How to cheer yourself up

Sometimes if I'm feeling a bit blue, I write myself little pep-notes and hide them to surprise myself with at a later date, which are supposed to make me feel better. Something along the lines of:

Dear Nom, 
In case you forgot, you're totally amazing and lots of people think you're SUPER COOL.
Love,
Nom

or

Dear Le Nome,
You're too awesome and busy to be confined to a relationship right now and there are plenty of years to go before your ovaries turn to dust, so really it's a GOOD THING that you're single and free.
Peace out,
Nombles x

This usually works, unless I'm really down in the dumps, in which case I'll probably just end up hating on myself for being such a loser as to write myself pep-notes.

Anyway, what I'm saying is that sometimes we all need a little reminder that we're great. Just a little something that you can look at and think 'Huh, yeah, I forgot about the fact that I'm awesome. Yeah maybe I am chubbier than my best friend, but actually, people still love me so it's not the end of the world.'

That's where this necklace from Finest Imaginary off of that Etsy comes in. It states the facts. Plain, simple. Capital letters. GOLD. Under a tenner. It's ticking a lot of boxes for me right now...

Marvellous millinery

We've talked before about my occasional need for accessories which do a small amount of communication, warding off potentially boring conversations and alerting people to my general mood. So I'm delighted to tell you I've found another Folksy Friend* in the form of Janine Basil, who's bringing comically verbose headgear to the aid of millions of speechless women throughout the MARVEL UNIVERSE. And potentially, this one too.

Check out this beautifully twinkly and ever-so-slightly aggressive BAM! fascinator, which costs £85. This is literally amazing. I would wear this A. to a comic book themed party where I could controversially go as The Text and mumble something that sounds vaguely intelligent about Roland Barthes and the death of the author, or in this case, illustrator, or A. wear this all the time. In my house. Outside the house. And whenever I catch my reflection in a in the mirror or window, just shout BAM! at myself. In the house this would be acceptable, my housemates find my mild insanity endearing. Outside the house, this might not fly, so perhaps I'd just shout BAM! in my head.

My other personal fave, because as you may have gathered from previous posts I'm a girl-geek-who-loves-the-chic (er, whatever, I'm speed typing on loads of coffee this morning) is the comic book inspired POW! rhinestone fascinator, which also costs £85. Man I so want one of these. I could pretend to be a superhero all the day long. And who wouldn't want that opportunity in life?

Moving away from the comic book theme, is the delightful Oh La Lah! rhinestone comic inspired fascinator, which again costs £85. I feel I could easily wear this with a nice pair of tailored black capris, one of my beloved stripey tops and black ballet pumps and you know, just have a totally French themed day. I'd eat tarte-au-citron and think about the Eiffel Tower and ride a bicycle and sigh wistfully and say 'oui' a fair bit, which sounds silly but really it's not.

The fascinators come as standard attached to headbands, but you can put in a special little request to have a comb or elasticated headband. Good old Janine's nice and obliging like that. Each rhinestone is carefully glued on by hand, so you know that she must be really quite skilled, a dab hand with the old glue-gun and totally deserving of our patronage.

If you're not into the rhinestones, or you're happy to speak for yourself she also as a lovely collection of crowns, bows and some hilarious zombie-themed 'oopsie-daisy-my-brain-is-peeking-through' headbands too!


* Well, strictly speaking, we're not actually friends, but I have emailed her to ask her permission to feature her work, so maybe, she'll potentially errr, like me for that? Maybe an internet friendship will bloom. Or maybe not. Who cares? This is getting awkward. I'm going now. Buhbye.


I originally wrote this post for About Your Dress Blog, you can still find it amongst heaps of other posts by me and two other talented ladies there if you'd like to go and have a peek.

Cooler than carbonite, kids

There was a time in my (as you're about to discover) misspent youth, that I would idle away my lonely hours in Forbidden Planet, looking at comic books and pining after over-priced toys. Despite the fact that any geek worth their salt will pinch the bridge of their nose and scream in your face 'THEY'RE NOT TOYS! THEY'RE MOVIE MEMORABILIA/ACTION FIGURINES/COLLECTIBLES', they are, actually just toys. Toys for grown ups. Deal with it. I have.

I stopped going to Forbidden Planet because a. I was never given pocket money and b. although I know I dazzle you on a weekly basis with my charm, wit and intelligence, I'm simply not intense enough to be classed as an actual geek, so I got totally bored of having conversations with people who just *have* to prove a point, even if it's over an incredibly minor footnote in the history of The Marvel Universe.

