Happy LATE August, everyone. You know, in my office days, NOBODY worked this time of year. Not even the assistants! The Condé Nast building was dead—like, post-apocalypse vibes. I always figured that all of publishing operated this way. So imagine my surprise when, in the first week of August, the good people at Crown Publishing offered me two dates for THE very important marketing and publicity meeting—THE one in which you sit front and center, addressing people in a conference room—at Penguin Random House headquarters. Did I want to do August 12 or August 21?

August 21?! I squawked in my head. Are people actually working?

“Um, I’ll do August 12,” I said.

Confirmed. Phew. I love to work, but I have to take the last two weeks of August off. I have been go go go all spring and summer—multiple legal and copyedit drafts, publicity, Zooms, UK book deal stuff, art direction work, on and on…and have been truly concerned about launching straight into autumn without taking a break. A real break—especially from my computer, writing, and thinking about the new book—and preferably in nature. (Yes, I went to Europe, but I worked remotely every single day there.)

The Big Meeting on August 12th was going to be a special not just because I’m thrilled to be publishing a fucking novelwith Crown, but because I have horrible memories of this same meeting in 2016 for HOW TO MURDER YOUR LIFE. I was so, so sick. My mom slept at my crazy Chinatown apartment to make sure I got up and went. I trembled, shook and cried in the conference room—in front of like ten high-ranking people at Simon & Schuster.

CAN YOU IMAGINE?!

Anyway. My editor, agent and I decided to power lunch at the most old-school spots in Manhattan before the 2 PM meeting. All in all, I had a CLASSIC publishing career day in a CLASSIC New York neighborhood that I truly love: Midtown Manhattan. Read on!

*****

7:35 AM

I woke up and turned on Howard 101, which plays old segments dating all the way back to the eighties. His voice is like opening my blinds: it’s just part of my morning, and has been for over 25 years. I got out of bed and made it, misting it down with the Good Home Co. Beach Days Sheet & Clothing Spray…

…which I bought out of nostalgia; not because I needed a fucking $30 linen spray. I used to love this beachy scent during my magazine beauty days!

In the shower, I shaved my legs with a Flamingo razor (trash) and Athena Club Glossy Shave Oil in Golden Vanilla (very nice). I made drip coffee with my new Cuisinart PerfectTemp Coffee Maker, and I can’t quite get the coffee-to-water ratios right. I cooked my usual stovetop oatmeal with chia seeds, plus blueberries, strawberries and a tablespoon of Justins Peanut Butter mixed in. YUM. Then I sat down with breakfast and turned on my TV. I flipped between the Today show, Good Morning America, CNN, and the BBC—with the volume off on weekdays, always.

8:10 AM

I started working. Believe it or not, I am still in near-final copy edits on THE BORED AND THE BEAUTIFUL (please, please pre-order here if you’re planning on buying it anyway).

In second-to-last-draft—finally a fancy PDF, not a Word Document—I can only leave notes for copy-editors in the margins as I read and comb through pages slowly and carefully. The body of the manuscript is laid out in the publication font now (not pictured—that’s my cover font on the cover page). The writing itself is in a classic, elegant, prestige Big Five Publishing House font, per my request. In my opinion, gimmicky fonts are good for titles and covers, but inside…no.

11 AM

I got up and took a two-minute shower again, because I’m crazy. I like to show up places FRESH TO DEATH. Then I got dressed. I put on a long black Ba&sh black dress from the RealReal and pulled out the nude patent leather Prada wedges I wear with everything. I’d be carrying my new handbag all day…

…an Issey Miyake BAOBAO Boston Prism bag, which I got brand new on Poshmark for like $100. I have had my eye on these bags for a while, because they are often vegan and not hideously overpriced like the other designer shit online. Also, they look like modern architecture, and I feel that’s very me.

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Hi all! Time for another xoJane throwback—Cat and Julie get lip injections! What’s exciting about this column is that all of the photos survived in it! I have a big master Google document of old xoJane columns, but ninety percent of them have zero photos—so when I reprint the articles in 2026, I look for images from that era to plug in. But this article contains every original xoJane image! Which is terrific, because they are pretty rough (I appear to have been in a “drinking heavily” phase).

Some notes!

What’s really funny to me about this column is how I talk about being “obsessively vain” and “shallow and looks-obsessed basically to the point of legitimate mental and emotional impairment”. HAHAHA. Can you imagine me saying that today? Looking back, one’s twenties are so, so narcissistic. I think about that watching young influencers contouring themselves—in the mirror, and in front of a camera. That’s just part of being 28.

Also: I say, “So as a veteran beauty editor, I believe that everyone could be better looking”. That was a line/concept—that one could always choose to be higher maintenance, beauty-wise—ripped off from my ex-boss Jean Godfrey-June. I’m not sure why I didn’t credit her back in 2011, so I’m doing it now.

As for Julie Schott...my extremely smart, talented and chic former beauty intern at Lucky and beauty assistant at xoJane, who went on to become an Elle beauty editor/elle.com beauty director and then founded the wildly successful Starface...well, she was like a little sister to me. I haven’t spoken to her in ten years.

It’s actually the only close friendship—I genuinely loved her—in my life that’s ever ended in a strange way. In fairness to Julie, she had a front row seat to my most toxic years, and she experienced the wrath of my addiction, mood swings, and something I will call “The Devil Wears Prada” gene in ways that most people did not. In fairness to me, I got Julie hired at xoJane, introduced her everyone I knew (professionally and personally), fiercely protected her, and always endorsed the fuck out of her (I always knew she was gonna be a star).

