My Illustrative Life

NOTE: I’m basically still offline! But I wrote this, and transfered it to a computer that can get online, so, here it is.. for YOU.

>((Cross your fingers for me to be able to get my BSB colum up the day after tomorrow, huh?))

I used to watch Ocean Girl

Actually, I used to watch Ocean Odyssey, because I am Bri’ish. But the show was Australian, and in Australia it was known as Ocean Girl.

I read it, too; there was a cinemanga-style phoo story adaption thing in Girl Talk, which was my favourite magazine. The radest thing about going to the Big Bash in year six was going to the Girl Talk booth and talking to the editor, getting a goodie bag and my nails done.

Ocean Girl was a pretty good show. It was the kind of sci-fi where the speculative aspect of the genre is just an add-on to our current real life, and Australia and New Zealand (something in the air? Or water?) were apparently really good at those from about 1994-2005. According to wikipedia the show was “an example of deep-ecology science fiction” - it was about two boys (both named, as the captain formally addressed them, “Master Bates” I am not kidding) whose mother’s job as a marine biologist demanded that they move to an under-sea research dome lab run-like-a-ship thing. They have to learn to get along in their new environment, in the cramped quarters with the other kids whose parents are ‘on-board’, with having left their friends, with their dastardly father’s absence, blah blah.. but then they also meet Neri, who is magic.

Course, she isn’t just a wizard did it-style magic. She lives alone on an Island, and can talk to a whale (Charlie) and swim underwater for extended periods and is terribly curious about the boys’ world whilst also fearing outside influence. Pretty straightforward Pocahontas-arc stuff, only eventually it turns out that Neri is actually an actual alien, from space. By the end the elder boy and she fall in love.

When it’s written down like that it sounds like just my kind of thing. Emotional drama on a backdrop of futuristic science fiction, with no gratuitous tit-flashing (because, For Kids), with a basically ridiculous premise played straight. Dark Angel, The Tribe, Dekaranger, Buffy, Kamen Rider Anything, The Girl From Tomorrow, classic X-Men, etc etc. And the costuming was good too - Neri wore a dressthing made out of what looked like natural fibres and fishing net, which was perfectly evocative of ‘ocean’ and ‘girl’ and even ‘alien’, really. The boys (and the other kids on the station, who were the gang in the background for use when needed) wore variations on a basic lab-base uniform which got across the whole “suddenly trapped in a military-style world away from home, grasping for identity and personal connection” thing. But somehow.. somehow it never really became “mine”.

You know what I mean when I say “mine”, right? It’s the difference between being a fan, and just tuning in or picking up. You know what I mean.

It kind of bugged me, what was so-called ‘wrong’ with Ocean Girl. It did. It went off-air in 1998 and I think I stopped watching before it finished, but it stayed at the back of my head somewhere. I was curious! But I watched the first eight or so episodes recently, and I think I figured out what my problem was.

Wikipedia, again, says that the show was set “in the near future”. We all, I think, know how poorly vague that can be. But that wasn’t the point here - the point was that the show never contextualises itself that way. That’s not the whole point, but I’ll get to that in a minute.

In August 1994 I was seven, and as a seven year old it didn’t occur to me that underwater bio-dome laboratory stations didn’t actually exist. I didn’t know - I lived in inland England, and I was seven, and I had heard about Atlantis. I knew that science was pretty amazing, and that people had been to space. Sure, people could live underwater. Why not? With that as the only solid suggestion that the timeline on Ocean Girl and the timeline I was living on were out of sync - because I definitely never noticed any dates referenced the first time around, and I gotta say I never noticed any this second time around either - there was no reason for me to think Oh yes, of course, this is set next Sunday A.D. Of course! Culturally, things may be a little different!

That was a problem, because the hairstyles on the base-bound girls in this show were fipping wacky. I’m serious, I am fairly sure that this was the basic reason why I could never really get into OG’s groove. I can’t quite believe how small-minded that makes me look, either.

But see, at seven one is old enough to know about “normal” and “weird”. Honestly I don’t think this is a parental-fail thing - parents don’t know about which trainers are cool, and my parents raised me to not see “cool trainers” as something I was entitled to, but I still knew which ones were cool and that people valued them based on that. I may not have been completely down with omgtrainers or omgcool, but I still felt the pull of cool trainers. Y’know? Am I sounding totally well excuuuse me princess about being a judgemental asshole (at seven)?

It’s nice to see that the [whatever they call character designers on liveaction shows] were doing their job, being creative, experimenting. It’s good that they tried to do a bit of extra world-building. But the script, alas, completely let them down.

In Dune, things are different to now and nothing is explained; it’s just written as if what’s everyday to the characters in their weird drugged-up space-future is everyday to you, the reader - and that’s cool, it’s good, it makes the story larger and realer and engages you all over the shop. But in Dune, it’s more than just “Paul woke up in his perfectly normal bed, put on his perfectly normal trousers and shirt, went through the perfectly normal automatic door to the bathroom and looked in the mirror at his COMPLETELY BATTY ENORMOUS SQUARE BOUFFANT WHICH LOOKED CRAZY. He mused on how utterly usual everything was, especially his hair, which he never mentioned to anyone ever.”

