Carrot soupy soup

Made a carrot soup. It was ace.

VROOOOOOOM!

I've got a bath going on so this'll be a short post.

There isn't a single programme I'm subjected to (I say subjected as its never my first choice) more than Top Gear. Its not necessarily a bad thing, because I dont hate it, far from it in fact.

Its the presenters. I dont follow general concensus of "Jezza Clarkson is a tosser-tory-titbag". He is, but I actually quite like the fact that he's a self-realising bonehead.

I flush at the thought of James May, decked in his lovely patterned shirts and deceptively foppish hair. Sometimes I even dream of being married to someone like him. Mmm, thats quite embarassing really isn't it?

Its The Hamster. He's not as good at acting as the others (and thats saying something), so he irritates me interminably in Top Gear specials. But its not that that irritates the most. Its one thing; his necklace. Or more specifically, the fact that his top two buttons are always undone to reveal it. Thats it really.
 

John Grant and the sunshine.

I'm going to see John Grant tonight! I suggest you look him up if you dont know who he is. His album, Queen of Denmark is my favourite of the year so far. Check out the Guardian review of it here because they know longer words and are better at adjectives than I am.

I'm excited not only to see John Grant (he has a Twitter page by the way) but because we're walking along the beautiful quayside to The Sage, my favourite of venues. Its lovely outside, I got a bit pink in the face eating my Bran Flakes this morning in the garden.

Just have to decide what to wear now....skins being an arse so I've taken antihisthamines but they've knocked me drowzy. Gonna slap some hydrocortison on and hope I dont look a mess.

T'ra

Fatboy

I know I'm months behind in saying this but WHHHHHHHHHHYYYYYYYYYYY????

The (not) Happening

Picked that picture from the The Happening as it perfectly sums up how I felt after watching the film.

The thing about The Happening is, well, nothing really happens.

Film starts, Marky Mark (sarky science teacher) and Zooey Deschanel (Zooey Deschanel) escape the city when an unknown toxin is released into the air causing everyone in contact with it to attempt suicide. MM and ZD get on their way and end up getting lumped with John Leguizamo's kid (he goes a bit mental and leaves it then goes a bit more mental and kills himself) and they somehow end up in a crazy old ladies house whilst trying to avoid the toxin. And thats it. Oh and then they somehow end up back at home with an adopted daughter and a pregnancy on the way at the end.

Deschanel for all her indie charisma is barely present even when the producers try to get their money's worth,  inserting some weird storyline about her having 'teeramasooo' (her pronunciation, not mine) with a colleague. Her laserbeam eyes are perfect for watery close up emotional shots, but they were massively overused. I felt a bit misled by her presence after thinking 'oooh thats Zooey Deschanel, this'll be good'. Whalberg has a go at comedy, but he's not entirely convincing.  Still, he's moderately engaging and likeable and you do (sort of) want him to guide his missus and the kid to safety.

 Also on the 'massively overused' list were boring shots of trees blowing in the wind. The storyline emerges as plants (fucking plants!) are revealed as being the murderous culprits. Queue endless shots of trees blowing ominously in the wind with over dubbed whooshy noises (to signify the distribution of the toxin) to add to the tension. The plants, apparently angry at the human infection of the planet have created and distributed and then promptly stopped (exactly 24 hours later, those clever plants!) the evil poison in the North Eastern region of America.

You know what? The film was so boring that I'm sick of describing it. I have created this pie chart for you people who prefer graphical interpretation.

Stupid Skin

My skin has persisted in being a pain in the arse for at least 3 weeks now and been irritated, inflamed, dry, peeling and generally a tit most of the time.

I normally use Astral for 'Mature and changing skin' according to their website. I suppose my eczema-ridden skin could be similar to older people's its certainly weak, left paper-thin under my eyes and around my mouth from steroid cream use in my youth. I find Astral to be greasy enough to cope with the dryness and not perfumed enough to avoid irritance.

