New Years 2015/2016

1) What did you do last year that you'd never done before?
Passed my driving test!

2) Did you keep your new years' resolutions, and will you make more for this year?
No and no

3) Did you (or anyone close to you) give birth?
No

4) Did anyone close to you die?
My stepmum's mum

5) Did you (or anyone close to you) experience a major life-changing event?
I got accepted to Teach First. My best friend got married.

6) What would you like to have this year that you lacked last year?
A positive attitude towards my body

7) What date from last year will remain etched upon your memory, and why?
05/11/2015 The assessment day for Teach First

8) What was your biggest achievement of the year?
Being accepted on Teach First

9) What was your biggest failure?
Not getting a lecturing job

10) Did you suffer illness or injury?
No :)

11) What was the best thing you bought?
My rabbit mug, of a rabbit reading Watership Down thinking 'fucking hell'.

12) Whose behaviour merited celebration?
Matt, for staying positive and hard-working.

13) Whose behaviour made you appalled and depressed?
Elliot. Urghhhhhhhhhh.

14) Where did most of your money go?
Bills, food, wine.

15) What did you get really, really, really excited about?
Being accepted onto Teach First.

16) What song will always remind you of last year?
None

17) Compared to this time last year, are you happier or sadder?
Happier. I get to leave the field of law.

18) ...thinner or fatter?
Thinner!

19) ...richer or poorer?
Richer

20) What do you wish you'd done more of?
Sex.

21) What do you wish you'd done less of?
Worrying.

22) What was your favourite book?
I've really enjoyed rereading the Harry Potter books (I said the same thing last year!)

23) What was your favourite movie (or TV program)?
Chappie.

24) What was your greatest discovery?
How nice Prague is. An American Diner in Manchester City Centre.

25) Did anyone come to visit you?
No

26) Did you travel anywhere?
Prague.

27) Did you do anything really special and memorable?
My best friend's wedding.

28) Do you love (really like) anyone or anything now that you didn't love this time last year?
I have grown fond of the King.

29) Do you hate (strongly dislike) anyone or anything now that you didn't hate this time last year?
Elliot. Because I didn't know him this time last year.

30) What did you want and get?
Teach First.

31) What did you want and not get?
A film studies lecturing job,

32) What did you do on your birthday?
I went to Zoo where Matt was dj'ing :) Matt took me out for a meal at Ning the next day.

33) What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?
Getting a film studies lecturing job.

34) How would you describe your personal fashion concept for last year?
Jeans, leggings, jumpers, jumper dress, doc martins,

35) What kept you sane?
Quiet evenings in cooking and eating with Matt

36) Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most?
Laurence Fox

37) What political issue stirred you the most?
Nothing

38) Who (or what) did you miss?
Rosie

39) Who was the best new person you met?
No-one. I don't really like new people

New Year 2014/2015

1) What did you do last year that you'd never done before?
Got a book contract and film lecturing interview

2) Did you keep your new years' resolutions, and will you make more for this year?
No and no

3) Did you (or anyone close to you) give birth?
No

4) Did anyone close to you die?
No

5) Did you (or anyone close to you) experience a major life-changing event?
My best friend's boyfriend got a job in Saudi Arabia

6) What would you like to have this year that you lacked last year?
Film studies lecturing post

7) What date from last year will remain etched upon your memory, and why?
02/02/2014 the day I got my book contract

8) What was your biggest achievement of the year?
Getting an interview for film studies lecturer

9) What was your biggest failure?
Not getting a hold on my weight

10) Did you suffer illness or injury?
A pretty bad depressive episode

11) What was the best thing you bought?
My kitchen cabinet

12) Whose behaviour merited celebration?
Can't think of anyone

13) Whose behaviour made you appalled and depressed?
Jon Shaw. Gross.

14) Where did most of your money go?
Clothes and booze probably. Maybe furniture

15) What did you get really, really, really excited about?
Getting a book contract and interview

16) What song will always remind you of last year?
None

17) Compared to this time last year, are you happier or sadder?
Happier. Matt has a job and I have an interview

18) ...thinner or fatter?
Fatter. Gross.

19) ...richer or poorer?
Richer

20) What do you wish you'd done more of?
Watching films.

21) What do you wish you'd done less of?
Binging on dominoes

22) What was your favourite book?
I've really enjoyed rereading the Harry Potter books

23) What was your favourite movie (or TV program)?
Gone girl was awesome, as was Interstellar

24) What was your greatest discovery?
I can live without anti-depressants

25) Did anyone come to visit you?
Julia and Boti

26) Did you travel anywhere?
Amsterdam, St Jean de Cole, Nijmegen

27) Did you do anything really special and memorable?
Spent my 30th in Amsterdam. Possibly don't remember as much of it as I should have.

28) Do you love (really like) anyone or anything now that you didn't love this time last year?
Daniel Radcliffe. Comes across very well in interviews. The Marvel films are pretty cool too.

29) Do you hate (strongly dislike) anyone or anything now that you didn't hate this time last year?
Can't really think of anything or anyone. My hates are constant it seems.

30) What did you want and get?
An interview for a film studies lecturing job

31) What did you want and not get?
A film studies lecturing job (not had the interview yet!)

