Oh happy day....

Reader, I am a very positive person. Sometimes to ridiculous amounts. I try my hardest not to be a complainer, or to get too down in the dumps, because in my experience, positive attitudes attract positive results and negative attitudes attract...well, you get the picture. Sometimes, like anyone, I get a case of the blues, but it's very rare, and when it happens I work hard not to dwell on it. I have a cry, then fight my way back into a sunshiney disposition, even if I have to fake it till I discover I actually am happy again (believe it or not, this does work, it's like some kind of placebo!). Which is why I find I have very little sympathy for people who see life through grey tinted glasses. My brother has a tendency towards this, and it's been the cause of many an argument between us, with me  trying to shift him out of a bad mood, him insisting the world is out to get him, me talking about all the lovely things in his life, him talking them down till they sound a bit crap. It usually ends in me throwing a pillow at his head. I have also noticed this at work. We all complain about working in a call centre. It's only natural, it is after all, an incredibly boring job. However, there is a line between good natured 'ugh, this job stinks, I wish I could win the Euro Millions and retire to a small exotic island with a pile of books and a keg of pina colada' and 'This job stinks, I deserve better, I should be getting paid more, I cant take much more of this, how dare they make me try and sell wine to people who don't want it'. Get your head out of your arse. No one likes their job. Apart from maybe Bill Gates. Or Parkinson. And if you hate it that much? Change the job. Go and be a waiter, or a teacher, or a bus driver or an accountant.

Then you get people who just seem to like complaining. There were two women on the train from Chichester the other day who were whining about their high paid publishing jobs; 'Well they DID pay for the hotel, but it was only 4 star, the TV had Virgin rather than Sky and frankly the conference was a bore'. 'Did you get paid extra to go?' 'Oh yes, about 10 grand for 4 days, but it hardly seemed worth it for how bored I was'. I wanted to take them to some of the council flats in Tottenham and show them some of the amazing, cheerful people who live there on jobs that pay less than minimum wage, with three asthmatic kids, a buggered up lock on their door from people trying to break in and a bad case of damp in the walls. What's that old saying? Only boring people get bored. These are usually also the people who, when you say 'oh, how are you?' in a fleeting way, go 'I've been better' or 'Well, I had a crap weekend'. Day in, day out. Never 'Oh, I'm great, isn't it lovely and sunny?' or 'Fabulous! It's only a month till Christmas!'  or even 'Wonderful, it was cold today so I got to wear my favourite gloves'. No wonder they're bored, they don't bother looking for any joy in life!

Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying you're not allowed to be down in the dumps. I've been depressed before, I know how hard it is to get out of bed when everything seems bleak. What I do suggest though, is let yourself have a limited amount of time to bask in the misery. There's a difference between clinical depression that needs drugs and possibly therapy and someone just being a moody sod. Interestingly, the people I know with clinical depression are far less willing to force their blues on other people than the moody sods. My trick is that I allow myself one day, or even just a few hours, to indulge in being grumpy, I watch sad films, I eat a family sized bar of dairy milk and some potato waffles, I write incredibly self indulgent diary entries and I may even have a cry to my mum, and then when my 'allotted time' has passed, I force myself to try and be positive and look at the world in a new light. And it works. There have been studies done on the power of positive thinking and it's many benifits. Positive people are the ones that get the jobs, the friends, the great experiences, they even bloody live longer! And they're not positive because of these things, it's all because of the positivity that they have them.

So go out and smile Reader! Go listen to carollers at Covent Garden, eat a mince pie or a Coconut cupcake from Lola's, watch it's a wonderful life, have a duvet day. Be happy! It's a rather nice world out there after all. And you'll live longer. Or something.
Bye for now,
Ash
x
p.s. has anyone noticed I've really got into the christmas spirit?

Department store cake's, with SJ (and music from the bloke who wrote the Crusha advert!)

Hello Reader!

So after much ado, and quite a lot of technical burps, here it is, the first filmed version of The Cake Blog with me and SJ! Apologies for bad quality of light, we're looking into ways of fixing that! Also, it's completely unscripted, so all opinions expressed are real and a bit silly. The jingle is by the wonderful creator of the Crusha adverts, Joel Veitch. We hope you like our little vlog, we had fun making it! 


Lots of love, Ash and SJ
x
p.s. for those who were wondering about the last blog, I did get the part I was waiting to hear about! Hurrah!

p.p.s sorry, I didn't realise that the 'embed image' thingy I copied and pasted didn't work. Here is the link to the video! Sorry I can't seem to embed it. I am a technological failure :(

http://vimeo.com/32382516

Waitin' and wishin' and hopin' and dreamin'

Reader, one of the worst bits about being an actor is waiting to hear back from auditions you really, really want. It's an entirely aggravating process, through which you constantly think you hear your phone going off (it didn't), you get nervous if you're five minutes away from your emails and whenever anyone calls you that isn't an unknown number, you're instantly 'busy'. Then, when an unknown number does call and it's not the casting people, you get unaccountably pissed off with the poor sod on the other end of the phone. How DARE they not be people telling you that you're hired!

