Story Time: How Did I Not Get Murdered?!

That’s it! I have officially banned myself from declarations of regular posting. Because. I. Keep. Falling. Through. Like seriously. Why is it that I can complete everything in my life to a regular pre-ordained schedule, but when it comes to blog posting – that shit goes out the window?!

So guess what? Now, I’m going to post whenever I am inspired to post, and that, dear readers, is now.

Anyone who read my last post will know that I have recently become obsessed with the podcast, My Favorite Murder. Because a) true crime and b) it’s hilarious. What I failed to mention was that admits the teachings of ‘fuck politeness’ and ‘stay sexy, don’t get murdered’ they provide minisodes in which they read murderino’s hometown murders. Now, I (un)fortunately don’t have any of these terrifying tales of brushing shoulders with serial killers to tell. Nor does anyone in my family, I haven’t like asked or anything so it’s just a bold faced assumption. What I do have is way too many tales that fit under the category of: ‘how did I not get murdered?’

So here I provide to you, for your reading pleasure, a tale of my stupidity.

In my first year of university, between the last week of classes and our first exam – one of my friends and I travelled from our small city to a much bigger city to see the touring production of Les Mis. Now when I say first year of university, I am talking 17. We were 17 and only partially supervised. So we were two 17, small country city girls in capital city taking cabs on our own. Which is fine, until your 17 year old brains have convinced you that it’s a good idea to go from the theatre to the after party, leaving only 2 hours of designated rest time before catching said cab. Then not actually using this designated rest time to, you know, sleep and hop into a taxi at 4am having been awake for over 24 hours.

Let me remind you that we hailed from a city that takes a literally 15 minutes drive to cross. We were 17, and in no way familiar with this city. And instead of jumping into a taxi alert and aware of possible dangers. We fell asleep. We both conked out like 5 minutes into the trip. All I’m saying is thank fuck we woke up at the airport and not in some side murder road in whoop whoop.

So yeah. Please don’t fall asleep in taxis in unfamiliar cities, because all you need is the driver to be a psycho and you’ve earned yourself a cab ride to murderville.

So there you have it. One of my many ‘how did I not get murdered’ stories. Let me know what dumb crime/horror movie shit you’ve done.

Nerdy murderino out. 👋🏻

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Weekly Obsessions: MFM, Gakkou Gurashi, Crazy Ex-Girlfriend

Anyone perusing this blog will notice that I have tried many things. Every attempt of scheduled posting has fallen flat a week in, because, in all honesty, I am a procrastinator with a fear of public opinion. BUT. That dies today. I have now, officially finished university, I am no longer spending my waking hours staring at a rubric trying to craft an essay. No. Instead, I am here, planning, and hoping to go through with posting weekly. I am an obsessive person. I let appreciation for things turn into a full-scale craze, and I’m going to talk about it. Weekly. (Fingers crossed). So here we go. The Same 26 Letter’s Weekly Obsessions. Take one:

My Favorite Murder with Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark 

To say that I am obsessed with this podcast is an understatement. I adore true crime, my Netflix suggested page looks like the film library of a crazy murderess. I have raised an Ambulance Chaser, the moment I see a cop car – my mind starts racing. To most people, this is a seriously morbid obsession, the type that loses friends and puts you on watchlists. But, Murderinos know the secret way to get around the horrified stares of people who find their murder obsession terrifying. In my car, walking around shopping centres, and going for runs, it doesn’t matter where I am, I can assure you I am listening to the hilarious Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark tell each other gruesome stories of murder and horror.

It. Is. Amazing.

I can’t explain how fantastic it is to hear two women, just sit down with some cats, and Steven, and chat about the thing that so many people judge you for being interested in. They are conversational, funny, and honest, constantly reminding you that these are real people who really love murder. If you love a laugh, have a fancination with true crime, and don’t get too bogged down in details, I can’t suggest My Favorite Murder enough.

Gakkou Gurashi (School-Live!)

