just a lot of water underneath a bridge i've burned

sasswagon — Tue, 23 Nov 2010 02:18:15 GMT

I should get back to posting here about things that make me laugh, because I need to do something to make myself less disgruntled. So:

Today at work, my coworker Tom was telling stories from a retirement party he went to on Thursday (it was for one of the hospital's pulmonologists, so it involved a lot of people who've worked at this hospital for an entire generation). Apparently, one of the attendees has a son who's a TV/film producer, and he works for the Spice channel. This person was unaware of the nature of the Spice channel and thought it was like the Food Network, which... I guess I could see the logic behind that one. Anyway, another coworker responded to this with, "Next time I see this guy I'm going to ask him what's been cooking on the Spice channel!" I couldn't resist suggesting she ask him if he'd gotten any good recipes from his son lately, and Tom piped in with "Well, you know, they mostly cover hot dogs and buns."

On an unrelated note, Tim just woke the cat up because she was snoring.

sasswagon — Thu, 01 Jul 2010 21:37:25 GMT

Okay, I know the internet picks your browser ads based on your cookies, or the websites you frequently visit, search keywords, and the like. On the vast majority of the web, the ads I see are for shoes and handbags, because I like to look at those things online.

Facebook, of course, has to be different. It likes to give you ads based on your profile. And while I was routinely entertained by "Earn your Pharm.D. from the University of Florida!" (hey, maybe a second one would do me good?), I am NOT thrilled with "custom-fit plus-size bras," six million diet programs, and today's straw that broke the camel's back - discounts on QVC's exclusive plus-size clothing line.

Look, I know I've gained 20 pounds in 3 years. I'm not thrilled with the way I look, to the point that I'm considering several minor cosmetic procedures in the year-plus before I get married. Even when I was a size 8, I was routinely informed of how inappropriately large I was, how obesity is a big public health problem and I'm setting a bad example for my patients. I know that I'm "not smart enough to stop eating," and I'm used to having to work harder and be smarter to be taken seriously despite my size. But... do I have to be forcibly reminded by marketing every time I log into Facebook?

sasswagon — Wed, 09 Jun 2010 01:14:29 GMT

I now have the same relationship with LiveJournal as I have with TV series. I am so far behind on both LJ and House that it seems like an insurmountable project to get caught up. So... I just ignore them. And I've let the DVR self-delete almost a whole season of House for space reasons, and I've let three months and several major life events go by without even looking at LJ.

I feel like getting fully caught up would stress me out. So I'm going to make a brief list.

- Tim and I are getting married 10/1/2011. :) He proposed on my birthday, for which I was COMPLETELY convinced I was getting a blender or some other kitchen appliance. (He pulled the "wrap the ring in a box inside a gigantic box" trick, so the blender-sized box sat wrapped in birthday paper in our living room for two and a half weeks before my birthday, and I didn't have a CLUE what was in it.)

- My dad has managed to stump the entire Western New York VA healthcare system with an autoimmune paraneoplastic syndrome. It's unusual for such a syndrome to occur in the absence of active cancer, and it's been conclusively proven that his lung cancer is totally gone (believe me, they'd have found it by now, since he's been scoped and scanned from top to bottom). It's rare enough that there are only case reports to refer to, and even those are inconsistent. If I were an oncologist or researcher instead of a pharmacist, I'd be writing a paper about this.

- New Job (well, not so new, since today was 3 months) remains pretty good. I was a hundred percent right to want back into hospital pharmacy, and I'm happy I stumbled on the opportunity I did. I just ordered the review books for the BCPS exam, and once I find an educational program on "how to trust your instincts and/or stand up for yourself," I'll be well on my way back to Drug Geek-ville.

- I've become addicted to the outlets. This should surprise no one. They sell shoes.

sasswagon — Sat, 13 Mar 2010 03:53:38 GMT

I just spent way too long doing an elaborate holiday-themed manicure that didn't even turn out perfectly, but it'll be good enough for the Hartford St. Pat's parade (although I'm not going if it rains). But in the spirit of NOT completely neglecting my internet life, I'll update briefly to say:

I LOVE MY NEW JOB.

That is all.

sasswagon — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 14:50:43 GMT

I'm in Buffalo! My parents' cats are following me around, which I find kind of hilarious. (The running joke is that I was always the cats' favorite, and they're kind of mad at me for leaving them alone with the crazy old people.) I haven't even given them the catnip mice yet.

sasswagon — Tue, 02 Mar 2010 04:33:45 GMT

Okay. Wow. LiveJournal FAIL, Rebecca. It has been exactly four months. And I'm not sure my 11/1/09 post really counts since it was just a makeup post, haha...

Probably the biggest development in the last couple of months was that I have finally found an inpatient job! My last day of LTC dispensing was Friday, and it wasn't even a horrible night like most Fridays are! (Hospitals tend to push a lot of discharges to nursing facilities out at the end of the week so that people don't end up just chilling in the hospital all weekend. So Friday nights are batshit insane for the pharmacy sending the drugs to all those people who just got out of the hospital.) So I'm off this week and I have HR orientation at a community hospital a few towns over on Monday morning. I'm WAY excited to get a chance to be a "real pharmacist" again.

But before I do that... I'm going to visit my mom! She's already booked us hair and nail appointments. Also, I bought cat toys. (Tim and I went to Buffalo for five days at Christmas, and unquestionably the best thing I took home was the three-pack of catnip mice. The fat tabby hasn't jumped that high in YEARS.)

