Now this might sound weird to some of you but I am just a sucker for a new catalogue. I bloody love them. The anticipation of what will be inside and the smell of shiny new paper gives me little goosebumps. It's right up there with the feeling you get when you get your new shoes out of the box (again maybe that's just me).
This week my new well known store directory arrived, I put it to one side so that I could enjoy it when I could sit down and give it the time it deserved. This got me thinking about my love/love relationships with catalogues and where it all began.
As a child I remember the arrival of a new catalogue being quite an event. Back then the catalogue of choice for my mom was Kays. We didn't have a lot of money and that was old school poor not like these days when you can have a car, plasma TV, computer, phone, game console but can't afford 'luxuries'. I remember not having a fridge and using a bucket of cold water, running out of 50pence pieces to put in the rented TV (the TV rental was paid for by the 50ps), no heating and having to share our phone line with several others. So Kays was the answer to well, just about everything. School uniform, clothes, toys, bikes, Christmas, carpet, washing machines could all be paid for weekly. It was great. Basically if it wasn't in Kays and couldnt be paid for at 20 pence a week then we weren't getting it.
However for me as a child the best bit about anew catalogue was that I got to have the old one to cut up. Initially I cut out toys that I wanted. Later I cut out the people and outfits. This got quite elaborate and I would cut out outfits and transpose them onto the heads of models I liked. I would create what I called layouts so my flappy cut out person could move about them in a Frankenstein-esque one dimensional dolls house type scenario.
Can anyone else relate to this? No? Just me then. It was the seventies, I didn't get out much, kids TV was only on for a couple of hours a day and my mom preferred educational games like scrabble. Great but when you're on your lonesome not much use. I was creative but I was bored. I actually think these fantasy paper worlds were the forerunner to Sims. Some computer genius stole my idea. I was sitting on a goldmine and I didn't even know it.
Later on I graduated to the heady heights of Grattan and Freemans but they were never as precious to me as that trusty Kay's catalogue that came out for each life event to see what we could order.
Anyway this seasons offering of shiny store directory fails to light my fire like the old days. The anticipation was right up there in the Kay's category but the selection of rehashed fashions and homewares just doesn't grab me (didn't I wear that style about 20 years ago?) and it fizzles out like a damp firework. The only alternative use these days is a door stop or weapon of choice for self defence. Plus to add insult to injury you have to pay for the damn thing. Give me a Kay's any day. Can't quite bring myself to throw them out or cancel my subscription though. I live in hope of creating the dizzy heights of my childhood and there is always that outside chance.
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