"I wanna be a billionaire....

SO FREAKIN' BAD!"

Oh my gosh I am so poor it's untrue.

Now as a student, one is always joking about being poor 24/7, but obviously, joking about it normally means you are actually not that poor, but have dollar for things like cereal, bread, beer, and y'know, the necessities.

But no, really, I am poor. and by poor I mean SKINT. I have £10 in my bank which my poor mother has had to put in to save me from FURTHER bank charges for going over my overdraft! (I kidd you not, the bank CLEARLY do not sympathise with my situation!) PLUS I can't even get to the bank because I can't afford bus fare! seeeeriously how poor can one person be?

Thank God I'm getting paid tomorrow or else I would be in biiiig trouble. Rent comes out on saturday and If I don't have le funds for that I am in serious shizzle.

Thank goodness for parents, they really do save your life.

So I know this is not an excuse for failure to blog, but it does mean that my social life at the moment is fairly non-existant! (unless you count making friends at spinning class or meeting older friends for £1.19 McFlurries at the local McD's?)

The gym has saved me from staying in the house all day, every day, as I have already paid for my membership so technically it's free! and plus, I guess I must be getting fitter so there might even be a plus side to my poorness??

My friend Soph came over yesterday and I took her on a (budget) tour of my hometown (Oxford for those of you who haven't read my profile ;])

It was really lovely and we walked for miles, visiting some of the colleges and having HUUUUUGE lunches in quaint little pubs. Was really fun!

Here are some pictures from the day (I warn you, we are total losers)








Also, I ventured into London the other week with my friend Tiff, where we wandered around Covent Garden, ate paella and ran through Ruislip in the pouring rain, getting splashed by cars. It was awesome.











Our dinner on the bus:


mmmm healthy.

Time for tea?

My life at the moment = work > gym > food > sleep

and not much inbetween.

As I have nothing interesting to blog about I will leave you with this picture of Lady Gaga from her Twitter account. I love her. (this is currently my My blackberry background pic)

Supersize Me!

Quote from this week's Fashion Statement.

QUOTE OF THE WEEK
"She's an amazing model. She can make herself look bigger or smaller depending on what the client wants"

Crystal Renn's agent responds to speculation that she has been deliberately slimming down. And claims some pretty amazing skills on her behalf.

Amazing model or the incredible hulk? HOW IS THIS POSSIBLE?

If she's lost weight, why don't her agency just admit that and we can all get on with our lives knowing that she's human and does give in to media pressure after all?

Blockage, of the creative kind

Image from here.


Argh, don't you hate when you're having one of those days where you seem to be in a dreamland, drifting in and out of reality but not really absorbing or taking anything in?! Well I'm having one of those days today, and it's driving me crazy!

I have so many things to think about at the moment, that for some reason my brain has decided to shut down and instead, allow only one thought at a time, which means I am unable to have any kind of coherent conversation with anybody or anything.

I had problems with my bank this morning as well which made me super frustrated and depleated and as a result I have really achieved nothing today. And have eaten only one food group. the bad kind. (carbs and lots of them) eshhh.

I have a spinning class tonight which should hopefully release some endorphines and make me feel more awake. either that or it will kill me and I will be limping for the next few days. not sure what the outcome will be actually. hmm.

More updates tomorrow when I am feeling human again.

Ohh p.s rented out Paris, Je t'aime from the library! can't wait to get lost in that later.

Au Revoir xoxo

Happy Independence Day to everyone in the US ! :) xoxo





Picture from the Washington Post

and the Size Zero debate rages on...

So there I was reading my bible of the month, Fashion Statement (the Guardian's fashion news weekly e-newsletter) and I came across another wonderful 'Quote of the Week', this time, from Julien Macdonald, designer and Britain's Next Top Model celebrity judge.

....

QUOTE OF THE WEEK

Or perhaps Anti-Quote of the Week, from new Britain's Top Model judge Julien Macdonald:

You can't have a plus-size girl winning - it makes it a joke. It's not fair on them - you're setting them up for a fall. They are looked down on, they're frowned upon. A catwalk model is a size six to eight. If you're a size 14 in a room full of size eights, you're in the wrong room.

How about you make it the RIGHT room then? Gosh, we wonder who could possibly have the power to change this. Oh, we know, maybe a FASHION DESIGNER?

A pretty poignant quote, if ever there was one. Sad thing is, I find it hard to disagree with him. Being a size 12-14 myself, I live for the day when 'curvier' (whatever that means) women take centre stage on the catwalk, and for the industry to accept 'normal sized' women into their exclusive bubble of glamorousness. HOWEVER I have to agree that this is not the reality at the moment, and if a plus-size model was to win BNTM, I can't see her getting the same work that a size 6 winner would be given, nor can I imagine the fashion/media industry taking said winner seriously.

I do agree with FS when they say that fashion designers are the ones to change this stereotype, so for Julien to say the above comment seems a bit judgemental and not exactly open-minded.

Look at Crystal Renn, the 'plus-size' (yep, still in inverted commas) model who is taking the fashion industry by storm, even the skinny people love her.(!)

Renn made her debut modelling at Mark Fast's A/W 2010 show, and since then has appeared on countless tv shows in America and the UK, and has been featured in gazillions of women's magazines, mostly as a poster-girl for the anti-size zero campaign, which rages on.

However, recently it has been suggested that Renn has had a dramatic weigh-loss, seen here on Fox News' entertainment site.

So does this mean that Julien Macdonald may be talking some sense after all? If beautiful models like Renn are already feeling the pressure to slim down and become more like their waif counterparts, does this make the whole plus-size model a sham?

