A Sweater, a Puffer Jacket, and a Pair of Sweatpants Walk Into a Bar

I'm not sponsored by Quince, but I should be!

How’s your week going? I literally just had to google the words “what is it called when a shirt and pants are joined together?” because I could not, gun to my head, remember the word “jumpsuit.” That’s how my week is going! My brain kept saying “pantsuit! It’s called a pantsuit!” even though I knew that wasn’t right, that a pantsuit had a few more shades of Hillary Clinton than the actual word I was looking for (jumpsuit!) but I could not, for the life of me, remember it. I also could not even think how to describe a jumpsuit (I am sure there are ways of doing it that are more linguistically eloquent than “a shirt and pants joined together”) but Google, apparently, has seen much worse (I have to assume Google has always seen much worse) and obediently returned with the word I was looking for, as well as several I wasn’t.

Stop trying to make playsuit happen, Google, it’s not going to happen.

Is it mom brain? Chemo brain? Being seven years into a 10 year course of immunotherapy treatment to prevent my cancer from coming back, the side effects of which include the aptly-named “brain fog”? Is the world on fire, literally and metaphorically, thus making it harder to concentrate on anything else? Is a jumpsuit just a particularly difficult piece of clothing to mentally categorize and recall, given that I own precisely one and never wear it? Is it all of the above? I say it’s all of the above! Anyway: jumpsuit. I won’t forget that one again anytime soon. Except I probably will!

I was looking up the word for jumpsuit—I like how that sounds as though I was looking up how to say it in a different language; nope, just looking it up in my native tongue, English!—because I was listing that one jumpsuit I never wear for sale. I have been doing this a lot recently, selling my old clothes in various Facebook groups, and while 75% of the time it is an excruciating exercise in futility and frustration (l’enfer c’est les autres, and so on), I keep continuing to do it anyway. Because when it works, it works! I like feeling happy that I’ve made someone’s day by providing them with the item they were looking for! I like feeling smug that the clothes I no longer want are not ending up in a landfill! One time when I was in the UPS Store, the man behind the counter gave me a whole stack of these giant label stickers that you can attach to your package, with your printed mailing label inside it, and every time I use one, I feel like I am fulfilling some long-dormant childhood dream of “playing post office.” You get a sticker label, little package! And you get a sticker label, big package! Sticker labels for everyone!

Wow, there really are meme generators for everything.

Anyway, one of my favorite things about selling my old clothes is that then I get to buy new ones! Not every time, obviously, which would defeat the purpose of streamlining (aka “trying not to own too much crap”), but in certain cases where the void left by an item necessitates the procurement of a new version of that item, it’s quite fun to then procure it. Recently, for example, I sold three (3) jackets that I never wear anymore, and replaced them with one (1) new jacket that I have now worn every single day since I got it, and which has already been the recipient of two compliments out in the wild.

She is the Responsible Down Cropped Puffer Jacket from Quince, and I am obsessed with her. I got her in “Hot Fudge” because I cannot get enough brown clothing right now. I know it sounds like I am taking a cut from Quince or something, with the number of times I recommend them (literally just urged you to buy the cashmere crewneck fisherman sweater, I know), but I have been so happy with everything I’ve ordered from them.

Here, let’s look at a few more things!

This is the 100% cotton mock neck sweater, which my friend Amy recommended in her Substack, and which I bought to replace two other black turtleneck sweaters I got rid of that were each annoying me in their own way. It is soft and thin, yet somehow still warm, and it has a flattering drape. I have worn it on two Zoom calls and not hated the tiny little box at the top with my picture in it. Good Zoom neckline! (Great band name).

Okay, look how happy this woman is. It’s because she’s wearing her French Terry Modal Wide Leg Pants! I own these in black and they are so soft. I wear them to lounge around and work from home, but on the occasion that I leave the house in them, I don’t believe anyone has ever thought “that woman is wearing her pajama pants!” even though it very much feels like I am wearing my pajama pants. (Or maybe they have? Who cares!)

One of my other faves from Quince has been this 100% Organic Cotton Fisherman Boxy Cropped Cardigan, which I own in Ivory like the lady above, although I do not look quite so much like a character in a Nancy Meyers film as she does, because I mainly wear it over dresses or with jeans, not with baggy cream slacks that my children would immediately get Trader Joe’s knock-off Takis dust on. Still, tomayto-tomahto! (They would also immediately get tomato on them.)

And finally we have the Flowknit pullover hoodie, which I own in black, and which I will personally cut into pieces and eat on live television if it turns out it’s not actually made from the same fabric that Vuori is made from (it’s a total dupe, I swear! Okay, I am like 98% sure. And if it’s not the exact same fabric, then it is very, very, very close. I have held it up to my Vuori sweatpants and they’re virtually indistinguishable from each other. Please don’t actually make me eat a hoodie on live television.)

Okay, I’ll stop there because I legitimately do have to get to the UPS store to mail out this jumpsuit (jumpsuit! Nailed it!) to its new owner, but I recommend all of these pieces highly. I take my normal size in all of them (although I size up in the cashmere fisherman sweater for ultimate coziness). I don’t know how Quince keeps knocking it out of the park like this, but I am here for it. Sorry for being an enabler!