Blank Doll eats up.

There's a paragraph from I, Lucifer by Glen Duncan that I like alot.

Take torture, for example. What do you want from torture? You want the suffering of the victim, obviously, the bougquet of fear, the parfum of pain; you want the gradual revelation of the body's thraldom to physics, the careful journey back to the flesh's sovreignty over the spirit. You want his appalled grasp of the inescapable ratio: your motivation is pleasure; your pleasure increases proportional to his suffering; your capacity for pleasure exceeds his capacity for suffering; no amount of his suffering, therefore, is ever going to be sufficient...You want, too, his degradation in his own eyes; you want him to observe the dismantling of his own personhood, his astonished shift from subject to object. It's why the classier torturers force their victims into a relationship with the instruments of torture before those instruments have been torturously employed.: the whip is drawn caressingly over the shoulder or loins; the rods and prods, the ferruled canes, the probes, the nightsticks, the crops- must be kissed, fondled, or otherwise venerated by the torturee, as if they themselves were sentient subjects while he is a mere object of their intentions. You want him to see that in the universe you now control, in your universe, all prior hierarchies are void.

Ah.

C'est tout.

Blank Doll

Annoyed that I can't even work out properly because I'm ill and nurofen is making me dizzy.

C'est tout.

Blank Doll eats grass.

Glorious post-exam day today thanks to my mother.

Yes, I get out of the house only after 3pm. Went to Canele once more to have tea with my mother. Indulged in macaroons again and ate the strawberry shortcake which was a charm. Mummy liked the place as expected and told me about her clubbing days at Double O.

We walked all the way to Goodwood Park hotel, along the way talking to her beautician at the SkII counter who looks very pretty thanks to Botox and dentistry. Worth the walk though because tea was too much. Oh, and I asked an idiot salesperson if they stocked Tom Ford's Black Orchid and he said he's never heard of it, what an imbecile. It's quite like the woman at Paul Smith who had no idea what split yokes were for.

Went to the Aspara for a massage, just what I needed after the A levels. Service was discreet and nice. The people there thought I was taking an old mother out for a massage, funny how you can fool people over the phone. Well, it was a decent massage although I've tried better. I like the service though.

Then, Mummy and I went to Bugis Junction to get my sunglasses. They are resolutely, absolutely perfect. Seriously. I was born to wear sunglasses. Actually, that probably means I don't have nice eyes. What the hell, they're a pretty pair.

Dinner at Ah Teng's at Raffles. Don't you love Kipling for coming up with "When in Singapore, feed at Raffles". Damn his White Man's burden. I think I ate a little too much there since Mummy ordered the crayfish hor fun (crayfish shell is edible!) and I ordered the fried rice. I hate rice, except in sushi.

Walked through Chijmes with Mummy talking about The Past and how we're all glad it's over and we're all more wonderful and enviable for it. My childhood was a good trial by fire for a spoilt child like me.

Just a thought, I want to grow up to be the sort of person who scares people without having to raise my voice. I think I'm getting there, considering I can now get salespeople into all sorts of confusion until they pass me over to the manager.

I will survive.

C'est tout.

Blank Doll eats.

It's a little disappointing that the doctor didn't give me something that'd make me sleep and then also a little ironic that I managed to wake up so early on the day after the official ending of my school career.

Today's going to be fun! :D

Oh, oh, I'm not sure if I should do a run-through of the A Levels but then if I don't go through this cathartic process, bits of it are sure to hang around and haunt me later on when I grow up in some form of Freudian psychosis so there:

History: Oddly, I'm very comfortable with it. I thought IH was challenging but quite fun to do and I actually didn't see what the fuss was about. I'm a little miffed with my Seahist because I actually had one and a quarter of an hour to do my SBQ but between daydreaming and wanting to piss, I ended up not being able to finish it. Nonetheless, I did manage tos squeeze in four criteria for two of the essays so that should be fine.

Economics: I think I sort of ruined my mcq paper because I couldn't be bothered to study for mcq. I think I saved myself later on when I did my drq/case study which I thought was interesting and quite nice to do once you saw what it was looking for. I can't really remember my essays but I think I did well for two of them and sort of bungled up the last one.

Literature: I'm not quite sure if I did well for lit or not because the entire exercise was so strange. The questions were strange to begin with and I found myself being forced to do contextual questions because those were the only ones with decent thematic concerns. Then I think I messed up my Conrad essay which is supposed to be my best although maybe it wouldn't turn out to be so messed up in the end. Woman warrior looks much better this time round and the Duchess essay was a cheat as was the M4M essay. I hope I do well for pc, I think I did rather fine for the prose.

