Leandra Medine's Blog, page 749

Plaidurday, Oh Plaidurday

The only day of the week better than Saturday is one that technically does not fall on the calendar. Or the Gregorian one, at least, and it is called Plaidurday. It occurs every year on the weekend after Christmas and prompts that you click through a slideshow of beautiful people and things not while hungover but rather just because. You are also expected to sing through the bravura of Vampire Weekend’s “Holiday,” constantly replacing the word “holiday” with “plaidurday” until you’ve sung it so many times you have completely lost sense of tonal appropriation.

On the day, you are further expected to dress up in as many layers of the ubiquitous kind-of tartan (often manipulated, replicated, but never successfully duplicated) pattern that your closet currently boasts. Then you are to do a stock check.

How many layers are you wearing? If it is upward of six, you’ve done the print decently proud. If it is less, however, you might want to spend more time watching Jared Leto as Jordan Catalano, or Alexander McQueen as himself and his mental objects (the ones that are revealed as laudable runway models) to determine the manifold additional ways that you too, shall wear thee tartan.

After you’ve completed the math portion of your day, you’re expected to run around yelling “where the fuck is your plaid?” at any uninformed pedestrians who appear to have missed the memo on the historic jour de many checks.

Of course, we would not expect you to celebrate a day (especially one that proposes you demonize the ignorant) that you know nothing about so here is the brief telling of its past events that put the history in the anterior historic:

First, there were the Scots. And then? Then there were the hipsters.

The end. Drops mic. Wear your plaid, send a selfie, call the Man Repeller hotline and break.

What Can $500 Get You After the Holidays?

Post-Christmas sales shit on Black Friday sales.

I don’t think that just occurred to me but I think I have only recently come to terms with it. And you know what else? I take my initial comment back. It’s not even about shitting if you think about the difference between say a 30% dip and a 70% dip. I think I am actually talking about some deeply healthy, grade A, just-ate-too-many-fiber-crackers, oh my goodness it is coming, diarrhea.

So, sale recall: Post-Christmas sales diarrheas on Black Friday sales.

And it’s a terrible catch-22 too (ha) because for the most part, your moral obligation is to indulge the people you love prior to December 25th, isn’t it? You can’t send your favorite cousin a gift on December 27th chased with the remark, “sorry! Was waiting for a better sale deal! Merry belated!”

Or, I don’t know, can you? You know where I stand adjacent to this particular holiday.

But let’s backtrack. When those sales start to kick in following the notorious day of gluttonous turkey consumption, my instinct is always to buy, sell, buy, buy. Once my mind catches up, though, I am reminded that sales are not unlike leaks in that they start slow and rather unassumingly. If, however, they are left unkempt — which often they are because the afflicted is barely even aware that the leak is in motion — the drip accumulates and in isolated instances might even become a Noah-get-your-ark flood.

Of course, if this were to happen in real life would be its own sort of tragedy but when considering the metaphor, there’s some value in leaving those diffidently slashed prices unscathed until you’re capable of asking the very question posited today.

So, what can $500 get you after the holidays?

A whole bunch of stuff. Like, for example, the above photographed Eddie Borgo ring, now $90, paired with that neon Tom Binns necklace and a yellow leather mini skirt, now $150 just because it’s yellow, it’s leather, it’s indulgent and you’re doing you.

Maybe you want your jewelry to do all the talking for you. That’s fine. Iosseliani’s fringe necklace-cum-blouse is running for a generous 70% off.

Phillip Lim is offering the most darling pair of Stella McCartney-esque pinstriped shorts (now $170) which in my opinion will look terrific with a pair of thigh high socks and the photographed uneven-hemmed Alexander Wang sweater which, mind you, will also work terrifically with those PLAID PANTS BY PREEN! Dream Preen pants, man.

