If I die before I wake up/Pray the Lord don't smudge my make-up
I don't know why it seems to hard to write things down these days. I suppose it must be because I've got SO MUCH on my mind that I don't know what to concentrate on.
So, let's get frivolous. Let's talk about COSMETICS. Heaven knows there's plenty of serious stuff around.
Some of you know that I've been cheering myself up recently by the sub-capitalist method of buying nice things. My typical response to job insecurity is not usually to blow all my savings, but it isn't entirely crazy, it *has* worked to a certain degree and it's been a good start on Project Take Better Care Of Yourself. While I'm the first person to agree that appearance isn't of great importance, I was still getting fed up of looking like a dog's regurgitated dinner every time I managed to go anywhere or do anything. It's literally depressing.
Getting parcels, however, is EXCITING, especially if they're parcels full of nice things - and yesterday it was a big box full of special rare never-again forum party stuff, which is even more exciting. So now I have much more awesome Lush stuff, including some things I've been wanting for ages, and most excitingly of all, some perfumes I can actually wear. Yes! For the first time in years! I also realised, during the house-poking after Xmas, that most of my make-up was either unusably ancient or had vanished to somewhere unknown. So I *also* have a bunch of lovely new Urban Decay stuff (mostly at greatly reduced price from Ebay, plus also a few full-price treats I couldn't find elsewhere) and if my allergies are kept further in check with inhalers & such, I can actually WEAR SLAP AGAIN! Which is pretty damn exciting.
However, it's reminded me of one of several perennially annoying make-up 'things', and I'm curious to see what others make of them.
SMOK(E)Y EYES
What does this actually *mean*? Beauty commenters and advisors go on and on about "smoky eyes"; my general assumption has always been that it meant a mix of dark eye make-up which is fuzzy, not sharp, and there's a fair bit of it. But even that covers an incredibly wide range of eye make-up styles and, frankly, leaving aside all the "nude" and "natural look" stuff, it's a pretty imprecise term. UD even sell entire kits for creating the 'smoky eye look', complete with instructions for "demystifying the process", as if it were 3-d spatial modelling (is it?). I noticed recently that Sali Hughes had written a column and made a video about how to do them easily, so I thought "great, clarification at last", and while it was fine, it left me even more confused. Her eyeshadow isn't even very dark! Are 'pale smoky eyes' a "thing"? I guess the person who commented that being a girl was SCIENCE had more of a point than I thought, except of course that by "girl" they meant "person who wears make-up", and they were being annoyingly binary-gendered about it, but that's par for the course, unfortunately.
Maybe I've unconsciously been doing this smoky eye thing for years and not realising, although I generally prefer mine to look more like a bruise than a soot smudge, but y'know. So I want to ask you, dear readers, what you make of this utterly unimportant question: what do *you* think "smoky eyes" refers to, what do they look like, have you ever done them and do you like them? And how do you tell them apart from any other kind of not-very-strongly-defined eye make-up?
I'll write something serious & political some other time, k?
This entry was originally posted at http://nanaya.dreamwidth.org/371226.html. Please comment there using OpenID.
So, let's get frivolous. Let's talk about COSMETICS. Heaven knows there's plenty of serious stuff around.
Some of you know that I've been cheering myself up recently by the sub-capitalist method of buying nice things. My typical response to job insecurity is not usually to blow all my savings, but it isn't entirely crazy, it *has* worked to a certain degree and it's been a good start on Project Take Better Care Of Yourself. While I'm the first person to agree that appearance isn't of great importance, I was still getting fed up of looking like a dog's regurgitated dinner every time I managed to go anywhere or do anything. It's literally depressing.
Getting parcels, however, is EXCITING, especially if they're parcels full of nice things - and yesterday it was a big box full of special rare never-again forum party stuff, which is even more exciting. So now I have much more awesome Lush stuff, including some things I've been wanting for ages, and most excitingly of all, some perfumes I can actually wear. Yes! For the first time in years! I also realised, during the house-poking after Xmas, that most of my make-up was either unusably ancient or had vanished to somewhere unknown. So I *also* have a bunch of lovely new Urban Decay stuff (mostly at greatly reduced price from Ebay, plus also a few full-price treats I couldn't find elsewhere) and if my allergies are kept further in check with inhalers & such, I can actually WEAR SLAP AGAIN! Which is pretty damn exciting.
However, it's reminded me of one of several perennially annoying make-up 'things', and I'm curious to see what others make of them.
SMOK(E)Y EYES
What does this actually *mean*? Beauty commenters and advisors go on and on about "smoky eyes"; my general assumption has always been that it meant a mix of dark eye make-up which is fuzzy, not sharp, and there's a fair bit of it. But even that covers an incredibly wide range of eye make-up styles and, frankly, leaving aside all the "nude" and "natural look" stuff, it's a pretty imprecise term. UD even sell entire kits for creating the 'smoky eye look', complete with instructions for "demystifying the process", as if it were 3-d spatial modelling (is it?). I noticed recently that Sali Hughes had written a column and made a video about how to do them easily, so I thought "great, clarification at last", and while it was fine, it left me even more confused. Her eyeshadow isn't even very dark! Are 'pale smoky eyes' a "thing"? I guess the person who commented that being a girl was SCIENCE had more of a point than I thought, except of course that by "girl" they meant "person who wears make-up", and they were being annoyingly binary-gendered about it, but that's par for the course, unfortunately.
Maybe I've unconsciously been doing this smoky eye thing for years and not realising, although I generally prefer mine to look more like a bruise than a soot smudge, but y'know. So I want to ask you, dear readers, what you make of this utterly unimportant question: what do *you* think "smoky eyes" refers to, what do they look like, have you ever done them and do you like them? And how do you tell them apart from any other kind of not-very-strongly-defined eye make-up?
I'll write something serious & political some other time, k?
This entry was originally posted at http://nanaya.dreamwidth.org/371226.html. Please comment there using OpenID.