grace grits and gardening

ramblings from an arkansas farm girl

It Is What It Is!

By

When I drew pay at the bank, the President and I kept an ongoing list of phrases and words that needed to be ixednay asap. We were so over it.  I hope he is still keeping the list going. I know it’s still in his head. Many of these annoying words are used primarily in everyday conversation, when Facebooking or text messaging. LOL they are smooth worn out. 

Whitney looked terrible at that party, just saying. Just saying? Just saying what? Exactly what is the point of these two words tacked on the end of a sentence? These two words change the meaning – it’s a bit of a pot-stirrer phrase. The sentence is insinuating and must be spoken with a cocked eyebrow. Whitney looked terrible at that party, just saying (…I think she was drugged out of her head). Also it reminds me a bit of Yoda-speak? Terrible at the party Whitney looked, just saying.


Anything with Obama used as a prefix needs to go – hopefully by the next election – Obamaland, Obamamama, Obamanation, Obamayomama, Obamalicious.

Today for something to be politically correct it must be green. Green living, Green building, Green clothing, Green Obamacare, Green eggs. Slap the word green in front, and it is like super awesome! Greengreengreen! Like, it is so cool to be green. Like, whatever. OMG, like was he for real? And then I was like, ROTFLMAO! No way? Way! Like duh! I know! Like, whatever! Seriously. Like for real. 

And, thinking outside the box. What’s wrong with being inside the box? I would not, could not, in a box or with a fox. My bad! Your bad what? Your bad grammar? 

In the BIG-bidness world, there are many obnoxious phrases that need to, like, totally disappear. 

“When you pencil it out with the major players going dark, the hard corner would be cash neutral even with ground up construction. Let’s drill down and revisit these mission critical actionable items in next week’s focus group maintaining full transparency, of course.” Totally. Huh? 

At the end of the day, this makes me want to puke. Seriously, just saying.
talya


Musical Pairings:


Tim McGraw, “Back When”
Laura M. Kelly, “Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious”

Couture for Big Dummies

By

I live 5 minutes from the Dallas Arts District. The district is a magnificent collection of venues designed by Pritzker Prize winning architects, with world class art collections, opera, musical performances and sculpture. People travel across the globe to this destination in downtown Dallas. I travel through it quite often on my way to watch the Dallas Mavericks play at the American Airlines Center. It’s an impressive cultural district. My favorite is the annual Dallas Symphony’s Christmas Spectacular. John and I also attended South Pacific at the Winspear Opera House. We chose this particular performance because a) it was not an opera, and, b) my dad allegedly named me after some Polynesian chick in the book South Pacific. I was curious to see if Talya would be included in the cast of characters. Not. I feel just a bit hipper knowing our home is so close to all this culture – in case we want to partake – which we rarely do. But, it’s good for re-sale.  (I hope.)


Yesterday, my mother and I set off to soak up a bit of Dallas culture. Her friend, Carlos, a tour guide at the Dallas Museum of Art (DMA), invited us to attend the current exhibit – The Fashion World of Jean Paul Gaultier, From the Sidewalk to the Catwalk. The exhibit had received rave reviews and was ending soon, so we quickly jumped at the chance to attend. And, with our own tour guide! Prior to this invitation, I really had no desire to see this. I didn’t know much about Gaultier other than he designed those pointy conical boob corset rigs for Madonna during her 1990 Blonde Ambition World Tour. 


I studied up for about five minutes before the tour. According to the DMA website, Gaultier is “unquestionably one of the most important fashion designers in recent decades…. draws inspiration from dance, pop-rock, cinema, television…..eclectic and vibrant sources of inspiration… over 140 haute couture dresses and ready-to-wear pieces made between the early 1970s and 2011.” Well that sounded pretty interesting! Maybe there would be Oscar dresses on display – like the first lady inaugural ball gowns at the Smithsonian? I loved that. So elegant and historical. My favorites were Mamie Eisenhower and Lady Bird Johnson. Hillary – not so much. 
  
What to wear? I felt as if I had to pay particular attention to what I wore as I would be surrounded by high-class fashion. Well that thought was fleeting – I wore jeans, boots and a gray sweater – my typical uniform. It was haute enough for me. The first thing of note when we arrived was the lengthy line of cars waiting to park inside the DMA parking garage. Very strange for a Thursday morning I thought. Was Madonna actually going to be wearing that corset inside?


