pretty much what i thought. am geting more reclusive as the years go on though. will take the test...
Changing
Sunday, 31st August 2008, 3:50pm
I’ve wanted to be someone else for as long as I can remember. I think that’s even one of my motivations for writing about fictional characters.
Everything about me seemed wrong, even my name invited teasing from my schoolmates. Then I started overeating when I was aged seven, I put on weight and my body developed early. I remember being the tallest person in school when I was ten years old, and I even remember consciously deciding to hunch my shoulders in a silly attempt to hide my chest.
During my teens I would decide to start a diet every Monday, but by Tuesday the diet would be forgotten. I tried eliminating certain foods from my diet, or I allowed myself a little bit of what I liked and found that I couldn’t stop myself once I’d had a bite.
I had a few successes too. In my early 20s I tried Weight Watchers and lost eight pounds in the first week. I lost interest in it after a while though; the meetings bored me and if I didn’t attend them I was effectively paying just to get weighed.
I went to see a Lighter Life counsellor once, but couldn’t afford the fees, and didn’t really feel that eating prepared food packs was going to teach me how to maintain a healthy lifestyle for the rest of my life.
The only times I’ve lost a proper amount of weight were when I was working in a library in 2001 (being a library assistant is actually pretty physical work) and when I went to the gym fairly regularly between 2004-2006, and worked with personal trainers. Even then I still had some weight left to lose, but I felt better about myself.
I read about different strategies for losing weight, but none of them really resonated with me until I read this book called Shrink Yourself. Now I’ve read books about emotional eating before, but this was the first one that really touched on issues that I’d encountered, like self-sabotage. Each time I’ve lost weight I’ve felt that I could reward myself by eating junk food.
That’s one of my biggest problems actually. I reward myself with food for just getting through the day, when I should be rewarding myself in a healthier way for actually achieving something.
I’ve always felt that my life won’t improve until I become slimmer. This belief has held me back from doing a lot of things, and I’m fed up of it.
I’m tired of saying to myself, “When I’m slim I’ll …”
I’m tired of feeling unhappy when I look in the mirror or sit on a packed train.
I’m tired of hiding in the shadows of my life.
I want my looks to reflect my personality. In short, I want to be gorgeous inside and out.
But how will I do it? Have any of you lose weight? Does anyone have any advice?
Breaking the Blogfast
Saturday, 30th August 2008, 2:16amI haven’t written a post here for just over a week. I’ll talk about my blogging block later, but for now I thought it would be fun to steal a meme called My Mosaic from J.D.’s blog.
1. Type your answer to each of the questions below into Flickr Search.
2. Using only the first page, pick an image.
3. Copy and paste each of the URLs for the images into fd’s mosaic maker.
1. What is your first name? Penny
2. What is your favourite food? Toasted cheese
3. What high school did you go to? Notre Dame
4. What is your favorite color? Purple
5. Who is your celebrity crush? Daniel Craig
6. Favorite drink? Orange Juice
7. Dream vacation? Cuba
8. Favorite dessert? Coconut Ice Cream
9. What do you want to be when you grow up? A Writer
10. What do you love most in life? Meaning
11. One word to describe you. Solo
12. Your Flickr name. nubiana
And here’s a few bonus pics of Daniel Craig, just because.
Happy Family
Friday, 22nd August 2008, 4:47pm
Yesterday I went to visit my friend in Middlesex, about 2 hours away from where I live. She has two young children and is primarily a housewife, while her hubby works as a computing engineer. I haven’t been seen them for about a year, and though I am always very welcome there, I also feel quite awkward.
When I met my friend, Katsu* at music college, we were both single girls without many responsibilities. Now I’m still single and irresponsible, while she is a married mother of two. She met her husband at church, and they are both committed to their faith.
Near the end of my visit, Katsu asked me about my love life and I said that I wasn’t involved with anyone; she said that I’d meet a “nice, sincere man” in church. Not wishing to be impolite, I simply said, “No, thanks.” And I think that surprised her, as she repeated my words back to me in a quizzical way.
We also had an interesting conversation about the housing market. When Katsu married her husband in 2001 he had a small 1 bedroom flat already. Four years ago, when they decided to start a family they sold the flat and rented a small 2 bedroom house, in the hopes that house prices would fall eventually. I don’t know how much their rent is, but it must be at least £1000/month. She asked me if I was planning to move out of my parent’s house soon, and I explained that I wasn’t able to at the moment due to: a) high house prices, b) the current difficulties in getting a mortgage, c) not being accepted onto the council housing register, and d) my low income. She asked me why I didn’t rent a flat and I basically said that I couldn’t afford to. Then she said that I should have a lot of savings from living at home, so I should be able to live off my savings… I didn’t want to get into an argument, so I just said that I pay rent to my mother and have bills to pay so I’ve haven’t got loads of cash. Then later she said that her husband was in charge of all of their finances, so I guess that she’s doesn’t have to worry about that side of things.
