MIDTERM CRISIS

A midterm crisis, for those not in the know, is exactly the same as the mid life crisis, except it occurs mid way through a term rather than life, and on a much smaller budget. Not being, middle aged I can't really say what exactly a mid life crisis is about, but my mid term crisis was centred upon the crushing weight of work I have yet to do, things I have yet to organise and emails I have yet to reply to, alongside exhaustion that makes me feel like I could happily go into hibernation, and my current lack of a job. 

I dragged myself into college despite feeling slightly fever-y for a meeting, wearing gym gear and a baseball cap. I have a vague recollection of this meeting being successful despite the fact the room was spinning and I rudely cut people off mid sentence a few times due to not being quite sure whether I in fact was actually in Trinity and not dreaming, in bed. I got ID'd in CEX buying the first bioshock game, went to see the girl on the train. Collapsed into bed to fever dreams that had me convince my boyfriend that there was a drink deal on a viking website to the point he googled it. 

My mid term crisis culminated with a crack. Unfortunately, the crack was that of one of my teeth splitting in half quite spectacularly. Not trusting any dentist but my own with a tooth that has already cost more than I would like to know in root canals I got the first bus I was awake for down to Kilkenny, in deep mourning for my days as a women with all her teeth. 

This was incredibly over dramatic, and incredibly vain. An image of of myself, laughing attractively to reveal a terrifying black gap in my smile where my tooth had once been (despite the fact the tooth was right in the back) was the only thing on my mind. On the way to my bus I consumed a large coffee, and then bought a large chai latte in Starbucks in order to use the toilet, which backfire because once it was finished and I was 20 mins into my 90 min bus journey I needed a wee once again. Eventually though, I got to my dentist office, early, to see whether anything could be done. 

My dentist is a hero. After some begging, she agreed to leave my tooth intact, removing the broken half and reconstructing it. While doing an incredible job, it was also a time consuming job. It could have taken the next 3 years and I would walk out happy at the end of it with the knowledge all my teeth were intact. 

Thirty minutes into what turned out to be a procedure that would take the same length of time as my bus journey, everything took a turn for the worse. The news came on, and the 7th circle of hell opened up. Trapped in the dentist chair, with several instruments stuck in my mouth and no way of signalling clearly to my dentist that I'd like a change in the station, a speech by Enda Kenny was broadcasted. 

Hearing Enda Kenny talk about pornography is a little portal to hell that can be accessed by anyone with an understanding of the english language. I would rather watch the entirety of Nathan Caters bank holiday special that ever here that again (something I wrote about how much I dislike Nathan here). It ended eventually, and I walked out of the dentist office with half a brand new tooth. Weirdly enough, my midterm crisis was over. 

I think it ended because hearing Enda talk about porn was a low point in my life, and it could only go uphill from there. Even hearing him mention the word is like a magical remedy for any academically induced crisis. It hurts, and is painful, and leaves a rather large mental scar, but at the end of the day places you on the up once again. 

The Bedsit Chronicles: Part Two- Neighbour Wars

The novelty of living in one room really wears thin when exams approach. The horror of sleeping in the same room that you have spent the last two days battling through Kant and then accidentally burning pasta, forgetting to do dishes and having to brush your teeth in the same sink is incomparable. I would rather get up at 7 in the morning to be the first person in the library instead. 

So I have started a new chapter in my life that involves setting alarms on my phone for before 10, making green juice, and going to the gym. The library security guards wish me good morning! I am a new person. A person who is reading war and peace before bed mostly every night and makes packed lunches, mostly. 

Before I get into this, I want to stress that if you have never lived in an apartment with thin walls, you probably won't understand how it is possible to know your neighbours so intimately that you have a clear image in your head of what they look like despite never having laid eyes on them. You know their deepest, darkest secrets, because you have overheard them. It's a special, weird relationship that is impossible to imagine until you enter into it. 

The first indication I had of the thickness of the walls was when what sounded like two parents fighting with their son about his fondness for smoking marijhuanna. It was so amusing to hear someones teen angst erupt in a situation that I had no emotional involvement in whatever I actively enjoyed the shouting. It ended pretty quickly, I fell asleep, and weeks went in perfect science, apart from the occasional rumble of a deep male voice and the sound of a TV on quiet. I felt pretty lucky, to be honest. 

