BOMBASTIC

bored with this. starting over.

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The boyfriend & I drove up to Austin Saturday morning to spend a day & night at SXSW before it ended. I had never attended SXSW, despite living in Texas...um, MY ENTIRE LIFE (minus a few overseas excursions). I don't know why or how this was possible, but there it was. Needless to say, I was pretty excited.

We had actually driven up to Huntsville the night before to attend a good friend's wedding. Outdoor wedding + ballroom reception + open bar = A Good Time Had By All. No really, it was beautiful. I like any excuse to wear circle skirts and four inch heels, so I was pretty happy. And getting to watch someone I love get married to someone they love and just LOVE in general. Plus, free beer.

We woke up in our Motel 6 bed the next morning and began the most beautiful drive I've taken in a long time. Googlemaps really did me well on directions from Huntsville to Austin - Scenic Highway 390 was worth the frustration of finding country road junctions and some silly bike marathon that seemed to never end. Rolling hills and bluebonnets and indian-paintbrushes and black-eyed-susans and old farmhouses in the middle of nowhere under big, bright blue skies. Bubbling creeks and red dirt roads. Baby horses, baby cows, baby turtles. Spring is here, finally.

Austin was amazing, as per usual. Downtown was a madhouse, but in a good way. We walked all over, sampling beer in lots of places, hitting up free shows like it was nobody's business. The big free show in Waterloo Park was a good thing: sitting in the grass, listening to bands and watching the cutest one year old with a mohawk hit people with sticks. We leaned against trees and sipped Tecate ($4! boo.) and listened to good music. The weather was perfect and I saw a man writing in his Moleskine, so I had to join the club. SXSW notes:

SXSW! Sitting in the grass - 1970s throwback band, audience etc. En vogue: long beards, frayed denim, motorcycle boots. The sun is shining, Texas summer has begun. Barefeet in Waterloo Park. Not a cloud in the sky - the shadow of he Capitol Building. The drive was beautiful - rolling hills eventually but rough mesquite and cacti to begin with. The bluebonnets are blooming. We passed 4 historical markers but didn't stop. I didn't want to stop the scenery as it rolled by and the sun streaming in the windows and Guy Clark on the radio and the window cracked and a cigarette between my fingers and his hand on my knee. Green, green, brown. Tangled underbrush giving way to Indian paint-brushes. Birthplace of Texas: old cabins, fat tourists.

I love having friends with hook-ups in nice places: later that night we met up with good buddy Mike who got us free parking, free Keystone Light and free entry to the Nylon party (which was LAME LAME LAME but still fun to say I was there. Where hipsters go to die, apparently). Ended the night in Whisky Bar to watch good friends spin good tunes: Humble Represent, felt like a high school reunion. Just a bit.

In the end, a good time. Next year: bring more money, wear skirts, TAKE MORE PHOTOS.


Hipster Heaven. BORING.


The Boy in front of the Capitol Building.

There's been a secret brewing around these parts and I'm really excited to finally be able to reveal it!

My mother and I have been thrifting and thrifting for years now and we've stock-piled a nice little cache of treasures; it's overflowing from all cupboards, rooms and even the garage. So we've had a little plan in our heads for awhile now - to open a shop. And the first stage of this was to start selling things online. Eventually a brick & mortar store, a few years down the road. Until then, our brand new, very own etsy shop:



Yay!

I CAN'T STOP COUGHING.

Houston weather has decided to pull my chain yet again and go from like 85 to 45 in the span of, like, AN HOUR. Which means i am sick yet again. Actually, I was sick from Monday to Wednesday and now I feel fine except for the Cough Of Death which is scaring children, animals and the boyfriend.

The boyfriend. Oi. Life is good, really. It really, really is. I am broke. School is kicking my ass. But I am a happy little chicken so it's all pretty much okay.

I am insanely wishing, hoping, dreaming for summer right this very minute PLEASE. I mean, if Houston can go from warm to FREEZING in t-minus whatever....surely it can just up and decide to be SUMMER? Surely.

I need money, so please buy summer accessories over at the shop:



Real coral branches hung on vintage chains with vintage charms & beads!



Hand crocheted necklaces using vintage yarn and vintage charms and beads!

Lots more stuff to come, plus something super secret & super new in the works!!

♥

I've been eating a lot of seafood lately; actually, I've been cooking a lot of seafood lately. For those of you who know me, this is INSANE. Katy does not cook. But lately, due to lack of monetary resources for both me & the boy, we've been cooking it up in my teeny-tiny apartment kitchen. We've made shrimp nachos from these big, beautiful Jumbo Gulf Shrimp he brought back from Port Lavaca; the nachos were decided because I had neither the money nor the inclination to go to the grocery store for other ingredients, so we used what we had. Corn tortillas fried into chips, shrimp cooked in garlic-butter, sauteed onions, cheese & a tiny bit of sour-cream & homemade salsa. Better than expected.


Bad cell-phone photo because I am lazy and keep forgetting to buy batteries for my camera.

