Rainbow Falls

Check it out: this is in South Carolina. It's Rainbow Falls, up near the NC border. The trail is pretty new. My friend (in yellow) and I went there yesterday. It was a really sweaty and humid hike, but once you get there and play around in the cool mist of the waterfall, everything is perfect and you know you can just hustle downhill the whole way back.

A Nook; Moving

Well, I moved into my new apartment, which was crazy-making, and stayed up to 5:30 am unpacking and moving boxes around, and then left a few hours later for a two-week trip home to see my family in South Carolina. Procrastination, scarce car resources, and a camping trip conspired to keep me from moving early, which would have been less stressful but, what's move without a meltdown or two?

Anyway, I got just enough rearranged before I left to start to see our new dining room as a real room I can live in, rather than a staging ground for boxes. It's a big room and the dining room table is tiny, so I think we'll have a lot of bookshelves and my big comfy blue velvet chair. I got the chair from my grandma, and it definitely shows its age but it's still pretty nice and really great for sitting and reading and drinking coffee. So I'm going to position in by the window, kind of like in this picture.

Picture is from Kathryn Ireland, an interior/textile designer, via Ill Seen, Ill Said.

I did it: Red Hair

So I actually went through with it and dyed my hair. It went from looking like this (above) to this (below).
Oh my. This is exactly one day after I henna-ed it, so it has mellowed out a good bit since then. It's now a pretty solid red. I missed a few spots, since I put it on dry hair, so I might go back when I start seeing roots and redo it a touch. Anyway, it's a big shock and rather hard to get used to, but I really like it.

Biking Scandalicious!

Saw this on Dress, Design & Decor the other day. It's from Elle Russia via Oh Fashion Models. Sorry, DD&D, I like your blog but this is ridiculous. I know biking is super trendy and all right now, but ain't no way she's going to bike in that short of a dress. Some of us, like the girls at Academichic, bike to work and class and everywhere, and know the perils of skirts on bikes. I sent this over to Daddy Likey who has a funny feature called Don't Show-Cha Your Chocha, we'll see if it makes the cut!

There's so many pictures of models looking super cute and biking or pretending to, and even Martha Stewart is in on the commuter bike trend, but it just kindof annoys me. I guess I should be happy that the greatest form of transportation is getting the love it deserves, and is being taken out of the uber-hipster world of fixies or super-pricey mountain bikes. And I am, I just want to point out: this picture is ridiculous. Notice how she has to do the awkward leg-cross just to keep it PG? Yeah, you can't do that while biking.

In fact, once a little boy yelled at me on the street while I was biking, "I can see your panties!" So, getting over the fact that the word "panties" is totally unacceptable, I'm going to chalk that up to childish rakish mischievousness, as mine were definitely not showing and it was in fact Halloween, the only time it might be even slightly appropriate. And my dress was way longer than hers.

Side note: in Egypt, I only saw one woman riding a bicycle. And she was a foreigner, and it was in Maadi (a neighborhood rather far from the city center where many foreigners live). I envied her a lot, and frequently entertained thoughts of stealing the little old bike leaning against the wall in my alley, totally unlocked and ripe for the taking. I think it belonged to one of the kids that delivered tea or something to the scores of guys who hung out at the barbershop at the front of the alley. But, you know, gotta maintain some kind of respect from the neighbors (who am I kidding? I suspected some of them thought I was a "lady of the night" while others were really nice to me, like the fruit stand man Abdullah, my buddy, and the sweet potato seller lady).

Rustic, Done Wrong.

I love rustic & old & repurposed as much as the next person (arguably more than the next person) but this first image gave me the heebie-jeebies. I do not want to sit there, at all. My back hurts just looking at it. DANGER CHAIR! (My roommates came up with this name for the chairs I collect from the alley that are not in the best shape-- one had an alarming tendency to flip you backwards, another creaks dangerously if anyone over 130 pounds sits on it.)
Then it gets worse. This makes me think: wartime orphanage (except the pom poms which are really pretty cute, and I wouldn't say no to the ceiling beams or the lamps).
Rusty chair and iron bed? No thanks. I'm sure it will stain the perfect white linens and probably give you tetanus. Also, chinks in the ceiling = wicked draft.
Don't move the pendant lights or they'll drop rust flakes into your food. Ew!

First two images: house in Nimes used for photo shoot locations and movie sets from the company Light Designs via Bliss. I can see now that it's not meant to really be liveable.

Last one: Atlanta Homes & Design via Griege via Dress, Design & Decor.

Sorry to be drinking the hateorade. I really do usually like the stuff that these blogs post but it's kindof freeing to break off the "omg so pretty" blogger vibe.

Up Chairs

I rewatched Up, the Disney/Pixar movie, a few nights ago and was impressed again. It has some of the most moving dialogue-free animated sequences I can remember, and the attention to detail, especially in textiles, warms my heart (maybe) even more. I'd take Ellie's chair--the wildly disproportionate top-heavy one on the right, please. Oh, and an art deco blimp, that too.

And P.S. - google image search for "up chairs movie disney" brings some insane gems. Enjoy.

Lions & Tigers & Bears, oh my!

WTF?!

I think I fall in the "this is not ok" camp.

via What Possessed Me, a funny funny blog.