Cleanse....

OK so I don't want to bore you all with each day of Clare's cleanse. Bentley and I originally took cover but she seems fine and happy and mellow. She and tasha are texting each other for support and helpful hints and so far so good. Apparently it doesn't taste too bad and actually does kill the hunger pangs and feels pretty good. So I shall keep you posted. The girls had fun this morning making the first batch. Tash brough Sam over. Sam is Bentley's girlfriend so the moment she arrived he went all loopy loo running around after her. He is definitely in puppy love. It's cute to watch. He brought her his toy to play with and then just followed her around trying to kiss her face. I love that first bit. When you just meet someone and you have nothing but high hopes and butterflies and can't stop smiling and it seems as though the sun is shining brighter and birds are singing louder. It's the best feeling in the world and I totally understand why people do the things they do for love. It can come out of nowhere when you're least expecting it. So Bentley is happy and so is Sam, I'll keep you updated about their romance.
So Paul left yesterday and flew back to London. Which is always a bit sad. We all miss him and his happy energy. But he'll be back in less than a week and it's probably better that he is away while Clare does the fast. I am not sure he would approve. So we are falling back on hanging out with the girls. Which is just about the best fun you can have (without boys).
Four of us are going to see Sex and The City 2 tomorrow, Clare, Tasha, Emma and .... someone else .....and we cannot wait to see it. I love the clothes and they're such fun. I think we'll see it at The Grove and maybe do a little shopping while we're there. Proper girl stuff.
This afternoon, Emma came over to lay out by the pool and get a little colour for the summer. She brought dogs and a whole lot of support and distraction to get Clare through another afternoon of not eating. She was a little ambitious this morning and went to yoga but had to leave after 45 minutes as she felt a little faint. Aside from that it was all good. The best way to get through anything hard is surround yourself with great girls so it looks like that's going to be the order of the day for this memorial day weekend. Will keep you posted. OH AND MOST IMPORTANTLY THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU TO ALL THAT SENT EMAILS AND POSTED SUPPORT ON CLARE'S WALL AND SENT TEXTS TO ENCOURAGE HER, YOU GUYS ARE THE BEST. LOVE LOVE LOVE XXX

Healthy days.....

So there seems to be a bout of healthiness going on in this house right now. Clare obviously hikes every morning but has recently discovered the new Nike thing that you put in your shoe and link to your ipod. So now our hikes have become competitive as she is always trying to burn more calories or mainly do more distance. The music plays on shuffle and then a ladies voice interrupts all time telling us the distance and calorie count. You can even compete against other people so we challenge Natasha and that really helps. Clare also has a new private yoga teacher called Camilla, who is swedish and amazing and is changing her life. She even breathes differently and definitely seems calmer and more chilled.And then tomorrow she has lost her mind entirely, and as Paul has gone away for a week, she is doing the master cleanse with Tasha. They basically are going to drink only lemonade, cayenne pepper, maple syrup and water for a few days (she has a goal of five days) but who knows how long this could last - five hours possibly. So they have all the equipment and ingredients and they are raring to go. Will let you know as it goes on just how hard it is and how good. I worry not eating is going to make her a little grumpy so Bentley and I are staying under the couch for the first few days to be safe.
So last night was the finale of American Idol. It was so good. Loved the Bee Gee's, Hall and Oates, Janet, Joe Cocker and when Brett Michaels came out the roof practically blew off. It was so good and of course we love us a little Casey James in the house haha. Love a Southern guy and he's from Cool Texas which sounds about as cool as you can get.
After the finale we headed over to Ceconni's for dinner with Simon, Ryan, Randy, and the girls, even Paula was there. We ate Truffle Pizza and stayed pretty late until we went on to the Idol aftershow party at The Mondrian. It was great spending the last night with all the boys together again. I am going to miss Simon so much. I actually got a little teary during the show and saying goodbye to him at the end of the night. I hate goodbye's the most.
So we ended up back at the house with some of my favourite girls, Kelly and Jamie were so awesome and cool, and I have to say there are not many girls beautiful enough to be able to hold their own in a photo with Raquel Welch but Kelly did. That woman is ridiculously beautiful. The girls ended up dancing round the living room and it was such a silly laugh but a perfect way to end the night.
It was all about the love, with a touch of drama on the side, but that's part of the fun too. Climbed into bed late but happy and so blessed to have all these wonderful friends......AGAIN, but really at the end of the day, what else is there. Love to all of you and help me through the cleanse with some encouraging emails haha xxxx

Endings....and cool beginnings....

