Fun with Friends

Today was a great day. I got up and was picked up by my friend Merbabe. We drove together to Salem for brunch and meanderings.

Merbabe in the "Stickwork" structures.

Me on a ridiculous throne wearing furs, both of which are on sale in the local thrift store. 

Random blue dinosaur peering over a fence?

Me and Merbabe by the wharf.

After Salem, I dashed off to Plath's house for an Ethiopian food potluck with Plath's family and Alice.

Plath, Alice, and me.

I had a blast, and was super excited when Alice gave me my belated birthday present - a scarf she crocheted herself! Isn't it lovely?

Me in my new scarf.

Fierce Friday and The End of Skirt Week

Today was the last day of Skirt Week. Thank goodness, since I've run out of skirts!

Daria and Jane.

I decided to use the end of skirt week as an excuse to debut a thrift store find I'm really excited about. It's a long stretchy black and white striped skirt (thin stripes) with black lace bands in several places. I absolutely love it! I decided to goth it up a bit with black nail polish, black t-shirt, black and white striped tie, screw earrings, and my black combat boots. I felt like a stompy booted fem made of awesome and I think that Jane Lane and Daria would be friends with me if they met me in this getup.

Whole body picture.

Torso picture.

Skirt and boots!

I haven't chosen fake names for these friends. I went to their house and hung out. Then we went out to Indian food, played scrabble, and went looking for pokémon.

Still Skirt Week

I started off the day with another completely inappropriate for the weather outfit because I figured all I was doing was setting up the new apartment so it didn't matter what I wore. So I pretended I was on Cupcake's cruise in the Bahamas instead of in snowy Massachusetts and I wore a super comfy pajama dress that Joy gave me when she was purging her wardrobe. Of course, halfway through the day I decided to go out after all, which meant digging out my car which was entombed in ice. So I didn't actually wind up wearing a skirt all day. Oh well…

The dress is a tank-top dress that is long and stretchy with red, yellow, teal, and black triangle and zigzag patterns. I'm wearing my seahorse necklace, my anchor earrings, black nail polish and toenail polish a teal scarf, and a big floppy black and tan striped hat.

Head shot.

Body shot.

Attempting to get all of me in the picture but basically only got the top half.

Also, I spent some time today thinking about skirts. There's a double standard when it comes to gender-bending clothing. Women can get away with it much more easily than men and the reason for this is misogyny. Women are already at the bottom of the sexist hierarchy, so a woman dressing masculinely is ok because we think men are better than women and masculine dress is seen as more powerful. Conversely, men are at the top of the hierarchy so a man dressing femininely is considered unacceptable because society considers femininity worthless and degrading so it's seen as bizarre for someone with male privilege to find value in it. Obviously this is an oversimplification, but for proof of this idea you don't have to look very far. For example, masculine girls are labeled "tomboys" and are seen in a mostly positive light whereas feminine boys are labeled "sissies" and are mocked and tormented by other kids and even adults. I wish I could snap my fingers are change this, but the best I can do is put effort into fighting sexism and continue to dress more bravely than I feel so that other men and boys who might be stifling themselves to fit into masculine gender norms can see that they aren't the only ones and that it's ok to express yourself without fitting into those boxes.

Picture of a boy in a plaid skirt, blue shirt, necklace, and khaki button down shirt.
He is holding a piece of paper with a feminism symbol and there is black overlaid text that says:
"Girls can wear jeans and cut their hair short, wear shirts and boots because it's ok to be a boy.
But for a boy to look like a girl is degrading, cause you think being a girl is degrading."

Lazy Wednesday

It's the middle of skirt week and I feel super cute! I even changed my Facebook profile picture to one of me in today's outfit. I got home at about 7am today and I basically ice skated up my street. Look:

At least it's pretty?

