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Wednesday 29 January 2014

Six reasons living together DOES work

A friend of mine just posted an article titled "Six reasons living together doesn't work" on facebook which popped up on my newsfeed. She says she "agrees with everything and thoroughly enjoyed" reading this article. So naturally, I clicked on it and I've come to the conclusion that my friend is mad. Be warned now, this blog post is going to be a full on rant and probably quite opinionated, so sorry if I'm coming across a little rude.


First off, I'll just link the article here so you can read it. I'm pretty sure this website is a kind of online community for Christian women (my friend's father is a minister) so perhaps a lot of ideas in the article stem from the Bible? In no way am I Bible bashing (is that the correct term?) or criticising the readings or people's beliefs bla bla, we all know that disclaimer, but what I'm going to write is what I believe. Essentially, I'm going to quote the article and then say it's all crap.


Point number one: "You can't try out commitment". Actually, you can. The author of this article is suggesting that "marriage at its core is all about commitment" but, um, so is a normal loving unmarried relationship. In fact, I'm trying to write more about this point but I can't because THE WOMAN'S ARGUMENT IS SO ILLOGICAL. "Couples think they can 'try out' this marriage thing by living together, but that doesn’t work because marriage is about more than sharing an address, or expenses, or a bed.  Marriage at its core is all about the commitment." It sounds a lot like she's suggesting any relationship other than a marriage isn't committed? Isn't it a million times better to live together for a bit and then see if this person grates on your nerves so much that you actually can't take it, than to "court" for a year or two before getting married, and then move in together only to find you can't deal with being with them 24/7? It is.


Point number two: "Your needs are important too". Okay, so learn to compromise like any normal person would. I honestly don't understand this argument. Who said anything about giving up everything you want? The author says that a guy's top relationship needs are "physical responsiveness, companionship, domestic support" and that "a living-together relationship is more likely to meet his needs than yours". Isn't she contradicting herself? Marriage is about equality, happiness, bla bla, so why is living together before marriage a bad idea purely because it might make him happier than it makes you? The hypocrisy is mind blowing. (Also, what if it's a same sex relationship? Her theory here suggests that these couples will have exactly the same needs, because, you know, the dynamic of every relationship is dictated by gender. NOT.)


This brings me on to point number three: "It sets a norm for selfish living". The lady says you need to "be willing to make selfless decisions" and that "this is not the culture created in most living-together relationships." Can we take a moment to let that sink in? It seems like she's made a pretty huge jump from you need to be selfless to living together will make you selfish. But, please, do tell... how does it make you selfish? You're sharing a home, making decisions together, letting them into your life. I don't know, call me stupid, but what part of that sets a standard for selfish living?


Points four and five are essentially the same so I'll just lump them together: "You shouldn't have to earn the ring" and "you are more valuable than that". Alrighty. Who said a couple who are living together have any obligation to marry each other? What if they just like spending time together and have some level of commitment to each other? Why can't that be enough? Like I said previously, perhaps living together for a few months has shown a couple that they don't want to be together for the rest of their lives. Why does marriage have to be the be-all and end-all of a relationship? Some people don't agree with the idea of marriage anyway. You're allowed to explore your feelings within a relationship and - shocker right here - YOU'RE ALLOWED TO BREAK UP IF YOU WANT TO. Holy crap, living together isn't some automatic pass to marriage. It's a trial period, if marriage is what you're after, or two people might just want to hang out more and living together is a nice convenient way to do that.


Point six "if you want God’s favor, you’ve got to follow God’s ways" is kind of irrelevant for me because, while I do believe in God, that belief is not what I base my life around. I don't go to church or read the Bible or not get drunk at parties or never swear ever. The way I see it is that God wants y'all to be happy. (I just said y'all, I've been watching too much Ellen DeGeneres!) If you're living with someone who, oh my god, isn't your husband or wife, He's not going to hate you. Hell, He's not even going to disapprove because you're probably a good person and you're happy and you're making someone else happy by compromising (not that the author of this article gets what that is) and you really like - or maybe even love - each other. God loves love, yo.


If I find someone who I like enough, and who likes me too, and we're in a happy relationship, we can move in with each other. We don't have to get married and our feelings are allowed to change. We don't have to stay together forever. Living together is going to help me see if I could spend the rest of my life with them and if they actually want me in their life forever. We're going to "try out our commitment" to each other (yeah, I said it!). And it's going to be pretty great.

Monday 27 January 2014

Late January Updates

I don't know why I'm calling this an updates post - there's not a great deal to update you on. I feel like January has gone so quickly (only four days left, whaaat??) and that I haven't done much in that time. I honestly can't tell you anything special I did last week, or the week before, or the week before that. It feels like I have so many plans for the future but that I'll never get there. Rather, it's going to take a long, long time to get there. I'll do what I usually do when I feel lazy and overwhelmed and that is to write a list of January's happenings.