So this is a funny week. It seems like a week of season finales on TV and some other endings too. It seems so strange to think that it's Simon's last day on Idol today, it's the end of an era and we shall miss him terribly. Last night we went to the show and it was great to watch and be a part of it. The whole gang is in town so tonight should be a great night. After Idol we headed over to The Greek to watch Get Him To The Greek, Russell's premiere of his movie. It was really special watchng the movie at the place it was about and filmed at. Although nobody had told me it was outside so I was frozen and Clare had to cover me up with free promotional tshirts for the movie to keep the cold out :)
The funny thing is that both things were glamorous and fun, but as always the real fun, the amazing moments come from being with friends and sharing it all. It's only ever about being with the people you love and the lovely moments you have together, no matter how glamorous the surroundings. Clare bumped into one of her oldest and dearest friends Dawn Heuser. She and Dawn know each other through Tove and Nora and Ingrid and they all went on an incredibly memorable horse riding vacation in Colorado which is one of her happiest memories. She's a fabulous girl and now they're facebook friends. Clare never actually thought she would be that girl that yells "facebook me" across a movie theatre but there you go. It's a fabulous way to bring people together again. And then there was Sadie and Suze, Ollie and Chris, Nick and Sean, and of course Danny.
It was great to see Russell and Katy after and congratulate both on them on their work. They are just lovely, wonderful, awesome and such a talented couple and deserve all their success. Clare was particularly excited to meet and talk to 'Kenneth The Page' from her favourite show 30 Rock. He is her favourite character, well he's from Georgia :) and he makes her laugh more than anyone else on TV. It's funny because Clare has had Georgia on her mind a lot lately. I think she's finally ok and happy, all this time on, has moved on from the ex. I know it takes a while to get somebody out of your heart. She doesn't let people in there lightly and it really takes a long time for her to prise them out. I guess they're all still in there a little bit, but the feelings have gone, she doesn't think about him anymore and I think that big heart of hers is finally ready to let somebody else in there. So watch this space. I hope he has a dog :)
So tonight is Idol finale, so we shall tweet or facebook from there if we can. Bentleys followers have reached 30 and he is deliriously excited to have Ryan following him too........never in his wildest dreams did he think anybody would be interested in what a dog from Knoxville Tennessee had to say about life, love and lazing about.......thank you again. Go Leeeeeeee, just in case you're wondering who we're rooting for.......

Connect....

So we got up this morning to go on our hike and when we opened the garage doors and saw all the news trucks back again outside Brittany Murphy's house, my heart just sank. We could tell from the questions being shouted through the car windows that her poor husband had died last night and it was hard to drive and hard to just carry on as normal. I feel so sad for her mother and everything she has had to go through. The strangest thing that came into my mind was to "love your neighbour". It is so easy these days not to connect with people who are right next door. You mind your own business and shut your door and keep yourself to yourself, but sometimes it's important to take some care of the people close by to you. Extend the hand of friendship and compassion; but in some situations you don't know what to say, or whether to bother them, so you just say nothing. I think one of the biggest things we have lost is Community. Back in the old days, communities were communities and people looked out for one another and knew each other and rallied round the old and the weak and nowadays that is overlooked in our busy insular lives.
I think if there was one thing I would take from this, it's to try and take the time to meet and know the people living close to you. I remember when we lived in London, our flat was one of six in a building in Chelsea, but we rarely stopped to chat to our neighbours, we just passed each other on the stairs and nodded. Connection is everything in this world and it's important to make connections to make other people feel as though they are seen and heard and cared about and matter. That is so key to feeling a part of this world so let's all do what we can. All this technology for connection and what we really only know more about is how anonymous we are in the grand scheme of things. There are so many ways to connect with others nowadays and I think that's amazing. I have made some friendships on line with people all over the world and I treasure them. Facebook, twitter, BBM, Yahoo Messenger, Skype, text, phone and just saying "Hello how are you"......the more you do the better. “Humankind has not woven the web of life. We are but one thread within it. Whatever we do to the web, we do to ourselves. All things are bound together. All things connect.”
We had a nice weekend, dinner with Ryan Friday was the most fun ever, and then we spent the rest of the weekend saying goodbye to Kate and Rupert Friend and Sunday was Chris Dyson's birthday party at The Palihouse which was so much fun but now all seems quite a long time ago. It's a sad day, and I say a prayer and just appreciate all the little things just a little bit more today...“At different states in our lives, the signs of love may vary: dependence, attraction, contentment, worry, loyalty, grief, but at the heart, the source is always the same. Human beings have the rare capacity to connect with each other, against all odds.”

