"If you weren't born with it, just buy it"

It’s hectic, gnarley and a heaps sick aye.

Welcome to The Shire! Or the Sutherland Shire, a Local Government area in Southern Sydney.

It’s Australia’s newest ‘dramality’ show, portraying the best of the Aussie bogans.

Channel Ten said the show is made up of ‘hot surfers, vivacious models, girls next door, on-and-off couples, loveable rogues and entrepreneurs’...But it’s actually nothing like Jersey Shore.

Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiight.

It’s set to air Monday Channel Ten @ 8pm. I’m excited!

Don’t be a kook. Neck up with ya prawns and eshays and prepare for a Shire sesh.

Shire-isms:

Yiewww interj. Expression of excitement

Kook n. A crazy or eccentric person

Heaps sick aye adj. Very good yes

A long neck away adj. A measurement of time

Prawn n. Attractive body, unattractive head

Cheers to you adj. Here’s to enjoying this tasty beverage

Neck up v. Please be quiet

Sesh n. An enjoyable event with one or more person

Lamo n. Feeble individual

Eshay n. An Australian ‘lad’

Eating's cheating

The Ashy Bines Bikini Body Challenge

Heard of it?

It’s the latest diet craze/accused scam flying through the Aussie community. It all hails from bikini-model-turned-health-guru Ashleigh (Ashy) Bines, who claims she has developed a clean eating “plan” for women who can eat what she eats in the lead-up to a modelling competition and, essentially, get a body like hers.

Apparently the plan says you shouldn’t eat too much lettuce or cucumber because they ‘contain too much sugar’.

 

Lulwut.

You pay $69 for a 12 page booklet on different things you can eat for breakfast, lunch and dinner. But you get no suggested menu. Oh, and don't eat more than one piece of fruit a day – sugar thing again.

I’m not going to condemn this diet/eating plan/lifestyle change because I haven’t actually tried it. But I beg someone to do it and let me know how it goes.

Just don’t eat too many healthy things. It’s probably got too much sugar for A.B.

Here's ACA's take:

Fifty Shades of F*cked Up

I know I’m late jumping onto this bandwagon (and by ‘late’ I mean, like, the last person ever) but there’s a few things that give me the heebie jeebies (not the good kind) about the latest book-crazemania, Fifty Shades of Grey.

  

First off, why is this book popular amongst 50 year old women? I wouldn’t want my mother reading this and if she was reading it I’d be very disturbed as to what is happening behind closed doors when I go to sleep at night.

Anyway, before I launch into an attack (?) on this wierd/fetish/sex-filled novel, I’ll write a brief brief BRIEF synopsis on the book...so far. I’m only ¾ of the way through as I type this. Stop judging.

The story is narrated by Ana, a self-confessed clutz, average, mumbling and whatever. She gets sent by her over-bearing roommate to interview a successful, rich young man called Christian Grey for a college newspaper. She’s attracted to him and long story short she falls for him (shock horror) and he takes her to his ‘Red Room of Pain’. He then deflowers her, and proceeds to perform all kinds of kinky shit. The only kind of relationship he proposes to her is an ‘agreement’ that she’ll be his Submissive sex slave and he’ll have his way with her. He spanks her, and doesn’t make love but ‘fucks her, hard’ (sorry mum).

Sounds romantic, huh.

The only reason I started reading this book was because of all the hype and, of course, the sex scenes. But to be honest I’m sick of them. It’s weirdly fetish-like and he makes her do things that are cringe-worthy and I find myself speed-reading those sections to get to the actual story part.

It’s gross. Seriously. E.L. James, what happened to you as a child?

Anyways, the story reminds me of Twilight (sans Vampires) because there’s the shy, average girl and the suave, amazing-looking male who’s all kinds of everything you don’t expect and they fall in love.

Been there, read that.

However, I will finish reading the book and to be honest I’ll probably read the whole series. I finished reading Twilight four years ago, it’s time for something new...I guess.

Travel Etiquette

Since I’ve travelled a bit in my time (Europe, North America), and since I have a couple of friends who just recently travelled/are still travelling AND my sister is getting home from two years in France tomorrow (lucky biatch) I thought I’d do a little tip post on travelling etiquette.

1.       Stay off the drugs.

 When I was staying in a hostel in Vancouver I picked a mixed dorm (possibly a mistake) and one of the guys in the room decided to snort speed (in front of two of us in there – he was gracious enough to offer us some. We declined). He then decided to go party – which was fine. At 4am he arrived back in the room, climbed into bed with my friend (they’d met once) and when she awkwardly pushed him away he stuck his head out the window and screamed for his friend who was assumedly wandering somewhere on the main street 6 floors below. Not so fine. If drugs make you do stupid shit, seriously just lay off. Or get a single room.

2.       Don’t lie in bed all day.

YOU ARE NOT AT HOME! It’s uncomfortable for everyone if you lie in the room all day and emerge only for the bathroom. Explore the amazing city you’re in dammit.

3.  And DON’T for the love of God come home at 4am and turn on all the lights.

So. Much. Hate.

4.     Clean up.

It’s not your bedroom. I’m not your mother. Clean up your bloody clothes. And if you’re cooking in a shared kitchen CLEAN UP. Other people want to eat too.

5. AND OHMYGOD IF YOUR SHOES/UNDERWEAR SMELLS THEN DO NOT I REPEAT DO NOT JUST LEAVE THEM.

Air that shit out or burn it. Either way get that smell outta here.

6.  Actually talk to your roommates.

The amount of times I’ve stayed in a hostel and the 6 other people in the room don’t mutter even the tiniest of squeaks is phenom. Seriously, just talk. We are all travellers, we are all poor. We could be best friends.

7.    Carry a map on you, and always carry cash.

Seriously, you’ll get caught out. And you’ll probably need to tip people – in America pretty much anything you do requires tipping. So carry at least $2 on you at all times.

8.    Buy a watch.

You can thank me later.

9.   Call your mother.

While you’re out meeting new people and getting ridiculously drunk she’s distraughtly waiting for the phone to ring. Give her a quick a-ok message. You’ll save the poor thing from biting her nails to the bone.

10. And lastly be smart.

My first trip to New York my friend and I were so tired we jumped into a mysterious looking van, got locked in and then realised we weren’t actually in a taxi. Worst. Feeling. Ever. Never have I prayed so hard.

I also spent a night in the Grand Canyon jumping through a toilet window to escape the security men because I was under 21 and drinking and they were asking everyone for passports. Fun times.

So have a blast, be courteous, know things aren’t going to go exactly the way you planned, be open to new things, travel cheaply and travel far. It’s only going to happen once.

You can read my travel blog here!