Mint Chocolate Chip

Yes. I regret wearing this outfit. (Can you tell by the pained expression on my face?) Seriously. I look like a bowl of mint chocolate chip ice cream! If not that, maybe an Andes chocolate mint?

dress — Old Navy (Old Navy)

jacket —Gap (thrifted)

boots — Enzo Angiolini (thrifted)

In case you can't tell, I'm the one on the right (the yummy stuff is on the right ...) (and yeah, I'm wearing that jacket, again!)


This was another disastrous outfit, and in some respects it's worse than the one I wore here. Why is it worse? Because I actually did wear it to work. Ack! Too wrinkled. Too short. Too ... ACK! (fill in the blank) ... (I left the jacket on ALL day! and not because I was or afraid of forgetting it. See here. LOL.) To be fair to myself, I did get a fair number of compliments... but more than likely that was because I wore it on a gray and dreary day, and the colors were bright and cheery.

I'm not sure if this is salvageable, but I'm going to try — I just love the color! I think that if I wore it with heavier tights, I could get away with it being too short. Or maybe I just need to cut it off and wear it as more of a longer sweater?

What have you regretted wearing to work?

Just like Pajamas

Have I ever said how much I love sweater dresses?! Yes. I adore them (please ignore the wrinkles — it was left in the laundry basket a bit too long!). 

dress — Weekenders (thrifted)

boots — Dansko (Dansko Factory Store)

belt — (thrifted)

I think it's hard not to look good in one (they're so forgiving), and besides that? They are so-o-o-o comfortable! To me, they're the closest thing to being able to wear pajamas at work.

And speaking about work ... I was laid off last week. Yes. Here I go again (read about how I got laid off last year here), worrying about money and wondering when and if I'll get another job. It wasn't entirely a surprise — the project that I was working on had ended last month, so I knew the ax was going to fall at some point. I just didn't know when exactly.

But on the bright side of things. . . good-bye to one hell of a commute. No more putting in 12-hour or 18-hour days, or even staying up all night because there was no point in trying to sleep before getting on the road. No more packing up in the wee hours of Monday morning to spend the next three or four days on the road. And no more getting dressed in the dark! Can you tell that I'm a bit relieved?

Even though it's scary to be unemployed, getting laid off is probably a blessing in disguise. My commute was just completely wearing me down. The days that I wasn't commuting, I was living out of a suitcase. It seemed like I was never home, and if I was home, I was so exhausted that I couldn't really do anything that needed to be done. I think that I spent enough time commuting in the past 6 months to last me a lifetime!

I do think the economy is getting better, and I got some really good experience that should help me find another job this time around. But still ...  keep your fingers (and toes) crossed that something will come up soon, and that it won't involve commuting for hours upon hours every day. In the meantime though, I'm going to start catching up on everything that went by the wayside for the past 6 months. 

Linking up to Patti at Not Dead Yet Style for Visible Monday once again!

 

And since my dress (and my bangle and my belt) was thifted?

I'm going to link up to Megan at Brass in Pocket for  Thursdays Are for Thrifters.

Things that Matter

"Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter."

~ Martin Luther King Jr. 

dress — First Issue (thrifted)

boots — (Dansko Company Store)

Was my sweater dress supposed to be a dress? or maybe it was just supposed to be worn as a cardigan? I dunno ...  but I think it worked okay as a dress (I didn't get any hairy eyeballs from the people at work, so that says something right there.)

I have a hard time remaining silent when I see something that I feel is wrong. This past weekend was a case in point. I got into a political discussion with one of my Facebook friends. He has since unfriended me, so we are no longer friends. I am not all that upset about losing him as a friend — he was one of those friends from high school who you never really knew all that well, but they reappear in your life, thanks to Facebook. You were pretty sure that you didn't have a whole lot in common with this person, but you want to give them the benefit of the doubt, so you friend them — sometimes against your better judgment.

