Happy New Year!

Hey Guys!

Welcome to 2015, I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas and are recovering well from your last night antics. Now every year you see all over social media people talking about "new year new me!" and about their resolutions which induces many eyerolls but personally I don't see it as the detriment people make it out to be. Yes you should constantly strive to improve yourself and yes life doesn't change in the space of a few minutes, but if it puts the motivation back into people I'm all for it!

The previous year without a doubt has been a hard one for me that I'm so happy to see the back of. I've had to come to terms with a lot of things mainly health related, I've had to switch jobs, I had to temporarily abandon my studies because of how ill I'd become and I've learnt a valuable lesson that people may not always be who they first seem. In contrast this year is going to be huge for me and I'm already accepting of the fact it's not going to be easy either, I'm finally starting a new chapter of my life and moving away from the town and people I've grown to love with all my heart. I'll be honest I've not been overly thrilled by this concept and previously have been filled with dread if I dare think about it for too long as I'm such a homebody. But hey, I guess we all have to do it at some point or another.

So much love for this picture - Source LoadingArtist.com

So in true cliche blogger fashion I'm going to make some new years resolutions and then next year I can look over them and see how many I've actually achieved and how many I've forgotten about and will inevitably end up on this list next year!

• Finally fly the nest and move out to university to pursue my passion. If you've been with me for a while you'll be aware that I had to postpone going to university for personal reasons but this year I want to change that and become a fine ass scientist.
  
• Be more open about my health. For the past five years i've been very private about my health issues and in ways embarrassed about it. This year I want to be more open about it with people and accept that if it's something I've go to live with then it's going to make my life so much easier if I just explain to people why I might have to leave early etc. People are more understanding than I give them credit for.
  
• Lose weight. Cliche resolution that needs no explanation, get rid of the christmas podge for good!
  
• Worry less. I'm a super anxious person and I don't deal well with people not liking me and have a tendency to fret over the smallest of details. This year I want to take a step back, let life happen and not get myself in a state about things that won't matter in a few weeks time.
  
• Do things that scare me. From being ill I've managed to convince myself that I can't do things that are perfectly normal and my social life's really taken a hit from it. So this year I'm going to force myself out of my comfort zone and reclaim my life.

That's all I've got for you today guys, what are your new years resolutions are are you against the idea and think goals shouldn't depend on the first day of a new year and roll your eyes at claims that "this year will be better". Either way I hope 2015 is full of wonderful things for every single one of you.

Love & TubTubs

Reading Festival Rant 2014

Hey Guys

So every summer I throw myself into the world of festivals and this year was no different with me attending both Sonisphire and Reading Festival. When it comes to music I tend to gravitate towards the alternative scene however this still ranges over a large spectrum from glam rock to heavy metal so festivals such as Sonisphire, Download and Bloodstock are the obvious choices every summer. However, with me being local to Reading Festival I decided to go with a friend that had a spare ticket and even though the line up wasn't exactly to my taste there were a select few good bands and the idea of partying in a field for three days solid is always an appealing one. Hey what could go wrong right?



Source: http://www.readingfestival.com

 

Oh how wrong I was. Don't get me wrong I will be fair to Reading and say that some of the reasons I didn't enjoy my time there were down to poor decisions on my part and it did have some high points which I will get onto later but first let me get my little rant out of the way. Firstly the staff that were working for Reading Festival were definitely only there for the free entry, never in my life have I met more unhelpful staff who were constantly giving me wrong advice or not knowing answers to things they really should of. Now I'm not sure if this was down to poor briefing on the festivals part, or laziness on the members of staffs part but I picked up very quickly that if you wanted any helpful advice to look for staff members that looked like they really didn't want to be there. Another point I'd like to make is the amount of hiccups that occurred with bands sets over the weekend from the power going out during paramores set to bands having to stop mid-song because their instruments weren't tuned properly. I totally accept that things like this may happen here and there with such a huge event but it happened with 50% of the bands I saw and by Sunday was really starting to grate on me.

