Lately March...

This month I bought my first Happy Meal in years because THEY HAVE ADVENTURE TIMES TOYS. This takes me back to when I was a kid and me and my friends were obsessively collecting the Happy Meal Beanie Babies!

This month I had my first Saturday off work since October and for some reason thought it would be a good idea to go the the nearby shopping centre. When I got there I instantly regretted it- it was hellishly busy and I hate crowds so I had a coffee and escaped home to read instead!

My favourite band Garbage have announced the release date of their new album (June 10) and I can't wait! Shirley Manson gave this fantastic interview and it reminded me why I love her so much. I wish I could be on her level of badass-ery!

I don't celebrate easter, I do however celebrate chocolate in the shape of an egg!

Also...

❤ I'm so excited for Captain America: Civil War! I've watched, analysed and discussed the new trailer a lot! Antman being shot on Hawkeyes arrow *excited squeal* Scarlett Witch fighting The Vision *another excited squeal*

❤ If you're a Netflix fiend like me then this List by Empire Magazine of the 50 Best TV Shows on Netflix is pretty useful for new finds. Ok, I have seen a fair few of them and I feel no shame! 

❤ Also How brilliant does the Lego Batman Movie look! Arnett> Afleck...

New books...

Disclaimer by Renee Knight

I realised my tbr shelf was running low on thrillers, and seeing as this is the genre I find most easiest and quickest to read took it as a sign I should stock up. This one is about a woman who finds a novel in her home and begins to read it only to find the main character is her! Apparently this is very clever and full of twists.

Our Endless Numbered Days by Claire Fuller

This one is about a girl who when she was eight was taken to live in a remote cabin by her father who told her that the rest of the world is gone. As she gets older she starts to doubt her fathers story... This one sounds very interesting and is supposed to be very dark and shocking. I'm looking forward to getting to it.

The Watchers by Neil Spring
As well as stocking up on thrillers I decided to try a few genres I don't usually tend to read which explains these next two. Firstly The Watchers is set in Wales and inspired by supposed alien sightings in the 1970s. A man is sent by the Ministry of Defence to investigate sightings he saw as a child... I was mainly drawn to this because of the beautiful cover- I'm not usually a sci-fi reader but this sounds like it could be interesting.

Faceless by Alyssa Sheinmel
I didn't realise until I got home that this is in fact YA because it was put in the wrong section (I'm really not a fan of YA fiction...) This is about a girl who is burnt in an accident and gets a face transplant and it looks at her struggle to find her own identity. Despite it being YA I will still definitely give this a try as I find anything to do with self identity very interesting (nerdy psychology student here!)

I'm definitely putting a ban on buying more books as I'm buying them quicker than I can read them lately and my tbr shelf is fit to burst...!

Payday haul... March

 This month was a bad anxiety month so I went a little overboard (or more overboard than usual...) on the random spending. My Mum surprised my with some adorably cute Tokidoki stationery- How cute is that milk carton pencil case?! I also bought a pink and sparkly drink cup from Primark which I've been using non stop. Also nice stuff that cheered me up: Adventure Time stickers, Sailor Moon badges, Yankee Candle bits, some nice felt tip pens for colouring in, Jem & the Holograms vol 1 (reviewed here) and My Little Pony kinder eggs (I am a big kid and am really impressed with how decent these are!)

I also got some dvds I've been wanting to watch and a couple more of the Penguin Little Black books. Oh and I'm currently obsessed with anything Daim related- those Cadbury eggs are so good- the amount of bags of those I have consumed is shocking!

I got a couple more figures to add to my collection- both were bargains from Zavvi and Amazon respectively. I told myself I wasn't going to start collecting Dorbz but this one is too cute. I also got one for my four year old niece as she is currently obsessed with 'the best baddie poisonous Ivy' and dressed up as her last week for school and looked very cool!

And finally my recent comic pulls, including a beautiful cover for The Wicked + the Devine by Grimes.

Pop in a Box: March

Another month another Pop in a Box! I'm going to cut straight to the chase and reveal that I got...

Yuimetal from the Japanese pop/metal band Babymetal! The Babymetal pops are very cute and there's some great detail to her hair and outfit. Yuimetal is also doing the Babymetal hand sign of the kitsune (fox) which is a nice touch. Another good month! 

If you are interested in subbing to PIAB use my link: Pop in a Box to get 20% off.

For the rest of my PIAB posts go here!

Indie brand: Snikt and Bamf

If you are a regular reader of my blog you might have noticed my obsession with Catwoman. She's my favourite comic book character and I collect anything related to her. I also have a growing obsession with pins and brooches since getting my fake leather jacket so how could I resist this amazing acrylic brooch from Snikt and Bamf.

