Sponsor A Fingernail In Need

I know this will not come as a surprise to any of you, because of course you've all read my recent memoir, The Little Book of Anxiety. But for those of you who enjoy a recap, let me state for the record: I bite my nails. This is, arguably, my deepest shame, alongside not being able to locate Algeria on a map, eating Nutella with my hands, and trying to seduce Elliot Perlman at a writer's festival (although the only shameful part of the latter was the fact that I failed quite spectacularly).

Not my nails. But soon will be!

It pains me deeply that I have not managed to kick my nail biting habit in the forty three years I've been on earth. Even assuming that I didn't start biting my nails until I had teeth, that's still around forty two years I've had my fingers in my mouth. And at least 40% of the time those fingers don't even have Nutella on them, so there's really no excuse at all.

As I wrote in my Little Book, I have managed to overcome my embarrassing habit by getting acrylic nails. Sadly, however, I have also managed to bite off said acrylic nails at least eight times in the past two years. I have now reached the point where I am too ashamed to venture into the nail salon yet again to have them replaced as I can no longer bear the pitying looks.

So... I have made a resolution. I am going to grow my own, calcium-based nails, for real, this time. But for this, I need your help. I cannot do it alone. (I know this because I have failed about five times a year for the past forty three years.)

How can you help? Well, I have a unique and thrilling idea. (Trust me, you'll be thrilled.) I am calling on ten of you to Sponsor a Nail and encourage me on my quest. And let me tell you - Sponsoring a Nail is an incredible privilege. What do you get? I'm glad you ask! Sponsoring a Nail gives you naming rights - yes, naming rights! - over one of my nails. And that's not all! I will also keep you updated with information about your nail's progress, including how it is growing and whether I've been tempted to nibble it. But wait - there's more! Because when a suitable length is reached, and I get my real nails painted for the first time, you determine the colour of your particular nail.

Can you believe it?

So how do you win one of these ten fabulous nails??? To apply to Sponsor a Nail, please comment below, including the name you would choose for my nail, and which nail you would like to sponsor. (Obviously you would all prefer to sponsor my Bum Finger nail, but please bear in mind there is only one of those.)

My kids and I will choose the ten winners, and announce them on this blog when the competition closes. (The competition will close when I have decided I have enough entries. It's my competition, after all.)

So thank you all very much for your support, and I look forward to receiving your entries.

tickled by a magic pen.... or something.....

Today I got tickled by a magical pen after I was caressed by a total stranger. Nothing weird about that. Right?

I'd booked myself in for a technologically advanced facial, with microdermabrasion, light therapy, and a massage. I've never had a facial before, but desperate times call for desperate measures. And if you saw me just after I rolled out of bed this morning you would know. The times, friends, they are a-desperate.

I walked into the salon and was introduced to my 'facialist' (as opposed to, say, my 'bottomlist'). Elizabeth was very friendly and asked me if I would like to use the toilet before my treatment (so, quite possibly, she actually was a bottomlist as well).

When I returned from my toilet trip, Elizabeth told me to relax, and then instructed me to take off my top. This surprised me as I assumed that, given that this was a 'facial' and not, say, a 'breastial', that Elizabeth would be working on my face. Apparently, however, she would be working on my shoulders too (which I guess made her a shoulderlist) and needed access to my 'decolletage'.

The first part of the facial wasn't so bad. Elizabeth cleansed my face with some kind of industrial strength potion, and then scraped a really rough rolling pin over my skin. This was, apparently, the 'microderm' portion of the treatment, and had something to do with exfoliation. It was scratchy and sandpapery and felt most uncomfortable and I enjoyed the process immensely. 

MAKE IT STOP!

Then came the facial massage. Elizabeth tilted my head back and caressed my face gently all over in delicate circular motions. It was healing and loving and caring and nurturing and it made me want to run and scream. For - as I remembered at the exact moment Elizabeth started the massage - I cannot stand people touching my face. Unless you're one of my kids, or actually having sex with me (which, depending on how many readers I currently have, rules out at least 50% of you), I do not want your hands on my facial skin. There's no deep psychological reason. I just don't like it. I'd rather you touched my bottom. And quite frankly, I don't want you touching my bottom at all.

Of course, Elizabeth didn't know that, and kept on with her rubbing. And, because I'm so passive in the hands of beauty professionals, I let her do it. Really, I'm pathetic. The woman could have started shaving my head, or tattooing my chest with a giant panda, and I would have just sighed inwardly and said nothing.

To my relief, Elizabeth stopped massaging after about 15 minutes and began the next part of the session. This was the most important part of the treatment, the part that would radically change my skin for the better. The Pulsing Light Therapy (or, you know... words to that effect).

