Day 61 -- Fortunate (Great-Grand) Son

Right after your heart-shaped box of chocolates has nothing left in it but the odd ones filled with fruit and/or nuts but just before it becomes socially acceptable to eat a Cadbury Creme Egg, there comes a period of time formally known as "The Winter Blahs."  The sight of snow on the ground has lost its charm, and the prospect of Spring Break (or even MTV's annual coverage of it) seems so far off.  Worse yet, TV sweeps week is over so most of the best shows are reruns...or preempted by lackluster mid-season replacements.  This is also the time of year in which most people proclaim that they are sick of their wardrobe and they start pulling out the spring looks.

I, however, did not pull out my Ann Taylor Loft pastel collection, and was secretly (I guess not so secret anymore) quite happy with the ugly turn that Chicago's winter took...especially since I knew that I could never get away with today's sweater if the words "unseasonably warm" were ever uttered on our nightly forecasts. As I have no intentions of breaking out the short sleeved wool sweaters (Bad. Idea.), I need this lingering chill in the air to remain for at least 39 more days.  Oh, and a blizzard or two wouldn't hurt.  It doesn't need to be on the level of the storm that almost shut down Christmas in Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer--it just has to be enough so that people actually take out those brushes from under their seats and dust off their windshields (I'm lazy...I usually just use my wipers and hope that the rest will just blow off.  Again. Bad. Idea.).

So, since the meteorologists have all been calling for "substantial snow" this afternoon, I decided that it would be the perfect opportunity to wear this lovely little cashmere snowflake turtleneck from the early-to-mid 2Ks. It's an adorable shade of, well, what exactly would one call this?  Lime? Spring green?  Help me, OPI (Wan Kenobi)...you're my only hope (they would probably call it "Tom Green" if it were from their "Mid 90s: Where are They Now?" collection. Hey, if they can come out with a Modern Family collection, nothing is out of the realm of possibility).

Although this is a lovely little turtleneck, I wonder if there is a reason that I don't wear it very much.  Either I'm intimidated by its cashmere lineage or, possibly, I folded it so neatly that I did not want to disturb its peaceful slumber in the armoire (sadly, that's actually the more likely of the explanations).

The message here is simple and uncluttered: snowflake.  That's it.

Nary a pill in sight.  Impressive.

"And the neck snaps back...wash after wash."

Even though I waited for a snowy day to wear this sweater, currently, I am blogging about it in the low 80s with the air conditioning on, and am wondering how I can possibly find nine more days to convincingly pull off wearing a sweater. Ah, procrastination...it's not just for college students anymore.

After wearing this all day, I am left with a sense of disillusionment at the sweater this might have been.  Sure, the color and the graphic are adorable, and the neck never once caused me a moment's unease...still, the fit was slightly too slim for a sweater of this nature, and I found myself "willing" the sweater to instantly grow just a few inches longer on more than one occasion during the course of the day. Perhaps if it covered just a little bit more surface area, this might be the optimistic little turtleneck that I would gravitate towards in the most Gothic of winter days.  As it is, I can't recall wearing this on more than a handful of instances (and even that might be a bit of an overstatement). In fact, were this sweater in a really ugly color (like, oh, "Shecky Greene"--can't believe I referenced him here) or featured any other winter symbol besides a snowflake (would anybody wear a sweater with a graphic of a plunging thermometer on it? How about a salt-covered car?), I might not be cutting it so many breaks.  

So while it is not as perfect as it purports to be, it's a really cute color, it's well-made and the neck stays in place.  I suppose it's not really hurting anything by hanging around the rest of my sweaters (maybe some of its good breeding will rub off on the acrylic factions), and there's always the hope that it will someday reach its true potential on my watch. And boy does it photograph well!  I wonder if it's been surgically enhanced...or, at the very least, airbrushed.

My rating: Armie Hammer.  And I can already hear the collective, "Who?" all over cyberspace (or at least the two non-computerized, not-my-Mom readers that might accidentally stumble across this blog when they are looking for something better to read).  You know him, even if you think that you don't.  He played the adorable-but-uptight Winklevoss twins in The Social Network, and will also be appearing as The Lone Ranger (with Johnny Depp as Tonto.  Will probably skip that one). He's also been in some other movies which I didn't see (c'mon...did anyone watch J. Edgar?  Didn't think so). What separates him from the other really really good looking actors is that his last name is Hammer, (No, not as in MC, but that would be amazing). He is the heir to the baking soda fortune (am I the only one who didn't know that Arm & Hammer was actually kind of a real name?), and is, like this turtleneck, a product of very good breeding. He's one of those performers that is so attractive that you tend to overlook certain things like, oh, juvenile snowflake graphics, short sweater length, and not a lot of range in his acting abilities. Mr. Hammer might not be this generation's Olivier (as in Lawrence, not as in Halle Berry's hot fiance/baby Daddy/future husband Olivier Martinez), but he comes from good stock (cashmere), is quite attractive, and there is not a pill or blemish in sight. I might sometimes get confused between baking powder and baking soda when I cook, but I will never forget Armie Hammer when the recipe (or weather) calls for him.