Guardian Girl

On this day in history I was allowed to wear a relatively normal outfit, but for the enormous flower cuffs, which I tried to emulate by tying white rags around my wrists. However I had to remove them before my shopping trip for fear of looking like a self-harmer among the supermarket community. I also had to put on some tights as it was breezy outside.

Sorry about all this pouting but, as you can see, the project dictates it sometimes.

My next task for the day was to try to look like Christy Turlington. I look absolutely nothing like her (see above) so this wasn’t going to be easy. I studied the Measure’s picture of her for a while and decided the main things I needed to do, other than sign up for major surgery, were to have darker hair with no fringe, whiter teeth, redder lips and dark blue eyes, and to be thinner.

The lipstick was about the only easy bit. I dyed my hair dark brown but the fringe will just have to wait as I can’t afford extensions – and if I could, I’d only be one of those women who has an obvious basin mark around the level at which the new hair has been attached. A proper mullet, in other words, which I’ve already rejected this month.  I wanted to get a teeth-whitening kit but my friend Adam told me his friend told him the best thing to use is Beverly Hills Formula toothpaste, so I got some of that and I must say it’s already working a treat. People keep coming up to me going ‘Christy, Christy, can I have your autograph?’ and I have to bat them away with my Swarovski-encrusted yoga mat. I also wanted to get some slimming pills while I was around the healthcare aisle, but Adam told me I was a clever girl so there was no need for such nonsense, and I was led away by the elbow to Argos, to look for some cheap coloured contact lenses. I suspect ‘contact lenses’ and ‘cheap’ shouldn’t really appear in the same sentence but hey, it’s only eyesight, you can always buy some more.  I’m telling you Argos used to sell coloured contacts but they don’t anymore, so I crossed that off the list as I wasn’t going to David Clulow or whatever to spend loads of money trying to look like I have dark blue eyes.

I ought to put a picture of CT next to a picture of me to demonstrate my (lack of) success but I don’t want to, and it’s my blog, so I’m not going to. Maybe later in the week, if I’m allowed to also put a picture of Maureen from Driving School to balance things out a little.

The recipe for that evening was sardines in filo.

The supermarket had no filo so I used a packet mix of shortcrust pastry I had in my cupboard. They also had no sardines, so I used smoked mackerel. The result was that I ended up with smoked mackerel pasties. They were really nice, I recommend them. All you have to do with those packet mixes is put some water in. Then you can squish handfuls around whatever you like in the manner of kids with Playdoh and toy cars, and put them in the oven for like 20 minutes. Never mind Hugh, never mind even Delia’s cheats. Follow my recipes instead. Get a packet mix, squash it around something, cook it.

Conclusions:

• I have actually reached a couple of conclusions of late. One is that having tidied my flat up a lot, decided I need to be more organised and filled my freezer with home-cooked meals, I do feel a great sense of wellbeing. I think this project is definitely making me happier.  What a result! The lifestyles magazines tell us will make us happier might actually make us happier. But is that just by virtue of matching up to their benchmarks? I dunno, probably, I’m no psychologist. But I know my pa would say it makes you much happier to have food in the cupboard and a neatly made bed. Mind you, do you need the Guardian to tell you that? I do, actually. I always thought making beds was like tying your shoelaces after taking your shoes off, until now. Now I see I was wrong.
• There is also a darker conclusion I’ve drawn lately. I feel like a capitalist monster. I am very careful to waste no food in the making of these recipes as everything uneaten goes straight into the freezer, but still. There’s something really gross about the whole thing. ‘Oh, the Guardian says I have to buy five jumpsuits and a pair of trainers this week. Off I go to the shops then!’ Maybe if I stop shoulder-barging those charity people in the streets I can absolve myself. I’ll think more about this.