Sigrid Squid Is Having a Sale

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If celebrities are beautiful only because they have a team around them, give a normal person the same team, and see if you end up with someone who looks like a celebrity. Who wants to be a millionaire?: Stylist Alan Keyes and Amanda discuss bling options, while make-up artist Chris Conrod prepares her for her close-up.

Molly Moo the Lonely Cow

And that's it, really. That's how I came to disrupt my nice life that I like and throw myself on the pyre of superficial self-improvement. I gave myself a month, and I became my own alchemist. I took the base metal, and with deep foreboding and a sort of secret, wild hope, I set about trying to turn it into gold. In the space of 30 days, Amanda Hooton goes from girl reporter to screen goddess. It's three days before my celebrity month begins, and I feel as if The A-Team montage music should be playing in the background.

I'm not quite at J. Lo level four bodyguards, four managers, two stylists, two hairdressers, a personal trainer, a spiritual adviser, two eyebrow shapers and a coat holder, among others , but I've made appointments with a food coach, a personal trainer, a hairdresser and a stylist. I'm feeling reasonably positive.

American Mineralogist

Okay, okay - I'm beside myself with excitement. Obviously, here in our post-feminist new millennium world, the prospect of such unworthy surface change shouldn't matter. And obviously - to me, at least - it does. My first interview is with food coach Judy Davie, who writes a food advice column in a national magazine, speaks regularly on ABC radio, and has written a cookbook called, surprisingly enough, The Food Coach. In person, she is slim and blonde and businesslike. As per her instructions, I hand over a list of everything I've eaten in the past week. She reads my worst day out to me, a sort of exercise in public shaming: There is quite a long silence while I try, and fail, to think of mitigating factors "the muffin was very small", "the Champagne was free".

Then Davie says calmly: No more alcohol of any kind. No coffee, no tea, no chocolate, no sugar, no carbs after five. She explains that she will write out a day-by-day menu plan and take me shopping and give me cooking lessons. I, in turn, will have to report every single thing I eat to her on a daily basis. But if you've only got four weeks, you just have to go for it. Motivation is going to be the hardest thing. You're going to have to realign all your priorities. Looking the part is your whole job, your whole reason for existence.

Davie sits back, looking serious. There may be moments where you really need a treat. An energy boost, or you absolutely have to have a sugar hit. You could have a date. My personal trainer is equally serious. According to Melbourne-based Donna Aston, author of five books and miracle worker not only to me but to Sigrid Thornton and Vince Colosimo , every diet and exercise regimen I've attempted in the past decade has been wrong, wrong, wrong, because each one focuses on weight loss as a measurement of success.

But what is really important is your lean muscle to fat ratio. Because lean muscle is heavier, as you lose fat and get fitter and more toned, you actually put on weight. I find this deeply counter-intuitive, but I'm swept along by Aston's scientific approach.

She measures my upper arm, thigh and stomach using an ultrasound, in order to calculate the percentage of fat in my body. A healthy body-fat ratio for women is between 18 per cent and 30 per cent. She twiddles her dials and plugs the numbers into her computer. And the next thing I know, my ratio is I am centimetres tall and weigh I've spent my life thinking I'm average - perhaps even a bit on the thin side - and now here I am: All Aston's reassurances - "30 per cent is by no means the average: I listen in a state of thinly veiled hysteria as Aston explains that people like Jennifer Aniston and Cameron Diaz all have body-fat ratios of 18 per cent: Somehow it's all made much worse by the fact that Aston is an eminently sensible woman.

She explains my exercise routine and it seems far too easy. Half an hour's brisk walk every day, 40 minutes of cardio exercise and a half-hour weight-bearing sequence three times a week. This feels all wrong: This routine is almost exactly the same as Sigrid's," says Aston. It's just not physically possible. The very best you can do is to lose four kilograms of fat, and put on one kilo of muscle.

And that's right on the edge of what's achievable.

But if you do, you'll be amazed at the difference. There seems to be nothing to do but follow Aston into the gym to begin my far-too-easy exercise routine. An hour later, every cell in my body is screaming in agony and I can barely lift the FitBall. And oddly enough, I feel a tiny, tiny, tiny bit better.