I haven’t watched anime in forever. I stared at my iPad, deciding whether or not to open up that app and binge for over a year. Yesterday, I finally did it. I picked the show with the least episodes on my list and just started watching. AND HO-LY SHIT. Not only have I forgotten how good anime is. But four episodes in and Gakkou Gurashi has me gasping every episode. One minute I want to laugh, the next I just want to leap into my screen and hug them all. I already have cosplays planned and wigs bookmarked.

There aren’t many ways to explain how cool the story is without spoilers. But if you are interested in anime in any way, hunt down that first episode and watch. Because the twist is performed in a way that makes you want to go back and re-analyse the entire episode again.

Crazy Ex-Girlfriend (Season 3)

The irony of this final obsession is strong. But this show is amazing, and the most recent season took a turn from frivolous antics with the occasional social commentary, to hella real, hella fast. Rachel Bloom is a gift to this world, and to many her show about a girl moving across the country for a boy seems sexist, dumb, and unnecessary. They are wrong, they are so so wrong. Crazy Ex-Girlfriend uses musical theatre to highlight the pressing issues within our society such as: mental illness, feminisim, religion, stereotypes, LGBTQIA+ issues, and many more. It is satire at it’s musical finest and I wish I could march up to Rachel and give her a round of applause for managing to get a show that says so much about the faults in the world we live in on TV. And then a hug. Becuase I seriously love Rachel Bloom. As a bisexual woman with anxiety, this show, and its representation of minority groups means a lot to me. And the most recent series’ serious turn really gave me a perspective of some of the fucked up shit in our world.

So there you have it. My weekly obsessions. What are you obsessed with? Think I might like it? Leave a comment and let me know.

See y’all next week (hopefully).

Nerdy Elf Girl Out.

Roll Like A Girl

The players gather around a table littered with character sheets, laptops, and dice. A pair of elven sisters plan their next move in hushed voices, a dwarf fighter argues with a human cleric about the leadership of the party and somewhere in the distance, a bard is making poor life choices. There is a rustle in the trees, the eerie feeling of being watched. One of the sisters ceases her discussions in low elven, glancing around at the forest. She gestures for her sister to draw her weapon as she notices something in the trees. The dungeon master’s voice rings through the trees, “Roll for initiative”.

The world of tabletop role playing games (RPGs) has always been seen as a male-dominated platform. Like most games, tabletop RPGs first gained popularity with a male audience, as ‘boys’ clubs’ or a ‘guy thing’. The stereotype suggested that ‘girls can’t play because it’s a boy’s game’ but with a rise in both gender equality and ‘nerd culture’ more girls can be seen joining campaigns and taking charge as dungeon or game masters.

Inspiring females playing RPGs such as Dungeons and Dragons (D&D) are slowly creeping into the media with YouTube channels, live streams, and Twitch streams dedicated to the platform. Shows like Geek and Sundry’s Critical Role, which includes an almost even split of male and female players, are not only introducing the style of gaming to new generations but also proving that anyone can be a part of a tabletop RPG.

Marisha Ray, Critical Role’s resident half-elven druid once said, “female should never be a personality trait”. Not only is the increase in female players and game masters improving the general diversity of the the game but also the diversity and representation of characters played within RPGs. I talked to some local female tabletop RPG players about their character and campaigns.   

Melina Newnham-Kirby

An oak tree tattoo growing across her bow arm, a knowing smirk, and a vendetta against all things demonic, Melina Newnham-Kirby’s current Dungeons and Dragons (D&D) character, Kynareth Akamiir, is not one to mess with. The wood elven ranger is charismatic, stealthy, and a little scary. The missing heir to a tribal throne, growing up in the forest with no one but her younger sister, Ellis, Kynareth is another character added to Melina’s plethora of tabletop personas.  “I got into D&D because some of my male friends were playing and I showed enthusiasm in joining” she says. Since then she’s been everything from a ranger to a rogue, an elementalist to an astrophysicist. “If you have a good GM, it’s always uber good,” she says as she begins to list some of her favourite moments from her different campaigns. Pick- pocketing, false hydras, and a Bard attempting to play a dagger as a flute, Melina’s list of favourite moments goes on. “My advice is if you want to try it, then go for it. It’s not at all just for guys. Pester them until they let you join then earn a kickass name and deal some brutal damage”.