Do you get my drift Ocean Girl?

I’ll show you pictures, now.

Mark, please - there are three characters here. One of theme is batshit bonkers in the locks department, two are merely real-world unusual and what you might call bold. If I saw them alone, or in real life, I wouldn’t squint at them or wonder what their game was! I’d think, you rock that puff lady, right on. They wouldn’t unsettle or throw me out of a story in just about any other circumstances. It’s just the volume of unusual that’s here, all crammed together, never mentioned, discussed, spotlit or even lampshaded.. there’s a kid with a fringe cut in steps, too, and a boy whose details I have forgotten but who again alone would look interesting and individual, but packed with the rest makes/made me want to shout EXPLAIN! EXPLAIN! TELL ME WHAT IS GOING ON because I know that that isn’t what you’d get if you just took a bunch of people!

It’s a SQUARE, just on her head. Why.

If you are going to evidence cultural shift, even ‘just’ visually, you need to note that your story is not set now or kids like me, who pick up on patterns but are too young to quite articulate or realise the questions forming due to them will just not be all that into your show. And it will bug them to all heck, maybe for twelve years.

Then I guess they’ll write a blog post about it, and maybe someone will read that and think “I remember that show, I loved it. I think I will buy the dvds RIGHT NOW” let me know if that’s YOU, so maybe my tirade is all in vain, and it’s actually a pretty good long-term marketing strategy.. ..?

It’s still really annoying though.

Happy watching, ocean girls and boys.

These ain’t my clothes, y’all!

I’m Dinner Ladying the rest of this week and all week and I’m in TROUBLE, because this morning when I got dressed to go to work I had to wear my sister’s clothes.

I’ve gone over in some detail the personal troubles I have with summer clothes, but now I have met the professional perils and they buffeted me onto my rear. See how:

My job entails squeezing around tiny tables and chairs making sure kids eating their lunches are behaving, seeing if they need their food cut or their yoghurts opened, pouring drink, etc. Then I have to make sure they’re safe and happy running and climbing around outside. Skirts and shorts are a bad idea; I don’t trust 4/5 year olds to be fully cognizant of physical boundaries, f’rex. Low-cut or loose tops are a bad idea because I do a lot of leaning over, ditto hipster trousers (no child needs to see the crack of authority). Button-up tops are a bad idea because they gape. The few graphic t-shirts that I own are either intricate - interesting and distracting (they ask me my name often enough - “what’s that about?” is a question I’d like to avoid answering seven thousand times), or scary (when I was small I wouldn’t have wanted to stare at the Crimson Ghost whilst eating, that’s all). Sweaters or roll-necks are WAY too hot right now- really anything long-sleeved is. Showing my belly is inappropriate. And so on. And so on. And so on!

O___O’

This, in my wardrobe, leaves nothing!

!!!

It also does not help that both my pairs of trousers are in the wash right now. Oh, bravo, bravo, I know.

Sister was in the shower so I grabbed and contorted my way into a shirt I haven’t seen her wear for ages and the first pair of skinnies on her floor.

I safety-pinned the back of the shirt of the seat of the trousers because when they say they are low rise they really

are not bluffing, and thank goodness I had a badge of comparable size when I noticed this at the last minute -

..What the heck am I going to wear tomorrow?

When I get paid, I might be looking in to some skinny “jeans” in an interesting colour - I really like the way they just fitted right into my boots. Any recommendations on where to get good quality examples?

It feels like I’m complaining a lot recently. Sorry about that! I will try to do better.

I just want you to know that even though having weighed the fact that I’m not belittling anyone, or insulting anyone, or demanding anything and that hearing someone say that they also have these problems would have meant something to me when I was younger (or now, actually) - and the encouragement to bite the bullet from my honey and some of my fine twitter peeps - posting this makes me feel very very guilty. Because.. the stereotype goes, women are supposed to ‘want’ to be ‘thin’? Because being ‘a thin person’ I have, like, the metaphorical official celebrity/body image media seal of potential approval? Because of fucked up insecurity-sells ingrained societal bullshit, basically. I would never, ever, ever post this unsolicited in size acceptance forums. I’m not including demonstrative pictures because I’m wary of becoming ‘thinspiration’. If I sound like a major jackass? Please, tell me. Right. Here goes.

Let’s talk again about how I hate summer clothes, shall we? Because they don’t fit me? Good. That will be fun.

I am never going to try to convince anybody that people individually and ‘the fashion industry’ at large treat thin people (or genetically average short people) worse than fat people*, or people with bodies that otherwise differ from the so-called norm. That would be ridiculous and cruel. I’m not suggesting that my problems are worse than anyone’s. But since this here is my space, I do get to tell you about how it sucks to be too small to find clothes that fit. You can listen or not, as you please. Please beware of triggers if you’re susceptible; female body image stuff can be volatile.