1) I locked in my firm - Chester - and my insurance - Anglia Ruskin - choices on UCAS today. I was a bit sad to see my other three offers automatically delete themselves but hey, it has to be done.

2) I've spent some time trying to apply for student finance today but it's complicated and I'm lazy so I've given up for now.

3) I am drowning in coursework for school and I feel like wailing 24/7 and letting the whole world know I can't coooooope! I'm sure it will get better; this week is just a bit of a let's-bury-Kate-in-essays one.

4) It's my last ever parents evening on Thursday. LAST EVER! How crazy is that? After this, there's going to be no more of "oh I guess I should behave because my parents are going to get told about it". I like to work on a need-to-know basis with my parents with regards to everything, be it school, boys, friends, outings, anything. And after Thursday, they don't need to know a single thing about my progress (or lack of) at school.

5) The Rookie yearbooks are a total godsend and there's a story in yearbook two which has hit me particularly hard. It's called "The Year I Learned Everything" and it's on page 288 should you have RYB2 and want to read it again. You could read it on the Rookie website too. Although it's a short story, I feel a review coming on.

6) I kind of don't want winter to end. It's my favourite season and I love wrapping up warmly and thinking about snow (not that there has been any!) and drinking hot things. However, this summer is going to be cray good, I hope, with the end of school forever, going to Zante, the Lake District and Germany, our prom, and just freedom. Can you tell the only thing getting me through everything right now is the thought of summer?

7) On Friday, I went out with the guy I may or may not be kind of seeing/ dating-type thing and we were going to go and sit in a pub - that word makes me feel like a man - and maybe just drink J2Os, not even anything alcoholic. As it turned out, little underage me wasn't even allowed in to this "family friendly" pub, even just to eat - I asked. Since when was that a rule? It's a stupid rule fo sho.


I think that's everything I've been doing as of late. Also, I'd be interested to know if you guys think it's rude to go to a restaurant and just order starters (let's say the starters are bloody huge, okay?) and drinks. Is that bad? Please leave a comment letting me know yo thoughts, it's something I've been wondering about.


Song of the day:


Monday 20 January 2014

The Eve of St Agnes

One of the texts I studied for AS English literature last year was a poem by John Keats called The Eve of St Agnes. It's a tale of two young lovers who elope and escape the constraints placed upon them by the girl, Madeline's, father. Feel free to read it here. I think it's beautifully written. The text really resonated with me because who doesn't dream about finding true love and running away with them to live happily ever after? I know I do, and I know it's on an almost daily basis.


Madeline's nurse tells her about St Agnes's day which happens every day on the 21st January, and that the night before - if certain rites are performed - a girl's future husband will come to her in her dreams. However, this only happens if the girl goes to bed without any supper, sleeps naked and with her hands under her pillow, and lies with her back to her bedroom door. Madeline is enthralled by the idea and does exactly as the nurse has told her. She goes to sleep and, sure enough, a young man appears in her dream. They fall in love and get married.


In actuality, a young man named Porphyro sneaks into the castle in which Madeline and her family live. He creeps up to Madeline's bedroom, sees her undress and get into bed, and watches her sleeping. He then goes over to her bed while she's only half awake, and it's implied that they have sex. It doesn't sound entirely consensual to me. As far as Madeline is concerned though, she's just dreaming. When she wakes up and sees Porphyro, she's terrified he'll leave her, and so she persuades him to elope with her.


After I read this, my best friend and I vowed to put this date, the 20th January in our calendars so we too could get a glimpse of our future husbands in our dreams. I'm a sucker for magic and superstition and old fairy tales, so I'm pretty excited. But, let me tell you, I won't be going to bed without dinner, no sir. I also won't be sleeping naked because I always manage to kick my duvet off and my dad comes in every morning to wake me up. I do sleep with my hands under my pillow but I like to thrash around whilst I sleep so there's no guarantee I won't be facing my door. We'll see what happens. (There will also be no one breaking into my house, watching me sleep, and there will be no non-consensual sex either.) 


Perhaps it's all some psychological trick and now that I know I'm meant to be dreaming of a future husband, I'll have someone already in mind as I go to sleep, who will eventually end up in my dream. Who knows? Let me know if this idea appeals to you too, because, well, yolo.

Sunday 19 January 2014

Do I look like someone who loses dance offs?

Yesterday, my friend challenged me to a dance off. He insisted he would win, and I insisted I would. We had a bit of a debate. It ended in me sending him a photo with the caption "do I look like someone who loses dance offs?"



