There and back again-

My good lord.
I've just returned from a four day long trip into the mountains with three of my best friends. It was a fantastic time - rivaling the original Idyllwild trip, I think.


And I'd love to tell you all about it but I seem to have caught a cold somewhere along the way so I'm less then eloquent at the moment.
And as for photos, well....I took over 100 during the trip so if you'd like to see them, feel free to hop on over to my facebook album as I haven't got the energy to repost them all here.


And hey, I'll leave you with some videos a video we took of sledding fun.


(I do actually have two videos but the second is taking much longer to upload then I had originally thought. I'll post the second one as soon as it finishes.)

Pink Foam Rollers: or The Progression of Hair

Remember when you first started dressing in vintage? 
The hours spent online- combing youtube for pincurl tutorials, nearly crying when Nocturne's website, that mecca of beginner vintage hairstyling, went down, painstakingly rolling your hair for hours into little 1 inch sculptured pincurls?




And now, if you're anything like me, you can hardly be bothered to put your hair up in a bun, much less do a full wet set. My current go-to styles of ponytails and quick hot rollers are a sharp contrast to my earlier days of victory rolls and nightly pincurling. I can blame some of it on the fact that my hair was much shorter back then and wet sets were less of an ordeal. But honestly, I'm lazy and busy and no longer have the will to put in the time for full sets unless I have a special event. 


Well, if you remember, I did have an event over the weekend, an invite to The New Boy's holiday work party. And the night before, I found myself busting out my pink foam rollers for the first time in months. It was just like I remembered, difficult to sleep in and the look is still more crazy lady then Rosie the Riveter when I scarfed up the next morning.


But the effort was worth the results- the authentic look you get from a wet set just can't be duplicated with a curling iron. 

 Another drawback of rolling your hair- being stuck in the house half a night and all the next day. Because really, the public doesn't want to see this.

 Here we have that stage known in the vintage circles as Poodle Hair, Shirley Temple on Crack or "Oh, Dear God- what have I done?"

Ah, but you see, with a little faith and about 20 minutes of brushing, poodle hair of doom calms down and turns into lovely 40's glamour waves. Now if only I could figure out the secret to keeping this look all night, I would be the happiest little vintage-wearing gal on the block. Until then...

It's 58 Right Now

and we have 5 mph winds coming from the north. I don't think I can recall a time when we've had northern wind.


Anyway, this post isn't about the weather. It's about music.


Yesterday, I worked at the KFMB station for the first time in months. It's always a trade off working there. On one hand, everyone is always so happy to see me again- asking me if I've lost weight and telling me how much they missed me. Who doesn't love that?
But on the other hand, I'm stuck in a small little cave for 9 hours at a time by myself without so much as a cigarette break. Nightmarish. Add to that the fact that business was pretty slow and I was practically bouncing off the walls. My only saving grace was that I had a fully charged ipod to help offset the madness. And that got me thinking on how much music affects my day to day.
My music is one my few constants- it's always playing, in the car, on breaks, even right now I'm blogging to music. I realize that I spend more quality time with my music then I do with some close friends. And it isn't that I have such a huge collection of songs- I don't. I have maybe 15 bands that I listen to with any regularity. So, I'm certainly not varied with my music tastes but what I do like is always brilliant. With only 15 slots, I don't want to waste time with music that makes me anything but supremely happy.




Like Red Hunter.

Or Redding. Or Peter and the Wolf. He goes by a lot of names. He is one of the greatest things to come out of Texas. He also got me through a bad break-up and came along for my first road trip with the SC boys.






And The White Stripes.
Whom I had to listen to in secret my first year in college after I rashly denounced them in my English Literature class as doing nothing more then coattailing The Doors. My god, I was stupid at 19.






Then there's Miss Gillian Welch and this song which hold one of the most gut wrenching lines in all of music....






Devendra Banhart With his improbable name and nicety- he never fails to make me wish it was summer. And that's a feat as I hate summer.






And Far Who ruled my life from 2000 til 2005. And yeah, okay- they still get a fairly strong say.






And Colin Meloy.... Who once had a little band. And before they called it quits, that little band created my single favorite song in the world. He could have stopped there and still had my eternal gratitude but no, He iced the cake and formed the Decemberists.

Regarding shopping schizophrenia and birthdays

A lot of girls will say that their shopping weakness is shoes or purses or maybe something completely different- like model trains. And while I do love shoes and purses and (to a lesser extent) scale models, my real shopping weakness is events. 98% of my purchases happen when I've got a fancy party or a trip or show coming up. I get an image in my head of how I want to look and then scour the internet and local vintage shops in an effort to force that mental image into outfit reality. 

 The process goes a little something like this....

