Event review: Tim Gunn

I drew this in the dark because I'm polite. 

I'm quite certain Tim Gunn walked out onto this stage and thought to himself "Those ferns are beat!" The ferns had brown tips. Cough, cough. 

Otherwise, my date was lovely- she stuck with me through the long signing line and took a cute pic with him that you can see here on her tumblr. She's my first internet-stranger-lady date of Arkansas.
I went on tons of internet-stranger-lady dates in NYC and usually it's good. I started stalking this girl online when she was tweeting from a Maddow talk at the Clinton school.

Tim talked at length about restructuring the fashion design program at Parsons and I feared that all of this beauracratic talk was lost on the audience, who I'm sure really mostly wanted to hear what Heidi eats for lunch. He really talked so much about the administration at Parsons.

He did mention how he created the senior review and I can attest to how freaking cool that process is, as I went to see (photo album here) my friend and former intern present her collection. Each student gets ten minutes to present a final senior collection in front of a panel of various fashion professionals. It was one of the coolest things I went to while I lived there.

He was really great and sweet and gracious until this one little point toward the end where he brought up Tavi Gevinson and made this erroneous claim that her parents bought all those designer clothes for her and that fourteen year olds don't know anything. That stabbed my heart, but not too bad because I'm not the biggest Tim Gunn fan anyway.

I didn't let him know that Tavi is now running a feminist website for teenage girls (that girls my age love too!) His negative comments about her success showed his age, in my opinion.

I have flipped through the book which he's promoting, and it is a patriotic text book of American fashion history. I did tell him that seeing the full page photo of Michelle Obama made me run back out to the lobby to get a copy for myself. It did.

I was really just there to get some old gay man wisdom like what Tom Ford gave, and to get the book signed for my play-brother and his boo.

My Diet Story for NYPost

I didn't think I should blog about it, so I just sent a million secret emails to all my buddies and top-shelf bitches while I was on this mission. I participated in a six-week diet review for the New York Post.
I was assigned - Christine Avanti's Skinny Chicks Eat Real Food. I LOVE THIS BOOK!

I fell in love immediately. My mother-in-law got Christine's first book, which sounds a lot more strict than the diet book I just lived-by and reviewed.

Here's the text of the NYPost article:

The Dieter
Julie Hardee, 31

The Diet: “Skinny Chicks Eat Real Food” ($26.99) by Christine Avanti, shuns processed, chemical-laden foods in favor of more wholesome (and even full-fat) meals.

The Results: Hardee, a receptionist who lives on the Upper East Side, was slim to start, but wanted to tighten up a few problem areas and rid herself of bad habits, such as midnight snacking on Fire Cheetos and indulging in the office candy bowl.

Within the first week of reading Avanti’s book, Hardee was singing the author’s praises. “I am in love with my book,” she says. “She talks about how you should only eat things [when] you understand what the ingredients are — and try to keep it to five ingredients or less on the label. In short, don’t eat stuff you don’t understand, because it’s probably bad for you.” (Which delighted Hardee, because locally made organic beer was green-lighted.)

Not only did Hardee kick her Diet Coke habit — “Everything in Diet Coke is basically poison,” she says — she took to the health-food store with gusto. “The book didn’t have any specific exercise — it was more about label reading and enhancing your diet with flax meal and coconut oil or drinking a fermented food every day I had a kefir [a yogurt-like dairy beverage].”

Hardee even managed to put aside her fear of full-fat products. “I learned that it’s better to eat a pure-fat sour cream that comes from well-treated, lovely animals than to eat some reduced-fat sour cream fakeness,” she says.

Before
Height: 5’8”
Weight: 143.4 pounds
After
Weight: 141.2 pounds

Book: Skinny chicks eat real food

The Grade: A
“Amazing . . . [but] if you can’t go a health-food store, or if you were on a really tight budget, it’d be really hard.”

Read more: http://www.nypost.com/p/entertainment/totally_waisted_Hi2mLFEM2PZbPAuXmpGXcP/1

And screen shots! I need to run out and get this in print.

I had airbrush face make-up for the first time in my life, and I Loved the hair & make-up girls. 

I thought my hair looked amazing at the time, but now I think it looks flat. And my tricep looks like a roll of dough but I'm critical. 