Now, because poplin is about to become the fabric of our lives, might I suggest that white cut-out Mugler blouse, now $202? Where poplin is not concerned, you can get a white silk Rochas blouse for a cool $345 which, I realize only leaves room for one or two more spoils by the rules of 500 but you’d be surprise at how often you’ll probably want to wear such a Peter Pan collar.

Next up: Jason Wu’s short-ish heel ankle strap pumps, now $237 and wearable under any circumstance that does not include a rock that you must climb. My gut says they’ll look great with Asos’ $50 mom jeans.

If I know anything about the future it is that you will want to wear flat mules that could have been bedroom slippers in a previous life but are now a gateway drug to looking cool so get yours at a discount, eh? The photographed ones are Oscar de la Renta and will pair perfectly by the rules of this game with your Venessa Arizaga bracelet.

In the land of many sneakers, you can get your hands on discounted Golden Goose or you can abide by the new rules of footwear and administer to yourself a pair of white high top tennis sneakers. They are Saint Laurent which means not so cheap but on sale which means, you win!

There are also coats like that one with a white fur collar by Opening Ceremony ($380) and the double breasted blazer-style one to its right by Blk Dnm ($398). And if you want a purse, might I suggest the spotted one by Carven?

This is so much better than the holidays. I’m glad we did it.

How to Make an Old Top New Again

You’ve seen me turn Simone Rocha’s white eyelet midi dress into a dramatically long blouse and Camilla and Marc’s glorified satin towel-cum-dress into the vertical band that cloaks a button up, both in the name of making old garments feel indispensably new again. But what can I do with a crop top? Other than, you know, wear it the way it tells me to?

First, we must consider the caliber of crop top. The one in question isn’t just any — it’s the near ubiquitous, identity-crisis stricken Zara-moonlighting-as-Balenciaga white crop top. The one that boasts an opportunity for every woman to indulge in her golden triangle. The one that, frankly, has no place trying to flourish in the dead of winter’s eye.

Unless, that is, I have anything to do with it which as fate, luck and a little bit of perseverance would have it, I just so happen to. And though you likely don’t need me to spell out the formula I utilized to bring this look to fruition (if you’re here, your eyes function), I probably will anyway because I like to talk/type/tell stories and — fingers crossed — you like to listen. (?).

So, what you’ll find in the above slideshow is, first, the watermarked-way in which I wore Zara’s crop top last May. Those are Alexander Wang tropical pants and an R13 denim jacket. The shoes are completely deliberately and highly un-ironically Balenciaga. It was May, it was warm, stomach be damned, it was party time.

Once December rung around that dumb-ass rosie, stomach still damned, party time halted. So what did I do? Simple — included an army green button down blouse underneath the crop top to create the illusion of stark white summer crop as sweater and to assuage the jarring difference in color, I placed a grey wool double breasted blazer over the two layers.

In considering the ilk of bottom I’d use, I thought about making like Winnie (the Pooh) and free-balling but ultimately decided that if ever there was an opportunity to give yourself up to a burgundy wool mini skirt, it is when you elect to wear a crop top as a sweater.

To keep the lewk weather apropos, I also added black tights and a pair of meme burgundy Tabitha Simmons flat booties. For a moment, I felt like a back up singer in a tribute called Not The Clash. But then I took my booties off to try another pair on. This time, they were six-inch navy blue creepers which functioned as a reaffirmation that shoes still maketh the outfit (and repeller). And that was the end of that.

Studio Nicholson blazer, Mother utility blouse (and on sale! Ole!), Zara crop top, Isabel Marant skirt, Falke tights, Tabitha Simmons booties (they 60% off at Barneys) and Burberry Prorsum creepers. Necklace by Amy Fortgang.

Do You: The Man Repeller Guide to Holiday Survival

Dr. Seuss is not back but you know who is? The rhyming enigma-as-storybook indigenous to Man Repeller as illustrated by one Charlotte Fassler. This guide around, it comes in tandem with the sweet, rhythmic melodies of Amelia ‘dumbass’ Diamond.

