12th to Sterling

This is the first year in the last five that I’ve missed Bay to Breakers, my very favoritest holiday. What a tragedy to be thousands of miles away from the wild festivities and general debauchery that I’ve come to treasure each year.

Instead, I enjoyed myself yesterday at the 5th Ave Fair in Park Slope, Brooklyn. There were no crazy costumes, no creative floats with free-flowing kegs, and certainly no ugly naked folk. However, Brooklyn’s cheap beer in the sun, the delicious street food and the little independent jewelry and clothing stands almost made up for it.

Or should I say, the jewelry and clothing stands that we THOUGHT were independent. Early on in the day, Cate and I stopped at a little stand that sold African-looking jewelry, various scarves, tapestries and purses. We were attracted to two bags featuring colorful, creative patterns and unique straps. African imports, we wondered? Independent designer? Maybe they were hand-sewn by the woman at the stand. We didn’t ask. We just happily handed over our $20 and walked off with our great finds.

“Yeah, those are nice,” Julie admired our bags as we showed them off to her that afternoon. “Wait a minute, did you look at the tag inside?”

“Tag? What tag?”

“That one inside… yeah… uh, those are from Old Navy.”

Oh. No, we did not realize that. I don’t particularly care; I shop at Old Navy anyway. I was just a little annoyed that we were mislead and over-charged. I will be very surprised, however, if Cate “I-only-buy-independent-designer-and-vintage” Reilly ever uses her bag even once.

This would never have happened at Bay to Breakers. We'd be too busy doing beer bongs and rolling around in our own urine.