First impressions
My first thought this week was that I was going to try a new blogging format and catalogue my attempts by day, rather than by item.
My second was that I was going to format my bullet points in a different way, with full stops at the end of each one.
My third thought was that I’d better open the magazine and see what I had to do this week.
Frills and spills fashion
A bit girly – scary colours and bare legs – but I just got some more beautiful FARHI by Nicole Farhi (yay Evi!) clothes that I hope to incorporate, which is exciting.
Groovy in grey fashion
Good. I have lots of grey clothes and I quite like the hairstyles.
- The Hero blouse – what is this? The name of a Balmain blouse? I already know I can’t afford it.
- Christy T – erm, well it’ll be a doddle to look like her. I guess I’m dying my hair again then.
- Frilly brollies – useful and achievable, for once.
- Ted’s biker playsuit – looks kind of like it might be alright on, but a bit scary, possibly too pricey and probably not in the shops yet.
- Blonette hair – great but how do I incorporate that with looking as much like Christy Turlington as possible? Tsk, the writers of The Measure could’ve thought this through a bit better couldn’t they?
- The Cameron/Brown holiday wardrobe circus – irrelevant to me. I don’t even care what celebrities are wearing, let alone politicians. It’s enough effort to work out what they’re saying.
- “This is it” tour merch – fine. I hadn’t planned to buy any MJ socks.
- “Cinch your waist” to be replaced with “square your shoulders” – since my waist is quite a lot less waisty than it once was I’m happy enough about this – but it could leave me looking like an American football player. In fact once I was sitting in the pub with a mate and he suddenly went: ‘Christ! You’ve got big shoulders, haven’t you,’ so either I’m well suited to this look or I’m in big trouble.
- The Cheryl v Dannii debate – fine by me. I have no telly and vitually no idea about any of this stuff anyway.
- Ditto Michelle Heaton – looks awful, send her down, keep her away from me.
Lauren Luke’s summer pink
Hmm, not sure. Pink eyeshadow can go either way, I already know this. At least I own some though.
Great headline, the sub in me notices. The belly in me notices that the recipes look pretty good and tasty. The brain in me notices that they also look simple enough to do and the worried woman in me can’t see a great deal of cream involved. Good all round.
This headline removes all the goodness created by the previous one (they’ve changed it online. Oh I know, it’s to so with search engine optimisation isn’t it. Good for them. Shame, for my purposes). The recipe is secondary. But delicious looking.
Yummmm, can’t wait to cook it.
Relationship matters and Aspects of love
Another new relationship piece! Gosh, the pressure is really on now for me to find somebody to share my life with. Poor sod had better be prepared for a lot of dinners at home. However, loved-up or not, I can see the sentence ‘get eight hours sleep a night’ or words to that effect. Certainly something for me to aim for this week.
A flat filled with empty rice sacks – finally something a little more achievable for a girl of my means?
First impressions
On Saturday morning I settled down with a bag of pastries, a lightly furrowed brow and the latest copy of Weekend to discover what was in store for the next week of my new life. I’m already becoming quite interested in what happens when you transpose the magic and sense of possibility of a lifestyle magazine on to the reality of everyday life, with its size 14 bodies, disorganised flats, working hours and supermarkets with limited stock. The bubble very quickly bursts. But it seems unwise to draw any conclusions now, so I’ll stick to my first impressions as I leafed through the magazine, happily perusing the pretty pictures and stopping occasionally to brush croissant crumbs from my chin in dismay as I realised what I was set up for this time around.
Fashion:
- Stevie Nicks is great but when I open the fashion story inspired by her style, my eye is drawn to a small top hat and a pair of lace leggings. This doesn’t bode well for me. It bodes badly for me. I then notice this is supposed to be festival fashion. Because I’m not best pals with Sadie Frost, I don’t wear heels at festivals. And I slightly object to the suggestion that anybody should
- Menswear! Hmmm. But I’ll probably do a better job of emulating the outfits, poses and ankles of these guys than I do the women
- Alice in Wonderland, brilliant, but isn’t it getting a little tiresome watching Johnny Depp and Helena Bonham-Carter being wheeled out in white face powder, backcombed hair and crazily eccentric facial expressions every time Tim Burton makes a new film?
- Balenciaga sandals. I can but pray they’re not on sale yet or I’ll be on the phone to my bank about my overdraft quicker than you can say ‘death to Natwest’
Make-up
- Lauren Luke’s doing Dita von Teese this week and it’s music to my ears. This is my preferred face paint. Out the window with all that beige rubbish
Recipes
- Oh no, more sweet pies! Call them flans, tarts, whatever – they’re pies, and I can’t keep eating them every night for long before the last remaining jeans go Oxfamwards
- I spy the word ‘chill’. This is on my list of hated recipe words alongside ‘preheat’, ‘marinate’, ‘leave to rise’ and ‘allow’. It’s all very well if you’re relaxing at home on a saturday afternoon with a gin and tonic and a group of friends, wistfully watching your golden-haired children play happily together on the lawn as you hand out more olives, but what if you just walked six miles home from work carrying an awkward bag after editing marketing dross for nine hours, sustained mostly by coffee and cup-a-soups from the vending machine, and JUST WANT SOME DINNER? Chilling indeed
- That’s more like it
- A new column, great. About love, fantastic. Wait, do I need a partner for this one? What was there before this column started anyway?
- Harr, yeh, right
- Oh yeh, that was there before
I've always found it funny when people write letters to the Guardian's Weekend magazine complaining that the recipe ingredients are too middle class and the fashion only looks good on thin people. After all, it's just a magazine. Or is it? I decided to follow its recipes, fashion and lifestyle advice as closely as possible, to see if the aspirations promoted therein can really be achieved by the average reader who is not especially wealthy, not necessarily model thin and is obliged to work regular office hours. This blog has no affiliation whatsoever with the Guardian but I link to the Weekend magazine website for the purposes of illustration. 
Guardian Girl 
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