You Will Be CONSUMEd. Resistance Is Futile
What's this? Another warm body whose biological and technological distinctiveness we are adding to our own? That's right: today we welcome Runamuck to the CONSUME family. A tricksy gentleman whose main pleasures in life seem to be beer and the Transformers (not necessarily in that order), he's keepin' it real out there on the Left Coast. Represent! (Just a reminder, if you haven't guessed already: I am very, very white.)
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As If High School Weren't Bad Enough...
Every once in awhile, we at CONSUME like to recommend a product that consists of the actual written word. We already know you like reading: you kids certainly aren't spending your days WORKING, after all...
But perhaps you'd like something to peruse after you've exhausted the internet? You know, on those cold lonely nights in bed where you curl up in your sleeping chamber in a desperate attempt to stave off those feelings of doom about how pointless it all is...
If so, let me suggest Milrose Munce and the Den of Professional Help, by Douglas Anthony Cooper. Two teenagers of questionable popularity and skin tone, a high school full of ghosts only they can see, and a Professional Helper who wants to cure them of their ability to do so: this book is for the spooky, alienated "I SEE DEAD PEOPLE" kid in all of us. Check it out, and then get one for the young person in your life who also likes to read. Because if you don't infect them early, they won't become one of us... [Ed. -- we apologize for this uncharacteristically dark digression. We're working on getting Runamuck some professional help...]
Buy it! Milrose Munce and the Den of Professional Help, $11.60, from amazon.com.
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I Scream For Ice Cream! And Pickles. And Pizza. And...
About some things, I have no shame. I sing (AND DANCE) along with the grocery store Muzak -- right in the condiment aisle! I talk to my dog as though she were my BFF and could give me advice as to why my hair is limp and lifeless despite the application of approximately eight million different brands of conditioner. But I AM deeply ashamed of the fact that, while I have been pregnant, my life has devolved into sitcom cliché: I crave ice cream like Lindsay Lohan craves crack and rehab. I can't get enough! Night, day, elevenses, second breakfast, posting to CONSUME: anytime is a good time for ice cream.
As long as I'm indulging myself, the least I can do is have some sexy ice cream bowls (like these Zaks!) lying around at my disposal. Hip moms like me don't eat ice cream out of plain old ordinary cereal bowls. (That's what I keep telling the dog, anyway.)
Buy it! Zak Ice Cream Bowl (kiwi), $9.99, at amazon.com.
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Frank Lloyd HOT!
I have to admit that, when I first saw the name of the huggable Mr. Wright doll here, I had imagined a miniature of Rodin's famous sculpture The Thinker, but with FLW captured in the iconic pose. (Then I remembered The Thinker is perched on his rock in all his glory, and I had to go find a place to sit down for a minute, as I was feeling a little swoony.)
What?
How delighted was I to discover, then, that the aforementioned Little Thinker was actually an adorable stuffed likeness, complete with tiny walking cane and wee pretentious man-scarf? VERY. I just want to bring him home, cuddle him as if I were his fifth wife and listen to him whisper sweet nothings about organic architecture an Usonian design principles.
What??
Buy it! Frank Lloyd Wright Little Thinker, $15.95, at shakespearesden.com.
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London Call...er, Showering
When I lived in one of those "My First Home" apartments (by Fisher-Price!) -- you know: one of those places when you just get out on your own where buzzing people in from downstairs seems impossibly grown-up, rather than the colossal pain-in-the-ass that it actually is -- I had an awful shower curtain. (Because, as we all know, shower doors for the "My First Home" model are Sold Separately.) This shower curtain was green- and white-striped and looked like something I swiped off a cabana chair while a Carnival Cruise Ship was in port. In my defense, it was better than any of the other available curtains at Target, in that it was made of fabric rather than (apparently) Saran-Wrap.
I can look back now with fondness on those days when I was so young, so naive, so ignorant of the fact that there were shower curtains out there that would have let me feel as though I was standing in the middle of Piccadilly Circus while I was attending to my personal hygiene needs! I'm much more cosmopolitan now...although I still kind of wish I could buzz people in.
Buy it! Izola Designer Shower Curtain - London, $35.00, at loftparty.com.
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The Luck of the...Japanese?
And when I rolled out of bed this morning, here I thought it would be another uneventful Monday. I couldn't have been MORE wrong, because I defied death not once (dodging a Wisconsin driver who decided that that red light couldn't possibly apply to HIM), but TWICE (getting all insert-NASCAR-driver-of-your-choice with my mad defensive driving skills as some guy wiped out in front of me -- apparently the clear skies and dry pavement were just too much for him to handle.)
