Green, Green, Green

After Hyne knows how much time, yesterday Shimmy Gin and I finally met. In contrast with his bipolar girlfriend, though we kept postponing our meeting, not even once we questioned the fact that we would meet. And we did. Shimmy was a bit late, as usual, since the traffic at Escazú is completely impredictable, even to Paul The Polip, and me... well, I was kinda late too - not all that much, but late still - for kinda the same reason: the traffic at Sabana is the most perfect random system ever concocted between men, nature and asphalt.

To my doom-delight, after not going to "home" for Hyne knows how long, I was subreptitiously ambushed by no other than my beloved Benetton store. I guess I keep falling and falling for it. It is simply inevitable. The Sun rises at East, sets at West and I will always be seduced by Benetton. Some things are simply the way they are. It was the haphazardly breath of the new collection setting in, still awkwardly pushing out the past one, with racks of green skattered, sensual, suggestive with soft cotton spilling in messed up piles, shades hanging here and there more in a hectic mix of textures, than a progressive order of any sort. It wasn't a store, it was a closet. The sweater you took off yesterday in a hamper of tops and blouses you didn't care folding, just fisted into the shelve, pushed it deep and hoped it won't fall on your head when you open the closet door again.

I was late, as I said earlier, and I still wanted to check Argento, as I am looking for a new silver ring to take the place of my Nibelung ring, and I really had to hurry, but hey, if Shimmy where there he would give me a call, right? Besides, I wasn't going to buy anything. I was just... going to check out the merchandise. That's quick and there's nothing wrong with it. And these are the lies us addicts tell to ourselves. I gave myself rules: I would only check out the green stuff. Just the green. Oh, I kept that one. I thought of the office, and so discarded a lot of informal, thin, tiny tops and skirts that wouldn't make the cut in a serious environment. Some made me laugh, truth to be told, and sneering I noticed the Sisley label on it. And some people consider Sisley the "elegant brand". Suuuuure. Collection after collection, Sisley constantly strikes me as the "dumby, trashy little sister of Benetton". Uneven hems, large, sparkly prints, lots of beads and rhinestone and such. Not me for sure. I was reaching the end of the rack and I was delighted: there was not a single piece for me in the rack, so I could turn around, walk out and keep the virtue of my card.

You never underestimate the power of the Store.

At the very end there was this awesome wool dress, knee long, perfect cut and amazing as a top layer over pants, worn as a sweater. And it was on a mindblowing discount. Okay, I would try it on, and perhaps, perhaps it wouldn't fit. Yes, only that by the dressers there was this oncoming, new collection green dress that was just too perfect to leave. No price on it, so it could be a very, very unpleasant surprise. I had to try it on. Why do I do that? It's Benetton! Of course it's gonna look awesome! You never, never try on a Benetton piece if you are trying to quit. Everytime it's gonna look like a banking bailout on you: so good it's immoral and should be ilegal as well. Trying it on IS buying it. And the worse thing? I actually stayed within my rules: only green. So I set another rule for myself: IF the dress goes over $120, I won't buy it. Mentally I tried to push up the limit up to $200 - $250. The pro argument convincingly said that the card was squicky clean, and the amount could easily be covered with the next paycheck, but still, I nailed my resolution to $120. It was far less. Tricked again.

So I did the old move and slid the gold, and walked out with a bagful of luscious, fresh green.

Thanks Hyne there wasn't a single decent ring at Argento.

Shimmy and I met at our favorite crèpe place, and chatted away. Got updated on gossip both on old acquintances as well as the Twitter entourage and latest activities and followed twitters. We dissected people and personalities, found an application to the deductions I've pulled from my musings on Nin and again made an effort to understand the collective and individual mind of the surroundings in which we have been plunged. Some book flirting then next door, coyly looking at covers and spines, letting ourselves be seduced by backcover words, let the flirt unroll and then hold or decline. We submitted to the clutching dependance of the printed word and grabbed our poison from the shelves. My new additions includes a novel by Elizabeth Kostova, author of "The Historian", and an "Ars Magica" of sorts that caught my attention. Books on witches always get to me. Oh goodie, even more books to carry over seas.

This time around, Shimmy was quite disperse, intensely enthralled by the potential #twittertour developing under our feet, at the lower level in Hooligans, were he identified at least three twitters he admires. His rushing, his running, my waiting. But I had my Benetton and a new book to read.

Thin Shimmy is still as engaging as Thick Shimmy, but he is far less focused.

Oh well, until next time.

@ Leroy, where the World finds Meaning Again

This is me right now. Well, not "right now-right now", but less than ten minutes ago... well, maybe not, but definitivelly not 30 minutes ago. This is me at Leroy finding peace and quite, alone with a glass of coke and a crêpe that thretens to defeat me. Cottage cheese mixed with sour cream and sugar for filling, covered with warm vanilla cream and peaches on top. It is delicious, but after an avocado roll it is a bit hard to down. This is one of the happiest places in the world for me, and definitively the best place to be after a series of unfortunate events.

