Sweetie, let's just have some bolly and a bitch through Vogue

Wendy Felton at glossed over undertook the formidable task of reading Vogue's September issue cover-to-cover in one go for her sixth annual Vogue live blog.  It's well worth a read and far more delightful, charming, and entertaining than the magazine issue itself.

It is in this spirit that it seemed an opportune time to recycle revisit my own sizing up of the 2009 September behemoth:

Girl, you better werq!  Fashion Week (originally posted September 11, 2009)


I cancelled my Vogue subscription a while ago, but they keep sending me magazines.  I recently received the September issue, and while thinner than last year's, it's still not something you want to drop on anything wee or delicate.  Let's take a look at the issue, and how it measures up to various things in my apartment ...


It's   definitely smaller than a 14 oz. box of Cheerios.  Also, it will not help you lower your cholesterol.

Advantage: Cheerios

It takes 2 seasons of Supernatural on DVD to stack up to the September Vogue; however, Jensen Ackles may be prettier than Charlize Theron.

Advantage: Supernatural

You need almost three copies of Frank Herbert's Dune series to equal one Vogue.    You might think Vogue has the edge here, but I'll actually read the Dune books more than once.

Advantage: Dune   

Vogue is almost as large as the cast iron ebelskiever pan, and certainly as heavy.  But if you pour batter onto Vogue and place it on a gas stove, all you will succeed in doing is burning the kitchen down.

Sadly, while Vogue may offer 584 stylish steals and smart splurges, it will not offer me delicious pancake balls.

Advantage: ebelskiever pan

Sorry Vogue.   Better luck next year.

Wordless Wednesday

Wordless Wednesday

Happy Saint Patrick's Day!

If only you knew the power of the Dark Side.

uberdorkgirlie via The Mary Sue

Wordless Wednesday

Wordless Wednesday

Wordless Wednesday

Wordless Wednesday

Bathing in Knowledge

Tip'o the hat to @bethanew!

via BoingBoing

Handle with Care

Christmas is over.  The New Year is upon us.  Time to take down the tree and carefully pack away the ornaments.

Or not.

Photographer Alan Sailer works out of his garage shooting things with a high-speed pellet rifle and photographing the results using a homemade flash unit. An interesting series of photographs he has, titled ‘The War Against Christmas’, involves filling Christmas tree ornaments with various things and shooting them for unique explosions of texture and color.

Check out his full photo set on flickr.

credit: Alan Sailer

via The Mary Sue 

2011 - If it wasn't on Facebook it didn't happen

In 2011 ...

1. Johnson County Sheriffs were enjoyed at Cville Coffee
2. Bachelorettes were WOOOOO'd
3. Slushageddon was survived
4. Fled from the Smoke Monster
5. Missions were accomplished at SDCC
6. Mazes were ... actually, I was done with the maze after 10 minutes and bush whacked my way to freedom.  With the Stage-Harveys at the Dole Pineapple Plantation.
7. Teeth were pulled.  Apparently I am a girl with a tiny mouth and ginormous teeth.
8. Sanctioned drinking during work hours
9. Animals were fended off with Creed songs
10. Nephews were born
11. Skee was balled.  We were the Knights who said SKEE!
12.  Terrenced with Ames in Fred
13. 40th birthday parties were survived
14. Dear friends visited
15. Hurricanes were hunkered
16. Cookies were exchanged

It's British Friday! It's British Friday!

It's a Stampede! Link Roundup - I'll tumblr for ya edition

Suri Cruise and her biting fashion commentary is putting the Hollywood sandbox set on notice.

People want to believe that Harper Beckham and I are going to be rivals. This could not be further from the truth. I have no qualms with well-dressed, well-mannered young celebrities—it’s the slovenly little miscreants I take offense with. (And if you think I’m going to be jealous of a baby’s wardrobe, let me just remind you that I have invested $100,000 of Tom’s money in my shoe collection.)

Suri's Burn Book

If author Cormac McCarthy wrote achingly spare and atmospheric Yelp reviews instead of novels, they would sound something like this:

Paplote Mexican Grill 

Mission - San Francisco, CA Cormac M. | Author | A dusty home at the end of a road, NM

 Two stars

The young cowboy lies in the afternoon sun, gut shot. The bitter tang of cordite and blood mingles in his mouth. In his hand, a pearl handled revolver, still warm. He lies propped against the lone cottonwood. A mile distant, dust trails mark a coming reckoning. Three riders, maybe more. 

