favourite musician, with my best friend, in my favourite city, and spending the weekend there.

3. Geneva, 2011. I go skiing with my parents and my cousin every year, and we drive there, a long journey through Europe, and usually cross about three different countries. This year, we stopped at a roadside bridge my dad spotted and all of us raced along it.

We spent the rest of that day in Geneva, in Swizerland, and it's one of the most beautiful places I think I've been to. We were only there for about an hour but walked through a park, saw the Lake, payed a busker and took pictures of some swans.

4. Spooning in the park, July 2011. A few weeks ago, the day we broke up from school, I went to a slumber party with just my two best friends and nobody else. It was at someone's big farm house, and I think that period - from about 5pm to 3 the next day, I was completley honest the whole time, we all were. We ate a lot of cookie dough and watched High School Musical 3 because I was deprived of it my whole childhood, then ended up getting drunk but not crazy-drunk, just the kind of drunk that opens you up and makes you laugh too much. So we walked to the park and all just lay down in a heap and talked about all the things you're not supposed to the rest of the time. I felt warm and I felt loved.

WORST DAYS

1. Harriet, the girl at the out-of-school club, 2002. The summer I started school, I went to an out-of-school club in the summer whilst my mum was working. Usually my best friend Charlotte was there, or another girl called Maia, but this one time my mum dropped me off and the only person to "play with" - that's what we did then - was a girl called Harriet. I mean, there were a lot of boys, but boys were icky. I recall playing a jigsaw computer game with Harriet, which she made me watch whilst she repeated, and shouted at me that she got three goes in a row, then I could have ONE turn. Aside from that, I can't quite remember what she did to me but I know she was some kind of four year old psycho bitch. I really clearly remember that in my mum's car on the way home, I thought to myself "THIS was the worst day ever. Nothing that has happened to me before or will happen can possibly compare."

2.Sitting on the shower floor after drinking Tia Maria, 2010.
The first time I drank a lot was at someone's house towards the end of last year. I remember a gap between when we were doing shots and it seemed fun, and then some other stuff happened and after that there's a gap between lying on a mattress being hit and then drunkenly sobbing whilst somebody stroked my hair. Then I hugged the person who'd hit me and I told them I was sorry and I don't know why, I wasn't, I was mad at them but I desparatley wanted them not to be mad at me. The next day I got home and I felt like crap and I was still angry so I sat on the shower floor and wept. That was probably quite a low moment.

There are some more worst days I can think of, but they're all similar and hard to explain.
And isn't it better to have twice as many best days than worst days?

"Never Let Me Go" review

(there's spoilers, yes.)

"Never Let Me Go" is a book by Kazuo Isiguro I read back in April, and watched the film adaptation tonight. The story takes place at Hailsham, a seemingly idealistic boarding school in the English countryside, and the narrator is a young girl referred to as "Kathy H". The first portion is mostly tales from Kathy's youth, and of being at Hailsham with her two best friends Ruth and Tommy, but there are odd little things we're told about the school which suggests something behind it all - visits from Madame, a Belgian woman with an art gallery who picks out some of the children's art work, the way that the children's health is a huge priority - and the film opens with the headmistress, Miss Emily, scolding the entire hall after some burnt out cigarettes were found in the grounds. The children don't ever leave the confinement of Hailsham, or seem to want to, also their parents or families are never mention, nor are their surnames.
And although they already seem to know, it's spelt out to the children by one of the teachers - or "guardians" - that they were brought in the world purely so that when they grow up, these children will donate their organs to patients of private hospitals in need of replacements.

Considering how much I loved the book, the film was always going to have a some faults in it for me, but I really enjoyed Never Let Me Go. For one, it was just so well cast. Carey Mulligan was brilliant as Kathy - she showed all of the mature and sensibility she has in some ways, compared to Ruth and Tommy, then also the fact that she's also naive in a different way. But I think it was Andrew Garfield and Keira Knightly who stole the show for me. Garfield just was Tommy - the rage, the heart, and most of all just the tiny bits of clumsiness in his walk, and so many of his manerisms were so genuine to the character, he is a child all the way through. And Keira Knightly, who I think I've only really seen as a protagonist or a love interest type character, was absolutley brilliant in this where she was bitchy sometimes. In those early scenes in The Cottages, she showed all the tenaciosity and bitterness - I'm mostly referring to the scene where she completley downgraded Kathy in the attic. She was also wonderful playing the aged, weaker and worn out Ruth in the recovery centre.

There were only really two things I was annoyed that they missed out on.

The first was the scene in the book where Kathy listens to "Never Let Me Go" on a Judy Bridgewater tape - she thinks it's about a woman who finally has a baby after a long time of waiting, and she dances around the dormitory clutching a pillow, then notices Madame just watching her. I know it would've been hard to explain without the narrative there is in a book, but this scene was just the key to portraying how Madame saw the children at Hailsham, and how they saw her (Kathy knows she feels awkward around them, and she thinks that she's upset when she sees her dancing because she knows the Hailsham children can never have their own babies, we don't know why at this point).

