Skip to main content

Posts

Showing posts from August, 2009

Do liquid leggings and a liquid diet go hand in hand?

I did something today that I never NEVER thought I'd do. I handed over my credit card to a sales assistant at a department store and voluntarily parted with cash for, wait for it... a pair of pleather leggings (look like leather but are far tighter and very shiny)!!! This piece of info from the girl who HATED peddle pushers, refused to wear standard black lycra leggings and was addicted to boot leg jeans. Being of a the curvy-thighed tribe, I never expected to own a pair of skinny jeans – FYI I now own two pairs of grey 'a la Kate Moss' skinnies that are my standard 'I dunno what to wear' default. I wear them with boots, I wear them with flats, I wear them with a blazer to work and with a casual tunic-style top to play. I should've seen the warning signs when I became a skinny jeans convert... I was only a hop, skip and a twelve-step programme away from really wanting the trend that's been labelled 'liquid leggings'... Rhianna, Khloe, Heidi, Li

A tale of two cities

Was just on the phone to my sister, she's 21 months younger than me but these days it often feels like she's the 'big sister' – so grown up, so responsible, so wise and witty and just downright clever. She's an occupational therapist at a government hospital and lives in Cape Town which is only a two hour flight away but some months it may aswell be as far as Australia...  Right now she's sitting at home bored out of her mind on sick leave having had a minor op last week. It'd be so cool to be able to pop round with cupcakes (freshly baked by 'Melissa's' ) and make her a cup of tea and bring over a few chick flick DVD rentals for her to pass the time watching. It'd be so cool to just be able to help her out, do the dishes, paint her to toes – all the stuff your sister's supposed to when you're not running at full capacity. Alas! Puddle Duck and I haven't lived in the same city since December 2000 when I packed my bags and boar

Birds do it, bees do it...

apparently even educated fleas do it. But I'm not talking about falling in love (although it does play a big part), I'm talking about babies. There's an epidemic in my social circle – seven   six pregnant friends at last count ... three of whom are at the critical 12-week (Yay! We can finally tell people) stage. This morning one of the ovens that has/had a bun in it popped out a beautiful, bouncing, baby girl called Emma Rose...  (Allowing a pause for 'aaaaah, what a pretty name!')  Turns out they named the little sprog after the two grannies...  ( Allowing another pause for 'aaaah, that's sooooo lovely!') Anyway, about two minutes after receiving the news of Mr and Mrs Watson's new bundle of joy I got an email titled '12 week scan'. One click and a couple of scroll downs later I was checking out a 30 second video clip of an ultrasound on uTube that I had been directed to. It's an amazing thing to see and definitely one step up fr

Is it wine o' clock yet?

It's been a pretty long, uneventful day. One with not too many lowlights (gotta be grateful for that) but not many highlights either. I like days that would be coloured hot pink, but today was definitely one of the beige ones... ya know, kinda indescript. If my day could be summed up in a scorecard it'd go a little something like this: Got up later than I should have – didn't get my ever-expanding butt to gym = minus 1 Managed to forego the coffee for a cup of green tea = plus 1 Ate a bowl – way bigger than the recommended portion size – of Jungle Oats BFast (which is Pronutro for the wheat-intolerant)  in the bath with bubbles and was far too lazy to shave my legs = minus 1 Put on a serious working girl pencil skirt and heels only to change 2 minutes later into my ever-faithful grey skinny jeans and a black v-neck = minus 2 (purely for lack of imagination) Got to work just in time to spend ten minutes chatting with 'M', one of my best friends, while she got h

Diamonds are nothing more than chunks of coal that stuck to their jobs

Mark Twain once said: 'Let us not be too particular; it is better to have old secondhand diamonds than none at all' ... I'd have to agree all though I can't say I have personal experience of such a thing. You see, my hubby got it 'oh-so- over the top -right' when he picked my engagement ring which left me speechless and in a puddle of tears for a good few minutes – the poor man had to remind me that he knee ded an answer! I got spoilt, very spoilt. But enough about me (well at least for a few paragraphs before the need to be shamelessly self-indulgent strikes again). The point of this post is to talk about my second stream of income, the one that doesn't come from inhaling paint fumes and beating up on canvases. The one that lets me play with pretty things and make the dreams that grown women have had since they were little girls come true. Whether it be a modest 0.3ct round cut diamond delicately nestled in a simple gold band, or a 2-carat flawless m

