Happy New Year!

Well, it’s been a year of highs and lows for me in many respects, but every moment I’ve spent working on this fashion journal has been a pleasure. I’d like to thank you all for reading, and hope you’ve enjoyed my fashion adventures as much as I have.

Whether you’ll be dancing up a storm under disco lights or partying slow-style – as I read about today in the latest issue of Australian Grazia, (wear your favourite dancing shoes regardless) – I hope you have a fabulous New Year’s evening!

Here’s to slam-dunking it in 2010!

P.S. Don’t forget to check out the Outtakes & Extras gallery as I couldn’t decide which was my favourite pic!

Shoes For Me!*

Shoooes for meeeeeeee! Isn’t Uncle Nick just the best? I knew he wouldn’t forget my Christmas present, just because he has a squajillion other girls to look after.

Christmas started late at our place, what with Prancer and Dancer locking antlers over a cookie over Amsterdam, and then Rudolph went and got his hoof stuck in someone’s chimney. Uncle Nick was a bit flustered when he got back at half-past five in the morning, so we let him sleep in a bit.

I hope you had a lovely Christmas and are going to bed happy like me. (And if, er, by some unforseen accident you found only one Jimmy Choo in your stocking, please write to me, not Santa!)

Kisses.

*NB This entry is best viewed through Firefox or Safari.

It’s Christmas Eve!

It’s Christmas Eve and here I am helping out old Uncle Nick in the packing department of the Wish Factory.

I can’t believe he’s making me stuff stockings with shoes for other girls! That’s his idea of a hilarious joke. How cruel. They all think he’s some fat jolly guy, all with the ‘ho-ho-ho’s’, and he’s not. He’s got a real mean streak. Obviously.

They all think he’s some fat jolly guy, all with the ‘ho-ho-ho’s’, and he’s not.

What about me? I’ve been so good this year. What am I going to get in my Christmas stocking? I’ll bet Uncle forgets. It’s always the way: the chef doesn’t want to cook when he gets home; the plumber won’t fix his own blocked pipes.

Hmph. Forget Santa’s elves – Uncle Nick has every last cousin three times removed slaving away here. And I’ve got the absolute worst job of them all.

Ladybird, Ladybird

The second to last time I had cupping done, the first thing I thought (after the initial shock of how purple the bruises were passed) was that I looked like a ladybug. How kind of my massage therapist to place the cups symmetrically on either side of my spine!

On Tuesday I paid him another visit. When he asked me if I wanted to have cupping done, I replied, “Sure, if you think I need it.” Yes, I did. I added suggestively, “Last time you did it they were soo pretty, all symmetrical down my back. I looked like a ladybird.” I didn’t need to say any more.

And like last time, when I got home, I had a shock at the sight of my bare back. I must be chock-full of toxins! (Which I can’t at all understand, clean-living as I am.)

But this time I was ready to photograph the results. Later he and I chuckled over the spots, and discussed the artistic merits of creating cupping pictures on his patients’ unsuspecting backs – sort of like balloon art, only classier. “I can photograph them for you,” I told him, “and I’m sure there’ll be some art gallery owner somewhere who’d be totally into it.”

I am fully expecting a smiley face next time.

More pics in the Out-takes & Extras gallery.

Highway Robbery!

Do you have any idea how much it costs to have leather drycleaned? I had a nebulous idea of current costs, but recently I had cause to discover exactly how much prices had risen.

Not long ago I wore my caramel coloured leather skirt to a house party, and when I eventually got home, discovered that I must have sat on a potato chip. There was a grease mark the size of a thumbnail right on the tush. There was nothing doing: I had to bite the bullet and have it professionally cleaned, or never wear it again.

I took it – along with sundry other items that needed laundering – to the local drycleaning outfit. I was informed that the skirt must be taken to a specialist leather cleaner; would cost $70 to have cleaned; and could take up to two weeks before it would be ready. Furthermore, I had to sign an indemnity form indicating I would forgive them if the skirt suffered any further damage. THEN in addition I had to give them a $40 deposit!

What kind of racket was this?

I was miffed, but resigned, and forked out the cash (after having to traipse to a nearby convenience store to get some money, as the drycleaners did not have EFT; another count against them). Then, to my consternation, I was told it might be a week before my other items were ready. A week! What kind of racket was this?

It transpired that three weeks passed before I darkened their doors again. Another $64? I shrugged. Certainly. By that time I was utterly indifferent to the dollars fluttering out of my purse and merely wanted to finalise my first and last transaction with this shady operator.  

Thank heavens I can report that the grease mark had been well and truly rubbed out.