History S: This is one paper I half-know and half-hope I'll get a distinction for because seriously, it just flowed. I love it when paper just flows and the thought process was practically crystalline. Yes, I finished half an hour early but I'd like to think that was because I was in control of the paper and not because I didn't have enough to write.

Economics S: And yet, and yet. I fell sick for the paper and really couldn't concentrate. I will most probably get a U for this paper and I can't really say that I care even though I must say that I really enjoyed econs s.

It's really over. I feel a little shell-shocked. Now, I have to begin preparation for my portfolio. Yay!

C'est tout.

Blank Doll stalls.

The past week has been kind to me, with the exception of today where I promptly fell ill for my econs s paper which promises to result in a U grade. Ah well, c'est fini.

Finally managed to get my macaroons which have made me exceedingly happy. I was even going to start experimenting with chocolate souffles but now that I'm sick, I guess that will have to wait.

Spent a strange night with my mother and her friends karaoke-ing. Seriously weird, I'm like eighteen and they're all older than me. Ah well, I'm still a kid.

Whoa, woozy. Ok, shall lie down now.

Die you sucker.

C'est tout.

Blank Doll was wondering.

It seems amusing to me that economics exhort us to be rational then people appeal to our sense of humanity and morals. Fair trade, why ought I support fair trade if it's going to cost more to me than free trade? Why do I care what happens to another person (and by extension the good of society) if it does not affect my individual pleasure? Why would I want to pay more tax just for the sake of social redistribution if I'm not going to get a larger share than that which I pay? Why wouldn't I want to take advantage of the system to enrich myself?

Don't you love the human mind? Such a complicated thing for the simplest of ends.

Il pleut comme un vache qui pisse. The things we learn in French school.

C'est tout.

Blank Doll wonders.

The strange things you think of when you're walking back home with a little block of butter wrapped in a plastic bag. Take life for example. What differentiates all the living creatures of the world from the unliving? What is the last unit of life? We learn that the spirit holds dominion over the flesh, but why ought this spirit transcend the material? Nothing but animated dust after all. We are as shaped by the material as we are by our spirits.

White is the colour of purity. White denotes space, denotes things untouched. White is also the colour of bone and snow and death. White is the colour that obscures the divide between life and death. White is the colour of nothing. There is a certain frisson to white. White asks to be defiled, white begs to get dirty. White stands away from the crowd yet longs to be brought down.

My mind unravels.

C'est tout.

Blank Doll barfs.

Go get your own signature you little stink.

And get a bath.

Oops, being childish and annoying again. Guess what? I don't care.

Oh and pray tell which shit can't afford two more percent of GST? Is it going to kill you? Make eating rice a thing of the past? Oh wait, I know, you're not upset about the hike right? What you're upset about is that the government isn't giving you FREE medicale care and FREE education right? You want to be a little parasite right? Next you'll tell me you think strikes and the minimum wages are good ideas. Next you'll tell me we should forget about meritocracy and spread the smart people around. Next you'll be telling me we should slap a good 50% tax on those rich asses at Bukit Timah, yeah, that'd make you happy wouldn't it.

Seriously, eat your own bleeding hearts and don't be such an embarrassment.

Blank Doll eats.

This weather is making me murderous. Seriously, either go for an all-out torrential shower or don't. This little namby pamby sprinkle of water just makes the heat worse.

Gorged on salad just to keep myself happy. I hate taking lunch so late in the day. Oh and silly me, I just realised that the darling little chocolate shop at Palais Renaissance was Teuscher! Come wednesday, I shall buy myself some champagne truffles to comfort myself.

Stop giving in to me. Seriously, don't make it seem like I'm asking for anything when I'm not.

Tired. Maybe I need rest.

Blank Doll takes a gulp of air.

Economics is over. Finally. Now, I can throw all my Economics stuff away unless they have something to do with S paper.

It was international history today however and that was one hell of a weird paper. I'm experiencing irrational bliss now even though I did a question that was out of syllables so don't interrupt it. Allow me this one moment where I actually savour the feeling of having done a paper where I thought I'd done a rather fine job considering I didn't have much information on hand.

Oh god, let this be over soon.

C'est tout.

Blank Doll sits down.

It says alot about me when I always prepare myself for confrontation but am lost when somebody treats me nicely. Annoying.

