season's greetings, all; i hope your toes are precisely as warm as you would like them to be.
Showing posts with label shoes. Show all posts
Showing posts with label shoes. Show all posts
12.23.12
season's greetings, all; i hope your toes are precisely as warm as you would like them to be.
04.27.11: the dirty dozen {twelve pictures of my feet}
01 and the pacific [CA]; 02 at a jersey wedding [NJ]
03 and questionable loafers [NY]; 04 at a sea captain's house [CT]
05 and a swimming hole [AZ]; 06 at the russian tea room [NY]
07 firefly-hunting [NJ]; 08 and madison square garden [NY]
09 and h.p. lovecraft's grave [RI]; 10 bowling [NY]
11 on a glacier [IS]; 12 at the blue lagoon [IS]
01 and the pacific [CA]; 02 at a jersey wedding [NJ]
03 and questionable loafers [NY]; 04 at a sea captain's house [CT]
05 and a swimming hole [AZ]; 06 at the russian tea room [NY]
07 firefly-hunting [NJ]; 08 and madison square garden [NY]
09 and h.p. lovecraft's grave [RI]; 10 bowling [NY]
11 on a glacier [IS]; 12 at the blue lagoon [IS]
03.18.10
there are two sorts of shoe in my life: the loud, complicated ones i buy on sale or impulse and wear a handful of times season after season, and the little black flats i wear almost every day until they fall apart (magical things, those little flats: they make almost any outfit juuust businesslike enough for the office). it takes me four to six months to destroy said flats; as i walk two miles a day just scooting to and from work, i feel like i'm getting a pretty square deal. i was getting a square deal, that is, until - somewhere early in month two -
this happened. what the hell? do i pirouette on my left foot unconsciously? is there some sort of twelve dancing princesses thing going down after i fall asleep? does steve madden booby trap his flats?* then i realized i'd seen that shape before. oh, yes.
my shoe has sprouted a kraken's eye. when i said a few days ago that the end was nigh, i thought i was talking about kitten pictures - but as tennyson wrote,
on sightings, i can also report that mentioning pretty in pink last week actually summoned james spader.
celebrities v. giant inflatable rats:** steff edition
he swept past me on fifty-seventh street wearing an indiana jones fedora and walking a fluffy white dog, so it wasn't exactly a brat pack moment, but in a six-degrees-of-kevin-bacon way it brought me closer to both molly ringwald and william shatner than i have any right to be.
rats: 4.5
star: 13
there are two sorts of shoe in my life: the loud, complicated ones i buy on sale or impulse and wear a handful of times season after season, and the little black flats i wear almost every day until they fall apart (magical things, those little flats: they make almost any outfit juuust businesslike enough for the office). it takes me four to six months to destroy said flats; as i walk two miles a day just scooting to and from work, i feel like i'm getting a pretty square deal. i was getting a square deal, that is, until - somewhere early in month two -
this happened. what the hell? do i pirouette on my left foot unconsciously? is there some sort of twelve dancing princesses thing going down after i fall asleep? does steve madden booby trap his flats?* then i realized i'd seen that shape before. oh, yes.
my shoe has sprouted a kraken's eye. when i said a few days ago that the end was nigh, i thought i was talking about kitten pictures - but as tennyson wrote,
There hath he lain for ages, and will stewprepare for the last battle, internets.
Battening upon huge sea-worms in his sleep,
Until the latter fire shall heat the deep;
Then once by man and angels to be seen,
In roaring he shall rise and fuck up Lauren's shoe.
on sightings, i can also report that mentioning pretty in pink last week actually summoned james spader.
celebrities v. giant inflatable rats:** steff edition
he swept past me on fifty-seventh street wearing an indiana jones fedora and walking a fluffy white dog, so it wasn't exactly a brat pack moment, but in a six-degrees-of-kevin-bacon way it brought me closer to both molly ringwald and william shatner than i have any right to be.
rats: 4.5
star: 13
imaginary reading group discussion questions
01 what the hell happened to my shoe?
02 were you aware of canada's postal excellence? (check out the whole cryptozoological quartet. where's our ogopogo stamp?)
03 on a totally unrelated note, paul auster readers, is the book of illusions acceptable as an entry point? a copy materialized, kraken-like, at my office, and i'm thinking of auditioning it as a subway book.
*a designer willing to knock off the balenciaga lego heels is capable of anything.
