out it tumbles

word tumbly from copymojo! communication | open heart writing | passionate communicator - works it out on the page | words matter | ideas matter more ...

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Job Search Tip #11 | Bypass the online agency

If you use a lot of online jobsites, you'll know that most of the jobs are being pushed by agencies. Agencies are ok, I don't like them much - but they can be really helpful especially if you are looking for temping roles. In the main it's best to stick to agencies with a specialism if you are looking for anything professional. If you want to avoid the agency - try this. Copy and paste a phrase from the jobsite ad straight into your preferred search engine. Most companies advertise their roles on their websites as well as through the jobsites and 9 times out of 10 you will find them using this simple trick.

Now you can bypass the agency screening and tailor your CV and covering letter.

A quick call to the company switchboard to find the name of the recruiting manager and you can send your application direct. Remember they don't pay the fee if they find the candidate they eventually recruit themselves - so you'll get a lookin - for sure!

Good luck.

[mojotumbly]

G'is a job! 10 steps to shaking hands at interview

I had an interview yesterday. I was a little nervous but that's normal. I checked the time and I located the office on a google map. So I was all set, except for the waiting to catch the bus into town. While I waited I thought I'd jot down my top tips for preparing for interview. Play to my strengths ... Time was if I got the interview, I got the job. In the current climate - well we all need an edge, here's how I plan to get mine. I hope it helps you get yours ... Good luck.

10 Tips for preparing for a job interview | giving yourself the best chance to excel

First off, acknowledge your invitation, it's a small thing but it costs nothing to be polite, and if they haven't told you who will be interviewing you - it's worth asking.

Google your interview panel and check if they have a LinkedIn profile. You'll get plenty of insight into their background and how you might be connected. I don't name drop or over work the connections in an interview I think it comes over as pushy - but I know really slick sales people who do leverage their connections.

Research the company, they will expect you to know what they do, and you'll find most of what you need on their website. Google them for up-to-date news and set up a google alert. I also check their social network presence too. Search them out on Twitter, Facebook and YouTube. That way you'll find out what they're talking about, what's important to them and what is being said about them.

Use your network to find out information, and get a feel for the company, you're bound to know someone with some intel!

If you have a presentation to put together now you'll be ready with the information you need.

Go through the Job Description and Person Specification and think up questions that they might ask that will help them understand if you can deliver on the job's objectives.

Now go through your personal achievements and identify your strongest. Turn these into mini case studies that demonstrate your key strengths, skills, experience that you have identified they will need to fill the post. You will feel more confident and sound much more assured if you have these front of mind. Remember - what were the successful outcomes?

Choose a comfortable and smart outfit to wear. Clean, neat and pressed is almost always the best option.

Collect together any presentation, information, examples of your work, qualification certificates and proof of right to work in the UK you need to take the night before. On the day your aim is for a stress free run-up to your moment.

On the day, focus on your strengths in the shower. Face into the questions you are not looking forward to and reassure yourself that you have an answer prepared.

Finally, I have a trick that works really well for me. I think about the qualities I need to do well to land the role, and the friends I have who have those qualities in abundance and I create a virtual team that I take with me to the interview.

How would my friend who can create fantastic content on any subject, in minutes handle that question? What about the 30 ideas a second mate who has more useable solutions pop into her head while she's pulling on her tights in the morning than most people manage in a month of brainstorming? Then there's the brilliant editor, the amazing networker, the gifted designer, and the scarily organised procurement Director. I've learnt from working alongside them and admiring them and I can take that into the room with me.

Oh I do get into some visualisation and tailored affirmation on the day too - but that's a bit bibbety bobbety for most people.

If you do nothing else - look at yourself in the mirror and list your strengths. You're brilliant and the job's yours. Now go and get it! Best of luck.

[mojotumbly]

Forget your troubles c'mon get organised!

