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Suit of the Week: Argent

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professional woman wearing an olive green blazer, olive green trousers and a lighter green olive blouse

For busy working women, the suit is often the easiest outfit to throw on in the morning. In general, this feature is not about interview suits for women, which should be as classic and basic as you get — instead, this feature is about the slightly different suit that is fashionable, yet professional.

Argent has some interesting, colorful suits in seasonless wool, including this olive suit (and a Very Bright aqua!). I like that it's a super classic cut, in a seasonless wool, with a fun color. They also have it in navy and black if those are more your speed.

Side note: I absolutely hate the hemming on the pants as styled — with trousers your hem should hit the top of your feet (but still leave about .5-1″ of heel exposed). The heels are too high by about 2″ here, IMHO.

The blazer is $358, and the pants are $238-$268 (there's a wide-legged trouser and a “tailored trouser” with a cropped fit).

This post contains affiliate links and Corporette® may earn commissions for purchases made through links in this post. For more details see here. Thank you so much for your support!

Sales of note for 1/22/25:

  • Nordstrom – Cashmere on sale; AllSaints, Free People, Nike, Tory Burch, and Vince up to 60%; beauty deals up to 25% off
  • AllSaints – Clearance event, now up to 70% off (some of the best leather jackets!)
  • Ann Taylor – All sale dresses $40 (ends 1/23)
  • Banana Republic Factory – Up to 50% off everything
  • Boden – Clearance, up to 60% off!
  • DeMellier – Final reductions now on, free shipping and returns — includes select options like Montreal, Vancouver, and Venice
  • Eloquii – $29 and up select styles; extra 50% off all clearance, plus ELOQUII X kate spade new york collab just dropped
  • Everlane – Sale of the year, up to 70% off; new markdowns just added
  • J.Crew – Up to 40% off select styles; up to 50% off cashmere
  • J.Crew Factory – End of season sale, extra 60-70% off clearance, online only
  • Rothy's – Final Few: Up to 40% off last-chance styles
  • Spanx – Lots of workwear on sale, some up to 70% off
  • Talbots – Semi-Annual Red Door Sale – extra 50% off

Sales of note for 1/22/25:

  • Nordstrom – Cashmere on sale; AllSaints, Free People, Nike, Tory Burch, and Vince up to 60%; beauty deals up to 25% off
  • AllSaints – Clearance event, now up to 70% off (some of the best leather jackets!)
  • Ann Taylor – All sale dresses $40 (ends 1/23)
  • Banana Republic Factory – Up to 50% off everything
  • Boden – Clearance, up to 60% off!
  • DeMellier – Final reductions now on, free shipping and returns — includes select options like Montreal, Vancouver, and Venice
  • Eloquii – $29 and up select styles; extra 50% off all clearance, plus ELOQUII X kate spade new york collab just dropped
  • Everlane – Sale of the year, up to 70% off; new markdowns just added
  • J.Crew – Up to 40% off select styles; up to 50% off cashmere
  • J.Crew Factory – End of season sale, extra 60-70% off clearance, online only
  • Rothy's – Final Few: Up to 40% off last-chance styles
  • Spanx – Lots of workwear on sale, some up to 70% off
  • Talbots – Semi-Annual Red Door Sale – extra 50% off

And some of our latest threadjacks here at Corporette (reader questions and commentary) — see more here!

Some of our latest threadjacks include:

185 Comments

  1. Do you have a recommendation for where to get a provider to write a prescription for only tretinoin (Retin-A), without paying a fortune for either the consult or the medicine?

    I was using Curology, but wanted to limit my formula to just tretinoin, with no other active ingredients, which they said wasn’t possible with their service. My derm is happy to write a prescription, but I don’t see her for awhile and I don’t want to message her for something so trivial (her schedule is jammed with people who have serious conditions).

    I’m happy to use an online provider/service and I’m in California if that makes a difference.

    1. Message your derm and let her figure out if she has time in her schedule vs you assuming she doesn’t.

    3. Apostrophe! Like Curology but you can just get Tretinoin. Also Spiro + other prescriptions.

      1. I also used Apostrophe. It isn’t the absolute cheapest but was super easy and didn’t involve strange overseas transactions.

    4. Many derms even stock it in their offices; I’d definitely call or message and see your options.

      1. +1 my derm’s office also stocks it in their offices at the different strength levels. Definitely call.

    5. I would send the message. At my dr’s office, the dr herself does not read all the messages – assistants and then nurse practitioners handle most of them.

    7. Curious about why you think you’d prefer retin-A alone to your curology? What are the other ingredients in your curology?

      I’m genuinely curious as a fellow curology subscriber.

      1. My rough understanding is that there’s tons of very good research establishing the safety and efficacy of tretinoin, to the extent derms commonly use it themselves. I have not heard of such overwhelming evidence for the other active ingredients and I don’t feel like I can rely on my Curology provider to give me an accurate read on the state of the research.

        I have no reason to believe the other ingredients are unsafe, but I also don’t know of any overwhelming reason to use them for a long period of time.

  2. I just wanted to thank everyone who commented on my wedding registry post yesterday, especially Aunt Jamesina and Ribena. My day went a bit off the rails, and I’m just reading the comments now. Much appreciated! 

  3. I used to have crystal and glasswear and there was an Event when a shelf bracket failed and . . . now I have a sorry assortment of items. One iced tea glass. Three monogrammed water glasses. Some white wine glasses. A few read wine glasses. Of course, the new place’s cabinets are glass-front. It just looks so sad and mismatched (and in COVID: so lightly used, just laughing at me). Just soldier on, pretending that if I were a person who had big sloppy parties, this would be the natural result? It feels so sad to buy things I am not likely to use soon and seem odd for outdoor eating (we are not a crystal in the fancy barn sort of extended family and I think that outdoors is more begging for a red solo cup or Tervis tumbler).

    1. Why would you replace them if you’re not likely to use them? Use the remaining ones until they break, or get rid of them, and consider the shelf breaking as a message from the gods that they agree you’re not a crystal person.

      Do you know they make sturdier washable, infinitely reusable solo cups? I’d get a set or those.

