Yes, it’s time once again to play Twistie’s Sunday Caption Madness! You all know the rules. I post a picture that in some way amuses me, you send in your best captions via the comments, and next saturday I declare a winner.
So hit me with your best shots based on this image:
Ready…set…snark!
Turns out, you may not know as much about the fast food eating habits of Americans as you think you do. I know I didn’t. But I learned a lot reading this article in QSR magazine.
Over and over again, we hear that fast food is mostly eaten by the poor and the lazy. Turns out, that’s not so much the case as has been assumed. In fact, the people who eat the most fast food are actually men below middle-age with higher than average incomes. In fact, here’s how Alexander Kleijngeld, vice president of client services for Research International (who performed the study) described the difference between the popular assumption and the results of the study:
“While the stereotype of a typical fast-food customer may be that of a couch potato, our research found the opposite to be true as high frequency fast food users are more involved and more active than the average consumer,”
Interesting.
In fact, I’d say that’s food for thought.
This beautiful pump is available up to size 12 in four different combinations of fabrics/colors. If you look closely, the zipper has a leetle tiny peace symbol on it; designer Donald J. Pliner will donate $2.50 to the Peace for the Children Foundation for every pair sold! (It is less than 1/100th of the price of the shoe, but still.)
Happy shopping and happy weekend!
I hate my No Buy. I HATE my No Buy. I want my No Buy to become incarnate so I can put Nair in its shampoo and spread rumors about it doing unsavory things with then entire water polo team. I want to ask it to prom, and then not show up, or ever better, show up with her best friend who is wearing the same dress and looks totally hotter.
But why do I hate my No Buy? I’m so glad you asked.
I hate my No Buy because I cannot buy these $372 Galliano mules for $149
I hate my No Buy because I cannot buy these Bibas with the ever-elusive mid-heel, so I can wear them with black tights come fall.
And I ESPECIALLY hate my No Buy becauseI cannot buy these perfect perfect perfect $500 tango shoes from Martin Margiela on sale for less than $150.
A word about Yoox pictures. They are not always the prettiest. Most shoes are photographed at a slight angle to look more gracile, while Yoox shoots them straight from the side. Not as flattering, but hey, for $150 Gallianos, I’ll take a little slapdash photography.
Thanks to an internet friend who calls herself “a scrawny girl” for sending us this news item:
PORTLAND, Ore. – When Susan Kuhnhausen returned home from work one day earlier this month, she encountered an intruder wielding a claw hammer. After a struggle, the 51-year-old nurse fended off her attacker by strangling him with her bare hands.
Neighbors praised the woman for her bravery, and investigators said they believed the dead man — Edward Dalton Haffey — was burglarizing Kuhnhausen’s home.
But after an investigation, police now say the intruder Kuhnhausen strangled was apparently a hit man hired by her estranged husband — Michael James Kuhnhausen Sr. — to kill her.
::snip::
An emergency room nurse who lives in a southeast Portland neighborhood, Susan Kuhnhausen arrived home on the evening of Sept. 6 to find Haffey coming at her with a claw hammer.
She was struck in the head and wrested the weapon away, but the struggle continued and Haffey bit the nurse, according to police. A large woman, she was eventually able to get the slight Haffey into a chokehold and police later found him dead in a hallway. An autopsy revealed the cause of death as strangulation.
Police say she acted in self-defense.
Whoa!!!!
Francesca says again: Whoa!!!
She is most gratified and moved by the end of the article:
Susan Kuhnhausen was out of town attending a nursing conference and did not immediately return a phone call seeking comment.
She left this message on her voicemail: “I’m not able to answer all the calls that I’ve received in the past few days. I’m being comforted by your concern and your support. I want you to know that our lives are all at risk for random acts, but more likely random acts of love will come your way than random acts of violence.”
Kuhnhausen is large of body and of spirit.
Shoe clearance on women’s and kids’ shoes at Nordstrom! oh, oh oh!
(”Approval” meets Francesca’s approval! Especially at 40% off!)
Certain t-shirts at Avenue are selling now for under $10, while supplies last. Each one comes in so many wonderful colors! Stock up for next summer.
Today only, get discounted ground shipping on any order over $100 at Zaftique, by entering code FRSUMMER08 at checkout.
The bi-annual “red tag” clearance sale is going on at Coldwater Creek. Save up to 80% on over 1,000 items. (Here are the 45 items still available in Size 3X. Francesca likes this sweet gingham front-tie shirt, and this silk wrap-shirt. She is also thinking about getting this eyelet shirt-and-shorts set, for lounging around on a Sunday at home, or to cover up a bit at the beach when the sun is too strong for her.)
