Chinese Giant Salamander

Hi guys! So today's animal is definitely not a good-looking one. I know I said that about the condor yesterday, but even it had its redeeming features, like the bright colors on its head, its glossy black feathers, and the cuteness of its babies. But today's animal really doesn't have anything that people would like to look at, unless you like big slimy things that creep about in the night. However, ugly creatures should not be wiped off the planet just because they are ugly. They deserve help too. So the animal we're gonna look at today is the Chinese Giant Salamander:

I wonder why this one is peach-colored. I also wonder why it's smiling like that.

    The Chinese Giant Salamander is kind of cool because it's actually the biggest amphibian in the whole world. It can grow up to six feet, although most adult salamanders today only make it to about 3 feet and 66 pounds. Which is small for the species, but still scary big for a salamander. They spend most of their time underwater in mountain streams, are nocturnal animals, and eat insects, frogs and fish. But sadly for them, they  are coming awfully close to extinction because they are losing their habitats due to pollution and development. This has forced them into smaller places, which is partly why they never really grow into the magnificent giant salamanders that they are supposed to be. They are also seen as a delicacy in China, so people will overhunt them to use in presumably delicious dishes. They actually can't see and hunt by feeling vibrations, which makes it extra unfair, because people can just kind of run up on them and snatch them up before the salamander even knows what's happening. It's like kidnapping a blind person. Poor salamander, right? :(

So here are my Chinese Giant Salamander nails. I tried to replicate the splotches on the salamander's skin:

Sunlight, no flash.

Ottlite, no flash.

Sunlight, no flash.

     To do this, I started with two layers of OPI Bling Dynasty. Then I used Sally Hansen Sequin Scandal and a dotting tool to apply random splotches and dots to my nails. Last thing was to carefully apply topcoat, so the pattern didn't smudge and that was that. 

    Overall, I like how it came out. When the design is supposed to be random, it's easier to get away with stuff lol! My only thing is that I wished I had done a few more splotches and maybe made it matte. It would have looked really cool matte.

P.S. If you're wondering what happened to my nails, I broke a large chunk of corner off one of them in a horrible collision with my desk, and in a fit of rage and maybe madness, I filed all the rest of my nails into pointed nubbins. It's weird not having square nails anymore since that's been my nail shape for the past...three years. But it's cool too, and I kind of want to see what happens with them as they grow out. 

But that's all from me today!

Thanks for reading, and I hope everyone has a wonderful day!

St. Patrick Day Greens!!

Hi guys! So tomorrow is St. Patrick's Day, and I have been wearing greens all week to celebrate. Like I've said in the past, the holiday doesn't mean anything to me personally, but I just like to indulge in it. So to get everyone in the spirit, I thought it would be fun to make some green spam.


First one is Diamond Cosmetics Never so Evergreen.

Ottlite, no flash.

Ottlite, no flash.

    Never so Evergreen is a smoky, faded hunter green, with lots of golden shimmer in it. It's really beautiful and unique, and I love how it looks on my nails. The application was also super easy...two coats of color and a layer of topcoat was all I needed for it to look perfect. 

Next is Zoya Yara.

Ottlite, no flash.

Ottlite, no flash.

Artificial light, with flash.

    Yara was a weird one to capture. It's a dirty olive green with lots of grey in it, and my camera had a hard time balancing those. I guess the true color is right between the ottlite ones and the flash one. But anyway, I wasn't expecting to like Yara very much and really only bought it because it reminded me of one of my favorite queens from RuPaul's Drag Race, Yara Sofia. But when I put it on, I really did like it. The shimmer is really visible and looks great against the base, and the shade of olive itself is fairly flattering, because it doesn't have too much yellow. Formula was also really easy...I only needed two coats of color and one of topcoat. 

Next is Nina Ultra Pro Salsa!

Ottlite, no flash.

Ottlite, no flash.

Ottlite, no flash

   Salsa is a bold and slightly deep kelly green semi-jelly. The shade of green is really fun and punchy but I think my favorite part of this polish is the finish. It has the opacity and ease of application of a creme, but the jiggly quality and shine of a jelly, and with the shade of green, it makes me happy lol. It just reminds me of springtime and makes me want to skip and dance. I used three coats of polish and a layer of topcoat for the pictures, and Salsa went on pretty smoothly and easily. 

Next is OPI Damone Roberts 1968.

Artificial light, with flash.

Artificial light, with flash.

    Damone Roberts 1968 is a really smooth and creamy mint green creme. It has a good bit of grey, some brown, and a hint of yellow in there too, all of which soften it up and make it much easier to wear with my skin tone. I love how it looks kind of vintage-y but still really modern, and am so glad that I snagged a bottle when it was still available. However, application was tough on this one...I needed four layers of color to get it even and streak-free, and I had to be really careful to apply with a light hand, or there were these annoying divots. So it wasn't fun, but definitely worth all the pain in the end. 

And last, but definitely not least, is Nfu-Oh 569. 

Ottlite, no flash.

Artificial light, with flash.

Ottlite, no flash.

Ottlite, no flash.

    Nfu-Oh 569 is a blackened forest green jelly. It's known as being a dupe for NARS Zulu, which I guess is accurate, and as such, I lurvee it. It's so sexy and rich, and I love the way that it shines. Wearing it, I feel wicked, but in a good way lol. Application was also pretty easy. I used three layers of polish and a layer of topcoat, and although it kind of took a long time to dry, the polish itself went on fairly well. A little streaky on the first coat, but the next two fixed it. Incidentally, if you are in the market for Zulu, I would actually recommend picking up this one instead. You get more product for less, and Fabulous Street's shipping is much better than NARS'. 