Right that's it! I am officially swamped. I've got ideas coming out of my ears for online projects, short stories even iPhone aps. I've got a to-do list that spans interior decorating, shopping for birthday presents, blogging, exercising, setting up meetings, preparing for meetings, finding work, on and on. I also need to eat, sleep and watch Strictly.

My online footprint looks like Big Foot tramped through on his way to meet a cousin up North which just adds to my stress and increasing feelings of helplessness and exasperation. I need an efficiency drive.

I can't find anything quickly, which means I start things but can't finish them. I get distracted trying to find the file, picture, song I need to progress. It's affecting my ability to think - I've just abandoned a perfectly serviceable metaphor because I couldnt find the similie quickly enough to make it flow.

I'm surrounded by half eaten stories, unfinished wordpress sites, undone to-do lists and an empty fridge. I'm also due to leave the house in 15 minutes and I'm damned if I can find the notes from my last meeting with my next appointment.

Strategically I lack direction, operationally I lack focus and organisation - emotionally I am ricocheting between angry with myself, frustrated by the unstoppable flow of stuff and whiningly defeated.

I've had a go at putting in some efficiency measures and for the most part they've worked for a few days. I practice inbox zero, alphabetical filing of all emails and on and offline files,  though I have stopped short of reorganising my kitchen cupboards alphabetically and I am using online tools to aggregate and organise my reading.(Which I still never actually do, but at least it's all in one place now huh?).

I've read the excellent Getting Things Done by David Allen (I confess I got distracted and haven't actually finished it) and the bemusingly entitled Pomodoro Technique (I just haven't found a timer I like enough to enslave myself to) and I've even downloaded to-do lists and efficiency tools onto my iPhone - all of which I use happily for a day and then forget about.

All this has led me to this incontravertable realisation...

Before you start to get organised - you have to:

Articulate the big hairy plan.

Commit to getting organised - defining a daily, hourly chant works for me.

Stop kidding yourself that little bursts of organised will get the job done.

Know how to get organised. (duh!)

Get help. Read a book, adopt a tried and tested efficiency process attend a workshop or find a coach. It just is harder than you think.

Just DO IT!

And remember this - if you do sign up for a workshop, the chances are you'll be networking like crazy with some great local businesses.

What could you do with an extra hour or two a week?

Check out Think Productive for some advice and workshops - their productivity ninja Lee Cottier has inspired me to get this far.

[mojotumbly]

It don't mean a thing if it ain't got that swing. Bop shoowop. Bop shoowop. Bop shoowop...

Irving Mills

[mojotumbly]

Allotment Soup!

Our dear friend Kath has got an allotment. Most weekends I imagine our Kath can be found happily digging and pulling and planting and kerfuffling on her little veggie patch - helping mother nature make real food. Over the year we have pinned our expressions to 'mildly interested' while listening to tales of muck shippments, allotment politics and the correct way to lay out your onions.

(Apparantly you lay them out in neat rows on the ground with the stalks still attached, before you plait them together french onion seller stylee and hang them from your kitchen ceiling.)

I love seeing pics of Kath in her trusty green wellies, wielding spades and hoes alongside an army of sexy looking, outdoorsy chaps -all ruddy cheeked and puffed up with effort. It's almost worth volunteering myself... almost.

What I really love is being the lucky recipient of the allotment harvest. Recently we scored some huge onions (no stalks on - these were the few Kath got stuck into before noticing her neighbouring 'lotty didn't go to the bother of lopping them off...) and a mahoosive courgette.

I made allotment soup...

1 cup chopped celery

Half red onion roughly chopped

Huge courgette chopped into large cubes

Juice of two lemons

Chilli (any type)

Stock

two - three tablespoons olive oil

Put the oil in the pan and add the chopped onion and celery, shove the lid on and let them get to know each other in the steam and sizzly heat.

Now's a good time to chop up your courgette or marrow. I don't like adding the middle bit with the seeds and stringy stuff, but you can if you're not squeamish.

After the onion/celery mix has been going for a few minutes, sling in the courgette chunks and stir them around. Cover half the pan with the lid and let it all get a bit sweaty for another couple of minutes. While you sort out your stock.

