Nails Inc. Tate

Posted on by Cynthia

Tate is the color that I imagine Roxanne wearing: a beautiful, glossy harlot red that she would wear before going back to her “home on whore island.” Sorry ladies, I just couldn’t help myself. I am a creme finish lover (wow, that sounds inappropriate), so of course I adore Tate. It’s bold, glossy, creamy and absolutely gorgeous. I love to wear red nail polish because it’s so LOUD and immediately commands attention. I am very animated when I speak, moving my arms and hands all over the place, so I love to have strong colors on my nails for dramatic effect. Ready for some swatches after I have babbled on and on about prostitutes, whores, and creme finishes? Ok!

No, I wasn’t lying. This is gorgeous and it’s a one coater!!!! I used two coats because that’s what I’m used to, but you can definitely get away with one coat.

GASP! Glitter!!!! I know, I know. I keep saying that I hate glitter, but I’m starting to think that maybe I’m just lying to myself. I can almost guarantee that I will *never* pay over $5 for any glitter but I am open to anything under that price point. I just hate how hard glitter is to remove most of the time and the thing that bothers me most is that rough feeling that it usually leaves on my nails. I really do like sponging–even though I still can’t get the gradient sponging right–so I mixed two glitters to sponge on my tips: OPI Servin’ Up Sparkle and Wet N Wild Rockin’ Rubies.

How do you like Tate? Do you love wearing red on your nails or is it just too loud for your taste? How do you feel about the glitter mix on my tips? Let me know! I love to hear your opinions.

China Glaze Aroma Café

Posted on by Cynthia

I found a bunch of really old China Glaze polishes at a little hole in the wall beauty supply store that I go to often. I don’t like to spend too much time in there at a time because it’s so dusty that I feel like I need a shower afterwards. Eeeek! I like to peruse the section that I like to call “From the Mesozoic Era” because they have all kinds of crazy bottles that look like they are full of primordial ooze. They are all separated and most of them have long lost the original bottle lettering. This probably sounds like garbage to most people, but to me it is a chance to possibly find a treasure. Since I am a huge China Glaze fan, I was intrigued by these little bottles. Upon further research, it looks like this collection came out in the fall of 2002 and I was so excited to get something so old. This collection precedes my nail polish obsession like so many other awesome collections. It always makes me sad to know I missed out on the OMG collection.

These polishes came in a set of 6 colors and were supposed to have a coffee scent to them. I wasn’t expecting the scent to be there 10 years later–and it wasn’t! They did, however, smell “like a turd covered in burnt hair.” The smell was pretty disgusting and I don’t know if that’s just what happens sometimes when nail polish is super old…or maybe the coffee scent fermented to the smell of death. I also noticed that the formula was kind of spotty and then it went postal when I put a top coat on it as you will see below.

With Milk, Please! was streaky on me and when I applied a top coat, it became a beast. Look at those ripples!! What the heck is that? It’s like ridges. The color is a perfect café au lait.

 

Xpress-Ahh! is a super saturated dark coffee bean color. This one smells bad too, but I like the color better. It also reacted poorly to the top coat but it’s less evident because the color is so dark.

Will I wear these colors again? No. Do I regret purchasing them? NO WAY! I love having these old polishes. I guess you can say the collector in me has taken over. You can still find these on ebay and other independent nail places that never get rid of inventory.

Now I want some Starbucks…Caramel Macchiatos dance around in my head (nonfat and triple shot, of course!) Are you a coffee drinker? What is your coffee drink of choice?

Color Club Almost Famous

Posted on by Cynthia

How do you feel about yellow nail polish? I think I have maybe 3 yellow nail polishes in total and I rarely use them. My mom always used to dress me in yellow when I was a kid because she said it was her favorite color on me. She used to dress me up so girlie: matching dress, shoes, purse, accessories.  It was brutal and I pretty much rebelled at the age of 7 and started wearing whatever I wanted. Wearing this yellow color also reminded me of a childhood story.

When I was a little kid, before starting school, we used to live in a really crappy part of town. In fact, it was outright dangerous so my mom would keep my brother and I locked up in the house. That is like the worst torture for a kid so we felt like little caged animals. Whenever we would go out anywhere, my brother and I would run around like crazy completely relishing being out of the house. In fact, whenever we went shopping we would just disappear and we almost would have to go up to a store employee to page my mom because after a while we were lost. So my mom bought us a set of matching neon yellow/orange sweat pants suits. I swear it was radioactive bright like crazy velveeta cheese, and I hated wearing it. I don’t know if it was her way of making us easy to spot or what, but I still kid her about that.