Cause of guide? The holidays, duh — which we will call holla-dayz henceforth — and all the parties that come with them. We may be past those of the office variety but figure that sliver of story a foretelling caution for next season and bask in the prolific advice to assuage the circumstances of elsewhere and otherwise.

Elsewhere and otherwise, you might wonder, where’s that? But come on, you know.

That awkward encounter with Aunt Kathy and Druncle George on Christmas Eve, the insincere sympathy you must dole for your vapid, Jewish friend and her late-month birthday (that’s me), and the most distantly imminent but highly lethal New Years parties, chock full of dickheads, which you will absolutely be present for.

Sit back, click through, laugh your ass off and, duh, HAPPY HOLLA-DAYZ!

We’ll see you next week.

Stay Cool, but Don’t Freeze

You know what’s not easy? Getting dressed when it’s so damn cold out. You know what’s even harder? Showering. (Being wet + being cold = death by a million paper cuts.) While I have yet to find a solution for the latter that does not involve dry shampoo and further forgoing the fundamentals of decent hygienic upkeep, I do believe I might be inching toward respite in the case of getting dressed. The operative words here are might be inching.

Now, you may be wondering why I even bring up the shower bit if you’re going to be dealt tips for keeping warm but staying cool — right? Frankly, it is only to place an impediment on whatever visceral and crude reactions you might be having to the state of my hair and face in the above images. I’m sorry I look the way I do but this head chose me and I have no regrets.

Now! Moving forward. Remember that note I conveyed on girls who go out and the one who wears angora, she is a hypochondriac?

Well, here’s what I’m thinking: if you’re willing to wear a shrunken, cropped short sleeve mohair sweater, you might be in the must-consume-five-glasses-of-water-upon-walking-indoors clear. Allowing your arms and a sliver of your belly the ability to breathe will only enable better times for you and your oxygen flow. High waist jeans are optional but for the sake of taking man repelling seriously, they’re also highly encouraged. I’d suggest a peg leg or cropped pair so that you can wear your weirdest and favorite booties and have the hem of the jeans meet the boots’ trim for a tete-a-tete called perfection. (Pronounced the French way, so, per-fek-si-own).

Wear socks because it would be foolish not to and then lastly: add your most interesting coat. In the case of my self and closet, this signaled the use of my deer print Carven coat. You should know that the print is just a print — the coat is not made from fur (hasn’t Bambi suffered enough? She lost her mom at near embryonic age). It is wool and sometimes, when I catch my reflection while I’m wearing it, I feel like I’m wearing a bathrobe while on my way to a wild mushroom hunt.

And guess what? That’s it. That’s all I’ve got — a “modern” take on the 1950′s lady who doth not engage in sex but doth chew bubblegum. Saturday night is but a mere few hours away, though, so, tell me: how you gonna stay cool without freezing? (Ultimately, I think I can still use some pointers), so…?

Sweater from Topshop, coat by Carven, jeans by Blk Dnm and Charlotte Olympia boots.

What to Not Wear On a Date…Ha ha ha

Just a day shy of the one month anniversary of Amelia’s story, How to Dress for a Date, Who What Wear published their version of a similar story that commissioned the help of 11 style bloggers-cum-apparent dating pundits to discuss the clothes that women should not wear on dates.

The 11 opinions offered one example each plus pithy reason not to wear X. And though it’s certainly not our style to maliciously criticize what one woman might consider her dating treasure, it is also not our style to leave, say, socks and sandals or sequins undefended.

As is always the case, anything one chooses to wear should be underscored by a deep sense of self satisfaction and if that displays itself as comfort or discomfort, harem pants or no pants at all seems irrelevant when considering that which makes you characteristically you.

