Let’s Just See, Shall We?

The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams.

– Eleanor Roosevelt -

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Ten Lovely Things Thursday

It’s Thursday, which means, it’s nearly Friday, which means, it’s nearly…

VOTING DAY…. DUN DUN DUUUNNNN.

Because I’m sick to death of all the voting talk,all the leaders debates and the ZERO canvassers (can you believe that!? NONE) that came to my door, I’m going to list ten things that have absolutely nothing to do with politics.

I had an email recently INFORMING me that my blog was shallow and didn’t deal with any ‘real’ issues, or anything ‘of substance’. This is a reply to that email.

This blog is escapism for the people who read it. People who are highly intelligent, and who want to read just one thing that’s not steeped in political jargon and economic policies. So, emailer. There you have it.

Number One

My birthday weekend with the college ladies… It had everything. Good food, good buzz, great company and more… excitement than an episode of Hollyoaks. Ladies, I love you, and I loved my birthday and all it entailed. *ahem*

Number Two

This picture, which I saw on the lovely Lady Peach’s blog the other day. I just thought it was so novel and something I would definitely want to have in my house. It’s only a bloomin’ office in a wardrobe.

Number Three

My recent Vita Liberata spray tan. WOWZERS, I’ve had my fair share of spray tans and this one was just the business. Colour went on amazing, after three showers it’s still there and coming off very well, not patchy at all. Best part? NO SMELL. My boyfriend has tired of getting a whiff of either biscuits or rice whenever he hugs a recently-tanned me. HIGHLY recommended, girls.

Number Four

Adele performing her new song at the Brit Awards. Holy moly, she’s amazing. I was an advocate of ‘Rolling in the Deep’ ages ago, and I’m delighted her new song is as good. Here’s the video of her performance. Emoshunal.

Number Five

This new cardigan I got in Topshop when I was in London. Everyone has been complimenting it. Not me, now. It. It got it’s highest compliment when someone else tried it on, actually. But ain’t it nice?

Number Six

Twitter being like the Yellow Pages and Google and LinkedIn all in one. I needed a number, I asked on Twitter and I had it within a few minutes. The power of the internet astounds me.

Number Seven

Duck. I love duck. It’s probably my favourite poultry. Is it poultry?! I don’t know for sure. But I know I love it. Confit of duck with pickled pear, rocket leaves and plum sauce… om nom nom, you might say. Just try not to imagine it like this or you’ll get sad.

Number Eight

I managed to get myself nominated in 5 categories at the Irish Blog Awards! Wahoo! Although these are only the longlists, and shortlists are yet to be announced. And all judging is done by actual judges too. I’ll scream at the top of my lungs if I get on a shortlist, let alone win anything.

Number Nine

This picture of me and my little gorgeous cute cousins, Erin, Robyn and baby Conor, taken on my 23rd birthday in my parent’s house. They’ve got some cuteness genes that I was obviously denied access to.

Number Ten

January Jones in this picture. How stunning does she look?! Can’t remember who the dress is by, but who cares really… I know some of you do. I’m sorry for being so cavalier about the fashion.

Especially You, Mr Emailer, I know you need the outfit deets. Otherwise this shallow, worthless old blog would be entirely incompetent. *bitter rant over, soz*

Happy Thursday!

Say WHAT?!

I don’t know about you…

But when I sing along to a song and I don’t know the words, I just sing the closest sounding thing I can get to the real lyric.

Makes for some interesting listening for my passengers, I’d say. Here are a few I’ve been blissfully unaware of for the past while.

Aaliyah’s song More Than A Woman creeped me out unnecessarily for YEARS before I realised that I’d been wrong about the lyrics. What I thought was her saying “…newborns in your closet…” was IN FACT “new bones in your closet” (as in skeletons, I’m presuming). Thank God Aaliyah wasn’t condoning infanticide.

And there was I thinking Justin Timberlake was just a fan of the older women. His song ‘My Love’ features the lyric “…and I know no woman that can take your spot my love…” and NOT “…I know an OLD woman that can take your spot my love…” as I had been singing. I figured he was talking to Britney about Cameron Diaz. I was wrong, evidently.

So, Pat Benatar isn’t a freaky weirdo with a shark fetish after all. “Hit me with your BEST SHOT” really does sound like “Hit me with your pet shark” though, doesn’t it? Listen closely. I think it’s funnier that way too.

