relax.

Uncle Eddie's cray-cray date on Grounded for Life reminded me of how cute socks can look with heels. It's a look!

self-doubt.

Every time I start to feel self-doubt, particularly about the things that are most important to me [writing/literature, theatre/art in itself, and england], I remind myself of three things:

1 At three, I critiqued my first theatrical production.

2 At seven, I wrote my first complete book.

3 At ten, I read my first Charles Dickens.

The fact that these all stem from childhood means a) I don't believe much in redemption, b) that I really believe in a strong foundation formulating who you are as an adult, c) every little success I've made as an adult is awesome, but a given since it's all very much expected with maturity, d) all of the above. Plausible.

But, it stands, these three smilers really do the job of staving off self-doubt. What are your three Self Doubt Stavers?

work of art

It took me a while to catch on to Bravo's new show, Work of Art: the Next Great Artist. Of course, now that I have, I'm hooked. I've been sort of put off from my devoted feelings toward Bravo arts-realities shows when they allowed Lifetime to steal away Project Runway. I mean, why PR? Why not those housewives? They seem much more fit for Lifetime, but alas.

I've now watched episode 3, and then reversed to episode 1 via Hulu, and episode 2 is in the queue, but here's what I've gathered thus far:

• Simon de Pury has the makings of a hilarious Tim Gunn spinoff.
• China Chow needs a better catch phrase.
• Episode 3 was genius, in my eyes, as book cover design has been mouthwatering to me since childhood.
• Ah, Judith Judith Judith... So very necessary to the cast of characters, but holy pants, writing Pride and Prejudice backwards to serve her selfish sense of artistic narcissism was not okay. I shouldn't get angry at television shows, but the selfish, narcissistic writer I am was enraged.
• I feel like they need an old-salt sort of fisherman painter in the group. Something's missing.
• I'd let Amanda design my wallpaper any day.
• Let it be said that I, along with the majority of women with even some of my age, taste, and personality classifications, am absolutely enamoured by Miles. The style, the goggle choice, the obsessiveness, the whole success at a young age thing, the facial expressions and first introduction to Sarah Jessica Parker, the looks wahey, and most importantly, the fact he insisted on reading the entirety of Frankenstein before designing the cover. Enamoured!
• Very few unnecessary cutaway shots of the city and a night sky and other fluff that takes up purely entertaining silly artists.

It's a silly show! I'm on board!

here's the thing..

So I've heard it said many a time that the sign you're really starting to feel old is when all your friends and acquaintances seem to, all at once, start getting engaged, married, and/or pregnant.

This notion has proven to be true. Why, I'm nearly two months from twenty-two and already feelin' it. Old!

But moreso is the foreseeing of myself as that woman who never actually seems to get older cos she's constantly seeing the world and not being held back by anything or anyone. And that's okay!

Also, drinking gin, and seam ripping with my glasses drooping down my nose. That too.

But playing football [soccer..] with a hyperactive cat after getting excessively excited about the FIFA Group C results [both the country of my birth, and the country my heart belongs to, moving forth] totally makes me feel young!

...You be Rooney, I'll be Gerrard. GO!

[I'm always offsides, he always gets a yellow card.]

some

favourite images:

• city street after the rain
• foggy open field with stone walls
• horses peeking their heads over stall doors
• sunrise, anywhere.

consider yourself.

Things that are nice about Oliver! the film:

- It was probably the first time anyone pulled the "tuba notes marking big guy's footsteps"move. That shall henceforth be called a Bumbleism. Family Guy explains it better.

- Identical team of really old guys with swords appearing out of nowhere in a child's workhouse? This is somewhere I'll have to refer to my copy of Oliver Twist for a possible explanation.

- That owl. It has the best moments. Oliver enters Fagin's lair and all the boys are staring him down, coldly, and this owl is staring him down, coldly.

- "These sausages are moldy!" "Shut up and drink your gin!" Fagin is a fascinating study of a unique type of paternal figure [I wish more people would tell me to shut up and drink my gin. Cool.]

-Jack Wild.

- Nancy's purple tights. Symbolising her positive and sassy attitude, no doubt.

-It would be nice to play Fagin cos he gets to talk to an owl all the time. They like, hang out.

That said, it's obvious why it's been one of my favourite musicals, novels, and films since I was in the fifth grade. Groovy.

bogling to aswad.

One of the things I love about writing is that I get to call watching Oliver!, listening to the Billy Elliott soundtrack, living in England, and talking to my friends about their really strange quirks research, and be completely serious.

amthgf.

