Dior Ebony with Confetti Tazmanian Devil

Today I am a very sad panda. I've had to cancel my flight back home to New York because I am sick as a dog. It's going to be a lonely Thanksgiving for me... :(

Confetti Tazmanian Devil over Dior Ebony

Trying out my brand new iPhone 4S camera. Not bad in non-well-lit scenarios (and while lying in bed, too dizzy to move)! Super cheerful manicure (three coats of Tasmanian Devil over two coats of Dior Ebony). What is it about glitter that makes life just a tiny bit better?

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OPI Red Shatter over OPI Rally Pretty Pink (Serena Williams collex)

OPI Red Shatter over OPI Rally Pretty Pink

I have been so pleasantly surprised by the gorgeousness of the Serena Williams collection -- I think I may have almost all of them -- but Red Shatter was a disappointment. First of all, Rally Pretty Pink is, as the name suggests, really damn pretty. And Red Shatter kind of is a dull jelly... which just makes the manicure look lifeless. :( I wouldn't hesitate to try out Red Shatter on, say, a white creme but it seems a waste to use it on an interesting shimmery polish.

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Nicole ...Spotted! over Dior Nirvana

Nicole ...Spotted! over Dior Nirvana

Nicole ...Spotted! (one of the dumber polish names, imo) is multicolored (blue, gold) and multisized glitter (some hex, some micro) suspended in a turquoise jelly. The polish alone is pretty sheer so I layered it over Dior Nirvana, whose color is pretty much a perfect match for the Nicole jelly. It was less sparkly than I expected it to be, leading me to suspect that it might actually be a better layering polish over a contrasting color. Still, it was a nice way to extend my Nirvana manicure for another day before I got bored of it. :)

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China Glaze Fault Lines Crackle over Huemorista Hidden Rainbow

I wasn't ready to take off my Hidden Rainbow mani so I put ChG Fault Lines over it.

China Glaze Fault Lines over Huemorista Hidden Rainbow

Errr. This was not pretty. Is there a reason this dried so dull and cracked so sadly? C'mon, it was a purple shimmer crackle! That's practically a formula for gorgeous, no? :( This is one thick coat of Fault Lines.

Fault Lines over Hidden Rainbow

Yeah, doesn't look better in closeup... at all. Yuck.

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Essie Smooth Sailing and OPI Navy Shatter

I never thought that eBay would be my preferred outlet for buying any nail polish but gotta say, it does me well for Essie. (The trick is to, um, buy a lot and order from a seller who has a great combined shipping deal.)

Essie Smooth Sailing

Photos just don't do this justice. It's actually a kind of chunky iridescent shimmer that sparkles blue and pink and purple and is so very, very, very pretty. Great application, two coats. This is the third day of wear.

Closeup of Smooth Sailing

You can sort of see the great shimmer in this photo. Just imagine it all over the nail...

Essie Smooth Sailing and OPI Navy Shatter

Am loving the jelly crackles. Some people might be annoyed that there's such a difference between one and two coats of the polish -- the discrepancy is most obvious on my middle finger -- but I kind of like the variation it gives to the polish. At one coat, it's obviously a blue jelly; at two, it turns more into dark navy (almost black but not quite).

Closeup of Smooth Sailing and Navy Shatter

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Nubar Baby Sprout and Essie Kisses and Bises

Despite its imperfections (umm, I don't know why my Poshe has developed black lint... wtf??) I loved both of these NOTDs.

Nubar Baby Sprout

A little bit on the stark side, Baby Sprout is a light pastel green with very fine pearly shimmer. It does appear creme in lower lights but as soon as the sun hits it, the pearly finish comes out. This was three coats (on the second day of wear, I believe).

Nubar Baby Sprout and Essie Kisses and Bises

And I was just OBSESSED with this manicure. I had read that Kisses and Bises was really a very neat layering polish but I didn't think that this pink/purple shimmer in a mostly clear base would wow me as much as it did. It added such depth and interest to Baby Sprout! It's subtle and playful at the same time. Love it. I used one coat of Baby Sprout.

