Expensive makeup that sucks

all hail Freckle

With high-end makeup, the packaging is almost always nicer, but the quality isn't always better. Prestige brand eyeliners are worse than drugstore brand eyeliners. I have purchased eyeliner pencils from Buxum and Urban Decay, and I hate them.

• They are too thick/wide and do not come to a point when sharpened
• they come off onto my fingers when I touch my eyes despite longevity claims
• the supposedly long-wearing eyeliners migrate to my undereyes regardless of my air conditioned climate, giving me raccoon eyes 
• despite this they are EXTREMELY difficult to remove with most makeup wipes and removers, forcing me to scrub at my delicate eye skin
• The Buxom eyeliner is a dry and thick consistency and pulls on my eyelids
• The UD pencils do glide on but irritate my eyes when I use them on the waterline. What is the purpose of a so-called 24/7 long-wearing waterproof eyeliner pencil that cannot be used on the waterline????? 

These disappointments cost $17 and $22 each, respectively. The UD pencils were in a set that was on sale, but still.

I've also used a mini size of the Marc Jacobs Highliner Gel Eye Crayon (full size $25), which was probably the worst eyeliner I've ever used. It had all of the same problems as listed above, plus it wouldn't even do a complete line on my eyelid because it was so dry and patchy. You could argue that the full size would be better quality, but mini sizes of prestige makeup items are given away as gifts with purchases in order to get you to fall in love with them and buy the full-sized product, so I don't think that argument holds up. I had the exact same issues with the terrible mini IT Cosmetics' No-Tug Waterproof Anti-Aging Gel Eyeliner ($22 full size). It definitely tugged, and that probably made my eyes age.

My Rimmel kohl/scandaleyes eyeliners, which are like $5, glide on like a dream and stay fairly well. So do Colourpop's eyeliner pencils, which are $5.50.

I've also bought a Too Faced liquid eyeliner marker, which was like $17, and it:

• was extremely watery 
• lacked almost all pigment
• dried up in the tube incredibly soon

My Physicians Formula liquid eyeliner pen, however, is like $11 and is so much better (it even has a brush tip!).

While it worked fine, I found that IT Cosmetics' "universal" brow pencil ($24 full size) was too grey and light for my dark brown eyebrows. For that, you're better off using one of Nyx or L.A. Girl or e.l.f.'s eyebrow pencils, which you can get to match your eyebrow color and only pay $3-10.

I follow beauty vloggers, and I've heard several of them rave about Ofra Cosmetics liquid lipsticks and how long-lasting they were. Ulta had a sale once, so I bought a couple.

• They did not dry down, despite being a thin formula and being given plenty of time. 
• They disappeared at the first touch of food or drink. I'm talking completely disappearing when I drank some water, no ring around the lips even. It was as if it had never been applied.
• They transferred on my fingers, cup, etc.
• They did not last, at all. 

They were $18 full price, and I bought them for $9 on sale!! I returned them. So disappointing, since the colors were gorgeous.

I was also disappointed at Stila's "stay all day" liquid lipstick ($22). I put it over lipliner and it gave me ring-around-the-lips after eating. I tried it alone and it still didn't last through food.

It was the same with Kaja's "high-pigment lip stain" ($18), which was more of a moussey liquid lipstick. I put it on and went to a potluck 15 minutes later, and it was gone. It didn't even stain my lips. It's supposed to be matte, but it wasn't really that either.

The Urban Decay Vice liquid lipstick in the shade Purgatory was patchy, drying and uncomfortable. Wet N Wild has a liquid lipstick in a similar dark metallic burgundy shade, and even if it's just as bad, it's only $5.

If it's not going to be long-lasting and will come off anyway, I recommend Colourpop's liquid lipsticks ($6 or so) or Nyx's liquid lipsticks ($5-9). Heck, Wet N Wild and e.l.f. have liquid lipsticks and they're like $5 too. There are a few drugstore brands that have actual long-wearing liquid lipsticks, such as CoverGirl and Maybelline. These come with special lip balms or clear glosses to extend the liquid lipstick's life, and are usually around $10.

