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?

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?

Remember the time I lost my favourite dress? And also a top?

I think I know what happened to them both. And the reason I think I know what happened to them? This weekend, I almost did it again.

This time around, my innocent clothing victim was a skirt. I’d bought this skirt a couple of weeks ago: it was just a cheap, cotton thing, but I thought it would come in handy for holidays (and yes, it had stripes on it, SO?), so even although it was a size too big for me, I decided to buy it anyway and get my long-suffering mother to alter it for me.

As with the Sorry Tale of the Green Dress, the first part of the plan was executed smoothly. The skirt was delivered to my mum, who altered it successfully and gave it back to me when Terry and I went round there for dinner on Saturday.

You can see where this is going, can’t you?

Well, we had dinner, then Terry and I drove home, where I spent a bit of time tooling around on the internet before going to bed. For some reason, though, as soon I opened my eyes on Sunday morning, the skirt was the first thing I thought of. “Hmm,” I thought. “I don’t remember hanging up that skirt last night, I wonder what I did with it?” I pictured myself siting at the computer the night before, putting Rubin to bed, brushing my teeth… No matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t picture the stripey skirt taking part in any of these scenarios.

The more I thought about it, the more I became convinced that something BAD had happened (again), so I got of bed and went to look for the skirt. It was not in the office. It was not in the wardrobe. It was not in my handbag. It was not in the house AT ALL, in fact, and so my fear grew. Had I… ? Could it be…? No, I told myself, absolutely not. Not even I am dumb enough to make exactly the same mistake twice, after all, so surely all we could gather from the absence of the stripy skirt in my life was that I had forgotten to pick it up when I left my parents’ house, and they were, even now, finding it hanging across the back of the chair in their conservatory, and saying, “Look, that dumb-ass of a daughter of ours has forgotten the stripey skirt again!”

The thing about that though, is that, as I’m sure everyone is well aware, by now, I AM dumb enough to make the same mistake twice. And probably three or four times more. So even although I went back to bed to drink my coffee and read a book, as is my Sunday morning tradition, I did so with an unquiet heart, and a strong sense of deja vu. Terry, meanwhile, headed downstairs to begin HIS Sunday morning task of painting our back door red (That was just a one-off, by the way. He doesn’t do that EVERY Sunday. That would be weird.), little realising that we were in the midst of yet another Missing Clothes Crisis.

Which is why he was really quite surprised to find a stripey skirt lying smack in the middle of our driveway when he headed out to put something in the bin later that morning. “Look!” he said, eyes wide in surprise, when he brought the item upstairs to show me. “I found a SKIRT in the middle of the drive!”

For a brief moment, I was tempted to just tell him that, why, the Stripey Skirt Fairy had obviously paid us a visit in the middle of the night! But Terry knows perfectly well that if there’s something covered in stripes lying around somewhere in the vicinity of our property, it’s probably connected to me, so of course, the truth came out, and the conclusion was that I must have dropped it as I carried it from the car to the house the night before.

Luckily, the stripey skirt was none the worse for it’s night under the stars. The green dress, I would assume, was not so lucky.

From now on, no item of my clothing will leave this house unless it’s on my body. I’ll just have to hope I’m not QUITE stupid enough to manage to lose myself…

(The masochistic among you will find Part 1 of this story here.)

When we left our heroine, she was floundering in the stormy sea of “grunge”, wearing Doc Marten boots and a selection of baggy, unflattering clothes, and totally failing to see the irony of “rebelling” against the uniform of one group by adopting the uniform of another. Because she really was THAT stupid. She was also apparently referring to herself in the 3rd person, so she’ll stop that now.

Before we continue the sorry tale of my life in fashion, I did actually manage to unearth another image from my Sullen Teenager era:

...and then the wind changed, and Amber's face stayed that way forever

Oh, shut up - YOU’D frown too if you were wearing a brown floral PLAYSUIT. Ahem.

(Also pictured: Ted. Who had apparently been drinking again.)

Anyway, when I went to university, I packed all of the aforementioned “grunge” gear (not the playsuit, though. I wasn’t quite THAT bad.), even although, somewhere deep down, I was never really comfortable with that look, possibly because I’m 5’3″, and maxi skirts make me look like a midget starring in a costume drama. I thought that was the kind of thing people would wear at university, though. I imagined we’d all sit around in smoky cafes all day, listening to The Smiths, reading Sylvia Plath and talking about how no one understood us. And actually, I DID do all of those things at university: I just did them on my own, in my bedroom, because everyone else was too busy partying.

