A Hodgepodge of a Post

Since I last blogged, eons and eons ago I have been very busy doing things. So this post is a mixture of all the things that I should have written a full blog post about, but didn’t.

I met Neil Gaiman

This was the first ever event I went to in any Apple store and it was so much fun. Neil Gaiman is currently on one of the many, many legs of the biggest tour in the history of the world. I couldn’t go to his main London event because I had tickets to the theatre (more below), but when I noticed a sign in the apple store where I was randomly browsing, saying that he was going to be doing a talk later that evening, I decided to listen to the book gods and stay for the event.

Here are some of the things I learnt:

–          After the Neverwhere radio adaptation, Neil gGiman revisited London Below and wrote a short story on how the Marquee Got His Coat Back

–          When he was a child a man stole his Dad’s mini and committed suicide in it (so that part of The Ocean at the End of the Lane was based on fact(!))

–          One of his characters, Angela, is being introduced into the Marvel universe as a superhero

I went to see The Cripple of Inishmaan

This was the second Michael Grandage play I had bought tickets too and one that I was slightly wary about. It starred Daniel Radcliffe yes, but a black comedy set in ye olde Ireland? Can DanRad even do an Irish accent? I came out of the theatre very, very impressed and very, very glad that I went to see it. It was funny, tragic and brilliant.  The cast were superb and while DanRad’s accent wasn’t as thick as some of the other actors’, his was undoubtedly Irish!

There is one thing that I would like to mention about this play. Blackfacing (when a white actor black up his face to play a black character) is wrong and has been wrong for years and years (unless you’re RDJ in Tropic Thunder). It’s discriminatory and racist – you get a black actor to play a black character. But it isn’t the same for disabled characters like Billy in The Cripple of Inishmaan. He was played by Daniel Radcliffe. Um, why? I understand you want a big star name to draw in the punters but isn’t this just as discriminatory? Why is it that an able bodied actor playing a disabled character screams excellent reviews and award nominations but blackfacing is seen as a crime?

I met Isla Fisher and Jesse Eisenberg

Jesse Eisenberg and Isla Fisher

After the Neil Gaiman even in an Apple store, I kept my eyes open for other events and the very next week both Isla Fisher and Jesse Eisenberg were going to be popping by to promote their new movie, Now You See Me, one which I can’t wait to see. Purely aesthetically and superficially, Isla Fisher looked amazing and by the end of the evening I was a little in love with them both.

More importantly, this is what I learnt

–          Isla Fisher almost drowned while filming the scenes when she is escaping out of a tank.

–          Woody Harleson began to believe he was really a mentalist when he thought he’d convinced Mark Ruffalo’s mind to see everything ion shades of blue.

–          Dave Franco can cut a banana in half using a thrown playing card. He is apparently very, very good at using them as weapons now

–          They are all hoping for a sequel (as am I)

After questions were opened up to the floor and gems such as ‘what was it like working with Morgan Freeman and Michael Caine’ and the priceless, ‘Jesse, you talk very fast in all of your movies. Why?’ were asked.

Of all the questions to ask an author, you ask why do you talk fast?! I had my hand up and I wasn’t picked. So they had why do you talk fast instead.

Wendy Davie became Khaleesi

There is nothing I need to add to this except for the picture below:

Wendy Davis is Khaleesi

I read Janet Evanovich and Lee Goldberg’s The Heist

I was looking forward to reading and clever, tense and fun con book. This is not one of them. The characters are enjoyable, the plot OK but it wasn’t what I wanted. It was just like the show White Collar if White Collar was a little more dull and a lot more stereotypical. And talking of stereotypes here are some of them:

–          Badass female police detective has a washboard stomach even though she hasn’t has fruit in anyone’s living memory

–          Badass female police officer has never worn a dress in anyone’s living memory

–          Badass female police officer has no life. Or her life is her job

–          Sexy con man is sexy

–          Sexy con man shows badass female cop that she is allowed to dress up

And on and on. I know this is going to turn into another epic long series but I don’t know if I will read any future books. Which is a shame because I was really looking forward to this one.

