A REVIEW OF 2012: A YEAR OF CHANGE

Everything changes doesn't it?  Change is good isn't it? Well that's not how I felt at the start of the year when everything in my life seemed to be changing.  I was miserable and sad, but what I didn't realize at the time was the reason things were changing was because I was already miserable and sad before these changes. Change is never easy and believe me at times it was difficult, but I do not regret any of the decisions I have made this year, they have all been for the best.  Happiness is the best change of all.  Right I finished with the schmultz, its time for the review.

WEDDINGS
This was the year of weddings, with three of my closest friends getting hitched.  All three weddings were all different and great in there own special way. I purchased new frocks, got drunk and avoided being set up (does a drunken kiss count?) even though some people were trying their hardest, at each of the weddings.  Hopefully there won't be as many next year.  Your costing me a fortune. Congratulations to:

Mr and Mrs Mills

 Mr and Mrs McIndoe

 Mr and Mrs West

BABIES
I have got to that age where everyone seems to be having babies these days.  Three came into the world this year

 First up my cousin Nicole and her husband Dre welcomed the lovely Ava Carrington into the world.

Then of course my old housemates, Oli and Alex gave us the lovely Lyra.

And finally the much anticipated Henry, who after a difficult birth and giving us a bit of a scare is now well and kicking. Congratulations to my oldest friend Liz and her great husband Paul.

FAVOURITE FILM OF 2012

Searching for Sugar Man

FAVOURITE ALBUM OF 2012 

Funnily enough its the Searching for Sugar Man Soundtrack!

 FAVOURITE TV PROGRAMME

Game of Thrones:  OMG!  I know its geeky but I'm totally addicted.  I watched series 2 in 3 days flat!

TRAVELS

I started the beginning of this year in Mexico, but this year has been all about Spain.  I have found myself there 3 times this year.  Firstly in Almeria with work; second time in Barcelona visiting my friend Mariel ; and finally in Malaga with my sister for some much needed rest.  I love Spain, the people, the food, the culture and the language even though I'm not so sure that Spain quite likes me inflicting my Spanish on it?

WORK

Oh yes, that thing that has consumed my life for nearly all of the year.  I have been on the same job all year, and I would love to tell you about it, especially now I have finished, but even so, I'm still not going to say what I worked on, as its probably more trouble than its worth. Sorry.

HAPPY 2013 EVERYONE FROM LADY WARRINGTON X

BABIES THAT LUNCH

Every woman knows the importance of lunch date with her fellow females. It's where we put the world to rights; we comment on how well the other looks; discuss the failings of men; catch up with the latest gossip and maybe wear a new item of clothing that we pretend not to care about, but really we just want to show off. Yes ladies that lunch is very important. I feel if the leaders of the world, made all of those important decisions for humanity in the lady lunch manner, the world would be a lot happier place and they would probably be a lot wiser on what is a good skin care routine to have too!

I meet up with my friends Alex and Kym the other week. We have met up like this many times before, but this time it was different. This time we had a BABY!

It only seems like yesterday, that we were in Mexico last New Year, when I got out of the shower to find Alex also naked on the toilet (this wasn't a surprise, Alex gets naked a lot; she hasn't got a problem with nudity)!
"I'm late"! She informed me.
"Your late! But your never late! God! Imagine if your pregnant!" I replied.
It turns out she was and now nearly a year later, here we are with 4 month old Lyra.

I have come to realise over the years Alex is one of my closet friends, which is funny because when I first met her, I couldn't stand her. I even think I might have described as a rude bitch after our first meeting? Though to be fair I think maybe the feeling was mutual, but as time went on and with our years of living together we came to know each other and find our friendship, which usually consisted of her acting like a Jewish mother, me rolling my eyes a lot and telling her to calm down. It worked though our strange ways of friendship. Apart from when she used to ask me to take the recycling bin! That was never good for our friendship. Bloody hated that bin! Don't miss it at all! God dam bin! I hope it burns in Hell! Hell I tell you! Hell!
As I said the recycling bin was never good for our friendship.