The gist of it is: it sucks to be too small to be able to find clothes that don’t say to your body “Oi oi, fellas, you’re not quite right here. I think I’ll swamp you and drag you, and make you feel like you’re treading water in your own garments.”

Going on clothes alone - the societal judgement aspects can probably wait for another day, I am way to zoned out to dip my toes in that acidic pool just yet - I’m pretty sure we can all relate to not being able to find an item of clothing that fits. You know, that doesn’t restrict or choke you, doesn’t bunch up in uncomfortable places or blouse out where it would feel and look better to cling, doesn’t need to be tugged down or hitched up, doesn’t get in the way of your other clothes, doesn’t ride up/down/around.. clothes that work for your body and your psyche, not against them.

It’s hard for an industry to predict, of course - people are of all different dimensions. And it’s probably hard for most people a lot of the time- truly, I don’t forget that.

But I’m talking about me, and I know for a fact that it’s hard, for me! Very almost ALL of the time! So quit rolling your eyes and let me vent, OK?

No matter how much I like and enjoy and feel lucky and thankful to be in the body that I have - and believe me, I do - the fact remains that mainstream, highstreet clothes (or.. any clothes I have ever found when I say a thing “fits perfectly” I mean “it doesn’t cause me extreme irritation the minute I put it on” aren’t made for me. It’s worst in summer, because nothing is as stretchy and forgiving as a knitted sweater (FUCK T-SHIRTS and their rigid ways!). And that pisses me off! Not that I feel personally slighted, exactly - I know it’s not done specifically to defy me. Nevertheless, it does defy me, and puts me out, and like any thwarted warlord that makes me shout.

When I was in the first few years of high school, it was just that I was littler than the average range of women and teens, so to find clothes that didn’t make people mistake me for an actual nine year old - I also look young in the face, yay you may think this would be flattering or whatever but when you are twenty two and multiple (multiple!) people TELL YOU they mistook you for twelve, well, get back to me on that, and try not to look sour) - I mostly wore tops designed for kids aged four to six, so that they were tight and my belly showed. “Like a teenager”, 1998 - 2001. That just.. didn’t feel good, you know? When all your friends are talking about their bras and buying things from the shops in J17 spreads and saying “I feel so fat” like it’s a badge of grown-up womanhood’s honour.. “Hey, look at me, I’m a tiny stunted juvenile weirdo”. Only I didn’t HAVE to say look at me, because people were already saying “you’re so small, wowww!” and “she’s so thin, look” and “God, you’re so skinny, it’s not fair”, and “whisper whisper whisper *point*”.

No, it isn’t fair - I can’t do anything about it any more than you can. It’s not my fault and it doesn’t get me anything. It doesn’t mean you don’t hear the adverts saying “you could be slimmer!” or that you don’t have to teach yourself not to think “I look bulgy” or “I should be more streamlined” - because literally every healthy body has some skin or fat on it that can form folds no matter how small, and folds, sez lying traitorous ladymedia, R BAD. You get quotes from Gwyneth Paltrow** or Eva Mendez*** about how “even I feel fat sometimes” and people become so scathing - yeah, I am a little too, because that’s a cack-eyed harmful way to say it when you’re in the public eye (and lauded as being so beautiful). But I understand - the current capitalist world is built to make everyone feel like they aren’t good enough, that every bloat is death fat, that if you fail at meeting these mad stats of perfection for even a second then you fail forever. I remember thinking that way. There’s no haven for thin people in the world of celebrity diet judging; every one of us needs to work honestly at making our own republic of heaven.

The only times I heard about those paragons of thinness, professional models, back then in school, was when people (real people, TV, magazines) talked about what a bad influence they were what with their attractiveness and necessary eating disorders and all - because people can’t naturally be that thin!

Hearing that your natural body essentially enforces the patriarchy and apparently causes your peers to feel inescapably inferior and that you’re unnatural and freakish is, actually, not all that fun. FYI.

Now I am big enough that I can wear clothes designed for average-range adults, by which I mean that they will not actually fall off of me if I put them on (and tall enough that I’m only an inch or so below the upper height requirement for ‘petite’). And that’s pretty nice! But it would be nicer if every shop carried ‘my size’ (they don’t; it’s nice (SARCASM) to know I’m still small enough to be weird), and hey, let’s go crazy - it would be SUPER nice if ‘my size’ fitted my lumpen protrusions in so that I could WEAR ‘my size’ instead of a size up which leaves me swimming and feeling like goblins are grasping my shadow. The back width, the arm circumference, the waist; when these are too wide, the excess fabric gets in the way and grinds. And honestly, to avoid that.. I’d really rather not wear an item that fits in the places I have bones but otherwise makes me look like I’m trying to spill my fleshy privacy all over your desk. Comparatively small stature’d people can have lumps and bumps and shapes of variety too, y’know? Bravissimo’s band sizes go down to twenty-eight, if you get what I’m saying.

