What has my life become?!

One day, I'm writing frequent blogs and just being awesome at life and then I look again and it all stops. Life isn't as awesome and blogs aren't so frequent, instead I'm sitting- wanting to go to Peppa Pig World (without a child)... because it looks so damn awesome!

...But let me just assure you, I have a niece... I don't just sit around watching Peppa Pig while drowning my sorrows! (That is not how it works!)

How has this happened?

Have I told you, I've also started learning to knit?! (Not that there's anything wrong with knitting...)

But why is everything so tame?

Why has my hobbies changed from blogging to knitting? From Harry Potter world to Peppa Pig world? (As awesome as it may look!)

Well here is where I draw the line! From now on... Mixing it Up and Down will be upheld with pride!
There will come a day, when my blog looks back on it's life and stumbles across this rough patch.... but then it will remember that it got through this chamber of emptiness and thrived on the written word to produce a blog that was better than any other blog, a blog that can be proud of it's contents, a blog I call my own!
LONG LIVE THIS BLOG!

I suck... and I know it.

So, in my last post I promised that the next post will be back to the regular style of 'Mixing it up... and down' and that it would be super awesome! But I have not yet posted anything and therefore I suck! I do apologize. Once I get back into my groove, the posts will be flowing as ever.

Today, I looked out the window to find rays of sun breaking into my room, this filled me with gratitude and please... Stepped out, and it's as cold as the freaking arctic! I am now trapped in a Starbucks, with my lowering Latte almost coming to an end, and I don't know what to do from here. Do I run to my next destination in the hope that I won't notice the cold? Do I camp out in Starbucks until they kick me out? Do I just freeze to my imminent death? I don't know! HELP! I don't want to go outside... It's too cold!

So, this post consisted of pretty much nothing! I am sorry. I will try to do better next time. I just thought I would pop in to say "Hello!" and to let you all know that I am still alive!

Alligator Spotting and Orange Picking

I recently visited Florida for a conference... I just thought I would share two photos from that experience which I think are iconic to my visit to Florida:

Look at those wonderful, naturally-grown oranges... You can't go to Florida and not pick an orange! They were where the sunshine came from in the 'Sunshine State'.

This was a lake full of smiling alligators!

These type of photo blogs are not my usual 'Mixing it up... and down' style so, my next blog will prove to be just that so stay tuned! I just thought I'd share the reason for my recent silence and blow you away with these two bursts of Florida magnificence!

Captured in a Flash

This year I went to Tunisia on holiday. The desert was calling me as it calls the cacti and camels. I was one with the subtly desert breeze as I added dirt tracks to the yellow, powdery sand on my quad bike. I did capture a few special moments as I said good-bye to the country I will always hold in my heart:

Life is easy... (Is it?)

Lately, I've been in quite a frenzy! I guess you could call it a 'life frenzy'. Everything has just been crazy, I have been overly self-critical and have been thinking about everything.

One thing which entered my mind is that a person just assumes that life is easy, because billions of people do life everyday, but what hardly anybody discusses is how difficult it is to do life.

Even, if you lived in your own world and stayed at home you would come across challenges like what you would eat. How you would get food. How you would cook the food. And you would also have to take care of bodily functions. That is the total minimum you have to do and it is already a lot.

Then you have to think about quality of life. Your body takes a lot of maintenance: hair, makeup, clothing, weight, overall appearance. That is a lot to think about. Then you have relationships: relationships with friends, family, boyfriend, girlfriend, husbands, wives, cousins etc. They all take a lot of work otherwise they would be non-existent.

Another thing is work. You go to school, university, work and you have to put in a lot of effort to succeed otherwise you find yourself being fired or kicked out.

Everything else is optional in life, but the things I have mentioned is just the total minimum which most people do. And the whole point is that I think that the amount of effort you have to put in to do life is totally under-estimated... or at least most people make out that it is.

I'm not saying that it isn't worth it. It totally is. The more you put in, the more you get out and it is a journey where you have your up hills and down hills and even your cruises, but it just occurred to me how much work just trying to live is. You would think that by default you would just be able to stay alive, but how untrue this is!

Make sure you live life how you want to!

Now, onto shower number a trillion (just daily maintenance!)

Money is the fruit of a dead plant

I have been thinking about money lately. Currency is such a weird convention of working with things. In the olden days, I used to be able to get a sheep for 15 chickens, sometimes I could get jam for some milk and maybe if I was really lucky, I could get a smile for a smile. 

Today, in 2013, it is a lot different. I now have to give my sheep away for a few pieces of paper? And that paper, can get me jam, milk, eggs, chickens... What makes this paper so valuable? People do. 

Happiness. Sadness. Distress. Are all emotions which can come from events which occur because of this paper. What makes it so powerful? 

I can't understand the concept of money. Why do we need it? Why can't I farm a few sheep and give them away for an airline ticket? Why do the airlines insist on the paper? 

And there isn't even a standard currency for the world. There are Pounds, Dollars (all types of Dollars... Australian, American...etc), Rands, Euros. Where has all this complications come from? And who is responsible for it? I would like to have a stern word with him! 

