Oooo I do love trying out a new make up brand! I was vey, vey excited a few months back when I heard that Illamasqua was launching in BT2. Illamasqua is make up that’s definitely not for the faint hearted! It’s for girls [and brave boys!] who love a bit of drama, something a bit risque, something quite unique and who demand bloody good quality in their make up! Now, I mentioned drama and Illamasqua is all about the dramatic. Once you go onto the website, you’ll be under no illusion that this is more than ‘mere’ make up for the masses, it’s ‘Showtime Make Up’. Taking inspiration from the ‘dark and illicit club scene of the 1920’s.. and members of the alternative scene for whom self expression was paramount.. it also combines a rich heritage in make up for Film & TV’.

What I do love is that each range makes a fierce statement, for instance ‘Bite – for lips that are intense and arresting.. lips that speak volumes’; ‘Scratch – for nails that say you are in control’; ‘Pierce – for eyes that reveal the inner person.. expressive yet mysterious’. And the website is just stunning and there is so much info on it! Everything from the full range of products and accessories to a blog section, latest news, loads of video tutorials and how to’s and even the biogs of the Art Team are interesting.

But what’s the make up actually like?! Well, colourful is one way to describe it. Deliciously inviting is another! All lined up on a solid black counter, their twinkly, shimmery hues just begging to be picked up and slathered on… but I digress. My first purchase of Illamasqua was a lipstick and a lip gloss. The lipstick is ‘Underworld’, a fabulously rich, jewel colour with a slight bluey tint – I get many compliments on this lipstick, which lasts and lasts by the way and it really makes a statement. I also bought ‘Indulge’ part of the ‘Intense Lipgloss’ range which while creamy is shiny, there’s a bit of texture to it so you can wear it on its own. There’s also a range of more sheer lipglosses but you will get more colour in the ‘Intense’ range.

More recently, I purchased from the latest range, Dystopia. the 4-colour palette in purple is right up my street! The white base has a hint of glitter and shimmer, as does the black shading eyeshadow. The purples are matt and very much stand alone colours if you’re more into block colours on your eyes, which I am but as you would expect, work great together as well. Again, the staying power is great, you won’t get any budging of this stuff until you, eh, actually remember to take it off!

I also bought ‘Explode’, an unusual sheer lipgloss that is a bright pinky colour on its own but it’s designed to add depth over any lipstick or gloss, which it duly does – a dab in the centre of your lips will add a new dimension to any colour!

Priced in the MAC range, with the palette above costing €35 and lipsticks and lip glosses under €20, Illamasqua is available at BT2 on Grafton St and for online purchasing here.

Fizzy died at home yesterday. She was nearly 13 – a great age! Last Friday Fizzy wasn’t at all well and very quickly became quite weak. Our vet couldn’t diagnose exactly what the problem was there and then, prescribed some medication and wanted to see her again within a few days. Fizzy ate a little ham on Saturday but was having difficulty keeping anything down. Over the weekend she didn’t improve and by Monday it wasn’t looking good. We really don’t think she was in pain, maybe a bit uncomfortable. She wasn’t able to eat properly again. My Mom was on duty around the clock [Fizzy lived with her] and with a heavy heart told me that she didn’t think Fizzy would make it. An hour before she was due to go back to the vet, Fizzy let out a cry and breathed her last. Mom was with her, stroking her fur and talking to her. She left a voicemail for our vet a while later to let him know Fizzy hadn’t made it and he rang back within minutes to sympathise, as he’s that type of vet.

