things i have: anxiety and dirty dishes

(disclaimer: i know the human body is more like 60ish % water. it's a meme so it's funny even though it's not accurate. the whole point is kind of that it's inaccurate. please don't think i'm dumb. oh, look, anxiety!)

i've tried to come back to this blog several times in the past six months.

turns out, every time i'm away from my blog for more than a month, i want to preface everything with an apology.

i automatically start thinking of excuses for why i've been AWOL.

then, i imagine the possible titles of my "oh-look-i'm-finally-returning-to-this-poor-abandoned-blog" post. here, for your pleasure, i list some of the candidates my mind came up with:

A. i'msorryi'msorryi'msorry 

nah, too grovelling; no one likes a groveller. plus, those apostrophes are annoying and break up the rhythm - but i'm not removing them because i'm a grammar pedant. ok, next candidate; 

B. #NewYearSameMe - aka let's see how long it takes me to abandon my blog again 

ugh too long, too defeatist; 

C. well, this is embarrassing. 

oh, wait, i've used that one already. a title that prefaced an entire post about embarrassment. greeeeat!

D. oh, hi! remember me? 

wait, what if they don't? or what if they didn't want to? or what if they've never read this blog before and they're like, "no i never knew you in the first place, idiot", and gaaaaaah this is exhausting, and i can't even remember what i wanted to say in the blog post in the first place, and it's likely that no one will care anyway, making this kind of futile, right? maybe i just won't blog after all.

whew. enough frenzy, right? my brain likes to gang up on me sometimes. anxiety - how charming!

BUT. when i stop and think about it, i can occasionally be reasonable. as in: i am actually not beholden to anyone but myself on this blog. (or in my life, currently. cue me typing this blog post in my PJs at twenty to twelve in the morning... BOOM.) if you're reading this, it's because you wanted to; if you want to walk away now, that should really have no affect on me. I need to write about what I care about or find funny or attractive or silly or annoying; this blog should reflect me. it's my blog. wow, if this is all really obvious to you, i get that it's dumb that this is not all really obvious to me sometimes. i seriously get that. my brain is just occasionally really frustrating. *insert cry-laughing emoji here* what that ultimately means is, i get to post about what i want to post about, when i want to post about it, and if i don't want to post about anything for a really long time, i needn't feel bad about it. turns out, for the past few weeks i've been writing essays on Instagram, and i was just about to write another essay on Facebook when i decided to rather turn it into a blog post.

so. i remember what i wanted to blog about today! (a small victory - cheers from the crowd ensue.) it helps that it's about anxiety, but it's also about my dislike of cleaning things, and my need for distraction when i have to clean things.

you see, i really hate doing dishes. or making my bed. or sweeping. cleaning in general is not something i look forward to. (does anyone?) however, it still has to get done and living alone means it has to get done by ME! (also, if i were to ever in this lifetime theoretically live with someone else, i wouldn't expect them to do all of the cleaning, because i am not mean. i think.)

what this calls for is some level of diversion or amusement to take my mind off the horrible activity in which i'm obligated to take part. some people like to watch series; i can't do this because i am obsessive and like to watch every detail playing out on screen, not just listen to the dialogue. what if i miss important visual cues??! it happens! i'd love to be able to read a book but HAAAA, that's not gonna happen with soapy hands, sadly. audiobooks, then, would be a great option, but they cost money most of the time. music is fun and was generally my go-to all of last year and the year before, but sometimes i won't want to listen to several of the songs on the playlist and it's frustrating to have to stop everything and dry my hands off to skip tracks till i'm reasonably entertained again. my solution to this was to listen to the artists i generally never have to skip through and of which i have a fairly wide collection. my main two artists to clean my flat to were (you're going to laugh) Taylor Swift and John Mayer.

last year, though, i delved into the world of podcasts for the first time ever and started really enjoying listening to Ira Glass's This American Life episodes. i would listen to these podcasts while working on my computer at the department, really getting involved in the multiple stories and the varied perspectives they provided while still getting a solid chunk of design work done. i wouldn't have to stop what i was doing to skip a track i didn't like; i wouldn't get distracted by the flashy music videos on YouTube (happens every time) or stop working to sing along to a ballad and have to reorient myself to what i was working on before the distraction.