The middle man (it's a tight squeeze)

I spend about 90% of my working day as the 'middle man' – often playing referee between high-flying (art-buying) execs and whimsical ' I live to create' artists or acting as the buffer between customs clearing agents and 'just visited Africa' tourists. It's my job to keep the peace and make sure that both the price and the customer are always right. Often more easily said than done... because every client wants an even better deal than the last one and every painter is always playing the 'starving artist' card. Some days I feel like Robin Hood in reverse, pecking away at the poor's profit margin only to give it to the rich dude so that he can buy his third wife the latest Louis Vuitton purse. Case in point – my always chic, tragically fashionable interior designer who has just moved into a mansion that could house a small West African village comfortably and still have room for the English soccer team and their WAGs. You'd think that he&

Things I would do if time travel were possible...

Go back to pre-school and really appreciate afternoon nap time; Take a ride on the Orient Express back when women wore white gloves and men carried pocket handkerchiefs; Go back to 12 December 1984 and see what life was like for me as an only child before my sister arrived the following day. As I can't imagine life without her... I'm sure I was very lonely before she made her grand entrance into the world; Spend a little longer on the phone to Grandpa Ray the last time we spoke; Take a walk through Carnaby street back when flower power was all the rage and a VW beetle was the must have mode of transportation; Have breakfast at Tiffany's with Audrey Hepburn; Never have started smoking in the first place a.k.a should have listened to my mother; Would have bought 'Starry starry night' from Vincent Van Gogh' a minute after he finished painting it; Be old enough to vote in 1994 – when first democratic elections were held in South Africa; Go back to the momen

A tale of an angry mosquito and a baby shower

It's not yet midday on this sunny Jo'burg Saturday and I've already: Gotten up, gotten showered, dived into an outfit suitable for a baby shower, an art consult, a diamond deal and a girls night in (DVDs and lots of wine) Managed to resist the temptation to put my frizz bomb (a.k.a my hair) into a bun, and actually straighten it from soaking wet (couldn't use my hair dryer and risk waking sleeping beauty at 8am on a Saturday morning – that's just not fair play in the game that is marriage) Popped into 'Party in a box' to get the perfect shade of tissue paper for a 'we want the sex of the baby to be a surprise' baby shower gift – couldn't be pink, couldn't be blue, so the artist in me opted for the perfect blend of both... purple Clocked 30kms driving like an angry mosquito on the highway Spent fifteen minutes at said baby shower – where I downed up a cup of tea, inhaled a few cucumber sandwiches, guessed the number of jelly babies

Bacon and eggs with a side order of AK47

Some people start their day with a bowl of Special K and a cup of green tea, others might sweat it out on a treadmill before digging into a protein shake. Me? I start my day with eleven messages blinking red on my Blackberry from my boss (who is supposed to be on holiday  in Greece), a customs clearing agent and a dodgy Russian customer. Said messages barely leave me enough time to shovel some cereal and luke warm tea down my throat before running (well, teetering) in my tried and tested 'comfortable' heels to my car – furiously typing responses to messages and trying not to get really annoyed with spell check. I'm not one of those women who got the multi-tasking gene ... I get distracted. Hence the three almost accidents I managed to swerve out of the way of just in time (Thank you Lord!). Anyway, I did actually manage to get to work without adding another dent to my ever-faithful 'Puckles' (yip, I named my car). And managed to get into the gallery just on time to

For the love of shoes (among other things)

Living in the Northern suburbs, one feels a bit like a magpie at times. Lots of pretty sparkly things, lots of temptations and every distraction you can conjure up in your pretty little, twenty something head. You see, I earn a living selling luxury items ... artwork and diamonds. I work in the heart of Sandton – Joburg's flagship shopping district – and pass the brands Nine West, Louis Vuitton, Jenni Button, Marc Jacobs, Jimmy Choo, Christian Laboutin and (my own personal kryptonite) Marion & Lindie everyday on the short well-heeled march from my parking spot to my desk. It's a tough job, but somebody's got to do it. I have perfected the art of keeping my eyes focussed with laser precision on my blackberry every morning from the minute I step out of my (small but perfectly formed) Fiat Palio, until the 'ding dong' of the gallery's motion sensor alerts my colleagues to my arrival at work.  I have learnt that any deviation from my route inevitably leads to ha