Fizzy was a lovely cat, had her funny little ways, the things she did that none of out other cats ever did, things she liked and things she didn’t. Fizzy loved being stroked between her shoulder blades. She loved- and was quite smug about having – her own chair in the sitting room, complete with fleecy blanket. She was a real little rufty tufty and although small, well able to chase away cats and dogs that had strayed onto her patch! Fizzy loved sitting in sunbeams in the bathroom and was partial to roast lamb and pork and white cheese, not red cheddar but white cheddar although she was still happy to get her ears ruffled and a handful of Go-Cat. She also gave Molly short shrift if she got too close, Molly the Boldie would tip her tail, wanting Fizzy to join in and play - Fizzy was the matriarch, the boss, well able for Molly’s antics and only one of them ever gave in and walked away with her tail between her legs. Fizzy was in awe of the real boss though – she’d sit for hours on my Mom’s knee, just staring up at her, quite content. They also used to have breakfast in bed together – I know! – Fizzy would toddle in from  garage and both of them would wait for Dad to bring up breakfast, Fizzy polishing off any milk Mom hadn’t put on her cornflakes! 

It’s funny how attached you get, how attached we as a family have got to numerous pets over the years. And we wouldn’t be without them.

I got into the taxi and sighed with relief. I had been almost in pain trying to keep my face from scowling over the past few hours and there was also the fact that I was absolutely starving – I had just been at ‘The Meal from Hell’. Pretentious overpriced food, combined with snooty yet inefficient wait staff AND that I was out with work colleagues I didn’t want to spend a second more than necessary with, this had all the hallmarks of uncomfortable dining before we picked out the wine.

I was in a very well known restaurant on Stephen’s Green. My boss was there to pay and the marketing witch was there to try and beat us into enjoying ourselves. It had been her idea, one that was met with rolled eyes and lots of grumbling, asking why did we have to go to dinner with people we barely put up with in work and who we most definitely didn’t want to go to dinner with. Everyone felt the same way, no one wanted to go as it was an unwritten thing that none of us liked each other and just accepted we had to work together. After one person dropped out with a pathetic excuse, the rest of us were told that no matter what we were going and that we were going to enjoy it no matter what. You can imagine how much I was looking forward to this then. Groan.

Sitting in reception, waiting for everyone to arrive set the scene for the uncomfortable silences that were to come. When at our table it started off with the horrible little annoying man, grabbing the wine list and arguing with the boss over which were the best wines and being told that he wasn’t allowed pick any bottle over £60 [this was a number of years ago]. And then the resident alcoholic slimy sales guy announced that he wasn’t hungry and didn’t want anything. The waiter that arrived merely added to the tension with his appalling attitude. Maybe our money wasn’t the same as everyone else’s eating there that night.

The menu consisted of lists of meals that I didn’t like, food I just couldn’t eat, everything seemed to have at least one element I hated – and I’m not that picky an eater! Very rich, very carnivorous, very continental, very much a heart attack on a plate. Let me simply go through what I ended up ordering as the best of a bad lot. My starter was spring roll with goats cheese and salad. The roll itself was room temperature yet the goats cheese inside was very cold and had a straight from the freezer texture and taste. There was nothing else in the spring roll, just the cheese, the salad was a leaf of rocket and a sliver of red onion on the side. I ordered scallops and black pudding with lemon risotto as a main. Five tiny scallops sitting on five barely visible discs of black pudding with runny slop in the middle arrived. There wasn’t a shred of heat in either the scallops or the black pudding and the risotto looked like rice pudding. The lemon risotto tasted like rice pudding, the scallops and black pudding didn’t taste of anything but were a challenging chew. Having only managed one mouthful of my starter, hunger took over and I ‘filled up’ on the scallops and pudding. Very quickly I was left to stare into space as everyone was only really getting into their mains. Oh, but that was after the boss had a loud argument with the waiter about why his steak didn’t come with potatoes or vegetables and that  he had to pay an extra tenner per serving of potatoes or vegetables. By the time those who had also ordered steak added the necessary accompaniments, the bill had shot up by another £120 or so and there was only six of us. The fish main that was ordered came with salad and I was too busy gagging on a scallop to even consider ordering any side dishes. And anyway, I was hoping the ground would swallow me up as arguing over the amount of expensive wine being ordered had also started up again.

