Monday 17 February 2014

SUSPENSION

Notice Of Suspension

This blog is now officially on suspension, from at LEAST
 February 2014 to September 2014.


Fine Print.


Vampire Academy 2014 Movie

RUSH POST.

I'm going to talk to you about an old obsession of mine that had become a faint buzz in the back of my mind - and is now officially dead.

... okay okay, I'm being overdramatic!

I hate saying this, not just because it was my obsession and I used to LOVE the Vampire Academy books - I felt so empty when I'd finished reading - but because I still think they are excellent books. But I cannot deny that the way 'They', and I don't know exactly whom I'm referring to here - decided to turn Vampire Academy from a (in my opinion) highly-serious, high-stakes, surprisingly romantic, high-school vampire concept into a Mean Girls meets Twilight, not only did my heart drop out my butt (lol) but I grew worried that this movie would tarnish the BOOK.


New book cover.

Now I must take some time to explain exactly what I mean by this. It's a delicate matter. Heh XD

[ 1 ]
We ALL understand that since the rise of Twilight, the Film Peoples have been taking every teenage book - oh, by the way, that genre is now called Young Adult, commonly known as YA (you probably know this but JUST SAYIN'!) - and turning that book into The Next Big Thing. Which, don't get me wrong, is pretty cool. Especially for the authors. Personally, I'm bored of this, but my opinions always have been and still are the minority and thus discarded. So er, despite that I find The Hunger Games and Divergent series intriguing, when they're on screen, the most highlighted bits are the things that were done before. Tiresome. So what first worried me what that Vampire Academy would be 'altered' to 'fit in' with what's already popular right now.

[ 2 ]
But on the other hand... like I said, these books are great. They're also very complex with many different things going on. Because of this, there's a part of me that is really glad that Richelle Mead is gonna get the extra attention from this movie. As far as I'm concerned, regardless of how a movie turns out or is received, if they're sold the film rights then they've 'Done It'. Or 'Made It'. I guess. (I've kept using this phrase because I couldn't think of a better one. e_e ) And it's great that her books got this opportunity - not all books do. We know this.

[ 3 ]
I have made the decision, as I do with most film adaptations of books I've read, not to see this film until a long time in the future, if at all. First because I often don't like film adaptations; second because I don't like a lot of films in general, I dislike moviegoing; and thirdly because I don't like being influenced by other opinions while the hype is still quite big. I can't remember how I ended up seeing The Hunger Games, but it was over a year since it had been in the cinemas and I was both glad I saw it and glad I waited. So in other words, everything I write in this post can be waved away as obviously I am only SPECULATING and making ASSUMPTIONS before I have actually seen the movie, and I dunno about you but it's annoying when people do that. So I'm annoying myself right now. A lot.

[ 4 ]
Um... this is going to sound rude but none of the characters cast are how I imagined them. At least in some other film adaptations there's a similarity, but in this case there are huge discrepancies between my crazy brain and the cast! Which is nothing more than an 'Awwwhhh...' type of thing. It's a bit hard for me to get Rose in my head as Glamorous. Really hard. It's obvious that she is a remarkably pretty girl but... seriously. No, srsly. I have to reprogram my brain for every single character in this. Like... an alternate dimension VA.



One thing I must say though, I adore the new covers, MUCH better than the original and somewhat better than the red covers. They're very much in line with the new Hunger Games and Divergent covers that were released after the movies came out, which all have a common dark-colours scheme to them. A lot of YA books seem to do this now, with the dark covers instead of bright, often they're dystopian books as well! I can only say this because I work in a bookshop and otherwise I wouldn't know or care.

I love pretty imagery on books but I have never liked faces, I think I mentioned this before. I hate that. I don't want somebody else to ascribe a face to a character I'm about to make a bond with, I'm not sure why but it really irritates me and can often put me off a book. I love being able to picture characters in my mind. Funnily enough though, I don't mind cartoons or silhouettes. I just can't stand real people. Once in a blue moon, faces can actually pull me towards a book - like Philippa Gregory's The White Princess. I can stare at that cover for ages, it is heavenly.


