Monday 31 October 2011

Halloween party time.


I managed to completely forget about my cold for one night to host a Halloween/ post-birthday bash.
Any excuse to dress up and decorate my flat.

Me and Jimmy got very excited about our pumpkin carving.
I can't take any glory for Jim's haunted tree... which took centre place on our fireplace.
We did three each. I can however, take credit for No 1, 2 and 5 (left to right).

We invited a stack of our mates around for a home-cooked Chilli, ghoulish cakes and hours of boozing and singing.
We ended up moshing around the kitchen to scary Halloween songs (like the Monster Mash) and smashing glasses repetitively with our over enthusiastic, drunken dancing.

I decided to get dressed up as Wednesday Adams from The Adams Family. But as a living dead version with blood trickling out my eyes, nose and mouth. And one zombiefied white eye.
I did plan to wear two white eyes but they were so freaking uncomfortable and I couldn't really see jack all.
My boyfriend Jimmy came as The Voodoo Man, who has a white face mask, black long hair and a top hat. Although he decided to take off his head gear for the below photo.
He managed to wear both of his red-out eyes, he's more hardcore than me. Obviously.

Wednesday Adams and Voodoo Man
  
I got VERY excited about this life-like evil, black witches cat
 with red eyes and a proper steam bubbling cauldron.


Jimmy as Voodoo Man
  
me and my friend Tammy drunk and disorderly



Me and my mate Alexandra hugging a ghoul which me and
Jim had sneakily positioned in the garden.

Wednesday 26 October 2011

Did The Hoff give me a cold?

It's been a funny old week.
I took an entire week off work. I wasn't flying off anywhere exotic or hot, just had high hopes of gallivanting around London checking out various tourist hot spots and the like.
It was my birthday as well last week. So I was hoping to go for high-tea at The Ritz on my bday afternoon and then out for dinner with my brother the following night.
I also arranged to go for a pampering session with the girls at a salon on Thursday, which would've including drinking champagne and no doubt chatting animatedly about boys.
However, my hopes were ambushed by a kick ass cold/ flu virus. Gutted.
So to cut a long and very boring story short, I spent the whole week, including my birthday, under a duvet sniffling on the sofa.
I didn't get out of my PJs for days and generally just shuffled around the flat feeling sorry for myself.

However before this moment of self deprivation and hermiting I interviewed The Hoff. David Hasslehoff, Knight Rider, The owner of Kitt, Mitch Buchannon of Baywatch fame.
I've interviewed Mr Hoff a few times before and each time he's got progressively more bonkers.
This time I  think it's safe to say he is officially madder than a box of glue-sniffing frogs.
Me and fellow Goss girl Sonja met The Hoff at the Charlotte Street hotel in Soho.
We walked into the library and came face-to-face with a more animated David than we'd even imagine in our freakiest dreams.
He spoke at us, literally AT us, for ten minute, waffling, frantically at 100 mph.

We have no idea what he was going on about. We tried to reign him in and ask a sensible, newsworthy question but he over looked our concerned glances and carrying off chatting inanely about, seriously, only God knows what.

Me and Sonja came out the interview, feeling drained and instantly knowing we had nothing to use in the paper the following day. What a waste of time for everyone involved.

However, we got this corker of a photo. And a hilarious ten minutes of audio we can listen back to on our dictaphones if we're ever feeling bored or in need of entertaining in the office.

Me, Hoff and Sonja
The last time I met The Hoff wasn't much better.
He was giving his bodyguards a run for their money at a party.
They were employed mainly to stop him going anywhere near the champagne and wine trays.
Say no more.

I forgot to say the list of 'Not Allowed To Mention Topics' for our Hoff interview was hilarious.
Including....
Being sacked from Britain's Got Talent
Anything to do with alcohol or binge drinking
Getting divorced
The custody battle
That 'burger video' that circulated a while back
Simon Cowell

The first time I met The Hoff

Wednesday 19 October 2011

Forget wife swap....anyone fancying house training my fella????

