Dressing the Part

Albert Einstein reportedly used to keep a panoply of identical suits in his wardrobe so that he didn't have to think about what to wear. The wardrobe dilemma was instantly solved. The ingenious hack is employed today - in reverse - by a host of entrepreneurs, CEOs and other influencers in the public eye, to various degrees. Mark Zuckerberg is a prime example - and exception to the rule at the same time. As the product of a generation where social codes, rules and etiquette have been questioned and shunned and 'anything goes', he might consider dressing down as a positive, which indeed hasn't been as detrimental to him as it could have. Yet for anyone else this ultimately is a disservice, especially if aiming high in the career stakes. The social code the hierarchy commands plays the safe card of tradition rather than sloppiness (or eccentricity!) in order to achieve and sustain respectability, credibility, trustworthiness and integrity, the very cogs in the wheels of professionalism. Personal brand image is thus everything: it defines you in a way that either enhances your career and persona or damages them.

Soundsuit #2 by Nick Cave, via ArtSpace

When you resemble a forever teenage dirt bag stuck in the middle of a video game, with a smile like the dork encountered a unicorn on his way to the donut stash, you cannot expect to be taken seriously. Call me old-fashioned and a conservative, but nothing will ever beat an attire that matches the occasion. And in doubt, dress up rather than down. You can always dress down if you are too dressed up: remove that tie, undo that collar, take off that jacket... How can you dress up when all you are wearing is jeans, tees and plimsols?

Jeans, tees and plims are Zuckerberg's trademark. He believes this is all he needs to wear, in a fluid environment that has blurred home, the workplace and the after-hours of socialising. He travels light yet don't be fooled! His bank account is heavy. Those who view Donald Trump as part of the elite (based on his fortune alone) should cast a long hard look at Zuckerberg, worth $76.7b. This rates him 4th on Forbes 400 and the world's 5th richest billionaire. Get the calculator out: he's 25 times wealthier than the US President (#248 on Forbes 400)!

Now I agree that basing an opinion upon looks alone is misleading: looks are superficial and deceptive, and clothing fashion fickle and skin-deep. What truly matters is what is under the hood, the engine (value system, ethics, beliefs, accomplishments, ambition). Though it remains that appearances are the first port of call when meeting somebody. Look at it as a book cover. Is it enticing enough for you to find out more... or do you just walk past in search of something more appealing, more interesting? Or worse, do you run in the opposite direction? Jeans and tees might define a certain segment of fashion but a suit will always defy the vagaries and fickleness of fashion always, and remain a staple that every wardrobe should have - mostly if you are a manager, director, CEO. This includes Zuckerberg.

Untitled (Soundsuits) by ibid, via LA Times

Multi-billionaire Zuckerberg is only fooling himself and his copycat teen lookalikes when pretending to be 'one of us' the populace, wearing slacks day in day out like he has no care in the world and only a few dollars tucked in his pocket. The only reason he has been able to get away with it is because he is putty in the hands of the governing elites. They saw potential in his Facebook creation and dictate to him how he should fine-tune his algorithms in order to skewer free speech into a tool of surveillance, propaganda and subversion - a topic for some other time.

Look at rapper Jay Z: he understood long ago that the three-piece suits, crisp white shirts and a bow-tie would take him places within the corporate music arena that the ghetto-fabulous diamond-encrusted sneakers and the massive gold chain dangling over a pair of low-cut baggy jeans would not...

In The Godfather series, the mafia bosses and their underdogs are all dressed up in suits when they conduct business. They understand that in order to gain credibility, no matter how dubious and downright criminal your motives - businessman or con artist - you must look the part. Indeed the dress-up code works at both ends of the respectability paradigm. In both cases they help you get things done.

Soundsuit #6 by ibid, via Artspace

Dressing up sharpens your attitude: it lends you poise, and gives you presence and clout. What applies to meanswear applies to womenswear. By dressing up, you will instantly behave in a more professional, more restrained, manner. It fine-tunes your mindset, tweaks your general frame of mind. It sharpens your thought and your word. Try this blind test: conduct one business phonecall (from home) wearing casualwear, and one dressed up. You will notice that when dressed up, your body holds a certain way, your voice projects more and you come across as more assertive and focused. Now translate that to a face-to-face situation. You are on to a winner.

You need to know when to push your affairs in terms of dress code. Classic, conservative attire will always be a winner. It will not let you down: it will serve you right.

All Saints' Day Survivor

In the Christian calendar, November 1st is a celebration of the dead, All Saints' Day, a bank holiday in France. Traditionally families purchase chrysanthemums, heather or cyclamens (usually impressive potted displays) and take them down to cemeteries in order to fleurir les tombes, flower their (loved ones) graves. Needless to say, florists and garden centres make a tidy profit that gears them up into the festive season, by then less than 8 weeks away!

Mum's the word! (June 2017)

You guessed it, All Saints' Day has been co-opted into a consumerist feat, with a sea of floral displays that pours out of the flower shops onto the pavements and inflates in volume by the day, in the run-up to November 1st. Then plants migrate from flower shops to car boots and from car boots to the tombs, and before Christmas most will have migrated from the tombs to the cemetery bins - in heaps! Incredibly wasteful and downright ridiculous but this is the way it has been programmed into the French.

