One pair wedge sneakers.  New in box.  Make me an offer.

…and bought a pair of these damn things, like a damn-ass-loser-y follower:

Except mine aren’t $645.00.  And they’re not as moon-shoe-ish.

To redeem myself, I will say that I TOTALLY thought these things were SO ridiculous, then one morning I was going to get coffee and there was some gorgeous sinewy model-type in front of me wearing leggings and a pair of high tops with her blond hair all askew and wind-blown and SHIT, and I was all like “must. buy. impractical.and.ridiculous.sneakers”.  I am so disappointed in my lack of restraint.  Here are mine:

Well… yeah… they’re pretty moon-shoe-ish…

I managed to unexpectedly receive a gift card recently for FIVE HUNDRED DOLLARS to spend at Holt Renfrew, which is a bigger present than anything I have ever received in my life.  Having this much money to spend on PURE FRIVOLITY (because, let’s be honest, no one is going to Holt’s to buy like, five-packs of white cotton underwear) made me temporarily feel like an actual, honest-and-for-true, Rich Person.  I decided that, instead of being sensible and using it to buy several moderately-priced smaller items, I wanted to BLOW the whole thing on one amazing item that I could never afford otherwise.

Here are some things I contemplated while trying to figure out what to buy.

First thing I came across was this orange/burgundy/red Marc by Marc Jacobs purse that is f-ing stunning and was “within” my frivolity range at $585.00.  Seriously, it is the perfect fancy-lady-slash-hipster bag, and, as such, I believed it would make me feel like a fancy lady from the 70′s-slash-hipster from the 90′s (which is like a style orgasm for my brain-hole).  It was the first thing I saw, so I didn’t want to jump the gun, but just to be sure I picked it up and walked around the store with it the whole time so that some other fucking person didn’t steal it from me.

The Marc Jacobs bag was pretty much the only purse that I liked that wasn’t $3000.00.  There was also this Rebecca Minkoff bag… but meh.  Didn’t even compare.

 On to the shoe section.  There was a sale on so there were some fancy-person heels on sale that came within my $500.00 range (jesus it is crazy that I just wrote that sentence).  First, some classic pink Louboutins:

I have never tried on Louboutin’s, and since they cost more than a month’s rent, I guess I assumed that when I put them on my foot would start singing and I would feel as if I was wearing magic comfortable uggs-slash-slippers.  JUST SO YOU KNOW… the cost of the shoes is *definitely* not related to comfort.  It felt like I put my foot into an uncomfortable cone of razors.

And, like, seriously – don’t they look exactly the same as a pair of fucking pink shoes from Aldo or Zara or something??  Like, WHAT THE F am I paying hundreds of dollars for?  NOTHING.  THAT’S WHAT.

The only other pair of shoes I tried were these studded Chloe ankle boots.  I actually really liked them, but:

1. Outside of my $500.00 price range;
2. One size too big; and
3. They are *slightly* crazy-person shoes.  Like, if I were the waifish lead-singer of a cool British alt-metal band all hepped up on heroin and on tour in Japan, I could get away with them.  Unfortunately I am a lardy Corporate shill.  So no studded boots for me.

Anyways, fuck the shoe section.  Off to clothing.

So this was the issue with the clothing section.  I am a fat lardo right now and I didn’t want to buy something that fit because I plan on losing copious amounts of lard, and I didn’t want to buy something too small because I might not lose that lard, in which case I would be wasting my $500.00.  Such a ridiculous rich fancy rich lady dilemma.

Tried on a few Helmut Lang blazers… meeeeeeeh.

And then this shirt that I thought would look cool and edgy but actually just looked like a shitty futuristic space-uniform:

Anyways.  Of course.  I left with my new love:

Have only worn it about twice because I’m petrified that it might start raining or a baby might throw up on it or something.  Still.  She is beautiful.

And so ends my one, brief, shining moment as a rich person.  Sigh.

