Sunday, June 28, 2009

RADA

I've been searching for my true identity for my entire adolescence, but I now realise that it's been here all along. My dream is my identity.

I remember watching Blue Peter when I was about 11 (which was strange because I hardly ever watched it) and seeing one of the presenters visit RADA, the most prestigious and reputable drama school in the country. It seemed simply amazing - a highly exclusive group of promising young actors given the best acting advice anyone could receive. From that moment I had the recurrent vision of myself in that university training for the BA in acting, living out my dream.

I've never given up on that dream. No matter how convential it sounds, I've always wanted to be an actress and drama has been my only solace at times. A bad day, bad week or even a bad year can be remedied by stepping out of your own shoes and into those of another person's - anyone,
anywhere. I can be anything, do anything, in front of an audience that are all watching me, and at the end I might get a fraction of the applause.

Two years from now I'll be applying for universities and I'm quite positive that RADA will be at the top of my list of choices. Maybe it's not a realistic choice, and admittedly dreams of being an actress could be just that - dreams, but it's good to aim high. Consider this: in the conception of a baby, no one considers how slim the chances of the egg being fertilised by the sperm are. Whether someone wants a baby or not, they always think about the prospect of conceptionnd new life. So why should I focus on not getting in to RADA when I may very well have the potential?

Avenue Q is on the radio :D

Avenue Q is my favourite musical ever (and I do love a lot of musicals) and it's on the radio right now! It's also the funniest musical I've ever seen, and having watched it 4 times I still plan to see it at least another two times in London. Have a look :) http://www.avenueqthemusical.co.uk/

Hence, I'm listening to the radio (which is a rare occurrence for me). Julie Atherton and Daniel Boys, both stars of the musical, are being interviewed and are each singing a song from the show at the moment. It's the first time I've heard Julie Atherton speaking out of character and it's quite strange as I didn't imagine her sounding like she does at all. I would call her accent quite a Yorkshire one, but the tone of her voice is very similar to that of Kate Monster's (one of the characters that she plays in the musical).

In other news, I have a follower! That's Hershi, so now we have a follower each. It means quite a lot that she reads my blog, and I have the honour of being the first follower of her blog too! It's working out well.

Saturday, June 27, 2009

The Wolff Family

Warning - if you don't play the Sims 3 or have no interest in it, this blog post may not be very entertaining. For those of you that do and/or are, read on...

The Wolff family are a pre-made family on the Sims 3, living in a large, modern and beautifully decorated house with 25000 Simoleons as funds. The family consists of Morgana Wolff - an workaholic, family-orientated, artistic, good and charismatic young adult Sim working in the Medicine career - who's married to Thornton Wolff - an ambitious, perfectionist, frugal Sim who dislikes children, has commitment issues and works in the Business career. Both are young adults and have rather contrasting desires in life; Morgana loves children, Thornton doesn't. So, guess the first thing I did in this game?

Yes, I took Morgana's side and forced pro-creation on Thornton >:) Days later, they returned from the hospital with a daughter, Claryssa. Daughter Cleo and son Clement followed, so they ended up having quite a hectic lifestyle, having to balance demanding careers and even more demanding children. All children aged well throughout the life stages and in general they were quite a perfect family, despite Thornton's mood meter taking a dip whenever he spent time with his beloved children.

Though I don't exactly share this view in real life as of now, I love my Sims having children in the Sims 3. Okay, so babies are deadly boring, it takes a long time to teach toddlers everything and growing up is terribly slow, the clothes and hairstyles for children are vomit-worthy and I find it near-impossible to help a teen balance school and a part-time job, but I find children a very important part of this game. I can honestly admit that I don't remember a family on any Sims game where I haven't thought about them having children, even if I give up before getting to that stage. I love seeing how the generations progress, the features children inherit and how far my family's come since that first flirt that the parents shared.

More so, I adore the Wolff family. I've experimented with many other households, but all feel boring compared to my precious family which is nearing the third generation. I don't think I've ever been this committed to a game, and I must have played over thirty Sim days. A Sim day is 24 minutes, meaning that I've played over 720 minutes of this family. That's at least 12 hours. It doesn't feel nearly that fast during the play of the game, but it's only when I glance over at my clock that I realise how much of my day I've frittered away on the Sims 3. As long as I still have time for revision, homework, coursework, family, socialising, reading, drama, eating, sleeping, excreting, showering, tooth-brushing, music and everything else, that's fine with me :D

Friday, June 26, 2009

Association game

Rules: pick a word to start and write the first word that comes into your mind. Continue in this way. Only nouns allowed.

