A good bag is hard to find

I'll take my $148 tote bag with a side of uncomfortable parrot.For a non-rich broad, buying a handbag is hard. Anything less than $200 is liable to break on you. It's not fair. Everyone needs a bag to hold all their crap. And as a journalist, I have a veritable shit-ton of crap to lug with me day-to-day. This makes it trés dificil to find an inexpensive bag for my needs.

In addition to my iPhone, wallet and you know, nine lipsticks, I have the following: notebooks, many pens, a voice recorder, earphones, a laptop, a plug for my laptop, a phone charger, and any paperwork/documents I may need. Also, I will soon add a camera to my daily schlep. Oy vey.

Right now, I'm rocking this shitty pleather bag from Urban Outfitters. Yes, it is pleather. I refuse to say "vegan leather." There is no such thing as "vegan leather." Vegan leather is plastic, fools. Cheap bag manufacturers say it's vegan to sound fancy and exclusive. Really they're just cheap and their bags smell like a gas station.

"No I'm really not a diaper bag, I swear to god!"Anyway, I know from experience that it's only a matter of time before this polyurethane satchel o' mine ruptures while I'm scurrying down Cookman chasing a story. Ipso facto, I need a new bag.

Also, my bag is black and it's April. It doesn't look right with florals.

The most reasonable thing would be to buy a backpack but I'm not cool enough to know how to wear one without looking like Chuckie Finster. Seriously, imagine me walking around with a backpack on and try not to laugh. If you put both the straps on, the thing's gonna bounce up and down and possibly hit your butt while you walk. If you try to insouciantly toss just one strap over your shoulder while leaving the other hanging, you look like the bully in a 1990s sitcom. I know some people look normal with backpacks on but that is just not happening for me.

So I think I need a tote bag. I've been perusing the tote sDon't mind Sean Hunter, he's just REALLY COOL.elections on some of my favorite websites and I'm becoming concerned. I keep gravitating toward colorful, springy, Monet-esque prints. I'm worried this could make me look like the mom who buys accessories from museum gift shops. Like hi, don't you love my dangly Stonehenge earrings?

Anthropologie has a great selection of non-mom-esque totes but the cheapest among them is like $100. Is that ridiculous or sensible? The thing about a bag is it's the one thing that you can wear almost every day, so it's not like you won't get your money's worth. But what if I drop a hundo on some stupid tote and the strap snaps off anyway? Can I return it?

The most perfect bag is also the most $248.I don't know. Am I the only girl who dreads buying a bag? If it works for me I will carry the same bag for six months straight just because I can't handle buying a new one. Maybe I hate bags because after a few months they become mobile garbage cans, full of old CVS receipts and cough drop wrappers and paper clips even though you never use paper clips.

I guess carrying a variety of bags and switching often would mitigate the garbage problem. But then you have to BUY A BUNCH OF BAGS. Which I've already told you is impossible. There has to be a better way. Maybe I'll just say eff it and get a rolling suitcase.

Blueprint Cleanse Day Three — I want to squeeze food's face as soon as possible

I woke up this morning feeling much better than yesterday. My bout with whooping cough is over, although I still have a lingering sore throat and cough.

Other than that, physically, I feel great. I had energy today. But mentally I'm not doing so well. I feel kind of depressed and anxious and I almost cried tonight while talking about Oprah. It wouldn't be the first time, but still. Not normal.

The three-day lack of food is definitely to blame for the strange state of my brain right now, which is not surprising. I am aware I need food to live. But the good news is instead of wanting to eat a cheeseburger and sweet potato fries with chocolate mousse for dessert, I want a huge green salad with some obnoxiously healthy slab of fish and a big glass of red wine. And maybe a tiny piece of dark chocolate.

