The Mid Week Rant: Mind Your Own Business

When Curtise forwarded me a link to this post I thought I'd slipped into a coma and woken up in the 1980s. 

In this day and age do we really need to be advised to wear "slenderising" dresses and to disguise our ageing necks with £100 skin cream if we want to succeed professionally? Will our businesses fail if we look a bit flabby? Will the customers go elsewhere if they detect a hint of a wrinkly neck? Man, it was bad enough 20 years ago when I got a warning for wearing a trouser suit and advised to make more of an effort with my make-up so I looked "more feminine".

Yes, you've seen it before, the nightmare that was the corporate whore.

Only someone who hasn't been forced to follow a corporate dress code would advocate wearing a pencil skirt to work. Fitted, tailored clothes might be all very well for posing for photos, catching taxis and acting out power dressing fantasies in the bedroom but for real working women they're not only impractical but, certainly in my case, draw unwelcome attention to your body, which in a professional capacity ain't much fun. Try keeping your cool when the managing director brushes your arse every time you top up his Sancerre or your male kitchen staff hold up pseudo ice skating score cards behind your back when you pop into the kitchen to check their work . In 1991 I got indecently assaulted on my way to work whilst wearing my hideous uniform. I know sex crimes are generally hate driven rather than through uncontrollable lust but I still blame that fecking skirt. With that hideous pencil-shaped nonsense restricting my knees, I couldn't even run away from my attacker. Take it from me, wearing clothes you hate can traumatise you for life.

Just wear what you think is right. You either work for yourself or were awarded your job on merit which means you're an intelligent human being who doesn't need the advice of a stranger to get dressed in the morning.

This was today's business attire,

.......naturally accessed by some bad ass rule-breaking, jingly jangly jewellery.

My working day included a 8am trip to the car boot sale, three loads of washing & pricing and ironing my stock for Moseley on Sunday. Practical (waterproof boots, non trailing in the grass hemlines, necessary for fields and walking to the washing line), modest (shorts prevent inadvertent knicker flashing when rummaging), noticeable (Jon can't lose me amongst the greige car booters, the sellers remember me and offer discounted rates).

More business. Now they're all washed, ironed, scrubbed and sorted here's Monday's flea market finds.

And, the pièce de résistance, my high priestess of hippy 1970s maxi coat.

Me-made psychedelic playsuit (seen HERE), 1960s fringed suede jerkin (Second to None, Walsall, 2010), beaten up leather cowboy boots (car boot sale on Sunday), 1970s tooled leather bag (Car boot sale this morning), Native American pendant (50p, car boot sale, 2010)

Now what on earth shall I wear to work on Sunday? I can guarantee it won't be understated or in the least bit current!

See you soon.