A cappella harmony makes me happy.

That is all.

How is it Friday already?

No, really. When did that happen?
I could have sworn it was only just last weekend?
I'm not complaining, but seriously. What happened to the days?
I think time is messing with me.
Because clearly time has nothing better to do.
I'm so confused right now.

 I should go to sleep.

Dydd Santes Dwynwen Hapus.

And a very happy Burn's Night to you all.
May your evening be filled with cwtches, whiskey, Welsh love and Scottish poetry.

<3

And now for something completely different.

This made me laugh so hard I cried. There are no words...

My capacity to eat junk food is disgusting.

Truly, truly disgusting.
Hello fatty.
Oh well, at least I'm still awesome.

Things that make me happy.

Processed cheese, L'Oreal nail polish for only two dollars and watching Anonymous in a pretty independent cinema.
Aside from the whole "promoting the idea that Oxford wrote Shakespeare's plays even though there isn't anywhere near enough evidence to support this claim and most scholars have rendered this argument invalid" thing, it's a rather wonderful film. And it was an entire two hours and ten minutes of listening to good old-fashioned British accents, which brings joy to the heart of a lone Brit in an icy sea of Canadian voices. It also has some rather lovely music in it, which did a lot to enhance the mood of the film, until I realised that the mood was being created by the music and started analysing it. I'm so much of a muso geek it hurts sometimes.
And even if nothing else had been good about the film (although I did find it to be quite wonderful) all would have been forgiven anyways, because I got to see a half-naked Jamie Campbell Bower recite Shakespeare. *swoon*

Lucky, lucky Ginny Weasley. *sigh*

3.15am fire alarm.

Minus twenty degrees outside.
Disgruntled Hannah.

KD.

The food of Gods.

Hello readers. I don't really have much to say to you today, except that I am happy. Why? Anybody's guess, but I find myself in a state of sheer contentment. And I like it. And it still looks like Narnia outside my window. And it's nearly the weekend. And I've been watching Darren Criss singing Tom Jones in red skinny jeans.

Life is good. :)
Here ends the smug blog post.

P.S. Justin Bieber's middle name is Drew. And they say you don't learn anything at university.

cdvsyiaofdns;ogdsohfdiu

I'm something of an emotional wreck after watching Sherlock. Then again, I'm something of an emotional wreck in general.
Sherlock is quite possibly most definitely the best thing to ever have graced television screens.
And not just because this man is in it:

And just FYI, I have every intention of marrying Benedict Cumberbatch (for the surname, as much as anything else). Although, you might not want to go hat shopping just yet.

Meet my favourite couple...

Shamy <3

Just a thought.

Maybe if you complain about having to get up early for church, it's not a good idea to be on Skype at 3.30am. Maybe, when you are on Skype, it might be courteous to not have your laptop at full volume, because the world doesn't really want to hear one side of your conversation, let alone both. And just as a side note, the volume issue also applies to your music, or whatever it is you call that. Having said that, I did enjoy the Spice Girls session of a few weeks ago.
Maybe it might be nice to not squeal and giggle like a Justin Bieber superfan during early morning Skype sessions. Or any Skype sessions, for that matter.
Maybe, just maybe, you should go to bed and shut the f**k up.

But hey, what do I know? I'm just a passive agressive roommate.

P.S. Most people appreciate being able to use their own kitchen and bathroom without finding copious amounts of hair all over the floor/themselves. Just sayin'.

Oh and by the way...

I no longer live in Ottawa. I now live in Narnia.

To the girl complaining about having wet feet: that's what you get for wearing Uggs in snow. Fool.
And to the guy wearing sandals in the snow: I'm not sure whether to respect you or question your sanity.

It's so pretty :)

And now from the sublime to the ridiculous.

Skip to 1:19 for my personal favourite movement, and please spare a thought for the poor souls of the Divertimento Orchestra (including yours truly) who have to play this without laughing hysterically.

If music be the food of love, play on.

Check me out being all English studenty and quoting Shakespeare. I'm so damn sophisticated.
I've fallen in love with Copland. Again. I'm the kind of person who likes to be listening to music all the time. I'm also the kind of person who finds it impossible to listen to music while reading, because I just end up singing along. And so I find myself scrolling through my iPod in search of wordless music to drown out the noise of university life while I read, and ended up re-acquainting myself with the utter babe that is Aaron Copland.