... anywhoo... =/

I'm still not sure how I feel about a great deal of YA books being so heavily fantasy based. As a huge fantasy fan, it's hard not to tear a YA book apart for not adhering to fantasy principles. (Much simpler when there was just 'teen' =c ) But as I read VA before it was actually classed as YA, I still have a soft spot for it. It's kind of different. I didn't feel that way about the House Of Night series. Ages ago, I said I was gonna re-read the VA series but I couldn't bring myself to. My friends bought me the spin-off series with Sydney as the lead, and as I didn't much like her in the origin series (nowhere NEAR as much as Rose, Rose was my FAVOURITE), I couldn't bring myself to read it.

So to conclude...

I am a terribly fucking annoying person and if I ever read this post again, I'll probably delete it.




Star xx

This is one of my Rush Posts - when they are all posted, you will find my NOTICE OF SUSPENSION.

The Ineffective Valentine's Day

RUSH POST.
I got this awesome picture from Dalanda's blog!

(Like I said before, I went on an investment course, so I completely forgot it was Valentine's Day on Friday until... well, today! Which is stunning, as most years it's smothering. But on that course, we were learning about becoming financially free, so we didn't really have time for that farce.)

I'm going to be honest.

I don't know how the HELL Valentine's Day came about or why we are still celebrating it today. My feelings about it are much like Christmas - the idea is noble, but people make it stink. On the one side, it great that it reminds you to appreciate that special someone once a year. On the other side, People in a Relationship feel Obliged to do Something - like birthdays. And while this is great as a kick in the butt to make sure you are appreciating that person, we all know that this should be more than ONCE A YEAR.

But c'mon guys, you know I'm biased. I don't 'date' (or anything of the sort because the moment things start to go that way I panic - trusting people is hard for me) so it makes no difference at all to me WHAT happens with this holiday. I generally find it sweet when I hear the awesome things that partners did for their other halves, and annoying when people go on about Valentine's in general like it's Christmas. I came across recent blogger posts - Valentines day books, dresses, movies, ideas for the day if you're in a couple or single, basically getting into the spirits of things. Which is not a bad thing. But it's EVERYWHERE. Still not a bad thing... just tiring.

I'm concerned about sounding like a broken record which is why I'm going to post this topic once on my blog, and then I'm never going to do it again. It'll be the Topic That Must not Be Named. Valentine's Day.

After all, society does drive us to believe that we are SUPPOSED to have someone for Valentine's Day, that's we're SUPPOSED to be paired off like Barbies and Kens or albatrosses (I LOVE albatrosses. They're my favourite bird c: ), and that choosing to be single or childless is some sort a moral sin. Bizarre. Oh well. I understand that even continuing to type this post, and then proceeding to post it, I'm suggesting that I somehow care.

Oh well.

I laugh at all the ways retailers encourage excitement in people about all of these moneymaking holidays throughout the year; Christmas, Easter, Black Friday, Valentine's Day. I laughed at feeble Manic Monday attempts, I don't really even know what that is. Anywhoo. I won't be posting about this topic.... pretty much ever again! This post is simply to ponder over it's influence on society and question why we care so much.

Thank God this post is almost over, I'm already getting tired of it.


Wouldn't Valentine's be so much better if it was -

WORLD LOVE DAY...?

Limiting this day to romantic love makes it really crap. Remove that boundary, I think this holiday improves dramatically. I would give flowers and chocolates to EVERYBODY, it would be AWESOME. I laugh embarrassedly now to remember when I made a Valentine's Day card for my MUM. Yeah, I just thought you were supposed to give a card to someone you love! Easy, right? Urgh, facepalm. I only ever see three responses to this holiday, though more could exist;
- Positive (excited people in relationships)
- Negative (bitter people who are single)
- Indifferent (those who don't care either way, regardless of what their status is.)


Look, look, check out this Valentines Day card, I also got this pic off Dalanda XD


Isn't it such an awesome card?

