Helen Mirren’s Queen Elizabeth I shows us how to behave in the face of adversity.

Anyone who believes life is easy probably lives under a rock, inside a cave or in the magical, enchanted land of Denial. Life is more like a visiting carnival in the local church parking lot. You climb into that rickety “Black Hole” spinner ride – it shakes, spins, and pins you to the sides of its walls until you have the strength to peel yourself out of it at the end of the ride. But you have to know how to cope with the pressure when life straps you in for that wild ride.

This is exactly why we need Helen Mirren in our lives. The always eloquent British actress, who has played six queens in the course of her career, knows how to inspire both on and off the screen.

Here she plays Elizabeth I in an HBO mini-series of the same name. Mirren delivers the queen’s famous speech to the troops at Tilbury in Essex. The year was 1588 and England was facing a possible invasion from the Spanish Armada. The Queen herself rode out to greet her troops, who were massed to face the Spanish Duke of Parma. The text of this speech was found among royal papers in 1624, and it is believed that Elizabeth I herself delivered these very words to her troops.

Mirren spoke of playing Elizabeth I to HBO. As Mirren explains, “Queens are always such fascinating creatures, especially queens who equip themselves extremely well. They don’t fall prey to their circumstances or to men. It’s much harder for a woman to do that than a man. Much harder. She [Elizabeth I] earned our respect over the many generations that have come after her.”

Strong words from a strong woman about one of the most badass female icons. And yet, we can all carry this strength into our daily lives and livelihoods, even after the carnival ride, or in the case of Queen Elizabeth I, after a bloody war.

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15 good reasons to approach the season of cocktails and cookies with healthy aplomb.

Caring about our weight is part of the American experience, like finding a Victoria’s Secret next to a Cinnabon at the mall. We shouldn’t count calories but we do, despite reading subscriptions to Cosmo and remembering that beauty comes in all sizes. 

In a world of Occupy Wall Street, the Great Recession, and an overseas war, life can feel out of control so we control what we can. We hold our bodies up as some kind of indication of how “good” or “disciplined” we’ve been and in a world of fantastical thinking, that life will then reward us with great jobs, healthy relationships, and a reliable economy if only we can just put down the carbs.

We set ourselves up to fail. Alanis Morisette, famous noter of irony, admits to iVillage, “I remember being at my most thin one day, feeling like I could barely drag my lethargic body around, only to be met with the most compliments I had ever received.” At the same time, she has felt the scorn of extra weight. “Equally, and perhaps more abrasively, when someone inside the struggle with food tips the scales high above the average Hollywood red-carpet star, comments are thrown out about how indulgent and undisciplined they are.”

Pop culture forbids us from ever forgetting about our weight. Open up a web page and you’ll find that actress Mischa Barton is too thin. Reality host and soap star Alison Sweeney went spinning on Thanksgiving day. Jennifer Love Hewitt did Pilates while her family ate mashed potatoes. Jessica Simpson may or may not be getting a $4 million deal from Weight Watchers to lose her baby weight. Good thing, because Mariah Carey calls her baby weight body “rancid.” All of this seeps into our brains like high-fructose corn syrup.

We have the right to be a little bit chubby or a little bit skinny. (As long as nobody is giving themselves diabetes or an eating disorder, right?) We are more than numbers on a scale. We are more than our jean size.

And just in time for the holidays, 15 good reasons to approach the season of cocktails and cookies with healthy aplomb.

1. It is a universal truth that the last three pounds you triumphantly lose will go completely unnoticed by everyone else.

2. Sneaking a bag of sliced celery sticks into a movie theater is as pointless as the $8 box of Sugar Daddies you will buy halfway through the movie.

3. When a “friend” caresses your upper arm and says “You’d be gorgeous if you just toned this up,” you will look him up on Facebook ten years later and find that he died alone.

4. We are living in a glorious age where leggings paired with a flowing shirt are fashionable.

5. The law of nature gives women periods. Periods give us cravings. Cravings give us Tater Tots. This is the law of nature.

6. If a burger comes with a side salad, is it really a burger? (See above: The Law of Nature.)

7. After a certain age, your face looks thin despite a muffin top around your waist.

8. Fretting over your muffin top will just make you want to bake muffins.

9. The more weight you gain, the bigger your breasts. Money once spent on push-up bras can be redirected towards organic donuts. Donuts made of buttermilk, organic cane sugar, and ripened strawberries which melt in your mouth.