      1. I think it’s that people aren’t really entertaining now. I know one goblet would just look sad. A set of 4, not so much. My guess is that people getting married in 2022 are registering for fancy entertaining pieces even if they will likely mothball them. FWIW, wine in a solo cup is sad. Wine or even water in a fancy glass is somehow civilizing in these weird times.

          3. Oh to be clear I wasn’t necessarily recommending OP only have solo cups. Just for the outdoor gatherings where she mentioned solo cups.

        2. Buying a new set of glassware you’re never going to use just for aesthetics doesn’t make much sense to me.

    2. Why would you buy new ones if you never use them?

      We purchased a few sets of pretty acrylic “glassware” from Pottery Barn as outdoor-friendly pieces that don’t look like a frat party.

    3. If you used them before the pandemic, I’d re-buy. Heck, you might find some good deals at estate sales or thrift shops now that no one is entertaining.

      1. +1

        You mentioned not being used soon, so if you’ll use again in the future re-buy and use your current mismatched set for every day!

      2. A lot of classic styles can be found second hand. See, for example, Waterford wine glasses or Lenox Autumn china. And you’re right, breakage is a result of use. I’m trying to think of an elegant way to say this but I don’t want to leave a pristine set of wedding china to my kids when I die. I want half the plates and most of the glasses to be chipped because we’ve used them with family and friends!

    4. Since most of your glassware is already broken and now mismatched, I’d take that as a license to use it for every day use! Using fancy glassware is an easy way to bring joy to my day and in your situation I’d no longer be worried about breaking the nice stuff!

      2. I keep mismatched glassware for girls night/parties so that everyone can keep track of their glasses. Works better than wine charms.

    5. I have three sets of wine glasses (red, white and sparkling) + 2 brandy sniffers because I actually notice a difference in drinking out of the appropriate glass (and it makes me feel festive and happy – sometimes it is the small things!). The sniffers were a gift so I am not counting those but the three main sets are all good enough for company but not so fancy that I would be upset if they broke. There is a middle ground between expensive crystal and Solo cups. Mine are from Costco.

      1. I have all of the wine glasses (including the specific Riedels for my favorite varietals) and I still use the small Picardie tumblers linked above the vast majority of the time.

        The Riedels are nice but I’m a klutz who talks with my hands, and nothing interferes more with the enjoyment of wine than breaking a $40 wineglass while drinking it.

        1. Reidel has a less expensive set (not as specific as their super fancy ones but still red/white). And if you buy on their website you can get 8 for the price of 6. Still something like $25/glass but still lovely.

      2. +1 to fancy glassware making me feel festive and happy – well worth the price of buying more mid-level glassware if it also makes you happy

        1. I use regular glasses during the day and for water with my meal, but I only use crystal for alcohol. I like the weight of it in my hand and it feels more adult. Even on my own I would reach for the crystal as it makes me happy.

          Some of it is from sales and other bits purchased from ebay (the crystal pattern I like is long discontinued).

          I also use the good china and cutlery every night. My parents always used their good stuff daily, so it’s normal to me. I also eat at the dining room table each night, complete with tablecloth and napkins. It all makes me feel happier than eating off the chunky plates I use at lunchtime.

    6. I would put the one iced tea glass in daily rotation as a breakfast or after dinner drink glass and enjoy having a nice glass every day.

      For the other ones, three, some and a few are all useful quantities. Don’t rebuy until you find exactly what you need or want. If it looks sad, put something else in between groups of glasses. A ceramic vase, some candlesticks, or even a mason jar of beans can be a decorative element that breaks up the sadness in your cabinets.

    7. Replacements sells out of stock items. You can buy the minimum number to make a usable set. So a pair of flutes, or a small table’s worth of wine.

  4. State of the Union – is it our duty as Americans to sit through that. I’m a moderate Democrat, thought Trump was a disaster and I voted for Biden, but I still didn’t sit through Biden’s address being all rah rah that’s my guy. I watched all of Trump’s too.

    I have never enjoyed nor learned much from any of them. Whatever side is in office stands and applauds every third sentence. The other side stays seated. And now we’re going to bring in Bob the steelworker or Jose the LEGAL immigrant depending on who’s in office. It’s such theater and I find it nauseatingly formulaic.

    This is not a comment on Biden’s specific address. It was as good or bad as any prior.

    1. I happily voted for Biden, and I do not think it’s anyone’s duty to sit through those. I hate them. Big speeches like this are more propaganda than information in my view. If some people like them and get energized, then great. I do not, and I don’t think I’m a negligent voter.

    2. Lordy, not for me. SOTU is a signal that I likely have all I need to do my taxes and it is when that occurs annually. And oddly, it is to the same end: feeling the cost of government that I bear (state, local, US taxes of all sorts). Same theme, different means.

    3. I despise the SOTU no matter how much I like whatever president is giving it. It is long and boring and wastes too much time on applause and keeps me up too late on a weeknight and prevents me from falling asleep because I am thinking about politics. I read the transcript the next day.

      1. It’s performative. Stuff that you could say in 5 minutes and a solid set of visuals. Like if this were a meeting? No. Just no. One-star review.

        1. Completely agree. I never watch it, regardless of how I feel about the President who’s delivering it. I feel the same way about the State of the Union address as I feel about awards shows: why torture myself sitting through all the blah-blah when I’ll be able to see the highlights on YouTube like 15 minutes after the whole thing is over? The highlights are all I’m interested in anyway.

    7. I think the only people who’s duty it is to sit through them is the actual attendees (i.e., congress members). And I think that that duty extends to be a respectful, even if disagreeing, audience member and disrespectful behavior is absolutely reprehensible… as evidenced by two particularly disgraceful congress members.

    9. I sure hope not. I wasn’t going to sit through that and listen to somebody try to put a positive spin on disaster after disaster. I’ll keep voting for the best available candidate, but it’s honestly easier the less I know.

      1. gross attitude. how do you know the best when you are willfully under informed?

        1. Once I know enough to decide who to vote for, what difference does knowing more make? It’s not exactly a close call these days.

    10. Thanks everyone for being on my side of this (so far!) I’m going to let myself off the hook on this.

    11. I’m in politics and it’s my job to watch in case my field gets mentioned, and then we’re suddenly off to the races. (Happened a lot in the Trump era when you’d wake up to a tweet or off-the-cuff comment that turned an entire industry upside down.)