Because sadly family values in France are not as sacred as they once were and catholic religion has taken a nosedive, graves are rarely visited, although All Saints' Day remains the one and only yearly reminder still anchored in the collective psyche that encourages the modern busy Christian to pay graves a visit - and leave a proof of their visit behind, in the shape of a big fat chrysanthemum that battles it out for space with other relatives' mums! Don't you bother watering your offering because par une opération du Saint-Esprit, by the Holy Spirit intervention, pots will somewhat self-water or at least absorb little morning dew they can in order to survive the run-up to Winter if they don't get knocked off the tomb by the competition and the elements and roll down the alleyway like a poor cosplay version of Jackie Chan to end up wedged between the tool shed and a bench.

Chrysanthemum to the left, nasturtium to the right, under the watchful eye of Némo! (Sept. 2017)

Life as an All Saints' Day chrysanthemum is all about survival: it's mean out there. Tampered with genetically in order to yield all sorts of crazy colours and patterns, chemically fattened up in order to grow fat and fast like a Christmas turkey of the floral kind, produce blooms ten a zillion that will magically burst open in time for the Day of the Dead. Showtime in the graveyard but by November 2nd there is no-one left around to admire the flowers! Then the draughty unforgiving graveyards take a toll on their petals into a crumpled-up, dried-out worn-out affair. Lack of care its toll, and the trip to the bin is a short, disdainful and unceremonious whack and go.

Through this tale of doom and gloom interspersed by a brief showtime stint and casting couch moment on the florist's shelf, one of those mums I saved from the basket of deplorables. Now it takes pride of place on my south-facing terrace, pampered and watered and whispered to! I saved it from my village's overflowing cemetery bin last December as I was gingerly walking past with Tickle, casting a sideways glance in search of a discarded, unloved, unrequited empty flower pot container (or filled with a dead plant) which I could save from trash and call my own and take home to repurpose into a pot for my Winter seedlings.

Pride of place! (Nov. 2017)

The mum was totally dried out, a browned-out crispy sorry sight! I took it home, disposed of the dead twigs and stored the pot with the soil in it in the cellar for a good month, almost forgetting about it. Then one day I noticed a shoot on the surface of the soil and then another one! I took the pot out onto the terrace, took a long hard look at those incredible green shoots battling for survival. I watered them and witnessed the gradual resurrection of the mum! It has since rewarded me with several flowerings. It is currently a feast of multicoloured blooms of white, canary yellow, orange and magenta red, a rainbow of delight! Let me tell you: I am the proud mum of one proud mum!

The moral of the story: when everything looks dead and done, give it another go, it might surprise you!

Toxic Love in a Southern Garden

There is a deathly obsession going on in gardens of southern France and elsewhere in the sunkissed regions of Spain, Italy and Greece. No matter how toxic the relationship, the likes of my mum and my unfortunate next-door neighbour will pursue the affair nonetheless, despite the warnings.

'Oleanders', oil on canvas by Vincent van Gogh (1888), via The Met Museum

The affair involves misleading lust for mediterranean flowers of the easy kind: easy come, easy grow, easy show, easy go. A native of the Mediterranean Basin and the Middle East, it was later introduced to the Far East and Central America. Give them a good watering in times of peak Summer heat, they take care of themselves the rest of the time. They even remember to flower year on year in time for Summer and would even do a little dance if they didn't look so conceited. They're a novice gardener's delight, thus can be pruned back, hacked hard and generally grossly mistreated. Still they will manage to summon enough gusto to thrive back to shape within a trimester and reward you for your carelessness with a myriad blossoms.

The Terrace at Méric (Oleanders), oil on canvas by Frédéric Bazille (1867), via WikiArt

Those come out all over in a rash, in shades of pink and white. The blossoms may look prim and proper as you drive by but get off the car and take a closer look: they are messy. They discard leaves and flowers on a whim, like a furry pet sheds hair, and the freshly-shed flowers end up sticking in clumps to the pathways and pavements and garden tables and the sole of your shoe. Maybe Charles Baudelaire spared them a thought when he penned The Flowers of Evil. You might call them pretty if you're my mum or the woman next door but that sort of beauty is lethal: avoid it at all cost!

(pict source)

They look impressive to the easily impressed, but it's all falsely affected to the tune of fakery in a flurry, like soul sisters begonias and petunias. They're a fifties garden fashion throwback that never actually went away - or went anywhere for that matter - passed on from generation to the next like a heirloom. Why? Because - remember - easy come, easy grow, easy show, easy go. Ubiquitous, so they are, especially when originality is unsummoned and garden space needs to be filled, a hedge be hastily erected at a moment's notice: Nerium oleander is the shrub of choice.

Fatal attraction

No surprise to be had: they behave as expected. The plants are easy on the dollar sign too. In their droves, they charm the charmless garden and will even endeavour to hide a multitude of sins like the ugly breeze-block wall they are backing onto or the irregularities of the terrain. They may fool you with their myriad petals and get you to absolve them of their sins. But their aroma shall fool you not with the old sweaty tee pong, yes the soaked-out worn-out garment that should have been thrown in the wash (or best, in the bin) but clocked an extra day instead. Sweaty pong is all there is to get out of that shrub, and if you stand long enough nearby, you may decide the heavy lingering aroma is posh speak for 'putrid'.

Pretty poisonous is the ugly truth!

Call it oleander all your might, it is of ill repute, plaguing life and playing with death, for it is toxic through and through. My next-door neighbour knows it, yet she amorously planted a couple of those next to her plum tree and allows for the branches to get jiggy with it under the midnight sun. And she still won't come to her senses, instead dragging her chaise longue across her patch of land so it stands exactly right under the flimsy shade of her protégés, admiring their pretentious stance from underneath as she lays down. A morbid rehearsal to God's waiting room?

Putting on a show!

