evilmidori.com (Dammit)

freakin blogger...

2010-04-30T20:26:00.001-07:00

Ummm been procrastinating my blog migration. Making one last post before I have to switch my publishing method UGHHHH

Green-eyed monster (say hi to my monoliddishness)

2010-04-23T13:57:00.000-07:00

A quick update on life before I dive into things...

Work has been INSANELY busy. We had a morning deadline...an EST morning deadline which SUCKED which explains why we were in the office so late on Sunday.

...Okay I started that entry days ago and never finished it...and I forgot what I was going to write in that particular paragraph. MOVING ON...

Last month in my yearbook photo entry I wrote this:

You girls who grew up/are growing up in the era of the fashion blog and YouTube makeup tutorial? You have no idea how lucky you guys are.

When I was in high school all I had were magazines and the instructions that came on the CoverGirl palettes I had. Now, that might have been enough for some girls, but for a young asian girl with small internal epicanthic folds it was incredibly confusing. All I could think of was "Why on earth would I want to put shadow in my crease?" because of course, my eye "crease" (or what I thought was a "crease") wasn't exactly the kind of eye crease they were talking about and in fact was not really a crease at all.

I mean, even now it's tough for girls without creases to figure out their makeup...take it from someone who knows. I know it sounds weird but it's taken me years (well, not that I've been doing nothing but researching eye makeup for the past few years but you know what I mean) to figure out why standard eye makeup techniques don't really work for me...and it's all because it's rare that the intricacies and variations of the "Asian" eye (which it's usually described as even though all Asians don't have "Asian" eyes and all people with "Asian" eyes aren't necessarily Asian (hi Bj�rk)). For instance, there's a huge difference between someone with an inner epicanthic fold and someone who has a real monolid, and there's even a huge difference between people with folds of different heights.

I really started to think about these differences when I came across a couple of threads on a makeup forum. One OP was a girl with a monolid who was asking for a critique of some look she had done. She had obviously looked at tutorials that all had the define-the-crease-by-following-your-eye-socket step in them and it looked like she had some random line drawn above her eyes. And it's not because she hadn't blended, either, because she had. But if you try and define your socket when there's absolutely no socket definition to begin with it kind of has the same effect as Mariah's painted on abs. The worst part? No one freaking told her this. Actually, that's not entirely true. After about 10 posts praising the look in its entirety (these forums are generally pretty friendly) there was finally someone who gently told her that maybe that particular technique wasn't working for her. The other thread's OP was a girl who was asking for advice on how to do her eye makeup so it was noticeable but not too heavy. The responses made me really sad because I don't think any of the other posters--not even the other "Asian"-eyed girls!--understood exactly what kinds of issues she was dealing with. I don't think people in general understand the difference between different types of monolids and how they even work. Which is fine, until you try to put makeup on them.

I think that the best advice to girls with this dilemma is just to experiment. At some point I realized that none of the advice or tutorials were going to help me figure out what do do with my eyes and the only way I was going to find a method that worked for me was to figure it out myself. Of course, there are some rules of thumb and advice that I picked up that think are important, but this entry is getting WAAAAY too long haha. Maybe I'll pick up on this later.

I'm going to leave you with a few (completely unretouched...actually the top ones were completely unretouched too now that I think about it) photos that I snapped w/ my point and shoot because the colors came out better. Also, I'm actually smiling in one of the photos so I decided I should probably post it.

The first thing I did after shooting this was wash my face. I haven't worn that much foundation (or makeup in general?) since ever. The second thing I did was trim my eyebrows because HOT DAMN JANKY.

That is all.

(btw it took me like 3 days to finish this entry...kept getting sidetracked. that's prob why it doesn't read too smoothly SORRY SORRY SORRY)

Diet of Engineering Champions == fast food/caffeine

2010-04-18T13:47:00.000-07:00

It's a good thing I don't drink coffee anymore because now my caffeine component is a 16oz diet coke and maybe some green tea (supplemented by lots and lots of water) whereas if I still drank coffee it would probably be something like two c� ph� s?a ?� and/or Starbucks doubleshots which is the stuff I pretty much lived on in college.

