Hi :)

I just wanted to talk, I suppose, because I never really use this and I think people who actually read my blog will know why but some of you don't. I started Animal Care Engagement in September and it finishes this Friday (I got in to Level 1 so I'll be back in January!) and me and my boyfriend of two years broke up in September, too. My holidays are back on when I finish Friday (around 11am, it's a short day...) so I want to get back into making some posts over the Christmas period as it's probably the only time off I'll get from work for a while and I get tired easily lately so I won't want to post much.

So, on Tuesday next week (22nd), I'm going away to England again to see my grandparents and this time around my sister is joining us too to see my dad and his girlfriend (who I'm not too fond of so I won't actively try to spend time with them). I'm not sure how long we'll be staying, not much longer then a week most likely. Because I won't be home for Christmas day, we are having an early Christmas with my mother on Monday (21st) and I'm pretty exited about it. I want to take lots of pictures and post them on here like I did last year (or...thought about doing last year, I can't remember if I actually did...) because it's just fun to share the times when I'm happy, especially when it's getting few and far between. 

But yes, I was just...happy about how things are turning out. I'm still getting over the break-up with my ex, but I'm sure I'll eventually get there. Toodle do! 

Bookish Pet Peeves! Part Two.

(an old post, sorry! this was written before the chaotic mess that is my life came about and I'd like to say some of these points don't make me as angry anymore, but they're all still my opinion so I'd still like to share it. enjoy)

If you wanted to see part one of this post but you missed it, you can click here to take you there. It wasn't all that interesting, though, just a lot of anger. 

Like, a lot.

Number Eleven. 

Love triangles. Especially when it's an obvious choice.. Looking at you, Twilight. 

Number Twelve. 

Why is every book being compared to The Hunger Games?!?!?!

Number Thirteen. 

When authors develop a society by themselves and create conflicts and action and all this cool, cool stuff but will do one of the two things. 

They'll either give no explanation towards how the society even got that way, or any developed detail on that society.

Or, they'll wait to the next book to solve the conflicts of this book. Like, no, the point of series' is that it's a contiuation of the story but the first book should do okay as a standalone. In my humble opinion. 

Number Fourteen. 

When a really strong, badass female charecter is weakened because of love. Love is supposed to make you stronger, not make you dependent and less of a person then you were. 

Number Fifteen. 

When authors continue a series when it doesn't have much more meat to add to the story so everything from there on out is pointless and boring...don't drag on a series when there's nothing left, authors. Please. 

Number Sixteen. 

When authors write a perfect, well-rounded person that has no flaw. 

Likewise, when a reader complains about a charecter because they are flawed and they act like any human probably would in a chaotic situation at a young age (Tris, guys. Tris). 

Number Seventeen. 

The author pretty much telling us this person is so and so without actually giving us any backup or proof that this is in anyway correct. Like, for example, saying "This guy is desirable" when at no point in the entire book did I like him, or saying "This girl is strong!" and there has been no point in the book where she has been strong. 

Number Eighteen. 

When I read something that gave no warning that it had spoilers in it. I was doing research for this post, and BAM! Spoiler for Stephen King's ending of "IT". I was planning to read that, it's on my bookshelf. How in the hell do you expect me to read a 1000+ book with anticipation for the ending when I already know it?! Man, I am fuming. 

Number Nineteen. 

When the ending of a book doesn't make sense, or when everything is resolved and sugary-sweet. What?

Number Twenty. 

When the cover gives away wayyyy too much of the plot THANKS A LOT. 

Number Twenty-One. 

"Wow, are we in a lot of trouble. Oh, lookie here! A big ball of conicidentally placed helpful tools that are perfect for what I need to do right in this very moment! Oh, yes!"

 Number Twenty-Two. 

Despite "My Sister's Keeper" being one of my most re-read books, I can't stand metaphours. Over-used metaphours, that is. 

Number Twenty-Three. 

Terribly written dialogue. 

"Did you watch last nights' episode of Breaking Bad?"

"Yeah, pretty good"

"It was"

"Wasn't it?"

Blegh. 

I do hope you enjoyed that. 

You probably didn't, you probably left really annoyed by my terrible spelling and structures, and my invalid points. 

But, they do anger me...it's the truth, y'all! 

Yeah, bye.

(A Late) Monday Missions #12

I'm slowly getting back into the blogging groove again and what better way to start then a talk about what I will be attempting to read throughout this month?

