#365DaysOfHappiness - Why I Love Music And The Playlist Shuffle Tag*

I don't know why but there is something about birthday's that makes you want to shake everything up and start again. Birthday's used to be something to look forward to - a day full of cake and presents -. You didn't dread them you looked forward to getting older. I'm now officially in the last year of my 30's and whilst I don't necessarily view getting older as a bad thing, I have spent more than a few minutes lately contemplating where on earth the last 30 odd years have gone, and asking myself why haven't I done more with my life.

Instead of looking back though I'm intending to spend the last year of my 30's living my best life, doing things that make me happy, trying new things, and taking a few risks along the way. If you follow me on Instagram you'll know that last week I started the #365DaysOfHappiness project and I've made it my goal to post a picture of something that has made me happy every day in the run up to the big 4 0 next May.

Today's photograph reflects one of my major passions in life, music. I'm not talking about playing a musical instrument I'm talking about the simple pleasure of listening to a piece of music that you love. I was lucky enough to grow up in a household that loved music. My dad was a big country fan, with a record collection that matched that passion so I grew up listening to the likes of Johnny Cash, Willie Nelson and Hank Williams, with the odd bit of Elvis, and Jimmy Nail thrown in for good measure. My mum on the other hand listened to a wide variety of stuff ranging from classical to show tunes, and even Gregorian chants. It's safe to say that my musical education was a varied one but I'm thankful for that, I can safely say that I can appreciate most types of music, in the early days I was a bit of a metal fan, one of the first gigs I went to was Guns 'N' Rose, Soundgarden, and Faith No More, before progressing on like so many other 90's kids to a bit of Brit Pop when I spent my time wearing Adidas Gazelles and watching the likes of Oasis, Blur, Pulp and Ocean Colour Scene.

Nowadays I'll pretty much listen to anything, I like something that's catchy or that I can sing along to and I appreciate DJ's and mixing as much as I do a full on bands that play proper instruments, I love it all. I literally listen to music every single day and it makes me happy in a way that few other things do, yes it can make me sad or melancholy on occasions but there is always an element of happiness in every emotion and that's the nature of the beast.

When it comes to listening to music I literally listen to it on every medium possible depending on where I am. I'm a big fan of digital radio, and I still watch music television, in an attempt to seem down with the kids or to reminisce about my own teenage years, you pick the channel you decide! Unlike a lot of people nowadays I still own a CD player, a turntable and several cassette players where I spend many hours pouring through my own and my parents prized collections, remembering songs, and remembering times gone by.

I do hanker for the past on the occasions but modern technology has really made a world of difference to the music fan, now you literally have every single song in the world at your finger tips, and available for your listening pleasure in seconds, via You Tube, a online listening service or via your smart phone. I don't spend as long on buses and public transport as I once did but one of my greatest pleasures now is sitting on a bus and in sticking in my earphones, and allowing the music to take me somewhere else, and of course who doesn't play music where there in the bath or the shower, I've pretended to be Adele, or Lana Del Ray more than once using my shampoo bottle as my microphone, come on, don't tell me that you haven't done the same ;) As far as technology has progressed that I still think the inbuilt speakers on smart phones sound a little tinny and don't real add to the listening experience, I've tried all the tricks to improve my in-shower and iPhone listening experience like putting my phone in a cup, a paper tube, a bowl and in the sink but I really do think that I need to invest in something like the Panasonic Speaker System, to improve my in-shower and round the house listening experience, it would certainly improve the sound quality but I don't think it could do much for my vocal abilities (can you believe I was actually in the school choir though - what were they thinking?)

So now that you know a little bit about my love of music and my listening habits I thought I'd share my eclectic musical tastes with you by doing this fun tag, The Playlist Shuffle Tag that somebody once tagged me in on Facebook x

The Playlist Shuffle Tag

-

"Sweet Disposition"

1. Put your iTunes/Foobar/Spotify/Whatever on shuffle. 
2. For each question, press the next button to get your answer 
3. YOU MUST WRITE THAT SONG NAME DOWN NO MATTER HOW SILLY IT SOUNDS. 