Like Sophie Dahl before her, it seems a shame that Renn has felt the need to lose weight, given her catwalk success,and having entered into a domain no 'real-size' women has ventured into for some time.


Photo by Nicholas Routzen seen here.

"I'm very athletic...people don't believe me...maybe 'cos I weigh 240 pounds"

HELLO!

Wow, officially the busiest 2 days ever!

So friday came along and I tottered off to Laaandan town for my meeting with the lovely Sarah and Mark from Idol! (check out the website here, or go here to buy some of their lovely clothes sold exclusively in New Look)

After a huuuuuge coffee from Starbucks I found their office in East London and had a wonderful meeting with the team, who asked me to do some writing for them, which is awesome! so I was a very happy bunny after that :D

You might have seen Idol in New Look stores (300 across the country!) and if you haven't, pop down to New Look NOW and check them out, because their clothes are awesome. My personal fave (which I am wearing right now...might be a bit sweaty after countless tube journeys around London...) is this wife-beater style tank top, with a skull motif and distressed detail on the back, and silver bits on the front, which I love.


so yeah, check it out!!

So anyway, after the interview I went to this Monsoon sample sale down Tottenham Court Road, which was crazily hot but worth it! I came away with a high-waisted skirt (kids 12-13 size...don't tell anyone!) a red rope waist belt and a pair of black platforms (for a tenner!) all for £22. The best part is that all proceeds from the sale (which ended yesterday...sorry guys!) go to the Monsoon and Accessorize Trust, which aims to help women and children in disadvantaged parts of Asia, by working with local communities and seamstresses to make clothing for the company. It's an amazing charity and knowing that my £22 was going towards helping people who need it most made me feel much less guilty about delving further into my overdraft!

I also took a brief trip to Topshop Oxford Circus (to use the toilet if i'm perfectly honest) but ended up buying some gorgeous sandals which I put on to relieve my high-heel bitten feet, only to find that I couldn't walk in them as they kept falling off my feet! Cue some embarassing limping down Oxford Street until I could find a suitable place to put my heels back on!

So a fail on all accounts!

All this limping and sample-sale shopping had made me ravenous so I took the tube to High Street Kensington to go to what I like to call my personal Mecc, AKA Whole Foods. AM-AZ-ING food, some incredibly healthy, some not so much! (their gluten-free vanilla cupcakes are to die for!)

If you haven't been to Whole Foods by now, GO GO GO! It's worth a trip to London if you don't live there and Kensington is a nice place to have a wander round anyway, so it's a win-win situation :D

I bought this lush salad box...there are rows and rows of salad-box fillers, from every type of rice you can imagine to noodles, and ahhh gosh, EVERYTHING! It's amazing, I know I sound really sad, but trust me on this!

And last night I watched Star Trek (2009) which was brilliant, really funny (mostly thanks to Simon Pegg) and totally gripping. I would recommend it to everyone. Plus, Chris Pine, who plays Captain Kirk Jr, is hot hot hot. Even is you hate sci-fi, watch it just to admire his beautiful face.

Right now i'm listening to Radio 1 DJ Nick Grimshaw's(another one of my fave people) interview with Beth Ditto of The Gossip from Thursday's show. She is hilarious! Listen here for the full interview, it's so funny, worth a listen for sure!

In case you were thinking, this is where my blog title has come from. genius!

I'm super excited to start my West Wing marathon tonight...have rented out the boxset (form the library....go me) and plan to absorb myself in it for the rest of the summer. God bless the library for providing me with mindless entertainment I can't afford to buy!

OH and I got the Monsoon job! YAY :D x

Love this :)

I have a new respect for karaoke now!

Who ate all the pies?

So i'm sitting here, somewhere in rural England, eating ice-cream, watching Brideshead Revisited and listening to the pub next-door play countless Aunt Sally matches.

Could I be anymore of a cliche Brit?

ahaha.

So anyway, I was perusing through the Daily Mail online when I came across this story about Whitney Port super-sizing herself via the iPhone FatBooth app.

Whitney posted the pic on her blog (which is actually pretty damn good and worth a read...)and she seemed to find the not-so-flattering photo of herself highly amusing, much to my liking.

I love love love it when so called 'untouchable' celebs can poke fun at themselves, and this makes me love the Whitster even more.

Can you imagine Olivia Palermo doing such a thing? hmmm...

that's like, sooo last season (!!!!!!)

I am officially a convert to the Guardian's Fashion Statement bulletin/blog! Having recieved their weekly email through my inbox for several months now, I regret to admit that I have never had the time to sit down and actually read it, and boy, I've been missing out!

Unlike some newspaper websites which seem to offer fashion goss as a sideline to what many call 'real news' (pah!) the Guardian offer a witty, light-hearted take on this week's fashion news, seasonal trends and general goings on in the world of fashion/showbiz.

Check it out here or simply sign up to get it sent to your email for your weekly fashion fix. Personally, I prefer the email-version as it's denser and more accessible but whatever, it rocks!

Check out this week's comment on Lourdes' blog post,(AKA offspring of the Mad-ster) featured on the 'Quote of the Week' section:

QUOTE OF THE WEEK

OK but no joke gladiator sandals are OUT. They came out in summer 2008 and I was like, ok those are really cute. Then 2009 comes around and people are still wearing them so I'm like, ok whatever it's just a phase. BUT NOOOOO. Because good old 2010 is now coming along and people are STILL wearing them, and then I was just like OK NO! It's been three years people COME ON!!!!!!!!! I'm just like what????

Lola, aka Lourdes, aka Madonna's daughter, shares the full benefit of her 13 years of wisdom on fashion in her new blog. Has anyone mislaid a vast stockpile of punctuation marks, by the way?

Genius, no?