But according to the god damn BluePrint Cleanse people, I'm supposed to phase in food groups as follows: fruits on the first day post-cleanse, vegetables on the second day, legumes on the third day (because we're all DYING for legumes) and meat on the fourth day. Fruits only on my first day post-cleanse? I will not be participating in this lunacy.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not about to down a pork roll, egg and cheese tomorrow morning but let's put it this way. Let's say your significant other leaves town for three days. When they come back, you're not like, "I think I'll phase you back into my life gradually." No! You want to squeeze their face as soon as possible. And I want to squeeze food's face as soon as possible.

Yes, I compare food to a significant other. I. Love. Food. Three days ago, I thought that was bad — that I was emotionally attached to food and I ate too much because I was addicted to those feelings of pleasure that arise from eating. And that was probably true. There is nothing loving about eating three Reese's peanut butter eggs for breakfast just because they're there.

But now that I've gone without it for three days, I realize food really is an amazingly sensual and social thing that makes life worth living. Tomorrow morning when I eat a slice of gluten-free raisin pecan toast with almond butter on top, I am going to diiiiiiie. I'm going to close my eyes and chew it so slowly and it's going to taste crunchy and creamy and sweet and salty all at once. And I will love it so much, I don't think I'll need anything more than that.

And it will make me doubly happy, because anything with almond butter reminds me of standing around my parents' kitchen eating and gossiping and doing weird dance moves to Prince songs with my mom and my sister. I can't imagine the three of us bonding without the food. It ain't right.

And I'm going to have black tea tomorrow, not green. It makes me happy not only because it's caffeinated, but also because it reminds me of my aunts and my grandma and the marathon chat sessions they used to have around the kitchen table when I was little. It was like the tea held some kind of power over them. From the time they poured the first cup, they would sit and talk passionately for ages. If my cousin Amy and I were playing at her house all day and my mom came to pick me up, we would plead with our mothers — please have a cup of tea! Because we knew if they started boiling that water, we'd have at least another hour to play Barbies.

And I'm going to have red wine tomorrow night because it reminds me of what else? Studying abroad in Paris. I got a crash course in wine there because it was the cheapest, best thing to drink. We bought bottles of wine for three euros and drank them without a glass on the Seine's canals, me and a bunch of girls I barely knew who became my best friends for a summer. Wine from the bottle on the banks of the Seine — gives new meaning to the term cheap and chic.

So going without food for three days really was beneficial. It made me remember good food makes life worth living. Eating together is the ultimate catalyst for conversation and bonding. What can provide you with as much delight and pleasure as a perfectly cooked meal?

I understand my need to make peace with food is an obnoxiously first-world problem. But growing up female in America isn't great for your body image or your relationship with food. If you diet, you're uptight and high-maintenance. If you eat a lot and you're thin, you're fine. But as soon as it catches up to you, you'd better lose those extra pounds or else you're just a pathetic fat slob... But don't even think about ordering a salad on a date, because guys like girls who eat. But only if they're thin. And the cycle continues.

Not to mention all the lying celebrities with 4-percent body fat giggling, "I just have a high metabolism!"

Anyway, this has turned into a huge rant. Where was I. BluePrint Cleanse. I guess I recommend it if you need an attitude adjustment when it comes to eating. As far as I can tell, it worked for me. I feel a lot better about my relationship with food. I just wish I didn't do it during the workweek because balancing work with the weird emotional side effects and the sore throat and having to pee every 12 seconds was difficult. I wish I started on a Friday and ended on a Sunday.

I did this to see what all the juice cleanse fuss was about and to try and conquer food once and for all. Instead of conquering food, I ended up working out a lot of my own messed-up feelings. It was cathartic. No more shameful peanut-butter-egg breakfasts for me, at least for now. So there's my juice-cleanse epiphany. Food is one of the best parts of life.

Blueprint Cleanse Day Two — Not feeling so hot

Day Two of the Blueprint Cleanse was tough. I was unfortunately right this morning when I declared this to be some sinister shit.