Making our way inside, the place was jammed packed! Wow. This was impressive! Obviously the economy is improving. Well attended artsy fartsy events are a very dependable good leading indicator. Waaaaay more reliable than the volatile stock market. The Nasdaq fluctuates based on Lloyd Blankfein’s lunch selection. Is someone without grocery money really going to spend twenty bucks to see high fashion, when you can see it for free down the street at Neiman Marcus? I think not. But, of course, Neimans does not have Madonna’s actual bustier, complete with sweat stains.  My consumer outlook was becoming more positive. 

I’m not much on fancy clothing. If I won an oscar I would probably be Sharon Stone-like in a black Gap sweater with maybe a long black taffeta skirt. Slenderizing. In junior high, Anita Ashley and I went to charm school. Our mothers thought this would be an excellent idea. It was on Saturdays for several weeks and the grand finale was a fashion show at a restaurant in Blytheville. We selected a few outfits from some little boutique in town and walked around throughout this restaurant, during lunch discussing our outfits. OMG! This was so outside my comfort zone…  We were charged with simply walking up to tables of lunching ladies to interrupt their meals with, “Excuse me, I’m wearing a Hang Ten Tennis Dress with a silk scarf. My shoes are Tretorn.” Please, God, just let me die in my sleep before I make a fool of myself at the Blytheville fashion show!!! Well, I survived the ordeal, no more or less charming, but recognized I would never walk the catwalk, or be on any stage in any capacity.  All those years performing for Daisy Mae were for naught.

Carlos gave us a a brief synopsis of the exhibit before we began, telling us that the mannequins would be speaking to us. He told us to be sure and listen to what they had to say. Hmmmm. Ok… The first room was the Odyssey, inspired by the sea and religion. Half of the mannequins looked like the evil Inferius who nearly grabbed Harry and Dumbledore while hunting for horcruxes. The others were wearing an odd assortment of sailor inspired navy and white/beige striped outfits – an evening gown on a dude, lots of topless outfits, cage dresses, feathers, toile. They were all horizontal stripes so immediately I knew Gaultier fashion would not be for the normal person. Normal people avoid horizontal stripes. 

The mannequins were as freaky as anything I had ever seen. Very, very realistic – somehow a projection trick. They spoke and blinked and all had terrible teeth. The wax museum folks really needed to get on board with this technology. If I could get my hands on one of these when the exhibit breaks down next week, this would be the perfect addition to my Halloween decoration collection. Must discuss with Carlos…

The Boudoir room was a bit more interesting. Madonna’s corsets were on display along with gowns made of ribbons and satin, most designed to be worn naked underneath, leaving nothing to the imagination. I would have worn one of these, maybe, with a wife beater and tights. There was a lavender velvet pointy conical breasted evening gown that was interesting until I realized a man was wearing it.

The Skin Deep exhibit was designed to represent the red light district in Amsterdam. So there was bondage. And leather. And overall bizarro clothing. There was a mannequin in the corner having a conversation with himself, “Should I wear this or not? Is this appropriate, etc.” Well, I could save him some time – hell NO. It was a dress! Carlos explained to us that Gaultier pushed the limits, challenging societal ways with humor. There were body suits that were actually designed to look like a naked body. So why even bother? Just go naked – be a streaker. Gaultier “clothed nudity with nudity.” My mother just stared at Carlos with her mouth open. When Carlos asked, “Does that make sense?” she blurted out, “NO!” I laughed out loud at my mom, but quickly composed myself. I must hang on. No laughing. It would be like laughing at Graceland. It just was not done. I looked around at all the hundreds of visitors. Did they really get this? I was having a difficult time making the stretch from Gaultier high fashion designs to Gaultier inspired t-shirts at my favorite Target. 

Punk Cancan was the best exhibit in my opinion. There was a catwalk in the center with moving mannequins dressed in evening wear and more traditional clothing – traditional for Gaultier. If I squinted, there were a couple of dresses I could see wearing to Kelsey’s inaugural ball. Maybe. On either side of the catwalk were punk mannequins making fun of the fancy cat walkers. With the exception of the mannequin wearing a hefty bag, tin can bracelet and a steel wool soap pad around his neck, these outfits were the best – they included three camouflage ensembles. I had never been so happy to see camo. I felt like cheering.

The final exhibits included items inspired by outer space (weren’t they all?) and cultures and the environment. By this point, I had checked out. I was becoming a bit delirious. It was couture overload. Especially for me. I was really trying to take it all in, understand it, think outside the planet. My head hurt. I was hungry. There was a body suit on one mannequin in this area with a picture of Jason Kidd in the center. It was supposedly Gaultier but I knew it was really Jason Kidd. I wonder if Jason knew? I doubt any of the Mavs had set foot in this exhibit on their way to practice. 