Only today I wanted to buy a particularly nice Swatch watch that I really wanted, which after a year of looking and finding nothing to my taste, I finally found that one, only to realize today that it had been sold. Sold, no more. That was a blow, a very low hit. Then I realized what I've been experiencing all year long: Swatch hardly has anything else to offer me. That's most disappointing. To wash over my sadness, I went to the Benetton store, to buy myself new gloves, since I lost my Parisian Benetton gloves somewhere, probably in my Escape from The House of The Mother-in-Law. I really loved those gloves, but the run and the escape are a fair price for my gloves. Now I'm wearing some ugly white Mickey Mouse-like white gloves I would rather not use. Well, gues what? No gloves. I mean there were some "gloves", red and green, in the best Louis Vuiton style, which I dislike. So, no Benetton gloves for me. I did found a lovely garbo blouse, stripped in green and blue shades, but I believe that 168€ (some $238) is just a bit too much for a garbo. Trust me, if I say it's a bit too much, it's because it is. Specially when a sweater of the same material, but with V neck costs only 47,50€ (some $67,50). I'm crazy for Benetton, but I am not stupid. There was a lovely knitted gray and coal skirt there, in one size only. S. I ain't no S, I'm an M, but like to wear L because it's more comfty. There were M and L skirts... in gray and white. I want gray and coal, not gray and white. It would have been lovely for this weater, but I want grey and coal, and though I could make an effort and try on the S, I won't. Why do everything has to be so hard in here?

There were other pieces that have got me thinking, a few skirts I could purchase, perhaps, and then leave them here so that I have some solid clothes ready for when I move in. The idea is good, but first I'd like to check on other Benetton stores bafore making my final decision. This store didn't take me off my feet, so it will be put on hold.

Now, regarding my latest skin products, I must say I've been transformed into a believer of L'Occitane. First of all, yes, when you have the chance, purchase the products at airports and Duty Free places, because even if you "think" $53 for the product is too much (specially this traveling kit of daily moisturizing 24 hour lasting cream and eye contour cream, both of shea butter, grand total: $53 in Costa Rica's airport) it is not. In Budapest you can't get the kit, only the creams by separate. Grand Total of both? $92. And it works. I mean, I know that my brand new glasses totally hide any bags under my eyes, which I have always had, but I can assure you that using the eye contour cream in the morning and at night have made VISIBLE differences on my skin. Puffiness has been reduced, darkness is gone and the daily cream makes my face silky even in this weather. I tell you all, I've found GOLD.

Initially I planned to scribble up an entry all in Spanish about the truth about my mother-in-law with a detailed minute-by-minute recount of the events occured on the faitful day of December 26th, but then I changed my mind. Perhaps it will still happen, but I believe I have to work some more on the subject, mull it over and fill my soul with other experiences to digest it better.

The end of the year is coming close and with it, the time for resolutions, for living and letting die, for letting go and going on. Time for the annual cleaning, when in mind, soul, body, space and cyberspace you let go of the things that anchor you so that the new year begins full with hope and possibilities and enough place to grow into. There's something so beautiful about getting rid of all those things you don't need, and look around and see so much space, so much "possibilities" around you. Cluttering slows you down, cleaning and getting space invigorates you. It is the best feeling in the world!

Benetton Again

So, maybe I'm "residually depressed". Only that could explain yesterday. Now, "residually depressed" is not a clinical term, but I would like to propose it as a way to refer to when you are getting out of a depression and you are feeling better, yet you have certain "typical depressed" behavior patterns still going on. Residually, of course. Well, then again I could be depressed because I have been trying again to find some Viktor/Cedric fiction with no avail. But could that be the cause for slamming it at a Benetton. Not like I don't totally deserve those skirts and that dress, but DAMNED, ain't even my birthday and I broke my last standing spending record?

No, that's not the dress, but I'll be making sure to get my hands on it, even if I have to blackmail the salesgirls and the store manager to get me one. Love the colors, just love the faded, dull, smokey colors it has. It opposes to "perky" and "happy" with a distinctive urban dismissiveness and cold, but polite brutality. Soft in fabric, as soft is every human being, but dressing up the colors of a cold indifferent atitude, which is the urban, metropolitan, city-atitude that brands us all.

I have here a post-it with a quote from a friend of mine, Shimmy.

"There's nothing worse that trying to be cool without a sense of style."

Clothes, not unexpensive clothes, remind me always of certain people I've had the distinctive displeasure of meeting at one time or another of my life. The fashion victims. These people rush into getting this or that and be always "in", depending on the fleeting, money-pushed, clueless pointers sprayed around by fashion rag magazines, as if their entire sense of self depended on what to wear. Which colors are in, which accesories are in, which designers and designs are in. So I've been agains the balloon style and found it terribly hideous? Yes I did. Put a balloon dress on a stick-like model and I'll hate it each time. And then again, just take a look. Overly puffy clothes wrapped around wire-thin legs make the models look like a badly wrapped lollipop.

The balloon-style was not my cuppa until yesterday I stumbled across this soft, legére cotton skirt designed by Benetton. Fairly short, may I say, since it reaches to my mid thighs, yet incredibly comfortable. I tried it out just for the fun of it, and seeing it on me, feeling it I loved it immediatelly. I guess I only had to wait for it to be right, to grow on me naturally. It's a process that takes time, yet not always happens. Like a piece of a puzzle, if it is a fit for you, you will accept it, otherwise, keep on hating it. However, lots of people put things on because they are in, because they thing they must validate themselves and become socially acceptable by being fashion fiends. Hey, put some thought in it, would you?

Some people are no more than hangers.