Readers, a question has flooded in! Well, a problem, really. For me to solve. This is awesome. Maybe after this I’ll at last fulfill my dream of having my own problem page in a magazine or something? It could be called “Agony Amber”. Magazine editors: call me!
Now, before I put my Agony Amber hat on, a couple of three quick disclaimers:
1. Am totally not qualified to give anyone advice, about anything. OK, maybe shoes. Say what you will, but I DO know shoes.
2. Will give it a shot anyway. Because any excuse to get all wordy on you is just fine by me.
3. This is REALLY wordy. More so than usual, even.
So! The question comes from a reader I’m going to call Isabella, because isn’t that a pretty name?
Isabella says:
“Hi Amber,
I have been following your blogs for a while now, and thought you may be able to help me with something.
My fiancé of 3 years has recently started complaining about me buying clothes and shoes. In the past year he has mentioned it casually, but the other day we got in a full scale argument about it. He doesn’t seem to understand that I like to buy clothes for fun and that it makes me happy and more confident when I am wearing certain things. The frequency of shopping is around once a month when I have saved up some money. He complains that shopping isn’t a hobby and that there is something wrong with me. He seems to think I am the only one who is like this, whereas there are many style programmes, magazines, websites and so many high street fashion stores it is obvious there is a huge market for it.
Have you got any ideas of how I should overcome this? I want to keep him happy, and this is the only thing we argue about – I don’t see why it is such a problem. I would also quite like to carry on shopping, and it is my money, after all. I could just not tell him when I buy new things, but I don’t want to lie to him!
Have you ever experienced anything like this before?”
So, I like to shop. I know this isn’t exactly breaking news for anyone who’s been reading this site for more than a day, but it’s true: I didn’t JUST dress up as Becky “Shopaholic” Bloomwood for Halloween last year because I’m lazy, you know. Like Isabella, I shop about once a month, using money I’ve budgeted for the occasion. I have some fairly strict rules to govern my shopping, too: for instance, I NEVER use credit. If I can’t afford it, I don’t buy it. If I REALLY want it, I save up for it. I will also only buy something if I really, really love it, or if I think I’ll wear it constantly. And I do wear the things I buy: these days I operate a cunning “coat-hanger” system which means that I don’t just buy things and hang them in the closet never to be seen again. If something doesn’t get worn, it gets donated, and it serves me right for spending money on something I obviously didn’t really need or love.
But the fact remains, I like to shop. By that, I don’t just mean that I like acquiring new things: I mean that I enjoy the whole process. I love hunting down something that’s exactly my style. I get a thrill out of finding that perfect dress, or pair of shoes, and I get even more of a thrill when I find it on sale, or on eBay or something. I even enjoy just walking around shops browsing, although I’d probably enjoy that even more if The Others weren’t such spoilsports all the time. Then of course, there’s the whole process of bringing the item home, putting together outfits with it, and then getting to wear it and (hopefully) feel great in it. It’s a creative process, but it’s also a lot of fun, which is I guess explains why so many people enjoy it. Shopping isn’t my ONLY hobby, of course, (I also enjoy whining about stuff on the Internet, too, for instance. Am well-rounded person.), but it would be fair to call it a “hobby” of mine. And here’s the thing:
I don’t think there’s anything wrong with that.
To answer Isabella’s last question first, no, I’ve never actually experienced the kind of situation she describes. Oh, I’m sure there are a lot of people out there who feel that way about me and my shopping. So far, though, none of them have been brave enough to come out and say it to my face, though, and while I don’t think Terry really relates to my love of shopping, exactly, he likes the fact that it makes me happy, and he understands that when I’m spending my own money, that I earned myself, it’s really up to me what I spend it on. Sure, he’ll say “Not ANOTHER pair of shoes!” (he said this just last night, in fact) and it’s his (incorrect) opinion that I have more than enough dresses, but as long as I’m not spending our savings on them or racking up debt, he’s cool.
I originally started off that sentence by saying “I’m lucky” that Terry is like this. But while I don’t want to play down the wonder that is Terry (Who I am, indeed, very lucky to have) I really think it’s pretty much a given that your partner should enjoy seeing you do something that makes you happy, and should understand that we’re not all the same, and we don’t all get pleasure out of the same things. This “Shopping isn’t a hobby” thing? Says who? I mean, it’s not like there’s some magical list somewhere that says “Things That Are Acceptable Hobbies To Have”. Is there? If there is, can we have “gardening” removed from the list? That would be great!
