Fashion Choices for the Unfashionable

Today I'm going to impart some wisdom to you all. If you know me you probably know I'm not the most fashionable of chicas. I wear tracksuits, I don't ever style my hair, I only own two pairs of high heels, I've never worn fake eyelashes or fake tan. On the internet these days, there are a vast and uncountable parade of blogs about who's hot and who's not, what's chique and what's not and it got me to thinking: There's no blog for us left-footed people of the dressing world. There's no blog for those of us who don't really try and be fashionable. As Coco Chanel says, "Fashion is made to become unfashionable." So I figure, let's skip the middle fashionable stage and go straight to the 'Yeah....it's unfashionable already' stage. I bring to you, fashion choices for the unfashionable.



This fetching style of exuberant horizontal strips of colour, combined with trousers made from a raincoat style material, can be easily accessorised with au natural curls (with no recognisable parting), necklaces inspired by tribes of Papoa New Guinea, belts to keep that elongated crotch pouch attached and secure (so nobody sees your gentleman's business) and a subtly placed advertising strategy for Pepsi. If possible, this style will work best if you have an identical twin and two willing identical twins of the opposite gender that you can co-ordinate best with. Because it's not enough to have matching faces.


This young lady is demonstrating that it's okay to take your love of Billy Ray Cyrus to another level entirely. Denim on denim is perhaps the most tantalising of combinations. She's gone for a rather modest white vest top, which Billy Ray has jazzed up into being rather more of a chest barer. Denim on denim is a very flexible style: the two denims don't have to match. Sometimes it's a case of: more clash=more street credibility. Basically you can play it safe, or you can go the extra mile and incorporate fringing, rhinestones and a frightened and dubious facial expression. A word to the public, don't mock somebody who has the guts for double denim. Or you might break their 'Achey Breaky Hearts.'

 A style which has been synonymous with comfortable tourism fashion has to be the glorious combination of Socks and Sandals! The terrible twosome: Ben and Jerry, Mary Kate and Ashley, Mickey and Minnie. Even if the weather's scorching hot, there's no need to actually use sandals in the way they were intended! Why have your feet bare to circulating air when you could trap them into socks so they get nice and sweaty? Plus side: you don't need to make your feet part of your 'summer body', they can look like a hairy banana if you so desire them. A fashion choice for the morally conscious: it's highly immoral for a lady to show her ankles. Newsflash: It doesn't matter about the rest of the legs, wear hotpants and nobody will bat an eyelash but show your ankles *shudders* you're a harlot! Here  is the perfect solution, and hey, less chance of a blister when wearing those new sandals for the first time. Ring a ding ding.

Don't listen to the cats.












For the larger gentleman or lady, a style which always goes down well with you and your loved ones: the redneck. Although in actual fact I probably am a bit of a hick...well, a British hick (a brick??) there's something about a ponytailed man with an ensemble which screams "Too small! Too small!" that really can bring a girl to her knees screaming "Why, red necks, why??" If you wish to try this subtle and understated style you will need: long, unwashed looking hair, a baseball cap that doesn't fit your head, a cut-off Lumberjack style checkard shirt (the length of a crop top), a t-shirt with a provocative slogan (also the length of a crop top), a protruding stomach which you pat from time to time as if you are carrying a baby (not just 10 years of holiday fat), jeans with no real shape or defining features, and of course, a six pack of cheap beer in your hand. Before you get to thinking it could be pricey to put together this ensemble, relaaaax! Just get really fat...then all your clothes will shrink away in terror from your stomach anyway! 

Do you ever find a jumper pattern you just really enjoy?? Well if you do, buy in bulk!!! The ultimate trade mark of us unfashionable is to bulk buy one thing and over-wear that one thing until everybody we've ever met has seen us in it at least ten times. Sometimes you find a sweater which just happens to be in every size imaginable!! When this is the case, guess what?? You can buy it for all your family! Then you can all wear it together for family fun times together. Hot damn! And you know what? They'll all really thank you for the matching.  If you find a sweater with a suitable bold and colourful design, it's best to keep the bottoms in a mute singular tone. You don't want to look....clashing, right?



The most beloved item of the middle-aged woman. The Mum/Mom Jeans. An essential item for your wardrobe, they are characterised by their above waist waistline, their tightly belted waist, their ability to make even a slim women look like she has a hugh pelvis region, their accompaniment with tucked into tops (of course) and their disappointing ankle finish which culminates in either: 1. An above ankle length or 2. A ballooning effect to disguise your ankles from the world.

Wearers of the Mum Jeans are usually elsewise characterised by their sensible handbags, their sensible shoes and the most beloved of all Mum related things: The Mum Run. You might have seen them, women in a hurry, women rushing to cross the road before the lights change, women taking children to taekwondo and tap dancing. The Mum Run basics: Your legs have to move really quickly. Like in a cartoon when the character is about to move and their legs blur and there's a lot of smoke. Although your legs are moving quickly though, your arms have to stay at your sides, as if you have weights on the end. You're in a hurry, but nobody needs to know that! The illusion of a casual walk is brilliantly created by the still arms. Genius. Mum Running is not just for Mums. Oh no. A few young ladies of my acquaintance can vouch for our own accidental transition into Mum Runners for our own stresses and worries. The difference being, we feel the after shame. True Mum Runners do not.

