Tacky?

I'm torn.

Normally, I say no no no to wearing white after Labor Day. It's SO New Jersey.

But celebrities are breaking all of the rules at this month's movie premieres and it isn't all bad. (of course, they are in California, a place where naked yoga is acceptable).

As a rule, anything Gwyneth Paltrow does is OK, even naming a kid after a laxative-like fruit. She and "Sky Captain" co-star Angelina Jolie both donned the snow color at that movie's opening.

I have to wonder if our rules shouldn't be ammended. I'm winging it here, but maybe wearing white after Labor Day is OK as long as (1) you're rich, (2) you aren't in Virginia and (3) you don't wear white shoes because I don't care what anyone says, white shoes are tacky.

Vola. Problem solved.

In other news, jump on the Product and Purses Party bandwagon, and you could make a killin', Botox goes on trial and why Sinead O'Connor is not our role model.

And like a good neighbor

Living in close quarters is tough, but it's something just about all city-livers have to put up with.

Every day around 6 a.m. when the three-year-old who lives upstairs rises, for instance, she slips on her wooden clogs and tromps downstairs, into the kitchen, around the living room, back up the stairs, down the hall on a joy-run cat-chasing mission, back down the stairs and finally, about an hour later, out the door.

An article in today's WP adresses how to handle close-quartered neighbors with tact ("Snuff out the smokers without starting a fire"), but I find I'm not any more inclined to tell little tromper's mother that she should burn those shoes.

A few weeks ago, I was back from a walk and Tromper and her mom were outside in our shared front yard. Tromper was wearing a little pink skirt and a little white ruffled top. Her whispy blonde hair was in knots, her cheeks were round and peachy and she was sitting in a heap of fresh-cut grass she'd gathered into a pile.

She was wearing the clogs. And they were pink.

Damn were they cute.

Believe you me, if they hadn't been, I'd have executed my plan to yank them off her feet (how would I do it without being stopped?) and take off running down the alley en route to the dump ... or a large, burning fire.

But I imagined the screaming. It could last hours and that would certainly interupt Sunday afternoon football.

And then I imagined that to pacify the screaming, Mom Tromper and Dad Tromper would do what I would have done -- buy another pair. Only this time, I reasoned, they may have upped them a size so that she could wear them next season, too.

Then Mom Tromper hit me square in the face with the question, "Are we too loud?"

Holy shit, yes, woman. Do you have any idea what those shoes sound like from the underside of a hard wood floor?

"No, no. You're fine. I mean, sometimes we hear the girls," I said looking right at Little Tromper and smiling, "but they're darling." ... when they're asleep, I should have added.

We exchanged a few more words, smiled and went our seperate ways. It wasn't until later that night, as our IPod screamed Buena Vista Social Club and both televisions blared CNN, I saw the genius in Mom Tromper's Jedi mindtrick.

I turned the music down and shut off one of the televisions.

Now, Tromper has a new name.

Pitter Pat.

Real ladies read the news

Top picks for today:

• Forget global warming and world peace.

The Washington Post reports today that the RSVP is near endangered status and experts predict the problem will only get worse as the fall party season approaches.

It's a tacky and rude world, indeed. The Virginia Housewife offers this suggestion -- Ditch the anacronym and just spell it out: Repondez, S'il Vous Plait. French = classy.

• Also from the Washington Post, reality TV guru Mark Burnett (Survivor, The Apprentice) is chatting with Martha Stewart about developing a prime-time series .

Housewife applauds Martha's decision last week to begin her prison sentence on Oct. 8. That graceful move bumped her stock up a few notches and this announcement will surely do the same (if only because Burnett was authorized to purchase 2.5 million shares of his own) .

She has nowhere to go but up. Burnett, afterall, is the man who's made Donald Trump look good.

• More...

How to plant bulbs from the Boston Globe
Mulching in the right places from the Seattle Times
Decorating for dummies from the Richmond Times Dispatch
Ready to wear window dressings from the Dallas Morning News

Give us this day our daily bread....

Only please Lord, don't make it Wonder Bread because they've filed for bankruptcy and their stock isn't worth crap.

Heavens to Betty Crocker, it's finally happened. Interstate Foods, makers of Wonder Bread and Twinkies, announced the filing earlier today.

If you were bold enough to actually have held onto stock in a company that makes bread "kids like to play with" and sweet snacks that an adolecent in 1985 could have stashed in her hope chest and found 15 years later still in tact, then maybe you're due whats comin' to you.

Had we women of the new millennium been adults then, we'd of told you the company was doomed from the start.

We're the ones who had to eat the stuff, afterall.

Look, supermom, we aren't blaming you. We love the supermom. The supermom worked and cooked and came to our swim meets. We love the supermom because she took her own vacations, with out superdad. We love supermom because she taught us how to love life and how to add fractions.

And so we aren't going to raise an eyebrow at her for seeing a pratical alternative to baking her own bread and sweet treats, even if those alternatives were packed with preservatives and wrapped in cellophane.

Supermom, Interstate Foods led you astray. They made you forget Mrs. Randolph's famous words, "put everything to its proper use" by tricking you into believing that Twinkies were food meant to be eaten and not a bricks meant for stopping doors.

You were duped.

But now? Well, forgive them their trespasses.

Come on in!

For this kind of thing, you have to be inspired, and so I was.

One Friday evening of late, after crabcakes and cocktails at the home of an elderly friend in Virginia's Northern Neck, I discovered "A Virginia Housewife," which was first printed in 1825 and is still in circulation. I suppose as long as there are Virginia housewives it will be.

It was dusty and of unusual size and hiding inbetween a gardening book and "Virginia Hospitality." Mary Randolph is the author, and a descendent, I presume, of the aristocratic Virginia Randolph family. I later read that she was at one time revered as the best cook in Richmond. (A title that indicates she must have fed every single person in that city, though hopefully not all at once. )

I'm newly married and so I'm thinking much more about domestic life than I ever have. Would I finally learn how to elegantly prepare a traditional Virginia meal for 250? Could Mrs. Randolph advise which is best -- bake biscuits before cooking bacon or after?

Would I finally and with good conscious be able to burn my Martha Stewart mags?

I opened the cover and began reading.

"The government of a family, bears a Lilliputian resemblance to the government of a nation."

I have no idea what Lilliputian means, but it sounds important and therefore must be true. I jotted a note down in order to remember to refer to myself as Commander In Chief and my husband as VP.

"Management is an art that may be acquired by every woman of good sense and tolerable memory."

True indeed, and something I should bring up with my boss come promotion time.

"When ice creams are not put into shapes, they should always be served in glasses with handles. "

I hadn't ever thought of it, but now that I see it in print, it seems only right.

"A late breakfast deranges the whole business of the day and throws a portion of it on the next, which opens the door for confusion to enter. "

Oh heavens. We musn't open the door for confusion. Absurdity, yes. But confusion? Just get back...