...I have a whole bunch of essay to write! In the mean time, enjoy this video of dancers making musicals come to life for some lucky travelers at Grand Central Station in New York.
Seriously, how many times have you wished that things like this would happen?
Have a great weekend, lovelies!
Saturday, April 11, 2009
Thursday, April 9, 2009
Or Maybe a Knight in Stylish Cloth Chainmail?
These boot... things are $150 at Modcloth. I first saw them a few days ago, and I have been trying to figure out what they remind me of so that I could write something funny about them, but even though I feel like they seriously do remind me of something, I'm keep comin' up short in the comparisons department.
A cave girl? A burn victim with their wounds all dressed? An elephant in wedges? Help me out here, guys!
A cave girl? A burn victim with their wounds all dressed? An elephant in wedges? Help me out here, guys!
On Dermatophagia
I distinctly remember the moment that I began self-harming. I was in the second grade, and I was sitting in class, facing away from my desk, attention rapt on whatever the teacher was saying-- so much so that I noticed a bit of my fingernail was a making a break for it. I decided that, like any reasonable human being, I would bite it off. I did so so enthusiastically (or with such poor aim) that I actually dug into the skin next to the offending hangnail. And for some strange reason, it must have felt great.
That was twelve years ago. Since that fateful day, I have been chewing the skin off my fingers on a daily basis. And by daily, I certainly do not mean there is a certain time I do it, a little bit of space in my day where I can relieve this strange urge. I bite my fingers constantly. I bite them unconsciously. I bite them until they are sore and bleeding. I bite them even though they are often sore. I bite them despite my mothers constant warnings when I was younger that I would get gangrene and have to have them cut off. I bite them even though my boyfriend has expressed how much he would like me to stop hurting myself like this. I bite them because I cannot stop biting them.
I always thought that biting my fingers was just a habit that I had formed and that it was nothing even close to psychological. This is what I told my mother, who has tried in vain to get me to stop. Telling me how repulsive my hands look did not work ("Vanessa, you're a flutist! You can't have such disgusting fingers!"), nor did the aforementioned warnings over the serious medical repercussions that could occur (I assure you, I used to live my life truly believing that my days with operational hands were numbered). She began asking me why I was so nervous. I always assured her that I was not nervous, that this was not the case (if you knew me outside this blog, you would that that's a damn lie). It was a habit. Just a habit. And I could stop anytime I wanted to.
I tried to last year by wearing gloves for the entirety of the latter half of winter break, and the results last a few weeks, but I never reached a point where I could feel fully comfortable without biting just a little. I told Luke to tell me when I was biting (or picking at) my fingers and make me stop. He tried in earnest to help me, but most of the time when he stopped me for a moment, I found-- almost mysteriously, as weird as that sounds-- my hands in my mouth as soon as his back was turned. It was incredibly frustrating for us both. He tired of failing to stop me, and I tired of feeling-- moreso than ever-- like I couldn't even control this strange behavior. I think trying to stop was really the point at which I began to think that maybe there was something wrong with me that wasn't just nervous or crazy or purely habitual. I had only ever briefly, passingly thought of my behaviors as a form of self-mutilation. It certainly is, and you would know that if you could see the sheer damage I can do on my own body with a complete disregard to the pain it causes me. (Unfortunately, my camera is not very good at doing its job and I've continued to forget to buy it batteries, so I won't be able to show you my actual hands as an example. Examples of similar ones to come, if you're interested. Just sit tight.)
One night, I was sleeplessly sitting in front of my laptop gnawing away when I decided that I should just look the damn behavior up on the internet. I found something that I never thought-- nay, dreamed-- I would find. A wikipedia article titled "Dermatophagia." When I opened the link, I was shocked. The pictures were so familiar to me that I swear I wondered if someone had sneaked into my room and took photos of my fingers. I read the article hungrily, desiring nothing more than to know what this dermatophagia business was all about. Believe it or not, the suggestion that it is actually an OCD-spectrum disorder was one of the most exciting things I have ever read. I further looked up Dermatillomania (in recent years I have also suffered a significant amount of compulsive skin-picking related to my hands and otherwise), and then Impluse-Control Disorders. I was floored. I was psyched! The idea that something is psychologically wrong with me and other people do this, too, and maybe someone can fix me omg omg omg was one that lifted a huge weight from a shoulders, a weight that had been plaguing me for twelve whole years. When I read that therapy can help-- for the first time in my life and after a very negative experience with therapy as a child-- I wanted that therapy. I wanted help. I wanted to be able to shake someone's hand and not worry that they'll be sickened by me. I wanted to be able to pass papers in class without trying my best to keep the person next to me from catching a glimpse of my torn-up skin. I wanted to not be sore, to not bleed, to not feel out of control of my own body. The idea that something could be at work psychologically was amazing.