Write me a modulation like the one at 4:21, and I'll be yours forever. Makes me swoon every time. <3

Education, education, education.

So in the gushing sentimentality of my last post, I failed to mention that I'm back in Ottawa and have been thrust back into education with great gusto (the gusto being on education's part, not mine). The flight back was uneventful, aside from the random encounter with my Shakespeare prof from last term who apparently spent most of his break in Italy. Alright for some. I watched Beauty and the Beast on the flight, which made me very happy :)
New term means new classes, and a series of unfortunate kerfuffles means that I'm now taking five classes instead of four, and I have to leave choir (MASSIVE sad face) because apparently I'm just a stupid Brit who couldn't possibly know anything about American history compared to Canadians (because clearly proximity to a country increases your knowledge of it) and so even though the pre-requisite clearly states that you only need first-year English, my inferior knowledge and I have to take a second-year American Lit class in order to take a third year American Culture class, even though my GCSE history bears far more relevence to said American Culture class than the aforementioned American Lit class. Rant over.
So my classes this term are as follows:

• Brit Lit - continued from last term. Still boring, but yesterday we listened to Paolo Nutini, so I can't complain. And we're doing the Romantics and Austen and Dickens and Oscar Wilde and other such wonderful people, which is a marked improvement on an entire term of Pope and Swift.
• Shakespearean Drama - also continued from last term, but with a new professor who is an absolute babe. I've never been one to use the word "hunk," but in this case it is entirely appropriate. Sadly, he's married. I checked. As did every other girl in the class. And possibly some of the guys (the class has a lot of theatre people in it, not that I'm stereotyping).
• American Lit - ok, so I moaned about having to take it because I have to quit choir, but it's pretty good and the prof is both interesting and somewhat entertaining, as well as actually giving us relevent information. And it's all post-civil war, so none of the boring old stuff.
• American Culture - started that off with a bang with paedophilia. And you think I'm joking. I managed a quite spectacular coffee-juggling act in that class today, providing much entertainment for those around me. Apologies to the girl whose shoes now have coffee on them. Lots of books that I really want to read, which means that I might actually do the reading for this class - I'm already ahead (be impressed).
• Film Music - the last film on the syllabus is Shrek. 'Nuff said.

Perhaps my biggest mistake this term was the decision to take two three-hour night classes, both on days when I have other classes earlier on. While this preserves my free Mondays and makes Fridays something of a doddle, I fear that I might just die mid-week, but we shall see. I've survived thus far. On a positive note, I've actually made some friends in my classes, which is not to say that we'll be partying hard together every weekend, but I've established something of a network of people with whom I share various classes (I had a few last term, but not many) so I'll actually have people to talk to. The fact that some of them are of the rather attractive male variety is just the icing on the cake. This is also very useful as it has come to mine and Brittany's attention that now that Simone is back halfway across the world (miss you, little one <3), we don't really have any friends...
And now that the boring stuff about education has been documented, here for your viewing pleasure is a picture of me in a ridiculous hat...

And, just for giggles, here's a picture of Mark Twain holding a kitten.

That is all. I've got some Hamlet to read.
Goodnight.

No-one expects the Spanish Armada!

