Digital ravings of an analog girl

Health and nourishment pumps

Today I’m wearing high-heeled snakeskin pumps. No snakes were harmed in the making of these shoes.

Actually, that’s a bald-faced lie. I suppose the snakes whose skins were used for my pumps might have been a little harmed. But as the shoes were made in China, I’m pretty sure the snakes didn’t die just to feed my footwear fetish.

Their venom and blood would have been drained to make winter restoratives for old folks, and the rest of their bodies were probably stir fried with some fresh asparagus and oyster sauce (tastes just like chicken!) to feed the shoemaker’s kids.

So in a way, my shoes have provided warmth, comfort and strength to some Grandpas and Grandmas (and according to Chinese old wives tales may even have enabled Grandpa to give Grandma a bit of a thrill), and nourishment to some hungry family.

Really, I feel kinda good about my shoes…

Never worn with a smile

Today I went back to the gym (see my gym shoes?)  I have not been to the gym for six weeks because of [insert excuse here].  Go ahead, insert one.  I guarantee I’ve already thought of it and used if on my gym instructor, my friends, myself.  The truth is, I hate exercise.  All exercise for the sake of exercise.  There.  I’ve said it!

You know that adrenalin high that you get after a strenuous workout?  Yeah well, I don’t.  I think it’s a myth like the G-spot or a cure for male pattern baldness.  There’s nothing I like about exercise.  I don’t like sweat.  I don’t like breathlessness.  I don’t like sore muscles.  The only high I get after exercise is from gratitude that it’s over.  Like if you hit me repeatedly on the head with a stick for 20 minutes, I’d feel quite good when you stopped.

So why do I belong to a gym? 

Well, I’m told that I have to exercise in order to remain healthy and live a long life.  I dislike my gym slightly less than playing sports or going for a run.  Plus my gym has the E Channel and Sky Movies on the cardio machines.  Big ups to you Exodus.  At least visiting allows me to keep up with the Kardashians.

Today, like all days when I return to the gym, I got a different gym instructor.  I assume it’s a different one as he had a different name, but frankly, they all seem the same to me.  They are all 20ish, ‘sporty’ and overly confident in their skills with people.  They are flustered when I insist that I will not get to like exercise eventually.  I’ve been working out, on and off for 25 years, with varying levels of success, and I still don’t like it.  Even when I was running marathons, I did not like it. I’m willing to accept that gym instructors may actually enjoy exercise.  Why can’t gym instructors accept that I may not?

The proposed solution (sort of)

So here’s what I propose.  I’m going to put together a business plan to open a gym for people who exercise because they have to, not because they like it.  People who wear their gym shoes and a frown to the gym. 

All the instructors will be middle-aged or older, and also exercise because they have to (Madonna-esque Amazonians need not apply).  No instructor will ever utter phrases like ‘Feel the burn!’ or ‘Doesn’t that feel great?’  If they do, you are allowed to hit them instead of the punching bag.

You will pay me $20 per week to belong to my gym.  When you attend, I will pocket $20 from you.  On weeks you don’t attend, I’ll still take $10 to cover overheads, but I will donate the remaining $10 to children with cancer.  That way, when you just can’t face the gym, you can feel good about it.  It’s a win-win.

So, what do you think?  Would you join my gym?  Would you stump up seed money? (call me, we’ll talk).   Would you be a gym-donor rather than a gym goer?

Silver sneakers just for show...

Today’s shoes are silver Minx sneakers (pictured).  I love these sneakers and I admit that I bought them because they are cool.  However, I still expected them to perform like… well…  sneakers.  They do not. 

The first time I wore these sneakers I wore a hole in the back of the left heel where my foot rubs when I push in the clutch of my car.  When I complained about this to my friend Anne, she casually pointed out that ‘designer shoes are not designed to be worn when driving’.  She removes her shoes whenever she is driving.  What?!!?  I did a quick survey of my (female) friends and discovered that many of them do this also.  Incidentally, they are the friends with expensive shoes.

So I’ve been thinking about other things that are much more trouble because they are more expensive.  I’m sure there’s an economics term for this type of product (Kondratieff Goods maybe?  Can’t remember – varsity was a long time ago)  For example, my cousin Trigs bought a fabulous rug for her hallway a few years back, and for the next year and a half insisted that all visitors to her flat walk around the edges of it.  It seems this expensive rug was very difficult to clean.

My family home when I was growing up had a ‘formal salon’ (it’s a Greek thing) which my mum wouldn’t let me go into except to dust.  Mum also had a ‘good’ dinner service that I believe she only used once. 

Mum died suddenly twenty years ago, and I have inherited a lot of the stuff she kept for ‘good’.  I am using that dinner service whenever I cook for friends and family, and what’s more I put it in the dishwasher after every use.  I admit it’s wearing out, but I feel good about using it.

Contrary to appearances, I am a function over form girl.  I like my stuff to be aesthetically pleasing, but I need it to be usable first and foremost.  So come on, what expensive things do you have that you’re reluctant to use because you might ruin them?  I challenge you to get whatever-it-is out and enjoy it.

P.S. A quick shoe blogsearch has revealed that Michelle Obama shares my love of fancy sneakers.  Check it out here.

My new Italian passion

I have just taken possession of an outrageous pair of boots from Ultra Shoes.  It took me six weeks to pay for these boots.  They were expensive.  I don’t mean obscenely expensive – as in equal to the GDP of a small third-world country, but the price I paid could have fed a child in said third-world country for a year. 

In addition, the boots are, well… not that practical for me.  They’re comfortable enough once I have them on, but in order to get them on, I need the assistance of two circus midgets, a tube of KY Jelly and a big bag of ice.  I do not have little people at home.

