The BEST thing IKEA have ever done!

Now, I'm not the biggest fan of IKEA stuff myself, although Phil thinks they are amazing - and to give credit where credit is due, some of their furniture is rather good. The big red metal lockers that Phil has in his room are retro and funky, but I've always found their designs to be a bit too formulaic, bland and whatnot.

However, this post is not about their design innovations or meatballs, but about a very clever idea they had for their latest advert.

HERE is the ad, with an article on how they made it.

Splendid. Not enough ginger moggies for my liking, but still, splendid.

Well done.

Good Things About September

And now for something completely different.

I'm pretty sure I've said this before, but September always fills me with an incredible, joyful nostalgia and excitement - like going back to school with a new bag, new pencil case, new coat and new haircut but without the anxiety of starting new classes and wondering whether you'll get the teachers you like or still have friends.

The next few months have always been my favourites. Autumn, Hallowe'en, frost, snow, storms, Yule, hearty soups, hot drinks, warm coats and scarves. I LOVE IT. This September has started pretty well so far. Weather-wise, we had one day of glorious autumnal sunshine and then plenty of gusty winds to refresh us. The air smells right, leafy with just a hint of decay, bonfires and sea spray.

I've discovered Echo Bazaar! and the glory that is Fallen London. Go look! Play!

Thanks to a friend, I've also discovered that I can create a Wishlist on Amazon which isn't restricted to their products alone. Mine is HERE under the title "The Sin of Covetousness". It's acting as massive motivation to get earning again!

ABANDONED continues to be awesome, despite some serious competition in the form of DEVIANT returning to Brighton at a new venue. The next few weeks are going to be interesting as we see the students return and Freshers Week happen...I've also revelled in rediscovering bands I'd almost forgotten about and getting back into loving music again :)

The Art Of Losing Friends in 2010

There are times, dear readers, when I loathe and despise technology.

I appreciate the irony of writing about this on my weblog, a link to which I shall no doubt post on my Twitter feed, comments upon which will arrive in my email account or to my mobile phone; However, in the absence of actual therapy I do find this blog to be extremely useful. So I shall begin.

There are two main reasons why I make the opening statement:

Firstly, there is no way to feel completely alone any more. Of course, I hear you say, "No! You can turn your mobile phone off, log off from the internet, delete your Facebook account". This is indeed the case, but who among us actually can do that, for more than a few hours at a time? I do go without actively posting on Twitter or on this blog, but scarce a day goes by (in fact I'm sure it doesn't) where I don't post/look on Facebook or send/receive a text. To be honest, this is probably a good thing for me, because being out of work and my natural anxiety combined means that I could go a whole day without communicating with anyone other than my boyfriend, my housemate and the cats.

But there is a part of me which misses the absolute peace and quiet of solitude - without wondering what the rest of the world/my friends/family were doing. It's that curiosity, nigh-on morbid, which has been born out of the world of social networking sites and skype and mobile phones and forums and blogs and so on and so forth...

Secondly your private life becomes so public. I'm not talking personally here, because the majority of my friends are thankfully mature enough not to air their dirty laundry in public, but I do see it on other people's Facebook walls. Nothing is sacred, nothing is private, everything is public property, every transgression, break-up or scandalous gossip-inducing incident. It makes me sick to my stomach. I honestly do wonder how much of it is done with malice, and how much gets splayed for the world to see simply because that's how things seem to be done nowadays...

More and more often I am grateful to my very core that social networking sites were not in existence/as widely used as they are now, as little as 5 years ago; things which happened to me, things I did or said were restricted to the community I was part of, not privy to all and sundry on the internet. Yes, gossip still had a way of spreading like wildfire, but still, it felt more human somehow...

The final part of this post is the rather sad thing I noticed the other day. As and when you fall out with someone or circumstances conspire to the point that you are "defriended" on Facebook (is that even a phrase? It probably is now) they quite literally disappear from your life. People that you don't see on a regular basis perhaps but who figure on your daily radar thanks to new photos and status updates, vanish. It hits harder than simply not seeing that person again as your friendship drifts apart. It's a very final, definite thing.

I think this blog post has rambled away from the original title a little, but it's too late in the evening for me to think of anything else.