Day 71 to 78...where has all the time gone.

I am  a bad blogger and have failed to post ALL week! I have a good excuse, I have had what can only be described as a whirlwind few days. As the seasons appear to have changed over the last 72 hours, I have been preparing to entirely change my life in the next 72.

Today is the last day of three wonderful years in my current job and I have been industriously packing significant amounts of belongings, drinking significant amounts of alcohol and saying goodbye to huge numbers of significant people in my life. Sob. As a result I have failed to update of my antics and regale you all with tales of wardrobe exploits, however I have still been taking my photos and here they all are.

Day 71: A Thursday and a chilled day in the office, I ditched my jacket for the photo as it seemed to be making me look like quasimodo! EEK

Friday and Day 72: my leaving party ended with me looking considerably worse than I do in this. Although I love my M&S shift, I must remember NOT to put my arms above my head. Oopsy

Day 74: Sunday. Following a day and half of packing on a hangover I went out with Bekah to meet friends for lunch. (Day 73; no photo due to extreme hangover and inability to speak)



Day 75: Monday, the beginning of my last week at work and a nice little dress for the occasion. Thankyou Primani



Day 76: Tuesday, I think this was officially the last temperate day of the season. RIP sunshine, hello woolen outfits.

Day 78: Friday and my last ever day in the office, my last ever photo from Dawks (photographer extraordinaire) and a really wooly jumper! Hoorah.

So that's my last week and a fun week it certainly has been. However, as always I have been having a think about Hanger Strike as I have trundled through life. I think, despite the wall I came up against last week that I have begun to get into my stride. I have thought very little about my wardrobe famine as my mind has been taken over with mundane tasks such as cancelling the water bill and packing the kitchen utensils. It sort of makes me think that maybe part of my shopping obsession is a boredom thing.... I was definitely less preoccupied with my attire in the days when I had a pony to look after .I always put that down to a youthful lack of 'a clue' but perhaps this is an overinterpretation of the facts. Perhaps people who have more to do are less obsessive ad thus purchase a more easily mixable wardrobe, resulting in less time thinking about what to wear and therefore less time worrying that they have nothing to wear. In my mind I now try to think of stylish busy people who do this, however I can only think of Simon Cowell so am quickly deciding that this must in fact be a pile of complete tosh. I am now categorising boredom as one, not the only factor affecting my propensity to purchase.

Stay tuned for more, better thought through musings when I have a single second to sit down and ponder.

PS, my Day 77 photo has been taken but requires me to work out how to get it from i-phone to computer and thus to blog....it won't be long.

Days 68 to 70.....this is called 'the wall'

In my sporting life I am well versed in the concept of 'the wall', that moment during sport when your body says 'no ta, I think I will stop' and your brain madly tries to talk your body out of doing such a silly thing. I have experienced the wall from two main perspectives. Firstly and most obviously as something I am trying to get through in some well intentioned but remarkably unspectacular sporting endeavour and secondly as something I have watched and talked others through in my old role as a rowing cox.

Although there is something electrically satisfying in finding the other side of the wall as an individual, whether it be within a team sport or alone with only the treadmill to blame it on, I personally found more pleasure from the rowing type of wall. I enjoyed knowing the rowers I trained with, knowing where their limits lay and what motivated each one of them. I loved that understanding those things enabled me to talk to them as they pushed themselves to the physical limit and ultimately I loved knowing that the knowledge that I had and how I used it could be the difference between them breaking through the wall and not, the difference between winning and losing.

Now I find myself facing an altogether different type of wall. The wall I know is one laced with physical pain, broken down only with a grim tradeoff of sweat and tears as mind battles body on it's way to the fabled second wind. Today's wall is a wall of high street shops, glossy magazines and transactional websites, all beckoning me to fail. Like an intrepid member of the public preparing to run the gauntlet in the street style version of Gladiators, I find myself looking on the 10 months ahead as an almost insurmountable barrage of obstacles and temptations. Gratings to damage my shoes, dark socks to ruin my white t-shirts, Oxford Street two tube stops from my new office, GAP launching a transactional website and Jack Will catalogues raining on my head.

