Things I enjoyed this week

Making do and mending, a brilliant film and dipping my toes back into the dating pool

I have no grand essay for you this week. I'm learning that there can't be an essay every week. By essay, I mean pouring forth a stream of thoughts on one topic. I just don't think I have it in me to produce one of those every week! But I like writing to you all regularly and I hate to not do it because I can't rally my mind to scribble a 'proper' Substack so I am going to try some gentler, rambly, things-I've-been-doing-that-you-might-be-interested-in-reading-about posts - don't worry, I still will be doing the essays but these 'catch ups' will take a little pressure off and keep me in contact with you all. 

So here are some things I've been up to this week... 

1 Making do and mending

I don't consider myself a particularly eco person but over the last few years I have developed a horror of waste. I can't bear to think of buying a new skirt just to wear it once (yet I used to do that all the time in my early twenties). I'd rather get good quality secondhand furniture on Facebook Marketplace than buy some cheap stuff that I know will end up in a landfill soon. 

I'm also keen to make the most of what I have. When I bought my flat, the previous owner left a lot of furniture behind. There are some seriously stellar pieces - a sideboard in the living room which I've fallen in love with and a mid-century chest of drawers that could easily fetch a nice price on Vinterior. There are also some not-so stellar pieces like these scrubby old chairs. 

I decided to try to breathe new life into them with the help of a staple gun, some foam, a metre of fabulous fabric and a Youtube video. 

Like all DIY projects, I bought the bits and pieces full of enthusiasm then life happened, deadlines came and that sad fold of foam festered on my bedroom floor. Then on Friday night - which doesn't say much for my social life - I suddenly thought: I'm going to do it!

I watched this video - honestly, where would we be without Youtube videos? - and got to work. I cut out the foam, the padding, stapled them in place - I cannot tell you how satisfying using a staple gun is - wrapped the jaunty fabric around, stapled it in place, did some fancy-ish pleats in the corners and, you guys, they didn't look half bad! They really didn't. In fact, I adore them. I'm now toying with stripping the wood, sanding it down and putting another finish on it in the hope that it will be lighter like the table - but in truth, all that does sound like a lot of work - or painting them... wait for it... a cherry red. Any thoughts?

I can't tell you how much joy I get from looking at these charming little seat pads, knowing that it was I that stapled them into place and that I rescued a pair of chairs I probably would have tossed otherwise. 

This make do and mend ethos has led me to ransack my parents' garage and find overflow tiles from projects of 25 years ago. The plan is to use them in my kitchen. I'll let you know how that goes.

2 Thrifting

Thrifting is what Americans call shopping in charity shops and I love that term because it really gets across the activity and hobby of it. Thrifting is my favourite thing to do. 

This weekend, I rooted around my local St Christopher's Hospice shop and found these pretty ceramic bookends. They are currently propping up my cookbooks. I've had a lot of luck with ceramics in charity shops lately - the charity shops of Lymington yielded a very cottage-core vase and these silly little parrots are one of my all-time favourite finds. They look so silly and sweet and loved-up and I always smile when I spot them on my bedroom mantelpiece.

3 Watching American Fiction 

This is one of the best films I've seen in an age - and I really mean it. It's about a middle-aged Black novelist, Thelonious 'Monk' Ellison, who is forced to take a break from his job as a humanities professor after he 'upsets' snowflake students. He goes home to his successful but dysfunctional family in Boston. He's depressed by what he sees as the popularity of Black victimhood narratives in the publishing world but he is in need of some money so, for fun initially, he writes a spoof novel about life in the 'hood' and sends it to his agent to make a point - but the publishing world falls in love with it and the movie goes from there. Alongside the satire and the social commentary, there's some really moving stuff about family and the love, anger, pain and disappointment that comes with being in a family sometimes.

I really don't think I'm doing this film justice. I loved it, ok? It cracked me up, I actually cared about the characters - particularly Coraline, I loved Coraline - I do think the ending was a bit fumbled, but overall it was a stellar film that I'd even see again - high praise from me. 

Also, isn't going to the cinema just the absolute best? When I went, I was feeling grouchy and what a dream to escape all of that, in a lovely red plush seat at the Soho Curzon, with a dear friend beside me who had snuck in four packets of salty popcorn and a bag of Maltesers for us to eat. She then demonstrated how to mix the two together, shook the bag up, and instructed me to eat the sweet and the salty together - 'for the umami'. 

4 Writing about how selfie-takers have invaded the house where Saltburn was filmed

I worked on this piece this week with my dear friend Charlotte. It is quite a story about how TikTokers have become so obsessed with Saltburn that they are turning up at the house where it was filmed and... even trespassing on the land! The family that owns the posh house are obviously not happy and have even had to get security to patrol the land. I did ask Charlie Stopford-Sackville, the owner of the house, what he thought of the film but he wouldn't be drawn on it - he told me he liked parts but he didn't see why other bits were included. 

I think if someone filmed that bathtub scene in my house, I'd have to move.

5 Going back on a dating app

Is this something I’ve enjoyed? I don’t know. I'm trying to dip my toe back into the dating world and, well, the apps are not as horrendous as I remembered them. We have to take the small wins! It's so funny how my attitude towards them has changed - when I was younger I was pretty much compulsive about going on them (I have great sympathy with these people waging a lawsuit against Match for getting them hooked on the apps) and now the problem is I just cannot be bothered. I really do have to make myself go on them. Is this progress? Fuck knows.

I think that's it from me! What have you been up to this week? Any recommendations? Thank you, as always, for reading my Substack. See you next time xxx