Support the Fashion Industry or Naomi Campbell Might be Your Dentist

I am a freaking genius. For some time now my fluffy slippers with the big yellow claws and green fuzzy bits have had a major flaw. I have worn out the bottom near the heels. This means chilly heels when the rest of my feet are toasty warm. Now however thanks to scissors and a leftover newspaper heel chill is a thing of the past. This piece of domestic brilliance is on a par with my judicious use of a stapler to fix the tear in my pyjamas. Shopping for sleepwear has been put off to the indefinite future.

I always feel slightly inferior when I go clothes shopping. I have no idea what might look good or what might suit me. This means I tend to avoid it whenever possible. Walking into a shop where every one of the assistants probably knows more about how I should dress than I do irritates me. Work clothes, no problem. You simply can't go wrong with a fine pinstripe and french cuffs (although last time I bought work clothes I took a friend with me for the sake of safety). Other clothes don't concern me too much, I have a twenty year old t-shirt that I still refer to as my new one because I bought it new rather than second hand.

Second hand shops are great places to buy clothes as long as you don't care particularly what they look like. The only difficulty comes on those rare occasions when I want to look smart but a suit would be overdoing it. Fortunately most of the people I know have got used to my dress sense by now and expect nothing else. It doesn't really matter anyway, all my clothes have a gentle layer of cat fur which no amount of brushing seems to remove. If anybody was asked to describe me they would probably start by saying I'm white and fluffy.

My friend Thomas (who guided my recent suit buying foray) despairs of my casual wardrobe although I can't help thinking that I probably don't have enough clothes with pictures of people playing polo on them for his liking. I can't remember the last time I bought a pair of casual pants that were new, or fitted properly. Eclectic is what I call my wardrobe when challenged. In actual fact it is just a bunch of stuff hanging out in reasonable proximity to each other. The cat sleeps on all of it anyway so obviously it meets with her approval.

I have no fundamental objection to being well dressed, I just refuse to spend any time or money attempting to achieve such a goal. When I see reports on fashion shows I react with a kind of bemused disbelief. How any of the models make it down the runway without collapsing in fits of hysterical laughter at what they're wearing continually amazes me. But I guess they're proud professionals. Grimly they will sit there while the make up artist transforms them into something resembling a slutty panda and the dress makers staple random bits of fabric to their bodies. Then the call comes and they are off, facing the grim challenge of getting from one end of a plank of wood to the other and back again while wearing stilettos made of pasta and decorated with fuzzy disco balls. The female models have it tough too. No wonder they take drugs. I would too if I had to wear that stuff for a living.

Instead I just wear stuff that makes it look as though I spend most of my money on drugs. I don't even look cool and alternative, just badly and cheaply dressed. If ones clothes send a message then the message mine send is "here is someone who spends very little on clothes".

I used to think the fashion industry was pointless and a vast waste of resources that could be better used doing almost anything else but I realise now that I was wrong. Whenever you look at a person or a profession and think "What on earth is the point of that?" just consider what such a person with such a mentality might be up to if they didn't have a career in the fashion industry.

Gangs of stick thin, six foot women would roam the streets beating up pensioners for enough money to buy a decent pair of shoes. People like Giorgio Armani and Yves St Laurent might have gone into architecture or serial killing. Interior decorators would be night club bouncers or airline pilots. The consequences for our civilisation would be catastrophic. Its bad enough that the occasional one wants a music career. Whenever I look at Naomi Campbell and raise my eyebrows I swiftly remind myself that but for modelling she might have been my dentist or my bank manager and then I realise the vast benefit to society of the fashion industry.