BURN BABY BURN

On Monday my alarm went off at 4:45am!!! I had catch a bus from school at 6am so we could be up in Aberystwyth pretty darn early. The reason for this redoncolous wake up time was that I was going to watch Carwen carry the Olympic Flame through a section of town! It was another beautiful day and it was scorching by 7:30am or even earlier. Whilst waiting for Carwen to start her torch run, coca-cola were giving out free stuff from their little red London-style double decker bus! We received limited edition Olympic flame coke bottles and like a drum-cum-tambourine thing that's supposedly called a 'Beat Pad'. Carwen took the tourch up Constitution Hill on the train, walked back down and ran across a section of the prom. Hundreds of people were there to cheer her as well as the other torch bearers. Whilst queueing for my 'beat pad' thingimajig BB Aled walked past me. As in Aled Jones from the Chris Moyles Radio 1 breakfast show! Chris Moyles and co. were presenting the show from Aberystwyth that day in celebration of the torch passing through Aled's hometown! Mr. Moyles was even a torch barer. I couldn't find them though as they were all the way up in Aber's arts centre.

After watching Carwen walk with the torch and passing it on to a Sun journalist (which led to her picture being in The Sun newspaper!) we walked back to the bus (after walking around Aber looking for a lost school child! We found him in the end so all is cool!). As the bus was filled with mostly young school children, 8-14ish, we ended up in McDonald's after their begging! I grabbed myself a toasted jam bagel. At just after 10am I arrived home. That is one very busy morning in my book! After a quick lie down I continued with my (endless) revision!

The first 6 pictures are from Gwyneth Richards. The rest are mine.

THOSE 7 YEARS FLEW BY

Wow. 7 years of school came to an end last Friday. I still have my exams in June but I have no timetabled lessons anymore. I wont have to stand in the back of the hall for Assembly anymore and neither will I sit in the common room during my free lessons chatting and laughing with my friends waiting for the bell to go. Wow. That's all I can say. Even though school to people seems to be the worst place on earth, for me it is actually an enjoyable place. The lessons are OK, especially in sixth form as I'm taking the subjects that I actually want to do - English literature, Geography and History, but the real thing I enjoy about school is the socialising.

My close friends have changed numerous times since year 7 but I've always had the same friends surrounding me. With these friends I started my first day of secondary school back in September 2005! 2005 -wow! (I think wow is the word of this post!) It is with these friends that I've been on school trips with from Denmark in year 8, History trip to France and Belgium in year 9, Skiing in Austria in year 10, Sweden in year 12 and Ireland in year 13. These friends were with me whilst I walked down the catwalk to raise money for charity, and these friends were also there to congratulate me for my rugby, exams and general success.

The teachers have also been incredibly helpful. Not everyone. Not all the time. The majority however have been great and even though it might sound weird but you do create a close relationship with these people you see everyday for 7 years! They know you extremely well and understand you as a person, your likes and dislikes, your strengths and weaknesses. I have been extremely lucky that I've had teachers that I get on with and who are also very good at what they do! Thank you!

On Friday (our last official school day) I arrived in school at around 11:30am in order to give my teachers 'thank you' gifts. It was quite a stressful couple of days organising all the presents but in the end we pulled it off! To most of the teachers we gave them pictures, flowers, cake and even an autograph of Stephen Jones (Welsh rugby player). Before the present giving however we headed to the canteen and had our last all-together-year13-school-lunch. We then changed into our shorts and t-shirt (it's been boiling here for the last week or so! Like really hot!) and headed down to the field to play some rounders! Classic game. Carwen and I  then headed to Conti's to grab some homemade ice cream and then we headed back to her house to get ready for her 18th birthday party that was later that night. What a wonderful day!

With out a doubt I'll miss school and its friendliness and its familiarity but I'm also very excited to move on to the next stage and to university. Wow, (there's that word again!) university!

Just have to successfully get these exams done first!

Here are some of the photos I gave to my teachers. (+ few extra)

I'D LIKE TO GO TO THE SEA SIDE.

