The Renegade Craft Fair and other things.

Last Friday night was the first time Moon has ever slept over at my house, which was nice because I have better pillows than him. After being really stressed out at the beginning of last week, I calmed down a lot and took a few personal days to take my mind off my depressing job hunt. Taking time out resulted in considering booking my theory driving test and finally editing down the images to be uploaded onto my online portfolio because it seriously needs an update.


When Moon got here on Friday we had stew and watched Friday-night telly, not really exciting but nice anyway.

What I Wore 07/10/2011:
Cardigan: Topshop
Scarf: Primark
Dress: Dorothy Perkins
Belt: Primark
Tights: Dorothy Perkins
Boots: Fitflop
First time busting out the wooly boots, I have no idea what October thinks it's playing at. Also got complimented on the tights, I find it weird that people don't know where to buy coloured tights, I'm pretty sure nearly everywhere does them now.


On Saturday we woke up late but thought that we should definitely do something so took ourselves to Brick Lane to have a look at the markets, as well as have a quick nose around the vintage shops, not that that was much cop.

We accidentally stumbled into The Renegade Craft Fair, which was being held in The Old Truman Brewery. It was really cool, with lots of work from independent artists and loads of different craft-related stalls. Sadly I came away empty handed but I'm definitely considering a What Party? embroidery as well as a Jimbobart plate and a poster from the Bungaloo. Moon was lusting over the Bungaloo's My Morning Jacket poster, fanboy.
It was nice to just look though, and it's good that I can refer back to this when I have the room and money to buy all these lovely things. A list of the artist's that were at the Renegade Craft fair can be found here, I hope that they put another one on soon.

What Party?

Cheese + Pickles studio

Jimbobart

the Bungaloo!

After looking at the craft fair we had a wander around Brick Lane, making the now obligatory trip to Rough Trade and venturing into a lacklustre vintage clothes market that was also being held at the Old Truman Brewery. It was a nice day out because it actually felt like we had done something and it was a bit more interesting than hanging out at home or in somewhere like Crawley. The public transport situation was lame though and we walked all the way from Brick Lane to London Bridge, getting a bit, but not too lost on the way.

I find it funny that every other person walking around this area had some kind of camera yet nearly everyone doing anything is funny about you taking photos. What are fun things to look at if there's not even a choice of whether you can or can't take a photograph or not?

Taking the opportunity to say this stall's stuff was overpriced because he wouldn't let me take a photo of the neat way he'd laid out his merchandise.

The most noisy street performer, ever.

I went back with Moon to his house where we were disappointed with X Factor and couldn't stream An Idiot Abroad. On Sunday morning we went to Rusper carboot with Chris and it wasn't as good as last time, but I have a feeling it's because we were a bit too early (even though it doesn't start until 12pm). I picked up some delicious strawberries and a dress, which was a bargain at £1.50.





I spent Sunday evening with my Gran and cousins catching up and eating. It was nice, and I have a potential job too, an advantage of having a close family.
I feel a bit guilty for writing a post about the weekend when the weekend was a whole two days ago, but I just haven't had the time, you'll see why later.

To find out more about the Renegade Craft fair, click here.

Post-Holiday, Pre-Birthday Update.

So it's been a couple of days since I returned from Hong Kong and I appear to have very quickly recovered from jetlag, I think the late flight with early-morning arrival was a big plus.

Since returning nothing much has happened, I basically rushed straight over to Moon's as it was his brother's birthday and I had to deliver some gifts. We've had a nice couple of days behaving like teenagers, it really is odd being at home all the time, I won't be over it until I am able to move out. We went to see The Rise of The Planet of the Apes yesterday; I mainly went because I like James Franco but it was actually a good film and I'm now looking forward to the rest of the re-boot. Despite having not seen the originals and disliking the most recent re-makes, the concept of these films really interests me and it will be interesting to see if they'll be able to improve upon the already impressive CGI in future films - don't believe the print adverts, it actually does look good.


After the film we went to Nando's, a nice treat. We were supposed to be heading up to Leicester to go to Summer Sundae but due to the festival's poor organisation and inability to reply to our email's until a few days before we decided against it, even though I honesty do love The Maccabees just that much.

On the job front it's not looking very promising. I was waiting to hear back from a couple of jobs while I was away, particularly from the interview I had at London Bridge for a company called wireWAX, sadly I didn't get it which was kind of a bummer because I really wanted it - check out their website, it's so cool and I was so excited. I suppose if it wasn't meant to be, it wasn't meant to be, I'm sure things will pick up soon once I get back on it. I would love to not have to go back to the Job Centre again but if I don't hear anything by the time I come back from France at the beginning of next month, it's likely to be inevitable.

So, while I'm avoiding getting back to applying for jobs, I'm currently figuring out what I want to do for my birthday, which appears to have crept up on me, how am I going to be 22 years old? I think I'm just going to spend it with Moon, planning things is hard and it isn't as though it's an important birthday.
So far we're planning a quick swing by the Natural History Museum to see the Age of Dinosaurs exhibit, I'm going in almost blind but I've read quite a few mixed reviews, particularly relating to price. I genuinely hope that it doesn't disappoint, purely because The Natural History Museum is one of my favourite places in London. I'm kind of struggling to think of things to do afterwards though, it was much easier to plan and look up touristy activities in Hong Kong. I don't think I could possibly have exhausted London's attractions, I just don't want to go on The Eye or to the zoo and most websites make out that that's all to see...

London Zoo.

My sister and I had a day trip to London Zoo yesterday, there was a lot of walking involved but we had a nice day being tourists and looking at animals. It wasn't too busy or too full of families with screaming children. The tigers were asleep and hopefully I took some nice photographs. I've uploaded a full set onto Flickr.

© Ruth Johnston 2011.

Since returning from NUJDM I have decided that it would be a good idea to revive my Flickr. I also want to move everything over to Lightroom but I think that it would be a better idea to do that when I have more time, so, along with a new website, it's being put on the back burner for the time being.

I'm being interviewed for a documentary tomorrow by Gareth Lewis, who participated in my half-Chinese project. Coincidently he was also thinking of doing a documentary on the same subject and he's finally put the wheels in motion to get a pilot filmed so he can begin applying for funding. I've never been interviewed before but it's quite convenient that I'm fairly recently clued up on the subject and know what I want to say.

Also, I have plans in July to head over to Hong Kong with my mum and sister, I'm quite excited about it, mainly because I'm quite up for taking as many photos as I can.

My weekend.

I have just had a great weekend back home, now I am back in Portsmouth with even less of an idea of what to do than before. Eep, I took a few more photos for it but they'll be in the next post.

So, I was back home to see Russell Howard with Moon and my sister got me tickets for Christmas and couldn't go. He was so funny and we had a great evening out, even if The O2 does get super-busy.
Here are a few photos from that sort of period, they're all a bit muddled. We also took a trip to Pollock's Toy Museum, which was a bit nostalgic, some of the stuff in there could do with a bit of a spruce up though but then that is also part of it's charm too. I found the best Paperchase in the world too, I'll have to go back there when I have some money, it has everything crafty I could ever want, and once I'm not a student any more I might have some time to feel less guilty about not doing projects and actually do them.

© Ruth Johnston 2011.

Things you forget about when living in Portsmouth:
- How green everything can be.
- Flowers are quite nice.
- There are many other kinds of birds other than seagulls and pigeons.