Oh Hello, I Didn't See You There

Who up in this bitch likes clothes and getting paid? If you raised your hand, you might like to know that Mercedes Benz Fashion Week is here again. Of course, we are all now starving and dying because while there is no depression in Heaven, there is one here on Earth. Bummer. It is well documented that many designers are trying to reconcile the luxe loucheness of pretty birds in sparkly dresses with imminent doom, and one of the ways they cope is with PRESENTATIONS, where said birds line up or lounge about and wear said dresses.

Witnesseth, Exhibit A:

We are so bored,



Exhibit B:

The designers get their moment with the chorus girls,



Exhibit C:

The shoes are kind of cruel when the girls have to stand in one spot for a half hour,



Exhibit D:

You achieve a new level of intimacy with the process when the models and stylists start talking to each other in plain view,



A presentation, though classical in structure and effect, is nowhere NEAR as much fun as a runway show as the pace is slower and static, and the crowd hewn and refined to close friends, staff, and Important Tastemakers (Editors). You could say that a presentation "intimate." You could also say there are "fewer freaks." Tomayto, tomahto.

I've also noticed that the people working the shows, the support staff, the hair and makeup boys and girls, security and the media are all just happy to be here and employed. Count me among them.

While some designers opt for smaller presentations, others still use the fanciest trade-show venue in the World, The Tents. ON WITH THE SHOW.

Behold, a tiny space for all your hair and makeup needs,



A double-wide prepping area sub-divided to fit two designers' crews in at the same time (economies of time, space),





There are fewer cameras on the runway during pre-game this season, but they all end up in the same place (this has not and will not change ever),



The usual suspects are still in the front row,



I'm pretty sure the staff photographer for Nicole Miller pre-rigged the venue with strobes. I can't recall having seen that before, even though I'm sure it has happened at least once. In any instance he lit that space up like a motherfucking roman candle.



People still applaud the effort and time.



That wasn't so hard, was it?

Yes, I Went To Disneyland

Disneyland is many things, and a mess of contradictions which I am still limping my way through. Currently. In no order:

1) It's smaller than I remember. Now, I've not been there in 12 years or somewhere thereabouts. In any instance, the forced perspective in the buildings (Main Street gets narrower and the buildings get shorter as they approach Sleeping Beauty's Castle) is now less effective now that I am 6'2". There is also an argument for my "seeing better," if that makes any sense. What took a whole day to walk around now takes about 20 minutes and most of the time is spent waiting in line for rides, which speaks to the designers' grace in jamming so much shit into such a (relatively) tiny space and still managing to give each Land its own entry way and exit.



2) Disneyland is BIGGER than I remember. There's a whole second park, with a second admission fee (Disney's California Adventure), which was built over the old parking lot. Now you take a tram (or walk through Downtown Disney, a weird little shopping mall/esplanade thing) to the main gate from the multi-story parking garage with super-high-flow escalators and a view of scenic Anaheim over and beyond the Magic Kingdom.

2a) Disney's California Adventure is clearly not meant for people from California. Or maybe it is, but that has a certain cynical implication that the good people of the state of California are too dumb to go visit their own (real life, with real bears) attractions. My family and I took a cursory walk through it and I was pretty unimpressed.

Consider below:



Poppies: Check. They are the state flower. Well done. They're all along the highway.

Retro Font: Check. Sell the postcard image of sun-drenched beaches and Beach Boys compilations.

Movie Theater: YOU'RE IN LOS ANGELES MOTHERFUCKER GRAUMAN'S IS VERY CLOSE BY MAYBE YOU SHOULD GO. SHIT IS CRAZY.

Pen: I don't get that. It must be some Miramax-Barton-Fink leftover shit.

Sun, Surf, Palms: See: "Movie Theater," substitute "Venice" for "Grauman's."

3) Disneyland is scary.



There's a lot of skulls. I recall there was a skull count a few years back (which was done apropos of nothing) and the number was pretty high. Or higher than you might expect or think of off the top of your head. There's a lot of blacklight stuff and fucking two story WOOZLES (above) which will clearly haunt your dreams. We can joke all we want about Coney Island being a strange and violent looking place, but all things are equal in this instance and in spite of Uncle Walt's best wishes, Disneyland is closer in spirit and execution to the old carnivals he was trying to render obsolete than we might want to admit. Permanence is great, and the safety record of the park is unbeatable, but content is content is content and the Indiana Jones Ride is just as dark as Dante's Inferno.

4) I might just be getting cynical ("getting," "ha, ha") in my old age. I mean, the holiday re-dressing of the Haunted Mansion (the ride, not the sad Eddie Murphy movie thing) for the Nightmare Before Christmas was pretty cute, and clearly had a lot of thought and love behind it (unlike the sad Eddie Murphy movie thing). Kids seemed to be having a good time still, which is important, because when the STOP having a good time we should burn the place to the ground, and people closer to my age seemed to be having a reasonable time as well. So what does this say about me?