Those ships can be sneaky little bastards.
Happy New Year, my darling readers. I must apologise for not blogging over the Christmas period, but I was far too busy enjoying the fact that I was IN THE UK. Yes, I got to spend a whole eleven days in the beautiful land and pouring rain of Britain, and it was utterly wonderful.
But I'm getting ahead of myself.
When I last wrote to you (yes, this blog is actually a series of letters written to you, and you alone), I was about to hop on a bus to meet my sister in Toronto.
And to Toronto I did go. And it was lovely. My lack of luggage got me pushed to the front of a monstrously long queue at the bus station, which was a massive win as it got me on the first bus, and the guy I was sat next to on said bus was wearing a Superman hoody, so it was good times. I arrived in Toronto at 5.45am in a sleepless daze, and promptly fell asleep on my rucksack as I waited for my dear sister in the bus station. Toronto is a wonderful city. Even on a wet and dreary day like the one we unfortunately chose, it was amazing. We went to a little music garden, which supposedly had different sections based on the different movements of a Bach cello suite. All we saw were dead plants, some really pretentious descriptions of each "movement" of the garden, and some suspiciously young people having wedding pictures taken. I did, however, give a kick-ass poetry recital while standing on a rock. We then proceeded to the CN Tower, where we paid $30 each to look at mist and pretend to be logs (It was a simulated ride. We didn't just decide to lie really still on the floor). It was a life-changing experience. We wandered around the massive underground mall, watched a 4-piece soul boyband complete with Uncle Phil look-a-like and took a quick wander around bits of the university (shout-out to Becca Funsworth!) which has some gorgeous buildings, unlike Carleton which, as much as I love it, has about as much elegance as Jedward in tutus. We went to a market where we somehow managed to get haggled into buying some ice wine for our parents by a salesman who used to go to Carleton. What a coinkydink. After much shopping and Tim Hortons-consuming, we hopped back on a bus back to Ottawa, on which our hopes of sleep were quickly dashed by a charming fellow who felt the need to test the sound barrier with the volume of music coming out of his headphones. When I can hear your music over my own, then it's too loud, sunshine.
Anyway, now that Toronto's out of the way, I can get on to the really exciting business of the fact that I went home. After a decidedly less stressful plane journey than my one to Ottawa in September, I found myself excitedly greeting the gloomy skies of Britain, while being crushed by the embraces of my parents on Christmas Eve Eve. Words cannot actually describe just how wonderful it was to be home for Christmas. Although I did spend my first evening home crying and moping out of sleep-deprivation, jet-lag and the discovery that I had impetigo (only I could manage to get a skin infection that's most common among young children in hot and humid weather at the age of 19 in sub-zero temperatures). But, as it turns out, a 15-hour sleep can cure everything, and I sprung into Christmassy action with our Christingle service, complete with a 600-strong congregation, a 40-person orchestra and my first chance to sing carols. Yes, it took me until Christmas Eve to sing Christmas carols. I didn't even get to sing descants until Midnight Mass. Madness. Christmas itself was wonderful. Lots of food, lots of family, and the odd bit of casual racism from a tipsy great-aunt. What more could you need? I was also reminded of my favourite ever cracker joke, which I had a few years ago, and goes as follows:

What's yellow and writes poetry?

A ballpoint banana.

Make of that what you will, but whatever you do, don't suggest that the answer to the question is "an educated Chinaman". I don't think I stopped laughing for about 10 minutes. Casual racism ftw.

Home also meant seeing friends, which was more wonderful than I can even say, especially when said friends can get you 25% discount in Topshop (love you, Duckie <3).

The other exciting element of the holiday season was, wrth gwrs, New Year, and I spent mine in the home away from home that is Exeter. Friends, food, alcohol, cocktails, fireworks, real champagne in white plastic cups, "Am I Jesus?!", bad renditions of Auld Lang Syne, Narnia, Articulate, "lady shaver", sleepovers (not orgies), tea, Sound of Music, hugs, love, joy. If I listed everything that made that weekend wonderful, then this blog would be even longer and more tedious than it already is. Oh and I saw in 2012 while wearing a cat dress. Life doesn't get much better than that.

Words cannot even begin to express how much love I have for everyone at home and in Exeter that made my short but incredible time at home so amazing. I didn't realise until I went back just how much I miss have a constant network of amazing people around me, be it my family, my best friends, or the amazing musos of Exeter. I didn't feel home because I was in a familiar bed or a familiar house with the same old sofa and piano and Christmas decorations. All of the houses that I visited in Exe were ones in which I had never been before (such is the nature of student living). I felt at home because I was surrounded by the people that I love. I adore Ottawa, and Canada, and I'm happy to be back, but leaving home again damn near broke my heart. Apologies for the sentimentality, but I need to find some way of telling you people just how much you mean to me. It's a cliche to say that I'm one of the luckiest girls in the world, but I've always been of the mentality that a cliche is over-said for a reason. I sit here in Ottawa with a heart full of love for every single member of my family and for every single one of my friends, be you in Canada, Britain, France, Australia or any other part of this annoyingly large yet staggeringly small world. I wouldn't be the first to say that home is with the people that you love, but it's taken me until now to realise just how true that is.

And they say you don't learn anything worthwhile at university.

So while I promise that I will give you pictures and stories of Canadian adventures very soon, for now I will simply leave you with one hell of a lot of emotional, rambly, heartfelt love.

<3