XXL shopping

People always say that men spend less than women, especially on clothes. But that so isn’t true! Krystal hit it right on the head when she says that the way guys shop isn’t conducive to saving. They get in and get out. They go for one thing. And then they leave.

It’s difficult enough to shop secondhand for guys, let alone in extreme sizes. Outlet stores are also usually out of the extra big sizes. Which leaves T (who’s 6′3, stocky and maybe 120kg) just SOL most of the time. He really hates shopping, and although I love to stalk stores waiting for a bargain, that’s his version of hell. He also really hates to wait for stuff (no delayed gratification here), not to mention that it’s hard enough to find things that fit him, so instead of thinking “let’s wait till that goes on clearance” it’s “quick, snap it up before all the big sizes go!”

Did I mention he is also really hard on his clothes? He’s the typical boys’ boy, likes to mess around with cars, wrestle, roll around in the mud etc. (Kidding about the last one…sort of). He’s either vegging out being a couch potato, or being super active. Clothing never lasts long – it stretches, rips, gets irreversibly stained, etc.

His sturdy Dickies are finally giving out, and I’m dreading shopping for him. No $20 pants for this boy, not like me. And he needs a dress shirt or two. And a light jacket. And jeans.

Anyone got great tips for shopping for an extra large person?

Wishlist

There are so many things I need to buy right now.

For the house: A toilet brush, new kitchen and bathroom sponges, bulldog clips to hold up my hanging shoe organiser, and new sheets – I’ve had most of my bed linen for almost four years! Am loving my new duvet though – the old one must have shrunk, because it didn’t fill out the covers anymore. SO annoying, having empty fabric all around the edges.

For me:  new facial moisturiser, a short jacket (my long coat looks ridiculous with casual outfits), a new bag (have my eye on one at the moment, but have only set aside $30 towards it so far and it costs $50), socks and underwear. I’d also like a long line cardi and some tops, and sandals and casual shorts for summer, but they can wait. In the meantime, I’ve cut off the legs of some old jeans and now have a pair of somewhat cute denim shorts. I just have to sew up the hems…

T needs a new wallet (his is literally falling apart), singlets, and a jacket. Earlier this year (or late last year?) someone decided to start a fight at a party, bottled him in the head (yeah, REAL classy) and I awoke in the middle of the morning to him coming home with a bleeding head. To top it off, his awesome checkered jacket was stolen. Honestly, it was the styliest thing he ever owned, and it didn’t make him over heat – a thankless task – as it had a nice cool lining, even in the hood.

This one’s for the girls

Following my recent laundry mishap (I lost THREE bras to a single wash/dry episode) I really, really badly needed to go bra shopping. I don’t know about anyone else, but three bras is a lot to me…it’s almost half of my entire bra collection. I don’t exactly have a large chest, so it’s not uber important to me to have a super well made, super comfortable bra…as long as it fits fairly well without chafing or riding and isn’t fussy and lacy, I’m on board. Thanks to rock bottom sales, the Bendon outlets, and Dress Smart, I think the average price I pay for a bra is between $5-10. I wear them till they give out and then reluctantly begin the hunt all over again.

Luckily for me, I managed to pick up three brand spanking new bras for just $21 at BnT in DressSmart . Considering they were all originally $40 to 45, that’s a steal. I kind of want to describe them or even post pics, because I’m kind of in love with them, but I think that verges ever so slightly on TMI.

And then the checkout girl asked if I wanted the matching underwear. BLANK.

I’ve never in my life bothered to buy a matching set. I just don’t see the point. But I’ll note it down on my list of things to do before I die (along with flying first class…somewhere, anywhere). I’d be too disorganised to actually wear them together, and despite being told I should never wear the same bra two days in a row…well, I do. Methinks it would make more sense to buy two matching bottoms for every one bra.

I’m pretty sure I break a lot of the rules when it comes to bras. I don’t spend much. I wear them more than once before washing them. I don’t replace them every six months and I don’t buy matching bra/knicker sets. And I don’t lovingly arrange them in a drawer organised by colour/fabric/X-factor. I have a lingerie wash bag, but I don’t always use it (plus, it seems to unzip itself in the wash about half the time, voiding its purpose entirely).

Come to think of it, that’s probably why those three bras gave up the ghost on me. It’s karma.

