PCC vote OMG

Yesterday was a very important day, not just because I was able to go to the midnight showing of Twilight but it was also the day when we were supposed to vote for our Police and Crime Commissioner. That’s right, advertised as the voice of the people it was in theory our chance to have a say in who runs the police force in the neighbourhood. 

If you go on the website the position is described as this,

‘Police and Crime Commissioners (PCCs) will aim to cut crime and deliver an effective and efficient police service.

Police and Crime Commissioners will ensure community needs are met as effectively as possible and will improve local relationships through building confidence and trust.’

I can only assume that the role is very important and is heavily involved with the people in the community. Which is funny considering I didn’t know the names of the people running until my mum told me five minutes before I was about to vote. If you go on the official website you can get a biography of the candidates in your area but am I wrong in thinking that they’re after my vote? I live in a small town so I’m not expecting knocks on the door or anything but hey if you’re going to have leaflets print enough for every house that votes.

My parents and I trot along to the polling station, we initially thought it was closed as there was nobody visible but the lights were on o we went in and there were three lovely people waiting inside. We were the only people there and didn’t see a hint of anybody else when we were leaving.

The people at the polling station said it had been slow about 10% turnout, you’ve got more people voting for I’m a Celeb (though I don’t blame anyone because Helen Flanagan is bloody hilarious). You’ve got 10% turnout where 3 of them were my parents and I who didn’t really know a lot anyway and we were the people who cared enough to vote.  

The winning candidate needs to have a 50% majority in order to be successful. 50% of 10% is 5% of people eligible to vote, not really the voice of the people is it.

Dissecting Disney

I may be a 23 year old mature, young woman but I am unashamed to say that Disney still makes me happier than a toddler on Christmas day having just been given a hover bike and a horse. I’m not saying all Disney is good, I’ve not seen John Carter but I have it on pretty good authority that it is awful and Camp Rock was so bad that I couldn’t sleep the night after I watched it. Generally however give me a love story, singing and dancing and I will be a happy bunny.

There has always been something that has not sat right with me though, and it involves The Little Mermaid.
Ariel is 16 years old the youngest and prettiest of her family and is living with the constant mental torment of knowing that she is living her life as a mermaid when she longs to be a human. I do not believe that she is in the right frame of mind to be entering into a relationship with a man which involves changing her ACTUAL PHYSICAL BODY! What would you call her a Transpecies?

There is a pretty pivotal scene where Ariel gets into an argument with her father over Eric. Let’s take a minute to really think about what is going on here, Ariel has spied Eric on a boat for roughly five minutes. She hasn't said a word to him and up until that day did not know of his existence. Ariel’s father walks in to her talking to a life size statue of Eric, gets all angry and trashes her stuff. I remember being young and thinking this was awful, Ariel was so sad and alone. Looking back now as an adult I completely understand where Ariel’s dad was coming from! If my Dad walked in on me talking to a statue of a fit man that I had seen at work I’m pretty sure he would have something to say about it. The worst thing was that her defense was hat she loved him! She loves him!?? She has never even spoken to him, I have more right to say I love Calvin Harris than she does Eric. ( That's right, I once spoke to Calvin Harris after a dj set in Reading for 2 seconds and he shook my hand.)

When she does eventually meet Eric she is unable to talk, they spend three days together but he knows absolutely nothing about her. He then meets another beautiful woman and agrees to marry her! I appreciate that he was under a spell but if it were me it would put serious doubts in my head, but no she still loves him stops the wedding and marries him herself, cutting herself off from all her friends and family.

Is this love?? Is this the right thing?? I do not think so!

I am a One Direction fangirl, fangirl

I’m sorry My Zoo and Masterchef, something has come along that has engrossed me so much that almost everything else in my life has fallen by the wayside. If it wasn’t for my job I almost certainly would spend all day everyday indulging in my new addiction. 
I have now become completely involved in the world of One Direction fan fiction. This is stories written by fans of One Direction, the stories consist without exception of a love story between one of the members of the band and a young beautiful girl. The stories blow my mind, they are bizarre, incredibly detailed, elaborate and most importantly hilarious. 

It is unbelievable the imagination that the girls that write them have, I will give you a brief overview of the most recent one that I have just finished. Spoiler alert so if you are planning to read Get out of my head – a Liam Payne love story I suggest you skip this next paragraph. 

