a few things...

Over the bank holiday weekend Pod and I successfully managed to get through the whole of 24 series 2. thats about 22 hours or so i think of unadulterated TV viewing. Aided by 3 bottles of wine, a big pot of stew, a roast chicken, a seafood salad and cadbury's chocolate fingers. Oh yeah.

I got an email to say that ive been invited onto UCCF student council to be london rep. It's gonna be a lot of fun i think and i feel privleged to be able to give some of my time and energy back to UCCF and im sure its gonna be a really exicting year of learning too! woo hoo!

Tonight I ate big fat prawns. oh the joy of pulling off the tail and skin and popping it's succulent little body in my mouth. the taste of the sea, the taste of freshness. yum.

Right, Milly's coming over in a moment for drinks and anne of green gables. I love Milly.

hey that was cool...

Brilliant! Kath is in too...

hey that was cool...

Hooray!

Pod,Liz and a person i don't know called Chris have joined the project...

conversation with pod 4

Becci:"I just want to do some quirky arty thing that makes people happy."

Pod: "I think you should make some money."

fi's joined in!

well, Fi's joined up see her 365 days of coolness at www.coolfruits.blogspot.com

Lets get this thing going....!

that was cool

I've started up a new project called 'hey, that was cool' and im looking for a community to join in. Whether, you stop my blog regularly or are one of those random 'next blog' clickers...consider this: Are you glass half empty or glass half full? Do you find yourself amazed at people who seem happy, able to be thankful for the random little happenings when you seem to forget them? (am i beginning to sound like a cheesy advert?) At the risk of cheese, i wanna experiment with my mindset and see if i can change my outlook by, everyday, for a year consciously finding somethig *different* to say 'hey, that was cool' to. Different, every day different. Like being thankful. Every day, for 365 days...Join in, I dare you...erhem, actually my experiment won't work unless you do...

http://thatwascool.blogspot.com

so, set up your blog...whats good?

til your grace sings so loud

There's a small cloud in the distance
So i'll keep on walking
til your grace sings so loud
I can't hear myself talking

And i tear hard this brittle bone
And i drink deep this wine
I live rich on the meat of this table
Cause its here where i can find
The grace of a saviour
The face of a lover
The absence of what i fear
I'm not alone, for here i've found my home.

end of...

so, it's the end of an era. Megs, my American housemate is flying back to Oregon tomorrow afternoon. The five of us, Megan, Sam, Margot, Laurel and myself have all lived together for two years and now we're parting ways. So this weekend we've had the mother of all party weekends. Last night we had the goodbye party for megs. We themed the whole house to represent all the seasons in which we've had parties. Becuase Sam is season crayz we have so many tacky decorations its unbelievable. Megs' room was hallooween, the kitchen was thanksgiving, the hallway was valentines and the living room was christmas crazy.

The party went on until 5am at which point we crashed, people everywhere. it was a bit mad. i still look at my friends, and the other people i dont know at these parties, totally drunk and high and just ache inside for them, and long that they would know Jesus. On guy got so drunk that we got our old matress and put it in the halway for him to sleep on.at 6 am, he got up and peed on it and then puked three times. He stumbled home, really embarassed about 4 hours later. Why?

This morning we all went for brunch together and then set about gutting our house of all the rubbish, stale smells and party leftovers. Then we cleansed ourselves...


It feels weird really, after two years. But im glad to be moving on too. It's not been easy and my longings are still there. I just pray God will keep working.

award update

So we didnt win the award, but i didnt expect to which is cool. the LGBT society won istead...we therefore didnt stand a chance...hmmm. anyhoo it was a good night and all the kickboxing crew came to support me. It's always funny when we hang out cos we all look totally different with hair not scraped back and sweat dripping from every surface. nice. But it was great and good to be able to nail my colours more, as it were! afterwards, I had a great chat with Lee, my coach about stuff, he's a really interesting guy, very perceptive and good to talk to. Faith, philosophy, art and life:always a great combination.

Anyway, gotta go to Interface arts thing now...

Goldmsiths CU...society of the year?!

