Today I did something I've been wanting to do for a really long time: I went to see a movie on my own.
The idea of it started a few weeks back, because I was discussing with one of my friends whether or not going to see a movie alone is "cool", and decided that it most probably is (because it shows you're interesting, and interested in what you're doing and it's quiet and nice.)
Then, last weekend, I went to see The Dilemma with all of my teenage girl friends. I'd really wanted to go and see Black Swan, which everyone had decided would be too scary, and so we settled for a romantic comedy type thing which I quite enjoyed, it just didn't fill what I'd left the house hoping for. After the movie ended, I talked to my friends about whether I should go see Black Swan now, alone (it had started ten minutes ago, but adverts). Most were kind of mutual/mildly shocked that I was considering doing this, one in particular discouraged me, "Bleh, you'll look like such a loner, you can't go to the cinema twice in a day, you'll get fat!" (?!)
I didn't go then, but the fact that someone had told me I couldn't go to see a movie alone made me want to do it. It made me want to do it MORE.
I couldn't get the idea out of my head. Today I woke up without much to do, schrumped around until 11:30-ish when I decided something needed to be done. I googled it (using my phone, internet was broken, hence boredom) and Black Swan was starting at 1 o clock. I could make it, just.
I walked briskly into town, feeling excited and almost a little proud of myself for leaving the house using only willpower, and made the bus just in time. I like riding the bus with my friends, but sometimes I like there not being voices around me, and especially when there aren't people my age there who I'm not with. The only people who saw me were old ladies, not watching me disaprovingly because of R&B music blaring from a mobile phone but thinking, "Isn't that nice? A quiet, respectable teenage girl who probably won't rob me. And that book she's reading, "Neverwhere" looks interesting, I'll google Neil Gaiman when I get back to my bungalow."
Anyways.
I got to the cinema and queued up to buy my ticket, I asked for a ticket to Black Swan.
She said, "Black Swan is a fifteen."
"I'm fifteen," I said.
"Do you have ID?"
And this made me angry: not that she was questioning my age, because fair enough, I'm not fifteen for a month and I wasn't wearing very much make-up but because she'd asked if I have ID. Of course not - I don't have a driver's licence, no real fifteen year old's parents would allow them to leave the house with passport, birth certificate ect. There must be a better system. So then I was like "Myeh, fine."
She almost went on to serve some 10 year olds behind me, but I booked a ticket to The King's Speech and then went to the next counter and got my nachos.
I actually liked it a lot. Collin Firth, Timothy Spawl and the actress who played the Queen Mother whose name I don't know were all brilliant, as was the King's speech therapist Lionel. Parts of it made me feel so good, sometimes patriotic and sometimes just happy. It made me laugh and smile, no part of it was too dark, and unlike most historical films, I never felt like I was missing out on anything because my knowledge of the time period is vague. Maybe that's because it didn't rely on it too much, maybe I'm just starting to learn stuff more. Yay for "Rebecca" and GCSE History?
And I liked the experience. I love my friends but sometimes in the cinema I feel quietly embarassed when they talk loudly in the adverts (I probably do so too when I'm with them I think) and adults judge me and I almost want to apologize. It's not us, it's just being in any large group of girls generates a lot of clutter and noise.
My throat started hurting so I got iced tea on the way home.
And to summarize, in self defence, I've done it and going to the cinema alone is cool. You should try it. I may even go back and re-attempt Black Swan next weekend.
I'm kidding.
...
Also I got a cold, felt tips and an idea all within the last few days
If anyone follows me on Twitter, know that Bob is fine now. Another cat bit him and the vet had to cut into his side, which he moaned about a lot and had to have two other vets hold him down, but he's better now and just having to take a lot of antibiotics. He only has a bald patch on his side which I think he's worried will ruin his cool (if kitties can be egocentric, Bob is). Callie and Sandy wander around sympathetically and lick his wound, if he'll let them. It's happy.
Seeing as I've mostly just talked about myself today, here is someone who's music I started to fall for when the song "Fidelity" was on a TV show called Mistresses (which I'm getting to writing about one day soon, I promise). Regina Spektor is so, so awesome. She plays piano, her voice is lovely and her songs are sometimes happy and playful, like "Dance Anthem of the 80s" sometimes and melancholy and nostalgic like "The Call" or sometimes just plain awesome, like "On The Radio" which is one of my favourites (videos for "Fidelity and that one are both brilliant).
"This is how it works,
It feels a little worse,
Than when we drove our hearse,
Right through the scremaing crowd,
While laughing up a storm,
Until we were just bone,
Until it got so warm,
That none of us could sleep."
That's all for today. Have a nice week/few days and stuffs. :) .
- lizzie
Saturday 29 January 2011
Tuesday 25 January 2011
Answering questions about yourself isn't vain...
Hello.
I wrote you all something fairly long a few days ago, so to make up for it, here's a sad excuse for a post made up of questions I found and answered, because I'm a teeny bit self indulgent and I like talking about myself, sometimes.
Enjoy. I know I did.
I'll make up for this at the weekend, swear.
First name?
Elizabeth.
Middle name?
Alice.
Do you ever wish you had another name?
I used to a lot.
Do you like anyone?
Myehhh.....
What's the best feeling in the world?
Listening to incredible music really loud, thinking you're in love and being all full of hope, being at a concert and all alive where everyone is feeling the same, or a combination of all those three. The first few bites of a roast dinner when you're really, really hungry.
Worst feeling?
Death, maybe?
How much cash do you have on you?
None, I'm in my bedroom.
What's a word that rhymes with "DOOR"?!
More!
Favourite planet?
Haven't been to many, it's pretty nice here on Earth, isn't it?
What kind of shoes are you wearing?
I'm not wearing any shoes. ;)
What were you doing at midnight last night?
Sitting around on my computer.
Favourite age you have been so far?
I've liked being fourteen. Eight was also a good year.
What shirt are you wearing?
Grey Imogen Heap t-shirt I bought from the RAH. It has birds on. I like it a lot. Last week I thought it was lost but my mum found it a few days ago, because she's awesome.
What are you listening to right now?
Oddly, complete silence. The last music I listened to was Kate Havnevik a few hours ago, and then some Imogen Heap before that.
What is your favourite number?
42.
What is the last thing you ate?
A chocolate coin.
How is the weather right now?
Nothing-y. It looks like it's pretty cold.
Who is the last person you talked to on the phone?
Poppy, my best friend.
Do you have a significant other?
No, I'm single and I live alone with my parents and my cats.
Favourite TV show?
Hustle!
Siblings?
No.
Height?
About 5"5?
Hair colour?
Brown.
Eye colour?
Blue-y grey-y green.
Do you wear contacts?
No.
Favourite holiday?
Christmas is good, though I'm getting to like New Year's Eve more.
Favourite month?
Depends. Last year it was November, because of Imogen Heap shows and all the writing I got to do. I'm starting to rely on actual events, instead of things like Christmas and birthdays for happiness.
Have you ever cried for no reason?
I have! The summer before this one I went to Florida with my parents, and one day had been out in the sun for a long time. When I got out of the bath, I was suddenly aware of how burnt I was. I kept going between being sweltering, sickeningly hot and freezing cold, to the point that I was shaking uncontrollably. All of the time my head ached and I felt as if my shoulders couldn't support it We were in a diner eating dinner and I was wearing a huge jumper and still felt like I was lying naked in snowicewatercoldness and I'm not that sure if it was how ill I felt or just nothing but I burst into tears and didn't stop for about forty minutes. Crazy.
What was the last movie you watched?
Rebecca (1970s version), just then. Adaptation isn't as good as the book.
Can you do a headstand (not using the wall)?
Hang on...
... no. I tried, I swear.
What books are you reading?
I'm reading "Neverwhere" by Neil Gaiman and so far, it's brilliant.
Piercings?
No. I'd like my ears done but have a fear of needles. (I just typed noodles instead of needles, wtf?)
What were you doing before this?
Watching Rebecca with my parents.
Butter, plain or salted popcorn?
Butter, please.
Dogs or cats?
Cats. I like dogs too, though.
Ever been caught doing something you weren't supposed to?
Probably.
Ever loved someone?
I could write an essay. But aside from parents, close friends and pets, I've decided probably not.
Ever fired a gun?
Only in Laser Tag.
Do you like travelling by plane?
I love flying.
Right-handed or left-handed?
Right. Trying to learn to be ampidexterous, because apparently that means if I have a stroke I won't lose the ability to speak. Yay.
How many pillows do you sleep with?
Four. But two are just decorative side pillows I tend to nudge away.
I wrote you all something fairly long a few days ago, so to make up for it, here's a sad excuse for a post made up of questions I found and answered, because I'm a teeny bit self indulgent and I like talking about myself, sometimes.
Enjoy. I know I did.
I'll make up for this at the weekend, swear.
First name?
Elizabeth.
Middle name?
Alice.
Do you ever wish you had another name?
I used to a lot.
Do you like anyone?
Myehhh.....
What's the best feeling in the world?
Listening to incredible music really loud, thinking you're in love and being all full of hope, being at a concert and all alive where everyone is feeling the same, or a combination of all those three. The first few bites of a roast dinner when you're really, really hungry.
Worst feeling?
Death, maybe?
How much cash do you have on you?
None, I'm in my bedroom.
What's a word that rhymes with "DOOR"?!
More!
Favourite planet?
Haven't been to many, it's pretty nice here on Earth, isn't it?
What kind of shoes are you wearing?
I'm not wearing any shoes. ;)
What were you doing at midnight last night?
Sitting around on my computer.
Favourite age you have been so far?
I've liked being fourteen. Eight was also a good year.
What shirt are you wearing?
Grey Imogen Heap t-shirt I bought from the RAH. It has birds on. I like it a lot. Last week I thought it was lost but my mum found it a few days ago, because she's awesome.
What are you listening to right now?
Oddly, complete silence. The last music I listened to was Kate Havnevik a few hours ago, and then some Imogen Heap before that.
What is your favourite number?
42.
What is the last thing you ate?
A chocolate coin.
How is the weather right now?
Nothing-y. It looks like it's pretty cold.
Who is the last person you talked to on the phone?
Poppy, my best friend.
Do you have a significant other?
No, I'm single and I live alone with my parents and my cats.
Favourite TV show?
Hustle!
Siblings?
No.
Height?
About 5"5?
Hair colour?
Brown.
Eye colour?
Blue-y grey-y green.
Do you wear contacts?
No.
Favourite holiday?
Christmas is good, though I'm getting to like New Year's Eve more.
Favourite month?
Depends. Last year it was November, because of Imogen Heap shows and all the writing I got to do. I'm starting to rely on actual events, instead of things like Christmas and birthdays for happiness.
Have you ever cried for no reason?
I have! The summer before this one I went to Florida with my parents, and one day had been out in the sun for a long time. When I got out of the bath, I was suddenly aware of how burnt I was. I kept going between being sweltering, sickeningly hot and freezing cold, to the point that I was shaking uncontrollably. All of the time my head ached and I felt as if my shoulders couldn't support it We were in a diner eating dinner and I was wearing a huge jumper and still felt like I was lying naked in snowicewatercoldness and I'm not that sure if it was how ill I felt or just nothing but I burst into tears and didn't stop for about forty minutes. Crazy.
