Horse Girl A Primal Response/Horse A Girl

I had not seen the Horse Girl trailer when I wrote the Dolphin Girls blog. In my heart of hearts I never dreamed such a thing could exist. I thought we had too much respect for each other and too much fear of God to cross the thin line in fiction based on girlhood exceptions. I underestimated the human desire to open doors that should never have been opened.

I don’t think the Horse Girl trailer is bad, and I don’t think that Horse Girl is necessarily going to be a bad movie. I can’t think anything about it because as soon as I start watching the trailer my body goes into fight or flight mode: I break out into a cold sweat, my heart starts pounding, and my mouth tastes like metal. I can’t tell what response Horse Girl is supposed to provoke in me but that’s the one it does. Is Horse Girl a psychological thriller? Is the main character actually turning into a horse? Is the whole plot just the horse thing? Did she like horses before? Why are horses so scary?



Co--Star called me a d-list horse girl so I am uniquely qualified for this. Not only I am a horse girl I’m so much of a niche horse girl that I can’t even be marketed to the masses.




Let’s break down this trailer for a minute.

At first very normal film about an average awkward girl called Sarah struggling romantically and socially.Very much the foundation for a movie about a former horse girl rediscovering her passions and deciding she doesn’t care what people think. That’s not the direction they decided to go in. We’re in familiar territory when we get that shot of her looking at herself in her car mirror. Something isn’t right.




Aww she’s got a dead mom and ohhh she’s got a horse that she visits that’s cute. Maybe the mom died while riding/used to be an equestrian or loved horses too? I don’t think so.




Debbie Ryan is also here and her Disney Channel persona used to give me serious Horse Girl vibes. Look at her being a good friend and hooking up her roommate*. Maybe he’s into horses too?




But then her nose starts to bleed. And here’s the tone shift. Music cuts, the camera angle shifts and we get thrown off kilter as well. After this point the trailer is giving me more questions than I think the movie can answer. Clearly there are some links between inheritance and family (with a grandmother who looks eerily similar to Sarah, mental health and possible animal transformation. But how do the horses fit in? There are so many horses in this trailer but I don’t know what they mean. I don’t know what the dressmaking means either and I’m not sure which scares me more.




Wait no I do, it’s the horses.




This movie has an R rating and I don’t know what that means for my future. Don’t be mistaken I will be watching this movie. Nothing can stop me from watching this movie. I don’t know who I will be after watching this movie. So look forward in the future to seeing my review of Horse Girl by Jeff Baena


Is it this the thirteenth year but with horses? Is this cat people but with horses?



*someone get me one of those NetflixTM roommates so I can get my life back on track.

Dolphin Girls, A Blog

Eee! Eee eee EeeeEEE! That’s dolphin for nothing at all. Books and media for young girls teach them the language, personalities and facts they need to memorise in order to be categorised for their obsession for the tween*-early teen years. Who makes these decisions? Does it matter? Everyone talks about horse girls, they get all the press. Mermaid girls and fairy girls are the next most popular, but there are so many others that go under the radar. There are history girls, book girls, science girls, tv girls, I know it sounds like I’m just listing things and the word girls after it but it’s true. There are probably more different types of girls even since I was a girl.

An environment girl. She loves the environment so much she’s trying to like save it? Or something wild like that.

The obsession paints the walls of your bedroom and your life, defines your friend groups and becomes the weird facts you spew out when you are drunk in your early twenties. But there is one group of girls I don’t think gets paid enough attention to. Dolphin girls. Because really, what the fuck?


Dolphins, the horses of the sea. Smooth bois that slip through the ways and into the hearts and minds of many young girls. Dolphins have gotten their own branded products, films, tv shows, books, probably other stuff that I don’t want to delve into right now. And it’s still really weird. Unlike horses you can’t own or ride a dolphin no matter what Hollywood tells you. For one thing they just have entirely too many teeth. I found this out to my terror as a child. Unlike fairies or mermaids they aren’t mythical, they don’t necessarily speak to a sense of magic or adventure. And while dolphins are good at swimming and jumping real high they cannot braid your hair and their voices are shrill above or below the water.