Another point that I really want to make is the crowds at Reading, now as I said before I tend to gravitate towards heavier music which means I'm no stranger to rough crowds, mosh pits and many drunk people in a small area. That said the crowds at Reading were nothing like I'd ever experienced before, even with the more mellow bands that I saw there were people starting pits left right and centre which is fine by me. However, these were not standard mosh pits these were people out to try and hurt everyone around them; kicking, punching even biting I saw it all and don't even get me started on the amount of young girls I saw being dragged into these pits that clearly wanted nothing to do with it and were scared shitless. Eventually I decided I'd had enough of being kicked in the head and went to leave the crowd which was a challenge in itself as it appears no one is willing to help you in anyway and you end up having to turn into an asshole yourself and push people out of the way to get yourself out. I guess mosh etiquette is wasted here and I'm just spoilt by the kindness of metal crowds, and they say we're the rough bunch!

A final point I would like to add to round off my Reading rant 2014 is that this assholery didn't end at the crowds and I received regular abuse walking around site, this hit an all time high when I group of guys decided to grab me and harass me on my way back to my tent on my own. I must say out of every music event I've ever been to Reading is definitely where I felt the least safe, and it takes a lot to unnerve me. Now these were the main points that really made the festival a total write off for me, sure there were other things that did annoy me over the weekend but I will credit that to me already not feeling great about things due to the above points and also some poor decisions on my part.

With my rant out the way I'm going to say that although I completely stick to my view that Reading 2014 was the worst festival I've ever attended it did have some high points which I will cover in my next blog post to prevent this turning into an essay. Hell it feels so weird to write a negative review on something but I really needed to vent my frustration about a wasted £200! So I'll talk to you guys very soon with a much happier outlook on things and even a few festival pictures thrown in there for good measure!

Love & TubTubs 

Because Sometimes Life Takes A Detour

Long time no speak eh? Don't worry i'll get the hang of this blogging crap one day...maybe. Anyhow my sudden inspiration to write another post stems from my chain of unfortunate events because to be perfectly honest this week has been crap! My trip to Wales to see my tribe was canceled due to a lovely infection in my toe, my "long term" partner and me broke up and just to top it off I got on the scales the other day and erm cried...Brilliant.

So as you can imagine I've not been in the best of moods as of late, in total honesty I've been in the worst mood, many pints of ice cream have been consumed and far to many hours have been spent in bed bawling my eyes out. But as the saying goes every cloud has a silver lining and this week has been so valuable in the sense of showing me what I still have left, in ways I feel blessed to have people in my life that are so compassionate and willing to take time to help me get my feet back on the ground. Within this I've received some fabulous advice and pick me ups which I want to share on here for me to refer to when I feel like my world is falling apart because lets be honest, I get into that mindset far to often!

"Don't worry about it too much, life does go on, even without our loved ones - Relationships come and go all the time at this point in our lives, it sucks but if you think about it, they weren't the one for you if things do go wrong and one day, you'll meet a person who makes you feel like you're living a lifelong dream."

"You're gonna pull through this even stronger and resilient than before. You're a kind, intelligent and beautiful person and you deserve to be happy. Whether that's with or without someone by your side, you're never alone because you have so many friends and a supportive family by your side."

"The only person you can rely on for your own happiness is you"

So there we have it future Alexi, life goes on, you've been through a lot of crap and whatever you're going through is just another thing to add to the list of things you've overcome in your life.

Now I'm off to go and write another post on the wonderful events that occurred before this week of dismay occored to cheer myself and this blog right up!

Love & TubTubs

Alexi 

"I had these memories all around me, so I wouldn't feel alone

Some may be from showing up, others are from growing up

Sometimes I was so messed up and didn't have a clue"

- Rose Tattoo

21/05/14 - Sam's 18th & Chemistry Coffee

Hey Guys!

Had a sudden bout of inspiration to pick up the iPad and start blogging again courtesy of my lovely Norwegian friend Kine (I seem to be picking up a regular stream of Norwegians now days, lovely bunch, maybe I can build up a fleet!). So the last month of my life has been mostly dedicated to revising my butt off for my final A-level exams however, (plot twist) I've decided to stay put in my home town for the extra year which means next year I'll have the joys of sitting these exams all over again just hopefully with less stress and reduced weight gain. I have many reasons to stay put for the extra year one of the main ones being a string of poor decisions in the previous past two years has meant the stress of moving to uni may cause permanent damage to my sanity, but I can't help but feel that topic should be a whole blog post in itself so I digress!