You may have guessed, Reader, that I am currently in that situation. I know I'm down to the last two for a part that I really really want, and I know that they're auditioning the other girl again today. So after about 3pm I shall most likely be a nervous wreck. I'm already keeping my phone in my bra (in case the girl doesn't show or has chopped off all her hair so they decide to just give me the part) and am already showing signs of a nervous breakdown. The thing is, if I hadn't known it was just between me and one girl, I think I'd be less worried. If there were a sea of nameless actors I was up against, I'd think 'well, it's like playing the lottery, no point getting nervous' but now it's more like a gameshow or something. I'm having to distract myself by doing lots of other things. Here is my list of things to do whilst trying to get the audition off my mind:

• Bake cookies (have made three trays so far)
• Go to a Rosemary Connelly class (ignoring cookies on side)
• Aerobics class with much older women who are much fitter than me
• Tea at Grandparents (hide phone, they might think I'm being rude)
• Take cat to vet to get his lump prodded (the scratches might distract me)
• Remove make up, then re-apply
• Eat The Lad's birthday chocolate, turn the Rosemary Connelly booklet upside down because it's making me feel guilty
• Paint nails
• Realise nail varnish is gone all gloopy and hurry to take it off, spilling it on white duvet
• Read Tolstoy
• Stop reading Tolstoy and pick up copy of Cosmopolitan instead
• Stop reading Cosmo and pick up copy of Heat instead
• Stop reading Heat and pick up copy of Thomas the Tank engine instead
• Stroke cat
• Tend to scratches
• Check online to see if the casting director's been really obvious and has written any hints on her facebook
• Wonder if adding casting director as a friend on facebook is too bum-lickey
• Make a chart of x-factor predictions
• Book a train ticket to see friend on other side of England
• Consider quitting acting to become a teacher 
• Consider cutting hair
• Decide not to cut hair
• Decide to cut hair if I don't get the part
• Go slowly but surely mad

The end!

Ash

x

In which The Lad gets older....

It's a special day today Reader, because The Lad is turning 23. Finally he will be the same age as me (so I won't feel like quite such a cradle snatcher). This may mean that he comes home wearing a suit, talking about his shares in the plastic industry and worrying about a pension and varicose veins, but that's quite unlikely. What's more likely is that he'll come home, get very excited about the prospect of the novelty cake I've made (the theme of which I'm keeping a secret till he sees it, but will post a pic later), glue himself to his Xbox (Skyrim arrived today-there goes my relationship...) and talk about pokemon. He may at some point try to tickle me till I wee a little bit (let's hope not, I hate being tickled) and will go to bed fully clothed like he did the other night (tirednenss? Coldness? I have no idea.).

Tomorrow night we're going to a rather groovy place called The Breakfast club and having lots of cocktails. I'll buy us something cheese covered to eat (or rather, I'll buy HIM something cheese covered. I may have something like that if my weigh in goes to plan, but if not, I'll just stick to the booze). A group of our lovely friends will be coming and hopefully a fabulous night will be had by all. And then the next day, we're playing board games (am slightly concerned he may force us to play the Pokemon game my parents got him, but am hopeful I can distract him with the prospect of snacks). He's quite spoilt really, but given that the poor sod is working 6 day weeks till Christmas, I reckon he quite deserves a bit of spoiling.

You may have noticed I mentioned a weigh in...that's right, I'm trying to lose a couple of cakes worth of lbs. Not so much because I'm lardy at the moment, more because I'm very aware Christmas is coming up, and I'm planning to eat pretty much the whole contents of Marks and Spencers. Particularly their chocolate covered cherries. Christmas has always been about family, cosiness and eating frankly shocking amounts for me, and this year will be no different. In fact, I bet there'll be some competition between me and The Lad on who can eat the most, given that this year will be the first we'll be spending together (am I excited? Yes. Am I a little bit sad that this means I'll have to share my quality street? Yes.). Last year, I got so carried away by mince pies, I had a tiny bit of a melt down the week before christmas when I realised I couldn't fit my arse in a coveted christmas outfit, so this year, I've promised myself that I'll only truly pig out the week of Crimbo. Which means aerobics classes till then, and portions my great grandmother would have spat at. Fun.

