Friday 21 November 2014

Brains, Excuses and Physical Exertion

I went for a run today. It was great… and by great I mean absolutely awful. Now you may be wondering why this is a bloggable experience. Quite simply I cannot remember the last time I went for a run but I suspect it was at least two years ago.

Yeah, I’m not an exercise person.

So why did I go for a run? Well for one, today I had to try on my summer clothes to make sure they still fitted and assess the state of my wardrobe (it wasn't pretty) and secondly three days ago a neurologist told me that in the absence of any identifiable cause lifestyle changes would be the best (only) way to deal with my current wide range of symptoms.

I suppose I need to give you some more context. I had the excitement of having an MRI of my brain, then the excitement of hearing that there were some weird white patches on that scan, then the excitement of googling what the patches suggested (even though they told me not to), the excitement of seeing for myself those white patches and an examination which involved having a highly trained neurologist prick me with a safety pin in varies places and asking if I could feel it and finally the excitement of finding out that there is nothing wrong with my brain and it just has funny white patches when you scan it.

So, obviously the good news is that there is nothing wrong with my brain, plus I got to see a picture of my brain, MY BRAIN peoples. The bad news is they have no clue why I am feeling so sick.
So what followed was a generic, eat well at regular times, sleep enough at regular times, avoid caffeine and exercise regularly preferably outside spiel that everyone knows but never actually listens to until they are desperate and a highly paid and educated medial person tells them.

Now, I don’t know if I am just still readjusting to humanity post exams or something but I’m feeling a bit of an identity crisis going on (it probably just an overly dramatic teenage thing). Quite simply I always say my dream is to be an actor but I never do anything about it. There is that saying about if you don’t want to do something you will find excuses and if you do want something you will make it happen. And lately I have been making a lot of excuses. Take community theatre for example. All of the closest ones are still very far away, they often do musicals (singing is not my thing) and to be a member you have to submit a theatre CV. Now the CV thing seemed quite odd to me I mean its like the whole job and experience thing where you won’t get a job without experience but you cannot get the relevant experience without a job. I mean if community theatre is not the place for a novice actor to get acting experience where is? So let’s imagine I can get to the location and have enough acting experience to have an theatre CV (currently 1 intermediate school production, 1 high school production, NCEA levels 1-3 in Drama including a years 12 and 13 drama class production). I then have to hope that the show they are doing isn’t too objectionable for my sensitive standards and has a part that vaguely fits me. We then have the challenge of fitting rehearsals around work and uni (impossible). And finally I have to audition well enough to actually get a part.

There is also the option of signing up with an agency that involves getting head shots and there is still the issues of experience and scheduling around uni and work.

So no instead I get uni which I hate and a job as a checkout chick, writing scripts in my head that will never be read let alone made into anything and spending my evenings binge watching tv series and feeling bitter about the fact that these actors are doing what I wish I could.

But perhaps I am being too hard on myself a mean right now getting out of bed and through the day without crying is a huge achievement. I’m just sick of felling sick and miserable and I hate that I can’t be bothered to do anything about it, It’s all just too hard, I know that they say exercise will help but seriously exercise is the last thing I want to be doing.

But, I have just bought a voucher for five fitness boxing classes so that is going to be an experience (I blame Arrow, it is the last show I binge watched).

Why can’t I just enjoy my holidays like normal uni students?


Till next time.

Sunday 16 November 2014

Habit Formation, Distraction and Thrift

So I am currently typing this at uni. I have just finished my last exam and don’t quite know what to do what to do with myself. Some part of me obviously thought it would never end. So, instead of wallowing in what mistakes I may have made or what I could have done differently I am talking to you. This is becoming quite a habit I know.  Well actually, the first thing I did was look up the past exams for a paper I am enrolled in for summer school (by choice) and one that I think I might change to but that all felt a bit too much like studying so here we are.

The unfortunate thing is that I have nothing to talk about. I mean not that I ever really do but I usually at least have something. But, the last three weeks of my life have been hellish exams and we don’t want to talk about those. And they really consume your life in a bad way (I would make a very bad advocate for university, this is why I don’t ever visit my old high school, every so often they would get a past student to return and tell us about how great uni was, they must have been paid). 

Now I was going to do a rant about how I didn't like the fact that Taylor Swift took all her music off Spotify but then I would have to admit that I listen to her music. Now I go through phases but I wouldn't call myself a fan or anything. I'm more like a casual observer who will give most music a try by reserves the right to like or dislike music on a song by song basis. So, it’s not that I am devastated that I can’t listen to her songs but it is the fact that she left. Because I like Spotify and Pandora and the like, to be honest I barely listened to music before they existed. And I will openly admit I am cheap, the thought of spending money on something I might only like 10% of doesn't jell with me, plus I am a poor student (Yes I am playing that card). Now obviously I think artists (I know that term is controversial for many, but it is the easiest to use) should be paid fairly for their work but its seems like what I think is fair is rather different from what others think.


So I guess I kinda did my rant anyway. I really want to read a novel (weird considering all the reading I have done over the last three weeks) but the ones I want to read you have to order from the library (like Spotify but for literature) months in advance and I just haven’t had the head space. Plus all I have with me is uni stuff. Wow, I am so unprepared for post exam life I really must of thought life would end after my exam I didn’t even pack lunch.

So this incoherent but at least it is legible.
I’m stopping now.
Bye.