January 28, 2004
open for business *ding*
*ding* there you are! sorry for the late opening. snow, you see, and my handsome bakery assistant [the one over there, with the lovely muscles] has been shoveling snow from our little front door for hours. never mind that, it's warm in here and there's a fire roaring. have a seat. switch on that phonograph and let billie holiday do that thing she does so well.
see those little cheesecakes, individually sized on flowered china plates to avoid bickering over slices? you won't see it for long. shivery is laughing her tinkerbell laugh as she passes delicate plates with golden cheesecake out to TCHW, the charming adrian, and... who's that? a shy lurker named neil? well, neil, i'll be holding your coffee hostage until we're properly introduced.
and stuart, very nearly seduced by the wiles of shiv and her cheesecake, has instead asked for death by chocolate. well, he asked for genocide, but i'm afraid the snow has prevented that delivery truck. as a consolation prize, stu darling, i've drawn a little skeleton out of creme icing on your cake. hope that does the trick. now, go drink your mojito like a good lad and take...
... away all karen's winter things! this lass gets special treatment at le bakery, folks. so of course hers is served by the hostess proper. here, dear, have a dessert i've never heard of but managed to whip up to perfection: a csoki ciga and one of my hand-brewed-and-steamed lattes. there, and i've tucked some homemade ginger snaps in your satchel for later. go sit over there...
... mark's entirely too engrossed with the macaroons in his lap and needs to be social. i'll bring his double expresso in a minute, i'm still finding the perfect demi-tasse for it.
*ding* oh, here's a crowd! kate, be a dear and pop behind the counter. oh, deal with gopi, please explain that stuart already ate all the death, he'll have to settle for cake. and marie! a stranger requesting vanilla ... how exciting! here's your french vanilla cake, in miniature of course, with lemon custard and merigue frosting. the tea, though, is raspberry. next time introduce yourself and we'll make it vanilla!
oh, my, stephanie's got coconut icing all over her face from the hummingbird cake. someone give her the iced coffee to wash it down. and wild darling! you're looking well. i had to go to rootland to get you rootbeer, but i would never deny anything to someone requesting my favourites, apple danishes.
well, a bananas foster and more fresh coffee for my pal brendan and i can finally put my feet up with a delicious slice of strawberry shortcake and a tall glass of lemonade.
what's that? yes, kate, you can stop serving coffee now. run in the back, you'll find an entire tray of cupcakes for you, made with our very own cow's milk and chocolates i brought straight from venezuela.
did i say lemonade? i meant vodka. right kate?
avec plaisir... since stuart
since stuart has cornered monday morning coffee racket and no one could dare replace the sublime karen and her thirst-quenching friday cocktail hour, it seemed there was no place for yet another charming hostess. but then i thought, what about wednesdays? and what about sweets? that's right. the hosting phenomena from old blighty will be making its weekly stateside home on wednesday mornings, at petit hiboux's le bakery.
what does your little heart crave? eclairs filled with creme and topped with sprinkles? cupcakes as big as chihuahuas? melt-in-your-mouth merengues or pluck-me-up pecan tart? a dessert so fantastical as to yet be invented? it's like this, folks:
veruca salt: snozberry? who ever heard of snozberry?
willy wonka petit hiboux: we are the music-makers, and we are the dreamers of dreams.
so pull up a wrought iron chair. plop yourself down on the couch. watch the crystals catch the morning sun in our cushioned window seat. every tuesday evening [well-timed so the brits can join], i'll be taking orders for wednesday morning sweet treats. from my le heart to le yours.
January 27, 2004
i love the winter
i love the winter weather because i've got your love to keep me warm PLEASE RELOCATE ME IMMEDIATELY TO SAN DIEGO.
look, i haven't posted about the cold snap here in new york for a couple of reasons.
1. it only makes me angrier to think up elaborate, creative ways to cyber-shake my fist at the elements.
2. people who live in places that are 60 degrees and above will leave comments telling me how warm it is where they are, and how sorry they am that i'm now ice-block-shaped, and I DON'T NEED YOUR GODDAMNED PITY.
but i'm posting about the weather now. i am. i can't help it. the freezing tentacles of cold have seeped into my grey matter and taken over, forcing me to babble incoherently at the sky in fury. this is the longest and deepest cold snap new york has seen since before i was born. it's been under or around 25 degrees since january sixth. i have not opened my closet door in weeks, opting instead to drag yet another sweater out of my trunk and pull on the same jeans and boots. these are some of the measures i have taken in the last few weeks:
1. putting two wool jackets on top of my quilt when i sleep.
2. briefly microwaving my pillowcase.
3. sitting in a hot bath for over two hours.
4. wearing sunglasses at night to protect my eyes from stinging wind.
