listening

People tend to talk to me.  I don't really invite it, but something about me leads people to believe that I am trustworthy and non-judgemental.  The first is true, the second, if I'm honest, is more dependant on my mood. 

A few months ago, when I went through one of my miserable loner phases I became sick of being everyone's confidante.  I found that those who would bend my ear nightly, were a lot less receptive to hearing my problems.  I clammed up, stopped answering my phone and sent a big middle finger to the world.

I'm over it now, I think

I'm put in a position of trust daily and today is no exception.  And its a special thing, not something I should dismiss lightly. 
Today made me realise that. 

celebrity adoption

Elton John wants a baby

Some of you may already be aware of the low opinion I have of the celebrity 'rent a black foreign baby' fad that is going on.  Madonna has been adopting "orphans" with living parents (it's amazing what doors money can open), and... ermm...

(Angelina and Brad are exempt - beauty opens even more doors than money so with beauty and money, they are pretty much vindicated of any crime!)

Ok so far only Madonna has really vexed me...

ANYWAY

The point was, I was watching that new BBC show, where Ian Wright is flanked by 2 Y-list blondes and they were chatting about Elton John's failed adoption attempt in Ukraine.

Firstly - Breaking news! Celeb finds orphans in Europe!  Soon they may realise that there are even orphans in the UK...

...nah I'm overstretching, my mistake.

Elton John went to perform in the Ukraine at an orphanage for the Elton John Aids Foundation, and fell in love with baby Lev whom he subsequently tried to adopt.  He was shot down because in Ukraine there are 2 adoptions rules

Rule 1:  the age difference between an adoptive parent and a child must be 45 years or less

Rule 2:  foreign citizens who are single have no right to adopt children

Elton John's civil partnership with David somebodyorother is not recognised in the Ukraine.

Discriminatory?  Maybe.  I'm assuming that according to this rule, a male-female couple who were unmarried would also be unable to adopt - which levels the playing field unless gay people aren't afforded the opportunity to get married in Ukraine in which case yes, it is discriminatory. 

But Rule 1 makes perfect sense

I'm not sure how accurate this is because google is not playing the game tonight but allegedly

"If you were born in 1950, your life expectancy at birth was only 68 years"

Elton John is 62.

Admittedly he will benefit from modern advances in healthcare and having the best health insurance money can buy (money, again!  That's some good stuff!), but it's not really looking good.  Seriously, if 60 year olds were supposed to procreate, breasts would win the fight against gravity, there would be no need for any little blue pills and fertility wouldn't decrease with age (or stop altogether as is the case with most women).

Elton, how about instead of the Madonna approach (using your fame and fortune to bypass the rules of a country), you fund the orpanage so that Lev can grow up surrounded by his culture and learn to help himself and other orphans like him. 

How about you give some money to one of those charities that have adverts with music that tugs at your heart strings and lil black and asian kids looking after their 10 siblings as the voiceover tells you that 2p a day could send lil Anita to school.  There is SO MUCH he could do with his power, wealth and influence and if he decides to be unoriginal and flaunt the laws of a country I will be very disappointed.*

*lol at the irrelevance of my disappointment to Elton*

strictly fabulous

 

The black hair salon

The bane of every black woman's existance at least once in their life. For those of us who reject the creamy crack (relaxer) the salon can hold even more horror.

I'v had my share of negative experiences. A few years ago I wantd my hair pressed and was feeling too lazy to contort myself in such away as to be able to do the back of my head properly. So I went to a salon in Lewisham. I won't name and shame, suffice to say that they call themselves a "natural hair" salon. Natural my back foot! My hair and scalp were burnt so badly in the straightening process that my scalp had scabs and my hair broke terribly in the following weeks. Later I learnt that my hair is naturally anti-heat and breaks in response to it, but that was the worst it had ever been.

After I realised that frying my hair wasn't a legitmate styling option unless I wanted to be bald by 30 I went back to braids. When I was younger extensions gave me the l'oreal hair flick I had always desired...

..."I was WORTH it!!"