Actually, gardening is a pretty good example here. I can’t for the life of me understand why some people enjoy gardening. Intellectually, I can understand that there’s a lot of satisfaction in creating something, and seeing it grow, of course. But personally, I can’t see the pleasure in enduring back-breaking labour, out in the elements, only to have to do it all over again a few days later. I just don’t understand it, but at the same time, I’m not about to tell all the gardeners out there that they’re “weird” (They are weird, though, aren’t they?) (That was a joke, by the way.), or that they shouldn’t enjoy gardening. Hell, they’re not hurting anyone, and while they’re busy digging in the cold, hard earth, they’re leaving more shoes for me, so have at it, gardeners! Garden for your life!
My point is that just because you don’t understand why someone likes something, it doesn’t mean it’s fair to tell them they’re somehow wrong to like it, or that it’s “not a hobby”. I think people say these things about fashion, or shopping, because it’s frivolous. And let’s be honest, here: it IS frivolous. There’s no point even pretending otherwise. But here’s the thing about that:
I don’t think there’s anything wrong with that either.
Sometimes frivolous is just what you need, ya know? We can’t all be super-serious all the time, and actually, now I come to think of it, I can’t really think of anyone I know who has a hobby that could be described as a weighty, important or intellectual pursuit. (Now that I’ve said that, I bet dozens of you are going to comment saying “Actually, my hobby is giving money to charity and building houses for the poor with my own bare hands.”) Hobbies tend to be, by their very nature, fun, relaxing things that give you a bit of a break from the serious stuff for a while.
Some people watch a lot of TV. Some like football. Or knitting. Or…jumping out of planes. And some like shopping, and fashion. I don’t think the person who spends 30 minutes watching Eastenders is a better person than the one who spends the same amount of time reading fashion blogs, or vice-versa. (Unless the fashion blogs are mine, obviously, in which case fashion-blog-reading person WINS.) We all have things we like to do with our spare time and spare money, and as long as we’re not hurting anyone, what’s the harm? You could, in fact, argue that even a “traditional” hobby like… oh, let’s go with gardening again, shall we?…like gardening is “frivolous” too. You’re not saving the world, after all. You’re not grappling with quantum theory, or discovering the cure for cancer. Ultimately, what you’re doing is making your environment a little nicer and creating something that’s pretty to look at. Do you see where I’m going with this comparison.?
(Am aware I’m on shaky ground with the gardeners, here. Obviously if you’re a vegetable gardener you’re also putting food on your family, as a not-so-wise man once said. So you win. In this example, though, you’re just a regular gardener, with the flowers and the water features and stuff. But moving on…)
Of course, you wanted advice, and you got a rant. Sorry about that. Let’s see if I can rescue this now…
At the risk of sounding like Jerry Springer, I think the best advice I can give Isabella is to sit down and talk to the fiance. I mean REALLY talk. Honestly, his surprise at your love of shopping is… surprising to me. It’s hardly the most unusual thing in the world for a woman to enjoy, is it? It’s not like you’ve just confessed that your hobby is dressing hamsters up as the Beatles and making them dance, say. THAT would be weird. (Although also a little bit cool, it must be said. Assuming the hamsters were into it, obviously.) I think shopping is only really a “problem” for a relationship if you’re doing it aaaaallll the time, getting into debt over it, or sacrificing other things because you just. can’t. stop. shopping. Like, if you see the assistants in Topshop more than you see your friends and family, or you want to buy a house together but you can’t because you spent all your money on shoes and now the debt collector wants to have a “friendly word” with you. Or if it’s literally the ONLY thing in your cold, empty shell of a life. (Which for most of us, it isn’t, because we are modern women, which means we can enjoy shopping AND quantum physics. Well, some of us can. Liking clothes, though, doesn’t preclude you from ALSO having an interest in other things, although, for some reason, lots of people like to assume that it does.)
To me, a once-a-month shopping trip, with money you’ve saved up doesn’t really fall into that “problem” category, so I think you need to first of all find out what it is, exactly, that bothers him so much about your shopping, and go from there. Hopefully some of the points I’ve made here will be of some use to you, but if not, I’m hoping my readers will weigh-in here with some advice of their own. Because they’re cleverer than me, let’s face it.