It perfectly sums a child's response to this day. And many adults, actually, at least one's I've spoken to! Check out Nix's blog if you wish to follow her journey. (The post I linked actually gave me the idea for this post.)



Now I've waited all that time talking about this shit, don't mind me if I go to bed.
I do hope everybody who cares had a wonderful Valentine's day, because like I said, the idea is great, and if you had a great day then of course I'm happy for your happiness. I wish people could be happy more. All year round if possible, but there I go a-dreamin'.

I'm very happy to say that I spent the whole day on a course that gave me the tools to start creating my financial freedom. It's the best use of a Valentine's, I think, ever in my life.




Star xx

This is one of my Rush Posts - when they are all posted, you will find my NOTICE OF SUSPENSION.

Shows in London, Spring 2014!

RUSH POST.

As you may know, I'm not the sort of person who goes clubbing or to parties, or the the cinema (I dislike most of the movies showing... pretty much all the time), or bowling (I get really bored by it! Believe it or not!) - yeah, I'm a really sucky 21 year-old. It's funny because in my first year of university, my friends were like, "Oh my goshh, you work sooo hard. You are so dedicated."

And I was like 'Yyyyeahh... my A's and B's do not accurately reflect me playing The Legend Of Zelda days before my unwritten essay was due.'

But honestly, though there are few things that I actually like. I really do love find new places to explore and walking around for ages, especially parks and lakes and LOTS of trees, I love trees - this ALWAYS gives me story inspirations. This is why my Story List is over 100 concepts long. Aside from that, I'm trying to expand my experiences and skills, and I've even considered Roller Discos and Ice Skating, even though the thought makes me wrinkle my nose!

BUT, one thing I really do love is shows. =D

Shows, or otherwise dubbed 'conventions', 'fairs', 'markets', 'exhibitions', I just love them. It's like walking into an exclusive world. I don't even mind if I only like it a little bit - I'm going with my Mum to a knitting show - I just love the idea of being able to find or learn something new there, especially is tickets are very affordable. Saaaay, £6 for two people =D now isn't that awesome?!

I discovered my first 'show' of that sort years ago, at Move It. When I stopped dancing "for good" about 2-3 years ago, I didn't really go to anything, until last year when I decided to go all out and went to MCM, Mind, Body and Spirit, Hyper Japan, National Home Improvement Show (I didn't post about that, I think.), and a few others. So, I've been hunting for shows! I thought this might be interesting for anyone dead bored out of their minds in London.


Shows I'm going to for sure

The Spring Knitting and Stitching Show
WHEN: 13-16 March 2014
WHERE: Olympia London
Website HERE

The Creative Stitches and Hobbycrafts Show
WHEN: 3-5 April 2014
WHERE: ExCel London
Website HERE

I bought both of these for my Mum, and one for me so she wouldn't have to go alone. She really likes this sort of stuff and she runs off the cutest cardigans on her knitting machine. Okay, so the one I saw was for a baby, but whatever man. =P I've wanted to do knitting for quite a while, but being dedicated to reading for uni and for myself, and writing my book and blog posts, I haven't found the time. I'd love to learn a new skill though. Been saying this for a while!


Pondering..
(in chronological order)

I found most of these on Amazon local or Groupon, so if you live in there area, check on there to get great deals! just go there first and type in the deal, or you can prob type it into google and it'll come up.


Who Do You Think You Are? Live
WHEN: Thurs 20th Feb, Fri 21st Feb, Sat 22nd Feb '14
WHERE: Olympia London
Website HERE
As I wanted to write a legacy of my family, I stopped to think when I saw this. The only thing is, I'm not particularly interested in this. I think I'll pass.



Art14 London: London's Global Art Fair
WHEN: 28 February and 1-2 March 2014
WHERE: Kensington Olympia (Hammersmith, basically..)
Website HERE
I generally like innovative art, but because my mind is... er... overactive, creative, crazy and the like, if I can see an image or make a narrative out of it, I like it much better. A black dot on a white canvas... I'm not sure if that really does it for me, though it does make me think about creation, I guess...
My favourite types of art are what I call Immediate Impact art. I also call it Officially WOW images on my Pink Sovereign blog. It's the images that make to inhale sharply on first sight. I love wild, bright colours, fantasy settings, aesthetic pictures. Yeah. That's me.



