The Holy Grail of Face Wash

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Say yes to tomatoes

Usually, I try to write something snarky, feministy, or astute on this blog. Unfortunately, I spent the weekend around a confirmed demon cat (I’ll tell you that story another time) and seeing as how I am very VERY allergic to cats, I’ve not been able to have one snarky, feministy, or astute thought in days because I’ve sneezed them all out. So, instead of something funny or thought-provoking, I thought I might just share one of my beauty secrets with you. And by “beauty secret” I just mean really awesome product that works really awesomely.

Here’s a shocker, when I was a teenager, I had acne. (I’ll pause for a collective gasp). It wasn’t so bad that I had to take hard-core medication but it was bad enough that my dermatologist gave me a prescription cream for it. Sure, I could blame the acne on the fact that I played tennis practically everyday and that makes a girl sweaty and sweat makes you break-out, but if I’m being really truly honest, I had acne even when I wasn’t playing tennis everyday. And I loathed it. All I ever wanted was clear, beautiful, glowy skin. When most girls were doing whatever most girls do, I was ransacking every cosmetic counter at the mall looking for two things.

1. The magic cure for my acne.

2. A good cover-up for when the magic cure didn’t work.

Seriously y’all, I tried everything. I tried every brand, every product, every anything that might possibly help. I took herbs. I stopped wearing make-up. I washed my face twenty times a day, at least I did until someone told me that was why I had acne, so I started only washing my face once a day. And you know something? After all that, I still had acne. Not all over my face but a few zits here and there was enough to drive me crazy. Zits were my enemy and they were winning the war big time. The only hope I could cling to was that when I turned 20 and officially ended my teen years all my zit problems would disappear. But they didn’t. Sure, my skin was a lot clearer and I had more days without zits than I did with zits, but I still got them frequently enough to feel as though my skin wasn’t really truly clear and it sure as hell wasn’t glowy. I had pretty much given up the search for the perfect combination of cleanser, exfoliator, and moisturizer and faced the reality that for me, perfect skin just wasn’t going to happen, until….

On a whim, I bought a new cleanser for my face mostly because I liked the packaging. Sure, I had a half-full bottle of another type of cleanser in my shower but what’s life without whimsy? So, I bought it and started using it immediately without even giving that half-full bottle of just ok cleanser another look. And guess what? I’m zit free! My skin has never been clearer and while it may not be quite as glowy as J. Lo’s, I can live with that. It’s soft and clear and actually pretty nice looking. Would you like to know what cleanser I bought? Well too bad if you don’t because I’m going to tell you anyway. It’s called Say Yes To Tomatoes and it’s mostly natural and smells quite nice and I don’t even really care that much about those things because it keeps my skin clear and for the first time in who knows how long, I actually like how my skin looks and even better it costs less than $10 a bottle. So, basically, I finally found the holy grail of skin cleansers and it’s called Say Yes To Tomatoes. The acne prone teenager in me is finally at peace.

Do you have any special products you love? Let’s not keep secrets people…

A Spirited Defense of Romance Novels

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It is a truth, universally acknowledged, that a woman who reads romance novels must be sad, lonely, and own a house brimming with cats.

Or, at least, that’s what the trio of teenagers in Barnes & Noble this afternoon would have me believe. Bodice rippers, they called them. Smut, they said. Housewife porn, they tittered, flipping through the pages for any utterance of the word “manhood.”

Obviously, they had to die.

Just kidding. I didn’t kill them with my sword of literary righteousness. It would have made such the mess. Blood stains do tend to ruin books, after all. Not only did I not end them, but I also didn’t launch into a lecture. It was close, but I bit my tongue and kept on browsing, with only the briefest of quelling death glares. I would like to cite my well-honed sense of tact for this, but let’s be honest. I didn’t lecture those kids, because it would do no good. There would be a new crop of giggling literary voyeurs in their place tomorrow. People love to mock romance novels.

As a longtime romance reader, I’m well-acquainted with such literary snobbery. Despite having bookshelves similarly filled with mysteries, non-fiction, and young adult books, whenever people peruse my library they comment on the romance novels.The following exchange has happened way too often…

Friend: Grace, you read trashy books? I never would have guessed!
Grace: They’re romances, they’re not trash.
Friend: But they’re all about sex! I thought only bored housewives read these.
Grace: The one you’re holding is written by a graduate of Harvard, Oxford, and Yale.
Friend: Look, it says “manhood!”
Grace: *explodes in fury*

Why is it considered socially acceptable to impugn romance novels? Despite it being the bestselling category of books, with over $1.3 billion in sales last year alone, it’s the darling of haters. No other genre has to deal with this kind of heat. Personally, I ascribe this to it being the only genre primarily written by and written for women. Classically feminine interests have always been easy to malign, after all. Alas, that’s a (long, rant-filled) discussion for another day. What I really want to talk about is the thing most haters of romance have in common: they’ve never actually read a romance novel.

