Song: Into the Night by Azari & III (Prince Language Remix)
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I’ve always been a little fascinated by those blogs where someone shows you what she wore that day (and, to a lesser extent, what she ate that day, although I give up on most of these very quickly because they tend to gross me out). This type of endeavor requires way more sticktoitiveness than I’ll ever have and I sort of admire the dedication.

So, I decided that, in honor of Fashion Week, I would bore you to death by posting pictures of what I wear every day for the next week. Starting today, when the only time I left the house was to go to the gym to lift heavy objects repeatedly and then put them back exactly where I found them. For this exciting adventure, I wore black Converse All Stars, black yoga capris (I don’t do yoga but I totally use yoga for its pants, but only for weightlifting because they fall down when I run), a black Neighborhoodie that says “Five Points” (I am nothing if not bad ass), and a White Sox hat. Is there anything about this outfit that needs to be captured and shared with the world at large? There is not. But that didn’t stop me from actually trying to take a picture of myself wearing several black articles of clothing and a baseball hat.

The problem is manyfold. First, our house is very small. Second, I don’t have a full-size tripod (thankfully!) and we lack surfaces of adequate height for unnecessary self-portraiture (a too-low camera is universally unflattering and doublechinifying and a too-high camera misses vital footwear). Third, I don’t have a remote for the camera (thankfully!) so I have to use the 10-second timer. Fourth, and I’m not sure why I left until fourth the most important problem, there is no reason for me to take a picture of myself dressed for the gym and share it with the internet. I didn’t even do that shit when I was bored, drunk, unemployed, and living in Nederland in the middle of winter.

I opted for the too-high camera and got a boring shot of 2/3 of me, stiffarmed, in front of Soren’s bedroom door, looking rather sour. Then I got the exact same shot, with a dorky smile because Soren made me laugh because the flash was hilarious. Also, redeye.

Then I figured I’d try again, outside, wearing a jacket because it was cold I didn’t think a nondescript black North Face jacket detracted from the outfit too much. So I went outside, set the camera on a dilapidated old bookcase that we sexily keep in the back yard, hoped no neighbors were outside, and took a picture of myself in my gym outfit and a jacket. The problem (aside from the obvious) is that I’d already realized the streets and sidewalks were a mess and traded the All Stars for some short, beige Uggs I’ve had for a million years and were once peed on by Coltrane at a gas station in Nebraska or Iowa that horrific year we drove from Denver to Chicago, with six cats in an enclosure we jerryrigged (is that the correct use of jerryrigged?) out of two animal cages, several bungee cords, some Christmas garland, and the parachute from elementary school gym class, and Coltrane (the highlights of this trip include but are not limited to Coltrane doing the following at my parents’ lake house: pooping in the sun room, peeing on outdoor chair cushions, jumping off the deck and briefly being lost in a very dark unfamiliar neighborhood, and eating part of the downstairs bathroom). I mean, first of all, who wants to see a picture of me dressed for the gym, but second of all, who wants to see a picture of me dressed for the gym wearing old pee shoes that make no sense with the overall aesthetic (holy shit did I spell that right?) I’m trying to achieve here.

You know how new models always say, oh my god, I didn’t know modeling was, like, so hard! I thought it was just standing there looking pretty! Well, I didn’t know taking pictures of yourself wearing clothes and posting them on the internet was so hard! But it is! It’s so hard I can’t even do it and this ridiculous post is evidence of my complete failure.

To tell you the truth, I’m not really a big fashion person, anyway. I enjoy fashion, but it’s one of those things where I just like what I like and don’t actually know what I’m talking about. Also, I lack the money to do anything about it, so I might say, oh yeah, I like this thing I saw someone do with an earthy sweater and giant seahorse, but that doesn’t mean I’m going out to buy shit to, like, recreate the look for everyday life as a dorky mom in Denver or anything although, listen, I’m about three beers away from buying everything for sale on the internet that involves seahorses because I kind of have a thing (it goes with the aqua thing, if you’re keeping track — I’m a secret Miami socialite). I mean, I tried watching Project Runway once and, like everyone else in the world, I have a crush on Heidi Klum but I just liked the pompous guy from Ramallah who draped everything and disliked the petulant child who thought all women should dress like Depeche Mode rejects from the 80s and who, of course, won. As a practical woman who owns seven pairs of Victoria’s Secret Pink sweatpants and all things being equal would prefer to dress like a college student, I have no use for looking like a Depeche Mode reject from the 80s.

I’m going to have to find another way to honor Fashion Week. This probably means that for the next several days, I’ll write boring stuff about, um, my kid’s hair, bangs (possibly, again, because whether to get bangs is a harder decision than whether to have a child and you think I’m kidding but I’m not), and, um, why I finally gave up eye makeup. All of which, I guess, is loosely related to fashion in one way or another, if you’re someone who lives in what the fashion world probably considers a flyover state who doesn’t get out much except to go to the gym or an office where you’re seen by like two people ever or Jenny’s Crack Head Market. Yeah. You might want to just stop reading now.