2012 Fantabulous Things: 101-121

101) The Amazing Race - the tv show. Very, VERY cool.

102) The Simpsons - again, the tv show.

103) Thick tinsel

104) Tim Burton movies

105) Tom Welling

106) Torchwood

107) Twizzlers - only the red ones

108) Vampire movies

109) Variagated embroidery threads

110) Warehouse 13

111) Warm fluffy socks

112) Whittards' white strawberry hot chocolate

113) Wil Wheaton's tweets

114) Wild Boys - the tv show

115) Yankee candles - I just wish they weren't so expensive

116) Yarn dyed especially for me - I got a few skeins for Christmas

117) Youtube videos

118) Zombie movies

119) Extreme Makeover Home Edition - I can't believe they cancelled it :(

120) New jewellery

121) Completing a jigsaw puzzle

I know it's an odd number to stop on, but those are all the ones that I collected last year. I have more... coming up soon.

2012 Fantabulous Things: 76-100

76) Reconnecting with an old friend

77) Red Dwarf - rumour is that it's coming back!

78) Reeses pieces

79) Refresher chews

80) Relaxing in a hot bubble bath with a good book

81) Russell Brand - I saw him live once. My friends and I went to the filming of the Big Fat Quiz of the Year 2007. He was hilarious.



82) Russell Howard - very funny man, and kinda cute too.



83) Sanctuary - the tv show.

84) Sausage and cheese muffins - I make these every Christmas. They're scrumptious.

85) Sherbert burps

86) Sleep

87) Slush puppies

88) Slush puppies with a splash of alcohol

89) Smallville - the tv show

90) Smell of fresh cut grass

91) Smiley face sweets - I may have a mild addiction

92) Sorting paperwork - except when it's regarding my debts

93) Sorting yarn

94) Stephen Fry


95) Stephen Fry and Alan Davies - I'd go and see Stephen Fry anytime, but I'm not sure about Alan Davies on his own. Ripping off Stephen in QI he's excellent. He's coming to Stoke in October - maybe I'll give him a shot.


96) Stickers

97) Superman

98) Supernatural - the tv show

99) Sweet potato biscuits/scones

100) Tall glass of cold orange juice

2012 Fantabulous Things: 51-75

51) Making a new friend - this is actually in reference to someone specific. She knows who she is.. hopelyy :-)

52) Making something for free that could cost £50. I made myself a nice Yarn Swift out of pegs and coat hangers!

53) Man hugs - I miss these. Very much.

54) Michael Mcintyre - A very funny man, whom I will hopefully be going to see in October - depending on currently dire financial situations.


55) Michaela - my baby baby sister. Otherwise known as Sprogget or Sproggetibog.

56) Mini mochi yarn - Just look at it!!! I'm making a blanket out of it.



57) Mint Vienetta - yummy yummy yum yum.

58) Misfits - brilliant TV show. I thought it'd suffer from the loss of Nathan, but the new guy is kinda funny.

59) Money - so much better when you actually have some.

60) Musty smell of an old book

61) My Family - I do love my family, but in this instance I mean the tv show.

62) Nathan Fillion - the man is pure genius. And sooooo hot.



63) Neil - when I initially added him to this list it was for very very different reazsons, but I still mean it.

64) Once upon a time - the new tv show

65) Parmesan roasted potatoes - they're delicious. I don't think I've had normal roast potatoes since I discovered the recipe.

66) Peanut butter m&ms - unfortunately they aren't available in the UK :(

67) Penguins

68) Penn and Teller - GENIUS!


69) Piles of christmas presents

70) Planning trips

71) Pleasant dreams

72) QI - the most incredible non-fiction show ever

73) Raising hope - another brilliant show

74) Ravelry - not sure how I ever managed without that site

75) Receiving swap packages

2012 Fantabulous Things: 1-50

The first sets are alphabetised, because I've stored them that way as I've collected them. They won't always be.

1) A Very Potter Musical

If you're a Harry Potter fan and you haven't already seen this, you must go to Youtube immediately and look at it.

2) American Horror Story

An interesting show that appeared this year.

3) Anita Blake novels

They're actually Laurell K. Hamilton novels about Anita Blake, but you know what I mean.

4) Being a Hogwarts student on Ravelry

5) Big Bang Theory

The TV show, not the event. Although I'm pretty sure the event was fantabulous too.

6) Bill Bailey



7) Blue Man Group

8) Bones

The TV show.

9) Buffy the Vampire Slayer

10) Captain Jack Harkness



11) Captain Jack Sparrow



12) Castle

The TV show with the amazing Nathan Fillion in.

13) Cayden

A very, VERY good friend who's been there for me when other "friends" haven't.

