The call came last Monday. It’s one I was expecting.

It was my top editor at the City Paper saying the Big Guns there had decided that my column was no longer valuable to the paper - ie., it wasn’t helping them sell ads any more.

So, as much as I hate to see it go, last week’s Style Arbiter column was the last. (I was happy to have gone out on a high note at least: I loved the answers Cali DeVaney and Joshua Black Wilkins gave to my Arbitrarian Questionnaire. Great pix, too - good job, Jude!)

While I wont quite say it’s an end to an era, it is only the second time in the last, oh, 15 years that I’ve been without a regular byline at a newspaper.

My first job out of undergrad (besides the time spent waiting tables) was in 1993 at my hometown paper, the Cleveland Daily Banner, in East Tennessee. In 1995, I left to go to grad school at NYU, where I joined the staff as a fashion writer/editor at an ill-fated daily - a billionaire’s vanity project called Open Air PM - half way through my first year of J school.

From there, I went directly to the New York Post, where, in retrospect, I can say I worked very happily as the fashion editor from 1997 until I moved to Nashville in 2004. I moved here, joined the staff of the Tennessean as a lifetyles editor; was moved by top brass over to helm the Rage about a year into my tenure. Fell apart due to some extenuating circumstances made worse by the stress (which is why I left NYC after all); went to rehab; came back as a reporter; left four months later to pursue work as a stylist and Glamour magazine fashion columnist.

I was tickled when my old childhood buddy, the CP’s then-executive editor/now recently deposed newspaper whiz Clint Brewer, asked me to come on as a style columnist at the CP back in early 2007. The timing was great; the gig was divine - I could explore the fashion landscape of my new-ish home town and continue working as a stylist at the same time. Twice a year, I got full reign to produce gorgeous fashion supplements like the ones I worked out when I was at the Post; they even let me bring in my own photographers from time to time! It was the perfect scenario.

And one I will really miss.

That said, I am excited to see what lies beyond this opportunity. I plane to continue blogging about fashion in Nashville at FloraVintage.blogspot.com (right now it’s just a dumping ground for pictures from my vintage stores; but stay tuned …); I will contribute a to Her Nashville’s blog a few times a week, as well (my monthly column will still run in that publication).

But I will miss the newspaper. It’s quite possible, with the media landscape as littered with dead news rags as it is (and with more paper giants falling in the near future, for sure), this might have been my last traditional newspaper gig. Though I’m excited to see what lies beyond me as this chapter of my professional life closes, the loss makes me sad.

So, goodbye dear readers! Until later …

I am not going to the Costume Institute Gala at the Met tonight like I used to, but I am no less excited about it than if I were back there, scurrying around the grand entrance room of the grandest museum in New York - nay, the U.S. of A.

The Met party, as it’s called by those who talk about it so much that they feel the need to abbreviate (and there are many), is called “Fashion’s Biggest Night.” And it is a biggie: hosted by Vogue’s Anna Wintour, it always follows a theme and attracts dozens, if not hundreds, of bold-faced names.

Except for the times I went to Oscar parties, I don’t think I’ve ever been so surrounded by celebs - and celebs dressed to the nines, at that. Most famous folks have been recruited (really, it is more of a recruitment than an invitation) to sit at the table of a certain designer (it’s a dinner/dance/lookyloo fest), who dresses them for the event. It’s really mindbogglingly beautiful, with gorgeous men in perfect uniforms standing in perfect sentry fashion down the long, tall marble halls that radiate out from the entrance hall, and fairy lights (ie, votives) dotting the stairs of the massive staircase, where Anna and her co-hosts - this year Justin Timberlake, Marc Jacobs and Kate Moss - form a greeting line.

The theme this time around is “The Model As Muse,” which means there will be dozens of mannequins on parade - always a good thing, in my book.

I’ll be on the web-lookout for my favorite runway walkers: Shalom Harlow (who inspired me not so wisely to dye my hair black back in 1995, the summer I moved to NYC, and teaching me the important life-lesson that, no: temporary black hair dye does NOT wash out eventually), Helena Christensen, Carmen Dell’Orefice, Erin Wasson, and, of course, Mossy, who will be the top of everyone’s look-see list.

