the way to a better life [part uno] March 10, 2009

I have recently started reading “The Monk who sold his Ferrari”. OK, it might be trite, but I still like some of the aspects of this book.

So I came up with an idea to share these aspects here. It also could be a notes for myself, what I should remember to make my life less miserable.

Firstly, to improve the quality of the life we need to improve the quality of our thoughts. To do so, we should imagine, that our brain is a beautiful garden with beautiful and colourful flowers in it. All those flowers are all good thoughts, ideas and dreams. Taking care of our gardens, we need to weed it regularly, yup? So we need to imagine that weeds are all those worries,  bad news we take into our hearts, bad thoughts and etc.

To maintain our beautiful garden we just need to stop worrying  about everything, we need to stop thinking about what bad had happened yesterday. As it is said in the book, we don’t do mistakes – those are lessons we need to learn. And really? Why should I worry if last week somebody told me, that my hair was a mess? Or that my English is unuderstandable? Pf. There is no such word like ununderstandable? Who cares?

1,2,3,4,5 February 10, 2009

1. I finished reading a great book last night. About Žygimantas Augustas the king of Poland and his forbidden Lithuanian lover Barbora Radvilaitė. They got married in the page 200, but she died soon. And then he died. It is a story of great love. And I want to believe it all was true then in 15th century. Well, I guess I should read some history books.

2. I went to town today and when I was passing the craft’s shop I got in and bought six small bags of beads. haha, I used to make bracelets from beads loooong time ago. I’ll see can I remember anything.

3. It was snowing again on Monday, but all snow have already melted. well, almost all. I hope it’ll be gone by tomorrow.

4. Pinky is all right.

5. I’m going to work after one hour. ;(

let it snow February 7, 2009

Weather went crazy here.

That’s what I noticed on Sunday night through the window

Well, I told to myself, it have to be melted by Monday morning. It’s England and snow can’t stay there over night, that’s just impossible.

I was wrong.

Monday morning I woke up to this

Bus service was really poor, classes at schools and colleges were canceled, and people were making snowmans in the middle of roads.

Gosh, England went crazy, there was shows on TV how to dress in this weather and what to have in your car before you leave home.

Funny thing is, that snow is still here, and English are still in panic. muahaha.

As I grow up in Lithuania with real winters, -20′C temperatures and snow above knees, this phenomenon is strange and very funny. It makes me wonder how foreign people from countries like India, Malaysia or Zimbabwe feels now. Especially if it is their first snow.

My workmate from Kenya said, that his daughter refused to go out, because she is afraid to slip and broke her legs or arms. She will be 13 in March.

environmentally friendly wannabe February 1, 2009

The boy on the beach.

Ponder the story of a little boy on a beach throwing stranded starfish back into the ocean. “Why do you bother?” a man asked him. “There are hundreds of them. You couldn’t possibly save them all”. “No,” the little boy answered, “but I can save this one, and it makes a difference to him.”

I bought this pocket-size book about six months ago, for a pound or two. Wow, I thought, it could be my new “Good for me and for The Planet Earth” hobby. Then this book disappeared in a huge pile of my other books and magazines.

Today I read the story about the boy on the beach somewhere on the internet and remembered my guide to greener life. Ha, I found it in ten minutes time!

What’s good about this book, that there are a lot of simple tips and tricks how to  help to protect our planet. Some tiny, some could inspire ideas for a lifestyle choices, some to help save money. And it’s all in a small, easy to read, colourful book with images for just a few pounds.

What I want to say here, that I’m going to try to keep this book on the top of my literature pile, read it time to time  and be more environmentally friendly than I’m now.

I even added a new category to keep myself motivated.

if’s January 31, 2009

If I could go back in time, I would go back to summer 2008. Then I would stop the time and enjoy my holiday forever.

If I could choose what I want to understand better in English I would choose English Conditionals.
Conditionals make my head spin.

Italiano January 27, 2009

I told you I’m going to learn a new language this year!

I already bought two books, a dictionary and download 1.2 GB of Italiano mp3 lessons.  I also have a cousin who is fluent in Italian and ready to help me. Ha!

I just need to turn off my PC one hour earlier every day for the next three months and voila!

olympus trilogy January 19, 2009

Everything started back in 2004 when my grandmother gave me some money on my 18th birthday and I bought my very first camera.

It was Olympus Camedia C-???. Cheap, easy to use, simple digital camera. It captured a lot of great moments of my life an I loved it.

