The Royal Cup-ple

Today I swapped my morning cup of tea from my usual Wonder Woman mug into something much more extraordinary: 

The Royal Cup-ple. (Well, half of it)

In celebration of today – the day that our great nation's hope for a modern monarchy, Prince William Arthur Phillip Louis of Wales married commoner/'fashion icon' Catherine Elizabeth Middleton – I ate brunch. To be honest I like brunch to mark many occasions, however this one was made extra special: I wore a dress at 9am in my living room, I drank champagne at 10am, and I plated the brunch on only my finest Royal Doulton china. It was remarkably quite a nice and pleasant way to mark the morning’s event. 

However there were a few things I learned along the way: 

1)      Never, shall I again open champagne in the manner that I did. It did not spill everywhere, but was in general a rather unladylike approach to the task. 

Most undignified

2)      There was too much food for two people. 

Royal Brunch

3)      I know more about waving than the newly anointed Duchess of Cambridge.

4)      Apparently I know ‘too much’ about the British Royal Family. 

I think that the first two points are fairly explicable by the photographic evidence, but I think it might be worth me commenting on (3) and (4): 

A friend of mine – well a ‘celebrity’ friend of mine I suppose he now is – Mr. William Hanson is the youngest etiquette expert in Britain and he knows a thing or two about these sorts of protocols. As I write, he is covering the royal wedding for the day with an incredible amount of enthusiasm which one can only expect of a young man who teaches people how to be refined as his day job – so, quite a lot I can only imagine. However, as a prelude to the wedding celebrations William was invited to be the ‘Mystery Guest’ on the BBC3 Television show ‘Russell Howard’s Good News’. For those that have never seen the show the premise of the segment is simple – the host has to guess who the mystery guest (someone from the recent news) is. And because William’s the youngest of the nations experts there had been some press about him.*

I somehow don’t think that I can do the clip of William much justice as it was about the etiquette of waving and that’s a rather physical thing, but the point was that when asked to wave - he host was a bit too vigorous, or ‘ferocious’ to use William’s words. After showing the audience a more polished wave, I’d learned my lesson and I had royal waving down! However it would seem that one such royal-to-be had either not quite gotten that lesson on the day or had just not showed up entirely. I realised right away that she was doing it too ferociously and jokingly mocked her for it for all of five minutes.

 As to point (4) This fact was brought to my attention by my friend Georgia during a several hour stint in front of the television this morning, waiting to see what would happen during today’s most anticipated event. I learned that not everyone has the same depth of knowledge about the Queen and her extended family as was pointed out to me during a moment when I commented on the event. In between pretending to be Kate by declaring 'Pippa, my train!' every five minutes and trying to lip read what dignitaries and the like were saying, this occurred:

Me: ‘Oh look, there’s Lady Louise Windsor’ (The daughter of Prince Edward - she was a bridesmaid fyi)

Georgia: ‘Who?’

This response made me realize that while I believe that Georgia should perhaps have known more, I probably should get my head out of books on the monarchy and go get a life. 

*For those that who are in Britain and would like to watch RHGN, the episode can be found here.

Bloggy Naysaying

I will be the first to admit that the idea of blogging can be construed as a bit of an ego trip for some people. My mother has been doing this for a number of years and from the beginning I thought two things (1) I kind of resent having a mother who knows how to use, and likes using technology and (2) I find her style a bit too personal and revealing for my liking. I think the worst thing is when she's mentioned myself or my siblings in a post it can become a bit 'did you really have to mention me'.* In all I have just bucked up and accepted that she has an active online presence ranging from her Facebook profile to her two (yep, two!) blogs she regularly updates.

However recently a third revelation has become apparent: (3) I have become a hypocrite for laughing at her blogs while writing my own.

While some people write about their innermost thoughts and fears, that is not my style. I find that a bit weird. I think the way in which I have commented on things that have occurred in my life over the last couple of months has been decidedly less 'I feel (insert relevant emotion)' and more 'this is the shit that went down' about the situation at hand. I realise that it is almost impossible to not evoke emotion into a personal piece of writing such as this, but I make an effort to leave my private emotions 'at home'. After all this started as a bit of fun to share some music, some tales of university life, and the odd interesting photograph.

