Friday Frock: Bond

I have one Bond movie to watch, and I will have then seen, over about two months, all 22 films.  I have some insights to share at a later date.  However, one of the most important things I’ve noticed, is that if you are going to be a villain, you need hench people. And your hench people need to be all dressed alike.

So, here’s what mine will wear. All black, because it’s what the most stylish minions are wearing.

Bond by wegan featuring Christian Louboutin shoes

Bond II by wegan featuring Prada accessories

I have suggested some accessories, but as a (slightly) benevolent evil leader, they can choose what they like really.

Ok.  You get to wear Prada, Christian Loboutin, Armani, Yves St Laurent, and DVF.  Who wouldn’t want to be in my army of minions?

I do feel really bad about this

I had a dream this week, in a night of very broken sleep, that my friend Clare and I were walking home, (I think along Linwood Ave in chch, but it appeared to have sprouted a river, and this bridge) and ran into Freddie Prinze Jr. We apparently knew him, having worked on some kind of investigation for him of the CSI/Law & Order variety.

Because we investigate criminals, doncha know.

Anyway, apparently we had spent a lot of time mocking FPJ, and he was really upset about it, and yelled at us. Clare was all for leaving him alone, but I was all like “no, i want to see what he’s so upset about”. Before he waded into the aforementioned river, he handed us notes. I’m not sure what Clare’s said, but mine was all like “Megan. Don’t come to Yum Cha with me. Don’t eat Yum Cha with me. Don’t SIT near me at Yum Cha”. And the note had food on it, so I said “Dude, you didn’t need to BRING me yum cha”. And the third note was to both of us and said something like “Megan and Clare. You are mean girls, mean mean girls and I wish you’d *&^% off. *&^% off and die.”

I think we might have hit a nerve with Freddie Prinze jnr. I feel a little bad.

Happiness

{I’ve written and re-written this post about 10 times now, mainly because every time I come to post it, I chicken out and decide it needs more rewriting.  It’s by far and away the most personal thing I have written on the interweb.}

I’ve been thinking a lot about happiness recently.  About what it feels like to be happy.  Mainly because I’ve been…not. For the past few months, I have been feeling discombobulated? Uneasy?  Blue? Maybe it’s been the mean reds:

Holly Golightly: You know those days when you get the mean reds?
Paul Varjak: The mean reds. You mean like the blues?
Holly Golightly: No. The blues are because you’re getting fat, and maybe it’s been raining too long. You’re just sad, that’s all. The mean reds are horrible. Suddenly you’re afraid, and you don’t know what you’re afraid of. Do you ever get that feeling?

But no, it hasn’t been that.  I don’t know what it’s been, but the only way I can think to describe it, is that I haven’t felt like myself.

And it’s been the process of coming back to myself, to being me again that has made me realise that that is what it is.  I suspect if I was a different person, I would have gone to my doctor and got somekind of medication before now.  And I feel like I have to justify that sentence by saying that I think anti-depressants are amazing things that help a lot of people and there is no stigma whatsoever to taking them.  But while I recognise that what I’ve just described sounds like text book examples of the signs of depression, it hasn’t felt like that to me.

I realise I am talking myself into a corner here.  I know I sound all “lalalala I don’t have a problem, I can stop drinking whenever I like” denially.  But I think we all deal with these things in our own way, and our own time and this, right here, is mine.

One of the reasons I wanted to do Dryly again (and believe me, this is the last time) was that I was hoping it would give me some time to think about these issues.  I’m a big believer in the “a change is as good as a holiday” school of thought, and I hoped that a change from my usual pattern of drinking, being hungover, and always being tired might help me to feel a little bit more myself, a little more excited about the world.

On paper, my life is great.  I have a job I love, a great house with a wonderful flatmate, amazing friends, lots of shoes and a big smile.  I have nothing to complain about.  I have none of the problems some of my friends are going through right now (brain tumours, miscarriages, sexual harrasment from a very married boss, who may also be the father of her child (yes, that last one is true, and yes, her life is a soap opera).  But this isn’t complaining.  In fact, I’ve only talked about this with one person.  I know my life is great, and that’s why it sucks that I’m not enjoying it.

