Blog Awards

Firstly thank you very much to Akoss,




and secondly to Rod ,



So I have to do seven random facts about myself.

1. When at home I live on a farm.
2. I'm really fussy about notebooks and the lines have to be just right.
3. I have a strange phobia of the bottom of boats and ship wrecks.
4. I'm been a huge Mcfly fan since I was fourteen and have seen them a ridiculous amount of times.
5. My favourite author is Daphne du Maurier,
6. I'm writing my dissertation on her at the moment
7. Despite my hatred of the bottom of boats and fish, I love swimming.

PHEW!

And now give the awards to some other bloggers;

Stephanie
Ella
Jess
Jolene

I wasn't sure how many people I had to give it to, so I just did a few... I'll leave it at that for now, just to get this posted... finally! Apologies if you have already had these! Now to the challenge...

And it's all over.

What a hectic week it's been. Handed in an essay, had tonnes of rehearsals happening every day, Friday was my birthday, with rehearsals again the evening, and Saturday was also spent all day rehearsing and then the show itself, followed by the after show party, which meant that I didn't get to bed until past 4.30 in the morning, before getting up for chapel in the morning. I went to bed at nine last night, unsurprisingly, and didn't wake up until 9 this morning... I definitely needed that.
But now I have to catch up on the reading for this week (I should be doing that now) and catch up on blogging and all of that,and writing, and also revisit my dissertation... oh yeah.... THAT.

Oh well. I'll do it. I have that horrible feeling that it's all over though (that will be the last one of those shows I'm in as I graduate this year, but I'm hoping to come back and watch next year). At the same time I'm relieved that it went well and it's over and that we raised loads of charity, but at the same time, I'm sad because I enjoyed doing it so much, and it was so much fun, rehearsing with my friends all the time and writing it, and having a good time, and well, we became our characters. I'm also like, well what do I do now?!

I know I have loads of stuff to do, but I'm still sad. I feel a great sense of loss today (and happiness at having caught up on sleep...yesterday was a weird day). It's that sense of deflation, which comes with both my birthday and the musical having come and passed so quickly. You know, like at the end of a party when you just have all the dirty things to clear up? It's like that.

My birthday, while I didn't do anything special, was lovely, and my friends were all so lovely and generous to me. I got lots of cakes, and presents and cards, and I'm lucky to have so many lovely friends. I'm always surprised, but they're all wonderful. I'm old now. Or at least I feel old... which makes me think I need to update that profile about myself... ah man :( I'm beginning to ramble again.

Although there's still stuff to be excited about; I'm going to one of my favourite places at the weekend, in Cornwall, so I can't wait for that :D

Also, there's a new challenge so I'm going to try and get round to doing that soon, and I've been awarded a couple of blog awards, so I'm going to post about them soon!

Song Playlists

I started doing something today that I have never done before, but have seen other people talk about before: I started making a play list for my characters for this latest new exciting story. Maybe it was something to do with the fact that I didn't want to edit my essay anymore. There just suddenly seemed loads of songs that I thought, yes, that is that character. Which is all very exciting.

This week is a busy one; I have an essay due in, it's my birthday, and the annual MethAng musical, which means lots of last minute rehearsals and line learning! I had my family down over the weekend, which is why I didn't blog, which was lovely - although my brother said he'd somehow managed to find my blog (hey btw....) which was kinda ironic after my post about keeping worlds separate. Oh well. I both dread and look forward to this week. More look forward to I think. Last year I got ill and I've got my fingers crossed that it won't happen again... which is why I should go to bed now.

Although it's a bit of a last minute panic in some respects, I'm really looking forward to the musical - which isn't actually a musical anymore - this weekend. We seem to have taken our characters a bit too much to heart, and as we wrote the parts for ourselves, we kinda are becoming our characters. Although none of us are actors really, and we just do this every year to raise money for charity; a tradition that has been passed down through the society and never stopped, we all enjoy it and it is such good fun - when will I ever get a chance to do anything like that again? And, in a sad way, it makes me think that this is sort of what it must be like to be part of something like Team Starkid. We are all so close anyway, it's great fun, and it's brilliant to be able to be part of something so creative and fun. We did spend a few hours in the pub this evening however, basically being our characters and discussing back story and stuff..... and we keep automatically calling each other by our character names; alright until you know that they are the four horsemen of the apocalypse,and we're addressing one another as 'Death', 'War', 'Famine' and 'Conquest'... what other people must think.

Anyway, away from the point, not that I really had a point to this.

Writing wise I am still writing this new idea, although I am now feeling that I need to go back to my other projects and edit, although ideas are still swirling round my mind, there are some things I really need to sort out with that idea. Weirdly I find it easier to start and then go back and plan the rest. Or something like that anyway.

I need to finish that song play list as well....

But right now I need to sleep.

Challenge.

Write a short story/flash fiction story in 200 words or less, excluding the title. It can be in any format, including a poem. Begin the story with the words, “Shadows crept across the wall”. These five words will be included in the word count.

The inspiration/characters for this come from the new thing that I've been writing.

I was about to write 'it's really short'.. but that's kinda the point, so I won't. Here you go:

Shadows crept across the wall. Rose pulled her bedcovers up around her tightly, and watched them. She wasn’t afraid anymore.

And if they were coming for her, she was powerful enough to fight them away. Yet she knew that if they were coming, they would be coming for him, for Joseph.

She was ice cold; but she no longer noticed that. She had long grown used to the feeling that she was living within a fridge. She closed her eyes, and listened, pushing the shadows away. She could hear the wind coming nearer, roaring and whirling as it raced its way towards her, and she knew, as the shadows crept closer, and the wind grew closer, that it was nearly time.

She kept her eyes closed and concentrated harder.

He had taught her well; for the winds seemed to retreat as she concentrated and soon she was at the centre of the storm – the eye of the storm as they said, and it was nothing but a breeze swirling around her.

Rose smiled to herself, a smile full of knowledge and confidence.

It wasn’t time for him to go. Not quite yet. As she opened her eyes, the shadows recoiled.

Keeping Up...

I'm trying my best to keep up with everything; I've been completely snowed under by work, and it seems like there is so much to keep up with at the moment, with all these new blogs and campaigner challenges and everything, so I apologise if I'm not keeping up (I also apologise for all this apologising... I'm English, what do you expect?!).

I have had tonnes of work to do (but handed something in today which is a relief) but, as always, I have found the time to do some writing and started something new - which I shouldn't be doing what with all this editing I'm trying to do, but the idea grabbed me and well, I had to... - and I hit 10,000 words on that last night which makes me happy. I will start doing that editing again.... Something struck me today in my dissertation workshop. I know we have tonnes of work and reading and all of that at the moment, and I work hard, and get unnecessarily stressed out. Yet I still make time to write and read what I want to. There were people - which to be fair always happens - saying that they have no time to read anything that's not for their course, nor to do any writing, and I'm just.. well, if you want to do it, you would do it right? That's what I think anyway. But then I wonder if I'm doing something wrong, or missing out on something (maybe the complex social life, but shhh... I do do things...). There is always time to do those things. I think so anyway.

Anyway, I'm using this brief window of time to catch up and post the first challenge, from Rach Writes' campaign. Which I post seperately, because of this ramble...