If there was an award for the world's messiest boyfriend, mine would win, hands down. I'd bet my mortgage on it.
He should be in the Guinness Book Of World Records for his dedication for fucking up my house.
He could win medals, travel the world winning competitions, tournaments even.
If you think your boyfriend is messy... you need to spend a week with mine.

Jimmy, my fella of two years, has a wonderful ability to cover my cream bedroom wall with feet marks, not hand prints, feet prints... time and time again.
I'm not even going to mention the black hand prints all over my white bathroom walls.
Do other men insist on propping themselves up against the wall, with both hands, while taking a piss? WHY?

No matter how often I clean our lounge door, which so happens to be made of glass, it's always covered with finger prints... always.
I might as well just remove the handle. Seriously. Jim never uses it.
Why would he when he can push it open using the glass window with his greasy, KFC chicken ridden, fingers.
Obviously pushing the door open that way makes so much more sense?

Also I really should have clocked on by now about the cooking mess.
When he offers to cook dinner, I should politely decline saying, "I'll do it tonight darling". No drama.
If Jim cooks anything, it's guaranteed to be all over the walls, the utensil holder, the cook books, the kitchen ornaments, you name it. Not forgetting of course, ALL over the floor.
When he's cooked himself a simple Spag Bol, it looks like he's cooked Christmas dinner, for 10, blindfolded.
Even just making a cup of tea is a palaver.
There's tea slopped all over the bin lid, dripping down the kitchen cupboard and a trail across the floor from where the tea bags been slopped onto a spoon out of the cup en route to bin.
Moments later I shout 'bluuuurgh" as he's accidentally put two sugars in instead of none.
Hence the whole tea bag dripping, slopping, floor-splashing scenario starts again for tea making mark two, hopefully this time with no sugar.
He's been known to finish cup two by accidentally adding another sugar. No joke. Are men really this dense?

Another thing which you could look forward to if you lived with my boyfriend was his indescribable boy's logic.
The other day Jim was making sausage and mash... great, one of my favourite dinners.
I couldn't look as he turned our kitchen into a squat.
About 15 minutes later he declared, "the potatoes done, shall I put butter in them or just milk?"
I walked into the kitchen and saw the raw sausages still sitting on the side.
He hadn't even put the sausages under the grill.
I looked at him, frustrated asking "Why didn't you cook the sausages at the same time as the mash? The potato will be stone cold my the time the sausages are ready. How are you going to keep them warm?"
He replied, totally blasé, "I'm just gonna leave the mash on the side while I cook the sausages."
Why! Why!! Only a man could possibly think like this.

Seriously I have asked, in fact pleaded, with Jimmy at least 100 times, that is not an exaggeration, I wish for the sake of my own sanity it was, to open the shower curtain after having a shower.
We've had to throw away more shower curtains in the last two years than I can remember as they're covered in mould.
All he needs to do is leave the shower curtain open to air after having a shower. Simple?
Jim's response: "Babe, I just don't think, I physically can't remember to do it."

Maybe I should stick his Xbox in the bathroom and let that get covered in damp gunk? Bet he'd remember to move that.

Jim's amazing and constantly makes me laugh, but I'm in desperate need of Super Nanny to come and house train him.
Any one up for the challenge?

Sunday 16 October 2011

Sarah Harding in Rehab. Sad times

Sarah and me in Cannes for the
annual film festival
I love Sarah Harding. We've always supported her in our showbiz column, even back in the day, years ago when I had only just started at the Daily Star.
Hardcore Harding, as we nick-named her, always put us to shame with her canning ability often calling it a night hours past sunrise.
I've spent many a boozy night with Sarah in London, at Alton Towers, in Cannes and she could seriously drink most men under the table.
However, there's obviously a fine line between swigging out of a bottle of Jack Daniels while flicking the paparrazi your middle finger, to not realising your life's spiralling out of control.
So it was a sad day when we got the call to say she'd checked into an American rehab centre for alcohol addiction and depression.
Get well soon fellow party pal.
 
