This year I have found a small batch scented wax independent businesses that will be supplying me with all my nice smelling wax needs, and for those Christmas presents that drive me to the edge sanity, there is a huge chance they will receive some amazing smelling wax from WaxShack. By found, I mean it is more, Fran who runs the website, is the partner of one of my boyfriend’s friends, and after following her beautiful Facebook feed for a while, I’m this (imagine me squashing my thumb and index finger together) close to put in my first order: Come on pay day!

Fran started WaxShack as a kitchen table side gig hand pouring luxury soy wax snap bars, and currently her youngest child is the business’ self appointed smell tester and accidental taste tester (who wouldn’t kiddo? It’s only logical; when it smells that nice it has to taste nice too, right?). Her web shop is restocked twice a month (1st and 15th) and there are previews of what is coming in the Facebook group. Come on, join in, look at the pretty pictures and your nostrils and olfactory bulb (yes, I just googled what part of the brain processes smells, because my last biology lesson was a long time ago) and your Christmas gift receivers will thank you.

This has been the second part of my series I’ve called Supporting Christmas Dreams, where I share my list of small independent businesses, makers, designers and shops that make up my Christmas shopping list this year. I decided soon after Christmas last year that I will get my Christmas gifts this year from smaller independent brands, than my usual Amazon last-resort gift-dash. First out was the amazing Village Haberdashery in West Hampstead, and no matter how much I wanted this to be a weekly thing, but seeing as it took twenty-one days from Part 1 and Part 2, and three months from inception post to Part 1, who knows when what’s next will come? Just know that I love it, and I can’t wait to show you.

  For part one of the series, head here to read about The Village Haberdashery.

Somewhere over the North Sea I felt vaguely closer to the Universe, and I remembered listening to Rachel Dratch’s book “Girl walls into a bar” on Audible, and her talks with the Universe, and how putting plans/dreams/goals into The Universe might have helped them happen. Therefore, I’m shouting out into the void that is the internet that is The Universe, in hope that something happens.

Dear…

On the 24th of May, I published a post where I talked about Christmas. Who talks about Christmas in May? I do. Not because I’m keen on Christmas showing up (apparently now in August there is already Christmas items in some stores already, but I refuse to acknowledge them until the more appropriate November), but because I plan on buying my Christmas gifts from small, independent retailers this…

There is currently 24 started blog posts in my drafts folder. Some almost complete, some just outlines, some titles, and some rambling parenthetical that started as an idea in a parenthesis in a previous draft I wanted to expand on, but as I finished the original draft, that idea, the drive, the thought had evaporated, and new ideas, titles, and thoughts had preoccupied my brain. That seems to be…

🎶I Like big words and I can not lie

You logophiles can’t deny

When you open a thesaurus

With mill’ more terms

And All that quick-wit in your face

You Get sprung🎶

It’s that time again, I’ve had a bunch of words that I’ve gone: “What does it mean!?”

Amiable: /ˈeɪmɪəb(ə)l/

adjective: amiable– having or displaying a friendly and pleasant manner. This word has been thrown around in a lot of…

I’m a few pints past tipsy, and a KFC past pub number 10 on our 10 stop Sam Smith pub crawl. I’m near Goodge Street station and I watch more or less drunk people order food to line their stomach before, during or after going on the lash. Suddenly a thought strikes me: “I’m in a foreign country where they do not speak my language.”

“You silly cow! You’ve lived in this city for 3 years, and you’re…

Big fish, little fish, cardboard box.

Lawnmower.

These are some of the terrible dance moves I have observed, tried to learn, and failed miserably at perfecting. Partially because I am as coordinated as a newborn giraffe (not that I ever will be that graceful when I grow up), and partially because I am easily distracted, which makes my brain go:

“Littles fish, big… Oh! Shiny new dance move over there! Let’s try to do that! Shopping trolley, pick right, pick left, and strut! What? That has less arm movements! OK! Lawnmowering along, lawnmowering along… What now? Everyone has a new dance move? What is it? What is it? What is it!”

And what is the latest dance craze my brain is so keen on? What is it everyone seems to be doing? How can I try to learn it by being distracted by it for a hot minute? Tell me more, tell me more, like does it have a name?

Wake me up before I hustle.

Teach me how to hustle, teach me how to hustle.

Duh duh duh duh it’s hustle time!

I can’t even dance close to this.

Yeah, that is right: Everyone seems to have side hustle now. Everyone are multi-potentials, who want more out of their lives than what they get out of their day job. Its not that they don’t like their jobs; some has jobs where their creative output isn’t enough, some use their analytical potential that they don’t use in their daily life, some combine their creative and analytical skills to make a new hustle, some hustle with showing off who they are in a way they can’t in their day job, and some work on making their side hustle their main hustle.

The side hustle craze is infectious, and it has been gnawing at me.

I’m getting hot for a side hustle.

“Why don’t I start something? You know making things make us happier?”

“But, your making isn’t that good. Who would buy it?” the voice at the back of my head responded.

“I don’t know? People on the internet?”