Self: Oooh, I'm going to a work holiday party with The New Boy this month. Dang, what am I going to wear?

Frugal Self: Don't go buying a new dress- you have a million hanging in the closet. Wear one of those.

Self: Alright, I do love The Wedding Dress and I've only worn it twice....

Indulgent Self: But what about shoes? It's the holidays and nothing says the holidays like red shoes. 

Frugal Self: We have red shoes.

Indulgent Self: They're falling apart.

Self: That's true, ok I'll buy some new shoes and I'll make sure they're fairly inexpensive.

Indulgent Self: And a giant statement bracelet...

Frugal Self: No way! Totally unnecessary.

Self: Hmmmm...

Indulgent Self: And new underwear!

Frugal Self: What are we, made of money or something???

Self: Ummm...

Indulgent Self: AND YOU HAVE TO GET A NEW PURSE!

Frugal Self: THIS IS WHY WE STILL LIVE WITH OUR MOTHER!! BECAUSE YOU CAN'T BUDGET YOUR MONEY!!

Self: Both of you just shut up! You're not even real- you're just Freudian manifestations of my own internal dialogue.

End scene.

Ok, so here's what I ended up buying.

 Bangle set I picked up from Taneesi Jewelry on Etsy.

 

New Red Shoes from modcloth

And a whole bunch of pretty underthings from Dollhouse Bettie.

I showed all kinds of restraint and did not buy a new purse since I own a perfectly lovely red evening bag that was a gift from ML. Also, it's my birthday so that mean I have to share this which has been my birthday song for something like 8 years now. I don't think I've ever posted Jonah here but He is another of my favorite people and I will forever love his music. so here ya go. 


Jonah Matranga Live at WAH part three // 14-41 from We Are Home. on Vimeo.

Clever Headline Here!

I'm think I need a tag called Failures in Blogging and that way you could click a link and see every one of my "apologies for not posting for 3 weeks" posts. You can add this one to that list.

I'm actually on my way out the door to the reason for my recent internet absence- work. Yes, yes the dead folk of San Diego have been keeping me pretty busy this week but I get tomorrow off and am hoping to convince The New Boy to go with me to the Southpark walkabout tonight. I love the walkabouts- especially the one in the winter months.

Anyway, I thought since I can't get around to doing a decent blog for the life of me,  it might be nice to share with you my favorite blog. This girl is my ultimate icon- the epitome of ideal vintage perfection. I shamelessly copy her looks and all of my favorite repro shops I found through her. She's one of my favorite people which I realize is quite odd as I've never met her. Nevertheless.

The Freelancer's Fashionblog

 

addendum: These photos belong solely to The Freelancer's Fashionblog and appear here only to advertise her awesomeness.

House Warmings and Birth Days

Collective from the past two days- The Cass house warming party and CJ's birthday celebration. 

The hour drive up to their new place was worth it to see how well they've done up their space. KC had a really adorable kitchen- totally her style.

The cute couple. And Tom Waits.

 Also, The Ex brought his new puppy along who was the biggest draw at the party.

`

 Onto the pizza/beer/birthday fest. We all braved the rain and headed to Blah (obviously) and proceeded to buy every type of beer on the menu and most of the pizzas. 

 I'm guessing the french fry was super hot.

 Not totally sure what this was all about...

 

 It was actually really beautiful out with the rain and the street lights. Unless you wanted to smoke- then it was inconvenient.

 Or if you had curled your hair that night. Mine fell pretty hard. Unlike The New Boy, who always has very nice hair.

I'm not sure how I'm supposed to leave all these amazing people in a few months...

Sometimes I like to Glut Myself on Amazing Things

Like this morning.

I'm currently sitting out on the porch under perfectly cloudy skies. While eating a bell pepper and sausage scramble, while drinking a very strong cup of coffee. All while smoking a cigarette and listening to Alison Krauss.

My own personal Bacchanal.

Sadly, it can't last as I need to go get ready for an hour long drive north for the Cass housewarming party. And then back down south for my brother's birthday dinner. 

So, I'll leave you with some Chris Thomas King. I've been listening to the O Brother soundtrack on repeat lately and this song is just so brilliant.

Upadation

Yesterday was a busy ass day and I'm paying for it this morning. It started at 5am with the first of many garage sales to happen over the next few months. I have to admit, it's a little heart-wracking to sell off my things. My record player, dresses from high school dances, my books. But I keep telling myself it's all for the cause. After the sale, CJ and I decided to go down to the harbor and watch the America's Cup boats. And then we proceeded to do everything else possible first including: make tea, wait for CJ to shower, go to Jamba Juice, stopping at Nest Vintage and driving through Golden Hill to remind CJ that Yes, she has been to the Ex's old house on 26th.

