League of Gentlemen

The Metrosexual has been test-driving a new range of men's grooming products (men are "groomed;" we women are beautified) from The Refinery, an exclusive spa for gentlemen in Mayfair, London. While we might be tempted to scoff at the pomposity of a private club wherein modern-day Beau Brummells are primped and pampered, The Metrosexual, usually difficult to please, is in fact quite taken with the products. The Shave Cream "blasts out of the pump," he enthuses."You don't need much to make it thick but not heavy. It smells of clove and Armagnac." The Post Shave Balm is "cool to the skin, like a luxe butter. Try some on your lamb chops." The Face Scrub: "The minty memory of barbershops as a boy." And The Moisturiser? "Unreal formaldehyde lab smell with olive oil." Unreal in the surfing sense or in the not-lifelike sense? Available now at Mecca Cosmetica.

Not the only gay

Now, isn't this a pack of rogues? Look closely - Kath & Kim meets Little Britain meets Bob Downe. My pal Mark Trevorrow sent this photo along after his first Bob show at Melbourne's Butterfly Club on January 21. Left to right: Jane Turner, Magda Szubanski, Kevin McGee, Matt Lucas, Mark Trevorrow, Gina Riley, Fiona and John Thorn. (Photo courtesy the musical Thorns.) God, if only you could bottle it.

No Vangelis?

I've been a naughty little non-poster in the past few weeks but I know readers of my books will forgive me as I'm confronting an horrendous deadline for my next novel. Forty-two chapters and counting down...Once I'm done, I'm off to LA and New York for a bit of R&R... In the meantime, I have been listening to Kaiser Karl's double-CD compilation of music he really really likes. Why am I surprised that I actually really really like a lot of this material too? It's divided into "home" and "work/fashion show" selections, with Karl's short attention span scattershotting everything from disco to gypsy music. I am reminded of the first fashion show music I ever heard, in Paris at YSL back in the early eighties - Kraftwerk's Trans-Europe Express. Thank you Andrew Olds for bringing me the album from Madrid - down here we have to wait until March if we want to buy it in store.

Brideshead Regurgitated

The Ovation Channel has been screening the digitally-remastered version of the TV "classic" Brideshead Revisited. I've been nestling down with the teddy bear and a few gallons of very fine red to watch it each Wednesday evening - but, my Gawd! How dreary is it? What might have seemed elegeaic in 1981 now just appears comically pompous. We know what happened to Jeremy Irons, but where on earth is Anthony Andrews? Gone to Luvvy Land apparently. I've found this selection of outtakes on YouTube - worth it for scenes of Jeremy chucking a custard pie and Anthony merely chucking.

It's not Picasso

It's a new year in beauty and those crazy fashion PRs are up to their tricks again. To promote a new range of Joico hair care for blondes, we are sent... a painting. Oh, well, rather than ruining the environment with a gift shop's worth of boxes, ribbon, cellophane and styrofoam, as is usually the case for these promo gimmicks, the girls at Hush at least have given a bohemian a job.

Me and My Music

I'm spinning some of my favourite disks on ABC local radio tonight (702 Sydney, 936 Hobart) from 9 pm with my pal Mark Trevorrow. My summer music mood includes Yma Sumac (left), CocoRosie with Antony, Brigitte and Serge, Leonard Cohen, Marianne Faithfull, Melanie, Rufus Wainwright and Canadian-Mexican singer Lhasa de Sela. Serge est mort but I'm pleased to see that Yma is still warbling. And that old chestnut about her really being Amy Camus from Brooklyn - not true.

Star cross'd

Happy birthday to me and my fellow January 12thians Kirstie Alley, Rob Zombie and Howard Stern. What a strange mob we make.

Style tip: orange goes with everything

My Bring David Hicks Home mini-billboards have arrived this morning, thanks to GetUp! Stylishly Guantanamo Orange in colour - and water-proof! Now the dilemma is - where to put them? I live in a quiet little street where only the postman comes by. I worry they're not going to be effective here. And - I hate to admit this - there's something of the bumper sticker about them, of the Che Guevara poster in the student dormitory or the Aboriginal flag dangling from the art dealer's Paddington terrace. But - still - I must get over this post-Hippie malaise that has gripped us all. The cult of cool, which sidelined activism during the 80s and 90s, needs to be tossed, otherwise we'll be strangled by our collective ennui. Hearts back on the sleeves everyone! On January 11 Camp Delta will be five years old. Join the protest, get up, order your own free Bring David Hicks Home placard.

The Tempest on the Tennis Court

Reasons to watch the AAMI Kooyong Classic, starting next Wednesday, and the Australian Open, which begins on January 15? How about this one?

The China Syndrome

I don't make New Year's resolutions - but this year I thought, what the hell. I will not buy any clothing made in China. I will not spend my posperous Western bucks on anything that will steal the girlhood away from millions of young Chinese women. (See post "China Blue" 6/12).) I have so far held the line (five days and counting) but my resolution is proving trickier than I thought. I have deliberately NOT gone shopping, even though there are 50% reductions all over town. I do not need any more clothing. Nevertheless, my husband gave a gift certificate to Fleur Wood, which necessiatated a visit to Paddington Shopping Village. Luckily, Fleur's heavenly satin bias-cut slips are made in Australia, so I snaffled a brilliant midnight-teal one without breaking into a sweat. (It's very Maggie the Cat.) Then my inbuilt radar took me around the corner to Elizabeth Street, where Easton Pearson was having a sale. Again, all made in Australia - so, even though I was not buying anything, I bought a pretty black Victorian blouse that I'll treasure for years. But the Puma yoga pants at Rebel Sport had to be put back on the rack and the entire collection at Country Road was made in China. (Shame on you.) My husband says I am going to end up naked by the end of the year. But he forgets that I am still wearing clothes that are 25 years old. We called it "investment dressing" when I worked at Vogue back in the 70s and 80s. And it paid off. Photo courtesy of vogue.com.au

Not the wire coathanger!

Welcome 2007 - the International Year of the Drycleaner. At least it would have seemed so by the giant red neon coathanger that appeared last night on the Sydney Harbour Bridge. Or was it something to do with the fact that the bridge, affectionately known by all as the "coathanger," is 75 this year? One thing for sure - Joan Crawford would not be pleased. Maybe the spitting from the heavens that we all took for rain was actually Joan expressing her distaste.