Tuesday’s Free Inspiration…

Still no job interviews, so what’s a girl to do? Well, best to get some great inspiration to keep away the out of work blues; first, one of my fabbest friends is a teacher so I told her about this fab offer from Lucky Voice – key workers get 2 free hours of singing like a cat’s chorus at this super glam karoaoke establishment – so we did and it was super fab…

Take a look at this great cover – is he the new Elvis?

Brush aside those frumpy fash mags and get hold of this super inspirational title, Wonderland, my top favourite magazine

And have you seen this great ad? It’s such a feel good few seconds, I think I’m going to have to dig out my old shell toes

And last but not least, spring is nearly here and that means, cherry blossom everywhere and I got these today from Graham and Green, so pretty and fluffy, they can’t help but bring a smile to my face – and don’t worry, I didn’t spend a penny, I had a £50 voucher to splurge…

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72hour online living – thank heavens it’s over

My sojourn into cyber living has proved to be a mare – if I had to rely on it I would despair. Still got flu, I haven’t left the house for three days during which I’ve feverishly shivered, sneezed and ached.

Ooh 70% off at figleaves.com – what better way to cheer myself up – I picked out some bras but there were no matching knickers – I tried to go from the sale site to the normal site to find some matches – the sites aren’t connected so I gave up – again…

My tesco.com ‘delivery slot’ meant bog all – eagerly awaiting my supplies and flat out of milk, 1pm, 2pm, 3pm – the slot passed and I began to panic. Fair enough, someone rang from customer services to say the order would be 30 minutes late. It arrived 90 minutes later, no apology and the Happy Christmas from the delivery guy was obviously a hint for a tip. Harumph!

Next, online Christmas present shopping – thanks Amazon – I got the best deals on everything there having compared play.com, apple store, argos and tesco. An iPod (£15 cheaper than elsewhere), Sony Vaio, Nintendo Wii and Wii fit (great bundle), along with a bunch of other Christmas goodies were ordered. Then the pain. My card was refused six times. I called the HSBC fraud prevention department, it was a total ‘Computer says no’ experience. They said my transactions had been picked up as unusual and therefore refused. I went back to Amazon and tried my card again when they told me it would work, but it didn’t, so I said they should stay on the phone while I put the transaction through. After most of it was paid for I rang off, only to get yet another email to say my card wasn’t working – I used my Barclaycard instead without a wimper. HUMBUG!

Back in the real world – I shredded my banks statements to avoid cyber crime – oh, the irony – I can’t even use my own bank card!!

I’m still copying my CDs onto my laptop awaiting the arrival of the iPod – I wasn’t going to buy one until I found my Sony stereo docking station is only compatible with iPods, sorry Creative Zen but a girl’s gotta do what a girl’s gotta do.

On a better note (pardon the pun) a friendly call from Luckyvoice to confirm my booking – thank heavens someone has this stuff sorted out – a pinch of the real world in customer services goes a million miles. 10/10

I’ve just done the Guardian Quick crossword online – I am not sure how long I will stick to online newspapers. It’s a daily ritual of mine to buy The Guardian, The Sun and The Mirror, at the Post Office and say Hi to the lady that runs it. If I stop doing that, I feel I won’t be supporting my local community, the post office, the butcher and the corner shop punctuate my walk home from school. It’s a social dilemma.

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48hour living online – a static voyage

~Some bloke on the fiddle ~

Flu has seriously kicked in – at least I have a festive red nose and the appearance of being surrounded by snowballs constructed from a pile of used tissues no less 😦

So there is no way I could make my usual dash to get the Sunday papers today, so my 48hour living online experiment continues, even though I have now run out of three essentials; milk, Lemsip and bread.

So, News of the World is amazing online – I’m definitely not buying it again, maybe they’ll make money out of me with their online offers – but I’m definitely not a Laura Ashley fan and Brandalley – well, it’s hardly exclusive anymore, and everything is on sale these days anyway.

