Real questions brew for real thinkers around the “Designed by Celebrity” phenomenon we’re confronted with these days. Like weeds encroaching on a well-groomed lawn we have cross-fit devotee-models, singer-entertainers and the like being introduced as “Fine Jewelry Designers” in various manners of spin. For serious jewelry collectors, this message delights much like a dingle-berry in the punchbowl. The message we’re receiving is “we hope you have the instincts of a lemming” or more dryly….”Appropriate Education Completely Unneccessary”.
From the outside and occasionally from the inside, being a fine jewelry designer is a super-shiny, aspirational position. It seems unattainable for those not born to industry families, except for the brave that charge in to find out what is required from an ordinary human who dares to live the artist life. Years of learning, mistakes, improvement, investment of a frightening amount of money if you have your own line, travel, negotiation, competition and it doesn’t end for most of the best. Respect for those, the most highly regarded designers doing the work that put them at the top. On their feet greeting shoppers in Bergdorf Goodman in the last hours of December 24. Traveling from state to state to meet clients in personal appearances. Jewelry designers of broad recognition for the most part still earn their title.
The message we’re sending our creative class, should these new weeds take ahold, is this. If you want to be known as a high end jewelry designer, you’ve got some serious work ahead of you in the gym and the recording studio.. Not your skill set? Have a famous parent? No? Good luck to you. Seriously.
So is this a case of nouveau culture tone-deafness being incongruent with the seriously fine jewelry audience? Or, are established-brand jewelry houses becoming caught between a rock and a hard place for those Instagram hits and thus borrowing wholesale from the fashion industry and cosmetics’ “marketing constructs du jour”? If it works with the throngs purchasing thirty dollar lip kits, can it work magic with 18 karat gold and gems?
Just for familiarity, let’s review the efforts of a few “unbelievably talented” celebrities related to us by established media in regard to their fine jewelry designing chops.
These are just a few samples of the media generated with a google search. Jewelry companies would have you believe that in the midst of everything else, these celebrities are doing the designing work. For every few articles that describe the celebrity as an “influence” or a “collaborator” there will be headlines or statements that tango with the words “designed” and “designer” in reference to the celebrity, if not declaring such outright.
To be clear, omni-channel entrepreneurs and creative collaborations are interesting. They create excitement and infuse diversity, even the ones that are quite fluffy. Ivanka Trump had a “brand” which incorporated seasoned jewelry designers working for that brand. Tiffany and Co. had a feel-good campaign with Lady Gaga that felt right. However, it was clear in all messaging that the legitimate design work was from Tiffany and Co. and not Lady Gaga.
The likes of Chopard, with a covetable history of high jewelry and Messika (who arguably deserve more exposure and applause for the in-house design talent pre-Gigi Hadid campaign) can set the right example of authenticity. Party like rock stars in Cannes if those are your perks from the collaboration, but in the act of creative leadership, be vigilant that your media coverage is consistent and clear about the real designing being done. Be an advocate for Authentic Luxury. Then, put your jewels on these beautiful women and snap away.
Today's treat on Big Tits Creampie is Catalina Taylor, a smoking hot Dominican with gorgeous natural tits. Watching her lube those hot tits up and bounce around got my dick rock hard. She gives one of the wettest and sloppiest blow jobs I have ever seen! Watching her get fucked and stuffed was almost too much to bear. It damn near made me pop my top. Hope you enjoy watching this sweet pink pussy getting filled to the brim with hot cum.	Click here to watch this whole episode.
When I was in college, I would babysit for my nephews every time I was home for a visit. On one occasion, my nephew Aaron was just barely old enough to be able to dress and undress himself. I sent him upstairs to get into his pajamas. Not two minutes later, a butt naked 3-or4-year old came walking nonchalantly down the stairs. When he reached the bottom, he looked at me and said, "I am Naked Boy. Woo. Hoo."