And then on Tuesday night we bought Tilapia and Tony's Fish Fry and fried up the fish and some oysters from Port Lavaca and made FISH TACOS. So good. Eaten so fast I didn't get a chance to take photos. We also fried pickles, which were amazing and if you have never had a fried pickle then your life is pretty much meaningless.


Not My Photo: courtesy of Google Images, those lovely darlings.

AND THEN last night we went over to the boys sister's and she made us gorgeous catfish with a crawfish-chowder sauce. No photos, but here's one of her sweet puppy passed out on the boy, just because it's ADORABLE:



Tonight is leftovers at work since I have to work until 9 O'CLOCK and then tomorrow is Rodeo Cook-Off time in which I will eat my weight in BBQ. And drink lots of cheap-light-beer and two-step inside smoky tents. Life is pretty good right now.

I spent two years of my life studying Fashion Journalism in London; breathing fashion, eating fashion, living fashion. It was all we ever talked about, it was all we ever read about. What was new, what was hot, what was up and coming. It permeated my brain - until it started to leak over the edges and I was SICK of it.

Almost two years later and I'm starting to care again - but in a different way. I abhor the fashion industry - I saw the inside for two years and it made me sick. The season shows no longer interest me, except for the way they trickle down and influence what I can afford. I have a new approach to fashion as a whole: instead of slavishly following the runways and style blogs, I browse. I have several blogs I like to check up on now and then - mostly street fashion and a strange amount of lovely Swedish ladies (what is it with the Swedes?). I look at pictures of the Olsen twins (love) and Lilo (love love) and I wonder how their layering could translate to my wardrobe. I thrift store shop and ebay trawl. And I've begun to notice how my own style is slowly starting to evolve into something me.

I have an 'Inspiration' folder saved to my hard-drive and it's full of photographs of stylish ladies and gents of all ages, shapes and nationalities. Photos of groupies from the 70s, photos of celebrities, photos of old ladies in Finland. And when a time comes around where I want to look new and different and (my idea of) stylish, I open it up and pick through it. Pull ideas from different photos. Translate clothing items to what hangs in my closet. It's funny how interests come back from the dead: when I first got back from London, I Could Care Less. Fashion was something that had burnt out for me....it had crawled away somewhere and expired. And now, two years later, it's back.









(all images from various blogs and stuff)

savepolaroid.com

I'm not a professional, I'm not what you might call an enthusiast even. I'm just a girl who enjoys her cheapo thrift store $2 polaroid camera every once in awhile. Who likes taking silly photos with her boyfriend, who likes shooting random buildings and friends drinking beers and her dog. Polaroids are special, they're little moments frozen in time with grainy film and beautiful, otherworldly colors. They are fun and exciting, they make me laugh and smile and cry. Please, join the fight.

savepolaroid.com
flickr savepolaroid photo petition
save polaroid online petitition
request fujifilm petition

♥

I spent a day walking alone in the gardens of Bayou Bend and traipsing through the house looking at the collection of American decorative arts and 18th century antiques and beautiful portraits. The sun was shining the the wind had died down and there was hardly anyone there. It was like this tiny pocket inside the city, on the banks of Buffalo Bayou three minutes from downtown and surrounded by high-rises. Beautiful. The camellias are in bloom.

Life is a giant bubble. Floating. Laughing. I don't know where these curve balls come from, but they keep coming. The newest one is in the form of a tall, brown haired boy who wears pearl-snaps and draws in sketchbooks and buys me Thai food and beers and kisses like a champ. Out of nowhere. But it's perfectly okay because I am really very happy. I have no money, school is overwhelming - but I'm happy. Last night we talked about traveling, about seeing the world and getting out of Houston. SXSW first - Austin nights and hot days walking down crowded streets and watching bands through doorways and drinking keg beer in someone's front yard while the world spins underneath us. And then maybe the Caribbean, and then Asia. And then the world. I don't know, it's wishful thinking, but it's the good kind of wishful thinking. I want to sleep in tents with him, I want to walk on the banks of rivers and swim under low-hanging trees and eat campfire baked-potatoes and listen to the owls and spin in circles on the tops of hills. I want that life you see in the movies, where the sun sets behind kissing and the credits roll. Except I don't want the credits to roll, I want to keep standing there kissing and watching the sun go down over and over again.

This is generally how I feel about life these days:

It is 76 degrees outside and I love it. It's so funny how I always forget how hot it gets in the summer here and how miserable I am come August, but it's always the same: March starts looming with it's promise of Spring Break and various outdoor festivals and fairs and I start longing, pining for the heat. You would think after 25 years of Houston summers, I would remember what it feels like to melt, to stick to car-seats, to watch my makeup slide off my face. But no, I always romanticize the heat and start dreaming about flip-flops and cut-offs, sun-dresses and freckles on my cheeks. Oh well, at least we have a few months of bearable spring weather before the heat-wave really hits. All I know is come June or July, I'm sure I'll be eating my words.

Ooooh summer: