Is cheap just cheap or am I a snob?

The way I look at it, you can’t get nothing good for cheap, whether we’re talking material goods or services. The best possible example I could give you are shoes. What are the four main criteria when buying a pair of that every day necessity?

The first thing that catches your eye is the model itself. The way it looks in general, the silhouette and the shape with all of the little details combined. Need I even say that the higher the price, the better the design. Most of us are familiar with the names of designers like Karl Lagerfeld and Marc Jacobs, which stand behind the two most powerful fashion empires of our time. On the other hand, the million dollar question is: Name one designer that works for Strawberry? Huh?!? Exactly my point! If they were more creative and artistic they would probably be the ones working for Chanel and not Karl. U pay extra for the innovation, the creation, that little something that takes your breath away. You are buying the emotion and the feeling that absorbs you the minute you see that perfect pair of pumps.

The second thing is the feel. The quality of the material. The sensation it gives you once you touch that fine and almost silky leather. There is a huge difference between a pair of  Lanvin ballerinas and the ones from Zara. Off course you expect the highest quality for the price of 400 euros. That’s why I feel offended when most people stare at me in shock once I reveal the price of the shoes. They always say that I am not normal on the account of paying so much for a pair of flats. The last straw is when they say that I could have bought the same one’s in Zara for 50 euros or less. Come on, are u kidding me?!? Are your senses not working? How can you even compare the two? Even better, sometimes it happens that even Zara is too expensive for them, and that you could find great shoes for under 20 euros. Who needs real leather, PVC is just fine. Sure, that is the material land chairs are made off, and during higher temperatures your feet sweat and stink like a pig in them, but hey, they are affordable!

That’s another thing, I hate when people use the word affordable! Some women are famous for their “money saving act”. They only buy shoes that are under 40 euros, but then they buy the same model in 10 colors! 40 * 10 = 1 pair of Lanvin ballerinas! Are you really gonna wear all those colors? Wouldn’t it be better just to buy one pair in black or beige that goes with everything? Is it crucial that you have a pair of lime green shoes in the closet? Is it?!

Lets get back on track. Stitching is one of the most important things in fashion. How is the product put together? Is everything perfect, or are there threads sticking out? That just makes me sad, when I come home with a product, and there are spare parts sticking out of it. I might be insane, and sane people would say to this: Can’t you just pull the thread out, or burn it with a lighter? And I would reply: If there is a screw sticking out of your new laptop or a coffee table, are you just gonna pull it out? They just put it there merely for decoration, it’s probably not necessary? I don’t think so. Well the same goes for my pair of sandals. If I pull that little thread connecting the strap to the sole, I might be the one getting down on the dance floor, doing the worm. That is also one of the things that never happen to a high brand product. Because it mustn’t! You, as a customer paid good money, and in return you expect it to be perfect. Absolutely flawless!!

The last criterion is the experience. I don’t know about you, but shopping makes me feel all bubbly inside. Never was able to understand people who look at it as an obligation. I just feel sorry for them, when I see their frustrated faces in the store. Maybe that’s because they never tried luxury shopping. With luxury products comes luxury experience. You’re greeted into the store by a smiling and satisfied salesman(not to mention well kept and smelling great). He is there to fulfill your every need. He bring you fifty shoe pairs (if necessary), places the shoe on your foot 100 times, and even better, he doesn’t expect of you to buy anything if you are not completely satisfied. And the scenery, well those stores know how to lure and keep you nesting inside. Beautiful large spaces, whit shelves and racks widely separated, give you the “one step away from Zen” moment. Once they bring out the strawberries and champagne, you’re officially in heaven! That is the complete shopping experience, opposed to the crowded bazaar feeling of a store like, for example; New Yorker. Every time I step foot into that place I get an anxious feeling… it kind of sucks all the energy out. Oceans of packed racks with cheap material clothes, just thrown onto those pathetic skinny hangers, are literary over cluttering the space. Shoes that are clasped one to another, hanging form a rods like criminals….just look sad and pathetic. It makes me feel bad for the poor things. No shoe should ever be forced to hang of a rack like that!

Do you get my point now, or am I still a snob?

What have we learned today? The four shopping criteria are: Design, Material, Stitching and Experience. We could even shorten it and put it in an acronym that you could easily remember: M.E.D.S. Once we’re on this mind mapping road let’s put it in a sentence:

What are my shopping M.E.D.S.?

Who needs inspiration or creativity….

