Return To SF (And Also? Return to SPLAT!)

in case you were concerned, my return trip to san francisco was uneventful. i made it home in one piece, and that is saying a lot.

so i thought a lot on the plane about how many breezy-elegance inspired stories i haven't told you guys yet. and man, are there ever a LOT of them.
[sidenote: um, remember how this blog was supposed to be about weight-loss and knitting? yah-huh. well, since my GYM CLOSED and i've been preparing for my travels and everything, i have not been very good. and hi? sitting around drinking wine and watching my sister with her newborn? not excercise. but more on my renewed renewed renewed weight-loss plans later. (uh, nothing like being around tan, beautiful, quasi-anorexic women to remind oneself of one's goals...) oh and knitting? i was totally on my way to finishing the friggin' ribbed-for-her-pleasure cap for Snarky when i discovered that somehow my wine had crept in and dropped a couple stitches. (yes, the wine dropped the stitches, not me.) but i'm not entirely sure how to fix that, so i just stopeed. i did make a nice scarf, though! and was pleased to discover non-metal knitting needles are allowed on the plane.]
anyway.

so tonight i'm scheduled to have dinner with my darling Post-Modern Relationship guy friend. (this is the one who would've been an ideal match for me if by "ideal" i mean "my opposite who i could never actually date because he would drive me crazy and then i would have to kill him.") and it's always fun when he comes into town because i get to pick a fancy, cool, hip SF place to take my tall, handsome, dashing just-in-from-europe friend.

these semi-annual dinners make me feel so urban and chic, you know?

but but but, we all know i'm really usually just uh, breezily elegant.

and thus, i picked the restaurant for tonight for a very special reason. because i have something to prove.

see, last december, my company had a nice holiday party at this restaurant. very trendy. very chill. good spot for a non-demoninational, sf-like festive gathering. uh huh. and the food was amazing and the drinks were great and the service was delightful.

so picture this with me. about an hour into the event, i was in a great mood. the party was going well. i had had a few glasses of wine. my colleagues were convivial. my date (TheBoy) looked great and was attentive to me and charming to my coworkers. and i was wearing a "fun" outfit that i felt comfortable in.

(i mention my outfit because it is relevant to the elegance.)

i was wearing long velvet pants that were "cuffed" in marabou. (while i pulled it off for the occassion, in actuality, the marabou had been added to said pants via rudimentary sewing and hot glue the previous halloween when i dressed up as a cat. but that part didn't get mentioned to my coworkers*.)

and because the pants were a little long (because i'm only 5'4"), i had to wear heels with them or else they'd drag on the floor.

i will take a moment now to remind my imaginary internet friends that maybe i am not the best person to go walking around in heels ever. ever. but i continue to try, because i love them. even if they hurt and are stupid and i trip.

but also, heels become a whole different story when we add alcohol to the mix. on the plus side, for some reason i tend to be more steady in heels if i've been drinking. it's true, dunno why. *however* (and you knew there would be a however), despite becoming more agile in heels, drinking also tends to make me believe i don't really need to be wearing shoes at all.

which is why i have found myself shoeless at countless formal occassions (including weddings, especially my own), house parties, informal gatherings, and yes, even in dirty bars and clubs.

oh right! and at holiday parties. at chic restaurants. even when my pants are too long.

so back at the holiday party, then. i am in a fabulous mood, the night is going well, i've had wine, and now my shoes have come off. and so at some point i decide to go to the ladies' room.

the ladies' room is located down a long, candle-lit, cement-floored corridor (which is also the entry to the building).

and on my way back from the ladies', returning to my company's private event room, i decided -- because i was gleeful and all was right with the world because the holiday season was upon us and i was in a cool space in a cool city with cool people -- to skip.

you read that correctly.

i decided to do a (clearly wine-induced) little hop, skip, light-footed gallup thing down the corridor. because yay! for good moods.

which is the point in the evening where my "light-footedness" was demonstrably not. and, as the pants really were too long for me, i sort of "skipped" right onto of one of the cuffs, ripping strands of marabou off. meaning my foot came down and ensnarled itself in the freed marabou. so that when i went to take my next step (because this is all happening very fast and i was already in mid-skip-motion), my foot was stuck in my pant leg.

and i went down.

i literally made a SPLAT! sound that echoed down the cavernous corridor as my hands hit the cement. right in front of the podium where the hostess was standing. right in front of a cute couple entering the restaurant.

right in front of the entire dining room.

restaurant: 1 me: 0

i will point out that i did not, however, fall near where my company party was, so none of my friends or colleagues saw it happen. i was able to just get up, take a deep breath and return to the site of our event as though nothing had happened.

and when i rejoined the group and found TheBoy, he took one look at me and asked, "what happened to your pants?"

i looked down to see quite a marabou "tail" hanging from my right pant leg.

"i sort of took a spill in the hallway," i said. and then tried to tuck the marabou tail into itself so as to be less conspicuous.

i put my shoes back on.

anyway, the point is that tonight i am returning to the scene of the crime and will wear heels and will not skip and will show the dastardly uber-chic restaurant that i am too cool enough to, you know, be there and not fall.





*until now. hi, guys. yep, hot glue.

Comments

  1. OMG! I was literally laughing out loud reading that!
    That sort of stuff happens to me. I especially trip on my cuffs and hems because I am under 5 feet! Even my 3 inch heels don't do the trick.

    You will be the image of cool with a hottie beside you tonight. You may even get VIP treatment.
    Have fun and enjoy.