So what else is happening? I got made a team leader at work (yay!) which basically means that they trust me to keep people entertained and buy lots of glitter covered signs for our pod (we already have paper chains, a paper snow mountain range and a glittery christmas sign and that's only the beginning. Someone asked me if I wanted to be a kids tv presenter the other day because of all my d.i.y decs!). It's a bit exhausting, means that I have a whole lot less free time now as I spend my mornings buying prizes for competitions and have to come in early for meetings, and I stay late at work making sure everything is properly put away. I feel a bit like a hyperactive mother from the fifties, passing round biscuits and making sure everyone has a nice time. I'm hardly rock and roll sadly, but ah well!

Right loves, I'm off to put on a wash, since most of my clothes are now covered in flour,
Bye!
Ash
x

All women are not sperm thieves...(now there's a title I never thought I'd write...)

Reader, you cannot have missed the huge outcry that's come from columnist Liz Jones writing about the time she stole her boyfriend's sperm to attempt to impregnate herself. As a very smart friend said the other night, she's a journalist, she's written it for the sensationalism that it would create, the notoriety it would paint her with and the column inches she would gain. Fair enough. But for the point of this entry, I'm going to ignore that element of it, because I find the whole concept of a woman being THAT desperate fascinating in an 'Oh God, I can't believe....oh gross....oh that's really not a great idea' sort of a way. If you haven't read the article, you can find it here.

The whole article is a series of oxymoron based phrases and ideals. The writer claims to be a feminist (the same woman who got a breast reduction because she wanted to look more like a model) and says that she looked down on mumsy types. Now, first and foremost, I might be wrong, but surely feminism is about support for each other? About women having the right to choose what they want out of life just as much as men do? And if a woman chooses to be a stay at home wife and mother, what's wrong with that? It's still a choice.

Next, she talks about having a boyfriend who was so suspicious of her that when they first started dating, he wouldn't have sex with her. All I can think about this is CLEVER MAN. Fair enough that he wouldn't shag her when she was constantly whittering about her dwindling egg supply, or agree to have a child when they clearly didn't work as a couple. But also, she had told the poor sod she didn't want a family with him! How could he even consider the idea properly when she'd vehemently denied wanting kids with him!

And then (and this is the gross bit) after they'd done the horizontal tango, she'd sneak off to the loo with his used condom and do things that I can't even think of without gagging a little. And then she has the audacity to say 'I don’t understand why more men aren’t wise to this risk — maybe sex addles their brain'

yep, that's right guys, all of us girls are just despo to steal your baby-making materials make a child against your will. So guard those disposed condoms like precious gold, gold I tells ye! I just had a thought of a man laying in bed going 'B'jeebus! I was so knocked out by all that hardcore sexing that I forgot to put my sperm in the little safe I carry around with me! NOoooooo!' and his girlfriend scurrying into the loo like the imps from 'Willow' going 'I stole a baby! I stole a baby!'. I mean seriously. Also, how patronising to think that men are slaves to their willies that much. I know sex rules our lives as human beans, but I'm pretty sure my male friends and peers wouldn't be able to do their jobs if all they were thinking about was getting it on every second of every day. Although, admittedly, part of me does find the idea that you'd be able to spot who'd got some recently by how dizzy they looked hilarious.

The thing is, I know I'm only 23, but do women really get to the point where they're so eager to have their bellies practically torn open that they'll quite happily degrade themselves that much? I know I have time on my side, but I genuinely can't imagine that I would turn into such a rabid nightmare if a partner didn't want kids with me. If I wanted them that much, that being in an unhappy relationship and stealing his sperm seemed like a good plan, I'd slap myself, end the relationship and go to a sperm bank. Or Adopt. Or foster. 

Saying that, as I said, I'm young. I haven't been through the trials of not being able to concieve, I haven't reached that stage where my body rebels against me and cries out for pregnancy and nor have I been in a relationship with a complete commitment phobe. Maybe when I'm 38 and The Lad wants to jaunt off and follow his dreams of becoming an international pokemon hunter instead of settling down and having a couple of really chubby babies, I'll go a bit mental. But I pray that I would never become the sort of person to trap someone into staying in a relationship. And if I did, I'm not sure I'd be brave enough to write about it. Because despite my horror at the story, and the way she's depicted women in their 30s and 40s (tarred with the same brush much?!) I do quite admire Liz Jones. She makes no attempt to make herself come out as the hero or indeed the victim in her columns. She is unashamed about her past, she just offers it up, and let's face it, she's a talented writer, they make for entertaining reading. I almost have to think 'well, good for her, that's a very ugly side of herself she's exposed' which few women (or indeed men, because I'm sure there MUST be men so broody they'd do something silly) would let anyone know about.

Ash

x