Ali-Lou's Random Life

Short hurried post, cos I haven't written anything for ages!

2006-02-28T03:55:54+01:00

Today (well, yesterday as it's 2.50am)...

Wrote a letter about buttons!

Took some stuff I'd sold on ebay and the letter to post office

Bought 3 potatoes

Watched some Black Books on DVD

Sulked 'cos I hadn't done all the things I needed to.

Bought 5 films from amazon!

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Pass the parcel

2005-12-15T04:59:20+01:00

I think this is really worth while thing to do, an extra gift need not cost much at all, but it can make a real difference to someone. It can mean that a person gets something who would other wise get no gift at all.

I'm not condoning the commercialism so evident this time of year, it's just the thought appeals to me that a simple gesture such as going into a shop and buying a bottle of bath foam can mean that an elderly person, who has no one, will get a gift instead of no gift.

I'll find the link to put in here.

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feeling creative

2005-12-10T05:35:24+01:00

hello!

I've not been ignoring this blogging thing, that's not why I've been so stingy with the posting, it's because I've actually been busy doing things other than watching tv or randomly browsing ther internet amusing myself with snowflake generators or some other fun but pointless excercise.

I've decided to follow my childhood dream which was "make things and sell them" not the usual ambitious dream like "I want to be a airline pilot" or the impossible "I want to be Supergirl", this one I could actually do. (Look at me being all possitive, and without the drugs too )

The question is though what do I make and sell? I have tried this avenue of thought before, but I really should have researched it a bit before thinking that I could spend £200 on little tiny beads, thread then to make necklaces and make a profit And there was the time when I was given a load of glass paints and painted pretty patterns on lager glasses and sold them for £5 each as vases (less the shops 50% selling fee of course), they sold really well all summer, then the shop closed down as it couldn't survive through the winter in Whitby, and took all the stuff I had made with it.

The next year after I had made painted many vases over the winter, a bargain shop opened and sold a really similar product for 99p made in some far away place where the poor souls who actually did the work get paid a bowl of rice a day for their efforts. So that was the end of that, and my beautiful handy work wouldn't even sell at the car boot sale

***

So where did all this new enthusiasum come from? A teenage book
From one of those late night shopping sprees on amazon
It's the kind of book I wish I had when I was a teenager, I'm 31 and still learning from this book! It's called "Girlwise" by Julia DeVillers (I'll put a clicky in here, US amazon has reviews etc)

It's just so encouraging and inspires confidence to be yourself. And it's full of bit of advice and answers for those questions that never get asked. Stuff like what to do if you are someone house and clog the toilet! Also general life advice like following your dream and choosing a career, what kind of thing to wear to different types of job interview, three simple yoga poses, getting your poem/story/work published, public speaking confidence, budgeting money, changing a nappy Making your own website.

Enough of the book reveiw!

I'm off to go look on Ebay for inspiration, something I can create might make me a bit of cash! I'll think about the career another day

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hello it's me...

2005-12-04T05:12:19+01:00

yeah it's the middle of the night again, I guess you could say I'm an insomnia blogger.

Things I've been doing today are:

Sold stuff on ebay ...lot more than I thought... *refuse to be ebay bore*

£ncouraged by recent success I've been busy clearing out clutter that is invading my flat.

Went to pub, and drank 2 drinks (I'm such a party animal today)

Had several vodka + cola drinks when I got home.

Watched Transporter, not excited about the sequel!

It's too late/early to be making meaningful posts

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hello again

2005-11-28T07:30:54+01:00

I've not been very chatty recently, my appolagies all (6) people who read this blog!

The aforementioned paint only cost £90 and I have so far painted one wall lilac, and done one coat of white satin wood on a door frame and a bit of skirting.... I have good intentions though.

