And she's back!

First things first; an apology.

Its been 8 months since I last blogged and even for my extreme laziness, that's pretty bloody poor. But I'm back and this time I'm here to stay... probably.

I am almost certain that you're all dying to know where the hell I've been and what I've been doing with my oh-so-exciting lifestyle, if this is the case - read on. If you're really not all that interested (and let's be honest, why would you be?) then I'd suggest you stop wasting your time reading this nonsense. 

So let's start with the little girl that I mentioned all that time ago when I first started this writing of feelings business. I'm going to call her S for reasons that have also been previously mentioned.
S is now 2 and a half and she is still the apple of my eye. It really has been incredible to watch her grow over the short time she has been with us and the thought of her not being part of our lives seems almost alien to me. Unfortunately though, that thought is soon to be a harsh reality. On the 23rd of December (yup, 2 effin days before Christmas, the supposed day of joy!) she is going to go home and then that will be that.
I don't really want to dwell too much on that thought because if I'm honest I'm almost certain that letting her go is going to be excruciating for me and I have no idea how I am supposed to handle it. But for now, all I can do is appreciate the time that is left.

So what else is new? Well...

I GOT INTO UNIVERSITY. 
That's right boys and girls, despite my almost constant state of procrastination throughout college I managed to get shit done and do what I set out to do.
So you are no longer reading the blog of a petty college student, and instead are reading the memoirs of a prestigious soon-to-be barrister studying at the University of Greenwich, London. Okay, okay I'm probably not prestigious, and being a barrister isn't going to happen any time soon but the Greenwich thing was accurate.
Being a uni student is excellent and horrendous, uplifting and soul-destroying, interesting and dull, all at the same time, and I love it! (I also love my beautiful use of juxtaposition in each of those pairs of words - you're welcome, Great Britain). 

Uni life has been life changing for me for a number of reasons:
1. I have to drive a minimum of a 3 hour round trip everyday just to educate myself.
 This has resulted in me having to sell my beautiful yellow VW Beetle and having to invest in a brand spanking new Fiat 500. Yes, it is sexy.To be honest the driving doesn't bother me all that much, what does bother me is sitting in traffic at half 6 in the morning when you know you're only doing it for a 2 hour lecture. But on the whole, the driving is fine.
2. I had to make NEW FRIENDS!!!!!
This is something that I was almost certain would never ever happen. Let's be honest, I hate socialising, I hate people and people hate me so the odds were brutally stacked against me. Despite that, I did it. On my second day I met a fantastic set of girls that have now gone on to be some very good friends to me. I also made a friend on twitter (very 21st century) who after avoiding any physical, social contact for about 3 weeks has actually gone on to be one of my best friends. So, surprisingly, I am not at all struggling on the friend front.
3. I have soooooooooooooo much work to do, alllllllll the time.
There isn't much else to say about that really. Obviously that is the shit part of university life but it's kind of the bulk so it's something that really needs to be got over quickly.

As a whole, I'm doing well there and more importantly I'm enjoying it. Hurrah!

Not much else is that new in my life actually. My brother moved out, which is absolutely fantastic. I am currently working as an elf over the festive season although most of my work buddies have and up'd and left... heartbreaking :(
My fabulous collection of Disney DVDs is still growing and I am still understandably proud of it. Over the summer all my dreams came true because I went to DISNEY WORLD! It was literally the most incredible thing of my whole life and there isn't much I wouldn't do to go back and one day I will. I also went on my first ever holiday without mumsie and father to Magaluf with my bestest friend Katie and, of course, Benn as our body guard. That was also pretty amazing. 

I guess I should probably rap this up now, I've told you everything that you've missed and I promise not to fall off of the edge of the planet again any time soon. I'll throw some photos at the end of this blog to show you what's been going down instead of just telling you.

Until next time, beautiful world - goodnight. 

