why maybe i should start avoiding my haven

LIfe is hectic right now. This morning was the first time in about a month I hadn't been woken up involuntarily (alarm clock, shaken body). Nevertheless, I woke up at 9. My body clock is that unused to a lie-in. This is the main reason why I haven't been blogging, or writing for leisure, or doing anything else creative, because when I'm not working or dashing or something, I'm lying in a zombie-like state on Facebook or some other unproductive activity.

Anyway that's not really related to this post, apart from the fact that it means I have also basically stopped any semblance of 'creative shopping', which I see as combing through vintage and charity shops, or spending hours online looking for the best deal, or wandering across unexpected jewels at a market or boutique. It just requires too much effort.
But maybe my bank account would be better off I made shopping for myself a little harder. Instead, this past month, I have only been to the shops twice, and both times I could not be bothered to actually have to move from shop to shop so I just went to Selfridge's. That was today and the day of my last post. Surely that in itself has to be some testament to the ability of this shop to inspire me, or something. Never mind that I cannot afford 99.9999% of the items in this store. Surprisingly, considering its elite image, there remains a 0.00001% (I think the maths there is right...) of items which are exactly what you'd find on the high street, only they're laid out more beautifully, with more helpful staff, and air conditioning, and toilets, and space, and food.

Hence perhaps why I can't help but find that one thing I've been looking for for years on end every time I go. Last time, it was the holy grail of trench coats.

My trusty trench in action, marching and protesting its little heart out last Saturday.

And today, Minnetonkas. Overpriced, maybe, but when there are only three pairs left and two of them are your two possible sizes and one of them fits perfectly, and last year's summer shoes all fell apart/got lost (don't ask), you can't really say no, can you?

But now I think it's time to stop. I seem to have confused buying clothes for the summer and saving money for the summer. Plus, I was meant to write an essay today.

painful gain?

A couple of months ago, after a particularly rough night out, I woke up on Sunday morning and decided to stop drinking. That following Friday, however, I was invited to a pretty fancy party. I had nothing to wear and I was trying to resist the temptations of liquor. But then I found a nice shimmery gold dress in a local boutique and so I did my hair, put on my make-up and decided to go. Then it was time to choose the shoes. This part was not difficult. I only had one pair of heels, and this outfit and venue demanded heels.

So I wore my gold dress with sparkly blue heels. No-one looks at your feet anyway, right?

Maybe so, but my feet were the only thing on my mind that night as I danced away, alcohol-free, and the pain in my feet steadily grew worse and worse. Here's a few things I learnt that evening:

1) Dancing in heels hurts when your nerve endings are not numbed by alcohol.
2) Drunk people do not have the courtesy to avoid stepping on your toes.
3) Drunk people are not funny when you are sober.
4) The ground is actually really cold if you try to walk home shoeless in October, sober.

After that night, two things happened:

1) I stopped wearing heels.
2) I started drinking again.

So for the past few months I have been stomping around in boots and brogues, happily dancing away while still painfully conscious that this outfit would look a lot better with heels. I have spent hours scouring internet websites and sale racks for a suitable pair, but with feet that hate heels as much as mine, yet a mind with a taste for spindly stilettos, this search has been fruitless.

Finally, I found the perfect pair. They were approximately double my budget, and they were in the sale. But they were also beautiful and I bought them. The shoe gods must have been getting fed up of my unladylike footwear, because they blessed me with a sales lady who is not very good at mathematics, and further reduced the shoes' price.

I love them. And they are called 'Carbonara'. Be still, my beating heart.



There's just a slight problem. A problem entitled 'the bunion and extra half size of my left foot'. A problem which squishes and cramps my abnormally long left toes. But, I've done my research, and the luxuriously soft leather of these shoes seems perfectly suited to a shoe-stretching spray. I could also use the spray on the slightly too small toebox of my other beautiful left shoe. If that doesn't work, I will fill myself up with some vodka and brave the pain.

shameless

I have lots of exciting new acquisitions which I want to share with you all, but that will have to wait as today I am going to be a bit shameless.

