So it’s six geese a-laying and we have eaten goose for Christmas but it would seem that most people in the UK eat turkey on Christmas Day so here are six turkeys, utter fails that happened during the year.
My rogues’ gallery includes the Ziip (2nd one, as the first one gave up the ghost suddenly after 9 months) which was lauded by all sorts of beauty type influencers as the New Big Thing that delivers electric nanocurrent deep into your skin. I quite liked mine though I think its effects did vary, but the nanocurrents worked so well that one of the electrodes eroded and the rough, scratchy result was unusable on my face. People who bought it this year, reading about it as a top New Year pick are just about to discover that this happens. I do hope they haven’t accumulated too much stock of the gold or silver conduction gel, highly expensive consumable that has to be used with the Ziip.
In a similar vein is the Dr Dennis Gross LED eye mask. Now, I did like this and used it every day after my shower and I think I saw some improvement around my eyes. This started to fall apart after three months and the plastic perished shortly afterwards, just as many of its Amazon reviews had predicted, so it turns out.
Though I don’t cook much these days, I have been able to experiment with a few new recipes. I was mesmerised by cloud-like mochi enveloping heavenly chunks of mango, that I first tried in Tai-O in the spring. (I subsequently raved about them to Susan and I think I overegged my enthusiasm because she seemed to think they were a bit meh.) I scoured the internet for DIY recipes and there were several simple ones but something went horribly wrong and I ended up with a sort of gelatinous goo pudding. The next time I tried, using my new bread machine, the mochi came out a bit better but it hardened and was quite unpleasant, so heavenly soft mochi remains a work in progress.
A failure that resulted in a revelation was my bread effort during the summer. Loaf after bagel refused to rise and I was left with stodgy pudding instead of a normal wholemeal loaf. It was only once I’d replaced my bread machine twice (long story) that I discovered that rise is affected in ambient temperatures of 25C and above. An easy fix for this was to refrigerate the water for the loaf overnight and put the air conditioning on during the time the bread machine is at work. I suspect my disappointing Christmas panettone was another casualty of a too-hot kitchen. Despite the stodgy, this year’s was wolfed down by the fam in a couple of days so I’m contemplating making another and using the aircon this time.
A disappointment after the huge hype was Pat McGrath’s foundation system. I like the brushes and the primer but the foundation itself is so drying that it can only be worn in the most humid of times here. I didn’t bother taking it to London with me. I’ve passed it on to the next generation, who are likely to have skin oilier than mine. The face powder was an evil cloud. For one thing I was automatically sent a shade that was far too dark and yellow for my skin tone but the copious explosion of powder that sprang from the inadequate packaging left a huge mess everywhere on my (rented) dressing table nook. Never again.
The final major failure this year was that of democracy in the UK. We happened to be there at the end of August when #BrexitJohnson announced that he was proroguing parliament for five weeks to “prepare for the Queen’s Speech,” meaning that the biggest travesty of democracy was subject to almost no scrutiny and the resulting failed Brexit state will soon be upon us. I shall never forgive people who excused, dismissed, waved away this disgusting failure. It’s not enough to wash my hands of it and let them bear the consequences. More that half of voters in the recent general election voted against the Conservatives, against this flagship policy of abject stupidity and ignorance and yet we’re all being dragged off that cliff. People will lose their jobs. People who have lived here for years will be deported. People will die. For shame.