      Gotta be honest, it’s much more fun watching the SOTU as a 20-something in one of the DC bars where they have SOTU bingo and drinking games for every time certain words come up (think Affordable Care Act during the 0bama years, etc). As a grown-up, I listen with my Political Ears and grade each sentence – SOTU had much more nerdy patriotic sparkle as a youngster.

        1. I’m OP and same

          The bingo board during the Trump years would have been so …. interesting. Would Personal Grievances be one square or many?

        2. We had a presidential primary watchparty with bingo cards in 2020 at my union office. Fun times!

    12. I watch political debates and key addresses because I feel like reading the recaps still doesn’t capture the speech correctly

      That being said- I only caught the first half hour and then went to bed

    13. I’m 42 and have never listened to one or read the transcripts. I find them performative garbage that annoy me to no end regardless of how much I like the current president or not (Biden is not my fave but I did vote for him). I’d rather watch the boring S show that is the Batchelor.

    14. I only watch it because I work in a politics-adjacent job and it could be relevant. I never watched any of Trumps and also didn’t watch Obamas because its just a show and if he says something new I can just watch the clip the next day

    15. As a foreigner (to the US) I had never heard about this one. It sounds very much like any “head of state makes very generalized speech about current (read yearly) affairs. It sounds like the very definition of irrelevant to current affairs.

    1. Those are good! I couldn’t pull them off in my office, but I know people who could.

        1. I have note cards that say “We can’t all be Queen – someone has to bow when I walk by” and they are perfect for WFH

    2. In a similar vein, there are a couple of coffee mugs at Effin’ Birds that I am considering for my WFH office

  6. Somewhat in the same line of questions from this morning regarding people living the life they want — is anyone else in the camp of I’m not going back to the office at all [bc I want to be full time remote, I’ve moved far away etc.] and if they require it, I’m leaving? Just curious. I know lots of people say that but I wonder how many are doing it.

    2. Yup. Got fed up with my dinosaur company insisting everyone had to come back and stare at their computers in cubicles all day. Found a new job paying 60% more, my boss is three time zones away, and it’s a no-video culture. I have zero need for anything other than sweatshirts and joggers for the forseeable future. I am still gleefully remembering my exit interview where the snide HR chick told me I would need “some serious luck” to find something fully remote (not knowing I already had it, not her business).

      1. “the snide HR chick told me I would need “some serious luck” to find something fully remote”
        Bwahahaha. The people who need luck are the HR recruiters trying to find top talent that wants to be in the office full-time.

    3. I’m actually of the opposite camp: if I have to wfh full time I will quit and find a hybrid job.

      1. I don’t know that I’d quit (because I’m very risk averse, older, and my job is pretty good) but I am hopefully that my job will start back with limited hours in the office (right now, 2 days per 2-week pay period are required) and gradually ramp up to more.

        Hybrid will be great, but I would not like 100% remote at all. I actually like my coworkers and we have come up with some great project ideas in the past just from casual conversations in the office that don’t really happen remotely.

        I just want you to know that you are not the only one who is not-thrilled by the idea of 100% telework.

        1. Another person who doesn’t like wfh. Don’t mind if other people do it. Not in management so I don’t make the decisions, but wouldn’t force people to if I did have that power. But I personally hate it.

      2. +1 my job has let me come in part time to the empty office because I was about to lose it. WFH is not for everyone. This introvert almost had a melt down without having an office to be alone in. Working from my livingroom was social/sensory overload.

        1. I am WFH forever but I can really support companies like mine that are allowing people to choose – work full-time in the office if they want like in 2019 (some people never stopped), part-time in the office with a dedicated desk/office if they want (part-time WFH), or hot desk in the office whenever they want and WFH forever if they want. Of course, this is for the lucky people who are knowledge workers or non-face-to-face workers who WFH all pandemic. I am happy that it worked out for me and I hope other companies are smart like this. Even with WFH, I could see using a hot desk or an office if my house was being repaired or if the furnace died or something like that so I like the flexibility.

      3. Same, in fact I already did. We can’t afford a big enough place for two people to comfortably work from home right now.

    4. I know someone who is almost doing it. Work wouldn’t allow 100% remote, so she is going on part-time and will be fully remote this way. Work is still getting her skills this way and she gets to lean into other things. We also have a lot of people who started remotely in the last 2 years, and not all of them are going to want to move here. Employers will just have to figure it out, the toothpaste is out of the tube.

    5. My job doesn’t really work as remote, but we’ve gotten the “back to the office” announcement and I am pretty sure we will see a mass exodus in the next couple months.

    6. Yeah, I’d quit if I had to go back on a regular basis. I actually hate working from home (I hate the lack of separation between home and work) but after dealing with it for two long years while we weren’t vaccinated and were stuck at home, I want to reap the rewards of being able to work remotely from somewhere fun now that travel is opening up and our entire family is vaccinated.

      But before I’d quit I’d get a lawyer and threaten them. I work on a team where 3 of us have very similar job descriptions, essentially performing the same role. My two co-workers (both male) each moved several states away during the pandemic. I know they’re not going to make these guys come back. So if they order me and only me back into the office, they’re going to have a sex discrimination lawsuit on their hands.

    7. Me. After working from home for my previous company starting in March of 2020, I realized WFH is the answer to the question “why do I hate working so much” that I’ve been asking since I started my career. It turns out, I don’t hate working; I actually like working. I do not like working in an office. I do heads-down analytic work that requires a great deal of concentration. I’m also an introvert. The constant interruptions from chatty people who love talking to others all day and having to make small talk and be “on” sucked for me. As did having to deal with office politics, mean gossip, and microaggressions (or outright aggressions) with good grace (my last organization was pretty dysfunctional). I did not realize it until I started working from home, but working in an office from 8-5 every day was what was making me miserable. Not my actual work, my job, or working in general. I am ten thousand times happier in all aspects of my life working from home. So I went and got a full-time permanent remote job working for a company that has had a distributed workforce for many years and can’t call me back to work in the office because there’s not one within 1000 miles I could get called back to.

      I have already told my husband, if I have to get a new job and can’t get a WFH job (or at least partially remote) I am not going back to a full-time office job. I will start a business flipping thrift-store clothes on Poshmark, or selling baked goods at farmer’s markets, or heck, maybe I’ll be a 45-year-old squishy-stomached mom shaking her jibblies on O nlyfans. But I’m done working full-time in an office. Forever. There is no opportunity or amount of money anyone could offer me to entice me to go back to that.