Have you noticed that high-end lipsticks' bullets are shorter than drugstore lipsticks? I haven't been able to compare every single brand out there, but my Too Faced and Bésame Cosmetics lipsticks' ($17-25) bullets are shorter than my Wet N Wild and Essence lipsticks ($1-5).

Physicians Formula is a drugstore brand, but its Murumuru Butter Blushes are expensive ($13). I tried the lightest shade, which was a lovely natural soft pink in the pan, and it was so pale it wouldn't show up on me. It wasn't shimmery enough to use as a highlighter, either. What a disappointment. The shimmery pink blush I bought from e.l.f., however, is $3 and looks great. To be fair, I have also bought a pale pink shimmery blush from e.l.f. before that was too pale to be a blush and not shimmery enough to be a highlighter, but the disappointment was less because I only paid $1.

Bobbi Brown's Retouching Face Pencil ($35!!), which was clearly made to be used as a highlighter, was very dry and chunky-glittery, and didn't look good on the face. Wet N Wild and e.l.f. have some very nice and cheap highlighter sticks/crayons that glow and shimmer beautifully.

It's like some lady said on the internet, at the end of the day it all goes down the drain (as you wash your face), so you might as well save your money.

Book review: Curioddity by Paul Jenkins

I bought Curioddity from the dollar store because the cover and the summary were intriguing.
Amazon summary:
Will Morgan is a creature of habit―a low-budget insurance detective who walks to and from work with the flow of one-way traffic, and for whom imagination is a thing of the distant past. When a job opportunity enters the frame in the form of the mysterious Mr. Dinsdale―curator of the ever so slightly less-than-impressive Curioddity Museum―Will reluctantly accepts the task of finding a missing box of levity (the opposite of gravity). What he soon learns, however, is that there is another world out there―a world of magic we can only see by learning to un-look at things―and in this world there are people who want to close the Curioddity museum down. With the help of his eccentric new girlfriend Lucy, Will will do everything he can to deliver on his promise to help Mr. Dinsdale keep the Curioddity Museum in business.

Sounds cool, doesn't it? I love books about finding hidden magic and museums, so I was sold. It sat on my bookshelf for a while, then in my mailbox waiting for me to grab and read it during a reference desk shift, until I finally did.

I enjoyed this book, although not quite as much as I thought. It started off boring and depressing, then sped up and because more interesting, just like Will's life. The writing style was clearly trying to be clever and funny, but came off as kind of jerky (the movement, not the adjective form of jerk or the meat), at least until the story picked up and I got caught up in it. The author has definitely read Douglas Adams' The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy series, and you see their influence in the most fast-paced, high stakes parts of the books. It's not as good as Adams, of course. There was a running gag that involved Will getting hit on the head with a heavy object again and again, which I did not find funny. I did find the smartphone with the sentient AI amusing, once we got past the tedious "old man yells at technology" bit we inexplicably get despite Will being 32 and not an old man.

Will's dull life is explained by his parents. His mother was a dazzling scientist who taught him about magic and wonder and conspiracy theories (idk) who died? in a physics accident. His grieving father banned all magic, wonder and science and pressured him heavily into living a stable, safe, and predictable life identical to his own. There's the usual "parent's desire for child's safety/a certain profession in order to not lose the child actually pushes child away" thing, but I won't go into it. Surprisingly, Will's mother's "death" isn't solved; perhaps Jenkins has another Curioddity book in the works? It didn't feel like a beginning of a series.

