Monday , November 16, 2009
Laura Jane's Ultimate Fashion Challenge: Week Ten
(this week's background image is by Astrid Sampe. It has something to do with IBM, which is similar to UFC in that they are both three-letter acronyms. How novel! It is taken from John Hopper's ever-amazing Textile Blog).
PS: For those unfamiliar with the Ultimate Fashion Challenge: formal UFC rules, guidelines and regulations can be accessed HERE.
Day 64 (10.06.08)- CRACKPOT GREYHOUND IN NO WAY CHIC-CHIC: Chief Skull Vans; pink ankle socks; vintage Benetton red & white striped jammer pants; The Last of the White Wifebeaters; yellow Pirates baseball t-shirt; plain black crewneck sweatshirt
Remember, if you can, what it felt like to be alive on June 18th, 2006, that fateful day when Sir Paul McCartney turned 64, and every single newspaper/online newspaper in the world made some dumb "When I'm 64" pun about it. That is a lot like how it feels to be inside my head today:
When I'm (on day) 64.
I'm on Day 64. Whoop de doo.
This is bus-gear. I look like an idiot. Tonight I am riding on a Greyhound bus to New York City (New Jerk Shitty? I always want to make that joke, but can't figure out if it's funny or not). I will arrive there tomorrow morning, and it will be a whirlwind day. This much I know is true. I am going to hang out with my best friend, go to the Museum of Modern Art, and see the Fiery Furnaces play. The Fiery Furnaces! Play! Me! See them! You know what I am? Kind of like? A DEADHEAD. I'm like a Deadhead, only with the Fiery Furnaces. I'm a Fiery Furnaces Face.
Right now, clothes are the last thing on my mind, but I may as well state for that record I'm always going on about that I am hella stoked to be future-Laura on the day I wear these jammers as jodhpurs with my black knee-high boots and black leotard (SEE DAY 47) once the UFC is over. Wow! Me! Hi! One day, the UFC will be over. One day.
Maybe when I'm 64.
Day 65 (10.07.08)- THE SAZERAC OF TUESDAYS: Men's cream knit polo worn as dress; my grandfather's mother's gold necklace; grey stockings; cream woolen knee socks; black boots; tropical ice cream ring; American Flag print bangle
In order for a Tuesday to be THE SAZERAC OF TUESDAYS, you really have to care about making it the best Tuesday you ever lived. Take it seriously. Hand-tailor it to befit your own personal Sazeriacal specifications. Obviously, your SAZERAC OF TUESDAYS would be very, very different from mine, and if not: stop copying me.
My SAZERAC OF TUESDAYS went like this:
1) I ate a macrobiotic apple-walnut scone from Souen and did a crossword with myself in the sunshine.
2) My original SAZERAC OF TUESDAYS plan was to take myself out to the MoMA. However, my knack for showing up at museums on the day of the week they are closed superceded this plan. However, it was the SAZERAC OF TUESDAYS, so I did not even fret for a second! Instead, I went across the street to the MoMA Design Store and bought myself my Tadaaki Wakamatsu tropical ice cream ring.
3) I WENT TO THE CENTRAL PARK ZOO AND LISTENED TO "AT THE ZOO" BY SIMON & GARFUNKEL AT THE SAME TIME.
4) I hung out with two of my best friends in the entire Universe, bought new stockings because the crotch of my first pair kept riding down and I was NOT LETTING THAT RUIN THE SAZERAC OF TUESDAYS FOR ME, drank about 2342378943r333311 white wine spritzers (Riesling not Chardonnay! I LOVE THAT), um, SAW THE FIERY FURNACES,
...and other things that were great also happened, but the UFC is all about non-specifics, so use your stupid imagination.
In conclusion, on THE SAZERAC OF TUESDAYS, I could have been wearing a bubblegum pink Juicy Couture velour tracksuit and still would have felt like me for sure.
Laura Jane Faulds is very good at running away.
Day 66, Part 1 (10.08.08)- THE LUKEWARM COLT 45 BACKWASH OF WEDNESDAY AFTERNOONS: Heather-pink jammer pants; purple & white "June Lawrence School of Dance t-shirt; "american flag cowboys in silhouette" sleeveless tee; coral knit wood-buttoned cardigan (once my grandmother's)
Today I noticed that my tan from this summer has faded.
Whatever, man.
PS: That dude from Day 61 totally txted me! He thinks I'm "gutsy"!
Unfortunately for all parties involved, I totally lost interest on, like, Day 62.
