Trials of Tanning

Lordy it’s been awhile! So much has happened this week – I made soup, I kept on getting shooting pains in my ear due to allergies, I went to the supermarket. All truly, earth shattering exciting stuff. God it’s great to be me! Sarcasm really isn’t my strong suit, is it?

In any case, last week in one of my thirty blog entries I promised to write a review on some of the self tanning products I have used to add some color to my scarily white Casper-like appearance. Never one to back out of a promise (unless of course I promised to help you move or feed your dog or not drink before your wedding), without further ado I present to you the top three products I have had fairly good experiences with over the past four years or so.

No. 3 – Sally Hanson Airbrush Legs

I fell in love with this product when Amy discovered it about two years ago.

Pros: Went on evenly, has a natural look – not orangey or yellowy.

Cons: When you are applying it, it gets on everything. My sink, my shower, my floor, my cat, my glasses. Everywhere. Seriously. Everywhere.

Since I wasn’t about to stand out in my backyard buck naked (now that’s a mistake you only make once in your life), I had to give up on my beloved Sally, which was okay because I was getting the vibe she needed her space anyhow. I can be needy sometimes.

No. 2 – Mystic Tan

Who doesn’t like to strip down naked, go into a strange looking booth and spin, all while donning a sexy shower cap on their head? I’m certainly not raising my hand. Besides the anxiety of someone accidentally walking in on me (and this never ever went away), I became addicted to mystic tanning when it was popularized in 2003.

Pros: The first few times – no streaking, perfect coloring.

Cons: Pretty expensive for something that only last three or days. After a few times I had some bad experiences, detailed below.

One time, the tanning stuff pooled in my cleavage – it looked like a less severe form of the disease Michael Jackson is suffering from. At a business meeting, a woman (who no longer works with me thank god) looked at me and loudly proclaimed “oh, I know what that is – it’s a bacterial infection.” Then she lowered her voice and whispered that she had one once too, she got it in a pool. I announced that it was from mystic tanning – but it was too late, my other co-workers now thought I had bacteria on my boobies. The upside of this was I got my own special bathroom for a few weeks. Swanky.

Last summer for my friend Lady’s wedding I got a mystic tan. The morning of we were sitting on her front steps having coffee when all of a sudden she spits hers out in fit of laughter. “your feet! The bottom of your feet!! They are tanned!! You look like a freak!!” She was right, I guess I didn’t apply the lotion they give you for parts that you don’t want tanned correctly, the bottom of my feet were tanned and I did indeed look like a freak. The worst part is, after a few drinks at the reception, we found this absolutely hilarious and now Lady has several wedding pictures with me showing the bottom of my feet to friends and strangers alike. Again, swanky.

All in all, Mystic may be worth another shot, but I’m too nervous to do it again for a special occasion in fear of the boob pool or freaky feet.

No. 1
Jergens Natural Glow Daily Moisturizer

Another Amy discovery! Once I tried this I have never gone back to anything else. It ROCKS!! It is perfect for my really light skin – it gradually gives you just a bit of color.

Pros: Natural looking, does not streak, affordable, moisturizes (and they even have a “firming” kind now!), not fake looking.

Cons: If you are looking for a dark tan quickly, this is not the product for you. It’s a gradual process and the more you use it, the darker you get.

So that’s it folks! Happy Almost Friday! Hopefully I’ll have some more exciting shit to blog about soon, life is pretty dull lately – but that isn’t so much a bad thing.

Cherri-Oys

Last night I was visiting my mother, Jude. While bantering about the remains of the day, she went to the cabinet to fix herself a bowl of cereal.

Oh my goodness! I forgot to tell you! I bought Jewish Cheerios. They didn't have the smaller boxes of Cheerios so I bought these instead.



Now please understand that according to my mother, this is ethnic cuisine. I don't think an event like this has happened in my family since my father was alive and discovered a Jewish bakery a mile from the house. And they are even open on Christmas! he beamed. And so a tradition was born, every Christmas morn (after church of course) he would go to the bakery and buy bagels, mostly because he could.

She sat across from me with her bowl of Crispy-O's and eyed them suspiciously. I suspect she was wondering if by eating the cereal she was somehow denouncing Christ and therefore losing her special place in heaven with all of the other saints and martyrs. As she lowered her spoon I giggled a bit because I thought of the old Life cereal commercials - but instead of Mikey sitting across from me it, of course, was my 65 year old mother.

A smile came across her face. She likes it, she likes it!!

These are the best things since....

Moses parted the red sea? I asked.

No, no, I mean. Best thing since regular cheerios.