14) Chocolate caramel cookies

I was referring to the ones I made with Rolos and Pecans in a month or so ago. They were gooooood. Must make some more.

15) Christmas

16) Christmas trees

17) Clothes fresh out of the dryer in the winter

18) Cookies in general

19) Dancing in the rain

20) David Tennant



21) Desperate Housewives

22) Discworld



23) Dr Horrible's Sing-a-long Blog

24) Dr Who



25) (A Town Called) Eureka

26) Family Guy

27) Felt!



28) Finishing a project

29) Firefly

Why did they cancel it? Wwwwhhhyyyy???

30) Fresh clean pages of a new notebook

31) Fringe

32) Futurama

33) Generous strangers

34) Glee

35) Going on trips

36) Google

37) Grey's Anatomy

38) Harry Potter Fanfiction

39) Helena Bonham Carter



40) House



41) Jeffery Deaver books

42) Jennie

My likkle middle sister - aka Little Squish

43) Jensen Ackles



44) JK Rowling

45) Johnny Depp



46) Kitten cuddles

47) Kittens and toys

48) Kittens' faces when they singe their tail fur

49) Lee Evans




50) Leverage

The TV show. An American version of Hustle, basically.

On the Fourth Day of Mario...

...my Nerdness gave to me...



...one Yoshi egg...



...a litle angry bird thing and a question block...



...one Italian plumber...



...an uncompleted border and some temporary tacking!

On the Third Day of Mario...

...my Nerdness gave to me...



...a litle angry bird thing and a question block...



...one Italian plumber...



...an uncompleted border and some temporary tacking!

On the Second Day of Mario...

...my Nerdness gave to me...



...one Italian plumber...



...an uncompleted border and some temporary tacking!

On the First Day of *still censored"...

...my Nerdness gave to me...



...an uncompleted border and some temporary tacking!

Tune in tomorrow for the first proper picture and the removal of the censoring.

Discworldathon

Do you know who this man is?



Do you know where this is?



That man is Terry Pratchett. He is the creator of that wonderful place: The Discworld. His novels and stories of the occupants of Discworld are amazing, and they've just kept coming and coming for as long as I can remember.

The future of Discworld is now uncertain, because Terry Pratchett has Alzheimers disease, and in the years to come he will suffer (among other things) confusion, trouble with language, and severe memory loss.

In an effort to pay tribute to this incredible man, I'm partaking upon a Discworldathon. In the year 2012 I intend to read all 39 of the Discworld novels, in order to raise money for Alzheimer's Research UK.

Please sponsor me. As little, or as much, as you can afford. Every penny will help.

http://www.justgiving.com/Colette-Horsburgh

And please pass on this news to your family and friends and colleagues. Spread the word, and help me support Terry Pratchett, Discworld, and Alzheimer's Research UK.

Coming soon...

One of my Project 200 pieces is a big piece with lots of littler pieces. I'm not sure why, but I got the idea to do them in a series, after Christmas, in a blog special.

Project 200 - 61/139

I've done another one. A nerdy one this time.



61 down
139 to go

Feltaversary

July 14th 2011 is my 2nd Feltaversary. Which means that two years ago I made this delightful little piece.



I haven't shown much of my work recently, because it hasn't been Project 200 stuff. I've been working on pieces for my Etsy store, and designing patterns, and trying to finish this damn Mammoth Secret Project. But I have been working with some felt for the store, so I can show you one or two pieces.

Project 200 - 49/151

Very nearly a quarter of the way through.



49 down
151 to go

and for an extra little bonus...

Remember this?

The Slytherin scarf was a quarter of a Project 200 piece. I still can't mark it as complete yet, but here's the second quarter...

Project 200 - 35/165

Here's the next one, May 2nd's piece.



May 3rd's is coming up in a few hours, and hopefully May 4th as well. Wish I had a Star Wars themed project.

35 down
165 to go

Project 200 - 29/171

This is the biggest Project 200 piece I've done so far. It's taken me two months.



It's a large, flat humbug!

Lol, no it's not.



It's SNAPE!!

Snape, Snape, Serverus Snape, Snape, Snape, Serverus Snape.... DUMBLEDORE!! Sorry. I just woke up; I'm a little giddy.

29 down
171 to go

Internet Disillusionment

I have a lot of mental issues. Aside from my depression, I also have a problem with agoraphobia. It's been a lot easier to manage in recent years, but ten years ago I'd have a panic attack whenever I left the house. So I didn't leave. I found comfort and companionship in the internet.

I LOVE the internet. You can find anything and everything you want somewhere online, and probably things you don't want to find too. There was a time when even if I didn't see or speak to a person in weeks, I was never lonely, because I had a whole community of friends online. From all over the world. So at any time of day or night, whatever was on my mind, I always had someone to talk to.

