The B425 list.

After watching a video of a group of people going 'canyoneering' and abseiling down waterfalls I've decided to compile a list of things that I want to do before I'm 25 because during my time at university I don't feel I've had the chance to be adventurous.

Just as a reminder - these are all for me. If you've got a list of your own or have some cool suggestions, please feel free to comment.

- Stick with your pescetarian diet and maybe try going vegan for a month just for the experience.

- Make a savings account. Ok, that sounds like a really dull one but in a few weeks I'll be looking for a job and I want to have money to put away for my future that can go towards a deposit on an apartment, paying for a nice holiday, paying off student debt etc. It seems kinda lame, but I feel at this stage it's a sensible thing to do. Even just £10 a week will do the trick, however much I can put in there.

- Stand out in public with a 'Free Hugs' sign for at least an hour just to spread some joy. Maybe do it to raise awareness of/raise money for a charity that helps with mental health.

- Revisit places that made me happy. I want to travel to the islands around my home country, Scotland, and return to some of the places that have brought a sense of inner peace. I want to be the old me that swam in waterfalls, danced til dawn and even skinny dipped in the North Sea. I also want to revisit Venice. I'd return to Venice every year if possible. There's no place ever I've felt more at peace in.

- Finish at least one novel and seek publication for it. Pretty self explanatory but I'd like to be a published writer by 25. Before you say it - yes, I know how tough it will be, but there is no harm in being ambitious.

- Try to learn how to make sushi., even just one basic kind.

- Take up a class in something new. Maybe I could do one each year. Maybe I'll finally learn to knit or take up karate. Or both. Knitrate.

- Get back into hiking. Once your leg is healed, try jogging again.

- Roadtrip. It seems like a dreadfully cliche thing to do but I'm gonna do it... Straight after I learn how to drive and buy a car.

- Learn to drive.

- Buy a car.

- Act again. I used to be involved with amateur dramatic societies and really enjoyed it. It was relaxing to spend an hour a week playing dress up with your friends and pretending to be someone else. I may also follow in my father's footsteps and attempt to write a pantomime. Maybe I'll direct a play.

- Get in shape. One day I'll probably be acting as an incubator to a human being and that will make my tummy swell to the point I'll have little pink lightning bolt style stretch marks all over. I would like to slim down as much as possible and enjoy a few good bikini years before the whole baby thing.

- Visit at least one of the following places, at the very least: New Zealand, Australia, USA (preferably for a road trip style holiday), Canada, Spain, Ireland. If you hit more than one, even better. Anything beyond that is just gravy. Also, take more trips/short breaks with friends like Kavos this summer. Find a nice mixture of travelling alone and travelling as part of a group. New Zealand is the most likely at this point in time - but if the changeover is in America, that technically kinda crosses USA off the list for the time being.

- Try your hand at journalism.

- Write some form of fanfiction, just for shits and giggles

- Get a job. Any job. I don't mind what, but I do know that I want to be working as soon as I am done with university. How else am I going to support some of the more expensive entries on this list such as world travel?

- A list I read featuring things to do suggested to write a song and put it out there. I'd like the idea of just recording a couple of songs with friends to contribute to the ever growing monster that is music. I miss singing. I want to get back into singing again, strengthen my voice and my lungs, and record a few songs... maybe even perform them live to an audience.

- Get involved with charity again. Do fundraising or donate each month. Something. In this world it's far too easy to forget these things

- Learn to cook. Ok, I will admit it. My cooking is pretty basic. I've been meaning to try to learn how to cook Chinese cuisine for some time and after university I shall probably try. I'll also look into interesting vegetarian recipes and maybe try to come up with my own. If I write them down I could create a vegetarian cookbook. Ha! Me with a fucking cookbook. It's actually a pretty funny idea. Actually, you know what? I'll try it.

- Try to write a vegetarian cookbook of your own recipes. If no one wants to publish it, which is probably what will happen, start a blog about it.

- Take up some sort of dance class. Come to think of it, future me, you've always been shit at dancing and learning how to move your own body might be good. Ballroom, salsa, whatever. It's cool. Just not disco. We tried that once. We quit after the first session. DEAR GOD, EVERYONE WAS WEARING DENIM AND DANCING TO COTTON-EYED JOE AND SEEMED TO ENJOY IT.

- Try to pay off your student debt as soon as possible. Good creddit, yada yada. Weight of debt forever looming until you do, yada yada. You get the point.

- Start writing/filming/creating short films and sketches. These can be for YouTube or to pursue a career in film. Anything! I'd love to direct my own film or TV show that I had written and was therefore there from the point it was created and seeing it through the whole process.

- Take up photography. It used to be something that you were so interested in. I'm not saying you have to do a course in it or anything but as long as you can see something pretty, hold a camera and press the right button it could be a nice way to spend your time.