My mum built hedges of those in her dreams and now her dreams are coming true. Leave it to her and leave her to it: she'll talk to them and caress their finger-like leaves with maternal care. Care for them to grow big and vigorous and take over her front lawn like a corporate mission statement: bold and boring. She'll refuse to notice the sap seeping out of the branches and scores of ants and white flies glued onto it. My mum taught me as a child about the toxicity of oleander and now she can't have enough of it in her garden's front row. Such a puzzling contradiction!

Where's Tickle gone? To the safety of the nearby bougainvillea!

I don't see birds showing an interest and rare are the butterflies that do so. I don't take an interest either: I actually dislike the plant with a passion and, as a nature lover, this is one strong statement. Tainted love for some, quiet desperation for others!

Watch Out, There's a Hipster in Your Coffee!

I can't quite figure out how it came about. As my spoon cuts into the foam of my cappuccino and the cocoa constellation dissipates into the milky way of my cup, I look up across the packed out café and smile absent-mindedly. I vividly remember the turning point. At the turn of the millennium, the coffee revolution took us almost unawares and I welcomed it with open arms and a big kiss. In one swell swoop, it swept aside the shameless kettle and Nescafé combo, the gritty coffee pot at work whose treacle-like substance would be laced with lashes of full fat milk and a spoonful of sugar to tone the bitterness and general malevolence. The conservative coffee machine would not fare any better either if you were to self-proclaim coffee maestro. And tumble would the slightly higher-brow cafetière (French Press) that only ever had pride of place in those households that vacationed in France and Italy.

The London Coffee Festival 2015

At that point, coffee had ceased to be that monochrome, low budget, one-dimensional, nonchalant affair, black or white, one sugar, no sugar. Strong and you call it espresso like you're in the know. Weak and you call it Americano, once again if you want to flaunt your two words of Italian (three if we add 'pizza').

The London Coffee Festival

Coffee would be and it would be much more: a coffee named desire. Coffee was going to finally exist, express itself, albeit with attitude and a price tag that yells out indulgence. The Italian vocabulary would expand, and be re-invented should its linguistics become suddenly too limitative. Enter Frappuccino, the foam-at-the-mouth, shirty, expansive creation that makes the paltry espresso look like a size zero, deflated, monastic model. Savvy marketers gave themselves carte blanche to jazz up, sex up, amplify and yuppify coffee and make it indispensable under its new guises. Under the new paradigm, coffee became art creation, indulgence, a liquid brunch - and a neat, no-questions-asked multi-billion-dollar endeavour at the check-out.

The London Coffee Festival North 2016

The revolution would redefine coffee to the point where it would take a long sentence to define your drink to the barman, sorry the garçon, sorry the barista. Just so you can listen to yourself saying it in that all-knowing encompassing 'I'm in the club' way while the punter behind you in the queue quietly rehearses their prose before their grand finale, a brief, sudden verbal diarrhea of a purchasing interjection, cured by a fancy drink that costs a pretty penny.

The London Coffee Festival North 2016

Along with that morning white that suddenly became a long Ethiopian roast skinny decaff latte, the staff behind the counter would be redefined too. Enter Barista, full steam ahead, the busy body that is all arms, concentrated like a strong coffee! They whizz their magic within a few square feet perimeter on the other side of the counter like a storm in a teacup, precise, repetitive movements, attached to shiny expensive machinery with pumps and gaskets, and through the steam, the pulls and the metallic thuds, you would be forgiven to believe they're operating the Orient Express. They add the drama that you bought and paid for to your humble cup, tick boxes and scribble ancient codes on it, spin a thousand variants and combinations around coffee like they're the key to the Graal's safe, so many of them, they've morphed into algorithms. They froth up a hot beverage like a coiffeur teases a curl, with painstaking dedication. And if the impermanence of coffee art weren't fleetingly irrelevant, you have latte art to ponder about.




Now to the crux of the coffee is that correlation of late between fancy, jazzy, niche-market coffee from the café in the know, and the hipster. If we are to believe the hype, it's being percolated to us like it's non-negotiable.

Coffee has become art and science, especially in its percolation. Coffee is edgy: it has become the new absinthe. And in its heyday, absinthe was the poison of choice to the creative mind losing its mind in the buvettes of Montmartre. Modern creatives or wannabe creatives display their edge by drinking connoisseur coffee, a safer healthier option! They still look like the 1890s never quite went away, bar for the rolled-up sleeves displaying elaborate tattoos on their forearms. They wear the bushy beard, checkered shirts, suspenders. Unroll the sleeves to hide those arms, and the chaps wouldn't be out of place on those long-forgotten family photos circa 1890. But why, oh my, did fancy coffee and hipster become an item, if only for the fact that both are stuff of a fashion trend? I doubt I will eat my words on this one: fancy coffee will outlive the hipster but for the time being, chance is you'll spot them together like two coffee beans in a pod behind the counter, about to squeeze into that ristretto.




Hurry up if you wish to catch a gulp (sorry, a slice) of the action! The London Coffee Festival is taking place in a couple of days, 6th to 9th April, Old Truman Brewery, Brick Lane, London.

Action Station

If I somehow managed to convince you to fall in love with handwriting all over again, well done! Handwritten notes and letters needn't be fancy or pricey, as long as your heart is in the right place. Start off with whatever pad or notecards you have handy (this might involve a little treasure hunt down the depths of your drawers and boxes). However should you seek a little style in the form of office covet, read on.

Although you might find your happiness down the Staples aisle - and there is nothing wrong with that - more often than not the interesting stationery pieces happen to be located off the mainstream retail track. Here are some right little gems to get you started and lend a spring to your creative step. If vintage is your thing, you're in for a treat: we've got it covered as far back as the late 17th century!

