Lipstick & Magazines #66: Smart

Obviously people who buy "books by the foot" and in particular shades to match the den are very, very smart. I think this is hilarious and would love to be in charge of color-coordinating the spines for people with this kind of $ to spend - reminiscent of Chris Cobb's art project at Adobe Books in 2004.

Smart people also would be keen on checking out Babes with Books which restores my faith in...something. Too funny.

I would consider anyone who wanted to sew me anything made out of the Japanese fabric at Super Buzzy to be ridiculously keen. Pink hippos!

I received lots of owl gifts and cards at my last birthday, so owls, a symbol of pure smart, are hanging in there as trendy animal of the year, though I'm predicting deer will take the lead in '07.

Reddingk t-shirts are smart. And cute. Their prints, framed, would be a lovely new year's gift as well (too late to order for the December holidays).

Finally, cookbook lovers would be wise to check out Sur La Table's surprisingly lush collection of autographed cookbooks. Seriously, who doesn't want Martha's new Homekeeping Handbook, with a bookplate signed by the mistress of perfection herself?

Lipstick & Magazines #65: Foreign

Having just returned from my first trip to both London and Paris, I'm doing everything possible to hang on to the *travel magic*... what a lovely experience. Here are a few of my faves, many of which were suggested by my very cultured friends, some of which, of course, involve the books read along the way, in questionably comfortable beds and on flights filled with adorable (crying) toddlers:

*Fingersmith by Sarah Waters - recommended by the perfectly cast kooky glasses and fly-away hair (no, not me) bookseller at Red Wheelbarrow Bookstore in Paris. I'm now ready to read all her books...

*Laduree's raspberry macarons. Simply ridiculous.

*The Manet to Picasso exhibit at the National Gallery in London.

*Yes, the bone marrow salad at St. John

*Musee Rodin

*The jewelry at Sic Amor on 10 rue du Pont Louis-Philippe in the Marais district of Paris. I could live in here.

*The Parisian chick lit novel Left Bank, bought purely for the cover shown here, designed by letterpress stationary company Hello Lucky.

*The supremely filling lunch at Books for Cooks test kitchen - sweet potato and red lentil soup with lime and creme fraiche, cabbage and feta filo with a salad, and blueberry buttermilk cake. For 7 pounds!

*Aimless wandering with no email or cell phone...

Can you tell I'm ready for the next trip?

Lipstick & Magazines #64: Local

My recent hiatus from L&M implies:

a. lots and lots of important work exploding all at once
b. a gnarly tweak o' the back requiring lots of relaxing to compensate for exploding workload
c. tons of fun events keeping me out of the house when i should still keep relaxing
d. all of the above

Yep, d.

But there is so much going on!

Here are some upcoming goodies not to be missed:

Litquake's Lit Crawl! On October 14, if you're in the Bay Area, you have no excuse to miss this unique and incredibly fun literary extravaganza. I'm producing the Mommy Lit venue, so come on by and say hello.

Far Away - my friend Molly is directing this Caryl Churchill play, about whose work I plan to be enlightened. Opening 10/13 and running through 11/4 at Exit Theater.

Luis Alberto Urrea at Books Inc.'s new Opera Plaza store on 11/1 - Day of the Dead. Our SF One City One Book author is a great storyteller, and I'm sure he'll pull out all the stops on this special day. If Books Inc. pulls out all the stops with sugar skulls, who knows what fun will happen?

Here are some recently consumed items of viewing and reading pleasure that I highly recommend:

• The Brambles by Eliza Minot
• The Emperor's Children by Claire Messud
• The Notorius Bettie Page on DVD
• The Departed
• Kiddley

Lipstick & Magazines #63: Look

UC Berkeley has launched Calisphere, which provides access to primary sources including historically themed collections for teachers (Popular Culture, Women in the Workforce, San Francisco General Strike) and specially selected websites created by UC profs, librarians, and researchers (Classic American Food, Bathing Beauties...). Not only is it great to have access to the content, but what an attractive and browseable site! Kudos.