I suddenly find my mind telling me  that it is not possible to succeed, it strikes me as incredibly similar to the feeling one gets halfway through a hideous run in the rain. Your brain starts to tell you little lies, that death is just moments away unless you stop immediately and you find yourself in a battle to prevent your subsconscious forcing you to become immediately motionless. Metaphorically I am in that place, I could at any point lose control of myself and find that I have bought something with no conscious authorisation of a transaction. I have dreamt about buying just one little thing, a little pretty piece of jewellery or a teensy little cardi, in my dream it would hardly make any difference, no one would even notice.

It is such terribly covert workings of my mind which have begun to worry me a little as I consider the months ahead. Is it possible for me to make it, is it worth it. If I didn't make it would anyone care? I admit, I found myself having some form of schizophrenic argument with myself the other morning; the pragmatic side of my mind told the drama side that it was being ridiculous and the end of the world wouldn't be speeded by the lack of shoe boots in my wadrrobe (yes I was confused too). What it all seems to boil down to is whether the perceived gain of making it through Hanger Strike is worth the mental pain it will take me to achieve it.

Late on for a Monday at work and a Crunchie to help me through the evening. I suspect I would have benefited from having my snap taken earlier in the day.

I suppose only time will tell. In the mean time I had better manage this week as I have been featured in Manchester's Large Magazine and it would be embarrassing to fail when I have been put in the spotlight! Onwards and upwards my friends.

Day 69: my first outfit duplication, again I had a bit of a long day and this was taken after driving to and from London. Not my freshest.

Today is day 70 which feels in some way momentous. I celebrated by showcasing the whitest legs in Christendom before freaking out and buying St Tropez....more of that tomorrow.

Days 66 and 67 my pre Autumn musings

Firstly I must start by lamenting that unfortunately, yet again my weekend post is not accompanied by pictures. Unlike the previous weekend this is not due to a lack of organisation but, sadly, a complete lack of friends. I have been unaccompanied since I left Laura's in my scruffs on Saturday morning, my housemate has entirely vanished and I have only surfaced to visit the hairdressers. I am in fact relatively displeased at this state of afairs as I was quite proud of yesterdays get up, I had managed to team my little polka dot dress with some nice bits and bobs and was quite looking forward to seeing my outfit in freeze frame. Tut.

Even without leaving the house for more than 2 hours I have in achieved not insignificant amounts with my weekend. I have dedicated considerable proportions of the sabbath to the packing up of my life in preparation for the big move and have found myself marvelling once again at the sheer quantity of things that I own. I am sure all of this stuff cannot be necessary, yet I find myself almost incapable of throwing anything out. I have launched three bin bags but still I make not a dent on the piles of things to be moved to London. It is at this sort of life juncture that one would normally execute a somewhat ruthless wardrobe edit, however this seems incomprehensible given that I have 298 days of Hanger Strike still to go (of course I am counting). I have succeeded so far in adding a single pair of cord trousers to the car boot pile and consigning some horrideous capri pants to the bin. Hardly ruthless, and definitely unlikely to lighten the moving load.

Following a mentally exhausting morning I settled with a cup of Earl Grey in my beloved Emma Bridgewater and devoured Grazia from cover to cover. Once and for all it was time to get a grip on the Autumn style as I listened to the dulcet tones of Jo Wylie chatting to Gemma her fashion expert on Radion One's Top of the Shops.

It seems that the fashion world is gearing up for a real lift in tempo, much more so than anything we have seen for a few years. The winds of change are whistling and I for one plan to do all that I can to keep up. And so it is that I find myself writing a list of the key trends and musing over whether my wardrobe has what it takes to keep up;

1. The camel coat is the key trend, everyone is clamouring over soft, caramel tones accompanied by ruby lips and brown eyes for maximum effect. I think I will be able to work my trench to keep up (ish).



