FREAKING BEDA and reviews and stuff.

So, as approximately three of you know will know, April means the beginning of this WONDERFUL thing called beda, or veda.
BEDA - to Blog Every Day in April (or any month beginning with A, really.)
VEDA - to Vlog Every Day in -- oh, you get it.
But if you don't.
vlog - to Video blog

/definitions.

AT ANY RATE MY CHILDREN, today, being the first of April, is the beginning of what I have suddenly and completely on the spur-of-the-moment (should that be hyphenated? do you care?) decided to do BEDA. If I was a real YouTuber, I might try to VEDA, but maybe I'll do that later. In like, some other month. Or something.

An easy thing for me to make yet another humble return to blogging with is a review, which is what I'mma do. But first, let me give you a review of my day.

Adrienne's Day: in Three (3) Parts
In the beginning, Adrienne awoke from a pleasant slumber deep in the Land of Nod to a beautifully dark and ominous morning, which is really the best type of morning. She was barely late getting ready and didn't quite miss the bus, which she always counts as a win. This was the beginning.
The the early afternoon, Adrienne had a very enjoyable luncheon with her beautiful friendie Gabby, and then, upon returning to her place of business, Adrienne was informed that she was the proud winner of two FREE tickets to the festival of sounds, the sound of music, Warehouse. She was awarded this for being an exemplary dresser-upper.
In the evening, Adrienne went to a morderately nice dinner, with the fambam, and came home to the comfort of her laptop, where she decided to embark on the adventures BEDA would bring.
Fin.

Adrienne's For Real and Totally Serious Review of:
Anna and the French Kiss by Stephanie Meyer PERKINS

A brief synopsis*? Why, yes, I think I might.
Anna is an American teen with a passion for films and a flair for critiquing them. When her father, a wealthy author of trashy books (think Jodi Picoult) decides it would be to her benefit to spend a year at a boarding school in Paris, Anna is ...unimpressed.
However, left without a choice, the books opens with Anna unpacking in her new rooms, and meeting her new friends, most importantly including the American-Born, French-living, English accent-speaking, all around Gorgeous One, Etienne St Clair.
He has a girlfriend, and most of the girls in their class fawning over him, and she is just a girl from Southern America (not South America) who really, really likes the cinema.
Will their love triumph over the influences of other relationships, or will they be forced apart by the pressures of their faimly? </really lame cliched writing (think Jodi Picoult)>

Yeah, it's a romance novel for young adults [please note: here the phrase 'young adult' is used almost exclusively to refer to young women. and John Green], and it does hold many of the hallmarks of a typical text in this genre. There's little development of the secondary characters, St Clair is the perfect dreamboat, complete with stacks of money and Daddy issues, and Anna is filled with insecurities. Also, just like in real life, it's set in Paris.
HOWEVER, that sounds like I ididn't enjoy it. I loved it. Stephanie Perkins, through her writing, was able to show that she was aware of the fact that she wasn't developing her secondary characters. At one point, one of Anna's underdeveloped (characterwise, not like, boobwise or anything) friends even says 'you haven't really asked about me, you've been too busy with St Clair' or something similar. Yeah, St Clair is amazing, but seriously, who wants to read a book where the guy ISN'T amazing? And Anna's insecurities are so well-written that they're endearing, not enraging.
Another thing I loved about the book was the tiny little gems of fantastic writing. I mean, I thought the whole book overall was well-written, enveloping, and everything a fun, romance book should be; but there were also so many little bits of writing that just showed that Perkins was writing in this genre because she wanted to, not just because that was all she could write ( ... ... ... think Jodi Picoult). Phrases such as "Paris was hovering on the edge of autumn" and the accompanying descriptions just expressed such beauty and love for both her work, and for Paris. There was a passion that was expressed through the book, and it wasn't a passion for hot boys, or money, but a passion for places and people and experiences and life.

Also, it was so good that I read it until 1.30 AM by mobile phonelight in order to get it finished, even though I haf to get up at 7. THAT good.

THAT IS THE END OF MY REVIEW.