Recently a “good friend” of mine (notice how I emphasized the good friend part…) complained (…if you don’t stop complaining you’re not gonna be so good anymore) on the lack of new posts coming from yours truly. I told him that at the moment there is nothing “worth writing about” happening in my life and that I am running low in the inspiration department. The following words that came out of his mouth were shocking: “Who cares for inspiration anymore, write about anything!”

Basically he said that nobody would give a crap for the subject, as long as I  post a new blog. Who cares, write about grocery shopping, dusting, Turkish TV novellas, laundry, and maybe if you’re really desperate like Carrie about a perfect french frie. I don’t know if I should feel flattered or just be worried!? It is unbelievable that people (read: my closest friends that have extra time on their hands are the only ones reading this kind of rubbish) like my writing and are willing to read it religiously no matter the content, but on the other hand I am beginning to wonder if the whole world is going nuts?!

Are we so obsessed with the packaging that we don’t even stop for a second, and think about what we’re really buying? In this case the product is a story. A story with no inspiration or a real subject, just a bunch of words, witty arranged, floating aimlessly throughout the screen. Where’s the point in that? Just to read a bunch of crap, amusement purposes only, without learning, revealing and discovering anything useful or new. The same goes for material products. For a second I almost considered buying a pair of plastic red lips on a stick….seriously!?! They definitely don’t have a function, not even in the art world, because they aren’t artwork. It’s a Chinese mass produced piece of home decoration, overpriced and not even so decorative.

We’re so obsessed with labels, brands and packaging that the bare product has become unimportant and almost obsolete.

The other day I came across a picture of a platinum and diamond, million dollar fishing hook. Can you believe the absurdness of that? An object that is usually made out of cheapest material is now, for the first and probably the last time in history, fit for a gold fish! Lol, get it? “Gold” fish! :D Fuck I’m tired….  Anyway,  it goes into a fishes mouth for Crist’s sake, and some idiot came up with an idea to make it out of platinum and cover it with diamonds and rubies. The saddest part is that there is probably another idiot in the word that will actually buy that diamonded piece of crap!

I think that now I can proudly say: I rest my case! People are dummies and marketing suckers who are willing to buy anything whit a pretty pink bow or a “return to Tiffany” stamp. That includes you my friend….yes you. You’re the one that is reading this ridiculous post. Peace out sucker!  :P

Is “Idiocracy” our future?

Yesterday I watched a really interesting movie. Well….at least the concept of the movie was interesting, as for the final product, let’s just say that it should have been called “Dumb and dumber, the sequel”. But I consider the first 10 minutes to be the most enlightening “documentary” I’ve ever seen.

The theory goes like this: Evolution doesn’t always guarantee it’s outcome to be a higher intelligence, so there is a big possibility that in a few hundred years we will be reduced to our beginning, basically we’ll become cavemen again! To elaborate it, the movie gives you an example of two families and their plans for procreating. One is a highly educated couple that calculates every aspect of their lives, combined with the current situation in the world (including global economy, politics and ecology), into making a decision about having a child. The other family is a regular “trailer trash” low IQ couple, that doesn’t put so much effort, let’s rather say none, into making that type of a decision. The first couple decides that they will wait for a while, because their careers are going in a great direction and they are both rather busy at the moment, so it is not the perfect time for a baby. Couple number two just got the news that they are expecting once again, and that there was a little misunderstanding about who was supposed to be in charge of the contraception. In other words, they were both too horny and drunk to even think about stuff like that. Better luck next time! Two years pass and our first couple is ready for a child when it comes to their schedules but they decide to wait a year or two because the economy is pretty bad and it is not the best time to bring a child into the world. On the other hand, the hillbillies are at their sexual peak, popping babies like crazy, not caring about the fact that the husband is fucking half of the neighborhood and the wife is not capable of keeping the children or even him in order. A few more years pass, and our model citizens are still without a child, the biological clock took it’s course and it’s a little harder to get pregnant, they start thinking about artificial insemination. Family number two is still humping like rabbits. A couple of years latter wife number one becomes a widow. Her husband dies from a hart attack while trying to do his part of the whole artificial baby making process. It’s a sad day for science, and the widow of course. By this time, “proud parents” number two are on the path of becoming grandparents, because their little sunshine, Mr. Star Quarterback knocked up half of the high school cheerleading team.

Do you see the problem in this story?!

