Once Upon A Look(let): A Diva Is Remixed

Let me get something out of the way: Charice, the teenaged Filipino singing sensation who's currently touring with David Foster right now? Love her. Lurve her.

This look, on the other hand? Do not lurve.



And while the Chuvaness Army is currently debating whether or not this look is age-appropriate, my beef with this is that it's not very original. True, I like the big hair... but the hair and the overcooked fake-bake, together? Too. Much. Look. And Charice's God-given features are too delicate to pull it all off.

At first I thought they were trying to make Charice look like Leona Lewis, but after listening to Charice hit those high notes, it dawned on me:

The stylists in charge just tried to turn a 17-year old Filipina into MARY J. BLIGE!

Folks, let me tell you what a bad idea this is: There is only one Mary J. Blige. I know this because I grew up in the age of New Jack Swing, and Lord knows how many times I've re-watched her live performance of "No More Drama" at the 2002 Grammys. Plus, as much as I would love to hear Charice covering "I'm Goin' Down" or "Reminisce," I can't imagine her even touching a single hair on Mary's weave, let alone biting her whole style.

Besides, if the folks really wanted C. to pay homage to the Queen of Hip-Hop Soul, they might as well go all the way...


In fairness, I'm probably suggesting this because I used to rock a near-exact version of this very outfit (including the newsboy cap) when I was Charice's age. Seriously, though, isn't this a good midpoint between cutesy and sexy? Not to mention height-enhancing, what with the striped pants and the nice shoes. I would probably swap out the cap for the purple fedora that Mary J. favors, but otherwise I think this should be fine.

Also, something tells me that Charice's stylists in Manila should do themselves a favor and text-message the folks who dress up Anna Maria Perez de Tagle, pronto. (Or Anna Maria herself, if she's even up for it.) Seriously, I think those girls should swap wardrobes, because I can totally see Charice rocking the off-shoulder tees better... and, admit it, isn't it about time Anna put the flat iron away, at least once?

Face of the Moment: Soltera-fied

And now we get to the part where we talk about the makeup from this entry.

Unfortunately for me, I went into perfectionist freak-out mode in choosing the right picture to show off the makeup. See, this picture was actually taken in the middle of the kikay process, and I forgot to add mascara to what was an otherwise great look. (Mind you, I was taking these pictures in the middle of preparing for a hosting gig at our church.) Add to that the inevitability of changing tops in the middle of said kikay process, and my face was perilously close to becoming a hot mess - literally - by the time I was ready to leave the house.

Enter my alter ego La Soltera, who we last saw deceiving my fair viewers into thinking that I have found my calling as a telenovela actress.

She took one look at the JPEGs I had in mind, and immediately turned up her nose like the Bella Flores of this generation. I didn't even have to ask her what the matter was, because she gave it to me straight.

"We have to go digital," she said.

"But why?" I asked. "I just wrote an entry about my full-disclosure policy on this blog, and you're telling me to retouch my photos? Do you think I'm going to risk my integrity for that?"

"Look," she answered, "you're already risking your integrity as a beauty blogger by posting a picture of you with makeup that ended up not looking good on camera, and you knew it. You already owe it to your readers to show how it did work without resorting to shoddy photography. And, hello, this isn't your first time... remember?"

I shuddered. I didn't want another repeat of that badly-done wig job from Taaz.

"And besides, you of all people should've known that Taaz just added new features to their makeover functions," she added. "This would've been the perfect time to talk about those."

"All righty, then," I answered hesitantly. "But no wigs, okay?"

So: Badabing, badaboom.

(We had to futz around with Taaz's HTML code for this picture, so if you need - as in, really need - to see the "before/after" versions of this makeover, click here.)

"Looks like somebody had fun with the photo-editing software on my computer," I said.

"Aw, hush, you look great," LS answered. "But Taaz still didn't get the correct list of the products I used on this picture... so why don't you do the talking?"

