The Week in Review.

1. Everyone’s probably back to school now, including my Wellesley friends who don’t happen to be going abroad. In truth, I’m kind of missing school too. I was busy most of the summer, but I’ve also had about two or three weeks lazing around at home, and I’m ready to get back to work! The start of school is the perfect excuse for getting a new tote bag, which is an infinitely cooler way to carry one’s books than a backpack. (Of course, if one has a lot of heavy textbooks, it’s best just to use the backpack to avoid injury.) While I’m just going to pack a more formal and business wear-appropriate tote during my semester abroad, I am quite fond of keeping around a fun and casual tote for class. Colorful prints or materials like canvas or straw can be very cute.

Betseyville Tote, $45.00.

2. The new O.P.I. for Sephora nail polish line is quite fun to play around with in the store. They are a bit pricey because they are salon-quality, but wow, just from trying it in the store, there is a difference. Since they go on to the nail very thick and smooth, it’s easy even for someone with clumsy hands like mine to do their nails neatly with higher quality nail polish. When compared to the price of several manicures, $9 a bottle is not too bad. They also offer a top coat, a base coat, and other odds and ends so that you can really do your own manicure. I probably won’t be investing in this since I get tired of individual colors so quickly, but if you can find a roommate or two to split it with and plan on using it for a while, the pricing is not too bad at all.

3. I hope no former Hillary supporter is fooled by McCain’s choice of Sarah Palin as a running mate. I was a Hillary supporter myself, but will of course be voting for Obama come November. I am not particularly enthused about Obama as a candidate. I am, however, well aware, that the Democratic candidate I liked less is still a far lesser evil than McCain/Palin when it comes to actual women’s issues like the right to choice. I’ll step off my soapbox now, but the argument that people will vote Republican just because they have a woman on the ticket makes me so angry. No one’s going to be fooled by that transparent a ploy from the Republican party. It’s just like those articles that argue that today’s teenage girls or just today’s teenagers or children do stupid things just because of what’s on TV or what’s going on with some specific, little groups of people.

4. I am almost completely recovered from my wisdom teeth extraction! I do not actually have dry socket, which is a relief. The recovery process for getting wisdom teeth out is actually not that big a deal at all, I just have very little else to complain about, and I quite like complaining.

5. I have the biggest urge to start browsing thrift stores because of the way some bloggers out there are able to incorporate thrift store pieces into their outfits so well. Unfortunately, those seem to be in very short supply in the California bay area. In the Boston area, I’m only familiar with the likes of Second Time Around and other still kind of pricey, swanky places that have locations in the Newbury Street area, but I’ll be sure to keep an eye out for more options in both my home locales.

Until next week, stay stylish!

Cheap Thrill: Forever 21 Flower Headband.

Forever 21 headband, $3.80.

Though I love being at home, one disadvantage to being in the suburbs is that the shopping options just don’t match up to being within easy reach of a city, even a smaller one like Boston or Providence, where I occasionally go to visit my roommate from last year during short breaks. The Providence Mall Forever 21, for example, is new, shiny, and gigantic while the Forever 21 at home is a bit small, disorganized, and hasn’t been redone since I was in middle school. I’ve been there once or twice since coming home and the clothes have been a bit disappointing. Though I do love to shop there dearly, the comparatively low quality of the clothes there does get highlighted when they try to incorporate prints or patterns like the ubiquitous plaid that seems to be quite in for fall.

The hair accessories, though, don’t disappoint quite as much. I really like this red faux leather flower headband. It looks a bit unwieldy, but the flower is just the right size when the headband is on, and it’s surprisingly understated. It’s also available in black, but I opt for the red since it has better contrast with my black hair.

I’ll Admit it, I’m Wimpy.

I’m feeling a little more under the weather now from getting my wisdom teeth taken out. I’m starting to really feel the unpleasant side effects from some of the medicine, and I’m not even taking the most hardcore painkiller anymore. I think I might also have dry socket, and if that’s the case I can probably look forward to being under the weather for a bit longer.