      1. Not the poster at 3:44, but for those seeking this out, the “company that has had a distributed workforce for many years” bit is key to finding a WFH position that won’t get pushed back into an office. This describes my company which was permanently remote before COVID. It also means the company likely has a health insurance plan that will work in many states.

        1. Yes to distributed workforce. In my current position, my boss and other team-members are in a different timezone/state, two others are five hours away, and two others in two different states and this was pre-pandemic. Our support teams are in various states. We were all in the office pre-pandemic but were like little island in the office with no local coworkers. The butt-in-seat mentality was strong, now it’s not.

    8. A couple of colleagues have done this. We do allow hybrid work schedules (time in the office/time at home), which I personally think is a nice balance. I hate to say it, but I did notice that relationships started to suffer when people never saw each other in person. And yet most of those people loudly proclaimed that they were just as productive from home. Maybe true, but I do think there is a certain amount of relationship building that happens less naturally when everyone is remote. Notice that I didn’t say “never,” but a lot of people think they’re better at it than they really are.

      1. I 100% agree

        In some jobs, I’ve been cordial but anti social with my coworkers, and at other jobs I’ve found life-long friends. Regardless of the situation, I would HATE to lose out on those relationships and I do think they suffer when not in person.

      2. I don’t want to go back, but I completely agree that you miss out on relationship building being fully remote. I feel like I don’t know anyone I work with and I miss out on so much small talk and gossip. People try to make small talk over zoom but it’s just not the same at all.

      3. I think this is true but am not persuaded it’s actually all that detrimental. I feel like people are more focused now, and we’re not spinning wheels on optional projects the way we sometimes did when there were more social motivators, which has actually benefited core projects.

    9. Yes, 100%. We are still remote and heading towards a “hybrid” system, but I will be requesting permanent WFH whenever it comes to me being told I need to be in the office, and if that request is not approved, I will be leaving and finding somewhere where I can work remotely on a permanent basis. I actually agree with the comments about how relationship building suffers in a 100% remote environment, but I personally don’t care about that. I’m not at work to make friends, I’m there to do my job and make money, and I’m simply not open to losing the lifestyle that I have now as a result of WFH.

      1. +1 I just commented above but agree with all of this. Relationships suffer but I don’t care. Work is what I do to earn money. The life I have outside work is my real life.

    10. My company decided that for me by shutting down the office building in my city. It wasn’t a big deal to shift to WFH b/c there was no one in my physical office building that I worked with on a daily basis. My boss is in another state and I work with people in India and across the US. If I had to look for another job, I would definitely look for remote options.

    11. I spent 2021 applying nonstop to remote jobs in order to avoid that exactly. It was worth every minute of interview stress to know that I don’t have to worry about being called back in.
      I’ll still occasionally head into HQ or travel to a conference – but I don’t have to worry about the daily grind, which is an amazing relief.

  7. In light of other Ukraine discussions here, thought I would ask if anyone works for one of the big firms that does work for the Russian gov’t/state companies? I was just reading about a Harvard 2L who turned down a SA position with a big NY firm because of their work with the Russian gov’t. Obviously it’s much easier to turn down a summer position you haven’t started (and if you’re a student at Harvard) than to just quit your job, so not making any judgments, but curious if this is something that might gain traction. Also just interested in thoughts about this. On the one hand, I can appreciate the student’s position; on the other, I firmly believe in the right to counsel and that there need to be lawyers who defend even terrible people and I am always nervous when we take issue with lawyers who have unpopular clients. But I guess that’s more of an issue for me in the criminal or free speech context. I don’t know that it necessarily extends to helping a Nazi with a real estate closing, to use a simplistic example.

    1. We pulled out of Russia. Too much FCPA risk and I’m frankly surprised at the people rationalizing their toeholds there. I am also surprised at our China footprint and I hope our servers there are completely separate.

      1. Not to be too harsh about it, but I agree completely that outside of a moral reason it doesn’t seem to make business sense to stay in Russia anymore. The economy is a disaster, and you’re only going to get bad press for staying there.

    2. For someone who is not an HLS student who will probably get 10 more offers as a direct result of turning down that one, I would imagine the calculus is a bit different. One would probably consider whether one was working directly on matters for the dictator in question.

      Some firms are dropping questionable clients. See, e.g., Mazars’s decision to drop DJT.

    3. I think there’s definitely a line between the kind of legal services that are in support of somebody’s business or way of making money when that person/business is definitely unethical vs. defense. I’m guessing that most firms do much more of the former than the latter.

    4. My rule to myself was that once I crossed above the poverty line (for my city) I could not work an unethical job anymore. So I worked for evil companies as a student making $10/h but not after that. There’s a difference between economic necessity and choice, once you have a degree you are making a choice.

    5. Pharma company I work for did not stop to sell and promote their medicines (Rx, OTC, vaccines) in Russia/Belarus, rationalizing it as “we believe in access to medicine for all”. I mean, we don’t sell to North Korea or some other countries. I could understand to keep selling life-vital meds that do not have other alternative on the market…. But I am disgusted by the company not taking a stand I fully understand that it would lead to local Health Authority of revoking our licenses etc.
      When I am recruiting again, the company actions towards Russia/Belarus will for sure be taken into consideration. I am too old to accept cowards. Same approach as a shopper – given the choice, I will buy rather from a company who supported Ukraine and stopped activities in R/B.

      1. What if you sold insulin? Average lives are worth saving. It isn’t like Putin has T1 diabetes or whatever.

        1. This. You’re not selling wine glasses. Everyone needs medications. There’s nothing wrong with selling them in Russia.

    6. Like everything else, those who can afford to take a principled stand can afford just about everything else. It’s not like a Harvard 2L is going to go begging.

      I’m personally going to stop buying fewer things made in China, which just means buying fewer things altogether, but I’m privileged enough to be able to do that.

  8. Thoughts on putting an area rug on top of carpet. Yay or nay? I’m at the point where I can’t tell if I’d genuinely enjoy the additional color, pattern, and texture, or if I’ve read one too many design blogs. It’s a large room, so the expanse of same-color carpet is pretty massive.

