So, Maria at Mommy Melee has told us that ‘this week on Girl Talk Thursday we’re talking about a theoretical magical fifty-dollar guilt-free shopping spree’. As she said, ‘holy shit, $50 doesn’t get you very far, does it?’ More to the point though, $50 get you even less far (I can haz bad engrish!) when you have to pay in pounds. Shit, that means my $50 is only worth £33.9117 as of 14:42 today, and I can’t even spend that last 0.17p. So, to get the full worth of my 50, I’m changing it from dollars to pounds.
And the three items under £50 that I would absolutely have to have are:
Shoes. I need new summer shoes, preferably of the wedge variety. Maybe one of these slingbacks or either of these knot wedges. Ok, I know none of them hit the £50 budget, but maybe I could get two pairs?
A super dooper ice crusher. Really, I’d like to steal into Starbucks one night and retrieve one of their blenders – they’re amazing! Seeing as crime isn’t really on my list of things to do before I hit 30, I figure one of these should do the trick. I need one, honest. My caipirinhas need one.
And last but definitely not least, as any addicition needs fuelling, I’d require £50 worth of items from this list. Because there is not enough supernatural romance in this world…
In all honesty, I don’t do much shopping for myself. The last pair of shoes I bought was in January 2008 (and only because I had no shoes to wear to the sister in law’s wedding), my ice is crushed by my regular blender, which is really showing the strain, and I rarely buy books, instead heading to the library or swapping them. Clothes are bought on an as desperately needed basis, and I can’t remember the last time I went shopping just to shop.
C planted the idea in my head. Last week, whilst we were bemoaning the cost of fresh fruit and veg.
Tooting. It was my mission for Saturday. Mangoes and pineapples, in particular. Guavas and papayas would be a bonus.
The boy wasn’t too thrilled about a trip shopping, but his objections were soon pushed aside when a trip to the park was promised. He trekked around the pound stores with me (well, you couldn’t imagine finding one in Wimbledon) whilst I searched for items unknown to myself, and tried to persuade me that we should buy a bird feeder and feed, just so he could watch the birds. I weaseled out of that one. We don’t get birds in our garden, I said. It’s true; I’ve never seen one there before. He dutifully stood by my side in Primark, singing the opening bars of Disturbia but he didn’t share my excitement upon hearing of the new, bigger store opening next weekend.
Two undercover markets, mirrors of each other. Fruit and veg at seemingly bargain prices, money transfer, African and Carribean foods, baseball caps, butchers, hair extensions, fishmongers, material for African and Asian dress and nail bars. The smell assails your senses as you walk over the concrete paths: acrylic, meat and fish. We looked at the fish in the pet shop; they held more interest than lovebirds or hamsters. He begged for the rest of the afternoon, “Mum, can we have a pet?”
The boy stared at crabs and octopuses at the fishmonger, but one thing held his attention more than others: the pigs’ heads at the butchers. The broiling chickens had nothing on these beasts (although he may beg to differ if you reminded him that the butcher dangled one just inches from his face).
I’ll never forget the sight of a sheep’s head in a Peckham butchers, stripped of its skin but still wearing its eyeballs, resting in the display. It was like a creature from a horror movie. But a pig’s head, well, that’s nothing but bacon.
This firm’s all about corporate responsibility. Recycling, fairtrade tea bags, snazzy printed posters on high quality paper with massive ink usage reminding us to turn lights off as we go. Yeah, you can just see the sarcasm dripping from my words along with the salad dressing dripping over the edge of my plastic lunch pot.
The latest drive is a ‘limited edition’ jute bag instead of the regular paper bags they hand out at lunch. At last, an excellent idea’s popped up in this place: a cute lunch bag manufactured to fair trade standards by a social enterprise based in India providing a more ethical alternative to paper or plastic lunch bags. What’s more, as an incentive, each bag comes with a fairtrade chocolate bar the first time it’s used.
Yes, that’s ‘used’, not ‘re-used’.
Where’s the incentive in that? Pick up a bag at lunch, get a free chocolate bar. The chocolate was quite nice too; I might go back for some more bags. FAIL much?
And while I’m on the subject, I could barely fit my salad pot in the bag, and they’re not even that big. What happens if one day I want a main meal to takeaway? They don’t exactly come in small (waxed, probably not recycled paper boxes). No way one of those will fit in there. Again, FAIL.
So yes, I commend you for trying. But, like most things that come out of our canteen (carrot & mango soup and red cabbage, grape & dessicated coconut salad), perhaps you should’ve thought that one through a little more.
So the other day, whilst I was trawling through my feeds, I came across a post about some guy called Chris Mann. The writer was right; he is “pretty nice to look at” and I was more than a little curious when she said “he does amazing things like cover Kanye West’s “Heartless” and does it BETTER than the original”.
And I did what any curious person would do, and hotfooted it over to YouTube (because I’m lazy and I couldn’t be bothered to click through to the actualy post and the video hadn’t shown up in my reader) to check out this video. And I was completely bowled over.
I knew there and then that I had to get this guy’s music onto my iPod, but could I find it anywhere? No. I searched iTunes and Amazon with no luck (ok, I pretty much gave up after those two, because if they dont’ have it, clearly no-one does). Then it occurred to me that maybe, just maybe, it hadn’t reached the UK yet, so I tried the .com versions, but even they didn’t have it. It seemed like someone was playing a cruel joke on me.
Chris Mann’s site had no mention of an actual release date beyond summer so I did the only other thing I could think of: I resorted to his MySpace, where I promptly chucked on my headphones and immersed myself in the few songs posted there. His music is amazing, and fabulous and I simply cannot wait until the album is released.
So, @IamChrisMann, if you’re out there listening, please please please send me an advance copy and I promise I’ll listen forever, I’ll make the husband listen over and over again and I’ll make all my friends rush out and buy your album. Just don’t make me wait till summer.
So, Maria at Mommy Melee has told us that ‘this week on Girl Talk Thursday we’re talking about a theoretical magical fifty-dollar guilt-free shopping spree’. As she said, ‘holy shit, $50 doesn’t get you very far, does it?’ More to the point though, $50 get you even less far (I can haz bad engrish!) when you have to pay in pounds. Shit, that means my $50 is only worth £33.9117 as of 14:42 today, and I can’t even spend that last 0.17p. So, to get the full worth of my 50, I’m changing it from dollars to pounds.
