Blog Challenge #9: Baller adventures

THE RULES:
You have to choose one baller to do each of the following activities with.
You can't choose the same baller for more than two answers.
You have to explain your reasons behind each answer.
Bonus lolz for being specific with certain questions!

Who would you choose to...

1) Go backpacking across Europe with
Ok, well I've been backpacking (sort of) in Bulgaria and it's actually kind of fun. Except the walking in a field full of grasshoppers part...so I would pick Fernando Llorente. He's tall enough for me to be able to jump on his back and be far enough off the ground to avoid any other icky creatures.

2) Teach you their language
Well, it has to be someone Spanish, because that's the language I want to learn the most. Vicente sounds the best, but he talks too fast, I would not learn anything. I'd say that Nando could teach me Spanish. I'd pay attention to what he was saying because I dont see him in that way.

3) Go on Who Wants To Be A Millionaire with
Niko. He's clever, he can take the political questions, I'll take the legal shit and we can split the general knowledge for the most part.

4) Bake a chocolate carrot cake with
Albiol, he knows how to cook so it would be good cake. Though I can't promise there would be anything remotely chocolately about it. Other uses may be found...

5) Get drunk and sing karaoke with
Stevie. I wish I could find the video of him drunk and doing karaoke just to prove my point. And they WOULD have whatever damn song we told them to have for our duet.

6) Go on an extreme sports holiday with
Alexis looks like he'd be a fun guy to go on an extreme sports holiday with. I bet he'll turn out to be a total sissy, but those tattoos alone are enough reason for me to pick him. If I get scared, I can just make him take his shirt off and stare at them. He also looks like he'd be strong enough to carry me home when I inevitably fall and hurt myself.

7) Raise money for underprivileged kids with
Iker, because he's done it already. People know him, they trust him and it would be all too easy.

8) Marry and have lots of sex and babies with
Well, obviously it would be Vicente. Because he would totally make the cutest babies in the world. And you know, he's not playing much these days. It means he'll have plenty of energy to burn.

9) Play an embarrassingly tabloid-worthy prank on
Gattuso. Because this reaction pwns all others, you can guarantee to make the tabloids when he goes psycho.

10) Have a short but wholly satisfying sordid affair with
Dahveed. I don't know if I could deal with being bitchfaced for the rest of my life, but I could take a few weeks/months of it. And the excitement of being caught by the rest of the Valencia boys and word getting back to the hubby would make it all the more exciting.

11) Go to a fancy dress event with
Crouchie. He can be my penguin. I like penguins. He always has the coolest costumes and you can guarantee we would win first prize for best dressed pair...

12) Have a drunken hook up that you may regret with
Probably Xavi. Though if I'm honest, I'd probably regret the fact that it's not a Valencia boy more than the fact I'd regret it was Xavi. And can you imagine how bad I'd feel waking up the next morning next to a guy that's shorter than me.

13) Go ballroom dancing with
Raul. He's handsome, looks good in a suit and definitely looks like he could show me a thing or two on the dancefloor.

14) Pull off an Ocean's Eleven style heist with
Any one of the Valencia boys would totally work here, but I'm going to go with Albiol. Because he's totally ninja.


15) Go on a secret mission with
Erm, I would say Dahveed. Because he is totally BA and the secret mission would totally be secret forever. He'd just bitchface anyone who tried to get any information out of him.

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Blog Challenge #8: Music from our chosen era

Music Playlist at MixPod.com

This would have been a lot more difficult if I had stuck to just five songs, but the Beatles are just THAT good, I couldn't possibly narrow it down. The following five videos are just a random mix of Beatles songs, though the last two are possibly my favourite songs by them ever.