Anyone?
Tagged shopping stuff
Terry: Last night I had a nightmare. I dreamt we were in a car crash. The car rolled over onto its roof, and I was trapped inside it…
Me: Wow, that must have been scary!
Terry: And then you got out and started taking photos for your blog.
[dramatic pause]
Me: I’m totally blogging that dream…
Tagged Terry, the stuff of nightmares
I try my best not to read the Daily Mail – or the Daily Fail, as I like to think of it. Inevitably, any time I follow a link there by mistake, I end up on the site for an hour, clicking from one hideous story to the next and ranting and raving to anyone who will listen about the sheer idiocy that’s generally displayed over there in such great levels. It makes me sad for humanity, it really does.
The link I followed to the Fail today (sent to me by reader Maayam) was no different: I ranted about it until Terry finally got up and went to the gym just to get away from me, but this time I wasn’t ranting about the poor journalism or the “lobotomised at birth” standard of the comments. This time I was ranting purely about the story itself, the title of which is “Terrified girl, 12, dyes ginger hair blonde after receiving death threats from schoolmates“.
I make no apologies, then, for linking to the Daily Mail just this once. This story really saddens me. It goes on to explain that the girl in question (Who, by the way, has beautiful hair, but even if she didn’t, wouldn’t deserve death threats over it) has actually been withdrawn from the school in question, who apparently refused to take the parents’ complains seriously, and is being homeschooled by her father. I’m not sure how much effort the Fail went to in order to coax a response from the school, but all they seem to have said is “Meh, bring the ginger in and we’ll talk about it.”
I was bullied myself at school, although NOT because of the colour of my hair, so I know how serious it can be, and how much of an impact it can have on a child. For me, it changed me from a happy-go-lucky, confident child who really didn’t have a care in the world, into a nervous wreck who jumped at her own shadow and had to be driven to school so I could wait in the car until the exact second the bell rung, and not have to risk spending even a minute in the playground with my contemporaries. As an adult, I still cringe when I walk past groups of children or young teens. I still expect to hear jeers and insults (and sometimes I do), and when I’m with a group of females I don’t know (because it’s always the women, isn’t it?) I’ll frequently get that sinking feeling that they’re just waiting for me to go to the bathroom so they can start bitching about me.
This is the legacy of childhood bullying, and let me be clear: I got off lightly. This poor girl is apparently too frightened to leave her house, and it doesn’t sound like she’s had the kind of experience you get over quickly. There is one positive in this, however. I finished the article, and steeled myself to read the accompanying comments, expecting the usual rash of “But gingers DO deserve to die!” nonsense from the Fail readers. This time, though, they surprised me, and I found myself nodding in agreement at the person who said:
“If she’d been teased because she was non-white the place would have been swarming with lawyers, police and politicians within hours.”
Very true. But of course, because the girl is “only” receiving death threats over her hair (and as we all know, it’s perfectly acceptable to hate “gingers” anyway), no one wants to know. So very sad, and I can only hope Nicole Nagington one day comes to realise how beautiful she is, and how pathetic are the people who want to bring her down.
As a counterpoint to this story, however, I present this article about how Kate Moss has – wait for it – lines on her face, OMG THE HORROR! I mean, can you even IMAGINE a 36-year-old having LINES on her face? And OK, let’s be honest: it’s true that Kate has clearly done her share of drugs in her time. In fact, Kate’s probably done everyone ELSE’S share of drugs in her time, too. But actually, Daily Fail, not many people manage to age without getting at least a few lines, and it seems a little hypocritical to me to publish one article commenting on how awful it is that someone is being bullied because of their natural appearance, and then turn around and effectively bully another person because of theirs. Women in their thirties get lines on their faces. They do. So do men. It comes to us all. I’ve never taken coke in my life (other than the brown, bubbly stuff, obviously), am younger than Kate Moss and I STILL have lines on my forehead. It’s called “not being 15 any more”. (It’s also called “Screwing up your face every time you’re in direct sunlight, because you’re stupid.”)
