Hi guys!

I don’t know why I’ve been away from this lovely blog from so long. Too much work I guess. Plus writer’s block. Anyway, I’ve decided to write a post today, after reading a bit of Raconteur-a nice witty blog set up by an old school friend. I actually chuckled out loud while reading it, so I recommend you read his blog too.

So what have I been up to lately? Actually, I’ve never really written about myself on this blog. I guess it’s a good way to restart a blog after a long time. Write about what you know best. I’m actually at university doing graphic arts-advertising, level 2. It’s been quite a lot of work thus far, but I’m trying to be more organised this year.

Anyway, today I’m going to feature this blog:  No Shower Family.

Mmm…octopus

The blog is basically a photographic journal by some Taiwanese students of their daily diets, ranging from home-cooked food, shop-bought soda cans to eating out. As a student, I’m quite curious about what other students are cooking in their kitchens. It’s always brilliant to find other young people who have a passion of food and who love cooking. When I was a child and throughout my early to mid teenage years, I found myself among a lot of people who were narrow-minded when it came to food. They wouldn’t even eat simple dumplings! So therefore, it is really great to find people who genuinely love food and will try anything. If I had a tonne more money, I’d be cooking much more adventurous things. My diet currently consists of cereal, fruit, stir-fry noodles and veg and toast every single day. :\ Food on a budget.

Anyway, back to No Shower Family. Although it is wonderful to see what other students are eating, and to look at beautifully photographed mouth-watering food,  it would be even better if they could post some recipes for us! XD So go ahead and have a look through all of their delicious food adventures!

DESERT CANDY

Yes, I know-my blog has been a bit of a desert lately. However, here I am with a lovely, twee little blog:

Bring out the chef in you by following the beautifully photograph-illustrated blog entries featuring annecdotes, reviews and recipies (with a Middle Eastern twist) for these original desserts. These are great for any occasion-whether you want to impress your friends, get your boyfriend/girlfriend to give you some more lovin’ or if you simply want a fancy snack. There are recipes for everyone, no matter what your level, so everyone should be able to cook something delicious. Unless you get stuck to the computer screen staring at the lovely photos though, haha!

Recommended for Begginners

• Ambari Rice Pilaf
• Chedder Sage Biscuits
• In Praise of Purée

Recommended for the Experts

• Crab, Fennel and Apple Salad
• London Calling
• Homework

Who baked all the cakes!?

Yes I know; fashion websites are nothing unusual or new, but they are very intriguing. For the Internet savy fashionistas, it’s time to say “Bye bye” to the likes of Marie Claire which creates monthly and ever-so-repetitive advertisement Bible (as opposed to what should be a monthly fashion Bible). With blogs, you can get frequent, daily fixes of fashion straight to your computer, and it’s all pretty much for free.

Today, I have picked two excellent fashion sites. In irony to my above slating of Marie Claire, I have featured one of their favourite websites called:

This blog features fashion from the street. However, we’re not talking about Indie/scene/chav kids here. Multi-talented blogger Scott Schuman has an eye for classic yet whimsical styles, and scouts the street with his camera shooting some brilliant photographs of people who embody such styles. I would say that this blog is suited to those who like the high-end of fashion, namely haute couture and polished, tailored office wear with a little bit of casual thrown in. There isn’t really a ‘what to wear right this minute’ kind of blog, but a look in to how people dress on the street today in everyday life and how their personality shows through there interesting fashion senses.

My second recommendation is:

This is more commercial than The Satorialist, and instead of stalking people on the streets, it stalks the magazines and cat walks. Featuring anything from accessories (even for the iPod!) and makeup to cat walk garments, this keeps you up to date with everything you need to know about how to look good at this very moment in time. I would say I am Fashion is on-a-par with commercial, mass-printed magazines, as it offers concise but detailed explanations of each new trend.

There are many, many more fashion blogs and sites out there, but these are so far the best I have found, many of which are excellent in content. I say ditch the paper tablets and go for the fashion electronica instead!

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• The Dummie’s Guide to Make-Up
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Today is 8th August 2008 aka 888-what is supposed to be an auspicious, lucky day. For me, it means two things specifically:

1. Happy Blogoversary to Internet Ramblings!!!



2. Congratulations to Beijing, China, on what I heard was an excellent and outstanding Olympics Opening Ceremony. Some time in the next few days, I will be watching it on the recording I have taped. Let the games begin, I say!

Beijing Olympics 2008 in People’s Republic of China – The XXIX Olympiad

I even got a tiny pay rise, so today must be not just lucky but also wealthy!

