Letter to the past

Dear Past-Sophie,

Even though your parents divorce hasn't completely screwed you up, there are a few things to remember.

Like everyone says, it's not your fault, sometimes people just grow apart. They still love you.

Step parents aren't evil and villainous like in books and movies, it's probably time to stop reading Jacqueline Wilson books. At most they are a little annoying.

And believe it or not other people can have parents that are happy together, so don't get freaked out when you see your friends parent hold hand or other such stupid things.

You'll have to learn to put up with your mum moaning and bitching about your dad for many years and mostly about the same things but remember that sometime mum doesn't really have anyone who will listen to her.

On the whole you are going to come out of this relatively undamaged, which is good but try and help a bit more. Oh and you'll get twice as many birthday present one of the better bonuses of divorced parents.

Yours,

Future-Sophie.

Bullying happened to me too

I never realised I was bullied until I left school. I never felt like I was bullied, I knew people didn’t like me and I had been the victim of being physical bulling but it never actually occurred to me that I was being bullied. It was just a part of going to school that I had to put up with.

I was never popular when I was at school right the way through from primary to secondary, but I guess pretty much all the bullying I experienced happened in secondary. When I was in second year, about 13 years old, I was commonly described as a “goth” because I like alternative music and wore skinny jeans and a lot of black. This mainly cause a problems because the large majority of my school were neds (The wiki article isn’t great in my opinion but it should give you rough idea), so anyone who is different from them is a target for them, I knew people who “swapped sides” so speak in order to avoid the bullying. I never changed because I always thought, “This is me, why should I change?”

Bullying wise I’ve been spat on, had chewing gum in my hair, all kinds of things thrown in my direction, sly comments, water poured over me in home ec and probably a lot more but I just can’t remember anymore. Writing this out makes me wonder how I never knew I was bullied...

The most direct kind of bullying I remember ever happening to me happened during, I think, my third year. In Scotland everyone has to take RME (Religious and Moral Education, which obviously didn’t work) and most people don’t want to be there. Unfortunately for me two of the most disruptive neds in my year happened to be in the same class as me and a few of my “goth” friends. I remember dreading going to that class because none of the teachers were any good at controlling or keeping their pupils safe. There is no story to this attack other than that I was sitting in class talking to my friend when he jumped off the table behind me and kicked me in the back. Everyone saw. The teacher saw. But nothing was ever done. I feel this speaks more about my schools attitude to this kind of behavior, like there was no point in doing anything because they’d do it anyway. I mean one winter a large group of were standing outside and we were having balls of ice with stones and all sorts in them thrown at us, I remember sitting for ages waiting to see the head teacher about it and then being told to just go to class.

Now that I’ve left school I haven’t actually experienced any bullying and it’s pretty great. I know it sounds stupid but being able to sit in a room and not having to worry about what people think or checking that all my belongs are with me or being scared that something is going to be thrown at me is pretty great. It makes life easier.

I think I said role models too much

I spent a lot of last night lying in bed thinking about who my role models were, and it turned out to be more difficult than I had expected. There are so many people who I look up to and who influence the person I am. I eventually decided there was two main role models in my life.

The first is a person who has been in my life for pretty much my who life, my dad. I mean obviously our parents are the people who shape us most in life, even my mum is a great influence bu my dad has pretty much always been someone I've wanted to be like. He is hard working, most mornings he is away to work before I'm even up. But he is so enthusiastic about so much stuff, like his band and playing guitar and doing DIY and cooking and watching movies. He encourages me so much in everything I do. I want to be able to work as hard as he does and do all things in life that make me happy.

John and Hank Green are obviously major role models in my life and have been for a long time now. I definitely think that if I hadn't read John's books I wouldn't think the way I do about a lot of things, I have learnt a lot from them, good thinks that have helped me in the way I think about the world and the way I treat others. I think the internet in general has improve me as person but I don't really think I could get away with saying the internet is role model.

Happy birthday!