What was the last movie you watched?
Rebecca (1970s version), just then. Adaptation isn't as good as the book.
Can you do a headstand (not using the wall)?
Hang on...
... no. I tried, I swear.
What books are you reading?
I'm reading "Neverwhere" by Neil Gaiman and so far, it's brilliant.
Piercings?
No. I'd like my ears done but have a fear of needles. (I just typed noodles instead of needles, wtf?)
What were you doing before this?
Watching Rebecca with my parents.
Butter, plain or salted popcorn?
Butter, please.
Dogs or cats?
Cats. I like dogs too, though.
Ever been caught doing something you weren't supposed to?
Probably.
Ever loved someone?
I could write an essay. But aside from parents, close friends and pets, I've decided probably not.
Ever fired a gun?
Only in Laser Tag.
Do you like travelling by plane?
I love flying.
Right-handed or left-handed?
Right. Trying to learn to be ampidexterous, because apparently that means if I have a stroke I won't lose the ability to speak. Yay.
How many pillows do you sleep with?
Four. But two are just decorative side pillows I tend to nudge away.
Saturday 22 January 2011
How I Made It to the Royal Albert Hall and Back
I was going to have to write a Royal Albert Hall blog someday, and I've been putting it off for a long time because, as Neil Gaiman said in "Neverwhere" the other night, describing my trip to London and those few days would be like "describing the planet Jupiter as bigger than a duck". It's cliched but I feel like it isn't a thing that can be put into words. But I'm going to give it a firetruckin' good try, because I feel energised and Callie's asleep here in one of my hoodies and I have a malteaser hot chocolate latte drink type thing and I want to write something, and right now there's nothing else I have to give.
A prologue: Last year on February 7th, a few months after I fell in love with Imogen Heap's music I saw her live for the first time in Manchester with some of my friends (Poppy and I had been going to get the tickets, until my mum was like "Stop! I already got those for your birthday! - my parents are awesome a lot of the time). It was a Sunday night, and for the two hours of the concert and about twenty four afterwards I was in a completley blown away and stunned. The next day in school, I could completley recall the sense of being there, not just seeing and hearing but the smell and how my feet felt and the people stood around me. It had changed me and I couldn't grow back into everyday life that quickly, not quite, because I couldn't grasp the idea that it was a concert and it was just a few hours of my life I'd spent somewhere, because it wasn't. It was the happiest I'd ever felt, I think, and there was no way I could get it back, because the strength of my memories were fading fast and every maths lesson and walk home from school was a reminder that it wasn't real, not quite.
Every night on Twitter, there were photos and videos from more shows from the tour and childishly, it only made me feel horrible and my stomach twist at the thought of not being there, like when I was a child, I hated watching the TV on New Year's Eve and I cried. I was at home, not in London with the fireworks.
But there was a solution, it was simple. I had to go again.
At that point in time, there were no other UK tour dates announced in the upcoming future (I had no idea a second leg of UK tour was happening) except there was a show in England in November time.
The only problem was that it was at the Royal Albert Hall.
My parents had shaken it off as a "No", and I accepted that for now. I had until November and I could work on it, but by April, as tickets started to sell out, I panicked. The time I chose to ask them again, God knows why, was in a cable car whilst we were skiing.
My mum was quick to tell me that my dad couldn't take me, it was on a Friday and he shouldn't have to spend his limited days off work doing this, and she couldn't take me either. They hated the idea of me taking a bus or train to London because, of course, they're all filled with murderers and rapists and things, or even being alone there because unlike the town we live in it has buildings larger than two stories and also a crime rate.
My dad vaguely understood, he has the same Thing with music, I think but tried to comfort me by telling me that he didn't go to concerts until he was eighteen. It made it worse. I didn't want to wait. Yes, I could do things when I was older too, but if I had the time and money and could get myself there, why should these strangers get to stop me? Why did I have to go on living like this another four years?
I don't ask for a lot from my parents. I wasn't asking for money or even for them to take me there. I was just asking for them to let me go.
And so, with vague hope, I went to my best friend, Poppy. She loves Imogen Heap too and she wanted to go, but I didn't really think her parents would take us. I only knew that, if push came to shove, she'd be willing to get on a train with me and just disappear to London for a night.
I just didn't really think we'd actually do it.
We had a long talk lying on her trampoline one Tueday afternoon, and she suggested asking her mum, who had a friend around there, if we could stay with her.
And then it all happened very quickly, because we actually could. As a birthday present, I bought Poppy the tickets and her mum got us a discount on the train.
On Royal Albert Hall Friday, it was also part of something called Curriculum Enrichment Week at school, where we wear non-uniform and don't do very much. I packed my bag for London and lined everything I needed up ready at the door. I started to walk to school, plugged my earphones in and started to play "Tidal". I got all the way to the end of my street before I realised I'd forgotten to take any bag at all to school, and I laughed out loud at myself right there in the middle of the street because I was so excited and emotional, there was nobody around, and I felt like I was going to melt into a puddle because of all the things I was feeling.
I didn't have a great morning at school; Curriculum Enrichment Week meant pointless lessons doing things like mummifying fish, Period 2 I spilt acid on my thumb and any time I moved my hand all day it stang. My friend told me to tell a teacher or go to the nurse, but I told him he was insane - surely, they'd send me straight to A&E and I'd spend an afternoon there, later and later for the 6:30 doors closing by the minute.
At 1:15 I came into afternoon registration trembling because I was about to do something badass, I've actually never missed school for a dentist appointment, so leaving midday seemed even more shocking. I gave the receptionist my note and was convinced she'd quiz me or would see something in me but she didn't, and as I got closer to and then passed the school gate, my sad, unexperienced heart was actually racing. I turned the corner, and for a few minutes, any passing cars would have seen a flapping flag of curly hair over a blurred high school uniform whiz down the main road. I got home, I got dressed and did my make-up super-fast, and by ten to two I was waiting outside the house with an umbrella and a suitcase.
Poppy was leaving school at 2, to look less suspicious, at about 2:01, I got paranoid because her mum and her weren't there yet. When they actually arrived, it was 2:10-ish I think. All the way to the station I was on edge. Ever two minutes I checked my bag to make sure that the tickets were still there. And they were.
We very almost missed the train: I would have run everywhere anyway, and I did so even more and I think it annoyed Claire no end. We made it in time, waited on the platform for a while and got coffee. Our train carriage was full of Italian football fans which was fun and interesting and annoying. I specifically remembering one large, muscular and rowdy Italian man falling asleep on his friend's shoulder. Poppy jokingly whispered to me, "Aww, gay men are cute.".
He opened one eye and beamed, looking straight at me (who he thought had spoken) and said in broken English, "No... not gay... he is... he is brother."
We laughed and said "Oh, ok,", then exchanged a Look.
The man opposite us on our table looked like the pixie from the TV show adaptation of Enid Blyton's "The Wishing Chair" and both of us noticed.
We played car games.
It was during NaNoWriMo, and I had my laptop and tried to write stuff, but for once I was too caught up in my life than in someone else's. It WON. So Poppy read some, and kept pointing out things that were situations we'd been in, or I had, some of which were more literal and I hadn't noticed. She was surprised because of how much more I'd used the word "fuck" that I do in real life.
The journey took way less than I expected, then we got to a large tube station (embarassingly, I don't know a lot of names of places in London) where there were also shops. Claire went into an Accesorise store to buy a present for Antonia, her friend who we were staying with, and Poppy and I waited outside. It was spacious, there were people passing swiftly with briefcases and suitcases and so we started singing an impromptu, acapella (though less awesome due to lack of numbers) performance of "Let Go" quite loudly to see if anyone stared at us.
They didn't. Because it's LONDON.
We took the tube a few stations, and being from a small town which is sort of in the country side, we offered up our seats to sweaty business men and women, and other strangers, who shoved past each other with elbows and gladly took them each time.
I like the tube a lot. It's strange.
We stopped at Antonia's house, their family friend who we were staying with. It was small and homely, there were books and movies everywhere. Her husband/boyfriend was there too, a Turkish man named Hassan, but his children weren't, for now. Poppy promised I'd like them even though I really hate little kids most of the time. (I actually don't nowadays, It's just babies).
We ate an entire pack of cheese twists on the couch, because we're teenage girls and we have hormones and hadn't eaten for a few hours. Antonia asked about the concert, who we were going to see.
"Imogen Heap!" we blubbered.
"I've never heard of her."
"No," I said. "You won't have done. She's awesome."
"Well, if she can fill the Royal Albert Hall."
We took the tube there and en route, I found a newspaper on the side of the fairly empty carriage. On one of the pages, I found a small piece about the Albert Hall show and tore it out and placed it in the envelope where my tickets were.
There was panic when we got to the tube station: we were late, there was a certain time in the first half of the show our tickets wouldn't be let into. And although half of the people I was with I didn't know that well, I wanted to yell at them because they weren't running, but I reigned it in and we got there, just in time. On the way through side streets, we got lost and I ran up to some strangers asking if they were going to see Immi. They were. I was so glad I laughed.
Note anything over-confident I did in this episode was because the whole night I was overemotional and crazy. It was everything I'd been waiting for for the last seven months.
I wish I'd walked up to the Royal Albert Hall slowly taking it in, like a kid on the run-up to the big pink Disneyland Paris castle, but I didn't, we ran. At the same time Poppy was having a fight with her mum, who was planning on asking the maitre d what time the show ended (it would be about 11, we'd told her to come for us at 1 so we could hang around and meet some awesome people). We ended up settling for 11:30, though later on bumped it up to 12.
They went off to a restaurant and this was it, we were on our way in and a woman was taking our tickets and we were in the lift with a couple in their mid-fifties. They were smiley and glamorous, and I squee'd at the idea that they were Immi fans and, so rarely, all of the people around me were.
We got to the top floor, ran to a way in which was the wrong one and to a second. Poppy laughed at me because I was sprinting everywhere.
And then we found the door and walked in to the Royal Albert Hall.
I wasn't sure what I'd imagined, but this was more. Mainly it was just much, much bigger. Did you know that there are around 140 billion galaxies, which is the number of frozen peas you can fit outside the Royal Albert Hall. The Royal Albert Hall is really, really, big.
There were big, pink mushrooms on the ceiling and the stage was tiny fron where we were sat. At the previous two Imogen Heap shows I'd been to were in university academy halls and there was one, big tree in the middle. Today we had the big tree and, around where the orchestra would be sat, smaller trees. I counted. There were ten in total.
And then, much quicker than I expected, Imogen walked on to the stage, dressed in sparkly conductor's attire, and Love The Earth film began.
She directed the crowd and for the first part, the whole of the top section was supposed to breathe outwards in a sort of Mexican wave and nobody close to us did except for Poppy and I, of course.
During Love The Earth I cried twice, and I don't know why. Two years ago, I wouldn't have listened to a piece of classical music all the way through, let alone been moved to tears.