It's crunch time here. My eyes burn.

I went out and bought some Vick's VapoRub after reading your comment, Sar!

2010-04-15T22:21:00.000-07:00

VV: (cuddling up next to me in bed) Did you use Tiger Balm???
me: No it's Vick's!
VV: You smell like my grandma!

SEXY

Chugging along

2010-04-13T15:56:00.000-07:00

Photo taken a few weeks ago. No makeup/hair looks kinda sketchy but I like the light.

Anyway, VV is away for work (coming back tomorrow evening) and I still have this nasty cough that wakes me up in the middle of the night. Last night I popped a Ricola when that happened and promptly fell asleep again which is good for the most part except when I woke up in the morning I still had the Ricola in my mouth which was weird. And a little gross too, I guess. Not going to stop me from doing it again tonight if I have to because waking up with a 3-hour-old Ricola in my mouth is better than not being able to fall asleep again.

Also, my abs hurt from coughing so much these past few days which makes me feel LAME because apparently my abs are so out of shape that I can't even cough comfortably. If there's any such thing as comfortable coughing.

Better updates later maybe? I'm kinda spewing brainvomit right now. Eh. Meh.

Quick post...

2010-04-09T16:13:00.000-07:00

This is the quick and dirty 20 second video I spliced together when I was testing out a piece of software at work just to see what I could do. I've never done any video editing before so it's kind of a sad effort. I changed it up a tiny bit...replaced company "logo" with "evilmidori" and blurred out the first video clip since no one here needs to know what the things on my desk or monitors are.

Life on hold

2010-04-08T17:44:00.000-07:00

Work got insane all at once and I'm not entirely sure when it's going to calm down. Maybe in a month? Maybe in three months? On top of that, I got sick last week...was running a low fever for the first time in nearly two years. Ugh. Anyway, as a result I'm REALLY stressed out and I'm pretty sure a lot of life is going to have to be set aside while we muck through this. That includes internet life, which is why I've fallen behind on blogs and my personal email (ahhh) and haven't been very active on Twitter.

Stress. STRESS. As I guess some of you know but a lot of you don't, I'm working at a startup right now. In this economy, startup = REALLY EFFIN' TOUGH. We're going to tough it out, though, and maybe someday I'll be able to talk about what's going on (non-specifically of course) but not yet.

On another note, I kind of want to do a vlog just because I want to mess with some open source video editing stuff I just installed. Problem is, I don't know what I could do that would benefit from being in video form as opposed to being written. Well, that and lately I've been looking like I got dragged out of bed and had a bucket of ugly dumped over my head before leaving the house every day so yeah.

Anyway, anyone have any video ideas for me?

Hi shit. Meet fan.

2010-03-31T13:24:00.000-07:00

There's a lot going on. Everyone pretend I don't exist for a while, k?

Leftovers

2010-03-29T16:42:00.000-07:00

Just a couple of photos that I finished processing but ultimately felt didn't quite fit in with the others. Felt that I might as well use them because they're there.

Anyway, work got suddenly shitty and I ended up working through the entire weekend meaning I had to back out of a birthday dinner and I didn't drive back to LA on Sundays like I usually do. I'm still in stress mode and have a feeling I might be pretty wound up for the next two or three months. JEEBUS.

Part II: MAC lipstick in Hot Tahiti

2010-03-24T23:19:00.000-07:00

The next series of photos has to do with lipstick...which I almost never wear. I bought this to serve as training wheels for red lipstick. This is MAC lipstick in Hot Tahiti. It's a glaze which means it goes on kind of sheer.

On the MAC website the swatch is pictured as being a really dark pink, which I don't get because it really does look red in the tube. I'll admit that I doctored the color in these photos, but that's only because I wanted everything in the photos to be cool and desaturated except for the lipcolor...something that wasn't going to happen without some post-processing.

No full face shots because I was still wearing my crazy eyes (i.e. mascara all over the place) and I wanted the focus to be on the lipstick. Lots of close ups of my hands/fingers. Thank goodness my nails are naturally pretty ;)

This last photo is pretty jacked up. Meh...I was in a rush.