I have never forgotten it... and I have never let him forget it, either. (He is now 13 and I'm sure he LOVES when I remind him of this particular night)
Last night, I was working late. When I got home, Daddy was running the bath for the Boy. I yelled out, "Hello!" to let them now I was home. Out of the bathroom, my blond haired little cherub came running, saying, "Mommy Mommy Mommy!" He was wearing only a pair of jeans. He stopped dead in front of me, I picked him up, and he said, exuberantly, "I NAKED!"
It took me back to the moment when Aaron did almost the same thing. It took my breath away at how fast the years pass. How quickly my boy, too, will grow up.
It's that time of year again (already????).... that lovely, hectic, insane time in which I am planning the Boy's birthday party. I love putting together the party. I love having the right food, an adorable cake, fabulous and enlightened goody bags which cost almost nothing to put together....
I hate the invitations and thank-you notes. I spent forevah combing various discount stores for the perfect invitations, which I opened and began writing on BEFORE discovering that a different store had packages which included matching thank-you notes for very little more. Grr. Imagine my distress when I realized that while my son would have the perfect, Lightning McQueen invites, he would have to settle for generic, balloon-infested thank you notes. Which I would write, because he is, you know, two years old and all. All he would do with the notes would be to try and eat them, or "read" them to the cat.
The theme of the party was very easily chosen this year, as it was last year. Last year we were all about Sesame Street, whereas this year we have matured and moved on to the ever-popular "vehicles" theme, so chosen because the Boy can name literally every vehicle that passes us on the street. And woe to you if you do not acknowledge his naming; he will repeat it at increasing volume until you do. He's just excited; he loves the vehicles SO MUCH that he wants to share them with you.
My MIL is making the cake; as she does, she made our engagement party, bridal shower, wedding, and baby shower cakes as well as the Boy's 1st birthday party cake. I have told her to go crazy with the vehicle theme; one less thing I have to think about. Especially since the Boy (being WHOSE child???) is not especially fond of cake. Not sure where that aspect of his tastes comes from; he is just like me on the cheese front.
I've been trying so hard to do this blogging thing. How do you all find the time? When I get home from work, I am swept into a crazy maelstrom of dinner, errands, outside time (thank god the winter seems to be over), bath, bedtime, and an attempt at restoring my own sanity by reading YOUR blogs. Having an almost-two-year-old tornado who is learning words, letters, and numbers almost faster than I can teach them, who never sits still, who is always exploring and curious to explore even more, makes it almost impossible to sit and write about my own life. But I'm still trying!
Things are GOOD. The long, dreary, cold winter seems to be over (although in New York, we never lose sight of the fact that it can still snow even in April or May), and we are gearing up with sidewalk chalk, bubbles, and plastic lawn mower, wheelbarrow, and dump truck for a spring and summer full of outside time. I'm feeling optimistic- my husband just got a new job, making a bit more money- enough so we don't have to fret at the end of pay periods, float a rent check, worry so much in general. We're getting to a point where I can see an actual house in our future- sure, it's years away, but it's there, a glimmering possibility on the far horizon. We just signed our apartment lease for another year- it's small, but we love it, and we can make it work- at least until we add to our family in a year or two. Our lives are full of playdates and fun, friends and happiness. Keeping my fingers crossed that it stays that way!
The Boy is learning about what animals say. He's quite good at this, and has many animals and their accompanying noises, all present and accounted for.
Meltdown #1: In shoe store. Tried a pair of sandals on the Boy (in FEBRUARY, yes, we are wild and crazy). They were far too small, because somehow my child has gone from wearing a 5 to a 6.5 WIDE no less, and it being the middle of winter and all, they didn't have any in his freakishly large size. So we put them back. And he ssccccreeeeeeeeeeeamed. He wanted the SOOS, the SOOS! SOOS PEAS! And it didn't matter that we were getting him two fabulous and very manly pairs of toddler sneakers. He wanted the SOOS! I found myself repeatedly reassuring my boy child that we would indeed, come back for the sandals as soon as they had him in his size.
