Puttering About in a Small Land

My dad bought a new truck this week! It's a dark grey Ford Ranger. I took him to the dealership yesterday to pick it up. They had just gotten in a new shipment of Saleen Mustangs...drool! It's a beautiful truck w/extended cab. He got it to replace his 14 y/o Ranger that he calls his "faithful burro." I'm excited for him. He still hasn't taken me for a ride in it.

Mom got back from SC on Saturday. Nephew is fully recovered from his ear surgery, yay! Mom's got to go have her car fixed where the basketball goal fell on it. There's a minor dent near the top of the windshield. Thank goodness no windows were broken.

I need a haircut this week! Split ends everywhere! I think I'm going to go shorter with the layers around my face. I've contemplated some long-ish bangs that I could sweep to the side, but I think that I'll go with shorter layers first, then progress to bangs if I want to (and if I'm brave enough).

Currently, I'm lusting after the new AL lipsticks. I'm trying to limit myself to one order per month, but I might have to make an exception for the new lippies, hehe.

I also can't wait to place an order with I Kick Shins! I've got my eye on some of the curly falls in green & some Manic Panic streaks in red & purple. One of the lovely ladies at the AL forum introduced me to this site.

I got my most recent AL order on Thursday but didn't really get to play with it until today. I got a bunch of Pure Rouges, Perle powders, and samples of the eyeshadows that are being discontinued. :( The finishing spray was on sale, so I went ahead and picked that up. I really like it so far; it sets the minerals nicely and smells divine. I use it after applying my foundation, finishing powder, blush, and eyeshadow but before liner & mascara. I also bought the tapered cheek brush. It was a little smaller than I expected (I read the measurements on the site, I guess I'm just used to a bigger, fluffier blush brush). It's a little bigger than the large blender e/s brush, same texture. It's been good for blush so far, it picks up & holds the minerals very well. I have the AL fiber optic blush brush w/the silver handle (which they've since replaced with a different f/o brush) which is great for intense shades like the rocks! rouges and shades that are dark compared to my complexion, but I wanted a bit fuller coverage & heavier application for the lighter Pure Rouges & Pure Blushes.

This morning, my nephew had minor surgery to have tubes put in his ears. He came through it fine, thank goodness. Whew! Mom said he's back to his usual hungry self. Poor Broseph, I felt sorry for him. :(

Broseph!

Here's an excerpt from the weekly restaurant email newsletter my boss sends out.

"I have some news that you aren't going to like.  After nine years of restaurant ownership, G. is ready to "retire" and try a 9 to 5 job where he gets a regular paycheck and, more importantly, regular vacations.  Currently, if G. wants to go home to Italy to see his family, we have to close the restaurant...and since we can't afford to do that, he just doesn't get to go.  Even long weekends are difficult.  We have an excellent sous chef in J., who has been a Godsend to our restaurant, but no one chef can handle our weekend business by himself.

"So we are going to sell the business - but PLEASE don't stop coming, thinking we are closed!...It could take a couple of years to find the right buyer; we are looking for someone to continue a like business who will employ our well-trained staff.  We are committed to working with the new owner in order to make the transition a smooth one.  In fact, if you know someone who has always wanted a restaurant (or a bakery - we need a bakery, don't we?), send them our way.  Remember, WE ARE OPEN UNTIL YOU GET AN EMAIL FROM ME SAYING OTHERWISE."

[Italics & bold mine.] So it's official. The part about continuing to employ the well-trained staff (namely, B., J., & me) is encouraging. We shall see.

My mom is down at my brother & SIL's house in SC babysitting my niece & nephew. Nephew has to have minor surgery to put tubes in his ears on Friday. It's sad that he has to go through this, but hopefully it will put a stop to the constant battle with ear infections. Poor kid.

We had some pretty severe weather in NC & SC yesterday. Downpours, high winds, and lightning. I was at work, and the streetlights went out. It was a bit eerie. Also, the lights in the restaurant flickered a few times, & we thought we were going to lose power, but thankfully that didn't happen. I was talking to my mom last night before I went to bed, and she said, "Hang on a second, Matt (my brother) says that the basketball goal fell on my car." We thought he was joking at first because that's exactly like a prank he would pull. Unfortunately, the bball goal had blown onto my mom's car! It dented the right side above the window, but thankfully the window survived intact. Whew! Strange happenings.

Album of the day:

Sticky Fingers

The Rolling Stones

I couldn't sleep last night, and in my internet wanderings, I stumbled across these awesome hairdo how-to videos on youtube. This lady has gorgeous hair, and she does some amazing retro/pin-up hairstyles. Fun fun. I got all inspired to go play with my hair even though it was probably close to 1:30AM. Ahhh, delayed sleep phase syndrome. I guess I got carried away because I did a makeup look to go with the hairdo. Makeup was inspired by the Pin-up/Retro Fantasy m/u thread on the Aromaleigh forum. Here are the end results.