I've put a few things for sale on ebay, including some boots and a leather biker jacket, I'll have to find some more stuff though as I keep buying as much as I sell, and I'll have to convince myself that just because that "GORGEOUS skirt £50 retail *BNWT*" is "£0.99" I don't actually need it, especially when the P&P charge is "£9.99"

Went to the library to return some well overdue books on Friday, and ended up spending £13 on renting DVD's. And I thought the £4.70 fine was going to break the bank. (Note to self: Putting things back on the shelf is an option.) I'm usually very good at budgeting, think I must be making up for all that self deprivation recently.

Well thats about all I have to say at the moment, maybe I'll have more to say another day when it not 6.30am I've had more than 3 hours sleep.

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shopping

2005-11-19T18:17:37+01:00

I went all extra girly yesterday, I went shopping and bought some clothes, another hair dye to try tone down the burgundy colour of the last one, fake tan stuff for your face, and tinted lip balm.

The hair looks a little better!

My bank balance doesn't.

Plus I'm going to the DIY shop soon to get the paint to decorate our whole flat.

Think I be selling stuff on ebay again soon.

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SRL - Survival Research Labs

2005-11-18T04:21:19+01:00

did anyone look at the SRL web site btw?

just wondering what people thought of it

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more photo blah

2005-11-18T04:16:22+01:00

Well, not much else is happening around here.

Went to dark room, made many 5x7 inch prints, to see which I like best to use for my asignment.

I have to come up with an apropriate 'visual theme' title for a few pics I select from the 100's I've taken for 'seashore' subject theme. I stared at a pile of photos all over the floor for several hours and only came up with rubbish theme names. Like 'triangular' or 'random rust' told you they were bad!

I also made contact sheets for the negs I processed on Tuesday, they ain't that bad... about 6 pics are ok!

Tommorow, laundry day. Or I'll be wearing my boyfriends clothes.

Also I dyed my hair, and it's now burgundy! Not quite what I intended. Oh well... it's different.

Need coffee

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one of those days

2005-11-15T23:35:17+01:00

I'm having one of those days where everything I touch turns to crap

I ran a bath of cold water as the hot stopped working part way through.

I burned my micro meal.

And then I went to photo class, my films I developed were mostly crap, a lot of black squares, and grey blobs.
It took 9 attempts to find an enlager that worked and wasn't in use.
I made only 2 prints, the first time they were both on the same piece of paper due to me being crap and getting them mixed up.

The second time I tried one was ridiculously pale despite what the test strips showed. And the other had that soot-and-snow contrast effect, whatever I did with the filters to alter the grade.
So I just tried to make some contact sheets, to show thumbnials for the negs I developed today, and they came out so pale you could only just see something there.

By then I gave up. I'll try again on Thursday, I'll have 8 hours, hopefully I'll get some good results

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SRL - Survival Research Labs

2005-11-15T02:52:13+01:00

These people build the most amazing machines, this one is fantastic the videos are a must!

Hovercraft

The Hovercraft is an all aluminum machine. Four 4 foot long pulse jet engines putting out 70 lbs of thrust provide propulsion and steering. The machine weights approximately 350 lbs.

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bored mind

2005-11-15T02:34:25+01:00

Self Portrait

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Pictures

2005-11-15T01:49:03+01:00

A couple of pictures I found that I made years ago.

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just another Blogthing

2005-11-14T15:58:20+01:00

How Weird Are You?

*You Are 50% Weird*

Normal enough to know that you're weird...
But too damn weird to do anything about it!

How Weird Are You?

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and I thought my flat was small...

2005-11-14T00:35:39+01:00

little tiny house

Never again will I complain about the size of my flat, and that I don't have anywhere to put things.

ok that was a lie

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Busy busy busy!

2005-11-13T23:52:37+01:00

No blogging since Tuesday! I'm being rubbish at keeping up with this, sorry.

I've been busy however.

I just found out how much work is expected to be handed in at the end of November and at what standard for the A level photography course I'm doing.

