Christmas is over, you spent the last month shopping for other people, everything's discounted and you're about to embark on an orgy of self-gifting. You're experiencing sales euphoria!

First thing's first: set your alarm early. There'll be no crowds for you – no siree. You'll be ready to start shopping at 9am sharp, before all those other suckers wake up.

Turns out your body's not in an early morning place right now. You sleep in. You can't find the gift voucher you got for Christmas, and all that holiday weight gain is slowing you down. You arrive at the shops at 11.30am.

No matter – it's all still to play for, and you're a tiger. You walk into the first shop, feeling strong, confident and optimistic. It's a bunfight. This might have been a terrible mistake.

Everywhere you look, grown women are fighting over discounted knitwear like vultures over a wildebeest carcass. Luckily, you remain calm and poised.

You gather your strength and start sifting through the sales rails. You've had your eye on this dress all season! Wait no, they don't have it in your size. In fact none of the nice things are in your size.

You can feel your standards starting to slip as you survey all the discounts. Under normal circumstances you'd never pick up this dress in a million years, but it's so cheap. You would be crazy not to try it on.

This jumper would fit you, but it's got a nasty foundation stain on it. Still, that probably means you could wangle an extra 10% off at the till, so...

By now you've grabbed a dozen items to try on and you're perspiring heavily. You head for the fitting room, where the queue is approximately 1000 women long, and for some reason everyone smells of feet. You feel a rising sense of impatience.

Twenty minutes later, with aching arms and a short temper, you get into a cubicle. Four of the items look hideous on you. Three won't do up properly. One, which you found in the dirt-cheap bargain bin, has what looks like a third sleeve. 

BUT THE OTHER THREE ARE AMAZING! Your efforts have paid off and you've never felt so smug. 

Of course now there's a long queue to pay for them. But you remain calm by gazing at the shoppers still arriving – they're so naive, with no idea of the horrors that await. You feel like a soldier returning from (sales) war, and you congratulate yourself on a job well done. Because even though you'd never have bought any of this stuff at full price, you've got three new purchases for under £100 and you're a goddamn sales hero.