Also, if I have any readers left, and they know anything about clothing: I have a bridesmaid's dress that is almost, but not quite, a full size too big. Do I return/exchange for the next size down and hope it zips, or do I find a tailor and risk spending as much as I paid for the dress getting it sized down from a 12 to what amounts to a 10.5? I'm torn.

sasswagon — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 04:07:10 GMT

Because I forgot, and because I'm sure _erin wants to know even if no one else does...

Cover Girl Lash Blast Length - This is the first Cover Girl mascara I've really been impressed with. The original Lash Blast (which I bought in waterproof last fall) was just OK for me, and I didn't see the amazingness the Internet was attributing to it. The bloggers/reviewers don't think as much of this incarnation, so it's fitting that I actually liked it a lot. I got good length and - an important point - low-effort, mostly clump-free application. That's a rarity for me with these rubber brushes, but somehow this one doesn't hold a ton of mascara like the other ones seem to. It's not a dramatic mascara, but most "dramatic" mascaras translate as "thick and clumpy as hell" on me anyway. I used this one consistently for a good three weeks before Mascara ADD kicked in. There were two drawbacks to this mascara, though. There is no waterproof version available, and while it holds up decently well I do have some "shedding" under my eyes at the end of a day. And... it smelled really bad, like wall paint or industrial glue, from the first use. I bought this literally the first time I saw it in stores, so it couldn't have been on shelves more than a week or two; I'm not sure if Cover Girl sat on the launch for a while and my tube was thus old, or if the smell is just the way this stuff is. I would re-buy if they launched a waterproof to see if the wear problem is solved and if the smell is the same. I would NOT pay the $9 the drugstores are charging though, I'd wait for a sale.

L'Oreal Voluminous Carbon Black Waterproof - It had been so long since I tried the original Voluminous (which I remembered generally liking) that I bought this on a BOGO to see if it's noticeably different. It's certainly black-tastic, and the application was relatively trouble-free with only a little work required to straighten out/de-clump. (Can I just say that the long-handled mascara spoolie from the Sonia Kashuk line at Target was the best two bucks I ever spent?) However, either it's not legitimately waterproof, or it's SO overloaded with carbon-black-itude that it cannot be contained, because it gave me gray circles under my eyes. I don't think it's too much to ask of an allegedly waterproof mascara to keep me circle-free through a 10-hour workday. This one got worn... once, maybe twice, because once I have an ugly outcome I really hesitate to give these mascaras another chance.

L'Oreal Telescopic Explosion - Another one I bought right away when it hit stores, because I was intrigued and baffled when Givenchy's PhenomenEyes came out but wasn't willing to drop $28 on something I wasn't sure would work for me. I'm simultaneously glad I waited for the drugstore knockoff and curious if the higher-end version is better. I found Telescopic Explosion to be... challenging, at best, to apply. The ball applicator is rubber and, like so many of its rubber brush kin, holds on to a LOT of mascara, so it puts gobs on your eyelashes. The wand itself is weirdly bendy, almost like it has a joint in it about a quarter inch up from the ball end. This makes it hard to scrape the ball on the neck of the tube, so you've got to deal with the gobs. I also found this mascara to "shed" little eyelash-shaped black flecks under my eyes at the end of the day. I think I wore it for three days and then cracked a backup tube of an old safe standby, Maybelline Lash Discovery (if you wiggle the brush it works just fine for top lashes).

And then... I bought the Sephora Favorites LashStash, with TEN tiny high-end mascaras!!! Fun ensues!

Fresh Supernova Mascara - Hands down the prettiest mascara tube I've ever seen, with a swirly/scrolly white design etched into a matte black tube. This has a pretty standard, slightly hourglass-shaped brush that doesn't hold a huge amount of product. It goes on smoothly, with only a tiny bit of de-clumping needed on the corner of the first eye (mostly because of that annoying blob you get on the tip of just about every mascara wand ever). The effect isn't as dramatic as the ad copy boasts, but I thought it was a nice natural-look mascara with a little bit of length and volume enhancement. This isn't waterproof and I had a liiiittle bit of shedding/crumbling on the outer corners at the end of the workday, but not nearly messy enough for an automatic fail. I'm not sure I would pay $25 for a full tube though.

Hourglass Superficial Lash - Another good one! This mascara has a conical wand, but it's long and skinny and somehow doesn't have the "huuuuge gobs on both ends of the brush" problem I had with MAC Dazzlelash. It has short bristles but doesn't get terribly clogged with mascara. I did not have to do any de-clumping work at ALL with this mascara, which is big for me. I also had just about no shedding/fallout/smearing after wearing it all day. I really liked this mascara and was prepared to vote yes until I looked it up on sephora.com... it's $26 a tube. And the whole point of Mission:Mascara was to do better than the $24/tube that started it all. So... it's a love with reservations, I guess. I'll use the sample tube until it starts to smell funny and then remember it fondly.

I also recently tried out two Cliniques (High Impact and Lash Doubling) that were freebie/GWPs, but I only wore them once or twice each and I don't have a good recollection of the details. Will have to re-test and make notes.

sasswagon — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 16:29:45 GMT

So, three weeks later, I get around to posting about my dear old friend Tracey's wedding!

I drove from CT to Hamburg on Thursday, making it with just enough time to change into a church-appropriate outfit for the rehearsal. However, there was one wrinkle in my church-appropriate outfit: I'd forgotten to pack shoes that were suitable for black straight-leg pants. (I was wearing clumpy brown Mary Janes to drive - seriously, they feel like sneakers - and the only other shoes I'd brought were my open-toed sparkly bridesmaid shoes and essentially motorcycle boots, which were entirely too bad-ass for the House of God. They also would've looked weird as hell with a silk blouse and prim cardigan.) So I texted my mom from a New York Thruway rest stop and asked her to go find me some shoes. There was much laughter at me, of all people, not having shoes, but she came through for me and met me in the church parking lot with a pair of suitable slingbacks. When emergency shopping needs to be done, Mom never disappoints.

