Wednesday 24 October 2012

Some more things I know:

1. Airing out your apartment in fall is worth sitting indoors in your coat and shoes. 

2. If you wait for perfect conditions you'll never get anything done. One day I may even follow that advice myself.

3. I spend more time adjusting and fussing with the layout and colour of this blog then I spend blogging. Today we shall try wood paneling to go with the industrial brick print.

4. I may be a little anal about the layout.

5. I get easily distracted: I came in from the library, and decided that since I had my shoes on I'd take out the garbage, on my way to take out the garbage I stopped to open a few windows to let fresh air in, then I sat at my computer to start loading an episode of british hoarders so it would be finished when I came back in, then I started looking on Apartment Therapy, which lead to Bloglovin, which lead to me feeling pathetic about how little I blogged. So, it's been an hour since I got in, the garbage is half emptied in the hall waiting for me to take it out, my house is really cold from all the open windows, and my video isn't loaded... But at least I got a bit of blog writing done.

6. See number 2.

Sunday 21 October 2012

Some things I know


Sunday is a CBC Radio kind of day.

I don't enjoy malls any more, I must be growing up, or getting better at not buying stuff I don't need, or smarter, or all three.

Crayons are still awesome to write with, even though the ends get duller and duller the more you use them and ergo your letters get fatter and fatter.

I don't call my mother enough.

Writing down my do to list is just as satisfying as actually doing the things on my to do list.

My apartment isn't big enough for all the rugs I want to make/buy.

Party on Garth.



Tuesday 16 October 2012

Oh heyyyy long forgotten blog.

It's been ages. 

I'm only having a mild identity crisis, but more on that later.

Work has been steadily busy, I was the 2nd in the craft department on a Christmas movie, just did some chopping and dish washing for the catering of a pilot shoot, farted about with some other work with some TV and a touch of modelling. Relationship is good (as far as I know, eek!), family is healthy, wallet is steadily getting bigger, but I dunno. Something is off.

I've narrowed the iffy feeling down to several possibilities:

  • I'm lacking job satisfaction. I like doing craft services and all, but I think it's time to try and push my self into other departments, try and do more TV, work on my model portfolio... You know, challenge myself. Things have been challenging, don't get me wrong, craft is a tough job if you do it right and people don't give it enough respect, but I think I want to attempt to create a more secure job net buy expanding my skills and tech knowledge. 
  • I'm seriously lacking a creative outlet. There's only so many times I can kid myself that tidying my apartment and rearranging furniture is a creative endeavour. I have an idea for an art project that isn't a practical home DIY, we'll see how that goes.
  • I'm overwhelmed by too much stuff. I am not a hoarder or anything, you can see nothing but tons of floorspace and neatly displayed neat things (No dusty china dolls here!) in my apartment,  but if you were to open a closet, yeah... whole other story. I'm attacking boxes of forgotten crap in little bouts to fight my clutter unhappiness, hopefully it will be a huge weight off my shoulders when I get it to a manageable place. 
  • I'm not meant to live with a roommate. My roommate is lovely and sweet, she doesn't steal my stuff, do drugs in the living room or bring boys home every night, so it's nothing against her. I think I'm at a place where I am really ready to live on my own, to take up all the space in my apartment, decorate ALL the walls, own all the food in the fridge. I'm so ready. My roommate moves out end of November. I'll miss her. but I'm ready.
  • I need to read more. I'm taking suggestions for good books. Hit me up.
I'm optimistic that tackling some of these things will help me be more satisfied about me. More comfortable, more relaxed, less high strung. 

We'll see how it goes,


Wednesday 27 June 2012

Wet Beach Days

Yesterday was probably the rainiest day we'd had in a long time, and not just rainy, windy. Hurricane windy. Miserable sheets of heavy cold rain and face pelting windy. 
So naturally it was the perfect weather to go to the beach.
I stole away the boyfriend and dragged him (willingly) to Rainbow Haven for a no fuss in-car breakfast picnic of bacon sandwiches, hard boiled eggs and coffee. We were the only people on the beach save for two kite surfers tearing up and down the beach. 
When you deliberately go outside to get soaked in rain, it's always a good time. The wind and sleet instantly turned our coats into sails and we were aggressively coaxed across big slippery rocks and through sea grass, stopping only occasionally to marvel at the suicidal kite surfers.


Some peoples children eh?


 Instagramed photo of dry spots under rocks due to wind off the ocean.
Follow my Instagram feed for more photos: fionaestella




My cone headed boyfriend being turned into a human sail.
Also from my Instagram feed fionaestella


Yesterday just goes to prove that some of the best adventures are spontaneous, low maintenance and totally inexpensive. Big smiles and silliness will always find you if you just open yourself to them.

Monday 4 June 2012

I'm all hair and glasses.

