Seasons Greetings

Oh!! This is only a short update because I promised I would let you know!!!

So, we all know that Christmas was yesterday, MERRY CHRISTMAS EVERYONE!!!! HOPE YOU HAD AN AWESOME DAY!!! AND STUFF!!

So, a couple of posts ago I mentioned that I was learning the ukulele and my granddad set me a challenge for learning christmas songs and I said that I would let you know how that went, so here goes…

It went pretty good for someone who has only been playing for a couple of months :) had a couple of singalong songs and stuff but all good :D 

With Cats and Dogs

So, I have two puppies right? They are almost a year old now, so probably can’t really be called puppies for much longer, but they will almost be my little babies  :D

They are tricolour border collies, black, white and brown, and one of them has a LOT of brown in them, so they don't really look like border collies, more like Kelpies? I think, I’m not sure, I don't really know a whole heap about dogs.

So, I am bringing this up because we got them fairly recently right, just under a year ago? And we also have a pet cat, who is about six or seven now. Everyone knows the ongoing feud between cats and dogs, their long time hatred between the two species, almost as bad as the Capulet’s and the Montague’s from Romeo and Juliet. Bringing in these two strange and awful creatures into this old cats life probably wasn't the nicest thing we could have done, but we did it regardless, because dogs are awesome, right?

I still remember the first time they met. If I wasn’t feeling sorry for our cat, then it would have been hilarious. I believe that if we only had one puppy then their meeting would have gone down a little, or really, a lot better.

So, what happened was, the cat walked outside being all curious, probably thinking what is that awful smell! And because cats are naturally curious, hence the expression ‘curiosity killed that cat’, it ventured outside and had no idea what was awaiting her.

Trixie (our cat) only saw one of the puppies at first, Zalika (who at the time was a totally coward) and things seemed just fine. They had a bit of a standoff and a little growling but they didn’t hiss or bark or try to scratch the other. That was until the other puppy (Bridie) heard what was going on and came to join the party!! Now that there were two dogs against the one cat, things got messy.

Dogs are playful and friends, and these two are sisters, so they like to work together, even today when they are older! Now, the puppies were small, but still larger than our cat. I feel really awful for Trixie, these puppies had no idea that cats even existed so they kind of circled her and ganged up on her without realising that it was absolutely terrifying her!!!!

So naturally, that's when the hissing and barking started.

Trixie attacked first, of course, because she felt threatened. And soon, we needed to grab the puppies to let Trixie get away from them. It really was not a fair fight.

Ever since then, the cat has avoided the puppies at all cost! She now permanently lives upstairs (we have a gate on the stairs so it is a puppy free zone), and whenever she wants to go outside, she will sit on the stairs just above where the gate is and wait for someone to see her and open the front door. She then takes a few minutes before she darts out the door, because she has to double check the puppies aren’t around so it is actually safe for her to leave her sanctuary behind the gate.

And the puppies aren’t stupid either. Sometimes they wait at the gate down the bottom, as if waiting for Trixie to come down and play. They occasionally will sit there and stare at each other from opposite sides of the gate, Mexican Standoff style. And every time Bridie is let inside the house, she immediately darts for the stairs to check if her ‘friend’ is there.

Ahhhhhh, animals are so cool. And funny. And stupid. They make me giggle.

Hehehe

Ta ta for now!!

Down the Rabbit Hole

My favourite quote of all time, at least that I can remember, is from Lewis Carroll's, Alice in Wonderland, when the Mad Hatter asks Alice, “Why is a raven like a writing desk?” He asks this towards the start but even by the end when Alice asks him for the answer, he responds with, “I have no idea.”

This is truly brilliant. Because it has left us pondering, and grappling for straws, imagining what the answer could possibly be! Maybe the raven’s feather forms a quill, used on the writing desk? Maybe they are the same colour? Maybe because they both can see the world? One by flying over it, the other by creating it through the written word?

I was so enthralled by the question that I tried to Google the answer. Several answers came up. Some of them include:

• “Poe wrote on both”, Sam Lloyd
• “Because there is a ‘b’ in both and an ‘n’ in neither”, Aldous Huxley
• “A writing desk is a rest for pens and a raven is a pest for wrens”, Anonymous

Carroll himself said that the question has no answer, but after serious convincing from fans, he did give us one. He said, “Because it can produce a few notes, though they are very flat; and it is never put with the wrong end in front.” He really is quite an exceptional writer.

That answer right there is, of course, brilliant all by itself. But it completely stumps everyone who was looking for a real answer. And well, I have come up with an answer for myself.

