Field Office

When it's a cold and wet Friday and staying in bed is not an option, going out for a coffee and a pastry is the next best thing.

After a long break, coffee-club is back and we visited The Field Office in the Fringe District.

You know those scenes in TV shows where the quirky single gal with a huge appetite and petite thighs spends her days tapping away at her Macbook and sipping a coffee while pondering the existence of any good men? While if those shows ever needed a perfect backdrop - and were filmed in Cape Town - this is it.

The Field Office as the name gives it away was created as an inspiring meeting point, a office without all the usual dramas, a quiet place to work or just a comfy place to be.

It's certainly that as you can either work as I saw some peeps doing, you can meet friends or you can just sip your coffee and watch the city. It's in the Fringe District so you just know it's bursting with creativity and cool people.

The other side of the cafe is a kind of showroom for Pedersen + Lennard furniture. The kind of pretty stuff I could never afford or never buy because I just know I'll mess it up.

The coffees were amazing and the pastries even more so. It's a large space so you can really just do your thang and not worry about anyone else. Also they have free WiFi. So if you wanna browse Facebook, er work really hard, you can.

If you're in the hood, check it out.

Field Office
37 Barrack Street
07h00 - 16h00

Ex-Oh! Ex-Oh!

Dear Future Boyfriend Part Twelve

Here’s a confession: I know us girls are crazy. I am probably one of the worst. Luckily for you I try and keep it in. Unluckily, it might all burst out in a shooting rampage one day. But back to the majority of girls…We change our minds all the time. We say one thing but we really mean another. We need you to break our codes. Yes we talk in codes. 

All these little things mean that boys try so hard to do the right thing, to impress us, to make us happy and they have it all wrong. And thanks to fairytales, romantic comedies, some of the men of Sex & the City there is so much more pressure to treat us girls well. So to help you out a bit, at least in the romance stakes, I have drawn up some simple guide to romance with some helpful hints.

Setting the Mood

Candles? They work. All the time. Girls love flattering light. Therefore a few well-placed candles are the perfect setting when you want to be romantic. Note, a few. Not shitloads. Not only is it dangerous. It will take ages to light all of them.

This just says "Hi there, nice bedroom, let me take off my pants."

Rose petals? They do not work. What a waste. Flowers are nice (see below point) but spread all over my house and on my bed? No thanks. Let me clarify that again, all over my bed. Hell no! If it’s my bed, you can bet that linen is Egyptian cotton because we are no longer students and can afford to sleep on soft sheets. As soon as you put rose petals on there, you either ruin the mood by waiting to clean it all up *or* you get busy on top of the petals. And then they stain. My sheets. My expensive sheets that you didn’t even notice are now ruined.

Bunch of Flowers

I’m not a big flower girl. I think they are lovely and receiving a big bunch at work is a sure-fire way to make the office mean girl hate you even more but they die. Quickly. And before they die, they get grotty and smell. Oh the smell. Therefore if you want to surprise me with flowers, try something different like an orchid which is classic and timeless or tulips which are not always in season. If you got me tulips I know you mean business. Or just save us both some time and just get me cupcakes. Even better a bouquet of cupcakes. 

Hello Lover!

Gifts

Most girls, I assume, love presents. And the mere fact you were thinking of us goes a long way. But there are only so many times we can fake joy at receiving a bad gift. Areas you can stay in and you will excel in:

Lingerie because sometimes you get the really sexy stuff we would never buy ourselves in case the La Senza lady judges us.

Jewellery because if it sparkles, it can stay.

Spa Vouchers because you almost always go for a package deal which includes everything or you give us a monetary value so we can get our Gellish done and not feel bad we spent over R200 for two weeks

Sadly there are so many places you can go wrong. Particularly clothes and/or jewellery. If you really, really think your lover wants a sequined boob-tube or horrible granny scarf then please re-think your purpose in life. Call her best friend or find a suave gay guy and ask them for help. We appreciate the gesture but there are some things that will not fly and this is one of them. 

