Just wanted to introduce you to my two favourite artistic muses at the moment (damn those superior Eurasian genetics at play!).
Ms Holly Suan Gray - http://www.facebook.com/home.php?ref=home#/album.php?aid=101010&id=608370118
Mr Jeff Hahn - http://jeffhahn.blogspot.com/
Browse and marvel at the gorgeousnesses of their visions.
They make me sigh and believe in fairytales.
Enjoy.
x
Tuesday 25 August 2009
Sunday 23 August 2009
We are the champions - Queen
"I've paid my dues
Time after time
I've done my sentence
But committed no crime
And bad mistakes
I've made a few
I've had my share of sand kicked in my face
But I've come through"
Sorry Dominique, I know quotes at the beginning of anything are a slack way to explain what you're thinking without using any literary skill - but I feel a little song lyric sets up a wibble rather nicely :)
So it is eight weeks on and I completed my mofo bootcamp!!!! Wooohooo.
It has gone fast and there have been many glaring changes to my life and several that will ripple onwards for some time. Here are the few that catapult to mind immediately:
1. I get a hangover after two glasses of wine - proving that sobriety. does indeed. bite. Hypothesis proven :)
2. I've gone down a dress size.
3. Normal pants fall down.
4. My arms, shoulders and legs are showing muscle definition.
5. When I'm looking in my fridge for tasty nibbles I approach in a dogdown fashion with beautiful bendiness.
6. I cut all my hair off and got lots of nice compliments.
7. I haven't been out on a Saturday night for two months.
8. I run a lap of the footie pitch in 1 minute.
9. I plank without putting my back out.
10. I finally went to see a physio who is helping me with my back problems.
Looking back at notes I scribbled down in my blog, I was freaking terrified that first Saturday night before the whole terror of Bootcamp began. It was just something I had never envisioned myself doing. I'm just not that alpha-winner type. I like to mooch about smelling the flowers rather than whizzing about getting there faster. The fact my body is built for comfort and not speed (where does that come from, I have been hearing it for as long as I can remember?!) meant that bootcamp was not for me. Bootcamp was for people with chiselled abs who received a strange perverted joy whenever someone screamed at them. My abs have been sculpted, using cake icing, no chisels required and if someone shouts at me I become strangely quiet and plot their downfall. Anyhew, I was doing it.
I imagined everyone else would be mega fit and that I would vomit. This is what I blogged of my new comrades of Boot:
"And then I saw them, the first few boot types entering the court and walking towards me (I clearly resembled a 'booter' due to my trainers and apprehension). One larger man, one slender man, and a woman who looked like she already ran ultra-marathons.... A cheerleader type replete with ponytail came next, then another fellow fashioning an Ed Hardy T-shirt. Then the Boot Camp Leader herself... Dora, the yoga teacher..."
This was the reason I was able to complete the course and do so happily and bouncily - Dora.
For some reason, I had imagined Bootcamp to be recreations of the exercise scenes from Officer and a Gentleman, with Richard Gere. I guess this was the first time I saw someone be forced to perform the indignity of a push up while being shouted at. Yoga teachers tend not to be too much into abusing their students, as they have the concepts of mind, body and spirit which need to work in unity for any success at all. So long as I tried my best, I was applauded. So long as I sweated and grimaced then smiled, all was well.
For the first few weeks of Bootcamp, I eagerly checked my progress. Did I do an extra star jump? Leap higher up footie nets? Run further? Skip faster? But by the end that didn't feel so necessary. The fact is there were consistent warm weather warnings, so 30 minutes of any kind of movement in the still hot air outside left you feeling like Lawrence of Arabia staggering about seeing mirages of cool water. The simple fact that your body could now actually perform the feats that seemed impossible at the beginning was good enough. So we were effectively slowed down by the oppressive heat which led to us feeling more drained once inside. Luckily, a great ipod selection of music would always help us get up on our TRX systems and make sure everything hurt and we were in fact hobbling by 10am of the same day. Thank God the heat cancelled those wheelbarrows, as it turned out that I have a dysfunctional lumbar/pelvic thing going on (hehe) which explains why so many exercises have proved so painful in the past. Praise the Lord for Bootcamp, as without all this exercise, I would not have forced myself to seek out a physio in the first place.
