Maybe I'll throw in a unicorn, just for the fun of it.

Do you have those days when you feel as if you didn't really exist because your phone seems sort of dead and the best social interaction you have is ordering coffee at Starbucks?
Monday was such a day for me. I had to work on a boring spreadsheet all day. I was terrified because the feedback for my essay was waiting at uni for me. My first King's essay, oh excuse me, "Critical Commentary". What the eff is a "Critical Commentary" anyway, and if you don't know what it is, how are you supposed to write one? Maximum anxiety level. When I got home I ended up watching tons of Nigella , and it made me feel even worse. I want her hair. I want her cooking skills. In order to have at least something in common with her (the hips), I ate all of the chocolates in my advent calendar.Children, do not try this at home, it sucks and you'll have no chocolate until Christmas.
At this point you are probably asking yourself, and rightly so, why I am writing this. Didn't I promise some weeks ago I'll write only happy things? Also, you only came here because of the competition, and now I am going on about eating chocolate instead of giving you some (chocolate). TTSSSSSSK. WELL... If you never lose, how you gonna know when you won?
If it's never dark, how you gonna know the sun when it shines...  These are the words of a gorgeous young popstar wise old man.
And they do not only make an awesome song, they are true as well. Apparently, karma wanted to make things up to me, and I got all sorts of sweet messages and texts the next day, even from people I had no idea they had an idea that I exist.
I also met up with Rachel, I really nice girl from my course who shared a peanut butter cupcake with me. That made me really happy.

Rachel kindly explained the British marking system to me, because even though I had collected my essay, I had no clue what my mark meant. As it turned out, the essay went down rather well, which astonished both me and my tutor (I wish I was exaggerating here, but I am not. He was even more surprised at my grade than I was). I feel really relieved, because I was worried I would do much worse here at Uni than back home in Switzerland.. But it turns out I can keep doing what I enjoy doing, so it's all good, kids. The topics for my two forthcoming essays were approved this week as well, and in case you are a nerdy person like me who is interested in English Lit essays, they are:

- Mary Poppins, Myths and London (or something like that - but I AM WRITING ABOUT MARY POPPINS. YAY. AND LONDON. MAYBE I'LL THROW IN A UNICORN JUST FOR THE FUN OF IT).
- Queerness in Katherine Mansfield's short stories.

The latter, no doubt, will add to the "queer" impression some of the people here seem to have of me. Several times I was asked in either a pushy or nervous tone whether "all that stuff on my facebook" is true.

How can this be my son??










Oh wait, but that wasn't what you ACTUALLY wanted to know,right? No, I am not married to Isa. But she's all sorts of awesome. If that didn't answer your question: The last person I had (have?) a bit of a crush on has better makeup skills than I have, And you know, my makeup skills are even more accomplished than my profound knowledge about the members of take that. So what does that make me? I think it makes me really  cool, HA. And if you don't think so, why not go and read another blog instead? Joy the baker is really good!

So, what I meant to say with all this rambling gibbberish is: Everyone has horrible days. It happens. Don't watch Nigella. Just read a good book and go to bed. What's good about horrible days is that they are usually followed by awesome days.
I would like to make your day more awesome, especially after  you went through all the trouble reading my rambling gibberish. The first person who can spot me in this video will get a Christmas surprise. By post. Just comment here, you don't need a blogger account to do it. Because if you never win, how you gonna know when you won?
MERRY CHRISTMAS.

How my faith in humanity has been restored by Ricky, the taxi driver

I usually don't mind London buses.. I guess the tube would be faster, but it's about 90% inacessible for me, so I don't really bother with the remaining 10%. But this Tuesday, I had absurd bad luck with the buses..In the morning I had an appointment at the hairdressers and was 20 minutes late because of the ramp of the bus not working - the bus driver tried 2 or 3 times, but then just drove off.
After I had my hair done (I quite like it, though it's more reddish than orange, again - I wonder if I will ever achieve really orange hair - it's one of my life goals) I had a seminar at the Museum of London. And again, the ramp of the bus (a different route and everything) didn't bloody work. But then something AMAZING happened. There was a black cab behind the bus, and the taxi driver got out of the cab and asked me where I wanted to go - and then he offered to take me to the Museum, for free. Just because I had the same haircolour as his daughter - apparently she's 13 and had it dyed because she's really into Florence and the Machine. How adorable is that? Honestly, being a redhead rules. You get free taxi rides and get on time to classes and everything.