I use bought stock, in all and any form - you just need enough to cover the veggies comfortably.

Add the stock & chilli flakes or oil to taste (I don't like it too hot so half a tspn to a tspn is enough for me) - check the heat and let it all cook until soft.

You can add the lemon juice at any stage, round about now I'd squeeze your lemons, or just tip out a couple of ladles full from the bottle - and add to the soup.

(Or you could take the rind off, cut them up into chunks and drop them into the soup too).

Cook a little bit more - and then whisk the whole lot up until it's smooth.

At this point you can adjust the seasoning - I liked it with quite a bit of rock salt added so it had that lemony, chilli, salty vibe going for it.

I loved this soup and would give it 3 stars ***.

Podge only liked it and would probably only give it 1 * but I'm not asking him in case he doesn't give it any.

[mojotumbly]

Social media and internal communications

I've just had a conversation about social media and it's growth. We were specifically wondering about how companies can step into the space with confidence, now all the hype has died down - and colleagues have expectations and indeed expertise in these social communication channels.

Here's my two bob's worth...

For me social media offers the opportunity to engage in conversations with all sorts of people. I listen in, I ask questions, I offer opinions and I engage with friends, colleagues and clients all over the world. Social media is a broad amplification of word of mouth communication. (I read that somewhere and I agree with it). As with all communication there's some good and some damagingly bad and most of it in the middle is, well - ok really. Back in the day we used wet straw and big old leaves to create smoke signals which our neighbours would need to interpret - I imagine often with hilarious results! These days we have more sophisticated ways to communicate and we are increasingly skilled at managing our communications and understanding the meanings. People are endlessly resourceful just look at the fast development of symbols to subvert the 140 character limitations of twitter for example. #tagging, bit.ly shortening of urls etc. and emoticons before that. We create new words, gestures and symbols and new meanings spring from old symbols used differently - we are endlessly able to invent, create and share these. Communication professionals need to keep up with the new channels, understand how their audiences are engaging with their brands, products and each other online and learn the new symbols and meanings ascribed to the conversations happening online. One last thing - we do still tend to think about twitter when we talk about social media but there are hundreds and hundreds of social media applications out there including blogs, wikis, noticeboards, file sharing, bookmarking, niche microblogs and aggregating newsfeeds and on and on and on... many of which offer real benefit to our engagement strategies and our internal communication channels. We need to take the opportunity to assess our communication and engagement strategies and policies, understand how our people want to engage with us and each other and provide the channels, training and governance to support them to do that in persuit of our business objectives.

[mojotumbly]

Achooh! Mercy posting of killer cold remedy.

If the seasonal presto changeo of the weather has left you with a horrid sniffle | help is at hand. Here's my kill or maim cold rescue remedy. It does taste nasty, but the effects are nearly as good as Class A drugs.

Send someone out to get these goodies:

1 large clove of garlic (peel and slice)

nub of ginger (around the same size as chubby garlic clove, peel and slice)

juice of half a lemon

4 -8 whole black pepper corns

cinnamon stick (just use half of one)

chilli flakes (optional, so as many as you like)

What to do now?

Flop on the sofa under your cuddleblankie, and moan gently to yourself, while some one else does the following:

Boil the kettle and in the meantime - put all the ingredients into a sturdy mug. I use one of those french cafe coffee cups from the 70s. You know the ones, they were school uniform green with a gold rim around if your mum liked fancy.

Pour 'as hot as you can manage' (just boiled) water onto the ingredients and then take a pessle (or is it mortar? No it's definitely a pessle.) and lightly crush the garlic and the ginger.

Try and drink this as quickly as possible - you don't have to eat the bits, but you do need to inhale the vapour to get all that volatile oily goodness up your hooter.

Take a couple of these cocktails a day and you will be as right as ninepence in no time.

Garlic is your friend...

If you can bear it, chop up some raw garlic and swallow it with water. Do this 2 - 3 times a day and your aches, pains and chills will disappear along with that annoying oik from finance.