Here are a few things that I purchased for myself on impulse as a reward for nothing.

1. Fuzzy Leopard Wallet

I totally needed a new wallet, so this is a justifiable expense.  Also, this stupid wallet was originally $150.00 and I got it for $30.00.  Who the frig would ever spend $150.00 on a wallet?  You?  You probably should not do that, because you can get them for $30.00.

2. Two (count ‘em), TWO Rag & Bone Neon-Flecked Cropped Knit Sweaters

Why do I need two, you ask?  Because.  They’re both equally awesome and I liked them both.  That’s why.

3. Burgundy Knee-High 70′s Boots with FRIGGIN AWESOME TASSELS

Awww yeah.  So totally unnecessary.

4. Snakeskin Oversized Mick Jagger-esque Cool Guy Blazer

So, it’s been a while since I’ve splurged on a Sandro purchase, but I’ve had my eye on this blazer since it came out in early fall and it went on SUPER DUPER DUPER sale and they had one in my size and what-fucking-ever, I bought it.

5. *Perfect* Black High-Necked Fit-and-Flare Dress

Another Sandro sale purchase.  So, it doesn’t really look like much on the hanger, but this bad boy fits like a G-L-O-V-E  and make me look all svelte and lovely.  It’s about ten pounds too small for me so I have to start eating less.  But I will wear it… mark my words.

Due to my extremely large pimpness, I have managed to procure a full 6 place-setting of French china for about 15% of its retail cost from Bernardaud, which is like, extra fancy and only for rich people usually.

DO I NEED A FULL 6-PLACE SETTING OF FRENCH CHINA?  Fuck no.  But I wanted it.

Teacups are EXTRA FANCY.  Especially when the saucers look like this:

JEALOUS YET?  Well, GUESS WHAT?  The design of china is SO FANCY that each different type of dish in the line has a similar-but-different design so that when you stack them all together it looks all extra-fancy and matched-but-mis-matched like SOMETHING EXTRA FANCY:

HAAAAAAAAAA HA HA HA my fanciness is just too overwhelming for you, I know. 

I will soon be having fancy-person dinner parties for the exclusive reason of using my fancy china and telling people “Oh, this china?  No big deal.”

So, as mentioned previously, I’m heading to Europe at the end of September and I’m starting to get preeeetty excited.  Here is the schedule:

• 4 days in Munich during Oktoberfest
• 2 days in Vienna bein’ bad-ass
• 6 days in Prague  ballin’ large

Being in Munich during Oktoberfest is going to be figgin’ amazing, not just because I’ll get to be part of such an iconic event, but also because me and the four other girls on our “travel squad” have decided to be one with the locals and buy “Dirndls” (i.e. German Wench Dress Thing) so that we can get drunk in costume, which is infinitely better than getting drunk in your regular-person clothes. 

SO.  With that in mind, please help me pick my amazing German Dirndl (PLEASE NOTE that I will not be wearing a circa 1999 steam-punk choker with stars and suns hanging from it as shown in the photo):

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Option 1: Red

Option 2: Light Blue

Option 3: Dark Blue

… a really fucking awesome one.

Yes.  They. Are. Mine.

Had to whisk off to NYC for a couple of days last week.  I don’t want to milk this too much, but I’m pretty blown away that I have the type of life where I WHISK OFF TO NYC for a couple of days. 

Here is an important thing to know – at the Pearson Starbucks they do not toast their bagels.  So they taste like gluey flavoured pieces of seed-infested dough.

BLURG.

Anyways.  I have acute paranoia about missing flights, so of course I left three hours before I had to take off.  This means that I spent about 2 hours and 45 minutes oscillating between sitting awkwardly pretending to have things to do on my phone at the gate, and wandering to the bathroom.  Hey – did you know that very few people update their Instagram feeds at 6:00 am on a Wednesday?  HA HA HA.  Now you know.

