The rules of unfriendment.

In case you were scared with my recently taken up dare or the giraffe post that you were going to get just puppy pictures from now on, rest assured and don’t be silly – this will not happen.

Day one of the dare went really well though. At one point while driving, someone cut me off and instead of yelling asshole, I shouted oi, dudey. Which is slightly concerning as far as verbal expressions go and I have no idea where it came from, but obviously it was far more polite than asshole.

Yesterday I also started thinking about the rules of befriending or unfriending someone – on Facebook that is. I and assumingly a lot of others have a love-hate relationship with Facebook and what it does to relationships, singledom, and stalkerism. We love to know, but actually we don’t want to know. Thinking about it, I came up with my rule of thumb of how much and whom I want to know: Just because I slept with you doesn’t mean I want you to be my Facebook friend, but if you are, I won’t mind having at least a theoretical coffee with you. Upon these grounds I recently unfriended Mr. April. It wasn’t so much to make a statement to him (well, obviously a little bit), but I just didn’t care for updates of his new therapist (girlfriend) and thought him now overall a bit too weird to be called friend. I thought all in all this was valid reason to unfriend someone, non?

I also learned that I had been unfriended as well. Mind you, I think I broke quite a few hearts back in the day and probably don’t deserve even virtual friendship from a few men, but it wasn’t even of them. Last September I met a guy and we hit it off. We hit it off like you always dream of hitting it off with someone. That was till he gave me the worst line any morning after has ever heard: I am still in love with my ex. Eight months later when we met again and hit it off again – for a night. Then he declared it could never work as I don’t like camping or trance parties. He was quite smart, the way he figured me out and had me all put in the proper boxes within a total of 3 dates… Anyhow, I have long ago given up on trying to convince someone to be with me, so I didn’t attempt any further. We continued our lives as Facebook friends who occasionally give each other thumbs up and yes, if I had to have a coffee with him, I would have managed just fine. Till I realized yesterday that I was unfriended by him. I was so puzzled I even wondered if it might have been me in a state of upset and drunk, but no…I only text drunk! So here I am – still very puzzled. If anything, shouldn’t have been me doing the unfriending?

In accordance with this week’s dare though…I am just letting it go. I will not ask why, I will not call him stupid, I will just let it go. After all I know deep down that he could have only done it for one of two reasons…

He saw this picture of me, realized he made the biggest mistake of his life, and now can’t deal with seeing me as a happy camper:

OR

I am quite guilty of spreading quotes lately, yes. I guess I should be glad he was the only one who unfriended me!


P.S. I am quite aware that this post contains a few words which cannot be found in the dictionary. I made them up, because they sound most appropriate and thesaurus wouldn’t offer options. If anyone can, please feel free to comment.

I dare me!

Yesterday I decided I would take after Flourish in Progress and dare myself a bit. Dare myself to be a nice person for a week. Be one of those persons who usually annoy me. Why? Well, I thought in order to make my life better, I might have to make myself a better person first. I am not convinced it will work, but for some reason it popped into my head yesterday that I should at least try. Just for one week. I shall give a progress report.
Today did not start well. I was woken up by blaring sounds, which cannot be called music, from the downstairs parking lot, actually set up straight and yelled out loud: What the f*** do you think you are doing? Obviously I yelled the entire f-word.
Then I remembered my dare, but it was too late. Luckily a part of it is to also being nicer to myself, so I didn’t beat myself up over it.
The rest of the morning went by just fine. I don’t think my super was ever greeted this friendly in his life.
Facebook and Twitter are becoming a challenge though. A lot of stupid interesting people are saying a lot stupid interesting things and my urge to reciprocate is almost too great to bear it. Like this tweet:

Gotta love the #USVisa application: 'Do you seek to engage in espionage, sabotage or any other illegal activity while in the US?' Duh!

I know a lot of people think the Americans stupid. I happen to be not one of them. I don't have any problems with them, at least not any more than I have with citizens of the UK, Germany or the rest of the world. Someone may not agree with my sentiment and that is fine, but then please don’t travel there. So that is my first problem with this tweet. Secondly I believe that actually most countries these days, which require you to get a visa, ask these questions, silly or not.
This is what I wanted to say to this person, but in accordance with the dare I decided not to and just bitch about it here. Please don’t judge - for me that is a big step in the nicer direction.