I tried to get the boyfriend to join me in my face mask session today but he wasn't impressed. See photo to the left. I used a Montagne Jeunesse mango and rasberry cleansing mask then buffed to get rid of the flaky gross bits.

I suppose the best bit about any face mask is the letting-it-dry-then-cracking-it bit so I took care to watch all of Bargain Hunt before visiting the bathroom mirror so see myself crack like a crumbling statue. It was so satisfying. My skin feels much better too.

Thank you Montagne Jeunesse. I feel a bit more human now.

One for the ladies.

 

When I saw Janet Street Porter sat behind the panel with Denise, Colleen et al on Loose Women I'll be straight with you, I was gutted.

I've always loved JSP for what seems like forever admiring her brutal honesty and coarse capability of taking the piss out of herself. I loved her on that Gordon Ramsey programme not just for her passion for the subject of sustainable farming but through her capacity to shut the twat up.

I've been making and effort to watch it to see if somehow she's augmented the collaborative IQ of the panel into verbalising something other than the whinging, seeping, bitter, righteous nonsense it normally does. I'm a bit undecided so far. We've seen less of juvenile Carol McGriffin, but more of wacky, perma-pissed mentalist Sherie Hewson.

Thing is about McGriffin, although caustic, she doesnt seem as begrudging of general fun times as the rest of them do. Andrea McClean is a horsey non-entity, struggling with regimenting the disruptive pupils in the class akin to leaving a prefect in charge of a bottom set.

The news that Colleen Nolan is set to leave should come as gratifying to both Mclean and co-controller Kate Thornton as her cattish wisecracks were often voiced in the direction of less confrontational members of the panel such as themselves.

Set to leave to 'pursue other projects' (that always sounds really ominous) we can only assume that Nolan is aspiring to become a full time novellist as her recent book 'Envy' (similar to Nicole Ritchie's The Truth about Diamonds, or any of Jordan, sorry, Katie Price's shit) penned in a similar pseudo-reality style became a best-seller.

My favourite Loose Woman by far is Denise Welch, who I personally relate to in far more ways than any of the others. An open sufferer of mental health issues, and a fellow Geordie, I've always found her down-to-earth even in the midst of being a recovering alcoholic and cocaine addict. I even had a sly 'Gan on Son!' at her husband Tim Healy standing up for her ("She's 54 and got four jobs ye'knaa!") when continual cock-end Jason Gardiner criticised her on Dancing on Ice.

I'm hoping in the absence of Colleen, the addition of Janet, standards such as Denise and guest presenters such as hilarious Sarah Millican, there's hope for intelligent discussion on Loose Women yet.

Maybe.

Brilliance

Like any passionate girlfriend I think my boyfriend's the best at music. But instead of being completely biased, I look at him objectively and say, yes, he really is the best at music.

So maybe you should listen. It might make your life better. It has mine.

Is this the end of the music video?

Robo-voice. Check. Stepford grin. Check. Less attractive friends to star in the video with. Check.

So did her parents pay for this or what? This is totally the next super-sweet-sick-16 present isn't it? It used to be 'Daddy, I want a pony!' then it was 'Daddy I want a car!' followed by 'Daddy, I want Beyonce flown over to personally sing happy birthday to me!' now its 'Daddy! Make me Beyonce!'

And who wrote the song? Its laughably poor but catchy as fuck. Its subliminally drilling the message of fun into my brain. I hate people that happy. Fucking lunatics! Seriously, next week you'll find me cross-eyed, chiming 'FUN!FUN!FUN!' at everyone smirking like a baby who's just filled their nappy.

It's the rapper I feel sorry for. Little did he know this mess would go viral. Mwah ha ha! (Evil laugh) Thats the price of selling your soul.  Actually does anyone know who he is?

Layer Cake (of crap)

I'll give you 5 reasons Layer Cake is shit.


