Paper Bag

My feet are way bigger than they used to be. Am I alone here? I mean WAAY bigger. It’s so…well, it’s awful and freakish, is what it is, and I’m really and truly terrified that one day I’m going to wake up with my flipper-like feet dangling off the edge of the bed like a rubber chicken. To wit: three years ago, I was a size six-and-a-half. Yesterday, I bought a pair of running shoes in size eight. SIZE EIGHT. Granted, you generally need a half size up in running shoes, but still. STILL. And worse, I’m hearing that they grow again when you get pregnant, and God, I’m telling you, the clown feet are coming and there’s nothing I can do about it.

Also, I have officially become a Person Who Exercises–a person who is rather rabid about it, in fact–and nothing frightens me more, because really, am I going to turn into that chick on Work Out? (I love her, by the way. She’s totally obnoxious and self-aggrandizing, and all those awful, despicable things, but I’m strangely drawn to her, but not in that way, if you know what I mean, and I think you do.) I have become a little obsessed with the state of my arms, and am all but flexing them to anyone who walks by, because hi, have you met my tricep? I’ve never had one before, and boy howdy, I’d like to introduce you to it. Adam is decidedly not interested, as he’s concerned that I’m going to turn into a bodybuilder type who thinks it’s cool to open Brazil nuts with her armpits at parties, and it’s a valid concern, because if I could open nuts with my armpits, I totally would. Wouldn’t you? Much cooler than tying a cherry in a knot in your mouth, non?

Incidentally, and apropos of nothing, I was tooling around our local department store, and I was positively entranced by the seemingly never-ending collection of peignoir sets. Kate Chopin aside, I’ve always wanted to be the kind of person who wears peignoirs. Doesn’t it seem so strangely romantic, if horribly impractical? If I wore a peignoir, I have to believe my life would in some way be more glamorous, and also include late-night cheesecake festivals with my two best girlfriends, and maybe my mother, who would suddenly be Italian, and also named Sophia. Instead, I’m usually wearing the tank top I worked out in, and maybe a pair of pajama pants fished out from some unsavory bowel of the closet.

Also, incidentally, while wandering around the department store, I found myself in the handbag section. Have I ever mentioned that I love handbags? I love them, and it’s completely incongruous, given that I’ve announced on several occasions that I can’t dress myself and I hate shoes, but oh, I love an expensive handbag, and sadly, I always carry one, and it’s usually Kate Spade. I realize she had her day, when everyone had her classic nylon bags, but I’ve never moved on from her (though I no longer carry the nylon bags), and I still find them to be absolutely perfect under all circumstances. I buy a new one every season. Don’t hate me, because, if it’s not obvious, I am not the kind of person who judges others by their handbags, and again, I’m usually carrying these cute handbags with vagabond-like clothing. It’s my one vice.

This is important information before I launch off here, lest you think I come from a place that does not appreciate pricey handbags, because oh, I truly do. But Dooney & Bourke? Are they serious? I find them to be positively tacky and hideous and everything a handbag shouldn’t be, and further, I am strangely ENRAGED by Emma Roberts sponsoring her own line of bags, because, not to beat the teenage horse, but she’s SIXTEEN. And while I love expensive handbags, I can’t help but feel like I’ve sort of earned the right to have an expensive handbag, because Jesus, people, I’m THIRTY-ONE, and wow, look at all the money I’m saving on clothes and shoes! Emma Roberts’ peers? They’re SIXTEEN. Sixteen-year-olds should not be coveting $250 handbags, and I’m not even going to start on the nepotism, I’m just not.

(Speaking of clothes, Ann Taylor Loft is having a fabulous sale right now. Pants! I bought two pairs of adorable capris for $14! Hooray!) (I have to go to the mall a lot for my job. It’s not healthy. But I digress.)

I’m sorry. I really need to stop hating teenagers. I think it’s because school is out, and again, Jesus, they seem to be everywhere, like that godawful LOL cats trend (“I’m in ur pool…wearin’ a bikeeni”) (Have I mentioned how badly I want to find that site funny, but I can’t? I mean, it was funny once, but at this point, I am LOLcats’d out.)

Also, to end on a light note, while I was on a professional call (in my car, of all places, parked) yesterday, something–I do not know what–made a horrible noise that sounded exactly, and I mean EXACTLY, like a giant fart. I promise you, if I weren’t the owner of these buttcheeks, I would swear that I farted, but that kind of noise is something you can feel, of that I’m certain. So, what do you do? I was horrified and embarrassed, because seriously, I DID NOT FART, and yet I’m completely certain my phone mate not only heard it, but he now thinks I farted on the phone with him, and also have a gas problem. I mean, I could hear the iced coffee he was slurping, there is no way he didn’t hear the fart-like honk. And yet, to say something seems wrong (“It was my shoe!”) and calls attention to it, and also sounds needlessly defensive. Only a guilty farter would say such a thing, so I didn’t say anything at all, and just let the fart lay there, but oh, there was an awkward moment where I didn’t do or say anything–the kind of awkwardness that follows a real life phone fart, so it’s not good, not good at all. He thinks I farted, and I didn’t! I DID NOT FART.

*Fiona Apple or Anna Nalick. Of the two, I prefer the latter. Oh Fiona. How I’d like to break you in half.

42 comments July 11th, 2007