I’d also love to know what the Fail and its readers would like Kate Moss to DO about the lines on her forehead. She could get Botox, of course, but I absolutely guarantee that if she did, the Daily Mail would be one of the first to write an article saying, “OMG, Kate Moss has had Botox, can you even BELIEVE it?” and she’d be called “plastic” and “fake” and God knows what else. So Kate can’t win. Women in general can’t win. And no one who’s ever read the Daily Mail is in the least bit surprised by this…
Tagged Daily Fail, kate moss
If you know me in Real Life (as opposed to this fake, imaginary life we all have on the internets), you may want to prepare yourself for the fact that next time you meet me, I’ll be speaking a little differently.
More specifically, I’ll be speaking like a drunk person. I promise I won’t actually be drunk. Or, OK, maybe I will be drunk, who knows? But even if I’m NOT drunk, I’ll still sound like I am, and that’s because today I picked up my new Invisalign tray for my lower teeth and the first tray for my uppers. Because obviously being me wasn’t enough of a challenge already.
I hadn’t originally intended to have Invisalign for my top teeth. They’re actually quite straight, but I do have a gap between two of them (Caused by my old nemesis The Peg Tooth), and I had assumed that I was stuck with this gap for the rest of my life, mostly because that’s what every dentist I’d ever spoken to had told me. “You’ll have this gap forvever!” they’d say cheerfully, and I accepted that this was so, and prepared to spend the rest of my life hating that freaking gap between my teeth. Then I decided to get Invisalign, and the dentist was all “We’ll have that gap closed in no time, and all it will cost you will be every penny you have!”" so naturally I said, “Sign me up for that right away, my good man!”
Today was the day designated for my teeth to begin their journey towards each other, and, me being me, I was feeling quite nonchalant about it. “Am Invisalign expert,” I thought smugly, as I settled down into the chair. “Am not even feeling like I’m going to gag when I wake up every morning now – will be no problem!” And I continued thinking this right up until the moment when the top tray was snapped into place, and I realised that I sounded like a drunk person. GAH.
The dentist and his assistant very kindly managed to conceal their laughter until I left the surgery, as did the receptionist who relieved me of the rest of the money in my bank account. Terry, however, was not so kind, and has spent most of the morning alternating between laughing outright and trying to trick me into saying words with lots of sibilants in them. “What would you say is the best sunscreen?” he’ll ask. “SPF 66 or SPF6?”
I’m told the whole “speaking like a drunkard” thing will last for about 24 hours, after which I will apparently get used to it. So far, I have my doubts about that, and think that, knowing my luck, it’s more likely that I’ll just speak like this forever, even when the Invisalign is removed. I’m having to speak veeeerrrryyy sllllooooowwllly. Like. I’m. Talking. To. An. Idiot. Or like I am a cyborg. I’m also drooling. Yes, drooling. Just a nice image for you to end your Friday afternoon on, there. I hope no one was eating while they read this…
* For the benefit of the people who always take everything I say literally, I am exaggerating here. The “closing the gap” thing is fairly straightforward, and therefore much less expensive than most Invisalign treatments, so it’s not quite costing me ALL my money. Just most of it.
Tagged Amber's Adventures in Invisalign
So, I’m out walking Rubin. I’m NOT wearing a dress, you’ll be pleased to know, and neither is he. He is, however, wearing his leash, and because it’s one of those extendable ones, and Rubin likes to be as far away from me as he possibly can on his walks (perhaps he’s embarrassed by what I’m wearing, who knows?), this leash is stretched taught between my hand and his body, and remains like this for the duration of time he pulls me around the footpaths of The Ghetto. (Actually, I don’t know why I even call the outings Rubin and I take together “a walk”. It would be better described as “a pull”.)
Now, note the word FOOTpath, here, folks. This is a path for FEET. Not for WHEELS, say, but people on wheels do love to use it: mostly cyclists, but we also get the occasional MOTOR CYCLIST roaring along it, and all I can say about that is that I hope there’s a particularly hot space in hell for those people, I really do. The regular cyclists, on the other hand, don’t really bother me. Most of them are really good about ringing their bell when they get close to a pedestrian, and this gives me ample opportunity to reel Rubin in and prevent him from trying to throw himself under their wheels, which is totally what he would do, and why he is kept on his leash on this particular footpath.
