Rocking the sunhat in winter

I went to Mountain Warehouse, to ask if they had any packaway sunhats. ‘We don’t have any summer hats’ the teen sales girl told me. ‘It’s winter’.

You could have knocked me over with a frozen feather.

I went to Millet’s. ‘I know it’s winter’ I said (by now knowing the drill and not wanting to be mistaken for a seasonally disturbed personage) ‘but I’m going to India and I wondered if you had any packaway large-brimmed hats’
‘I’ll see what I can find upstairs’ said the sales assistant, and returned five minutes later with about ten hats for me to try on. ‘When are you going ? Oh, so you’ve got a bit of time…’

I tried them all on and chose the blue one. It packs flat and offers UV protection. The shop man advised me not to pack any valuables in the zipped pocket in the hat (!) in case a thief stole it. I replied that I was more worried about monkeys stealing it, and that I was glad it had a chinstrap, for that very reason !

I find this level of service reassuring. Goodness knows, I could buy a roll up hat in India for a couple of hundred rupees (£2) and lose it the same day, as one of our party did last year, but I like to be prepared.

Why buy a hat today anyway? I got a message from TML, whose youngest daughter had asked me about a game, Bugdom 2, wondering if it was the same game I used to play on my
MacBook a long time ago. I was over the moon to find that it still exists, and went and found a whole suite of games by the same developer, Pangea, for the iPhone. Asked Steve if he remembered buying it for my birthday, a million years ago. No, he said, but would I like the suite for my birthday present this year? I said ‘thanks, but I think I have a free trial of some games, so I’ll take that first, and concentrate on something practical to take to India’.

Hence the hat. Now, excuse me while I find out more about this game-trial …. apparently, women in their thirties enjoy gaming. I was definitely in my thirties when I got my first iMac, which came loaded with Bugdom 1, and likely in my forties by the time I was playing Bugdom 2. Exciting to think that I could waste even more time in my sixties playing Bugdom and other such games involving fighting off giant insects and possibly even dinosaurs !