Thought: Episode 2

2. What is worse, failing or never trying?

This questions sucks and has an obvious answer. But despite the obviousness of the answer, it raises the point of why do people not try?

When reading this question, I sort of responded as I would to an interview question, which is: what is the answer that they want to hear? It seems as though there is only one 'correct' option, which is saying that never trying is worse. But people still do it. Failing is hard, it's true, but it has to be seen as an inevitable part of life. I think I struggle with this too, I mean, there are lots of things I'm no good at. but because I'm good at things, I tend to avoid the other things I can't do... which is equivalent to never trying. Arguably I've failed at them in the past and therefore have done my trying, and am in the region of 'failing' in the venn diagram of this question, but I don't think knowing my limits makes me a worse person.

I'm sure I always try my hardest. Whoever wrote this question definitely meant it to convince people, or make them convince themselves, that they should not be afraid of failure because even thogh it has more immediate, direct consequences, the consequences of never trying are worse.

Thought: Episode 1

I don't think I think enough. I want to remedy this.

I found a blog that claims it contains '50 questions to free your mind', and so I want to blog an answer to each of them. Well, not an answer, but my thoughts. You see? So let's begin. I'm kind of nervous!

1. How old would you be if you didn’t know how old you are?

Okay, my initial though is that you would be as old as you feel. But I now remember that everyone feels like they are about 18, and that they never age. So you'd have to take a look at yourself and guess based on how you look. If you didn't know how old you were, I'm assuming it would have to be because of amnesia because otherwise you'd have a vague idea based on how many years you remember living, along with people you grew up with maybe being able to help you. Age is a fact, because you can't change how old you are (other than ageing)- that is to say that you can't change your reference point; your birthday. It would also depend on your units.

If you don't know when you were born, ergo how old you are, it would only matter if you cared about it, or if other people cared about it, otherwise you're just an entity. Age is one of the least important aspects of a person, as it is just a scalar quantity. It doesn't have any meaning. It has the implied meaning of experience, but that's a different quantity. It is logical that the longer you have lived, the more you learn, so if you know a lot, then you must be older than someone who has not learned very much. A similar quality would be naivety. Having said this, I am sure it is possible to learn very little. But I refuse to believe that people can grow up and learn nothing, even if they learn about mundane things, like the names of characters in TV programmes, or what days the rubbish is cleared out. What you know is not significant in an age sense. It's the depth to which you know it.

So my answer to this question would be: you are as old as the knowledge you have accumulated.

I wonder where this view stands?

The Protest

I was in the library

On the day they held the protest.

Clamouring for freedom

While we meekly shovelled knowledge.

Who could but hate

The atrocities they've faced?

But the students kept on studying

In that hallowed place.

If we all work hard enough

then maybe we can excel,

So I was in the library

The day the protest was held.

The things we make, the things I've done

I acquire so many hobbies when I'm procrastinating. When I'm not working, my every thought is filled with what I could be creating. I've found useful outputs for this, such as knitting. Don't tell Matt, but I'm knitting him something really exciting for Christmas! And yes, it's now been a few days since that festive occasion, but I've barricaded myself into the house for revision, so I haven't seen him yet. We'll have our own post-Christmas festivities, and I'm pretty excited.

I've had an uneventful break. My last week of uni was filled with things and plans, which kind of overruled my revision. Now the floodgates have opened and knowledge should hopefully be flooding into my mind. That said, today was my first proper day of revision, and although I got a lot done, it's going to be a long slog. Not to mention that tomorrow is new year's eve, and so some sort of partying will happen, and productivity will suffer. It sounds like I'm ultra-lame, but I seriously have a LOT to catch up on. Anyway, let's see what I've made recently.

Article one is my brother's birthday card. His annual aging was a bit earlier in the year, and I took the liberty of making him an elaborate card. Here it is:


It went down pretty well. My brother may be 23, but he still appreciates the finer things in life, such as Optimus Prime and Pokemon. Bless him.

In terms of cooking, I had a big culinary success with the Thai Fishcakes I made for myself and my flatmates. The recipe was from this book: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Pasta-Pancakes-Ultimate-Student-Cookbook/dp/1844007332 which is currently in London so I can't say what went in. But they were delicious, and here's photographic evidence:

Tasty.
I've started reading the complete works of Shakespeare. I'm going to be in a musical next term, and its plot is based (loosely, I may add) on the Tempest. I read the musical libretto first, as I got hold of it first, and I've since been trying to match up the characters with those in the actual play. I read the majority of The Tempest aloud to myself in the bath, and based on initial readings, I'm afraid to say the Musical (Return to the Forbidden Planet) made a lot more sense. Never fear, I'm planning to re-read the play again, to read into some of the meanings. That's what one does with Shakespeare, right?