Ideal Home Show
WHEN: 14th to 30th March 2014 !! =D
WHERE: Earls Court Exhibition Centre
Website HERE
I'd heard of this before but knew little about it. My Mum says it's really popular, which may explain why it runs for half a month!!!! I think it would be great for ideas on improving our home.



London Super Comic Convention 2014
WHEN: Sat 15 and Sun 16 March
WHERE: ExCel London
Website HERE
I booked my ticket the moment I saw it. Even though I was disappointed by MCM, that was my issue and not because MCM was a bad event. I'm hoping that this convention will do it for me... whatever it is I'm actually looking for!



The London Cruise Show
WHEN: Sat 22 and Sun 23 March 2014
WHERE: Olympia
Website HERE
I can't go to this one as I work every weekend, and the last one I have for this tax year is on the Saturday of London Super Comic Con. However I'm badgering my sisters into taking my Mum because I think they'd really enjoy it. Also my mum's not the sort of person who'd whine and moan and not being about to afford it, she'll Oooh and Aaah about the lovely things she's seeing and set it as a goal for the (hopefully near) future, put it on a vision board or something, make it a positive thing. (That's why I love my Mum, to itty bitty pieces! She's my best friend. (Well. One of them. Heh.))


 ('hem' Kensington Olympia, Olympia, and Olympia London are, as I understand, all the same place. (e_e) )




Star xx

This is one of my Rush Posts - when they are all posted, you will find my NOTICE OF SUSPENSION.

Shen Yun 2014 - MUSIC

RUSH POST.

I never get tired of seeing their new yet familiar banner every year!!

I've written about Shen Yun Performing Arts before; first, when I went the first time in 2012, and again in 2013. I simply love the company, from the artistic style to the costumes, to the backdrop to the choreography to the music.

But right now, I just have to talk about that PHENOMENAL music.

I can't explain how much I love it, how much it moves me. Every time I see a trailer or a short clip, the unmistakable sound of merged Chinese and Western classical and folk music. Since Shen yun 2012, I've been trying to get my hands on a CD of the orchestral pieces used in the performance, but I can't seem to buy one anywhere. Not even Amazon!!! Good ol' Amazon!!!

I left a comment on youtube and somebody kindly responded with a link, but it leads to the company site where you can gifts and memorabilia and the like, and the only CD's there at the moment seem to be a DVD of the performance, which of course I can't put on my violet iPod. Booo. Maybe this will change. Hopefully it will. =D





Star xx

This is one of my Rush Posts - when they are all posted, you will find my NOTICE OF SUSPENSION.

Tuesday 11 February 2014

3-day Update: Mood and Food

I've been meaning to update but it kept being delayed for various reasons.



Friday

On Friday, I wasn't doing too great. I feel like I let a friend down and my constant fatigue pulled down my mood so I kind of stayed in bed for most of the day. My Mum came into my room with some craziness like "Star, no matter how you feel, sometimes you've just got to push past that and not let that bother you."

Mental Fury: What do you think I've been doing? Do you think I give in to every slight upsetting thing that enters my head? NO! I am trying! I'm sorry if it got far enough for me to stop functioning but you didn't actually try to think about how I might have been feeling today.

Anyway, I didn't want to go into it.

Despite how that comment made me feel I'm glad I have someone in my life to tell me to knuckle down, sometimes I think it does shake off the misery a bit. Often is doesn't, but sometimes it does. She even made me some food. Ah, I did say I'd post Nix of The Forbearer a picture - sorry it's four days late, Nix!

It's really simple but it was tasty and improve my mood: chicken goujon-things, some sort of chicken lentil curry-thing (as it's Tuesday now, as I'm writing this, I completely forgot what she said), curly fries and frozen vegetables. OOO, and the Teasers for after!