I was going to either bake a cake or buy one and put a candle in it and take a photo to celebrate but then I forgot. Fun ideas only work if you remember them apparently.

It really is hard to believe that its been a year, it really has felt like no time at all. It is so strange to think that we started of know each other by just our usernames and now we know each other as people as oppose to nameless, faceless internet strangers. I guess it goes to show that communities can grow out of groups that have just sort of been flung together.

It's hard to think of ways that I have grown because of this blog but I guess if anything I hopefully have gotten a bit better at writing. I will acknowledge that I do occasionally miss words out and forget to fix it, so I guess I've learnt that I really need to proof read. I think this blog has forced me to try and write more. I tend not to be able to write as long blogs everyone else, perhaps this is due to me using twitter and trying to condense my thoughts into 140 characters.

Mostly I'm really happy I took this opportunity. I can't imagine sitting on a Wednesday night now without think, "OhcrapIgottablog!" But that doesn't change how much I love it. I hope we are still doing this years from now.

I also want to pick up what Sarah said about how it's nice that we are all from different places and so we have so much more to share. I love that I can talk to other people who have had different experiences from what I have. On the other hand though, I would love to meet you all in real life! It's a shame there is such a distance between us all.

Anyway I should round this off and get back to my homework. To many more years of happy blogging! Hip hip hooray!

In which I am clumsy

I haven't really been up to much except working (and by working I mean procrastinating) pretty hard on college work.

Today was a fairly unproductive, I got up too late to go to college and sat around for a while. I did however decide to put on the very lovely necklace my boyfriend got me yesterday and then subsequently broke it. This was followed by some mild panic and guilt. I sat around some more and figured that only time I had to get it fixed before I next see him was today. So I headed out and luckily the nice woman at the jewellers replaced it for me free of charge, I'm not sure how I managed to get away with that though but I so happy about it.

After that I decided that since I was in town I should make it worth my time. I headed to Waterstone's the book shop and had a browse and ended up buying Zombies Vs Unicorns, which I'm going to start reading as soon as I've finished writing this. I mainly bought it because I really love the cover. I find it very hard to enter a book shop and not leave with something. I also made the discovery of the fact I actually like the clothes in Urban outfitters but I still have a problem with a lot of their prices. Also they had a Mountain Dew lip balm, I was very excited about this but again is was £5 for something just a bit bigger than my thumbnail.

So really my day was getting up, breaking stuff, replacing stuff, buying stuff and not doing very much work. Oh and I also watched three episodes of Supernatural, Glee, New Girl and Castle. Add that to my list of distractions. This will come back to bite in the ass later.

Advice on friends

I don't feel that advice giving is a strong point of mine but I'll do my best.

Tips on meeting/befriending fun and interesting people outside of school?

I'm not a particularly social person and I find making friends a daunting task but somehow I manage it. My advice would be to look on your pants and see if there are any nerdfighter gatherings happening in your area. This how I meet some good friends of mine, it's particularly good if there isn't a really a well established community, that way everyone is kind of in the same boat. If there isn't any gatherings coming up, make one!

Try going places with friends and get them to invite mutual friends that you don't know. You might have some common interests.

Rachel's question about defriending her friend.

I didn't what to put as the question for this so that is why I have that.

I have lost a lot of friends over the years, lossing contact or being ditched for the "cooler kids" or a simple fall out leading to silence for over a year, so I feel I have some expertise in this field. I'm going from what you've said, I would say if you no longer speak and just drifted apart there's no need to delete her from your sites, but if you've had arguments, disagree over things and seeing her posts make you annoyed then delete.

You shouldn't worry about how she will react, that's not your problem any more because you are not friends. If she's upset over it, that's her problem not yours. Keep the people you care about and who care about you, no one else should matter.

I know I've not really wrote much about it and sure it will help but my feelings about friendship are pretty black and white.

Things that make me happy

I like coming home and being able to take my shoes off for the first time all day, that feeling is like nothing else, it is best when you have been running around all. I always were sensible shoes but it's still so nice to take them off after a hard day.