It’s just…sneakers? No sneakers? (That’s embargo #1), Come on! Never mind the intrinsic benefit of convincing yourself that you’ve successfully fashioned your body as one of those so-low-maintenance-yet-cooler-than-ice broads, if I know anything about the male species, anything at all, it is that they appreciate a lady who can keep pace.

Then there is glitter and there are sequins. Now that you know everything there is to know about those shiny-ass micro discs, you can’t really believe that selling the great awkward-tension-alleviators out in the name of a date is worth the sacrifice. What’s so bad about a sequin anyway? And why are we assuming that the other end of this date can’t handle da glitz? The critic opposite this style said “it looks crazy” but to that I say, “Aaaaand?????”

Next up: turtlenecks, but here’s where I stand — or rather, stood. When I was still swinging across the dating monkey bars, it was deeply important that whoever found himself sitting across from me understood my fundamental emotional dependence on Diane Keaton. And, really, how else can you spell out “You don’t own me” without actually singing it, lest you sport a turtleneck?

The next ban is on flip flops. Though we see her point, what if army pants are involved? What if you’re on a boat? What if the only remedy for your slight-but-lamentable case of webbed toe is to wear flip flops day in and out?

Tracksuits have also been mandated a “no-no” (their phrase, no ours) but tracksuits are awesome. Have you never seen The Royal Tenenbaums? Or met one of those effusive grandparents that seem indigenous to Boca? Does the deceased velour jumpsuit craze of the early aughts mean nothing to you? Never mind the comfort factor, what if you and your date decide to do this? (Click that link.) (Did you click it?) (Are you laughing yet?)

According to the next critic, guys don’t like the way our butts look in high waist jeans but that should just make it our moral obligation to wear them. Why? Because dating is a process of elimination. And if he can’t handle your large sized, rectangular vagina in the pants, he doesn’t deserve the opportunity to jam with your clam in better-looking pants.

Our last comment refutes a bar on socks and sandals because, EARTH TO READER, it’s December and if you want to wear sandals you best be wearing insulated socks tambien. Also, though, sandals and socks look cool, so make like Nike and just do it.

Just remember — process of elimination. Bring him to the ledge and then let him decide to plummet to his death-in-conjunction-with-you or hold on for (a) dear life (of whiskers on kittens, matcha on chia, camaraderie and questionable neck coverings/lambskin condoms.) And this.

This.

This.

This.

Treat. Yo. Self.

Ladies, gentlemen, penguins of the North, pigeons of the South, this is for you.

I understand that Christmas is a mere five days away and, yes, that the imminent holiday purportedly moonlights as an exercise in giving, giving, giving, but can’t I argue that the holiday might also demand a self-indulgent nod to getting? From ourselves?

Frankly, if I’ve learned anything in the 25 years (no, really, today is the anniversary of my emergence from a womb called Laura’s) I have spent ambling about the earth, it is that (with the help of Parks and Recreation and one Aziz Ansari,) one should treat him or herself at least once. (A week? A month? A year? Point blank? You decide).

So here’s to that.

Now, as for the parsimonious activity — it’s fine if you decide that you want to get a fancy spa pedicure or massage or facial or any number of fleeting hedonistic treatments but figure this: it will only take one phone call — one phone call — from an angry relative or employee or the U.S. Post Office after your massage for the knot that has just been removed from your shoulder to reform and stake its claim once again. One phone call. Conversely, it’d probably take just one slice of pizza for the benefits of your facial to have been completely eradicated and as for your pedicure, take your socks off. Tell me how your toes look.

Oh, sorry, what’s that? Smudged-as-fuck? Ah-huh.

So, how about we discuss the ways in which you can treat yourself in a capacity that allows for an aftermath shelf-life that lasts, let’s say, forever long.

Take the above photographed Edie Parker clutches for example. Do you need a hard shell clutch that can barely holster even your metrocard? One that comes in mother of pearl and has a sailboat emblazoned across its cover? How about a wider one equipped with sharks? Or a micro surfboard?

No. Of course not.

