<$100: My Sofa

Upon moving into my little white apartment, with its adorable cream colored vaulted ceilings and white tile floors, I wanted nothing more than white furniture to make this place feel like a fucking cloud. More than that, though, I wanted to spend little to no money furnishing and decorating, and as it turns out white furniture is pretty expensive.

I had taken it upon myself to have a budget of $100 to spend on my whole apartment, and at 420 sq. feet, it's really not that hard. And when you take into account that I had half a house full of furniture stockpiled in some bodunk storage shack in Mesa, $100 seems pretty alright. My first order of business was to find a sofa. A pretty sofa. And it has to be white. For way less than $100, since I still have a bunch of other this-and-thats left to buy. I'm guessing you already know, but in case you don't, white sofas are either super expensive, or super dirty. I toyed around with all sorts of ideas, the most prominent one being "hey I'll make my own goddamn sofa!" I'd read enough design blogs to know how to make a sofa, and to be honest I'm pretty damn crafty when I need to be.

So I set out to make a sofa.

Of course, as that turns out, building a sofa costs more than buying a sofa, even if it is a white sofa. I guess it's the price to pay for not being an IKEA yuppie home. Between the wood and the paint and the foam, fabric, nails and glue, not to mention time, making a sofa turned too overwhelming all too fast.

So here I am with no money and no sofa, and now no ideas.

So I went on craigslist. I figured hey, if I can't make my own sofa, I'll redo someone else's! I'd get a janky free couch from the internet, and then pick up some white fabric and reupholster that bad boy so it's new and fresh and most importantly, WHITE. Being the internet, I find a plethora of free couches here and there, with torn cushions or scratched up armrests, pet dander and cigarette burns. The options were limitless! I needed only to pick one up and make it mine. Right? Wrong. What comes with picking up a free sofa, of course, comes with taking it home, and my little Taurus can't fit anything bigger than 39 inches wide. And you know, couches are much bigger than 39 inches.

But then, like a beacon of hope from the heavens, craigslist sends a giant papasan chair my way. You know, those wicker-bamboo-rattan bowl chairs you see at Pier 1, always sit in, and dream of owning even though they are $200 for basically a giant bowl. This one was not terribly far from me, either. So minutes later I am out the door and over to see my new potential sofa, and of course, the thing is blue. Couldn't be a warm color to go with my beige house, noooo. It had to be the worst shade of cornflower blue that would make even the worst IKEA Kramfors couch vomit.

But for $25, I thought, I'll deal.

So the thing is now in three parts, cushion, bowl and base, and barely fitting into my Taurus' trunk, which I'm growing to resent more every minute. It's half sticking out and I drive the 10 miles back to my house, taking local streets and having people eye me as they drive around and pass me. But like I said, for $25 I won't complain. So this hideous blue thing is now in my living room, the perfect size and everything, but hey, I wanted white.

So I threw a white blanket over it and called it a day. And for $25, it's pretty adorable, right?

And it really is just like a cloud.

Do expect more stories of decorating woes and wins, because this is the best use of my time I've ever encountered. It's even better than reading design blogs.

Hair & Individuality Woes

I'm sad to say that I've once again joined the ranks of the "normal haired" people's world. Meaning, I took (pulled, wrestled, tore) those silly little yellow stripes that I used to have in my bangs, that were a result of some spontaneity on Portobello Road. I grew to like them, though, despite the initial shock that I looked like the chick from X-Men. I liked to think that those 4 little lines made me a little more noticeable in a crowd, and in San Francisco (aka 2nd Asia), that meant alot to me. Now I'm just another Asian girl, with her black, straight hair and little slanty eyes. Alot more people would look like me if I didn't take the appropriate measures!

I take alot of pride in the fact that I am really quite weird looking. It makes me so happy to wake up every morning and remember that no one in the world looks much like me! I like to think that we as people can only have so many combinations of eyes, noses, bodies or whatever that there isn't really much variety when you think about us collectively. The thing that sets you apart from everybody else is the stuff you put on and prance around in everyday! I mean clothes. So much of me as a person shows from what I wear on a day-to-day basis that it makes me so sad when I see some generic skinny blonde chick walking out of Hollister, wearing Hollister, and holding her little Hollister bags full of the same distressed jeans, striped tanks, embroidered logo tees, and HOLLISTER emblazoned zipped hoodies as every other kid who's traded their individuality for being "cool". I'll admit I get a bit disturbed when I see one of these Generies (like "generic", rhymes with "canaries") leaving one of those popular mall franchises. I can't help but wonder what goes through their heads as they look through their closets in the morning. "Gee, I really want to wear the same thing I wore yesterday, but in a different color combination". "Oh, I am so cool because I am wearing the same thing as a mannequin!" I don't know.

And it's not just generic teen/tween places that bother me so much these days, it's mostly the ones like Urban Outfitters that push my buttons (that means "makes me mad" right?) lately. As much as I love their $10 sale section (and I really do love it alot) I can't get past that this store offers a shortcut into finding your own style, turning dressing "crazy" or "unique" into another generic mall franchise. Wear those oxford shoes, opaque tights, fedoras and high waisted suspendered things as much as you want girl, but you know there's an identical chick right behind you in line to buy more triangle scarves and obnoxiously bright Ray Ban knockoffs.

What a person wears says so much about their personality, and allows so much room for self expression (I know, it sounds like something you say when you're angry about your high school's dress code, but it's true!) that it seems kind of mind boggling that so many different kinds of people all choose to dress exactly the same. Of course I wear some stupid things sometimes, I don't really know how to make outfits, and sometimes I am a fashion disaster, but at least I can say for sure that no one in the world dresses like me :)

On a side note, I would also like to mention that my google search box currently has "Bourgie Tea Party"

Evil Thought #1

I love looking through facebook pictures to find that someone I know has gotten chubby.

Cute ass guniea pigs

This makes me want a guinea pig (or four!)

This does not.