From the va-ttoo to the vajazzle, in 2010 the m.blog kept its readers in-the-know on the latest trends to keep your lady-parts looking HOT.

One would assume a saturation point had been reached and we had heard the last of ways to glamorize your nether-regions; not so fast. Just last week, a colleague of mine pointed out the latest development that has PETA outraged (but really, when are they not?). As seen on New York Magazine’s site, spa chain Completely Bare (owned by former Housewife Cindy Barshop) is now offering the “Foxy Bikini” and the “Carnivale Bikini.”

And yes, it is exactly what you are picturing. For $225 or $195, respectively, your freshly waxed skin is covered by a patch of neon-colored fox fur or feathers.

And while I can’t think of a more frivolous reason to skin an animal, what concerns me more is not the type of woman that decides to get this glued to her body, but rather the reaction from the unassuming partner when this animal down under is unleashed.

Posted by Emily

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There’s been a lot of crazy shit going on in the cruise industry as of late. First, Royal Caribbean announced that a specialty cruise with plastic surgery darling/reality TV fame whore Kate Gosselin is slated for August—at between $2k-$5.5k/person—and then the Costa Concordia ran aground off the coast of Italy, allegedly because its captain had tried to pass too close to shore to allow the head waiter to salute his family (give me a break).

These two horrors have roused quite a bit of debate in the mm/c office—are cruises good or bad? Having been on my fair share (read: 3 or 4), I believe they have their place—I’ve been fortunate enough to visit Belize and Turkey among other beautiful locations—but they’re totally cheesy, often occupied by classless Americans, and generally plain old bizarre. My dear colleague, Hannah, even believes their place is on this list.

But enough about that. How about checking out the Titanic Memorial Cruise?! Yes, folks, you read that right. Following in the doomed “unsinkable” ship’s path, the cruise—already completely sold out—sets sail on April 8th from the original port-o-call, Southampton, UK. From there, these Titanic-fanatics and daredevils will travel to the exact spot where 1,517 people died exactly 100 years ago. After two days of reflection—natch—the ship will continue on the Titanic’s original route (provided it doesn’t encounter any icebergs) to New York City. While on board, passengers can enjoy the same food & drink served in 1912 and even wear period costumes!

Does this freak anyone else the f*ck out?! Maybe I’m a bit of a believer in karma and curses, or I just think there are some things best left undone, but this is just wrong. I totally admit to being super intrigued by the disaster—when I was younger, I read books, perused artifacts at the traveling exhibit, and, yes, fell in love with the movie (sidenote: Titanic 3D? VOMIT!). Hopping on board a replica of arguably one of the biggest disasters of the 20th century? Pass.

File this one under: Be careful what you wish for.

Posted by Haley

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How desperate would you have to be to peddle your body to strangers—Chicken McNugget-desperate? According to Khadijah Baseer, the answer is a resounding yes. Finding herself at a $0.99 deficit for the heavily processed orbs of “chicken,” Baseer offered oral sex to drive-thru customers at a Burbank, CA Mickey D’s in exchange for her treat of choice. Alas, the craving went unfulfilled and all she got was a misdemeanor solicitation charge. Gotta admire her tenacity though!

Perhaps if she caught a glimpse of the mechanically separated meat paste that makes up those nugs, she’d have at least opted for a Big Mac. Don’t sell yourself short, honey! Go for the KFC drumsticks next time!

Posted by Abby

Think we’re funny? Awesome? Genius? So do we! Vote for m.blog in BostInnovation’s Insider Awards for the best Advertising/Marketing blog through January 27.

As everyone who has ever used a computer knows, Wikipedia went black last week to protest SOPA. While this may have put a slight snag in my random “research projects” (all in the name of a personal quest for knowledge*), it didn’t really rock my world. I’ve been searching the Internets and Google-ing for years; a Wikipedia blackout is a minor speed bump on the road to Internet-induced self-improvement. In other words: If I have a question about some obscure piece of pop culture, I will go to the ends of the Internet to find the answer, Wikipedia or no Wikipedia.

That’s why it was a bit troubling to find out that high school kids and their teachers were all up in arms over their inability to get onto Wikipedia last week. First of all, if you’re really that much of a lazy shut-in who has to do all of your research on a computer, there are other ways to search for information using the Internet. Secondly, every heard of the library? They have these things called encyclopedias. Encyclopedias are big books that were used in olden times (read: the late 1990s) the way Wikipedia is used today. The only catch is you can rest assured that all of the information in an encyclopedia is factual—and not the result of a comedian encouraging a few thousand fans to flood an entry with false information to pull a quick one on the easily gullible Wikipedia-reading public. Imagine that! A reference item that is scrupulously edited and not subject to the whims of thousands of unbalanced weirdos (myself included) clicking away on a keyboard.