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  2. Am very glad you only tripped. Given the setup, I expected your heel to catch in the marabou cuff and pull your pants down. I did something similar at a conference last year...

    We were at Bryn Mawr, with the college's castley building... meaning many stairs and many cross-campus jaunts outside from castle to castle. 'Twas a Very Rainy Day, and I thought I'd be Very FairyTale Quirky, and wear an ankle length silk skirt, cami and crocheted shawl/poncho/thing with low-heeled sandals. I was happy. Yes, well, whilst climbing one of the many flights of stairs with my fellow attendees one heel of said sandals caught in the silk skirt, causing back of skirt waist to slide down into the convenient nook where bum meets thigh.

    I pulled it up promptly and kept on climbing, with little halt. I've hoped that the crochet ponchothing disguised the event. But, you know how these things work. Our favorite moments always gather witnesses.

    So yes. Am very glad you only tripped.

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  3. I am also a shoe remover, only I do it when I teach. You'd be shocked how often my students give me an "ew" face when I'm scampering around the classroom with no shoes on.

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  4. There is no more hillarious passtime than watching women in high heels on a friday or saturday night trying to negotiate the ancient cobbled market square of a town near to where I grew up. The combination of irregular stones, high spirits, stilletos and alcohol causes a good deal of teetering, tottering and tumbling.

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  5. I love to take off my shoes at events where it is inappropriate to do so. At a friends wedding, I stepped on the hem of my bridesmaids dress, ripping it at the waist seam. Luckily I usually keep safety pins in my purse, as klutzy me is wise to do, so uncomfortable dress holding up only had to last a few minutes until I could get the gaping hole pinned up.
    Have a great time at dinner!
    rg

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  6. I love the word "convivial" ... nice ;)

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  7. What restaurant was that? I can't remember being to one that fits that description. But of COURSE I've been to all the best places... so... hrmmmm... ;)

    My coworkers still tease me about the time we went out drinking, and I "fell in the gutter".

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  8. OHMYGOD I think I saw this incident! Was it at Foriegn Cinema in the Mission?

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  9. *stares at anonymous*

    are you serious, and not one of my friends/co-workers? because, yeah.

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  10. I know it was at Foreign Cinema because I WORK there and saw it happen. Yes, Kristy, I hate to tell ya but we wait staff did have a good giggle on that one.

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  11. I thought stuff like that only happened to me!

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  12. I thought a Marabou was one of those big elk looking amimals from the Artic Circle....oh wait thats a CARIBOU. My bad.

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  13. OMG, I did that at my aunt's wedding when the introduced me, luckily I was on my father's arm and he held me up as I slipped across the floor in my pink lame dress!

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  14. marabou is like, really fuzzy furlike stuff. kinda like soft ostrich feathers (like, the kind of fuzzy stuff satin robes would've been lined with in 40s hollywood.)

    and how mortified am i all over again at the fact that someone who WORKS there saw and remembers and READ THIS? small town.

    but hey kids, at least you know i'm not making this stuff up.

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  15. I love stories of breezy elegance. Just like the time I had the back of my skirt accidentally tucked into the back of my pantyhose... ON MY FIRST DAY OF WORK. :)

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  16. I love stories of breezy elegance. Just like the time I had the back of my skirt accidentally tucked into the back of my pantyhose... ON MY FIRST DAY OF WORK. :)

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  17. My moment of breezy elegance: on my way to meet a boy for a first date at the Beach Chalet, I decide to breezily sort of half-run up the stairs. Only I missed the last step. And fell. Flat on my face, in the entryway of the restaurant. And everything just stopped while the hostess ran over to ask (loudly, that bitch) if I was okay.

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  18. I am so glad I am not the only one to embarass myself in "elegant" public places

    my moment: While the date of a very lovely man at a firm function I got up to go to the loo and my dress did not get up with me. (I now always use double-sided tape, just in case)

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  19. my friend from wisconsin calls this "taking a digger." like "taking a dive" i guess, except, well, a digger. one the best diggers i've taken was while crossing the street at a really, really busy intersection in france, when i tripped UP the curb. i fell flat on my face as well, except about 50 people saw it. and apparently it looked really bad, because people were yelling "woah, are you OK??!" out their car windows. except, you know, in french and stuff.

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  20. Unfortunately it is all too easy to take a dive when you live in a place where the ground is covered by ice and snow half the year. Too many "fell on my ass or face in front of a bunch of people" stories to recount. At least you didn't rip any clothing or bleed, as I tend to do.

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  21. Too funny. I'm always "Takin' a Header" and ending up bruised and bleeding. I am such a klutz that stairs and I ... well, falling up 'em I guess is better than falling down 'em.

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  22. As if you don't have enough comments from your IIF's to tread through on a daily basis, i have to let you know that i do read this. All. The. Time.

    As it is, i'm leaving this comment, here, four years after this particular incident, but i couldn't resist telling you how utterly articulate and perfectly descriptive you are in telling stories. I love them.

    You see, i am one of those blog stalkers of yours who rarely leaves comments. But today is different. Today, i'm at work laughing. Usually, i get a good giggle and a smile out of you, but this one had me stifling my laughter so my boss doesn't discover my unproductiveness.

    I have been reading this for a while now and occasionally go back through your archives when you haven't posted in awhile and i need a KristySF Fix.

    Sincerely, Thank You.

    Landlocked Iowa Girl
    Nicki

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