Of course it wasn't just the two hour exercise on Sunday mornings that made so many changes in my appearance. The fact you KNOW the bootcamp is going to hurt you, means you feel most inclined to get fitter during the week. This meant yoga on Mondays and Wednesday, pilates on Tuesdays and TRX on Thursdays, all at Dora's Island Life Gym, and all under her watchful eye so she could help with any exercises you struggled with to ensure you were pushing yourself without hurting yourself. That's one of the joys of this little Lamma gym, classes often only have 3 or 4 people in, so you really do get a personal training service for an relatively tiny financial outlay.
As I noted in my blog - for the second bootcamp:
"In fact, there were only 5 of us. Mr Ed Hardy T-shirt was there, but had been out on the piss all week so had done zero exercise and felt rough. Little Miss Ultramarathon was there and whizzing around the activities in a sporty person type fashion. Herman the Incredible Shrinking Man was there doing his thing, as was the 19 year old uber-ripped Keira Knightley doppelganger. So we all got that little bit extra attention from Dora, our Trainer."
We ended our final bootcamp with 5.
Herman (our editor), Adrian (husband of Liz the ab slayer), Elissa (the physio professor), Lydia (ripped sleepy doctor chick) and me.
Five very different types of people. All very pleased with themselves.
I leave you with another lazy lyric that I think rather sums up who should get their arses to a bootcamp near them:
"Big ones, small ones, some a big as your head"
I hear the next one starts in a month, and will be by moonlight... leading us neatly up to the 10K run I've signed up for at Disney in November?
Strange, strange world
Exhausting just thinking about it!
x
Time after time
I've done my sentence
But committed no crime
And bad mistakes
I've made a few
I've had my share of sand kicked in my face
But I've come through"
Sorry Dominique, I know quotes at the beginning of anything are a slack way to explain what you're thinking without using any literary skill - but I feel a little song lyric sets up a wibble rather nicely :)
So it is eight weeks on and I completed my mofo bootcamp!!!! Wooohooo.
It has gone fast and there have been many glaring changes to my life and several that will ripple onwards for some time. Here are the few that catapult to mind immediately:
1. I get a hangover after two glasses of wine - proving that sobriety. does indeed. bite. Hypothesis proven :)
2. I've gone down a dress size.
3. Normal pants fall down.
4. My arms, shoulders and legs are showing muscle definition.
5. When I'm looking in my fridge for tasty nibbles I approach in a dogdown fashion with beautiful bendiness.
6. I cut all my hair off and got lots of nice compliments.
7. I haven't been out on a Saturday night for two months.
8. I run a lap of the footie pitch in 1 minute.
9. I plank without putting my back out.
10. I finally went to see a physio who is helping me with my back problems.
Looking back at notes I scribbled down in my blog, I was freaking terrified that first Saturday night before the whole terror of Bootcamp began. It was just something I had never envisioned myself doing. I'm just not that alpha-winner type. I like to mooch about smelling the flowers rather than whizzing about getting there faster. The fact my body is built for comfort and not speed (where does that come from, I have been hearing it for as long as I can remember?!) meant that bootcamp was not for me. Bootcamp was for people with chiselled abs who received a strange perverted joy whenever someone screamed at them. My abs have been sculpted, using cake icing, no chisels required and if someone shouts at me I become strangely quiet and plot their downfall. Anyhew, I was doing it.
