Of Window Shopping and Warthog Tusks
This weekend, Paul got the idea to go "window shopping" on Madison Avenue. Unless I happen to be in the market for some actual windows, I don't like this concept at all. I don't like shopping in places where there's nothing I can afford to buy.
This doesn't seem to bother men as much as women, which explains the existence of Luxury Car Shows, where the average Joe can preview the new shades of kidskin leather (beige vs. extra beige) for his new 2007 Bentley. Same goes for the concept of strip clubs. I've never had any problem with the idea, but I'm amazed that guys don't. You can look at the naked women, but you can't touch them or even yourself without being pounced on by a 300-pound dude with ridiculous sideburns, who might have recently escaped from prison and/or the walrus pool at Sea World (hence the job at "See" World, ahem). This might be one reason that you don't see as many women going to see male strippers. It's like window shoppping, but with no option to buy. That, and naked men wearing bow ties look a bit ridiculous. That, and naked men not wearing bow ties look a bit ridiculous ...
The problem with living on the Upper East Side (well, one of them) is that you're surrounded by tons of luxury items that you never knew existed, but that you start to feel impoverished to be living without. This is how I felt as we walked past items like this in the window of the Safari Outfitters, where you can get all those must-have items for your trip "the Bush." And we don't mean Kennebunkport. Or a strip club.
When travelling in rural Africa, it's important to take along your leather Race Day Bag, so the starving child who has to run behind the air conditioned Range Rover with your luggage will know what he can buy if he and everyone in his village saves 100% of their income for the next 25 years. Colonialism is cool again, kids!
It's important to let everyone in Zimbabwe know that, really, you would have paid for their food and AIDS medicine for 10 years, except that you really needed these. Fortunately, I live within walking distance to the "finest collection of vintage cocktail shakers" in the U.S. (a must for any safari). It was even in the broker's ad for our apartment: "1 bdr hwfl UES, near CP, FCVCS ..."
I tend to believe whatever Madison Avenue wants me to believe. I don't mean the advertizing industry, I mean the actual avenue. Sometimes it tells me to do things. On Sunday, it told me to buy some $40 lip gloss. I mean, "lip plumper." I'm not sure when it was that we all decided our lips just weren't plump enough, but I think it was around the time we all decided our teeth and eyeballs needed to be just a bit whiter.
We went into Clyde's, a pre-Sephora makeup and perfum emporium/drugstore on Madison. The thing I like about Clydes is that, unlike neighboring boutiques such as Safari Oufitters, Chloé and Carolina Herrera, I can actually buy stuff. Granted, it may only be a face loofah (a.k.a., "that falafel thing," if you're Bill O'Reilly trying to sound sexy). It may be a $15 loofah, and hence a huge rip-off. Especially since loofahs, and falafels, have now been ruined for all of us who read the transcript of the Bill O'Reilly phone calls. But at least the $15 loofah is in the realm of reality, which, conveniently, borders on the kindgom of Stupid Ways to Spend Money. I am no stranger to this land.
Unfortuntely, I have to go do some actual work, so I'll have to continue this story later.
Tune in next time when...
ME: So, do my lips look plumper?
PAUL: Yes. Which is more than you can say for your wallet.
ME (puckering, looking into a store window): I'm serious.
PAUL: Seriously. You look like you've been eating BBQ goat meat for the past hour.
ME: Really?! (slowly realizing that this may not, in fact, be a compliment)
This doesn't seem to bother men as much as women, which explains the existence of Luxury Car Shows, where the average Joe can preview the new shades of kidskin leather (beige vs. extra beige) for his new 2007 Bentley. Same goes for the concept of strip clubs. I've never had any problem with the idea, but I'm amazed that guys don't. You can look at the naked women, but you can't touch them or even yourself without being pounced on by a 300-pound dude with ridiculous sideburns, who might have recently escaped from prison and/or the walrus pool at Sea World (hence the job at "See" World, ahem). This might be one reason that you don't see as many women going to see male strippers. It's like window shoppping, but with no option to buy. That, and naked men wearing bow ties look a bit ridiculous. That, and naked men not wearing bow ties look a bit ridiculous ...
The problem with living on the Upper East Side (well, one of them) is that you're surrounded by tons of luxury items that you never knew existed, but that you start to feel impoverished to be living without. This is how I felt as we walked past items like this in the window of the Safari Outfitters, where you can get all those must-have items for your trip "the Bush." And we don't mean Kennebunkport. Or a strip club.
When travelling in rural Africa, it's important to take along your leather Race Day Bag, so the starving child who has to run behind the air conditioned Range Rover with your luggage will know what he can buy if he and everyone in his village saves 100% of their income for the next 25 years. Colonialism is cool again, kids!
It's important to let everyone in Zimbabwe know that, really, you would have paid for their food and AIDS medicine for 10 years, except that you really needed these. Fortunately, I live within walking distance to the "finest collection of vintage cocktail shakers" in the U.S. (a must for any safari). It was even in the broker's ad for our apartment: "1 bdr hwfl UES, near CP, FCVCS ..."
I tend to believe whatever Madison Avenue wants me to believe. I don't mean the advertizing industry, I mean the actual avenue. Sometimes it tells me to do things. On Sunday, it told me to buy some $40 lip gloss. I mean, "lip plumper." I'm not sure when it was that we all decided our lips just weren't plump enough, but I think it was around the time we all decided our teeth and eyeballs needed to be just a bit whiter.
We went into Clyde's, a pre-Sephora makeup and perfum emporium/drugstore on Madison. The thing I like about Clydes is that, unlike neighboring boutiques such as Safari Oufitters, Chloé and Carolina Herrera, I can actually buy stuff. Granted, it may only be a face loofah (a.k.a., "that falafel thing," if you're Bill O'Reilly trying to sound sexy). It may be a $15 loofah, and hence a huge rip-off. Especially since loofahs, and falafels, have now been ruined for all of us who read the transcript of the Bill O'Reilly phone calls. But at least the $15 loofah is in the realm of reality, which, conveniently, borders on the kindgom of Stupid Ways to Spend Money. I am no stranger to this land.
Unfortuntely, I have to go do some actual work, so I'll have to continue this story later.
Tune in next time when...
ME: So, do my lips look plumper?
PAUL: Yes. Which is more than you can say for your wallet.
ME (puckering, looking into a store window): I'm serious.
PAUL: Seriously. You look like you've been eating BBQ goat meat for the past hour.
ME: Really?! (slowly realizing that this may not, in fact, be a compliment)
posted by Marguerite at 7:45 AM
3 Comments:
Heh. There is an option to buy at strip clubs, well, rent for a bit at incredibly inflated prices for the services rendered. And every stripper, even the married ones, hopes some very rich old man comes in and wisks her away from that nasty place for good right into the Bentley and stately home they all feel they deserve.
Hey, you didn't buy the lip plumper, I DID. And it did look like you'd been eating goat meat. In a super-sexy kind of way.
I love reading about your shopping trips. I do hate window shopping though. Ugh.
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