Everything you NEED to know about Black Friday

Attention all shopaholics, Black Friday is back!

For those of you that don’t know, Black Friday is the wedding day of the retail calendar. It’s one of the best days in the year to grab yourself a bargain and treat yourself to something that you’ve resisted buying all year round. So whilst Black Friday technically starts today, some retailers started offloading their bargains yesterday afternoon. Keen!

What once started as a one-day event in the US, is now a 4 or 5 day event across a large part of the globe. The day spread across the shores as the prices dropped, and you don’t even have to venture out of the house if you don’t want to – get your bargains online, right in time for Christmas!

The best thing about this year is that Black Friday 2014 is set to be bigger than ever before and, potentially, bigger than those Boxing Day sales that we LOVE. Its officially kick-starting the frantic online Christmas shopping season and I, for one, cannot wait. So before you’re named the fool, here are just a few of the one-off discounts that you could get your hands on over the next few days. Stand by for bargains!

Is 50% too tempting?

Topshop are offering up to 50% off selected lines. In other words, they’re not brave enough to take the big leap and discount all of their products, they’ve just chosen a select few. Jewellery, winter boots and fluffy knits seem to be the dominant garments for one of our favourite stores.

ASOS have taken the plunge with a 20% discount on EVERYTHING! Sounds great, right? But it doesn’t stop there. ASOS are feeling generous enough to continue their sale through until Tuesday. It’s the perfect opportunity to grab your hands on a trendy bargain for Christmas.

Boohoo are staying fairly neutral, with a 30% of everything. However, we know that we can always count on an online favourite for a little added extra – free delivery! There is nothing more frustrating than paying for item delivery. As if we haven’t paid enough already for what we’re purchasing, they have the cheek to add on another week’s wages in delivery. Scandalous. But not today!

Missguided might have a number of discount days throughout the year, but you certainly cannot say no to another 20% off. The increasingly popular online retailer are helping you out with discounts across all departments. Maybe its time for a new dress for the party season? Or maybe you just fancy another festive jumper? I know I do!

Can you resist Black Friday?

Miss Selfridge are teasing us with a juicy 50% off (well, up to 50)! If its a store that you might choose to bypass if you’re short of a penny or two, then now is a great chance to land yourself a treat. Maybe you fancy something more sophisticated? Or something to dazzle in at the work Christmas do? Go on, go for it.

River Island are offering another 20% off in store and online. You’ve got to be clock watching with this one though, from 11am-3pm only. We can always rely on River Island if we’re in need of a new jacket or coat, so don’t hold back this Black Friday!

Stand by for those bargains as the Boxing Day sales have come early this year. Comment below with any juicy deals that you manage to get your hands on – Happy shopping!

Has it gone too far?

Now there is no denying that each and every one of the Victoria’s Secret models have dream bodies and are absolutely gorgeous. However, during their recent slating over their most recent commercial ad, has the company gone too far in demoralising and damaging women?

The Perfect Body?

It’s nothing more than a poor choice in words; “The Perfect Body”. They are perfect, that is the way that every woman should look in order to be perfect. Is this not wrong? Everyone knows that women come in all shapes and sizes, and that a large majority of us don’t look like Karlie Kloss, Cara Delevingne or Alessandra Ambrosio in our undies, but this is what the advert portrays. A petition has been put forward by students in order to get the company to change or retract the advert, but it really does raise the issue between women and the appearance that they should have. In this case, the responsibility is in the hands of Victoria’s Secret as they have sent out the damaging and unhealthy image of the way women should look. People shouldn’t be judged in society by the way that they look, but they are. The standard of beauty in our world today is dependent on the shape of your body and the proportion of women that are unhappy with the shape of their body is only increasing due to controversial adverts such as this.

Clearly, when you look further into it, the advert is nothing other than a play on words. The “perfect body” is meant to be describing the shape of the bra and the ‘perfect fit’ of the new underwear range that they are advertising. And yes, when there is a line of scantily-clad super-skinny women standing before you, obviously the first message you are going to receive is the fact that you don’t look like one of them. And the uproar on social media has been in relation to the instant message that you get from this advert’s title.