Look, I’m not saying that this is the worst problem ever. That there are such things as the concept of “fit” and “clothing sizes” at all tells me I’m not capriciously making a mountain out of a molehill, though - you can feel it when something doesn’t fit you. It irritates all day in little ways.

Here’s some trivia: my Primary School nickname was “Titch”. Being small - but not medically small, because that would be a different matter altogether - is an unremovable part of my public identity nowadays; it goes without saying for me. Still not for other people, natch, but for me. It’s drummed in. I’m normal enough that I really can’t reasonably complain (berate me), but I’m too small for people I don’t know not to remark upon it. And for clothes to fit me! That’s what I’m talking about, right, right.

I guess by this point the being used to it works against me - I bring it (some of it) on myself: being a short person I should be buying from the racks marked “Petite”. My shoulder to waist measurement is fifteen inches. According to the internet, that’s shoulder to underboob on your average lady. Normal-people clothes are too long and shape-moulded in the wrong places, I really can’t deny that. But I have never bought anything from the short-person selection.

You see, even when they’re in evidence I have never taken Petite ranges seriously, because I have never passed a Petite rack or section that didn’t make me think “but I am not a forty-two year old physically graceful life-long academic with shoulder length honey brown hair who was born in Italy and is now married to an English (or, possibly, Welsh) policeman!”.

This lady that I see also wears minimal pink lipstick, and those necklaces made of coloured thread with small rock beads tied in various places; multiple-strand. She’s kind but stern, and speaks softy but with force, wears moccasins, and sometimes a headband. She’s middle-class rich and was a “bohemian” in her university years. I like her fine. She is nothing like me.

That is a trouble. I need to look harder if I want the right to rail against injustice knowledgably. I suppose I need to buckle down and do some in-depth research. It looks like Topshop has a short people range.. that’s made up mostly of tops.. which also feature in the normal-sized people ‘cropped’ range. Nice. Are they cheating by using the same garments for both(cropped for normal people, normal-length for short torsos?), or do they have a version that is petite-cropped too? Of course, either way, the size chart lines up crazy, they charge a minimum £18 for t-shirts embellished with old-t-shirt fake wear&tear, and everything I have bought from Topshop has gotten (non-purposeful) holes in quick smart. I wonder how easy it is to find petite stuff second-hand?

Wull, ’til I win the job lottery, guess I’d better get used to chopping the bottoms off of and sewing elastic into the back of my shirts.

That’ll look nice.

Fuckin’ clothes. What are they good for?

**I use the term “fat people” because that’s favoured by a lot of the pluz-sized size acceptance advocates that I read the most.
**This one from years ago I particularly, clearly remember, because I could see something wrong about it but I wasn’t sure what, and I compared my body to hers in the mirror afterwards
***I am actually not 100% sure on this. I like Eva Mendez, she seems a fun person. She was good in Hitch.

Fathers Day!

Bikes in car, drive, park in layby, cycle, reach village.

You see, because I am a good and loving daughter, today I allowed my dad to menace and terrify me by exploring a village “Scarecrow Festival” together.

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah.

The worst part is that these weren’t the worst part. Those Morris Dancers that go about covered in rags with their faces painted night-black and feathers on their hats? I don’t care how traditional they are, or that my beloved’s father occasionally partakes - these guys are FLIPPIN’ SCARY.

No pictures, because I am a big wussy.

X_X

Ever done a workout video? I have. Just one.

The lesson here, is “always check the charity shop VHS stocks when roaming town with your romantic object”. This cost us twenty one pence, I think. That or twenty four. A difference of three pence isn’t that much.

Here’s a section of the video!

Honestly, it’s a really good tape. At one point she goes a little overboard with the “being sedentary is bad because you get fatter” rather than “being sedentary is bad because it makes you feel less vital”, but - overall it’s a really nice, Jessica Fletcher-y pro-you 50 minutes about how to feel generally better about yourself. And! Having done the full workout today, I feel.. miles better, physically. Less stiff. THAT’S EMBARRASSING I’M ONLY YOUNG.

It’s basically a series of stretches and flexes (some involving a towel or a windowsill), tips like “don’t feel guilty about doing relaxing tasks like watering flowers, wondering round the garden or sewing!” and “in the morning, rub yourself and thing positive thoughts” and “take tea! It’s nice!” (and who doesn’t love to be validated in regards to this stuff?), topped off with about ten minutes of “free movement”. Which is enormous fun. Georgia and the Ace Gang, as my sister remarked, would definitely do this tape.