Looking back...Julie never asked for those things: endorsements, protection, introductions. I just love friends obsessively. Back then, this love—combined with amphetamine abuse—was basically my whole personality. I’m sure it was a bit much for a young person like Julie trying to become her own cool self, especially coming from someone as high profile and erratic (an annoying combo, truly) as “2010s” me. At some point, around 2016, I “protectively” interfered in her personal life, and Julie blocked me on Instagram. We never spoke again.

Enjoy!

*****

OG XOJANE TITLE: CAT AND JULIE’S MOST EXCELLENT BEAUTY ADVENTURES -- LIP INJECTIONS WITH THE AMAZING DR. ANNE CHAPAS

OG PUBLICATION DATE: Jan 9, 2012

Okay! So as a veteran beauty editor, I believe that everyone could be better looking. EVERYONE.

Including me. Look at my yellow hair in these pictures, for God’s sake! Don’t worry (you weren’t worried), I had it fixed later that night. I keep going to the worst colorists because I’m such a slacker and schedule same-day color appointments with people I’ve never heard of at the salons where I have VIP comp cards, and then two weeks later my hair is fried and yellow. Yellow-yellow. Meth-head yellow.

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Hi everybody! I read to be a better writer, but also for fun, and frequently, this time of year, on a rooftop chaise lounge. It’s time for another honest discussion of the books I read recently—ranked by enjoyment, as always. Let’s do it!

#1 PICK OF THE MONTH (PEAK ENJOYMENT)

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Hello guys! Here’s the third installment of my FUCKING LONG Eurotrip diary. When we left off in Part Two, I was about to depart Saint-Tropez for Italy after feeling extremely, confusingly queasy and fatigued. Several of you commented last column that the 300 milligram generic Wellbutrin XL (bupropion XL) I started taking in January can make me more sensitive to sun and heat. I Googled, and...you’re all right. MYSTERY SOLVED. (For the record, this medication has changed my life, and will not stop taking it.)

As ever, diary entries are written the morning after the day they are describing (aka the Andy Warhol method). At the end of this column, I reveal the sandals I’m obsessed with—that I collect—for comfortably walking 15,000 steps a day without getting one blister, or a raw top-of-the-foot situation, or any foot pain whatsoever. YOU’LL NEVER SEE ME LIMPING AROUND EUROPE. That’s amateur hour. I don’t even pack Band-Aids, bitch!

Let’s go!

SATURDAY, JULY 4 - GENOA, ITALY

Damn, Genoa is fucking cool. Genova. Same thing. It’s the sixth largest city in Italy and the capital of the Liguria region. I got here by train yesterday—well, technically I took a boatback to St. Raphael from Saint-Tropez, then got on a train towards the French-Italian border. I switched at Nice Ville, then again at Ventimiglia, the first town on the Italian side. The seaside views are so beautiful on trains in this part of the world. I love that the railway tracks are so close to the water. You have to sit on the correct side of the car, though.

After four hours on the train, I pulled up at Genoa Piazza Principe, and rolled my suitcase to the Family Hotel Balbi, a four-minute walk away. As ever, on fast-paced trips like this, I stay practically on top of the train station.

The guesthouse was up a ton of stairs. I haven’t been discussing how badly I overpacked on this diary—to the 50 lb./ 23 Kg “ugly American” limit—because I actually feel traumatized thinking about it. I am very strong and can carry luggage up and downstairs like a man, but I’m ill from the heat. Anyway, I made it up several flights and checked in, and then my attic room in the guesthouse was up another steep stairwell. The desk guy insisted on taking my suitcase up—I tried to decline and do it myself, because I knew exactly what was coming—then huffed and groaned until he put it down. Then, he asked me if I was going on a cruise. And that is what we call a Genoese insult.

I stripped off my train clothes (Outdoor Voices skort and some sort of tank tucked in), showered for the second of three times that day, put on lipstick and a non-touristy black dress, and went out walking in the early evening. It’s actually really hard to describe Genoa. My father would have me tell you that Genoa was a fierce historic rival and direct competitor to Venice, as both served as powerful medieval maritime republics vying for control of trade routes in the Mediterranean and the Black Sea.

I would tell you that Genoa is incredible-looking. There’s so much character. Like huge, ornate architecture—old-merchant wealth—and the historic caruggi, which is winding alleyways—the largest of such mazes in Europe, and a UNESCO World Heritage site.

Genoa a port city, which…if you know me, I just love them: Marseille. Antwerp. Hamburg. These are all formerly seedy European cities which have transformed into still-gritty-but-trendy hotspots in the 2000s. Port cities have an edge to them that really makes your imagination take off. Like, in Genoa, you imagine sailors and brothels from the past, but those same areas are now vibrating with energy and little restaurants and bars and food stalls.

I’d like to go back and take an informative tour of the city. The food scene there is amazing. Genoa’s specialities are pesto and focaccia. Pesto isn’t vegan, but focaccia dough is. I found focaccia with just tomato on it and sat near the port eating.

Delicious.

SUNDAY, JULY 5 - GENOA, ITALY

It’s 7:23 AM and I am double-fisting liquids. There’s an espresso machine in the common room of this guesthouse and every shot is fifty cents. Oh, and there’s a sparkling water machine. Free! Anyway, I have to write this in literally five minutes because I’m a moron and got stuck with an 8:19 AM train to Venice. Both the 9:20 AM and the 11:40 AM sold out while I was waffling between them last night—just staring at my phone. So I was stuck with either 8:19 AM or 1:45 PM. The old me would have booked the 1:45 PM, no question. But sober me is such a morning person. So here I am.

