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The green-legged monster

Oh horrors. The fall fashion pages are full of coloured tights.

Coloured tights! Agh! I remember those from the first time round (sadly, a recurring theme as I sail perilously close to my mid-thirties). And I remember them with serious misgivings.

Coloured tights is not a look that can be carried off by normal folk. They only work if you are under 21, have legs like twigs and the sort of panache that enables you to carry off a quirky look. If, like me, 21 is a distant memory, you have legs like a Shetland pony, and wearing anything other than black (except in the height of summer) makes you feel foolish in the fear that you look slightly insane rather than delightfully kooky, then I beg you to steer clear.

The only pleasing aspect of this latest resurrection of the fashion disasters of my youth is that this time round the tights are opaque rather than see-through. I still shudder at the memory of my appearance at the school disco with legs clad in bright red 15-deniers, feeling pretty snappy and more than a little bit cool. Until I saw a picture of myself a week later, that is, looking as if my calves had been flayed raw. Not my finest moment.

You know, I can't wait until I get to the point where I can't give a stuff about fashion. I never did do it very well. These days, I might buy the fashionable looks but they increasingly languish in my wardrobe - what might look passable on me in the boutique feels way to foolish in the street; the baby-doll dress, the footless tights, the up-to-my butt smock, the slashed-to-the-navel top -what on earth was I thinking? It's fashion madness and, frankly, I'm old enough to know better.

I might be 21 in my head but gravity disagrees.

I'm off to invest in a pair of magic knickers and some nice tailored seperates. After all, there's something distinctly unsavoury about mutton displaying itself as a fashion lamb (to the slaughter).

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