A moment during in it, there was a clip of some sparkly water, just for a second, and I'm still not sure whether it was my clip I or not - I've no idea if they'd have contacted me or not, seeing as so many people's videos were included, and maybe I'll never find out, but I think that it could have been.
There was an interlude before the second half, which she'd said would be the "normal, Imogen Heap singer-songwriter part". Here's the time-lapse between the two.
And so, I gave Poppy the explanation that I owed her and she told me something which was a big deal to and I do hate talking like this here, but I sort of think of it as the closest to a heart-to-heart conversation that I've had, because right in the Royal Albert Hall, the moment we said it'd be for weeks, with two middle-aged men either side of us we blubbered away about relationships and sex and and love and stuff and didn't realise until afterwards just how many people had possibly been listening, and not out of choice.
I thought about all of the people I was in the same room as, a strange combination like my best friend and my favourite musician and Thomas Ermacora and people like my awesome friend Emily from Twitter. And there are others I know now were there and I didn't at the time, like Guy Sigsworth (we found out later in the show he'd been playing in the orchestra at the beginning!). Similar too, Immi's mum had been singing in the choir and this makes me smile.
When Imogen came on, I almost wasn't ready.
The first song she played was "The Walk", you hear the beginning and the time lapse. The second song was "Swoon", during which me and Poppy smiled and laughed, that day she'd learnt that the lyrics in a part in the middle of the song are nowhere near as meaningful or complex as she'd thought,
"This is where I was going to sing your name over and over again,
But I chickened out at the final minute, cause I thought you probably wouldn't like it."
Imogen was wonderful and lively and clever and talked about the songs and stories behind them a lot more than usual, she'd done the same the last time I saw her in Liverpool. During "Come Here Boy" she talked about a teacher she liked at music school, after this she played "Wait It Out", and talked about Zach Braff and Hawaii, and during the song both of us cried. The next song was "First Train Home", which as usual, got off to a bad start and then came out beautifully, and it sounded different to any other time I'd heard it. "Little Bird" was lovely, as was "Canvas" (in which I think she played a little of "The Fire") and I was glad she played "Aha!" - the second show I went to, she didn't. "Earth" was amazing, the first time I'd heard it, done all with voices and a brilliant beatboxer I didn't realise until after the show was Schlomo. I cried during "Speeding Cars" because of how appropriate it was at the time, "Let Go" was incredible, and special because we sang along and rocked out a little even though the people around us were sat still in their seats and listening, "Let Go" I think is the song that led me in.
I love "Just For Now", but I was a little disappointed in the Royal Albert Hall performace, not Immi's fault at all, it was just that the two shows I've been to audiences have sung along enthusiastically. I know that we were sat up and far away, but I almost wanted to say something to the peoples at around me for their disappointingly little amount of spirit.
I started filming a little of "Between Sheets" and I'll post it if I ever find it back, as with "Goodnight and Go" which is one of my favourite songs - Immi said that she didn't realise so many people liked it, and this shocked me no end. I may remember crying during this song as well.
I love "Headlock" live because it's so different and so much more drums and bass and piano than the album version, more a combination of strings and electronica, both are excellent for different reasons. Then she announced she was playing "Tidal", the last song with the band and I knew that it was coming to an end, it's always the fake last song before encores, but I didn't mind because I wanted afterwards to take how happy I felt out into the world. It's my favourite live, I think, and it didn't fail to disappoint, the keytar solo kicked ass.
She walked off then came back and played "The Moment I Said It" with just piano and drums, and it was beautiful, and then "Hide and Seek". Poppy was crying, because it was the last song, and I usually do at this point but I just sat and sort of absorbed it and I was in a trance the whole time we were walking out.
I don't remember the order the next few things happened, but I remember it going a bit like this.
We got to the door and I realised I'd left my umbrella inside, so we tried to go back and get it but they wouldn't let us in and instead we were directed the the stage door. We were waiting out there a long time and laughed about how accidentally lucky this was, imagining Imogen Heap emerging with the umbrella and saying "Is this yours?" but that didn't happen, instead a security guard thought we were creepy and made us leave, so we tried another desk and they didn't have it.
We gave up on my umbrella so started walking all away around the edge, from outside. It was pouring with rain, and on the way I stopped and bought a shirt. I think we'd agreed it wasn't likely we'd meet Imogen Heap tonight, and so as we passed the tour bus (I recognised it from outside the Liverpool show) Poppy decided to be badass and touch the tourbus.
And I know it isn't that awesome, but it seemed like a good think to do at the time and so I ran in the rain and touched the side and kept running and tried to feel adreneline like someone was chasing me.
And there's my claim to fame. I've touched Imogen Heap's tour bus.
After that we found a door where people were queuing outside, I asked a guy if they were waiting to meet Immi and he said yeah. He was American.
We waited there for a while, talked about all the stuff from before a little more, but it got to 12 and we had to leave before we turned into pumpkins or just before the last tube left, and so we ran to our friend.
Poppy said, "If she comes, tell her that Poppy and Lizzie give their love."
And he said, "Lizzie and who?"
"Poppy."
He smiled. "Ok. I will do."
And I high-fived him because I wanted to and we ran for the train and just made it.
We went home and Hassan talked to us about the show and gave us Turkish delight and I showed him my shirt.
Then all of them went to bed, Poppy and I settled on the couch and on the floor. I got out my laptop and I wrote to reach my target for NaNo that day and then we went to sleep.
The next morning their children were there, Adam and Marcus, and they were seriously lively considering one of them had been throwing up all night and watched TV with them. Poppy was right, I did like them. We went for a walk in the park, I accidentally flipped over a swing and hit my head (I didn't tell the kids that - they just saw me do a trick and thought I was awesome). Then I had my first ever lunch at Nando's and we got the train home.
That took two hours and fourteen minutes to write and I feel good now but I want to go to bed.
Goodnight.
- Lizzie
A prologue: Last year on February 7th, a few months after I fell in love with Imogen Heap's music I saw her live for the first time in Manchester with some of my friends (Poppy and I had been going to get the tickets, until my mum was like "Stop! I already got those for your birthday! - my parents are awesome a lot of the time). It was a Sunday night, and for the two hours of the concert and about twenty four afterwards I was in a completley blown away and stunned. The next day in school, I could completley recall the sense of being there, not just seeing and hearing but the smell and how my feet felt and the people stood around me. It had changed me and I couldn't grow back into everyday life that quickly, not quite, because I couldn't grasp the idea that it was a concert and it was just a few hours of my life I'd spent somewhere, because it wasn't. It was the happiest I'd ever felt, I think, and there was no way I could get it back, because the strength of my memories were fading fast and every maths lesson and walk home from school was a reminder that it wasn't real, not quite.
Every night on Twitter, there were photos and videos from more shows from the tour and childishly, it only made me feel horrible and my stomach twist at the thought of not being there, like when I was a child, I hated watching the TV on New Year's Eve and I cried. I was at home, not in London with the fireworks.
But there was a solution, it was simple. I had to go again.
At that point in time, there were no other UK tour dates announced in the upcoming future (I had no idea a second leg of UK tour was happening) except there was a show in England in November time.
The only problem was that it was at the Royal Albert Hall.
My parents had shaken it off as a "No", and I accepted that for now. I had until November and I could work on it, but by April, as tickets started to sell out, I panicked. The time I chose to ask them again, God knows why, was in a cable car whilst we were skiing.
My mum was quick to tell me that my dad couldn't take me, it was on a Friday and he shouldn't have to spend his limited days off work doing this, and she couldn't take me either. They hated the idea of me taking a bus or train to London because, of course, they're all filled with murderers and rapists and things, or even being alone there because unlike the town we live in it has buildings larger than two stories and also a crime rate.
My dad vaguely understood, he has the same Thing with music, I think but tried to comfort me by telling me that he didn't go to concerts until he was eighteen. It made it worse. I didn't want to wait. Yes, I could do things when I was older too, but if I had the time and money and could get myself there, why should these strangers get to stop me? Why did I have to go on living like this another four years?
I don't ask for a lot from my parents. I wasn't asking for money or even for them to take me there. I was just asking for them to let me go.
And so, with vague hope, I went to my best friend, Poppy. She loves Imogen Heap too and she wanted to go, but I didn't really think her parents would take us. I only knew that, if push came to shove, she'd be willing to get on a train with me and just disappear to London for a night.
I just didn't really think we'd actually do it.
We had a long talk lying on her trampoline one Tueday afternoon, and she suggested asking her mum, who had a friend around there, if we could stay with her.
And then it all happened very quickly, because we actually could. As a birthday present, I bought Poppy the tickets and her mum got us a discount on the train.
On Royal Albert Hall Friday, it was also part of something called Curriculum Enrichment Week at school, where we wear non-uniform and don't do very much. I packed my bag for London and lined everything I needed up ready at the door. I started to walk to school, plugged my earphones in and started to play "Tidal". I got all the way to the end of my street before I realised I'd forgotten to take any bag at all to school, and I laughed out loud at myself right there in the middle of the street because I was so excited and emotional, there was nobody around, and I felt like I was going to melt into a puddle because of all the things I was feeling.
I didn't have a great morning at school; Curriculum Enrichment Week meant pointless lessons doing things like mummifying fish, Period 2 I spilt acid on my thumb and any time I moved my hand all day it stang. My friend told me to tell a teacher or go to the nurse, but I told him he was insane - surely, they'd send me straight to A&E and I'd spend an afternoon there, later and later for the 6:30 doors closing by the minute.
At 1:15 I came into afternoon registration trembling because I was about to do something badass, I've actually never missed school for a dentist appointment, so leaving midday seemed even more shocking. I gave the receptionist my note and was convinced she'd quiz me or would see something in me but she didn't, and as I got closer to and then passed the school gate, my sad, unexperienced heart was actually racing. I turned the corner, and for a few minutes, any passing cars would have seen a flapping flag of curly hair over a blurred high school uniform whiz down the main road. I got home, I got dressed and did my make-up super-fast, and by ten to two I was waiting outside the house with an umbrella and a suitcase.
Poppy was leaving school at 2, to look less suspicious, at about 2:01, I got paranoid because her mum and her weren't there yet. When they actually arrived, it was 2:10-ish I think. All the way to the station I was on edge. Ever two minutes I checked my bag to make sure that the tickets were still there. And they were.
We very almost missed the train: I would have run everywhere anyway, and I did so even more and I think it annoyed Claire no end. We made it in time, waited on the platform for a while and got coffee. Our train carriage was full of Italian football fans which was fun and interesting and annoying. I specifically remembering one large, muscular and rowdy Italian man falling asleep on his friend's shoulder. Poppy jokingly whispered to me, "Aww, gay men are cute.".
He opened one eye and beamed, looking straight at me (who he thought had spoken) and said in broken English, "No... not gay... he is... he is brother."
We laughed and said "Oh, ok,", then exchanged a Look.
The man opposite us on our table looked like the pixie from the TV show adaptation of Enid Blyton's "The Wishing Chair" and both of us noticed.
We played car games.
It was during NaNoWriMo, and I had my laptop and tried to write stuff, but for once I was too caught up in my life than in someone else's. It WON. So Poppy read some, and kept pointing out things that were situations we'd been in, or I had, some of which were more literal and I hadn't noticed. She was surprised because of how much more I'd used the word "fuck" that I do in real life.