In order to make room for my new stuff, I have decided to not only clear out as I do periodically anyway, but also try to sell my old stuff for the first time. Who knows how it will go as I am totally inexperienced in this field. Anyway, I currently have a dress up for sale which I love love love and posted about on one occasion on this blog, but have never worn. I am probably going to add a couple of bags and bits and bobs over the next few days so I'll let you know if I do. But please have a look at my current listing because I have this fear that it is just going to lay there buried under all the other shiny and professional listings by hardcore ebayers.

CLICK HERE



Update:

click HERE too! And here and here and here.

imposter

So, I have either reached the final frontier of fashion blogging...

or I must relinquish my total and finally admit it: I am a total fashion imposter.

This is what I wore on Saturday night:

Time to bow out?

mine

I have frequently charted my search for a functional bag. I considered a backpack, before remembering that I am nowhere near hipster enough to not look like a tourist in a backpack.

At the beginning of the academic year, I received this:


I convinced myself that I had not yet written about this big exciting purchase yet, the way I normally do straight away, because I hadn't had a chance to take a good illustrative photo. Whatever. I just took the photo you can see above, no repeats, and it is SOOC (straight out of camera), a low quality digital photo with absolutely no editing, cropping, anything.

The truth is that I have quite complex emotions towards this bag. Does that sound silly? Does it sound stupid that I can extrapolate huge emotions, relationships, shifts in style, and more, from the purchase of this one bag? Is it ridiculous to feel that I could write a whole thesis on one bag?

If I were to write the thesis, this post wouldn't be up on my blog before the bag had disintegrated into shreds. So I'll just present what the rough draft, the paragraph structure, of the thesis might have been.

1. Why spend £70 on a non-leather item?
My first desire for this bag arose from its function. The perfect size, shape and weight for a bag to lug around all my books, while maintaining style. But there are other bags that can do that. There are fakes that can do that. When I got this bag, it felt so special. I have very little experience in luxury brand names, but I have even felt their effect when carrying a Chanel shopping bag. When the bag is not simply a container but the item itself, it seems to be even more steeped in luxury, the gold-plated zips seems to take on an authentic golden sheen.

2. The process of the purchase
I didn't spend £70 on this bag. The short story is that my dad got his sister to get it at a discounted price from a large department store. The long story involves family conflict, divorce, and when someone asks me how much I paid, I can say nothing, because it was an unabashed guilt-trip gift - which I do feel bad about now.

The bag took a long time coming, and the first time I met my father to deliver it, his sister had forgotten to remove the security tag, so back it went and it was another week before she got round to sorting it out and I got it again. So it was a drawn-out process, especially if you factor in the years I'd been admiring its perfection from the corner of my eye.

3. The damage
The idealised perfection of this purchase made it seem somehow timeless. It seemed justified because it was the perfect university bag, so something that will carry me through the next three years. But within weeks, scratches and stains were appearing. At first, these stressed me out. Then I realised this is that kind of item you use, heavily, and that is why I originally wanted it. I wore it out in the rain. The scratches and the stains slowly merged and faded and vanished.

This is not a unique bag. But no-one else has my style, or my story. Like the scratches and the material, this bag seems to have somehow melded with me. I have extended to beyond the appearance and to what no-one else can see, but even the physical object has its own effects. The colour green is an important symbol of self-flattery and acceptance, to me. The strong aesthetic, slightly urban equestrian, combined with an item I wear every single day, represents the introduction of a constant in my otherwise schizo style. This bag is a book carrier, and I am a student. This bag is definitely mine.

I feel incredibly self-conscious writing this post. Trying to finish it off, I still feel a sense of ridiculousness in ascribing this much importance to just a bag. Has a new item ever led any of you into a thought-process like this? What conclusion did you come to?

This week I have lived in my Topshop pirate pants and, oh the shame, tracksuit bottoms. It's been that kinda week. But I on general principle despise sportswear, and my pirate pants were starting to need sewing/patching up and generally looking a little worse for wear.

I went on a bit of an epic search for an alternative, and came up with these.


