...I don't like those drugs that keep you thin...

So it’s the 25th London Fashion Week.
All that buzz…
What will be the latest lines on the catwalk?
What can we expect to hit the High Street next year?
What will influence the way we dress over the forthcoming 12 months?
Who will launch the most outrageous pile of crap this side of a pair of steel wool knickers?
Who gives a f4ck?

All the fashionistas will be there, drooling over the latest Costelloe creations or the next slice of Westwood weirdness.
But what does it mean to a scruffy, denim wearing, t-shirty type like me or to my good lady, who has to wear sensible clothes to work.
Lets see…

What about the latest McCartney offerings or the New York offerings of de la Renta?
Do these come in any sizes bigger than a 6. No thought not.
Looking at some of the models, we are in scary territory here. This is not feminine.
How the hell is someone with less meat than a length of barbed wire fence, supposed to make a figure hugging dress look stylish? The whole androgyny of it makes it look like some weird teenage cross dressy type gig.
What we have here is something that is leaner and weighs less than one of my legs! Where this very notion that, to be a catwalk model, one needed to be size zero came from, is beyond me. There’s nothing attractive about it and it must be an absolute bastard getting clothes to fit a toast rack on legs.
I'm not advocating the Fat Slags look here but the female figure generally has the bust sticking out just a teensy bit further than the hip bones (normally).

Yup, these creations are all very well for Keira Knightley and the knotted string brigade but if you’re arse is anything like normal you’d be better off hiding it in one Paul Costelloe’s offerings.

Some of the latest Costelloe creations look like they’ve fallen off of Kokeshi dolls or Samurai warriors. The only thing missing was the top knot or the Kendo Nagasaki wrestling mask to complete the image. Others were so outlandishly shouldered that it would be hard to imagine what shape of being was inside – in the realm of big suits, forget David Byrne or Grace Jones, we are talking Sue Ellen Ewing meets NFL chic. As for the thing with the funny little baseball cap peaks for sleeves, why did he not go the whole hog and have Sydney Op House on one side and the SECC on the other. Some of it is just plain silly. Can you imagine it?
“I say Darling, will you pop down to Harrods and pick me up some smoked elk”
“Of course sweetie, I’ll just have to iron my Costelloe before I go out”

You’d be dead from starvation and the Elk would be extinct.
HOW THE F4CK do you iron something like that.

Me, I’m not naturally talented in the ironing department but I’ll do it if I have to.
Shirts, jeans, T-shirts – fine, but see some of that women’s stuff?
If I was a woman, and I knew that I was going to have to do the ironing, I’m f4cked if I’d be buying something that shape.

I guess though if you can afford a genuine Costelloe you can afford a maid.
Nonetheless, I can’t see there being many couturier designed dresses in Aberdeen next year.

It does make me think though, that buying clothes can be a bit of pain in the arse.
All of my family are fairly average size. Consequently, all the sizes that fit us, generally sell out first.
I went to buy a shirt the other week for a dinner I was going to.
Nothing fancy. Just something new. Just the usual Rocha John Rocha, stripy job, just like all my other shirts (so I'm told).
I prowled around my chosen High Street store and decided on the style I liked best.
I flicked through the crammed rail looking for some clue as to the size. They all either looked tiny or massive. Eventually, I sussed out the deal with the labels – they were hanging down the inside of the sleeve.
Now, will someone please tell me why in the name of suffering f4ck do they do that? Is it some kind of man hating, bitch game or what?
Eventually, I pull up all the tags looking for something that says large or 40”.
Squat! Sweet diddly f4ck all!
After replacing all the fallen shirts on the rack I managed to get hold of an assistant.
“Do you have this in a large” I asked
“No”
“What about this one”
“No”
“This one”
“No”
“Thi…”
“No”
“Do you have anything in large (apart from your vocabulary)”
“Er, No”
“What about a medium”
“No”
“Anything at all that will fit me”

And so it went...
I mean, it’s not as if I’m build like Arnie Schwartzifuckinegger or have three arms or something, I’m just plain old average.

Surely the major High Street Stores can employ a pimply student to study the demographic so that they can get a better understanding of the percentage of different sizes. At least that way they wouldn’t be stuck with twenty XXXL sumo-sized shirts and half a dozen things that look like they’ve met with the boil wash.
And more importantly maybe, just maybe they might get their arses round to ordering enough garments in MEDIUM AND F4CKING LARGE.


And some music??

Why not?

Leonard Cohen – Live in Toronto
http://www.sendspace.com/file/h7fufs

Saw Doctors - Live in Galway
http://www.sendspace.com/file/z9pv7k

Malcolm Ross – Wrong Time Wrong Place
http://www.sendspace.com/file/m6tacu

Lisa Knapp – Wild and Undaunted
http://www.sendspace.com/file/0xqev2

Jonathan Butler – Jonathan Butler
http://www.sendspace.com/file/6qo54m

Jeff Buckley - Shine
http://www.sendspace.com/file/qk8lys

Mull Historical Society – This Is Hope
http://www.sendspace.com/file/r5vmq7

Bob Dylan – Blood On The Tracks Test Pressing
http://www.sendspace.com/file/ny39ab

Lisa Hannigan – Live in Leeds
http://www.sendspace.com/file/xlkeit

Glen Hansard & Marketa Irglova
http://www.sendspace.com/file/96rw4c

Bap Kennedy - The Big Picture
http://www.sendspace.com/file/h4vgfg

The Silencers – Edinburgh Castle
http://www.sendspace.com/file/0terk9

Fairground Attraction – Live in Japan
http://www.sendspace.com/file/sdkrfp

Warren Zevon – Wanted Dead Or Alive
http://www.sendspace.com/file/iboyta

Alan Rankine – She Loves Me Not
http://www.sendspace.com/file/u5349a

Iggy Pop – TV Eye
http://www.sendspace.com/file/xhereo



Cheers til next time...

Hooli