Love & Magic in the Future & Japan

First things first, you gotta watch both of these movies if you haven't already. Watching them is like being spooned by the universe. If I was a useless doctor I would prescribe these movies like a tonic for the sad and lonely. I sometimes want to be a doctor, for the money mostly, but also because I like helping people and stuff. Anyway, this is my contribution to the happiness quotient of the world. Watch these two movies and feel better. 

But why?

Well, they are both ridiculously good, like ten-outta-ten vibes. They are also both deliciously life-affirming which is strange given the presence of a Catbus (see here) and an intelligent operating system that with the perils of Vodacom shitty network coverage and airtime, seems maybe more unbelievable than a fucking Catbus. 

"Her" the top one if you didn't already know, is so beautiful to watch that it falls into the category of movies that you can absolutely enjoy on mute. But that doesn't mean that the dialogue isn't amazing, because it is... Intelligent, interesting and beautiful, the dialogue is still swimming in my brain, albeit bastardized by my poor memory. Also, I really, really loved the colours in the movie, rich hues of orange and brown, and the notable absence of the colour blue. The future according to Spike Jonze is actually a 1930's throwback with the presence of "close", intuitive technology. I kinda hope that he is right, I personally cannot wait to wear Opening Ceremony like it's a uniform. A movie about love. A movie about death, transience and high-waisted pants. I loved everything about it. 

Now on to "My Neighbour Totoro". Goodness! This movie just made me want to wash my mouth out with soap (in the best possible way). It presents a world that is so sweet, innocent and sincere that it made me feel like I've been a bad girl my whole life for thinking otherwise. I only wish that I had watched it when I was younger instead of being introduced to the world via the lunacy of Disney's scare tactics. Actually, just thinking about the movie makes me smile and roar "TOHHH-TOHH-ROHHHH!" 

In conclusion: now I really need to get to Japan and just get knee-deep in some Totoro merch. Also, I need to rethink my haters-hate-everything stance on Amy Adams given her great performance in "Her".

This Is The Goal

I saw this on Twitter and I pulled a sad face.

It is just too much of everything that I want in life.

To explain:

MENSWEAR. The trend, the lifestyle, the clothes: I love it.

Also, Imma let you in on a little industry secret: a zebra crossing in an editorial = urban setting (probably NYC) = city girl with an amazing apartment and life. Thanks every magazine ever! Don't you see? She's on her phone which obviously = oh-this-is-just-my-weekday-steez. Obviously. 

Also, those shoes. Cut out detail is my thang dammit. 

Then there's also the whole ponytail situation. I have always had ponytail envy cause even when I had long hair, I never (not once) achieved this. 

I'm going for a haircut on Friday to save my self-esteem and end what appears to be the humble beginnings of a mullet. 

White Sock & Other Fantasies

This photo does things to me. 

Back in the dizzle, when I was would wear a moon-bag (with no irony), I would imagine my future to be something like this: smoking, sportswear X lifestyle and you-can't-sit-with-us eyes. I mean, it is like this photo is stolen from my ten year old brain. 

The bright white socks alone make me lick my lips. At the ripe old age of 25, I still attempt to recreate this vibe into my day-to-day look, although more cautiously and more aware of the omnipresence of my thighs. 

Unfortunately, I don't have you-can't-sit-with-us eyes, rather, I have been gifted with everybody-talk-to-me eyes which mean that I have been asked for advice, toilet paper and political insight from a menagerie of strangers. I actually enjoy talking to people so I don't mind, although I wish I could be Naomi cool. She's apparently dating Michael Fassbender hey... 

I should probably just go whole-hog and live my fashion dreams, I mean YOLO dressing is a thing (see here) but at 7 in the morning when I am getting dressed I don't think about fashion or anything really. I just think about tea and my afternoon nap; I'm basically a baby adult. I bought cute socks from Cotton On recently so it is a start. Like the Manrepeller says: Carpe Diem, it’s Latin for YOLO.

Fashion Mathematics: Witchery + Bey

This steez:

Plus this hurr: 

= The Heather that I have always wanted to be but have yet to become. Hopefully she will surface around June, for Youth Day and stuff. 

I'm growing my hurr as we speak.

P.S. I really scanned the Witchery lookbook, I know it's lame, I know. But that's how much I love it. 

Don't Forget Me

Photo by Kimberly Tell.

Delphine Diaw Diallo

Delphine Diaw Diallo has been on my mind.

I am a visual person, my eyes and my heart are directly connected. 

