Obviously I took yesterday off. No reason really. I just wanted to do nothing. Big fat lazy nothing all day long. It was really quite blissful. And such a luxury these days when everyone is so busy all the time. I slept in. I lazed on the couch. I lazed back on my bed. I snoozed. I napped. I didn’t even really read or watch television that much. And I ignored the fact that it was time to tend to my toes, which are in dire need of a repamper and repaint. I just felt like doing literally nothing. Lazy cow, I know. Now, of course, I have two days of work to cram into one, plus a little bit of a pedicure to boot, so maybe it wasn’t the best idea I’ve ever had in my life.
I had my annual check-in with my nutritionist yesterday. I look at it like a retuning and reprogramming, just like you reassess your health once a year with a GP check-up. And I wanted to make sure I was on track with my intake of calcium, protein, etc. I went straight from the appointment - having all sorts of virtuous thoughts about tempeh and dahl - to a lunch, to celebrate French brand Roc making it into the top 10 of prestige beauty brands in Australia. And it made me realise just how hard it is to stay healthy in this line of work. Just some of the French delicacies put in front of us were champagne, wine, pommes frites, snails dripping in garlic and butter (in which I did not partake, mostly because of the non-veg factor, a little because of the ick factor), and melt-in-your-mouth strawberry macaroons and chocolate éclairs. So, oui, today my body is my temple again and I am nil but carrot juice by mouth.
Did you know that Origins only uses cruelty-free honey and beeswax? Me neither. And do you know what that means? Neither - until now. The company has pledged to only work with honey farmers who sign affidavits declaring that they do not gas their bees in the winter (the unproductive months), which is apparently a common practice in honey farming. Now I’m not the bees’ best friend. I’ve been stung before - it wasn’t fun. And bees may not be as cute and cuddly as, say, a rabbit, but that’s still no excuse to sacrifice them for beauty. No animal, no matter how big or small, should be harmed or killed by our pursuits of vanity. And any company that is not anti animal abuse, or is not working its butt off to phase out animal testing (on ingredients as well as on final products) should be ashamed of itself.
For those of you who have just gone through your year 12 exams - what do they call them now? I can’t keep up. It was VCE back in my day. Or was it HSC? Oh dear, showing my age. Anyway, congratulations and I have so much respect and admiration for you. Because you’ll know what a torture year 12 is. I have never worked as hard as I did back then. I think I actually went a little loopy. I wrote so many practice exams that my hands actually bled and I had to sit my real exams with band-aids all over my hands and fingers. And, yes, I was slightly OCD. I also managed to fit in two or three aerobics sessions a day (Jane Fonda or Step, natch). And all this before I had discovered coffee. I’m still in amazement at myself. I will give some credit to oats - I ate a bowl of porridge every morning, which fuelled me for almost the entire day, give or take a bowl of pasta here and there. (more…)
As the lovely makeup artist Elsa Morgan reminded me yesterday, seeing as it was Pink Ribbon Day, it’s timely to recommend a DIY breast check next time you’re in the shower. If you notice any changes at all in either the look or feel of your breasts, go see your doctor immediately. Speaking of GPs, if you’re in denial of your overdue pap smear, it’s time to act on that too. Never fun, no. But even less fun is the worst-case scenario.