#3

Hi all! I do hope you're all fine and dandy and enjoying your weekend. I can tell you that I am most certainly enjoying mine and I'm sure you would just love to know the reason why that is. Well, you're in luck; because I'm about to tell you. 

On Friday, myself and the lovely Benn Hepworth went to see The Script's #3 tour at the 02 arena. Wow, seriously just wow.

I had already seen the script on the 23rd of March back in 2011 but I loved them so much that I practically begged Benn to buy me and him tickets to go and see them again for my 18th birthday. And here's a little post about how it was. 

Our day started with a trip to Basildon where I picked up a new outfit for the evening as I had literally zero outfits in my wardrobe that didn't look like I had bought them from some sort of illegal charity shop. After that, we come home where I spent the whole of ten minutes getting myself ready to go like the pinnacle of femininity that I am. At around half 3 in the afternoon we left. Now, I'm not a fan of the underground so we couldn't go by train and so I had planned on driving us there, but for any of you guys that know my dad you'll have already guessed that he forced himself on me and insisted that he would drive us there and then drive back to pick us up. I had to do the obligatory half-hearted protest but at the end of the day he saved me like £25 petrol and another £30 parking so I was pretty chuffed. The journey there was pretty standard, dad dropped us off in the usual car park and in we went.

I was pretty damn excited to go in because it was Benn's first ever time in the 02 and his first ever time seeing a concert! I think I was more excited about this than he was but never mind. Then we ate dinner in Frankie and Benny's which would have been fine if they hadn't seated us outside and left me shivering over my steak. But I wasn't going to let a bit of cold ruin my spirits. 

And then the worst happened. 

Here's a piece of advice that you should hold on to very tightly: Never, EVER wear new shoes when you're going to be walking around a lot. That's right, clever cloggs Jordan decided to wear a pair of brand new creepers. Yay for my bleeding feet. Even a whole pack of plasters couldn't salvage the horrendous situation and it ended with Benn having to take one for the team and give me his white socks to put on with my all black outfit. As you can imagine, I looked choice. Thank God there is nothing I could care less about than the way I look. I was comfortable and excited and that was all that mattered.

By the time the whole blister palava was sorted, the doors were open and we could go in to the main arena. We found our seats pretty easily, I had never sat so high up before and although it meant that I wouldn't quite be seeing the sweat beads on Danny O'Donoghue's beautiful face, it did mean that I could see the whole of the arena which was absolutely beautiful. In my opinion they were the best seats we could have been in for Benn to be able to take in the full experience of his first ever concert. Cutie.

The support band were called The Original Rudeboys, I wasn't much looking forward to them on account of their shit name but they were actually really good! Yeah okay they could have done with holding back on the rapping a bit but with 'Rudeboys' in their name, the rapping was pretty inevitable. But yeah as a whole, a good support band. And they were from Ireland which fit nicely in with The Script plus they had the lovely Irish accents which made me feel all warm inside. 

And then The Script came on.

Spoiler alert. But considering they're playing their final show of the tour as I type, it shouldn't be a problem. They opened the show with Good Ol' Days which is from their new album. I looooooooove this song, and correctly predicted that it would be the opening song. Check me out! A few songs in they sang Breakeven, I could never explain to you in a few words how much this song means to me so when it came on, it felt like the whole world had stopped spinning. It was beautiful, really really amazing, one of their best in fact. Then they went on to sing the majority of the new album with drips and drabs of their old stuff. Towards the end of the night they got the crowd to sing The Man Who Can't Be Moved. During this, I stopped singing and listened to the rest of the arena singing together and I wanted to stay in that moment for a very long time. After that they sang I'm Yours. Christ. The last time I went to see The Script I was in a really dark place in my life, and I remember listening to Danny singing I'm Yours with his guitar and I broke down in tears. And this time I did exactly the same. It was such a strange feeling because it overwhelmed me how much my life had changed since I had last stood in that arena and listened to that song, they were most definitely happy tears. 

And then they said goodnight and came back on and did a couple of encore songs. They ended with Hall Of Fame which was excellent and then they did their bowing and off they went. 