The question causes us to think and use our imagination. Remember the other quote, “Sometimes I’ve believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast.” Carroll’s question is just a catalyst to start our crazy, imaginative process, trying to decipher how a raven could possibly be like a writing desk. It is simply, just a way for us to think of some ridiculous and impossible things for breakfast (or at whatever time we are actually being asked this question).

*Sigh* Now I want to go and read Alice in Wonderland again. Or maybe Into the Looking Glass? Or maybe I should watch the movie? But Animated or Johnny Depp version? Or both? Yes, I am going to go do all those things :)

Catch up later!!!

New Hobbies...I guess

A lot of people have asked me, you’re a uni student, you have heaps of holidays, what do you actually do with your time? I have only been at uni for one year now, so I don’t really know why people expect me to know the answer to this, but I understand how that is a valid question.

I get about two months for winter holidays and about four months over summer. Uni is 24 weeks a year in total, not counting exam time. That is only six months. So, I have half a year off on holidays (this all depends on exam timetables of course).

That is a hell of a long time. Seriously, after I figured out I was literally like OMG holy moly I seriously get that much holidays? Pretty shocking at first.

But then I realised, what the hell am I actually doing or going to do with this time?

Over the last holidays I got a lot of reading done. I’m the kind of person who enjoys buying books and collecting them (and reading them, of course), but I can never keep up with myself. My pile of unread books keeps getting bigger because I can’t read them fast enough! So, I spent my month or so off last time reading as much as I possibly could and I managed to get through quite a big chunk of my collection. (That sounds really awful, it wasn’t like it was difficult or painful, I love reading, that sounds too much like it was torturous).

I plan on doing similar this holidays and although that’s great and all, it’s a little sad and I feel like I should have some new hobbies or something.

Anyway, recently my brother has been doing guitar lessons and is doing well (for a nine year old with three lessons at least). You know how siblings are, so now my other little brother (seven) is a little jealous so my step mum pulled out her old mini guitar and her ukulele so that my slighting older, younger brother could teach the other one. So, then I was like ‘well, now I feel left out so I want to learn!’ (This all has a point I swear).

So then, while my nine year old bro was playing his guitar, and my seven year old bro was playing the mini guitar, and then there was me, playing this tiny ukulele. It was quite a sight to behold.

But anyway, so he taught me a few things on the uke (I had to google how to convert from guitar to ukulele because the strings are different and such but it wasn’t that difficult), I now I am totally hooked. I am teaching myself how to play the ukulele!! It’s been a few weeks already and I am still obsessed.

It’s been years since I was learning an instrument, I was learning piano when I was younger but I think my last lesson was when I was ten years old (and I am eighteen now) so it has been a long time.

The other day when I was home alone, the postman came delivering this huge box thingo. This is normal at our house seeing as we buy practically everything online, and I have learnt to just sign for it and put it on the relevant seat at the kitchen table so that whoever’s it is knows that it has arrived.

So, I signed for it and put it on the table and was about to walk away when I saw the label that was on it. It was from some kind of music store and it was the perfect size for a ukulele. So, after some careful poking and prodding I discovered that I am TOTALLY getting a ukulele for christmas! And I am so excited!! :)

I am officially obsessed and have found my new hobby!! My granddad found out that I was learning and has set me a challenge to learn to play at least one christmas carol by Christmas. So, of course, I have found a whole booklet of songs to learn and have slowly been going through them and I believe that I can learn probably about three by christmas time so yay me haha!! :D

And now I am excited about Christmas for a whole new reason!

I’ll let you know how it goes later I guess, ta ta for now!!

Beautiful and Terrible Words

Do you ever look at a word for too long, and just think it is the weirdest thing in the world? That is just looks wrong? It might be spelt correctly, just a perfectly normal word in a normal sentence or phrase, but the longer you stare at it, the stranger and more ridiculous it seems? This happened to me today.

It was the word ‘among’. It can be pronounced like ‘amung’ but spelt like the word ‘long’. It is so weird. Seriously, just look at it.

AMONG

AMONG

AMONG

AMONG

It is so messed up right? No? Yes? Am I just officially going crazy? Sounds about right to me…I swear that I am not. I am in perfectly good health and absolutely perfectly sane (at the moment at least) but I just cannot get my head around how wrong this word feels to me right now.

But its not even the weirdest word in the English Language, because, lets face it, it is the weirdest language in the world and our grammar just let’s the weirdest things be grammatically correct.

Take this sentence for example. (taken from tumblr, where all the in’s and out’s of the English language is discussed).

Is that not the best and most wonderful sentence in the whole word? How can that seriously make sense, it is a wonderful and beautiful thing.

Did you know that that sentence is cool, but so is this one? Go on, read it again.