Part I: B&C BROWLASH Regent Build Mascara

2010-03-24T00:22:00.000-07:00

When I went to Japan last August I bought a few cosmetics I didn't think I would be able to find here. Unfortunately I didn't really know what I was looking for so I mostly ended up getting random crap...and not even that much random crap.

One of the things I did get was this double ended mascara by B&C. I kind of decided on it on a whim. I don't remember how much it was. I think I got it at Jusco in Kyoto. AND I LOVE IT. I really like the "Step 1" brush (the comb pictured on the left) and the formula doesn't clump on my lashes like JUST ABOUT EVERY OTHER MASCARA ON THE PLANET. Unfortunately I don't know where to get it here. I found a page on Sasa but it doesn't look like it's being offered anymore.

These photos are slightly ridiculous but they were freaking FUN. I didn't actually use the B&C mascara for all of the clumping/smudging around my eyes because I didn't want to waste it (ha). I used regular old CoverGirl mascara for that.

This is the first time I've worn that hooded crop top. I got it on sale online and when it arrived I realized that the fabric was a lot stiffer than I'd anticipated and therefore doesn't drape the way I'd hoped. I couldn't return it even if I wanted to since it was final sale. Returning online orders is a pain anyway. I still love it, I just haven't figured out how to wear it without making me look weird shaped. It's not so bad here since all the photos are waist-up so I don't have to worry too much about proportion.

Part II coming VERY soon!

Groove is in my heart!

2010-03-22T23:36:00.000-07:00

So yes, I am a fan of Lady Gaga and I just bought The Fame Monster deluxe edition this past weekend. Anyway, I was flipping through the liner notes and was reading through her her thank yous and the name ENRIQUE ONGPIN jumped out at me. He had once come across my webpage and left a comment (not visible since haloscan crapped out and I haven't integrated the old comments yet) after googling himself and finding this survey in which I'd mentioned his name. This was both embarrassing and awesome...embarrassing because I kind of said I wanted to meet and marry him solely based on his interior decorating abilities and awesome because he actually left a very nice comment that didn't say "BACK THE FUCK OFF YOU CREEPY-ASS FURNITURE-LOVING CREEP" which is what I think most people's first reaction would be. I emailed him in response telling him that he's awesome and also created a post saying that he's awesome. AND HE'S STILL TOTALLY AWESOME BECAUSE THANKS TO HIM I NOW HAVE AN AWESOME (albeit tenuous...but who cares?) TWO DEGREES OF SEPARATION FROM LADY GAGA. Now tell me that's not awesome. Actually don't. Because I think it's awesome. And that's all that matters.

So there.

HOWEVER. This is not what I wanted to talk about (I know I know in your head you're probably like wtf THERE'S MORE??? but dude I'm not forcing you to read this).

*ahem*

So anyway. Before there was Lady Gaga, there was Lady Kier. And who is Lady Kier you ask? She's probably best known for being a part of Deee-Lite and for being kind of the embodiment of awesome. For starters, Lady Miss Kier's real name? Kierin Magenta Kirby wtfawesome. She's also probably the only music artist who looked almost exactly as I pictured her before I knew what she actually looked like. Her look has evolved from gamine androgyne to 60s go-go girl from space to tranny-fabulous. My favorite look of hers is definitely the 60s flowerchild spacegirl though and hear you me I'd totally rock the look if I had the body to pull it off (and maybe it's a good thing I don't because I think no one I know would want to be seen with me). Anyway, here are some visuals so you can see what I'm talking about.

(all photos link back to the original flickr page)

OMGSOHOT

And while we're on the subject, you must listen to Apple Juice Kissing by Deee-lite. Probably my favorite song of theirs.

(wow that was long)

because public humiliation is FUN

2010-03-19T23:04:00.000-07:00

Time to FLASHBACK TO THE 90sssssssssss!!

!!!

Yes, I'm posting my old high school yearbook photos. Just for kicks. For reference, I'll include the year the photo was taken.