All in all it really was a sublime night. I loved every second, even the seconds when my feet were in excruciating pain. 

My weekend continued to be good times because I got to work this morning and was told it was closed all weekend. What, a, bonus.  

So yeah, it's been a good couple of days for me. And now it's bed time. Goodnight all. 

xx

The top 10.

Okay, so you should all know that I hate Thursdays. I hate everything about them. I have Law followed straight away by Psychology at college and then I finish at 20 to 3 and have to go straight to my dad's garden centre to start work at 3 o'clock which means I am always late due to my psychology teachers incapability to let us out just a few minutes early. Work in itself is a burden because I am not the type of person who enjoys being alone with nothing to do, maybe I'll use that time to write these posts in future? 

So, what I've decided is to do a weekly post about the top 10 music chart on a Thursday in an attempt to lessen my hatred for the retched day of the week. The decision was brought about for these posts when I was having a conversation with a friend about music not 5 minutes ago and I thought 'Yeah, I could write about music every week. Easy peasy'. We'll see how it goes.

Here we go then. I am going to go by the iTunes top 10 chart because everyone trusts apple (said the girl typing on the PC laptop. I have an iPhone though so I'm allowed to say that still).

10. One way or another (Teenage Kicks) - One Direction.
Okay so I must at this stage confess that I am a huge One Direction fan. I went to see them at the 02 arena a few weeks ago and it made my life. They sang this song when I went to see them and I listen to it on loop in the car for substantially long periods of time and in my opinion it's one of those that you just can't get tired of. I hated the Blondie original and Teenage Kicks on it's own isn't up there with my favourite songs but the combination of 1D's voices and these two songs seems pretty perfect to me.And it's all for charity so that means you can't hate it anyway.

10/10

9. White Noise - Disclosure

Being a religious Radio 1 listener, I have heard this song more times than I am willing to discuss. At first I was like 'oo yeah, what a banger. Rave, rave, rave' and now I'm all like 'Oh my god, get this offensiveness away from my ears'. I suppose what I'm trying to say is that if you haven't heard it yet (which is unlikely as it is horrifically overplayed) then you should give it a whirl and have a little boogie. But if, like me, you've heard it over ten thousand times, it starts to get on your tits just a little. Saying that, I'm sure the next time I'm drunk in a club and it comes on, I'll scream like its my favourite tune and go and dance very badly to it. 

6/10

8. Ho Hey - The Lumineers
This one is pretty simple to talk about it because it is just so damn lovely! Ignoring the fact that all of The Lumineers' songs sound pretty much the same, their music is just so nice and happy! I realise that I just used two of the potentially most boring adjectives ever invented but that's my description. Plus, it's a nice little love song; and we all love a love song.
8/10

7. Thrift Shop - Macklemore & Ryan Lewis (ft. Aluna George)

Right so everyone I have spoken to absolutely adores this song. Here's my deal with it: I DO NOT UNDERSTAND. That's right, I don't know whether its because I am not exactly fluent in 'gangsta talk' or if I'm just being thick but I just don't understand what the hell Macklemore is talking about! To start with he says 'Wha' 32 times at the start of the song. 32 TIMES! Who on God's earth needs to say that word 32 times? Then he goes on to tell us that he is going to 'pop some tags', what does that mean?! I assumed it meant buy some designer clothes but considering he only has $20 in his pocket, I am unsure as to how he's going to pop anything but a balloon with that kind of money. Sorry guys, but I'm not impressed by this one. 

