Tainted Strawberry Gashes in the Paranoid Ending

Today has felt like a very musical day so far. I've been sorting my cds, finding ones which I'd forgotten I owned, finding others to be missing (sob) and also discovering ones which I thought were unplayable but seem to be doing just fine now! Odd, but very good!

Jack Off Jill, Garbage, Avril Lavigne (be careful if you have the speakers on when you visit this site!) and Marilyn Manson have been my soundtrack for the afternoon.

An update on The List!

I've accomplished three more things from my epic List!

31) Re-lace all my corsets correctly - Proof of which can be seen in photographic form here

43) Eat a twinkie for the first (and probably last) time - Every time I went past or into Cybercandy in town they didn't have any! One morning last week they had a box full but they were closed and I honestly couldn't justify waiting around in the cold for an hour! But, yesterday, Phil and I ventured in and they had some on Buy One Get One Free! REJOICE!! So we each got one and...well, it wasn't totally gross ;) Here I am taking my second bite!

68) Watch the sun set over the sea in Brighton - Now sadly, there's no photographic proof on any of my blogs of this, but Phil did take some spectacular ones which I'll try to upload at some point. We were on the Palace Pier with Hannah-May and Mike, watching the starlings do their crazy low-flying hypnotic dance around the shoreline. It was absolutely amazing to see, as the sun slowly dipped behind the horizon. Breathtaking.

Kittehs?

I'm pretty sure that Celia is pregnant! :D

My Adventure in the Haunted Flat

The incredible ceiling in the ballroom

A tiny kitchen within the kitchen!

Ring for service!

This is absolutely insane.

I am currently staying in the most incredible house I haveever had the pleasure of setting foot inside. It's like staying in the poshest hotel imaginable. This is actually a little difficult to put into words so you will have to bear with me, dear readers!

Ok, let me explain. My friend Hannah-May cleans for a very nice and very rich lady who has two very nice but very spoiled dachunds. Said nice and rich lady has been whisked away by her husband for a holiday to celebrate her 50th and asked Hannah-May to dog-sit. Because the house they live in is HUGE and somewhat creepy (and also apparently haunted – more on that later) she really didn't want to stay overnight on her own so she enlisted myself and Becca to help out and essentially have a bit of an adventure.

We arrived on Wednesday at around 4, settled in pretty quickly in the Children's Bedchambers upstairs and I got the tour of the place. There's the usual beautiful and spacious kitchen, dining room, toilets, bathrooms, utility room, bedrooms that you would expect to find in a lovely Regency flat, but on top of that, here we have an ante-chamber with an indoor fountain! Fully usuable servants quarters and hidden stairway! A toilet which was apparently used by a king! A dressing room which is hidden on the main stairway and is really, really creepy!

The crazy indoor fountain

The incredible range in the kitchen where we cooked and ate each night.

There's a Ballroom with a grand piano which was restored and redecorated by the V&A Museum (this is where I am currently sitting now, on the plushest sofa, watching something inane on the enormous TV) – so much gold leaf and rich embroidery! It's honestly like a room in the Royal Pavilion. I LOVE it so much. I've often wandered through old houses and castles wondering what it would feel like to stay over night there and NOW I KNOW! Crazy times. The Head Girl of Slytherin feels right at home here – granted, she rather fancies repainting the yellow marble-

effect walls with a deep forest green or silvery grey, but hey, you can't have everything. The house was taken over by squatters a few years ago, but that actually led to the house being saved from further damage. On of the upstairs toilets was broken and leaking, which meant the ceiling in the ballroom was being damaged but had the squatters not been there the damage would have gone on for much longer and the epic ceiling would have been unsalvagable!

And yes, it is reportedly haunted. The other girl who cleans here full time has told the owners and Hannah-May that she's been tapped on the shoulder three times while cleaning the hidden dressing room, only to turn round and find there's no-one there. Mrs Nice-And-Rich has seen odd refelctions in mirrors on the upper floors. Personally, we haven't seen anything ourselves yet, but I can well imagine it being haunted. The building is very old and as such, creeks and groans in the dark at night. Lights flicker on and off. The wind whistles in the chimneys and is clearly audible as a high-pitched moan in the large open fireplaces in most of the rooms and this is really offputting when you're here by yourself :) I have another night here tonight and Becca is joining us for a girly night of nailpainting, facemasks, movies, popcorn, drinking and gossip – and inevitably some ghost stories and tarot reading – so who knows what the darkened rooms will bring tonight?