Exam season began to approach, and I started going to bed the earliest I have gone in 3 years and waking up the earliest in order to get a seat in the library. Its a routine that has brought me surprising calm. I enjoy it. The third night of this new me, I cracked and didn't go to bed until half one in order to watch Game of Thrones. As I was drifting off into  sleep, the house was blissfully quiet. I was trying to empty my mind of thought in order to drift off into blissful sleep when suddenly, a TV started blaring, I live in an attached house, so it was in the next room (and next house). Whatever the person was watching, it was dramatic. My empty mind filled with the noise of frantic violins, and a couple having a violent argument. 

I laid in bed, the knowledge that my alarm was going to go off in 7 hours filling me with panic and anger. I got close to knocking on the wall several times. I thought about the Buddha, and how he says all suffering is alleviated by abandonment of the self. I tried to abandon myself, and not care about the neighbours for what felt like thirty minutes before my hate fire  was burning so brightly it was impossible to sleep. I deeply regretted not taking my sleeping tablets, and got out of bed to take one, despite the fact that they make me drowsy after 10 (it was two in the morning. 

I climbed back into bed, and the singing started. I am sure the Buddha himself would not have been able to abandon his ego if he had to listen to two men (in my head they were wearing check shirts, had receding hairlines and were wearing jeans with brown loafers) singing wagon wheel over the blaring noise of the TV drama. I knocked on the wall, the univeral symbol of neighbourly displeasure, and nothing. They seemed to be working their way through Nathan Carter's (described by my mother as "a man who should be silenced') entire discography. I banged a shoe, and still nothing. I thought wagon wheel was the song I most despised on this planet, but I had yet to hear Back to Tourmakedy. This inspired me to throw War an Peace (which conveniently was located beside my bed) at the wall. 

They moved on to Tequila Makes her Clothes Fall Off. I realised the music was so loud they couldn't hear me. I had thrown what some considered Tolstoy's finest literary work, one of the longest novels ever written with great force at the partition wall which had proven itself to be very thin and they still could not hear it over the volume of their Nathan Cater sing along.

I had nearly reached a level of rage that would have overcome my hate for confrontation and was considering going next door to ring their doorbell in breaks between songs and then let all of my pent up anger out, when I remembered that I had a secret weapon I could utilise. Two could play at the annoying music game, especially when one of those people(me) had an unusual like for bagpipe music. 

There is an incredible man on youtube called MarinesandPiper, a man I had unleashed against neighbours many times with great success. A man who covered pop songs on the bagpipes. I think he is a hero, and should be sainted, but most people despise Lady Gaga's poker face on bagpipes for some strange reason. 

Pavlov's dog new what was up. I decided that the only cure for this awful, awful, two in the morning sing song was Rebecca Blacks Friday, covered on bagpipes. I turned it up loud enough to drown out the music, pressed the repeat button, and drifted off into sleep confident in the fact that when they eventually did stop singing, they would spend the rest of the night listening to the worlds most irritating song played on what some consider the worlds most irritating instrument. 

I woke up the next morning to the shrill noise of terribly recorded bagpipes. I felt like Leonardo de Caprio emerging from the frozen body of the bloody horse in the Revenant. My sleep had not be the most refreshing, but my desire for revenge made it sweet. 

i wish this was the end of this story, but it isn't. The same thing happened for the next three night. Something had changed though. The singing was coming to a stop sooner and sooner after I began the bagpipe music. 

But on the fourth night, something magical happened. 

The voices started up around half one, and I clearly heard a male voice shout "I have been enjoying a drink for the last forty years, fuck off". Nathan Carter started up. I hit play on the bagpiper cover of Taylor Swifts Shake it Off. 

Nathan Carter stopped a verse in. A broken man shouted "Those fucking bagpipes!", and silence. No more Nathan Carter. I turned off Marinesandpiper, liking the Taylor Swift cover and sending out thanks to the universe for its inception. It was over; I had won. Nathan had been defeated.