When Luke woke up (God bless him, really-- this is the man who has said to me that if feel like hurting myself, I should just bite on his hands instead), we talked about it.
"I looked up a ton of articles after that-- everything I could find, even though there wasn't much-- and they say that if I get therapy for it, I might be able to work through this and really stop."
This possibility is one I have never thought would be realistic for me.
I wanted to write this post even though it is irrelevent to fashion because of the excitement I feel in my search for treatment. I wanted to write this because there is so little about dermatophagia on the internet, and I can only hope that if someone just like me is trying to find someone just like them out there, they will find this post and feel not-so alone anymore. I have been thinking and worrying about making this post for a couple of weeks now, because I didn't know what admitting I have a such a bizarre and, frankly, gross compulsion as part of my everyday life would mean to you readers. I feared admitting it would make me lose all credibility, or seem like a psycho, or just seem disgusting to others. But I've said it. And it is a weight off my shoulders.
To make this entry relevent to you: is there something about your appearance that makes you embarrassed or that you try to hide? Are you trying to improve it? Become more comfortable with it?
EDIT: Part 2 of this series on Dermatophagia/Dermatillomania
That was twelve years ago. Since that fateful day, I have been chewing the skin off my fingers on a daily basis. And by daily, I certainly do not mean there is a certain time I do it, a little bit of space in my day where I can relieve this strange urge. I bite my fingers constantly. I bite them unconsciously. I bite them until they are sore and bleeding. I bite them even though they are often sore. I bite them despite my mothers constant warnings when I was younger that I would get gangrene and have to have them cut off. I bite them even though my boyfriend has expressed how much he would like me to stop hurting myself like this. I bite them because I cannot stop biting them.
I always thought that biting my fingers was just a habit that I had formed and that it was nothing even close to psychological. This is what I told my mother, who has tried in vain to get me to stop. Telling me how repulsive my hands look did not work ("Vanessa, you're a flutist! You can't have such disgusting fingers!"), nor did the aforementioned warnings over the serious medical repercussions that could occur (I assure you, I used to live my life truly believing that my days with operational hands were numbered). She began asking me why I was so nervous. I always assured her that I was not nervous, that this was not the case (if you knew me outside this blog, you would that that's a damn lie). It was a habit. Just a habit. And I could stop anytime I wanted to.
I tried to last year by wearing gloves for the entirety of the latter half of winter break, and the results last a few weeks, but I never reached a point where I could feel fully comfortable without biting just a little. I told Luke to tell me when I was biting (or picking at) my fingers and make me stop. He tried in earnest to help me, but most of the time when he stopped me for a moment, I found-- almost mysteriously, as weird as that sounds-- my hands in my mouth as soon as his back was turned. It was incredibly frustrating for us both. He tired of failing to stop me, and I tired of feeling-- moreso than ever-- like I couldn't even control this strange behavior. I think trying to stop was really the point at which I began to think that maybe there was something wrong with me that wasn't just nervous or crazy or purely habitual. I had only ever briefly, passingly thought of my behaviors as a form of self-mutilation. It certainly is, and you would know that if you could see the sheer damage I can do on my own body with a complete disregard to the pain it causes me. (Unfortunately, my camera is not very good at doing its job and I've continued to forget to buy it batteries, so I won't be able to show you my actual hands as an example. Examples of similar ones to come, if you're interested. Just sit tight.)
One night, I was sleeplessly sitting in front of my laptop gnawing away when I decided that I should just look the damn behavior up on the internet. I found something that I never thought-- nay, dreamed-- I would find. A wikipedia article titled "Dermatophagia." When I opened the link, I was shocked. The pictures were so familiar to me that I swear I wondered if someone had sneaked into my room and took photos of my fingers. I read the article hungrily, desiring nothing more than to know what this dermatophagia business was all about. Believe it or not, the suggestion that it is actually an OCD-spectrum disorder was one of the most exciting things I have ever read. I further looked up Dermatillomania (in recent years I have also suffered a significant amount of compulsive skin-picking related to my hands and otherwise), and then Impluse-Control Disorders. I was floored. I was psyched! The idea that something is psychologically wrong with me and other people do this, too, and maybe someone can fix me omg omg omg was one that lifted a huge weight from a shoulders, a weight that had been plaguing me for twelve whole years. When I read that therapy can help-- for the first time in my life and after a very negative experience with therapy as a child-- I wanted that therapy. I wanted help. I wanted to be able to shake someone's hand and not worry that they'll be sickened by me. I wanted to be able to pass papers in class without trying my best to keep the person next to me from catching a glimpse of my torn-up skin. I wanted to not be sore, to not bleed, to not feel out of control of my own body. The idea that something could be at work psychologically was amazing.