BBQ extraordinaries right here!

Because this seemed like a good idea at the time!

The birthday boy (pre-chunder)

The best people ever!

Aside from having my head stuck in a textbook and drinking unhealthy amounts of red bull I have actually had a few decent nights out the latest of which being the 18th birthday celebrations of one of my oldest friends Sam. We had a simple BBQ in his back garden followed by a night I don't overly remember down the pub but honestly it was a much needed night full of old friends I'd not had the chance to catch up with since starting my A-Levels. Highlights of the evening included Issac setting the BBQ on fire and Fluffy having the fabulous idea to put it out with a cider causing a mild explosion, Sam vomiting all over the pub carpet in true 18th style & spending £35 on shots that no body really liked haha. I do remember also rounding off the evening with a nice open mic session of "Fast Car" which is a beautiful song that made me very emotional (that said I am one of those drunks...Owp).

As you can imagine the next morning was hell and not made any more comfortable by having four hours of chemistry. As luck would have it though my chemistry teacher sensed my livers distress and got me coffee, best teacher award over here! So although short but sweet I'm going to depart from this post seeing as if my teacher's nice enough to fetch me coffee the least I can do is actually pass one of his exams so I'm off to drink more red bull and cry over thermodynamics. See you soon!

Love & TubTubs

Alexi

♫"And I, I had a feeling like I belong. And I, I had a feeling I can be someone" ♫

2013 Round Up!

Hey guys! So I've mentioned it a million times before but sometimes I like to use my blog as a diary to help me keep track of what I'm doing with my life. So today I'm going to share a roundup of my life in 2013 with you lovely lot. It's been a really big year to me and I've been through a lot of highs and lows, but I've come out the other side okay and I'm super excited to see what the new year has to offer! So without further ado lets get started, apologies in advance as I can tell this is going to be super long!

January
January was a blank slate for me and I really do think I made the most out of it, I started my weight loss journey very successfully and this is also when I decided to step out of my comfort zone and start talking to new people. This was the start of many wonderful friendships with amazing people from all over the world that I honestly feel blessed to have met, at the same time though a few long standing friendships fizzled out. I stand by my belief that this was no one's fault and sometimes people grow apart especially once you've left school and are starting to build your own identities and even though I'm no longer friends with these girls I wish them all the luck in the world with what they wish to do in life.

February

February was the month where my relationships with my new friends flourished and I really started to find my feet and come out of my shell. I attended social gatherings and really started to put myself out there I grew as a person and it also marks the first year I celebrated my birthday with more then three people. I've always been too scared to have parties because I worry that no one would show up but I'm super happy I did because it was the best birthday I've had to date!

Best birthday to date <3

March

March was a very male orientated month unfortunately filled with many bad decisions. It marked the end of my two year relationship which although hard at the time I came to terms with and am happy to report that we're still on good terms and there was no bloodshed. I also decided to meet up with someone I met on Facebook, he turned out to be both real and not a rapist which is always a good sign however it was a short lived friendship and I will completely take the blame for that one. I'm willing to admit that I hurt a fair few people in that month and it's definitely a time I'm not proud of, on a happier note now amends have been made and I've learnt a lot from these experiences, every cloud has a silver lining.

April & May

I'm afraid I have very little to report for April & May, I entered a new relationship which was a big mistake on my part. Emotionally I wasn't ready for it and needless to say it was short lived but we'll get into that a little further on. It was also this month that I broke up with a little thing called Physics, I made the decision to drop physics due to falling so far behind due to poor health and I'm happy I did because I could then put all the energy I had into my other studies and I feel really grateful to be in a teaching environment where the staff care about my well being and let me make that decision. My health really did affect me during this time period and stopped me doing very much of anything hence the lack of any sort of blogging substance...sorry!

