Randomramblings

So, according to United wankers of blogosphere people percieve me as a person who deals out "much of that cold stern contempt that makes sensitive people shrivel away and cringe in fear" and also as someone who lashes "out at people she disagrees with". But I'm smarter than that. I know that you can change people's opinion by showing them you have your weaknesses. Telling them you have your soft spots - and suddenly they'll (hopefully) realize you're just a person, too.

Now, this is another of my confession times. I love make-up. Love buying it, love trying new things out, love testers, love comparison between brands etc. So it will some as no surprise that I hardly ever wear make-up. My justification is simple: if you want to look like the girls I see daily on the bus (with horribly obvious orange tinge on their faces, so much black kohl around their eyes, it makes you wonder just how much they they spend on it and so much excess lipgloss it's actually dripping on their chin), it takes about five minutes. (Oh, OK, the numerous replications of gloss add some extra minutes, but you get my drift.)

But should you be interested in looking slightly more - shall we say - normal and less obvious, then it takes about 20 minutes. Actually the more you want to look like you're not wearing make-up at all (and it's only perfect skin, long-eyelashed you), the more time it takes to apply make-up. First you wash the face, dry it with a towel, apply face cream, massage the face cream in, apply some appropriate and hopefully longlasting foundation (and for girls with pale complexion like mine finding the right shade is as tricky as shopping for condoms in the Vatican), let it set, then dust your face with some loose powder. This is fairly straightforward. Then comes the more complicated part - applying Eyeshadow Base, which is a necessary step, if you don't want the shadow to crease by mid-day. (The only reasonably priced eyeshadow base I've discovered in Slovenia is by ArtDeco and the little pot lasts a long time as you only need a little to set the shadow. Now that I know the beauties of eye base, I'll never go back!)

Then you apply the eyeshadow. Which shade? Eyeliner or not? Eyeliner on the lower lid as well? When you have finished the fine brush work on your eyelids (You can apply shades with fingers as well, but brushes give better results - the lines are smoother, the colour stays longer and is applied more evenly and is exactly where you want it to be, not something you could claim for finger application.) you only apply mascara - I find that applying it on lower and upper lashes gives the best results. I use a brown mascara, not black. This was a mistake, since I always just buy a mascara without checking its colour, but then I realized that brown gives a much softer impression than black. Naturally, for evening occasions black is still a must, but for day-wear brown should be preferable for blondes! I swear by Intesifique (a L'oreal mascara) which I've been wearing for years. I recently tried Lashlift by Max Factor and it was a disaster. It did lift the lashes, but it flaked and creased in two hours already! Thanks, but I really prefer to walk around looking like I wasn't just hit in the eye. So I'm staying with L'oreal even if their mascaras are more expensive than others. I just hope they don't discontinue this product!

Anyways, then you've just got to do the lips (where I avoid the lip liner as it creates a too serious look and saves time) where I like a lipgloss, a lipbalm or a Max Factor Colour Perfection, which I like because it doesn't leak over the line of your lips.

Then, when you've (with as few touch-ups as possible) worn the make-up for the day, you have to remove it, which is my weakness. Sometimes I'm just so tired I completely forget to remove it. But if I'm a nice girl and wash it out, too, then I've got about 40 minutes taken up each day just for make-up. And that's too much. If only make-up was less time consuming; if it only were like a nailpolish - you apply it once a week while talking on the phone and you remove it at the end of the week, as the polishes today last quite a while. Which reminds me - yesterday I bought a really flattering nail polish by Nivea Beaute (I only recently figured what quality polishes they make) in 78 Mauvestar. A very shimmery pinkish summer colour that I already look forward to wearing on the beach.

(Incidentally, while I'm speaking about the beach - boyfriend and I are going to the sea-side this weekend and I'm already praying for warm weather and sun, but looking through the window on the combination of snow and rain leaves me slightly less hopeful that the weekend will really be sunny.)

My decision not to wear make-up is based solely on the fact that I have too little time to venture into make-up application. (Which really doesn't deter my from buying more make-up.) Though I know a great deal about the matter, I only wear it for special occasions when I do bother applying it at all. It's such a shame taking into consideration that my stocks of make-up: shades, glosses, liners, foundation, loose powder, bases, brushes, etc. are so extensive they take up an entire shelf. In fact, a very good female colleague of mine recently exclaimed "Oh my God - you look so much more - errr - pretty with make up on!" And I thought: Honey, if you only knew I spent so much money on cosmetics in my life that if I decided to save it instead, President Drnovsek wouldn't even need to start a Darfur fund - I could just donate all the savings! And - you too wouldn't look very flattering with swollen eyelids, a see-through pale complexion and huge brown circles underneath your eyes - anything can only look better from there on. But I only smiled and sheepishly replied with a thanks, pretending I never knew that before.

So again we come to the same conclusion. Being a woman is complicated - the dilemmas we face, the scarce amount of money we can spend - men (I guess Freud was right) can have no idea how it feels like... buying things and then never using them again.

P.S. Things You Can Tell Just by Looking at Her is a lovely film, if ever you wondered where I get such fine titles for my blog posts.

Labels: random ramblings