Mr. Dinsdale is the typical kinda crazy kinda wise kooky old man who has a connection with magic or whatever and teaches our hero to see the world differently etc. etc. You get it. Lucy, Will's love interest and girlfriend of all of one (1) date, is basically a manic pixie dream girl who dresses like a hippie, including wearing an oft-mentioned anklet, and says stuff like "groovy!" and "epic fail!", often in the same sentence. Both these statements date the book, and I found them cringy. Her personality basically just consists of her being bubbly and up for anything. This is unsurprising because male authors are notoriously bad at fleshing out female characters, especially love interests. They make them pretty and quirky and then stop there. Given how boring Will is, I don't understand Lucy's attraction to him, especially given his behavior. Such is the mystery of the MPDG/depressed guy's relationship. Lucy's magic/thrift shop and the Curioddity museum have some magical space-time connection that isn't really explained, despite my wishing it would be.

Anyway, I enjoyed this book and would recommend it to while away an afternoon. You need a strong tolerance for ~*magic is everywhere if you know where to look*~ type stories, as well as fantasy/science fiction hybrid stories. I liked it but not enough to be sure I'll keep it, since I have such limited shelf space.

Cover notes: I like the cover, although it is definitely for a different book, one much scarier than this one. There are no isolated eyes or eye motifs in this book, and Will never wears a hat or carries an umbrella. I like the colors and font though. The book is new enough that there are no other covers to compare this one to.

Score: 4 out of 5 stars
Read in: early November
From: dollar store
Format: hardcover
Status: giving away probably

Book review: Harriet the Spy by Louise Fitzhugh

Heavy spoilers throughout, I guess

October was a dry reading month. I discovered a new game app (to be reviewed later) that sucked me in and killed any desire I had to read. I had to work on Halloween night, though, and grabbed this book from the children's books section of the library where I work, so I could read it at the desk. Harriet the Spy has pretty much always been on my radar as a children's classic, but I've never read it.

Amazon summary:
Harriet M. Welsch is a spy. In her notebook, she writes down everything she knows about everyone, even her classmates and her best friends. Then Harriet loses track of her notebook, and it ends up in the wrong hands. Before she can stop them, her friends have read the always truthful, sometimes awful things she’s written about each of them. Will Harriet find a way to put her life and her friendships back together?

I read this in one sitting. There was plenty to like, even for an adult who's already forgotten a lot about being a child. While I journaled infrequently as a child, I nonetheless understood Harriet's impulse to write down and comment on everything that happened. There was this one part where Harriet was playing with her parents and then abruptly stopped to write down in her journal was was happening and how she was feeling, and then looked up to see her parents staring at her like she was an alien from outer space, concerned about how abnormal her reaction was. I felt that keenly, as a weird kid whose parents didn't understand her. Harriet sounds like she may have been on the spectrum, as she found it difficult to interact with others without her trusty notebook, kept such a strict schedule that Ole Golly would have to make sure she wasn't wearing the same thing every day, and she always had a tomato sandwich for lunch. She preferred writing to socializing, and did not like having to follow social convention. Here are two excellent    articles on the matter (I only read the first).

I also remember having a similar impulse to spy, although nowhere near to the extent that Harriet did. She actually snuck into a rich lady's house and hid in the dumbwaiter in order to spy on her! Her spying was rather privacy-violating and nosy, and her observation skills were combined with her age-typical lack of empathy. I was unsurprised when her classmates took her frank, often mean comments personally and shunned her. I did think the extent of their punishment went too far for what she actually did. When you pick up someone's journal with the word PRIVATE on the cover, you know you are transgressing by reading it, even/especially as an 11 year old. If you read something mean about yourself, I can see being mad at the author and maybe not talking to them for a week or so, but they actually made an anti-Harriet club (which lasted for weeks, atypical of children of that age) and had a parade of haterism in front of her outside of school! All of the adults were clueless, but I would have liked one of them to point out that when you read someone's diary or eavesdrop, you deserve whatever bad things you read or hear about yourself. To be honest, I'm shocked no one leaned over her shoulder to read what she was writing in class way before this, kids being what they are.