Closeup of Baby Sprout and Kisses and Bises

See! The fabulous! shimmer. :) Ignore the freakin' lint. :(

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Essie Braziliant and OPI Blue Shatter

Hey, I'm alive, I exist. Really. Summer has FINALLY arrived for me -- except not really because I do actually have a ton of work to do and am going to France in two weeks for a conference -- and I have a pretty substantial backlog of NOTDs that I have to post! (Plus a lot of swatching to do... alas, I don't think I'll be able to resume swatching until after I get back from France.)

Essie Braziliant

This was such a disappointment for me. It was this really bright orange in the bottle with this fabulous magenta shimmer... and then I put it on and discover that it just looks coral in most lights. (Oddly, once I uploaded the photos to blogger, it looks a lot more red...) You can see the magenta up close (though I wasn't able to capture it in the photos) but it just sort of mixes with the orange and turns into coral... and I just don't look good in most corals. Application was great though: two coats. This photo was taken on day 2 or 3.

Essie Braziliant and OPI Blue Shatter

My SO took one close look at my nails and asked, "Why did you choose this color combination?"

I answered, "Because it's the ugliest color combination."

He replied, "OK. Just making sure you knew that."

But I love it. I would not mix blue and orange in any other situation but my nails but I just love this shatter *coughcrackle!cough* mani. This was taken on Day 2 of the shatter mani (which would be day 4 of the Braziliant mani). I used one coat of the blue shimmer shatter and it crackled beautifully. Why can't all crackle polishes crackle nicely? (Oh, and it wasn't clumpy. Thank goodness.)

Braziliant and Blue Shatter closeup

So I have a question for y'all: I have several boxes that are CHOCK FULL of nail polishes that I need to get off my hands. (I'm sure there will be more after my annual summer de-stash.) Some are older, some are more recent. The vast majority have only been used once; a small fraction have had 1/4th decanted from them. Most cost between $1 and $10. Many, many different brands. I do plan on selling the ones that I paid many pretty pennies for individually (though I won't charge pretty penny prices, I promise) but there are at least 300 polishes that don't fall into the "oh man, I spent too much on this one polish, I have to recoup this loss" category. I just don't have the time to sell all of them off individually.

I know my $10 (+$5 shipping) small flat-rate grab-boxes have been popular in the past. But even selling these polishes by the dozen is a daunting task. Would there be any interest in my selling medium flat-rate grab-boxes? I need to pack one up properly to see how many I can fit into a single box but I estimate it to be between 40-50 polishes. The price will probably work out to be about $1.50 a polish (plus shipping), a good mix of brands, colors and finishes guaranteed. (And seriously, no one will get a box even half full of polishes that cost me less than $3.) It's a steep price but for those who want to build their stash quickly... I mean, it's a stash-in-a-box. Open it up and voila, a decent-sized stash for a fraction of its retail price.

If I do go with the medium flat-rate grab-box idea, after selling a few, I'll probably be offering small flat-rate grab-envelopes (which can reliably hold 20 polishes, price TBD). ...there's plenty of nail polish to go around!

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TiNS The Neptune and China Glaze Lightening Bolt Crackle

TiNS makes the most incredible glitterbombs. Alas they are fairly expensive and rare in the US so I have to rely on... well, an MUAer by the name of TerribleTerra. She gets tons of polishes from Asia, sells the ones she doesn't want... and over the years, I must've purchased around 100 polishes from her. Nearly all my Asian polishes -- with the exception of the ones I purchased this year from Taipei -- are from her.

TiNS The Neptune

Cobalt blue jelly, chunky (but not in a dull and icky way) with different sizes of holo glitter. This was two coats and on the third day of wear (as you can see from the tipwear/shrinkage). Most TiNS glitter polishes sparkle without the benefit of actual sunlight. I. just. love.

Close-up of The Neptune

ALL sorts of holo glitter: larger hex glitter, smaller round glitter, square glitter... glitter galore!

TiNS The Neptune with China Glaze Lightening Bolt on top

This didn't turn out as well as I hoped it would. Part of it is that the white crackle never quite looks as opaque as one feels like it should. Part of it was that the contrast wasn't striking enough.