In all seriousness, Carlos was an excellent tour guide – very knowledgeable. I cannot imagine seeing the exhibit without someone to explain away the overall strangeness. To recap: 

  • The Dallas economy is on the upswing
  • No need to waste one more thought on your wardrobe. There are no rules. Anything goes. 

Afterward, we lunched at The Screen Door which was fantastic. After all that haute couture, I needed to see a normal, everyday screen door – with peeling paint. It was true art.

Thanks Carlos!

talya
(and the BAT)

Note the sticks coming out of the Bat’s head.
Very Gaultier.

Musical Pairings:

Madonna, “Like a Virgin”
Lady GaGa, “Fashion”

Do you think I’m Tex-y?

By

In my zone. I was typing away furiously, the words freely flowing – life is good.  Typing is one of my true talents – I am speedy, and I have the high school trophies to show for it – at home in Arkansas, underneath the sink in the bathroom, where the mice play. Tall trophies. I won them at the Cotton Boll Vo-Tech School in Burdette, where Mrs. Byford took all her bright, shiny Future Business Leaders of America students. And unlike today, there was a 1st, 2nd, 3rd place trophy and a whole room of leftover slow typists who went home with nothing but a day off from school. I might never speak French, but I could type. This one girl I knew once said, “I never want to learn to type – Everyone will always ask me to type their papers in college.” What? What kind of sense did that make? Who was going to type her papers? Kids today are born knowing how to type. The typing gene was passed down from those of us who took timed speed tests in the 1970s. 

So as I was on a roll, cracking myself up, a certain mischievous schnauzer plops a raccoon on my air mac hitting just the wrong key and launching me into a whole new level of cyberness. Ugh!!!!!!!!!!! She typed a whole line of jumble. Of course, it wasn’t a real raccoon, although I wouldn’t have batted an eye had it been. Thank goodness for the Undo Button. I threw the raccoon across the room and looked down at my keypad and screen to make sure it wasn’t bleeding. That’s when I really noticed Great Grandma Creecy’s hand searching for the undo button! WHEN did my hand turn into a piece of fried chicken? 


Daddy always said, “Doesn’t matter what you do to the rest of your body, your hands will give you away.” Once again, here he was, speaking from the grave, right as rain. He didn’t say a whole lot but when he did he was usually right. And his message was usually delivered deadpan. There was nothing funny about this. 

Maybe it was the bad lighting in my bedroom this morning? And I probably needed to drink more water – that was my new years resolution this year (and every year). Like most resolutions, I did really well for a few weeks….  I bet I was dehydrated! All that night sweating was shriveling my hands! And my nails were disgusting. My cuticles were jagged and each fingernail was a different shape! Gross. Looked like I had traded in my banking job to pull Johnsongrass full-time. But the most glaring thing was this warty thingy near my wrist. It was sorta like a wart but wasn’t. It was like a hard knotty zit – one that had nothing inside but you kept thinking it might. Handsome-Dr.-Ruben-with-the-perfect-skin said it was nothing, “But I can freeze it off, if it bothers you.” Yeah it bothered me – it stared at me all day long. While I typed. It was stifling me.

So he burned it off, turning it really nasty for a week or so. It blistered up and popped and drained and scabbed and healed. And then lo and behold, it came right back. Staring at me again. A bit smaller but still there! I hit the Undo button, restored my words, put Mac back on the desk and ran downstairs to get rid of this carbuncle myself. 

I got the duct tape. Duct tape fixed everything, right? I cut off a piece and taped it over the heinous thing. Somewhere, somehow, I heard that duct tape cured warts – maybe it suffocated the virus? This wasn’t a wart, but it was wart-like. It might not work, but it couldn’t hurt, right? At least I wouldn’t have to feel it glaring at me. I didn’t have the silvery original duct tape, but I had white. Would the color affect the outcome? 

There aren’t that many things I would undo in my life – one things affects another. If you undo something in junior high, you might not have that fab typing trophy in high school. But I would undo the amount of time I spent baking in the sun which has brought me to this point of wearing a piece of duct tape on my KFC hand. 

Needing a professional, I tossed a couple of dog treats to Annabelle and Lucy so they wouldn’t eat a book, and drove to the nail salon for the works. All my little Vietnamese friends were thrilled to see me – no one else was there at 10:30 am. Everyone had jobs. 

