Damn You Donmar

My head is exploding. And it’s Michael Grandage’s fault. His artistic direction of the Donmar Warehouse is making me think I need to live in London this year instead of France because thanks to his casting choices I’m going to be traveling there so much I might as well just stay.

When I found out a few months back that Kenneth Branagh was going to be starring in the Donmar’s production of Tom Stoppard’s new version of Anton Chekhov’s Ivanov next season, I knew I would have to go. If anything, just to make up for not flying from New York to London to see him in Edmond by David Mamet a few years back. Yes, spending around $500 for the trip plus the cost of a theatre ticket is not something a normal person would regret not doing when they were poor and living in NYC, but I am far from normal. There are very few actors worth that trip, and sadly, I didn’t take it and regret it to this day. While Chekhov is not necessarily my cup of tea most of the time, I don’t want to pass up another opportunity to see Kenneth Branagh onstage. Especially when it’s a much cheaper opportunity.

Soon after discovering this wonderful information, I found out that not only would Mr. Branagh be starring in a play at the Donmar but directing one as well. Its a little play called Hamlet and its going to star a gentleman named Jude Law. HELLO. I cannot pass this one up either, so I decided to pencil in another little trip and have two very awesome jaunts over to London to look forward to. No harm, right?

Well…then the Donmar Warehouse decided to have a casting orgasm of theatrical legends. Not only must I travel to see Mr. Branagh, and Mr. Law, but now I must travel to see Mr. Jacobi and Ms. Dench. Seriously. Derek Jacobi will be starring in Twelfth Night as Malvolio, and Judi Dench will be commanding the stage in Madame de Sade. The Donmar season is now more like a master’s class for theatre and no one currently studying literature, specifically dramatic literature, can ignore what is happening on that stage. Undeniable classics performed by undeniable legends. Thank God for $20 tickets to the shows or we’d be in major financial crisis.

I suppose my problems could be worse. If taking more trips to London than I can probably afford next year is my major gripe, life must be going pretty damn well.

Here are the dates if you’d like to join me… :)

Ivanov w/Kenneth Branagh
12 Sep 2008 - 29 Nov 2008

Twelfth Night w/Derek Jacobi
5 December 2008 – 7 March – 2009

Madame de Sade w/Judi Dench
13 March 2009 – 23 May 2009

Hamlet w/Jude Law
29 May 2009 – August 2009

Pretty Dresses and Pink Martinis

In my quest to become a girl again, I have been looking for the right clothes to buy (hence the bloomers blog), the right shoes, makeup, etc. It’s a long term project really, I only need to start being a consistent girl come the end of summer when I arrive in France but building the right wardrobe takes some serious preparation. Not to mention some serious bargain hunting when trying to do it on a student budget.

It also takes a very serious vision of the type of girl you want to be. Do I want to be modern chic? Do I want to be trendy chic? Classy chic? Feminine chic? These are very important, vain questions to be answered when reinventing one’s closet. In order to make sure I knew which direction I wanted to go I consulted what any normal girl would, the pink bible – my Sex and the City collection.

Think about it – between the four women on that show, you have four completely different styles, and bets are, any girl will prefer one over the other three. There’s Carrie, the uber chic, trendy, experimental one, Miranda, the professional, powerful, sexy modern one, Samantha, the sexy, provocative, flashy one, and Charlotte, the feminine, flirty, traditional one. And through marathon watching I have discovered that my style guru is Charlotte York, Park Avenue princess extraordinaire.

Every time I watched a Sex and the City episode, and most definitely when I watched the movie, I found myself oohhing and ahhhing at the majority of what she wears. There’s all those cute little dresses, fun, flirty, feminine, demure – yet still sexy. That is so me! I’m a regular Park Avenue princess…without the Park Avenue bank account. Typical.

Now to be realistic, I’m halfway there. Between my closet full of Banana and J Crew dresses I am on my way to Park Avenue perfect, with just a few more stops to go. I’ve got a great closet full of clothes, but every wardrobe needs a little tweaking to be the perfect fit for your life. And while I will never have Charlotte’s determination for social perfection (thank you Jesus) or her perfect upper body (bitch) I will have her wardrobe, even if I have to track down crazy Patricia Fields and demand it from her studio.

My biggest fashion flaw really comes down to one thing, and it is my greatest fault as a woman - my lack of love for shoes. For some reason I’ve just never been a shoe gal and it’s something I have to overcome. The right shoes can make or break the outfit and their necessity cannot be ignored. Why I have such a problem selecting and buying shoes I’ll never know, I just know I need to overcome it. I need to accept that there is a way to have traditional, simplified taste and still find shoes that are hot. Shoes that make my short legs look long and my fat feet look slim. So if I find the store with the magic shoes I’ll be set!

