Not feeling very well, Neighbours 'The Fire' and giving relationship advice! Wednesday 18th November 2015

Hey guys, hope you are all doing well today? It’s almost 3 o’clock on Wednesday so we are almost over that hump now and on the slide towards the weekend.

I haven’t been feeling very well this week.  I get random little bouts of sinusitis that I tend to get every few weeks.  I have been getting them since I had glandular fever about 5 years ago, and I was told that the virus made my immune system super sensitive and it attacks basically everything that it doesn’t like which in turn makes me feel poorly.  When I get the sinusitis it tends to only last for 3 or 4 days and I never get very ill, I just seem to get very congested and have a high temperature and generally feel run down.  I just hate it because it does affect my productivity and mood, but I know it will pass son enough and there are worse things that I could have to live with.

Putting feeling unwell aside, I actually had a very nice weekend.  I stayed with my sister on Friday night at her house in London and had a nice girlie evening watching Goggle-box and Children in need.  On Saturday we went Wedding dress shopping for her and we found ‘The One’.  I wasn’t expecting to actually feel that moved by her choosing a dress but I found it very emotional.  I absolutely adore the dress that she chose, and I think I knew as soon as I saw her in it that I thought it was made for her and that she looked like a perfect Disney princess in it.  It is definitely a very special moment being there when somebody chooses the dress to say their  ‘I Do’s’ in, so  if you haven’t ever been wedding dress shopping with somebody and you get the opportunity, then go for it.

On Sunday I had a complete chill out day just catching up on TV.  My Dad was out for the whole day so it was nice to have the place to myself.  One thing that I am still getting used to with moving from living on my own to living with somebody is how rare it is to get full day’s to yourself.  I caught up on X Factor in the morning which I am really loving this year.  I really like Che, Louisa and Lauren and I was really obsessed with Monica so I was gutted to see her go.  I am still not really sure why the public didn’t take to her because we normally like very down to earth people, but I think it is hard for the contestants in the early stage of the competition to get their personalities across in very short VT clips.

On Sunday afternoon it was time for me to catch up on something that I have been putting off for a while – watching ‘The Fire’ episodes of Neighbours.  If you don’t watch Neighbours then this won’t interest you at all, so apologies for that.  I am literally so obsessed with Neighbours that whenever there is a big episode coming up where people might get hurt or will be in danger, I generally have to psych myself up to watch it.  I put my brave pants on Sunday and watched the episodes, and although there was a lot of drama during those episodes I was relieved that nobody died.  I thought my heart might burst when Tyler told Paige that he has been secretly in love with her, I feel like I have been waiting the whole of the year for Tyler and Paige to just get together already!

As well as not being very well, this week has been a little bit stressful because I have been helping a friend who is going through a difficult time in her relationship.  It’s been around three years since I broke up with my ex and during 2015 I suddenly found closure on the whole situation after three painful years of working things through.  Even though a lot of time has passed since the break-up, I still find other people’s relationship problems very triggering, but I still want to help people that I care about.  When you have been in a situation where you have walked away from a horrible relationship and never gone back, and ultimately survived it all, you just want to tell people who are being messed around to do the same, but you have to put yourself back in that position and remember how hard you found it to get the strength to walk away.  I guess what I find difficult about helping people with their relationship problems is the amount of time you spend giving advice and helping them, only for them to listen to none of it and just gloss over everything once their partner apologises and tells them what they want to hear.  I think what I try to remember is that it is only my job to be a supportive friend and that the relationship is on its own path and that my friend has to learn her own lessons, just like I had to three years ago.

 

When I see other people’s relationship drama’s it does make me feel very glad that I am no longer in a stressful relationship that is full of anxiety and tension.  I guess what I am trying to say is, that at the moment I am glad I am single!

 

Thanks for listening! xxx

Finally settling in, Eastenders and I need more time to read! Wednesday 11th November 2015

 

Hi guys! Happy hump day! I hope all of your weeks are going well.

It’s been almost two weeks now since I moved back home to my Dad’s house and I am finally starting to settle down.  I think now that the craziness of actually packing my whole flat up and handling the move is a distant memory, I am finding things a lot easier.

I think I expected a bit too much of myself initially.  With the last two months practically a write off due to holidays, being ill, packing and dealing with viewings from new tenants from the flat I was living in, I had barely done a scrap of work in all that time.  As each day became a mountain of move related stuff to navigate through I longed to just sit and my computer and work on projects.  So after the move was done I expected myself to just fire straight back into everything but as I have found out it is not as simple as that.

I think it takes a week or so for you to get over the actual stress of moving, so it was more towards the end of last week that I began to find myself excited at the prospect of being able to work on my projects again.  I am still feeling those little pangs of longing for my old home and my routines but slowly but surely my childhood home is starting to feel like my home again. 

I have only allowed myself to unpack clothes and essential items, and I plan to leave everything else in boxes.  I want to keep myself as motivated as possible to be able to move out into my own place as soon as possible, in past experience I have found that the more stuff you have to pack up the more deterred you can be from actually moving again.  So I am making myself a bit uncomfortable again to keep myself focused. 

