So that's why I never wear that eyeliner

I found this really pretty eyeliner today and couldn't figure out why I never wear it. Now I remember.

Because it doesn't stay in place long enough to finish both eyes, and I look like I have two very pretty-colored black eyes. And the camera is being very generous with me here. In real life I looked like a sad clown.

Best Picture Ever

Here are my three cats:

This pretty much sums them up. Monster is the fat orange one who's oblivious to everything else. Max is the Siamese who's jumping around and probably causing trouble. Rosie Sparkle is the bitchy one who looks very evil in this picture. 

Strange Footwear

These are my new shoes:

They made me laugh, so I had to get them. This is the basic premise of all my purchasing decisions.

A Nail Polish Milestone

As previously indicated, I'm coming up on a nail polish milestone. I have 99 bottles of nail polish, which logically indicates that the next bottle will be my 100th. I feel like I should have a party or something. Or at least it should be a really super awesome nail polish that I've really wanted. This creates a huge dilemma. What should be my 100th nail polish?

These are the ingredients on today's shot at a new herbal supplement:

Sadistic Excitement

I just wrote a really fucked up scene for my big project I'm working on. And now I'm feeling very happy. After writing a scene in which the main character may or may not be killed by another of the characters who you may or may not like. Yay death! Or almost death. It's a mystery. Just like my IRS payment plan.

Taxes

Could I possibly fuck up my taxes more? Yes, apparently, I could. This was the first year I freelanced all year, so I didn't have an employer or anything like that. I'm an independent contractor. Apparently that also means I'm a business, which means I also pay small business taxes. Fuck. Missed that memo.

So I owe taxes because despite being dirt poor, I'm a dirt poor business, not a dirt poor person. Isn't that neat? I suppose you can legally refer to me as "that" now instead of "who." I know you're thrilled.

I'm the most responsible person ever. I'm so responsible I feel guilty for not being responsible for other people's responsibilities and for things out of my control. Yes, this is psychologically incorrect. So is your face. Anyway, as soon as I realized I owed a bunch of money and couldn't pay, I set up a responsible payment plan that I can afford and set it to automatically withdraw so I will never forget and anger the IRS. The first payment was supposed to come out on August 1.

Well, today is August 22. The payment hasn't come out. Not only was this the first payment, but it was also the setup fee. So that's a little important. I have the letter saying it's all set up, but I also don't want to default on the payment plan loan and get stuck having to pay it all at once. Because I can't do that, so I assume then the IRS would confiscate everything I own to pay my debt. And I really like that couch.

I went online to try to pay on the IRS website where I set up the payment plan. That thing is fucking confusing. I couldn't even figure out where to go if I had already set up the payment plan. When I finally figured that out, they kept asking me for a four-digit PIN. The only PIN I have is six digits. Awesome. But when I tried to request a PIN, the form wouldn't submit and instead just cleared all my info every time. Great. That left only one option: I had to call them. On the phone.

The IRS warned me of hold times in excess of 30 minutes, which is a neat way to begin your Monday morning. Know what's an even neater way? Having all your worldly possession confiscated. So I sat on hold. To be fair, it was more like 25 minutes. How exciting is that? Then Mr. Phillips, reference number 1000145689 or something like that, picked up, and we proceeded to chat about what the fuck happened to my payment. Apparently I should have received a letter that I didn't receive double-confirming the payment plan and doing some other stuff like giving me this PIN everyone keeps asking for that I don't have. Kickass. I love it when I don't have things because someone else screwed up and not because I lost them. That makes it totally not my fault.

I know a thing or two about how to fuck over someone's credit rating, which means I also knew I had another nine days before I'd default on my loan and cause all sorts of crazy shit or something. Probably the apocalypse. Or at least they'd take my couch. Whatever the case, I calmly made the payment, and it allegedly even came out of my account this time. I'm still not convinced that means it went into my IRS account, but there's absolutely no fucking way to check this. Isn't that cool? So it's like a mystery every month if they got your payment the month before. I love mysteries!

The moral of this story is this: if it can go wrong, it will go wrong for me. The other moral is this: don't fuck with me. Seriously. Because you might think you can pull that sneaky bullshit where I get fucked over, but guess what. You probably can't. Or maybe you can. I don't know. I guess it depends on the situation.

Jay-Z Reference About My 91 Nail Polishes

I have 91 bottles of nail polish. By the end of next week I will have at least 99. Yes, 99 different colors of nail polish. In case you'd forgotten, this is my (newly reorganized) stash:

I'm looking at this, and there's not a single color I feel like wearing right now.