We were given details of the assesment criteria on Tueday, and I'm panicking! It looks like the examiners are expecting that students have prior knowledge before they start the course, and be spending the first few weeks just on the first project, not learning about how to use a manual SLR camera and processing photographs. We only learnt how to make a print on Tuesday!

I found a media workshop place that's fantastic! They have an open session to use their dark room on a Thursday, and it's £1.50 for to spend 4 hours there, and you can stay from 1 - 9pm if you want.

It allowed me to catch up on making contact sheets and prints, now I'm nearly at the point expected at this time into the course. By next week I should be caught up. Some people in the class keep saying they are struggling and that don't know what they are doing, three people haven't done anything to their sketchbooks, and one person goes every week without fail but had yet only got one sucessfull film processed. Someone tried to process a colour film with b&w processing to see what would happen

I've been stood around on a freezing cold beach taking more pictures today, two reels of film, I'm hoping I'll get to develop them as far as negatives at the class on Tuesday, depends how much time there is to do that kind of thing, after the 'teaching' bit. Then I'm wanting to make some prints on Thursday and I should be caught up

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Tuesday 8th

2005-11-09T07:43:42+01:00

Did more drawing and notes in a photography sketchbook.
Went to photography evening class, found out dead-line for this unit is end of November, and we are only there for two and a half hours, one night a week.
Stayed up till early hours of the morning doing homework, then decided to catch up on this while I could get at the PC.
Been drinking coffee and cola and now I feel too awake to go to bed

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Monday 7th

2005-11-09T07:34:52+01:00

Went to laundret 2nd day in a row.
Threw a tantrum as I'm fed up of doing housey stuff all the time.
Boyfriend stayed home, from part-time course, with headache and earache.
Then we went and stood on a pebbley beach in the dark and I took pictures using the rest of the 1600 ISO film, and the flash.
Did some drawings and notes in a sketch book.

It's 6.30am... I can't be bothered to type much.

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Sunday 6th - Dull day

2005-11-09T07:16:11+01:00

Went to Farmfoods. Bought frozen food.
Went to laundrette. Dried clothing.
Went to Tesco garage shop. Bought a magazine.

It rained.
A lot.

The magazine I bought (New Scientist) came with a 'free' book called Does anything eat wasps? It turns out many things eat wasps and one guy tell's of how he spent over an hour throwing wasps at his pond to watch things eat them.
Also in this book is a disturbing story of how green potatoes have poison in them called solanine, also found in Deadly nighshade, which is in the same family of plants as the potato.

Even better than the book was the Presents Direct mini catalogue that fell out of the magazine. My favourites are the Pet Wheel-Away the Biggles Hat and the Talking George Bush.

Pet Wheel-Away

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Saturday Continued....

2005-11-09T06:26:36+01:00

Drink Blur

Amazon.co.uk Absolute Balerdash

Took Absolute Balderdash and Lambrini to our friends house. It was very fun and very silly, and reached a low level very soon after we started playing the game. Especially with those Here's a film title, what's the plot? type questions. And the what do these initials stand for? ones.

Got home at about 2am

Went straight to sleep

Think I might be getting old

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Catch up

2005-11-09T05:23:48+01:00

Few days blogging to follow in a short space of time, mainly because I can't get to the PC while my boyfriend is playing video games.

Modern Man At Rest

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I really hate housework

2005-11-05T19:18:40+01:00

Today I got up to find a messy kitchen and my boyfriend was playing games on the PC.

I had to wash pots to make room so I could make my morning cuppa, including his mess he promised he would clean up last night boys are messy.

Drip drip drip

I've spent the rest of the day mostly doing laundry, and defrosting the freezer, so we have room for the food we were going to buy from the shop that is now closed.

In a few minutes I get to go to the launderet to get the washing dry that I've spent all day washing, and go get some food from some random shop, I hope.

Later we are going to a freinds house to not play poker. We usually play poker, but they are bored of that so I think we are playing Absolute Balderdash. Which is always good for a giggle.

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Really tired...

