Temptation vs Seduction

Temptation - an act that looks appealing superficially but usually has a negative connotation, infers a lack of self control.

Seduction - a deliberate enticement, from the Latin "to lead astray", can be positive or negative but more usually refers to a sexual connotation.




My brief time in the UK seemed to be full of temptations, seductive in their allure, and mostly caused by this being on the doorstep.

Of course I did not deny myself, staunch self belief must allow that having made a public vow not to be consumed by consumerism that I would be able to uphold that vow even in the face of such an arsenal of enticements.

Ahem - just because I resisted doesn't mean Thea did the same!


I have therefore mananged to maintain my no new clothes vow, shopping for clothes only in charity shops and on second hand stalls.

But no way could I resist these:

- you can't expect me to really - after all new shoes are an essential element in a happy Monika, and these are my first new new new pair this year - only £3.00 in the New Look bargain bin.

Oh dear - consumerism wins  - well - they have got purple satin ribbons!!!


Days and days of roaming around old stomping grounds and trawling through shop after shop merely reinforced my feelings that consumerism  seems to have become a societal panacea for any ill.

Cafes, pubs and coffee shops were empty, yet every shop I saw had at least 3 or 4 customers already carrying bags from other stores.  Snippets of conversations that ran along Jeremy Kyle lines were persistently interrupted in mid flow with exclamations over sale bargains or Friday night's essential dress code and where to buy it.

I did not think that I had been gone that long but I did not recognise the dramas being played out around me.

Forgetten are those leisurely lunches of putting the world to rights between friends, a fast food fix and on to the next shop featured on a glossy photospread seems to be the new order.  I sat with a friend eating lunch in an area where every conceivable cuisine was on offer and watched the speed at which meals were crammed in, where conversation consisted of which shops had not yet been trawled and watched bludging bags fight their way through more bludging bags to the nearest tills, when we had sat there for an hour I realised that the tables around us had changed customers 3 times while we lingered catching up on old times.

Finally it dawned on me, it is not the world that has changed - it is me.  And I am immeasurably happier as a result.

So after 4 years in the sticks in rural France, what were my top 5 buys once back on UK soil:

1.  NEW SHOES - obviously.
2.  SUSHI
3.  CLOTHES - with every other shop now a charity shop once you move away from the large shopping malls, there are good quality items to be snapped up everywhere.
4.  HERBS AND SPICES - even the internet cannot compete with 150g of ground paprika at 29p.
5.  BOOKS BOOKS BOOKS BOOKS BOOKS BOOKS - by far and away the thing I spent most of my holiday pennies on.  English books at £1.00 in every charity shop, even some at 50p still, and I really pushed the boat out splashing out on some at £1.49.  

Today my shopping parcels get picked up in the UK and start winging their slow way across the Channel to me.  Should be here by Friday.   MUST NOT SIT AND READ ALL WEEKEND!!


P.S. - yes OK, I did buy stuff in Primark too - their socks were just too tempting - would socks count as clothes, not in my mind, I am sure they fall into the underwear category.

Bag lady chic.....

OK it's a fair cop - I do have more in my wardrobe than the same 10 pieces that I am alternating with on a daily basis.

Yet I feel that all I do is stitch up hems and darn yet more holes.

I know that the answer does not lie in a shopping mall yet somehow I think that my self inflicted new clothes ban is to blame for this vague itch of disgruntlement.  But how have I arrived at a situation in my life when I think that the answer to a general rumble of dissatisfaction lies in the purchase of some new clothes.  I know consumerism is the panacea for the 20th century but for some reason I thought I was inured from it.

Just last week Brendan, courtesy of my mother's recent forays into the charity shops and car boot sales in her town left me with two shirts and a pair of trousers that are like new, so why am I hankering for poorly lit, dreadfully musak-ed stores full of lollipop headed sales assistants (that always make me feel so self conscious when shuffling through the racks looking for something in a size larger then Belsen).  I don't even like the majority of the clothes, nor am I keen on the conditions in which they were created but so suckered in am I that I am yearning for a plastic tagged label to remove.

