1-Minute Topical

Infernos Everywhere! Run! Or, Cover Yourselves.

That Asian-Looking Chick 2 Comments

Some of you appreciated my impromptu ramble about masks, so let me do another “1-Minute Topical” as a kind of Public Service announcement. Subject: sunscreen. I wear it on my face every day, no matter what. Even if there’s no sun. Even if I’m not leaving the house. It’s the one product about which I’m kind of fanatical; I’ve been using it religiously for decades.

I once read – and I truly believe – that where there’s daylight, there’s a need for sunscreen, because a room filled with daylight is a room filled with damaging UV rays. Yes, your skin can sustain damage under a cloud cover! The term “sun damage” is a misleading one, in my opinion. You don’t need golden beams of sunshine to end up with skin damaged by UV rays. You are not safe if it’s overcast. Know how vampires are affected by daylight even if they’re inside? Same danger.

 

Skin cancer happening

Skin cancer happening

 

While I envision horrible things happening to unprotected skin after sunrise, I’m not daunted. It’s easier to put on sunscreen than to hide from the daylight in a coffin until nightfall. I like an SPF of 30, minimum, in a broad-spectrum (that means UVA and UVB) formula. My current anti-UV ray weapon of choice is Eucerin’s Sensitive Skin Everyday Protection Face Lotion, SPF 30, which I’ve used since at least 2009. It’s great. (Side note: Eucerin and its parent company, Beiersdorf, claim to not test on animals, though their names don’t appear on current cruelty-free products lists… so I’m not sure what that’s about. Conflicting information alert.)

Speaking of animals, our boys’ true natures have really emerged since we’ve been here. It’s warm, and there’s carpet, so they’re letting it all hang out, so to speak. I’m not sure about Nounours (he’s harder to read), but Ronnie James is Hawaiian at heart. This is clear from the fact that he enjoys playing air-ukulele while lying on his back. We’ve caught him dancing the hula, also while lying on his back. And he loves to sit on his butt in big armchairs, as people in Hawaii are wont to do. (I know this first-hand. My family is originally from there, so I’ve spent a lot of time there, myself.)

 

WrahWrah-Bundy

 

Mmm-hmm… Ronnie James’s got the hang-loose ‘tude of the locals down (not that Al Bundy is Hawaiian), and he was obviously born with it, because his ukulele-playing, hula-dancing self has never been to Hawaii.

 

Hula dancing

Hula dancing

 

 

Behind Masks and Closed Doors….

That Asian-Looking Chick Leave a comment

Ha! I just startled Callaghan when he turned around and found me covered up in an Epielle Facial Essence Mask. The single-use mask is basically a small, white cotton sheet cut to fit the face, with holes for eyes, nose and mouth, heavily saturated in liquid botanical extracts and other ingredients. You unfold it, drape it over your face, and smooth it down into place. So easy! I leave it on for 30 minutes. Peel off, throw away, done. There’s no need to rinse. Your skin drinks up the product and air-dries after you remove the sheet, and then you can carry on with your normal routine.

Continuing for a second with this tangent (because I didn’t plan to talk about facial masks): I love sheet masks. Oil-absorbing clay masks have their merits, but seriously? Making the effort to remove a hardened clay mask from my face was never my favorite thing to do. I’m too lazy. (I’m not a fan of peel masks, either.) Mom sent three different varieties of the Epielle masks: Firming and Lifting with Vitamin C (“rejuvenating & conditioning formula”), Green Tea & Aloe (“detoxifying & soothing formula”), and Cucumber (“refreshing & purifying formula”). I’m currently wearing a cucumber one, which my skin loves. It feels luxurious, and it smells delightfully like a faintly sweet, fresh cucumber.

My mother has been my beauty mentor all my life. I do my own research to stay current with the science behind skincare, but I follow her advice and use the products she sends. She looks a good 15-20 years younger than she is. She’s amazing, and I’m lucky. I started using sheet masks when she first started sending them to me over ten years ago. Thank you, Mom!

So here’s the question that’s been smoldering in my mind since yesterday: Do you ever wonder what’s going on behind that closed door when you go to someone’s place and no one answers, but you suspect that someone’s home?

Yesterday, Callaghan and I were sitting here on the loveseat when someone knocked on the door. Based on recent events, we guessed that the visitor was either a kid selling something, or a couple coming to talk to us about religion, though we could have been wrong. We deliberated for a few seconds before deciding that we would answer the door. But there was a snag. Literally.

“Back here!” Callaghan hissed in my ear as he frantically pointed and gestured behind his neck. He was leaning forward at a tentative, strange angle. I looked. A thread from one of the couch cushions behind him was badly ensnarled in the clasp of his thin gold chain necklace. He was stuck! The cushion was attached to his back like a shell on a turtle, and someone was waiting at the door. I muffled a laugh with my hand as I hopped over him quickly to get the scissors from the kitchen.

The gold chain is very delicate, and the loveseat cushion is very nice, and we didn’t want either one to get ruined, so the situation required some patience and finesse. By the time I’d extricated Callaghan from the cushion, the person at the door was gone. Maybe I should have answered the door on my way to the kitchen, but then we would have had to explain that we don’t usually wear our furniture. (Rather, our furniture wears us.)

So that’s what the person on the other side of the door would have seen had they come equip with wall-penetrating X-Ray glasses. Something to think about the next time you go to someone’s house and they don’t answer the door. You just never know what’s going on!