This morning I took myself off into the big city Taunton. This was not, sadly, to sit and watch Somerset all day, though the boys are doing remarkably well against Kent, having just established a first innings lead of 219. I had shopping to do, and I needed to be back here in the afternoon to do some work. But I am able to report on a notable success for the Cheryl Shopping Method.

You see, there are different ways of being a shopping genius. I have seen Ellen Datlow in action, and I am in awe of her ability to find bargains. But I don’t work in quite the same way. Ellen has endless patience for going through racks of stuff. It is sort of shopping as browsing. I have more of a big cat approach. I’ll pick out something I want, and wait.

So when I went up to London for Pride I spent Sunday “shopping” and didn’t buy anything. You may have thought that odd, but I was happy with it. I hadn’t spent money on anything that didn’t work for me, and I had a few ideas. In particular I had seen a dress in Monsoon that I really liked, but I couldn’t find a shop that had one left in my size. So today I tried Taunton, and not only did they have the dress in the right size, it was half price in a sale. Pounce!

I’m very lazy really, but it is surprising how often it works.