Scarlett Bortolotto

Dr Boom, the chaotic half-orc alchemist turned vampire queen is Scarlett Bortolotto’s favourite of her many RPG characters. A player in countless campaigns and GM in a handful more, Scarlett is no newcomer to the world of tabletop RPGs. “I run random campaigns, whatever anyone wants. Mostly just Pathfinder and 5^th edition D&D, but really its up to the players.” Her campaigns include everything from sentient Roombas to boss battles with Australian politicians. “[My favourite moment was] when I survived a mission by turning into a giant whale and falling,” she says, looking back at all the insane events of campaigns past. “Just find a book and let your imagination fly free, it’s just like playing imaginary games as a kid”. 

Lisa Huggon

Inspired by Matthew Mercer (Critical Role) and Mark Hulmes (High Rollers), artist Lisa Huggon is taking on the biggest role in any tabletop RPG, dungeon master (DM). “I love creating worlds and characters and being in charge” she says “I love to make things that other people will like … I’d love to experiment and see where this new form of creativity will lead”.

Dungeon masters rule the games, armed with dungeon master’s guides and monster manuals they create the worlds, the non-playable characters, the encounters, and the storylines. “To begin with, I’ll be using a premade campaign, just to take the strain off of being a new DM. But after that I will be tailor making stories for my characters. Each with a different arc of their own,” she says.

Lisa can’t understand why there would be a legitimate reason as to why females would be excluded from a game. “If a girl wants to play a promiscuous male Half-Elf, that’s fine! If she wants to be a genderless shardmind, go for it! If she wants to play a Male Half orc, fill your boots! It is a role playing game after all, and anyone who has an issue with it isn’t embracing the true spirit of the game”.

Day 2: An Open Letter to Virgin Australia

I was travelling yesterday. My first ever connecting flight by myself. An hour and a half to disembark, find the gate, go to the loo, find some food, sit down and wait. Easy, right? Apparently not.  As my flight landed in Sydney I was pumped and ready to go. I turned my phone off flight mode and suddenly ping. ‘Virgin Australia apologises flight [insert flight number here] on 01 Sept is delayed. New departure time is 1905.’ Yes, this was frustrating, especially when my initial flight was supposed to land at 1805. But flights get delayed all the time, things go wrong – it’s understandable and not the issue earning this post.

No. The issue comes after I have left the plane, paced the airport back and forth a couple of times and find myself at a Virgin counter. Not particularly wanting to spend the next three hours hanging around an unfamiliar airport I asked for a possible flight change. A ‘please chuck me on any plane that leaves earlier, I will sit in the bathrooms if I have to’ request. There I was told that four previous flights had been cancelled, and that my 1905 delay was in fact the next earliest flight.

So wait I did. Outside the gate for the first two hours, then it happened. Over the speakers: an announcement for the soon to be boarding Canberra flight – leaving half an hour before mine. I watched people from my gate stand up and head down towards the gate. People from my flight. People who were not just aware that earlier flights existed, but had gotten a ticket. I packed up my stuff and stalked, to my frustrated shock it wasn’t a mistake – it was most certainly a flight, leaving before mine, to Canberra. I was not told that there was another flight with no availability. I was told, directly that there were no earlier flights. No. Earlier. Flights. Yet there in front of me was an earlier flight. Boarding in right in front of my eyes.

But my waiting was not over there. Oh no. Five minutes before estimated boarding it was discovered that the Captain and his first mate were not at the gate. The Captain of the plane, was not at the plane five minutes before estimated boarding. I appreciate the employee at the counter, trying to make us all laugh in that moment, because there was murder in the eyes of everyone waiting. Four cancelled flights, multiple delays, a missing Captain. These people, myself included, were about one more case of Murphy’s Law away from homicide. So thank you Virgin counter lady for keeping the tone as light as possible to prevent disaster. You were one of the best parts of one of my most frustrating days.

