camouflage

Apologies, loves. Between A Lady's whole moving/starting new job/attempting to dissuade her dog from eating yet another pair of shoes, and my... um... wait, what's my excuse? oh yes, my general habit of running around to things like Monday night dance parties that leave me waking up on Tuesday morning covered in mylar confetti and gold glitter, well yes, we've been lax at the updating.

In the interim, as we frantically scramble to be witty and amusing, an exchange on How To Hide The Fact That One's Hair Is Disgusting. Perfectly appropriate, as I am on day three of unwashed hair (I did try to rinse out the confetti, but may not have been entirely successful), made all the more attractive by the fact that I have not had a haircut in a long overdue while.

D:
Ways to Hide Last Night's Hair:
1) stay in bed
2) grey woven fedora of my dreams
3) drag queen wig
4) swimcap

A Lady:
5) t-shirt sleeve as head wrap
6) cornstarch
7) bun
8) stay in bed

D:
9) drape pet jauntily around crown of head
10) kerchief
11) hoodie
12) get out of bed, but only to move to couch
I am rocking option #7 today. Last night's hair was definitely not on my mind with This Morning's Oversleeping.

A Lady:
13) execute makeup perfectly, pretend hair is intentionally messy
14) baseball cap
15) beanie
16) balaclava

D:
17) full ski mask
18) turban
19) define self as "J.D. Salinger-esque hermit" and avoid all human contact

alleycat

D: I have a story for you. It involves bacon, being awkward, and stalking a cute boy in my alley.

I wake up this past Sat morning with a well-deserved hangover and am addressing this by making a huge fucking pan of bacon on the stove, next to my large kitchen window. The phone rings, and I smush myself up against this window to get a little cell reception. I happen to glance outside into the alley and there is a totally cute boy out there. Ginger hair, nice glasses. And you know I am a sucker for nice glasses.

A Lady: Uh huh

D: Then, as I am a spaz, I exclaim into the phone "Dude! There’s a cute boy in my alley!" ... before realizing that I am standing in front of an open window, facing this boy who is now looking up at my window. Who totally heard me.

Then I realize that I am wearing a bathrobe and rocking seriously matted hangover hair, so I run away from the window.

But dude! The bacon! I cannot let the bacon burn!

A Lady: Ahahahaha

D: So I scoot BACK to the stove, next to the window. Cute Boy is still there.

A Lady: Noooo

D: I then proceed to press myself up against that window most of the day in the hopes that he'll come back.

A Lady: Please tell me you peeked from behind your frying pan.

D: Nah. But I should've dangled bacon out the window like a lure.

A Lady: Totally.

D: THEN! I'm out on the back steps later that night and I see him again. He is totally the houseguest of someone in my building! I must go forth and be detective-y!

A Lady: Wait, what was he doing in the alley? Are we sure he's not just loitering?

D: The first time, he was looking confused and looking up at the window as if he’d been accidentally locked out.

The second time, he clearly left from within my building and was heading out on an errand of some sort. Not a homeless dude in the alley, it would seem.

A Lady: Did he recognize you?

D: Nah, I only saw him as he disappeared down the alley.

BUT!

On Monday night, I'm leaving the building via the back steps, and I run into my downstairs neighbor and I ask: “Hey, you guys didn't have houseguests this weekend, didja?"

(neighbor) "no, why?"

A Lady: Ohoho!

D: (me) Oh, there was this really cute boy in the alley on Saturday who I saw from my kitchen window, and he was looking up at your window like he was locked out."

(neighbor) "Um. How cute? What did he look like?"

(me) "Exceedingly cute. Ginger, nice glasses."

(neighbor) "THAT IS TOTALLY MY BROTHER."

A Lady: OMG

D: (neighbor) "HE HUNG OUT HERE ON SATURDAY."

A Lady: OMGEEZY

D: (me) "You have a very cute brother."

A Lady: Et????

D: (neighbor) "Mind if I pass along the compliment? …and are you single?"

(me) "Please do …and YES."

A Lady: OMFG. Open-mouth grin.

D: I knooooooooooooow.

Alleystalking: the new meet-cute.

I am hoping to run into the downstairs neighbor again soon to push the Hook A Sister UP With Your Cute Brother agenda.

A Lady: This is amazing. And without the awkward dating-friends'-siblings thing, because he's just a neighbor.

D: YUP.

Although, jumping waaaaay ahead into the Realm of Possibility ZOMG, if we do end up hooking up, it may be awkward as his brother's apartment downstairs is the exact same layout as mine. Meaning: my bedroom is directly over theirs.

A Lady: D’oh.

D: (I plan ahead.)

via velo

As A Lady is in the midst of "important" things like moving, starting a new job, and such, imagine her chiming in here to say things like "bikes: we like them!" and "be careful not to rip open any seams held tenuously together with sixty-year-old thread".

"But how do you bike in that, D?"

Yes, I get that a lot. The answer: comme ça, dear. Put on helmet, place feet in pedal cages, hike up dress, and bike forth. Is it, as A Lady noted, Potentially Inappropriate? Of course it is. I figure that anyone who may see me biking to work, to the grocery, to the bar, etc., is unlikely to be someone I will ever see again, and this turns my give-a-fuck meter down to zero.
N.B.: don't do this while wearing any delicate vintage pieces with seams that are a leeeeetle too tight around one's hips. That's just asking for trouble.

Eventually, one develops biking calluses on the inner thighs from where they rub on the seat. This is 1) highly unattractive, and 2) massively useful, and I am fully in favor of it. I'd rather have little quarter-sized calluses on my legs than have saddle sores. Related: I am gross about things like this. More scar tissue, says I!

(Let's talk about how ridiculous my bike is, guys. I am very lucky to have a free bike (the latest in a long line of free bikes, fantastically), but it is ultra-heavy, and the frame does not fit me, and it's really impractical to do my daily 12+ miles of city biking on a big-ass mountain bike. I lust after the Surly Pacer: I test-rode it last weekend, and oh my lord, I am having a hot-and-heavy imagined affair with this bike. It's perfection, and the Minnesota connection is just a bonus. I take a 56cm frame, if any generous patrons would like to gift a girl.)

peer pressure

In which A Lady bosses me into not cutting my hair before I see her in November. (I am not cutting it in preparation for a truly kick-ass Halloween costume, at the moment.)

D: So: Theda Bara! I am growing my hair out, doing loads of research, and planning the Theda-as-Cleopatra costume. This might be the thing that spurs me to buy a sewing machine.

A Lady: Oooh.

D: IT INVOLVES A HEADPIECE. You know I am a sucker for headpieces.

A Lady: YES. Dude, come here for Halloween, and I'll be Louise Brooks.

D: OOH, YES. Louise Brooks is my idol. And my haircut inspiration, obvs.

A Lady: …Though I am excited to see you with a longer 'do.

D: I might cut it post- Halloween though; it tends to get stringy when longer. But! there will be Halloween photos.

A Lady: Nooooooooo.

D: Striiiiiiiiingy, L.

A Lady: I wanna see it longer. In person.

D: Bossy, bossy.

A Lady: Duh. Also, that's what dry shampoo is for.

D: You will not see it longer in person if it's all lank and gross.

A Lady: Hmph

D: …But if it's behaving, I'll leave it. We'll see.

A Lady: Pah.

Let it be known that if I am sporting unflattering hair around on my vacation this November, it is totally A Lady's fault.