To my delight I can tell that it is already working a bit too. I just got confirmed that I can teach a yoga class right by the Vic Falls, which seems like the über-location to do yoga and I am silly excited. In case you don’t know yet, yes, I am going to Zambia to plant trees with Greenpop in addition to Morocco vacation in August. Just putting this on (digital) paper makes me realize it is really working well already…

Sometimes life is similar to being a baby giraffe.*

I have realized a lot of women are in love with cats. A lot of female bloggers take it a step further and share cat pictures with what I find annoying frequency on their blogs. I like cats too, but I don’t think them that exciting as to write a post about them.
Giraffes on the other hand are a whole different story. As you may or may not know I love giraffes and yes, I have written a post or two about them. Thus I can’t really judge the cat bloggers too much, because though I think giraffes are ten times more exciting than cats, I can admit for the possibility that not everybody shares this sentiment.

This post happened by accident though. I promise, all I wanted to do is find one giraffe picture to trace, because I wanted a sort of comic giraffe to be on my new blog design. Then mean Google not only showed me pictures of giraffes, but also one of a baby giraffe. Then it became even meaner and gave me the option of searching ‘baby giraffe’ and then as you can see it went all downhill from there….

So the baby either has a rather short neck or
the mum a really big head...what do you think?

That's how you end up looking if you play with your food
instead of eating it.

Cocktail hour for baby giraffes.

"Hello, you there, behind the funny black thing!"

The Kiss á la giraffe.

They look so proper in their family portrait, they
should be wearing Ralph Lauren.

Find the baby giraffe in the picture.

Sorry for sharing, I couldn't help it...

P.S. *No, this is not something I came up with and no, I have no idea what it means either. It just came with this picture:

Cookiemonster.

I recently read a blog that was talking about the idiosyncrasies of the average American diet. While they probably had many valid points, I thought it strange that the author thought cookie dough ice cream was one of them. What on earth could be wrong with cookie dough ice cream? Versus all other cream, sugar, and chocolate filled ice cream variety? Why would cookie dough be any worse? I sincerely doubt the author ever had any, otherwise she wouldn’t dare point her finger, but rather dip it in the pint and scrape some more doughy bits out. Those are obviously the best part of the whole ice cream. Alas I think it wouldn’t do to just buy a whole role of cookie dough (which yes, don’t look so shocked you can do that easily in Germany and SA too these days…) and eat it. The dough needs to be emerged in the ice cream, slightly frozen, and you have to work to get to it. Scrap and dig and eat around it.
It never occurred to me that some people may actually not like cookie dough. I was retelling the blog story over dinner on Saturday and we started discussing cookie dough versus the final product. To my amazement Claire said she couldn’t see the appeal in the dough, she’d rather have a proper cookie. I stood my ground firmly that cookie dough is the holy grail of sweet stuff and beats a regular cookie any day.

That was till I opened my for-the-hostess-gift from Claire and Laura:

I opened them after the guests had left to have a little sweet midnight snack. I ate one. Then another…and another…and probably two more. Maybe it was four. Then I pried them out of my own hands which was tricky. I went to bed and repeated the whole scenario for breakfast. When I pried the bag out of my hands this time, it was empty though.

I shall now do a show down between oat and honey cookie dough and oat and honey cookies. After completing and repeating it twice to give the whole experiment proper credibility, I shall report back if I changed my mind.

Cannes part III.

I thought I had seen it all and said it all, but apparently not. Since today is a nasty, rainy Friday and I am still feeling very sorry for myself for my very sore shoulder (which I will report about in the appropriate context next week), I allow myself to indulge and gossip a bit longer. Thus I give you one more for the road the scary side of Cannes:

Scary doppelganger.

Is it just me or is Peter Dundas well on his way of becoming the next Karl? The only visible difference I can find is the hair colour and age group of their respective arm candy.

Scarier doppelganger.

She doesn’t even look like herself anymore. She looks more like Sansa from Game of Thrones who is all together a silly cow with a nice scary glare. Isn’t Diane dating Spiderman? Wouldn’t that make you want to smile at least once in a while? If they ever cast for a Medusa, she will get my vote for that one.

Scariness is a dress.

Louis Vuitton is another one of these companies who just don’t do evening well. Just look at Kirsten and her, to me, unknown friend. It is actually just sad.

Scary entertainment.

I think as far as celebrity couples and there entertainment factor goes Kanye and Kim are a golden. I also think as far as glitzy mini dresses go Balmain is one of the few acceptable options. Putting it both together though just scares me.

On a less scary and totally unrelated note – winter is here and I shall be having Glühwein and Pizza tomorrow. Happy weekend!

Of models on fire and Helen of Troy.