I also enjoy putting music on while I tidy my room and singing along rather enthusiastically with some bad dancing. With the curtains shut of course and when no one else is home.

A really cold drink on a hot day. I remember at the end of July last year I was in Edinburgh for the day and my bottle of water was cool anymore and I was so thirsty. I bought a bottle of cola on the way to the train home and it was the best thing ever!

Phoning my mum is one the few things that bring real joy on a day to day basis. I don't really like talking on the phone to anyone except my mum. Even if our conversation is just me telling her what had for dinner or her telling me the crazy things my nonna said, phoning my mum really brightens my day.

My last thing is taking an hour something to read or watch an episode of whatever tv series I'm currently obsessed with (right now it's Castle). Although, if I get really into the book ends up being longer and if it's a cliff hanger ending there is 99% chance I will watch the next episode to find out what happens. I think tonight I might watch castle and then read a bit of The Fault in Our Stars. I rather sadly got one of the unsigned copies that Amazon UK had sent out, in fact right now I only of one person who got a signed one.

Happy New Year!

Sorry this is late I still have my holiday brain on. (Also, there is something stuck under my S key so if there is any missing I apologise.)

This year I've had a great time. I started off with a Chritmas get together with my old school friends, every year we do secret Santa a way to save money. This year we all helped make a mini Christmas dinner, roast chicken and veg, soup and a lot deserts. I love seeing my friends this time of year since we all go to university in different places and its hard to get us all in the same place now.

On the eve of Christmas eve I went to visit my nonna with my dad, luckly my two great uncles were there too so that saved us a trip to see them too. It was really nice to get to see my nonna, she's 83 now and hasn't been very well lately so I'm trying see her as much as can now. She was still doing her best to fill us all full food a usual though.

The only real tradition we have now in my family is after dinner on Christmas eve me and my brother get one present, this is usual chocolate or something small and silly. I remember for years we would get glitter glue pens, and if I'm totally honest I would still have the most amount of fun with them if I still got them.

I spent Chritmas morning with my mum, brother, aunt and her greyhound, Mandy. We spent the morning opening presents and saying, "oh, you shouldn't have! You really didn't!" I spent the the afternoon watching tv cuddling up to Mandy. After we had dinner I headed round to my boyfriends so we could watch Doctor Who together but I ended up missing most of it because I was too busy asking his family how they were and wishing everyone a Merry Christmas.

The weather where I am has been super windy, like upto 90mph. On the 28th my mum, brother, aunt, dog and I where meant to be going to Arran, an island not far where we are but because of the weather all the ferries had been cancelled. We managed to get the first ferry the next day but my brother and I only got to stay one day because of this. I hadn't been to Arran in years and it is honestly one of the mot beautiful places in Scotland, if you ever make this side of the Atlantic you should put it on your places to vist list.

My new year was pretty standard. I went to a party and had a few drinks, manage just in time to switch on the tv to count down to the bells, hugged and kissed and wished everyone a happy new year.

I have no real resolutions other than to be better this year than last. It seems to me to be the easiest to keep and most achievable.

Yule Balls and Saints

For months now my friends and I have been planning a real Yule Ball, like in the The Goblet of Fire. And for a while it was just a thing, it didn’t really feel like something that was going to happen but now it’s a few weeks away I’m just like, “safhdkvbbvo!!!”

If someone had told me at the start of the year I was even going to be attending a yule ball I probably wouldn’t of believed them. Because mainly I wouldn’t of known any one nerdy enough to of gone with me and there is never anything like it held in the UK. I’m seriously looking forward to it.

I also noticed today when I was out for dinner with my friends that today is Saint Andrew’s Day. It just made me realise how little people actually care about it. It’s probably a bigger deal in schools and maybe if I paid attention to the news and stuff I would of noticed. But I kind of think if Scottish people had the same attitude as Americans, Saint Andrews day would be a much bigger celebration. But then again, I think I’m probably stereotyping.

