In Which I Am Assigned To The Scrapheap By Rough Trade

I sort of had a spare day to day because I was expecting to be travelling back from Glasgae, but of course I was still here.
I made the Offsprogs a brunch of smoked salmon on brown bread and we decorated the Christmas tree, which had to thaw out in the kitchen for an hour first. There is a very sad-looking little lemon tree in the yard that is not going to survive this winter- I used to be able to put plants like that in an outside alcove with the radiator in the kitchen on the other side of the wall, but nothing like that exists here.
As usual, half the fairy lights had stopped working since last year (what do they do? Have a group meeting in July and decide their lives are not wort living any more and just give up?) but there were enough to drape and sparkle and I'm sitting here is magical semi-darkness feeling very festive.
I went to Brick Lane and inhaled the lovely food smells and marvelled at the odd blend of uber-trendy youngish white people and the Asian community of all ages. There's almost a line halfway down Brick Lane where the restaurants give way to trendy shops and bars and the population crosses the boundary each way with their own version of the social landscape imprinted firmly in their heads.
I was in search of a leather satchel for Offsprog One, but while I was there I decided to re-stock Rough Trade with Suburban Pastoral, as they are the only people apart fro me to sell it.
I check the website and if it's out of stock, beetle down there with a few for them.
The guy was just taking them from me to put in the warehouse when a woman behind the counter sidled over to him and muttered in his ear- very rude and humiliating, actually, as the matter clearly concerned his transaction with me.
He looked embarrassed, and told me that they couldn't stock them any more as it was too out of date. They usually take some, as people still want to buy them, but I wasn't going to argue because I felt like a prat.
I got the money from the ones they'd already sold, and left swiftly without spending the money on new music, which is what I normally do.

The thing is, I was enjoying the afternoon anyway so I wasn't going to drop into a miserable sulk even though I do think they are silly and ungracious.
So I went to Covent Garden and got a present for Offsprog Two, resisting the penchant I have of  'one for them, one for me' greedybuying (sorry funky tartan dress, someone else will have to buy you).

When I got home, Whippersnapper cat (who is oblivious to music, CDs and grumpy record shops) told me he was HUNGRY and COLD and NEEDED A CUDDLE and lots of other things that he might get if he meowed really LOUDLY for half an hour. The Offsprogs NEEDED THINGS TOO and will continue to do so, but at present they can't find me as I'm sitting in a corner lit only by candles and fairy lights: they whizz about far too fast and furiously to see me.

I can live with being abolished. I will rise like a phoenix again from the ashes of a career which, rather like charcoal in an annoying cheapo supermarket barbecue in a tinfoil container, never seems to burn out completely.