Hackette Tanya Gold’s habit of sharing with readers virtually every detail of her life (no matter how dull, intimate or embarrassing) has made Axegrinder suspect she is rather light in the friends department. If she had friends, she could confess all to them rather than readers of the Daily Mail, Guardian etc.
Now I fear she is about to lose another friend … and all because she felt the need to tell Guardian readers how she hates wedding lists.
On Wednesday she wrote: “Three weeks I ago I received a wedding list from a friend. Let me be more accurate. She used to be a friend, but as her wedding looms she has been replaced by a shape-shifting, John Lewis-icking monster.”
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The friend’s error was to want “ice-crushers and cookbook holders and spoons. Give them to me, she squawks through her John Lewis proxy, because I am in love – and that means I get consumer durables for free! I demand a new kitchen – and you will pay for it!”
Gold, who we know from past revelatory pieces (and endless photographs) is rather keen on her food, favours another type of wedding gift.
“I will take my friend out for dinner … Although I suspect she will probably stick the cutlery in her bag and take it home.”
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When the article appeared on the Guardian website, it didn’t take long for Gold’s poor friend to deliver her verdict. In a comment posted on Wednesday lunchtime (a time when the hungry hack was unlikely to be at her computer), someone called Jo Holland posted the following:
“As the bride referred to in the piece I should point out that Tanya was invited to my wedding but no wedding list was included in her invitation because I know how much she hates them.
“I do have a wedding list at John Lewis which I can appreciate is bourgeois but we decided that it would be practical, though by no means compulsory. The irony in all this is that I really, really don’t care about gifts and have never even brought the subject up with Tanya (my dress, I concede is another matter). It might sound trite but all I want is a happy unforgettable day surrounded by people I love. My wedding is less than a month away and frankly, Tanya I don’t want any spoons but I’m not sure that I want you at my wedding either.”
Oh dear, another weekend at home beckons for poor old Tanya.
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