Elizabeth put patches over my eyes so I wouldn't be blinded by the light (or revved up like a deuce, another runner in the night). And then I lay on my back for about 30 minutes while she trailed something that felt like a slim metal pen all over my face as an important 'beep beep beep' sounded rythmically in my ears.

Now, presumably that pen did something special and magical, because I now look far better now than before the treatment. (Sadly that last stanza was a lie. I actually look exactly the same now as before, but as I paid lots of money, I'm not going to admit it.) Still, as I lay there on the bed, I couldn't help but wonder if the joke was on me - if there was no Light Therapy, if Elizabeth really was just trailing a slim metal pen all over my face whilst playing a 'beep beep beep' in my ear, and then giggling all the way to the bank.

Still, I'm not even sure it matters. I had a nice little snooze while I was being tickled by the pen, so the session wasn't entirely wasted.

And besides, the relief after the massage stopped was enormous. It was worth paying money just for that.

An Australian Girl In America: NEW YORK

Some of you may have noticed that I ceased blogging about my American holiday at Day 3, and have not updated it since we arrived in New York. This is not because I am lazy or do not have access to the internet or have lost my mojo or have had my fingers amputated in a horrific subway accident. It simply means that I have been too busy shopping and eating cheesecake brownie icecream to write.

For this, I apologise. And I shall attempt to make amends with this comprehensive guide to All I Have Done In New York (which is actually only Some Of What I Have Done In New York, but I have shopping to do and cheesecake brownie icecream to eat, so it will have to do):


The room. The WHOLE room.



1. I have stayed in a hotel room the size of my bathroom at home. And it's not an especially big bathroom. Seriously. I have to climb over the bed to access the toilet. And when I do sit on the toilet, my knees bump up against the wall. Luckily, however, the room comes with an enormous balcony, so we don't get too claustrophobic. Oh, except it doesn't.

2. I have visited pretty much every Bloomingdales, H&M, Gap, Macy's, and *insert name of every American chain store and unique shop in NYC* in NYC. I have walked into each one, laughed out loud at the delightfully low prices, and walked out with a bag of something unreal. And then I've carried it back to the teeny weeny hotel, laid it out on the bed, and sighed with happiness.

3. I have nearly got run over about 25 times as I keep looking for traffic on the right side of the road, which here, unfortunately, is wrong. If you know what I mean.

4. I have tried to drink diet Cherry Coke. I failed.

5. I have perfected my Starbucks order, as drinking Starbucks is a necessity in this town that never sleeps, but has never, in all the years it has been awake, learned to make great coffee. For the record, my order is Full Fat Double Shot Grande Coffee Frappucino. It gets me through the day.

6. I have seen a beggar chatting animatedly on a mobile phone, and another with an iPod.


Yum Yum



7. I have seen Whole Pig Butt on a menu. I declined to order it.



8. I have sat at a table with a New York woman who spent 15 minutes instructing the waiter on how to prepare her meal without dairy or wheat as she is severely wheat and lactose intolerant. After eating her fish, she ate a slice of her friend's double-cheese pizza. I am not kidding.


Someone's idea of heaven. Not mine.



9. I have watched my husband buy chocolate-covered bacon. My response to it was much the same as my response to the Whole Pig Butt. I suspect the taste was too.

10. I have sat down at a window in a diner alone for 5 minutes and been approached by some crazy dude in a silk shirt and giant silver ring who announced that he and his 'special lady' have an arrangement and that he would like to make love to me. See responses to Pig Butt and choc-covered bacon.

11. I have felt dirtier than I have ever felt in my life. It's like a film of grot settles on me  from the moment I leave the hotel until the moment I get back in the shower. New York in summer is steamy and smelly and grimy. But there is soap and there is water and there is H&M and cheesecake brownie icrecream so who the hell cares?

12. I have said 'Ya' several times a day, every day. It is the American version of 'Yeah', and it is catchy and contagious and I love it and am going to take it back home. You don't think I'm serious? Well YA. I am

13. I have missed my kids. Crazily. And however fabulous NY is, I cannot wait to get back home and see them again.

Saved From The Elephant Woman

Let me state for the record: this is not a sponsored post. I have never had a sponsored post on this blog, and never will*. I paid for everything mentioned in this blog, and will continue to pay for them**.

Before we get into paying for things, though... a confession. I am 42 years old (no, this is not the confession, I am very proud of my age and have no problem with it at all***) and I have never, ever taken care of my face.

It's disgraceful. Up until recently I would wake up in the morning, wash my face in the shower with some supermarket face wash, bung on some supermarket moisturiser, and be done with it. At night I would (usually) take off my (supermarket bought) makeup with a (supermarket bought) face wipe and go to sleep. And I would wake up looking like the crumpled eighty year old love child of Bette Midler and the Elephant Man. Except with pimples.