But do you want one?

YES, YES, A THOUSAND TIMES YES.

And why? Because it is cute! It is cool! It will make your wearing tennis sneakers look more formal and if you’re Amelia, the sail might even function as the self-fulfilling prophecy that finally lands you a New England lad clad in boat and corresponding shoe. What’s more? When you don’t want to use it anymore, you can just put it on a shelf and let it perform as the decorative fodder that makes your home a more compelling destination than all the other homes in the history of real estate. Once you want to use it again, which you will, it will be there, waiting for you, behaving as the palpable reminder of that one time you treated yourself to epicurean bliss.

So in the spirit of loving yourself, I urge the shit out of you to share not what you’re giving but what you want. From yourself. Shoes? Jewelry? A tote with crabs on it? Chocolate? Bengay? (It’s like the New York Lottery always says: You never know.)

Even if you don’t tangibly get it, digital-cart ownership is a very real thing, so, Treat. Yo. Self.

She’s Just Bey-ing Miley

If you have Internet access and a pair of working eyeballs, you should know by now that sex sells.

In the unlikely event that you still require convincing, however, consider this: on Monday, Apple announced that the album that Beyoncé unceremoniously unveiled last week sold 828,773 copies in three days. Featuring 14 new songs, 17 elaborately produced music videos, and roughly 90% of its titular artist’s naked body, the eponymous work was hailed as “impeccably constructed and calibrated” by Variety, termed “excellent” by Sasha Frere-Jones at the New Yorker, and declared sonically addictive by me, who has been listening to it to the exclusion of all else since Sunday. The melodious feat now sits comfortably at number one in 104 countries and is currently dominating the “Most Recently Played” lists of approximately every sentient human I know.

Critical acclaim and stunning commercial success are not the album’s only achievements. Since the moment of its unorthodox release, Beyoncé has been heralded by insiders as a certifiable game changer. Taken as a pioneering example, the record has the potential to catalyze a systemic revolution in the music industry. But while its formal elements unquestionably challenge tradition, its content is subtler in its commitment to flouting convention.

As the blush-colored stamps peppering its track list indicate, Beyoncé is explicit. Think: NSFW, pornography-adjacent explicit. Not one for understated innuendo or veiled euphemism, the album positively reeks of skin and sex. On it, the same singer who proclaims herself a “grown woman” and reminds detractors that she’s more than “just his little wife,” also growls: “Driver, roll up the partition please /I don’t need you seeing ’yoncé on her knees.”

Still, such evidence and the rather controversial lyrics that her husband contributes to “Drunk in Love” notwithstanding, I find myself not only mesmerized by but also deeply admiring of Queen Bey’s latest offering.

Time.com’s Eliana Dockterman is similarly awed. In a review of the record, she writes: “With her new album, Beyoncé has become the embodiment of modern feminism for a generation that has been reluctant to claim the word.” Like so much of Beyoncé’s music, “[m]en and love are a focus, but she makes sure to let us know that those songs are also about empowerment.” That is, even within the confines of an unapologetically normative account of domestic life and despite the album’s literally breathtaking raunchiness, Beyoncé espouses a brand of female sexuality at last befitting its millennial audience.

You might remember that some months ago Miley Cyrus purportedly set out to deliver the same. She promoted an unabashedly X-rated product, performed in a uniform of latex and leather no more revealing than the ensemble Beyoncé wears in “Rocket,” and tried very, very hard to assert an equally deliberate artistic vision. Given such theoretically damning parallels, it should be harder to explain why I am so captivated by the woman who croons “Let me sit this ass /On you,” but so horrified by Miley’s mandate to shake “it like we at a strip club.” And yet the difference between Beyoncé and Bangerz is obvious. In every respect, one of them knows what it’s doing. As far as I can tell, even as the self-styled Mrs. Carter embraces an identity at least partially defined by her husband, she remains as independent as ever.

