It’s Definitely Not a Date

I was expecting to do a fun-filled humour post this week after the recent feminist overload (I blame it on the fact that my friend said to me the other day: “No Jess. I just don’t think you’re a strident feminist” and ever since I’ve spent my spare time gathering all the ashes of the men I’ve burnt into bell jars to present to Queen Plath when I next visit her grave). So, today we’re feministing again or should I say, shedding the feminist light onto an issue that’s taken a backseat recently: dating.

It wasn’t until a few weeks ago, when I found myself trying to get out of a first date situation, that I realised you rarely see women in films turning down men. Now I don’t just mean rejecting the homeless man with halitosis that approaches the Jennifer-Aniston-level-of-hot main character, in the empty country pub she ends up in after her car’s coincidentally broken down outside, and offers to be the plus one to her sister’s wedding. We all know that fictional characters are shallow enough to turn down someone that hasn’t washed for four years, but what about the normal, nice guy that they’ve slept with by the time the credits are rolling. Why do they never turn down people- not because there’s anything aesthetically or physically wrong with them but- because they just don’t want to be with them? Apart from the secondary character whose name no one can really remember, no one in films ends up single.

All Work and Only Gender Assigned Play

It became apparent to me, after the recent birth of my rather squishy moonfaced baby brother, how bad gender stereotyping is amongst almost every aspect of a child’s life. My stepmum was the first to run to Mothercare and buy everything blue the second she found out she was having a boy, even refusing to buy the super cute giraffe onesie that I picked out because yellow is for girls- personally, I thought yellow was more for the school nurse’s sick bowl coloured office, but maybe times have changed. Or maybe girls make her feel sick. Let’s leave the analogy at that. Although I guess this wasn’t that surprising considering she decided to reject feminism a while ago (despite being a kick ass woman in the world of hotels) as she felt she ‘didn’t need it’ and I fear the same closedminded thought track will be passed down to her son.

But how? And it’s a good question because of course we don’t naturally adopt all our parents views, especially if they’re as subtle as a distaste for Germaine Greer, but this is where it gets scary. In Mothercare the clothes are laid out in catagories: boys, girls and (I think) baby (which always confuses me because are they saying that babies surpass gender and can just dress like the White Queen from Alice in Wonderland for the next 12 months?) Instead of giving parents a choice about what they can dress their children in shops are telling them that those super cool sparkly pink ballet pumps that you really want to buy simply do not belong on a boy because they are in the section for girls. Granted, they’re probably ridiculously overpriced and you could be glad that the rather helpful signs have just saved you £24 if you’re not focusing on the fact they’re a huge invasion of self-expression and overall a bit stupid. Why are we telling kids what to wear? It would be way more practical to put all babies in dresses, unlike the faux corduroy babygrows my 4 week old brother wears that have such a complicated system of poppers that you end up sticking his leg through the armhole and putting it on back to front- by the time you’ve dressed him properly it’s time for another nappy change. It seems unfair for everyone involved.

We Power Dress To (t)Werk

The Apprentice: I love you and all the top notch narcissism you entertain us with every Wednesday night, but I feel like I’ve got to fem it up just a little bit. And I genuinely mean only a little because overall I feel Alan’s search for his next sugarcube is an incredibly gender equal one- the applicants are very much split 50:50 men and women, the tasks dwell on skills that surpass gender and the general presence of Baroness Karren Brady (how she isn’t Queen yet I’ll never know). But there is one teeny tiny detail that the programme showcases during its promotional period and that is the power dressing.

I’ve blogged- or should I say ranted- about the fashion industry before, however that mainly focused on award shows where people are being judged solely for their ability to wear the least fabric with the biggest designer label on, but with The Apprentice I thought it would be different. After all, no one’s really focusing on the dresses, right? It must be all about the business.

Apparently not according to this photo taken of a candidate called Jenny who has not only been brozer-ed to the extent that she looks like she’s smeared a 2p across her cheeks but has also matched her lipstick and her nails before contrasting them with the dramatic white patches on her dress (which look a bit like fuzzy felts). Don’t get me wrong, she looks great and I’m capital LOVING the ‘sass-me-and-you’re-dead’ arms, but she seems to have gone to a lot of effort for a programme that isn’t America’s Next Top Model. 

Cake It Off

Because we’re a combination of middle class and pretentious, in our house there is no last minute rush to Poundland to buy food for our visitors at Halloween, we bake it. This comes as a welcomed decision amongst most of our trick or treaters cue ‘Cake is my bae!’- said a child dressed as Nicki Minaj that breached the age restrictions of the word ‘bae’ (you have to be at least 14 to use it surely?) but not so much for others, quote:

Me: Do you want a cake?

Kid dressed as wolverine: No. Well…are they nice? I’ll try it but I don’t think they’ll be nice.

Which was ungrateful but honest as the cakes were pretty rank (I’m ashamed to say my cupcake game has majorly deteriorated since last Christmas *sings Wham*) but while I was making them I realised that baking itself comes with many challenges that those, how should I describe myself, that haven’t properly evolved in the kitchen department, regularly struggle with in recipeworld. And as I’m losing my making-dinner-for-my-parents virginity tonight, I thought I would expose all my culinary issues so that they can’t blame me when I probably give them salmonella. Or E. coli. If you can even catch E. coli.