guilty pleasure.

Sometimes I feel bad about smoking; sometimes I feel bad about drinking. However, I would not consider these to be guilty pleasures...vices, if anything. Because I am young, I don't think I ought to feel guilty about most of the things I do (that doesn't mean that I don't...it just means that I know I shouldn't). From what I can tell, I have a good thirty years before ice cream would even qualify as a guilty pleasure (thank you, commercials targeted at middle aged women).

Something I do spend some time thinking about is how I navigate the internet. I'm not someone who is terribly interested in picking up a newspaper, therefore you can guess that the hard-hitting, information saturated sites aren't at the top of my visiting list. I am not proud to admit that most of my news comes from jezebel.com or perezhilton.com, but you know what? They have their moments. Plus, Jezebel's "The Good, The Bad, & The Ugly" gives me a daily gallery of eye catching togs. These sites are tabloid magazines updated by the moment. Awesome.

Now comes the admission of my guilty pleasure: my third favorite blog. It isn't updated as often as the others, and maybe (considering my affinity for Martha Stewart Living) you won't be too surprised. I love designmom.com. The "Design Mom" is a woman named Gabrielle Blair and, according to her, she is: "a designer/art director and mother of five. [She posts] on where design and motherhood intersect." It's true. Her posts are either about her children, decorating a family home, or parents' date nights. I love it.

There is little-to-no reason for me to read what the Design Mom has to say, but somehow she fascinates me. I know way too much about her life: from the details of her recent move to Colorado to what her siblings like to post about on their blogs. She may or may not be a mormon, but she's certainly pretty cool in a mildly out of touch way. My appreciation might, in part, stem from the fact that I've tried more than once to have her post about the website I work for (definitely in her league of postable items) and she's never responded.

Congratulations, Gabrielle Blair. You are an enigma to me.

P.S. She's in Chicago right now.

(image of Chicago courtesy of designmom.com)