The Beijing 2008 Olympics logo
The five Fuwa mascots

Is anyone else fed up with all the political banter surrounding the China Olympics coming up soon, on 8th August 2008? I sure am. It’s time we celebrated sports and the hard work that China has done to prepare for what will hopefully be a great 29th Olympics 2008.

To help you all to get in to the mood for the up-and-coming festivities, I have found some online goodies for you to see related to the Beijing Olympics 2008.

Desktop

• Beijing 2008 Official Website-Funpage-Cute Fuwa-related wallpapers
• Flash-Screen.com-More Fuwa-related wallpapers
• Zimbio Pilot-Olympic Village-related wallpaper
• I Believe in Advertising-Beautiful wallpapers by Freddy

Songs

• Beijing Olympics 2008 Official Song-We Are Ready Song
• Welcome to Beijing
• A Song For Olympics Beijing
• A Song For Olympics Beijing-Malaysian version
• Olympics Song by SHE
• Everyone Is No. 1 by Andy Lau
• Forever Friends by A Mei

Misc

• BBC Sports advertisement-Based on Legend of the Monkey
• Fuwa 365-A year in the life of the Fuwas!

Be sure to catch the Beijing Olympics on 8th August 2008, at 8pm (China time) on your TV screens. In addition, I’d just like to remind readers that it’s my blog birthday on the same day! Cool, huh?

Beijing Olympics ‘Bird’s Nest’ Stadium, China

(Click to enlarge)

Ever so sorry; long time no post! I’ve had a lovely holiday abroad for the last month and didn’t find any time to cook up a new revelation in the world of weirdness for you guys reading.

However, having arrived back from my holiday, I felt it was time to catch up on BBC News. As I was eating my breakfast and getting used to the early morning sunlight, I couldn’t help but gape as I saw the newsreader talking about these new tights (pictured above), called WOMAN tights. These tights are made for both men and women, with each side designated to each gender accordingly to fit the different, ahem, anatomy of the two genders (if that made any sense!).

Like other modern women’s property, such as concealers, perfume, man skirts and various other items, men have now decided to use their tights too. What on Earth made them decide to wear such a garment in modern times as daily wear?

It seems that men, like women, have been enlightened to wear tights due to how warm and comfortable they are. On MyTights.com, customers stated, “The WoMan tights fit very well – i.e. they are not just womens tights re-tagged as unisex.” “They fit me like a second skin”. “The packaging gives a very good first impression”. “Comfort – very good all over”. “The Levee WoMan tights for men are in a class of their own… far ahead of the competition… they are leading the way in legwear for men”.

Not only are tights comfortable, but many men use them as winter wear when it gets cold. Workers in parts of Europe are known to wear tights under their boiler suits, due the the freezing climate during the winter season.

Despite seemingly innocent and positive male reviews of the wearing of tights, some women believe it is wrong that men should wear tights. They argue that it is perverted and ‘wrong’ due to the femininity associated with tights. Others things tights aren’t even normal, stating that they are uncomfortable and cause unnecessary perspiration in ’sensitive’ regions due to the unbreathable Lycra material.

At the end of the day, I actually feel that tights are okay for men to wear as long as I don’t see them. Men’s calves are already big enough-they do not need to be emphasised further by the use of tights, from a fashion point of view! As long as it’s comfortable, I suppose. Living in Britain, I can probably understand the biting chill in a European winter, meaning that it’s probably practical for men to wear tights under their working boiler suits. Even if it is a totally pervy thing, then it’s not that bad a fetish-there are many other worst fetishes out there!!!

Anyway, who doesn’t want to see those bums up there some more in the local lingerie store (surprisingly still sweet in tights, funnily enough)? I wouldn’t mind seeing those hot buns when I go shopping! ;]

Er…not so hot.
Calvin Klein catwalk show

Useful Links

• MyTights.com
• Tights For Men
• FemaleFirst.co.uk

Related Posts

• The Man Skirt
• Print Tights
• The World Beard And Moustache Championships 2007, Brighton

Four finalists (from left to right): Lee McQueen, Claire Young, Alex Wotherspoon and Helen Speight.

If you recall last year, I typed up a post on the legendary television program, The Apprentice. Well the series was on again this year, and tonight the final will be aired at 9pm on BBC 1! This year, the favourites to win are Lee McQueen (“There’s the Shreddies. Now THAT’s what I’m talkin’ about!”) and Claire Young (who will probably load up rounds and rounds of bull in to her AK47!). However, who knows? Sir Alan has been making some very funny decisions lately.

I mean-just look at his adorable face; You just have to love him!