I imagined everyone else would be mega fit and that I would vomit. This is what I blogged of my new comrades of Boot:
"And then I saw them, the first few boot types entering the court and walking towards me (I clearly resembled a 'booter' due to my trainers and apprehension). One larger man, one slender man, and a woman who looked like she already ran ultra-marathons.... A cheerleader type replete with ponytail came next, then another fellow fashioning an Ed Hardy T-shirt. Then the Boot Camp Leader herself... Dora, the yoga teacher..."
This was the reason I was able to complete the course and do so happily and bouncily - Dora.
For some reason, I had imagined Bootcamp to be recreations of the exercise scenes from Officer and a Gentleman, with Richard Gere. I guess this was the first time I saw someone be forced to perform the indignity of a push up while being shouted at. Yoga teachers tend not to be too much into abusing their students, as they have the concepts of mind, body and spirit which need to work in unity for any success at all. So long as I tried my best, I was applauded. So long as I sweated and grimaced then smiled, all was well.
For the first few weeks of Bootcamp, I eagerly checked my progress. Did I do an extra star jump? Leap higher up footie nets? Run further? Skip faster? But by the end that didn't feel so necessary. The fact is there were consistent warm weather warnings, so 30 minutes of any kind of movement in the still hot air outside left you feeling like Lawrence of Arabia staggering about seeing mirages of cool water. The simple fact that your body could now actually perform the feats that seemed impossible at the beginning was good enough. So we were effectively slowed down by the oppressive heat which led to us feeling more drained once inside. Luckily, a great ipod selection of music would always help us get up on our TRX systems and make sure everything hurt and we were in fact hobbling by 10am of the same day. Thank God the heat cancelled those wheelbarrows, as it turned out that I have a dysfunctional lumbar/pelvic thing going on (hehe) which explains why so many exercises have proved so painful in the past. Praise the Lord for Bootcamp, as without all this exercise, I would not have forced myself to seek out a physio in the first place.
Of course it wasn't just the two hour exercise on Sunday mornings that made so many changes in my appearance. The fact you KNOW the bootcamp is going to hurt you, means you feel most inclined to get fitter during the week. This meant yoga on Mondays and Wednesday, pilates on Tuesdays and TRX on Thursdays, all at Dora's Island Life Gym, and all under her watchful eye so she could help with any exercises you struggled with to ensure you were pushing yourself without hurting yourself. That's one of the joys of this little Lamma gym, classes often only have 3 or 4 people in, so you really do get a personal training service for an relatively tiny financial outlay.
As I noted in my blog - for the second bootcamp:
"In fact, there were only 5 of us. Mr Ed Hardy T-shirt was there, but had been out on the piss all week so had done zero exercise and felt rough. Little Miss Ultramarathon was there and whizzing around the activities in a sporty person type fashion. Herman the Incredible Shrinking Man was there doing his thing, as was the 19 year old uber-ripped Keira Knightley doppelganger. So we all got that little bit extra attention from Dora, our Trainer."
We ended our final bootcamp with 5.
Herman (our editor), Adrian (husband of Liz the ab slayer), Elissa (the physio professor), Lydia (ripped sleepy doctor chick) and me.
Five very different types of people. All very pleased with themselves.
I leave you with another lazy lyric that I think rather sums up who should get their arses to a bootcamp near them:
"Big ones, small ones, some a big as your head"
I hear the next one starts in a month, and will be by moonlight... leading us neatly up to the 10K run I've signed up for at Disney in November?
Strange, strange world
Exhausting just thinking about it!
x
Friday 14 August 2009
Sweeter than heaven and hotter than hell
Is my new crush's lament.
Florence and the Machine. Her albums Lungs. All written around mythology and the fact she feels things rather more intensely than your average person. She's like Kate Bush in a cocaine haze and ketamine reverie.
I love her. I listen to her album when I wake up, when I go to sleep and as I walk about my Hong Kong life.
Tonight it was an unusually suitable soundtrack.
I outed my new chopped hair and teamed it with panda print mini dress. I went to the comedy club, with my dear friend and ass kicker, Dora Bootcamp and two Dora Devotees from Pure BodyPump.
