Surviving the End of Year Sale Rip Off

Like hundreds of thousands of other Brits, I am Not Well right now. Thank goodness not with the norovirus, but with a cold that has turned itself into one of the most severe I can remember coming down with in quite a while. Throat like razor blades, constant painful coughing, choking and spluttering mid sneeze, hot and cold, exhausted, and pretty miserable with it. I only push stoicism that far. I may be British but even Brits have their limits and these days I do a perfect line in feeling sorry for myself. Actually, even without a cold I am pretty good at feeling sorry for myself. A tragic loss in the family has resulted, among other things, in a new propensity of mine to weep whenever anyone on TV weeps, no matter how stupid. I wept watching Look Who's Talking. I wept watching the Strictly Come Dancing Final. I am an unstoppable faucet. Only time will slow the flow. Bang a cold on top of that and I am headed straight for Fetid Duvet Land, surrounded by endless dirty teacups and soup mugs.  OK, enough of that. So, I'm not well. And now is a really bad time not to be well, because now is Sale Time. Shops everywhere started their sales on or around Christmas Day and all retail hell has broken loose. This year like every year I have pursued a really successful approach to Sales shopping. I don't. That's it. I buy an item in a Sale only if it fulfils these criteria: a) I saw it earlier in the year, b) I fell totally and hopelessly in love with it, c) I saw a need for it in my life, d) my eyes popped when I saw the price tag. That's it. Any item that does not fulfil all of the above criteria, does not get bought. So, when the Toast catalogue declared its sale I hopped right in, searched out the sweater they were asking ridiculous money for that I really really wanted for my birthday (handily located in January) but was not going to ask anyone to mortgage their house  to buy, not even in the name of love, found it at 50% off, bought it. End of. Except of course, that being ill changes your perspective on sale shopping and therein lies the ultimate sales psychology. Sales are for people who buy stuff as a reward for themselves, for whatever reason, but in my case it would be because I feel awful, and I imagine quite a few shoppers out there have reasons not a million miles away from mine. In my snotty state, hot water bottle on lap, Paracetamol within reach, dirty tissues scattered across the carpet, I Go Online and suddenly items I do not need, would not normally give a second's glance to in fact, suddenly possess an allure. They look shiny and new and massively reachable with their knocked down price tag. I on the other hand am not shiny and new. I am dirty and sick and feel and look disgusting. But if I buy that dress/sweater/bag/sofa etc etc, I will cease to feel that way. I will feel as shiny and new as the item I have just bought.  The temptation is extraordinary, and it takes superhuman strength, something I do not possess in abundance right now, to spot it for what it is. It is not me talking. It is my Sorry For Itself alter ego. It's the same damn voice that reaches for milk chocolate digestives, actually. I know this voice really, really well. So, I'm willing to bet, do you. And so do all those sales marketeers, guys. That's the voice they are appealing to. So. I put that FABULOUS red shift dress with the leopard print collar that I don't need and probably does not fit, into the online basket, and then I left it there. A bit like a really, really rude email that you compose and then save but don't send. I went away and refilled my hot water bottle, made myself another cup of soup (ah, sachets...even foodies like me have a use for soup sachets when just heaving yourself off the sofa feels like a climb to the Summit of Mount Everest), go back to my trusty IPad, look again at it. The scales fall from my eyes and I am back to normal. This is an Impulse Buy, it is emotionally motivated, and I know if I buy it I will not only regret it but will feel ashamed of myself for buying it. I close down the website, and await the knock of the door that will herald the delivery of the Toast sweater that I really, really wanted.