I am not so sure that I like yellow polish on myself, so you let me know.

As far as yellow polish goes, Almost Famous was not terrible to work with. I did find that it got streaky and I created bald spots if I wasn’t careful. I usually try to stick with two coats, but I felt that I third coat would help to make the color more even. This is a very bright and sunny yellow for sure, and I can’t imagine wearing this any time except summer.

 

I don’t know why I did this design because I hate it. It reminds me of a NASCAR checkered flag. This is just barfalicious and I took it off immediately after taking these pictures.

How do you feel about yellow nail polish? Is there a color that you really don’t like to wear on your nails? Thanks for visiting!

Zoya Wednesday

Posted on by Cynthia

I have way too many untried polishes. It makes me feel bad that I now have over 500 bottles of nail polish and I continue to add to my collection without having worn all the ones I already have. Wednesday is a color that I picked up during the Zoya Earth Day Promo along with another dozen or so polishes. Yeah, I know…terrible. You can’t really go wrong with Zoya most of the time.

Really beautiful and creamy, right? I’m sure there are a lot of dupes out there…Essie Turquoise & Caicos is the one that comes to mind first, but I haven’t done a side by side comparison yet. This is 3 thin coats.

 

Since I’m getting back into stamping with a fury, I used Konad M73 and the special black polish. I love the pigment in the black polish, but it is a huge pain to clean up. I still have staining on my skin.

 

Do you have Zoya Wednesday? Can you think of any other dupes? Let me know what you think!

More Sation Love

Posted on by Cynthia

Today I have for you the last two polishes I purchased a couple of weeks ago from Miss Professional Nail’s Sation line. I am giving this brand a lot of love lately because I’ve been really pleased with the color selection. By the way, Miss Professional Nail is giving away 3 piece sets of their nail polishes to a few lucky winners so don’t forget to visit them on facebook for a chance to enter.

Stirring Silver does not look silver at all. Well, maybe it’s supposed to be a blue toned silver. You can see the beautiful blue shimmer in some of the bottle pictures, but sadly it does not show up on my nails at all. I’ve said many times that these polishes seem a little too thick to me, but I find that they tend to self-level pretty well so I don’t really have issues with application.

Class Flirt was impossible to photograph. It looks radioactive in my pictures because it really is that bright and saturated. This one is described as a “radiant roseberry” and I think that’s pretty accurate. This did not strike me as a neon at first, but I do think it qualifies as one.  It doesn’t dry completely shiny and glossy but it’s not exactly a satin polish either. I’ve shown it here with a coat of Seche Vite.

What do you think of these colors? Are these colors you would normally wear?

10 Books I Can’t Live Without

Posted on by Cynthia

I was talking to one of my friends today about how literature can impact your life. I remember that when I was a freshman in college, I was convinced that I wanted to be a Shakespearean scholar in the vein of my literary criticism idol, Harold Bloom. I don’t know when that was put on the back burner, and I lost interest in so many things. It was a rough period, and I think that I’m just finally starting to find my way back to rediscovering the intense passion I used to feel for things. I don’t have many (any?) friends who share my love of the written word so I decided to just make a list here and put it out there. Yes, I started this blog because I wanted to indulge my obsession with nail polish, but I quickly realized what a wonderful vehicle this is to get things off my chest and just talk about anything and everything. There is no judgment here…no fear at all. I love that.

The following is a list of the 10 books that I feel have changed me to the core at the time when I read them. Not only are they works of extraordinary beauty, but they have and will stand the test of time.

10. Vladimir Nabokov – Lolita

9. JD Salinger – The Catcher In The Rye

8. Ralph Ellison – Invisible Man

7. Antoine de Saint-Exupéry – The Little Prince

6. Leo Tolstoy – The Death Of Ivan Illych

5. F. Scott Fitzgerald – The Great Gatsby

4. Henry James – The Beast In The Jungle

3. Gabriel Garcia Márquez – Love In The Time Of Cholera

2. William Shakespeare – Hamlet

1. Gabriel Garcia Márquez – One Hundred Years Of Solitude

If you are a lit geek like me, do you have your own list?

