Fancy
Posted: July 16, 2014 Filed under: Clothes | Tags: blue, brooch, navy pleated dress, red, red t-strap heels 4 Comments
I wore this to a Bastille Day celebration at the French Embassy. My dad works with a French university, so he got invited, and he took my mom and me along. Is it lame to hang out with your parents like that? I don’t know, and even if it is, I wasn’t going to turn down free food (free French food) because of it.
This dress is a hand-me-down from my sister, and it’s actually dark navy, so I kept with the “red-white-blue” theme by adding my silver pin and ruby heels – they’re pretty much my “special occasion” shoes now. I don’t go out on special occasions too often, but every time something like this comes up, I always remind myself that I need a black dress and dressier shoes. Of course, I would always manage to put together something sufficiently appropriate from what I already have, and tell myself that there is no need to buy a black dress and shoes that I only wear once in a blue moon. What do you guys think? Is it worth the investment?
Dress: H&M (hand-me-down), Shoes: Steve Madden (thrifted), Pin: Etsy
Thursday List
Posted: April 24, 2014 Filed under: Clothes | Tags: black, black cardigan, blue, navy skinny jeans, necklace, red, red t-strap heels, white, white eyelet top 4 Comments
It’s Thursday and my brain is shutting down, so I thought this list of questions I got from happy, honey and lark a while ago would be a fun way to fill up the post.
What did you look like one year ago today? Pretty much the same (even my hair was the same length, because I only have it cut once a year, around June or July when it gets too hot to have longer hair). It was way warmer this time last year though.
When did you wake up this morning? I’m not sure what time it was, but my mom turned the bathroom light on so it must’ve been pretty early. Then again at around 6:15, which is my usual wake-up time when I have to teach in the morning.
What was the first thing you thought when you woke up? “Is Taco back yet?” Our dog, Taco, has gotten into the annoying habit of escaping through the backyard fence and going on nightly excursions. Apparently he came back around midnight.
Have you called someone today? Who and what did you say? The publishing company where I translate books. My translation of “Warm Bodies” just hits the shelves so I asked when I can stop by to pick up my complimentary copies.
What mood are you in? Tired. Is that a mood? I don’t know. I’m just tired.
Do you hurt anywhere? My shoulders and back and neck from too much computer, as usual 😦
If you could choose anything to eat right now, what would you want? Chocolate!!! Always.
What did you buy last? Oh man I honestly don’t remember. Does grocery count?
Which was the first website you visited on the internet today? I checked my email, then feedly and tumblr.
What are you doing tonight? Watching Hannibal. I’ve just started it, so I’m doing a marathon (the only kind of marathon I do) to catch up, except it’s not always a good idea to watch too much of it before bed.
Which is the first song you put on today? Care of Cell 44 by The Zombies. I just downloaded their album after last week’s Mad Men.
What were you doing exactly a week ago, this time? Probably the same thing I am doing now – at my desk tearing my hair out over a script.
What are you wearing today? Mango top, F21 jeans, Target cardigan, thrifted Steve Madden heels, and Icing necklace. My “pop of color” rule continues to work out well.
The weekend then, what about it? Nothing on Saturday, then on Sunday I’m teaching a class for amateur filmmakers. So more work. I’m thinking about showing this short film to them though, so that should be fun. I like traumatizing my students (go ahead, watch it. You know you want to :D)
Flamingo
Posted: March 24, 2014 Filed under: Clothes, Style Imitating Art | Tags: black, black midi skirt, brown, camel sweater, gray circle scarf, red t-strap heels, style imitating art, tights 5 Comments
For this week’s SIA, inspired by Alexander Calder’s “Flamingo”, I knew I was going to wear my red heels to mimic the sculpture itself, but I had no idea about the rest of the outfit. Then when I looked at the photo of the sculpture again, I came up with the idea of wearing all neutrals so that the heels would stand out like how the sculpture stands out from the buildings around it. I liked this when I put it together, but now when I look at the photos again, I realize it’s that weird mix between fussy and frumpy that some of my outfits usually end up when I overthink things (jeans might be better.) It looks like simplifying my style will be more difficult than I thought…
Sweater: J.Crew (thrifted), Skirt: thrifted, Heels: Steve Madden (thrifted), Tights: Target, Scarf: self-made
Don’t forget to swing by Jen’s blog to see how this is interpreted! It’s the first time a sculpture is featured in SIA, so it should be awesome.
