Dribble Drabble

Taking a break from my childhood thing to advertise. Mwaha. Please note that I haven't been asked to do this; I'm doing it of my own free will to support a friend and boost the community of a forum I moderate.

If you're an aspiring kid/teen writer, check out KWC, a forum dedicated to helping kids and teens improve their writing. Participate in seasonly challenges, post your writing, guide other writer's through writers block and have fun! Talk about your favourite books and authors, learn different writing techniques, and watch your writing improve rapidly. KWC is a place for everyone; we'll welcome you with open arms.

My Childhood; Part One.

A blog or two ago, I mentioned that I'm going to make a fool of myself. Well, the time is upon us. When cleaning out my room on Saturday, I found a notebook that I've had for as long as I can remember. I'm going to share with you, bit by bit, it's contents ... because embarrassing myself is so much easier than thinking of blog ideas. Looking through the book, I realised I wrote a hell of a lot as a little kid - none of the stories actually got finished, though, I noticed. I'm going to type it up exactly as it's written so you can see all my grammar mistakes and laugh at my past self. Have fun.

The first few pages consist mainly of handwriting and spelling practises, because I was a little nerd. This is the first creative writing piece, and it's so embarrassing xD I must have been four or five. You'll recognise some of it; it's a nursery rhyme, but I just extended it xD

Pussy cat, pussy cat where have you been?

"I've been to London to visite the qeen."

Pussy cat, pussy cat what did you there?

"I frightend a little mouse under her chair."

Chorus.

pussy cat, pussy cat don't do that.

pussy cat, pussy cat never do that again.

No no no.

Pussy cat, pussy cat what would you do?

"I'd meow to her and bow to her too."

Sadly (and thankfully xD), it ends there. I never got round to fixing it. Like I said, I haven't corrected a single thing ... hence the spelling mistakes in the first stanza. I was such a sad child, wasn't I? xD Over the next few pages, there's just more spelling practises, until we come to this: EDWARD IS a bRAT!, written in green crayon, taking up the entire page, and then crossed through with blue, orange and green crayon. You know the Union Jack? It's got the same style, with the one vertical line, one horizontal and two diagonal. For the record, Edward is my cousin. On the next two pages, in grey crayon, I've written ME AND Sophie Are a Team. Sophie is another cousin; Edward's half-sister. Capitalization really wasn't my strong point, I've noticed.

On the page after that...

Sophie gave

Sophie gave Me a picture.

Edward is was singing Scooby Doo. 

I Was Writing in this book.

Sophie gave Edward a Picture.

Edward ga makes a cup of Tea.

I Watched the really boring Tweenies.

It seems to be a record of about an hour or so one day, and I have no idea why it suddenly switched to present tense on the penultimate line. I was only young, okay? xD

I think I'll leave it at that today; I plan to carry this out for a few days. I think we skip to when I was seven next... 2004, it says. So yes, I would have been seven. Heh. Reading through the next page, I'm going to have to cut some of it out... it has my old address there xD

Before I go, I want to share with you this crappy little icon I made for AmazingPhil. It's really bad; nothing like I had in mind. But it's better than nothing, right? It was inspired a question asked in this video and the still is from a point in the video, too. I'll probably upload it to my twitter later and @mention Phil so he sees it xD

← That's it. Danger!

Now I've officially linkspammed you, I'll leave you for today. Keep blogging, people :3

Home For Christmas: A Short Story

So, because I'm lazy, I can't be bothered to write an actual blog today. So I decided to leave you with this. In November/December 2009, our homework project was to write a short story revolving around Christmas. Now, because I'm incapable of writing happy, fluffy, joyful stories, I decided to write something a little more depressing. And, this is it...

Alice drew her legs up to her chest, her arms wrapping around them in a half-hearted attempt to keep warm. With less than an hour until midnight, Christmas crept closer with every tick and every tock of the persistent clock on the wall. The decorations had lost their appeal weeks ago, as did the annoying carols that everyone insisted on singing at the top of their voices, no matter how out of tune they may be.

But now, there were no noisy carollers around her, no Christmas specials on the TV. She didn't want to hear any of it. The house was silent, except for the ticking of the clock above her. The silence was disturbing, tense, as if Alice was expecting someone to jump out at her with a kitchen knife. She shuddered at the thought, looking around nervously.

Paranoia had stuck to her like a plague the past few weeks. She looked over her shoulder as she walked down the street, feeling like someone was following her; she'd wake up in the middle of the night and run to the baby's cot, in fear that someone had snuck in and taken him; she left her light on at night because she was afraid of something lurking in the darkness. It was pathetic. Alice knew that no one was there, but she felt so defenceless and scared all the time without anyone there to protect her. She felt so alone and weak, abandoned and unloved. She found it hard to make it through the day, feeling so numb, so worthless.

She hummed softly to fill the silence, trying to calm her pounding heart. She didn't recognise the tune; it might not even be real, it might be something she picked up on the spot. She knew only one thing – it wasn't helping to sooth her nerves. At all.

Her eyes flickered to the cot on the other side of the room, where her baby boy slept peacefully, unaware of his mother's worries. Through the thin material of the cot, Alice could see his chest rising and falling with each breath he took, wishing she could be in his place instead. His name was Harrison, named after his deceased uncle. Everyone said he resembled his mother, but had his father's piercing blue eyes. The parents agreed.

