Showing posts with label Pump 'n Slipper. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Pump 'n Slipper. Show all posts

Tuesday, May 18, 2010

REFEED CITY

I went into uber-deficit (read: very bad weight training) mode in the four days leading up to my formal affair, so as to compensate for my hair and make-up inexperience. The best thing the dress had going with it was its slink factor. I donned big jewels, big lips, big hair (inadvertently channeling Sandra B. -to show solidarity!) little dress, and a hundred and thirty-sex pounds (that's right, 1-3-6) of primp and confidence. Judging from my ex boyfriend's inability to make eye contact for the first hour after I made my entrance, I think I can say I killed it.

The three ensuing weeks have been filled, not unlike the moist sugary centers of creme-sandwich cookies, with moist sugar. I scarfed a half-dozen Dunkin' Donuts the morning-after (after brunch); the floodgates open, I rediscovered pastries, ice cream, whiskey, pasta, and, most winningly, accessibly and destructively, creme-sandwich cookies. Pleasingly, it took about ten days to gain any weight at all - I was still all narrow boy-belly and golden tan until just last week, when I reached, and hovered comfortably at 140 lbs.

One forty. As a Big Girl - accustomed to shouldering Big Girl inconveniences (the ill-fit rompers, the involuntary air of austerity, the dreaded Big Spoon Syndrome) - the number haunts me. I'm -dare I say it? - self conscious. It's not a Big weight to be sure; but while my build is stubbornly svelte, and my clavicular lordosis* lends itself to the appearance of delicacy, there's simply something about being Big that runs counter to femininity. (135, on the other hand, ekes out 'winsome'.)

Numbers aside, though, it's got to be said that I look better at 140 lbs. I don't apply "too thin" lightly - I admire thinness, aesthetically speaking. Taylor Momsen, in a skeletal blaze of cigarette smoke and cigarette jeans, is addicting to look at. There's something ethereally striking, almost academic about a really willowy woman - the prominent leanness of Angelina Jolie supersedes, in my mind, pin-up types (quite low-brow, really) and athletic figures.

Of course I realize that weight isn't a particularly relevant component to endearing appearances. A 98 lb Jessica Simpson retained, albeit on a smaller scale, her bux.


Angelina, meanwhile, makes a lanky pregnant lady. The frame on which one carries one's weight is the determinant of perception - and mine, as it were, isn't "skinny". Infuriatingly, I look "too thin" without actually being too thin! The frumpy turn of phrase 'being comfortable in one's own skin' is the inevitable solution.


*Not a medical term

Monday, April 19, 2010

The Weekend Roundup

The weekend roundup:
 -Bad food days on Friday / Saturday evenings, owing to a wonderful, tasty duo of dinner parties featuring French cooking, wine, cheese and cake. -2 deficit days, which sets me back to 15 days to go. Sad face.
-Good lift on Saturday; mini-lift on Sunday.
-Procured a dress! After much scrambling around Midtown - SoHo BarneyDale's, becoming panicked at unbecoming, uneconomical choices, I made an eleventh-hour drop into my favorite little vintage boutique. Miraculously, they pulled out a luscious one-off unlined satin, backless vintage slip dress that fit like a dream - and for $100! It needs a little bling, but it's succulently slinky and quite unique for a black, floor-length dress. It's deliciously clingy also - which is inspiration and threat to be extra-conscientious with regard to deficit this week.

The only problem is the sunburn pattern on my back.

Thursday, April 15, 2010

The Thighs Have It. . .

Cottage cheese is a fantastic diet snack, because it tastes so truly awful that I can't have more than a couple of spoonfuls before totally losing my appetite.

Onwards!

Yesterday was a good example of a good lift day, with no added weight. I did one slow set of 85 on the bench press, but I probably have at least 2 more lifts before feeling confident about moving on. My bench press is slowly but surely catching up to my LB squat. On that front, 100 is still a fairly challenging set. I had a very solid deadlift at 155; I'm allowing myself to graduate to 160 (huzzah!) next time.

Formals. Are. A reason. To attend graduate school. I'm so, so thrilled to have been invited to Yale's annual Pump & Slipper ball. It's in precisely 10 days, which coincides nicely with Project Deficit (3 successful days down; 15 to go). I popped into Max Azria last night to pre-screen some formal wear, and remembered (from high school prom, a decade since!) how devastatingly I fill out an evening gown.

I can't find a photo of the L'atelier gown online, but these two were both pretty solid affairs. Unfortunately, the black was a little boring, and they didn't carry the one-strap number in my size.

I'll be making a concerted effort to land a killer ball gown + accouterments this weekend, with bride-to-be N in tow.