Yesterday was a fucking insanely gorgeous beach day—an Italian riviera tour. I booked a really good $33 boat tour which departed the historic Port of Genoa at 10 AM. There would be three stops, and I was most excited to see famous Portofino. The beaches at the first two stops, Camogli and San Fruttuoso, were so incredible. Like a dream. It’s the contrast of the European people and colorful umbrellas and perfect water:

We had over an hour at each place. I bought a bikini and laid out on the wet pebbles with no towel, like the Europeans do. It’s not like sand: when you stand up, you still feel nice and clean.

The third stop was Portofino and it was a big yawn, with two Dior stores and a small harbor. I don’t know what I was expecting. I sat in a bar eating peanuts, drinking Coke Zero, and texting Ben Detrick about LeBron James free agency.

Back in Genoa, I was craving pesto for dinner, so I looked up a vegan restaurant here: Soul Kitchen. YUM. Okay, gotta run to catch this 8:19 AM train.

MONDAY, JULY 6 - VENICE, ITALY

Holy shit. Yesterday was so crazy-serendipitous; thank God it worked out the way it did. The number-one reason I came abroad this trip was to see the Venice Biennalle, aka the contemporary art Olympics that takes place every two years from May to October. It’s massive, it’s outdoors—each country has a different pavilion the size of a house—and for some reason, I just assumed it was open 7 days a week. Nope.

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I’ll write more about the cover in a real column soon—not just an email blast. For now, the most important thing is that PRE-ORDER IS LIVE for my new and scandalously autobiographical novel THE BORED AND THE BEAUTIFUL, published by Crown. And what’s the number one thing you can do to help out an author (not that I feel entitled to your help)?

You guessed it: PRE-ORDER HER BOOK. Something I didn’t know until I became an author is how HUGE the pre-order thing is. Pre-ordering gets bookstore’s attention; it gets crucial Amazon algorithms going; it vastly boosts a book’s chances of making bestseller lists.

So if you’re planning on reading THE BORED AND THE BEAUTIFUL anyway, won’t you consider ordering it in advance?

PRE-ORDER LINKS!

PRE-ORDER THE BORED AND THE BEAUTIFUL FROM AMAZON

PRE-ORDER THE BORED AND THE BEAUTIFUL FROM BARNES AND NOBLE

PRE-ORDER THE BORED AND THE BEAUTIFUL FROM BOOKSHOP.ORG

PRE-ORDER THE BORED AND THE BEAUTIFUL FROM TARGET

PRE-ORDER THE BORED AND THE BEAUTIFUL FROM WALMART

THANK YOU SO MUCH. More soon!

XO CAT

HI! Hope you’re great! Listen, this column is so LUDICROUSLY LONG that I am not doing an intro. A refresher: I kept a diary during my recent two-week trip to Europe, which I am now publishing in three sections. Part One, the Paris section, is here if you missed it. At the end of that column, I’d just departed Paris on a four-hour train trip down to a region of the South of France called the Aude department. That’s where this column picks up.

Remember, diary entries are always written the morning after day after I’m describing. Oh, and at the end I plug one of my favorite skincare products. These are beauty columns again, babe!

Enjoy!

MONDAY, JUNE 29 - NARBONNE, FRANCE

The train from Paris to Narbonne yesterday was a straight shot and it was totally fine but I didn’t have a window seat, which is insane for a four-hour train ride in France. There were sunflowers out the window, not that I could really see them. The free WiFi was good so I was on my phone most of the time, not reading my strange Hemingway novel, THE GARDEN OF EDEN. The train pulled into Narbonne over an hour late, which I just knew was totally going to screw up my plan to go into nature—via public bus—after dropping my luggage off at my hotel.

It was a 94 degree Fahrenheit Sunday afternoon in France, which meant things were dead as hell.

I’d booked a 6 PM ticket for a tour of the pink Gruissan Salt Flats, only a 23 minute bus ride away. Of course, the bus never showed. Ubers were $70 and I should have done that, but I know the sleepy side of Europe too well to count on transport like that, especially on a Sunday evening. Like, even if you get your expensive ride one way, then you can’t get home. I’ve been stuck in places so many times, not able to get a car back. I gave up and just walked around Narbonne instead. Absolutely nothing was going on. People come here for the beautiful beach, Narbonne Plage, as well as the aforementioned Gruissan. Narbonne the town kinda isn’t the greatest. The lights weren’t even on in the grocery store; I was shining my phone at everything to see it.

The hotel I’m staying in is super nice; it’s an old convent and my room was huge and ornate.

I was so tired but I couldn’t sleep until late, like 3 AM. Honestly it was not distress at all; it was feeling just really happy and full of love and interest in so many things. My brain was racing. I watched Nancy Grace on YouTube and she’s pissed that Casey Anderson is writing a memoir (which she kept pronouncing so funny—mem-wah).

It’s 10 AM. In an hour, I have a short train ride to my next hotel, in Collioure. Oh, and I left my travel-sized Justin’s Peanut Butter Squeeze Packets in Paris and I’m livid.

TUESDAY, JUNE 30 - COLLIOURE, FRANCE

I’m typing this on the bed in Collioure; I just ate my usual breakfast of two rice cakes and peanut butter—I bought some—with a Pink Lady apple, plus three shots of espresso from the café downstairs diluted with some delicious EU-grade tap water, LOL. I took French melatonin last night and slept so hard when I woke up I couldn’t remember where in France I was. I really, really couldn’t remember. I stared at the ceiling and wouldn’t let myself look around the hotel room for a second, like a game. Then I finally cheated and looked and remembered I was in Collioure.