I read Anna Lee Hubur’s The Anatomist’s Wife

Like The Heist, this book had its stereotypes – random vaguely aristocratically mobile widow meets a handsome, confident detective and they join forces to solve a crime. Set in ye olde Scotland, I thought that this would be a copy of Deanna Raybourn’s Lady Julia series. And to a certain degree it was. Well, it was a copy of whomever Deanna Raybourn copied.

The book certainly followed a formula, but it is a formula which 1) I love and 2) was written with such engaging characters that I was swept along for the ride. This book I recommend to everyone because there is so much more to the characters than I or the formula gives them credit. Lady Darby’s past is WOAH and it makes for a great basis to this story. Except for one moment when she does something which all female amateur detectives in books like this do, she behaved like a normal person, which was so refreshing.

This is also the first in a series, and unlike The Heist, I will definitely be picking up a second copy.

 

Image credit: Isla Fisher and Jesse Eisenberg 

Wendy Davis is Khaleesi 

Truth of the day

‘Unless you physically see me opening a pad, don’t just assume that because I’m angry I’m on my period, because that’s just annoying. Tonight, when you’re sleeping I will ‘just assume’ you are dead and bury you in the garden’

 

Feminism VS Fashion

I want that bustier

It didn’t occur to me until very recently that fashion and feminism don’t go hand in hand. But when you think about it, it’s easy to understand why some people think that you can’t be a feminist who likes fashion. Let’s count the ways:

• The fashion industry is obsessed with women’s looks
• It promotes a certain look for women. By this I mean ridiculously thinness (one which definitely isn’t me)
• Women are nothing from than faceless clotheshorses
• It encourages women to spend their money on utterly ridiculous and expensive items of clothing and shoes which cause you to wish you had no toes

But this isn’t fashion. Fashion isn’t about which celebrity was wearing what at Coachella or wherever; that’s fashion media. Fashion itself is more than the slimy upper layer which sadly gets all of the attention.

To me fashion, actual fashion is about self expression – what a woman chooses to wear is a feminist action because she chose to wear it. And I don’t see anything wrong or unfeminist about a woman spending the money she has earned on something which makes her feel good. Arguing that women only feel happy because they are dressing to please The Man is insulting to women. Women are intelligent enough to tell the difference between liking an item of clothing because it pleases them and liking an item of clothing because it pleases a man.

The fashion industry – one dominated by women and aimed towards women is too easily dismissed by the media (male media perhaps?) as being frivolous, not serious and not deserving respect or silly. I am not saying not to criticise the fashion industry – in some aspects it sorely needs it – but it’s not a feminist action to dismiss the whole thing altogether.

I know that the feminist movement as it currently stands isn’t very cohesive in its aims and goals but what all factions agree on is wanting women to have better lives, and whatever the definition of better is, it definitely includes women having the choice to enjoy themselves. And this has to include enjoying their clothes and enjoying fashion.

 

Image credit: Talytha Pugliesi in “Brazil Dazzle” by Eduardo Rezende for How To Spend It, May 2013

 

Taking the High Road like Katherine Jenkins

Katherine Jenkins running the London Marathon

As a person You*are expected to take the High Road. You know the road I’m talking about; the one filled with perfectly composed people who have no problem turning the other check. These people don’t stoop down to anyone’s level and You should be more like them. My childhood was filled with such sage advice – from teachers, parents, anyone which a smidgen of age on me – it’s not worth it, don’t do it, you** are a better person, and poking someone’s eye out will make them blind or whatever.

I always wondered if these people ever understood the rage a nine year old feels when their skipping rope is broken by a ten year old angry that they kept forgetting to jump, thereby missing the whole concept of skipping. That’s the kind of anger which knows only fury, let me tell you. And I am expected to be OK with her obvious disrespect and vandalism of my property? Are you batshit insane, teacher?

