Random Classification of My Current Wardrobe

A couple years ago I got the coolest t-shirt from a guy at work who was my Secret Santa that year. He refused to tell me where he bought it; I didn't care because I am awesome at Google. Unfortunately I never looked it up. Now the shirt is getting old and I can't find a new one. Granted I haven't even looked yet. Instead of researching it I spent two hours writing this letter yesterday to my co-worker. I am bored and for some reason this was very entertaining to me. Don't judge.

Also, one day I decided that a shirt I was wearing looked vaguely like it was from the 1920s, so I added a bunch of glass and crystal jewelry. The look was very subtle especially considering I was wearing corduroy pants instead of a dress. I do stuff like that a lot, and frankly I do it to entertain myself. I don't expect anyone to get it. He took one look at me and said, "Wow J, you are looking very Great Gatsby today." So I knew this letter wouldn't totally be out of place to him. Oh and he is straight. Very straight. And also married. Not that it matters, I am so not his type. You know, normal. As evidenced by the email below:

I wrote up this little ditty for you. Please remember I am very bored, which makes me very weird.

Jem & The Holograms - I like to wear this grocery shopping; the store employees tend to talk to me more and give me free samples. People are generally more helpful. I even got a free cab. True Story. I was sitting at a bus stop and a non-creepy cabbie stopped and said he was going down that route anyway, so he would give me a free ride. Of course the ride ended with him giving me his phone number. I am hot, but I prefer to credit the sheer awesomenss of the shirt for all of these free goodies.



Oddly Drawn, Slightly Creepy Monster - This shirt allows me to be grumpy. It scares off the people I probably don’t want to talk to. The people who are amused by it are dark and cynical so they prefer to simply nod in appreciation. If I am feeling like I don’t want to be totally unapproachable, I wear it with a huge vintage turquoise crystal necklace. Then people who like my style will talk to me, but I don’t mind because they probably have a similar sense of amusement and won’t irritate me.





Paris Hilton and Scott Baio - For my ironic look. Both of these shirts pair nicely with my pink NASCAR ball cap. I like to wear my Member’s Only knock off for the full white trash effect. I wear these to gauge people’s reactions. Do they understand I am making a hilarious joke, or are they not worth my time because they think I am serious?


Debbie Harry and Pepsi Challenge - They are non-confrontational and great conversation starters. Nobody hates Debbie or soda. Plus, I have multiple jewelry sets for each to match whatever mood I may be in. Oddly, they also pair nicely with all the plaid shorts I own.



Talk Derby to Me – My favorite T-shirt. I have photographed it with the hat I like to pair it with. The side patches resemble armed forces badges. This allows me to publicly support derby while giving silent props to the Green Barrettes, my favorite team who made me fall in love with the sport. It has been worn and washed so often that it is now faded into a dingy grey. It has also started losing its shape. I was recently distraught to find a stain on the front and panicked thinking it was time to retire the shirt. Thanks to a combination of Spray & Wash, my tears and frantic prayers to the Powers That Be to please give the shirt a reprieve, the stain was removed.

Unfortunately the realization that this shirt is not going to last forever has brought a shadow to my once bright joy. I find myself hesitating to wear the shirt. I pull it from my closet along with my black, pinstriped capris. But as I don the shirt and smooth the stretched fabric into place I think, "Perhaps I should wear something else. I do not plan on leaving the house today. It would be a shame to waste one more day of its life in the quite solitude of my home." And then I put the shirt back in the closet with a sigh. I reach for Scott Baio bolstered in the knowledge that I am strong enough not to squander the happiness of Talk Derby to Me on myself alone.

If only I knew where I could purchase a replacement for this shirt. But alas, despite numerous attempts to Google the shirt, I have yet to find the answer to my quandary.

This was his response:

Wow Ms., I am impressed. I must say, that was one of the better Secret Santa gifts I have found (well, the remote controlled rat was pretty sweet, especially when we used it to scare the sh!t out of S). I did a quick search of my own and came up with a few results. One suggestion, look up the name of the company on the tag and Google search that along with Talk derby to me.

