you could smoke a spliff with a cliff but there's still no mountain hiiigh enough

after slogging through an unfortunate series of airline delays, mechanical issues, fuel shortages, closed airports, and about fifteen hours in transit, intermittent drizzle and a gunmetal sky welcomed me back to the 02138 this morning. sheer exasperation alone kept my mood from plummeting accordingly - even the most dismal weather beats the inside of an airport, after all.

as for the blissful week i just spent in st. petersburg, florida, i have a bad habit of - or is it a handy knack for? - living in the moment rather than documenting it. as a result, i have absolutely no photographic evidence of my time spent watching french movies about french women, sifting through wedding dresses, falling into the baroque world of fernando botero, enjoying long walks on the beach, and reading lolita by the pool. trust me when i say that i gorged myself on the best gelato in the world, and just take my word for it that sara and i spent friday night rubbing elbows with a bunch of middle-aged women, jersey shore-types, crooklyn clan, and tone loc.

undocumented claims aside, i happen to have an abundance of st. pete souvenirs to make up for my total lack of vacation snapshots. naturally, all of these souvenirs happen to fall squarely into the sartorial realm - so much for a shopping system. i was planning on allowing myself to buy two more items for the month of march, and ended up with eight or nine new things, and that's not including the things i cajoled my dear mother into buying before even arriving in florida.. oops?

still, as heady as i felt slapping down the plastic time after time, i swear i wasn't acting completely on impulse. as i explained to a friend, i felt as if i were suddenly shopping for my postgraduate self - who can don something a bit dramatic without looking too over the top for, say, a seminar on protestantism in american literature - and it was a great feeling, indeed.

images to come, folks.

[via google]