Of course, as the four women entering the club late, we were swooped upon. Names and statuses were enquired. Maribee had both husband and boyfriend. Dora had husband and baby. Dada had husband. I was the single one. Which is no cause for lament, particularly when with panda dress, new hair and three new friends.
Jamie, the compere, elegantly pointed out that I was from England. White. Female. And therefore fucked. No white guys would go near me. And neither would the Chinese. I would be staying single for some time.
This could seem harsh. But as a stereotype it is amusing. The joke that all white guys go for Chinese girls. And all Chinese guys are not interested in troublesome gwai mui (lady white ghosts). Is not too many million miles away from the truth. But I have lived other lives. Where I spent time with Asian guys and/or White guys, depending upon my moods at the time. I recall turning down a particularly handsome fellow named George a few years ago, as I was only into Chinese men... We all have our phases and times when one route seems the only way.
Suffice to say. I was not insulted by these comments at all.
It did not make me blush. What did, was a white guy sitting behind me shouting out, 'She's hot!'
This has been my first night 'out' in a few months.
Certainly the first time since my sobriety experiment began.
I glowed back to the ferry. Where the 11.30pm was awaiting me. The passengers were suitably relaxed and I had the joys of comments about how fabulous my new look was and how well I looked.
This may sound like my crowning Narcissus moment, due to end in my falling desperately in love with my reflection where I shall surely perish. But this is not my tale, to disdain those who love me and be punished by the Gods with the same treatment.
In the words of Florence
"Here I am, a rabbit hearted girl
Frozen in the headlights...
I wish that I could just be brave
I must become a lion hearted girl"
All very Lewis Caroll I admit
But when my life is turning beautiful
I tend to make exceptionally erroneous choices with my heart
And am determined to be less rabbit and my lion on this occasion!
Rooooaaaaaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrr
*twitchy nose*
xx
Florence and the Machine. Her albums Lungs. All written around mythology and the fact she feels things rather more intensely than your average person. She's like Kate Bush in a cocaine haze and ketamine reverie.
I love her. I listen to her album when I wake up, when I go to sleep and as I walk about my Hong Kong life.
Tonight it was an unusually suitable soundtrack.
I outed my new chopped hair and teamed it with panda print mini dress. I went to the comedy club, with my dear friend and ass kicker, Dora Bootcamp and two Dora Devotees from Pure BodyPump.
Of course, as the four women entering the club late, we were swooped upon. Names and statuses were enquired. Maribee had both husband and boyfriend. Dora had husband and baby. Dada had husband. I was the single one. Which is no cause for lament, particularly when with panda dress, new hair and three new friends.
Jamie, the compere, elegantly pointed out that I was from England. White. Female. And therefore fucked. No white guys would go near me. And neither would the Chinese. I would be staying single for some time.
This could seem harsh. But as a stereotype it is amusing. The joke that all white guys go for Chinese girls. And all Chinese guys are not interested in troublesome gwai mui (lady white ghosts). Is not too many million miles away from the truth. But I have lived other lives. Where I spent time with Asian guys and/or White guys, depending upon my moods at the time. I recall turning down a particularly handsome fellow named George a few years ago, as I was only into Chinese men... We all have our phases and times when one route seems the only way.
Suffice to say. I was not insulted by these comments at all.
It did not make me blush. What did, was a white guy sitting behind me shouting out, 'She's hot!'
This has been my first night 'out' in a few months.
Certainly the first time since my sobriety experiment began.
I glowed back to the ferry. Where the 11.30pm was awaiting me. The passengers were suitably relaxed and I had the joys of comments about how fabulous my new look was and how well I looked.
This may sound like my crowning Narcissus moment, due to end in my falling desperately in love with my reflection where I shall surely perish. But this is not my tale, to disdain those who love me and be punished by the Gods with the same treatment.
In the words of Florence
"Here I am, a rabbit hearted girl
Frozen in the headlights...
