Apologies for the radio silence, but I have been busy with life - moving house, a ridiculously demanding job and the small vestige of a social life I've managed to cling on to have taken up all my time.
Moving out of the parental home (years later than I should have) has been a bit of a wrench. Packing all my beautiful clothes into two giant market bags was a bit upsetting too, as is not having any proper clothing storage. I can not convey how much I hate having my carefully curated wardrobe hanging on cheap plastic Argos rails, but at least they are now unpacked.
Anyway, the new house is beautiful. The people we are sharing it with are very nice - let's call them M&S as those are their initials and it is also very apt given we have moved to the middle class nirvana of Queen's Park and there isn't a useful abbreviation for Farmer's Market. They have a lovely puppy and a haughty cat who I am determined to win over. Everything works in the kitchen and our bathroom is so pristine it looks like a hotel bathroom.
Of course, to live somewhere lovely costs money, and sacrifices will have to be made. So it's bye bye high street, bye bye Liberty and bye bye ebay. At least for a little while. Or maybe just until i can't bear it any longer.
Some people would say that my relationship with shopping is a little unhealthy. My mother certainly thinks so. She suggested that I just not buy any clothes for three months to rebalance my finances and if I couldn't do that then I had a serious problem. Perhaps I do. But it's not a problem that is hurting anyone, is it? And as long as I reign in my spending habits a bit, stick mainly to the chairty shops and car boot sales and only visit Liberty to drink tea and gaze at things longingly rather than impulse buy in the beauty department, we should be fine. And I won't want to bite anyone's head off or feel too miserable.
Sometimes mother just doesn't know best.
Showing posts with label shopping. Show all posts
Showing posts with label shopping. Show all posts
Tuesday, 13 April 2010
Thursday, 14 January 2010
Almost back...
Some frankly weird things have been happening during my break from blogging...
Jimmy Choo announced a collaboration with Ugg, which when you actually think about it probably won't result in a product any more horrible than those already created by both companies.
V launched its curvy issue, including a shoot by he-of-the-fatty-hatred Karl Lagerfeld.
Many of my favourite blogs went suspiciously quiet.
Among the less surprising but more depressing events are Primark reporting a 19% profit increase; my birthday and the abject failure of my family to do anything about it; the delay in my pay which means I've been living off two weeks salary since December 4th and have done precisely zero sales shopping despite wanting many things like this and this and oh so many other things; Cristiano Ronaldo taking off his clothes to pose in tiny pants again.
Some good things have also happened - JFK bought me a lovely piece of Alex Monroe, making himself very poor and me rather happy. Three of my favourite people in the whole world were at my self-organised and quite subdued birthday drinks even though two of them are rarely even in London and one of those was actually supposed to be working that night. The birthday dinner that EDF trekked across a snowy London to cook for me which entirely made up for my family being rubbish. I found a vintage Pierre Balmain polka dot skirt suit for £15 in a charity shop and discovered truffle salami on the same day.
This evening I will be finishing off my Masters application, which I will be taking in person to the University via a two hour train journey tomorrow to meet the deadline. Cutting it fine I know. After that things should return to some semblance of normalcy around here... thank you for bearing with me and a special thank you to two of my favourite bloggers who commented on my absence. It's nice to be missed.
Jimmy Choo announced a collaboration with Ugg, which when you actually think about it probably won't result in a product any more horrible than those already created by both companies.
V launched its curvy issue, including a shoot by he-of-the-fatty-hatred Karl Lagerfeld.
Many of my favourite blogs went suspiciously quiet.
Among the less surprising but more depressing events are Primark reporting a 19% profit increase; my birthday and the abject failure of my family to do anything about it; the delay in my pay which means I've been living off two weeks salary since December 4th and have done precisely zero sales shopping despite wanting many things like this and this and oh so many other things; Cristiano Ronaldo taking off his clothes to pose in tiny pants again.
Some good things have also happened - JFK bought me a lovely piece of Alex Monroe, making himself very poor and me rather happy. Three of my favourite people in the whole world were at my self-organised and quite subdued birthday drinks even though two of them are rarely even in London and one of those was actually supposed to be working that night. The birthday dinner that EDF trekked across a snowy London to cook for me which entirely made up for my family being rubbish. I found a vintage Pierre Balmain polka dot skirt suit for £15 in a charity shop and discovered truffle salami on the same day.
