EastGirlsWest

So last night we had some acquaintances stop by, a nice couple in the middle of a home remodel who wanted to see our house. As I was in the middle of giving the tour, one of them turned to me and said “You’re not from California, are you?”

Now wondering exactly what gave it away…

Just catching up on the New York Times after a weekend away, and saw that FRANK RICH IS BACK!!! And in top form, comparing the Bush White House to the classic film “Carrie”. Read it here if you subscribe to Times Select.

Also, check out Salon’s coverage of Stephen Colbert’s performance at the White House Correspondent’s Association Dinner. You can watch his speech in full, plus a hilarious taped skit with Helen Thomas, here. Read the opinion piece on the speech here.

Apologies in advance that more than one of my post-Austin posts will be about shopping. But when a woman leaves town to visit her sister, shopping is bound to occur. This is a story about our trip to Hem, the denim bar.

My sister was determined to help me find a pair of dream jeans while I was in Austin, and pretty convinced that Hem was where it could happen. By day two of my visit, somewhere between lunch at Whole Foods and dinner on South Congress, I ended up purchasing and being photographed in a pair of PaperDenimCloth. Let me start at the beginning:

So we saunter into the denim bar. My sister in her super-sexy jeans she bought there a few weeks ago, complete with studded belt, studded tanktop, appropriately messy multi-colored hair and the pure-hearted goal of helping her sister. I followed in my baggy cargo pants, feeling somewhat dowdy and slightly afraid.

I have to explain, on some level it was meant to be that I would end up at Hem with my sister. After the first time she went there, she called me flush with excitement about her successful purchase. “It’s a new denim bar, owned by two sisters! I can’t wait to take you there!”

Then, two nights later I was watching Letterman, and Dave was doing ‘Audience Show & Tell’. His first contestant was a young woman from Austin, who told him she owned a denim bar along with her sister. I called MY sister immediately to report, and upon arrival at Hem this weekend promptly told the owner I saw her on Letterman. She was thrilled.

Not exactly sure what “denim bar” means. If it’s “bar” in the sense that a traditional bar has a many varieties of one thing (alcohol) to choose from, then I can see the comparison. They had a whole lot of jeans and nothing else. On the other hand, they did offer all of us a beer while we were shopping, so maybe it’s actual alcohol in combination with the denim that makes it a “denim bar”. Unclear.

There were three women working while we were there, and they ALL scattered to help me the perfect pair of jeans. Amazing customer service experience. I must have tried on 15 pair, which is probably nothing compared to what they’ve seen there, but for me, an immense commitment. My sister stood at the dressing room, directing the traffic of pants in and out, rating each pair that made it around my hips with either the nod, the wince, or the occasional eyebrow raise.

Meanwhile, the boyfriend and my mother were settled in the exhausted-shopping-companion chairs, each trying to be patient in the face of, let’s be honest, a worse-case scenario for the person NOT interested in buying jeans. I can’t prove it, by I think there may have been some eye-rolling. Before long though, they discovered the Hem Book of Butts on a coffee table. This is a photo album the ladies of Hem have put together - an essay of satisfied customers modeling their successful Hem purchases…all shot from the rear. One smiling butt after another, in every shade and style of denim imaginable. (I guess the one thing everyone in these pictures has in common is that they all paid over $150 for a pair of jeans.)

While Mom and the boyfriend were in hysterics over this book, I was nearing a purchase. Although there were a few pair that nearly triggered a crying fit, there were some that actually seemed to have magic powers. Butt-shrinking, leg-lengthening powers. We narrowed the pile down to two promising pair, and after a few laps around the store in each, a selection was made.

Since my sister was wearing jeans she bought there, and I was waltzing around in a winning pair, it was suggested that we pose together for a photo. I was drunk with confidence and possibility. I’d found a pair of jeans that didn’t make me cry! Surely my butt was photo ready! So we posed, side by side, while I tried not to think about the fact that my sister once did pilates every day for two years (the results remain). In that brief moment of denial, all butts were equal.

The final touch on the Hem polaroid is that you get to add your own caption. My sister grabbed the marker and wrote, “Butt…we’re sisters!”. Then our photo was added to the Book of Butts for all eternity.

As we were hurtling down the runway for takeoff on Sunday night, I turned to the boyfriend and said, “I can’t believe the one thing I left in Austin is a picture of my ass.”