10. If your significant other is male, accept the fact that he will likely eat three times as much as you and still retain a flat stomach.

11. If you find yourself hiding the last of the Thanksgiving potatoes from your significant other, no one will judge you.

12. A cupcake will not kill you. However, falling off your spin bike because you were distracted by visions of cupcakes just might.

13. In some circles, abstaining from once-a-year delicacies such as eggnog means you hate children, Santa, and the Baby Jesus.

14. If we could harness all the energy we spend worrying over a few extra pounds, we would have the ultimate renewable energy source. Seriously.

15. Pop culture says we are all too skinny or too fat. Common sense says we are all beautiful. Suck it, pop culture. Suck it.

Images: powellburns, puikibeach, kristinausk 

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How far will the branding of Occupy Wall Street go?

For anyone born after 1965, the current political climate feels like we’re living the pages of a history book. But now, Flower Power is repackaged into 140 characters or less. An iconic image of young protesters flower-bombing police officers is replaced with a soon-to-be iconic image of an 84-year-old activist bombed with pepper spray. For many of us, supporting or opposing the ideals of Occupy Wall Street places us firmly in roles that feel familiar. We’re the hippies, now. The police. The veterans. The armchair activists. We are the American experience.

Except in the 21st century, there’s one big difference. Now, we’re being branded.

It’s ironic, really. Occupy Wall Street is a movement born from frustration with a perceived capitalist’s greed. People are angry, fed up, tired of seeing the inequities of a supposed democratic society washed and diluted into a sea of bad decisions and wasted money. And yet, simply, we are still a society that revolves around consumer demand.

Accordingly, “occupy” has become a buzz word with businesses using it to market themselves and pop culture infusing it into the vernacular. Just, how did we get here?

It started with a casting call on Craigslist. Unemployment rates for the under 25 crowd is at 18 percent, compared to the national average of 9 percent. Hence, young people are pissed. And MTV, the youth network, wanted in. “If you are over the age of 20 and appear to be between the ages of 20-24,” wrote the October 17th, 2011, posting, please send three recent photos and your bio to realworldcasthing@bunimmurray.com.

From this call came “True Life: I’m Occupying Wall Street,” where we met Bryan and Caitlin, two middle class youths disenchanted with their present and future prospects.

Then there was Jay Z’s line of Occupy Wall Street t-shirts. Last week, the rapper-mogul came under fire for marketing a line of Occupy Wall Street cotton shirts on his Rocawear clothing line – without planning on sharing the profits with the movement. Called a “scrotum” with the “political sensibility of a hood rat,” Jay Z was accused of cashing in on a movement that is protesting cashing in. Ironic, but not too.

The t-shirts inevitably disappeared from the Rocawear website.

Then “Occupy” started showing up in blog stories unconnected with the movement. Gawker called a New York Times report on the “sell-out” California college kid’s trend to “Occupy McMansions.” Twilight enthusiasts occupied “Twilight Street” ahead of the latest movie premiere in Los Angeles. In fact, “Occupy” is officially part of our vernacular, soon to be validated as a buzz word of 2011.

Hell, even the conscious businesses are getting in on it. A recent email blast went out from Solar Mosaic to “occupy” rooftops with solar energy. As the company’s enthusiastic press release writes, “Called Occupy Rooftops, this new wave in the Occupy movement is being spearheaded by solar finance company Solar Mosaic and 20 other companies and organizations to help people kick start a project on a building in their community such as a school, non-profit or place of worship.” For as little as $100, you too can have solar energy occupying your home.

It seems as if we’re drawing on Occupy Wall Street like a leviathan swirling around a fleet of rogue pirate ships captained by dashing, dread-headed swains. (Copyright, The Walt Disney Company.) It’s enough to leave you wondering, just who is occupying who?

But if it changes the way we think, does it matter? We are all consumers. In the end, remembering this may be one of the best ways to effect real change. We can choose not to buy from giant chain stores. We can choose to support American-made local businesses. We can invest and bank responsibly. We can buy ethical house wares and local, organic food. And yes, we can even consciously source our energy.

We are the 99%. Time to occupy our own choices.

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Rita Hayworth’s Gilda was the ultimate femme fatale, but do we want to emulate her?

