New Year, New You?

As someone who is always motivated to become healthier, but is constantly run down and poorly, my major body control is run by my diet. I work out occasionally, but not as much as I wish I could.

Between Christmas, New Year and a full time office job, I have a hard time eating healthy. I have my days, where instead of bringing in crisps or chocolate I have little boxes of homemade nuts or fruit and veggie sticks, but I usually ruin this by grabbing a bag of chips or a cheeky McDs for my lunch/dinner combo.

However for a while there was one thing that got me on track. Not only did I eat healthier or push myself harder to workout when I had ‘bad’ days, but it got me drinking a lot more water and monitoring my progress. A free android/apple app. LIFESUM.

I found the app accidentally through an Instagram advertisement and downloaded it because why not, it’s free. This app allows you to input everything you’ve eaten (you can even scan barcodes to make it easier) and calculates how much of your daily calories you’ve used, what food groups and how healthy you’ve been.

I’ve never been one to track my daily intakes, but it allowed me to actually see what I was eating, what was good or bad for me and learn how to improve my diet. It also has a  water tracker, which encourages app-users to drink more water. As someone who at a push would have one glass a day, it brought it to around 6-8 a day instead of drinking fizzy drinks.

It even offers healthy recipes, but most are in the upgraded package. You can also add in your workouts, so it’s a great way to track your life, in a healthy way. It’s definitely worth a download. I’ve got it again to track my progress and hopefully I can see a healthier mind and body for 2017.

Android and Apple available: Lifesum. Free original version, upgrades cost.

Why September 11th broke my heart twice over!

Today is a day when millions of people mourn the loss of their loved ones, friends, family, colleagues and people they never even knew. Whether the people who’s stories they read, saw or heard about, or the knowledge of the heroes who risked everything to save as many as they could.

My heart goes out every single year, every day to every family of those who lost someone that day. I remember about two or three years after 9/11, my high school stopped taking a moments silence to remember those lost. I was so ashamed and stunned, I made a point of reminding everyone of why we should unite and take just one minute to remember how important life is.

Especially in these times today, how the world is. We need to remember that we’re not all evil, we shouldn’t hate. We should unite together and love. (There’s no way to say this kind of sentiment without sounding corny.)

But, there is another loss on September 11th that means so much to me and one I still haven’t gotten over. John Ritter. He died two years after the terrorist attack and when I found out he had died, I literally ended up on my kitchen floor, having a breakdown.

I was baking actually and my cookies ended up on the floor, I think my mum thought someone in the family had died. Ritter was family to me though. Obviously not in a biological way, but I learnt so much from him. I was inspired by him and admired him.

My image of him, is of course skewed by Paul Hennessy, his character on 8 Simple Rules. That’s the reason I saw him as a father figure to me. He was the perfect dad, I mean a total failure, he did everything wrong half the time but he tried to be right for his family and teach his kids everything they needed to know and protect them. I think that’s why I looked up to him so much.

When he died, I felt like I had lost my dad too. A part of me which was created by him, the views on life, the views on careers, even the college I applied for were influenced by this man. I don’t think any man has influenced in such a way that he did.

So on today, September 11th, and every 9/11 from now, until forever, I’ll mourn the loss and remember the lives of the 2977 lost on the planes and at the World Trade Center in 2001 as well as every other life lost through terrorism. Most importantly, I’ll remember how easily we, as a world, can become one in loss and in our attempts to stop a great injustice. I’ll also remember John Ritter and the difference one person can make.

Thanks for reading. Be safe at there people and lest we forget.

*To read my full experience with 9/11, read my post from last year HERE.

Have you got the Nerve?

I am lucky enough to work at one of my local cinemas and one of the benefits we receive is being able to see up to two films for free each week. I usually don’t take advantage of this benefit too much, as it’s finding the time in my schedule and that of a friend or family members, so we can see a film together.

All week I’ve been thinking about just going alone though, after work (my other job) and just been able to see something I want to see, when I have time and without going through the hassle of making plans with somebody else.

I’ve wanted to see Nerve since I saw the first trailer released online a few months back and thought it looked so interesting and exciting. It’s still in my cinema, so I arranged the one ticket for myself and went in. I’ll admit it was awkward to sit alone watching the adverts and the trailers, while everyone else in the screen was in either a couple or a group and I missed having someone there to react with throughout the movie, but all in all I felt fine being alone for the first time at cinema.