And then, ten days ago, it all changed. I had had Enough. It was time for Change.

I needed Products****.

I headed over to Myer, where I made a beeline for the Clinique counter. Why Clinique? Well, the one makeup product I have used religiously since I read about it in a Marian Keyes novel (which was fiction, though the product was real) is Clinique pore minimiser. I love it. It makes my pores look minimised (funny that). I don't go anywhere without it. And I figured if Clinique's pore minimiser was good, then their moisturiser should be good too. Plus there was no way I was spending eight hours trying products from every range. I'm a busy woman, you know.

I picked up a bottle of Clinique moisturiser and headed for the counter. "I'll take this, please," I said politely.

The saleswoman picked up the bottle and raised her eyebrows. "Well, sure, I can sell this to you, but it doesn't have any anti-aging properties," she said pointedly.

Ah. Right. That '42 years old' thing again. How did she know?

"So what moisturiser does have anti-aging properties?" I asked. Because god knows I need anti-aging properties. Lots of them. Anti-aging skyrises. Hell, anti-aging cities.

"Let me show you our three step program," she said. And my heart sank. Because I knew what 'three step' meant. It meant there were at least three steps. And I only wanted a moisturiser.

Well guess what. There were more than three steps. There were dozens of steps.

There was the moisturiser. There was the post-moisturiser night cream. There was the cleanser. There was the toner (oops! Sorry. 'Gentle exfoliant'). There were the lifting, soothing eye creams (one for day, one for night). And of course there was the tinted moisturiser, to give me that even skin tone I've always dreamed of.

And you know what? I needed them ALL.

But still, there was more. So much more. And I wanted all of it. I wanted the face scrubs and face masks and blemish fighting concealers and petentrating liposome bust firmers and pro-magnificence radiant extractors*****. Quite frankly, however, I wouldn't have been able to carry them all home. And our bathroom cabinets aren't big enough to contain them.

So I got the first lot - the.. er.. basic essentials - and took them home with high hopes. (Actually, I had no hopes at all; in fact I worried terribly that I'd been ripped off, and that I had been conned into spending a great deal of money for absolutely no reason).

Still, despite my misgivings, I used my 'regime' twice a day, every day. Faithfully. Without fail. And it has added at least 20 minutes each to my morning and bedtime routine, which is 40 minutes less time I spend interacting with my family, or - more importantly - browsing the internet.

But it is worth it. Truly, truly worth it. My investment has paid off. I look a zillion times better. I look glowing. Okay, so maybe not glowing, but I no longer look like mandarin peel left out in the sun to wither, so that is definitely a vast improvement.

So my message is this. To all you readers out there, look after your skin. Invest in some products. It does make a difference.

And to all you Clinique executives who are no doubt reading this post (because I have a huge following amongst the Clinique family******, I can be contacted via this blog and am happy to receive truckloads of free products at any time.

I wouldn't write a sponsored post, but I'd sell my soul for a youthful glow.

*unless I am offered a great deal of money, in which case I will happily reconsider.
**unless I am offered them for free, in which case I will happily accept.
***This is a lie. I would much rather be 30.
****Capitals intended.
*****I may have made those last two up.
******well, I did give my card to the saleslady....

Off I Fly. Soon. If I Make It. Which I Will. I Hope.

Next week I am going overseas. I am going with my husband to Los Angeles and New York to spend time with my good friend Simon Baker and appear on Saturday Night Live.

Of course, I lied about the Simon Baker part, but the rest is true. Except for the SNL part, which is also a lie.

It's a heady feeling, knowing you've got an overseas trip coming up without the kids. I mean, it's not that I don't adore my children, but a long haul flight is bad enough without having to wipe up your family's regurgitated airline food from your lap. (Of course, that could still happen, but I'm hoping my husband would have the sense to vomit into a bag.)

And I really some alone time with my husband. We need to reconnect as people, not just parents and homemakers. We need to remember what it is we love about each other. We need to see each other as who we are, away from the pressures of work and home.

Oh, who am I kidding. I just want to go to the States and shop.

The only problem with travelling overseas (apart from the great expense, securing child care, and retrieving the Visas we accidentally threw out from the bin) is packing. I am an utterly useless packer. I inevitably pack seventeen pairs of undies and no bra, or six tee shirts and no warm jacket, or four bikini tops and no bottoms (and none of the seventeen pairs of undies match).













