Saturday, April 29, 2006

you're damn right, Al.

quote of the day:

"Nobody realizes that some people expend tremendous energy merely to be normal."

-- Albert Camus, french existential writer


Friday, April 28, 2006

product review #1: beauty edition

even though its clearly stated over yonder ( <--- )that this is a chronicle of our 'adventures', even i get a little - just a little - tired of reading about myself sometimes. and although we're sure you're aware by now, dear readers, that you're not checking out our site for discourses on our current political climate (and if you are, you may find that our tales of falling pines, minstrels, and stuffed bears actually make more sense...), i'm sure even you need a little change of pace. variety is the spice of life. ("is it? i thought it was oregano. no wonder my life sucks." - found that quote in a comic in the NY Press years ago and have been waiting for a time to use it...)

that said, i figured i'd do a product review and clue you kids in to some phenomenal new goodies i've found. to enhance your lives and whatnot. i'm not one of those "product whore" girls - my face will never come off on your pillow - so for me to be swooning over beauty products means that they're pretty damn good.

so you know how sometimes you just smell so good that you want to make out with yourself? (no, i don't mean it in the Divinyls one-hit-wonder sense...if you don't know what i mean, then perhaps you should invest in some nicer smelling products. just saying.) well, Herbal Essence's Blackberry, Avocado, Mango conditioner is the sorta stuff that'll do that to ya. now, please don't think that i'm one of those woman who's fallen prey to HE's ridiculous "organic experience" campaign. as a matter of fact, i'm more inclined to NOT buy HE products, simply because they insist on making the women fake orgasm so loudly (please. there's never a need to be that loud, no matter how good he may be.) in their dumbass commercials.

so when you look at what HE has stacked against it in my book (i'm a big fan of boycotts), its really a testament to the power of their Blackberry, Avocado, Mango conditioner that i'm this much in love with it. as for the chemical components and whether or not its beneficial to my hair and/or would be good for yours, i really can't help ya (what a great critic i am) - i mean, i don't have split ends but that's just as much attributed to my wonderful haircutter as it is to the silkening agents in the conditioner. so what you want to buy this one for is the scent-sational showering experience. i swear missy may find me in the bathroom one day drinking it.

up next is the most fantastic thing to happen to lips since the invention of the kiss. now let me preface this review by saying - i AM a lip balm whore. i am. i admit it. i can't get enough. i'm addicted to it, and if a NY Chapter of BA (balm'ers anonymous) starts up, i need to join. i daresay this abusing of the balm stems from my fidgety nature, and i suppose re-applying lip gunk 100x a day keeps my hand free from more harmful hand-movement activities, like smoking, random inappropriate slapping, or sucking my thumb.

anyways. so i've tried them all: chapstick (eh), carmex (great, but non-aesthetically pleasing), kiehl's (superb), bigelow (minty-licious, but a little too tacky), etc etc. recently, a friend tipped me off to Benefit's lipscription, and i don't think i can ever turn back. lipscription is more than a mere stick of balm - its a lip experience. it comes in two-parts - one tube filled with lip exfoliator, the other with the silkiest balm ever. those little buffer beads will find dry patches you didn't even know you had, and the balm, even on its own, is fabulous. seriously, your lips won't know what hit them.

so there you have it. chrissy says run, don't walk, to the nearest drug store/makeup counter and purchase HE's blackberry, avocado, mango conditioner & benefit's lipscription. oh yea, and some mango body butter (my third obsession, but no need for a review, as those three words alone - mango. body. butter. - should do it for ya). your body will thank you. (see? and you thought we were only good for your mind and soul...)




Thursday, April 27, 2006

all i wanted was a hug.

"go in your corner. and put on your pajamas."

sweet sisterly advice when one of us shows up home intoxicated and attempts to cuddle on the couch with the other.


