We Haven't Forgotten About You

No need for alarm - the 3CrankyChicks haven't forgotten about you - we've just been too busy to blog about how cranky we are that we are so busy. You follow?

Well, this "First Lady Got Back" has got me/us riled up. Salon's Erin Aubry Kaplan has dedicated an entire article to talking about Michelle Obama's ass. Not her clothes, her hair or any other superficial image issue, which frankly no one wants to read about that crap either. No Kaplan wants to talk about the soon-to-be-First Lady's boo-tay.

I cannot even articulate how completely INAPPROPRIATE it is to write about the size of the future First Lady's ass. As CrankyFashionChick points out, no one talks about Laura Bush's pancake butt. And no one should.

Leave these women alone! Just because your spouse decides to run for office doesn't mean that your ASS is up for public commentary.

Check the Rear View

People, before you leave the house do yourselves and everyone around you a favor.  Stand in front of a mirror.  Turn around.  Look over your shoulder.  Please.

This summer I have seen far too many people who haven't done this...with disastrous results.  Summer is a time for wearing white.  White is often see-through.  The answer to this is NOT to wear white underpants with your white dress/skirt/pants.  The answer is to wear nude underpants.  I don't want to see your underpants.  And in most cases, NOBODY wants to see your underpants.

The see-through pants showing off your undies syndrome is, sadly, not the province only of women.  I SWEAR TO GOD, I saw a nice young man on the way to work a month ago suffering from the same condition.  

While I am not usually prone to checking men's butts on my way to work, I did notice that the young man in question appeared to have stains on his khaki trousers.  "Oh.  Bummer" I thought to myself.  Then I noticed that there seemed to be several stains at regular intervals and they were more or less flower-shaped.  "Holy cow," I thought to myself.  "Those aren't stains, those are his flowered boxers showing through his khakis!"  And they were.  I didn't even know they made khakis that see-through.  And clearly, neither did he.

Now, see-throughness is not the only reason to check your rear view.  While staring out the window, enjoying the parade of passers-by in San Francisco a few weeks ago, I saw a young woman go by in a dress that really should be classified as a top.  But that wasn't her most serious fashion infraction.  The back of her dress had gotten caught on the lining of her leather jacket and she was showing her hot pink underpants to everyone behind her.  Lovely.  I'm just glad she wasn't wearing a thong.

So.  Walk over to the mirror.  Turn around.  Look over your shoulder.  Some day, you'll thank me.

Ugliest. Shoe. Ever.

Period.

It's a white, peep-toe, knee-high, wedgie boot. Everything I despise all in one place. Nuff said.

Jolie-Laide? I don't THINK so!

Much to this cranky chick's chagrin, Mary Kate Olsen is on the cover of this month's Elle magazine. I find this annoying for many, many reasons, but chief among them is the insistence on pretending that this young woman and her twin sister are beautiful. They are not.

They were ugly babies. They were funny-looking little girls. And they are unattractive adults. (I suspect that the occasional introduction of...oh...I don't know...maybe a SANDWICH? might help make them less weird-looking, but that's hardly the point.)

Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that all actresses MUST be gorgeous. But why are we pretending that unattractive people are not just attractive, but BEAUTIFUL? Because they're famous and rich. And that just AIN'T ENOUGH.

Jolie-Laide is a French phrase meaning "pretty-ugly" which is used for women who are unconventionally pretty (read: Ahn Duong or Sarah Jessica Parker).

For the record, Mary Kate is not jolie-laide. She's just plain old laide. And the sooner we stop pretending, the better off we'll be.

Bad Bathroom Behavior

I've seen some zany things in our office bathroom, but this is a new one.

Don’t you know you’re supposed to throw those away after you use the bathroom? If you’re that big of a freak who needs to sit on the equivalent of a roll of paper towels (There were many layers, the photo doesn't do the situation justice!) – don’t make the restroom cleaning lady pick up your dirty butt towels!