San Francisco Hotel Project - gave me a new appreciation for the grungier and less immediately appealing aspects of my city. These photos by Mark Ellinger, who lives in an S.R.O. on 6th Street, are a must-see.

Fertile Ground Zine - I haven't seen a copy yet, but I love the look of this homegrown parenting publication - reminds me of something that would have been published in the 70s-early 80s (except for the blog and website part).

I like these insulated lunch bags from Reusable Bags.

Melamine ice cream cones and Andy Warhol banana split dishes. Cute cute cute.

Lipstick & Magazines #62: Summer

This summer is doing one of these evil fly-by time warps. I can't believe it's already half-way through August! Here's what I've been checking out these last few weeks:

Custom-made author buttons or magnets - cute idea

Stila lipglaze sticks in quite yummy flavors - worthy of a collection

Wallaby yogurt - best. yogurt. ever - try the Maple flavor and go a little wild by adding a few extra drops of maple syrup

Sesame Letterpress coasters

Reprodepot children's gifts. What kid doesn't need a book called Contemplating Your Bellybutton or her own Marimekko bowl and mug set?

Retro Recipes

Handmade paper dolls from Black Apple on Etsy.com

Movies that twist your mind inside out a bit (aka Julie and Rosie movies, because my friend Julie and I only go to the theatre together to see these kinds of movies, especially if they are French and disturbing) - recent DVD releases of this sort include Cache (yes, French) and Sorry, Haters (very American).

One of my new fave writers - Elizabeth Gilbert

Lipstick & Magazines #61: Short

...and sweet.

Weeds, now on DVD. So good!!

Barefoot Contessa baking mixes at Crate and Barrel

Philosophy frozen lemon custard lip shine. Sparkly and tasty.

The Itty Bitty Kitchen Handbook

Neko Case - I am pleasantly behind the times in my listening, always happy to be brought up-to-date and discover a musician this awesome.

New Herbal Essences bottle shapes & scents. Orchid & Coconut Milk? White Nectarine & Pink Coral Flower? Yum. Sold.

Lipstick & Magazines #60: Mind

A few things that have been on it anyway (my mind, that is):

Don't know yet how I feel about these Playaway audio books...have you seen them? They're adorable! And I suppose if people share them, that's pretty cool. But there's something so disposable about the concept that I'm waffling a bit. A single book on a device - it never expires, but so much packaging for one use, no? I guess the same argument applies to an actual paper book, so maybe I'm being sentimental. I do like that they are promoting them to libraries (though they might want to think about offering a discount on ear buds for libraries - nobody's gonna be sharing those with their public library comrades...)

Personalized postage stamps - Zazzle.com is a little clunky, but yes, you can make your own for a wedding, party, or business mailing. You can also find really cool images (like from the Library of Congress) available if you need inspiration and get posters and prints too.

The East Bay's 101 Most Delicious Things To Eat in the East Bay - from Diablo Magazine

Newspaper Snippet Generator - this one's fun...give it a whirl.

Endlessly amused by how complicated it gets to keep oneself organized. See here, the 25 To Do Lists to Stay Productive. Yikes. I'll add it to my to-do list to explore to-do list options...

Lipstick & Magazines #59: Covet

Now which of these things do I covet so much I need to just buy them and stop the website "window shopping?"

Keds are cute again! Look at these adorable pairs with rock poster artist Eleanor Grosch prints (owls, seahorses, llamas). Much lovelier than my last pair (6th grade) which I wore with no laces and had all my friends sign (tacky, tacky).

More shoes to love, the Asics Onitsuka tiger sneakers. Waiting for a sale...

Fred Flare's next BIG thing - just great for cheery colors and good browsing.

My friend Peggy set me up for a financial down-fall by mentioning rock scissor paper's personalized stationary, with images like owls (yes, again - the new cupcake?), scooters, and lanterns. Something for everyone.

