Escape from California!
Hi. It's me. Je suis la. En voyage...somewhere between Damascus and Paris and a small village in the Pyrenees. No one really knows how to follow a map now-a-days and I think that global positioning system devices are a little creepy, so you can just click here to follow along, figuratively.
As a certain Mr. Tomilson learned a few months back, accidentally caught up with protesters of the G20 protests in London, wearing black can be risky (even for bystanders). But, let’s put the fight against capitalism and police brutality aside and focus on the task of what to wear. There exists the perception that wearing black is safe. It’s slimming. It’s somber. There’s the little black dress and the black tie. It doesn’t show stains. It matches everything!* And, hey, if hip people from big cities can wear black in the heat of August, well then there must be something positively magical about this sartorial tactic. Indeed, black is dark, simple, perfect! Black is the old black, the classic and original black. All these “new blacks,” so many, so changing-with-the season, they do not deserve the honor of blackness. Stick with black on black on black and you’ll be fine.
Traveling is the best! Being a tourist is the worst! What to wear when you’re a tourist who doesn’t want to look like a tourist??!?
Well, first things first: shoes: sneakers are a dead give away. Especially outside of the U.S., no one wears sneakers in the city unless they’re going to work out. No shorts neither. In general, when I’m traveling to foreign cities, I try to dress conservatively, nicely, and comfortably. That means, I avoid wearing jeans and t-shirts (although these are a must for any rural adventures), I bring a super comfy pair of leather shoes, and I cover up. So for a day of window shopping and cafe hopping in Barcelona, llevo esa: top and shirt by Filly (As adorable as it was before, I altered the skirt so that it is less flared), woolly tights for warmth and modesty, the most comfy boots (Also modified from their former mid-calf height.), and (not pictured) a vintage jacket (cropped, black raw silk).
Self Portrait at the Fundació Joan Miró
Yesterday I rode my (borrowed) bike up to the Joan Miró gallery in the Montjuïc park. I decided to purchase an “Articket”, a pass that allows entry into seven museums and galleries, is valid for six months, and costs €20. Since each of these institutions charges between eight and thirteen Euros for entry, and since I wanted to go to more than two, it was a good deal.
Honestly, Miró is not very interesting to me. The majority of his work, I could just as well leave it alone. read more…
I’m not big on denim. I feel uneasy about casualwear in general. Nonetheless, a favorite pair of jeans in a cherished piece of clothing. I too suffer the need to find the perfect pair. And then today I found them. Well, actually I found them over a year ago, but there weren’t the perfect pair until today. These are super dark, heavy weight denim from a time before “washes” and a time after they started letting women wear pants again. I’d put them around 1968.
At any rate, these babies needed some alteration in order to conform to my modern lifestyle. That is, I needed to narrow the leg. Originally, the jeans noticibly drawn in around the waist and the ankle, but looser through the butt and thigh. At least, that’s how they fit me. I’d already taken them in at the center rear seam. And earlier, I’d sewn a long dart along the entire length of each leg, making them completely fitted from the waist to the ankle. In this state, they were only suitable for wearing with cropped sweaters and high heeled shoes. Today I tore out that dart and took in fabric along the inner seem of each leg such that they are not so loose around the knee and the leg is straight from the calf through the andle. Now, they are quite perfect.
Today is the day I sell at a loss. I all set up for a rainy day yard sale, parting with so many classic vintage jewels and trashy retro garments. Most of the things I’m selling today will not fetch the price they’re worth. Many of the nicer things just won’t sell. But, I need to reduce minimize these material possessions. They are weighing me down and holding me back. read more…
Seriously. I found this amazing site through one of the fashion flickr groups: We Counted All The Tiles. It’s a style blog created by two Muslim girls living in Canada.
The style blog is weird phenomenon: endless fotos of someone’s outfits?!? Usually that’s all they are. They’re like DIY fashion spreads with a super low production value on the internet. Some are interesting. Some are terribly mundane. These teenagers with headscarves do it better than anyone else.
Well, not really. I just always seem to get drunk and talk shit when I attend the Bicycle Film Festival in San Francisco. Perhaps things will be different if I attend in Paris? Well, I suppose it will be different in the sense that I can’t talk shit very well in French.
I do know that “Faites un film de velo” means “Make a bike film.” That is, they’re currently accepting submissions. Actually, my French language abilities are improving thanks to the frequent, though short, conversations I’ve been having with local franco kids. I’ll be riding my bike across France during July of this year and I expect it to be a grand experience. Not worthy of a film. But maybe some photographs. To this end, I’ve recruited a friend, someone who knows something about taking pictures and something about bikes to help me shop for a camera.
Last week, as the big fancy bike race rolled through Santa Cruz, thousands of kooks crowded the downtown streets hoping for glimpse of gaunt European men on magic two-wheeled machines. The local law enforcement were swarming. And they handed out gift bags! Behold the fiscal responsibility of our local law enforcement agency: A frisbee and beach balls printed with the emblem and contact info of the Santa Cruz Police Department. I’m not terribly concerned about this, but I do find it an amusingly irresponsible way to spend money (Especially after so much controversy over the City’s budget cuts this year, a plan that did not include cutting police funding.). But there are bigger coppers to fry, like the arrogant bastard in Arizona.
Today I’m scheduled to work my last real shift as a bicycle courier. And I will do so with a full dose of daytime liquid cold medicine and some serious rain gear. It is pouring. I plan to ride about 20 miles in a head wind today, and the rain will probably seep or drip into my dry wool layers within a few hours. I do, however, intend to stay warm enough and I plan to enjoy my last day as one of those defiant, incomprehensible people who would rather spend a day in the weather than a day at a desk.
I watched Waltz with Bashir last week, by myself after work for the last matinee showing of the day. The animation was beautiful. The imagry, the dialogue evoked emotion. The film was a portrayal of one man’s honest truth, his experience of a terrible moment in history. Upon the ending credits, I was left thinking, “O.K. What now?!” Something was missing. After a morning of link-clicking, I found what the Western-consumer-ready movie lacked. In a review of the film (I found this via Fhar’s blog), this paragraph stood out:
The question of who was doing whose dirty work is not so easily answered however Israel was nobody’s sidekick when it invaded Lebanon. The film does not show us the Israeli shelling of Beirut that led to 18,000 deaths and 30,000 wounded, the violations committed against civilians, the destruction of Palestinian and Lebanese resistance. read more…