So it's not surprising that I've entirely missed the boat on this Star Wars Han Solo ice cube tray, which costs £8.99:

Now, I know I said that I gave up on the quest to become a genuine geek, due to commitment phobia, lack of funds and unacceptable dress-sense, but when my twitter pal @marcusgalley hooked me up to a link with this, I got ridiculously overexcited. So excited, a little bit of wee came out.*

Look at poor Han! He's DROWNING! Nooooooooo!

Now, I'm hoping that you all get why this is great, but in case you're too young to have seen any Star Wars films prior to Episode I, this product makes a most amusing gift for the true Star Wars Enthusiast, because in Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back (which is arguably the greatest of the Trilogy, but I do like a bit of the old Episode IV: A New Hope, particularly the bit with The Cantina Band, which is my ringtone, incidentally), Darth Vader forces Solo's old Frenemy Lando Calrissian to trick him into chilling out for a bit in Cloud City, where Vader imprisons Solo in carbonite and turns him over to the faceless and mysterious bounty hunter, Boba Fett (I know, isn't his name awesome?) who sells Solo's ass without a second thought to slimy, slug-like kingpin, Jabba the Hutt. It's a particularly poignant moment in the film, because *just* as Solo is about to be encapsulated (and no-one really knows if he will even survive the carbonisation process - it's never been tested), Princess Leia finally tells him she loves him, after much sexual tension and bickering has been played out on screen. Like I said, it's a VERY POIGNANT MOMENT FOR STAR WARS FANS. This is what Han Solo looks like in the film when he's all carbonised and shiz:

I know, right? Travelling across the galaxy this way makes Sleazy-Jet look like a dream.

In short, this is seven types of awesome and if you buy it for a Star Wars fan, they'll appreciate it massively. Unless they have already been given fifteen of them. If you don't feel comfortable going into Forbidden Planet, you can always buy online, or you could just make them a Han Solo Trapped In Carbonite Cake.

*Actually that's hyperbole, I'm a fully and happily continent member of society peeps. So please don't spam me with offers of Tena Lady.

I originally wrote this post for About Your Dress Blog, you can still find it amongst heaps of other posts by me and two other talented ladies there if you'd like to go and have a peek.

I was recently introduced to the designboom blog by one of the creative team at my new job at Ocado. Basically, they'd seen an article on there about a virtual supermarket in South Korea; and by virtual I don't mean, like, Ocado online, I mean a whole underground station transformed into virtual supermarket, using QR codes to enable passengers to shop whilst waiting for a train. How awesome is that?

Anyway, naturally once I'd read the article, which was, for all intents and purposes work-related, my fingers slowly found themselves edging the mouse towards the designboom shop... I wasn't disappointed. It has loads of supercool presents; presents for you, presents for me, presents for wine buffs, presents for geeks, like, for example, this laptop bag which looks like a Windows 'My Documents' folder. CLEVER.

This costs $30 (about £18.80, thank you Expedia Currency Converter), not including postage. I really want it; I think it will definitely help me in my eternal quest to attract a cute, geeky boyfriend. It totally sends out the right vibes. It's like 'I'm geeky, but also cool', in a non-contrived way, obv. And 'geeky-and-cool-in-a-non-contrived-way' is a rare and attractive combo.

Sadly, I don't actually have a laptop, so once geeky-cool-non-contrived-potential-Mr-Nom saw the contents of my case, he might be slightly dubious about my coolness and geekiness, but I'm sure by that point I would have probably made some good jokes involving innuendo and maybe dazzled him with my smile*, so he'd be trapped in my web like a geeky and cool fly and the Find Nom A Boyfriend Plan would be successfully executed.

*If not my smile then definitely my boobs. Or my aforementioned zebra print onesie.

I originally wrote this post for About Your Dress Blog, you can still find it amongst heaps of other posts by me and two other talented ladies there if you'd like to go and have a peek.

Threadlessly

I'm in a mopey mood today. I'm tired because I started a new job and moved house all in the same week. On Friday I went and got bosco absoluto, which is rather a silly thing to do when you have to move the other half of your belongings and clean your old flat the next day. FAIL. So today I am mostly feeling sorry for myself and wanting to mooch about wearing comfy clothes, eating naughty things, such as the cold pizza I bought last night and probably a large quantity of chocolate. Ooh, I could really go for a scotch egg, thinking about it.

The humble t-shirt is an integral part of any mooch-situation. Sometimes I like to kick it GAP style in a plain white t-shirt (whilst not wearing any actual GAP branded items because everything I have ever tried on in GAP looks boxy and squat and they can DO ONE if they think I'm going to buy into that look). Other times, I like to wear something that is a little bit more interesting. Threadless is handy for this kind of clothing dilemma.