The dessert menu was about 3 or 4 items, and if you didn’t like rubarb crumble or tiramisu [I don't, especially as I don't like coffee] you were a bit stuck. Even the one chocolate pudding had something like lavender infused sauce on it [I find lavender very overpowering] . Then I was actually given out to by my boss and the marketing witch, ‘Don’t be so ridiculous, you have to like one of them! Order a dessert for fuck’s sake, just order one, we’re waiting on you now’. Apparently I committed a mortal sin when I expressed that I wasn’t really into any of the desserts – I was the scapegoat for the underlining snippy and sarcastic comments that had followed the latest ‘chat’ than lasted 3 times as long as the subsequent silence. The waiter said that there was sorbet in the kitchen, he wasn’t sure what but… I just said yes straight away, sorbet, grand, whatever type. I was presented with the most fabulous mixed berry sorbet with a mint flavoured coulis. As I was about to take a second heavenly spoonful, the marketing witch asked me a question, a bleeping ‘where do you see your life going’ type question and I had to answer – no one else was talking, just eating. I said about 5 words and tried to resume eating. She asked it again but slightly differently and wouldn’t let it lie. I got into a conversation and at one point my boss remarked on how my sorbet was melting and he proceeded to polish it off. Ate all but the one mouthful I’d had of the one tiny, tiny little bit of the entire meal that had potential. No, I didn’t want coffee!! I just wanted out of there. I wanted a very large drink. I wanted something to eat for God’s sake! I was starving. I’d been trapped at the table from hell and would swear Satan himself was hovering nearby laughing.

The final bill was close to £1300 for the six of us. I calculated that I ate  ordered about £65 worth of food and had to battle the alcos to get even a couple of glasses of wine to try and dull the pain during one of the worst evenings I’ve ever had. And I did get a chicken burger in the chipper on the way home, just to try and find some semblence of normality out of the night . Sure you can’t beat an auld chicken burger to remind you that sometimes the simple things are best.

‘Excuse me, do you have these in a size 6?’

‘Oh.. well, ok then, I’ll try the 5 if that’s all you have. I’ve a few pairs of shoes from this brand and a 5 was grand before.’

So starts My Summer Sandal Saga. I wanted needed a new pair of sandals a few months ago. I’m a bit of a hoarder in terms of clothes and shoes, once I find something I like I’ll wear it forever or until it literally falls apart. I have a certain style, a certain look and I really don’t find much in your average high street that I like, so I grab it with both hands when I do and then hang onto it! Having finally admitting defeat with a pair of fab wedge sandals with a row of black flowers as the single strap, I condemned them to the wardrobe in the sky and needed new ‘everyday’ sandals. You know, ones that would do for work and that I’d still get away with going out if the rest of me was a bit more dressed up.

By chance I happened upon a pair of such sandals in black patent with swishy crossover straps and they were even on sale at half price at a measly €35! What’s not to like about this? But they were the last pair left and they were officially a size smaller than what I normally take. Without so much as a second thought, I said to the sales assistant ‘I’ll take them!’ and next thing, me and my new purchase toddled off. Delighted with myself I was! So much so, I put them on and headed out again to meet friends 5 minutes after I got home. Now, these sandals don’t have much of a heel, maybe an inch and a half, practically flat for someone like me who loves how big, big  heels for the way they make me feel like a giant - I have 5inch Kurt Geigers that bring a tear to the eye. So they wouldn’t hurt, even though they’re brand new, right?

Wrong. Wrong. Wrong. After a few hours, I could definitely say that my toes were sore. All sharp pain and a feeling of blood supply being cut off wasn’t a good thing. It got worse when my heels started to hurt. My heels? Normally it’s only with really high heeled shoes that you get pain there. And that’s even after the front part of your foot feels like it’s on fire. I had a definite pinchy feeling in both feet, on the last  and second last toes. I saw the next day that blisters had formed – at some point during the night the pain stopped – that’ll be the alcohol – but I still remembered the relief at taking the sandals off. So what, they were new sandals, they had to be broken in and obviously I wasn’t wearing socks so it was bare flesh against the sandal straps.

