Feeling Festive

I may be 18, but I'm never too old for an advent calendar. 

Squeezing it into my tiny suitcase as I pack to head home from uni, there are a few things I've had to sacrifice for this small symbol that Christmas is coming and it's time for the festivities to start.

Everywhere seems to have caught the bug. Even as I sit getting my hair done, girls are having shiney bits of tinsel and festive colours fused into their glossy locks. 

The town has been transformed into a winter wonderland, trees and lights and seasonal offers in shop windows tempting fellow Christmas lovers to spend their Christmas money before it's even seen their bank account.

Couples really come into their own during this festive time. Gloved hands in a finger embrace floating down the road on the cloud. I'm not pessimistic, that was me a few months ago. I'm just honest.... It's a tad cliche.

Surrounded by couples and sporting my new 'do'; my friend and I sit sipping Christmas flavoured coffee and talking Sex and the City style.

This is my first Christmas being single in a while and I think I like it. No need to fork out my hard earned wages to get a present. No one telling me how I should spend my New Years and no uncomfortable extra Christmas at the beau's family home.

This Christmas will be different. 

Down It Fresher.

It's not everyday that you're thrown into a new home with sixty strangers, approximately three hundred miles from home and facing life as an adult; with bills and shit.

That's university for you: a surreal drunken blur of young adults trying to get by in the world. Somehow managing to make friends along the way, doesn't the human mind just baffle you?

Two weeks of Freshers later and as a collective group (#bassmentclub) we've created a dynamic that can only be described as chaotic; and it's amazing.
         
                              "Strangers plus alcohol equals friends for life........."

All the drink, drugs, friends and painful all-nighters were worth the amazing memories made over the two weeks of freshers and the further three beautiful months of university.

#UniLife

As my dad drove away in his now ten tonne lighter Citroen Picasso, leaving me standing outside my new home, the only thought that passed through my mind was "Fuck."

I had left all my stuff in boxes upstairs in my room, and to put off the awkward meeting neighbors ordeal for just that little bit longer, I thought it best to unpack and try and make the place feel more like home.

But seriously, how long can it really take to put clothes in a wardrobe and books on a shelf?

There comes a time in your life when you just need to stop acting like such a pansy and start acting more like ... well, someone who doesn't hide in their large en suit bedroom to avoid awkward introductions.

So this pansy blossomed; socialized, got very drunk, went clubbing, made some friends and lived happily ever after.

Of course it's never that easy. Alcohol may be the best social lubricant there is... but a hangover is not.

By night, the freshers experience exceeds all expectations and everyone gets on like a house on fire; following the well known social equation of strangers + alcohol = best friends.
By day, being a fresher is lonely, a little awkward and all you want is for your mum to tuck you into bed while she makes you tuna pasta bake [insert other hangover curing food here] for dinner.

One weekly food shop for £10, a few conversations with people in the hallway about the night before and a long nap later, I'm sat here, in bed thinking I should probably eat something, or drink something ... Or at least go on a half-hearted quest to find people I think I know the name of.

Uni life aint no picnic, and I haven't even started lectures yet. I mean, is it even possible to meet and befriend 60 strangers in one night?

[Shout outs to the strangers who added me on Facebook or provided me with the internet or a bulb for my lamp. You're my faves]

So in conclusion. I'm on a fucking roller coaster, drinking green tea and eating socca, because apparently that's the kind of person I have chosen to be at uni.

Wish me luck.
Peace Out ♥

Cornish Cheese

The 10th Cornish Bluegrass Festival was my first, and boy was it a totally unique experience.

Forget everything you think you know about festivals; the mud, the camping, the rain pouring down during a gig. We stayed in a caravan, on the beautiful Hendra Holiday Park in Newquay and both stages were in doors, sheltered from weather that can only be described as wintry.

The atmosphere was amazing, with even the headliners of the weekend joining the supportive crowd before and after their set.