I woke up feeling like a million bucks except for the slight nag of a sore throat that's been bugging me since Sunday. I drank a bunch of juice and tea, admired my de-puffed face, and headed downtown to get some work done. Then after a quick lunch break (spent watching someone else eat), I went home to write. Out of nowhere, my throat was on fire and I was coughing and wheezing. Yes, wheezing like a junkyard bull dog in wedges.

I shouldn't be surprised by my sore throat. To be fair, I have felt this hybrid case of bronchitis-pneumonia-black-death incubating in my gullet since Sunday, way before the cleanse. I was successfully ignoring it but today it caught up with me.

But was it because of the juices? In spite of the juices? Is it a coincidence? Who can say. I did some research online and apparently a sore throat is a side effect of cleansing. This makes no sense to me. What, all my toxins are getting wasted and lighting shots of vodka on fire in my throat right now? Why not exit through the normal ways, where gravity wants to take you? Why would I be slowly upchucking toxins into my throat, and why do they burn??? Is this because of Nutella pizza with powdered sugar?

I hope this sore throat isn't being caused by the cleanse. How embarrassing — I could have brought this on myself by spending way too much money on some new-age juice fast and not eating for three days. But like I said, I've had a sore throat since before the cleanse began, so it may be unrelated. Although I'm sure this diet is exacerbating it.

After some deliberation I decided to continue the cleanse despite my malady because frankly, I already paid for the juice and it goes bad in two days. Also, these juices have many vitamins... That should help, right? And you know what they say, feed a fever, starve a cold. And I'm certainly starving.

Maybe I have Stockholm Syndrome and my thoughts are being controlled by that bangin' Cashew Milk promised to me at the end of each day. How could something that tastes so good be causing me this much pain? But wait... being unhappy with the results of consuming delicious food and drink is exactly what got me here in the first place. Shit. I eat a cheeseburger, I gain weight and break out. I subsist on green liquids and my throat feels like it's lined with hot sauce and broken glass. Sweet.

A lot of what I've found online says the potential side effects — sore throat, headache, nausea, etc. — are just symptoms of your body flushing out its toxins. This is a little too convenient a theory for the cleanse man to be pushing. Again, why would toxins defy gravity and push themselves up through my throat?And what the hell is a toxin, anyway? Are they even real? WHERE IS SCIENCE?

I'm not trying to totally bash this thing now — I felt amazing yesterday and this morning and that, I attribute directly to the cleanse. This sore throat thing is too weird though. I feel like the cleanse has turned on me. Like listen, cleanse gods: I'm sorry I bragged about losing five pounds overnight to the whole Internet. I was excited. Give me my throat back.

Oh, there was one silver lining to my day when I resisted one of my most favorite and least healthy meals. Before I keeled over in a wheezing shame fit this afternoon, I went to lunch with my boyfriend. We go to Bond Street Bar for Big Kahuna burgers all the time. A Big Kahuna burger is a hunk of red meat cooked in teriyaki sauce with swiss cheese and a pineapple on top. It's so good. I get it without the bun usually to pretend it's healthy.

And we always wash our juicy red meat sandwiches down with a giant basket of greasy sweet potato fries. We often speak of ordering something different, but we always end up getting two BKBs with a side of SPFs and wistfully saying, "Did you see they have pork roll fries? Yeah. Maybe next time."

So we went to Bond today and he got the burger and the fries. I successfully withstood the temptation to steal (yes, steal, by force) a bite. I didn't even have a fry. Anyone who has been out to eat with me knows that's a huge triumph because usually I finish not only my entire plate but also, always, someone else's leftover fries. And he left half the basket of fries there, all greasy and salty and orangey and waiting to be eaten. But I was like, "Talk to the hand, you fried jerks. I'm cleansing at the moment."

And then I went home and died of a possibly-but-hopefully-not-related sore throat.

So Day Two... Cleanse-wise, it was all right. I didn't even want to eat and I'm really loving those Green Juices. The Cashew Milk is still totally boss. The only issue was that damn Spicy Lemonade further scorching my throat.

