i come from the land of the ice and snow..
…and that’s where I’ll be going shortly, or at least some of the way. Since I’m having a break whether I like it or not and with my birthday in a couple of days, I’ll be heading home for a week or two of peace and quiet, a bit of sea air and some bracing walks.
That’s the theory at least, the more likely outcome being a week or two of peace and quiet under my sofa blanket watching TV with whatever freezer tapas I can rustle up by throwing an assortment of what the supermarkets call ‘party food’ in the oven for twenty minutes when I can be arsed to move (and since when has anybody needed a party to eat their body weight in crispy beige things off a baking tray in their dressing gown?)
More constructively I have made a majestic effort to take the shopping down a notch despite the winter sales and special offers, since the return to a semblance of my usual size over the summer brought about something of a splurge that included many, many pairs of boots and also of shoes (despite my feet being largely unaffected by the home-baking-and-Pringles diet of late Spring 2020). Plus countless tops, bottoms, jumpers, jeans, dresses, pyjamas, scarves, handbags and coats. Always coats.
Kidding myself that I’m saving money because I buy everything except socks and underwear secondhand is something of a pipe dream (in the short term, anyway) when the secondhand shoes in question are Chanel patent leather loafers or Manolo Blahnik satin pumps that cost roughly fifteen times what the likes of New Look would ask for a brand new pair. And likewise, whilst there are countless other good reasons to eschew the chain stores and choose the better pair (or neither, since cheap shoes hurt my feet), none of them are applicable to those who are not earning anything and have expensive rent to pay bar possibly the fact that the good stuff always has a resale value. And they’re pretty!
Regardless of any of this, belts need to be tightened both physically and metaphorically and so far so good; no clothing purchases at all since the start of the year and it’s the 20th already – yay! A small exception may be made by way of a birthday present (or rather another one, since my latest Abe Books order is winging it’s way over as I type), although as today is Trexit day – like the old song says, who could ask for anything more?
So to business – or rather the continued hiatus from it – and I should provisionally be back at the start of the second week of February at the latest; another Kings Cross closure is on the agenda for the weekend after next so I’ll be avoiding the associated ballache and likely returning a few days later, but if I’m honest I really can’t say for sure. We’ll just have to play it by ear, but you’ll be the first to know!
Predictable Song Of The Week, yes – air guitars (and/or air drums, should they be your preference) at the ready! And don’t forget to watch Thor: Ragnarok before your free Disney +runs out.
More soon! I will report from the boondocks just as soon as I’ve got the bra off and the oven on.
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