Write like you mean it!  ✂ 

Drawing Set, Paris, circa 1690, auctioned off by Invaluable

Don't be square!  ✂ 

'Clarence' die-cut fold-out greeting card from a print by Sarah Young, 

via The Blank Card Company

  Lighten up your nota bene!  ✂

'In a Write Spot' notepad by award-winning BerinMade for Chronicle Books, via Modcloth

Ink big!  ✂

'Vert Empire' Fountain Pen Ink in Napoléon Glass Bottle by the oldest name in pen inks in the world, J. Herbin

Stay sharp!  ✂

Caran d'Ache Pencil Sharpener by the reputed Swiss maison Caran d'Ache, via Calepino

Take your pick!  ✂ 

  Eraser Pick & Mix by classic/ vintage office supplier, Present & Correct

Stick with it!  ✂ 

  Paper Glue (with a marzapan aroma!), via Labour and Wait

Say it with flowers!  ✂

  'Shanghai Garden' Thank You greeting card by Rifle Paper Co.

It's the thought that counts!  ✂

  'Bouquet' Thank You greeting card by Rifle Paper Co.

Always a cut above!  ✂

Beak Bird Scissors by Danish studio HAY for MoMA Store

Water cooler antidote!  ✂

Yarrow Tea Stems by Le Bénéfique, via La Petite Papèterie Française

Wedding Cheers!

I'd kept this under wraps and there had been no hint of it in my blogs. Understand that I am a private person, fiercely protective of my personal life, and like to keep it that way, only sharing a milestone moment in a few chosen (almost discreet) words. And this milestone right now is circled in a couple of wedding bands!

Roby and I got married recently! We held a private ceremony amongst a very small circle of close family members. It was all about simplicity and honesty. To us, what matters is not so much the theatrics of the big day than the deep significance that marriage, love and commitment behold. It is not so much about the big day than what comes after the big day - yeah the day after - and I need to point this one out, because I might be saving a few marriages in the process. It appears that way too many people out there are still getting married for the wedding day rather than for the marriage! And this is where it all goes pear-shaped!

Oh, I do love browsing through the sheer elegance of Style Me Pretty and BHLDN, don't get me wrong! But for me to dedicate a hefty budget and - let's say - months of careful planning, or to delegate this to the expert hands of some wedding planner, to ensure the hush of the confetti is coordinated to the hush of the sugar rose petals sitting atop a profiterole, that or I shall lose my beauty sleep, get hot under the collar and break into a sweat... Well the arrangements and lavishness and pretence and whatever it might be called was no bridal priority of mine - or Roby's. As much as I am a sucker for design and pretty packages, neither my husband nor I needed our wedding day to be a showcase for it. Because what matters most to us is not the packaging, it's what is inside it; a love that tastes sweet and genuine and is solid and enduring, rather than a love that just looks pretty - and somewhat manufactured. This is one of the reasons why we kept it low-key.

Here is a little household fun to brighten up your Monday - not to be taken literally at face value, but rather with a generous pinch of salt - as some might read it as a sexist misinterpretation of marriage. Those inexpensive wedding presents are from Housing Units, an old haunt of mine back in my Manchester days...

Meanwhile check out our Mirabelle lifestyle feature on our wedding!

Amore Pair of Mugs Gift Set

Amore Mr and Mrs Bottle Gift Set

Amore Mr and Mrs Keyrings

23-Jan-2016 Update:

My heartfelt thanks to my coach, Dina Robison!

Woohoo! A past client of mine that came to me exactly two years ago just got married to the love of her life! I'm so excited for this couple glowing with #LOVE... Posted by Dina Robison - Deliberate Attraction Coach on Friday, 22 January 2016

A Date with the Halloween Guys!

Come on, we do like to flirt with a little controversy over here on La Baguette! And what's more appropriate to set the date than Halloween? Are you up for it? Dare to introduce that somewhat elusive edgy boyfriend that makes your heart aflutter, that slightly scary-looking 'squeeze' that makes you feel as high as a kite, to the parents and/ or to those conservative biased friends of yours... Tis the night to go the full hog, emancipate those stuffy principles, challenge those unspoken limits, push and shake the clichés, and twist and turn the boundaries around what defines boyfriend material from the rest. Meditate, then take a deep breath, stay cool, calm and collected and take the dare. Expect the odd reservation, timid nod and suspicious glance from your folks, actually they need a little time to adjust. But bear in mind that they might turn out to like loverboy after all and end up getting on with him like a house on fire! Bonus!

You know I know that you know... How mum disapproves of tattoos and long hair on men, and how dad can't stand music that strays one note away from jazz, and that he associates a motorbike owner with the Hell's Angels.... Too bad! Tis the night to prove them wrong. Because often behind the crazy off-centre image, behind the apparent hard-to-crack shell is a good guy with a little insecurity, either still looking for himself or out to stand out to show all and sundry that his exterior is a reflection of his interior: creativity unleashed. Take Rob Zombie: he's definitely one of them... And - despite not being everyone's cuppa - he is definitely cool, edgy and talented! I've got my eye on him! Happy Halloween, you lot!

Rob is as hot as a real life zombie + he's a singer and film-maker!

Benefit Cosmetics via Twitpic

Total Recall - Product Reviews

Wahoo almost there! And thanks for sticking with me, guys! For Total Recall Day 7, we'll have a blast with our product reviews. Now I am acutely aware that if I had chosen to religiously go down the (retail) product review road with this blog, day in day out, I would have made a killing in terms of online visibility, and I would have thousands of followers in the process! My blog's Google stats are pretty eloquent!