I forget my extra special face cream, without which I will immediately revert to looking 117 years old. Or I forget my extra special eye cream, without which my face will still look sparkling and fresh, but my eyes will recede into hollow, wrinkled sockets.  Or I forget my extra special hair oil, without which I look like Afro Woman from Seventies Frizz Town, and give everyone an electric shock when they touch me.

I forget my phone charger. Or my phone. Or my laptop. Or my credit card. And I take three carefully chosen novels to read on the plane, one of which I finish in the first hour and a half, and the other two which turn out to be crap.

Worst of all, I forget my sleeping pills, and have to stay awake the whole flight, eating horrid airline food, watching stupid airline movies, and feeling sick about wasting $64 on books I discarded after the first paragraph, all the while worrying worrying every time I hear the engines change, and fearing we are going to die.

Still, apart from all that, I'm very excited about my holiday. If I can just get over the packing and worry and guilt and expense and fights with my husband (who presumably will want to do more than shop, though god knows I can't imagine why), it's going to be great.

Oh, and I'm especially looking forward to attending that Pilates session at Madonna's personal studio.

Except I lied about that. I mean, Pilates with Madonna? Please.

I would never do Pilates.

Marie Claire Interview - Oh K!

I had an interview with Marie Claire magazine yesterday. Clearly someone high up in the echelons of the magazine has either forgotten or forgiven my ill-fated attempts to nominate myself for Marie Claire Cover Girl, for they are still prepared to feature me in their beautiful glossy pages.

Now, when I say 'interview', I mean 'a journalist from Marie Claire interviewed me for a story'. I did not, as some assumed, apply for a job at Marie Claire. Obviously if Marie Claire were to offer me a job I would grab it (I still have my eye on that position as Cover Girl) but this was not that kind of interview.

I was perfectly cool about being interviewed for a high end mag. I didn't obsess at all about what I was going to wear; I tried on three different outfits simply because I had time to kill. And I certainly didn't change my top after a friend suggested that what I was wearing was slightly too... well... 'wrong'. I changed because I was just ready to change. Fullstop. And I polished the 'K' in my 'K' necklace simply because I like it to look shiny. Nothing to do with the interview.

I didn't worry at all about my hair; I washed even though it wasn't washing day because I just felt like a good scrub. And I definitely didn't put on any make-up - just foundation, eyeliner, eyebrow groomer, two shades of eyeshadow, blush, lipstick and mascara - what experts call the 'natural' look (if 'natural' is wearing a shitload of makeup). And yes, it was annoying when I stabbed myself painfully in the eye with the mascara wand whilst applying the 17th coat, but I didn't even come close to having to cancel the interview; after all, my other eye was still perfectly functional.

It's true that my stomach was a little bit jittery before the big event, but that was no doubt because I hadn't eaten much that morning - just an orange, two pieces of toast, a couple of slices of cheese and a nice big cappucino. And I settled my tummy easily with an egg mayo sandwich and a Coke Zero, only smearing the smallest bit of egg over my beautiful MC ready top, and spilling just half a cup or so of Coke Zero over my lovely skinny jeans. Happily, it all dried before the interview and no-one noticed a thing. Or at least, if they did, they were polite enough not to tell me.

What made things even more exciting was that the interview was filmed by Channel 7. Which meant that the very charming sound guy got his hands down my bra to insert a microphone in my cleavage. Or at least he would have, if I had any cleavage. As it was, he kind of taped it to my ribcage. Poor guy. He was totally ripped off.

The interview went well. I was relaxed, witty and insightful, chatting easily about all sorts of fascinating subjects. At least, I desperately hope that's how I look when they edit the thing. And when I came home and ran to the mirror, I was thrilled to see that my mascara was still in place, my eyebrows were neat, and - best of all - there was no egg in my teeth.

It wasn't until this morning that I realised the horrible truth. The 'K' in my 'K' necklace had been turned the wrong way. I'd done the interview upside down.

Oh K! Guess that's just the kind of cover girl I am....

She's Got The Look

I was feeling a bit low on Wednesday evening. I'd had a rough couple of days and had tried to cheer myself up on Monday with a spot of shopping, but got it horribly wrong with the Lying Smock from the Evil Shop. By the time Gab* arrived on Wednesday I was despairing of ever finding a suitable outfit to wear to my book launch, only eight weeks away (which, in Arranging-Outfit days, is mere nanoseconds).

Gab, in her usual style, walked in and took charge. (Which is perfect, because that's exactly why I hired her. Being fairly incapable of taking charge of my own life, I need as much assistance as possible.)

"Let's have a look here," she said, browsing through my wardrobe. "We're after something very Fashion Forward. You need a Look."

"What about these?" I asked her. I took out my purple-and-green-striped armwarmers, bought two years ago and never worn, mainly because they are hideous. They were, however, very Fashion Forward. (At least they were two years ago.)