Assuming you agree, has Beyoncé earned her reputation as a role model? Does a song like “Blow” jeopardize her status or cement it? Is it even fair to distinguish between Cyrus and Sasha Fierce? Finally, how awkward is it going to be when Baby Blue comes across a metaphorically dusty copy of this audio file lying around?

Let’s Talk About It.

The Genesis of the Holiday Sequin

The holidays, no matter your denomination, are essentially a cluster hump of back to back opportunities for glittering fetes. I’m using “glittering” in the literal sense, not in an attempt at painting you a wordy picture; the outside moonlight is not dappling across the room or playing tricks on eyes all up in this bitch. Rather, every party is literally glittering because at least 25 party guests — cater waters and dogs included — are wearing sequins.

So how did this come about? Who declared that sequins were the pinnacle of festive-wear? Well boy oh boy did you come to the right place.

It all started around 2500BC, which is where a very reliable source that rhymes with shmickapedia cites the first occurrence in the form of tiny, decorative gold disks. What rhymes-with-shmickapedia does not mention is who wore them, because to this day it’s still technically unclear. I am privy, however, to a tadpole of information that was leaked to me by way of a shady deal at a backyard bar wherein I promised to sell a pair of very strange old shoes that once belonged to my cousin Zeba in exchange for a bit of knowledge on She Who First Wore Sequins.

The first wearer of sequins — or gold discs, per the BC tagline — was a young woman who was a master at the art of distraction. Let’s call her Pam. You see, despite 2500BC being a time that feels farther away than your remote control, people still had to endure family parties. And they were asked, just as you and I are, repeated and annoying questions about the state of affairs regarding love life, work, and love life again, all whilst trying to navigate the awkwardness that is conversation between bites of puff pastries.

Now you see, our young heroine had exactly this type of holiday party circled on her pre-gregorian calendar for weeks. She was feeling equal parts excitement (Family! Presents! Ironically terrible sweaters despite this ancient era’s otherwise undocumented lack of thrift stores!), and equal parts dread (No love life to speak of when Grandma asks. No job to speak of when grandpa asks. Still no love life, Aunt Cathy. Did Grandma ask you to ask me that?).  She knew that to enter said party unarmed and unprepared could mean a barrage of unwanted questions for which she just didn’t have the answers.

So, Pam did what many women do and pre-planned her outfit. Only this outfit — ha ha! — this outfit would distract the shit out of everyone.

She spent night after night leading up the eve of the party, sewing on sequin after sequin. By the time her debut finally rolled around, she’d created a dress so heavy that she could barely walk. (So pre-Gucci of her!)

Pam rang the door bell which may or may not have actually existed back yonder, and as Uncle Jamie opened the door with the family clamoring behind him, the setting sun’s light hit her dress just so, and a million billion spots of light exploded into the room. Everyone was temporarily blinded and dizzy, and our little Lady Wonder waltzed into the room without so much as a “Seeing anyone special?”

For the remainder of the night and all parties going forward, anytime she didn’t want to answer an annoying question — “Hey! Have you decided on a major yet?” — she found a touch of light to reflect in people’s eyes with her sequined dress. She was like the sun: regal, gorgeous, but when confronted head-on, impossible to stare at directly. She became a legend, and nearly every woman of 2500BC adopted the trend.

It should be noted, however, that these tiny gold discs were thought to have otherwordly powers. Since women were afraid to overuse the magic, sequins were worn to great excess only for the duration of (what we’d consider) December 1 through January 2.

Fast forward to today where a holiday fiesta is just not festive without that extra burst of sparkle which permeates the unilateral dress code. We may think we wear it because it’s pretty, or because there’s something about the concept of twinkling in general that seems to imitate snow’s luminescence under a full moon or the bubbles of a freshly popped bottle of champagne. But it’s actually all about Darwinism, because we need these sequins to mentally survive the Season of Annoying Questions.