My iPad is testament to this with hundreds of photos that I treasure like magic beans that are ready to sprout with inspiration. My extensive photo collection served as our "TV" in Paris since our apartment was without one. Good times people. 

There is one photo that stands apart from the sea of photos of pugs, ladies who don't smile and cutesy illustrations. It is this one bellow:

Doesn't your heart try exit via your throat? 

Well, mine does. 

This French-Senegalese photographer has me on my knees worshiping at the altar of her undeniable mojo. Can we all just exude this much sexiness, strength and whatcha-lookin'-at chutzpah? Can we puhlease. 

Best Friend, Boyfriend & Haruki Murakami!

This is a very happy time for me because yesterday my best friend celebrated her birthday and tomorrow my boyfriend attempts to celebrate his. My scorpio tribe take up so damn much of my heart that I barely have space left for Conan O'Brien, receiving money for nothing and baby pug gifs. 

Both Tommy and Tumelo are bound to be richessful (rich and successful) so I'm hoping that they'll keep me around or else I will be penning their unauthorized biographies with photos, ya dig? Nonetheless, I got mad love for my two T's and this wouldn't be my self-indulgent blog if I didn't attempt to praise their wonder and all-around amazingness.

In other news, this is a gift from the internet (click here). I engage in delusional thinking on the regular and one of my classic bitches-be-crazy daydreams is that Haruki Murakami is my homeboy. I usually just text him or he invites me for a beer in a dingy bar somewhere. I don't drink beer but that's wholly irrelevant. His writing just inspires that kind of intimacy, well, that's my reasoning anyway. Read this and follow it up with some of this (click here).

 “It’s strange, isn’t it?” the woman said in a pensive voice. “Everything is blowing up around us, but there are still those who care about a broken lock, and others who are dutiful enough to try to fix it. . . . But maybe that’s the way it should be. Maybe working on the little things as dutifully and honestly as we can is how we stay sane when the world is falling apart.”

Haruki Murakami, Samsa in Love.

One last thing:

"If we are the same person before and after we love, that means we haven’t loved enough."

Elif Shafak, The Forty Rules of Love.

P.S. I realize that these photos are completely unrelated but I took them and I like them so that's all there is to say about that. 

That's My Shit: Harriet The Spy!

Nostalgia on a hundred trillion. 

This was the first movie that I watched at the cinema during the week. My dad took me to Fourways and I was amazed that people actually did stuff on a school night. The trailer included the pilot episode of Hey Arnold! How's that for winning? 

For months after watching this movie I ate tomato and mayo sandwiches just like Harriet and I attempted some part-time spy work on my neighbors with binoculars and a notepad to boot! I still have that notebook and I must say that my rather keen eye is wasted on this life, with insights such as "her nose looks like it belongs to an angry pig" and "he shouts with his eyes" I should have become a P.I. instead. 

I would like to revisit this movie but experience has taught me that that's a bad idea. Still, it remains worthy of being the first entry in the That's My Shit category. 

P.S. Did you know Eartha Kitt was in Harriet The Spy? I knew I loved her from a past life! (See here too). 

Phiney Pet!

I've always wanted to wear doughnuts. Just eating them is not enough. 

My eyes get happy-drunk looking at this collection and I'm in good company too, Topshop has brought the technicolor brains behind this London label into their trendy embrace. 

I don't know why but I like imagining Sir Philip Green wearing Topshop. 

Daleah's!

My homie Daleah has created a cosy and delicious spot to rival the very best in a little street that is so great that we call it a whole suburb: Braamfontein.

Miss insert-long-Greek-surname, may or may not have inadvertedly sponsored this post since I first emailed her one December afternoon whinging that I could bake and that I needed money (in nicer words of course) and she kindly obliged and so far this year I've baked close to 70 peanutbutter chocolate cakes for this fine establishment. 

So friends, hoes and that guy in Ukraine who all read this blog; please pop in, order my cake (of course) and be merry.

Naturelle, Peanut Butter & The World!

This peanut butter is the champagne of the peanut butter world. Straight outta the fridge and straight outta my dreams, I want to eat this with everything. But actually, I like it best on its own. This terrible (beautiful) habit stems largely from my favourite movie during high school, 25th Hour. 

To bring you up to speed: Rosario Dawson's character, Naturelle made me consider homosexuality. But more importantly, in the movie she eats peanut butter fresh from the tub and it just looked so damned good. So that's where my love affair with the always claggy delight began. At the time I really hated peanut butter, so you can perhaps grasp the intensity of my affection for Naturelle Riviera. Up until then I had always associated peanut butter with grade one boys' breath. But Naturelle ushered in a new phase of peanut-loving that has served my belly well. 