Gab looked at them and frowned. "No," she said. "They're not right." Then she brightened. "Perhaps try wearing them on your legs."

I slid them over my ankles. They worked.

"Yep, loving the colour," said Gab. "Very Fashion Forward. But can we brighten it up a bit more?"

I thought for a minute and grabbed some purple platform heels. "These?" I asked.

"Excellent," she said. "But do you have anything in a contrasting colour?"

I grabbed my orange hoodie. "Divine," said Gab. "But it's still missing a little something...."

I pulled an ornate scarf out of my drawer (not knowing exactly how it got there) and tied it around my head. And then another in leapord print, which Gab tied around my neck.

"Perfection," Gab told me. "Now all you need is a bag."

I searched my wardrobe and came up with something spangly. And I looked in the mirror. Sensational.

Still, there was more experimenting to do. I changed my shoes, and tried a more Parisian look, with a man-style cordoroy jacket (manstyle because it was actually a man's), a flower pinned to my tank top, and a pink-and-white beret** worn at a rakish angle:

But my personal favourite was....well... see for yourself.

So not only do I have The Look for my launch, I now have a new fall-back career. Because if my literary career fails, the world of modelling and fashion design clearly await.

With my babysitter by my side, I'm going to take on the world.

*My long-haired, tattooed, foul-mouthed babysitter (also Private Investigator, Makeup Artist and Barista) who comes to my house two afternoons a week and is the best thing ever to happen to my family, though so far we have only used her in three of her four capacities
**Okay, it was a shower cap. Who the fuck has a beret these days?

Taking Shots

Last week, I had some professional photos taken for my soon-to-be-released book. The last professional picture I had taken was in the late nineties, and if I remember rightly, I was wearing a long white dress and clutching a bunch of tulips. So it’s been a long time between shots.

The day began with the arrival of my personal makeup artist (who I had promoted that morning from her previous position as ‘babysitter’ when I’d learned she could wield a mascara wand). As I’ve never been able to apply makeup, I needed Gab to do it for me.

Actually, that’s not quite true. I can apply makeup. It’s just that I was hoping to achieve a certain ‘look’ for my author pic, and ‘messy eyes’, ‘blotchy base’ and ‘smeared lipstick’ wasn’t exactly what I was going for. I wanted to look good. Effortlessly good, to be more precise. And looking effortlessly good, I discovered, takes an awful lot of effort.

First Gab applied foundation. Then eye makeup. Then powder. Then concealer. She applied blush, and mascara, and eyeliner, and lippy. By the time we finished I still looked liked me, a ‘trying extremely hard to look good’ kind of me. Which kind of defeated the ‘effortless’ part, really.

Gab told me to ‘trust her’ (which I felt compelled to do, as she was holding my eyelashes firmly between her fingers). So I resisted the urge to scrub my face clean, and obediently wiped lipstick off my teeth.

The photographer was lovely, and did her best to make me feel at ease. She told me I looked nice, and shouted things like ‘Big smile!’ and ‘Lovely!’ She photographed me in a number of locations all over my house, trying to capture me in the most flattering light (or, in other words, ‘disguise my oldness’). She placed me on the stairs, in a chair, on the floor, by the pool.... I think she would have put me in the bath had it effectively covered my wrinkles.

We also tried a number of poses, with varying degrees of success.

First up, there was the ‘Big Cheesy Smile’. It was early in the shoot, I was feeling a little awkward, and the smile came out a bit forced. This resulted in a series of pics that weren’t right for me, but would have been perfect for a book entitled ‘Jokes For Silly People’, or the cover of a Dental Surgery pamphlet.

There was the ‘Serious Author’ pose, which was supposed to look thoughtful and wise. Unfortunately, I’m not good at looking ‘thoughtful’ or ‘wise’, and instead appeared ‘mournful’, ‘depressive’ and ‘pained’. Perfect, had my book been called ‘Memoir Of A Life Of Sorrow’, or ‘A Life Without Hope Or Happiness’.

There was the ‘Sultry’ pose. I tilted my head slightly and looked up at the camera through sexily half closed eyes. Tremendous, had my book been entitled ‘Chronic Sleep Deprivation And It’s Consequences’, or ‘How Not To Flirt: The Ways I Get It Wrong’.

Still, in the end, the pics were taken and we had a winner. It was a huge relief. Of course, I’m still going to have to change the book title to match the photo, but it’s worth it.

Look Happy, For Goodness Sake. We’re Going Into Overtime!

Has a nice ring to it, don’t you think?

P.S. This pic is not the winner. Just one of the runners up.