He and I had our little dance off last night and I think we can all see who won ;)



I like to call this one "and what?!"

(I think we can also see that I do love my black velvet clothing!)


Song of the day:


Friday 17 January 2014

A rite of passage

I've just booked my first holiday! Without parents, that is. Well, I say it's my first - it's kind of my second. I went to France in the summer of 2012 without my parents but I stayed in my friend's holiday villa out there and, while we were left alone for 98% of the time, there was at least some form of parental supervision. But this time, there will be none! Unless my parents are doing that whole Sun-Sex-And-Suspicious-Parents thing and are going to come and spy on us. Please lord, no. The ZANTE experience cannot be ruined.


My best gal pals and I popped down to Thomsons on Wednesday and found a great package deal for only £388. We went away and thought about it and did some research on the hotel bla bla, all the boring bits, and we went back today to try and book it. But, in the two days, the price had risen to £496. Over a hundred bloody pounds more expensive?? We freaked the frick out. We didn't really want to spend much more than £400 so the nice lady there found a couple more deals at different hotels for £430 - the cheapest there is now. It's mad, everyone is booking their trips, like, today. In the time it took us to decide between the two new deals, one of them rose to £465 because someone had bought the cheaper flights.


I don't know why I'm giving you the rundown of my time at Thomsons but one useful thing can be taken from this: if you want to book a "lads holiday" this summer to a party island, do it now. It's only getting more expensive! But I'm so blooming excited. Part of me thinks I'm not, like, chavvy enough to be doing a holiday like this (no judgement, I promise) but the other part of me knows it's going to be so so so much fun.


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I am off to the beautiful Greek island of Zante with five of my best friends to frolic on the beach, eat fabulous food, and perhaps visit a, erm, club or two. For a week. It's going to be so great.

Thursday 16 January 2014

Winter skincare

2014 Blogger Challenge - post 2



Let's be (or lesbe.. haha) honest, I don't really take care of my skin that much, so this is going to be a very short post. I wash my face in the mornings with shower gel when I'm in the shower, and then put my Garnier BB cream [1] or Clinique foundation [2] on if I'm leaving the house. That's pretty much all I do until it's time to go to bed about fifteen hours later when I use a flannel and water (pretty standard!) and either my Clinique facial soap [3], or my Neutrogena daily scrub [4]. Then, if my skin is feeling a bit dry, I'll use my Neutrogena moisturiser [5] all over my face. And then, I whip out the old Sudocrem [6] and dab it on any particularly disgusting-looking spots. 


I was assuming this topic of skin care was aimed at facey-skin but what if it's not? If my legs are looking dry, I'll use my Ted Baker body souffle [7] (heaven in a plastic tub, I promise you) to get them looking not quite so horrible. The rest of my body doesn't really tend to get that dry so my skincare is pretty much just legs and face


 [1] [2]

[3] [4]

[5] [6]

[7]
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Apologies for the awful lighting. Can you tell my bedroom has a north facing window and I don't get a lot of sun in here in the afternoons? It's true.


I hope you enjoyed reading this terribly rushed post, and I hope that your skincare routine is a lot better than mine!

Sunday 12 January 2014

Girls love girls and boys

On my aforementioned little shopping excursion to Kingston last week, I also picked up a pretty simple red (or coral, if we're getting technical) dress from H&M. It's a pretty flattering cut for someone with a body shape like mine, ie: curvy, perhaps bordering on slightly overweight but hey, let's make the most of those, um, assets. I didn't buy it for anything as such; it's just something to wear to school with a jacket and Doc Martens. I love how wearable it is, and I've also been told by my mother that I wear a lot of dark colours so it's something to liven up my wardrobe - or floordrobe - a bit.




Also, thanks to Rebecca Black's highly entertaining videos (love that gurl), I've discovered our song of the day:


Friday 10 January 2014

The 1975 + tour tshirt!

Wow-ee, The 1975 were amazing! As pathetic as it is to admit, it was my first proper concert at an actual-proper-real venue, the Brixton Academy. It's times like last night when I'm so so happy that we live in London and that it's twenty minutes on the tube to get to somewhere like Brixton. (Thank you mum and dad for choosing to settle down here, you picked a bloody brilliant location.) My friends and I arrived super-early, surveyed the queue situation (very very short) and so popped up to McDonald's for a bit. When we came back, there were still only a few people standing outside so we joined them. By the time we were let in, the queue was snaking all the way around the building and then down the road, so we were practically next to the people at the back. The poor souls.