I am NOT wearing them ironically with vertiginous heels and a £2000 blazer. I am wearing them slumped in a corner with the world's worst hangover, fuggs and a 'vintage' football shirt.

backwards and forwards

I'm still trying to work backwards and catch up, but time keeps on moving forwards and new things keep appearing. It sort of feels like when you try to climb back up an escalator.

You see, I can't stop buying new things.

I don't know what it is, if I'm trying to fill a hole in my heart, if I feel like money is burning a hole in my pocket now I'm not in crazy summer spending mode, or if I am just noticing holes in my winter wardrobe and am in the mood to shop.

Actually, scratch that bit about needing stuff.

I just bought a yellow bag.(I was looking for a black bag)

definition

I think I'm more of a winter dresser, in that in the winter I seem to start dressing more creatively. I have a few nice summer dresses, but apart from that my summer wardrobe is basically casual separates. Whereas, right now, I am shopping more, experimenting more, thinking about my outfits more.

Before this shift, I had a uniform: denim and a black top. I was expert at varying on this theme, with a hundred different style of jeans and black top. It was a tad dull and uniform-like, but also comfortable and failsafe. Right now, though, I don't think I've worn jeans for over a week.

Instead, my style's gone a bit mad. And I try to think about it, and analyse it, and come up with a definition, but I fail. Everyone around me, all of my friends, seem to have a perfectly defined style, while I wildly oscillate. While I am aware of my shifting moods, the thing which makes my undefined style all the more obvious is other people, and their comments.

I love wearing pink lipstick, because it makes my lips look less corpse-like, but it's not as high maintenance as red lipstick. I love wearing waist belts and fitted silhouettes because they flatter my in-and-out shape. This personal preference has resulted in what I feel like a vaguely 50s/60s style. But this is simply a vague impression, and the main reason I have pinpointed it is the offhand comments I have remembered. One friend said I looked like a girl in a 60s inspired band, I looked them up and she has long blonde hair (mine is short and red). He then said it was something about the collar on my dress. A collar which is not even real, but stitched on. I am sure that the inaccuracy of the details in my '50s' look would make a die-hard retro fan break out in hives: no-one wore crepe soles in the 50s!

Other times, at 7 in the morning, I will want to wear something baggy and therefore unconstricting, and so I will pair my flared pussy-blow blouse with an equally flared squared, and then I look like a member of the women's institute. That is not the intended look here, guys, and I don't appreciate the comparison.

Someone told me the other day that she has never seen me wear the same top twice. I don't know her very well, and I was a bit taken back. I never feel like I have very many clothes, buthen a highly clothes conscious male friend turned around and said 'you know, it's true, you have so many clothes'. I don't actually buy very much, but I also don't throw away very much, and when I was younger I had more time and money (to spend on clothes). As a result, my wardrobe is a wild mixture of old, new, and even older (passed on, handed down, borrowed), distinctive pieces neglected in a six month long black t-shirt and jeans phase and therefore totally familiar to me, but no-one else.

Today I received a lot of compliments, and I understood why. It is not that my outfit was particularly special, and if I posted it on here it would not create a huge response (in brief: loght grey jersey mini-dress, charcoal wool cowl neck jumper, black leggings, cinammon wool legwarmers under tall browny-grey boots, stripy wool navy and white scarf, khaki bomber, khaki Longchamps tote). But it was a style which mirrored their own. When I wear pink lipstick and fitted retro dresses, I am a million miles off from the 80s red-lipped, sparkly, baggy and short vintage of my friends. Wearing a bright skirt or dress that reaches my knees is an even more foreign notion, and makes me look 'old-fashioned', be it in a succesful retro combination, or a less sucessful librarian unchic. Short, uncolourful and casual: familiar, ergo 'really, really nice today'.

That's not to say I didn't like today's outfit; I did. I love the combination of the matching wool texture with the palette of a range of neutrals. I love being able to snuggle up a million layers. But for me, this is 'comfortable'. This is, 'I don't want to attract loads of funny comments about looking old-fashioned'.