June
June marked two very big things this year. The first thing was Download festival 2013, now I don't normally put festivals and gigs down as "big things" but this was different. Not only did I manage to overcome my medical issues to go in the first place but I met Ville Valo which is a complete dream come true for me and I'm still in awe that it happened. The second thing was the start of my exams, but after meeting Ville nothing was going to get me down and I went full speed ahead into my exams

Me & Ville. Please ignore my trying not to die face :')

July

July was a very up and down month for me. Right in the middle of my exams I was dumped which really damaged my moods and my grades. However, thanks to my wonderful friends and family I really turned the month around, finished my exams and went on to have a wonderful summer. I had plans almost every single day and I was making the most of spending time with my friends before they flew home for good. It was a summer of relaxing and creating memories that I'll honestly cherish for a lifetime.

August
August really was just a continuation of July, I had to say goodbye to some really good friends but I also made new ones, I went abroad for the first time in four years and just enjoyed life and all it has to offer. The end of August marked the dreaded results day, upon opening my envelope I didn't receive the grades I'd wanted but after crying in the toilets for a hour I spoke to my teachers got a plan of action together and came to terms with it pretty quickly if I'm honest. Looking back on it, my results weren't even too bad, I "passed and was able to progress into my second year so all wasn't lost!

Leaving party for my girls <3

September

September was a really hard month for me, as I said at the start the year was full of highs and lows and I think this month was the worst of the year. Going back to sixth form was hard because I was walking into the common room and my group of friends was now a fifth of the size and that took a while to adjust too. The hardest part of the month and possibly my year was the loss of a friend of six years, I won't go into to much detail as this is at the end of the day the Internet, but my best friend turned out to be someone I didn't know who was manipulative and decided to put poor life decisions before our friendship. I was betrayed and completely crushed and sadly this does still effect me though I have come to terms with it much better recently.

October

October was proof to me that things do get better, it marks the month I reconnected with my current boyfriend (remember the Facebook guy from March?) who not only makes me happy for the obvious boyfriend-ey reasons but has taught me a lot about myself, life in general...and pronunciation! I grew closer to my remaining friends, however also had to deal with my closest friend moving to the other side of the country which although hard I dealt with so much better than expected. This was the real game changing month for me, things headed up from here and I can only hope that this new outlook stays with me because it's making life wonderful!
 

November & December

November and December I've merged together for two reasons. One, I've been blogging so anything of interest that's happened during this period you will already know about and two, this post is stupidly long. In short things are looking up, I've gained a new perspective and I'm trying more things. I've learnt to be satisfied with the person I am and I feel that despite everything that happened this year I came out of it all in the best way possible.

Wow this is probably the longest post I've ever written, leave me a comment if you actually got to the bottom of this, seriously I'm interested! So there we have it, my 2013! I know it's a little vague in some places but I do have to keep in mind that this is the Internet, I really wanted to put this up not only for my benefit but also to show how much things can turn around in the space of a few months so if things were hard for you last year chin up and keep moving forward! Until next time...

Love & TubTubs

Merry Christmas!

Hey guys, I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas and are looking forward to the new year! I'm currently typing this from my wonderful new iPad mini courtesy of my lovely parents this holiday because once again I am sick (I swear my immune system has decided to go on holiday over Christmas). That said though I'm probably going to have to format this from my laptop anyway because the blogger app is appalling, sort it out Apple! (...please?)

Grumbling and sickness aside I had a really wonderful Christmas period, from the 22nd up until Christmas Eve I was in London with my boyfriend forcing my Christmas pixie ways upon him and just having our own little Christmas from our hotel room. For those of you who don't know I'm in a long distance relationship so being able to see someone so special this time of year really meant a lot to me (cue the eye rolls) and besides all the couplely crap he brought me Moomins which is always a huge plus!