The film starts slowly, but if audiences grit their teeth and wait a few minutes, it is worthwhile. As soon as the pace picks up, it doesn’t falter. There is barely a moment when the audience weren’t anticipating something new happening, especially when Emma Roberts’ character, Vee (Venus) is taking part in a Nerve dare.

One surprise was how likable the relationship between Vee and Ian (played by Dave Franco) was. Even if the start of the relationship was forced by the watchers of the game. Ian singing his love declaration dare to Vee was one of my favourite moments, but the audience were shown the clear admiration the couple begin to have for each other, especially Ian’s love for Vee. His protection of Vee is heartwarming in the midst of the hate and desperation the teenagers have for fame.

The ending is a twist that no one could expect, and one I definitely did not. It was one of the best movie climaxes in 2016, the tension in the screen was at an absolute high and it rewards the audience following this intensity.

Rating: ✮✮✮✮✮ (-.5 star)

If it wasn’t for the terrifying scenes that was too much on a personal front and the cliche relationship  potentials and dramas  this was an all round interesting movie.

If you’d like a free starter graze box, click the link below. Also if you want to purchase any multipacks from the graze shop, use the code SNACK5 for a £5 off discount. http://www.graze.com/uk/p/HT5X5CNFU

Bye Bye BHS!

This week has been an emotional time for myself and my fellow employees at the BHS store in Hull. It has been a journey we’ve been on for a long time and something that has united our one store with all across the country to create one large #teamBHS. With the final closures underway, our Hull store was among the many who closed this Wednesday.

I, myself, am one of the fortunate staff members who already had work lined up, as a concession worker in BHS. Some of my colleagues, who I have spent the last (almost) two years getting to know are left with little to no pay or redundancy and no job on the other side.

Sir Philip Green is living his life of luxury while the people who worked their asses off to make him even richer are living pay check to pay check. I think as a united front, there should be a way for us to enforce Sir PG to pay those retirement funds, the redundancy pays, everything he owes to his hard working staff.

My time at BHS though? The people, of course I love and have loved. They became my friends, I spent a lot of time talking to them, getting to know them and actually opening up about my life as well. It’s difficult to not love the people you work with when you work with them all the time.

The building and the management weren’t always the best. Our BHS was a very old building, which didn’t always have the safest conditions. Any customer of the Hull branch will know our customer lifts, toilets and even the escalators were frequently out of order or broken. For the last few months of business we had no lift or up escalators. This meant customers in wheelchairs or with prams couldn’t access the second floor (aka the floor with all the children’s wear…. bad planning there).

The BHS management also expected myself and my fellow concession employees to take on all the responsibilities as both concession and BHS staff. Frankly, I’m still waiting for the security guard raise I should have received after taking on the role as security for the past year. The amount of shoplifters we had coming into the store everyday, a shop of mostly young female employees, was threatening to say the least. I, an average sized and above average tall girl was not cut out to protect a store (that didn’t even pay me) against drug addicted thugs.

I didn’t always enjoy the job at BHS, and I didn’t always love my role in the concession, but I have to admit it has been an amazing almost two years. I am happy for the experience, the training and the respect I was given in my position. I worked my way up the ladder in my own concession, being relied on greatly, which I appreciated. I was trusted, listened to and accepted in this job.

It’s a sad loss to see BHS leave the high-street and especially for my friends and those BHS workers who have been left unemployed, you all deserved so much better than what Sir (shouldn’t really be a sir) Philip Green left for you.

Good luck to everyone in the BHS family and anyone shopping in the stores still open, please be respectful to everyone working in these stores. You may want your bargains, but they may no longer have the money for the essentials, let alone luxuries.

Thanks for reading.

Beautiful in Bare Minerals!

Recently a friend of mine invited me to a Bare Minerals event at Debenhams, which she, as a worker for the make-up counter, was hosting. Ironically, I had decided I wanted to do another beauty related post, so thought it was the perfect timing for that.

I planned to turn up and observe, like a true journalist, however I also expected a lot to be crowded around the counter and unfortunately I turned up too early and missed most of the customers at the event. Since it was so quiet, I did get a semi-full make-over on my pretty little face.

Emma, my friend and consultant asked me first which type of foundation I’d like, as she knows I don’t usually use it. I said whichever she would recommend for my skin type and we went with a liquid foundation. She tested two on my skin, one with a pink pigment, while the other was more yellow toned and asked me to pick which I preferred.

She cleaned off the samples and primed with face with a “tinted hydrating gel cream” which honestly made my skin feel amazing, rather than oily and blocked like I sometimes feel with some skin products.

