Don’t you just love the mall? I mean really love it? Yesterday I spent half the day at one, and it was glorious! — not the mall, but the experience. The mall was just okay (Northgate in San Rafael). They do have a Macy’s and an H&M…but that’s about it. Oh, and a See’s Candy (YES! I’ll take a free sample, nom nom nom).
It was nice to be away from the computer for a while, ya know? I forget sometimes how many hours I spend online…
I finally caught The Social Network, too, and I thought it was much better than I expected, not that I thought it would be bad at all. I know the reviews have been great, and a lot of you gals have been urging me to see it, but I thought really? — El Hub, I practically live online as it is; can’t we see a movie about vampires instead?
And then last weekend we did see the movie about vampires (Let Me In, loved it!), so this time it was either The Social Network or Jackass 3D. ‘Nuff said.
I thought it was just a solid, well directed film, and the acting blew me away, especially when you consider the amount of dizzying dialogue. Some of the lines are delivered so fast they’d give David Mamet whiplash! Seriously, the actors must have been mainlining caffeine on the set.
Anywho, I hope you’re having a good weekend so far. What have you been up to? Can you stay awhile (I’ll make the coffee)? We can chitchat and take a look back at some of the things we talked about this week.
NEUTROGENA RAINBATH
REFRESHING SHOWER AND BATH GEL
Hmm… I honestly don’t know what Tabs would have said about me if he’d known me back in my Neutrogena Rainbath Refreshing Shower and Bath Gel phase ($8 for an 8.5 oz bottle), aka the late ’90s, aka my club kid days.
“Meow,” perhaps?
In his short kitty lifetime, he’s only known me as his cranky, uncool mum — the boring one who hits the haaay every night at 10.
He probably would have liked the late nights and parties because, back then, that’s how I rolled.
My, how things change. Read more…
SMASHBOX WISH FOR THE
PERFECT POUT
Er, can you guess who’s been listening to Eric B. & Rakim?
I’m still auditioning songs for The Ultimate ’90s Hip Hop Playlist (keep those recs coming!), and today, while listening to Don’t Sweat the Technique and swatching the new Smashbox Wish For The Perfect Pout ($29), it hit me — this hip hop classic kinda reminds me of this limited edition holiday kit.
Have you ever tried putting on an opaque, bright gloss without a mirror? It’s hard, right? It requires sweating over one’s lipgloss technique, so to speak. You gotta get the color even and if it goes beyond your natural lip line you look all kinds of crazy… Yes, I’ve totally done this before, and it’s not cute.
But with the glosses in Wish For The Perfect Pout, it’s all gravy, as Tabs would say. The six shimmery shades go on with different degrees of sheerness, so if I accidentally apply too much, the contrast doesn’t look as stark as it would with a full-coverage gloss. Shoot, I could probably put these glosses on while doing the butterfly (remember that dance?) and still come out looking semi-sane. Don’t sweat the technique, indeed. Read more…
DIOR HOLIDAY 2010
FIVE GOLDS FACE OF THE DAY
The $58 quint also goes by the more marketable stage name, the Dior 5-Colour Eyeshadow Palette in Five Golds #001, and it’s one of two new Dior eyeshadow quints for holiday 2010.
The five metallic shadows aren’t as pigmented as usual for Dior, but they certainly do shimmer!
Based on the colors, I’m not entirely sure why Dior chose to call the palette Five Golds. Two of the shades (the silvery one, and the one on the far left in the swatch pic below) don’t have any (or very little) gold in them at all. Read more…
NARS HOLIDAY
2010
Holy wow, pumpkin! All I have to say is werk!
I’m not talking work like cubicles, time sheets or lame vacation requests, but the neck swerving, hair flipping, three snaps in z-formation kinda work — the kind of work NARS obviously put into their holiday 2010 collection.
For the holidays, it’s nice to see something almost traditional — with lots of golds, silvers, berries and plums — from such an untraditional brand.