It had been a year of great change for both of us and even our friendship. When I first left Hackney Wick I felt our relationship was strained. I was sad and angry about a lot things and I was finding it hard to give up the flat. Alex who was the ultimate party girl was coming to terms with the fact she was going to be a mother and her life would change for ever. It was not a good combo. We clashed and had some blazing rows. As fiery as I am, I hate arguing with anyone, and especially people I care about. I distanced myself for a while as to sort out my own unhappiness, but now that seems along ago memory. I'm happy now and Alex is too. She has the beautiful Lyra and she is a great mother. This mass of energy that she has always had now has this amazing focus: Lyra.

Alex will always be Alex, I saw this at lunch: bossing the waiter around; making loud comments about people staring at her breast feeding; and shocking the hell out of the manager by trying to change the baby's nappy in the middle of the restaurant! Buts that what I have always liked about her. She doesn't give a shit. She now just doesn't give a shit and has a baby too.

A couple of days later, we met to take Lyra on her first cinema outing, to see the Hobbit 3D at the baby showing (Yes they do parent and baby showings, can you believe it)? Alex who had invited me seemed genuinely shocked that I had turned up. To be fair so was I! Going to the cinema with 30 screaming babies is my worst nightmare isn't it? Well actually it isn't, because during the ladies lunch I realised I really liked hanging out with Alex and Lyra. We didn't get wasted, we didn't pull guys and we didn't roll in, in the early hours of the morning, but it was one of the best days I'd had out in ages. I guess we are getting older, but with that comes a calmness. Yes a calmness and its nice. I feel our friendship has changed, but for the better. Oli and Alex have always been like a london family to me, albeit a crazy one, but now there is a new addition: Lyra. She brings a great new energy to us all, and me and I know Aunty Kym as well, want to see her grow and be part of her life. This is why there will be many more Babies that Lunch days to come and many, many other things too.

GOODBYE CARDIFF: ITS BEEN EMOTIONAL!

That's a wrap! 10 months! 10 God dam months of my life, here in Cardiff and its over. No more 6 day weeks, no more night shoots, no more crazy schedules, no more stress, no more CARDIFF! I have my life back, but the funniest thing happened during the clear up, a couple of days after the wrap: I burst into tears. Why? Because I'd been praying for the job to be over for so long, but then I was left with a feeling of complete sadness. Confused! Yes so was I, but then I realised what I have known for a long time. Coming to Cardiff was the best thing for me. I came here 10 months ago a broken person. I was truly miserable. I had left my home of 5 years that I loved and had been hurt by someone who I adored and who I never thought would treat me like he did. I felt like I had lost everything, but now I realise that was not true. Getting away from my old world and going somewhere completely different made me evaluate a lot things in my life and who I am and what I want. I have worked on myself for 10 months and realised things about myself I never knew. I know what I want, I know how I should be treated and I know what I deserve and I have never been able to say that before.

One of the best things about this job has been my costume family. It's been a tough 10 months with ups and downs but we have supported each other through out. They have lifted me and never put me down and made me feel good about myself, buts that's what real friends do. I've been a fool at times, I've been blind at others, by spending too much time and energy on people that were never worthy and never really cared about me. I have been clouded for so long, but now I see things more clearly and from that I feel calmer. I will still make mistakes but that's OK, because everyone does.

Cardiff I want to thank you. You pushed me to the edge sometimes but you were a journey that added to me as a person. I survived you Cardiff and that has to be an achievement in itself, doesn't it? Will I be going back? No bloody way! Ha ha.

FIFTY SHADES OF GREY: A TRULY HONEST REVIEW!