THIS IS A HELL NO!

Public Displays of Love/Affection

Firstly I am not talking about necking in a club or shopping mall. I am talking about those large-scale proposal type events that guys in movies do. These have ruined me and the rest of the world’s girls into thinking that out there is a guy out there who loves us so much he will get a bunch of friends to perform a Bruno Mars song for us. Now I cannot sugar coat this. We all do want this. And we want a Youtube video out of it as well. The only compromise I can say is it doesn’t have to be a Bruno Mars song. A Jason Mraz song works just as well :)

 

Ex-Oh! Ex-Oh! 

Images from here, here, here, and  here.

Cosmopolitan and Revlon Polished Event

You know how they say every girl has something about her body she’d like a change? Well I have a list. And it’s long. Just one of my gripes are my hands and nails. My mother has long slender hands and those elegant, pointy nails. I have short, sausage-like stubs with square nails. Beauty therapists like to convince me they’re square-oval because at least that’s a fashionable shape. But these babies are nothing fashionable.

Since they don’t make magic knickers or a Wonderbra equivalent for nails, I resorted to the next best thing: nail polish. So from a young age when all I was allowed to use was that Tinkerbell stuff that you could peel off to the days of Gellish, my nails are almost always covered in varnish. You can imagine how attractive they look when I go bare. (Sometimes I like to scare men who have wronged me by flashing my nude nails at them and watching them recoil in fear)

So when I received an invite to Cosmo Polished event, I squealed with glee. In fact I probably did break out into a Glee-inspired number.

The event was hosted by Cosmopolitan (duh) and Revlon and held at the super-fancy Bree Street Studios. Me and one of my besties Sara grabbed some pink champers and made our way to the front row. Thanks Cosmo for the reserved seating, you know how to make a girl and her friend feel special.

The setup consisted of a nail station with all the essentials a girl would need for the perfect manicure. There was cotton buds, sponges, toothpicks (oh yeah), nail polish remover and some other products from the Revlon range. Most importantly there was stand of nail polish including Revlon’s latest collection Brilliant Strength. You may have noticed the ad campaign with Emma Stone doing the rounds at the moment.

 

To start we were welcomed by Cosmo’s new editor Cathy Lund, who is all kinds of adorable in real life. Seriously I wanted to hug her but that kind of behaviour normally gets me kicked out of events. She in turn introduced Chi Chi who was our manicure tutor. Chi Chi took us through three styles that are gonna change the way we do our nails: ombre, nail art and marble effect. No more boring red for us. Chi Chi showed us all the steps needed to try these three styles and you know what, she made it look *just as easy* as those smug bitches on Pinterest make it look.

 And the truth? It was relatively easy. To mess it up. Sara managed to do the marble effect on her first try. And it looked amaze. Seriously have a look. The rest of the nails were a little bit more interesting. Sara, if you’re reading this, love ya.

I attempted the ombre look. It was more like the sombre look if I’m honest. It was all going so well until I found a way to mess it up. In fact one of the very helpful and nice Revlon ladies had to come over and help me. Like the slow kid in a classroom. I was that girl.

While we were doing our nails, we were entertained by the band Shenfm who you have to check out. If only because they are super-hot. Music isn’t bad either :)

 

So after numerous attempts at trying to create some nail art, I finally succeeded and came up with this masterpiece. Yes that is a smiley face with eyebrows. Take that Pinterest!

Massive thanks to the wonderful peeps at Cosmopolitan who invited us and made this whole evening special. Special shout out to all the Revlon girls for not laughing at my nail art and being so patient with me. Also massive props for the insane goodie bag. I didn’t take a picture of the contents because as soon as I peeked inside it was a goner. Hopefully this picture will suffice.

How we roll at events.

 

Why I'll probably not be invited to another event.

Enjoying the life (while we can).

Ex-Oh! Ex-Oh!