So whether Victoria’s Secret choose to listen to the petitions and uproar of the public, or not, people are still going to be judged on the way they look; unfortunately that is the society that we live in. So why should we care about a petty controversial advert? We see enough of them. But for how much longer should these style of adverts be allowed to sent out to the public? I think for now Victoria’s Secret can keep their fancy underwear for their skinny people and we can just buy our underwear elsewhere. Problem solved.

There ‘aint no party like an S Club party!

Don’t stop movin’!

There ‘aint no party like an S Club party – and that was certainly the case for Bournemouth last night! Oh goodness, I can already tell that this is going to be a lot more difficult than I thought because all I want to do is stand up, with my best vocal performance and sing “SSSS Cluuuuuuuuub” but nevertheless, I’ll give it my best shot and attempt to retain my excitement.

Partying in the church (this is the nightclub, Halo, previously a church but now home to one of Bournemouth’s busiest student nights) with childhood FAVOURITES S Club 7 is definitely one of my better ways to spend a Thursday night. But before you get as excited as I did, only 3 members actually turned up. Unfortunately, Rachel Stevens is far too ‘big time’ for us students and as for the others, well Hannah’s tied up in some TV programme with dinosaurs (Primeval I believe it’s called) and the rest, I’m not even sure what their excuse was but it certainly was not good enough! With only 3 others remaining, it was a good job Jo, Bradley and Paul were up for showing off their best moves to the funky, funky beat (see what I did there?!).

So as students poured in, it certainly didn’t take long for the club to become crammed filled with excitable 90’s kids. Barely being able to raise your left arm in time to shout “Reach”, a front row spot, for me, beat all the hustle and bustle. You might have expected that over the years, since S Club were at their prime, the vocal ability may have dipped just slightly but this couldn’t have been further from the truth. Their ability to work the crowd is still phenomenal as there was not one single person that didn’t have their hips going and their arms raised up in the air – and yes, even the bouncer was reaching for those stars.

S Club partying in the Church!

Reach!

“I’ve never had a dream come true”

Left to right: Paul, Jo, Bradley

Most of us will remember S Club for their party anthems with the catchiest beats. This is clearly the reason why I’ve had the entire set list in my head for the whole day and probably starting to annoy people with my sudden outbursts of “SSSS Cluuuuuuuuuub!” However, sooner than hoped, it came that point in the set where the slow, tear-jerker’s were up. ‘Two in a Million’ and ‘Never had a Dream Come True’ brought the church down a notch as the fist pump quickly transformed into a swaying of both arms. It’s always a guaranteed crowd pleaser and there’s always one that can’t contain their emotions (may I just point out, this was not me!) Whether you sounded like Celine Dion or the strangled cat in your neighbour’s garden, there was no holding back when it came to these power tracks. It’s always the best way to round up the night, belting out some of the ultimate classics from your childhood favourite band surrounded by all your friends (look at me getting all cringe!), but it honestly is the truth.

So after last night, I’m calling for a huge S Club 7 reunion, with all members making an appearance (and yes, Rachel, that does mean you too). Who’s with me?

Regrets over Ron?

SPOILER ALERT! For all those Harry Potter lovers, it’s safe to say this will make you cry a little bit inside. But nevertheless, a perfect opportunity for a new blog post!

It has been revealed in a recent interview with J K Rowling, that the fictional romance of Ron and Hermione was “wrong”. Rowling goes on to explain in her interview how she now sees that Harry would have been a more suited match for Hermione and that she “made a mistake” by plotting a Weasley and Granger marriage at the end of her seven-novel cycle.

Should it have been Potter?

It sounds to me like one of those secondary school moments where the overly nerdy and repelling boy manages to bag himself the most attractive girl in the year. Everyone knows he’s punching way above his weight but it’s one of those things where everyone is intrigued to see how long it will last. Well, in the case of Potter, Hermione and Ron’s flirtatious banter (or ‘flanter’ to those switched on to today’s society’) has been blossoming right from the word go. So I guess we’ll be expecting to see them arriving and leaving together at next year’s BAFTAs won’t we? Oh wait, this is a fictional romance. Look at me getting far too engrossed in the antics of Potter and his crew!

