The year in numbers.

The year in numbers.

33 blog posts

3 blogger recognition awards

4 jobs

2 house moves

2 holidays

2 cities

2 cars

1 relationship

Too many cocktails

3940 blog views...

It's been a whirlwind year.

When I started writing this thing as a means of keeping myself sane back in March, I never dreamed I would still be writing it now.

The response and feedback I have had from friends and readers has been absolutely crazy so thank you for sticking with me!

I will be spending the remainder of 2014 drunk, and then extremely hungover on the road back to Leeds, so I just wanted to say, here's to an awesome 2015 everyone.

And if anyone has the misfortune to spot me on the A1 South on Thursday, please keep your distance. 

Hangovers and road rage don't mix!

L x

And the bells were ringing out...

Whenever I come home to the parents house at weekends, I tend to see less of them than I do during the week when I'm 110 miles away where all we have to communicate by is FaceTime.

When you're on such a limited time frame, it's hard to get to spend any kind of quality time with anyone because there is always a hundred things to do.

So I feel very blessed that I have a whole week off over the Christmas period to spend some actual time with my nearest and dearest, rather than feel like I'm rushing to see everyone I have to see before I head back South.

Today has been amazing. I don't think anything can beat a proper family Christmas.

After a traditional boozy Christmas Eve in the home town, celebrations this morning started late with a rather fuzzy head.

It was nothing that Christmas dinner couldn't solve though, and Prosecco, and cake... And some chocolates and then some more cake...

Basically I'm in a Christmas food coma.

Twice today I have physically had to lie down on the floor, and I even had to take a nap in the middle of the day.

Hangover or no hangover, I think I may be starting to feel my age!

So here I am, tucked up in bed in my fluffy panda pyjamas, happy as a clam because I got to watch the Downton Abbey Christmas special (yes, I am that tragic) and all there is really left to say is, MERRY CHRISTMAS!

I hope Santa was good to each and every one of you!

L x

The sleepy monster.

I feel like I should probably start this post with an apology for the tirade i subjected your poor eyes to last week... If any of you hadn't already guessed, I pretty much turn into an overemotional monster when I'm sleep deprived.

The neighbours house party last Thursday finally shut itself down at 4.10am with no help from me. I paced the floors a bit and tried ringing 101 twice but never got through.

Oh West Yorkshire police...

So as you can probably imagine, Friday was a complete write off. After feeling like I was coming down with Ebola during the week anyway, the lack of sleep really kicked the s**t out of me and I ended up crying at my desk within the first half hour of getting to work.

Just keeping it classy you know!

"Go home to bed Leanne" my boss said... Despite not wanting to pass on my germies, I hugged her and did exactly that.

Unfortunately my germies are real germies and I've since been completely floored by a chest infection, so there's not much to report from the weekend gone apart from I've done a LOT of catch-up sleeping from the comfort of home.

I have managed to drag myself back to Loiner-land to get through my final day of work before the Christmas holidays and I'll be driving back up to the frozen North tomorrow.

As it's already 4.30am and I'm writing this from my bed in ugly house where once again I'm wide awake, I'm going to be sleep deprived and emotional again... 

Drivers beware! 

Ultimate road rage coming to a motorway near you.

L x

I'm going mad.

I think I'm slowly losing it.

I've been re-reading some of my very first blog posts from when I very first moved to Leeds to try and gain some perspective, and all I have ascertained is that, I'm losing it...

...The will to stay here that is.

I thought ugly house life was going to be the bees knees. The cats pyjamas. The dogs tuxedo. But instead, so far in under a week, I've been pushed to my limit not once, but TWICE.

Not by my housemates or even the household appliances. But by my new street.

When I first began house hunting, colleagues warned me away from certain areas of Leeds. Hyde Park was mentioned, as was Chapel Town and Beeston... But everyone said that Headingley was the place to be. 

So like a good girl, I listened. 

All of these people can't be wrong? Surely?