The good thing about Threadless is that the designs can be applied to girls t-shirts and boys t-shirts and hoodies for either gender too. I think there's even the option to buy designs for younglings, but I've never investigated that option in any depth because I don't have a boyfriend, never mind offspring. The t-shirts are always really nice quality too. Another awesome thing about Threadless is that anybody can submit a design and if enough people like it, they will print it! I think you get a $1000 dollar prize if your design wins. Get your pencils out.

To go with my morbid mood, my first selection is Zombie at Tiffany's, which costs $20 (£12.18, thank you Expedia).

My housemate Helen thinks this is hideous, mainly because she loves the Breakfast At Tiffany's poster so much she has a copy of it up in our kitchen. I think it's hilarious. But then, I am sometimes one sick little puppy.

Speaking of puppies, Satan's Little Helper also costs $20 and features a fun pun and a picture of a doggrell, which I like muchly.

On the cute theme, there's also this Cookie Loves Milk tee by Jess Fink for $18. It comes in purrrrty colours too.

Love this Useful Facts tee ($15) too. Sometimes, knowing some good Facts can really come in handy. I make it my business to know random Facts. Such as, your hair doesn't really continue to grow after you die, your skin shrinks which makes it seem longer. Gross right? Also, white chocolate isn't technically chocolate at all, because it contains no cocoa solids, just a little cocoa butter. If you have nothing to contribute to a conversation an interesting Fact can be a real ice breaker. And when you're hungover, this could be essential.

I originally wrote this post for About Your Dress Blog, you can still find it amongst heaps of other posts by me and two other talented ladies there if you'd like to go and have a peek.

Write me, Balthazar...

Isn't it a shame that most of the time the only post that graces your doormat is from EON or HSBC telling you that you owe them money or that you're overdrawn and you'll have to sell a kidney to get through the next three months? I wish more people wrote letters. I wish more things were beautiful for the sake of being beautiful and made me smile. Don't you?

Well. There's this man, right, and he's an imaginary sailor and a pretend photographer. And he's also like... a letter prostitute. He writes love letters or dirty letters or letters full of nonsense or advice. Any kind of letter really. He writes them for you or you can order one for a friend! And he'll even include a beautiful, sensual, original Polariod that he's taken. Paying $5 for the Polaroid is optional, but let's face it, it would be genuinely rude not to reward such selfless kindness with a measly $5. It's not even £5, I just ordered one on Paypal and it was like, £3.26 or something*. Also, you should think about the fact that it will come with an interesting stamp on it, because it's coming from Madison, in the US of A. AND his name is Balthazar...

In actual fact, Call Me Balthazar is a creative duo, a mysterious twosome of the aforementioned Balthazar and his model, writer, stylist and muse S.M. Kubica. Aren't their names cool too? So go on. Be part of a project and make yourself feel special and get an original polaroid, request a letter from Balthazar.

You can also buy photographic prints by Balthazar on the website here or on his Etsy page.

*DISCLAIMER: EXCHANGE RATES MIGHT WELL VARY.

I originally wrote this post for About Your Dress Blog, you can still find it amongst heaps of other posts by me and two other talented ladies there if you'd like to go and have a peek.

Homophone wallcards

I love a good pun, me. There is quite simply nothing I find more delightful than a game of words; English is a language chock full of interesting little quirks like seemingly insane spellings, irregular verbs and homophones.

We learn about homophones in primary school, nice and early on so we can spot them coming a mile off. They're those tricksy little words that sound the same, but are spelt differently, like 'made' and 'maid' or 'pear' and 'pair'.  There Their They're confusing even for grown ups (see what I did there? HOMOPHONEJOKESLOL). Which is why you might want to have a few of these wall cards from Present and Correct scattered about your abode to help you remember that the homophone is constantly lying in wait, ready to trip you up at any given moment in time.

I love the nice, clean typography, which is aesthetically pleasing and helpful for learning. Did you know that teachers often favour the sickeningly friendy font Comic Sans because it's one of the few sans serif fonts (essentially this means it doesn't feature curly tails or hats on the a) and that makes it easier for children with dyslexia to read. Unfortunately, comic sans makes me want to simultaneously scream, vomit and tear out my eyes every time I see it, particularly as it's usually plastered all over some form of passive-aggressive note in a toilet or kitchen, so it makes me really happy to see this pretty little font featured on these wall cards.

Additionally, each card has a great set of homophones on both sides, so if you get bored of 'piece' and 'peace' you can flip it over and give 'hole' and 'whole' a turn.

