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It’s your choice—the self-defining allure of customised drinks

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I ducked into a café the other day to get a takeaway. A rare occurrence. I’m usually happy with the sludge I distil from my plunger, which I drink black and limited to two cups in the morning.

For the life of me, I can’t see the attraction in paying some barista to put a silver fern or similar chocolate or cinnamon ‘artwork’ on top of coffee-flavoured frothy milk. It seems a modern sort of financial self-harm, especially if it’s repeated several times daily. Now we also run the gauntlet of choice overload through the plethora of options on offer, including the ability to customise our drinks.

It’s not all chocolate drizzles and boba-bubbled tea

OK, so what genius pioneered the concept of people’s choice beverges? Many cafes and bars offer options to personalise your brew from a seemingly infinite variety of ingredients and combos. Sounds like a great idea on the surface. But it’s not all chocolate drizzles and boba-bubbled tea. As well as the fun factor, there are some distinct drawbacks, not least the time involved which is making the whole concept of convenience frankly, inconvenient.

But perhaps you’re more accepting than me and just scroll patiently through your phone messages while the personalisers ahead in the queue prevaricate. By the time the wretched barista or cocktail maker has crafted their dream concoctions, I’m in danger of losing the will to live. Or, at least, cracking a back molar as I grind my teeth in frustration listening to the dithering. “Sorry, I’ve changed my mind; I don’t want toffee salt lime slush. Can you please make it a cuckoo spit slime?” “Wait, thinking about it, let’s add some hellwort hot sauce…” Oh please people, just get on with it.

Fancy customised drinks are a crowd puller

Whether customised, personalised or just plain elaborate, fancy drinks have become the ‘must have’ offer for any hospitality worth its Tibetan sea salt. Even MacDonald’s is at it. Their new drive-through beverage spin-off CosMcs launched in Chicago in 2023, offers “out-of-this-world beverages and treats” that “lift humans up with every sip.” I’m sure humanity will be duly elevated and grateful for the boost. The menu includes CosMcs Sea Salted Caramelactic, “a shaken (not stirred) Espresso”. So, it’s not only James Bond who prefers his drinks that way. However, the very clubbable 007’s signature Martini is unimaginably dull by today’s standards, with only two ingredients: vodka (or gin) and vermouth. Wait, make that a daring three with the addition of an olive as garnish.  

Coming back to CosMcs (because it amuses me), you could have a Coconaut Cold Brew, an Oat and Honey Moon Latte, or a French Toast Galaxyy Latte. Chai Frappé Burst, anyone? A Popping Pear Slush? These drinks are all “signature brews” and kudos to the creatives for the names. There’s no personalisation but lots of pose and perplexity. Oh, and the good news? Your first “space drink” is on them. I counted 45 options you could choose from to wash down your Creamy Avocado Tomatillo Sandwich and a side order of Cookie Butter McPops. I know, I need to get a life.

Customising your drink—the new form of self-expression

OK, so I’m ignoring the appeal to many people, which is all about the fun involved in experimenting with different tastes. The ability to conjure your ultimate bedazzling magic potion of syrups, powders, fruit chunks, boba, sprinkles, foams, etc. And where’s the harm? Like bling, it’s just another way of making a personal statement. A simple black coffee says nothing in this world. Well, perhaps ordering a black coffee could be taken as a mild rebellion against the herd mentality. A bit of inverted snobbery even.

According to Starbucks barista and TikTok trendsetter Josiah Varghese,  a drink “is a status thing—people can carry it around and show people: This is me”. It sounds like an improbable way of showing your individuality, but he has 1.8 million followers on TikTok, so what would I know? 

I’ve always believed in self-expression. The customised drinks variety, although it doesn’t call to me, is just another way of achieving it. Pretty much every choice we make is to some extent driven by the image we want to portray. Where we live, the cars we drive, the clothes we wear, cosmetics, perfumes, food preferences, whether we straighten our curly etc. So why not our coffee and other drinks choices?

It was so simple in the ‘before times’

I’m a Gin & Tonic girl, not only because I like the taste (or acquired a liking for it after a fair amount of experimentation) but also because it enhanced the self-image I aspired to in my youth. This choice has proved to have a shelf life as I’m still a G&T girl when I drink spirits, which is as now rare as sightings of those poor pangolins around the world.

10 Things You didn't Know About Pangolins — www.wild.aid.com

Pangolins are cool

Just digressing for a moment, I’ve done something few other people have and it’s not swimming with the All Blacks which is my other claim to fame. I saw a pangolin in Africa years ago to the astonishment of our small party and our guide. Apparently this sighting was the safari equivalent a one-in-a-million-year event. Pangolins are one of the most endangered species in the world through poaching and habitat destruction, but it’s hard to track how many are there because they’re so shy and rarely seen.

What doesn’t kill you makes you stranger

Anyway, G&T seemed like a sophisticated choice, a perception that was strongly influenced by a very sophisticated grandmother. G&T was her preferred ‘poison’ and something she thought appropriate for ‘young ladies’. She made an elegant ritual by pouring generous pre-dinner drinks from gleaming crystal decanters which seemed so gorgeously grown up and admirable. Imitation is, they say, the sincerest form of flattery. Whether she was flattered by my adoption of her drink is anyone’s guess, but she certainly did her share of role modelling in many areas of my life.

Now, even ordering a gin has become an ordeal of choice overload due to the burgeoning barrage of increasingly bizarre gin labels. For example, Pisces Chilli and Pineapple Zodiac Series Gin, Hot Cross Gin (handy at Easter) and Malfy Con Arancia Gin. How about Dancing Sands Wasabi Gin? Hmmmm …. must try that. But, as the Joker quips in 2008’s Batman movie, The Dark Knight, “Whatever doesn’t kill you makes you stranger”. I’m certainly not averse to a bit of spicy strangeness.

So, is the hype worth it?

One bonus could be that many of these complex concoctions—are they still drinks?—are close to meals in their own right. No need to fork out on actual food. I guess that’s why CosMcs drinks to food ratio using a beer mat calculation is around 10:4. 