Slapping that bully of a girl did not make me a worse person. It definitely didn’t make me a better person, but not taking the High Road did not make me a bad person. Also, why would anyone want to take a High Road in a situation like that? (Yes I can understand that at times it is important to take the High Road; I assume there are situations where you could die a horribly brutal death or you could be the person doing the killing, but since this has never happened to me I am going to dismiss them as the insignificant problems that they are.) The person who stooped so low had no problem stooping so low and stooping to their level is ridiculously satisfying, isn’t it?

Of course, violence is rarely the answer*** and now that I am no longer a 9 year old I understand just how powerful words are and how using words makes stooping all that easier. And, to an extent, unavoidable. This bring me to the other part of the High Road – what about the person who starts everything? They never seem to take the High Road, and now with our culture of shaming everyone, they aren’t criticised all that much either. Let’s remember that they choose to stoop on purpose.

 Words written on the internet are everywhere and (usually) someone takes offence and retaliates with their own words**** Of course this helps if you are Somebody whose words a read by more than two people (one of whom is your mother and the other your father). You can sling mud left right and centre and see what lands where and on who as you cackle malevolently at your computer screen.

One company who specialise in doing just that is the Daily Mail Fail. And it’s just not the High Road they don’t take, they just enjoy criticising other people (namely women for being women). One such criticism was what journalist Jan Muir wrote about singer Katherine Jenkins who ran the London Marathon last month.

Among all the runners at the start of the race on Sunday, 32-year-old Katherine was uniquely red carpet magnifico. Her biscuity maquillage was flawless. Hosed on, as they say in the trade. The building trade.

She had lashings of pink lip gloss, sooty false eyelashes and sweeping, coal black eyeliner. Not to mention a perfect silvery manicure, those ever-tanned limbs, her blonde hair pulled back into an immaculate ponytail and raisin-sized diamonds in her ears.

At points during the race she would pop on a pair of £200 Prada sunglasses just to add to her athletic mystique. Perhaps the only miracle was that she didn’t run backwards, in high heels, while singing the Welsh national anthem at the top of her voice

All KJen***** seemed to do was run the marathon and also look pretty at the same time. Because those two things should never go hand in hand. Ever. Especially on a woman. Certainly when I run any distance more than three miles I look red in the face and sweaty, and I assume it’s the same with Jan Muir, however I think that’s just because neither of us are as fit as KJen. Maybe if we trained we would also look as if we are having a great time supporting a charity we believe in while running one of the greatest races in the world.

Also, why aren’t you allowed to wear make-up and exercise at the same time? Personally I can’t be arsed, but my laziness isn’t matched by everyone else so I don’t think there is any point in hating KJen for that. What annoys me more is how in TV shows women wake up with a full face of make-up and perfect hair. Now that is really annoying because no one looks like that. But I digress, because what happened next was all kinds of brilliant.

KJen, with all her Prada fuelled athletic mystique,****** decided to not take the High Road, which in this case would have been to do/say nothing. Instead she wrote this:

Jan (Moir), I wish you love & happiness in your life. I adore & support other women and I only wish you could do the same. I ran on Sunday in memory of my father & to raise money (£25,000) for an excellent charity (@macmillancancer) who helped him when he was dying. Yes, I twittered about it but I did so to share my progress & day with those kind people on twitter who had supported & sponsored me. I ran in sunglasses because it was sunny. I tied my hair back in a pony tail because I expected to sweat. As if you had some insider knowledge you wrote I was wearing eye shadow, eye liner& lip gloss. Wrong again – none of the above – I had Vaseline on my lips, handed to us by St Johns Ambulance on our way round the route. You can knock me all you like but you cannot take away from me what I know I accomplished last weekend. Next time you run a marathon Jan, I will be the first to sponsor you, because I know how much guts, hard work & determination it takes.

Seriously, why would anyone want to take the bloody High Road when they can defend themselves with kindness and a sort of exasperated patience one usually uses on the annoying?

 Kjen, I don’t know you but I couldn’t care less if you wore designer sunglasses or if you wore make-up. My opinions on your singing or anything you do don’t matter either (unless these activities include rape or murder – then I would judge you).  I am over the moon happy that you raised so much money for such a good cause AND completed the marathon. But what makes me love you a little bit is the fact that you defended yourself perfectly. I am especially thrilled that you put in that bit about you wishing Jan Muir could also support women. Brava!

