Nipples

That got your attention right?

Now, I have mixed feelings about Ann Summers.
On the one hand, I think it's great that we have a mainstream, high street sex shop chain in this country. I think sex is nothing to be ashamed of and people should be free to exercise their personal desires without fear of censure, so long as it's with consenting adults, they're not forcing their choices on anyone else and no one gets seriously or permanently hurt. I've made purchases there, for myself and other people, and have been more than happy with the results.

But on the other hand, I find a lot of what they sell tacky, badly made, cheap, nasty and not worth the money. If you're going to buy sex accessories, you need to be sure you're getting quality merchandise and with our society's collective squeamishness about sex, it's not always easy to complain about the quality of a product. And in some cases, it's obviously pretty impossible to return it. Second hand vibrator anyone? Thought not.

One of my other other problems with Ann Summers is the tone of the sales pitch on their website. It's all so knowing, but still incredibly euphemistic. This is not an exact quote, but a paraphrase "Wear this sexy little number and you'll have him asking for more and more..." More and more what? Coffee? Come on people, let's not be squeamish, we're talking about sex. Sex. SEX. SEX. The coy nature of the site still seems to indicate that sex is something to be vaguely shy of and ashamed about. Even Ann Summers can't call a spade a spade.

And quite frankly, some of the merchandise bemuses me. I maybe fortunate enough to be blessed with a graphic imagination and overly inquiring mind, but if you need a board game to have interesting and fulfilling sex, then I have to say, "ur doin it rong."

But when it comes down it, where they have really lost me is with these.

I mean Double-you-tee-eff indeed.

I don't care if they are re-usable, I've already got some!

Mamma mia, here I go again...

At the weekend, I saw what is possibly the girliest film ever. In a good way. That was Mamma Mia! I'd been to see the musical as a birthday treat when it first came out years ago and loved it and was really looking forward to the film.

A bit of background, I've loved ABBA since I was 10 when, while looking through my parents' old tapes and LPs for something to choreograph a dance to, I found my mum's copy of their "Arrival" album. It contains some of their best known songs including 'Dancing Queen', 'When I Kissed The Teacher' and "Money Money Money'. I was hooked at first listen and for a good many years, they were the only 20th century band I had ever heard or cared to listen to.

My liking of ABBA was just one of the many things that singled me out as slightly odd in secondary school and I was teased about it for quite a long time, until people realised I wasn't going to give in. I had high hopes of the film, based on memories of the musical, and in the main, it didn't disappoint.

I loved Meryl Streep in The Devil Wears Prada and I thought she was fabulous in this as Donna Sheridan. She carried the sadder parts of her character's story really well, given that the whole thing is meant to be a comedy, and revealed a more than decent singing voice. She, Christine Baranski and Julie Walters made a wonderful, if improbable, trio of best friends and their interaction was at the core of the film and really made it for me. This was the girly in a good way. The bouncing on beds, the dressing up in silly costumes to cheer up a friend, singing songs using hair brushes for microphones, telling dirty jokes, chasing males, running away from males, meeting up with long lost friends by running at each other screaming into a mad embrace. The best bit of the film for me was when Baranski and Walters' characters cheer up Donna by reminding her of her Dancing Queen days. They end up going for an impromptu dance round the island, picking up every female inhabitant along the way and ending with them all strutting their stuff along the pier before jumping or being pushed into the sea. It's a wonderfully joyous affirmation of all the fun things about being female.

The girly in a bad way was provided by Amanda Seyfried, who I completely didn't recognise from Mean Girls (guys, watch it, seriously, it's funny!), and who was completely annoying as Donna's daughter Sophie. I didn't understand why anyone would want to marry her, let alone potentially be her father. She was self-centred, indulged and idiotic and would have solved lots of her problems if she'd just got everyone together at once and explained things. It may have been that way in the stage version too, but I don't remember her character being so nearly annoying and whiny. I also think they may have streamlined things slightly for the film.

Dominic Cooper, who I knew I recognised from somewhere, and who turns out to have played Dakin in the film adaptation of Alan Bennett's The History Boys, was suitably buff as Sophie's boyfriend Sky, but wasn't given much to do beside look tanned and sulky. And while Cooper as Dakin could quite happily have pulled off a Cuban cigar, he really couldn't as Sky. Again, memories are hazy, but I'm guessing his role might have been quite slimmed down for the film.

Colin Firth, Stellan Skarsgard and Pierce Brosnan are a decent trio as Donna's ex-boyfriends and Sophie's possible fathers. None of them can sing particularly brilliantly, and Pierce Brosnan sounds a bit like David Bowie would if he couldn't sing, but they do their best and provide a counterweight to all the screaming femininity that makes up a large portion of the film.