LEFT (1997) Ohhh freshman year. I was a freshman during 1997-1998 and I was 13 when this photo was taken and it totally shows. Also, my eyes were closed in this photo which is just great. Not sure how evident it is given the photo quality and all, but I'm wearing one of those shiny satin-y shirts that I thought were cool back then. Actually, they might have been cool back then but I'm pretty sure I wasn't cool enough to pull it off so it doesn't really matter. This shirt was in a beigy-gold color. I also wanted ones in shiny purple and silver/gray but I think we'll all agree that sometimes it's good that your desires aren't fulfilled.

RIGHT (1998) Sophomore year...I was 14 when this was taken. I know it seems like I was a little young, but these photos were always taken at the end of the previous school year or at the waaay beginning (or even before!) of the current school year (September) and my birthday is in October. ANYWAY. This was my phase of too much makeup that I had no clue how to apply. You girls who grew up/are growing up in the era of the fashion blog and YouTube makeup tutorial? You have no idea how lucky you guys are. Seriously. But more on that later (really more on this later and by later I mean another post). In this photo I guess my hair is okay (relatively speaking) but my eye makeup is kinda janky and so is my skin. Thank goodness for the low quality black and white print. Also, I have braces.

LEFT (1999) JUNIOR YEAR ohhh the crappiness of it all. Thankfully this was taken before the hell that was junior year so my face was still relatively intact. I pretty much spent half that year sick and exhausted and my eyes were almost always completely swollen from allergies/exhaustion/sickness. There's not anything especially horrible about this photo and it's actually my favorite out of the four. It's a good thing I decided not to smile because I'm pretty sure I still had my braces.

RIGHT (2000) Senior year, the color photo. I guess I was 16 when this photo was taken. I'm not sure what it is I really don't like about this photo. Actually that was a lie my face is what I really don't like about this photo, though I can't really pinpoint why. All I have to say is thank goodness my hair is pretty conservative and that I didn't have the balls to apply makeup with a heavy enough hand to make it visible because I'm certain the photo would be far worse than it is if that weren't the case.

As you can see, I haven't changed a freaking bit. Except I was a little thinner when I was 13, but who wasn't? Oh, and I guess I don't have braces anymore and my undereye bags might be a little more prominent now than they were before.

And that's the end of my blast to the past! Maybe next time we'll go through my ID cards. That'll be total awesome sauce.

The light faded faster than I could walk

2010-03-18T11:52:00.000-07:00

Pictures pictures! Sorry kids, no makeup again. This time it's because I'm lazy. Anyway, daylight savings got me super excited because it was still light after work/grocery! I rushed around to put away groceries and then walked down the street to try and catch some light, but it was disappearing pretty quickly so only the first few photos I got (including the one above) really benefited from the sun. The rest (like the ones below) were all pretty long exposures, which is why you can see my sensor dust.

Also, ended up drunk for no reason that night. VV and I opened the Chimay he'd bought a week earlier for us to drink when I got off the meds. After we were done with the beer I remembered that I had an open bottle of red wine I needed to get through, so I ended up drinking maybe half a bottle's worth? Maybe a little less. In any case, I was really hammered. I was twittering crap I don't remember twittering and VV said I was having a full on conversation with Anthony while I was watching No Reservations (Harbin episode!) and while I do remember making a few comments (as I usually do) I wouldn't go so far as to say that I was having a complete discourse though perhaps I'm not to be trusted in such matters whilst that smashed. I didn't intend to get that drunk and didn't think I would, but I ended up feeling kinda ill later that night and fell asleep sideways right in the middle of the bed. I don't think VV wanted to move me so he went to sleep sideways too ;P I woke up a couple hours later to reposition, though. Reposition and drink some water.

Did any of you So Cal people feel the earthquake that night/morning? I did. I woke up a minute or two before it happened. I've also woken up right before another small earthquake a few months ago (a 4.something centered somewhere in the Riverside area) and the Northridge quake. Does that happen to anyone else?

Hope everyone had a good green beer day yesterday! VV got Irish nachos and we had that + burgers + Leffe (no Guinness or green beer for us...though I would of dyed it green if we had food coloring handy) and watched a DVD. We're boring like that.