While Wikipedia is an invaluable resource to my daily life (where else would I go to find out what movies Kim Richards starred in to make her a child star?), I have enough perspective to know its limitations. I certainly wouldn’t be using it to write papers in school—and if I were a teacher, I certainly wouldn’t be using it to plan my lessons. But hey, maybe I’m old school. I did, after all, use microfilm to research papers in college. How very 2003 of me.

*Recent Wikipedia searches include: “OK vs. okay,” “Jerusalem artichoke” and “Macaulay Culkin.” Clearly, I am learning.

Posted by Amelia

Think we’re funny? Awesome? Genius? So do we! Vote for m.blog in BostInnovation’s Insider Awards for the best Advertising/Marketing blog through January 27.

Dear Loyal m.blog Readers,

Today, we ask for your help; your help to win.

Don’t get us wrong, we win on a daily basis (have you seen all the press we get our clients!?). At the risk of using a taboo hash tag, our team of talented guys and dolls goes into every day with a #winning mindset, which is why Sam starts his morning (or shall we say, mid-morning) with a mocha-marijuana-valium-vodka latte. Yes, we actually have a mug in the office that says that.

All jokes aside, we want to win BostInnovation’s Insider Awards. Why? Because the awards celebrate “crushing content & dropping knowledge,” which is pretty much the m.blog’s tag line…at least it is now.

We shouldn’t have to spell this out for you, but we’re nice (sometimes), so we will. Five days a week for the past three years, we’ve provided you with snark, wit, charm, honest insight and heartfelt hatred. Not to mention, we’ve educated you on new words, vaginas (and vajazzling!), recycling beef fat into your beauty routine and how to tell if your son is gay.

We’re not just about gossip and entertainment, either. We teach you etiquette, like how to not be a douche while using public transportation, the steps you can take to avoid being trashy, what to do if you find yourself with a dude who has two…um…peni? and how to ace a walk of shame.

We reminisce about the days of yore, when life was better, simpler (a.k.a the 90s), tell you personal anecdotes, and demonstrate that working in PR is not just one big fabulous party. Together, we’ve experienced history, like when Alyssa actually got engaged after making Glamour’s engagement chicken recipe, blogged about it, and was then chosen by Glamour to be featured in the magazine in a story on the famous recipe. OH WAIT, then she got flown to NYC for a photo shoot to model a Vera Wang wedding dress, get styled by Vera herself and be photographed by Patrick Demarchelier. That’s right, the m.blog changes lives.

The point is, we go there. We’ve been givin’ it to you straight for some time now, without fearing whether you’ll judge us, find us rude, lewd or crude. We’ve never asked anything of you, but now we’ve come to collect. In exchange for all the entertainment we’ve provided you, all the mornings we’ve spent stressed out over finding a worthy enough blog topic, please vote for the m.blog in BostInnovation’s Insider Awards for the best Advertising/Marketing blog.

We may be awesome, but you’re the ones who inspire us to be that way. So in the immortal words of Jerry Maguire, help us help you by spreading the word!

Facebook it, Tweet it, LinkedIn it, Google Plus it, Pin it, make it your Gmail status, pretend like you’re in the Girl Scouts again and send it to your daddy at work…we don’t care, we just want to win!

Oh, and voting ends January 27. Chop chop!

(We’ll even do all the work for you. For your posting pleasure: #vote for @marlomarketing’s m.blog in @BostInnovation’s #InsiderAwards Advertising/Marketing category http://bit.ly/zqD5Cv)

Posted by Hannah

Think we’re funny? Awesome? Genius? So do we! Vote for m.blog in BostInnovation’s Insider Awards for the best Advertising/Marketing blog through January 27.

The hipster backlash has been quite active for the last few years, so there’s really nothing left to say about it. Yes, they’re pretentious, annoying and lack self-awareness. The same can be said for a million other subcultures.

While I harbor mild disdain for the hipsters, I do have to give them their due when it comes to Cuppow, a snappy (double entendre alert!) lid attachment developed by a few Somerville, MA friends and manufactured in the good old US of A. Kind of like a baby bottle nipple for adults, the Cuppow allows you to use a (hipster favorite) Mason jar as a travel mug. Brilliant!

These kids have also created a pretty cool video ad for the product—you can check it out on Bon Appetit’s blog.

While the road to redemption is a long one for the hipsters, this is a step in the right direction.

