I’ve been a tad spendthrift this weekend. Like most people when I’ve been without money and spending my nectar points on groceries because the folding stuff has unaccountably vanished along with the gold and silver pieces, when I get money I tend to go a bit mad. Not ridiculously mad, just slightly mad. And so in short order I bought curtains for the study, new shoes, a couple of books, some beers and a bottle of wine.
The curtains were slightly problematic. I had the measurements carefully logged on my phone and when I got to B and Q I was happy to see they had the exact shade of green that I needed. I even got a pot of the paint I’d used and placed them side by side to check. But for some bizarre reason they don’t sell curtains in pairs (why would anyone want a single curtain?) and there was only one left in the size I wanted. Oh well, I thought, I’ll get some in the next size up. But somehow or another I got the height and drop mixed up and when I got them home they fell to the floor. By which I mean they were too long. Never mind, I said to myself. Being an expert needlewoman I can cut off the extra and make it into curtains for the futility room. So I cut the curtains to the right length and put up the new shiny silver curtain rail and Bob was eventually my uncle.
At this point the words ‘new shoes’ began to whisper in my mind. If I ever go to any sort of formal event I’ve basically got the choice of trainers or purple DMs. Not the best choice with a long black or blue dress. A pair of black lace-up shoes may not sound very exciting to you but to me they are the very stuff of life: when the Doc shop in Leicester closed down I got three pairs of Docs in the sale and one of them was a pair of flat black lace-ups which I wore until they fell apart. Since then there has been a flat black lace-up shaped hole in my life which, it occurred to me on Saturday morning, I now had the means to fill. So off I went to Clark’s (mask – check, gloves – check, wallet – check) and was served by a delightful young lady who did not mind at all the teetering piles of boxes as I tried on several pairs in various sizes. I like Clark’s because they are the only place to do width fittings for adults and I have wide feet. I love the shoes and would go to bed in them if I could.
After that, what with Waterstones being next door, what could I do but browse the ‘BOGOHP’ (buy one get one half price) table? It’s be rude not to, right? I quickly snapped up a couple of books I’d had my eye on for a while: Lockdown by Peter May and Westwind, a re-release of an early Ian Rankin. They have things in common which I didn’t know when I bought them but I’ll tell you more about that another time.
And that was my weekend. How was yours?
Kirk out
Sarada Gray 
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