Cat drama

Housekeeper has gone home on holiday, and there is Cat Drama. Lap-cat, who is primarily attached to me, is unmoved. Bus-stop Cat and Scaredy-Cat however, are very upset. Poor Part-Time Cleaner, who is temporarily Full-time Cleaner, with the bump in pay accordingly, was very concerned on the first day when they refused to eat lunch. It's also swelteringly hot (40C every day) which doesn't help.

Scaredy-Cat is getting over it, I think, but Bus-Stop Cat, who is very attached to Housekeeper (she was his sole carer for the first fortnight after he was rescued from the bus-stop ten years ago, and he imprinted on her very strongly) is still refusing to eat together with the other two. And of course if he walks away from his food, they'll happily eat it for him. He's quite portly, so it won't hurt him to miss a meal or two, but I'd rather it didn't go on.

The current solution is to feed them separately. Lap-cat and Scaredy-cat in the kitchen as normal, but under supervision to make sure that Scaredy-Cat doesn't take over Lap-Cat's bowl too, and Bus-stop Cat out in the sitting-room, with the doors closed to make sure that they stay where they are until the bowls are clean. Hopefully they will calm down eventually.

It's just clothes...

https://www.theguardian.com/fashion/2023/apr/30/eva-wiseman-why-do-we-buy-into-stealth-wealth-and-the-class-who-wear-it

https://us.loropiana.com/en/c/woman/dresses?page=0

Really, there's no need to stress so much about other people's taste in clothes.

I like Loro Piana's designs; they have a bit of a thing about exotic fabrics, which I find entertaining too I (though I did laugh many years ago when they claimed to the Financial Times to have cornered the national supply in Myanmar for lotus-fibre cloth ...) Apparently they are "Uniqlo for billionaires"; since I don't feel inclined to pay that kind of money as a usual thing, I see no problem with buying actual Uniqlo, which anyone reading this blog would probably have noticed...).

But generally, I find their clothes very nice, and not at all boring. If I were near any convenient outlet shop that sold past seasons' clothes for not less than a 70% discount, I'd absolutely go for it (genuine outlet shops are the point for me where snob value and value for money intersect and say "buy me!").

Anyway, anyone able to sew (or with access to a decent seamstress) and an internet connection (for good fabrics) can mock up a decent facsimile for a lot of things, especially for stuff that relies on pricey fabrics rather than complex cuts. Vogue Patterns are very helpful for this too. To get myself a nice, silk-lined cashmere dressing-gown for under four figures (I do visit friends in cold countries), I bought two large pashmina/silk shawls (on sale) and a printed silk sari at the local Indian we-sell-everything department store (all easily available online with a bit of searching). Then I dug out an old cotton dressing-gown of the appropriate configuration, took it to my dressmaker and had her copy it; I dithered a bit about adding the fox-fur collar that I picked up in an Australian op-shop some years ago (they're wonderful, I will post in their praise one day), but decided it against it for now. I can always add it later. Voila, affordable luxury.