Soo..this is the Single life for me then?

So apart from the "woe is me, he left me, how can I cope *cries and drinks*" post and "the List" of the perfect man for me post, I have been oddly quiet.
It is not because my depression over another failed long term relationship took me over the edge, indeed, it seemed to breathe life into me and give me back my pixiedust that was slowly being drained out of me. I have had so much adventures Since March I hardly had time to breathe let along write in details over where I have been and what I have seen..
From the sheets of new lovers to seeing live music to giggling with friends, this Summer was the Summer of Adventures for sure.

So a quick Summary of the highlights:

• Playing and completing Pokemon Gold. I am that cool at being a (causal) gamer, this goes first!
• Going to Bath in April and then in May to see my good friend Dan Artsie. We explored the hills, the national trust park, Saw Lions, and witnessed his Graduation. I also met his Mother for his first time. Very cool woman.
• Getting back on track to University. Going back in September and getting my Bursary too. I get paid to complete the training. *Dances*.
• Going to Bristol to visit Waffle. It was a weekend of intriguing catch ups and seeing a more relaxed Bristol.
• TENBY! yes, I went for the weekend for Brenda's birthday. Wales was amazing. Paint balling, beaches, Urban exploring, welsh cakes and going on the track for go karting!
  
• Sheffield for The Beach Party (Dan's 21st) and Then for the Big Brother house with with the introduction of Sam. His Blog and version if you care to read is here.
• Going back to Work and getting off benefits and sorting my head out a lot better. Off the anti depressions and Self harming stops being so regular :)
• Saying a final goodbye to my close Friend Belinda and her lover as they depart to Australia for a year
  
• Going to Wimbledon Tennis with a new face in my life, Clockwise..and realizing how much I hate tennis..Urgh.
• Going for many BBQ's in various parks!
  
• Seeing Wireless! Wooh! Finally seeing Pink!
• Going Camping in Latitude! 54 acts in 3 and half Days..<3
• Going to Ben and Jerry's for the 2 days..Free Ice creams and many happy moments with friends
• Going to see many bands and my beloved La Rebla Fam and Mad Ramblings!

And the plans for the future?
Well to carry on with the adventures and get my PIN. All good times me think!

• Planning to go to Berlin for the Xmas holidays and qualifying just before then :)
• Going to Travel to America with a certain Hayley if Funds allow it and see a certain Lori
  
• To enjoy the joy of being free, young and with a good job. :)

Wooh. Pixie's back!

See you all soon!

(And thank you all for helping me get back my spirits in the hard times of Winter and Spring. I never forgot your help, support and constant Love. Especially Cookie, Sparrow, Mr D, Raz and my Mama. God knows I am happy to know you!)

Valentine's Day love!

I hate Valentine's. Seriously I do. For a person in a loving relationship and who has free time to plan things for her lover, I was not the most happiest come the 14th.
It is not the stress.
It is not the commerical. nature.
It is the fact that one day out of the whole year people are forced to go against their nature and be nice and romantic to who falls into their lustful eyesight. Come on guys. There are 365 days in the year last time I checked. You do NOT need to wait til Febuary to show that you care and love someone..

That rant out of the way, I did have a good time.
John phoned me and told m
e to dress in leathers and warm clothes. It meant one thing. I was going to ride on his bike (He hates riding with others so that was a treat in itself!)
After having a quick hot choc and me posing in the lid he borrowed for me:

The question where/what are we going to do was soon answered when we pulled up outside Bloomsbury Bowling Alley. For those that don't know it, it is a cool bar that has bowling, Karoke, gigs, dancing, random machines and a 50's style.
It was cool, Quirky and totally us.

Food was consumed:
(yes it had to be typically us..Ordering more then we can eat..The milkshakes were cool though..and ridiculously filling!

Bands were admired:

(Check them out..Scarlett's Rose was amazing live. Love the blond singer's voice!)

And our competitive nature arose when we bowled with our funny names:

I lost but only because John managed to get 3 strikes. Well it was nearly Turkey after all..(his favourite word it seems.)

I also embarrassed John by repeatly asking for tea. The guy felt sorry for me and evenually made me one from the staff stock! Well, if you ask you get don't you.

I also got a heart balloon. Doesn't it look like nipples..? It does doesn't it..? It is not just me, is it..?

I wanted to keep it, but John decided to burst it on me as he claimed
"I would look like a twat if I was riding a bike with a balloon sticking out".
Meanie.
Still, I got a new band to be obessed about and I Really want a bike. Good times
:P

A day and night in Camden Town...

Okie, so these last few days I had a reason to visit my old haunt in London. Glorious Camden Town. I had lunch, coffee dates and gigs. Almost feel like my old self a bit at that.

First time was with Vince. He likes Camden. I like Camden. Seemed like a great place to choose to meet and catch up. Bad plan for me though, as I came straight from John's and had heavy books, dirty clothes and my laptop. Note to self. Lugging around a giant rucksack makes wondering slightly difficult.
It was nice though. Brought a diablo from Oddballs, ate a lot of Camden style food and laughed with Vince at the "fashion" there. Bliss.