Is there a patron saint of America or Canada? I know you can get lots of different saints for places but I don’t think I’ve heard of any for America or Canada. Even Glasgow has its own saint, Saint Mungo.

I apologise for that last bit of mindless pondering.

It's a wolf but big

I've spent a lot of time thinking about what mythical beast I would want as a pet but I couldn't think of one so I think I made one up, it may actually be mythical but I'm not sure. I would like a giant wolf, the kind that would be as tall as me or maybe taller than that.

I think it would be like having a pet dog but only bigger. I could rid on his back and we could run through fields. In the winter we could cuddle up together and keep me warm. He'd keep weirdos away from me. I'd imagine it would make getting to and from college more enjoyable and a lot quicker.

Although that said trying to train a giant wolf will probably be pretty difficult and pretty problematic. It's like a dog only bigger... but maybe it would be smarter. And where would you keep a giant wolf, you'd either need a really big house or keep it outside and that doesn't seem fair. Plus how would you feed a giant wolf!? Where would you get enough food for it, it wouldn't be good if the local farmers came with flaming torches and pitch forks because it ate their cows and sheep.

Regardless of the cons, I would still really love to have a giant wolf. I think, the idea may of come from Princess Mononoke. There was some pretty big wolves in that wasn't there?

Costumes through the ages.

I guess we're doing costumes this week. This is just going to be a history of most of the costumes I've ever had.

My favourite costume I ever had was one my mum made me when I was in nursery. It was a Little Miss Muffet costume. My mum sewed it all together, it was a little bonnet and apron which had a pocket with a spider on it. It was pretty cute. If I was at my mum's I would take photos of it to show you because for some reason I still have it.

I'm pretty sure between the ages of 6 and 11 I was a witch every year for halloween. I'm also certain that my intensity of wanting to be witch increased when I got into Harry Potter. I even remember making my own wand one year from a stick I found in our garden.

And between the ages of 12-14 I think I was a vampire. I remember one year me and my little cousin went out trick or treating (which in Scotland we call guising which comes from the word disguise). My little cousin was about 9 years old at this point and looked up to me and copied just about everything I did, so we went out both dressed as vampires. We only went down our street and across the road but we got a decent amount of sweets and couple of pounds from neighbours who had forgot to buy sweets.

And from about the ages of 15 to now my go to costume tends to be a zombie. Like I have so much fake blood laying around it's unreal. In 2009 and 2010 there was zombie walks on Halloween both of which I attended with friends. The zombie walks are pretty fun and it's alway great to everyones costumes and the effort put in to them. My favourite was a pregnant zombie with a zombie baby sticking out from the stomach.

I can't really think of a decent way to conclude this, so I'm just going to stop.

Bah Halloween

I really like the idea of Halloween, dressing up and eating sweets and scaring little kids but I don't actually like it in practice. I don't think I've ever really had a good Halloween. And I guess as I've gotten older they've gotten more sucky. I'm like the Scrooge of Halloween. Only no ghosts will try to show me the spirt of Halloween.

So this year I am not going out and I am not dressing. I had been offered to go to a couple parties but really it was a bit too late to even think about getting a proper costume put together. Which actually leads me nicely to one of the things I hate most about Halloween: slutty costumes. It's pretty much impossible to find a female costume that doesn't leave you showing off everything and it really bugs me. I remember a couple of years ago I wanted to be Claire from Heroes but I couldn't find a cheerleading costume that wasn't slutty.

But I don't want to put a downer on everyones Halloween so I will say that so enjoy carving the pumpkin on Halloween, in fact it's probably my favourite part. Although I should point out that here in the UK our pumpkins are tiny compared to the ones you guys can get like seriously pumpkins here aren't much bigger than maybe the size of my head.

Really all I'm just look forward to some extra chocolate this week.

I can't think of a title

Space and time bending please!