Feel free to hate on a genre, if you’re well read in it. All too often, however, the people talking about how smutty romances are have never actually picked one up. From cover art and literary gossip, they make all sorts of ridiculous assumptions about the books and their readers. Since it would be impossible to force them to pick up a pink book, I’m just going to break some myths myself. How convenient that we write this blog, isn’t it? Get ready, captive audience readers, we’re talking romances today.

Myth One: Women read romances for the sex.

Oh, darlings. No. Romances are not porn. If I were reading a book solely for its erotic content, I’d be more efficient about it. In the average romance novel, there are like six total pages of sex. If the book is 400 pages, that’s 1.5% total. Y’all, I’ve read young adult books with higher percentages than that. In romance, like other genres, it’s all on a spectrum – they range from sweet romances (kisses only) to erotic romance (legit erotica), but most popular romances fall in the middle. One or two sex scenes tops, most of which I skim through. Because…surprise! That’s not why I, or most romance readers, pick up a romance.

Myth Two: Women who read romances have submission fantasies.

Ah, the bodice ripper argument. This is the reason I truly know most haters have never read a romance. Bodice rippers, books with overly-Alpha (read: chauvinistic asshat) heroes and unwilling waif heroines, haven’t been popular in over twenty years. Modern romances celebrate realistic characters. In historicals, you’re just as like to run into a pickpocket heroine as you are a countess, and neither one will be a helpless waif. Heroes also run the gamut, from sensitive Gammas to boy-next-door Betas, but the one thing you don’t find anymore are irredeemable Alphas. If a guy acts like a jerk to the heroine, he better have a good backstory about why and he better lighten up eventually. Heroines aren’t pushed around anymore. If anything, they’re the focus of most modern romance novels, something which my feminist core adores about the genre.

Myth Three: Romances are poorly written template novels.

Every romance reader has heard this before. Aren’t all romances the same? They’re formulaic, sentimental shlock that preys on women’s emotions. To this I say: No, you moron. The only thing romances have in common, one book to another, is that the hero and heroine must end up together. That’s not called a formula, that’s called a genre convention. It would be like saying all mysteries are the same, because a crime is solved. It’s just illogical.

Like in any genre, there are good romances and bad romances. They’re not all one or the other. However, like in other genres, there are brilliantly written books that just happen to be romance novels. Even my mother, who isn’t a romance reader, will pick up the latest Susan Elizabeth Phillips…because they’re wonderful, well-written books, no matter what genre they fall into.

Myth Four: Women who read and write romances are just bored housewives.

Oh, holy bejeezus. Let’s just stop this nonsense right there, shall we? From just my sampling of friends who read romance novels there are: two lawyers, one of whom graduated first in her class from a top law school, three doctors, and five women with “executive” in their job titles. Sure, some housewives read them too…because some readers are housewives, not because they’re all women’s weak little brains can handle. Have you met housewives lately? Did they seem dumb or bored to you? Because some of the smartest, busiest women I know are stay-at-home moms.

Beyond that, I defy you to find a group of better educated writers than romance authors. As a writer, albeit in a different genre, I annually attend Romance Writers of America’s national conference. Each year, I meet doctors, lawyers, and college professors writing in the genre. Eloisa James, one of my personal favorites, is the chair of Fordham University’s English Department. Julia Quinn, one of romance’s most beloved modern writers, was accepted to Yale School of Medicine, when her first book sold. Excellent credentials for anyone’s intellect, I would say.

So, why do we read romance novels? Just like other genres, it’s hard to pigeonhole readers, but I think it all comes back to characters.  Romance is the only genre whose conventions favor character over plot. Mysteries must have an investigator, but chiefly they need a crime to unfold. Science Fiction needs a hero, but even more it needs world-building and large scale plotting.  Romances are, at their core, about two people falling in love. Ergo, the people are the most important part. They must be three-dimensional, well-written characters to truly make us feel the emotion of their journey. Like in every genre, there are books that don’t succeed, but the great ones do so brilliantly.

If you’ve dismissed romances, I challenge you to read a few. You might become a lifelong fan or, perhaps, you’ll just bust a few more myths. Either way, I think you’ll be pleasantly surprised at what you find. Don’t worry, you don’t have to own cats to enjoy the books. I’m more of a dog person anyway.