And finally, Typhoon has launched in the US - kitchen goods that you can shop by retro color or vintage style. The Vintage Green cake tin is putting me over the edge.

Lipstick & Magazines #58: Potential

Here are ten books (somewhat recently or soon-to-be released) on my virtual nightstand as we head into summer:

The Nasty Bits by Anthony Bourdain ~ he's always a good, down-n-dirty food read

Swapping Lives by Jane Green ~ light, but not too fluffy

Possible Side Effects by Augusten Burroughs ~ eagerly anticipated

A Student of Living Things by Susan Shreve ~ the beautiful cover sold me

Elements of Style by Wendy Wasserstein

Which Brings Me to You: A Novel in Confessions by Steve Almond & Juliana Baggott

What to Eat by Marion Nestle ~ she's a straight-shooter

Theft: A Love Story by Peter Carey

Alternatives to Sex: A Novel by Stephen McCauley

The Last of Her Kind by Sigrid Nunez

Any other suggestions of recent good reads?

Lipstick & Magazines #57: Select

The cream of the crop, the best of the rest. Beautiful, well-curated, stunning, and smart.

Project B: Vintage Photographs & Other Curiosities - If you're intrigued by photo names like Affectionate Sailors, Iowa Woman 513 lbs, and Children in Donkey Cart, take a browse through Barbara Levine's virtual vintage photo albums. Photos are for sale, as are curiosities like McIntyre's Hypnotic Ball and gorgeous Cigarette Cards. Levine's exhibition entitled "Snapshot Chronicles: Inventing the American Photo Album" is currently on display at the SFPL.

The 25 Sexiest Novels Ever Written from Playboy - An interesting book list. How many have you read? Probably the first time Judy Blume has been highlighted in Playboy.

15 Years of the Best Sources from Martha Stewart Living - And even if you bought the print magazine, Ms. Stewart has been good enough to add some "Web Extras" that didn't make the first cut. Thanks Martha!

Lipstick & Magazines #56: Great

Great new...

Book: Sweet and Low: A Family History by Rich Cohen - a voyeuristic treat, Sweet and Low finds Cohen playing the investigative reporter, trying to suss out the truth of his own family, whose patriarch started the company that would go on to create and package the pretty pink packets of sugar substitute. Cohen's wing of the family, or rather his mother and "her issue," as his grandmother's will refers to them, is disinherited, freeing him to dig deep into the complex, strange, and juicy history of his Brooklyn-based Jewish family.

Movie: Prime - written and directed by Ben Younger, who also made the wonderful Boiler Room, this "romantic comedy" is truly refreshing - real chemistry between older woman Uma Thurman and younger guy Bryan Greenberg, an excellent Jewish therapist mother played by Meryl Streep, and an overall tight, sophisticated, stylish and poignant film.

Website: Dive - you gotta love an SF-based food blog that includes the SF Dept. of Public Health on its link list. But seriously, strong writing, a true sense of place, and great photos of food that's not necessarily served up asking to be photographed.

Idea: Eau du PLAY-DOH - I can vouch for their Orange Creamsicle scent; now Demeter Fragrance has created a limited edition Play-Doh fragrance to celebrate the company's 50th anniversary. I must admit, I still enjoy a good whiff of Play-Doh, so I'm very intrigued.

Revival: The Babysitter's Club~graphic novels - Props to my former middle school classmate Raina Telgemeier for scoring this cool gig - she's the cartoonist drawing these adorable new versions of the 80's classic pre-teen girl reads. How fun.

Lipstick & Magazines #55: Moms

Happy Mother's Day all you moms, new and old (well, not old - you know what I mean), and moms-to-be!

Enjoy...

Celebrity Babies

Library Book Card baby announcements from Akemi Designs - oh my!