So Virgin Australia, I know that you have a hectic job – trying to organise flights. Getting people from A to B is intense. Just a word of advice, try not to tell frustrated people that there are no more flights when there are. It’s frustrating, it’s rage-inducing, it’s infuriating. It prompted the awakening of the inner psycho stalker within me. I can safety say that I didn’t have a fun travelling experience, and from the murmurings of the passengers around me when we finally landed in Canberra, I was not alone.

Frustrated traveller girl out.

 

Day 1: Roll for Nerd Damage

September is here. That means I will now officially start my challenge of writing a post a day. Yeah, I realise that I didn’t outright say that in the original post so to the everyday person it looks like I outright failed my own challenge on day one.

But alas. Here I am. On a plane. On the first day of pre-Halloween month. There is a baby crying behind me and someone sleeping beside me. The normal plane stuff.

No matter how travelling anywhere sounds like it’s a great thing to blog abut. I’m not going to. Because my travelling so far has consisted waking up, playing Overwatch for too long, forgetting what time I needed to leave the house, and packing final items about 2 minutes before I had to walk out the door. Not the eventful travel story for the ages. More of a study of my absolutely shitty ability to read a clock.

Instead I am going to talk about a quiz. Anyone who knows me knows that I kinda love Dungeons and Dragons. I play two campaigns, attempt to DM another, and spend more time making characters than being productive. So when I came across a ‘What D&D Character Would You Be?’ quiz in my daily social media scroll it was evident that this quiz would define my entire life. Who cares about horoscopes? Your alignment is what’s really going to tell me if we’ll get along. This is the second biggest defining quality behind your Hogwarts house.

Of course, I had pre-disposed ideas of where I sat in the world of D&D – a Chaotic Good Gnome Ranger. Maybe a Halfling, something short. So I set down to fill in this quiz while waiting to board, ready to have my suspicions confirmed. And, I was kinda right. Pretty close actually. Sporting high stats for Intelligence, Wisdom, and Charisma – here I stand, a Lawful Good Elf Druid/Ranger. Half a point to knowing I sat at the upper end of the alignment scale, another point for getting Ranger – if only secondary class. My constitution is horrible, yay me, and while I still only sit at first level in both my classes – I can see badassery in the future.

Who cares what Sagittarius can tell you about my personality. Psycho-analyse the Slytherin Lawful Good Elf Druid/Ranger. I’m here to talk a lot, pet animals, kick ass, and help people. It might not be a Chaotic Good Gnome, but damn. I’ll take it.

Dorky Elf Girl out.

Post a Day: Let’s Do This Thing!

I’m setting myself a challenge.

Anyone scrolling through this blog will notice something – I post, on average, yearly. Like, we are talking real slack here. I begin every year with this bright-eyed, bushy-tailed positivity that ‘yes, I am going to post weekly, fortnight, MONTHLY’. Then I get to work, write a post – chuck it up here and then BAMB. Nothing. Zip. Zilch. Nada.

I love to write. It is my favourite thing. But then when it comes to this blog I’m either running on empty for ideas, inspiration, basic paragraph structure.

I find myself staring at the blinking line, waiting for me to write, thinking ‘what can I put on my blog.’

Everything. Anything. Literally anything. It’s my blog. Duh.

So. Guess what. I am going to set out to write something, anything. Everyday for a year. I will write something about something. And I will do it. EVERY SINGLE DAY.

So let’s get started.

 

He Drew a Knife – A Short Story

*** Danger! Danger! The following story contains not PG-rated language! Proceed with caution***

He drew a knife and promptly proceeded to quite loudly exclaim, “Oh piss it”

The victim of what was supposed to currently be a murder stopped shaking. “What?” she yelled, hands flung into the air.

