My recent addiction is hoodies. I got one that I wear with a tank top and jeans sometime ago and I love it! But I don’t wanna wear it out because it’s so cute – a very light pink undertone. Speaking of which, most of the contents of my closet sit on hangers in a corner in someone else’s room now. My room isn’t naked enough for renovations yet and I’m so tired of packing already but at the same time stubbornly refusing help because I want to know where everything ends up.

The mare I rode last time (also known as D) is one that I haven’t been on for about a year. She is friendly, energetic and very cheerful. She is very happy to be asked to do things and tries very hard for her rider. One bad thing is that when others ride her she is pretty much taught to follow. When we were alone she listened to just me, but when other people came in she kept trying to run off and follow them. I think I did well having her listen to just me. If people are a few meters in front of me trotting, and she trots – I slow her to a walk, then ask her for a trot a few minutes later. She loves to canter. Her back is very comfortable for me! She quickly picks up on the canter, you only have to tell her once and she responds instantly. She is so happy to be asked to canter that she sometimes bucks/half-rears when she does it. I don’t think that she does this because she is in pain or anything because she has always been like this (she’s pretty young). Last year one girl I rode with accidently asked her to canter (it was her second day riding) and she half reared and the girl fell. Others freaked out about it, but really – the mare just stood there when she realized that no one was on her back which tells us that she is very well broke, she wasn’t upset or scared.

I read that some horses really are happy to be asked to canter that they buck. Although they do this, usually the trainer must stop them and then ask them to canter again until they learn to do it without bucking. Even though she isn’t my horse and her owners are the ones that should be concerned with this, it is a good thing to keep in mind.

Maybe some of you remember how my last jumping lesson went last year? It was hilarious on so many levels, but I haven’t really jumped since then. Except my accidental-on-purpose trotting over poles with S which caused him to jump a little (trainer removed the polls when she realized what I was doing!).

Yesterday, though, as I was cantering with D I lost my stirrups. Usually I like to canter without stirrups but these days I’m trying to teach myself to canter with them so I can go back to jumping lessons. I am getting much better at finding my stirrups while in the canter, but I guess doing that takes away most of my concetration so I didn’t actually tell D to stay near the wall of the indoor we were riding in. There were two poles placed sort of in the middle… and as soon as trainer realized where we were going she called out, “No! Don’t go that way! She’s going to jump!”

And she did.

It was… the coolest thing. The first time I ever got to experiance jumping while in canter. Know what the best part was? I didn’t fall. Although I felt like I was flying, I managed to regain my position after the jump and into the canter. Know what else? I hadn’t found my stirrups yet. I was pretty shaken up at the time (and it was the end of my riding time anyway). But as we were driving home I thought, “You know what? I wanna do this again!”. Can you tell I really like jumping? I wouldn’t mind riding D again also because she obviously loves to jump. On my last jumping lesson the horse needed a lot of encouragement to jump… and a lot of the time he actually jumped from halt (which caused several amusing accidents because I wasn’t prepared), but D? The only thing I told her was to canter on her right lead!

One other thing that I find extremely adorable about D (other than the way she looks and her size, of course) is that whenever we stand next to other horses she goes out to nuzzle them. I usually let her because I think it’s good for her to be social when we aren’t particularly doing anything.

Today I will leave you with screencaps from Persona: trinity soul. My sister and I really like it so far.

One of my recent DeviantArt favourites was actually a part of a competition that took place here several years ago. Feel free to check out their main website for details on all the horses. If you’ve been to Dubai and have seen the painted horse sculptures all around – then you will recognize them from this website. A person I knew from school actually took place in this event with several different horses, but I won’t be posting their name here for their privacy. It is just amazing that you can give different people the exact same scupltures and come out with all sorts of unique results.

Some recent news and blurbs:

• I am growing tolerance to coffee: No joke! I recently drank some Arabic Coffee and didn’t have a headache ag all, it was one of the most amazing things. I may dislike the smell of Nescafe, but all other types of coffee’s gave me a semi-instant headache.