The journey took way less than I expected, then we got to a large tube station (embarassingly, I don't know a lot of names of places in London) where there were also shops. Claire went into an Accesorise store to buy a present for Antonia, her friend who we were staying with, and Poppy and I waited outside. It was spacious, there were people passing swiftly with briefcases and suitcases and so we started singing an impromptu, acapella (though less awesome due to lack of numbers) performance of "Let Go" quite loudly to see if anyone stared at us.
They didn't. Because it's LONDON.
We took the tube a few stations, and being from a small town which is sort of in the country side, we offered up our seats to sweaty business men and women, and other strangers, who shoved past each other with elbows and gladly took them each time.
I like the tube a lot. It's strange.
We stopped at Antonia's house, their family friend who we were staying with. It was small and homely, there were books and movies everywhere. Her husband/boyfriend was there too, a Turkish man named Hassan, but his children weren't, for now. Poppy promised I'd like them even though I really hate little kids most of the time. (I actually don't nowadays, It's just babies).
We ate an entire pack of cheese twists on the couch, because we're teenage girls and we have hormones and hadn't eaten for a few hours. Antonia asked about the concert, who we were going to see.
"Imogen Heap!" we blubbered.
"I've never heard of her."
"No," I said. "You won't have done. She's awesome."
"Well, if she can fill the Royal Albert Hall."
We took the tube there and en route, I found a newspaper on the side of the fairly empty carriage. On one of the pages, I found a small piece about the Albert Hall show and tore it out and placed it in the envelope where my tickets were.
There was panic when we got to the tube station: we were late, there was a certain time in the first half of the show our tickets wouldn't be let into. And although half of the people I was with I didn't know that well, I wanted to yell at them because they weren't running, but I reigned it in and we got there, just in time. On the way through side streets, we got lost and I ran up to some strangers asking if they were going to see Immi. They were. I was so glad I laughed.
Note anything over-confident I did in this episode was because the whole night I was overemotional and crazy. It was everything I'd been waiting for for the last seven months.
I wish I'd walked up to the Royal Albert Hall slowly taking it in, like a kid on the run-up to the big pink Disneyland Paris castle, but I didn't, we ran. At the same time Poppy was having a fight with her mum, who was planning on asking the maitre d what time the show ended (it would be about 11, we'd told her to come for us at 1 so we could hang around and meet some awesome people). We ended up settling for 11:30, though later on bumped it up to 12.
They went off to a restaurant and this was it, we were on our way in and a woman was taking our tickets and we were in the lift with a couple in their mid-fifties. They were smiley and glamorous, and I squee'd at the idea that they were Immi fans and, so rarely, all of the people around me were.
We got to the top floor, ran to a way in which was the wrong one and to a second. Poppy laughed at me because I was sprinting everywhere.
And then we found the door and walked in to the Royal Albert Hall.
I wasn't sure what I'd imagined, but this was more. Mainly it was just much, much bigger. Did you know that there are around 140 billion galaxies, which is the number of frozen peas you can fit outside the Royal Albert Hall. The Royal Albert Hall is really, really, big.
There were big, pink mushrooms on the ceiling and the stage was tiny fron where we were sat. At the previous two Imogen Heap shows I'd been to were in university academy halls and there was one, big tree in the middle. Today we had the big tree and, around where the orchestra would be sat, smaller trees. I counted. There were ten in total.
And then, much quicker than I expected, Imogen walked on to the stage, dressed in sparkly conductor's attire, and Love The Earth film began.
She directed the crowd and for the first part, the whole of the top section was supposed to breathe outwards in a sort of Mexican wave and nobody close to us did except for Poppy and I, of course.
During Love The Earth I cried twice, and I don't know why. Two years ago, I wouldn't have listened to a piece of classical music all the way through, let alone been moved to tears.
A moment during in it, there was a clip of some sparkly water, just for a second, and I'm still not sure whether it was my clip I or not - I've no idea if they'd have contacted me or not, seeing as so many people's videos were included, and maybe I'll never find out, but I think that it could have been.
There was an interlude before the second half, which she'd said would be the "normal, Imogen Heap singer-songwriter part". Here's the time-lapse between the two.
And so, I gave Poppy the explanation that I owed her and she told me something which was a big deal to and I do hate talking like this here, but I sort of think of it as the closest to a heart-to-heart conversation that I've had, because right in the Royal Albert Hall, the moment we said it'd be for weeks, with two middle-aged men either side of us we blubbered away about relationships and sex and and love and stuff and didn't realise until afterwards just how many people had possibly been listening, and not out of choice.
I thought about all of the people I was in the same room as, a strange combination like my best friend and my favourite musician and Thomas Ermacora and people like my awesome friend Emily from Twitter. And there are others I know now were there and I didn't at the time, like Guy Sigsworth (we found out later in the show he'd been playing in the orchestra at the beginning!). Similar too, Immi's mum had been singing in the choir and this makes me smile.
When Imogen came on, I almost wasn't ready.
The first song she played was "The Walk", you hear the beginning and the time lapse. The second song was "Swoon", during which me and Poppy smiled and laughed, that day she'd learnt that the lyrics in a part in the middle of the song are nowhere near as meaningful or complex as she'd thought,
"This is where I was going to sing your name over and over again,
But I chickened out at the final minute, cause I thought you probably wouldn't like it."
Imogen was wonderful and lively and clever and talked about the songs and stories behind them a lot more than usual, she'd done the same the last time I saw her in Liverpool. During "Come Here Boy" she talked about a teacher she liked at music school, after this she played "Wait It Out", and talked about Zach Braff and Hawaii, and during the song both of us cried. The next song was "First Train Home", which as usual, got off to a bad start and then came out beautifully, and it sounded different to any other time I'd heard it. "Little Bird" was lovely, as was "Canvas" (in which I think she played a little of "The Fire") and I was glad she played "Aha!" - the second show I went to, she didn't. "Earth" was amazing, the first time I'd heard it, done all with voices and a brilliant beatboxer I didn't realise until after the show was Schlomo. I cried during "Speeding Cars" because of how appropriate it was at the time, "Let Go" was incredible, and special because we sang along and rocked out a little even though the people around us were sat still in their seats and listening, "Let Go" I think is the song that led me in.
I love "Just For Now", but I was a little disappointed in the Royal Albert Hall performace, not Immi's fault at all, it was just that the two shows I've been to audiences have sung along enthusiastically. I know that we were sat up and far away, but I almost wanted to say something to the peoples at around me for their disappointingly little amount of spirit.
I started filming a little of "Between Sheets" and I'll post it if I ever find it back, as with "Goodnight and Go" which is one of my favourite songs - Immi said that she didn't realise so many people liked it, and this shocked me no end. I may remember crying during this song as well.
I love "Headlock" live because it's so different and so much more drums and bass and piano than the album version, more a combination of strings and electronica, both are excellent for different reasons. Then she announced she was playing "Tidal", the last song with the band and I knew that it was coming to an end, it's always the fake last song before encores, but I didn't mind because I wanted afterwards to take how happy I felt out into the world. It's my favourite live, I think, and it didn't fail to disappoint, the keytar solo kicked ass.
She walked off then came back and played "The Moment I Said It" with just piano and drums, and it was beautiful, and then "Hide and Seek". Poppy was crying, because it was the last song, and I usually do at this point but I just sat and sort of absorbed it and I was in a trance the whole time we were walking out.
I don't remember the order the next few things happened, but I remember it going a bit like this.
We got to the door and I realised I'd left my umbrella inside, so we tried to go back and get it but they wouldn't let us in and instead we were directed the the stage door. We were waiting out there a long time and laughed about how accidentally lucky this was, imagining Imogen Heap emerging with the umbrella and saying "Is this yours?" but that didn't happen, instead a security guard thought we were creepy and made us leave, so we tried another desk and they didn't have it.
We gave up on my umbrella so started walking all away around the edge, from outside. It was pouring with rain, and on the way I stopped and bought a shirt. I think we'd agreed it wasn't likely we'd meet Imogen Heap tonight, and so as we passed the tour bus (I recognised it from outside the Liverpool show) Poppy decided to be badass and touch the tourbus.
And I know it isn't that awesome, but it seemed like a good think to do at the time and so I ran in the rain and touched the side and kept running and tried to feel adreneline like someone was chasing me.
And there's my claim to fame. I've touched Imogen Heap's tour bus.
After that we found a door where people were queuing outside, I asked a guy if they were waiting to meet Immi and he said yeah. He was American.
We waited there for a while, talked about all the stuff from before a little more, but it got to 12 and we had to leave before we turned into pumpkins or just before the last tube left, and so we ran to our friend.
Poppy said, "If she comes, tell her that Poppy and Lizzie give their love."
And he said, "Lizzie and who?"
"Poppy."
He smiled. "Ok. I will do."
And I high-fived him because I wanted to and we ran for the train and just made it.
We went home and Hassan talked to us about the show and gave us Turkish delight and I showed him my shirt.
Then all of them went to bed, Poppy and I settled on the couch and on the floor. I got out my laptop and I wrote to reach my target for NaNo that day and then we went to sleep.
The next morning their children were there, Adam and Marcus, and they were seriously lively considering one of them had been throwing up all night and watched TV with them. Poppy was right, I did like them. We went for a walk in the park, I accidentally flipped over a swing and hit my head (I didn't tell the kids that - they just saw me do a trick and thought I was awesome). Then I had my first ever lunch at Nando's and we got the train home.
That took two hours and fourteen minutes to write and I feel good now but I want to go to bed.
Goodnight.
- Lizzie
Monday 17 January 2011
In which Lizzie gets all feminist, and also defends delicious yeast extract sandwich spreads
I don't really have anything interesting to talk about today. I'm sorry.
Thinking about it in the shower just now, one of the things I thought of writing about then dismissed was a thought I had before.
I was watching E4 and an advert came on for the TV show How I Met Your Mother, and I noticed that the funny thing about it is that it seems to me like it was showing all of the men in the show as fun and loose and immature, whilst women sit and tut at them. In the program it isn't like that all, it was just the way the advert portrayed it a little.
And that reminded me of something Dee Plume tweeted a while ago, about a similar thing in a movie poster: men having fun whilst their wives sit and tut at them. And I was thinking about how that was a little annoying and stereotypical but then I thought: they can't really do things the other way round, because that wouldn't be very politically correct either; men tutting and complaining at the stupid and immature things that females do.
So, as usual, that didn't really have a point or conclusion.
The other really, really important thing that made me think today was this, an Amanda Palmer song about a break-up because of her hating "Vegemite", which I'm pretty sure is Australian marmite.
If you aren't familiar with marmite, it's a weird salty brown beer type sandwich spread which tastes delicious.
... and if there's a point to that whole thing, it's that marmite tastes good and Amanda Palmer is wrong but the song is awesome and I lol'd.
