Lost In Translation

I've mentioned dealing with asshole customers at my cashier-and-more job at the Asian supermarket, but not all my customer stories involve asstomers. Sometimes the people I deal with are just weird. This is one example.

I'm pretty used to customers who can't speak English. Most of the time, they can say a few words or point to something on a list, and I can handle that. Not so much when they just assume I know their language and talk at me in Korean/Japanese/Chinese/et cetera, despite my blank look of not understanding.

So this one woman summoned me to the register by calling out in Korean, which is something I do get: a call for assistance has pretty much the same tone of voice no matter what the language. I detangled myself from the cases of shrimp-flavored crackers I was working with and hurried to the register, and she just kept chattering away in Korean while I rang up her items. Then, I came to a soup pouch I didn't recognize. She had apparently dug it out of the stack of taped boxes containing things that were not yet in the system and did not have a price. It took a few minutes for either of us to convey what we were trying to say, but she eventually decided that she didn't want the pouch of soup after all.

OK, I thought to myself, I can deal with that. As I was swiping her credit card, all of a sudden she pulled out a stack of six Jehovah's Witness pamphlets (in English) from her purse and shoved them into my hands. "Present!" she declared with a smile.

"Oh, um, thank you?" I responded while handing over her receipt.

"Thank you! Thank you!" The woman nodded and smiled and hurried off with her purchases, leaving me holding a bunch of Jehovah's Witness stuff and feeling thoroughly confused.

Why did she give them to me? Did she not know what they were? Did she think that because they were in English and I speak English I'd appreciate them? Or was she really able to understand English after all and wanted to convert me? Who knows? I certainly don't.

Off to work again, and I wonder what types of customers I'll encounter today.

XOXO
Gossip Ghoul.

Aurora's Weekly Favorites: Om Shanti Avengers

Hey, everyone! Some people call Sunday the beginning of the week while others consider it the very end. For the purposes of the Gossip Ghoul Blog, I'm considering Sunday the end with a recap of some weekly favorites. Not all of these are from this week or were put online this week, of course. These are just things that I've been loving this past week and want to share so that you can enjoy as well.

First off, I found this little gem from the San Diego Comic Con on Fashionably Geek. It's from the masquerade featuring a group of cosplayers performing Om Shanti Avengers. Yes, it is an Avengers and Bollywood crossover. The costumes are hilarious, and the dancing is very Bollywood-esque. It made me laugh a lot. Here is the video from the masquerade:



And here is a clip from the Bollywood film Om Shanti Om. It's an especially awesome movie if you understand even some of the self-referential insider jokes about the industry. Either way, watch, and your heart too may be filled with the pain of disco.



Yeah, not going to lie, but I love Bollywood and find that highly enjoyable.

Speaking of music, my song of the week has been Girls, Girls, Girls by Motley Crue. It's been in my head all week, and now it can be in yours.

My nail polish of the week has been Noho by Nails Inc. from the leather effect line,  with China Glaze's Stone Cold from the Hunger Games collection as the accent nails.

Picture from Sephora.com

Aditionally, I plan to spotlight a great beauty tutorial from YouTube every week. Inspiration for different looks can come from anywhere. Today's video is the geekily fantastic Daenerys of Game of Thrones look by Michelle Phan.



Of course, there's more to life than makeup, as demonstrated in this list of five lessons about life learned from Cosmopolitan magazine. I've often been criticized for my love of Cosmo. Just yesterday at the bus stop a woman felt the need to rant at me about how the women in those pages aren't real because they're wearing makeup and have had their hair done professionally and how that's horrible for people to see because they can never look like that. Yes, I will never look as amazing as celebrities in glamorous red carpet photos, but there's so much more to Cosmo than that, and the list in this link really summarizes it well.

I hope you enjoyed the little things that have made me smile this week, and I hope we all have an enjoyable week ahead of us. Fingers crossed.

XOXO
Gossip Ghoul.

Howl At The Moon

Back in May, my friend J and I decided that this summer we would watch a series together that neither of us have previously seen. We have similar tastes in books, movies, and shows (with  a few exceptions -- I will never like Anchorman, sorry), and viewing a few marathons together was a great way to bond before she left for her internship. After much debate, we selected Teen Wolf.
 

Picture belongs to MTV.

All I knew about Teen Wolf previously is that it involves werewolves (obviously) and that the big slash ship is Sterek. I didn't know it's MTV. I didn't know it's an adaptation of the cult Michael J. Fox film. I didn't know Scott is the main character. I didn't even know what Stiles and Derek look like. The only thing I really knew is that Sterek is the big rival ship for Destiel.

Now, I am a huge Destiel fan, and I desperately want the pairing to become official for Supernatural season nine. I just about melted into bittersweet sobs when Dean told Castiel, "I need you," while Castiel was struggling against mind control not to kill him. I am currently working on multiple -- that's right, multiple -- Destiel fan videos. Therefore, reading that Sterek is considered the Destiel of Teen Wolf instantly intrigued me.

 

 

 

 

Picture from Tumblr.

 J and I watched the first couple episodes, and immediately we were hooked. The show is incredible! It has intriguing storylines and brilliantly developed characters. Every single character is interesting and likeable,* even minor background and side characters. (Who else here wants to create a fan club for Greenberg? Our motto would be: Greenberg, We Love You Even Though Everybody Hates You And We Have No Idea What You Look Like.) Even the more villainous characters are loveable and sympathetic, especially snarky Peter, and who else here cried for Deucalion at the end of Visionary? Speaking of crying, I do cry a lot during Teen Wolf, especially this current season. Season one was great; season two was even better; and season three is amazing, with each episode being more intensive than the last. After this past episode, I'm dying for this coming Moonday. Is Jennifer actually Paige? I must know!

