Hot Pink

So I came back home and had a long hot shower to keep warm and decided I'd go on a mission to Westfield at Bondi Junction with the aim of buying two new bras.

Then Darren came home from work and I told him about the Chinese people in the pedicure shop and how I was cold because I didn't have the right clothes for the coldest winter in twenty-odd years. Believe it or not, we are doing the year in Australia on the back of 23kg of luggage each (give or take some air-freighted books and knives and towels), and 23kg doesn't extend to a winter coat, warm jumpers or a choice of bags and shoes. It also doesn't extend to the lovely leather gloves I was given for Christmas last year, or rather, I didn't think I'd need them.

And then I just collapsed in a heap and started to cry.

"I want to go home. I want my stuff. I'm sick of these people and I need to go to Marks and Spencer because my Bras are running out. I'm not homesick, I just need to go home for a week or so and get the rest of my stuff.

The only warm coat I have is my fleece and my waterproof - I used to work with women who turned up dressed like that, I look daggy and I feel daggy and I just want my stuff".

So we went off to Bondi together and into Myer (which I've worked out is the closest thing to Debenhams), where I industriously gathered up eleven bras (avoiding the Elle McPherson line as Elle McPherson has designed a range of bras a size too small, just to remind you she's thin) before setting off for the changing rooms, where I was met by a Chinese bra-fitting assistant.

Now I'm not having a good day with the chinese, or a good month for that matter, so she's skating on very thin ice when she starts trying to interfere.

"I see those bras are all black" She begins

"Yes, they do seem to be"

"Well how about a bit of colour? We have some lovely lilacs". She pronounces lilac in the australian way, as lie-lack.

"Well no thanks - I specifically want a black bra. Especially with your top-loading washing machines because they'd eat lie-lack for breakfast"

"Okay, here, let me check the sizes. Right, well you have eleven bras and the limit into the changing room is five so I'll keep six here and you can come back out and get them"

"But I'll have to get dressed again to do that"

"Yes, you will."

"Right". I looked at her jolly,perky little face, eye-liner drawn meticulously across her lids in the way I used to manage before I had Ella. I was in no shape to stand up to such perfect maquillage.

"Before you go in though, we have this range of bras you might be interested in. They're called Bio-bra and they're Australia's leading brand, been on the six-thirty report and everything. Such great colours, a really playful little bra"

"Playful? I want it to hoik up these spaniel's ears, not beat me at Trivial Pursuit"

She hadn't finished.

"And tell me, as a B stroke C cup, do you find your breasts are very far apart?"

"Compared to what?"

"Well, I'm a little A cup and mine are very close together but some older ladies, or bigger-chested ladies find their breasts have spread out a bit"

Now she was officially pushing it because either she's saying I'm an older lady or a big chested one, and B/C cup certainly isn't large, not unless you're Chinese. Either way I had to think about what she was asking and concede that no, they weren't exactly whispering sweet nothings, they were a normal western-style pair of knockers, and yes, whatever, I'd try the sodding bio-bra on if it would put an end to this line of questioning so she went off and came back with one.

"Don't worry about the colour" she said. "hot pink goes well with anything"