5. accepting any and all offers to be bought drinks, simply to have something warm in my stomach.
the most annoying thing about the weather [besides imminent frostbite and never looking up while you walk] is getting dressed. i can't shower in the mornings anymore, choosing to shower at night when the heat is still on full-blast in the apartment. this morning, i actually stretched my arms from my bed to my dresser, pulling out underwear, tights, and undershirt. i dressed myself under the covers and then got out of bed, pulling on jeans, two pairs of socks, a wool turtleneck sweater, knee-high boots, a knee-length puffer jacket, an eight-foot-long scarf, and a wool hat made by blind sheep-herders in the brasilian mountains.
i was still cold on my way to work.
but the number one, life-saving, last-shred-of-sanity thing i've done during the cold snap is:
BOUGHT MYSELF A TICKET TO BRASIL. IN MARCH. FOR A WEEK.
i hope this sends the message to god or donald trump, whoever's in charge of the weather: "fuck this noise, i'm leaving."
January 24, 2004
blogs are people too
when i went surfing through the pages of nyc bloggers, i couldn't help but notice how many people have more links to other places than their own original thoughts, in any given post. perhaps this is only new to me. but the blogs i read fall in two main categories: they're either impressively well-written and literarily bent, or they're highly unique personal blogs [as i aspire to make mine]. that is, it's a given that i'm not a fan of whinging livejournals or bad poetry.
apparently, i'm also not a fan of recycling pithy news briefs in blog form. i cannot tell you how blogs i clicked through today that covered the following current topics: con-ed's little electrocution problem, DC's wonkette, matt drudge/moby arguments, martha stewart's hearing, dean's rants... i'm just naming the ones that were incredibly prevalent both in the news and on the blogs. i'm not linking to these newsbits because it's a waste of my time to even write out the tags.
now, i write my blog for a number of reasons. first, because i'm vain and like seeing my writing somewhere. second, because i love tinkering with the design, and using pretty colors. third, i sincerely do appreciate the cool community of people i've built up, either face-to-face or via our blogs/emails. i feel like i have a friend in every city now.
what i don't do? i don't blog to simply be a conduit for information. mainly because i hate writing tags, but also because i think you come here because you want a piece of me. if you wanted to know about paris hilton's latest escapades, you'd go to the post. if you wanted restaurant reviews, you'd go to citysearch. and most of all, as politically aware and sensitive as i am, if you want someone's intelligent perspective on global politics, you'd read thomas freidman. it's not reflective of me if all i post about is politics, new york city news, or hollywood gossip. it's not a personal weblog. it's just adding to the information overload. i don't mean to put anyone down that has a news-or-gossip-driven site. in fact, i really enjoy gawker and gothamist, mainly because they have such interesting ways of putting things. but i don't consider those personal blogs. i consider them news sources, to an extent.
i'm not attacking anyone. the logical answer is, "you don't like that blog-form? don't read it." given. but i'm such a big proponent of the blog-medium, as a way of building community and learning how to speak your mind, that i'm not sure how simply disseminating information and calling it a blog really fits into that vision. it's simply not original. when i write something that makes you laugh, or makes you think, or even if you hate it - you didn't read it any where else. you may compare me to this girl, that blog, but what i put here is distinctly my own. which, ostensibly, is why you're here.
and that seems so much more personally valuable to me than recycling scraps of other people's words without adding your own uniqueness to the fray.
covering our tracks believe
believe it or not, dear bloggers, i've made provisions for pH in case of sudden death. half-jokingly, i emailed my best friend [a consummate non-blogger] my passcode information and told her to tell the internet i was dead if i unexpectedly bought the farm. or just feeling bored on the weekend and wanting to see how the blogisphere deals with the death of a loved one. kidding. i'd never do that. well, probably not anyway.
but it seems i have to make one more provision in case of demise. for the most part, my life is an open book. no doubt grieving friends and family would go through my emails, my letters, my journals. but my one request is this:
the IM log between myself and kate MUST BE DESTROYED by kate herself. if the two of us kick the bucket simultaneously, it must be destroyed by shiv. this is to protect the world from ever discovering how very, very evil we are. our wicked cruel merciless mocking of all things under the sun will die with us, the passwords protected in the depths of our black murky hearts.
and with that, lsfmasdlkfj sdgks dkfg sdk;gfjdsgfksd gfshg.