This was a place I was quite excited to visit on this trip. I saw a big show at the Met a year or two ago, COLLIOURE IN COLOR, about Matisse and Derain posting in this fishing village together for a single summer in 1905, playing with color and cranking out paintings. Anyway, it’s very nice. It reminds me of Brittany, France a little, or an English beach. Last night the sun didn’t set until 10 PM and I was out walking on the ramparts and walls, filming things in the harbor. Kids were skipping stones and it was really cute; I used to do that. It’s both very tourist-centric and pleasantly low-key; there’s no supermarket in the village; you’re meant to eat at the restaurants. We’re 15 kilometers from the Spanish border.

I have two nights here, and the plan was always to use Collioure as a base to explore Perpignan, the city next door. So I arrived here yesterday from Narbonne—the short train ride was so beautiful; it’s all nature—and dropped my luggage at the lovely Hotel des Templiers, then immediately got on the train again. Perpignan is France’s southernmost city and known for it’s Catalan heritage; it was the capital of the Kingdom of Majorca in the 13th century; I read in this book how Spaniard Picasso used to hang there. It has just always sounded so interesting.

It was a 20 minute train ride, with nice views of the Pyrenees mountains. I exited the Perpignan station, consulted Google Maps, and then took this very unpleasant walk that gave me the willies. The area was really depressed and not fully seedy, but the energy was so bad. I was like, whoa, thank God I didn’t actually book a night here. I kept walking and it was dark and cloudy and the vibe felt so dark. Even touring the Palace of the Kings of Mallorca was kind of weird; I was zipping around nervously, listening to Howard Stern. Out on the street, I still kinda felt creeped out, even though the city was getting prettier.

I walked and walked. Suddenly, I hit the good touristy part, and the sun came out again, and it was like a completely different place. It was bizarre. I think I was just walking in a bad neighborhood initially. (UPDATE: I have since come to learn the Perpignan train station is horrifying 1990s French serial killer territory and now believe that I was feeling ‘DALI KILLINGS’ ENERGY. Jesus Christ!) I bought a bunch of groceries, including the aforementioned peanut butter, to take back to Collioure.

Anyway. It’s 9 AM. Today, I’m impulsively popping over to Spain real quick. I gotta pack a lunch for the train and guess what, it’s gonna be rice cakes, apples, and peanut butter.

TUESDAY, JULY 1 - COLLIOURE, FRANCE

Someone DM’d just me to tell me that Mercury is in retrograde. I wouldn’t believe in astrology, but yesterday was such fucking mess that I kinda do (also, Camille Paglia believes in astrology, and she’s a genius). I popped over to Spain on the train to Figueres yesterday as planned. It’s where Salvador Dali was born; the museum he designed and entombed himself in is there now.

I went to the Dali Museum in high school on the teen trip with my then-boyfriend…whose name I changed in MURDER. To what? I can’t remember.

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YO! Happy Friday. I am thrilled to announce that I am sitting on my sofa in Manhattan, editing this bloated bitch. I just returned from two weeks in Europe, and it was A WHOLE LOT OF EXERTION. Like, I am looking forward to RELAXING back at home, and we all know that for me relaxing in New York is running 16 miles a week, deep-cleaning my apartment four times a month, and perfecting 400-page books to the point of involuntary eye-crossing.

My adventures started in Paris during a fucking historic heatwave.

Here’s my diary from the first few days, with—as I’ve been promising you all a return to beauty content—all of the makeup I used listed at the end. As ever, please note that diary entries are written the morning after the day I’m describing. Enjoy!

THURSDAY, JUNE 25TH - PARIS, FRANCE

To start my trip, as usual, I brought all of my luggage to Neelam’s studio on public transport and had my eyebrows dyed. I always ask her to leave it on so it dyes my skin. I could not imagine traveling without doing this first. It’s like semi-permanent makeup for my trip. Emphasis—unfortunately—on the semi. I’ve been getting my eyebrows tinted since I was 19 and the dye used to last so much longer. Now, after I get them done, I only wash the lower part of my face with soap and water—to extend the effect. I use Neutrogena Hydro-Boost Wipesaround my forehead.

I used my stupid United credit card miles to fly to Paris from New York and I might not continue with that card. First of all, the values are not great. I paid 39,000 miles to fly to Paris in peak season—okay, I can accept that; with Delta in June to Europe it’s comparable. But the United 39,000 miles flight was with a layover in DC! At Dulles. The Delta would be direct for that price. And I booked this stupid DC layover flight months ago, and as it grew closer, I really regretted it. It’s ridiculous, as a New Yorker, to not just fly direct. The flight path is right there. There are THREE airports to choose from in New York, and two in Paris. But I always make things complicated. I think I hadn’t earned enough miles yet to book a direct flight and I was anxious about getting abroad for the Babyshambles concert. Anyway, it wasn’t a huge deal; I’m just saying.

What did I do on the plane? I always watch the same sort of thing: chef movies, docs, and shows. I saw JIRO DREAMS OF SUSHI for the first time—perfect, peaceful, subtitles.

Oh, and I didn’t get a vegan meal even though I called and confirmed I’d have one. That’s another reason I’m turning on United. The reason one wasn’t provided was because vegan meals “don’t exist” on that flight. Like…huh? Vegan meals are so easy. Curry and rice. Done. They kept bringing me things from business class, like little salads. I knicked an airplane blanket to use as a beach blanket.