[mojotumbly]

Wilma Tenderfoot and the case of the frozen hearts cookies

We made these cookies today - after finishing the book last night, we decided to give them a go. They are especially good with a cup of peppermint tea to aid any deducting you may find you have to undertake.  

As ususal we just went with what we had in the cupboard - so we put in some muscle building work with the pessle and mortar to make granulated sugar into caster sugar and we substituted bonkers lemony essential oil for the grated lemon rind.

They tasted jolly excellent. A word of warning - keep a close eye on these beauties, if they overcook - they are way way less delish.

If you don't already have the ingredients, rush out and buy >

100g butter, soft 100g castor sugar Zest of 1 lemon (wash the lemon, then with a fine grater, grate the yellow outside only) 1 egg, beaten 100g polenta (cornmeal - fine or coarse, it doesn't matter) 150g plain flour ¼ tsp salt 2 large baking sheets, lightly oiled

This is how we roll ..

1. In a large bowl, cream the butter, sugar and lemon zest with a metal spoon or an electric hand-mixer, or shove it all in the big magimixywonderment. 2. Add the egg and use a wooden spoon or the mixer to form a lumpy batter. Or just sling in the egg and whizz up some more. 3. Add the cornmeal and flour a couple of tablespoons at a time until you have a dough dry enough to roll out. You might need a bit more flour, or not quite as much. You decide they're your biccies. 4. Roll the dough out on a clean, floured surface until it’s about 3/4 cm thick. Use a small round cutter (about the size of an eggcup or if like us you're all fancy use an espresso cup), or if you can't be faddled just cut small squares or triangles with a knife, to make small biscuits.  5. Put the biscuits a couple of centimetres apart on a baking sheet and bake for 18 to 20 minutes, until golden brown. (Please note, pale cookies taste better - no idea why but after an extensive survey we can confidently say 4 out of 4 peeps preferred them. 7. Allow to cool before eating - if you can wait! (Don't wait, they tast so scrumptious warm, it would be a crime to let them cool down).

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all the little birdies on jay bird street...

 ... love to hear the birdie go tweet tweet tweet!

(Here's a more business focused post from late last year, it still holds true - while a lot of my online pals are in-bound marketing like good'uns - many small business owners are still a bit flumoxed by Twitter and unconvinced of how it might help them. If you are a fence sitter this post might encourage you to take another look.

Since writing it I've run a couple of sessions about Twitter and other online networks for groups of people feeling a bit bemused by the hype. It isn't difficult to get started and more and more success stories are adding to the good news about the advantages of social networking for small businesses). 

My gosh there is so much twaddle about twitter online, it's a wonder any sane person signs up at all. Get past all the celebrity nonsense or the silliness talked about the possibility of building millions of dollars worth of business in a week and what have you got? People talking to people about the stuff they like or don't like. It all depends on whether they fancy themselves as 'love puppy' sharers or net savvy debunkers on a mission to give us all a dose of their personal reality. There's a growing number of businesses that are using twitter and other social networks to create genuine interest in what they have to offer, simply by engaging their customers where they like to hang out. Whatever they're up to - the trick is to get the twitterati to like you! If they like you, they'll tell others about you by retweeting your tweets and then maybe they'll follow you some more and after a while, if you keep them interested, they'll want to know even more about you. That's when they'll leave tweetlandia and come and find your blog or your website. People like free stuff. They like it even more if it's the really good free stuff. So all you have to do - is figure out what you have that is good and useful and that people will really like and start twittering about it. If people like your stuff, they'll tell other people about it and before you know it - they'll all be wanting more of your really good stuff! Hang on a minute - that's like the old days - when word of mouth was king - and brands like Ben and Jerrys created a buzz by doing what they did best - really well. People liked it and told other people about it and soon thet got to show loads more people their good gear. Can't be that hard then? Here's three things to figure out today, to get you started. 1. First off before you start, ask yourself what it is that you are really good at? Think about what you are really passionate about? Is it something you could give advice and help about online? That's great. Your in bound marketing campaign can begin! 2. Figure out a good way to share this good stuff with your social network buddies for free! Don't forget to invite them to find out more about you and your other good stuff. 3. And now you need to keep up the momentum. Make sure that if they do love your advice, your funky little art sketches or your wonderfully useful widgets, you're ready to offer them more. Once you start this 'make 'em like me by giving them freebies' malarky - you'll need to keep it up, don't worry it will pay off. Experiment with this in a small way for a few weeks and notice how many more followers you pick up - and who they are. Come back and tell me how you got on, and what cute things you came up with to get retweeted. I'm betting that your new friends will all be people interested inyour products and services too. Now you need to turn that new twitter follower into a customer. Communication and marketing types call that lead conversion!