The second thing was that so many little moments between Kathy and Ruth - them sitting together talking about sex on the pavillion, how Ruth came up and talked to Kathy in her bedroom every night they were together in the Cottages, were missed out on, and although their not that relevant alone, I think this ended up completley forgetting to show a lot about Kathy and Ruth's friendship. "Never Let Me Go" was hugely about friendships between females to me, and really in the film Tommy is much more of a part of Kathy and Ruth's relationship than in the book.

Visually it was beautiful - Hailsham and that area of Norfolk and the Cottages and the boat and really all of the locations were pretty much exactly how I'd imagined them. It was a weird time to watch this, because recently I've developed this odd amount of love for England (maybe it's because of all the Laura Marling music) considering normally I complain about living here. I shouldn't, really, it's beautiful, and Never Let Me Go showed that not in dramatic landscapes or anything incredible but just on what is here and what is real.

Other little things - Miss Emily was too harsh-looking, though I really liked Chrissy (even though she wasn't like I'd imagined) and Rodney (Bill Weasley?!) - I loved the scene in the cafe where Tommy, Ruth and Kathy are quite socially anxious around the waitress and have no idea how to order.

In short, Never Let Me Go was brilliantly cast, visually lovely and a very underrated British film - although I did like The King's Speech, I really think this deserved much more of the credit that had.

Um... fin.

Today we turn one!

(yes, this was sort of just an excuse to colour instead of doing homework...)

(EDIT - 31st/07th: Sometimes, you post something to the internet but then you missed a t out. And it's sad...
Also did I mention I realised we share a birthday with HARRY POTTER?!)

I'll warn you this is probably going to be really sentimental.

A year ago today I packed for our family holiday to Turkey, listened to some Imogen Heap, opened a bank account and that night sat up at my desk and started writing a blog - something I hadn't tried since I was well, twelve.

And since then I've been to see Imogen Heap twice more, visited a continent I hadn't been to, made new friends, done well in exams, done awfully in some other exams, discovered folk music, been kissed, been slapped, read new books, watched new films, been drunk and learnt that being honest is usually a better idea than not.

I know that this isn't really something people read, but I'm pretty proud that I've stayed comitted to posting here regularly, considering how much I procrastinate and the shortness of my attention span.

The title of this was going to be "We are one!".
Then I remembered that song by Same Difference...

Happy birthday, whether you're people or just a blank space. Here's to another year of more of the same.

I'll see you on Wednesday.

- Lizzie xx

Amy

I was at a party on Saturday night when someone announced to us all, almost half laughing, that Amy Winehouse had died.

And what I kind of picked up on that made me sad was that not only were some of my friends that were there not at all sad about it, but people were chiming in with "Well, she deserved it eventually taking all those drugs" and "She did have it coming". They were almost acting the same as with Osama Bin Laden's death - as if it was completley socially acceptable to be happy about what had happened to Amy Winehouse. So it was almost comforting when I got home to the internet and saw that not everyone - not even close - was acting like this.

At the start of the year in my Media Studies class, we were shown two photos of Amy Winehouse. One was of her climbing out of a cab, barely dressed and clearly wasted, which was from a red-top newspaper. The other was from her official website, and it was this:



Words like "fresh faced" and "young" and "graceful" were written on the board. The point was that different parts of a person can be used to represent them differently. And then the teacher asked us which one we thought was the "real" Amy Winehouse, and I think that the answer is that it is both and it is neither.

The people I've come across seem to be in one of two groups about Amy Winehouse's death. There are the ones who class her as a low-life and an addict and an equivalent to a mass murdering terrorist, then there are those that, maybe regardless of whether or not they appreciate her music, understand that this is a huge loss, and a very sad way to die. (I know that we're unsure at this point the exact causes of Winehouse's death, but I'm refering to the drugs).

I wasn't really a huge fan but when I heard about Amy Winehouse, I was eleven years old and my dad played her cover of "Valerie" to me in the car, and I thought that her voice was brilliant. Then I watched some Youtube videos of her singing. And there are a few things that make Amy Winehouse iconic - there is the beehive hairstyle, the red lipstick, and the drunkenness there seemed to be behind all of her live performances. But I think at the time I thought that the slight slur when she was talking and the way Winehouse staggered around the stage was sort of romantic - quite sad, but glamorous too.

Since then I have grown up some, I've had my own experiences with drinking (though let's highlight, never constantly or to the extent that I can empathise with an alcoholic, just more than when I was eleven) and also found out that most of my childhood I was shielded from the fact that a member of my family is an alcoholic and has been in and out of rehab, restbite care and various hospitals my entire life.

Amy Winehouse was twenty-seven and that's the same age as Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, Jim Morrison and Kurt Cobain all were when they passed away. Artists take drugs because they're a part of the glamour, because they spur creativity, because they're desparate and because they're sad and lonely. But I also want to think about how many people go through this all the time, who instead of a terrifying throng of people are scared to face their job, their bills, their empty bed. This is something that can affect a businesswoman or a rockstar or someone sleeping in a shop doorway with an aching back.

