she's got a ticket to ride

twenty four hours is a long time to spend on a plane.

but if you're going to spend twenty four hours on a plane, you might as well be flying singapore airlines. oh, and going to germany.

i am officially leaving melbourne with the other students on the study tour at 5pm tomorrow, and after our long-haul flight we will land in frankfurt airport at about 7am german time. we then get straight on a train to go to freiburg where everyone will settle in the youth hostel. throughout the next three weeks or so we will stay in munich, berlin and cologne, with day excursions to bordering regions in austria, switzerland and france.

so it's safe to say that i probably will not be updating for at least three weeks (that is, if anybody actually reads this thing). it is possible that i'll post but not likely ~ i have plenty of holiday homework to fill my evenings and i need to keep in touch with all my friends via email/facebook. hopefully i will be out having fun at some point, too.

bye for now. see you in a month or so (:

_______________________

i'm bored of cheap and cheerful

since i have a decent camera now, i finally joined chictopia. add me ~ http://www.chictopia.com/fallingdown

you know i couldn't last

on march 21, 35 years ago, this woman passed away from leukemia at the age of 29.

only she wasn't technically a woman, she was actually a pre-op transsexual.

candy darling, born james lawrence slattery, appeared in her first warhol film - flesh - in 1968. she also starred in warhol's women in revolt and would later appear in bit parts in major hollywood pictures including klute with jane fonda and la mortadella with sophia loren.

in 1971 she was encouraged by warhol to take hormones in order to grow breasts in time for her appearance in two of german director werner schroeter's films. the pills were taken off the market four years later when they were found to be carcinogenic, but by that point it was too late. candy darling died of leukemia in march of 1974, leaving behind the following note.


to whom it may concern

by the time you read this i will be gone. unfortunately before my death i had no desire left for life. even with all my friends and my career on the upswing i felt too empty to go on in this unreal existence. i am just so bored by everything. you might say bored to death. it may sound ridiculous but it is true.

i have arranged my own funeral arrangements with a guest list and it is paid for. i would like to say goodbye to jackie curtis, i think you're fabulous. holly, sam green a true friend and noble person, ron link i'll never forget you, andy warhol what can i say, paul morrissey, lennie you know i loved you, andy you too, jeremiah don't take it too badly just remember what a bitch i was, geraldine i guess you saw it coming. richard turley & richard golub i know i could've been a star but i decided i didn't want it. manuel, i'm better off now. terry i love you. susan i am sorry, did you know i couldn't last, i always knew it. i wish i could meet you all again.

all these things that i've done

today was my unofficial birthday. my actual birthday is on march 28, but that would prove difficult to celebrate with my family considering i will be on the plane to germany at the time.

i actually have an extended birthday ~ i hop on the plane at 5pm on the 27th, sometime during the 24-hour flight it becomes the 28th, and then since germany is ten hours behind melbourne we arrive at about 8am on the 28th again. only five days left until i leave :)

since today was the day we chose to celebrate my birthday, i got some presents: a new nikon coolpix digital camera [i can test it out on all the castles in germany], a book of andy warhol portraits, and a $50 gift card for cotton on body. i spent it on two sets of underwear, and eventually went over the $50 limit with a white bathrobe and some adorable grey over-the-knee socks.

we also went to the camberwell markets this morning, where i bought a pair of nicola finetti studded platform heels for $10, a first-edition of the edie sedgwick bio edie: an american biography for $4, and a silk scarf for $20.

i started officially packing for my trip today, and limiting how much i put in my bag is proving a little problematic. normally i'm not a gratuitous over-packer, but there are so many things i want to bring to germany, along with several things i don't really care for but have to pack anyway ~ an awful navy waterproof jacket, an ugly maroon umbrella [mum inexplicably bought one that "matched my uniform" .. ugh], etc. but whatever. i guess if i buy stuff and i have to make room, i can always surreptitiously throw things away. after all, who needs a towel anyway ?

currently listening to:

love is dead ~ brett anderson

dancing with myself ~ nouvelle vague

mersey paradise ~ the stone roses

bubblegum ~ brigitte bardot

psycho for drum machine

several friends and i hit the melbourne grammar social last night, it was mediocre at best. nobody was attractive [my creepy penchant for older men aside], the music was awful [the only highlight was pokerface .. it's a guilty pleasure], and there were 70 people there, max.

i only found out about the social earlier this week so i kind of threw my outfit together, it's not amazing but at least i fit the theme of "white". [spot the odd one out.]

tallest .. but WHY am i standing like that ??

i luv this photo because everyone looks incredibly high and i'm just smiling away obliviously .. my friend was actually falling on me as the photo was being taken [hence my baby-deer legs] but as you can see i am still making a concerted effort to look nice

bathroom photos are classy

______________________

i think everyone enjoyed taking photos more than than the actual social lol

tu veux ou tu veux pas

"yesterday's committee,

sticks, but a broken drum,

midnight in the city,

flutes in a vacuum,

shut lips, sleeping faces,

every stopped machine,

the dumb and littered places

where crowds have been: ...

_________________________

all silences rejoice,

weep (loudly or low),

speak - but with the voice

of whom, i do not know.