Day 66, Part 2 (10.08.08)- CONFIDENT GIRL LEPRECHAUN IN CABO SAN LUCAS: Black footless stockings; green t-shirt made into sarong-y miniskirt; striped pattern-y little boys' "Bunny"-brand t-shirt; ski toque; my grandmother's sweater again
This outfit sucks a lot less than I thought it would. This is because, as usual, I am confident. Oh Sweet Confidence. Confidence counts for EVERYTHING. True confidence= the ability to exist within a balance between your internal self and the external environment. Trust your instinct (like John McCain), but reflect upon it (like Barack Obama).
Do you like how the Ultimate Fashion Challenge has recently turned into a self-help column? And not just any self-help column, but a self-help column penned by someone entirely unqualified to help you? If you answered "yes" to this question, cut the sleeves off a tank top and wear it as a slutty little skirt! If "no", cover up your crappy hair day with a pastel knit beret so damned adorable it'd make Joe Biden look like Shirley Temple.
Everybody wins! Balance! Confidence! HOORAY FOR FASHION!!!!!!!
Day 67 (10.09.08)- EVERYTHING I DO, I DO IT FOR YOU, JOHN LENNON: Keep Company African-print Junipers; 20$ Wal-Mart jeans; gold chain belt; camo-print t-shirt; LENNON SAVES t-shirt (because Lennon does save, you know); baby yellow blanket/shawl/wrap thing
This outfit fell apart fast. Normies are SO offended by my "Lennon Saves" t-shirt. I was just going to write down "It made me sad" but then realized what it actually made me was MAD. On what would have been John Lennon's 68th birthday, I wanted to ooze positivity, but instead ended up antagonizing 90% of the Earth's population by existing. So:
I took off my "Lennon Saves" t-shirt. I SOLD OUT.
Then it was an Indian Summer day, so I had to take off my insanely sick (in the good way) avant-wack yellow baby-blankie shawl. The next thing I knew, I was just some dirty scrub in an Old Navy army-print t-shirt and ripped-up Cherokee jeans. The cherry on the shit sundae that can occasionally be my life is that my jeans were too low and my t-shirt was too short, so all day long Humanity was treated/subjected to a free show of my slammin' (NOT!) inguinal ligaments, if girls even have those, which I think they don't, but I do. Normies balked at my indecency.
Like John Lennon, I hate Normies. Well, I hate bad Normies. There are some GREAT Normies out there (and, conversely, there are some damned horrific Non-Normies. Life is complicated, you know?), but none of them seemed to cross my path today. The true indecency of October 9th is that, if asked, all those balking Normies would probably claim to love/be inspired by John Lennon and his message of peace.
Crucified Christ, Normies, could you be bigger phonies if you tried? Holy Ghost Language School, I wish this world would just gimme some truth for one minute of one day ONCE. "Imagine" that.
Today's outfit: C-
John Lennon's legacy: A+++++++ (x Pi, forevs)
Day 68 (10.10.08)- (WAR)BRIDESHEAD REVISITED: Flowery Wal-Mart flats; black footless stockings; baby green soulmate dress; beaded belt; black deep v-neck sweater
This dress was a warbride's. She died in 1972: lung cancer and heart problems. In 1939, she wore this dress with painted-on nylons and black-and-brown spectator pumps that didn't quite match. Once, when her husband was away fighting in Normandy, she messed around on him with a freckly Kentuckian draft-dodger with an IQ of under one hundred. She never told that to a single solitary soul. I only know because I am an extremely intuitive person, and because her and I are cosmically connected through this dress belonging to both of us. It is ours.
Like her in 1971, this dress is dying. It is falling apart on my body right now, and there is nothing I can do about it. I bought it in March, when I was coming out of Montreal winter hibernational hell-era Laura Jane's Life. Along with karaoke-ing "Sympathy for the Devil" at Piano's one night, eating mango tofu at Thai Princess another, and repeat listens of Winter Women/Holy Ghost Language School by whatever the Helvetica that dude's name even is, this dress helped reintegrate me back into normal existence. This dress and I were meant to be.
Today is our Last Mango-Tango in Paris. After today, it will be done forever. It was a brief but highly-satisfying love affair. There is no fixing it. Perhaps I will give it a proper burial. Perhaps it will be less painful that way.
Day 69 (10.11.08)- EXPLORING THE FEMININE MYSTIQUE-CHIC: Camel-and-black ballet flats; black footless stockings; stripey floaty flowery frock from Anthro; pure-purple flared cardigan; Thelma Design headband; Stella McCartney perfume
I am really sick today. I am ailing. I am under the weather. I am as sick as a sick dog. In life, I am one of those people who never gets sick (ever!), so it's all really upsetting for me, and I'm being an annoying complaino-baby about it. I'm sorry, everybody who has to deal with me today.