• I lost weight, but then gained it back again: It was something like 2 kgs but now they’re back. How annoying! I think the power is back in our gym so I could probably get back to work soon.


• Considering club membership: To make aerobics/yoga/pilates/ice skating lessons cheaper, and get a reasonable discount on my packages at Dalouk and Orchid.


• Craving my coffee scrub: Because it smells absolutely heavenly. Maybe this point should go with the tolerance to coffee? I am definately starting to smell coffee in that little jar.


• Packing is taking forever: But of course, when you sit around all day writing, or updating your deviantart and youtube accounts with pictures and videos, you probably won’t get any packing done anyways!
  
• Morning French lessons have been bad: Probably because I am not a morning person and I already knew that. Doing something athletic in the morning? No problem at all, I may even be better because being sleepy makes my brain work less which incidently causes me to push beyond what would normally be considered an obstacle or a limit (aka. common sense for my scardeycat head). Something intellectual or requiring thought and concentration? No way.
  

When we went out yesterday, we went to a little shop called Pixi (Orchid Beauty Boutique stocks some of their products), and these are what I came home with:

First off, I would like to share some inspirational videos that were posted on YouTube. Beware, though, they have forced me to activate my tear ducts and if you’re not up for that sort of thing don’t say I didn’t warn you. Please watch them in this order: One, two and three. I watched them in reverse order as I am subscribed to the user that posted them, but did not watch many of their older videos.

Next order of business; I am suffering a writer’s block thus put up whatever I have of my story in hopes of having the slates wiped clean causing me to have some form of inspiration. But maybe it’s too soon to tell.

Lastly, I have a point-and-shoot again! It is an older version of the camera that my friend Ai has. Hers is the Canon PowerShot SD850 I believe, and mine is the SD750, I’m happy with the purchase so far. The good thing about my old camera dying, though, is that I was forced to start using my DSLR more often. Its size and weight discouraged me from taking it anywhere but I guess necessity is the mother of invention, and that’s all I’ll say about that.

These pictures were actually taken with the camera that died. A tray of chocolates that a friend brought over. I am not permitted to go anywhere near it as I have a sugar induced headache!

It has been a while since I’ve watched the guild, so I’ve been catching up! I’d be lying if I said it didn’t make me even more nostalgic towards being in an online game with a guild and stuff. Speaking of which, my ROSE trial ran out and I decided that I won’t renew yet, I don’t want game time hanging over my shoulders when I won’t have a computer!

Top five things I hate about weddings:

1. Getting ready: for us this means sit around lazily while someone else does your hair and make up. It is absolutely boring and takes up the good part of an afternoon.


2. Getting dressed: because with dresses of this type, style and weight – you cannot possibly put on by yourself. If you did not need help with the zipper, then you will need help with the shoes, and if not, someone will have to fasten your bracelet/necklace because you couldn’t possible reach them yourself (given the fact that you couldn’t reach your feet to buckle your shoes). Didn’t I say I wanted to wear a pair of breeches and tall boots?


3. Seeing people: there is something about how walking into a room full of people your family knows, but you personally do not necessarily know, that expect you to go over there and say hello when you don’t even know their names. What’s worse is that they sometimes do know your name, but you are standing there staring in awe because you have no means of addressing them.


4. Drama: there has never been an event in this size without any amount of drama. However small, it’s usually there for everyone to cope with. Even if it’s just an argument started with “Who forgot to bring the last basket of pasteries?” or “Why is the photographer late? Did someone tell her the time wrong?”. We all just have to deal with it with a graceful smile because this day will soon be over and we’ll all get to go home.


5. Getting home: No matter how tired and sleepy you are, you still have to wash several layers of make up and hairspray (which, by the way, has put you in a state of constant headache) and clean up the mess you made while getting ready before you can sleep.

