Do you live here?

I was working in the boutique today and we had some gorgeous new stock. There's a lovely brown Lisbeth Dahl hat (as modelled by yours truly)! There's also a candle holder by Rice that I utterly adore. It's light blue and super kitsch - it's got colourful birds and flowers all over it. I'd absolutely love to buy it, but I just can't justify spending £40 on a candle holder right now! Especially as I don't even have a house to put it in as I've moved back in with my mum for a bit! Where on earth would I put it!? In my room on top of all of the boxes of crap I'm storing there where it will be an utter fire hazard! I'd really be welcome at my mum's if I burnt the house down all because of a kitsch candle holder! Maybe one day that candle holder will be mine! And maybe one day I'll have my own house to set fire to!! A man came into the shop today - completely lovely but absolutely insane! He joked about needing a West Wing to put the candle holder - then he went on to joke how every family needs a castle to prevent family disputes. He came up with the fabulous theory that putting the children in the West Wing with the candle holder for a few years would solve all problems. I wouldn't mind being shoved in the West Wing for a few years if I had the candle holder, so it sounds like a good theory! I think it could work!

So I restarted my other job at the clothes shop last week. I decided I'd go back in style and ran through the shop on my way in singing "I'm back, I'm back" to the tune of Michael Jackson's "Bad" - complete with the exact same dance routine I did to the song when I had dance lessons at the age of 14! How embarassing! But I think they appreciated it! My lovely colleagues then joined in with me, but instead of "I'm back" to the tune of "Bad", they were singing "Splashback, Splashback" at me as I had mud all up the back of my jeans - I'd walked into work in terrential rain wearing flip-flops - oops! Disaster! We then all danced around just repeating and singing the words; "Splashback, Splashback!" Ah, what fun! It's good to be back! For some reason, I just don't feel comfortable unless I'm having the piss taken out of me and acting a bit silly!

So, now I'm a single lady (now quite how Beyonce describes it) but single all the same, the jokes are rolling in about me hooking up with the rather lovely male mannequin. (I did go through a phase last winter where I'd be found in the changing room hugging the mannequin) - he was a great hugger - ok! So if my boss gets married, who am I going to take to the wedding? -The mannequin they all say! Apparantly he's perfect for me - he doesn't need feeding, he won't interupt when I talk at him, he doesn't make me clean and tidy up after him and I don't have to wash his clothes - amazing! It's a mannequin life for me!

So there have been lots of weird people in the shop lately - one old woman who wouldn't stop speaking to me, so I couldn't get away and she smelt SO badly of wee wee! Like, proper stereotypical old lady smelling of general body fluid - lush! And one woman who loaded so much onto her buggy with her child in it (the sale was on!) that the buggy buckled under the weight and tipped sideways with the child in it! Oh God! The shop was full of people and there was just silence as the mother scrabbled to rescue her crushed child from under a mound of buggy and clothes - poor child! I couldn't help laughing - I immediately turned to my assistant manager and both of us had to try and repress a fit of the giggles, which meant we both went bright red with tears streaming down our faces (we looked very compassionate!)

So, at my clothes shop job, we get mystery shopped once a month. We have to say hi to people within 3 seconds of them coming in the door and we have to make conversation at the till. My conversational line is always "are you on holiday at the moment?" - I know the answer every time, as you can pock the tourists out a mile off, but they're on holiday and they like to be asked! So they always say yes, and I say "where are you from? How long are you down for?" Blah blah... just while I'm folding the clothes and scanning everything through the till, but pretty much every time I get asked; "do you live here?" I still can't stop being shocked by the amount of people that ask me that! I always think - what do you think I'm doing behind the till! I didn't come down from Scotland today to stand around in a shop talking crap with you! Of course I live here! I think most of the tourists don't believe people actually live in a town that's so small! Like it's an impossibility- how bizarre! It just doesn't make sense to me! St Ives might not be London, but people do still live here when the tourists go home! What a strange thought- it can't possibly be true!