I still wore them the next day though, sure they had to be broken in. I got quite a few compliments on the sandals, they became very popular! And I spent another day & night with them being just that bit ‘pinchy’. It was well into sandal weather and nothing was deterring me from wearing them again and again. A pattern emerged. I’d wear the sandals, they’d still hurt, I’d still get compliments on them. A month later I really was wondering why they still hurt my mainly second last toe on each foot. Ok, so they were officially a size too small but they were bound to stretch a bit with wear, surely? The first time I got caught in rain wearing them I ended up with blackened tootsies, which may not have happened if my feet hadn’t been wedged right up against the offending material for hours. A few more weeks later and I had to concede that maybe they had stretched a bit but not quite enough for my feet. I didn’t stop wearing them though.

I still haven’t stopped wearing these sandals! It’s right at the end of ‘Sandal Weather’ for 2009 but I’m still hanging onto these babies. Although, I’m beginning to think that perhaps it wasn’t the best idea in the world for me to wear these day in day out all Summer – types she as she loosens the strap on the left foot and sighs with relief. But the things is, I wasn’t prepared to give in and simply not wear them. Yes, I could’ve spent a lot of time pain free, yadda yadda…

What with a recent survey telling us that women will wear cripplingly painful shoes that are the wrong size, just to look good, this is hardly stop-the-press stellar type information that will change the world! Everything I’ve said.. I saw you nodding your head in agreement, well, it’s true! And I know you know what I mean! What’s a little pain between friends… and great shoes!

Ooooooo-oooo I gave you my heaaaa-aarrtttt. Dont go breakin’ my.. don’t go breakin’ my.. Don’t go breakin my hear-ah-art.

Oh don’t be silly! This isn’t a downcast Friday Feeling song! I’m not languishing under a pile of Jelly Snakes and copies of Cosmo looking for some inspiration or should that be aspiration? Anyway.. I’m not blue, or sad, or crying  – oh the flood of Tammy Wynnette and Dolly Parton coming to me right now is almost, gasp, overwhelming, but I digress..

It’s always ok for a bit of Muppet Magic – ye still haven’t lost it guys and eh, pigs! And there’s great synchronised clucking as always from the chickens.

Mind you.. apart from the revelation that Auntie Elton can’t remember the words to his songs anymore and needs an autocue, maybe why this song popped into my head and subsequently hasn’t left it is down to the Tinys. Who are now the Tiny Teenagers… with lots of energy and the ability to scale curtains and sets of drawers in the blink of an eye. The poor curtains. And then there’s the scuttling along the top of my lovely leather couch and the inevitable scraping sound when one of them ambushes the other. Sigh. One of their favourite games seems to be ‘See how much litter we can flick onto the floor from it’s tray’, along with ‘First one to knock the vase of flowers can have first go seeing if she left a window open’. Groan.

Sometimes I think these Tinys are going to break my heart with their boldness… other times I know my heart would break if anything happened to them!

Oh I do like a nice military jacket! I have to say, it’s one of my favourite looks – sharp, edgy jacket with skinny jeans and boots with a heel just begs for a ‘I know I look great’ attitude. Back when I was a teenager in 1842 and not exactly living near Camden Market or the Portobello Road, there was a distinct lack of the kind of clothes I wanted to wear available in Smalltown. I did once resort to buying a man’s blazer in a charity shop and then fashioning epaulets out of gold material and sewing fringing that was actually meant for curtain ties into the kind of thing I wanted. I also managed to somehow find a gold brooch that resembled a type of battlefield medal and I looped some different gold rope-y kind of stuff that I also found in the local haberdashery store between one shoulder and the collar. Oh, I loved that jacket! And you couldn’t really see the sewing stitches unless you were really, really close up!

