My Special Cupboard

Am in a black jumper (sweater), with a big, stencilled, white zebra on it, and black leggings, inside, editing my thesis, on one of those English, still, white-sky days. But, fortunately for me, I have all these pretties ready to unleash over the Summer as soon as the weather picks up again:


(Excuse some of the models' expressions - we rarely need more of that in life. Please do imagine me writing this with a semi-crazed smile.)

Love the dramatic neckline and print. For some summer drinks.


Shopping...Although, it would have to be optimal (shame-free) conditions for me to keep the hat on.

Never sure about long shorts on women...very risky...but I might wear this to a casual day party.

For travels, however near.

Just 'cause.

Festival-going.


Swishy, swishy at a garden party.

Yep. All sorted. Thanks, special cupboard (stare, stare, honky laugh).

Preparing for Home

photographs by: xssat

In between churning out the words and riding my bike to and from the library, I'm starting the mental and physical preparations for my upcoming England departure. I am heading home for the final (?) thesis burst and to spend Christmas and most of the summer with my family and friends. This will be my first Christmas at home in a few years. It will be lovely to draw in a waft of pine needles and mangos at the same time, to sneeze at the bright sun in the high sky, and to dive under the dauntless ocean waves. Tralalala!

One thing's for certain: I will have to face Sydney trendies. Australian trendies are like English trendies, only with a little less audacity, a lot more skin, a few more smiles, and, most importantly, beset by white light, the most unforgiving of all the lights going round. (Evidence for your pleasure included above. Click to zoom.) This makes me apprehensive. In Oxford, you would never even have to see, let alone reveal, anything from below your neck if you didn't choose to. Quite normal. Plus, in the graduate community (not to be confused with the undegrads, darling!), people tend to think a t-shirt with a clever slogan slapped on it is daring. I have to decide whether I can be bothered trying to look as interesting and appealing as everyone else or whether I should write myself off as a PhD geek and stick to the jeans, trackies and odd, excessive layers until completion (even on the beach!). Not the most significant worry...but more fun than the rest of them...and the one I am least attached to.

Festival Gear, British Style

images

My boyfriend took me to a music festival, the Cornbury Festival, pretty Oxfordshire, last Saturday. It was my second time and it was super. The highlights: The Magic Numbers, the lamb, mint and potato homemade pie, and having a pretty good go at a harnessed trampoline (to aid somersaults) activity with a bunch of five year olds. It was not the same festival as the one where the above pics were taken (Wireless Festival, Hyde Park), but a variation on the same themes I am sure: music, booze, food stalls, rides, tie-dye rubbish and cheap trinket stalls, fairy outfitters etc. (One could argue, though, that Cornbury has some of the best food of any festival.)

The ladies' festival fashion wasn't far off these pics: beaucoup de check shirts, old and faux-old (Batman, scouts, Atari) t-shirts as dresses (sometimes with shorts), floral dresses (maxis are huge - haha!), charm necklaces, mixture of chunky and scrawny bracelets, leather sandals, trendy wellies, aviators, and just entered my teens hair, all tied together by a cup of Pimms or a bottle of beer and some fairy wings or glittery fake eyelashes (the posh rurals probably get into the fantasy accessories a little more heartily than the London coolies). Of course, in an instant, British festivalgoers, no matter how trendy, can transform en masse into an army of garden gnomes in dark green or black hooded, full body raincoats. I know. I saw it. It's weird.

I'll give you style if you give me chocolate

photos by: Michael Gray for Street Chic, UK Vogue online

Last night, my (English) boyfriend finally agreed after many attempts that Australian Cadbury's chocolate is better than English Cadbury's. By better I mean more full, rich and soft, and less brittle, buttery and bland. Being the fair-minded person I am, I told him I would concede something on behalf of Team Australia. I admitted that English women (or a particular group of English women) tend to have a better sense of dress than Aussie women. Wouldn't you agree? No matter how hard we try, we cannot pull off the shabby chic look in quite the same way as a Brit and it's not just the darker tan and whiter teeth that dimish our efforts (tee hee!). I pointed out that I was being especially magnanimous as he is not chocolate.

I have been in the Radcliffe Camera today revising my thesis outline. I was somewhat distracted by the dusty sun beams coming through the window overlooking St Mary's Church. But I did fairly well. I had figured it was time to check that my chapters were working for the same boss.