I was just told that I am funny and should become a female Perez Hilton. This coming from my journalist friend Julia, I feel really flattered and so here you go…

My first question which I was still good to ignore yesterday – what are all the models doing in Cannes? I do understand the symbiosis between fashion and film and thus the mingling and meddling of models and actors, but seriously? There shouldn’t be more models than actresses clad in silk and lace on the red carpet. And yes, I still count Diane Kruger to the former. Thinking of her as Helen of Troy still makes me grind my teeth. Or take Milla Jovovich – has she done anything noteworthy movie wise ever since the Return to the Blue Lagoon? They are by far the best examples of models turned actresses as they have actually put foot on a movie set or two. I guess that in itself gives them sort of validation of being at Cannes, but the rest… Surely there are enough hot actresses that the eye candy factor is taken care of, non?

Anyhow, excuse the little ramble… I just had to get it off my chest.

So now back to the glitz and the clothes and oh wait, the first is actually the perfect combination of the above mentioned ladies. Because back in the day when I was little and playing Helen of Troy or Greek Goddess or something to this extend, I would take a nice sheet, wrap it around me and end up looking something like this:

I did not take the sheet, wrap it around me, and pretend I was an actress on a red carpet. Just saying.

And if you are model, just a proper one, not a model turned actress, and yet you feel the need to grace the world with your attendance, please try to look different than an Oompa Loompa in her boilersuit.

Cheryl on the other hand looks like Katniss, the girl who is on fire.

I like how her dress is melting into the red carpet. Kind of cool, so it doesn’t even matter that I have no idea who she is or what she does or if she has any good reason in my books to be there.

That was all that was new and exciting for now. On a final thought though, I just wish to add: Sneaker shoe still life - I did it first, Mr. Big Shot Cannes Photographer!

Left: sneakers in Platbos forest, May 11th. Right: sneakers in Cannes, 2 weeks later.

Cannes cancan.

In honour of my fabulous cousin Thekla who just landed in the sunny South of France, I thought I should do a quick Cannes post.

Also the fact that style.com actually posted this picture of some Buddhist monks. 

I am not sure how it is related to all the glitz and glamour of Cannes, but it sure seems an appropriate welcome for Thekla. Considering that her husband is Buddhist, I thought this would make her feel right at home.

Other than that I assembled some random Cannes facts for no other reason than the sheer amusement of it…

1. Even in the rain, the red carpet in Cannes looks glam and walk-worthy. I want to go!

2. Brad Pitt seems a bit random in his choice of hand to autograph these days.

I mean, can we talk about these nails? Caroline (which one I wonder), please find yourself a new manicurist!

3. I didn’t really know who Jessica Chastain was before Cannes, but I think she is the best dressed all around this year. Just look at her…

 Tripple Va-Va-Voom.

4. Diane Kruger as Marie Antoinette. Yawn. Diane Kruger all. over. the. freaking. place/ red carpet. Double yawn.

Can you tell I really don’t like her?

Yes, that would explain the lack of picture.

5. I am in love with Marion Cottilard. Officially.

And how could I not?

6. Kirsten – sourface – Stewart inspires me to read: I want to attempt On the Road again.

Who would have thought this girl can inspire me to do anything at all? 

She might not even prevent me from watching the movie.

7. Prada surprises me again with some awesome evening wear, but why does she look like she hit a tornado? The hair…the dress almost coming off…pity that.

8. I think my uncle would agree: Jane Fonda has spunk! 

9. Not all alligator skin is good alligator skin:

This simply takes worst dressed ever. I think she knows it, trying to put on a brave face. I guess that’s all she could do at this point.

10. I would do Cannes really well. Hanging with my pals Adrien and such.

Chez Pucci and hat. On a yacht. Of course.

 Yes, I would do very well at Cannes.

Pastaholic goes hunting.

I’m really loving the South African winter right now. Especially when it looks like this…

I didn’t love it so much anymore when all those exciting mushrooms we found, were so slimy when cooked that the sauce has a gluey consistency and we all wish we would have eaten the homemade pasta on its own. The day was saved by homemade tart to fill our bellies instead, lots of red wine to wash it down with, and Catan to make us forget the horror of it.

Needless to say the next time I want a mushroom sauce my hunting ground shall be Woolies & Co.

Teacher's pet.*

In case you are wondering what I will be doing tomorrow morning:

Come join the madness if you dare...

Other than that I have strawberry tartes, mushroom hunting, and Zambia on my mind.

Happy weekend for all!

*That title came up while I was starring at my post and eventually I got from me teaching to teacher and looking at the little Hot Dog to pet, put both together et voilá. It ain't gonna win me any copy writing awards, but it is wine o'clock long overdue already, so I think I am forgiven.

Trees in motion.