Products Used IRL:

• Primers: Smashbox Photo Finish primer and MAC Paint Pot in Painterly
• Face: L'Oreal Bare Minerale pressed powder in Sun Beige; Max Factor Erace concealer in Natural, mixed with Cover Girl CG Smoothers concealer in Deep
  
• Blush: Everyday Minerals in Salon Fun
• Eyes: Stila Icon all over, followed by Stila Twig on lid and L'Oreal HIP cream eyeliner in Black (applied on upper lid and 1/4 of lower lid)... followed by a layer of MAC Hot Contrast (now discontinued) on the eyeliner
• Brows: Some pencil (can't remember which)
  
• Mascara: Maybelline Volum'Express Hypercurl Waterproof in Brown
• Lips: Clinique Long Last Glosswear in Kissyfit layered over a coppery-pink NYX Round lipstick (could be Calisto) - though Taaz would also recommend Make Up For Ever's lipstick in #311 Golden Copper
  

Other Things Worn:

• Scent: Penshoppe Paints body spray in Fuchsia
• Outfit: Olive green peasant blouse by Mossimo for Target; silk rose-print skirt from Gap; enamel-plated black orchid necklace from Singapore
  

What's Your Fantasy: Feast for Life Edition

Dear Discovery Travel & Living Southeast Asia:

- Please tell Janet Hsieh to stop screaming, or at least tell her people to stop sending those clips of her screaming. I've already met my WOOO! Girl quota with reruns of How I Met Your Mother, thanks.

- Please continue to air reruns of No Reservations, and in particular the one where Anthony Bourdain visits the Philippines. You know how we feel about our country, so it's nice to be reminded, time and again, that Tony believes we have the BEST. PIG. EVER.

- Also, I need more Chef Abroad, too. Too bad that I am never home whenever that show comes on... unless you count that one show where I thought I saw Michael Smith in the kitchen with Marco Pierre White, and even then I can't be sure that it was him.

- You know which show also needs more reruns? Jamie at Home. As much as I love the documentaries about Jamie Oliver's wacky experiments with school lunches and fighting British obesity (and how delicious is it that Timothy Spall gets to do the narration for the Ministry of Food documentary?), I would rather watch him skinning pheasants and harvesting rutabagas. I swear, watching him in the garden relaxes me.

- And speaking of hosts who happen to be cute, it would be nice if you could deliver any of the following to my doorstep, preferably on the days when my parents are away from the Hacienda:

Andrew Anthony, from Life's a Trip (yep, it was the haka episode that lured me in)


Bob Blumer, from Glutton for Punishment (because one second of him sticking his tongue out unconsciously is way hotter - to me, at least - than 30 minutes of Gilles Marini taking his clothes off... and that's saying A LOT)



And because I have this alphabetical-order Canadian-host theme going on right now, I'll throw in Corbin Tomaszeski (even though his humor on that kitchen show reminds me a bit of that annoying handyman from the last few seasons of Clean House)


Also, because I'm not that blind, I'm also going to ask for Bobby Chinn and Curtis Stone as well... as long as they shut up and keep cooking, heh.




Other than that, thank you so much for continuing to be part of our cable package, and for keeping me sane during these last few months. Y'all rock.

Mahalo, Meimei

Yet Another Episode in the Hair Chronicles

The last time I got a haircut, I looked like this:


Could use a little more zing, perhaps, but not too shabby otherwise.

Then two weeks ago, I got another haircut - and came out looking like this:

I'll talk about the makeup in a bit, but let's focus right now on the story behind the hair.

What happened was that I hadn't been able to get a hold of the stylist who did my hair last time. (Who is, in fact, the same person who does my Mom's hair.) After one last futile attempt to schedule an appointment, I decided to go to another salon in our town, just to get the deed over and done with.

The salon that I visited was different from my usual. While the other place was stuffed to the gills with customers, salon assistants, and diva-esque stylists, this one was very low-key - not too crowded, but most of the customers were regulars and the stylists were friendly.

The stylist who worked with me was an older, soft-spoken man who concentrated on my hair even as he talked shop with the other folks in the salon. I had brought along a picture of Heidi Klum to give him an idea of how long and layered I wanted my hair to look like, plus another picture of a model from a Matrix ad with diagonally-cut bangs to show him how I wanted the layers in the front to fall across my forehead. So he went ahead and got to work.