My birthday was a great day! Haha, Daddy bought me the to-die-for shoes that I would have sold my soul for because they were on sale and then I bought a pair of cufflinks. French was fun and after that, I went out for a spot of shopping with June from my French class which was even better. The Ferragamo sale is so worth it!

So I was late for dinner right and Mummy told me to hurry back home. I promptly took the wrong train and so spent half an hour trying to get back home by which time it was eight.

Anyway, I entered the house and *boo* surprise! Did I mention that I hate surprises? Well, I still do but this surprise was nice. Ying, Xuan and Tzhock were there which was quite a surprise indeed since everyone must have been so busy preparing for the As. Mummy had ordered a buffet and her friends were there, trust her to come up with such a thing. So I had to push aside my dread because I really needed the time to revise because I was just touched that my friends had bothered. I mean, seriously, it sort of scares me to be eighteen.

We talked alot, renewed amity, Xuan bakes (ok, half prepares) the best cornflakes-in-a-cup and Ying has established this tradition where she buys me famous amos cookies every year. Tzhock was really sweet and gave me a swiss army knife although I'm not really sure what to use it for.

So I want to thank everyone because that was just really sweet, especially because I'm not a sweet sort of person which makes me awfully guilty now.

And then there was today's lit paper. I hate it. Come to think of it, Liyana made sense when she said the paper was too easy. It wasn't a brag, it was said with indignation. I mean, come on UCLES, give us some credit- straight forward character questions? What a cheap shot. Oh, and what's with the weird thematic questions? I had to do the context questions (help, help, help) even though I've never done context questions in the two years of my life at RJC.

This promises to be a weird examination run which means that I don't care if I didn't get straight As because I know I deserve (almost) straight As and the paper was weird.

Then, there's the question of Econs S.

Sigh.

C'est tout.

Blank Doll waves.

Ok, I have to record this dream sequence down before I forget it because it was so strange and so funny:

First part of it, the part that I remember anyway, involved the entire family at the club walking by the pool towards another wing where suddenly I saw the entire A01E class sunbathing and had to say hi to Alps. Weird dream part 1.

Then for some strange reason my mother wanted to see the interiors of RJ so I brought her to the school because I had somethings to collect anyway. The funny thing was, the school had changed. Oh and the General Office had this weird staff who kept insisting that I go to the music room to collect my notes. So I brought Mummy in and the met Bhavan, Kristine and Steven too. Bhavan for some strange reason was from TJ though I knew him in my dream. RJ for some weird reason had been transformed into some sort of neo-gothic english manor and there were vaults and gaslamps! Ok this is not the weird part, the weird part is when we stopped at the library right? Steven happened to be climbing up the building from the outside and asked us if we wanted to join him instead of taking the stairs. We said no because we wanted to take my Mummy to look at the library. Eh?

The library was gorgeous and there were these strange corridors that led out of the building into clearings. Suddenly, it wasn't quite RJ anymore because it became a university town with the library as the centre compound and all the corridors were just taking us to different smaller schools. I remember a School of St. Nicholas. Now THAT is weird. There was even this corridor built in the honor of King George the something.

Next scene, the entire family is living in some part of Paris I think in this three storey house which was a little cramped I think but very beautifully furnished. Apparently, Pa had a winning lottery ticket and had to collect the money instantly but didn't know how to take the metro so I had to tell him what to say in French. Mei had to actually ransack the entire basement which was another two floors for the ticket. I have no idea what's going on in this dream.

Another scene. I'm with a group of friends, the weird thing was, I don't know these people in real life. I haven't had a dream with make-believe friends since I was eight! (I always remember dreams with make-believe friends so I can watch out for them on the road) We were talking and talking and one of my friend had this little tortoise that had clung to the wheel of her bicycle and was turning the wheel. It was all rather funny because people started throwing coins on the floor thinking my friend was a beggar and she couldn't get the tortoise to stop. The bicycle wheel became bigger and bigger as we were laughing but nobody else seemed to notice this. Then the tortoise became a frog! A frog that could jump real high (or was it still a tortoise? I can't remember) and we were joking about entering it into some competition while my friend continued to insist that she didn't train it.

I woke up laughing. Sheesh. Thanks GOD, for another cryptic dream on what to do for the coming year.

C'est tout.

Blank Doll thinks about it.

Today is the last day of my life as a 17th year old. You know, being a 17 year old has always been strange for me. There is something not quite right about 17. It straddles the coming of age year that is 16 and the yet more coming of age year of 18, not much credit given to being 17.