Hopefully you'll stick around for my BEDA, and hopefully you will ignore the inevitable millions of spelling mistakes in this post, because I cannot be [expletive]ED to proofhyphenread it.

IREALLYLIKEYOURFACE.
xx




* Synopsis - blurb, in smartypants talk.

It's been a while.

It been so long, in fact, that it kind of got to the point where I was almost scared to come back. I was worried people wouldn't care, or would have forgotten, or just that I would have lost the writing mojo, but I love blogging, and I have ideas and stuff, so I'm not giving up!

A brief explanation.
As a mentioned in a few blog posts, I think, I've just started a new job. And by 'just', I mean about a month ago. My last blog post was, if I recall correctly, just before I started my job, and I have to admit that since then, I've been feeling pretty physically and emotionally defeated. The earliest I ever finish work is about 6, which often doesn't get me home until 6.30 or 7, and sometimes I can finish work as late as 7.30 or 8. This, combined with the dull, uninteresting and repetitive work that I do, has given my life an overarching feel of unpleasantness; I've got very little time, and when I do, usually my head hurts from looking at a computer all day, or a just want to chill and do nothing. I'm also learning a lot all at once, so I'm panicked about not remembering, and if I'm completely honest, it doesn't give me much opportunity to think of things to write. I've stopped experiencing things in my life, which is horrible. I don't see my friends, I don't do anything, because I'm too tired. My weekends quickly fill up, with church, basketball, and maybe catching up with a friend or two, and because of the nature of my job, I can't ever plan anything for after work, because I never know what time I'm going to finish. So, I don't really do anything, and me blogging about another day at work wouldn't hold your interest for very long at all. But I am going to try, because this is an excellent outlet and cultivator of my creativity, which I feel at the moment is being squashed out of me. No offence, Southern Cross Media.

If you're curious, for my job I basically schedule ads, promotions, and the tv shows that you watch on all Ten and 11 channels, and some 7 and 9 channels. It's not nearly as exciting as it sounds.
The work is simple (in a bad way), the pay is not good, but the people there are all really nice and I'm tolerating it.

This all kind of very slowly brings me around to my point. You know, the thing I actually want to blog about.

All these things I'm doing (working, complaining about work, looking forward to payday, having a desk) are all really grown up things, that I've always associated with people over 30 doing, which is weird because pretty much everyone in my team at work is under 30. I don't feel like I should be doing these grown up things, and I don't feel like my friends should be living overseas and going to uni, but I am and they are.
In short, while I'm doing grown up things, I don't feel like a grown up.

Which brings me to my blogly anecdote.

The other day (OK, you got me, it was about 2 weeks ago, WHATEVER), Mum and I were driving home from basketball, and as we got to half way through Fyshwick, we drove past these two teddy bears on the road. We stopped at the lights, and I begged Mum to turn around so that we could pick them up and save them from being destoyed, and while she said it was sad, she refused and kept on driving.
I was really upset.
She couldn't understand that these teddies had been abandoned. I mean really, can you imagine how they'd feel?
Mutinous thoughts were running through my mind, and I couldn't stop thinking about them lying there, on the road, all alone and being run over.
I got home and called Ben, and our conversation went pretty much like this:
B: Hello!
A: Hello we were just driving home and there were some bears on the road and I told mum to stop and turn around and get them but she said that the people might come back for them and wouldn't go back and get them and I don't want them to stay there getting run over so I was wondering if we could drive out there this afternoon and pick them up please because I don't want to leave them because they looked so nice and they're getting run over.
B: OK?

So a few hours later, these were in my possession.

Yes, they're squinty - God knows they're squinters! - and they're a bit beat up, but they're safe and they're mine.

But to get to the point (longest freakin' blog post ever), after this happened, and I was still really disappointed in Mum, I was thinking about why she reacted in the 'don't think about it and keep driving' way.
She acted like a grown up.
I'll concede, a grown up with a childlike sadness at the misfortune of the bears, but her actions reflected more of the grown up side than the childlike side.
For Mum, it was something that wasn't practical or logical, and a sad, yet trivial event.
For Ben, it was something that I know he enjoyed doing, but I think it was more because he thought it was cute that I cared so much.
For me, there was no question about getting and saving the bears; it was something I had to do, otherwise I know I wouldn't have stopped thinking about it.

