from the NME website a long time ago...

Faris Badwan of The Horrors explains his lyric writing process thus:

"You can never tell if you like [a lyric] until you've had a while to decide. I have the '24 hour rule' - if you write something down and it doesn't make you cringe the next morning then you're alright."

I like this, I think that is a good rule for creating anything.

aestheticism

Inferior poets are absolutely fascinating. The worse their rhymes are, the more picturesque they look. The mere fact of having published a book of second-rate sonnets makes a man quite irresistible. He lives the poetry that he cannot write.

- Oscar Wilde

the uni post.

The uni post. It needed doing. ;)

So, tomorrow I will have been here for a week! Officially a student. It feels odd to read my blogger updates (not to mention post a blog) from my own laptop but at an unfamiliar desk, in an unfamiliar room.
Uni, I won't lie, has been a little bit of a shock to the system. After spending the last ooh 2 years constantly being lectured about uni, talked to about uni, asked about uni...I was beginning to feel sick of it before I'd even started. But let me tell you, it is just nothing like everyone describes it.
Not being the most outgoing of personalities, and chancing upon having a rather small flat, I won't pretend that meeting people has been easy because it hasn't. But I know I'm not the only one who is a little bit lonely, which makes me a little happier.

The place itself though is truly beautiful. I am by the great British seaside, anyone who knows me knows how much I adore the sea, so when it all gets too much I can go for a wander and watch the waves from the beach. Bliss. :) And come to think of it, I am studying creative writing so I had better find somewhere better to write than the window of Starbucks...

At the risk of sounding like an utter geek, I really can't wait for my course to start. I know it will be a lot of hard work, but sometimes it feels like people forget why we have come here. Its all so new and exciting!!

If anyone else has ever felt this strange feeling; a mixture of nerves, happiness, excitement, homesickness, confusion, trepidation and adventure, then I'm sure you will be able to assure me that the bad bits will fade and the good bits will win out.
As the mothership keeps reminding me, what kind of writer has never been anguished? haha.
one day I'm sure I will read this back and think 'whaaa? it wasnt that bad!'
that day will make me smile

good luck to everyone else starting uni this weekend! love every moment!
x

Somewhere.

I cannot tell you how excited I am for this film to come out!

I have been waiting since I saw the trailer in, ooh about July-time? and it just looks so perfect. But to be honest, I'd sort of forgotten about it, until last night I heard on the radio (because I live in the past, and don't actually own a tv of my own, therefore at night depend on my darling radio) that Sofia Coppola has won the Golden Lion at Venice Film Festival this year, for this very film.

(Plus, of course, I and every other fashion-mag reader in the western world is waiting to see whether or not Elle Fanning will follow in the stylish footsteps of her elder sister. I really loved The Runaways.)

In short..
HURRY UP AND BE OUT IN THIS COUNTRY!!!

x

by the old oak tree, how i love things as they used to be

3 updates in one night?
BAM.

But I couldn't resist, I was idly browsing the internets (partially waiting for my hair to dry before I go to bed because I don't like to use a hairdryer if I don't have to, and partially playing the if-i-had-the-money-i'd-buy game...) and I realised - in a Clueless like moment - just how totally, majorly, butt-crazy in love I am with Peter Pan collars.

These three beauts are all from Miss Selfridge.

Can you believe it!?!

Whilst part of me hates when vintage styles come into fashion, because savvy vintage/charity shop owners hike up the prices of that previously bargain item, I cannot deny the cuteness.

Sigh.
x

The Ideas Book

Today I bought a non-lined A4 hardbacked notebook. Sensational news, I know.

I've had an identical one for a few months now, in which - inspired by a blog I saw - I have made my own Lookbook. The pages are stuffed full of anything and everything cut from the pages of magazines and newspapers. It started off being purely fashion - cable knit cardies, maxi-dresses with shearling boots, grungy florals with dirty plaids, Mulberry heels, a Tatler spread... all the looks I would wish to emulate had I the capacity/patience, and all the looks that genuinely do inspire me if I need to look nice but am uninspired. But the book is no longer fashion, because I couldnt resist cutting out other things that inspire me - nice photography, interviews, articles, interiors etc. The book is now so thick it barely closes...ooops.
Well anyway, since the original book is full, I havent any mags left to destroy,
I am off to Uni next week, and am anticipating that after the haze of the first few busy, exciting, stressful weeks, I will occasionally need something to occupy my mind - and my hands. My ultimate dream is to become a screenwriter, and I am constantly opening text files, blurting out ideas, and saving them under file names which are frankly so enigmatic that I never read them again. So I have started the Ideas Book.

When I have quite finished blubbing over the end of The History Boys (one of the few films in the known universe to make me weep) I am going to go work on it some more.

Its so cathartic, I think everyone should do one, on the subject that they think about all the time. It might make you realise just how many ideas you really have.


x

music when the lights go out

if I could have any hairstyle in the world...

...(and considering that my bezzie-mate has already nicked Florence's superhero locks)...

...I would like this.

But with black at the ends, not pink, because lets be honest - if your wardrobe doesn't consist solely of Proenzer Scholer and you don't look like that model, there is no way neon-pink hair can work in real life.
Or, and this is something I could seriously consider, leaving my hair its natural very dark brown with the ends dyed - wait for it - grey.

A bit fashion forwards I guess but, going by Nylon magazine's Fashion Week tweets, streaks of grey are going down at Cynthia Rowley and I'm anticipating this trend emerging from the other shows. I can see why - as a colour its chic, pretty, and subtle enough not to limit how you dress. (But if you really were clashing horribly, since its only the ends it could be easily hidden with my go-to style, a messy bun high up on the head).

Hmmmmmmmmm.
Grey hair? Will it catch on?

x

i caved

twitter.com/je_suis_anglais

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