I’d been optimistic and hoping to make it to Berkeley to see one of my best friends and visit her for the weekend now that classes have begun there. (I always find it really interesting to see how different it is at different colleges.) Looks like I’m going to have to postpone my trip. Oh well, my recovery period does give me an excuse to eat lots of coffee ice cream, which is my favorite.

Photo from Flickr.

What I Wore: Early Spring.

Cardigan from Express, T-shirt from Urban Outfitters, Skinny jeans from Hollister, Flats from Kenneth Cole, Yellow cross-body bag from China.

I am really, really missing the cooler weather since I really hate the heat. It makes me feel too tired to come up with good outfits. This is an outfit from early Spring while I was at school. My younger sister, who will be going through the college-application process this year, was visiting me because she wants to go to MIT. She’s definitely the more hard-working and science and math oriented between the two of us. It cannot be denied, however, that Wellesley is a supremely good undergraduate institution.

I definitely wear those skinny jeans too much, from winter to summer. I do really like skinny jeans, but the Hollister ones are super cheap and so they do get a little weird, wrinkly, and stretched out very quickly.

Back to School: Some of my Possible Picks for Fall.

Sweater Dress from Forever 21 Twelve by Twelve, Necklace from Forever 21, Scarf from H&M, Bag from Gap, Flats from Urban Outfitters.

Here are some of my favorite things at my usual shopping haunts that I would love to buy for back-to-school. The sweater dress and necklace are especially consistent with the more lady-like and elegant style I hope to portray through my outfits. The bag is a good size for notebooks and the like, and I do have a very soft spot for messenger bags though things get heavy very quickly when carried that way.

If and when they ever bring a shopping online option to H&M fans in the United States, it will be once of the most exciting fashion moments of my life. I imagine very popular pieces would still sell out very quickly, but I wouldn’t curse myself every time I see something there in the store that’s already completely gone in my size.

Another Reason why I’ll Never Work in Fashion.

“A ranking candidate for a six-figure-a-year-with-perks editor job, the woman has been well-briefed by a friend, a Voguette already safely ensconced in the elite fold, as to the toe cleavage sans stockings. Anna, the bosom buddy has warned the job seeker, dictates everything that goes into the magazine… to how they are supposed to dress if they want to work there, or continue working there.”

– Anna Wintour: The Hot Life and Cool Times of Vogue’s Editor in Chief. via Gawker.

I have terribly sensitive feet and sometimes get aches, blisters, and the like on my 1.25” inch splurge work/evening heels. I shudder to think what even trying on three or four inch heels are like. That being said, most any workplace you find yourself in, almost right down to working at your local Hollister or Abercrombie, comes with at least a moderately restrictive dress code. Most bosses are not quite as powerful in their industry as I assume Anna Wintour is, and don’t have quite as much power or will to be as exacting, but there are always standards and dress is a very important part of how others perceive you. It’s not unique to the fashion industry at all, though I imagine Anna Wintour is uniquely intimidating to anyone lucky enough to work at Vogue.

Of course, I’ll probably eventually transition into higher heels so as not to be so conspicuously short when in the working world. That and I’ll either end up working somewhere where dress codes are fairly loose so long as it’s a bit professional-looking and not provocative (professor or researcher at a think tank) or somewhere where I can only wear an old fashioned, dumpy power suit (top law firm) and must keep my hair tightly up if it’s past a certain length.

Wisdom Teeth Extraction Complete!

My wisdom teeth surgery went very smoothly. They took out all four teeth under IV sedation and I was completely unconscious the whole time. The scariest part was just all the precautions they had to take – an oxygen tube for the nostrils, a blood pressure and EKG monitor, and I didn’t even really feel the IV needle going in. I’m also fortunate enough not to get any side effects from the Vicodin or the antibiotic, though the oral surgeon said something about including something for nausea in the IV bag. I might find that I actually am sensitive to the medication tomorrow, but I can phase out the painkiller pretty quickly, I think.

There shouldn’t be much slowdown to my rate of posts at all. Something as routine as wisdom teeth removal can’t get me down for long.