January 23, 2004
maybe we could even
maybe we could even get together, maybe you could break my heart next summer
text message, 11:49PM, krissa to kate: "i totally just gave my number to the hot flamenco guy. CARPE FUCKING DIEM."text message, 11:52PM, kate to krissa: "carpe DICK, dude. carpe fucking DICK."
you heard it here first, kids. i gave out my phone number for the first time last night. attending shiv's open mic, i ran into El Flamenco [y'know, accidentally on purpose]. i'd met him months back, when i was already romantically entangled, and had verily enjoyed the body-language flirt we'd shared while smoking outside the bar. so in my new quest to get laid not die alone with my fifty cats get laid, i showed up last night to floor El Flamenco with my leather pants and come-hither eyes.
i told him it was getting late, he told me to stay a little longer, so i waited through an eternity of terrible comics in order to see him on stage with his beer and his guitar, strumming his way into my pants heart. every time he lifted those smoking eyes from the guitar, he looked right at me and i swear, i... well.
so after the show, with much gentle pressure from shiv and her boy D, i walked right up to him and said, "i'm leaving," and he said, "come tomorrow night, i'm playing again" and i smiled as coyly as i could [only realizing later that i had garlic breath] and handed him my phone number.
carpe fucking dick diem.
quiet last night i
last night i went head-to-head with a five-straight-sequence of cosmopolitans.
on an empty stomach.
in less than two hours.
the cosmos won.
corrollary information: i walk better in tall heels when drunk. what does that mean?
January 21, 2004
for a girl who
for a girl who doesn't believe in destiny...
... when i was seventeen, i watched a dear friend walk away from where i stood, without saying goodbye, because we'd fought months back and were both stubborn as mules. i watched this friend walk away, having never kissed him, but having sworn off the love our friendship was made of, and even at seventeen, i thought:
it's not through between us.
i still think that, even though we've danced that danced and i've walked away, too much a pragmatist to stand his hedonistic belief in careless destiny. and yet for all my pragmatism, that stubborn seventeen-year-old says, it's still not through between us as if we were a sandwich and there's still a bite on the table to be dealt with.
the question is - can it be possible to not know how something's going to turn out, but still know there's more to be played?
just in case you
just in case you think my life is all brunches and gallery openings, cupcakes and vodka...
last night i ate a can of cheezballs® and ONLY a can of cheezballs® for dinner. i watched the horrifically bad uptown girls instead of the .
hell, even the fantastically glamorous need an off-night.
January 20, 2004
femachoism when they say
when they say women are starting to approach sex like men, do they mean...
"remember him? the flamenco guy? sandul or sankil or sundial or whatever his name was? it's not like i need his name anyway. i can just call him Dick and be direct about it."
did that really just come out of my mouth?
20 on the 20th:
having not been nominated for the much-blogged-about bloggies, i've decided to create Bloggies Owlies of my own. there will be no waiting, no competition, and no prizes. yes, these are all bloggers i read and link to regularly. that's because i read and link to them regularly. these are MY Owlies. don't argue with me, please.
AND THE OWLIES GO TO...
Most Charming Blogger for 2003: myself. that wasn't hard [this doesn't count in the 20... i'll win it every year, fear not.]
Best Charming-Disguise-for-Inner-Evil Blogger [side award - Best Wicked Use of Short Denim and Tall Boots Blogger] : duh.
Best Written-About Wrenching Heartbreak and All-Around Glam Kitten Blogger: shivery.
Sexiest Dirty-Old-Man/Best Short Fiction Blogger: acerbia d
Sexiest Lawyer/Longer Fiction Blogger: chuckles.
Funniest Pregnant Lady Blogger: dooce.
Best Serial Poster/All-Around Great Chap Blogger: london mark.
Sexiest Blog-Den Mother In Red Heels Blogger: karen of uborka.
Absolutely Sweetest British Boy Blogger: stuart.
Funniest Use of Unabashed Egotism/Scariest Ladder-Climbing Blogger: joshua newman.
Favourite Infrequent Bloggers: helen jane and seastreet and the biscuit.
Hardest-Laugh Post of the Year: Geese Aplenty Takes on Mya
Cutest Gal-Pal Blogger: this fish
Favourite New-to-Me FG Bloggers: the stiletto philosophy, daniella and pixel diva.
FUNNIEST BLOGGERS, PERIOD Bloggers: greg and his geese and sarah and her knuckles. Runner-Up: the better bryan adams.
Now that everyone has an award, let's all go get tanked on martinis and put it on the Bloggies tab, shall we? what are you drinking to celebrate?