Oh! As for where sequins originally came from? Alien puke, duh. That shit is really, really sparkly.

If you have a different theory, you know we have to hear it, and if you have a picture of you in sequins, you know we have to see it. (We’ll wear sunglasses while browsing the comments just in case.)

*Click here for the Genesis of Ruffles, and here for the Genesis of Turtlenecks.

Girls Who Go Out

Never is it as apparent that we are a city of women cut from profoundly different cloths than on the coldest or wettest of winter eves. Why? Because on any given Saturday night, you’re subject to find yourself standing heel-to-boot among a transparently visual sea of Human Icy Hots, or Semi-Repellers, or Hypochondriacs.

Confused? Don’t be.

Figure this.

It’s snowing. No, raining. No, snowing and raining but because your best friend is turning 30 and as a result finds herself at a crossroad that begs a puddle of vulnerable doubt in conjunction with her life’s ambitions, you are making the trek out from the depths of your comfort to function as the vessel that elicits her comfort at a birthday party. On the Lower East Side. You’ll tell her she’s doing huge things. That 30 is but a chip of the old block, you might share an anecdote about this girl you know through a friend of your mom’s friend who’s life changed for the better when she hit the 30-mark, etc, etc.

On your way to meet her, you notice a line comprised of a true mixed bag of nuts outside a door near Rivington Street. You briefly thank heaven and the angels that it omits that you’re not going to be waiting on a line. 30-year-olds don’t have birthday parties at places that boast lines. But lo and behold, the cab’s meter stops and there you are, left to loiter while you try to keep warm, rummaging through your purse to find your ID — which, mind you, you haven’t used since you were underage — thinking about how far your bed is, how close your temper is to lost and whether your friend is in there or out here, among the puddle of sequins and coats and bare legs and socks.

And then! You find her. She’s dressed as a human icy hot. Why, goodness, why? You take inventory of the rest of your surroundings and because of the handy guide we’re about to deliver, you start playing this game called Match the Girl to the Label.

First, there are The Human Icy Hots, who have seemingly never used the weather app on their iPhones, or more prehistorically, watched the news. It is 16 degrees out but Honey Banger doesn’t care. She hates socks. And tights. And evidently, doesn’t own a coat save for the paltry leather jacket slung over her arms. She doesn’t look cold which is confounding until you see her fall to the ground and realize she’s either alcohol or temperature inebriated. Her skirt is really tight, she’s wearing a going out top and man, oh man would I like to be a fly on the floor of which she resides tomorrow morning.

Then, there is The Semi-Repeller. She’s equal parts stupid and smart which makes her effectively a whole lot of nothing. Poof. Thin air. While she wears a beanie for cosmetic purposes, she completely omits the importance of a concealed neck given the climate and it’s clear that this is because her lapels are cool. She’s wearing a t-shirt under a pseudo-coat. It’s certainly not as frail as a leather jacket but it’s not quite a down comforter either. On her legs she’s got pants, which is great, but dear goodness! Your ankles! Those pumps! It’s snowing. Frankly, ladies and gentlemen, she is me.

And finally, there is The Hypochondriac. This asshole never gets sick because she is also over-dressed. The thing of it is, past the dramatic layers of warmth that make ambling about palatable — two coats, a scarf, tights and socks, is a mohair sweater worn over a t-shirt that makes being indoors slightly unbearable. That shit is practically a full functioning heater. I’m sorry, have you ever tried to socialize in angora? I’m also sorry for that sentence but it is as counterproductive is trying to bathe in urine. Often if you know her, you don’t actually recognize her — she’s a walking ad for the whale-watching association of the Arctic.

And you’re just like, why am I here?

So, are you one of these girls? Do you know any of these girls? Have I forgotten to pin point another genre of girl? Tell me so many things that your fingers start falling off while typing. (But then figure out a way to click “post.”)

Illustrations by Charlotte Fassler