How’s this dress with this overdress, then? The sweaterdress itself is too short to wear in public. It also ends just as it’s passed the exact widest part of my thighs, which looks interesting and “unflattering” in a private way. But it’s perfect to wear under the apron-thing - form-fitting so as not to distract or get too blousy, cotton to keep cool, long sleeves for contrast. Is the blocky black-grey-white too stark vs the broderie anglaise pretty-pretty?

And why do things I wear so often end up making me think “the sixties!”? Ah sweah, it’s not intentional. Or maybe even apparent to anyone but me.

Pee Ess checkout my snax! Delicious

Watching Pulse, now, BBC3 (hence “bodyhorror” tag!). I like it. I like it quite a lot. Hope it gets picked up!

Watching Ironside, talking to my gent about Bloody Roar, we came to thinking what if they had new outfits, a bit like outfits from the sixties?.

Bloody Roar actually has some really good character design; I like it a lot. Google Image “Busuzima” sometime. Actually no! I will show you right now. This is great work! It’s plain engaging to look at, I want that jacket, it’s an unusual fashion sub-genre to exploit, it telegraphs “this guy is weird”, it works with the fact that he can turn into a chameleon. It’s a pleasing counterbalance to his lab-based scientific career:

So anyway - I drew a couple. Simples. Tiny sketchy fun! Please try to enjoy.

Protip: Don’t paint with inks over fountain pen lineart. Because, this happens! Bleeding.

Gado (Gadeau!):

Busuzima:

Jenny, again (she is my favorite, because we have the same haircut. Yeup).

Desperately Seeking Susan is a film about a woman who hasn’t quite realised that her life doesn’t fulfill her finding herself through her idolatry of the romance gathered around a selfish free spirit, and amnesia.

It’s even better than that sounds, though.

When I was twelve or thirteen and staying up late to watch TV was still a relatively new and clandestine operation, I had the luck of being in a part of the country that received Channel Five. Channel Five (as well as showing the Tribe, natch) did (does) pretty great theme nights. I got exposure to Bruce Lee beyond what I’d seen on badly printed Market t-shirts from Five’s Bruce Lee Night (thank you), I was introduced, unironically and without peer judgement, to the Osmonds by their Osmonds Weekend (thank you!), and I spent a lot of happy evenings watching my VCR’d Science Fiction Night tapes. But the particular and relevant Five Night was (obviously?) Madonna Night.

I didn’t really know much about Madonna; this was about 2000 and she was a vague, other-people-like-her metastar. We saw her videos discussed on Live and Kicking by Zoe Ball and Lene from Aqua (”I couldn’t stop staring at her tits!”) and were generally aware that she was “important”. But I didn’t know anyone who was A Madonna Fan and when I asked, the next day, if my friend had watched Madonna Night she said “No, I’m not really into that kind of thing” and gave me a dubious look (Hi Laura!). So I was watching out of a sense of curiosity and out of enjoyment of the wow I am up late factor.

There was a bunch of documentary, talking heads type stuff which I don’t remember but also, as I think you have guessed: Desperately Seeking Susan! I watched it and I didn’t really get it all and I didn’t watch it again until boxing day 2009, but the reason that I did watch it on boxing day 2009 was that I realised when my beloved and I talk fiction and character motivation and costume design, which we do and always have done regularly, Desperately Seeking Susan was a source I repeatedly turned to (in my memory) to illustrate my points and clarify my thoughts.

Don’t you think that’s impressive? One watch, and nine years later I’m still using it as an example par excellence? And I mean various parts of the movie, not just one.

Susan!

Transcription: “Because the film is very much about identity, who somebody is on the outside vs who they wanna be on the inside, we decided to open the movie in a beauty parlor because that’s so much about female identity and appearance and transformation. I think in the original script the opening was actually set in a department store where she and her sister in law were trying on clothes. And ultimately it, in one of the many re-writes, it was changed to a beauty salon because i think that the idea of being remade - which is what beauty salons are about, you go in being one person and you hopefully come out having been transformed into somebody else - is really the essence of what the whole movie is about.”

Susan is more of a straight-up Makeover Movie than Billie Jean - the above clip from the commentary track (commentary tracks by writers and directors are basically the only sort of DVD extra that mean anything to me; they can be so fascinating and educational and inspiring. I recommend Larry Cohen’s commentary on the Q: The Winged Serpent DVD release if you’re into hearing about creative budget film shoots) says in as many words that this is a film about identity. Billie Jean, I rekkin, is a film about integrity rather than identity. They’re very closely related concepts, but they’re not identical.

You should watch this movie. I’m not going to detail everything that’s good about it, because that would take too long and rob you of the discoveries. But artistically and entertainment..ly.. it’s a really, really satisfying and enthusing film. And it’s written, directed and
double-starred in by women! And the main character starts the film by turning thirty, which I love. It’s never referred to again, and she has her coming-of-age teenage self-awakening plot and it’s positive, all the way along.