Meltdown #2: In our bathroom. There exists in our home a small stepstool from my childhood (so yeah, 30+ years old or whatever). It has a picture of some odd bearish creature riding, for some reason, in a train. On the stool is written, "Step up, I'm a stair, or sit down, I'm a chair." The Boy in his wisdom figured out that if this stool was placed in front of the bathroom sink, he could REACH the WATER and even hold his toothbrush IN the water oh my hell. So then it was bathtime, and we had the audacity to remove him from the stool to put him in the bath. A meltdown such as the bathroom has never seen. I basically threw some soap on him, splashed him with water, and hauled him out because GOOD LORD THE SCREAMING.
Not a meltdown, but funny all the same: Daily, in our house. The Boy sometimes needs to be given water in every single cup he owns, all at the same time. Then he drinks from them, one after the other.
I honestly cannot think of anything witty, pithy, etc. to write here. I am a wife, Mama, sister, daughter, friend. I love all of these jobs. Not so much having a different job outside of those. But oh well. I live with Husband, who is a totally awesome man and huge dork like me. Last year we were joined by Boy, who is also awesome, but possibly not a dork. Too early to tell yet. But we have high hopes for him. Also: two cats, Jenny and Nutmeg, who are crazy insane lunatics who run around at top speed a lot. I am obsessed with Barenaked Ladies and had a moaning, looking up at the sky and shaking my fist moment when I found out Steven Page had left the band. Dude. Get the band back together. Also, love Snacktime which came out just in time for my first child to be born. Now I am rambling. Read my blog blah blah love!
These steps are appropriate for the invitation-based Games where a Guide leads a selected group on an Outing.
The Guide begins by forming a Team, essentially a list of Members. The assumption is the list of Members has already been created within the system along with their WordPress Accounts, but it should be possible to add a New Member while assembling the Team.
Then, the Details of the Outing are pulled together as part of Prepare Invitations and the candidate email is displayed (and optionally sent to self) for verification before sending. Prospective New Members have an additional set of instructions for downloading, installing and registering the application.
The last step performed by the Guide is to Send the invitations out to the Team. At this point, each Member would take over the flow.
Receiving the email provides a number of different options to the Member (including prospective New Members). Full details under Invite Contents.
Once the Member's Device is Registered, the Member may accept the invitation (declining an invite does not require the app).
Once the day of the Outing has arrived, the Guide will verify each accepted invitation is present and confirms the team's presence.
The Scheduled End is the time at which invitations will expire; members can no longer join the Outing once the Outing has completed.
We need the JWT session to verify the authenticated session — which permits nearly all actions with the application
Two years ago Team Mojo scaled Falls Creek, only to encounter a passel of hassle. It’s not a bad trail, particularly the first four miles or so. There are some creek crossings, yes. The trail gets sketchy here and there, yes. But it’s beautiful country, no one’s around and the terrain is challenging, varied and rapturous.
Still, we eventually had to call it quits. After emptying out into a broad meadow sliced by a babbling creek, we simply could not find the trail. When you ride with Jim the Lyon King, that’s saying something. A onetime professional mountain guide, Jim can point out trails on ridges miles away that look like nothing more than seas of trees. After spending nearly half an hour wandering around, Jim finally picked up a scent. There it was — a rocky, eroded line of rubble climbing straight up the hillside. It didn’t look like much fun, and the sun had disappeared behind the ridge. We decided to leave it for another day.
Fast forward to our Winthrop weekend of 2010, and there we were again, this time armed with two data points: 1. We knew where the disappearing trail picked back up again. 2. Joe had told us that the horsers had done some maintenance up there.
To get to Falls Creek you drive up West Chewuch Road), past Road 5130 on your left, taking Road 5140 on the left. It climbs for a long time, but get this: It’s all paved! We’ve run into this from time to time, typically on logging roads that also serve as fire-access roads. It’s pretty nice; you can make twice the time as the typical rutted, water-bar-laden fire road. Eventually the road dead ends right at the head of Trail 518, and you’re in business.
We got an earlier start and made great time to the point where the trail steepens. After that it was a matter of grunting, pushing, cursing and carrying — but all with the knowledge that we weren’t that far from the 8 Mile Ridge line — and from there it had to be all downhill.
