The only people who haven’t seen Star Wars…

What can I even begin to say about Star Wars? These movies have been some of my favorites for as long as I can remember – some of my fondest childhood memories are watching the first halves of all three Original Trilogy movies before I fell asleep. Actually, I’m not entirely sure if I ever saw the end of a Star Wars movie until I was about six or seven and old enough to stay awake through the whole thing.

I remember having male friends in kindergarten, despite the fact that boys had cooties, simply because they needed a female to play Princess Leia on the playground and I was more than happy to step into that role. My first “boyfriend” played Han Solo as we chased each other over the jungle gym shooting imaginary blasters at our enemies. In the late 90s and early 2000s, I eagerly queued up in front of the movie theater with my dad in order to see and be disappointed by the Star Wars prequels. In fact, a discussion I had with a very terrifying 8th Grade English teacher about the pros and cons of Revenge of the Sith was the first time I realized that scary teachers didn’t have to be so scary.

This brings me to a few years later, and an episode of How I Met Your Mother:

the only people who haven't seen star wars

Apparently my friend Helena (yep, she’s the one who writes the kickass newsletter that I wrote about before) lived them. She lived the Star Wars.

We’ve been having this conversation for about the last ten years we’ve known each other. We’ve known each other for eleven years. And I’ve always thought it woefully sad that my best friend, who I always consider so up to date on pop culture (again, read the newsletter), has never seen what I think is one of the most genre-defining epics in cinema.

There was only one way to fix this, and that involved Trilling It Up (a.k.a. watching the entire Original Trilogy in one sitting with plenty of snacks). I ordered the DVDs especially for the occasion, and also because there was no way I was going to live the rest of my life without owning these DVDs in case other such emergencies should arise.

helena with star wars
Here, Helena majestically poses with the DVDs in anticipation.

This also fit well into my 2015 Summer Challenge – I was required to spend an entire day watching old movies, and by “old” I count anything that was released in cinemas before I was born. I know, I know, I’m young. Or at least that’s what the people at work keep telling me.

The manicure I did for the occasion wasn’t particularly complex, and definitely didn’t involve trying to draw the symbol of the Rebel Alliance (I’m good, but I’m not that good). Instead, I went with some basic Space Nails (that’s Sinful Colors’ Black on Black with my China Glaze Fairy Dust and some Hard Candy Black Tie Optional on top to make the stars) on my index and little fingers…

So glittery!
So glittery!

And then a bright blue (Julep Alyssa) and a bright green (Julep Sam) on the ring and middle fingers for some Jedi lightsaber action. I’ve given this a lot of thought, and I think that, should my Force powers ever awaken (yes, that was a reference to the new movie that’s coming out in December OH MY GOD OH MY GOD – I’ll definitely do a different Star Wars manicure when the time comes!), I would almost definitely have to have a blue lightsaber. It’s not even a question.

star wars nails 2

My thumbs received a coat of red, Julep Ellen, because there are two sides to the Force, and the Sith had to be represented here somehow. I mean, they’re the main villains and all. And of course they had to be red; if you’ve read previous posts, you know how much I hate red nail polish and wish it didn’t stain my fingers every time. And it smudged too. That’s just typical for those pesky Sith Lords.

star wars nails 1

And now, a review from the great Helena about what she thought of her first foray into a Galaxy Far Far Away:

Luke Skywalker has the hots for his sister.

But on a more serious note, I really liked Star Wars and I’m glad that I no longer just have a vague understanding of it.

I can live with that.

May the Force be with you, always,

Mary

A Day on the Lake

Hello, dear readers. I’m terrible at updating with any consistency – who would’ve thought a high-powered corporate job involved so much neutral nail polish? That’s definitely not worth posting about!

Either way, I do get some breaks from corporate life, and I took a trip a few weeks ago that was just what the doctor ordered in terms of relaxation with good food and fun friends. I joined a group of my college gals this past Saturday in order to spend an afternoon at Lake Anna, which I had heard about but never visited in person.

Strangely enough, this is the only picture I found where you can see everyone’s faces. And I’m the one making a funny one.

When you don’t have enough time in your schedule for one of those week-long beach trips to the Outer Banks or something that you see popping up on your Facebook news feed, a day trip will definitely do the trick in a pinch, especially with amazing people to back it up. The Roommate, who is pictured above although she would rather me not specify exactly which one she is, even took an impromptu photo shoot of me in my odd-looking one-piece bathing suit (cut outs and crazy tan lines FOR THE WIN), which I’ll share if only for the hilarity factor. I mean, Lifestyle bloggers do these kind of shoots all the time, right?