IF SOMEONE SAYS 'ARE YOU OKAY' YOU SAY? 
Empire State Of Mind - Alicia Keys

HOW WOULD YOU DESCRIBE YOURSELF? 
Joy To The World - David Bell, Huddersfield Choral Society 

WHAT DO YOU LOOK FOR IN A GUY/GIRL? 
Lana Del Rey - Video Games

HOW DO YOU FEEL TODAY? 
Telephone - Lady Gaga



WHAT IS YOUR LIFE'S PURPOSE? 
Tired - Adele - (Ha Ha!)

WHAT'S YOUR MOTTO? 
Find Me - Kings Of Leon



WHAT DO YOUR FRIENDS THINK OF YOU? 
Stay With Me - Sam Smith

WHAT DO YOUR PARENTS THINK OF YOU? 
Here Comes The Sun - The Beatles

WHAT DO YOU THINK ABOUT VERY OFTEN? 
Disappear - INXS



WHAT DO YOU THINK ABOUT YOUR FIRST KISS? 
Ho Hey - The Lumineers



WHAT DO YOU THINK OF YOUR BEST FRIEND 
Linger - The Cranberries 



WHAT IS YOUR LIFE STORY? 
Story Of My Life - One Direction (freaky but this was genuinely the next song that I got)

WHAT DO YOU WANT TO BE WHEN YOU GROW UP? 
(You Make Me Feel Like) A Natural Woman - Carole King

WHAT DO YOU THINK WHEN YOU SEE THE PERSON YOU LIKE? 
Need To Feel Love - Reflekt

WHAT WILL YOU DANCE TO AT YOUR WEDDING? 
Waterfall - The Stone Roses 



WHAT WILL THEY PLAY AT YOUR FUNERAL? 
Wings - Birdy



WHAT IS YOUR HOBBY/INTEREST: 
 Let It Go - Idina Menzel

WHAT IS YOUR BIGGEST FEAR? 
Cold Little Heart  - Michael Kiwanuka



WHAT IS YOUR BIGGEST SECRET? 
Wish You Were Here - Pink Floyd

WHAT DO YOU WANT RIGHT NOW? 
 Chasing Cars - Snow Patrol



WHAT DO YOU THINK OF YOUR FRIENDS? 
Someone Like You - Adele

WHAT WILL YOU POST THIS AS? 
Sweet Disposition - The Temper Trap 



I'm not sure about the sense or reliability of some of the answers in determining my inner most thoughts but I hope this has given you just a sneaky peek into my musical world. I don't think there was anything too embarrassing there but believe me I do have a few things on there that do make me cringe a little bit when I hear them, Aqua anyone? Never mind it's all about the memories I guess, I do wish though that you could filter out Christmas albums though in the Summer, Joy To The World indeed haha x I'm going to tag anyone that wants to do this, so please give it a go, and share your random playlists with the world x If you do it, please link me up below I'd love to know what kind of music you listen to, and maybe I can discover a new favourite song or piece of music in the process x

*Sponsored Post 

Learning Spanish With Three Mobile*

It might sound strange to some of my younger readers but believe it or not there once was a time before mobile phones were commonplace. At the risk of sounding ancient I got my first mobile phone in 1996  when I was 18 and I felt like the bees knees. I was one of the first of my friends to own one and I didn't care that it just made phone calls and sent text messages with just words in them, I felt tres sophisticated and way cool.

Although you can still buy extremely basic phones, the majority of phones nowadays do way more than just make phone calls and send text messages. I'm an iPhone user and whilst I do use it occasionally for texting and calling there is so much more that you can do with it. You can surf the internet, take photographs, listen to music, and of course you can play games. I'm guilty of the gaming thing and I spend way too much time playing games on both my phone and on my iPad. That isn't a bad thing though a lot of games these days make you think and make your brain work and I'm a firm believer that you need to keep your mind as active as you can. As well as gaming and communication though, they can be used as a fun way to learn a new skill or even a new language

A few weeks ago now I was contacted on behalf of Three Mobile to celebrate the inclusion of Spain in their Feel at Home mobile roaming network plan, and to celebrate I was given the opportunity to bring out my Mediterranean side and to a learn a bit of Spanish.