I also got styled, as in, these were not my clothes. I worked for a fashion stylist for a few years and never got styled from scratch like this. It was weird being on the other side. I also felt really awkward in the photo-shoot because I'm standing here on the seamless (backdrop) by myself and all these people who organized this were on the other side chatting and what-not. 

I was pretty nervous in the last 72 hours that I might not have lost any weight and would my story would be headlined under "Failure" but I lost 2* pounds and 1.5" from my hips. 

However, I've been "free" from this for a few days and I ate a pretty gnarly cheeseburger, and some delicious jell-o desserts and jell-o is not in the plan. 

While I was on the "Diet" - I didn't even feel like it was a diet, it felt like a Healthy eating plan, I ate one cheeseburger. The most amazing thing is I learned how to really read lables and I QUIT DIET COKE. 

I've quit Diet Coke before, after reading "Skinny Bitch" the scariest diet book in the world, which really just tells you to be vegan. I haven't had a diet coke since October and I'm very happy and not craving it at all. Now when I need a quick drink on the go, I grab a coconut water. 

I did have sprite twice during the 6 week diet phase, but I don't think sprite is as evil as Diet Coke. 

I kept a tiny food journal in my purse and I love chatting with Weight Watchers participants. Journaling is a major key to success. 

John Waters - "Role Models" Book Event NYC

I went over to Bryant Park immediately after work on Monday to line up to get a free seat at the NYPL Live series John Waters event. I was able to read a lot of the book while I was waiting. I love John Waters because he's very open-minded and loved, and he's extremely positive and seems really sweet. I grew up in Arkansas and everyone describes to everyone as "Sweet" and I kind of hate that, but now I enjoy "sweet" as a personality adjective in extreme moderation. And mostly only for unlikely characters.

If you're trying to convince me I should meet someone because they are "a sweet person," I'm typically not interested.

I got the book, "Role Models" signed for my play-brother who really knows his body of work much better than I, and I got up-close to take a pic with him and now I know John Waters has great skin. I'm becoming the "skin police."


This was my 3rd John Waters speaking event and I guess the 4th time I've seen him. (3 speaking engagements and 1 art opening for his work.)

Since I had read the book, I had heard a lot of the material that was discussed. I did not enjoy the moderator. He took forever to roll out these questions and they weren't even that original. Every time the moderator spoke I got frustrated and wanted to scream "SPIT IT OUT!" John Waters really can do it all by himself, like he does at his Christmas Special. He just gets up and talks, and it's bliss.

The setting in which the event took place was magnificent. Outdoors at Bryant Park right behind the huge, NY Public Library. The Library where Big jilts Carrie and she beats his ass with her bouquet in the street.


My Book review so far:
Personally, my life depends greatly on the role my role models play and have played. I feel in many ways that I was raised more by a group of people than my parents. My personality and skill-set was shaped by a group of teachers. John Waters has tremendous parental support and a wonderful relationship with them. No matter how interesting my life and adventures may be - I do not and did not have that. -Tremendous parental support and a great relationship. "It takes a Village" is the story of my life.

I am jealous of people who have wonderful parents and now he's on the list.

The book is a really cute, light read. Fantastic beach reading and John Waters himself recommended it for that. Then he cracked a joke about the oil spill.

I took notes about some art things around the city that he recommended - some porn photography shows, etc. He too loves the Mike Kelly blanket of stuffed animals that I previously blogged about. The piece was in the Whitney Biennial. It made my fucking day to turn the corner and find this masterpiece and it warmed my heart to hear that JW loved it too. I am going to try my best to craft one when I am nesting for my own little baby. Someday.

I am really happy about another first-time experience that I had last night. I love this little surprise that I found on my bicycle- a flier.


I forgot what it's like to find a flier under my windshield, because I sold my car and moved to New York City 3 years ago.

Outift for 2/18/10

Major Arkansas thrift going on here.


This is what the context of the apartment looks like.


I'm reading this Suze Orman book. Got it at the library! I'm really enjoying it and looking forward to new money-management strategies when I get a new job/income.

That's what I call my nightstand. I love that mirrored tray with silver 80's bows on it. I got it at the Salvation Army in Hot Spring, AR. Matt hates it, but it makes me happy. He doesn't appreciate gorgeous 80's bows.