The Homophone Wall Cards cost a mere ten of your English pounds. I was duped into spending more than that on a vodka, lime and lemonade on Saturday night in Soho. One of these would not only be better for my general behaviour in public places, but it would also be, like, totally helping me learn more stuff and that.

For anyone who is interested, here's a list of homophones. I don't know why you would be, you're here to kill time on our lunchbreak presumably, but if you do happen to be a little bit bored and interested like I was, you can have a nosey there.

I originally wrote this post for About Your Dress Blog, you can still find it amongst heaps of other posts by me and two other talented ladies there if you'd like to go and have a peek.

Swanky accessories

Do you ever have one of those days where you're just insanely busy and nobody is adoring you and everything is going wrong and you're pretty much just like AAAARGH? Of course you can't actually scream that out loud, because people might think you were unhinged or something, so maybe you just stick to thinking it or tweeting it. Or maybe you wear it around your neck to subtly remind people to give you a freaking break:

This AAAARGH necklace costs £22 from jewellery designer Swank, aka Becky Wignell. Based in Otley, Becky's designs are often made from recycled material (the chain on the above for example and her range of recycled Lego-themed necklaces are pretty squiffy geek-chic too), which means you can feel happy about what you're hanging round your hooters.

Also worthy of note are her really cool plane-related necklaces, which come in silver, gold or black-backed perspex. You know me, I love black and gold, it's so opulent and trashy:

Seriously cool, non? The F1-15 Fighter Jet necklace costs 30 smackeroonies and can be located by clicking this link here.

And then there's the Grumman Wildcat necklace, which also costs £30.

Lastly I want to show you my favourite, because it's named after a song which never fails to make me giggle and it's also AWESOME:

The Rock Lobster necklace costs £18 and comes in red, pink or gold perspex. Seriously cool. Which one should I choose, red or gold?

I originally wrote this post for About Your Dress Blog, you can still find it amongst heaps of other posts by me and two other talented ladies there if you'd like to go and have a peek.

Fan art by Liam Brazier

I'm writing this post, even though I'm a little bit frightened (and strangely excited) that any moment now, fifteen massive men wearing full SWAT gear are going to break through all the entrances to my house screaming, shine a torch in my eyes and bundle me into a van never to be seen again under the express instruction of George Lucas' copyright infringement scary badass legal collective. But you know what I'd say to them as they broke my typing fingers (yes, I'm a two finger typer. I know, it's totally messed up. But I'm still fast. I get on just fine with my two indexes, I'm just like the rest of you, I don't need no special treatment)? I'd say, in what I imagine to be a liberal accent:

"You can't suppress talent dude! The MAN George Lucas, May Peace Be Upon Him, is wrong to like, try and put financial boundaries on creativity dude! You can't OWN creativity brother! PEACE! We're spreading the message man, it's fear that stops you from sharing the magic. And we all know about fear man, fear leads to anger, anger leads to hate, hate leads to suffering..."

Then probably one of them would kick me in the ovaries and I'd pass out and that would be the end of my story because it's getting a bit weird now, but anyway I really like these prints!

They're totally freaking awesome. Okay so maybe not all (or any) of you are fans of Star Wars, but Liam Brazier has managed to transform C-3PO, helping him to transcend his robotic nature and providing him with an elegant sense of dignity (and C-3PO is not an elegant character, he's *just* annoying).  He's lent the humble Stormtrooper a sense of ethereal gravitas; no longer just a clone, but a complex, fragmented, 3-dimensional character worthy of his own portrait, his own place on the mantle. The gloomy depths of the Bounty Hunter's helmet stare boldly into the eyes of the Viewer, daring us to gaze for a moment into the abyss. Okay so I'm borrowing heavily from my A-Level Art essays now, but seriously, I think these are ace and if you know anyone else who likes Star Wars, they probably will too.

Good old Liam is selling giclee prints of these bad boys at his inPRNT shop in various sizes, 12 x 18 inches for $20 and 18 x 24 inches for $40. They're on 100% cotton rag archival paper, which might not mean anything to you, but let me tell you as a photographer, it's blooming expensive and it basically means it will last forever (well, about 300 years actually, if kept in the right conditions).

It's not just Star Wars though...look, Superman too!

Probably best that we all buy these before George Lucas uses the force of his legal team to have him executed, because then they'll be worth four bajillion times the price you can buy them for now!

I originally wrote this post for About Your Dress Blog, you can still find it amongst heaps of other posts by me and two other talented ladies there if you'd like to go and have a peek.