Posted by Amelia

The hit single “Wannabe” shot to the top of the charts, and like just about every other tween girl and aspiring Adam Lambert, I became obsessed. Pretending to be fiery redhead Sexy/Ginger Spice, natch, I locked myself in my room with my karaoke machine and belted out the lyrics to each song accompanied by my own choreography. My little sister even joined in the fun, taking on the role of Baby Spice, which considering she was only 5, today seems both fitting and seriously inappropriate. On the other hand, this group promoted girl power, and I learned a lot:

Smilin’, dancin’, everything is free—all you need is positivity!

Make it last forever—friendship never ends!

Set your spirit free—it’s the only way to be!

The reason for my admission and trip down [embarrassing] memory lane…word on the street is that a reunion might not be too far off. While fans and industry insiders have been hoping for and whispering about this for years, it looks like the Girls are in talks for a potential ‘nostalgic performance’ at the London Olympics this summer. Um, YES PLEASE! And, like my fellow colleague, Amelia, who’s followed Hanson’s career (and even attended a concert in Boston last year), I, too, totally plan on returning to my middle school self for a visit to Spice World.

‘Til then…people of the world: spice up your life!

Posted by Haley

I foster fond childhood memories of sneaking into my mother’s jewelry box after raiding her closet, wrapping myself in oversized silk scarves and stumbling around in a pair of high-heels while grabbing as many mix-matched rings, bracelets and necklaces as I could get my little paws on. Eventually going on to bedazzle anything from a pair of jeans to my first cell phone, it is evident that my girlish love for all things sparkly started at a young age…and apparently hasn’t stopped since.

Aside from the lavish fairytale-esque frocks that swept Chanel’s under-the-sea Spring 2012 runway collection, nothing grabbed my attention quite like the tiny pearls embellished on the faces, bodies and hair of each of the models. Adorned down spinal cords, snaked around ear cartilages and dispersed throughout elegant up-do’s, these self-adhesive pearls, in my eyes, stole the show.

Think this is something you could rock in real life? Try these super affordable craft pearls from Martha Stewart on Amazon.com and let the bedazzling begin!

Posted by Emily

Since first offering 20-something American men the chance to smell like douche bags, Axe Body Spray has consistently marketed itself as a foolproof chick magnet. And when the company’s newest scent, Anarchy, debuts at the end of the month, women too can smell like regulars at the Jersey Shore cast’s favorite haunt, Karma. First, it was heinous man jewelry; now, body spray for women. Can we all just agree to let each sex keep exclusive sovereignty over respective accessories/grooming needs? Kthanks.

As Axe’s senior brand manager puts it, “We’ve been hearing for some time that females have been asking for and looking for their very own scent of Axe.” Okay, who are these women? J. Woww? I’ve always dreamed of smelling like dark tanning oil and stale cigarette smoke!

Yeah, I think I’ll pass.

Posted by Abby

Editor’s Note: I have the weekly honor of culling through all of the staff’s blog posts, editing and curating to create a week’s worth of m.blog posts designed to entertain, enlighten and amuse. Every now and again, two of my colleagues will write on the same topic, leaving me with the difficult decision of which to publish. The introduction of Axe body spray was apparently big news amongst the ladies at mm/c, and both Abby & Hannah took compellingly different approaches in their common derision. So in a first for m.blog, I’ve decided to run both. Am sure both will entertain and amuse….enlighten, this time ‘round? Well…2 out of 3 ain’t bad!  Read on….

Axe, the oh-so-popular men’s grooming company, has decided to test its success in a new niche: The female market.

No doubt, Axe has had some great success with men. For a mass produced product that is available on the shelves of any CVS, I actually like the smell of some of its scents—for dudes. But for ladies? Sure, in middle school I wore those God-awful cucumber melon, raspberry and vanilla perfumes from Body Fantasies, but I was 12; wearing something from Marc Jacobs would have been inappropriate. According to Axe’s senior brand manager, the new scent, Anarchy, is a result of “females…asking for and looking for their very own scent of Axe.” Bitch, please. I have two points I would like to make regarding this new product launch:

1. Most women buy perfumes to establish their own unique scent. You know when you borrow your friend’s sweatshirt and go “Oh, this smells like Ali?” Well that’s how it’s supposed to be! You want your signature smell to evoke a distinctive memory of you, especially for your boyfriend. You don’t want him out there thinking “Oh, she smells like my girlfriend…mmm…”
2. You’ve all seen the Axe commercials, right? Well, here’s the problem. While all women like attention, Axe products promise a lot of attention, like throngs of people chasing after you attention. I don’t think women are looking for quite the same outcome. This parody video sums it up nicely.

Most gals would never dream of sharing their coveted scent with a friend, so I don’t see how a generic body spray will go over well in the female community. Best of luck on the new scent, Axe. I’ll probably go sniff it out when it hits shelves, but I will not be wearing it. That would be trashy.

Posted by Hannah