“I brought the wrong knife” he cried, waving the plastic toy in her face, “Bloody hell. I must have grabbed my son’s by mistake. Fuck”

“Oi. Language!” the victim cried, “If anyone it gonna be swearin’ it’ll be me, matey”

“I can’t ruddy well murder you with a plastic knife now can I?”

“Then use your imagination Goddamn it. What kinda serial killer are you, if ya can’t work with a plastic knife” she slumped against the wall and checked her watch.

“Fine” he yelled, digging through his bag. He drew a gun. She gasped, he pulled the trigger and…

click, click, click.

The victim groaned and rolled her eyes.

“Let me guess, you’ve got a toy chainsaw in there too, aye” Our killer just stood there pulling the trigger again and again and again to no avail. “Give me that” she ripped the gun from his hands and threw it down the alley. “Ain’t there nothing in this bag that could actually kill a person?” she said crouching on the floor and rummaging through the bag. “Toy axe, toy ninja stars, toy throwing knives, toy sword. You are the worst serial killer to have ever tried to kill me, you know that? Is this an action figure?”

“A what?”

“An action figure, like a doll but named differently due to society’s standards of seeing feminity as weak and havin’ to change the name of ‘dolls’ so boys will buy em an’ shit”

He stared at her, she waved the action figure in his face with attitude to spare.

“Fuck,” the killer said, swiping the bag from her hands

“What did I say about language?”

“I took the wrong bag”

“Whatta you mean you took the wrong bag, it’s the only one here you numpty”

“I mean that I took the wrong bag this morning, this is my son’s murder bag”

“Well you gon’ an’ fucked up aven’t you matey”

“I’ve got to go” he hastily shoved the plastic weapons back into the bag and swung it over his shoulder.

“I’ll see you same time next week then, maybe you’ll try an’ bring actual weapons that time” she called out as he rushed out of the alley, he wasn’t listening. Someone suburbs away a young boy was murdering teddy bears with legitimate weapons. As he ran out onto the street he was filled with an overwhelming sense of dread. His car had been parked on a tow away zone and was now nowhere in sight. With an annoyed sigh and a ‘this day can’t get any worse’ he trudged back into the alley to ask his victim for a ride home. She was standing there leaning up against the wall, already jinglingly her car keys.

All I Know Now by Carrie Hope Fletcher – Review

When I saw All I Known Now in Big W one faithful day I screamed – abandoned my journey to get a PS4 (on sale) and ran to the book section. I looked at its yellow cover, picked it up, flicked through the pages and very soon it was sitting on top of my PS4 at the counter. This, however, didn’t prevent me from actually starting reading it like 10+ months later. University and laziness, it happens.

But it’s all okay now because I have read it. All it took was a holiday to Perth (throughout which I spent a considerable amount of time in my room, with my head firmly stuck in the pages of this book) As you can imagine what I class as a ‘considerable’ amount of time probably wasn’t much in the long run because this book barely left my hands, in fact, I think it spent more time in my reading embrace than it ever spent on the bedside table on that trip. I’m not sure you really even read this book because it didn’t feel like reading to me. It felt like sitting down to a cup of tea with a friend, and this friend just so happens to be Carrie Hope Fletcher.

My Carrie Hope Fletcher backstory: So, the first time I heard about the internet’s big sister was actually a collaboration with Danisnotonfire, the YouTube clicking maze began and I was on her channel within seconds. That’s where I found it. The song that played on repeat on my iPod for months on end. What I still class to this day as my song. Boys in Books are Better.

So yes, I am a fan of Carrie’s, hence the screaming and running to her book in my local Big W. (I wonder if any of the staff would still recognise me?) Which is why the language used in this book feel so much like a conversation to me. The references, the side commentary, right down to the words she uses. It’s all just so Carrie. I read a majority (if not all) of the book in her voice. As I smiled and laughed and occasionally muttered things such as ‘oh no’ under my breath.