i've translated this diversionary tactic over to cleaning since i've been back in my bachelor flat this year, and so far (read: the two times i've listened to a podcast while doing dishes) it's been a huuuuge success. imagine looking forward to washing plates and bowls and cutlery! on Thursday i listened to Episode 225: Home Movies, and this morning i listened to Episode 545: If You Don't Have Anything Nice to Say, SAY IT IN ALL CAPS. in the car on the way back to Grahamstown, i also listened to Episode 575: Poetry of Propaganda which was SO GREAT. these are from no specific year - Home Movies was produced in 2002 (!), ALL CAPS first aired a year ago and Poetry of Propaganda is one of the podcasts released in December - and yet they're all on par in terms of quality, interestingness, relatability. they all offer vignettes into people's lives - sometimes quirky, sometimes heart-breaking, sometimes laugh-out-loud funny, but always listen-worthy and very often relatable to my own life in some way.

for instance, let's look at the ALL CAPS episode from this morning. first of all, here's the synopsis of the show:

"It’s safe to say whatever you want on the Internet; nobody will know it’s you. But that same anonymity makes it possible for people to say all the awful things that make the Internet such an annoying and sometimes frightening place. This week: what happens when the Internet turns on you?"

the show itself is then made up of several stories (or "acts", as the podcast defines them) dealing with the topic from a variety of angles. this particular episode was made up of four acts, and the one that captured me the most was the final act, called "Mailer Demon". here's its description:

"This story, produced by the podcast Reply All (website, iTunes), asks the question — can internet bile ever be helpful? PJ Vogt interviews Paul Ford, a man who programmed a website to deal with his anxiety. The website sends him abusive comments all day long."


guuuuuys. the idea here is amazing. i looked up AnxietyBox - the website Paul programmed - once the episode was over (which coincided beautifully with the completion of my dishes washing mission!) and you have to see it for yourself to fully appreciate its beauty. if you go to the website (i mean, go, i'm encouraging you - it's hilarious) you'll see that it's not currently operational, but this is what the old homepage looked like:

I APPRECIATE IT SO MUCH. here are some examples of the anxious thoughts you could get sent:

• People are only tired of you because you are so deficient and predictable.
• Compared with everyone else you grew up with you definitely turned out irredeemable.
• It's unfair that so many people say you're boring.
• You might as well forgive yourself for being so incredibly unoriginal and fake.
• All of your friends were trying to describe you and what came up was: a fraud and third-rate.
• When you aren't around your friends say you are incapable.
• You are too hard on yourself. I can think of worse ways to be than badly prepared and perpetually scared.

and here's an excerpt from the show's transcript explaining it all - the process of AnxietyBot - really beautifully:

Paul Ford

So let's imagine that I'm standing on the train. I'm about to go down into the train platform. And I look at my phone, and I have an email. And it's from my anxiety.

I mean, here's an email from June 2 in the afternoon. Now here's the subject - 'History will forget you because history forgets people who are unable to finish anything'. "Dear Paul, so you're probably used to being at the front of the class, and this is a wake-up call that you're not even in the middle. Inform me, are you ready? Sincerely, Your Anxiety."

PJ Vogt

Remember, Paul set it up so that he'd get these messages on average 12 times a day. 12 times a day, his phone would ping, and there'd be a new attack waiting. While he was eating breakfast, ping.

AnxietyBot The simple reason you're not happy is that you're unworthy of saving.

PJ Vogt

When he was at work, ping.

AnxietyBot I respect that you just live your life and don't care if people think you are childish and disgusting.

PJ Vogt

While he was watching his kids, ping.

AnxietyBot  Your mom and dad would never say anything, but they so want to know why you would choose to be unlovable and not smart.

PJ Vogt

When he was getting ready for bed, ping.

AnxietyBot People on Facebook look at your picture and think, in possession of a weird nose.

PJ Vogt

And you made this to make yourself feel less anxious and better?

Paul Ford

Well, that's the thing. So the thing I'm trying to do here is externalize the anxiety and actually simulate it.

PJ Vogt

So what do you mean?

Paul Ford

Well, anxiety, it turns out, like building this little emulator, this anxiety simulator, made me go, oh, this part of me is incredibly stupid. It says the same things over and over again. And it really is like that is what my anxiety looks like. It's not smart. At some level, it's like a little robot that just screams. What this let me do is look at the robot.