Having been given all this liquid diversity, the pendulum, as it inevitably does, is swinging back. Chains like Starbucks are beginning to recognise that endless choice serves no one. They have radically pruned their “overly complex” menu. The aim is to reduce bottlenecks and win back cash-strapped customers as the cost-of-living crisis bites the hand that feeds people. Starbucks’ global sales fell by 7% between July and September 2024. I’m picking they won’t be alone as fickle customers long for the ‘before times’ when the choice was simple: Lucozde, Robinson’s Barley Water, Rose’s lime juice. Remember them? Maybe even a Coca-Cola if you were an adventurer looking for kicks.

Anyway, talking about G&T has made me want one and it’s beyond the appointed hour. However, in the spirit, as it were, of our times, instead of tonic, I’ve got a sudden urge to add some Berry Hibiscus Tobasco Sourade to the one I’m about to pour. Cheers. 

The love times they are a changin’ — fancy a polycule anyone?

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It seems that relationships are getting more complicated by the minute. Or maybe we’re just in an age of micro-definitions. Take the polycule. A concept I was happily unfamiliar with until I read about it last weekend. In case, like me, you didn’t know, polycules are a version of polyamory. Polyamory being of course, the juggling act of engaging in multiple romantic, typically sexual, relationships, with the consent of all the people involved.

New names, old behaviours

I’m pretty sure that the only thing that’s changed is that we’ve now got names for stuff that people have been at since Adam and Eve got chucked out of Eden. People experiment with all sorts of sexual combos. They always have. You only have to think ‘Mormon’ and ‘sister wives’. The practice of taking multiple wives or lovers goes back to the earliest of times—some anthropologists believe that up to 80 percent of early humans were polygamous. But it seems to be a thing now in a way it hasn’t been before, perhaps because of the predominance of social media in shaping or naming trends. As a consequence, there’s an emerging sexual zeitgeist with a growing vocabulary to define an increasing number of relationship variants meaning we can now choose our “lovestyle”, not just our lifestyle.

So we all know about throuples right? Three-way relationships where all three participate. Throuples—also known as triads—have been in vogue for some time as celebs open up about their non-conventional preferences. For example, in 2011, Charlie Sheen openly talked about living with two 24-year-old girlfriends, he called his “goddesses”. Throuples don’t necessarily live together, but they are in an acknowledged and sexual relationship. Imagine if Menelaus, Helen and Paris had the open-mindedness to form a throuple, instead of Paris stealing Helen away from Menelaus and the ten years of mayhem and destruction that followed. Troy might still be standing, as I’ve said before.

So, what is a polycule?

What is a polycule?
https://www.allure.com/story/what-is-a-polycule

In a polycule, three or more people might be involved but don’t all necessarily have sex. Let’s put that in context. Priam is in a sexual relationship with Hecuba and Athena. Hecuba and Athena don’t shag each other. So this group is not a throuple. But they are a polecule because, like the atoms in a molecule, they are connected to each other through Priam, who functions as a “hinge”. The person in the middle. Hecuba and Athena are “metamours”. People whose lover has another lover but with whom they have no romantic relationship. .e., the partner’s other girlfriend or boyfriend or their lover’s spouse. So if you’re partner has another lover, they are your metamour, and you are theirs.

With me so far? I repeat, it’s complicated. The word polycule itself is a construct combining polyamorous and molecule. I’m sure all you chemistry lovers are familiar with the concept of molecules as groups of atoms that are bonded together. In polycules, it’s groups of people that get bonded.

But wait, there’s more…a one-sized polycule doesn’t fit all

Polecules vary in size and shape— some can be extensive. There’s the parallel poly when members of the group know their lover has another lover but don’t form any relationship with them. There’s also garden table poly, which means the various partners all socialise convivially together. The difference between your bog standard polyamory, as far as I can make out, is that polycules are largely a constellation of intimate connections that are not all about sex.  

So if I were in a polycule (I’m not BTW), it could go something like this. I’m dating Hector and Paris. Paris also dates Helen and Cassandra. Hector dates Andromache and Hecuba. I’m not necessarily dating Helen, Cassandra, Andromache or Hecuba. Let’s face it: what woman wouldn’t feel her cup runneth over if it contained only Hector and Paris? But the others are nonetheless integral parts of my polycule, being my lover’s lovers and all. We’re all intimately connected. In the garden poly variety, we’d likely all pitch up at Trojan royal family feasts to listen to Cassandra’s latest doom-scrolling prophesies.

There are many more varieties—thanks to Cosmopolitan for this further insight. There’s V Polyamory (one person dating two who aren’t involved with each other), Quads, Comet Partners, and Platonic Polycules, as well as the different integration levels of metamours. Polycules can be open or closed (i.e. exclusive or permissive) and may be hierarchical with one person as the primary link between the others or ones where everyone is on equal footing. There’s also Parallel Polyamory—polycule members have other partners, but they don’t interact or have contact. It’s a parallel structure. This spawns teleamours— our partners’ partners’ partners. There are no rules as long as everyone’s consenting.  Some polyculers go all in and share houses and bank accounts.

Is the secret to the polycule “authentic love”?

Feminist writer Simone de Beauvoir (1908-1985), most known for her feminist novel, The Second Sex, was famously married to the even more famous Jean-Paul Sartre (1905-1980). The couple never married, but their lifelong open relationship, which saw each of them pursuing other sexual and romantic partners, lasted more than 50 years. They talked about their approach as “Authentic Love”. Originally Sartre’s idea, de Beauvoir was apparently game to “embrace all experience.” They claimed this approach succeeded because the sole condition was total transparency. Despite the relationship’s longevity, peers questioned how happy they were. It seemed to suit Sartre better as de Beauvoir was reputedly prone to jealousy and had far fewer affairs.

Jean Paul Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir 1954
Jean Paul Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir 1954

Which brings up a good point. How do you navigate any polycule variant without someone getting their nose (or other anatomical item) out of joint? Is everyone involved so secure that they don’t doubt their centricity to the melange? It feels as if the starting point is deciding what you want from any relationship. It must be just as crucial that three (or more) people have convergent expectations as two. And what happens if two of a triad are more into each other and even marginally neglect the third? Is there ever the possibility of love equity, or even such a thing?

It’s not all a bed of authentically scented polyamorous roses

Polyamory isn’t legally recognised in Britain or America, so you don’t get the sort of benefits monogamy brings, such as tax breaks, pension plans, sharing mortgages, child custody, and a clear inheritance plan. Come to think about it, we singletons don’t benefit from those either, but it’s not yet illegal to be single or childless (or a single, childless cat lover).