Then she dabbed the foundation in spots on my face then blended it, all with a variety of brushes. Who knew there were so many brushes?! But they all looked so fun, I ended up playing with one which was fine, soft bristles at the bottom with thicker more “spikey” bristles at the top.

Once my face was finished with this and set with some powder (again to match my pale skin colour), I literally looked airbrushed. Maybe this is a typical thing with make-up, that your skin does look flawless, but I was amazed by how good it looked. I usually am skeptical about make-up.

To finish off the look, Emma let me pick a lip-gloss. It was a plain-ish colour which kept me happy. I must say the products at Bare Minerals leave the skin refreshed and appearing airbrushed. Worth a look!  I’ll definitely be returning to get some foundation to brighten up my face.

Thanks for reading my basic make-up review, check into your local Bare Minerals and get a free beauty make-up or test out some of their latest products!

Sorry Junebug!

It’s safe to say I failed June. I easily failed my holiday flashbacks. As of this time tomorrow (a year ago) I will have been back in my own home, sleeping while babysitting my niece.

And if you follow me on Instagram you know I’ve failed my Bookstagram June Challenge. But what I want to say is: I TRIED! And trying is worth everything. Yes, there’s time left on the June Challenge, but I have been going through a lot this past week and a half that I don’t even have the energy to really think about this post.

I’m trying to work on my novel in my spare time and my spare time just got dropped completely to barely any time.

This is a small warning that my plans to start writing daily or two-three times weekly won’t be happening anymore. I’ll try to do a weekly update and I will try to set a specific day.

Since my popular posts are the original ideas I had, I’ll be working on those again. Reviewing make-up, books, movies etc. So I’m happy to get back to that and I’ll also be considering posting some extracts from novel to get some feedback.

Thanks for being patient and for reading.

Love you faithful guys ❤

Adios, San Francisco!

I have slipped again, so I’m going to spend the next couple of days catching up.

_________

Last day in San Francisco was mostly us trying to squeeze in everything we didn’t want to miss. We saw the beautiful gardens in Golden Gate Park, we even hopped on a bus for practically free. We only had enough money between us for one ticket (not used to the coins) and luckily we had a nice driver who let us on for the price of one. We visited a Japanese Tea Garden too, saw a lot of botanical gardens basically.

We got our first Starbucks of the entire trip. One of our goals was to get a cup with our names on it, spelt wrong… unfortunately the baristas we encountered knew how to spell. We went shopping in Union Square, even pretending we could afford tot breathe the air in Triffany’s. We even faked some posh accents to fit in, although I’m sure our clearly tourist-like appearances gave us away and the major sunburn on my back and shoulders.

We said our goodbyes to Clarissa’s sister, and bought some last minute snacks for the airplane from the Dollar Tree and then we were all packed up and saying our goodbyes to San Fran.

_________

We checked in early at San Francisco Airport the next morning, since Clarissa had work and I had a sad goodbye with the friend I had known for years and finally met. On the plane, I started reading The First Five People You Meet in Heaven and I read the entire book, while Ellie slept once again on the plane. My Cheetos (purchased in the Dollar Tree) expanded with the altitude of the packet and I couldn’t open my cheesy puff snacks.

Our travel route was SFO to MSP (Minneapolis/St Paul) and after running through the airport to catch our connecting flight on time, with barely enough time to catch our breath at the gate, we were on our way to IAH (George Bush Intercontinental Airport). This time I opened my snacks before the plane took off, so I enjoyed the bright orange cheese puff dust on my fingers.

I did a little work on the airplane and Ellie stayed awake for one flight, finally. We finally arrived in Texas and despite having visited multiple times in my life, I ignored my past and kept my skin tight jeans on and died the second we left the airport, waiting for my aunt. The humidity in Houston, even at 8pm is unbearable.

Once arriving at my family’s McMansion and after having the tour and a little chat, Ellie left me and my aunt to catch up. We hadn’t seen each other in years, so this catch up lasted until about 1AM. By this time I was exhausted and practically passed out when I laid down in the most comfortable bed in the world. They say the first best bedroom should be the guest one and damn was that bedroom lush! The relaxation holiday had officially begun!

_________

Thanks for reading!

A Walk Across the Bridge!

My third and fourth days of this adventure were spent with our host, Clarissa, who finally had time off work. We had planned what we wanted to try to squeeze into these two days with her and she had organised the best way to attack that plan, with her San Franciscan knowledge.

I wanted to desperately visit the oldest building and church in SF, Mission Dolores. I had read all about it and really ‘nerded’ out on the idea. This was our first stop. It was such a beautiful church, both the old and remodeled versions.