We ended up getting into a political discussion over something that I had posted. I should have known better about posting it, because I know that politics is a trigger point for me, and Facebook is just not a good meeting ground. On top of that, I haven't figured out how to walk away from a discussion, and to just let it go, and let it be.

Take a deep breath, Kari ... 

I know that I'm not going to change anybody's mind, so why do I keep chewing on it the way a dog does with a bone? I am agonizing, really agonizing, about what I said and how I said it. There has got to be a better way.

How do you walk away from an argument or discussion feeling okay?  And how do you remain vocal about things that you believe in but at the same time keep your cool?

Linking up to Patti at Not Dead Yet Style for Visible Monday. This week, however, I wish that I had not  been quite so visible.

End of the Line

This dress was an amazing score! $4.99 for a silk and angora sweater dress! Can you believe that?! On top of the amazing price, it was also a perfect fit. I didn't even bother trying it on — as soon as I saw it, I just scooped it right up! Have I told you before how much I love thrift stores?

dress — The Silk Collection (thrifted)

boots — Dansko (Dansko outlet)

I have been promising to finish up my story (I actually don't think that I'll ever really finish it — every day seems to bring something new!). I'll start tonight by saying that it's 9:00 pm on Monday night, and I just got on the train in Union Station. This is the last train of the night that goes all the way to my station. (If I don't make this train, I spend the WHOLE night in DC. Luckily that's about the only thing that hasn't happened to me yet.) I'm at the end of the line (the last stop), so I don't get off the train until around 11 pm, which means I won't get home until almost midnight. And that is a LONG day.

The ride is only about 90 minutes long in the morning (I say "only" with a wry grin — my idea of what is a short and long ride these days is somewhat skewed). But since it's the last train of the night, we stop at every single podunk station along the way (including mine). On top of that, I'm on the commuter train, which in this neck of the woods is the MARC train. The MTA (Maryland Transportation Authority) leases the rail line from Amtrak, so any time the Amtrak comes through, we have to get off the line and let it pass. That usually means that we have to sit and wait. And when the Amtrak comes through?! Holy crap! It goes by so fast, and it's so close, that you can feel it go by. The first time it happened, I literally jumped in my seat and screamed!

Tonight is one of those days that I am just exhausted. Overtired, in fact, to the point where I feel like crying and every annoyance seems to be magnified tenfold. I hate when I feel like that, because I lose all semblance of having patience. And invariably whenever I am this tired, some yahoo with a phone plops down next to me and has this long personal conversation in which I can hear EVERY SINGLE WORD! I am practically deaf,  (I have a hearing aid for one ear, and I need one for the other, and I say, "What?" almost nonstop when people are talking to me.) If I can hear you, you're speaking REALLY REALLY LOUD!. (And yes, I am using all capitals for a reason.)

Tonight was a case in point. The woman kitty corner from me yapped for over an hour until she got off. It wasn't just me who seemed to be frustrated tonight — I thought the guy sitting in front of her was going to rip her phone away before she finally ended up getting off. In the morning, they actually have quiet cars, where talking on your cell phone, or even having conversations, is not allowed, but when it's this late in the evening, there's not enough people for them to devote an entire car to having one be a quiet car. I think, too, that they think one isn't needed, because most people try to sleep on the way home.

(Not only was I at the end of the line tonight, I was at the end of my rope!) Am I alone in finding people who yap on a cell phone in public places annoying? I need to find some noise-cancelling headphones that aren't too big or bulky, because it's just not worth letting it get to me.

I'm linking to Patti at Not Dead Yet Style and her Visible Monday post. Why do I feel visible? The bright color ... the chunky necklace ... even it just being a sweater dress made me feel so very visible! And visible in a good way.

I'm also linking up to Tammy at Silverstyle for her Trending through the Decade: Accessories post. I used to wear such dainty rings and necklaces. No more. The older I get the bigger my accessories are.