I was cheerful to be at Charles de Gaulle airport, the great architectural hub, with all the fun tube escalators. For me, that cheer-upon-landing is way stronger than any red eye sleeplessness or jet lag energy. The heat wave was on but I didn’t think it was SO horrible. I took the train in from CDG to Gare du Nord. After waiting for a bus with an African dude for 20 minutes, I finally just hailed a cab. The taxi went up to Belleville. I got out at the Hotel des Pyrénnées and tried to speak French and the crabby innkeeper hated it, haha. I’d never stayed there before but it’s a cheap hotel ($77 a night) with air conditioning in a neighborhood I like; I know the Pyrénnées Metro stop well. Long before I knew there was a heat wave, I only ever book hotel rooms with air-con in Europe in the summer. Great views were just around the corner—down the iconic Belleville hill, with the Eiffel Tower so far away. Just like I like it.

I showered and by then it was like 3:30 PM. I hadn’t been to Pére Lachaise cemetery since high school and I keep meaning to go back, so I walked over there. Everyone is buried there: Proust, Oscar Wilde, Jim Morrison, Edith Piaf, Colette, Pissarro, Moliére, Victor Hugo. I really wanted to find two graves: Apollinaire, the glam French poet, and Marcel Marceau, the mime. When I couldn’t write How To Murder Your Life and used to sit around my TriBeCa loft drunk and smearing clown makeup on my face and crying all night, I would watch Marcel Marceau on YouTube. I found his grave, but that’s it.

Oh, and I bumped into Chopin’s without looking for it. The cemetery is fucking HUGE. I only had 50 minutes; it closed, so I had to leave. My phone kept shutting down from the heat.

Walked home and stopped at les supermarchés for all the essentials: lentils, carrots rappe, beets, couscous. Apples. Food of queens.

FRIDAY, JUNE 26TH - PARIS, FRANCE

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HELLO! I’m sure you’re not sick of seeing Knicks content on your phones at all, so here is Part Two of the diary no one asked for: that of my very social, friend-filled, few days running around in the city-wide party that was New York during the historic 2026 NBA Finals. When we left off, I’d just spent Game 3 (”the Trump game”) with “new friends” (post-2020 return-move to Manhattan after living abroad): such luminaries as the Cookies Hoops guys (two of the coolest and smartest in New York), Rachel Rabbit White, Nico Walker, and Julia Cooke (whom I affectionately call Julia Coke) at an Alphabet City bar.

Two days later, on Wednesday, I stayed in for the incredible Game 4 Knicks comeback game—watching, agog, on my white sofa, under a white UGG blanket, burning a white candle, as that shot went in the basket. People were screaming outside my window. So good.

*****

Game 5, the potential elimination game, was on Saturday, and I was happy, because I had another event to attend that evening. I don’t write about my friend

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Hi you guys! Holy God, has it been a few crazy weeks in this New York. I don’t need to tell you about the joy and mayhem in this city recently. To sum it up: GO KNICKS.

I had such a good time going out, hitting NBA Finals viewing parties. After going to bed at 11 PM and waking up at 6:30 AM for the last year while working my ass off, during this special Finals period, I was frequently staying up until 2 AM. I think I even slept until 10 AM one morning! I’m still a WILD BITCH; haven’t you heard?

No one could have predicted that the Knicks Finals run would turn into a historic celebration in the streets—the likes of which I have never seen in my 26 years living New York City. There…hasn’t even been anything close?! (I’d mention the first Obama election, but I was so high during that event that I was passed out indoors on the big night and only heard whoops outside my West Village window.) I don’t blame band-wagoners: who the fuck wouldn’t want to be part of so much happiness and revelry? I personally was delighted that the whole party, the cultural renaissance, the joy, revolved around THE NBA. I fucking love the NBA. Longtime subscribers know! (And know. And know. And know.)

I was pushing through the final draft of the book through most of the playoffs, and simply couldn’t engage in anything more complex than a whirling ceiling fan after 7 PM. So when the Finals arrived, you know I wasn’t going to miss a thing.

Beyond last-minute agreeing to co-host a same-day Cookies Hoops viewing party, I planned nothing and coordinated with no one and still saw half the people in my phone over the course of one week. It was actually such an elite re-entry into socializing after FUCKING FINALLY finishing the novel. I saw soo many friends; so many downtown people in one room, from all different groups I run with: graffiti writers and artists and party girls and even some of the chicks from my last Greek retreat. I’m telling you—everybody!

Here’s a rundown of my fun week: all of the friends I saw, the clothes I wore, and the beauty products I used along the way.

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Hey! 2026 Cat here.

As someone who works from home, I pay a lot of attention to my teeth. It’s something I get up and mess with all of the time when I take writing breaks. I brush after every meal. I floss. I bleach (I have a tray in my mouth right now, in fact). I keep all sorts of little tools tucked around the house. Back in the day, at Lucky magazine, I was always the beauty department member pushing dental stories (my boss, Jean Godfrey-June, was never interested for some reason). I had so much fun playing with, like, extravagant toothpaste.

Anyway, here is an old xoJane article; I have no photos in it, so I’ve tried to plug in substitutes. I don’t know why I’m talking a little s*** about my own family; I guess I was just immature and 28, which as I get older, I realize is full BRAT age (and not in the good Charli way). By the way, there was absolutely zero chance that relative was having an affair with my childhood dentist. Don’t make me identify the moron who implanted that idea in my head.

Some of the disrespect in this article really bothers me. I can’t really remember who in my family subscribes to these columns at this point, but if you’re reading this, please note that my subscribers know how grown-up I am and how solid my relationship with family is now. Also, 2026 Cat just...does not say unkind things about people who have literally done nothing wrong. I was toxic back then, less than a decade out of teenager-dom, talking trash in my little Internet corner.

The products recommended at the bottom of this story are no longer in the market, so I plugged in what I currently use to clean and whiten my teeth in 2026.