When Luke woke up (God bless him, really-- this is the man who has said to me that if feel like hurting myself, I should just bite on his hands instead), we talked about it.
"I looked up a ton of articles after that-- everything I could find, even though there wasn't much-- and they say that if I get therapy for it, I might be able to work through this and really stop."
This possibility is one I have never thought would be realistic for me.
I wanted to write this post even though it is irrelevent to fashion because of the excitement I feel in my search for treatment. I wanted to write this because there is so little about dermatophagia on the internet, and I can only hope that if someone just like me is trying to find someone just like them out there, they will find this post and feel not-so alone anymore. I have been thinking and worrying about making this post for a couple of weeks now, because I didn't know what admitting I have a such a bizarre and, frankly, gross compulsion as part of my everyday life would mean to you readers. I feared admitting it would make me lose all credibility, or seem like a psycho, or just seem disgusting to others. But I've said it. And it is a weight off my shoulders.
To make this entry relevent to you: is there something about your appearance that makes you embarrassed or that you try to hide? Are you trying to improve it? Become more comfortable with it?
EDIT: Part 2 of this series on Dermatophagia/Dermatillomania
Wednesday, April 8, 2009
Results May Vary
chris heads photography*Attack of the Robot Folk-Dancer!
*For some good, clean fun, check out LoveLeeSoaps' shop on Etsy. I have never seen such adorable soap in my life. Like, I would never want to actually use this stuff. These would make great little additions to any birthday gift or bag o' party favors! My favorites are the hippos.
*I've been reading One Sentence obsessively as of late. It's so hard to stop once you start.
*For some good, clean fun, check out LoveLeeSoaps' shop on Etsy. I have never seen such adorable soap in my life. Like, I would never want to actually use this stuff. These would make great little additions to any birthday gift or bag o' party favors! My favorites are the hippos.
*I've been reading One Sentence obsessively as of late. It's so hard to stop once you start.
this is an actual product called the "do hit chair," but i just loved the photo*Coming from the small, about 98% White community, I didn't even meet a Black person until I was 17-years-old. It's funny to think I would end up in my most (blissfully) committed relationship with a man who is biracial: Luke is half Jamaican and half White. Thank goodness for college, right? Anyway, racial diversity has always fascinated me, once because of my lack of exposure to it, and now because I am in an interracial relationship, and-- if everything goes how we want it to-- planning on having children of mixed race. I found this site about The Hapa Project ("Hapas" referring to people who are mixed White and Asian or Pacific Islander) by Kip Fulbeck, and I've really been captivated by the sample pages from the book. I think it's so important to embrace who we are and where we come from. Writes one man beneath his photograph, "I am 100% Black and 100% Japanese." A little girl draws a picture of herself beneath hers with a word bubble: "I am a person."
by irana
*Am I the last person to know about Poladroid? Probably. That happens to me a lot. If not, I recommend that you download it immediately. I even made a little sample collage of photos of the boyfriend and I to show you how cool the photos come out and how artsy your desktop will look:
by the way, my background is a punch-sipping pikachu i cropped out of a vgcats comic
by irana*After reading that big ol' chunk of text, here's a fun flash game about robot dinosaurs you can play. Please take note that this makes two robot-related bullet points in this one post.
*My friend Minh introduced me to Blend Apparel at some point last year, and I've been periodically going "what was that place called?" and frantically google-searching it ever since. Blend Apparel is an eco-friendly company that sells T-shirts made of organic cotton and bamboo (it makes them extra soft), and even powers its servers by harnessing the energy of the wind! Awesome! What's even more awesome is that all the shirts are emblazoned with not only mega-creative but positive messages. Not your everyday graphic tees. I know Minh's favorite was Love Fuel, and while it's a great design, I have to go with Everything is Ok.
*Have you been keeping up with the Photo of the Day at National Geographic? No? Well, start now, why don't ya!
*My friend Minh introduced me to Blend Apparel at some point last year, and I've been periodically going "what was that place called?" and frantically google-searching it ever since. Blend Apparel is an eco-friendly company that sells T-shirts made of organic cotton and bamboo (it makes them extra soft), and even powers its servers by harnessing the energy of the wind! Awesome! What's even more awesome is that all the shirts are emblazoned with not only mega-creative but positive messages. Not your everyday graphic tees. I know Minh's favorite was Love Fuel, and while it's a great design, I have to go with Everything is Ok.
*Have you been keeping up with the Photo of the Day at National Geographic? No? Well, start now, why don't ya!