1: The Long and Winding Road

2: A Hard Day's Night

3: Ticket to Ride:

<4: I Wanna Hold Your Hand

5: Here Comes The Sun

I don't care who you are and what your music taste is, everyone in the world has at least one Beatles song they like. They were just legends and I am sorry I wasn't around when they were at their most famous. Music like this just doesn't exist any more :(

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Blog Challenge #7: Happy music

I listen to a lot of music. I don't really mind what it is, I'll give anything a try once. Sure, I have my favourite bands, but as long as it's not total trash, I will listen to it. I don't really have a specific set of songs I listen to when I'm feeling down, it varies depending on how bothered I can be to look through my Zen. However, the most played songs on there are as follows:

5: Jackson Five - Blame it on the boogie. This is just one of those feel good songs that will always put a smile on my face regardless of how upset I was to start with.

4: Red Hot Chilli Peppers - Scar Tissue. Actually, pretty much any song by the Red Hot Chilli Peppers puts a smile on my face, but this is the most listened to one, so I guess it's the one that cheers me up the most.

3: Daniel Powter - Bad Day. It's one of those songs that makes it seem like anything you've gone through, there's someone out there that's going to make it all ok.

2: Linkin Park - Pushing me away. This is another one of those bands that pretty much any song helps cheer me up. I just picked this one because it was the first one I came across.

And finally, the #1 song that cheers me up. Erm...well, Juanes in general. And because I couldn't find a video for La Paga that I could put in here, I am just going to link you up and post this video instead.

I realise that a lot of the music that cheers me up would probably depress most people, which is why I didn't put it in. The songs that I have put in are sort of happy-ish. They sound a bit more upbeat that the usual stuff I listen to when I'm all sad and shizz anyway...

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Blog challenge #6: Pretty women

This week, our blog challenge was to list the women we think are beautiful/pretty. Now, I had a pretty tough time narrowing this down (should I be worried about that btw?) because there's a lot of women I think are pretty. Apart from all my lovely blogger friends (whose pics I won't put up in case they don't want you to know what they look like - aura of mystery and all that), the special ones that made the list are as follows:

Halle Berry - Can you believe this woman is over 40? *wants to look like that too aged 40*


Salma Hayek - well, yeah, self explanatory. You'd have to be mad not to think she's pretty.


Catherine Zeta-Jones - she's one of those rare women that still look good without make up. I'm jealous.


Penelope Cruz - erm...are you noticing a pattern here yet?


Angelina Jolie - even after having 3 kids, she looks amazing. Shame she's hooked up with Brad Pitt though. Ugh.

So apparently, I not only have a 'type' when it comes to guys, I have a type when it comes to girls too. I'm pretty sure that there's loads of others I could put into the list (someone that isn't an actress for a start) but I watch a lot of movies, so yeah...

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Blog Challenge #5: The hot list

I am going to attempt to narrow this down, because I'm sure we all have better things to do with our lives than read through a list of men I find hot, so here's my top 10 in no particular order.

Kimi Raikkonen. Those. Eyes. Kill. Me.


Jay Hernandez. He's a cutie and I sat through Hostel for him. Never. Again.

Johnny Depp. Don't tell me you wouldn't.

Keanu Reeves. Just hot. End of.

Alexandre Despatie. Like he needs a reason, have you seen what he does for a living?!

Frank Iero. I love him so much, I named my hamster after him.

James Franco. Oh dear god, yes please.

Adam Garcia. He is not at all the reason I have watched Coyote Ugly more times than I care to remember. Nope, not at all...

I was going to try and not include any footballers in the top 10, because you all know which ballers I like. However, these two are just too good not to include, and they're probably my fave people in the world right now.

Dahveed Veeyah. Is an explanation for this one really necessary?

Vicente. Also known as The Thigh. He also does not need a reason, he just is.

Honourable mentions go to David Silva, Raul Albiol, Alexis, Mata, Josh Lewsey, Nicky Byrne, Jason Statham, Orlando Bloom, Dave Grohl and Ian Watkins (the Lostprophets one, not the Steps one!)

There was plenty more I wanted to include, but I told myself I'd narrow it down. And you know, I have to leave in like an hour, I doubt I'd have time to put them all in.