Can you believe that saying that that is actually correct? And that ‘that that’ thing is also correct. That is repeating the same word THREE TIMES!! Am I serious? Yes, the fact that that ‘that that’ thing is real is just another reason for my love/hate relationship with the English language. (FOUR TIMES)

So, I’m getting lost again. Let’s go back to ‘among’ shall we?

Among. Is it starting to look weird yet? If it is not, then clearly, I am most definitely going crazy. I mean, don't even get me started on the word ‘amongst’, like seriously? Who came up with these? Who decided that these letters in this combination and order made a perfectly good word that was totally acceptable.

Common Decency

To that teenage couple making out in the back row of the bus, you're not fooling anyone. And please at least do it quietly...

PDA (public displays of affection) is a matter argued over much amongst the youth of today. First, second and third relationships, in school particularly, are so exciting and new, everyone wants to flaunt their new partners to their friends and spend all their time with them. Who wants to hide the most exciting thing in their life? Not me for sure, but where is the line? How can avoid crossing it and becoming that-weird-couple-who-is-always-grossing-people-out?

Well, that line is as fine as can be, I would say, normally a peck on the lips for hello or goodbye is accepted, but full-blown making out is definitely not. Can we find a middle ground? How long can that peck go for before it gets weird for everyone around, watching as friends, or just strangers passing by?

I DO NOT, however, want to see two people sucking each others faces off in a very public place that I cannot remove myself from, short of throwing myself from a moving vehicle. There is the line!! We found it!! If your audience is forced to watch and/or listen to you both exchanging saliva, I think it is safe to say that your PDA is no longer accepted. 

There are just so many little things that get on my nerves. Pet peeves that could be fixed so easily if people were to simply consider others around them! With PDA, yeah, I get it whatever, but even just some people walking around in public don't know how to behave!!  

For example, it is common knowledge to just walk on one side of the footpath not in the middle. I understand if you don't want to walk on the left (as is normal in Australia) and walk on the right, that's fine I can accommodate that. I'm flexible. I can move over. But seriously, please keep to one side!! 

Today, some girl was walking right along the middle and didn't care in the slightest that she pretty much pushed me off the path, right into the muddy puddle next to it.  Thanks a lot by the way. These were my favourite shoes, and now they will never look the same. That is seriously not even an exaggeration!! Ugh!!

Just, please, if you are reading this, keep in mind other people around you. Think, this is a person to, is what I am doing right now going to harm them? Is it unnecessarily annoying? Am I just being a bad person for no apparent reason? It is not that difficult to just have good manners. It’s really not that difficult. Being kind and courteous is not uncool. In fact, people actually like it better!!

And signing off just a little bit frustrated.

Until next time!

Furry Friends *Ahem* I mean Purr-y Friends

Have you ever thought about cat videos? They are this huge phenomenon across the internet, mostly YouTube as it is the most popular platform for videos at the moment. But have you ever asked why we love them so much?

Yes, they are cute and adorable, but there is so much more too it than that. So, being the weirdo that I am, I have devised a list about the appeal of cat videos. Here goes!

Reasons why we love Cat Videos:

·      You don't like cats: in most videos you see the cats do silly things and fall over and such and you may enjoy watching their pain and failure (you horrible heartless person)

·      You are allergic to cats: watching these videos is a way for you too enjoy these adorable creatures without sneezing or physical reacting in anyway

·      Relate as you have a cat: this one has two parts. 1) You have a cat so you can see how adorable they are, and maybe try and prod your cat to do the same things that you have seen, because it was just SO CUTE. 2) You understand how much effort it is to care for the creature, feeding, cleaning up after and just living with the strange thing. In the cat video you can appreciate the cat without thinking about how your going to have to clean out the kitty litter later on.

·      You want a cat: maybe you’re not allowed a cat, if your parents don't let you, or your roommate is allergic, these videos are good enough to satisfy your desire enough to stop annoying the other person or people you live with.

·      You humanise the cat: if you can watch a cat video and at one point think “same”, then you are humanising the cat. If you are watching a cat be all adventurous in a bath tub and then watch it slip over, and find it funny because the same thing has happened to you, you love this because it is funny and you are not the one in pain. You relate the cats adventures and annoying habits to your own life, thus you love cat videos.

Awww, wasn't that a nice little break down! :D I thought so!!

Of course, I couldn't possibly be talking this much about cat videos and not show you one!! This is one I watched earlier hehehehe

Please enjoy!

What’s also totally fascinating is that Cats don't know about the internet, yet they are globally famous. That is just totally not fair!! And all because they were just being themselves. If only it was that easy for us humans too!!

Bye bye for now!

P.S. hahaha nearly forgot the link…awkward

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w-iIbotFkzQ