 

Essence Color & Go Nail Polishes

Posted on by Cynthia

I am not one to ever turn down a good deal so I when I saw some Essence polishes at Ulta, I decided to get a few. For the $1 price tag, I wasn’t expecting anything too special and I was more than happy to try something new. To tell you the truth, I hadn’t noticed this brand even during my regular trips to Ulta. I am glad to report that I think these polishes are just fine. I can’t speak of their longevity just yet, but I thought the colors were nice, pigmented and the brush wasn’t atrocious. I actually liked the brush because it’s wide and it covers my nail bed pretty well in one swipe.  I didn’t pick very original colors, but now I know that I can purchase additional colors without reservations.

 

Nude It! is just a plain old neutral. There is nothing really special about this color but the formula is fine and was opaque with two coats. I wouldn’t really wear this color too often but it makes a good base for stamping and other nail art.

 

OPI Not Like The Movies, is that you? It’s actually not really a dupe but it has some similar properties. I do like the OPI version better because it has some tiny glitter which really makes it shine. However, I think that Where Is The Party? has a more pronounced color shift. It’s very pretty, but I definitely don’t like the visible brushstrokes.

 

Boring black? Well, I can’t remember the last time that I wore a black polish on its own. Black is Black won’t wow anyone because it’s just a staple color. Again, I don’t think I’d get much use out of this nail polish on its own but it’s shiny, creamy and pigmented.

 

Overall, I can’t really complain about these polishes. They are dirt cheap and have a good formula. These are cute little polishes that I can see myself putting in a goody bag or something similar. I’m sure my little cousins would love them for sure. You can’t go wrong for $1!!!

Friends, Travel And Other Demons

Posted on by Cynthia

I had a really nice day today mostly because I got to spend it with D. I told him that he has to come visit my blog. I know most guys aren’t into nail polish or reading about nail polish, but he should do it because he’s my friend, right?! We haven’t been hanging out too much lately since he got his new job so it was nice to just veg together and catch up. D. and I go wayyyyyyy back to August 1997; that was our first day of college and we met in French class. How fitting! We ended up being super close especially after we were both studying in France for a year at the same time. To this day, I still tell him that he just copied me. Eventually we ended up working together at Air France which allowed us to go gallivanting around the world for a few years. Over sushi, I asked him what he thought was our craziest travel adventure and he mentioned two:

1) Running to catch a train in Milan. We ran as fast as we could, threw our bags onto the train and did a flying leap onto a moving train. I don’t know how we did it, but we did. I also got my wallet stolen on that trip because D. walked off and left me alone in the compartment while I slept. Ok, it wasn’t really his fault, but I like to bust his balls about it.

2) The time I had tickets to go to Amsterdam and we were going to go for 3 days until we arrived at the airport and we were told the flight was cancelled because the aircraft had been hit by lightning. That should have been our clue to go home and just relax before having to go back to work. So what did we do instead? We took the red-eye to New York without hotel reservations or any idea about what we were going to do. We ended up in some kind of drug house hotel with Russian immigrants and then I walked into a homicide scene on the street. Yeah…I think I will talk about this one.

At our company Christmas party, I had won a pair of tickets on KLM so we made plans to take a long weekend and crash at a friend’s place in Amsterdam. I was super excited about this trip until we got to the KLM counter and we were told that the flight had been cancelled due to the incoming aircraft being struck by lightning. Completely disappointed, we headed over to our counter to see if we could re-issue our tickets for a different destination. Because we were airline employees, we could buy super cheap stand-by tickets for any airline we had an agreement with. So we decided to buy some tickets on the next Delta flight to NYC. The next available flight was unfortunately the red eye. I won’t talk of that flight because it was miserable. We got to NYC around 5 am and we had to now figure out where we were going to stay. To say that we had a limited budget is an understantement. We had planned to crash with a friend so we hadn’t truly thought about the cost of lodging…oh silly, Californians who know nothing about New York.  The only thing that was in our budget was on the corner of Crack Whore and Pimp Alley. Oh well. We weren’t going to be in the hotel much, right? Well, we ended up in some shit hole with exposed pipes and bunk bends. Nice. It was so gross that I was afraid to take my shoes off at all. We did make a point of staying out all day and visiting EVERYTHING. Unfortunately, it was December and it was freezing. I soon started to complain about the cold and drove D. up the wall.  It’s a gift I have. D. is actually one of the most patient people I have ever met in my life, but I somehow manage to exasperate him. That night we decided to catch a movie late at night so by the time we got out, it was way past midnight and we had to get back to our hotel. We decided to take the subway and we got a little lost….great. I got irritated with D. and I started walking ahead annoyed that we couldn’t find our street. Well, we finally got on the right street and then I raced ahead because I was tired and irritable. I started to hear screaming and running but I wasn’t really in the mood. All of a sudden, a bunch of police cars converged on the corner and I saw someone lying on the floor face down. Did I just walk into a murder scene? I was so shocked that I just kept on walking…right past the body and into a liquor store. I don’t know what I was thinking but I yelled at some man to let me through to buy a Coke. D. was behind me, probably in utter shock, and we finally got to our hotel and passed out. We spent a total of 3 days in NYC with plenty of other silly things happening, but these were the main highlights. How do you like NYC?