After securing footwear, the rehearsal was pretty smooth, with the exception of the groom having some sort of stomach virus/hangover combination that culminated in the bride-to-be driving him over to the maid of honor's house for IV fluids and anti-nausea meds. (The maid of honor, another old Hamburg girl, is an EMT. She swore that other than this, she was COMPLETELY off duty for the wedding and did not want anyone having heart attacks or injuring themselves.) We were also provided with a lengthy list of Things Not To Do In The Church by the priest, including "no writing bawdy sayings on the soles of your shoes" and "no smoking in the church." (Seriously.) The other two bridesmaids and I acquainted ourselves (I walked up to a knot of people who looked affiliated with the wedding and said "Hi guys, I'm the fourth bridesmaid!" and it was like a light bulb went on over their heads), and we ended up sitting together at the dinner along with the flower girl and family (she was the MOH's daughter). The flower girl proceeded to bust me for eating a cookie before dinner because she had been explicitly told no cookies until dinner; the only excuse I could come up with was "Well, my mommy's not here so I'm being a bad girl."

The wedding itself was really lovely, with the bride looking positively stunning and the groom having made a complete recovery. However, we three bridesmaids missed a lot of the ceremony because we were on flower girl duty. I knew Paige was the MOH's daughter, but for some reason I thought she was older than four and a half. At that age, they totally don't have the "sit still and quiet through a Catholic mass" concept down, and she came up with some serious laugh-out-loud one-liners throughout the ceremony. Highlights:
- Turning to me about a third of the way through and announcing, "This isn't my favorite church." I told her that it was Aunt Tracey's favorite church and because it was her wedding she got to pick.
- Simultaneously dropping a flower out of her arrangement AND stepping out of her shoe right as we were supposed to go stand on the altar. I reassembled her as quickly as I could and then looked up to see that the entire wedding party was up front except for us, so we scurried as quickly as possible to our positions.
- Asking Emily, one of the other bridesmaids, if they needed to wait until the line went down to go get a piece of cheese (she thought the priest was handing out slices of cheese for Communion).

Also, on the topic of Communion... we probably should have more explicitly warned the priest that the only practicing Catholics in the wedding party were the bride and groom. We actually briefly huddled during the sign of peace to determine if any of us were eligible to receive, and here's how it went:
Me: Is anyone planning to go up front for communion or should we all just stay in the pew?
Emily: Well, I'm Jewish...
Nikki: I'm not Catholic either.
Me: Okay, in that case I'm not getting up because then we'll get out of order.
This made for a slightly awkward moment when the priest, in full regalia with sparkly chalice in hand, signaled our row to stand... and nobody moved.

After the ceremony, we tried to go take pictures at Woodlawn Beach State Park, but it had started to rain during the ceremony and the bride was unable to put her dress down anywhere without ruining it. We did a couple group shots in the covered area, then rode around Hamburg in the limo and drank beers until the reception. I have to really hand it to Tracey and Dan for how well-executed the reception was - instead of numbering the tables, they gave them names of meaningful places in their lives; they had the bridesmaids' dates escort them in instead of matching them up with random groomsmen when they announced the wedding party, giving the DJ a list with everyone's names (and pronunciation guides). They also had adorable favors - fancy triangular tea bags in little paper wrappers, which we promptly dubbed "tea-pees." (I'm not sure how Tim and I ended up with six tea-pees. I think we might have collected a whole table's worth somehow. But the tea was delicious.) There were all the usual wedding reception trappings - food, dancing, bouquet tossing (caught by Emily the bridesmaid) and open bar. It was really a lovely wedding, with a lot of the couple's personality in it, and I was really excited and happy to be a part of it. :)

sasswagon — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 01:18:08 GMT

I have a ton to post about - went to Buffalo for a wedding two weekends ago, rapidly losing patience with coworkers who are older than me yet act twelve, numerous mascaras to log reviews of - but I simply do not have it in me to generate it tonight. I fail, I know. But... I need my ass-sitting time.

sasswagon — Sat, 03 Oct 2009 02:49:10 GMT

A vignette from this morning:

6:00am, suburban Connecticut. A couple - TIM and REBECCA - stirs in bed.

TIM: Honey.
REBECCA: Mrrmph?
TIM: Honey, what's that noise? That buzzing sound?
REBECCA: Dunno.

TIM gets out of bed, goes to living room to investigate. A moment passes during which REBECCA squints at the clock, then buries her face in her pillow. After another beat, TIM scurries back into the bedroom.

TIM: Honey. It's the fire alarm. Get up, we have to go outside.
REBECCA: ... Seriously?

TIM jumps into a pair of jeans conveniently located on the floor. A spectacle-less REBECCA stumbles down the hall and buttons a cardigan over her pajama top.

Yep. Fire alarm at 6am this morning. And I was going to get to sleep until 8:30...

sasswagon — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 03:00:21 GMT

I got a twitter. I'm @thebeckbeck. (I know, I know, I've been sasswagon for EONS... but no one who wasn't around for the sasswagon years really gets it. It's too much explaining! So, as "beckbeckgoose" was taken, I'm "thebeckbeck.")