*Am I the last person to know about Poladroid? Probably. That happens to me a lot. If not, I recommend that you download it immediately. I even made a little sample collage of photos of the boyfriend and I to show you how cool the photos come out and how artsy your desktop will look:
by the way, my background is a punch-sipping pikachu i cropped out of a vgcats comic*C'mon, Disney! You stopped actually drawing your movies (yep, I'm anti-Pixar/Dreamworks CG animation), and now I find out you were cheating way back when anyhow? Sad face. I mean, I know these are small sequences within movies, and that hand-animating/cell-shading and stuff is extremely time-consuming, but I like to imagine a world without cut-and-paste. Nevertheless, I long for the days when such talented artists worked on movies.
*I love the ShamWow Song by Rhett and Link. And am I the only one who thinks Rhett (left) is kind've cute?
hedi slimane
P.S. If the posting end up being a little spotty in the next month, please remember college finals are fast approaching. I'll try to post as much as possible, anyway, but I figured you deserve a timely warning just in case.
EDIT: I totally forgot to provide the LINK for Poladroid. I fixed it so you can find it more easily.
*I love the ShamWow Song by Rhett and Link. And am I the only one who thinks Rhett (left) is kind've cute?
hedi slimaneThese are some of the things (other than you pretty people) I'm lovin' this week, but let me know what you think in the comments!
EDIT: I totally forgot to provide the LINK for Poladroid. I fixed it so you can find it more easily.
Tuesday, April 7, 2009
Monday, April 6, 2009
Sale Alert! Fascinators, Anyone?
I stopped by Etsy today to check up on the usual suspects, and I found that one of my favorite Etsy girls, Shelley of glitteryblue, is having a sale on fascinators. I don't know if any of you are into that sorta thang, but they're handmade (of course) and cost only $25-- no shipping fees, either! Plus, they're gorgeous. I've never bought a fascinator from her (or anyone else, for that matter-- maybe someday when I'm feeling very brave and experimental), but I have purchased a necklace from her shop and found the service to be impeccable, and the necklace I bought is now one of my absolute favorite pieces of jewelry I own, so I'm willing to bet these feathery headbands are as great in person as they are in pictures. My personal favorite is the one called "Hot Chocolate." It would look especially adorable on someone with hair a similar shade of brown to the girl in the picture-- I love how it blends in. Find her fascinators here, and make sure to check out the rest of the glitteryblue shop, too! Let me know how it goes, yes?
Saturday, April 4, 2009
It's a Good Thought, But...
While I love the idea of anything that doesn't seem especially frightening about American Apparel, I do cringe when T-shirts speak in fragments. The first photo shows a T-shirt saying, simply, "Legalize Gay;" legalize gay what exactly? Gay people? I think they're already legal.Oh, gay marriage. You can tell because the above version says "Repeal Prop 8" on the bottom. However, that still does not mean that "Legalize Gay" is anything close to a sentence. Would it be so hard to add the word "Marriage?" I somehow doubt that it would cost them millions of dollars to add one eight-letter word to these T-shirts. At least if they did that, I would go "yeah, absolutely!" instead of cocking my head and saying "wha...???" Maybe the English major in me is unjustified for going all grammar Nazi, and really I shouldn't be picking on Dov for making these shirts with such obviously kind intent. I mean, he even let the models wear pants.
You comment blog? Make happy.
Friday, April 3, 2009
I Love College
painting by karen radkaiI go to bed at midnight, wake up at 9 AM, go to class for 50 minutes, and then go back to bed at 11 AM.
Can you take naps before noon in the real world? I don't think you can. I don't want to go.
Wednesday, April 1, 2009
Results May Vary
hilary rhoda (<33333!) by terry richardson*"But don't talk back to Darth Vader-- he'll getcha!"
*I found this great site of useless stuff. It's called World Wide Fred, and it features stuff like stiletto-shaped doorstops, Pac-Man oven mitts, and butter dishes shaped like bread. I think I'm going to buy pretty much everything when I have my own place.
*Speaking of my future home, if I ever have a game room...
blik wall decals-- find 'em here*Endangered Species Chocolate looks like a pretty good deal, if you ask me. You get awareness, a nice package, ethical trading, and lots of other good stuff all for about the price of a high-end chocolate bar at your grocery store. I mean, you gotta pay the shipping cost, but it's worth it. C'mon-- chocolate!
*The above picture is from a website full of kids' artistic interpretations of common sayings. I love it. It's addictive. It's adorable. It's reflective of how silly, silly, silly the English language is. Check it out.
*If you get tired in the middle of the day, get into your comfiest nightwear and take a nap. What's your rush? The world will be there when you wake up.
*One of the funniest Onion News clips I've seen in awhile. Ah, satire.
*I kind've adore The Mighty Boosh. If this leaves you with your mouth open, confused and drooling, take comfort in the fact that I'm pretty sure that's what's supposed to happen.
by jodi cobb at national geographic
These are some of the things I'm lovin' this week, but tell me what you think in the comments!
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