      1. Why icky?

        I rent, my apartment is carpeted with boring beige carpet, and I can’t remove it. I got a really pretty 4×6 rug in Morocco some years ago and I have it out in my living room, on top of the boring beige carpet. I think it looks nice.

      1. I’d rather not. It’s a finished basement and carpet is the norm in our area because hard flooring + basement ends up being pretty uncomfortable for part of the year.

    5. We are intending to convert our carpets to hardwoods, but the area rug arrived first, so it’s sitting on top of our carpet and makes an amazing difference in how much I like the room. So I say go for it.

    7. I’ve done it and thought it looked good. If you have busy carpet it may look odd but if it’s plain then rug away.

    8. As long as you aren’t putting a rug on very plush or high-pile carpet and creating a tripping hazard, go for it.

    9. I have done this–even with rug pads and double sided tape, it is a pain in the @ss. Looks wrinkled, toes pull at it. I wouldn’t do it again unless it was a low traffic area and a very small rug.

  9. Just coming here to vent that the Ghislane Maxwell verdict is likely to be overturned because one of the jurors has been running around giving interviews about how he was a victim of s*xual abuse as a child AND talked to all of the other jurors about it so they could “understand the victim’s perspective.” After expressly stating in the juror questionnaire that he had had NOT been the victim of such abuse.

    All the prosecutors’ hard work; all the (I am sure very difficult) testimony from the victims – all likely to go down the drain.

    And I just want to stand up in the court house and scream “Don’t lie on your jury questionnaires people.”

    Ugh

    1. Seriously.

      As a victim, I dread that I have to have this discussion but understand why it is important to do so.

      My guess is that she skates on trial #2 if a mysterious suicide doesn’t befall her first.

    2. I agree with not lying on your jury questionnaires. But it also bothers me that defense attorneys can ask people if they’ve been victims of the crimes being adjudicated and then exclude them. One in five women is the victim of rape or attempted rape, and nearly one in four men is the victim of sexual assault. Statistically, a representative jury would have at least one female victim of rape or attempted rape, and at least one male victim of sexual assault. You’re entitled to a jury of your peers–if that jury, almost by definition, includes victims of the extremely common crime you allegedly committed, it doesn’t make your trial unfair.

      1. I know, I hate this so much! It’s not like they ask if anybody has ever committed sexual assault.

      2. I am a sex assault prosecutor and I completely agree with this. We try to be sensitive when a juror indicates a past sexual assault, and ask questions about it in private vs. in the whole courtroom, but often any display of emotion from the juror results in them getting booted from the jury. One thing you can do to increase your odds of staying, if you are a sexual assault survivor and wish to sit on a jury: you need to be able to set aside your own experience and judge the facts of the case apart from that. And then you need to confidently assert that in your conversations, and keep saying it. “Yes, I can and will follow the law.” And that has to be true – but those are the magic words.

        1. These stats are well-studied, well-known, and very easy to find on the internet from credible sources if you are actually interested in them and not just trying to argue.

          1. ok, I know this sounded like heckling, and I knew that when I wrote it, but couldn’t come up with another way to phrase it(other than spending a whole paragraph couching my statement in flowery verbiage, which makes me want to puke). I did google for this stat, but RAINN and the National Sexual Violence Resource Center have completely different numbers than ‘one in four men’. I found the number surprising, and was honestly asking for a source to learn more here.

      4. Similarly regarding a jury of your peers – I am anti death penalty. I was called for jury duty for the sentencing phase of murder case. The judge excused everyone who was against the death penalty. While I understand it in sort of a logic puzzle sense, how is that a jury of your peers when 50% or more of the population is anti death penalty.

  10. MMLF and Poshmark Questions:

    1) I bought a couple of MMLF tops on Posh. 2 separate sellers. One of the tops REEKS of the seller’s perfume. Would you downgrade your rating for that?

    2) for the Deneuve top, can that be washed on the handwash cycle of a machine? It says dry clean only but hoping that’s not the case because I’m lazy.

    1. I would write a note to the seller first and see what her response is. I bought a top that reeked of cigarette smoke once. I wrote to the seller and said she should have disclosed that. She apologized, explained that she had thrifted it and hadn’t noticed, and refunded me enough to get it dry cleaned. That was satisfactory to me so I still gave her a top rating.

      1. And re your second question – I have hand washed that top (had to Google it because I don’t know the style names) but the first time I hand wash something that says dry clean only, I literally hand wash it. So not in the machine.

        In case you are interested, here’s how I hand wash. First, I look for any spots. If there’s a grease spot, I apply the tiniest amount of Dawn dish soap and lightly rub it in with my fingertip.

        Then I fill my little hand washing basin (a large mixing bowl could work) with tepid water and about a tablespoon of a no-rinse wash like Euclan. I use my fingertips to make sure the detergent is dissolved, then I fold the top like it would be folded on a table at a store and gently submerge it in its folded form in the basin. The folded form is to prevent stretching. Once the garment is fully and willingly underwater (you may have to prod it a bit) I leave it for a while. At least an hour.

        Then I pour off the water while holding the garment flat at the bottom of the bin. No wringing. I do my best to press the water out without disturbing it too much. I might squeeze handfuls but again, you don’t want to stretch wet fabric too much because you don’t know whether it will bounce back.

        I then roll the top in a clean towel and let it sit for the towel to absorb moisture, then lay it out to dry in as close to the original shape as I can. I don’t unfold the top until I’m at the laying it out stage.

        Ok so that’s hand washing. If your top looks good to you after this, like the fabric doesn’t look weird and the shape is still ok, then you can be more confident about using your machine’s hand wash cycle next time, but I’d still put the item in a mesh bag to prevent the spin cycle from over stretching it

        Not this top, but for wool or other animal fibers, the agitation even at the gentlest machine cycle can lead to shrinking/felting, which I have definitely learned the hard way too many times, so now I’m hand wash for life on those, especially hand knits.

    2. I have several Deneuve tops and have washed them on a regular cycle and dried them. They survived.

    3. I’d be careful and not dry that top if it’s on the cusp of being small. Mine is now fine for Zoom meetings, but too short in real life.