I know that there are people out there that laugh at the mere thought of my doing this.  I have narrowed them down to a two types: 

(1) Those that read my blog once and laughed and just thought it was stupid, and (2) Those that read every post (or most of them) and laugh, think it's stupid, but continue to read 

I have no problem with either one. I think it's a perfectly reasonable thing to laugh at what someone writes and then decide that it's 'stupid'. I encourage people to have opinions and even if it's not a great one 'stupid' is an opinion. Three months ago I might have even been with the Type 1 group, laughing at the ridiculous stuff that people posted about their lives on the internet like the best of them. Although while I have always drawn the line at verbalizing any nastiness, it is in the nature of the internet for people to hide in their anonymity and say whatever the hell they want to. That is probably one of biggest freedoms the internet gives us, no matter how dangerous it can be sometimes. And so while I know that the Type 1 exists, s/he and I have no issue. At least not until one of them verbalizes it to my face, which I've accepted will probably happen sooner or later.

Now to the Type 2. I just find it amusing. If you find my writing 'stupid' or uncalled for in anyway, why do you still read it? If it's to gather fuel for an eventual attack then I will suggest now that you might need to speak to a therapist now before it gets to that stage, otherwise why don't you put down the mouse for a minute and either embrace the fact that you're secretly enjoying reading it or quietly transform yourself into the near-harmless Type 1 and just stop reading.

The fact is I write about stuff that a lot of my University of Manchester counterparts have knowledge of or are thinking about themselves. In the words of a friend: 'Rosie, you write about the library, that's funny'. 

I hope it is.

I had one small aim when I started writing and that was to not give up and I haven't so far - so that's a minor success. So if you want to piss on that, do so, just keep it to yourself in your heads. I'm not asking you to be opinion-less, just be considerate of others when forming them.

If you're not enjoying what I'm writing, don't read it. It really is as simple as that. 

*So I mentioned her here. I'm not above retaliation. 

6/52

A fan of what has be dubiously dubbed the 'West London folk scene' by a number of journalists, I took a little longer than most - approximately a year and 3 months - to listen to Sigh No More by folky, accordion-playing, delightfully handsome, Mumford and Sons, despite having one of their earlier singles being mailed to me by their PR agency the same month as the album's release (a result of my position in local student radio at the time). I'm not ashamed of the fact I didn't get into the album sooner, and while yes I suppose I now am one of the 'hangers on' to the earlier fans, I don't care. The album is beautifully written and hence deserved it's #2 spot in the UK chart and Mercury Prize nomination. 

There are about four or five tracks which I would potentially post - and might do across the remaining weeks of the year's experiment - however I think the title track is a good start. 

6/52

Mumford & Sons - Sigh No More 

 

"Love it will not betray you, dismay or enslave you, It will set you free"

Happy Egg Day

I hope everyone has a good day whether you partake in an egg hunt or not.

Such is Life

Where I would like to be sitting: 

The park outside my window

Instead I enjoy this view:

Such is Life.

4/52 and 5/52

So, my recent vacation was not just a holiday from my dissertation, but also from everything else it seems. So without further ado: 

Moon River is a song that I can listen to in any form. I've only sat through Breakfast at Tiffany's once in its entirety, but it's a song that has accumulated a lot of listens on my last.fm profile. I think one of my favourite versions is by Barbra Streisand, but for tradition's sake - here is the clip from the film. A clip I find no fault in whatsoever. 

4/52

Audrey Hepburn - Moon River

 

While walking around Boston on my recent vacation there were a couple of songs that would not leave my head and my friend Katie and I decided to sing and remix multiple times.One of these was the theme from the late television series Gilmore Girls. So to do the song justice I've posted a Carole King version (she's adjusted the lyrics somewhat), not any sort of home recording of us butchering a classic.*

5/52

Carole King - Where You Lead

*Although, it really was something special

Dissertation Hiatus

So I recently decided to ditch the books in (well for the most part) and take a quick week off in Boston in the good ole' US of A. I have only ever really had one reason to go to Boston and that has been to see my best friend since the 7th grade. Katie is a junior at Tufts University and this year I decided that I would head back to Massachusetts to see her again. The first time I was in Boston was two years ago, but did not get to see as much as I would have liked. This time around I decided to remedy that. While much of what I did would not constitute an interesting post - namely singing a lot of Elton John in public (Bbbbbennie and the Jets)  and buying dinosaur mood rings and raccoon finger puppets - there were a few days where I ran round the city on my own having some  fun. 