Its full of crap unecessary accents. Faaaakhing 'ell, laaawds a Cockney geezers are stereotyped as inept Delboy style wheeler-dealers. Terrible Essex accents for both fick slaag played by Sienna Miller and her tit of a boyfriend (Ben Whishaw). Generic Northern gangsters from Liverpool, generic Eastern European gangsters from er, Eastern Europe and top of the pile sits a generic posh London mob boss. Then there's sloany Daniel Bond, I mean Craig (I'll expand on this later).


Its unpleasingly easy to follow: So Daniel Craig is explaining to his mates what just happened, and up pop cut aways of what just happened, editied silently over him explaining what just happened. Eh? How stupid do they think the audience is? If Daniel Craig says 'so I called him and he was out with X'  we dont then need to see a shot of Daniel Craig calling him and seeing him being out with X.

Daniel Craig: I might be mean in saying this, as you can say an actor is only as good as the script he's given, but fuck is he wooden in this. The delivery of lines, the pensive looks, the furrowed brow, the dramatic movement...eugh. Plus its pretty obvious that he used this in his audition-reel for the James Bond role.

Casting: Daniel Craig ok; passable at best. Tom Hardy, he was invisible which I guess is good.. Ben Wishaw...talented Ben Whishaw? Whats he doing in this shit? Sienna Miller as an Essex tart? About as convincing as seeing her down Faces with the cast of The Only Way Is Essex on a Saturday night.
However, the icing on the cake has to be the casting of Professor Dumbledore himself as Don London. Michael Gambon, however accomplished an actor, must know he'll always be recognized as Dumbledore. THEY HAVE THE SAME VOICE!
Still, they also hired George Harris (Kinglsey Shacklebolt - Also Harry Potter alumni) so at least they can Obliviate the audience's memories after seeing them in such a shit film.

The Omission of Danny Dyer: I thought he was standard in shit like this? I missed his little face. 

Current Listening.

Close your eyes and listen.

Comedy at any cost.

Someone pointed me in the direction of a particularly vile anti-athiesm video on YouTube yesterday and the instant reaction was to balk at the appaling ignorance of the woman in the video. I'm not going to post the link because I'm unconvinced at the latter claims it was made by a satirical comedy group, and also because even if it is satire, its still pretty bad form to use the Japanese disaster as a rod to poke fun at Christians. 


Anyway, video goes as such, Christian woman claims to have proof that him upstairs (for the record, I am an athiest) is listening as he has answered her prayers given at the beginning of Lent. Her prayers, she divulges, were that she hoped that athiests would be 'shook to their core' into becoming beleivers. It is worth noting (just to build up a better picture) this woman whispers the word athiest like athiesm is akin to heroin addiction and resembles a putty-faced moomin.


Her prayers have been answered she claps, and athiests will be enlightened by the 'power of god'. Gleefully chiming that if the earthquake and tsunami were the result of a few days of solid prayer, what could be next for those terrible athiests? 

The video has since been removed from YouTube but a bit of hunting and you'll find it. The comments (as I read them last night when the video was available) are fairly telling, and with around a 99.9% swing of commenters blasting the woman in a swathe of insults. There are calls of blasphemy from different Christian sects, people wishing death (and worse) upon her, and quite a large amount of people advising psychological evaluation. 


This pattern of comments was repeated after my friend on Facebook posted the video and then one at the bottom;
 "chill out, its an elaborate satire on religious nutjobs, check out her other videos"

That comment could be right. It could be satire. But if you can't tell its satire, and its still offensive, is it really satire at all?

That Martin Kemp\Marco Pierre White\Bernard Matthews mess.

Who commissioned this mess?

It smacks vaguley as a scene from The Sopranos. Mafia boss turns up at restaurant of chef who owes him a favour. Chef, quitely shitting it tries to diffuse the situation by rambling on woodenly about the benefits of turkey. Mafia boss sinisterly eats said turkey. Chef makes a misjudged joke about mafia boss's wife's cooking. Think we all know the outcome.