Polyamorous relationships seem to me to come with as many, if not more, hooks than monogamous ones. There are so many decisions to make, not least how you schedule your playtime. Equally, do you meet your partner’s other ‘squeezes’ or leave well alone? Does it help or start to erode the foundations of your relationship with them?

On the other hand, polycules could be the perfect antidote to giving too much or falling too deeply for one person and the anguish that can follow if it goes wrong. Perhaps sharing the love means fewer eggshells to walk on. If one person in the polycule doesn’t feel like it tonight, there’s a fighting chance someone else will, so could it be the answer to duty sex? In this world, Paris wants to watch the footie. Menelaus wants to watch the chariot races on the beach. Helen wants to bring back a bit of that loving feeling. Paris is happy to oblige. Menelaus is happy they’re both happy, and he gets to do what he wants.  Perhaps it’s easier with your polycule posse taking up the slack when you’re not in the mood, or can’t be fagged to go out to see a play, have another baby … whatever.

The lovestyle choice for a growing number

I’ve always believed that pretty much anything goes between consenting adults. So, if a polycule or any variation on the them is what does it for you and your polyamours, good for you. In any case, you’re not alone.  Polycules are growing in popularity. A recent YouGov poll found that about two per cent of adult Brits are in polyamorous relationships, and seven per cent say they would be open to it. Those numbers aren’t going to turn society on its head. However, it does mean that an increasing number of people are asking the questions differently and challenging norms that no longer work for them. 

If you’re into a whole lotta love and not finding conventional couplings are doing it for you, perhaps a polycule might yield better returns for your labours of love. Less chance of love’s labours lost? As for me. Well, I’m too lazy. Or too old. Or both. If sticking with one person for the long haul has proven challenging, how on earth would I wrangle several? Eek. In any case, call me old-fashioned, but for me, “Be my teleamour” doesn’t cut it like “Be my Valentine.”

PS Despite the title, I’m not really asking if anyone’s up for a polycule…in case you wondered.

You’re a brand, like it or not, make it count!

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We hear a lot about online influencers and personal brands these days. As a brand thinker, I’m a little sceptical about whether these personal brands are good. Unless you’re scrupulously honest, the brand, oops, of course, I mean person, simply becomes a construct. A facsimile of someone designed to highlight the heroic and park the problematic. It offers a polished facade with no apparent flaws. A title with no story. A standard of perfection that the rest of us can aspire to but never reach.

I want what she’s got!

Influencer brands are carefully curated to make us want stuff. By the way, anyone else noticed that we no longer just design or make things; curating them implies much more finesse and we live in a time when more is … er … more, so curating it is. Anyway, influencers seemingly live the dream—they inhabit perfect lifestyles, surrounded by perfect people, played out in a series of perfect locations. Sounds a bit like Barbie’s world and its inhabitants in the recent movie, come to think of it.

If the influencer is flawless, the implication is that by walking a mile in their shoes, you can be just like them. By following their wellness regime, you too will be rampagingly healthy and desirable. Going to the places they go or at least recommend, you’ll be too cool for school … like them. Forking out on all the stuff they’re peddling on behalf of consumer brands who milk FOMO for all it’s worth, you’ll be the envy of everyone in your orbit.

Absent better options, we find our heroes wherever and however we can. Where’s the harm?

But who am I to judge? It were ever thus. Absent a better option, why shouldn’t my new deity be an online influencer flogging over-priced skincare or exotic travel? Spirituality even. What’s the big difference between that and a medieval priest peddling indulgences? In any case, being a follower makes me feel like I am part of something bigger and that I matter. A like on my post worshipping at the (TikTok or Insta) shrine of the demi-goddess I’m following puts me on top of the moon. Who am I hurting?

But, going for perpetual perfection is paralysingly pointless. We all know that no one is. Even Barbie figured that out in the movie. On the surface, there’s a compelling and colourful story. But when you scratch the surface, the story lacks depth and nuance. The facade cracks faster than you can say “Lululemon”. Worse, by wanting what they’ve got, you risk trashing or trivialising what you have—your precious individuality and identity.

Seeing yourself through a branding lens

I recently published a new book—Never Succumb to Beige & Other Tiips for a Colourful Life. It has attracted a lot of publicity, which is cool, not least in converting to the number of books sold. But there was another, wholly unexpected benefit. The interviewers loved the title, and the questions they asked me were playfully provocative and opened up some interesting discussions. This process made me think long and hard about what I value and believe in at this stage in my life. What genuinely matters to me and how I want to present to the world.

A recurring theme from the interviews was how one does it. Stay visible, that is. After much navel-gazing, I figured I could best answer that question by swopping my ostrich feathered, bling-encrusted personal hat of many colours for my slightly less ostentatious professional hat as a brand development specialist. Think about the questions in terms of my brand.

Personal brands are not just something for the young and trendy

The most successful brands know what they’re about and who they’re for. However flippant my opening paragraphs, I like the idea of thinking about who we are through a brand lens. It’s a helpful framework to define and review our evolving selves, particularly as we age. People are as multi-faceted as the eyes of a dragonfly and just as complicated, so we need to tap into deep self-awareness to see through to our essence.

I always thought the complications would diminish with age. Instead, they seem to multiply by the day, perhaps due to experience hammering home the fact that instead of the arrogant assumption that we know what we don’t know, we finally get that we don’t know what we don’t know. There’s a gap the breadth of the Milky Way between those two sets of understanding.

Writing your story and controlling the narrative

All good brands have defining stories. These change and evolve as the brand matures and their operating environment changes. Quite by accident, I came across a great way to define my story. The concept of Never Succumb to Beige started as a challenge about what I would call my autobiography at a dinner party one night. It was a fun evening. At the time, I think I went for something a bit lame like Frankie’s Follies (my friends at that time all knew me as Frankie and seemed to see me as a cross between Virginia Woolf and Barbarella so this was really pandering to their perceptions rather than mine).

Over the years, I’ve come up with a range of options, at least one of which will feature as a chapter title in my next book, so I won’t do a spoiler alert here. But I stuck with Never Succumb to Beige, which I used as the title of my blog and now the book, because it captures my philosophy of being true to yourself and who you are. This philosophy hasn’t fundamentally changed since. Never succumbing to beige has become the central theme of my brand. It’s my pole star that helps me safely navigate life’s jagged reefs. My guiding light that shines a light on the path I should follow.