Like most Brits my first proper holiday was to Spain, and over the years I've been to most of the Costas, a few islands, and I've been lucky enough to spend some time in both Valencia, and Barcelona, which is easily one of my favourite cities in the world. When it comes to language though I'm a bit lacking. My comprehensive school only offered French and German as a foreign language so I never really got the chance to learn Spanish, and I've only managed to pick up the odd word or phrase over the years mainly "Dos vinos blancos por favor" and "las rebajas". The first one if pretty self explanatory 2 white wines pleases but the second one not so much, it basically means the sales- I once hit El Cortes Ingles at sale time and I quickly realised what the huge signs meant :)

There are so many different language apps available on the Apple App Store that it's hard to know where to start but the lovely people on behalf of Three Mobile provided me with a little bit of guidance and an iTunes voucher to get me started. I downloaded the apps that they recommended which gave me some good grounding because they are all so different.

Learn Spanish By Mindsnacks

This one is my favourite, no question - why? because it makes learning a language fun. The lessons are split into nice manageable chunks and it's all about (at least in the early stages) learning basic vocabulary, starting off with your basic numbers, days, months, weather, seasons and colours.

You learn by reading, looking at the accompanying picture to trigger your memory and by listening to the pronunciation. That doesn't sound that much fun so far but then you get to test your knowledge and your skills by playing games. As your progress through, and master different lessons and perfect your skills you earn XP which unlocks more games. The games in the earliest stages, are Swell where you chose the correct word to stop the water draining from the fish bowl, and Belly which you can see above where you feed the frog by matching both the written and spoken word to the pictures.

There is also Word Birds which gives you a word in English and you then need to spell the word in Spanish from the given letters and there is also Bloon which is my favourite game so far. It's a bit like Bubble Bobble or any of those bubble bursting games, you need to clear as many of the bubbles as possible by matching up both the English and Spanish words.

If you have no knowledge of Spanish whatsoever than this is probably the app for you, it's strange how games really help you to absorb some of the information. The spelling game Word Birds is particular tough and it really gets your brain working. My one complaint with this one is that so far there is no option to test your own pronunciation but I have a long way to go so maybe that might come in later.

Learn Spanish

This is another app that I would recommend for beginners, again it guides you through all your basic vocabulary. Again pictures are used as a memory aid and as well as reading the word you can also hear how the word it pronounced. Unlike the previous app though this one give you the opportunity to record your own pronunciation and listen to it back - eek!

Once your familiar with the vocabulary you can play games and carry out exercises such as memory games, flash cards, listening exercises, spelling tests and quizzes to help you test your knowledge. It isn't done in quite as fun away as the Mindsnacks but it's easy to use and I like the option to record your own voice.

Duolingo

Despite the fact that you can pick how experienced you are for me, this app assumes that you have a little bit of prior knowledge. Unlike the other two apps this one doesn't focus on vocabulary instead it focuses on the basics of the Spanish language, and how you use the words that your learning.

Each lesson goes through a variety of tasks from identifying the correct word and picture, to translating a sentence, typing what you hear, selecting the missing word, and repeating the phrase.

Unlike the other two apps that are more about vocabulary this one is actually teaching you words, verbs, and how to use both the masculine and feminine form of words, it's basically teaching you how to speak, spell and construct sentences. It's take me a little while to get to grips with it but after setting my reminders every day to practise I'm starting to feel a bit more confident with it.

Okay after a couple of weeks I'm far from fluent and my spelling and pronunciation still leaves a lot to be desired but by spending 10 minutes or so a day playing with the apps, playing games and practising my vocabulary I can definitely say that I know a bit more of the Spanish language than I did three or so weeks ago. All of the screen shots are taken from my iPad for clarity but I've got all of these apps on my iPhone too so I can practise on the go, be it in a hospital waiting room, on even a bus or a train.

As well as the means to learn Spanish, and the fab Spanish flag that you can see next to Mummy Lou's paella in some of the pictures above, the fab people at Three also sent me a copy of The Rough Guide To Spain. It's currently on my bedside table and it's making me desperate to return to the country and its islands, and in particular Barcelona, to try out my new found language skills - ha ha, maybe next year when I'm a bit more fluent :)

I love trying new things and learning, and I've really enjoyed this experience, and who knows where it will lead to. It just shows you that mobile phones, and especially smart phones and the iPhone are no longer just for making phone calls, they really can open the door to new skills and new experiences whether we're at home, out and about or even abroad. Have you ever learnt a skill via your iPhone, or smart phone? Let me know below x 

*iTunes Voucher, Spanish Flag, And The Rough Guide To Spain Were All Provided On Behalf Of Three Mobile