Anyway. I do have one element of this fantastic story that I’ve picked to epitomise the make-overyness and the pivotal themes and the wonderful, WONDERFUL AMAZING EXCELLENT work done by the costume designer / production designer (Santo Loquasto: your work was brilliant here. Looking up Mr Loquasto’s name in imdb, I just noticed that Richard Hell is in this movie. I missed that!). There’s a scene half an hour or so in, that goes like this:

(Actually first there are some scenes like this, skip the next two centered paragraphs if you haven’t seen the film:)

Roberta goes to meet Susan in her Susan drag and Susan gets held up, which means that the Very Bad Man currently looking for Susan mistakes Roberta for Susan. Which means that the Very Nice Man currently looking for Susan to offer her shelter against the VBM also mistakes Roberta for Susan. And Roberta falls over and hits her head - which means that by the end of the scene, Roberta mistakes Roberta for Susan.

Left: Susan-Roberta! Right: Jim (the Very Nice Man)!

This is the outfit that Roberta wears for this scene.

Oh my GOODNESS, it is so spot-on!

It’s so patently an ita-loli approximation of Susan-clothes I could choke. It’s someone so keen to get the look (and you can’t be that keen without wanting something of what the look means, on the inside) but lacking the tools, someone uncomfortable with who they are and where they’ve been going but not completely au fait with where they think they want to go now, either. It’s so vulnerable and unconscious-self-conscious, it makes my heart squeeze for her. I get that; that’s probably what I did get from this movie when I watched the first time around. This outfit tells the whole story of the film! People say that the clothes don’t make the woman, but mortar doesn’t make a wall. It just really helps to hold a lot of them together.

First of all, don’t even ask me what’s up with that little acorn-bag thing. Gosh that looks annoying. It can’t relax into you, it’s just going to be hitting you awkwardly whenever you walk (like Roberta’s current constructed identify?). It’s non-identifiable (like Roberta’s current self?). I kind of hate it. No, I hate it a lot. I guess that the reason it’s round and rigid is so that it can roll away into the water when she hits her head (taking ID with it), so there’s that. Beyond that I’m not going to touch it, because I would just be mean about it.

The colours aren’t strong or pure. Lilac is a powder colour, it’s decorative and passive. That weird red-peach on the sweater is vague and indefinable. But red and purple clash, and that’s a bold confrontational mix. That’s the Susan. That and the jacket, which actually belongs to Susan.

The sweater has the collar cut off, which is a little bit tough and rebellious, in a studied sort of way (yeah, I do it too and it makes me feel better), but.. I think she’s wearing it over a lady-collar shirt. The kind which you get to wear at school during summer if you choose not to wear a tie. Or I did, anyway. You know the style I mean? Even if it’s a normal collar, it’s a soft purple and raspberry-striped shirt in that 80s-weight cotton, which is the least rebellious fabric I can imagine. Florals worked for grunge, because you can subvert something so veryvery delicate and girlish (flowers!), but you can’t subvert innocuousness. Innocuous things have, like, magical negative power. They’re the antimatter of cool.

Having noted the shirt, even the punch of the purple/red combo is lessened. If you’re co-ordinating your aesthetic break-out with your existing sensible-person shirts, you’re not really breaking so far, huh?

The trousers aren’t wide-legged, or flared, and they aren’t tight. They’re just.. there. They aren’t baggy but they aren’t slim-fitting. They’re just crinkly and probably let air circulate a bit. They’re high-waisted but they’re worn with a baggy, airy sweater that hits at the hip-bones which blocks any flattering or enhancing they might have done. They aren’t even actively ugly or frumpy. They’re just there! They don’t tuck into the boots with an interesting pouf over the ankle, or fit neatly! THEY ARE JUST THERE, plopped there. They go loose at the knees. They have no aggression, just an air of sitting obediently, waiting for someone to say “..Yes?”. These trousers are Roberta, as she was in her life before and during the start of this film.

It’s all in the body language too, you can’t ignore body language when you’re character designing or costuming. The Fug Girls are always complaining that people have ruined their great dresses with slouching and people like Grace Jones pull of the wackiest stuff because they wear it so fiercely - this outfit could work, if the person inside of it was comfortable with their/its awkwardness. There is no dearth of bloggers who have run with waif-chic and granny-chic and make their pigeon toes and rounded shoulders a matter of personal trademark. But Roberta has fear in her physicality, and the fear that’s written in her wardrobe bounces it back complimentarily.

The mass of scarf in her hair is arranged so precisely, and the curls she’s done herself are so soft and arranged so softly. Here’s the real Susan in this same scene:

Difference, right? One’s Done, one’s just done. The difference between constructing a persona and living one again, yeah? Susan wakes up, gives herself a blast of supercool just by looking at herself in a mirror or shiny surface, and leaves to hang about town or maybe do petty crimes. Roberta prepares herself, practices before the (full-length bedroom) mirror, arranges everything just-so, and steps in. Then she leaves, for the purpose of learning-by-voyeurism ad waiting to be told if she’s doing it right.

