April 21, 2009

"Why do you hate the South?"

"I don't hate it," Quentin said, quickly, at once, immediately; "I don't hate it," he said. I don't hate it he thought, panting in the cold air, the iron New England dark: I don't. I don't! I don't hate it! I don't hate it!

-Faulkner Absalom, Absalom!

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Houndstooth jumper dress: Thrifted
Sweater: Forever 21
Tights: Target
Shoes: vintage '60s, thrifted
Bag: Thrifted

Octopus necklace: Etsy

That second photo kills me! I was doing a happy flaily dance and this was somehow caught-- it looks like I'm posing! I'm so bad at actually posing, so this is kind of exciting, despite being out of focus. A big reason I started photographing my outfits was as an attempt to become comfortable in front of the camera, because I just freeze and forget to actually move (as witnessed by, um, all of my normal poses). I'm trying!

Rhiannon often makes lovely posts about how beautiful the South is, with photos of abandoned buildings and fields and pretty old houses, things like that. I've always lived in North Carolina, and because of that I've grown up with Spanish moss and cotton fields and old run-down barns and buildings everywhere. I've known that it's beautiful, but at the same time I've struggled with accepting that this is where I'm from. It just comes from this strange embarrassment that a lot of southerners feel (especially liberals stuck in red states, cough). We tend to overlook the beauty in favor of the acceptance of a bigger city. In college, one of my favorite professors (and a Faulkner scholar) said that one of the hardest things is to accept where you're from. This is particularly true for the South, and especially when you're from a microscopic little cotton mill town in the middle of nowhere like I am. Reading lots of Southern Gothic has helped me to appreciate how weird and special and creepy and full of history it all is, though, and now I realize that I don't think I could live anywhere else. At least not without coming back in the end.

Also the husband and I are about to go on an epic road trip to New Orleans, our absolute favorite place! One week there, one week driving through Mississippi, Alabama, and Georgia to Florida, where we'll be staying with friends. New Orleans in particular makes me feel like I'm part of a weird little club-- I would live there in a second, but the heat/humidty almost kills me here.

The town we live in now is the second oldest in NC. It's not super exciting and we miss Wilmington, but I'm determined to make the best of it until we move next year. Pepsi was invented here! That's something I suppose. There's an amazing cemetery that has to have its own post, so consider this part one.

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Those silhouettes are painted on the boarded-up windows of several abandoned buildings around town.

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The photo on the left is from an outdoor chapel at an old church downtown, and the one on the right is what I call The Orphanage. It's totally not an orphanage, just an old house, but it's tall and has broken windows and sits on the corner of our street all ominously. It's what I imagine Tom Riddle's orphanage would look like. The azaleas attempt to make it cheery but don't let them fool you!

April 14, 2009

Birthdays and '50s dresses.

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Dress: Vintage '50s, Etsy
Cardigan: Thrifted
Tights: Target (of course)
Boots: Thrifted


I feel like I've been away forever!

With schoolwork, a visit from my parents, and a little birthday party Saturday I had a very busy week/weekend. Sunday I was going to make an Easter post (I have pink bunny ears and everything!) but we kind of just lounged around and ate candy instead. Yesterday was my actual birthday and I had the loveliest day; my brother-in-law and future sister-in-law bought me Scrabble (which I've been wanting since Christmas!) so I made my husband play with me a billion times. This was a large chunk of our day:

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I'm such a nerd. And then we cooked dinner and had it out on the back porch using our new little cafe set! So yes, that's my kind of birthday.

Every time I wear this dress I tend to pair it with boots, which isn't the best idea since ankle boots combined with the dress length do absolutely nothing for my shortness and make my legs look all stubby. But I can't help it! This is the only '50s dress I have and it makes me feel weird to wear it in a dressed-up way, I don't know what that's about. I'm much more of a mini-dress person. But this one really is a great little summer dress, so I can put aside my '50s weirdness for that I suppose.

April 6, 2009

Bags and things.

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On the way home from the dentist the other day I was so loopy and happy with the world that I convinced Jeremy to swing by the Salvation Army to see if they had anything good. If anyone was alarmed by my puffy face and stoned eyes they kept it to themselves, thankfully. :/ I was only there about twenty minutes and snagged all kinds of goodness for around $15.

I'm in absolute LOVE with the vintage bags that I found-- the brown one is Samsonite, the mustard yellow is American Tourister. The brown one is quite possibly the most perfect laptop/carry-on bag ever, and both of them are in perfect condition. I have such an obsession with vintage suitcases.. for those that have seen my apartment photos you'll notice I have two suitcase "tables," one in the living room and one in the bedroom. It's really just because I have so many (17!) that I had to start stacking them. It's such a space-consuming thing to collect but I can't seem to stop buying them. At least I'm more discriminating about it now and don't buy everything I see.

I don't think they're allowed on planes (?) but I once saw a girl at the train station with two big vintage hard shells. So maybe as long as you have keys for them? I'm not sure. Anyway, they're all we use when we go on roadtrips.

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cheapy pink sparkly heels, vintage Etienne Aigner loafers, vintage ballet flats, plain black oxfords, weird peter pan slip-ons

And the shoes-- nothing too special, those sparkly pink ones are just random cheapies, but they are SPARKLY and PINK and I felt like I might need them for something at some point. Those adorable little brown ballet flats are marked 5.5B, but I can squeeze into them so I'd say they fit more like a 6.5. I had to get them for my future Etsy shop though, which I'm getting more and more convinced that I should start this summer! The ones on the right side remind me of peter pan shoes.


April 2, 2009

Lookie!

The wisdom teeth extraction went much better than I thought-- I wasn't put under at all and instead they gave me halcium and lots of numbing shots. I'm still kind of groggy and sore, but I have vicodin (woo!) so it's not too bad. I plan to spend the next couple of days lounging around with pudding and netflix (as per kater's suggestion!) and reading--

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Yay! Jeremy got it for me as a feel-better present. Gosh, it's just so pretty. And it's my first, since I've never been able to find it around here.

I worked myself to death yesterday trying to finish upcoming assignments, so now I have the next few days to just relax and catch up on blogs and comments. :)

And oh, I've only just started a Twitter (today) so follow me please! My icon is all blurry but I'll fix that later, right now I think the Dead Like Me: Life After Death movie is calling... (please don't suck- I fear it's going to suck.)
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