I'm the sort of person who has always done even moderation in extremes. Last month, on a trip to a&e (sprain) I was asked if I was an athlete. Apparently my resting pulse rate is 47. Im a bit wary of sounding like Samantha brick here, but being a long established dog walker means I am super busy, very fit and always running and walking.

Obese people seem to have no heads. There are pictures all over the media every day of headless obese people. In fact, it's hard to find an image of a fat person who has a head. Even on the often misinformed and biased 'news' reports on TV, all I see are grainy scenes of fat people slowly walking around shopping centres, shown from the neck down.

I would like to offer my congratulations to Ms Samantha Brick. To write an article that achieves the kind of earth-shattering, record-busting, never-seen-before success hers has takes quite something.

I pity Samantha Brick. No, not because the poor love can't strike up a fag for the want of thousands of Zippo-clutching men leaping to her aid, nor because of all the cruel jealous bitches out there hating on her 'beauty'.

I believe that I am a beautiful woman and I feel no shame in saying that out loud, in public, online or anywhere else... I suppose Samantha Brick and I are quite similar. The difference between us however, is that where I understand that beauty is in the eye of the beholder, Samantha Brick seems to think that beauty is a finite measurement.

Pondering the Samantha Brick phenomenon and recalling my reaction to my friend, I realise once again it's my relationship with my looks that's askew, not theirs. And that's despite considerable efforts to put that relationship right.

I'm not entirely sure whether Samantha Brick is right, mainly because I'm not drop dead gorgeous so cannot confirm or deny her experience. But I think she courageously raises a major issue about whether a woman's looks define how she is treated by both men and women socially and professionally.