pumpkinstrokemarrow

First thought is off to the hat shop, or at least the hat departments of assorted shops. The idea was to get one of those baseball caps with a long peak but with the top missing, all the better to ventilate with. Not much about and what there was appeared to be more about keeping the fashion in that the sun out, although to be fair I did not go to the bother of going to a golf shop which might have done rather better. Annoyingly, I had unknowingly cycled past a big one at the northeast corner of the junction of the A243 and the A3 before the need for such a place had been articulated. And I only found out about it when on a non-stop shopping bus to Kingston. Then I tried out an already owned sun hat, one of those floppy jobs. BH complained that it was a summer sun hat not a winter sun hat and she was not at all sure that she wanted me to be seen in the thing. But it did almost do the trick. There was a chin strap so it did not blow off. There was a broad, 360 degree rim which kept a lot of sun out. The only catch was the the hat was indeed floppy and the all important rim was apt to blow up, with massive reduction of sun stopping power.

Next thought was one of those things that Clint Eastwood wears when filming spaghetti westerns in Spain. Stiff leather job. And we did find such a thing but it cost rather a lot - more than £20 anyway - and had no chin strap. So declined. And there the matter rested for a few days until the sun glasses option was successfully pushed in.

So off to Boots. Do you keep records? Rather frosty yes. Can you make me some sun glasses using my last long range prescription? Well yes but we think that is a very bad idea. It is more than two years since you last had an eye test and who knows what your eyes have been doing in the interval. Plus there are all kinds of interesting diseases that a timely eye test might mitigate. Why don't you have a free eye test first? Subtext: then we can sell you three pairs of glasses rather than one. Eventually, the lady behind the counter, the dispensing optician that is, gets the idea that I am not going to buy three pairs of glasses so we settle down to the business of buying one.

Interesting point here in that I am taking advice about how many pairs of glasses I need to buy from the person who sells them on a fairly massive margin. Big conflict of interest. But not clear how this is to be avoided in a cost effective way. Mandatory separation of eye advice and eye sales would ease (not eliminate) the conflict but I suspect us poor consumers would wind up paying more rather than less overall. And I fear that the poor old NHS is heading slowly in the same direction with hospitals being paid by the primary care trusts by volume, while at the same time advising on need. With anxious consumers somewhere in the middle of all this. Maybe New Labour should get some of its highly paid management consultants to explain in powerpoint and pictures why health in the US is so expensive.

Moving back to my domestic problem, we then discuss how much sun I want to eliminate. Polaroid much better, although more expensive. Don't understand the explanation of why better but then it turns out that my eyes are too naff for Polaroid. Got to have tinted anyway. Do I want to cut out 70%, 80% or 90% of the light? They have samples but in the absence of any testing sun light, I don't have a clue. Cutting out 90% seems a bit drastic so we settle for cutting out 80%. Oddly, one seems to be able to see through the sample quite well on this basis. Maybe the great designer designed us eyes which were intended for reading in the dark.

And so onto frames. No you can't have frames the same as the ones you have got on. Sir, please. They are at least two and a half years old and were discontinued ages ago. Can I have something similar? No, not really. The current fashion is for shallow lenses - a lot wider than they are high - and big side pieces. At around £150 a pop. I am not sure that shallow lenses is really a very good idea when it comes to sun glasses. Big is good for sun glasses. What about those ones? They have big lenses and they seem to fit. But so old fashioned sir. They don't really you suit you at all. Yes they do. They cost £25 which is a lot more suiting than £150. And so we conclude a deal on that basis, with the lenses taking it back up to £150. Could I have had a winter sun hat made to order for this sort of money?

That aside, the pricing structure people at this optician had not really got it right at all. If the cheapos had been say £75, but otherwise identical, I might have been persuaded that paying double was providing enough added value. But persuading me that paying six times was a good idea was always going to be a lot harder.

The same people at Microsoft can't win all the time either. I can buy Microsoft Office, licensed for up to 3 home PC's for £100. Now it may be that Microsoft have got their money back on this product many times over and ought, in common decency, be whacking the thing out for not much more than the cost of the CDs. But as it happens, I would probably pay £1,000 for the thing if I had to. It is worth that much to me. Luckily, I don't have to buy at the car boot sale where the barrow boy can see the whites of my eyes and make an all too accurate assessment of what my bit of the market will bear.

Which reminds me that I got heisted at the north end of Surrey Street market in Croydon earlier today, it being a long time since I have bought oranges in such a place. See a barrow, barrow boy (actually of middle years) with fag on, no names no pack drill, selling rather good looking Spanish navels for 5 for a pound. Yes please says I. Barrow boy ignores me. Eventually I attract his attention. You have to come around this side if you want to be served says he. So round I go and he serves me in such a cack handed way that I completely fail to notice until it is too late that he is serving me from a rather inferior tray of navels. They might taste OK but they are not nearly so pretty. And I only get four of them plus a rather elderly banana as a bonus. All in all, not a very successful purchase. Good job it was only £1. Will do better next time.