Eminem

Hey! Hear me out, hear me out! His music, not him (although, yes, I would definitely not say no!)

I love him. I do. A modern musical genius, if you will allow me to indulge myself. No, I have not gone mad, I really do think so! 

Eminem's songs (well, some of them. Some admittedly should probably not see the light of day!) are works of musical art. Lets start with his lyrics. Witty, clever, rhyming and rhythmic. It's fairly easy to make lyrics rhyme (take J Biebs for example: "You are my love, you are my heart; and we will never ever ever be apart,"), but to make them become central to your songs beats is something totally different and for me why he stands out from other artists (For a prime example of this try Eminem's Lose Yourself). They also make you take a step back and think sometimes like Stan or You're Never Over. Stan in particular is a masterpiece. A beautifully haunting song. And they are so, so clever sometimes. You remember Love The Way You Lie with Rihanna? What's you're favourite lyric from that song? Is it "You don't get another chance; Life is no Nintendo game; But you lied again; Now you get to watch her leave out the window; Guess that's why they call it window 'pain,'" hmmm. Thought so!

The icing is his perfectly complimentary beats. And the cherry? The songs he samples. They just fit perfectly too. I could listen forever and not get bored. You'd keep finding different hidden meanings or euphemisms in his lyrics.

Well, that's what I think anyway. I love him as an artist and producer. But it is personal taste and opinion.

My favourite Eminem lyric? There are lots. But one fittingly for me: "all those who look down on me, I'm tearing down your balcony."

My Weight

Ok. Ok. It's not what it sounds. I do not have an eating disorder. If anything, I'm on a seafood diet. I see food, I eat it! (Get it?! Alright, enough with the Dad jokes...)

I'm short, and thus don't weigh a lot. I also struggle to put on weight. No matter how much I eat (and I can sometimes eat up to 5 meals a day in the middle of the season), I just can't seem to put on any weight. I blame my fast metabolism (although I'm not really sure what science says about that!) and the fact that I spend most of my time running around, chasing a ball into a goal!

Lets straighten some things out here. I have a BMI of 20.08(kg/m(sq)) which is classed as normal (i.e. I'm at a healthy weight), although as a sports scientist I will mention that BMI isn't always what it's cracked up to be. This is however, a recent development, I used to be 18.something for a long time, and only just above the underweight category.

From the ages of 13 to 18, I was 42kg. 42. For 5 years. 5 long, lightweight years. Then I went to uni, and I put on 2kg in 9 months to bring me up to 44kg. Fantastic! I then went to live and study in New Zealand and in 4 months put on another kilogram after the discovery of my love of beer. Ace! I then went travelling round New Zealand, eating to live rater than living to eat (which is how I normally am!) As a consequence I lost nearly 2kg in a month. 2. Sucks! So, very nearly back to square one.

"So Jen, tell us, if you're at a healthy weight, why do you want to put on weight?"

I play sports. Mainly football although I have been known to dabble in hockey, netball, athletics and the like. My issue is that because I'm small, I sometimes get pushed off the ball too easily. Not because I'm not strong (I have a brother and father to vouch for that!), but because the majority of the opposition could probably bench press me. Do I think it's holding me back in my sport? No. Not 98% of the time. But that other 2% pisses me off. I work hard to be fit and strong and to be a good player so when I lose out because of something like how much I weigh, it can be very disheartening.

As a result, I obsess about my weight. Not how to lose it like a large proportion of the population, but how to gain it effectively, and keep the weight on. God knows I've tried various different things. It's also not easy on a student budget.

Hey, ho. I still managed to chase the ball down and make a goal-line clearance on Sunday, even though I do weigh next to nothing! Life is good :)