Naked in the Gym

Two of the CrankyChicks periodically visit the gym in order to avoid literally becoming too big for our britches. While our regular visits are helping us with the cardio thing and the muscle thing, they have also exposed us to some pretty weird naked behavior in the ladies’ locker room. And we are not happy about it.

So far, we’ve seen far more of some gym rats’ naked bodies than we have of our own. This is unpleasant and leads us to believe that there are some basic rules of etiquette associated with locker room nakedness that these people are either willfully ignoring or are unaware of.

OK – you’re in the locker room to shower and change. Some nakeness is expected. Once your street clothes or your disgusting, sweaty gym clothes are off, you are going to be naked. But there is no reason to prance around like that. You do not need to lean against the wall and chat while naked. There is no reason to wash your face naked (and the bending over is particularly icky). And blow-drying your hair naked is just exhibitionism.

Then, there’s other weird stuff. CrankyFashionChick will swear on a stack of Tim Gunn’s Guide to Styles that she saw a woman pull her underpants down underneath her butt and THEN rummage through her locker and stop for a drink of water. Why would you do that? It was one awful, pale, cellulite-laden, flat butt, too.

She has also witnessed a woman butt-naked doing stretches in the steam room. Not just little arm stretches, either. NO, I’m talking about lying-on-your-back-one-leg-down-the-other-in-the-air-showing-the-whole-world-what’s-usually-reserved-for-your-gynecologist stretches. Ugh!

And CrankyFashionChick’s FAVORITE was the lunatic woman who, after showering and drying off, put on her underpants, tights, kilt, boots and pearl necklace and then proceeded to blowdry her hair. Notice anything missing from this picture?

CrankyCheeseCurlChick swears she made it out in the nick of time last night. She has learned to head straight to her specific locker after a workout and not dilly dally trying to remember which locker she stashed her stuff in. It's the dallying that gets her in trouble. The nakeds dilly dally. With naked friends sometimes. It's most disturbing, especially when they hide behind corners and then pop out - "Ta-Da, look at me I've got no pants on... And no shirt... And no bra... And no unders... Just me, rummaging through my purse, looking for my keys or my cellphone, or my ipod. Bare-ass-naked. Wait, wait, I'll turn around so you can get the full view..."

CrankyCheeseCurlChick winces at these encounters. It makes her a little bit afraid of the gym on the inside. Not because she's a prude, but because seriously these are scary nakeds. A gym membership does not double as a nudist club pass. Good naked includes a towel wrapped around your privates while you go about your business. Bad naked is sitting your bare butt down on the same bench where SOME people used to place their water bottle or jacket to rest. And lingering there for a few minutes while you figure out why you're just hanging out in the locker room with no clothes on, la-dee-dah.

And so last night, CrankyCheeseCurlChick caught a brief glimpse of naked coming around the corner aimlessly and bolted out of the locker room before suffering any additional mental and emotional anguish.

So, naked people, stop it now! We beg of you!

Cranky Comes In All Sizes

How cute is this cranky little face?

What's Next???

So, it’s not enough that we have cell phones, blackberries, instant messaging and social networking sites to keep us up to date, dialed in, online and available all hours of the day and night. (Heck, I finally caved this week after peer pressure from CrankyFashionChick and CrankyCheeseCurlChick and signed up for Facebook. Now I’m working on mastering improving my LOST and The Office trivia scores.) But can someone explain to me the need for an electronic business card with a glamour shot on it??? I’m not kidding – oh how I wish I were.

A colleague (and that is using the term really loosely) forwarded an email describing her new job and concluded the email with her new contact information in one of those electronic business cards, containing her picture. And not the kind of picture that is on your realtor’s business card – you know a tasteful headshot – but the kind of picture where she’s posing with her head cocked back and her hair BLOWING. Okay, maybe the hair motion is due to the fact that she’s tossing her head over her shoulder with a big smile on her face, but the point remains that HAIR MOVEMENT is unnecessary on an electronic business card. What’s next? This woman is a professional – why is she doing this?

God, I hope this doesn’t catch on! The last thing I want to have to do is send my picture to people I only have electronic communication with in a freaking email.