Besides her classmates, household, and the rich lady, Harriet spied on an older, cat-hoarding man and an Italian family who owned a grocery store. Harriet's rich WASP background showed itself in how she looked down on her working class subjects and found their lives and circumstances exotic. (To be fair, Harriet looked down on nearly everybody.) The family's portrayal was of course rife with stereotyping (like Harriet, Louise Fitzhugh came from an affluent WASPy background, and this book was published in the early 1960s). It didn't sit right with me that this little rich girl was spying on and judging a family who were going through things she would never go through or understand. Because her spying was done in secret, none of the adults in her life were able to tell her she was wrong for doing that.

I found Harriet and her nanny Ole Golly to be interesting characters with an familiar yet unique relationship dynamic. Plenty of well to do children have nannies in books, even stern or opinionated ones, but Harriet actually loved and respected Ole Golly. The book changes roughly halfway when Ole Golly falls in love and gets married, leaving Harriet. This sets the stage for the things that happen to Harriet, in my opinion. No one realizes that Harriet is grieving the loss of her actual parent, as Ole Golly was far more of a parent to her than her real parents were. I wasn't surprised at the leaving or moving away (Harriet was rather old to have a nanny), but Harriet and Ole Golly could have written to each other, and should have! Harriet handled this severe rupture to her schedule and life badly. Her class reading her notebook and judging her wouldn't have affected her so badly if she'd had Ole Golly to help her. She basically fell apart when that happened, claiming to be sick so she could stay home from school, lashing out, acting out in class, etc. Her parents, unused to actually parenting, freaked out and ineffectually tried to help her, even taking her to a child psychologist. A letter from Ole Golly arrives and sets Harriet straight and encourages her, and she starts to mend her relationships with her former best friends. The school decides to channel Harriet's compulsive writing by allowing her to take over the 6th grade newspaper, which seemed to be published daily? Harriet's spying and her observations on her subjects were outlined in the newspaper, which became very popular with her class.

This, to me, was unsatisfactory. Ole Golly should have given Harriet more of a heads-up that she was leaving, knowing her love of routine. She should have had a proper goodbye with Harriet, instead of telling her never to cry and then jumping in a taxi. I don't see Harriet's junior tabloid being popular with her classmates, as it was all about people they didn't know, and any school worth its salt would have read it and stopped Harriet from printing only gossip.

Also, this doesn't really fit anywhere, but as a twenty-first century educator I found it unsettling that Harriet's scientist bestie wanted to blow up the school and maybe the world (people from the early sixties would have found both the school blowing up and the girl scientist silly and extremely unlikely to happen). Harriet's other bestie was a boy who was basically the single parent to a slacker writer father. The boy budgeted, did the grocery shopping, cooking, cleaning, etc. while the father "wrote" (slept) and partied. I was livid at the level of neglect this poor child lived with.

In all, I found this an interesting book that probably would have been too weird and sad for me as a child. I think it might be helpful to slightly older children who are going through bullying at school. At least one article on the internet told me that Harriet is a well-beloved character among lesbians and queer women, due to her gender nonconforming clothes and attitude (in the 1960s girls mostly wore dresses/skirts and mary janes, not hoodies, jeans and sneakers!). You can see Harriet on the cover image above. The illustrations of the cover and in the book are by Louse Fitzhugh as well; she was a lesbian. One subplot deals with dancing school, much dreaded by Harriet and her scientist bestie, and Harriet's main beefs are with the annoying girly teacher's pets in her class. Harriet's two best friends are actually gender nonconforming as well due to their hobbies and activities (science by choice, housekeeping out of necessity).

Cover notes: I liked Fitzhugh's illustrated cover best, so I used it. My copy didn't have a cover because it was a library book, and we toss hardcover books' slipcovers in my library. Any attempts to girlify or age up Harriet on her book covers should be illegal. 

Score: 3.5 out of 5 stars
Read in: October 31
From: library
Format: hardcover
Status: returned