Monthly Archives: February 2012

Not Buying It – Expensive Skin Care

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I’m going to keep this post short and sweet because what I know about skin care could easily fit on the back of a postage stamp.

What I do know about, however, is marketing.

Throughout my teens and twenties I tried to understand skin care and skin care products… 3-step this, exfoliate that, fine lines, anti-aging, anti-oxidants, retinol…and the list goes on.

Let me be completely frank – I don’t buy any of it. Not just the products but the science (aka marketing) behind it.

This may well come back to bite me on the bum (or face and neck in the case of aging and skin elasticity) but I do not follow a prescribed skin care routine. I don’t use products now, although I’ve dabbled and got disillusioned in the past, having no confidence in what was being ‘sold’ to me.

What I do use is;

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My 3rd Anniversary – Looking Back…Yet Moving Forward

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27 February is my 3rd anniversary. Of what? Discovering minimalism? Life simplification? How exactly is it defined?

I don’t think it can be defined.

(photo taken by Joanne Wright 23 February 2012)

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How Twilight Turned Me Vegetarian

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I’m joking of course.

**Please be aware before reading further this is a lighthearted post and not designed to debate the ethics of vegetarianism or vampirism**

Or am I joking? Could Twilight turn me vegetarian? If a vampire can stick to a vegetarian diet, surely I can?

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Not Buying It – Birthday Gifts

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The title of this post is a little misleading. I do give Birthday gifts. I also buy some of the component parts to make up the gift. Rather, what I do not buy is the added value that retailers and manufacturers build in to charge us a higher price for the gift.

In fact I love giving gifts. I truly believe the cliché that ‘it’s the thought that counts’. This does not mean to say that just by giving a gift the job is done. It is the effort that goes into it that makes the gift special, regardless of cost. I’ve already posted about how Christmas gifts are exchanged.

Here’s a little storyboard of how such a gift comes to fruition.

Step 1 – Buy the component parts

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Simple Slow Cooked Chicken and Mushroom Pie Recipe Plus a Wedding Photo

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Don’t ever presume that the whole of a dish needs to be slow-cooked. There are many recipes that can be part slow-cooked and then finished off in the oven. The laborious part of the dish can be dealt with by your slow cooker as you go about your daily business. As the ‘Why Don’t You‘ crew always said ‘Go do something less boring instead‘.

As a fanatical meal planner, yesterday’s dinner was planned and already on the board.

Simple Slow Cooked Chicken and Mushroom Pie

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Not Buying It – Bread

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One of my first TV memories was a programme called “Living in the past“. I was just 4 when the show aired. It was the first reality TV show of this type to be shown in the UK, 22 years before Big Brother hit our screens.

‘Living in the past‘ focused on 15 volunteers who in 1978 sustained themselves for a full year, equipped only with tools, crops and livestock which would have been available in Britain in the 2nd Century BC.

There’s very rarely a week that passes in which this programme does not cross my mind.

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