Wisdom teefs

2010-03-14T16:11:00.000-07:00

So I ended up taking lots of pictures of random crap the day I got my teefs pried out of my head. Probably because I was high on Valium and anaesthesia.

After the surgery they had me lie down for a little bit and they went over aftercare procedures with me and VV (because I probably wouldn't remember myself) and made a follow-up appointment (which I totally don't remember doing) and then they wheeled me down to the car. I was completely numbed out and kind of out of it and my tongue was really dry and caked with blood and it was really gross looking and for some reason I found this crazy funny and kept trying to take pictures of it on the drive home.

Sorry that picture is resized a bit smaller than usual, but my tongue really was pretty gross.

Grosss blood yogurt!
10:26 AM Mar 4th via web

The first thing we did when I got home was ice my face and then I tried to eat some yogurt. It was hard. And for some reason I thought it'd be a good idea to take a photo of my bloody drool on my paper towel.

I have trouble swallowing larger pills (unless they're gelcaps I guess) so I'd cut my painkillers into pieces and eat them with yogurt or pudding.

It took days to get the glue from the tape off of my skin.

Vicodin pudding! Vicodin makes me feel weird. If I'm lying down it puts me to sleep, but if I'm sitting or standing I felt dizzy/nauseated.

Antibiotic...with pudding of course.

And that's the exciting story of my wisdom tooth extraction. VV worked from home for the rest of the day so he could take care of me and heated up soup for my lunch and dinner. He also cut up my first couple of painkillers for me when I was still numbed out and loopy. He's a good boyfriend.

ps. HAPPY PI(E) DAY!!

Seriously though they should print this on the dollar bill or something because SERIOUSLY

2010-03-08T23:12:00.001-08:00

Because in America? That's how we roll.

(took this back in October at some food place in George Bush Intercontinental in Houston)

Self portraitage at a strange time

2010-03-05T19:40:00.000-08:00

So what do I do when my face is all swollen and I'm not wearing any makeup and I haven't even showered in over 24 hours? TAKE PICTURES OF MYSELF YAY. After a work meeting (via telephone) I decided to do some self-portraits because it's pretty rare that I get to work with natural light. I threw on a dress that I've had for ages but for some reason have never worn except to try it on when I got it and devised some non-face centric setups.

I LOVE 17 Tea. VV likes it too (that and mugicha barley tea) so I like to keep it around for him (and me). I'm glad he doesn't drink the Arizona iced teas anymore because he used to go through GALLONS of that stuff. He always got the calorie-free kind, but I'm sure all that artificial sweetener isn't all that good for you either :P

Anyway, I'm doing okay. I just showered right now (for the first time since Wednesday night HAHA) and I'm allowed to brush my teeth now. I wasn't supposed to brush my teeth for 24 hours following the surgery and it was effin' nasty taking bloody gauze out of my unbrushed morning breath'd mouth when I woke up this morning. EW.

2010-03-04T10:59:00.001-08:00

Wooozy weird play by play streamof conciousness on twitter.com/evilmidori Ate key lime blood yogurt half of which ended up on my face. Lips re dry. When I try to dink water half of it ends up down my shirt. Nurse type people liked my giant forever21 hoodie. Icing face right now. Cooold

not happy.

2010-03-03T23:22:00.000-08:00

Getting my teeth pulled tomorrow. Not excited. I'm probably going to crap my pants when I see the IV and I will probably choke on my gigantic painkillers after the procedure. And I will probably die when I have to change my bloody gauze. And I mean bloody in the literal sense.

AND. I think my period is coming really soon. Like maybe tomorrow or the day after. That would suck ASS. Then I'd be bleeding and changing pads on both ends. Not cool.

So, going to be high on Valium and Vicodin ~~and Viagra~~ for the next 48 hours. I just took my first Valium tablet about five minutes ago. Let the games begin!

Also, I bought these on my way home from the gym. At a vegan restaurant.

2010-03-02T14:25:00.000-08:00

I wanted something different to eat with my aioli (which I still have a ton of, btw) so I got sweet potato fries.