I can’t remember what TV show it was but someone said they wanted to have ghost powers because it was like having three powers in, invisibility, flying and walking through walls. I thought that was really creative but I don’t think I’d want any of those powers. Invisibility is cool but I don’t think it’s really that useful, flying is cool too but it’s a bit Superman and I’m not sure I could pull it off, walking through walls would be good, I was going to say for robing banks or something but it depends if it’s just you or you and the objects you hold that can go through walls.

If we lived in a world where everyone had some form of superpower I’d quite like the power to use other people’s powers. Which I know is cheating but really everyone knows that Peter from Heroes was the best and a total bad ass.

I think that on a regular basis that I wish I could teleport. Like when I sleep in and am running late for college be able to teleport would be good because then wouldn’t need to worry about the long bus journey. Or when I’m really tired I could teleport home. It would be really useful if I had to carry heavy stuff. And I guess if was able to travel through space I’d also like to time travel. Time travel would be pretty cool but I’d only use it to witness important historical events. And also to buy as many 1950’s dress I can. A lot can go wrong with time travel but I think it could help me with handing work in on the deadline, I could do the same 10 minutes until it was finished.

Yeah, so basically I’d like the superpower to bend space and time.

What I've been upto

What have I been up to... Hmmm. I started back at college about three or four weeks ago so I've had plenty of craziness with that trying to get back into the swing of things with deadlines and doing work and getting up before noon. I also used a large chunk of my loan and saving splashing out on a MacBook for college too and I'm glad I did because it is so much faster than my old laptop.

Something I'm really excited about is my friend and I are working on a short graphic story for a competition. I'm doing the artwork and he is doing the writing part of it. It's really great because we've been saying that we're going to work on something together for a while now and never really done anything. We had no idea what we were going to do so we went for coffee and batted ideas around and ended up with thumbnails for our four pages by the end of that one meeting. I am hoping to have it all finished by the end of the week, which is a tight deadline but I think I can make it.

I'm hoping if the graphic novel thing works out well that I could hopefully make some sort of career out of it but I'm pretty nervous about it because I don't really read comics and I didn't read them growing up, so I always kind of feel like a noob when it comes to that sort of thing. But I guess if we place anywhere in this competition I'll probably give me the confidence to continue.

I guess that's all I've really been up to, it seems like so much less when it's all written down.

Nerd on!

I think for me the thing I am most nerdy about is Harry Potter and I think it has gotten worse over the years. I remember when I had just began to read the books I would take them everywhere with, I think I have a photo somewhere of me when I was 10 in Italy reading The Prisoner Of Azkaban. This summer I went to the midnight showing of Deathly Hallows Part II with a group of nerdfighters dressed up wearing my shirt and Gryffindor tie, it was unfortunately too hot for me to wear my Gryffindor hat my mum knitted for me though. I also spent hours when Pottermore first turned up trying to submit my email to get early entry. When it came to getting sorted I was so scared I was going to make it into Gryffindor, so many people have said I am more of a Huffelpuff but they were wrong.

Maths is something that I really liked when I was at school. Probably because I was quite good at it but since I'm doing an art course now at college I don't really do any sort of maths now. In fact I can barley remember anything I learnt, but at the time I really like all the long complicated equations and the feeling when you get them right.

I'm also pretty nerdy about art supplies , particularly paper, I'm always searching for the perfect watercolour paper. I like the different weights and grain paper has. Quite a lot of the paper I end up buy ends up in a pile not used because it's too nice to use and I'm scared to use it.

And this the part where I can't think of any more nerdy things about myself and I can't tell if it's because there are no more nerdy things about me or if I'm so nerdy I think it's normal.

Luisa

Unlike Sarah and Kaite, my name is very common where I am but I still dislike Sophie. To me it's a baby name, a name for a little a girl so I feel that I have out grown my name a bit. Technically, my name is Sophia but again I dislike this name .