I think my soul is tired.

More Frowning

"A kiss with a fist is better than none."

No, Florence + the Machine. It's not.

Bad Hair

The announcement on Facebook for tonight's Atlanta Braves promotion:


SHEAR THE BEARD: As we close our series against the Giants, we're giving fans FREE haircuts and beard trimming tonight at Turner Field...seriously! Offer valid for Tim Lincecum and Brian Wilson as well

My Kitties

I love Alice.

How cute is that? If you just look at it quickly, it almost looks like they're cuddling and she's not attacking his head. 

Say What Now?

These are the ingredients of my new herbal supplement:

So obviously I know exactly what I'm taking.

OMG This Still Exists

So back in the 1990s when Alicia Silverstone was, like, the coolest ever, she went on Letterman or something like that wearing a nail polish by a little company called Hard Candy. Of course, as soon as she said the name, demand skyrocketed. Everyone wanted Hard Candy nail polish, especially in Sky, the color Alicia was wearing on Letterman. I'm fairly certain demand exceeded production ability, which is why they kind of fell off the map. But for a little while there, Hard Candy was pretty much the coolest thing ever.

I didn't know all of that because I was, like, 13 or something, but look what I have, vintage 1996:

The Green Album

The Muppets are super trendy right now for some reason, and to celebrate/capitalize on this, someone or other is releasing The Green Album, a compilation of Muppet songs as sung by current artists. I love the Muppets, so of course I had to check this out. A review, you say? Why yes, I was indeed planning on such a thing! The album is on NPR First Listen, so you can go enjoy it yourself. Or "enjoy," possibly.

First up, "The Muppet Show Theme" by OK Go. OK Go is a band that is popular due to their impressive ability to perform choreographed dance routines on treadmills. I'm not saying this is a bad thing. That video is fucking awesome. This song is boring. I assume they're all high, which is fine and all, but I feel like they should probably sound like they care at least a little bit. Dude, it's the theme song. You're excited and shit. Oh, you're not? Next!

Get Off My Hands!

Things that don't come off my hands:

peppers

garlic

onions

ginger

soap

tomato plant

I can't even touch any of these things without my hands being stained with their smell for days afterward. It's extremely obnoxious.

More New Colors

Here are my three newest nail polishes. I was quite excited to find these brands at Sally Beauty, and they didn't disappoint. In fact, I'm fairly certain I may have inadvertently bought the top three colors on my Zoya Wishlist. Kickass. Anyway:

This is my foot. Last time you saw it, it was green. Oh, the memories. Today it's blue. The color is called Art of Theft by a company named Finger Paints. Their colors have mostly art-related names, which is okay with me. Some of them are lame, but I'm cool with the theme. This is a very dark blue with a purplish shimmer to it. This is not at all the color I was expecting from the bottle:

Bad Nail Polish Names

I hate nail polish names. They're so dumb. I'm sure these people think they're being clever, but they're not. It's just stupid most of the time. And if there's anything I love, it's making fun of stupidity. Today's offender is Essie. I actually have never tried Essie nail polish. It's at the top of my list of polishes I want to try, and they sell it at Target, so mostly I'm just being lazy by not buying one of their colors. However, with a name like this, maybe I don't want to support this company at all.

This polish is called Starter Wife. Yes, Starter Wife. Apparently this is a color you use for a couple of years until you get sick of it, and then you trade it in for a new, younger model.

Art Show!

My fiance's cousin is a really incredible artist. We went to a reception thingy for her the other night, which was super cool because the gallery she's showing at is this really neat little hippie place with a great vibe, and also I just have so much respect for people who do what they love and are successful at it. Also, she's really nice and a great artist, which kind of makes me want her to succeed even more. I like nice people. So it just makes me really happy.

This is the print we bought:

Yes, it's an orange cat. Nobody is surprised that we picked this one. We're kind of predictable. 

Check out more of her stuff at http://www.darkenart.com. It's really cool. 

Blue Fingers and Green Toes

More fun with nail polish! Have I mentioned my crippling nail polish obsession? It all started when I decided I didn't want to bite my nails anymore. Now I just like all the colors. I have a thing for bright colors. I also really enjoy doing strange things with my nail polish, like wearing many different colors at the same time. Today's adventure is greens and blues. 

These are my toes. I have monkey toes. Also, in this picture I have green toes. Currently I have normal-colored toes because I'm about to paint them again. But that's irrelevant for this post.

Do I Want To Be This Color?

