Loren: Of moths and old/new flames

You dont know it, but in less than 24 hours, a Great Event is about to happen. 

Tilly and Miss Yuki will be coming down to Melbourne to hang out with this lowly being, at the same time.

As mentioned before, I live in Melbourne, Tilly in Auckland, and Miss Yuki, a mutual friend of ours, lives back in Singapore. Usually Tilly and I meet up here in Melbourne, and I bump noses with Miss Yuki when I return home for the holidays, very rarely does Tilly venture down to Singapore and since our schedules dont match up, we hardly ever hang out in Singapore, but I think she has met Miss Yuki there, once. ANYWAY, (my brain is too tired to function on a complicated level) this will be the first time that all three of us will be meeting in Melbourne - without loveydovey boyfriends, overbearing parents or disapproving guardians. 

The only thing restraining us will be our bank accounts....and Tilly's inability to stay up late at night, and my inability to wake up early in the morning.

It was meant to be a surprise, Tilly's trip Down Under (I still think dirty when I type that) and the sneaky girl had planned with Miss Yuki to drag me out of the suburbs to stay with them in the city, but due to Father Loren's possible arrival, (and the fact that I probably need notice to pack/plan my wardrobe) the cat had to be let out of the proverbial bag. So once we finished squawking and flapping our feathers, the two of us reached the same point. Very typically female of us, and I am sorry to fulfill such a cliché. 

"WHAT ARE WE GOING TO WEAR?!"

If its just the two of us, its a lot less stressful. After all, we've seen each other in various states of dress and undress (kinda), and putting together outfits for each other is like....having a nice warm bath. Preparing it is second nature, you just slip in naturally and come out surprisingly revived. Okay, not the best of analogies, but you get the gist. 

However with Miss Yuki here, there is a pressure to show this special segment that I like to call, "How Singaporeans Could Dress When Away from the Small Mindedness of the Tiny Island". No need for further explanation.

With a little shoving, and a lot of courage, we will be taking daily outfit shots. Somehow. Maybe I can put a pillowcase over my head. Yes, I think that is what I will be doing.

Still, despite the stress of, "How in the world am I going to be able to pack everything into one small bag and not have my arms drop off from the weight?!" and "Why the heck do I have so much black?! Am I going for some Recon mission that I'm not aware about?!" and of course, "Crap, how do I lose that weight? Right. Carry heavy luggage bag.", I'm looking forward to this, mega-ly. I just hope that its a good trip for them both, and that Melbourne showers them with pleasant surprises of the droolsome kind.

One last squawk.

Eeeeeeeeeee!

Loren: Straddling a barstool on stage

Dear You,

How are you?

I like to ask that at the start of every conversation, partly due to etiquette, partly because my brain is scrambling to remember what I need to remember when it comes to that particular person, and partly because well, I'm hoping that the person will be so preoccupied on telling me how they are doing that they forget to ask me about....me.

That's me all over. Thinking way too many things at the same time, wanting to push forward, yet shrinking within myself, seeking to be more even as I wish to be satisfied with less.

But I'm getting ahead of myself here.

I dont know how much you have gleaned from the stuff that I write here on the blog, how much insight or what kind of impression you have formed of me, and it may be extremely wrong, or it could be uncannily spot on - but the one thing I'd like to dispute is the impression that I am a person who is very sure of herself. Confident. Reassured. A mini James Dean strolling around in my pants. 

In the very essence of the word, I suppose you could say that I am a person who is certain about what kind of person she really is, but that in no way means that I am a confident person....or that I know what I am doing when I give advice or make the decisions that I make. There is a difference, you know, between knowing yourself, and being confident of yourself. I think knowing yourself just means that you've dug behind the bookshelves of your character and have come face to face with the dirt that is hidden there....and you accept its presence. Being confident enough to try and clean out the dirt, or even to hold it up in the air and reveal it to the world to see - is something else entirely.

I'm talking about this rather muddling topic because every now and then I bump into a youngling, and then for some reason they look at me with envy and tell me that they wish they could be as "sure of myself as how you are of yourself". I sometimes dont know if they mean what they are saying or they dont know what they are saying has nothing to do with what they really mean. And then they look at me with admiration (eurgh) or envy (ewww) or worser still, adulation. Excuse me while I visit the insides of my toilet bowl. Ah, so thats what I had for breakfast.

I know what they are looking for, a mentor, and I hear the many voices in my head burst out into cackles of laughter inbetween their puffs of smoke, at the thought of me being some kind of spiritual lighthouse to a lost little tugboat. 

I am no mentor. I cannot guide you towards what is Right and steer you away from all that is Wrong. The best I can do is to advise you on how to Think. And as for that, the older I get, the more I think that its not something that can be taught. Either you have it, or you don't. Its not so much the 'higher stream of mental ability' but more the state of self-awareness. Hmm, might be the same thing. Have to think about it.

I am a great many things. Arrogant, self-centered, selfish, whiny, long-winded (bet it must have crossed your mind at least twice in this entry)....but please, dont ever say that I am a confident person. Like everyone else, I am still squatting in the dark, trying to blindly feel my way towards a stage of enlightenment. The only difference is that I've stopped freaking out about being in the dark, and I am in no hurry. That's all there is to it.

I'm just as screwed up (mayhap even more so, who knows?) as the next person, I'm just not as worried about being screwed up. The screwed up thing is that it amuses me to be a Mess, and while that might make others think I have stumbled through the door of maturity or some other baloney like that, what they dont see is that I am the last person they should huddle closer to. I am comfortable hanging out with the creepies in the dark. Its simply Like recognizing Like.

Still think that I am a better person than I make myself out to be?

Sigh.

You're entitled to your choice, of course, but dont be surprised when you find yourself being led down that winding, thorny passageway. I promise, at the very least, I will refrain from saying,

"I told you so."

Best regards,

-L.

Loren: Two ways to ask for a favor from men.

Method One: Just ask. Directly. With Instructions. (hint:numbers help)

She: Maybe out of the whole, I was like...0.06% jealous, and that's not significant, but the fact that it was there to begin with... ...its appalling.

Him: Is there anything I can do?

She: Sure you can. Level the playing field. Can you be, 0.08% jealous?

Him: You want me to be 0.08% jealous of you?

She: Yes. Then I can go, "Aaaah, I'm not so horrible, I am only 0.06% while he is 0.08%.".

Him. Okay then, I'll try.

She: I appreciate it.

Method Two: Express your displeasure. He will (hopefully) get the message.

"I..."

"told you...."

"not to..."

"buy..."

"full cream..."

"milk..."

"didn't I?! *roar*"

(Vogue Paris May 2009 from The Fashion Spot)

tilly: A Picture

Loren: Who keeps dropping bottles/cans onto her foot...

Okay, so recently the blog has gone off on a slight shoe spin....which is to be expected, considering that Tilly and I have such massive shoe fetishes. Actually, Tilly has another vice but that's a little too risqué to mention in a public blog. *coughsexcoughs* But rest assured that we have been doing more fashion related stuff other than pounding our fists against computer screens and texting each other furiously whenever a pretty shoe appears.

If you're an avid follower of the awesome fashion blog (or should it be classified under 'street style' photography?) JAK&JIL, then you should have come across this awesome picture of Kate Lanphear, who has already gotten a couple of mentions around this blog, and rest assured, her name shall be dropped a couple more times accompanied with sighs of envy.

Kate-gushing aside, I really love the jacket that she is wearing in the picture on the right. Unfortunately, I can't place it, although I could swear that I've seen it on a certain runway....Yohji Yamamoto? Rick Owens? Junya Watanabe? Well, one of the designers who does wonderfully deconstructed jackets with zips. I love clothes that have dual purpose and versatility, a shirt that unfolds into a dress, a skirt that can be worn as a cardigan, a dress that can be worn in different styles with just a twist and loop of the straps....the list goes on.

So a jacket that can become a cropped jacket with the pulling of zips? Admiration.

But you figure, since Kate is wearing it, how can mere mortals afford it? (Okay, so sometimes they do wear common brands eg. Emmanuelle Alt in ripped Topshop jeans?, but normally the stuff they wear is out of the grubby reach of us-eat-instant-noodles-everyday folk.)

Then, while doing some research for another entry I was planning to write about, I come across this.

(Maxshop.com.au)

Hmmmmmmmm....

Buttons, sleeves, collar, material aside - Hey! Its the same horizontal zip thingamajig!

And its AUS 299, which isnt too bad considering the real thing could  be 2999. Its a nice enough jacket that seems to be going for a casual, military look, and I wouldnt mind getting it in gray, but I am a little iffed out that its designed by Kirrily Johnston, who is a great Australian designer in her own right, which just makes me wonder why she chose to imitate/get inspired the jacket that Kate is wearing. 

They say imitation is the sincerest form of flattery....but the age old question remains. How much further along before it is no longer seen as flattery, and becomes a case of copyright infringement?

Loren: Bleary eyed, but quick of foot

Awakened this morning by Tilly's phone call, telling me about a pair of shoes that she has admired for a pretty long time, suddenly appearing on that eeevviiill site Outnet.com (which, if you dont know yet, is the Sale section of the infamous Netaporter.com) discounted to a heartbreaking price....and she not being able to buy it. 

Shaking off the remains of a weird high school dream that involved a ruined quiche dish, two bunnies and err, Takeshi Kaneshiro, I stumbled to my computer to peer at Outnet.com and find out exactly why my friend was trying to mask her major wigging out session while she was at work.

This is why.

I yawned in admiration. I like the sculptured heel, but that particular shade of blue, well, depresses me.

Then I click, click clicked around the site, and paused, toothbrush in mouth.

Those leaf platform pumps by Chloe. Those metallic red peeptoe pumps by Marni.

Absent-mindedly, I swallowed a mouthful of toothpaste. Then my brain swept in hurriedly to rationalize the two pairs of shoes before my slumbering heart awoke with a roar of desire.

I wouldn't wear a pump with such a skinny heel. (I'm always afraid of breaking them, silly, I know.)

I wouldn't wear a white shoe out.

Those red pumps are so trashy. (that's where the allure is, actually.)

I dont have any clothes to match.

They are too chunky for my legs.

And the biggest rationalising point.

Outnet will put out another shoe that you would rather have over these two shoes.

Tilly, on the other hand, is working on a fierce denial front. As long as she never sees the shoes again, she can pretend that they dont exist, in her size, at a droolsome price.

Good luck to her.