Fashion Corner |
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Breathe easy: I will not for a moment pretend to actually know a damn thing about "fashion." After all, the word "fashion" covers so much ever-shifting territory, like the shadow of a blimp over a pile of dog poo, that calling yourself a Fashion Expert, Maven, or god forbid Savant (le koff koff) is like retaining the law firm of Soyestaday, Overin, Dunn, LLP to handle all interview requests. So I don't know much about fashion, he said, looking fabulous in his natty Friday cazjh, leaning back in his Eames chair and propping his Keds on his desktop, BUT! this I know: Using ties in place of belts is done, over, and out. It was being shown the door the first time it came over, and now it's in the backyard with the garbage bags, dog bones, and tortured metaphors. I saw this girl on the street here in midtown this morning, and, okay, perhaps I was not in the most charitable of moods, but I almost kicked her tie-belted pinstripe-skirted ass just for the hell of it. These Sally-Cinch-Latelies had better start adopting some new obsolete style, and soon. So that the cycle of life might continue. We're treading taffeta, here.
[10:40am est]
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Clam up again: I will totally claim to know tons of shit about fashion, though I will not give myself any lameass titles. As the world spirals faster and faster towards its own tar-feathered demise, even the retarded bullshit I hate gets recycled. The "crafts" page of TeenVogue is regularly one of the most disappointing* features. Uh, making skirts out of neckties? Was old even when I did it in like 1991. For God's sake, girls, I know you get bored, and you're looking for fun ways to add flair to your school uniforms or whatever, but QUIT IT with the sewing on patches, the adding of lace panels, the stamping of designs, the be-dazzling, the what-fucking-ever. As the Salvation Armies wither into overplucked wastelands of fashion-barren racks, you must remember why they were once so rich: People didn't know what was cool. Stay ahead of the stupid trends, or start your own. Who wants to wear polyester pants in the summer anyway? I say that home-embellished sweatshirts** from Nana are this winter's hilarious Golden Ticket to the fashion Chocolate Factory.
I could get into the masculine/feminine fashion thing, but instead let's talk boys' pants, because I have been thinking of them a lot lately. It seems that boys don't know how to buy or wear pants 85% of the time. You want, ideally, a line from shoulder to ankle that is trim and straight, and yet even the slimmest boys, obsessed with a "relaxed" fit, are buying pants hamfistedly. First off, NO PLEATS. Look at what pleats do: get a large volume of fabric to compact for shaping purposes. Now look at their placement on pants. Do you have large, ammonia-filled sacs on either side of your dick that need pantly accomodation? No? Then, unless you are at a formal occasion and have flat, trim abs, LOSE THE PLEATS. You look bulgy. Also: Cuffs truncate the leg. Wide-wale corduroy creates the impression of bulk. And pants that are worn too low on the waist will frequently bulge out at the thigh, like jodhpurs or Aladdin pants--chances are, the pants themselves are fine, but you don't want your precious gut constricted by fabric. Do you have any idea how much I go through to get my "cute" pants on? SUCK IT UP AND PULL YOUR GODDAMN PANTS UP, Hoser. One ex of mine, a short, goaty-legged Jew, wore cuffed, pleated wide-wale corduroy pants low on the hip, and though he was a skinny fellow, he looked like a fucking lamp base. Is that what you want? Why don't boys know any of this shit?
*I say, as though I have high expectations for the content of motherfucking TeenVogue. Snort.
**Did I tell you this story? One of the first boys I ever crushed super-hard on was named Justin Millimoniker (I am not making this up) and he used to come to the $1.99 movie theater where I was the surly Goth ticketgirl, and that summer he wore the same too-small red sweatshirt with a cross-stitched snowman on the front, and I longed to tear it from his skinny, 16-year-old frame. I was 15 then so this isn't as pervy as it sounds.
[2:01pm pst]
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Okay, sweets, you are not allowed to write such gigantic posts in response to my mellow, ambling little paragraphs. I cannot compete with your delicious, manic logorrhea unless I'm in tip-top shape, which nowadays I can't even describe tip-top shape with a handful of Play-Doh. Please restrain yourself so that I will not be too ashamed to respond, leaving two-part posts like this moldering for four long days. ANYBOP! On the boring old topic, this morning waiting for the train I saw three hipsterettes wearing lightweight outerwear the same shade of purply-burgundy; two of them had elected to complement with hot pink tees. As they passed within ten feet of each other, I felt a rare frisson of a.m. glee. The girls did not acknowledge each other in ANY WAY. Just mute embarrassment apotheosized in a ten-foot circle, like the conjunction of three purply suns. Two of them quick-walking to opposite ends of the platform as the third stayed put in the geometric center. That was the best thing that happened to me all morning.
(This was later overshadowed when I joyously discovered that, given the abbreviation "MCLAC" (which stands for Monroe County Legal Assistance Corp [yawn, don't ask]), while my office pronounces it like "MICK-lack", we have out-of-state pals who call it "muh-CLACK". MuhClack, people! I love it! Wa ha ha!)