And while I may be doing grown up things like working and planning holidays on my own and thinking about uni, I don't ever want to be so grown up that I don't stop and save some bears from lying, dying (melodramatic?) on the road as I think about how sad it is, but it's quite inconvenient to turn around, and we really do need to get home, so we'll just trust that someone else will pick them up.

I don't ever want to be that.

If I ever am, I give you full permission to slap me, and give me a teddy to cuddle until I snap the hell out of it.


P.S. Rita, thank you for helping me overcome my emotional hurdles and get back on the blogging horse. Your support makes me feel a hundred times better. :)

I started full time work today.
I'm not going to blog about it.
I am tired, and going to sleep.

In closing, I passed 1000 views sometime in the last few days.
Thank you to everyone who's ever read this.
You're all my dream girl/boy.

***WARNING*** Feelings and stuff contained below. ***CONTINUE AT OWN RISK***

I don't know why I always blog when I'm meant to be going to sleep.
I think it's because I'm more creative when I'm so tired my eyes droop and my fingers keep hitting the wrong keys.
And I actually had to stop and think to make sure I didn't write "and my keys keep hitting the fingers".
I don't know where the 'wrong' went in that, but I'm too sleepy to care.

On an unrelated note, I'm in Melbourne.
IF (intentional capitalisation) you don't know, I was born in Melbourne, and pretty much come back at least once a year.
This time, it's struck me really strongly how much I love it here. But a different kind of loving it to what I used to have.

Let me clarify.
Yeah, you can't stop me clarifying!

So, I lived in Melbourne until just after my sixth birthday, which means - if you don't know - I moved up to Canberra in June 1998. When I first found out we were moving, I was so upset. Leaving my friends, and my home and my everything and moving to this stupid place I'd never even heard of! Eugh! And I remember crying for hours because I had to go back to kindergarten.
[If you don't know, in Victoria (and some other places) kindergarten is the year or two before you start primary school: what is known in Canberra as pre-school. In Canberra, the first year of school (in Melbourne called Prep) is actually called kindergarten. So, in my mind, I was regressing intellectually, being forced back a year. It was very traumatic.]
And then once we were up here, I wanted SO BADLY to go back. I recall fussing and carrying on and trantruming because I wanted to live in Melbourne again, and I hated this stupid 'city' where nothing happens.
A few times, my mum got upset, because she preferred Canberra to Melbourne, and she felt more at home here, but to my pre-adolescent self, I couldn't understand any of this. I just wanted to move back HOME.
I was pining for my idea of a place that I was too young to understand. I didn't really know Melbourne that well. I was young enough that most of my experiences had been out of my control, and really, I couldn't remember a lot of them anyway. But, it was home to me, and where I'd grown and made connections, so I wanted it.

Unfortunately, the powers of a 9 - 10 year old girl over her parents' life-changing decisions is not as prolific as she might have hoped, and we stayed in 'Berra.
It took me a few years to realise that it was fantastic to be here.

Now, I'm not saying I love Canberra. I think it can be dull, and REALLY, nothing EVER happens here. But if I'd stayed in Melbourne, I know I'd not be the person I am today. The social influences on me would have been completely different, my parents may not have got divorced, or it may have happened differently, I'd have grown up around my family. I'm not saying I'm glad I didn't have these things, but if I had, I wouldn't be who I am now.
And I like who I am now.

So, I finally reached an age where I can appreciate being in Canberra, and the people I've met and the things I haven't done (because have I mentioned nothing happens there?).

But it was only really this trip to Melbourne that I fell in love with Melbourne for a different, if related, reason.
I love the people here, and what I have shared with them.
I love how special each and every memory me and my oldest friend Courtney have. We spend so little time together that every time we see each other, it's so much more special. And we laugh at random memories, like trying to eat a bath bomb this one time, and avoiding being captured in the naked videos that some other members of my family and Courtney's didn't avoid.
Not that I wouldn't like to see Courtney every day, but you get the idea.
And I love how when I go to Courtney's house, all her family and my family sit around and talk about the embarrassing stories we have about each other.