If you follow me on Goodreads, you'll know that for a good few days now I have been tackling through "Leviathan" by Scott Westerfeld and I'm still not even 100 pages into it. It's not that it's a bad book, it's a wonderful book. The part about the fencing was pretty dull, but it's been pretty good so far. I'm just having difficulty reading (yay, depression!). I'll be reading this at my own pace so it'll probably be what I'm reading next week, too, although I really want to get into Star Wars!

I'm also getting through some National Geographic's but obviously that's more light reading then getting stuck into a book.

Thank you for reading, hope my old readers are still around.

- Loz x

Personal || A Letter of Absence.

It's been a while, hasn't it? I feel like I owe you an update, so here that update is. As you know, I started community college but right now I'm just on an Engagement course. Level 1 doesn't start until January. It's called Animal Care. The reason why this impacted my ability to thing of ideas and to write them down was, well...I don't think there is much reason, but since starting college I haven't been reading either. My everyday sort of thing is that on Monday's, Tuesdays, and Fridays I walk two miles there and two miles back (and I usually don't eat till around 5pm, which I am changing because I need the energy). I'm in Wednesday too, except it's not 9am - 4pm, it's 9am - 12:15pm.

As you could probably tell from the last post, Austin and I broke up and he "ran" this with me. We had been together for two years, although it didn't come as a shock it was still a lot to take and still is. I'm coping fine, though. 

I was also having confidence problems in my writing skills (and again, I still am) so I'm probably going to turn this blog into more than what it is - much more than just books. I want to reach topics and talk about them (feminism, deforestation, that general road) to improve myself. It's going to be more like a blog of self-discovery, and I'll write on here when I want to more than scheduled. I think.

As you can probably tell, I'm still exhausted, I've been sick and feel pretty drained. Thank you for reading, I'll see you at...some point. 

- Loz.

Farewell; from Austin

Hey, sorry to bring forth a somber post, as I was looking forward to finishing my MGSV post, but I won't be apart of the blog anymore for some personal reasons, I hope the blog really grows in size though! It's an amazing blog, I love you all, random readers. Loz is better at writing anyways. Goodbye.

Personal Life || The Day Before My New Chapter!

Oh yes, guys, oh yes. Tomorrow is what I consider to be a "big day" for me. I'm going to be joining community college. I don't like to say that, "joining", because other then an email of confirmation that we had to call to receive I am just really worried at this point that I'm going to turn up at 8:30am tomorrow morning like "Where do I go? Who are my teachers? Should I go to reception?" and then they'll say something along the lines of "Sorry but you're not in our records, you're in our reservation list for Level 2..."...I realize none of this is making sense without context, so let's start from there.

So, early last year (I want to say...December? Maybe November?), my careers adviser showed up during my free-time asking me what I would like to do when I left school and I said "Oh, I'd like to do Animal Care at college", the college about a mile and a half away from me and she was like "Oh, sure, let me just call them up and see what we can do and I'll get back to you". I'm not sure how long has passed, but I know it was a few months away at this point from leaving school and I had yet to hear back from her about the signing up. I took it in my own hands because someone...I don't know who, but someone came up to me and said "Have you heard back from her or do you have to do it online?" and I didn't even think about that. Of course, as soon as I got onto a laptop, I signed up for Animal Care. 

I received a call pretty quick afterwards asking about an interview, so I forwarded the number to my mum (if you haven't guessed at this point, I have social anxiety) who called them a few times and eventually an interview had been set up. Originally, we were going to go for Level 2 Animal Care which had no available spaces so I would be in the reservation list in case anyone dropped out or whatever (which never happened, as an FYI). Then they said there was still available spaces for Level 1 and it would be best if I joined that one instead, and it was unclear to me what was happening because they were talking amongst themselves and then afterwards one of the ladies who was there said "Yes, you're definitely in" which I'm still not taking to heart incase there was a lack of communication or something and I haven't actually been accepted.

A few weeks (maybe?) later, I got nervous because I hadn't heard a single thing from them since and I got my mother to call the college and they said "Oh, we had you on the reservation for Level 2" (which I think is weird because I don't think I even applied for Level 2, so maybe the forms got in wrong or something) but then she said something like how their files were mixed up and sent me a confirmation on how I had been accepted into Level 1. 

