Bare Minerals High Shine Eyecolor

Before I discovered this I only used Bare Minerals makeup for my face and thought of it only as a mineral makeup. Sadly I discounted all their other makeup products because for some reason I thought, how can a brand that makes good mineral makeup make good cheek/lip/eye makeup? I know, makes no sense now that I think about it.
Anyway, this eyeshadow is AMAZING. Since I started wearing makeup I have yet to find an eyeshadow that doesn't crease and basically, look disgusting after my eyelids get oily from an entire day's wear. This one does not crease at all and the color looks just as fresh, almost all intact, as when I first put it on. It's also not your standard palette eyeshadow. It comes in a powder format, almost like MAC's loose pigment (http://www.maccosmetics.com/product/shaded/154/372/Pigment/index.tmpl), but it glides on since it's on a brush applicator. That also means it's highly pigmented. If you're not into that, or loose powders as eyeshadows then it's probably not for you. But...then you're missing out.

I'm Just Going to Brag About this a Little

Guess who is attending the 2011 TEDxUSC Conference? That's right, I am! My application was accepted, and even if I spent 99 dollars for a ticket, I think it will be a mindfuck for me. I got the email at 11 22 AM and by the time I checked an hour later, all the 39 dollar student tickets were sold out. Grrrrar. You fall behind in life these days without a smartphone with a data plan.
http://stevens.usc.edu/tedxusc2011.php
An extra 60 dollars...
That's ok. It is a little price to pay to be blown away.

Thesis Interrupted

Today I was in the lot of Fresh and Easy when a man walked up to me and asked if he could clean my car windows for some small change. I gave him a dollar to do it. He had told me he could wait for me to come back to my car to start doing it, but I told him he could do it while I was in the store. Right after I uttered those words and walked away, I regretted it. I had left my backpack with my precious computer in it, in plain sight, in the front seat of my car. What if he was crooked and decided to break in? Ironically, I cared more about the computer than the car. (Measured in quality, my Macbook stores more of my life worth than my Yaris.) But I didn't want to show that I had considered him to be a breacher of trust, and told myself not to be so paranoid. I felt bad about myself for not giving people the benefit of the doubt. My parents, on the other hand, would never have let me forget about it if they had known.

He had the windows squeaky clean by the time I came out and I was curious to know how he had gotten into the position he had today, as I am with homeless people or other window-washers but are too timid to ask. So I asked him what his story was, and he told me he had run into trouble with drugs in Chicago, been locked up, and after being released made his way to California, where he was scraping by to make ends meet, living in shelters, people's couches, and on the street. He said he cleaned windows because in life, no one gives you a handout. He was trying his best to offer something to the world in exchange for his existence. I gave him another dollar.

This made me think about a few things. The first is that society truly is unforgiving. You mess up in life a few times, make a few bad decisions, and it has the very likely potential of condemning you for the rest of your years. Trouble with the law, rap sheet, and employers will not hire you. Former criminals are branded with suspicion and mistrust by people like me. The stigma will never go away, even if one is genuine about reform.
The second thing was a jolting reminder about how rich I am. I have four walls and a roof over my head, a desk and a computer to write this blog entry, a car to get me to the places I want to go, and a bed to retire to when I'm feeling tired. I have a family who loves me unconditionally and friends who care about me. I can pay for yoga classes, shop for a nice outfit, grumble about 8 dollar parking because I have the ability to pay for it, increase my personal human capital by reading books and writing because I am literate, and think about what I want to eat for lunch because I can afford it. I live in a society where I will not be punished for what I think and argue simply because I am female, where I can take my everyday security for granted, and where I can choose how to spend my money because I have choices. Because of this I can preoccupy my time thinking about things that people fighting for survival would consider trivial and irrelevant. Because of this I am a million times richer than a majority of the world population.

Most of all I have the consciousness to appreciate the value of these things.

The Most Stressful Month and a Half of my Life

Tough times call for tough measures. Goodbye, Facebook. See you soon (hopefully?).

Cuteness Overload

ZOMG. I don't want to eat pork ever again.

AHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!! It's so FLUFFY!