The air in the bar radiated the local ale's and as the drink started (and never stopped) flowing, so did conversation with some of the top Bluegrass performers in the world.

During all the festivities, I got to thinking about the drunken cheesy conversing between a couple. Why does it suddenly become so okay to drown the other in confessions of love and trust and that gooey/fuzzy/fluffy feeling you get deep down whenever you see them? 

Why is it suddenly not okay whenever you are sober?

What is the deal with cheese?

Quoting Shakespeare, looking deep into the eyes of a lover, meaning every single word. The thought makes me cringe. The thought makes everyone cringe; but do we secretly crave it? And how cheesy is too cheesy?

Taking example from idol and fictional character Carrie Bradshaw in the final series of Sex and the City, is romance really considered a bad thing in the 21st century? Or do we all want to be whisked off our feet by a poem-reading, dress buying, french speaking Russian artist? 

It seems people have a love/hate relationship with the cheese. When it's with you're lover, it's suddenly acceptable; but from a pessimistic singletons point of view, it's just people bragging about their false happiness in their stupid relationship with a man who will obviously run off in the night. Ahem... We've all been there. 

So at the Cornish festival, talking cheese with my cheesy boyfriend, starting to feel the effects of the rum and Pepsi's and the odd swig of straight whisky, I thought to myself.... this aint so bad. 

... Just don't let anyone else know I've gone soft. 

Peace Out ♥

Real Talk

Sitting in a spacious basement kitchen in a stylish Victorian town house. A group of my oldest friends sit around the dining table, drinking fizz and eating home-made, vegetarian food, celebrating the change about to occur in our lives.

We're leaving home, moving away, and starting university. It's a big step, and where as the majority of us will either be within at the most a two hour drive from one another or jetting off to India or Vietnam for a gap year, it's still hard to accept that things will never be the same again. 

So a catch up was in order. Shout out to good friend and fellow blogger Amy Rylett (Click Here to view blog) for organizing an awesome night.

"When did everyone start owning a dildo?!" 

The answer is simple. While other people were falling in love at seventeen and getting regular sex. 

We're women now. We have needs; and not in a patronizing "you'll understand when you're older" kind of way. We actually have needs. 

Hormones aside, dildo's have become a top conversation topic. Do you own one? Is it actually a dildo or just a bullet? When do you find the time to use it? 

When do we find the time to use it? 

During a long shower? After realizing you've drunk too much coffee before bed? Any time at all. 

I've been in a relationship for three months, and in that time I've worked nearly everyday, earning money for university and spending it all on anything but university. I'd forgotten what it was like to sit down with this particular group of amazing people and get down and talk about the dirty.

Is it so wrong that we just don't feel the need to be conservative in private?

We live in the modern world. It either takes a whole night, with a week of organizing, a new dress and several top flirting techniques to establish an orgasm as a single girl. Or a simple purchase at Anne Summers and a hot bath, without the hassle of having to sneak out the next morning. It's a no brainer, and Anne Summers deserves a medal on behalf of all the horny feminists out there. 'Cus we don't have to put out for no man.

Of course, being in a relationship is different. But I'm off to university in two weeks and it's going to get lonely. So queue a trip to my new best friend Anne Summers. A little something for me... And a little something for him when I come back to visit. 

So get off you're high horse and discuss. You'll be seriously surprised by how many REAL women you know.

Peace Out ♥

The 'Defendership'

"He's really a nice guy at heart."

Words all too familiar to woman-kind, often followed by "relationships are hard" and "when it's good, it's really good" but is this really how we should view love?

Do we, or do we not deserve more than an okay relationship?

In today's world, it seems that we are forever falling for the wrong guy; too protective, too distant, too emotionally unavailable. What ever happened to Mr. Right? Did he get abducted in the night? Or should women just learn to accept that we should settle for what's in front of us?

It seems that the more intolerable relationships get, the higher the expectations of the person on the loosing side of this viscous tennis game of dating, and so onto match two.