    4. Yes, downgrade rating to please alert other buyers. If I opened a package that reeked of perfume, that would give me a migraine that would put me out of action for a day or two.

  11. Wondering if anyone can relate. I’m more than happy to aesthetically present as female, but I find the expectation to act female or carry out ‘womens work’ to be humiliating and degrading. Things like party planning, caregiving etc are my cryptonite. I will and can do them well, I have the skillset, but the acts themselves upset me very deeply. So much so that when I got married I made DH plan the wedding. Anyone else like this?

    1. About a couple things, yes. I eventually learned that my reaction 95% of the time was a Me Thing – my own insecurity about feeling like I had something to prove and was on my way to being so important that I couldn’t/shouldn’t deign to do [party planning]. With time/maturity and the ability to step back from myself, I realized the person asking me to get coffee or whatever was probably just asking the most junior person in the room and it wasn’t a giant sign of the patriarchy holding me down. YMMV on the self-reflection thing – that was what mine was about, might not be yours.

    2. This looks like pot-stirring to me, but I’ll play anyway.

      Huh? I am female. I do not plan weddings and my husband does the laundry. I have a Big Job where I am the Boss. Does that mean I do not “act female”?

      1. Yup. I don’t do pinteresty things with my daughter’s birthday parties, I arrange for an entertainer and pay them. My husband loads and runs the dishwasher, I am great at math, and yes I am female and like wearing dresses.

        1. I wind up doing everything (both at home and at work) b/c I do not have a man in my life to do the men things. At work, I do alot of the things secretaries are supposed to do (plan office parties and events), as well as the legal work. At home, I manage my food, apartment and am starting to watch my finances that dad manages with Ed for me, since there is no man at all to handle that, yet. I am hopeful tho, because I met a guy in my building who is older, but who is taking an interest in me. I saw him at the mailroom and he started talking to me. He knows when I check the mail (around 3 pm), and is always down there when I get there. His name is Phil, and I know he lives on the 18th floor which is a few floors down from me. I will try and be solicitous to him as my Dad told me to, as there is no other man. Myrna says to be careful because he likely is not working — perhaps he is independently wealthy or retired. I just don’t know. I want to ask him w/o being to pushy. Dad says to slowly real him in, but not by being to forward. I don’t want to jinx myself, but I think there may be possibilities. Wish me luck! YAY!!!!!

    3. I honestly don’t spend any time thinking about things like “women’s work.” Maybe I’m self-absorbed but I do what I want, which does not generally include things like party planning.

    4. It sounds like you may have something deeper going on here around internalized misogyny? It might be worth digging into why you have some shame around things that might be considered ‘female’ obligations. My therapist has a phrase “If it’s hysterical, it’s historical,” meaning that if something is producing an outsized reaction (i.e., is really upsetting as opposed to just mildly annoying), it’s the result of some type of belief system or past experience that is fueling intense emotion.

      Some questions to ask yourself would be: What do you think doing ‘women’s work’ means about the person doing it? Did you ever observe scenes or receive information that would make you think it’s degrading or shameful? What associations do you have with ‘women’s work’?

      Similar but not similar – I had a lot of baggage around sex and feeling that it was inherently degrading to women. This turned out to be the result of a lot of lessons I internalized growing up, compounded with some bad experiences early on. But it was similar in terms of the intense upsetting feelings of humiliation/degradation/shame that others seemed to not experience at all.

    5. I just dont do these things. Does my mom get mad that I don’t help in the kitchen on holidays unless my brothers do too? yes. Do I care? no

      At work I have literally never planned a party or brought in baked goods or even volunteered to take notes – if I get assigned to take notes here and there that’s fine but I don’t volunteer. I do love planning parties in my personal life, so I do that, but only because I enjoy it.

    6. I don’t like things like party planning and so I don’t do them. But I also think it’s sexist to call them women’s work and say it’s humiliating and degrading for people to do them. It’s obviously not great if women are being forced to do things that they aren’t valued for, like in a work context when women are expected to do things like this instead of things that get them promoted. However, I think we’d be way better off if everyone valued things like caregiving more, instead of thinking it’s degrading to do care work.

    7. You’re not alone. I was a bit annoyed when another woman in a different department called me out for not bringing in birthday cake for one of my junior male coworker. Excuse me, first of all, my department doesn’t celebrate birthdays, and secondly, why didn’t you call out my male coworkers too? And also some years ago I had to explain to a junior female coworker why telling me to bring in baked goods was an absolutely terrible idea – not only were we both women, we were both minority women. I got to where I am by my technical knowledge of my field, not by bringing in baked goods.

      I also avoid voluntary note-taking unless it’s something that’s rotated throughout the department so everyone my level and lower has to do it at least once year.

      1. Yes all this. When I’m asked to take notes I just see red, I’m so tired of men trying to leverage social norms to keep me down and allow them to be lazy.

    8. No. I honestly enjoy doing those things. I don’t care if things I like are stereotypically female.

    9. I enjoy planning and relationship building, but if it’s any sort of extra work, outside of the main job function, then I am very mindful about balancing the workload between all employees as a matter of principle. I do find it degrading when that sort of work is reserved ‘for the ladies’.

    10. IDK — I do our taxes because I’m good at basic math and have the patience to read and fill in forms. It isn’t fluffy women’s work — that sort of phrase belittles women and their work.

    11. What is it about those things that you find degrading? It is the assumption that women should want to do it or be better at it? Is it being asked or expected to do it? Do your feelings change if men do it? Some insight into your feelings might be helpful because my sense this is not just anger at being the person in the office expected to know how to use the coffee machine. Because getting pissed off at sexist stereotypes is one thing but this – at least as expressed – is something else.

      From my point of view, there is nothing degrading or humiliating about party planning. I know plenty of men and women who are wonderful at it, enjoy it, and do a great job at it although I am not personally one of them. Do I know more women than men who fall into that category? Certainly – but that does not make it “women’s work”. And there is certainly nothing humiliating or degrading about care giving. All of us needed it as children; almost all of us will need it in the future, whether that is health care or elder care; almost all of us will end up giving it to one degree or another. For some of us, including me, parenting my child is the most important thing I have done or will ever do and having it described as humiliating and degrading would be incredibly insulting if it was not so incredibly wrong.