Yesterday, though, this did not happen. Instead of ringing his bell to let me know of his approach (INCOMING! INCOMING!) one particular cyclist decided to sneak up on me in complete silence: a Stealth Cyclist, if you will. It was only when I felt one of those rare pricklings of danger at the back of my neck that I turned around and saw him… just as he prepared to cycle at speed into Rubin’s leash – an act that would surely have sent his bike spinning out of control, with Rubin and I spinning right after it.
I am not ashamed to admit that I shrieked like a girl at this point. OK, I am a bit ashamed to admit it, to be honest, because it was a particularly dramatic shriek. He was SO close to us, though, and he cycled right up to Rubin’s rear (note: there was plenty of space around Rubin and I, so there was no need for him to do this. I did wonder if he just hadn’t noticed the leash, but even giving him the benefit of the doubt there, it would still have meant he was planning to pass really close to me, and he was cycling fast) before swerving at the last possible second, giving me plenty of time to imagine him flying over his handlebars, and me and Rubin ending up in court on charges of Interfering With a Cyclist or somesuch. (And I just KNOW Rubin would sing like a bird to get the law off his back, and would blame it all on me…)
The cyclist, meanwhile, didn’t even give us a second glance. He just sped away nonchalantly, and I got the distinct impression, although I’m possibly just making this up, that he felt the shrieky scare he’d given me served me right for daring to be in his path. It was this, rather than the scare I’d just had, that prompted me to shout feebly after him, “You’re not supposed to cycle on footpaths, you know!” Which would’ve TOTALLY told him, except at this point I noticed that he had headphones on and wouldn’t have heard me anyway.
And THIS is why Terry normally doesn’t let me walk the dog on my own…
Things you don’t want to hear from your husband: “Seriously, you are NOT going out in that, are you?”
To be fair to him, I was planning to walk the dog in a dress. (Me, I mean. Not the dog. The dog hardly EVER wears dresses.) This dress, in fact. Because I am nothing if not, er, a sailor.
In fairness to me, however, I was also planning to change into my “dog-walking” flats, and throw a jacket over the top: voila, now I just look like I’m wearing a skirt and a skanky old pair of shoes, no one will look twice! (And that dress looks much less “dressy” with a cardigan over it, which I was wearing due to it being a whole lot colder than it actually looked. Also, no, I didn’t put it on with the purpose of walking the dog, it’s what I was wearing anyway, and I was too lazy to want to go and get changed.)
However, Terry probably wins here, because the jacket? Was the only warm-ish jacket I didn’t put into storage a couple of weeks ago. And it was…dressy.
“No one walks their dog dressed like that,” pointed out Terry. And he was right. No one DOES walk their dog dressed like that round here, because the thing is, “round here” is pretty casual. In fact, make that “very casual”. Actually, scratch that: it’s the kind of place where if you’re not wearing jeans or sweat pants, people will look at you like you have horns. Dresses or skirts? Forget it. If you’re wearing a dress, you’re obviously going to a wedding: probably as the bride. If you’re wearing heels? There’s clearly something wrong with you, because why would ANYONE wear heels when there are sneakers in the world, WHY?
You can see why all of this is a problem for me, can’t you? There’s this inherent mistrust of people who look “dressed up”. They are regarded with suspicion, and when “dressed up” means simply ”wearing anything other than jeans”, you can only imagine the reaction a dress and heels will get you. This makes me sad. Over the past couple of years, I have somehow managed to move from wearing jeans all the time (acceptable), to my husband refusing to leave the house with me unless I go and get changed, and now I need to try and find my way back. It’ll be hard. I mean, just in case it wasn’t obvious, I like clothes. Specifically, I like dresses and heels, and I think in this respect I’ve managed to find the only downside to working from home: it gives me no excuse at all to wear them. Like, not EVER. Not even on the weekend, because on the weekends we like to do outdoorsy stuff, and that means dressing down. Meanwhile, most restaurants around here tend to be pretty casual, even the nicer ones.
With that said, my last couple of jobs had very conservative “business-attire” dress codes, so it’s not like they were a fun fashion free-for-all either. Moving to the kind of place where people wouldn’t look twice at me waking the dog in a dress isn’t an option (moving anywhere isn’t an option, actually…), so what’s a girl to do? How to indulge my love of fashion while living in a small town?
Because I am lazy, here is a quick summary of some things I’ve done in the last week, in a handy list format. You’re welcome!