I still can't find the shirt. Although I still haven't looked. What? I had to reformat all of this to share with you. That took another couple of hours. The good news is that I am getting better with MS Paint so you can probably look forward to more visual aids.

You're welcome.

A Christmas Story in June

Yesterday when I was writing about birthday hijinks, I remembered another story initiated by my birthday celebration. The same week I got the surprise party from our clients, my project manager and good friend decided we should have our very own celebration since we had kitchenettes in our hotel rooms. We went to the store; bought a bottle of my favorite vodka; went back to her place; and made martinis. The two of us without alcohol involved is bad enough. We can get into all kinds of trouble because we egg each other on and have the same sense of humor.

It all started during our first martinis when she expressed a desire to repay my dad for a bunch of bootlegged Bob Dylan CDs he had made for her at my request. As I was mixing the second martinis, I asked her if she remembered the leg lamp in A Christmas Story. I told her about this gift I had seen online and wanted to get for him, but it was too expensive. Hoping she would chip in, I brought up a website that sold leg lamp replicas and that's when the trouble began.

She loved it so much that she decided to get one for her husband for Father's Day. Since she was willing to do it, I changed my mind about it costing too much. They were only $70 and definitely worth the price. As we were checking out, we were presented with the option to have the lamp shipped in a crate exactly like the one in the movie. We debated the pros and cons over our third martinis. The crate was $150, but weren't we already laughing hysterically at the mere thought? The shipping cost came to $80. But only because the crate was so heavy. And we had already decided the crate was essential. We made our purchases and congratulated ourselves on being generally awesome.

The next morning, dreams and reality were fighting over my state of consciousness, when reality landed a drop kick to my gut. I shot out of bed with the realization that the previous night I had spent $300 on a gag gift. I called my coworker who told me she woke up the same way, but got on line immediately and canceled her order. Since she was on her way to the client's office, I couldn't use her laptop.

Not having one of my own, I called my then boyfriend in Denver and begged him to cancel the order for me when he got to his office. With his commute and the time differences, it shipped before he could cancel. When I called, they said I could return it for a refund but I would still have to pay the shipping fees. This left me to decide if I wanted to pay $300 for a lamp or pay $160 for no lamp. I told them I appreciated the help, but I would go ahead and keep it. He then said he had received another order to the same city that had been canceled earlier and asked if I knew anything about it. I confessed the incident and we both laughed. I decided to make the most of it and prepare my mom for the arriving present.

I vaguely described the situation and told her it was an expensive present that I couldn't return and implored her not to lecture me if she ever found out how much it cost. I didn't tell her what it was. My family is cuckoo for gifts, mostly the watching others open them part. I figured I had already ruined the surprise for my brothers when begging them to chip in. The least I could do was let my mom enjoy the fun. I called her and told her something was being shipped to dad and I needed her help to keep him from figuring out what it was until he opened it. I told her she would have to cover up the box when it came, but to call me so we could share the joke.

I called her a week later when I didn't hear from her. She told me she did get it, but she didn't call me or cover it up because it was in a wood crate that hid what it was. She giggled and announced they knew it was Italian because it said "Fragile" on it in big letters and paused for my reaction. I didn't quite know what to say. She explained that it looked just like the crate that gets delivered in A Christmas Story. More silence from my end. Exasperated, she described the leg lamp delivery scene to jog my memory. The only thing I said was, "And you still don't know what it is?"

"No!" She laughed. "But, it says Fra-GEE-lay on it just like that scene, so we can't stop repeating it." It finally dawned on me that there was no way they would guess the expensive present was a leg lamp. I suddenly laughed wishing I could be there when he opened it just to see my mom's face. I asked her to call me so I could at least hear the reactions. She agreed and we left it at that. Unfortunately, my mom's mom passed away a week later. I went back to Oregon for the funeral. The silver lining was that it meant I would be in town for Father's Day.