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I'll be honest - even though it was about 17 hours ago - I don't remember any of the actual performance. No, I wasn't high or drunk or intoxicated at all... more like high on LIFE. All I know is I had a lot of fun and there was lots of jumping and dancing and singing and sweaty bodies and a girl's afro in my mouth??? (About six times, might I add) But it was so great. Here's a photo the band took last night. I'm somewhere in that crowd, about six rows of people away from the front, eg: v. close.



(The white parts above and below this photo are so annoying!) I don't want to sound boring and unoriginal but, like the majority of 1975 fans, my favourite song is Chocolate so it all went a bit wild when they played it. It's pretty much the only song of theirs I'm word perfect on, and being able to sing along always makes everything ten times better. I also freaking loved the second support act, a band named Swim Deep, so I'll probably be writing a lot about them later once my obsession with them kicks in.


The show finished just after eleven and a couple of my friends went off to buy 1975 tour tshirts from inside the venue, which cost them £20. Outside on the Academy steps, dodgy looking men were selling tour tshirts for £10 but for a band who I don't love love love, a tenner is still a bit much. However, down at the end of Stockwell Road, an ever dodgier-looking man had similar ones for £5. I thought it was a freaking bargain so I bought one for me, and one for my best friend who spent all her money on a crazy sized poster of the lead singer, Matt Healy. I think she's going to start stalking him. Taking fangirling to the extremes.








I also really love the back of the shirt, and that it has all the tour dates (something which the £20 ones didn't!). My incredibly self-righteous friend slated me for not supporting the band by buying their merchandise and for encouraging the production of counterfeit clothing bla bla, but at least I was supporting the dodgy-looking man, right? The guy probably has a family to feed!


Let me know if you've been to see The 1975 or want to - which is something I'd definitely recommend! (The lights and staging were just wow!). I'll leave you with my aforementioned favourite song of theirs, Chocolate:



(Chocolate is apparently slang for heroin - who knew? Well not me, that's fo sho)

Wednesday 8 January 2014

Polyvore - 1975

Polyvore - 1975



BOSS Orange coat
$680 - conleys.de


Boohoo circle skirt
boohoo.com


Betsey Johnson tight
betseyjohnson.com


Dr. Martens dr martens shoes
karmaloop.com



I'm seeing the 1975 tomorrow! Apparently, all cool people wear dark colours to gigs so this is what I'll be doing (to give the illusion that I'm cool). It's also going to be hipster central there so, you know, I have to fit right in. I'm practising my hipster face right now.

Monday 6 January 2014

Sheer blouse + white collar

What an inventive title for this post, huh? I popped into TK Maxx in Kingston on Friday (so much better than my closest one, but Kensington still rules) and saw a lovely blousey-shirty thing. At first, I drawn to the collar on it but then I saw that I love the pattern too, plus it fits really flatteringly: 10/10. And for just £13, I'm pretty happy. Outfit posts like this one are a great excuse for multiple selfies so here we go. (I met a girl the other day who spells it "selfy"... what even?)






So, I've found two ways to wear this beauty: one more casual, and the other much classier so I'm thinking this could be a potential job interview/ formal family gathering item of clothing, as well as being something I can wear to school with jeans. Speaking of school, it was the first day back today and I'm really ill so it was horrible. I'm ditching homework tonight and will continue reading The Virgin Suicides which is amazing so far!


Hope you're all having a happy Monday. xx


Song of the day:


Friday 3 January 2014

Running shoes: New Balance 610 V2

I run a lot. (Almost 25 miles since Christmas day.. yes, I'm counting!) I've had the same running shoes for a few years now which I know is bad because you need cushioning bla bla, but they're just so comfy that I didn't want to get rid of them! However, they were starting to fall to pieces and I realised the time had come to bin them. What a sad day. A sad day turned very happy day when I purchased these babies from my local Sports Direct (absolute bargain store, never buy your sports wear from anywhere else!).


They're so light and so comfortable that I've taken to wearing them around the house because I just can't bear to take them off, honestly. You can probably google proper reviews on them because this is just me saying they're perfect and that every person should own a pair (or five!) so it's not entirely evaluative.





I also love the colour. Blue goes with everything - and looks especially nice with my brand spanking new coral running socks I bought with the shoes. I feel like a proper athlete with them on and, let me tell you, that's a pretty good feeling.

Thursday 2 January 2014

Ain't no party like an S Club party





Whose tonsils can you see? Oh that's right, mine. Above are some of my favourite photos (aside from the last one!) of New Year's Eve. Can you tell I didn't really stick to my outfit plan? I looked like a bit of a hobo but I hope you all had a great night!


Song of the day:


Wednesday 1 January 2014

New Years Inspiration

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An alternative to New Years resolutions (because who ever sticks to those anyway?!) to inspire me and others who happen to chance upon this blog. Happy 2014!

#2014BloggerChallenge