Matching My Blog

I spotted this Calvin Klein top in a thrift-store. The front panel and shoulder-piping are leather and the color of the top matches my blog. The piece was brand-new with original sale tags attached. It retails for $69 (a price I'd never pay) but, in the thrift-store, it was only $13 (a price I would and did pay).

I'm pairing the top with a plain skirt and patterned tights. It's a look that's simple yet appealing. It is what I dream of wearing to work.

Thoughts?

Louis Armstrong

I just made a deal of the decade.

Louis Armstrong was the greatest musician of the last century. I recently started exploring his stuff and am amazed. Louie is so talented and his songs appeal to us even today. I want to get deeper into his oeuvre and have been searching for his music on vinyl.

Yesterday I leafed through a dusty, disorganized record store and found a 4-record box set with dozens of Louie's best songs. And the collection includes wonderful photos and biographical literature. Upon examination I see the records are pristine: they look like they've never been played.

The price for this treasure? Five dollars. Or, as we say in New York, "fi-dollas."

Yahoo!

When Pigs Fly

My motorcycle-friend Fuzzy told me there's a place where pigs fly. So I had to go there.

It's The Flying Pig Cafe which serves delicious breakfast and lunch. Outside is a sculpture of a flying pig; inside is a wall of adorable piggy banks. There was live music, tasty food and strong coffee. Bingo!

Kindergarten

An old classmate just contacted me on Facebook. She shared the class photo of our kindergarten class from way back in 1963. Can you pick me out?

I'm enlarged in the next picture.

Does it look like me?

The Red Pill Or The Blue Pill?

My best friend Suzanne gave me an amazing coat. I decided to create an outfit around it.

Suzanne collects and sells clothing online, deploying superior fashion sense for pecuniary reward. I'm honored whenever Suzanne gives me something and this piece has exceptional brio.

I paired the coat with attention-grabbing checkered pants, a white body-suit and red heels. I wanted to create a visually dramatic look. Did I succeed?

The blog-post heading is inspired by the coat; the phrase is a popular meme from a 20-year old sci-fi film, "The Matrix." You can learn about the phrase's cultural meaning here.

What do you think of the outfit?

New Is Not Always Better

These days all you have to do to make coffee, listen to music or buy anything is push a button. On a machine. Life's become easier and cheaper -- but not better.

The first sacrifice of this ease is quality. Compressed digital music files are vastly inferior to vinyl recordings whose warmth and fullness is palpable. Coffee-pods made a year ago lack the freshness of newly-ground beans. And the real motivation behind most of these "improvements" is to make products cheaper and thus more profitable.

But things are lost. Not only quality but something equally important -- romance. Personal involvement. When you work to make something, you appreciate it more. Brewing coffee from scratch, putting a record on a turntable is effort that involves you in the process of creation, a joy unappreciated until it's lost.

Why all this nostalgia from an old guy? Because I just discovered a pleasure of my youth is still available -- Jiffy Pop!

You can still make popcorn by shaking a Jiffy Pop container on the stove or over a fire. Instead of pushing a button on the microwave, you actively shake the container until it magically grows and grows and becomes a dome of delicious food. The process is fun for kids and, I just discovered, fun for adults.

I assumed Jiffy Pop must have disappeared decades ago but, no, it's still here. You can buy it in supermarkets for about $2 a container. I bought some last week and am re-living my youth.

Have you ever eaten Jiffy Pop?

The Mod Squad

I flipped the instant I saw this dress. Its bold colors speak to me. "Hey, Ally!" it says. I also love the simple design and unusual material.

After I put the dress on I realized it has a "Mod" style. That prompted me to pull out white boots -- you know, the ones made for walkin', that's just what they'll do, one of these days these boots are gonna walk all over you... dum da dum, dum da dum...

Thoughts?