But this second time around, all the excess hair felt heavy and alien. My scalp rebelled with an army of flakes and although I received compliments I didn't feel that they were my due. This was also when I realised the fragility of my hairline. When I undid the braids after a month (ahem, or more) I noticed a hell of a lot of my hairline being removed along with the Kanekalon. To avoid my hairline following the same fate as that of Stevie Wonder's I implored the hairdressers to "tek time", be gentle, don't pull the hair so tight and don't put so much hair on my head. This was when I learnt that hairdressers suffer with a condition known as selective deafness. The prevailing symptom is when, in a salon atmosphere, basic instructions from a client sound like white noise and are ignored. This experience occured in salons across south-east london.

My response?
To boycott salons completely - anything that I couldnt do myself I'd just have to live without.

When I started my locs I knew how to retwist, but for some reason I couldn't find the time to sit down and do it. My twists were floating on a sea of regrowth and I knew something had to be done.

And here we come to the point of this post. I found a salon the turns stereotype on its head

Strictly Dreadz in Crystal Palace renewed my faith in the black hair salon.

See why after the jump

Caster Semenya

I am seething over how this girl has been and continues to be ripped apart by the media.

Read the Guardian's latest here

She is 18 years old and has been repeatedly and publicly and internationally humiliated to the point where now she has had to go into hiding.

18! Think back. What would you have done at 18 if you were told that you had internal sex organs of the opposite gender? Now what would you do if your whole family knew? Friends? College/ university? Random people on the street that you have never met having intimate

Although yesterday I heard that she definitely had Androgen Insensitivity Syndrome*, the IAAF have yet to publish any results regarding Caster's gender. Apparently the Australian press got a lil trigger happy and decided to let the unverified cat out of the bag early.

South Africa seem to be standing behind their athlete and have threatened "world war 3" should she be banned from competing. I hope that they call for an investigation into the privacy measures (or lack thereof) of the IAAF. They would be well within their rights to do so.

The IAAF have said that they won't be releasing their conclusions until the board meets in mid-November.



*What is Androgen Insensitivity Syndrome?

The default gender setting for developing mammals is female unless there is a high level of testosterone present, usually the result of a Y chromosome. In AIS the person is chromosomally male (XY), but their body's physiology is insensitive to the effects of testosterone, therefore they follow the default gender setting and to all intents and purposes appear female. Most people with this condition don't find out until they have a gynae exam, usually to check out their infertility.



There are other conditions where chromosomal sex, physiological sex and social sex don't coincide, I think a wiki search is in order...

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What a week...

I'm lying in bed, my first lie-in of the week and I am enjoying the hell out of it. The past week was my first full week back at uni since the summer and I had forgotten the mind numbing exhaustion that late nights and early mornings can induce. Next week is all about the 10.30pm bedtime, let's see how that feels.

It has been an alright weekend I guess. A lil disappointing. Friday night me and my girl D went out to dinner at one of the jerk restaurants on Wardour Street to discuss life, love and the human condition (as you do). Firstly, the food was uniformly dry, like surface of mars dry - there may have once been moisture, but it was long gone. I didn't even know it was possible to dry out mac and cheese like that and I had been looking forward to it all day! Boooo! Secondly the service was crap, but, well, you know the stereotype so whatever - no tip for you.

Anywho, I digress. After our conversation covered life and work it turned to men. Now D is confused as hell because she has a friend who is sending her mixed up and confused signals. D's friend, who she likes, recently has started to kiss her. Unfortunately this friend is so laid back that he is near comatose and so she has no idea what else to expect. Add to this, that he not a big talker and "I don't know" is a standard answer to most things. Irritating, no? Originally when I first heard about this guy I was backing team J hard! Now he just sounds lazy. Booo to laziness, D deserves better.

D's story was just another addition to the foolishness that I have been suffering from all week! I call it Y chromosome foolishness because yes, it has been gender specific.

Two examples after the jump:

Test blog

The letter writer is taking me to the jazz cafe tonight. We're going to see Laura Izibor (who is his alleged future wife). I've never heard her sing before but I'm avoiding a youtube search. Sometimes it's nice to be surprised.



So far the letter writer is ticking many boxes, too many in fact, he's freaking me out a little. I'm also not used to his free and easy and frequent and honest expression of emotions. We don't do expression in my family, we're pretty controlled for the most part. And getting emotions out of most of the guys I've dated in the past is like wringing the proverbial blood out of the proverbial stone! I call it emotional retardedness (politically incorrect I know) and I also possess it in spades.