Becoming a classic Hollywood femme fatale is very simple. Start with the basics. Lean back in your posture at all times. Lead with your breasts. Work your eyelashes vigorously as if live tarantulas are in fact affixed to your lids. Keep your arms akimbo with your hands on your hips. Make direct eye contact a lot, but don’t look too alert. Then start slapping everyone you see. (*Don’t slap everyone you see.) You’re out for revenge.

Becoming a new Hollywood femme fatale is simpler. You flash your crotch at the camera and then take an ice pick to anyone who gets in your way. Luckily, you sometimes get to wear flats.

But back to the old school way of femme fatale thinking.

Rita Hayworth used to say “They go to bed with Gilda, and they wake up with me.” Her 1946 turn as Gilda was made iconic by her one-glove striptease, placing Hayworth permanently into the American cultural brain as the ultimate femme fatale. She played such havoc on the zeitgeist that her “bombshell” image was affixed to the first nuclear bomb tested after World War II. You know you’re sexy in America when your cinematic image evokes mass destruction.

We enjoy ourselves a femme fatale, but we’re not sure we ought to. Like a George Clooney girlfriend, they seem interchangeable. Sure, she might have red hair, or blonde ringlets, or sleek black bangs, but doesn’t it just seem like she’s there to make the man look good? We covet their style, their hair, their ability to work an evening glove. But the femme fatale is often a non-entity, a woman who doesn’t seem to be in control of her own life. Her central theme is inevitably a man’s downfall or redemption. And really, where’s the fun in that?

So let’s reclaim our femme fatales. Gilda does not have to be anti-feminist. She’s like a lollipop. They aren’t inherently sexist, until you place one in the hands of a greased-up 24-year-old woman on the cover of a men’s magazine. Instead, let’s see Gilda as a window of empowerment. We can all vamp in red lipstick, corsets, and elbow-length gloves, but we’re doing it for ourselves and carefully, in heels.

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Meet celebrities recently in the news who use their giant paychecks for good.

It’s Kim Kardashian’s world, we’re just living in it. Or so it would seem by the intense media onslaught covering the reality starlet’s $10 million wedding and subsequent divorce a mere 72 day later. A wedding her family is rumored to have been gifted despite collecting a $65 million fortune from their reality shows. But stay with me, I’m not here to wring my hands over Hollywood’s abundant cash flow but rather to call out the do-gooders of Tinsel Town.

There are many celebrities who use their fame and fortune for causes outside of having a hair stylist on call 24 hours a day. In fact, here are seven who have made recent headlines doing positive things for both population and planet.

Robert Pattinson builds a school for girls in Cambodia
Perhaps we all know Robert Pattinson best from his role as Reese Witherspoon’s grown-up son in 2004’s “Vanity Fair.” He also stole hearts as the doomed yet dashing Cedric Diggory in “Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire.” It’s possible he may have been in a vampire movie or two since then, I’m not sure.

Nonetheless, a family in Chicago recently paid $80,000 to meet with this little-known character actor. (Just kidding, I know he’s an attractive vampire.) And what did the dreamboat of a million sparkling dreams do with the money? Pattinson donated 100% of the proceeds to the Go Campaign, which is being used to build a home for PAGE (Program Advancing Girls Education) to educate teen girls in Cambodia. Pattinson is also donating a November private screening of “Breaking Dawn” in Los Angeles, where all proceeds will go to the Go Campaign.

Ashley Judd fights for family planning
This Kentucky-raised actress is well known for her good deeds. Among her acts of advocacy, Judd is a Global Ambassador for Population Services International (PSI), a leading global health organization dedicated to children’s health around the globe. Recently, on World Population Day, she sent out a call to arms in the fight for population control.

“As a woman, I believe it is essential to welcome men into the conversation,” she wrote for PSI. “According to World Health Organization statistics, approximately 1,000 women die every day from preventable causes related to pregnancy and childbirth.”

Russell Simmons advocates for marriage equality
The co-founder of Def Jam Records thinks that marriage is a human right for all people and made sure the state of New York knew it. Last June, same-sex couples were granted the right to marry in the Granite State in part because of the substantial support the movement received from the public. Simmons, a prominent New Yorker, made a video in support of marriage equality for the Human Rights Campaign. It played in taxi cabs all over New York City before the historic vote. In April, Simmons also received an Excellence in Media Award from GLAAD  (Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation).

