Heightening My Hypervigilance

Here I Am.
It's Monday Nite, 8.48pm. I'm sitting in my Toy Ugg Boots. Actually, that's not quite true. How could I possibly be sitting in ugg boots, although I wish I could. I'm sure it would feel all Cozy & Womb Like. I'm soo dreading The End of Winter when I'll have to pack them away for yet another year. And as I keep on saying, they're not even  Real Sheepskin, but Toy Sheepskin, bought by my daughter at 'Aldi' for eight bucks.
Who knew that Toy Sheepskin could feel so good? I can't even imagine what The Real Deal would feel like.
Sheepskin Heaven perhaps?
Look at the look on my face taken today. What does it say, I wonder? I can't Decode.
The Sad Clown? After the Earthquake? The Cat that Swallowed the Canary?  On a Clear Day You Can See Forever? 
I'm not sure.
But it's not hard to tell that I'm faking a smile. An informative Guide to Detecting Faux Smiles that I once read said that one way to tell is if the eyes & the smile don't match up.
Mine clearly don't.
And the reason can be found at my feet.

 Yes, I've just finished with the School's Annual Op Shop Parade & Stall. 
I'm sure I explained all of this in my last post. If you can't remember what I wrote or didn't bother reading it, I'll give you a quick Executive Summary:
 Clothes Donations from Girls/Mothers. Some with labels still on. Some a bit off (e.g. Puky Green tee shirt with 'Bouncing Ball Basketball Camp' emblazoned on it in even Pukier Yellow). Stylists. Models. Huge Hair & Slightly Slutty Makeup.  Tears. Accusations. Clothing Stall at lunch time. Absolute mayhem.
Look at what my classroom looked like last thursday when we should have been studying 'Wuthering Heights'.

 Here I am above in Aftershock After the Parade. I'm loaded up with Faux Pearls from the Fruits de Mer section of my Jewellry Vault. I needed it for protection against Angry Student Stylists.

And here I am calmly explaining to a child that the reason why she can't wear 20cm. heels & a midriff top & butt skimming shorts & black glitter lipstick down the runway is because we're not playing 'Schoolgirl or Streetwalker?', which is a variant of the popular 'Starlet or Streetwalker?' segment in my almost favourite show, 'Fashion Police'.

 Earlier last week I was in a slightly more sedate mood when Trixie & I visited 'Abbotsleigh', a v. posh girl's school deep in the heart of the Leafy North Shore of Sydney. I was there with an entire auditorium's worth of other Middleagedteachers  to listen to Carol Dweck, a psychologist from Stanford University who wrote a book called 'Mindset'. Although I'm normally v. interested in what Carol has to say about how we can train our students to be more interested in developing a Growth Mindset, my own mindset couldn't help but fixate on what all the other Middleagedteachers were wearing:
1. A Propensity for Layering.
2 Slight Heels, although nothing Trampy which I think is a shame because  Trampiness can often Add Interest to an Otherwise Dull Outfit.
3. A desire on the part of some women to  Firmly Reclaim their Waist Even Though They Don't Have One Anymore. I admire their Determination.

I was encased in a  Sea of  Brown.

1. Real Calvin Klein dress.

2. A Slightly Creased Scanlan & Theodore Car Coat (one of my Mother's favourite terms) which sadly I don't have the Ability or the Facility to Iron.

3. A v.v. good Louis Vuitton fake bag.

4. A scarf featuring a combination of Fake Hermes Motifs & Wild Animal Print.

5. Toy Gold Jewellry which gave a slight Sharon Stone in 'Casino' feel to the outfit.

 Here's some photos I secretly took of the windows at Chanel at Bondi Westfield. I arrived at the Mall mistakenly way before the shops opened last Saturday & raced to Chanel to photograph it. Sadly, even though no one was around, a big Burly Black-Suited with a Matching Headset Security Person who looked like something out of 'Men in Black' was already in position waiting to tell me that I can't take photographs. Perhaps he has to stay there all nite & guard all the Magnificent Quilted Bags.
I would soo love that black one in the picture above & would not say no to the one below even though it may be made of alligator or perhaps a Venomous Snake.

 And here's me also last week Before the Rot Set In wearing items from the A-List Section of my Wardrobe:
1. a felt Real Valentino cropped Jacket with sleeves with Pirate Overtones. Somehow I've convinced myself that my arms don't look too much like Legs'O Mutton in them.
2. a vintage 'Lanvin' silk dress. It's always stressful wearing it because the button at the front keeps on popping. This heightens my Hypervigilance.

 Oh, here we are Back to the Op Shop. If you look closely, you can see that one of my students is hiding under all those clothes. I am not really standing on her. If I did, it would be a Duty of Care Issue. And we can't have that.
I'm wearing a Real Diane Von Furstenberg wrap dress which always feels a Little Too Age Appropriate for my tastes.

 Talking of taste, here's me at last sunday nite's Dinner trying to hack my way through a Pear & Chocolate Tart that I made. As they say in America, I made the shortcrust pastry from 'scratch' & dutifully followed the recipe that I got from Taste.com, my Recipe Bible, & baked it 'Blind' for a few minutes. (To the uninitiated this means baking the pastry without the filling). Even though I was using a v.v. sharp knife, I could barely cut through it which I totally blame on the Blind Baking not on the fact that I may have Overkneaded the Dough. As if.
In case you were wondering, I'm holding up the carefully folded baking paper that I used on the side of the baking tin in a failed big to emulate my current Cooking Crush, Donna Hay.
I can't believe that I'm wearing an oversized Abercrombie & Fitch tee shirt left by The Previous Regime. 

Lastly, what can I say about Kim's Wedding? Nothing much really. I'll just leave that to Joan Rivers who said that she'd seen 'More tasteful headgear on a Pony'.