I wish I could paste in the business card with her photo – but I’m not that brave (I happen to like my job thank you very much) and she happens to be a very nice woman just one with a dumb photo and questionable taste.

Note – CrankyFashionChick insists that the picture is not a glamour shot but a pic from a fancy dress party or her prom. :)

Rant over, happy Friday!

Sucks to be YOU

I’m driving in to work this morning, just tooling along minding my own business. I’m not talking on my cell phone, filing my nails or even rummaging for a different CD in the backseat – not that I ever do those things while driving. As I approach one of DC’s famous circles I notice all the orange construction signs, YES they are doing ROAD WORK at 8:45 am! You read me right ROAD WORK DURING RUSH HOUR.

Thankfully it only affected the poor fools going the other direction. That attitude is not very nice, I know, but that’s the way it goes when you’re zooming (well not me at 8:45 am, more like a steady pace of 15 mph) down the road – you play the “Sucks to be YOU” game in honor of all the suckers just sitting there.

Anyway after not bitching about all the traffic headaches from the Pope’s visit last week, not that I wasn’t cranky - I just didn’t have time, I thought I would share this morning’s joy. I can’t wait to see what my trip home will bring.

I’m not the only one who gets this stuff, right???

I’m talking about spam. We all get it – some of us more than others. The fearless leader of the 3CrankyChicks gets close to 3,000 pieces of spam a day – and this CrankyChick has waded through it to pull out the poor messages that fell through the cracks and lived to tell about it. But seriously, have you ever considered opening an email that begins with the subject line “Your Mom Naked” and “THE BIGGEST BUTT?” Seriously, I cannot think of ONE PERSON who wants to have the biggest ass and to see their own Mom naked. Yuck-o.

I feel like I’m fairly tolerant of most spam. I recognize that there are people who are dumb enough to buy discount medications, watches and ways to get a longer member online. Not to mention the perverts who want to see Britney Spears and Paris Hilton doing things I don’t like to think about at 9:00 AM while I’m de-spamming my email. But even these morons don’t want to see their moms naked!

Please, if spammers of the world are reading this (and YES I know they aren’t) please stop sending the ones NO ONE will ever open. Most of us haven’t even had our second cup of the day!!!

What the HELL???!!??

Guess what THIS is!!


Do you give up yet? Do ya?

I would. You'll never figure it out.

It's a bracelet.

I'm not kidding.

You're supposed to wear this around your wrist.

Guess how big it is!!

C'mon - guess.

It's 7 1/2 inches in diameter. And it's THREE INCHES THICK.

Guess what it costs!

Ok - I can't wait any longer. It's $1,035. Plus shipping and handling.

Really.

And what kills me is that someone, somewhere will buy it.

The Most Wonderful Time of the Year

Yup, it’s tournament time and this CrankyChick (barring an early exit by my beloved Tar Heels) will be a very un-CrankyChick for at least a few weeks!

Happy Basketball to all! And to all a good night!

Thank you Maureen Dowd!

Earlier today when I was horribly cranky (thanks to bad customer service, inadequate database systems and deadlines – you know the same ol’ thing) this excerpt from Maureen Dowd’s column today made me smile. Okay, honestly it was a smile and a very unladylike snort/laugh.

“With Obama saying the hour is upon us to elect a black man and Hillary saying the hour is upon us to elect a woman, the Democratic primary has become the ultimate nightmare of liberal identity politics. All the victimizations go tripping over each other and colliding, a competition of historical guilts… As Ali Gallagher, a white Hillary volunteer in Austin told The Washington Post’s Krissah Williams: “A friend of mine, a black man, said to me, ‘My ancestors came to this country in chains; I’m voting for Barack.’ I told him, ‘Well, my sisters came here in chains and on their periods; I’m voting for Hillary.’ ”

If you want you can read the whole column - here, but trust me that was the best part.

NO Taxation Without Representation

Last weekend this CrankyChick went home for some fun family bonding time AND to have my mom do my taxes. I know, I know, I hear you snickering. You’re just jealous because your mom isn’t as good as my mom and you have to do your taxes yourself or hire a trained professional!