**an ongoing tally of the famous people and union-displeasure-indicating balloons i see in the city.
11.18.09
sneakers and i have had a complicated relationship over the last few years. the day after joe and i were married in oxford, i bought a pair of feisty yellow and black golas that had been making eyes at me from a shop window on the high street; they promptly gave me spectacular blisters, and i had to wear flip flops for the rest of our honeymoon (sorry about that, belfast). the golas and i warmed to each other eventually, and we were close (even, i admit, at the office) right up until they fell apart last year. i've since turned to running shoes at the gym and ballet flats for everything else. i haven't even flirted with sneakers - which is impressive, i feel, given that joe shops for them all the time.
i then wandered into bess, where i met a pair of used white converse all-stars. they were covered with pyramid studs and ballpoint pen, they fit me perfectly, and they cost $60. "sixty?" "no," the guy at the counter said, "one sixty for the low ones." actually, i misheard him the second time as well; when i got home and looked them up online, they were $260. upcycling, buying handmade, and encouraging design are all near and dear to me, but...oh, who am i kidding? i'm poor. i plagiarized with gusto.
i messed around on ebay in search of a used pair of chucks that would fit as well as the ones i'd tried, but they're not unlike aggressively used jeans (in that people keep them until they disintegrate) - hence these blinding white fellows. (i figured the leather had a better chance of holding up to the studs than canvas would.) they're covered with big ugly holes because i made the beginner's mistake of ordering 1/2" pyramid studs, which are gargantuan. i didn't admit the error until i'd finished a whole shoe; the poor thing looked like lil jon.
after a week and a second delivery from studsandspikes.com (heh), i was ready to have a go with dainty little 1/4" studs. they're much more difficult to anchor, thanks to their size, and i ultimately needed a craft knife to perforate the leather. i owe said craft knife (and the needle-nose pliers i found at a dollar store) at least three fingertips; that first round of studding, starring a bent fondue fork in place of an awl, was an episode of super surgery waiting to happen. with the right equipment, all i had to do was perforate, place, and bend, over and over and over.
and so! i need to dirty them up, my spacing is a smidge uneven, and i'll probably need to line the interiors with something like electrical tape (those tines, even crimped in against themselves, are a bit scritchy), but: sneakers! in other news, can i stud that for you?
sneakers and i have had a complicated relationship over the last few years. the day after joe and i were married in oxford, i bought a pair of feisty yellow and black golas that had been making eyes at me from a shop window on the high street; they promptly gave me spectacular blisters, and i had to wear flip flops for the rest of our honeymoon (sorry about that, belfast). the golas and i warmed to each other eventually, and we were close (even, i admit, at the office) right up until they fell apart last year. i've since turned to running shoes at the gym and ballet flats for everything else. i haven't even flirted with sneakers - which is impressive, i feel, given that joe shops for them all the time.
i then wandered into bess, where i met a pair of used white converse all-stars. they were covered with pyramid studs and ballpoint pen, they fit me perfectly, and they cost $60. "sixty?" "no," the guy at the counter said, "one sixty for the low ones." actually, i misheard him the second time as well; when i got home and looked them up online, they were $260. upcycling, buying handmade, and encouraging design are all near and dear to me, but...oh, who am i kidding? i'm poor. i plagiarized with gusto.
i messed around on ebay in search of a used pair of chucks that would fit as well as the ones i'd tried, but they're not unlike aggressively used jeans (in that people keep them until they disintegrate) - hence these blinding white fellows. (i figured the leather had a better chance of holding up to the studs than canvas would.) they're covered with big ugly holes because i made the beginner's mistake of ordering 1/2" pyramid studs, which are gargantuan. i didn't admit the error until i'd finished a whole shoe; the poor thing looked like lil jon.
after a week and a second delivery from studsandspikes.com (heh), i was ready to have a go with dainty little 1/4" studs. they're much more difficult to anchor, thanks to their size, and i ultimately needed a craft knife to perforate the leather. i owe said craft knife (and the needle-nose pliers i found at a dollar store) at least three fingertips; that first round of studding, starring a bent fondue fork in place of an awl, was an episode of super surgery waiting to happen. with the right equipment, all i had to do was perforate, place, and bend, over and over and over.
and so! i need to dirty them up, my spacing is a smidge uneven, and i'll probably need to line the interiors with something like electrical tape (those tines, even crimped in against themselves, are a bit scritchy), but: sneakers! in other news, can i stud that for you?
