Reading: Tina Fey: Bossypants     Tina Fey is pretty high in the Bookish Brunette list of icons (I’ll publish this list in full one day). She’s clever, funny and cool as hell. She also wears glasses and has brown hair – traits that make us, essentially, the same person.   Bossypants was in my pile of books that I was reluctant to read because everyone else was raving about them (see also: How to be a Woman by Caitlin Moran). In these cases, my inner contrarian acts out and I find myself willing to read anything, including the back of shampoo bottles and People’s Friend magazine, instead of what I really want to read.   I caved late one night and purchased Bossypants to read on my iPad. Oh my, this book is good. It is like an inspirational handbook for every nerdy and ambitious woman out there, though I don’t think Tina would agree with that. She’s too cool to try and tell people how to live their lives. The book recounts Tina’s childhood and her early days in improvisational comedy. She is honest and direct when it comes to her success in the male dominated TV industry. Her account of the Sarah Palin phenomenon is hilarious in how it depicts the madness of a TV juggernaut alongside her anxieties over planning her little daughter’s birthday party.   Tina Fey has worked her ass off the get where she is on her own terms. I plan to do the same. Thanks, Tina.   Michel de Montaigne: On Friendship   I blogged about this dude a while back, when I was pondering my own tendency to be “on the fence” about certain things. I picked up a copy of On Friendship from the book market on the South[.....]

    Grunge happened five years too early for me. My sister did it properly, what with her riot grrl friends who gave her tapes of Veruca Salt songs and had rainbow-streaked hair adorned with daisies*.   I came of musical age post-grunge and post-Brit Pop. To over intellectualise the issue, it was a time of musical flux. Britney was prancing about in her school uniform, Christina was writhing around in the sand and I was still wearing white knee socks and velvet Alice bands with my name piped on them in puffy pen. Pop was reigning supreme and I was not feeling it in the slightest. I‘d seen my sister grow up and thought she was pretty damned cool. So I decided to be an alternative indie rocker, just like she was.   It was a nice little identity to play with as a 14-year-old. The make up was glittery; the hair was dyed with pots of gloopy paste from the hippy shop and the nails where always black and always chipped. The tights and accessories were pretty awesome too.   Faux-fur and tiaras aside, the music really mattered to me. Music is still very much my radar, it is where I find myself when I’m losing sight of who I am and what matters to me.   Some of the albums from my teenage years have not aged well. A case in point: Tura Satana’s** All Is Not Well album (sample lyric: “In the back of their neck, I got a nickel plated flex-g and a right to dress sexy”). As a 15-year-old I considered this to be a masterpiece in rap-metal and feminism. As a 27-year-old, I consider it to be “a bit of a racket”.   I’m on a bit of a musical nostalgia trip this[.....]

  There has been lot of stuff that has baffled and bemused me this year. I kind of wish that I’d kept a list of all these things, it would have made writing this list easier and have resulted in a far superior piece of work. Well, there’s always next year…   1)    Downton Abbey: Not seen it, don’t want to see it. Bring back The House of Eliott, now that’s what I call a period drama.   2)    How Facebook is ever going to make any money: You don’t want to know how much of my time and energy has been wasted pondering this issue. Best solution? Fine users for the following infractions:   i.     Status updates that hint at political allegiances with the EDL ii.    Status updates whilst in labour iii.   Spelling “with” as “wiv” iv.    Stupid chain messages/statuses suggesting that I can help cure breast cancer by sharing my bra size and colour with all and sundry. It isn’t funny, it is just plain creepy.   There are more but I’ll stop there.     3)    That Fenton video on YouTube: It is an old dude chasing a dog through a park. I can watch my Dad doing something very similar on a daily basis.     4)    Thatcher “nostalgia”: Yes, she’s a powerful woman. This doesn’t mean that I should respect or give a shit about the heinous old cow.     5)    Why everyone suddenly became a current affairs pundit/satirist: I blame Twitter for this one. From Hackgate to Higgs Boson, everyone has suddenly decided that their opinions and gags are so important and hilarious that the WHOLE WORLD needs to read them. I really hope 2012 is a slow news year.     6)    The Kate Middleton look: Hurrah! Sloane for the 21st Century! That’s just what[.....]