January 17, 2004
give me heaven or
give me heaven or hell, calais or dover
winter makes me restless. well, more restless than usual. summer usually finds me happy, humid, in dainty heels and big sunglasses sipping sangria with my friends. but winter finds me desperately wishing to be the someone else who'd be long gone from the harsh pierce of arctic air.
when i'm dreaming of escape hatches magically appearing, there's an element of fantasy to them. when i escape realistically, i go visit friends in places i'm familiar with, flying off for a weekend. but when my imagination soars away from the skyline of new york - it's always a slightly different me that's leaving.
the romantic in me always wants to go to vienna with a lover. i want to wander the tiny cobblestone streets, listen to opera, and sit in cafes together, reading the herald tribune, intermittedly reaching with hands and eyes across the table to offer some love and share the joy of the old city and the best cafe in the world. this imaginary lover, of course, has the best taste in books and is naturally a john irving fan, so we can relive our favorite moments in HNH and Garp. and maybe, at the moment where we're riding a vespa outside of the city to explore the mountains and i've got my arms around his waist, everything will be perfect.
then of course, there are other places, places from my past, which call me back. i wish i was sixteen again, wandering the north kenyan beach in front of our open villa wearing nothing but a bikini bottom and an oversized, faded budweiser tee shirt. i miss watching my puppy terrier kirby (god rest his puppy soul) chasing sand crabs and i miss holding nothing a book and a glass of pineapple juice in my hands. i miss that wild coastline, with seaweed floating lazily in the azure green water. i miss the feel of rough sand between your feet, the vast silence of the ocean. i miss that youth, those long weeks spent walking up and down the beach, building bonfires with friends at night, eating home-cooked meals and waking up on the top floor of the villa, no walls between me and the ocean, sleepily petting the dogs and watching the sun warm up the most beautiful place on god's green earth.
perhaps the person i see escaping life to a cottage in the english country side, or by the great lakes, is an older person altogether. perhaps she's married, perhaps she even has some beautiful children. all i know about her is, she craves the solitude of a cabin on the lake, or a cottage in the hills. she doesn't need to hold someone's hand on cobblestone streets, or be sixteen by the wild kenyan coast. she needs her peace, she needs her privacy. she needs nothing but a book, a cup of tea, some cake, and the fireplace. she may be married, happy, successful, but she's in this cottage alone. and she likes it that way. because when she stares into the fire and looks back at her life and where it's brought her, she's both happy to have it and happy to let it go for a weekend.
and most of all, most unlike me, is the crazy girl who'd get in a car with her two or three best friends and drive as far as the road stays straight. i dream of being in a car, wearing nothing but my bra and underwear, driving through montana and laughing crazily about the coke i stole from the convenience store forty miles back. sleeping in the car, hanging out with strangers, driving with my knees, sitting outside the window while the car does eighty miles a hour... it may never be me, and my roadtrips may always need a plan, a backup plan, and a plan B backup plan. but it's nice to think, every now and then, that i could be that crazily spontaneous.
January 16, 2004
"... and they ran
"... and they ran off and had adorable ralph lauren babies together."
...which is no doubt how the show would end if life was sex and the city. natch, it's not. so, the date with The Preppy was quite nice. at first it felt a bit stiff, since he's a good deal more reserved and even keel than i am. he was almost laconic, very nearly monotone. being around quiet people makes me react like a hummingbird on crack. that is to say, i'm all over the map. when i'm really comfortable around people, i'm not more chatty than socially acceptable and piercingly charming. but around quiet people ... i feel the need to compensate. hence, the crack-filled hummingbird effect.
halfway into the meal, The Preppy visibly loosened up and we had quite a few nice chats of varying seriousness and depth. he seems intelligent. we talked about college, about our jobs in the magazine industry, drugs, living overseas, and death to hipsters.
but here's the thing, folks - our The Preppy is SO much preppier than even i could have imagined. we're talking northern california upbringing, exclusive boarding school, yale [dear god another yalie], summers at a vineyard in france... i was overwhelmed by the Preppiness of it all. as much as i'm a proud self-proclaimed yuppie, i certainly didn't have a classic Preppy life, and i'm drawn to it almost as much as i mock it. for all his preppiness, he's still quite sweet and rather down-to-earth. so we'll have to see, won't we. for now, i had a nice date with a curly-haired, blue-eyed blond boy with nice fashion sense and a sweet - if rare - smile.
the kicker is, as we left the cafe and made our way to the F train, it was snowing big lazy flakes, and the light was glowing pink in that way only manhattan manages to pull off, and the west village was the most perfect place in the world, and we shared a cigarette and talked about winter and music ... and i didn't kiss him, even though i wanted to. how pussy am i? SO puss. and as we rode the F together, i didn't see my stop creep up on me, and had to dash off awkwardly, thus shooting the chance for my classic goodbye kiss mojo.
ah well, if this one crashes and burns, there are always more The Preppies out there to satisfy my yuppie fantasies.
