The Evolution of Beauty

If you haven’t yet seen this short video, The Evolution of Beauty, go ahead and check it out.

I’ll wait :)

Crazy, isn’t it? On one hand, it’s kind of depressing because we, as a culture, embrace these unreal standards that nobody could ever live up to in real life.

On the other hand, it’s very liberating because, in theory, you’ll never feel bad about yourself again when you see those picture perfect models and celebrities in print.

I’ve blogged about this before but since then, as a designer and Photoshop user, I’ve come across even more examples (click on Samples) of how you can’t really trust what you see. And this one, though it’s been around for a while, is always worth a second look, particularly if you have pre-teens/teenagers, who will definitely benefit from it.

If you’re feeling particularly fortified, check out this video or if you prefer something less visually disturbing, check out either of these videos.

Your thoughts?

Weekend Wrap Up (aka Don’t Piss Off a Blogger with a Camera)

The weekend began a little early at our place since there was no school on Friday. I decided to forgo all the other things I could have and should have done and took the kids to get their portraits done at Sears. I really needed to do it. P hasn’t had an official picture taken since last fall and when he’s old enough to notice that our living room is practically a shrine to his sister’s babyhood…well, let’s just say I already feel bad enough. Thus the portraits needed to be taken though I loathe the experience. It’s always an exercise in totally masochistic self-flagellation and not in a good way. *sigh*

I won’t take you through every detail of the entire ordeal because I’m sure most of you have already experienced it for yourselves. Suffice it to say that two kids equals twice the fun, particularly when one just wants to escape from the photo studio and does, with great success, numerous times. But my real issue is with the photographers. The lady takes like seven shitty pictures and declares our session complete and I’m all “Wha??? But I don’t LIKE these pictures. How can we be done?”

She says “What’s wrong with them? Tell me what you don’t like about each one.”

Grrrrrrrrrrr… I feel my head getting really close to exploding.

So she finally concedes and takes pictures of them standing, which I asked her not to do. Then she changes the background, which I asked her not to do. And then she wants them to lay down and take pictures looking down at them. WTH? What about normal pictures where they sit and smile at the fricken camera?

So after all the photo fun comes the mindmelting experience of choosing poses and packages and sheets and other stuff that makes my head spin every time. Urrrrgggghhhhhh. We finally got the hell out of there with some cute portraits but I swear to God, next time I’m going somewhere where they do it down and dirty, like WalMart.

On Saturday, we went to a gymnastics birthday party and while it was fun for my daughter and son, it was mostly a workout for me chasing P around this gigantic facility for two hours.

When it was time to eat, I’m trying to get some food for P and I but while I’m trying to corrall him with one arm and carry juice boxes and pizza with the other, strange children are handing me their plates asking for second slices of pizza.

Um hello? Do I look like I have a free fricken hand to go fetch you some more pizza? Ask your mom to get it for you. Oh wait…YOUR mom is over there enjoying a nice plate of food and a beverage and engaging in some adult conversation. Hmmmph! And then I got them their damn pizza with my third arm. Sucker.

Saturday night, I spent a couple hours cataloging all my mp3’s. Why? I don’t know. I just felt like it. So now I have a list and while it’s not representative of my entire music collection, it is a pretty accurate list of what’s in my iTunes at this moment.

When I was done with that, I googled varying combinations of the the words “mom” “mommy” “SAHM” and “The Pixies” “Janes Addiction” “Butthole Surfers” “Depeche Mode” “Pink Floyd” because it occurred to me that I don’t really have any mom friends who share my musical tastes. None. And that’s really sad, ya know? So many good concerts have come through town and I haven’t had anyone to go with (because we don’t have any babysitters so the huz and I don’t go to anything like that together). As far as I can tell, I am a member of a very small club with maybe three members.

Today, Sunday, we didn’t do that much. Early in the day I took the kids outside to play for a while. We walked to get a Sunday paper and I took some great pix of my daughter. Later the whole fam piled into the badass momvan and we went to Wild Oats. I lured the huz with the prospect of one of their fantabulous sandwiches.

We ended up getting sandwiches AND desserts plus groceries and it was all good except for some asshat from the deli giving me crap about taking a picture of my kids. I guess they have some unposted policy about photography in their stores. WTF? I take my camera everywhere and nobody ever bothers me about it.

I was mildly snarky to the guy when I told him that even though I was a corporate spy for Trader Joe’s, I had no intentions of putting my camera away. I decided to chill out, though, and obey their silly rule ONLY because I didn’t want to embarrass my husband like I have so many other times when people get me riled up.