Note: This is why I don’t call myself a lifestyle blogger.

 

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You may think I’m striking a pose, but it was just REALLY bright outside.

 

 

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Proof that I was actually at a beach.

 

 

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And that I actually went in the water.

 

As for the manicure, I happen to have a fantastic polish that’s exactly the right color for this sort of thing. You can see in the picture that my nails were orange on Beach Day, but if I had to choose again, I would have worn Julep Libby, a beautiful teal that would have perfectly matched my wonky bathing suit.

 

 

Julep Libby

That’s another item checked off of my Summer Bucket List, on which I’m admittedly very behind. Well, I’ve got 27 more days until the challenge is complete. Let’s see if I rise to it.

Best wishes,

Mary

How Big, How Blue, How Beautiful

How much are you freaking out over Florence + The Machine’s new album? I pre-ordered my copy months ago, and I am now the proud owner of a hard copy CD and a printed booklet of beautiful and ethereal shots of the woman herself, Florence Welch.

Her latest album, How Big, How Blue, How Beautiful, is named after the third track, which she wrote for “someone [she cares] about.” She encourages all of us to share it with the people we care about, and I’m not one to disappoint a musical goddess, so of course I had to provide the link:

Honestly, I think it’s a masterpiece. In honor of this album, I of course had to do an appropriate manicure. My nails have been taking on either a very bright or a very dark tone as of late, so it was fun to use the white to lighten them up a bit. And, as always, making them blue makes me happy and fits in perfectly with the theme of the album.

I promise, I’ll take a blue hiatus for a couple of weeks, seeing as I’ve posted so many blue manicures lately (it’s my favorite color!). At least comfort yourselves with the thought that I used a white this time. And it was blacklight reactive, for reasons I’ll go into later.

The hangnail was unfortitunate…and painful.IMG_1850
The blue background makes it more fun.

The colors are mostly repeats that I’ve used in other manicures: Essie’s Bikini So Teeny and China Glaze’s DJ Blue My Mind. The new blacklight-reactive twist is Julep Dana, which has blue shimmery undertones if you hold it in just the right light. How blue, how beautiful indeed!

But…why the album nails? Well, one of the things that kept me very busy this week was my trip to…SEE FLORENCE IN CONCERT!

My friend Helena and I were able to get pre-sale tickets (which were my main reasons for buying the actual CD instead of downloading HBHBHB) and wound up sitting five rows away from the stage. I swear, Florence and I made eye contact at one point. It was amazing.

I’ll be out of town this weekend, but many new movies and manicures will be headed your way. While I’m gone, I’ll leave you with some cool concert shots I got when I wasn’t too busy rocking out and singing along.

Stay beautiful,

Mary

Summer 2015 Challenge

beach panorama

Hey guys,! It’s Sunday now, but as of Monday, it’ll be June 1! It’s Sum-mer-time, and the living is eeeeeeeeeaaaaassssyyyyyyy…

(We sang that song in choir last year. I haven’t been able to get it out of my head since.)

In case you hadn’t known, I love attempting challenges. I’ve tried the Whole30, various distances of running, book lovers’ challenges, 30-day post challenges back when my preferred platform was Tumblr, and about a million other things for no reason other than to see whether or not I could do them. Sometimes I finish them; sometimes I don’t, but I always like having a project.

Because of this, I’m going to try and complete 30 entries I’ve chosen from The Odyssey Online’s 2015 Summer Bucket List. I picked 30 that seem realistic yet fun (and often a little crazy), but I nixed four that The Odyssey recommends because they would make me miserable – for instance, I hate camping with a fiery passion (camp, fire, see what I did there?), and I haven’t been able to carve my name on a tree since I watched Fern Gully in the first grade.

I’ve made a checklist page on this blog so that you can follow my progress – click here for the link!

Rules are as follows:

  1. All entries must be completed between June 1, 2015, and August 31, 2015.
  2. All entries must be accompanied by a blog post about how the particular activity went. Pictures not mandatory; some of them (skinny dipping?!?!!?!) are not things that should be posted on the Internet.
  3. Themed manicures should be attempted for at least 20 of these challenges.
  4. The challenge is completed when all 30 items link back to a post about that particular activity.

I’m looking forward to trying so many new things with the people I love this summer, and I’m happy that I’ll be able to keep everyone in the loop!

Are you doing anything cool this summer? Leave your summer plans in the comments – hell, I’d love to feature you in a My Friends Do Cool Stuff post sometime soon!

And please, just to be on the safe side, wear your SPF!

Love,

Mary