bookshoplaura

Recently I was making a card for a college friend and It got me reminiscing about my college days. I went as a mature student so I don't have to travel back all that far mentally. Now while I did find many elements of my course fascinating, that wasn't the part I tend to remember. Perhaps it's because My degree sits in a folder at home and I work in the completely unrelated field of retail, helping people who are literally too stupid to realize despite the many signs that they are in fact standing in the section of the shop where the books are ( some days it's a miracle that I don't bang my head against the customer services desk repeatedly until they go away) I think the fact that I haven't used it to further my career is probably why my college memories seem to center on the social side of things. I could sum up my college days in two words drunk and hungover as I spent most of the four years in either of these conditions. Well I wasn't literally drun...

So here in Ireland we are getting our own mini heat wave. Most people would call it summer but those of us that know better are trying to soak up all the sun before it goes away. Yesterday leaving work I realised it was still a glorious day out and resolved to change into summery clothes at home and then Get out and actually enjoy some of it. Only one small problem there. When I delved into my wardrobe, in search of summer clothes I realised I didn't actually have any and ended Up Outside in jeans wishing I'd had the foresight to buy at least one pair of shorts. Now in previous years I'd have dug out last years summer clothes And maybe bought a few things to top it up if the good weather lasted. But here's the thing. ( and I know this is unlikely to garner me much sympathy) in the last year I've lost a bit more weight. I would say I've gone down a whole dress size. Now last summer I had shorts so baggy on me that they barely stayed up and skirts that h...

So Picture this, on Friday I was home on my day off trying to work out if I felt like doing a second class because my stomach was all horrible and crampy when suddenly out of nowhere   I started feeling very emotional. I tried to pull myself together but I couldn't seem to control the urge to cry so I decided I'd drive home and spend the night under a blanket having a pity party for one but after driving as far as Kilsheelan while driving and crying (so much so that I was too embarrassed to stop anywhere for petrol and my car was getting low) I had an abrupt change of heart and turned the car around and headed to the Forge to have some of the sad beaten out of me. I did eventually get back to Waterford a lot less teary but feeling rather blue and so crampy that I was convinced I'd have to stop baking with barley flour (which did nothing to improve my mood) but then I realized that my period had started and suddenly the madness of the day (the cramps and tears and irratio...

If you've never seen Breakfast at Tiffanys then you might not be familiar with this scene where Audrey is woken and looks delightful with her hair in place and her eye mask gives her a more glamorous air. She's kind of my idol and she was everything I'm not. I don't think there's any danger of me being accused of being sophisticated any time soon. However I do own an eye-mask, in fact I have several, so that's something I have in common with a character she played. A tenuous link, to say the least. I didn't always sleep with an eye-mask. It was a habit I adopted during my second year in college and it was not because I was channeling Ms Hepburn. I had just moved into a new apartment and my bedroom window faced out on to an outdoor walkway and some genius had kindly placed three lights right outside my window which meant I had enough light to read by even with my light off and my curtains closed. I actually thought I was going to crack up and then I found...

Somehow I've accidentally left myself stranded in Waterford without a real social circle to speak of and it's probably lucky that I rarely have money for socializing because I am not exactly inundated with opportunities to do so. I have become so self sufficient that I will often completely forget to keep in touch with friends. If it wasn't for Facebook I probably wouldn't know what half of them are up to and in a way social networking becomes a blessing and a curse. On one level it allows you to keep up with the lives of friends you aren't getting around to emailing but then what happens is you see on Facebook that they have started a new job or dating someone new and they went on holidays and you look through all 80 holiday snaps and feel like you've actually been caught up on their life. I find after this I'll often forget I haven't actually spoken to them. It makes you lazy     and then you remember that people usually just put the good stuff on...

Apparently this is a sign I'm getting old because I find teenagers incredibly annoying but I don't think that's the case because I distinctly remember feeling this way about them the very moment I stopped being one myself. Yes exactly on my twentieth birthday I sighed and said I surely wasn't half as annoying when I was teenager. Yes, I really was that world weary. If I am being completely honest (and it's my blog so I probably should) I'm fairly certain that I was just as annoying as teenagers today but I wasn't a complete idiot and now that I am working in a bookshop, specifically the section where teenagers get all their books or come to sprawl on our floor, I find myself accidentally eavesdropping and the snippets I hear do not bode well if these young people are to be our future. Today while attempting to soak up some sun on my lunch break I sat on the only bench outside that didn't have eight people sitting there or wasn't overrun with bird...

Clearly I have a problem in that I find food scares more than a little interesting. I can't help it. I've been cleaning up my diet and tackling my IBS headfirst so I can't help being fascinated by what's going into our food. I think the overall view is that if it has a nutrition label then chances are it's not all that good for you in varying degrees but If you're sticking to   fresh meat and vegetable you're still not guaranteed safety. So let's say you're not a in position to grow your own organic veg and slaughter your own chickens/cows etc. And let's face it, most of us aren't well then you have to brave the world and always be cautious of not buying a trolley full of chemicals, hidden in many delicious guises. The Monsanto group have been in the press a lot lately because they been advocating that genetically modified fruit and veg are just as nutritious as the non modified variety and have been happily peddling their wares to the n...