Also, as a random side note, what is a biscuity maquillage? I think Jan Muir means KJen’s skin colour but I have no idea.

Image credit: BBC

*a Royal You meaning We. Though maybe not Me

**not a Royal You, then meant me.

***It is only the answer when clothes are involved, because I am totes a stereotype.

****This is actually a best case scenario – then you can have a twitter war. And your twitter feed is incomplete without a good war going on with a random ‘celebrity’. Come on ‘celebrity’, fight with me – I insulted your sub-species, call me a whore so this shit can go down.

*****Is that her official name? It is now.

****** what is that?

 

Skinny-Shaming

(NB: If you are going to criticise this piece please read it all before you do. I have had too many people tell me off because I use sarcasm in the title and they don’t understand it as sarcasm and read it as truth – idiots)

I am going to admit something here which many people don’t agree with – I like the movie Salt. There I’ve said it, it’s off my chest. I feel lighter already knowing it’s out there. I. Like. The. Movie. Salt. Now I’ve said it twice!

I love spy movies, and I love spy movies with a female lead even more. When that female lead is Angelina Jolie, a little part of me dies with happiness. I can understand it if people don’t like the plot/acting/believability – and many people don’t like this movie for those very reasons – what I can’t understand is when you don’t like the movie because the female lead is too thin.

And by too thin, I mean skinny, that new word which is beginning to take on the same connotations as the word ‘fat’. Once upon a time both of them were just adjectives. Now ‘fat’ means something far more disturbing and hateful and scary, and skinny is starting to fall along those lines.

Angelina Jolie is way too skinny to be believable as Salt in Salt. The whole movie was taken over by this debate – AJ leanness in the movie. And she does look thin but it’s to be expected; after training for however long however many hours a day she wasn’t going to be rocking the double chin was she? This isn’t the first (and sadly will not be the last time) an actor (usually female) has been screeched at because of their body shape. However if the actor was fat, would anyone actually call them so? Or would they just call them curvy? Or being more ‘real’?

Pointing out to someone that they are fat has become a cruel form of torture. So is skinny-shaming.

I know that the fashion industry has a lot to answer for and one is their fetishism of skinniness. On one hand models are sought out because of the amount of bones we can see and they become instant role models for thinspiration, on the other we hate them for their skinniness. It’s a fucking strange dichotomy and has somehow meant everyone under a size 10 is a loathed thinspiration role model.

Is it just from jealousy? Is the green-eyed monster so massive that we hate the fact they are thinner than us? And jealousy doesn’t seem to be the cause of fat-shaming. That seems to be rooted in a deep fear that we will become like them. Where has this nonsense come from? Why are we willingly letting ourselves be judged by ourselves? Is there nobody else out there who thinks that’s a tad fucked up?

I don’t want this post to turn into a ‘be who you are supposed to be’ type of piece because if you want to change yourself then go for it – be more intelligent, thinner, fatter, fitter, stronger – whatever but why loathe and envy people who are different from you?

Poor Angelina Jolie (don’t worry my pity for her stops when I try to begin to comprehend her bank balance and wardrobe choices) she doesn’t deserve to have criticism of her movie (good and bad) be wholly dependent on her twig-like arms. No one does. And whether you like it or not, not having a noticeable bosom does not make you a fake woman.

Cover Loves Episode 11 – Nancy Drew

Sometimes covers made by fans are far more interesting than covers which actually exist* and these covers I have found for made up Nancy Drew books by Maddie’s Silly Diddies have to be the best ones I have ever seen.

I loved Nancy Drew growing up – she was the person I wanted be when I grew up, the solver of mysteries.** And I based this on the books I grew up reading – the books written now definitely don’t interest me as much. But if these books had been written I would be first in line to buy them because Nancy is so badass that I may actually learn tact in order to be like her.

Who doesn’t want to see Nancy wrestling with a shark?