PJ Vogt

Seeing the voice in his head, seeing its opinion of him actually written out, it seemed crazy that he'd ever believe that what it was saying about him was true.

Paul Ford

It was immediately effective. And seeing it actually externalized as 20 messages in a Gmail inbox, it was so much like what my brain was producing. Seeing it was really funny. It turns your entire emotional freak-out into this relentless form of comedy.

PJ Vogt

Right.

Paul Ford

Yeah, it turns out that you're not as important as you think you are, nowhere near as terrible as you think you are, and actually fairly ridiculous. It's just so ridiculous to scream at yourself all day long, and yet there it was. There was the evidence of it. And so it was like, oh my god, I've been wasting a lot of time with this little son of a b*tch.

PJ Vogt

I feel like something about having it in an email lets you fight back against it.

Paul Ford

You can actually reply, right? I would reply and be like, go f*** yourself, over and over again. So the ability to actually yell back at something, which I think is something that we usually associate with being terrible on the internet, in this case, it's wonderful, because you can yell at the robot and tell it to shut the f*** up.

there are not words for how excellent i find all of this. because i'm on a hand-lettering kick and i found this story so hilarious and awesome, i lettered one of my favourite insults generated by the AnxietyBot (with some cute gummy bears thrown in for good measure):

i filled in the info form on the AnxietyBox website in order to get put on the waiting list for when AnxietyBox 2.0 is launched, and added a message to Paul in the relevant field, telling him how brilliant i thought his idea was and mentioning that my MA degree - the topic of which revolves around depression and anxiety and searching for ways to better communicate about and tackle these issues - is ironically the main cause of my anxiety at the moment. i really look forward to the day when i can get emails from "my anxiety" telling me how useless it thinks i am - and then being able to physically delete that spam/crap/nonsense. Until that happens, best believe every time an anxious thought pops into my head i'm going to picture it as an email that i can laugh at, delete and move on from, each time telling myself:

oh, this part of me is incredibly stupid; 

it says the same things over and over again.

plus, now i have a fun way to pass the time while i wash my dishes. it's a win-win, really. thanks, This American Life!

my fifteen favourite: feelings

one of the craziest things i find about being a person is how much you tend to FEEL things. that might sound dumb to you, and just reading back that sentence it sounds a little dumb to me, but our propensity for having strong opinions, reactions to and emotions about the things that go on around us is a pretty crazy notion when you really start to think about it. don't get me wrong: this is not a 100% awesome thing. oftentimes we let our emotions cloud our judgment, or stubbornly refuse to let anyone who doesn't hold the same opinions as us have the time of day. feelings also sometimes make you feel (ha, no kidding), well, kinda crappy. on the flip side, though, feelings can be just amazing. The tremendous Hank Green (one half of vlogbrothers awesomeness) tackled this idea last month in one of his vlogs. His video description summed up his thought process so brilliantly that i thought i'd share it here:

When we're confronted with negative experiences, we want to analyze them and think about them and remember them for future use. But with positive emotions, we often just feel them and enjoy them, which is wonderful, but also leads to us putting less weight on them and it seems like they take up less space in our minds. No one feels comfortable shouting at the world about how great their day was, or what a cool person they met. Recognizing and harping on the positive experiences we have is a great way, I think, to both have a better outlook on life, and have more positive experiences. So that's what I did in [this] video.

he's awesome, huh? some other cool vloggers have since picked up the baton and listed their 15 favourite feelings, and i caught wind of the idea through my brilliant friend Bronwyn's blog post the other day. since reading her post, i've been compiling my personal list in multiple places (first my brain, and then scribbling on a notepad so i wouldn't forget things) and now i've finally gotten around to typing it up here. so grab the popcorn, strap yourselves down, prepare yourselves in whatever way necessary for the discovery of HANNAH'S FIFTEEN FAVOURITE FEELINGS. (i have accompanied them with my favourite illustrations from LastLemon's 'Happiness Is' series, which is the best thing in the entire world. check some of their illustrations out here.)

1. hot-mug-in-my-hands feeling

yay, i get to experience this feeling right now! it's around 8 degrees Celsius today and my supervisor/boss just made me a mug of coffee. i love wrapping my cold hands around a nice warm mug of something and feeling them heat up. i drink hot beverages pretty quickly (case in point: my mug of coffee is already finished) but even after i've consumed all the coffee/tea/hot chocolate, i'll try to soak up as much of the residual heat still left on the mug as possible.