A Tree Falls in Staten.

people always think that sissy and i make up stories. i do. a little bit. okay. a lot. but mostly just in my own head. sometimes i spread my internal rumours to bear. eventually the story will leak out to sissy who will then point out that said statement is totally false and i (and bear) are both delusional and lonely.

having said that, this story is totally true:

the other night while cheating on our aforementioned celebreality diet (with wine, natch. we don't cheat with food. liquid diet, folks) we received a phone call from Disco alerting us to the fact that our parents eighty year old pine tree ripped it's own roots out of cement and fell precariously next to our house, taking down a fence and resting in one of it's neighboring trees. granted this could have been a tragedy. but we're not in that shakespearean mode this week. so instead it's a constant source of amusement. how does an almost century old tree fall? how did our parents know it fell? well, Disco was outside bbq-ing (mmmm, meat) when he noticed that the tree was at a rather peculiar angle. always prepared, though never a boyscout, our father moved his car from the driveway just in case. about a half-hour later a noise was heard which our mother describes as "a large bucket of clothespins falling" (yes, seriously. imagine our lysol infused childhood please), our father compared to thunder, and two rando busy-bodies across the street identified as an earthquake (but they're from the house with the suburban drug problem). anyway after realizing that no laundry assistants were to be found, mother rushed to the dining room window to pull up her every perfect white and straight venetian blinds to experience the oh-so-chevy-chase scene of a giant pine tree pressed against the side of the house. the great thing about this story is that if the tree had fallen a few feet in any other direction it would have caused major havoc, but in the true style of our family, danger was narrowly avoided and hilarity ensued. the fun continued with an army of bewildered firemen and the discovery of a recently severed root on neighboring property (sabotage anyone?). all of this while sissy and i were confined to our couches in astoria. of course when we move out the island finally starts getting interesting. more when punishment is doled out to the offending neighbors.

m

Wednesday, April 26, 2006

being good is highly overrated.

going against everything we stand for, loveandcyanide decided to start up a diet this week. surprisingly, we've been incredibly good thus far - which is saying a lot, as this phase of the diet we've chosen involves only eating fruits and vegetables, and as much as we like rabbits, its way more fun to eat them than imitate them. except for the bunny hop, which, bizarrely, we used to do around the house a lot. a lot.

sadly, all this good-ness has brought nothing but tragedy to my Favorite Sensible Work Bag. earlier this week, the oatmeal packet i was toting around with me opened, unleashing its contents all around FSWB. a grainy mess, but at least i got a whiff of cinnamon whilst putting on my sunglasses. today, the tupperware holding salad did not open, but somehow magically leaked out oil & vinegar all over FSWB. of course i only noticed this once the oil stained my pants, so now both poor FSWB and i smell a bit like a salad bar. (a minor plus to this, as i like conducting little sociological experiments, i can test to see if i'm attracting more vegans than usual.)

so the moral of the story? sticking to a healthy diet is totally hazardous. sausage and egg on a bagel has never once caused any harm to any of my belongings. and if it did, as we all know, i'd rather smell like a sausage than a salad anyday. someone, please, go eat a bacon cheeseburger for us.

Tuesday, April 25, 2006

fyi

i was screamed at by a VH1 'celeb-reality' star today. its not nearly as glamorous as one would expect.


Monday, April 24, 2006

There's a wind-up man walking round and round...

Do you remember the movie Return to Oz? if you answered yes, skip down to paragraph 4. my bet is that the majority of you answered no, and i wouldn't be surprised as it seems like whenever sissy and i bring it up no one ever knows what we're talking about (with the exception of the Scissor Sisters, who actually wrote a song about the movie, which is reason #17 why we love the band so damn much!)

so RTO, as the title so nicely suggests, involves Dorothy's return to Oz where, of course, drama and hijinks ensue. as the wicked witch from the first movie (which, by the way, i never enjoyed. judy garland always bothered me, which is somewhat ironic as there's been a few instances lately where, when wasted and taking photos in a cab, i wind up coming out in the pics looking a lot like her daughter, liza minelli. which is scary, i know, and if there's anything that'll get me on the wagon, that'll be it...)is no longer around, the sequel is brimming with new villains, much scarier than the old witch in the crappy green face paint. evildoers so disturbing to children (well, children like us) that sissy and i have been scarred since our first viewing.