Reactions shouldn't form my personal style. But they do, and they inevitably affect the way I feel about an item of clothing, and my overall style. On this ramble through my thoughts over the past few weeks, I seem to have wandered away from the original path of 'defined style', a tangent which I don't feel too guilty about as it is a pretty well-trodden path. But I also don't seem to have arrived at a destination, a decision about how I feel about the whole act of creative dressing. The only thing I do know is that I am enjoying the journey, and seeing what new ideas I arrive at.

On Friday night, as I struggled to keep my eyes open and my brain engaged in wakefulness, I realised I couldn't remember the last time I had been free to do as I wanted, and not too tired to do it. Reading before bedtime is not an option when your eyes are forcing themselves shut...

I decided that the next morning I would go for a run for the first time in more weeks than I could remember.

It was painful, and short. But I felt so great afterwards.

Sunday I dedicated to reading (a fiction, for pleasure, how novel) and then in the evening, I went for a walk.

That is not to say that I am suddenly carefree and spritely: I am not. I slept 6 hours last night, and the night before. Hence, why although I decided that on Monday I would resume writing, I ran out of time and was a day late. Restoring the habits which practice makes natural isn't effortless, but I think it's important.

I can feel the joltiness in my writing, I am too unused to writing outside of the restraints of essay structure. But I'm going to do my best, and I'm going to work backwards, and hopefully as I reach the point where I stopped writing, I will get nearer and nearer the fluency I had then.

So.

Most recent purchases:




Never fear; I only ever wear them together when part of a Catholic schoolgirl in Gossip Girl ensemble, which is only rarely (and no, I am not putting a picture of that up on this blog for all to see - if any of you are still out there).

flash

So the company which sent me the free pair of shoes asked me to post up a photo for a competition of a fashionable outfit I designed around the shoes. I was of course happy to oblige with the photo; however, today was the hottest day of the year (apparently) and I simply could not be a**** to get changed. You know how it is when it's hot and sticky and you want as little stuff touching your skin as possible, and if you are afforded the luxury of removing whatever it is touching your skin, you are highly unlikely to want to reclothe yourself.

Never mind; as luck would have it, the clothes I was already wearing I found matched my outfit pretty well.

I painted on some red lippy but then remembered that I'm meant to be blogging anonymously. So try to visualise some red lipstick and these cute little earrings dangling from my earlobes somewhere behind the explosion of light:

I love my Maloles from the Sarenza collection. I have blisters on both my heels the size of coins from the sandals I posted and the soft squidgy leather is a balm to my sore feet.

This isn't a particularly special outfit, so I'd feel bad asking people to vote for me. But I decided to go for this one anyway, because it epitomises my life, my style and my shoes: cuteness, seasonal appropriateness, but above all, comfort.

hot hot hot

This heat is a double-edged sword. On the one hand, I love it. No need to layer or remember an umbrella. Ice lollies and cold drinks in the park. Lying outside with the sun on your arms and legs.

This year I have come to terms with all the negatives. I'll soldier through the mosquito bites nicely adorning my limbs, even the red swollen infected one which radiates heat, and all the other inconveniences of comfort which summertime brings. Because I do love summer.

Summer doesn't love my style, though. It stinks up my clothes with sweat (so I'm too scared to wear the nice ones), makes denim and black burn on my skin, makes wool and cashmere itchily redundant. In other words, 75% of my wardrobe is useless.

I bought this awesome tee I've wanted since January (aha - winter!) last week in the sale but I still haven't worn it because it's just not summer. That's weird, because it is a t-shirt, but it's also delicate and black and macabre.


In the summer, I'm all prep: white DKNY jeans mini-skirts, short short-shorts, breathable cotton polo-necks in pink, white and blue. I thought that's just what I own which works with the weather, but now I'm wondering if maybe it was a subconscious stylistic choice. After all, theoretically this is a summer t-shirt. But for me, it's just not.

shoe shrines

Whenever I buy or wear a new pair of shoes, I always seem to create a post for them. An entire post, describing the need, the hunt and the acquisition and garnished with a photo or two: it feels like I am making a tribute to a VIP. In a way, I am. Shoes for me are the hardest thing to get; I have big feet which are sensitive to pain and I walk, a lot. So every pair feels like a rare triumph, although in retrospect, I do actually buy a lot of shoes. But they are also the only item of clothing I will wear every single day and I wear them out fast.