But… the boots are also tall, sleek and Italian (as are many things I can not resist) and they make me ridiculously happy.

If the shoe fits…

These boots are the 31^st pair of shoes in my wardrobe.  In honour of the boots, and because there are 31 days in May, I am declaring the month of May as Shoe Month.  Each day this month, I intend to update my facebook and twitter profile pics (@technebish) and twitpic with pictures of my shoes du jour.  It’s a social experiment.  I want to see if I get discovered by shoe lovers and foot fetishists alike.  Let’s just give it a whirl, and see where it goes. 

…Of shoes and ships – and sealing wax – and cabbages and kings…

Back in 1994 (B.G.), I was ‘discovered’ by an art collector.  I made my first six art sales to a man I never met – they were charcoal and pastel sketches of feet that I had made in my life drawing class and I had put them forward for a group exhibition in a small gallery in Hong Kong.  I never got to show at that exhibition.  The gallery owner made one discreet call, and all six pieces were sold and spirited up The Peak before the exhibition opened.  So Mr Foot Art Collector of Hong Kong, if you catch on to this, contact me.  I am willing to churn out more feet-related sketches, paintings, stone sculptures, vegetable art, photography, whatever – I’m not too proud.

And any and all comments on my shoes, your shoes, foot fetishism and the meaning of life are welcome.  Let’s hear it!

It’s late.  I can’t sleep.  I’m too tired to read.  There’s only mindless crap on TV.  I can’t face housework.  So I’ve been lying here contemplating my navel.  And I have composed an ode to it.  Here it is:

O’ mysterious navel,

Deep and bejewelled.

Have your folds

many lint-seekers fantasies fuelled?

Do the depths of your vortex

A secret conceal?

Is the ring made of gold?

Can the crystal jewel heal?

Has the ingoing spiral

had its praises sung?

Is there room in your cavity

For the tip of my tongue?

I reeeeaaaallllyyyy need to sleep…

Back when I was still dating, I was often set up on blind dates by well-meaning friends and marriage-meaning realtives.  In those days, I would have a couple of phone calls with the prospect before I met him for a date.  Yes, I dated B.G. (before Google) – that’s what we used to do then.

Anyway, it’s just as hard to get to know someone over the phone as it is over the internet, so my opening gambit was always to ask the guy to go to his fridge and tell me what was in it.  This told me everything I would need to know about him.  Here’s some of the code cracked in case you too want to use this method:

• Expired milk, old cheese and mouldy vegetables – His girlfriend left him some time ago and he needs a new one to clean out the fridge.
• Champagne, proscuitto, asparagus, eyemask, Roquefort and quince paste – Gay.
• Beer, Brie, crackers, vege sticks and Ketchup, pesto dip – Gay, but doesn’t know it.
• Champagne, caviar, arugula, pomegranates – liar, or The Aga Khan…
• Bread, milk, cheese, chops, carrots, lettuce, cabbage – lives with his mum, but will deny it.
• Chardonay, milk, bread, cheese, hummus, yogurt – lives with his wife, but will deny it.
• Beer/wine, chops, Ketchup, milk (in date), lettuce, tomatoes – Has potential…
• Beer, wine,  film, lipstick, milk, Ketchup, moisturiser, cheeses, yogurt, pesto – steer well clear… that’s me!

What’s in your fridge?

I have 3 shades of lipstick in my bag right now.  The are ‘Mauvy Night’, ‘Spiced Brandy’ and ‘Royal Red’.  Frankly, these names make me ashamed to be a marketer.  Why do I need a shade name that identifies that the lipstick is a version of red or pink?  Is there a huge surge in colour-blindness rates amongst lipstick wearers? 

I would like to change the names of the lipstick I wear to ‘Pretending I Don’t Wear Lipstick’, ‘Flirting My Ass Off’ and ‘Don’t Fuck With Me’.  Any company that has shades with those names, contact me immediately and I will buy some.

Here’s a question – blokes included.  Would you buy a shade of lipstick called ‘Gives Terrific Head’, ‘Deal Closer’ or perhaps ‘So Funny You’ll Wet Yourself’?  Ideas please… What would your shade be called?

I will post pictures of my shades as soon as I can figure out how.  Don’t wait around, it may take some time…

I’ve just spent the evening with the adorable Chris Brogan, uber-blogger and fellow night time epistolist.  Also a great real-world guy.  He has inspired me to have a go at blogging – especially to while away those frustrating mid night hours when sleep eludes me.  I’m working on the theory that sleep deprivation is my muse.  We’ll see…

So what’s on my mind at 2.11am on a Friday morning?  It’s curly eco lightbulbs. 

Did ecobulbs get sexier in the past few months?  No, really.  When they first came out, I dutifully bought a bunch, but only put them in the light fittings where the bulb was not visible.  I thought they looked cheap and ugly, as well as casting a rather sharp, fluorescent-style light that shows up my cellulite and crows feet. 

Tonight, I got home, and my hallway light had blown (bare bulb – eek).  I only had a curly ecobulb to put in.  Guess what?  It looks great!  I think the design of it is beautiful.  I love the way the tube curls around itself – almost like delicate light-tube lovers about to have a pash. 

Can’t imagine how I thought this marvel of aesthetic design was ugly.  It even has a very cool retro look to it.  I’m going to replace all the exposed bulbs in my house with ecobulbs.

For those of you who’ve known me for a while, no, I did not do drugs tonight.  I really do have ecobulbs on my mind.  Yes, that’s what my muse is telling me to blog about.  Noone said sleep deprivation would make the most fascinating of muses…

Oh arse!  I’ve just realised that now I’ve got to figure out how the heck to post this online.  Writing of blog, 5 minutes.  Posting of blog, 127 minutes…

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