Tuesday.

The Boyfriend isn’t here tonight. And my funemployment reached new levels of smugness just now when I realised that pretty much every branch of South London travel is currently affected by manic chaos (person under a train at Norbury, person under a train at Stockwell, Victoria station closed, London Bridge station closed.. How on earth will we cope with the Olympics?!)

Being at home sans Lurch tonight means that I absolutely have the time to do everything I am too embarrassed to do in his company: exercise, militant skincare regime, weeping wildly to West Side Story/Funny Girl/any other musical I can get my hands on tonight. I also definitely get to watch Glee without being criticised (I need some Lea Michele in my life, it’s been too long!)

Although, I know what I’ll totally end up doing tonight. I’ll open a bottle of wine, listen to John Mayer for hours whilst smoking a ridiculous amount of cigarettes, and crying endlessly whilst I listen to ‘Gravity’ on a loop. Until 2am finally arrives and working links for Glee are plastered online, so that I can then spend 45 minutes crying endlessly whilst either listening to Lea Michele serenading me or despairing at how much Ryan Murphy hates me and doesn’t want to let me listen to Ms Lea Michele.

Oh, and I will almost definitely try to teach my cats how to dance. Who needs exercise, anyway? 

Making waves...

Okay, 'waves' is the wrong word. But Chasing Alice is up and running. Yes, the name is terrible but it was the only thing my awful brain could come up with at 3am. It won't officially be up and running for a few weeks yet - leaving enough time to hopefully find some contributors. I believe that everyone has a voice, a positive one, and have hopefully created an environment where people will be able to express that voice. Chasing Alice won't be my site, it will be yours. It will belong to anyone who reads or contributes to it.

Although the project is in it's infancy at the moment, it will eventually become a creative hub where people can write, sing, photograph, draw or whatever to their hearts' content. Sort of a sharing place where the contributors will detail things that inspire them, or just simply share favourite memories, music, books, etc. in the hope that other people will also feel enlightened or inspired, and thus creating a little environment where people are free to express themselves through the arts.

If you have anything you would like to submit, or perhaps any questions you would like answered, the Chasing Alice team can be contacted through http://chasingalice.tumblr.com/. Yes, the site is pretty bare at the moment, but that will change with your input. Make 'Alice' the site you want it to be!

Facebook is great, as is Twitter, Tumblr, etc. But I’m pretty bored of only the “Hipsters” being appreciated. There is beauty and talent everywhere, not just with the regular crowd who seemingly only appreciate carbon copies. It’s been an ambition of mine for quite to a while to create a hub for people to express themselves. A place for people to share what inspires them, things they’re passionate about, places they love and people they admire. I’m not going to fool myself into thinking it can happen overnight, but I’m determined to get the ball rolling this year. I’m turning 21 this year and I’m desperate to finally achieve this. 

In a world so full of negativity, the positive aspects can get lost and blurred so easily. People spend so much time reading, writing, and singing about things they hate and things that get them down. I wonder: have we lost the ability to truly accept the positive areas of our lives? Do we dwell on the negativity in order to feel good about ourselves? I’m not about that! I need creativity, and beauty, and inspiration in order to survive. It helps me become a better writer and photographer, and it helps me to become a better individual. 

So here is my plea: I can’t promise you that this project will hit the big time this year, or ever, in fact. But if there’s something you’re passionate about, or something you adore, then please share it with me. I will provide full details to anyone and everyone who is interested. Believe me, it will make so much more sense when I have people on board!

Taking a break from writing before I go insane. Amusing myself with 'Alice Roulette'. It's something I used to do as a kid whenever I was ill, and seeing as I'm still stuck in this cold/flu haze funk, and am suffering from severe writers' block, I've decided it's time to play once again. The whole idea of the game - which I invented as a six year old with chickenpox - is to flick through 'Alice's Adventures in Wonderland' and whenever I land on a page, I read the first paragraph that I see. After that, I watch the relevant scene from the original Disney movie. Sure, it's weird and doesn't make much sense, but it kept me happy as a child, and I'm still happy with it now.

So as I battle this awful flu/cold thing and attempt to break down this horrifying writers' block (seriously, why is it so hard to break through this?!) I'm finding comfort in my childhood companion. And also, baby animal pictures online. Who doesn't love baby elephants?

I’m laying in bed, watching Philosopher’s Stone, and avoiding the important conversation I’ve been meaning to have with myself. It’s an all too common conversation and I’m absolutely dreading the thought of having to have it again. Instead, I’m distracting myself with Harry Potter and all the glorious childhood memories it’s bringing back. Back then, I wasn’t such a confused, neurotic individual. Instead, I was convinced that magick, in all of it’s glory, truly existed. I spent my days pretending I was Alice, searching for the rabbit hole every where I went. When I wasn’t desperately trying to be Alice, I instead created my own characters. I would bribe my younger sister into playing with me, forcing her to live out my imagination in front of any family members who would sit and watch for longer than five minutes. I would write stories, countless stories, about the most bizarre things. Some of them were pretty awful (including one ‘novel’ written aged 5 about a boy called ‘Charlam’. I couldn’t pick between Charlie and Adam, so he was stuck with the name Charlam. There was a whole series about him!) but some of them truly captured my warped imagination and limitless optimism. And thinking about all of this has got me thinking: What happened to our imaginations? Why does all of that magick and wonder have to disappear once we become adults? Why do we need to grow up? I’m not too keen on that school of though. So I’ve had an idea. One that will keep me amused, entertained, and enthralled. Send me your favourite stories of childhood imagination to my inbox. Your stories will remain private unless you express that you want them published on my blog. I’m fascinated to hear your stories. Will we ever grow up? Should we ever have to? Let me know… Don’t be shy!

“

Every atom in your body came from a star that exploded. And the atoms in your left hand probably came from a different star than your right hand. It really is the most poetic thing I know about physics

You are all stardust.

You couldn’t be here if stars hadn’t exploded. Because the elements, the carbon, nitrogen, oxygen, iron, all the things that matter for evolution weren’t created at the beginning of time. They were created in the nuclear furnace of stars. And the only way they could get into your body is if the stars were kind enough to explode. So forget Jesus. The stars died so you could be here

”

—	Lawrence Krauss

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It's 2012! We made it! I made it! I've developed a new fondness for exclamation marks!!!

Seriously, I can't believe that we have made it through yet another year. 2011 wasn't the best year (it wasn't the worst year) but I'm shocked I made it through relatively unscathed. And I sat down today to write out my New Year's Resolutions. Thinking that I'd only come up with two or three, my notebook suddenly had a three-page long list of resolutions. Some are slightly obvious (get a job, become healthier, quit bickering with Val) but some are slightly bemusing, even to me. It's incredible what your mind can come up with when you're not forcing ideas out. 

I doubt 2012 will be my year (after all, I'll still only be 21 at the end of it) but I've got a good feeling about the year. Maybe it's because I feel liberated from the god-awful job I found myself in last year, maybe it's because I honestly feel safe and comfortable with the people in my life, or maybe it's just because I know it's finally my turn to have an amazing year. Either way, I'm not going to think about it too much (another New Year's Resolution - Stop overanalysing everything).. I'm just going to enjoy it and hope that this good feeling lasts. It's been a while since I've felt so happy, I'm gonna cling on to it as much as possible.*

*Give it three weeks and I'll probably be saying "2012 is The. Worst. Year. Of. My. Life." It wouldn't surprise me.