The Susan jacket isn’t even a match for Roberta’s Susan outfit; amongst the fit and the colours it floats and hangs. Every shape from Roberta’s wardrobe is soft and giving (as in, it gives in if you oppose it, not that it is a gift) and the jacket doesn’t have a harsh enough presence to make a real statement against them. It would have been simple to make The Jacket be one that’s worn by Susan but wears Roberta, but instead Loquasto (I think) designed this one that is worn by Susan, and doesn’t even bother to wear pre-amnesia Roberta. Because: which rock star cares about wannabees?

The whole thing works just as well if you consider that she’s also wearing this immediately after she bangs her head, and the amnesia and complete identity crisis sets in. She literally doesn’t know who she is, but thinks/is helped to think that she might be (and then is convinced that she is) Susan. She doesn’t know how to be Susan, and she’s nothing like the image of dangerous flightly Susan that Jim has been told to expect. She’s not-Susan, just like her clothes are telling us-her-him!

Would it be going too far to draw comparison between unconscious-Roberta and primordial ooze? These clothes and the curled hair pool about her shapelessly, ready to form.. a new life! The Pokemon Ditto is a pink blob, which can take on the identity of any Pokemon it faces. Hmmm. Maybe this is overthinking? I mean, it works, but maybe I have just made it work and am being unscientific.

There’s a lot more to say about this movie. But I’ma let you watch it and say it for yourself now. This was the real “Makeover” nucleus of the film, in my opinion, because this was the outfit that was designed (both meta-wise and in-movie) for the specific purpose of transition. Roberta’s continued evolution was organic and intuitive - not “A Make-Over”.

Why thanks, Gillette & Venus! I do. I don’t need your product for it, but thanks for the email!

So, I’m just throwing this picture out here again, a) because I can, and b) because it makes me uncomfortable but I think it shouldn’t.

Now, I’m not implying that all ladies should eschew leg shavin’ or whatever; the email very strongly implied that to feel Goddessy and whatnot that I need their product. And whilst I appreciate capitalism and advertising and all that, I also think that companies don’t have tabula rasa on social political issues.

I wore green today. Partly because I’m thinking about Robin Hood a lot recently (not excited to see the new movie; very interested in thinking my own thoughts about the legends) and partly because where I live there are a SHITLOAD of Conservative “FOR CHANGE” (ugh seriously?) banners on just about every road, and a tiiiiiny Green Party rectangle on one single bridge, which I only saw because I get lifts to work in that direction. GREENS GREENS GREENS! Plus, I have been watching through all of the vlogbrothers videos on the youtube. Which star John and Hank GREEN. Oh, and it’s Earth Day!

Mostly though because I really like this shade of green! It’s punchy!

When I was younger the idea of people participating in BDSM or violence-related sexual roleplay kind of upset me. Not in an “arrest them!” sort of way, I just didn’t understand why people would want to be what i understood as ‘mean to each other’ in their intimate relations.

BUT THEN, I read the first issue in the “Kissing Mister Quimper” volume of Grant Morisson’s Invisibles - pencilled by Chris Weston, Inked by John Stokes, coloured by Daniel Vozzo. This issue has this scene in it (the last page is separated from the first by a section of a different scene):

The back of this volume hold this quote from Spin: “A timeless battle between the forces of psychic liberation and their dark counterparts, sleazy insectoid gents of control and repression… Basically, it’s about everything.” Robin and Mob, seen below, are the leaders of a cel of psychic magical armed freedom fighters combatting the combined forces of aliens from another dimension (which might be more understandably one-sentence described as chaos gods?) and human malevolence and cant-be-bothered. Does that help, if you haven’t read any of it?

And then I was like, ohhhhh right! No I can see that, sure Because for these characters, that makes sense.

So thanks for helping me become a more enlightened person, Grant and Chris!

International Women’s Day! I hope you all had a good one. I wore purple, and green, but no white. I don’t really own white, because it requires you to be so careful when wearing it.

Have you ever read anything about Suffragette Jewelry? It’s very interesting. In political movements, particularly in the push for rights that are denied due to what is perceived as basic inequalities in the people who have and do not have them, image is terribly important. It’s used as a weapon by both sides, of course, but the underdogs are generally cleverer about it, I think. They have to be - if you can intrigue, visually, you have your foot in the door of a person’s opinions.

I’ve got my mind on the Suffragettes at the moment because I’ve been doing some illustration for Sherin and Orchid’s Political Awareness gig’s fliers. The aim is to get people who aren’t that fussed about voting interested and maybe a little bothered - but first things first: my part’s about getting them (you?) to the event in question.

When I asked for a basic brief, they said they wanted a goat motif involved somehow. Gotta have a gimmick, as the movie said! And honestly, the loose guidelines mixed with the one specific (weird) bit of imagery is right up my artistic alley. When I think “votes!”, I think “for women!”, so this was the natural port of call at the head of my list (if you want to see more, and the images in a later stage of ‘finishedness’, keep your ear to this ground):

I figure, that a goat-headed person is unusual enough to catch the eye of an uninterested party.