The time finally came for my dad to open his gift. My brothers brought it into the room with my mom chanting "fra-GEE-lay" in the background. She tried to stop them from laying it down on its side and pointed to the "this end up" printed on the box. I interrupted and told her to trust me, it would be all right. They got the crowbar out and took the lid off. When my dad started digging through the excelsior, my brothers repeated lines from the movie and threw chunks of it over their shoulders, while my mom exclaimed, "They even have straw just like A Christmas Story!"

I knew when my dad found the lamp because he stopped digging; took a couple of steps back from the crate; looked at me; and laughed harder than I had ever heard him laugh before. My mom, couldn't stand the suspense, so she reached into the box and pulled out the leg. At that point, she started laughing and my brothers reenacted the scene complete with stroking the leg up to the thigh in a creepy imitation of Ralphie. It was an amazing shot of humor after a weekend of grief, which may have accounted for the extra hilarity. It has even become a part of our family traditions as we have "just the place for it. Right in the middle of our front room window." The neighbors wait for it to come out every year.

It turns out $300 was a bargain for the amount of joy we got in exchange.

Party at the Middle Aged Home!

I have always thought that everyone comes to a place when basically your fashion sense stops evolving. My friends and I used to mock the idea. We knew it happened, we just knew it would never happen to us. We studied the latest fashion magazines before we went shopping. We refitted our wardrobe every season with new items to keep up to date. I loved clothes too much to think it could ever happen to me. But, without the slightest struggle, it did happen.

Looking back it all seems so obvious. I can see now the exact moment in time when I threw the towel in. I had just gotten my new issues of Lucky, W and Jane all at once. I went through each magazine as I normally did and folded down the corners of pages with outfits I liked. After I had gotten through all of the mags, I realized that I had only folded down 2 or 3 pages. So, I went back again and added pages with things I sort of liked. Finally I widened my search to include pages with items that I liked instead of outfits. Still I found virtually nothing.

All of a sudden I felt tired and strangely bored. I was confused. I didn't understand what was going on. I actually told someone, "I am going to sit this season out. There isn't one redeeming article of clothing to even bother with." It all happened so fast, I didn't see what I was doing. How could I have been so blind to the fact that I had started calling it in? Fashion pitched me four curve balls after that; I only managed to hit a piece of one.

It all started with the skinny jean. I just could not believe that anyone would wear those. They only looked good on a body that could be confused for a 12-year-old boy. Any woman with hips would never be able to wear them respectfully. I labeled them as a fad that would soon be gone. Strike one.

Right on the tail of the skinny jeans debut, came the ballet flat. Now those were cute. I just couldn't wear them because of knee issues. Really? Knee issues? Strike two.

The babydoll soon followed and I was at a loss. I embraced that look in high school. But now that I had an admirable set of ta tas, there was no way to wear one without looking pregnant. Even though I didn't have a belly, my girls pushed the top out past the point of no return. The flared bottom that should have fallen in folds over my figure, just tented out, leaving me enough room to shoplift an entire pumpkin if necessary. So, instead I found a few empire wasted tops that did me justice. Foul Ball.

Leggings. I struck out looking.

That was a few years ago. I didn't recognized that my glory days had passed me by. I still went shopping, but I bought less and less. I rarely purchased items that weren't duplicates of something I already owned. When I did find something new I bought multiple colors of the same thing. Forever 21 became false advertisement. I got a credit card from The Limited so I could by things that I could wear both in and out of the office.

A few weeks ago I got a catalog from Delia's. As I was silently mocking the grunge plaids and hippie wear that was being recycled for the second time, it hit me like a ton of bricks that I didn't care anymore what was trendy. I suppose if Twenties me met Thirties me, I would slap myself for the betrayal. But Thirties me would block and say, "Here's a flash from the future. You will never wear that $70 sweater because you will grow boobs. Those $100 pink pants will only be worn as a part of a Halloween costume. And, the $250 pair of boots won't fit when you find out you have to wear arch supports to avoid knee surgery." And then Thirties me will drop kick Twenties me back to the past for wasting that money. Because I totally need a new dishwasher.