The DM boots and grungy clothes, however, lasted one day exactly. Because what I realised when I arrived at university was that this was a place where you could wear whatever the hell you wanted to wear, and be anyone you wanted to be. And I quickly discovered that what I REALLY wanted to wear was very short skirts and very high heels:

(more…)

From Formspring:

How did your personal style evolve throughout your life?

Contrary to popular belief, I was not born wearing Louboutins and shouting “Bring me a green dress! With a bow! And some stripes! Also: dots! Bring me dots!” Quite the opposite in fact:

Yes, readers, I was once a little boy. My secret is out.

OK, so maybe I wasn’t a REAL boy, although like Pinocchio and George from the Famous Five, I did often behave like one, for in my formative years  I was a bit of a tomboy and my interest in clothes extended no further than wondering how many days in a row I could get away with wearing that bathing cap my mum bought me for swimming lessons, but which went just PERFECTLY with a pair of Wellington boots:

(I’m not joking: I refused to take the bathing cap off. I thought I was IT. I was, like, SO EDGY and ahead of my time. If I’d only realised, I could be an up-and-coming British fashion designer with a trademark line in “crazy” by now, but sadly I was too busy pulling worms out of the ground and presenting them to my next-door neighbour as a “gift”. Another promising career ruined!)

Sadly for me, things didn’t get much better, fashion-wise. Some would say not ever, in fact. As I got older (this is the serious part of the post coming up, by the way, so quiet at the back please, and stop rustling those sweets) and reached an age when I was starting to realise to realise that clothes could look NICE as opposed to  just providing a good excuse to never have to brush my hair, I was being pretty badly bullied at school. We’re talking parents in regular meetings with the head teacher and considering removing me from school, me being kept behind after class to make sure my classmates didn’t try to kill me on the way home: that kind of thing. And actually, as surprising as it may seem, none of the bullying was connected to my appearance: it was just stupid, petty schoolgirl stuff, but it got WAY out of hand, and it totally destroyed my confidence for a long, long time. One day I left school to find most of my classmates waiting for me outside the gates: they followed me home, surrounding me and hemming me in, while the ring-leaders hit me with rolled-up umbrellas, which were apparently the weapon of choice at the time. Thank goodness guns weren’t legal!

After that, my only real aim in life was to not stand out, and not give people any reason to want to pick on me. This was difficult for me, because I pretty much always stand out, and not JUST when I’m wearing a bathing cap in the street. Once I grew out of the tomboy phase, you see, I started wanting to dress up. It’s always (well, OK, not ALWAYS: see above for evidence) been my instinct to be slightly-to-outrageously overdressed. I tend to feel most comfortable in the kind of clothes that make people ask if you’re off somewhere special after this, and this tendency in me first reared its head when I was about ten, and came to school wearing a bright green coat and kicky little matching beret. This was the era of designer sportswear and shell suits, so you can imagine how well THAT went down.

For the next few years, then, I did my damnedest to just blend in. I always got it WRONG, though – sometimes really badly wrong – and that’s why there are no photos of me from this era. (Well, there are, but I’d rather eat my own eyeballs than put those photos on the Internet.) This was the late 80s/early 90s: it was a disastrous time for fashion anyway, but I was also “growing into myself”, as my mother put it. I had a horrendous, frizzy perm, a fringe which I “styled” until it stood up perpendicular to my head and… those were some bad times. But! Better times were… actually, no, better times weren’t coming, because once I realised I sucked at the whole “blending in” thing, I decided to rebel. Grunge was big at the time, and I embraced it in the way that only a angst-ridden teenager who is pretty damn sure Kurt Cobain is, like, the ONLY person who understands her, can. I had Doc Marten boots, long skirts, lumberjack shirts, and a collection of shapeless black sweaters. I also had hideous, high-waisted jeans with slightly tapered legs, because those were the only kind of jeans they had in the 90s, CAN YOU EVEN IMAGINE?

Because I refused to have my photo taken, and because my parents were probably worried that my scowl would break their camera anyway, this is the only photo I could unearth from that era:

Also the only photo you’ll ever see of me voluntarily using a phone. This was the day my 6th year exam results came out, and I was calling my grandparents to tell them my results. (I got straight As. No, you WOULDN’T think it, would you?) The shirt was my dad’s, the leather jacket was from a second-hand shop in Glasgow, because I was just too ALTERNATIVE for normal shops, and the jeans were straight-up hideous. Luckily you can’t see my feet, but I was wearing my DM boots, and was pretty sure I would wear them FOREVER, which just goes to show what I knew, eh?