But two things have happened recently that have made me realise that I am getting back to normal.  First, I was walking through the supermarket, when something reminded me of one of my favourite movie quotes of all time (“You wanna be a big cop in a small town? Fuck off up the model village.) and I smiled.  Not a small, wry, smile, but a face cracking grin.  And it made me realise how long it has been since I smiled like that.  And then, when a woman walking past, smiled at me, and said “You have a great smile”, well warm fuzzies, all round. And same thing when someone at work told me I have a great laugh that makes her laugh.

Speaking of warm fuzzies, I asked Twitter to say some nice things to me, when I was in a really bad mood a few weeks ago.  It’s safe to say all these people are included in the amazing friends I mentioned up there.

“you’re a fox, and you make delicious cupcakes, and you’re charming and clever.”

“= a great friend and drinking buddy”

“we don’t see you often enough, and it makes @chef_du_plunge sad.”

And because they clearly rock, I asked them to tell me what makes them happy.

“in bed with a cuppa tea and toast on a saturday morning with a glossy mag, looking forward to yoga and socialising w mates”

“When my toddler wraps his arms around me and says “I love you too Mama”, sunny afternoons spent on the beach & chocolate”

“Sunday morning, no work, at home with my wee family and coffee and pancakes.”

“With my oldest friends, and booze and nicotine. Inevitably leads to crying with laughter.”

“Winter happy = curled up in bed with fresh clean pjs, crisp clean sheets, reading an excellent book with my cat for company”

“on the top of a mountain in the sunshine”

“Today: There’s a frost outside [I love frosty mornings] and I got paid”

“Laughing with friends.”…”and dancing. Though usually happiness creates dancing, so it’s a chicken-egg situation”

“happiest when chilling, listening to music while talking to my babe, white Russian in hand.”

“seeing the boy wake up; snuggling on the couch; when I write something clever. usually not all at once”

It’s laughing with friends for me, too.  And I am lucky to have great ones.  So…here’s looking forward to me being myself again.  To enjoying them and pretty shoes, and loud music and good food and wine and and mandarins and knitting and yarn and sewing and netball and derby and all the things I love in life. Tell me, what makes you happy?

Wondering

I want to learn to crochet. Is it hard, and who will teach me?

Friday Frock:Whip it

It’s not so much a frock, as an attitude, a lifestyle, a sport, just: awesomeness.

But the Girl Scout outfits rock.

Whip it combines two of my favourite things.  Derby and angsty teen melodrama.  Can. Not. Wait.

Dryly makes me sick.

The alternate title to this post was “I’m very stye-ley”.  Because you see, remember how I said on friday that I felt like someone had punched me in the face?  Well, on Saturday afternoon, I was driving around, after a lovely morning with Gillian, and I realised, oh, yeah.  This is what if felt like last year when I got a stye.  In looking at that post I just linked to, I realise that it is almost a year to the day that I got the last one.  That’s…a little freaky.

This one actually hasn’t been too bad, thanks to realising early what it was, and having leftover medication from last year. But I am choosing to blame Dryly.  It can’t be a coincidence, can it?  Apparently my body’s natural balance relies on at least 12 glasses of wine a week.

But there’s some good things to be said for Dryly.  It did mean Claire and I had an excuse to go to High Tea at Hippopotamus.  Which was lovely, in a more “Afternoon Tea at the Ritz” way than Martha’s Pantry:

Friday Frock: Slumber

I know that it is the height of naffness to write on the internet about how tired you are, but you know what?  YOU do a week of 4am starts and see how sparkly and witty you are feeling.  4am starts when you were expecting to work afternoons, and so had made plans you didn’t want to cancel, and so sleep suffers.  There’s a special kind of frustration that comes with lying in bed at 11:30, thinking “Hey, AWESOME, my alarm is going to go off in 4 hours”.  I believe it’s called the 8th circle of Hell.

Three nights in a row of four hours sleep is not enough for me to maintain the concentration it takes to do my job even adequately, AND keep up the social niceties of office interaction.  So, if I told you to bite me this week, well, I’m tired, and you’re annoying.

You can imagine therefore, that between the tiredness that is making me feel like someone punched me in the face a lot yesterday (either someone did in fact punch me in the face, or i slept with very clenched teeth), and dryly, I don’t feel much like looking at party frocks.

But maybe I’d sleep better if I had some pretty pyjamas?

My friend Caroline and I have always wanted to have a shop, that would sell, pyjamas, slices of pizza, ice cream sundaes and coffee table books. Pyjamas because I want to be able to go to work in my PJs, the pizza and ice cream, because they were things you couldn’t easily get in Christchurch at the time, and coffee table books, because…well, pretty.

