Fear of a Blue Jacket

Everyone has irrational fears. Well, everyone else has irrational fears - mine are all entirely reasonable. Wearing patterns: what am I a clown? Loose teeth: OMG, too scary to even contemplate. Speaking in front of large groups: I might get ridiculed by a significant partner, after presenting at a meeting of firm leaders, who claimed I was reading too much off my notes, hypothetically of course. Lastly, blue: what shoes do you wear, can you wear jeans, what matches it - help me!!

If you are immune to the terror that is the color blue, you should purchase this $17.50 jacket. It comes in both Scary Blue and Blue Fright. Take your pick, just leave me out of it.

Scarf it down

We get it, Winter. You've been feeling a little overlooked, what with all the talk about global warming, and you just want to remind us all you're still here. Well, let me assure you that with the third blizzard, you really got your point across. We remember you. You can stop now.

But just in case you don't, I've shelled out $3 bucks for this scarf.

Shoe Me the Money

I may have mentioned this before, but periodically Amanda needs to remind me that I am not, in fact, Sheryl Crow. You would think the lack of royalty checks would tip me off. I'm not that clever. But clever enough to find these for $35.

Title with Vest Pun

One day last week I watched the Today show - well, I watched the Today show every day last week, and every day of the last 26,000 weeks as well - and they did an instructional piece on layering. They took their usual somebody-please-give-me-a-sandwich model and put her in a reasonable top and, alas, leggings. Then they 'layered' roughly 73 other items on top, including a vest, a belt, a cardigan, a parka, a down vest, a hat and a reasonably small blue plastic child's chair. Oddly, by the end of the lesson, this 83 1/2 pound woman looked laughably puffy and wide. So much so that the show's host started to giggle. Thank you , Today Show; lesson learned!


That said, I think this little 'boyfriend' vest (does your actual boyfriend wear a vest with a shirred back panel?) over a tailored blouse and with a skinny belt would make an attractive ensemble - with actual pants of course.

Back in Black

That trip into the wide world of color was scary. Admittedly, both items were the same color... Nonetheless, I must retreat back to the warm comfort of black. Sometimes pairing it with the shocking contrast of gray, you know, when I am feeling full-on cuh-razy.


This dress at Esprit.com's incredibly painful-to-use site is only $17.50 with their 30% off coupon.

Purplicious

I spent my entire childhood in purple. That means that in nursery I wore a purple pinafore and rode a sparkly purple tricycle. I spent elementary school playing in my purple-flowered room, in a purple dress, or riding my purple bicycle, wearing a lavender windbreaker . And because my childhood, apparently, continued straight through high school, I had a purple curling iron, purple lipstick, purple moccasins, and, so sorry to say, purple heart-shaped glasses that, even now, I cannot convince myself were ironic. Purple sweater, purple eyeshadow, purple earrings (again with the hearts). It really is no surprise that I spent my twenties in various shades of black.


But lately I have come around to the idea of a touch of purple as an accent color, to the notion that one can enjoy wearing a color without extending the theme to include mascara (you didn't think I missed out on plum mascara, did you?) and eyeliner, (lavender, on the inside of the bottom lid, of course). Here are two awesome purple suede purses, for $15 and $80. Either is big enough to slip in a small purple notebook and purple glitter paint pen.

The Legend of Brooklyn

Once upon a time, many years ago, as far back as the late '90s, in a faraway village called East, there lived a group of twentysomethings. They were all recent college graduates, some from Pratt, some from NYU -- though the latter would be quick to tell you they were in Gallatin, and all bankrolled by parents they liked to pretend they didn't have.

They were happy in their little Village, and rarely left, until one fateful day, when the Villagers found themselves with a lot of time on their hands. You see, unsuccessful dotcom start-ups pretty much ran themselves, they couldn't watch TV because they all pretended they hated TV, and none of the Villagers was due to get a new face tattoo anytime soon. So they decided to go on adventure.

"Where should we go?" cried one, as she fiddled with her lip ring.

"We could go West," suggested another.

"No, not West! West is the Land of the Men Who Are Gay Unironically. We cannot go west," explained the first.

"How about South?" offered a third Villager.

"No, not South! I had Chinese for lunch," said another, running his hand through his dreadlocks.

They all knew they could not go North, for they were afraid of North. North was the domain of the People in Suits, and the Villagers were terrified the People in Suits would trap them in their cubicle dungeons. So that left only . . .

"East? How can we go East? East is only water!" wondered the Villagers.

"Then we will CROSS the water!" declared the bravest of them all.

So they all put on their tightest jeans, and packed some kimchi for the road, and departed on their journey to cross the water, which they did via the L train.

And lo and behold, once they made it to the other side, they were rewarded for their bravery and cunning, for the found a land of riches, a magical land no one had ever seen before. There were dive bars as far as the eye could see, vintage clothing shops on every corner, and not a single Starbucks. Indie music filled the air, PBR flowed like water, and a faint scent of pot tingled their noses.

The Villagers cried in delight, and hugged each other -- but, you know, ironically. "We have discovered the promised land! A land no one has ever seen before! We will call it Brooklyn. Here we can dwell, and open pottery studios!"

And so they stayed, and they live there to this day.

Commemorate their historic journey with this t-shirt, $16 through Sunday.