When we got my hair to its desired length, however, he had this peculiar look on his face. At first I was concerned because I thought it was OK, but for some reason I knew that he was going to let me down if I told him to keep it long.

Then he told me what the problem was: "Tinning seesor."

Long story short - translated and paraphrased from the original conversation in Tagalog - the problem was that the last stylist had used thinning shears all over my layers, which eventually resulted in the back and bottom layers of my hair going totally limp and mullet-y whenever they grow out. In order for me to avoid looking like Steve Perry before my next haircut, he said, he really needed to blunt out the thinned layers by cutting them short. He warned me, however, that it wasn't going to be enough to take out the jagged ends, which meant that my hair was still going to grow out with weird little shaggy tails in them.

By this time I wasn't worried that my hair was going to grow out with zig-zag edges any more; just the way he said "tinning seesor" was enough to snap me back into reality. I gave him the go-signal to keep cutting... et voila.

This was a moment of truth for me, to be honest. Of course my hair was going limp - it was actually feathered to the point of being uneven! And if my old, bowl-cut childhood photos were any indication, blunt-cutting was the best way for my hair to look, and feel, thicker. So how did I manage not to pinpoint that problem with the other stylists I've worked with in the last few years - even after countless pictures from hair magazines? All I needed to do was tell the hairdresser exactly what I wanted.

And this stylist, who charged me no more than the equivalent of US$2.00 (tips included), gave it back to me in spades.

Two weeks after the haircut (and the photo taken above), my hair has grown out significantly. The stylist was correct about the extent of the "texturizing," because my layers have gotten pretty shaggy - but the blunting actually works because it's now growing into a sophisticated, layered bob. As for the diagonal bangs, they're also working for me, because now the hair in the front doesn't just flop straight into my eyes or flatten down the sides; it's not swoopy - yet - but the diagonal angling has done wonders in maintaining the direction of the side part, even without product. Plus, my hair has more body and swing now, so the cut is working wonders.

I'm not sure how long it will take before I'm up for another haircut - not when I'm still growing out those jagged layers - but if I do, I'm definitely going back to this salon. Seriously, it's a great deal, :)

Unsolicited Career Advice, Part 2: Now With 100% More Polyvore!

As much as it pains me to do so, I guess I'll have to go ahead and do this:


Remember my open letter to Anna Maria Perez de Tagle from around this time last year? Well, consider this entry a sequel.

Anna, dearest: As your unofficial ninang in the Filipino blogverse, or at least this particular corner of the Pinoy blogverse that deals with these sorts of style issues, I feel like I have to be a little more protective towards you. See, I know that you're very much into this fashion thing. We have similar approaches to our wardrobe, especially when it comes to the specific "issues" that come with being petite. And I love that you're also working with classic, retro looks, which is very refreshing for a young woman of your age.

HOWEVER.

You do realize that you are headed towards a style rut, right? (Just look at your IMDb page and tell me that you're not.) And for every picture that shows you at your best - including this totally chica gray number - there are probably a handful of others that, unfortunately, make you look like the Bride of the Marshmallow Man. And I will not dignify those pictures with a hot-link.

I'm not doing this to rag on you, dearie. You're still very young, and having a lot of fun - so it follows that you should enjoy this moment while it lasts. But I also want to remind you that, somewhere down the road, you will want to do things differently - in fashion, and in life - and you will realize that, at 19, you're way too young to be stuck in a rut.

Behold: Another set from Polyvore, created by yours truly.

Near-Perfect Symmetry by meimei96

What we're dealing here is the one instance where you're most likely to get your picture taken at this point in your career: premieres for teen movies, where everyone usually dresses up hip and casual. Think of it as the Disney/Nick version of aspirational dressing - not too casual as to look cheap, but not too OTT so as to get the parental units upset. There are two looks in this one set - one is breezy and casual, and the other is dark and edgy - but both are unified by the same constants: a basic, knee-length black skirt (in this case, the Balenciaga in the middle), tanned legs (though you may want to add some fishnets in there if you want), and major eyelashes from the Diorshow... along with the long hair and clear skin and whatnot, of course.

