gain a heart in phoenix, leave it in san francisco

To celebrate our one-year anniversary, le boy and i jetted off to san francisco for the weekend, partially as a mini-romantic-getaway, partially as a means to show him how amazing the city is and convince him to love it enough to move there with me next year. His vote has been for chicago, but since i spent 18 years growing up there, i was looking forward to moving somewhere new once i left phoenix. Part of the Operation Fall in Love With San Francisco involved my two roommates/best friends from when i studied abroad in rome, who currently live in SF with their boyfriends and were jumping at the chance to show us a great time and get us to move there.

Operation: SUCCESS!!

It was great, we walked everywhere, ate everything, and drank a lot. Coming from Chicago, where I didn't get my driver's license until I was 19 because it's so easy to walk and use public transportation everywhere, it's been difficult living in Phoenix, land of strip malls and sprawling suburbia and freeways. People take freeways to get EVERYWHERE. I really miss being able to walk around -- with the intense heat and the fact that nothing here is compact, except for small pockets of downtown and around the university, it's just not a walkable place. So, once we arrived on Saturday morning, we spent the next 8 hours walking from Union Square (downtown) to the North Beach neighborhood, meandering along the Italian and French cafes lining its sidewalks, and perused & bought books at Beat Generation Central (i.e. City Lights Bookstore. ah, my heart flutters just thinking about it, below is a photo from the bottom of one of its steep staircases). i bought a simone de beauvoir's she came to stay for me and kerouac's on the road for le boy.

We drank in old-tymey pubs all along the way, and walked up to the overrated and out of control touristy Fisherman's Wharf, and back again. i felt mildly nauseous all day from our dim sum lunch in chinatown, which at the time was delicious but i became pretty sick by the end of the nite. Happy annivesary, honey! Now pass me the Tums and lights out at 8!

but the next day, thankfully, i felt all better and we met up with my friends and we did some amaaaaaazing shopping in the haight/ashbury district. i got some great finds for my vintage site (tiniest spark) and a lovely satin kimono top/minidress for me at one of the gorgeous little boutiques.

oh, and the heart photo above? le boy smelted, smithed, forged, and fashioned the pendant for me for my anniversary gift. as an apprentice to a blacksmith's girlfriend, i got my very own handmade, custom-designed piece. : )

and, i had lots more photos but for some reason when i upload them and blogger says DONE! they don't appear in my post. grr.

all in all, i had an amazing weekend -- i fell in love with san francisco years ago when my older sister lived there, and everytime i visited her was better. i feel like san francisco, more than any other U.S. city reflects my personality perfectly. i feel like i belong there more than anywhere else -- its layered neighborhoods, its cultural diversity, its hilltop views from every corner, its colorful houses and storefronts, its streets lined with unbelievably charming cafes and restaurants and bars and little shops, its prominently independently-owned businesses and its general city-wide eschewing of corporate, big biz enterprises. i love it i love it i love itttttt!

sigh. one more year. <3

aaaaaaack! gwynnie!

oh, GWYNNIE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! as one of my most favorite actresses and a style ICON, WHAT HATH YOU WROUGHT HERE?? (fyi photo found on www.perezhilton.com, i had nothing to do with the mini-yoga-convo). first of all, you have a LOVELY, incredible, lithe, long body. even after two children (cue jealous scoff at the knowledge i will never, EVER resemble her after 2 children. although maybe if the father were chris martin....), ANYWAY, even after 2 wee ones, you have a great body and what do you do? you go and throw it all away with this wholly unflattering combo. the light-wash jeans, the oversized jacket, which i realize is the new shape for fall, but simply does not work here, and the ... oh ,the horror of it all... those LOATHSOME BOOTIES. the booties which are so oddly proportioned that even the skinny jeans don't know what the heck to do with them, so they fold this way and that, attEMPTING to cover up the uggo factor, but nevertheless failing miserably.

sigh.
i'm not even going to get into mr. stipe's offensively whiny voice here. another blog, people, another blog.

NEW BLOG coming soon, with much less negativity!! i spilled soy sauce all over my brand new sexy HP laptop before i left for san fran on friday, so it's still in the shop. until i get it, the grandiose san francisco post will have to wait, because i want to show you photos!
it was a glorious weekend. hope that tides you over.
: )

life imitating posters?

i was surfing poster sites because i wanted to buy some fashion posters to adorn my brand-new office with (whoo! i have my own OFFICE now! it's in my new apartment, but still.), and i came across these (allposters.com) :

GAH! is it just me or does anyone else want to be IN these posters? i want to wear that 1940s candy-striped swimsuit! porkchopgirl has had a swimsuit on sale just like it that i've been eyeing for weeks. an the last one! not a fashion poster per se, but the way her yellow scarf flows in the north french breeze, her stylish hat and her bright red parapluie...ah! i want a parapluie, and binoculars that look over to mont st. michel!

there was such a subtle glamour to these old fashion posters, these simplistic old-tymey graphicsand as much as i enjoy some of today's fashion advertising, i'd take these over a naked waif sporting nothing but shoes (a watch, a diamond necklace, a handbag...) anyday. i think i'm going to buy that first one. but first i need the matching bathing suit.

this may be scandalous, but...

i HATE the majority of the shoes that our wondrous forward-thinking top fashion designers have whipped up for fall/winter 06. Leafing through vogue & elle, i recoil in horror at the monstrosities that we are supposed to don on a daily basis. Even as a SPECIAL OCCASION, these are horrendous: BOOTIES??? are you kidding? upscale booties? iiii think not, my friends. and ankle boots (below), well...i am so sick of ankle boots as the new trend -- they have never looked flattering or appealing in the past (cough80s) and they don't now, either. they have a terrible shape and cut your legs off at a very odd place on the upper ankle. kate moss manages to pull them off and look rocker chic and hardcore, but, well, kate moss can pull off just about anything. i know of no real live human (not that kate moss isn't a real live human, but she is too legendary and removed to think of her as an ordinary model pulling off just another pair of shoes...plus that whole pete doherty soap opera makes her that much more removed from real life) who can actually pull these off and look good. or make them look better than, say, a knee-high boot, or an above-the-knee boot (my personal favorite, a pair of mine are just LANGUISHING in my closet, waiting for cooler nites). anyhow these are awful:

and these ugly things...augh. platform-heeled sandals are the worst thing to happen to sandals in a long time. i work in a very money neighborhood in phoenix, and these rich trophy wives come in all the time sporting high sandals like above -- sometimes worse because the heel is actually a thicker platform -- and it amazes me. you have money and you are CHOOSING to dress like that? sigh.

looks like i'll have to disobey the fashion trends of the moment and rebel against these shoes, choosing instead to stand steadfast by my lovely pointy flats, high boots, and higher boots.

you, meet karl lagerfeld. <>

saluuuut, mes amours,

it's an exciting week in the vintage shop, because i just added a vintage nautical-style karl lagerfeld dress!! it is oh-so-gorgeous, see for yourselves in the photos below. i'm pretty insane to give it up, as it looks great not just on me, but on my waifish model/friend as well. it fits most body-types just beautifully, and is the closest i've ever come to owning a piece of such high-end fashion. i always sigh wistfully at magazine pages of high-end designers, and toss them mournful glances (sometimes indulging in some illicit material fondling) in the designer sections in stores, but never have i actually held and owned (!) such exquisite finery myself.

and i'm giving it away. to you. what a fool!

voila: it is gorgeous, non?