Its like it was borne from that scene from that Alan Partridge episode where he's desperately pitching shit TV ideas at David Schneider.You can imagine hims saying it... "Jet from Gladiators to host a millenium barn dance at Yeovil aerodome or how about Marco Pierre White, famous chef and Martin Kemp from 80's pop group Spandau Ballet discussing the benefits of turkey. MONKEY TENNIS!"

Basically, I think its shit.

Existential Crisis

The eternal debate. Tea or Coffee. Do I stay true to my British roots and enjoy a comforting cuppa, or do I take a leaf (or granule) from my American and European cousins and choose a hot shot of Java?

The Boyfriend has only ever had filter coffee from a cafetiere in his life since his parents (unusually for misguided English people) never had instant coffee in the house. Quite drastically different to my only experience, which was from an early age was that coffee was a disgusting bitter and salty drink only grown-ups drank. This I assume was only because my parents, well my Dad really, bought cheap instant freeze dried stuff from the supermarket. My Mum has the same anxiety issues I have, and cut caffeine out of her diet about 10 years ago, I didnt follow suit as I had no problems at the time, but it added another reason for me to avoid it.

Make no bones about it, tea is an institution in Great Britain. Its the first thing we drink in the morning to wake us up. Its the first thing we do when we get in and sit on the sofa. Its a social drink (I just made 8 cups of it at my Grans when I went round to drop her birthday presents.),  it's comforting, and it feels like home. I've always been tea girl. Strong, plenty of milk and no sugar. And I never thought my allegiance would waver. That is until I felt sorry the boyfriend drinking the salty bitter crap I'd bought from Lidl because it was £1.79 for a massive jar.

Sainsbury's cafe yesterday had bags of filter coffee on special for 50p so I bought one and then realised it would be useless without buying a cafetiere to prep it in. I bought that one above from Sainsbury's and eneded up pissed off at it being shockingly over priced at £6.50 even though it was the cheapest.

Up to now, I think coffee tastes shit, instigates panic attacks and leaves me out of pocket. So why do I persist with it? I'm not really sure, I guess I always thought it was one of those tastes that I would develop as my palete matured like red wine or olives, but it never did. I can definately taste the difference between instant and filter coffee and definately prefer the latter (with 3 sugars) but I still have a sneaky feeling I might be kidding myself. But I won't give up. Never!

Adam Lambert ruins my evening.

Had to write about this grotesque freakshow. At my Mums so nothing much to watch on TV.

I've just have the bad luck to turn on the horrorshow that is American Idol. Panel consists of one dehydrated sea turtle (Steven Tyler) one smug cartoon toad (Randy 'DAAAAWWWG' Jackson) with a Malteser for a head and one frozen robo-female (Ryan Seacrest...I joke,I joke).

The contestants come out grinning with glazed eyes like their full of opiates, miming to some horrific Michael Jackson medley, desperately trying to compensate by eyeing the camera up sluttily for the painful attention-demanding vocal riffs that the pre-recorded track does not allow them to scream. Shame really because the frenzied battle of who could sing the loudest or most audacious run of notes inspired such levels of cringe in me that it often forced me to turn off.

Adam Lambert was introduced by tiny mole-man Ryan Seacrest as mid-show 'entertainment' and the true heinous nature of the programme dawned on me. Its self-perpetuation means that potentially, this show could renew itself forever. A new judging panel here, a shake up of the format there, all supported by thrusting the artists that didnt win (strange thought, I thought winning was the point?) upon the audience in arrogant self justification. Its like a self multiplying bacterium, festering on the audience infecting all aspects of their media consuption. AI tours, AI on the radio, AI on the TV etc.