Also, I need to show you some of the ridiculously gorgeous people I went to see Patrick Wolf with this week:
Roy and me in Cardiff (yes he is wearing blue lipstick, which somehow makes his eyes sparkle. He even wore the blue lipstick when we went out for pizza the night before, because he is super cool like that):

Aaaand Elissa and me in London. We also went with Jenny and Finn, but they are not pictured, because that would be too many pretty people in one blog entry. You'd just ignore the writing and stare at the pictures.I can't let that happen. I know Elissa from Creative Writing Society at Uni. She's totally cool and awesome, and her prettiness makes people give us free carrot sticks:

You might have noticed that Roy is featured in pretty much every blog. That is because he is crucial to my happiness.
That's all.

Material Girl

I am sorry. I let you down. I didn't post last week. It's only Monday. Can we pretend it's Sunday?

What made me happy this week (well, ok, last week..shhhh) is a pile of things. I learned in my seminar on Victorian Literature that there's nothing wrong with a bit of commodity culture. By the way, some dude always brings up "David Beckham's tattoos" (or something similar) in that seminar, which is especially funny as it is taught every week by another teacher on a different topic, bute dude never fails to throw in a random pop culture reference. Naughty, naughty.

So, here's a list of fabulous THINGS. go get some things, they'll make you cheerful. Hooray for consumerism.

1) Meddy the reindeer. Esther made this for me. WITH HER OWN HANDS. Like, properly crocheted. Esther's all sorts of awesome, even if she wouldn't crochet cute animals for me. She visited this (ok LAST) week. I miss her, booh. But Meddy the reindeer keeps me company. We drink Babycham together.

2) Do you know Babycham? It's a sparkly pear cider drink that comes in sparkly bottles with Bambi printed on them. SERIOUSLY. I didn't just make that up. Somebody else made that up. Probably an elderly lady who looks like Dame Edna. Even the name is all sorts of awesome. Let's say it together. Babycham, Babycham.

3) My mum sent me an Advent calendar. It's glittery and has dwarves and little angels on it. (Yeah, i didn't know that they like to hang together either). Love my mum, miss her MUCH. I might have told you that Tori Amos/Geri Halliwell/Pippi Longstocking/The little mermaid is the reason I dyed my hair red. But, my mum is. Because she is cooler than all of those ladies combined.

4) I have to read Mary Poppins for uni. It's pretty much the only book for that class I have read before (ha!) and I think it's one of the most wonderful little novels ever written. Please don't be the 367 person (yeah right, as if I knew that many) to tell me you didn't know that it actually is a book. Just go and read it. Mary is a major bitch diva in it. Love it.

5) I got a new sash/necklace/cord/barrier thingy. A handsome young man with major makeup skills gave it to me. Only it was used in the club to separate the "VIP tables", or some random shit. So security wanted it back. But I ran off to the loo, hid it in my massive bag, and went home. Living on the wild side, beaches.

6) I bought a necklace made of christmas lights that light up in the dark. Because you should buy yourself stuff that's cool and special and lights up in the dark. You deserve it.

These are my favourite things. What are yours?
'Now,' she said, 'spit spot into bed.'

What also made me crazy happy is that Wagner AND Katie got chucked off the X Factor.

Yes, I know that my carpet is ugly. It's even uglier in real life.

December will be magic again.

What I loooooooooooooved this week is the Christmas fair on the Southbank, right on my doorstep (There are other good things on my doorstep, cute puppies for example. Or adorable ears. Or, like, the Thames. Duh). So here are some expressions to get you in a christmassy mood.  

ELVES!!!

Santa's Letterbox!

Mini-Books!!!

Shoot Bang Whatevs.

Let me introduce you to Fudge. We have a love/hate relationship.

cuuuuute.

small sticks come in pretty colours.

Rudolph

Sparkle the dark up, With just a touch of make-up. I love Kate Bush so much, what a genius to write lyrics about Christmas AND makeup. There aren't enough songs about makeup.

Britney's got attitude.

I don't really have time to blog, I still have to finish an essay on how Oscar Wilde invented homosexuality.
Buuuuuuuuuut I promised one Happy-Blog every week, and this was one of the bestest weeks ever, so I decided to give Oscar some privacy for a moment, even though that won't help him much. Poor Oscar.