05.03.09
101 in 1001 {II}: 036 buy a pair of hot shit designer shoes [completed 05.01.09]
i came to a realization when we were playing darts a few weeks ago. the early crowd of pub regulars had dissolved into a more nattily dressed bunch of saturday-night-in-new-york-city types, and the flip flops i'd been wearing all day were starting to look especially plain. i turned to george and joe: "i need stripper shoes." "oh, no," said george, "big clear platforms?" actually i meant something more like these; the sad truth is that i've been wearing ballet flats and sensible little kitten heels for so long that i have no concept of anything that kicks your height up by more than an inch or two - you know, the sort of shoes that make your legs go on for miles. "stripper shoes" means "flattering heels worn by women who are not usually me." sad, really, given that i used to roll around stanford in ten-inch platforms. but that's a story for another time.
i worried that this was going to be one of the Big Cash Outlay for Questionable Ends list items: i'm not especially good at shoe shopping, and crazy sample sales like the jimmy choo bonanza down in chelsea last week are better for peoplewatching than they are for making purchases (as someone tweeted about that obscene wait, Guy in Chelsea observing the line for the Jimmy Choo sale: "You'd think they had invented a ladies-only swine flu shot."). but! the save fashion popup store at port authority (open for a month as of friday, with a rotating weekly selection of designers) saved the day. i got these babies, by charlotte ronson, for next to nothing - and i knocked off the first half of another item [030 buy a bikini (and wear it in public)]. rawr.
1: why am i taking a picture of your feet?
2: for the internet.
1: this will not end well.
101 in 1001 {II}: 036 buy a pair of hot shit designer shoes [completed 05.01.09]
i came to a realization when we were playing darts a few weeks ago. the early crowd of pub regulars had dissolved into a more nattily dressed bunch of saturday-night-in-new-york-city types, and the flip flops i'd been wearing all day were starting to look especially plain. i turned to george and joe: "i need stripper shoes." "oh, no," said george, "big clear platforms?" actually i meant something more like these; the sad truth is that i've been wearing ballet flats and sensible little kitten heels for so long that i have no concept of anything that kicks your height up by more than an inch or two - you know, the sort of shoes that make your legs go on for miles. "stripper shoes" means "flattering heels worn by women who are not usually me." sad, really, given that i used to roll around stanford in ten-inch platforms. but that's a story for another time.
i worried that this was going to be one of the Big Cash Outlay for Questionable Ends list items: i'm not especially good at shoe shopping, and crazy sample sales like the jimmy choo bonanza down in chelsea last week are better for peoplewatching than they are for making purchases (as someone tweeted about that obscene wait, Guy in Chelsea observing the line for the Jimmy Choo sale: "You'd think they had invented a ladies-only swine flu shot."). but! the save fashion popup store at port authority (open for a month as of friday, with a rotating weekly selection of designers) saved the day. i got these babies, by charlotte ronson, for next to nothing - and i knocked off the first half of another item [030 buy a bikini (and wear it in public)]. rawr.
1: why am i taking a picture of your feet?
2: for the internet.
1: this will not end well.
04.23.09: PA redux
alright: philadelphia. as i tweeted (and said about four thousand times, i'm told), it's pinchably cute. we had the good fortune to be in town for dazzling weather - breezy sunshine straight through - and the flowering trees had just started to shed their early spring blossoms, so everything was covered with petals. revolving doors and air conditioned shops would kick up little white eddies. it was like wandering around in a snow globe.
our pre-trip research was far more fruitful than i'd expected it to be: tripadvisor led me to the independent hotel [nb 2016: now the independent philadelphia hotel], a little boutique place in rittenhouse square, and travelzoo hooked us up there; we paid $119 for a room with a pressed tin ceiling in the bath.* design*sponge's city guide did us several solids, too: in fact, most of our random decisions worked out so well that i started to expect a stroke of bad luck just to balance things out. i'm used to special occasion doom, you see.
doomless occasions are so nice, internets. as we sipped pints and peoplewatched by the windows at mcgillin's,** joe's blackberry beeped: an anniversary note from his parents saying how happy they are that i'm their daughter.
alright: philadelphia. as i tweeted (and said about four thousand times, i'm told), it's pinchably cute. we had the good fortune to be in town for dazzling weather - breezy sunshine straight through - and the flowering trees had just started to shed their early spring blossoms, so everything was covered with petals. revolving doors and air conditioned shops would kick up little white eddies. it was like wandering around in a snow globe.
our pre-trip research was far more fruitful than i'd expected it to be: tripadvisor led me to the independent hotel [nb 2016: now the independent philadelphia hotel], a little boutique place in rittenhouse square, and travelzoo hooked us up there; we paid $119 for a room with a pressed tin ceiling in the bath.* design*sponge's city guide did us several solids, too: in fact, most of our random decisions worked out so well that i started to expect a stroke of bad luck just to balance things out. i'm used to special occasion doom, you see.
