How is everyone feeling since the announcement of another lockdown here in England?

I’ve been a little down about it myself as the idea of being stuck indoors all day again isn’t a particularly appealing one, but then I tried to look at it from a different perspective as I like to try and find the positives in situations if I can.

I’ll have more free time on my hands again which will allow me to focus on a few projects that have been somewhat neglected. Plus I can use the time to start taking better care of myself, something that also often gets neglected.

I’m hoping to get some writing done and that being cooped up won’t crush my inspiration and motivation as it sometimes does. But if I do have a down day I’m going to allow myself to take care of myself, and then pick things up the next day. All feelings are valid and I find it’s always better to process them than to try to block them out or bottle them up.

Are there any projects of things that you are planning to work on during this lockdown?

What do you love most about Halloween?

I’m going to have to say the atmosphere. With the days growing shorter I enjoy the eerie quiet and stillness of October darkness, as a stark contrast to the lively and warm evenings of summer.

Plus there is just a feeling of fun and all things weird are celebrated around Halloween (and being rather weird myself I very much enjoy this). Not to mention that the comfy clothes and cosy blankets come out, which is perfect to snuggle up under while hiding from a horror movie!

There’s something fun and exciting about being spooked on Halloween, and I think it’s because we get to do it on our own terms, to whatever degree we can handle and can therefore enjoy it! Horror mazes are a good example of this. (Oh and there’s also FrightFest which is one of my favourite UK film festivals.)

It’s a shame that we aren’t going to be able to experience Halloween in the same way this year because of Covid-19 but there are still ways to feel part of it and enjoy the atmosphere. Get involved with my #DuvetGhostChallenge on Instagram and Twitter for some laugh out loud silly fun! You can also get cooking or baking and see what seasonal delights you can whip up. There’s been some really good ideas floating around on how to keep trick-or-treating alive, from putting up spooky posters or pumpkins and parents taking their own sweets to give to kids when they spot one on their socially distanced Halloween walk, right through to having up sweets outside your house as part of the decorations!

So even though we can’t do what we normally would, there are still lots of ways to have fun. Keep an eye on my blog as I’ve got a post coming up where I review a spooky DIY at home escape room...

What are your plans for Halloween this year? I’m going to have a movie marathon with snacks and spoon myself silly!

There are currently two missions available to play. The Heist - Vol. 1: Chasing Hahn, and The Heist - Vol. 2: The Silk Road. I was lucky enough to be given the chance to play both missions so I could review them, so a big thank you to The Escape Game team for that! In volume 1 you work as a secret agent, helping International Police to uncover the true identity of an infamous art thief before another masterpiece goes missing; and then in volume 2 you pick up where you left off to find and capture him after reports of him dealing with artefacts related to the Silk Road.

As the story of the games goes in order it makes sense for me to talk about volume 1 first, but do stick with me right through to the end or my review! The first thing that you will need to do is create an account which is good because the game will store your progress so that any internet issues won't mean having to start over. This also is where I encountered my first issue though, this platform and game is very much designed for people in the USA. For some reason I was asked to provide my zip code, I'm not sure why it was needed for this if I'm honest and I wasn't able to leave it blank. I also couldn't enter mine because being based in the UK I don't have one and my UK one contains letters so wasn't accepted, I just made one up in the end.

Once I was in it was easy to enter my activation codes which allow me to play the games, and then I could get started! It's all really well themed and the dashboard is easy to navigate and looks great. It also flows really well and it's just fun, not taking itself too seriously. There were a couple of minor glitches like the clearing itself when trying to submit to see if you're correct, so we had to remember what answers we'd put to retype the correct ones, and you can't close the suspects ID without refreshing the dashboard, but these really didn't bother me too much.
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information about it or how to get involved in it then click Minute Monologue in my website menu bar at the top!

​I'm really happy because yesterday we had our first live Q&A on Instagram with the awesome platform that is WeAudition! We talked all things casting and discussed what things might be like and how the casting process may change after lockdown because of Covid19. We also chatted about what each of our platforms do to help actors. It was fantastic to engage with both of our communities and to be able to answer some of their questions. I'm grateful to Darren for joining me to talk. The video is on the IGTV section of the @MinuteMonologue Instagram proflie if you'd like to watch it later.

I'm hoping that we will be able to do lots more live chats on Instagram and keep growing a friendly and pro-active acting community on there, as well as sharing advice, opportunities, casting calls and workshops! It's so awesome to see casting directors, agents and directors starting to join in and follow the feed, I really do hope that the initiative will help people to achieve their goals and get work in this industry. ​