Incidently I'm typing this and hopefully posting it from my new crackberry which is already exerting it's addictive influence over me. So please excuse typos and a lack of pics, it is a work in progress

Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device

FLIPin heck

not the greatest pic, but jeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeez, too fly!!!!

What a fab night!

To be honest, after making me sit through the drivel that was Final Destination yesterday, Nadz really did owe me something good.

She delivered Motown, in a park, for free. All things I love.

I am pretty sure I have seen the show twice before, but it's motown, so repetition isn't a problem. Shimiing and shaking under the stars at the front of the crowd would have been good enough, but we were blessed by the inclusion of Flip in the cast of the show.

Lord have mercy

Flip was fiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiine

Flip made us both stand up and take notice. Flip salsaed through 'Fiesta', and back flipped across the stage. Flip made my heart beat a little faster every time he sang. He was cute, a lil skinny, but had the kind of voice and smile that makes a girl's mind wander. I might have even drooled slightly. Weirdly, he also reminded me (and nadz) of my ex, and really made me want to drunk dial (minus the alcohol) but since he is now seeing someone (grrr) I exercised the remanants of my self control and put down the phone.

Well done me!

Jeez it's been a while since I felt some pure, unadulterated lust.

Good stuff!

french women are fabulous

Really? Are they?

I've been to Paris a few times - and yes the women had a certain je ne sais quoi. But on my drive through France recently and spending time in the country, french women seemed to be the same as all others. Maybe it would help if I understood the language...

Anyway read this, it's interesting

How you can be a femme fatale

Eight legged freaks

Yesterday there was a spider in my bed.

It was large, and black, with more legs than anybody really needs. It scuttled up my sheet in that disconcerting way that spiders have when they move quickly.

I employed my usual spider response

Namely the 'scream and run'

It's very effective when the spider is somewhere that you don't mind not being. But this one was in my bed. By the pillow. Under the duvet. Where I wanted to be.

Yesterday I employed a new technique.

The 'little brother rescue'

He's amazing, he's taller than me and an absolute skinny beanpole. But he handles spiders with skill.

So today I dedicate my night of uninterupted sleep to my brother. THANK YOU!

***there was supposed to be a picture - but it scared me so just use your imagination***

there ain't no party like a HOUSE PARTY!

I am aware that I am a lil late to the party.

Actually if I'm honest I am the houseguest that turned up at 6am after the police raided and just in time to help the clean up crew.

I'm late.

This weekend I watched the classic 1990's film House Party...

...FOR THE FIRST TIME

Like I said - late.

My only excuse is that I was only 5 when it came out and I have parents that severely restricted my viewing habits up to the age of 15, by which time I was pretty book smart, but I missed all the classics of my generation.

I have been asked by the friend that introduced me to House Party to make a list of all the classics that I have yet to see. This could be embarrassing since right now I class my self as a (lapsed) cinephile.
(Lapsed because I now work on Orange Wednesdays - freaking sacriledge!)

The List (black films for now)

• Boomerang (and most of Eddie's films)
• Jungle Fever
• Poetic Justice
• House Party 2 (and 3 and 4)
• New Jack City
• Malcolm X (which is sitting under my bed as we speak -my cheeks are shame coloured)

Have I missed anything?

Please let me know - the plan is to have a movie weekender and catch up.

I also missed a LOT of sci-fi and horror classics. I'm sure they'll get their own list soon.

For the record, I loved Kid, he was such a clueless cutie (Play not so much). And this may be one of the few films I like Martin Lawrence in - he cracked me up. I still don't like him in Bad Boys - sue me. Darryl Mitchell, who I recognised from Channel 4 day-time tv show Ed, was in there as Chill. I couldn't place the face initially so I googled him (as I do) and found that in 2001 he was paralysed from the waist down (paraplegic) hence him being in a wheelchair on Ed is not acting. Tragic.

Tisha (from My Wife and Kids?) also starred. And hot DAMN, her body was freaking inspirational!! Her lil round face belied the wash board abs and toned legs and reminded me that it is time to start the winter gym attempts in the hope that next summer I can look bikini ready (this summer I most definitely was NOT).