News from Hollywood.. An Englishwoman looking in..

Extreme weight loss - Results and side effects to come

American mancunian — Tue, 05 Aug 2008 23:52:30 GMT

A week doesn't seem to pass without another influx of celebrity magazines critiquing the rich and famous, for something as unbelievable as gaining five pounds on a honeymoon [something that can happen to me after a weekend of over-indulging on pizza and one too many vodkas]. Though as quickly as we see these stars gaining tiny amounts of weight, we see them tanned, toned and super skinny, losing perhaps 10 pounds extra in the same 7 days, in the same magazine.

How? Well one reason reason that is out there is the extreme diets that grace the same pages of these magazines, one being the water fast.

While most of us will never attain the same look associated with most Hollywood starletts, this diet promises to detoxify the body as well as lose a lot of pounds in the process.

My parents arrive in the US in one week. I am sure we will all gain a few pounds over the couple of weeks that they're here and when they leave I have one week until school begins. Solution? Cleanse.

I will begin my "cleanse" on August 28th for a total of one week. During the time I will keep a diary on here to track my progress. Please stay tuned for this as I will definitely need the support. Goodness knows I love my food!

Blogs - Useful, or useless?

American mancunian — Tue, 05 Aug 2008 23:34:00 GMT

You’ve had a bad day. Your coffee was cold, work was a drag and your other half is complaining after you forgot to let the cat out this morning as promised. But why worry?The day’s concerns will be washed away once you sit down at your Mac and write up theday in your beloved blog.

That’s right, folks. Those websites we can seemingly no longer get away from have become “therapy” for the average American. Informative? No. Egotistical, pretentious and self-absorbed? You bet.

Twelve million American adults keep a blog, according to a 2007 report by Pew Internet.The report also showed that 37% of these bloggers citied “my life” as the primary topic. Trailing miserably in second place with 11%, came Government and Politics. Although the blogging community is huge and people writing their own online diary is growing, only 27% of internet users actually read any other blogs.

So, who actually cares about your life? The sad truth is people have become so concernedwith jotting down every moment of their being within these spaces, that they’re no longer interested in reading about anyone or anything else.

I could go on about how the blogging community is destroying print media, but I wont;As technology expands it is clear to see why online information would be taken advantage of and a decline is inevitable. But will the blog ever take over the real news of the world?

Of course not, because while blogs are written continuously, no-one cares about any but their own. And occasionally everyone needs a newspaper, when your homepage is down,to see how the rest of the world is doing.

Is THE BRITNEY LAW even worth it?

American mancunian — Tue, 05 Aug 2008 23:20:55 GMT

The Britney Law. Yes, you heard right. The law is being considered by Los Angeles City
Council in the wake of recent paparazzi attempts to photograph the star in various situations. But as Los Angeles Police Department Chief William Bratton put it, “we need Britney to stay home instead of traipsing all over town. We don’t need additional laws.”

The absurd act would give celebrities a 20 foot personal safety bubble whilst out and
about in Los Angeles. This is while the rest of us bump into every other person down the street, on the subway or even on the dreaded bus, just to get to our office.

Many successful celebrities stay out of the public eye to avoid unwanted paparazzi
attention, in turn gaining some level of respect and privacy from the media. It is not
difficult to stay away from hotspots such as Rodeo Drive, but somehow the current celeb targets find themselves drawn to all the places they know they will be photographed. So if it’s such an inconvenience, Britney and Lindsay take note; stay away from the The Ivy, and avoid the pictures. It’s really not that difficult.

Not only do many of these conniving celebs conveniently find their way to the most
popular hangouts in town, it seems they also offer out their schedules so that the paps
actually know where they are throughout the day. If that doesn’t make this law seem like
the most ridiculous law of recent times, I don’t know what will.

For the people who believe the paparazzi have no place in Hollywood, please get real. We can
all deny that we’re interested in today’s ever growing celeb culture but the facts speak for
themselves, and while newspaper sales are on the decrease, celebrity gossip magazine sales are only on the rise, with some reporting 50% rises within a year, according to a 2006 report by The New York Times.

We can pretend we’re not interested in Britney’s latest failure, or the next unflattering beach photo of Tyra Banks, but the paparazzi are doing their job for us, the public who pay into it. And we all know we need to make sure we have the latest gossip come Monday morning... Once we’ve pushed and bumped our way past every other person in the area to get there.

My opinions..

American mancunian — Tue, 05 Aug 2008 16:12:23 GMT