Friday, October 15, 2010

Going Black and Green

For as long as I can remember, I have always used some form of milk or cream in my coffee. My husband Bill, has been trying to get me to drink it black for years. I've tried it black a couple of times, and "bleck", was uttered every time.

The first cup of coffee is an important part of my day. I love coffee, it soothes me, and at times, keeps me calm. Ironic, I know, because, for most people it makes them jittery.

There are downsides to requiring milk in your coffee, especially when traveling. Milk or creamer is not always available. Hotels usually provide a coffee pot in the room, but the coffee and condiments were always lacking. No one really likes the dried up creamer packets that come with sugars and stirrers wrapped in plastic, especially me. Bleck, bleck bleck! Those creamer packets are just icky, and clumpy. This was before the fancy complimentary coffee stations and breakfast bars that most hotels offer today. As usual, my husband, would always come up with some sort of solution to solve my milk and coffee weirdness. He's an awesome human being.

Last December, prior to a trip, and during dinner with friends, I was encouraged to give it a try. Everyone who drinks  their coffee black says, "you will never go back to milk once you switch." Since I was going on a trip and didn't want to deal with the whole "milk thing", I decided it was time for a change. Why not, change has been a part of my life for the past three years. The next morning I poured my travel mug full of black coffee and some sweetener and off we went.

The black coffee drinkers were correct after all. No more bleck words uttered from this girl. I'm not a true black coffee drinker, because I still use sweetener. However, I do not and can not even think of having moo juice in my coffee.

This summer, iced coffees have become my top drink of choice. I found myself saving my plastic tall cups from Starbucks and making my own iced coffees at home. They were perfect for a take and go situation, so I thought. On one of our trips to Towne Center , we decided to take a quick tour of Bed Bath and Beyond. You never know what you're going to find in that store. They have so much stuff. In one of the large bins, Bill picked up this plastic cup. 


It's a Copco, 24 oz, BPA free, to-go tumbler with a funky stirrer on the bottom of the straw. The price was right and with a discount coupon, it came to around five dollars and some change. Eco is in, as it states on the tag and I try very hard to be as Eco-friendly as possible. I even take my regular coffee tumbler into Starbucks for them to fill. I get strange looks from the baristas because my favorite tumbler is a Christmas tumbler.

On the back of the little tag attached to the Eco tumbler were three statements. The second statement caught my eye. I had to read it twice and as for the third, I have done just that.


Friday, October 8, 2010

Similar but Different


I have a larger than normal, cosmetic collection. My lime green cosmetic bag contains a variety of eye cosmetics. One girl should not need five different compacts of eye shadows. I purchase them believing in the statement on the box "No smudge or smear up to 12 hours."  I fall for that marketing line every time.

See these two items, one is a lip liner, the other, an eyeliner. If not for the writing and color, it would be tough to distinguish one from the other. 

One afternoon, prior to running some errands, I decided to do a quick touch up on my makeup. I grabbed these two items and a couple other things from my green bag and began my touch up routine. It's so routine, I can do this blind folded, especially lining my lips. I was going through the motions, and apparently preoccupied. I was looking in the mirror, but not really looking. I applied my lip liner, and then picked up the next long thin stick to apply my eyeliner. When I work on my eyes, I tend to move in closer to the mirror. As, I moved in, I glanced down at my handiwork of lip lining. YIKES, I had drawn a perfect dark brown line around my lips. I was ready for the circus, I just needed to fill in the rest of my mouth with white paint. The dark brown line would look lovely on a bronze beauty, but not this medium white girl. 

I laughed, and promptly began to remove the clown smile from my lips. I was just glad that I had not started with my eyes that day.