Elise Sereni Patkotak

I spent more on two outfits I bought yesterday than I have on clothes in the past two years.  But the deed is done.  The mission is accomplished. I have the outfit I will be buried in because trust me when I tell you I will never spend that much money on an article of clothing again.  I have the wedding outfit and the graduation outfit. In my world, that translates to having an outfit to wear after six and one to wear before six.  And I now officially declare my wallet and closet closed. 

As I head out to shop, I have to ask exactly who made up these stupid fashion rules? Why can’t you wear stripes and plaids together? Why will the world end if I wear brown shoes with black pants?  Why the hell can’t I wear white after Labor Day?  Will the earth stop spinning? If I walk out in public dressed in pants with one pattern and a shirt in another will democracies fall?  And why does everyone but me think that a dressy sweatshirt is a contradiction in terms?

AOL has a headline about someone named Jessica Simpson snubbing a GOP fundraiser. At least, I think that’s the story. I didn’t read past the headlines because 1. I don’t care and 2. I don’t care.  If people want an inane and ultimtely useless headline, they should just ponder why I am going to die so poor while someone like Jessica Simpson (who does something that has apparently made her famous but I can’t figure out what it is) is going to die very rich.  Oh God!  Do you think it’s the blond bimbo factor?  I was never good at

I received a very thought provoking e-mail to my column about going back to Barrow.  It’s not a perfect world and I didn’t mean my column to imply that it was some kind of utopia. But my belief is that people in the bush are fighting for their lives in ways we can barely imagine because we live in the same culture we were raised in and can’t begin to understand what it’s like to try and straddle both worlds.

Anyhow, this was my response to the e-mail.  I think the writer had some good points about the problems in

Uniforms!  I wore them through grade school and high school and didn’t realize at the time that it was a period of Nirvana in my life that would never be reproduced once I had to make clothing choices.  If we all had to wear uniforms, I wouldn’t have to worry if there was ever a time purple and orange went together and whether my sister would get little pains in her shoulders if I tried to pair them into an attractive ensemble.  OK, I lied about the attractive part. I’d wear it if I thought it covered me enough to

Another change – the column will appear as usual tomorrow. The change to Friday has been reversed and it’s now on for its regular day. Sorry for the confusion.  But I do now know how to find something on my website that hasn’t been published yet and edit it. So ultimately it’s been a fruitful experience (says Pollyanna).

For all my regular readers, all nine of you, my column won’t appear in the paper on Wednesday. This week only it’s been moved to Friday. So, those of you reading it weekly on this site, look for it to pop up here sometime on Friday afternoon.

As the pundits wax eloquent about our current president winning hands down as the worse president ever, I wonder how anyone could have doubted this would be the inevitable result of a president who most closely resembles Alfred E. Newman in both looks and mentality.