Mankind is domed because intelligent and educated people are beginning to wait longer and longer when it comes to becoming parents, and sometimes that waiting is endangering them of ever having a child. Even if they manage to sail into parenthood, it’s never more than one or two children. That draws a question….how come there are around half of million babies born in the world every day if we are postponing that act? The answer is quite clear from the example above…we might be keeping our legs crossed, but the less fortunate part of the population with IQ lover than room temperature is taking the matter into their own hands, or may I say hm-hm’s! Stupid people are just manufacturing babies which are gonna grow up to be just like them, and that is even more stupid. STUPID + STUPID = MORONS!!! You do the math. On every intelligent kid there are few dozens of idiots. Each smart kid, when he grows up, is going to have (just like his parents) a moderate number of children. The idiot is probably gonna produce a whole football team. You just add a couple of centuries in the equation and you get a world filed with Neanderthals which only know how to drink beer, have sex and in some cases maybe even kick a ball…

The story about a smartphone and a pair of tweezers

Misplacing things is a great big pain in the ass! Although it happens to me quite often, I never seem to get used to it. Sure it’s not such a big deal if it happens with a t-shirt or a piece of fake jewelry which you don’t depend on a regular basis….but it’s a completely different story when it happens to an object that you use almost every day.

I have misplaced my only pair of tweezers exactly five days ago. For the first two days I was pretty calm considering the situation, thank goodness I’m not one of those picture perfect “I have to look fabulous every minute of the day” type of girls, cause if I was, the missing tweezers report would be filled out the first second of the 25^th hour. The evening of day three was the first time I started to feel the need for my steal made friend. I was doing my regular washing and moisturizing evening routine which is always played out in front of the bathroom mirror. I stopped for a second and just stared, uhhh, that doesn’t look too good. My eyebrows have started to grow new friends right beneath them. Not a pretty picture. Something had to be done. I swept thru the regular places where I could have put the tweezers, but nothing. After that I started to look in the unusual places, even took a look in the fridge (one time I left the remote in there), but still nothing. They were definitely missing in action! That night I went to bed very uneasy. Day four was even worse, the eyebrows kept expanding and the tweezers were nowhere to be found. This morning I woke up with hope that they might turn out, you know the way everything eventually does, but this wasn’t the case. The eyebrows have completely took over my face. I’m raising the white flag, and buying a pair of new tweezers tomorrow morning. A good general admits his defeat.

This little situation made me think about the tools that modern day Women couldn’t survive without. I’m not talking about making a fifty item list, cause we all know how we come to depend on a lot of different gadgets these days. Let’s just think about the essentials. The items you couldn’t survive even two days without. And keep in mind that I don’t mean it literary “survive”. Of course that the only basics you need for survival are water, a snack here and there, and something to keep your booty warm. I’m thinking of modern world things, like a hair iron, or a regular iron….thou I think anybody could survive without either one, especially the second one. Let’s think about it for a second….hmmm….hair dryer? No, you could always dry it naturally, that’s even a healthier option. Hair brush? Think you could manage a few days with out that item? Sure. Ok, let’s get out of the beauty section…what else is there in life? Work, family, friends…. Put that all in one and you get “keeping in touch”. Off course, that’s it! A smartphone! That’s the only other thing you really need. Don’t get me wrong, and misread a phone. A phone is a contraption of the last century. The new, and improved version is the smartphone. Imagine the phone had sex with the computer and they had a baby. A little smartphone. The same way a hybrid of a vampire and a werewolf would have both their powers, so does the little love child of the two very popular electronic devices. You can call and text, but at the same time you have the option of checking and sending your emails, browsing the internet, and enjoying the vide variety of social networks. That’s one of the devices I definitely couldn’t live without!

I could survive a week without a lot of things, but please don’t ever separate me from those two things. Take the TV, laptop, fridge and the washing machine, and I will manage. I could easily hand wash my clothes, but I don’t know how could I pluck my eyebrows or text without the previously listed items. Smoke signs have been outdated for a couple of centuries, and my attempt of making a sugar waxing paste wasn’t a success.  :D

Could somebody knock me out, please?

One, two, three, four, five, six…..one-hundred-thirty-nine, one-hundred-forty, one-hundred-forty-one, wait a second, were there two jumping across together just a second ago?! F***ing sheep!! I would really like to know, who was the brainiac, that came up with the counting sheep technique!?! I doubt that it worked for him cause it sure never worked for me. Maybe I give up to fast, and you shouldn’t quite before the one-thousand sheep jumps over the fence, but come on, really? How could I put this? The method is stupid as hell. After I concluded that a sheep’s place is in a barn and not in the bed, I moved on to more logic techniques.