I really need to spend my internet time doing more than just... reading the archives of beauty blogs. Sure, it's fun, but it's not really enriching (and if cognitive decline really starts at age 27 like an article I saw a few months ago says, I don't have much time left) and it also gets expensive. (WILL NOT LET MYSELF EVEN LOOK AT the Guerlain Brun Mordore eyeshadow. It's BROWN. I HAVE A DRAWER FULL OF BROWN.) I mean, kingzog uses the internet to do things like fix his bathtub. _erin does weight watchers online. I... look at pictures of makeup. I should go back to using Erin's password to read medical journals from the UB libraries. And also updating here more regularly, since it makes my mom nuts. :)

Speaking of my mom, she was here last weekend. Like most Mom Visits, it was a whirlwind. We fixed the configuration of the master bedroom so you can WALK instead of wading in there, which is great. (It takes three people to move my desk, which was why we couldn't do this ourselves... two people to lift and pivot the desk, and a third to spot the absurdly skinny legs with their tendency to detach from the body of the desk. I was the floor spotter.) And then, of course, there was shopping. It appears that boots don't count as shoes, so I could get those!

I've got a horrendous case of postnasal drip. I don't know if it's allergies or a nascent cold or what, but it's making me absolutely NUTS. Can't clear my throat, can't blow my nose, it's sort of in this terrible limbo where it does nothing but annoy me. And since I'm posting about the state of my nasal passages, it's probably time to stop writing and go lie down.

sasswagon — Sat, 05 Sep 2009 03:35:50 GMT

I shipped a box of birthday presents to my little brother in England today. Yes, I know his birthday *is* today and thus it kind of sucks that I didn't get the box to the post office until 4pm today... but I suspect he will appreciate the effort put forth by his big sister. Especially since most of the items were things he specifically requested in an email sent to my mom. (My brother, like a lot of younger males, has some serious issues with advance planning - mainly that it never occurs to him to do much. As a result, one of his birthday presents is actually 12 pairs of socks. I'm sure he took SOME socks with him, but I was emphatically informed that he NEEDS MORE SOCKS. If I were going overseas for 9 months, I'd have taken every damn pair of socks I own... but then again, I'm a girl.)

Speaking of socks, I've definitely found the one form of shopping in which I'm not at home - men's basics. I feel lost in those departments, and I was reminded of that when picking up Dan's "low cut athletic socks" today. I'm sort of baffled by the fact that all of this stuff is sold in a form that cannot be tried on. This doesn't matter so much for socks, but for things like t-shirts and underwear... Granted, I know you can't try on women's underwear, but there's usually an option to buy single pairs instead of a multi-pack when trying out a new brand. Last month I bought Tim packs of boxers and tees, and he blithely tossed them in the wash without trying them first even though I'd bought him unfamiliar brands. I could *never* do that, even for what amounts to just a layering tee. If I blindly bought a medium in a brand I'd never worn before, I would have no idea whether it would fit, or if I could even get it on; I might be a medium in one brand and an XL in another. Even if two different shirts with the same size on the tag don't match exactly, I can FEEL the difference, in how the armholes fit and whether the fabric pulls across the chest or not. Has men's clothing really achieved this level of standardization, or are guys just not as concerned with fit?

I've implemented a beauty product buying freeze, by the way. I have something like seven unopened mascaras in the drawer, on top of having at least half a dozen partially used tubes, and the other products - particularly eyeshadow and eyeliner - are out of control. I've got to dig into what the beauty bloggers would call my "stash" and make some of this stuff work.

That said, on to the mascaras:

- MAC Dazzlelash: I have mixed feelings about this, because I really like the mascara - I get some lengthening, nice dark black color, and a smooth application. (I think it's this... smoothness, for lack of a better word, that sets the mid-range and high-end brands apart from the drugstore brands. I have yet to experience the "string of little balls on the lashes" effect with a mascara that cost more than $10.) It also lasts all day - longer than most of my allegedly waterproof liners - without any flaking or smearing, despite being labeled not waterproof but "smudge resistant." However, the brush for Dazzlelash is a pain in the butt. It's a small, tapered cone of a brush, which isn't bad in and of itself, but it gathers a HUGE glob of mascara on both ends of the brush bristles. This means if you angle it wrong, you stick the giant mascara glob to your eyelashes. Of course, you can get it OUT with an eyelash comb, but I prefer not to have to screw around that much, and the globs also make you prone to getting mascara on places other than the eyelashes. I'm hoping I can figure out a way to better scrape the brush, because this is good stuff otherwise.
- Rimmel Sexy Curves Waterproof: I finally found this both in stock and on sale - a rarity for the waterproof version! - and had to buy it because it looked so darned interesting, with the hourglass brush and flaming teal tube. The first thing you notice about this mascara is that it has a weird fragrance. No, Mom, it's not The Smell That Means Your Mascara is Bad; I know that smell extremely well, and it's heralded the disposal of many an otherwise still good mascara. This smells like... tea. Tea with some kind of spice to it. It's not a bad smell, it's just a weird thing to smell coming out of a mascara tube, and it's unique to this particular mascara (this is the third Rimmel I've tried and neither of the others smelled). The brush is definitely an original, and it's probably the least clumpifying of any rubber brush I've ever used. The mascara itself seems very dry, almost mousse-like instead of liquid; there is almost no end-of-brush glob. This doesn't go on as smoothly as the Dazzlelash (its main recent competitor), and honestly I think it makes my lashes look shorter. It's not a bad mascara - especially at 40% off at Walgreens - but it's not my favorite.

sasswagon — Sat, 29 Aug 2009 03:43:54 GMT

Step number one toward feeling old (this month): my little brother, having graduated from college, has taken off to England for an internship. He's doing some sort of lacrosse related thing in Reading, which is apparently in the south of England, and even from across the Atlantic he's still giving my mom fits. ("He mobile updated his facebook! That's international data rates! And when I check the online usage, girls are still texting him!")