The original plan was to visit winter wonderland but due to the horrific storm that hit the UK it was canceled, so not to put a damper on our spirits we headed into Covent Garden for a nose about before walking over to Picadilly just lapping up the Christmas spirit and having a cheeky pit stop in M&M world, which may I add A. Smells divine and B. Is bloody massive! As the night went on the storm got worse and worse so we headed back to our hotel and ordered in a pizza and played vanguard until two in the morning, because you know that's clearly the mature thing to do! The following day I also had my very first Wagamama's! This is a huge thing for me because I'm such a picky eater and I don't like trying new things but I will say it was utterly delicious, our waiter was a darling and I was full for the rest of the day which was a Christmas miracle in and of itself!

 

After a battle getting home on Christmas Eve thanks to many canceled trains I woke up Christmas morning to a lovely present opening session with my family which is always lovely with everyone in that happy sleepy state and Tub's shredding the discarded wrapping paper on the floor. In true Christmas spirit me and my little brother then proceeded to take millions of Christmas selfies, he is definitely taking after me with the camera whoring! My nan then came over and we had Christmas dinner, my dad brought a XL turkey for five people...yes it is now two days later and we're still living off it and will continue to do so for the rest of the year by the looks of things! After putting ourselves into food coma we settled down in the living room for bad TV and a game of Cluedo, who did it you may ask? We will never know, Tub's kept taking off with the pieces, so much so that professor plum no longer has a face. My dog is a tyrant!

So there's my Christmas in a nutshell, I really hope you all had a great Christmas too by the looks of all the blog posts I've seen it sure looks like it! If you were one of the unfortunate families that lost power due to the storm over Christmas I really hope you still made the most of it and are celebrating hard now the power has returned. So if any of you guys have done a Christmas post link me in the comments so I can give it a nose, if not let me know how it was or even better write one! Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night!

Love & TubTubs

Old Friends New Beginings

Hey guys thought I'd give you a little weekly update of what's been going on in my world as of late. As some of you may know if you follow me on twitter I had a practical exam for biology on Thursday which I well and truly ballsed up (Fuck you plants, fuck you!). Not going to lie that really got me down. I knew the material and I just made one really stupid mistake that I knows cost me a few marks, I know it's only a couple but I have a bit of a perfectionist streak and I'd rather get something done well or not do it at all, guess that's another personality trait I need to work on (I'm gathering a fair few new years resolutions mind)!

Me trying to do practical science

On a lighter note I got to spend my weekend catching up with some old girlfriends that I haven't seen in a while which was much needed! Don't get me wrong I love having my guy friends about but you just can't drag them shopping and stick a face mask on them, but oh how I wish I could haha. On the Saturday I met up with Laura who I last saw on Halloween, we went into Reading to get some much needed Christmas shopping done, and bloody hell she is quite an enabler, don't think my bank balance will be forgiving me anytime this year. On a positive though I now have all my presents done and dusted and only the wrapping to go (Eeep I adore wrapping gifts, I'm a bit of an odd one really) which means I can spend the remains of my dwindling bank balance on having a good time over the Christmas break. After our shopping spree and enough KFC to induce week long food comas we went down to the riverside to have a few cocktails in a nice little pub called The Slug & Lettuce, it was only about six in the evening by this point so it was lovely to just have a few drinks somewhere really chilled out with no loud music and no one vomiting in the corner...nice.

Rumberry Mojitos!

On the Sunday I then met up with a lovely girly called Lily-Jasmine, who I haven't seen in about three and a half years now! It's crazy how time flies and I really need to have more catch up sessions like this because it's so nice to rekindle old friendships and it was like we'd never been apart! After a quick shop around town (yes more shopping *slaps wrist*) we went back to her house where I introduced her to the wonderful world of blogger and she showed me the wonderful ways of journal writing. I really think I'm going to start keeping a journal you know? As much as I love you guys I can't put my entire life onto the internet so I think it'll be a good way for me to keep a record of what's been happening in my life. As this year has proved, so much can change in a year!

So all in all this weekend has been a success! I really do think it's important to make time to catch up with old friends because you never know what may come of it and at the end of the day as Lily rightly said your friends are the ones who are always going to be there when all else fails. So guys that's enough of my ramblings for one evening as I'm clearly just writing this post to get out of writing my Chemistry Presentation (good old Arenes...Kill me). But seriously, pick up your phone and text a friend you haven't in a while, you never know where it could lead.