At various stages the shop has had different iterations. Gilly was going to join us with a range of cosmetics, now she’s going to have a catering company doing corporate tiffins. It occured to me recently that if you take how I imagine the store, all sumptuous fabrics and whitewashed walls, add the ice cream sundaes, and mix in a little booze, you have the perfect venue for a slumber party. Now, if I could just win lotto or find a backer, bring Caroline back from London, and find a premises, I reckon I’ll be a millionaire business woman in two years, tops.

Amazing Ladies

Indeed.

I always thought that there was nothing an antifeminist would want more than to have women only in women’s organizations, in their own little corner empathizing with each other and not touching a man’s world. If you’re going to change things, you have to be with the people who hold the levers.

Because I need to have this list somewhere.

I have almost finished watching all the Bond Movies.  Soon, it will be on to the books.

1. Dr. No (1962-Sean Connery)
2. From Russia With Love (1963-Sean Connery)
3. Goldfinger (1964-Sean Connery)
4. Thunderball (1965-Sean Connery)
5. You Only Live Twice (1967-Sean Connery)
6. On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (1969-George Lazenby)
7. Diamonds Are Forever (1971-Sean Connery)
8. Live and Let Die (1973-Roger Moore)
9. The Man with the Golden Gun (1974-Roger Moore)
10. The Spy Who Loved Me (1977-Roger Moore)
11. Moonraker (1979-Roger Moore)
12. For Your Eyes Only (1981-Roger Moore)
13. Octopussy (1983-Roger Moore)
14. A View to a Kill (1985-Roger Moore)
15. The Living Daylights (1987-Timothy Dalton)
16. Licence to Kill (1989-Timothy Dalton)
17. GoldenEye (1995-Pierce Brosnan)
18. Tomorrow Never Dies (1997-Pierce Brosnan)
19. The World is Not Enough (1999-Pierce Brosnan)
20. Die Another Day (2002-Pierce Brosnan)
21. Casino Royale (2006-Daniel Craig)
22. Quantum of Solace (2008-Daniel Craig)

What a fabulous way to spend my winter afternoons.

Friday Frock: On Saturday (Sorry about that)

When I was a kid, growing up in Christchurch, we went on a yearly school visit to the Christchurch Museum.  There were two parts I loved.  First, the old, fake street:

When I was going there, there used to be a big horse and carriage in the middle of the street.  I loved that plastic horse, and would always pat its nose.  I think it is gone now, which is disappointing.

The other thing that I loved was a gallery, upstairs with dresses “through the ages”.  So pretty with the lace and the brocade and the colours and the sparkly things.

I realise it makes me sound tremendously shallow, what with the liking of the shops and the frocks.  But rocks and hunks of metal and weapons don’t engage me.  I learnt more about history through those sparkly things, through looking at how small the waists were, and how uncomfortable the shoes looked.  I could imagine myself going into the shop to buy some snuff for my husband and a hatband and some ribbons, and that taught me more than sitting in a amphitheatre looking at a huge globe ever could have.

Which is why I wish I was in London (aside from all the other reasons) so I could go to this exhibition.

Is that dress on the left not divine?  Plus how could anyone resist details like this:

[Norman] Hartnell succeeded magnificently, adapting his signature style of full-skirted dresses decorated with exquisite beading for the rigours of life in perpetual motion. ‘Hartnell used a great deal of duchesse satin,’ explains de Guitaut. ‘He found that more conventional satin tended to crease, while heavier materials were simply too hot. Duchesse satin, however, combined exactly the right amount of weight and softness.’ An evening dress designed for a later tour of New Zealand in 1963 bears this out. The oyster-coloured duchesse-satin skirt is cut into a scissor-style shape, which manages to be both architectural and fluid. What’s more, its heavier weight provides a firm backdrop for a beautiful embroidered panel decorated with pearls, diamanté and sequins arranged in a diamond pattern.

If you had to wear a dress with an Olympic ring pattern, wouldn’t you want it to be just like this?

Plus, she’s not just styley, she’s also very practical.

The Queen might be asked to ride an elephant, as she was during an early tour of Pakistan, or be presented with unusual items of clothing, which will have to be incorporated into an existing outfit. Her ceremonial feather cloak, presented to her by the Maoris of New Zealand and worn subsequently on several public occasions, offered particular challenges.

Love.