I've now started on the Taming of the Shrew, anyway, and it's going well. So far this rich Lord is playing a hilarious prank on a drunkard he found passed out by an alehouse. He gets the drunk guy taken into his house and put into the finest room. He has him washed etc while he is unconscious, and he asks all the servants to pretend the guy is a Lord when he wakes up, to fool him into thinking he's always been a Lord, and his whole life was a dream. He even gets a guy to dress up as a woman and pretend to be his wife! What a joker. Anyway, where I've got to the drunkard's just woken up and is starting to believe the farce. Intriguing!

Happy belated Xmas, and laters to all.

LE...THAR....GY

Hot weather = laziness. I couldn't even be bothered to write a sentence expressing that equation. My productivity in terms of knitting has decreased to, well, pretty much zero this week.
Who's gonna stay inside knitting when I could be doing something outside- basking for instance? Basking's underrated.

But I don't need to be doing/making stuff at the moment. I can go outside and see/do stuff! For example, this caterpillar. Have you ever SEEN such an awesome caterpillar?
(disclaimer- I did not 'do' the caterpillar, just saw it).I have certainly not. I really, really miss the camera I used to take this photo. Look at that detail! I've been trying to figure out the caterpillar's reason for the exquisite 'brushes' on its back... It doesn't need a reason though, it's just damn badass.

Also I just found a photo of a chandelier (in the loosest sense of the word) that I made for myself last year, no idea what happened to it. It was made from forks I acquired in Berlin...

Katie 1: 0 Gravity

I wish I wasn't listening to such cheesy Spanish Music.
Musser Sumic

If you're inside reading this, you should be outside! Go out and do something- find random objects and make stuff with them! I know I will...

FINAL FREEDOM YAY!

I've finished exams! Expect much joviality from me now :) and in the spirit of summer, I thought I'd talk about some mittens I knitted.
They were, in fact, only the second thing I ever knitted. I had mastered the art of stripes after the Hogwarts scarf and I was ready to move on to the realm of TWO-COLOURED PATTERNS!
It proved surprisingly easy. What I didn't realise when trying to learn to knit (a painful period of last summer) was that once you know how to do the basic knit and purl stitches, there's not too much more they can throw at you if you're knitting something square. Round is a whole new kettle of fish, but that's for another blog.

Anyhow, I was making the mittens for my boyfriend, so he went for a fairly plain, manly colour scheme (not maroon and gold, surprise surprise). This time I decided not to knit for him as a surprise, as that didn't go so well last time. The first one took me a month, and the second one took me a week- by the time I'd finished, in February, it was still cold enough for him to wear them which was more than either of us had expected! I've realised I sound like I'm constantly knitting things for him, so I'd like to point out that I have and AM making inspirational things for myself- I'm just worried that if this blog catches up with what I'm making at the moment then there'll be nothing to post about, as my knitting is sporadic and kind of slow...

I'm working on trying to take more arty/pretty photos of my stuff- not sure I'll ever be cool enough to know how to play round with settings on my camera. In other news I had courgette soup for dinner! And it WASN'T bland- in fact it was more of a herbs with courgette than a courgette with herbs, but still creamy and yum.
I'm pretty proud of the mittens anyway- but Matt's nearly had a heart attack twice because he thought he'd lost one. I think he's scared of me (clever boy).

Finally- this is when pacman somehow appeared in the bottom of my candle?!

Weird.

Cakes of Summer

It strikes me every year how unfortunate it is that exam season coincides with another, extremely different season- summer.
Just as the sun starts to appear for more than a fleeting moment, just as days become beautiful, and you want to drop everything and rush outside to enjoy the climate, you are forced to do the opposite. You must stay inside (believe me, revising outside can't be done effectively) and sit very still, and fill your brain with un-summery thoughts.
Couldn't have timed it better!

I'm glad for the change in weather though, at least there'll be some nice weather this year. I'm growing sceptical about how the summers keep turning out. The only summers' day I can remember being particularly hot last year was Matt's birthday, and we took advantage of the heatwave to grab a rowing boat on the Serpentine, and then have a picnic. Oh, and sunning ourselves by the ponds in Holland park, while the koi idly nibbled at our toes.
This was my creation on that particular day:

The cake was complex to assemble because I had wanted it to be a secret, and so i had to ice it while he was away. We went to see the Ukelele Orchestra the night before and Matt came back to the house with me and I had to force him to go home so I could ice the damn thing!

So worth it though.
The cake is my mum's special recipe- maybe I'll post it because it's the most DELICIOUS recipe ever, chocolatey heaven.

I'm hoping this summer holds many more cakes in store!