Frustration

Earlier today I was talking to my friend Lana on the phone. I was using my iPhone which is of excellent quality; she was using hers, which is sadly, very inferior. I use the word 'inferior' in reference to the inability of her phone to actually convey the sound of her voice to me, which, in my understanding, is kind of its purpose. Lana tells me this has something to do with the 'poor phone reception' in her residential area, but this 'poor reception' seems bizarrely to follow her phone around wherever she is, so I'm not sure I believe her.

But anyway, that's really not the point.

I love talking to Lana and I don't do it nearly enough (due to annoying interferences such as children, husbands, housework and jobs). So I get extremely frustrated when I am unable to hear her properly in the few precious moments we have. Sometimes I try to bluff my way through and pretend to hear her, hoping I can piece together our conversation later in my head, but when all I can glean is 'And th____ bl____ in the gi____ down my fl_____ w____ plo_____..... well, it's kind of difficult.

But anyway, that's really not the point either.

The point is, speaking to Lana this afternoon got me frustrated. And it also got me thinking about my other greatest frustrations (apart from not being able to consummate my imaginary relationship with Simon Baker, of course). So here goes:

- Not being able to squeeze a pimple. I know that's a bit disgusting, but it absolutely drives me mad. One of my kids had their first ever pimple recently (and happily, their only one) and they would not let me even touch it. Perhaps they might have let me touch it had my husband not poisoned them against me, warning them to 'never, under any condition, let Mummy touch your pimple, no matter how much she begs and pleads'. This, of course, is because HE has never let me squeeze HIS pimples either, which is COMPLETELY unfair and nearly KILLS me. My kids had better stay completely acne free for the rest of their natural lives, or I'm going to spend their entire teenage years in paroxysms of despair.

- Not being able to access my email or Twitter account. This happens regularly, when my computer exercises its right to be temperamental, taunting and teasing me with glimpses of the precious communications that await me, but refusing to let me access them for ridiculous reasons such as 'Network Connection Failed' or 'Certificate You Are Viewing Does Not Match'. And naturally, even when I was not particularly desperate to check my emails, being denied the opportunity to do so will send me into spasms of frustration.

- Noticing a stray eyebrow growing in a place eyebrows shouldn't grow (for example, on the bridge of my nose, or out of my chin) when I am out and about and don't have a pair of tweezers on me. This leads to frantic and fruitless attempts to pluck out the hair with my stubby little, nail-bitten fingers, forsaking whatever other chore or activity I am meant to be doing, until finally I must run desperately into the nearest chemist to buy tweezers and pluck out the offending hair in the car. Then, of course, I will absent-mindedly bring the tweezers home with me, and leave them in the bathroom with my other 276 pairs of tweezers (275 of which were bought in similar emergencies) and go through the exact same ordeal a week or two later when a hair appears on my forehead in the middle of the supermarket. Maddening.

- Seeing a delicious chocolate cake that has been sliced unevenly. Some deep primitive need emerges in me to even up the slice by trimming it with a knife and eating the shavings. If I am prevented from doing so (say by my mother, who believes such 'picking' at the cake is evidence of bad manners) I become immensely frustrated and distressd. Inevitably, of course, I will yield to my cravings, and slice the cake, but my slices are never symmetrical enough, and I am forced to keep eating and eating and eating and EATING until nearly all the cake is gone and I am in agonies of fullness. Clearly, cupcakes are the only possibly solution.

So what are yours? Obviously I have a million others, but I don't have time to write them all down. I have to try to call Lana again. Of course, she probably won't answer her phone at this hour.

Frustrates the hell out of me.

Behind The Scenes - The Truth About Beauty

Many of you will know that I live in a very special house. My Husband The Architect designed a super modern residence reminiscent of the physical incarnation of a DJs mix of the Titanic versus Apollo 13. Or something completely different from that. I'm not so good with the architecture lingo.

ANYWAY... as a result of living in this very special house, we have a lot of fashion shoots take place inside its walls. This is a great thing for us, as the fashion shoots pay a great deal of money with virtually no effort required on my part, except that I must clean the house beforehand, which of course does take a great deal of effort, but one which many people (notably, My Husband The Architect) argue that I should be taking anyhow.

Having fashion shoots in my home gives me an Up Front And Personal insight into the workings of the fashion industry, one which very few people who do not work in said industry ever get to have. And, though we all read about how unglamorous fashion shoots actually are, when these words of wisdom come from people in the very glamorous magazine industry, we tend not to take them too seriously.

So let me tell you, as an absolute layperson, I can assure you, they are completely unglamorous, and completely illusory.

