How to shop.

Do you shop better alone or accompanied? It depends on whom you're shopping with. It may be that shopping alone, you go exactly to the items you need and efficiently purchase them. No one grouses about the money or engages in any other wearying naysaying. But, alone, you may wander about aimlessly and think too much and decide you don't really need or like anything. Yesterday, three of us drove two-and-a-half hours to Chicago to shop, and, without question, the accompaniment facilitated shopping. Not only did nonstop conversation make the five hours in the car breeze by, my friends prevented the usual dithering. I could see that making a purchase entertained my co-shoppers. If you're going to spend money, it's good to bring people with you -- not naysayers, good shoppers -- because your yielding up of the credit card will delight them. Somehow I managed to spend the most money. (I live to entertain.) The shopping trip culminated in Tiffany's, where we all went in for fun and all left with those tiny blue shopping bags. Since I was the official high spender, mine had two little white-ribbon-tied boxes in it.