3/10

6. Ready Or Not - Bridgit Mendler
For a regular radio listener, I was surprised to find that I actually hadn't heard this song before. So I gave it a cheeky YouTube and I have to say that first impressions wern't great. I liked the lyrics I guess but it isn't the sort of thing I'd pay 99p for on iTunes. But then again, once I've heard it a few more times I'll probably be loving it. 
5/10

5. Pompeii - Bastille
Okay so I adore this song. Funnily enough, this was the song that me and a friend were talking about when I decided to write this post. I'm not sure if there is anyone else on this planet that will agree with me but I really think they sound like The Wanted and You Me At Six's lovechild! Anyone? No? Okay then. I think Pompeii is such a beautiful song, one of those tunes that you listen to on a sunny day when you're driving with your shades on in your bright yellow VW Beetle. Just me? Cool. Anyway, yeah Pompeii gets a thumbs up from me. So does Bastille.
9/10

4. When I Was Your Man - Bruno Mars
Is there anything that Bruno Mars does badly? Every song he releases seems to make the whole world fall in love with him just a little bit more. What amazes me about this song is that in it he is clearly admitting that he was obviously a pretty rubbish boyfriend and the break up was his fault for not bringing his girl flowers and giving her all his hours, yet we still hate the ex girlfriend! He seems to be the only person who is able to be the arsehole guy that's singing about how much of an idiot he was and still makes himself so unbelievably desirable. Good on you Bruno, you tha man.
9/10

3. Just Give Me A Reason - Pink
Awwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww. She's so lovely isn't she? Such a hard exterior but that girl is just so deep. This song is beautiful, I can totally connect with Pink. And it has Nate Ruess from FUN in it which totally bumps it up a few points. Not much else to say about this song if I'm honest, all I will add is that if you're a Pink fan you should listen to 'Glitter in the air' that song touches me on so many levels.
8/10

2. Mirrors - Justin Timberlake
Now you should know that I really am not in any way a JT fan. I hated his comeback song Suit and Tie and I am yet to listen to his new album. It's not really that I don't like his music, well... I don't like his music, but it's more to do with how much of a terrible actor he is. That just puts me off of everything else he does. Having said that, I love Mirrors! It's ridiculously catchy, the lyrics are good and it's so deep! I have spent 99p on that and what a worthy 99p. Excellent JT, good job!
10/10

And now for number 1. Drum roll please...

1. What About Us - Little Mix (feat. Sean Paul)
Well isn't this a catchy little tune?! I haven't always been a big Saturdays fan but I agree with the general population on this one. I kind of wish Sean Paul wasn't involved but I guess the combination of rapping and pop songs is a must if you're after a number 1 these days so I forgive you ladies. So yes, very good choice for number 1. 
9/10

There we have it people! The low-down on the top 10. Enjoy your week of music and we'll re-group next Thursday. Same time, same place. I'll be here. 

Well, that plan failed.

For those of you that read my post from this morning, you will know that I had a pretty structured plan of how my day was going to pan out and you'll remember that I said I'd try to inform you if anything changed. 

Firstly, I opted for breakfast. Not sure why, I just went downstairs and thought 'hey, I'm going to have some coco pops today!'. Then, Benn didn't beep outside in his Punto, he rang the doorbell! Obviously that wasn't a life changing difference from the plan but I like to be thorough. 

College went as smoothly as it usually does. With the inevitable struggle to find a parking space and more than one Malteser bunnie being consumed. Although I did decide to spend my break between lessons in Basildon's Waterstones, re-living my childhood through Beatrix Potter and A. A. Milne. The main difference to my previous planning was that me and Benn didn't make it to our wicked Wednesday pub quiz! There were a string of reasons really. The main one being that Benn's mum was ill and so couldn't come, and seeing as she's the one who gets the only correct answers we decided it wasn't worth going without her. Benn also had coursework that needed to be done so he dropped me home and we went our seperate ways for the evening. 