Online Fabulous

So, onto The Sunday Times – well you can now buy an e-edition – see the free trial here – reading the bog standard online version is fine by me, especially if it’s free. I am totally gripped by this feature Exposed: Dick Fuld, the man who brought the world to its knees – the writing is worthy of Tom Wolfe. It’s one of those rare press articles that really makes an impact – written by Andrew Gower, who was working at Lehman at the time it collapsed, it really does resonate on a grand scale with other tales and fables of hubris – Nero, Rome and fiddles spring to mind – although this time, it’s all of us who have been fiddled. Out of credit, security and jobs. It makes me angry, I am swept away with this story, the tide of intrigue, how obvious the downfall is and how shit it all really is. Every day I wake up and think – Bloody hell – I haven’t got a job anymore. When I was fired I was told that I’m a great talent, charismatic, an achiever – spare me the saccharine I thought. Emails are being sent around to teams saying ‘what a loss’ and ‘sorry to see you go’ – is the vanity and avarice of this one man really responsible for this crisis in my life – yes, sadly, I believe that this is true.

I’ve not yet received my Tesco delivery – another four hours to go – and I aim to be asleep for most of those. I managed to watch about four or five movies last night while ripping CDs and I’ve now got two boxes of CDs to do away with. I also sent email and text invites to my birthday party and booked a room at Luckyvoice – so pretty productive really.

Some things just don’t really work though – I tried to book a restaurant on toptable but my search blew up – I really don’t believe the site is clever enough to calculate Christmas closing times so I don’t trust it. I always have problems finding places to go as my birthday is a couple of days after Christmas, so hotels are usually the best option, I’m thinking of the Soho Hotel or perhaps St Martin’s Lane – not quite sure yet.

I’m still bargain hunting online for Christmas stuff but overwhelmed by choice – why don’t they make web sites which just have really limited collections instead of an infinite inventory?

I’ll leave you with that thought as I go back to my foraging, TTFN.

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24hour online living experiment – no minx is an island

Yep – crawling the walls, visitors don’t come near when you’re infectious. I haven’t left the house for 24hrs – I’ve definitely got flu so my weekend has been totally nixed. My glad rags are still hanging in the wardrobe as I’ve had to cancel all this weekends parties. Damn, I was looking forward to letting my hair down.

Yesterday was spent on the sofa shivering and sneezing, too sick to go out and feeling really rotten. Boredom is paramount during flu, so in my ennui, I’ve decided to see if I can live digitally – I’ve been emailing, texting, calling to stay in contact with people – nothing new there. Unable to get my daily papers, I’ve switched to online and found The Guardian has finally put it’s crossword online and you can even cheat! I do the crossword everyday religiously and it’s more fun online. I’ve been reading The Sun online for ages so won’t bother buying either paper anymore. That’ll keep the recycle bin a bit slimmer and stop me worrying about trees 😉 Will the publishers notice?

Virtual milk? Shame the milkman doesn’t deliver anymore huh? Do I want to leave my cashmere cardi, scarf and slippers at home and wrap up to go out in the pouring rain? Not bloody likely. I’m checking Tesco so see the earliest delivery, they can do 1-3pm tomorrow – not bad at all, I can last until tomorrow.

Entertainment? Sky is fab – all those things I’ve recorded and never had time to watch have been viewed. You can not argue with the glorious technicolour TCM, I just love it. I’m going back to bed to copy all my CDs onto my laptop and then ditch the boxes in storage…I hate the clutter.

No point facebooking – everyone’s out doing Christmas shopping and partying – I can shop online but the party is over for me this weekend -and it’s horrible – I suppose if I get really desperate, I can switch on the Xbox and have a karaoke session with Lips. I feel like I am living on the moon, life is nothing without people, I need my family and friends, one can not live online alone!

The upside of all this is that I can shop without leaving home (yay!) and I’m bargain hunting Amazon and all the other usual suspects for deals on laptops, iPods, Nintendo Wiis and zoom lenses without wearing out my shoeleather. I’ll venture out to the new Westfield when the sales are on…
Ciao-achoo

PS: a note to all you manic emailing brands; urbanoutfitters, graham and green,

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