Then in 2005 I moved to England and gave promise to myself to buy a new camera.  You know how fast things are changing.

When I found a permanent job in February 2006 and saved some money, I bought this beauty

It’s Olympus SP-350. It was a perfect camera, believe me people. 8.0 mega-pixels, 24 pre-programmed scene modes, such as Night Scene, Indoor Portrait or Cuisine Mode, QuickTime Movie Mode (the camera could record movies of any length, limited only by the size of the xD-memory card), Micro and Macro Modes and so on. I loved it, I still do, but it had been broken while partying at the gay club last summer and it doesn’t work any more.

With Olympus SP-350 I captured even more great moments of my life, such as first days in England, my holidays, and thousands of very small things, just like this wasp

You know how annoying they are.

However, nova days I read more and more great blogs about photography, I see more and more great photographs of random people and more and more I want to make better photographs. More and more better photographs. After breaking my beloved Olympus SP-350 I decided it is time to go manual. And I went.

I bought this monster about five moths ago

It’s Olympus E-510. It’s a monster.
Yup, it is DSLR with 18 Scene Modes. It has hundreds of mysterious buttons and other convenient things. Also It is too big for most of my handbags so it is hardly possible to take this camera everywhere I go… And I miss Macro Mode. I need to buy a new lens to be able to capture wasps, bugs and even my hamster.

My task for next few weeks is to find and read some articles about shutter speed, aperture and other things how to make better pictures.

trick January 16, 2009

Our light in the kitchen didn’t work for last two weeks. It was definitely good for my figure, as I couldn’t prapapre food. However, evenings are long and dark this time of the year and it had to be changed. The thing is that it was not an ordinary light bulb that I could change myself. It was a long, strange light tube. Seriously how can I know how to change it? I called to agency two times this week. You see, we rent house from agency and they are supposed to change everything from A to Z if it belongs to landlord and doesn’t work anymore. So, I called two times and all I get was promises, that someone will come to fix it as soon as possible. Yeah right, I have been waiting for some time. So I decided that only thing I can do is to make landlord sick of me and come to fix it straight away.

I call him at 6:30 am this morning. That man was definitely asleep and all he could say was “mama, let me miss the school, let me sleep”. All right, all right, he didn’t say that, but he said he was sleeping and he couldn’t understand what I want and who I am and why I call him while outside is still dark.

But guess what? It worked! My long strange light tube had been changed one hour ago!

The question is will he come to change sofas if I call him at 5:00 am?

many things to do January 13, 2009

That’s it, I done with my laziness. This time for real. Hey, I fried fish today. And cooking is not a common thing for me.

People say things are easier when one has a plan and is organised, so I made some resolutions this year. Want to see it? No? doesn’t matter.

Here it is (in no particular order) :

1. Collect all James Bond movies.

2. Learn a new language

3. Read 50 40 books

4. Keep Pinky’s cage clean

5. Make my bed every morning

6. Find a new job

7. Stop avoiding talking in English

8. Send 100 postcards from each account

9. Make some postcards

10. Lose 8 kg

11. Sort out my mysterious friendships

12. Answer emails, messages, texts on time

13. Go to London

14. Go to Blackpool

15. Stop buying useless things for my mother

16.Spend less, save more

17. Learn how my camera works

18. Go to cinema at least 15 times

19. Complain less

20. Publish at least one new post a week

21. Read/watch news

22. Do yoga

23. Donate clothes and shoes I don’t wear

24. Eat more healthy

25. Go to at least one concert

26. Go to theatre at least once

27. Say yes more

29. Clean my room properly before holidays

30. Buy a skirt/dress

31. Wear a skirt/dress

32. Photograph more

33. Make cake

34. Decide what I want to study

35. Go to open days at all colleges

36. Sing karaoke

37. Go to York

38. Take more walks

39. Drink two liters of water a day

40. Stay in touch with my friends

41. Don’t stay in pyjamas even on very bad days

42. Improve my English

43. Ride a bicycle

44. Get fit, keep fit

45. Comment blogs I read

46. Tell my friends about this blog

47. Use wallet, not pockets for money

48. Mark all important days in the calender

49. Find new friends

50. Learn Photoshop language

51. Organise weekdays and weekends

52. Cut ff energy drinks

____________________________

52 stands for every week of the year. I’ll better go to start reading now.

Thank you for visiting.

(Time in Leeds: 02:15)

start January 12, 2009

She’s gone, holiday is over, time to face the music reality.

I should post my New Year Resolutions this week and then (I hope so)  show will begin.