And I love that I can sit with my family and apart from the initial ten minutes after arriving, it doesn't seem like I've ever left. I can get as many hot drinks as I like from my pa, and my cousins just want to play and cuddle and my aunts and uncles are chatty about regular, family, normal things.

I come down here, and I feel comfortable. It's not about some deep connection I imagined or hoped to have as a child. It's not that Melbourne is just a hundred times cooler than Canberra.
It's just that no matter how stressed out, hot, bothered, annoyed or embarrassed I get here, I feel completely comfortable.

But don't stress Canberra folk! I feel that way with you too. It's just slightly more surprising being somewhere I don't live. Somewhere that isn't, despite the fervent wishes of my childhood, my home.

I don't know the point of this, so I wouldn't try too hard to figure it out. It was just some thoughts I'd been having that I wanted to share.

xx

He wears a Stetson now.

Hol. Y. Ma. Go. Las.
And
Oh. My. God.

I'm baaaaaaack...

... soon.
When it isn't nearly 12 at night.
And I have to get up at 8.
And I'm tired after travelling.
For the past two days.
But I know you missed me.
So I just thought I'd tell you
that I have, in fact, returned.
Alive, well, safe, happy.
And soon I shall post a long,
long, long, long, long, long,
probably not that long, post here.
So keep watching, and waiting.
I know, you're excited.
I am too.
I will speak to you soon,
beautiful, beautiful sir/madam.


xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Potentially Titled This

I just got accepted into university. I've decided to do something different than 90% of the people I know, and not post it on my Faceybook. Not that there's anything wrong if you did; I'd just like to talk about my plans at the moment, and my feelings and stuff.

I've just been accepted into the Australian National University, to study for a Bachelor of Science (Psychology). While personally, I'd much rather go to the University of Woollongong, that's not really an option for me at the moment, financially and emotionally, and I also kind of feel like I'm wasting this amazing resource if I don't go to ANU. I mean, I live in Canberra, and ANU is one of the top universities in the world, and I feel like if I go elsewhere, it's kind of stupid, because I've got ANU right here, where I can live, rent free while I study.
And for that, I sacrificed the course at U of W that I really wanted all along, which is a Bachelor of Arts (Psychology).
This would have meant that instead if studying a science subject, like I have to at ANU, I would have had room for three other subjects of whatever-the-hell-I-want, which I'd have preferred.
But hey, I made the choice.

I was just thinking today about how weird everything is. I mean, some of my friends are already talking about O Week. Those that aren't, are far away, in obscure places or distant countries, without their parents, living independently. Even the ones staying here, whether for uni or something else, are fiercely independent, at least in my eyes (however, keep in mind that I have yet to get my Ps).
And you know what I think?
I'm not freaking old enough for this.
I'm not saying I'm old.
I'm fully aware that I'm not.
But, I mean, travelling alone, living alone, going to uni, working full time, these are all things that grown ups do. Real people, with real lives and real responsibilities do.
Because that's what my friends are: grown ups.
And it's become painfully obvious, quite suddenly, to me, that I'm a grown up too. I've been aware of my adulthood for quite a while, with voting in the election, the ability to drink, hang out with my friends until late, go out clubbing and so forth, but feeling grown up is different.
[At this point, please note that I'm not saying I'm completely grown up. I, and my friends, are just doing things that, in my mind, have always been things 'grown ups' do.]
I've been accepted to uni, I've got a job, I'm planning my travel, and I've got control of my life.
Sure, I still have to keep my room clean, but the important things are now mine.

For the curious, this year, I'm taking a year off, getting a full-time job until June, then travelling to the US and Canada for two months (San Fran, Boise, Vancouver, Toronto via Winnipeg [that's in Canada!], Orlando for LeakyCon, LA for VidCon, New York and Washington DC), then flying to Manchester and spending until around Christmas living in London and travelling all over Europe.
On the job front, I've been offered a job, which I've accepted, at Southern Cross Ten, working with the organisation of ads, but I'm also hoping to hear back about a public service job.