To what do I attribute my good fortune? I could point to the (ever-expanding) crate of bunnies I lug around at all times (you can never have too many rabbits' feet!) Or maybe the Supergirl Underoos I was sporting, thus rendering me invincible. I'm going to have to go with my Clover and Honey Bee Bento Box, though. It's covered with four-leaf clovers AND it keeps my juice box cold! How can anything bad happen when you're toting one of these?
Buy it! Crux Petit Happy 2-Layer Bento Box with Chopsticks and Carrying Case: Clover & Honey Bee, $15.99, at shopkawaii.com.
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Half Man, Half Bull, All Awesome!
I've always been a geek about mythology from all corners of the globe. Japan, India...Norse mythology has always been a favorite of mine. But the old classics (the ORIGINAL old classics) from Greece are always a pleasure to revisit, a pleasure I hope to instill in my children someday. But we all know that kids HATE anything that smacks of literature or history or god forbid LEARNING, right? Which is why Mr. Cuddly Bull-face here is the perfect... Trojan horse, if you will: stealth culture at its finest! AND a fun alternative for parents looking to distinguish their kid from every other drooling Tickle-Me Elmo toter out there...
Buy it! Minotaur, $19.98, at amazon.com.
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Fashionable At Any Speed
I love my VW Jetta, which is a good thing, because it's going to be around a long, LONG time, being made, as far as I can tell, entirely from plastic. Don't you miss the old school cars, that had solid metal quarterpanels that BENT when you backed into a tree, rather than shattering? That had those shiny metal belt buckles that seared their logo into your skin after sitting for hours in the afternoon sun? Good times. Now you can relive a little bit of that golden age of automobilery with these Chevrolet Logo Seatbelt Belts -- click these retro-styled Chevrolet logo buckles around your waist and see the USA!
Buy it! Chevrolet Logo Seatbelt Belt, $17.00, at yque.com.
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I Fail At Amishing
So, when our power went out last night, it was kind of like in the movies where one's life flashes before their eyes. But, in this case, it was my FUTURE, not my past, a terrible future where, devoid of the modern conveniences of home, I passed my days attempting to milk our dog Devi in order to make enough cheese to sell at the farmers' market and replace my defunct high-tech electricity-dependent career and my evenings hunched over the butter churn cozy I was knitting, eyes straining as I cursed my lack of foresight in not ordering these Knit Happens (Glow-in-the-Dark!) knitting needles while I was still blessed with the glory and majesty of teh interwebs, weeping and gnashing my teeth at the irony. Oh, knit happens, all right; sometimes life is just one BIG ball of knit...
Then the lights came back on and I finished watching House. But I think I'll be ordering those needles, just in case...
Buy it! Knit Happens knitting needles (size 15), $15.00, at etsy.com.
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Ixnay on the Ing-bay-Ong-bay!
I have officially seen THE coolest thing on teh interwebs. That's it, show's over, last person out please turn off the tubes. What could it be, you ask? A viral video of a DRAMATIC TREE SLOTH, perhaps? Or maybe someone's LOLFIREFLY gallery? Nay, nay, a thousand times nay! For once, the coolest thing on teh interwebs is cool AND useful!
Behold the Recordable Wireless Doorbell and Chime!
*crickets*
OK, maybe you're lucky enough not to live with all the forces of Hell compacted into a wee dog shape: La Diabolita, Arch-nemesis of the Doorbell. Let's just say that I spend most of my free time praying that no one visits my house for fear of the firestorm of howling and barking unleashed once the seemingly innocuous "BING-bong" rings through the house. (Well, except for Mormons -- she can bark all she wants at them.) With a RECORDABLE doorbell, visitors can fire up a clip of "O Fortuna" or maybe "Highway to Hell". ANYTHING but the "BING-bong". Maybe, just maybe, I'll be able to buy some Girl Scout cookies THIS year...
Buy it! Recordable Wireless Doorbell and Chime, $187.94, from doorbellexpressions.com. (via cribcandy)
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Ye Olde Death Masques
On a recent trip to Baaahstan, Massachusetts (the destination behind the slightly bewailed hiatus of a few weeks ago), Mr. rethwyll and I had occasion to trip the historic sidewalk fantastic through a few of the city's historic cemeteries (or -- as they seem to be known out there -- burying grounds, which is awesomely Ichabod-Crane-fleeing-the-Headless-Horseman-by-sexton's-lanternlight.)