The love story is between Liam and Louis Tomlinson’s sister Meghan (Louis is another member of One Direction for the uneducated). The spark notes of the story are as follows, they meet, Liam likes Meghan, Meghan has a boyfriend, they start flirting and almost kiss, the band and Meghan go to the beach where in an attempt to impress Liam she jumps from a cliff and starts to drown, she is pulled out by Liam who then administers CPR until she starts breathing again, she then falls into a 3 day coma (where Liam stays by her side while her boyfriend doesn’t show up) she is released from hospital and Liam cooks her a romantic meal,  Meghan feels guilty and goes to her boyfriend’s house, finds out that he has been cheating on her with somebody else, she goes missing, is found by Liam who carries her home. They go to Madonna’s house party (haha) where Liam tells Meghan he likes her and they kiss. The next day she is kidnapped by her ex boyfriend who insists they get back together and when she refuses throws her from the car and leaves her in a park. She is found by Liam again and the decision is made that they should all get away for a bit so they all go camping, while camping they make their relationship official but Meghans boyfriend shows up demands she return to London with him. She refuses so he pulls a gun on Liam, Meghan says she will go with him but he still attempts to shoot Liam, Meghan moves the gun so it misses him but hits a car which explodes seriously injuring Anthony (Meghans Ex) they then go to hospital where the police tell them that Anthony will go to prison for attempted murder. Liam and Meghan are free to be together and it ends with him giving a personal performance of the One Direction song That One Thing.

All of this happens within the space of about 6 weeks! I haven’t even mentioned everything, there is about 4 chapters when she gets mobbed and almost beaten up by jealous One direction fans. How could anyone survive such an intense set of experiences, I would almost certainly need to be hospitalised. While the stories are hilariously extravagant my favourite thing is how they are written, you can completely tell that it’s a 14 year old who is imagining themselves as the leading lady, and they try to make it feels so real with incorporating Alan Carr interviews and the Nickleodeon kids choice awards, so they can pretend the story actually could happen. They get so involved in the story that they don’t even care about spelling or punctuation, and the language has to be read to be believed.

Here are my favourite quotes from that story;

‘I smiled back at her and continued to change myself. I pulled off my shirt and I forgot what great shape I was in, not to brag or anything, but I felt great.’

‘There was only one thing I could do. I had to perform CPR. I didn't have time to think about how great it would be to put my lips against hers. All I could think about was reviving her.’

‘The most popular song in the United Kingdom was on. It was 'What Makes You Beautiful'. I got up out of my seat and quickly walked out of the shop. I couldn't stand to hear Liam's angelic voice at the moment. ‘

‘"Just leave me alone! The boys will never like you if you keep acting like brats!" I yelled. I know it was a bit harsh, but they had pushed me to the limit’ – I love how she thinks that was a bit harsh!

‘I'll admit, I did miss her. I missed her body against me when we made out. I hadn't made out since that one day with that one blonde which was yesterday! I needed action, now.’

The last quote is from the point of view of Meghan’s ex, not Liam, Liam is a good boy. The problem for me now is that I know far too much about the band for a 23 year old, for instance when Liam doesn’t drink in the story I know that’s because in actuality he only has one kidney and when they go Nando’s it’s because it’s Niall’s favourite restaurant. I feel if I continue to read the stories I will eventually end up writing one. If I do write one I’m pretty sure it would be epic. About Niall and a girl, we’ll call her Kacey Stones, a psychology graduate who travels with Niall in order to make sure he is coping with the pressures of being in such a successful band and as they get ot know each other they fall in love.

JOKING!! I couldn’t handle the pressure.

Free Speech? Or people not worth listening to...

BBC 3 has launched a new debate show called Free Speech. The show is basically meant to be a young person’s Question Time where a panel of cool young hip people debate topics that are supposed to effect cool young hip people. The episode I watched was set in Bristol which was the main draw for me as well as being presented by Jake Humphrey who I love. (I always want to support the career of someone who used to do children’s television making it as a grown up.)

The problem with the show for me was that it is so hard to make current affairs trendy and everything that they did to make the show seem young had no point and was purely there for the gimmick. Along with Jake whose presenting role was to ask the questions and lead the debate they had a second presenter Michelle de Swarte whose sole purpose was to be on the internet checking Twitter. I can completely see where the show is coming from, Twitter is cool and hip so we must incorporate it in the show somehow. The problem is people can be talking about your show but it doesn’t mean what they are saying is relevant or complimentary. The show was hashtagged as freespeech but the thread mainly consisted on how fit the presenters were or how shit they thought the show was, not really recipe for television gold.