I've sank to a new low recently. I didn't think I could sink this low, but it just happened! I confess! I went out and purchased Fifty Shades of Grey!!!! For some one like me, who prides herself on her reading material, this is a grave sin indeed! You might think I sound arrogant or big headed, but I have never been a person that reads the usual chick flick tat that floods our shelves (Ok I read Grazia now and again but that's a magazine, so it doesn't count)! Give me D.B.C Pierre, Hilary Mantel, and Sebastian Faulks any day or a history chronicle, followed by a biography of a person that has made their mark on this world. Not bloody Jackie Collins or Jilly Cooper (though paragraphs from Riders is very good to read in a group when extremely drunk)! No! I read good stuff. I have never read rubbish!
Well that's not strictly true. I had a phase when I was a teenager, of reading a lot of Mills and Boom books given to me by my Nana Lil. Deep down inside,I knew they were trash, but I couldn't stop turning the pages. Why? Because they had sex in them! A 14 year old girl who is just discovering sex is like a sponge, she wants to know more; know everything of this new world that has been opened up to her, and books were the perfect way. I kept on reading more books (funnily most of them coming from Nana Lil), one of which was a little bit too eye opening and I had to go downstairs and tell my mother,
"Lil has given me this book and these two girls keep doing stuff to themselves with a hose pipe in it. Should I be reading this?"
I can't remember my mothers exact response, but it was probably somewhere between motherly shock and slight amusement, as she knew Lil was no normal grandmother.
It was around this time I had my first kiss. His name was Stew, but everyone called him "Pot head", which in reflection doesn't seem that great! But at the time he was cool, as he was older than me, being 18 and was in the sixth form and even though he didn't have a car, he could drive his mums so that was cool also (God 15 year olds are so easily pleased)! We were at my house, in my bedroom and we are sat on my bed. I'm pissed off with him because we had been sat downstairs for the last half an hour while Pot head has been talking none stop to my mum, even though I've asked him if he wants to go upstairs a hundred times but I'm ignored and left to watch Eastenders, while he continues chatting. I eventually get him up to my room, only for him to say,
"Your mum is lovely and really attractive!"
This is why I'm pissed off. By now he can tell this, as we he are sat on the bed in awkward silence. He grabs me and sticks his tounge down my throat; I can hear Eastenders and my brother and sister arguing downstairs; he tries to touch my breasts; I'm scared so slap his hands; and I'm doing this all eyes wide open wondering if he wishes it was my Mum he was kissing rather than me! This wasn't how it happened in the books! This is the thing! You slowly learn that the reality isn't quite like the books. There is no rich millionaire, dashing lord or exotic waiter called Fernando! No! They are usually are called Dave, Matt, or Andy and them whisking you away is probably a Curry night down at Weatherspoon's. Oh! and there usually isn't a happy ending. Yes! I have certainly learnt over the years, that the reality is never like the books. So why the hell did I find myself buying and reading some woman's fantasy novel, when I should know much better? I'm no 14 year old girl anymore.
Well I'm bored; I have no love life; it's meant to be naughty and quite frankly it being the biggest selling book ever, I want to know what the all the fuss is about. Oh God! I'm just like another million women out there!
I wish I'd never bothered, is the truth! So I'd heard it wasn't the best written book in the world, but was that a underestimate! It makes Jordan look like Charles Dickens. Actually a six year old could do better (is that the same as Jordan)? Honestly its the most badly written book I have ever read. It was off putting. Even though I realised this, after the first paragraph, I had to carry on. There had to be something to this book. Sexually naughty I was led to believe? Well maybe if your a sexually repressed middle aged woman who watches Loose Women, then this is the most exciting thing ever, if your not this reads as a bit more of sexed up Mills and Boom, but you get bored of it, as all they seem to do is have sex all the time (and I'd never thought id say that)! Oh but they have some kinky sex! What! He spanks hers! I bloody would do too. Anna the main character is so feeble and annoying I wanted to hit her, never mind him! And she keeps going on about her inner Goddess all the time. What the Hell is her inner Goddess, for me it was more like her inner moron!
As for Christian Grey, who is meant to be head of a muti-billion dollar empire, which I don't know how, as he spends most of his time walking round with his top off and stalking a girl in way that is not romantic, but freaky to the point that you would have a restraining order out on him. I tried. I Really did, but I didn't make it to the end. I think I have eighty pages left. I should want to know how it ends, but the truth is, I really couldn't give a dam. He can keep on being creepy, she can keep on talking about her inner Goddess and he can spank her till his hearts content! It's boring, stupid and about as sexually exciting as watching an episode of the antiques Road Show!
From now on I'll stick to Michael Fassbender movies and University Challenge for my excitement! Actually I'm definitely not like a million other women out there. Ha ha!

IT

"To have "It", the fortunate possessor must have a strange magnetism which attracts both sexes. He or she must be entirely unselfconscious and full of self confidence, indifferent to the effect he or she is producing, and uninfluenced by others. There must be physical attraction, but beauty is unnecessary.