I don't know if us telling ourselves people with an addiction to alcohol or drugs "have it coming" is a way to tell ourselves that the whatever it is the way we cope with things is right, because it probably is, but it's unimaginable to understand a drug addiction, and I don't think I can try to. And maybe I'm wrong and it's just a part of living so completley on the brink, that although Winehouse and Hendrix, the rest who are known as something called the "27 Club", and also Vincent Van Gogh and addicts who can't put up with themselves, and all of the other rockstars and the like who've died young, aren't ready to have to grow old or face up to whatever's coming next.

But whether or not Amy Winehouse's death was an eventuality, someone has lost their daughter, many, it seems, have lost a close friend, and the world has lost a beautiful singer. Amy Winehouse has achieved a lot - she had an excellent voice, she collaborated with and was admired by so many artists, I'm sure she has a very loyal fanbase that loved her and the world is lucky we still have her music left behind.
RIP <3

"Things That Will Make Me Happier" and Other Bits and Pieces

So I don’t really know what to write today and I feel like I should do something, because I just went back and counted and I think I’ve written for something like the last seven Wednesdays. But it’s not really an achievement anymore if everything I force myself regularly I’m worried it will become completely rid of quality… like pretty much everything I posted in the last half of February.

(Actually, I lied to you… it’s actually Tuesday today. Tomorrow’s the day before we break up for school, for the summer, and I won’t be home from leaving for school until Thursday. I’ll find a time to post this.)

I’m really excited about the summer. Firstly I have to get away from school – I can tell I’m getting tired and lazier than usual, today I got my first considerably awful grade of any of my GCSE courses. Also I’m beginning to hate everyone. But I’m also really about things I’m doing – Isaline’s visiting from France, I’m going to a Greek island called Zante, I’m planning on trying to be quite productive and might also be a part of this madcap internet project which I don’t want to get my hopes up about just yet but I’ll talk about at the time!

I went to see Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallow Part 2 at the weekend and I’ll talk about that soon, because I think I probably need to see it again before I can make sense of it all enough to write anything comprehensible.

And I found this list today (when I sat down to write this blog, I didn’t want to do anything so I thought of skimming through old writing journals to see if there was any gold in there. There wasn’t) and I remember I wrote it in the bath a few months ago. It partly made me kind of happy, but also embarrassed about my needy pessimistic white girl problems.

*sigh*

THINGS WHICH WOULD MAKE ME HAPPIER

- Flying to somewhere I’ve never been, a few times a year
- Not living with my parents, just visiting every so often
- Being made stressed only by things which I’m passionate about
- Having the strength to run a marathon
- Berlin.
- A radio station existing which I really love and connect with
- Someone I wake up to on sunny mornings who makes me pancakes
- An attic with long windows
- Being able to talk completely honestly, to maybe just one person
- Being closer to the seaside
- The freedom and money to go to concerts more often
- No languages coursework!
- Clearer skies at night time
- A time in the day when I’m alone in a wide space and I could dance without people staring at me
- A pet unicorn
- More friends, less acquaintances
- Being good at painting

This has been a blog made up of bits, I’m not sure if that’s a good thing. I’m going to watch an episode of Charmed now. I’ll see you soon.

Lizzie

So after the Youtube "Life in a Day" project (which I thought was really interesting but missed, my grandfather died on July 24th last year and it just wouldn't have worked very well) I stayed up on what I think was a Wednesday to watch the premiere online and felt sort of inspired. The next day I took my Flip camera into school and decided to document a typical day.

I apologize for cheesiness, and the editing, which is nearly as bad as the self-cut fringe I had back then.

(So I don't get yelled at, the songs are "Flicks" - Frou Frou, "Piazza. New York Catcher - Belle and Sebastian and "Around Us" - Jonsi)

2011 Reading Update

Remember a while ago, when I said I was going to read these thirty books in 2011?
Well. I'm sort-of backing out.

I still am going to make myself read at least thirty books by the end of the year, and talk about each of them here, but it's not going to be the thirty on the list (but I will read all of those. One day).
Here's why -

- Books are pretty expensive
- My mum's always saying how you have a right to stop reading something if you aren't enjoying it. And that happened.
- I loved "Unbearable Lightness of Being", was close to the end and lost it. And it's irritating and the library don't have it yet.
- It was stopping me reading other things in the spur of the moment, that I just find in a shop or someone lends to me or something and I love doing that.

I'm sorry this blog was short, but I wanted to write a post because it's Wednesday, and Wednesday is always blog day even though I know this post is sort of a waste of time. A lot of stuff's happened this week (I think that last week and the one before my time for notsome, now it seems to be everyone else that bad things are happening to and I'm having to be around for that) and I've also been super-busy. School is stressful, Poppy and I played a show at the weekend. I have one more big thing at school before we break up for the summer.But after that, I should have way too much time on my hands again.

I may even do BEDA that's a lie, I probably won't do BEDA.

But I'll be back and write something proper, like book reviews or "thank you notes" in a few days. I hope you're having a good week :)

Thanks for stickin' round.

Lizzie xx