Despite the fact that yesterday was bone-chillingly cold...the high...the high mind you, was about 14F (-10C)...that's not factoring in the wind chill (which means that one of the ice cubes in my freezer is having a milder winter than I am)...Mr. Heb and I decided to venture out. The end goal was an art gallery but, you know how it is, you're wandering past a store...you're the "cold and huddled masses"...it's a centrally heated America waiting to welcome you in.

The welcoming store in question was H&M...I hadn't been in in a while and had therefore not realized that their sale had reached desperation level. Like the circles of Dante's Hell it had passed from "sale"...to "2nd reductions"...to "gift with purchase"...to the level I visited...where the clothes lurk in corners embellished with $5 and $10 labels.

Yesterday I mentioned that my summer wish list included a striped dress...in a typical "ask and ye shall receive" scenario I found one...too thick for summer but, at $10 and from H&M's organic cotton line, too good to pass up. A faux-Prada lace turtleneck, also $10, was similarly difficult to ignore. Perhaps the best part of the outing (apart from visiting some of John Singer Sargent's ladies at the museum later in the day) was that I had a $10 H&M gift certificate lurking in my wallet meaning that the total outlay for this little extravaganza was $10 (plus tax). Oh, I love a frugal splurge...