Elinor Glyn

A couple of weeks ago Howard received a phone call from Miranda, Sir Gareth's sister. Yes! She has a title too. It's Lady Miranda, and she is a real Lady because some stupid ancient law means that she can cross her sheep across London bridge anytime she wants, or something like that? It's a stupid law anyway. I don't even think she has any sheep to bloody start with? Sorry, Im getting sidetracked. Back to the story. So Miranda, I mean Lady Miranda, wanted Howard to go and retrieve some box from the house and bring it back to London with him. The next morning, Howard came out of the house carrying a huge metal case, looking like he was going to have a heart attack! He shoved it into the boot of my car a little breathless.
"well, I can't take that whole thing back with me to London! It will kill me! It weighs a tonne! I looked down at the case. Scrawled on top in red chalk was "E GLYN." I knew instantly who the case and it's contents belonged too.

Elinor Glyn, maybe a lost name to many these days, but she made her mark in history and coined the phenomenon of "It" which seems to play a major part in 21st century culture. What do I mean, you ask? Well every time you turn on the TV these days and see a talent show and some judge goes,
"You just don't have it";
When you see the newest face of fashion that has "It"; and you read a magazine with the latest star of the screen with that "It" quality. If you think about it, X factor is just another way of describing "It!" So yes! Now, you all know what Elinor Glyn has contributed to society. Oh! So why does the house I'm staying in contain a case of Miss Glyns belongings? Well she only happens to be Gareth and Miranda's great grandmother!

Let me give you a quick history on the amazing life of Elinor Glyn.
OK, she was born in Jersey on the Channel Islands, in 1864 to Douglas and Elinor Sutherland. Her older sister was Lucy Duff Gordon, otherwise known as "Lucile" one of the most successful fashion designers of her day. Lucy was also one of the most famous passengers on that ship you might of heard of: The Titantic! You will be glad to know she was one of the survivors!
Elinor married Louis Clayton Glyn at the grand old age of 28 (which was pretty much ancient in those days!) popped out two daughters and started writing racy novels, (she was like the fifty shades of her day) to keep her in the living she was accustomed to, because her husband was a bit shit and not good with money. This also probably explains why she had lots of affairs which caused a lot of scandal, but helped inspire her more with her novels. Later in life she went to Hollywood to write for the movies and helped the careers of Valentino and Gloria Swanson, but her biggest star in Hollywood was Clara Bow who she chose as having "It" for her film and making her the first ever "It Girl" and probably the best one as well. Not like those shit ones we have these days called Lady stuff, toff, Palmer something or another, who are only famous because there mummy and daddy are really rich, not because they have an inch of talent, never mind "It"! Anyway Elinor mixed with the greats of her day and died happily in London in 1943. Da Da! The end.

Howard explained that Miranda, wanted the case taking back to London, because some writer had sort her out and wanted to write a book on Elinor and was after as much information as possible. Apparently there are 30 or more cases like this, full of her belongings gathering dust somewhere in some old universities vaults. There would have been more I am later told, but Elinors son was said not to like his mother very much, so destroyed a lot of her stuff. I'm not sure how true this is as she never had a son, so that puts a slight flaw in this story!
The case is sat on the costume truck, amongst are everyday workings, when Howard decides to empty its contents into something lighter to take it to London. Me and Lauren can't resist looking and before we know it, we are lost amongst letters, photos and postcards of the past, of which the case is full of. I become entranced with reading Elinor's letters, some to Grandmother which she draws pictures of how she styles her hair in the modern day fashions and how her mother hates it. Every fragile letter I read, I was quite aware I was holding a piece of history in my hand. I could of stay there forever reading those letters.

Elinor's presence is quite abundant in the house. There are pictures of her everywhere from oil paintings to photos. There is red sketch of her that hangs above my bed and looks down on me when I'm sleeping. The more I get to know of Elinor the more I like of her. She wasn't conventional and went against form. She lived life to the full. I look at her picture with her knowing eyes and think I would of liked to have known her. I think we might of got on? Besides she really liked cats as well, so we probably would have been like best friends?