__________________________

absence, say, of susan's,

absence of egeria's

arms and respective bosoms,

lips and, ah, posteriors,

slowly form a presence;

________________________

whose? and, i ask, of what

so absurd an essence,

that something, which is not,

nevertheless should populate

empty night more solidly

than that with which we copulate,

why should it seem so squalidly?"

___________________

text from brave new world by aldous huxley

ermine furs adorn the imperious

bloggers are getting butthurt about it but idk, i quite like mischa barton's outfit.

the shoes are a little iffy, but she pulls it off. people are getting all "evil bitch talentless whore animal killer ~!!!!11!" over it and it's a little pathetic.

or maybe i'm just a hypocrite. it seems like only yesterday that i was being incredibly self-righteous and bratty about this kind of thing, but my attitude towards fur has mellowed in recent years.

it reminds me of those 90s PETA anti-fur ads featuring its most famous supermodels - think christy, naomi, cindy, elle and, of course, kate - under the slogan "we'd rather go naked than wear fur". almost two decades on, to the best of my knowledge they have all renounced their anti-fur ways in the form of high-profile fur advertising gigs or just wearing it out and about. in the late 80s and early 90s, PETA reached the zenith of its anti-fur campaign, and there is still a great deal of antagonism about fur even now [although most of the people who get grumpy at fur-wearers either wear leather, eat meat or do both].

the supermodels and i, we're the worst kind of fur-wearers. we know what an awful thing it is to do, but we do it anyway. it's bizarre, because i really do love animals and i like to think of myself as someone who genuinely cares about animal rights. maybe i just fail at being consistent. maybe i'm just a lot more shallow and a lot less moral than i was at thirteen. it's probably a bit of both. what would ingrid newkirk think of me now ?

of course, now that i am older i can finally see the point of everyone who is against PETA. it's quite pathetic in its extremism, not to mention incredibly sexist. like a bunch of inexplicably naked women in your campaigning/ protests and spokespeople such as pamela anderson are going to help people take your cause seriously. it's a pity they give animal rights supporters such a bad name, really.

to end on a less vindictive note, here is my current hairspiration. must .. grow out .. hair .. so it can look like this.

AND she has freckles .. further proof that platinum blonde hair will suit my skin tone

just to forget my scars

i'm kind of obsessed with the slumdog millionaire soundtrack. i saw it again last night [my parents and sister hadn't seen it yet] and it was just as great the second time around. my favourite songs from the soundtrack are ringa ringa, latika's theme and o... saya. the d.f.a remix of paper planes is good, but it's just not the same without the gunshots :(

i really, really, really want platinum blonde hair. not now, obviously, or i'll look like an agyness deyn wannabe. maybe when my hair is a bit above shoulder-length.

i can has ur hair ?

[and/or boobs ?]

others conquered love but i ran

this is one of my favourite poems. it's called i wanna be yours by manchester performance poet john cooper clarke.

i wanna be your vacuum cleaner

breathing in your dust

i wanna be your ford cortina

i will never rust

if you like your coffee hot

let me be your coffee pot

you call the shots

i wanna be yours

i wanna be your raincoat

for those frequent rainy days

i wanna be your dreamboat

when you want to sail away

let me be your teddy bear

take me with you anywhere

i don’t care

i wanna be yours

i wanna be your electric meter

i will not run out

i wanna be the electric heater

you’ll get cold without

i wanna be your setting lotion

hold your hair in deep devotion

deep as the deep atlantic ocean

that’s how deep is my devotion

currently listening to:

since yesterday ~ strawberry switchblade

the greatest ~ cat power

genius of love ~ tom tom club

you don't have to say you love me ~ dusty springfield

i'm gonna watch the bluebirds fly

without any intent to sound melodramatic, i have never felt more awful in my life. my cat was hit and killed by a car yesterday afternoon, he was only three years old. the house feels empty. i can't believe he is really gone forever.

of deep meaning philosophies where only showbiz loses

apparently record labels have just gone on an insane deleting spree. about a quarter of my youtube videos had to be deleted because of copyright. the videos are made to sync with the song so this silly audioswap business isn't going to be any help, sorry, thanx for trying. this is so annoying, i slaved over these videos. while none of my ~best works~ were deleted, there were several with disabled audio that i was quite fond of including a fred astaire and ginger rogers tribute set to "lose control" by missy elliot. edgy, i know. but now nobody has the pleasure of watching it except me. ugh. i guess i'm just going to have to start using more obscure songs for my videos. check out one of the 18 videos remaining ~ my channel is d1sintegration [named aaages ago when i was obsessed with that song by the cure, okay ?]

on a more cheerful note, i now have everything i need for germany except for boots. i have issues with buying boots because my calves are abnormally slim, so boots are always too wide and look completely ridiculous. but anyway on saturday i hit piccadilly circus in carlton and as far as successful purchases go, i got ~

~ a red wool and cashmere duffel coat, $149 ;

~ black wool/angora gloves, $24.95 [i can't find a good picture that looks similar]

~ black acrylic scarf, $24.95 [ditto].