I am slowly adjusting to working away from home again, and although it has its challenges I do feel like I am getting a lot done, and I like that I have a definite time that I finish work each day, which is something I haven’t had for the last two years.  I am definitely sleeping like a baby each night at the moment.

I had a mixed weekend with a trip to London on Saturday for a girlie lunch and then a quiet Sunday where I got some home bits done.  I am definitely finding it a bit different living somewhere that is quite cut off from shops etc., so I am going to try and make sure that I spend time at the weekends with friends that live in London to ensure that I don’t just stay in a lot because it’s too much effort to go out anywhere locally.

Now that all the craziness of moving is over I am slowly starting to get back into catching up with TV shows again.  I am really loving Eastenders at the moment and I am long overdue a catch up on season 2 of Empire.  I also really want to check out Scream Queens as I have heard great things about that show.  I am trying really hard to push myself with reading this week and I have started reading Beauty by Louise Mensch.  I am really enjoying it so far, it’s just the challenge of finding time to read it especially when you are writing your own book!

Thanks for reading, catch up with you again soon xxx

A little bit uncomforatble, stress awareness day and finishing landline! Thursday 5th November 2015

Hey guys, I hope the week is going well for you guys, if it’s not then it’s just one more day till the weekend.  So..I have been living back at my Dad’s house for exactly a week now and I have to say that I am still adjusting to things.  For me it is not just a change in home and town but a change in my working environment too.  As I have told you guys before, I have been lucky enough for the last 2 years to be able to afford to write and create full time from the flat that I lived in, which meant that I could be very flexible about how I worked.  I tended to be more laid back in the mornings and take the time to do things like catch up on TV shows and YouTube, read, journal and run errands and then work from the afternoon till about 8.30pm, and then I would usually do bits of work at the weekends as and when I could fit it around seeing friends and family.  Generally I preferred having the mornings as my ‘me’ time.

Now that I am living with my Dad and he works at home, I am having to work away from the house as I know that I don’t feel particularly creative when other people’s routines are disturbing or distracting me, so I guess that I am moving into more of a 9 to 5 work style for now.  While I don’t think that it is the ideal way for working a creative job, there are definitely some pro’s to it, like the fact that there is a clear time that you switch off from work and also that sense of coming home from work that you don’t get really when you work from home.

After having so much independence for the last 2 years I am finding it strange having to discuss meal plans and bathroom routines with somebody else, and I am still feeling quite unsettled.  I realised earlier this week that I feel very uncomfortable at the moment, and then it struck me that in some ways maybe that’s a good thing.  Being uncomfortable with where you are, means that you will push yourself a bit more to be where you would like to be.  I know that not having my own space and not wanting to be stuck in with my Dad will push me to get out and see friends more and do more things out of the house and that can’t be a bad thing.  We all get into a comfort zone every now and then and it’s good to get forced out of it.  I know that this living situation is just temporary and that will things will improve financially for me soon and I will be able to move into my own place again.

Up until I moved last week I hadn’t really been working properly on projects for about two months.  Mainly because I went on holiday at the beginning of September and then when I returned I had to get my flat sorted out to be viewed by letting agents and potential tenants.  After that I suddenly came down with a nasty virus that it took me two weeks to get over and by the time I was better it was time to start the mammoth task of getting my whole flat packed up ready to move.  Since I have worked for myself in a creative role I tend to go through phases like that, where everything seems to conspire against me being able to focus on work, and that can be a downside of not having a lot of definition between your work and home life.  Prior to all of that chaos I had been working on a project that I was very excited about, and I have recommenced work on it this week and I have found myself reconnecting with it and feeling that buzz from it again.  I even decided on the perfect title for it this week, which made me super excited to carry on working on it.

Other than readjusting to a new life, I managed to finish Landline by Rainbow Rowell this week.  I didn’t love it as much as I wanted to, but the story held me and I really liked the ending.  That was my second Rainbow Rowell book, and I am still not really a full convert to her writing style yet, but I do think she had the best book cover of 2014, no doubt about it.  Up next on my reading list is ‘Beauty’ by Louise Mensch.  I am going to try and use this whole working away from home thing to up my reading game a bit.  I set my goodreads challenge at 50 books, but there is absolutely no way I will manage that, but I think I can make 25 books if I push myself for these two months.  Although that is only 50% of my target, when you think about the fact that some people never read anything at all, then 25 books in a year is pretty good going.

It was national stress awareness day yesterday which kind of leads me to a good opportunity to say thank you to people that have been buying and reading my book ‘a safe place’ this week.  Even though I wrote the book two and a half years ago and it’s been out for almost eight months, I still honestly feel touched every time I see that somebody bought a copy or borrowed it on Amazon.  Stress awareness day made me reflect a lot on the time of my life that I wrote about in ‘a safe place’ I remember how hellish real stress was, so I just want to say that if any of you are going through that right now please take some steps to start changing behaviours and looking after yourself in the best possible way, because you and your health are so important.