Our House

So it's been a fabulous week. So much going on and all of it good. Funnily enough we've been very interested to watch the new Rolling Stones documentary about the making of Exile on Main Street. There is a connection to our house that's interesting, most of the album was made in the south of france at Nelcote but they finished the album in Los Angeles and during that stay they lived here in our house. Cocksucker Blues was shot here too, which was a banned black and white documentary made at that time. It's funny to see footage of Mick and the boys by the pool and hanging in the house and walking out of the front door which still looks exactly the same as it did then. I love stuff like that. We have the movie here and it's funny to watch it in the screening room in the same house it was filmed in. I always love to imagine people in the past standing in the same spot I am standing in. So many creative people lived here - John Schlesinger, the director of Midnight Cowboy, Diane Warren who wrote so many amazing songs I adore, Richard Gere and Cindy Crawford lived here when they were married and apparently the Dalai Lama came and stayed in the media room when he visited them, and Julie Christie apparently lived in Clare's room too. So these walls could tell a lot of stories. Bentley is so excited to be tweeting now, he has 23 followers and I love each and every one of you for being so sweet and kind to support him. I suppose I take it for granted that I had a book written about me and my blog and have had my fair share of media attention because of that, appearing on TV and such like, but Bentley hasn't had the same attention so he is excited to be able to put his own spin on things. I feel as though he is warming up and finding his little voice but nonetheless he is enjoying it a lot. For those of you who don't know what to do to follow him, you just go to Twitter.com, give yourself a name and then find LoveBentley and click FOLLOW and there you are, regular up to the minute musings from my friend.
Last night we drove down to Venice and had dinner at Steve Shaw's which was delicious. Natasha, Kate, Paul and Clare, all sitting round Steve's dinner table eating the most delicious wild salmon I ever tasted. So thanks for that.
And Clare ate all of it for a change, due to the fact that she went to the doctor to find out the results of her physical and when they'd tested her blood they found that she had a very underactive thyroid so her metabolism has been underactive and causing her to sleep badly, have loss of memory, be irritable and depressed, and she just thought it was normal, so she can eat finally and get her energy levels back up. It's amazing that she didn't even know and just put it down to getting older, so make sure you get regular medical exams to make sure you're as healthy as you can be. So that's all the news this side of the pond, unless Bentley has something to add later today. Love and hugs and kisses to all......

Skunks and other creatures...

My favourite time of the day is first thing when we wake up and I have my breakfast and then we all jump in the car and drive up the hill to the canyon. We usually meet up with Natasa with Sam or Bryan with Henry, or we make some new friends or meet other friends, and it is just so wonderful. The most fun canyon in LA is Runyon. It is full of amazing characters, beautiful people, a smattering of famous faces and every shape and size of dog you can imagine. It's the only canyon where dogs are allowed off leash (legally) so it is pretty popular. And it's great exercise for toning your legs and bottom if you're a human. It's just like a giant social club for dog lovers and exercise fiends. We have made some great friends for life there. There are quite a few other great danes there too, Sam obviously, and Gigi, Diesel, Otto, Orion and Marmaduke. They're all fun.
The best part about the canyons is being in such beautiful nature We see amazing birds, coyotes, lizards, deer, owls, racoons and even skunks sometimes!!! Oh and the occasional rattle snake, which we know to avoid. It's like anywhere else in this city, there are good creatures and bad creatures. My least favourite creature happens to be "freeloaders with a sense of entitlement" and unfortunately their natural habitat is LA, but they are quite easy to spot as they have distinctive traits, so we try and avoid them as well as skunks and snakes and that makes life easier :) We had a great weekend with our human friends this weekend too Friday night we had a fun and games night at the house to welcome Kate Buckley. Emma P-B, Ollie, Jonny Lee Miller, Rupert Friend, Meredith and Steve Shaw all came by for curry. Emma brought her hubbly bubbly pipe with apple flavour which everyone had a go on which was hysterical fun. I have only ever seen these things in Morocco and wasn't sure what it was like but it certainly was a lot of fun. Sunday was a perfect day....up early for a hike with Scott Wood and then we came home to have breakfast with the gang. We lazed by the pool most of the day getting tans and then drove over to gorgeous Sadie Turner's for a fantastic Birthday BBQ with some of our favourite boys, and girls. She was the best hostess and threw a fantastic party we all loved. It was a great afternoon of hanging and talking and laughing. There was ice cream cake and singing before we headed home for Chin Chin's and some Housewives of New York City on TV which was hilarious. Guilty pleasure for a Sunday night, but then again, if that's the worst guilty pleasure we have right now, life is pretty good....Happy Birthday Sades, love you xxxx

OH AND BIG NEWS FOR BENTLEY FANS (IF THERE IS SUCH A THING) DUE TO POPULAR DEMAND, BENTLEY NOW TWEETS, HE THINKS HE HAS THINGS TO SAY SO YOU CAN FOLLOW HIM ON TWITTER ON @LoveBentley where his name is Bentley Love. Enjoy his profound thoughts there xxx

Spiritual Growth....