January 15, 2004
turning to tricks any
any mild harmless foot fetishists out there? i have a proposition for you. buy me these boots and i'll send you a picture of me wearing them. that sounds about fair, right?
miss otis regrets i
i have a blind date tonight. with a man i'll call The Preppy due to his UWS address, connecticut area code, and izod-wearing golf-playing first name. this is a rare date with someone who doesn't read this blog, so you can bet your bottom dollar i'm gonna milk it. however, it's in the single-digits outside. i'm seriously considering sending the following email:
dear The Preppy:
look, we're both adults here. let's admit it - it's fucking freezing outside. we both probably have been scarred into such low expectations from this date, its unlikely we'll be able to see the forest for all the raging cynicism. so how about we reschedule for say, the 20th? of april? unless we've met someone undoubtedly better?
cheers,
The Bitch
but i don't think i'll do that. i think i'll brave the cold and the west village because along with all the other self-improvement i've been up to recently, i've promised myself an opener mind when it comes to actually getting to know men who might, at some point, let me down. while it feels like cozying up to a hand grenade, just pass me my armor and call me a soldier. The Preppy, here i come.
January 14, 2004
essay i usually don't
i usually don't post too many of my longer essays on pH, preferring to keep things short and pithy. when i do, though, they usually live over at the deuxieme hiboux. recently, i wrote a piece about what my childhood really meant to me. i wrote it as a way to finally understand and communicate how being an overseas kid affects you - not just knowing different languages or getting to say, "when i was in africa...", but the way it shapes your personality.
so if you're interested, it's living over here for a while. if you have no desire to read anything of merit, here is a shallow, flaky pH thought for the day:
you know, if carrie bradshaw had to deal with single-digit weather, she wouldn't always have the cutest outfit on either. she'd be all, "i have to work with three layers of wool, and i'm supposed to look spunky and original on top of THAT?"
Adaptation
Everyone has anxiety dreams of walking through identical bland hallways, running into the same faces like a sick broken record. For some people, this is where they wake up. For me, it was the first day of middle school in suburban Houston, Texas. I’m what people call a TCK – third culture kid. My father worked for a major oil company and for all of my childhood, home was wherever we laid down our posessions. Before I arrived in Houston at age eleven, I’d only lived in the United States for two years before elementary school. Not even American by blood – my parents are Brasilian and Greek. This is the complicated pedigree I’ve lived with my whole life, and I wouldn’t change it.
But that first day in Houston, looking at a sea of American kids who’d grown up together, I wished with eleven year old fervor that I wasn’t so different. I wished that the teacher didn’t introduce me as, "A girl who’s lived in Africa!" and I wished my classmates didn’t translate that into harmlessly cruel middle-school-speak as "that African girl". I wished I didn’t have to explain that no, I didn’t ride elephants to school. I wanted desperately to be back in the relative safety of overseas International schools, where everyone has a different skin, religion, language, and where conformity was impossible and thus not in high demand.
But I wasn’t. I was in suburban Houston. And when my incredibly generous and understanding parents saw how hard it was, they told me I’d have to learn to adapt. It sounds like an easy concept, but everyone learns by trial and error. How I adapted, indeed how I always adapted in the seven different countries and schools, was more of a mutation than anything. After being teased about my glasses and my precocious reading habit, I started wearing contacts and joined theatre. After being called a geek, I spent more time at malls than the museums of my childhood raptures. In the three years we lived in Houston, I passed as a remarkably well-adjusted American teen. That is, bratty, self-involved, a little lost and bordering on flaky.
When we got the transfer to Kenya after ninth grade, I remember feeling a secret relief that I could return to the "other" me. The younger, more innocent girl who loved books, talked to her dogs, made friends with everyone, and dragged her parents to every temple in Greece, blabbing into the video camera about which god or goddess had been worshipped there. So what was adaptation, I asked myself later? Which me was me – the mall-hopping American teen, or the gregarious geek? Was it both? When I returned to Houston for senior year of high school after two refreshing and life-altering years in Nairobi, I started to grasp the difference between adaptation and mutation.
I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about my relatively unique childhood, which I often have to trot out begrudgingly for bewildered newcomers to my life. Yes, it was marvellous and hard. Yes, I learned about cultural tolerance from such a young age, it’s a natural language to me. Yes, I can travel almost anywhere in the world and feel at home. But I’m not comfortable with the idea that my father’s career as an accountant has made me more culturally aware than any brilliant American who’s never left the continent. After all, I didn’t choose to go overseas and live a different life. What I learned about myself overseas had nothing to do with language or tolerance or riding elephants. Rather, I learned that life is tough and it’s not going to be comfortable. I will not always be surrounded by the familiarity of place, and my character cannot be sustained by geography or conformity. Living a life as mobile as I did offers the temptation to sleuth out the modus operandi and toe the appropriate lines. But I learned by trial and error that place, and character, are what you make of them.
