I’ll let you catch up with it all if you’ve not been following by pointing you to Amber’s summary of the issue on  The Fashion Police. I’ll wait here.

Okay, now, all reasonable people will now be agreed that:

• There is no ideal shape / weight / size. You can only eat well and do adequate / ample exercise.
• A mixture of physical role models is lovely an’ all, but role models based on achievement, rather than appearance, would be even better.

If you’re not reasonable, then good luck to you. I might publish your comments anyway.

Now for the tangential bit. Ms Featherstone went on to clarify that she did not mean what the Daily Mail said she meant, which I have no trouble believing. But she also used the term ‘stick insect’ to describe thin women, which is a bit off, from where I’m sitting. I’m happy to use the word ‘skinny’ – my husband is skinny, and looks great, thanks very much – because in my head it’s a description, not an insult. But there’s no way to read ‘stick insect’ kindly.

Yet, for the bigger woman, Featherstone used the accepted euphemism of the day: ‘curvy’. I understand that the word ‘fat’ is upsetting to many because it’s been used as an insult for so long that people have forgotten that it’s just a fact. Of course, not every person wearing a size 14 plus IS fat. Some of them are genuinely just big. Or muscular. Or so tall they wear a bigger size but are still perfectly toned. But, equally, not everyone wearing a size 14 plus is curvy. Some are straight up and down. Or, like me, they’re just a bit overweight.

Actually I’m curvy AND fat, and a UK size 14 (US10-ish). I have weight to lose, and muscles to tone. As soon as I’ve recovered from the imminent birth of my first child, I plan to start building up to doing more regular exercise cos I’m unfit and that makes me tired and fed up and there’s heart disease in my family. But when I use the word ‘fat’, people wince and look uncomfortable. They think I’m fishing for compliments, or being unnecessarily self-hating.

So, in many ways, bloggers and journalists are caught between a rock and a hard place. They feel they can be blithely rude about thin women, but even if they’re sensitive enough not to be insulting are safe using ‘thin’ or ‘slim’ or ‘slender’ because these are factual. But ‘fat’ is equally factual – in some cases – and yet it’s completely unthinkable to use it. I hesitate to use it about anyone but myself because I know how hurtful it can be; it’s taken me years to accept it because I know with what vitriol it’s usually delivered.

My compromise is to stick to ‘bigger’ as it’s still factual yet not as mealy-mouthed as ‘curvy’ ‘plus size’ / ‘out size’ (out of WHOSE size?) or ‘voluptuous’ (‘voluptuous’ is to ‘fat’ what ‘flamboyant’ used to be to ‘gay’), although there are probably times when both curvy and voluptuous are appropriate as well – just not as a description of SIZE. They could apply to very small women too. No one could realistically call Salma Hayek fat, but my Lord is she curvy.

We’ve been working so hard to reclaim one F-word (feminism, in case you were wondering), that we’ve lost another one. It’s no longer safe to describe someone as fat, even when they are. Yet it’s okay to demonise thin women and liken them to pretty unpleasant things – I kept stick insects as a child and I can assure you there’s nothing alluring about their appearance. They’re also very boring.

So what is a writer who cares about women feeling happy, confident and healthy and wants to write about these issues to do? Fly the fat banner with pride, or prevaricate around the point? I genuinely don’t know the answer.

There are so many things I want to be doing, but my head can’t seem to get it together. I want to write some posts for BitchBuzz because it is an awesome site that Cate Sevilla has worked her arse off to make a success. I want to get back to writing the damn novel I’m 20,000 words into, but somehow when I try it all comes out sounding wrong and then I get dispirited. I know that is exactly the point at which I should continue to write, not give up, but I’m scared I’ll end up so irritated that I’ll scrap the whole lot. Although I think my husband might go mad if I did that; he actually enjoyed reading it. I want to plough on and finish before I go back and edit because otherwise edit is all I’ll do, but I can’t take my mind off a continuity slip I know is festering in one of the earlier chapters.

I want to review the mighty Keris Stainton’s excellent book, Della Says: OMG! but the words are Just. Not. Coming.