The casual look: Pacific Rim fusion. I don't know if you've seen Forgetting Sarah Marshall, but one of the things that really stood out for me in that movie was Mila Kunis and her consistently flawless tan. I wanted to recreate that here by incorporating some beachy elements into the existing look. The ikat print on the top runs vertically - hello, lengthening effect! - and pairing that with the gold earrings leads the eye up towards the face. The woven detail on the platform sandal grounds the ethnic look along with the black skirt, and takes the outfit away from the beach. Since this look is very summery, I chose to pair this with some light bronzer from Sephora and a sheer, creamy lip gloss from Philosophy to go with that semi-effortless glow.

The semi-formal look: Eurasian chic. Should you decide that a scholarship to FIT or Parsons would be a good post-Disney career move, may I suggest updating that off-shoulder look to something a little more avant-garde? Sure, that Martin Margiela top is way too pricey for a deconstructed T-shirt, but it's tailored to stay as close to the body as possible - again, a big plus if you want to look taller, especially when you add the earrings and the peep-toe heels to the equation. And because I couldn't resist going dark with this, I would suggest taking the light pink side of the Sephora bronzer from the other set and pairing it with some Urban Decay eyeliner and a MAC Lipglass for extra-chica factor.

See, hija, it all works out for the best: you don't have to follow this to-the-letter, but you can pick up a few hints here and there to get you inspired. Baby steps, mind you, or you might end up skankifying yourself. Good luck! :)

Commercial Break: Maquillage!

Here's the stunning Japanese model Anna Tsuchiya modeling the Shiseido Maquillage x Alexander Wang collection.

Colors used: Eyes Creator (3D) in BR365 and Moisture Rouge in RS721.

And speaking of Shiseido, here's Angelina Jolie for - what else? - Integrate lip gloss.

Randomesticity: Fatigue

Que vivo Mexico! Que viva Colombia! Que viva las Filipinas!

It's only Monday, and already everyone is so, so tired. This morning's paper, the blogverse, the relief-operation volunteers... they're all full of crankiness, as if the storm clouds from the last two weeks had been replaced with an equally dark sense of bitterness and collective cynicism. As much as I want to chalk it up to human nature, though, I'm not buying it - and I don't know if this makes me sound like Anne Frank or something, but I want to believe that we'll make it out of the darkness soon enough if we don't keep adding our psychological garbage into the existing mountain of trash we're in right now.

Sorry, Philippines, but I can't afford to stay emo for another week.

I want to remember that there has always been a world outside this country, this existence, before all of this happened. I want to remember that this world outside ourselves will be there to help pull us through for as long as we're willing to reach out. I want to remember that there was, is, and will always be, something - and dare I say it, Someone - bigger than all of this... bigger than corruption, global warming, and even the weather itself.

That's why I take comfort in this piece of advice, which I got from a family friend recently: One will eventually find amusement in even the darkest situations. For every person who cries about losing their home, or getting their relief donations stolen from under their noses by hoarders, there's another person who's going to make sure that somebody gets a reason to smile once in a while.

*****

Not much of a bulleted run-down for this edition of Randomesticity, though, since I still have yet to deliver on what I promised last time. Already, however, I am seriously jonesing on eyeliner, so I'm thinking about breaking down and buying the first cheap kohl pencil that I get my hands on in the next few days.

In the meantime, a few more thoughts:

• Proof that I'm probably getting too old for this sort of thing: I'm of the opinion that La Roux is one of the most overrated and over-hyped bands that I've heard in quite a while, and crawling pretty fast on the list of Bands I Just Don't Get, Period. Which means that I'll probably start liking them by, oh, around this time in 2011, if they haven't broken up already.
  