My plan was to buy me a dress for under $50 for my friend’s party next weekend. The only stipulation is we can’t show up in black! I was keen for something in one of these colours:

Combed Recycle Boutique, the chain stores, the crazy minimall of Asian fashion shops in Atrium on Elliot and DressSmart.  But nup, no luck.

We did however, scoop a major bargain for BF at the Dickies outlet in DressSmart. Grey Dickies pants (go for well over $100 retail, were $69 at the outlet branch, and $52.50 after a further 25% special Queen’s Birthday discount)! Something I’ve been wanting for him for ages, but Dickies aren’t cheap. So instead of buying me a dress I don’t really need (I still don’t know what I’m wearing for her birthday, but I’ll sort something out…two of my dresses are too casual, one is black, and the other two far too formal; might have to work the separates), we got him some sturdy, NICE pants to wear to the party.

I love the Warehouse’s return policy.

I don’t know so much about their 10c plastic bag charge, but that’s why when I bought a new kettle yesterday I decided to spend 99c on a pretty red reusable canvas bag.

Then I got home and found our flatmate’s GF already got us another one.

Luckily the Warehouse lets you return anything within 12 months as long as it’s in a resaleable condition with a receipt.

They didn’t used to require a receipt at all, but apparently too many people were abusing the system. It’s still way more generous than most retailers though!

So, no poorer than when I started (minus the red bag). I wonder if I still get to keep my rewards points from the purchase, or do they retract them along with the refund?

I actually NEED to go shopping!

Today I realised something: I really, really badly need new underwear.

And a new bag.

I’ve had my silver handbag for, oh, three years? It only cost me about $15 and has held up pretty well, but is starting to wear pretty heavily. The fabric is fraying and the underlayer is showing through around the seams.

Maybe something along these lines…

As for underwear, well, when when things start to lose their elasticity and go seethrough…..

And I’m due for a couple of new bras – just can’t afford it!

The $60 refund I received from DTR came through, but it’s going to have to go towards just paying the bills this week instead of paying for new contacts.

Why? Well, mainly because of our huge power bill. Now that we know the culprit (the evil power sucking water cylinder, soaking up electricity yet not heating our water…what’s the point of paying exorbitant power bills if it’s not delivering you any benefit?), once it’s fixed our bills should return to normal. Yay!

Shopping adventures

Finally got around to visiting Dress Smart today! The cute blue woollen top that caught my eye in Portmans (the city branch) a wee while back is now mine. I went back to buy it a couple of weeks ago, only to find them all gone. I spoke to the sales girl, who told me they had JUST literally shipped the remaining tops over to their outlet store.

Anyway, I went to the Dress Smart store today. It was marked down another $10 to $20, and when they scanned the label it was another 20 per cent off! So just over $15 for a top that was originally $60. Go me! I must NEVER EVER shop anywhere else but Dress Smart.

SO, very happy and feeling pretty pleased with myself…

Then onto grocery shopping. We splashed out on some chai tea, two cute mugs (red and yellow, drinking receptacles NEVER last in this house, they all get broken. Our bowls and plates have all pretty much also mysteriously disappeared. I hate it here), got some flour and sugar (I anticipate some baking) and some Worcestershire sauce along with the usual suspects. I’m trying to get more greens into our diet, so there’s going to be a lot of salads this week for dinner.

Our checkout girl today wasn’t very onto it. She forgot to process one of our mugs, and I had to pay for it separately (luckily I had a lot of change and paid in cash, it would have really annoyed me to have to swipe my card again). I did my best to check the items as they went through the checkout, but they whizzed through so fast I missed one of the 2 for $5 specials. It cost us about 6.60 instead. I did catch that on the receipt as we left, but figured a dollar something wasn’t worth going back for. It did annoy me, though.

Spotted a few new flavours in the cake mix aisle. I’m excited to try them! Just have to wait for a special….the prices are a little steep.

Yeah I know….I could find a homestyle recipe but the pictures were just sooo pretty and tempting…and I’m both a lousy and hopeless baker. I once tried to make a marble cake. Never again. It did not in any way resemble food. As much as I tried, it was totally inedible.

The vanilla package looked heaps better instore…it was a different box, but this is all I could find.