Sometimes in my thirst for fame I am tempted to go down that route well travelled and 'give them what they want', but I have way too many interesting personal things I wanna share with you for me to sell out to the well-oiled formula of blog success. I mean it's like having to choose between Walmart and the local deli, or between E.L. James (a.k.a. the author of Fifty Shades of Grey) and P.D. James (established crime novelist), or - come to think of it - between P.D. James and Agatha Christie. I choose to remain unwealthy - yet healthy - as the purveyor of intelligent food for thought for a lifestyle with attitude, rather than some supersize lifestyle fodder!

Tali and Ophira Edut a.k.a. The AstroTwins (pict source)

• Fancy a Brazilian? (31/03/2013) >> I actually had a lot of fun (and pain!) writing this review! A light-hearted and tongue-in-cheek approach to the latest craze in town! Not for wallflowers or shrinking violets though!
• March 2012 - FRF - The Vintage Tea Party Book (26/03/2012) >> I got a great Twitter accolade from Angel Adoree, the lady who wrote this delicious book that I purchased from Selfridges London. This made my review even more so special!
• February 2012 - FRF - The AstroTwins (18/02/2012) >> This is a tribute to some of my favourite astrologers, twins Tali and Ophira Edut. Exposure to the article went stratospheric after I tweeted the link to the twins! A case of success gone viral, and above all for me promoting a great website by two passionate sisters!
• Beauty Review - SkinCeuticals Serum 10 (24/03/2011) >> My best-seller of all times (in terms of page views that is!), and I am rather proud of my photographic prowess too, challenged by a basic digital camera and natural Winter light.
• Fashion Review - Doc Martens (24/01/2011) >> In my early twenties, I got acquainted with a pair of Doc Martens shoes and these really defined my style as an undefinable woman: Doc Martens (associated with punks and goths) worn with cords (Seattle grungey) + a fitted beige raincoat (Kinda East Coast à la Reese Witherspoon) + vintage style flower shirts + an ever changing hairstyle from PJ Harvey to Courtney Love + 1960s style make-up... I mean everyone had reasons to feel confused about me, myself included!

That's it for now, but don't forget we've still got one day to go and we will have covered 40 great baguette posts! As always thanks for your support, and please do not hesitate to spread the baguette love to your friends and family! See ya tomorrow!

Total Recall - Media Comms

Looking at our most recurrent blogpost themes, media & communications may not be a hot topic as such but it actually doesn't fare too bad... So I thought I would dig in deep and dig out some oldies but goldies for us to revisit on our Total Recall Day 5:

Do we still need to say who she is? (pict source)

• Your Personal Brand Image (23/04/2013) >> It is wrong to assume that only public figures have a brand image to protect. So do we! And this is even more acutely so in the here and now, with social media galore that encourage us to go above and beyond the call of duty and dish out indiscretions about ourselves and members of our circles...
• Inspire Aspire - Ladies Who Launch (11/02/2013) >> We all know how the internet is a formidable invention and how it has helped us connect to people the other side of the world we wouldn't otherwise have heard of in real time. Astrologer Kelley Rosano, business entrepreneur Jody Jelas and business lifecoach Marie Forleo are three of these wonderful people I got to discover, and have followed ever since on YouTube.
• No Labels (04/09/2012) >> Language has gone sloppy, over the top and suddenly "everything is great!" Or is it - literally - that great? Come on click on the link - you know you want to - if only to feast your eyes on that Camaro SS!
• Google Me, Google You! (07/03/2011) >> What's in a name? Better to take it with humour, eh?!
• Dear Car Crash TV (12/01/2011) >> Oh I can hear the snidey remarks and all that slack from the more discerning TV audiences, and *huh* OK it's only cheap fly-on-the-wall entertainment verging on reality TV, but come on, we all crave fluff and sugary nosh (at least) once in a while, be it cos it's time of the month for us laydees (we need to take it easy on the brain then, don't we?), or cos that's simply all we want to feed upon (as we do with a whole tub of ice-cream or entire pack of biscuits)! So pass me the sugar, honey, and let's get that no-brainer of a programme on!

Thanks for sticking around, guys, and don't forget we're on Total Recall until this Sunday! See you tomorrow for episode 6 of 8!

Total Recall - In a Travel State of Mind

On Day 3 of our Total Recall, I'm taking you down a physical journey that is akin to a personal journey, since I firmly believe that travel or living in another country for some time is an important component of personal development. And by travel, I rule out those expat lifestyles cut out from the reality of their host country, or those on luxury cruises who'll boast that - say - they know Singapore, purely because they were on an 8-hour stopover there. Travel is a state of mind, and you'll capture some of its essence in our following posts:

Zabriskie Point, Death Valley National Park, photo by twoGiraffe, via Flickr

• Plan A (21/11/2012) >> OK, so I didn't stick to those 2013 travel plans that I had made at the back end of 2012, but maybe I wasn't quite emotionally ready for the big leap yet... In the meantime there is no harm in dreaming, and yes somehow the frustrated armchair traveller in me does realise that my personal fulfillment includes travel. I have no intention of spending the rest of my life in the place where I am currently living and, after a 16-year stint abroad, the appeal of foreign lands beckons more than ever!
• An Acute Case of the Wanderlust (12/09/2012) >> From a young age I ambitioned to quit my small town life and hit the road less travelled to places as diverse as Guatemala, Brazil, Kenya and Bhutan. When the girls in my class were dreaming of a shopping city break in the preppy French seaside resort of Deauville, my lofty ambition was that one day I would get the opportunity to land upon the infinite sand stretches of Baja California, Mexico, and embrace its coastal biodiversity.
• The (Late) Lowdown on London (05/09/2012) >> Welcome to my light-hearted travel guide to Central London in a few pointers and snapshots!
• The American Soundtrack to My Life (28/08/2012) >> This post captures the essence of travel and free-spiritedness, via an American traveller I befriended in Corsica: venturing to places off the tourist radar, volunteering in environmental projects, staying in cheap hostels, living like the locals and befriending them, speaking their lingo - and leaving that travel guide on the bookshop shelf!
• Ill-Fated Journeys (08/01/2012) >> Not all journeys in life are geographical, some are metaphorical, and as with geographical travel, they're not always mapped out as should be...