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Blog Challenge #4: 5 favourite words

Ok, so this week our blog challenge was to pick our favourite 5 words, and give reasons for them. Most of my favourite words are made up, so I had to think really hard about this one, but the final list is as follows and yes, I did put real words in here:

5 - Banshee: Does there really have to be a reason for liking the words? Because I don't think I have one for this. It just rolls off the tongue easily.
4 - Cappuccino: well, this one's pretty self explanatory. I'm addicted to coffee, therefore one of my fave words was bound to be something to do with it.
3 - Gargantuan: This one just makes me laugh basically. Who the hell would take the time to say this instead of saying huge?
2 - Strudel: And it has to be said with a slight German accent. It's just a cool word, I have no other reason for liking this one really.
And finally, we come to my favourite word of all time.
1 - Aubergine: I don't care how many times I hear this, it makes me laugh every time. I honest to god cannot say it without bursting into giggles.

Words I like that didn't quite make it into the list include oaf, foetus, conk, mush, squish, anemone and coconut. These are mostly for the comedy value, I seemingly have an obsession with words that make me laugh when I hear them/say them, and all of these fit the bill. No, I don't quite know why either, though coconut makes me think of that song. "I've got a lovely bunch of coconuts" and that's what makes me laugh, I guess.

Also, some words that I absolutely hate are antidisestablishmentarianism (seriously, you think I care that it's the longest word in the dictionary, it's too long to effing remember!), diet (just the thought of one of these makes me break out into a cold sweat) and butter - that last one is just because I have a common accent and never say the t's so it comes out sounding like 'buh-uh'.

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Blog Challenge #3: Why we support the teams we do

So you may by now know I support 2 teams. I don't even know why I support them, I just do. Well ok, there's probably more to it than that. Flash back to when I was 11 years old and I first discovered football. It was the World Cup 1998, England vs Argentina. Anybody remember this?

Well, that goal was basically the reason I really started paying attention to football. Michael Owen became my first ever football love, and while it makes me feel bad that I started supporting Liverpool because of one footballer, that does generally tend to be how I get into football teams, as you will find out. After that goal, I started watching Liverpool games just for the chance to see this boy wonder play and show off his mad skillz. As time went by, my love for the team grew and grew and it wasn't long before I found myself cheering them on in every game, even the ones that may have seemed insignificant at the time. It helped that my dad was a Liverpool fan too, so he'd tell me all these stories about the Liverpool team of the 80's. It didn't seem like the current squad was having any such success, and that only made me like them even more. I've never been a fan of teams who win all the time, give me the underdog any day. It gets boring seeing the same teams win over and over again, that's not a competition to me.

Anyway, I think it was during a Champions League game in 2002 that I first noticed Valencia. By that point, I'd been watching football, but I'd never really seen anything beyond national teams and the Premier League. I was in absolute awe, this was a team I'd never heard of and yet they were beating a Liverpool team that was firmly embedded in the top four in their domestic league. And beating them comfortably at that. I'd love to say that it was down to their obvious skill that I started watching Valencia play, but it really wasn't. Well, it was, but not the skill of the whole team. I've already explained how Vicente was the reason I got into Spanish football, so I won't go into that again.

From that game on, I tried to watch as many games as possible in La Liga, which was difficult because they didn't always show them. I didn't give up though, and that's how I've got to the stage I'm at today. Even though I say I support both teams, Liverpool were my first team, and I will always cheer for them. It would feel wrong willing them to lose or draw, no matter who they were playing. I just have to hope they never play Valencia again in a game that matters.

Of course, Rafa B was the manager of Valencia at the time, and then he moved to Liverpool. It made me happy in a way, because I knew he was a great manager and that he could help Liverpool win loads of stuff. At the same time, part of me was sad that Valencia was losing a great manager, and I wasn't all that sure how well the new one would settle in. This manager change only went to further cement my support of both teams and basically, the Valencia link with Liverpool just made me love them even more.

Besides Liverpool and Valencia, I do have a soft spot for many teams in both leagues. Well, ok, more in La Liga than the Prem. I watch Arsenal games and usually get upset if they don't win...unless they're playing Liverpool, or are too close for comfort that is. And in La Liga. Erm, this season its *takes a deep breath* Villareal, Sevilla, Real Madrid, Atletico Madrid, Sporting Gijon and occasionally Barca. i.e. when my dad is home and he wants to watch them. Yeah that's a lot of teams, but I don't necessarily want them to win or do well. I just like watching them. I'm a total football whore it seems.