• Looklet has been driving me up the wall with their site's inability to save any of the stuff I've created... a pity, since I was actually enjoying all the crazy avant-garde designs on that site. (The fact that they don't have a "publish to blog" option only makes things more frustrating for me.) So, until this problem gets resolved, I'll going to stick with Polyvore for my aspirational-fashion fix.
• Apart from the blog-monetizing that I talked about in the last entry, there's also a huge career-related development brewing in my real life, which I can't share yet in full until the particulars have been nailed down. All I can say is this: It will be epic.
  

The Interest of Disclosure

Above: A snippet from a recent Sephora Beauty Insider email I received recently. (Why oh why oh WHY did I have to move out of Honolulu before this could happen?)

****

About the FTC regulations asking beauty bloggers to disclose where and how they got products reviewed on their sites...

Let me be up front here by saying this: There are several ways that a product review ends up on Domesticity.

1. I bought the product myself.
2. The product was a sample that came from a separate purchase. (This is applicable for things that I get from Sephora, or things I find between the pages of a magazine... but not for the majority of Pinoy retailers that I frequent, since what's usually considered as a "sample size" can be bought for a small pittance at your local store.)
3. Somebody else bought the product for me.
4. Somebody else bought the product for themselves, but I ended up cockroaching them from the nearest vanity. (My apologies to my parents, my sister, Scribey, and the makers of fine hotel toiletries throughout the world.)
5. Somebody else bought the product for their salon and used it on my personage... but then, that would lead to #1, so it just brings everything full circle.
6. I signed up for the brand's mailing list. (I think I did this with a review of Dove products not too long ago.)
7. If I didn't buy it, or it didn't come from a separate purchase, then I am either going by a second-hand account or I'm basing my judgement on a swipe I made on my hand. (My apologies to Sephora, Nordstrom, Macy's, Neiman Marcus, and the Aveda salons of Honolulu... you may have lost the biggest sample whore that ever sample-whored in the entire state of Hawaii, but rest assured now that my word is pure gold, and I never lied to you about having a blog!)

I could go on and on, but here's the main point: Not once have I reviewed something, anything, that was given to me by a publicist for the purpose of putting out a non-negative review. Like I've said before, I only use this blog for fun, but have not used it for profit - and never, ever, for the sake of earning freebies.

And sure, there are circumstances where I've come close to a few ethics violations... but I have yet to receive a cease-and-desist letter from anyone, and if I did I'd be the first person to publish the whole thing in verbatim.

Sometimes a picture of a product that I have never tried ends up on my blog. But that's probably because I happened to like the label or the advertising campaign. Again, I would be the first person to tell you if I was contacted by the Powers That Be on the brand side of that product... preferably before I do the review, but I'd tell you too if they contacted me afterwards anyway.

I say this now, too, because I also happen to be friends with a few brand managers from some of the big guns in the personal-care industry here in the Philippines. (Clue: NOT Vicki Belo.) I'm not saying that they shouldn't contact me and ask me to blog about their products - in fact, I actually welcome their input - but that doesn't mean I'm not going to speak up if I find something wrong. Like, say, if they sent me a lotion that turned my skin the color of a legal pad, or if the shampoo they gave me made my hair smell like dirty socks.

And as for free treatments... well, speaking as somebody who has participated in all sorts of PR shenanigans in a former lifetime - like dancing in a fish costume for a government agency, and coming close to getting my teeth bleached for television - I know too well how the game works. Again, not to say that I shouldn't be getting invites for product launches (because, au contraire, I welcome that too... call me, Power Plant Mall!) but I'm also not going to hesitate to show you proof that I was invited to the event, the reasons why I was invited in the first place, and whether or not somebody else paid the bill for me. Then again, I do live in a country where even prominent fashionistas get crap service at expensive salons... and thus have a bigger duty to blow the whistle, in case anything goes wrong.

Long story short: I'm fully compliant.

******

That said: I'm in the process of considering options for advertising on this blog. I don't want to disclose too many details, except for the fact that I am exploring an option that lets me generate revenue locally. It might change the "profit" angle for a bit here, but I'm hoping that I could do this without compromising the editorial tone for the rest of this blog. Will keep you posted.