Sunday was a gorgeous day with the sun shining down on us here in Ceredigion. After quite a lazy morning, in the afternoon we decided to go on another coastal walk (you can see the the other walk we did here), this time from Aberaeron to New Quay. As it was a very hot day and Hendrix has only got little legs we didn't make it all the way to New Quay but we did walk around 5miles. The views were spectacular especially as we reached the top of hills and looked down at the sea. Nothing but blue for miles (:

After our nice little walk I really craved a refreshing cold diet coke with ice, so we headed over to the Harbour Master which is situated right on Aberaeron's harbour and we drank our drinks outside on the harbour wall looking out at the sea (: It was absolutely heaving there, people were out with their friends and families watching the sunset and enjoying the rarity that is nice weather in west wales! Lovely Jubbly.

SATURDAY CINEMA

Yesterday I decided I wanted to go to the cinema either to watch the hunger games or to watch Elfie Hopkins. However most people I asked were busy, except for Nicola. The film started at 5:45pm so in the mean time I went up to Lampeter by 12pm grabbed myself an iced soya caramel late and went to watch some hockey. It was a tournament and my friend Carwen was playing and after an hour or so I picked Romeo up (carwen's little Jack Russel puppy) and took him home to have a play date with Hendrix (more info and pictures in next post)

Nicola came to pick me up at 4:30pm and we made our way to Aberystwyth Arts Centre to watch Elfie Hopkins. Aberystwyth Arts Centre has an independent cinema which is quite cool as it screens a variation of films and is also a small screen so it's quite 'cwtchi'. The reason I wanted to go and watch Elfie Hopkins was because it was filmed really close to where i live, near New Quay. The director, Ryan Andrews, also originates from around this way also. I was looking forward to watch this film as it had a great cast line up with actors including Jamie Winston (Elfie) Aneurin Bernard (Dylan), Ray Winston (Bryn), Rupert Evans (Charlie) and many more. Also i was looking forward to watching my first horror genre film in the cinema. If I'm totally honest I left the cinema quite confused. The film was apparently set in a small Welsh village even though only around 3 people actually spoke in a Welsh accent. The lack of continuity and attention to detail here took away from the credibility of the film just a little bit. The plot was, all in all, quite good and just seeing Rupert Evans on the screen was enough for me!

The film showed real pzazz by the end with Elfie destroying the Gammon Family once she has found out that they're actual cannibals. If the film had picked up a bit earlier then without a doubt it would have been a very very good film. Andrews(Dir.) showed his potential as an exceptional director in these last scenes and I am looking forward to go and watch his future films. The other funny thing for myself and Nicola was seeing our English teacher as an extra in the Gammon's house warming scene!

Even though this might not be the best film out this year, or even this summer, I enjoyed it. I think I enjoyed not only the film itself, but the fact that the director and the film came from Ceredigion. This excites me as I am able to see that yes, people from small villages in the middle of nowhere can actually achieve something like this, can actually go out and make a film, and can make a name for themselves as film-makers. This I really like.

After the film Nicola and I headed into town and grabbed some chips and walked on the promenade. Lovely!

This film gets 3 Lisa Loves.

HUNGER GAMES

"Lisa you are not going to get involved in another teen loves story book/film series". These are the words that I told myself when I first heard about 'The Hunger Games'. Well you can probably guess what happened. . . I was in Tesco, it was late . . . give me a break! Well thank god I didn't listen to my head because, wow! I first thought it was going to be bella/edward Esq but I was wrong. The 'love triangle' in this novel is but a mere speck in the adventures of Katniss in the Games. Katniss is like our modern day Spice girl - Girl Power! Right? She's strong and independent, she is the one who saves the men not the other way round! I love the suspense in the novel and to tell you the truth I have never read a book where I lose track of time and just can't stop turning the pages. There were actuall butterflies in my stomach as Katniss fight her way through the terrain in the Games. The ending, well the ending just makes me want to drive down to tesco again (this time wide awake) and purposefully by the next instalment in the Hunger Games series.  