Technically, this isn’t a song – it’s an ad. But still, I have been singing it wrong for YEARS. You know that ad for Birdseye Waffles? The song goes “Birdseye potato waffles, they’re waffle-y versatile”. Well, until I met my current boyfriend and sang it in front of him, I was convinced the words were “Birdseye potato waffles, they’re waffle-y bird’s surprise.” I don’t know what I thought that meant. Secret bird flavoured waffles, maybe?

What lyrics have you misheard?

And hey, don’t say the one about vegetables from that Michael Jackson song. He was *actually* singing the word vegetables.

Things I’ll Never Be…

On the day of my birthday last week, I got to thinking about my life and what I’ve done with it.

I wouldn’t call my realisations anything mid-life-crisis-ish, but I was certainly a little bit bothered when I thought about all the things I can never and will never be.

Some of the thoughts I had are a little strange. Bear with me.

A child prodigy

Let’s face it, people. At 23, the chances of me becoming a child prodigy are slim to none. The ship, my friends, has sailed. For most of you reading this, your chance as a child prodigy will also be gone, tough as that is to accept.

Creator of Earth

I checked with someone, apparently that position was filled AGES ago. Another thing I’ll simply never be. Would’ve made me super popular.

Beyoncé

Once again, thank you parents for being neither Tina NOR Matthew Knowles. And as for me being born in 1988, well. That’s just TOO late. Beyoncé was born in 1981. How can I compete with that?!

A princess, Disney or otherwise

My parents really stuffed me for this one. NEITHER of them are royalty. Thanks Mam & Dad for ripping my dreams to shreds. I’m never gonna have my own castle now. And the only good looking, semi-local prince I know of is getting married in April. Curses.

A lottery winner

I mean, yeah, there IS a chance I could win the lotto. I suppose. But when it comes to competitions that depend solely on the amount of luck you have, I don’t just lose, I bomb. I never win a thing that depends on any kind of draw. And people – the lotto is the ULTIMATE draw.

Yasmin Le Bon’s best friend

I met her recently. We had cocktails. Did I ask her to be my best friend? NO. Of course not. We chatted, we ate cashew nuts, but at no point did I think HEY. Yazzers would be a great BFF, maybe I should get her digits?! Curses once more. Here’s my would-be Bezzie in Moschino…

A guest star on Glee

Unless I get ridiculously talented and shoot to stardom by sometime next week, I get the feeling the Glee phenomenon will have burned out before I get to guest star. Unless they put a call out for talentless unknowns with a face for radio. *hopes*

Tell me, what will YOU never be?

HPY BDY TWYL

Think What You Like

is a year old TODAY!

Fancy that.

I would have made more of a fuss, but this is a blog and not a human, so I figured it wouldn’t mind not being showered with gifts and serenaded with birthday themed tunes.

TWYL in Numbers

265 Posts

1,498 Tags

2,141 Comments

200 Facebook fans

1,308 Spam comments

13,893,446 Emails offering me Viagra

78 Subscriptions

42,846 Views

(this is a screen grab. March & April approx 150 each… then BAM, a few months go by and January gets over 7,000!!)

and most importantly…

An invaluable and innumerable number of fans, readers, commenters who I am eternally grateful to. Grateful to you for reading, enjoying and not having me signed in to a secure facility for the mentally imbalanced.

Happy Birthday to TWYL!
*clinks glass of champagne and then pours it into plant pot*

Want to read a few of the gems from the Think What You Like archives but aren’t bothered rooting through the posts to find some?

*waves magic wand and twirls with a flourish*

Here’s some of my favourite posts from the past year…

I’m Living In Fear… A tale of how Gothika scared the BEJAYSUS out of me

Rugby For Dummies Why we don’t have to hate France for touching the ball

Desert Island Discs Me and Tom Hanks will have a helluva boogie

Seven Deadly Sins, One DEADLY day Committing sins, TWYL style

Alcohol-less Anonymous My take on not drinking alcohol. Ever.

Same Sex Unicorns and Other Stories “Marty Whelan Topless” and why that phrase should NEVER be Googled

Black Swan: Reviewed Ye olde movie review of my film of the year

Facebookaholic When social networking turns you into a shut-in

That’s it. I’m going to Mars! Earth just isn’t good enough for some people…

Mascara Unmasked Everything you need to know about mascara. BAM.