This year I purchased a home – okay a 500 square foot box – in the lovely District of Columbia and I’ve resisted changing over my car tags, license and voting registration. Heck I just changed everything to MD after keeping NC tags, license, etc. for four years after I moved to the area! Anyway, I’m continuing to act out in the same manner by not moving everything over to DC. I did this for one simple reason, okay two reasons. One, I am lazy. Two, I refuse to pay taxes and be forced to vote in a place where your vote does not matter and going over my FEDERAL TAX RETURN this weekend fired me up!

How do people who have lived a lifetime in the District deal with this? Hell I’m nuts and it’s only been four months! (I’m also nuts for other reasons, but that’s for another post.) How does Eleanor Holmes Norton keep herself from walking into the U.S. House of Representatives and scream, yell, and rage at all the idiots who refuse to give DC residents a VOTING member of Congress every single day. WE (citizens of DC) don’t want just some pansy who has to get someone else to sponsor her bills (sorry Eleanor) but a REAL member of Congress. AND, I don’t want to have to give Utah another seat either. I don’t care about Utah – I care about us!

This isn’t about getting another Republican to balance out the Democrats – this is about what’s fair. I pay taxes, I want a voting member of Congress. It’s that damn simple – OR I’m taking back all of my money, take that George! I think I’m going to have to devote some serious CrankyTime to figuring out how I can claim a number of dependents so high that the “Man” gets no more of my money until the law is changed… or until I’m thrown in the clink for not paying my taxes.

If I Had My Own TV Show

I’ve figured out why I love “Gordon Ramsay’s Kitchen Nightmares” and almost all judge shows – because the show is basically about people calling other people on their shit and telling them to knock it the hell off. I want a show like that!

I’m going to hire a camera crew and producer to follow me around while I gently encourage the citizens of our country to pull their socks up. I think my catchphrase will be, “WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING?!”

I plan to start with the Metro. My first targets will be people who step onto the train and just STOP MOVING, so that everyone behind them crashes into them and can’t get on the train. “Excuse me, sir? WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING???!!?”

Then I’ll confront the raging jackass who thinks he deserves to have a seat all to himself and gently explain that his briefcase doesn’t need a seat and that since he didn’t pay a fare for his briefcase, he should give up that seat DURING RUSH HOUR to another HUMAN. I don’t want to sit next to him though, because he’s a SELFISH BASTARD.

I shall also explore the reasoning of people who stand on the wrong side of the escalator, jam up the area near the car doors when there are plenty of free seats and they’re not getting off for another 10 stops, leave their newspapers in the car when there are receptacles JUST FOR NEWSPAPERS AT EVERY STOP, and block the turnstiles staring at their non-functioning farecards so that no one can get by them. All together now, “WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING??!?”

We’ll also feature people who read books while driving on the freeway; people who actually attempt to drive, eat and talk on their cell phones at the same time; people who cut in line; people who steal parking spaces, oh…the list goes on and on.

I’m calling my show “America Wants to Know, ‘WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING??!?’” Coming soon to a TV screen near you…

Valentines Schmalentines

I’m not normally one of those single gals who gets horribly depressed, wears black, and cries “woe is me” because I don’t have a fella on Valentines. This year, had it not been for the constant Every Kiss Begins With Kay commercials on TV and the radio, I might have actually forgotten about the entire holiday! Silly me, like the folks that run the jewelry store would ever let me forget.

This sums up how I feel about yesterday.

CrankyFashionChick got this from her loving husband.

CrankyCheeseCurlChick got this from her boyfriend.

It was a lovely piece of quiche but she ate it before I had a chance to get a pic.

And I got this.

After a long day of work and parking what seems like miles away from my apartment, I finally make it home and stumble through the front door while trying to open my only Valentine (a very lovely card from my Dad which actually made me a bit misty – but maybe that was the pain, hmmm must re-read tonight) and at the same time I give myself a giant paper cut, hence my bandaged finger. I must have sloping shoulders because every day my purse falls off my shoulder as I’m trying to get myself and my gigantic handbag through my front door. Basically, the purse fell, my hand jerked, and I sliced my finger with the damn pink envelope. Even when you win, you lose!