I guess if I had to chose my own name I'd chose something more Italian because I'm very proud of my heritage and I don't think my name really shows that off well. Maybe a name like Luisa. It's a name that I have very recently liked, it was meant to be the middle name of one of my aunts but my papa got it wrong on the birth certificate and spelt it Louisa, and I think that's a funny story and that's part of the reason I'd like it.

I also know that a name my mum was think of calling me was Victoria and I've always kinda loved that name. I think it' a big, grand name. I wouldn't say I'm either of those things but I'd like a name that had some sort of importance to it. Also I think Vicky would be a really nice nickname.

PS. sorry this is late, I did start on Wednesday I just forgot to finish it.

Time to relax

There are a few things a like to do to relax and recharge after a hard or stressful day but my favourite is nap. I like to come home and get my ipod, pick my favourite album and just curl up in bed. It's great way to relax and just block out the world. It's also even better if it's winter and it's really cold outside, it makes everything so much better. That's pretty much my go to way to relax.

Another way I like to relax is just to watch DVDs or TV. The best kind of movies to watch are ones which are so bad they're funny or just funny ones. It's also great to watch these with friends, particularly the ones that don't care if you haven't made an effort to look good. The really bad movies are the best to watch with friends because they give you something you can all laugh and make fun of.

Also, a combination of both these is a particularly great way to recharge, watch a movie in bed and then sleep.

Going on walks, I find is also pretty relaxing. I had a stressful time recently, so I took my aunt's dog (Because I don't have dog of my own) and I went on a walk around the farm type part round the back of my house. It was good. Partly because dogs will always love you and partly because even though I don't really go out much, I like being outside. Fresh air is good.

Books I like

I had a little difficulty picking out the books I wanted to talk about for this but I narrowed it down to three. I was going to mention books like the Harry Potter series and The Hunger Games, I think they're great books but I don't think need any badly worded praise from me.

Looking For Alaska, John Green. I was going to try and stay away from John's books because it seem rather fangirly to mention his books in a blog which is basically about the community based around him but Looking For Alaska is my all time favourite book. I can honestly open this book at any page and start reading it and enjoy it as much as I had the first time I read it. Words cannot describe the love I have for this book.

Going bovine, Libba Bray. This is a fantastic book from start to finish. It's about a sixteen year old guy called Cameron who finds out he has a weird disease and is going to die. He ends up on a road trip with a dwarf and garden gnome. It's a really interesting book about living and dying. It also has one of the greatest opening sentences ever, "The best day of my life happened when I was five and almost died at Disney World."

The Second Coming, John Niven. I'm actually in the middle of reading this but so far it is fantastic. As the title suggests it is about the second coming of Jesus, basically the story is God goes on holiday, comes back to see the world the way it is and how messed up it is and decides to send Jesus back to fix things and spread the word. What I've read so far is really good but I think it's a rather controversial book due to the language used in it and the pot smoking in heaven. Still I think it's a great book, I know it's not published in the US but if you can get it online you should totally read it.

I was a prefect :D

I was pretty much going to the same thing as Katie did, I picked out some photos to show but I had to clean out my wardrobe and I found my old school ties and my prefect badge. I know that in USA you don't really have schools that have uniforms, I'm not too sure about Canada but I think it's the kind of the same, so I thought this would be some thing interesting to share.

These are the three ties I have, the one on the left is from the first primary scho

ol I went to, I was there from primary one to primary 3, the middle tie is from the second primary I went to because I moved house and it was closer, I was there from primary 4 to primary 7. The last tie is my senior high school tie which is still the same knot from the last time I wore it and it still has my prefect badge on it too. I'm kind of upset I that I don't have my junior tie any more, its like the other two ties it has stripes it was the same colour as the senior tie but with light blue stripes.

Here's a close up of prefect badge

I would like to point out that all the sixth years at my school got prefect badges, I'm not special in any way but I am proud to have gotten one. Another thing I think I should point out is that in my school juniors are first to fourth years and seniors are fifth and sixth years.

Anyway I hope you found my walk down memory lane at least a little bit interesting.