I remember being very young when I saw my first pin up girl image. I can't recall exactly what it was, or who it was, but I do remember being completely transfixed by the cheeky sexiness and playfulness of this once risqué art form. At the time I was starting to become aware of how over sexualized the world was around me, with stereotypes of beauty I could tell already I didn't fit, and the picture just captivated me. It was so different than any of the other images of woman I saw plastered all over magazines in checkout lines as my mother dragged me through them, with me feverishly flipped through all the glossy pages I could reach.
I was probably only 9 or 10, but with the joys of early onset puberty I could already tell I was never going to be tanned (Not without the risk of melanoma, thanks genetics), blonde (Not without copious amounts of dye and fry) or tall (5'5" is so tragically average). I could also tell early on that I was never going to have those unattainable skinny legs that slid effortlessly into knee high boots, even the rubber kind. I knew right away I had a better chance of looking like one of these retro stunners than Kate Moss when I came out on the other end of puberty.
Of course it goes without saying that puberty was a miserable experience. I'd say we can chart my self 
esteem and happiness with the way I looked by the following photos.



This photo was taken the year before I got glasses. I'm seven. It was probably also the last time I was happy, or at least not unhappy, or even aware, of how I looked before 'The Change'.

Thankfully Facebook didn't exist for most of my grotesque mutation into an adult, but you can imagine it: Tons of red crazy hair, face full of freckles, a wire across my bottom teeth, terrible baggy clothes and the same bronze wire framed glasses for 5 years. It got to the point where I got hit in the face with enough projectiles in gym that it was a wonder they still stayed on my face. This is the best worst picture I could find:



Here's a little number I like to call Helicopter Hair.
Thankfully around seventeen I opted for contacts instead of glasses, finally stopped mutating and became happy with how I looked, if only for a brief period until college where I forgot how to dress like a girl and gained 20 pounds of macaroni and cheese weight. Unfortunately Facebook did exist then, so yeah... Lots of unflattering photos.

*Sigh* College was two years of baggy free T-shirts and sweaters. I don't even think I plucked my eyebrows in this photo.*Shame*

Anyway, to bring you up to speed: It took a long time, but I'm finally happy with the way I look again, and I'm flipping ecstatic about how awesome I feel inside and especially on the outside. A few weekends ago I collaborated on a retro pin up shoot with Truro Photographer Jeff Babineau which turned out to be the biggest boost in self esteem you could ever imagine. The final product was better than I could have hoped for and I'll be the first to admit I was shocked I could look like this:











Who knew eh? For the complete collection of photos and the photographers take on the whole experience wander over here

There's these long stretches while you're growing up that you doubt you'll ever look or feel normal, let alone beautiful. It felt so empowering to own my looks and to own my sexy self and to realize all that growing up crap finally amounted to something awesome.


I love that I got to live out a small silly little girl's fantasy that one day I wouldn't only look like a pin up model, but I'd get to be one too, even just for an afternoon. 


My awkward 12 year old self would've so been stoked.





Tuesday 29 May 2012

Identity Crisis.

I really am terrible, TERRIBLE at remembering to keep this updated!! Agh!


Look, life happens. Bought a car, started a new relationship, you know how it is. 


On an exciting note: I was saying the other day, after yet another viewing of 'Across the Universe' that it was a real shame that I didn't own any Beatles music. Well, low and behold I  discovered today that I not only have Beatles music, but I have every single album on one mp3 disc. So essentially I'm flailing and singing along to the White album...and making my best effort to type.  Mother Superior drop the gun.


Now on to business: This blog is having a serious identity crisis. I understand the key to a successful blog is to have consistent content, a theme, a plan... You know, all the things this blog doesn't have right now.


So in other words this blog is a very confused teenager searching for an identity. But just as I grew out of the mediaevalist, nerdy, lazy goth and 'Safety Pin Girl' phases of my questionable high school career, this too will pass. 


In the mean time, let's pretend this is a style blog and gush over how grown up my living room looks after I replaced this impractical dumpster dived coffee table: 




With this gorgeous second hand Ikea find I bought off a moving friend:


I will be eating nothing but pasta and frozen peas for the rest of the week but it was so worth it. I've finally gotten my living room to look like the space I can be happy with for a while, all for less than $250. And as an added bonus, when I swapped the gear out between the stands I discovered a stack of CDs I'd forgotten about (including the Beatles collection) and managed to streamline all the wires, eliminating two. Let's hear if for simplified, and lets also hear it for sitting back and admiring ones tidy living room. Huzzah.






Wednesday 25 April 2012

I'm too busy enjoying life to remember to blog...

My mother told me I should make an effort to blog at least once a week. I was never really good at doing anything my mother said, so I guess this is no exception. So, um, here's a feeble attempt at keeping this blog up to date.