So, I guess this year’s Valentine’s Day left me a lot like my finger – stung at first but ultimately patched back up and over it.

***Correction: I actually got two Valentines this year. A very cute card that didn't make me bleed!

A Random Thought...

All too often, riding in a cab is like visiting with a crazy uncle – you’re trapped in a small space with someone who insists on espousing insane and sometimes offensive opinions as though they were fact. And you just have to listen politely, and sometimes even smile and laugh weakly, until it’s over.

The only difference is that you don’t have to pay your crazy uncle.

Change Your Underwear

I love Donna Karan. She has been my fashion hero since her days working with Louis Dell'Olio at Anne Klein. When she launched her five easy pieces line for her own company, I was enraptured. Half my closet is DKNY. So imagine my distress when I discovered this priceless item on the "New Arrivals" page on the DKNY web site.

Why do I want a coin pocket in my underpants? Under what circumstances is anyone going to need to stash change while standing around in their underwear? And how much change can you get in there, anyway? 75 cents? Maybe one of those new gold dollar coins?

I am beyond perplexed. If anyone can explain the purpose of underpants with pockets, please let me know. I guess instead of changing our underwear, Donna wants us to underwear our change.

LOSTini!

Two of my favorite things in the whole world are Lost and cocktails, so here's my recipe for a cocktail in honor of one of my favorite shows...the Lostini:

2 parts mango juice
2 parts peach juice
1 part pineapple juice
1 part orange juice
1 part orange vodka
1 part Midori
1 part Curacao

Shake over ice and strain into a martini glass. The lovely color is reminiscent of the island and the tropical flavors make it the perfect Lost-watching beverage.

The ideal garnishes would be a pineapple wedge, a plastic palm tree and a teeny, tiny plastic plane.

Special thanks to CrankyBossChick for her input.

Panda-monium

All right folks – let’s chat about the Super Bowl! No, not the phenomenal job the Giants’ defense did on that pansy Tom Brady. The man had purple lips, no? Was my TV the only one with weird color? I only ask because last year after the Oscar telecast we were having our fashion debrief and CrankyCheeseCurlChick said she liked all the dresses but that everyone wore beige. Huh?!? I had to pull up pics of celebs online to prove to her that something was in fact WRONG with her TV because everyone was not wearing beige. Anyway, I spent most of the game pondering if Tom was continually drinking grape Gatorade or if he just liked grape Chapstick. For the record I think he has strange colored lips and that my TV is fine!

Let’s talk commercials! For the most part I thought they were lame, but one stuck out in my mind.



Um, when did blatantly racist commercials become funny? After it was over, I looked at my friend. She was just staring with the same “WTF?” face on that I did. Seriously folks - we’re past bad stereotypes as punch lines. There wasn’t one person at the ad agency where this was created who said, “wait…maybe this is too much”? One commenter on Mollygood said “I also can’t believe its creators spent so much money yet failed to cram in the big round glasses and buckteeth as an Asian stereotype. If you’re going to pay that much to broadcast racist sentiment to one of the largest TV audiences of the year, get your money’s worth and fit in all you can.”

Ugh, people suck.

Pee for Two!

Okay, this doesn't necessarily make me cranky...but it does make my stomach churn.

I get it, in this day and age society is a bit more lax about social boundaries than I would like. I can wrap my twisted mind around the filthy habit of talking on a cell phone in the bathroom. Heck, I have even been the recipient of one of those calls. And in one very embarrassing incident, I have answered the phone while in the bathroom stall - there was an unfortunate speaker phone and flushing situation that I'm still not quite ready to talk about.

But this, I cannot believe...