Anyway, I guess I don't feel like I should be accepting uni offers and settling into full time jobs and planning trips because that's stuff grown ups do, and I still feel like a four year old, or an eight year old, or a something-younger-than-I-am-now year old.

I'm aware that there are so many things left for me to experience, and that I'm not old, or even fully grown (one could argue that one is never fully grown), and that this responsibility, while it may seem like a lot, is still slight compared to the coming 50+ odd years of my life.
It's just startling that I've gone from 
Adrienne May, Daramalan College student, basketball player, has some friends
to
Adrienne May, potential uni student, potential world connoisseur, potential full-time worker, potential failure, potential inspiring success story, potential new friend, potential new housemate, potential enemy, potential crazy cat lady.
In short,
Adrienne May, potential unknown.

Stupid realisations made too late in life.

This is a collection of stupid things that I thought were true, up until the point where discovering the truth, and revealing the incorrectness of my thoughts, is just plain embarrassing.
Enjoy.

Beginning with some festive cheer.

Thing: Mince pies
Truth: Most commonly pastry containing varied and minced fruits. Often covered with icing sugar.
Idiocy: While I am aware that there are mince pies that are entirely made of mince, like, meat mince, I am also aware that no one eats those. And by aware, I mean I recently became aware. Until recently, I thought that they all contained minced meat, not fruit, despite the fact that I had, on a number of occasions, actually eaten them. Yes, I'd eaten fruit mince pies, and still been utterly sure that all pies in the 'mince pie' genre (I like to think of my pies as genres) were composed entirely of meat. Even though it tasted like fruit. And I always wondered why my mince pies always tasted so much like fruit
Age of startling realisation: 18.


Thing: Mules
Truth: Animals that a similar to a donkey and similar to a horse. Make a weird groaning/braying noise.
Idiocy: Was told by my father (confirmed by my brother) that this animal, a cross between and horse and a donkey, in fact say "mule mule" in a rather deadpan, nasally tone. If you ever see me and remember, I will make the noise for you. My family assured me this was the noise mules made. I bought it.*
Age of startling realisation: ... 17


Thing: Hearth
Truth: The bit in front of a fireplace. Pronounced hahr-th
Idiocy: Thought it was pronounced her-th. This is made more embarrassing by the fact that I consider myself quite good at English, in that I have a wide vocabulary, always check the spelling of words of which I'm unsure, and use correct grammar, even in text messages. And I'd been saying this wrong for a long time. Not that I say heArth very much. But you know. Also made worse by the fact that my pronunciation seems logical. H-earth. But I guess so does heart-h. WHATEVER.
Age of startling realisation: 18 years, 6 months and 26 days old. And if you do the maths (and know my birthday) you'll have the startling realisation that this was about two months ago. Yep.


Thing: "Because We Want To"
Truth: A bad '90s pop song by Billie Piper, referred to only as 'Billie' in track listings
Idiocy: Perhaps more forgivable than some of the others, because my naivety is a result of a fact that a) Because We Want To wasn't actually my favourite song ever, so I didn't really pursue more music by the artist, and b) I didn't know who Billie Piper was then, and she had no significance in my life. Now, as a Doctor Who fan, I know who she is. I was aware that she did write (bad) pop songs, but I didn't think I'd ever heard any of them. UNTIL I went on an old web page that was talking about prospective Doctors to take over from 10th, and she was listed as one of them, and in her short bio, it mentioned "Because We Want To". It may not seem like a big thing, but I had the biggest "OHHHHHHH!!" moment.
Age of startling realisation: 18 (about a month ago)


Thing: Cloning in YouTube videos
Truth:YouTube vloggers quite frequently overlap images in their videos to make it seem as thought there are two or more of them. Often seen in Community Channel and Wheezy Waiter videos.
Idiocy: Now, if you know me, you'd know that I'm fairly fond of the YouTubes, and when I first started watching, I watched a few Community Channel videos, and some Charlie videos with clones, and I swear, the first three or four videos I watched with cloning, this is what was running through my head:
"Man, a lot of YouTubers are twins."
Following that, it was:
"And I don't think I've ever seen triplets before, but there are so many!"
I still haven't seen triplets.
There aren't that many.
I'm just stupid.
I'm pleased to say this didn't last long, but still, it was there.
I are smart.
Age of startling realisation: 18 (and after having watched about 4 videos with clones)


</embarrassing stories>
You owe me so bad, [insert reader name].