And to top it off. Internet banking makes it even more confusing, but that's a story for another day!

Pay me in cattle and jam any day! 

Victory to a dead cow...

A little while ago, my friends and I decided that it would be a good idea to attempt a burger challenge at a local restaurant. It was a decision we had made months prior to actually attempting it, however when the night finally arrived, I think describing our feelings as being excited would be an under-statement. This was something we had been looking forward to for some time.

A few days before 'Challenge Day' arrived, we were discussing tactics of all sorts: What we would eat on the day, how much water we would drink, at what pace we would eat the challenge, what we would eat first etc. It was an overwhelming presence in our lives which would be over in a matter of hours, but for that moment, nothing was more important.

Arriving to the restaurant we were chirpy, laughing, mobile creatures. We ordered our water and promptly ordered the challenge. It was a 1kg burger challenge which included: a bun, 2 beef burgers (with extra salt), 2 rashers of bacon, 2 chicken fillets, a lump of chilli con carne and a pitiful lettuce leaf fraction which I can only assume was there by accident. It was topped off with 6 onion rings and pierced through the heart with a skewer. The plate was sprinkled with a flooding of chips, which coated the burger and the rest of the plate. 

As I looked upon the challenge, it seemed tough, yet it didn't seem like an impossible venture. One by one I started with the chips, smothering them with ketchup, mayonnaise and any other condiment I could find to change the tastes in my mouth to some sort of variety. Slowly, I switched to the burger and straight away I was hit by a wall of salt. The burger was loaded with my yearly salt intake- which I think was strategically placed in the meal to make it more unbearable. I thought I had it. I thought I was going to finish. I wasn't feeling full at all... or so I thought.

Looking over at how my friends were getting on... 2 of them were almost finished, making it look like a piece of cake, or a really small burger! The other 2 had given up. Which side was I on? The more I wanted to be on the victorious side, the more I was hindering myself.

I decided to go for a walk to digest the food I had eaten and make room for the second round to finish this thing. I walked to the bathroom, but feeling delirious in a food coma, the inevitable happened...

Ding. Ding. Ding. And within a few seconds it was over. There was no point in eating anymore, because I wouldn't have ever completed the challenge. I was on the team I didn't want to be on.

Only one of us had completed the challenge victorious, but looking back, was it a victory? Or did the burger unknowingly beat us all?

My body rejected the burger, the salt, and my pride; because it was all gone that night.

I am no Adam Richmond, but in that challenge of Man vs Food... Food knocked me out!

I don't think I will be getting my O.W.L.S...

For the past week, my life has been submerged in work: Studying for exams. Today was my first one. After a few days of stressing about it and banging my head against a very hard table, I woke up this morning with rays of motivation beaming from me. I was adamant that I was going to do okay in this exam, or so I thought...

In reality:

I woke up without beaming rays of motivation but more of dripping drops of nervousness. Opened my curtains to reveal a snowy horizon, I wasn't sure if this was a sign to come of the frosty reception of the exam paper.

I studied, with panic, for the last few hours I had. Confident I was going to do okay.

Half way through the exam, I wanted to vomit and cry simultaneously whilst punching myself. I feel like Prof. Snape would have written a kinder paper for Harry.

Not a great paper, however, now as I sit with a warm, comforting cup of tea to end the day, it still seems like I've done at least one good thing today!

I study Computer Science, is this something that I feel like pursuing any further? Not anymore! After this exam, I might not even be allowed to.

Life is weird. It takes you on a crazy ride with you steering using decisions. The outcome is unknown. The destination is not the goal. The fun is in the wonder.

But, let's just say: Based on this paper... I don't think I will be getting my computing O.W.L.S!

Happy New Year!

Well, we are 11 days into the new year. Well Done to you for getting so far into it already!

2013. 2013? 2013!?!?!?! I can see where the Mayans were coming from. 2013 is so weird to say. It doesn't flow. 2011 is normal. 2012 is pretty easy to say. 2013 and you just want to skip right over the year. Maybe, it will get better soon.

So for now, the world has not ended or changed in anyway, so for that... let's release some balloons as a celebration...

Every year- at the beginning of it- I decide on a resolution. Not a big one, sometimes it's: "this year I will make a sandwich" and I usually complete it and then I feel amazing about completing my new years resolution. So, this year I wanted to step up my game and got to thinking.

I didn't want to choose any cliche, that everyone chooses because I want to be different and original and creative. However, I'm not very good at thinking up things and got slightly overwhelmed and well...

Just to inform you. New years resolutions aren't meant to make you want to throw yourself in front of a bus or bang your head on the table out of frustration, if it does: You are doing it wrong!

So, after several hours I thought of something... Something cool. Something amazing. Something that made me think: 'Yeh, I'll just go with it'.

My new years resolution is to calm down and take it easy! I think I might be able to do that.

Yup, I'm going to boss this year!

I hope you all have an above-average year! 

P.S. I am planning to post more blogs this year so keep a lookout!