Can I offer your giraffe a biscuit?

Toni Maticevski.

No, I've never heard of him either, but from the line outside The Altman building on W18th, you'd think he was the next coming of Christ.

When I finally get inside I am shoved a ticket with 'ST' on which I assume is industry abbreviation for 'standing'. I trudge over to another line and accept my fate as bottom of the fashion feeding chain. At the shows, who you are depends not just on where you sit, but if you get seated at all. Those given a standing position are pet food.



But 20 minutes later I hear the golden words from a PR- "Grab a spare seat if you can" I forget my Britishness and scramble frantically over a line of tightly packed fash people to claim my place in the second row. If there was room I would do the running man in celebration.

The show begins. A freakishly thin giraffe necked girl stalks down the runway in a full chiffon dress. Kinda grey. Then another giraffe in more grey. Not understated good grey, just dull, not invited to the party grey. I am fascinated by a model who is doing a kind of Monty Python walk in her 8 inch heels. The skinniness is breathtaking.

More heart stopping is what follows. Somehow the clothes have mutated into a incomprehensible mess. Stretch transparent Lycra with unfathomable sequin embellishment. Knickers on show at the back, more chiffon in a dollar store floral with a bunched up grandad jacket.




It's like boudoir met punk in a pub and had a one night stand...in 1986. At one point a Madonna-esque sequin bra floats by in a haze of my disbelief. It all screams cheap, market stall tat. Is anyone else thinking the same?





Right on cue the man next to be lets out a gigantic yawn.

''Oh god!" he laughs "Am I that obvious?"
I smile and put my hand over my mouth to address him "What do you think of this?"
"Do you know the designer? he whispers
"Fuck no!" I say
"It's a mess!" he tells me "It's like a student show. A bad one."
"Oh my god! I think the same! It's like a customising project gone wrong."
"It's a horrible miss match and only two of the models can even walk properly."

I smile at my partner in bitchy crime and then when the horror show ends we chat and introduce and shake hands.

I have made my first fashion friend.

Just fix it.

What it is about technical people that makes them think you want to understand what the problem is?

I don't care about what's causing it. Just fix it.

As soon as the man from Time Warner Cable arrives to make the Internet work again I explain that I know nothing about computers and wireless connections. I tell him that I don't know the difference between a router and a modem and that my life is happy that way.


I essentially tell him "Just fix it." in a very roundabout British way. As proof that I am focused on our very definite gender roles I offer him a cup of tea. He laughs. I ask him why that's funny and he says:

"I love your accent." which makes me dig my nails into my arm until a bit of blood comes out.

"Ok! I'm going to leave you to it!" I say with a faux cheerfulness and disappear into the kitchen and do some dishes loudly so it's clear I am occupied and he won't bother me.

"What is your network key?'' he shouts 3 minutes later above the banging of plates.

"I don't know anything about computers." I say defensively
"Yes, but I just need to know what your network key is."
"Well I don't know, because I don't know what one of those is."
"Your network?"
Blank expression from me.
"We should call my husband." I say.
"No Miss, I can fix this, don't worry I will find the network key."

So I leave him to find the key, even though I don't know of any keys that came with the Internet stuff. Where does it fit? What does it lock? Maybe I lost them? I make crashy washing up sounds so it will be clear I'm busy and not bother me again. Doesn't work.

"I think you may have a problem with your router, but I am going to replace the modem anyway." he shouts at me.


I sigh and come back in from the kitchen holding my rubber gloved hands aloft as the clearest sign possible that I am busy doing pink jobs and should not have to be bothered with this bluest of blue jobs and that he is trying to make this Internet thing a purple job and everyone knows that purple jobs don't really exist.

I breathe deeply when he starts mentioning routers again and I allow myself to drift away into a happy place where technical things are fixed by a twinkly fairy who never dares speak of the reasons that things are broken.

''So you gotta problem with your proxy server Miss.'

What language is he speaking?

''I'm ringing my husband."
"No Miss I was just kidding on that last bit! I can fix this, it's just your router."
Oh. Computer humour. I am deadpan.
" I don't know what that is either, I'm ringing my husband."
"No, I can re-establish the modem connection with a hotwire."
Hotwire? I haven't heard that phrase since I dated a football hooligan in the late 80s. What has hotwiring a car got to do with the Internet?



He keeps speaking but all I hear is ''Na noo nam nam blah blah blim blim internet wah wah."

"I'm ringing my husband"

He says no again, but this time I'm not listening because I know that The American is expecting me to fail at this whole getting the Internet fixed thing and therefore actually wants me to fail, so he can swoop in riding a white Macbook and declare me unfit to deal with blue jobs in his absence. So I dial him and pass the phone over to Time Warner Cable man and they speak to each other in perfect harmony like Navi flying the magical forest. Blue Navi.

"It was a mainline ploxim issue with the mighty plexy server widget connecting with the blunket torch fixator?" The Time Warner Cable man says. Possibly.
"Meh." I say
"But it's fixed now."

I check the internet 5 times before I set him free and then bake some cakes.