This, of course, meant we had to throw him a patented Garage Party for his send-off. Like the ones we had for his high school graduation and my pharmacy school graduation/moving to New York, a Garage Party at my parents' follows a very specific formula. There are two phases to these parties: a Day Phase where all the aunts and uncles and cousins are invited and classic family party food is served, and an After Dark phase where we play beer pong in the garage with the doors closed so the retired cop neighbor doesn't call the police on the gaggle of drunk and disorderly college kids in the yard. A Garage Party must have a sheet cake with a photo of the honoree, at least one keg, and a rented Porta-Potty in the yard (so those who partake of the keg can pee freely without tracking mud into the house or risking public urination charges from the aforementioned retired cop neighbor).

Originally, I wasn't slated to attend this fete. My mom mentioned it in passing to me, but didn't invite me because she figured the CT-Buffalo haul was a bit much for a weekend trip. It was actually Tim who brought it up, asking me the weekend before "Isn't your mom having a party for your brother?" When we pitched this to Mom, she immediately started cleaning the guest room for us, so we took off after work last Friday and landed in Buffalo at about 1am. I will say it's a much easier trip when you can switch drivers, as I only made it about 5 hours behind the wheel before my eyes started crossing. (Mad props to Tim for navigating the construction outside Syracuse in the rain in a car I don't think I've ever let him drive extensively.)

The recurring theme of the weekend (and something we're still joking about a week later) was my stepfather's "go big or go home" approach to planning a party. I may have mentioned the Frank Theory of Cost Estimates in the past - when Frank tells you how much he expects one of his projects to cost, you double that number and round to the nearest hundred, and that's how much it will REALLY cost. Well, Frank apparently overestimates how much people can eat to nearly the same degree he underestimates the cost of building materials. My mom sent him to get corn on the cob, and he wanted to steam clams. We ended up with 40 dozen clams (for MAYBE 10 seafood eaters... my family's not big on fish) and seven CRATES of corn. Apparently, he set out to order seven dozen ears of corn, and some miscommunication took place about the units of corn measure. So we ended up with 28 dozen, which is 336 ears of corn. Corn was cooked and eaten; leftover corn was set out for intoxicated munchers; uncooked corn was offered to each and every partygoer with the motto "thanks for coming - have some complimentary corn!" Tim and I escaped with only six ears, four of which are in the freezer at this moment. If anybody in Buffalo wants some corn, get in touch with my mom, because I think she had a couple dozen left. The leftover clams were mercifully incinerated in a trademark Frank Fire the next day, which is fortunate, because God only knows what you do with clams.

sasswagon — Fri, 14 Aug 2009 23:19:25 GMT

Wow. Okay. Livejournal fail. I haven't even checked my friends page in a full week!

So... What the fuck have I been doing, you ask? Well, I went back to work on 7/27. This has led to my brain hurting a lot of the time - I'm trying to adjust to a new layer of pharmacy software on top of the one I already knew (fortunately they usually play nice together), and I'm trying to reprogram myself into CT controlled substance law. It's not anything that would be that hard on its own, it's more trying to erase the old knowledge (which is pretty well embedded) AND master the new stuff at the same time.

Beyond that, I did a crapload of recreational shopping before going back to work (which probably wasn't the smartest sequence of events, but... whatever). The purchasing phase of Mission: Mascara is WAY ahead of the testing phase. And all the Macy's here have MAC counters! It's extremely dangerous. Yes, I am a hopeless makeup-a-holic. I've accepted this about myself and am considering starting a separate blog to keep track of all this crap.

I like my new apartment, but I'm wondering if we shouldn't have sprung for one of the slightly more expensive ones with an in-unit washer and dryer. There's only one washer/dryer for the floor we live on, and I cannot commit to a full day of eight consecutive loads of laundry. I've been making Tim come with me to the laundromat so we can do all of the laundry simultaneously. Fortunately, we found a laundromat that serves beer at the snack bar, so it's not complete torture. :)

sasswagon — Mon, 20 Jul 2009 01:26:59 GMT

(As always, every mascara tested is the waterproof version unless otherwise specified.)

L'oreal Double Extend (the original, not the beauty tubes one): This one was, at best, meh. I've found that of the drugstore products with two steps - primer and mascara - the primers seem to be really clump-genic, and this was definitely the case here. I also don't think the primer end did much for my lashes, because I got the same kind of length (just fewer clumps) when I used the black side by itself. I might use up the mascara end or I might just toss it to make room in the drawer (since I got this one half off at the closing Rite Aid, I don't feel as compelled to Make It Work).

L'oreal Extra Volume Collagen: And the first true failure from L'oreal emerges. This mascara is just un-fixably clumpy. Instead of going on like a smooth coat, it goes on like little chains of mascara-balls. It seems like something's not right with the brush - the bristles seem sort of randomly pointing off in different directions, instead of the usual neat lines or spirals of most brushes. I couldn't fully de-clump with a comb and I didn't get a lot of length out of it. I feel like a lot of mascaras that claim to be "volumizing" really just put huge gobs of mascara on the eyelashes, and this seems to be what's going on here. I don't think there's much I can do to make this wearable.

Maybelline Pulse Perfection by Define-a-Lash: Yes, I finally cracked and threw down $12.49 because I was dying to try a vibrating mascara, and this is the first one that's not at least thirty bucks. This mascara has the Define-a-Lash brush (I didn't officially test Define-a-Lash, but I used it once about two years ago, and I wasn't too excited. I think the theme may have emerged that rubber brushes don't do a lot for me) and a little motor in the handle that you turn on by holding down a button. The big issue I had with this mascara is that my (admittedly twitchy) eyes FREAK OUT when I get the vibrating wand too close to them. I absolutely can't get this brush down to the roots of my eyelashes while it's turned on without blinking, and blinking gets mascara absolutely everywhere. What ends up happening is that the outer half of my eyelashes looks pretty good (dark, thick, long)... and the inner half is just naked, so there's this weird contrast between the black mascara and my brown eyelashes. I'm glad I got to try this and I'm doubly glad I didn't have to learn this lesson with a $34 model. People with less twitchy eyes than mine might get awesome results with this stuff; for me, I might use it up without turning the motor on just to salvage the investment.

