Coffee Break: Ridge-Filling Base Coat Nail Polish
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I'm hoping to do a post soon comparing different “my nails but better” treatments/polishes, and I just ordered this one after seeing Fiddy Snails rave about it this morning. Admittedly, she liked it as a base coat (IIRC in her story she called it “the base coat that changed my life,”) but from the Amazon page it looks like it can also be worn by itself. I got the slight lavender tint, but there were a lot of good “barely there” colors.
(What else should I be considering for a MNBB roundup? So far I've got Londontown, Manicurist, Nail Envy, Zoya Naked… I'd love to hear any others you recommend or have been curious about!)
One of the reasons this Gellen base coat was a quick buy for me was the price — it's under $10 at Amazon.
Sales of note for 9/25:
- Boden – Up to 50% off sale + extra 15% off (I'm trying to figure out which color(s) of this sweater I should order…)
- Ann Taylor – 25% off the weekend collection and extra 50% off sale section
- Anthropologie – Extra 50% off sale!
- Athleta – Lots marked down to 40% off; with an Athleta card you get an extra 20% off.
- AYR – Archive sale, up to 60% off
- CVS – Epic beauty sale
- J.Crew – Fall styles start at $39
- J.Crew Factory – 40% off new arrivals, extra 20% off orders $125+
- Nordstrom – over 9800 new markdowns
- M.M.LaFleur – Labor Day Sale Event, save sitewide! (Try code CORPORETTE15 for 15% off on other items)
- Nordstrom Rack – Extra 40% off select clearance
- Talbots – 40% off one item, 30% off everything else
- Theory – End of season sale is on!
I’ve been feeling really ambivalent and pretty annoyed at my job for over a year now, and half-heartedly interviewing to leave.
I’ve been here for a long time, and I’m feeling quite stagnant and under-appreciated. BUT, the one silver lining is that at this point, IDGAF if I get fired, which means that I’m just charging ahead with some things I’m passionate about.
That includes public speaking and bringing up the next generation of female talent in my industry. I just secured a keynote spot at a conference and invited a rising star on the team to co-present with me, and we have a couple of free tickets to the event, which I’ve now offered to a few other rising stars on the team.
Will the PR team slap my hand that I didn’t run this through them first? Maybe, but the consequences are really just a DM. Will a zillion other teams want to weigh in on the content and give feedback? Probably, but since it’s my session and my frameworks, I don’t have to include them.
It’s actually kind of liberating to just lean into doing the things I want to do, knowing that they’re neutral at worst and quite helpful to the company at best, and I get to shine a spotlight on some of my mentees. If you’re feeling stuck but can afford to break some of the low-stakes rules, it’s a good way to make your day-to-day a little better.
FWIW, I’m someone who regularly needs to fill panels for programming and line up interviewees for articles in my current job and previous job (trade media and professional association). I’d say 90% of the speakers don’t run it by their PR like they’re “supposed” to and probably half or less of article interviewees. Granted, the topics aren’ anything all that controversial. But no one has time for that. Bigger companies may ask to run a few quotes after the fact. If I’m going through PR to reach the person, they’ll often help give them a talk track–and that can be good or bad for the output.
I learned that I can give 50% at my job and still be considered a top performer. I’ll aim for 100% when I get the promotion I’m overdue for and that my boss is making excuses not to give.
This is a lesson I’ve learned myself and constantly need to remind myself of!
Totally – it takes time to learn that you’re (most of the time) not getting rewarded for burying yourself and once you reach a certain level of competence that leads to positive perceptions of your work, there are diminishing returns on your effort and less of a need to go the extra mile. There are some things that make an outsize impact (like being responsive to clients) relative to their level of effort and I make sure to keep those up even if I’m otherwise looking at reels and fantasizing about my vacation.
Anyone have resources that will teach me how to lie better? My default is always honesty and if I do remember that I ‘should’ lie I can never come up with something quick enough. I’m starting to realize how much other people are dishonest (or telling selective truth or whatever euphemism) and how much of a disadvantage it leaves me at.
