Try again!

Well, it's October now and this is only my 5th post. I'm so bad at keeping up-to-date with blogs. My intention when I first started this blog was to update regularly, or at least once a month. Maybe I'll try again with sticking to that.

I enjoy writing a blog. I like the fact you can write about anything you like and people all over the world can read it. You never know who might stumble across your blog!

Today I'm going to talk about my love for London. I spent the day there on Tuesday with two friends and I had a great day. There's just something about London, I don't know what it is but it's special to me. I've had so many great times there with friends, at gigs, shopping and just hanging out. On Tuesday we did a bit of the tourist thing, shopped and had lunch. I've not been there as much this year as I have the past few years. It's not as easy to find the time when you and all your friends work full time. But I try to go as often as possible. Knowing that I'm going again in a month for a gig with friends I don't see very often makes me happy.

There's certain places I like to go to when I go to London that not everyone necessarily knows about. For instance, there's a little arcade, just along from the London Eye next to the Thames. There's some fun photo booth-type machines and all the good arcade/fun fair games. As well as dodgems and bowling. It's a good place to go if it happens to be raining and actually a lot of fun!

I also love the atmosphere in London. You get all sorts of people rushing about doing different things. People who have never been there before and people who are there every day.

I'll never get bored of London. Although, as much as I love it I don't think I could live there! It would just spoil the magic for me.

View of the London Eye, Parliament and Big Ben from the Millennium Bridge.

One of the fountains at Trafalgar Square complete with bubbles!

Wow!

So much for keeping going with my writing, I haven't made a post for half the year. For some reason I thought about it today while I was at work. And while I was doing what I do, it made me think about all the little, random things that make me happy. So here's a few:

Holding hands with my boyfriend. Seeing friends I haven't seen for months. Waking up in the morning and knowing I can get up when I want. Getting a phone call from a friend inviting me over for the evening then when I get to their house another friend of ours who lives thousands of miles away has turned up and surprised us all. My favourite home cooked meal. Hugs, lots of them. That moment when the band I've been waiting to see comes on stage and all the excitement and anticipation bubbles over. And every moment after that being lost in the music until the band goes off stage. Pay day. Looking at photographs that bring back memories. A good night out with friends. Finding something I love in my favourite shop in the sale and in my size. The first kiss when I haven't seen my boyfriend for a while. Days in London with great friends. Seeing the smile on someones face when I give them a present they love. Seeing the first of my friends get married, and how beautiful she looked. Looking forward to a holiday. Spending my day off with my boyfriend.

I'm sure there's more and I'm add them to the list sometime. What random things make you happy?

Think happy thoughts...

Well, it's been a little while since I last posted, sorry about that, I've had a busy few weeks.

For this post i thought I'd explain where I got the name for this blog from. It's been buzzing round my heads for a couple of weeks I just haven't had the chance to actually sit down and writing it, so here it finally is;

"Think happy thoughts" is a line from the song Headfirst for Halos by one of my favourite bands, My Chemical Romance. Headfirst for Halos also happens to be one of my fave MCR songs. And when they sing it live, which admittedly they don't do so much anymore, it is truly amazing.

There is just something about seeing MCR live which gives me the biggest buzz in the world. A buzz that I don't get when I see other bands live. I still remember the first time I saw them. It was September 2004 at the Mean Fiddler in Charing Cross Road, London. My brother offered me a spare ticket for the show, and if I'm being honest I wouldn't have called myself a 'fan' at the time. I'd heard my brother listening to their music (you couldn't miss it in our house!), I liked what I heard and fancied checking Gerard Way and co out.

So, off I went to London not knowing what to expect. I spent most of the day hanging out with my brother and his friends as i didn't know anyone who was going, so by the time the gig came around I was a little bored. If I remember rightly the support act was Your Code Name Is Milo, who I didn't think much of, and still don't really. And then it was time for My Chemical Romance to come on. One of the things I remember the most is the way Gerard holds the audience attention. There's just something about him that makes you listen. And now I'm not taking anything away from any of the other guys; Mikey Way, Frank Iero, Ray Toro and Bob Bryar. It's all of them together that's makes for such an amazing experience.

But back to that night, I thought afterwards, even though I didn't really know any of the songs, or that much about the band themselves, I knew I'd see them again. And now of seen them nine times, and each show seems more amazing than the last. No matters what else has happened that day or how awful the support band were, as soon as the guys appear on stage and I hear the first few bars of one of their songs everything else is forgotten and I'm theirs for the next hour and a half.

I'll say one thing to you; if you like My Chemical Romance and you ever get the chance to see them live, do it. You won't regret it!


My Chemical Romance live, 22nd August 2006, Hammersmith Palais, London. The first outing for their new The Black Parade material.

Feeling creative

Hello again, it's been a few days since I started this blog, I was planning to post a bit sooner but have been a bit busy.

I saw an idea for making a memo board in a magazine, which I thought looked good. So I bought the few bits that I needed to have a go and this is how it came out:

It's simply made from an artists canvas and some ribbon. Took me a good couple of hours to make, but once I'd finished I was really pleased with how well it turned out I might even say I was proud of myself.

As well as writing I love crafty things. I've really taken to making birthday cards and I made all my Christmas cards. I love it when you think of an idea and then it looks good (or even better) when you've made it. Occasionally something won't turn out the way it did in my mind and I might get a bit annoyed. But I just come up with another idea and it'll turn out fine in the end. Last year I bought a scrapbook as another way I keeping my photographs, and also other memories such and concert tickets or anything that reminds me of a good time. I've only managed one or two pages so far but this year I'm hoping I'll find the time to do much more. It makes me happy to look back at photographs and I don't know how many photo albums I've got. So a scrap book is another way of bringing two of my loves together. I enjoy spending time designing a page and remembering the day of the picture or memory. It also keeps me busy as I can get bored easily!

So I guess it's a hobby of mine. Does anyone else have something like this that they do?

Happy New Year

I was thinking earlier, I need to continue with my writing, to keep up with my Journalism skills. I studied Journalism at uni because I love writing, and I don't want to lose that. So this is my new project for 2008.

I'm gonna write about all the things that make me happy, and also post pictures. It could be about anything. It might be something I saw, a song a heard or something I did. If I see something I'll take a photo and then write about it here later. Or if I find an old photo that makes me smile I'll write about that.

This brings together two of my favourite things: journalism and photography.

If you read anything that always makes you happy too, or want to say something about my writing, then please feel free comment.

Today's picture:

I took this photograph from my back garden a couple of years ago. It's not particularly special, but I love how I managed to capture a rainbow in a photograph. It's one of those things that you wish you had a camera with you for when you see it. I love rushing to look at rainbows when they appear in the sky, or seeing one on a rainy day. It's something that will make me smile to myself for no reason. Rainbows are so out of place, yet they look like they belong.

Sadly there was no pot of money at the end of it!