Envoirment

My previous role I needed to be in all the time, although they did have really flexible hours. My current role is almost purely admin based and I've been able to work 1 day from home a week which is great. It's really nice to be able to save a couple hours on that day so I can have a lie in or have more time for myself once work is done. One other benefit is that in my previous role I would be on my feet all day moving around etc. So a lot of the time if I was quite ill I would take sick days as going in to work would make me feel horrid/worse. Whereas now I can work from home if ill without worrying about getting behind on tasks or such or people needing to cover me. Of course if I am very ill then I will still take a sick day. Although I haven't actually had a sick day in over a year now which is a first, so I think the flexible working has benefitted me health-wise as well. It's also great to have the option to work from home if there are family emergencies and such (One example was my mum being very ill so was able to work from home to help her go to the Doctors and keep an eye on her whilst my dad was at work).

Honestly I thought the top was right and Kitty winning fair. She was my favourite, something about her Diana really tickled me. :lol: She also had a good runway. Nehellania surprised me! She did really well and a gorgeous runway. Pythia was also a pleasant surprise as they seemed to be setting her up to flop with the last minute character change and such. I didn't agree with Vanity & Tessa's positions. I would've had Alyssa as bottom 2 honestly with Vanity low and Tessa safe. Alyssa's performance was just hard to watch/cringe? Honestly really disappointed by Alyssa this season and the favouritsm is the only thing saving her :lol: I think Kitty is just misunderstood on this season. Her humour is very dry/sarcastic/over the top and I think that's quite lost in the season. On UK3 she was pretty much the same (one of my favourite moments is her reaction to winning the The Miss Fugly Beauty Pageant challenge) but her type of humour is fairly prevelant in the UK. Add in the language barrier with the other queens and it can be a bit more difficult to read. It's also very easy for the production team to edit to be more villainous.

This *_* I don't think the album is that bad. It's full of passive/basic bops with a few good ones. A step down from Smile though. Maybe a song will go viral or something to revive the era. If not, I'm sure I'll enjoy the album for a bit.

Honestly thought the judging was pretty much spot on, although I would've put Alyssa in the bottom over Vanity I think. Sad to see Soa go :( I thought she was just coming into her own and then they hit her with another design challenge :lol: Happy to see Gala stay but sad to see her being overlooked this season :( Nice to see Tessa win - she did a great job!

Total bop and great video. Hope it charts at the very least! Could see something like this going viral on Tiktok. Hope it's not too late for it to become a small hit!

Perhaps the best thing she's done so far this era. She gave a great performance at the VMAs!! p7zrX4NU8YE

She performed it at the VMAs and it sounds like a bop. p7zrX4NU8YE

Great start for Linkin Park - also #36 on Amazon which is a great start there and the music video has over 8 million views so far. I'm thinking it'll go top 20 fairly easy. Top 10 depending on how well it holds up. I really like the song so hope it does hold on well!

What a shit show. :lol: I don't understand any of that judging... Soa, Pythia & Nehellenia were easily the top group and should've had a joint win tbh as I can see arguments for either winning, especially when you take into account runways as they all had such amazing runways. And how on earth was Gala in the bottom 2? Bottom two should've been Eva & Alyssa or Eva & Kitty. It also blows my mind how produced this is. Sure Kween, Kitty & Alyssa ended up in the same group by chance.... They should've spread them out into 3 different groups to avoid favourtism. I also feel so sorry for the queens as they had filmed 4-5 episodes in like 7-8 days. Clearly there wasn't any real prep time or a chance for them to catch their breath during filming. And it shows in the challenges. The overall quality of the challenges isn't at the "global" level I was hoping it to be which isn't the queens' faults as they aren't given enough time and the challenges just aren't really edited right? Also I'm a little bit annoyed of the lip sync songs used. Given it's global all stars I feel they should be using more songs in other languages. This global all stars isn't what I thought it would be sadly. :(

This is really catchy and I wasn't expecting RM's deeper voice *_* Hope the BTS army do their thing to get Meg (+ RM) and a nice hit. Good follow up to "Mamushi" now that is starting to slowly fade (still streaming fairly well though globally!).

So excited!!!! :cheer: Going through the queens, dare I say this is probably the best overall cast for a UK series yet? A good range of queens, some very prominant/successful ones. My highlights so far are La Voix, Dita, Marmalade & Rileasa. Although I'm sure that will change once we get the first episode or 2!