The first of these interesting days was when I was dumped in Harvard Square in the middle of the afternoon. Now, I am the kind of person who can find stuff to do for an afternoon, especially when it's sunny and I'm on one of the oldest university campuses in America. After a very intimidating hour and a half walking around the Harvard Yard I came to two conclusions: (1) I'm really glad I don't go to Harvard and (2) I think that the University of Manchester (a) needs more grass and (b) needs brightly coloured chairs to relax in on said grass. 

As you can see, the second thought was just out of pure jealousy of how happy those students looked. In regards to my being glad about not being at Harvard - I think the amount of pressure that there is on students at Harvard is immense and I think that if I were to actually go to there I would probably break down in front of a tour group at some point. However despite this, I imagine that Harvard is a hard place to say no to. The prestige alone gets to many people, and I like to believe that the sheer amount of Harvard University related merchandise you can buy really persuades a lot of kids.*

After my self tour (I couldn't bring myself to follow the crowd for two reasons: it wasn't free, and I risked looking like a tourist - which granted I was, but I don't like looking like one), I decided to head towards the Charles River. I'd purchased some snacks and a second hand book so thought that I could definitely kill a couple of hours sitting by the river bank. Needless to say when I got there I discovered something even better: the Harvard 'crew' teams were practicing. I put 'crew' in quotes because quite frankly the Englishwoman in me just calls that a rowing team. I watched them for about an hour in the late afternoon light and spent a good deal of time taking photos as I walked from the boathouse down the river.

'Crew' Team

The Harvard boat house

My next solo outing was a couple of days later on a day with decidedly different weather. Now don't get me wrong, I live in England, our weather is nice and rainy most of the time, but this rain annoyed me as it rain-out the ball game we were going to (I adore baseball and was ticked off to say the least). 

Rain, rain, rain. 

However the rain meant that I could spend more time in the Museum of Fine Arts. I think in order to get around to all of it you need about 4 or 5 hours. I however was incredibly distracted by the European and American art. In the American wing I got to see a number of works by artists I have admired for years including Edward Hopper, Scott Prior, and Norman Rockwell. One of the more interesting things was my discovery of what in Boston is a popular painting - 'Boston Common at Twilight' (1885) by Frederick Childe Hassam. 

Overall I found the MFA to be a great museum, kind of like the kid sibling to the Met in New York. Museums are one thing that I find that the American people do very well - the Getty Center in Los Angeles is also amazing.

While the rain hindered our plans to visit Fenway Park to see the Red Sox (or as my mother (a Yankees fan) calls them the 'Red Sux') - Katie and I finally found something I'd been looking for all week. In  1941, Robert McCloskey wrote and illustrated one of my favourite books as a child - Make Way for Ducklings. In 1987, a statue was erected to celebrate the story which has since been declared the official children's book of Massachusetts. I had been looking for these ducks all week after purchasing a nice second hand copy of the book. Luckily by the time we reached the ducks it was the evening, it was raining and there were no small children around which meant that a small photo shoot of the ducks ensued. 

I was the ninth duckling

Definitely not the first and certainly not the last to do this

After all, what's Boston without riding a bronze duck? Nothing, nothing at all.**

*I don't actually believe this. But I was blown away by the amount of crap you could buy.

**Boston is also good if you go on the Freedom Trail tour with a man dressed up in costume, this is also more amusing if you are the only two people on the tour. This was the situation two years ago.

3/52

I managed to completely forget to post this week's musical musing on a Monday, so please accept my apologies with some awesomeness. 

(500) Days of Summer is close to being a desert island film of mine. And even though the song is quite old (1981) with Joseph Gordon-Levitt dancing (swoon much?) it brings Hall & Oates to a new and much younger audience. I started my day this morning by watching this and already feel better for it. 

3/52

Hall & Oates - You Make My Dreams (from (500) Days of Summer) 

I've Found Someone New...

Dear John Rylands University Library, 

I have a found someone new - his name is Samuel Alexander and he also has a computer cluster. He doesn't let silly rules like 'no eating' get in the way of work.* He's quiet and doesn't disrupt my essay writing. He's respectful and organized, he tells me when he's busy and has classes going on. He lets me work in peace John Rylands. More than you ever did. From now on our relationship is strictly about the books as you insist to be the largest university library on campus.