Cardiff/Roy/pink unicorn
I went to visit Roy in Cardiff. Roy is the coolest, sweetest and overall best person in the world. The fact that he presented me with a massive pink unicorn balloon when he picked me up at the station only confirms this. The Unicorn is called Chee Cho and now lives on my door. Cardiff is pretty, especially Cardiff Bay. Sometimes the Mystery Jets play there. They seem to like pink unicorns too, good for them.
Here's a picture of Roy and the unicorn which is full of awesomeness.

Tea
It doesn't get much better than sitting in my kitchen with Frank and Christina, inventing new words. Because Frank and Christina are clever like that. I love having clever friends visiting me.


Dancing to Britney with Christina and Jakes
..At a new club night called "Haute". It was awesome. A band was playing too, they were called "Pandering and the Golddiggers". They were super fierce. We had gin and tonics. It was so much fun. According to a massively stylish gothic lady-man, Jakes is my "main friend". That's cool, I never had a "main friend", and I like that it's Jake, because he is adorable and awesome and the Sporty Spice to my Ginger Spice. Viva Forever.
We also met that night a loony Austrian who let me give him a glitter makeover (but his shoes were so ugly, the makeup couldn't really save his look) and a sk8erboi who sernaded us with Avril Lavigne songs on our way home. "He was a punk, she did ballet , what more can I say?"

 Attitude is Everything
Attitude is Everything improves disabled people's access to live music. This is very important, because I think gigs and music can make such a difference to someone's life. For many young people, live venues play a massive role in their social life, but at the same time so many of them are not very accessible for disabled people. I got in touch with attitude after the London nightclub Heaven denied me access to a gig this spring because I'm in a wheelchair. Heaven sucks. Don't go to Heaven, kids.
So, I think "Attitude is Everything" is a really cool and important organisation, which is why I'm going to work for them. Do check them out.

Happy without shoes

Last night I made a resolution. No more angsty or emo blog entries. After all, being emo is only cool if you are 13 and wear a size 6, And I'm twice.. both, actually. When my friends tell me what they like about me, it's usually my positive, optimistic attitude. Somehow I lost that a bit during the last couple of weeks, and I am determined to get it back. Full hardcore style.
So, from now on, instead of telling you how much I hate my bank assistant or how much I am terrified of handing in my first essay here, I will dedicate one entry a week to things that made me happy. Because I am bloody worth it, and even more so are you, dear reader. Let's do it! Here we go, in no particular oder (actually, that sentence is almost always a lie. There is always an order. But figure it out yourself):

1) Coffee
The salesguy at Pret A Manger today offered me my latte "on the house". Just because he wanted to. That made me happy.


2) Boys in my flat
Last night I had a little accident. It was very unglamourous and involved me falling over backwards on the floor and a whole tub of tomato soup that I drenched myself and half of the kitchen in. It was disgusting. However, my flatmate Julian did not only help me up from the floor, he also helped me cleaning and reassured me that the smell of tomato soup everywhere was in fact rather pleasant. That was very sweet of him. I really like all of my flatmates, although I felt a bit weird around them in the beginning, as they are not the kind of people I am used to hanging out with (all three of them are heterosexual males, after all). All three of them are lovely.


3) Time of my life
Last night was the radio premiere of Patrick Wolf's new single "Time of my life". Back in December 2008 a snippet of it was released in the "Battle Megamix". At that time I had been in and out of hospital for 2 years due to an ongoing problem with my feet, and I had to get used to the fact that I wouldn't be allowed to wear normal, cute shoes anymore. In that snippet Patrick sang "Happy without you", but to me it sounded like "Happy without shoes" and I found that strangely comforting. And it is true, I am now, 2 years later, happy without shoes, with healthy feet and orthopaedic boots. For me, this song symbolizes how Patrick Wolf single-handedly transformed what could have easily been the darkest two years of my life into a time of glittery adventures. Sure, I had to go to the hospital every bloody week, but I also wore sequined dresses and danced to the "Magic Position" in Berlin, London and, umm, Düdingen. As Nick Grimshaw would say, "well done, Patrick Wolf". I love the song dearly, and so should you, even if you are able to wear pretty shoes. It's got handclapping and gorgeous strings and.. Just listen to it.