On the flipside, I have filled up the freezer with meals and baking to be enjoyed after Octobaby makes her appearance, and I have got almost everything ready for her room, etc. I have an appointment with the consultant next week to ensure I’m still low risk and can keep planning for the birth I’d prefer (on the understanding that ultimately it’s Octobaby that decides). I do need to step up the hypnobirthing practice a bit but I haven’t let it slide completely either. Octobaby is currently forcing us all into a guessing game by refusing to reveal to the midwife which end is up (or down) – perhaps she’s re-enacting the tale of the Grand Old Duke of York – which is making me slightly nervous. Yes, I’d rather have a planned Caesarean than an unplanned breech birth, but I will be a little bit gutted if it comes to that, because surgery was the one thing I wanted to avoid, and I have had back surgery that makes me worry about the effects of an epidural.

I now feel huge but am apparently still not carrying that prominently considering that on Saturday I’ll be a full eight months gone. But then, it’s a novelty having clothing clinging to my stomach and not feeling self-conscious about it!

Mr. G. is taking a couple of days off – tomorrow and Monday – to help get the final bits and bobs ready to welcome our little wriggler into the world, so I’m hopeful this will fill me with renewed purpose, so that I’m not wandering around the house reading baking books and wittering to the cats. Because I have my retirement for that. (Joke! I have very active parents and in-laws; I am not being ageist. Promise.)

I’m not talking about the professional kind, which are good, proper and helpful. The “by the way, these are my words not my employer’s” sort and “oh, this is my client” type are super duper. It’s the personal kind that are awkward. I suppose they’re not really disclaimers at all, but I think of them in the same category of “by the way, here’s something you should know”.

I’ve learned the hard way that if you just say something publicly* – on a Facebook status, for example – you get a barrage of advice, solicited or not. I’m not a fan of locking comments, even though that’s exactly what it avoids, because that also prevents the nice, private, supportive types from being able to comment. So I add in a point, sometimes at length, on the lines of: “this is a statement, not a question. No advice needed, ta.”

This, as I am often reminded when people go ahead and unleash their ‘helpful’ honesty anyway, is pointless.

So I have to examine my motivations. Why do I want to say it publicly in the first place? I guess it’s so that I can share something I’m excited about with my community of friends, but I suppose part of me also wants to share it as a broadcast, not a conversation. I’m happy to absorb the support and goodwill, but when someone challenges me (even if I’m completely 100% sure I’m right), it’s annoying and I just don’t want it.

Obviously that’s only the case in a very small number of posts. Most of them are open to challenge every which way. And maybe it’s an English thing; you just expect people to know which areas they should refrain from pelting you with advice about (like, say, childbirth). Though the Greek part of me laughs with unbridled scorn at the idea that people you’re close to would, you know, keep their opinions to themselves. After all, if your close friends and family can’t give it to you straight…

I always roll my eyes a bit when people don’t realise that what they say online is in the public domain, and yet here I am hypocritically expecting to be the exception to the rule just because I asked nicely.

Yep. Alex, you’re just going to have to suck it up. If you broadcast it, replies will come. Remember that.

*I only have friends and close colleagues on my Facebook profile. It is otherwise locked down for a reason, which is that it’s nice to have a closed community sometimes. Twitter and this blog are public; knock yourselves out.

So duly I sit down with my cuppa and biccies to listen to one of the worst Cock-er-nee accents ever committed to film, but before we even get to the jolly holiday scene, Mr. G. glances at the Spoonful of Sugar scene and comments:

“Those are American robins, you know.”

They’re also mechanical, I point out. Big, creaky, 1960s mechanical birds.

“But I can prove it! They’re American robins!”

I gently point out I’m not really bothered. [Read: I kicked my legs up and down on the sofa squealing "I don't care! I don't care!"]

He waves the laptop at me triumphantly, displaying a picture of American robins which are, indeed, rather sizeable compared to their teeny British cousins.

Then he goes a stage further:

“Look! All these film error sites point it out as well!”