Enjoy!

*****

TITLE: HOW TO GET GLEAMY-GORGEOUS WHITE TEETH (AND WHY YOU SHOULD NEVER SLEEP WITH YOUR DENTIST)

ORIGINAL PUBLICATION DATE: January 17, 2012

Sorry about this weird photo.

I don’t really know how else to show off my teeth; I don’t know. Once again, I loathe the xoJane always-include-a-photo-of-yourself policy, though I also recognize why it’s super-awesome and makes you guys feel like you know us better.

But sometimes I just want to write a roundup of really gorgeous hand soaps or whatever and then I’m all, “Do I have to POSE with a hand soap? Or do I have to take a picture of one in MY house, next to my messy sink?” And then I don’t write the article.

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Hey y’all! I read seven books in May. Let’s dish and rank them by enjoyment, shall we?!

NUMBER ONE PICK OF THE MONTH

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WOWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW.

I FINALLY DID IT.

I handed in my novel to Crown! Look, my Penguin-Random House page is up and everything:

February 2nd, baby!

Okay, sorry; I know this is anti-climactic to you guys. For people on the outside, the huge thing is the book deal, which, for me, happened back in…I don’t even remember. Autumn of last year. Yes, I sold a completed 95,000 word novel back then. What a relief for an author! Right?!

Well, yes—on a business level. I was assured that it would get published.

BUT. On the editing level, that was when the actual pressure started. The clock began ticking. The work one does between a publisher buying a novel and it getting put into production is IT. That’s what’s going to the fucking printing press. And what goes to the printing press determines how the rest of your career will go. And your career pays for the roof over your head, as well as for your future.

Any author who gives a fuck (believe me, there are some out there that don’t) will at this point start revising. At the very high professional level where I am proud to say I operate, writing is self-editing—TO THE VERY HIGHEST STANDARDS. It’s about pushing, and pushing, and pushing. And revising. And revising. And revising. Make it better. Make it better-better. Make is better-better-better. Make it better-better-better-better. Make it—okay, I’ll stop.

Someone like moi might keep obsessively hunting for flaws to trounce and destroy forever. That’s why deadlines are good. On May 20th, I handed in the final 365 pages, and it’s SUCH A CRAZY FEELING. It’s over. AFTER THREE AND A HALF YEARS OF OBSESSION AND RIDICULOUSLY HARD WORK…

I NEVER HAVE TO WORK ON IT AGAIN.

LIKE, EVER.

SO, SO CRAZY.

So while the book deal announcement is fun, THIS date, final submission date, is the day the author actually celebrates. The document that has consumed us for years, which we are so sick of that our stomach actually flips with nausea when we see reminders of it, is taken off our hands, and our lives become completely different.

I am so proud of myself. Completing HOW TO MURDER YOUR LIFE during active addiction will always be the greatest accomplishment of my life, but this book is easily my second biggest accomplishment.

And the timing couldn’t be better. BOOK-FREE SUMMER IS ON DECK, BITCHES! Here’s a massive list of things I’m looking forward to:

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HAPPY MAY, PEONIES. I need to do a short intro because this column is long as fuck. As I’m sure you are aware, I travel a lot. I impatiently country-hop. I SCHELP. Oh, God, the schlepping. I sleep in aisle economy seats with my knees up against the seat in front of me and a bandana pulled over my eyes. I wash my underwear in sinks. I do it all.

I use travel as something to look forward to—a shimmery prize in the distance that keeps me motivated as I write full-time from home. So when I sold my novel last fall, and knew I’d be editing the 400 page manuscript for months before finally submitting to Crown (MAY 15TH, BABY), I started planning a ‘spring break’ trip. This was back in November.

I came up with a signature Cat Marnell Deranged and Exhausting Plan to visit four new countries in one holiday. On April 15th, I’d take a $149 NORSE flight to Rome for two nights, because Vatican City is its own country, and I’d never been. From Rome, I’d fly Hungarian budget airline Wizz Air to Jeddah for $77 and experience Formula One at the Saudi Grand Prix. Then I’d take a short $120 flight to Kuwait City for one night, and do a class at Barry’s Kuwait. I’d fly another hour-long flight to the island nation of Bahrain, and stay one night there. To get home from the Middle East, I’d fly into Mumbai for a few days, where leopards prowl the city-center park. For my final flight home, I’d fly UAE airline Etithad from Mumbai to New York, with a fun 10-hour leave-the-airport daytime layover in Abu Dhabi. I’d be home April 26th, squeezing all this in under 11 days. Whew!

Well. You know what happened next.

To make a long story short, I wound up keeping my flight to Rome and keeping my flight home from India. Everything else in the middle got re-planned last minute. Ironically, due to unexpected scheduling delays with Crown, the trip wound up not being a vacation at all. It fell during of the most crucial editing periods of the entire multi-year process—so I had to take the printed-out manuscript with me and work like a fiend on it the whole time. On trains. On planes. In automobiles.

Did I still wound up spending time in wartime Middle East—just a six-hour drive from the fucking Straight of Hormuz? Of course I did! Such were the foibles of this strange trip, the busiest trip ever. I kept a detailed diary the whole time. Please note that entries were all written in the morning, describing the previous day’s activities. Enjoy!

THURSDAY APRIL 16, HOTEL ALEXIS, ROME

I’m back in Roma after a few years, staying at my favorite kind of hotel, a little one practically on top of the central train station. I like Rome but have never loved it like I love Naples and Venice. I slept on and off on the red eye flight from New York—not bad. Norse is such a hilariously terrible airline. The stewards are hostile. I’d actually paid $40 for vegan dinner and there wasn’t even a tray. It was just a hot pocket thing in a cardboard box.