These are graves, mind you, that date back to the 16- and 1700s, graves that have seen witches burned, redcoats slaughtered, Red Sox humiliated... As befits such a gruesome march through history, the vast majority of the tombstones in the cemeteries are decorated with winged skulls, at once whimsical and morbid (just like me! Needless to say, it was love at first sight.) I filled up many a megabyte of flashcard memory snapping pictures of the flying boneheads. I was tickled, then, to discover these Winged Soul pendants. Now I can take a piece of Merry Ol' New England wherever I go...
Buy it! Winged Soul, $18.00, from arcanenonesuch.com.
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Your Home Could Smell Better
So we kind of like bacon around here. OK, FINE. We like bacon A LOT. But man (and woman!) does not live by bacon alone: you need some other basic food groups in there, no matter WHAT the (late -- ahem) Dr. Atkins would have you believe. Like vegetables. And toast. And mayonnaise.
Fortunately, there is one perfect source of sustenance that incorporates all of these important elements: the Bacon, Lettuce and Tomato Sandwich. It's the perfect summertime concoction, when all ingredients are at their best: tomatoes are juiciest, lettuce is crispiest, bacon is mouth-meltingest. And then, before you can say "Hey, 'mouth-meltingest' isn't even a word!", that magic time is gone. But now you don't have to lie awake during those cold winter nights dreaming of that first sultry summer day, because there are these BLT-Scented Votive Candles. Light a set and dream of the day when global warming makes all this possible year-round. (You have to find your silver linings where you can...)
Buy it! BLT Scented Votive Candles (set of 3), $33.95, from gratefulpalate.com.
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Light GOOOOOD
Everyone knows that, when the zombiepocalypse happens, all of our electrical conveniences will become extravagent luxuries. Porch lights. Microwaves. Radios. EVEN NOSE CLIPPERS. And while it's highly unlikely that having party favors streaming from one's nose will directly affect one's fate at the clutching hands of the undead, being caught after dark without adequate illumination certainly will. Actual flaming torches can only get you so far; this Hand-Cranked Flashlight will get you all the way to the safety of the nearest human enclave. And, if worse comes to worse, carrying one of these babies will ensure that you always have something worth bartering for supplies (besides your streamer-nosed bod.)
Buy it! Hand-Cranked Flashlight, $39.95, at lehmans.com.
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LEGO My Cake!
When I was 10, I would have begged my mother for 3 months for a birthday cake shaped like LEGO bricks (preferably smothered in blue frosting, because who doesn't love blue food?) Now that I'm an official Grown-up™, I don't need to beg anyone, but I still want a blue-frosted birthday cake. Blue and red. And yellow. And white. On a big flat green plate. In fact, what I REALLY want is about 7 of these stacked together into a CAKE OF GLORY. Perhaps in the shape of a spaceship? Wait, that's silly: I'd need WAY more than 7 for that. Hmmmm... Maybe I should invite a couple more people over...
Buy it! LEGO Brick Cake/Jelly Mold, $12.99, from lego.com.
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Heeeeeeere's Soapy!
Even though summer is not exactly my favoritest of seasons (which is a little like saying that Black Eyed Peas is not exactly my favoritest of musical groups), every year I look forward to finishing typing my 537th sheet of "All CONSUME and no play make rethwyll a dull girl", chopping an exit hole in the door with my trusty fire ax and hitting the trails and backroads of our fine National Parks System. There's nothing like spending a week with Mother Nature to make you forget all about elevators full of blood and making out with waterlogged corpses.
But after a week of battling mosquitoes, stubborn campfires and recurring nightmares, even a hardy outdoorswoman like myself misses the little niceties of home after awhile, like clean hair. Somehow, washing one's hair with the leftover dishwater just isn't the same. Fortunately for me, there exists space-age technology like this Dissolving Paper Shampoo. Light and easily portable, just add water for a luxurious cleansing. It's like staying at a five-star hotel in the middle of the forest! (And nary a Room 237 to be seen...)
Buy it! Dissolving Paper Shampoo, $12.95, at spoonsisters.com.
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Bloomin' Madness
Suddenly it's all babies, all the time on this blog. Which is cool, I am totally into babies. My hypothesis on the matter is that girls who aren't yet moms (me!) are really into babies because they are basically nice-smelling dolls on which it is socially acceptable to spend lots of money accessorizing. Since I am of the un-sprogged persuasion, I can really only speculate, but I am guessing that the face-smack of reality kicks in right around the first diaper change, when you realize that your chubby doll that you just named Emma or Jack is displaying undeniable signs of giftedness in the arena of pooing.