- Buy cheap clothing/accessories and modify them, make them really personal. Like your Bauhaus shirt... but better.

- Read all the books on your "To Read" list. Maybe even do the challenge of setting yourself 50 books to read in a year and get through some of the classics you've neglected, and the books that have been lying around on your shelves for years that you said you'd get around to.

- Get back into writing poetry, maybe try and get a book of poetry published. Also support current poets and go to more poetry readings.

- Go canoeing.

- Try to learn how to make proper French style macaroons.

- Skinny dip again. Because it's fun and nudity is fun. FUN.

- Go to a gay pride parade or Slut Walk.

- Try to get over your fear of needles and give blood. You're Type O Negative. Not only do you share your blood type name with a band, but it can save a lot of lives.

- See if you can take up taiko drumming. Gotta love taiko drumming. You're shit at instruments but you can probably bang a big drum.

- Take up a sport, even if it's badminton in the back garden.

- Get into weightlifting with Hannah and get physically stronger.

- Take up bellydancing. It's something I've always wanted to do and I've not done any sort of bellydancing since my poor attempt at it on a coach on the way back to Cairo. That reminds me... if I ever get the chance to ride a camel again, I promise I won't scream a second time round. They're wobbly fuckers.

- Maybe try getting involved with the Cambridge Film Festival again. Last time was so much fun and it'd be a great experience.

- Plant a tree. Somewhere, anywhere. Just do it at least once.

- Spend more time with your family and pay for it. Take them out to dinner, do nice things and foot the bill. Lord knows they must have spent a fortune raising you.

- Help your sister revise so she can achieve great results in her exams. I know you were always worried she'd come along and outshine you but you love the little bugger so you really don't mind at this stage if she does.

- Host a themed party. Growing up I was known for throwing big scale themed parties. My Moulin Rouge! themed party was still the topic of conversation when I was leaving the town, about three years after the party itself. I threw three big parties, each having a theme. I'd kinda like to do it again. Maybe not on so grand and house-trashing a scale - that Moulin Rouge! party was great but we were still pulling beer bottles out of bushes years later.

- Get involved with local volunteer work.

- Take up meditation. I tried it in my teens and I probably just wasn't as emotionally mature back then to do it any justice. Even just one or two attempts will allow me to score it off of this bucket list.

- I know I've already discussed cooking, but why not try a cooking challenge? Like in the film Julie & Julia where the protagonist gave herself a year to cook every recipe in the Julia Child cookbook, I'd love to do that. It'd certainly whip me into shape and I could hold dinner parties, maybe get some feedback for my efforts.

- Further explore your family history to better understand your roots. 
- Try vlogging.

- Study a language. I've already studied French (A* at GCSE level, and then I took it all the way onto sixth form), Spanish (A at GCSE) and I also did Italian and Japanese (both without exams) and I'd like to either learn and revisit one of these or learn something completely new. Languages were always something I was good at.

- Get a tattoo. Well, this one is optional, but you've always liked them so I figured I'd put it on the list.

- Try yoga.

- Take photos and create beautiful scrapbooks full of memories. We seem to live in an age where having photos is all about putting them up online. Am I the only non-hipster who truly misses old Polaroids? I want to document this ol' life of mine in general, really. Hence vlogging.

- Try taking up art. I used to draw, I tried painting. I mean... why not?

- Go zorbing/zorbballing or whatever it's called.

- Try to climb a mountain - or as high as you can get with your vertigo.

- Get drunk at Disneyland. There. I said it.

------------

Well, on the basis that this list is getting long and I have a dreadfully short attention span I'm going to publish here. If I think of anything else later then I shall add it to the list. I'll refer back and hopefully blog along my journey of completing the things on this list. Like the film "Yes Man" I hope to enter into lots of new experiences simply by allowing myself to be/remain open-minded. After university I'm really hoping to do a lot of self exploration (no tacky masturbation jokes plz, kthnxbai) and having positive experiences.

p.s
Since my last post, a veritable mind dump though it was, I saw this and it was actually on a list of things to do before you're 25. It says:
'Try not to beat yourself up over having obtained a ‘useless’ Bachelor’s Degree. Debt is hell, and things didn’t pan out quite like you expected, but you did get to go to college, and having a degree isn’t the worst thing in the world to have. We will figure this mess out, I think, probably; the point is you’re not worth less just because there hasn’t been an immediate pay off for going to school. Be patient, work with what you have, and remember that a lot of us are in this together.'
True words. Hopefully one day this university experience will work out in my favour and I look forward to that day when it comes. 

Do you have a bucket list? What's on yours? Have you achieved anything? Let me know in the comments. 

Keep calm, and blog on.