 The show also introduced this ludicrous feature called the power bar. This was where each panellist was voted on if the people of Twitter agreed or disagreed with what they were saying. This was basically a glorified popularity contest with Jamal Edwards of SB.TV continually having the highest power bar rating even though he really didn’t say much of anything at all. Of course he had asked all his followers to support him so he at least knew how to play the game.  At one point the specifically mentioned the they were trending number 4 in the uk, this would be impressive if they weren’t being beaten by the phrase beliebers will never leave Justin.

While the social network elements were gimmicky and embarrassing , the real problem was that even though the show was called Free Speech you could almost feel the tension as someone began to say something controversial, or not saying something that relevant or very well constructed. The problem with asking young people about current affairs is that they probably don’t really know enough about it and can’t articulate their argument well enough under the pressure of live telly.

I love Jake Humphrey though, he hasn’t aged a day.

Songs can be stupid

In recent years there has been this strange trend in pop songs of using horrendous simile's to talk about love and life, I personally think its ridiculous and have compiled a list of the worst offenders;

Charice - Pyramid

Pyramid, we built this on a solid rock
It feels just like it's heaven's touch
Together at the top, like a pyramid
And even when the wind is blowing
We'll never fall just keep on going
Forever we will stay, like a pyramid


How stupid is that, I dont really understand why the characteristics she is describing are so desirable? If one of the most important things is not falling when its windy then love is just like lamposts and trees and park benches. Romantic.

Jordin Sparks - Tattoo

 Don't look back at a new direction
I loved you once, needed protection
You're still a part of everything I do
You're on my heart just like a tattoo
(Just like a tattoo, I'll always have you
I'll always have you, I'll always have you)

This one I can understand to a degree, tattoos do last forever and I feel that that is what the song is trying to convey what frustrates me is all the other lyrics the song is just a stream of words and phrases that rhyme a bit but don't really mean anything, the verses imply that she's moving on but the chorus is about how she'll love you forever.

Jordin Sparks (again) - Battlefield

I never meant to start a war
You know, I never wanna hurt you
Don't even know we're fighting for
Why does love always feel like a battlefield, a battlefield, a battlefield
Why does love always feel like a battlefield, a battlefield, a battlefield
Why does love always feel like

Jordin Sparks is the worst repeat offender for stupid simile's,  the reason this one annoys me is that unlike Tattoo, which doesn't reference the simile enough, Battlefield is just all about the simile, it talks about white flags, and shields, and surrendering. Too far Jordin it just gets silly.


Katy Perry - Firework


'Cause baby you're a firework
Come on, show 'em what you're worth
Make 'em go "Oh, oh, oh"
As you shoot across the sky-y-y
Baby, you're a firework
Come on, let your colours burst
Make 'em go "Oh, oh, oh"
You're gonna leave 'em all in "awe, awe, awe"


This doesn't really work as its not actually a simile but the lyrics are so stupid I just had to include it. Its just such lazy writing, just noises and elongated words. Let what colours burst? You need to be more detailed in your metaphore's Katy.


Jessie J - Laserlight


You're like a laserlight, burning up
Burning down, on me
You're like a laserlight, burning up
Burning down, on me
You make me feel good,
You make me feel safe,
You make me feel like I could live another day

This is the worst! Lights are not a good representation of love, 'burning down on me', that sounds awful, who wants that? If you did something wrong you would expect your managers stare of hatered to be burning down on you, and that does not make me feel safe.


Honourary mentions go to these songs aswel, Taio Cruz - Star, Rhianna - Umberella, Beyonce - Halo


All ridiculous.

No wonder I have low self esteem

I have little to no boobs, I started developing breasts at the age of eleven and then stopped at roughly eleven and a half, If you were to describe them you would say they were basically slightly raised nipples. It bothers me and given the chance I have always said that I would have a boob job.  I don’t really want a boob job, that’s not true, I don’t want to want one, ideally I wish I had the self confidence to be happy with the way I look realise that nobody is perfect and it’s about what’s on the inside that matters. That can be a little hard when you realise that this kind of thing has been going on,

 