1. Rendered myself unable to walk, courtesy of the elliptical machine at the gym
Having arrived at the gym, I discovered that the massive blister I’d managed to rub into my foot the day before (People always ask me how I can walk in heels, but it’s always flats that try to kill my feet) was not going to allow me to run as usual. “I’ll just use the elliptical!” I thought. “Because that won’t be painful AT ALL.”
People, I literally couldn’t walk properly the next day, and I’m using the word “literally” in its, er, literal sense here, unlike the girl on The Fashion Police last month who commented, “I literally died when I saw these shoes,” and who was either using “literally” incorrectly, or communicating with me from beyond the grave. Seriously, though, when I got off the machine, my legs were trembling, and when I got up the next day I discovered they were locked into a kind of “sitting down” position, and I had to try and walk around like that until they loosened up. And every time I sat down for more than a few minutes, it would happen again. GOD.
2. Got ID’d while buying a bottle of champagne for my mum’s birthday
Now, you have to understand that this hasn’t happened to me for a WHILE. I used to get ID’d constantly. Up until a few years ago, people would come to my door and, when I answered it, would ask if my parents were at home. (“Probably,” I’d answer, “But they don’t live here, so I can’t say for sure…”) Lately, though, this kind of thing has stopped happening, and I can’t help but notice that my ability to buy alcohol without having to hand over my driver’s licence first has coincided with me ageing like an old hag. And I’ll be honest: I’ve been struggling with this ageing thing. I know you’re supposed to be all, “Oh, I’m so happy in my skin that I don’t care if it has wrinkles,” but I’m more, “Screw that, where’s that expensive face cream that’s supposed to completely immobilize my face?” (Note: that was a joke. I don’t ACTUALLY want to immobilize my face. Maybe just partially immobilize it.) So, anyway, I was downright THRILLED to be asked for ID, although the cashier’s reaction to seeing my driver’s licence was slightly less than thrilling. “JESUS CHRIST!” she said (slightly inappropriately, I felt. Also, I really wanted to say, “Oh, did I give you the wrong card? Look, here’s the one with my other identity: you won’t tell anyone I’m actually Jesus, will you?”) “I’m really sorry,” she said, once she’d regained her composure. “Oh, don’t be sorry,” I assured her. “That’s the best compliment I’ve had all year.” And it totally was.
I’m slightly surprised, though, to find that the under-age drinker’s beverage of choice is apparently CHAMPAGNE now. Kids are so sophisticated these days, aren’t they?
3. Performed the Great Wardrobe Switchover of 2010 (Summer Edition)
I’d put this off for as long as possible because, well, it just kept on snowing, didn’t it? But on Friday the weather took a turn for the (very slightly) warmer, so I decided the time had come to say goodbye to my coats and boots and hello to about fifty million pieces of striped or spotted summer clothing. This time I decided to do the thing properly, so rather than just consigning the old season’s clothes to to the top of the wardrobe, I bought a couple of big plastic containers (seriously, they’re so big you could fit a body in each of them. Just a handy tip there if any of you are currently dealing with body-storage issues.) and put the winter clothes into them. Then I stood for about seven hours, ironing all of the summer stuff that had been crammed into the top of the wardrobe for months and hanging it up. It was Not Fun. Every time I thought I was reaching the end of the pile, I’d find yet ANOTHER dress lurking in a corner. I’d like to say here that the experience was a lesson to me to stop shopping, but we all know that would be a lie, so moving on…
4. Killed my laptop, bought a new one
Relations between me and my laptop had been strained for some time, but last week, due to events too tedious, complicated and totally my fault for me to want to go into here, our differences finally became irreconcilable, and Terry decided it would be simpler just to buy a new one rather than keep on and on (and on, and on…) having to fix the old one, and listen to me whine about it. I’m pretty sure it was mostly the whining that tipped him over the edge, to be honest, which I guess is something to bear in mind next time I want to buy shoes but don’t have any money.
The new laptop is currently on its way, and should be here soon (Maybe even today, in fact!), at which point my working life will be revolutionized, and I will become a super-productive blogging machine, for as long as it takes me to break the new one.
I’m now off to have a shower, as I know from experience that this will be the best way to hasten the arrival of the delivery man…
EDITED TO ADD: The laptop did arrive, but… it’s faulty. Am gutted.