FYI if I have you on facebook I likely stalked the shit out of you that morning.  Don’t be weirded out if I bring up some obscure reference to a photo from party you attended in 2006 the next time we see each other.

The GOOD news about the wait is that I went into the duty free shop and bought some orangey-red lipstick and tried to wear it for my whole trip.  You know, “New York Natalie” styles.

So I was in NY for two days this time instead of one and I happened to have a whole FIVE HOURS at my disposal to go ape-shit in the city and do whatever I wanted all by myself.  It was luxurious.  However, with the scope of things to do in NY being what they are, I concluded that I had to be super anal in order to maximize the enjoyment of my five hours and planned out my route accordingly:

Note that the letters are going in the opposite direction of my route.  First, Madewell, of course.  I was obsessive about visiting there because all of my purchases up in the ‘shopping third-world’ of Canada were on-line.  The dress below was tried on for Tami:

NOTE THE ORANGEY-RED LIPSTICK.

Tami – it’s not as nice as I thought it would be… the fabric was like a cheap-ass burlap and the waist made me look like a pregnant Oompa-Loompa.  I wasn’t as blown away with Madewell as I thought I would be. 

Next stop – Levi’s Store.  Bought a pair of boyfriend jeans for $25.00 and a pair of high-waisted waxed black skinnies.

A-Balls had suggested Creatures of Comfort, so I moseyed on over there next.

Granted, everything was gor-ge-ous.  But it was also very very expensive.

Terrariums everywhere.

I had about $200.00 budgeted for shopping, and since the only thing at Creatures that cost less than $200.00 was like, a white undershirt, I didn’t buy anything.

The plan was to head on over to Freemans for a long, luxurious, three-course expensed dinner, but I found a little boutique on the way and bought this shirt:

I love it – all oversized with raw hems and stuff.  I’M SO EDGY. 

Note that two days later in Toronto I found the exact same shirt at a store literally half a mile from my house. 

Anyways, off to Freemans…  down the magical alleyway…  pass by the hipster barber shop where drop-dead gorgeous men cut the hair of other drop-dead gorgeous men…

Oh, hai fancy drink.

Some people hate eating dinner by themselves, but I LOVE IT.  I can order whatever I want and NO ONE CAN JUDGE ME.  Also, I get to people-watch and muse philosophical about why people are at the restaurant and what their lives are like.  Like these guys:

I assumed that they were there on a dinner break from a dress rehearsal of a stage production of Easy Rider.  Obviously.

Freemans was pretty awesome, although not really different from all restaurants in T.O. with the same “antlers on the wall” type vibe.  The bathroom had a gardening wall in it.

Oh, hai cheese plate.

What are those things in the little ramekin?  Why, zombie strawberries, of course.

Braaaains.

Seared Tuna Special with chickpeas and sauteed citrus.  Yes, it was delicious.

Since I get to expense my meals, and since I am a big fatty who enjoys eating food, I also got the Bananas Foster.  HAAAAAAAAAAA HA HA HA!

I had an early dinner because I am a crotchety old woman, which meant that stores were still open when I left Freemans.  I thought I would wobble over to Opening Ceremony to revel in clothing that was several strata above my price range.

I had about four drinks at dinner, which made me feel invincible as I poked through the racks. 

In my ‘mind’s eye’ I felt as if I was a high class and elegant connoisseur of designers, flipping though the racks with the skill of a fashion editor.

In ‘reality’ I probably looked like a skeezy drunk tripping over racks of expensive designer clothes and touching everything with my grubby hands.

On the way home I decided that a three course meal wasn’t enough to satiate my gorilla-man hunger, and I bought a red velvet cupcake or whatever they’re called.  It fell over in the bag and the icing got all smushed.

Then I decided to take a bath, as I often do when staying in a fancy hotel.

