If anything, I never realised how much I took my opposable digits for granted. I would bristle at the thought of spending my life thumbing up or down her decisions but now barely stretch to wag in disapproval. I skulk around the dusty floor, where I patrol for pests gliding across. As she mixes in the cauldron, her face mesmerised by the smoke and colour changes, I circle around her legs chirping. Still too preoccupied, I start to jag into her legs in order to elicit a response. We know each other but can now barely understand: that’s the punishment.  

“Why do you do this every year?” “When your aunties and uncles were younger, we weren’t able to afford the steak pies sold at New Year. Your Grandpa knew this butcher who reduced the price of turkeys after Christmas and we just decided to have that instead…” I don’t know why I do this now. You’re all too hungover to get up and help me clean the table and floor surfaces beforehand, making excused about having to clear up before your own parties and not getting any sleep. Don’t be like that, I’m not just blaming you. I want to see you all getting the chance to pull crackers and have a meal together. It’s just the house seems too small to have everyone around here, with the children chasing each other and the cat wanting its space. I have to clear this up on my own; the tables, the chairs, the spare cutlery, the leftovers. As much as you’d all want to have a break from this big meal every year, and I do too, you’d only come whining back to me as it draws nearer. I’ll still be there, making the soup in time for the Bells...

It’s unfortunate that girlishness often equates to rubbishness. For all the campaigns against gender-segregating space weapons and Lego sets from styling dolls and mock-up kitchen playsets in order to create the equal-opportunities playroom of our hopes and dreams, you still get the idea that even they wouldn’t touch the girly toys. To me, socializing girls into pink princessiness is not just the problem – it’s also socializing everyone else to denigrate said pink princessiness. This unfortunate tendency is most evident in children’s television. As Transformers proved, any dumb eighties cartoon produced to sell action figures can just about coast along on fanboy nostalgia. There’s none of the misty-eyed recollections of learning to share thanks to the Care Bears. Oh really? Try telling the rabid fanbase of My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic! The 21st century reboot of the pastel pony collection’s Saturday morning cartoons was created to appeal to little girls and their mildly nostalgic mothers, before inadvertently cultivating a more vocal and proactive fanbase of nerdy young men who call themselves “Bronies” (from the rather ungrammatical “bro ponies”). The Bronies had several reasons for adopting the show. At first it was the episodes’ breadth of pop culture references...

What’s the hardest thing about being a journalist? Is it coming up with interesting ideas that could be developed into newsworthy pitches? Finding the motivation to crack on with difficult assignments while juggling day jobs and distractions elsewhere? Being able to cope with evenings of networking and nights alone at the laptop trying to finish a piece? For a journalist with Asperger’s Syndrome, you would be likely to answer “all of the above”. Asperger’s Syndrome is a hidden learning disability on the Autistic Spectrum. As a young woman with the condition, I have to work hard at improving my social communication, concentration skills and spatial awareness. People with Asperger’s are defined by their tendencies to stick to routines and certain regimes and their (in)ability to adapt to changes such as relocation or breaking into new groups. Some of you neurotypical journalists reading this may assume that I am automatically unsuitable for working in the media. Your assumptions were probably raised by the Onion News Network’s (obviously fake) autistic reporter who is more comfortable parroting facts about trains than interacting with grieving relatives. But I would like to think that this is a reflection on how my condition is reflected...

?Celia Pacquola emerges onto the stage in a ramshackle fashion. Her feet poke out from behind a black screen that she appears to be trying to hide behind and her opening remarks are hesitant and unsure. This shoddiness characterises a set that attempts to lead us through Pacquola’s emotions following a painful multiple betrayal by an ex-boyfriend. Throwing pictures up on to the screen to symbolise her emotions and clicking her fingers whenever she wants us to experience what she was going through, Pacquola irritates more than she engages. Digressions outside of the theme are equally uneven, descending into inappropriately tasteless rape gags and random “How crazy am I?!” territory far too often. Pacquola herself is likeable, and clearly intelligent enough to develop her act away from confessional material. But, as the title may have pre-warned you, this show isn’t much more than a wallow in self-obsession.

?Dollymix contributor Bridget Orr is here to deconstruct portrayals of women in the media, and what lies beneath both new-fangled and traditional female stereotypes. This week, she wonders about the ‘girl overachiever’… Calling someone an ‘overachiever’ is a bit of a backhanded compliment. Instead of appreciating someone’s academic or sporting success at face value, calling someone an overachiever seems to mock their achievements slightly. The impression of the overachiever is someone who spent lunchtimes in the chess club instead of hanging around the local shops indulging in Pot Noodles and sweets, and rubbed their intelligence in their classmates’ noses with English talks on Hannibal’s uprising against the Roman Empire (no really!). They are the kind of people who get flustered about popular culture and the popular kids at school. Whilst life tries to teach the overachiever that a B or a 2.1 is okay just as long as they manage to socialise at the same time, they will not take any of it. Overachievers - they’re just not normal! I apologise for that slight generalisation there and back to the deconstruction. More recently, the ‘overachiever’ has been associated with the image of the pretty blonde, presumably private-educated girl clutching...