We HAD to visit Chinatown. Clarissa insisted on us trying some Chinese cuisine, I had a ‘Lotus Cake.’ I don’t entirely remember the ingredients of it, but it was delicious. I also got to speak to an old (online) friend while we were shopping too, as he and Clarissa were also friends and that was nice. Chinatown was so much fun and the artwork was spectacular.

We walked to and then up Lombard Street, as you can imagine my knee was on fire constantly, but I literally wore my brace like 24/7 on this trip. Minus the days when it was too hot to wear my jeans or cover the bright blue strap on my leg.

Naturally we did the Cable Cars, we had to do it, but we were waiting about an hour to go on one and this limousine driver kept walking along the queue and offering people a ride for $6… I mean, that sounded dodgy to me but whatever floats your boat, SF. The Cable Cars was terrifying. I mean I felt so unsafe on them, I was such a wimp the whole time. Clarissa insisted we stand and I was holding on for dear life, while the other two were taking selfies!

We ended the day with my first ever trip to the Cheesecake Factory, Penny wasn’t working unfortunately. The cheesecake we ordered for the three of us to share, was HUGE and even between us all, we couldn’t finish it!

On Sunday, we went to the San Francisco Zoo and spent the morning there. I got sun-burnt all over my face and I met the most handsome guy ever working at the Zoo. He was called Garrett and I never saw him again. (still getting over that loss)

Since it was easier to drive there, Clarissa took us to the Golden Gate Bridge and I, like a true tormentor, made us all walk the WHOLE way across. Clarissa, who had taken out of town friends before said she had never walked the whole distance. We didn’t have to walk it, but I wasn’t going all the way to SF and not walking the entire bridge, what a waste?!

For our second to last night, we ‘took’ Clarissa out for Chinese food. I tried crab, squid AND prawns this time and again, not a fan, but I tried! I learnt how to use chopsticks and felt like a damn professional.

It was a really fun two days and I was happy to finally spend time with Clarissa. The past few days, we have been reminiscing of the time I spent there. I can’t believe it has been a year since I met someone who I have been so close to for years for the first time.

*I know this one was long, but tried to condense two days into one post. Thanks for reading and keeping up with my throwback adventures!

Have Fun in Prison!

Day two in San Francisco was another filled with random fun once again. We had booked tickets in advance for a day tour of Alcatraz. It was one of the attractions on the “must see” list my aunt had given me from when she visited the city. We took the tram from Clarissa’s work once again to Pier 39. It was nice to just relax this time (since we had walked the day before) and take in all of our surroundings.

We had set off very early to make the most of the day, so not all of the stores had opened on the Pier, but we managed to occupy our time until a crepe shop opened up. I ordered a sugar crepe and somehow that translated to CRAB crepe…? I don’t even like seafood! As you can imagine this brought a lot of entertainment to us.

We found a child’s heaven in a candy store, where we tried Salt Water Taffy! A real F.R.I.E.N.D.S moment, if you ask me. Although, I’m not sure what the fuss was about, sorry Ross! The shops in general were really cute. I bought my best-friend a Minion’s Voodoo Doll, which seems odd looking back at it, but back then it made sense to me. There was also one entire (quite large) store dedicated to cowboy items of clothing. Hats, boots, holsters, pants, button downs after button downs. The hats and boots were to die for.

I actually tried shrimp, for the first time in my life, and we saw a real Bubba Gump Shrimp Co. Alcatraz was fun, but I found the Pier more exciting. The funniest moment of the entire day was as we boarded the ferry to Alcatraz Island. The ticket guy, after checking our tickets said: ‘Have fun in prison.’ Thank you ticket guy, we did have fun in prison.

At some point in the day, my knee gave way. If I remember rightly, it was while we were actually on the island and it didn’t get better. I had to limp to the bus, to the BART (train station). We did stop in a Walgreens for a brace for my knee, but they were way out of my price range. I did eventually get a brace, one which I still own and my knee never truly healed.

But the pain was well worth it. If you ever visit San Francisco, I’d recommend checking out Alcatraz. If you’re brave, I’d recommend a night tour. That’s when history really comes to life… or so they say!

Thanks for reading!

Busy couple of days

so the past few days have been pretty busy between working and chores and what not. If you follow my Instagram my June challenge is up to date but I’ve slacked on the holiday blog. 

Tomorrow I’ll do two posts. One for the 5th and a joint one for the 6th and 7th as we did a lot in those days but those were days we spent with Clarissa when she was off work. 

More pictures to come too!