Shopping is a language and you either speak it or you don’t. I speak fluent shop. It’s one of my many talents.

Recently, Working Boy took the kids to an indoor trampoline park. I had planned to take them myself but of course Baby N managed to change his nap schedule as a one-off special and he ended up having just fallen asleep when we needed to leave for our booking. Luckily Working Boy had taken the day off and happily obliged in taking the kids. Not so luckily, 1 hour after their departure, he rang me to say he had been called in to an emergency, and he had to leave. I woke up baby N and jumped in the car. I have never been to the trampoline park before. I didn’t know exactly where it was. I called a friend, who gave me the street directions, which I mostly got, but was slightly unsure, especially the part about turning across traffic into a small side street off a busy road, before you actually got there.

As soon as I got there (once I had done an illegal U-turn after missing anonymous side street) it was obvious. Skyzone is across the road from Space Furniture and Domayne, just behind Nick Scali and Cosh Furniture.

If my friend had said that, I would have known exactly where to go. Because that is my language. Note to Skyzone – I would put my description under “address” on your website rather than 75 O’Riordon St.

When we bought our car three years ago, they wanted to know what colour we wanted. It’s often hard to tell from their colour chart how it’s going to look as a car, rather than a small square on a piece of glossy paper. We were told we could go and visit a different dealership to see our car in our colour. If our salesman could have just said “You’re considering the charcoal? Think Chanel Black Pearl” we could have saved the shlep time.

That is the colour of my car

To speak shop, you have to think shop. And that I do. I have an imprint of Westfield Bondi Junction behind my retinas. And it must show, because random people constantly come up to me and ask me if I know where a certain shop is. It’s eerie. Luckily for them, I always do. I never lose my car in the car park.

And yet I have been known to lose all sorts of things in my house. Maybe if I set up little shop fronts throughout my home, I won’t lose things as often. Or aisles even. I know my Coles aisles by heart too. Who knows? Perhaps this is genetic and my kids will stop losing their things too.

“Mum have you seen my school bag??” “It’s in aisle 2, sweetheart. Across the road from “Mess is us” where all your stationary is, and a few odd sheets of homework, two random pieces of Lego and a key to unknown lock”.

I am not intrinsically a tidy person but I’m trying. I think this could be the key.

XOXO Shopping Girl

I have a strange shopping compulsion. I am often propelled to purchase things for the life I think I should be living rather than the life I actually am living. This explains the stilettos I cannot walk in, the significant amount of sequins in my wardrobe, and my fascination with studded fashion. The children call it my armour. “Are you going to wear your armour shoes today to go with your (Alexander Wang Rocco) armour bag?”, they have asked on occasion. The answer is no incidentally. I think the rose gold flat studs on the bag coupled with the silver spikes on the shoes is overkill. But, separately mind you, the studs and spikes make me feel rebellious. They make me feel a little less suburban housewife, even though there are no two ways about it – that is exactly what I am.

Sometimes all four children are calling me and I think to myself “What the hell is going on? Aren’t I 22 and just finished uni?”

I have spoken before of trying heavy black eyeliner to feel a bit less “mummy” after a bad night. This is not a great idea because when you are a “mummy” and you’re tired and distracted, you rub your eyes a lot, forgetting your rock-chick liner of the morning. In the same vein, I listen to triple j. (But not when the kids are in the car because swearing. I also don’t listen to most commercial stations because stupidity). Mostly it’s because I like 70% of their music and the announcers are not complete idiots. But it’s also partially for the black eye-liner effect.

It is with this framework in mind that I recently bought these earrings.

Which for believers in symmetry (or matchy-matchy) may look strange. One is a stud. The other looks like this on (ear):

I was feeling a little rebellious yesterday (a morning at home playing with a 13 month old and loading dishes into the dishwasher can have that effect on me) and so I decided it was time to crack open the earrings.

Baby N was napping. Everyone else was out. The pressing housework was done. So I went into the bathroom to put them on. I thought I might need the assistance of the mirror for the ear cuff placement.

I was wrong.

I needed much more than a mirror to get these bloody earrings on.

For a start I needed thinner ears.

I put the single spike in one hole. No problem. I put the second spike with the chain in the other ear. No problem. I raised the cuff towards the top of my ear and tried to slide it on. Nothing. I tried again. Nothing. I used one hand to rearrange my ear into a more presentable shape and tried again. No game. The space that the ear cuff presented was simply too small for my ear. In seconds I had developed a new complex – clearly I have fat cartilage. A new low for global women’s body image issues.

Now I am on a mission. No earring calls me fat and gets away with it. I am not giving up. Not only have I spent money on these earrings…..but my ears need the rock n roll lifestyle that the earrings promise . I gently try and prise the cuff open. It moves a millimetre or two. I try again, but the opening is missing my ear. I try and move it closer but the mirror is starting to confuse me and my hand moves even further behind my ear and gets tangled in my hair.

Baby N wakes up and starts whinging through the monitor. I may or may not swear.

I wrestle my (fat) ear cartilage into a flat position and put the cuff on. Success. My ear is now tomato red from all the manhandling. Baby N’s
whinging has increased in volume and frequency. There is a reason that I should not be wearing these earrings and it’s not that I am too old and conservative, though both of these is true. I do not have TIME for earrings that take 15 minutes to put on.

I admire my (glowing, edgy) ear in the mirror and let go of my hair. You now cannot see my ears. Clearly this has been worth all the effort. Still stubbornly triumphant, I leave the bathroom to tend to Baby N, with the growing sensation of a vice gripping the cartilage of my ear. Comfortable.

Later that night, we have people over. I have a close friend who moved to the US in December and she’s back, with her family, to visit. I open the door and we give each other a tremendous,
squeezy hug. As we pull back, she is rubbing her cheek and wincing. I have stabbed her in the face with one of my spikes. Sorry chicken.

My studded J Crew jumper is too heavy to wear. My newish Ginger and Smart skirt cannot be worn around Baby N as he pulled off significant chunks of the raffia the first time I wore it. This is problematic as 99.99% of the time, I am with Baby N.

As I said, I have an issue with actually dressing for my life.

These earrings are not family friendly. They are not friend-friendly.

But I still love them.

XOXO Shopping Girl

6am this morning.

T: How much money do you and daddy have altogether?
Me: Probably about a $100.
T, thinking about this: Well how much money will daddy get for working today?
Me, lying: I don’t know.
And then carrying on truthfully: But whatever he does get we’ll use to buy food, and pay for the house and all that stuff.
T: Yes, yes I know. But mummy, do you know what we could buy if we didn’t have to use it for all that?
Me: What?
T: An electric guitar!

Not what I was thinking, but true.

XOXO Shopping Girl