Front Row Dress Circle

If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!

It has been a hell of a journey this year for one ordinary woman who set out in February from her little council house in a Scottish town to travel to the Big Smoke to try her chance in a major talent contest. When Susan Boyle left her home that morning she wore a dress she had bought for her nephews wedding and with a packed lunch in her bag she made her way to London for the auditions of Britain’s Got Talent just hoping that the judges would like her voice.

And did they ever !

Today, just eleven months later, Susan can buy dresses from the top designers - if she cares to - has eaten in the top restaurants in New York City, has met the worlds most famous celebrities and counts them among her fans. She has endured as many highs and lows in just a few months as most stars do in several years - and she has come out a winner, a true Pro. When she stood on that stage back in February she told the sceptical judges and a sniggering audience that her dream was to be as famous as Elaine Paige - nobody is sniggering any more as Susan has realised that dream by singing on stage beside her idol. And in her own television show!

A few months ago I wrote about how Susan would handle her new found fame, how she represented the hopes and dreams of many ordinary people everywhere and how she is living proof that glamour and talent in a woman do not necessarily have to go together. Susan became as famous for her ordinary appearance as she did for her incredible voice - the glamour came later and doesn’t she look great?

Susan is proof that wonderful things can happen to the most ordinary of us - and that if you have a special talent and believe in yourself it is never too late to find success. How we define success is arbitrary - finding personal happiness and realising your dreams, no matter how small they are, is the greatest success of all. Well done SuBo!

Popularity: 37% [?]

It sure is - the British public, those of them who had more than enough money to waste on phone-in votes and the minimum amount of brains to be able to dial the number - failed in their attempt to get rid of Katie Price from the show I’m a Celebrity Get Me Out Of Here. Katie ‘walked’ of her own free will and good for her; after being a better sport than anyone would have imagined and completing six out of the seven bushtucker trials she decided enough was enough and it was time to give some of the other suckers a chance at all the free publicity Katie’s so-called ‘critics’ have willingly given her.

She showed viewers that she is still the up-for-it goer that she was when she appeared in the same show back in 2003. It’s an older and wiser Katie these days - she did not behave the way the nay-sayers all predicted and stayed away from any eligible males in the camp. Not that there were any - but the last time she dabbled with a male camp-mate she got saddled with a worm of a male who turned out to be a gold-digger and traitor. She’s well rid of Peter Andre that’s for sure.

She was good viewing while it lasted and offered a valuable opportunity to show my children how bullying can take different guises and how it can happen even to celebrities - but given British society these days such hatred and spite is not uncommon among members of the public.

I had to laugh when she and Kim Woodburn tried to eat the kangaroo testicles and fish eyes - their retching was hilarious even though it must have been awful for them, but when Katie had to eat the fried flies (as pictured above) I truly gagged and could not look. We Aussies have a full-on hate thing going with flies of any kind.

Popularity: 24% [?]

One has to wonder at the double standards displayed by the British media with regards to so-called ‘cyber bullying’ because if you consider the way it treats model Katie Price then you could accuse most media hacks of doing just that. I have, this morning, read two articles on Katie Price written by so-called ‘respected’ journalists who pulled out all the stops for malicious and vitriolic content.

Clearly these females are jealous, as are those flocks of sheep who follow in their wake submitting equally malicious comments in response that are put together with all the articulacy of a deaf parrot. For we women all know deep down that a successful and wealthy woman is the most threatening and annoying thing we can encounter, especially one who made her fortune by looking great and better than all her critics could ever hope to look in a million years. She also speaks her mind, likes to party, works damn hard and has been blessed with three lovely children who do not look like performing muppets a la Suri Cruise. Her children are not dressed like mini designer dolls too precious to play or get a speck of dirt on them like poor young Damien, son of Liz Hurley, and she has raised a disabled child from birth on her own - despite her ex-husband trying to take the credit for her past good work - and she alone deserves the praise. Yes, she used her body and looks to make her fortune and her son Harvey has benefited the most from being able to receive the excellent medical care and schooling he so obviously thrives on.

You can argue all you like about how much public scrutiny celebrities are expected to take from the media and public but just where do you draw the line with regards to personal criticism in the form of the kind character attacks that Katie Price has been subjected to lately - and why is such bullying tolerated when it is aimed at her but not at some teenager on Facebook or Bebo…? but the one thing both incidences have in common is that the bullying comes from ignorant individuals who are motivated by boredom, lack of intelligence and sheer cowardice; how easy it is to slag someone off when you don’t know them, use poorly presented hearsay as your source and have the screen of anonymity to protect you.

Admittedly Katie has overdone the cosmetic procedures in the last couple of years so that she barely resembles the naturally pretty blonde that graced so many calendars, but you have to laugh at those who call her ‘ugly’ - how many of her critics can use their own inherent ugliness to make as much money from it as Katie does? I am no huge fan of Ms Price but I do have some sympathy for her and I do recognise when enough is enough. The one thing I do admire about her is her staying power, she will be around for a long time yet and that must irritate her jealous critics no end.

Popularity: 22% [?]