Ryan Seacrest uses his voice to help others
Yes, Ryan Seacrest of American Idol fame is actually an executive producer of the reality machine that is “Keeping Up With the Kardashians.” At least the reality mogul is using some of his money for a good cause. His non-profit, The Ryan Seacrest Foundation, is building broadcast media booths called The Voice in pediatric hospitals across the nation. Sick children are able to host radio shows and broadcast on closed circuit television, as well as blog from the centers.

The first Voice was launched at Children’s Hospital of Atlanta, and Seacrest recently opened a second booth at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. “Moms will come up to me and say ‘My kid hasn’t gotten out of bed for weeks and for this today, they have.’ That means the world to me,” Seacrest recently told ABC 6 of Philadelphia. His goal is to bring more Voice booths to other hospitals across the nation.

Barry Manilow helps Joplin sing
Barry Manilow is known for writing the ballads and jazz songs of our childhood recitals. But did you know the legendary crooner recently donated $300,000 worth of instruments to tornado-ravaged schools in Joplin, Missouri? On May 22, 2011, a tornado destroyed much of Joplin, taking much of the local high school with it.

As Manilow told Rueters, “I know first-hand how invaluable music can be to get you through life’s tough times. It is an honor and a privilege to help these kids after such a disaster.” He then explained to some confused students that he was the “Justin Bieber of the 1970s.” Then he schooled them that music and passion are always the fashion.

Shakira shakes up a reason to learn
Columbian-born singer Shakira is best known for her Grammy-award winning music, but she’s also an inspired philanthropist. Growing up in Columbia, the singer witnessed the suffering of area street children. This moved the artist to create The Pies Descalzos Foundation, or the Barefoot Foundation. This organization works to reveal a sustainable model of education to help children in vulnerable communities. Shakira has helped found six schools since 2003 and recently opened a U.S. branch of her foundation. To top off her good deeds, she is a global ambassador for UNICEF.

Leonardo DiCaprio tweets for tigers
DiCaprio is well-known for his green advocacy. A committed environmentalist and activist, he wrote, narrated, and co-produced “The 11th Hour,” a film highlighting the eco-impact humans are having on the planet. Recently, DiCaprio spoke out (rather, tweeted) about the tragic Ohio Tiger killings, when 18 Bengal tigers were killed by sheriffs after their suicidal owner let them free. A devoted animal rights activist, DiCaprio has already lent his support to the Save the Tigers Now campaign.

Image: dpurdy/Flickr 

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The modern screen heroine can learn from Brigitte Bardot’s unapologetic sexual power.

In 1956, “My Fair Lady” opened on Broadway with Julie Andrews as Eliza Doolittle. Fidel Castro began to inflame an uprising in Cuba. And the U.S. Supreme Court declared Alabama’s bus segregation laws illegal. America may have been in the thick of Eisenhower’s puritanical 1950s, but the shades of a social revolution were starting to stir.

In the midst of it all, Brigitte Bardot exploded onto American movie theater screens. Her 1956 film “…And God Created Woman” made the 22-year-old actress an international star, catapulting both the French ingénue and the foreign film market straight into the American consciousness. Bardot became the symbol of a new kind of sexuality, embracing both frankness and spontaneity with an abandon never before seen on American film screens. Consequently, her defiant disdain of convention both shocked and inspired a generation of women and men.

As Juliette Hardy, Bardot became much more than a stereotypical sexpot. The first time we meet her, she’s sunbathing naked in the St. Tropez sun as the camera plays on her naked form. But her sex is the source of her power. Sex is not a weapon she’s using to get what she wants – it is her end goal.

Mix Bardot’s “unbridled appetite for pleasure” into 1950s American culture and you have the beginning of a feminist revolution. She was the first of her kind, a new kind of sexually-liberated heroine. Bardot was a threat to the status quo. Her Juliette was confused, abandoned, and at times childlike, but conversely one of the most powerful female characters of her time.

But did Bardot’s example survive in cinema? She was scandalous to the 1950s American public. Today, she’s just as rare. After all, who would be her modern equivalent? There is Angelina Jolie, whose screen presence often seems to hold sexuality like a sidearm. But compare Bardot’s Juliette to most characters played by a Julia Roberts, or Katherine Heigl, or Kate Hudson. It’s like putting a panther next to a litter of kittens. The so-called modern screen heroine pines for marriage and Mr. Right in a typical modern romantic comedy. Ironically, it’s the 1950s that’s considered a quaint and conventional period in American history.