Snikt and Bamf make cool geeky jewellery and accessories from anything to do with Batman, Jurassic Park, Star Wars, Marvel and Nightmare Before Christmas. The brooch is a thick layered acrylic that is really sturdy and good quality. I love it! My next purchase is definitely going to be the Poison Ivy brooch... or maybe one of the Jurrasic Park ones.

Their links...

Snikt and Bamf store

Instagram

Twitter

Recently watched...

The Imitation Game (2015)

For some reason I didn't think this would be my kind of film but decided to give it a go. Set in the second world war about real life code breakers including mathematician Alan Turing, it follows them as they try and break the nazi enigma code. This film was amazing, I'm not really fussed about Benedict Cumberbatch usually but he gave such a warm and dignified performance here. The parts about Turings sexuality were heartbreaking, and overall the film was just brilliant! 5/5

Child 44 (2015)

Based on the book by Tom Rob Smith this is set in 1950s soviet Russia. It follows a secret agent played by Tom Hardy after he is exiled after refusing to denounce his wife as a traitor and starts to uncover a string of child murders. I felt like this was a bit all over the place- the first half was really good and appealed to the George Orwell fan in me, but the whole murder mystery thing felt shoe horned in and wasn't really a mystery anyway. The Russian accents were also a bit dodgy (it was mainly British actors) but Hardy, and Noomi Rapace were both very good in it, and it was strange to actually see Tom Hardy communicating by talking rather than grunting... 3/5 

Dark Places (2015)

Dark Places is a film adaption of the book by the same name by Gillian Flynn (writer of Gone Girl) and is my favourite of her books- in fact it's one of my all time favourite thrillers. Paired with the fact it stars one of my favourite actors Charlize Theron I've been eagerly awaiting this film ever since it was announced. For some reason it took around a year to be released here and went straight to dvd. I thought this was ok, the acting was good but it rushed through the layered story too quickly. There are so many twists and turns in the book that the film forgot to really give much time to exploring the characters- which were very interesting and complex and it just left the film feeling really flat. I'd definitely recommend picking up the book first, but this is still worth a watch. 3/5

The Diary of a Teenage Girl (2015)

This is another book adaption (although I haven't read the book) set in 1970s San Francisco about a 15 year old discovering sex and becoming an adult. I mainly wanted to see this because it has Kristen Wiig in (she's not really in it much) but this was a genuine, warm and often funny film about being a teenager. This is way better than the majority of YA films I've seen- there was no sugar coating, or patronising message it was just honest, and fun. 3.5/5 

Etude House Magic Pole mascara...

I find it so hard to find a non high end mascara that I love (recommendations please!) and realised I hadn't tried a mascara from Etude House before. I opted to try the Magic Pole mascara because frankly I liked the packaging. There is either a volume or curl option- I went for curl because I didn't like the look of the volume brush. 

The gimmick with this mascara is that it has a kind of dome at the end of the brush to get to the inner lashes. I wasn't the hugest fan of this mascara, it made my lashes look really short, although to be fair it did kind of curl them- I've found this works best layered over another mascara. I also found it goes a little crispy and isn't the easiest to remove. On the plus side the brush is good for getting the little lashes and well the packaging is very nice!

It looks like the search is still on...

New books...

Calm by Michael Acton Smith

This book has been sitting in my Amazon wishlist for ages, as someone who struggles with anxiety it appealed to me (and also I loved the cover!) It's true the book is designed beautifully but the contents is a little meh- there's the usual stuff about a good nights sleep, meditation, baths and also slightly more weirdly flower pressing. There's 2 pages that say about reading some poetry then just list some poets! I think it's kind of style over substance but it will be a nice book to have a flick through.

The Collected Poems of Thomas Hardy

One of my all time favourite poems is Neutral Tones by Thomas Hardy, but I realised I haven't actually read much more of his work so picked up this book. It turns out it's a huge 900 pages and I think it contains every single one of his poems! There's also an introduction which talks about Hardy's life and is quite interesting. So far I've only dipped into this a few times but I've already found some new favourites. 

All The Rage by Courtney Summers

I've heard some great things about this YA book about a girl who is raped by the sheriff's son and people refuse to believe her until a girl goes missing. This deals with how she copes, and her refusal to be a victim. I'm not a huge YA reader but I'm looking forward to reading this one.

20 Facts about me...

1. My all time favourite books are 1984 by George Orwell, To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee, London Fields by Martin Amis and Ghost World by Daniel Clowes.