My Fantasy Dinner Party Who made the cut and who didn’t…

Death Cupcakes from HELL My misguided attempt at domesticity

Bored? WELL…. Endless hours of joy and entertainment

French Fairytale JESUS that’s cute.

Twitter Thoughts… The nuances of the ever-growing social network

Places I don’t want to live Would YOU want to live in ‘Intercourse’?

11 Reasons Never To Sleep Again Horror isn’t for everyone

Embarrassment on a National Level Why Ireland has fallen. Ish.

So, there are LOADS of others I could’ve put here but I’m too lazy to read through the rest, frankly.

Enjoy!

Rugby for Dummies

Rugby for Dummies…again?

Yes, I know what you’re all thinking. I’ve seen that before. And you have. But the whole country is rugby-mad at the mo because of the Six Nations, so I thought I’d shove it in your faces once more. Hope ya enjoy it. Again.

My dad informed me recently that there was too much fashion and make-up and girl stuff on my blog.

I explained that I’m a girl, and I’d imagine most of my readers are girls. And apart from a dedicated but very small group of males who read regularly, I tend to write with females in mind.

His suggestion was to write something on “ya know, golf or rugby”. Yeah. Well. Herein lies the problem.

Golf makes me want to self-harm. I can’t bear to watch it for longer than three minutes before I’m compelled to flee into the night. It’s just so BORING. I know, any golf lovers will be all “how can you think it’s boring? It’s captivating”, blah blah blah. Not for me, thanks.

Rugby, on the other hand, I can get on board with. Rugby is anything but boring. There’s action. And there’s speed and accuracy and big huge men and a big huge ball and all sorts of nice things that you find in good sports. I was more excited to post about rugby.

But I decided to do a ‘Rugby for Girls’ Guide. NOT Girl Guides. A Girl’s Guide. Different. So here we go.

Top Teams

The top teams in the world are generally these, in no particular order, except the first fellas:

New Zealand: also known as the ‘All Blacks’ maybe because they wear all black. See? Fashion! They spontaneously break into a dance routine before each match. And they say rugby is a mans game. Pfft!

Ireland: Yes, we’re actually fairly deadly at rugby, unlike most other sports (apart from GAA but that doesn’t count cos it’s just us who plays). Oh and we have some of the world’s best players on our team. C’mon Ireland!

South Africa: also known as ‘The Springboks’ – don’t know why, don’t care. They wear gold and green.

France: also known as ‘Les Bleus’, presumably because they like blue better than their other national colours? We don’t have to hate them like we hate the soccer team. They can touch the ball whenever they want.

England: I don’t know if they have a nickname. My dad’s proposed nickname would no doubt be unpublishable pre-watershed. They wear white mostly, and the red rose is their team emblem.

Australia: Their nickname, God bless them, is ‘The Wallabies’. The play wearing green and gold. They sing Waltzing Matilda all the time. I’d imagine if they weren’t rugby players, I’d bully them on the playground.

Wales: Can’t find their nickname either. Everyone on the team is called Stephen Jones, David Jones, Gareth Davies, or Thomas Thomas. ALL of them. Except Gethin Jenkins.

Argentina: Their nickname is Los Pumas. Without having a translator to hand, I’d imagine that’s something to do with pumas. The animal, not the runners. They wear blue and white, the national flag colours.

About 0.00000023% of the Rules:

Object of the game: to get the ball past the giant poles either by kicking it or by charging past 15 huge angry men

Methods for achieving the aforementioned:

Running at speed, ball in-hand, avoiding layer-upon-layer of burly man trying to stop you

Kicking the ball towards the giant poles hoping your team might catch it

Methods for stopping the other team from achieving the aforementioned:

Grabbing them as they run and dragging them to the ground

Catching the ball that has been kicked in your direction

Some of the stuff that’s not allowed

Throwing the ball forward (apparently, that’d be too easy)

Stamping on people while they’re in the pile of men that seems to form every 5 seconds

Tackling someone in such a way that might make them break their neck (fair enough, I suppose)

Actually killing someone

Apart from that, pretty much anything goes

Names and simple explanations of positions

(FYI, there are 15 players per team on the pitch, and unlike soccer, all the teams use basically the same formations, and each position has a skill specific to their position)

Forwards (these guys, I presume, go forward?) also known as the ‘pack’:

Numbers 1 & 3 – the props. They support the hooker. Much like pimps, really. They are usually strong and heavy. For keeping other pimps away from their hooker. Turf wars are not cool.