[mojotumbly]

An old post revisited ... Prompted by artist fiona flynn

I thought today, to remind myself of past passions and posts - I would collect together a few scribbles from other places here. This little tumbler blog is my own sandpit, so I can do what I like. Today I'd like to remember stuff...

After two long stints living in Newcastle NSW where the artist community is as deep-dug into the rock as the old ockers who hollowed it out in the first place – I am convinced that unless ‘community’ art springs spontaneously and opportunistically from the artists’ personal motivation to connect – its just sanctioned municipal wallpaper – and usually mediocre twaddle.

Local artists do sometimes put their work into shop windows there – thriving, young businesses that welcome the excitement of their association with the artists. They also ‘flash art’ the streets, the walls, the beach and come together in clumps to start things.

Mostly they do it without interference from the local plodding counsellors and the dwindling retail streets, and a dingy shopping mall that is still a no-go area after 9pm are not much improved by these local artists’ efforts. Of course not, how silly to imagine they would be.

Now I live in Bristol and Banksy has a lot to answer for round these parts. Chuck a sparycan in any direction and you’ll hit a mural. Take a wander down Stokes Croft to see how unlikely ’shop window’ art is to inspire regeneration, or cheer up the locals. (Although there is a sense of fierce reverse pride in the homemadey, ramshackle, independence of the area).

The people who live here, in the SW need to make some cash to spend in the shops, and when they do – my guess is that they’ll be rushing past these art daubed derelict commercial units on their way to worship the art of Geiger, Baker and Moss in the frighteningly huge Cabots Circus.

Find Flynn's work and writing here http://fionaflynn.wordpress.com/

[mojotumbly]

Peanut butter and chocolate cookies!

These are pnutty and sweet and if you add some proper chocolate chunks they'd be unbelievably delicious and fat makingly good. We ate them quick. They are of course, absolutely not suitable for people who suffer with nut allergies...

4 oz unsalted butter (but I never have that so don't worry)

4oz soft brown sugar (which I also didn't have so I used good for me lite white)

9 oz plain flour & 1 oz cocoa powder

1 large egg (Florence advises you use freerange)

2 oz of peanut butter (preferably crunchy)

some honey roasted peanuts bashed about a bit.

Preheat your oven to 190C. Line a baking tray with baking paper.

cream the butter and sugar together

add the peanut butter and the egg and beat together

stir in the flour and the cocoa and knead it until it comes together in a dough

shove in the bashed nuts if you are using them

now's a good time to add chocolate chunks too...

Pull of small chunks of dough and roll them into a ball and flatten them into biscuits the size you like. I made mine quite small and fat. Then I had to add a few minutes to the cooking time to make sure they were cooked through.

I ended up with 'well done' biscuits which is exactly how I like them - if you like pale and thin little critters, that'll work, just make sure you take them out before they burn.

Put in the oven for around 10 mins (more if they're portly).

[mojotumbly]

'easy as' biscuits

Ingredients

140g self raising flour

110g margarine/butter* (for nortypeeps)

40g sugar - granulated or caster* (you can use sugarlite)

¼ - ½ tsp ground ginger (depends on how gingery you like your snacks)

1 large egg (or milk)

Equipment

·         Mixing bowl

·         Baking tray

·         fork

·         Cool hands

Method

Turn your oven on for 180c.

