Thoughts from the Bus Stop

'It looks sort of like she sat on her wedding cake.'
Oh my, are you in for a treat... feast your eyes on Ugly Wedding Dress. Does exactly what it says on the tin.
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'I wanna stop and thank you, baby...'
Message Plums: Still dead dead busy, but in a nutshell: How sweet it is to be loved by you.
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"The Quene said she had Clothes of every sort, which every day thereafter, so long as I was there, she changed..."
Am very excited to have discovered The Renaissance Tailor - a wonderful resource about reproducing 16th and 17th century clothing - or using period methods in constructing modern garments (I found it whilst looking up how to add a godet to a skirt). There's oodles of advice and instructions and I'm really inspired!



And while I think of it, props to the encyclopedic Fashion-Era site - a must for any student of women's costume. I'm constantly astounded by the depth of information here - it's addictive. Ooh, and hair history site Hairrific is great too.
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'...Oh Rock of Ages, do not crumble, Love is breathing still...'
It's gale-force out there, and the middle section of the West Pier has finally crashed into the sea. You can get an (obscure) idea of the damage on BBC Southern Counties' webcam.
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"If that's Neil Tennant, tell him I want my stepladder back."
Great article in the Guardian about Channel 4's fantastic Popworld:
'..."We try to find what the bands are saying," Amstell says, "and what their PR is saying... What are they trying to get away from? What are they hiding?" What are they hiding? "Their sexuality, their lack of talent and the fact that they have wavy hair."...'


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Have only just had a chance to have a proper look at the R2 knitting mag which Plums bought me last week. It's the latest manifestation of the 'Knitting is now cool' phenomenon (hey, I've been knitting for years, sometimes even in public - I didn't start just cos Julia Roberts has...). It's a lovely zine-y format, with some great things to try. I'm particularly keen to try the criss-cross method of making very looooooong knit stitches and moving them about within the knitting. Looks like a fancy stitch: isn't!



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'Shiny disco balls...'
"We’ve got a 40 foot boat, which Neil and Zoe have completely mirror-balled."



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Hey la, hey la, my boyfriend's back!
I can barely contain my joy at Mark Radcliffe's return to the Graveyard Shift. The first night he was back on I listened to most of the hour-and-a-half on my feet, jigging about and giggling... high as a kite!

I love this man, so much - his musical taste and sense of humour suit me down to the ground. While he was on daytime Radio 1 I couldn't listen to him, but now he's followed me to Radio 2 I can immerse myself in good music once again. I used to be so into music, to the point of anorakdom - heck, there was even a fanzine - but now I look at NME or Dotmusic and I haven't a clue who most of the bands are. So hopefully this means I can get into some new stuff - which hasn't happened for years.

STOP PRESS: It's happened already! My colleague and I were 'listening again' to the Monday night show, and a second listen to Charlotte 'Ash' Hatherley's new single, Kim Wilde. And I'll go to the foot of our stairs: turns out it's a free download, complete with CD artwork! Get yours HERE.


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Jack Rosenthal has died.
This is incredibly sad news - I didn't even know he was ill. I got into his work via my fondness for his wife Maureen Lipman's many autobiographical books, in which she writes with great wit and affection about her husband, children and mother. They made me realise I was already a fan of Jack's work - Outside Edge in particular. Barmitzvah Boy was wonderful, as were Eskimo Day and Cold Enough For Snow - great, sharp, comic, moving observations of being Northern, or Jewish (or both), parenting, and crossing the class divide, and in his Omnibus profile of a few years ago he came across as a really down-to-earth man, full of warmth and good humour. His wife described meeting him as feeling like 'coming home'.


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'Falling and laughing...'

Is 'No Roots' by Faithless the most pompous record ever?
'...Its notion of intellectual profundity involves delivering the line "Hey Mister Rich, why don't you help the poor?" without collapsing into helpless giggles...'
It was 37 years ago today - and Sgt Pepper cover has still failed to pay
'..."In one work Marcel Duchamp meets Tracey Emin in the desert, with three camp cowboys. In another he meets Elvis and the Spice Girls."...'
Heartbreaking Country Ballad Paralyzes Trucking Industry
'..."There's been an alarming number of loads that don't make it to their destinations. And the ones that do make it are usually behind schedule, because they're being loaded, transported, and unloaded by crews brought low by the thought of a good-loving woman a man loves best packing everything up but her wedding dress and going back to the town she never should've left."...'


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Things I've done today:

• discovered a Tardis-like hardware and haberdashery shop I never knew existed (this is important to someone who comes out in a light sweat when let loose in Dockerills, Clarkes Stationers or Fabricland...)
  
• run lots of Secret Squirrel errands which I can't talk about here in case the Gorgeous Blonde's watching
  
• learned how to spell 'Ffestiniog'!
  

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'The top of your head is cute.'
Let's pause for a moment to muse on the pleasure to be had from simply gazing at the one you love. Last time I was besotted with someone (but couldn't work out why), I remember telling a friend, 'I just like looking at him...'.


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