Adam Lambert sounded like like someone was squeezing his ballsack as his 'performance' (screaming) went on. Excruciating is an understatement. Adam advised after his song that the proceeds from the remix of his single (Why just the remix? Stingy bastard.) were to be dontated to the charity behind the 'It Gets Better' campaign. Adam, if you're reading this, I sincerely hope it does get better. Nice cause and all but how about next time you do us all a favour and do a sponsored silence?

Anyway. Point is, we're all doomed.

Rain

Its pissing down today. Spent the day watching DVD episodes of Police Squad with the boyo. Also learned chords E and A on the guitar.

Awaiting pick up from the mother to be taken to dinner at the lovely Ridley Arms in Morpeth. Today's bargain beauty dress is courtesy of Pearl Lowe for Peacocks and is an Ossie Clarke inspired number.  (see picture)

Dressing it up with a Paul Smith Trench my ex bought me a few years back and down with a pair of bright pink Primark pumps.

Think this might be my shittest blog update so far. Sorry world. Actually its only me who reads this so sorry to me. I'm going to stick my head in the oven now!

Effort needed.

I need to get ready to go out tonight but sitting staring desperately at the computer or the TV (which is on CBBC and on mute) is winning over painting my nails. Every time I look at the clock on my computer its mockingly advanced another 10 minutes whilst I, sitting in a beach towel and not much else get increasingly irritated.

All I have to do is paint said nails (Barry M - Noir), moisturise (Nivea Rich Nourishing with almond oil) shove some clothes on (eugh no idea...but maybe the A-line bargain leopard print £10 dress) and paint my face. Thats the hardest bit. I'm allergic to mushrooms and some sneaked into my food rendering my face bulbous and gross. Once the face went down, my skin was awful and peeled like a snake, or someone with bad psoriasis. So yeah, trying to slap er, slap on with a crusty face is pretty bad. I end up looking like an old hag at the back end of a chemical peel.  Maybe thats why I'm putting it off. To escape the inevitablilty of looking shit.

So writing this has what, shaved another 15 minutes from my getting ready time. Brilliant.

Petulance

Watching C4's The Model Agency. John the model booker's just flounced out because colleagues said good morning to him in a manner he didnt like and told him to 'turn his frown upside down' (those hateful BITCHES!)

For someone in a coveted role, for which I am assuming he worked as an unpaid intern first, and probably completed a fashion degree, I cant really understand how he could jepordise his career so easily. I mean, I have no idea how it will turn out for John (thats episode 4) but the inner Sherlock Holmes makes me suspect that  he could have engineered the situation to get more camera time. 

He obviously would have anticipated the fall out with colleagues surviving on barely minimum sleep and an increasingly fraught schedule. The argument with Carole and Chris was irritatingly sad,  by the end of it they were screaming  and livid at each other and had seemed to forget that it was John that had dicked them over.

Anyway, he'll be last weeks fish-wrap this time next week when I'm whinging about some new plonker on The Model Agency.

Charlie bloody Sheen

Why is this man getting so much media attention for what basically seems like some sort of mental health crisis?

I know he has passed four sequential drug tests but isnt this something unrelated to current drug use?

Recently fired from Two and a Half Men Sheen declared (while weilding a machete) that he was going to cut (Two and a Half Men producer's) head off in front of his kids. That threat followed claims (and evidence) given by his ex wife alleging that he threatened to behead her if she didnt give him custody of their kids, Bob and Max. (I'm saying nothing about those names....) Now if this weren't a person of note, wouldnt he be in prison for making threats to kill?

Moreover, why does the media perpetuate his egotistical self image by publishing more and more trivial stories about him and his shit life? I'm not one normally to put the world to rights but this really has me puzzled.
 

Precious

I've fallen in love with a cat from the Dog and Cat shelter.

<- This is Precious. I think I love her not only because she's called Precious, but also because she was like a stone overweight when she was sent to the shelter and she's been on a massive diet.

I'm going to go see her on Saturday to see if she loves me back.