stuff i can buy instead of expensive cosmetics, part 2

Hey guys! Hope you didn't want the Rescue Beauty Lounge Fan Collection, because it is 

Pretty Fucking Sold Out! 

Just like basically the entire nail polish community, but mostly the poor end of its financial spectrum, I completely devolved into a spitting, frothing hell-creature made out of blissful id-like instinct, lust, and rage at the sight of these colors. However, I knew I would never own them, for exactly two reasons:

1.) I need to eat this month.
2.) My body has a built-in self-destruct mechanism where it will begin to liquefy itself internally--starting with minor vestigial organs--if I even think about dropping $80 for 4 bottles of fucking nail polish. I got as far as putting three of them in my cart before I was undone by literal, physical agony.

This was before two of the four colors totally sold out on the RBL website, which means they're gone until they resurface some six months to years from now. (Aqua Lily will be back in November; IKB: 2012--along with the other two in stock, which will inevitably sell out as well--is likely to see a year or more, if ever.) Now if you want these polishes, you're going to have to descend into the greasy coke-dens of Ebay and buy them from people I have no choice but to believe are visible herpes sores on the erect penis of capitalism. These people are scalpers. Do you know why they're called scalpers? Because once they whip out a butcher's knife and hack off whichever hand of yours is holding seventy five dollars, they will proceed to hang that hand on their belt, like a war trophy. These people are serial killers who just happen to sell nail polish on ebay.

So now I am here, stewing in a swampy pit of jealousy and sweat, cursing the heavens and every shitty person who buys limited edition anythings only to turn around and carve their initials into your skin 10 years later when they break into your house while you're taking a nap. That's where this series--temporarily and unofficially titled "stuff i can buy instead of providing a living for monstrous harpy-villains on ebay with my own fucking money"--comes in. It is here to save me from myself.

Rescue Beauty Lounge Fan Collection: $180

see swatches at Scrangie's blog

Now, I'm not even going to pretend I can find proper dupes for these colors, mostly because pink shimmer is not a Thing yet, though it will be next year as everyone in the entire world starts shoveling mountains of pink shimmer into their polishes. Until then, I'm pretty satisfied with not giving any number of shits above "0" and just putting whatever I feel like on my nails.

What I Want to Buy Instead: 

Sinful Colors - Seaweed, $1.99

see a swatch at Oh So Lacquered

Kleancolor - Teal Envy, $1.75

see a swatch at The Edge of Sanity

Misa - Mermaid Dreams, $3.75

see a swatch at Body & Soul

Nyx Girls - Pacific Blue, $2.25

see a swatch at Project Vanity

5 pounds of red iron oxide, $13.50

2 pounds of aluminum powder, $23.00

magnesium ribbon, $8.85

10 inch terra cotta planter, $2.39

12 bags of lucky charms marshmallows like you don't give a fuck, $13.99

TOTAL: $71.47

Now, you might be thinking to yourself, "Ayla, what am I going to do with half this shit?" This might be because chemistry class is boring enough to sleep through 94% of the time so maybe you missed it, but that other 6% of the time is dedicated to stuff that blows up, where science crosses the line into sorcery and everything feels like you're playing a Dungeons & Dragons campaign. Here's where we find thermite, a mixture of iron oxide and aluminum powder that will basically burn through whatever it wants because it does not care about anything on this mortal plane. Observe:

What would you do with thermite? Something appropriately dangerous that will probably end in property getting damaged or someone getting killed, obviously. I personally dream about a parking lot full of cars owned by shitty ebay scalpers, and thermite smells like the sweetest of all reckless, prosecutable justice.

And the marshmallows?

If you tell me you've never wanted an entire box of Lucky Charms marshmallows just so you could unhinge your jaws and cram them in your mouth, I will call you a fucking liar.