I wish that I could just be brave
I must become a lion hearted girl"
All very Lewis Caroll I admit
But when my life is turning beautiful
I tend to make exceptionally erroneous choices with my heart
And am determined to be less rabbit and my lion on this occasion!
Rooooaaaaaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrr
*twitchy nose*
xx
Monday 10 August 2009
SEX
Yes. Sex. That is this evening's musings. I would usually be at yoga round about now, but following a Samson style shedding of my long locks, I met a friend for drinks, and was unable to dog down while tipsy.
I have been growing my hair for 7 years now, it was long, and could be plaited and twirled and flicked but I wanted something new. As a snake sheds its skin. I wanted to shed some of mine.
I took advantage of the Toni and Guy Academy and paid the 25 pounds my mum sweetly sent me for a whole new look. I had full head highlights and a graduated transverse cut, or some such, for the cost of a usual trim.
It is lighter. It is 1920s flapper girl. It reminds me of sexual acceptance at school. I had always been the bookish one. Who boys never noticed. Til I took on my role as Tallulah in the Bugsy Malone musical at school. With a tight corsetted black satin number, boys soon realised I was not so bookish after all. And so Anthony Kelly, who played Knuckles, finally noticed me. Fabulous, furtive fondlings and platonic sounding sleep overs followed.
Following my sobriety journey - fondlings have been somewhat off the menu. As what a role the social lubricant of wine and beer and moijtos and B52s plays in the sexual emancipation of young ladies set astray in Hong Kong, or any other part of this world come to mention it.
So I leave the salon, bounce to the ferry, scribble madly in my journal to the F.E.A.R courtesy of the legendary Ian Brown and manouevre my way home. I feel full and bountiful of Eastern promise. I play my new Florence and the Machine CD. Which is resplendent.
I want a play mate. I have none. So devoured a Haagen Dazs Vanilla and Almonds icecream instead.
I may be bootcamping, and yogaing, and pilating, and TRXing, but without some other outlet... the icecream will win out.
Sobriety bites.
x
I have been growing my hair for 7 years now, it was long, and could be plaited and twirled and flicked but I wanted something new. As a snake sheds its skin. I wanted to shed some of mine.
I took advantage of the Toni and Guy Academy and paid the 25 pounds my mum sweetly sent me for a whole new look. I had full head highlights and a graduated transverse cut, or some such, for the cost of a usual trim.
It is lighter. It is 1920s flapper girl. It reminds me of sexual acceptance at school. I had always been the bookish one. Who boys never noticed. Til I took on my role as Tallulah in the Bugsy Malone musical at school. With a tight corsetted black satin number, boys soon realised I was not so bookish after all. And so Anthony Kelly, who played Knuckles, finally noticed me. Fabulous, furtive fondlings and platonic sounding sleep overs followed.
Following my sobriety journey - fondlings have been somewhat off the menu. As what a role the social lubricant of wine and beer and moijtos and B52s plays in the sexual emancipation of young ladies set astray in Hong Kong, or any other part of this world come to mention it.
So I leave the salon, bounce to the ferry, scribble madly in my journal to the F.E.A.R courtesy of the legendary Ian Brown and manouevre my way home. I feel full and bountiful of Eastern promise. I play my new Florence and the Machine CD. Which is resplendent.
I want a play mate. I have none. So devoured a Haagen Dazs Vanilla and Almonds icecream instead.
I may be bootcamping, and yogaing, and pilating, and TRXing, but without some other outlet... the icecream will win out.
Sobriety bites.
x
Wednesday 5 August 2009
Moons and rabbits and mice oh my!
So it's a big old lunar eclipse this evening. Which helps explain why I'm feeling mad as a March hare!
'The energies of the August 5/6 lunar eclipse are here now. This powerful energetic opening has been felt with increasing intensity in recent weeks. The third in a triad of summer eclipses, this cosmic doorway carries signatures for emotional sensitivity, spiritual knowing, psychic openings and the recognition of latent creative and artistic abilities.'