I am positive you will enjoy this little travel selection of mine, and don't forget to join me tomorrow for our Total Recall Day 4!

The World's First Really Live Feed

Who said that awareness campaigns and calls for donations had to be stern and serious in their approach? In the UK, the animal welfare charity CIWF (Compassion in World Farming) came up with an innovative and interactive marketing campaign aimed at promoting the benefits of happy free range pigs!

Ingredients: take one free range country farm in Buckinghamshire, a posse of five happy-go-lucky cheerful and slightly peckish "Tamworth" piggies, and a giant interactive billboard down the road (London's Westfields Shopping Centre). Ask would-be benefactors to stand in front of the interactive screen, armed with the CIWF smartphone app in order to connect to a crazy-professor-style apple catapult strategically placed in the field, and part with £1.00 for the benefit of feeding one juicy green apple to the piggy brigade.

The smart thing is that the donator can literally see - in real time - where their cash is going. As soon as the £1.00 transaction has been processed, the apple is ejected into the field and a horde of happy gallivanting pigs comes for it, while the name of the benefactor shows up in big letters on the screen for that glittering 15 seconds Ta-Da fame moment!

All in all, this is a tongue-in-cheek fun experience that goes the light-hearted way - while striking a chord - to promote free range into the streets and educate consumers ... (vegetarians, look away now!) ... about their bacon! Over five days, 500 apples were thrown and the campaign reached out to 500,000 people, with the "to eat free range is to eat happy" slogan.

Unlikely Friendship

I've struck an unlikely friendship with a retired lady neighbour of my parents. Her name is Janine and she is old enough to be my mum. Since living at my parents, I would occasionally bump into her in the street, we would say "Hello" and exchange the odd nicety, nothing less, nothing more. Her and I were poles apart.

Then back in September of last year, we got chatting in the street quite randomly. We poured our hearts out to each other about our lives as islanders and I found out how lonely and bored she feels here... Janine is from the city, independent, well-off, sophisticated, ultra-feminine and more acquainted with designer labels than plant tags. You get the picture: she is no country girl. She also happens to be married to a retired intrepid adventurer who made a living in the oil industry, from Scotland to Cameroon, from Mexico to Gabon, and it was her husband's idea (not hers!) to retire on the island, so he could indulge in boating, fishing, hunting and other earthly "pleasures"...

So far from the London buzz...

Recently Janine and I stumbled across each other again and we struck that unlikely friendship. It started off with a walk down the resort followed by a hot chocolate at the local café. But soon enough we agreed upon the fact that this sedate lifestyle was getting too much for us, and we needed to spice it up! Since then we have jumped in her VW Polo and taken to the roads less travelled of Corsica - at our peril, set that adrenaline rushing to the temples as we found out that quirky narrow mountain road abruptly turned into a piste and we had no other option than do a U turn in a tight portion of dirt track, wedged between a cliff face and a ravine.

We've ditched the sedate café for the trendy bar with deep carpets, lamé surfaces, dark corners, risqué beaux and fashionista waitresses, swaying gently to that pre-party ambient groove à la Ministry of Sound, clinked Champagne glasses, laughed dizzily and indulged in a glimpse of the lifestyle of the Housewives from Bravo! I can still picture Janine raising a perfect eyebrow from above her D&G glasses and pouting: "You have no idea how solo dining in a restaurant is soooo not fun!" And we exchanged that knowing look as high-profile culinary escapades are to be next on our list!

The Mercedes E-Class Coupé

Oh, I'm liking it. And I'm liking it much more than my bank manager as this burgeoning friendship promises to be high maintenance and a potential threat to my overdraft. But it takes my mind off my mundane preoccupations, and makes me indulge in a more shallow part of my personality. Janine and I have already planned to hit the top-end tourist hotspots when the weather hots up.

As she readjusted her designer clutch in the trendy bar, pensively admiring her French manicure, she leant towards me and casually added: "And for the occasion, we'll make sure that we hit the promenade in my other car, the coupé convertible". Talk about getting noticed in style! In preparation, maybe I should start giving Net-à-Porter a bit more of the attention it deserves... and worry about the cash later! Ahh, life is a breeze - a seabreeze even!

Fancy a Brazilian?

Now ladies, I wouldn't blame you for thinking I was on about that type of Brazilian... Anyone of those would surely brighten up a dull day?

Hot under the collar? Brazilian fashion model Isac Fioravante, photographed by Martin Traynor

But before some of you might be tempted to entertain Certificate 18 desires with the aforementioned, please allow me to clarify my thoughts on the subject. The type of Brazilian I am on about, although as likely to raise eyebrows as the hottie above, is more likely to be found in a beauty salon than on Praia de Ipanema... Get it? Oh yes!