There had been some maintenance, yes. But the trail wasn’t any great shakes. A lot of loose rock, and solid rock, and big rock.
Finally we topped out at Burch Mountain and took a few moments to look around. You’re at 7,400 feet at that point and the world looks pretty reasonable. This time, I felt sure I wasn’t going to get any phone calls.
There’s a nice big fat sign at the trail top reading “Eight Mile Creek” and sitting abreast what looks to be the start of a nice downhill run. And for a few hundred yards, it was. Then it got a little thin. Then we ran into a couple of blocking blowdowns. Then a couple more. After half a mile there was hardly any indication of a trail, logs lay strewn about like matchsticks, we’d descended more than 500 feet and it was time to reconnoiter.
“I don’t think it’s going to get any better,” Jim confessed. “And my suspicion is that it’s only going to get worse.”
“Actually, we may have to climb another ridge,” Jim said. “That is, if we can keep track of the trail at all.”
I’ve never been much for common sense, else I’d probably have given up on mountain biking a long time ago. But this time the handwriting was not just on the wall. It was on the trail, the bikes, the ridge and all over the sky. We literally did not have any choice.
We trudged back up the ridge — this is called blowing your verts — and, once at the top, started the ride back down. It wasn’t going to be a great ride, at least till it leveled out at the meadow below. But at least we knew we could get back to the car.
As I said, we were basically riding rock. I love this kind of stuff, challenging and absorbing, and took off down the ridge with whoops and hollers. Jim yelled something after me that I couldn’t hear, I was having too much fun.
Unfortunately, I soon got a bit ahead of myself. I was JRA, Just Riding (more like bouncing) Along, when something happened and I went over the bars in a big hurry. I slammed my left side into solid granite and felt my arm buckle under me. I sat there in a yard-sale heap for a few moments, tangled up with my Mojo. Then I started to move, hoping nothing would signal broken bones.
The worst off was my elbow. Already a big lump had formed at the crook of my arm. My forearm had a long stretch of raw skin beginning to bleed. I felt short-winded and nauseous. But my arm seemed to work OK.
It seemed like an eternity before Jim — who was wisely walking his way down — caught up with me. His first words: “Didn’t I tell you?”
Jim had me do some rotation and clenching motions. Everything seemed to work. I slapped some Neosporin on my forearm and we were good to go. I felt pretty washed out — shock will do that to you — and from that point on took it a bit easier. Please don’t tell my wife about this, as she never reads this blog.
After the trail leveled out it was pretty much a scream back to the car. I couldn’t fully enjoy it — something was catching at my left rear rib cage and Jim speculated I’d pulled or torn one of the little connector muscles. But given what might have been, I felt happy to be upright and rotational.
The ride nonetheless felt like half a loaf. We’d dealt with the unfinished business of two years earlier, to the extent that we made it to the top of the ridge. But we felt woefully cheated out of a killer ride down 8 Mile Ridge. Mayhap the horsers or Methow Valley Sport Trails Association (MVSTA) will find the wherewithal to clear 8 Mile Ridge and we’ll get to complete the job some day.
Back in Seattle, we ran into Peter Morgan, acting executive director of the Cascade Bicycle Club. Peter mentioned he’s proprietor of the Methow Valley Inn and invited us back for a stay. We’ll be sure to check it out the next time we go riding in Winthrop. After all, we still have that unfinished business calling out our name.
[Mileage: 12.2 / Elevation gain: 3,236 feet / Maximum grade: 16 percent / Time: 4 hrs 39 mins. The Falls Creek/8 Mile Ridge trails are tricky to track on Green Trails. You’ll need Map Nos. 52 (to show access roads), 51 and 19.]]
Posted in Rides | Tagged 8 mile ridge trail, falls creek trail, methow valley mountain biking, winthrop mountain biking
You were so close, after the “matchsticks” you can continue on with the ridge to your right and eventually you’ll cross the trail and it gets better and better all the way down. You did the hard part—next time!