The Bedsit Chronicles: Part 1

I currently reside in a 'studio' in caber. Although it is one room, I love it. Its clean, surprisingly warm for having single glazed windows and just down the road from the house I spent the first couple of years of my life. It's near the phoenix park, my favourite place on this planet, and my landlady is lovely. I share a bathroom with her daughter, who lends me books, and it takes me 15 minutes by bus to get the college. 

I really like living here, despite missing my previous housemates, and it really feels like a home, but at the end of the day I still reside in one room. And my cooker is a small microwave with a hotplate. These were two key fact I blatantly disregarded when deciding to host a pancake Tuesday event to which more than 10 people were invited. The third key fact was I didn't really check to see what cooking equipment I had. Apart from one stirfry the first week I moved in, up until this fateful tuesday I hadn't cooked anything other than microwave porridge. Somehow I just cannot bring myself to cook in my bedroom. I tell myself the smells linger, and they do, but I am lazy. And Mammas revenge is so convenient. And a burrito is designed to contain all your nutrition needs for the day, I'm sure. It has beans, what could be more nutritious? 

So, back to the pancakes. On Monday, while struggling through a very boring lecture, I decided to host pancake tuesday. I photoshopped a picture of my face onto Jamie Olivers, invited more people then could possibly fit in my flat at very late notice and proceeded to think no more about it. 

Tuesday rolled round and I began to panic about the amount of people I had invited. The fact that I only had two chairs had not occurred to me the night before. Is it weird for people to sit on your bed while also in the kitchen? How many people could realistically sit on the bed? I was trying to calculate this in my head when I suddenly remembered I only owned two plates. I owned three bowels which could, if necessary be used as some sort of holding device for a pancake but how did I decide who I liked enough to get a plate, who got a bowel in a kind of second tier of friendship and who I made eat with their hands? i couldn't allow the hands people to have any sort of messy topping for practical reasons but what happened if they rebelled? Or if someone thought they deserved both a chair and a plate? 

Delia Smith has long been my cooking idol. I don't cook, as my dear friends and family know. She makes cooking look easy. I bet she's the sort of woman who plans a party. She has probably never cooked a chicken with the plastic still on, or accidentally put a plastic spatula in the oven. I like to think that she would have struggled in these cooking conditions, but its really only to make myself feel better. Delilah probably would have managed to set up a pottery wheel and make more plates while simultaniously 'throwing together' crepe flambeaux and carving rustic looking chairs out of recycled wood. 

I am a lesser woman than Deliah Smith. 

It was a horrible, stormy day so it was with some relief that people kept messaging me that they couldn't come. The practicality of hosting this party became more and more possible, it was starting too look like I could maybe retain some shread of Deliah (like dignity but it knows how to make puff pastry). The numbers were down to a perfect two, myself and a friend from my course, Veronika, who would be celebrating pancake tuesday for the first time since she is from Finland. 

I remember joking about never having made pancakes before and not being able to cook but I can't quite remember when the realisation that it was true set in. Its easy to google recipes when you have equipment such as measuring scales, less so when you don't and also have no idea what the hell you are supposed to be doing. So I did the only thing a person can do in this situation (well in the first world anyway) and I walked to my local shop for pre made pancake mixture. 

The previous week there had been a whole display of mixtures, now there was a very small one with considerably less choice. Everyone else in Cabra had obviously had the same panic I had except their panic had been slightly earlier. One of these two mixtures looked like it could be nice. It was from odlums, and it purported to make american style pancakes. All you were required to do was fill up to a certain line on the container with milk, shake and then pour on to the pan. 

The other was in a suspect looking box. The sort of box you would think contained baking soda, or something to clean your dishwasher. It's brand was "just-add-water". I am actually not joking. There is a whole brand devoted to making products that you just add water. The pancakes on the front looked like they were made of rubber, but apparently I suffer from selective blindness because all I could see was the sticker that said €1.50. Even though I knew I was making a mistake, even though I knew that a saving of €1.50 would seem like a robbery once I had tasted the pancakes, I bought them. The man on the till looked surprised. He didn't outright say that nobody else had bought this mix of their own free will, but he did point to the Odlums bottle and ask did I want it instead. I wish I had taken his advice. 