And yes it is painful too. Rest assured, no hearts are broken over this one though, not even the bank, as you can expect on average to pay £20.00 for the service. Haha, no innuendoes please! How did I encounter my Brazilian (wax) experience? Well, this is mildly humorous actually and I thought this would be great blog post material! So here we go... (Don't worry, for the small print section, I shall be mindful of sensitivities and treat the subject with all due respect. Yet I shall not be held responsible for any innuendoes or unintentional puns and play on words, blink blink!).

For a few years now, I had been having a bikini wax everytime I went to the salon, as an extension of my leg session, and regardless of whether I was off to a beach holiday or not. I did it for myself, it's just the thing that finishes off your look, that makes you comfortable in your own skin. Thing is, a bikini wax is fairly conservative in its hair zipping method. You might wear that tanga on the day that gives you high leg definition and get the beautician to eradicate those sparse stragglers. Looking back, it was nothing earth-shattering although it did feel like it at the time!

Pict source: South Beach Swimsuits

Things started to change after my move from foggy Manchester to Corsica-on-the-Med, where my definition of bikini wax became slightly offcentre. The beautician would pull that brief up, get me to open my legs in earnest, because the likelihood is, living on an island with some of the hottest Summers in Europe, you are bound to nip down to the beach and expose some flesh, and you want to avoid any possible embarrassment. That's how my hairline from down there started receding, and actually I didn't complain, save for a bit of pain.

One night, bored online, I started clicking on different beauty videos (as you do), and I stumbled across one that explained what a Brazilian wax entails. Of course I had heard of those before but thought they were relegated somehow to those Certificate 18 industries and since pole dancing or a revisit of Debbie Does Dallas were never gonna be on my agenda, Brazilian was one wax strip too far for me. Anyway the description from that girl on the Youtube video made the technique sound terribly painful and – besides – unnecessary for a 'regular girl' like I.

For some reason, I still had the foresight (or insight!) to research the subject further as I was intrigued (or surely more bored than intrigued, right?). I found out that the Brazilian wax had been made popular in the USA, via NYC, by two Brazilian (who else?) beauticians back in the early 1980s. Please note that the Brazilian should not be confused with the Hollywood wax, the latter popularised in later years, leaves the skin completely smooth and bare! The Brazilian spares a teeny-weeny strip of modesty. Interestingly, and technicalities aside, I found out that it was possible to authentify the time period of a porn movie, based on the amount of hair on show down there... Erm, right, I shall leave this to the experts.

No pain, no gain, Nat!

Meanwhile a couple of weeks later down to my beauty salon on the off-chance to get my monthly leg and underarm wax, I was told that Jenny, my beautician, was fully booked up that day. I know I should have made an appointment, but instead I decided to nip down to the next salon and get that wax out of the way. I explained to the girl what I wanted and left it at that. She casually handed me a paper thong and when she saw my puzzled look, shrugged it off with "Oh, it's easier for me to work down there if you're wearing one of those..." Alarm bells should have started flashing in my head. Next I was lying on that couch, feeling exposed and awkward. She didn't blink an eyelid (eh, she had seen it all before!) and proceeded straight away with the bikini wax. When I felt the warm wax covering those neither regions I started to panic... "You wanted a bikini wax, didn't you?" She giggled and pulled that strip at the same time. Ooouch OMG! This had to be Karma sending me a reality check!

Now I have to admit that the result was good, great even, if you blank out the pain, because you can't expect it painless! When I came out of the salon, I noticed I was walking funny, like a cowboy who'd been riding his horse too long. I was chaffed down there for a few days, and thought I would never return to normal as some of the nerve endings were quite sensitive. But eventually everything went back to normal, and the hair even started growing back. And then I became kinda hooked. To that Brazilian wax. I felt clean and polished. No itching (except when the hairs start growing back, at the point where they break the skin). It made me feel strangely confident too. In the bathroom mirror, wearing my undies, I would have fun pretending to be a ballerina or cheerleader, extending a leg up and still look neat, wow!

Cheerleading my way to the bathroom mirror!

On that second time around I had to motivate myself to push that salon's door, but I came in prepared. I had taken a paracetamol beforehand, and arranged to wear comfy yoga pants. I was actually more apprehensive than on that first time when I had been taken unawares. Yet the pain was not as acute. It certainly isn't a pleasant experience, it won't feel like a pampering treatment, and in the heat of the moment you might rather be at the dentist's, trust me! If you are half-awake like I was on that early morning, the effect is that of a treble espresso X10... Never mind awake, you will feel wired for the rest of the day, but eh all for the good cause. You will look and feel great a few hours down the line, and that's a guarantee.

So much so that Brazilian waxing has now become part of my beauty regime. I might be preaching to the converted but if you are just wondering what the fuzz (sorry fuss!) is about, go for it! And you might even like it.

Plan A

OK folks, so here's the deal! Sarawak - Australia - Hawaii - California. 

I had to call this Plan A because each of those idyllic destinations contains at least two letters 'A'. My rationale was that  Plan A would give this trip project a forward-thinking dynamic vibration! Secondly, as much I would like to be able to explore other avenues and travel opportunities, this is currently about the only tangible Plan there is for me. So to paraphrase that great M&S campaign, we call it Plan A because there's no Plan B!

'A Morning View', photo by Rana Simhan (cknara), via Flickr

All going well, kick-off for Plan A is Spring 2013. Ideally I would love to get one or two of my adventure-enclined friends involved in this combo but so far they either can't or won't commit, for reasons their own. As a result, it looks like I am solo-bound. Not an ideal situation for the gregarious, people's person that I am, but honestly I could still be waiting an hypophetical number of years until a seemingly 'ideal' situation presents itself... And I've learnt the hard way that you have to compose with what life offers you, not rely on others and build your future on dreams, promises, illusions, fantasies and waffs of hot air... If I want something, I'd better roll up my sleeves, architect it and build it myself!

