So many books, so little time

I love reading. I've always loved reading. I remember staying up way past my bedtime reading, I remember sneaking a read ahead of what my mum was reading to me in Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, and having to feign surprise at Tom Riddle being Voldemort   He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named. I remember getting left by my (irresponsible) parents in a book shop for 4 hours, and not even noticing. 

But then life gave me more distractions:
-Phones
-TV
-Laptops
-A University degree

And I found the amount I read getting less and less, and books taking me longer to get through.
But as an unofficial new years goal, I want to read more, and more often.
So far I've read three books, and am on my fourth. Its not as many as I used to get through, but hey, I had exams and reports to do, so cut me some slack, fictional blog-readers!

So far on the Richard Book List-
1)A Short History of Tractors in Ukrainia-Marina Lewycka A million times better than it sounds!
2)The Earth Moved- Amy Stewart It may be about worms, but as my friends would confirm, I loved it
3)Will Grayson Will Grayson- John Green I loved this book almost as much as I love John Green. It was finished in a day, and I highly recommend it!

How much sooner one tires of any thing than of a book- Jane Austin

LifeScouts

So recently I heard about this thing, LifeScouts. Its like scouts, but for grown ups. Instead of getting badges for doing stuff like being able to climb or make knots or start fires (fyi, I had over 35 badges fo'shizzle (fyi fyi I can't pull off fo'shizzle)).

Here it is:

Seeing as I loved scouts so much I stayed on an extra year, I decided to see which Lifescout badges I already own, and blog about any that there is actually anything to say about.

Fishing- I have a fishing rod, but am ever so lousy at fishing its unreal. 

-I went seafishing and mainly caught other peoples lines that were on the other side of the boat.

-I went fishing with friends and managed to catch

1)A tree

2)A branch

3)A very small fish

before we were chased off by angry ducks

I'm REALLY bad at fishing

Well the temperature inside is frightful, but the snow is so delightful

In what's appearing to be an annual tradition in the house, the boiler decided to break again today, and the house soon got down to a toasty 10°C. Fun!

Because we're sensible, mature, grown ups,we build dens. Vics was a lot more aesthetically pleasing than mine:

It worked quite well, got it up to 18°C, so I think I won (until it collapsed).

We were hoping to go sledging today, but decided not to, as going back to a house that is colder than outside was not too appealing.

However, we did go sledging yesterday, and it was awesome:

(The first and last pic by me, the others by FranklyVic)

But then we realised that sledging without getting hurt was no fun, so we decided to  be idiots.

(Again, all but the last pic are from FranklyVic)

until the sledge (and me) had a horrific collision with a hidden brick, cutting short the afternoon

Photo by  FranklyVic

Photo by  FranklyVic

I love the snow.

At which point, we went home, getting a new sledge on  the way to use next time

Testing

Its exam time at the moment, meaning that my life is too full of boring stuff like revision & essay writing. This means not as much time doing fun stuff that I can write about/photograph, and thus a lot less blogging.

As V would confirm, I'm awful at sticking with something. Be it blogs, going for runs, getting a new hobby, at some point a little voice inside my head says "Just give up, no-one cares, you're awful at this, stop wasting your time trying to be something you're not". So there's a good chance that I'll give up on this blog milarky. I don't want to, but it may happen. 

So this is a test for myself.

Nothing compared to that stint Jesus did in the desert 

(btw, I once played Jesus in an adaptation of this, stole the show)

 But a test all the same

See you on the other side (hopefully)

:)

The most middle of 2012

After watching a video by the hilarious Wheezy Waiter:

I had a think, what would I rate as the most middle things of 2012?

Film

I quite liked 'The Watch' when I went to the cinema. It wasn't the greatest film I've ever seen, but the jokes were funny, the actors were alright, and I felt I got my moneys worth of jokes and story. Its not going to win awards, but its not going to win any razzies either

Photo from this guy

TV Show

This was a hard one to choose, I found Breaking Bad very average, but its not really from this year, so not sure if it should count. So I'll have to go with the new smegging season of Red Dwarf on Dave. It was OK, better than the latter series and the horrid Back to Earth majobby. But it was no-where near the quality of the original four series. 

Band

I'm undecided between Rita Ora and Fun. (I have no idea why they have a full stop after the name, thats silly, punctuation shouldn't be messed with). Rita Ora seems to be a 2012 Gwen Stefani. Her songs are ones I can put up with when they're blaring out at work, but I wouldn't go to see her if she played Sheffield. Unless it was free, it seems I have no limits to who I'll listen to if its free (Jedward, The Saturdays, Craig David, Joe  Mcelderry- please don't judge :/)

Fun (± the full stop) seem like very generic indie pop, the kind of thing I know I should like, but find it very...meh

Song

Gangnam style-Yeah, its funny I guess. oh look, someone miming to it in a hilarious way, thats quite funny. Oh look, its being played on the radio, most the humour is in the video, but I'll let it pass. Oh, its being played again, and again, and again, and again and again, and again, and again and again, and again, and again and again, and again, and again

"Play any song a billion times and its starts getting annoying. Apart from he-mans cover of 4 Non Blondes' song 'Whats Up', thats always funny"

-Me

Whats your most middle of 2012?

The 12 sofas of Christmas

We're in that confusing time of year, between Christmas and New Years Eve when:

-We all have absolutely no clue what day of the week it is (its Thursday, right?)

-According to adverts, we need to get a gazillion sofas because they're a bit cheaper

-According to my true love, I need two turtle doves and a partridge

-According to mum, I really really want to try the turkey cheesecake, or turkey smoothie, or other such turkey foodstuffs
-According to Wikipedia, its the feast of Stephen (which reminds me of a joke;
Q-How does Father Christmas like his pizzas?
A-Deep-pan, crisp and even

-According to the TV scheduling people, I need to watch a show about tap-dancing dogs, and Disney's Sword in the Stone (actually, both of those sound appealing)

-According to customers at work we all need to get so drunk we don't know what we're doing

-According to me, we should watch rubbish TV, do enough work that I feel I'm on top of it, but not enough that I work up a sweat, and 'help' the family with the tough task of eating all the sweets, drinking all the spirits/beers, and being merry (or Mary if I'm feeling in a panto theme)

Merry Christmas(plus or minus a couple of days)

The Holly and the Ivy, the Baubles and the Tree.

Our house seems to become a forest every Christmas, probably due to my mum being a pagan, and it being Yule or something, I don't really listen.

We have our spots to get holly, ivy, pine cones and fir twigs. It wasn't the best year for holly berries, so it took a while of searching the country roads for holly bushes. We got a few funny looks, and I got my foot run over by my mums car :(

But eventually, we got the following haul

Although we did cheat, and get the mistletoe from the market, it was too high up to reach :(

With the decorations down from the attic, and the tree brought in from the back garden, , it was time to  put the decorations up

And in the darkness:

With the Christmas plants in, and some apples, oranges and chillies bought, the rest of the house was soon just as chrismassy

Although, I always insist on some 'less grown up' decorations 

MERRY CHRISTMAS EVERYONE