Things I love about my apartment: hardwood floors. Lots and lots of closet space. Large windows in the main room. My spacious bedroom. The door in the kitchen, to throw open when the steam and smoke get to be too much. The courtyard.
Things I don’t love about my apartment: scrubbing the hardwood floors. The amount of noise on the weekends (damn undergrads). The suspicious black spots on the ceiling in the bathroom.
I’ve reached the crazy level of having FOUR laundry baskets in my room. One for towels, one for whites, one for darks, and one for things that need to be hand-washed, or have some sort of special attention paid to them. (I don’t really own any brights, or I might have five.)
I still fit into my (lovely) black-and-white ruched dress from Express that I wore to a Christmas party two years ago. This is pretty fabulous, because it’s a size 6, and I definitely did not fit into J. Crew’s size 6 dress I ordered in December. Oh, fickle fashion sizing. This is good news, because there is a Winter Wonderland Grad Ball in February – basically, an excuse to dress up and not dance. In any case, I was going to get a new dress for it, but if I can just wear that one, I’ll probably splurge on some new shoes (like wedges I can walk in, instead of my excruciating 4″ stilettos) or some bright red accessories (I’ve been thinking about flowered hairpins or hairbands a lot lately).
I think I finally figured out a way to catch all the little bits and things that life throws at me and I want to remember, for whatever psychotic reasons:
- iPhone Reminders app, to capture all those quick and creative ideas I have: a spark for a short story, photographic series, or other artistic piece.
- A .txt file (I know, how Stone Age) on my desktop for quick access, to copy-paste any words/phrases that catch my eye. I’m a sucker for a bon mot, and often will want to save a snippet of an article while I’m catching up on my daily blog perusals.
- LittleSnapper, a fantastic screenshot and websnap capture application for Mac. It’s beautifully designed and allows for the building of both ‘Smart’ and manual collections, the application of tags, and (most importantly) a notes field, so I can remind myself why I captured a particular image. (It also has a bunch of fancy highlighting, annotating, and other edit/capture tools, but I don’t really bother with those.) This replaces a messy, multi-tiered folder system on my desktop.
- An iPhone Notes file for capturing vocabulary words I don’t remember and quotes I want to remember while reading (these get transferred to an iOS wiki program called TrunkNotes I keep on my iPad and back up to DropBox).
You can count me in among the people that are obsessed with Downton Abbey. It’s amazing! I may or may not have watched the entire first season in one sitting. (Psst: It’s on Netflix instant-stream! And season 2 is available on PBS’s website.) I’m totally daydreaming about horseback riding and chandeliers and luxurious baths in claw-foot tubs.
And finally, since I’m heading to SLO for a weekend out-of-town with some girlfriends on Saturday… Joan Didion’s packing list.
To Pack and Wear:
- 2 skirts
- 2 jerseys or leotards
- 1 pullover sweater
- 2 pair shoes
- stockings
- bra
- nightgown, robe slippers
- cigarettes
- bourbon
- bag with: shampoo, toothbrush and paste, Basis soap, razor, deodorant, aspirin, prescriptions, Tampax, face cream, powder, baby oil
To Carry:
- mohair throw
- typewriter
- 2 legal pads and pens
- files
- house key
I admit, I probably won’t follow this when I pack on Friday in a rush on Saturday morning, but how much more awesome can you be? Cigarettes, bourbon, and a typewriter. How very chic.