Online Shopping (NZ)

Hereby, a list of the best shopping sites for NZ (according to me and what I buy!)

The Deal
Awesome, awesome site. Gets heaps of random last minute/ends of lines, that kind of thing. The Deal should be your first stop for random browsing! Clothes, shoes, beauty, makeup, homewares, basically everything. Of course the range varies widely so it pays to check back often. You can be really lucky and score stuff up to 90% off, and they sometimes do free shipping too.

Dump It

Cheap looking site, but has some gems from time to time. It’s a discount store where suppliers dump stock they can’t move. Categories are a bit limited.

Strawberry net

The place to get makeup and skincare online! Big brands, at lower prices. They don’t have absolutely everything by everyone but the selection is pretty good. There’s a huge range; I’ve honestly never heard of some of the brands.

Less for Specs

Site is not the flashest, but the service is unbeatable. It’s really personal; they go the extra mile to help you. And cheap! Not so much the frames maybe (at least in my case) but certainly the lenses. Online is where it’s at!

Lenses Online

There are a bunch of contact lens sites but I like this one. Prices are super competitive. That’s really my only criteria for lenses, as long as they’re in stock! I had issues processing my payment, so I rung up and we did it over the phone. Seriously, if you’re still buying your contacts in store, STOP. You’re being ripped off.

Price Spy

Really hard to read and navigate, but it’s amazing how much is on here. Basically this is the place to compare prices and check out if something is a good deal or not.

I haven’t been very impressed with the sales assistants I’ve come across this week. We tripped it over to the Warehouse and picked up two shirts and two singlets for the boy (30%, came to just under $5 each!) Got to the car, realised we’d been charged for five things instead of four, and had to get in line at the infamous customer service desk queues. They refunded the money to my credit card – something which I think is really cool but am always a bit wary about – how can you REALLY know they returned the money, until you can go away and check your statement? Even more so with a credit card, as transactions don’t show up for a few days.

Yesterday we spent about two painful, arduous hours at Dick Smith. We unfortunately had the pushiest, most annoying sales lady. A super fob Asian type, whose favourite phrase seemed to be “Yes, this is the same, but different” when asked about various computer models. Even when one was far superior, with double the RAM, hard drive and a way better intel chip. Pissed me off no end. That, and the fact she asked “So which one do you want?” about five times. Lady, I get that we were the hardest sale you ever made. You were annoyed. You wanted us the hell out of there but wanted your commission. You were trying to close the deal. IT DID NOT WORK. WE WEREN’T READY. And phrasing it that bluntly did not endear us anymore towards you!

DSE needs to train their staff up a bit more. For example: one of the laptops clearly stated: 2 year warranty. One of the salesmen who nudged in was insistent it only had a one year warranty, despite the contrary evidence. He also refused to believe that the Toshiba came with a $1 camera, phone or tech pack deal, despite it very clearly being advertised in their current mailer (but for some reason not on the stand).

Same with the fobby woman. I went to ask her what was included in the camera pack, to which she responded “that deal is finished – no more!” That’s when I nearly lost it, after her constant nagging “which computer do you want?” I pointed out the mailer was current until 16/2, there was no “limited time only” or “until stocks last” disclaimer. Lady had to go consult her manager, for christ’s sake. I always thought that advertised specials should be honoured in store, no dramas – clearly an outdated concept.

So to summarise – I did, in the end, get me a Toshiba – and a camera with SC card, batteries, cable and bag for 849. Well, half of that, courtesy of my dear mother. It’s great to rejoin the online world! it’s a bit of a step down – the specs on my stolen Compaq were approximately double everything on this. although, I do prefer the keyboard on this one. As long as it lasts the rest of the year, I’m happy.

I was keen on an Acer with dual core processor and 2g with two year warranty, however my mum preferred a similar Compaq with a one year warranty. BF couldn’t stomach the thought of getting the Compaq as the Acer had far superior graphics for the same price… but as I was only paying half, I didn’t really feel I could push the issue. And I went with what I’d planned to get all along, this Toshiba with the Olympus Fe-20 camera. Beggars, choosy, etc. However, I’m not keen to repeat that two hour ordeal – as much as I appreciate my mum’s contribution, I think next time I’ll suck it up and pay for it all – and choose a better computer, with longer warranty, and be out in half an hour, tops.