Adaptation is not about staying true to your surroundings, or molding your character on those around you. That’s simply mutation, a trait exclusively claimed by chameleons. True adaptation, and true character, is about staying true to yourself perhaps in spite of your surroundings. Understanding yourself isn’t something handed to you at birth, not even for the carefree and stable children whose life I coveted everytime I saw my life in boxes and a plane taking us off to another strange place. When I was younger, I used to tell my parents that I’d give my own kids a home whose walls they’d known since infancy, friends they’d grown up with. But even those children need to learn what standing firm means, and I was lucky enough to have a strong dose of that reality from an early age. That is more important to me than languages or exotic countries.
My life, having not chosen it or the places it took me to, doesn’t make me better than anyone else. I’m loath to accept that interpretation. I’m often bewildered by the impressed reactions my background garners. Coming back to the States, finally seeing myself as an American, and choosing to continue my life here on almost foreign soil, was a difficult decision for me. I had the opportunity to go overseas again after graduation from college and I chose this country, over all the others I’ve lived in, because I’ve learned how to adapt here. How to appreciate its culture as much as any of the others I’ve seen. But I wouldn’t have come to that decision without realizing the value of what my other life gave me.
I may be more versatile with foreign ground because of my childhood. But that’s a surface benefit. Fluency in French doesn’t make me a stronger person, or provide me with the character and backbone I’ll need to succeed. What most prepares me for the world, as I embark on law school and life, is the benefit of knowing the difference between fitting in, and fitting into yourself.
January 13, 2004
why i enjoy chatting
why i enjoy chatting with D:
exchanges like -
krissa: well, i won't use you as a battering post for all my personal frustration with people with committment issues.
D: Thanks. I won't get snarky and condescending back at you.
January 12, 2004
le petit hiboux presents
le petit hiboux presents :: the art of charm and preparedness....
The Fabulous Girl Gadget Guide!
part of being charmed is being fabulous. and part of being fabulous, is being prepared. not just in the girl scout way... but in the fabulous girl way. and the most important element of on-the-go fabulous is a FG's purse and contents. petit hiboux is here to point out what every fabulous girl already knows, but perhaps needs a gentle reminder of.
the Fabulous Girl Purse
well, every girl, fabulous or otherwise, has her fair share of purses! this is just one example of a cute, all-functional black purse. believe it or not, girls, i got this fantastically chic new trend, the initial bag, at target. yep. pick a purse based on your needs, of course, but also based on criteria like: will i completely destroy leather within six months [if yes, settle for a nice believable imitation]? do i need the strap to fit over large winter coats? shouldn't i at least look at somplace divinely marked-down like TJ Maxx, that still carries huge designers, before i drop $400 on this DKNY clutch? these are important questions every FG would ask. now, what's inside this girl's best leather friend?
a. the wallet: i always think it's a good idea to have a big heavy wallet, that way you feel its absence if it gets lost or stolen. other than that, the style is completely up to you!
b. the address book/agenda: unless you're a tech-savvy FG and have yourself a snappy little palm pilot, you should always carry some record of your life around - either to book a date with the cute guy at the coffee shop, or for the police to have evidence of your name and address and that of your family, in case of an emergency!
c. the cell phone: ahh, the cell phone. while every FG has one, every FG also knows when to turn it off, n'est ce pas?
d. the mirror/lipstick: even if you're makeup-low-maintenance, like i am, it's always good to have your trusty favourite shade and a mirror. mine's clinique's black honey.
e. your keys: yours, your family's, your best friend's, your boy's.. whoever's! don't forget them.
f. the filthy habit: for the FG smokers among us, cigarettes are up there with cell phone and wallet for never-leave-behind accessories. i suppose if you don't smoke, you can tuck your halo in the empty space.
g. FGSP: what is this little bag of mystery? well, we shall see!
h. your purse: duh! try carrying all that stuff in your hands and looking fabulous.
The FGSP: Fabulous Girl Survival Pack
what is this, you might ask? well, it's not very big, it closes firmly, and no matter how tempting it is to travel super-light, no fabulous girl's purse should exist without it. let's face it, we're girls on the go! that means there are a handful of essential items that you simply must have with you, health-and-beauty wise. so if you haven't got the following handy list in your purse already, i suggest you start your own vite vite! what's inside?
a. chapstick: any kind you want, really. i love cherry because it reminds me of childhood.
b. contact lens solution: if you don't wear them, natch, ignore this. but if you do - remember, they always double as rewetting drops in a pinch!
c. makeup: this is the simplest kind - merely a tinted moisturizer in a tiny container. i use lancome's imanance.
d. mascara: again, this is lancome and it's a sample size. if you don't have any sample mascaras, hustle your more makeup-mad friends! no doubt one of them has a stash.
e. the little pouch: amazing how much it holds! again, this was part of a free gift at lancome.
f. hairthings: very important, especially if you're a gym-frequenter.
g. meds: everyone's got something... birth control, acid-reflux, wellbutrin. whatever it is you take [for me, it's the emergency allegra and some aleve], make sure you've got some of it on hand!
h. contact lens case: self-explanatory, especially for hot-date nights!
i. ______: girls, you know what this is. if you don't, go back to 2nd grade. now they make them in this handy compact size and non-marked plastic wrap. love it!