Even in Alice's dreams, everything was chaos. She dreamt repeatedly of losing her loved ones, of being killed, of being tortured to insanity. When she awoke, she would be drenched in cold sweat and shivering like she had just stepped out of an ice bath. She had tried everything; sleeping tablets, sleeping drinks, calming rituals, but none of it worked. The nightmares continued

Alice hugged her legs tighter to her chest. The ticking of the clock was starting to get annoying, and so she hummed louder in a failed attempt to drown it out. There must be less than half-an-hour until the twenty-fifth of December by now, as the moment she dreaded drew ever closer.

Alice had always loved Christmas. Every year for the past two and a half decades of her existence, she had truly loved the occasion. She was known amongst her friends as the one that truly held Christmas Spirit. She was always the one that sung Christmas carols, that dressed in the festive red and green, that went over-board with the decorations. She was always the one who recorded the Christmas specials on TV; the one who loved spending the day in the kitchen, preparing the Christmas feast; she loved watching the kids open the presents; she loved making home-baked mince pies. She definitely put the spirit into Christmas.

Well, usually.

This year, however, she refused to celebrate it. She steered clear of festive clothing, disconnected the TV, hadn't brought a turkey to cook for the next day, hadn't put any presents under the tree. The reason for the change in Alice was simple. Everyone understood, so no one asked questions, for which she was thankful for.

She knew David would have wanted her to enjoy Christmas, but she couldn't do that without him. David was her husband and an ambitious man who loved adventure and was always seeking something new to do. He was brave and spontaneous, always jumping from one dangerous hobby to another. His most recent mission was what had left Alice so shaken and paranoid.

He had gone to war.

Alice was proud of him, indeed, but no amount of pride could destroy the worry and anxiety building inside of her. Thousands of men lost their lives at war each year, and even though David promised her he would be alright, she knew that could change so quickly.

For the past three years of their marriage, she had never spent a Christmas without him, except for this year. At the end of November, David had been accepted into the army and sent off to Afghanistan almost immediately. He promised he would stay safe, that he wouldn't die, that he'd be home for Christmas. Two of those promises had already been broken, and a third could also have been shattered quite easily. War wasn't safe, so that promise was broken the moment he made it; and there were only fifteen precious minutes left until Christmas, with no sign of Alice's husband in sight.

Alice screwed her eyes shut, releasing a shaky breath as she tightened the hold on her legs, pushing them further against her middle as if she was trying to fit into a small box. She wished that David would return from the war alive and well, that she wouldn't have to spend another Christmas alone next year. A single tear appeared at the corner of her left eye, which was still clamped shut. It rolled down her cheek slowly, the ticking of the clock consuming her mind.

Tick, tock … tick, tock … tick, tock. Chime.

She sighed and brushed away the tear.

“Merry Christmas, Alice,” she said dryly, her eyes opening slightly as the corners of her mouth turned up into a humourless smile.

Aren't I just a little ray of sunshine? I promise to actually write a blog tomorrow, instead of just pulling out a story and shoving it in your face ^.^

Sherlock Holmes: Film Review

Today, I watched Sherlock Holmes, the Guy Richie film starring Robert Downey Jr., Jude Law and Rachel McAdams. All of whom, I feel, are amazing actors in their own ways. I really enjoyed the movie; it was funny and suspenseful, and kept me asking questions. Sherlock's crazy ideas matched with Watson's witty remarks, I couldn't help but laugh at them. However, like every movie, there were flaws. My first issue, which isn't too big, was that the fighting seemed too organised. I know, I know, it HAS to be organised because it's acting. But a good movie (take The Bourne Identity and X-Men for example) can make the fighting look unprepared, unrehearsed and adrenalin-controlled. Although the fighting did keep my attention, the actors seemed almost bored of it, like they'd done it a thousand times and they'd much rather be snogging their character's respective love interests. Also, it might just be me, but I found it hard to grasp the plot at first. It seemed really scattered, and Sherlock was talking too low and fast for me to actually take in a word that he said. This is probably just me... but it felt horrible feeling so lost.

Irene Adler (Rachel McAdams) is one of the most amazing villans of all time. I'm serious. She had the attitude and false innocence that male villans just cannot have, and being able to outwit Sherlock makes her extremely intelligent and witty. I love her character. Another character I love is Watson. He's such a witty, sharp-tongued character with quick-fire comebacks. You can always count on him to cheer up a serious scene with a witty comment. He's great.

Overall, I give the movie a thumbs up. T'was thoroughly enjoyed!

In other news, we had most of my family round today (aunt and her husband, aunt and uncle, baby cousin, grandparents, mum and me) and we had a Chinese takeaway. Which was yummy. And my baby cousin is staying round tonight because his parents are working really early tomorrow and they don't want to bother us so early, so they're leaving him here overnight to make things easier. I have a few blog ideas in mind for the next few days; you can all have a good chuckle while I make a fool out of myself.

(:

Google Fail

Yeah, yeah, second blog in one day. Whatever. Don't care. I'm posting! Because, honestly, this cannot wait. It's just too insane. My friend messaged me and said, "Hey, check out this fanfiction story!" Only, she didn't provide a link (genius). So off I went to Google, started to type in the title... and I couldn't help but notice this...


Now, the ironic thing about this is that, just an hour or so earlier, I was looking on failblog through some rather hilarious fails. And then I just happen to notice this. Naturally, I print-screened and put a square around the offending suggestion. But, really, "can you fly when pregnant?" is one of the most ridiculous questions ever.

Fail? I think so. I'm going to submit this to failblog, now. The world needs to see it.

Flying when pregnant... sweet Merlin...