6*15*02

Saturday? Great! A whole day to write. It's a cold, rainy Saturday--the best kind. But first, I must clean my room. I must do some laundry. I must make a list of errands:
*Staples: get new ink cartridge, plastic file-box, cardboard magazine holders.
*Bread & Circus: organic vegetables, fancy cheddar, hummus, olive oil.
*Mall Discount Liquor: retsina so I can offer a glass of w in the evening.
*library: return Marie Antoinette book and get out five other books about French history (fortunately my phases are short-lived, otherwise I'd be reading The Garden of Eden again and despising adjectives.)

I sit down in front of the iMac. I open a Word document. I look out at the street. I look at the screen. I look at the street. I look at my sewing machine, which I have cleverly set up next to the iMac so I can switch from one machine to the other by moving my chair two feet. While I haven't been working on discontent I have found time to sew three shirts, two dresses, and four pairs of boxers. One of the dresses was a 1954 "Vintage Vogue" dress & bolero set that really impressed me with features like a pleated lining, encased buttonholes, and POCKETS. It made the McCall's and Simplicity patterns that I'd been using look wicked cheap.

A big part of sewing addiction is finding the right place to buy fabric. In downtown Boston, I highly recommend Winmil Fabrics on Chauncy street. It is by far the least scary and gross store in the fabric district, and they sell cotton for $3.99 a yard. They also have nice 60" bolts of dupioni silk in cool colors like flame and fuchsia and cornflower. For even cheaper cotton--like for making boxers or easy blouses--there's a Jo-Ann's near the Burlington mall that totally rocks. Also a good place to buy clusters of fake grapes or a glue gun or large quantities of vinyl if you're feeling super crafty. Finally, the Fabric Corner in Arlington has more cool cottons from about $8.99 up. They specialize in insane prints like desert hares among the cacti or knights posing before castles or southwestern vegetables. As a result the place is popular with the equally insane quilting & slipcover sets--hardy opinionated sisterhoods that can verge on carnivorous when closing time draws near. Overhead while standing in line: "...it was covered with cats playing in a jazz band. They were wearing shades and one was sitting on a stool so it could reach the bull fiddle. It was so funny! Totally adorable!" Yeah.