The Case for the Model

Yep, that's the new ad campaign for the D&G Perfume Anthology, and the short version is running on Philippine television. Using "Freedom '90" as a soundtrack only makes this ad sweeter.

*****

I'm not gonna lie to you: I've been following the brewing crapstorm at Chuvaness over the use of foreign celebrities and models by the Filipino clothing brand Kamiseta. On the one hand, I get why a lot of folks are confused about a Filipino brand spending scads of money on New York shoots with top global celebrities, including current Kamiseta endorser Natalia Vodianova; it brings up all the unspoken anger about race and colonial mentality. Yes, it would be nice to have a Filipino brand using Filipino models as part of a global push. Yes, it would be nice to use Filipino talent behind the camera. Yes, it would be nice if the clothes themselves were, well, nicer.

But you know what? It is a global market - and whether you like it or not, "nice" doesn't cut it in a global market that demands more from every brand, even the established ones. We can argue till the cows come home about what Kamiseta could've done differently, but it's still not going to change the fact - as Cecile put it quite succinctly - that the final decision comes from the brand itself.

I'll also be blunt here: If the ad agency for Kamiseta only wanted a foreign face for their clothes, it would've been so, so easy to pluck out an expat kid or two out of nowhere, hook 'em up with a stylist, and let things go from there. As a former international-school kid, I've seen how these things work... not first hand, mind you, but I've lived in the Philippines long enough during the '80s and '90s to see how a well-orchestrated ad campaign can turn, say, that baggy-pantsed jock in your Algebra class into an Armani-clad "businessman" toting the benefits of coffee creamer, or a gawky 8th grader into a super-cool skater boy promoting boxed juice to Filipino kids. Nowadays, the Philippines is a different market for foreign models, and the influx of (affordable) new talent from South America and Eastern Europe has made Caucasian-featured models more easily available to local advertising agencies.

So what does a Filipino brand have to do to stand out in a global market like the one we have now? Easy: Skip the regular models and go for the big guns. San Miguel Beer has already blazed trails in the last three years by pairing Manny Pacquiao with Erik Morales and Jet Li (and note to San Mig: I can has Ricky Hatton commercial plz?), and Bench has started making inroads into the greater Asian market with ad campaigns featuring Jerry Yan of F4.

Kamiseta isn't even the first Filipino fashion retailer to use a non-Asian (read: white) global celebrity, either; for that, you need to go way back to Mandy Moore's earlier ad campaigns for Penshoppe.

(Screencap taken from MandyMoore.org)

Compare Mandy's ads for Penshoppe to the Kamiseta campaigns with the likes of Petra Nemcova, Alicia Silverstone, and Kate Hudson. Notice the quality of the photography, the poses, the whole feel... then tell me if all the money Kamiseta poured into getting all those big-ticket models and stylists have not paid off handsomely.

Personally, I think that Kamiseta's taking a big risk by following the Mango playbook of featuring models outside of their nationality (see also: MNG's campaigns with Karolina Kurkova and Milla Jovovich); it's a way of establishing brand-name association, in terms of both product quality and mystique. I wouldn't be surprised if this risk pays off so well that Kamiseta ends up breaking into the major fashion markets in Japan, Europe, or even the USA... but until then, all this debate has done is make Kamiseta even more buzz-worthy, and might even make the bottom line more profitable for the company.

****

And while we're on the subject of putting the Philippines squarely on the fashion map, I have a bold proposition to make here.

You know how Target gets people like Devi Kroell and Alexander McQueen to design stuff for their stores? Or how Payless usually gets a line from, say, Abaete or Lela Rose?

...Okay, so we already got a Pinoy designer into Target already, and that would be our boy Rafe Totengco. (Side note: Those bags that Rah-FAY just did for Tar-JAY? Lurve.) But stick with me here: What about a global designer collaborating with a Filipino retail brand?

You say it's been done before? Sure - Lesley Mobo (a UK-based Pinoy, as a matter of fact) just did a very cute lingerie (and, um, boxer/brief) line for Bench, which I adore. And the Mobo for Bench line, come to think of it, is the best example of what I have in mind for a major collaboration anyway: not too high-falutin' that it's out of reach, but not too far down the bracket that the quality might come into question.