And those are all the greens I have for ya'll today! 

Thanks for reading, and I hope everyone has an amazing St. Patrick's Day!! ^_^

OPI Here Today, Aragon Tomorrow Suede

    I actually have Independence Day nails to show you guys, but the weather is pretty suxxors so I can't take pictures. I think tomorrow's weather will be better, so I can put them up then. Or the day after. Because I am lazy in my soul. ;_;

In the meantime though, I have Here Today, Aragon Tomorrow Suede, from OPI's Suede Collection. 

Here Today, Aragon Tomorrow Suede is a matte hunter green base with tons of silver shimmer.

Sunlight, no flash.

Natural light, no flash.

Sunlight, no flash.

Sunlight, no flash.

And here it is with some topcoat:

Sunlight, no flash.

Natural light, no flash.

Sunlight, no flash.

Sunlight, no flash.

     In it's matte incarnation, HTAT Suede is actually not that great. The shade of green is pretty, but even with the shimmer, it's a little more flat (why did I first spell that "flatte"?) than the other shimmery mattes I have in my collection. But with topcoat...wow wow wow. HTAT Suede becomes this incredibly lush and sparkly green wonderland. I can't wait to do some Christmas nails with this. Because it looks so awesome with topcoat, HTAT Suede is not a puchase that I regret, but I probably will only wear it matte in a pinch. Which kind of sucks, because generally, you buy a matte to wear it...matte. 
    HTAT Suede's formula was also kind of disappointing. It was really thick and gloopy, and I had a hard time getting it smooth or even. But at least it didn't dry instantly, so there was some time to work with it a little bit. 


And that's all from me today! Have a wonderful Sunday night! ^_^

OPI Bring on the Bling

       So this past weekend was my mommy's 50th birthday, and to celebrate, our family threw her a big party. Such an occasion requires serious glittah, plus gold was one of the theme colors for the party, so I went with OPI Bring on the Bling, from the Burlesque Collection.

Bring on the Bling is a ton of multi-colored, multi-shaped, and multi-sized glitter in a clear base. There's mostly   cool-toned gold glitter, but there is also blue, orange, fuchsia, green and silver in there too.

Sunlight, no flash.

Sunlight, no flash.

Natural light, no flash.

Sunlight, no flash.

Sunlight, no flash.

    Bring on the Bling is awesomee. It's pretty much a gold version of Mad as a Hatter, so it's got bling, pops of color and general insanity. But one thing about Bring on the Bling that I really liked was the rather unique shade of gold that OPI chose as the main color. It's kind of pale and almost a little caramelly, and in the bottle, I was kind of scared of it. But on the nail, it's really quite pretty and flattering. So yeah, me gusta!

   The formula for this polish was typical glitter bomb fare, in that it went on fairly smoothly and dried quickly. I used four coats of color for total coverage and two layers of topcoat for a really smooth finish. So yeah, it was kind of alot of work, but that didn't annoy me. What did annoy me was the terrible wear I got out of Bring on the Bling. Just two days in, and there are already chips galore. OPI glitters never wear well on me anyway, but it's still pisses me off when this happens. -___-

And that's all from me today!! Thanks for reading, and if you celebrate Memorial Day, I hope you're enjoying it! If not, then I wish you a great Monday all the same. n_n

OPI Mystic Moonshine

     We are having some crummy weather today (and for the rest of the week) in New York, so the next few posts will be coming from the backlog. Damn Mother Nature, always trying to ruin my life. But anyway, here's Mystic Moonshine, from OPI's New England Collection.

Mystic Moonshine is a silver base, studded with small, square silver glitter. 

Sunlight, no flash.

Natural light, no flash.

Sunlight, no flash.

Sunlight, no flash.

    I don't like Mystic Moonshine. The silver base is quite pretty and clean, but the glitter just looks lumpy and messy to me. That was weird too, because the glitter didn't feel lumpy. It just looked lumpy. I also felt like it didn't sparkle properly, and in this type of color, the sparkle is necessary. I kind of want to keep it, just because it's elderly, but moving my polish back home this past weekend has taught me that mercy and sentiment is for the weak and the masochistic. So regrettably, Mystic Moonshine will have to be re-homed.

    But moving on to the formula, Mystic Moonshine was okay...not terrible, but not great. It was opaque in three coats, and dry time was quite good, but it was prone to bubbling and dragging. 

And that's all I've got for today! Thanks for reading, and have a wonderful day!

OPI Wing It!

      For today, I've got Wing It! (ahh I hate unnecessary punctuation) from OPI's Summer Flutter Collection. 

Wing It! is a sheer reddish-pinky-coralish base packed with flat, color-shifting pink and blue shimmer pieces.

Sunlight, no flash.

Sunlight, no flash.

Natural light, no flash.

Sunlight, no flash.

Sunlight, no flash.

Sunlight, no flash.

    I found Wing It! to be really funny. The base color just kind of hangs out in this really ambiguous area, and the shimmer is the same. It's kind of iridescent, kind of blue, kind of pink, kind of violet, kind of duochrome, kind of metallic...but it doesn't fit firmly into any of those groups. Wing It! is like...the epitome of a noncommittal polish and even though I don't like noncommittal things (and people), I think I'm going to keep it. 

   I still have to think about it though, because I didn't like Wing It!'s formula at all. It went on smoothly enough, but was rather thin and hard to control. It also took five coats to eliminate all VNL in person, which is of course no bueno. So I guess we'll have to see on this one.

    

 But that's all for today! Thanks for reading!