But I didn’t come here to share a bunch of dolphin hatred. Honestly I’d forgotten dolphin girls existed, or that I kind of was one for a hot minute I remembered about dolphins when I stumbled onto a mid 2000’s book called The Music of Dolphins.

This book combines the 2000’s obsession with weird science concepts and categorising girlhood. A young girl has been raised by dolphins is caught by scientists studying feral children. For a while it seems like she will be able to rejoin human society but she reverts and is sent back to live with her dolphin family. It’s interesting to see these books now that National Geographic has taught me what I know now about dolphins and their social behaviour which I am kindly not sharing today. This book, and all others of its ilk create and intimate relationship between girlhood and its subject. Being a girl is inseparable from being a part of the world of categorisation and doom to any attempt to separate the girls. Choice is often a factor in these stories as well. While the girls may have an evil stepfamily, or a prophecy, or a stolen friend bringing them into the world they want to be there. The girls have a point where they could walk away and they never do. Instead while the world remakes them in their image, they remake the world in their image.

I wasn’t as into dolphins as I was into other things like mermaids and obscure facts. I watched some movies, I read some books but they never really caught my heart. Except for these fat fuckers who I think are actually porpoises:

But I guess dolphin girls are just like the rest of us, just trying to figure out what we like and what really means something to us. The deep defining obsession of girlhood is really to figure out who you are as for the first time of your life one stage ends and another one begins.




*Does anyone even use the word tween anymore?

Binge Watching II

So if you follow me on Twitter you may or may not know that I am slightly obsessed with the Property Brothers*. I have reached that stage in where whenever I walk around my house or any house really, I mentally look around and decided what to change to add value or what has been to improve the space. I’ve seen their Youtube videos and their Vines. I’ve watch random interview videos because I was bored.

The Property Brothers show is one of those that is easy to binge watch for two reasons. One the hosts are likeable and fun to watch, plus their easy on the eyes.

[meat in property brothers sandwich gif]

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UDRnuCNkvQo

Two (for me especially) there are no real stakes. The show’s formulaic: They buy a house to renovate, some drama comes up, the house is perfect. You know how it’s going to end and you’re just in it to look at pretty pictures of houses. I didn’t get a job till about halfway through the summer which meant I spent my time home either  Helping around the house or Watching Property Brothers**. Since we don’t have USA network anymore I think Property Brothers are on more than Law and Order: SVU. Plus I don’t understand how they film so much, Brother vs. Brother just ended and now a new season of Property Brothers: Buying and Selling is coming out

Watching so much Property Brothers has given me some good career insight:

1. Good Branding is crucial. Make sure what you do and who you are is recognisable
2. Audience engagement brings whatever it is you’re doing to life
3. Flannel=win

*Jonathan’s my favourite

**Writing nearly made the list.

Accepting your ugly

Most of the body positivity movement centres on on loving your body unconditionally. You should love your body and they ways you are uniquely beautiful.* But the truth of the matter is you can’t be happy with your boy 100% of the time. You can love your body all the time (or try to) but you can’t be happy with it all of the time.

Part of me learning to love my body was learning to accept my ugly. To accept the days where I looked in mirror and thought “Nope.” When I was puffy and bloated, when I broke out and when my hair looked like a black mass about to consume my head. I learned to live with days where I the image of me in my head did not match with reality.

You will not think you look perfect 100% of the time. It’s impossible. You will have days where you look in the mirror and think “Why does my face look like a beach ball?” I had to learn to accept this about my body. I had to learn to sink into my own skin and embrace it every day. Accepting my ugly days was freeing. It let me take the pressure off myself, i no longer had to match the idea of my ideal self in my head. I just had to be me.

I still have days where accepting my body is hard. I have days where I look in the mirror and think “Why do I look gross? You were fine 2 hours ago?”** But I’m cool with it. I move on. I lie down in my bed and chill out watching Property Brother in my PJ’s. Beauty is a social construct, it doesn't define me. There are days when I’m happier with my body than other but I accept it how it is, ugly or not.