Turn Here, which needs a new name, but has a great concept: short films about cool places, so you can travel without leaving your computer, or, a million times better, prep for an actual trip. Clement Street is currently representin' for San Francisco

...and after a very scientific study of East Bay bakeries with my friend Katey , I can vouch that Teacake Bake Shop, Emeryville-mall-based though it may be, is producing some delectable treats, especially the Cupcakies (just the tops, with a bit more frosting).

Lipstick & Magazines #54: Grab Bag

Apartment Therapy's Smallest, Coolest Apartment Contest - excellent voyeuristic browsing of very awesome pads - not how the "other half" lives, but how I (and many of my friends) live.

Pimp My Snack - Another reason to be thrilled about visiting London for the first time this winter - I can get my eye on the ingredients people are using to concoct their food treats on this stylin' site. How cool is this Fizzy Cherry?

A new e-card site! Hipster Cards

And finally, a novel I absolutely loved. It's the early 70's. Inez Ruin is growing up, bouncing between So Cal life with her former-Flamenco dancing, gorgeous mom and abuelita and her Nor Cal (North Beach and Marin) life with her somewhat detached counter-culture/computer genius dad and his revolving girlfriends (from young hippies to a wealthy romance novelist). She also has a Mormon best friend, a half-brother who lives on (family legend says) a commune with his crazy mother, and a proper and prim other grandmother. Check out The Ruins of California by Martha Sherrill.

Lipstick & Magazines #53: Enjoy

A few things I've been, yes, enjoying recently:

Shelterrific - a blog started by the peeps who used to work at Budget Living Magazine (sadly no more). All around great posts of products, food stuffs, home goodies, and more.

Covers - The best in modern book covers. Lots of comments worth reading. Submit your faves.

Perez Hilton - Quality celebrity snark. High on the commentary. (thanks Liam)

This Book Will Save Your Life - Out this week, A.M. Homes latest: existential man-life pain mixed with some freak show Los Angeles settings, seemingly random human connections, and a dash of the apocalypse. I read it in a day. And she got a really cool blurb from Stephen King on the back.

Little Manhattan - Toss the cynical shell aside and enjoy this charming film about 11 year-olds falling in strong "like" - maybe love? - in the Big Apple. Captures an incredible sense of the city, the New York space.

Lipstick & Magazines #52: Rain

At this point, you just have to give into the rain rather than wish it away. While you're stuck inside, fortify yourself with:

Footballers Wive$ - I didn't realize how fun it would be to type out wives with the dollar sign. If you are even slightly intrigued by watching the travails of sleazy, too-wealthy rich British women, and their terribly, badly-behaving husbands, with a dash of dysfunctional family dynamics thrown in, you will love this BBC show, first season now available on DVD.

Vegan Lunch Box - How sweet. And yummy-looking and inspiring.

Public Radio BookSource - What was the name of that book, by that woman, that you heard about on that show?

Hip-Hop Reader - Great site, promoting literacy and reading among urban high school students.

Blow Monkey Nail Dryer - What (??) you say Just take a look. Adorable.

Lipstick & Magazines #51: Cool

Do you like to stay on top of the coolest of the cool and the newest of the new? I don't buy 1/1000th of the stuff I read about on these sites, but I still think it's fun just to know, you know?

Coolhunting. Aren't you glad someone else is out there doing the hard work and all you have to do is browse?

Popgadget. This very cool site is geared toward women, featuring items (tech, pet, wearable and more) with great design features and, often, really fantastic bright colors. If you're a guy who appreciates these features, you might groove with this one too. Popgadget led me to these book cover iPod cases - too damn cool!

Wired Magazine features the Japanese Schoolgirl watch, so all Americans can know what will be really hip here in a few years.

Agenda Inc. Live Feed. You heard it here. Tupperware parties are hot again. I'm a little bit excited about that.