I’ll report back tomorrow on the Nashville faces that make the scene: I’m expecting Karen Elson and Jack White to be there (they usually are), as well as a possibly appearance by Jessica Simpson (she came with Michael Kors last year) and Taylor Swift (Badgley Mischka) and Carrie Underwood.

I allowed myself to go into Target yesterday. (Regular readers will remember that I made a semi-serious resolution to not visit Tarjay this year, since I tend to drop a wad every time I go in on very cute T-shirts or dresses - or, usually, both - that i can absolutely live another day without.)

I resisted the darling Loomstate tank top wtih two bunnies on the front (I’m a sucker for the view of a rabbit from the back: wee cotton tail stuck to the bottom of a  little round body, with two tall ears standing at attention - my God, is there anything cuter than that?). I resisted the blue net Alexander McQueen shift dress with unzippable neckline (totally cool design), which was on the clearance rack for 30 percent off.

But once I saw the amazing Miss Trish of Capri for Target thong sandals with freakin’ gold metal lion’s head on the front - I love me some metal lion’s heads - I was a goner. I was gonna buy those $29.99 leonine kicks, for sure.

Twas not to be: they were out of my size. Actually, they were out of most sizes of the flat sandals (the platforms apparently weren’t as popular, as there were tons of them at the White Bridge store). They’re also out online.

My plan is to hit some Targets on my way down to the FLA tomorrow. I’m heading to Santa Rosa beach to meet my parents and some of their buddies; going to spend my 39th birthday thrifting Fort Walton beach, which I’ve done twice before, and which is strangely fruitful.

Gotta have lots of new stuff for the shoppers at the big vintage and local designer sale I’m hosting this Saturday at Fanny’s House of Music in East Nashville! More on that later. But do mark your calendars: 10 to 6, on Sat., May 2.

I know as a good fashion person with a good conscious, I’m supposed to, like, have deep disdain for Forever 21 - or XI Forever, as the Sh’Opry Mills store is now known. After all, stealing other designer’s designs point for point is decidedly uncool - not to mention soon to be illegal (well, probably: the courts are still debating how copyright laws apply to fashion designs).

But, my God, how do you expect me to stage a proper boycott when they’ve started to carry  such fabulous jewelry all of the sudden? Oh, and did I mention it’s cheap, too?

Here’s how cheap:

These were $5.80

The Moroccan-style bad boys below were just $8.80.

Awesome stuff, right? And convincing, too: I wore them to the Symphony Fashion Show with a $3,000 dress and no one knew the better.

Speaking of the symphony fundraiser, I ran into the fabulous - and gorgeous - makeup artist Debbie Dover at the pre-show cocktail party. She looked amazing in a strapless maxi dress and the multi-colored version of this necklace:

Give you one guess where she got it.

Yep: F21 - for $8.80!

I’m obsessed with fringe right now - good thing, since it’s popping up on everything from shoes to dresses to necklaces this spring.

I recently thirfted an amazing black 80s jacket with multiple rows of matching fringe. Totally rad, and looks fabulous with a tank,  cargo pants and a pair of stupid-high sandals. Casual-sexy is my favorite kind of sexy these days.

I quite like the dress in this photo from Style.com, which was shot at the Coachella music festival last week. More to come.

It was a sad day in Belle Meade - nay, in every corner of our fair city - when Mary Pillow Thompson closed her upscale shoe store, Razz Kirk.

Those who are mourning her selection of Cynthia Vincent, Loeffler Randall and Pucci kicks can ease their pain a bit this Wednesday when Mary Pillow holds her annual Shoe BBQ!

Here are the deats, straight from MP’s email to me:

Basically it is all the rest of the rest of my shoes from the store— so they are all brand NEW- this is not consignment!

Sizes from 5- 11….

3802 Woodmont Lane – 37215.. in my backyard… starting a 5pm. So that people can basically come after work.

Prices will start at $10 and probably nothing prices over $95 and that would be for either a new Bernardo sandal (reg $135) that sells on my website at full price or a great deal on a $400 shoe.

I will take credit cards and of  course, cash, checks.

You know my brands: loeffler randall, sam Edelman, bernardo, Claudia ciuti, emma hope, eric javits, Cynthia Rowley, delman, Cynthia Vincent….

Sounds like a great deal to me!

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