But I did say “almost.” 🙂 After all, this is still NARS we’re talking about. The colors are a casual affair, many of them shimmery and saturated but not heavy or foreboding. Read more…
KIKO MAKE UP
MILANO
Not gonna lie, but shopping at Kiko Make Up Milano was hella stressful.
I checked out one of the big Italian brand’s freestanding stores in Milan last month, and it was PACKED! Wall-to-wall teenagers, makeup and Japanese tourists, except for one short, brown beauty blogger and a really clueless American dude who zigzagged into the store, held up a shopping list on his phone and bellowed to no one in particular, “I need to bring all this home to my girlfriend or she’s gonna kill me.” HA HA! Seriously, I couldn’t make this sh*z up.
There wasn’t a lot of room in the store to move around because every square inch was covered with makeup (stimulus overload!). Enhancing the effect, they blasted loud techno music, so it was kinda like being in da club, or a makeup hybrid of Forever 21/Claire’s/Abercrombie and Fitch. Read more…
DIOR HOLIDAY 2010
EYESHADOW QUINTS
Whoa, what’s this? A holiday collection that actually looks like a holiday collection?!?
Get out!
Dior decided not to break with tradition while they broke away from the pack with a classic holiday color palette in shades of gold, black, gray and pink.
They must have figured they’d leave the springy holiday stuff to their luxury counterparts (Chanel and Dolce & Gabbana) this time around.
Good call. 🙂
Four of the nine items in the collection (available now in stores) are palettes. Palettes have been playing a big role this season, and it looks like they also were over at Dior HQ.
Here’s a quick look at both of the eyeshadow quints and a pricing/availability breakdown of everything in the release. Read more…
SMASHBOX WISH COLLECTION
HOLIDAY 2010 FIRST LOOK
“What should I wish for?”
“I don’t know. Maybe one these new limited edition kits from Smashbox.”
“OOH! Those are pretty.”
“I know! They just came out with their holiday collection, Wish 2010.”
“Wish? Oh, very punny. Wish. I get it now.”
The four new kits range from $16-46 each and come with various combinations of products for eyes, lips, cheeks and face.
In the holiday spirit, Smashbox plans to donate $1 from the sale of each Wish collection purchase (up to $25,000) to the Children’s Miracle Network.
Even though that kind of thing can seem like a marketing maneuver, it isn’t always, and the fact remains — it’s something that quite a few cosmetics companies simply never do (donate a portion of sales to charity), so I say “Good job, Smashbox!” 🙂
Take a peek at these product pics and swatches of two of the four new kits, Wish For The Perfect Pout ($29) and Wish List ($49). Read more…
VERONICA MALIBU
SEAWEED AND PINEAPPLE BODY SCRUB
I love a good meat tenderizer as much as the next gal, but I didn’t expect to find one — make that two in my new body scrub!
No, indie skin care line Veronica Malibu does not have quality control issues at their manufacturing plant. The meat tenderizers I found in this jar of Seaweed & Pineapple Body Scrub ($28 for a 2-oz. jar) were added deliberately, and they make the product stand out in the crowded field of skin scrubs.
Lately, I haven’t been in the mood for abrasive or painful scrubs; I want something kinder and gentler, so when I found out that water, aloe vera gel and seaweed were the top three ingredients in Veronica Malibu’s new scrub, it piqued my interest. Read more…
Your friendly neighborhood beauty addict,
Karen
Sarahc says
Hmm, I’m not getting what the big deal is about The Social Network. Mumbly Jesse Eisenberg is the most annoying kid I’ve ever seen. JT should have played Mark Zuckerberg because he and Andrew Garfield were the only good things in the movie.
Karen says
Aw, you didn’t like it? I thought it was pretty darn good, and I thought Jesse Eisenberg got Mark Zuckerberg spot on, granted it wasn’t much of a stretch for him.
Hope you had a good weekend. What’s the last movie you really enjoyed?