Just in case my parents decide to ground me over this post, I feel I should point out here that they DID try to dress me like a little girl sometimes:

That’s Snoopy (he of “doing the toylet in the cichon” fame) I have in a headlock. My favourite thing about this photo is the very undignified doll in the background.

Oh, and I ALWAYS liked stripes, apparently:

I’m pointing at the ground to indicate where Snoopy had just done the “toylet”. Because if there’s a funnier thing than a dog peeing on a child’s sandcastle, well, my younger self didn’t know what it was.

To be continued later in the week, or possibly never depending on how I feel…

I know the image above is actually pretty hilarious given that I recently went out in public wearing two different boots, but allow me to bask for a moment in the reflected glory of The Fashion Police, which has just been named the winner of the fashion category in The Appletiser Blog Awards! Let’s just hope they never read Forever Amber, eh?

This is the second award the site has won, and both were the result of a public vote, which is particularly flattering, so if you were one of the people who voted for it, thank you: you helped make my day, week and month!

Seventy-one pairs of shoes. That’s the answer to one of my most frequently asked questions (The others: “If my husband’s grandfather’s dog’s sister’s auntie was a ginger, but I have black hair, do you think my children will be gingers too, and can I drown them in a sack if they are?” “Will those boots you wrote about in 2007 fit me, do you think?” and “Can I buy three of these dresses, please?”). It’s usually followed almost instantly with, “And what do you actually DO with all those shoes?” To which I always answer, “I thread them all onto a piece of string and wear them around my neck, obviously, what do other people do with shoes?”

I bring this up because I’ve been asked The Question a couple of times recently, and only found out the answer myself last night, when I decided to actually count the damn things. (Counting shoes: not as interesting as you might think, kids! Bit like counting sheep, actually…) Seventy-one pairs, not counting running shoes, and wellingtons, and those ancient ballet flats I really should throw out, but God, they’re so comfortable, maybe I’ll just give ‘em another week. I’ll be honest: I thought the magic number would be higher than that, and my first reaction was “Wow, that’s hardly any! I’m really letting the shoe-blogging side down, here, must buy some more!”, but of course, seventy-one pairs of shoes IS quite a few, I suppose. Well, a few more than “a few”, hmmm?

I just realised this post sounds like it’s building up to some kind of dramatic “I’m giving up shoes for Lent!” type of declaration. But, er, it isn’t. For one thing, being a complete and utter heathen means I don’t have to give up ANYTHING for Lent (which is awesome, especially when other people give up chocolate. It leaves more of it for me.), and for another thing: AS IF. So I’m not giving up buying shoes. I am, however, going to start trying to wear them all more often, rather than just that same pair of tan peep toes (summer) and black boots (winter) all the time. Then I will …well, then I will probably buy some more.

“Why shoes?” is always the next question in this particular conversation. To which I say: why not? I can’t claim that shoes are the answer to world peace, or that they have shown me the meaning of life, or anything deep like that: I just like them. Always have, right from the moment I slipped on a pair of those toy “high heels” once childhood Christmas, and probably always will. Shoes are fun. You never have to worry about whether they’ll make you look fat, or clash with your hair. They last for years (many of the pairs in my collection are pensioners in shoe-years), you don’t ever have to iron them, and they’re good to look at. What’s not to like?

Anyway, hopefully this answers the burning question on at least two people’s lips this week. And I have to admit, it’s nice to get a question I can actually answer for once, rather than the usual stuff about “ginger” babies…

Well, we’re off on holiday on Monday, and I’m pleased to announce that so far I haven’t fallen prey to some kind of debilitating illness. You know, like I did last year?

I’m less pleased to announce that in preparation for said holiday, I seem to have totally screwed up my packing. You know, like I did last year?

This time, of course, I don’t even have the excuse of the aforementioned debilitating illness. I haven’t had so much as a head cold (Watch one come and claim me now that I’ve said that, though!), and I’ve also managed to keep my workload under control, so, in theory, I have plenty of time to pack without all of the STRESSSTRESSSTRESS that usually accompanies the thing. Last year, I was so ill with flu that I was forced to leave it all until the last possible minute and then I basically just opened my suitcase and threw things in at random, meaning that when we arrived at our hotel, I realised all I’d brought with me was 25 black tops, a handful of black shorts, a couple of black cardigans, an evening dress, and the shower curtain. (OK, maybe not the shower curtain, but definitely all the rest.) Almost every single item was black, and actually, black isn’t really my colour, to be completely honest with you.