So that cheered me up, and tasted very good. After that I had a bit more strength to pull myself together and get some work done. I'm really grateful to Mama.



MALTESERS TEASERS

I think this is my first blog post involving food as a topic and picture of said topic... oh, except for christmas... okay, maybe I'm wrong, I just can't be bothered to go through my archives.

I remember that easter when the Malteser bunny first appeared. They were sooo popular, and just delicious. Mama bought so many of those, way more than she should, prolly. And then the Teasers cropped up and you could buy those all year round, which was great. They taste kinda like the bunnies but inside the chocolate bunny (I forgot this until recently,) is a huge blob of honeycomb and inside the Teasers are little bubbles of honeycomb.

So, for some reason, since January I've been really craving these teasers bars and find myself buying one now and again. Then the bunnies were back on the shelves, three months early for easter *rolling my eyes* and i thought I get the 4-pack of mini-bunnies, only they're horrible. They chocolate on the outside is so thick compared to the honeycomb on the side and I didn't enjoy it at all.

Then I ended up tasting a bit of an actual bunny (it's was my Mum's and I was starving at the time) and that was delicious! I'd forgot how nice the normal ones tasted.


Oops, so anywhoo, the FREE BAR THING.

They're doing this 1-in-6 chance to win a free bar thing. As I'm more of a savoury person, I love my McCoys crisps and I don't mind some malted mind biscuits, I generally forget to check packets to see if I won anything. It's a habit NOT to check it with me. But this free bar thing, lately I've been winning quite a few! 1 in 6 - my chances of getting a winning one was pretty high anyway.

What was weird about it was - whenever I got a 'Congratulations! Free bar!' wrapper, it was out of a bar that I bought. Whenever I redeemed the free bar coupon in the wrapper, I got a 'Sorry, next time' wrapper. Both times I picked the bar of the shelf. Weird huh...

To date, I've won about 4 free bar wrappers, not including the one I bought for my Mum that she won. I keep forgetting to redeem the last 2 though. Meh, tomorrow.

That's it for the mo. I posted an extract of my book on another blog so I had to bounce, but I'm back now to post this.



Sunday

Oreo ice cream cone..

I've been craving these since I bought it yesterday. The Oreo biscuit on top is soft soft but the cone is so crunchy, and it has than unmistakably Oreo flavour. Yaaaaaaaaaaaaay, I'll be near a Sainsbury's tomorrow! Think Im'ma pick some up!


KIDS

My nieces were over today. I didn't expect them to warm to me very much, I think I already explained about me being awkward with kids, but actually they really wanted to play with me. I was like Wha -?!

The older niece is really loud and boisterous and the younger niece is alot shyier and quieter, so I think they warmed to me because the older one is naturally curious and inquisitive, so she came over to ask me questions about what I was doing (washing up) and my birthmark and looots of others things, and because her younger sister copying ehr in pretty much everything, she came over too. The younger one was too shy to give me a hug last time but she did now :3 I think she's about three.

We played loooads of games. W played, uh.... Mums And Dads *shrug* Apparently I wasn't allowed to be the mum (lol) so I was the 'sister'; we played Copying (copying dance moves), we played Magic Stones, and we played Picnic. Probably the most fun I've had with kids in ages, (hahaha.) When they left, i was DEAD TIRED. I can't imagine what it would be like for there mum to have them all the time! No wonder some parents are always tired!



Tuesday

I went to see my course leader at university then I went to class and luckily some of my friends decided to come in. I was really happy to see them, it's been a long while. Over six weeks, I think. Then I spent the afternoon with my university friend, (let's call her Miss Lovely.) She really cheered me up today. She said she didn't feel like herself though which made me a bit sad.