NB: depending on your sex life, you might want to consider having a little plastic-wrapped pal in your FGSP as well.
this list, of course, is rudimentary, but remember to try and keep it to the bare essentials. the bigger your Fabulous Girl Survival Pack, the more likely you'll be to leave it out of the smaller purses or more packed totes, and then what's the point?
remember: if charm is two parts fabulous, then fabulous is two parts prepared!
weekend holiday well, i
well, i got tired of trying to grow my hair, and instead sacrificed a couple of inches in favor of, well, a saucy new bob. i also got a new pair of sexy burgundy slingback kitten heels. i realize that to most men, that sentence read "[unintelligible gobblygook] heels", but for anyone who worships the shoe gods like me me and my girls, head over to pd's latest piece de resistance, the shoe project, and see my sexy heel addictions additions.
aside from cutting my hair and adorning my feet, this weekend was also perfect because:
* friday night's stellar performance by our own little songbird, followed by late-night dinner/drinks for twelve apostles tribe members.
* saturday morning, i woke up at one. yes, pm.
* the Great Mom arrived bearing goodies and company shortly thereafter, also hugs.
* i cooked a marvellous repast for two dear friends who sorely needed a break and some pampering. there was roast tomato and garlic soup, shallot oven-roasted whole chicken, oven-roasted new potatoes, and a celestial mousse au chocolat for dessert. followed by tea, cookies, and a rousing game of trivial pursuit.
* sunday morning was brunch with the Great Mom, biscuit and shivery, then a madcap shopping spree at target, then driving the two home to brooklyn and on the way, watching a glorious winter sun set down over the brooklyn bridge. the city as seen from the BQE never ceases to dazzle.
* sunday night pizza with the Great Mom, losing graciously to her over our family card game, and howling along to our old brasilian favourites.
Life sometimes gives you two solid days of perfection. and when it does, you should really bake Life yourself some cookies.
January 09, 2004
plant life death if
if you're ugly, and offended by this post, don't read it, ugly-pants.
so last night i was curled up on the couch under, oh, three blankets. and i'm watching tv. more specifically, i'm watching extreme makeover. and if you laugh at me i will totally cut you. so there's this woman being made-over extremely, right. poor thing is really quite ugly, i mean, time has ravaged her once-young and pleasant face. plus, she's mostly deaf and mostly blind. which also sucks. so then we're at the point where she's revealed to be suddenly much less ugly, where three or four plastic surgery miracles have smoothed her wrinked face and perked up her drooping nose, eyes, and breasts. and of course, they've fixed her hearing and sight.
and you know, i'm a sensitive girl, so when i see her hugging her still-ugly husband and listening to her kids laughter and seeing her old dad's face, of course my eyes get a little moist around the edges like. because, you know, it's touching. she's de-uglied, and plus can see and hear. swell.
only, then my plant falls over. this is a very near-dead plant perched on my coffee table. the only reason i keep it around is to warn other life-forms that come into my home... this is what'll happen to you if you choose to stay. plants have terrorism-conventions and colored warning systems about me. i'm the osama bin laden of plant life, mercilessly killing all i see by merely looking at them. so this plant has been hanging on for its dear pathetic life with one little stalk. but when De-Uglied is hugging her family and i'm getting a little weepy, plant falls over onto the floor.
and i'm thinking, what possibly induced this plant to plunge 2 feet to its death? then it hits me - the plant was watching the show too. and the plant thought, "damn, i've always held out hope that life could get better for me. look, it got better for De-Uglied." but then the plant must have realized the crucial ingredient it was missing. "you know, i would love an extreme makeover. except, as a plant, i lack the requisite range of expressive emotion to show how pleased i am with my new look. the producers would never pick a plant. o, woe is me. i need to commit suicide." so the plant threw itself to its hardwood death.