 So, I've tried to give you a few suggestions readers. The most important thing about being unfashionable is to cause this face
<<<<<<<<<<<< to happen at least once a day when people see your ensemble.

Also you should note, my unfashionable friends, we are not alone in this. 8 out of 10 people quite enjoy an unfashionable day or two. Here's a secret: we're the normal ones!!! We know what we like and we aren't afraid to be bold enough to wear it. We are fashion. We are ingenuity. We are.....
probably really very unfashionable. But I love you anyway :)

And you look great. 

“Let me live, love and say it well in good sentences.”

Hey there, old (only as old as you feel) friends! 

This Saturday I found myself reading 'The Bell Jar'. Reading 'The Bell Jar' and eating cake. I can tell you are all thinking 'Oh no, it's one of THOSE posts.'

 It's not.

I actually had a jolly sort of day and it provided some sort of comfort for my current apres-education predicament.

The character in the novel, Esther, is an English graduate who can't get a job. An English graduate who likes writing and has based her years of education on being commended for a good job, for being creative. Of course, Esther goes one further by ending up in an asylum, and I don't think I'm quite teetering so close to the edge of a break down (though some mornings when the air is rife with the stench of rejection letters, I find myself Patrick Bateman laughing and Chris Brander face pulling), but the general sudden realisation of I don't know' when asked what you're doing after college is certainly familiar. ( “What do you have in mind after you graduate?'
'I don't really know,' I heard myself say. I felt a deep shock, hearing myself say
that, because the minute I said it, I knew it was true.”)

Not much has changed since the 50s/60s: “I didn't know shorthand either.

This meant I couldn't get a good job after college. My mother kept telling me nobody wanted a plain English major. But an English major who knew shorthand would be something else again. Everybody would want her. She would be in demand among all the up-and-coming young men and she would transcribe letter after thrilling letter.

The trouble was, I hated the idea of serving men in any way. I wanted to dictate my own thrilling letters.”

It all seems to be about who has the most additional skills they can contribute to a job. And with every Tom, Dick and Harry constantly bettering themselves, it becomes a bit of a challenge. I lived abroad so I could improve my German. Additional language: check.
I got relevant experience in several different mediums of writing: check.
I have a range of interests and, let's face it, a rather amazing personality.
But it doesn't seem to be enough.

I was recently talking to my friend in the U.S, and she said something that has really stuck with me. "I feel as if my life has slowed down considerably in the last few months, and I'm trying everything I can to speed it back up." And this is something worryingly familiar to a whole generation of 18-25 year olds at the minute. Very few of my friends who have jobs are doing jobs they imagined they'd be doing, or that have any long term prospect of increased prosperity. Those of us unemployed hear of wonderful statistics such as our universities having a 95% after education employment rate and we can't help but laugh at our incredible good fortune to be the minority. A vast number have gone on to further education as a chance to get ahead,, but for those of us with no funds and no chance of affording the fees, even with scholarships, there is a bleak sense of no possibility whatsoever.

It's a strange place to be in, this no-man's land, and I find myself increasing losing my capacity to think. I'm slower at doing the Times crossword, I haven't been reading enough, I feel like the best sentence I can form sometimes is 'Me like cookies!' and there's a sort of silence that descends on me when I don't find any jobs to apply to and when I don't know what to do with myself.

Meanwhile, I had to Sign On a few weeks ago, but so far all I've received is four trips to the centre, a patronising talk about how to make a CV, several accusations of being foreign and zero money whatsoever...so it begins to feel like all I'm doing is spending a few hours questioning my own person and my own abilities just for the fun of it, with no compensation for my time.



We were promised a lot more by the older generations for our early 20s- this is supposed to be the time we truly become ourselves, with the people we are destined to love, and live in the places we are meant to be and that we've always dreamed of. 

I've prepared a film referencing system. Here we were: fresh faced youth ready for our next big adventure, straight off the graduate train of success and exam completion.

Pretty happy, eh?

After a few months of being minimum wage workers, or unemployed, or emotionally ravaged by the pressing loneliness of suddenly being without your closest friends indefinitely, we somewhat more resemble these poor guys:

"You got a little Chow?"

"OHMYGAAAWD!"

"Yeah, yeah, you...
you make my dreams come true!

IRONY!





So, I guess my point is: if anybody's got a way to turbo charge these years back into the good times they are meant to be, please go right ahead!

In other news, I'm going to see a comedy show with my mum at the weekend....but we're sitting in rows C +Q...so really it's going to be like going to a comedy show on my own! Which is the emotional equivalent of listening to Saint Saens 'The Swan' while doing a sad Mime Artist routine which involves (real) Ugly Crying silently while an audience breathily salivates over popcorn and smelly nachos.

Good times!