Mix all your ingredients together in a big old mixing bowl until you get a lovely soft dough. (Or cheat and fling it all in a food processor – add the egg last, or enough milk to encourage it to whizz into a dough).  A couple of desert spoons should do it. Pinch off small walnut sized pieces of dough and roll lightly in your hands.

Pop these onto your baking tray and flatten slightly with a fork.

Stick your tray into the middle of the oven and bake for about 20 minutes until golden brown in colour. Carefully remove and place on a cooling rack.

Serve with afternoon tea… Other flavours to try…

½ tspn lemon essence and a large table spoon of dried thyme

Replace some of the flour with cocoa powder and some well bashed up chocolate pieces (orange rind might work with this combo too).

[mojotumbly]

Don't panic! You can do Social Media...

The New Year is in full swing and online bloggers, vloggers, microblaguers and taggers are all busy busy, predicting the next big thing.  Marketers, Social Media gurus and hawkers at the front of the pack have already jumped onto their hastily built bandwagons and are hanging off the running boards, helpfully extending their well manicured paws ready to grab the cash as the rest of us poor slow coaches struggle to get a leg up.

I feel like a beleaguered housewife, trapped in my living room while some dodgy carpet cleaner salesman pours dirt onto the Axminster and pressures me into buying a machine that wouldn’t look out of place in a Pertwee  episode of Dr Who.  He’s got facts, figures, flashing lights and a bamboozly patter that has been honed over 100s of hours in other people’s houses.

All I’ve got is a grubby carpet.

High up on many of the top bloggers lists of things we must consider to stay in the online game this January is an online social media policy.  All very fancy if you are large enough to warrant a policy, but if you’re not and you are eager to engage with emerging media  –  do you need to worry about policy and procedures really?

Takes deep breath and pauses for dramatic effect…  No. I don’t think you do.

Easy Tiger! I do think you need a plan, and I also think you need to work out how to translate your brand (personal and/or business) for online interaction – but I genuinely don’t believe you need to over-think it.  If you have already spent time developing your business and marketing plans, then you’re over half way there.

If you can answer  an honest ‘yes’ to the next five questions, you can be confident that you’ve got what you need to start adding elements of social media activity to your communication mix.  If you can’t, then whether you should focus on Twitter or LinkedIn may be the least of your worries this year…

Have you got a clear business plan?

Does it include a fully researched marketing plan? Be honest now!

Can you list your brand/personal values?

Have you got a basic grasp of the key elements of online/mobile communication channels? (blogging, Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, Digg etc)

Are you clear about what you want to achieve by entering the online space?

If you can answer a confident ‘YES!’, then you have the foundation for a successful online presence ready for you to build your campaigns. All you need to do is review your marketing plan and add in some emerging media elements.  Base your decisions on what you know about where your target audience hangs out online and what benefits you can deliver to them.

Don't get hung up on deep analysis - just work on making an existing business activity better.

Don’t forget to build in clear measurement criteria, so you can assess the success of your adventures.

Copymojo! Tip:

There is plenty of help online to get you started.  Try going to the source for clear information and free advice about each of the channels, you will find plenty of marketing information and helpful tips on the homepages of social media websites.

If you want a crash course in social media check out www.hubspot.com it is a fantastic resource.

[mojotumbly]

Little Cheese Soup

This is an adaptation of a soup I used to make years ago from a long since lost recipe book. It's changed so much over the years, I don't think I'm breaking any sacred cookery witch codes by not citing the original source.

This one is based on parsnips - but you can make a mixed vegetable one - or butternut squash (although I'd use cheddar rather than stilton for these alternatives).

For the pot:

1 large onion, roughly chopped (any colour, I like red)

5-6cm lopped off the end of your celery hand then chopped

As many cloves of garlic as you like

Black pepper corns and/or some chilli flakes/powder

Small amount of olive oil

6 parsnips

2 apples (I use the ones going a bit dodgy)

Any left over mash (optional, but I always have some).