Angel
Heaven
God
Religion
Christianity
Church
Nun
The Sound of Music
Musicals
Avenue Q
London
Selfridges
MAC Cosmetics
Youtube
Gatherings
Summer
Park
Friends
School
Coursework
GCSE
A Levels
University
Drama
RADA
Actress
Fame
Perez Hilton
Gossip
Secrets
Conflict

Wednesday, June 24, 2009

Hershi :)

A girl I know. A rather fantastic one, actually. The odd thing is that in many ways we're complete opposites.

Okay, we do have some similarities, such as:
  • We both really, REALLY love cats
  • We love photography almost as much as that
  • We're both quite intelligent
  • We both do stupid things from time to time
  • We're both extremely clumsy
  • We both like Little Boots
  • We both love to dance to weird techno dance music
But in many other ways we're incredibly different:
  • Me - extrovert, Hershi - introvert
  • Me - loves change and variety in days, Hershi - hates disruption of routine
  • Me - very good at reading people, Hershi - finds this difficult
  • Me - has basically lived in skinny jeans out of school for the past year, Hershi - doesn't like jeans
  • Me - very private person, Hershi - more willing to talk openly about things
  • Me - loves spiders, Hershi - scared of them
  • Me - likes alternative music (e.g. Regina Spektor), Hershi - likes a lot of heavy metal
  • Me - likes loud atmospheres such as concerts and parties, Hershi - doesn't so much
  • Me - never really in a state of 'hyperness', just happiness, Hershi - gets hyper a lot
  • Me - loves all bright colours, doesn't wear much black at all, Hershi - wears mostly black with bits of red and dark purple

Tuesday, June 23, 2009

Have I made my mark on this world?

Not my carbon foot-print, not in a bad way. I want to leave my part of this planet better than it was when I first arrived. My 6 billionth of the land. Well, a little less than that now. Or maybe a little more. I can't be sure. Ever. That's a bit scary.

I do quite like to now what's happening, how it's happening, who's making it happen and when this happening starts and finishes. I don't necessarily have to be in control; I just have to feel like things are going smoothly. I like surprises, but would find it an incredibly dubious entity to be lead to a place without having any inkling as to what that place could be.

I feel like I'm living up to my potential academically, but I'm wasting possible talents by not partaking in enough extra-curricular activities. In Year 8, aged 12-13, I joined a local drama club and felt so at home there. For the first term we did a production of Pinocchio and I absolutely adored every session.

However, things began to go down hill when for the next two terms we did an extended production on war and kings and some other things from the Middle Ages. It sounds good in theory, but rather than being one drama piece it was snippets from many others, some devised by the group, others scripted. It just didn't gel well at all and I loathed one of the drama teachers' attitudes as he never seemed satisfied - always agitated. And after that anti-climatic production I didn't return to the drama club.

I want to find something similar but on a larger scale. Something where I'm not just always performing to parents and friends - I want to perform to people who aren't biased and come purely because they want to see an actor, not Abby, perform. I want to have to audition and experience the real world of theatre.

More than anything, I want to sing and dance at the same time, too. Well, maybe not all at once, but I'd love to be in musicals. I can't really be sure that my singing is good, but I seem to faire quite well when singing in an accent. And dancing... that could use a bit of work. But I'm a fast learner and seem to have a natural aptitude for ballet as my mother does. I want to learn a lot.

I've realised that I'd also love to learn to play the piano. Regina Spektor has been the main influence in this. I don't think I can do everything, though, so I think it would be to concentrate on either performing arts or the piano. I'll try.

Monday, June 22, 2009

True story

Considering my house is a mere two minutes walk from my school with only two roads to cross, I never really gave two thoughts to the possible dangers lurking on the journey. That is, until now.

As I ambled along, optimistic at what the day had to offer, I reached the crossing road of my walk. Anxiously I pressed the button at the traffic lights, keeping my eye on the intimidating gang of boys also on their way to school. Before I had time to shift away from them the crossing man flashed a vibrant green that meant it was time to stride across the road and escape from the raucous boys. My foot touched the road and I began my second step, hurrying to my destination.

However, this was clearly not going to be a smooth journey as I felt a mysterious object ploughing forcefully into my left thigh at a ridiculously high speed. Before I could even think or let out a squeak of pain I was splattered on the floor, my limbs a flailing mess and my right school shoe strewn into the middle of the road. That was when I felt the cruel taunts of hilarity from those formerly imposing boys. Now I wasn't frightened, just humiliated.

At that point I gaged that I had to drag myself up and somehow transport my aching body to school as I was already close to being late. Heaving my head up in shame, I caught a glimpse of the culprit of this heinous crime. The boy responsible for the accident wore a silver-black jacket, contrasting with his tanned skin and gently waving hair. He hoisted the hazardous bike up and his face shrouded with what I would have loved to be guilt. My teeth ground in frustration as I realised that this emotion was instead rage. I gave him the type of glance a disappointed teacher might give to a misbehaving student in an effort to prompt him to apologise. But rather than this he simply uttered a profanity and stormed off wheeling the bike away with him.