Top five things I love about weddings (or this wedding):

1. Seeing people: Although there is a number of people you don’t know, there is a bunch of them that you do know and are quite fond of and are happy to see, and will have something to say to them. Even with people you are not familiar with, if you are friendly enough (and they are interested enough), you never know, you might meet someone new!


2. Happiness: If you are close to the bride or the groom (or both) you start to notice them … glowing. I don’t know how to describe it any better than that, but happiness is clearly visible on their faces.


3. Hair style ideas: I loved my curls so much that I may just go out and buy a large hair curling iron so I can wear my hair in this style more often.


4. Meal: Usually, a gathering is accompanied by a meal. The food has been really strange at my house lately that any change in diet, no matter how heavy, I would consider healthy.


5. Rest: When you’ve had a part in planning a big event, you are soaked in an overflowing relief when it ends successfully, when everyone goes home happy and you actually get home. You may even sleep better than all the other nights!

In other news, my camera died. It was so unexpected because it survived a lot of unfortunate incidents that we have once thought of it as invincible, but clearly… this is not the case. Here are some pictures a day before its final moments. RIP Mr. Carl.

With my room undergoing changes, I decided it was time that a few other aspects of my life need to change as well. As I started to pack away my things in boxes, some objects took my breath away in more ways than one. There were all sorts of things that I’d forgotten about. It’s amazing how an inanimate object, such as a book, or a dvd can trigger emotions that you thought you placed in a bottle and threw away at sea. How can a scent be moving? How can a pendant laying on lace tablecloth be nostalgic? Why did it feel like you haven’t looked at these things in centuries?

It hasn’t been centuries, now, has it? A person should always be mindful of what they are, what they used to be and what they are becoming. This might be trivial to most people, but I spend a lot of time with this one question going around in my mind, “Who am I?”. Although we all claim that we don’t do it, but we do. Sometimes we want to know where we stand, or where we belong. I am me, but what kind of people do I belong with? Who are “my people”? What sort of things do we like? What don’t we like? What are our hobbies and interests? What jobs do we usually have?

Scrapbooking. I’ve been collecting scrapbook supplies for about two years saying that I would save them for “family-trips” or “tributes to family members”. But really now, since when did my family take pictures of each other? There are no recent pictures of any of us together anywhere and there probably wouldn’t be any time soon. So maybe it is time to put those things into use, and like Rory, make an album of the things I like. In middle school, I used to have a notebook that I used kind of like a scrapbook, yet it contained screencaps of my favourite actors/actresses in my favourite tv shows/movies. But now I think it should contain everything, every little detail I could think of about all my favourite things! It might be a fun little project for me.

I’m not sure, though, whether I want to make this on one of my real-life albums or something digital (similar to Tarina Tarantino’s jewelry box). When I say similar, though, I just meant the idea of having something from real life put together like a webpage, and every item in that webpage is clickable. Nothing else will be similar (if I go through with this, that is).

Just a little life update for those that matter (since I can’t seem to contact you in any other way). School finally went out but I’m still attending my French lessons and nearing the end of my level. It was actually during my lesson that the phonecalls and SMS started to rain on my phone with good news about my upcoming internship. Yes, Ai, this one is for you! We might be seeing you tomorrow morning!

Although we still have somewhere kind of far to go to this evening, I will still have the time to attend my figure skating lesson. It’s funny, last time I was thinking “when I can spin again/start sit spins, I’ll ask my coach about contacting the person that sells skates”, and last time, I spinned! Ever since the rink closed, I just haven’t been able to spin… but it just takes getting back into the hang of things.

Sephora Nail Polish remover is a true blessing to the world of nail polish dissolvants! I haven’t felt this satisfied with a nail product since Nail Kiss. I’m currently trying out this nail art thing that I’m planning to use for the two upcoming events that I’m attending and had to paint and repaintmy nails a lot… but they stayed healthy and shiny! Let’s give this one five stars, girls!

My friends gave me a birthday present a while ago… I thought it deserved a spot in my blog! Isn’t it cute?