Dear Conde Nast:

Please stop shrink-wrapping all the magazines you send me. I know you deperately want me to renew (early and often), but all that nasty plastic is starting to piss me off. If I want to resubscribe, I will use one of the eleventy billion postcards you thoughtfully scatter throughout your pages. Alternatively, I will go on this new-fangled thing called "the internet," where I can buy magazines with no paper waste what-so-ever. No more plastic wrap! I beg of you.

Sincerely,

K.

Decisions, Decisions...

Hypothetical decisions, as I am broke. If I were going to buy a pair of sequin Chuck Taylors from 6pm.com, should I get:Black?

Silver?

or Blue?

I'm leaning toward blue, but maybe they would look bad with jeans? Perhaps the black would be more... understated. Ha! Also, Dear 6pm.com, why are these still $52.00 when they came out two years ago? That's less than half off! I pretty much refuse to buy anything unless it's 80% off.

Amish Ryan would hate these. It may be worth $52 just to see the look of horror on his face.

Hey Acne!

Apparently there is a clothing brand named "Acne." Why they decided to name their (expensive!) clothing and shoe designs after one of nature's most irritating and unattractive skin conditions is beyond me. I'm waiting for the diffusion line, Psoriasis. Sorry, that is not the point of this, I just got caught up in annoyance at the whole we're-so-edgy-ness of the name. Moving on!

I was reading Fashionista.com today, because I am a glutton for punishment, and they did one of their "Adventures in Copyright" posts regarding the lovely footwear specimen above, the Acne Ataconda. Apparently, Jeffrey Campbell has made a shoe that looks (almost) exactly like this highly coveted clodhopper. Horrors! And I mean horrors, that TWO designers would create such an ugly shoe, AND that lots of people would want to buy it. Doesn't it look orthopedic? I had a college professor who had a short leg due to a hip problem, and her left shoe looked a lot like this. Except without the snappy metallic stripe.

Image via Polyvore. God knows where they found it.

Hey! Rachel Bilson

So recently there has been some debate about the FTC rules about bloggers disclosing free stuff they get from companies to review. That's all well and good; I don't really care because no one gives me free stuff. I'm really more annoyed about celebrity product endorsements. I hate when you see a celebrity in an ad or on a commercial, shilling some product you just know they don't use. (Tiger Woods drives a Buick? Sarah Jessica Parker colors her own hair at home with Garnier??)

A particularly irksome example of this phenomenon occurred in the November issue of Lucky. Rachel Bilson* (who's also on the cover) stars in a six page advertisement for Tresemme products: Note the text starting on line 4: "With the help of Tresemme, she achieves the most fashion-forward hairstyles to compliment each look."

Then, about twenty pages later in the "Her Way" segment, she gives a recommendation for a shampoo and conditioner: Tresemme! No, wait, that would actually make sense. Instead, she recommends something called Davines Love Smoothing Shampoo and Conditioner, which will set you back $19 and $22, respectively. What?! Didn't you just spend six pages of ad space trying to convince me that Tresemme will make my hair look like yours for about $3 a bottle? Liar!

Scanned evidence! (from Lucky Magazine, November 2009)

If you click the picture, you can see the whole thing, if you need to.

*Who is this person, anyway? I keep seeing her all over the place, (well, on the internet and in magazines) but she doesn't seem to do anything, other than lie about shampoo and wear outfits that people think are really cool. Anyone? Am I just getting old?