This morning found me yet again setting aside a pair of denim 3/4 length trousers to repair for the umpteenth time, alongside a particulary unflattering example of pyjama nightmare where the hem is steadily unravelling in a slow attempt by the article in question to hide its shame and seek relegation to the rag bin, but no, off I go to sew it back together again.  But why?  It is so hideous I daren't photograph it for fear of cracking the lens yet I know it will find its way back into the top of my wardrobe and I will be sleeping in it again before the week is out.  And its not like I don't have any other night wear.

Why am I so incapable of throwing away these poor excuses for clothing in favour of the other items lurking in the depths of the wardrobe?  Do I really feel that the face that I want to show the world has much in common with a bag lady?

For some reason I have managed to squirrel away all my nice clothes on hangers and have let the dross rise to the surface time and time again to the point where I am intimately acquainted with about one tenth of my wardrobe and the rest is a mystery.  Trinny and Susannah where are you when I need you most?

I am going to gird my nettle and strengthen my loins and I vow to take a day next week and empty the contents of my wardrobe and swap everything at the back for everything at the front, rag everything that has been patched up at least  5 times, everything that is stained, everything that is stretched beyond recognition and everything that looks as though it has been used for mouse bedding.

In the meantime, I'll just go and sew another patch on my grotty grey t-shirt that I use for gardening, and ignore the fact that my black tracksuit trousers that I normally wear for work are now fetchingly spattered with some of the lovely purple paint from the bedroom wall.  

Bag lady chic anyone?

Riders on the storm and a frugal shopping list

With the temperatures of the last few days it is not surprising that we have a storm forecast now.

In a bid to get the garden ready for a good watering, I weeded out the herb garden completely. This will be its last weed of the year, I only have so much time and patience for weeding and I have exhausted it now. Everything is large enough to take care of itself against the influx of clover and grass now. I did sow a last couple of patches with some parsley seeds I found knocking about the bottom of my seed trug, no idea how old they are now but before they get any older I might as well throw them in and see what they do.


The flower bed needs a last weed too, and then the poppies and daisies have to fend for themselves too.

I plant everything very closely together and if something starts to dominate I just cut it back, like the mint or the horseradish. I would rather that the whole area looked green and full than regimented rows of things with bare dirt in between. I jumble stuff up as well and have often sown parsley and chives in with the flowers and asters and marigolds in the herb garden. I like the way it looks when the beds are full and overflowing with life, much more natural, full of vitality and the bees seem to like it too.

By the time I drove back from work I was chasing the tails of the storm, and had just enough time to get the last onions and carrots in the ground before the rain started.

Now the sun is back out but the garden smells fresh and clean and is beautifully and evenly watered throughout - perfect.

That just leaves me enough time now to go and sort out some materials ready for my next recycled bag.

Tomorrow my project is to pattern cut - I have several colour schemes in mind but have not had the time to do the unpicking and patching to make enough material in one run to cut the basic bag shapes, so I want to make a start tonight, because as well as some studio time tomorrow I also have to go shopping.

Supermarket hell.

Whilst visiting the local bio (organic) shop is great for the odd bits and pieces we are also living a very frugal life and that means supermarket budget buying, things like creme fraiche and natural yoghurt are a quarter of the price of the bio versions, and my family want sandwich fillers like ham and tuna.

I cook the majority of my meals from scratch and apart from the odd pizza I don't buy any ready meals but there are also occasions when my other half is the meal provider and then we need something simple for him to throw in the oven and forget about, then serve with some chips or salad, (Gordon Ramsey he is not).

And then there are sweeties. We all like a sweetie, especially car sweeties for me, I have to have them otherwise I get car sick - even when I am the one doing the driving!

I would love to be able to ignore the attractions of the supermarket, but even with having cut back on so many of the things that I used to buy in another life, some things just can't come from anywhere else, like coffee - I like a cup of instant mud in the morning, not a fancy pot of arabica.

At least I can grow and raise a large percentage of my family's food requirements, and know that these are organic, free range and pesticide free, but I can't be completely self-sufficient in food.

Frugal and organic are not two sides of the same coin, and when I only have one coin to spend, frugal wins every time.