32) What did you do on your birthday?
I flew to Amsterdam and saw a museum of cats

33) What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?
Losing weight, film studies lecturing post

34) How would you describe your personal fashion concept for last year?
Leggings and jumpers

35) What kept you sane?
Quiet evenings in cooking and eating with Matt

36) Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most?
Laurence Fox

37) What political issue stirred you the most?
Nothing

38) Who (or what) did you miss?
Rosie

39) Who was the best new person you met?
No-one. I don't really like new people

A Milestone Day

Right now, I'm sitting in the library (Sackville) thinking about how to start writing my conclusion. I'm sitting in front of a word document with a list of questions I want to have answered, with the world 'Conclusion' at the top. Because this is such a pivotal day in my life as it has been over the past 4 and a half years, and because it serves as a way to procrastinate, I thought I would take a little time to reflect on this.

I feel a little sick. That feeling you get when it feels like air is surging through your limbs instead of blood, a bit light-headed. Trying to remain calm. Did I ever think I would get to this point? Over the past few months, yes, I did. But before that, I'm not even sure I allowed myself to think about it. I'm not sure I could have thought about it even if I tried. It's like trying to imagine what life was like before you were born, or what it will be like after you've died.

I started to think about being titled 'Dr' yesterday, in terms of, this will actually happen, it's not just a self-indulgent fantasy that occupies you as you walk the depressing mile and a half to Salford. It terrified me so much, and made it seem like there was no way I would be able to pass my thesis if that was what was going to happen, I had to stop thinking about it. In part, I think this is what is and will make these final stages of the thesis so difficult. I think this is what makes finishing anything difficult. What you will have achieved is so unbelievable, your mind just can't programme it, it will not happen, therefore you will fail at what you're trying to do now. So run, run away from the end as much as you can. Even if it means undoing everything that got you to this point.

That's the difference between people who succeed and people who don't. Far more so than the capacity of intelligence, more than financial means. Those who choose to continue, those who choose to finish what they set out to do. There are so few people at the top because there are so few people willing to get there.

I'm willing to do this. I choose to finish. And I choose to do it to the best of my ability, rather than taking the easy way out and saying, well if I don't do so well it's because I didn't try hard enough. If I'd tried harder I'd have reached the top but I couldn't be bothered. It was my choice to stay down here and I'm fine with that choice so it's ok.

That's always a lie, always a cop-out, always a way of coming to terms and living with your own failures, your own personal failures I mean, not of the work you've done but the way you've chosen to live your life.

I choose differently.

So, I suppose I'd better get on with this then, hadn't I?

What I Miss

I miss the days I would wander round an empty house aimlessly, crying my little heart out. I might have had money in the bank, but it didn't even enter my head to buy a binge round. I might have looked old enough for alcohol, but using that wasn't a shadow of an option. I remember the desperation, what the fuck am I going to do now, I feel like I have reached the end, and my body respected that, it cried for that, it wailed and convulsed and dribbled for that. Now I just have a bunch of poor substitutes. And I miss having nothing. I miss having nothing but the fluids my body would afford me. And maybe it left some scars. But I feel like I'm making bigger ones now. They're just not visible to the public eye. Woop di do.

Visions of the future

A modest sized flat a walking distance from the city centre. A stylish yet comfortable bedroom - bedding is VERY important, where weekend papers are read. A second-hand piano in the lounge area so I can reprise my youthful talent (ahem, I wasn't that good actually). A bath where I spend dull-weathered Saturday afternoons, sipping a glass of wine, surrounded by bubbles, listening to Matt play an instrument (he can play many, clever). Thinking about what to have for tea. Plans for holidays, visits to see friends, keeping fit, eating well, sleeping regularly.


Site I currently love: http://mycatisadick.com/

Nothing else

Just having a browse through some crime scene photos. Looking particularly at pictures of victims of serial killers I've read a lot about. It's strange to see what you've read described time and time again. They may not be real. They look real. Some of them catch my breath. They're not horrifying in themselves. Not in the way I expected - some sort of indescribable vision of the results of evil that transcends this world as we know it. They're just meat. The kind we see hanging in butcher's shops, just human shaped. There really is nothing else. Just blood, gristle, flesh. And that's not the human with something missing. I'm not suggesting that when you see the ones with the faces still attached it's like a person but not quite. They're still entirely recognisable as people, whole and complete. The ones that haven't been butchered just look like they're sleeping. The ones that have been butchered look like the ones that are sleeping, but bloodier. And this isn't perspective building either. It is what it is. Just meat. Just me. Nothing else.

http://vanessawest.tripod.com/crimescenephotos.html

Meet Henry, the newest member of the family

Soooo, I got a tattoo yesterday. I decided to get one Saturday afternoon as I was walking home from seeing Angela and Sean in Teacup (fantastic pork and fig sandwich). I felt blue so thought a bit of retail therapy would go down well during which time I figured, you know what I really need? What will really cheer me up? A needle scoring through my skin at a mega fast rate. So I went, picked a design, booked in et voila. My tattooist was Steve, a very pleasant and talented man who took the time to make sure I was happy with the design. Once it's healed I'm going to go back and ask for some shadows to make it look more like he's climbing on my shoulder.

Sorry about the dried blood, it was too fresh (read, painful) to wash. And for the record, it IS on my shoulder, that is not my breast for anyone who may be confused.

Next up: The Queen. Alien I mean. Not your royal 'I pay more attention to my nails than the GB team walking out during the Olympic opening ceremony' highness.

This lady's dome and body:

This lady's head and mouth:

This lady's colouring:

 

 Beautiful ain't she?