Many blogging returns

Why Miss Jones is 100 posts old today. I know, we don't look a day over 75.

Thank you if you have read or commented on any part of it. Just dump your coat in the bedroom. And why don't you wear one of these?

Party ring?

Now, let's dance.

Apologies for the sound quality, but just look at the awesomeness of the Ikettes' moves. And Ike Turner here just reinforces the lesson that you should never trust a man in a poloneck.

Snowdon for the trophy

White smoke at TV Centre. The Strictly Come Dancing line-up is official. 

I am disappointed for the following reasons: 

Reason one: Stephanie Beacham cannot be in it every year. 

Reason two: After discussions with various female friends, I am asserting that we have been unequivocally short-changed in the hotness stakes. Let us examine the evidence. The women are: Lisa Snowdon (fox), Rachel Stevens (dwarfish, bovine, but nonetheless clearly a fox), Cherie Lunghi (fox for the dads), Christine Bleakley (bland teatime fox), Jodie Kidd (posh polo fox), Gillian Taylforth (older, borderline fox but shades it because crucially, as my friend Colin is wont to say, looks like she knows her onions), Jessie Wallace (not a fox, but seems like she'd be Up For It), Heather Small (not, to me, a fox, plus has a voice that could crack paving slabs).

Boxes for foxes ticked: 6.25/8

Let us now turn to the men. Mark Foster (fox with ludicrous Disney Strong Man physique), Tom Chambers (fox), Austin 'Hairpiece' Healey (fox potential, were he accepting of the receding hairline issue – chicks dig vulnerability, Austin), Don Warrington (bizarrely, borderline older fox), Andrew Castle (as bland as rice pudding, significantly less comforting, therefore non fox), Phil Daniels (less a fox, more a Jack Russell terrier), John Sargeant (adorable but profound non fox), Gary Rhodes (massive, massive cock – sorry Dad, I know you were inexplicably a fan but the apple falls many miles from the tree on this one).

Boxes for foxes ticked: 2.75/8

There has been a lot of talk of glass ceilings in the media this week. No one, though, is talking about the glass ballroom floor that symbolises the sexual inequality of hotness on Strictly Come Dancing. Perhaps, on reflection, I can see why this is. But ultimately, the line-up is irrelevent as the Strictly soap opera irresistibly weaves its way around whatever celebrity bookings they've scraped together. And anyway, like some Saturday teatime translation of The Breakfast Club, there will always be, in the simplest terms and the most convenient definitions:

The Princess Dead-behind-the eyes, highly competent but ultimately unlovable (Emma Bunton, Rachel Stevens)

The LadyJock Hideously ambitious former captain of Games, again may prove unpopular (Gaby Logan, horse-riding Jodie Kidd)

The Ladette (with apologies for hideous 90s terminology) Game girl with throaty laugh, adored by men and women (Alesha/La Snowdon)

The Puppy: Blandly attractive pet to be trained by high-maintenance Camilla Dallerup (James Martin/Gethin Jones/Tom Chambers)

The Geezer: Cheeky diminutive tryer who throws himself wholeheartedly into Carry On-style, nudge-and-a-wink-laden but ultimately slightly nauseating routines (Dominic Littlewood, Phil Daniels)

The Lurch: Starts badly, ends badly (Dennis Taylor, Quentin Wilson, John Sargeant)

The Journey Man: Sportsperson who goes on a sequinned voyage of self-discovery and learns to move his hips independently of other body parts (Darren Gough, Matt Dawson, Austin Healey (?))

The Journeyman: Works hard, improves steadily, nobody cares (Carol Smillie, Andrew Castle)

I could go on, but I have to go and work on my new-series Strictly Bingo Cards/Drinking Game. Wield your Mecca dobber/take a drink/have a Hobnob every time a) Arlene fluffs one of her pre-written over-alliterative comments, b) Anton makes desperate reference to his heterosexuality, c) any of the judges make a water-based pun when critiquing Mark Foster (thanks to Miss W for this entry)… You get the idea, I'm sure.