“But, for your products to be profitable, the quality/time ratio would be off the scale!” she protested.

“I don’t need it to be majorly profitable; I just need it to feed my need to make.”

“But, then you can make for yourself! You don’t need to sell it to create!” she huffed.

“What am I going to do with that many things? I am trying to downscale my material stash!”

“But, can’t you just give away all the materials you haven’t used to make stuff?” she gesticulated wildly.

“I spent good money on all those materials!”

“But, you haven’t made anything significant in ages!” she said with a raised eyebrow.

“That is because I haven’t prioritised making lately.”

“But, how are you planning on making a side hustle of something you are not prioritising?” she defeatedly responded as she dug her face into her hands.

“I want to prioritise it now. I want to start sewing things. And I want to see if other people want it.”

“But, why don’t you just go ahead then? Start making, start setting up your shop and prepare for implosion!” she countered sarcastically.

“I will!” I responded defiantly.

My first step in my side hustling is searching Ebay for heavy duty leather sewing machines to start using all my material stash. So one day soon, I will take the step, open that Etsy shop, and properly start my side hustle. So right now I’m doing the Carlton.

Minor victory dance.

Alternate title: The World Cup summary from a non-football fan.

…

The country (and the rest of the world) has been hit with World Cup fever, and I hear it at home, on the commute, in the street, at work, and I pleasantly listen, and try to offer my two cents whenever appropriate (which isn’t often or worth much due to my inability to care enough for football to work on understanding what is going on). The first week of the World Cup at work I listened in on a conversation between the old men I work with, and it went something like the following:

I just can’t watch women’s football: it’s like watching second division.

And that national player woman pundit at the World Cup: she knows everything but I just don’t believe her. It’s her voice.

You know the boxing movie? What’s it called? Million dollar baby: I couldn’t watch it. Women shouldn’t do that. Well, there is enough of them beating their husbands to a pulp.

But it’s mostly men following the World Cup, right? It’s not like women watch it.

Day off from talking about football on TV, so thought I would go and play some instead!! Nice to be back with #fifa and the #fifalegend for a kick around ⚽️ #worldcup

A post shared by Alex Scott MBE (@alexscott2) on Jul 5, 2018 at 12:00pm PDT

The voice at the back of my head was at this point shouting: “You know this is sexist bullshit, right? Why the fuck aren’t you saying anything? For fuck’s sake how bad does it have to be for you to actually react? This is not true at all. A: Women’s football teams are outperforming their male equivalents all the time. B: Fuck that shit, they just don’t want to listen to a woman they know are right, because they are scared for the validity of their own fucking masculinity. C: All my friends who care about football watch it, whatever their genitalia.”

As the voice at the back of my head was loudly reasoning through all these valid points, I was deeply into reasoning my counter argument: “I know fuckall about football”, when my boss asked, to gauge the female viewership: “Do you follow the World Cup?”

“No.”

“Not even when Denmark is playing?” he responded with a look of shock and horror on his face.

I stared at him for a few seconds to see if he saw the error of his question, before I responded: “Why would I?”

And he looked confused for a few seconds, before he nervously laughed and when back to his previous conversationalists.

Huge thank you @itvsport for an unforgettable 3 weeks at the best world cup of all time! It was such a pleasure to work with the ITV team again after a fantastic experience at Euro 2016. Thank you also to @talksport for all the fun on your radio shows. I GAVE this opportunity everything and left nothing on the "pitch" making sure I was focused, prepared and ready to watch LOTS of football. I loved every single second! Despite my heart being in my mouth and mouth in my chest, watching England's historic penalty win in Moscow on Tuesday night was the cherry on the cake.Truly unforgettable stuff! OFF AIR the 4am chats in the hotel bar about amazing football stories and football debates with Gary Neville, Jacqui Oatley, Roy Keane and Martin O'Neill are high on my list of favourite moments in Moscow. Thanks to all the ITV pundits who made the experience so much fun. WHEN I became the first female footballer pundit on Match of the day extra 4 years ago, the aim then was to break the mould and keep building on that experience as a football pundit. Now I leave Russia after analysing and watching the worlds best teams and players and sharing my view with millions of people. It's all part of the dream. I HOPE now the status quo and narrative will continue to move forward to a gender neutral appreciation of pundits and broadcasters because of the amazing work all the women at this world cup have achieved for many years. Shout out @alexscott2 @jacquioatley @meseemajaswal @gabbylogan @kellycates0 Vicki Sparks and all other women I may have missed out. AS ALWAYS thank you to my agent @joannatongue @tonguetiedtalent. NOW IT is time to switch my brain off with a short holiday and watch some world cup games on a beach😎⚽️ Then off to my new home in Turin, Italy!! Brb ❤ #WorldCup2018 #IWasThere🙋‍♀️ #MustGo #Moscow9

A post shared by Eniola Aluko (@enialuko) on Jul 5, 2018 at 2:51am PDT

On the last Tuesday of June, I was one of my monthly scheduled social outings, Best Friend Tuesday (colloquially called BFT by the group of us that are going) at the place my boyfriend likes to call our local (not because it is the most local to where we live, but because it has the best beer selection and our actual options for our local have a clientele that creeps me out and I don’t feel like I belong) Beer+Burger. For the World Cup they have installed TV screens, and show all the games, and on June 26th Nigeria played Argentina. While my friends (all female by the way) watched the game, and tried to show me pictures of Nigeria’s varieties of kit to keep me intrigued (their travel kit is definitely worth a look, because, well, LOOK AT IT!), I was mostly hoping that the beautiful dog that walked in would walk over my way so I could pet it.

