Join Me in Snarkville

Now first, before I begin, I must ask the all important question, at what doctor’s visit do I get the “here’s the three perfumes you must chose to wear for the rest of your life; from this point forward you will have a weekly hairdresser appointment and the word ‘teasing’ will be used often; and just for kicks, here’s some double knit polyster pants with elastic waist to wear.”  Oh, and the sensible shoes — because there must be sensible shoes, right?

Well, I may not know when we get pulled aside in the GYN’s office and told of the ways of the older woman, but I have learned where one of the three perfumes can be purchased.

Today, I did something I’ve never done before — I went to a Mary Kay party.  Now, I don’t want to dis Miss Mary or anything, and I have to freely admit that I liked the hostess and the rep from Mary Kay.  What bugged me was the smell of everything handed to me.  If you LOVE Mary Kay and have been using their products and LOVE the scent — awesome, more power to you, please enjoy.  However, I feel I must explain that very few times in my life have I wanted to crawl into my purse and leave — this party was one of them.
Now the cool part, for me at least, was that this was not a make-up party.  It was a “spa/pedicure” party.  Ok, that was cool (well, when the skin on my feet was not being burned off by the too hot water I was asked to dip my bare toes into).  We soaked in HOT water with some fizzys; we rubbed down our feet and legs with a sugar scrub (available in MANY scents all more horrible than the next), we scrapped the dead crap from our heels, we painted our toes, and we moisturized.  Yup, that was it — until she pulled out the perfume.  Oh my — my nose was assulted by a 43 year old bottle of perfume.  It made me wonder, unfortunately outloud, if Mary Kay had a nose anymore.

I’m guessing no one is going to be shocked that I left without a single purchase.  Not even a pity purchase.  The ONE smell in the whole lot I didn’t want to rub all over the closest woman over 80, was a limited edition and they wanted $32 for it — $32 for something that I’mm 100% sure I could buy for $7.50 a bottle from Bath & Body Works.   The part where I wanted to crawl into my purse?  Well, there was the musing about Mary’s nose outloud; there was the part where I was the only woman there not pruchasing and most assuredly NOT filling out a Santa’s Wish list for the rep to CALL my “Santa” and tell them what I wanted; and there was the part where I was the only person in the group not living in the community the rest of them were living in — which caused me to be both pegged as the “rich kid, too good to live in the slums” AND “the cheap bitch who won’t even make a pity purchase.”  Oh, yes, it was a good 2 hours, why do you ask?

To prove that my stone heart isn’t completely dead, I’m signed up to knit for the one thing recently that has made me cry.  I’m sure you all know about the Amish school shooting.  Well, when I saw the news story, I cried.  I physically hurt for the parents who in trying to do everything right for their kids couldn’t protect them from this horrible world.  I’ve always been impressed with the devotation to their faith that the Amish would live completely separate lives.  In a way, (and with my own personal addictions to gadgets) their life could not be more different than mine.  Yet, they believe deeply, they strive to be good parents, and they have been hurt horribly by “my” world.  The protector side of me wishes that the worlds could have never collided because theirs is too sweet and too innocent.  (After all they don’t have a TIVO full of crime dramas).  So, some really cool knitters and spinners are getting together in an effort to help support show love and handspinning and knitting mourning shawls for the mothers and sisters of the victims.  I believe that as of right now they are looking to make 13 shawls, all with the Amish traditions in color, decoration, and technique.  So, I’m going to be putting down my other projects (as this has to be done quickly) and picking up handspun black wool to lend a hand.