Although I’m sure you are imagining a very sultry and alluring spectacle in which I am in the bath, all bubbly and slick and what-not, in reality it was more like this:

Me eating a messy, melting, fatty-bo-batty cupcake and drinking a cheap-ass beer.

Tomorrow, read on as I get mistaken for a prostitute by an 85-year old man.  The fun never stops.

I haven’t been taking too many pictures lately, mostly because I keep forgetting to charge my phone then I have to save every last bit of phone juice for pithy facebook comments-slash-googling pictures of hot boys.

Which means a lot of this post will require reading, but you can handle it. I have confidence in you.

Friday night Sarah got much-coveted tickets to the Bahamas concert, mostly due to her connections and all-around babeliness.  It is beneficial having a babely friend when you are significantly less babely because then she can get things with her babeliness and give them to you.  Which she did.  With a ticket to the show.

I don’t go to shows too often because I like to sit on my ass and listen to music while drinking wine in my house in my underwear, where I don’t have to deal with stupid people or washroom line-ups, but this was a good show.  You know when you’re at a show and the bass is like, so loud and well-timed that you’re all like “YES YES YES you are in beat with my heart, you attractive singer-songwriter, you.  We should probably get married.”.  Yeah, that totally happened.

The only bad thing was that I decided to run to the washroom 2 minutes before he went on and then when I got back Sarah and Julia had taken the initiative to move up to the front.  Being a total coward, I am physically and psychologically unable to push through crowds, so I stood by myself at the back of the bar for the whole time, swaying awkwardly with strangers…

… or as I like to call it “going to jam” by myself in the corner. 

Honestly, that wasn’t bad at all, it was just the four guys behind me who kept saying things like “This is boss.” and “This is the sickest track. I love this track.  Sickest track on the album”  SICK TRACK?  Who says that? WHAT IS THIS?  2004? 

The plan was to go to some art show thing at Brickworks, but then there was a line up of SIXTY BILLION PEOPLE so we decided to go to Pizza Pizza instead.

We probably sat in the Pizza Pizza for like 2 hours talking about stuff and business and eating pizza, and Sarah (maybe) almost got robbed, and then we went home and I ate an additional two hot dogs.  Really, they were called “frankfurters” on the packaging, which I thought was SO FUNNY in the middle of the night.  Like it said ”Put the frankfurter in boiling water” HA HA H AHAAAA.  I kept saying “frankfurter” in my mind for the next four days and giggled every time. 

Saturday I had lofty plans to walk around aimlessly and maybe buy a leather jacket (because 4 leather jackets is clearly not adequate), but instead it turned into this:

Which of course turned into this:

Little known fact: Ossington has turned into a fucking disgusting douchebag SHITHOLE.  We danced at Huey’s for a bit, which was fun, but while my two nice, relatively sober friends and I were standing outside, politely trying to get a cab, a tiny-nutsacked-loser THREW A FULL TALL CAN OF BEER AT US from a cab.  It smashed against the *Escalade* that was parked next to us and fucking exploded everywhere, narrowly missing Karen’s head.

Five minutes later a gross souped-up corvette thought that the car in front of him was going too slow, popped it into 3rd and gunned into oncoming traffic to pass him, narrowly missing groups of drunk people trying to get cabs.

You are all gross.

Anyways, I finally got a cab and the following conversation ensued:

Cab Driver: You seem like a nice lady – all of the people on that street were crazy.
Me: I KNOW – someone threw a beercar at us for no reason.
Cab Driver: You know where the best fares in the whole city are?
Me: No, where?
Cab Driver: That club Wicked.
Me: Whaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaat?  Really?
Cab Driver: Yes, they are all very excited to go home and get on with the rest of their night.
Me: *laughing* Yes, because their night is just beginning.
Cab Driver: Yes – you know you should go to Wicked.
Me: …
Cab Driver: It is only $10.00 for you to get in.
Me: You mean for ladies?
Cab Driver:  Yes.  Do you know how much it is for men?  $80.00.
Me: …
Cab Driver:  And even then sometimes they don’t get what they are paying for.
Me: …
Cab Driver: You should go to Wicked to see it, you know.
Me: …
Me: …
Me: WELL HERE IS MY HOUSE BYE GOTTA GO.

