Day 14 - My Bedroom

This was one of the blog prompts so I'm not really sure what I'm meant to write about. But here is my bed. Dad bought me the Union Jack blanket last time he was over. You can just see my prize soft toys on the far pillow. I think at the moment I have 7 in the party but they vary from time to time.

This is above my bed. I call it the travel wall. The large fan in from Thailand and the small white one from Spain. There is also a smaller black one from Tenerife but it's hard to see. There's the world map underneath and then the map of the Game of Thrones realm just for fun.

On one of my shelves I have my bottle collection. They pretty much all have a story and my favourites are the small ones at the front which were all found in the garden, beach or river mud flats. Not sure why I collect them. It's my hoarder tendencies shining through perhaps. Also I come from a family of collectors but I never found my niche so I have quite a few little collections of random things.

I adore anything miniature so miniature bottles are doubly exciting to me. Closely followed by miniature books. Then mini anything else! So far I've only been able to find tiny bottles that are full of glitter. I saw a few empty ones online once but they were too expensive for me to bother with and the only other ones I've seen are used in fancy jewelery or keychains and although they are adorable they are also way over priced. Yep I'm a cheapskate when it comes to my collectables, if it costs more than $10 I'm probably not going to buy it.

Another sort of collection. Dragons and Wicca/witchcraft/pagan related items. This shelf is pretty empty because most of these kind of items are again quite expensive. At the other end of the shelf though is a collection of sea shells. I find it hard to resist picking up more whenever I go to the beach. I only like to have less than a dozen on my shelf though so most have progressed out to the garden!

Last picture. This is my favourite thing in my room, my book shelf. I actually have two in my room. Both full. and three others around the house. Plus my desk. I have a 'thing' for books. Books to read, books to write in. Fact, fiction. Pretty much anything. The whole top shelf of this book case is Tolkein at the moment. I like to go to charity stores and see how many different editions I can find. It's amazing what turns up and all have been less than $5.

So there you have it. That's the condensed tour of my room. I could do an entire post on my book collection and perhaps I will some day soon. It will make me want to go book  shopping again though!
Do you have any collections?

A Somewhat Depressing Post About Depression

Today has been a busy day. A day for keeping busy, for distracting myself and trying to change my attitude to life. I like to tell anyone who will listen (which is next to no one) that I am a strong and independent person who does what she wants and doesn't care what other people think. In truth, at the moment, I am none of these things and that worries me. More than I am already worried since anxiety seems to be my new go to mode. I have been sliding into a destructive pattern lately, feeling worthless and miserable and it's time for it to stop.

My first move was to tell my boyfriend or whatever he is (we are supposed to be fuck buddies but it has become more complicated recently and I hate complicated) that I don't want to see him for awhile. Everything he says and does lately seems to make me feel insignificant, petty or boring. He doesn't mean to make me feel that way and tbf he's treating me pretty much the same as he always has. The problem is my self esteem is at an all time low and anything less than praise or being the most important person to someone else is leaving me depressed. Pathetic right? Especially since I used to be so strong in my belief of myself. I've told him not to contact me mostly because that means that I won't be disappointed when he doesn't. I won't be constantly checking my phone, stalking his fb page or getting annoyed when he hangs out with his friends while I sit alone. I won't feel worthless or boring when he doesn't txt me or invite me over. I guess this either makes me seem like a horribly needy person or makes him sound like a terrible friend and perhaps both are true at the moment but neither of us mean to be these people and things will change. They have to.

I'm striking out on my own for awhile. I need to find that girl that I know is inside me that can be her own hero, her own cheerleader and her own best friend. I need to learn to rely on myself again as I am the only person that I can trust to understand and take care of my feelings, to boost my moral. How can I expect anyone else to want to spend time with me when I can't stand being around myself.

That's a distressing thought for me since I really used to love myself (perhaps too much) I was unique and daring, witty and adventurous. I used to be interesting.