If Veronika had been coming to a nuclear winter re enactment party, It would have been a roaring success. This pancake mix was probably sold on by the government when the cold war ended. I firmly believe that all nuclear crisis could be averted if warring governments were invited to my panacake party and told that is what life would be like after the missiles hit, because these pancakes were so disheartening I believe they would make Trump a liberal. This is, however, getting ahead of myself. 

Veronika arrived, and the pancake making commenced. A small crisis was averted when she remembered that water bottles carry a certain measurement, and forks made adequate whisks. I found a casserole dish that looked like it escaped from Plesentville to serve as a mixing bowl and a crystal milk jug that was probably owned by a Home Economics teacher in a past life to pour out the batter. Another small crisis was avoided when I found a tiny frying pan in the cupboard. For a moment, It looked like the evening could be a success. 

Apparently being unable to scoop out batter with a jug and pour it onto a frying pan, Veronika quickly took over. The first pancake was the most unusual combination of pancake types ever. The bottom was like the sort of crepe you buy in a packet in France. The top was burnt. It was the first pancake though, and my mother said the first pancake never counts. We persevered. 

The second pancake brought the realisation that the frying pan was broken and was the reason we were cooking them so badly. Not to be deterred, I whipped out my wok, the only other pan I owned, and a couple of pancakes passed. They looked exactly like the box, which wasn't saying much. 

My boyfriend arrives and after asserting the frying pan isn't working by torching a pancake takes over from Veronika. We sit, chopping bananas and eating them with nutella while the stack grows ever higher. There is a small blip where he decided that I should be involved in making food for my guests at the party I am hosting instead of them cooking for me, and I quickly destroy any hope of that ever happening by making the pan so hot it starts to warp and almost setting it on fire. I return to banana duty, and he returns to pancakes. 

Eventually, the pancakes are ready. We sit down, and everyone gingerly takes a pancake and covers it in as much nutella as possible. There isn't much room for conversation because as well as looking like they rubber these pancakes have the consistency of rubber. I remember wondering why all burned food tastes the same. We chew our way through the first pancake, and my boyfriend is finding it hard to mask his dislike. He pretend the crack in his voice when he compliments them is the start of a cold rather then abject fear of being made eat another one. He suddenly becomes very full from eating bananas. 

Both trying to be polite, Veronika and myself struggle through a second pancake. My nutella to pancake ratio is obsene, and in my quest to mask the texture of the pancakes I have smothered them in a sickly amount of nutella. Veronika has been braver and gone for the pancake taste over overwhelming amounts of nutella. Nobody even pretended to like them enough to mention having a third. The stack had started to congeal into itself. I felt like I had just eaten two large plates of the stuff my dentist used to make mouls of my teeth and entered the marathon equivalent of a chewing competiton. 

Two more old school friends arrived. They came prepared with cans and their own pancake batter. My ability to cook has not been lost on them. Somewhere between reminiscing about €2.50 pints after school on fridays and deciding to buy more cans, the pancakes disappear. Someone has thrown them away and there are never to be seen again. 

Pancake evening draws to a close. I apologise to Veronika for the events of her first pancake tuesday. My bedsit is full of the smell of slightly burned pancakes, and crushed dreams. But it doesn't really matter, because who needs pancakes when you have friends and Tubourg. Friends who love you despite your terrible hosting skills.

It's my birthday and my anti- wrinkle campaign has begun // reflections on turning 20

Me on my last birthday with my youthful skin

It's my birthday next thursday and I'm scared. I'm turning 20. Twenty. I distinctly remember being 14 and my dermatologist telling me that I had a couple of years left of not using anti agin products but when I turned 20 it was time to start tackling my aging skin. Now I am 20 and my skin is aged. I am old. I am over the hill. Well, maybe not quite but I am no longer a teenager and therefore approaching the hill.

I do things like buy toilet paper for myself, take out the bins and decide that it's not sensible to go out because I have a lecture the next day. I haven't eaten mcdonalds in months. 

I wrote this before meeting my mum and aunt, Rosamund, for afternoon tea. My feeling on the subject after this life changing tea is quite different. 

