And Now For Something Completely Different.

I have a recollection of what it was like to have a fashion blog.  About second hand clothes.  What it was like to be a bit of a hipster.
Perhaps I am coming out of a coma?
Let me throw bodacious pieces of my collection at you to distract from the lack of cohesion in the post.

Mother's bowling shoes.  the best, the BEST.  Inspiration for me to keep all of my clothes for future children/cats.

Grand ol hippy shawl from retro shop in Oamaru's Historic Precedent.  

Should I promise some proper outfitty posts sometime?  Naah.

Desert Island Books

Ok.  This page is dusty.  And I haven't been properly contributing to our little corner of the internet.  I won't apologise, because I am the dictator of this blog.  But I will start commenting and being a positive citizen again.

Nowthat'sdone.


English reading and upcoming 24 hour book sale is fuelling  my perpetual book obsession.  This tag via kayleyreads looked spiffing.  Theoretical debate on what to bring to a desert island.  No survival books allowed.  There is only room for sentimentality on this life raft.
   
A book you have read & would like to re-read.
One of the John Green Triumvirate.  Paper Towns, Looking for Alaska or The Fault in Our Stars.  I'd glue the covers together to form one glorious volume.  Doubt I could decide.

A book you have never read & would like to read.Lord of the Rings Trilogy.  Or Grapes of Wrath.  Actually probably LOTR.  To satisfy need for fiction and history.

A childhood book.Anne of Green Gables.  No question.

A series.The Chronicles of Narnia.  Can't think of any series I really care about enough to want to take.  Wish I was less generic with these choices.  Maybe I should just take multiple copies of Dancing with Cats.  I hope there are cats on this island.

Random choice!
Something satisfying and uninspired like Complete Works of Shakespeare.


Am interested in what words others would wish to take.  Maybe we could be stranded on the same island and form a library.

Let me recommend you.

I don't whore things on my blog.  So please realise that when I share this I do so because I want it to continue, not to be annoying.

Oh please let this series have web virility.  Good stories should be retold.

P.S On the sad poetry.  University is a privilege, and I am rather enjoying myself.  The outpouring my most poetical soul was caused by leaving home after Easter break earlier than expected.  Also having two essays too many due on one day.  They are both complete and I am not feeling the Muse so much now.  All is well.

i was told to blog more. so i spam you with poetry.

Leaving home after too short a time feels like
a little hollow space
expanding in gut.

Cat purring, quilted bed,
soup, family jest
not available in new independent life.

Stress magnifies sadness.

I need a cup of tea.

First Day.

An outfit post!  What is this witchery?  Time to get back into the swing of blog things.  And study things.  Urgh study.  Lectures are daunting.  They whiz through so quickly.  Sorry Professor, what was that insightful thing you just said? Could you please repeat?  Or at least leave slides up long enough for us to copy them down.  I expect I'll feel overwhelmed and ridiculous for this semester.  Or the rest of my life.  Hyperboles always make me feel better.

Attended a meeting for Debating (or was it Drinking?) Society yesterday.  After short announcement everyone was invited back to a flat for cheeky Tuesday night shindig.  Let's acknowledge that it was a TUESDAY night.  Woohoooo?  I attended said Tuesday flat party, for 15 minutes.  More to be able to say I attended than actually wanting to socialise on a Tuesday night.  Seriously Tuesday?  

Not trying to be artistic, insanely difficult to take full length outfit photo.

As worn on first day of lectures:
Shirt - Random retro shop in Otaki
Mullet Dress - Jay Jays $15.  Never call these 'asymmetrical' or 'waterfall'.  No point beautifying a mullet.
Scarf - Yaks n Yetis
Earrings - Kismet.  Resin and Kimono fabric.  Apologies for lack of link.  They're pretty underground
Polish - ~Justin Beiber~ for OPI <3 xoxoxo gg ;P

Whilst blogging I recieved text saying "Learn more! Revise!".  I will attempt.  :/

Going Well to the Great Perhaps.

Tonight I come to you as a bona fide University Student.  Let's just take a moment to appreciate this.  It's been misimagined, stressed over, longed for and dreamed about since I first heard parental mythologies of student days.  The chapter where Anne goes to Queens was bookmarked for reference halfway through last year.  And now here I sit, in a knitted poncho, in a Hall of Residence, in New Zealand's oldest University.  