In terms of general health, I've seen better days. I really hope my throat feels more like a normal organ again tomorrow and not like the surface of the Sun mixed with sandpaper. And I hope the cleanse isn't what's making me feel so shitty! Everything else is fine besides my throat — oh, and the other adorable side effect of having to blow my nose every two minutes. Also I'm freezing. And I have to pee every 20 minutes. Christ almighty. What am I doing to myself.

Did I really just lose five pounds in a day?

I started the three-day BluePrintCleanse yesterday and I didn't even do it to lose weight, really. I just wanted to try and break some of my food addictions and re-set my body or something. Little did I know I would lose FIVE POUNDS OVERNIGHT.

The way the cleanse works is: I have to drink six juices a day and no food or caffeine allowed.

Three of the juices are the Green Juice: romaine, celery, cucumber, apple, spinach, kale, parsley and lemon. Judging by online reviews, some people seem to think the Green Juice doesn't taste good. I don't know what they're talking about. It's pretty good and for a bottle of unsweetened vegetable juice, it's phenomenal. It's refreshing and light and somehow filling. I have to wonder what the haters thought a bottle of lettuce juice was supposed to taste like.

I also drink one bottle of pineapple, apple, mint juice in the morning, which is lovely. It's like a little liquid brunch. Then there's this spicy lemonade in the afternoon which I'm lukewarm about but it's still nowhere near bad.

Then at night I get to consume the most bangin' drink known to man. It's cashew milk with agave nectar, vanilla bean and cinnamon. It's so good. It's better than a milkshake or a pint of Guinness. I want to drink it every day for the rest of my life but I heard it's $12 by itself so that's not happening. I'm definitely going to try to find out how to make it myself though.

So the weird thing is I don't feel lightheaded or tired at all. Okay, I got a little lightheaded in the afternoon for like a half hour in between juices but I took a B12 and drank the spicy lemonade and I was fine. Honestly, after the cashew milk, I actually felt full, which was really weird.

Also, my brain is working just fine, which was a big concern. I thought I would be unable to write, but instead I had a productive day and did two stories and an interview. My interview subject may have thought it was strange when I kept pulling numbered juices out of my purse and chugging them but... whatever.

So anyway, I'm really shocked that I lost five pounds already. I legitimately don't feel tired or lightheaded at all. It's kind of too good to be true. This is some sinister shit.

But still, I woke up this morning feeling great. And I'm not even drinking black tea, only green tea. This is unbelievable. A lot of online reviews said the second day is the toughest, though, so we'll see...

Oh, also, I forgot to add one annoying side effect I've experienced. I'm freezing cold all the time. I cranked the heat up really high in my apartment last night because I was shivering. When my boyfriend came over he was shocked at how hot it was while I was still wearing a sweater and feeling kind of cold. But I'll take feeling cold for three days, it's not a huge deal.

Also I'm still having trouble justifying to myself how much money I spent to basically not eat for three days. I feel really really guilty about it. I'm definitely gonna have to do something charitable to rectify my karma. And I'm never spending that much money on this again. This was definitely a one-time thing because I couldn't stop wondering about it and had to give it a try. I could have spent the money on a juicer and learned how to do it myself. But I just wanted to do it 100% right the first time and not give up out of frustration at making the juice myself, ya know?

And to anyone who says I'm just going to gain the weight back when I start eating normally again — I don't care because I feel so energized and all my cravings for bad food are pretty much gone. I actually looked at a brownie yesterday and didn't want it for probably, literally, the first time in my life. Worth it.

On the eve of my cleanse...

My Blueprint cleanse will arrive at my doorstep via FedEx in less than 12 hours and I will be subsisting on six bottles of juice a day for the next three days. Questions are prancing like peanut-butter-filled chocolate bunnies in my head.

• Is my breath going to smell weird?

• Am I going to be shakey?

• Am I going to be cranky?

• If I pass out, do I get a refund?

• How glowy is my skin going to be, on a scale of one to 10?

I guess I'll find out tomorrow. Don't touch that dial.