Russia here we come 🇳🇬 #Naija

A post shared by Mikel Obi (@mikel_john_obi) on Jun 11, 2018 at 6:17am PDT

The dog did eventually walk over and I got some much needed petting-time (living in a flat with a pet-ban is shit, but so is the London Life). I believe that was the highlight of the World Cup to me. Sadly there is no picture of said dog, because I’m no sneaky ninja-photographer, and if I considered taking a picture the voice at the back of my head would go: “You know they can see you take a picture? Did you ask? What if they don’t want people to take pictures of their dog, and share them unabashedly? Would you like it if people did that to your dog if you had a dog?”

“Actually if my dog brought happiness to someone, I would be happy for it to be shared on the internet! Puppies for everyone!”

“You are such a child of the internet! Puppies, kittens and unicorns is a freaking addiction to your whole generation!”

I cocked my head and raised an eyebrow at her: “We’re the same generation! You squeal at puppies and kittens just as much as I do.”

“But I do it with refinement.”

“There is no such thing as a refined squeal,” I said and ignored the rest of the humphing from the voice at the back of my head.

If the dog was the highlight of my World Cup, the low point was the quarter final where England played Sweden on July 7th. I was out for the whole game, and I mainly heard the cheers from all the pubs and open windows, and I had a good day out with In Colourful Company on their Shoreditch Colourwalk. Then there was a hop and a skip onto a bus to take me back to North West London. Sure, buses are slow, hot and miserable, but they are my only free means of transportation through the dreaded Zone 1 (free as in I buy an Oyster card for Zone 2 and 3 to get me to and from work, and that entitles me to all the bus travel I can manage in all the other zones). I hopped and I skipped on to bus number one and it started to snail itself through traffic. Two and a bit stops from Liverpool Street Station the bus came to an halt, and the driver mumbled something across the tannoy: “… in the road … don’t know how long we will be stuck here … doors are open …”

I sat on the upper deck trying to see ahead, but all I saw was standstill buses, non moving cars and flashing blue lights. “Car crash,” I thought. After a few minutes had passed, and none of the surrounding traffic had moved, I went down the stairs and started to move down the road, planning on catching a bus on the other side of the car crash.

Further down the road I heard them.

“Eng-er-land! Eng-er-land!

It’s coming home!

*generic drunk loud crowd noises*”

A little further I saw them.

“Oh, great. Football fans,” I sighed sarcastically to the voice at the back of my head.

“Fuck fuck fuck,” she messed as her awareness of the crowd grew. The street was a sea filled more or less shirted football fans, and started to feel my heart racing.

“We need to get to the other side, there is no turning back, just look ahead and keep moving,” I instructed her as I balled my hands up, and took a deep breath before I started the slow, sidestepping waltz trying to skirt the crowds. The sidewalks were where the path of least resistance lied, and I manoeuvred through the endless stream of people pouring out of pubs and bars. I tried to control my breathing, but all that came out were short, shallow breaths.

When I came to the corner of Boxpark Shoreditch I realised I would not find a bus, so my only option to escape the crowds was the overground.

“I don’t care how much it costs, just get us out of here,” the voice at the back of my head pleaded.

“If we could just get one station further down the line, we would be home free,” I futilely tried to reason with her, but I knew, we needed to get out of here now. I eyed up the sidewalk leading to Shoreditch high street station, and plotted a path trough the revellers. I picked up the pace as I continued the sidestepping waltz, bumped into and removed the light from someones cigarette, and darted into the station. Sitting on a rail along the platform I closed my eyes and tried to block out the world.

It’s coming home,

it’s coming home

Football’s coming home.

“I hate this. I don’t trust them. Fuck them. I hate this. I don’t trust them. Fuck them. I hate this. I don’t trust them. Fuck them. I hate this. I don’t trust them. Fuck them,” she messed at the back of my head, and I started typing my boyfriend just to block out her voice and the surrounding noise of the English Horde. And it kept me calm’ish for the time it took to get home.

The semifinal where England played Croatia was spent at home because I refused to leave, and the voice at the back of my head was just laughing at my football-fan boyfriend’s complete elation and total crushing despair because I know how he reacts to utter defeat or great victories. It was a way to round my apathy to the English football fandom. I did also watch the final, and I enjoyed the rain during the rewards ceremony.

Somewhere in the last week of the World Cup I had had enough of trying to write about football. If you came here to read about actual football, I will tell you now, that this blog will never actually contain football. Now that this terrible attempt at being current is over and outdated, this blog will get back to it regular unscheduled mess. Ta. xx