It’s not a pose. I love living in a rainbow of glorious and colourful attitude that allow me be seen and counted. It’s important to me to stand and deliver in how I present, what I say and write, how I am with others, and what I bring to the world. I’d like to matter … in a good way. That doesn’t mean I aspire to perfection. Far from it, but I do aspire to perfect the qualities that make me unique and set me apart from everyone else. After all, if I don’t control the narrative and tell my story my way, in this online era, Google and the other apps will do it for me. Who wants that? It’s also a vision of who I can be as I get older and allows room for life-long curiosity and adventure.

Leave the cloak of invisibility on a hook by your door

I’m saddened by how many people I’ve encountered who feel invisible, marginalised or useless as they grow older. They tell me it’s inevitable—I fundamentally don’t believe that it has to be. We don’t need to allow society’s judgement to push us into the railway siding of invisibility. If we don’t give ourselves licence to stay on the main line, no one else will. 

Perhaps that’s easy for me to say. I was born with a sunny, outgoing nature and insane corkscrew hair—I’ve had a love/hate relationship with the latter throughout my life. Still, it has the merit of giving me a head start in the non-invisibility games. Likely, it also played a part in developing a deep-rooted commitment to my individuality and sense of self.

Despite this, I’ve worked hard to fight feelings of inadequacy and low self-esteem. I’ve also faced down that lurking menace known as Imposter Sydrome on more occasions than I can count. My brand, my recidivist disinclination to be anything other than wholly and colourfully myself, helps me feel the fear, do it anyway and bounce back when the going gets tough.

Strike the pose, there’s nothing to it

My last post was about being scammed — Scammed, Slammed and Hung Out to Dry — written solidarity with all the many others who’ve experienced this morally bankrupt contemporary blight. Not succumbing to beige clearly has little to do with colour and lots to do with attitude. How you deal with setbacks like this, which rock you to your core. I’ve had to dig deep to cauterise the wound it left. The scars are still vivid, but they get paler by the day and I certainly won’t get fooled again. It would be easy at such times to retreat inwards. Having a strong brand like m non-beige one, gives us the confidence, mandate even, to move forward without losing ourselves.

I’d love to inspire people heading towards their older years to believe that invisibility isn’t a given. To blaze a trail for younger women that shows ageing isn’t a long, lonely, greying road to oblivion. In modern parlance, I’d like to be an influencer. But not one that postures at caring whilst peddling endless products, destinations or wellness miracles for affiliate brands’ marketing programmes. I want to use whatever influence I can muster to find joy and commonality in our shared and, at times, very bizarre humanity. To lighten the mood and bring people together.

Successful brands are built on insight not wishful thinking

It’s said that personal branding begins the moment you discover yourself. Knowing what you’re about and who you’re for requires deep self-understanding. Defining and living by a set of firmly held values. Making a promise about what you bring to the world and sticking to that. It raises self-awareness and honesty above self-interest and greed. For your brand to succeed means being consistently you wherever you are, whoever you’re with or whatever you’re doing and holding yourself to the highest standards. Not giving yourself a pass when it’s inconvenient or difficult.

Successful brands are not flim-flam.They don’t get blown about in the wind like so much tumbleweed in a Western ghost town. At the end of the day, whatever our brand, we’re actually still people, with all the frailties and idiosyncrasies that entails. Even the best brands get it wrong sometimes, but the ones that last, don’t go down in a fiery bonfire of blamestorming and bruised egos. Their managers recognise what’s happened and find a better way. On a personal level, when we lapse or stuff up, our inner brand manager should cut us some slack and understand that there are times when we just step out of character, flare up in the moment about something stupid. Ultimately we are people not brands. Seeing ourselves through a branding lens just helps us be the best we can be.

Be yourself — everybody else is already taken

So said the peerless Oscar Wild who know a thing or two about being an influencer and icon. As American actor Graham Brown (Malcolm X, The Muppets Take Manhattan) said, “Life is about choices. Some we regret, some we’re proud of. Some will haunt us forever. The message: we are what we chose to be”. We might as well choose to be something special and gloriously original.

I don’t know about you but, given my “druthers”, I wouldn’t choose to be a Barbie Girl living in the Barbie World, however superficially enticing it appears. Life in plastic is only fantastic if you’re a doll.

Scammed, slammed and hung out to dry

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I still cringe when I ‘fess up to anyone that I got scammed a few weeks ago. And why do I see in in confessional terms? As something somehow shameful? I was a victim not a perp after all. Knowing that doesn’t help much. Getting scammed is not something anyone is keen to admit to because we don’t want to admit to being helpless or gullible. It’s embarrassing. I certainly consider myself to be competent, confident and generally on to it. But, to be Biblical, pride goes before a fall. And how I fell.

I took a call early one morning which woke me up. It appeared to be from my bank asking about charges that had been added to my credit card and could I confirm whether they were bona fide. They mentioned several quite large charges in the $1,500-$2,000 range and I got into a panic because the voice on the phone kept telling me another one had come through and asking me to provide text message codes they were sending so they could stop them.

What a moron! The lack of request for vocal ID by the caller (supposedly from my bank) should have sent great big red letters of fire flashing before my eyes in warning. It didn’t, and I just kept on making it worse for myself. I’ve adroitly side-stepped other scammers. Not this time. I walked blindly into this one and the trap snapped savagely shut on my credulity like a gin-trap on the leg of a harmless little animal. Like the animal, I had no way out. I can hear your groans and cries of “what were you thinking?” from here. Believe me, there is nothing anyone can say to match what I’ve said to myself.

Being scammed is the ultimate own goal — you might as well set fire to the money

Of course I blame myself. But I’m not the villain of the story. I had a moment of poor judgement and am paying for it on many levels. Scammers are thieving amoral clever cxxts (sorry but there is no word I can think of that adequately describes my feelings other than this) who prey on our decency, credulity, frailties and fears. They don’t care who they hurt or how deep the damage. When I got the call, my fear of financial loss was triggered and I didn’t stop to think. Stupid me. Poor me. Maxima mea culpa. All of the above. But it’s not my fault that predators exist. There have been charlatans, mountebanks, fraudsters, imposters and confidence tricksters since Adam was a boy.

