I saw Maxim's so called "Hot 100" ("the ultimate list of the world's most beautiful women") posted on a forum today. Lists like this always tend to be at odds with my own tastes and make it clear to me why I'm not one of their readers and am obviously not in their target market. Out of the 100 listed, the ones I'd rate highly are:

Olivia Wilde
Ali Larter
Rebecca Romijn
Kristen Bell
Jennifer Garner
Eliza Dushku
Avril Lavigne
Mischa Barton
Hayden Panetierre
Elisha Cuthbert
Sarah Michelle Gellar
Jessica Biel

I know that despite doing well up to about 2005/2006, Paris tends to get screwed over by such magazines, so no suprise there (and a reason to boycott such a useless magazine if ever there was one). Milla Jovovich also tends to get criminally ignored (as in this case) or relegated to the 90s and it's not the first time that Naomi Watts has been ignored. But where are Angelina Jolie or Gwen Stefani, who usually feature somewhere on the list? I really don't understand these stupid lists and their fickle moods!

Anyway, the definitive Top 20 of the most beautiful women in the world at the moment, would obviously go more like this:

20. Jennifer Garner
19. Mia Kirshner
18. Keira Knightley
17. Eliza Dushku
16. Sarah Michelle Gellar
15. Eva Green
14. Elisha Cuthbert
13. Shannon Lucio
12. Mischa Barton
11. Lucy Pinder
10. Maggie Grace
9. Diane Kruger
8. Keeley Hazell
7. Angelina Jolie
6. Gwen Stefani
5. Shirley Manson
4. Rebecca Romijn
3. Naomi Watts
2. Milla Jovovich
1. Paris Hilton

Although I'll still be posting the occassional supportive comment at my favourite Paris Hilton site and still use it's offshoot forum, I really can't be bothered reading the other comments or responding to them. Some of the regulars annoy me with their small mindedness and judgemental natures. One regular called Angelina Jolie a "freak" for being bisexual(!) and seems to think that the bulk of Paris haters are poor people (an insult to me as my family was always pretty poor when I was growing up and I'm longterm unemployed). Another regular repeatedly calls Paris "immature" for the great crime of being happy to talk about her relationship and how happy it makes her. Apparently when you're in a relationship, you're meant to be a body snatched pod person - completely private, reserved and not showing any affection, signs of happiness, etc. When I point out from my own experience that I've known older people than Paris (including longterm relationships and married couples) who can happily talk about their feelings for their partner, the fact that older people "act silly" is denied. The same regular even thinks that Paris's parents should intervene (despite the fact that they personally approve of Paris's relationship and seem to hear wedding bells on that score themselves). WTF? So now talking happily about a relationship is on the same list of crazy Betty Ford Clinic worthy behaviour as joining crazy cults or severe drug/alcohol addiction? And supposedly just because some of us give Benji the benefit of the doubt of possibly being a decent guy who really does make Paris happy and we don't have a default position of assuming he's automatically a moneygrabber or only out for publicity, we're supposedly giving him a "sainthood" *headdesk* I don't know what kind of pills this chick is on, but her constant criticism of how Paris leads her life (and by extension probably everyone that doesn't subscribe to this person's rules to live by) used up the last of my patience and reasoning skills.

On Tuesday, I start a thirteen week incarceration with the Scottish Training Foundation's work experience course. This has me feeling depressed and horrified. I did six months with them previously on 2003/4. And I can still remember the minute to minute monotony of being stuck in room five days a week, about seven hours a day, doing jobsearches, looking through newspapers and writing the occassional letter or filling out a job application and then just sitting there for hours, waiting for whoever is in charge to let you away (and if it was left up to one guy in particular, he would enjoy dragging it out as long as he could before throwing us a bone). Last time there wasn't even enough chairs to keep up with the influx of new prisoners and there were only about three computers for twenty or more people (and of course they took all the fun out of the internet by putting a lock on most of it). Then somewhere along the thirteen weeks, they'll probably find a work placement for me, which means slaving away somewhere for my benefit, getting the shit jobs that the paid employees can't be bothered with (my worst experience of my two work placements last time was B & Q where I got shackled to a right obnoxious bullying cunt who insisted on giving me all the heavy lifting duties and needed the manager to tell him to get me inside when it was heavily raining outside). New Deal is supposed to help give a boost to your jobsearch, but I can't think of anything more dispiriting than this kind of enforced monotony and servitude. There are times when I really miss George Orwell and his eye for beauracratic injustice. Like other things in life, it serves to remind me that nothing is ever going to get better in life and there's nothing worth pursuing that I could actually achieve that would actually make life worth living (instead of merely enduring).