With friends like these...

How was yours? Particularly unlucky?

I woke up to being screamed at that I hadn't done the dishes (because I'd overslept), went down to do them only to be told to go away, so I hid in the bathroom while mother did the dishes herself, crashing them around like they'd done something wrong. I then had a very paltry dinner of a bit of salmon and salad - you'd not think I was the only one in the house not on a diet. I've seen my mother for less than five minutes and she's spent half of that shouting at me, and the rest of it either ignoring me or speaking to me like she might throw something at me. I do the dishes when it's my turn, pretty much every time. I even do Amy's turn when she's out or not up (and Amy didn't even cover for me, thanks kid), and it seems to me that there's no point in my doing anything at all because whenever I forget just one time it's like I never do anything anyway.

Being lazy and being yelled at for it seems like it would be a lot easier on my confidence than doing things and having them completely brushed aside because one thing is forgotten.

I feel so distanced from my family here. They don't know me at all (to take the emo teen angle). My sister and my mother are very alike, they both like soaps, they both like (ew) Twilight, they both like to shop and all those girly things. Me, I'm a nerd. I like Star Trek and computers, and politics and history. Things that mother won't even humour me about. I'm just stuck inside my own head. It's a bit depressing really.

Also my lady week, as nasty_show calls it, started today, and I was curled up for four hours with crippling cramp before the painkillers kicked in.. or it went away on its own, I don't know.

The fact that my 'leave a comment' link is now cut in half is bugging me. Does anyone with any HTML knowledge want to check through my layout code and see if there's any way to fix it? :T I've looked myself but my HTML know-how is very limited and I have absolutely no clue what I'm looking at.

The faulty laptop that I've spent the past week trying to return has now gone. The courier came for it yesterday, and I would have posted about it then but for some reason that I don't understand I was up all night and too tired to put together my thoughts to type up an entry. I have a receipt, but hopefully that's the end of it and I can get my refund then give dad the money I owe HIM for getting me a laptop that actually works. I'd love to know what happened to that one that it managed to break like that. I have the feeling it might have been roughed up a bit in the van when it was being delivered.

On Monday, I went to Bolton with mum and Amy to see a play, and managed to fall over within two minutes of getting out of the car. The most awful part wasn't the hitting the ground, or the entire right side of my jeans being soaked with ice-cold water, or my sore hip, it was feeling my foot go out from under me and knowing I was going to fall. I hate that feeling. I suppose I was lucky, I could have smacked my head off the floor or broken a bone, but as it was I was just wet and cold and embarrassed. I'm thinking though that I might have fallen a bit harder than I first thought, since my shoulder has been aching since yesterday and the side of my hand keeps twinging. I can still bend my fingers so it's probably not serious, but still. Muh.

I hate falling over.

Mum, John and Amy went to see the new Sherlock film last night. I didn't, because I'm not really that interested, and they didn't seem very taken with it. Amy was getting bored before it finished. I've not really been that impressed with any modern adaptations of Sherlock Holmes though, so I'm not really surprised.

I got a nice surprise in the mail yesterday, too! A letter from ishilde, which I have duly written a reply to and I will be sending that off as soon as I can find a stamp. Hopefully the Xmas post won't slow it up too much :T I love getting letters. I also have my Xmas present from iiluov, which is a long-since retired TY Beanie Baby that I had as a kid and managed to lose somehow, probably in one of my mum's clear-outs. It might be silly for a 23 year old to miss a toy but I don't care :T

I'm staying in my room today. My stomach hasn't been quite right since last night and I still feel a bit icky. Bluh.

I've agreed to do a reverse bungee. It will be taking place on November 13th. My boyfriend lemmi162 will be there to watch, as will my dad pushkingram if he can stay over on the Saturday night since he'll be here anyway.

Why did I agree to this?

WHY DID I AGREE TO THIS?