I'll leave you with another photo and the rest are on my facebook!

The large, and somewhat creepy entrance hall. Can you see the orbs?

NINJA!!

My boyfriend's brother is a bit of musical genius. He's recently made a lot of very positive changes in his life, turned 30, and started recording songs (some covers, some original) and whacking them on youtube. He's really rather good and deserves all the praise he gets! Check out his other offerings and leave him a comment!

This is my current fave - starring his mates Simon, Gareth and Matt.

There's another Ninja song in the pipeline, so keep those eyes peeled...

The List so far...

A quick update on my epic List of 100 Things To Do In The 100 Days Before I'm 30:

1) Write a list of 100 things to achieve in the 100 days before I am 30! DONE! :D

8) Use Wii Fit every other day - haven't managed it every other day yet, but I'll keep trying!

9) Take a multi-vitamin every day - Yup. Which reminds me, I've run out and need to get some more!

11) Read a new book every month - This month I have actually read books 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 and 9 of the Sookie Stackhouse books - also known as The Southern Vampire Mysteries (and the inspiration for the excellent TRUE BLOOD series!) They are completely addictive and I can't wait for the next one to be released in May this year!

16) Blog at least once a week - So far, so good.

20) Hoover my bedroom once a week - whether I think it needs doing or not :) - So far, so good.

21) Visit the toy museum in Brighton - We actually tried to do this, but it was closed due to the snow! Must go again :)

30) Learn to use my hair curling tongs properly - I finally managed to do this for NYE!

39) Drink a green tea every day - I've not quite managed this, but I have been drinking a herbal tea every day...

41) Do everything within my power to get Celia to have kittens again! - Well, her boyfriend Gnarkill stayed over for a whole week, and we think they "did it" so we'll know in the next few weeks!

45) Cuddle Phil for no less than 10 minutes a day (this was his request) - Oh yes, doing fine on this one! :)

55) Do some yoga daily - Yup.

56) Cut back on the amount of caffeine I drink - Down to one or two cups. Some days, I'm not even having a coffee, so I'm doing good!

60) Drink more water - I'm averaging around 1.5 litres a day so far!

61) Drink a pint of real ale - I did this! I'm amazed, but I did it! Greene King IPA, and it wasn't completely gross either.

64) See my parents - Went to see a wonderful ballet with Mum and Dad on the 10th January

65) Tell Phil I love him every day (which is a bit of a cheeky one, as I do that anyway!) - yes, so far, so good :)

74) Take a walk under the full moon - Walked home on New Year's Day under the full moon, which was the second full moon of December and as such was known as a Blue Moon!

87) Start the New Year with a BANG! - Spellbound at the Komedia with friends :)

88) Do a proper 3 day detox

89) Avoid losing phone or keys (yes, very good Phil!) - Haha, so far, so good :)

100) Celebrate my 30th birthday in STYLE! - Plans are afoot for my birthday party, very exciting!

I've got 88 days left...I think I'm doing OK...

Ballet and Ghosts.

Despite the unprecedented snow which has frozen the south coast, Phil and I managed to join Mum and Dad at Chichester Festival Theatre for a beautiful production of Sleeping Beauty yesterday!

Originally we were supposed to be there on the 7th, but the snow was so terrible that day that there was no way my parents could get there. Luckily for us, the Theatre were nice enough to swap our tickets to Sunday - which also meant that instead of seeing Romeo and Juliet, we got to see one of my preferred fairytales! I do love the Shakespeare but sometimes star-crossed lovers and untimely death isn't quite what you fancy.

It was SPLENDID. We had fab seats so close to the stage and the dancers were incredible. The Moscow City Ballet are well worth a look, so if you get a chance to see them, I recommend you do!

In other news, I'm spending a few nights in a supposedly haunted grand old house with my friend Hannah. She's dog-sitting for a family she cleans for this week and doesn't want to stay there alone overnight - some parts if it give her the creeps when she's working there. She's asked me to join her, so we will be sleeping over there and trying very hard not to freak ourselves out!

Nothing to see here.

WELL.

There isn't actually much to report, bar the SNOW which has hit the south coast in an almost unprecedented way! It's frozen solid now, which makes walking around very difficult, and means that I am quite happy to stay inside ;)