It's graduation time again!

Yay?

My graduation day was no fun at all. I was in an enormous fight with my boyfriend (we had already decided to break up after graduation, which was, you know, that day, so I'm not sure why we bothered), and I was desperately hungover, so in all my pictures I look pale, nauseous, and near tears. Memories!

And of course the ages-old problem with recent grads is that we all think we will immediately become Oscar-winning actresses (hello!), in-demand journalists making $5/word, or presidents of our very own companies, because we deserve to. To those of you who are graduating this year: you don't, and this will not happen. Unless you are already wildly rich and/or well-connected, you will probably be getting coffee or waiting tables for awhile while you either work your way into an interesting position or figure out what you want to do, and THAT IS OKAY. Completely, 100% okay. It took me six more years and several soul-crushing failures before I was able to get my wheels more or less on track. (For some excellent post-grad advice from Lilit Marcus, author of Save The Assistants which - plug plug plug - makes an excellent graduation gift, click here.)

Did you know that there's such a thing as "bedbug anxiety"? Apparently it's fairly common. I once had a bit of it myself: the day after we got back from our honeymoon in Thailand, I noticed a couple of little bites on my leg, and started worrying that we had brought some bedbugs back in our luggage from one hotel or another. For weeks, I woke up multiple times every night to inspect the crevices of our mattress with a flashlight, and had tons of nightmares (more night terrors, because they felt very real and were tough to get out of even after I woke up) in which bugs were crawling on me.

Happy Friday!

If I haven't lost you yet, there's a reason why I'm making you feel so itchy and nervous on a lovely morning. Remember how crazy the bedbug scare got last summer? Bedbugs in Lincoln Center, movie theaters, etc? I had a couple of friends get them, and let me tell you: it is no joke. One of my friends even had to move out while the problem was dealt with, and according to Refinery29, the average cost of dealing with this is FOUR THOUSAND DOLLARS. And the bad news is that, while the craziness seems to have died down a bit over the past few months, summer is just about upon us again, meaning: problem.

Anyway, I'm usually not in the pesticide-testing business, but the aforementioned anxiety (and my general bug phobia) led me to an event a couple of days ago where I learned about BedBug Logic, an organic preventative spray that you can, for example, take with you when you travel to spritz on your hotel's mattress. It's also recommended for treating vintage furniture that you pick up in thrift shops, and of course for regular use on your bed and linens.

Because it is so, so good. The prices are still up there - hey, they're fancy bags - but the discounts are enough to be sorta thrilling (I'd estimate about 50% off for many styles).

Above: Mom's new M.A.C. clutch, in grey and ivory (which I've never even seen in stores). They have the M.A.C. in every possible color and pattern, along with tons and tons of other bags, wallets, and coin purses...but probably not for long. So run! RUN! And tell me what you end up getting :).