Try to picture this: Monique Lhuillier designing limited-edition capsule lines for Rustan's, featuring resort-inspired clothes and/or linens that capture the old-meets-new vibe of her native Cebu. Or Rafe Totengco going back to his old retail roots by designing an affordable (leather!) line of shoes and bags for SM. And, since we've already made such a big deal about Steve Aoki helping to establish a hipster boutique in Manila, let's start bringing in more boldface names in here too... Gwen Stefani working with Cinderella, perhaps? Or a cross-collab between Tracy Feith and Kamiseta? Or Mossimo serving as a creative consultant for Bench?

Wild, I know. But if I can only dream, why not go all-out and start dreaming big, right? The only thing more scandalous than all of this is not pushing the envelope far enough.

Trendwatch 2009: Pale Pink Lips

There used to be a time when pale pink was the color of sweet girliness: Barbie, Strawberry Shortcake, Molly Ringwald; peony blossoms, Easter eggs, a child's first ballet class. And wasn't it almost yesterday that MAC had a line of girly pastel pinks for last spring's Sugarsweet collection?

Now, as fall approaches and springtime's promises are still out of reach, the pairing of pale pink lip color with strongly-colored eyes - from dark smoky eyeliner to vivid Technicolor lids - becomes more than just a "transition" look; it's a bracing shot of sugary politeness, the better to soften the bolder fashion statements of the coming months.

Check out this ad for MAC's Style Black collection...


...and the models in Michael Kors' Spring 2010 runway show during New York's Fashion Week (credit: WWD via Allure)...


...and the pages of Sephora's Beauty Central...



...AND - perhaps the most fun interpretation of them all, in my opinion - on the lips of Sandara Park and fellow members of the Korean girl group 2NE1, in this TLC-esque video for their Bollywood-flavored megahit "Fire."



Best of all, you don't have to wait until Spring to get pretty with pink, regardless of your skin color: October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month. Check out the pink-ribbon beauty products, fashion items, and other items available to benefit the Breast Cancer Research Fund.

Last Song Syndrome: Take Me To Brazil

Randomesticity: Typhoon-B-Gon

There's a joke here about this new "supertyphoon" sharing a name with a certain neighborhood in Cleveland, but I am going to leave that comment for Scribey to make. Heheh.

Okay, so I'm not going to let the typhoon coverage go just yet - not when there are folks still recovering from the last Big One who continue to cry for help, and not when reality continues to deliver elephantine slaps in the face to emo kids like this one (sorry, but somebody had to say it) - so everything I've written this week will stay on this page for the rest of the weekend, or until I can be absotively-positutely certain that help continues to be on its way to those who really need it.

Also, for those of you folks of une certaine génération (and not just the young kids, mind you) who still haven't gotten the memo yet: start registering to vote NOW. Because whoever leads the country in 2010 will continue to answer to the mess we're in right now, and we have to make sure that the Leadership FAIL we've seen this week never happens again. EVER.

This concludes the recent PSA section of Domesticity. Thank you.

(slow clap)

Anyway, regular-content blog posts will resume next week. As it should, too, since I just got a haircut a few days ago - pictures of which I will post as soon as I can. (Clue: It's short, but not too short... and the guy who cut my hair was able to tell me why I tend to look like Steve Perry whenever I grow out a layered haircut. Milagro!)

Other proposed future posts:

• The current pink-lipstick trend... and how it ties into Manila's fascination with Korean pop music
• How I'm doing with the whole diet-and-exercise thing
• A mini-review of exercise videos that I've been using to get this body into shape
• Digital-makeover fun with Looklet, Polyvore, and Taaz
  
• More drooling over hot Filipino men (...not so fast, Dingdong)
  
• Even more drooling over some great local makeup and skincare finds
• And! The much-postponed but soon-to-be finished Meimei Wishlist!

Until then: stay safe, warm, and dry out there!