I love red lipgloss.

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Spit curls!

Here's one of the back part of my hair.

Hurr

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The flash made the bobby pins very obvious.
























For the hair, I basically followed the technique as demonstrated by Iris in her youtube video. I took a section of hair from the front of my head (the part of the hair that would be bangs if I had bangs) and twisted & rolled it up into a big curl & bobby-pinned it in place on top of my head. I did the same with 2 more sections of hair from the right & left sides of my head. Once the curls were pinned in place, I made spit curls out of the whispy baby hairs that grow right by my ears (you know, the ones that never stay in place and stick straight out to the side at random). I took all the little whispies & wet them with gel, formed them into curls and plastered them to my cheeks with hairspray. I sprayed the h/s directly on my finger and patted it onto the curl, which cemented it to my cheek. I even put in my fake red rose.

M/u products used are all Aromaleigh except where indicated.

Face

• My personal foundation blend, an equal mix of Glissade X (Ghost white), 00 (Alabaster), and 1YL
• Lite cream concealer under eyes
  
• Cherry Blossom finishing powder all over

Cheeks

• Several layers of Pure Blush in Pink

Eyes

• Primer
• Champagne Pure Blush all over eye area
• Wheat matte e/s from lashes to crease
• Umber matte e/s in crease
• rocks! Rockbottom e/s over Umber in crease & on vee
• Fiona lustre e/s under brow
• Blackout gel liner
• Salon Perfect false eyelashes (I forgot which # style)
• Umber matte e/s applied in brows with an angle brush

Lips

• Bedevil gloss
  

My mom got a laptop for her birthday, and with it came a wireless internet router. Yay, we finally have wireless in our house! Before, I would have to take my laptop upstairs to the bonus room (aka The Black Hole due to lack of adequate lighting) and steal Mom's DSL modem. It wasn't a huge inconvenience, but we couldn't both be online at the same time. Anyway, Mom's got a gorgeous shiny new Inspiron in red with a glossy 17" screen, and we've got wireless!

Now here is a product I've been loving lately.

Rimmel Lash Maxxx Mascara

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I'm a mascara fiend. It's probably my #1 can't-live-without-it gotta have it I-won't-leave-the-house-without-it-on favorite item in my makeup collection. I've tried many, many different brands & formulas over the years, and I have to say that Lash Maxxx is one of the best I've ever used. Why do I love it?

• It's got an ingenious little comb applicator. You can really work the product all the way from the base to the tips of your lashes. It also allows for layering, and it combs and separates the lashes while you apply.
• No clumps. Yay.
  
• The formula is divine and functional. It goes on smoothly. I usually prefer lengthening mascara over volumizing mascara, but Lash Maxxx gives the best of both worlds. I like to add a little bit extra to the very tips of my lashes for extra length.
• It doesn't dry so fast that you can't work the product around with the brush (er, comb) before it sets.
• It's not billed as waterproof, but for me, it weathers a night of work flawlessly.
• It's a very high-impact deep carbon black color (I believe it's called "Extreme Black?).
  
• Removes easily with m/u remover. I love waterproof mascaras, but I hate resorting to greasy eye m/u removers to scrub them off. Lash Maxxx washes off completely, and I am not left with raccoon-eye residue in the morning.
• On that note, it's also easy to remove any specks that might fall on your cheeks during application (Or, if you're like me, you accidentally touch the shaft of your wand to your temple and make a nice black streak. Eeeee.). A Q-tip or even just a whisk with a fluffly brush will erase any mishaps.

In other news, the restaurant where I work is for sale. Very sad. There are only 6 of us on staff (including the 2 co-owners), so it will be a sad occasion when the time comes to close & disband the crew. I have no idea about the time frame for the sale. The boss actually didn't tell me; I found out from my co-worker. That's pretty much par for the course, though; the boss tends to be vague on details and doesn't let us know stuff until the last minute. All I know is that the restaurant is for sale. That's it. And now the job search begins.

The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test

Tom Wolfe

It's acid-tasty delicious. With frequent use of the term "Day-Glo." How can you go wrong? My fascination with all things counterculture continues. I stayed up til 4 in the morning reading it & eating Skittles. My own little high. A sugar high, of course. It's like my dad says. I might look like a flower child, but I'm not. I think I'm your basic kid sealed in a pseudo-hippie package, psychedelic wrapping paper if you will.

Here I go again with the blog. I maintained a LiveJournal during my college years. Then I switched to the myspace blog. Now I am at Vox. Many of the lovely ladies on the Aromaleigh forum are voxers, and I'm jumping on the bandwagon. Perhaps I shall import some of my old LJ or myspace posts. I'm still exploring/figuring stuff out/perusing Vox, so stay tuned. Or not. Peace.