But this in no way means that if you aren’t a fan of Carrie’s you won’t enjoy this book. The advice in this book is not only given out to those in the confines of Hopefuls. It is open to anyone in need of it.

Trust me, the advice in this book, I sure needed it a couple of years ago. Not that I haven’t been using the advice now, because I have already started my new outlook on admitting I am wrong (which is hard, I must say) and trying to be the bigger person, but some of this stuff would have been great a few years in advance. Do you think I can send this book back in time? Maybe I should just tell every teenager I know to read it instead. Because hey guess what guys, I was the shy, kinda awkward, nerdy girl who wanted people to like me and so much of what Carrie has poured into this book just resonates with me. Do you know what helps it resonate even more? Musical theatre and Doctor Who references.

For one, All I Know Now isn’t sectioned off into parts but Acts – it may be a small detail but from the moment your eyes hit that contents page it’s so Carrie-esque. The tributes to the theatrical parts of her life don’t stop there.

Yes, there was a particular chapter of this book that had me singing Wicked songs for a whole day. I kid you not. I will admit that I even put the book down (GASP!) to grab my iPod and listen to Thank Goodness a couple hundred times. Then of course, there’s the Les Mis, gosh this book made me want to go see Les Mis again every day until I die of Musical Theatre exhaustion. Musical Theatre fangirl aside, Carrie knows how to connect with an audience, she does this with her acting, she does this with her music and she most certainly does this with her writing.

With her words of wisdom delivered through a collection of fun, amusing and a little too relatable stories, Carrie has written a book that can help and put a smile on the face of anyone. It doesn’t matter if you’re a Hopeful or Musical Theatre geek. A teenager or a child at heart. Human, wizard, Time Lord. Whether you’re reading this book in your room, dorm, car waiting to pick up your kids, TARDIS or even Hogwarts – this novel with its bright yellow cover and girl with the Hermione-level frizzy hair is sure to brighten your day. You know what’s even better? You’ll also learn a lot on the way.

 

 

 

 

Crazy Cat Lady in Training

I am a crazy-cat-lady in training. Now before you ask, I only have one cat. Yes, I’m sure. Just the one. This whole ‘cat-crazed training program’ isn’t about me exceeding legal cat limits and filling my house with furry, purring creatures. Nor is it about my pre-planned future cat names (Moriarty, Loki, Salem, and Khosekh, if you were curious.) Oh no, this revelation is something different entirely.

Let it be known that I am a MASSIVE cat person. I don’t mean in the ‘dogs are horrible’ way, because come on, dogs are effing cute. No I mean in the ‘I REALLY JUST LOVE CATS’ way. I do also have a particular friend who is very, very, very (let it be known that at this point the word very looks fake and its causing a crisis, but back to the cat point) anti-cat. Which I don’t understand because cats are cute furry balls of demonic hatred and claws, and I love it. Yes, my cat can be a little evil (he once scared the crap out of a air-conditioning repair guy by staring at him through the window with death and hatred in his eyes) but that’s beside the point. Not even the occasional malevolence of my cat will distract me from my love of cats. This is the very same cat that used to get stuck a top palm trees and once fell into a fishpond in a high speed moth chase. I love my clumsy, evil cat.

If you need further evidence in my cat person claim here it is. I see a cat, any cat. A neighbour’s cat, a random cat, a picture of a cat, often my own cat. Any cat in general and I will stop. I will turn my attention to the cat and announce its presence to anyone, or often no one, by pointing and quite loudly stating ‘CAT!’. I am assured that the people around me are like “Yes, we can see that the creature over there is a cat.” But I will announce the animal’s existence anyway before, in full Baymax style, approaching/chasing the previously stated cat.

As I said crazy-cat-lady in training over here. Should I be wearing L plates?

