Saturday 10 March 2012

Raindrops and Roses

And Reader, lastly, here you go, a threequel. A list of my favourite things. Besides all the things Julie Andrews mentioned; here are a few additions.

1. Tea cups
Whether they have in tea in them or not, I can't explain it I just love looking at tea cups. Maybe this ridiculous fondness for tea cups has unexplored psychological bearings or maybe it just stems from being charmed by that singing chipped tea cup in Beauty and The Beast. All I know is they make me happy.


2. Train Journeys
Train journeys are peaceful and calming. I did have one bad experience in a train when I was six that should inhibit me from liking them as much, but I don't. Nothing beats watching the sun rise or set on the horizon through a train window. Or pretending you're in a melancholic scene in a bad Bollywood movie. 

3. Illustrations in Children's books
I think as a kid it was the illustrations in books that made me want to read them. Especially in those Enid Blyton books. Don't you wish sometimes that the Harry Potter books also had illustrations? No? Just me?

4. Rom-Coms 
I'm a sucker for Romantic Comedies. They are so predictable and mushy and gooey. But they know exactly how to please an audience.

5. Aeroplane trails in the sky.
They make me happy. 'Nuff said. And I plan to get proposed with an air plane trail in the sky saying "Will you marry me?". 

Hey, a girl can dream right? Right.

Thursday 8 March 2012

Words have power

And here you go, a sequel to my dare to blog regularly, in which I am going to list out my favourite words in no particular order. 

1. Serendipity
A "happy accident" or "pleasant surprise"; specifically, the accident of finding something good or useful without looking for it. 
Love the movie. Love the word.

2. Candid
Free from undue bias; disposed to think and judge according to truth and justice, or without partiality or prejudice; fair; just; impartial; as, a candid opinion.
Sounds like candy. And it is a lot less intimidating to say than words like "blunt" or "frank".

3. Deliquescent
The property of a substance that inclines it to absorb moisture from the atmosphere and dissolve.
This word made high school chemistry bearable for me.

4. Plush
Luxurious. Or a fabric of silk, rayon, cotton, or other material, having a thick deep pile.
Saying this word just fills my mouth with awesome. Say "Plush" out loud five times. There, don't you feel better?

5. Lackadaisical 
Lacking spirit or liveliness.
Although, the use of this word is almost justified by my life, I still love it. 

I love words like a cat loves to sleep. I love words that sound nice. Words that have a nice ring to it. I love to write words. I love to say words. I love to type words. As such, my social life includes reading dictionaries to improve my vocabulary (Crap, this is on the internet). Oh whatever. Don't be a hater; yes, reading dictionaries in my spare time, may seem ludicrous and preposterous, but words like "perfidiousness" and "sesquipedaliando help in baffling naive people. 

If you love words as much as I do you will enjoy this site. Savethewords.org is a charmingly geeky website where you can adopt words that once led significant lives but now lie abandoned and alone.

Creating a World Worth Living In

I don't want to write a long speech or anything, All I have to say is: Watch this. If you've never, ever before heard of it, watch this. If you've heard of it but don't know what it is, watch this. If you know what it is but have never seen this, watch this. Just watch it. That is all.








Creating a world worth living in? Watch. Share.

Wednesday 7 March 2012

Favourite Fictional Character

I understand that dedicating an entire post to a favourite thing is the mother of all cliches in the blogging world. But Reader, I see it as a dare to blog regularly. So here goes.

There are way too many literary and movie characters that I love, to pick a favourite. Picking a favourite child would be easier. The trick is to just let each child think they are your favourite. 


I've read this book 8 times, and it's not even close to boring yet. 
But I digress. I know with all the easter eggs and references, I've been dropping in my past posts, it would seem that I'd write this post about Jane Eyre. Reader, I'll save Jane for another blogpost, today I choose to talk about Alaska Young, from Looking For Alaska by John Green. Since I just read this book recently and was completely mind blown by her character.

 She was crazy, temperamental, messed up, self-destructive and a compulsive bitch. She was also gorgeous, clever, funny, articulate and utterly fascinating. First of all, with a name like Alaska, it's hard to say that one doesn't automatically becomes interesting. Like most of us, she was most definitely a nerdfighter! She was strong-hearted. A feminist; she never failed to cry out, "DO NOT OBJECTIFY WOMEN" when people dissed the female gender. She was always full of life and exhibited a reckless combination of adventurous and destructive behaviour, much like a hurricane to which she has often been compared to. 

SPOILER ALERT. If you haven't read the book. (Get your butt off the internet and read this book right NOW) 

It's a fact that I always get attached to tragically misunderstood characters (Severus Snape, Luke Castellan) and somehow all these epic characters die in the end causing me to feel tight-chested and teary-eyed, because yeah, it's sad. And right now I'm grovelling in the death of this epic character. 



Lastly, out of all female characters from YA Literature, I think Alaska has to be the most interesting of them all.

"I really would give you this clover. Except luck is for suckers." She pinched the runt petal between the nails of her thumb and fingers and plucked it. "There," she said to the clover as she dropped it onto the ground. "Now you're not a genetic freak anymore." -Alaska Young