Anyway, once I got home I decided that since I wasn't going anywhere today I'd just dress completely inappropriately for the weather. So I pretended it was summer and wore Cupcake's black polka dot skirt, my pink shoes, my tan "it takes balls to be a fairy" shirt, a fun hat, my fake diamond earrings, and grey scarf with pastel lips all over it. 

Head shot. I look like a model! This is my new Facebook profile picture!

Bottom half of me.

Full body shot. 

Pi Day!

Today there was a snow storm! In honor of the snow, I decided to wear a white skirt, white t-shirt, white nail polish, white earrings, and my snowflake necklace.

Head shot of me showing off my nail polish.

Body shot sitting on the floor.

Today is also Pi Day! The day that geeky people celebrate the irrational number pi aka the ratio of a circle's circumference to its diameter aka 3.141592 (pi is actually a much longer number but that's all I have memorized). How do we celebrate? By eating pie on 3/14 because the date looks like the number pi. 

Einstein in a pi shirt holding a pie.

It turns out that wearing white may not have been the best choice of my life since I also decided to bake banana tarts for pi day. Good thing I have an awesome apron!

Me pointing at my tarts while wearing my white outfit
and a brown apron that says "They see me rollin' they hatin'."

Finished tart close-up.

And just because I liked this cartoon, I'm adding it into my post.

Violin Store

My big task of today was going to the violin store for repairs.

Inside the violin store.

I figured they don't care what I wear in the violin store since they cater to musicians which means they probably get a whole bunch of interesting clients. So I wore a pink tutu skirt, sparkly black leg warmers, a black fishnet shirt with my "I don't sweat I sparkle" tank top over it, a fish skull necklace, and axe earrings. I'm also wearing black toenail polish, but you can't see my feet in these pictures.

Selfie.

Full body selfie.

Skirt Sunday

It's Sunday and the third day of Skirt Week for me. Today I had church and my Circus Class and I couldn't think of a single outfit that would work for all of these things. Church is the one place I go each week where I tone my outfits down a bit, because I feel like the focus should be on God and not me or my fashion choices. Since wearing a skirt to church is pretty much the opposite of this I felt like it was a no-go. Circus Class also has a dress code. I need to wear something stretchy but not baggy that covers my knees/armpits/waist and that doesn't have ties/zippers/hooks that might get caught on things, and I can't wear jewelry. What was my solution?

When I was in France last summer I noticed that lots of the African immigrants took large pieces of colorful fabric and wrapped them into skirts. Basically a fancy version of the towel-around-the-waist beach cover up technique. I've seen folks from India and Asia wear similar garments, and I've heard a bunch of words for them: sarong, kanga, kikoy, lungi, fouta. Here's what I'm talking about:

Three older asian men in sarongs.

Younger asian man in a blue sarong.

Five Indian men in sarongs.

Shirtless very fit black man in a pastel sarong.

Older arab man in a sarong and hat drinking tea.

My brilliant plan was to dress up for church in nice pants and shoes and to wear my crocheted tank top but throw a sweater over it. Then I came home, ditched the shoes and sweater, and swapped my church pants out for my gym pants. I threw a wrap on top so I'd have a mid-day outfit that worked for skirt week and didn't require an entire wardrobe change. Then for class I just took off the wrap and swapped the tank top for a t-shirt. I didn't take pictures of the church outfit. Here is my wrap skirt outfit:

Me with a crocheted white tank top and a silver colored necklace of mini skulls.
The mini skulls go with the skirt because the skirt has a warrior pattern on it. 

Bottom half of my outfit is orange wrap with blue and green and black warriors,
black leggings underneath the wrap, and black toenail polish.

For circus class, I put on a t-shirt, took off the jewelry, and threw a pair of shorts over the leggings. Today's lesson was aerial silks and it was SO FUN! I think I might take their Aerial Silks 101 class next. Here's a picture of me doing aerial silks:

Me hanging upside down from the aerial silks.

And here's one of Bone:

Bones doing tricks on the aerial silks.