And well, the songs are as good as they ever were and I loved every one of them. Obviously, some had to be changed slightly to fit the libretto, but I didn't have any major complaints here except for what they did to 'Lay All Your Love On Me.' If I remember correctly, this song was written just before Bjorn Ulvaeus and Agnetha Faltskog of ABBA (the group was founded when two male musician friends invited their girlfriends to sing with them) finally separated and it's about urging your other half not to stray and to remember where their loyalties lie. The film re-works it as a song about Sky's jealous love for Sophie, but it really doesn't work in the film, when Amanda Seyfried is poncing about coquetteishly in a bathing suit and then starts writhing on the sand in some soft of softcore beach porn moment. It then gets even weirder when Sky's friends, all done up in flippers and snorkel come to take him off for his stag do, and proceed to do some kind of weird penguin dance in a long line. It just doesn't work.

Having said that, I thought the rest of a film was a great success and, frankly, a good deal sexier than I had thought it could be. But then I guess the missing words from the song 'Voulez-vous' are, in most people's minds "couchez avec moi, ce soir?"...

And if you're male and think you won't like it, I have to say I went with my dad and he had a good time. So you never know, it may surprise you.

Is this song about rape?

Joan Armatrading is one of my favourite and only recently-discovered-by-me artists. She is a black, female singer of incredible vocal prowess who writes beautiful, moving and articulate songs, displaying an economy with words found among the very best songwriters.

The lyrics below are for Water With the Wine, which you can listen to here. The music for this song sounds happy, cheerful and celebratory. It was only today when, for whatever reason, I really listened to the words that I picked out "got no strength to make him stop" that I was thrown.

Met him on a Monday
And he said he loved me so
Walked me to my door
Before I knew it to my living room

I thought there was no need for worry
When he took me in his arms
Drank some whisky
Hung his coat upon the stand

That's when the music started
I heard the light switch click
I stumbled on a lost shoe
The fever's starting

This man was getting hot
I got no strength to make him stop
I guess it's too late
But I'll know next time
To mix some water with the wine

The sun came pouring in at five
Upon my face
I felt the taste of last night's love
Upon my lips
I wasn't sure if I had dreamt it
Or had not
But there across the pillow was the face
I had forgot

That's when he said he loved me
Could be the truth this time
He put his arms about me
Fever's starting

This man was getting hot
I got no strength to make him stop
I guess it's too late
But I'll know next time
To mix some water with the wine

So my question is, is this song about rape? Or at least, about sex someone doesn't really want but feels unable to prevent, which many feminists would class as rape? Or is it deliberately ambiguous? Is she just messing with my mind, writing a song with a chorus in a major key so that it sounds feelgood but actually isn't?

Ok, so this isn't one of life's Big Questions^TM, but still, I wondered.

The House of Bishops

While my Christian credentials may be somewhat dubious, I am nothing if not a feminist, in the truest sense of the word. To me, feminism means simply this: that you believe in equality between men and women. Not subjugation of men by women, not compulsory castration of men by women, but a world of equal rights, equal pay and equal freedoms. Where women don't ever have to be afraid of men and women's behaviour is not limited by male expectation or prejudice.

That's not an all-encompassing definition and could probably use a little work, but it's the best I can come up with on the fly.

In the light of my feminist convictions, and my mother's professional vocation as a chaplain, I would like to bring this to your attention. In a large part because of what she has achieved and had to put up with in her professional life, there is no one I have a higher regard for than my mum.

It's a petition for lay members of the Church of England to be submitted to the House of Bishops asking that they appoint senior female clergy to bishoprics. In my view, the idea of women bishops was effectively sanctioned when they allowed the first women to be ordained. If you're going to let them in at the lowest rung of the ladder and apply a meritocracy, it's inevitable that some will eventually become suitably qualified for such positions.

I'm not saying you have to sign it and for some of you, it might not accord with your own religious beliefs, or lack of. But I thought I'd throw it out there and see what happened...

(cross-posted to An immedia reaction)

Pretty fly

In line with the gratuitous narcissism shown by Patrick's beard post, I decided I might as well plaster my face all over this thing, in the name of finding out whether I am cool or deluded. Or whether I'm just female and males will never understand.

Last Saturday, I went all-purpose summer shopping in TK Maxx and spent around £150. This is unusual, even for me. I hate long extended shopping excursions and part with money with great reluctance. However, my final amount was greatly increased by my decision to purchase a pair of sunglasses for £69.99. Now, according to the label on them, they would normally cost £240.00 but because I was buying them a season or so late, I had saved myself oodles of money. Though this assumes I was always going to buy them in the first place (which isn't necessarily true, I'd have to be fairly off my face on some noxious substance to even contemplate spending £240.00 on sunglasses).

Neither of the males I was with (boyfriend and his mate), could see the attraction. They said they make me look like a fly. While I can see this is true, I also feel that I have just acquired two hundred and forty quid's worth of schweedie-dahlink without the associated painful hit in the wallet.

And even if I do look like a fly, I can hide behind them and scowl at people. Which, along with looking sultry and possibly famous, is what giant sunglasses are for. I did consider cheaper options (Honda sunglasses, £15, a bit more practical and big squarish ones, with white arms, £20, and what the aviator would have worn if he was an Essex girl), but didn't like either as much. And my mum said I might as well go with the ones I really liked because at least then I would definitely wear them. So I went ahead and treated myself.

I guess I'm asking, would you ever spend that much on accessories? What's your cut-off point? And did I get good deal out of it, assuming I wear them lots and they don't break in a week?