Saturday 18 April 2009

Heels! Heels!


I was recently bought a pair of purple wedges with a platform and a straw-like heel. I'm told that having just the one colour on a shoe is not up-to-date, as a venture in my favourite shoe shops tell me.
So no, unfortunately they aren't these lovely structural Dior catwalk beauties but I could never walk in these anyway - phantom wedge or not. But does anyone else have a problem that heels are too difficult to walk in? Some fit snugly when you try them on and so you think that you'll be walking gracefully down the street in a pair of beauties.
But then you realise that the cobbled street outside probably isn't going to help your balance and you don't want to be falling over constantly like some klutz so you mournfully put the shoes back. I possess only two pairs of true heels and one of them might not count. Firstly, a tenner's worth of black patent Primark (yeah, yeah) courts with four inches of heel and the second are a reduced-price pair of Office black suede ankle boots with a funky round-the-foot zip and a three-inch heel, no platform on either.
The ankle boots have been recently worn but that was the first time since going to see Neon Neon in November where I danced so much that my feet swelled up and looked rather abnormal. I can't even remember the last time I wore the courts.
I think my point is that wedges are the way to go - I can walk in mine comfortably (but without pop-socks, they make my ankles too slippery!) and without the fuss of heels. Heels are now renamed hells. And I don't care what people say about wedges making your legs and ankles look fat - at least I won't be injuring myself 24/7.

Sunday 5 April 2009

Japan: Still Hidden


Oh God, how disappointed am I? I've been pretty seriously ill over the last few weeks and the one of the only things that has kept me mildly sane is the "Hidden Japan" season on Beeb 4. Now, when they said "season" did they mean a good few weeks jam-packed with programming? Like bells they did!
What we actually got was three hour-long documentaries and a couple of films shown late at night. That was it. Seriously. "In Search of Wabi-Sabi" featured the brother of Louis Theroux making slightly embarrassed faces in maid cafes and struggling to keep up with the intensive rituals of monks. Next was "Fish! A Japanese Obsession" which was a little more interesting (oddly, as I have no real interest in fish besides eating a bit of salmon now and again). This examined everything from the eating of fish to the breeding of Koi Carp and fishing for points (hey, now I know where they got the idea for Zelda fishing from!). Finally there was the illuminating "Japan: A Story of Love and Hate" which followed the life of 50-something Naoki and his 20-something girlfriend Yoshie as they battled against poverty - as he puts it "this isn't special poor, this is normal poor in Japan." I guess you just had to see it to believe it - I knew that Japanese houses and apartments were small but this one really took the mickey.
These 3 shows coupled with a Japanese word of the day that seemed to poke a little fun at the Japanese terms for phrases we had here was all I got. I've had a lifetime fascination with Japan and this is all the Beeb are giving me? I thought that they might explore manga and anime, look deeper into the weird idiosyncratic shops and rituals that they have, even explore the language of Japanese.... anything more than we got!!
Ah well, I guess I'll just have to wait until the next time they show anything mildly interesting about the country.