    Reading   Googled: The End of the World As We Know It by Ken Auletta   The end of the world as we know it? Is it? Really? If it is, I feel fine. Obligatory REM gag out of the way, I must stress that I’m not really buying the whole “Google/Facebook/Twitter has changed the world” schtick. Yes, they’ve changed some people’s lives, but there are still people who genuinely don’t give a crap. Take my Dad – his world is very much like it was pre-Google. He gets up, has a cup of tea, takes the dog for a walk, reads a book about sharks or Nazis, watches a documentary about sharks or Nazis, has another cup of tea, plays with the dog, reads the Screwfix catalogue… …you get the picture. The only people for whom the world really has changed are Larry Page, Sergey Brin, Mark Zuckerberg and the dudes who invented Twitter whose names escape me. They are really bloody rich now and full of the smug satisfaction that comes with being told that you’ve “changed the world” on a daily basis. Bravo.   Everything “changes the world” now, just like every event is “historic” and every celebrity or handbag is “iconic”. I’m bored of it all. Here’s something that could change the world: perspective.   Rant over.   The subtitle is my only real beef with Auletta’s book; otherwise it is a really intriguing and inspiring story of how two nerds changed the internet (note: not “world”). His investigation is thorough and balanced, grilling Page, Brin and Eric Schmidt along with their rivals and former employees.   It is quite cute how utterly clueless, naïve and arrogant Page and Brin were when they first started out. They made rookie errors and had no idea[.....]

    Do you ever get the overwhelming urge to go out and dance? Put on a trashy frock and highly impractical shoes; spend an hour applying eye make-up before trying to squish a huge amount of stuff into a teeny-tiny bag?   I live the good life – it is all cocktails, fancy dinners, highbrow cinema, galleries and obscure indie artistes. It is all terribly grown-up and I love it. I just sometimes miss going out wearing a short skirt, strawpedoing a Smirnoff Ice and dancing to Flo-Rida.   I was never a wild-child. There was a six month period in 2005 when I went proper batshit crazy (another story, a never time), I’ll be honest: it was bloody hard work. The cost of the extra eye make-up remover alone was very off putting. In the main, wild nights out were a rare treat rather than a weekly event. That’s probably why, six years on, I’m still not bored of them.   Growing up near Wolverhampton has given me a warped perception of what constitutes a “wild night out”. It is a place where a cocktail comes served in a pitcher and contains four cans of Monster. The music tends to be of the R‘n’B/Cheese/Reef Place Your Hands variety. By hipster standards, it is a lot shit.   But who cares? I’ve had enough of standing around and “appreciating” the music, I’m fed up of seeing blokes with beards wearing chunky pullovers, discussing real ale and nu-folk. I want to get sweaty dancing whilst drinking cheap gin and tonic from a plastic beaker. I want to laugh at silly boys with silly haircuts wearing silly All Saints low-cut  t-shirts. I want to eat a sandwich from Subway at 2am and spend the next day sending and receiving texts of[.....]

  Top: Topshop Pleated miniskirt: Pimkie Yellow tights: Topshop Cardigan: H&M Bag: My Nan   This look was pulled together out of laziness and convenience (that’s how fashion I am). One of those, “I’m too busy to pick an outfit, so I’ll buy a new one instead’ looks. Actually, only the top and tights were new. The skirt was bought in France from shop called Pimkie, it is like a cross between Miss Selfridge and Peacocks, so not exactly haute couture.   The French high street is interesting, there doesn’t seem to be a middle ground. You either get cheap and cheerful “fun fashion” (that can also be a bit tacky) or very conservative and bland stuff. There was some gorgeous stuff in the department stores, especially by labels like Carven and Sandro but it was priced accordingly. There are probably some astute cultural observations that could be drawn from this, but I’ll save that for another day.   I wore this for a night at Atta Girl celebrating my friend Jimmy’s birthday. We did the usual dancing, drinking and eating chinese food at a ridiculous hour. Atta Girl was incredibly good – I particularly enjoyed dancing to TLC’s “No Scrubs” and  Hole’s “Violet”. The place was packed and the atmosphere was friendly, fun and feminist. I loathe how “fun feminism” has become a derogatory term used in certain quarters. Why the bloody hell can’t it be fun? You don’t suddenly wake up one day and decide “Oooohhh, I fancy some fun today, shall I go to Alton Towers or become a feminist?”.     The rubbish “summer” weather has made me reassess my views on opaque tights. If it is freezing and cloudy and a cardigan is required, then 80 denier is perfectly acceptable. I love the combination of[.....]

  Watching “Troubadours: The Rise of the Singer-Songwriter” on BBC Four last night made it very clear that I need a time machine.   I’d pack some floaty dresses, a dog with a bandana and plenty of floral hair garlands, I’d then drive over and pick up Alex before travelling to LA circa 1971.   We’d head to the Troubadour and watch Carole King then try to chat up James Taylor and Jackson Browne (mmmmm…1970s floppy haired boys with guitars…). I’d insist on heading up to Laurel Canyon, just to see what all the fuss was about. I’d also find out exactly how Carole managed to make a crew neck jumper and jeans look so good.   It would be the road trip to end all road trips. And we wouldn’t have to straighten our hair or even bother to brush it for, like, a whole week.   While I’m waiting for the time machine, I’ll make do with YouTube videos, ditching the straighteners and walking around with bare feet.   See you in 1971!   BBxxx