This is a swatch of a Rescue Beauty Lounge nail polish from my favorite nail polish blog, Scrangie. I've never tried this particular brand of nail polish before, and at $18 they're over the limit of what I can justify spending on a bottle of nail polish. But the color is pretty.

I have a problem with nail polish names in general, which is another post altogether, but this one in particular bothers me. This color is called Bruised. Just thinking about that name makes me really sad. Why would I purposely want to be the color of a bruise? I've spent enough time in my life trying to cover up bruises that I just can't imagine wanting to be Bruised on purpose. You know? 

There are far more offensive nail polish names and far uglier colors, but this one just makes me sad. 

Alice

Here, for your consumption, are some pictures of Alice the foster kitty. Everything Alice does is super adorable. Chances are very good Alice will not be a foster kitty for very long.

Today's Nail Fun

I recently remembered we have a Sally Beauty Supply in town, which I decided to check out. Of course, they had some super awesome brands I've been wanting to try in some super awesome colors nobody should probably ever wear. Here are my first two.

On my left hand today is a color called Solar Flare by Nina Pro Ultra:

In case that doesn't totally demonstrate, here's the same color against my black pants:

It looks like I took a yellow highlighter and colored all over my nails. It's super awesome. It did take about eleventy coats to get to this level of opaqueness, though, which is annoying. The plus side was that they all dried super quick. The minus side was that since I took this picture this morning, two of the fingers have already chipped pretty badly. Oh well. I wasn't going to want neon yellow fingernails for very long anyway.

This color is neon melon or coral, not quite as orange as it looks here. It's called Flip Flop Fantasy by China Glaze. Wow is it bright. This one is a definite winner. It went on nicely, and it's a great color. I think I may have found my new second-favorite nail polish brand.

Also, I'm totally going to go broke from buying new and exciting nail polish colors.

Yum

This is my dinner tonight: 

Yeah, it looks super appetizing, doesn't it? 

My Reading Habits

I don't read much. This might be a surprise to some people, given my love of calling myself a writer. But this is a topic we can discuss in another post.

Here's a pretty good illustration of my reading habits. You'll note I keep my books and my nail polish in the same place. In the case of a fire, I'd pretty much just grab my bookcase and run. Because I'm totally that strong.

Now Let Me Get This Straight...

Him?

This guy has the Number 1 album on iTunes right now:

Really? I mean, I do like this song (which is, like, really old), and I really like Mat Kearney's voice, but really? I had no idea anyone else even knew who this guy was.

I Miss Parry

I have two favorite outdoor birds. Okay, I have a whole bunch of favorites. But my favorite favorite two are the nuthatch (of course) and this guy:

This is a red-bellied woodpecker. They were frequent visitors at our feeders last year, and then they just disappeared. Which really sucks because they were totally my favorites. We had at least a couple of them, which I named Parry and William because their heads are the same color as Hayley Williams' hair:

I usually don't name the outdoor birds, but in this case, I obviously had to. Hopefully they'll be back soon.

Pinched Eyelids

This just seems like the best invention ever:

Because seriously, if you've ever tried to curl your eyelashes, chances are good you've pinched your eyelid. And that hurts like hell. I just wish Urban Decay would combine with Tarte's eyelash curler that you don't have to loop around your fingers:

Because then you would have the perfect eyelash curler.

I know this is something you worry about every day.

The Best Advice I Ever Got

When I was a freshman in college, I lived with two other girls. One was kind of a bitch. I disliked her. I called her Gwyneth. I don't remember her real name. The other, however, was pretty cool. She was a senior, and I think she was in that whole "finding herself" phase, except that she always had a pretty strong sense of who she was. It was just figuring out who everyone else was.

Anyway, she had this friend named Colette who was, like, the coolest girl I'd ever met. She was this tall black chick with kind of stereotypical '70s natural hair, and she always had on a Rambo-style headband. She worked at the co-op down the street, and she dressed like someone who would work at a co-op like that. She always kind of reminded me of Janice from the Muppets, off in her own world.

My new blog

Sooooo...it has come to my attention that I have a lot of shit to say that has nothing to do with grammar or writing or really much of anything. So guess what. Time for a new blog to incorporate all of the weird bullshit that pops into my head throughout the day!

So be prepared for cranky, rambling posts about the Atlanta Braves, nail polish, my parrots, society, and pretty much any other random things I feel like writing about. Because I can totally do that on this blog, whether you like it or not.

Oh, and check out Nobody Talks In Semicolons, my other super-awesome blog.