2. oh-goodness-the-airplane-is-flying feeling

there are two components to this feeling. the first is the literal feeling you get as you're sitting in an airplane and it's rolling down the runway and suddenly it lifts off the ground. that first second of airborne-ness, the feeling that your stomach is a couple metres below you, the crazy almost-weightlessness - i love that so much. the second component of this feeling is the excitement that usually accompanies the literal take-off because you're going somewhere. it's so very lovely.

3. woah-you-get-me feeling

sometimes it's hard for me to communicate my feelings (hahaha clearly not in this post) or make someone see something from my perspective, and that can be super frustrating. i often prepare myself to be misunderstood and have to explain my position further. other times, though, i'm having a conversation with a person and one of us will say something and the other will say YES YES YES and it's like fireworks in my brain exploding the words "I AM NOT THE ONLY ONE WHO FEELS THIS WAY WHAAAAT" into the night sky of my universe. (shoooo that metaphor.) this also happens to me with literature and poetry all the time, which is mainly why i love it so much. there's little better than reading a book and reaching a paragraph that resonates so deeply with you that you feel like jumping up and down and punching the air triumphantly. even Ms Dickinson got it....

I'm nobody! Who are you?

Are you nobody, too?

Then there's a pair of us — don't tell!

They'd banish us, you know.

How dreary to be somebody!

How public, like a frog

To tell your name the livelong day

To an admiring bog! 

- Emily Dickinson

4. workout-and-a-hot-shower, let-me-now-take-on-the-world feeling

i am not a morning person, and yet almost every day i drag myself out of bed at 5:45 to go torture myself physically for an hour. (i also am prone to hyperbole; i wonder if you've noticed?) i originally started doing this because it was the only real time during the day that i could commit to getting my exercise in, but now that it's a part of my routine i find that it's just about the best way to get my sleepy body out of bed and started with my day. i absolutely love giving the workout my all, taking a freakin' blazing-hot shower and thinking, "if i could get through that workout i can sure as heck tackle anything today has to throw at me".

5. pillows feeling

...buuut also i love sleep. and i love comfy sleep. and comfy sleep for me means all of the world's pillows on my bed, around me and under my head and back and and and... yeah, i'm kind of pillow-obsessed. my ideal pillow situation is now at least two poofy pillows under my head and at least one poofy pillow between my mattress and my upper body, and when i achieve this equation it's the greatest feeling to just lie there and feel comfy and cocooned.

6. reunion feelings

i'm in a situation now where so many of the people i love are all around the country and the world. while this sucks while i can't be with them, it means there are constantly opportunities for reunions with my friends and family whenever i go somewhere. i absolutely adore seeing people i love after a long time apart and just being able to catch up and feel like no time at all has passed.

7. my-cats-love-me feelings

of course, living away from home means being away from my furries, too. every time i get back to my small town and we pull up outside our house, i love seeing Roo trot up to the gate expectantly; i love jumping out of the car and having Gimli come up to me for scratches. the best is when i'm watching something with Mom and Gimli or Roo decides my lap is The Chosen One for the evening, or in the middle of the night when Roo jumps up onto my bed and meows to be let under the covers and snuggle with me. like Hank says in the video above, it's awesome when the cat chooses you. it makes you feel special ;)

8. hair feelings

okay, i have a lot of feelings about hair. hair is the best thing. i have narrowed it down to four main feelings that i go crazy over (ja, really, there are more - i'm not joking about this love of hair business). first, and tops, is the feeling of the wind in short short hair. if you've ever shaved your head, you'll probably know what i'm talking about. since i've always had long hair, when i shaved my hair off a few years ago i wasn't prepared for the amazing feeling of your scalp tingling when the wind blows, even ever-so-gently. it's giving me goosebumps just writing about it. since i can't get that feeling these days, i resort to the other three favourite hair feelings: the someone-playing-with-or-plaiting-my-hair feeling, the fuzzy-ends-after-a-haircut feeling and the oh-yeah-my-hair-is-clean-and-smells-fantastic feeling. hair is the best.

9. breakthrough-moment feeling

there comes a time when you have been puzzling over something for a long while and trying and trying to get something right or think of a solution or a creative approach to a problem, and suddenly it hits you, like you've been struck by a (very lovely, not dangerous to your health) bolt of lightning. the AHA! moment. i live for that feeling.