Things have changed a lot since then. I moved, and my agoraphobia subsided. I went to university, I met people IRL. I became a little more normal. But then I had my big breakdown, and dropped out of university, and had major money issues, and stopped getting regular bus tickets, and stopped going out and...

I deny it. Whenever anyone mentions that I don't go out, I tell them that it's just because I have nowhere to go. But it's more than that. I don't WANT to go out. I don't have anywhere to go, but I could go for a walk. I started to, when I was activating the Puppy Plan. Then I broke up with Neil and didn't go out for walks anymore. A part of me wants to go out for a walk, but a bigger part of me really, REALLY doesn't want to leave the house. There are lots of things I could do. I could use £3 on a payday to get a dayrider and ride the buses around randomly... I enjoy that. Or I could go for a walk. I could just go and sit on the grass across the road and read a damn book. But I don't want to. I'm lonely, but Inside is safe, and Outside is not. I don't know what I think will happen. I just want to stay indoors where I'm safe. And yes, I'm fully aware that this is a problem that needs dealing with, but it's not actually why I'm writing.

I've lived in solitude before, and wasn't lonely. But I'm lonely now. In the past I've had "text harems". A dozen people I could text when I was feeling blue, or just bored. Now there are 41 contacts on my phone and only 9 of them are actual people as opposed to businesses. Most of those are family. There are precisely three people I can talk to when I'm bored or miserable. One is too busy with work. One is my exboyfriend who I'm still in love with and probably shouldn't even be talking to. One currently has enough problems of his own.

Aside from missing the text harem, the internet is starting to feel like a lonely place too. I talk to dozens of people, but mostly on the Ravelry swaps I run, and people there are usually annoyed with me being so OCD and persistent about my listkeeping and checks. My MSN contacts list has only a few people on it, and most of them are never online (or have me blocked). I have 37 friends on Facebook, and nearly all of them are family. Social networking is HUGE at the moment... so how come I don't have any friends? Am I really that repulsive that even my online persona isn't worth talking to?

The Tell-Tale Tattoo

On my back, just hovering over my right shoulder blade, is a tattoo. Inked in the sharp curves of Klingon script, the letters translate to read “wordsmith”. I have 21 tattoos to date, but this is the one that sticks most fiercely in the forefront of my brain. It is the tell-tale tattoo. Throughout my day of internet surfing, crafting and playing with cats, the tattoo throbs. The word echoes in my brain.

On one of many shelves in my bedroom is a series of books. Books that have my poems in them. Published works. I’m a published writer. Except that I haven’t written anything in years. I’m not a writer. I’m not a wordsmith. I’m a fraud. I have lists of ideas, and a million first drafts and random paragraphs. And I have a million excuses to not sit down and write. I need to finish that knitting project. I need to feed the cat. The rug needs vacuuming. I need to defrost the freezer. I need to do absolutely anything except sit down and face the fact that I can’t write anymore.

I can open a blank page, or try to work on a half-finished piece, and all I do is sit there. Sit there waiting for inspiration to strike. Waiting for the words to flow through me onto the page. Sit there feeling like a fraud and an imposter. My shoulder heating up with the slow burn of that tell-tale tattoo.

Even now. I’m writing. And I’m pleased that I’m writing. I’m ecstatic and over-the-moon that words are appearing on the page in front of me. But I don’t know what I’m writing. These sentences don’t make sense to anyone but me. They have no form. They’re mere ramblings and nonsense. I have a blog for that. In fact, I may well copy this over to the blog in a moment. But I’m meant to be writing! Poetry! Prose! Fiction! I have this idea of the tell-tale tattoo in my head. It’s been there for years. My own personal homage to Edgar Allan Poe. But I can’t manifest that idea into an actual piece.

Perhaps... perhaps my problem lies in first person. I hate my own life. I hate myself. I find nothing about my own personality or life to be interesting, so why would I think anyone else would? Why do I write in first person all the time? My common sense is telling me that perhaps I don’t write in my journal/blog enough. Perhaps I have too many thoughts and feelings and emotions to get out of the way before I can start to create. And now that I have isolated the problem, I can work on the solution. I need to keep up with these inane ramblings. When there’s nothing more to flow, then perhaps I can create.

In the meantime, my tell-tale tattoo story needs a protagonist. Someone who isn’t me. Someone who isn’t quite nerdy enough to get a tattoo in Klingon.

Double Knitting

These pieces aren't part of Project 200, but they're a new knitting technique I've learnt. It's called Double Knitting, and you end up with the reverse looking the same as the front but in mirrored colours. Very cool.