In other news, MY BOYFRIEND IS COMING OVER. I don't talk about him much, and I ought to. His name is Darren, and he's from Reno, Nevada, and we're finally going to meet when he comes over to England for a week and a half next month. >O<;;

Mum seems to be in a much better mood now that me and Amy have taken on cleaning the house. I'm not minding this at all since cleaning doesn't take much effort and it makes my life easier if she's not breathing down my neck because she thinks I'm being lazy.

I had to clean my goldfish's tank again today (after about three days) because there was a load of random white fluffy stuff clinging to everything. I'm not sure what it is but it seems to be a kind of fungus that's caused by decaying material in the tank - namely plants and food. Since the tank is cleaned regularly the plants aren't dying and any bits that are stuck in the gravel get removed, so I can only assume that it's because my stepdad is overfeeding the poor thing and it's leaving food on the bottom which then is causing the fungus. Lovely. I'm going to be keeping an eye on the tank to make sure it doesn't come back.

It's getting to winter now and it's growing cold. At the moment it's 10 degrees outside (that's 50F) which may not seem that cold to a lot of people but when you live in a temperate climate it's sliding to the lower end of uncomfortable. What's more uncomfortable, however, is not the fact that it's cold outside, but when it's cold outside it's also cold inside. My bedroom, and my sister's, are located in a dormer and when it was built it didn't really get amazing insulation, as well as having a flat roof. So, the rooms lose heat. Quickly. I'm not looking forward to this winter. Ironically, in summer it's the complete opposite and the rooms hold in the heat like a furnace.

Plotbunnies are coming in thick and fast these days. Right now I have 25 fics on my prompts left to do, and four chapterfics. One of them is new, an idea given to me by something my bestu berwaldox said. It's been a while since I've had a France/Scotland idea, but while RPing with her, something that her Scotland said caught my eye - "He's come back to me like I always said he would" or something to that effect. I'm going to see what I can make of it but it's likely going to be a short chapterfic with some matchmaking. I do like France/Scotland.

Last night I spent a very amusing hour or so attempting to come up with a name for one of the main antagonists for my dear friend and waifu lemiru's upcoming new webcomic which is yet to be titled. He has been nicknamed 'murderprince' up until this point and after much throwing names at Miru and much giggling on her part at the random names I was managing to come up with I threw the name Matthias Ulfred Rodolph Dmitri Eduard Rafe Philip Robert Ingram Niklaus Cedric Eisenberg at her. So you don't have to spend any time staring at it wondering why on earth I picked those names, I will tell you right now that the initials spell out 'M.U.R.D.E.R.P.R.I.N.C.E.'. I thought it was quite clever.

Eventually, Miru decided she liked the name Albrecht, which I think fits quite well with the name of his errand-boy Marechal, Tibeault. Seriously. 'Albrecht and Tibeault'. How well do those names go together? I think 'very'. 8)

Though the wisdom that is Miru also decided to tack the MURDERPRINCE string on after Albrecht, likely with a few changes in the names, because royals always have ridiculously long names and because his initials all together would then spell out 'A MURDERPRINCE' which is just too awesome.

Mother is coming home today, and I'm kind of torn over whether or not I want to go to the airport when John goes to pick them up. On the one hand, it would be nice to see them off the plane, but on the other hand, mum wants to go out for dinner and I have this sinking feeling that something will happen to cause an argument, which will just leave me wishing that I never went. I don't think that I want to risk it, so I'll just wait until she comes home. I also have no wish to be trying to get to the airport (and away from it) in rush hour traffic... e.e

I think I'll just stay here. =| I have plenty of writing to keep me occupied.

I'm hoping that today is going to be one of those days when I get a lot of things done. I'm already off to a good start, and it's only just gone 1pm. Mother will be home on Monday, and John and I have decided against telling her about my horrendous sleeping habits this week because I know she wouldn't be impressed in the slightest.

Thanking very much to haro for giving me an invite code so I could finally set up a dreamwidth account like I'd been intending to for a while - since the last major LJ outage, actually. I think I still prefer LJ so I won't be moving over there, unless I can find a way to make it look how I want it to, but it will serve well as a backup until I decide to shift. Even then I'll likely still be using LJ. I'm a complicated person.

