Damned with faint praise.

I suspect that given the choice between a beautifully styled "lady" and Galen I would far rather spend a day with Galen

When my children were small an old family friend once said to me "I've never seen you as the motherly type - but you don't seem to be doing any worse than any one else"!

My grandaughter asked me to go on the bouncy castle with her. When I refused she asked " why nanna its good fun" I replied " yes but I'm old and boring" yep you guessed she said " nanna your not boring" oh well that's somthing

Ok. Reubenesque it is, then

Wow! The last way I'd have described myself. Reubenesque perhaps (he liked his ladies on the large side)

Wow! That's just a wee bit shorter than me.

Not at all, galen. The Queen is 5'0" isn't she?
Would you prefer 'regal' then?

Neat and tidy? Might apply to a pile of old washing, I suppose.

Just got back from bows and arrows. Disaster. I'm trying to use a sight which involves a different tequnique.
The coach told me to pull my shoulders back, push my chest out and try to I imitate a page 3 model!
Collapse of stout party in giggles and next two arrows ended up high in the wall above the target!

Majestic = large!

If someone described me as neat and tidy, I would escort her to the nearest optician.

You are a very elegant lady Galen........without even trying

O wad some power the giftie gie us.

Galen having met you, I can safely say that the word which springs immediately to mind when I think of you is 'majestic'.
So there!

Galen I think one's sense of dishevelment/dowdiness etc is more in the mind than the external appearance. People who appear dowdy and untidy usually either do not know or do not care how they look.

My own DD has always been on the large size, since she was a year old, despite visits and consultations with health visitors and dieticians and my own careful monitoring of what she ate, my closest friend from school is similar. Both of them work on the basis of its not what I look like it is what I am.

DD flaunts her cleavage and as someone who swims up to 15 miles a week, winter and summer, has no hesitation about being seen in public in a swimming costume at the pool or on the beach. DF is equally gung-ho.

It is what you are, not what you look like that counts and, from your postings on GN I think your personality will outshine your figure any day.

The only good things about my looks are my pearls, and they're in for restringing as they broke the other evening.
Wish I could go for the equivalent of being restrung?
What do you good neat and tidy ladies suggest I do about it?
At the moment I feel very dowdy and untidy in spite of just having spent a fortune on new winter clothes as I've 'grown out of' my old ones and don't seem to be able to get my weight down.

merlot and grannieanne I've just had an almost sleepless night punctuated by nasty dreams, your posts made me with my early morning cuppa, thank you

merlotgran, thanks for making me laugh. I do hope you were able to laugh

The in-laws came to stay for my thirtieth birthday. We had some friends round for a meal and MIL chose that moment to give me my present.

'I know you'll like this' she said. 'I thought it was very you.'

It was a bottle of that well-known 1970s perfume, TRAMP!!

Many, many years ago, when we were newlyweds, my OH went to a mate's stag 'do' that included a visit to a strip club. When he came home I was naturally curious to know what the experience was like - especially the performers. His reply was "They were all awful - honestly YOU could have got a job there!" Needless to say, he's never been allowed to forget it!

I went to my brother-in-law's funeral, and met one of his brothers for the first time. He knew two of my sisters, who look nothing like each other. One is ash blonde, straight hair, tall and willowy with blue eyes. The other is shorter and curvier with dark reddish curly hair, and hazel eyes.

I am shorter and curvier with mid-blonde reddish curls and blue eyes. He looked at me and said - 'Aha! Now I see it! You are the missing link'.

When I was an art student my mother used to refer to me as Mick Jagger I suspect that neat and tidy is still not my thing.

I once bemoaned the fact that I had nothing nice to wear to go out in. My mother looked me up and down and said "you'll pass in a crowd". I was less than flattered.
jingle when I worked in a grocery store we used to have back fat left over from preparing the bacon. We used to sell it cheaply to customers. I have never known what they used it for though.

Yes, it's nicer than the Wurzel Gummidge look isn't it?

Actually, if someone described me as 'neat and tidy' I would be over the moon.