Mt Flickr Pro account expired a couple of weeks ago, and I’m too mean to pay to renew it right now, so I’m afraid that means some of the photos I would normally have posted there are getting stuck here instead: sorry.
These were taken today, on our first day trip of the year – and given that we were up to our ankles in snow just a couple of weeks ago, it was a joyous occasion indeed. These photos were taken today at Seacliff Beach, in East Lothian: it’s our favourite Scottish beach, and as it’s my mum’s birthday tomorrow (Happy Birthday, mum!) we celebrated with champagne and chocolate cake on the beach: yum!
Here’s hoping for enough good weather to let us have a few more days like this…
So, yesterday morning I was sitting at my desk, working away when there was a knock on the door. It was the postman, and the postman was delivering one of those cards that say, “Oh, hey, we have a mystery package for you, but the person who sent it didn’t bother to pay the correct postage, so you’ll have to drive all the way to the sorting office, cough up the dough, and then find out what it is!”
(Aside: why do Royal Mail do this? I mean, why not just BRING ME THE FREAKING PARCEL, and allow me to pay for it right then and there, when I have the chance to, you know, LOOK AT IT and decide whether it’s something I want to pay money to receive? Wouldn’t that be easier than the postman coming to my door with a card (a waste of paper, and the earth’s precious natural resources!), then me getting into my car and driving to the sorting office (a waste of fuel! And time!) to ask ANOTHER member of Royal Mail staff (a waste of manpower!) to rummage through the mail, and find the parcel? It’s not like they’re not in the business of delivering mail ANYWAY, after all. It’s not like they’d have to sit scratching their heads for hours, thinking, “Oh my, how on earth will we accomplish the task of transporting this package to someone’s door?” Or, OK, given how much they struggle at this sometimes, maybe they would…)
Anyway, I got this card, and immediately I was torn. My natural curiosity, and, indeed, greed, made me desperate to know what was in the mystery package (What if Christian Louboutin had suddenly decided to just randomly start sending me shoes, like he did in that dream that one time?), but my natural laziness/stinginess made me reluctant to haul ass aaaaallll the way to the sorting office (I realise I’m making the sorting office sound like it’s in outer Siberia here. It’s actually just a few miles down the road, but, you know, lazy.), just in case the Mystery Package turned out to be something not worth paying £1.10 for. It was a difficult decision, but in the end, curiosity won out, so this afternoon I made the arduous journey and presented myself at the sorting office counter clutching a shiny £1 coin and a 10p piece which I’d stolen from Terry the day before.
The first clue that all was not as it should be came when, rather than disappearing into the other room and returning bent double under the weight of a hefty package, the Sorting Office Man simply reached under the counter and produced an envelope.
An envelope.
Can’t really fit shoes in an envelope, can you? “OK,” I thought doubtfully, “Maybe it’s just stuffed full of cash. Cash works for me too!” I stared at the envelope. It stared back at me, blankly. Once again, I was torn. It seemed unlikely that there was anything in there that I’d actually want to PAY to receive, but then again, you never know when opportunity’s going to come a-knocking, do you? Maybe the envelope contained notification that some wealthy, yet distant, relative had died, leaving me their entire fortune, plus a slightly creepy house in the middle of nowhere: a house with a CHILLING SECRET? Perhaps it was a letter from a publisher, saying, “We’ve read your blog and even although you only have five readers, we’re so impressed with the cunning way you weave tales about your teeth, that we want to turn it into a novel, which we will call TEETH: A Tale. Please sign the enclosed contract so we can transfer £1,000,000 into your account immediately for the exclusive rights.” Perhaps I just read too much chick lit?
With these thoughts racing through my mind, I slapped my £1.10 on the counter, and excitedly ripped open the envelope to find…
A PRESS RELEASE.
Yes, a PRESS RELEASE. You know, one of those could-totally-have-been-sent-by-email pieces of marketing designed to persuade me to write about someone’s product?
(Another aside: Why are people still sending press releases through the mail? Is it secretly 1994 again, and I just didn’t notice? Doesn’t it stand to reason that, as a blogger, I’m likely to be in possession of a computer and an internet connection, which would allow me to receive these things by email? Wouldn’t that be easier for everyone concerned? WON’T SOMEONE PLEASE THINK OF THE TREES?)