I think the past year has been great for me. It truly has been a very fruitful year in which I have changed alot. I like to think I've changed for the better, that I am now a more confident person and that I have conquered at least some of those little buggers hiding behind the closet. There have been friends that I know I'll cherish and there has also been the little wisdom of 2006 that amity is always a bilateral affair.

The year 18 ought to be a clean break for me and it would be were it not for the period of two years I have to spend in NS. Let that be my little sojourn through the desert. I hope it doesn't dull my edge, I hope it doesn't break my individuality even by the tiniest bit the way my dad says it will.

But I suppose in a way, it is a clean break. The two years I have spent in RJ have been great. Lots of garbage from the past have been thrown out. Two years of great harvest to be followed by two years of drought. Hooray for me and my lousy biblical references. The thing is, I wouldn't be who I am today if I had indeed gone to some other school because this school has shown me alot. For one, I now know I have an irresistable urge to laugh when somebody talks about giving back to society and that alleviating poverty is a moral duty.

I don't have enough time. I think all of us are aware of our mortality, it looms so far away at the vanishing point on the horizon yet like all things to do with perspective, that far away thing could really be larger than the event at hand. I think I'm a little desperate because I keep telling myself that, I don't have enough time.

I need time to succeed. I need time to break through. I need time to establish, to create. I need time to love, to lay to rest the rage that I have carried from my childhood. I need time to have a family, to teach another generation to love. I need time to learn about myself once more, to finally understand what objectives I might have in life beyond taking a high seat among the devils who wear prada (I for one, prefer Hermes so maybe I'll take a higher seat). I need time to wreck my life and to mend it again. I need time to breathe, to be acquainted once more with solitude. I need time to live.

If I work really hard, I might have another sixty years left. That's a little over half a century. I don't know how the world would have changed. I look at my grandmother and I can't help but wonder about what she sees. Her world has changed so much! I hope the future will engender as much change, that in the blinding optimism of youth lies a brighter future for Mankind.

I hope the European Union picks up and eliminates their bloody labour restrictions before I have to work. I hope they vote Jacques Chirac out and get a tough liberal capitalist.

I will be the generation to witness the new century, the first of the third millenium. It is an altogether too frightening thought. Let it be that Singapore should prosper even when I exhale my last breath.

Happy birthday to me.

C'est tout.

Blank Doll grouses.

In a fit of anger yesterday night, I whipped out my pencil and a piece of paper and began to sketch out my top shelf in perspective. I refuse to believe that a person of my calibre and learning cannot self-teach myself to draw. If I can self-teach myself the croquis and figure drawing, I can bloody draw a line of parallel trees.

Explained to my sister why art and science were the twin pillars upon which civilisation is built. I know this is a little presumptuous because a person of my level of learning cannot possibly grasp the significance of the idea of civilisation. In the best pedagogical fashion, I suppose bequeathing what little I know to my sister so that she may venture forth prepared in the least. Just as well that my sister at the tender age of 12 knows about the Gutenberg press and stuff like that instead of being preoccupied with- I have no idea what twelve year-olds are preoccupied with today but I remember an embarrassing obsession with digimons.

This brings me all back to the notion of truth. I don't think I can grapple with that idea without a headache and having exhausted what mental faculties I have on revising Heart of Darkness, I don't think I want to try. What fascinates me is this general consensus among different authors that I have read about the truth. It appears that far from some perfection, the truth is terrible. The truth is no shining light at the end of the road, no signpost to some divine firmanent, but is in its concrete certainty, terrible.

Ouch.

I have also eaten two mincepies thus far (Christmas is around the corner when M&S starts selling mincepies) and my calorie intake today is still below the daily recommended amount. I love my restraint.

C'est tout.

Blank Doll.

Today has been terribly boring, I can't wait for the exams to be over so I can get my life back on track. I need to learn (all over again) how to paint and I need to learn perspective.

Am I annoying you? I hope so.

C'est tout.

Blank Doll eats a muffin.

I can't wait to weigh myself again because I think I'm living permanently below the daily recommended calorie intake. Breakfast is such a relief for me, when I am allowed to eat something.

Yesterday night, I had a dream where I had a strange pet. It was like a cross between a furry penguin and a turtle with one hell of a beak. I tried tickling it while it tried to bite me until at last I clamped its fins down and then it couldn't. Strange.

I was going to blog about how I find people who spit along the road disgusting but then decided that I hated it not because it was Morally Wrong but because it Offends my Delicate Sensibilities. Really, spitting is gross.

FF12 is out! FF12 is out! Somebody please get it for me as a gift.