BUT! Take a peek at this pic. I wish all the nails turned out like my ring finger:

Crackle polishes were made for macro mode, don't you think?

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Hey, want to see the worst NOTD I've had in a long time? (CND Brigitte with Anna Effect, Jason Wu collection)

I was really into the idea of the Jason Wu/CND collaboration. So much so that I actually bought it for full retail price and then some from Cult Beauty (because I was getting the Rococo Gold Leaf polish anyway and if I was going to pay for across-the-pond shipping... etc).

I like interesting textures. I like taupey, underplayed colors. I really like CND's new polishes. (Though I just saw some old glitters from 2008 on the Pretty Random blog and holy effin' crap, I so want. Even though my experience with old CNDs was pretty bad.) So when I heard about a whole collection of sophisticated shroomy types of colors with an Effects polish that promised a "tweedy" texture, I was pretty excited. (No one else was but I was.)

And then I put this on. I mean... I've been having bad mani days (much like bad hair days but worse because I can see my nails at any time and I need a mirror to see my hair) but this took the cake.

Behold, the cake:

CND Brigitte (Colour) and Anna (Effect)

Mauvey, taupey... warm and sort of dull. But that's not the worst part. The worst part is the bubbling. This polish did not enjoy my Gelous bc and/or Diamont tc and reacted very angrily to me when I made them all play together. Also, what happened to the fantastic CND creme formula? Some of the core CND Colour polishes are simply perfection (completely opaque and smooth in two coats) with a dummy-proof brush. This, in comparison, was watery, thick, and needed three coats (which is not desirable in a polish meant to be layered underneath another).

Actually... no, I change my mind. The worst part was the "tweedy" texture, the Anna polish. In the bottle, it looks a lot like a matte topcoat (and indeed, it does mattefy). But when applied, it mostly looks like I stuck a hand with wet nails into the pocket of an old wool coat. The little linty shards coming off the nail... I mean, that just kind of put it over the top.

Closeup of Brigitte and Anna

A bubbly, hairy manicure. Couldn't wait to take this one off and I kind of didn't want to post it... except... it's a bubbly, hairy manicure and that's kind of funny in itself.

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OCC Perpetual and Rococo Gold Leaf

I had said I didn't want it. But in the end, I bought it anyway. Yes, Rococo Gold Leaf, I'm lookin' at you.

OCC Perpetual and Rococo Gold Leaf

When I put on this combination, I was so disappointed. I thought Perpetual would be this awesome, semi-neon purple creme. It turned out to be very jelly. Three coats, definite VNL. It didn't apply smoothly, had bald spots and after thinking I'd be getting an awesomely pigmented creme (something OCC is extraordinarily good at), I wasn't too happy with it. But I actually ended up loving it. There's something very seductive about the jelly squish look.

As for Rococo Gold Leaf. Holy heck, it is HARD to get that gold leaf onto the brush. (Once you get it on the brush, it transfers somewhat easily to the nail.) Picking it out with something hard like a toothpick made a lot of the larger pieces fall apart. The best way I could figure out was to shake it up a bit and to sweep the gold leaf that gets stuck in the neck onto the brush.

What you see on the nail is... three coats? (Like I said, it's hard to get on the brush.) But I think I like it. I thought I'd hate the manicure (between the jelly and the sparse gold leaf) but I was quite attached to it by the end of the first day. The gold leaf turned out to be incredibly... gold. Such a rich color (probably because it's real gold leaf) with a beautiful texture that, even minute, was obvious.

Closeup of Perpetual and Gold Leaf

Somehow it became one of my favorite manicures of late. :)

(OCC Perpetual was sent to me for review by OCC. Rococo Gold Leaf was purchased personally.)

Anyway... today is the wedding day of one of my friends and I'm sad that I couldn't make it to the ceremony and reception. (It's kind of on the opposite side of the continent.) So I just wanted to wish her a wonderful, wonderful day. And that her Shellac holds up (which I'm sure it will, because it's pretty tenacious) and looks fabulous peeping out from her Manolos. She probably isn't reading this right now -- at least I hope she's not -- but I wanted to send happy thoughts (and sanity vibes -- it's a big wedding she's planned) towards her out into the void anyway. Good luck, babe. It's gonna be a great day. :)

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Sally Hansen Problem Child: Happy Mother's Day!