Picture belongs to MTV.

Now I have another reason to smile at the full moon.

XOXO
Gossip Ghoul.

* Except for Jennifer. She's not very likeable, but she's still very interesting. Though truth be told, we just hate her for manipulating Derek and keeping him from Stiles.

Fabulous Tip of the Day: Easy Spa Treatment

Today's Fabulous Tip of the Day:

"In the shower, buff skin with a handful of regular white sugar -- it's an inexpensive and amazing face and body scrub. To help erase self-tanning streaks, add a teaspoon of lemon juice."
-- taken from The 5 Minute Face by Carmindy, page 15.

Sometimes I use coarse raw sugar instead. Just be sure not to use the lemon juice if you'll be spending time in the sun immediately afterward, since the bleaching effect of lemon juice can make your skin more sensitive to the sun.

XOXO
Gossip Ghoul.

Deformed Squiggles: My Early Attempts At Nail Art

Only a fraction of my nail polish collection, of course.

I have to admit that I love nail art, and I really admire the people who do such fantastic designs, like at The Daily Nail Blog. The problem with nail art, however, is that if you suck at art in general -- in other words, are unable to draw a circle without it being misshapen or even a straight line -- then you most likely suck at nail art. And by you, I mean me.

OK, so I don't suck at all nail art. I can do well with very simplistic designs. Sally Hansen's nail art pens and fine-tipped Sharpies make things easier, like polka dots or a deformed squiggle. Not to brag or anything, but I'm super skilled at deformed squiggles that are so terrible that they don't look remotely like alike on any of my nails.

Picture from The Daily Nail Blog

Now, I definitely don't want to sound like a hipster, but I was doing nail art before it was big. My first masterpiece was for the opening of Spider-man 3. On my left hand, I did stripes of alternating cherry red and midnight blue Wet N Wild polish because, you know, red and blue are Spider-man's colors. Duh. Then on my right hand I alternated dark purples because, being an optimistic idiot, I actually thought Venom was going to be an important part of the film. Silly me. Years later I did a similar concept for the opening day of The Amazing Spider-man. I got the minis set from OPI's tie-in collection for the movie and alternated the nails of my left hand in Into The Night (a gorgeous deep blue) and Your Web Or Mine (a pinky red) and my right hand with the silvery-greens of Just Spotted The Lizard and Number One Nemesis, although these were solid nails, not stripes. However, I didn't have my Spider-man hair ribbons to wear to the premier, so I wasn't quite as geekily awesome that time.

My best nail art ever was for the premier of the Watchmen movie. I actually had to go to four different stores to find yellow nail polish, and eventually I got a tiny bottle from Claires. I recreated the book cover on each of my nails (minus the title and text). I did three coats of yellow (since it was such a thin color) and then a swipe of black from Hot Topic down the middle, trying to make it as oval as possible. Next I put a slash of blood-red diagonally through the black to be the splatter of blood across the smiley face eye, and finally I sealed it all with a top coat. Very simplistic, but fantastic. I keep thinking I should recreate it sometime.

The following summer, I attempted to make Rorschach ink blots on my nails when the director's cut of Watchmen was released on DVD, but that attempt at nail art was a fail. Symmetrical, abstract blobs of black are a lot harder to pain than they sound. For the record, the Batman symbol is also very difficult to paint. Kudos to anyone who can accomplish that.

Picture from The Daily Nail Blog

Not all nail art has to be nerdy, of course. That's just the direction I happen to lean in. Sometimes nail art can be as easy as using a crackle or shatter, magnetic, or texture polish. And for the lazy girls like me, there's always nail wraps, those stickers or strips of nail polish, many with fabulous designs. For those, it doesn't matter if you suck at art; you can still have fantastic nails no matter where your talents lie.

Btw, if anyone can pull of Rorschach nails, tweet me the pictures (@ak_gossipghoul) so that I can glower at them in envy and awe.

XOXO
Gossip Ghoul.

Fabulous Tip of the Day: Dazzling Eyes

Today's Fabulous Tip of the Day:

"For a wide-awake look, use cobalt-blue on the lower, inner rims of the eyes."
-- from Crazy Busy Beautiful by Carmindy page 135.


The blue on the waterline will accentuate the whites of the eyes. Definitely an eye-popping trick to try out!

XOXO
Gossip Ghoul

The Dark Knightsblood Returns

So I've been gone for a while. You may have noticed. You might have not. Either way, I feel pretty bad about my leave of absence, and I'm here to apologize and make amends.

In previous posts I've touched on my depression issues. If I'm honest with myself, I've got to admit that those will never go away, but sometimes they're manageable and ignorable. Sometimes, however, I get stuck, and then I feel miserable while attempting to write. If I can't enjoy writing, then I don't do it. All that led me to falling out of the habit, especially because the few things I did write I couldn't bear to post -- such as making a list of all the people who'd actually care if I died and then getting stuck after the first name.

I fell away into the abyss inside me and then let myself get distracted.

But now I'm back. I'm not making any promises as to how frequently I'll post. All I can say is that I will try my best. I have no idea if anyone other than my two friends has read any of this blog, but like all my writing, I write for myself; and I owe it to myself to force myself off the ground and continue working on this. I complain so much about my sucky life, but it'll never change unless I take the initiative.

Stop bitching, and start dating.

XOXO
Aurora Knightsblood, Gossip Ghoul.

Picture belongs to Mattel.