Are you kidding me?!? What kind of person/couple wants to go to the bathroom together? YUCK. EWWW. GROSS. Who wants to spend $1,400 on the downfall of social graces? What happened to that point in a relationship where you were even afraid to "rip a fart" (thanks to CrankyFashionChick for the lingo) in front of one another and now you want to go to the bathroom together?

I hope and pray that this is a joke, a la an old SNL skit, but I really fear that it's true!

We’re Not Cranky About LOST!

3CrankyChicks are totally excited about the long-awaited return of the brilliant TV series, LOST! On Thursday night, you’ll find all of us parked in front of our respective TV sets following the continuing adventures of Jack, Kate, Sawyer, Locke, Sayid, Hurley, Rose, Bernard and the other Losties.

While some of us have more or less love for certain characters, here are the things we agree on:

Lost is a most excellent show.

Ben sucks.

Locke is annoying as hell.

Hurley rocks.

We’re happy the baby is Jin’s.

Sawyer’s hot.

Kate’s a big whiner – she acts like its such a burden having to choose between two completely HOT guys.

Sayid is our top draft pick for people we want on our islands.

And if the writers’ strike isn’t resolved soon, we’re going to die!

Gen Y Whiners

So, one of our co-workers who is not an “Official CrankyChick” but one who keeps us informed of the shenanigans of the general public, brought this to my attention. I realize this is old news, but I’m just getting fired up about it now!

Basically, a high school student decided to call up the county official who makes the decisions about snow days at home because he believed that school should have been cancelled. The county official’s wife returned his call and left him an angry voicemail. She read him the riot act, and called him (and all kids I think) “snotty-nosed little brats.” The student, Dave Kori, took her voicemail, posted it on YouTube and Facebook, AND included the official’s home phone number. Well the scandal took off from there. (You’ll have to look the voicemail up for yourself - I’m not doing that much of the work for you.)

The county official has taken a lot of flak, as did his wife, since the Washington Post and local news stations ran stories all last week.

I wonder what possessed Dave to call a school administration official at home… from his barred cell phone… at lunch? Was he thinking that actual working adults go home for lunch? HELLO Dave - people WORK for a living, and most of us work through lunch!

Why does Dave think that his opinion matters? I blame the parents. Much has been written about Generation Y and how dealing with these kids is going to be a nightmare. Trying times are coming. This is the generation of kids whose parents have told them how wonderful they are every second of every day. This is the generation of kids who need constant praise for doing the simplest things. This is the generation of kids who don’t like red pen because it’s angry and it hurts their feelings. And, this is the generation that makes me want to stab them. NEWSFLASH – you’re not wonderful. Your parents have to say that to you.

One columnist reminds Dave that employers and college application boards are just the type to Google him before his interview. Would you want to hire the kid who would post – what you thought was a private conversation – online? I don’t think so. As the fallout from posting someone’s home telephone number online has caught up with Dave, I think he’s had a chance to rethink things. He reportedly has asked his friends to take down the official’s phone number from their Facebook sites.

I’m not saying the official’s wife was right for yelling at the kid, no wait… I am. It’s about time someone told these Gen Y punks to shut up. I’m tired of kids who think that the sun shines out of their ass. Listen up kids, this isn’t the first time you’ll be yelled at for something you think you don’t deserve, and it certainly won’t be the last. Sometimes life sucks and you just have to put on your big girl panties and deal with it.

Cold Weather SUCKS.

Nobody likes wind chill factors of seven degrees.

"Rudy Radiates Leadership..."

AAaaaaaah!

I found this gem of a letter today giving props to Mr. Giuliani, here's an excerpt:

"Rudy has promised to secure our borders and to identify every non-citizen
person in our country. These reforms will make America safer. "

Um… Ok…

And:

"The United States was not formed to be a Third World nation; we were formed to
be a leader, not a follower. With Rudy, America will restore our position as the
global leader, while improving the life of every American.

Rudy is a leader, let him lead.

Rudy! Rudy! Rudy!”