But wait there is more. Yes, the tipping point of my crazy-cat-ladydom. Steve/Alan and Han Melow, the cats. Now you’re probably confused. Context time. So I am a very fandom and shipping orientated (i.e. obsessed) individual and on occasion I will write small, itty-bitty, paragraph long fan-fictions and send them to my friends. What does this have to do with cats you ask? Well. At the beginning of last year Starbucks (Steve Rogers and Bucky Barnes, not the coffee shop guys) moved into the prime real estate of my OTP (One True Pairing) and with that came a lot, and I mean A LOT, of itty bitty fanfictions filling up my friend’s inboxes. Within this array was Steve/Alan the cat. Bucky’s cat. Bucky’s cat named after Steve because he gets lonely, but Steve of course is unaware of this so in his presence the cat is Alan. It’s a little weird, I know, its more confusing for the poor cat. But trust me, its also super cute. I guess one cat related fan-fiction is okay. An isolated incident, right? Nope. As 2015 drew to a close, here came the new Star Wars and with the new Star Wars came new shipping prospects. One gif set of John Boyega with a cat on Tumblr and suddenly StormPilot (Finn and Poe Dameron) needed a cat. This one was Han Mewlo (the cat). Yeah I know super original, calm down matey it was the name that just stuck in my head, okay. Another long list of unread messages hit my friend’s phones as I created another non-cannon cat. While there may only be two at the moment, I can assure you there are more to come.

My brain never says ‘You know what, today these people are going to have a dog/bird/fish/pet rock.’ No, its always a cat. Even with my own characters, you guessed it, there is usually at least one per story with a cat. My non-cannon cat collection will grow and so will my actual cat collection. I might only have my one clumsy, evil, air conditioning scaring kitty cat (and two fictional cats to accompany my shipping) at the moment but I am still only in training. While I read back over this in disappointment at my lack of cat based puns and contemplate running the entire post through Kittify, I know that one day my cat shaped L plates will come off and my training will be over. I will be a certified crazy-cat-lady, ready to share my love of cats with the world in fully licensed glory. But for now I will write cats into my stories and have full blown conversations with my loud, annoying yet beautiful feline as he asks for food 5 minutes after he has been fed. For the time being I have already got a bit of the crazy, and I don’t need my training to be completed to really love cats.

 

Oh Gosh, I’m Growing Up!

Long time no post. Yes, it’s been over a month since Christmas – therefore, its been over a month since I last posted anything. Not good. I have since finished the complete Grimm’s fairy tales and maintain the idea that I don’t want to get magically transported to a fairy tale wonderland anytime soon. So what have I been doing? Well apart from some new found obsessions with Teen Wolf and How to Get Away With Murder and of course making my way through my Critical Reading novels (there are seven) I have been staring at the unavoidable abyss that is growing up. In approximately 290 days I will be 18. Yeah, I know its only 18, but 18 equals legal adult. Ad-ult. No more looking around for an grown-up or parental signatures. I will be the grown up. That’s kinda scary.

I know that the clock isn’t going to just click over to that big 18 and suddenly all my responsibilities are going to hit me in the face. They’re doing that already. The thing is that once I’m 18 the world will stop seeing me as a teenager, instead look at me as a adult – responsibility not included. I will have a say in the government, I will be able to vote. I will be able to consume alcohol in restaurants instead having to look at the waiter frantically when they place the wine glass on the table and say ‘Oh, no. I’m 17’. To little kids I won’t be a ‘Big Kid’ but instead a ‘Grown Up’. The seat at the grown ups table will finally be open to me and I will be able to follow the intense conversations on politics and taxes, you know: grown up stuff. Because I will be an adult.

I’m not going to lie – there is no way I will understand politics or taxes in 290 days time. Give me another year and I still won’t know what’s going on in parliament. But none of that stops the fact that by the end of this year, I will be 18 and in some ways its a big deal. In others its not. Its life. You grow up and usually its not the age brackets that really distinguish maturity. Whether your sixteen going on seventeen, seventeen going on eighteen or eighteen going on forty-two. Its just a number and you have a year to be that number. Only one – so have fun. Instead of worrying about turning 18 in 290 days I am going to relish in the fact that I still have 290 days to be The Dancing Queen.