January 08, 2004
an exercise in fortune-telling
an exercise in fortune-telling
krissa:i want, as follows - a cool keychain, the perfect little black dress, a trip to paris, a pair of bagley mischka shoes, a cooler black wool coat than the one i have, better hair, a nice boyfriend, a car on the weekends, a well-trained dog, a powerbook G4, a dark red leather trenchcoat, and the ability to keep beautiful plants alive.
jason: First, you'll get a cool keychain. This will make you feel good about yourself, and your happy energy will get you invited to a fancy party, so you'll get a black dress. At the party, the host will think you're so lovely, with the help of your black dress, that he'll fly you to weekend with him in PAris, where he will buy you shoes. When you get back to New York, he'll buy you a coat, since you'll be cold. Then, you'll realize that he's nothing but an old leecher, and leave him. To pick yourself up, you'll get a new haircut, and the stylist, the only nice and straight one in NYC, will ask you out, and become a good boyfriend. He works on the weekends, and lets you use his car. While driving, you'll fall in love with a stay dog, and adopt it...
...the dog will run off at strange times, being of a wild nature. one day, he comes back with a brand new powerbook in his jaws, a big load for such a little dog. You'll use the computer to get involved in Geocaching, and find a red trenchcoat that someone has left in a teacup in central park. In the pocket are magic seeds.
[go to jason's to see the rest.]
January 07, 2004
top ten for a
let me put it this way - i stay over at shivvy's a lot. as i famously put it, "i'm here a lot in between boyfriends." there are numerous reasons why i would want to stay all the way in brooklyn on a week night and trudge to work in the same jeans the next day. among the multitude are:
1. shivvy
well, that was easy. also:
2. she has every piece of makeup ever created, and more DVDs than you can shake a stick at.
3. she puts cinnamon in her morning coffee grinds.
4. her couch loves me.
5. she's friendlier in the morning than most men i've slept with and i don't even have to put out.
6. my cell phone has almost no range in her house, making me happily near-unreachable.
7. princess pizza.
8. there may not be food in the house, but there's always whiskey and wool.
9. i can get an impromptu unplugged performance with little or no arm-twisting. and she doesn't mind that i sing along.
10. those scantily-clad pillow fights*.
*we can guarantee no actual scantily-clad pillow fights. so get away from the windows, you're leaving drool-marks.
January 06, 2004
and by hive mind,
krissa: the landlord seems reasonable - cats and dogs are fine.
kate: good thing, too, since we have all those pets.
krissa: pets, boys wearing leashes, SAME CONCEPT.
kate: HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA. HAHAHAHA. like, there would just be boys wearing leashes, like, AROUND all the time.
krissa: RIGHT. but they're HOUSETRAINED, obviously.
kate: oh of course.
kate: and by housetrained,
kate: you mean, able to shake up a decent martini.
krissa: and by housetrained i mean, certified bartenders and michelin-approved chefs.
kate: OH MY GOD HIVE MIND.
krissa: OH MY GOD HIVE MIND.
i love the winter
... and i shamelessly love the way my handwriting looks on the new design. in fact, i'll bake a batch of cookies for anyone who can make a font out of that handwriting. yes, i'm that narcissistic.
January 05, 2004
where'd the party go?
january is usually my favorite season - after the frantic holidays, january is like the end of the party where it's only your two best friends, flopped on the couch and slightly drunk, gossiping about all the guests. but this january hasn't felt that cozy so far. maybe it's because my best friend left town this morning, after five glorious days. maybe it's because the temperature dropped ten degrees overnight. maybe it's because i'm back at work after nearly convincing myself that i live a life of leisure.
but maybe it's something else. if the three major fields of life are health, work, and love, i suppose two outta three ain't bad. but that third is starting to feel tricky. i have so many friends in relationships, of every stripe imaginable. dependant, independent, casual, serious, healthy, less than, freeing, stifling - at least half of my friends are coupled. and it seems that even the single half are out having adventures d'amour. since i've proved incapable of coupling, and i'm terrible at adventure ... what road am i on, and how do i get to their sides of the map?
in 2003, i tried celibacy. six months of it. waiting. but then that one broke my heart with the squealing tires of a hasty departure. pick up, dust off, try again: this time, he wasn't anything i wanted. nor i, for him. pick up, dust off, try again: this time, he was everything i thought i wanted and it turned out not enough for either of us. so much for 2003.
i wonder, as i watch all my friends run into relationships, fall out of them, soar through them ... am i the Girl that Love Forgot? sure, i'm happy being single. in fact, i cherish and jealously guard my freedom and independence. but when the other two sides of your life triangle - health and work - are going well, you can't help wonder why there's never the right person, at the right time, in the right place. Love's a bitch of a master, yes, but if you're her servant, should she throw you a bone every now and then? and when you know how much you've got to offer to Love, what do you when Love seems to take one look at your platter of delicacies and run the other way? when does a dry spell become, well, the climate?
i'd say i'm hopeful for 2004, except that just seems like tempting murphy's law. so let me just say this - if i am really the Girl that Love Forgot, i'd better be getting a handicapped parking space.