- Grace

Awesome romance-centric sites:
Smart Bitches, Trashy Books
Dear Author
All About Romance
International Association for the Study of Popular Romance

“Cute” Is Patronizing.

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Penguins

See? This is cute.

Listen folks, I may or may not have had a few glasses of champagne and this may or may not be a rant. Just so we’re kind of clear.

I loathe being referred to as “cute” and I absolutely abhor my writing being called “cute”. Why? Because “cute” is patronizing y’all. It’s patronizing as hell.  Sure, being called “cute” used to be a nice thing, but around age 14 it stops being nice and starts being repressive. At age 14, “cute” hits its own form of puberty and turns from light fluffiness to ugly patronizingness.

At least, 14 is when I first remember feeling like “cute” was no longer a desirable adjective to be called. “Cute” was what all the popular girls called you when they really meant, “not cool”.  “Cute” was what boys called you right before qualifying it with “ but not hot”. “Cute” was what your art teacher called your final project when she really meant, “derivative and without vision”.  “Cute” was what your English teacher called the poem you wrote in iambic pentameter when he really meant, “lovesick teens are the worst”. “Cute” is what your Mother called the homecoming dress you had previously loved and then promptly had to trash. Around the age of 14 “cute” stops being cute and morphs into degrading, minimizing, dismissive, and patronizing. “Cute” means “Cute…but….” Once you hit puberty and meander your way into adulthood, “cute” always has a “but” attached and it is that implied “but” that is so patronizing. “Cute” is less than, “cute” is not really good enough.

So, when someone, anyone, refers to my writing, which I’ve put assloads of effort and time into as “cute”, I tend to get a little pissy. Call me sensitive, call me insane, you won’t be the first or the last person to do so, but I know when I’m being patronized and dismissed as “less than” and I’m going to fight like hell against it. How am I going to fight against it? I’m going to drink champagne, write this blog post, and say “Screw you” to anyone who calls it “cute”. Puppies are cute. Babies are cute. So are Lisa Frank notebooks, Shirley Temple movies, kittens, stuffed animals, cupcakes, and penguins. Feel free to call all of those things cute. But don’t call my writing “cute” unless you are looking to start some stuff, because I will start some stuff. Ya dig?

Girls Who Hate Girls Who Hate Girls

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I believe in warning signs. Where there is smoke, fire is ablaze. Where there’s a siren in Kansas, tornado approaches. And where there’s a broad generalization about how all girls are bitches, there’s…a bitch.

“I just don’t get along with girls.”

You’ve heard that statement. I know you have. How do I know this? Because it is a much beloved catchphrase among a certain set. Often said with smugness, this statement is fraught with hidden meaning. It intimates that girls are catty, or that other girls have always been jealous of the speaker, or that this girl was done A Great and Terrible Wrong by female friends.The person saying this doesn’t mean she doesn’t get along with girls, she means she doesn’t like girls. She doesn’t care for half the people walking around on Earth. If you have a vagina, she’s out.

What a load of crap. This infuriates me. I wish to find a radioactive spider, if only so I could be bitten, gain superpowers, and trap people who say this in a prison of feminist rage web. While I am not the type to insist we all love each other, simply because we have matching chromosomes, I am the type to insist we not actively bash our gender.  Saying you don’t get along with girls is saying you believe gender stereotypes. Awesome. Here are just some of the opinions you have aligned yourself with:

  • Women are catty.
  • Women will do anything to land a man.
  • Women’s favorite topic of conversation: shoes. Preferably pink ones.
  • Women’s second favorite topic of conversation: men. Preferably rich ones.
  • Women are irrational, when on their period.
  • Women are dramatic.
  • Women aren’t as good at math and science.

The list goes on. I think we can all agree, these stereotypes are ridiculous. People are people. Not every woman likes shoes, just like not every man likes football. These are just traditional gender norms handed down to us by society. There’s not a single generalization you can make about the sexes that holds true. Even the ones presented by evolutionary biology don’t hold up from person to person. Not every man wants to spread his seed far and wide, nor does every woman hear a “biological clock.” So, saying that you don’t get along with a whole gender is not only awful, but ill-informed.

People, the rational ones, take others on a case-by-case basis. They don’t throw a hand out and say: “I don’t get along with people from Texas!” Even if they hate barbeque and cowboy boots, they know not everyone in Texas likes those things either. (Though, seriously, why wouldn’t you like barbeque? The mind boggles.) It must be miserable, not looking at others this way. If I seriously thought every girl was out to talk about me behind my back or steal my boyfriend, I’d probably throw myself off the nearest cliff. That’s just a lot of malice to see in the world.