 

Thanks for reading, I will write again at some point this weekend. Xxx

Drinking problems, remote control car fun, and a grid guy? Neighbours Episode 7195 Friday 4th September 2015

Hey, I am back on my blog today with a write up of episode 7195 of Neighbours, I hope that you enjoy it!

After Paul gives Terese the secret letter and she says that it doesn’t belong to her, Terese thinks that it belongs to Brad and she confronts him about it. Brad says that he didn’t write the letter and that she is his wife and he would never say he regretted marrying her.  Hmm, I think we can all imagine that’s not true though!
 

 

Nate, Tyler, Russell, Karl, Brad and Aaron decide to have a remote control car rally in Ramsay Street and to film it for Toadie.  The guys ask Paige to be their grid girl for the rally and she is offended and says that it is completely sexist.  I love it when fierce, feminist Paige comes out to play!

 

 

Brad thanks Lauren for letting him store his wood in the shed and says that he will carve her something to say thank you.  If it is anything like the first thing that he carved then I would pass if I was Lauren.

 

 

Paige and Lauren challenge the guys to a remote control car race and say that Paige will be their grid girl if there is also a grid guy.  Aaron agrees to be the grid guy and takes his outfit very seriously, queue some full on lycra!  I really enjoyed the car rally element of this episode, it kind of reminded me of Neighbours in the 80’s and 90’s when the characters used to play cricket and basketball together a lot in the street.  I know that they still do that, but definitely not as much as they used to, so it was nice to see some street socialising in an episode.
 

 

 

 

There is also an intimate moment during the car rally when Aaron helps Nate to steer the remote control chemistry.  I am definitely loving the sweet chemistry between those two!
 

 

 

Susan overhears Brad saying to Karl that he doesn’t want to talk about Terese and Susan gets worried and goes to see Terese. 

Terese talks to Susan and makes her see that she is being slightly paranoid about everything.  The way that Terese just stays indoors during this episode and gets irritated at the noise of the car rally kind of summed up everything that I dislike about Terese.

Lauren and Paige beat the boys at the racing and they celebrate with drinks at the Waterhole.  At the Waterhole Tyler is relieved that he wont have to work with Russ, and Karl says that he is proud of him for giving his Dad another chance.

 

Lauren and Brad run into each other by the lake and reflect on the past.  Brad says that they have always been drawn to each other but Lauren says that they have never been able to get the timing right, and that they will always be connected by Paige and that she will always be a symbol of them.  I really loved this scene of Brad and Lauren kind of finally admitting the real feelings between them and of the idea of two people that can’t ever seem to be together but will always have this person that they both love to bind them to each other forever, and who represents the love that they share.

 

 

Tyler is thrilled when Paige challenges him to a game of pool and Nate thinks he is excited about it because he is still into Paige.  Yes of course he is still into Paige and we are just waiting for Brennan to get out of the way for this to happen.  I can’t even tell you how much I want Paige and Tyler to be a thing!

When Brad tells Sheila that Terese has fallen off the wagon with dry August, Sheila tells Brad about Terese stealing wine from the Waterhole and that she thinks Terese has a drinking problem.  Even though I have no love for Terese I did kind of think that it was a bit low of Sheila to expose her to Brad, but I guess that she was concerned for her well-being and we can let her off for that.

 

 

 

Thanks for reading this post.  All images used in this post and their associated copyright belong to 11 and Neighbours.

 

 

 

 

Feeling home sick! Monday 2nd November 2015

Hi guys, hope everyone is doing well on this Monday!  Last week I talked about the fact that I was due to move back home to my Dad’s after two years of living and working in pretty much a dream flat, in an ideal location.  Well the move has happened now, and while I am glad that all of the stress of new tenant viewings, packing, sorting, throwing out rubbish, closing utility accounts and moving furniture is over, I am finding making the transition from living on my own to living with somebody else quite difficult.

I am used to getting up in the mornings and just having my own routines and rituals, and as I work for myself at the moment it can quite often be a good couple of hours before I actually speak to anyone in person.  As a creative person I highly value that time to just think, read, watch things that inspire me, or to plot out some work ideas.  As soon as the move happened at the end of last week I found myself getting irritated at having to discuss dinner plans, and what times I would be coming and going from home. 

I also couldn’t help but be reminded of the last time I moved back home when my relationship of 11 years had ended, and at the weekend I found myself not wanting to be at home too much because I didn’t want to be sucked back in to that frame of mind. 

I think the thing that has been most difficult to deal with is the fact that I just feel a bit home sick at the moment.  I am craving my old flat and that feeling of being at home, and it hasn’t really sunk in yet that I won’t ever be going back there.

I know that I am luckier than a lot of people.  I have a roof over my head, a bed, central heating, internet and demand TV.  So even know I am not exactly where I want to be, I know that everything is temporary and this is just a bit of a detour on the way to the next exciting adventure of adulthood.

 

Thanks for reading xxx