I think he sums it up pretty well there. I'm going to find a small patch of land somewhere, fill it with "aliens" and lead us on a quest to be the most impoverished, most deprived country in the WORLD! Then I'll go and round up all non resident people and "identify" them. But how to identify? Would wearing hot pink t-shirts be enough? Would there be a special whooping call or a certain way of lacing up one's sneakers. Hmm. That plan still needs to be cleaned up a bit. But I'm confident, like buddy here says, that will make the borders safe. Now that is a fine blueprint for nationbuilding.

Maybe my boy Dennis Kucinich wouldn't have called it quits if I'd managed to get myself all riled up like this guy and found an outlet to publish my praise in.

Rah, Rah, Rah - Dennis, Dennis, Dennis!

Guess that's what the blog is for.

Check it out, it’s entertaining (in a Freddy vs. Jason sort of way).

Since I don’t care to be sued by the nice people of Bloomington, Illinois – a great state! – I’ll say no more.

Look Who's Cranky

We had a little visitor in the office. Isn't she just the cutest thing, even if she is wailing! Of course I'm not complaining about a baby, my goodness I'm never that cranky! I mean really, do ya'll think I would bitch and moan about a baby?!?

Sometimes Fashion Makes Me Cranky

What's worse than bad fashion? NOTHING! And yet, year-after-year, season-after-season, we're subjected to some seriously bad fashion. Don't get me wrong - I LOVE fashion...or at least style (I'll leave you to ponder the difference), but some fashion is enough to make me cranky.

The February issues of the fashion magazines are beginning to clog my mailbox and cover my coffee table and once again, I'm being subjected to some seriously DUMB trends. The most ridiculous of all being THE PEEP-TOE BOOTIE!! What IS this thing? It looks like an otherwise perfectly respectable pair of booties that were VICIOUSLY ATTACKED BY A LAWNMOWER.

Booties usually keep your tootsies warm in cold weather. If you cut the toes off, they're no longer warm. Shoes that show your toes usually keep your feet cool in warm weather. It's hard to have cool, comfortable feet when they're ENCASED IN LEATHER. This brings me to ridiculous trends from seasons past, which I shall classify by the ways in which they offend the sensibilities:

For God's sake, pick a season!
The peep-toe bootie falls into this category. As do wool shorts. Really people, this was one of the dopiest trends of Fall 2007. Shorts are not warm. They are not fall and winter clothes. They are summer clothes. Making them out of wool will NOT make them fall and winter clothes because THE REST OF MY LEGS will be exposed. "Oh, but you wear them with tights," some idiot will say. If you need to wear tights with shorts to keep your legs warm, then perhaps you'd just like to invest in what you should be wearing in the first place...A PAIR OF PANTS!

It was stupid last time, and it's stupid now.
Ponchos. What addle-pated fashion designer decided we should re-launch the poncho? I had a poncho once...in the 70's WHEN I WAS A CHILD AND DIDN'T KNOW ANY BETTER. Ponchos are an amazing item of clothing -- they're not warm enough and they're too warm, all at the same time. Frankly, unless you live somewhere where the temperature never gets above 70 or below 60 -- YOU CAN'T WEAR THESE THINGS!!! And ponchos were clearly invented by men because no one put any thought into where you're supposed to hang your shoulder bag. Does it go  over the poncho or under it? I don't know!! And that brings me to...

Impractical clothing
Oh, don't even start with "fashion's not supposed to be practical." I KNOW that. I'm CrankyFashionChick. I have shoes that I can only wear if I'll be sitting down the entire time. I have skirts that won't let me take steps wider than six inches. I have the world's most fabulous winter white, wrap wool coat. It' s not warm and it has to be drycleaned after every wearing. I own SIX LEATHER JACKETS. Don't talk to me about practicality. But there's impractical and then there's ridiculously impractical. Let's start with...

Footless tights. First of all, this sounds far too much like crotchless panties. And that's not even my biggest objection to them. With a long skirt, you can't see them (Why are you wearing black long underwear under your skirt? Did you know it's showing?) and with a short skirt...YOU CAN.