Then he eyes went all full of wonder and she talks about Tinseltown, and I was like "Oooo let's go! When shall we go?" and she was like "Today!" and laughed and I was said "Okay!" It happened so quickly that we both paused for a minute for our minds to catch up with the transition from joke into seriousness, so just to clarify I said, "Sure, we can go after class today." And she was like okaaaay and looked really happy. :D

Tinseltown was greeeat. It's a brand new one thats just opened in ym town so it's really nice and cleeean (Lovely said the one in Queensway was 'grotty') and the music that was playing was okay, but it was commercial pop music like what plays on the radio and I was like 'eh'... but at least they didn't play any songs I hated. And although it was loud, as least it wasn't deafening (Lovely said queensway was deafening). We had to serve ourselves, like Nandos and GBK (though she said the one in Queensway, they serve you. That was interesting. I wonder why they made the change?)

I shoulda taken a picture of the food. It look really nice on the white cutlery and was well presented.

As I don't eat pork, I've never had a hot dog, but as the TinselTown hots dog are 100% 'prime' beef, I decided to go for it. At least I got to try something new and it wasn't that far a jump from the beef burger which was what I wanted. Since I bought sainsbury's frozen quarter pounders, I've been craving beef burgers, but that beef hot dog was a perfect substitute =] Even now, just over two hours later, I still feel content, not a bit hungry. The portion was pretty big for seven quid!

And because of my newfound oreo addiction (Mum's fault. She started it (e_e) ) I was SO tempted to try a Oreo shake or even more, the Oreo ice-cream-cake thing. But I'm glad I didn't because I was FULL after my one meal. Pheeee-yew.

The only thing was that was concerning me (apart from the music, towards the end,) was firstly that where me and Lovely sat, but side was the comfy, bright green booth thing but her side was like a chair. I asked if her chair was comfortable and she said 'it's alright'. another thing is the light was really low over the table. I mean yeah I appreciate being able to see what I'm eating but as it wasn't even dark yet, I just thought about how annoying it was that that light was so low after Lovely hit her head twice standing up.

But that's it. It was a good first-time experience, like when I went to Frankie and Benny's for the first time in December and TGI Friday's got the... oh, actually I think it was the second time - in November. It was really nice, and great food, all three times.



What now?

As I went to see my course leader today, I am aware of my options in terms of my course. I am behind, as in, missed a term's worth of work behind, and that does scare me, but I also believe I can catch up, especially as I'm meant to be getting a mentor. Today I'm going to get my blog posts ready for the rest of the week, schedule them, forget about them.

Then I can focus on my investment course coming up this weekend, writing my book, and planning my university work timetable.

If I get a bit of extra time, I may even be able to work on my online stories DVTJ and BGF, because at the moment it's pitifully slow, especially as I've been devotedly focussing on my Fantasy Blog for my other ego. It's taking a lot out of me. I'm lucky to post one chapter a month.

I need to prioritise.

The most important thing right now is me and my health. One I can get that MOSTLY okay, I can figure out where I derailed and get back on track. then I'll be moving again.



Star.

Thursday 6 February 2014

Still Coping, Somehow.


All this pissing rain. Honestly, it's such a downer. Non-stop! All this rain should have been snow, if it was a bit colder - well done, global warming. Well done, human beings. What. A. Shame, 2014. I am disappointed.

I am tired, blue, hungry and with a headache. All of those things are my fault.

I've had a dream every night for the past five days and they have all been bizarre.

I am too tired to write a Psyren 14 review. Yes. I did cave in and read it.

The blog for my other ego, I suppose the Author Ego, is coming along both great and horribly. When I think about it, I want to close my eyes and sleep and eat ice cream and drink tea and sleep again and  bang my head against a wall and laugh and cry.

Money. money. I wish my life didn't revolve around money, but it does. I am sad.

*

The following image is excerpted from the post Gone Girl on So You Want To Be A Writer?.


Yeah. That's what I feel.

*

Yesterday, there was a spring in my step, I sang all over the house, I was full of energy and optimism. But that's what depression does. It sits quiet when everything is going fine, then it leaps out and attacks you... when everything's still going fine. Nothing AT ALL has changed. You feel lost and alone and miserable constantly, and it's hard to even explain why.

Trying to reach for a better feeling.

Trying to reach for a better feeling.



One thing that makes me happy right now - this song. Reminds me of Raphael Saadiq.