So, as I wrote, sometimes my tributes are to shoes re-discovered: example 1, example 2, example 3... or, this winter, all the boots I bought: example 1, example 2, example 3... or just random shoes: example 1, example 2, example 3. See what I mean? Finding these examples took me all of five minutes using the search function on the side of this blog, which has miraculously recently decided to start working again, much to my delight! Anyway, as you can see, I love paying tribute to my shoes.

Then you can imagine my excitement the other week when my lovely mother bought me the most fabulous pair of sandals to finally put an end to my never-ending quest. Or maybe she was just fed up of the smell of my over-heated feet. But when I got home, I found out I had another pair of shoes on my way. The lovely people at Sarenza had offered me a free pair of shoes, and with my affordable footwear difficulties over the years, there was no way I was going to refuse.

So I held out until I could post my two new beauties in tandem. And here they are. And that is all I have to say this time.

African Berry by Clarks (a portion of profits go to charity Soul of Africa)



Zoe pumps by Maloles

very very old

In my ever-continuing quest for shoes to wear, I decided to have a clear-out to determine exactly what I do and do not have.

I ended up throwing away one pair of cheap red plastic ballet flats which were never actually comfortable.

I know, I'm a good clear-outer.

There was one pair of shoes I really struggled over. My grandma bought them for me when I was 11 years old; yes, they are that old. Any sign of where they came from has been erased by wear from the shoe and by time from my memory. I can remember trying them on in a shoe shop in central London, and agonising whether to buy these or another red velvet pair. I can remember they were expensive. But that's it - no concrete details.

Anyway, I stopped wearing them a few years ago when they started pinching my toes a bit too unbearably. The funny thing is, they are white, which you would imagine to be the least durable colour possible, and indeed they are pretty scruffy. They are not, unsurprisingly, particularly fashionable. But I still can't stand to throw them out.

So the other day I need to put some shoes on really quickly, as I was running late. Post clear-out, my old shoes were resting somewhere near the top of the sea of shoes that is my footwear chest. I put them on for the first time in years and actually ended up running in them in an effort to get to my destination on time. It was pretty painful.

But I didn't get any blisters and now somehow the shoes feel a lot bigger. They must have stretched. I am pretty delighted and I'm going to wear and wear and wear them now until they fall apart. Then I'll have to investigate methods of preservation and mummification of very very old shoes.

twins

I finally made my first successful eBay purchase for myself this week. It was also the first time I successfully used bid sniper (thanks go to WendyB for the recommendation!) which means sadly my free trial is over (unless they give me more snipes for that link...)

In the meantime, I slipped into my new dress as soon as it arrived and started prancing around in my bedroom, feeling all summery and bright despite the deluge I can hear outside.

I say 'new dress', but then I started thinking about that's quite a misleading statement in a number of ways

1) It's from eBay. I know it's at least two years old, because I remember when it was in the shops. However it was sold 'as new', smells totally new, no weird stains or anything of that sort. I feel like the stitching could be tighter, but if it unravels it should be pretty easy to fix.

2) Is it really a dress? It covers my bum when I'm standing up. And the top of my thighs. I see it as a dress, but the eBay seller sold it as a 'top/tunic' and most other people might agree... also, I've been wearing it as a dress for the last two years and haven't received too many outraged glares.

Which leads me to number 3):

I sort of already have it. The same style, the same brand, the same fabric, the same size: the same dress. Only difference is the colourway. I normally try to refrain from buying duplicates; I see it as lazy and that there are so many great options out there, why buy the same thing twice? I'll do it with workout clothes and underwear, but that's it normally. Maybe with a basic t-shirt. But a statement dress??