Got up and grabbed a warm glass of milk and the new issue of Cosmopolitan magazine. This should do the trick. There is nothing more annoying then the articles that get published in that magazine. A lot of crap like: 1. the dating rule everyone must know; 2. what’s he secretly thinking on your first date; 3. how to get revenge; 4. the one text you should never send him; 5. how to transform your body; 6. these jeans may change your life; 7. what is the secret to a comfy home; 8. find out is he the one; 9. are you a good friend; and so on… I still can’t believe the various subjects those people can make into an article. And every time they treat it like it’s some kind of a huge revelation, and what they basically do is make up new and insane breakthrough discovery for an issue that is clear as day. First of all there are no dating rules, even Cervantes, a couple of centuries ago, knew that all is fair in love and war. Second, as far as I know, there wasn’t any talk about a new thought detector invention lately, how the hell should I know what the guy is thinking on the first date? Third, revenge is easy, just slash the tires on his car and spread a rumor with STD in it. Four, they say there is only one text that you should never send to a guy. Only one? I don’t think so! From my personal experience, there are dozens of different guy unfriendly messages. I should know, tried out half of them, each time with the man-over-board effect promised. Five, a new body? That’s easy, just seal that mouth and get that ass moving. Six, a pair of jeans that might change my life? Seriously?!? I am all for the fashion does wonders saying, but I still can’t see how a single act of me sticking my big ass in a pair pants, excuse me, jeans, could change my life?! Seven, the secret to a comfy home is in the combination of an amazing decorator and a good cleaning lady. Eight, the quizzes that promise the knowledge of compatibility with your partner based on type of cereal you share and boxers or briefs he wears….need I say more? Under nine, I would say that you’re a pretty good friend if you don’t need a BFF reality type of show every two years. Ten, oh, wait a second, I haven’t listed a ten. Thank god, cause this could last on forever. Trying to prove a point preoccupied me so much that I almost strayed off the subject. As you can see, milk and Cosmo only made my mind run wild, actually that was the effect of the magazine alone. The milk just gave me a bad case of cramps.

I was running out of options. Meditation was next on my list. Let me correct myself, more of a visualization exercise than meditation. Visualize something calming, hmmm….ok, I’ve got it. Drinking a cup of café au lait on a terrace of a chic little restaurant at Saint Germain des Pres square in Paris, watching the pretty Parisian ladies and handsome gentleman pass by, soaking in the beauty of the historic architecture, amazing art décor is covering the vintage looking buildings, Chanel sign, cute little pots of blooming flowers flood over the old wooden windows, such a STOP!!! Rewind, Chanel sign?!? F*** the coffee and relaxing, I feel a new pair of flats in my closet! Shit, double shit, it’s only a visualization. But still, maybe I can visualize a nice Chanel bag? No. I should better get up and check the new collection online…

And that’s how I ended up here.  :)

That old book again?!?

Old loves….the ones that you never really get over. They lurk in the shadows of your mind, sent there to be lost and forgotten. But usually, every once in a while, something triggers them and they pop back on the surface. There’s a variety of causes: an unexpected phone call, bumping into that person after a longer period of time, or even a visit to the place where you shared your first romantic episode. I think the last option is the hardest!

We humans are very submissive types of beings that respond quite well to different stimulants in our surroundings. A picture is worth a thousand words. Well, when you incorporate that picture with a certain smell, you get a custom made time capsule which takes you to the farthest parts of your brain, and not to mention heart. Old memories and feelings that were bottled up throughout the years come bursting out! Suddenly you want to call that person, tell them you miss them and are still pretty much in love with them. The problem becomes even bigger if the two of you stayed good friends.

You know it’s never a good idea to open up that old book again. Start reading the story which you’ve gone thru a thousand times, cause you’re quite aware of the fact that the ending is never going to be “happily ever after”. Why go there?!? Because, on one hand, we’re all sadists that have the urge to win over the person that we know is not capable of loving us back, at least not the way we want them to…..and on the other side….you never forget that fist true love. The feeling that person evoke just by being close to you. It is also one of the reasons why most of our relationships are doomed.

We will always unconsciously compare the new person in our lives to the one true “never gotten over you” love. That sucks, cause nobody will fill those shoes ever again (let’s be real, there are no two people, on the whole wide world, that are so much alike), but at the same time somebody is measuring us by the same stupid ex standard. The truth is, if you’re not one of the lucky people that manage to hold on to “the one”….you are basically screwed!

My advice is, put your love life on hold, concentrate on other aspects, and while you’re doing that somebody might even come along….not maybe the real thing, but the high quality knock off (we don’t want the cheap Chinese version, but the Tokyo “almost can’t see that it’s fake deal). Until that happens, put Fergie and her “Labels or love” on your mp3 player and start strutting proudly down the street with your real Birkin on one hand and the fake “boy toy” on the other!