Dance Dance Dance

I just downloaded Far East Movement's album and part of Chris Brown's latest F.A.M.E. Yes, I know I am always riding the end of the trend wave since these albums came out eons ago, according to the time frame pop culture sets for itself. But I think it's impressive I keep up at all considering my head is buried in school most of the time.

Initial reactions: Justin Bieber's voice is changing. But it actually sounds good. That vocal coach must be amazing. And why are all but one of FEM's songs a collaboration? I hope they break out as a true standalone musical group for their next production.


Omg. I love Keri Hilson. She is so gorgeous. And so underrated.

Whirlwind DC

Here, in succinct summary format, are the highlights of my Spring Break DC trip. I really, really liked the city and after seeing it have decided it's a place I could see myself being for a while for professional reasons. The ambiance is definitely not LA. The cliche of LA being a laid-back, mellow city really was solidified for me when I experienced DC. Life moves at a much faster pace there, and you really do see the change in environment on a weekday (important-looking people bustling around in suits) versus a weekend (families taking a stroll on the National Mall and people throwing frisbees around). The distinction is not so much defined in LA.

Flew in on Saturday evening, checked into my downtown DC hotel, and quickly realized I was in a part of town that basically died after 6 PM. Chinatown was about 4 blocks down and that was a little more exciting.

On Sunday I visited Newseum and some of the Smithsonian museums. Newseum was in a word, awesome. I would totally recommend it on a sightseeing trip to DC. There was so much interesting information, captivating exhibits, and just such a rich collection of print and digital media. Highlights were seeing the Unabomber Ted Kaczynski's original off-the-grid cabin in the Montana mountains when he was living in solitude and the Pulitzer Prize gallery. But the entire museum was redeeming. I wish I had more time to see more Smithsonian museums, but the ones I visited included the National Gallery of Art (everything from impressionism pieces to American and European scenic paintings to scratch-your-head modern art) and the Hirshhorn (more of the good-ol'-scratch-your-head stuff).

Monday and Tuesday was my Wilmington, Delaware trip. I had a productive (and hopefully promising) meeting with company staff and directors. I can't say too much about that right now, for better judgment, but we ended up taking a nice little unexpected detour to Philadelphia, which I LOVED. I loved it so much I am expressing it in pictoral form.
Philadelphia was just so gosh darn charming. The brick buildings, the history, the sprawling parks and greenery made it seem like a DC without the tension. I really could see myself living there for a while and enjoying everything the city had to offer. After I got back that night I had dinner with a friend from college and she was cool enough to take me down to U Street, apparently a street that stands on its own in terms of history.

On Wednesday I did a walking tour from the Capitol down to the Lincoln Memorial, a 2-mile stretch. Nice, long walk which included the Supreme Court, Washington Monument, WWII Memorial, and the Vietnam Memorial. The highlight of my DC visit was definitely the Library of Congress. Talk about a beautiful building. All the buildings in DC are locked in a competition to see which is more imposing and important, but the LOC really stood out on its own. I fell in love with the Greco-Italian-German architecture and just the majestic grandeur of the place. Everything was so out there, but it worked together harmoniously. Later on I hit up the White House and had dinner with a good college friend who gave me some very insightful experience on his DC experience so far and what it's done for him. We also hit up Dupont Circle, which was a nice little yuppie area (and I use that term in the most positive sense possible).

Thursday I met up with friends in POIR and went to Ben's Chili Bowl, which is supposed to be famous in DC. It was pretty good. I'll leave it at that. We walked to the Jefferson Memorial and along the riverfront, then the Kennedy Center. It was a gorgeous day. Sadly enough I was two weeks too early for the Cherry Blossom Festival, which would have been amazing to see.

Needless to say, being there a week made me think about how much I would miss my family, my friends, mellow LA, and my dog. It also made me realize how I need to look beyond my bubble and blaze a path for myself now, so that one day I can love my family, like my friends, bask in mellow LA, and coddle my dog not as a poor graduate student who lives for the moment, but as a provider for all the people and things I care about and as a mature someone who can look beyond what's in front of me and out towards the horizon.