I allow that it might be taken as an insult to female voters - that would suck. I took pains to depict a benevolent (but not weak!) goatface, and to keep her posture capable. I’d hope that the pagan / faux-satanic air of subversion would keep the image from appearing straight-up offensive.

But to be honest, people who don’t care about voting probably don’t care about showing respect for women who were prepared to die and endanger for the right. When was the last time you heard someone truly, honestly “sing in grateful chorus, Well done, sister suffragettes?”

If you are me, never. So I am singing it now, via blog via youtube via film via book. Well done, sister Suffragettes! Your movement wasn’t perfect, but whose is? You paved a great road for us, and we shall continue to alleviate the tolls.

If you think you might be interested in giving any sort of help to a London multi-band gig that wants to inspire the yoof of today to care about their ability to vote, send Sherin and Orchid a note. Every little helps! Your daughters’ daughters will adore you.

My sister, and my foot again. I’m just unable to colour things without using yellow. Why, I wonder? I barely ever use white for highlights, even when I’ve built up enough pigment to block out the paper or canvas. Or if I do use it, I start to hate it and feel put-upon.

Don’t worry, I’m not gonna be posting these every day!

Plus: I’ve been twittering my discontent with Ian Holt and Dacre Stoker’s “official” sequel to Bram Stoker’s novel Dracula; Dracula: The Un-Dead. I drew this in the night, after reading a particularly enraging, faith-breaking passage. Please excuse my vendetta.. Dracula is just too darn GOOD.

Warning: Possible rape triggers

…Odd angle..

The crocii (crocuses?) are pretty today:

This is so cute!

Bonus: An Impression - The Miracle of Birth!

Been cleaning the house all day.. finally relaxing with Wayne’s World 2. One of the best films, this is. Y-M-C-A!

P.S. JOIN THE GREETINGS REVOLUTION

Oh I forgot! The best thing about these massive medieval pockets! They make it so easy to reach snax!

My mum and sister had half-term last week, so we took an overnighter in Buxton. To walk in nature, and.. look at stuff. We stopped at Chatsworth House (because my sister is a big squealer for Pride and Prejudice), which as you can see above is quite delightful. This is the view from one side of the bridge:

One of several reasons I am proud to volunteer for BW: Waterways are wonderful. So pretty! I drew as much as my freezin’ fingers would let me.

There are links to more pictures (reference/stock) of these gorgeous landscapes in the righthand sidebar.

Also fascinating was the toilet paper, where we stayed. No really, take a gander!

Lots of charming pokey shops, too; antiques and bookshops aplenty. A surprising amount of clothing, in the antiques emporiums in and around Buxton actually - maybe it’s a local thing, but ‘vintage’ seems to be creeping in all over where it was once disdained. I may be being overly romantic.

There was the most excellent bookshop. Second-hand, antique to current, FIVE FLOORS. It had free tea and coffee! That you could make for yourself! It was glorious, and I kick myself for not being in the right sort of mood to really appreciate it. Then again, I really can’t afford to be stocking up on old, old thick books with the sorts of covers that make you want to weep from the perfection of illustration.

Where was my mind? Photographic evidence:

The horrors (and adventures) of my youth.

Truth be told I came out with exactly what I did want - Teacher’s Pet by Caroline B. Cooney, a Point Horror (remember those?) that chilled me so royally that I refused to use the downstairs bathroom for years. I’ve been looking for it for months; I wanted to see if it still had the power.

In the story the heroine finds a rough workmans glove in the woods, which turns out to still have a hand in it. My dad keeps his work gloves in the downstairs loo. I was a nervous and imaginative child!

So, watch out for THAT review, coming soon..

It snowed! The end!

I don’t always illustrate my face subject to the thoughts I had when I dressed for the day. Sometimes I do, but sometimes I just add what I think would look fitting based on the taken photograph, or to add a balancing agent to the mix (for example, if I look bodaciously Disney-buxom, I’ll probably add a manface). Sometimes I add a completely new element, to see how it changes the story of the clothing and my body language.

Today my creative process went like this:

“Haha, this outfit looks way sixties! A thinking socialite, like the ones from the movies, who took the Sound of Music straight to heart. Such things were nowhere near my mind when I put this stuff on! How interesting! I think I shall add a snooty model head, to complete the ensemble.”

“Hmmm. A lot of my thighs are visible here. How can I make a thigh look interesting? Well, much as I dislike him, Batman has made forearms look interesting.. how can I improve on that.. fins.. fins.. mermaids?.. fishpeople.. Gillman!”

“I can’t be doing with drawing ANOTHER set of thigh scales. The Creature’s only my second favourite type of classic movie-monster, anyway; I’ll show that Kate Beckinsdale what for. What a twit.”