What fresh hell is this?

Following the boot/stiletto unishoe, and the shirt/jumper combigarment of my previous post, today in Dorothy Perkins I stumbled upon further joined-up madness in the dregs of the sale. A shirt (nice) sewn onto a skirt (OKish) to make a dress (TOTALLY DERANGED). Where will it all end? I will tell you. One day in the not-too-distant future every one of us will be wearing all-in-one adult babygros with hoods and laughing as we remember the dark days of separates.

I hung the skirt-shirt-dress on the end of the rail while I fumbled with the camera on my phone, and during this time someone actually picked the fabric behemoth up with genuine enthusiasm slash admiration. They proceeded to hold it up against themselves for several minutes in the mirror. Readers, I knew not whether to laugh or cry. As they pondered, I noticed them doing their Trying On Clothes face. Everyone has one – a highly individual combination of scepticism and studied nonchalance. In the same way, everyone has a Photo Face – the expression they effect when posing for a picture, which they think portrays them to their best advantage, and disguises their least favourite part. Most people's expressions are identical in any posed picture you see of them – in the shadow of the Eiffel Tower, at a birthday party, to the left-hand side of the bride.

Mrs Jones, in her own words, 'can't wear hats' and I believe this is entirely due to her Hat Face, which is at once apologetic and embarrassed, so that as soon as she tries on any kind of headgear, it immediately looks all wrong. Confidence is key. The confidence to wear a hat. The confidence to know something looks good or not. The confidence to match your own stupid clothes together. 

And big breath in and out.

And I'm moving on.

These boots are made for burning

I would like to be able to pretend to you, friends, that life is all swiss roll and mild sexual content, but the fact is, there are darker forces at work, all around us, all the time, and I cannot hide this from you. At any moment, we may turn a corner, only to be assailed by Fear and Pain, waiting to jam a sprig of unlucky heather into our buttonholes.

It happened to me today. No, no, don't worry, I'm OK. You know, in myself. But this morning I turned the page of the magazine I was flicking through, only for my eyes to be maimed by the sight of the Ugliest Shoes In The World.

I'm sorry that I have to visit them upon you in turn, but you cannot run from real life. And the truth is that someone, somewhere, finished the manufacturing of these boots, and said, metaphorically or otherwise, 'Hey guys, look what we made! High five!'

I think with their patent detailing, they may be essaying some essence of brogue. But what they actually look like is a pair of not very nice brown suede boots, with a pair of not very nice black stiletto sandals worn over the top. This, however, is such a repellant notion which goes utterly against all that is natural and right, that your brain refuses to entertain it – and instead thinks it is looking at a pair of bare legs which are actually made of brown suede, wearing a pair of black patent slingbacks. Which in turn would suggest, if you are the hapless wearer, that:

a) your depilatory and moisturising routines could use some attention

b) you are probably choosing to present your legs as being a dramatically different skin tone to the rest of your body

c) you are one half of a pantomime horse.

The composite garment is, any form, a wretched and deceiving creature. You're enjoying some recreational shopping. You're admiring a shirt, which appears to be displayed in a 'serving suggestion' style, beneath a sleeveless jumper, on a hanger. However, when you try to separate them you find they are stitched together, and the shirt you have fallen for is no more than two sleeves, a collar and half a decolletage. Oh yes, you can wear it, but only with the tank top that they – the Fashion 'System' – have deemed its perfect partner. Well, comrades, I will not be told. If I want to wear a tank top with nothing underneath – like some kind of sleeveless Michael Douglas-at-the-disco in Basic Instinct – that is exactly what I will do, and damn the chafing. If I want to own a blouse that is made from more material than the average handkerchief, I will not be stayed.

