So, I no longer have a credit card.

It wasn't exactly my choice, I must admit. But after my nth call to Barclaycard to request a lower rate than the 24.9 per cent APR I was paying, and their nth refusal to change it, I cancelled it altogether. 

I am furious, so forgive the following rant because I am absolutely blue with fury. 

What, exactly, does Barclaycard consider to be a good customer? One who has been a client for 25 years? One who owns her house outright and her car outright? Who has no loans or mortgages? Who periodically pays off her balance entirely, always pays off the minimum each month and who pays by direct debit so she can never miss a payment?

And yet they couldn't wait to get rid of me. To say that I am beside myself with rage would be an understatement.

The issue is that, clearly, I don't fit into one of their little pigeonholes, so I am no use to them. I don't have a monthly salary, being freelance, and I don't have high outgoings. That is the kind of client the banks really want, so they can pull you in, fling you over a barrel and keep you there indefinitely. They are scumbags. No wonder the world economy is in such a mess. Over the years I've gotten well sick of banks phoning me up trying to get me to take out a loan, or a mortgage, or a remortgage for an extension I don't need or a car I don't want.  

Back in the UK I have a friend, C, who with her partner runs an electrical goods shop, selling televisions etc. She has been amazed these past 10 years at the people who are buying the equipment - unemployed people, people on income support, people from the local council estate. The Waynes and Waynettas of the kingdom, or what we British call 'Chavs'.

"It's all on tick (credit) Trish," she told me, gobsmacked. "You know - WE can't afford these things, these plasma-screen TVs and stuff - we just have an old colour telly. But all these people have credit cards and they come in here and they drop thousands..."

Myself and C, who was a nursing matron for many years, come from the same kind of background. Our parents weren't wealthy. They were modest, hard-working people (we too lived on the council estate), but in those days credit - 'the tick' - was frowned upon.

My parents regarded it as little better than the pawnshop and what we couldn't afford to buy, including our television, we rented. We bought almost nothing new - not cars, not furniture, not even clothes. "If you can't buy it from your savings, then you can't afford it," was their mantra, and over the years I have come to agree with them.

The truth is that the credit card exists to fill the gap between the person you are and the person you'd like to be - and God help you if that gap is too wide. 

Time was when, blithe about my employment prospects, I'd run up large amounts on the credit card (though never more than a couple of grand) and just for things I wanted, rather than needed. But over the years I noticed the APR getting higher and I switched to using the card only for overseas purchases where I couldn't use a debit card (Paypal, Amazon.com etc). But this is not the kind of client the credit companies want - the careful, organised shopper. They are simply not making enough money out of me.

So, now that credit stream is closed to me, and it looks like I won't be buying from overseas any more (though luckily I can use a debit card on Amazon.co.uk).

Oh la. If that's the way they want it. No-one has a right to credit, but all I wanted was a reasonable rate - the kind of rate that they offer their new customers. And if they can't offer me that, then screw them - I'll manage without.  

Happy New Year folks, and I hope you're all well.

This is my first blog for a while, having been vegging out over the Christmas period watching daft films on telly and eating too much chocolate (thank you sister and MIL). 

Christmas is always an odd time for an unbeliever, especially one married to such a rampant atheist as the DH. He usually gets into a strop about all the religious stuff and stomps off to the office to write to The Times or somesuch. Me, I'd go carol-singing, if the French did it, even though I don't believe a word of it - tradition can be a wam and fuzzy thing. 

We didn't have a proper Christmas meal this year. Instead I cooked a chicken Indian style and we took it to the coast on Christmas Eve as a picnic. It was a glacial, sunny day and we ran the dog ragged, ate in the car and wandered home through the sunset. On the day itself, we split a raclette - a sort of Swiss tabletop grill thing - which is a lot of fun and very little washing up. The cats got turkey Whiskas and the dog got turkey Friskies, and a good time was had by all. 

However, it was definitely an austerity Christmas this year and the truth is, the whole neighbourhood is crippled with apprehension. One friend is on a two-day week now, which is hard when she has three children and a disabled husband. Just before it, at a get-together, another friend burst into tears as it looked like she was going to have to declare bankruptcy due to the economic downturn. Luckily, the bank have not foreclosed and they live to fight another day, but just after Christmas, yet another friend closed up his business and has signed on for work, unable to meet the ridiculously high charges we all pay here in France. 

It can be hard. I recently calculated that we have 7,500 euros compulsory payments to pay out this year before we even earn a penny, much less make a profit. They include payments for poor rural families, compulsory pension, healthcare, 'professional tax', and accountancy fees. Meanwhile, our earnings are down by a third because of the drop in the value of sterling (a constant problem when you earn money in one currency and spend it in another), and work is getting very tight, with journalists being laid off, embargoes on freelancers and pagination dropping. In many ways, we would be better off if we stopped working. 

What is one to do?  Keep one's head up, I suppose. And so I am starting up a downshifting blog, which will talk about measures one can take to stay afloat in a tanking economy, from making your own toiletries to creating meals for a euro a head. I'll keep it separate from Second Cherry, and it won't be as frequent, but I'll let you know when it's up and running. Watch this space.

Since times are tight and we all need a little help to look good, I thought I'd trawl Amazon and see what's out there for those of us who have a beer income but champagne fashion tastes.

I can't recommend any of these books personally, but they all look worth a punt. Maybe I should write my own...

How to be a budget fashionista, by Kathryn Finney. 

I'm sure most of us are familiar with Kathryn's blog, The Budget Fashionista, which is always worth a visit. This book is very definitely for the American reader, dealing as it does with outlet malls, shopping at Sears and other things that Europeans aren't familiar with, but it gets nearly five stars on Amazon, so current readers are clearly very happy with it. 