SIA: The Milkmaid
Posted: February 24, 2014 Filed under: Clothes | Tags: belt, blue, green gingham button-up, mustard cardigan, navy skirt, red t-strap heels, style imitating art, yellow 8 Comments
For this week’s SIA, inspired by Vermeer’s “The Milkmaid”, I only had two options: either blue cable-knit sweater + red pants + mustard scarf, or mustard cardigan + navy skirt + red heels. In the end I went with the second choice, because even though this skirt is not the rich shade of royal blue like the milkmaid’s apron, it allowed me to layer my green gingham shirt underneath to mimic the green sleeves of the milkmaid’s bodice. We’re nothing if not exact here at SIA 🙂
Remember to check out Animated Cardigan to see how others interpret this classic painting!
Shirt: Gap, Cardigan: Target, Skirt: Banana Republic, Heels: Steve Madden (everything thrifted)
The Headless Horseman
Posted: October 8, 2013 Filed under: Book/Movie/TV Reviews, Clothes | Tags: mint, mint v-neck shirt, navy skinny jeans, red, red t-strap heels, tv 5 Comments
The outfit is nothing to write home about, so here’s an impromptu TV review instead:
I had some unexpected free time this past weekend, which I spent watching the new Sleepy Hollow TV show. I love the Tim Burton movie, I like the writers, and the premise looks interesting. So far I’m enjoying it, but I think they make the mistake of overloading it with too much mythology so early in the series – to sum it up, the Headless Horseman is one of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse and Ichabod Crane is brought back from the dead to stop the end of the world. Which is all well and good, except it leaves the episodes weirdly uneven, and I often wonder what the “Monster of the Week” has to do with the bigger story arc. They should’ve taken a leaf out of Fringe (written by the same guys, Kurtzman & Orci) and presented it as an episodic show with an overarching mystery, and let us learn about the mythology as we go. Of course, that risks putting the show in the same trap that Fringe fell into, where it gets so wrapped up in the mythology and becomes way too convoluted.
The cast is good, though. Tom Mison, who plays Ichabod, is too pretty for my taste (mostly because I know him from Parade’s End, where he plays the quintessential pretty boy), but Nicole Beharie, who plays a Sleepy Hollow’s police officer unwittingly pulled into the fight to stop the Apocalypse, is awesome, and they have fantastic chemistry. Honestly the only regular character I don’t like is Ichabod’s wife Katrina, who’s not so much a character as a vessel for the writers to tell us what’s going on. Still, it’s only been three episodes, so I’ll keep watching.
Shirt & Jeans: Mango, Heels: Steve Madden (thrifted)
Dressed Up Tee
Posted: September 19, 2013 Filed under: Clothes | Tags: black, black jeans, brooch, gray, gray tee, red t-strap heels, white polka dot scarf 6 Comments
You can tell how tired my brain is when I didn’t bother to come up with any clever post title and just use a plain description of the outfit. Anyway, I’m participating in the Thursday Thread link-up, which I’ve always wanted to do but never seem to remember the deadline. The theme is, you guess it, “Dressed up Tees”. It’s perfect for me, because I’m still a bit sick and a simple t-shirt and jeans is all I can manage. At least I tried to jazz it up with fun heels and a scarf .
Shirt: Vietnamese shop, Jeans: Hermes, Shoes: Steve Madden (thrifted), Scarf: Target, Brooch: gift shop at the Getty
Eager Young Minds
Posted: July 8, 2013 Filed under: Clothes | Tags: blue, bracelet, navy wide-leg jeans, red t-strap heels, white, white embellished tee 1 Comment
I’m getting the week off because it’s the university entrance exam week. In Vietnam, these exams are kind of a big deal (though not as much as they are in Japan) but my own entrance exam week was actually pretty breezy. I took two exams, one for film school and the other for the University of Foreign Studies (at my parents’ insistence, so I’d have something to fall back on.) I did virtually no studying, because for the film school exam it was just some questions on literature, a storyboard exercise (they gave you a bunch of pictures and you have to tell a story from it), and an essay on a movie they showed us (in my year it was Kramer vs. Kramer), and for the other one it was literature, maths, and English, which were all my strong subjects. The funny thing is, I didn’t feel stressful back then at all, but you cannot pay me enough to go through it again. Maybe that’s why I’ve been holding back on the idea of getting a PhD, because it means I would have to take the GRE, and I’m really, really done with exams.
T-shirt: Target, Jeans: Old Navy, Heels: Madden Girl (thrifted), Bracelet: thrifted
