5 desert island beauty essentials

So, the idea of beauty 'essentials' if you were stranded on a desert island is perhaps a little absurd, but it's January, I'm a bit nippy, and just thinking about beaches is helping me out. 

Say you have water, ok? There's a freshwater pocket in the ocean, don't ask me how these things work, but you have water. And coconuts. And maybe a bushel of pigs. And there's a man there if you're straight, or a woman if you're bendy, so you would want to put makeup on to lure them in. And they'd be fit. All right. I feel like that is a lot of 'ifs', but it is an excuse to list undoubtably the best makeup products of 2011. !Vamos a la playa!

Number 5

Dove damage therapy conditioner intensive repair

Thinking rationally, my friend Lucy helpfully pointed out that a deserted beachy island would probably be quite a coup in providing some natural beauty alternatives. Free beauty products! You can tell why she owns a blog called thriftylodge. Sand is a beautiful exfoliant, salt water and sun clear up your skin (so no concealer), and never again would you have to purchase anything from Tigi with the words 'surf' or 'spray' in the title. However, I'm imagining the elements might be quite rough on the tresses. That's where Dove's damage therapy conditioner comes in. It's cheap (750ml for £1.19), and it really does the job if you have dry, split hair that has been damaged by the sun. As some detractors have pointed out, it does coat your hair with silicon, but to be honest you can always just use a clarifying shampoo if you feel like you're getting build-up. But who doesn't like silky, plasticky build-up?! I don't understand the world. Moving on, at number 4 we have...

Number 4

Shiseido eyelash curlers

Where would I be without lash curlers? I'd be up shit creek, and I actually am up shit creek because I lost mine at a friend's house, and am too cheap to get some more. But if you are new to the lash curling world, you may as well leap in with a bang (mixing metaphors), and go for Japanese brand Shiseido's offering. They are quite expensive - about £16 in London - but if you buy a terrible pair you'll only rip off about eight lashes, get really frustrated and throw them in the bin. Shiseido have been around since 1872, and have managed to develop a pair that look like any other, but don't pinch, get the littlest lashes, and actually produce a curl that makes a noticeable difference.


Number 3

Lancome hypnose mascara

You may as well not bother curling your lashes if you're not going to put mascara on, is my motto. Having said that, I do have quite small eyes so I think the bambi thing is always in the back of my mind when it comes to eye make-up. Bigger is better! If you're looking for natural looking mascara then this is not the product for you. However, I think TOWIE, Geordie Shore and Desperate Scousewives have reinterpreted natural makeup to the point where I don't consider false lashes for daytime that outlandish.

Lancome's Hypnose mascara comes in a nice curvy tube (I always appreciate an ergonomic design), has the option of curvy or non-curvy brush, and lengthens lashes like a motherbitch. It also adheres to lashes like a motherbitch, so invest in makeup remover a little stronger than a wetwipe to get this baby off.

Number 2

L'Oreal Sublime self-tanning gel

Can I try and defend putting fake tan on a desert island beauty essentials list? I for one, am vehemently British, and would get so sick of all that sun. Also, you don't want that harsh light beating down on your face all day - it's a recipe for leather face. Rachel Zoe talked about how she never wears sunscreen in her (amazing) book A:Zoe, but she just had a facelift! Hot climate = wrinkles and sun spots. And skin cancer. honestly, it's a wonder they don't bring back the parasol. L'Oreal's Sublime Bronze self-tanner is about 9 quid, which is half the price of San Tropez, and I honestly think it gives a better result. Exfoliate in the shower, dry thoroughly, and put vaseline (or any moisturizer) on your kneecaps, back of knees, elbows - any crevasse, nook, or cranny. Then squeeze some gel onto a mitt, and rub the mitt over your body. I've never tried this stuff on my face, but my friends say it's fine to use if you don't want to shell out on face self-tanner as well. I just trowel on the bronzer to even myself out, but whatever floats your boat, you know. Also get the gel, because every time I use the spray, I discover a beautifully-tanned bit of bathroom wall about two weeks later.

Number One

Le Vernis nail polish, Chanel. (Chanello!)

Coming in at number one, is the old, the favourite...nail polish! Nail polish was the first beauty product that I ever used, and though I have neglected it over the years doing the unkempt, androgynous thing, I know I will always come back to my old faithful. Toes are notoriously disgusting; we all know this, and really the only way round them is to dab on a bit of colour. Kind of like painting a pig. I don't really have a preference for brand: Chanel vernis polishes are good, but expensive. Revlon, No. 7, Maybelline: all good, Sally Hansen and OPI are good too. The only brand I hate, HATE, is ModelCo. Seriously, never buy anything from there, because I have a putrid blusher and a terrible grey nail polish, that I thought would be directional but is just the colour of bellybutton fluff. Aside from them, go for a jazzy colour, test it first, and then just splash it on. The best thing about toes is no-one is ever that close to them (unless you're dating a foot fetishist, and if you are then you probably won't need any advice from me about how to keep your feet spick and span). So you can pretty much apply it blind, and it'll look good.  

There you have it... 5 essential beauty products when you're stranded on a desert island with a man or woman you want to make babies with. (And you already have water and a bushel of pigs)

Scottish Farmer Fashion

I'm not sure why we're all meant to be dressing like we're heading for a wild moor to birth some lambs, but there it is. Fall (if you're American) has arrived, and the style consensus?


Argyle. Knit. Cable. Scratchy wool jumpers, with batwing sleeves, big holes, and so much static you could potentially give yourself a nasty electric shock.

He definitely isn't happy about this situation.

Now this works if you can pull it off the ironic, Marc Jacobs way: with 8ft long legs, an oversized knit sweater with a short skirt comes across as cheeky, rather than mad. On a lot of women, however, the chunkiness of knit doesn't translate well when draped heavily across the torso. put bluntly, it makes you look very wide.

Good idea in theory, but hard to pull off

The solution? I'm bringing out all my old blazers from seasons past, along with parkas, bobble hats and huge scarves. I'm loving the fur lined parka from River Island:

But at £90, I'll be needing to save for a bit. Cruising around Oxford Street in Topshop for a full hour at the weekend, I can definitively state that the only jumpers have bat wings, some sort of itchy wool, or are the regulation plain hoodies that, while cheap, don't really cut it for anywhere outside the park. Where should I be looking for jumpers that have style without the scratch?

Why Pretty Little Liars is the best thing on TV

There’s something about female-led mystery dramas that America just does really, really well. Nancy Drew, Miss Marple, Veronica Mars, and now, Pretty Little Liars. Maybe the girls aren’t quite accomplished at sleuthing as Nancy Drew, nor have such a grip on phone tapping as does Veronica Mars, but the four girls manage to convince, shock and intrigue in their efforts to find out the identity of their dead friend ‘A’, who is threatening them from beyond the grave.

At first watch, this was run-of-the-mill, Desperate Housewives for pre-teens. Yes, there are negatives; the girls are all white, thin and incredibly glossy of hair (seriously, they’re like seals), but the writing, music, and plotlines, together, manage to elevate it beyond a typical teen drama.

Separately, (confusing, but bear with me) there is not much there. The plotlines attempt to push the four girls out of the mainstream: Aria is dating her teacher, Emily is gay, but using homosexuality and student/teacher affairs feels played out. To contradict myself yet again, I will say that the plotlines are not played for salaciousness as they well could be; Aria shares a more chaste relationship with a 23-year-old man than half her classmates do with their 16-year-old boyfriends, and Emily’s lesbianism is not titillating or played for a male gaze.

Another high (if shallow) point of the series is the fashion. Good god, the fashion. The Fug Girls (gofugyourself.com) have raved about it, and there are several trends in the show that seemed to have swept along. The feather earring, which Aria wore, was the beginning of a trend which is probably peaking right about now (Kesha adopting the feather headdress probably didn’t help either)

The girls all have individual styles and their style pretty much stays the same throughout the series (with the exception of clothes getting slightly upgraded as more people started watching and fashion probs caught on and started giving better samples)

Emily is a swimmer, an athelete, and prefers luxurious sports-wear – think silk jerseys, off the shoulder tees and track pants that look very soft. Hannah is the epitome of girly – little dresses, heels, made-up. Lucy is also girly but a little more daring – thigh high socks, plaid skirts and knitted caps. Spencer’s style is probably the most interesting, as she is so gorgeously preppy: think buttoned up shirts, berets, tailored kilts. All four of the shiniest hair I‘ve ever seen, I had to state that again as it is slightly mesmerizing, if not very realistic.

Yet, rather than concentrate on fashion – the girls barely allude to clothing or makeup – or boys, the show centres around four high school students attempting to find the identity of ‘A’, a cruel mimic of their dead friend Alison who is attempting to ruin their lives. I think the biggest reason for Pretty little Liar’s appeal is its recognition that teenage girls, teenagers, people, everyone! – wants to feel significant. You want to be the one with the secret, you want to be the one with more important things on your mind than school. And if it involves opening gift boxes full of broken mirror chards, or getting run over after discovering a secret that you shouldn’t? So be it.

Ten tips for a future career in journalism

How to survive and succeed in the world of journalism? Here's four tips for ya. There'll be more forthcoming just as soon as I get one of those ergonomic chairs (see 1))

1) Take up Pilates

A tip that I have not taken up (the money! It’s hard to think about finding your core when you can’t pay a measly council tax bill) Ok, so if you don’t do this, at least get a good office chair. Can’t afford that either? Steal a co-worker’s when they’re on holiday, and pretend not to notice when they wonder why their chair is so squeaky. Get up a lot. Go and get water. Do the coffee round. Offer to run everyone’s errands.

Back pain is a bitch, man. 10 hours plus hunched furtively over a computer screen does wonders for your posture if your aesthetic ideal is that old paedophile in Family Guy. From taking up smoking, I have reduced the sting in between my shoulder blades to a persistent ache. Granted, I’ve probably taken 15 years off of my life, or guaranteed a fun throat box-thingumajig, but tomayto/tomahto, right?

2) Schmooze like a mofo

Well hello, random beardy man from News of the World! So good to meet you! Yes I will take that proffered glass of warm, opaque champagne! No, I didn’t water that plant with it for fear that you had slipped a roofie in it! No, it hasn’t horribly missed the potted plant and is now dribbling all over the floor onto an irascible photog’s cable!

You get the drift. Be nice to everyone, with a couple of exceptions. Scottish workies who are severely regretting paying for a Travel-lodge for a miserable week of steaming clothes can probably soak up your misplaced anger. They’ll go back up to Scotland, and everyone knows there is no culture there.

3) Learn the lingo

Go to press. Running copy. Contacts and collects. B2B. Hack. Learn all these terms, and drop them in at random throughout your career. If you still don’t really understand the difference between ATL and BTL advertising, try not to worry too much, because no-one else does either.

4) Cop an attitude

In journo world, every PR is a pain, every real-life is difficult, and all rival magazines are idiots. Every phone conversation should follow with a long sigh, a cried expletive, or putting the offender on speaker so the whole room can hear their ignorance. You should be casually blasé about famous-people interviews, and always make disparaging remarks about them not looking quite so luminescent in real life. For any celeb couples, he is always gay, and she is always a bulimic beard.

Perez Hilton is an idiot

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Tier 1, or why immigration is so fucked

I love how the UK has managed to slip this one under the radar by bringing out the news in the middle of nationwide riots in England.

Tier 1 is a new law that is named all fancy so we're distracted by its Star Trek implications. It has been implemented to allow 'exceptional talent' to hold UK residency.

For the first year of operation there is a limit of 1,000 places. Between the 9 August and 30 November there will be 500 places available and a further 500 places available from the 1 December to 31 March 2012. This limit will be reviewed at the end of March 2012.

But what is exceptional talent? You can be considered if you have won an Academy Award, a BAFTA, a Golden Globe or an Emmy Award or have been nominated in the five years before applying.

This means that a refugee fleeing from a war-torn country may (will) find it impossibly hard to get on the road to citizenship, but James Franco can shimmy up in here. James fucking Franco.

Immigration is fucked.

Time slips

They're an interesting thing, time slips. While I don't think of myself as Christian, or attuned to any particular religion - obviously due to an atheist upbringing and a healthy sense of snark - if I had to choose some line of religious upbringing, I would choose paganism. Nature has always seemed to inspire the most adoring and suspicious of reactions. You've got views that make you cry, you've got wind blowing unexpectedly on a flat plain with no clouds. I just think something is up with nature.

Time slips are basically when people experience a place, but not in its real time: the most famous incident being in 1901, when two lady scholars experienced Versailles as it had been in the plague. There's a fascinating story here, about three cadets that felt as though they had been taken back in time when they passed through the village of Kersey in 1957

http://blogs.smithsonianmag.com/history/2011/07/21/when-three-british-boys-traveled-to-medieval-england/

The author makes a convincing argument for the boys basically just over-reacting, but there seems to be something in the mythology of experiencing a place as it has been, not as it is. I think I have experienced it, although not in as concrete a way as has been recorded: more of a feeling, a sens that you are not seeing things as they should be. Could one feasibly prove timeslips?