BECAUSE I LIKE MY UNHEALTHY WITH A SIDE OF UNHEALTHY

VV doesn't use facebook

2010-02-26T18:07:00.000-08:00

(06:00:04 PM) me: oh god my mom posted this on her wall
(06:00:05 PM) me: 'Whatever you give a woman, she will make greater. If you give her sperm, she'll give you a baby. If you give her a house, she'll give you a home. If you give her groceries, she'll give you a meal. If you give her a smile, she'll give you her heart. She multiplies and enlarges what is given to her. So, if you give her ...any crap, be ready to receive a ton of sh__.�
(06:00:30 PM) vv: hahahahaha
(06:00:37 PM) vv: what s a wall
(06:00:51 PM) me: facebook thing you can post notes and stuff on
(06:01:02 PM) me: looks like the friendster testimonials area
(06:01:06 PM) me: just more evolved
(06:01:46 PM) vv: thats mad loco
(06:02:16 PM) vv: i'm a wall
(06:02:21 PM) vv: you can post notes on me
(06:03:15 PM) me: i do
(06:03:17 PM) me: http://www.flickr.com/photos/evilmidori/2298831274/

More bad food (and some good food, too)

2010-02-24T16:09:00.000-08:00

Lemon olive oil cake FAIL.

VV's dad gave me some sweet lemons. He said that they're definitely sweeter than regular lemons, but not so sweet that you could eat them straight. Cool. I thought about what I wanted to make with those lemons and decided that they should go in something dessert-y. LEMON OLIVE OIL CAKE. So on Monday I zested (very difficult, these lemons had really thin skin and were a bit soft) and juiced one lemon and tasted the juice and wtf just a bit sweet and NOT TART AT ALL. I went ahead with the cake anyway and after it was done baking (I used a muffin tin because individually sized anythings are win) I took them out and they looked kind of weird...the tops kind of spread out over the top and ran into each other. Oh well. After they cooled I tasted one and it was SUPER moist and SUPER fluffy and SUPER bitter. WTF. I didn't know what happened. I mean, it was sweet but it had this weird bitter taste at the same time, almost as if I'd ground up Tylenol and added it to the batter. I still have no idea what happened. They're in the trash right now. Better luck next time.

Also, I looked up sweet lemons later that night and found this Chowhound topic. I wish I'd seen that earlier. Anyway, I still have one more of those suckers and don't know what to do with it.

A more successful endeavor was the aioli I made with the leftover egg yolks. When I was done with the emulsion I put about half of the aioli into a container and whisked Sriracha into the remainder. Yesterday I ate it with tomatoes/spinach/pita bread and it was SO GOOD. I think I'm going to mix Sriracha into the plain half too. YUM.

In lieu of a real post here are some pictures

2010-02-23T22:51:00.000-08:00

Here are a couple of photos I took of myself back in October. I was in Texas but a couple of friends really wanted to see what my hair looked like (this was the day after I got it chopped) so I took a couple photos of myself to email to them that night.

My hair is kind of in an annoying in-betweeny stage right now. I know how I want to get it cut next but I need to wait for the shortest layers to grow out a couple more inches first. Right now I can't really do anything with it except let it dry straight or Remington Airwave it (that hair dryer is the BEST). I can't wait for it to get long enough for me to curl it again. I tried using a curling iron the other day and it was disastrous. I looked like a poodle. From the 80's.

Bad eggs

2010-02-22T15:53:00.000-08:00

So on Thursday I was boiling eggs and left them unattended while I was busy getting distracted by my mom's birthday gift that had just arrived that day (will elaborate on that after I give it to her this weekend) and kind of forgot about them. Yeah, they got kinda overcooked.

The eggs were kind of gross by themselves so last night I made deviled eggs out of them. I used an electric hand mixer to beat the yolks of those SOBs into submission. I'm happy to say my efforts were mostly successful.

I've really got to update this blog more regularly.

SO.SAD.

2010-02-21T22:24:00.000-08:00

Photo by Yulanda

I discovered her blog over a year ago and since then would visit her blog on a regular basis and worship her photos because she was an amazing photographer and had the most incredible self-portraits. She was definitely WAY too young to die.