Roses are red, violets are vile get me the hell out this god damn aisle!

The last Valentines Day card I sent was in jest to my media studies tutor at University (He had offered a first to anyone who handed him a card with their assignment). Game for a giggle and a being bit of a cheeky chancer I thought sod it, in for a penny, reached for some card and quickly penned some hilarious doodles and a creative poem which read as follows:

“Roses are red,

Romance is dead,

So get your kit off,

And get in my bed”

As I recall I did pretty well on that assignment, but never the less I can’t say I’m really a fan of valentines because they usually go a little like this...

Picture it.

It’s a glorious Thursday afternoon. You’ve been for been for that typical morning run (you may not run marathons just yet but you usually run twice most weekends...albeit a bath on a Friday night and your mouth off in the taxi rank come the early hours of Sunday morning). You’ve annihilated the dishes with a little help from your best friend Finish, and even managed to amend the wonky shelf a la Stevie Wonder in the bathroom. It may have been supporting a hundred cans of hairspray and enough body lotions to put Boots outta business, but you managed to fix it with a mere hair grip and some eyelash glue. Who needs a bloke, for you are DIY genius!

Feeling accomplished you head to the supermarket in search of super foods and dietary delights, for you also harbour deep suspicions you are a secret Rosemary Connelly-Esq. goddess, queen of the kitchen and all round aerobic expert. You’re cruising round the isles smug as Saturday morning leisurely tossing a salad into your trolley when you suddenly remember the subsequent side effects of certain food faux pas and make a swift left on loo roll...

Shut The Front Door! BOOM! Clear up on aisle five as your heart shoots through your arse at the sickening sight of six thousand flowers, the sudden invasion of tacky trinkets, novel knickknacks and all things red, pink and notably nauseating! Roses are red, violets are vile get me the hell out this god damn aisle!

As the sweat starts to pour you pick up the pace and head for safety round the corner to catch your breath. As you look around it also dawns on you it’s also almost lent...halleluiah! The god squad have handed you a lifeline as you hurriedly stash in some pancake mix and-

...behold!! The holy grail of the Easter egg isle!!

It’s inevitable you’re not only miserable and alone you now have type 2 diabetes. Marvellous. On the plus side the exercise regime has stepped up a gear and now includes a demanding dash for the Mr Whippy.

Once upon a time I actually used to love Valentines Day. At primary school we would make cards with silly rhymes signed ‘guess who’ and sneakily bob them into your drawer of our would be sweethearts. As the bell rang after school we could barely contain our excitement to see if we had any special deliveries and giggle bemused as we pondered who they may be from.

 Perhaps this is the reason this day of vile-times infuriates me the most. Its original exciting sentiment of suspense and mystery, tentative possibilities of secret admiration and revelations of undeclared affection have long since disappeared. Those bloody smug marrieds and long-time lovers have swooped on in stealing the limelight with their soppy serenades and cringe-worthy cooing, which quite frankly makes me wanna hurl. 

Personally, I shall more than likely be donning a fleece snuiggie and be in the company of the greatest men in my life, Ben, Jerry, and Take That. Alternatively, if you’re being whisked off to be wined and refined dined here are my favourite looks that may float ya fancy.

Memoires Of A Pommy Faux-Pas

As the British Autumn continues to pay homage to the highlands, It is the Aussies, it seems, who have unwittingly transpired light years ahead in the fashion files. Who’d have thought the students of Erinsborough High and Sumer Bay would seem so savvy in their stylish school dresses circa 2013 as the nineties remain influence supreme.

    Ahh the nineties, such fond memories of unsurpassed youthful awkwardness, I recall my ongoing incurable obsession with boy bands and (thinking back) distinctively un-cute celebrities from yesteryear (enter Con Bordino from the T.V show Heartbreak High-the shame!), My mother excitedly screeching to an entire supermarket of bemused shoppers, proudly declaring the news that her then severely mortified thirteen year old was officially becoming a women, but perhaps my personal highlight was undoubtedly what is now commonly referred to as ‘poo-on-shoe gate’ in which I unwittingly trampled a pile of gooey-fresh and particularly smelly dog mess round the school hallways, bewildered as to it’s both its origin and why with scrupled noses, my fellow students refused to sit within three feet the whole day. Tragic!