Except I don't like to call my new dress a copy; I prefer to think of it as a twin. The same design and DNA maybe, but different colours and patterns and motifs branded on the hem and back. The comfort of the known: when I bid, I knew it would flatter and fit me and I know what clothes it will work with. But at the same time, the excitement of the unknown: different palette, different vibe.



Twin I---------------------------Twin II

So really, I still think of it as a new dress.

The Chair she sat in, like a burnished throne

A few days ago, I sat down at my desk in my pyjamas for a day of work. It felt wrong and I couldn't motivate myself so I decided to get dressed (up). I put on a silk dress which I received in February but which I haven't had the opportunity to wear yet. Sitting at my desk in a luxurious dress I felt kind of silly, but also nice and important.

I carried on wearing the dress through my evening plans, but I think even if I didn't have evening plans, it's an interesting idea to dress in beautiful things even if the only person enjoying the sight of them is yourself. Especially if the only person enjoying the sight of them is yourself (because you don't need to fear being over-dressed, under-dressed or otherwise inappropriately dressed). The beautiful printed animals were sort of distracting, though.




------------------------------------------------------------
For ages now (maybe a year) I have noticed a ring my mum has. It is always somewhere else; sometimes on the stairs, sometimes on the windowsill in the lounge. Today I noticed it's been getting a bit damaged, so this is what I said to her:

'I thought it might be a good idea for me to wear it, seeing as it's going to get lost or damaged lying about the house, at least until you decide what you want to do with it'

I have no idea where she got it from but I love wearing it and feeling even more regal and ridiculous.

Excuse the ink stained finger, I swear the ink from my pen must have permanently stained my skin as I can't get rid of it!

my proudest moment

I didn't end up wearing those pretty shoes was planning to. I woke up and it was an hour and a half after I was meant to wake up, so I was meant to have left home twenty minutes before I WOKE UP.

I had to run. No time for uncomfortable cork wedge experimentation. So sorry, no report on that just yet. Luckily the weather seems to have cooled down a bit so I can go back to my beloved winter boots.

I did, however, have time to photograph my one-step outfit. I have started chronicling them, you see, because that only takes a minute.

Now these photos are exceptionally rubbish. They are taken in the reflection of my dusty mirror in my often poorly lit bedroom with a little point-and-click by yours truly. Which is why I haven't taken up the habit of posting my daily photos on this blog; this is meant to be a collection of pretty things, and my outfit photos are really anything but.

I'd prefer to take nice photos to share with you all. But I am so so so tired (hence why I managed to sleep through my alarm). And I really don't think you want the alternative, but in case you do, this is what it would be like:


^^Me, trying to snap the pretty bow on the back of the top I wore today. No, I didn't upload the second photo by accident.

spring/summer footwear

I really am struggling with footwear this summer. The weather has suddenly taken a turn for the better, so my new boots are definitely relegated for the time being.

In the meantime, I am wearing these super-comfy cuties. Day in, day out.

But I am quickly growing tired of them. I am also running out of cut-away socks to wear them with. Also, they fact that they are completely does nothing for my legs. I miss the subtle heel on my winter boots.

My other options from last summer are weirdly all no longer suitable. The converse I used to rely on now give me tremendous blisters, ever since I wore them for a half hour walk without socks (even though now I wear them with thick sport socks... it's really odd!). I am not feeling the Birkenstocks at all. I obviously, being a girl, have a multitude of colourful pumps but they all hurt like hell and are mainly too small. I just keep them 'cos they're pretty. The last two summers I had the most awesome pair of white leather moccasins EVER, but I literally wore them to death and the whole things unravelled.

Basically I am left with these as an option (which isn't happening).

Digging around in my shoe chest, I came across these:


When I first bought them about 3 years ago for something like a tenner from Topshop, everyone made fun of my granny shoes. And indeed, walking in them would be better described as hobbling. But I love them, and they don't hurt my feet when I'm stationary, which is already one up from all the pumps in my shoe chest. So I'm going to try to wear them tomorrow, armed with boxes of plasters and my comfortable Clarks in a spare bag. I feel like such an old lady already!

a medium child

It's funny how I've been posting more frequently recently. I think it's a combination of having creative writing block, and revising block, which leaves me with nothing to do but think, think, and unable to write what I need to. So it's nice to have this outlet.