Another reason that I always feel awkward when I visit Katsu is that she always makes a big deal out of my fussy eating habits. I feel like such a complete weirdo when she brings up that subject.
It wasn’t a horrible visit at all though, it just showed me the differences in our lifestyles and perspectives.
I was so embarrassed when Katsu’s 3 year old boy suddenly poked me in the chest and shouted, “Big!” He kept on trying to grope my breasts, and I had to hold him off and tell him not to several times. I guess he’s not used to busty women…
Vampire Weekend
Friday, 22nd August 2008, 2:51pm
Early this morning I had a dream about vampires, though they weren’t called that in my dream. I won’t call it a nightmare as I did not become a vampiric drinking trough, though it definitely could have gone that way.
I’m going to write a story based around my dream, and see where it takes me.
Cute but Mean
Friday, 22nd August 2008, 12:46am
Just how I like my monsters. Pick a card, any card. (via)
I’d probably never use them for the sake of civility, but just knowing that I can whip out a card when faced with obnoxiousness would make me feel wonderfully omnipotent.
If a kind person from the USA is reading this and planning to purchase a set, please get an extra one for me, and I’ll reimburse you for it, as the company’s international shipping prices are way too expensive for a single pack. You’d make a naughty Brit blogger very happy.
The Great Unread
Sunday, 17th August 2008, 6:07pm
When I was 14 I was put into the second level English class, while several of my close friends were placed in the top set. I remember when my friends in the other class were reading Wuthering Heights and would discuss Heathcliff during our lunchbreaks, and though it all sounded interesting I didn’t bother to read the book just to be able to contribute to their discussions.
We have a copy of Wuthering Heights here that my mum received while she was in a mail-order book club years ago, and I flicked through the book but didn’t wish to spoil its hard-backed perfection by reading it, so I borrowed a copy from the library. Then I decided not to read the library copy for some reason which I can’t remember. So I still haven’t read Wuthering Heights.
When I attended a writer’s course several years ago and was asked about my favourite books, I felt like a fraud for not having read many literary classics. Since then I’ve dutifully read Pride and Prejudice, Jane Eyre, The Picture of Dorian Gray, etc.
Early last year, after reading Pride and Prejudice I decided that I should read Jane Austen’s entire oeuvre. I found that WH Smith had a special offer on her books, so I ended up buying Mansfield Park, Sense and Sensibility and Northanger Abbey. However, after reading the last-mentioned novel I’ve gone off that idea.
Sometimes when I hear about how novel x was so influential on x genre I feel like adding it to my wishlist, but no one has time to read everything, and life is too short to read something that you wouldn’t enjoy. There are so many gaps in my knowledge, but I’m beginning to realise that the most important thing in the world is to know myself.
That said, it amused me to watch this video of authors talking about the books that they’re most ashamed of not reading. Reading the comments was even more interesting; one person had received an A grade on an essay about an unread book, and another person even admitted teaching a class on a novel that he had never read…
They made a movie about me
Sunday, 17th August 2008, 4:13pm|
You Are Helvetica |
 Your life is ultra modern and ultra streamlined. You don’t get bogged down in details or decoration. You like to think that you’re the epitome of style and taste. |
I should probably watch the Helvetica movie at some point, but this one about a font conference is a lot of fun:
If Nike made burgers
Sunday, 17th August 2008, 2:28am
The Nike Air Max 90 by Olle Hemmendorff (via)
Two
Thursday, 14th August 2008, 9:46pm
I remembered, then I forgot. (And if I forget, who else would remember?)
Last Friday was this blog’s second birthday.
Leaving things so late I could only get a birthday cake which had originally been made for someone called Lila. It was the only cake that the shop had when I visited today.
I don’t think that Blog will mind since Blog likes cow print. Blog would have preferred a deeper shade of pink, but Blog will eat pink bits first. Blog would like to offer you all a slice of cake.
Marriage Material
Thursday, 14th August 2008, 9:22pmEarlier today I was looking for a pic from the movie Casablanca for my previous post, and saw the following dress in the image search.
Intrigued, I clicked on it and explored the site, which was a showcase of wedding dresses by Stephanie Allin. Some of the dresses are so alluring that they almost make me want to get married (or at least have a wedding night).
I also like that several of the dresses have women’s names, so for £1500+ I could become Celeste or Louisa, Jacqueline or Gina, Nina or Siena, or even Havana.
