How Sez Sees It

Keeping well while you're staying at home It is a weird world right now. As I write this we have been in lockdown for one month in the UK and we have at least another two weeks of this. People are getting into a new routine with things like shopping and working. I have noticed that there are a lot more tins and toilet rolls in the supermarkets so that is a blessing at the moment. However, it is easy to fall down the rabbit hole and start to feel helpless when this is all going on. Mentally there are a lot of people struggling at the moment. It might be because you are cut off from friends and family, or you just look at the world and feel totally helpless with everything going on. Some of us already have our fights with mental health and this is pushing us further and further down. Then there is the physical aspect. How do you stay fit and healthy when you are stuck at home? This is especially hard if you live in a block of flats. There is also the temptation to snack for som...

A love letter to horror Horror is just one genre I adore alongside fantasy and sci-fi, but horror has consistently been there in my life. Some of my earliest memories involve horror, or things with a horror theme. When I was born in the mid-1980's, and for a few years after, there were regular repeats of things like Michael Jackson's 'Thriller' video on TV. I also remember being shown the camp, kitsch and yet horror inspired Rocky Horror Picture Show when I was five years old. Back then I couldn't understand the story, but what I loved was the songs and the horror visuals. Even as a child I could appreciate the power of Tim Curry (Frank 'N' Furter) dressed in a dark cape with black eye shadow and dark red lipstick (like some incredible vampire figure). Like many Children I was introduced to the idea of hunting monsters through Scooby Doo. Not only did we have endless repeats of the original episodes, but we had our own new episodes with the edition of ...

On being a fan and the number of times it has saved me You hear this a lot (or read it a lot) if you go online and scroll through your twitter or tumblr timeline. Someone will be talking about how a particular song, band, tv show or film saved their life. You might not understand this way of thinking and I am genuinely happy for you because it means you have had the stability in your life to just enjoy things without them taking on a greater meaning for you. However, I am one of those people and I am going to explain how being a fan of different things at different times saved my life...in some cases literally! How Lord of the Rings saved me The year was 2001 and on 28 December I (just turned 15 years old) went to the cinema with my family to see the first in a trilogy of films adapted from the J.R.R. Tolkein series, The Lord of the Rings. This first instalment was called The Fellowship of the Ring and tells the story of a band of different peoples (Dwarfs, Elves, Men and Hobbits...

First up I hear some of you asking what Yaoi even is. From the Japanese it roughly translates as 'boys love' and it is a genre particularly popular with women, which is why I chose to use it for this piece. Why is yaoi familiar? If you have spent any time on the internet you will be aware of this concept. Yaoi, or 'boys love', is particularly popular on micro-blogging sites like tumblr or pinterest where fans (usually female) create posts out of photos, gifs or imagined conversation text posts that put their two favourite male characters together. These posts range from the innocent flirting between two characters to romantic gestures to full-on hardcore sex! Now, I fully acknowledge that there is a section of fanfiction about imagining yourself with your favourite character, but this blog essay will concentrate on the overtly homosexual version of fanfiction. Another popular form is the aforementioned 'fanfiction' where two people or characters are throw...

I realised I haven't posted here for a while, so I am long overdue. I had thought about putting this one on my anxiety blog, but I feel the science part makes more sense here. A little about my fear I never used to have a fear of flying. Actually, the first couple of times I got on a plane I absolutely loved it and it was one of the best experiences of my life! Then something happened to me. I don't know what, but I think it was connected to an extreme bout of anxiety and stress I had in my early 20's because the first time I got on a plane with my now husband, I lost it entirely for the whole flight! This was about nine years ago now and I have been getting better every time, but it still weirds me out. I am hoping that this blog will be cathartic and allow me to get over some of this fear before I next get on a plane...which is very soon at the time of writing. The frustrating thing is that my husband is utterly obsessed with planes! Cannot get enough of them and des...

This week WWE are doing something that I don't entirely agree with. They are going to Saudi Arabia to put on what is being titled the 'Greatest Royal Rumble'. I would argue that this event is not so great for a number of reasons, but especially because of the treatment of women. Shock horror! I am a woman! I also really like professional wrestling and have followed it on and off ever since I was a kid. Right now I am REALLY into it and watch it religiously every week. I have a subscription to the WWE Network so I can watch all the original programming and every pay per view. I have a long list of favourite wrestlers but the ones I loved watching as a kid were The Rock, Stone Cold Steve Austin, Triple H and Chyna. Now my favourites are Seth Rollins, Nia Jax, Ember Moon, Cedric Alexander and Johnny Gargano. What has been awesome to watch as I have grown up is how women have gained more respect for their talent as performers and there is less emphasis on them as being just t...

Welcome to another blog post straight from my mind. I know these are now few and far between but I feel like blogging when passionate about something is important. This one is about my renewed love of wrestling and in particular that of the WWE. I have had people tell me recently that at 31 years of age it is immature to like wrestling of any kind and that it is 'fake'. I am here to tell you why all of that is bulls**t. Where it all began Back in the 1990's we had a really crap TV reception. So bad that when all this country had was analogue TV (yes I know satellite and cable existed but we couldn't afford that when I was a kid) and only five channels existed my family could get four of those...on a good day. BBC 2 was pretty clear and ITV, BBC 1 and Channel 4 all had snow effect on them. Channel 5 just couldn't be got without satellite or cable and no companies would run cable to our village so we just didn't get that channel. Channel 4 used to show som...