Jewelry web blog

It’s important to get it right when it comes to choosing things for Girlfriends. My Hedge Fund Girlfriend (HFG) no longer works at a hedge fund, but I can’t be doing with renaming girlfriends just because they change jobs. How will I remember which one is which? HFG now works in a bank and hangs out with fund managers who can make or break share prices with a click of their dealing buttons. They are the people of million-pound bonuses, and she knows how to impress them – her wardrobe is a sea of labels, the staff at Manolo Blahnik in New York know her by name, and when she had a bad haircut a few years ago,tiffany necklaces, she invested in 600 of extensions to put right the damage. Her 44th birthday approached and I knew I had to buy her a present in keeping with her persona.

By contrast, my Headmistress Girlfriend (HMG) is a totally different proposition. She’s only 38; her birthday was in February but I had ignored that. I thought instead I would buy her a gift to mark her appointment to her first headship. No bling here – she wears a very subdued black trouser suit to work each day, I have never seen her in makeup and her jewellery, such as it is, is very discreet. Until I bought her a handbag last year, she had never owned one. She is happiest in a tracksuit, fading into the background, and her brief burst of notoriety involved taking seven wickets for 51 runs in a Test match rather than appearing in Hello! magazine.

I commissioned a pair of earrings each for them from my favourite jeweller. For HFG,tiffany cuff Links, I chose a pair of pink morganite studs – similar to pink diamond studs but of a size that would have needed some serious Russian money if they had been the real thing. They screamed flashiness and would not be comfortable to sleep in.

For HMG, I went to great lengths to commission the most discreet pair of diamond studs that are possible to wear without disappearing into your ear lobe. I thought they would signal class, and would imply serious headmistress values while not inhibiting the bowling action.

HFG works in London,tiffany money clips, so hers were couriered to her; HMG’s were posted, both on the same day. I soon got an e-mail from HFG: "OMG," it said, "I will thank you properly when I see you but they are gorgs and wildly extravagant! you are a wonderful friend!! A security guard brought them up how posh am I!!xx"

I went via her office that evening to buy her a drink. She came out and embraced me. What did you do with the earrings? I asked. Did the security guard make you leave them in the office safe? She looked puzzled. I am wearing them!

I peered at her ear lobes and needed to put my reading glasses on to see what on earth she had in them. My heart sank – yes, the jeweller had sent the wrong parcel to the wrong woman. That meant that the next day Royal Mail would be delivering one of the world’s flashiest pair of pink earrings to the woman least likely to wear pink on the planet

There was nothing for it. I had to come clean. HFG had to be persuaded that I had not really meant to send her a pair of earrings that needed a magnifying glass to find in among all the packaging and HMG had to be persuaded not to open her package the next day for fear that she would decide that I had taken leave of my senses. And that is before they read the notes I had crafted for each of them. HFG, who earns almost exactly 10 times what HMG does, would have been very surprised to find me congratulating her on forthcoming headship,tiffany pendants, and HMG would have thought the note I had sent HFG to be so completely over the top that she might have suspected me of an ulterior motive.

Next time it is iTunes vouchers all round.

mrsmoneypenny@ft.com

Mrs Moneypenny will be appearing at the Edinburgh Fringe daily between August 5 and August 29; www.edfringe.com