The Chronicles Of…

Last year I bought a jacket at Camden markets in London, well… actually I kinda bought 2. The first jacket I bought was really the one I wanted -it was predominately green with a yellow stripe down the arm – but… the zipper broke within about 20 minutes, and so I went through all the hassle of trying to get my money back which was basically impossible.

In the end I had to exchange the jacket for one which I didn’t like as much (great deal…). It was still nice – 100% cotton, made in Nepal, mostly blue with a couple of red an white stripes down the arm and a couple of big white panels on the sides (very patriotic). The zipper worked fine on this one, and so I walked away a partially satisfied customer…

Yesterday I washed this jacket for the first time since buying it (which isn’t as bad as it sounds because I’ve only worn it a handful of times last winter… really…).

All’s well until I pulled out the jumper to find the jumper had run all over itself (which I find an amusing expression). What I mean is that the blue dye has pretty much stained everything else on the jacket. It’s no longer blue red and white, it’s blue, light blue, spotty blue, and red with blue spots… Admittedly the washing instruction do say wash by hand in cold water, but I mean really, come on, who reads the labels? We’ve all put stuff in the dryer that says “do not tumble dry” haven’t we? But what was I supposed to do, cut white bits out of the jacket?

I have no idea where to go from here. Do I just keep washing it until it’s all a nice shade of the same blue? do I try some bleach? Do I soak it in water and drop it off the balcony in an experiment to see if it falls faster? I don’t know…

I can’t help but think that if I had the green jacket I wanted, I wouldn’t have this problem… though I wouldn’t have a zipper either.