This book is not at all related to my useless homage to peanut butter and the seemingly ageless Rosario Dawson, but it is my reading matter right now and it pretty much has me captivated. The title alone is gold. Plus, the colours of the cover reminded me of the peanut butter tub. Yup, I'm in that deep. I see it everywhere. 

Florence Welch Knows Decor!

I wish that I could move in or at least visit on the regular.

I'd call her Flo and she'd make me chai tea, probably write a song about me too. 

I mean, De Lempicka and Haring on one (amazing) wall proves too much for my heart to bear. 

I love the fact that before she moved into this place she was living with her momma. 

It's like Drake and Flo were living parallel lives...

"Living at my mama's house we'd argue every month". 

Oh Flo, invite me over soon, I make a mean cheesecake. 

Secret Lives

I'm reading this collection of short stories and it is haunting my dreams so much so that I see it everywhere.

I found the picture above on Tumblr and it reminded me of the cover. 

"She fought life with dreams... She dreamt of lovers who would come for her in sleek Mercedes sports cars made for two. She saw herself linking hands with such a lover, walking in the streets of Nairobi and Mombasa, tapping the ground with high heels, quick, quick short steps. And suddenly she would stop in front of a display glass window, exclaiming at the same time; Oh darling, won't you buy me those...? Those what, he would ask, affecting anger. Those stockings, darling. It was as an owner of several stockings, ladderless and holeless, that she thought of her well-being. Never again would she mend torn things. Never, never, never. Do you understand? Never." 

From Minutes of Glory

Oh Ngugi, you're too much. 

Three Things That I Love Right Now

1. This article.

Click Here & Love Malcolm Gladwell Even More

2. This piece of ass(piration).

3. These words from the indomitable Nizar Qabbani.

Roshe!

Tommy upgraded my life (yet again) by buying me these beauts. 

The inspiration and name comes directly from the word “Roshi,” which is a title given to a Zen master.

I don't know about Zen but I do know about love and this right here is some serious shoe loving. I mean I really, really love them. Look at the lime lining for goodness sake, it's pure magic. 

My Bestie The Internet!

I have been thinking about the internet a lot lately. There's no denying that I spend hours trawling the interwebs but the question remains whether I really should actually be doing this or if it is as I tend to suspect it is; a really (really) delicious but dangerous time eater that hates my dreams. 

Reasons I like the internet (incomplete list):

1. The Guardian. Sweet baby Jesus. I survived a 9 to 5 thanks to this gem. For realz.

2. Puppy sandwiches, Tumblrs dedicated to Corgis (click, click, you gotta see this), 9GAG and anything utterly ridiculous yet undeniably life affirming (see: puppy sandwiches). 

3. Wiki-fucking-pedia. In varsity I was told to hate it but now free of the shackles of tertiary education, (my bubbe thinks I have a doctorate) I can love and kiss Wiki all I want. Gee whiz, the Random Article button alone deserves mad love.

4. Need I say more? 

5. Good Reads. Quotes from just about any author or book. I am sincerely in love with so many dead people thanks to this website. 

6. My dynamic girlfriend collection. The internet has introduced me to so many beauties. 

a. Julia, oh Julia.

b. Hanneli, sweet Hanneli Mustaparta!

To be continued (basically my back hurts and I need a nap)...

Me & The Gruffalo!

I received the best gift from Tommy this weekend.

Tea drinking and cookie dunking on a hundred trillion. 

I am taking a hiatus from cookies so it'll just have to be decorative for now. 

P.S. The Gruffalo is known as 'Bubulis' in Latvia and 'Tostoraman' in Turkey.

Toro Y Moi!

I have taken my time. 

I think Tommy first peddled this song to me last year (yup, he's disgustingly cool like that) and I was like whatevs boyfriend where's my TLC cd? 

Anyway, now I get it. I love it. I play it all the damn time. And that little drum thingy happening at the end is just delicious. 

The video is swell too. Now I just wanna wear slacks in my house too and I gotta say that I'm not totally adverse to a polo neck either... 

Smooth real smooth, real name Chaz Bundick. 

Fail Safe By Debbie Millman

I love this. 

Neil Degrasse Tyson!

I love this man and he loves science. 

And whaddaya know he has an asteroid named in his honour.