I’m hoping to find myself the envy of all women next year upon my return from France with my wardrobe and shoe collection at its best. I’ll be that bitch who has that dress you want and when you ask me where I got it I’ll stand a little bit taller and tell you I got it in France and your jealousy will be intensified. It’s a shallow dream, but damnit its mine, and at least now no one can say I don’t have goals for my year abroad.

A girl can dream…

It’s a good thing I grew up with a weight problem and no money, otherwise I would be a nightmare, a regular hot Park Avenue mess.

Best Ad Ever

This is the best ad ever, for what I think are obvious reasons.

I wish I was her...if Erik has his way we'll have a little girl just like her...and then we'll be in BIG trouble.

Let the Madness Begin

And so it begins again – the stress, the intensity, the bad accents, the fear of failing – it’s all taking place in my daily French class until the end of August. I am sure you can feel my excitement leaping off the page at this very moment.

Given the over achieving tendencies of my French 3 professor last semester, the summer work load actually pretty much amounts to the work load I had before. We were told that we should expect 4 hours of homework per night – minimum – and sadly, that was actually no surprise to yours truly, and with a shrug my shoulders and an acceptance for my coffee addiction to come, I proceeded to just enjoy my class.

It should prove to be fairly interesting. The theme is Folklore and how the fairy tales and folklore we all know is incorporated into modern day literature, films, theatre, music, etc. That can’t be too boring, right? I’m remaining fairly optimistic at this point, it is after all only the first day. Burn out will not likely set in until the end of July so I should enjoy this excited, ambitious, positive energy while it lasts.

In other news, Erik gets home in a week – thank you Jesus. He has been gone for two whole months and I just can’t take it anymore. There’s something to be said for knowing that special someone will be home at the end of your day. Especially when that someone is Erik. He has a knack for knowing exactly what I want when I want it and preparing it for me before I even ask. Like cocktails. Right now, he would see my face after finishing my homework and before I could even refuse there would be a Cosmo situated right next to my textbook stating the obvious – RELAX. Best future husband ever.

This week is an especially good week to have class and homework given Erik’s impending return. If I didn’t have anything to do, it would just be a ticking time clock until his arrival and I would not be able to cope with the waiting. The last seven days are always the worst. Because it’s only a week – but it’s also a WHOLE week. And it never goes by fast enough. The last seven days we both morph into five year old kids waiting for Christmas morning – remember that feeling? You wake up every morning hoping you slept through the last six days, when really it’s only Tuesday and the fun doesn’t start till Monday…and then you walk around disappointed for the rest of the day. Yeah, that’s us right now.

Anyways, that’s my Monday - positive and impatient. Tuesday I’m aiming for positive and proactive, Wednesday neutral and narcissistic, Thursday tired and temperamental, and Friday exhausted and inebriated.

It’s always good to have goals for the week.

Damn the Man

In my late night research on my new home I have discovered something extremely disturbing…

There is a Starbucks in Lyon. I am officially disappointed, and frankly quite disgusted. I know it’s a big city but come on! It’s France! You have good coffee. NO, actually you have great coffee and even greater cafes to sit in to enjoy said coffee so why oh why would you let a Starbucks move in? Even I can’t drink their coffee without cringing.

Starbuck’s is not a coffee shop – it’s a sugar shop. When I used to go there I always had to get some sort of flavor added to my latte in order to drink it. It wasn’t until I finally gave in to Erik’s verbal abuse and tried Peet’s that I finally understood that the reason I needed two inches of syrup in my coffee is because the coffee tasted disgusting. Now when I get a latte, I still get a little syrup, but I also get an extra shot so I taste the coffee more than I taste the extra flavor. The flavor is just an essence, the coffee is the actual taste that I am craving. At Starbucks rather than taste their coffee, their customers will go into sugar shock with their flavors, whipped cream, and frappucinos. It’s just not right. And worst of all, they breed. When you build one, another one pops up, then another, and another. And before long, there’s four Starbucks in the span of a mile and no one considers going anywhere else cause Starbucks is always right there.

But what am I gonna do? It’s not going to go away. The commercial crack pen is there to stay so aside from glaring at the people in line when I walk by on my way to school from just having had some real espresso I just have to be a mature snob, ignore it, and find joy in the fact that I have better taste than those poor fools in line.