Now don't believe for one second that I'm in control and I know what I'm doing. I am absolutely daunted by the prospect of solo travel to places I have never been (bar California). I am no seasoned traveller either, I have never travelled on my own outside a few carefully-chosen European destinations, am generally more used to glamping than camping, although once again does sleeping in the great oudoors or in one's car count as camping and roughing it?

Escape to... Baja Mexico, by Santa Barbara Chic, photo by Patrick Moyer

If you take out the Sarawak bit and just concentrate on the Australia - Hawaii - California trio, you would be forgiven to believe that this is part of The Beach Boys repertoire, that I am bound for an Xtreme Sports Channel surfing competition, or a long vacation! Besides although it might sound like I've done the fun easy bit by picking up juicy destinations, it wasn't as random and carefree as it appears. Sarawak has been on my radar for the last 12 months via The Great Orangutan Project towards which I have secured a deposit as a (paying) volunteer on an orangutan conservation programme based deep in the Bornean jungle. From there I thought I might stretch it down to Australia, why not?

After a relatively 'hardcore' start with Sarawak, I thought it best to enjoy a breather and play it safer and cooler for the remainder of my Pacific odyssey, on an open return, heading first for the Australian Gold Coast (forget the outbacks and the dirt tracks!), then across to California (a soft spot for the Santa Barbara region), via Hawaii (a late addition to the trip, after admiring paradisiac views on Pinterest!). I intend to work (most of) my way through and line up a few contacts before leaving Europe!

Polynesian Knot Statue

Meanwhile a few practical matters have started nagging me lately, as they do... I have been putting strange video requests on YouTube in the name of research, watching the best creepy-crawlies each of my stopovers has to offer, and both Sarawak and Australia deserve gold stars! Ideally (as we know there is no such thing as 'ideally') I would like to avoid Australia's spider season if I can but it looks like I will be hitting the Gold Coast head on in the Australian Autumn... in time for a good face-to-face with those dreaded Huntsmans. Now we haven't even started on the tarentulas yet, have we?

As I am gonna get ready over the next few weeks, I warmly invite you all to follow my pre-departure adventures and check on those pre-trip nerves, via La Baguette Magique. Hopefully once I'm out there I will be able to provide you with regular travel updates. In the light of this, I'm gonna look into those sleek lightweight nifty Tablet/ Notebook devices that I can slip into my yet-to-be-purchased backpack! And here's another one to jot down the To Do list! Talk soon and meanwhile please don't hesitate to part with your advice, recommendations and suggestions, very much welcome!

P.S: Check out my 'Poolside or Seaside' Pinterest board for some Australian, Hawaiian and Californian coastline inspiration!

No Labels

Easy come easy go... We live in a society where we stick labels on anything that moves, on anyone. We pep up our conversations and writings with a liberal use of words that take up space and have no meaning. Labels that help us codify people, styles, ideas, concepts, feelings. Hands up, I am myself guilty of labelling.

'Sheepish', photo by Karena Goldfinch, via Flickr (25/03/2010)

First we've got those passe-partout labels that are supposed to describe someone: worn-out, vague, elusive overused 'one-size-fits-all' adjective labels that are stickable and reusable and adaptable to all circumstances like velcro patches... Labels that don't mean that much to anyone anymore: cool, awesome, rad, great, fantastic...  And those adverbs that nail the message, reiterate it: a (little) bit, kinda/ sort of, very much, a lot/ loads, really, truly, definitely, totally, absolutely...

Problem is, my definition of 'cool' might be slightly off centre, your definition of 'cool' might be off limit, their definition of 'cool' might be plain preppy conservative... And I certainly won't agree with my dad's definition of 'cool' unless it involves Steve McQueen or a vintage Ford Mustang.

Cool as the Camaro! (Pict source via Tumblr)

I still have nightmares about my philosophy classes back in my last year of secondary school. I was 17, dressed to impress (in a bad way!) and just about managing my own eccentricities as a gothic rebel, so this was as philosophical as it was gonna get for me in that lifestage of mine. Then in class we were told not to use words like 'very' anymore. Either something was good or it wasn't. My teacher's pet hate was anyone saying 'absolutely true/ right'. Truth is absolute.

The teacher was even more suspicious of adjectives that involved wider quantification like huge, immense... Everything is in proportion and in relation to one another in the great scheme of things. She lost me. I recall a similar stance from Robin Williams in Dead Poets Society and this certainly left an impact on me. If philosophy never became my cuppa tea, at the very least it raised some awareness in me and did make me self-conscious about word usage and in particular those easy labels.

The King of Cool! (Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images, photo by John Dominis)

For instance, you either love someone or you don't. You don't love them 'just a bit'... Maybe you like them instead. Maybe you are fond of them. If you love them very much, you adore them. Then sure enough my philosophy teacher would step in and give us a spiel about adoration. Some words need to be used carefully, or - at least - with moderation.

Now check out those loose chat-up lines:

- 'Did you have a great time last night, honey?'
- 'I had a good time!'
- 'A good time, uh? Is that all you had? What was wrong?'
- 'Nothing was wrong. I just had a good time.'
- 'Just a good time, now I see... Well honey, don't worry about the next time, cos we're done!'

Now please - can I have those labels back? I kinda need them very very much!