That's basically (believe it or not) the short version as to why I am so nervous about tomorrow mostly and I'll let you know how it goes. I still don't know what to wear or anything, I am so nervous. I'm going to fold up tomorrow's clothes, get my bag ready, have a nice bath so I smell great and try not to dwell too much. The walk is a mile and a half there, I have half an hour of time to think about everything. During my high school years, which I will talk about in more detail for a later post, I've always had a strong support system from the autism centre but now it's like I've lost my footing in the dark and if I fall, I can't be sure there's someone there to help me stay upright, this whole situation is putting me on edge.

Anyway, thank you for reading, I'm sorry I'm not spending much time on blogging or photos or anything like that, I will try harder I promise, just...my whole summer as been leading up to this, tomorrow is the day. THE. DAY.

*sighs* goodness.
See you tomorrow! 

Top Five Wednesday: Female Inspirations || YouTube.

Since August (posting pretty much everyday), the writing drive has been a bit knocked out of me and I feel like now that I write fewer posts they should be much better quality because I have more time to think of ideas and work on them and the pressure has been off-putting, I'm sorry about that. I hope this blog is improving my writing skills, but...it takes time. 

Enough rambling, today I wanted to at least try to write a Top Five Wednesday (if it publishes, I succeeded!) on something I want to go in more detail about in future posts but I am going to briefly touch on it today and that is my female inspirations. I have a lot of female inspirations, I strongly believe in women-to-women love instead of being jealous of one another and bringing each other down. This is no particular order. 

One || Saphira Howell. 

Saphira is a 17-year-old female still in school I believe from LA. She was formerly SaphiraFashion, but as since changed her channel name because it doesn't represent who she is anymore.

Why do I like her so much, I consider her to be one of my inspirations? Because she's very young and has a supreme amount of confidence is one reason. She knows she's pretty, she'll say "Yeah, I look good in this" and she has the confidence to put herself out there - like in her TEDx talk. She's real with what she talks about and doesn't pretend to be someone she's not for views.

She was nominated for the Shorty Awards I think earlier this year or later last year. There's a lot more about her that I feel like she needs to be looked up to for, but for that, go and visit her channel or wait until a later day when I make a full post on her! She's already taking up a lot of space here, I need to move on to four other female inspirations! 

Two || Emma Blackery. 

Her Channel

I love her for multiple reasons - she's a sassy feminist who can be absolutely hilarious without insulting anyone! She's an inspiration to me because she is proof that you can be funny without putting other people down, she's very real to her viewers and doesn't bullshit anything. She's adorable and works hard for what she does, she doesn't make excuses for herself, she's just an awesome person...I look up to her for being awesome, and for being herself (a common theme in this blog post!). 

Three || Beckie0. 

Her Channel

Again, she is my inspiration because of her brutal honesty to not only us but to herself. I won't talk too much about this, though, as what truly makes me look up to her is her amazing creativity. Her videos - mostly her older ones from a year or two ago, my personal favourites - really stand out in your mind. They're different, and have her own personality shooting through them, they're amazing. She also suffers with depression, I believe, but her biggest struggle is her battle with Trich and as someone who suffers a disability and two mental illnesses, it's a great source of motivation seeing her really making something of her life despite what is holding her back and I one day want to do the same. 

Four || Allaray Roo 

The Channel!

A much less known channel, but growing pretty fast (as she so deserves) is Allaray Roo, who actually hasn't to my knowledge done any videos on body-loving or anything majorly important like that, but she does stand out in my mind and she has inspired me multiple times to talk about the kinds of things she talks about in her videos. She's basically a story-teller of her very eventful and traumatic life, and the way she tells them is so hilarious, that I can't help but want to try and write some of my own (which I always lose the guts to post in the end!). Again, though, she is an inspiration to me because she always remains true to herself - she's wacky and I love that, she's so nice and friendly, I recommend checking out her channel!

Five || StacyPlays. 

Her Channel!

Okay, I know this wasn't meant to be in any order but I think this woman might be my favourite. I can't tell you how many times she has made me laugh hysterically on my darkest days! She is an inspiration to me because of how much she has achieved in her life, and how strongly she feels for saving dogs' lives! She's smart and witty and wonderful! She's a gamer, so slightly different from the women I have mentioned above, but nontheless she has inspired me to one day get a laptop or computer that will allow me to record and upload my own videos! 

There you have it, my top five female inspirations! Who are yours?! 

- Loz x