      1. ETA – I can agree that plenty of women don’ like to do those things. And they should not be expected to like them or do them because they are women. But there is a difference between I don’t like to cook and I think cooking is degrading and humiliating.

        1. The thing is I like to cook for myself, I find it degrading when I’m forced to and people use their leverage/power over me. Like if great grand boss tasked me to bring cookies for the group, can’t really say no, but I find it humiliating that I was picked because of my gender, that my value at that table to them is ‘treats’. Even if I don’t do the baking and run to the store for a platter of cookies, it’s still a time and financial expense men don’t have.

    12. Yeah, this is not unusual at all. It’s not like there’s a biological difference that makes women want to do these things more than men do.

    13. I’m single, so I do the “women’s work” and the “men’s work”. I find no shame or degradation in creating the peace and beauty of a clean house or nice food. Perhaps because I’ve developed the mindset that it is not a chore but an act of creation, the same as a well-written motion or fine tuning my finances. In the office, pre-pandemic, I did a little party planning because I enjoy it. I have been known to (gasp) bake things and bring them to work to share. It hasn’t affected the expectations of me at all. I am still expected to kick ass in court, and I do.

    14. Oh, absolutely, I get the tiredness.

      For me it depends on whether there is an element of emotional labour, third shift or a “you must enjoy XYZ because you have two x chromosomes” mindset in the vicinity.

    15. I know exactly what you’re talking about. I have no problem doing stereotypical women’s work but see red when *expected* to do so because of my genitalia. To me, sweeping the floor is a neutral activity: it is done because it needs getting done. But when someone puts an emotional burden on it – do it because you’re a woman – it becomes a bludgeon.

  12. I am one of the biggest proponents on here about the virtues of exercise, fresh air, eating well, etc. when youre feeling sluggish/down. I know that I need to push through and prioritize that in order to feel better, but I am just SO exhausted the idea of doing any of those things is incomprehensible to me this week.

    Tips on pushing through the exhaustion, knowing I’ll feel better once I clean my apartment/go outside/workout/eat a salad?

    1. Before you do any of those things, it’s really okay to rest. Go to bed early tonight, and start fresh tomorrow.

    2. Take a vitamin or snack on some cereal. Being really tired usually winds up being “needing some iron”. Maybe try that?

    3. I say don’t push through. Take a day off and rest. Don’t tackle anything on that to-do list except ordering a salad and maybe taking a walk. Read a book. Catch up on sleep. Then start doing the things, one at a time.

    4. Are you sure you’ve slept enough? My life has really improved once I realized that adequate rest is also very important. Well, my body really decided for me once I fell asleep for 14 hrs at a time. It was also the iron deficiency.

      My point is, get some rest, uber eats that salad, and then do those things.

    5. If you’re exhausted just pick one thing and do however much as you can of that activity. No need to push yourself to be perfect.
      Note: I really don’t like the idea of pushing thru when your body/mind just might not be capable of doing that at the time. Small actions count and something is better than nothing. Don’t let perfect be the enemy of good.

    6. If you are that exhausted, I would emphasize more sleep instead. Like, go to bed at 8pm in your messy apartment! Sleep is a bare minimum necessity for your brain and body.

    7. Pick something that is super small. Go outside for 2 minutes (literally). Wash one plate after dinner.

    8. To clarify – its been about a week (I think it started as jet lag and degraded from there). I’ve been going to bed early the last few nights, but then just wake up hours before my alarm. I usually go to bed around 11 and wake up around 7, but the last few nights I went to bed before 10 and was up around 5… I eventually fell back asleep, but then was too exhausted to wake up in time to go into the office today.

      I think getting back on track would actually help me – I gave myself all weekend to sleep in (and I did – slept in like 3 extra hours each day) and that didn’t work. Now that I’ve been up since 8:15, Im still feeling drowsy/groggy and am very unproductive. I think I need to do some of those things and continue to get a good 8-9 hours/night.

      1. I’ve had some success with telling myself I’ll do the exercise/walk/healthy thing just for 10-15 minutes. Once I get going, I usually go for a little longer.

        For walks, I find some podcasts I really like and only really listen to when I go for a walk,since I don’t have a commute anymore.

        Another thing I used to do in the past, was tell myself not that I SHOULD exercise, but that I GET TO exercise. My health is good enough that I could exercise, and I was able to afford a gym membership and proper shoes, etc. Sometimes that helped.

    9. When I need the pick me up, I take my meal outside to eat. Do you have a bench, stoop or front porch?

  13. Since we are talking a lot about choosing careers/ lives we want and the financial trade offs, can anyone help me organize chemo brain’s approach to “do I really want to go back to Amazon for a long time after this?”? I have honestly been so happy on disability leave, even despite chemo, because I get enough sleep and enough help (bless my family and neighbors and. coworkers, seriously) and time with my baby. I have financial goals that mean I either need to work at my current salary bracket for another decade (and then I can work for as little as I want) or work for less for longer. I think that if I go back into tech, I will choose to continue to pay for more help than I would have before (outsource more cooking and some cleaning and have a mother’s helper several hours on weekends). This will cost more, but I’m not willing to go back to the level of stress I had before. I’m not clear on whether there are other jobs out there that would want my skillset, what industries are available, and what they would pay. I think I don’t want to lateral from ambiguously moral company A to ambiguously moral company B with similar work-life balance if I’m going to switch, I want to either be doing something better for the planet or have my job deplete less of my time and brainpower. So there’s a lot of fact finding to do to figure out options. How would you organize your thoughts/ approach learning more?

    2. I worked for a company that a lot of people hated after 2008. I kept working there for 8 more years because I needed the job, but also because I liked what I was doing and I liked my coworkers. I was also a manager and pretty loyal to my staff. I felt like I had committed myself to mentoring and advocating for them, and it wasn’t something I took lightly, especially as I had personally recruited the majority of them. The people mattered to me a lot more than the company did.

      In terms of work like balance, only you can make those choices but it kind of irks me that we never hear men talk about this! In my personal case, my husband was the one with the smaller job that allowed me to be all-in at work when I needed to be.