The pain in my left thigh now returned but on a level that could only be described as agonising. The only option was to gather my belongings including my runaway shoe and hobble along to school, desperately trying to conceal my anger.

I spent the next lessons fretting that a nerve had been damaged or that my leg had been torn open barbarically, but thankfully the only presents I received from that unfortunate accident were a few scratches and a mammoth technicolour bruise varying in shade from the initial navy to the more developed regal purple and terminating with a lovely chartreuse. Fortunately, I could still walk perfectly a few days later so it all turned out well in the end.

Saturday, June 20, 2009

Struggling to gather the words



Lots happened today, namely shopping in town for a friend's birthday. It was fun, but it's not what I want to talk about now as I have something deeper that I have to get from my brain to my fingers to text.

Yesterday in school we received our reports with all our grades on. I was pleased with mine as it consisted completely of A and A* grades (A* is the highest grade you can get in GCSE exams). These grades will be passed on to sixth form colleges that I apply to, so I'm confident I'll get in to a good one.

A girl in my class, Kacey, who's not the most academic student and didn't have any A or A* grades on her report, told me that she wished that she could be like me. This really touched me and I felt incredibly flattered. I told her that she could with some hard work and dedication and gave her a big, appreciative smile. I truly belive that given the right help, support, time and motivation she could.

On a side note, I removed the green nail varnish and as yellow is a more dominant colour in this shade of green than blue it's stained my nails a ghastly shade of yellow. I hid my fingers in shame today, fearful that others would accuse me of smoking. Eugh, smoking is one of the most revolting habits around. I even bought some sheer pastel pink nail varnish today just to neutralise the yellow in case the staining stays around for school.

Regina Spektor is probably my favourite singer ever and as of late I've been even more obsessed with her. I think she's going to end up persuading me to learn to play the piano and write my own songs. If you haven't heard her new song 'Laughing With' yet, listen now. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rov3pV9PsRI It's just so beautiful. I'd rarely call a song beautiful, but everything by Regina is.

Friday, June 19, 2009

We must start somewhere...


...And that's here. And that's me a couple of years getting stuck in the mud. Or dancing - you choose. Hi, I'm Abby and I currently have green nails and pink hands, because:

1) I had to paint my nails green on a moving coach on the way to a Young Enterprise final. My friend Nattakan lent the green nail varnish to me because our company is eco-friendly therefore green seems like a logical colour. Young Enterprise aims to provide young would-be entrepreneurs an opportunity to start a business. My team (in which I'm the Human Resources director) had already beaten eight teams in various other competitions, all of which were older than us, but we didn't win this time. Oh well; it's a huge amount of pressure lifted off of us as we would have had to compete in London in the National Finals against the best schools in the country. So the Young Enterprise dream is over. However, we did win the award for best Health and Safety which I'm pleased about as that was one of my responsibilities.

2) I'm probably too hygienic and wash my hands very frequently especially before and during the use of my laptop. My hands are extremely sensitive to liquid soaps and flare up in a bright pink colour, so though I try to use bar soaps whenever possible the horrific pink school soap that smells of smoke and can't even neutralise food odours on hands is still present in my life on a daily base.

Oh... you wanted to know a little more about me, didn't you? I turned 15 nearly a month ago but I've postponed any birthday celebration or opening of most presents. I don't know when I will decide to hold my birthday, but I don't want to have it now because I'm not entirely happy with life at the moment and I'd like to let thing clear a little in my head before I attempt to celebrate a seemingly joyous occasion.

Regarding the nail varnish, fortunately green is my favourite colour so I don't mind it. But I do think it might be a bit too warm-toned for me. Normally I have a neutral skin tone (and always very pale - I don't allow myself to tan and I doubt I would significantly anyway being of typical Irish colouring) however the pink in my hands contrasts with the warmer green colour.

From birth to the age of 4, nearly 5, I lived in Islington, London. It was just me and my parents in a one-bedroom flat. I didn't even have my own bed, but it was amazing. I don't remember that much of my life there, but I recall enough to know that I don't fit in where I live now. My mother had acquired quite a Southern accent from living there for a few years and because she read to me in this accent I picked it up myself. I never lost that voice even though I've lived here for 10 years.

I've always wanted to move back to London but in recent weeks the desire has gotten much stronger and I'm almost beginning to despise where I live. I know it could be so much worse, but when you're the 'posh' girl who loves museums, art galleries, theatre, coffee shops, libraries, fine dining it can be difficult. Of course, I like all the more normal teenage activities too such as parties, shopping and sleepovers. And thankfully I have an amazing group of friends who never fail to amuse me. I love walking through school and just saying 'Hi' to everyone I know. Some people are truly lovely.

Sorry, I'll try and keep these blog posts much shorter. I'm off to play The Sims 3. It's oddly fulfilling.