Oh no poor Saki!! :( I was looking forward to seeing them. The first 2 episodes are top 2 queens lip sync. First being a talent show non-elim episode and then the 2nd episode due to Saki having to leave they don't eliminate anyone and do a top 2. That's quite nice in one way to give the other queens more time to show their drag.

Poor UK3, I actually really enjoyed it and the cast in general :cheeseblock: In fact I loved Kitty on the season, but she's not translating very well on Global All Stars. Also Vanity gave one of the best lip syncs to grace the UK seasons and a top notch one in general with "Scandalous" by Mis-Teeq. UK3 would've probably been an amazing season if a few things didn't happen: 1. Victoria getting injured. 2. Double sashay of River & Choriza. 3. The negative bias/edit towards Charity Kase. We would've seen a much closer competition with Victoria in. Plus I always think UK3 is poorly judged due to following the best season of drag race in UK season 2. I think there's some warmth/nostalgia around UK2 due to the pandemic which made UK3 even more disappointing. :(

The Latin & K-Pop mixes of the song were awful? Like one of the worst girl group challenges in my opinion? :lol: The last group did the best by far but I feel that's also due to having the best version of the song. Also how tf are people being mad at Nehellenia being upset when they were literally talking about her being in the bottom just before she walked in :lol: Honestly feeling really sad for Gala - they're really overlooking her. I thought she would've been in the top. In my head she's had a much better track record so far in the competition than the judges have given so far :( Also how was vanity in the bottom 2? Like wtf? So many other queens did worse than her in the challenge and I thought she had one of the best runways? Then the judges were saying there were too many reveals? :lol: I'm getting somewhat annoyed now by the judging. Quite clear they're treating the English-speaking franchises better (UK/US/Australia/Canada). I did love Kitty this week though and won't take away her challenge win! I thought she did really well. No clue how Pythia wasn't in the bottom 2. Whilst her runway was great, her performance was so bad there should be no reason for her not being in the bottom 2. Sad to see Miranda go, although she was the right queen to go this week. :(

Amazon Update: 1. Lady Gaga & Bruno Mars - "Die With A Smile" 2. Teddy Swims - "Lose Control" 3. Oasis - "Don't Look Back In Anger" (+105) 4. Oasis - "Wonderwall" (+126) 5. Oasis - "She's Electric" 6. Benson Boone - "Beautiful Things" (+26) 7. Myles Smith - "Stargazing" 8. Benson Boone - "Pretty Slowly" 9. Hozier - "Too Sweet" 10. Shaboozey - "A Bar Song (Tipsy)" (+43) 11. Sabrina Carpenter - "Taste" (+99) 13. Oasis - "Champagne Supernova" (+111) 14. Coldplay, Little Simz, Burna Boy & Elyanna - "WE PRAY" 15. Sabrina Carpenter - "Please Please Please" (+193) 16. Benson Boone - "Slow It Down" 19. Clean Bandit, Anne-Marie & David Guetta - "Cry Baby" 20. Billie Eilish - "BIRDS OF A FEATHER" 23. Katy Perry - "LIFETIMES" 24. Sabrina Carpenter - "Espresso" (+57) 27. Oasis - "Married With Children" (+132) 28. Oasis - "Morning Glory" 30. JADE - "Angel of My Dreams" 33. Oasis - "Some Might Say" 34. Chase & Status & Stormzy - "BACKBONE" (+44) 37. Post Malone - "Losers (feat. Jelly Roll)" 47. Shawn Mendes - "Why Why Why" 48. Charli xcx & Billie Eilish - "Guess" 51. Billie Eilish - "WILDFLOWER" 54. Oasis - "Sad Song" 55. Oasis - "Live Forever" 59. Alex Warren - "Carry You Home (feat. Ella Henderson)" 66. Charli xcx - "Apple" 70. Oasis - "Roll With It" 79. Sabrina Carpenter - "Good Graces" 89. Oasis - "Slide Away 94. Sabrina Carpenter - "Coincidence" 96. Oasis - "Live Forever" 108. Oasis - "Little By Little" 121. Oasis - "Cigarettes & Alcohol" 137. Oasis - "U pIn The Sky" 174. Oasis - "Bring It On Down" 176. Oasis - "Half The World Away" 191. Oasis - "Stop Crying Your Heart Out"

Agreed! I think he's done well for the most part, although the winter fuel allowance is the one big mis-step. I am hoping that we'll see that either reigned in or U-turned on when we get the budget. You can't really expect instant changes from a government which has yet to reveal a budget. Particularly as after the election came the parliament summer recess, so very little would be done except appointing of people and announcing various things to come in the budget. I have noticed the right wing bots out in more force though which is frustrating. I'm hopeful that with the slightly better than expected economic outlook that there will be more wiggle room in the budget for things such as the winter fuel allowance.