Wonderbras And Tamagotchis Optional

Who would have thought the ghastly getups of a 13 year old self could possibly give the post-pubescent  panache of a twenty-something  style savvy somebody a serious run for its dolla?!

The nineties conjure up a host of hits and hideous faux-pas in the style stakes...(not to mention the dodgy hair-dos, cringe-worthy crushes, and of course the utter debauchery of teenage high school politics). Yet, by some modern-day miracle plaid pants are once again plastered on pins-a-plenty and the crowds at Camden resemble the cast of clueless in a radical retro revival. Fresh for the fashion faculty of fall ’13 we bring you not-so nightmarish nineties negligee know-how (Wonderbra and Tamagotchi optional)

Over the past few years, grunge has been dominating my whole look, and looking a little like an extra from my so-called life slash sister act two is something of which I have become an expert...and admittedly at times a bit of a laughing stock (who’s laughing now my mom jean clad minions?!)

 Alas I admit, in a time where teenage boys admired older girls peered between curtains not in the living room, and trendy teens the world over and the likes of Crawford and co were working walkers shortbread poster girl and Rupert the bear rad, sadly I was not.

 Truth be known I was anything but nifty in the nineties. I was in fact slightly un cool (to say the least), and for me an agonising decade of adolescence was, for the most part, spent hidden under a plethora of unsightly sports tracksuits and behind an ever so ugly and rather unruly fringe.                                                                     

Boiler Suits And Scary Baddies

I’ve always had a bit of a soft spot for boiler suits, looking back I imagine this is largely owed to my favourite bright red heavy duty ‘flying suit’ I wore back in the day. Of course my sister had the exact same one which my mother would insist she dressed us in simultaneously, we looked so smart!.. (we looked like a cheeky pair of chubby Sylvanian-sized grease monkeys!). Being made to dress exactly the same as someone else is something which would no doubt infuriate me these days, but the truth is back then I secretly quite liked it, as anything which meant looking and being even half as cool as my big sister, was o.k by me.

So yes, my love of them has been long lived, I also always supposed that guys found them sort of sexy too, in a girl-in-any-pilfered-boyfriend-baggies + heels=surely enormously attractive kind of way, which could surely only be a bonus, right?!...Sadly, however, this illusion was recently shattered when my boyfriend pointed out there was nothing remotely sexy about dressing like Michael Myers!  Charming!

Work It!..Baby Work It

Well it’s January again- where does the time go?! Seems like only yesterday I was rocking my cats on holiday sweater and dungarees ready for a fresh new year of playing in the water tank and milk time in the reading area (even at the age of 4 I like to think I was somewhat the fashionista). So here we are a fresh new year, and whilst my days of Topsy and Tim and Uno at wet playtimes are truly over, I find myself once again equally as excited by sumptuous spring work wear as I once was about my shiny school shell suit.

January Sales=Pale Beached Whales

Now, don’t get me wrong, I am a bargain babe. I love nothing more in life than thrills at the tills. I can barely contain my excitement as that £40 sweater I’ve been eyeing up for months is finally about to be mine, grinning like the Cheshire cat, my heart beating so wildly it could pop out my chest at any given moment. Then as the assistant scans the label reading now just £18 I struggle to refrain from letting out a huge homer Simpson style “Woo-Hoo” …and repeatedly thank god for tena lady.

I always find the January sales, however, a total nightmare and quite frankly bloody frightening. Hordes of Mac-clad ladies wait anxiously frozen cheeked outside the doors at 5am under the cover of darkness, intensely throwing each other daggers of death as they stomp their hooves and prepare to charge the store. Once inside they frantically snatch garments off the railing and barge their way to the tills.

It all gets a little bit handbags at dawn, and furthermore nobody seems to understand that not at all are they investing in beautifully crafted stylish gems, but rather snapping up the rejects from bargain bucket which will no doubt do nothing for their post Christmas figure or pale washed out I havn’t been away since two summers ago-skin, and almost certainly leave them looking kind of, well, pale beached-whale.

Perhaps worst of all though, we all know that these ‘bargains’ are destined to remain hanging lifeless at the back of our wardrobes, tags still attached gathering dust and diminishing street credibility for years to come.

This year I beg you, don’t be drawn into traditional tat! New Year, new you: save your pennies for those spring time treats that will have you looking more chic and cheerful and bang on the money!

New York Nights