This evening I will be finishing off my Masters application, which I will be taking in person to the University via a two hour train journey tomorrow to meet the deadline. Cutting it fine I know. After that things should return to some semblance of normalcy around here... thank you for bearing with me and a special thank you to two of my favourite bloggers who commented on my absence. It's nice to be missed.
Monday, 30 November 2009
Journey into hell (also known as Brent Cross)
I think that we have by now established that I am a big fan of shopping. I love the thrill of the chase, the finding of a bargain, the touch of something new and the spring in your step when you put on something that makes you feel fantastic for the first time.
But even I have my limits. Yesterday I spent most of the day recovering from a trip to Brent Cross, the epic-centre of everything evil in shopping. Somehow a group of architects, planners and retail folk all came together to create a place that saps every last inch of your will to live out of you while surrounded by lovely things that mock you by being out of stock or expensive and hundreds of incredibly badly dressed people who bump into you, make a lot of noise until your head hurts, or, in one extreme case, throw up on passers by (admittedly the thrower upper was about three). And the worst thing is that these incredibly badly dressed people can actually afford the things that you can't.
This all in a grey faux-marble artificially lit environment that breeds a herd mentality of the kind that makes you queue for the supremely mediocre Wagmama's rather than just leaving as quickly as humanly possible with a bag of Waitrose's finest to scoff in the car on the way home feeling pleased with yourself for having escaped but supremely drained of all mental energy.
It's even worse at the weekends. Especially in the run up to Christmas.
Being a rare native north-west Londoner, I grew up with Brent Cross and have seen it evolve into its full Dante's-seventh-level-of-hell-like current incarnation. When we were young it was a good place to go and hang out after school because it was indoors and no-one would tell us off. Now it just gives me nightmares.
How could they do this to something as good as shopping?
I was forced to enter its horrid halls yesterday because my Mac suddenly froze and needed to be taken immediately for treatment at an Apple Store. But of course London Transport being the wonderful thing it is and me living on the Jubilee line, there is no tube to take me to the Apple shop in town at the weekends. So I girded my loins in the manner of Orpheus setting out to rescue Eurydice and drove through the pouring rain willingly into the underworld.
Look at how they've tried to decorate it for Christmas to make it seem almost cheery;
But even I have my limits. Yesterday I spent most of the day recovering from a trip to Brent Cross, the epic-centre of everything evil in shopping. Somehow a group of architects, planners and retail folk all came together to create a place that saps every last inch of your will to live out of you while surrounded by lovely things that mock you by being out of stock or expensive and hundreds of incredibly badly dressed people who bump into you, make a lot of noise until your head hurts, or, in one extreme case, throw up on passers by (admittedly the thrower upper was about three). And the worst thing is that these incredibly badly dressed people can actually afford the things that you can't.
This all in a grey faux-marble artificially lit environment that breeds a herd mentality of the kind that makes you queue for the supremely mediocre Wagmama's rather than just leaving as quickly as humanly possible with a bag of Waitrose's finest to scoff in the car on the way home feeling pleased with yourself for having escaped but supremely drained of all mental energy.
It's even worse at the weekends. Especially in the run up to Christmas.
Being a rare native north-west Londoner, I grew up with Brent Cross and have seen it evolve into its full Dante's-seventh-level-of-hell-like current incarnation. When we were young it was a good place to go and hang out after school because it was indoors and no-one would tell us off. Now it just gives me nightmares.
How could they do this to something as good as shopping?
I was forced to enter its horrid halls yesterday because my Mac suddenly froze and needed to be taken immediately for treatment at an Apple Store. But of course London Transport being the wonderful thing it is and me living on the Jubilee line, there is no tube to take me to the Apple shop in town at the weekends. So I girded my loins in the manner of Orpheus setting out to rescue Eurydice and drove through the pouring rain willingly into the underworld.
Look at how they've tried to decorate it for Christmas to make it seem almost cheery;
This is the best picture I could get of the nicest bit of Brent Cross. The roof in the central bit actually looks ok. Shame it only covers a small fraction of the shopping pit and none of the actual shops.
It's not even like the place would be useful if there was a zombie invasion (too many vulnerable access points). In fact, if anything, it's the place where the zombies are most likely to spawn.
Not everything about Brent Cross is bad. It does have both a Waitrose AND a John Lewis which means I can buy yummy cheese, Touche eclat, sewing supplies, Family Guy, Vogue and have a diverting rifle through Topshop all under one roof. But Sunday was horrific.
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