Of course, I have a theory. I don’t think the women saying this believe it either. What they do believe is that saying they don’t get along with girls sets them apart from their gender. Doesn’t saying you don’t have girlfriends, because they’re catty, mean you’re implicitly not catty? They wear their gender discrimination like a badge of honor. Hating other girls means you’re above all that “drama” the rest of us supposedly live for. Well, I think it doesn’t. Saying you dislike your own gender tells me just one thing: you’re a bitch…and not in a good way.

Strewn behind this girl are the carrion of past friendships: other girls. They’re the ones who thought she was their friend, only to have her ditch them when she got a boyfriend. (“They were just jealous!”) They’re the ones who told her who they liked, only to have her go after that person the next week. (“It’s not my fault we fell in love!”) They’re the ones who suffered snide remarks over and over, until one day they couldn’t take it anymore. (“They were too sensitive!”) All too often the women saying this are the ones who actually do love female competition, as long as they win.

For most of my life, I didn’t see this. I had friends who said this all the time and I wouldn’t get it – they seemed so awesome, why did other girls mistreat them so? Each time, it took awhile, but I figured it out. Those friendships ended, because hate always furrows its way out. Thinking that all girls are evil, means you’re all too quick to throw another one of us under the bus. Now, whenever I hear those words, I hear what they really mean. I hear: Run, Grace! Run far away, as fast as your fancy red espadrilles can carry you! Because while I do love shoes, I hate drama.

- Grace

The Injustice of Genitalia Slang.

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Dictionary of Slang

Have you ever thought about how many names there are for genitalia outside of the anatomically correct “penis” and “vagina”? Because I’ve thought about it a lot. And I’ve come to one conclusion: penises get a lot more slang terms than vaginas and that’s not ok with me.

Think about all the slang terms you use or have heard of for penis. I’ll give you a few minutes because it took me about 10 to exhaust my mental penis slang directory.

>

>

>

Finished already? (That’s what she said….) Ok, good. I bet you were able to come-up with at least 10 and that’s not even close to the actual 200+ the magical internet oracle was able to provide me with (in a Chrome incognito search of course). Here are a few of my personal favorites.

 Peen. I don’t know why, it just always makes me smile.

Who Who Dilly. It sounds like a mix between something you can buy at Dairy Queen and a Dr. Seuss character.

Bologna Pony. Sure, it’s gross but also it rhymes.

And then there are the ones I hate.

Ding-a-ling. It’s not a doorbell. Trust me.

One Eyed Snake/Monster.  A term coined to keep young women abstinent by terrifying them. It probably worked for a while.

Purple-Headed Soldier. Ummm…my vagina is not a war you are entering.

When I performed the exact same search for vagina, I was very disconcerted by the results. Only about 100 terms were found and of those, about 25 referred to the clitoris specifically so I’m not counting them. My favorites of those include,

Birth Cannon. I feel like it really gets across the brutality and bloodiness of what happens to you down there when you pop out dem babies.

Minge. I just feel so English when I say it. I feel like this is what Hermione Granger or modern day Jane Austen would call it.

Cha-Cha. It’s a fun dance. It’s a fun part of your body. This is my term of choice.

Honestly, I had a hard time thinking of three I liked, and consequently the list of the nicknames I hate is much longer but I restrained myself for the sake of writing symmetry and just choose to share the three I hate most.

Axe wound. How dare you. As if my vagina was some sort of wound I should see a surgeon about repairing.

Pink Sausage Wallet. My vagina doesn’t exist solely for a sausage.

Bearded Clam. First of all, gross. Second of all, I would appreciate you not making assumptions about the hair (or lack thereof) down there.

Why are there so many more nicknames for penis than vagina? Could it be because for centuries men have been taught to take pride in their genitalia while women were taught to be ashamed of theirs? Even Lady Gaga herself has coined two new terms for penis, “disco stick” and “vertigo stick”. And yet, she that is all woman has not coined one new term for vagina, of which she has one. Sure, she used “muffin” in Poker Face but that’s hardly a new term, in fact, I could find examples of that term being used dating back a few centuries. How is it that women can come so very very far in working towards equality and yet not have bothered to create a name for that which makes us women? I mean, didn’t it come up when we were starving ourselves to get the vote?

Ladies, I encourage you to take a stand against this situation and introduce new and lovely terms for vagina into the lexicon. I’ll start you off with one of my own: Lalala. As in, “My lalala quite enjoyed that.” Or “What a lovely lalala!” I like it because it sounds like a song Cinderella would sing after having a wonderful dream. I’m also considering referring to my vagina as a “Lady Gaga” but that honor is conditional on her creating a new term for vagina and incorporating it into a song.