After landing, I took the pleasant Leonardo Express train into city center. At Roma Termini there was a thunderstorm and pouring rain and I was just standing there with two hundred people, watching. Everyone in the station was waiting it out. I was a six-minute walk from my hotel, so I just booked it, with all of my luggage. After a shower, I Ubered to see the Zaha Hadidbuilding here—the MAXXI contemporary art museum. The depressing taxidermied hanging Maurizio Cattelan horse was there and so was the fucking banana taped to the wall. The building itself was okay. It’s my 11th Zaha.

In the Uber, I’d passed the ornate National Gallery of Modern and Contemporary Art and spotted life-sized lion sculptures on the steps, so I walked thirty minutes to that. Big cats loose in cities was one of my old PCP fantasies, so I always need to investigate them.

It’s 6 AM and I’ve been up since 2 AM. I went to bed at…11? I don’t know why I woke up, but I didn’t want to take melatonin. At 4 AM I said “fuck it” and pulled out my manuscript. I went over my editor’s light edits and entered like 30 pages of changes. I was in a cranky mood as I did that. Now I am going to breakfast to drink coffee.

FRIDAY APRIL 17, HOTEL ALEXIS, ROME

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Hi everyone! I have been working like a bat out of hell on my own book, in addition to taking one of the most unnecessary trips ever (and working there). I read eight books in April with my truly mushy brain. Here’s my number one pick and dishy thoughts on the rest of ‘em.

NUMBER ONE PICK OF THE MONTH

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YO YO YO. That’s how—in my mind—Timothee Chalamet and Kylie talk to one another in the w-word matrix. ANYWAY, I am sitting here in my creepily undecorated condo on a Tuesday afternoon in April in a great mood. The fact is…I’m going to have the best spring of my life.

You know why? (You all know why; you are so, so bored of me talking about it.)

BECAUSE MY BOOK WILL BE DONE. You guys, it’s not just almost done. It’s ALMOST-ALMOST-ALMOST done. Two or three weeks from sending-it-to-the-copy-editor-done. Free from three-plus years of toil and obsession done. As in, end of April done. Or, at the very latest, early May.

I’m particularly excited about this not just because I LOVE my CRAZY, CRAZY book—I LOVE IT, I’M SO HAPPY I DID IT—but because I’m about to get everything back. MY LOOKS (writing books steals your beauty). My PERSONALITY (it fully steals that, too). My FEMININITY (I currently identify as a North Face turtle fur zip-up-wearing cyborg). My eyesight (throw my nasty sunscreen-smeared blue light glasses AWAY). My interest in other human beings (during book years I legit hate everyone over 18). My social skills (currently, I only make eye contact with dogs).

I’m gonna finally decorate my BARREN-ASS apartment. I’m gonna go out. I’m gonna buy clothes—yes, even though they clutter my home. GIRLY CLOTHES. PINK SKIRTS. CROP TOPS. I’m gonna buy a new GARMENT RACK. Mine is dismantled in storage.

Oh, I’m so, so excited.

Anyway. What the fuck is this story about? Right. I’m here to tell you that SPRING BE SPRANGING, and frankly I have been shopping like a motherfucker. If I recently did something I swore I’d never do and added my savings account to my Am Ex’s payment options—well, I certainly would not admit that here.

Here is my SPRING SHOPPING SPECTACULAR—one gorgeous electronic, one perfume, one facial glowifier, and one line of $25 lounge sets in multiple colors that I will never live without again. Read on!

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HELLO! Have you been having a nice early April? It’s really so funny what used to occupy my addict mind this time of year…

Easter candy! Hahahahaha.

First of all, the colors! The cartoons! The baby animals. Easter is so me. It’s been my favorite holiday since I was a little girl.

Then I became a big girl, and things became considerably darker. My ED and I used to use and abuse those fucking baby chicks—Peeps!—adding them into the “rotation”, if you know what I mean (they go great with popcorn and Perrier). I was also a real whore for Cadbury Crème Eggs and the little ones in the candy shell.

It’s no accident that I’m wearing a KAWS x Uniqlo Cookie Monster t-shirt above. I bought that years ago because Cookie Monster was unfortunately my spirit animal. I have secretly stuffed myself with sugary junk foods for my entire adult life. I know—you’re all, “Me too, Cat.” Because EVERYBODY is addicted to sugar in 2026. It’s not just the treats. Sugar is in our ketchup and our peanut butter and Thai food take-out and in our dairy and on and on.

I guess the difference between me and many of you is that when I keep an addiction active, it utterly consumes me and handicaps me. The eating disorder I lived with for over two decades was never about being thin. It started and ended with addiction—with being in the throes of what you hear being called the disease.

I am addicted to putting sugary things in my mouth that spike my dopamine. When I feed myself sugar, I am feeding my addiction. There’s a saying in recovery: Whatever you feed, grows. Whatever you starve, dies. That’s why I had to give up processed sugar completely.

I’ve never felt so free, so happy around food, so secure in my mental health, and as confident as I do since I finally got sugar sober last year. Here’s how I did it:

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HELLO, HELLO. Good gravy, I am in a weird mood. I’ve just received my novel draft back after many weeks off, and snapping back into focus really isn’t that easy. I’m jittery as fuck! Man. But guess what. IT’S REALLY, TRULY, ALMOST DONE. There are, like, no notes on the draft my editor gave back. That’s why I’m so nervous. This last phase is scary. THIS IS IT.