This is very exciting! As far as short films go, the one I would consider my favourite is called Oscar & Jim. I first saw it in my Screenwriting course last fall along with other really great films that had been shown at the Rhode Island International Film Festival last year.

It's great British comedy with a fantastic storyline, brilliant writing, great characters, and starring one of my favourite actors, Harry Lloyd. Well!

I have been waiting for a long time to actually be able to purchase a digital copy or at least be able to watch it online. Well, quite by chance, I stumbled back by the website today, and you can watch it online!

Go For It.

gone googlin.

Google is the among the topmost ways, along with shopping malls, that we can observe just how silly humanity is!

Type just one generic word into the search bar and see what I mean. A really great example follows:

The most disturbing of observations is just how many searches include 'poop' as a key word.

fifa, inspired by forrest.

I don't want to talk about yesterday's match between England and the USA. Needless to say, England played the better game and that draw should not have happened. Bollocks.

Relax. Peace.

The World Cup is important to me in a way that's not comparable to anything else. There are so many different levels and variations of importance. My car is important to me, my work is important to me, my clothes are important to me, each of my separate friends are important to me, Twinings early grey tea is important to me, and football [soccer] is certainly important to me - But all in such different ways!

Some people who don't realise the different levels of importance seem to take sport too seriously, and other people who don't realise the different levels of importance are way too critical of people who are passionate about sport.

Well done today, team Germany;

Keep buggering on, team England.

allow me to be scary for a mo.

How could anybody hate vegetables, or even not like vegetables?

This is something I will never understand. My favourite childhood snack: mushrooms. My latest addiction: cucumbers. Vegetables are refreshing, and delicious, full of taste, crunchy and all around full of yum. And, oh yeah, ridiculously healthy, straight outta nature, and not full of fattening chemical grossness that this country loves so much.

The current V8 commercial is rather unfortunate and shouldn't be allowed on air. Making it alright not to eat your vegetables is so wrong. I don't care how much bloody V8 you drink - Part of the reason this country is overwhelmed with new physical and mental health issues is because from childhood on, people aren't forced to eat their vegetables anymore.

There's gonna be major issues.

Just wait, and in the meantime, eat a crunchy carrot. Eat til your eyes turn orange!

pufnstuf.

I have no idea how, as a child, this was one of my favourite television shows, as opposed to giving me terrible nightmares.

But I think it explains a lot.

Why I've always assumed that every ginger in white cowboy boots is a mayor [kidding].

My early interest in all things 1960s.

The beginnings of my passion for all things English [Jack Wild played a large role in that].

My early attraction to working class London boys who rise to the top...and wear 1960s vintage clothing [I, as a preteen, had a significant crush on preteen Jack Wild].

The disinterest in flutes that can't talk [in other words, why I became a percussionist].

Why I've never smoked pot.

a solo-adventure rundown.

Yesterday:

-All my troubles seemed so far away.

-I went to the mall. I haven't been to a mall in ages, and there I discovered..

-There is a Madewell shop in Connecticut! MADEWELL. One of my top four favourite shops. Yeah, four. It only took a pair of gorgeous heeled clogs, a few perfect pairs of shorts, and some head-tiltingly expensive slouchy pocket tees to remember I'm completely skint, or near that.

-H&M! Haven't been there in quite a while. I go every so often so that when I do, it's very exciting. As soon as I cross into the Divided section, I have this quick sensation of being back in England. It's like a shiver, and nice.

-There, I bought two things that are polka dotted, and one thing that's not. I very, very rarely have a craving for polka dots, but it happened! First, I found this top, and was very excited that it looks so similar to the one in this Refinery29 feature on Gigi Guerra from Madewell that I actually discovered through this entry about polka dots in Rhiannon Leifheit's blog Leibemarlene.

-Then I found a very vintage [love the alliteration] style yellow polka dot dress. I need to alter the too-long straps big time, but other than that, it's rather perfect, and unique for H&M.

-The racerback tank I bought is nothing to write home about. Really, if I bought it while abroad, I probably wouldn't tell anyone.

-Afterwards, I drove into New Britain [harhar] and found Central Connecticut State University for the first time ever [not that I'd ever looked for it before], and it looked different than I'd expected, I guess.

-I then went on a search for CVS, but found the Quick 'n Easy.

This is when I found the desire to study convenience stores. Everything from the buried histories of 7/11, and why you can never actually get a free slurpee on 7/11, to the lesser known Quick 'n Easies, and the lives of the underestimated 'regulars.' Exciting!

Today:

-Oh boy, about a lucky man who made the grade.

-Took a walk around Middletown in my new bright yellow dress. I swear, "Love is All Around" played somewhere. Alas, I need a good tam o' shanter for tossin'.