I quietly point out that he has thus far been able to accept a woman sailing up the bannisters, pulling ridiculously large objects out of a carpet bag and cleaning up a nursery just by clicking her fingers, and yet a pair of non-British robins that are CLEARLY MECHANICAL bothers him.

“True.”

The room briefly falls quiet.

Then he pipes up just one last time.

“Also, they’re both male.”

He doesn’t just talk about mice, ears, the Luftwaffe and cheese, you know.

Of course, it’s babies on the brain around here, as I practice my relaxation and breathing, argue with doctors over prescribing me antibiotics that clearly state they’re not to be taken during pregnancy and battle to make sure all my ducks are in a row before I leave work in four weeks (gulp).

It’s going to be so strange not working, but I have good intentions to keep up with everything religiously so I’m well-informed and ready to bounce back when I return. Good intentions that might fall by the wayside with my sleeping patterns, but at least the determination is there! I enjoy my job, and want to make sure a long break won’t affect it.

In the meantime, I’m now fielding more and more of The Questions, since I’m showing quite prominently now. There’s also The Comments (“you don’t look big enough for nearly seven months!” – er, thanks), but The Questions are a lot more unsettling. They seem to fall into rough trimester categories too:

First trimester / just post-announcement:

“Was it planned? / Were your trying?” Two questions so personal that if anyone stopped to think what they meant they’d never, ever ask them again.

“Do you want a boy or a girl?” I dunno. I’m kinda hoping for a kitten.

Second trimester / starting to show:

“How do you feel? / Do you feel sick?” Not. Everyone. Gets. Morning. Sickness. Also, I’m now paranoid I look as tired as I feel…

“Do you know what it is yet?” A baby?

“Are you going to find out what it is?” You mean, am I going to tell you. Maybe.

“I suppose it’s easier to buy for them once you know what they are, isn’t it?” Only if you live for stereotypes…

Third trimester:

“How long do you have left?” In life? Who knows?

“Aren’t first babies always late?” *sigh* No. Also, ‘late’ and ‘early’ are faintly ridiculous terms when you consider that anything from 38 weeks to 42 weeks is a normal, full term pregnancy.

“Are you nervous?” Nah, not at all. Facing up to pushing a 7-10lb butterball out of myself for the first time, knowing that it’s a perfectly natural process but beset with negative impressions of childbirth from ridiculously inaccurate media portrayals doesn’t get to me in the slightest. *stare*

“Have you thought of a name?” Yes. No, I’m not going to tell you what it is.

In all seriousness, I sound much crankier than I actually feel, and I don’t really mind people asking me things; it’s nice that they care, or at least make a show of caring! Just once in a while it would be nice if the pattern varied, but hey, I’m sure I’ve done it myself in the past.

And once she’s out, I’ll probably default back to The Questions towards other people, too. Oops.

I’ve only included the main three because they’re the only ones with a hope in Hell of winning. Besides which, lovely as it is to have the widespread choices of a Libertarian, an independent, a Green and a UKIP representative, I was never going to vote for any of them anyway. The constituency is new, but is considered a Labour-held area as until recently it was partly Ealing North (under Stephen Pound) and mostly Ealing, Acton & Shepherd’s Bush (under Andrew Slaughter, who has gone with the White City / Shepherd’s Bush chunk).

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Labour: Bassam Mahfouz

His website is a bit DIY, but obviously I approve of his use of WordPress.  He’s obviously embraced the web in some way for some time as there are posts going back to 2008, but an awful lot of the monthly archives have just one post.  This picks up considerably at the beginning of this year, but is it too much to ask for someone who cares about the area to be updating on a regular basis all year round, and not just when election fever strikes?

The blog posts that are there, however, tend to stick to active campaigns in the area rather than relentless slagging off other parties (there’s a dig at the Conservative uncertainty over Crossrail, but given how big an impact that would have on Ealing I call that allowable), which is refreshing.

There’s no whiff of a Twitter feed, but there is a Facebook group. I await my request to join to be confirmed so that I can see if it’s particularly active or interesting; disappointing that it’s not a page as it suggests a rather closed style of communication. So close to an election, should I have to wait to communicate? There’s also a feed of general Labour news.