Vegetable bouillon stock (or whatever you like).

Some stilton - about 2 tblspns per bowl (or more or less - you choose).

What to do next:

This soup is so easy, you can hand all this lot to someone else to sort out and have a sit down with a cup of tea. However, if you are determined to make it yourself...

Gently heat 2 tblspns oil in a large saucepan, add chopped celery, onion and garlic, pop the lid on and sweat while you -

chop the parsnip and apples quite small and

put a full kettle on to boil.

Add the parsnip and apple to the pan and jumble them around - put the lid back on and wait a moment...

Pour around a litre of boiling water into the pan (cover the vegetables well) and

add your pepper corns, stock/bouillon and chilli.

Cover your pan - and simmer on a low heat for around 10 mins until the parsnips are soft.

Stir in your mash - before you whizz the soup smooth.

Put into bowls and before serving add 1 - 2 tablespoons of crumbled stilton (depending on your sensitivity to calories)

I'm a salt freak - so I need to adjust the seasoning 'in-bowl' too.

Ta dah! Little Cheese Soup. Enjoy x

[mojotumbly]

[mojotumbly]

This is one of my favourite inspiration sources.

[mojotumbly]

when we were young

In a bid to slip the collar of everyone's freshly minted Business Rules for Twitter users, I've been hunting for new backgrounds that please me, and I stumbled across a wallpaper collection by the supremely talented Barbara Hulanicki.

As I mentioned, I'm feeling rebellious. Nothing new there, I was born to be subversive - while my sister was trying hard to look like Farah Fawcett I was nailing blakeys to the bottom of my monkey boots to see if I could actually make sparks fly from under my feet. (I couldn't).

When my friends were super gluing their hair into rad spikes and sneering through the 80s, I started my collection of vintage 60's pyschadelic frocks. I still wear some of them. Long before that even, when my mum thought I was over at Kim's house, we were both on the train up to London with Camilla Aziz, on a completely unsanctioned and thrilling shopping trip.

Our destination was Biba the most fantastic shop in the world and the pinnacle of glamorous rebellion. I bought an achingly chic and tiny pot of silver lipgloss with matching sparkly tights and false eyelashes which I was sure would be life changing, but as it turned out made me look like a slightly tubby cyborg.

We all spent hours putting on layers of makeup, perched on bar stools at the mile long counter all in a line, like a brace of underage showgirls. We made up new identities to match our newfound faces, and of course we spoke appauling french with heavy accents.

We were approached by an extraodrinarily rich looking American woman, who thought we were adorable and who insisted on taking us all to tea at the Biba cafe. We were beside ourselves with excitement, we'd already calculated that we couldn't afford to go to the cafe so this was like a magical gift from the fasion queen, I felt sure that the sainted Hulanicki herself was smiling on me.

Kim and I immediately clammed up and barely spoke another word, leaving Camila to entertain the lovely old american lady who bought us tea and cake. I can't remember a single thing more about her now. I only remember the feeling of real naughtiness I had, pretending to be somebody I was not and the excitement I felt sitting in the most beautiful place I had ever been in.

When I was young, I didn't bother much with how you were supposed to do things, I just did them. I was a rule breaker, and a trend setter in my own little way.

Now I am much, much older and starting out on some of my biggest adventures, I feel even less inclined to follow the pack, and conform to all the rules laid down by other people. I am convinced that to be a success you have to do what you feel passionate about so you can fully commit. All you need is your determination, some talent and the ability to cut through the 'blah blah blah' and get to the gold.

Looking back I think the American lady responded to our excitement and charm. I am sure she knew we weren't French, she may even have spotted that we were not savvy London kids, but we were really having fun, and we threw ourselves into it with gusto and elan.

So I'm spending the next few weeks consulting my inner teen on the art of rule breaking and I'm planning on making some New Year's r