*I hate you guys.

This will chronicle a recent adventure to the toilet-room.

I don't know what to call the toilet-room. My toilet (IT'S MINE but not really) is in a different room to the bathroom (which also functions as the shower-room, the sinkroom, the toiletries-cupboardroom, the towels-that-are-in-use-room, the towelrackroom, and the SHUT THE HELL UP NOW AND GET ON WITH IT WE WANT TO HEAR WHAT HAPPENED IN THE TOILET-ROOM BUT NOT REALLY room).

Shall we just call it bathroom 2.0? It seems to be a successful marketing strategy.

So a recent addition to our my b2.0 is the calendar on the back of the door. To the uninitiated, we always have a calendar on the back of our door. A different one each year. Just in case you don't know what calendars are/do/yeah.
As it's early this year, and the first time I've been to my dad's house this year, it was my first Calendar Viewing.

Ho-ly-crap-man.

We got a frakking Where's Wally (lolllll) calendar.
I literally just stood in b2.0 for like ten minutes trying to find the stuff, because not only does it have Wally, but it has the checklist of other things to FIND. Like a boy with a dog biting his bum.
WHAT?
How the hell do you ever expect me to pee when there's a Where's Wally to complete?!

I think that's all I had to say.
There was also a grey woman in the picture. I can see their attempts to include a variety of ethnicities, but I think grey, alien women is possibly a bit to inclusive.

No wonder Wally is hiding.


Also, nerdfighters.
Where's Wally? In Your Pants.

Resultioons. Yep. Resultioons.

You know, I never stick to New Year's resolutions. I don't know if it's just because I always make them too hard (Yeah, exercise EVERY SINGLE DAY, Adrienne. Err, gtfo?), or because I lack the motivation, or just because I don't care, but I always fail at them.
Sometimes I feel like New Year's resolutions are made up to make people feel bad about themselves, and to make you feel a bit like a failure.
New Year's resolutions are basically pretty stupid.

So here are my New Year's resolutions.

1. Live to 2012.
2. Figure out how to refer to this year. (Twenty-eleven? Two thousand and eleven?) I think I'm of the Frezned opinion (Frezinion?) that it should just be called 'Eleven'.
3. Get more subscribers on my personal YouTube channel than on my collab channel. This should work if I keep being a fliptard and posting my collab videos on my personal channel accidentally.
4. Go to another country. This should be easy, considering I'm meant to be going on an around the world trip...
5. Make 5 new friends.
6. Still use this blog.
7. Stick to New Year's resolutions.
8. Buy something.
9. Have my nails painted more often than I have them not painted.
10. Get over my obsessive compulsions.

See, you were all like "What?? She just spent 150 words explaining why New Year's resolutions a stupid, and now she's making some WHAT?"
But then you read them and realised they are all pretty lame and easy and silly.
The subscriber one may seem hard, until you realise that my collab only had 25 subscribers (Y)
So thems is my resolutions.

I also think I should point out that resolutions is a bitch to type.
Seriously.
This is how I want to type it every time.
reslutosn.
reslutons.
resultonsions
resloutons
resoltions.
resoliutions.
SEE! It is HARD.

I think that every blog post I've posted has had a "Seriously." moment in it.
Nearly.
Maybe.
Almost.
Seriously.

Good luck to all those peeeeeeeeps who is leaving town tomorrow.
Hope your planes don't crash and that you don't get abducted in your new strange towns.

ODD.
L.
ING.
S.


Phin.