Closet smarts, by Emily Neal

Written by an image consultant, this book, which also gets four and a half stars on Amazon, is all about going shopping in your own closet - something I'm a big fan of. We all know those horrible stats about how few of our clothes we wear (about 30 per cent), and one reason is that we buy stuff that doesn't go with our other stuff. In theory, after reading this book, you should be able to make your existing clothes work better for you without spending a fortune on new things. 

Secondhand Chic by Christa Weil

"Pointers not just on finding great buys in consignment, thrift, vintage, and resale shops, but for quality shopping in general," according to one ecstatic reviewer. This book covers how to get great clothes second-hand, including how to buy online. Again, aimed at the American reader. 

Any or all of these books might be a good stocking filler for the fashionista in your life - even if it's yourself. 

I was very interested to read a story in today's Telegraph about the rise and rise of discount stores in the UK.

It's because of the credit crunch, apparently.

They're mainly looking at Aldi and Lidl - both German, and both privately-owned companies with no shareholders to please - whose growth is burgeoning in the UK. A profound change, according to the Telegraph, where "Until recently, Britain had the most class-conscious shopping habits in Europe. Where you shopped traditionally spoke volumes about your social status".

I'd kind of forgotten that, thank God, having lived in France for nearly a decade. Britain IS a screamingly class conscious society and it affects every level of life. I remember being delighted when I could afford to shop at Marks and Spencer instead of Tesco's, an attitude of mind that now strikes me as unbelievably daft, along with the £100 a month I used to waste on a Vidal Sassoon haircut, silly arse that I was. 

However, these days I am far too old and cynical, and also far too intellectually arrogant to fall for bollocks like the idea that because Lidl is a discount store I shouldn't be seen dead in it. Apart from anything else, the DH and I were introduced to Lidl by our Swedish lodgers, who were delighted to find familiar brands in the UK and we'd shopped there for quite a while before I cottoned on to the fact that the prices were also much cheaper than Tesco's. Doh.

British supermarkets typically load up to 40 per cent onto the price of goods, which, as the Telegraph points out, leaves discount retailers a huge margin on which to make a profit but still offer low prices - all you have to do is not be as greedy as Tesco, Sainsbury's, Waitrose et al. The quality of the food is no different - in fact, Lidl's fruit and veg are often fresher than those at my other local supermarket.

The only downside is that the range is very limited, so if you don't, for instance, like the brand of dried dates they stock, you have to go elsewhere. I do the main shop at Lidl (meat, fish, fruit n veg, bread etc) and then get back in the car and do the top-up shop at our local SuperU in order to buy organic milk, eggs and yoghurt, and routine household things such as cleaning alcohol and washing soda. However, that top-up-shop costs the same as, if not more than, the basic shop, which is illuminating to say the least.

Nevertheless, I am continually surprised at how many of my friends (most of whom are downshifters and survive on about £8,000 a year) still won't shop at Lidl because it means going to two supermarkets. The supermarkets are at either side of my small town, about 3km apart, so yes, it's a bit of a pain to have to drive to both, but on the other hand, it's cut my expenditure by about a quarter. 

I am very grateful for Lidl having fetched up in my town, but another friend, who is always trying to find a way to save a buck or two, has now suggested that I try out Mutant. I have to admit, the name has always put me off somewhat(!), but she says the quality is actually very good, so next time I'm in Domfront, I'll pay it a visit. 

A friend popped round to see me the other day. She's one of those people who comes and goes with the season, she and her husband spending some of their time in Britain, some in France and some - though increasingly little, what with petrol prices the way they are - at their house in Spain.

Despite having been solidly middle class most of their lives, in retirement they are feeling the pinch. And the sign? She's buying a clothes horse. 

Oddly enough, I'd had the self-same conversation with my sister only hours earlier. She too was looking for a clothes horse - evidently something of a rare beast now in the UK, where people are expected to use tumble dryers. Since clothes horses are ubiquitous in my neck of the woods, where virtually no-one owns a tumble dryer, I advised her to wait until she visits me next month and take one home with her.

It is the size of their last electricity bill that has inspired both of these women to stop using the tumble dryer, as I myself did two years ago after a whopping 500 euro bill. "I bet 200 of that is the tumble dryer," I said, and so it proved to be. A shame, because I did, and do, like the softness that tumble drying gives to your clothes and the ease of washing the bedding, drying it and getting it back on the bed in a single day.

However, as we all know, tumble dryers are the children of Satan. They are bad for the planet - I got no sympathy from friends when I gave mine up, as they'd thought me a decadent cow for having one at all. They consume a vast amount of electricity and they also destroy your clothes - just look at what's in the lint trap: that's your clothes disintegrating. My clothes now show far less damage for NOT being tumble dried (and interestingly, in cotton things, less shrinkage too). 

An American friend, Linda, would be horrified. She can't get over the way the French hang their washing OUTSIDE on lines to dry, where people can SEE it - to her, a sign of complete hillbillydom. Well, I guess that's a cultural thing - she's probably changing her tune now that the bills are rocketing. 

I dry my clothes on two flat dryers that open out like big ironing boards and which are great for reblocking sweaters etc (I don't have a washing line outside). In summer, they just stand outside the door, hopefully in the sun, while in winter I have a different routine. I put a washload on when we light the woodburner each evening, then just before we go to bed, I empty the washer and put the clothes out on the rack to dry overnight in front of the stove. That way, you use up the excess heat and you don't have wet washing cluttering up the house during the day.  

The smell of it is comforting somehow - I grew up in a house with only a coal stove and no central heating, so it's the smell of childhood, I guess. And at least I have the satisfaction of single-handedly saving the planet. 

Watch out for an article on economising later in the week.