The funny thing was that even though I knew the film had just been released I had no intention of googling what actor played which character because the book allowed me to create such vivid characters in my mind that the thought didn't cross me to google who Peeta or Gales was in till I had read the last sentence! And now I really want to go and watch the film, as it's been out quite a long time now, most people have already seen it, so I'm going to have to convince them to go watch it again! I'm sure that wont be hard!

I give this book 4 and a half Lisa Loves!

RUGBY ON A SUNDAY

I woke up bright and early Sunday morning as myself and Carwen had to be in Whitland (which is about an hour away) by 10am. The reason for this was because we were playing with the Carmarthen Quins in a national rugby tournament. I haven't played rugby in a while because of my leg, but as this was the last game of the season and my last game with the Carmarthen Quins, as I am now to old to play for them, I just had to play! The place was filled with teams from across Wales. It was a 7's tournament and we played full pitch so you had to have speed and stamina! We cruised our way through our opening match playing against Haverfordwest and beat Cardiff Quins to go through to the final. After a very hard fought game we narrowly lost to the Cardiff Quins in the last second of the game. Even though we lost the final I really enjoyed the game as we played good rugby and it was exciting to be involved in!

Carmarthen usually play in green or red, orange and black, on Sunday however as people are in the middle of their exams we didn't have enough players including subs, so we paired up with Neath U18's. Therefore I wore the black shirt of Neath to play my last game for the Quins which was quite strange. But as long as we could play with a full team I didn't care what shirt I was wearing!

We eventually came runners up in the national 7's tournament (which tbh is quite good!) Even though we actually won and lost the same amount of games as the winners! So really we're all winners ;) I love playing rugby and to be involved in a game that has presented me with so many opportunities! I will always be thankful for the people I have met, the friends I have made and the things I have done whilst being involved with the Carmarthen Quins U15's and U18's! I will definitely be returning to watch them play when I'm home from university!

DEPP MAGIC.

Last Saturday Mam, Dad and I headed to Carmarthen as we were meant to go down to Ammanford but by the time we'd stopped with my grandparents and then roamed around PC world (dad looking for ink, me just playing with the cameras and ipads and setting alarms off as I went - oooops!) it was nearly time for mam and I to go to the cinema. So when dad went off to ammanford on his own mam and I had an Ice caramel soya latte in Costa and then went to watch Tim Burton's new film - Dark Shadows.

Of course Johnny Depp was the main character (being a Burton film!) I wasn't quite sure what to expect because I hadn't really seen many adverts etc.  but was very pleasantly surprised! Being a Burton film it was quite strange (in a good but weird way!) Depp plays a rich man who has been cursed by a former lover (who happens to be a witch) to eternal life as a vampire. For two centuries he is trapped underground but is released in 1972 to a totally different world. The story revolves around him attempting to fit in in his new world and restoring the Collin's name as the main fishing company in  the town. There are many laughs in between many quite surreal moments, such as when Alice Cooper randomly performs at the Collins' castle!

There are great performances by a very cool Chloe Grace Moretz and a young Gulliver McGrath. As always Depp and Helena Bonham Carter give us a funny, confusing, weird but awesome performance! I can't write a review of this film without mentioning the soundtrack! As it is set in the 70's the music is right up my street, with singers/bands such as T-Rex, Jimmy Hendrix and Alice Cooper. This film definitely appeals to my film preference as it includes comedy, GREAT music and a great cast! If you're a fan of Burton films you must go and see this film. Or even if you'd like to watch something different to your average film and come out of the cinema asking - "What in the world did I just watch!" then you should definitely go and watch this good film. It might not be the best film out this year and it most probably wont win any awards but it was nice to see some imagination and craziness in the cinema.

I give this film 3 Lisa Loves out of 5.

Here are some pictures from the day.



DEJA FOOD

On Friday I went to La Calabria. I went there exactly 2 weeks ago celebrate my birthday 
this time however we were there to celebrate my mam's birthday! Once more we had amazing food, I opted for the tapas for starters and then the gnocchi for main. The table had everything from swordfish to steak. After our delicious meal we had some pudding and I went for the apple torte - yuuuuumie! This restaurant is actually in the middle of nowhere and is situated on a farm - welcome to west wales! I look forward to my next visit to this fab Italian restaurant!