the main villain in RTO is Princess Mombi, who can take her head off and interchange it with one of the numerous women's heads she keeps locked up in see-through cabinets in a room in her palace. these heads are alive in the cabinets, and howl with scary banshee wails when Dorothy tries to steal one of them. (what? yea, there’s a talking chicken too…I swear it’s a good movie). although the mid-80's special effects could only make these disembodied heads look somewhat real, it always managed to freak us out.

so this morning i get on the local bus and actually get a seat - the elderly must have stayed home due to the rain - and as i'm leaning over struggling with my umbrella i look up and come face-to-face with a mannequin head. of course all i can think of is RTO and while i'm on a crowded bus, in the middle of daylight, and, as a rational human being, should know that this is not the removable head of an evil princess who doesn't exist, i can't help but get startled and jump in my seat.

turns out, there is no cause for alarm. the (inanimate. whew.) head is dangling from the hand of a girl whom i would assume to be some sort of hairdresser-in-training, as it is showing off a fancy set of cornrows. as I’ve now calmed down, I inspect the head (couldn’t she have put it in a bag?? a. it was raining, and b. the girl looked like a psycho, carrying this head around like a proud guillotine operator) and discover that it also has a nose piercing. Can mannequins come with body jewelry? Did this girl pierce the nose herself to make the head more hip? Did that mean the head was hollow, or was the stud just glued on? I was utterly amazed. Never did the thought of mannequin piercings ever cross my mind before.

Suffice to say, thanks to this creepy yet wonderfully unique experience on the Q101, I think I’m finally over one of my RTO fears. sometimes a disembodied mannequin’s head is just that. it won’t come alive and shriek at me, nor alert it’s headless master to my presence, causing it to chase me around a castle. next up, helping sissy conquer her fear of parking garages, stemming from the RTO villains, the wheelers.


because you desperately need to know more about this film -- http://imdb.com/title/tt0089908/

Sunday, April 23, 2006

new and improved!

it only took a few months, but finally my digital media classes paid off and i was able to figure out how to get links on here. excitement abounds.

now its time to get some food shopping done, as our cupboards are bare. did you know shoprite sends emails? i just received one this week - must be because i'm such a loyal shopper. or else its just another perk of old age...

Friday, April 21, 2006

"1, 2, 3...hot sundae!"

i am fully aware that i abuse the adjective "best", but this time i really really mean it. (actually, i always really mean it - my mental gold medal podium is faarrrr larger than the one the olympics' uses.) so last night was the best night of television, and since this recap will be all love and no cyanide, i dedicate this post to our "number one fan". =] (and unlike most "number one fans" she is neither deranged nor socially-awkward, and i don't think she'd ever go all misery on us and tie us to a bed and beat us. then again, i think bear enjoys shit like that...)

so we're perusing through our channel guide last night and came across The Ultimate Coyote Ugly Search on CMT (Country Music Television, y'all). missy protested, but as i was a coyote one halloween (the first and last time you'll ever see me in red pleather pants) i was curious to see what this show was all about...and of course to see if any of the contestants pilfered my moves.

the show itself is your standard reality show fare, however the extreme usage of the term "badonkadonk" **see below for definition, if needed** threw it into the category of fantastic for us. i'd say the word was used about 2 or 3 times per minute in every form imaginable - sung, drawled, shouted, and lest you think it wasn't possible, in a christopher walken impersonation. yes, the song "honky tonk badonkadonk" (what? you don't know it??) was said walken-style by one of the contestants. jerky hand movements included. this does not at all capture the insanity that was coming out of our television during that glorious minute-long segment - the best i can do here is clue you in to its existence - so i highly suggest tuning into CMT and seeing it for yourselves.

so the show ended and as our howls (heh) of laughter died down, we flipped channels and lo and behold, what did Adult Swim have in store for us??? Saved By The Bell. and not just any SBTB, but everyone's favorite episode where Jessie Spano gets addicted to caffeine pills! we were overjoyed. the episode was every bit as good as i remembered it, and i wish we could say we took away an important anti-drug message from it, but it truly is impossible to take someone seriously as a drug addict when they are wearing a giant bow in their hair.