This Frankenstein vestment is, in my experience, found in shops who imagine their customers to be busy career girls on the go, women who actually admit to having a working wardrobe. Oh yes, one of these superwomen can multi-task – breastfeeding triplets while simultaneously doing pilates and giving a presentation on corporate response to climate change – but can she select, and furthermore put on, two different items of top-half clothing in the morning? Oof, give her a chance. We only got the vote in 1928. Baby steps.

Dictionary corner part 462 - holiday special

Offshore frotting (noun) Safe-sexual water-bound physical interaction with attractive foreign stranger during vacation time. Origin: ANON.

With thanks to one of Miss Jones's favourite readers for this addition to the lexicon.

Train manners

I was on the train to work this morning, and we had reached the stage of the journey when more people were getting off than getting on. And as I began to enjoy the sense of calm that was descending on the carriage, I became aware of a repetitive, snip-snipping noise over my shoulder.

When I turned around, I saw that a perfectly respectable-looking woman (slightly reminiscent of Alison Steadman, wearing a smart red coat and glasses) had taken out some nail clippers and was very loudly cutting her fingernails. Clippety-clip, she went, as she propelled pieces of her dead tissue all over the train carriage.

I'm always surprised by the lack of inhibition displayed by my fellow commuters. Of course, it's not unusual to sit next to someone who is energetically applying foundation, or painting their nails and subjecting the rest of their carriage to the heady smell of solvents. But on one occasion, I sat opposite a woman who took out a pair of tweezers and began plucking hairs from her upper lip, while three blobs of eye-catching, luminous white spot cream worked their magic elsewhere on her face. Some part of me is admiring of anyone who can be so thoroughly unselfconscious and immune to the raised eyebrows of those around them. But there is no part of me at all that would be admiring if a shard of someone else's fingernail should land in my cardboard cup of coffee. Badly done, pseudo Steadman.

The baking battle cry

As human beings, it is our duty to undertake great labours, take risks, push boundaries, strive ever harder, ever further, for enlightenment. That is what separates us from animals. Well, this and Topshop. The time has come for me to undertake just such an endeavour.

Readers, I invite you to join me on a epic journey that will take place over the next few weeks  – I, Miss Jones (34), will attempt to bake a Swiss Roll.

I believe I have been specially chosen to undertake this mission, and I will tell you for why. I was given a sign. I walked into the kitchen at work this afternoon and there on the worktop was the box of a Marks & Spencer Lemon Swiss Roll. And suddenly, at that point, in that kitchen, there was nothing I wanted more in this world than a slice of that Swiss Roll. But there was none. The box was empty. So why had it been sent to test me thus? It was a mystery until I remembered that a couple of weeks before I had been in East Dulwich's most upmarket French-themed salon de thé, and there, on display amid the everyday tableau of fruit tart and carrot cake, was a Swiss Roll. At the time, I only noticed the mere novelty of it - Swiss Roll? who serves Swiss Roll? – but today I realised it was another jam-filled voice joining in with The Calling. And The Calling said, 'Miss Jones, you must bake a large flat sponge, spread it with jam and buttercream, roll it up using all your skill and strength, and do not allow your bones or your spirit to be crushed in the attempt.'

Like all baking warriors, I developed my fear and respect for the Swiss Roll as a tiny child, watching Mrs Jones, the mistress of many kinds of cakes and biscuits, wrestle with the spongey beast, amid much under-the-breath mum-swearing and nervous breath-holding by the rest of the family. If I had been writing this last summer you would have heard about me scaling a previous personal Matterhorn as I emerged flushed but triumphant from the battle of Miss Jones v Meringues – pavlova, to be precise. I feared the making of them no longer. Now I sweep the challenge of meringues aside as though they were brittle castles of sugar, and I am ready for a new adversary. A creature that has fallen out of fashion, and is more elusive, but no less dangerous, with its knack for collapsing utterly in your grip during the critical rolling process.

I need only choose my weapons – raspberry jam or rhubarb jam? buttercream or fresh cream? go kamikaze with an Arctic Roll? – and It. Is. On.