Nov
24
I was getting ready to leave the house the other day and after I’d loaded both kids in the car and run back inside to grab my purse I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror and came screeching to a halt. It wasn’t the sweaty, red face that startled me (my god, Dylan has become a hefty little honey-baked ham, and toting him in the carseat is like some sort of nightmarish Level FIVE strength routine in 30 Day Shred); it was the whomper-jawed hooters.
One was pointing slightly off to the left, the other making its escape down the right side of my ribcage. The thin, cheap fabric of my Target-purchased bra was doing nothing to mask the décolletage coup d’état happening under my shirt, and as I shoved both hands in there and wrestled everything back to place like I was trying to manhandle two unruly badgers, it occurred to me that in the absence of surgical intervention, it was time for some expert advice.
So yesterday I headed to Nordstrom’s lingerie department, dragging my friend Ashley along for moral support.
We found a clerk and I sidled up to her, awkwardly clearing my throat. “Hi,” I husked. “I know we are total strangers . . . but I feel something magical happening between us. I was wondering if you could come with me into a small dressing room and look at my unclothed breasts?”
Okay, not really, but that’s what it felt like I was saying when I asked if she could do a fitting. I’ve never been fitted for a bra before, so I wasn’t sure what to expect — was I supposed to whip off my shirt immediately, or were we going to engage in some girl chat first, maybe share a little pharmaceutical assistance to loosen the old inhibitions? Would there be a pillow fight, and if so, would the feathers that drifted gaily onto our naked shoulders be pink, or white?
Well, it turns out that a bra fitting is quite professional and there’s really no giggling involved, except when the nice lady informed me that I was not in fact a 36 C like I’ve been wearing for YEARS, but rather, a 32 D. I laughed disbelievingly and said I knew she was the one with the measuring tape and all but I did not think so, ha ha ha, and she had me try on a 32 D Wacoal that fit so perfectly I actually snapped my own picture when she left the room because I’d never seen my chest at, you know, chest level before.
(Dorky jumped-the-shark Lolcats text placement for modesty purposes only, because clearly every last drop of humor has long been wrung from this idiotic meme.)
I bought two bras in my crazy new size and both of them provide the key elements I’ve been looking for: elevation, containment, immobility, and, er, temperature shielding. I would never in a million years have thought to decrease the band size OR increase the cup size, but apparently that was exactly what I needed. Hooray for Nordstrom’s, their famous-for-a-reason customer service, and the oddly named “t-shirt bra”, which essentially creates a bulletproof, sag-resistant Viking-esque covering for that which has been Ravaged by Time and Motherhood.
In related news, I seem to have undergarments on my mind lately because I see I referenced a “pointy-bra’d rack” on a recent Lemondrop post, which is my TOTALLY SEAMLESS segue to ask you to visit me there because no one reads that shit, possibly because I have a lame posting schedule and some mysterious behind-the-scenes editor always adds at least one silly line to my entries, but still, empty comments fields make me sad, boo. Come say hi.
Nov
23
Crafty
Filed Under Uncategorized | 82 Comments
A couple of you asked how we did the wire art hanging whatsit I showed yesterday, and since I foolishly over-commited to this goddamned November blog-every-day business and need a filler post, like, pronto happen to have some photos handy, here’s a quick run-down for those who are interested.
The ingredient list basically consisted of picture wire, cabinet knobs, a sheet rock screw, and a drill bit.
Oh, and binder clips:
What we wanted to do was screw the cabinet knob directly into the wall, but since it’s designed to be attached to a cabinet, JB ditched the bolt that came with it and used a sheet rock screw instead. He used a vise grip to clamp onto the screw:
Then he cut the head off the sheet rock screw with a miter saw, using a metal cutting blade. Looka them sparks!
Afterwards, he used a grinder to narrow the top of the screw, so it would fit more easily into the knob.
The knob could then be attached to the top of the sheet rock screw, like this:
JB used a small drill bit to drill two holes into our kitchen wall (after using his stud finder, and AS ALWAYS, pointing the device at himself and grinning widely and waggling his eyebrows because HEY IT HAS FOUND A STUD GET IT HAR HAR HAR), then screwed the knobs into the wall. The wire could then simply be wrapped around each knob to create the line, and the art is attached to the wire with the binder clips.
Voila:
It’s not super fancy (if you’re really looking for cool art/photo-hanging inspiration this project is extremely awesome), but I like how it turned out. Our fridge is stainless steel so you can’t put stuff on there with magnets, which on the one hand is kind of nice because we don’t overload it with every little scrap we want to save, but we haven’t had a good alternative place for displaying temporary things like kids’ drawings. Now that we do, maybe I’ll actually hang a few of the eighty bazillion “art” projects that come home from daycare, instead of, um, round-filing them.
What? Oh come on, like I’m supposed to frame this . . . well, mysterious zen koan, or whatever the hell it is?
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