Kenzo Paris Fahion Week A/W 10

2. The midi skirt. Kenzo sent truly gorgeous stuff down their catwalk and left me dreaming of looking like these gazelle legged beauties with a cable knit talk and a narrow belt. Midi check, brown boots check, jumpers (erm probably) check, gazelle like legs......no comment
3. The trouser...we have been through this, we know it is a problem.
4. The aviator jacket complete with sheepskin clamours for guys and girls alike to channel TopGun and rock it like they have a call sign of their very own. Ok so I am a bit sad about this. I LOVE TopGun and believe I would enjoy executing many variations of the look, but think my trusty leather biker can get me through just about ok.
5. The classic understated bag. Well my bag collection is somewhat lacklustre but I believe that I have a couple of winners in there, not least my mega vintage messenger, it never ages....erm . Ok so fashion wise it is timeless, in terms of age, it is feeling it's years recently and will potentially benefit from a little TLC courtesy of a leather working expert.....
6. The leather skirt/ short. I plan to entirely ignore this ridiculous and visually unpleasant trend. It is perverse and I do not wish to be involved. Phew for Hanger Strike.
7. Court shoes. Thank the lord that the court shoe has yet to fall from grace, despite tantalising rivals in the form of the gorgeous shoe boot, the miltary lace up (sigh), the OTK, thats over the knee to the fashion challenged amonst us, the peep toe boot, and the sheepskin (just add sheepskin turn over to all aforementioned items...double sigh). So, I would't mind indulging in any of the above and rue the fact I did not invest in any OTK's last year but I think I will be ok, I have some shoe boots to reheel and a pair of little ankle boots to have resoled and then I will restyle like the proverbial biatch to achieve a semblance of current style. 
8. The shirt, this is a problem. The white shirt and the pussy bow blouse are fighting it out for pride of place on the fashion forward wish list and, shockingly, I own neither. I remain a little perplexed as to how I will fare in this chic tailored winter season with only two somewhat undramatic shirts. Watch this space for a cotton count based melt down.

So, to sum up, this coming season will be a mix of miltary toughness and ladylike silhouettes, all wrapped up in a sumptuous camel coat and topped with some classic 40's filmstar makeup. Ahhh red lips here we come. I think I am excited, I think I might be able to manage it. I think I am lying through my teeth.

Gulp

Days 63 to 65, a blog that brings people together

This week I have been chatting to lots of my boy mates about my blog. The upshot appears to be that the majority of men don't quite grasp what all of the fuss is about. In fact many feel they have been inadvertently partaking in a Hanger Strike of their own for years. Deiniol is convinced he hasn't bought a single item since him and I went shopping in Liverpool One about 18 months ago and James confidently confessed that he doesn't really understand having bought no new clothes for quite some time. Chris (known to many as Filthy) sent me a little facebook message to tell me he has found, read and reportedly enjoyed my blog but that he is one of many men who has been studiously avoiding the high street for eons. In fact he confesses to owning more clothes bought by his girlfriend and mother than clothes bought for himself.

Despite widespread scoffing from the male of the species, I have also been heartened to see that some men view my challenge with levels of alarm, not disimilar to that seen by the women in my life. One or two have straight out confessed that they couldn't do what I am attempting and others have expressed doubt that it is in any way a sensible or achieveable goal.

All of this got me thinking about the gulf that exists between the genders where clothes are concerned. Whilst of course many men are incredibly concerned with their appearence and spend as many hours as girls constructing the perfect look, there are more who find the entire rigmoral unfathomably confusing. They seem utterly nonplussed by the proportion of a women's life dedicated to the fabric within her closet. They are, it seem unable to comprehend the importance of the days outfit and the hallowed turf of the street style pages. In fact many claim not to care about clothes in the slightest and do not wish to devote a mere moment, a teensy ounce of stress to the construction of a classic look. I wonder why it is we are so different, why there is such a chasm between the sexes, and quite frighteningly, what would happen if men were in charge of what women wore.......I suspect the results would be quite the talking point for all concerned.
Regardless of their inability to comprehend my challenge on a personal level, the guys do seem to understand that this is not an easy task for a girl like me and the odd one has confessed a level of concern that I won't have any new shoes for some time. I too feel worried about the lack of shoe shopping available to me but suspect the concerns of these individuals had little to do with my personal happiness and inner peace. Enough said.