My Dreamwidth is here if anyone with it would like to add me. o3o

I've had a good turnout to the last meme I posted, even if Franada isn't really my thing and neither is SweNor.. looking at YOU, chiisana00.. I haven't been asked to do anything that I really object to. Which is nice.

It's been raining all day.

How is everyone? o3o

I would say that seeing the Red Arrows was totally worth this sunburn, but it isn't.

It's been three days and my forehead feels like it's on fire constantly. The rest the burnt spots are fine, if a tiny bit itchy, but my forehead.. it's like someone took a red-hot poker to it and it doesn't even look that bad. I have some aloe, but it's really only temporary relief (temporary, read: two seconds) and really it's just making me want to sleep all the time so I don't have to deal with it. I slept for ten hours last night and fourteen the night before, and for someone who normally sleeps eight hours a night that's a hell of a lot.

I don't care what my mum says, sunburn (no matter how 'healthy' looking it is - I don't think she realises what actually causes sunburn and tanning) is never a good look on anyone and unlike a lot of people my age I hate having a tan. Something about my skin being darker than my hair is incredibly unappealing to me. berwaldox put me on to her game, though. She's trying to make me go outside more often by saying I don't look that bad. I'm on to her now. 8|

What's annoying me more about it is that it's caused me to miss two usxuk  prompts that I was really looking forward to doing. I'll probably end up writing them anyway and posting them outside of the event, because I had ideas for both that I want to use. Yet more things to add to the list of fics that I have yet to finish.

The fish are still alive. Barney is back to his usual self though his tail is still a bit red-streaked. He's curious as ever and coming to the front of the tank when people are in the room. It was sad to see him get so shy and quiet when he was sick - he kept hiding and wouldn't come out at all. Robin is still very much tail-less, but I didn't expect that to change any time soon. Still not moving around that much, but that's not really surprising, it must be quite exhausting.

It's my mum's birthday today and she wants to go out for dinner. Me, I'm feeling utterly miserable and in constant pain/discomfort across my forehead. Mum says take a painkiller, which don't work on me. Amy says put make-up on, which is just a ridiculous suggestion. Who puts make-up on a burn? Silly girl.

Bluh.

I am sitting in my bedroom, watching the thermometer creeping slowly closer to 27 degrees, feeling rather uncomfortable already and it- (sod it, I moved downstairs. In the middle of an entry. I'm that hipster).

Anyway.

I'm now sitting in the dining room watching my parents do the garden and I'm drinking instant tea because we've run out of teabags. I don't know why I didn't just go and get some of my loose leaf tea from upstairs but mum said it wasn't too bad tasting. Well... it's not disgusting, but it reminds me of camping for reasons I can't explain and it's not something I'd choose to drink. I might have to get some Baroness Grey down me before the day is out, I've grown quite a fondness for that tea though I might try putting a little sugar in it. It's a tad too tart.

Mum pulled a carrot up today. Well, she pulled up four but only one of them was really worth a mention. This one.



Look at that. Look how freaky that is.

I have nothing more to say 8|

Now, I'm going to write some porn.

See, the other night while RPing with amael_elen , the issue of how many nations Arthur has slept with came up. The list came to twenty-six (including America)... so... I'm writing them. All of them. Some, you will expect. Some, you won't. Feel free to make guesses... xD

Also, here is a nice, dorky photo of me (and my mum). LOOK AT THE HAT.

Now it's been established that I need to stalk the main comm a lot more often, I actually have an update today.

My sad absence from posting fics has been due to many things, not all of them good, but on Sunday I went to Southport. For those British people who have never been to Southport, imagine Blackpool only less gaudy, with fewer piers, and you've about got it. If you're British and can't imagine Blackpool on account of never having been or suffering some kind of post-traumatic stress from being left in the underground public toilets by your mother's friend who was supposed to be looking after you and coming up on the wrong side of the road and being shouted at because of it... more power to you, you don't want to imagine Blackpool.