I’d probably characterise this approach as cautiously open, which is a start.

Liberal Democrats: Jon Ball

If I’m not mistaken, Jon’s blog has undergone a design change (mainly for the better, though it’s made the header unreadable) in recent days. Again he’s a bit of a fairweather blogger, but in fairness he does explain that he had let the blog lapse and is re-starting it after mainly spending his time on Facebook.  This time it’s a profile instead of a page, which again I find disappointing; I don’t want to be best mates with my MP, or to have them see any of my information, I just want to be able to access them easily online.

Jon does have a Twitter feed, though, which is properly streamed into his Blogger-based site. I would love to see more about him and more about Ealing on it; again I suspect this is a symptom of the election, but I’m tired about hearing why Labour and Conservative parties are wrong or old hat – there’s been enough of that from Saint Nick. I want to know about Jon Ball and his campaigns in Ealing. His blog is considerably better at communicating these, in between the press releases about Nick’s surge (which just makes me think of childbirth – ‘surges’ are what hypnobirthing practitioners call contractions) and what the Evening Standard said about the Lib Dems.

Given he works in TV and film, I would have expected Jon’s online offerings to be the most media-savvy and marketing-savvy and so, to give him credit, they are. It’s not always appealing, but it is always open.

Conservatives: Angie Bray

The only candidate for whom I haven’t received a leaflet in the post, so the only one I would judge entirely online, Angie goes for the middle ground with her website. It’s not a blog, but it’s not impersonal. Because it’s not a blog, it gets away with the irregularity of news additions, though it’s a shame they’re in stilted third person. She does get full marks for being the only one with a boundary map of the new constituency (the council’s own website still hasn’t been update to reflect the boundary changes, and there were no mailings of any sort to explain the changes to a perplexed electorate).

There’s a survey section, which is promising but sadly doesn’t deliver a great deal; one active poll has been running for a while and there’s only one previous one.  There are some personal areas, such as ‘How I See It’ and plenty of opportunities to get in contact, but aside from the polls no public spaces for doing so. There are no Twitter, Facebook, thread comments or similar.

It’s the most professional looking offering – and the least likely to snark at the other parties – but sadly the most distant (ironically enough, since locally I’ve been told by people in the area that Angie’s very approachable by email; it would be nice if she lived up to that online).

===

I can’t say that online representation would ultimately sway my hand from one party to another in the polling booth. I’m also not nearly simplistic enough to believe this tells me much about the general parties. In hack’s hands, I could see the headlines: Labour “a bit DIY”, LibDems “media savvy”, Conservatives “a bit distant”. Chortle, chortle, and everyone returns to their preconceived tribe. But it does tell me a bit about how the candidates want to be seen, and that in itself is very interesting indeed.

And I am quite enjoying it. I appreciate that this is because I’ve had a bit of a textbook pregnancy, with few strong symptoms and nothing that’s too tricky to handle. The worst part has been the restricted lung capacity, given I walk up stairs to work and was pretty unfit to begin with, but I’m not using it as an excuse not to exercise; now that I have my energy back – the first trimester was quite sleepy, tis true – I am swimming two or three times a week and walking as much as possible. Nothing earth shattering, but at least the minimum I can do to make sure Bumplet is getting her due.

I’ve also been doing a lot of relaxation practice, breathing, affirmations and visualisation as part of hypnobirthing preparation. You can read about what it is over at BitchBuzz but suffice to say I’ve already begun to feel a lot more confident about the birthing process in general.  Not that I would ever suggest for a second that bad pregnancy symptoms are caused by a stressed mother or anything, but I do wonder if my lack of stressing about it is contributing to the general positive, healthy feeling.

Funny thing is, after last year’s battery of gallstone removal, glandular fever and dreadful cold after fluey, dreadful cold, I feel completely and utterly healthy. Even though I’m immunosuppressed (pregnancy does that). Weird.