Personally, my favourite to win before he got fired was Raef Bjayou. His dapper dress sense, charming manners, Southern accent and good looks just makes him a dream come true! I am disappointed that Sir Alan fired him-he just made a couple of mistakes, in comparison to Michael Sophocles-the Apprentice’s resident sleaze bag! Thankfully, most of the apprentices are going to be back on the box to help the finalist teams. Let’s hope plenty of air time goes to Raef Bjayou!

To rev yourself up for the final, why not try The Guardian’s “Which Apprentice finalist are you?” quiz. Unfortunately, I got HELENE-my least favourite! If only I’d filled out all the pterodactyl answers-at least I’d have gotten a decent answer.

“Ah werk in a corpora’e enviro’ment and ‘ave lawdes and lawdes o’ men aroun’ me.” Lovely, dear, lovely.

What a b****. Not even a good, charismatic, funny one either, like our beloved Katie Hopkins.

Maybe you’d prefer to listen to the theme tunes. Dru Masters, who make and compile most of the music for the series, have kindly uploaded almost the entire series’ music to Last.fm.

So make sure you catch this on television tonight with a bowl of popcorn, or even better, invite your friends round and dress up in business suits while eating caviare and champagne for an Apprentice party!

The Apprentice 2008 candidates and Sir Alan Sugar

Useful Links

• The Apprentice Appraisal Game

Related Posts

• The Apprentice
• Look it’s Katie Hopkins…get me out of here!

And the winner is…

Apologies for not writing in such a long time! I have been extremely busy with coursework and exams. In fact, I should be doing some coursework now but I decided to quickly let you know I was still alive and well with a review of the grassroots music website known as Pitchfork.

Pitchfork is a fantastic website that is perfect for when you’ve run out of good music to listen to. Sometimes, your old records sometimes aren’t good enough and you need a new music track obsession-that’s where Pitchfork comes in.

This website gives you the low-down on most new music, ranging from rap to folk to indie pop rock. So whatever your taste in music, you’re bound to find something you like at this website. Navigation is initially slightly confusing, but you get used to it in the end. In a way, its navigation is not important as there are by-links almost everywhere you look, so you can skip here and there and go on a bit of a music adventure. The layout is passable and relatively pleasant, but its the content that really makes this website come in to its own. Pitchfork consists of loads and loads of music artists and bands, with detailed reviews and links to the artists’ websites. All of this is free-this is basically the online, full-blooded equivalent of your NME or World Music magazine.

Even if you’re not really that in to pop music and get easily bored of radio, I do recommend paying a visit to this website. It’s got some pretty weird, abstract stuff on it as well as the up-coming popular, new music, so you can be sure to find something you’ll be listening to obsessively for a good few weeks!

Cut Copy-Pop Band
Review/MySpace

Useful Links:

• BBC Radio 1
• Sky FM
• MySpace Music

This is suitable for if you’re:

1. Really really bored.
2. You have some kids round and they’re really bored and messing you about, and you need something to keep them occupied.

Following my clothes and make-up theme so far, this is a blog by Liana, who draws and colours her paper doll dress-up creations. Simply print-out, cut-out and stick on a paper doll, and wahla!

Related Posts:

• Cut-Outs and Dress-Up Dolls

Useful Links:

• Wikipedia

Barbie-style make-up in a MAC advertisement.

We seem to be having something of a vanity thread running through the most recent posts. Well here’s a new one (click on the banner):

This is basically a website that gives you the ins-and-outs of almost every single type of facial cosmetic item on the market, with a few body buffing tips as well. If you’re really bad at putting on make-up and, like me, can’t decide when “enough is enough”, then this is an excellent website for you. If you are already a dab hand, then add some excellent tips from this site to add to your going-out-make-up repertoire. It is particularly good for people with Asian facial qualities, as the woman (yes, she’s older than 20-can you believe it? She looks so young! *jealous*) who runs the website is Chinese and showcases various Oriental celebrities and their “make-up breakdowns” as well as Western make-up. On this website, you can learn how to apply make-up to eyes, lips, brows, facial coverage and even nails and contact lenses and their uses, and much, much more! You can even ask the web mistress, Phyllis, any questions about beauty.

Suitable for anyone at any level of make-up appliance, whether it be for your own personal every-day and going-out looks to stand out from the crowd, or whether you are in beauty school, this is a brilliant online, easy-to-use blog guide for make-up. This is certainly better than any magazine or so-called “beauty book” I’ve ever come across.

Barbie-style make-up in real life. Voilá!

Useful Links:

• Lizterati
• Raquel 13