This Is Not A Pastry...

...It's a Crystal Dessert

This is not a pastry...

...It's a Shoe

This is not a pastry...

...It's Mochi

Pastry pas·try \˙pas-tre\ 

sweet baked goods made of dough having a high fat content

(source: http://www.merriam-webster.com)

Just Can't Stay Away

Apparently Kanye is retiring after his latest album, 808s and Heartbreak, to focus on his clothing line.  I can't say that "retirement" is the right word. Has he been in the game that long? Or did he just burn out?  Either way, I'm sure he'll be back for more.

Here are some other people who attempted to retire on multiple occasions:             

 

Michael Jordan Who could forget his 3 retirements and brief stints in baseball and for the Washington Wizards?  Also the namesake of my shoe obsession—Check out these sweet "Opening Day" Jordan I's with matching lid. Notice the classic pinstripe pattern, Sox-like logo and sweet baseball lacing detail on the toe box.

Apparently the colors are inspired by the home and away unis of his team the Sox affiliate the Birmingham Barons.  The crest on the back outer heel represents the 3 homers and 51 RBIs Jordan had while playing for the Barons. You represent, Michael!  No idea what the cap is about, some other equally hilarious stat I hope.

50 Cent When Kanye pushed Graduation to September 11, 2007, the same release date as Curtis was scheduled to drop, the G-Unit frontman promised retire if his own album did not outsell West's.  West outsold 50 by 250,000 units.  He has yet to make good on his threat.

Brett Favre I mostly felt sorry for Aaron Rogers (Cal Alum!) who was 2nd to the throne (of starting QB that is) to a man who "flirted with retirement for years" and claimed to be "mentally tired" just before signing with the Jets.  Pretty cruel for such a nice guy.

Celine Dion The Canadian made plans to retire and now has a show in Vegas!  Claims to be going into semi-retirement this year.  Will she stay out for good?  I'll await her return with bated breath.  In the meantime, Cher has offered to take her place at Ceasar's Palace.  At least Cher never claims to call it quits! 

Willie Mays Amazingly, throughout his 21 season

career, Mays only played for the Mets and the Giants.

Roger Clemens Clemens

 career was marred multiple times by rumors of special treatment (ie not being required to travel with the team when not pitching) as well as by Jose Canseco's tell all and subsequent trials in which he and fellow Yankees pitcher Andy Petit(along with Trainer McNamee) accused one another of lying.  His forced retirement because of the steroids scandel is the only one to which I say, good riddance!

Jaÿ-Z I have love for the guy, but retiring after the Black Album and the Fade to Black tour/movie combo was a great way to go out.  Two "comeback albums" later he is still recording, I would argue, subpar material.  I do however, enjoy the Kingdom Come album cover.

Rickey Henderson Bill James on Rickey Henderson: "If you could split him in two, you'd have two Hall of Famers." Although practically guaranteed a spot, Rickey is still not actually in there yet because a player must be retired for 5 years before he can be nominated.  he man of steal" finally left the majors in 2003 and will be eligible in 2009 for the hall although he still refuses to make it official.  When is his shoe coming out?  The crest could look like this:

Nemises

Hipsters are lame.  Not only do they take everything cool, they make us civilians feel dumb for having liked whatever it was they stole in the first place.  Example A: PBR. Was just a good ol' cheap beer 'til hipsters started drinking it. Then I didn't want it anymore.  Example B: Tecate. The current cheap beer of choice, so amazing especially when you can get it in a can at a bar for $2.  This however brings up the paradox of hipsterdom.  Once hipsters adopt something it is in high demand and becomes readily available everywhere so as to make hipsters shun it for becoming to popular all thanks to them. 

Other examples include, plaid, the color purple, Ray Bans and Clarks, all of which I have loved for a very long time but now feel I

 can no longer love because of their prevalence in the hipster community.  Which also means I have nothing to wear.  

This brings us to my secondary nemesis of long standing (The second of 2 nemises if you will).  All of the things I have listed above are available at the dreaded UO—except the beer of course (though I'm sure their creative team is developing a way to market that as we speak).

My relationship with UO goes something like this:

I find something cool that I love and want to buy like these amazing dunks (left) that seem to be available only at the Nike Sportswear boutique.  I make plans to buy them.  Then they appear on the UO website.  I can no longer buy them. 

Sometimes, however, I am not so lucky.  Some

times I scour the Haight for some amazing wrestling boots which were all the rage in Europe at the time but were too cool for the US by far .  I find some bad Asics (below).

I buy them.  2 months later guess who stocks them in stores? I can no longer wear them for at least 3 years (speaking of which, time's almost up! Hooray, time to bust those puppies out again).  Side-note: Have you seen the Onitsuka Tiger Snow Heaven 72? Hilarious.

Another of my fave items: minnetonka mocs are also demoted to recluse-wear (in house) because I stupidly bought the ultra-cheap-most-common-version(brown) from a DSW-like store in Sacramento instead of buying the one's I really wanted(white).

Sometimes the item in question does not even exist yet, but is solely in my head.  I don't take credit for high waisted jeans coming back but I sho' know I wanted 'em before they were available to buy...

Best case scenario: I buy the item on sale from the dreaded store.  This has not happened to date but I keep checking just in case.

Item of note these days: a wrap cardigan with a navajo rug pattern on it.  Unmentionable store had one that was nice but it was on sale for $59.99 which seems like a pretty non-sale price to me. 

I also hate buying things from that store because the quality is so inconsistent.  One pair of amazing jeans from there, another from the same label, same size, completely huge and mom-butting.

The thing I hate the most though, about hipsters and UO alike is that competitive feeling I get when I see something I wanted or someone wearing things I think of as part of my individual style. I feel the need to point out that I saw the trend first, or was wearing it in 1983 (before I was born, by the way) or whatever little detail I can think of that will prove that I am different from the masses. 

  Which is why I love this article in the Times: The Fashion Report of 1920.

Redwings and a Filson jacket

are definately what I need to be rocking.  But I'm sure my nemesis will come out with them next week...

Dear William Gibson,

Please sell these shoe ideas to Nike because I need to own them.

"...they were wearing the same kind of black high-top SWAT-trainers that Rydell had worn on patrol in nKnoxville, the ones with the Kevlar insoles in case somebody nuck up and tried to shoot you in the bottom of the foot....'I had a pair of shoes like that,' Rydell said. 'Made in Portland, Oregon.  Two hun

dred ninety-nine dollars out at CostCo.'"

"...great big pebble-grain wingtips with cleated Vibram soles"

"...sneakers with little red ligts embedded in the edges of the soles...He had his feet up on the back of the front passenger seat and the little red lights around the edges of his sneakers were spelling out the lyrics to some song."

I have attached some drawings of what I think the shoes look like.

Thank you very much,

Sincerely,

Chinita Linda