Smiles of the week: We're up all night to get lucky

Well done Britain, you really did bank holiday weather perfectly. After months and months of wondering whether the sun would ever rear its head again, it timed its first real appearance absolutely perfectly. I spent most of my bank holiday Monday sitting in various parts of Leeds just staring at the sky, then most of the evening staring at the clock just across the river from my balcony in disbelief at the 20C temperature it was displaying. I was beginning to forget that temperatures like that actually existed.

The main highlight of my week (and possibly my year so far) was Live at Leeds which I talked about in my last post but even without that it was a pretty decent week. Here's a few highlights for you nosy people out there.

-Booking tickets to see Bastille in October. It may be months away but that doesn't mean I'm not allowed to be a little bit over-excited already

-Finding a new pair of sunglasses that don't make me look like I should be holding a white stick or a guide dog.

-Last week's episode of New Girl. Normally Halloween episodes of American shows can be a bit terrible but this one was brilliant. Although I'm starting to get a bit distressed by Jess and Nick still not getting together.

-Being a good person and getting one of those 'healthy' pizzas from Pizza Express. It made a nice change having the salad in the middle and still managed to fill me up- winner.

-Having a hysterical night out which involved my friend's boyfriend wearing a giant poster for a club night as a dress when we took a brief trip to the night's rival venue.

-Actually having a brilliant time in the queues for Live at Leeds and time between bands because of the hilarious company I had.

-Sitting in a beer garden before The Vaccines. Briefly. Then after being offended by the lack of ANY cider and the insane prices for all other summery drinks ending up sitting in a basement bar drinking cheap bottles of Kopparberg. We may have missed a few hours of sunshine but at least we gained some decent drinks. Plus we avoided bankrupting ourselves in the name of alfresco drinking.

-Getting into bed on Sunday night after two nights out, another attempted night out, hours of queuing, walking miles and miles between venues and jumping around to lots of bands. My legs had had enough and were incredibly appreciative that they had finally earned some time off.

Get Lucky- Daft Punk ft. Pharrell Williams

Play another song here and then you can leave

This week has been a good one for me exercise-wise. However, I do feel the need to warn you all that exercise can be bad for you. Not in a "woe is me, my legs hurt" sort of way (although for the record, walking has become quite a challenge for me over the last few days), but because my head has been infiltrated with a playlist of Zumba tracks which I keep finding myself singing as I potter about the flat. 

Now, don't get me wrong, Zumba music is pretty damn awesome and absolutely perfect for shaking your hips to in the company of 30 other lycra-clad women, but in the comfort of my own home (and my own mind) I like to consider myself to have better taste in music than that. 

So, as a desperate measure to force the weird medley of banghra, latin and hip-hop out of my head, I thought I'd compile a little playlist of a few songs that I've been loving this week that I'd much prefer to have stuck in my head as I hoover the living room. 

Laura Palmer- Bastille

You know that feeling when you buy a new album and find a track on it that you love waaaaaay more than the singles that made you want to buy the album in the first place? For me, this is one of those songs. I'm very guilty of getting a bit put off songs that I have adored for ages when they become 'big' and played about 1000 times an hour on Radio 1, so was really pleased to find a song on the Bastille album that I loved more than Pompeii. I'm really pleased that Laura Palmer seems to have been picked as their next single release as its a bloody brilliant song that deserves a good bit of success, but at the same time I'm reluctant for it to reach a point that I have it forced upon me through the radio so often that I can't bring myself to listen to it in my own time any more. 

Sacrilege- Yeah Yeah Yeahs

When I first heard this new offering from Karen O's vocal chords, it took me right back to my hey day at Uni. Definitely a good thing as hearing new stuff from the band that's as fun as Zero fills me with excitement at the prospect of going mental to this soon when I've got a good bit of vodka in my belly. Although it'll have trouble having the same emotional significance as the stuff from their last album for me as I'd give my right arm to go back to 2009 and listen to it all again as something new. Sorry, going a bit off track and onto a moan about the pitfalls of post- University life again! 

Biblical- Biffy Clyro

I have so much love for Biffy Clyro. Mostly because anybody who sings in a Scottish accent is a winner for me. One of the few bands that made the Reading and Leeds line up have any sense of appeal to me this year (sadly there wasn't enough else to entice me so I'm going to miss out on seeing these bearded lovelies when they come up to Leeds in the summer). But still, the new album is brilliant so I'll just have to play that with the volume up on full instead. Plus it'll be a nice chance to get back on my neighbours who think that even just watching tv at tea time requires surround sound with a room-shaking amount of bass. 

My waffling about musical goodness seems to have done the trick in erasing the Zumba tunes from my head for tonight at least. 

Although I'm sure I'll be right back to square one tomorrow when I go to my next class. Somebody get me some new music pronto!

Biblical- Biffy Clyro

If you had your gun, would you shoot it at the sky?

My never ending mission to get to know Yorkshire better continued last weekend when my parents paid me a visit. My Dad's hatred of being dragged around shops by my Mum and I, coupled with the fact that their car opens up a lot more possibilities for adventures for me means that we always manage to find somewhere interesting to go where we can have a play with our DSLRs. Papa T is the person who got me interested in photography in the first place, so I always like to go on little photography outings with him so I can pick up a few hints and tips. Not sure my Mum enjoys this quite as much, she has to spend a lot of time standing around like a lemon whilst we snap away. At least there was plenty for her to look at while she waited for us last weekend as we took a trip to Fountains Abbey in Ripon and the place was flipping huge! Even on a freezing cold day there were tonnes of people around, it was a great place for a Sunday wander and we ended up spending almost all day there because there was so much to see!

I think the cold, wintery weather suited the atmosphere around the ruins of the Abbey- at least the perpetual winter we seem to be living in finally proved handy for something (but seriously weather, don't let that think its ok to stay like this forever... WE ALL WANT SPRING NOW THANKS). No photos of my face made it into this little lot today- the cold weather gives me a permanently grumpy expression as smiling doesn't really come at the top of my priority list when my ears falling off due to frostbite is starting to seem like a genuine possibility.

Laura Palmer- Bastille

And the walls kept tumbling down in the city that we love

With the exception of little old me over here in Leeds, the majority of my family all still live on or very near the Wirral. Since half of the family live within 5 minute walking distance from my parent's house (we're an adventurous bunch!) it doesn't leave many exciting places to explore as we just have to nip up the road whenever we want to see them. But I do have one Uncle who doesn't live in Merseyside, he lives up in Edinburgh. Without a doubt one of the best places I could possibly have a reason to visit on a fairly regular basis. Well done Uncle, great choice of city to make your home in.

Since we haven't all been up to see my Uncle together for a year or so we decided it would be a nice thing to do for my Mum's birthday. And, although I did go up to the 'Burgh back in August with my buddies, I really don't think I could ever tire of the city. Its flipping beautiful. In just a weekend we saw so much, going up Calton Hill, driving around Arthur's Seat (it was way too wet, cold and windy to even think about walking up there...), going up to the roof of the museum to admire the view, and so much more!

 I love how diverse Edinburgh is, from the castle you can see old buildings, new buildings, water, mountains... nowhere else could you walk to the bottom of one of the main tourist streets and end up in the middle of a country park complete with hikers and crazy runners speeding up the hills.

Even on horrible grey days like last weekend, the city still looks absolutely stunning. 

EDINBURGH, I LOVE YOU.

Pompeii- Bastille