Sabrina update on Amazon (Top 500): 13. "Please Please Please" (+177) 19. "Taste" (+87) 29. "Espresso (+91, 192 & 480) 114. "Coincidence" 217. "Good Graces" 256. "Bed Chem" 412. "Dumb & Poetic" 444. "Juno" 462. "Sharpest Tool" All tracks rising nicely. Shame Amazon doesn't combine versions (would make their chart so much nicer). "Taste" has risen a lot - wouldn't be surprised to see it top 10 in a couple days.

"Taste" did 1.2 million YouTube views in first two days - massive numbers that will help it push for #1.

Bruno & Gaga now #1 on Amazon. :cheer: Sabrina also debuts at #1 on the youtube chart with 694,229 views (that will just be 1 day). Massive youtube views should help it build a decent lead to go for #1 this week. Music video up to 18 million total views, been a while since we've seen a music video by a western artist have such a big debut!

Production sounds quite nice from the teaser! Looking forward to hearing the song in full.

Just heard "Nirvana" snippets and *_* Sounds like a total bop. Everything I've heard to far from the album sounds stronger than WW & "LIFETIMES" which is promising. I do hope 1 of the songs from the album will catch on and become a surprise hit.

Catching up with the 2nd episode and I was quite surprised that Vanity was top 2 over Gala! Gala would've done a lot better in the lip sync as well. For the ball challenge the judging was definitely off. Maybe it's my taste but I acutally loved Miranda's looks and thought she was high safe? :lol: I love her reference for her design look and it was definitely one of the better ones. I can understand Tessa being low for storyline. You could tell the set up for a fall was coming when she mentioned she had a degree and then ended up creating that dress. Honestly I don't even think it was the dress but the way she styled it (should take notes from Alyssa!). She reused that god awful wig from her taent show :lol: I enjoyed Kitty's first two looks. Her design look was a choice for sure though. I honestly thought Kween Kong was going to be bottom as I didn't actually like any of her looks? And her design look was one of the worst. Poor Athena :( I thought her first 2 looks were quite strong and the design look wasn't that bad! Soa was rightly in the bottom 2 unfortunately. For me: Win: Pythia :wub: High: Alyssa (based on how strong her first 2 looks were) & Vanity (she should've been high based on her design look alone, stunning!) Low: Tessa BTM: Kween & Soa I am loving the Tessa & Alyssa back and forth though :lol: The editing is giving me bias towards Ru girls quite a bit (Kitty/Kween/Alyssa) which is slightly annoying as I'm really enjoying a lot of the other queens. But I can tell that they are not production's queens to push unfortunately (Miranda not Top 2 week 1 and then low this week makes me feel she isn't going to last long - which is a shame as I am really loving her!).

"Taste" is so good! The youtube views are likely going to help it quite a bit - over 13 million views already, should know its first day in the UK later today/tomorrow! Amazon Update: #3. Lady Mars - "Die With A Smile" - climbing a lot :wub: #10. Calvin Harris & Ellie Goulding - "Free" #52. Coldplay - "WE PRAY" #89. Sabrina Carpenter - "Taste"

I hope so, one of my favourite Lana songs, so divine. :wub: It's up to a new peak of #120 on Global spotify. Also Lady Mars are up to #8 on Amazon - top 10 now! :cheer:

They're both US artists and have gotten more support on streaming and such. The song also started going viral on TikTok which usually impacts the US quickly first. Plus it has a massive format appeal on radio in the US so I expect it'll likely be a big airplay hit which will help it challenge for #1 at some point. If they were on HHUK from day 1 I think their UK numbers would've been a bit better. On the plus side the music video views have been good so far which has helped lift the songs initial UK start despite a slow start on Spotify and Apple. I need to double check Amazon later but I do know it started quite strongly there Saturday when I checked. Edit: Managed to look at Amazon and they are #14 which is really good! Will likely be top 10 on there soon.