Revlon DoubleTwist: Much like Extra Volume Collagen was the first L'oreal mascara that DID suck... DoubleTwist is the first Revlon mascara I've tried that DIDN'T suck. The prior Revlon models I've tried have tended to shed little mascara balls onto my face and into my eyes, and they also tended to be irritating. DoubleTwist doesn't seem to do either (and I played volleyball with it on), which earns it at least a pass! The odd thing about it - and the characteristic that a lot of other Internet reviewers also seem to hate - is that the two-part brush is HUGE. It's sort of got a football-shaped plastic frame to it that gives you four rows of "comb" bristles, and in between those rows are regular mascara brush bristles. It's definitely tricky to use without poking yourself in the eye or putting on more mascara than you really want to. However, it's fixable with the lash comb, and the end result is pretty nice - some length, good definition, not horribly clumpy. Will definitely keep going with this one.

I have to give a shout out to that Clinique Naturally Glossy mascara again, as well. I've had that tube open for almost two months and it hasn't gotten chunky or developed that "your mascara has turned" paint smell. I found that if I store it standing up on its end, it prevents too much mascara from accumulating in the neck of the tube, thus preventing huge gobs of mascara from getting on the brush and thus into the eyelashes. Definitely well worth the fourteen bucks and, when I grow tired of Mission:Mascara, will be bought again.

sasswagon — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 21:36:45 GMT

... I clicked "post entry," and then realized that I had not even made mention of the Annual Family Picnic! Yes, I drove 7 hours back to Buffalo a week and a half after moving out of state, just so my boyfriend could get roasted by my cousins for an entire afternoon (while consuming copious Canadian beer).

Because it's not relevant to my everyday life, most people don't know that my mom has 13 siblings (11 still living, some half siblings, some whole siblings, but no one actually cares about those parts; there are 14 brothers and sisters, and that's all there is to it). All the living siblings have at least one child, and most of THEIR kids have kids by now - my mom is on the younger end of the family, so I'm near the younger end of the cousins. What this adds up to is a LOT of people, many of whom are still in Buffalo but some of whom have dispersed to other states. The main thing we have in common is our cracked sense of humor. The Annual Family Picnic has been going on in July (it used to be linked to my late grandmother's July 9 birthday) for as long as I can remember, and it generally gets a pretty good turnout. Even Frank, my stepfather who Does Not Do Parties, made an appearance this year.

The running joke of the day was the changing of my boyfriend's name. Backstory: One of my cousins is married to a guy named Gerald, and for the longest time our aunt thought his name was Harold (even addressing a card to "Lori and Harold" at one point). It was an honest mistake that just stuck, and the Gerald/Harold thing has been a running joke in the family for as long as he's been around. So I brought Tim into the tent with the male cousins, and Gerald introduced himself with "Why the hell did you bring him here? Are you trying to scare him away?" I told him, "We're taking bets on what Aunt Linda calls him. I'm picking Ted." Immediately, the surrounding group of people adopted this, yelling "Ted! You're on cooler duty! Bring us some beer!" and similar things. Tim, being a good sport, played along, answering to Tim and Ted equally throughout the day. The best moment, though, was Aunt Linda herself asking me if Ted needed something, then exclaiming, "Wait! His name isn't Ted! I KNEW his name... Oh, now it's going to take forever to get this one straightened out!"

Bonus Family Picnic Quotes:
Tim, on my uncle Tom: "Wow, Dawn, your brother looks like Wilford Brimley!" (He actually looks more like Mike Holmgren... but I digress...)
Frank, on his unscheduled appearance: "Well, I was out working in the yard and thought I could use a cold beer... and then I thought 'Hey! I know where they've got beer!' So I came over."

sasswagon — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 21:20:58 GMT

I kept saying I was going to write a real post and then putting off doing it because it seemed like SO MUCH TO COVER... but eventually it's gonna have to get done. So, I moved to Connecticut at the end of June. If I can say one thing to the readers I have left, it's this: when you move, GET MOVERS. It is SO worth a thousand dollars not to have to carry all your furniture up/down stairs when it's 85 degrees out and you're not really capable of lifting it anyway... hell, it's worth it just not to have to smell yourself in the process. It was easily the best money I have ever spent.

So we got here, the movers brought in my furniture, and my mom cleaned like a madwoman for like 36 hours straight. Then we introduced my mom to Tim's family, which went very well. I think my mom wants to trade me for Tim's sister now. She stuck around until the 4th of July weekend, and then Tim and I were on our own.

Except that Tim has a job and I kind of don't yet. I should've submitted the application for temporary permit to practice pharmacy before I moved, but things were so batshit crazy in Rochester my last two weeks there (packing, having Mom around, everyone on work being on vacation, and the like) that it didn't even occur to me. So I can't actually work because I don't have a pharmacist license. I did already take the CT law exam AND submit the temporary permit application, but they both take some time. I'm referring to it as being on hiatus, but I think Omnicare might still be paying me and HR hasn't emailed me back yet... I definitely got a paycheck for the last week I was there and then also the first week I WASN'T working. Unfortunately it also had some overtime hours in it, so I couldn't just split the check in half. Note to self: call them during normal business hours tomorrow and ask if they want some money back or if they want to take it out of my vacation time.