No, my dear little sister, you are specifically not allowed to get me that as a gift.

I'm so bored. I should be studying hard, but I'm not. I'm bored and trawling the internet for erm, food guides and restaurant reviews. God save me from my gluttony.

C'est tout.

Blank Doll eats a burger.

I. Need. To. Stop. Thinking. About. Food.

Seriously.

I like my baked enoki with garlic butter, just goes to show how simple cooking can be really. I hope one day to be good enough to cook for others. It really is imperative, you know, that one learns to do more in the kitchen than crack an egg over a bowl of instant noodles. Instant noodles being the scourge of the culinary world, right down there next to ketchup.

I need food, I need food. I need bluefin tuna belly tataki. I need beef carpaccio with shaved white truffles. I need sauteed foie gras crowned with figs. I need steaming brioche touched with a hint of honey. I need lobster and cepe risotto. I need champagne sorbet. I need a friggin bellini for crying out loud.

I need food.

It doesn't help that I punish myself by regimenting my diet everyday. I love a full fat milk, sauces full of yolks, a good loaf of bread. I can't have ANY of THOSE. AAAAAHHHH.

Not as cathartic as I thought it'd be.

Feed me. Please?

C'est tout.

Blank Doll.

I hate it when people promise me something and then forget about their promises. Maybe I am being childish here (wait a minute, I am being childish here and you know what? I don't care.) but you really didn't have to promise me anything.

I hate hope. Hope is so weak. Hope is for people who can't or won't do anything about their lives, about their futures. Hope is for people who leave their fates in the hands of others, who surrender power over their own tomorrows to someone else. Promises give hope. Don't promise me anything.

I'd thought the only thing that could upset me was betrayal (oh we all know about that particular rant by now) but I guess promises upset me too. Especially when they're broken, especially when they're broken by someone whose promises actually mean something.

I hate it when people mean things to you. I like it when love is expressed in purely material terms, because I understand material all right. I just don't get the immaterial aspect of it.

And it's not my fault either if I'm materialistic or if I see every damn relationship in terms of power so please, just go away all right?

Or maybe I'll go.

Yeah, definitely.

C'est tout.

Blank Doll eats.

This ought to be shown more care, thought and finesse but after jogging and the perspiration trailing down my forehead, I can't really summon the strength to do so.

What I meant to do was ponder about cooking. Is it not funny that cuisine, one of the great arts of living, is so laced with death? Each act of cooking, the spatchcocking of quails, the bludgeoning of a squid, the consumption of caviar on blinis, the very act of baking, is an act of death. I think the Greeks understood this for they celebrated the mysteries of Bacchus, the God of Viticulture, with the smashing of the harvest underfoot. The body of the God is crushed and in the process, the metamorphosis of grapes to wine is complete. (Childish rant: Transubstantion isn't a Christian novelty, so there, HAHA) The yeast in the making of both bread and wine, not for nothing is wine also called eau de vie, dies. Not even a sacrifice since it is Man who has manipulated the life of the yeast in his transformation of grain and vine.

I believe it is that faint taint of death that makes cuisine such a delight. Animals eat to surivive and in that process, life is perpetuated by death. It is as if Man seeks to forget that this is the atavism behind the joie de vivre that informs cuisine. The appreciation of food I think is at once the celebration of life, that exultant triumph of the predator, and also a display of defiance in the face of death.

There is another thread to it. Behind each bright spark of civilisation is the drawn out shadow that points to the provenance of Man. Civilized Man, how could he with his Magna Carta, his habeas corpus, his reverence of life, his worship of a living deity, endure the contradiction inherent in the act of consumption? How could he peer into the candlelight on the table and not see the smoky fires of a primeval era where in the first ages, Man partook of life in the vilest of fashion, where Man sometimes lived by the death of his brother?

Oh, and I managed the flip! I managed to flip my omelette (how do you spell that? I can never spell it, maybe I should just call it oeufs sur le plat)and then fill it with cheese. Perfect breakfast.

C'est tout.

Blank Doll eats.

Oh fine, be that way, look like a potato sack and see if I care. Oh and polo tee? Righty-o, why not pair it up with jeans and converse shoes while you're at it? Don't forget the plastic adidas bag. Don't forget to leave the brains behind.

This goes out to dear Jessie who is no doubt smirking at the moment.

Ok, there's nothing specifically wrong about polo tees and jeans since they are better than a roundneck and jeans combination. It's just, unless you're trying to go for that oh-I-just-got-back-from-lunch look, such a dismal lack of effort. Anyway, I always thought polo tees should go with something less stiff and denim than jeans, and then maybe with a pair of brogues. But then, I like it better when people had the sense not to wear denim EVERYWHERE.

