Daniella's Ramblings

Those of you who are both regular readers of this blog and who are gifted (or is that cursed) with a memory span longer than 3 seconds, will recall that I was rather unwell recently and that this contributed to a much diminished output from this blogger. It has also curtailed my adventures in the world out there and I have thus had very little to write about. I am happy to say that has changed, for the better, in recent weeks.

At the start of the year we were invited to a distant family members’ 70th birthday bash. We thought it would be fun to go, so we accepted. We therefore needed to get birthday presents for someone we honestly do not know very well at all… This is tricky. We e-mailed her daughter (the person organizing the party from 12 000 km away), and she said that crime books were in order.

So, it was decided that on the Friday before last we would go book shopping. It was also (I thought) my last chance for an en femme day as that was the day that schools closed for the winter holidays. I started preparing days in advance: I started by removing weeks of hair growth, which immediately lifted my spirits. Then, I went and visited my friend Annaleen of Perfect Touch Beauty Salon* (watch out for my upcoming review of her services) and got my eyebrows waxed, which is always fun and a satisfying way to spend a few minutes. On the day I got up early and got dressed as soon as the girls left for school. The long hiatus since I last had an en femme outing was telling: my makeup skills had gotten decidedly rusty. Winter is now in full swing and it was on the chilly side, so I wore white skinny jeans, with a grey polar neck sweater and my black faux leather jacket and biker boots.

We had time for a few pics before a friend popped in to see my spouse. Then we went off to buy the books. We went to the Readers Warehouse in the Lifestyle Garden Centre. No, it doesn’t make much sense to me either but if a book shop in the middle of a garden centre works, who am I to argue?

I have been to this garden centre many times, but never en femme. It was a quiet weekday morning and I was a little nervous, but all went well. We browsed the books, found a book for my daughter’s upcoming birthday and even managed to find a gift for the family member we had gone shopping for. It is always a plus when your shopping excursion delivers the intended results!

All the sales staff were very polite and there were no mis gendering incidents, which is always nice! We returned home, I showered and changed ready for my daughters’ arrival and I even managed to get the work I needed done. It was a very short excursion but after such a long hiatus and having to pretend to be something you are not for such a long hospital stay, it provided some much-needed relief.