That could probably explain the weird range of topics lately, so I thought I'd re-focus things by showing you this amazing find I found last week. I wrote about it briefly in my mad post last Saturday, although buried amongst a million other things I'll forgive you if you missed it.

And I wore a denim jacket I'd forgotten I had and which I expected not to fit me at all (I can't do the buttons up but it looks great!) as it is officially a children's jacket.

I was so pleased to discover it. It was a present which I don't even remember getting, so I must have only been about ten. It’s Diesel, so I bet it was expensive. And it was buried away in a drawer of clothes for my little sister for so long that we’d forgotten it existed, until I decided that I needed a denim jacket to go with this dress I wanted to wear. As I said, I can’t exactly do the buttons up (well, I can, but it looks completely ridiculous). And the sleeves are a teensy bit short, but not noticeably so. As my friend put it, it looks ‘shrunken on purpose’, as these days in fashion nothing’s meant to look quite right. It’s all about the accidental-on-purpose ripped, over-sized, skin-tight, cropped, painted, faded, hybrid. Which means I get to wear a child’s ‘Medium’ jacket.

If we want to get all analytical about this, as I seem to be doing with everything recently, I love how this jacket really affirms the transition into spring. But also, it seems to suit my mood right now. More than ever, I feel really, really young and not ready for all this grown-up stuff which is what life is made of. So I like wearing this jacket, because it makes me think that I can just be carefree and young and stop analysing everything. But I made this post not to get into all that, so look, look at my new old jacket, isn't it pretty?

internet sales

Today TheOutnet had a birthday sale where everything only cost a pound. Pretty dedicated, I set my alarm to 9AM to try and get something.

The sale started at 7.23AM and almost everything was sold out. As I proceeded to try to sign it, that took an hour and then by the time I managed even more had sold out. I managed to get a nice top into my basket before that, too, promptly sold out.

Apparently now the sale is closed, 9 hours early.

I am getting so fed up of this internet shopping lark. At least in person you can get pushed and shoved but you won't be left clicking furiously away and being greeted with nothing but a white screen and a couple of black lines of error code. It feels like the equivalent of one of those dreams where you're kicking up this huge fuss and tantrum but it's as if you're both invisible and silent.

The same happened with eBay; I couldn't just buy an item which I liked. I was competing with other people. Then I tried to get a Glastonbury ticket, but after being in a 'queue' for an hour I gave up. In real life it would be so easy to shove my way to the front.

I should just go back to real-life shopping, shouldn't I? If only I hadn't suddenly become so lazy, or busy, or both. I haven't bought anything from a shop since my denim waistcoat. Wasn't that in January? So I'm starting to think my shopping hobby is a lost cause.

How do you shop? How do you overcome your frustrations with the failures of the refresh button?

healing

I really need to improve my time-management skills.

I spent ages messing around with the self-timer on my digital camera, realising the utility of balancing the camera on a stack of books (finally, a use for all those weighty volumes I buy...), trying to successfully snap my new heels.

They're not exactly new. They are a few years old, only I recently managed to persuade my mum to give them to me seeing as she has only worn them once since she bought them.

You see, I don't wear heels. I am tall-ish so they would be pretty conspicuous on a day-to-day basis. I am not so down with dressing up. Comfort is the main thing I take into consideration with footwear. I walk a lot. And my feet are bigger than those of most of my friends so I don't partake in the whole sharing shoes thing. All elements not very conducive to heel ownership.

But I do love heels, and on Friday I felt a bit frumpy so I decided to put on these heeled boots. Wow! Immediate difference to my entire mood, posture, aura. I love that I don't feel very dressed up either due to their boot-ness.


Still, the click-clack when I walk makes me feel a little grown-up, so I'm thinking a softer heel is next on my list. Maybe a nice crepe-y wedge? Suggestions, lovely readers?