Nowadays however, Military jackets are pretty much a staple of manys the A/W collection. Oh you young ‘uns don’t know how easy you have it! I particularly like this one, pictured. From Laura Whitmore’s Impulse Bodyspray Collection, available in all A-Wear stores, this jacket ticks all the boxes! Great shape, big shoulders as seen everywhere this A/W, fab button detail and a not to be sniffed at price of just €70!

Wondering where you know the name Laura Whitmore from? Recognise the face? Laura’s currently an MTV presenter – ah, now you know her! – this is her first foray in fashion as the face of the Impluse Bodyspray Collection for A-Wear. I think she looks fab in these pics, mind, you’d need an awful lot of Elnett to keep that hair in place in Whelan’s at 2am on a Saturday night, but I can see many of you trying anyway!

This collection has been available in A-Wear since mid August and Impulse have also set up a ’street blog’ where you can see pix of the more fashionable among us as they eh, wander down the street! Have a look and who knows, you might be posing for the blog soon!

Everything I own is my stuff.. right?Just stuff I own. It’s my stuff, not anyone else’s and if I choose to actually put tacky fridge magnets from the town of my parents last holiday destination on display, well, I can stick them wherever I want to! And although it’s gone way beyond a joke at this stage and I don’t even try and refuse them, they’re not like my favourite things in the world, ok? They just make up part of ‘my stuff’, stuff you’ll find in my apartment.

Like anyone else, I can confirm that I’ve lots of ’stuff’ – you might want to refer to yours as crap. Ok, we all have loads of crap. The crap that sits in a drawer, hangs in a wardrobe, stands on a bookshelf or bathroom shelf. Chances are though, the real crap you have only ever sees the light of day when you’re convinced you’ve spare batteries somewhere, that you’re certain you have a picture of that ugly guy you once dated to compare him to your ex over a bitchy bottle of wine or when you’ve turned the whole place upside down looking for a particular lipstick you know you bought, never wore and now need. There’s also the crap you have kinda on display or at least in the top drawer in your bedroom/ bathroom, the type you know everyone else has but it’s also the type of stuff you shove further out of sight during the 5 secs you have to do a quick tidy up upon arriving home unaccompanied, if you get me.

It’s a little different from the ‘Me Casa, Su Casa’ situation, it’s more like a ‘My Crap, My Situation – so what? ‘ kind of thing. Put it another way, I’ve loads of books, very varied, from books on iconic magazine covers, to all of Candace Bushnells books, some Erica Jong, the complete stories of Winnie the Pooh, a few Douglas Coupland and an abundance of cat books. Many of the cat books are presents, I may add. I have hard back editions of ‘The Ultimate Cat’ and ‘Tales from the Animal Hospital’ from the BBC series years ago, for instance. Guys aren’t so taken with them, unsurprisingly and they leaf through ‘501 Must See Movies’ or my Brett Easton Ellis instead. Mind you, I’d rather the pisstake comments on my cat books rather than the time I was completely at a loss for words when a new neighbour invited me in for a welcome glass of wine a few years back – I’d never seen so much crap until that evening. Perhaps if I added that it resembled a sanctuary for chintzy china dragons and that floral plate things that were just stuck up against various walls and that this guy, yes guy had added a neon blue, neon blue, strip light around a window and odd looking Russian Doll type ornaments on every surface, you might understand why I was a little dumbfounded. Now, his place was really full of crap! I think what I was able to do was agree that he got great, ahem, bargains at the local auction house and thankfully got out of actually agreeing on how eh, lovely the place was now that he’d eh, done it up.

