something secret

Here's some random but also awesome news: I've decided to participate in National Novel Writing Month  and write my first novel! Completely left field I know, but I've always wanted to write a novel, and what better time to start than now? I've always been a huge reader. When I was in primary school, my teacher called my parents in because she kept catching me reading story books under that desk during class. What can I say? Math was boring. Roald Dahl was not. Books and the stories within them have always been a huge part of my life and to this day, I always have a book on hand in my handbag for unexpected downtime. I honestly think I've read upwards of two thousand books in my lifetime, and that's not counting the ones I keep going back to because I love them. Writing a book of my own has always been something I wanted to do, mostly just to be able to say that I did it, but I don't have the discipline to start and finish a project like that on my own unfor...

On Monday 26th August, 2013, I published an article entitled Solidarity Is For Miley Cyrus: The Racial Implications Of Her VMA Performance.  The article quickly went viral, accumulating over one million views, 700 comments, and 100K facebook shares in a little over 24 hours. That does not include the traffic that this blog received from cross-posting the article. Response was divided, but largely positive, with many people emailing me personally to thank me for the piece, and a number of influential people reposting and discussing the article. This is a summary of the events that led up to my writing the article. Continue Reading My Brilliance! >>>

The response to the Miley article has been way, WAY disproportionate to what I was expecting. While I've gotten some really sincere positive feedback, I've also had to deal with some devious trolling and personal attacks, and I'm not really able to deal with all of it on my own. So the comments on this blog (and on the original article over at groupthink) are now closed indefinitely. I will likely never turn the GT comments back on, but the comments here will be back as soon as I think the trolls that have been circling find something else to do with their time. I'm just one person, and I can't deal with all of the moderation on my own, and frankly this whole thing is stressing me out. So I'm taking a mental health sabbatical, and simply making this space a rhetorical one until further notice.  To my new readers, I hope you will stay, and that you find other content here that you find engaging. I haven't forgotten you, and I've very grateful for your eye...

You may have heard, but the new online Instagram profiles are here. The layout is simple, but effective, and functions much the same way that it does on your smartphone. It's very basic, and is mostly a way to view your Instagram pictures online rather than to engage in the Instagram community the way you can in mobile format. I'd like to see an option to search for users come in future (unless it's already there and I've somehow missed it) and the ability to browse your newsfeed, but for now, it suffices. If you're on Instagram, connect with me! I only recently joined, but I'm loving it so far. My username is BattyMamzelle  (predictably) and I'm having a lot of fun sussing out the different ways that people are using Instagram to share their lives.

So... I did this little thing where I changed the name of my blog. AGAIN. I know, I'm a pain in the ass. I've been thinking on this for a little while now, and I think this change is for the best. It's going to take me a little while to sort out all of the kinks and update all my links, so pretty please bear with me if things are a little wonky for the rest of the week. In any case, the new name of my blog is BattyMamzelle . There is a meaning behind it, but I'll wait until I've settled all the technical things before I write a detailed post about it. The new/temporary URL (until I get around to re-purchasing a domain) is www.battymamzelle.blogspot.com . All m other networks will change accordingly. ( twitter.com/BattyMamzelle etc.) Again, I'm SUPER SORRY that this is happening so suddenly and AGAIN, (I switched to PLola in January)  but I think it's a neccessary change, and I don't plan on changing again. I'm trying to have the old URL redirect here...

via Freshed Baked Sketches I am employed. So basically a miracle happened. I started last Friday, and I'm now officially a copywriter at an advertising firm. I won't say where yet because I don't know if I'm allowed to and I had to sign some scary looking confidentiality contracts... I'M PEGGY YOU GUYS. My middle name is even Margaret. FOR SERIOUS. Okay now that I've indulged myself and compared myself to Peggy Olsen, (as if) I actually really like this job. I mean, it's been a week, so it might be too early for sweeping assessments, but everyone is really nice, the work is fun and challenging, we drink rum on Fridays.... it's pretty sweet! I'm excited to do a little more and have more responsibility because bored is essentially death to me, and I want to feel like I'm earning my keep. The only thing that sucks is having to get up at 5AM to beat the traffic and get into town on time. I have been sleeping until 10AM for FOUR YEARS. This responsibi...