The actual conversation was about 30 times longer and involved many more encouraging statements about going to Wicked.

Anyways.  On Sunday I bought these mustard yellow witchy vintage Ferragamo shoes.  They might be a *little* too witchy, but you can suck my nut.

Please note my wrinkled up blue socks and how they make my feet look like blue pig hooves.

And now you are fully updated.

Have you been thinking to yourself : “If there is one thing I need, it’s a tee-pee, so that, instead of sitting in my living room, I could sit in my tee-pee in my living room, or instead of sitting on my deck, I could sit in a tee-pee on my deck, etc.”?

Well today is your lucky day, because all your teepee desires will be fulfilled.

Yes, I’m going to tell you how to build your own wicked-cool “3 person” tee-pee.  I put “3 person” in “quotations” because while getting blottzed last weekend we managed to fit 8 people in this tee-pee, but it was less than comfortable, and I’m pretty sure we almost destroyed the tee-pee.

But if you are looking for a semi-private location for three people to discuss politics and the socio-economic state of the world, say, while, doing shots of cinnamon whiskey, than this teepee is perfect.

I originally found my inspiration from Smile and Wave here, but made some modifications to make the tee-pee a big bigger and changed the design a little bittle.  Ok so go to the hardware store/craft store/dollarstore and buy these:

• 6 x 8 foot framing beams (1″ x 2″)
• Biggest canvas drop cloth you can find (I bought a 9′ x 12′ and it still wasn’t big enough… had to go back and buy another)
• A bunch of ribbons
• Twine or leather lace
• Paint and a paintbrush

Here is my fancy tee-pee pattern.  It’s pretty damn simple.  Figure it out.

Now that you’ve cut out all your shizz, time to sew.  Make sure that your sewing machine is not broken, because if it is broken, you’ll have to take it apart and put it back together after drinking two glasses of wine, and then the bobbin casing might get all fucked up due to your drunkenness, and the needle might get stuck and threaten breaking off into your skull or eyeball socket.

Remember that you are going to be sewing those ribbons to the INSIDE of the tee-pee (i.e. the seam-side) because you’ll want to tie them to the poles to keep them in place.  I basically folded by ribbon pieces in half, and stuck the folded end through the front about 1/2 an inch.  You can see it on the other side, but I think it looks all like cool and professional, like there are little tabs on the seams that I purposely put there.  I think about things like this way too much.

Now lay out the tee-pee on the floor and marvel at your ability to make unnecessary things.  Put your small dog on the tee-pee fabric shell to take a cute picture.

Then Instagram it.

Now it’s time to paint.  I was inspired by some tee-pee I saw on Pinterest with like, black and white Aztec stuff all up on it, and I put this triangle-sun thing on the top.  You know.  Just bein’ bad ass and all.

Ok, let that dry and make sure you don’t step on it while wearing socks and then put your shoe on then discover several hours later that you have “paint-glued” your sock to the inside of your shoe. 

Take your poles and drill a hole in the flat side about 6″ – 8″ inches from the end, then lace your leather or twine piece *loosely* through the holes and circle it around them to hold them in a triangle-ish type thing.  You’ll need to keep them loose because you’ll need to finagle them around while you put your fabric on.

Throw your fabric over and tie the inner ribbons to the poles to hold it in place.  I also tied twine between the poles at the very bottom of the structure to keep them equidistant and stable as drunken friends pile in.

NOW YOU SHOULD TOTALLY DECORATE IT MORE.  With, like, beads and feathers…

And maybe a suede blanket and a furry sheepskin…

Now take a picture of it and Instagram it.

FUCKING-BAD-ASS.