Love & TubTubs

Being Sick Sucks!

Hey m'lovlies, so as you may have noticed I fell off the face of the blogging world for just over a week, which is such a pain considering I'd finally gotten myself into a routine. But for the first time in my blogging career I actually have a decent reason for not being active, I'm really really ill. Boo!

So just to fill you guys in a bit without going into any graphic details I've been feeling a bit ill for a little but and assumed it was a winter bug that was going around and didn't think anything of it. Now I'm a pro at convincing myself I'm dying and Googling my symptoms so it would be that the one time something was genuinely wrong that I dismiss it *sigh*. So I went into A&E last Sunday and they drugged me up on painkillers before sending me home so unfortunately I'm still waiting about on my local healthcare service to have some more tests done.

So due to this blogging isn't the only thing that's taken a hit, I'm really far behind on sixth form work and had to miss out on hours at my job. So today I've just been playing catch up trying to get everything back in order before Monday when I have to return to sixth form and just get on with things. Blogging should return to normal next week though so don't think I've abandoned you lovely lot because I've really missed seeing your comments! Side note this post was a lot longer and went into a lot more detail, then my web browser crashed and I lost it all so this will have to do for now, sorry!

I hope you're all well and I'll see you next week!

Love & TubTubs

Covent Garden Adventures

 Hey m'lovlies! So if you follow me on twitter you'll know that I recently took a mini adventure up to London to catch up with an old friend who's studying there (that's that Lexy fellow in the pictures below). It feels so nice to be able to start doing things again and making memories with the people dear to me as two years ago my health deteriorated and stopped me doing things like taking trains. Boo! However, now that I'm recovering I'm making up for lost time and getting out to see the world! Well South England, we all have to start somewhere right?

So after the long ass train ride and a quick catch up coffee (not to mention the chaos that is trying to find a single person in Waterloo station) we decided to take a trip down to Covent Gardens. Now you may or may not know that I am a huge (obsessive maybe?) fan of the Moomins, for those of you who have no idea what these fabulous little creatures are go and look them up right now, seriously you're missing out big time! Quite coincidentally there is also a Moomin shop in London, even more coincidentally Covent Garden! So straight off the tube we decided (well I can't really say Lex had to much of a say in the matter) to go hunt down this shop, we soon gave up on Apple Maps after it telling us we were in Hertfordshire but my expert navigation skills got us there in under ten minutes. Expert Moomin radar right here I think!

Now I could go into expert detail describing my experience in that one particular shop and the pure joy that overcame me but firstly I think that's only interesting to me and secondly we wouldn't want you all thinking I'm a little odd now would we? So after an hour of gawping at everything I eventually went to pay and got talking to the lovely guy behind the till who signed me up to the newsletter and then casually told me that there would be a giant Moomin making an appearance at 12:30 later on that day. So obviously I set my alarm to prepare to rush back for such a monumental event and we eventually left the shop.

So whilst preparing myself for a key moment in my life (I did warn you it was a mild obsession) we wandered around and Lex introduced me to the wonder that is Forbidden Planet, now being a fan of Lord of the Rings & Big Bang Theory amongst other nerdy things this was probably one of the most awesome shops ever! After that delightful experience I realised it was 12:25 and ran back to the Moomin shop in my heals (this proved to be a huge mistake when I was later hobbling about London), I will save you another Moomin obsessed paragraph and narrow it down to I met a giant Moomin and brought more stuff...It was the best thing ever!

The plan after this was to travel down to Camden to look around the market, grab some food go and watch Insidious 2. However, once we got to the cinima it turns out that the viewing that we were planning to see didn't actually exist & three cinemas later we gave up and just decided to head back to Waterloo and generally act like tourists before I had to dash off and get the train home due to having a 8am class the next morning.

So enough of my ramblings I shall leave you with a few pictures from the day, I apologize for my tragic face/hair/existence in the picture of me and the giant Moomin I was very excitable and had just ran from the other side of Covent Garden haha!

Love & TubTubs (& Moomins!)