It's my birthday!  I'm 22! I'm an adult and I can drink! I'm an adult and I have to pay taxes... I'm an adult and I have to find a job so I can pay taxes... via somecards.com Never mind. This isn't fun anymore. But  anyway ... sob stories aside, it is my birthday today and I'm grateful that I've made it through another year. I'm not so grateful that I have class on my birthday and that instead of going out drinking and/or stuffing my face with cake surrounded by my nearest and dearest I will spend tonight studying for a quiz. Yay? via quickmeme.com ugh, omg THIS. But as it turns out, my aunt and I have the same birthday, and I never even knew! (Not a biological aunt. Long story...) Oddly enough it does make things a little more fun. :) Although I'm not quite here yet: via shesonehotmama.blogspot.com I AM feeling a little bitter that I'm not at home (in Trinidad) for my birthday. This is the first time that's happened since my family moved...

I'm bored. Like, SUPER bored. I'm bored with my life. I'm bored with fashion and I'm bored with this blog. I've been thinking about it a lot recently (hence the extended hiatus) and fashion blogging really is inherently stupid. I mean... what is the point? And this is more specifically about personal style bloggers, but HOW ARE YOU FAMOUS FOR DRESSING YOURSELF? No one pays me to get up and put on clothes... When you step away from the situation and you get some perspective, you start realizing how frivolous fashion really is.There are simply more interesting things that I could be doing. So, I'm going to start doing them. One of the biggest frustrations that I've always had with this blog is that in my attempt to try to keep it focused on fashion photography, I've ended up severely limiting the scope of things that I post about. I love fashion and photography, but it's not all  I love. via I Want Candy Illustration Anyone who knows me knows that I...

via PLola Underground Magazine [Volume.1/ Issue. 1] TA DA! I've finally, FINALLY gotten around to embedding my magazine to this blog. Last semester, I worked on a semester long project to create, brand, write and design a magazine from the ground up. With a team of four other girls, we slaved for hours in the lab putting together our vision of the magazine that we wanted to see.  I'm so incredibly proud of this and I'm so glad to be able to share it with my readers. In the tabs above, you'll find the link to a full digital copy of the magazine. Unfortunately I haven't figured out how to lay it out in spreads so you'll have to read it page by page, but c'est la vie! I'm just proud to be able to showcase it all. If this picture looks familiar, it's because it's the Emerson Elephant ! How awesome is it that my photograph made the cover?! If none of my dreams come true and I never make another magazine cover in my life, at least I'll have this o...

This year will hopefully be a year of milestones for me. If everything goes according to plan, I'll be graduating university, starting grad school, and moving to New York all before the year is up. I'm excited and hopeful, and I can't wait. Rachel Roy sketch for The Hunger Games. I promise to be this awesome in 2012. In addition to finally taking on adult responsibilities this year, I'm going to be trying to make some serious changes to this blog. I've been blogging for almost 3 years now, and in that time, I've learned so much about the fashion industry and about the blogosphere, and the relationship between the two. I've made mistakes, and I've learned from them, and for 2012, I'd like to be more active about defining this space in a way better matches up with my interests in the fashion industry. In October when I was at TVFU, I got some great advice from Teen Vogue EIC, Amy Astley. She said that in writing a blog, you should try to "create w...

via proprposture UGH! it's been ages since I've posted. there's been so much going on in the back end of things that I haven't had a chance to sit down and talk about the changes that have happened here since the new year began. basically, i decided that for the new year, I wanted change. so I changed. inkblot*photography is now Promiscuous Lola , and that's going to mean a lot of different things in the coming months. for right now, however, it means I'll be on hiatus for a while. In switching over to the new URL, there were some problems, specifically with the pictures, and before I move forward, I'm moving backwards to make sure that everything is as it should be. it doesn't make sense to me to keeping building on top of a shaky foundation. i've been having to manually tread through my posts and re-edit each one, so as you can imagine, it's taking some time. the goal is to be back up by the time I leave trinidad on the 14th, so I can start th...