Sarah and me at the BAFTA awards earlier this year


Without poking my nose in too much, I'm really glad she's sorting everything out.
I was worried she was heading for a Lindsay Lohan/ Britney Spears style meltdown.
There's been a lot of gossip/ whispers about Sarah on the showbiz scene for months.
Ever since she seemed totally out of in at the BAFTA awards back in Feb.

Then she split up with her fiance Tom Crane amid speculation of someone being unfaithful. I won't say who.
A lot of people have been worrying about her, and not just her friends and family.

Good luck Harding, I hope to see you with a smile on your pretty mug again soon.


Fellow Goss girl Sonja, Sarah and me at V Festival in Essex

Saturday 15 October 2011

Thorpe Park after dark = HORROR.

I'm going to be 100% honest, whenever anyone talked about Thorpe Park in the past, I kinda zoned out.
In my mind it's always been a poor man's Alton Towers.
I have no idea where this pre-conceived idea came from, as I've even never been.
But, I just assumed Thorpe Park was a cheap, naff version of Drayton Manor (which to be fair is pretty lame) and most probably just for kids.

So when I got invited to the press night of the Halloween VIP Fright Night - which, in a nutshell, includes drinking a stack of free booze/ eating plates of free food before going on all the rides in the dark. I thought 'Yeah that sounds fun'.
However, what I didn't realise, was that we would be testing out Live Halloween Horror Mazes.

One of the lovely PR's, Lauren Libin from House PR, came over and said: "There's no need to be worried, it's just a mental asylum with a horror film twist. You'll be in a maze, which has live actors inside who will run around, screaming at you and trying to touch you."

Ok, nothing to worry about then?! By this time we were all a little drunk and therefore over analysing everything.
To make it worse there was an ambulance outside one of the mazes with a full ambulance crew. We asked why they were there.
One of the park staff replied: "It's a really scary ride, and very claustrophobic, people often faint."
Great.

The fact it was 9pm at night and the whole park was pitch black made it worse. And as it was a Halloween themed night there were staff everywhere, dressed in scary costumes.
Instead of the standard witches, ghouls, ghosts etc there were men in black cloaks wearing pig heads, girls dressed as demon scientists and generally characters you'd expect in a freak show. Random.

Anyway, to cut a long, scary story short two of the horror mazes were horrendous. I mean really horrendous. Those being Asylum and Experiment 10.
I closed by eyes, screamed, clinged on to my mates Sonja and Ellie for dear life and ran most of the way. At one point I was practically bear hugging This Morning presenter Matt Johnson as I was so petrified. He must have thought, 'who is this lunatic, squeezing my hand like a mentalist.."
To be fair though, even Matt said he'd "never" go in the mazes again.

Apart from those two hideous rides the rest were brilliant. Including a ten loop roller coster and SAW which was awesome.

I have since decided that Thorpe Park is in a league of it's own. Leaving the likes of Alton Towers and Drayton Mannor cowering in it's wake. Well played Thorpe Park, I honestly didn't think you had it in you.

After being hurled around on all the roller costers, there were no queues because the park was closed, so we crammed six into half an hour, we started to feel sick.
Nothing to with the multiple vodkas, honestly, ahem.

Anyway, me and Sonja couldn't face getting the coach back to London.,
So we somehow, no idea how we pulled this off, managed to blag a ride with two of the Thorpe Park staff.
If by any miracle they are reading this, thanks SO much for helping two, green faced, damsels in distress.
We hope you enjoyed the cupcakes (yep, we didn't offer them cash, just our goodie bags, which came with cake).

