So, you can’t go to IKEA without buying something not on
your list. This lamp turned out very good looking in person.
Hopefully, when I put it together
it will be perpendicular to the floor (my #1 complaint about cheap
lamps….). The cord is fabric covered (all vintage-y) in black and white,
which is key. Also in brushed stainless with brass. Overall it was
a good trip…my friend and I are leisurely shoppers, and broke it up into 2nd
floor vignettes, pause for soda and cinnamon rolls (and get Char from
smalworld), hit first floor small goods…until cart fills up, check-out, then go
back to where your cart maxed out and finish up J
So it took a long time, but was the least stressful/tired I’ve ever been in
Ikea. Not entirely sure I needed to buy new guest linens or 18
wineglasses, but I’m just gonna go with it. And no worries, the Rast was
secured.
I also went to the Ballard Designs outlet. It is a lot
of scratch and dent furniture and last year’s Christmas stuff…but the discounts
weren’t that great. It did have good light fixtures and sconces, with
reasonable discounts. The building has 2 other catalogue outlets—Grandin
Road and Frontgate. I usually throw those catalouges away, but we walked
through. Grandin Road was pretty good—the discounts were good, and about
30% of the stuff was worth taking home. But Frontgate? Frontgate
makes me want to go door to door to McMansions and explain that there are (1)
people who can helps those without good taste and (2) starving people.
Even at half off, that shit was so expensive and SO RANDOM. And all the
furniture was in weird McMansion scale. My favorite was the tree
skirt…metallic pink, and intricately beaded in white and black. It was
really lovely although certainly a little out there…not a “classic
purchase”…and marked down to a mere $500. For some reason, a tree skirt
that might be used on one pink themed holiday for $500 was too much for me.
I’d drop $10K on a sofa, but this tree skirt was basically the equivalent of a
gold plated toilet and I got all angry and crazy-eyed and we had to leave.
Are you up on crowd funding (google it, old ladies..or see
here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crowdfunding)?
I love Kickstarter, and am looking forward to my 3D doodler (pen that draws in
solid plastic—awesome, right?) and a Brinca Dada circus set that teaches
physics through old-school stunts..I also bought a children’s book at some
point….. I have regretted NOT “investing” in this new set of playing
cards:
…it was so good, and for a certain level of investment, you
got (a bunch of stuff PLUS) one un-cut sheet of cards. Yeah, playing
cards are printed on a big sheet and then cut. How awesome is that?
But I’m less depressed about the missed opportunity than I was a few months
ago—the kickstarter campaign was so successful that the guy has a website
selling these cards and the other kickstarter investor swag.
Anyhoo, Tom sent me this new crowdfunding site: graphic
tees https://cottonbureau.com/
. I know, right? Combine crowd funding and graphic tees…just add
some champagne and call it my birthday, why don’t you. While I’m not
dying over any current offerings, the possibilities are endless. An
“Inpregnito” shirt, anyone? (that is cool twitter-speak for secretly
pregnant…Sharon hooked me up with that).
Let’s be clear about one thing….I hate Occupy Wall
Street. I hate everything about it, from the dirty hippies to the lack of
agenda to the idea of camping anywhere. Plus, I don’t hate the top
1%....I want to be in the top 1%. The top 1% isn’t even that big of a
deal anymore (because 1% is a shit ton of people…the really rich people are
the top 0.1%). BBBBUUUUUUUUUUUUTTTTTTTTTTTTTT—these guys are
AWESOME: http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/nov/12/occupy-wall-street-activists-15m-personal-debt
Because debt is so cheap in the secondary market, these guys have bought up a
TON of personal debt…and just forgave it. Even nicer is that they focused
on medical debt—mostly, b/c it is so cheap and (I’m assuming this was a
motivator) rarely aggregated like mortgage debt, but it is also such depressing
debt. Nobody run out for boob jobs they can’t afford just yet—this is an
overall drop in the bucket, and their primary goal is not to be Robin Hoods,
but to raise awareness about the secondary debt market so who knows how much
more they’ll buy.
PLUS…save up your pennies: The Costume Institute will
be doing a huge show on Charles James next year when its space reopens.
After missing the DeKooning retrospective a few years ago
due to being too cheap to fly to NY (shortly followed by NOT going to the
Maharaja, The Splendors of India’s Great Kings b/c I was too lazy to drive to
Richmond, VA), I have vowed to never miss an awesome museum exhibit again.
Apparently, people who spend money on experiences feel richer than people who
spend their money on things….even WebMD says so. How long does it take to drive from Indiana to NYC,
while stopping every 2 hrs to feed an infant? Watch out Tara…..
Did anybody get fooled by the Samsung/Apple story ? I did, but its fake. But in my head I read the verdict as $1M…since it is $1B,
it is admittedly ridiculous/impossible for Samsung to pay it in nickels. Oh internet….I think my willing suspension of disbelief can be blamed on the
fact that when I read it all I could think about was the poor attorneys who
failed to put wire instructions in the text of the settlement….and how Apple
would probably dump them, if not sue them….and then immediately taking a mental
inventory of everything I’ve ever written to think whether I always say that a
price will be paid in immediately available funds by wire transfer to X….and
then just being happy I don’t write settlement agreements, which seem more
likely to be nasty. I need to lighten up.
In other news, another Bailey McCarthy before and after:
If you haven’t seen her others, here is a link to her most
popular before and afters (they are pretty good...): http://www.peppermintbliss.com/category/most-popular-before-after/
Test #2
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