A Halloween Story (The Clown and the Unicorn)

I want to tell you a story. It's only a very short one and not very scary. It's about a girl unicorn who hung out with a bunch of topless gay clowns in a Circus.
That doesn't sound very realistic, does it? Well, remember that it's only a story. But, to make it more realistic, let's say it was Halloween and they were all in a "polysexual" night club called Circus and the girl was only dressed up as a unicorn - and the same goes for the clowns, probably. Now, the story goes like this:
The most gorgeous, most naked of the clowns (seriously, he was in the top 5 of the hottest gay guys the unicorn girl had ever seen, and she had seen many) begged the girl unicorn to kiss him. Just because he felt like kissing a girl for a change and because he had never kissed a Swiss girl before.
Really, what are the chances? That does not seem very likely, you might think, and so thought the unicorn lady. So she gave him a little peck on his super luscious lips, but he was not happy with that, went down on his knees before the unicorn and asked for a proper snog. Curiouser and curiouser. The girl unicorn didn't need much convincing and obliged. She was happy she did because a) it was very good and b) she had to neutralize her snogging karma after a very debauched Friday night that didn't involve gorgeous Brazilian clowns. In fact it didn't involve anyone gorgeous at all and does neither deserve a story nor a blog post (What a slutty unicorn, you might think, and rightly so!).
You may ask me about all this in private conversation, but don't expect an honest answer. It's just a story after all, anyway.

Coffee and hugs for everyone. And men in heels.

So I feel kind of bad for bitching about Geeksoc on my last blog entry. I went to an anime screening tonight (I especially liked a very silly one about bread and one that was more like the Hayao Miyazaki films I already knew, with a strong fantasy theme), and not only have they changed the rooms, but everyone was so sweet and accommodating and goofy. It was all laughter and hugs and warm and fuzzy feelings. So, looove Geeksoc, even the 3 people who were moaning on the forum about having to change venues. I don't know who you guys are, but let's have a virtual group hug.
Yea, Geeksoc made me happy. What made me also happy is that I found 2 very nice study-cafes. I prefer doing my reading in cafes, as I get more of a "OMGZ I AM IN LONDON"-kick out of it than at home or at the library (also, the library is sort of labyrinth-ish, sans David Bowie. It scares me a little). This habit also lends itself to buying lipstick during study breaks. Which might or might not be a good thing.
Anyways, one of the cafes I found is in Covent Garden (so close enough to uni), the other one's in Shoreditch so I can at least feel super hip while feeling super stupid for not understanding my Marx and Foucault texts. But I still want to find a cafe to do my reading somewhere between Waterloo and London Bridge (preferably not too far south, or there's a 99% chance that I might get lost). So if you know a good place in that area that meets the following criteria, let me know:

- bright and spacious
- no stairs to get in
- either music that is very subdued or very good
- good coffee
- not too crowded

Besides cafes and societies, I have also been to a debauchery of the best kind on Saturday night, a new club night hosted by the amazing Scottee Scottee. Check out pics . none of me, but still worth looking at - ha. Lots of gorgeous men in high heels. I'll now go back to my reading about Oscar Wilde and gay men. Life is good. Have a good night.

Who likes Amanda Palmer?

There's a society for literally everything at my uni: Japanese, Drama, Rugby, dramatic Japanese rugby players.. you name it. As I am new to this concept, I went to a fair where they were giving out presents and free candy, and subsequently decided to check those with the best candy some out.
The first society I got involved with was geek society.On their forum, they discuss a Buffy The Vampire Slayer - sing-a-long-event. Also, geek society sounds almost like Glee Club, and I always wanted to hang out with Kurt and Mercedes. And, let's face it, nerdy is the new cool. And I always wanted to be cool.
So, after talking to some of them online via facebook, I went to an anime screening, which was quite fun. The audience were mainly young men, and I swear some of them looked like straight out of Lord Of The Rings. Super awesome.  What is not so awesome is that all of their activities seem to be happening somewhere on the first floor without a lift. Not all of it in the same room or even same building, but they just seem to generally have a preference for places upstairs. What also isn't so awesome is that when I suggested on their forum that they move some of it to rooms downstairs, some people thought this was very "inconvenient".
Probably people do not realise that this is rude and that it hurts me. Now, I can walk some stairs, but if I do, I need someone to help me. They were very helpful at the one event I went to, but still, situations with lots of stairs mean I can't come or go when I want to, have to ask someone to help me up or down when I want to go to the loo, and walking stairs too often is not very good for my body. Situations where I have to depend on others, especially people I do not know well, make me feel really insecure. As if the whole "meeting new people" didn't make me feel insecure enough. Those situations also make me feel "disabled". If I am in good company and infrastructure is accessible, I do not feel like I have a disability. It is situations that physically challenge me where I am made to feel un-able.
Aaaaaaaaanyway, I am sure noone inteded to hurt me, and in the end some of the geeks turned out to be real stars, and it seems like they are willing to do some stuff in accessible rooms after all. If the Glee Club can do it, Geek Society can do it, right?