I went back the next day to meet my old Uni mates-Dolly, Smi and Sarah. All were depressed about work (or in Sarah's case lack of). Tis a hard life for us some times. We all were happy with catching up, being cam whores and eating in our favourite restaurant Max Oriental...


I was soon greeted by another friend: Cookie. It was good timing of her as the others left for new adventures in various London hangouts while I wanted to stay for a gig in Camden.
Cookie did seem to get on with Smi..At least Smi was making her giggle with talks of Clothes and accounting stories.
Bored with the shops, Cookie and I headed for Hampstead Health. The plan was to sit down in the green and have a hot drink. It was far to cold though to put that plan in action (In this weather? In this Country? What were we thinking?!), so we stopped into a quaint looking shop. It served good cake and was reasonable for the drinks. Plan B turned out to be not so bad.

Vince graced us with his presence in the evening..We meet at the World's End pub- Best one ever with this sign by the way:


and went straight on to the gig.

I saw one of the bands before-Molloy so I was happy. The lead singer Caz give me a big hug and it was nice to hear more of her life then just music based news. She was amazing on stage as usual!

Another band I grew to like was Slow Gun. I did make a prat of myself after with the Bass player- She was handing out badges and didn't hear what I was saying. Basically she thought I was a twat.

The other band was cute but boring to listen to. The name failed to register in my mind..Sad for them I'm sure.

Hungry after the music, I persuaded the others to go eat with me. I was going to have Chiense but the store for Falafels caught my eye. Managed to make a prat of myself for the second time that night.

Me: Do you do any veggie Falafels?
Guy: umm..Falafels are always Vegetarian
Me: But why does it say it has mince in it (pointing to the sign)
Guy: It says Mint, not mince.
Me: ....................I will have one then -Blush-

To top it all off, after I got the damn thing, I hated it and Vince and Cookie laughed as I struggled to enjoy it. That and I managed to get it on my skirt, hair and cookie's hair while devouring it..Typical.


Then on Monday I went again. Well this time to Mornington Crescent for KOKO. Managed to score two tickets to see Mika, Courteeners and JLS for free for the Album Chart Show. Went with Vince as I thought he would like it (he did). As it was live recording though it ran late. Doors opened at half 7 not 6..Brr, was snowing as well when we were outside.

Inside was okie, and was enjoying myself til JLS came on. My goodness, I took an instant dislike to them and it got worst as I realized that they were lip syncing and doing very dodgy dance moves. I cried when they had to re do the entire set.
I was so happy when Mika came on. I loved him before, but now I would happily be a mindless drone for him. He was quirky. He was a natural on stage. His voice was a-maze-zing. I am in love. Seriously.

Pictures came out good to!

Last was Courteeners. Not my favourite indie act out there, but they had talent (and an army of groupies it seems).


All in all. A great few days in my favourite place in London. You can guess where you can find me if I am out of bed now!

The lost art of Exploring.

It is good to be friends with someone gets pleasure in exploring. It is even better when that said person has free time at the same time as you. This person for me is Vince.
For today's adventure we decided to go to Tate Modern.
I was surprised that I liked some of the Artwork on display.
This artist in particular was really good for me and did a whole host of manga related work. It was interesting as well as stunning to the eye.


Couldn't stay in the gallery for the whole day, so went for lunch. Took him to Chilango- a Mexican chain. The portion was so big I struggled to finish mine and Vince did not complain of hunger for a good while after. Result for £9!


As usual we also went to a coffee house for a while. Vince knew of a cheap one off Piccidilly-Grace.
I was happy as they gave free smarties in a shot glass for every drink. Awesome.

Cookie's birthday Dinner

What more is there to explain..?
Cookie wanted to go out to Dinner for her birthday with close friends. I was entertained with good company while my stomach was entertained with good food.
The restaurant was in Russell Square-called . A mixture of all oriental food recipes from rice to weird soup. All cheap- though as I was a greedy pig and decided to order 2 starters and then 2 mains plus drinks mine was a bit excessive.
There was only 4 people I knew (Anna, Brenda, Cookie and Ryan (her boyfriend), so it was weird to talk to others















..As one knows I have been quite the reclusive so making "polite" conversation was not easy- glad I could stuff my mouth with food and avoid that issue!





Harder when Anna shouted out "Stop taking sex talk there!!". I would not mind but I was listening to Ryan talking about Cookie. -Sigh-. Am I that predictable in my chat?

We did joke that cookie should have her own twitter page to rival www.twitter.com/shitmydadsays.

The dinner got better when we realised that Brenda made a cake for Cookie..As we all know that she bakes only in special times, we realised how good it would be..(and it was. It was indeed..)







It did put a damper on thing getting the bill. Weird to think that food cost that much! What the hell?

Anyway, HAPPY BIRTHDAY COOKIE! :)..We all love you <3

So this is Spain huh..?

As I have never been out of the great United Kingston, except to visit Poland and Ireland, I jumped at the chance to visit Spain.
I was lucky. Anna's friend Maya needed someone to go with her to look after her baby Daughter while she was in a convention in Madrid. As I was free (and in the mood for an adventure I agreed. Who wouldn't want to have a free holiday with a beautiful baby and cool woman, where the only "job" was to babysit for a few hours for 3 days? Bargain I thought!