Although bursts of emotions have preceded University I don't feel particularly momentous or sentimental.  Moving in didn't feel profound; it just happened.  Experience has not been sullied by expectation but I feel the build up to this amazing thing has been an occasion in itself.  Urgh that sounds disgustingly try-hard-philosophyish.  Apologies.  


Meeting new people is pretty wonderful.  We must savour the awkwardness for soon it shall pass and we will know each other far too well.  The social need to be extrovert and exhibitionist to fill the holes of not knowing anyone is tiring.  Having a solitary, not-lonely moment in room (Although am very glad of art from home and John Green books to keep me company).  The clothes on floor feel like me.  The scratchy dust cover on bed does not.*  Wagon Wheel on repeat is comforting.  Not by weeping, but in a slightly unfamiliar disconcerting way, do I feel homesick.**  It doesn't sound like home.***  But I type that and look at the photo of my Grandparents and any frown is flipped.  It was time to go and it is good.


Dad wrote me to "Go Well" in my University adventures.  Deserve Success.  Do hard things.  Looking for Alaska**** starts of with the seeking of something radically other: "'I go to seek a Great Perhaps.' That's why I'm going.  So I don't have to wait until I die to start seeking a Great Perhaps."  The Great Perhaps is upon me.  Time to fulfil a wanderlust with learning, new friends and frolicking.  

My room is HUGE.  Instead of the Cupboard Under the Stairs I found Narnia when I opened the door.  

*Mother Dearest, could I please be sent my duvet and tri-pillow with the next car coming my way?  And A3 paper, green wool coat and the small brown bag with long strap?  It is hanging in the left side of my wardrobe.  Thank you very much.
**This song is the sole reason for pleasing English marks.  Bluegrass calms a girl down.
***Dave, I miss your singing.
****I am unironically enthusiastic about John Green's authorship.

In the same way I am told to be gentle on my teeth when brushing I was told to blog by my Mother.  There is no need to apologise for my lack of presence on the site.  It is summer and existence is simple.  Work takes up most of the time.  The rest is filled with family, soul completing time with kindred spirits and reading.  Sleep deprivation is a fine balance.  I am enjoying the break from school work and from blogging.  

A lunch time lake swim.  Blissful experience.  

Summer time was kicked off with the Op Shop Crawl.  Road tripping with a best friend seems a teenage rite of passage.  It was a memorable day, not so much for the op shopping, but for the solid friendship, delicious pork buns, navigational errors of losing Lawrence, picking up English-name-Deb hitch hiker and loud raucous singing in car.

View from road trip.  

With the goal of expanding knowledge and enjoyment I have challenged myself to read 50 books this year.  Words is how I connect to my world.  My fingers tingle when I pick up a book.  Does anyone else have a reading goal?  I've joined Goodreads.  Please, PLEASE add me.  I would dearly love to see all of your favourite books.

University is looming.  I am on the tip of this much anticipated thing.  Student loan forms which I cannot ignore are sitting on desk.  It is terrifying and exciting.  This will probably be all I blog about in the coming weeks.  

Looking forward to another groovy year of Owlinalarkworld,
Stay Classy.

Hobbit Countdowns.

Today marks one year till The Hobbit's release.  Don't have the luxury of growing a beard and being a miscellaneous dwarf to the premiere?  Never fear!  I have prepared some costumes to celebrate the coming of Bilbo.

Dressing as Gollum is super fun.  Tape half-cooked spaghetti to a vaguely beige head covering.  Then precede to creep around looking disaffected.  I have chosen to carry a fish related product for extra shire-cred.

Smaug's treasure is under appreciated in the world of Middle Earth.  This costume is all about empathy.  Imagine the embarrassment of being upstaged by a scrawny ring!  Tape silverware, jewellery and things which shine to body.  To convince yourself of intrinsic and narrative worth mutter the motivation adage; I AM preccioouuuusssss.  The Oscar I am holding was actually won by the LOTR crew a few years back.  Every New Zealander got one.

365 days till second breakfast!  Mucho excitement.

Bedroom Adornments. Op Shop Crawl HELP.

As creepy as it sounds I always ask to see people's bedroom when I visit their place of residence.  What someone adorns their personal space with is a weird insight into their mind.  It's always excellent to know people better.  The following are snippets of my room.  Please share yours.