doomless occasions are so nice, internets. as we sipped pints and peoplewatched by the windows at mcgillin's,** joe's blackberry beeped: an anniversary note from his parents saying how happy they are that i'm their daughter.
imaginary vacation awards
best bar: national mechanics (22 south 3rd st. @ market). i didn't even try to blend like a local when i got a good look at the interior of this place: it was designed so well that i needed at least a dozen pictures immediately. the apothecary jar terraria! the lamps made of pharmaceutical bottles and whippets! the bill cosby pint glasses!*** if you find yourself in philly, find this place immediately.
best use of artichoke: three-way tie, osteria (alla giudia), amada (on flatbread with wild mushrooms, black truffles, and manchego), and tria (in salad with grilled asparagus, white beans, tomato-onion relish and pine nuts). inspired by joe's dad and his all-haggis scottish adventure, i tried to have an all-artichoke weekend. an excellent decision, if i do say so myself.
best use of al gore: this room.
imaginary reading group discussion questions
01 if you were to eat one foodstuff at every meal for a whole trip, what would it be?
02 have you been to philly? how was it?
03 when joe and i finally buy an apartment, should our bathroom have a tin ceiling or a little chandelier?**** (both would be overkill even for me).
*which strikes me as kind of brilliant, as it'd be so much easier to clean than the painted ceilings i've always had (no weird condensation-mold!). note to self: install pressed tin in bathroom.
**cheers for that tip, anonymous commenter!
***i don't have a picture of those, but...ask me about them sometime.
****i was skeptical at first, too, but they're surprisingly pleasing.
04.08.09: the dirty dozen, part I {snow in april edition}
01 a group of my college friends and i started sending each other birthday haiku via our google group (hipsterdeathsquad) a few years ago. it's kind of great: the aged one gets lots of inbox love, and the rest of us get lots of bad poetry. my syllables for jen, today's birthday girl:
chicago locals
forgo easter services
for jen's birthday bash.
dare we conclude that,
like the beatles, our girl is
bigger than jesus?
she makes better cake
for sure. happy birthday, kid -
big love from new york!
02 via lucky's style steals blog, the zappos map: a real time feed that shows shoe purchases on a google map. it's a bit like the tweet-maps that sprouted up around the presidential debates last fall, except, you know, with shopping. someone in riverside's got great taste in sneakers.
03 i passed a flock of choirboys in front of carnegie hall on my lunch break today. what is it about formalwear (they were wearing tuxes and electric blue bow ties) that makes young guys such baby birds? teen girls, now: the ones i see running off to prom all over the city are bold little warriors. was i that confident when i was that age? were my dates so...george-michael?
04 amanda and i met last night for the season's last installment of poems & pints, a reading series at fraunces tavern (new york city's oldest building, where washington addressed his officers for the last time). i will spare you my theories about the intricacies of cultivating post-college, non-work female friendships (i tried working them out earlier today, and the resulting paragraph was infinitely creepy) and say that i had a lovely time (coworkers: "...so how was the girl-date?" me: "not terrifying at all!"). also, watch out for sharon olds's compost poems: that lady loves her digestion imagery.
01 a group of my college friends and i started sending each other birthday haiku via our google group (hipsterdeathsquad) a few years ago. it's kind of great: the aged one gets lots of inbox love, and the rest of us get lots of bad poetry. my syllables for jen, today's birthday girl:
chicago locals
forgo easter services
for jen's birthday bash.
dare we conclude that,
like the beatles, our girl is
bigger than jesus?
she makes better cake
for sure. happy birthday, kid -
big love from new york!
02 via lucky's style steals blog, the zappos map: a real time feed that shows shoe purchases on a google map. it's a bit like the tweet-maps that sprouted up around the presidential debates last fall, except, you know, with shopping. someone in riverside's got great taste in sneakers.
03 i passed a flock of choirboys in front of carnegie hall on my lunch break today. what is it about formalwear (they were wearing tuxes and electric blue bow ties) that makes young guys such baby birds? teen girls, now: the ones i see running off to prom all over the city are bold little warriors. was i that confident when i was that age? were my dates so...george-michael?
04 amanda and i met last night for the season's last installment of poems & pints, a reading series at fraunces tavern (new york city's oldest building, where washington addressed his officers for the last time). i will spare you my theories about the intricacies of cultivating post-college, non-work female friendships (i tried working them out earlier today, and the resulting paragraph was infinitely creepy) and say that i had a lovely time (coworkers: "...so how was the girl-date?" me: "not terrifying at all!"). also, watch out for sharon olds's compost poems: that lady loves her digestion imagery.
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