I don't really know where I'm going with this. I guess I just needed to tell someone how I'm feeling, that I'm trying to change and that I'm determined to succeed. Today was a good start. I stayed away from facebook as it always seems to depress me. Everyone saying how great their lives are, how much fun they had with their friends and I can't help but compare them to my miserable, lonely existence. Most of it is lies of course but lies can still hurt. Facebook is optional though so why do I still punish myself by trawling through it everyday? Why not opt out? Because I'm weak, I want to know what I'm missing, I want to get a cheap thrill by posting some crap on my page for attention but then I feel cheated when no one sees it or I only get two likes. Well enough of that. I'm not good at fishing for attention so I'll stop trying. No more Facebook every minute of the day. Instagram however is still allowed XD

Today I've kept busy and tried to achieve things to boost my sense of purpose. Firstly I baked some cookies and iced them, they didn't turn out as well as I hoped but my expectations are always too high considering I'm a novice baker. I also made crème brulee which is an easy recipe and always turns out well so that cheered me up. 

 

I went for a walk as exercise is good for the endorphins. We are looking after my Uncle's farm dog which is kennelled during the day so it felt good to give her some freedom and explore a paddock with her. I was thinking of starting up a routine of squats and sit ups but I'm not sure I'm quite that motivated!

 

Next I decided change is good so as well as cutting myself off from humanity I figured I should do something positive. I settled on moving my desk into the lounge since it's the only warm room in the house and it means that I can do some projects to keep my mind busy without suffering in the cold. I've been meaning to move it for a few weeks now but never found the motivation.

To feel good inside I need to like the outside so I changed all my ear bars to bright colours and comfy studs. I put my fav ring on my finger and swapped my necklace for one that has a cute disc which says 'Dream' on it. It seemed appropriate. 

 

I've also changed around the layout of my room, made it more airy and moved my bed closer to the window. I've disabled my tv and dvd player in there as I have been reading a book before bed the last few nights and it has really aided my sleep and eased my bad dreams. So no more screen time before bed for a while and that includes my phone and gameboy. Half an hour of reading will serve me better and it's not like I'm short on books. 

 

After posting this I plan to break out my colouring book and felt pens as that always seems to relax me but still keeps me occupied and gives me a sense of achievement when I finish a page. A little stress free therapy.

I'm not sure whether to be worried or impressed about how easily I can pretend that I'm ok to everyone that knows me. Maybe I'm just such a moody cow most of the time that they don't notice when it's actually serious. Perhaps I internalise too much, after all I don't confide in anyone when I'm feeling good so how would they know when I feel bad. Ultimately though I am the only who can help me so I think admitting to myself that something needs to change is a good step.

I'm sorry for blahing on. I guess I had more to get off my chest than I thought. I will keep you updated with my return to my former arrogant, weird, hopefully interesting self. Wish me luck!

When One Adventure Ends, Another Begins

After two months together I am at a bit of loss now that Dad has returned home to England. Isn't it funny how quickly a big change can become normal in our lives. After all, his arrival was quite an upheaval in the normality of routine here. Work was shuffled, our diet changed, our pets got extra attention and of course me and Dad travelled about 6,000kms in my poor beat up old car! I'm sure that soon enough the big change of him leaving will become normal too and my routine will drop back into place but for now it's all a bit odd.

We dropped him off at the airport super early on Friday morning and, as ever, when presented with an emotionally charged scenario I kinda wandered off into my brain to distract myself. For example check out the control tower. It's a face right? That's not just me trying really hard to find something else to think about is it? Well maybe...

Once we got home I kinda threw myself into doing stuff to keep busy. I sorted out Dads room, got the washing on and then started loading books onto the shelves that Dad had built for us. I'm hoping to have these full pretty soon along with the rest of my shelves. These bad boys are the start of my home library and will soon have the company of a few more shelves hopefully.

Rush is going to miss Dad too because everytime he showed up it meant that it was walking time! Over the next few entries I'll tell you some of the tales of the things we got up while Dad was here as well as writing about what I'm getting up to in my day to day life now that things are going back to 'normal'

Merry Second Xmas!

So if you hadn't already realised that I'm a bit odd it may come as a surprise that my family is rather odd too. My father and sister live in England while my Mum and I live in New Zealand so every so often we visit each other and this year is Dad's turn to visit us here in NZ. Since the post is so expensive we don't really send gifts to each other very often and if we do they are usually small. When we travel however all bets are off and we carry whatever will fit in a suitcase to give to each other. This meant that we knew Dad would be arriving with quite a few gifts for us which are always labeled as 'belated bday/christmas' presents so we decided why not have a little christmas to celebrate his arrival and enjoy our gifts.
We set the date for the Saturday after Dad arrived so that he could have a few days to settle in and wrap gifts before the big day! We had bought a few little things and put them under the tree ready and when Saturday rolled around we had quite a haul to open.