First I went to Luton on Friday where Maya lives. Luton is a tiny village it seem- and when I went out in the night with the Au Pair Anishca (Polish Girl), it was easy to find the best places to go out.




t

Was only briefly though as I had to get up at dawn for the flight. Did get to meet the lil one-Suzie. A glorious 3 year old.
Maya's lover Tony was dropping us off at the Airport in the morning, and it occurred to me I have not been on the plane for years-and I was not a good flier then anyway.
As we got on the plane my heart started racing.. It was made worst when I turned and saw lil Suzie smiling and not at all fazed by the fact we would be up in the air in a tin can creation by humans. Gulp.
Took pictures to take my mind off that fact..









Obviously we made it to the other side okay, even either with the check out delays. Suzie did a few dances to entertain us:

First thing we did after getting our luggage was get on the Metro to our hotel. It was a cute chain called 4C.


Headed to the main town square after. I laughed as it was called Sol and this band was playing outside:

That and a London reference:
Exploring Madrid showed with it's The Street Performers:





Beautiiful Parks and wildlife:



It's quirky..designs:

d


o






Fountains:



And a zillion Churches...Maya seemed content to see every one first hand and I was ont one to complain- Catholic Churches can take your breath away:





We also sampled a lot of the food there. The food was salty and not like La Tasca at all.I was surprised at the price too!Still the locals were friendly enough. Did embarrass myself with broken Spainish a lot of the time. This was a typical meal..Half pints and potato with sauce. Tasty though :)





The muesums were also something that I admired. They seemed to be one on every street. Some were closed but the one I wanted to see the Prada was open for business.
It was so big we got lost trying to find the exit after a while.
Spain seemed obessesed by having Play parks for the little ones everywhere as well. Good for little Suize who seemed to enjoy herself in her own way.


The next day Sunday was similar in nature: Explore the inside of Spain:

After being woken up by a beautiful Suzie:



We helped ourselves to the buffet breakfast. There was no warm things to eat like eggs or sausages. We were offered a range of buns, cakes, fruit and tea/coffee/ fruit juice. A weird experience for someone how eats hot porridge most days.



We saw some weird buildings like the Spainish version of the Leaning tower of Piza..

(



To a Egyptian temple that they gave Spain as a present..Right.






I feel in love with this Artist to, who was drawing simple designs of wall tiles. I thought he was good enough to buy from. Pity I did not realize that the paint was not dry yet and it got smudged badly :S





We also saw some more gardens:

Saw a wish box where you put the old Spainese coins into it..



And shopped on the main high street with the random dancers:






As our blood sugar was dropping, a meal of random tapas in a cheap looking place was what we did. It was not cheap at all, and the Waiter was annoying. I didn't know he spoke English so I gestured to him for 5 minutes before he let me know. He also thought Suzie was my daughter so led to minor embarrassment..

Chocolate was good-as Suzie shows!






Also got some really cheap Booze. The "kiss" cider was so cheap. Like 60p or so I think.




The wine was nice. Got really drunk and made a fool of myself. After an hour or so drinking, I got it into my head to go to the kitchen and get food. Tried to steal what I thought was a box of biscuits. It turned out to be a big box of juice, 10 liters to be exact. Did not stop me, as, after I realized and Maja finished laughing, I went down for round. I found a load of fruit, In the progress of bringing it up to the room, I got stopped by another guest who saw the big load of fruit and made me put it back. Shameful.

The next 2 days I was along with Suzie while Maya went off to the conference. I thought I would more nervous then I was in taking care of one so young. I think I managed okie though! Took her to the parks mostly. I never realized how hard ot is to manage a heavy buggy and an equally heavy toddler. Glad she feel asleep a lot of the time. Allowed me to go back to the hotel guilt free to have some zzz time myself (Golly, I would make a sucky mother!)






Still fun times though. Was not that impressed by the Macdonald's. I know, I know. I got to Spain and I eat the typical Big mac..So shoot me. Typical English and all..



Maya invited us to join her for the tapas Lunch on Tuesday which was cool. Got to eat all fancy dishes set out in a big hotel..then I took the little one to the park. Unfortunatly that is where my camera died. Stupid battery. I did have one more day more there before getting back to deary England (Weather, so good in Spain. No need for a jacket at all!) I was lucky because, as Maya's work lectures were cut short, we had a free tour guide to learn about Madrid. Went to the palace and saw the Guards changing. Saw the bull fighting place. Saw more gardens and streets. Saw a famous shopping place where all the locals go for fresh meat and fish and olives. Saw the oldest resturant in the world..(Called Botin). Forgot what else I saw. To be honest, I missed London a tad much and was looking forward to jacket potatoes and seeing rainy skies again. What can I say? At least I made a good friend. Me and Maya talked a lot about life, men and where we are heading. She is a smart woman to chat to , and I enjoyed her company. That and Suzie was amazing. Don't you think we look like we are related? tee hee.