Anyway, the nursery is now almost ready; just a nursing chair and a single bed for me left to buy, and I’ll do that when I’m on leave as I can schedule the deliveries better. I can’t believe there’s only 9 weeks to go before I have a month’s holiday followed by a planned nine months maternity leave. I am having the odd panic about that; I’ve not taken this long a break from work since coming out of full time education, and it does seem strange. I worry about keeping myself relevant and involved in the industry when I don’t have time to follow and tweet, and can only hope that I plunge back into the social media world as swiftly and decisively as I plunged into it in the first place.

We seem to be up to our eyes in 0-3 months clothing too. I doubt my daughter will have time to wear it all before she outgrows it! And speaking of outgrowing clothes, I’m thrilled to find that I’m not doing so as quickly as I’d feared; I’m still getting by on:

1 x maternity jeans

1 x maternity black trousers

1 x maternity leggings

3 x maternity tops

1 x maternity smart dress

Today I’m wearing a pre-pregnancy dress and I even still fit in some of my zip-sided skirts, although I concede they no longer sit on the hip and therefore ride a lot higher than before. I’ve done the top-to-bottom tape measure bump thing and everything seems to be on course in terms of centimetres to weeks ratio. My weight is about what it should be (it rose suddenly and then plummeted again at one point but I can only assume that since that coincided with doing more exercise that doesn’t really mean anything. Especially as I do replace my exercise calories!).

I’d be amazed if anyone other than a curious pregnant woman or a reminiscing mother was still with me at this point, but if you are I appreciate your dedication. As a reward, I offer you a link to something I read yesterday which I found so honest, simple and truthful that it has stuck in my mind since I clicked on the link. If nothing else, it certainly proves – should anyone doubt it – that teenagers can be insightful and eloquent:

Steph Bowe: Body Image

I have been blogging about it; just not here. If you like rants about cats and toxoplasmosis, the myths surrounding morning sickness and the way gender stereotypes are reinforced before the womb has even been exited, you can find them in my other, oft-neglected, more personal blog.

Mum is currently brewing up some dyed eggs (the traditional red, but also some yellow and green) so we can introduce my in-laws to the concept of egg-smashing on Sunday. They, in turn, took my parents through the world’s most abridged Passover Seder night ever. The eggs were always my favourite part of the post-fast fun, but funnily enough it’s not the memories of obliterating eggshell that always come to mind when I see them, freshly coloured and polished with a little olive oil, heaped in an obliging pile on the table. No, those memories are upstaged by a cat.

One of my parents’ late cats, Zoey, was an absolutely brilliant footballer. No kitten ball, rolled up bit of foil or bottle cap was safe. And one pre-Easter morning, we awoke to find strange patches of blue on the carpet. Even more bewilderingly, we found strange patches of blue on Zoey. It was only after a few minutes, when we saw her leave the room and then heard a rhythmic ‘tock… tock… tock…’ down the corridor that we discovered she’d nicked a blue-dyed egg from the table and was enthusiastically dribbling it down the hallways. Luckily the dye was non-toxic, but we learned to always keep the eggs tucked away from the cats after that.

God willing, this is my last Pesach and Easter without a child. Next year, my daughter will still be too young to know the stories, but I’ll make sure she gets used to the sound of matzo cracking and eggs smashing, and the tastes of sweet haroset and rich roast lamb. I look forward to her developing her own memories of both, and telling me one day what Easter eggs make her think of. And I’ll tell her all about Zoey, too.

Happy celebrations, if you have them. And if you don’t, then just enjoy the time off!

Happy Whatever You Do or Don’t Celebrate to you all.

A. x

*Mokus is the Hungarian word for squirrel. I am not Hungarian; however, I have Hungarian friends who in the past labelled Ashley “The Mokus”. This is why my Twitter name is @mokuska (“little squirrel”). Strange, and not that interesting, huh?

I thought Snaffle was very obliging in the second shot considering he usually doesn’t sit still for more than three seconds together and generally doesn’t like me. But he seems to like the smell of my mineral foundation and even licked my chin. Kitten breath is not as cute as it sounds…