So perhaps it’s time for the modern screen heroine to take a page from the Bardot’s handbook. We’re not prudes, sluts, or whores: we’re women empowered to unapologetically get what we want. So let’s reclaim the modern woman from an image as a marriage-obsessed desperado. Even if it means dancing a mambo, stepping on a man’s face, or being called a “demon-driven temptress.”

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Michelle Pfeiffer’s Catwoman reminds us of the best way to make a statement – and an exit.

Many of us fantasize about our dream comebacks.

Here’s one: Say there’s ketchup gracing your upper lip because of an essential meeting with French fries during your lunch hour. You return to the office and someone notices the dried red condiment just under your nose and makes a snarky comment, like “Don’t you know how to eat?” Before you sink into a deep depression from failing at something so natural, like eating and wiping your mouth, you do some quick, grease-fueled thinking. “Yes, I know how to eat,” you offer before slinking off to see if there are any cold fries left in your office trash can.

Not a strong comeback for you.

Maybe you should take heed and handle an uncomfortable situation like Michelle Pfeiffer’s Catwoman. Because really, when is kicking ass then back-flipping out of a situation not the best way to make an exit?

To many Gen Xers, “Batman Returns” remains one of the best childhood realizations of strong womanhood. The Tim Burton-helmed film came out in 1992, giving Third Wave Feminists a whole new ideal of sass. I still have a miniature Catwoman figurine climbing a string tied to the corner of my desk, where she remains an iconographic reminder of how one might behave in a situation calling for drop kicks. She’s also a good remember that a snappy, well-crafted comeback really just needs the right amount of confidence. Granted, Catwoman’s confidence comes from a lunacy inspired by a drop off a skyscraper, but now we’re just splitting cat hairs, right?

For further lessons in psychotic feline behavior, check out how Catwoman cleans out her wardrobe. Goes on a date. And quits her job.

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Barbara Stanwyck instructs us on how to properly court a man.

For two solid decades I dated. Sometimes I had a boyfriend for a few years, other times, I just saw someone for a couple months. This version of boyfriend once meant a peeing-off-my balcony-drunk man because he thought it was hilarious and cool. (Despite a fully-functioning bathroom as far away from you to this screen.) The moral of the story is that sometimes, I didn’t make the best choices in men. Also, it’s possible I’m not young.

Sometimes, I did meet a great and worthy man. Then, I would mask my keen feelings of attraction with modern courtship rules, which meant that I would really, really, really like him without ever letting him know how much. To me, telling a man that I was enamored was equivalent to walking through Hollywood wearing nothing more than pasties and a thong. It would mean I would be exposed, naked, and most of all, exposed and naked for possible rejection.

So if I could do it all over again, I would immediately revise all of my dating exploits in the following manner.

In the 1941 comedy Ball of Fire, Sugarpuss O’Shea (Barbara Stanwyck) shows us how to properly court a man. Here, Stanwyck plays a gangster moll on the run who takes refuge with scholarly Professor Bertram Potts (Gary Cooper). Ball of Fire, partially penned by Billy Wilder, is loosely adapted from Snow White. This makes Stanwyck our enchanted princess while Cooper stands in for one of the dwarves.

But Stanwyck is no Disney lily of the field. She reminds us of the importance of sass and truth when dating afield. Of the proper way to lay out our feelings on the table. We all can be Sugarpuss O’Sheas when it comes to wooing our preferred sex. We just have to hide the pasties and learn from poor choices in toilet-challenged boyfriends.

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You can lie, sue, and Spanx all in the name of youth in Hollywood.

We age. It’s a normal part of life for all women, like getting your period or slowly turning into a person who refuses to wear high heels. But if you live and work in Hollywood, it’s a different story. If you are a woman, you are supposed to look young. If you are a woman over the age of 25, you are supposed to look young – for your age. If you are an actress, you are supposed to look like a zygote with Botox who is allergic to carbs.

So what are the women of Hollywood supposed to do?

First, lie about your age. Most actresses shave a few years off their birth certificate. This is a given fact in Hollywood, just like Renee Zellweger’s amazing legs. Note that these hacked birth certificates suddenly invert for actresses after the age of 50, such as Meryl Streep, Judi Dench, and Helen Mirren. Then, their sheer force of coolness shines forth like a laser, scorching everyone in its wake.

