I just thought I’d let you know that no, I’m not dead. My lack of blogging and activity on the blog scene is due to dealing with a lot of school work. Expect me back some time next week.
I am still active on Twitter though. Follow me there if you like: http://twitter.com/cherienoir. Yeah, I made a new account. If you’ve been following my old one (B147CH) please follow my new one instead.
I often complain about how I hate living in a small town but never talk about what’s good about. Because believe it or not, it’s not all bad.
In Sweden housing shortage is a big problem. At least when it comes to affordable apartments. Young people with low incomes need patience, luck or connections to find a place to live with a decent rent. Many live with their parents, with friends or rent an apartment “second hand”. I don’t know how to translate it properly but I’ll try to explain. Person X’s name is on the lease but person X won’t be able to live in his/her apartment for a while, because he/she is travelling the world for a year or whatever. So while person X is away you rent the place – from person X, not the landlord. Since you have to move out whenever person X wants the apartment back this obviously isn’t the best way to live. Still it’s the way many young Swede’s live since it’s very hard to get your hands on a affordable apartment with a “first hand lease”.
It’s a lot easier in a small town though. For me it was ridiculously easy. The first apartment I was offered to have a look at is the apartment I live in today. In one day I found out there was a vacant apartment with a low rent, got the keys to have a look at it, saw and loved it and finally signed the lease. I realize I’ve been very lucky because this is not the way it usually goes.
Right now I’m looking for an apartment in Gothenburg, the second biggest city in Sweden. They e-mail me whenever there’s an apartment available that suits me. So I get an e-mail once in a while and always let them know I’m interested in whichever apartment’s available. About 3000 others do the same. Yep, that’s the usual number of people interested in each apartment available. No wonder I’m not having any luck because there’s no real queue system in Gothenburg. They just choose whoever “suits the apartment best”. Whoever has the highest income I bet. Because really, when you have 3000 people to choose from obviously you prefer a tenant with a good income rather than some poor student living off a student loan.
At least I have a home of my own. In the wrong place but it’s still a home, which I love. My apartment may be small but it was renovated in 2004 so everything is new and looks good. Not to mention that three out of four rooms are blue! My favourite colour when it comes to home decoration! The only things I’d like to change is the colour of the kitchen cupboards, the kitchen floor and the hallway floor. Other than that everything is perfect. It’s my home sweet home.
When I was a teenager it bothered me that the actors depicting teenagers in TV-series always were in their twenties. A show I watched a bit was Dawson’s Creek (I’m not proud of it OK?! >_<) and at the beginning in 1998 they were all supposed to be 16. The youngest of the actors playing the leads was actually 20 and the oldest 27! So here’s a show I’m as a teenager is supposed to identify with but yet they put a 27 year old in it? All it did was create these weird ideals of how to look which obviously were impossible to follow for most teenagers.
Now though, more than ten years later, I look at this in a kind of different way… You see I still enjoy TV-series and movies set in a high school environment. I might be 26 and prefer to watch movies about people my age but I can still appreciate something set in that environment because well, been there done that. I can relate because once upon a time in a not too distant past I was a teenager myself.
Not much have changed in the casting of actors for these series and movies in the past ten years. I have changed though. Now I’m very happy to see someone aged 27 playing a 16 year old because for obvious reasons I prefer to look at 27 year old guys rather than 16 year old kids. Take Glee for example. The character Finn is 16 but the guy who plays Finn, well he’s 27, my age that is. And damn he’s hot! And don’t kill me now Twilight haters but I think Rob Pattison is hot. Well at least in his vampire make-up. So he plays a 17 year old but in actuality he’s 23, not that much younger than me. Great!
I still think they should try to hire actors who are around the age they portray for a more realistic feel but I’m not really complaining any more. I’m glad they did choose Rob Pattison rather than a real seventeen year old.
“Just because they serve you… doesn’t mean they like you” is the tagline of movie Clerks which I’m watching right now.
Anyone’s who’s worked retail knows how true that quote is.