So here I am, living in Headingley, and in the space of 5 days, the house directly opposite mine has been burgled, and now my next door neighbour is throwing a house party on a Thursday night, blasting music into the small hours when I need to be up for work at 6.30am.

Oh yes, Headingley is the place to be... If you're a selfish student with no concept of reality yet.

Yes, I'm ranting like an old fuddy duddy, my Grandad would be so proud, but I don't know what else to do?!

Fair enough, I panicked over the burglary. My brand new car is parked outside, what if the burglars took a fancy to it while they were clearing out the house opposite and decide to come back?

But the noisy neighbour is a new irk to contend with.

It's now 2.30am... I've been round twice to tell them to turn it down. No answer both times. 

How my housemates are still asleep is beyond me. I'm trying to drown out the noise with my own headphones in and I can still hear the bass coming through the wall.

Do I call the police? Or is that just setting myself up for a further 7 months of hell?

All I know is I'm seriously questioning my choice of house right now. I think I may have made a huge mistake...

L x

Moving day: The sequel.

I have about 7 bruises on my legs and a few more forming on my arms and hands.

Nope, I haven't fallen down drunk, I've finally moved into ugly house, and it seems that me carrying boxes around is a disaster waiting to happen.

Saturday 13th December will now be only known as moving day. As it was the day after my birthday, I should probably have spent it curled up in a little ball of hungoverness, eating McDonald's and feeling like shit, 23 year old shit...

But instead, I packed up my car (and my parents car) and drove down from Newcastle to get everything out of my little city nest and across to ugly house. Who knew I had so many clothes?!

That's where the fun and games began.

So everyone knows that Leeds is an awful city to drive around in general. So imagine my delight when on approaching the outskirts of the city centre I discovered there was a football match on. 

It was out and out CHAOS! A sea of people in blue and yellow scarves were wandering drunkenly through the gridlocked traffic where I found myself stuck for quite some time listening to my SatNav repeat itself.

Another thing everyone knows about Leeds is that parking is very expensive. Luckily, getting a short stay permit for the service yard behind my building had never been a problem... Until moving day.

"I'm sorry I've let all of the passes out for today" the concierge man told me. He seemed perfectly calm, nice even, in my head even now I know it wasn't his fault, but at the time, it felt like he was trying to be as unhelpful as possible. So I yelled at him... Just a little. 

"WHAT AM I SUPPOSED TO DO? CARRY MY FURNITURE DOWN THE STREET?!"

Oops. Bad Leanne.

Then to make things worse, my landlord rang. He seemed to think I had arranged to meet him at 12pm to hand the keys over. As it was now 2.15pm and I'd kept him "waiting", he was less than impressed and gave me an earful of abuse too.

So stressed, angry, and with a limited time of about 20 minutes to clear my entire flat out, the parents and I started racing up and down in the lift carrying as many bags and boxes full of stuff as humanly possible.

My haphazard angry packing skills are not all that great, so our cars resembled a badly played game of Tetris by the time everything was in. All that was left then was to find our way out of the city to ugly house.

Even with 2 SatNavs and road signs, we got lost. Apparently I ran 3 red lights in my blind panic to not end up on the motorway to Manchester, but I think it was more like 1...

It was completely dark by the time we arrived at the house so I don't think my parents got the best first impression of the house, but by the time they left I think they could see the charm in it.

My housemate said to me afterwards: "It's amazing what 3 determined Geordies can do!" Referring to the rigorous cleaning spree my parents went on while I unpacked.

So ugly house is now not looking quite so ugly!

I'll admit I was disappointed that all the building work is STILL unfinished, and that our new fridges/freezer/tumble dryer/washing machine/dishwasher/TV still haven't arrived, but we have 2 Christmas trees and some flat pack furniture. What more do you need eh?

So now I guess it's just a case of settling in. My first night I was so exhausted I pretty much passed out, but tonight I haven't been so lucky. I'm finally noticing all the new noises and my overactive imagination is of course thinking the worst.

The worst being I think we've been burgled twice in one night.

I've probably had about 2 hours sleep and my alarm is due to go off in 20 minutes... It's going to be a long day!

L x