I got books! 9 Terry Pratchetts and a recipe book written by Hugh Fernley-Whittingstall and 4 dvds of his too. My sister drew me an A4 picture which I love and also gave me a new duvet set which has deer on it. I haven't set it up yet but when I do I'll be sure to include a photo. I got a few other little bits and bobs too but I won't bore you.
After all our present opening we went into town to check out the market where I bought a cornish pasty for breakfast. I've been eyeing them up for the last 3 years but since they never advertise the price I've never actually bought one. I decided though that since it was xmas I could treat myself but cripes I got a shock when she told me the price. $6! For a pasty! It was nice but I didn't enjoy it as much as I had hoped, the price was a bit of a sting. Oh well at least now I have tried one and won't need to try one again.

While we were in town we thought it'd be nice to pop along to one of the local schools as it was having a gala that had promised to be quite big. They had advertised a spinning Jenny which I had never heard of and since we share a name I wanted to see what it was and how it worked. As it turns out you 'buy' a paddle with a number on it and then the guy spins the wheel and if your number wins then you get the prize pack. I bought a paddle just to say that I've given it a go and of course I lost. I never seem to do very well with anything that involves luck but I don't have high expectations so it's never much of a let down.

For dinner I had planned a rather ridiculous fancy menu but eventually cut it down to just fish dinner and cake. The cake I made myself, vanilla cake with lemon butter icing and decorated with malteasers and chocolate fingers. It was pretty good if I do say so myself.
The fish was the snapper that my cousin gave me a while ago, baked whole with lemon, butter and herbs. It was a rather simple dinner but nice none the less and a good way to round out the day.

Book Haul!

So I may have to admit to having a bit of a fetish when it comes to books. I like to read them of course but also I just like the feel of them, the smell, they way they look, the sound of turning pages... I've got it pretty bad.
As much as I love reading books I think I actually like to shop for and collect them more. I'm quite happy to let books sit on my shelves unread for months while I go out into the world and explore because I know that they are mine and they will be waiting for me when I do decide to spend time indoors.  I suppose I am a book collector first and a reader second. Saying that though, there are days, especially in winter, where I can read solidly for 10 hours only stopping for toilet breaks or food and even then the book usually accompanies me on my forays!
For a long time now I've had the dream of turning one of the rooms in the house into a library but since it isn't my house I haven't really pushed the issue. It's been difficult though as there are just the two of us living in a house that has four bedrooms and even an office area off the lounge. For some reason Mum has insisted on having the two spare rooms set up as guest rooms even though, I swear to whatever deity exists, we have someone stay maybe once every 5 years. And even then it's usually a singular person, not plural...
I may have managed to convince her otherwise though since almost all available space in my room has a bookshelf crammed with books. If she won't let me go ahead with the idea of giving my books a room to themselves then I may just have to look into getting floor to ceiling bookshelves installed in my room, which is a 10 foot span. Mwahaha
So onto my haul! I've got a real solid love of Tolkien and being an op shop scrounger I come across his books fairly regularly so I have decided to try and collect as many different editions of Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit as I can. On this trip alone I found four that I didn't have! Two of them are only part 1 or 2 of the collection they were released as but that's ok. It will be a challenge for another day to find the rest.

As you may be able to see in the top pic I also managed to find a few books belonging to series that I need for my set. Some sets I think will take me years to complete just because they are so large or because they are so popular. Terry Pratchett for example is one my favourite authors hands down but he is loved by so many other readers that his books rarely make it into charity stores and even less so in an obscure town and the bottom of the world! I do occasionally see one or two but invariably I already own it or they have marked them at such ridiculously high prices that I leave them where they are.
That's the one big condition of my collection, no book should cost me more than $10 and preferably not more than $3. I get almost all of my books for just $1 which makes haul shopping extra fun because you feel like you can treat yourself to an absolute mountain of books knowing the cashier won't be asking you to empty your bank account. If you follow me on Instagram you will have seen that I bought four books recently that at full price would have cost me nearly $100 but because they came from the bargain bin I only parted with $8 at the till. That's $92 that I can spend on other books, hopefully 92 more!