It's in the bag

I keep finding more shoes...shoes that I forgot I had. The footwear tally must be 60 easily by now.

I've been thinking of posting pictures of my purses, too. Not that a lot of you would really care about them...but my purses make me happy. I can't have too many of them! I must have, at the very least, 30 of them. Or maybe I'd just post pictures of my favorite ones, since some of these purses I haven't used since high school.

I'd show you all one of my latest faves: my phoney Playboy airliner bag that I got from the Night Market in Vancouver. I adore that bag and I always get lots of comments on it...the perfect accessory for an attention whore.

There's also my beaded tote of the Brooklyn Bridge. And there's my denim Guess baguette, my imitation Gucci barrel bag from when I was a little girl, the industrial lock box I picked up at Contempo Casuals in Orlando, the fuzzball bag from Le Chateau, the Hello Kitty lunchbag Civic gave me one Christmas, the old school Adidas mini-backpack Weird Kid gave me on my 19th birthday, my New York city skyline clutch that came with my DKNY Woman perfume.

Ok, that's enough of the memory trip for now.

Last night, the retail girls and I had a product knowledge soiree at Derek Alexander. For those in Canada, more likely Western Canada, Derek Alexander makes high quality leather handbags. They are to Canada what Perlina is to the US. What makes me particularly proud of Derek Alexander, is that their head office is right here in Calgary.

A customer today had a really snazzy purse by Christian Dior. I don't know if I would own it myself (I think there are only two bags in my collection that cost more than 25 dollars), but "glorious" would be a good word to describe it. So I complimented her bag, and she beamed (I can't beat interactions with fellow handbag afficionadoes) and spoke of her "victory" in purchasing the bag after pleading with her husband in Las Vegas for him to buy it for her. Needless to say, he had some serious objection to the price. I wouldn't be surprised if he forced her to use it every single day to justify the purchase.

Unfortunately, I have little faith in Prada and Louis Vuitton as "big-time" handbag prizes. There are way too many imitations out there, everyone and their twelve year old daughter owns one (Not ME, though). In truth, if I ever did see a real one I would automatically assume it was fake due to the proliferation of their logos all over the place.

But to tote a Derek Alexander bag around here is to demonstrate your love for quality and your eye for class. All the "successful" ladies I've ever met in my family and social circle have at least one of his bags. It's "small-time" enough that his products are rarely imitated, and yet they cost enough (though nowhere in comparison to real Louis Vuitton or Coach) to have some "average shoppers" to balk. Up until last night, although I did respect the status boost his products create, I wasn't all that thrilled with most of his lineup. As one of the girls at the meeting said "My mom would love this" but nothing screamed out my name.

I was wrong. First of all, my bargain shopper instincts kicked in when he announced that he would allow each one of us to buy one of his bags at 25 percent below cost. All of a sudden I became a kid in a candy store. I could get my hands on a Derek Alexander and have the satisfying knowledge in that I got a better deal than 95 percent of the women out there!

Second of all, even though I had a few I was eyeing, one in particular just called out to me. Perched high on his display wall was this mini-bowling-bag-esque bag with his name boldly stamped on the front. It said "sassy" while announcing "Leah, you are becoming one of the sophisticated socialites!" I had to have it!

My score? 39 dollars for a purse that sells for 135 retail. And the sweetener? I looked at our catalog at work and we don't even offer that particular style. Unless Boutique of Leather carries this style I'm pretty much guaranteed that very few women here will have my Derek Alexander. I LOVE being exclusive. Life is so good to me.

I can't wait till they deliver my snazzycakes purse!