Eventually, we made it down to the harbor, walked the bay until we found a nice spot to sit- only to be chased away minutes later by the multitudes of dive-bombing gulls. Too much to do when I'm still under the weather- I woke up today feeling hungover when I didn't have a single drink to blame it on.

But it wasn't all shitting seabirds and exasperating sickness- we saw a truck filled with penny-farthings on our walk along the harbor.

 

 And I finally saw the SD city hall.

 Then, we ran over to Gelato where we attempted to tackle the Reader puzzles. And I found this ridiculous sticker (it says Punk rock is voting Bush) which made me think of The New Boy.

Ah, yes- I promised some further explanation of The New Boy. Well, through a series of Halloween coincidences, some scheming of his friends and some strategic red lipstick, we ended up meeting, chatting and eventually (and a little drunkenly) smooching in a law office building's courtyard during a downpour. Super classy, no?

We've gone on a few dates since then and I'm both pleased and little sad to say he's a very cool guy. Pleased because he's sweet and goofy and fun to be with. Sad because I had to meet him 6 months before I leave town. For now, I'm just enjoying the situation of actually dating again. Oh my.

Regarding illness and shoes

Well, I fought it and fought it but it finally won. Terrible germs have infested my body and I'm officially sick. Ok, so maybe hanging out with CJ when she was ill wasn't such a good idea and I'm thinking that kissing in the rain the other night was less romantic then it was foolish. 

(Wait- did I forget to share that news? Damn, well- I met a boy and he's interesting but I'll cover that in more detail some other time)

So, yes, I'm partially to blame for my current condition but I'm doing everything I can think of to combat this cold. Eating vitamin C chewables and pretty much bathing in green tea. And resting. So, while my body wages it's microscopic war, I've decided to poke around the internet looking at shoes. Surprise.

However, I'm not buying any since I'm trying to save for the move. I did make a little set of shoes that I would buy though, if I wasn't being so good and not buying them. Even though I really want to buy them.

Top left going Clockwise: Restricted Pop Art in Red, Miz Mooz Advanced Placement Heels, Seychelles All Dressed Up Heels, Sister Nature Heels at ModCloth, Madden Girl Uttsons, Poetic License Charm School Heels.

I feel the need to point out that I actually own very few high heels. Most of my shoes are 3" or lower, despite my high heel theory for large footed women.

And this is due to the fact that most shoe designers seem to have this awful desire to make ladies look like horses. The current trend in heels is a towering 6" which is not exactly practical for any sort of walking whatsoever. So, they slap on a 3" platform and the result is millions of poor gals clomping around in a very equine manner. 

 I actually own those last ones and though they are more tame in the platform regard then others, they still make me feel like I'm wearing horseshoes. Most modern designers seem to have lost the idea that heels should be flattering on the foot. Instead, they give us heavy looking weights at the end of our legs and tell us it's sexy. 

Well, the Revamp Vixen is here to tell you-  it's not. 

End sickness fuels shoe rant.

Things I love about November

The cold is finally starting.

So, the last week of October is was dry and hot and then boom!

November hits with rain, then downpour and now cloudy cold.

Which makes it perfect weather for staying in my pajamas and drinking coffee all day.

I get to resurrect my winter clothes.

Which means digging out the Great White Coat and all my fun long socks.

The holidays and parties and general fun times with the G.T.G's. 

One more great thing about Nov is that our trip to Idyllwild is only a month away. Eka is coming back to visit for the Christmas break and a group of us are heading up to the mountains for a couple days in the snow. I'm so excited: seeing my dear friend again, spending time with great friends and revisiting one of my absolute favorite places. I can't wait!

Hollow Even

Last night, we celebrated Halloween in the tradition ways- beer, fake blood, friends and bad dance contests. I went as Edgar Allen Poe's The Red Death. Unfortunately, no one got it. I really gotta stop doing cerebral costumes.

  Blaine was Ash from The Evil Dead movies. Note the actual chainsaw attached to his hand there. CJ replayed her cowboy outfit from last year after some mishaps with her original costume.

Fun party with some great people but the fun didn't continue. I woke up this morning surprisingly unhungover and proceeded to drop a ladder on my foot. Yup, ladder. On my foot. So now, I'm stuck on the couch with a seriously swollen, bruised foot. Happy Halloween indeed.

Last Night and This Morning

The night began with some pirate themed tattoo art at The Vishuddha Creatives shop. Home of my future Matryoshka tattoo and the object of my newly rekindled infatuation. I don't know his name but man alive, is he pretty.

Anyway, it was a small little show with some really nice pieces. Sadly, I forgot about photo documentation so you'll just have to take my word for it.