And that is the story of the teams I support and how I started supporting them.

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Blog challenge #2: Vampires

So, vampires. I could go into a whole big discussion about them and throw loads of random info at you, but I really can't be bothered to do that, so I'm going to do my blog post on Count Dracula because that's possibly the most famous vampire of all time. He's had many different representations in movies and books, but the general consensus is that he's an evil blood sucking killer.

Some of the basic facts you need to know about Dracula:

• The character was created by Bram Stoker in 1897
• The character was inspired by Vlad the Impaler
• He has been represented in many different movies and books since then
• Dracula is incredibly strong, stealthy and can change form into various animals, most commonly a bat.
• He requires fresh blood which rejuvenates him. Without this, he ages at an accelerated rate.
• Contrary to popular belief, the sunlight does not kill Dracula, merely weakens him.
• He must be invited into a place in order to enter it, but after this, he may come and go as he pleases.
• The only ways to definitively kill him being shooting with a sacred bullet, decapitation and stabbing through the heart with a wooden stake.

Vampires are generally seen as the "undead". They rise from their graves at night to seek fresh blood to drink, but they must return to the grave before dawn. They have recently become popularised in shows such as Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and it's subsequent spin off series, Angel. Movies such as Van Helsing and the Blade Trilogy have also added to the hype of vampires, making it popular culture for many young people.

Here is a video of the trailer for the 1992 movie interpretation of Bram Stoker's Dracula:

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Blog Challenge #1: Pirates

Ahoy there, me hearties! Welcome to me pirate ship. The price of this journey be a bottle of rum.

When I agreed to take part in these blog challenges, I ne'er actually thought I'd get pirates as my random topic. Ye may have to put up with a lot of waffle that has nothin' to do with anythin', because I don't know the first thing about pirates, but I'll try.

I guess that seein' as I be totally clueless on pirates, I'll cheat and write about POTC. Am I allowed to do that? Well ok, maybe not POTC exactly. But I did find this really cool avatar on a livejournal comm somewhere and it made me laugh lots, so I'll share:



Ok, I'll play along. Erm...pirates. Seein' as the extent of what I know is basically, they have a beard, a wooden leg, an eye patch and a parrot called Polly, I'm clueless, so I went on the internetz to research and I found a ton of uber cool stuff. Some of what I learnt includes the followin':

• Pirates believe that wearing pierced earrings would improve their eyesight.
• Pirates believe that having women on board their ship was bad luck. They also believe that whistling on a ship would cause the weather to turn stormy (as in ‘to whistle up a storm’)
• Although pirates have been around since the 15th century, most pirating happened between 1690 and 1720.
• Almost all pirates stole their ships because they couldn’t buy ships in case they got caught and sent to jail. Once they had taken over a ship they had to convert it for pirate life. This usually meant making more room for sailors to live on board and strengthening the decks to hold the weight of the heavy cannons.

We also suffer lots of horrible ilnesses, bein' a pirate isn't all fun and games you know. Scurvy, dysentry, gangrene and yellow fever are all common among pirates, many of these eventually killin' those affected. Also, because of the close confinement, such disease spreads easily and quickly.

While researchin', I also decided that my favourite pirate be Blackbeard. This may or may not have somethin' to do with the fact that he be the only one I had heard of before I started my research.


He be a super famous pirate in the 16th century and has a bit of a reputation as a meanie. As perhaps the most famous pirate of all time, there have been many character adaptations in books, documentaries and movies. He doesn't sound like the kind of guy ye want to bump into on a dark night! Read more about him here: http://blackbeardthepirate.com/story.htm

Many pirates got caught eventually and met a horrible end. Those who did not die at sea were often caught once they made it back to dry land and often hung in front of huge crowds of people. Sometimes, they were even decapitated as a warning to other pirates. We be an unpopular group, the pirates.

Anyway, land ahoy! That's the end of yer journey, now get off me ship before I make ye walk the plank.

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