I spent the evening watching 'We bought a zoo' which I absolutely loved. If you're an animal lover or a really-cute-film lover, you need to get on that. And Matt Damon is pretty dishy in it which helps with the watch-factor. Then I had dinner and then dad asked me if I could go to the shop and buy some beers for him. No problem, I thought. I was wrong.
So I walk into the shop at the end of my road which I am in all of the time and the guy who serves me is a guy who is always up for a chat. He asks to see my ID so I give it to him. He then tells me that that isn't my ID and that I look like I'm 16!! Unimpressed I told him that that was me in the picture and I certainly wasn't 16 considering I was holding my car keys in my hand. After telling him the make of my car, and having to show him every form of identification in my purse he finally accepted that I was old enough to buy the effin beers, by which stage I was in half a mind to go and get them from the Co-Op across the road. It was infuriating to say the least.

After that I went home and the rest of my night was as I would expect a Wednesday night in to be.

I hope the rest of your Wednesdays wernt filled with bland lessons and insults from shop keepers.

It's time for me to hit the sack. At 8 minutes to 9. I really am living the life of luxury. Goodnight all. Sweet dreams.

Benn with two N's

This is Benn. With two N's. 

To all you fellow regular followers of my blog, you will see his name mentioned quite a bit and I feel like if I don't dedicate a whole post to him and his two N's, you will spend the rest of eternity wondering why I am spelling his name wrong.

So, here we go:

The tale of Benn Hepworth, how he became part of my story and why he has two N's.

Before we begin, you must be warned that this post has potential to be extremely long. It is also going to have slight hints of romance, so if you're anything like me (a person who shows their affection through verbal insults and physical abuse) look away now. If you're a sucker for a heart warming story with a guaranteed happy ending, read on. 

So it all starts with a radiator. That's where we met, by a radiator on the first day of college. We didn't speak to each other, but he later informed me that he checked out my bum as I walked away - which is obviously extremely romantic. And then, call it fate, call it coincidence, call it whatever you like, but by some chance we ended up in the same English class later that day. For a few weeks we remained strangers, until Benn tactically got my phone number and started to send me cheesy pick up lines, the first being (if I remember correctly) 'Is that a ladder in your tights or a stairway to heaven?'. I wasn't even wearing tights. Smooth. 

Somehow and sometime later, he asked me out on a date. I agreed, but insisted to my friends profusely that it wasn't a date and that nothing was to come of it. How wrong I was. We went to the cinema and watched 'The Change Up', which I hated. Followed by a meal at KFC. It's safe to say I wasn't impressed, but I was intrigued. I certainly wasn't used to boys wearing their heart on their sleeve like Benn did, and if I'm honest, that scared me a little. 

I'm not sure if you remember, but I'll never forget. The first week of October in 2011 was unbelievably hot. I remember like it was yesterday, wearing a floral play-suit to college with my blonde hair curled and pushed back with a bow. That night me and Benn went out again, this time to a local field in which we spent hours watching the sky darken and talking about each other. If you're picturing something from a cheesy American movie, you're picturing it right. We kissed for the first time that night, that wasn't the way you're picturing it. He was shy, so it was more of a kiss-rape on my part. But if you'd prefer, you can picture it the movie way.

After that everything kind of fell apart. We fell apart. Things changed between us and something drove me away from him. Looking back on it now, it was probably the way I felt about him that scared me off. But at the time I was far too arrogant to admit that, instead I blamed it on Benn, labeling him 'too nice' for me. Yup, what a bitch. 

Things became strange with us then. We'd spend some time being inseparable and we'd go for months without speaking. Until finally, we called it a day and went our seperate ways. 

A few months and 2 boyfriends later, mine and Benn's lives were forced together again. It was a house party, I don't know what it was about that night but it was definitely something. I hadn't expected Benn to be there, but he was. I saw him talking to a girl who I knew liked him and I was hit by some sort of emotional ten tonne truck. And in typical Jordan fashion, I decided at that moment that I wanted him. Unfortunately for me, I had picked the worst possible moment to decide that, seeing as I was there with my boyfriend and he was across the room talking to the girl he liked. And I don't know how, but he knew. It was a roller-coaster of a night and it ended with me running off and Benn bent over a wall crying. 