Let me elaborate:

There is a photo shoot occuring in my backyard as I type. Out of the crew of about eight, none are particularly well dressed, most are wearing jeans and thongs (the daggy kind you put on your feet, not the sexy kind you wear under your clothes, though I suppose it's possible they are wearing both), and a couple are markedly overweight. None of the women are especially attractive or stylish, though one of the men is nice looking - or at least he would be, if it wasn't for the big sty on one of his eyes. Not a good look.

The model, when she arrived, was totally nondescript. Yes, she was taller than the average person, and slimmer, but certainly not someone you would look twice at in the street. After an hour in hair and makeup she looked lovely, but then after an hour in hair and makeup I would look lovely too, and no doubt so would you.

Out of the dozen or so models who have posed in this house, NONE of them has been particularly gorgeous or glam. They tend to be very thin, and pretty-in-a-bland-way. Some have nice skin, some have pimples. They are also usually very young, reserved, quiet and shy. Whilst the crew seem comfortable with each other, joking around and laughing, the models generally stand alone and outside the group, obediently waiting to be called upon to pose for the cameras.

Each shot is set up carefully, with lighting, shade, camera angles and props carefully positioned. Makeup is reapplied between shots. Often the model's clothes are pinned or clipped at the back to give them a better line. And if something is out of place, or there is blemish or mark, the photographer isn't fussed. 'We'll take care of that later,' he'll say.

But you know what's really weird? Even when the clothes are pinned and the makeup is done and the lighting is arranged and the model is standing in front of the camera - even then she doesn't look as good as she will on screen. It's bizarre. I can look at her across the room, and she looks nice, but when I look at her image on the monitor she looks incredible. Why? Well, I have no idea, because I'm not a photographer, but it's got something to do with the magic of the camera.

It's all an illusion. So please remember this when you're looking in your fashion magazines. And please also remember this if you visit my home.

Because I don't clean my house unless the cameras are coming. We may look glamorous from the outside, but the truth on the Spaceship Titanic is far, far messier.

Rejection Dejection

On my recent holiday to Thailand I ate a great deal of pasta and icecream, read several books of great consequence, read several more magazines of zero consequence, and engaged in a brief, traumatic fish pedicure*.

I also attempted to make some new friends, with 'attempted' being the operative word. My husband and I generally seek people out when we travel for a length of time. It's not that we get bored with each other's company. It's just that we... ahem... run out of things to talk about. After I've read my husband virtually every interesting passage of my book, shown him every inconsequential picture in my magazine, and pointed out every funny/cute/annoying/dangerous thing that any of the kids have done, the only topic left is the weather. And, as my husband generally experiences the weather simultaneously to me, there are no great revelations there.

We need external stimulation.

Over the course of the week we befriended two lovely couples, chatting, having a drink together, sharing the horrors of the fish pedicure, and, eventually, exchanging contact details.

However, things did not go as smoothly with Couple Number 3. Now, CN3 were a gorgeous looking young couple with a young daughter, who, as it turned out, live very close to us in Sydney. And when we talked to them, they seemed very pleasant. Strangely, though, no matter how hard we tried to connect with them - offering them seats next to us by the pool or inviting them to join us for lunch - they would smile non-committedly and disappear. I was a bit baffled by their behaviour until it dawned on me a couple of days later: I don't think these people like me.

The thought was shocking. Now, it's not that everyone in the world likes me. Far from it. There are some people who get to know me and decide I am just not their cup of tea (I know! But it's true!) However, I pride myself on being able to make people like me on first impressions. No... I need people to like me on first impressions. Making people like me is what I do.

But with this couple, I just couldn't do it. I smiled my broadest smile. I put on the charm. I asked them lots of questions about themselves and their little girl. I told jokes. I smiled some more. And nothing. NOTHING.

'Maybe they just don't want company?' my husband speculated, as I slumped rejectedly** on my sun lounge.

'Maybe,' I answered, pepping up slightly. At dinner that night, the couple were sitting with a family from the US. 'And maybe not,' I said, slumping again.

In the end, I couldn't crack CN3. I had to accept that - as much as it hurt - they simply didn't like me.

So I left Thailand having had a brilliant time, but with a tiny little piece of my heart broken (using 'heart' in the sense of 'ego').

Still, I did leave with one small consolation.

The fish loved me.

*A fish pedicure involves immersing the feet in a tank of water containing hundreds of tiny fish, which nibble the dead skin off the your feet. I did it because I was dared by my husband, who squealed like a little girl and pulled his own feet out of the water after the very first fish started nibbling his toe. I lasted approximately two minutes and 35 seconds, and consequently outdared my husband, but feel that the lasting damage sustained to my psyche was not worth the victory.
**which obviously isn't a word, but should be.