Yesterday I went on a date. Not horrible. I got red wine. And pizza. Yet nothing made me happier than this:

Silly smile every time I watch it (more times than I will admit). Now I am working on finding a way to go planting again in Zambia in July. Yes, I acknowledge the collective moan coming from all of you, scared of more tree stories...well, you may just have to learn to live with it.

A treemendous* thank you.

I like the idea of a gratitude diary, but lately I just don’t feel like it though I do have a lot to be grateful for and I know it. So instead I want to share my gratitude here and just share my thank you with you. A big thank you to the universe in general and a bit more concrete for an amazing weekend to…

The most amazing sponsors of 30.5 little treelings:

Amazing Spaces. Cape Royale Luxury Hotel. Cora. Deniz. Flash. Ian. Location Gallery. Lolo. Marc. Marcia. Marie. Mark Shakey Shaw. Melanie. Papa. Thekla.

Thank you for letting me annoy you as I did and buy the forest some new inhabitants!

Thank you to Sabina and my wonderful company for sponsoring me to go plant them.

Thank you Gareth for driving and having an iPod with great music ready.

Thank you Claire for being an amazing friend, bringing us all together and showing me how to break down a tent.

Thank you King Steve for setting my tent up in the dark.

Thank you Mark for the loan of camping plates, head lamp, prayer flags, and all the priceless camping advise.

Thank you Catherine, Laura, Fionna, Gerhard, and Sebastian for the planting and dancing companionship. I guess a special one to Gerhard for taking all the big hole digging off the girls’ hands.

Thank you Jax for truly inspiring yoga sessions under the tree and for teaching me to let my hair down and just breathe.

And last but not least…the biggest thank you to Greenpop – Misha, Lauren, Jeremy, and Charlotte – for caring enough to bring us all together for this amazing experience. For your kindness, patience, energy, and the never waning smiles on your faces. I think you guys rock - Thank you that and for making the world a bit greener at the same time!

*No, that isn't my creation - Greenpop came up with it and I just had to borrow.

The story of 2001 trees.

I’m still seeing a bit green and haven’t quite come back into the real world completely. So I will keep my Reforestfest recap brief and just tell you that instead of the originally announced 1000 trees, we planted 2001. Though the 2001. was a bit of a mistake as it was supposed to be 2000. But when the time came around to plant the final tree there was 1 little tree extra and everyone thought we may as well put it into the ground too so it wouldn’t feel left out, and voila we had planted 2001 trees.

It was simply the best weekend ever and full of exciting firsts for me…

I volunteered to sleep in a tent. And loved it.

I wore a head lamp, felt like the last unicorn, and was quite upset when I lost a battery within an hour of our arrival. These little buggers are very useful on a dark camping sites. Luckily I had some chaperones and a bright moon to show the way.

Call me a girl, but pink bubbly is appropriate anywhere.

I ate porridge with butter, brown sugar, and cinnemon for breakfast and think it is the best thing ever!

I danced in the forest at night.

I got down and dirty and planted a tree. And another one. And then some more.

A bit of a mad smile, but I was in fact enjoying myself.

I saw a big mole snake. Yuk. Exciting in the not so nice way.

I did yoga under a 1000 year old Milkwood tree with my hair down (Can you imagine? Me – doing yoga without my bun? Unheart of, but I loved every moment of it…)

Yoga mats warming up by the fire, getting ready for class.

I shared a mug of hot tea and milk with some friends and realized the act of sharing something makes it so much better.

I smiled for 2 days straight, but did not shower.

I learned how to break a tent down.

Shoes chilling in the forest.

A thank you to the sponsors will follow tomorrow. I’m still a bit lost in the forest today....

A good place to be a bit lost.

Forest fairy.

In Germany we have a saying called Holla, die Waldfee! I guess the closest I would get to explaining it even in German, is to say it is an exclamation of surprise. I was trying to find an adequate translation, but other than Waldfee being a forest fairy and Holla an old word for elder flower, I didn’t get far. It all came down that apparently one has to be nice to elder trees and fairies as an old English saying goes:

Elder be your lady´s tree,
harm it not or cursed ye´ll be!

I still like the idea that it is more a surprised greeting. Imagine you walk in the forest and you were to see a fairy. Wouldn’t you be rather surprised, maybe squeak a little, and exclaim something like Whoopsie, a forest fairy! 

Anyhow… it all just popped into my head yesterday while I was packing…random thoughts.

This little forest fairy, I mean me of course, has all the essentials and is off into the woods!

Forest Fairy essentials: fairy wings, gum boots, pink bubbly.

Wild things.