After that, everything kind of fell into place. I decided to just be honest with all parties involved. I was honest to everyone about how I felt and I set my sights on eventually being with him. And eventually, after waiting a year, and watching me go through two relationships, he got the girl. And boy did he earn it!

The rest is history I suppose, nearly half a year on and we are a happy little pair. Cute.

And as for the N's. It's just the way his name is spelt. I'm sorry to dissapoint but there is no elaborate story, just that his mum named him after Nigel Benn, the boxer. 

I hope you all enjoyed my little fairytale of Canvey Island. The lesson to be learnt from this, if that's what you're searching for, is that honesty is the best policy. And the main person to be honest to is yourself. 

Introducing me.

Nothing worse than not being able to put a name to a face.

I have set a new challenge for myself to add a photo from that day onto each of my blogs. iPhone quality pictures only, of course. I'm no photographer. Instagram is about as technical as I get.

Forgive me.

New beginnings.

I'm not a fan of cliche introductions. But after sitting here for well over an hour staring at a blank screen, it seems I have no other choice but to start with one. 

The start of this post could be summed up with one word. Typical. Because that's what I am. A typical teenager, surviving in the realms of normality and 'the usual'. My name is Jordan. I am an 18 year old who works on the entertainment team of an adventure park and am studying for my A-levels in pursuit of a law degree at Greenwich university.

So, yeah, it's safe to say that my life was moving in pretty much the same direction as the majority of the world's teenagers. Until last Thursday when the phone rang.

At this point I should probably brief you on the living situations of my house. I live with my mum, dad, 22 year old brother, my dog Bailey and my tortoise Rocky. And that's not all. My parents are foster parents. So living alongside the four of us lives a 10 year old boy who is suffering the shadows of autism, a girl the same age as me who is making her way through college with her sights set on becoming a social worker and, up until a month ago, a 13 year old girl, who has now gone home to her mum. My biggest problem here is I can't actually mention anybody's names because it's against the rules, and I'm no rule breaker!

So as you can imagine, life in our 6 bedroom house is pretty hectic. But following the celebrations of the young girl going home, my mum was left at a loss. The 10 year old boy goes to a boarding school so he's gone all week and the older girl practically lives with her boyfriend so the weeks were feeling pretty damn quiet. Which brings me back to Thursday night and the phone ringing. 

It was a pretty average evening in the sense that me, my mum, my dad and my boyfriend Benn (I'll tell you more about him and his two N's another time) were sitting around the lounge watching Eastenders. The phone call came at about half past 7 and as always mum was the only one who made the advance to answer the house phone. She did the usual scurry to the kitchen as she spoke and not much more attention was paid to her. Not, that is, until she hurried back into the lounge and explained to my dad that there was a social worker on the phone asking if we would have an 18 month old girl as an emergency placement. 

Within an hour, my dad was out picking up a cot from my uncles house and I was sitting by the window eagerly waiting for a car to pull up outside. I could feel my mums nerves radiating and filling the room, it was heavy. Finally, the car stopped outside. A woman first stepped out, and then opened the back door and pulled an angel out of the car. 

As I said before, I can't tell you her name. It's a shame because if I could, I would have been able to give this post the perfect name. But I can't. But what I can tell you is that she's perfect. She's actually 21 months, she has blonde hair, blue eyes and is a spitting image of me when I was her age. From the off she loved me, within 5 minutes of being here she was cuddling me and showing me things she knew the name of. Nothing's changed, she has warmed so much to me and my mum and we already have such a bond with her. Unless you have been through this, you will never know how this situation feels. The problem is that we have no idea how long she is going to be here. And it gets harder and harder everyday. Which is the reason for this blog. I promise to record everything that happens from here on in my life. I don't promise it to be interesting but I promise it to be consistent.

So, fellow bloggers, I invite you to join me on the voyage of a teenager living the life of a teenager whilst being totally in love with a baby that I know wont be here for forever. It's time to take every day as it comes and, for now at least, it's time to concentrate on the gifts God gives us.