This is partly why I want to work as a web designer. Minimum social contact. I’d love working as a web designer and just sit in front of my computer and not have to deal too much with people. Of course I want to be the web designer of my own company since I’d prefer to live without co-workers doing things the wrong way and bosses telling me to do things in a way I don’t like. When it comes to my work (whichever work) I’m kind of a control freak. I do things my way and really hate when people mess up and change things I’ve done in a way I think is good. I was in charge of the book section at my old job and it really bothered me when co-workers messed up the system I maintained. I knew exactly where to put things and then people put things in the wrong place. It bothered me more than it should since mostly no one but me noticed these errors. Yeah, I’m a perfectionist as well and it’s really not realistic to expect people to fully grasp my way of doing things all the time.
So yeah, working alone is my thing and hopefully in the future that’s exactly what I’ll do.
You know how happy I am about uni? I am happy and I’ve been happy ever since I found out I got into the classes I wanted to take. Now another feeling have replaced that initial happiness. Fear. Fear of failure.
And what caused this sudden change of feelings? Reading about my second assignment for my Animation with Flash class did. It’s nothing spectacular really. I just need to write a project description of the Flash movie I’ll be working on for this class. A minimum of two pages. I know that’s not a lot, I know I can write this, I know I’m very good with words, I know I’m very creative. Still I’m nervous because it’s been so long since I did something like this. Besides re-taking a high school maths class back in 2008 I haven’t studied for almost eight years. That’s a long time.
I feel stupid for being so nervous but I can’t help it. I guess it’s only natural to be nervous about going back to school after all this time. Oh well, if I could get a good grade in maths (which I hate) I can do this!
And then it hit me. For the first time in a long time I’m actually doing what I really want to do. Not just for the day, not just for a weekend but with my life. I’m doing something with my life that I truly want to do. When I really think about, actually for the first time.
You see high school doesn’t count, because even though here in Sweden you choose a major most of the courses you take are mandatory ones you haven’t chosen yourself and can’t get out of. The jobs I’ve had doesn’t count either since sure they’ve been all right but not what I want to spend my life doing. I want to work as a web designer and now I’m studying web design, moving towards that goal. For the first time in my life I’m actually doing exactly what I want to do. And it makes me feel oddly at ease. Right now I can ignore the fact that I hate the town I live in. I can ignore problems in my life. Because at least one piece has fallen into place. I’m moving forward and I’m kind of happy.
Uni is going well so far but I’m expecting it to get harder. So far I’m doing nothing but reading in my Flash Animation class and the first assignment in the CSS class is so easy it’s not even funny. Right now I fear that class will only involve things I already know. If that’s the case I guess it’s not too bad anyway. I’ll get a good grade and having studied this class I’ll be able to get into a more advanced one next semester. I reckon I continue with my studies this fall and right now I’m even considering studying through the summer as well. That will insure I have a income between June and August and I do need a income. If you live with your parents not having money for three months might not be fun but you can manage, living alone and not in a dorm though it’s absolutely necessary to have a income every month. I guess I could get financial aid of some kind during the summer but why not just keep studying? Besides that one maths class in 2008 I haven’t studied for eight years so I don’t think I’ll run out of motivation for a while.
Moving on, from a serious subject to a not so serious one.
Just looked at my little “to do list” for my site. I don’t think anyone but me understand much of it. And if you don’t speak Swedish you understand even less of it since I mix Swedish and English. It easily happens when it comes to site related matters since after all, my site is in English and so is all code but Swedish is still my first language. Just look at this confusing little list. Even I have trouble remembering what all this means when I haven’t looked at it for a while.
twitter time link
linkimages shadow
tags osv underrubrik
image background shadow
image address /
80×15 banner pink
whirlwindarchive swe ww
galleries divs i wp?
sidan hoppar vad göra?
bakgrundsfärg playlists + 1px för mkt top
copyright inte x2
searchbar
Anyway, this is the current list of things I need to fix on Whirlwind. Everything from looking into whether there is a way to use div tags within a Wordpress page (and with the help of div tags set up the gallery) to making another banner. I always have at least three things on my site related to do list. Whirlwind will never be “done”. There’s always something to fix, things to do better. Sometimes that bothers me but I know always striving to do better really is a good thing.
