Austin: JM Dry Goods

We need longer have to fly and drive all the way to Marfa for well-curated goods from Mexico.

 JM Dry Goods has opened shop in Austin.

 I first met the owner Michelle Teague while I was in Marfa on assignment for Texas Monthly, which yielded the September 2009 Street Smarts column. 

 Teague moved to Marfa after working as a costumer on the set of "There Will Be Blood." 

 And she opened the store and filled it with beautiful blouses, bags, hammocks, and palm frond necklaces that she picked up on her travels to Mexico.

I bought a Mexican house dress from there about a year ago and I wear it just about every night and still have it on while I fix my kids breakfast and pack their lunches (I'm wearing it now). I wonder if I look like my mother and grandmother to them as I putter about wearing it. 

College Station: Joshua Bienko

Meet the work of Texas A&M professor Joshua Bienko.

 In his series, Ever So Much More So, Bienko recreated the iconic work of Warhol, Murakami, Koons, and Duchamp

on the red soles of Christian Louboutins

 It's interesting commentary, no?

 If you think that this kind of contemporary art - soup cans, balloon dogs, urinals - is bullshit, then you can literally walk all over it. 

But if you love it - that would be me - the art you'd have would be two-fold. Gorgeous shoes with a distinct image, plus having to practice the art of restraint cause one walk in these and they'd be in ruins.  

Dallas: Taylor Tomasi Hill

By now you're sure to know that Dallas-born and -bred Taylor Tomasi Hill was snatched from her style and accessories directorship at Marie Claire by Moda Operandi to be their new artistic director. 

 While at MC she'd begun working on an eponymous capsule collection for Hong Kong's super luxe department store, Lane Crawford, and it's set to hit shelves in January.

 From what I've read so far she's doing a version of her ever present cat eye glasses, some lace skirts, and other TTH-inspired closet staples. Now if I can just figure out how to get my hands on some of this stuff stateside, I'll be good.

I mean, really. How fabulous is she?

Dallas: Bistro 31

For about a month now I've been going to Bistro 31 a little too often for lunch. There is something about the location and atmosphere here that makes me want to linger for hours over a glass of wine. Which, btw, I really don't have the time or alcohol tolerance for. 

The last time I was there I had a three-hour lunch - I convinced myself that I was owed 3 hours to bs over crostinis and pasta because I met a deadline - and the people that walked in with the same thing on their minds made me feel totally validated. At the table next to me was super agent Jan Miller (she reps Phil McGraw, Maria Shriver, Rob Lowe, Nicole Richie, the list goes on. If you're a writer, you know her), at the table behind me was the Dallas Museum of Art's Art Ball co-chair Julie Hawes, mingling in the back was writer Eric O'Keefe, and off to the side was blogging phenoms Hanh Merriman and Nini Nguyen. 

 And now that Bistro is serving breakfast, my a.m. hours are about to be hijacked, too. 

But I do have a question: Is the influx of relentless traffic in Highland Park Village killing you like it's killing me? I used to pop in to HPV all the time for a coffee, to pick up flowers at Avant Garden, take my kids to Mi Cocina. Valet for coffee? No, thanks. The new restaurants are creating a bit of a cluster, no? 

Dallas: Miles Fisher

I'm obsessed with Miles Fisher. Ob. Sessed.

The super talented actor/singer, who happens to be the son of the president of the Dallas Federal Reserve, graduated from Harvard and was a member of the university's a cappella group, Krokodiloes.

He gained some notoriety with this hysterical Tom Cruise spoof, left over footage from the film Superhero Movie and this month you can catch him in Clint Eastwood's J. Edgar.  
Love his music, too. Buy his songs here.