Look, I'm alive... and have polished nails. Who knew? (I've barely known. I think I've changed my nails three times in the last three weeks.)

In honor of Mother's Day...

Sally Hansen Problem Child

I'm not the biggest fan of the SH Complete line: the brush can be a bit too thick and the pastels never go over well (too streaky). But I love their dark shimmery colors. They apply so perfectly. If you apply thick coats, you can get away with one coat but this mani was two coats. It looks like a generic dark purple shimmer until you look really closely: it's actually chock full of blue and pink microglitter (or maybe just very bright shimmer) with coppery flakies! I wouldn't have thought it'd make a good combination, but it was lovely. Also, this manicure dried completely in less than ten minutes... and then lasted over eight days without chipping.

Close-up of Problem Child

But wearing a mani for eight days gets boring. So then I decided to layer Clarins 230 over it to see if any magic would occur. (Eh, it did not. Hence, no picture.) But I did have a bottle of China Glaze Broken Hearted crackle polish near me so on it went:

China Glaze Broken Hearted over Sally Hansen Problem Child (and Clarins 230)

If you click for a closeup, the cracks in the polish look a bit like sparkly lava. Sort of.

Well, my mother is finally coming back to the States from Taipei tomorrow (now that ALL the funerary ceremonies are done... you know... a month after my grandfather's passing) so I have no one to call for mother's day. I'm sending her a "Welcome Home" bouquet of flowers though to be delivered on Tuesday.

The past two weeks since I got back from Taipei have been such a blur. I seemed to have gotten a lot of nail polish. (More sparklies from Taipei, picked up a lot of Anna Sui at Duty Free, did the Zoya Exchange, ordered off of an etailer, bought Chanel Mimosa, and splurged on some Diors -- haven't decided whether I want the whole Pirates of the Caribbean collection. Probably not. Just a couple of colors. I REALLY want the Serena Williams Glam Slam France set.) This is just pathological because I don't have time to even really do my nails this quarter.

Hey, I needed something to do while procrastinating from making a poster for a grad school research symposium that I only had two days to prepare for. The "leaving it to last minute" thing was real smart of me.

Now til the end of the quarter is going to be hell.

• TA-wise: one more midterm, five more homework assignments, three more worksheets, three more sections, a couple more pop quizzes, and a final exam. TA hell will be largely over by June 2nd.
• Psychonomics 2011 abstract is due June 1st. My advisor and I hope to submit my newest study, whose results are very promising. I should start writing that today.
• Analyze the results of Exp 2 (currently running) for the June 1st deadline.
• Create and run Exp 3 and have preliminary results for the June 1st deadline.
• Do preliminary corpus analysis for another, completely separate experiment.
• Find an RA for the summer.
• Revise/resubmit a paper on the research I did the first two years of grad school to a journal before their imposed (90 day) July deadline. This is going to involve many hours of recoding and reanalyzing data. Not looking forward to it.

I just want to go back to sleep.

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China Glaze Starboard layered with Lippmann Boom Boom Pow!

Lippmann Boom Boom Pow layered over China Glaze Starboard

I wish I could have properly captured this manicure. It really doesn't look like just haphazard pieces of glitter in shimmery gold (but very sheer) base. It gave it a really lovely and somewhat unusual look; from arm's length, it looked as if I had put on very fine gold leaf over Starboard.

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Couldn't bear to take OPI Jasper Jade off... so I put Clarins 230 on top of it

It's like the dance of the rare polishes... Between what I paid for Jasper Jade (~$6) and Clarins 230 (~$50)... this manicure ALMOST made up of two expensively (but not crazily) priced nail polishes.

Clarins 230 over OPI Jasper Jade

'scuse the many pictures! Whenever I take a photo of a polish that's as multichromatic as 230, I always feel the need to include ones that show "just a little more green" or "look, the brownish red instead of the orangeish red!" The green of Jasper Jade really shows through the edges of the nails.

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