Have a lovely weekend ... I'll be catching up with the President

Hi, blog friends. I'll be in Washington D.C. this weekend (yay vacation!) taking in the monuments, visiting the Newseum, and eating cupcakes. Lots of cupcakes. Here are some links from around the web this week to keep you occupied until my return with scandalous stories. Oh, and hey, Philadelphia has cherry blossoms too - I showed them to you.


<3


There are a TON of good movies coming out. Particularly excited about the film version of Passing Strange, one the weirdest, most electric musicals I've seen.

Joanna Goddard got married and went on the most enviable honeymoon ever. And I hear she has Greece photos still to come!

My new favorite mom blog - great graphics (she's a designer) and her daughter's blog alias is Baby Bug. Adorbs. (God, did I just say that?)

I loves me some tap dancing.

Football inspired fashion.

And you thought your shoes were painful.

What a kid - throwing back that fly ball.

Recent Snaps - A Photo Post

Occasionally, when particularly jazzed about something I see in my travels (or, perhaps more accurately, daily commute or trip to Dunkin Donuts), I'll covertly whip out my cell phone to snap a photo. Or at least I think it's covert. "I'll blog about this later!" I'll exclaim to myself. Well, that later is now. Here are some recent images straight from my easily distracted brain and camera phone.

My sister moved into her freshman dorm this week (tear!) and has clearly sworn to be the classiest girl in her building. Frankly, I don't doubt that she probably is. Beyond the painstaking arrangement choices made (she ordered her posters weeks in advance), what freshman actually makes the frames for her (very distinctly themed) posters?

... or crafts her own pillow?

I've mentioned this before but here's the photo of the bedding from Anthropologie on the day we first met. Love at first sight. Someone, please. Decorate my room. I'm quickly tiring of the teal paint chips that I Scotch-taped up on my fading buttercup wall three months ago.



Ever since seventh grade Italian class, I've had a soft spot in my heart for cannoli. My will power did not stay strong against this peanut butter one I found in the cafe at work this week (or, excuse me, The Caf). Unfortunately, I give it a "meh" rating on the very analytical Lauren Food Scale. With its tastes-like-little-more-than-Skippy filling, Giada "MasssCahrponeh Scheese" De Laurentiis would not have approved.

It's shame I couldn't get a better shot of this. Each morning on the train we pass over a bridge overlooking some sort of body of water (a bay? the ocean? some other sort of inlet?) and there are always tonssss of tiny boats hanging out a little ways from the train. They always look abandoned to me, like toy boats someone grew out of then just sent down the Nile, or like lost little ducklings who have nothing better to do but hang. But - really - they must be doing something out there. What is it?



This one is my favorite of the week. I'm attending a wedding this coming weekend with the bf (yay!) and while perusing wedding cards this evening, we came across ones for gay weddings! I don't know why, but I think they're the greatest thing. Maybe the rainbow hearts are a bit cliche, but look at the other. Two tuxedos! So great! And, I'm sorry, but so cute! Although, no lesbian cards - gay or straight it appears that women will continue to be slighted. ... And I'll put my soapbox away now. Someone invite me to your same-sex wedding so I can buy you a justice wedding card!

What's the coolest thing you've seen this week?

Aldo Goes Green/Another Reason to Buy Shoes

We all love Aldo shoes (although maybe not Aldo Ventures Software Analysts which I bet gets a lot of mistaken 18 - 35 female visitors) Now there's more reason to love - and shop! I splurged today (probably ill-advised) and bought two new pairs of shoes (I'll wear them to work, I swear!). At the register, I was interested to see Aldo's new way of "bagging" my purchase. Well, in fact, there aren't really bags. Just boxes. A box-bag, if you will.

Very cool, Aldo. Maybe a little cumbersome and I bet you're annoying the eyeballs out of all your employees each time they have screw on a little shoe-string handle and tape the boxes together, but, hey, we've got a planet to save.

Oh, what did I buy? Well since you asked...

I love the first pair - really sparkly but just the right amount since it's a simple flat. Jury's still out on the black ones, though. I can't decide if I'm being edgy or if it looks like I'm a wounded ballerina. Or a high-school goth kid. Or someone who likes making her legs look short. Or if it was an impulse buy to make myself feel better after realizing none of Aldo's boots will fit my fat calves.

Well ... Maybe a Little Bit About Boys

I liked Amy's Astley's recent "So What Do You Do?" interview on Mediabistro. She's clearly a smartypants and I love how she called herself a style journalist - very neat. But I couldn't help but think back and chuckle at her comment about how Teen Vogue is "a girl-centric place" and "not about boys," when I saw the October issue - cover graced by Taylor Lautner. A boy. But what is a girl's life without boys, am I right, Amy?



(That was sarcasm if you don't know me very well. You'll learn to recognize it. In many ways I am very much a Miranda.)

It Tastes Like a Pumpkin Spice Autumn Again

That's right, I'm going to be snooty and say "autumn" instead of "fall." Because "autumn" just sounds that much nicer - like the ring of an ill-advised, so-called original baby name [Another thought: Isn't it weird how we call them "baby names" when they're names babies will also eventually grow up to continuing having? I guess "people names" isn't as pleasing to roll off the tongue.]

So. The Starbucks Pumpkin Spice Latte is back. Wait - let me rephrase. The Pumpkin Spice Latte is back!!! (This news truly forgoes all AP style rules.)

I actually didn't realize it was coming back so soon - last year, I remember stumbling across it only as early as November, which with the cold and Thanksgiving and the drenched Ugg boots and harvest-y stuff makes more sense. Good thing for Starbucks it was nippy in the Northeast this week (which was, in fact, glorious). I bet they planned it that way.

Regardless of the timing, I am super jazzed about its return. So delicious. So holiday. I think Labor Day is even further improved by this pumpkin-y addition to the usual sandy hot dogs and powdered lemonade.

Score. Will probably return tomorrow. Shh - I get skim milk. And no whip. Erm, maybe no whip.