Category: Lifestyles

Grieving

Jae-Ha Kim

Get over it isn’t eactly what you want to hear when your mother dies. Neither does heading that your loved one looks good dead. Yet the awkward words from the lips of our friends and family often add up to extreme insensitivity and hurt feelings, when it’s the last thing they mean. In the quiet moments after goodbyes have been said, it’s often hard to avoid dwelling on the hackneyed nature of sympathetic wishes. While we’d liek to think of our well wishers in a positive, warm light, those of us who have grieved can’t help but wonder: “What were they thinking? Are they nuts?”

Downsizing figures

Jae-Ha Kim

When is a perfect size 6 not so perfect? When it’s really a size 8. Confused? Join the club. If you’re a woman–or you’ve ever tried shopping for your favorite femme–you already know that judging fit by eyeballing the item or checking the tag is a crapshoot. A size 6 Donna Karan skirt may fit like a charm. But if you try that same size in something like Guess? or BCBG, you may wonder when you managed to pack on an extra five pounds.

Chairs on parade? City is furnishing them as street art

Jae-Ha Kim

Get ready for the latest in summer street art. Two years after Cows on Parade won worldwide media attention for Chicago, the city is installing “Suite Home Chicago”–a series of 350 pieces of life-size sofas, chairs, ottomans and televisions, decorated by more than 150 Chicago area artists. Workers began installing the fiberglass pieces at 8 p.m. Friday. By summer’s end, the city expects to have at least 500 of the exhibits on display along Michigan Avenue, on the museum campus and in the Loop. O’Hare and Midway airports will get exhibits, as well. (There were only 320 cows.)

Just friends–Reality bites for male-female buddies when one wants romance

Jae-Ha Kim

You have met the man of your dreams. Besides being a walking, talking hottie, he’s smart, funny and well-educated. You look at him and can totally imagine making babies with him. Bad news, though. He only thinks of you as a p-a-l; you’ve got a great personality, but he’s not going to be asking you out anytime soon.

The Currency Exchange: Cold cash vs. warm fuzzies. Which would make you happier?

Jae-Ha Kim

Admit it. You’ve fantasized about winning the lottery and what you would do with all that loot. You’d buy homes for your kids, hire a full-time chauffeur for your grandmother, donate to the United Negro College Fund, sail around the world on the QE2, and lose 25 pounds at the Canyon Ranch Spa. You’d be ecstatic 24/7. You’d be dead wrong.

These girls and boys just want to have fun

Jae-Ha Kim

Brooke Shoemaker has a surefire strategy for never appearing in public wearing the same outfit as some other woman: Dress so quirky, so creatively, so out there that there’s no way to duplicate the getup or the xpressions made by passersby as she strolls around, clad in a vintage floral dress, jelly bracelets, fake pearls, way oversize sunglasses and her trusty Van sneakers.

Princess and the plea: negotiating the city

Jae-Ha Kim

Lara Davidson has never had to change a broken headlight. Nor put together an easy-to-assemble desk. Nor hook up her home entertainment center. She has always found someone to do it for her. What Davidson, 27, learned early on was that with a little negotiating, she could be more successful in her day-to-day maneuvering than her more meek pals, who were too intimidated to ask for special attention.

City’s fashionistas turn out in force for Red Hot Chicago

Jae-Ha Kim

Two frightened Dalmatian puppies and a beaming baby almost stole the show on the runway Thursday night at the second annual Red Hot Chicago event. But knockout designs by the likes of Tiffani Kim, Jane Hamill and Reginalds made sure that the well-heeled crowd of 900 at Navy Pier’s Grand Ballroom got much more than a dog and pony show.

Go out `Sopranos’ style — Chicagoans pay tribute to TV’s hottest show: call it wiseguy wear

Jae-Ha Kim

Anthony Potenzo has one thing to say to about how the men dress on “The Sopranos”: “It’s about time!” A big-time “Sopranos” fan, Potenzo hosts weekly Sunday night parties. In his Gold Coast apartment festooned with photos of Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin, Potenzo cooks up a pot of homemade soup or pasta, serves wine to his nattily dressed crew and tunes the TV to HBO’s hit mob series, which just began its third season.

Rules of engagement

Jae-Ha Kim

Betsy Lancefield knew early on that she didn’t want to live with a man before getting married. But then she fell in love with a man who wouldn’t consider marrying a woman he hadn’t already lived with. She was torn. So they compromised. “Six months into the relationship, we got engaged,” says Lancefield, 37. “He went to work in Indonesia for eight months, and when he returned, he moved in with me. My family and friends were excited when we got engaged, but then when they heard we hadn’t set a date, they were sort of let down.”

The new rude

Jae-Ha Kim

Imagine finding strangers sitting on your lawn chairs, drinking beer and scarfing down sandwiches on your deck. You’d ask them to leave, right? Now imagine them telling you where to go. “Rude goes way beyond slamming a door in someone’s face or flipping them off on the highway,” says 48-year-old Wrigleyville resident Mike Porcaro, whose property has often been besieged by rowdy Cubs fans. “I had to chain my barbecue pit on the deck because people felt compelled to open the lid to look inside, as if they were going to find the Holy Grail or a mini-Sammy Sosa.”

It’s a small world after all at Disney

Jae-Ha Kim

Disney is suffering a bad spell of congestion. The crush of holiday visitors forced Disneyland in Anaheim, Calif., to suspend ticket sales Thursday for the third time this week. The park took the action in the morning, planning to resume sales. But sales still were halted at dusk.The amusement park also stopped selling tickets Wednesday and on Christmas Day, spokesman Tom Brocato said.This is the first time it has done this in four years.

Fashion Anthropologie

Jae-Ha Kim

“My mother came over to the United States from China in 1947,” said art dealer Elaine Kwan. “She brought a big steamer trunk full of dresses. But when she went to college in Minnesota, she didn’t have any use for them and just kind of forgot about them. I never really had the opportunity to get real, tailored Chinese dresses made, so when I came across this trunk, I couldn’t believe my luck. I fit perfectly into them.