I hope we can still be friends,

Rosie

*After writing it would appear that Sam Alex does have a no eating rule, but it's in tiny letters, not plastered all over the walls - he's polite like that.

It took me 10 minutes to figure out where it says not to eat - this is literally the only signage in the room that has this rule on it.

'Procrastination' is my Middle Name

At this precise moment on what appears to be a rather gray-looking Sunday afternoon - I have two pieces of work I need to be doing: (1) an essay on Irish immigrants in Britain circa. 1850-1945 and (2) my dissertation on the 1956 Hungarian Revolution. I'm 400 words into the first and 5,500 into the second. So far today I have not really done much work on either despite my desk looking like this: 

My desk reeks of work being done, yet I admit that a maximum of two hours of solid work has been done today. I really need to have done five. One of the reasons why I have spent my day on the internet pissing about on Facebook and Wikipedia is that I generally do not work well at home. Music, television, the internet, even cleaning - well...especially cleaning are just a few of the things I get distracted by. I work best in the library, which annoyingly doesn't open until midday on a Sunday - and I ultimately waste the morning away anyway. 

Another reason why I don't work well at home is that I am genuinely intimidated by my desk. It has too many books on it. In my final year I made the effort to have a work-focused and quite minimal bedroom - however that has translated into 'lots of books and files'...literally everywhere! I am an organized person, but it makes me look a tad more obsessive than I actually am (which is borderline perfectionist/obsessive-compulsive). Despite this, my desk, filled with books intimidates the crap out of me and genuinely demotivates me from wanting to work.

These books are just from the library - only a portion of the material that I have for my dissertation. Instead of reading them like I should be I instead decided to make a pile of them on my floor and see if my dissertation material would topple over. I got halfway before realizing that I was wasting time.

I suppose that it's a good thing to know that I waste time - at least I have no one else to blame in the long-run when I'm in the library at 10pm the night before work is due. However, I do know that both of these pieces of work will ultimately be finished and turned in on time, and yet I never seem to know how. I definitely pretend that I'm working about 40% more of the time than I actually am. I think that to an extent if we say we're doing something we're not it might force us in the right direction. I'm hoping just by writing this that I might actually do a few good hours worth or work this evening.

An Open Letter to JRUL

Dear John Rylands University Library, 

I think that it is about time that you and I had a heart-to-heart about our relationship.  

You cause me stress and make me ill. I sit all day from 9am within your walls working hard while I have cold upon cold. I persevere through this though to maintain our slowly deteriorating relationship and so that I can write my dissertation. But you annoy the crap out of me.  You change your opening hours to the extent that I just do not know what is going on anymore: is it 11am or midday on a Sunday? 9 or 9:30am on a Saturday? Make up your mind. Soon I will not be able to afford all these coffees I’ve been buying around the corner I wait an hour for your doors to open. You change the rules whenever you want don’t you? Why can’t I eat on the ground floor like I used to? I don’t want to eat my lunch on Blue 4 with all the studenty ruckus that’s going on. If I want a quick chat with someone – what’s the harm in doing it near the exit? It doesn’t hurt anyone. These changes are slowly picking away at what is left of my patience. You know that students don’t respond well to change. So why?

I know that I have my own flaws. I know that it was my fault for breaking my student card in the self check-out machine (for taking out too many books jokes a friend). I’m not above admitting that once I hid a book on the shelf so that someone else wouldn’t find it. I was a scared first year who felt like she had a lot to prove. But in doing so I did well on that essay – you helped me do that. I admit to snacking while on the computer. But it was just a KitKat, I promise that the crumbs stayed away from the keyboard. I’m not insisting that I’m perfect. I know I’m not. But JRUL, I’ve paid my fines. I sit quietly not disturbing anyone else. I wait in line for the computers. I don’t jam the printer. I use my phone in the appropriate phone designated areas. Come on it’s been three years now! I think I deserve a little respect. 

You seem to take some sort of pleasure out of this don’t you? I will be arriving at the doors  tomorrow at midday to discuss these issues I have brought to light. If you’re open at 11 then you can consider this relationship terminated. Time waster.

Faithfully yours,

Rosie