Kayley Hyde, not owlssayhooot

If you look up, you may notice that the URL for this blog is no longer owlssayhooot.blogspot.com, but rather kayleyhyde.blogspot.com. This is the second, first being my tumblr, change of this sort in my various social media outlets. I really like the video of consistency, I do, but in the past year or so, I've developed a bit of an issue with being constantly associated with owlssayhooot.  Also, prepare for a rather humiliating amount of self-indulgence and rambling on something you probably don't care about, but something I want to address. Now let's go back a bit...
I created this username when I was twelve years old. I liked the idea of owls, mostly due to Harry Potter and thought owlssayhoot was cute and clever (twelve years old, remember), so I went to make my new AOL instant messenger screenname. To my distress, owlssayhoot was taken, so I just extended the hoot to have three o's and called it good. Always being a creature of consistency to a certain extent, when I went to make a YouTube username in 2006, I used the same one and it was fine. Now, as you probably know, sometime between 2006 and now, the username and the person behind it (that's me) developed a bit of an internet reputation of sorts. Reputation is not the right word. Perhaps, recognition? I don't know. I'm not too great at self-reflection when it comes to what's taken place in my internet life. At any rate, I now have thousands of people who know me on the internet as owlssayhooot and while it's great that thousands of people care about what I do in my life…I have a bit of a confession: I don't really care about owls. I think they're really pretty, they are fascinating, I appreciate their associations with Harry Potter, but that's about it. I'm not some owl fanatic. I don't buy everything I see with owls on it. However, over the past few years, owls have become my 'thing' and like…I don't really know why. I mean. It's not like I talk about owls in my videos or make it a big deal, but the amount of owl paraphernalia I have received from not just people who watch my videos, but my friends and family, is rather insane. I'm not saying it's a bad thing, I must reiterate. Oh, my life is so hard, people give me things. No. I'm just saying that I don't know why it's always in the form of a creature I almost never talk about and just happened to put in a username. I like owls. Theyare probably my third favourite animal (after orcas and domestic dogs), but just... I don't love them. It leaves me believing that people like Khyan1 should be given things in the shape of the numeral one or MorganPaigeLoves to get…I don't know, hearts? I'm getting off-topic here.
It's common YouTuber practice to resent their username. I can assure to you that I am neither the first nor last person to be super annoyed with the offhanded choice made five years previously. But the least I can do is try to separate myself from it in the outlets I can change. YouTube usernames are set in stone, but others are not and I am just using that to my advantage. I've made a name for myself online and I'd just really like that name to be, well, you know, my name.
And now that I sound thoroughly annoying, I'm going to end this. I will not apologize, because I didn't make you read this, but I will say that I'm really not as much of a dick as I sound like in this blog. I'm a relatively pleasant person, I think. Generally. Maybe. You'd have to ask my friends. Actually, don't. That could end poorly for me. Okay. Catch me on kayleyhyde on the internet. Bye.

Reality

At what point should reality set in? Now, I'm not admitting to some existential crisis or trying to start some deep discussion, but sometimes things just don't feel real. You go about your day, something happens, you don't really experience it. Did that just happen? No, it couldn't have. It could be as easy as seeing a man run by in a chicken suit. There is that moment where your not sure if you were briefly lost in your own mind or if a man legitimately just ran by looking like poultry. Moments like these beg the answer to, forgive the admitted tumblr reference, what is reality? Reality is defined as 'the state of being real.' If we can't acknowledge reality, where are we? What are we? Surely reality exists even if we can't or won't admit it. Surely, despite your hesitation to believe it, that man did actually run by in that chicken suit. We cannot decide what is reality. Or can we? Can we convince our subconscious of things so much so that we can distort our own reality? Do we even have our own reality? One question after another, I know, but sometimes things happen and they don't feel real. That can't be real. I tell myself they aren't or that I will adjust to them, but I'm not certain that I can. Uncertainty plagues the subconscious that I try to distort and I'm left not knowing what to believe. Maybe that's a good thing. Maybe reality should constantly be in question. Maybe it's our job to keep it in check. Our job to decide what is real and what is not without the rules of definition or existence. If we continue to question all that is real, the world will always be a bit of a mystery. Maybe it's better that way. Maybe.

On missing dogs, books & scarves

The thing about living in London and having it be everything I've ever wanted and more is that it doesn't leave a lot of room for blogging. Or making videos, for that matter, which I'm sure you've noticed. I feel like I wear myself out so much that when I do have free time, I'd rather spend it relaxing, skyping and watching television. Go figure.  My creativity levels are incredibly low while I'm here. Not just writing and video, but also photography and drawing. I just have not spent time creating and while that is not something you push, it also troubles me quite a lot when I sit down and think, "alright, so that next video..." However, I am planning on setting aside all morning tomorrow to go through footage from the Netherlands and try to piece it together, as well as film a sort of catch-up vlog where I just talk about some of the things I've seen or don't in the last few weeks. It's a mix of theatre and film reviews, a couple experiences and a story or two, perhaps. So if all goes well, those will be up this week or next.
However, I thought I'd start out this creative surge by writing up a blog post tonight. Also, Marion has been amazing about blogging over here, which has motivated me this evening. I talked to my family yesterday for the first real time since getting here. I am really, really close with my family. If you have been following this blog, you will have seem my worries about missing birthdays and all of the sort of thing. Well, last night was the party for my youngest cousins birthday and even though I was extraordinarily nervous to see if I would just sort of break down on skype, it was really nice. It felt like I was there, which is not something I can say I ever feel on skype with my friends. It's strange how that happens. However, the moment my dogs came on screen, I barely kept it together. I talked a long time ago about how insane it is that people even get pets. We grow so attached to them and they live such short lives, but for those few years, they give you such joy. It really is incredible. But yes, seeing my dogs was hard and it took a couple hours of recovery after that. Overall, I think it was something that had to happen, so that I could get it out of my system. I miss them and thinking about them for too long makes me tear up a bit, but they still know my voice, so it's alright.
Now yesterday, you may have seen me tweeting to ask about secondhand bookshops here in London. I haven't ever really been to too many over here, so I thought I'd remedy that since I had no plans today. For those of you who don't know, which is perhaps everyone, I collect editions of The Hobbit. Whenever I go to a used bookshop, it is the first thing I look for. So I just decided to go on a little journey to find one, since I almost always come across Tolkien's work in secondhand shops. But that was not the case. I walked all the way down Charing Cross Road (about 10 shops), a shop on Gloucester Road, a shop on Euston, a couple Oxfam's...I pretty much exhausted every twitter suggestion. No hobbit's to be found outside of a lovely copy of Return of the King, which I probably would have picked up if I hadn't been in the early hours of my hunt; eager to find what I was actually looking for. So. That was a bust. That coupled with the fact that on this quest, I lost the scarf I purchased this morning to keep warm, I'd say today was a bit of a failure.
In retrospect, I think the last two days have been necessary. This experience has been so good. Sometimes you need shit things to happen to even life out a bit. Other than those minor setbacks, everything is going well. I'll try and write a blog with the happy stories sometime soon, but I sort of want to save that for the video I'm making soon. Until then, though, I will leave you with this picture of my friend Khyan in the Netherlands. Because. Um. Because of reasons.

 

Flights taken this year: 20.

you do me good

 

 

Sorry for the lack of updates, but I'm happy here. I've kept myself overwhelmingly busy; more than ever before. Downtime for things such as blogging has been minimal. But when I have the time to share an adventure, I'll be sure to return. Until then, these are flashes of a Thames River cruise I went on last week. For a couple different ones, click here. Until next time. x