There seems to have been an uproar from fans as to why Ron Weasley was the chosen one, why not Potter? They’ve come back with commentary suggesting that Ron would never be able to make Hermione happy and that she’s far too good for him. I mean, cut the poor guy some slack, he can’t help the colour of his hair (ginger!) And in Ron’s defence, it’s not as if Harry is left to third-wheel, he manages to worm his way in with the Weasley family by marrying Ginny (Ron’s sister) in the final novel.

Rowling briefly explains that her reasons for Ron and Hermione’s match were “personal” and “not for reasons of credibility”. I can understand that to some hardcore Potter fans, this is not the way in which the story, ideally, would have unveiled but I’m sure it’s nothing a bit of ‘wingardium leviosa’ can’t sort out – after all, you can’t pick and choose who you fall in love with. (Oops, there I go again, I need to remember that this is a FICTIONAL STORY and not quite true life… yet!)

Is it a bare-faced cheek?

“Selfie.” A photograph taken of yourself using a reversible camera, usually accompanied by a ‘kissy’ face or the individual looking in the opposite direction of the camera. To some, pointless. But the increasing popularity of this selfie trend has led to a viral campaign of which women posting a “no-makeup selfie” has raised over £2 million for Cancer Research UK in just 48 hours.

The campaign sparked after a huge cancer awareness vs. narcissism debate and is proven to be one of the most successful viral campaigns of this day and age. Remember planking? Well clearly women plastering bare-faced photos across the social media is a better way of raising awareness and money for cancer. Cancer Research UK announced that they had received an explosive 800,000 donations in the first 24 hours and the most overwhelming element of this whole campaign is that they didn’t even start it in the first place! The trend started off the back of Cancer Research posting the text code for donations over Twitter and Facebook and since then, women have taken to “no-make up selfies” as a more original way of raising money for charity.

So why a selfie? Well as much as this campaign is proving to be a success, it has had some backlash and criticisms as to the relevance of posting photos of yourself across the social media. Obviously, posting a photo isn’t going to raise the money, but it does raise the awareness and encourages more and more people to donate. Twitter and Facebook have even seen the bare faces of Kim Marsh, Michelle Keegan, Imogen Thomas and a number of others that have seen the charitable side to this trend. Most ‘selfies’ are accompanied with a nomination and #cancerawareness to continue the trend among their friends and family. Oh, and in case you’re not quite up with the times a ‘#’ is the way in which us “youngsters” create trends on Twitter when discussing similar topics.

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But besides raising awareness and donations to Cancer Research, women going make-up-free online also has an underlying message: being happy with your own skin, no matter what you look like, what you do or don’t have, what you have suffered from or what you are still fighting. Many of us have lost a family member or friend to cancer, and if you haven’t then you can count yourself incredibly lucky. So, you can protest until you’re blue in the face if you really dispute this “no-makeup selfie” trend but before doing so, make sure you find a better way to raise more than £2 million for Cancer in just 48 hours. Oh, and while you’re at it, text BEAT to 70099.

A Blast From the Past?

New and improved? Or just a bit ‘edgy’?

So as some of you may already be aware, as of 2017, a new, and supposedly improved, pound coin is being introduced to our British currency. If I’m brutally honest, I don’t really see the issue with the current one but there we go, that’s the government for you these days! I’m sure the intentions for this are all in the right place but clearly the subtext for the new pound coin design is all about cutting corners? Talk about a blast from the past, it looks more like we’ve moved back to the 1800’s and brought back the threepenny bit.

It’s said to help stamp out the issue of forgeries and counterfeit money which is obviously a massive issue in our society today. It reduces the value of our currency and increases the cost of commodities as there is more ‘money’ flowing through the economy. Baring this in mind, clearly action needs to be taken in order to tackle this problem but if the current pound coin has been studied in enough detail, how are you meant to fit a coin like that in your shopping trolley at Asda? The evolution of coin racing is going to come to a halt as the front runner and guaranteed winner is now not even round!

It is still under discussion as to the finalised design to the the back of this new coin. “Sorry” written in capital letters would be a start – I might even suggest this to Osborne. Imagine having loose change like this stacking up in your purse, it would send you over the edge! When the 2014 Budget announced this new arrival, it was as if April Fools had come early – it’s just horrific.

Maybe it’s George Osborne’s way of distracting the public about the changes that have actually been made to the 2014 Budget, by frantically waving around this edgy new coin, but I’ll save that for another day.