This is wrong. On so many levels.

I do not want to be subjected to this first thing in the morning. Once and for all, if you need makeup to appear in public, you should have it on BEFORE you appear in public.

This, my dear, glaring girl, is why. That is just disgusting. That's why I was staring at you, watching you put your face on. Why you felt that you had the right to be giving me the stink eye for watching a public display of crassness, I do not know.

Here's the whole thing.

OK. Thank the tv gods of programming that it's back. Finally.

First of all, Mr. Tim Gunn is right (as always, and about everything, DUH) when he says that this year's crop of designers is more diverse and more talented than ever. But, really, people. Do we need another Santino? Mr. Jeffrey Sebilia needs to go away, and soon.

I hate his tats, and that's not because I hate tats. I hate HIS tats. He has a little pea head, and his neck is wider than his ears, and all that writing going up and down his neck just makes him look "like a shmoo" according to RJ. According to me, it just makes him look like a pencil-necked asshole.
Also? His design, while not completely sucking, sucked. Again, just like Satan-ino, with the shredding and the distressing and the whickety whack.

(Hey! Bravo! Where's the whickety-whack t-shirt that Nick had on at the finale? We out here in tv-land want to buy those.)

Laura. Laura, I'm not sure if I'm going to love or hate. On the one hand, she has some major, major design chops. On the other hand, she had the cojones (as we say here in Miami) to ask someone from Ohio, to their face and seemingly in dead earnest, "what do people DO in Ohio?"

Then again, she has that whole Judy Davis
thing going on, and how can you hate anybody whose fashion sense involves ALWAYS wearing red lipstick?

Still, I feel I must make mention of the fact that she moved into the Atlas with matching Louis Vuiton luggage. Steamer cases. Please. The woman does not need the 100 thou prize. She's an architect who lives in Manhattan with five children. FIVE. That 100G must be chump change for her.

Vincent, I think, is this year's Daniel Franco. And I loved Daniel Franco. Don't ask me why, I can't say, except that he made beautiful garments and was the only person to get back up in Satan-ino's grill. Vincent openly admits that being in the rag trade in NYC almost killed him. Guessing by his age and look, I'd say it was the 80s (i.e.: drugs to excess, drink to excess, sex and drugs and rock and roll to excess) that almost killed him. But, since NYC nearly gave me a nervous breakdown in the 70s, I'm willing to cut him some slack.

And for all the wahwahwah about the basket hat, I didn't find it so repellent. I remember those hats in fur, and feathers and all sorts of materials, including straw. I found the sunglasses more distracting. I thought the whole thing looked like an interlunar stewardess from 2001. Not that there's anything wrong with that.

I also love, love, love Michael-the-hiphop-guy. That little dress made from coffee filters? Oh. My. God. Give that man a contract, stat. And, if he really is a street-cred sort of guy from Atlanta, maybe he'll just give that asshole Moo-lan the smack down.

Mooooolaaaaaan. I got him pegged as this year's snippy-ass blow hard. That accent, whether real or not-so-much has me gagging. I think he sounds more like Austin Powers than Austin Powers. I'm not expecting much from him except my-shit-don't-stink attitude and indifferent design. I wasn't impressed with the assymetrical shrug thing he produced for the first challenge.

Robert, The Mattel dude. Designing for Barbie hasn't made him loose his ability to design for real women. That little white dress, with the built-in bling and the big red bow in the back was to die for. I can't wait to see what he does next.

Keith Michael, the designated menswear-only designer, who took Tim Gunn's advice, added crap to his blue dress and then, after sleeping on it, turfed the advice and the add-ons and won the challenge is another designer I can't wait to see do more.

Not only did I love the dress, I loved his "Look. Just because I've never done women's wear before doesn't mean I can't do it, it only means I haven't done it." attitude. And, though I wouldn't suggest making a habit of it, he turfed Tim Gunn's advice and WON. the. challenge. If you haven't watched Project Runway before, let me tell you this. You do not turf Tim Gunn's advice and win. Ever. This may have been a first.

Except for my girl Laura (at least for today I love her) none of the other women have struck me as potentially very interesting designers. OK. I take that back. Girl from Ohio (Angela) seems like she might have something in her bag of tricks worth watching.

Wow. I just read her bio on that link. I KNOW she has stuff worth watching, now. She may just be my new favorite.

And last, but not least, I have to hand it to Michael Kors this year. He's come out of the gate with a bang. While "pink parts" is no "entirely too much tootie", the way he delivered it was golden. And the eye-roll while he dismissed the "granny panties" under the sheer curtains, well, it was brilliant.

My favorite annual writing contest, the Bulwer-Lytton fiction contest, has announced this year's winners. While the winner is, in fact, kind of humorous, the runner-up's entry had me on the floor.

The 2006 runner-up, Stuart Vasepuru from Scotland, played with one of the most famous pieces of dialogue from the Clint Eastwood movie "Dirty Harry."

"I know what you're thinking, punk," hissed Wordy Harry to his new editor, "you're thinking, 'Did he use six superfluous adjectives or only five?' -- and to tell the truth, I forgot myself in all this excitement; but being as this is English, the most powerful language in the world, whose subtle nuances will blow your head clean off, you've got to ask yourself one question: 'Do I feel loquacious?' -- well do you, punk?"

Oh, come on. You know you want to laugh and you know that you're jealous that you didn't write that first.

At least I am.

Yeah.

Syd Barrett, R.I.P.

Sigh.

So I get an e-mail yesterday from another stenodrone telling me that her micromanaging boss has given her such and such information for me. She ends by saying that the info comes "straight from the horse's mouth."

I reply that she obviously deals with the other end of the horse than I do.

(bada boom)

One of my very favorite sci-fi titles ever was "What Entropy Means to Me".

The bottom line on the estate issue is that the old childhood home, to which I planned on retiring and living out my dottage, will be sold. The insurance company has forced our hand by refusing to insure an empty home, and I can't buy it now.

Many years ago, my professional portfolio was stolen out of the trunk of my car*. It was simultaneously the most frightening and the most liberating thing that ever happened to me, career-wise. This is sort of the same.

I don't want to give up the house, but the RLA and I will be able to retire wherever we wish, and if our wish turns out to be my home town, then we can find our own dream house, and not my parents'.

Still, this is the third or fourth family home that we've had to close, and had to say goodbye to, when we really would rather have lived in it.

If there is one thing of which I am sure beyond all doubts, it is that the universe will unfold as the universe will unfold and no amount of wishing, dreaming or planning can change the course of time.

So. What can I do instead of trying to change the universe? I can appreciate the universe as it reveals itself to me.
I was so enamoured of this guy's hoodie that I actually asked him permisssion to photograph it. I usually just take pictures, figuring if someone is out in public looking like that, or doing that, then it should be no skin off their nose(s) if I take a picture.



Those shiny studs? It took me a minute to figure out what they were: the metal guards from the tops of bic cigarette lighters. Removed. Attached. Voila. Art.

How cool is this?



* from the trunk of my car as it sat in the parking lot at Tobacco Road. Figures.