Friday: taupe Hermes boots

Let’s just get this out there: New Year’s is overrated.

Of course I’m not talking about joining a million or so of your closest friends (but mostly out-of-town visitors) in Times Square to watch that tiny speck of light descend (since you’ll be about 15 blocks away anyway). I’ll never be caught dead there. Crowds — so not my thing.

But even the most sophisticated gathering can have its drawbacks. While I appreciate the opportunity to get dressed up — finally! an occasion for My Other Life Wardrobe! — it’s not so fun when you’re wearing four-inch stilettos all the way uptown with nary a cab to be found. (One bitterly cold year, I had to wobble my way down to the subway and take the 9 train home. Not a pretty sight.)

I suppose I could solve the transportation problem by actually hosting a party myself.

[sound of crickets chirping]

Oh but then I would be responsible for making other people’s New Years the most extreme fabulosity ever. And I don’t know if I could take the pressure — because, as you know, New Year’s is always a letdown.

Okay, how about this: I could get all gussied up, pop a bottle of champagne, and invite over only my closest friends. (Expectations are so much lower when you’re talking about people who’ve seen you without makeup. And anyway, you dress up for other women so they’re the only ones who need to see you glammed up.) And after Dick Clark rings in 2006 from whatever top-secret glass-encased booth he’s using for his return this year, I could kick off my heels and make that no-cab, no-shoes, no-problem trip to the comfort of my own home. (Yeah, my friends could stay over too.) Ahhh, home sweet home.

Happy New Year!

Wednesday: black Gucci Guccissima slingbacks

… um, let’s see … a lousy 13 handbags?!?

Two weeks, six cities, 13 handbags. Sounds about right, no? It started with a scarlet red raw silk bag with a handmade, round wicker handle. I saw it at a stall in a silk-making village on the outskirts of Hanoi, and I immediately imagined myself carrying my beach reading in it on a summer day. How much, I enquired. Thirty thousand dong, I was told. Quick calculation in my head… approximately 16,000 dong to a dollar, so… less than two bucks. Sold! (You instantly feel flush in a place where a quick trip to the ATM makes you a millionaire… in dong. It’s like the good old days of the Italian lira.)

At a market in Hue a few days later, I saw the same bag — this time in more yummy colors. I couldn’t help myself, and besides that, I figured they’d make cute gifts; I picked up a maize yellow one, and a crimson one (different from the first one, truly!). This time they cost a whole 35,000 each — a little over $2.

The next day, in the old quarter of Hoi An, I spotted more colors, and after spending the whole night before regretting not buying the light purple bag at the market, I jumped at buying the first one I saw. I was almost bitter about the markup — 40,000. Okay, not really. That’s what, $2.50? Then, a few streets over, I was buying $1 straw flip-flops when I spotted in the store yet another one of those silk bags, this time in an autumnal orange. Beautiful! And at 25,000 ($1.56), the price was right.

With five of the same bag in my suitcase, I didn’t stop there. I kept thinking, who knows when I’ll be in Vietnam again? Once I’m sitting at home in New York, I’ll be kicking myself for not buying enough. And besides, I was helping their economy. I didn’t feel the slightest bit bad that I was paying tourists’ prices. That was fine by me. And as much as you are supposed to bargain — some merchants are insulted if you don’t — I just couldn’t get myself to haggle over 50 cents.

So I found myself in Saigon, digging through all the bags — little and big, strap or no strap, pockets or none — decorated with the bright, quirky embroidery made by the ethnic minorities living in the northern mountains. Long story short, I cleaned out the joint. Then there was the Japa Sapa boutique across the street from my hotel (clearly priced for the tourists and not locals) that combined Japanese kimono fabric with the same ethnic Vietnamese embroidery in such a novel way. Special fabrics + whimsical styles = the biggest purchases of the trip, four items (two bags, a skirt and a top) for a mere $154.

No, there would be no non-buyer’s remorse on this trip — and despite all my shopping (including for an extra suitcase to take home the goods), there would be no fear going through customs back in the U.S. It’s a beautiful thing when, unlike on trips to Italy, you (1) don’t have to have crisis talks with your conscience over whether to fib on your declaration form, and (2) still know you’re nowhere near the limit anyway. Oh, the joy of an unburdened conscience!

Monday: brown suede Jimmy Choo boots

I thought that the best thing about being jet-lagged would be that I wouldn’t have any trouble getting out of the house to be at Saks by 8 a.m. today. (Usually I’m just up early on Dec. 26 out of sheer excitement.) Alas, no. My brand of jetlag has me napping around 6 p.m., staying up till 2 a.m. and sleeping past noon. So I had to drag myself out of bed this morning — no matter how tired I was, I wasn’t going to miss what’s truly the best shopping day of the year.

Or at least that’s what it used to be. Was I just off my game from sheer exhaustion? Because I found the sales today to be pretty uninspiring. And apparently so did everyone else; the Saks shoe department was a bit of a war zone, but the rest of the store was fairly civilized. (Through the muddle of my sleep-deprived brain, I registered that there were several women there who’d brought their husbands. My thoughts, in order: 1. These men are brave, and 2. These women are foolish.) I ended up just picking up a white shirt and a mauvish brushed cotton trench from Ports 1961.

By 9:45 I was about to collapse. I had my purchases sent — couldn’t even bear carrying a shopping bag — and had a perfunctory browse through the designer stuff on the third floor. Tried on a few Missoni things, but decided to pass. I really, really wanted to go home at this point, but I felt obligated to make the rounds today — pride, you know?

There was barely a buzz at Bergdorf’s, and they weren’t having their usual 50% off markdowns after-Christmas sale. I had to go see if there were any Laineys left, and after walking back and forth and back again on the sixth floor, I finally spotted a few sad sweaters hanging on a hidden away rack. (They really need to stop moving the Laineys around — in the past year they’ve been displayed in four different places on the sixth floor, none of them particularly prominent.)

In a fog, I headed out of Bergdorf’s at 10:30, so looking forward to the cozy confines of my bed. Though pretty much empty-handed, I didn’t feel too bad, since I’d already ordered this Missoni sweater (70% off!) and Prada acorn pumps (kitschy and so this-season-only, but 2/3 off!) from saks.com late on Christmas Eve. Next year, I just might sleep in and do all my shopping online!

Friday: leopard print Prada pony anklestraps

And on the eve of the eve of the day before my favorite shopping day of the year, Some Like It Haute rested.

I’ll be back on Monday from my travels in Asia with tales of after-Christmas shopping when you’re severely jet-lagged. Oooh, new excuse for overspending: I was still on Tokyo time — and I was thinking in yen!

Happy holidays everyone — and happy shopping on Monday.

Wednesday: tan Prada boots

I’m mesmerized. Cross a crystal ball and a Fabergé egg and what you get is this tiny treasure, this Temple St. Clair crystal egg pendant.

(photo from www.moondancejewelry.com)

It’s a mere $2,000 — $3,000 with the 18K gold link chain — which means I need to build a little nest egg for my little egg amulet. But you know what? It’s worth it. A friend of mine was saying the other day that after going for quantity over quality all these years, she’s all about the investment pieces now. And I’m with her. My mom always says that diamonds are good investments (no matter what that buzz-kill guy, the same one who told me I shouldn’t have bought all those shoes on credit, says). She doesn’t mean that my modest of-course-you-can-wear-them-during-the-day diamonds — forget the Google stock — can take care of my retirement. She just means that diamonds are, well, forever. Quality over quantity, you know? Though I would argue that the women on her side of the family shell out for both. Oh, yes, it’s in my DNA. So you don’t need a crystal ball to know what’s at the top of my shopping list!