How is anybody supposed to have a normal view of their own body when even the most beautiful of people aren’t deemed good enough. The really frustrating thing about this is I remember vividly this poster coming out. It can be a lonely experience having small boobs, none of my friends have small boobs and the ones that would consider their boobs small are at least a cup size bigger than me.  That’s why I had always liked Keira Knightely I’d seen her in Bend It Like Beckham and thought at the time that she had small boobs and this genuinely made me feel better, she was tall and confident and it didn’t seem to slow her down or make her less popular and that was really comforting. I was at the cinema when I saw the poster for King Arthur and I looked at it and thought oh she’s perfect, she doesn’t get how I feel at all, they’re not as small as I remember.  That stuck with me for a long time and I spent most of my early teenage years feeling like I was the only person on the planet to have boobs as small as mine. I didn’t see the film, which I think is a shame because if I did I probably would have realised that it was just the picture and in actuality she is the person I remember, but I didn’t so all I had was the poster, big and bold in front of my face.

Look at Kate Hudson for Fools Gold, at least I was older when this came out and was well aware of photoshop so I found this one more funny than emotionally isolating. I just think it is so ridiculous for someone who looks so amazing on the beach anyway is still not good enough for whoever it is that decides what beauty should be. She looks much better on the right than the weird spray painted gold thing on the left, but hey I guess the clue is in the title. Kate Hudson now has reportedly had a boob job, I don’t think she has said anything officially but by the looks of this picture it seems pretty clear,

 

I believe it is 100% a person’s right to choose whether to have any form of surgery or not, nobody can judge you and in the end it is nobody’s business. However on personal level for me it does give me justification in wanting my boob job, if Kate Hudson can’t hack it, someone who is so pretty and so privileged feels the need for surgery then how am I, someone who is just the sponge soaking up all these deceitful images ever supposed to be happy within myself.

Photoshopping is wrong and harmful to the people who see it, I hate the thought of another 14 year old girl seeing a poster, like I did with King Arthur, looking at themselves and feeling like they don’t compare, when even the people in the photo’s don’t compare. We don’t need photoshop the people who are being digitally enhanced are already considered to be the prettiest people anway that’s the only reason they’re on the poster or in the magazine, celebrities already have the upper hand, they spend thousands on their hair, clothes, diet, fitness, make up, and they have people who their only job is to make them look the best they could possibly be, how is that still not good enough?

This message is for anyone who has seen an image of someone and has felt worse because of it. All images are not real, their legs aren’t that toned, their stomach isn’t that flat, their hair isn’t that shiny, their skin isn’t that flawless, and their boobs aren’t that big. It’s all fake and it’s all false, Katy Perry looks just like the rest of us in the morning.

The evolution of miming

I find the practice of singers miming a very strange thing indeed. I don't find it strange because I think all singers should sing live, be pitch perfect and every famous singer has to be as good as Adele or anything like that, but more how miming has evolved and what is expected of singers these days.

Take a look at this clip of Bros from Top of the Pops in the 80s



This is what miming was like back then, popstars basically bopping along to their pre recorded tracks so you are listening to the cd which you are gonna buy with the band doing stuff on a stage. This is prerty much how television performances were then, it's not a subtle performance, its clear they they're miming as often the mike is away from his face and yet his voice doesn't differ or falter at all during the performance.

This was simple musical practice during the 80's, 90's and early 00's, everybody did it, everything became more about the image and the package. Steps, Britney and S Club, didn't sing live and if they did it wasn't on telly, but they looked good, put on a show and danced their hearts out, and this seemed to be enough for the public. Not anymore.

There has been a switch in the public's priorites and now everybody has to have it all. Its not enough to have catchy songs, pretty faces and nice moves, you have to prove yourself as a good singer if you don't 'cut it' live then you get no respect. This has lead to a new generation of miming, look at this The Saturdays performance,



here The Saturdays are miming but have recorded the track with new vocals so that it doesn't appear that they're miming, is this the solution? Why has miming become such a taboo? I would rather not hear a pitchy and breathless performance by The Saturdays thankyou very much. Stars should just be honest, miming in a way so it looks like you're singing live just seems pointless. Not everyone can be like Beyonce! You don't pay to be in the audience on Dancing on Ice and you didn't on Top of the Pops either and if you watch it on the tv you're not seeing it live anyway, so I don't think stars should feel obligated to sing live at every oppurtunity. If you've paid good money to see them live then thats when you should be able to expect a live performance, anything else is just a bonus. Let miming live, and lets not judge people who do it, this is just they way the music industy works, and I think it's time we all embraced it.