I'm listening to perhaps my second maybe equal first favourite ever cover of Radiohead's "Creep", by Scala and Kolachny. I don't know much about them, but this will always be the song that came up on stereomood in my last few minutes of writing for NaNoWriMo last year. I love this song a lot, I hadn't heard it at all until Amanda Palmer performed it at a webcast a while back. And I love them all, the original, Amanda Palmer's cover and that one.
Thinking about it in the shower just now, one of the things I thought of writing about then dismissed was a thought I had before.
I was watching E4 and an advert came on for the TV show How I Met Your Mother, and I noticed that the funny thing about it is that it seems to me like it was showing all of the men in the show as fun and loose and immature, whilst women sit and tut at them. In the program it isn't like that all, it was just the way the advert portrayed it a little.
And that reminded me of something Dee Plume tweeted a while ago, about a similar thing in a movie poster: men having fun whilst their wives sit and tut at them. And I was thinking about how that was a little annoying and stereotypical but then I thought: they can't really do things the other way round, because that wouldn't be very politically correct either; men tutting and complaining at the stupid and immature things that females do.
So, as usual, that didn't really have a point or conclusion.
The other really, really important thing that made me think today was this, an Amanda Palmer song about a break-up because of her hating "Vegemite", which I'm pretty sure is Australian marmite.
If you aren't familiar with marmite, it's a weird salty brown beer type sandwich spread which tastes delicious.
... and if there's a point to that whole thing, it's that marmite tastes good and Amanda Palmer is wrong but the song is awesome and I lol'd.
I'm listening to perhaps my second maybe equal first favourite ever cover of Radiohead's "Creep", by Scala and Kolachny. I don't know much about them, but this will always be the song that came up on stereomood in my last few minutes of writing for NaNoWriMo last year. I love this song a lot, I hadn't heard it at all until Amanda Palmer performed it at a webcast a while back. And I love them all, the original, Amanda Palmer's cover and that one.
I did tell you I'd write something intellectually stimulating.
...
- Lizzie
Saturday 15 January 2011
Walking with Goofy (and other things I've done in my sleep)
Hi.
I had a fight with my parents today, and it wasn't as big or as chaotic as arguments we've had a lot of the time but it was actually to do with something important. My mum's barely aware it happened I think, so I'm unsure whether to bring it up again until we've reached a conclusion, because there's no way of letting this one slide. Right now I've exiled myself to my bedroom with Callie and a cupcake and it's making me feel like it's night time.
Meh. It was eventual - we're been getting on for about a month.
Last night my internet was broken and I couldn't sleep, so I ended up just going through all of the old files on my computer. One of the things I found was a folder from the summer of 2009 called "Dreams", and I remembered that something I used to do for about a month was, usually straight after I woke up, go to my laptop and write down the dream I'd just had.
It was so, so weird to read and sometimes actually remember having them, other times not.
Anyways. I thought it might make some interesting reading. (note: any grammatical mistakes were my 13 year old self's. I thought I should not change them.
" ROSIE OR CHARLOTTE AND THE WOOLLEN PONIES
A few days ago; today is September 8th.
It started in some sort of field and I was with Rosie or Charlotte or both. It was dark and pixelated and there were horses everywhere, horses that looked like they were made of wool. I mounted one and decided that I didn't like and the same thing happened again, until I settled for a white/cream horse.
Then me and Rosie (or Charlotte) started riding along a thin road that looked like the track to Kathryn's grandma's farm or Poppy's driveway (it was long and thin and made up of grey rocks. Then we got to another field, thinner and fatter and lighter and there were less horses than there had been at the top. I have a feeling it was in Whichurch, or Wales. An old man that looked cartoon-like was waiting there.
We'd been riding from the top of the hill to Whichurch/Wales but now there wasn't one, and we just wanted to ride the woollen ponies but we weren't allowed.
Then I woke up.
THE VALENTINE CAFE
This was a few weeks ago (September 8th today) but it's one of the most memorable dreams I've had in a while.
I was in a cafe, and there were creators of TV shows there, though now I think back I can only remember specific people from Valentine*. Actors, actresses, producers, directors, writers.
It was one of those cafes that's sort of inside a shopping centre, and there were two stories. I was on the top floor. It was a thin-ish building and yellow, cream, white, gold colours. Not particularly expensive or fancy. Tables around the edges with piles of paper on and, of course, a counter somewhere. I was sat at one of the tables and Patrick Fabian and Christine Lakin were on the same table - I think I'd been there first and they came to sit with me. It was definitely Patrick Fabian and I'm pretty sure it was Christine Lakin there too but it could have been someone else. I remember seeing Jaime Murray from the back, her hair was in a ponytail and she was wearing a red dress she'd worn in an interview on Something For The Weekend.
Patrick Fabian or the woman that might have been Christine Lakin asked me, "Who are you?"
"I wrote the script," I replied, then straight away regretted it. I think I knew we were talking about Valentine and of course knew that it was not me who had written the script.
They nodded, seeming impressed. I was unable to contradict what I had just said; literally unable to move my mouth and speak so I sat there foolishly feeling a lot more childish than I had done about nine seconds ago.
Then suddenly I wasn't with them any more. I was at the other side of the cafe, next to one of the outer tables where I looked through a stack of books without opening any of them. One of them had an orange cover of a seaside like the cover of "The Other Hand" by Chris something but I don't think it was that.
Then I was with Katie and Jess in a shopping centre, I think, and it could have been the one that the cafe was in. Then we went to some toilets, not the ones in Chatwin's (that was a specific point) but next door, in Topshop. They were dark and long and thin and dirty and stuffed between the cubicles and the sinks near where the door had been was a line of glamorous leather recliner chairs. I was keen to sit in one of the turquoise coloured ones like Katie was in, not one of the pale pink ones with black patterns, so I sat on the one on Katie's left whilst Jess went to the toilet.
Then we were in an alley. It was dark and rainy and grey, but some sort of tiny parade was going on and two men wearing long, red wigs were dancing and I thought for a second that one of them was Patrick Fabian then realised it wasn't.
AN EMAIL?
Last night, Tuesday September 9th.
I got an email. I don't remember what it said; it was just the briefest flash of writing. I think it was telling me about something I'd done, something that had already happened, possibly in real life. I have a feeling it was something to do with guides.
MINNIE MOUSE
It's Wednesday September 16th and I've just woken up from this dream, and it's weird and kooky and fun and one of the loveliest dreams I've had, probably since the Valentine cafe.
This dream happened in five stages. At first I was me, and I went for dinner at Connor's house, after seeing a picture of me, Alex Farr and Becky Edwards on a computer by some bunk beds. At Connor's house, we ate pasta with gravy.
In the second part I went swimming with my friends. Rosie was definitely there, Becky, and maybe Poppy too. I knew they were all there. The pools were all outside, 3 were lined up as normal pools and then there was a larger one on their left and a tower ascended from that that was dripping water and people were climbing through holes inside it. There was some kind of slide I think, and it was Florida-like sunny where we were. When I first got in it was like a turned up high Jacuzzi and the pressure and currents were too much and I couldn't swim.
Then for a while I was lying in the larger pool - the shallow end. And for that part I was Alexa and I had pretty blonde hair and I'm not sure what I did then.
Then I was at Disney Land but walking through the less theme park-ish bits that I'm pretty sure aren't real.
In this section of the dream, I was Minnie Mouse. And I was walking with Goofy (this is definitely due to Dobbin's favourite joke**) who I think I'd left Mickey Mouse for because I knew I loved him. We walked through a fake desert, passing the occasional Disney character who I was afraid would see us, so I wore Goofy's hat for a while to cover my face.
In the last part I was myself again, as I passed through the gate from the desert in Disney Land I made the change from Minnie Mouse to me. Then I was walking around Disney Land with my parents and a strange little girl, who in this dream I remembered as my little sister. She was around 5 years old and pretty, I suppose, with very blonde, curly hair and dark brown eyes and high cheekbones. She was wearing a pink dress.
So in the end I saw Aerosmith (real rollercoaster at Disney World Hollywood Studios which I rue the day I never went on) and decided it didn't look that scary so I could go on. As I got in my seat I saw Becky on a seat near me next to a boy that looked like Cameron Douglas, and I waved.
ACTING
Last night (today is September 2009 - it's now 16:39 so this memory is a little vague.
At the start of the dream I was sat on the floor of a hall that might have been my school hall. There were groups of people sat cross-legged in lines and I think I might have been sat next to Sophie. And then I think someone told me it was Inter-house Drama or I just remembered or found out and I panicked. I was playing the lead in this play (it was something to do with Minnie and Mickey Mouse (ironic, I've never dreamt about them until this a few nights ago)). I think I was playing a character that was supposed to represent Minnie Mouse and had some weird, French sounding name begining with an m.
I didn't know any of the lines because I hadn't been to any of the rehearsals and I was given a script by someone, I think but the performance was in five minutes and I couldn't remember any of my lines. So I went to see Ms Pickthall who was in the hall and she told me they'd find someone to replace me and I could play the scenery. I asked what she meant and she showed me a drawing/map of what the set up would be like. She was saying things like 'just run along there like a bird' and 'you can run across the front like the sea' and I had an image of me running around the stage holding a stick in each hand and seeming like a stupid person. But I went alone with it, deciding I'd just copy what other backstage people that seemed to fade into the background would do.
Suddenly I was in a rectangle covered in curtains. There was a small raised platform behind me where three people were stood, and I stood on the floor in front just to the side of the tiny stage. Sophie was on the other side, and there were three people on the stage. One was dressed as Pinocchio. Through a small gap in the side of the curtains I could see a table, where Rosie was sat at the end of it near to me, smiling at me, Katie at the furthest end and Robin Price and someone else in the middle of them. I woke up around then, before the play started.
THE TREASURE HUNT
This was on Wednesday October 7th 2009 and I think it was about 4:30 that I woke up after. For the first part, I think I was with Freya, which is crazy. And my mum, maybe. We were in town and I saw someone from my school then realised that I was in my pyjamas and was immedietly embarassed.
There was another part where I saw the plant in my room had grown, because I hadn't watered it. It isn't a cactus but it was now. It had grown much, much taller and there were spikes coming out of all the circular leaves. I'm not sure if this came before or after the above part of the dream.
Then I was in town still, but it was night time. I was with my mum and there were cats with us. Fred, Darren and Hellen's cat was there and probably Bob. I was holding Callie. We were doing a sort of treasure hunt and there was a little scrap of paper with a map and coloured dots around it. The final part was a kareoke bar, which isn't real and is in the place of the alleyway that leads to The Crown and Mr Simms' sweet shop. Next door to the kareoke bar there was an old, abandoned shoe shop called something like Sally's Shoes. I saw a few pairs of glittery shoes, children's ones, that were red and gold and silver but the rest of the white shelves were empty.
We started to walk upstaris, me behind, then my mum went through a door and it slammed behind her. I heard a scream and saw a hand trapped in the door. I stood alone, terrified and waiting for something to jump out at me.
At this time I started to realise it was a dream, not before I saw a very fake Dracula.
