Image via Dermalogica

I've been knocked flat on my back with the most dreadful of maladies: the summer cold. Although really, I think "cold" doesn't adequately explain what I had. I could only stumble from bed to sofa and back again, unable to concentrate on the television and I found myself reading full pages out of the insipid but gloriously vacuous Gossip Girl novels (yes, they are from the Teen section at Barnes & Noble and I do not CARE), not understanding what I had just read. I would've thought that I caught that zombie disease, except that my flesh wasn't rotten; in fact, it was downright glowing. It was probably the 103-degree fever, but it just might have been my recent obsession with Dermalogica's Multivitamin Power Concentrate. Each little pod contains one day's serving of all the vities that keep you pretty: C, E, A and a bunch of grapefruit, orange and lime peel oils that seem to soothe my rosacea's savage beast. If it weren't for the tell-tale red nose and persistent sniffles, I'd swear that I was ready for my close up, even without make up. And that? Just doesn't happen.

Image via vngallery.blogspot.com

Fashion industry insiders are talking about the shocking apparent suicide of supermodel Ruslana Korshunova, an immeasurably beautiful 20-year-old French Elle and Russian Vogue cover model who leapt from her ninth-floor balcony in downtown Manhattan.

I will never forget the first time I saw Ruslana in a London fashion show, ethereal on the runway with her ridiculously long, fairy-princess hair and a melodic new band called Arcade Fire playing in the background. Backstage, I urged her not to cut it, even though I knew her agent would most likely eventually convince her to do so.

Image via walkmoreeatless.com

There's a health article in the Times called "Fit not Frail: Exercise as a Tonic for Aging," and though its aim is to shed light on the fact that a consistent fitness routine can delay or even prevent some of the pitfalls of age, such as loss of muscle and mobility, leave it to me to see the superficial in this mandate. Because if there's one thing I notice more than all the various health benefits associated with working out, the prime bonus is that of a fabulous complexion.

Image via mark

I'm blogging to you live from lovely Park Slope, Brooklyn, because I spent the weekend at my friend Erin's house (yes, my best friend's name happens to be Erin as well), and she is a true Product Fiend if ever there was one, so we've been playing beauty school and having fashion shows and drinking lots of champagne and doing girly fun stuff like that for the past few days. Anyway, we've also been walking around the 'hood in the hot, humid weather and, though the girl doesn't have much in her fridge, I've been dousing myself with the face mist she stashes in there, and it feels oh so refreshing. She uses Mark Mist Opportunity Multi-tasking Refresher, a blend that's filled with grapefruit, kiwi, and lemongrass antioxidants so you can give your skin a treat while you cool off at the same time. Oh, and P.S., it's only $8.

Wrinkles have become very interesting to me. I am fascinated by advertisements about serums and articles about treatments and department store displays of crèmes that will smooth furrows and decrinkle creases, and balms that will spackle the shit out of your canyons. It used to be that I was fascinated by pore-refining, acne-fighting, oil-sopping medicines and moisturizers. Suddenly that seems like the good old days, when I would get a zit and have to cover it up with a little bit of makeup, or not give a shit and just look like an overgrown teenager. But it turns out you can't hide wrinkles with makeup, and that is very, very upsetting to me. I have suddenly got wrinkles, and when the hell did that happen?

One of the nice things about being fat--it fills out the lines in your face. Your skin is full, plumped up, luscious and soft. There is no crepeing, sagging is reduced and furrows are more or less eliminated. I spent a lot of time being told that I looked way younger than my whatever number of years were--partially that is because I am a very silly person--but it was also because my fat was nicely rounding out the delicate skin under my eyes and blocking up the lines on either side of my mouth. When I lifted my eyebrows, my forehead did not crumple up into a series of gullies, and I never thought to worry about aging or under-eye creams. I rarely wore sunscreen, because I would never age! I have The Face of Eternal Youth!

Continue reading at ElasticWaist.com

Oh boy do I have news for you: According to a New York Times article, the fountain of youth may be found in one of two places, or both: self-starvation or red wine. I choose the latter. How about you?

Tragically, your favorite fashion icon and mine perished at age 71 yesterday after battling an unknown illness. According to his New York Times obituary, "Every man needs aesthetic phantoms in order to exist," Mr. Saint Laurent said at the announcement of his retirement. "I have known fear and the terrors of solitude. I have known those fair-weather friends we call tranquilizers and drugs. I have known the prison of depression and the confinement of hospital. But one day, I was able to come through all of that, dazzled yet sober." I will be pouring out some Touche Eclat in his honor...so sad.

I saw the new Indiana Jones this weekend, and despite every single second of it being totally recycled and an annoyingly silly plastic skull prop being passed off as this ancient sacred crystal icon, it was kinda good Memorial Weekend Day fun. But what really stood out to me were two things: one, Karen Allen, who reprised her role as Marion Ravenwood, Indy's one true love; and two, the fact that they eschewed the normal Hollywood practice of inserting some 20-something ingenue in the love interest role and cast a woman who is actually closer to Harrison Ford's age. YAY! Karen looks ridiculously good for her age, and maybe she's had some Botox here and there like they all have, but it certainly doesn't show and she looks very natural, handsome wrinkles and all. Major girl crush moment. Why can't American movie studios get this right more often?