ANYWAY. I’ll probably get through about three in April, but I did read seven books in March. But of the seven, there can only be one Number One—THE book I, Cat Marnell, grizzled (my enemies wish) publishing guru, instruct you to order right away.

Here we gooooo:

NUMBER ONE PICK OF THE MONTH

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Remember the previous decade—and as recently as 2023—when Kayne West would always call Kim Kardashian “the modern Marilyn Monroe”? Yeah, no. Leave it to a man to not understand the nuances of dark femininity. Kanye, honey, this could never be the reincarnation of Marilyn Monroe:

This was:

The magic. The absolute captivation of the entire world. The sex.

And then: the bad blur.

The drug addiction. The mental illness. The isolation.

(I think about Marilyn’s favorite pseudonym, Zelda Zonk. Has there ever been a more perfect name for Britney?)

Marilyn died at 36. Thanatos-driven Britney was placed in a vessel like Tinkerbell at age 26...

...and was arguably kept alive.

Britney is a legend. She is up there with—insert wince emoji—Michael Jackson, Prince, and Whitney Houston. But also, okay, with Madonna. Thumbs up emoji.

Britney was recently arrested for DUI, with speed in the car. It was reported on TMZ that she is buying Adderall in Mexico. I won’t patronize Britney by saying I hope she knows these aren’t the same pills that were on the black market before her conservatorship—that today’s counterfeit pills are killing people every day. Believe me, she knows.

*****

Okay, ENOUGH DARK SHIT. I actually pulled this xoJane throwback column to repost because last night, before I went to bed, I spritzed on one of my favorite bedtime perfumes…that—unlike so many of the beauty products in my old articles—is still available today. That very perfume is at the end of the article.

All of the photos from my xoJane columns are gone. I had to go on my friend Shaun’s old Tumblr and find images from the night of the 2011 concert. I’d bought four tickets, so three people would go with me. It’s hilarious, in retrospect, to remember getting on a weird bus a New Jersey stadium with wild SAME, Matisse, and Shaun RFC—during peak angel dust years.

What I love about this column is the pure joy in it. I was truly vibing that summer. Sorry in advance for a few offensive beats. Enjoy!

XOJANE THROWBACK

TITLE: I SAW BRITNEY SPEARS LIVE! AND DUH, I TOTALLY WORSHIP ONE OF HER PERFUMES...

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As a New Yorker, I put up with a lot.

I put up with no green space at all. I put up with dead rats. Squashed rats. Live rats. I put up with dog shit literally everywhere. I put up with $100 Uber rides to airports, crowded crosstown buses that smell like KFC, and the fun hometown newspaper I used to enjoy turning flat-out MAGA.

I put up with stolen packages. Junkies scowling at me for being in their corner of the park. The smell of marijuana and K2 floating into my lungs. I put up with bodegas that stink of rat poison and kitty litter. I put up with pulling down a container of Clorox Wipes with no price tag at any given aforementioned bodega, taking it to the register, asking how much it costs, actually watching greed conspire on the proprietor’s face as he makes up a price, and being told—drumroll please—$15 (actual, Google-able retail price? $5.59.)

I put up with classes at New York locations Barry’s Bootcamp costing $40. And SO MUCH MORE.

All this being said? I’m happy in 2026. I’m peaceful. I’m great.

That is…as long as the treadmill in my building works.

All I need is for the fucking treadmill in my building to work.

I JUST.

NEED.

MY FUCKING BUILDING TREADMILL.

TO WORRRRRRRRRRRK.

A SHITTY WORKING TREADMILL (FOR WHICH I PAY A FOUR-FIGURE MONTHLY CONDO FEE, BTW)—THAT’S THE ONLY THING I NEED.

*****

My usual caveat: it’s all good if you don’t work out. I am a sedentary houseplant of a freakishly assiduous full-time writer. Only hardcore movement sets me free from editing trances, in which I stay frozen for literally five hours at a time. Combined with my morning 300 milligrams of Wellbutrin (I doubled up from 150 without consulting a doctor, LOL), that incomparably sweet, panting, nauseous, peel-my-soaking-wet-sports-bra-off 5K run that I do 5 days a week before lunch (in addition to low impact, strength and sculpting workouts I do later in the day) is a HUGE component of my way-better-than-ever mental health.

But guess what. The fucking treadmill broke again. It broke while I was on it. It sputtered to a halt. I was screwed. The timing could not have been worse. It was days before a historic New York City blizzard.

The storm hit Sunday night.

This was no ordinary snow, my dears. It was different than any I’d ever seen in New York—it moved sideways, and was wet and intense and wild, not a pretty “winter wonderland” vibe at all. Alarms went off twice on my phone as the mayor declared an emergency for the city and banned cars until Monday at noon. I could barely see out my window for like ten straight hours.

I wouldn’t be able to run outside—or even walk outside—which is obviously always the broken-treadmill back-up plan. For a whole week!

But...somehow, I still worked out every single day. Here’s my customized blizzard-with-a-broken-treadmill MY WEEK IN WORKOUTS fitness diary. It’s 90% YouTube, with all of my favorite videos included. Let’s go!

*****

MONDAY

Woke up at 7:30 AM and it was still snowing. I called Barry’s NoHo while I was still in bed. No answer. I checked ClassPass. Afternoon classes were still happening. I booked it for 3 PM.

Sent a snappy “happy blizzard”-themed treadmill repair request email to my management—since they never wrote me back last time.

At 11:40 AM, Barry’s emailed: they cancelled class. Goddammit.

Worked until 1 PM. Then I did an old favorite, the 35-minute

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Hey y’all! I read eight books in February. Let’s do this!

#1 PICK OF THE MONTH

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