ALISON'S GOLD TRIMMED BLAZER
I keep re-remembering parts of this dream but I think I've got it all. This was on the night of Friday November 9th/morning of Saturday November 10th. I woke up in between part one and part two. In part one I was with someone I can't remember, it could have been Poppy. We were walking around town and then decided to go to a club. When we got there I wasn't with Poppy anymore, if I was to begin with, and I'm not sure who I was either. I don't remember much about actually being in this club type thing but whoever was there was wearing a red and black dress.
And I think I was wearing something black. I don't know... I don't usually think about clothing in dreams.
Part two began in the cloakroom at school. Alison was wearing a new blazer (or a different old one) that around the edges was gold, for being... good in school or something. Everyone was sort of laughing at her but clearly she was very proud of this.
She'd also been given badges for something and one of them was like, three circles in a line. For some reason I had one and I was teasing Alison, who really wanted it back. Then she agreed to split it in half and I was going to stop her and give it back, because I didn't actually want it back but she'd already taken a knife and halved it. (we were in my kitchen now). "
*Valentine was a TV show I used to love, about Greek gods and godesses (mainly Aphrodite) trying to function in modern day LA.
** LAWYER: Mr Mouse, I really don't think your wife's exceptionally large teeth are sufficient grounds for divorce.
MICKEY MOUSE: That isn't what I meant when I said she was fucking Goofy!
That wasn't everything, but that took nearly two hours seeing as blogger doesn't let me copy and paste. I'll come back on Monday and write something useful or intellectually stimulating. Maybe.
Have a nice weekend.
- lizzie
I had a fight with my parents today, and it wasn't as big or as chaotic as arguments we've had a lot of the time but it was actually to do with something important. My mum's barely aware it happened I think, so I'm unsure whether to bring it up again until we've reached a conclusion, because there's no way of letting this one slide. Right now I've exiled myself to my bedroom with Callie and a cupcake and it's making me feel like it's night time.
Meh. It was eventual - we're been getting on for about a month.
Last night my internet was broken and I couldn't sleep, so I ended up just going through all of the old files on my computer. One of the things I found was a folder from the summer of 2009 called "Dreams", and I remembered that something I used to do for about a month was, usually straight after I woke up, go to my laptop and write down the dream I'd just had.
It was so, so weird to read and sometimes actually remember having them, other times not.
Anyways. I thought it might make some interesting reading. (note: any grammatical mistakes were my 13 year old self's. I thought I should not change them.
" ROSIE OR CHARLOTTE AND THE WOOLLEN PONIES
A few days ago; today is September 8th.
It started in some sort of field and I was with Rosie or Charlotte or both. It was dark and pixelated and there were horses everywhere, horses that looked like they were made of wool. I mounted one and decided that I didn't like and the same thing happened again, until I settled for a white/cream horse.
Then me and Rosie (or Charlotte) started riding along a thin road that looked like the track to Kathryn's grandma's farm or Poppy's driveway (it was long and thin and made up of grey rocks. Then we got to another field, thinner and fatter and lighter and there were less horses than there had been at the top. I have a feeling it was in Whichurch, or Wales. An old man that looked cartoon-like was waiting there.
We'd been riding from the top of the hill to Whichurch/Wales but now there wasn't one, and we just wanted to ride the woollen ponies but we weren't allowed.
Then I woke up.
THE VALENTINE CAFE
This was a few weeks ago (September 8th today) but it's one of the most memorable dreams I've had in a while.
I was in a cafe, and there were creators of TV shows there, though now I think back I can only remember specific people from Valentine*. Actors, actresses, producers, directors, writers.
It was one of those cafes that's sort of inside a shopping centre, and there were two stories. I was on the top floor. It was a thin-ish building and yellow, cream, white, gold colours. Not particularly expensive or fancy. Tables around the edges with piles of paper on and, of course, a counter somewhere. I was sat at one of the tables and Patrick Fabian and Christine Lakin were on the same table - I think I'd been there first and they came to sit with me. It was definitely Patrick Fabian and I'm pretty sure it was Christine Lakin there too but it could have been someone else. I remember seeing Jaime Murray from the back, her hair was in a ponytail and she was wearing a red dress she'd worn in an interview on Something For The Weekend.
Patrick Fabian or the woman that might have been Christine Lakin asked me, "Who are you?"
"I wrote the script," I replied, then straight away regretted it. I think I knew we were talking about Valentine and of course knew that it was not me who had written the script.
They nodded, seeming impressed. I was unable to contradict what I had just said; literally unable to move my mouth and speak so I sat there foolishly feeling a lot more childish than I had done about nine seconds ago.
Then suddenly I wasn't with them any more. I was at the other side of the cafe, next to one of the outer tables where I looked through a stack of books without opening any of them. One of them had an orange cover of a seaside like the cover of "The Other Hand" by Chris something but I don't think it was that.
Then I was with Katie and Jess in a shopping centre, I think, and it could have been the one that the cafe was in. Then we went to some toilets, not the ones in Chatwin's (that was a specific point) but next door, in Topshop. They were dark and long and thin and dirty and stuffed between the cubicles and the sinks near where the door had been was a line of glamorous leather recliner chairs. I was keen to sit in one of the turquoise coloured ones like Katie was in, not one of the pale pink ones with black patterns, so I sat on the one on Katie's left whilst Jess went to the toilet.
Then we were in an alley. It was dark and rainy and grey, but some sort of tiny parade was going on and two men wearing long, red wigs were dancing and I thought for a second that one of them was Patrick Fabian then realised it wasn't.
AN EMAIL?
Last night, Tuesday September 9th.
I got an email. I don't remember what it said; it was just the briefest flash of writing. I think it was telling me about something I'd done, something that had already happened, possibly in real life. I have a feeling it was something to do with guides.
MINNIE MOUSE
It's Wednesday September 16th and I've just woken up from this dream, and it's weird and kooky and fun and one of the loveliest dreams I've had, probably since the Valentine cafe.
This dream happened in five stages. At first I was me, and I went for dinner at Connor's house, after seeing a picture of me, Alex Farr and Becky Edwards on a computer by some bunk beds. At Connor's house, we ate pasta with gravy.
In the second part I went swimming with my friends. Rosie was definitely there, Becky, and maybe Poppy too. I knew they were all there. The pools were all outside, 3 were lined up as normal pools and then there was a larger one on their left and a tower ascended from that that was dripping water and people were climbing through holes inside it. There was some kind of slide I think, and it was Florida-like sunny where we were. When I first got in it was like a turned up high Jacuzzi and the pressure and currents were too much and I couldn't swim.
Then for a while I was lying in the larger pool - the shallow end. And for that part I was Alexa and I had pretty blonde hair and I'm not sure what I did then.
Then I was at Disney Land but walking through the less theme park-ish bits that I'm pretty sure aren't real.
In this section of the dream, I was Minnie Mouse. And I was walking with Goofy (this is definitely due to Dobbin's favourite joke**) who I think I'd left Mickey Mouse for because I knew I loved him. We walked through a fake desert, passing the occasional Disney character who I was afraid would see us, so I wore Goofy's hat for a while to cover my face.
In the last part I was myself again, as I passed through the gate from the desert in Disney Land I made the change from Minnie Mouse to me. Then I was walking around Disney Land with my parents and a strange little girl, who in this dream I remembered as my little sister. She was around 5 years old and pretty, I suppose, with very blonde, curly hair and dark brown eyes and high cheekbones. She was wearing a pink dress.
So in the end I saw Aerosmith (real rollercoaster at Disney World Hollywood Studios which I rue the day I never went on) and decided it didn't look that scary so I could go on. As I got in my seat I saw Becky on a seat near me next to a boy that looked like Cameron Douglas, and I waved.
ACTING
Last night (today is September 2009 - it's now 16:39 so this memory is a little vague.
At the start of the dream I was sat on the floor of a hall that might have been my school hall. There were groups of people sat cross-legged in lines and I think I might have been sat next to Sophie. And then I think someone told me it was Inter-house Drama or I just remembered or found out and I panicked. I was playing the lead in this play (it was something to do with Minnie and Mickey Mouse (ironic, I've never dreamt about them until this a few nights ago)). I think I was playing a character that was supposed to represent Minnie Mouse and had some weird, French sounding name begining with an m.
I didn't know any of the lines because I hadn't been to any of the rehearsals and I was given a script by someone, I think but the performance was in five minutes and I couldn't remember any of my lines. So I went to see Ms Pickthall who was in the hall and she told me they'd find someone to replace me and I could play the scenery. I asked what she meant and she showed me a drawing/map of what the set up would be like. She was saying things like 'just run along there like a bird' and 'you can run across the front like the sea' and I had an image of me running around the stage holding a stick in each hand and seeming like a stupid person. But I went alone with it, deciding I'd just copy what other backstage people that seemed to fade into the background would do.
Suddenly I was in a rectangle covered in curtains. There was a small raised platform behind me where three people were stood, and I stood on the floor in front just to the side of the tiny stage. Sophie was on the other side, and there were three people on the stage. One was dressed as Pinocchio. Through a small gap in the side of the curtains I could see a table, where Rosie was sat at the end of it near to me, smiling at me, Katie at the furthest end and Robin Price and someone else in the middle of them. I woke up around then, before the play started.
THE TREASURE HUNT
This was on Wednesday October 7th 2009 and I think it was about 4:30 that I woke up after. For the first part, I think I was with Freya, which is crazy. And my mum, maybe. We were in town and I saw someone from my school then realised that I was in my pyjamas and was immedietly embarassed.
There was another part where I saw the plant in my room had grown, because I hadn't watered it. It isn't a cactus but it was now. It had grown much, much taller and there were spikes coming out of all the circular leaves. I'm not sure if this came before or after the above part of the dream.
Then I was in town still, but it was night time. I was with my mum and there were cats with us. Fred, Darren and Hellen's cat was there and probably Bob. I was holding Callie. We were doing a sort of treasure hunt and there was a little scrap of paper with a map and coloured dots around it. The final part was a kareoke bar, which isn't real and is in the place of the alleyway that leads to The Crown and Mr Simms' sweet shop. Next door to the kareoke bar there was an old, abandoned shoe shop called something like Sally's Shoes. I saw a few pairs of glittery shoes, children's ones, that were red and gold and silver but the rest of the white shelves were empty.
We started to walk upstaris, me behind, then my mum went through a door and it slammed behind her. I heard a scream and saw a hand trapped in the door. I stood alone, terrified and waiting for something to jump out at me.
At this time I started to realise it was a dream, not before I saw a very fake Dracula.
ALISON'S GOLD TRIMMED BLAZER
I keep re-remembering parts of this dream but I think I've got it all. This was on the night of Friday November 9th/morning of Saturday November 10th. I woke up in between part one and part two. In part one I was with someone I can't remember, it could have been Poppy. We were walking around town and then decided to go to a club. When we got there I wasn't with Poppy anymore, if I was to begin with, and I'm not sure who I was either. I don't remember much about actually being in this club type thing but whoever was there was wearing a red and black dress.
And I think I was wearing something black. I don't know... I don't usually think about clothing in dreams.
Part two began in the cloakroom at school. Alison was wearing a new blazer (or a different old one) that around the edges was gold, for being... good in school or something. Everyone was sort of laughing at her but clearly she was very proud of this.