Until recently, I had never heard of a relationship that was easy or simple or even working. But turns out there just might be light at the end of the tunnel.

Three years ago at an underage party tucked away in a small hamlet in Cornwall, two people met. Three years later and I'm having a conversation with my friend who has just finished telling me about all the reasons his relationship is the best. Breakfast in bed, day trips out on his boat and beautiful evening meals cooked and enjoyed together, totally ignorant of the fact that any so-called normal couple would have had a raging argument over how long the pasta should be left to boil.

I'm not saying all relationships are perfect. But when did it become okay to defend the other half for being a total arsehole, simply because "he's a really nice guy at heart"?

I'm being sexist of course. It works both ways; otherwise it wouldn't be a relationship.

Two years ago at a local town festival, two people met. Two years, countless break-ups and several interventions later is it really worth holding onto a failing relationship, just because of a fear that you've wasted the past two years? Or that you're too scared to be alone?

They say you accept the love you think you deserve, and it's possible that if you've only ever known the kind of love that needs defending or that is hard and painful, then maybe it's hard to believe that there's a better world out there.

Being single is hard and painful.
Dating is hard and painful.
Long term relationships are hard and painful.

Jeez, can we take a time out please?! I'm craving a twenty pack of Marbs and the largest tub of Ben and Jerry's I can find just thinking about it.

Three months ago, a guy approached a girl working on a stall and asked to take her out on a date. He swooped her off her feet, they fell deeply in love and it was easy and simple, despite never having known such simplicity in the past. Three months down the line and love is still easy and simple and who know's what the future brings; university, a touring band about to make the big time, but so far so amazing. Can I get a little optimism over here?!

Sadly, you'll all want to hate me when I say that this is my relationship. No one's perfect, and there will be bumps in the road. But it's fucked up that a so-called love between two people should revolve around covering up the faults the other person has.

It's as if, in a desperate bid to keep hold of a sinking ship, a perfect persona of you're not-so-perfect boyfriend/girlfriend is created in your mind as a coping mechanism during the "rough patches" even if this perfect persona ran out the door after the honeymoon period was over. Maybe that memory of how that person used to be was only ever a cover up to impress you. So stop defending the arsehole.

Stop being is a defendership, and start being in a relationship.
And failing that, tell them to get stuffed. No time has been wasted when you're young and you've learned from your experience.

Life's too long to settle for second best.
Peace Out ♥

The Ark Of Life

Always remember, amateurs built the ark, professionals built the Titanic. 

I'm not entirely sure what this saying is trying to tell me. Or what it exactly motivates me to do.

I suppose we're all amateurs in 99% of the things it's possible to excel at in life, but that doesn't mean that we'll do it perfect first time. Sadly, we're not all Noah, fulfilling a wish from God.

I do, however, believe it relates to the theory of beginners luck. Because why the fuck not just go for it and hope for the best?

The first (and last) time I ever used a gun was a terrifying, but exhilarating tutorial from the beau one night while walking the dog. I shot straight through the tin can from 25ft. SUCCESS!


We're not all lucky in love first time round either. The cheater, Mr over-protective and just "what the fuck was I thinking". Everyone's been there, crying into the largest tub of Ben & Jerry's the supermarket could offer, watching Bridget Jones and trying to budget a serious retail therapy session.

But, in all forms of cheese and cringe (shout out to the one person who will not let me live this down) it's worth the effort to keep trying.
I feel like my life has become a Noah's ark scale accomplishment; everything has fallen into a perfect harmony despite the fact that I spent most of the time trying to get here either on my arse or stumbling over yet another speed bump.

I'm not suggesting, as humans we should all build an ark that can house exactly two of every animal (I'm not sure there are even enough tigers, gorilla's, panda's or sloth's left in the world for everyone to possess two each) but that in achieving our accomplishments, whether we're Olympian's trying to win gold or a blogger with no followers dreaming of becoming a journalist; we're all in the middle of building our own Noah's ark.

Good luck succeeding guys.
Peace Out ♥