The financial loss wasn’t insignificant and it doesn’t look like there’s much chance of getting the money back. They’re investigating, but my expectations are lower than the proverbial wicked stepmother’s morals. I lost what was to me a fair chunk of money which means I can’t take trip home to the UK that I was planning for Christmas. But the scammers thankfully didn’t wipe me out.

I know scams often leave some people with nothing, so it could have been a lot worse. That’s like telling your kids to eat their greens because starving kids in less lucky places would be so grateful for your Brussels Sprouts! Just BTW, do any kids anywhere like Brussels Sprouts? Hard to imagine. In any case, it was enough money to cause me some real pain. If there could be a silver lining, I was lucky that I didn’t give any actual passwords to any of my other accounts.

But it’s not just the money

The financial loss was only a part of it. I felt violated. Dirty. Pathetic. Ashamed. Foolish. Vulnerable. Duped. Fragile. Worst of all, defeated. These are not emotions or states that I often experience. That sounds very smug, but it’s true. In my own eyes, I’m not a fool or an object of pity. Yet in the course of one very mis-guided phone call I proved myself to be just that. I got well and truly hung out to try. Trussed like a fowlfor the spit. Taken to the clearners. Caught hook, line and sinker. Done like a dog’s dinner. The scammers ate me up and spat the bones out.

It’s hard to put my finger on why this epidode has left me reeling when many other ostensibly worse things haven’t hit so hard. My last blog covered how to use the lemons life lobs at us creatively. I’m pretty good at that, but I’ve been struggling to think how to put a positive spin on this. I know from experience that time will heel the wound. I just wish time would also wound those scamming heels. It was a bruising experience that rocked me to the core. The whole sorry saga doesn’t jive with my sense of who I am. I’m Tigger for God’s sake! But I seriously had to check my premises and assumptions because if I could be that fooled in that way, am I fooling myself about other stuff?

The ‘gift’ that keeps on giving

I am still struggling to let myself off the hook even though I know I’m in good company and smarter folk that me have been hooked as badly or worse. Maybe some of my self-disgust is because I’ve seen too many movies where wealthy mature women get targeted by charming con artists like Steve Martin and Michael Caine in Dirty Rotten Scoundrels. Scammed is another one of those things I didn’t want to be when I grew up. And yet here I am.

I wasn’t going to write about this. I thought I’d got over it. And, to be honest, why would I focus on my own idiocy. But I mentioned what had happened to someone I know just in passing in a text and that ripped the Band Aid off. The hurt and bewilderment is still lurking like basking sharks waiting for their opportunity feed. I’ve cried as I’ve written this. I’m surprised by the depth of emotion. But it’s been cathartic and I’m glad to have got it off my chest.

We won’t get fooled again

I won’t let those parasitic, bottom feeding low life’s grind me down or I’d risk becoming a recluse who despises their fellow humans. I’m not that person. I’m still Tigger. Tiggers have to bounce. See all the happy things. Believe the best in people. But I’m also human. I hope Karma is a real thing. That what goes around comes around. So these travesties of humans who steal and cheat people out of their honestly gained savings, bring endless misery and don’t bring or create anything of value, get theirs in time.

We get bombarded with scamming stings. Phishing phantasamagorias. They work because they are so believable or play on our sympathies and inherent good nature. Would it have been less of an issue for me if the money involved was less? That a yes, because I wouldn’t be angry on two levels. If it was only a few dollars, I’d only be feeling foolish. But being scammed is a horrible experience on many levels. No one walks away unscathed. I hope telling my story will offer solidarity to others who have gone through it so We Won’t Get Fooled Again.

When life gives you lemons, make lemonade?

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I’ve recently heard at least three people trot out the old trope that when life gives you lemons, make lemonade. It’s such an easy-to-understand metaphor for staying optimistic in difficult times and turning the tables on what life deals to you. It’s the lemony version of playing the cards you’ve been dealt.

The expression first appeared in print in an obituary written and published in 1909 by the  American writer, publisher and artist Elbert Hubbard in the Literary Digest. In his opinion, “A genius is a man who takes the lemons that Fate hands him and starts a lemonade stand with them.”

It’s more often attributed to Mr Win-Friends-and-Influence-People, the king of self-improvement, Dale Carnegie. Carnegie used it in his 1948 book How to Stop Worrying and Start Living: “If you have a lemon, make a lemonade.”

However, others used it between the Hubbard and Carnegie instances. I particularly like this one in a poem published in a 1940 edition of The Optimist by Clarence Edwin Flynn:

Life handed him a lemon,
As Life sometimes will do.
His friends looked on in pity,
Assuming he was through.
They came upon him later,
Reclining in the shade
In calm contentment, drinking
A glass of lemonade.

A good metaphor, a bad rap for lemons

I like lemons. What would lemon tea be without the lemon flavouring? There’s no obvious substitute. Mandarin tea, anyone? I don’t think so. Gin and Tonic—unthinkable without a zesty zing of a slice or two of lemon. Okay, some people prefer lime. But the purists still choose lemon—the cynic in me thinks this could be due to the price difference, but that could be … well … cynical. The adventurous might even go for a taste bomb by adding a slice of both. I salute their inventiveness. Worse than a lemonless G&T, imagine a gorgeous white fish fillet slathered in herbs, garlic and butter without the blissful finishing tartness of a twist of lemon.

The lemon dissing even carries over into song. Harry Belafonte, the singer and actor who popularised Calypso and fathered Halle Berry, released Lemon Tree in the fifties. Lemon tree very pretty, and the lemon flower is sweet, but the fruit of the poor lemon is impossible to eat.[1] Duuuuude—come on. We all know you don’t eat lemons like other fruit. They’re garnish. Ingredients. You’d have to be desperate to peel and chow down an entire lemon au natural like an orange. But … lemon meringue pie … lemon cake …. lemon souffle … lemon mouse. I love the flavour of lemon in pretty much any guise. Ironically, except for lemonade, which I can’t see the point of and wouldn’t give you beans for.