Today we ended up watching a French movie called Intouchables. It was amazing, and I highly recommend it if it’s playing anywhere near you.

Afterwards, we went to my favorite sushi place and really pigged out. No, you don’t understand. WE ATE LIKE PIGS. Don’t believe me? Here we go…

This is  my favorite: octopus. I only have a couple of pieces because it tastes so much better if you’re left wanting more!

Yes, two people ate all of this. We have a term for this: sushicoma.

I wrote this because it was a really nice day and also to just share some of the weird things that we both got to experience when we were still carefree and in our early 20’s. I spent a year in my early 20’s completely incapacitated by depression and I hoped that I would never have to go through that again. I never sought any kind of help for my issues and they kept resurfacing every few years until I completely broke down last year. We should never be ashamed to ask for help so don’t piss away a whole decade of your life before you get the courage to get help whether it’s therapy, medication or both. Today was definitely a good day. It’s a real gift to have a friend with whom you can still act like a kid regardless of how old you are.

I hope you read this, D. You promised, you freak!

Nails Inc. Porchester Square

Posted on by Cynthia

It’s Sunday! Which song do you like better?

OR

Both are awesome in my opinion but I think I feel more like Maroon 5 today.  I wore the following color for two days. Yes, you read correctly: two days! I did change it up a bit today because I was bored.

I am sure that if you’ve been following my blog for any amount of time, you know I love nails inc. I really think that they make the best cremes around. That being my favorite finish, I can’t help but adore them and hoard them whenever I can. Porchester Square is such a nice and neutral color. It’s a grey with some pink and it almost looks a bit lavender in certain lights. I love how shiny and creamy this color is and the formula was fantastic.

 

No, you’re not on the wrong blog. This really is glitter. I bought a bunch of tiny Essence polishes at Ulta a while back but hadn’t used them yet. I pulled out this glitter to try out and was happy with the subtle look I achieved. I ended up using a mattifying top coat as well. I much prefer matte glitters IF I am going to wear glitter at all.

 

So how has your weekend been? I hope you enjoyed it and that you’re in a good frame of mind to start a new week. Every day is a new chance to start over. At least that’s what I keep telling myself……………..

Sation Miss Emo Shun All

Posted on by Cynthia

I’m still trying to figure out what the name of this polish means. At first I thought it was like an Emo girl who shuns everything/everyone and then I thought it just meant Miss Emotional.   Of course this could just be ambiguous on purpose to drive people like me crazy. Which one do you think fits better?

Well, whatever the case may be, this color is gorgeous. I think it might be a dupe for Color Club Disco Dress. They are both really bright purples and they have that really pretty satin finish. Why can’t there be more satin finish polishes? I really wasn’t expecting this to be a satin so it was a nice surprise. Besides, I can always put a top coat on it if I want a super shiny mani with this color.

I used three thin coats for this manicure. I guess that you could get away with two thick coats, but I always prefer to do thin coats for a faster drying time. After the second coat, it was rather opaque but I noticed that I could see some slight bald spots when I went outside so I applied a third coat to even out the coverage.

I’m a konad maniac even though I have been neglecting all my stamping stuff. I seriously used to konad at least every other day, but maybe I got sick of it. I am really interested in seeing the new Bundle Monster plates before I purchase them, so I’m going to wait and see some of the designs my fellow stamping friend, Nicole, uses on her blog first. Who am I kidding? It’s just a matter of time before I cave and get them too.

So how do you like Miss Emo Shun All? Do you like to use konad to spruce up your nails?

I hope you’re having a good weekend so far!