2. I'm not really into Disney (does that make me a bad blogger?!)

3. I am obsessive about organising stuff and I get excited about the prospect of reorganising my bookcase.

4. When I was a teenager I studied sound engineering, and wanted to work in a music studio.

5. I love going to the cinema and try and go as often as I can.

6. When I was a kid I had an obsession with old TV shows like The Munsters, The Addams Family, I Dream of Jeanie and the Adam West Batman.

7. I have a deep and intense love for peanut butter.

8. My all time favourite band is Garbage who I have loved for 17 years, and have seen live 5 times. They were my first gig and I dyed my hair red especially for the occasion because Shirley Manson is a badass.

9. My other favourites are Queens of the Stone Age, Ladytron, IAMX, The Smiths, Kate Bush, Siouxsie and the Banshees, Dusty Springfield, Roots Manuva and Patti Smith. (I also can't resist a bit of Britney...)

10. I don't know what I'd do without Netflix.

11. I love being and Aunt and big sister but I don't want children myself, and find it annoying having to explain why. I just don't! 

12. I used to collect Pogs, Beanie Babies, I loved the Spice Girls (my favourite was Sporty, but All Saints Were better :p), I couldn't miss an episode of TMNT,  I even went through that YO-YO phase- I was a clichéd 90s kid!

13. When I was a teenager I used to make a music fanzine and got to interview Kelli Ali (former singer of Sneaker Pimps and amazing solo artist.) When I found out I danced around the house in celebration as I'm a big fan :)

14. I've had red, pink, purple, blue and orange hair. But I've never been able to get my hair lilac dammit!

15. I love old horror- especially stuff with Bela Legosi and Boris Karloff or Hammer Horror.

16. I spend way too much money on books and comics.

17. My favourite films are Ghost World, Pulp Fiction, Lost in Translation, Secretary and Young Adult. I love films by Quentin Tarantino, Park Chan Wook, and Jason Reitman and anything that has Charlize Theron, Mia Wasakowska, Kristeen Wiig, Mark Ruffalo, or Leonardo DiCaprio in. 

18. Michael Keaton is Batman. Don't even bother mentioning Christian Bale to me. And Ben Affleck.... *shakes head woefully* 

19. I own a crazy amount of pyjamas.

20. My favourite food is pizza

American candy

If you like American candy and chocolate but don't want to pay crazy prices I'd recommend checking out the bargain shops (like Poundland, Home Bargains, B&M etc...) I will often stock up on Reeces, Cookie Dough and Nerds for cheap. The other day I found this cup in Home Bargains packed full of American candy for just £1.99.  

My favourites from the cup were the Cow Tales (It looks like an apple pencil but it's chewy caramel wrapped round vanilla fondant and was yum!) and the cotton candy flavour Dum Dums which was a lollipop that tasted exactly like candy floss. The lemonade wild cherry nerds were pretty good too. My least favourite was the Tootsie Roll, I've never had one before but it's a chocolate flavour chew- it didn't taste of chocolate it had more of a coco powder taste and it was disgusting! I wasn't brave enough to try the Atomic Fire Ball...

Mainly this post is an excuse to post these pictures because I thought they were nice and colourful and it's not very often my phone camera takes such decent images! :)

Japanese snacks: Kabaya & Torotto

Kabaya Chocolate filled crisp wafer

This is a wafer shell filled with white and milk chocolate. The chocolate has a bubbly wispa like texture to it. If I'm honest I found this a little bit on the bland side, but I'm not the hugest fan of wafer. Overall it was just meh.

Torotto Creamy Strawberry

I've been wanting to try these for ages, but they were kind of strange. The strawberry filling is really lovely but the outer chocolate has a really weird texture that I'm undecided on- it reminds me a little of when you melt chocolate in the microwave and leave it in too long and it has crispy bits!

I buy all my Japanese snacks from Oyatsu Cafe (this is an affiliate link)

Lately: February...

I feel like this month I have mostly been either working or writing essays for uni, but I did go for my first ever afternoon tea this month. I'm not the biggest cake fan to be honest but it was really nice and the scones were yummy!

This month I finally acquired all five issues of Paper Girls so was able to read them. I will be posting a review in my Feb reading round up but lets just say it's firmly in my favourite comic series list now! Has Brian K. Vaughn ever done anything less than amazing...? 

Wow... this month has been so uneventful- I'm really struggling for pictures here! So here's a lovely piece by artist Agnes Garbowska. I discovered her recently after loving her variant covers for the Jem and the Holograms comics.

Also...

❤ I really enjoyed this post by Fine and Dandy: 10 reasons why I suck at adulting. I can definitely relate!

❤ I'm trying so hard to resist buying this Princess Bubblegum/ Marceline tee from TeeFury

❤ This post about anxiety at work is pretty great