I also went to the Creative Writing Society, who were super sweet, instantly switching to a different room when the one that they had orginally booked had a broken lift. They seem generally super nice, talented and witty. One of the girls there has actually stalked met Stephen Fry. Can you believe it.
By the way, I noticed that every cool girl I seem to meet here is a massive Amanda Palmer fan. Why is that? So I decided to add all the KCL students who "like" Amanda Palmer on  facebook. Maybe we can create an AFP society.



god its been a lovely day! everything is going my way
i took out the trash today and i'm on fire...

chance encounters

So, during my first week in London, in bumped into tallhandsomeOMGsohotandsosweetinreallife Nicholas Hoult.. yea, I just had to rub that under your noses again. This lead to a squealfest in the middle of soho (with a hopefully big enough distance from Mr Hoult not to hear it, though he might have been under the impression that I am "mentally challenged" very intelligent anyway, what with all my stuttering and spluttering witty remarks during our 2 minutes conversation).

he looks even hotter in real life, I swear.

Buuuuut, this also lead to me making this list:

PEOPLE I WANT TO BUMP INTO IN THE STREETS OF LONDON

of course I realise that by making this list, I jinxed it and my chance of actually meeting any of those people evaporates to zero, so there's another, secret list of people in my head that I REALLY REALLY want to meet.
here we go:


1) Daniel Radcliffe
Because he seems so cute and awkward and like a good person overall, and also he could teach me Apparition and riding a broomstick and stuff.

you like muggles?

2) Karley Sciortino
Because her blog is absolutely terrifying and addictive. I actually stalked met Karley once, at a London hipster party, but all I managed was a nervous smile, and now she moved to New York. Fail.

3) Blaine Harrison from the Mystery Jets
For obvious reasons (namely his haircut). But I hopefully will, I will I will?!?

4) Marianne Faithfull 
Because she could be my motherly London friend. I want one of those.


5) Alexander Skarsgård
Because he could be my smoking hot heterosexual special friend. I want one of those.

Also, there's a list of people I don't want to meet:

1-5) Your hamster/uncle/grandma/cousin who is in London and needs somewhere to stay. Don't be so cheap, book a hostel ffs. And the same goes for people who haven't talked to me in YEARS, but still think they can use me as a free hotel. Eff you, there's no space. Alexander, Daniel and me are having a pyjama party.

Whoopie Pies, Ma'am.

It's very a bit pathetic, starting a blog with whining, but pathetic sums up my day pretty well. I had my first seminar on colonial women writers today, and while everyone else seemed so prepared and threw around the names of Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak and Homeboy Bhabha, I felt like a complete failure and did not do much except for staring at my nails. The most attention I drew to myself was when my pen fell on the floor. It's ok. That happens. Nevermind.
After those horrifying 2 hours I jumped on the next bus to a) get away and b) do some retail therapy at Oxford street, but things actually got worse.  Just as my mood lightened up because i found the most perfect dress (checked, long sleeved, peter pan collar.. ) at Urban Outfitters, the salesperson first had the nerve to tell me that UO does not do a student's discount because "London is not a student city" (???!!???) and then went straight on to call me - wait for it - "Ma'am"! How old do I look to you? 27?? 
But I did not let that ruffian discourage me, and headed straight to Selfridges to do some socializing. Roy and I made the acquaintance of an Italian guy who dresses like Lady Gaga over the weekend, and I decided to pay him a visit at his workplace. He seemed absolutely delighted to see me, but somehow was under the impression that I was his fangirl or something - he even told his co-worker that "this young lady" (which soothed my ego after the M-word) came here JUST to visit him, and that she would be the first of many.
I find his confidence inspiring. Also, I am very desperate for some friends here. My attempts to make friends at uni were a massive fail so far.(...)
What  really cheered me up, though, is that Roy got us tickets to see Whoopie Goldberg in Sister Act, The Musical. Yayayayay!!!!!  Because: 1. Whoopie is the coolest. 2. I was obsessed with Sister Act when I was 10. 3. This means Roy will come to London again in only 3 weeks 4. Roy is the most amazing person and the bestest company imaginable to stalk Whoopie. 


Whoopie makes everything better and makes my patheticness go away. Win. Thanks for reading, in case you did.