One of my favorite parts of the experience is picking a new toe color. There is an entire wall of polishes arranged in rainbow fashion with like colors grouped together. The color itself is important, yet  secondary – I choose based on the name of the polish. If the color doesn’t have a cool name, I’m not gonna wear it. I can’t walk around for weeks with toes named “Getting Miss Piggy With It” or “I Eat Mainly Lobster”.   This is just like choosing a horse at Oak Lawn. First the name of the horse, then the color. I always bet on a gray house, unless it has an unfortunate name. Bad name. Bad karma. Wasted two bucks.

I only do browns, cherry and blue/greens (polish not horses), but only if the name speaks to me. If the bottom of the polish has lost the label and I can’t identify the name of the color – I pass. I had been wearing Rosey Mistletoe’sies pretty much since Christmas – it was time for a change. After careful consideration, for my toes I selected “Do You Think I’m Tex-y” from the new Texas Collection. It spoke to me. But only for my toes. I keep my fingernails au natural. I’m predictable that way. I like my fried chicken plain. 

I sat in the big spa chair with my feet in the hot water and prepared to relax. I was plugged into my favorite tunes to drown out the odd Vietnamese instrumental renditions of Moon River and Deep Purple that played over and over – with a random Christmas song thrown in. I’d rather listen to my own odd assortment of songs… This was my chance to catch up on Demi Moore and Ashton Kutcher’s split. My favorite nail lady, Na, was attending to my feet. A lady I didn’t know (or maybe I just didn’t recognize her?) came over to address my nails. Hmmmm, interesting outfit to say the least. Was she hiding from the law? I should definitely watch America’s Most Wanted just to make sure… Maybe she was from another planet. I do think it’s a possibility. As she studied my nails, I studied her. On this beautiful, warm, 60 degree February day, she was smothered head to toe in strangeness. 

“What this?” she barked, pointing to my hand. Oh, I still had duct tape on my warty thing. I ripped it off – ouch – and dipped my fingertips back into the water. She looked at the thing on my hand, shook her head  as if thinking, “I not believe these white people”. It wasn’t that bad. I wanted to say, “What’s this?” and wave my fried chicken hand the length of her entire ensemble. But of course, I didn’t. I hold these thoughts in, to later spew forth into cyberspace. Sparkly black beanie, beige turtle neck sweater underneath a thick second pink sweater with pink furry collar(!) underneath a white lab coat. And odd yellow reading glasses perched on her pointy nose like an exclamation. She had to be percolating under all those layers! Her face was flushed, especially her nose. I studied her. Oh great! She was sick! Bird flu or something which would be passed to me.


“Are you sick?” I asked. She did not respond. I knew she heard me. She acted like she couldn’t speak English. “ARE. YOU. SICK?” I asked again a bit louder and more slowly in case she couldn’t hear through that beanie on her head. “No. Not sick.” She replied. “Allergy.” Hmmmm, I was skeptical. I should have never asked because suddenly the floodgates opened. “My father in Vietnam have allergy. My nose run and run and run. It horrible. It not stop. I up all night. My nose run.” Oh God.

The allergy lady dipped my hands in paraffin wax and then wrapped my arms to the elbows in towels. I had flashbacks of my recent facial. Typically I pass on the paraffin, but maybe this would help my wart thingy. As soon as my hands were all bound and tied, my nose itched like crazy. Oh great this would drive me nuts! This was ruining the whole relaxing experience. I tried to rub my nose with my huge hand which was now brining in paraffin, but couldn’t adequately maneuver. Allergy lady glared at me over those yellow glasses, looking perturbed. “What you do?”  “My nose is itching – I’m trying to scratch it,” I whine. Without warning, she reached up and swiped my nose with her bird flu hand!!!!! I flinched and accidentally kicked Na who was massaging my feet. This immediately set off an incessant chatter of choppy Vietnamese. You know what I mean – we’ve all heard it before. A customer does something that doesn’t sit right and off they go on a rant. The customers have no idea what’s being said, but we all know it’s about us! Great, I’d done it now. I’d have to find a new nail salon.

After the paraffin wax treatment, my bump thingy was still there of course, but now it was pink and glowing. Still, I felt better. Fresh toes always make a girl feel better.

talya


Musical Pairings:

The Rolling Stones, “Get Off Of My Cloud”
R.E.M., “Losing My Religion”




Food. Farm. Garden. Life.

THANKS FOR READING!