PUNCH THAT SHARK IN THE NOSE

Or climbing The Mountain Of Lies For The Truth?

I personally love the red nails

These last two covers are my personal favourites, because they seem the most realistic. Nancy Drew Intimidating Old People For The Truth and If You Slut-Shame Me I Will Beat You.

Intimidate the shit out of that old person (gender unknown) Nancy

I am very curious about this – what is the old person hiding?

Slut-shame me and I will beat you

The last book is the book I would love to read the most. I think it would be a lot like an excellent episode of Veronica Mars.

Credit for these images, the excellent, wonderful book covers belongs to Maddie’s Silly Diddies. Here’s hoping she does more!

 

*kind of like excellently written fanfiction – and I am not talking about 50 Shades.

**this was before I realised that until the denouement you needed some tact

International Women’s Day

International Women’s Day

Last week, on the 8^th of March it was International Women’s Day, a day where coordinated effort is put into women’s rights and their participation in the social, political and economic sphere. It is a day where David Cameron telling a woman to ‘calm down dear’ is ridiculed a little more*

Work, wonderful magnificent work, had arranged for Susie Orbach, psychotherapist, psychoanalyst, writer and social critic, to come during lunch for a Q&A session. Since there was only half an hour for her to speak, she and the interviewer started as they finished; a very loose and informal format was adopted of questions thrown by her and the floor were met with answers.

Susie Orbach started off by making an excellent point. No matter what the difference – economic or social or geographical – all women have one thing in common: we have been raised to be women. Whatever this phrase actually means, that is what we have been raised to be. What SO didn’t elaborate on is if this is a good thing or a bad thing, but she did say that there are joys and costs of being feminine, and that I can fully understand.

She then used her knowledge as a therapist to put forward the theory that women (at least the women who come to her) don’t feel as substantial as their accomplishments and that one of the reasons for this is the power new media now has, which has democratised the notion that you only exist if you are a celebrity. Not only are women and men are searching for identity conformation all the time, but there is a constant assault on appearance and the way you (women especially) look.

Sadly, by now, time had almost run out and the last think SO was able to mention was how important it is for women to be able to manage their own money. There is still the notion that women and men have that women need to be financially looked after and that this notion is a hindrance to both genders. I couldn’t agree more and I wished the talk could have lasted longer because by this time there was a really interesting debate going on.

I have known this for a very long time but so many people in the audience weren’t aware of this until Susie Orbach mentioned it again, feminism has come back onto the agenda.

*This might just be me though but he is a nincompoop 

Image credit: here

What I am currently reading

HAPPY INTERNATIONAL WOMEN’S DAY!

I am going to be writing a whole post on this next week because I was lucky enough to be an audience member in a talk given by the amazing Susie Orbach about IWD.

Until then, I leave you with this funktastically amazing lady who is in the cover of The Gentlewoman, the magazine I am currently reading.

Cover Loves – Episode 10

Female comic book lovers (me included) don’t want much from comics books. What we want are excellent female characters in excellent stories. Doesn’t seem that hard does it?* Male characters are always going through really tough, mentally and physically scarring issues whilst fully clothed, while their female characters aren’t. Male characters never have to do the boobs-and-butt pose, and they always seem to have spines and normal sized waists.**

Male characters are seen as being inspirational figures, with their spandex clad muscles prominently on display. Female superheroes are seen as objects to fuck with their spandex covered nipples prominently on display. Because women totes go around fighting crime without a bra on. Totes.

I think that one of the ways for readers to relate to female characters and understand them is to have them be more prominent and realistic. This was why the all-female X-Men line up had me jumping for joy as did the news that Marvel are planning to release long-fiction stories for some of their female characters.

This, I thought, is excellent. This, I thought, is brilliant. This, I thought is a brilliant medium for reaching new readers and fleshing out female characters***

I was a naïve little ray of sunshine.