10. exhausted, i-worked-hard feeling



okay, this is the one feeling that i couldn't really find an accurate accompaniment for, but these two combined kinda make it work ;) when you've been working on something for a forever-long time and you've poured your heart and soul and energy and life into it, seeing it come to life and feeling that good type of exhaustion, where you know you've earned success and done a great job, that is a joyous feeling to experience.

11. this-music/book-is-brand-new-and-awesome-and-giving-me-goosebumps feeling


aaaaah. finally getting to settle down with a book that you've been anticipating for months, or with some newly-released music that you've just been burning to get your ears on, and not being disappointed - that, my friends, is the life :D

12. my-food-approaches feeling

the image describes this perfectly, but i still want to talk about it because FOOD. so i will just say... FOOD FOOD FOOD FOOD FOOD FOOD HAPPY BELLY FOOD FOOD YUMMY FOOD GOOD FOOD FOOD FOOD FOOD.

13. trying-on-clothes-and-NAILING-IT feeling

sometimes you go clothes-shopping and nothing is fitting and you feel really stupid in everything you try on and it can be pretty frustrating... and sometimes you pick something off of the rack, walk into the  change room, put it on and feel elated because OBVIOUSLY this piece of material that has been crafted into a garment was made specifically and only for you, and it fits you like a glove, and you feel magical, as though you are from Harry Potter. it is a goooood good feeling, seriously.

14. boyfriend feelings

like hair, i struggled to narrow these feelings down to a single one, so i have grouped them together into the feelings i have thanks to my guy, Chris. (i love him more than my hair, though.) the first one is that "oh-hi-you" feeling, when i look over at him and i get crazy shivers and remember the first time i remember seeing him and loving the fact that i love him and he loves me so much. (eeeeuw.) the second is the cuddle/tickle feeling, when i fit perfectly in his arms and then he decides it is right and good to tickle me because he knows i will lose my head completely. connected to that is the next-level-safety feeling. what i mean by that is that i am able to be totally vulnerable around him and i have found such a safe place with him, and it is such a wondrous feeling. i also get proud feelings on the regular, because Chris is smart and strong, connected and reliable and funny, and an all-round winner at life. (for instance *brag brag* he was just very recently awarded a scholarship of a sizeable amount to go to a philosophy conference in the USA... i know.)

15. soft kisses

alright, this is also technically a 'boyfriend feeling' but i separated it from its kind because it is hands-down the best feeling ever and deserved its own place of honour. tender, vulnerable kisses with Chris say so much and they give me goosies and make me the absolute happiest person on earth, and so they get the final and top feeling on my list.

OK I'M DONE BEING GROSS NOW... those were all of my favourite feelings ever :)

ALSOTHESEOKBYE:

currently: February edition

hi, friends!

sorry for my absence - life in Grahamstown has been surprisingly busy, which has seen me only posting my "currently" for February near the middle of the month. OH THE HORROR!

without further ado, then, let me introduce you to my monthly list of stuff i'm up to, for you to peruse and judge ;)

READING: mental health books
the Master's course which i've just begun is practice-based, which means that instead of it being completely theoretical, it involves a major component of production - in my case, design work - which intersects in some way with an area that i'd like to research and from which i write an exegesis on my findings. i'm set on working on projects which intersect with the issue of mental health, which has necessitated a TON of reading! (something i've only just started doing... eep.) it's something about which i'm really passionate and i feel quite strongly that it's a necessary piece of research, but it's SO HEAVY... so if you have some light reading that you can recommend, please do so!

LISTENING TO: Sara Bareilles (this)
also: Mat Kearney's new album Just Kids (this)
also: Angus & Julia Stone (this)
also: Lennon & Maisy Stella (this)
also: Edward Sharpe & the Magnetic Zeros (this)

WATCHING: Downton Abbey
i'm on season 5 now... and it is THE BEST SHOW. Dame Maggie Smith is the absolute bomb. also, everything is so scandalous! the most scandalous thing happening in my life right now is my stubborn refusal to clean my flat.