I’m going camping. Have you heard? Considering that I like to have my space I thought the idea of camping less daunting than sharing a dorm room with 20 others at the Reforestfest. Only a little less though.

In case you don’t know that about me – I do not like camping. I have attempted a few times and each time it was at best really uncomfortable and at worst really painful (ever spend a night on an air mattress with a torn ankle ligament?). It is just not in my nature it seems as it is for South Africans. I am a city girl at heart. We only camp on asphalt in front of the Apple store.

That would me on the right. In my tent. In the wild. Scary, right?

Also after watching too much 24, yes I’m old school like that, I had the worst serial killer nightmares two nights ago. Upon waking up I realized that I would be in a forest, in tent, in the dark soon and boom! all I could think about was the Blair Witch Project. Not ideal. But with the crowded dorm room scenario looming and all my friends camping too, I am still set on braving the wild. So far I have tent, sleeping bag, gumboots, and pink fairy wings in place as well as someone who will pitch my tent. Someone I don’t even know yet, but apparently all it will take is for me to call him King Steve for the weekend and bring him a beer. I can do that. I cannot pitch a tent. I did have the choice to take a small pop-up one, but as Mark says a camping novice like me will need a big one, which has to be properly pitched. I trust him. I also rely on him for a head lamp.

 Me: Do you have one of those funny head lamp thingies? Can I borrow it for tree fest?
Mark: I only have a normal one. Yes, you can borrow it.
Me: But the normal ones are the funny ones!

So tonight I shall document and report how packing goes. I think if I can suck at anything even worse than I suck at packing, it will be at packing for a camping trip. We shall see.

In the meanwhile I found this little treasure at www.tailsofamermaid.com and though I presume there won’t be much grass in the forest, it makes the idea of going into the wild slightly less daunting.

A fashionable thought.

When I meet new people and they ask me what I blog about my usual answer is Pasta, men, and yoga – in no particular order. I feel that I have left anything remotely fashion related far in my past so I don’t look at fashion magazines, I don’t look at shows on style.com, and I definitely don’t feel any desire to write about it.
Today I do. Though I am just wearing a stripy jersey with jeans and don’t feel particularly sparkly, I do feel quite inspired after browsing through the pictures of the Met Costume Gala. As usual it was glamorous and fabulous and definitely fashion-y (unlike the Oscars and many other red carpets). Therefore I do question the attendance of some guest i.e. The Jonas Brothers. Have they ever a) been at the Met b) do or wear anything fashion noteworthy or c) even know who Schiaparelli was? With the current exhibit being Schiaparelli and Prada: Impossible Conversations that should have been a pre-requisite to score an invite I think. Needless to say, I would have gotten one.

Anyhow here are my thoughts on the outfits. In no particular order I give you The good, The bad, and The let me quickly avert my eyes…
Little to say when something is just right…and beautiful…and new…and breathtaking…and simply the best look No 1:

Christina Ricci in Thakoon with Thakoon.

The other best look No 1:

China Chow in Jean Paul Gaultier Couture.

I usually don’t care for Diane Kruger. Well, I actually still don’t. She is just too blonde (= blah) for my taste. I also think that though I adore anything Prada, I think it is a tricky choice for evening. This one though…this isn’t just a dress, it is mucking afazing dress (can you tell I carried a Charlie’s Bakery box twice this week?):

Diane Kruger in Prada.

I remember I was the only one wearing a short dress for my matrik ball. My favorite teacher, Herr Grund, gave me the doubtful compliment of commenting how very little fabric it had for a dress. There were a lot of dubious scenarios of skin-showing at the Met this year, but this dress especially makes me wonder what Herr Grund would have said:

I think she looks straight out of Lady & The Tramp and she is not the lady. I might be biased with her. I have never liked her and I never will. I blame an ex (you know who you are!) who loved her and called her Scarlywarly, not that I think she would have been impressed by this nickname. Still I think this outfit calls for the corner pub and a beer in a can.

Almost enough with the bitching. This one actually makes me a bit sad. I am such a fan of Blair, don’t like Serena, but Blair just does it all right all the time for me. But what the flip happened here with her face? She actually looks like an Oompa Loompa and reminds us all – even spray tans are bad for you

Do you know what I mean?

Last but not least – my dress:

Farida Khelfa in vintage Schiaparelli. 

That was me for today and now police and out.

P.S. I struggled a bit with my credits, so help me out if you can. All pictures taken from www.style.com , but I only credited the people and the dresses I liked as you can see. Not out of negligence, but it just seems a little mean to name and blame in one go. Tell me if I’m wrong.