The Lion, The Witch and The... Lamppost?

In my last post I claimed to have been busy. Here, you will begin to understand why.

You may know that i quite like theatre. You may then also know that I spend a bit of time at a theatre. (Just, you know, every spare waking moment I've had for the past 2 and a half years)

Therefore, Thing 17: Act in a play and even Thing 86: Sing in front of an audience, are pretty easy to say that I've done. In fact, I feel I've done them enough that any blog post I write about them will be exceptionally dull.

Instead, I will tell you about this: I am part of the aforementioned theatre's youth group. As one of the 3 or 4  older members of the youth group, I had quite a large amount of input into this year's youth production which was The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe. In fact, this much input:

Although I'm not sure if the programme quite shows the 2 full weeks we spent getting to the theatre at 10 in the morning and locking ourselves in a room until midnight making sure that the set, costume, props, tech and whatever else you care to name was ready in time for the performance nights.

We had some help from people who did actually know what they were doing, and that was lovely (especially when it got to 4 days before the opening night and our wardrobe was delivered in pieces, without a door, or wheels and painted bright orange and we genuinely had to consider doing the play without it) but it really and truly was a 'youth' production, and I'm really proud of that. I love theatre because it's so massive, a play is not just acting, it's more like an enormous multi-dimensional creature for the audience to experience and live in for 2 hours rather than just watch. Alright, enough of my pretentiousness, here are some photos of wot we done:

One of our two 8x4 flats which took a long time to paint. They were double sided and on wheels so could be moved and spun to create different scenes.

In the background is what the other side of the flats looked like - a house interior complete with wallpaper and wood panelling. In front is our amazing wardrobe which a lovely man called Phil spent almost 3 entire days perfecting.

Our little production team, with the most of the stone table which took DAYS of discussing and sketching and cutting and stapling and painting until it was exactly right - you might not be able to see how much of an achievement it was by the picture but the joy on our faces might give you some sort of clue.

If you feel like this is cheating, here's proof of a play I did actually act in, and sing a little bit. And rap, actually... not that that will be happening ever again:

Whilst looking through my book, I realised that during this process I also managed to complete a few other things.

Thing 20: Stay up all night (I assume this was meant to be in a fun, going to a party, having a laugh with friends way, not a eating risotto at half 1, sewing up fur coats and being too stressed to sleep way, BUT IT STILL COUNTS)

In the same vein - Thing 21: Sleep all day (Not actually the day after the last night - that was the set strike, or even the day after that - I spent that at the Olympic Park watching hockey, but I got home at 4 that afternoon, went straight to bed and didn't resurface until 1 the next afternoon)

Thing 21: Paint A Picture Good Enough to Hang on The Wall. I painted the picture for the poster, I probably wouldn't agree that it was good enough to go on a wall, but it did. I spent 20 minutes painting it a few months ago when I probably should have been doing something else, like revising for GCSEs, but it did its job:

Thing 19: Make A T-Shirt. (I didn't stitch it with my own hands, it wasn't really my idea and I'm never going to wear it, all the same:

And now I am quite happy to never go near a theatre, a fabric shop or a pot of Atlantis blue paint, ever again. (Until September, obviously)

52, 67, 72: Life Update

 Well... Hello there. I haven't written a blog in a while. I've been really busy, okay? Don't look at me like that, I haven't had time for all this writing stuff.

Really really busy.

I HAVE been doing things, very busy things, promise. Those 101 things I've been trying to do, remember that? Yeah, some of those things got done.

I'll start with Thing Number 52: Swim and 67: Build the ultimate sandcastle

About a month ago, we went on holiday. 'We' of course means my ENTIRE family, plus some extras. 13 people in total? Maybe? I don't remember. We filled two houses and a beach hut, whichever corner of Southwold you looked in, there'd be some ancient member of the friend family lurking there, probably eating a slice of sponge cake.

Luckily I was not the only person under the age of 50. When not playing scrabble, drinking tea or riding up and down the road on a mobility scooter, my cousin Emily and I made the most of our youthfulness by cycling and shopping and swimming. Swimming in the sea. (The North Sea) Most days. Despite the fact it rained non-stop the entire week and each time we got out the water my lips were actually blue and it took 10 minutes until I could feel my legs again. Hmm... now I put it like that, it doesn't sound so great. But it was fun at the time! I think... Ah who am I kidding, to put it quite simply, there's nothing else to do there if you're not into sitting in an octagonal room, silently wondering what might be for dinner.

Another thing we did though was building the ULTIMATE sandcastle. Here it is, pretty ultimate, I think you'll agree.

We drew inspiration from Hogwarts and Cair Paravel, it even had a proper little archway for an entrance. Whilst creating our masterpiece, we discussed if a 16 year old and a 23 year old are too old to be building a sandcastle. Our conclusion: No. Although we are too old to be carrying spades without looking like frenzied murderers. Proof:

Whilst we were in Southwold, Latitude Festival happened, in Southwold. So we went (Not all of us, obviously, that would have been a ridiculous exercise which would probably have resulted in at least one fatality).

Here is where I completed Thing 72: See A Music Idol Perform Live. I'm not sure who I would consider to be a music idol but my favourite band at the moment is probably Alt-J. and I saw them. And they were fantastic, if you haven't heard of them, go and listen now. The way I see it is: if you like music, then you can't dislike Alt-J.
Some of my other highlights included:
-seeing a band called Breton in a tent that smelt like a rabbit cage, admiring the bassist's crazy dancing then seeing him later, running at him and telling him how much we loved his dancing, like two insane fangirls.
-getting a poem written for us by this poet
-wandering into the Cabaret tent and seeing Adam Kay being all hilarious.
-watching middle-class, middle-aged festival goers getting more and more agitated as we queued for a minibus.
-walking through some woods that were so perfect and pretty, I felt like I was in Twilight.
-unexpectedly seeing Simon Armitage reading a load of poems that I studied for GCSE English and finally appreciating how good they actually are.