**definition of badonkadonk, courtesy of urbandictionary.com:

An ‘ebonic’ expression for an extremely curvaceous female behind. Women who possess this feature usually have a small waist that violently explodes (ed. note: !!!...thank god i only possess a mere ass) into a round and juicy posterior (e.g., 34c, 24, 38). Other characteristics would be moderately wide hips and a large amount of booty cleavage (i.e, depth of butt-crack).


Her badonkadonk made a brotha pop mad wheelies.

Thursday, April 20, 2006

Tres Appropriate.

never one to miss out on a holiday, sissy has taken to being the blog nazi in honor of adolf's day of birth.


that's right. i went there.

Tuesday, April 11, 2006

best thing ever.

not to be confused with 'best week ever' -- frankly, i'm over VH1 and their talking head overkill. trust me, i love nostalgia just as much as the next girl (probably even moreso. i throw disco bashes, dammit) but do we really need THIS many shows featuring marginally famous people (oh, and "pop culture experts". can't forget them) making marginally humorous remarks about decades/toys/celebrity breakups/whatever other topics a producer can come up with? it worries me that recent college grads probably aspire to be regulars on one of these sort of shows. kids, i know being on tv seems supercool, but these days it doesn't mean you're talented because they let you talk on camera.

now where was i? oh yes - so the best thing ever. the other day i washed a blanket, and folded it up and threw it in a bag immediately upon its egress from the dryer. and as i didn't receive an invite, i had no idea about the little static energy party going on within the confines of that bag since then. so upon unleashing my blanket onto my bed last night, i shut off my light, hopped into bed and unfolded the blanket...and saw sparks! seriously. my room lit up like it was the fourth of july. it was fantastic. (yea, so, a burst of static electricity completely made my week. what can i say - i never tried those basic science experiments when i was a kid).

Wednesday, April 05, 2006

i want an adult pacifier too!

we here at loveandcyanide love the surreal. not necessarily in the dali melting-clocks fashion, but in a more subtle way, as when unexpected and illogical things get peppered into your basic daily routine. like the minstrel showing up on our doorstep while we were unpacking groceries. i daresay this love stems from the fact that we always played house with stuffed animals instead of dolls when we were children. (to think that mattel - whoever - spent all that money making cabbage patch kids that looked just like us! when there were kids out there imaginative enough to go balls out and play mother to a stuffed tiger or monkey).

so imagine my delight when i looked out the window earlier and saw a blizzard! in april. i'm in here securing the provisions i need for Operation: Summer Wardrobe and its snowing outside. so fantastic. i'd love to see how all those premature flipflop wearers are coping this afternoon. the weird greenish ghostbuster sky (does everyone think of the ghostbusters movies when the sky is a strange color, or is it just us??) should have been an indicator of bizarre weather, but it was still a thrilling surprise to see such nonsense occurring outside my window.

and as the snow brings visions of cold and ice, we’d like to say a big YAY to the rangers for winning an important game last night. of course we didn’t watch it (although i almost accidentally purchased a different hockey match from our "whatever you do don't order any" pay-per-view service) but our father dutifully gave us the update after it was over. he was rewarded with the most entertaining text message he'll probably ever receive. unfortunately we must refrain from posting it here, as we wouldn't want it to inflame anyone.

and in the most entertaining news we'll probably read all week, rumour has it that mr. tom cruise had an 'adult pacifier' specially crafted for his baby-momma katie holmes, to ensure her screams will be silenced while giving birth, thereby adhering to one of the laws of scientology. as sick as that sounds, i'm actually enthralled by the idea of an adult pacifier - it would seriously save me so many pens and straws.