So, we’ve now reached a stage where I am actually paying to receive press releases, apparently. And not only that, I’m driving across town to pick them up, too. Maybe I could actually start WRITING them for the companies concerned? And I could PAY THEM for the privilege? Then I could publish my own press releases on my sites, and, I dunno, maybe I could pay them again at that stage? Because that’s the only way I can imagine it being any MORE inconvenient for me to be marketed to.
In closing, I feel I have to add my usual disclaimer here: I know not all PR people do things like this. I’ve worked in PR myself, I know people make mistakes. Hell, I make mistakes every single day. Sometimes they involve setting things on fire.
But damn, I was disappointed it wasn’t shoes.
Tagged PR
Yesterday afternoon, after a hard morning’s shopping, Terry I decided to go to our favourite local restaurant for lunch.
Well, we got there, sat down and the waitress took our order. Everything was just peachy. In the middle of the table, though, there was a candle, and next to the candle, there was a giant, paper flower. Both of these were directly in my line of sight, and obscuring my view of Terry, so I picked them both up and moved them to the side of the table.
And, in doing so, I set the flower on fire.
When I say “on fire”, I don’t mean, “It was smoking slightly around the edges.” No, we’re talking big, dramatic, “OMG WE ARE ALL GOING TO DIE!” flames. Terry grabbed the flower and frantically started blowing on it to put them out, and the look of sheer panic on his face, coupled with the fact that he was holding a giant, burning flower… well, people, I’m ashamed to admit that the first thought that went through my mind was, “Damn, I wish I had my camera!”
Anyway, Terry managed to get the flames out, and we continued with our (very pleasant) lunch, after which I had my first experience of removing and inserting my Invisalign in a public place. Which was… yeah.
I managed to get it out OK, by dint of ducking under the table on the pretext of getting something out of my handbag, and quickly whipping the thing out and into its case. This was fairly easy, because in the last week I’ve become quite the expert at getting the brace in and out, and as I was, um, under the table at the time, only a midget would have seen me do it.
Getting it back in, however, was not quite so easy, because before replacing the brace, both teeth and brace have to be thoroughly cleaned, and as we weren’t planning on going straight home after lunch, I knew they’d both have to be cleaned in the bathroom of the restaurant.
Now, I don’t really know why this was bothering me. I knew from previous visits that these are nice, spotlessly clean bathrooms, but let’s face it, it’s still a public toilet, and, I don’t know, there’s just something a bit personal about cleaning your teeth, isn’t there? Something that makes you prefer to do it in private, rather than with the audience of a small, but curious pre-teen girl, say?
The girl was washing her hands at one of the two basins in the restroom when I entered. Knowing that children generally find me a figure of fun anyway, and that people around here tend to have a very sensitive “weirdness” detector (i.e. they think just about everything is “SOOOO weird!”, I decided not to whip out my toothbrush in front of her. “No problem,” I thought, “I’ll just quickly use the bathroom, and by the time I’m done, she’ll have finished washing her hands, and I’ll be free to clean my teeth in private.”
But no. The girl continued to wash her hands the whole time I was in the cubicle, and was still washing them when I finally emerged a few minutes later. As I took my place at the basin next to her and started to wash my hands, she quickly ducked into the cubicle I’d just vacated, and then almost instantly re-emerged to begin washing her hands all over again. Either there was some kind of OCD hand-washing thing going on there, or my appearance had instantly tripped her weirdness detector into overdrive, and she was lingering deliberately in the hope that I’d do something to entertain her.
Well, I had no choice. Time was a-wastin’, and the brace had to go back in, so I resignedly got out my toothbrush and toothpaste and did the business, while Pre-Teen watched me with undisguised curiosity throughout. I suspect this is something I’m just going to have to get used to as I continue with my Invisalign journey, for in the same way that The Others hound me through shops, all crowding into whichever small, obscure corner I’ve found to surreptitiously try on a jacket or something, I just KNOW that I’m doomed to spend the next six months cleaning my teeth in public restrooms, while all of my fellow diners crowd in behind me to watch. I’m not sure why I expected any different, to be honest.
In slightly brighter news, I took a dress to my mum’s house for alteration on Satuday, and successfully managed to bring it back home again without dropping it randomly and never seeing it again. Baby steps, people, baby steps…
Tagged Amber's Adventures in Invisalign, the others
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