Deal or no deal?

Just a quick post to point everyone over to this blog, Dooce.com where she has an entire post dedicated to relationship deal breakers. It was so funny and so real that I remembered the whole reason I started reading blogs to begin with. The comments that everyone else posted on their dealbreakers? They were hilarious; I spent a whole half hour today giggling at them.

Here's an excerpt:

"It was just all the stuff that happened after the kissing that made the relationship more and more difficult to rationalize, and here is where I experience a lot of hand-wringing for all my Mormon girlfriends who got married without ever having slept with their men. It’s admirable, very admirable to enter into the covenant of marriage as a virgin, but what if smack dab in the middle of that first-night passion he starts quoting Al Pacino in Scarface? Or starts yodeling? Or says, “Do you mind if I turn on some Yanni?” IT COULD TOTALLY HAPPEN."

Oh and by the way, in case I totally forgot to mention, its Spring in Melbourne right now. The days are warming up, flowers are blooming, fruits are getting cheaper and generally I smile alot more now. The sun does that to me.

Enjoy Spring break everyone!

Too rich or too thin

This is interesting. Spain has apparently just passed legislation banning models considered to be "too thin". Amazing and potentially far reaching because of the impact on the Madrid fashion shows and because it's entirely possible that Italy or France (both huge fashion powerhouses) might move to do the same thing.

I'm frankly amazed. The super tall and super skinny models models have always ruled our billboards, magazines and thinking...and I doubt this is the end of their era somehow. But then again, in the last decade, I've seen the desired weight and height of models and girls around me drop by at least 5 kilos below what was considered a healthy acceptable number and it's a phenomenon that is at least a trifle disturbing. (I went and looked up Kate Moss's weight in a diet and nutrition book and it was so far below the acceptable weight figure for her height that it was scary). That, plus the last time I was home in Singapore, a friend told me that the ideal weight for height scenario for teenage girls was to be 1.65m tall and 45 kilos...and does anyone have any idea how thin that is?

It can't really go on that way. There is only so far weight can drop before you get scary skeletal cases like Nicole Richie running around. But I'm a pessimist at heart. I don't really think that the tide of waif thin girls has really turned. And sadly, I know I'd give almost anything to be one of them too, because they seem to have it so easy. Just be extremely thin and it will cover up any number of other physical/character flaws.

Can a girl be too thin? Actually yes, but its not going to stop hundreds of girls from trying to become dangerously underweight anyway.


Maybe there is too thin...the African refugee look is so not chic

The wheels on the bus go round and round

After something like seven years of procrastinating, I've finally done it.

I've finally started driving lessons.

No I'm not sitting for the driving test anytime soon. Yes after all of two lessons, I still kind of suck and yes, as of right now, I am definitely a road hazard.

God alone knows what made me delay my driving lessons for so long. I think it was at least partly because of my fear of losing control of the car and being in a horrific accident. All those years of playing Daytona only to have one's simulated car crash into barriers, go onto the grass and finally flip over really scared me into thinking I could probably never ever learn to drive.

BUT, lucky for me, I have the world's nicest and most fatherly driving instructor. He speaks with a charming accent, tells me everything slowly and nicely and never yells at me when I make mistakes. He totally validates my decision to learn driving here instead of at home.

To make things easier on myself and also because I get confused by machine parts and having too many gears and levers, I decided to learn auto driving instead of manual. Yes I realise most people think that it's a mistake because while manual drivers can drive auto cars, the reverse isn't possible. But I got the feeling that manual driving would drive me crazy, what with the extra clutch to deal with and the confusion of having to move the gears in a certain way.

I really hope I pass my driving test before the year is out. I just heard about a friend who failed hers because she nearly drove into a lorry that suddenly reversed into the road and suddenly, all my optimism about driving just evaporated.

Wish me luck!