Putting a positive spin on your lemon mountain

Anyway, there is a point to this meandering story. Like most people who have lived any length of time and taken the odd risk, life has lobbed a fair swag of lemons at me. But I’m not bitter, unlike those sour little yellow suckers. I tend to see my lemon mountain as an acknowledgement of an adventurous spirit prepared to try new stuff and push the envelope a bit. My adventures haven’t been at the extreme end of the spectrum. E.g., journeying to the centre of the earth-type adventures. I haven’t (yet) been embroiled in a space odyssey, even a minor one or been part of any pioneering expeditions to find world-changing places like the Northwest Passage. I haven’t even climbed any mountains of note. But I’ve most definitely taken the road less travelled at regular intervals.

AND Why stop at lemonade?

Back in 2010, in addition to becoming co-owner of a creative agency, I was co-founder of a pioneering event app, and I could see the dramatic impact smartphones would have on our lives. The ramifications were mind-boggling and made me think long and hard about the future of branding and design. This resulted, in 2012, in a short business plan in infographic form—we are a design studio, after all—setting out a blueprint for a digital transformation of our business. Not exactly messianic. All creative sector businesses worth their salt could see the writing on the (digital) wall and the need for reinvention to stay relevant.

But my thinking was a little different. I didn’t just want to make lemonade, as in shifting from a print worldview to a digital one— we had to do that anyway. No, I wanted to do something entirely different. To shift the paradigm (as we were so fond of saying then). I understood that our value wasn’t so much in our team’s undoubted skills and expertise or our quality of work and service model. Print-led or digital, any pivoting in the business-as-usual sense would be about survival and continued competitiveness rather than systemic change.

Our primary value was (and still is) in the IP around our brand development process, which we have amassed over many years. You’ve heard about software as a service. My thinking—couldn’t we create a branding-as-a-service offer. I.e, take our IP online and enable people to learn the nuts and bolts of developing and managing a standout brand, drawing on our years of intel, insight and innovation?

An idea whose moment has come

It was a great idea, but in 2012, it would have required us to build a complex (aka hugely expensive) bespoke web portal. We didn’t have access to template-driven websites like this WordPress one I use, with all the widgets and plugins that enable almost any interaction with users at affordable prices. There are even subscription-based learning platforms that host video courses, learning resources and offer community building tools. Everything you could want at a tiny (miniscule) fraction of the cost of building from scratch. Better still, it’s on them to keep adding features and functionality and support the system. My 2012 aspirations were ahead of the curve—the idea wouldn’t have succeeded even if we’d had the funding to make it happen. But the times and tools they have achanged.

Catalysed by the latest tsunami of lemons delivered to small businesses like mine in the COVID aftermath, supported by the seismic shift to online everything, I am finally making it happen. I love working with ambitious early-stage businesses, but our conventional pricing structure makes that hard. My online learning platform will allow anyone to access high-calibre brand thinking without the fancy agency price tag. I published the programme’s flagship Brands with Moxie — Eight Steps to a Winning Brand late last year. This book sets out to help entrepreneurs, small business owners, and early career marketing and comms managers understand and leverage the full power of their brands. That used up quite a lot of lemons. I’m now converting the remainder of the lemon mountain into video training courses and other resources, and I’m poised to launch the first of these by the end of the year.

Like most things, it all comes down to attitude

I’ve wanted to throw in the towel many times over the last few years. Go into hibernation mode as I talked about in a previous post. Admit defeat and walk away. Give up on years of business development and find something less challenging. But I decided to, as the saying goes, keep calm and carry on. Whether your bag is lemonade or lemon soufflé , with the right attitude, you’ll always be able to find something to do with the lemons life lobs at you. I’m not out of the woods yet. My new take on my business still has a long way to go to earn its and my keep, but I’m hopeful.

I feel proud of myself. Every time life has given me lemons, I’ve come back with a burst of extraordinary creativity, bringing a lot of personal growth. Everything is risky. There’s no such thing as a wrong decision. There’s just a different destination. I’m saying this as much to shore up my resolve as to convince anyone else. Bitterness is seductive. The drama of disappointment is too easy to get derailed by. Making disappointment a defining characteristic is diminishing and a massive turnoff to other people. Life increasingly becomes a dark place where ‘they’ are out to get you, and perspective disappears.

So, I say, whilst raising my G&T with its extravagant two slices, Slàinte Mhath—cheers—fellow adventurers. When life gives you lemons, don’t just make lemonade. Get creative. Make something new and exciting. Step away from your comfort zone. What’s the worst that can happen? You get more lemons and try a different recipe.

[1] YouTube failed me and I couldn’t find a recording, but here’s one of his most loved songs from that era Island in the Sun.

Woman Victorian Hat

Brattish or demure—which tribe do you belong to?

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A couple of days ago, I read about the trending makeover of the word demure on TikTok in an article How Demure Are You?[1]. TikTok is awash with advice about how to be demure. Before you get your feminist dander up, no one is urging a dash towards traditional womanly demureness. The repurposed demure is not about being reserved, modest or shy. It’s been hijacked to serve more modern mores.

The instigator of the new demure is TikTok creator Jools Lebron, who sets standards for seminal stuff like managing makeup and moustache sweat. The concept has been seized on and spread like wildfire. Lebron uses demure semi-ironically to encompass the ideas of respect and mindfulness. Well, who can argue with that? Not me—those are two qualities I wish were in greater supply, as a matter of course. So, sitting gracefully. Demure. Showing restraint in your coffee order. Light milk, not the full version. Yup, also demure. Demure dainty spritzes of perfume instead of the usual scent surplus that challenges the olfactory senses and triggers anyone with allergies. Demur clothes to show respect to others at work. Wow, maybe all those female lawyers flashing their cleavages in fantasy TV courtroom dramas could take a leaf out of this book?

I thought the word demure had long since been tossed on the bonfire of, if not the vanities, the behaviours no one (broad generalisation) seems to care much about. Instead, it’s heading towards the stratosphere in the influencerverse. It’s hilarious when you think it’s pretty much the antithesis of the “brat” thing inspired by Charli XCX’s recent album. Like demure, which is no longer about keeping your eyes modestly lowered, a brat is no longer a brat— a petulant, badly behaved child or someone acting like one. No, the new Charli XCX brat is a different beast altogether. This brat is super cool. Petulance has transformed into the more admirable audacity of non-conformity. Bad behaviour is now spirited youthful defiance and ‘out there’ or creative self-expression.