Extract from celebrity diary; Day 1. Still filled with horror about body fat. Is this the standard self-loathing that always accompanies the start of diets, or something different? Could just be caffeine withdrawal symptoms. Ate correct diet breakfast, went shopping in Chapel Street feeling demoralised, but at least had begun process. By midday felt fantastic: Bought great earrings, a very cool pair of summer shoes, and felt convinced I could beat Jennifer Aniston, regardless of scientific evidence.

Shopping glow entirely replaced by incandescent caffeine-withdrawal rage. Met lovely friend at the George pub. She had gin and tonic, I had water and ice. She chatted about life, I tried not to scream or kill her. The caffeine rage lasts three days.

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In the midst of it, smiling through gritted teeth, I have my "before" photos taken. As usual, I can't help feeling that the mad-hair, potato-faced results can't really be me, but for some reason I care less than usual. Perhaps because I am beginning to believe in the transformative powers of this exercise. This belief is aided by my interview with hair stylist Renya Xydis, cutter to the stars, who does Cate Blanchett's hair and Naomi Watts's and Ian Thorpe's.

She gives me a special shampoo and promises to cut and colour me for the final photographs, on the last day of the month. Don't worry," she promises celebrity team members are good at telling you not to worry: State-of-nation meeting with food coach. She asks questions like, "What about your sleep patterns? Went shopping to macrobiotic shop and had following loud discussion in aisle containing organic chocolate. The great point about this exchange is that normally I would have it with myself, my greedy side would win, and I would buy the chocolate.

But now, suddenly, I have a paid professional to fight the battle of will for me. And according to my research reading a few crappy magazines , it's also a great secret of celebrity success. Jennifer Aniston, for instance, reportedly has no food at all in her house, and has thus eliminated all ugly internal struggles over whether she should have just one chocolate biscuit before lunch. Instead, a personal chef simply delivers precisely calibrated Zone Diet meals to her door three times a day.

And Julia Roberts has a "fridge doctor" who removes all the ice-cream and replaces it with carrot sticks, so she doesn't even have to see the evil substance - let alone be tempted to grab a teaspoon and hoe in. I don't have quite this level of personal attention at the gym, where, due to budgetary and geographic restrictions, I have to go it alone until the end of the month when Donna Aston will repeat my measurements and calculate my wonderful God willing results.

But to the amazement of all concerned - including me - I do go, and keep going. The first few times I feel like a total dag, with my strange baggy trackpants and my routine carefully written out on a piece of paper. But I've always liked the sense of obsessive higher purpose that a new regimen gives me I would have been a good religious fanatic in the Middle Ages so I stick with it. On day five, I suddenly notice my skin looks really smooth and bright - as if a watt bulb has been lit somewhere behind my sinuses.

This has never happened before, and it is so startling it carries me through Friday night drinks with hardly a sideways glance at everyone else's two-for-one cocktails. Miracles will never cease. One of those days where best efforts were constantly foiled by fate and own ineptness. Had pedicure this morning: Spent whole time searching glossy mags for pictures to add to my style scrapbook. Have been directed by stylist to compile a book of "looks" I like - fabrics, styles, colours - in preparation for our shopping trip next week. Consequently was not paying attention to feet and ended up with horrible round nails instead of regular square ones.

Am very vain about feet and was therefore devastated. Spent much of afternoon walking with ugly nails around local park in order to make up "walk time" for PT. Bit boring, but sustained by thoughts of washboard stomach and gleaming skin and cellulite-free thighs. Went to dinner party at editor's and watched acres of forbidden food and wine roll out before me like a Bacchanalian feast. Sudden realisation as to why so many movie stars are coke fiends. It's the only joy in life that carries no calories, that one can enjoy in a vaguely social setting.

It was so hot that my paintbrush stuck to the wall on which I was painting! I also submit a variety of cartoons to magazines and newspapers including childrens activity puzzles with a cartoon theme. My work has been published in the UK, and also in Australian magazines and newspapers. I also create stock illustrations for websites such as Shutterstock, in addition to writing and illustrating small picture books for children and these can be found on Kindle.

My other interests include travel, photography, Toastmasters, bushwalking and snorkelling. Are you an author? Help us improve our Author Pages by updating your bibliography and submitting a new or current image and biography. Learn more at Author Central. All Formats Kindle Edition Sort by: Popularity Popularity Featured Price: Low to High Price: High to Low Avg. Handy hints, life hacks and advice featuring famous people from cartoonist Alan J. Benge Mar 31,