During my hiatus, I'm... having a difficult time entertaining myself. I have done some shopping, and need to do some more tomorrow (ridiculous coupons in the inbox for this weekend! must get one pair of Fat Pants that I can wear to work while I wait for the gym to kick in!) but it's hard to entertain yourself shopping when you don't know when you'll next get paid. I do go to Target just about every day and buy things like Frosted Mini-Wheats and cleaning supplies, so it's not like I'm out there buying frivolous expensive shoes, but it's still a challenge. I rearranged my bathroom closet and fixed some of the sources of clutter in the bedroom, and I still have a number of mini-projects to do around the house (like shelf liner paper in the kitchen) but... Target is more fun than doing those things.

And that's what I've been up to, kids. Hopefully there will be more to follow, sooner rather than later.

sasswagon — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 16:58:51 GMT

Real post coming soon I swear!! But in the meantime, read this and giggle:

Turns out you CAN have a questionably dirty license plate if you can come up with a plausible explanation!

My favorite vanity plate ever was probably "GARLIC." But "TEACUP," "COUPON," and "AZKABAN" are right up there. Everything I'd possibly want on a vanity plate is probably taken, though.

sasswagon — Sat, 27 Jun 2009 04:08:51 GMT

So Michael Jackson died, and America lost their shit...

I'm a little too young to remember Michael Jackson at his best. I was born the year after Thriller came out. People my age don't remember the ridiculously talented Michael of the late 70s and early 80s - we remember the tabloid legend version, the "Wacko Jacko" on his fifth nose who kept getting inexplicably whiter. I didn't listen to his music until college, and even then only on 80s mixes - I only had the single version of "Bad" on my iPod before American Idol did Jackson Night this spring, which led to the acquisition of a couple more mp3s.

I'm interested in finding out more about his death - especially if it turns out to be secondary to meperidine, as the gossip websites are trumpeting, because that would be the ultimate adverse drug event! - because of all the crazy rumors that have flitted about recently about autoimmune disease, chronic pain, and various other major medical problems that I'd love to see confirmed or denied. I don't think losing him is the tragedy the media has made it into, especially with all the other crazy things that are going on in the world. But he made some truly great music (I still can't play "Black or White" at night, it gets me way too energetic) and did some great things for the music industry in his era, and he'll be missed.

sasswagon — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 03:19:56 GMT

My mom was here for most of the weekend, and we boxed up... I'd say three-quarters of my apartment. All the pictures are off the walls, most of my shoes are packed, and I've been left one coffee mug, a fork, and a spoon to get through the week with. (Well, and paper plates.) It looks sort of desolate in here, with the piles of boxes. Note to self: call the cable people regarding giving my cable box back at the end of the week.

I don't know what time I start work tomorrow... I've been closing/on call on some Mondays, then on vacation, then working my normal daytime shift for a week, then off for post-call, so I honestly have no pattern to follow. And my SP didn't finish the schedule by the time I left on Friday. I'm thinking I'll call at 9am tomorrow and be like "hey, guys, do I start at 9:30 or 12:30 today?" And then if it's 12:30, I'll run back to Macy's and exchange the moisturizer I bought today before work... I said the NOT SPF kind, and she gave me SPF!

Is it bad that I'm too lazy to re-paint my toenails? It's just not fun to stay bent over that far for that long.

sasswagon — Wed, 10 Jun 2009 04:18:07 GMT

I have things to "blog" about - I'm moving at the end of the month, I'm trying (though progress is infinitesimally slow) to transfer jobs, people are getting married, getting dogs, graduating from college, moving to Europe (big props to baby brother for scoring that internship!), and all sorts of things are happening. But what are my hobbies? CLOTHES AND MAKEUP!

My mom and I tore through my closets this weekend with the dual goals of helping one of my cousins reinvent her fashion concept and reducing the amount of stuff we have to pack and haul to Connecticut. I own so many pairs of pointy-toed medium-heeled black shoes it's getting ridiculous. So my cousin scored 6 pairs of shoes and two shopping bags full of sweaters and tops, because she's just a LITTLE smaller than me and she fits perfectly into the stuff I avoid wearing because I feel like it's a tiny bit too tight. I gained some closet space, which is much appreciated around these parts.

I have sampled several mascaras since the last post! Now that I have a stash built up, I have little patience with mascaras I don't like, and I tend to go right to another kind if I'm not happy within a day or two of cracking open a new tube. So, without further adieu...