Also, whoever developed that 24hoursofhappy.com site is a GENIUS.



Star xx

Saturday 1 February 2014

Guess What?: The Liebster Blog Award

Happy February!



As it happens, I've been nominated for the Liebster Blog Award. Cool huh? My first blog award. I celebrated by making it my first post in February and the Chinese New Year - oh! And I created a new tag. c:

I was nominated by the incredible Zoe of That's Zoe blog, one of my favourite blogs pretty much ever. Thanks so much Zoe! Please check out her blog, she writes incredible, inspirational things, and if you've been following my blog you know that my posts aren't always cupcakes and rainbows. Zoe's blog always cheers me up!


_______________


The Liebster Award Rules


  • Thank the person who nominated you, and post a link to their blog on your blog.
  • Display the award on your blog — by including it in your post and/or displaying it using a “widget” or a “gadget”. (Note that the best way to do this is to save the image to your own computer and then upload it to your blog post.)
  • Answer 11 questions about yourself, which will be provided to you by the person who nominated you.
  • Provide 11 random facts about yourself.
  • Nominate 5 – 11 blogs that you feel deserve the award, who have a less than 1000 followers. (Note that you can always ask the blog owner this since not all blogs display a widget that lets the readers know this information!)
  • Create a new list of questions for the blogger to answer.
  • List these rules in your post (You can copy and paste from here.) Once you have written and published it, you then have to:
  • Inform the people/blogs that you nominated that they have been nominated for the Liebster award and provide a link for them to your post so that they can learn about it (they might not have ever heard of it!)



My 11 Answers (to the questions HERE from Zoe)


1.What's your most favorite part of blogging?
Being able to post whatever I want. No social media restrictions, no forum restrictions, I can be as serious or as carefree as please me and if I want to post a question mark than I can do so. YEP!
2. What do you do other than blogging?
Work, eat, drink, live... =D Jk, as a hobby, I write. A lot. I also read a lot but I'm not much in the mood for it lately.

3. What are your interests?
Generally speaking, the fantasy genre. That extends to my love of books, comics, video games, manga and movie soundtracks. That aside, I really like eating O_O
4. What is your favorite TV show?
Wow, um.... I don't watch TV! I haven't in years. The last thing I saw was either Frozen Planet or Game Of Thrones, and by that I mean Season ONE.

5. If you were to be stranded on a deserted island, what three things would you like to be with you?
Something with unlimited battery to play music, the biggest book in the world, and I know she's not a thing by my Mum. SHE GOTTA COME WITH ME.
6. What is your main goal for this year?
Get my book finished and published. 2014 DONE.

7. How would you like to see yourself in 10 years time?
... successful is the short answer, the long answer is: with my family all around me, financially stable and able to help others in some way, doing what I can to improve the state of mother earth and still pursuing my love of story creation.
8. Where do you want to travel?
Japaaaaaaan! Nihon!
9. Are you a listener or a speaker?
Listener. But I can talk your ears off if given half the chance =D Just give me the right topic and I can talk forever. Otherwise I'll be the sponge soaking up info.

10. What do you like most about yourself—physical and characteristic trait?
Awwww Zoe this one is haaaaard! Physical, I really have no idea. If I'm forced to say something then I'll say eyes, cause like, what can go wrong with your eyes...
Characteristic, I think kindness. I dislike it a lot because it makes me vulnerable, and when I feel defensive, it sure is a struggle to be like 'No, really, I DON'T hate you! Jerk.' But I realise that it's helped me to reach out to people I might not know otherwise, really nice and unique people. If that's not my strongest point, then... I am a very good sleeper. I can sleep for like 12 hours ._.

11. Describe a dream vacation.
I have NO idea what to say on this one. Let just say, I went to Florida and saw relatives, or I went to Japan and went to a convention where everybody liked what I liked and danced to Touhou music.


I KNEW my answers were gonna be long.
This is why you never give me a questionnaire !!!!


