MAC's Nightfall

Here’s why.  Upon hearing that my computer was going to be gone until OCTOBER (grrrr), he went out yesterday morning while I was still groggily attempting to turn over onto my back and brought me back an iced caramel macchiato and the fall fashion issues of In Style, Harper’s Bazaar, and Elle.  Is it any wonder I love this boy?  Having spent all day yesterday getting my fashion fix at long last in despite of my inability to access the internet, I am now feeling much better about my fate, if still mildly annoyed about having to wait two more weeks to catch up on online fashion week coverage. I was somewhat disturbed to find myself looking at a picture of Susan Boyle and thinking “ooh, I like those shoes!” (hey, they were Giuseppe Zanotti!) but a few moments of hilarity courtesy of Uncle Karl pretending to be Coco Chanel in Harper’s Bazaar made all well. (See today’s thought of the day for a representative sample.)

I am now in full swing fall mode, starting with an urgent need to Goth it up with some of the dramatic, hard-edged nail polish colors to go with this fall’s style warrior theme. Even though recessionary caution is still very much with us, a few new nail polishes always seem like a reasonable indulgence when the less-reasonable Hermes bag is taunting me from afar. read more »

Now that autumn is here (well, almost) and a moderate level of swine-flu panic is starting to set in, we should point out just how cute microbes can actually be when, uh, magnified one million times and fashioned out of plush.  (What?)  I refer of course to ThinkGeek’s collection of Giant Plush Microbes … if fuzzy pink swine flu isn’t for you, maybe the aquatic-looking clap/gonorrhea critter, the lavender blob of  mono-kissing disease or perhaps the e coli virus.

Dell has finally broken my spirits.  I’m not sure I have the strength to go into the ridiculousness that has occurred since my last post.  Suffice it to say that it involved representations that my computer would be overnighted to me by tomorrow (not gonna happen) and a circus of different people telling me conflicting information about what was wrong with the computer, sometimes several times a day.   Finally, Dell has achieved an indefinite delay to replace a part that was in perfectly good condition when I sent it to them and that the service depot apparently broke.  Is it just me, or should I not have an additional month’s delay because DELL broke something?

They now claim I’ll have a refurbished system in two weeks, but I’m not holding my breath.  It seems like it’s just about time for me to start looking for a new computer, and I sure as hell won’t be buying another Dell.  Of course, I can’t shop for it online, but I guess there are always computer magazines.  Anyone have recommendations?

So, if you’ve been watching tv, you may have seen the commercials for the upcoming season of “America’s Next Top Model.”  Bravo has been trying to present the next season as a groundbreaking search for women who aren’t tall enough for traditional model standards.  Look at us!  We’re broadminded and forward-thinking!

I am far from the only person to comment on this, but they’ve been using Kate Moss as an example of the trail these women are supposedly going to follow,  referring to her as “petite supermodel Kate Moss.”  Uh, yeah.  A quick Google suggests that Kate Moss is in fact my height – 5’7″.  While that admittedly makes us at least two inches shorter than most runway models, it also makes us taller than approximately 85% of American women.  Kate Moss is not a role model for “short girls,” people, and she’s not petite compared to anyone but models and basketball players.  5’7″, incidentally, is the maximum height for the upcoming season.  Exactly what sort of modeling career are they expecting women who are genuinely petite to have?

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It is like the Keystone Kops over there, folks.  After posting Wednesday, I got an email telling me that the computer (which I’d been told Monday had been fixed, remember) had been shipped out.  I replied to the email asking again if a tracking number was available.  Well, yesterday I got a call telling me that there had been an update that morning saying that not only had it not been shipped, it had not been fixed, and was waiting for a part on backorder so that it could be fixed.  ”I am going to ask you to wait another five to seven business days.”  Right.  When asked, he had no idea why I’d been told it had been fixed, what was wrong with it, what part was missing, or why I’d been told it had shipped, despite the fact that he’d been the one who sent the email saying it had shipped.

Come on, people.  I realize that repairs can take time, but what kind of part could my computer need that could possibly take the manufacturer over three weeks to get?  I would be okay being patient if I was getting the impression that they knew what they are doing over there, but after the it’s fixed-it’s shipped-it’s not shipped OR fixed debacle, I am starting to get the impression that my computer is caught in a vortex of incompetence that may not even be aware that there’s a computer in there.   And for more than a month.  Good God.  I was originally happy my computer was still on warranty, but I’m starting to wonder if I wouldn’t have been better off buying a new computer from someone else.  This level of confusion from a company the size of Dell is pretty impressive…

I love the Lifetime Movie Network – it’s truly a guilty pleasure.