On a totally different note, I found out a new interesting fact about living in France today - in France once someone rents an apartment it is almost impossible to evict them. From November 1st to March 15th it is not possible to legally evict a person under any circumstances in France.

I have yet to find out why this is. But it is good to know I won’t be homeless in the dead of winter begging for coffee and using the bathroom at Starbucks.

Can't I Just Pick One and Call It a Day?

The last time I was in Paris for an extended stay I seriously considered moving there. I couldn’t really come up with any reason to not live in Paris at the age of nineteen, and with a new boyfriend at University just outside London it seemed like a perfect fit. But then reality set in - the idea of looking for an apartment, figuring out and dealing with the hassle and logistics of what it meant to get myself on a lease, pay all the rent, the bills, etc. And to have to do all of it in French, that was more stress than I thought I could handle no matter how mature or worldly I considered myself to be.

Now, two months before my departure for Lyon I am realizing that the things you are determined to avoid are going to keep coming up in your life no matter what direction your life takes. Because, as it turns out, 8 years later I am now having to deal with renting my own apartment in France. It may not be in Paris, but it is in Lyon. All the negotiations and paperwork will be in French, the money will be in Euros raping my American bank account, and I will have to do the exact thing my younger self decided to avoid. Needless to say I am stressed. I should have moved back then. At least back then I would have saved myself a little bit of money. Remember the days before America was in financial crisis? Yeah… me too…

At least this is not my first apartment. I am sure there are UC students with our program who have never had their name on a lease, let alone paid a utility bill, so I think its safe to say that if anyone has a right to be stressed its them. I’ve done this before. I get the whole security deposit thing, I know that you have to inspect the apartment for damages before you sign the lease, I know how to handle a difficult landlord, and I know how much to budget to pay ALL my bills. And I’ve done it all in NYC, which is about as stressful a place as there is to rent an apartment. If I can handle that I can handle anything, except now I just have to handle it in French. Pas de problème!

But I’m looking, I’m being proactive, and I’m determined to remain positive until the day I get the keys to my new place. Fate has a funny way of working things out for you if you let it, so I’m doing my best to plan without necessarily orchestrating…it’s a delicate balance to say the least. This is where my cultural DNA comes into play in the strangest way. The French side of me tells me not to worry, everything will work out, stop wasting your time stressing. It tells me to turn off the computer, pour myself a glass of wine, and just relax. This is my fun and slightly irresponsible side.

Then there’s my Irish side which tells me to relax cause it’s all up to God and his saints anyway so just pray my little heart out and everything will be fine. There’s St. Anthony who helps you find stuff, St. Jude of all the impossible, St. Theresa who’s so awesome she’s had modern day songs written about her, and the big man himself. Somebody up there is gonna figure out a way to help you and everything will fall into place. This is my spiritual and slightly delusional side.

Then there’s my American side telling me to act now, be the first to get what I want, get the best of what’s out there, and do it for as little money as humanely possible. And then when it’s all over, pretend it was the easiest thing in the world to do. This is quite obviously my over achiever and stressed out side. It’s no wonder I’m two steps away from a panic attack if I think about it too much.

So I’m just going to try and find the perfect balance. The perfect cultural DNA cocktail if you will, a perfect blend that I can just nurse until it all works out.

I'm Just An Old Fashioned Gal

I was totally born in the wrong era. I want this outfit. The entire outfit. Including the bloomers. What normal 26 year old in the year 2008 actually wants to wear bloomers?

But I’m in love with them. They’re satin – and ivory – and oh sooooo pretty. And the corset is just perfect. The website that carries these corsets has officially become my Mecca. I hope to visit one day and spend lots of money on frivolous undergarments that only Erik and I will truly enjoy. This corset is $500 not including the fancy panties. And if I had the many pennies it would take to make this purchase, it would be on its way to me right now.

Finding this website was quite the adventure. A basic Google search for corsets led me to a blog belonging to a lovely woman who just so happens to be a dominatrix in New York City who had posted a laundry list of her favorite lingerie stores and websites. Now I can’t say I understand the dominatrix world, but damnit, those bitches know good underwear. It makes sense really. Their entire profession is based on their sexiness and appeal, so purchases such as these are investments in their livelihood, so they must be of the best quality.

I almost want to go back to her blog and thank her. Her prodomme wisdom may well have improved my wardrobe for the rest of my life. But I’m sure her clients give her enough thanks, especially since she tells them to.

If you or your sexy loved one wants to check out the website its http://www.lamagia-lingerie.co.uk/