*Beauty is a social construct which means you define it, it doesn’t define you. Those who say otherwise are wrong.

**In a friendly way. Mostly right after I wake up.

New Job?!?!

Anyone who knows me knows I don’t vacation well. Strange for a lazy person but true. I think the max amount of time I go without either a job or school is about a week or two before I go mad. Work is how I relax, there’s nothing I like more than completing a job and being productive. The paycheck doesn’t hurt too ;).

Recently, like all college students, I had to ask myself the question: How am I going to make my degree profitable? A conversation with an alumni from my college gave me the idea of trying out a job in marketing/advertising. While my eventual goal is to be a writer and a filmmaker, I have to pay the bills before then. I looked around for marketing jobs and managed to land a great internship at a local advertising firm.

So far I’ve been here about two weeks but I’m learning a lot. I’ve helped write talking points and press releases, done research and even gone on shoots for ads. That’s not even touching on all the amazing stuff that’s still to come. I’ve had some really great jobs, but my co workers here are some really cool people who do some amazing work. Summer internships are a great way to test out different career options, even if you think they may be unrelated to your major. I’ve decided to take some classes in marketing in the fall to become more educated about the field. I can’t wait to see what next summer holds!

The G.A.T.E. question

"The government who gets rid of G.A.T.E. is a government that has decided to retire."

This was my attitude for years, an attitude which time has made me lose confidence in. G.A.T.E. is a government programme in Trinidad and Tobago which funds tertiary education for citizens. This leads to large number of T&T citizens staying in the country for college. On the other hand, this system has invited abuse in past years because of poor regulation. Instead of tightening controls, from what I can tell the programme has just become less accessible to people. Arbitrary rules and regulations have been set up with means students have to jump through hoops in order to receive funding for their education. While there is a need to make sure that G.A.T.E. funds are used appropriately, these regulations have made it harder for students to even get the funding. Students now even have difficulty getting funding if they want to switch programmes, and often G.A.T.E. pays students' tuition late.

While I do not receive G.A.T.E. funding myself, most of my knowledge of the troubles associated with G.A.T.E. come from the experiences of my friends and family. While successive governments have tried to make G.A.T.E. more efficient, their efforts have been like a bull in a china shop. There is huge concern right now that students are abusing G.A.T.E. funds and wasting taxpayers' dollars. The concern is valid, however their approach is worrying.

Suggestions have been made that the programmes and institutions which qualify for G.A.T.E. funding be reviewed, or a 50/50 loan programme be put in place. How do you judge which programmes deserve to get G.A.T.E. funding? Do the sciences and law get prioritised over humanities and the arts? With the rising cost of education, how much can students really provide towards tuition?

As a nation we've decided on certain national priorities, education being one of them. Funding is expensive, but the rewards are greater than the expense. A nation with more educated people is a nation whose citizens are more productive and are more perceptive. Regardless of the degree, when a person is educated that person is empowered. By deciding that education is right, not a privilege we decide that nothing can disqualify a citizen from that right and that systems will be designed to prevent abuse of that right. Delinquency is a huge problem that has to be dealt with. Making access to fund for education creates more problems than it does solutions, It can end up decreasing the number of people who can reap the benefits of the system.

The Shepherd's Crown

I can't believe I forgot to write about this earlier but I finally read the last book of my favourite series. I put off reading Wikipedia articles and ran from all spoilers. Finally, I got a chance to read it. Coming home I had to buy some stuff for my mom and decided to get reading material for the plane at the same time. I had to restrain myself to stop myself from reading it between leaving college and the airport.

Reading The Shepherd's Crown was an emotional experience. Even though I still have several Discworld novels I haven't read, The Shepherd's Crown is the last that will be written. Years ago, because I was obsessed with Christmas, I picked Hogfather off the shelves. Anyone whose read it knows it is not the conventional Christmas story. Terry Pratchett was the first writer that really taught me that you don't have to follow any of the conventional rules of writing.

I won't include any spoilers for the book. The Shepherd's Crown is not the best Discworld book, but it's a fitting way to end the series, especially since one of the first Discworld books I read was a Tiffany Aching novel.