Whatever happened to the seductiveness of slow?

OK, so you probably realise I’m not a TikTokker. Reading is my primary source of what’s hot and what’s not, with an underpinning of docutainment from the streaming services. Even though I don’t spend time on TikTok, the impact of it is everywhere. As a reader of opinion, you can’t be entirely oblivious to some of its influencers’ influences as they whoosh past. It’s fascinating. It’s like the world exists in fast-forward—words and images flash in front of our consciousnesses in perpetual motion as each new thing grabs headspace and headlines. But you’d have to say all the brouhaha is entertaining. A bit of fun in our not-so-fun times. But, like Shakespeare’s Darling Buds of May[2], TikTok’s lease has all too short a date. Summer ends, and so do TikTok trends.

I’m taking a bit of licence here by bringing in Shakespeare in the context of TikTok, but his Sonnet 18—Shall I Compare Thee To A Summer’s Day?—is one of the most enduring and loved of all poems. The language is gorgeous, but the meaning is divine (see the poem below). Shakespeare’s theme is the opposite of our fast-forward and instantly forgettable ‘content-driven’ times. It is an exquisite word picture capturing the enduring power of love and poetry to immortalise and preserve. The Sonnet so elegantly puts across the author’s belief that the essence of a person, an idea, or a love can outlast death. These can be captured in words that long outlive the writer or the subject. The wonderfully comforting thought is that as long as we can see (read) and breathe, the subject will live on with each new reading.[3].

When I was the age of the current Brat Pack, I’d have been rampaging in brattish trappings with the best of them. An invitation to be demure, even in it’s made over sense? Not so much.

The whole “Brat Summer”[4] break out fun. Ditto, the reinvention of demure. I’m not saying they don’t matter—when I was the age of the current Brat Pack, I’d have been rampaging in brattish trappings with the best of them. An invitation to be demure, even in it’s made over sense? Not so much.

Whether your tribe is brat or demure, it’s okay to flirt with a new thing. But it all seems so fleeting and ephemeral, encouraging attention spans that might struggle to compete with the average goldfish. It were ever thus when it comes to shiny new things, but the speed at which the carousel is spinning is mind-boggling—an average TikTok post lasts less time than ice cream in the sun. Or, maybe I’m just demurring the reality of digital overwhelm when I say I prefer to keep company with concepts that eternal summer cannot fade.

Sonnet 18 — William Shakespeare

Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate.
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer’s lease hath all too short a date.
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimmed;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance, or nature’s changing course, untrimmed;
But thy eternal summer shall not fade,
Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow’st,
Nor shall death brag thou wand’rest in his shade,
When in eternal lines to Time thou grow’st.
    So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see,
    So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

Charli XCX Brat

Jools Lebrun on TikTok

@joolieannie

#fyp

♬ original sound – Jools Lebron

[1] Madison Malone Kircher, Callie Holtermann, Gina Cherelus, Melissa Guerrero and Anthony Rotunno in the New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/2024/08/14/style/demure-tiktok-mindful-cutesy.html?searchResultPosition=1

[2] The timeless Sonnet 18 by William Shakespeare. Originally published with Shakespeare’s other sonnets in 1609.

[3] I enjoyed this commentary of the Sonnet by ThoughtCo.

[4] The other big trend du jour, inspired by Charli XCX’s recent album Brat.

Mutton dressed as lamb and other outdated taboos

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I’ve always had at least one foot in the if you’ve got it, flaunt it camp. While I was flicking through the op-eds a couple of weekends ago, one of the headlines I hovered my mouse over was, Are You Ever Too Old for a Bikini?  The old mutton dressed as lamb thing in a more beguiling wrapper. In any case, that clever little clickbait title acted like catnip to … er … a cat, and I was hooked.

It turned out to be an advice column. The seeker of advice was worried about what to wear at her daughter’s beach wedding and whether a bikini would be appropriate. There would be a lot of conservative types attending and she didn’t want to be seen as a try-hard, attempting to look too young or an exhibitionist set on upstaging her daughter. While the main worry was about this specific occasion, it posed the broader question of whether there is an age beyond which one shouldn’t go all itsy bitsy teeny weeny[1] when on the beach, at the river or poolside.

My first thought was, are you fricking serious—this is something you need to ask? My second was, don’t you have anyone better to discuss this with??

I’m often surprised by the questions people send to newspaper advice columns. Perhaps, more accurately, I’m surprised by how many people lack self-confidence in the context of the question. But I’m amazed when it’s a question of what’s OK or not to wear—another headline that grabbed me a while ago was How Many Rings Are Too Many to Wear?  More disbelief on my part, I’m sorry to say.

But the people asking these questions in the public glare of a high-circulation newspaper or magazine are doing the rest of us a favour by bringing difficult topics into the open. Whether the question is to bikini up or not, or any other variant of Am I too old to wear…whatever…it is indeed a good question. It’s a question many of us ask as we stare in indecision at an item in our wardrobe while the mutton dressed as lamb monster lurks, rubbing its hands in glee, cackling at our dilemma. Gung Ho, though I am, I am certainly not immune to its judgements.

It’s all part of the invisibility trap: the pressure to act or dress your age and not break the myriad taboos laid down over generations.

So many conscious and unconscious biases are baked into our neural pathways from our earliest days about what’s acceptable in almost every facet of our lives. It’s particularly insidious when it comes to clothes. Running the gauntlet of dressing too young for our age is unthinkable. It would almost be preferable to die or become a hermit than to be considered mutton dressed as lamb. I’m shuddering as I write. But, like many buts, it’s a big one: We get so caught up in worrying about it that we don’t stop to worry about how effectively the wool (!) has been pulled over our eyes.

Although lamb and mutton can be male and female sheep, like many social mores concerning appearance and dress, this little mutton dressed as lamb canard is uniquely applied to women. But where did the lambasting expression come from? Sheep meat is defined in two ways; lamb is from animals up to twelve months old (young and tender before they’re weaned), whereas its mutton (mature and tougher) after that. The metaphor not only plays on this division in age and meat characteristics but also acknowledges the culinary procedure of ‘dressing’ something to cook, making it a conscious act. An attempt to gull others into thinking you’re younger than you are.