(I’d also apparently assumed that the weather on holiday would be permanently BOILING! HOT!, so when it was overcast and a bit chilly all the time, I was pretty uncomfortable in my little black  shorts and tank tops, let me tell you. )

“This will never happen again,” I muttered grimly to myself, as I got dressed that first morning (Well, the first morning AFTER the three days in which I got the flu AGAIN and had to stay in bed, moaning piteously and clutching a Coke Zero bottle filled with boiling water which I was using as a makeshift hot water bottle.) in the shower curtain and a pair of black tights. “Next year I will be totally prepared, and will bring clothes that are suitable for both warm AND cold climates, and which are any colour but BLACK. I have an entire year to prepare for this: what can possibly go wrong?”

I guess that’s why I now find myself the proud owner of no less than FOUR stripey dresses. And about a kazillion stripey tops. I even have a stripey jacket, and I WOULD have bought a pair of stripey shoes, but… Oh no, wait: I DID buy a pair of stripey shoes, didn’t I? Whoops.

These stripey items are what constitute my holiday wardrobe. I could lie down on the road and pass for a zebra crossing, it’s that bad. And the thing is: I can’t seem to stop myself. No matter how many stripey items I own, I still want more. It is a hunger that is never satiated. I will see a stripey dress/top in a shop. It will be virtually identical to one I already own. Hell, most of the time it will actually BE one I already own, given that I own all stripey items of clothing ever made. “Ooh, lookit that stripey thing that looks exactly the same as the stripey thing I’m wearing rightthisverysecond!” I will think, a sweat breaking out upon my brow as I gaze upon the stripeyness. “I think I will buy it!” And then I’ll have ANOTHER stripey thing. I look like a pirate most days. Aaaar!

Such is my way. If it’s not green dresses, it’s Things That Are Grey. If it’s not Things That Are Grey, it’s the Suitcase O’Blackness. And if it’s not that, it’s apparently stripes.

WHY CAN I NOT SHOP LIKE A NORMAL PERSON? WHY?

(Most of the other components of my holiday wardrobe are… navy. Which is, of course, DRAMATICALLY different from last year’s All Black, All the Time fest. Only a few of the navy items also have stripes. And by “only a few”, I mean “most of them do”. GOD.)

Remind you of anyone?

Not a hat

I think Terry and I should get one each, and wear them every time we’re out with Rubin. In fact, I think EVERYONE should get one. I mean, who WOULDN’T want to walk around with a Rubinman on their head?

This was the view from the car on the way home from the gym this morning:

And that was the view on Sunday, too. And Saturday. And Friday. There was a brief period of No Rain on Monday, but that was just because I switched my wardrobes over on Sunday night, finally succumbing to the growing pressure to pack away my summer clothes and get out the winter woolies once again. Naturally, then, the sun came out on Monday just to taunt me, and make me think I’d been premature in my winter wear decision, but nah, I’m thinking of building an Ark here now, it’s THAT BAD.

The whole “wardrobe changeover” thing was pretty bad too, to be honest. I mean, I’d say it wasn’t much fun, but that would make it sound about a million times better than it actually was.  Which was BAD. Where did I get all of those clothes ? What am I supposed to do with them? Why do so many of them look exactly the same as each other? These are the same questions I find myself facing at this time every year, but this time I’m determined to do something about it, utilizing a little technique I read about over at Fi’s blog. It goes like this:

First of all, you make sure all of the hangers in your wardrobe are facing the same direction. (I’ll just sit here and look smug while you do that, because I, of course, am far too anal about these things to permit my hangers to be any other way.) Then basically every time you wear something, you turn the hanger around to face the opposite direction, the idea being that as the weeks go by, you’re able to see at a glance which items are actually earning their keep, and which ones are just passengers in the wardrobe, hanging there unworn while I go out and merrily buy 19 more of them.

I’m going to try this for the next couple of months anyway, and then I’m going to be ruthless and send all of the “passengers” to the charity shop. So that I can go out and replace them with… well, probably with more of the same, knowing me.

(And no, the wardrobe changeover did not lead to the discovery of the missing green dress. I’d hoped it would, but I think it’s time now to accept that the dress is gone for good. Just like my tax disc, top, and that really important letter I threw in the bin on Friday, but managed to rescue two days later when I finally noticed it was missing.)