ANTICIPATING: Design Indaba
OHMYGOSH. okay, there is a LOT that i'm looking forward to right now. if you'd asked me a week ago, i'd have said the thing i was anticipating the most was my bursary money; thankfully that came through yesterday and i can eat again! now, top of the agenda is the Design Indaba, which starts in Cape Town two weeks from today (!!!!!) - i am so. excited. i get to go to Cape Town with some super awesome people, including two of the guuuurls who have made the past few weeks so great - Carissa and Amy :D plus, i'll get to see Hayley, and hopefully Lucy and Josh! also: CAPE TOWN. ahhh. so much awesomeness happening.

ENJOYING: Adobe and my office!
my reunion with the Adobe Creative Suite has been nothing short of magical. i'm also super thrilled with my new office and the amazing Mia, with whom i share office space. i decorated the wall the other day and it feels so Hannah-ish... brilliant!
something i forgot about when i made my currently list (in Adobe Illustrator... obviously) was how much i'm LOVING my new glasses! they have made me vain. see below.



MISSING: ALL the people
it's weird being in Grahamstown without Chris. it's weird being in the department without Bronwyn, Lucy, Kiera, Madien and Co. i don't like it. come back to me, people :(

CRAVING: fruuuuuit
it helps that the fruit section is right at the entrance to Pick n Pay, because that was my first port of call this afternoon when i finally did a proper grocery shop. (ask Carissa, she bore witness to my fruit craziness.) i'm currently munching on grapes, and i bought some plums and a mango, too! (i also wanted some bananas and watermelon... alas alack, while they had bananas aplenty and watermelon quarters for only R12.99 yesterday, neither such fruits were anywhere to be found today :( i am sad.)

CONSUMING: Darsha's food
at the end of last year, Darsha gave me close to the entire non-perishable contents of her kitchen, and i have been living off of this food (rice, and dhal, and chili bites) for the past few days while i waited for my money to come through. i even attempted to eat mung beans... but i don't know how vegetarians eat them on the reg, because they are basically disgusting. *shudders*

WEARING: whatever's clean
ah, the student life! i have min (read: VERY, VERY LITTLE) electricity, and i'm also a lazy donkey. naturally, that means i don't want to wash my clothing. luckily, i have stacks of t-shirts and shorts and dresses... unfortunately, my washing pile keeps growing and growing. if for any reason, then, you don't know where to find me, chances are i've fallen into my pile of dirty laundry and disappeared altogether.

so! that is my life at present. what are y'all up to? :)

currently - January edition

hi and welcome to my first "currently" post here at Save Me From My Selfie :D (side note: i've been trying to think of an acronym for my blog title - if anyone has any ideas, drop me a line, would ya? so far i have SMFMS, which i pronounce "simmmfimmms". super catchy. i'm definitely going places.)

i've always loved "currently" posts on blogs that i've read over the years - they're a fun way to find out what other people around the world are doing with their time and are generally not a very strenuous, heavy, social-commentary-esque thing to read, which is occasionally necessary. they're essentially fluffy, and that's not always a bad thing. i decided i'd start doing "currently" posts on this here blog for a few reasons, the main ones being they're a "staple" blog post and should thus force me to blog at least once a month (cue laughter to the point of tears). they're also a great way to look back on the months that have passed - a quick snippet of what you were doing a few months before - like a journal, only faster. (she explains at length in a long-winded paragraph)

so, without further ado, here's my "currently" for the start of this month, with some brief (hahaha) explanations of each thing beneath the photo:

READING: The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro

i love Kazuo Ishiguro's novels; Never Let Me Go is one of my favourite books of all time, and i subsequently read When We Were Orphans, which was another really incredible read. i bought a copy of The Remains of the Day last year but haven't had a chance to get to it until now, so my aim is to use the last few weeks of my freedom to give it my attention. it's slow to get into but i think i'm starting to reach the meat of the story and i'm enjoying it quite a bit :) (i have a STACK of novels i meant to get through, so you might hear about a few more of them this month. here's hoping!)

LISTENING TO: Ben Howard's "I Forget Where We Were" and Taylor Swift's "1989"

it's not really accurate to say that i'm listening to "I Forget Where We Were" in its entirety, since i haven't bought it yet, but what i HAVE heard from it is brilliant - i could listen to "The End of the Affair" over and over and over again. as for "1989", not a day goes by without me listening to at least one song off of the thing. it was one of my Christmas presents (inadvertently, after my mom got me an iTunes voucher) and, um, i'm obsessed. for some reference, it's playing now. (sorry, family!) soon, all of my conversation, consolation and advice will come from this album. you know, "shake it off!" and "baby, i could build a castle out of all the bricks they threw at me", and "when i was drowning - that's when i could finally breathe" and similarly nonsensical statements.

