SANTA BABY

So, Christmas is only a few days away and I'm not in a very Christmas-y spirit yet, though I am looking forward to cheating on my diet on the year's cheat-day par excellence. I had been thinking about what I'd want to get this year (somewhat inspired by the HILARIOUS videos by Drew Droege's impersonation of Chloë Sevigny) and so I came up with a list of things I would like to get and then narrowed them down to the following five (in no particular order):

NUMBER 1 : A TALL, DARK AND HANDSOME VEGETARIAN.
Santa MUST know I've been single for quite a while (insert Dalí's The Persistence of Memory here, or a video of a tumbleweed, or a cricket sound...or...never mind, I think I made it clear), and though I have broadened my standards, a friend recently reminded me that, once upon a time, being a vegetarian was an essential requirement.

EXAMPLE: CHRISTIAN BALE.

NUMBER 2: DINNER WITH MADONNA. Or lunch, or breakfast or brunch! Whatever it may be. Oh, and I need to be able to bring my friend Paloma along as well to make it complete. You see Santa?! I'm learning to share! (But let me figure out whether she really neeeeeds to sit with us at the same table or if she can just watch from afar).

I CAN SETTLE FOR PIZZA.

NUMBER 3: THE FABERGÉ EGG I'VE BEEN WAITING FOR SINCE I WAS 8.
I SO behaved that year, and I still didn't get it. I was so distraught. Of course, maybe Santa had a hard time deciding WHICH Fabergé egg to bring me. I was never able to make up my mind as to which one was my favorite and I never specified, so I'll give him that, but today I feel like I should probably have the one with the lily of the valley theme since they were, together with narcissus, my favorite flowers in my garden in Moscow (I think I'm just going to have to rush to the closest perfume shop and sniff some Diorissimo for nostalgia's sake).
Seriously, Santa, it's been 22 years...

(SIGH)

TINY PORTRAITS OF NICHOLAS II AND HIS FIRST TWO DAUGHTERS, OLGA AND TATIANA

NUMBER 4: MATTHEW MORRISON'S ABS.
No further explanation necessary.

NUMBER 5: NO MORE BULLFIGHTS.
This might sound like a party pooper to many, but it would make me SO happy. I would give up all of my other gifts just for this one.

So Santa, I've kept it VERY short this year. I'm not asking for much. Here's a little video that will help you realize how insignificant the things I'm asking for are. Please don't let me down...AGAIN.
Tootles.
ROGER

HOW RETRO

I've talked about the 80's many times, I myself was one of those that thought they'd never be back and then fell for almost every single trend from that decade that has sneaked back into our lives.  This morning's newspaper had the headline featured above, it reads "THE KREMLIN CONDECORATED SPIES WHO WERE EXPELLED".  Isn't this just a bit TOO 80's?
I remember a whole family of kids from the U.S. at my school in Moscow were expelled and had to leave the country in a short time's notice when their parents had been accused of being spies (one of them was a really good friend of my sister's).  We found it so unfair and thought it was just some sort of retaliation for a Soviet family that had been expelled from Washington weeks before.  Their American nanny stayed and became a teacher's assistant at our school.
I also remember how our house there had been completely wired (is this the correct term?).  A few months before we arrived in 1987, the Embassy had detected the places where the microphones had been placed, and when my sister and I found out where they were, we decided we place ourselves close enough in order to say nasty comments about the Russians and about living in the Soviet Union (God knows we actually LOVED it there).  Even the staff at the house was in on this game.  Our cook, Valia, was fluent in Spanish, yet she pretended to barely know the language.
We know fashion and its trends come up as a result or echo of our times, but today it just felt like it was the other way around.