Hey man, now you're really living

I screeched this blog to a halt on December 29, over halfway into year two. Reason being, I’m writing a pants-dropping, eyebrow-raising young adult novel – or, at least, a novel about young adults – and I found that having a full-time job; inventing, completing and writing up a daily mission and writing a book can’t actually be done.

The mounting evidence.

One hundred and four thousand words and eighty wheels of brie later, the first draft of the book’s done. The protagonist looks like this:

You’d want to read that book, right? Anyway, the focus of my attention needs to remain on the book for the time being.

Thanks for reading.

Me: selfie.

I realise I’m probably preaching to the choir here, but I’ve never investigated The Selfie. Reason being, the anomaly between reality and a triple-filtered person is frankly embarrassing.

To very graphically illustrate this point, this is my leg.

My Day 135 mission, learning mixed martial arts – or perhaps it was Day 138′s Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu – has resulted in a virulent staph infection.

This is the same leg through selfie filters.

False advertising, no? (If I was in proper selfie mode I would have slipped on a stiletto and got the chicken out of the way, obv.)

So I’ve been perusing the instructional videos of young ladies on YouTube, and this is how you make the ultimate selfie.

1) DOWNLOAD INSTAGRAM.

I had to do so for this post, making me something like the 85th million person and, thus, rather late to the party. You’ll need Instagram to add those vintage holiday snap/Campari commercial filters. X-Pro II is my favourite, as it brings out your eyebrows and eyelashes, Judy Garland-style.

2) DO HAIR AND MAKE-UP

Ideally, fake eyelashes and perhaps coloured lenses to give you Manga eyes. I can’t be arsed doing my hair ever, so I’m just going to hold it up in my hand, hopefully like this.

3) SORT YOUR POSE

You have options.

Chin down, eyes up. Ordinarily when I look have my head tilted down and look up it is with a pained expression as someone must have interrupted me, so I really have to work at this one. It’s hard, also, to not look like Dave Mustaine.

Bite lip, look away. Oh, this works well. Unfortunately, you could only do it sporadically or you’ll end up on YouTube.

Open mouth slightly and relax lips. This doesn’t work for me. I’m going to say it’s because my lips are already quite fulsome that this pose just makes me look gormless. Anyway, make sure mouth is either noticeably open or noticeably closed, or you’ll end up with one bared tooth. Obviously don’t pout and do the duck. The duck is so abhorrent that only the most gormless of gorms wouldn’t realise it.

The triangular open mouth – a la war time effort – works better for me, as it gives me much-needed cheekbones. (PIC)

Alert and alarmed. Lucille Ball was awesome at this.

Smize! Smize! Smize! Tyra Banks demonstrates how to smile with your eyes. It’s not for everyone. When I do it I look a cold-blooded killer.

4) HOLD THE CAMERA PHONE CORRECTLY

You can spot the selfie amateur – they’re the ones with linebacker shoulders. Never hold the camera straight onto yourself as you’ll look bulky. Rather, keep your shoulders even, project one arm out at 45 degrees to your body, and then crop out any protruding bit of arm from the end result.

5) USE APPS AND FILTER THE FUCK OUT OF IT

Post-production is the most important part of the process. Some good apps:

Camera+. This is an iPhone app from which you take the photo in the first place. It gives you additional filters and allows you to crop. My favourite filter is Cross Process which gives that bleached-out, 1960s faded snap look. It’s the Shoegaze of apps.

MoreBeaut2 allows you to soften and blur your skin, taking out any flaws. It also adds an ethereal glow. Careful you don’t get any buildings or heavy machinery in the background, as these will also glow.

Or, if you’re using a proper camera rather than your phone, upload it to Picfull for some devastatingly awful effects.

Gently correct your skin tone, bleach out a few features – and voila!

Keeper? Like Facebeef and the Janoskians,this one should be have remained a secret tool of Gen Z.

As neither of us have any Christmassy obligations, my fella and I decide to spend the evening up Mount Alexander, so that we might enjoy the sunset and then the sunrise, as we awake refreshed in the back of my ute.

The sunset gets full marks, but then things fall a little flat. We realise, upon five minutes of rustling ourselves into a swag in the ute tray, that we have simply nothing to do. We didn’t bring a laptop to watch a film under the stars and it’s too dark to read. And we already talked on the way here.

Sign of the times.

Thinking quickly, Justin pulls out his phone and brings up the night sky app so that we can establish which dot is Jupiter. Then we read Wiki pages on various mountains. Then we spend six hours trying to sleep (mountain peaks are surprisingly windy, FYI), until at the seventh hour we succeed and miss the sunrise.

Keeper? Yes, but with more provisions.