53. La Dolcé Vita

I’ve been completely missing in action this week after a short break to my parents in Italy to sleep and enjoy some sun with my mum. I haven’t laughed, eaten, been bitten by mossies, spent as long trying to figure out how to start the car or burnt as much as I did this weekend! Lobster red ("no mum I don’t need to get in the shade I’m fine look I’m not even pink yet"...fail) and back in muggy England I’m counting down to my next flight already. Pics below ♥

52. Friday Favourites

1. Weddings and anything wedding related in honour of my first ever hen do this weekend. I hereby promise to live my life vicariously through my soon to be wed friend and her lovely fiance.

51. The effort of making an effort

I had some good news, pretty bloody brilliant news if I’m really honest, today which I cannot wait to share and other than the fact I have a sneaking suspicion two weeks have actually been snuck into the last 5 days things seem to be picking up – hey I even managed to swipe free cake two days on a row in the office. Great for morale, not so great for my thighs which will  be unveiled for the first time this year in a weekend spa break for my lovely friends hen do – erm how grown up am I ? 

In preparation I’m now perched on the sofa tanned within an inch of my life so as not to replicate some giant milk bottle in the hot tub come Saturday  - even though I can’t guarantee I haven’t missed that same massive patch of skin on my back that will remain glaringly obviously white. 

It’s so much effort and I’m like the original anti-woman. Forget not marching to reclaim the word Slut, forget burning our bras (I sleep in mine) if anyone was to say I am not fit to be a woman it is me. I hate the routine of plucking, drying, straightening, peeling, maintaining anything and when I win the lottery the only thing I will spend my money on is someone to fill up my car with petrol (hate doing that with a passion) and someone to blow dry my hair.

Sometimes I get so taken in with cutesy packaging and pretty displays of make up,  new perfumes that promise to have men dropping at your feet every time they get a whiff, that iconic big yellow carrier bag packed full of pretty things to put on my face. They invariably remain in the bag, I’ve mastered wearing hardly any makeup and giving the illusion it’s literally caked on, I don’t get some orgasmic thrill from using my Chanel eyelash curlers like the woman behind the counter implied I might as I whip it out every morning.  I’ll hold my hands up and admit I don’t know how to use a primer, I’ve had a heated hair tong for years and never managed to get it to work and I don’t know the difference between cleanse and tone. 

My eyeline seems to stick anywhere but my eyes, sometimes I don’t rub my foundation in properly and find streaks, yes streaks how rookie is that, down my face. Sometimes I’m like ugly betty let loose in MAC and the result is similar to that of a child let loose with crayons. Blending your foundation into your neck? It looked like I was wearing a prosthetic face mask the last time I tried that. I remember scrubbing away to get rid of this over application – my face was so pink I had to pile more foundation on anyway.

And then there’s “the wax”. Ever had an allergic reaction to a bikini wax? Even had to hobble along to a&e to show a pensioner nurse your inflamed groin area while mother sits giggling in the corner? I wouldn’t recommend it. 

Or how about the over pluck? I paid someone for a tidy up and emerged with eyebrows over 15cm apart once. Look in the mirror right now and measure that out, I dare you. 

All this “being a woman” makes me feel so, unwomanly sometimes. 

I didn’t wear foundation until my first year at university but can’t imagine going out without a good covering now. "Mixing cement" is how one chap I used to know put it. I'm hooked, I’ve used over half a pot of Benefits erase paste in the last 2 weeks alone.

The reason why  is valid enough though if I'm honest and "because I'm munting" isn't necessarily it.

Between the hours of 11pm and 4 am my ugly noisy neighbour upstairs will have band practice or will be moving furniture about. Yes really.  This very minute I can hear him dragging various items across the floor – note to landlord, wooden floors? Brilliant idea, big thumbs up it’s so so quiet.....Probably the most irritating thing about him, and trust me he is particularly irritating, is his love of The X files . Ever woken up in the middle of the night to that theme tune? My first thought is not “oh James must have whacked another dvd on” – instead  I wake up worrying the aliens have landed and I have nowhere decent to hide  and last night’s washing up is still in the sink. Occasionally his girlfriend comes over and I have to listen to her having the best minute and a half of her life and then he usually sings to her. Again, yes really.

I am shattered 

But evenly tanned.

Possibly.