[3:20pm est]
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This one cock I hate has a plan to start a nonprofit* cultural center in Chicago (read: way for him to sponge off the public ad mortem while thinking he's cool). I forget the stupid name of it, but the acronym is C-CLAP, which would almost be fine were it a mod club (cue the Best Handclap Rhythm in The World, which goes: clap-clap, clap! clap-clap, clap! on the one-two-fours), but for this purpose, it's not, because it sounds like the frightened stuttering of the clap, which he prolly has, the filthy asshole. Why not just open like the Arts Institute of Drawing and Sculpting, or A.I.D.S.? Why not the House of Independent Video? Why not the fucking Burnished Underwater Brompton Oratory Neo-Interracial Center? This is ridiculous, but you catch my drift. You can't stutter in acronyms, you stupid asshole.
*I hate the namby-mcpambering bowdlerization of "nonprofit," too. I mean I guess it's more accurate as "not-for-profit," since charities do necessitate a physical profit for ops expenses, but not-for-profit sounds like you're anticipating a court defense consisting of the following exchange:
"Ms. LeMonde, why did you embezzle $60,000 from C-CLAP?"
"I didn't mean to make a profit. It wasn't for profit. I just sort of accidentally profited." Now I want to make a joke about agnostic Muslims being not-for-prophet, but I'll refrain.
Lastmost, lavender is the new pink this fall. It remains to be seen what the new trucker cap is in Stupid Headgear Trends, but I'm sticking with my chapka. Brooms? Any fashion resolutions?
[1:19pm pst]
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God, in September? Well, I guess. I resolve to buy pants that fit better, even if it means restricting my movement a tiny bit. Not, of course, that I will be affording new pants any time soon. No. Fashion resolutions that require no money, then: I will only wear white socks with sneakers. I will sew up holes in things, if they can be sewn, before the holes become scandalous. I will make sure that my outfit is approved by a girl before I go to any slightly important event. I will quit fussing so much. I will fuss more. I will do everything I can to prevent myself from turning into one of "those guys," however you define that term.
[6:01pm est]
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While I am visiting I will get schnockered on Scotch and help you assemble outfits. It will be like playing paper dolls with a big, angry, whiny doll who says "I can't keep trying on shirts! My back hurts! Where is my Pfizer shipment? Why are you doing this to me? Aaaaggh!" If you pay for the Scotch I'll even mend some of your shit. I can't think of a better way to spend my vacay.
This reminds me of an anecdote; unfortunately, it's the lame "This one time I was gonna do this and it might hypothetically have been funny when enacted but I didn't and now I'll tell you about it" (this is a direct corollary to "Ten minutes ago I nearly made this humourous comment [why am I telling you this since it wasn't funny then and isn't funny now]," that I hate). ANYCRAP. While you, Jer, were visiting this summer, 'member when you pulled your shorts, and by this I mean underpants, out of your duffel bag, and there was that inexplicable giant burn hole in the ass of them? Like, straight in the ass! And you made some hemmy-hawwy dunno-how-that-got-there murmurations and then tossed them in the bin and went home to New York and quit smoking, at which point you then said "I would use the nicotine patch but I'm not sure how"? WELL, I had this genius idea that I was going to fish your draws (quit squealing: they were clean, just bearing a suspiciously prison-sexy assburn) out of the trash, carefully sew a nicotine patch over the hole, and then wordlessly mail them back to you. This idea enchanted me for about eight hours, until a. I decided it was a tad creepy and b. I realized how fucking expensive nicotine patches are. Seriously: It's cheaper to smoke!
[10:03am est]
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trouble started by Universal Donor
September 24, 2004
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10:35 AM est •
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I'm Katherine. You're awesome.
# posted by : 6:00 PM est
Wow, it took you only 2 minutes to respond to potentially UD-directed praise. Remarkable.
# posted by : 10:55 AM est
The above notification automatically left after deleting a comment has been declared stupid by the author.
TEEN VOGUE... in the New Yorker short story collection "Fierce Pajamas" there is a story and i don't remember the title but it talks about how all these magazines now have "teen" versions and wouldn't it be great to have a teen medical magazine ("Cancer? Shut UP!") or maybe psychology ("Why does everyone hate you? DUH! It's called JEALOUS!"). well not like it was as funny as you two of course but a girl has to read books from time to time. anne(onymous)
# posted by : 3:15 PM est
or scumbag/slacker versions, like how yesterday we were talking about drinking and breastfeeding. "is the mole on your arm irregular, color-changing, or painful? put a cigarette out on it and see what the scab does!"
I'm not sure why you all are busting on Teen Vogue so much. Just this past Sunday, in the SundayStyles section of the NYT, Amy Astley, editor of Teen Vogue, had penetrating thoughts about the insidious effect America's Next Top Model is having on all our lives: "I think most professionals would look at these girls and say they're pretty, but not only do they not have what it takes to be a top model, they don't have what it takes to be a working model," Ms. Astley said. "It's a really good reality soap opera . . . but I think it's doing a bit of a disservice to the modeling and fashion industry." And to think, I have been living unawares of this disservice. Thanks, Amy! --sarah b. doesn't feel like logging in to blogger
# posted by : 6:39 PM est
Don't worry Claude, I have already volunteered to take you shopping, as I assumed Jeremy's patience for shopping would last about as long as your patience for hm while shopping; that and you've seen his clothes.
# posted by J.Ro : 2:08 PM est
jesus will bless you, rosenstock.
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