Every year the Students Union hold an awards night to give awards to outstanding societies, soceity members etc. There's trophies and prizes and drinks and stuff. Today I had a phone call to say that the Christian Union have been nominated as college society of the year! Crazy. So on Friday when the awards ceremony occurs, we might win...maybe. I was wondering whether it's a good thing. I think it is in the sense that we've been really active this year and made our presence known, we should be doign things that mean we live peaceably with all etc etc. But at the same time I wonder how much we should actually be hated for what we stand for and whethr therefore we stand firm enough...hmmm, anyway.

work expereince...

Right now I'm doing some work over in Teddington which is fab. It's a documentary commissoned, orginally by the BBC and now by channel 4 about a film by directed by Kenneth Brannagh. The film is an adaption of the opera, Magic Flute, that's been adapted by Kenneth and Stephen Fry. So basically Kenneth Branagh is directing a film which will be out in cinemas sometime next year whereby he's taken a bunch of opera singers and has been getting them to act in this film. The documentary follows the process of this. It's been an incredible few days for so many reasons.

I'm involved in postproduction. Which, to cut a long story short, before the editing to make the documentary happens, all the films (95 of them!!) have to be digitised and also each clip/time break labelled and transcripted. It's my job to set the films digitising through the mac and then transcript EVERYTHINg that happens. Its incredbly fascinating.

Fascnating to be involved in the process of making a documentary.
Fascinating to see so much footage about the making of a film. Like one 5 minute scene taking ALL day to get right! And with all it's different angles being shot etc.
Fascinating to see a film being merged with opera.
Fascinating to begin to see the art and beauty and technicality in opera
Fascinating to transcript all the interviews with Kenneth and the actors/actresses and see what they have to say, the depth of their understanding of what's happening and the themes and meanings etc. It's fab.
Fascinating to think through the possibilites of media that's responisble and ethical and the whole idea of making art and about art and culture really interests me.

It's all just very cool.

http://www.myspace.com/songsbyrich

nothing left but you.

fish obbsession part2

yesterday pod and i went to borough market and ate scallops freshly picked from teh sea-you could even meet the divers. they were presented in the shells. yummy. we also ate mussles.

today we had sushi in greenwich and then spent ages in a bookshop salivating over fish recipe books. its all a little weird.

grrr

man im confused. ive lost track again of what's right. and im frustrated. sometime i wish people would SAY what they felt and meant rather than something else. it would just make life so much easier and pleasant for all. blah. i might delete this post. ill see how i feel tomorrow. i dont like being negative but then this is reality.

I hate cameras

ARGH...my pentax camera is annoying me SO much. Everytime i try and take a roll of film something happens. This time, with a whole roll of film from the last 2 months of memories as I wound the film back for some reason the whole reel ripped itself out of the cannister and wrapped itself around the other reel at the end. Which, basically equals a roll of ruined photos. Brilliant. And i wonder why digital is so much more popular. ARGH.

day 2 of the summer holidays...

Brilliant...day two...

I got up early this morning and had a picnic on the field at college with some of my best girlies from CU. We havent hung out in so long because we all act like hermits when we're stressed...We ate bacon sandwiches and croissants and sat in the sun and caught up on each other's lives.

3 of the 5 of them had to go and do their art things and Kate and I had nothing to do, being ladies of leisure that we are. So I was like:

Me: "Kate, what ya doing today?"
Kate: "Nothing."
Me: "No me neither. Shall we hang out?"
Kate: "Yeah, what dya wanna do?"
Me: "I dunno...it's a nice day."
Kate: "Something in London?"
Me: "Shall we go to the beach?"
"Brighton?!"
Kate: "OK"

So we caught the train to Brighton and spent the day sitting on the beach in the sun, reading and chatting, catching up on weeks of unsaid life. Then we ate icecream on the pier. Then we wandered through the shops and got fish and chips and sat on the beach until 8pm. (Kate on the beach)
Then we got the train back. What a wicked day!!

yay, thames path!

hehe...i had a great afternoon. I got on my bike and cycled the length of my guidebooks 'Thames Path'. It took me from Deptford, along the Thames, through the beautiful Rotherhithe to Tower Bridge, over Tower Bridge (which opened!)then through wapping, Shadwell, Canary Wharf, Isle of Dogs then under the Thames into Greenwich.