While the idea is still excellent especially since I love books, this is what Hyperion’s editor-in-chief Elisabeth Dyssegaard. Dyssegaard said: (Hyperion is the book publisher Marvel will be using)

“Marvel has had tremendous success with recent hit movies, and we think it’s a great time to explore what happens to superheroines when they are dropped into traditional women’s novels. We think the books will definitely appeal to comics readers – male and female – but also draw a new crowd of women readers who will be introduced to superheroes through a medium they already love.”

Riiiight. OK. This seems fine though ‘traditional women’s novels’ makes me worry – what are traditional women’s novels?? I like the fact that they are targeting female readers, which is a potential new audience the size of half of the world. 

And then there was a more, soul-crushingly more.

The She-Hulk Diaries follow Jennifer Walters, a corporate lawyer and sometime green rampager who is looking for love. Marvel added that she:

“Juggles climbing the corporate ladder by day and battling villains and saving the world by night – all the while trying to navigate the dating world to find a Mr Right who might not mind a sometimes very big and green girlfriend.”

And then there is Rogue Touch where Rogue is:

“a young woman trying to navigate the challenges of everyday life and romance“.

Rogue puts her first boyfriend in a coma, then meets “the handsome and otherworldly James…Stealing a car, they head out on the highway and eventually, Rogue has to decide whether she will unleash her devastating powers in order to save the only man alive who seems to truly understand her.”

Dyssegaard adds:

“In addition to threats to the universe, She-Hulk and Rogue have challenges that women readers know well, including finding the right guy. Our heroes are real people first and super powers second, which is why fans connect with them. These books delve into what happens if dating challenges also include turning huge and green or having a lethal touch, offering readers a unique perspective on superpowered high drama.”

I’m crying.

These fantastically strong, brilliant characters can’t seem to function without finding Mr Right and for each book their superpower is the hindrance – it is the thing turning them into old lady-spinsters.

WHY?! Why is this a ‘traditional’ female story?? These novels relegate the stories to seeking happiness and love, as if they go hand in hand and are the only things ALL women care about. Comic book industry, here is a thought which may be new and shiny for you: why don’t you first make your female characters more than spray-painted spandex boobholders meant to titilate and audience you don’t realise is changing and want something different?

Rogue Touch is written by Christine Woodward and The She-Hulk Diaries by Marta Acosta. While the cover for Rough Touch isn’t out yet, The She-Hulk Diaries’ is. Yay.

The cover of the She-Hulk Diaries

*Sarcasm

**There are a few exceptions

***And not with bigger boobs.

Also, Happy Valentine’s Day everyone.

Reasons to Shave Your Head

According to certain members of my extended family there are none. So their reaction to the Japanese pop star Minami Minegishi shaving her head in an act of mea culpa was both infuriating and just. Just because, ‘she did what?!’ and infuriating because, ‘but her hair was so beautiful!’ The fact that she did it because she felt guilty about spending the night, and presumably having sex, with her boyfriend was really not the point.

But it is the point, it is, it is!

Maybe I should be glad. When I explained the whole situation to them, at least they thought the whole thing was ridiculous – a news story straight from the planet WHAAAAAT?! While the whole situation did get me thinking about Japanese attitudes towards gender roles especially in their pop industry, it also got me thinking about what would get me to shave my head, especially after reading Vagenda’s piece on this issue.

So here is my list of reasons why you should shave your hair off:

1. Cancer
2. Head injury
3. The cash you’d get from selling your tresses
4. Having a public breakdown
5. Becoming a monk
6. Fancy dress party
7. Stop it falling in your face all the fucking time
8. A bet where you stand to win more than £50 (or the cost of getting it shaved off frankly)
9. To check if you dented your skull every time you hit it
10. You want to know what the exact shape of your skull is
11. Exactly what colour is your skull and how much does it differ from the rest of your skin which is exposed to the sun
12. Getting a tattoo
13. To get an Indian head massage without all that annoying hair getting in the way
14. So hairdressers can’t rip you off (especially applicable if you are a woman)
15. Phrenology
16. Because you want to

I think the last reason is the best.

While also thinking of this I have also come up with a list of reasons as to why you shouldn’t shave your hair:

1. Because of someone else