EYELINER AND OTHER STUFF

Eye makeup is fun but it does change over the years along with one’s face. 

I'm told my eyes are my best feature, and for years I’ve enhanced them.  In the early years, too much.  What worked fifty years ago when I was 27 looks overdone now.  A light touch and subtle colors work well today.

Eyeliner takes a bit of practice.  A hard black line needs the smudge effect.  Black eyeliner is hard to work with, anyway.  Go for a dark brown. It gives a softer look.

For years I didn’t use mascara.  I didn’t think it would make any difference. It does and I use it now. Years ago I tried false eyelashes. They were very noticeable especially when one kept falling off!   I’m sure they work much better now but I’ve lost interest in them.

Eye shadows are beautiful now. The shades of beige, brown and gray are flattering and easy to apply.  Forget the shiny, iridescent colors; they only magnify imperfections.

Photo credit: ⊰❀ A Garden Waltz ❀⊱ / Foter / CC BY

My mother had an eyelash curler.  I was fascinated by it and thought it was some sort of torture instrument.  I’ve never used one but in lieu of false eyelashes an eyelash curler would be a good option.

A magnifying makeup mirror is an absolute necessity when applying eye makeup.  A regular mirror just doesn’t do it!

If you would like to respond, just click the link below that refers to “comment.”

Next Post, Next Monday.

Thanks for stopping by!

Joan

SMILING IN RETROSPECT

One of the benefits of getting older is you tend to look back to the past more so than when you were young.  I find that the good memories tend to stand out in my mind and the not so good ones tend to “blank out.” 

I would be hard pressed to recall a dozen things that made me very unhappy but here in no particular order are a dozen that still make me smile after all these years.

Luciano Pavarotti singing Nessum Dorma from the opera Turandot

Flying to Ireland and seeing the coast of Ireland coming into view.

Photo credit: ZTW1 / Foter / CC BY-NC-ND 

Watching my son and daughter taking their first steps.

Mowing the yard and the smell of cut grass.


Photo credit: super-structure / Foter / CC BY-NC-SA

The continued love of a good man.

Puppies- Great Pyrenees, poodles, Bernese Mountain Dogs, Scotties, Labs-
loved them all!


Photo credit: basykes / Foter / CC BY

The sudden brightness of my vision after cataract surgery.


Photo credit: ex_magician / Foter / CC BY

The marvelous memory of a great house in Ohio.

Sid Caesar and Imogene Coca from “Your Show of Shows”

The composer, Richard Strauss’  “Four Last Songs”.  It’s so beautiful it gives me the shivers.  Elisabeth Schwarzkopf, soprano.

The summer solstice in Greenland.  A marvelous thing to see- 24 hours of daylight!

Photo credit: christine zenino / Foter / CC BY 

Champagne for breakfast with Maya Angelou. I was the housekeeper in a bed & breakfast and she was a guest.  It was her 60th birthday and she asked the owner of the B&B and me to join her in the occasion!

Photo credit: Ilja / Foter / CC BY-NC-SA




If you would like to respond, just click the link below that refers to “comment.”

Next Post, Next Monday.

Thanks for stopping by!

Joan

TRAVEL, HO!

It’s an accepted fact that travel broadens one’s outlook especially if you’re quite young. Talk about leaving your ordinary background, imbued with the idea that this is the way things are always done and arriving in old Europe where that isn’t true at all!  

In the 1950s at the ages of 17 and 22, I made 2 trips to Europe: one with a chaperoned group of girls fresh out of high school; and the other with my brother on a youth hosteling trip, biking and hitchhiking.  We discovered that Europeans were less straight laced than Americans. Coming from a conservative background that was a bit of a shock. 

Europeans loved to discuss politics and were very interested in America. The only politics I’d been exposed to was at the dinner table where my father, who was republican, and my uncle, who was a very left leaning democrat, engaged in shouting matches!  I came home aware of a much bigger world out there.  Looking back over the space of 50 or more years, these episodes were “eye openers” for me and in retrospect very funny!

School Girls Trip:

Our chaperoned group of girls in 1953 spent their evenings in Paris writing postcards to their parents. That seemed like a waste to one other girl and myself so we escaped the chaperone (she had a boyfriend in Paris and was otherwise occupied) and went out to see the town.  We ended up at Pigalle with 2 young G.I.s and were shocked to see the can-can dancers with “no tops on.”  A real cultural difference. Nancy and I were “true babes in the woods” and we were lucky to get back to the hotel safe and sound.

Photo credit: B@Bé / Foter / CC BY-NC-ND 

There was no such thing as ‘traveling light” back then. The chaperoned group- all 5 of us were each issued a big green suitcase by the travel agency and we each filled up our big green suitcase with everything we could possibly need not realizing we would have to carry those behemoths!  I’ve been a spartan packer ever since.

Photo credit: jennandjon / Foter / CC BY-NC-ND

Hiking and Biking in Europe:

My brother and I and a Dutch kid with guitar were hitchhiking in Italy and were looking for a ride into Rome.  A large truck hauling quarry stone stopped for us and the 2 boys climbed up into the back with the stones and I sat in front with the driver!  “More comfortable” they said.  The driver was a lecher from “way back.”  A true case of the “roamin’ hands” and at the first opportunity my brother and I changed places. We pulled into Rome at dawn in the rain. My first glimpse of the Eternal City was from underneath a tarp but I was safe and happy and the view was beautiful!

