Umbrellas

The weather changed abruptly in the middle of this week. After a really beautiful October of sun and calm, during which I congratulated myself on staving off the dreaded moment when 60 denier black tights would have to be excavated from the depths of my drawers, compete with runs and fluff, the moment finally came.Followed, of course, by the inevitable, panic stricken mass purchase of the bloody things. I HATE tights. They are just too risky. The number of tights related mishaps are just too many to list, but if it's a toss up between mud splattered calves and blue knees, I'll take the former any time thanks. Not much you can do about the mud in rainy and windy weather - wait till it dries, then scrub it off with a tissue, or just pretend it's part of the design (that has personally NEVER worked for me). No, the real challenge in this weather, is Hair. This is the best possible weather if you want your hair to look as if you have run the gamut of an alien invasion and electric shock therapy. I tend to look this way at weekends and feel cheerfully unselfconscious about it, but work hair has to be tidy if I am to hold my composure in meetings dominated by sleek looking blokes. And that means wrestly with the worst accessory in the world - The Umbrella. They are hopeless things really aren't they. Small portable ones manage to camouflage themselves in my bag. I can never bloody well find it when I need it. Or I stick it into my coat pocket, which is ungainly but then at least I know it's there, and I open it up and five minutes later it's broken. Or you spend several fortunes investing in a smart full size one, maybe with a wooden handle, or one of those posh see through ones like the Queen has, and you walk along wtih it to the tube station and by the time you get there you realise that the reason why the Queen uses it is because she has some lackey carrying it for her. You never see her struggle out of a train with a curved stick attached to some plastic and metal spokes that somehow manages to wrap itself round your legs, or if it's wet, create rivulets of running water down the tube floor, causing venomous looks from fellow passengers whose bags are getting soggy bottoms. But hey. At least I always have one. It's reassuring. Which is more than you can say for the average bloke, who seems a lot less unselfconscious about the prospect of being hurled on all over the shoulders of their suit. Presumably this is because the material is drip dry? I was at a work lunch on Friday with one woman and three men and when we came out of the restaurant into an Autumn deluge the only people who had umbrellas were the women. Who were also wearing coats with hoods. So, we put up our hoods and donated the umbrellas to our hapless male colleagues, who muttered things like, it wasn't raining when we came out (it was actually, you were just being macho and ignoring it). Sigh. Muddy tights. Frizzed wet weather hair. Flat, rainhood hair. Damp shoulder pads. Broken mini umbrellas. Welcome to Autumn.