So.. I have stuff. Stuff.I prefer ’stuff’. Over the last few years I’ve thrown out loads of crap. You know the kind of stuff. The kind of stuff you know that you don’t need. Really don’t need, even if you might think you might want  it some.. eh.. time in the far off distant future. I’ve thrown out black bags full of clothes [relatively ok looking with jeans 100 years ago] and others just with either knickers [baggy gusset] or socks [mostly single]. I also love doing a big cull of various things that gather, like cards from certain people I now hate, buttons in dainty little envelopes from a swishy boutique when I don’t even know what item of clothing it belongs to. Take out menus! Crappy bits of paper with my horoscope from a day something great happened, cinema tickets, airline boarding cards - I collected loads of them over the last few years but they’re all gone now. Pens with glitter ink [cos they're actually very hard to read, I've always resorted back to a Biro!], they’re all gone. Cat stickers. Beer mats. Hair bobbins even though I hate my hair tied up. Soaps from hotels. Receipts. Sewing kits that only now have turquoise and lemon thread cos I used the 2 inches of black thread it came with but thought I might need eh.. lemon thread one day.

So, being very truthful, there was very little I threw out when I was moving. All the crap had been thrown out during various booze fuelled culls after yet another guy had let me down. Honestly. I just have grown up stuff now. I’ve only had grown up stuff for ages now. The tiny Elmo was a present and well, he likes living on the bookshelf… and well, the red ladybird moneybox goes with my red living room… and ok, the purple handbags, especially the one with the flowers aren’t exactly the most practical for actually carrying things around in, given they’re rather small size.. but they go with the main theme of my bedroom…  and em.. ah, you’ve got to give me the Elmo! Everyone needs an Elmo!

… that I’ve been fairly crap at updating Glitter See Glitter Do over the past fornight or so. I know! I’ve been really lax. See the thing is, that when I moved into my new place, it seemed that every day there was something I was trying to track down. If it wasn’t a lightshade or a cushion of just the right colour, it was side plates or a new lasagne dish. And then there’s all the time I’ve been spending staring like a loon at  looking after the tinys, making sure they were settling in ok. Rest assured though, normal working order will be resumed shortly!

One thing, you’ll just have to wait a little longer til I download the great pix of the tinys I have in their new pad – I need to find the camera software and install it on this laptop – but it’ll be worth the wait! I promise! Meow over and out!

… a FULL update and proper introduction to The Tinys when they arrive. And once they get their mani pedis and decide between the Louis Vuitton Feline Throw and the more recession friendly Cath Kidson ginham one [hey, they still have standards!] to place their very pampered bottoms on, they’ll be ready for their photoshoot.. hopefully.

Now, as a collective, they are The Tinys – Molly & Fizzy are ‘The Smalls’ [even if Molly the Monster is currently as big as a King Charles] and they now have half nieces and a half nephew, The Teeny Tinys. In the next few days The Teeny Tinys are due to be taken indoors, hand reared and good homes found for them, as what my sis has done with The Tinys. If you haven’t worked this out, the growing brood stems from a feral cat that more or less lives in my sister’s garden. We would love to be able to neuter this cat but our vet has advised us that due to the danger that feral cats pose [and this one is very vicious!], he won’t go near them, no vet will,  not even to attempt a long range dart process and knock them out for the operation. It’s a tricky situation.

Let’s have another pic! This time a good old action one! Missy [mainly black] is on the left and Pinky [yes she's white, but look at her ears!] is on the right. Meow indeed!

I’ve moved into my new apartment. I’ve nearly unpacked everything – there’s one large suitcase of clothes still in the bathroom of all places and there’s a small suitcase of ’stuff’ that needs to be organised into drawers of ‘kinda important, will keep’, ‘not that important, might throw out’ and ‘why didn’t I throw this out before I moved?’. A throw I bought in Argos that so didn’t turn out to be the same colour IRL as it was in the catalogue has to be returned and I’ll replace it with a nice, small end table thingy in glass and silver that I also saw during my several perusals of the entire doorstop of a catalogue.

I’m actually really happy with the way the place has come together so quickly! There’s just one other thing to arrive. Well, ‘things’, plural. Well, they’re not really things. More like THE most fab addition any place could have! You want to know what, huh? Or should that really be who… ? Oh yes, The Tinys are on their way! Who wouldn’t want these little bundles of cuteness to come home to? Who wouldn’t want these absolute dotes to play with and cuddle up to?