“Someone the other day asked the Prince of Wales at the Ancient Music whether he did not think some girl pretty. ‘Girl!’ answered he, ‘Girls are not to my taste. I don’t like lamb, but mutton dressed like lamb!’”.

Comment attributed to The Prince of Wales (later George V) by Mrs Frances Calvert, in her Social Gossip Journal compiled in 1811

The above quote is one of the first references, but there were earlier variations and other applications of the sheep (mutton/lamb) epithet, as I found in this fascinating book preface Mutton Dressed as Lamb? Fashioning Age in Georgian England by Amada Vicary. The author references period publications like the Gentleman’s Monthly Intelligencer, which noted in a 1737 article that a woman past her prime could be labelled an ‘old Ewe’. The Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue (London, 1785) included entries ‘Laced Mutton’—slang for prostitute—and ‘Mutton Monger’—a man addicted to ‘wenching’.

According to the Fashion History Museum, until the early 19th century, there was no real distinction in how the different ages presented. “Children dressed like miniature adults, and with an average life expectancy in the 18th century of 43 years, old age was not something to worry about, but rather to hope for”. Towards the end of the Industrial Revolution in the first half of the nineteenth century, fashion designers started offering fitting (pun intended) styles for different age groups as people began to live longer through scientific and medicinal advances. Children got clothes that acknowledged their activities instead of making them so many Minie-Mes.[2] Younger women dressed in sportier and brighter-coloured costumes, while older women were trussed in subdued but highly elaborate colours and styles.

Formerly attributed to Nicolas de Largillière, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
Formerly attributed to Nicolas de Largillière, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Soon, this separation became convention, and it wasn’t ‘done’ for younger women to dress too extravagantly or older women to dress too young. By the 1920s—the ‘flapper’ era—older women were still sporting the ‘buttoned up’ pre-war formal wear, while racy young women got adventurous. Hemlines shrank, whalebones were tossed away, and lower legs became daringly visible as they Charlestoned the nights away.

After WWII came Dior’s New Look, Courreges’ mini skirt, and many other couture innovations intended mainly for the young woman of the world.  Acknowledging the growing gulf between young and old fashion, Vogue created a column for older readers, ‘Mrs. Exeter, catering to “the woman of a certain age who chose colours to suit greying hair, and similarly suitable ‘styles’ for every social occasion — town or country.”

Then came the “youthquake” that was the Sixties, when the fashion world turned on its axis, and the generational divide became wider than ever. While some iconic designers, like Karl Lagerfeld, made clothes that “make older women feel sexy,” the new kids on the block designed for hipsters and made clothes unashamedly for teens and young adults. In this world mutton was even less welcome in lamb’s clothing than ever.

Coming back to the article. After reading it, I admired the woman for even contemplating wearing a bikini because swim or beach wear is where many lines are drawn in the sartorial sand. However well-toned and put together the age-kissed body is, displaying it in a bikini is quite brave and can be confrontational to others struggling with their self-images and fears. It’s one thing to bikini up in the seclusion of your garden or pool to catch some rays or enjoy a bit of water therapy, but should you flaunt it in public places?

My body’s not in bad shape for my age. I can’t kid myself that it’s in the same league as the movie stars of my vintage, but I’m proud of it, and I’m glad it’s all down to my efforts, not that of any cosmetic surgeon or treatment. While I recognise that my outer casing now is a well-lived life away from its younger versions, but I still have fun dressing it. Even the most phlegmatic amongst us don’t live in a vacuum where it’s possible to ignore the knowledge that youth and beauty still rule the roost (As I’ve written about in a previous post—I Feel Pretty). Or should that be pasture?

Bearing ageing arms in strapless tops is one path mature angels, like me, often fear to tread for example. But fashion has our backs on that one with so much choice of skimpy tops with mesh or diaphanous sleeves. There are some things I won’t wear—pelmet style short skirts have been out of the running for decades (other than for fancy dress parties—I work one recently to a Rocky Horror Picture Show fundraiser).

“I Feel Bad About My Neck!”

Nora Ephron onthe practive of ‘compensatory dressing’ by wearing turtlenecks, scarves and mandarin collars to hide one of the big flags of age, a crepey neck.

While it’s often difficult to come to terms with it, there is nothing unnatural or shameful about ageing skin and bodies. It just messes with our vanity and self-image. Our inner person is still young at heart and it’s hard to sync that with what we see in the mirror. There’s also the other aspect in that showing too much of it scares the crap out of younger people—OMG, am I going to be like that one day?

Faced with the bikini dilemma, this recidivist flaunter would probably dial it down if it were my niece or great-niece’s wedding. I can’t imagine anyone in my family opting for a beach wedding, but you never can tell. The last time I went anywhere near a beach, I coaxed myself into a somewhat skimpy one-piece cossie, but a bikini is probably beyond my comfort level. Why is this? What difference does a small additional bit of covering make? As we say in my brand world, “It’s all about perception.” Equally, as I’ve said before, if you have to get any part of your kit off, if you can’t tone it, tan it.

To bikini or not bikini is a choice. The length of your hemline is another choice. Whether you’re comfortable bearing your arms, keeping your hair long, or wearing tight jeans or figure-hugging ‘wiggle dresses’—all choices. I sincerely believe the choice simply depends on what you feel comfortable with. If you are hesitant about wearing something, don’t— there’s not much worse than suffering through an evening of wearer remorse. There will be something else that you can really rock.

I hate that we are so inhibited by so many unwritten and outdated conventions and proprieties—what’s ‘done’ and ‘not done’, The snobbery and judgementalism that pushes us into a doom loop of self-flagellation. Who can ever measure up? When I’m the ruler of the world, phrases like mutton dressed as lamb will be banished from the vocabulary in perpetuity, along with all those other ghastly limiting expressions that keep us chained up behind the bars of invisibility.

[1] The ‘Itsy Bitsy Teeny Weenie Bikini’ was immortalised in this truly awful song by Bryan Hyland of “Sealed with a Kiss” fame (a bit better, still cheesy) written by Vance and Pockriss whioch reached #1 on he Billboard Hot 100 chart, (#8 in the UK) and sold almost a million copies in the first two months of its release, when Hyland was only 16, and over two million copies in total.

[2] Mini-Me is a fictional character from the spoof Austin Powers film franchise, a miniature clone of the gloriously awful antagonist Dr. Evil.