She'd also been given badges for something and one of them was like, three circles in a line. For some reason I had one and I was teasing Alison, who really wanted it back. Then she agreed to split it in half and I was going to stop her and give it back, because I didn't actually want it back but she'd already taken a knife and halved it. (we were in my kitchen now). "
*Valentine was a TV show I used to love, about Greek gods and godesses (mainly Aphrodite) trying to function in modern day LA.
** LAWYER: Mr Mouse, I really don't think your wife's exceptionally large teeth are sufficient grounds for divorce.
MICKEY MOUSE: That isn't what I meant when I said she was fucking Goofy!
That wasn't everything, but that took nearly two hours seeing as blogger doesn't let me copy and paste. I'll come back on Monday and write something useful or intellectually stimulating. Maybe.
Have a nice weekend.
- lizzie
Tuesday 11 January 2011
Eleven Eleven
"Rock and roll is fast. If all goes to plan, I could be in rehab by Thursday."
... that made me laugh.
I'm trying to do two things right now - watch an episode of The Mighty Boosh and write a blog, but I'm tired and I'm not doing terrifically in either. Maybe that sounds stupid.
But really, I'm mainly waiting up 'til 11:11 so I can make an 11/1/11 11:11 wish. Yaaaaay.
So I just finished reading "The Catcher in the Rye" by J.D Salinger, which was one of the books on my list, and I'm still utterly confused about whether or not I liked it or not. Here's why.
Generally I like literary fiction, but there was something missing from this - I think it's that element in lit-fic that makes up for the fact that there isn't much of a plot, and "The Catcher in the Rye" aren't quite developed enough. They weren't as realistic, or perhaps just as relatable as I needed them to be.
The only thing I did like was something to it which I'd even say was a moral, and it only introduced itself in the last few chapters, and it was the idea that Holden wasn't just trying to get away, but to find something. And something someone said somewhere, about laziness being using the environment you're in as an excuse to lack of suceeding. They worded it much more intelligently than that, but it made me smile in a self-critical sort of way.
I'm pretty busy at the moment. There's a music thing at school which I'm sort-of participating in (accompanying two friends who are auditioning, competing against each other. Awkward.) and also I've actually been excercising quite a lot. When I have some free time, I'll get a move on with thinking about editing my novel.
Which is one of the things I wanted to talk about (when I say "wanted to talk about", I mean I just thought of talking about. Don't believe for a second that I actually sit down to write a blog and have any idea what I'm going to say). I've been thinking about Wall/whatever the hell it's called, and genuinly think I like it too much to go through rough, rushed editing, like I did last year, and self-publish through Amazon and CreateSpace. I want a lot of time to research the things I should've done before, to perfect my characters in that way I'm always picky about and give it a proper ending. I don't want to waste this.
If I do do that it means for you, ("you" being a you who maybe intends on reading my little story thing if you want to?), that realistically it can go to ways once it's edited and perfect and all sorted; either I write 50k of meaningless next November and try to go for the CreateSpace Amazon offer again, or I live life on the edge and write a letter to an actual publisher. I know I'm a little pretentious and young and that it's stupid, but I really want to do something with this. I'm not quite sure I believe my NaNoWriMo novel can come to anything, but this is just something I need to do. Because really, why shouldn't I? Rejection letters are healthy and one day if I get old and super-awesome, I can talk about this in an interview. Past Lizzie will look stupid. We'll all laugh. It'll be great.
I just don't want to rush through editing and miss out things. I don't think I can make this deadline. I owe a good story to my imaginary people.
Finally today, because today's all about the number 11 (though maybe there'll be another of these on the real 11/11/11, and I'll be stuck for something about) it'd be rude not to post a Jason Webley song, I suppose - from what I've heard, Icarus is my favourite.
... that made me laugh.
I'm trying to do two things right now - watch an episode of The Mighty Boosh and write a blog, but I'm tired and I'm not doing terrifically in either. Maybe that sounds stupid.
But really, I'm mainly waiting up 'til 11:11 so I can make an 11/1/11 11:11 wish. Yaaaaay.
So I just finished reading "The Catcher in the Rye" by J.D Salinger, which was one of the books on my list, and I'm still utterly confused about whether or not I liked it or not. Here's why.
Generally I like literary fiction, but there was something missing from this - I think it's that element in lit-fic that makes up for the fact that there isn't much of a plot, and "The Catcher in the Rye" aren't quite developed enough. They weren't as realistic, or perhaps just as relatable as I needed them to be.
The only thing I did like was something to it which I'd even say was a moral, and it only introduced itself in the last few chapters, and it was the idea that Holden wasn't just trying to get away, but to find something. And something someone said somewhere, about laziness being using the environment you're in as an excuse to lack of suceeding. They worded it much more intelligently than that, but it made me smile in a self-critical sort of way.
I'm pretty busy at the moment. There's a music thing at school which I'm sort-of participating in (accompanying two friends who are auditioning, competing against each other. Awkward.) and also I've actually been excercising quite a lot. When I have some free time, I'll get a move on with thinking about editing my novel.
Which is one of the things I wanted to talk about (when I say "wanted to talk about", I mean I just thought of talking about. Don't believe for a second that I actually sit down to write a blog and have any idea what I'm going to say). I've been thinking about Wall/whatever the hell it's called, and genuinly think I like it too much to go through rough, rushed editing, like I did last year, and self-publish through Amazon and CreateSpace. I want a lot of time to research the things I should've done before, to perfect my characters in that way I'm always picky about and give it a proper ending. I don't want to waste this.
If I do do that it means for you, ("you" being a you who maybe intends on reading my little story thing if you want to?), that realistically it can go to ways once it's edited and perfect and all sorted; either I write 50k of meaningless next November and try to go for the CreateSpace Amazon offer again, or I live life on the edge and write a letter to an actual publisher. I know I'm a little pretentious and young and that it's stupid, but I really want to do something with this. I'm not quite sure I believe my NaNoWriMo novel can come to anything, but this is just something I need to do. Because really, why shouldn't I? Rejection letters are healthy and one day if I get old and super-awesome, I can talk about this in an interview. Past Lizzie will look stupid. We'll all laugh. It'll be great.
I just don't want to rush through editing and miss out things. I don't think I can make this deadline. I owe a good story to my imaginary people.
Finally today, because today's all about the number 11 (though maybe there'll be another of these on the real 11/11/11, and I'll be stuck for something about) it'd be rude not to post a Jason Webley song, I suppose - from what I've heard, Icarus is my favourite.
Have a nice day, now.
- Lizzie xx
Friday 7 January 2011
"Hustle", "The Walk" and a Target Audience?
I started to write a blog. Then I realised that I have absolutley nothing to say today - nothing of value, no gossip my friends (who let;s face it, it looks like are my only readers) can laugh at.
This is a good thing. D'you want to know why?
Because I got STANDARDS. :o .
One of my friends at school today said something nice about my blog, and it made me remember she, too, reads it. A few of them do. And that made me feel nice and also pretty strange, because now I almost feel under pressure not to disappoint. But it's also confusing.
I'm aware that most of the people who visit here at Eff-Paf are my friends from school (and there's only about three of them at that) and from what I can tell I think that they mostly like it because in a way, it's gossip and it's a strange sort of "secret diary" blah blah blah. I can tell from conversations like this...
"So I read your blog last night, lol."
"Oh. So did you like the Dresden Dolls?"
"What?"
But then there's some other people, who Google "Mikael Erika fanfiktion" (yes, I do check my stats occasionally. Yes, I know it's pretty sad) and find me here, and maybe just read one post. And that's why I started this I think, not for people who go to my school but ones that share my interests. And I don't know if I'd prefer people to do that - to just skim by and read something that'll actually mean something to them, because it's a band that they like or their favourite movie or something interessting and discussable or just because they're actually interested in what goes on in my mind. What I'd really like are people who want both, and who'll read this because I wrote it but maybe try and experience whatever I recommend, and maybe they'll love it and take something from it and all three parties will be happy. Does that make sense, a bit?
And if you're one of my friends, that wasn't a jab at you reading my blog. I understand I can't post stuff on the internet under my full name and expect to hide it forever. I just wasn't ready for something like this to happen for a while, and I've only just thought about it.
Because I've wasted some time talking about myself today, here is the magical wonderful Imogen Heap performing a brilliant song, called "The Walk". It also showcases why her live setup is so special and amazing.
04:10
"There's no way out!
We are surrounded so give in, give in,
and relish every minute of it!"
and then that note. Aah.
There's a link to another performance, an incredible song called "Goodnight and Go" in the same session afterwards. Maybe you'll listen to it. Trust me, you'll want to. I think.
Also this week, something possibly very, very exciting and amazing happened. Or kind of enlightened that it could happen. But I pinky swore to somebody that I wouldn't talk about it, because I get excitable and this could be a disappointment. Internally I'm quite cynical and I'm fairly sure it will be a disappointment.
But you never know...
Hustle's back on TV again, and if I'd written here a year or two ago I would have talked about it here all the time. This sounds dorky, but I was a lonely thirteen year old, and I felt so connected to this show that it probed me to write fanfiction. The characters were so real to me. In some ways, I think it's the fanfic I wrote when I was younger that made me a better writer. I realised that what I had to write about was the people who acted out their stories in my head when I was lying in bed waiting to go to sleep. I idolised Stacie Monroe for about a year. I loved all of the main 5 characters equally, and I think being unable to have a favourite shows writers have created a brilliant chemistry between a group of friends on television. I feel the same about Friends and How I Met Your Mother (but if you haven't seen Hustle, know that it's completley different to both of those shows. It's actually a crime-drama about con-artists in London and I love it lots).
Then a new series was made and the actors Jaime Murray and Marc Warren were replaced by Matt di Angelo and Kelly Adams, who don't get me wrong are both brilliant, but I hated with a childlike passion for about three months. Once I realised Stacie's absense was not Emma Kennedy's fault, I wrote an unsent apology letter for hating her so much, just because it made me feel better. I was a weird kid.
I still watch Hustle with a love and devotion I don't have with very many other shows but it isn't quite the same without the original five. It'd be like replaying Phoebe and Chandler with.... think of some awesome other actors... I don't know, characters who were witty and adorable and genius, played by Zach Braff and Meryl Streep. Tony Jordan's plots are epic and mind boggling, all of the acting is great. It just isn't quite the same anymore.
I'm blogging a lot recently - I'd gotten into the routine of blog day being Monday, but this week I seem to want to talk about myself a lot.
that's all, folks.
- Lizzie
This is a good thing. D'you want to know why?
Because I got STANDARDS. :o .
One of my friends at school today said something nice about my blog, and it made me remember she, too, reads it. A few of them do. And that made me feel nice and also pretty strange, because now I almost feel under pressure not to disappoint. But it's also confusing.
I'm aware that most of the people who visit here at Eff-Paf are my friends from school (and there's only about three of them at that) and from what I can tell I think that they mostly like it because in a way, it's gossip and it's a strange sort of "secret diary" blah blah blah. I can tell from conversations like this...
"So I read your blog last night, lol."
"Oh. So did you like the Dresden Dolls?"
"What?"
