Home Sweet Home

So fingers, toes etc... (etc?) crossed that non of my current housemates come across this little outlet of mine, as I am about to have a little bit of a rant that may (will) shine an unflattering light on them...

I moved to London in November, so I have been here for nearly one year. And man, has it been one amazing year. I am lucky enough to have a job that I love, with a company that I am insanely proud to be part of. It is hard work. It is tough... Is it grueling every single day? Yes. Do I see this as a bad thing? No. Also, I have a cracking bunch of friends which allows life outside work to be rather fruitful.

Unfortunately for mem, when I first moved over I made the rookie mistake of rushing the house-hunting process and pretty much running with the first available flat I came across. The flat it self, lacks any sort of personality and has never felt like 'home' to me. The people I live with, are painfully ignorant individuals that couldn't hold a stimulating conversation if their lives depended on it. I tend to be a rather busy aul' be diring the week, and i'm rarley in the house at the weekend, and so I spend very little time with/around them. But it's only lately that I have realised, I bet that wouldn't be the case if I lived with people I could actually get along with.

Last week, after what can only be described as an absolute BALL ACHE of a new-home-hunt, I found my new place. It is a beautiful house (with a garden... yay) and i'm very happy to say that it has a real personality to it. The house mates (all three of them) seem really nice - easygoing, considerate, friendly and educated! I state this with a fair degree of confidence as I made a point of meeting them a few times before agreeing to move in.

It is so important, who you surround yourself with in life. Needless to say, those you live with.... no bloody exception.

As I was writing this one of my housemates arrived home, with four blokes (all total tossers) that he has clearly never met before tonight, and they are currently all sitting in the kitchen (that is littered with the crap that my dearest co-habiters haven't bothered to clean up after them) snorting their noses off and talking what I can safely bet my life on, is absolute trash.

I am a respectable human being.... GET ME OUT OF HERE.

Roll on moving day next week - I have no doubt this will substantial improvement to my life here in London Town.

B x

A Moment in Time

*A picture I took while over in NJ Shore this summer on vacation. Went exploring on my bike and came across this place. Needless ro say, I got snap happy*

There is something about photography that I think I will always appreciate more than any other art form... Yes people, that includes music, and food. My number one and two favourite things on this planet, respectively.

I guess it all depends on the individual, but whatever it is about being able to look back at an image, and instantly be transported back to exactly how you felt at that moment in time. What you were thinking and why. The camera somehow captures that, but only, if on some level, you want it to.

I think I have more photographs to my name than I do exhales (slight exaggeration but you get the idea), and I love the thought of knowing that, hopefully, I always will. i have said it before and I will say it again, No place is boring, if you've had a good night's sleep and a camera to hand.

There is this wonderful quote by photographer Ansel Williams - "There are always two people in every picture: the photographer and the viewer". I am inclined to agree.

Great Movie, Epic Soundtrack

"If I drive for you, you give me a time and a place. I give you a five-minute window, anything happens in that five minutes and I'm yours no matter what. I don't sit in while you're running it down"

Based on the novel by James Sallis, Drive - Five Stars for you, Refn.

This is one of the best flicks i've seen in a while. Refn's style seems to be centered around drawing out key scenes to make a slow film more punctuated, and I think it works. Gosling's character, unnamed, is pared back and raw, that works too. I think he has a real knack for (as one film reviewer put it) "outwardly affectless, inwardly seething characters". We are no watching this gent turn into a major a-list movie star

The soundtrack, for me, is the cherry on top. I haven't been able to tear myself away from it this weekend. One song it particularly is likely to stay with me long after my unconventional crush on The Goss will - College feat. Electric Youth - A Real Hero.

Life IS what you make it

Life really is what you make it.



I watched Steve Jobs' commencement speech at the 2005 Stanford University Graduation again this evening, and I find it genuinely upsetting that such a truly beautiful mind is no longer with us.

Jobs speaks with such wisdom and insightfulness that I find it incredibly infectious. It makes me want to be better, to do better. It makes me feel like i'm not trying/working hard enough (no harm in that i think). From beginning to end, he incapsulates aspects of life that are so lost on so many of us, me included.

My favourite excerpt from this speech - "Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma, which is living with the results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of others' opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary."

Yes.

B