Considering the fact that I have over-extended and/or -exerted myself every single day since mid-June (and about 5 out of 7 days per week before then, beginning since the day I was born), and am generally a moron and treat my body like a tenement not a temple, it is pretty surprising that this hasn't happened sooner. I think it comes from having Keith Moon as my spirit animal.
Since I literally feel like I could collapse and die at any moment, I thought that "dressing up" might trick my body into forgetting that I am knock knock knocking at heaven/hell's front door. It's kind of working! Or maybe it's just the fifty trillion different pharmaceuticalz presently coursing through my veins. Acksh, I think it's kinda both.
My outfit is fooling me into thinking that I am at a kid-style birthday party, the kind with loot bags, a clown, and nasty white Costco cake that makes you feel like your teeth are going to fall out. It's a good feeling. I'm going to hold one of those for my next birthday, only the stipulation will be that all attendees must be On Acid (and possibly wear glowstick necklaces, I haven't decided yet).
Day 70 (10.12.08)- TRAIN IN THE DISTANCE/"MY LIFE IS MY ART"-CHIC: champagne-colored bubble skirt; Pinot Noir-hued F-print button-up; pastel striped tennis sweater; red lipstick; grey old-man lace-ups
I spend more of my time in transit than anybody else I know. I spend more of my time in transit than any other type of person there is, except for nomads, flight attendants, and rich people. While listening to "Train in the Distance" by Paul Simon this morning (I'm feeling really MOR these days, probably as an antidote to the startling and at times unbearable complexity of My Complex October) and watching for a train in the distance, I realized that A Train In The Distance is the theme of my life right now. And then I decided that A Train In The Distance is highly preferable to No Train At All, and that made me somewhat happy. Which is obviously better than sad.
This of course has nothing to do with the Ultimate Fashion Challenge, but not much really does anymore. The coolest thing about the UFC is that it has given 70 days of my life (and more!) a really clear narrative- and that's GRRRREAT! I love narratives. Narrativeness. Narration. Narra-chic.
So, today my clothes look like wine. My shirt is the brother to Day 45's Sazerac of Outfits skirt. My ex-boyfriend once commented that it looks like something Bret Michaels or Criss Angel would wear as formalwear. He is right about that. I agree with him. Speaking of my infamous ex-boyfriend (the only one who counts), I wore this skirt constantly when we were in our three-month-mark love daze of 2000-and-a-long-time-ago, back when my personal style could best be described as "Charlotte York-Goldenblatt meets Harmony Korine in KIDS (but not on purpose)". So that's some sweet memories it brings on home to me. Cool.
This is one of those outfits that I/nobody would ever wear in a UFC-free world, but I like it. It doesn't feel wrong. It feels about as good as a train in the distance, ie. at least it's something. And how many times have I said on (or off) nogoodforme.com that SOMETHING IS ALWAYS BETTER THAN NOTHING? Well, about a billion. And I'm saying it again now. A billion and one.
So, as I leave Week Ten dying in the dust, moving forward fast into further Octoberesque trials, tribs and complexities, I guess I just have to keep on reminding myself: The UFC is probably better than the No-UFC.
SCORE! LUCKY ME! I AM SUCH A LUCKY FUCKING PERSON! YAYYYYY@#@)$(*#(DMWQEDWfker[t43tks;dflgmkfgkjfgjfq'=='['''
Happy Canadian Thanksgiving,
Laura Jane Faulds
Tags: 64, avant-wack, Charlotte York-Goldenblatt, John Lennon, Keith Moon as spirit animal, Laura Jane Faulds, Laura Jane's Complex October, Laura loves Matthew Friedberger, Laura loves The Beatles, nostalgia, Paul McCartney, The Sazerac of Tuesdays, Ultimate Fashion Challenge
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2 Comments!!
Say something so insightful and witty, it will blow us away. (No pressure.)
Got something to say? We'd love to hear it! Name, email and "type in the weirdo drunken text" thingie are all required to comment; don't worry, we won't email you or anything, we just want to make sure you're not an evil spambot. Keeping in mind the good-times mentality we like to keep going here, we've worked hard to keep NOGOODFORME.COM as fun as possible. We welcome all kinds of comments, but insults/abuse/general bitchery are not tolerated. In other words, we put the smackdown on evil troll posts. If you want to be a hater, please go elsewhere. Now, as Salt 'N Pepa say, "Only the sexy people..."
I was listening to Dear Prudence and it reminded to look at the latest UFC post. Reading it makes Sunday nights so much better.
By Elena on October 13, 2008 12:35 AM
Thanks Elena! Writing it makes my Sunday nights so much better too!
By Laura
on October 14, 2008 12:51 PM