[Insert witty title here]

I'm in Brisbane until... probably Thursday! Maybe tomorrow, if I feel like changing my bus ticket. Probably won't happen as I am very lazy, but these things happen. I've been up here writing for Discerning Bride again, and today I went on a photoshoot.
"These things get sort of boring, don't they?" the stylist said sympathetically to me as I clutched 6 red balloons in one hand and a plastic bag in the other.
But for my very first shoot, I found it brilliant. It was beautiful. The dresses were amazing, the location divine. The dresses were designed by Wendy Makin - who is absolutely lovely - and were shot at Enoteca in Woolloongabba. Enoteca is in my favourite building ever, the Moreton Rubber building, so it was an added bonus.

When I arrived here on Sunday, I felt bleak. I didn't really want to be up here. Maybe it was stress over a new job the next day, maybe it wasn't. I felt homesick, and I desperately wanted to curl my arms around Tuscany's neck and breathe in her doggy smell (as nauseating as it can be at times). Though, as I curled up on a bus seat on the way back from the Gabba, I felt it again. The feeling that this city has beauty, and that I do love it. I don't think it'll be my home forever (at least while I'm alive), but it will for 2 years more.

I've gotten in a few shopping trips - of course - and I snuck in a trip to Koorong as I left the shoot. (My boss, who dropped me off there, also turned out to be a Christian. Things like that amaze me, just considering how God's got it all sorted.) In lieu of any sort of review, I'll post up my purchases.

This is because while I know a variety of words in Spanish, I suck at stringing them together in a coherent way. According to my grandfather, I would be embraced by Chileans everywhere, because they face the same issue and welcome the gringos who cannot speak to save their lives.
I can't help but think that if I rocked up to an interview in any Spanish-speaking country with my currently level of fluency, I would be laughed out the door.

While I love Nicholas Sparks, I must say that I have become less enamoured with him since reading A Walk to Remember.
This isn't because I disliked that book - it's because I loved it so completely and fully that anything he's written before or after has paled in comparison. The love isn't as perfect as Jamie and Landon's, and that makes me sad.
On the whole, I did like this book. It was a good read and a nice way to end the day.

I had no real purpose in buying this book - that is to say, I didn't intentionally look for it. But I feel it's what I need. I find I get myself into better habits of reading my Bible when I'm in studies and whatnot, and as I have felt a bit distanced from God, I want to change that. Immediately. This book looked interesting and useful, so I'll see how we do.

I bought this for similar reasons to the previous book, except I actually went to Koorong with the intention of buying it. I signed up for an online Bible study with Melissa Taylor, and this is the book they're studying from.

It's in week 5 and I've just bought it now. Bad Tash is bad? Yes. But Bad Tash will catch up!

I can't help but notice I've bought books with a very orange theme. 

Regardless, can we all whoop because in four days there's a new Coldplay album yes yes? I think there should be whooping all over this place.

Tomorrow I have the day at home/Chris's place, depending on what I do. The highs of freelancing - I can work at home, and watch Dr Who (of which I have recently acquired all 6 seasons, or what there is of it so far).

Anyway, I'll get back to normal scheduling soon. Goodnight - or morning, if you're in the Welshie land.

30 Days of Books, Day 20.

[Your favourite romance book.]

As much as I love Darcy and Lizzie, and Emma and Knightley, and even Becky and Luke - though that falls more into the category of chick lit than romance - Landon and Jamie take the cake.
I first read this book towards the end of Year 11, I think. I was in my senior high school years, after I'd dropped out of conventional schooling to study via Distance Ed, and I was working at the local bookstore a few afternoons a week. Dad would pick me up from the library once he finished work (only a short walk from my job); my day was effectively books layered on more books.
It was cold, I remember, and I'd just watched the Notebook after reading the book. I slouched through the rows of books til I found Nicholas Sparks again. A Walk To Remember seemed like an okay way to fill in an afternoon.
As I settled into a cushy brown chair, wrapping my handbag and copious jackets around my knees, I opened to the first page.

When I was seventeen, my life changed forever.

Jamie and Landon's story is a beautiful one, one that reminds me of the importance of faith. I don't specifically mean faith in God, but faith in humanity. Faith in change. Jamie also has her personal faith in God, which gets her through her illness.

I love that Landon and Jamie appear to be different, and in such an unreconcilable way. You wouldn't consider that these two would be together, yet as they become closer you can see the similarities they slowly draw out of each other.

She looked exactly like an angel. I know my jaw dropped a little, and I just stood there looking at her for what seemed like a long time, shocked into silence, until I suddenly remembered that I had a line I had to deliver. I took a deep breath, then slowly let it out. "You're beautiful," I finally said to her, and I think everyone in the whole auditorium, from the blue-haired ladies in the front to my friends in the back row, knew that I actually meant it. 

The afternoon fluttered away as I sank deeper into the book, fully immersing myself in 1958 Beaufort, and into the beauty of this relationship. I didn't notice much going on around me. I didn't notice my phone vibrating on my lap. In fact, Dad was standing in front of me for a good five minutes watching me read, until I closed the book with a sigh of satisfaction. 

"Good book?" he said.

I could only nod. I was too busy texting Belinda telling her she had to read this book.

I held her close to me with my eyes closed, wondering if anything in my life had ever been this perfect and knowing at the same time that it hadn't. I was in love,  and the feeling was even more wonderful than I ever imagined it could be.

The first trip I remember taking to Brisbane with my parents isn't that long ago. (My memory is a thing is shame for me at times.) It's also a pretty fuzzy memory. I saw my first Borders bookstore, and as I wandered the shelves in crazed excitement, I came across the book. I couldn't idly walk by and not read it, could I? 

It was Dad who found me again, and who noticed book in my hands.

"Again?"
I blushed. "It's my favourite."
He tugged the book from my hands - I let out a mew of protest - and sighed, noting the price. "Okay. Okay. But if it's as good as you say, I'm reading it after you."

"I love you, Jamie," I said to her. "You're the best thing that ever happened to me."

The film for this is good. I won't lie and tell you it's not.
It's one of those movies that should be considered in its own right. The setting, the time, and the storyline all deviated from the book far too much to be the adaption. I'd have loved it if they'd done this book as it was written, but you could tell Nicholas Sparks had a hand in the script. That made me happy.
Also, if you're a romantic fangirl like me, there's so much to squee over in the movie it's practically required viewing.

"Do you love me?" I asked her. She smiled. "Yes."

Maybe I'm the only person who follows the happy ending. You know, the one where Jamie doesn't die. I've never been inclined to think that she died. It could be the overwhelming belief I have in miracles, something that this book makes massive reference to. Nicholas Sparks seems to agree, but he also mentions it's completely open to interpretation.

I want the ending to be as happy as possible. I refuse to believe in another Atonement ending, where everyone's dead.

It was, in every way, a walk to remember.

So if you've never read a Nicholas Sparks novel, this should be your first. It might be a simple love story, but it's a perfect one. It's beautiful. It's love. Gina Biggs says it perfectly on the Redstring banner, that no matter what, love is good.

I smile slightly, looking towards the sky, knowing there's one thing I

still haven't told you: I now believe, by the way,

that miracles can happen.