Rosamund stopped telling people her age when she turned 21. I am going to do the same. Every so often, she has a significant birthday, but her actual age is never revealed. So it doesn't worry her. After all, this is only a number, a cliche but true saying. So after 21 I will officially stop counting the age and focus on the amount of presents I get instead. That is the real reason for birthdays after all. 

I am going to use turning 20 as an opportunity to change some things in my life. Some small and some big. I am going to spend less time watching shitty TV and more time doing things. You never remember the 10 hours you spend watching keeping up with the kardashians, but you remember reading, or crocheting, or drawing. Or not but you have something to show for the end. I know I am turning into my mother when I say this. 

I am going to stop wearing sweatpants outside on most occasions. Obviously, there are some times that simply cannot be got through without sweatpants. Being hungover is one of these. But I have fears of becoming a middle age woman wearing trackies and in my effort to avoid this I am going to try and wean myself off them (at least in social situations).

I am going to read more. And I am going to read whatever I want, and If I don't enjoy a book I am going to give myself permission to stop reading it halfway through. Instead of scrolling through instagram before I go to bed I will read. 

I am going to print more pictures so instead of having thousands of digital images I never look through I at least have some that I can look back on. 

I am going to start putting my health first. Nothing is more important than being well, and I need to stop putting unrealistic goals and my perfectionism above my happiness. 

I am going to start doing the things I love again. I feel like I don't do a lot of the things I really love anymore and I miss them and would be happier if I did them. So I will. 

I am never going to pretend I like kale ever again. I do not like kale. 

I am going to spend more time with the people I love. I am going to travel and see the world and write and listen to music. I will never allow anyone to treat me unfairly, be rude to me, degrade me. I will believe in myself. 

Some of these things are big and some are small. I feel like my life has really changed, and is really changing right now. The main thing being half my face has swollen up so half of me is a happy puffer fish and half is an angry puffer fish. This fact would have made me super self conscious and I probably wouldn't have been able to leave my house a couple of months ago. However, today I went out to lunch with my dad and worked my confused puffer fish face and it didn't bother me at all. 

if being 20 means ageing skin, but I get to care a tiny bit less about unimportant things and actually start being the person I want to be, I am ready for it. 

Scream Queens Review/ Sorority chainsaw massacre

I can't stop watching scream queens. Not because it's a good TV show, because in most senses it's not. I don't really care what happens to the main character, grace. In fact, I'd actively like if she dies. She is the typical, nice girl who meets bitchy, rich mean girls and needs to save the world type, and it's boring. She isn't even funny. She wears a paddy cap (if that's the right word, you know what I mean). I was disappointed when her head wasn't mown off with a lawnmower. Hopefully the 'red devil' (creepy masked guy who is killing everyone) cuts of her paddy cap wearing, self righteous, do- gooder head in a future episode.

  "You know what, maybe it’s not Grace I don’t really like. Maybe it’s that fucking newsboy cap that this bitch NEVER TAKES OFF" _ desi-khaleesi, tumblr

There are some serious problems with this show. The only two coloured female characters talk like they are from the ghetto, which seems like a really really pathetic attempt to a) have a diverse cast (really??? did you even try??) and b) shitty, kind of racist humour that isn't even funny but instead makes me think about the representation of minorities and people of colour on screen, and feel sad. The two LGBT characters are both predatory and come across as desperate and seedy- the lesbian being butch and man hating, which just doesn't add anything to the show as well as being mildly offensive and tired. Most of the characters I just can't care about. I haven't actually even felt any emotion at anyone dying yet. 

But, despite all this, I have watched all 5 episodes and I can't wait for next weeks. The clothes and bitchiness in this show are SO ON POINT I am prepared to sit through all the rest of the (many) boring bits and watch characters that I don't care about die. Emma Roberts as Chanel Oberlin is a genius. She has perfected the sassy, spoiled sociopath and I want to watch every minute of her being a psycho bitch that I can. 

Then, their is the clothes. I don't know what to say about the clothes, only is I start wearing cat-eye sunglasses and a pink fur coat all year round the you know why I am doing it. Also, if you know why I suddenly turn into a complete and utter psychopath, you know my inspiration