I often say that the answer to any problem or crisis is always more spiritual growth and I get quite a few people asking what exactly that is. Well, I am no guru, mystic, shamen or clever clogs, I only know what's worked for me when I've remembered to practice it. Because I definitely don't do this all the time, I TRY, I practice, and eventually, usually when I get in enough discomfort I remember, or somebody kindly reminds me and I do it and it works.
I don't really think that being spiritual is about sitting under a tree in the lotus position or going off to a hidden cave, it's so much more a daily practice of just paying attention to everything that comes to us, and happens to us, and the realisation that every person, place, and event in our lives is perfectly designed to teach us something we need to learn in order to grow. So when somebody we love leaves us, or we get sick, or become rich and famous, somebody does something mean to us - we learn spiritual lessons from it all equally. We treat every situation as a lesson and a gift. Of course it's easier said than done, but just having faith that something somewhere is working for our higher good helps free us from the heartache attached to some of these things. We just have to stay open and wide awake, being students rather than victims or our lives. It helps a lot for me to believe this. "Life, like any other exciting story, is bound to have painful and scary parts, boring and depressing parts, but it's a brilliant story, and it's up to us how it will turn out in the end. Life's a mystery, but we have to solve it for ourselves by being sharp and noticing all the clues and signs. Life is dry and dull without diving into the wonder and challenge of the mystery of it.
So that's what I meant by that. And I continue to do my best to learn and grow and I get enough letters from others who are on the same path and I learn from all of you guys too. It's a fascinating journey and I'm glad I'm alive enough to see it in all it's glory. So this weekend was so much fun. We went to see Iron Man 2 and then went on to Ollie's birthday party at STK which was amazing. We had a private outside space with flowers and the most amazing food and his parents flew in and Zac Effron, Vanessa Hudgens, Kate Mara, and a whole ton of other friends of Ollie, he has more friends than anyone I know also turned up to celebrate before we all headed over to Soho House to continue the fun. It was the best evening which kicked off the best weekend.
Now we're so excited that Kate Buckley is arriving for the week and staying and that's always the greatest fun. So looking forward to it, it's ridiculous. She's one of our favourite teachers in the world. Can't wait to tell you all about it.....Happy learnings xxx " If you don't like something, change it. If you can't change it, change your attitude" Maya Angelou

Rejection....

I have noticed recently that one of the things that hurts people's feelings is rejection. Any kind of rejection stings, even when it's from somebody you didn't even particularly like, somehow even that rejection can be upsetting. And these days there are just so many more ways to be rejected - by text, email, facebook, twitter, voice message and complete silence. It kind of feels as though somebody is saying "You're not the one" or "I don't like you enough to hang out with you" or "I can't be bothered to return a text message from you" it's easy to start thinking you're not good enough, likeable enough, loveable enough, funny pretty fabulous or smart enough. And it all can hurt.
Even things that aren't really rejection, but things you perceive as rejection hurt just the same. Maybe that person was busy, or forgot, or had some sort of problem that they didn't feel like being around anybody - you can still take the rejection personally and let it affect how you feel. And that's where problems arise. So many times in my life I have thought, oh you rejected me so I'll reject you so I don't get hurt more, and actually they weren't doing that at all. Always good to check it out with other people you love and respect to find out if you're just being overly sensitive. Another person has a much better perspective on these things sometimes because they're not clouded by their emotions and can see more clearly.
I think all most people want in life is connection and acceptance after all “Human beings, like plants, grow in the soil of acceptance, not in the atmosphere of rejection” Just to feel that people know you and like you is the greatest feeling on earth. But even Clare, who has a lot of people in her life, can suddenly feel that nobody likes her and feel rejected, and imagine everybody is somewhere having a wonderful time without her and loving it. But that's usually not true!!!! So best to stop telling yourself those horrid stories.
Of course, sometimes you may be right. Somebody may well be rejecting you from their life, and when that happens I always try and remind myself that "Rejection is God's protection" and that perhaps it's better that person isn't in my life anyways and that God is doing for me what perhaps I couldn't do for myself. I also remember that quite often in my life I have been too busy for people, too caught up in my own stuff, or couldn't be bothered to get together enough and that probably felt like a rejection to them. So the best thing to do is try and come from a place of kindness and compassion and make time for friends and then they'll make time for you too.
This week has been such fun.....Nick Candy and Neil Reading were in town and we hung out, and then this week Russell Brand was up at the house filming his new movie and making us laugh more than I thought possible. During the shooting Bentley suddenly decided that he wanted to be a movie star and walked straight into the middle and climbed on Russell and sat down on his lap. He's going to want an agent and a lawyer next.......only in Hollywood :) “I take rejection as someone blowing a bugle in my ear to wake me up and get going, rather than retreat.”