Number 2 – the hooker. They ‘hook’ the ball in the scrum. Not like prostitutes at all really.

Here is where I got bored with the position explanations. Literally, I would be here for the duration of a rugby match on this topic alone. FYI: 40 mins per half.

Rugby Lexicon

Things you might hear during a game and wonder about

Breakdown: basically, this is anything the opposition do to stop the player with the ball from getting where they wanna get.

Tackle: the rugby term for wanton violence. Often results in a pile of men being formed.

Ruck: something that happens after a tackle. Looks a lot like a pile of men.

Maul: something that happens when the lad with the ball stays on his feet. Looks a lot like a moving pile of men.

Scrum: fairest way to restart the game after a minor infringement. Looks a lot like an organised, moving pile of men.

Line-out: when the ball goes outside the lines, the players line up nicely and lift some tall lad to catch the ball. Looks nothing like a pile of men, thank god.

22: they’re talking in metres when they say this. “Inside the 22” means the opposition is less than 22 metres from the line they can score at. Try to refrain from breaking into the Lily Allen song when you hear them say this.

TMO: Television match official. If the referees on the pitch are having a lazy day, there’s another ref with a TV in a room somewhere that can rewind the action and check if something bold happened. Like people watching at home, except one subtle difference – the ref can actually hear them when they scream at the TV.

Sin Bin: if a player does something bold, the ref can give him a yellow card. This means he has to go and sit in the sin bin for 10 minutes while he watches his teammates suffer on, a man down. Red cards mean he doesn’t get to come back on.

Phase: this counts the amount of times the team manage to form a pile of men before they score, or before they lose the ball to the opponents.

Offside rule: if you thought the soccer offside rule was complicated, you’d explode if you heard the rules of rugby offsidedness. And in an effort to keep my daily view count up, I’d rather not make people explode.

Scoring

(as in, during the game, this is not a ‘How To’ guide on bagging yourself a rubgy player)

Try: you’ll know this has happened because a man will slide onto the ground holding the ball and then a whistle will blow and the crowd will erupt into screams of joy. Ooh, a try is worth 5 points.

Penalty try: you’ll know this happened because no one will cross the line and the crowd will erupt into screams of anger, followed by screams of joy. Also worth 5 points.

Conversion: after a try is awarded, just to kick the other team while they’re down, the try scoring team get to go ahead and add two more points to their total by kicking the ball between the posts of the giant H.

Drop Goal: looks remarkably like a conversion, except the kicking fella isn’t allowed stop to sort himself out first, he has to kick the ball on the go. Three points if he gets it above the crossbar and between the posts.

Penalty goal: this is worth 3 points. Like the lovechild of the conversion and the drop-goal, given when the ref says an indiscretion occurred.

Some names to drop

Brian O’Driscoll – also known as Drico to his fellow players. Some spas call him BOD. Arguably the best player in his position (centre) in the world. Definitely so, if you ask my dad.

Paul O’Connell – he’s the lock for Ireland and Munster. Very tall. Ginger. Gets lifted up all the time, you can’t miss him. Also one of the best locks around.

Jamie Heaslip – Ireland number 8. That’s what they call that position, I’m not just being lazy and not finding out what it’s called. He’s very good apparently.

Matt Giteau – plays fly half for Australia. Again, apparently very good. Adept at slicing through holes, so I hear.

Morne Steyn – hilarious name. Plays at fly half for South Africa.

Rob Kearney – full-back/wing. Girls go mad for him. My sister advised me that I should marry him. As if it was a viable option for me. He couldn’t handle my talent. *ahem*

Ronan O’Gara – here’s a player I like. He’s very handsome and has a cute and effective little method for setting himself up to take conversions and penalty kicks. Little on the old side, but still good.

Felipe Contepomi – plays for Argentina. He has a twin. Please note: His name is not Felipe Cotton Pony.

I’m not going to deny it. This guide to rugby is full of gaping holes and is peppered with glib remarks about a very important sports game. To try to explain every single aspect of the art of rugby is possible, of course, but too tedious and boring for me, the blogosphere and all of you fine people.

But this should get you through the next Six Nations without angering every rugby fan that comes in contact with you. Maybe.