Halifax. You're beautiful. Why did I ever want to leave you?


It's an early Wednesday morning, foggy and cool. There isn't even the slightest breeze. It would seem the city is still waking up, and the moodiness of the fog would suggest it's very groggy. Perhaps even sulky.


On my slow leisurely walk home I passed all my neighbours walking in the opposite direction, mostly children with backpacks and mothers with strollers, and the occasional sullen teenager. My neighbourhood may not be nicest part of the city. It's a long street lined with identical brick apartments, all three levels, all characterless, all sturdy and uncompromising. Former military housing, built decades ago. Kids play in the streets here. Running from building to building, drawing with chalk and poking things that hide in Maynard Lake with sticks. It's the sight of these roving packs of kids that makes me love this street.


My last apartment I lived in was a high-rise, all single bedrooms, filled almost exclusively by bachelors and seniors. This place is young, lively, sometimes messy and only occasionally exciting. Watching my neighbour get taken away by the cops one day and by ambulance another may not be ideal... But at least I know my neighbours here.


We're in that part of Spring where it's going to be grey and rainy for what feels like an eternity. Begrudgingly tolerating the weather because we know summer is coming.


It's going to be a good summer. I can smell it.


Glorious Halifax with your sea air, your hipsters, your coffee and smiles. Why did I ever want to leave you?


Church of St David's, Pizza Corner, in fog.

Wednesday 21 March 2012

A perfect summer night, in March.


I'm a true believer that the best days are the ones that happen completely by accident. 


Today was one of those days.


After a planned afternoon of entertaining my friend and her adorable 3 month old in my apartment, I rushed off to a hair appointment, and thus started a perfect night out.


First, let me set the scene: It's March, in Nova Scotia, but by some amazing yet slightly horrifying twist of global warming it's a gorgeous 22 degrees. Everyone on the streets downtown are sharing a communal fantastic summer attitude. Shades on, sleeves up, summer shoes, iced coffees in tow. Needless to say, amazing weather after a miserable winter. 
Everybody is Happy.


I settle into the chair and chatter away while my winter shag is transformed into a blunt-banged hipster do. The conversation drifts effortlessly from Vietnam Tourism, Indian food, horoscopes, ghosts, parallel dimensions, time travel and Coronation Street.


Best. Stranger. Conversation. Ever


I pay and stop by Dalhousie's Sexton Campus and meet my old friend T who's in the process of building a robot with friends for a competition. I sit on the floor and watch two grown men sweat bullets and fret as they trouble shoot a robot designed to lift and move eight wooden playing blocks to spell a word: Profound. It succeeds in less than three minutes, and there is much rejoicing.


I manage to drag T off for a bite at the local south end BBQ joint Boneheads. We proceed to devour two plates of pulled pork and mac and cheese, chased with glass bottle ginger beer and coke. We close the place out and then leave for a wonderful spontaneous walk through the south end.


Highlights of the night included:
  • Moseying up streets and (mostly me) chattering about houses and architecture.
  • Ducking down an alley and showing T a secret part of the city he'd always biked by but never really saw.
  • Spotting this house:
Hello Jetsons!
  • Sitting on a bench at the corner of Spring Garden Road and watching people strut by in their hipster spring-wear lovelies.
  • Wandering over to the Library front steps and catching buskers swallowing fire and spinning devil sticks.
We finished off the night sitting on the church steps at Pizza Corner and listened to a heavy metal band practice through an open apartment window. As we sit and goof off while watching more packs of people manoeuvring in the cool summer night, we see the band emerge from the apartment, lugging gear. They look like a proper stereotype: Long grisly hair up in bandanas, scruffy facial hair, sleeveless tee shirts, spider web tattoos... And thats when we saw them load all their gear into the back --- of a brand new Silver Dodge Caliber...

I guess even the metal heads need reliability and storage in a midsize car.

Over all, this spontaneous date was just what T and I both needed. Sometimes it's not what you do, it's who you do it with, and then sometimes it's both. 

As I waited for the last bus to take me home to Dartmouth I thought about all the great days that stand out in my memory: Spontaneous picnics, beach walks on days that had no business being beach days, conversations on verandas that last into the wee hours, road trips to nowhere, surprise guests and swing sets.

On nights like tonight, with the air smelling of dusty summer, and my heart all warm and fuzzy I feel content. Content and optimistic. 

They say everybody associates certain smells with deep feelings, and I've always associated that warm scent of summer dust and new grass growth with hope.

And tonight reeked of it.






Saturday 3 March 2012

Death and Taxes.