I imagine the picture on the top left is the view from Lennie and George's farm.   It's actually a  British landscape.   In my head, at least, the dream of the rabbits lives on.  

Photographs.  Aren't I artistic?

Op Shop art.  Pensive velvet-suited children are the best.

Sarah Larnach's album art for Liam Finn and Ladyhawke.  Watercolours, kittens and beards.  Oh My.

50c from Butterflies Hospice Op Shop.  I call it 'Romanian Dancing Girls'.  Take note of Emerald City in the background.

Engineered Valentine.  Organisation of such things diminishes any romance.

By Rachel Hirabayashi. 

Queen Liz blackboard which gives me inspiration. 

The Monkey.  ♥ 

My Grandmother's HOMEMADE SPAGHETTI.  Which I can unreservedly say to be the best sustenance.  Ever.

Op Shop kitten.  I legitimately used it as motivation to study.   

Groovy old sheets and card from artistic, zany cousin.

Dear blog readers, I am in need of assistance.
My totally awesome best friend is organising an Op Shop Crawl.
An OSC works on the same principle as a Pub Crawl.  Except with second hand stores and cooler people.
To maximise the epic fun times their will be rules during the Crawl.
Existing guidelines include:

• Soundtrack for the crawl must be from an op shop.  Extra points for a musician with a perm.
• The participants in the Crawl must begin the day with t-shirt and shorts.  They must end the day with fabulous and hipster attire.  
• The 'Your Pants' game must be played in the literature section of each Op Shop visited in the Crawl.  The game consists of adding 'your pants' to the end of a book title.  This makes the title instantly more humorous.  For example: 'A River Ran out of Eden - in Your Pants'.

Your bodacious, creative and inspired contributions to the rules would be most welcome.

xx

Collective Post. There will be subtitles.

Election.
I had plans for an analytical political round up.  An angsty tantrum foiled such plans.  Debating and discussing the  opinions you have spent time forming is something to thrive on.  This blog doesn't seem the best forum for such debates.  It also takes a lot of effort to intelligently write on important matters.  A National government was expected.  I am not a member of the John Key fan club.  He is not a leader that promotes compromise.  Congratulations must go to the Greens.  Let's hope for positive, tangible change from them. 


Birthday.
Today is my final day of being 17.  Last year I regrettably missed the opportunity to obsessively sing '16 going on 17'.   The 2nd of December will not go to waste; I intend to spend it with Stevie Nicks 'On the Edge of Seventeen'.  Are your irony sensors singing?  I am the eligible age to vote exactly a week after the General Election.  Blarghf.


Second Hand Gems.
A spontaneous holiday to Dunedin heralded a jackpot.  The op shops were kind.  I will show ze clothing when I wear it.

Mother dear spotted these on the way out of Re-Store.  $10

Someone said 60's bowling bags.  I'm in a glass case of emotions.

Published in 1938.

I only purchased this to look at.  I wonder if it is disrespectful to all the learning books offer.   

Drive.
This movie.  An action film shot like art house.  Dialogue, fake blood and music (listen) were used sparingly and precisely.  The hands did cover the face during the violence BUT IT WAS WORTH IT.  Shots of the driving were such a pleasure to watch.  I even liked the tacky font used.  Also, Ryan Gosling.  I command ye to watch'th it.

Books.
Finished reading 'Dewey: The Small Town Library Cat who Touched the World'.  I have no issue with gratuitous talk of kitties so I found it enjoyable.  And Mr John Green read out the second chapter of TFIOS.  Have I mentioned 'The Fault in Our Stars'?  TheFaultinOurStarsTheFaultinOurStarsTheFaultinOurStars.  7-21 business days after January the 10th baby. 

Summer reading brings happiness.

Previous post clarification.
Let me translate.  Blue hair does not mean Ramona Flowers.  It means the tips will be semi-permanently blue.  I apologise for the lack of bad assery.  The eating of stone fruit is far less philosophical than it sounds.  Apricots, nectarines, peaches and cherries are abundant in my corner of the universe.  Though I suppose to 'eat stone fruit' could also be interpreted as expanding ones mind through the consumption of difficult and hard to understand stone-like ideas.  Yeaahh.


Surprise Study Break.

This is what a friend did for me.  No words.