His eyes shift upward to a circling vulture, a sentinel of inevitability. The blood is almost black. He has another hour at most. The pain comes in waves, lingering like the burn of bad whiskey. One bullet left in the Colt. 

Something as yet unheralded has died when a quesadilla comes on a spinach tortilla.

Yelping with Cormac by EDW Lynch.

This tumblr is my spirit animal.

ANIMALS TALKING IN ALL CAPS by the fabulously funny and prolific Justin Valmassoi.

I'm also pretty sure he was at Nicki and Mark's birthday party.

And while not a tumblr, I do feel the need to mention Cutting Open An Animal And Crawling Inside to Survive A Storm In the Wild.  I've written about this blog before, but after "a year in a concrete wasteland ducking into liquor stores to survive storms", it's back with advice that's more relevant than ever:

An 'expert' on CNN just advised everyone to get to their safe room. He's a damn fool. Room's aren't safe. What holds them together? Nails. Razor sharp steel blades just waiting for the moment a hurricane frees them from bondage so they can ravage you and all those you love. Get out of your house! Get out of your apartment! Get outside before it's too late!

Our only hope is to cut open an animal and crawl inside to survive the storm in the wild.

Cutting Open an Animal and Crawling Inside to Survive a Storm in the Wild

Bittersweet

I'd been at the magazine for five years before my name made it into the masthead.   May 2009.   My Dad carefully cut out the page - and every masthead page that came after - and saved them.

This month, I got my first byline.

I like to think wherever he is, Dad is adding an extra page to his scrapbook.

Check out the full "The Moment" here.

Lambic Pentameter: The Noun Game

The fabulous Duchess Jane Beth has started a photo project, and you should join in.  Here's how it works:

Go to her Week Seven post.  Watch the comments and pick a noun - or suggest one of your own.  Take pictures inspired by said noun, and upload them to Flickr, in the dedicated game group.  If there's a story behind the noun/photo, feel free to share.

Read more about the genesis of the game here.

Now go forth and shoot!

Ten-Ten-Ten

       A most auspicious day

Heather Champ is encouraging people to document today, 10/10/10, in photographs.  Your pictures can be shared at the tententen flickr group; you have 10 days to upload them and join in the tengasm with the rest of tenopedes.  Random images will also be displayed starting tomorrow at her site - here.

So what's so significant about today, other than a randomly cool symmetry that won't happen again for another gigabillion years?  Well, if you look closely through your lens, you may just discover the meaning of life.

Heather Champ via laughing squid

It's British Friday! It's British Friday!

via Jezebel

It's British Friday! It's British Friday!

via Jezebel

You Monday morning moment of melting

Spring is finally here, and DC has been enjoying near 70 degree weather. So of course, the 54 feet of snow we got in February had to go somewhere ...

This photo of the Potomac River was posted March 16 by Soichi Noguchi, an astronaut aboard the International Space Station.

More views from space by astronaut Soichi can be found at his twitter feed.

via DCist

It's a Stampede! Link Roundup - 3/21

I've already expressed my new found love of the violet infused Aviation cocktail.  29-95 thinks I should now try the subtly vegetal flavor of chartreuse in my drinks.

Damn them, I think they're right.

Tasting the businesslike Chartreuse | 29-95.com

This t-shirt.  Only 100 were printed, so step lively.

Apparently, people are very passionate about EXIT signage - with good reason I suppose, since your life can depend on it.

Although I've always found this version to be less "exit" and more "scampering this way".

The Big Red Word vs. the Little Green Man via Neatorama

Bea Arthur may have left us, but her wisdom lives on.  SNUU SNUU!!

I've never ordered anything advertised in Parade magazine, but that may soon change.

YES.  TO.  THIS!!

via Jezebel

I stumbled upon FashionFace.tv via their makeup tutorials on YouTube.  Most of what I've seen there have been evening, almost theatrical looks, but the main site also offers beginner vids covering all the basics.

Sam and Nic are freelance makeup artists based in Norwich England.  They're down to earth and engaging, and have already sent me off on a quest for MAC's discontinued eyeglass product.

As if I needed any more encouragement to buy makeup.

image credit: pixiewoo

It was later it was after two. We found a bottle of good chartreuse. The lights were green and gold. We played Latin soul. By the time Priscilla put the Al Green on the bottle was gone.