Yaaaaay! Stress Over!

Yaaaaay, I am now a permanent resident of the United Kingdom! This means I never have to buy another visa for the UK as long as I don't spend more than 2 years out of the country. Yippeee! It was a very very stressful process, but we got there in the end!!


;A

Confessions: #2

      Confession: I have a weakness for excessively cute pictures of animals...  I may have inherited it from my mother. But Awww, they're sooo adorable!

Oh my word! Does it get any cuter?

Baby hippo! Oh my goodness.

Awwww, really, who doesn't want a micro pig?

Platypuses! Aww, they're so ugly that they're cute!

Is this a repeat? ;

I can't remember whether or not I have posted this in the past. If I have - Oh well. I love it. This is the author's preface to The Picture of Dorian Gray, which is one of my favourite classical novels. This introduction is almost a work of it's own :-) I know that it's long, but you should really read it. <3

  The artist is the creator of beautiful things. To reveal art and conceal the artist is art's aim. The critic is he who can translate into another manner or a new material his impression of beautiful things.

   
    The highest as the lowest form of criticism is a mode of autobiography. Those who find ugly meanings in beautiful things are corrupt without being charming. This is a fault.

  
   Those who find beautiful meanings in beautiful things are the cultivated. For these there is hope. They are the elect to whom beautiful things mean only beauty.

   
   There is no such thing as a moral or an immoral book. Books are well written, or badly written. That is all.

   
   The nineteenth century dislike of realism is the rage of Caliban seeing his own face in a glass.

The nineteenth century dislike of romanticism is the rage of Caliban not seeing his own face in a glass. 
  
   The moral life of man forms part of the subject-matter of the artist, but the morality of art consists in the perfect use of an imperfect medium. No artist desires to prove anything. Even things that are true can be proved. 
   
   No artist has ethical sympathies. An ethical sympathy in an artist is an unpardonable mannerism of style. No artist is ever morbid. The artist can express everything. 
   
    Thought and language are to the artist instruments of an art. Vice and virtue are to the artist materials for an art. From the point of view of form, the type of all the arts is the art of the musician. From the point of view of feeling, the actor's craft is the type. 
   
   All art is at once surface and symbol. Those who go beneath the surface do so at their peril. Those who read the symbol do so at their peril. It is the spectator, and not life, that art really mirrors.
   
   Diversity of opinion about a work of art shows that the work is new, complex, and vital. When critics disagree, the artist is in accord with himself. 
  
   We can forgive a man for making a useful thing as long as he does not admire it. The only excuse for making a useless thing is that one admires it intensely.

          All art is quite useless.

OSCAR WILDE

Did you know that "hebdomadal" means weekly? Huh.

Today, 
   I went to Costco. It feels like home in there. I love how they sell Kirkland water, imported from Kirkland, Washington :-)

   The DTS left this morning for a tour around the UK.  :-( I will miss them a lot for the next two weeks. 

This week I have:
Watched a lot of Lost [I finally finished the 3rd season]

Worked on Christmas presents [delightfully satisfying]

Gone to the forest and adventured with my friends [I wish I could live in the forest]

Gone to a meeting where Connie Taylor spoke! [I love her so very, very much] 

Gone in to school two days in a row only to find that no one else had come... both days... [annoying]

Taught a friend to knit [eeeh :-) I love spreading the madness]


I didn't do a whole lot this week, but overall it was fairly satisfying.


What did you do this week?

Confessions: #1

Confession: I have a secret weakness for runway-esque fashion and make-up...

 

Oh my October!

AHH! Why have I done this??? It has been over a month since I blogged last! What an atrocity.

      Since it's been so long I'll quickly go over what has been happening for the last month, and then maybe go into it more some other time.

      About the beginning of last month I started the Musical Theatre program at North Warwickshire and Hinckley College. In England, college is sort of like the last two years of high school, only you can do it at any age. It's been really exciting so far, learning about acting, singing and dancing. We're working on a production of the Queen musical, We Will Rock You that we'll be performing the first week of November, but I'll post about that another time :-)

 

Shot of the cast of "We Will Rock You" in Costume

We're also working on a devising project, using 9/11 as the stimulus, which seems to be coming along really well, and will be performed later in November.

        My days this last month have basically been filled with college, and my evenings with hanging out with good friends from the Lodge :-)   Last weekend we had an event at our church, cleverly called "The Event". It was a get together of Christian teenagers from the local area, where we got to worship together, intercede and get some amazing teaching from some amazing people. It was a really awesome time to reconnect with God and friends.

       That's the basic overview of my last month, I will expand on some of it in future posts, but that's all for now :-) Have a lovely day! -Abigail