50. Half a century of posts with half a heart?

Sometimes there comes a time in every girls life when  she needs to cut loose, kiss – and may I add just kiss – boys and spend  two weeks grocery budget in Selfridges instead of Waitrose. 

I say cut loose, I mean drinking far too much on nights out. Drinking tequila and drunkenly telling my superiors at work that hey, I don’t hate my job but I sure don’t love it. Banging the ceiling with my mop at 2 a.m as payback to the man known not so fondly as “ugly noisy neighbour” for his all night drumming. Etc

Wild hey?

I started this blog right after moving in with my last boyfriend. I’d literally gush for 300 words a time about how totally fabulous and smug I was being part of this couple. Fast forward 9 months or so and I’m living in my own flat in Islington, sometimes I use face wipes to clean and I determine how long I stay on the phone to media owners by checking their Linked In profile mid convo to see exactly how attractive/ worth my time they are. Average phone call time? Oh around 40 seconds.  Amazing what “comes up” when you see they look older than your dad

It’s been hard of course it has, not helped with what can only be described as wedding baby fever hitting my office. Hitting it hard. Truth be told I kissed a boy and I didn’t like it all that much, I’ve been cancelled on because “something came up” more times than I’d care to share and the last (read: only) time I was actively chatted up it worked out as follows

“You smell great, have you just sprayed perfume?”

“Erm, no, no I haven’t”

“It’s gorgeous, no really it’s really fresh. Wow (cue leaning in so his face is level with my bosom, what’s that? Oh I didn’t add he was about 4foot tall?) you smell sooo good”

I wasn’t wearing perfume. And we were stood next to the ladies loo in a pub.

And it’s times like this that you realise exactly how easy you had it when you were in an aforementioned smug happy couple when even if you made no effort at all someone wanted to tear your clothes off and you’d both be satisfied. No guilt no compromise, god I miss not having to compromise – are my beer goggles working yet? No? Shot anyone? No worries that oh god I haven’t done my legs for a couple of days if he notices he won’t call and he won’t be my boyfriend and I’m going to be alone forever. Does that make sense or do I just sound like a slut? I want to be fancied of course I do, but this whole ritual is so much effort. 

“I’ve been dating since I was 15, I’m exhausted where is he?” Charlotte Sex and the City.

You see him, the ex boy, with mutual girl mates. Every photo hurts and conjures up images of them well, at it. It gets easier with every photo and suddenly he’s not the first thing you think of when you wake up. And sometimes not even the last. 

And then one weekend he makes the hour journey to your flat, he still remembers how to get there from the last time he stayed, and the next day is easily spent in an amusement arcade in Picadilly before shopping for treats in Fortnum and Masons. It’s like before you banter and catch up about mutual friends. You don’t hold hands because you don’t need to but you know that when he was asleep last night and you were still wide awake you kissed his bare shoulder just because you miss having that right with him. With anyone. 

Unlike every other time this has happened before today I’m not sad, not weeping into my pillow because it’s just slammed home that he doesn’t love me anymore. Am I “over” the relationship? Who can say? Should I have set a date on a calendar and spent the last 4 months ticking off the days? I guess what it is I’m trying to say is I still love spending time with the chap but I’m not, well, broken anymore. More importantly I’ve realised I’m not broken anymore.  Admittedly I started the morning with a BLT made with an entire, yes entire, pack of bacon - what can I say maybe  I eat my feelings. Either way they were yummy. 

Sometimes there comes a time in every girls life when  she needs to cut loose, kiss – and may I add just kiss – boys and spend  two weeks grocery budget in Selfridges instead of Waitrose.  

Sometimes a girl just needs to kiss the only boy they shouldn’t just to prove they can do it and survive it. ♥

49. Sunday Summary

It's been a while hasn't it? I would love to say it's because I have such a thrilling beautiful life these days and I've simply been far too busy to come up with posts but that would just be a big stinking fib. I've had a tough week - not the end of the world/ natural disaster / starving people of the world kind of tough but not very nice nonetheless.

Lazy Sunday gossips with the mother, warm vimto and a few cheeky donuts and  I'm nearly about ready to face another week.

48.

 I haven't posted in over a week, just as I was getting into a routine as well... :( Last week I was so unbelievably sad and really could only just bring myself to go through the daily motions of work, eat, see people, sleep. However, I am back and will be more dedicated here on I promise ♥