A bit of Shakespeare for your V-day

So anyone who knows me well, knows this is one of my favourite sonnets...I remember one particular evening spent with Rod analysing it over a beer in Nkozi.  The reason I love it so much is because Shakespeare is really sticking it to the poets who crapped on about perfection and my man was like, bollocks to that.  Plus I love the references to his mysterious dark lady.  Hope you enjoy a bit of Shakespeare in your Valentines day.


My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun;
Coral is far more red than her lips' red;
If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun;
If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head.
I have seen roses damask'd, red and white,
But no such roses see I in her cheeks; 
And in some perfumes is there more delight
Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks.
I love to hear her speak, yet well I know
That music hath a far more pleasing sound;
I grant I never saw a goddess go;
My mistress, when she walks, treads on the ground:
   And yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare
   As any she belied with false compare.

Valentines Day...V Day...The big V...

Well, anther Valentines Day is here for me to spend by myself.  Now don’t go getting out the violin...I’m at peace with that.  This year Valentines Day is a day for me to reflect and remember a friend.  Whereas last Valentines Day I was throwing up in the “shower” in Nkozi, Uganda before spending the day waiting at the hospital for malaria treatment.  Now that was a great week.

I’ve never been the kind of girl who gets spoilt on V Day.  Hard as it may be to believe, I’ve never been taken out, been brought masses of flowers or chocolates or even had so much more than a text message to be exact.  Except in 2009.  February 14^th 2009.  My sister and I were living together in Darwin and when we got home there was a single red rose on the outside table.  Just one rose.  No note...just a rose, a long stemmed red rose.  It was so beautiful. 

After an hour of guessing who the rose could be from or for, we gave up and just accepted that someone was thinking about us.  It didn’t even matter who.  “We” got a rose!  It was by far the best Valentines Day.  A week later our awesome-est friend Matthew Davies was in town, there he was at the door with a big cheesy grin on his face.  He said “did you get the roses I sent?”  When we told him we only got one without a note he couldn’t stop laughing...apparently he spent ages out at sea with shitty reception on a sat nav phone trying to buy us a rose each with notes and paid wayyyyyy too much for them on his credit card. 

It was singularly one of the loveliest things anyone has ever done for me.  This year, however, Matt is no longer with us.  He lives on in our minds though, for me, Valentines Day will be the day where I reflect on his life, that rose and the joy it brought.  So if you care about someone, a friend, a girlfriend, wife, mother, daughter, sister, anyone I hope you show you care.  Especially on Valentines Day...it’s often the things that we think of as minor and un-noteworthy that end up standing out strong in memory, long after we’ve gone.

One Love.

El marque del beaste! So much more exciting than your average mark...

I will never understand D-grade movies.  I do wonder what goes on inside the head of a Hollywood producer.  Is it two monkeys playing hackey-sack?  No, I'm sure they're very intelligent and so forth, and sometimes make bad mistakes etc...  But what I am asking is do they get a really crappy script and just think WOW!  This'll be great or do they know it's a shit idea and just make the film for fun?  My last two weekends have been spent studying and watching crappy movies.  No, I'm totally kidding it's been a non-stop party with loads of drugs and women with their tits out screaming, "Pass the Jager!"  It's your choice whichever one you want to believe...

I had the pleasure of watching a shitty movie called Cursed once.  But see I watched it in Spanish so it didn't seem that bad.  For a very average Spanish speaker such as myself it was actually really good, the sentences were short and they didn't use big or complicated words.  Plus there was just something hardcore about seeing Portia De Rossi (now Degenerees) saying in over-acted Spanish voiceover "El marque del beaste!"  I did enjoy that bit of bollocks.  Oh but tonight, I watched it again...in English.  It lost it's appeal.  So, so badly scripted, shitty-arse D-grade movie plot and storyline etc...  Although, Christina Ricci acted the arse of that role, in a corny "this has what my career has come to way".  I'm thinking they made it as a bit of a joke?  I hope.  It's either that or the director/producer/everyone involved in the movie really does just have two monkeys playing hackey-sack where brains should be.

Moving on...Eragon.  What utter crap.  I know, I know it's meant to be for kids.  But still...even as a child I would be thinking, "really...what crap, dragons aren't real and even if they were they wouldn't sound like Charlotte from Charlotte's Web".  I wish I had a dragon though.  You know if they were real and all.  When people would call me on a Sunday asking to hang out (because we all know my social life is so hectic), I could be all like..."oooohh no, sorry I'm just out riding my dragon".  Then they'd be all like, "Can I come too!?" And I would be all like "yeah...no...it's my dragon".