No Dinner, I'm Straight

Last night I straightened my hair. That isn't unusual. I straighten my hair a lot, generally when I have somewhere to go or someone to impress, and I don't want them to notice that I have dreadlocks under my curls like a Rastafari bongo player.

The thing is, last night I had nowhere to go and no-one to impress. The only thing that was on the agenda was ‘Home Duties’*, and the only people I could potentially impress were my kids (who think my hair looks 'weird' when it's straight because I 'don't look like Mummy') and my husband (who has seen me on the toilet with a pore strip on my nose, so is probably incapable of being impressed at this point).

What's more, it was raining outside, and the forecast was for more rain, so I knew that my hair would remain straight for approximately 21 seconds once I left the house this morning, and, as any woman with a GHD will know, half straight hair is far worse than hair that is not straightened at all**.

Even more significantly, I still had to bathe the toddler, feed the kids, do some laundry, clean up, supervise homework and make the school lunches, and I didn’t have time to straighten my stupid hair.

So why did I do it? Because the straightener was there. Yes, I saw it when I opened the bathroom cabinet, an idea popped into my head, and despite the fact that the kids were waiting for dinner and the toddler was prancing around naked from the waist down, I just had to use it. Like an older Jessica Watson, the straightener was my boat and my curly hair was the sea***.

It happens a great deal. I’ll have a long list of urgent and important things to do, and I’ll get completely sidetracked by some non-urgent and irrelevant task. Like painstakingly cleaning our entire white couch at 6pm on a Saturday night when guests are about to arrive and there are clothes strewn all over the floor, a mountain of toys on the table, and several days worth of dishes still in the sink. Or suddenly deciding I need to trim my fringe at 7.30am when I’m supposed to be getting the kids to school. (Never try that one. The kids arrive late, and it takes a $120 hairdressing appointment to repair the damage.)

So what is it with my constant segueing? I feel like the only way I could keep on track is to stay in a bare white room with no distractions until the task at hand is complete. Trouble is, it would be difficult to prepare dinner, bathe the kids or get them ready for school in a bare white room with no distractions. I mean, for one thing, where would the food and the clothes live?

So for now, I shall continue my careless ways, starting one chore and ending up doing something completely different. I mean, even this post took me three hours to write.

I straightened my hair again in between writing.

It rained this morning, you know.


*using ‘Home’ in the sense of ‘Crap’
**actually I use an FHI, but I presumed none of you would know what that is
***just threw in that Jessica Watson reference to keep my post fresh and newsy. Cool, huh?

The Chores We Abhor

I just shaved under my arms.

I know, I know, your finger is on the button, ready to switch to another, more scintillating blog. But hear me out. There is a point to this story.I hate shaving under my arms. Passionately. And yet I quite enjoy shaving my legs. Why is this? Same tool, same task, just different areas of the body. So why would I detest one and not the other?

It's strange the way some chores make me crazed with murderous loathing, whilst others don't bother me at all. For example, why do I despise putting makeup on my face? Of course, I do put makeup on it - when you're 174 years old, as I am, it's virtually compulsory. But the supreme monotony of donning of eyeliner and concealer and lipgloss, day after day after endless day, makes me want to stick a mascara up my nose, just to break the painful routine. And, occasionally, I do.

Still, other aspects of my personal grooming don't bother me at all. Attending to my pores, for example, is a source of radiant delight. Nose pore are one of my most satisfying treats; in fact, any form of blackhead removal rates up there in the pleasure stakes alongside sleeping and watching The Mentalist. I believe I could spend a whole weekend in a well-lit bathroom, with nothing but a packet of pore strips and a jar of Nutella to sustain me. (In fact, the Nutella no doubt contributes to the clogging of pores, in a favourable, symbiotic relationship.)

In housework, I am equally inconsistent. I like to clean, but hate to tidy. Put a bottle of Windex in my hand and I'll contentedly polish windows for hours. But show me a messy room, and I will slam the door behind it and go rushing to squeeze my pores.

Loading the washing machine is excellent fun, but sorting the clothes afterwards is hell. And washing plates is pleasant enough, but washing glasses is so hideously nightmarish I often use disposable glasses when entertaining.

Still, easily the most repugnant chore for me is the loading of my pill container, which I am supposed to do weekly, placing each vitamin and supplement into its daily slot. And yet - though my friend Leah says she loves nothing more than to pop all of her little pills into their little homes - I will studiously avoid this job for days at a time. As a result, I inevitably forget whether I've taken my pills or not, putting myself at risk of being hugely deficient, or overdosing on various substances.

So clearly there are no universally bad tasks. One woman will adore the chore another abhors. But why do some jobs aggravate us so much?

And does anyone like cleaning the toilet???