Swifty forever. also, after listening to this album multiple times (over 100, i'd guess), i reckon Harry Styles is a terrible driver and i would recommend you never get in a car with him. personal opinion. moving on.

WATCHING: Chuck (season 4), House of Cards (Season 1) and Black Books (Season 2)
i've missed Chuck so much! after watching the first three seasons as a family, we bought the fourth one and watched most of it a couple years ago - but we didn't manage to finish the season before i had to go back to varsity, and I NEVER CAUGHT UP. i finally pulled out the DVD box and am forcing everyone else in my family to watch episodes over so that i'm all caught up (sorry, family!) before we watch the fifth (!) and final (!) season.
i also have the first season of House of Cards (yes, i'm aware that i'm WAAAAY behind) and it's intriguing and very addictive.
to counterbalance all that hectic thinking and conniving, i'm watching Black Books which is, you know, Dylan Moran at his finest. he even provided me with the finest piece of summer poetry i may have ever heard:
"Think of a bee.
You are its knees.
You waft through me like a summer breeze.
Can I come round on Tuesday please?"
done.

ANTICIPATING: my trip to Johannesburg in a week (!) and graduation
yeah, in a week i'll be with Chris, in Johannesburg, and it will be GREAT. i am kind of excited :D
in other news, all my graduation info came in the post yesterday and it's all VERY exciting. i booked double the number of seats than i'm technically allowed, but i don't care. yaaaay!

ENJOYING: the sun, fruit, goals and Bananagrams

summer is the BEST. we are quite literally lying around in pools of our own sweat but i love it! it also means that there is a delightful range of delicious fruit on offer, and we've been eating ALL of it. grapes! plums! nectarines! mangos! spanspek! honeydew! watermelon! 

i'm also quite enjoying having goals and getting stuff done. doodling every day is so much fun! other things like exercise are less exciting, but quite gratifying ;)
finally: Bananagrams. best. game. ever. Mom, Sindi and i have been binge-playing. so fun.

MISSING: Chris, Andrea and Kymmie

these are pretty self-explanatory, but i miss Chris because i've gotten used to seeing his face all the time and we've been apart for over a month now, which has been below average. way below average. this week needs to pass by quickly, please!

i'm missing ALL of my American family desperately, but i am particularly missing my cousin Andrea and my aunt Kymmie. ANDREA: because, um, she is beautiful (i'm not superficial, i promise!) and this time last year we were having sleep overs at her house and dressing up in 80s get-up and driving around Sacramento singing along to Justin Timberlake and talking about the book collections we'd have on a desert island and eating ice cream and watching movies and running errands and babysitting and it was just fantastic. thus we can deduce that now, because we are NOT doing said things, it is just NOT fantastic. i'm really so smart. KYMMIE: since i've been doing artistic stuff, i've been especially missing this gorgeous and creative individual. oh, to be crafting and cooking and singing and dancing at her home! oh, to be hugging her! sigh.

CRAVING: a giant, blank notebook and my Adobe designing programmes

all of this doodling has me scrambling for places to PUT it. i have these tiny Moleskines with me in which i've been compiling most of my scribbles, but i stupidly went and left my LARGE Moleskines in Grahamstown... hence the illustrations for this post being done on the back of my (green) Graduation Information booklet. 

i'm also desperate to get back into Illustrator, InDesign and Photoshop and get digitally designing again, but a month is not long to wait! who knows - maybe the February "currently" will be digital ;)

CONSUMING: copious amounts of black coffee and double cream yoghurt

...because these are the best things to consume. end of story.

WEARING: summer dresses

another reason to love the heat: i can wear all of my summer dresses! :D wanna see the dress i'm wearing today? (YES. YES, YOU DO.) selfie time! i will give you two versions; ready?

THE DREAM VERSION

oh, lovely! so summery and flowery and flattering.

THE REALITY VERSION

i bought this at a thrift store in California this time last year. it is (clearly) three times too big for me. on the plus side, it breathes really well...

;)

what are y'all currently up to? :D