Then off to Tiger!Tiger! the newest offshoot of Blind Lady Ale house. It was their ubersoft opening or some such thing so there was much sawdust, haphazardly placed boxes and a general feeling of  not just there. And while it won't be bumping Blah out of it's coveted "Best Bar" spot for me anytime soon, it was still a fair shake. I'm excited to see what they do with it.

 Afterwards, I forced CJ to return to South Park so I could dance. Poor girl.

Morning hair and my collection of admittance stamps.

CG was kind enough to let us crash at his place. Honestly, he didn't get much of a say in it.

We were feeling understandably ugh this morning, so we decided to go to the Orient and overindulge in Szechuan.  This is a plate of salt and pepper tofu which even I had to admit was delicious.

Come one Come all! Buy a piece of Revamp Vixen memorabilia!

Yes, I'm doing it. 

It's begun.

The massive slow selling off of most of my lovely and adored junk. Shoes, hats, war garb, camping gear, books and miscellaneous things that won't be making the trip back East with me. I'm so sad to see these things go but I need the money and the space. All I can keep are the memories of my treasured possessions. Sob, sob....

Okay, do you now feel appropriately pitiful towards me?

Good, now go check out my Ebay page and feel free to bid on something :)

Vintage shoes, hats and more to be added soon.

And some stuff over on my Esty page. 

Boots cost Money

It's October and October means Fall is Here!

Ok, granted- it is currently 70 degrees and sunny as hell here in SoCal. But let's not let that little detail detour us. Fall is my favorite season as I love the cooler weather, the festive holidays and most important, cold weather clothes. If you remember last year, I spent a great deal of time and money gathering up a new Fall/Winter wardrobe. And the one piece that , hard as I tried, I couldn't seem to find was the perfect pair of fall boots. I had purchased and returned 3 pairs in anticipation for my trip back East and all three looked great online but just didn't do it for me in real life. 

Well, my boot quest continues this year and I do believe I have hit the mark this time.

After much searching online, I found a pair of very cute ankle boots that met all of my "perfect" priorities. A decent sized, sturdy heel- lace up-rounded toe- and a fair fit for my oddly thin calves. So, I went ahead and bought them. 

Then, two days later, I made a little trip to DSW with KJ of all people, and found another pair that also hit every mark. So, I bought those too. 

Now, you might be saying to yourself "Those are the same boots" and well, you'd be right, sort of. They are very similar I admit. But! to me the small differences make it justifiable to have bought both. The first pair is brown, fits much closer to the calf and has man made materials. Perfect for chilly rainy  Fall weather. The second pair is black, has flannel lining and is leather. Perfect for snowy New York winters. So, in my crazy backwards shopping addict logic, owning two pairs of essentially similar boots is necessary. 

Oh and I guess I should point out one more rather big difference. One of the pairs cost $53 and the other cost $150. Wanna guess which is which?

From Portland

 Last week, I got a wonderful little surprise in the mail- a letter from Miss Eka! It was perfect timing as I had just been thinking about how much I missed her. Of course, I cried a little bit. 

   Included along with the note were two little pins perfectly suited for me. A matryoshka and a cute little tattooed lady. I love having such thoughtful friends! Now I need to do up a reply letter.... if only I didn't have such chicken-scratch handwriting.

Relocation

Hello again. As the title hopefully indicates, I've decided (mostly) that I want to and will move out of San Diego. Despite my best efforts, I am completely wasted on my hometown. I've never lived outside of California and maybe the biggest reason, I'm bored and want a change. So, I'll be packing up the essentials (clothes, shoes and cat) into the car and heading back east. Rochester Ny mainly- South Wedge area specifically.

SW is pretty much a mix of Golden Hill-South Park and a little barrio thrown in. Turn of the century buildings, vegan bakeries and about a million coffeeshops. (That last one is high priority) The area is just now going under gentrification, so it's still got a lot of flavour without one being swamped with drug-addled trash. Living in Rochester means I'll finally be part of my extended family, I can watch my baby sister grow up and I'll be able to rent an awesome architectural place without needed three jobs and a roommate.

In addition to the Farmers market done weekly, they have Wedgestock- a craft/food/music/arts fest something akin to the Adams Ave street faire.

Oh, did I mention the community based victory garden? I will most defiantly be going in on a plot here.

Plus Rochester has it's own waterfalls. Two of them actually.

 And they do a Tweed Ride! Now, yes I know San Diego also has a tweed ride and I've never gone. But that's because I'm lazy and San Diego has too many hill for my curvy ass to go pedaling up and down.

 Highland Park- Rochester may be crazy small compared to SD but it's got some serious beauty to it. I realize this is a pretty ambitious undertaking, between saving up enough cushion money, a 5 day cross country drive with a cat, finding a new job and apartment. Not to mention I've never lived with "real" weather before. But I can't help being excited at the prospect of moving.