You know what would rock? If you could hide the part where the pooing happens inside a baby accessory so incredibly awesome that it completely eclipses the un-awesomeness of poo. In 100% unrelated news, I just found myself having the following conversation:
me: would mr. elliterate's-boyfriend totally flip out if he ever discovered that i bought baby clothes in anticipation of as-yet-unborn children that would, in theory, be biologically mine?
brainforest: yes
me: what if, even though they were really expensive, they were on sale?
brainforest: yes
me: what if they were days-of-the-week diaper covers?
brainforest: i would say that I bought them on sale for future friends who will have babies. but keep them for myself secretly.
Buy it! Days Of The Week Bloomies (pack of 7), $75.00 at katespade.com.
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Special Delivery!
So as the date of my baby shower draws ever nearer (at which time I will attempt to wedge my 9-month-pregnant self into steerage for a 45-minute flight across Lake Michigan, during which I will STILL no doubt need to visit the powder room 11 times), I keep running across things that I want people to give me. If it weren't so rude as to give Miss Manners a massive aneurysm, I would buy the darned things myself and shove them into the hands of the nearest relative, screaming "OMG GIVE ME THIS AND YOU ARE MY FAVORITE SECOND COUSIN TWICE-REMOVED FOR *LIFE*!" Like this Baby Bunch Clothes Bouquet. It's BABY CLOTHES. In the shape of a FLOWER BOUQUET. To borrow a word that my mother reserves strictly for baby shower gift commentating, it's PRECIOUS.
Since I save my screaming at relatives for major holidays (and since my second cousins twice-removed are all safely out of gift shoving range anyway), I'll just have to be content with weeping quietly and wishing that I knew people as awesome (and classy and humble) as I, since they would have already purchased this for me. (And if any family and friends are reading this, it's the hormones talking, I swear.)
Buy it! Baby Bunch Medium Floral Baby Clothes Bouquet (choice of pink, blue or yellow), $59.99, at rightstart.com.
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Wooden You Like Some Mail?
We've all heard it before: our spinster aunt bemoaning the appalling lack of civility in today's youth, who are so gauche as to not even send written mail anymore. "It's all 'E' this and 'LOL' that and 'L8R'. Reprehensible! Why in MY day, a proper young lady wrote 53 letters to her suitors before even DARING to show herself at the breakfast table!"
Yes, yes, yes, Aunt Mildred, civilization certainly HAS gone straight into the toilet with regard to our correspondence skills, mostly because the beautiful, expensive stationery of yesteryear has been replaced, for the most part, by the mass-produced, cheaply-printed SpongeBob SquarePants cards of today. But with this adorable Squirrel Wood Postcard, we can change all that! Who WOULDN'T love to get a note from a friend or horrifyingly rude niece (YES AUNT MILDRED) on a fun, eco-friendly slice of nature? Frankly, you'd be nuts (*rimshot*) NOT to buy 357 of them immediately.
Buy it! Squirrel Wood Postcard, $5.50, from patinastores.com.
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Hitch a Ride!
Relax, faithful CONSUME reader! Rest assured that you HAVEN'T slipped into some sort of timewarp to August 25, 1976, when the hottest album of the day was a plucky little self-titled collection by a group of no-name East Coasters...
No, this is just a small announcement to let you know that CONSUME will be taking a small hiatus in that rockin' town of baked beans, terriers, Red Sox and a metric buttload of history: Boston! As such, posting will be non-existent until July 23rd.
I KNOW. CONSUME will miss you, too. If you're really nice, it will send you a postcard. In the meantime, this should be JUST enough time to turn off the computer, stretch your atrophied limbs and remind yourself how much fresh air and sunshine kind of suck.
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Bike Gear For The Home
We all have "that friend". The gearhead who might as well have his bike seat surgically implanted in his ass for all that he's ever seen OFF of it. The one who's always telling us to get out of our gas-guzzling (AND AIR-CONDITIONED, we might add) speed machine and join him on the Bataan Death Ride he calls a commute. The one who would make Lance Armstrong shake his head and say, "Dude, maybe you might want to consider wearing some other color than yellow." For that friend, we have these sexy Recycled Tea Light Holder, made from spare bike parts like flywheels and cogs. Maybe a whole bunch of these will inspire him to put down the Allen wrenches and host a lovely summer evening cookout. Or maybe the next time we visit, he'll have pried these babies apart for spare parts to refit all his sets of wheels. Whatever. We tried, man.
Buy it! Recycled Tea Light Holder, $12.99, at elsewares.com.
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