Doing your taxes sucks. Super sucks. 
Especially if you're me and you're eyes start to cross at the sight of numbers. 
Especially if you're me and you graduated high school having failed the provincial math exam. Especially if you're me and you freelance in an industry that pays in cash at the end of the job. And Especially if you've worked close to 20 jobs in the past year. 
Yeah, taxes suck.
So here I am, sorting through a year's worth of T4's, pay stubs, cheque photo copies, invoices and receipts, eating something that claims to be risotto out of a plastic bag (My Mom would be so proud). Who am I kidding? I've done my taxes for ages, and I have a solid track record for doing them wrong each and every single year. So this year I surrender, I'm going to the mall and having a professional in a booth do them. 


Stuff I know: If you're not a mechanic don't fix your own car, and if you're a math idiot don't do your own taxes.


I love being an adult, and if I keep saying that to myself enough I may start to believe it.



Friday 2 March 2012

Funeral Songs.

My good friend John Clarke over at The Rector's Blog, posted a comment in response to my post about "Psycho Killer" yesterday: "want the Talking Heads song "Home: Naive Melody" plays just before my funeral starts." 


Which is cool all by itself, but what makes that even cooler is that John's the Rector at St. Paul's Anglican  Church in Charlottetown PEI, and when I was a kid he was the minister at my church in Bridgewater. He was a really positive role model for a awkward pre-teen growing up in a small town, and even though I haven't seen him in years I still site him as one of the adults that mentored me into being a decent human being.


I still love discovering what music we have in common, and I guess it never ceases to amuse me when you get to see someone as more than their occupation. Finding out your minister likes bands like The Clash, Talking Heads and M.I.A. is like finding out your math teacher is a demolition derby driver on the weekends. It kicks their awesome spectrum up a notch for sure. 

This Must Be The Place (Naive Melody) - Talking Heads

John's comment got me to thinking about funeral songs. Something I doubt very many people think about, especially 23 year old immortals like me. Ask any woman with an affinity for daydreaming and I can guarentee that she's probably already picked out the music for her wedding. I'll admit I've done it, how cool would it be to have a first dance to Brian Ferry's "Let's Stick Together", nothing says romance like boogying to a lyrical plea of sticking together for the sake of the children. Party. 

I think the songs you'll have played at your funeral are far more important in the grand scheme of things, I mean, you only get one shot at that playlist. Statistics show you're probably going to have a few weddings, chances are you're only going to die once.

Think about it, this is your last chance to show off your obscure music tastes, and unlike sharing a video or song on Facebook, your 'guests' have to listen to the music you picked. Have to. It's not negotiable. This is undoubtedly every music snob's wet dream.  Like throwing the ultimate party, you get to completely set the tone. My favourite example of this was in the film Love Actually: "Bye Bye Baby" by The Bay City Rollers. Brilliant. Absolutely Brilliant. Tongue in cheek all the way.

Maybe it's the maritimer in me but I think a funeral is a celebration of somebody's life, and shouldn't be all stiff and stuffy. Bring on the fiddles, I want to see drinking and eating, story sharing and laughter, and goddammit, there had better be little cucumber sandwiches at my reception or somebody's getting a poltergeist.

As far as what I would want played at my funeral I have no idea, but I know "This Must Be The Place" is a top contender (Yeah, I know that makes me a hack, funeral song thief. Guilty as charged.) I also know that I'm going to need to throw a hymn in there to make the old fogy's happy, so here:

Lord Of The Dance - Dubliners

This was my favourite hymn when I was a choir kid.What's not to like? Not only does this video give me serious beard envy, it's also catchy. It's a cheerful galloping little melody with a chorus you can pick up in no time, a rhythm you can clap/stomp to, AND you can swing around and around in a circle with somebody till one of you pukes. 

So essentially this hymn is the perfect drinking song, and therefor a perfect addition for my Dream Funeral. 




Thursday 1 March 2012

Inappropriate things I shouldn't have said #1:

Describing that pang of jealousy that sneaks up and diddles with your sanity:
"I feel like somebody just vacuum aborted my heart through my belly button"

Tricks my brain plays on me #1

Went to bed last night with thoughts of long-distance-relationship-induced-paranoia dancing around in my head. 

I dreamt I learned how to play the electric base, but the only thing I learned to play was the opening rift to "Psycho Killer" by the Talking Heads. Clearly this is some subconscious cry for help, because nothing says "I'm a sane, calm, cool adult" like starting the morning with this song implanted in your imagination. For the rest of the day all tasks warranted me singing this to myself under my breath. Vacuuming has never been so intense.


As far as I'm concerned this is the bad-assiest songs ever.

The only cold cure that works:

*Cough*Cough*Cough*

.... mummy....

Calling your parents and asking them to sing "Soft Kitty"is not surrendering, it's a survival move, and possibly the smartest thing I've ever done. In fact it was the only thing that made me feel better in nine days... Take that drugs.

The original soft kitty. Leo.
They need to bottle that crap. I'd pimp that on school yards.