At Swimsuits for All, Find Great Deals on The Hottest Styles on Sale Now at get 20% off any Plus Size New Arrival
by entering code NEW20. Or get 50% off any Women’s Christina Style
by entering code CHRISTINA50.
Always for Me is having a swimwear sale, with many items 25-50% off. (The style to the left is available here, at 25% off.) Please note: no returns on sale items.
Labor Day sale at Lane Bryant for six days!
Through September 1, get 15% off your full-price purchase at J.Jill by entering code HBC241 at checkout. Women’s sizes are here. Tall sizes are here. Francesca notices that many beautiful items in the Women’s section are on sale — and therefore not eligible for the discount code, but at excellent prices on their own. This dress here is available up to size 4x and is great for work.
Through September 5th, use code FALL2008 to get 10% off your purchase at WomenSuits.com.
Win a $100 “shopping spree” at the HolyClothing Webstore: Send an email to contest@holyclothing.com with a photo of yourself in a HolyClothing garment, telling them “a bit about yourself, where you enjoy wearing it, compliments you’ve received, etc.” Entries will be judged for the “best photo and text combination,” and winners will get more clothes and have their photo featured in an upcoming Holy Clothing newsletter.
Lots of new items at the Overstock section of Land’s End.
Happy shopping!
xoxo
Mustard and vanilla ice cream? Peanut butter on hot dogs? I’m not one to judge (HA. See what I did there? It’s called lying. Good times) but y’all are CRAZY.
It’s like my friend Greg who –after seeing my rather unusual lunch– announced loudly that he was glad to know I wasn’t pregnant.* Because what could possibly be less embarrassing than having a good-looking attached guy with whom you are friendly (but not, you know, “friendly”) proclaim his relief at your lack of ripening womb fruit to a room full of colleagues?
Where was I? Oh right, you people eat weird things. I want more.
Today Miss Plumcake wants to know:
What is your weirdest food combination or craving?
And just because turnabout is fair somethingorother, I will share with you that my favorite food in the whole wide world is a bean and egg breakfast taco with extra cilantro.
and haggis.
Because haggis is awesome.
*Come to think of it, that doesn’t even make sense. It’s not like I was drinking a bottle of hair spray and smoking a Lucky. I was just eating broccoli slaw, and isn’t eating weird things a sign that you ARE pregnant?
So many things wrong with the world are expressed in this Wall Street Journal article, on so many levels, that Francesca hardly knows where to start:
I’ve spent months asking people in the fashion industry why large sizes are so rare. Designer Elie Tahari explained last year that it’s expensive to offer bigger sizes, which require more fabric, as well as special patterns and a separate “fit” model, a model whose standard proportions are used to fit the clothes.
Mr. Tadashi, however, says large women are willing to pay extra for designer duds. His queen-size dresses retail for roughly $350 to $800, about 10% to 15% more than his standard sizes.
Perhaps more important, fashion-industry people are often fixated on their own ideals of beauty. Many designers just don’t want to see their clothes on big people — and many stores are complicit, displaying tiny sizes and keeping larger ones in back. Paige Adams-Geller, a former fit model for many high-end jeans manufacturers, told me in March that she urged designers to consider how their clothes would look on a woman who wore, for instance, a size 10.
“And the designer would say, ‘Well, I don’t want someone who is that size,’ ” she said, “ ’They shouldn’t be wearing my brand.’ ” Ms. Adams-Geller turned that into a profitable business, Paige Premium Denim, selling jeans for up to size 28 — or “4X.” “I’m like, there’s a lot of people out there that size with money to spend,” she said.
Let’s see. We have the fact that designers don’t want women like us wearing their clothes. But we knew that. It is bigoted and disgusting, but we knew about it.
We have the fact that large women often pay extra for their clothes, even though the proportions of the fit model, etc are often arbitrary; who decided that one body shape is normal and another is not? But we knew that.
We have the fact (later in the article) that “shoes and handbags” are the only items easy to fit to larger women. But boy, did we know that!
There is the implication (later in the article) that plus-size models actually do things like eat and smile during photo shoot breaks, making Francesca worry even more about the emotional and physical state of “normal” models.
There is the good news that some designers are seeing the $$$$ opportunities and making clothes for NORMAL PEOPLE LIKE US.
Francesca is grateful that the reporter, Christina Binkley, did not show any overt anti-fat sentiment in her writing. In general the article is respectful of the needs of women, and recognizes that MOST women are not being served by the fashion industry.
But it will be a much better world when even generally respectful people do not report that “gathers called ruching, darts and shutter pleats coyly masking all manner of flaws.”
Francesca knows it is a utopic dream, but would it not be wonderful if belly rolls, lumps, etc were considered simply “body shapes” and not “flaws”?
::sigh.::
(Hat tip: Thanks to our friend Nancy for sending us the link.)