So we bought our groceries and I had to fight like hell the urge to take some photographs of their perfectly merchandised Odwalla juice display. It was so colorful. And the beer. My God, they have a beautiful beer section! Not an empty space on the shelf and so many colors and pretty packages. As a designer, the visually appealing is so hard for me to resist. Bastards.

On the way home, I was trying to merge into traffic so I wouldn’t be forced to get on the interstate and this jerk saw me trying to change lanes WITH my signal on and sped up so I couldn’t get over, almost causing an accident. That was not only rude but also really dangerous. So I did what any good blogger with a camera would do…I got behind him and took his picture. So there.

The September ROFL Awards!

Cristina and I are pleased to announce the first-ever recipients of the ROFL Award! Thank you to everyone who participated this month and to all the others who have supported this endeavor. We can’t wait to read these posts and share some laughs with you each month!

Okay, Where are the Cameras?

I went to the 24 hour CVS tonight to pick up a few things, including some cough syrup and a decongestant because I have yet another kindergarten cold.

As I exited the cold medicine aisle, marveling over how one human body can manufacture so much snot, I spotted Jennifer Weiner’s new book and stopped to take a gander. I was flipping around, trying to decide if the book of short stories was any good when I heard an accented voice next to me.

“Excuse me”

I look over to see a nicely-groomed blondish guy, not really “hott” but not scary nasty, either. Apparently, he is speaking to um…me.

“Yes?”

“I would like to tell you that you are very beautiful” he said, spoken slowly and in an accent I cannot identify; possibly Russian or eastern European.

Huh? I mean I’m having a pretty good hair day and I know a woman with a phlegmy cough is SO irresistible but seriously…this is like Candid Camera or something, right? Where is Allen Funt?

But instead I just smile and say “thank you” because I can’t even remember the last time a person of the male persuasion complimented me, which is kind of pathetic on my part. I mean he could be a con artist or serial killer or something and I’m smiling at him.

But wait…I can see he’s winding up to say something else.

“I would like to ask you…”

Don’t tell me. Let me guess. You need some money for a cab because your car is broken down.

Or you need help picking out tampons for your sister/girlfriend/roomate.

Or…I’ve got it! You want me to buy you beer because you lost your passport, right?

“…can we go to a date together?”

The hell? A date? You want to go to a date? I glance over my shoulder looking for the cameras as I tell him in my trés sexay (read: hoarse) Demi Moore voice that I am married. I even show him my ring just in case he wants to debate the point. But he doesn’t. He just say’s “Oh, okay” and hightails it out of there.

I’m not totally convinced that he didn’t have an ulterior motive because seriously, what normal guy is hitting on older women in a drugstore at 11:30 pm?

He could be part of some foreign white slavery ring that specializes in frumpy American housewives because a certain sultan overseas prefers them and his M.O. is to find them out alone at night and flatter them and convince them to go out with him and when they do, he kidnaps them.

Stop rolling your eyes already. It could happen.

I told hubz when I came home and he laughed.

Laughed, dammit!

Operation Black Out

This morning I was flipping around like I do every morning trying to find something news-ish to watch that didn’t suck and I had an epiphany of sorts.

But first, I just have to say that I cannot stand the Today Show and especially Al Roker. There’s something about him that really bugs me. I also can’t stand how the FOUR hosts stand around and make lame chit chat with each other in the street. We’re supposed to find this entertaining?

But I digress.

I’ve been in a really down mood lately. It started a few weeks ago when I had a total meltdown one night when we were watching the late news. I just started crying about how much I hate the world; that if I had to hear one more story about a molested, kidnapped, raped or murdered child or woman or scuzzy pedophiles or a school shooting or genocide in Darfur or global warming or the impending extinction of yet another species or animal cruelty or child abuse or political corruption or the war…my head would explode. (To be fair, I would get my period a couple hours later and I can be nearly certifiable when I’m premenstrual)

I just find myself unable to be happy lately because of, I believe, a barrage of bad news that I can’t seem to escape. I can’t take anymore. I feel like the boy in that fairy tale The Snow Queen. He gets a piece of glass or something in his eye and from that point on, he can only see the negative things in the world.

So my epiphany, as I was looking for something decent to watch, was that I just need to bury my head in the sand for a while. As much as I like knowing what’s happening in the world, I have decided, for the sake of my mental health, to cut out all news except for NPR Morning Edition (because it’s always playing on my clock radio when I get up). I will not be reading the paper or watching the news on TV and I’ve removed all news links from my Google start page. This will be my new home page.

So what do you think? Can watching too much bad news depress people? Or do I just need some good meds?

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On a completely unrelated note, there’s a new post up over at Props and Pans where I discuss a product I was asked to sample. Go check it out if you get a chance :)