 

St. Valentine’s Day Haters Be Gone With Ye!

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Spinster friends, I will never understand the St. Valentine’s Day cynics.  Haters might say:

A.  It’s a holiday invented by the greeting card companies.

B.  It’s all about the commercialization.

C.  It’s designed to make the single people feel like losers.

D.  All of the above.

I just see someone who views the glass as half empty of its unfiltered tap water.  Oh sure, I know the other argument as well.  Expressing our love and appreciation of one another shouldn’t be limited to just one holiday.  Uh yah, I think we’d all agree on that one, but it’s way more fun to have an excuse to do it with pink and red and chocolates and flowers.

Perhaps I should put this love of the holiday in context for you.  I was the girl who got 1st place in the contest for best St. Valentine’s mailbox every year.  And alright, it was a contest that existed solely in my imagination but dangit, I won.  Nincompoop Nick and his shark mailbox (no doubt assembled by his mother whilst he secretly watched Power Rangers & Barney with his little brother) was no match for me and my television mailbox.  It was so creative – one dropped the Valentines in and they’d change the “show” on the screen to your Valentine.  I know.  Brilliance.  In high school I went all Martha Stewart and hand-colored paper doilies onto which I pasted hearts lovingly cut out of construction paper and lined with lace.  A few years ago I delivered little St. Valentine’s baskets to my friends.  I was like the St. Valentine’s Bunny!

So the cynicism makes no sense to me.  I’m a firm believer that attitude is everything.  Instead of this pessimistic outlook that seems to cast its gloomy shadow over the day, why can’t we all just hold hands and sing the “I Love You” song?  (I had that stuck in my head all day on Friday.  Others need to suffer with me.  You’re welcome.)  Furthermore, this is a holiday wherein you can eat an entire box of Godiva chocolates in one sitting without having to explain yourself to anyone!

Come, be happy with me, wear your pink and red, and:

  • Carry Benadryl to prepare for possibility of being surprised with flowers at work.
  • Practice your “that smells soooo good” and “this is delicious” exclamations so they come across as more authentic when your schnookums burns the dinner he decided to cook for you.  (True story.  Except schnookums was really my jerkface ex-boyfriend who also decided to write and sing a song to me – probably only to hear his own voice.  I cringed through the entire thing.)
  • Arm yourself with the facts of why chocolate is good for you so you can feel better about breaking your diet.
  • Make sure you buy those color-catcher washer sheet thingies so your pinks and reds don’t bleed when you get to your laundry next Friday.
  • Stock up on your stash of old school Valentines because admit it, it’s fun to get them and you could totally brighten someone’s day if you left one on their desk.

- Kate

P.S.  That awesome card above can be found here, on one of the best greeting card sites ever, Archelaus.

Friendquaintance Repellent

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I have discovered something new dear readers, something that I think will rock the world of science. Or, you know, make someone somewhere go “Huh.”.  I have found a way to repel my people, specifically my friends-acquaintances, without being mean, hateful, offensive, unhygienic, or talking in a baby voice. It’s called “being in love”. Go figure.

Yes, it’s true. Since falling in love I have had one of three reactions from my friendquaintances, which is a term I coined because just calling them acquaintances seemed cold but calling them friends seemed greatly exaggerated, hence the friendquaintance.

1. Oh! How nice. Good for you! (Then I don’t hear from them again)

2. Gross. Get out of here with all that love talk. (Then I don’t hear from them again)

3. Yay! I’m so excited for you! I need to meet him! (Then I don’t hear from them again)

It would seem that all of my friendquaintances have a severe aversion to being around any one in love. I really can’t imagine why. I’m not one to gush (except to Kate and Grace and they kind of have to love me) so I know it’s not because I’ve gone overboard on the lovey-dovey talk. And many of them are in relationships so it’s not a love-envy thing. It’s like I just mention I’m happy and in love and all the friendquaintances go running for the hills as if I’ve just told them I’m infected with zombie-virus and if they ever talk to me again they too will contract zombie-virus. How very odd it is. I never would have guessed that being in love was friendquaintance repellent, but then again, penicillin was an accidental discovery too.

The only other explanation I can think of is they were all murdered by a serial killer who is eventually working his/her way up to me. Of course this explanation seems far-fetched at best, but you have to admit, might make a great episode of Criminal Minds.

What about you foxy readers? Did your friendquaintances disappear when you fell in love?