2005-11-05T03:53:48+01:00

...but I guess that's allowed as it's 2.30 am

Rented Mousehunt last night, it was the funniest film I've seen in ages, I just ordered it from Amazon so I can watch it again and again

Went out to take more seashore pictures today, I used a 1600 ISO film, but still the sun went down before I'd finished. Thought I'd see if I could get a grainy look if I used 1600 speed film.

Also took a few snaps with the digi cam.

Someone kindly had a bonfire burning, so it was nice and warm But when I got home the smell of smoke was overwhelming so I had to wash my hair and put all my clothes in the washer. But not before eating a plate of chips.

Watched Overboard on TV and some other random stuff, while my boyfriend played video games. For a change

:
Bonfire by beach

Time for bed

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little to say right now...

2005-11-04T03:17:32+01:00

I bought pepsi max instead of normal pepsi while renting videos.

Why is the packaging so similar? You have to look for the "max" usually the diet versions of cola are in lighter colour packaging, or some other destinctive design.

To take away the taste I decided to add vodka.

Seemed like a good idea at the time.

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title-280794

2005-11-03T17:13:02+01:00

Woke up late again today, could be because I didn't go to bed until about 4am. Doing homework and playing internet games... (more of the later)

Went to the fridge and realised we had no food

The remembered it is my friends birthday tommorow, my Uncles on Saturday and my Aunts on Sunday.

I was going to have to go out in this lovely weather... and what's more, go choose cards. Also we needed food for 2 days, bread and milk etc... grrrrr:-[" class="middle" border="0">

Don't get me wrong, I like to send people cards, it's just the choice in card shops is so bad when you want to sent a card to someone who doesn't appreciate mean jokes. Especially when it's for a bloke and you don't want plappy poems or flowers.

I gave up with card shops, I got one from the post office, and two charity cards from Oxfam. I just hope my Aunt doesn't think I'm implying anything by sending her a card with a big sheep on it!

Also I got two packs of Birdseye chicken thingies for my boyfriend, a large pack of veggy burger things for me, a loaf of bread and two pints of milk all for £4.40. Bargain

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yummy

2005-11-03T16:49:51+01:00

Mmmm yummy gooey cheese on toast

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Can't live without...

2005-11-03T02:19:01+01:00

One of those list things again.
Feel free to join in, copy, steal etc

Can't live without...
Family
My boyfriend
Coffee
Cake
Sunshine
Noodles
Being creative!
Music

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and now I'll continue...

2005-11-03T01:20:43+01:00

I've had my caffine

Yesterday...

I once again had good intentions of getting up early and going out to take seashore pictures for the evening class i'm doing, I woke up at about 1pm. Ooops.

Finally left to go out at about 2.30pm, we stopped for petrol and bought an over priced sarny for breakfast.

Most of the roads seemed to have large chunks missing surrounded by cones and barriers, often coupled with diversion signs. Strangely I didn't see any road workers.

Eventually got there, via the pretty route took two reels of film, and it was time to leave again.

Ate a crappy micro meal and rushed out again to go to photography class on the other side of the city.

I got to develop 4 films including the ones I'd taken earlier, and they all came out Well as far as you can tell from negatives, hopefully I'll get to make contact sheet prints from them all next week.

Got home and sat with a nice cuppa and some yummy biccies.

Over Dunked that one

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Mmm coffee

2005-11-03T00:27:36+01:00

Mmm coffee

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lazy day

2005-11-02T23:45:29+01:00

Well, today has been another one of those lazy doing nothing at all days.

Mostly today I have been looking out the window at the rain pouring down the road forming an ever increasing puddle at the bottom of the drive.

I'd include a pic, but it's dark out now (and I can't be arsed!)

I did the washing up (well some of it) and ate a microwave Quorn lasagne.

Gonna get a cuppa! I'll see if I can be bothered to write about yesterday after that.

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weird clouds

2005-11-02T23:26:16+01:00

clouds seen out my window

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