The phone is ringing. I'm not answering it. Phones weird me out.

Anyway- bleurgh, cold tea... - the weather was good (shock) and we wandered around, and walked up the mile pier. Not all the way to the end, because a mile is a long way to walk for bugger all and then you still have to walk back.

We saw a pigeon. I'm sure you're wondering why I'm bringing this up and I'm doing so on account of the fact that I found this pigeon rather amusing. It was just sat there, on a bit of grass next to the pier, surrounded by bits of bread, barely feet from the path and not moving when people walked past it. We - that is, the people I was with, that being my friend Kelly, her boyfriend Matt, and Matt's friend Pete - decided that this pigeon was a low ranking member of the seagull mafia and was guarding the stash until they came back.

On the beach, Kelly and I rescued five ladybirds. I don't know what the hell they were doing half a mile out on the sand but they seemed to have crash landed, and were unable to take off again because of the wind. It was rather windy.

We later saw the same pigeon, on the other side of the path, sat between the tracks of a train line. Apparently he had failed in his duties and rather than let the seagulls take care of him was saving them the job and doing it himself.

Then, we went for some Chinese. There was a cute waiter there. I had duck. I love duck. Yum yum.

I spent the next couple of days making myself horribly depressed looking for jobs, before coming to the conclusion that there are no jobs. I have just been informed by my friend Tom that he has just been offered a job, so perhaps I'm not looking hard enough, or all the jobs are on another plane of existence that I simply don't have access to. I'm probably not looking hard enough, but the other explanation makes me feel better.

A good thing is that I talked to the friend I was bawwing about yesterday, and she really hasn't changed all that much. Not that I can tell, anyway. Yet. We shall see. What I find funny is that for the past couple of months she's been practically stalking me too scared to talk to me because of what I'd think of her. Silly woman. I do love her though.

Bit of TMI, now. Maybe. If you're squicky about that kind of thing.

I got the curse dropped on me this morning. I've been in pain all day. The main problem with this, is that I'm in so much pain that it upsets my stomach, so I really don't want to eat anything.

It really fucking sucks.

What else can I tell you...

I'm going to Brugge in December. Mum wanted to go in July for her birthday but we figured it might be too hot and so we got on a thing for the Christmas Markets. I'll take lots of photos.

I'm also going to Venice in September. This was not quite so elaborately planned, more of a suggestion sprung onto my father pushkingram by myself and my sister sparklyscorpio . We didn't actually expect him to agree to take us, but he did, because he's freaking awesome. So I'm going to Venice. I'll take lots of photos.

I might also be going to Ireland if I can ever get a hold of my friend Alison to make the arrangements for summer.

Also, I might impose myself upon lemiru in Switzerland if I have the money. We can have tea.

I'm going to be writing a lot today.

I've finally shaken that cough, though now I've developed two very strategically placed mouth ulcers, one on my top lip and one on the lower half of my cheek, both on the left side of my mouth, which are stopping me eating properly. My knee is still sore, too. I can't kneel on it without it hurting, and though the bruising seems to have mostly gone down, I'm wondering if there's any lasting damage... Meh. It's probably just deep bruising. I did land on the ligament after all.

So. It's my birthday tomorrow. I'll be twenty-one years old. I don't want to be.

Perhaps it's a side effect of people (namely my mother) always using my age as a reason why I ought to be doing certain things, but I don't feel 'ready' to be twenty-one. It infers a level of being 'adult' that I don't think I've reached yet. Sometimes it feels like my brain got stuck at sixteen and my body just carried on without it. I don't know if I just didn't grow up or grew up a different way but I'm just not doing the same kinds of things that other people my age do. I'd rather spend my time indoors than go out and get drunk with friends (that I don't have...)...

Meh. I dunno.

My grandparents are going to be here in about 45 minutes, and I can't be bothered. I never have anything to say to them anyway.