Emotional sensitivity - check (if you count getting weepy at pictures of other women with babies)
Spiritual knowing - ha - I wish! I suffer from perpetual divine discontent and deep envy of those who worship merrily at church.
Psychic openings - well my familiar has left me SIX decaying mice during this tropical heatwave - so that may some message I am yet to decode?
Recognition of latent creative and artistic abilities - hmmm. maybe. I certainly hope so! It has actually dawned on me that it's all very well changing jobs and countries and homes and various other circumstances (including alcohol consumption), but perhaps I should stop zipping from a to b and back again, and concentrate more on how I spend my time, not with whom or where. I have been encouraged to write since I was a little girl (thanks mum) but have always found some excuse or the other not to engage. Namely that I am a lazy procrastinating flibbertygibbet - who would rather read 5 books then write 5 sentences, which is what I have been doing for my life to date. I was always too busy living to actually bother with the business of recording the happenings. But as I have cut out item after item of my life, I have created the time and space where without writing, I am actually horribly bored. There is nothing for it. I am writing my first story.
I have learnt fabulous fairy stories from Stephanie Meyer of Twilight fame. She went from actually dreaming the story, to writing the story, to finding an agent in six months time? JK Rowling was a single mum scribbling in Edinburgh coffee houses and a lovely friend of mine from Leeds Uni is now published!?!
Enough of procrastination. Enough of wondering what genre? How long? Which characters? Who'll read it? Who'll like it? Enough of reading just one more book, watching one more movie.
The weather is helping with my glorious declarations as the heavens have opened and the rain is tearing down my window panes and rooftop.
I leave you with a quote from F Scott Fitzgerald:
'This is part of the beauty of all literature.
You discover that your longings are universal longings,
That you're not lonely and isolated from anyone.
You belong.'
xx
'The energies of the August 5/6 lunar eclipse are here now. This powerful energetic opening has been felt with increasing intensity in recent weeks. The third in a triad of summer eclipses, this cosmic doorway carries signatures for emotional sensitivity, spiritual knowing, psychic openings and the recognition of latent creative and artistic abilities.'
Emotional sensitivity - check (if you count getting weepy at pictures of other women with babies)
Spiritual knowing - ha - I wish! I suffer from perpetual divine discontent and deep envy of those who worship merrily at church.
Psychic openings - well my familiar has left me SIX decaying mice during this tropical heatwave - so that may some message I am yet to decode?
Recognition of latent creative and artistic abilities - hmmm. maybe. I certainly hope so! It has actually dawned on me that it's all very well changing jobs and countries and homes and various other circumstances (including alcohol consumption), but perhaps I should stop zipping from a to b and back again, and concentrate more on how I spend my time, not with whom or where. I have been encouraged to write since I was a little girl (thanks mum) but have always found some excuse or the other not to engage. Namely that I am a lazy procrastinating flibbertygibbet - who would rather read 5 books then write 5 sentences, which is what I have been doing for my life to date. I was always too busy living to actually bother with the business of recording the happenings. But as I have cut out item after item of my life, I have created the time and space where without writing, I am actually horribly bored. There is nothing for it. I am writing my first story.
I have learnt fabulous fairy stories from Stephanie Meyer of Twilight fame. She went from actually dreaming the story, to writing the story, to finding an agent in six months time? JK Rowling was a single mum scribbling in Edinburgh coffee houses and a lovely friend of mine from Leeds Uni is now published!?!
Enough of procrastination. Enough of wondering what genre? How long? Which characters? Who'll read it? Who'll like it? Enough of reading just one more book, watching one more movie.
The weather is helping with my glorious declarations as the heavens have opened and the rain is tearing down my window panes and rooftop.
I leave you with a quote from F Scott Fitzgerald:
'This is part of the beauty of all literature.
You discover that your longings are universal longings,
That you're not lonely and isolated from anyone.
You belong.'
xx
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