      The last thing I will say in favor of the big salary / big job is that your retirement savings really matter and you can’t truly make it up at a smaller salary. You said yourself you’d have to work more years at the lower salary. Life throws curve balls at us – I know you know that better than just about anyone here – and in my case due to an assortment of personal issues, I had to leave the traditional workforce earlier than planned. I still work, but I can’t do the big job now. I am SO GLAD I did the big job in my prime earning years and socked away those bonuses because that is what allowed me to take this step back when I really had no other choice, and be able to not worry about it too much when I have so many other things to worry about.

    3. Gently, I think you will have plenty of time to figure this out once current crisis is in the rear-view mirror. Maybe write some pro and con lists as the urge strikes you, but remember Job One right now is just to get through the current chapter.

      Much love to you!

      1. +1 Senior Associate is always right.

        You have had a traumatic few months. It can make you question everything.
        Don’t make big life decisions at this stage, just take it one day at a time and take it easy. There will be enough time to figure it all out once you are fully recovered.

        1. That’s a good point. I think that what we’ve learned (I’m already in remission with two rounds left) and how I’m feeling (have some energy) makes me wonder if there’s any research I can do now while I am not strapped for time. Once I go back it’ll be Amazon plus toddler. I don’t plan to change jobs this year or even in 2023, it’s more using this precious time to enable more choices long term.

        2. Going to pull a Senior Attorney and keep replying to myself :). It’s funny, when I wrote “just enjoy”, it was an enormous relief. So you’re right. I was planning out of anxiety and reaction to trauma. Going to go back to watching the baby roll now. Thanks all.

          1. You have good advice from others but want to say that I’m so happy for you that you have this great health news AND a cute rolling baby! Enjoy these wonderful moments.

      2. I disagree with this based on my experience with cancer for what it’s worth (posted below). If you are a high achieving person in an hours intensive job, disability leave may be one of the only times you have in your life to think about what you want to do with your career without the day to day grind of work distracting you. It’s a good opportunity to think about what you really want. Treatment is physically taxing but you often have a ton of time alone to think about your life. It’s nice to think about things other than the cancer – like your future.

        Cancer is hard but you are still you. You can make thoughtful big decisions.

        I am a big advocate for not putting your life on hold due to cancer.
        You should of course get through treatment and take good care of yourself and relax (that’s a given). I spent six months in bed barely able to walk because chemo knocked me out so hard. I am in no way downplaying how challenging it is to go through treatment or the emotional trauma (I see a therapist weekly and am still on antidepressants years later).

        But you don’t have to stick with your current life if parts of it makes you unhappy just because you had cancer. Cancer forces you to put your life in hold in many many ways you can’t control. I kind of hate the advice to “not make major life decisions in a stressful chapter.” If you were already in a challenging job you disliked before cancer, you don’t have to go back. Why would you punish yourself in that way? Cancer is hard enough! The feeling of “now I need to postpone X” (whatever X is – moving, new job, etc) can be suffocating and it used to fill me with dread.

    4. Use your leave to get a new job. I got a new job while I did chemo. I interviewed with a wig + penciled on eyebrows + a suit that barely fit due to chemo bloat, and I just did the thing. No regrets.

      I will say two things. One is that I felt the same you did (more relaxed while doing chemo) and that was a good sign to leave my job.

      However, this feeling doesn’t last forever. I don’t recall what kind of cancer you have, but for me, the worst part of cancer was AFTER I finished chemotherapy. I was very happy and relaxed during chemo and became extremely anxious and depressed during the 6-12 months after it was over. This is very common among cancer patients. It’s easier to feel better when you are in control of what’s happening to some extent (eg actively doing treatment). So you may feel quite bad after chemo in unexpected ways and it’s something to factor in if you change jobs.

      1. It’s a good point that the worst time may come after treatment, and it resonates with what I have seen in the Facebook group for this cancer.

        For what it’s worth, I loved my job pre baby and cancer. I just have always known it had an end date and am starting to think, since so many people are moving to greener pastures, whether I should consider it. Anonymous, thank you so much for your story, and I’m so sorry for the hard times you experienced. Best wishes for your health.

    5. I am a year from my cancer diagnosis, and 6 months out from the end (on hormone blockers for 5 years, ugh). I have found the stressful job to be less and less tolerable. I am trying not to make hasty decisions (elementary age kids, cancer, etc), but am considering looking. I had a plan to be here for a set number of years, and I’m one year short of that. I don’t know if it’s meds, pandemic, life after cancer, or job, but something needs to change and the changeable one is the job.
      I was not on leave during treatment, and I regret not taking more time off for surgery, so perhaps you have more time to think than I did.

      1. That sounds so hard. Best of luck to you. I am so lucky to have been put in a situation where I had to take disability and could not possibly have worked; it made the decision much easier.

  14. For those of you who do a hybrid WFH situation, where you are in the office 2-3 days and home 2-3 days, do you have any tips for handling not being in the same place everyday? I really thrive on routine, and not having that makes me feel weird. I also have FOMO on what my coworkers get up to, and a brand new associate who I want to be available for. Maybe that’s ok and a hybrid thing isn’t for me, but I am really trying to wrap my head around what I know to be true – being able to work from home a couple days a week can be really great, if you make it great. And being gone a couple days a week isn’t really going to make me miss out on anything or harm my associate. Anyways, hit me with your tips on this weird, opposite issue, please!

    1. I would love tips on how to make hybrid work as well. So far, I’ve concluded that for it to work for me, I need to have a predictable schedule where I’m WFH on certain, preplanned days. It’s too stressful for my brain to have to consider options and reconsider options all the time. I also try to schedule meetings for the days I’m in the office. I haven’t yet figured out what to do with things like paper files and records, which are currently all at home.

    2. I think it’s ideal if you have predictable days in office, and use them differently-more meetings, mentoring, and small tasks/email in the office and then use home days for focused work on bigger projects.
      I wouldn’t worry too much about the associate, it would be pretty intense to have a partner/supervisor checking in every day so this may help you two get in a good routine. Unless they are really phone-averse, I’d try to do quick calls with them on WFH days now and again so they know that’s okay and don’t feel like they need to save up their questions for formal meetings or in the office days.

  15. It is 2022 and apparently I have worn my faux Doc Martins with everything but a suit (including a fluffy prairie dress). To the office even. They are comfy and warm compared to flats.

    I don’t own cool fashion sneakers or Chelsea boots so this is my pandemic fashion.

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