-Stumbled upon a good basement used bookstore and bought a collection of Modern British short stories for only $4.00 and a little copy of the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam. Now, I'm no collector of ancient Persian literature, but there's actually a story behind this. In my youth, when my Titanic obsession began, I had this computer game called Titanic: Adventure Out of Time, which I believe helped to develop my writing skills as much as anything else. One of the items you, the character who went back in time during the London Blitz, had to collect before the ship sank was a priceless copy of the Rubaiyat. One of the clues was a clipping from it, which inevitably led you to the Scotland Road section of the ship, and when I found this copy in the bookstore, the page I happened to open right up to was this verse! It was Fate, and most importantly, it's lyrical and packed full of beautiful images.

-I also stumbled upon some natural fiber clothing store and there was a top with a vest, which created an identical top half of Han Solo's famous outfit. I really wish I'd taken a photo to prove it, but my sneaky iPhone camera skills are in the early stages. I could have bought it, and I probably know a few people who'd buy it back off me.

-I then drove around blasting Herman's Hermits and Brian & Michael.

I don't usually do list-style, or particularly long entries, but, uh.

Yeah, well.

interlude.

Freelance writing: I really, really want to do a piece on the American convenience store. Studying silly things about this country is really the number one activity that keeps me quasi-alright with stickin' around here. This is the first time I've really been inspired to go into freelance writing. Now, to find a magazine that's interested in the culture of convenience stores. It could be really exciting! More on this later [on convenience stores, not whatever I was just talking about].

Slimming down my list of grad schools I'm applying to is the most redundant activity on my To Do list. Every time I attempt it, I slightly change the order of preference, stare at it, minimize Text Edit, and walk away to go make toast.

My ideal man should wear big fuzzy sweaters made of Scottish wool and be really good at building bookcases.

fantastic.

[the fantastic mister fox is great!]

Mister Wes Anderson, I'm a little bit of in love with you.

[...half the life aquatic team is in it!]

an anecdote, a thank you note.

When I was in high school, and full of angst, I was told that if I didn't go to college, I would have to work at Cumberland Farms. Later, when I started college, and was relentlessly mopey, I was told that if I didn't finish college and get my Bachelor's degree, I would have to work at Cumberland Farms.

Not until I'd been living in Rhode Island for quite some time did I even know what Cumberland Farms was [as it turns out, there aren't very many of them in the area of Connecticut in which I grew up], but this little detail didn't stop the threat from working its magic.

Around-about a year ago, I became so acquainted with the place that it became casually known to me as the Rhody title Cumby's, and I became a 'regular' [a title that's been attributed to me at a growing list of establishments in the northeastern Rhode Island/southeastern Mass regions], and am greeted with a smile and often a sexy-joke from those who you don't really want a sexy-joke from [very few men are allowed the sexy-joke] at chosen Cumby's shops in areas I've worked or had relationships with guys who like to sleep more than me [truthfully, a pattern, not a one-time thing].

I got my Bachelor's degree, but honestly, Cumby's really helped me get there, as a survival tactic. Every occupation has its glory. ¡Viva la tienda abierta norteamericana!

[truth be told, i semi- freetranslated that. i don't know any spanish, but really wanted to say 'viva la' something. convenience store. that's not something rosetta stone teaches, is it? someone throw me a bone, and some spanish grammar skills. how will i ever thank fernando torres for kicking a ball into the seat next to me? just kidding...he knows english. oh, continued...]

Continued! Rafa left Liverpool FC the other day. Nuts. Shocked, but it might have been time. The Reds need something new or they'll forever be stuck in this mire of mediocrity that soo does not suit them. See ya, Rafa. It's been good times, champ.

either/or

What made 'Whose Line Is It Anyway' awesome when I was thirteen was that I found it hilarious and it gave my friends and I a simple mock-television show to do with my parents' circa 1980s camcorder. It was just intellectual, manic, and vain enough of an activity.

What makes 'Whose Line Is It Anyway' awesome at twenty-one has nothing to do with any of those things, and everything to do with the rad 1990s shirts they wear.

hit him again, smitty

When we purchase things that, collectively, compliment each other, it is the most subtle, and yet evident, display of exactly how we are feeling at that moment, especially when it's during a severe thunderstorm and everybody, and nobody, wants to be shopping.

local children dude.

The Children of the Corn films almost always - No, always - Involve a young married couple driving around in a place they don't belong, acting completely perplexed by every element of their situation, along with a bunch of kids that are hilariously not creepy, and one kid who's pretty damn creepy. And there's your formula.

Not what Mister SK had in mind, but works for late-night silly.