I don’t know what it is with me and my sleeping pattern. Since I quit my job I’ve fallen into this weird routine which is more of a total lack of any routine at all. Since I don’t have to get up in the morning, I don’t. I used to work until 2:30 PM but now most days I wake up later than that.
If I get to sleep without being disturbed I sleep for twelve hours straight. I’m not kidding. Obviously when I worked I never slept for that many hours a day since going to bed at 8 in the evening is a little bit too early. Now when I don’t work I go to bed late, sleep for twelve hours, wake up late and then repeat. Mostly at least. The thing is I sometimes try to set myself back to a normal day rhythm but even when I get up at a decent time I still stay up until at least 3 AM. Just because I can.
Besides, I’ve got a new lovely friend. Coffee. Not a new friend really. Me and coffee have been friends for many years but in the past few weeks we’ve become really good friends. When I’m tired but is too busy to sleep I drink coffee. I used to have one cup a day. Now I have a minimum of five but sometimes up to eight. And I’m not talking those little ridiculous cups with flower patterns that old ladies love, oh no I’m talking large mugs, each containing 2 dl.
I’ll try to get up at a decent time from now on though since yesterday was my first day of school. I do all my studying online but I still think it’s a good idea to get up around 12 PM, start my studying and then be done with it in the evening. So far it’s easy as a pie but I expect that will become more difficult pretty soon. At least when it comes to the Animation With Flash course. The CSS-based Web Design course seems really, really really easy. My first assignment is to create a XHTML document and a CSS document and set up things like background colour, font size etc. The very basics of CSS that is. Well that’s nice! This means I can spend most of my time studying Flash, which I contrary to CSS know nothing about.
…does the word “hubby” sound extremely silly? If I had a husband I definitely wouldn’t speak of him as my hubby.
…is the classic Louis Vuitton pattern ugly as hell? Would anyone wear something with that pattern on if it wasn’t a expensive brand?
…is harem pants possibly the ugliest piece of clothing ever created? Five years ago someone wearing harem pants would be the object of much ridicule but now everyone and their grandmother are wearing those fuglies because they’re fashionable.
More randomness:
1. The next time you do a good deed, don’t tell anyone about it. Then it will be truly selfless and not something you talk about to make yourself look better.
2. Something that bothers me is people who get animals but don’t think it through and understand the responsibility that comes along. People who put their animal to sleep when they get tired of it. How on earth can you get tired of your pet?! It’s one thing if your life changes and you’re unable to keep your pet but getting rid of it because you just don’t feel like having it any more. How can anyone do something like that?
3. Besides CSS-based web design I’ll also study Java Script and Flash Animation. I’ll take all three classes online. Two at Umeå University and one at Gotland College.
4. Sorry for not replying to comments like I usually do. I’ve just had a lot on my mind lately. That’s also why I haven’t blogged much. That and the fact that I’m working on a new layout, since when I’m doing so pretty much put the site on hold until I’m done. Well the site isn’t on hold now but don’t expect me to be too active here for a while.
Is it just me or is that last paragraph a type example of bad writing? I dunno. I’m so tired it took me like ten minutes to make that paragraph make some kinda sense. Sometimes I wish my site was in Swedish. It’s so much easier to write in my own language.
Welcome to Whirlwind, the online home of a 26 year old Swedish girl named Angelica. The site consists of 140 MB words, photos and art. Please do take a look around.
@eternalamour Ahh, cool! I don't think such things are available here in Sweden. #37 mins ago
@eternalamour But exactly what is the first item you added? Looks good but I don't know what it is lol #42 mins ago
@eternalamour All of it is gorgeous! Black and white is a great colour combination! #43 mins ago
All my furniture besides the living room table, desk chair and wall shelves is second hand. I don't mind. They were cheap and do look good. #44 mins ago
OMFG is this GORGEOUS or what?! http://tinyurl.com/yzmetno It costs almost 500 dollars though so I couldn't possibly afford it... #49 mins ago
Welcome to Whirlwind, the online home of a 26 year old Swedish girl named 