I'm so glad I am witness to these moments.

So today at work, I warned my friend Amy, who is Jewish, that my mother will likely bring up the subject of Crispy O's next time she sees her and to please not indulge her .

Amy immediately gets worked up and exclaims:

It's a conspiracy! Scotch, do you know what Kosher for Passover means???? All it means is that a Rabbi blessed it. That's it! Nothing more. Seriously, a Rabbi probably went to the cereal factory....no, wait, he probably flew over it or called it in, and now that cereal is kosher.

I reply: How do you know? Maybe they put him in a golf cart and drove him around the factory. We should really investigate this. Do an undercover operation of some sort.

Now let's go smoke and gossip about people at work and put all this thinking behind us.

And that is just what we did.

Cold, Wet, Foot in Mouth

Tonight Amy and I were sitting outside after work having a smoke when the marketing manager of our firm walks by us.

"Aren't your bums getting cold and wet from sitting there?" she asks

Trying to display some quickfire wit I reply "Well my bum is cold and wet but not because I am sitting here."

"Ew," she says and then walks away as I yell behind her "please forget what I just said, I didn't mean it to be so gross!"

I don't think that Amy and I have ever laughed so hard when we realized I basically just told an executive I shit my pants.

What was I thinking?

Update - Amy Tells Me I Could Have Died From the Peanut Butter

Amy read my blog last night and told me this morning that someone actually died from eating the peanut butter !!!!

CAN YOU IMAGINE THAT??

Oh I could hear the speculation of the towns folk now now:

"I've heard she was into that Michael Hutchence's thing - what a freak"
"I've heard she's been into meth for years now..."
"I've noticed her looking a bit down lately, maybe she did herself in..."

And then it would be revealed I died from eating tainted Peter Pan Peanut Butter and folks would think it was a story my family made up to cover up something embarassing like getting drunk and letting my car roll on top of me.

It's good to be alive. Especially on a Friday.

C26

This blog is for Amy.

As much as we discussed how much we hate our fetish for horrible chinese food, I have to admit, in celebration of the pig I felt it was my duty to just make my usual order, with a diet coke of course.

As I got my cash together (thanks to you) I decided to leave it by the door and am continplating just asking the delivery man to leave the food and grab the cash because I assume that I will be too involved with my cnn ans. I only feel free to do this because the delivery guy loves my tips so much that now he just knocks and comes right in (i live on the 2nd floor)...as I said earlier -

You know you are not in your twenties anymore when a man is more interested in your tips than he is your tits....


Witty.

Death By Gouda

Last night was the annual Yankee Swap with the gals from work at Legal Seafoods in the Charles Hotel in Cambridge. I was going to write a detailed description of what a Yankee Swap is for those who don't know, but I found myself nodding off as I did, so I will spare you the details.

Anyhow, this is a polite, professional Yankee Swap by most standards. For the most part, people did not "steal" gifts from others or exchange the gifts they opened.

One year, Amy ended up with a cheese cutting board. For those who know Amy, it's not a surprise to you that she pretty much didn't know what it was when she opened it. This is a woman who uses her kitchen as a clothes closet, after all. I love my Amy.

After a great dinner accompanied by several drinks at Legals, a few of us moved on to Noir, also in the Charles. Noir is a funky, dark little hotel bar. As Amy put it "this would be a great place to have an affair."

As you can imagine, after a few more drinks we all started to get silly and decided to call it a night considering we all had to work in the morning. Amy and I left and decided to make a pit stop in the hotel lobby bathroom.

As we emerged Amy decided that she could not lug the cheese board all the way home and looked around the lobby for some place to ditch it. At the same time, we both noticed a little old lady, probably about 85 or so, reading in the lobby library.

We immediately made a bee-line for her. What a wonderful thing to do during the holiday season! Old ladies like to cut cheese, right? (snicker, snicker)

"Miss, would you like this?" Amy asked.

The old lady looked at us as if we were about to abduct her. Sheer fright I tell you. We were both displaying drunken, polite, shit-eating grins so who can blame her?

Amy moved toward her and gently placed the cheese board next to her chair, face still frozen in crazy smile, and slowly backed away.

We both walked toward the main exit of the hotel.

"IS THIS A BOMB?" we hear her bellowing behind us.

"No, it's a cheese board" Amy calls back.

We noticed that we were starting to get attention from the folks at the front desk so we picked up our pace as we headed out. As we made it outside we both burst into a fit of laughter.

"Let's get the hell out of here," she said, "before we get arrested for planting a Cheese Board Bomb in the lobby of the Charles Hotel."