Irish Daisy

So, I felt like there was something I needed to talk about after the frenzy of Halloween candy consumption and before the holiday season, with its stuffing, cookies, pies, sweets, and Bailey’s, is upon us. A two-month orgy of savory foods and delicious treats, followed by the self-imposed penance of a resolution and the resulting massive guilt if said resolution is not carried through. Here it is: Don’t go on a diet to feel better about how you look. Really, don’t. It doesn’t work anyway. I’m not suggesting you shouldn’t eat fruits and veggies, or exercise to avoid a blood clot in your leg. I’m not even saying dieting doesn’t work for weight loss – after all, we see success stories all the time in magazines. It’s just that dieting until you’re raging hangry because you just know you’ll feel better about your thighs, or belly, or butt if only you could fit into size 6 pants…yeah, that might not turn out like you think. Your…trouble spot will get smaller and the scale will show...

I’m decrepit. Seriously, I am. Actually, I’m amazingly strong and reasonably fit for a woman of my age – which is a combination of the legacy of being an athlete in high school, stubbornness and an insistence on using hand tools, because they’re so much cheaper to buy than power tools, for all gardening functions. Toned arms are not indicative of overall fitness...at all. I mean really, there is nothing that matches the full-body workout of using manual tools to dethatch and aerate your lawn when you live in a place with rocky, clay-based soil. To hell with cross-fit or weight lifting – get a dethatching tool, a rake, a loop-hoe, some loppers and a pair of leather gloves. I can thank cheap gardening for my arms, my sore, painful, toned arms. At one point, I put together a slide show of gardening projects for my employees to explain why I arrived whimpering and limping every Monday. Window Dressing You know what’s not in great shape? My back – which is kind of the...

Renée Zellweger’s face is everywhere today, or should I say Renée Zellweger’s new face. It bothers me...a lot. Why? Oh, let me count the ways. First, and probably foremost, with all of the bad, bad shit going on in the world today, why in the name of sanity is any media this obsessed with how a woman looks – even if that woman once starred in some films. Seriously, even talking about Ebola some more would be preferable to this manufactured horror about a woman, gasp, appearing to age because, you know, she’s gotten fu!#!$@# older. Second, the faux shock that she may have had plastic surgery! Double gasp!!! Who the hell cares what she’s done with her face? Really? How does it affect anyone but her, the doctor who’s Land Rover she paid off and casting directors? It’s not like Hollywood, or all of Southern California for that matter, is unfamiliar with the concept of elective cosmetic procedures. I will admit that when I saw the picture I thought, “oh, poor thing.” But I was mostly ...

Photoshop is a thing. Its use is ubiquitous and pervasive and it's affecting all of our lives more than we realize. Other than your own family pictures, you never see a photo that you know for sure has not been retouched, or radically changed, through the wonders of photo editing software  (that is, unless you used one of those handy new apps to smooth out and model-fy your own pictures too - you didn't, did you?) We never see photos in magazines that have not been altered in some way - never - not even the red carpet or vacation pictures that both the media, magazines and celebrities like to pretend are semi-candid. Everything is altered or adjusted, and the most common changes are the most insidious. They smooth the skin, removing lines, wrinkles, random hairs, flaws. They make everyone, but especially women, look thinner. There's a lot of ways to do this - skimming the waist, thighs and general silhouette, but also elongating necks, stretching legs, and whittling arm...