i would post an outfit photo but tbh the webcam photo quality is just awful so i'd rather wait until i get a decent camera. [i actually do have a sort-of-okay camera, but i lost the cord that connects it to the computer. shhhh.]

on sunday i hit the camberwell markets with the family. my 11-years-old-as-of-march-6 sister, sophie, has been obsessed with the idea of busking lately so she brought her ipod speakers and sang this is me from camp rock. in case you haven't guessed, my sister and i are basically the most divergent siblings you can get when it comes to personality. anyway she bolted about 5 minutes after she started because dad was monitoring her and she wanted him to "go away", being helplessly infantile as usual, and eventually we all met up at the coffee shop.

it was pretty slim pickings at the market, clothing-wise, but i spotted a fabulous 80s party dress. it was strapless, cream and had three matching rosettes at the bust and the waist [it's a lot less weird and ugly than it sounds]. the dress is the exact same shape that i want for my formal dress and i was endeared to the cute details but unfortunately it had perspiration stains. gross.

eventually i got a pair of cute mesh gloves for $10 ~

such a small touch but nevertheless made me feel 50x more chic.

anyway i must stop writing because i have a health and human development 3/4 sac in two days and i am incapable of studying at the moment [as if i'm ever capable of studying]. it sucks because i can't dismiss it as not counting because it DOES count .. i have an english 1/2 sac on medea on friday but i'm not really stressing because i like essays and all i have to do is write notes. whereas i don't know shit about ishchaemic heart disease or w/e. so, bai for now.

we're so pretty, oh so pretty

before the punk explosion where the "rock chick" as we know it was born, there were the ronettes ~ the original bad girls of rock'n'roll.

paired with huge beehives, heavy batwing eyeliner and a whole lot of attitude, sixties girl group the ronettes made even pant-suits look impossibly cool.

dolling up in shift dresses and kitten heels or dressing down in pedal pushers and sneakers, these bubblegum pop stars left an indelible mark on fashion - and apparently provided amy winehouse with endless beauty inspiration, not to mention musical direction.

it's easy to copy the look ~ get a little adventurous and don a quintessential sixties piece like a full skirt or a frou-frou sequinned frock, or pair a v-neck cardigan with cropped jeans and flats and let your eye makeup do the talking.

more ronettes inspiration ~

as desperation takes hold

"or that the heat within would grow
until he stood
incandescent as a god ;
_________________________________________________

now there is nowhere I can go
to hide from him:
moon and sun reflect his flame.



in the morning all shall be
the same again:
stars pale before the angry dawn ;



the gilded cock will turn for me
the rack of time
until the peak of noon has come



and by that glare, my love will see
how I am still
blazing in my golden hell."

text from the poem to a jilted lover by sylvia plath
stills from the film vivre sa vie (1962) directed by jean-luc godard. watch it here.

shiny hair, that's my life ambition

i'm going to grow my hair out, for real this time.

and by that i mean, i made a kind of pathetic attempt to grow it into a louise brooks bob last year which failed miserably when i just got sick of having hair that was really fucking weird looking as it was growing out. but this time, i'm going to stick with it. it's been more than a year with my current hair, after all. these photos will be the motivation that keeps me going. i have a plan. starting with this ~

phase one ~ the jean. imagine that this is my hair right now, except thicker and a bit longer. the growing out process is only just beginning at this point. i need the shorter hair at the back of my head to catch up to the hair at the bottom so it will eventually be all the same length, but i don't want it to turn into a mullet, so i will get my hair trimmed every six weeks just at the back. every so often i will wield the scissors myself at home to manipulate the hair at the front into a position which will become a fringe once it is at the bob stage. if all goes according to plan, it will ultimately become this ~

phase two ~ the lulu. once i've gotten over the "is it a pixie or a bob ?" hurdle, it will more or less be smooth sailing for my hair. louise brooks's hair was razored at the back and tapered down to a longer length at the front, which is ideal for my plan to just allow my hair to grow while the short hair on top catches up. hopefully my hair will look like this come formal time, which is in six months, because i really don't want the totally bizarre-looking mop that is typical of growing out a short cut. once my bob has reached a suitable length, i'll cut it all to one length so it will look like this ~

phase three ~ the debbie. this would imo be pretty much the best hair ever if it was slightly longer, had a blunt fringe and didn't have debbie's trademark black stripe down the back [but hey, she made it work]. by this point my hair will be adequate but it won't quite be quite up-do material yet so i'll have to keep going until i get to a length that is approximately the same as this ~

phase four ~ the kate. this haircut is probably the closest to perfect i've ever seen - and since it's unlikely platinum blonde would suit my pallid-but-freckly complexion, the closest to perfect colour for me that i've seen, too. i guess time will tell whether or not i decide to grow my hair any longer, but if i do, the ideal result would be something like this ~

phase five ~ the marianne. the fabulousness of her hair in this photo speaks for itself, really. lovely. here's hoping that it will be me within three years. wish me luck.

currently listening to:

oh my god ~ mark ronson ft. lily allen

people are strange ~ echo & the bunnymen

when i fall in love ~ sandra dee

watching the detectives ~ elvis costello