So it’s with great regret that I have to report that they’ve dropped the ball on this one. And – of all people – JIMMY KIMMEL came up with the greatest Lifetime Movie concept ever: Kate Is Enough: The Kate Gosselin Story, starring Kathy Griffin and George Takei.

Brace yourself, ladies, it’s here! In a celebration of fashion presumably intended to give the flagging industry a boost in the current economy, Vogue and CDFA are sponsoring a full out fashion extravaganza tonight featuring events at hundred of stores throughout the city. Frankly, there are so many stores participating here and across the country that you hardly need a guide – just wander into your favorite fashionable boutique or department store starting around 7 and there’s a good chance you’ll find yourself with a glass of champagne or shaking hands with a designer. I’ve personally gotten invites to events at Mackage (free one-on-one style consultations with Philip Bloch and in-store blow-outs), eryn brinié (performance by singer Kate Earl), Trina Turk (champagne, plus the designer herself at the LA boutique), Theory (a special installation of their FW 09 looks plus cocktails from Belvedere vodka), plus half a dozen department stores, and that’s just the tip of the iceberg!  Even if you’re not really looking to shop, it’d be a shame to miss what promises to be a heck of an event.  If you’re looking for more guidance, here’s the official website, and the NYT’s article of yesterday.

Can’t wait!  Hope you all have the chance to get out and enjoy it tonight!

Thank you, Onion, for this awesome video.

Facebook, Twitter Revolutionizing How Parents Stalk Their College-Aged Kids

With luck, the long saga of my dry spell should be over soon.  Supposedly my computer is now fixed, some two weeks after the Dell service depot received it and a week and a half after they obtained the part they needed for it.  About time, too.  I think I have watched the entire TV oeuvre of David Bromstad, and I suspect I’m going to start running out of Divine Design soon too.  That said, I am going to share with you my latest call from Dell’s customer service folks because, well, people who make calls this dumb deserve to have it posted about on the internet.

The genius responsible for my last call from Dell (“Have you received your computer yet?  Oh, no, we haven’t fixed it yet.  And I have no update for you.”) said during that call that she’d call me in a few days with an update.  That didn’t happen.  Fine, no big.  I finally emailed Dell again on Saturday afternoon asking for an update on whether it had been shipped or whether it was going to ship soon, in the hopes they’d send me a tracking number.  In response to this email, someone called me on Labor Day.  He opened by asking if I had my computer yet.  Uh, no, I just emailed to ask if it had been shipped.  Oh, he knew that, that’s why he was calling.  And it hadn’t shipped yet.  So WHY was he asking if I’d received it?  Who knows.  (Clearly not because he thought it had been delivered Labor Day weekend.)  He then told me it’d been fixed but not shipped.  Since it took their carrier over a week to bring the prepacked box they sent me from me to them, I asked him if they could send it overnight or two-day air to avoid a repeat of that lag, being as my original warranty call to Dell was over a month ago.  He responded that it shouldn’t take that long.  I repeated my question about expediting it.  He repeated his nonanswer several times.  Dude, I realize that.  I am so with you on how it should not take more than a week for a computer to get from here to Houston.  What you are not saying is that you will take steps to prevent it from taking that long again.

I left this call unclear on whether he was going to do anything but rely on usual procedures to assume that my laptop would get shipped.  That’s okay.  I have email on my cell phone and leftover instincts from being a lawyer.  They have had my damn computer for three full weeks now.  If I don’t get a tracking number by the end of the day…

I know, I posted on my opinion of the continuing leggings trend only a couple of weeks ago, but a recent pass through the stores exposed me to fresh horrors that I just had to share.  I know that leggings are still in fashion.  I know that they’re going to be in stores.  I had hoped, though, that the out-and-out leggings (as opposed to skinny pants) would be confined to the juniors department and unobtrusive corners of the t-shirt and hosiery sections.  I was thus unprepared to enter the Theory section of Bloomingdale’s and see this:

Dear God.

Since I know this is a super-blurry cell phone pic, let me narrate.  They’re leggings.  They’re woolly.  And they’re fuschia.

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