Ooh, I should probably mention that fame-seeking monster Jordan turned up to the bash.
Yep, we all let out a hard-to-disguise, disappointed sigh when she arrived, as she always manages to ruin proceedings.
However, she didn't throw her weight around, or annoy too many people as she was far too busy making a headline-grabbing statement.
She was showcasing her latest love victim Danny Cipriani. You know, the nice Rugby guy who was dating Kelly Brook.
God knows what he sees in Jordan, probably just after a good sh*g, But anyway, they were together and here's the full story, should you care. Also a picture of them both on the SAW ride.
 

http://www.dailystar.co.uk/posts/view/214477/Danny-Cipriani-is-Jordan-s-new-man

Oh, and we couldn't make this up if we tried, but glamour girl Imogen Thomas t(ex Big Brother star) thought she was dating Danny Cipriani. So quite rightly caused a stink about it on Twitter.
I can understand that reading you've been dumped in the paper is probably pretty shite.

http://www.dailystar.co.uk/playlist/view/214702/Oh-Danny-boy

I just also want to say the goodie bags were pretty radical. They had glow in the dark condoms in them! Awesome.

Friday 7 October 2011

Chatting on 1Xtra

I love doing radio stuff.
In days gone by I used to co-present the breakfast show on Galaxy FM in Birmingham (now Capital FM).
I spent five years of my life getting up at silly o' clock (5am) and chatting on t'wireless for hours each day.
Those were the best days of my life. Despite the sleep deprivation.

So when I get asked to go and radio stuff, I'm always really keen to get back in the headphones.
I often do Saturday Night Live on LBC with Richard Arnold and also chat showbiz stuff on TalkSPORT.

Gemma and me in the studio
Today I went into 1Xtra to speak on Gemma Cairney's show, chatting about showbiz shizzle.

We chatted about how flipping brilliant Rihanna is after she came to the UK this week.
She decided to sack off her posh driver, limo or chauffeur and get a tube around London. And for us Londoners we know how rank it is on the tube at the best of times, so Rihanna must have been feeling particularly brave.
Following her gig at the O2 she then went to McDonalds. What a girl!! Fair play, I love it when celebs, especially ridiculously famous ones, act totally normal.
 Can't ever see the likes of Mariah or J.Lo doing that.

We also talked about The X Factor and the big evil twist where each judge (Gary, Louis, Kelly and Tulisa) is being forced to boot out one of their final four acts in the first live show. Drama.

Rock Of Ages: The Musical

I love a good musical.
Nothing like sitting around eating maltezers and ice-cream with a glass of wine as C -list celebrities prance around on a stage in front of you singing and dancing.
My fella doesn't really get why girls love the theatre so much, but I'm partial to getting tipsy with my mates dancing around in my chair.
A couple of months ago I went to see Ghost and despite thinking it was going to be a God awful pile of cheese rind, it was brilliant.
Also recently enjoyed Wicked, Flash Dance, Priscilla Queen of the Desert and very surprisingly Legally Blonde.

I didn't have high hopes for Rock Of Ages, I'm not into White Snake or other heavy rock bands, loved Metallica as an rebellious teen but that's where it ends.
I remember being 14 and dancing around on my mate's kitchen table, drunk out of my face on White Lightening, in stripy tights, para boots and an army coat moshing to Enter Sandman. Ahh the memories, I loved that album.

I'm not a big fan of Shayne Ward, the X Factor contestant from a few years ago. In fact did he win? I can't remember.
I've just googled, he did win. Shit, wonder what happened there then? Anyways, he's in the show as well as Justin Lee Colins.
You know the guy with the naff hair who was never as funny or likeable as Alan Carr.
You know, the guy who got caught fondling some random girl in the NOTW behind his wives back at a pub in Bristol.
Got it? Good.
Anyway. The show is good. Half of it is set in a strip club in LA, so it's full of semi naked girls waving their bits about and rock-star wannabe men trying to get their rocks off.
So all in all it's a bit of harmless sexual fun.
Also lots of power ballads Bon Jovi stylee and some laugh out loud moments.
Defo worth a visit if you have a spare £50 lying around.

We definitely enjoyed the after party... as you do.

me and my mate Sam unleashing our inner rock geeks