But then there's some other people, who Google "Mikael Erika fanfiktion" (yes, I do check my stats occasionally. Yes, I know it's pretty sad) and find me here, and maybe just read one post. And that's why I started this I think, not for people who go to my school but ones that share my interests. And I don't know if I'd prefer people to do that - to just skim by and read something that'll actually mean something to them, because it's a band that they like or their favourite movie or something interessting and discussable or just because they're actually interested in what goes on in my mind. What I'd really like are people who want both, and who'll read this because I wrote it but maybe try and experience whatever I recommend, and maybe they'll love it and take something from it and all three parties will be happy. Does that make sense, a bit?
And if you're one of my friends, that wasn't a jab at you reading my blog. I understand I can't post stuff on the internet under my full name and expect to hide it forever. I just wasn't ready for something like this to happen for a while, and I've only just thought about it.
Because I've wasted some time talking about myself today, here is the magical wonderful Imogen Heap performing a brilliant song, called "The Walk". It also showcases why her live setup is so special and amazing.
04:10
"There's no way out!
We are surrounded so give in, give in,
and relish every minute of it!"
and then that note. Aah.
There's a link to another performance, an incredible song called "Goodnight and Go" in the same session afterwards. Maybe you'll listen to it. Trust me, you'll want to. I think.
Also this week, something possibly very, very exciting and amazing happened. Or kind of enlightened that it could happen. But I pinky swore to somebody that I wouldn't talk about it, because I get excitable and this could be a disappointment. Internally I'm quite cynical and I'm fairly sure it will be a disappointment.
But you never know...
Hustle's back on TV again, and if I'd written here a year or two ago I would have talked about it here all the time. This sounds dorky, but I was a lonely thirteen year old, and I felt so connected to this show that it probed me to write fanfiction. The characters were so real to me. In some ways, I think it's the fanfic I wrote when I was younger that made me a better writer. I realised that what I had to write about was the people who acted out their stories in my head when I was lying in bed waiting to go to sleep. I idolised Stacie Monroe for about a year. I loved all of the main 5 characters equally, and I think being unable to have a favourite shows writers have created a brilliant chemistry between a group of friends on television. I feel the same about Friends and How I Met Your Mother (but if you haven't seen Hustle, know that it's completley different to both of those shows. It's actually a crime-drama about con-artists in London and I love it lots).
Then a new series was made and the actors Jaime Murray and Marc Warren were replaced by Matt di Angelo and Kelly Adams, who don't get me wrong are both brilliant, but I hated with a childlike passion for about three months. Once I realised Stacie's absense was not Emma Kennedy's fault, I wrote an unsent apology letter for hating her so much, just because it made me feel better. I was a weird kid.
I still watch Hustle with a love and devotion I don't have with very many other shows but it isn't quite the same without the original five. It'd be like replaying Phoebe and Chandler with.... think of some awesome other actors... I don't know, characters who were witty and adorable and genius, played by Zach Braff and Meryl Streep. Tony Jordan's plots are epic and mind boggling, all of the acting is great. It just isn't quite the same anymore.
I'm blogging a lot recently - I'd gotten into the routine of blog day being Monday, but this week I seem to want to talk about myself a lot.
that's all, folks.
- Lizzie
Wednesday 5 January 2011
I feel sick and I want to moan somewhere and it's my blog and so I can if I want to >:(
So today I did basically nothing. I woke up at 11:15, and I was going to go out somewhere with my friends but then I didn't because I thought I should do some homework.
But I was in one of those moods where I felt like there was no reason to do anything, not really, and I actually couldn't write my essay. Even though I knew that it'd be less hard and less time consuming than I thought. So I got dressed and felt productive and I was going to make cookies, but I didn't. And instead I lolloped around on the internet and texted my friend for a while being all moany. I went on Youtube and learned how to play a Regina Spektor song on the piano.
Then my parents got home, and I ate dinner and realised it was getting pretty late and I should write my essay.
At about 5:30 I said 6 o clock.
At 6, I said 8.
I ended up starting at 10, finishing at 11.
That was okay. That's a good time to go to bed.
I went to bed and tried to read a book for a while and couldn't concentrate so I tried to sleep.
Except I was lying in bed and then I was worrying about stuff and that made my stomach hurt and that made me hungry and then I thought of something and googled the answer and now it's pretty late and I'm still here, on my computer for no reason.
MUH.
The good news is that I finished reading "The Kite Runner" (first book from the list) and I loved it lots. It was a brilliant story, it was unpredictable and the best thing about it was that the characters weren't perfect (I highlight that whenever it happens, after a fight with my English teacher about Atticus), they were human beings. And it made me realise that there are poverty and wars and shit in the world I live in, not just in history, and that we're really all quite dumb and unprogressive.
K then. Bye.
- Lizzie
But I was in one of those moods where I felt like there was no reason to do anything, not really, and I actually couldn't write my essay. Even though I knew that it'd be less hard and less time consuming than I thought. So I got dressed and felt productive and I was going to make cookies, but I didn't. And instead I lolloped around on the internet and texted my friend for a while being all moany. I went on Youtube and learned how to play a Regina Spektor song on the piano.
Then my parents got home, and I ate dinner and realised it was getting pretty late and I should write my essay.
At about 5:30 I said 6 o clock.
At 6, I said 8.
I ended up starting at 10, finishing at 11.
That was okay. That's a good time to go to bed.
I went to bed and tried to read a book for a while and couldn't concentrate so I tried to sleep.
Except I was lying in bed and then I was worrying about stuff and that made my stomach hurt and that made me hungry and then I thought of something and googled the answer and now it's pretty late and I'm still here, on my computer for no reason.
MUH.
The good news is that I finished reading "The Kite Runner" (first book from the list) and I loved it lots. It was a brilliant story, it was unpredictable and the best thing about it was that the characters weren't perfect (I highlight that whenever it happens, after a fight with my English teacher about Atticus), they were human beings. And it made me realise that there are poverty and wars and shit in the world I live in, not just in history, and that we're really all quite dumb and unprogressive.
K then. Bye.
- Lizzie
Sunday 2 January 2011
Books I Will Read in 2011
Hello,
And HAPPY NEW YEAR LOVELIES! yaaay. I hope that you all had a fun New Year's Eve. I know that I did. And I hope that your 2011 is filled with love and friendship and productivity and general awesomeness.
Also, if anybody reading this follows me on Twitter I want to apologize for all the blabbering the other night/morning. I understand that nobody wants to hear me talk about my hair, but I was bored and lonely.
So one of my New Years' resolutions was to read more books (or a target within a resolution), and like I said, I made a list of things I'm going to read in 2011. I can use my blog to keep it organised, go back to this post and cross off when I'm done. it's a secret, but I like lists quite a lot. There aren't many other ways in which I'm organised. So, in no particular order.
BOOKS I WILL READ IN 2011
1. "Birdsong" by Sebastian Falukes"
2. "The Road" by Cormac McCarthy
3. "Hunger" by Knut Hamsum
4."Neverwhere" by Neil Gaiman
5. "How to Write While You Sleep" by Elizabeth Irvin Ross
6. "Emma" - Jane Austen
7. "They Went Whistling: Women Wayfarers, Warriors, Runaways and Renegades" by Barbara Holland
8."Rebecca" by Daphne du Maurier
9. "Jane Eyre" by Charlotte Bronte
10. "The Day the Falls Stood Still" by Cathy Marie Buchanan
11. "Cost" by Roxanna Robinson
12."Water For Elephants" by Sarah Gruen
13. "North of Beautiful"
14. "The Help" by Kathryn Stockett
15."The Kite Runner" by Khaled Hosseini
16. "King Dork" by Frank Portman
17. "Dear Catastrophe Waitress" by Brendan Halpin
18. "I Can See Clearly Now" by Brendan Halpin
19. "I Feel Bad About My Neck: And Other Thoughts on Being a Woman" by Nora Ephnon
20."The Catcher in the Rye" by J.D Salinger
21. "The Emperor's Children" by Claire Messud
22. "Lolita" by Vladimir Nobokov
23. "I Know This Much Is True" by Wally Lamb
24. "Sarah's Key" by Tatiana de Rosnay
25."The Secret Life of Bees" by Sue Monk Kidd
26. "Wuthering Heights" by Emily Bronte
27."Cracked Up To Be" by Courtney Summers
28. "Talk To The Snail" by Stephen Clarke
29. "Of Mice and Men" by John Steinbeck
30. "The Unbearble Lightness of Being" by Milan Kundera
Yay. I tried to go for a mixture of classics I haven't read yet and should have, and newer books which look exciting and FLW recommended. I know that nobody comments on my blog, but if you have a book I should read please say so, k? ;) I'm wondering if I have open space left for five or ten more, depending on how much time I have.
Okay. That's all for today.
- Lizzie
And HAPPY NEW YEAR LOVELIES! yaaay. I hope that you all had a fun New Year's Eve. I know that I did. And I hope that your 2011 is filled with love and friendship and productivity and general awesomeness.
Also, if anybody reading this follows me on Twitter I want to apologize for all the blabbering the other night/morning. I understand that nobody wants to hear me talk about my hair, but I was bored and lonely.
So one of my New Years' resolutions was to read more books (or a target within a resolution), and like I said, I made a list of things I'm going to read in 2011. I can use my blog to keep it organised, go back to this post and cross off when I'm done. it's a secret, but I like lists quite a lot. There aren't many other ways in which I'm organised. So, in no particular order.
BOOKS I WILL READ IN 2011
1. "Birdsong" by Sebastian Falukes"
2. "The Road" by Cormac McCarthy
3. "Hunger" by Knut Hamsum
4.
5. "How to Write While You Sleep" by Elizabeth Irvin Ross
6. "Emma" - Jane Austen
7. "They Went Whistling: Women Wayfarers, Warriors, Runaways and Renegades" by Barbara Holland
8.
9. "Jane Eyre" by Charlotte Bronte
10. "The Day the Falls Stood Still" by Cathy Marie Buchanan
11. "Cost" by Roxanna Robinson
12.
13. "North of Beautiful"
14. "The Help" by Kathryn Stockett
15.
16. "King Dork" by Frank Portman
17. "Dear Catastrophe Waitress" by Brendan Halpin
18. "I Can See Clearly Now" by Brendan Halpin
19. "I Feel Bad About My Neck: And Other Thoughts on Being a Woman" by Nora Ephnon
20.
21. "The Emperor's Children" by Claire Messud
22. "Lolita" by Vladimir Nobokov
23. "I Know This Much Is True" by Wally Lamb
24. "Sarah's Key" by Tatiana de Rosnay
25.
26. "Wuthering Heights" by Emily Bronte
27.
28. "Talk To The Snail" by Stephen Clarke
29. "Of Mice and Men" by John Steinbeck
30. "The Unbearble Lightness of Being" by Milan Kundera
Yay. I tried to go for a mixture of classics I haven't read yet and should have, and newer books which look exciting and FLW recommended. I know that nobody comments on my blog, but if you have a book I should read please say so, k? ;) I'm wondering if I have open space left for five or ten more, depending on how much time I have.
Okay. That's all for today.
- Lizzie
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