11 Random Facts About Myself

1. First word was 'duck'. I was referring to a bath toy as opposed to the verb. c:
2. I used to a a dancer, until I gave it up for the love of books. SO unfit now.
3. There's so many notebooks and pens in my house, we could start a shop.
4. I have egos. Which I hope was obvious from the blog. But my current ego (I think it's S.K.) doesn't want to go into that.
5. Obsessed with Japanese culture.
6. I love learning new skills. I always find myself trying to learn a new language.
7. I have an erratic, over-stimulated, super-imaginative mind. It's the cause of my years-long childhood insomnia, my phases of talking to myself in empty rooms, my awesome fantasy super-powered dreams, the reason I struggle to write one story as a time, and why I have seven blogs. (Five are public, one is private, one is for another ego.)
8. Eight is my lucky number, partly because of the I Ching. It has also been 5 (birthday), 7 (just like it) and same-digit numbers (Only 11 or 22 actually.)
9. SO glad I was born female. I love being a girl. Odd but true.
10. I have always thought myself as weird, different from everybody else, yet I've been told I'm 'cool' more than once. I'm happy. Either the standard has dropped or I'm, somehow, KEWL!
11. I go off on tangents. ^ Often.


My 11 Nominees

1. Zoe  of That's Zoe (yes again. She is AWESOME. On her blog like every day!)
http://thatszoe.blogspot.co.uk/
2. The Mad Twins
http://themadtwins.blogspot.co.uk/
3. Inger Anna Jones from So You Want To Be A Writer?
http://mrsjonestakesaleapeoffaith.blogspot.co.uk/
4. Vivian Leung from Vivianista...
http://www.vivianista.com/
5. Zoos from Tainted Heart
http://www.tainted-heart.com/
6. Shaire Blythe from Okay God, Why Am I Here?
http://midniqhtchic.blogspot.co.uk/
7. Skye from Skye's Scribblings
http://scribblerskye.blogspot.co.uk/
8. Melanie C from Mellow Yellow Blog (415 followers on bloglovin, phew.)
http://www.mellowyellowblog.com/
9. Dalanda from The Dalanda Archives
http://thedalandaarchives.blogspot.co.uk/
10. Nix of The Forbearer
http://theforbearer.blogspot.co.uk/
11. ANDDD, last but not least, my fairly recent-ish discovery... (so hard to choose this last one!) *drumroll*
Thalia of Fashion Galaxies XO !!
http://fashiongalaxiesxo.blogspot.co.uk/




I also adore Sakuranko, but she's got over a thousand followers!! Well, Liebster Award rules...

This was surprisingly hard. I could go into a lot of detail about why I like each one and others I could have added to the list, but - another day!! I also mention bloggers I come across that I liked HERE.



My 11 Questions


1. What was your goal when you first started blogging?
2. First Word?
3. (As a fantasy writer, I MUST ASK- !) What fantasy book, film, game or otherwise do you like best (or which one are you most familiar with?) :D
4. Aaaand favourite book in general? (Includes non-fiction, mangas and comics. ANYTHING.)
5. What's something you thought was true as a child, and now know it isn't?
6. Who is your favourite music artist?
7. Earth, Air, Water, Fire - which one describes you the most and why?
8. What's your favourite public holiday or time of year?
9. What is a talent you are proud of and a talent you wish you had?
10. If you became a millionaire tomorrow, actually TODAY, what's the first thing you would do?
11. Finally - what thing, person or experience makes you extremely happy? Really! =D


_______________


This is very interesting to me: as it passes through the ever-typing fingers of so many bloggers, who can say how much the award had changed, like that childhood game Chinese Whispers?

Some people swap around the order, change the font or size, miss out some of the sections (such as the 11 Random Facts, I often see that missed out =D ) I have found two blogs which seem to try and pin down the Very First Liebster Award:

http://liebsterawards.blogspot.co.uk/p/reglas.html AND
http://sopphey.onimpression.com/2012/05/liebster-blog-award-origins.html .

And this also led me to find The Pros and Cons of Receiving Blog Awards post. All very interesting, yes?



.....I wanna create an award O_O



Star xx