Perfumes and Purses

I don't know what happened, I seem to be on a purse buying spree. Well, I'm not really buying any much, the prices make me uncomfortable. A couple of months ago I came across this ad in a magazine, probably Vanity Fair or Vouge:

and just fell in love with it. Bubble gum pink leopard print! Va-va VOOM! With loads of hippie-esque fringe hanging all over the place. Drool : ) Yes, I am a peculiar dresser and I do not find it tacky in the least. I would use that purse in a heartbeat. A New York minute. Why, I even have a pair of Converse Chuck Taylor sneakers in the same shade of pink. I can see myself now, that fantastic purse, matching sneakers, a pair of jeans and my fur coat for the winter. Oh, you say it's a Spring/Summer purse?  I could rock that year round.

Unfortunatly, the closest I'm going to get to that purse is the ad hanging on my fridge, which it is. It's by Blumarine, which is somehow connected to schiaparelli pikenz, anyhoo, they all make perfume so I was familar with the names. But the prices....yikes, I saw a plain Blumarine purse, no leopard but it had the fringe-and it was around $1,000. Nearly knocked me off my chair.

Talk about Champange tastes on a beer pocketbook. Literally.

"A shitload of money" seems to be the going rate for a designer purse. As in more than I'd ever dream of paying for a purse. So I've been shopping around. Then the desire to out-do somebody (my sister in law, it's a long story) came about and I decided to buy myself a really nice purse. I've never owned one before. Plus, every year when I work my ass off during the summer I buy myself something special. Last year it was a vintage diamond ring, $200, with very sparkley mine cut diamonds. Another year it was a tiny ruby heart shaped pendant. I have been doing 50 to 60 hour weeks the past few weeks, so it's that time again. The price of gold is crazy right now, and I have enough perfumes, there isn't any paticular perfume I'm pining for at the moment. Why not a new purse?

SIL has a Coach, and since what I knew about Coach (plain, brown signature pattern purses) I looked around for something better. Prada, Gucci, Balengencia, to name a few. No can do, they're pricier than Coach. Next I inadvertently bought a fake Coach off ebay. Only $30, but it was too small to actually use, I couldn't fit all my stuff in it. Yes, I'm doing the chargeback now. Anyway, there are some Coach purses I do like, they're not all that boring brown signature print. Actually, the signature C's in "Moonlight" is very appealing. So is the horse and carriage print. And the C pattern in pink and silver. I still check them out on ebay, very leery of buying one there again. It's a project, I'd have to check the serial numbers, make sure the style number matches the bag and so on. My fake one had serial numbers. It isn't easy.

Betsy Johnson has a few nice purses, nothing spectacular though. Fossil has some eye catching stripes. I kind of like the Juicy Coulture Daydreamer bags, BUT I've seen them in person, in a store and am not so sure. Terry cloth seems cheap, especially for the prices they're asking for. I also like the B. Makowsky leather purses, there's one in pink I've been eyeing-but I've heard that the color of your clothes can rub off onto the lighter purses. If I'm going to drop some serious cash on a purse it better not have/get any issues. Is that too much to ask?


We may be going to an outlet place in the morning. Yup, I've hounded Hubby about purses since this kick has started. Then I cried in front of him when I found out my first Coach was fake. It hurt getting taken like that. I don't break my neck working 50 to 60 hour weeks to get taken by buying fake purses. It wasn't just $30 (plus shipping)  I had just won another one on Ebay for $50 and that was a fake, too. I would have been out $80 to $100 for crap.  Needless to say, I wrote to the seller of the 2nd purse explaining that the serial number was wrong, it was a replica purse and I wasn't going to pay. I also reported it to ebay, they have done nothing.

So this outlet place, they have Coach store, a Juicy store and several others. Wonder if any of the places would have that Blumarine purse? I'll look. My maximum to spend is a soft $200. I say soft because I could go a bit higher, but not more than $250 or $300. My spending comfort level is being tested here, I don't know if I can go through with a purchase like this! I felt the same way when I splurged on that bottle of Guerlain's Sous Le Vent, $315 at Saks. It took me several trips to the store to actually go through with it. Then I signed up for their credit card and got 20% off, which eased up the tension a bit. I paid it off within the month, so no finance charges, I spent enough for it, didn't want to have pay any extra.

I wonder if the outlets carry perfumes? You know, in case I have money left over.