Lipstick & Magazines #50: Simplify

Maybe you've heard of all of these, maybe none, but unlike so many websites that offer something great, seduce you into visiting once, and that's the end of the attraction, these sites hooked me. Sticky sites, loyalty-inducing, whatever you want to call them, they offer something that makes my life easier and I love them for it.

Can a URL be cute? If it's possible, Tiny URL is the one making it happen. When you're sending a link, don't send an unwieldy one that breaks annoyingly at line breaks. Plug the long one into Tiny URL and out pops a sweet little address. Lovely.

If you read blogs, you will save so, so, so much time using an aggregator like Bloglines. I subscribe to over 80, keep them organized by type. Book blogs, food blogs, craft blogs, airline deals, jobs ads - all fed straight to me, one site to visit. You can clip pieces you like, email them to friends directly, and streamline your crazy blog life.

Job hunting? Yep, me too. Simply Hired is awesome - it sweeps craisglist, corporate sites, Monster, and tons of other job sites so that with one keyword and location search, you can search them all. Easy! Then you can subscribe to the RSS feed for that specific search though Bloglines...and it just gets more exciting. Lots of other functionalities here to explore too.

Finally, Design Your Life is about the thinking behind design, and the application of design ideas in "everyday" life, as described by this impressive manifesto. This site requires some time for exploration but there is deep goodness here. From Self-Branding with Candy to In Praise of August, there is content here to both inspire and motivate.

Lipstick & Magazines #49: Think

I'm quite interested in social networks, collaborative filtering, all that new great stuff that smart people are using to make experiencing the web so much more meaningful (LinkedIn, Friendster, Yelp, etc.). Visualcomplexity offers really stunning graphic examples of mapped networks. From transportation networks to mapping the internet, these depictions are incredibly artful and worth a look and a few thoughts.

A respected librarian friend of mine suggested Edward Tufte's work to me, particularly Envisioning Information, which shows many different ways to display information in complex data in non-simple text. I love that he also sells graph paper on his website (see bottom). Great thought.

I'm currently reading Brand Hijack: marketing without marketing (by Alex Wipperfurth, a partner at SF's Plan B), which explores brands that allow themselves, or set themselves up, to be shaped by consumers and enjoy great success because of it (examples: Doc Martens, Friendster, Red Bull). Targeting niches based around values rather than demographic "types," allowing more than enough time for buzz to build, creating a brand "folklore," not taking oneself too seriously (a la Mattel re. Barbie), considering the psychology of the tribe - all interesting ideas that could apply to whatever realm you're working in.

Wipperfurth mentions American Brandstand from Agenda, which tracks "all the mentions of brands in the lyrics of the Billboard Top 20 singles chart." Did you know that in 2005, Jolly Rancher was mentioned 8 times?

Lipstick & Magazines #48: Goodies

Where-in we admire the following loveliness:

Black Wool Dotted Felt Hat from Pixelgirlshop

"Hairdos" jammies from The Cat's Pajamas

The little mini Mouse Purse at Plain Mabel

The new candy-coated novel Love Walked In by Marisa de los Santos

Orbit's Sweet Mint gum - it tastes like chocolate mint! But why?

This amazing Pink Floral Swing Coat for babies - jealous!

The Best of Youth - a six-hour film about an Italian family that you will be ready to watch again immediately

Favorite children's book animals like Maisy and Curious George on USPS stamps

Lipstick & Magazines #47: Make

I first spotted a big orange Sumo Bag at a happening Valencia St. apartment, then cozied up to them in the lounges at Sundance. They're super-cool, filled with little foam beads that conform to your body and hold your shape whether you sit down daintily or launch yourself at it.

For a well-made bag, I've been eyeing Sherpani - "yoga style," "urban pack," even an almost cool fanny pack (here called "small waist pack"). They have a great, slim, close-to-the-body cut.

Geek out a bit with How Products Are Made. From action figures to scratch and sniff to TV dinners, this text-heavy site offers a step-by-step process with manual-style line drawings to entertain and inform you. A great reference site.