- Maybelline Lash Stiletto. I'm a sucker for claims of lengthening, so even though this doesn't come in waterproof, when Rite Aid ran a buy-one-get-one-free mascara sale I had to pick one up. I then proceeded to hesitate to open it for almost a week due to fear of its non-waterproof-ness. After I got up the guts to give it a try, I have to say it was pretty good. Few if any clumps on application, and while the brush doesn't seem to have fabulous "grip and extend" properties, it doesn't glue your lashes together or pick up huge amounts of mascara. It does actually stay on pretty well, though it's definitely not in the league of the waterproof formulas. I usually put on mascara around 9am, and I had a few gray smudges and/or eyelash-shaped mascara pieces under my eyes when I washed everything off at 9pm. However, the raccoon eyes weren't nearly as bad as they were with the expensive mascaras (coughDiorcough). I liked it, but I'd probably only buy another tube if they came out with a waterproof version - especially since this is priced at the high end of the Maybelline range.
- Revlon Fabulash. This one has a truly weird brush - it's a spiral design, but the spiral bristles are the only one that stick out appreciably from the wand, and I felt like if my eyelashes touched down in between those raised bristles I got clumps. Of course, I think I got clumps from this anyway. I only wore this a couple of times because it seemed to irritate my eyes (I'm blaming the mascara because I wore it with completely different liners/shadows each time). It also didn't stay on very well, though I wonder if this was a side effect of the "sand in the eyes" feeling I had every time I wore it - I probably rubbed as much of it off as came off on its own, because it didn't seem to end up under my eyes. I don't outright reject a mascara very often, but this one just did not go well for me.
- Clinique Naturally Glossy. Okay, I'm really not sure what this mascara is SUPPOSED to do - Clinique promotes it as exactly what the name implies, a natural-look mascara with a "glossy" finish. I did *not* notice any "glossy" look to my eyelashes, but this seriously looks awesome on. (It's not just me, either, because it looks great on Erin too!) Absolutely no clumps at all (the brush is sort of... cucumber-shaped, with closely spaced bristles) and just enough lengthening to be noticeable. It's not big on volumizing, but this meshes with my personal preferences. It's not labeled waterproof but I've worn it for 12 hours, 2 days in a row, with NO undereye circles. I really like how this mascara makes my eyelashes look and I'll probably buy it again. This one also qualifies as "the cheapest expensive mascara" - it was $14 a tube.

I'm starting to see the finish line here. I've been through 20 or so mascaras so far, I've got at least 5 more in a makeup bag to try, and some patterns are becoming evident. I'm not seeing a distinct advantage in paying for prestige-brand mascaras, especially since some of the crappier candidates have been the most expensive ones. L'Oreal hasn't had a bad one yet, and Maybelline's worst offerings have been "meh" rather than bad. With the exception of the Clinique one, I really see myself sticking in the under-$10 mascara market in the future - which is good news for my personal finances, I suppose, though bad news for my local Sephora.

sasswagon — Mon, 25 May 2009 03:18:50 GMT

So I think I have a corn - I probably posted about this when it first flared up a couple of months ago, or at least wrote a post in my head. Anyway, I have a... something... on my right little toe. It doesn't LOOK like anything - it's just red. But it hurts like the dickens when pressure is applied, meaning I basically can't wear shoes. And by "shoes," I mean "most footwear with a closed toe," not just girlie shoes. I'm afraid I've permanently deformed my toe! I'm calling it a corn mostly because it doesn't hurt if I put a corn cushion over it; I have no idea what it actually is, and for all I know it's a tumor, or a sixth toe trying to sprout. I'm rational enough to KNOW it's from ten years of wearing stupidly narrow/high shoes every day, and I'm also irrational enough to continue wearing the same damn shoes. Essentially, I could do something about it, but I'm not, so I'm basically just documenting the beginning of my podiatric downfall for posterity.

Also, I can't decide whether I want to keep my hair the way it is for the long haul or grow it out long enough that I could actually put it up without the entire front half falling in my face. The former would require me to trust a person other than my mom to cut my hair after I move (which has not worked out really well in the past), but the latter might put me on the path back to the high school perma-ponytail rut. It shouldn't be a big decision but it is.

sasswagon — Mon, 18 May 2009 01:25:57 GMT

My brother graduated from college this weekend. He's 3 1/2 years younger than me. I feel old...

I have tried *two* mascaras since my last post! Blame my lack of patience with unopened things - it's definitely a test of my willpower not to crack all of them open at once. So...

-Rimmel Eye Magnifier. I bought this because it was mis-tagged at Target - I swore I wasn't buying any more test mascaras for a while, but this one was on a peg marked $2.24 and I thought it might be discontinued. It actually rang up $5.29. Anyway, I'm okay with this, but I don't love it - it's got a rubber brush that's sort of aggressive-looking and spiky, but the bristles seem too far apart to keep it from occasionally pasting two adjacent lashes together. The lengthening/"vertical lift" don't stand out in comparison to any of the other similarly priced ones I've used. Overall, it's another one that I'll use till it turns but probably won't buy again.

-Revlon Lash Fantasy. This was a half-price buy at the closing Rite Aid, which was the best possible way to acquire it. It, too, has the rubber brushes, but it's one of those two-phase primer-plus-color mascaras. I've never been thrilled with the double-ended mascaras because the shaft of the brush is shorter, making it a little too easy for me to bump my nose with the tube while doing my inner lashes. This one is not as bad as the Maybelline XXLs in that regard, but the brushes themselves have short, thin, widely spaced rubber bristles that seem a bit clump-genic. It looks pretty on once you get it on, although it can be tricky to cover all of the primer with the mascara (tell me why they don't just put some black coloring in the primer end?). I got away without using the lash comb, but I think it might have been of help. The thing that sucked about this mascara was, while it lengthened noticeably, when I went to take it off at the end of the day, the ends of my eyelashes were all crooked and bent. The "extra length" created by the coats of primer and mascara doesn't stay pointing the same direction as the lashes, which I found a little weird. I'll probably use the mascara end without the primer a few more times, but if this hadn't been half off I'd be sort of pissed at having dropped $10 on it.

Most disturbing commercial ever

sasswagon — Thu, 14 May 2009 14:32:41 GMT

And it's on like every five minutes on ESPN at night.

The funniest part of this, for me, is that the actor in the commercial was the patient on House a couple of episodes ago, and I just couldn't think of him as anything but "Scott."

quote of the day! how long has it been?

sasswagon — Wed, 13 May 2009 23:27:58 GMT

From a Jon Heyman opinion piece on si.com:

"My favorite part of the Roger Clemens interview on the Mike & Mike in the Morning radio show Tuesday came when he said steroids could be bad for him because of his family history, and then cited his stepfather's heart attack as evidence."

[snort]