And if you’re caught lying about said age? Sue. This week, Amazon.com revealed that they were being sued for $1 million after revealing the age of a “Jane Doe” actress on the Internet Movie Database website. Amazon.com refused to remove the age reference. Now that everyone knows she is a wasted hag, Jane Doe insists she can’t get work because she looks too young to “play” 40. The burden of looking younger than your years is heavy for some.

Second, admit that you wear Spanx. Jessica Alba, Portia DiRossi, Catherine Zeta-Jones, and Gwyneth Paltrow all cop to “a smoother silhouette” thanks to the spandex girdles. Further, the right slimming undergarments are essential, say housekeeping books from the 1950s that also recommend greeting your husband at the door with a martini and light conversation about your bomb shelter.

In a post-feminist world, Spanx are useful in manufacturing enlightening moments in a marriage. Like when you realized you haven’t packed your Spanx for an out-of-town wedding, and your husband asks if you’re talking about the underwear for your paunch. After everything goes white and “Flight of the Valkryies” plays in your head you admit, yes, it is the underwear for your paunch.

Finally, cultivate a “who cares?” attitude that secretly includes a nightly dosing of bird excrement on your face combined with extracts of sake and gold chips. Because have you heard? That’s how the Japanese stay so young.

Or you could just leave Hollywood’s standards and actually not care. In the end, we all age. Just smile at the 20-year-old heaving a long-winded sigh that he or she feels so old because they just found their vintage iPod from 2003. After all, there comes that day when we’re all wearing the same comfortable shoes and asking someone to repeat what they said.

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Watching “The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills” really is the most conscious thing we can do all week.

The other night, my husband and I performed a newly-established ritual in our marriage. “I’m going to watch the Real Housewives of Beverly Hills now,” I defiantly told my significant other, who glanced up long enough from grading papers to roll his eyes and turn up NPR. “You know, Michelle Obama watches. Her husband, the President, admitted it,” I added. I know this hard fact because I also following each viewing by a bracing read of gossip columns about the Housewives.

But back to my staged rebellion against everything.

“And your professor friend watches the Housewives. With her PhD. She told me,” I shrilled like Justin Beiber before marching into the living room. Once there, I set myself in front of the television, stabbing the remote rebelliously at the TV. I wasn’t fabricating defensive drama at all. I was being real. Housewife real.

Sure, the Beverly Hills Housewives might come off as shallow, anti-intellectual wannabes obsessed with money and eternal youth supplied by a plastic surgeon’s needle. But the rest of us know that the women from the RHOBH are really just socially-conscious wunderkinder inspiring us all to make the world a better place. There has to be redemption in watching this series. My sheer force of furious typing says so. Consequently, I present the three lessons of conscious living. It’s all about the journey, people.

First, they teach us to appreciate our faces. If you were to rewind time-lapse photography on most of the Housewives upper bodies, you would either discover a decomposing rabbit or find that they were once extremely lovely sans Botox and fillers. As someone who is of Housewife-friendly age, I can assert that sometimes our bodies just want to get on with it. Eventually, we all start to treat our skin and digestive tracks with more attention than we ever thought possible. But when we know it can swiftly be erased with the mere swipe of a cosmetic procedure, we learn to appreciate our flaws more.

Bullying awareness from the Housewives

Second, the Housewives provide useful public service announcements about bullying. A recent episode involved the Housewives transported via time machine back to 7th grade. It went something like this: a Housewife hosts a party. Two Housewives decide they don’t like the New Girl. When the New Girl fights back, all hell breaks loose. Dialogue includes things like “Bring it, bitch,” “She’s mean. I don’t like it. Make it stop,” and don’t forget, “Yes, I am a slut.” Really, we’ve all just received an important Schoolhouse Rock about the dangers of middle-aged bullying.

Finally, they promote animal-friendly living. Housewife Lisa VanderPump famously waggles her Pomeranian Giggy all over the west side of Los Angeles. Giggy dines at the finest restaurants. Giggy drinks out of expensive water glasses. Giggy has 37,235 followers on Twitter. Dame VanderPump has raised the bar on animal acceptance. Now it’s just up to us to train our flopping Labradors and unappreciative Persians to appreciate the finer things in life.

Really, it’s like the RHOBV (or Really Hoping Michelle Obama Believes in Vices) are the Mother Theresa’s of the West Coast. You can join the First Lady and me to watch these selfless ladies on Monday nights on Bravo at 10pm.

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