Restrooms in Italy in 1957 were hard to find for hitchhikers but bars could always be depended on. In most cases they were really primitive.  In one there was a hole in the floor instead of an actual toilet and an indentation of two feet in front of the hole where one was supposed to stand. You could brace yourself by hanging on to the doorknob. It worked well until the doorknob came off!

 


In Holland

Planning our trip.  Newspaper photo








Joan in London, pondering whether to trade in her bike for the Rolls Royce in the background.

If you would like to respond, just click the link below that refers to “comment.”

Next Post, Next Monday.

Thanks for stopping by!

Joan

SOME THOUGHTS ABOUT ‘PETS”

If you’ve never had a pet and think now may be the time to acquire one, consider a shelter dog or cat. There are lots of animals in this world that need homes but some are better left outside or in the wild. These are critters that I have handled or in the case of the house chicken I have owned  and I can truthfully say they make very  “iffy” companions.

CHILEAN ROSE HAIR TARANTULA - a BIG spider but the tamest of the lot- so I hear.  You can hold one, but just don’t drop it. They definitely don’t bounce.  Wikipedia says their bite is painful but not fatal.  Small boys seem to be entranced with this many legged lady. I held one and she walked down the palm of my hand and onto my other hand held beneath her.  She was so  “furry” she looked like a Halloween spider except she was brown, not black.

RACCOON-  These guys look like bandits.  I worked for an animal rehabilitation center some years ago and raccoons were our most common orphans.  We fed them with baby bottles and wanted to take them home because they were so cute.  But they can be really destructive as house pets.  Unless your house is a wreck to begin with, don’t even consider it.  

Photo credit:Saff's Photography / Foter / CC BY

PYTHON- These are the really big snakes that are loose in Florida and creating havoc with the natural wildlife.  I had this yellow female draped around my neck.  I didn’t know they came in “yellow”.  She was referred to as a "designer" snake.   She felt like an exceptionally long elegant purse, and apparently someone dropped her off after realizing she was getting bigger than they anticipated.

HOUSE CHICKEN-  Chickens are fun to raise outside but indoors is something else.  I had this hen for 8 years and she lived in my house.  Fortunately I didn’t have many rugs.  I had to run after her with a roll of paper towels!  I had to block off the stairway after she figured out how to walk upstairs.  She’d jump from step to step.  My dogs and cats put up with her but she was constantly stealing their food.  She was a one-time different pet and a real conversation piece. I was in tears when I had to euthanize her.  At 8 she was really old for a chicken.

Photo credit: ~Liliana / Foter / CC BY-NC

ALLIGATOR- Some people do keep these scaly critters as pets.  The one I handled was a juvenile and didn’t look pleased to be held up and “admired”.  Like pythons when these reptiles are young there’s a certain fascination about them, but they grow fast and then you’ve got a BIG reptile living in your bathtub!

PARROT-  My grandfather had one of these guys.  Actually she was a girl named Polly (what else) They have a long life span and if you acquire one that’s relatively young it’s best to make provisions for it in your will.  The odds are it will out live you! As I recall the recipient wasn’t too pleased to suddenly become the proud owner of a very cantankerous bird. For all I know Polly is still among the living.

Photo credit: Rodger McCutcheon / Foter / CC BY




If you would like to respond, just click the link below that refers to “comment.”

Next Post, Next Monday.

Thanks for stopping by!

Joan

CAN’T LET ‘EM GO!

Seems almost everyone has something favorite they wore years ago and just don’t want to get rid of.  Maybe it reminds them of a happier time, or it looked really good on them once, or maybe it still might after all these years.  The minute it gets tossed, the occasion just may come up to wear it again.  I found a few in the back of my closet.

I bought this at Montaldos in Winston-Salem, NC about 35 years ago.  It’s a heavy cotton and looks nautical, and interesting.  I hang on to it cause who knows - I may have the occasion to go yachting someday.

Saw this calico dirndl skirt and petticoat at the Laura Ashley store in London 40 years ago and just had to have it.  It seems to stay in style and will probably go on down into the next generation or one after that.

I haunt second hand shops and found this fur coat in one about 5 years ago. It cost me a big $15.  Since then I've tried to sell it at a yard sale. No takers.  Understandable these days.  I can’t just give it away cause that person might toss it.  It’s in good shape so I keep it.  It sits up in my attic looking chubby and warm.

Bought this out in Colorado some years back.  It’s all raggy and shaggy denim and went well with jeans which I wear a lot.  It’s too big for me now but I hang onto it in case I put on a few pounds!

An Armani jacket and a holdover from the 80’s.  It came along about 25 years ago after a hot sale at Bloomingdale’s in NYC.  I still wear it occasionally shoulder pads and all.  I like shoulder pads!

I bought this one in Ireland 30 years ago.  One of my favorites: country and striped sweater. I take it with me when we travel back to Ireland.






If you would like to respond, just click the link below that refers to “comment.”

Next Post, Next Monday.

Thanks for stopping by!

Joan