Day 63: a black dress for a client meeting and a pair of legs whiter than the snows of Hoth....Pale may be the new tan for Nicola Roberts but I feel the need to reach for the fake bake. PS no idea why this is so out of focus.

 Hearteningly, many of the guys do still seem to be following my ramblings as weeks turn to months. In fact, my blog has inadvertently rekindled the fires of a dormant friendship. As Deiniol and Filthy both found themselves engrossed in the literary epic that is Hanger Strike (ahem) they realised that they work around the corner from each other and now they are going to have a beer and discuss the varied merits of teaching English in Birmingham. I therefore declare it official that style brings people together, seemingly it's power knows no bounds.

Day 64: Black skinnes, boots and a classic piece of Hollister to welcome the first week of September 2010 into my life.

Some old but faithful Primani jeans and a vest helped me get through a long Friday in the office. I fear this may have been the beginning of the end for the Primani's though as a relatively small hole grew alarmingly in size.

Day 58 to 62....peaks troughs and plateau's

The last few days have been somewhat of a blur, Hanger Strike I fear has fallen to the bottom of my to do list as I find myself scrambling to organise my life. I have a new job and am busy packing up my entire life in order to move to the Big Smoke where I am reliably informed that the streets are paved with gold. Rather than worrying about having banished myself from the highstreet, I increasingly find myself concerned that I have no where to live. As one can surely imagine, this has meant that the mental capacity I have given over to Hanger Strike has been somewhat diminished over the last week.

Nevertheless the blog must go on and unfortunately this post starts with a little confession of natural blondeness (yes I am a natural blonde). I tootled off to London at the weekend in order to search for a new residence over the weekend and forgot to have any photos taken, such was my concern at impending homeslessness. I promise however that;
1. I wore clothes
2. I didnt purchase or come by any additional items over the course of the bank holiday period.

Day 58 was a bit of a scruffy Friday as I grappled with a distinct lack of interest in the concept of being awake. Some very comfy Jack Wills helped me alon, however I fear I looked a little scruffy

A loing day at the office immersed in handovers was followed by a night out and about with my lovely friend Becca, before setting off to London bright and early on Saturday.

A little brown H&M classic for a night out

Saturday, Sunday and Monday passed in a blur, not a moment's thought was given to the clothes that I cannot buy, however I couldn't help but note the easy style of South London as I perused the flat lettings market. I have to admit a not insignificant level of trepidation at the concept of completing the final 10 months of Hanger Strike in our capital city. Something about the whole situation feels rather ill thought through, as if a girl ever thinks about moving to a new city and a new job without arming herself with a single new item of attire. My office is two stops from Oxford Street and I can only imagine the final months of the challenge will stretch unendingly into the future, how extraordinarily unpleasant.

Again I find myself intrigued by the security of clothes. How they allow us to present ourselves to society in different ways and the feeling of safety that this gives us. I feel hugely uncomfortable about the idea of moving to a city where the styles are subtley different and being unable to amend my image in order to fit into that with a little more ease. I don't for a second wish to change who I am or my personal style but to not be able to buy a pair of shoeboots for Autumn in one of the most stylish cities in the world makes me feel quite frankly nauseous. I feel sure that the styles of London will feature regularly in the pages of Hanger Strike for quite some time as I adjust to the new challenges that lie ahead.

Tuesday Day 62 was a day for black and jewellery as I psyched myself up for the week ahead.