Oh all right, back to the GP paper. I'm not too sure if I should be happy or stumped that nobody else seems to have done the national boundaries question. On one hand, I know Shang and Janice did the language question so GOOD LUCK TO THE REST OF YOU WHO DID THAT QUESTION TOO. On the other hand, the question was fiendishly complicated and my structure more or less went out of the window by the time I was done. You know those last days before a show and you suddenly feel the need to maybe alter a few pieces? Like M. St. Laurent and his famous Mondrian collection? The chaos is totally instructive. So I basically changed my tailored suit into a tunic without back darts like those wondrous Balenciaga things. Let's hope the Cambridge examiner doesn't get it the wrong way round like those sad American ladies who did.

Moving along, I'm supposed to be studying now so this will be short. Don't worry, I'm so on top of things. Yes, keep telling yourself that. You're so on top of things. You haven't quite kickstarted your revision but it'll all be fine.

Breathe.

I still want roast beef. Somebody help me with my roast beef dilemma.

Oh oh, and I nearly forgot what I was supposed to do here. Implore people to read The Debt of Pleasure. It's a good book. You might hate the self-conscious vanity of the protagonist but I think the author meant it to be that way, and with good reason so it's all good in the end. Read it, like seriously, read it.

C'est tout.

Blank Doll fights for you.

This is dedicated to all those people out there who were laughed at or are alone during their childhood years in school for whatever reason.

Oh and disclaimer here, if you get laughed and or are alone NOW when you're 16 and older, than you deserve it since you're supposed to be able to defend yourself by now or at least manipulate somebody into defending you. So there, tough luck.

Don't let them get you don't, don't let those stupid remarks become truth for you. You are smarter, more talented and more brilliant than those little wretched curs. Don't let their childish taunts get you, don't listen to them.

Listen to me.

Be good. Head high. Stand proud. Do everything you can to make yourself better, to make yourself brighter, to outshine everyone. You don't belong in that cesspit of mediocrity, you can fly. Go on, fly.

One day you'll see them again. Don't let back. You have come far. Lash out at them with your qualifications, show them that you're better than them. Then be nice, show them pity because they will deserve it. Trust me.

And above all, I'll be there for you.

C'est tout.

Blank Doll talks.

You know, unemployed people should be cab-drivers. We never seem to have enough cabs on the road. This must either mean they're all over the place, annoying buggers who aren't ever there when you need them, or we need another cab firm since one cab firm obviously cannot supply the sufficient cabs to keep consumers (i.e. me) happy. I was late for my mock test today because I couldn't find any cabs within the vicinity of Bishan and so had to WALK to RJ. Do you have any idea how annoying it is? To have to work? If I wanted to exericse, I'd have gone jogging instead thank you very much.

Daddy took me to this place to get a suit made for 5 Dec so the guys in class had ALL better get suits too because I'm not going to be the only one while all you suckers come in some weird polo tee shit and jeans. Actually, that's not likely at all is it? I mean, Akesh isn't going to come in shit that's for sure. Neither will Steven or James, right? Ok, right. I still need to get cuff-links and SHOES. GARGH. I saw the perfect pair at Bally in Paris and returned home to find that our store doesn't stock it. I also see a darling pair at Tod's but I'm afraid to ask my dad. Maybe I could get it as a birthday gift? Yeah, I mean, if my current shoes costing as they do a hundred plus can last for like eight years, then a pair of Tod's must be able to last longer than that.

Oh, speaking of which. NOBODY stocks the tie I want. I can't find a black, satin silk skinny tie anywhere and it is disturbing.

I think I started this post wanting to mull about something deeper but as usual, ended up talking about the superficiality of my sartorial anxiety. I'm hopeless, I confess.

Ok ok, to make up for it, I shall now do show and tell. I'm reading a book called A Debt to Pleasure now by some Lancaster guy and it's pretty good. Then again, I'm the sort of person who thinks Umberto Eco is good so you know I get into this ecstatic fit when writers feed me words I've never heard of and write in such a demandingly sophisticated way that you just surrender to the prose. I mean, the hell with it, 'chthonic'? Whoever heard of that word? My Longman dictionary is woefully inadequate.

And now I've discovered that the Italians find a plain Windsor knot too boring and have invented a knot that makes you tie look crooked. Great fun, wot?

C'est tout.