Coats - It's a Northern Thing

I love buying clothes.  Even when my wardrobe was a bottomless pit of black, I still got that excited feeling when a parcel had arrived full of clothes.  I've never been one for trying things on in a shop, there is nothing worse than walking into a changing room with a pile full of clothes, and then walking out again with them all when nothing fits.

The one item of clothing I truly hate buying though is coats.  Like Kaye says from TestyBrunette, not wearing coats or jackets is a northern thing.  If we can get away with not wearing one, we will.   This works twofold for me as I can never find the right coat that ticks all the boxes.

My old faithful long black wool coat finally reached the end of it’s life a couple of months ago (read I finally admitted that it needed to be thrown out) and my hand was forced into the search for a new coat.

Here is my criteria: mid length, fitted but not overly, a colour that will go with most things, stylish, ok for work but will look ok for weekends, accommodate the chest area so the girls don’t look twice as big, warm, ok for wet weather. 

Yes, I’m picky but I’ve had so many coats that have failed for one reason or another, usually because they look bloody awful and are the “I give up, I’ll buy this” coat.  I was determined this time that I would find my dream coat, or just go cold for the weather.

Armed with my wish list I looked through all the clothing websites and made a list of the coats I liked.  Then discounted half as being impractical or just wouldn’t suit me (read fine on a size 8, not on me).  Eventually through, I struck gold.

Savoir Classic Stone Mac - Very

This coat ticked every box on my wish list and then some. It can be found here and comes in either the stone colour which I bought or in black.

I love the stone colour of the coat which goes with so much and enables me to mix it up with different coloured scarfs and accessories.  Rain just seems to roll off it and it looks good (so far) with everything I have worn with it.

So if you are an office girl like me who likes to keep it stylish at the weekend (I never knowingly under dress) then this may be the coat for you! 

A Watched Kettle

I'm impatient. When I know that something big is coming, be it good or bad; I want it to happen now.

They say that a watched kettle never boils, well in this case it's the opposite. The red LED of my Blackberry is constantly flashing at me, be it a tweet, text or email but, like the 3 buses lined in a row, the one that you want is never there.

The one that I want is an email from university. The one with my score in for my first essay. I feel like someone who hasn't ridden a bicycle in years, very unsure and uncertain at first, but after that first ride you know you'll be ok.

In this case though, the bike ride is scored. It's a indication, in my head at least, as to whether going to university was a good idea after all.

It's the chance card on the Monopoly board. Will I pass go and carry on with the game or will I be sent to the dunce's jail.

I've probably got at least another week to wait before I have my answer. My head says everything will be fine, but the little voice in there is also whispering "Are you sure?".

Everyone around me tells me it will be fine, I've nothing to worry about. I can be told that 100 hundreds times and it won't make an iota of different to how I feel. What I want is someone to tell me it IS fine.

I hold myself to my own standards, what I expect is good enough from me. What I want is a clear pass. Anything less and I'll be heartbroken, however, anything more, and I will be ecstatic.

I will look at this post one day and laugh about how worried I was. How I practically ran to my phone every time it flashed. But I care. I won't apologise for that.

So come on now, Mr Tutor Man, it isn't nice to keep a lady waiting.

Mob Mentality

On Remembrance Sunday a 19 year old boy was arrested by police.  For shoplifting maybe, a drunken brawl?  No.   No doubt in an effort to look “hard” in front of his friends, he had burned a plastic poppy and put a picture of it on Facebook, with a disparaging remark about “squaddies”.  He was arrested under the Malicious Communications Act.

Was he an idiot.  Yes.  Was it completely disrespectful.  Yes.  Should he have been arrested for it?  Absolutely not.  I think what worries me even more than his arrest, is the fact that someone in his friends list, because let’s not forget that it was posted on Facebook, not Twitter, reported him to the police.  That someone actually thought that what he had done should and must be illegal, scares me just as much as his arrest.

The arrest on Sunday fuelled many conversations I had on Monday, but the most memorable of which spanned throughout the course of the day.  The person whom I was speaking to thought that it was right that the boy be arrested and that in his opinion, he should be locked in a room full of squaddies to “teach him a lesson”.  

To be honest, this is the opinion I have come to expect from the mob mentality.  Threaten first, think later.  When it becomes dangerous is when it becomes punch first and think later or becomes a pack of vigilantes who don’t think at all.

By the end of the conversation (I do confess I was banging my head against a wall by the end) he suggested that an appropriate punishment would be community service for a charity.  Whilst I still do not agree that the boy should have been arrested at all, the conversation had got me thinking.

The mob mentality.  An individual is smart and will listen to reason, a mob will listen to no one.  The person I spoke to went from saying that the boy deserved to be beaten up by a group of “squaddies” to moving towards a community service order by the end of the day.  If the conversation had been myself and a group of people who all thought the same way he did at the start, their position would not have changed. 

The problem with these arrests is simple.  This is going to escalate.  Unless questions are asked and changes are made, this is going to escalate to a point where you have to be vigilant as to what you say, who you sa it to, what you do, how you act.  If this happens, what did they actually fight for in the First and Second World Wars?  Because freedom is about choice, not restriction.

The boy was arrested and released on bail, pending further investigations.  I understand that a QC has volunteered to represent him for free should the matter go to Court.