Footless tights, of course, are the less sturdy cousins of LEGGINGS! These look like crap on everyone. I once saw Christie Brinkley in a pair of leggings. She also had on a cropped top, so we could see her bum. Sweetie, if leggings and a cropped top looked bad on Christie Brinkley in her hey-day, you don't have A PRAYER of pulling them off.

Batwing or dolman sleeves. It just SOUNDS ugly, doesn't it? And they're amazingly unflattering. And you can forget about wearing a coat over any top that has these sleeves. Bunched-up city. You'll look like you have the fattest, flabbiest arms in Mayberry jammed into your coat sleeves. Maybe this is where the poncho was supposed to come in?

Ugly on everyone.
Leggings fall into this category. But so do...

LOW RISE PANTS. Thank God this is a trend has been declared over. Yes, it's over. Throw those pants away. When did sporting plumber's crack become fashionable? Yuk. And they gave even the thinnest girls muffin tops. In fact, the phrase muffin tops was coined to describe the flab that bubbles up over the top of low-rise pants and sticks out between the too-short top and the too-low pants. And it's vile. When a size zero has muffin tops, you have to blame the article of clothing.

Not for grown-ups.
The babydoll top and the babydoll dress. There's a reason it has the word "baby" in it. You'll look like you're carrying one -- as in, you're preggers. These are cute on little girls who can't possibly be pregnant and on pregnant women who have a reason to walk around with their waistline under their boobs.

And the worst fashion item of all-time.
Flipflops. I HATE flipflops. I hate the noise they make. I hate the way they look. I hate the way they make people walk -- like insane, shuffling ducks. I hate that people think that they're appropriate footwear for city streets (they're not). I hate that people wear them in the winter time (I mean, please). I hate that people actually wear them INTO RESTAURANTS, FOR GOD'S SAKE! I hate the way people's heels slide off the back of them and get all grotty and black. Ugh.

And that's my fashion screed for the day. Until next time...

We Have a Winner - *BS

And to think I thought I was going to get through an entire day without being seriously pissed off, silly me I was so wrong. Here’s a helpful note to our dozen readers, NEVER buy or lease any copiers from Mr. Shady Salesman OR Mr. Irresponsible Service Tech at *BS (a truly horrible service company in the Washington area that shall remain nameless, only because two of my best friends are lawyers and they insist that I could be sued. Although I will say that the company’s name ends in BS. That should have been a red flag for me right there!). They are lying scum suckers who’ll take your money and give you the WORST service in the history of bad customer service. How was I to know that a sales contract, which on the surface appeared reasonable and logical, combined with an attentive sales-person – up until the minute we signed on the dotted line – was actually too good to be true?

Okay, I deleted the rest of this post because it was getting to be a hate filled tirade. As CrankyFashionChick reminded me, this is a fun and lighthearted blog about 3CrankyChicks NOT a full description of all the low-down and dirty tricks *BS played on us. Plus she said I never should have trusted Mr. Shady Salesman because he wore a mustard colored suit. That’s right head to toe in baby poop yellow. How did I miss the shit theme???

So instead of describing in gruesome detail how I’d like to get a hold of one of those ?$!X@* by the throat (or somewhere a little lower) and just squeeze, I’ll just remind you that if you want something fixed you’ll have to do it yourself. And, if you’re unhandy (I realize that’s not a word. This is a blog – you’ll have to work with me cyber-people.) like I am, then you’re sure to get a little cranky while you do so.

Our Inaugural Post

Hello world! We're pissed off and now you can read about it!! We're three cranky chicks who all live and work in DC.

Today we're mad because we didn't get a snow day. The fact that we weren't actually promised one is irrelevant. There were large, lovely, fluffy snowflakes coming down a few hours ago, but did they stick? NO!!!! And now we just have sucky freezing rain, which does nothing but make the street slick and our commutes dangerous.

We're also cranky about a wide variety of other things. People who stand outside our office and yak on their cell phones really piss us off. People who eat chips and drink soda in the bathroom stall not only piss us off, but they kind of freak us out. The guy who runs the lunch place in our building who leers at women drives us crazy.

So, world, here we are and just know this...we don't like you.