It took me about 2.5 hours and was SO cool. The route is so beutiful at points with parks and the river and millionaire flats over looking the water with decking and chairs and flowers and things. There's loads of apartments that have the overhead walkways and cobble streets giving a flavour of London's merchantile past and old industrialisation.

Continuous changing perspectives of the beauty of the meandering river, the hustle and bustle of city life, wealthy flats and people with stories to tell. Green park land filled with sunbathers and darting kids and the looming scapes of canary Warf with it's waterside bars and restaurants. All finished off with an icecream in the wonderful Greenwich!

Any London bloggers fancy joining me sometime?

first morning of the summer holidays

This morning I cleaned my room, watched TV, read a magazine, read 2 Peter and thought about what it means to carry on in light of God's promises, and in a little while I'm going to get on my bike and cycle the thames path.

I am SO glad this year is over. Honestly, it hasn't been fun. Just one of those years when the majority of the time you don't really feel like you're LIVING.

God continues to be good and I'm looking forward to the summer and to my final year and the whole new adventure that that will be. Hoorah.

The sun is shining. yippidoodaday

here comes the summer sun...

BRILLIANT...that's me done for the summer. Yee ha!

love love love shooby dooby doo...

1 exam down, one to go. YES. and then i am free free free. woob-di-doo.

On a different note. I felt loved again yesterday, really loved:
"I will sing the wondrous story of the Christ who died for me."

Funny thing is I know I am loved. Always. I just long for that to be an ongoing expereince, that I might act and feel and speak and think like I believe it to be true.

Ok, back to revision. brilliant.

my...er...intereresting boyfriend...

hahaha...

well, i was going to write a little something about how wonderful Pod has been to me recently, patient and patient again with my stress, anxiety and general weirdness...

BUT i just read his latest blog entry...what the...?!?!?!?!
Go check it out and please, tell him there's being a buisness man and then there's being a buisness freakoid...
www.livejournal.com/users/podbo

beauty and deformity.

"I see poetry as the medium most similar to photography...or at least the photography I pursue. Like poetry, photography, is rarely successful with narrative. What is essential is the 'voice' (or 'eye') and the way this voice pieces together fragments to make something tenuously whole and beautiful."
Alec Soth

the series that this print is taken from is called 'Dog Days. Bogota'. Alec Soth and his wife adotped a little girl from Bogota, Colombia and he set about to 'capture some of the beauty that existed in this hard place.' Having spent the summer of 2004 in Bogota, these photos bought back memories and an interesting take on a city of simulatsously hardship and beauty.

Beauty and disformity. Creation and the fall. One day all will be made new but for now we live in a world that is at one time hard and at the same beautiful. Art that expresses just a utopian vision of the world is deceiving and unhelpful.That's not the world that exists and helps us understand nothing about what it means to live in the world that we do. The reality is of sheer beauty and yet utter depravity. The depravity makes us long for beauty, for wholeness, for the One who made all things beautiful and will one day start again.

it's all a little fishy...

Yesterday Pod and I took a trip to Birmingham to the National Sealife centre. It was VERY cool. My favourite bit was the baby seahorses and the HUGE sea turtles. They even had a Nemo section where they had all the real life versions of the fish in the film. In another tank they had these rays that when they swam looked like they were flying through the sea. This trip promoted two reactions.

1)awe and wonder for the Creator. So much variety and not only so many different types of fish but each fish had it's own personality-way of living, breeding, feeding etc.

2)A distinct craving for fish....I couldn't work out whether this was a good thing or a slightly sadist expression...HOWEVER,

We left the sealife centre and went to an art gallery where we had some food. A fish salad (squid, prawns, mussles, oysters in a sauce)

Later that night we went out for dinner to a French Restaurant where we shared Mussels in a garlic butter sauce for starter and both had fried sea bass for main.

We were going to follow this with ice cream at home...Ben n Jerry's pfish food..but we were too stuffed. And maybe just a little fishied out...