Calmness

So, I’ve been quite stressed in the run up to Christmas (some stuff around my family that I won’t bother the readers of this blog with, nothing too major but it’s been getting to me). Today I finally managed to calm down a bit. The mechanism by which I calmed down? Dressing up and cooking.

I hadn’t dressed for a while (OK, just over a week) but I think it was the cooking that was most helpful. Trish was at work and I was determined to make a proper roast dinner for when she came home.

No, I don’t want to be a French maid. But there is a little bit of me that quite likes the surface trappings of the 50s housewife (at least in some sort of glamourous, monied Mad Men sort of sense). I’m sure I would in fact go crazy in under a week with the misogyny and the lack of Real Proper Brain Work, but in the meantime I’d have fabulous dresses and make little cakes. Hmm.

Note to self: buy more fabulous dresses. Make more, or indeed some, little cakes.

But but but but but

I should not buy a Sarah Palin wig for Halloween. If I buy a cheap one it’ll look rubbish, and if I buy an expensive one it’ll be a waste of money to wear it once. And if I borrow someone’s glasses for the evening I’ll get a headache and/or fall over. So it’s definitely a bad idea.

Bad idea.

Damn.

No news is good news…?

Wow, I haven’t posted for three months. That’s how blogs end, of course. Nothing comes to a final conclusion, updates just happen less and less frequently until finally they stop altogether.

Not, of course, that this is happening here. I’ll keep on posting occasionally, I’m sure. It’s just that with this blog, my boy blog, my boy-blog-for-when-I’m-in-a-grumpy-mood, and my work blog, that’s a lot of blogging to do. I don’t want it to feel like a chore.

Yet somehow I post all the time to Flickr. The nice way to explain that is to say that I’m more of a visual person than a verbal one. The less nice way is to say that I haven’t got anything to say for myself but am in love with my own appearance. You be the judge

And finally…

Scene: Sackville gardens, some distance from the stage.

Her: “Hello! I know you!”

Lauren: “I, err, hello?”

Her: “Yes, I’ve seen you on the internet! Your blog is great!”

Lauren polishes her fingernails, and tosses her hair back.

Lauren: “Gosh, well, thank you, that’s really…”

Her: “Yes, you’re Becky, aren’t you?”

Yes, this really happened. I knew that hair was a good investment

But yes, Sparkle

I think this photo best encapsulates how the weekend went.

On the one hand I’m very proud of myself for getting out there and doing something, however stressful it may have been. On the other hand, I wasn’t as sociable as I would have liked to be.

I did get to spend some quality time with a few fab girls, and it was lovely to spend some time away with Trish. Still, it wasn’t the forcibly-make-a-hundred-new-friends thing I was semi-expecting from comparison with BiCon. But BiCon is longer and very much a closed system, with all the pressure cooker atmosphere that entails. And I’m probably too old for that now

I expect this is really down to organisation; you do after all get out what you put in. Seeing how my plan to meet up with Those Fabulous People From The Internet consisted of wandering about a bit and seeing if anyone recognised me, I should consider myself lucky I met up with anyone at all. Next year I will be less scared and more organised.

Thoroughly de-Sparkled

We had a lovely weekend at Sparkle. More details and of course photos in a later post.

Unfortunately when we got back we found we’d been burgled. TV, laptop, SLR and Wii are all gone. Forced entry, rear window, some time Saturday.

The laptop was backed up and the insurers are so far being cooperative, so we’re not too badly upset, but you can imagine it’s not a great deal of fun. The police are not helping with my mood by telling us not to touch anything but being very slow to send the forensics team.

Sympathy comments are appreciated but by no means expected. Comments telling stories about unpleasant burglar behaviour or police uselessness will be Considered Unhelpful and deleted.

Earring freedom day

So, today it’s been six weeks since I had my ears pierced (and um, since I last posted). I’m very sorry and promise to post more frequently in future. Blame the hayfever.

I was advised to leave my ears to heal for six weeks, before changing the jewellery. So today was bound to be a big day! Curiously I find myself in possession of about a dozen pairs of earrings already, from the sensible and elegant studs T bought me, through the nice silver teardrops I bought a couple of weeks ago, to the startlingly large and jangly earrings I bought today from the £1 jewellery shop (a fine innovation; the first I’ve seen).

These earrings really are special, from the plastic “jewels” to the silvery-coated plastic frame, they’re cheap and enormous. But not quite enormous enough to violate Lauren’s Chav Earring Rule (that’s the rule that says if your earrings are resting on your shoulders, they’re Too Damn Big).

Anyway, I’ve worn four or five pairs so far today. I guess I should leave some for later, but I can hear them calling to me already…

Topology 2

So, after a lot of faffing and umm-ing and ah-ing, I got my ears pierced at the weekend. Most of the faffing was due to worrying how I would be perceived as a chap with two pierced ears.

Yes, that’s a silly thing to worry about. I worry too much.

Anyway, last weekend I realised that if I wanted them healed for Sparkle it was now or never, so now it was. A quick journey into Selfridge’s and a surprisingly small amount of pain later, it was done (really, compared with any of the body piercings I’ve had this hurt less than the alarm clock some mornings).

The results have been… anticlimactic. Nobody (that I haven’t talked to about it, anyway) seems even to have even noticed. In particular I would have expected something at least from my colleagues. I’m going to leave it a week and then start asking if anyone’s noticed anything different about me…

Of course in a lot of ways this is encouraging; I’m still at the baby tranny stage of assuming that when I go out dressed everyone within a 100m radius will immediately notice. It’s hardly news that people in general wander around thinking about money or football or computers or last night’s telly or anything apart from what’s in front of them, but I guess I still need to learn that.

Anyway, I have the tiniest 3mm studs. I’m really looking forward to fabulous funky chunky ‘rings, or lovely sleek shiny things, but for the time being it’s standard studs and nightly cleansing with cotton buds. Boring, but I think it’s going to be worth it.

Male gaze

I assume you’ve heard of the idea of the "male gaze" – the idea that in most film the camera is directed in a way that assumes the viewer is a heterosexual man?

It’s something I worry about in the photos I take of myself. While I’m not as bad as those that photograph themselves with legs apart, bottom in the air etc., I still construct the image in quite a male way I suspect. Ah well, everyone needs something to worry about.

Of course, in this one, my camera developed a male gaze on its own. I set it to focus on my face, but still my legs end up in focus. Bloody patriarchy.

Pantyhose, a small correction

Quite a number of people have left comments on some of my Flickr images saying “Love the sexy pantyhose!” or something similar.

While it’s always nice to be appreciated, even by someone of maybe… specialised tastes, I should just point out that this is incorrect. I do not wear “pantyhose”. I don’t even wear tights for that matter. I wear stockings.

Maybe it’s the vestigial HPW in me, maybe it’s the way that “pantyhose” is so determinedly unappealing a word, maybe it’s just that I find them more comfortable.

OK, it’s the vestigial HPW, if I’m going to be completely honest. But I think we should all make friends with our inner HPW.

Of course, I’m not really expecting that this post will get read by the people in question, but I’m hoping that writing it it will make me feel better…