I only lie for things like “he was a wonderful man” said to the grieving spouse at the funeral when in fact, I thought he was a d1ck. Otherwise, it’s best to defer or deflect instead of lie most of the time.
Everything should have some degree of truth. You don’t want to get called out for a lie that is easy to fact check. I like selective truth because it allows for the “whose business is it” designation.
For dumb things like “what did you do this weekend” you can stick to “just relaxed.”
What type of lies do you want to tell? There is a different art to using selective truth and telling a whopper. I know people who have made up elaborate lies and pulled off fooling large groups of people into believing certain things. I can only get away with things like “No, driving you to an appointment is absolutely no problem.” and “Your baby is so cute!”
What a strange question.
you mean like white lies? Easiest to be vague rather than make up something detailed.
Yup. When I had a miscarriage and people asked me how my weekend was, I sure wasn’t going to say how awful it was, but I’m also not going to lie and say we went to Disneyland. “It was fine, how was yours?” is enough.
Good Lord why would you be asking this? If you don’t feel like you can be honest, keep your mouth shut.
I can see the reason to ask this.
What type of settings are you picturing using this skill?
Like, I get asked at work events how I like the wine, the speaker, the venue, etc. I don’t answer by saying the wine was too sweet, the keynote was boring, and the carpet is ugly. I say that the organizers clearly put a lot of work into planning the event, the turnout seems enthusiastic, and the agenda was robust. None of that is a lie, even if it doesn’t answer the actual question. It upholds the social conversation without insulting someone or reflecting poorly on my judgement.
Learning to deal in nuance is important, but I don’t think there is value in just totally BS-ing your way through life.
I think you are confused by people who don’t share every detail with the public, including friends and family, see eg the GLP1 disclosure conversation and people who don’t share key details with their spouse. Many, not all, consider this lying by omission to a spouse but that’s not the same thing as being private. I just don’t explain myself to others, within reason.
To follow up on the boots are back on trend conversation: I have a pair of OTK boots from like 2018. Black leather, almond toe, flat heel. They are in great shape. The OTK part isn’t super intense, it’s a pannel on the front that goes slightly over the knee. They are warm and comfortable. Keep or donate?
I saw an influencer say this fall’s biggest trend is . . . long sleeve solid color tshirts. For some reason, that was kind of the last straw for me. I can’t live in a world where I am told whether to buy long sleeve tshirts or not based on a trend.
All that to say, keep. They sound great. At the very least, you can wear them under midi skirts and dresses.
I’d wear them under longer skirts rather than over skinny pants.
Could you take them to a cobbler and have that OTK flap part removed?
We’ve had some good discussions about meal prep and how to make cooking easier on weeknights here. It’s kind of funny to me how totally different approaches make all the difference for some people. I was just talking to a friend about this and she and her husband recently resumed weekend meal prep and find it “life-changing,” whereas I, a meal prep hater, have discovered that the best labor-saving approach that works for me is using the crockpot and immediately freezing the leftovers (we don’t like leftovers for more than like, one day, whereas my friend and her husband will eat the same chicken for a week). Yet another friend swears Blue Apron is the gamechanger. It seems like there truly is no one solution that everyone can agree on, at least in my experience.
I do best with weekend ingredient prep, not true meal prep. That is – grocery shop with 3 recipes in mind, chop veggies for snacking on for lunches, take out meat that needs to be defrosted, and write down on our kitchen whiteboard what meals are on the docket that week so everyone is on the same page. I’ll also use Sunday to prep broth/muffins/some sort of grain salad most weeks.
This is coming from someone who didn’t make weeknight dinners until my oldest was about 3 – my husband and I would eat a lot of snack plates/leftovers on the couch after the gym. I fully expect we’ll go back to this model once the kids are in college, I hate cooking a big protein focused dinner!
I think it depends on what you dislike the most.
Figuring out what to cook and shopping for it? Blue Apron.
Active cooking time daily and not much freezer space? Bulk meal prep for the week and repeat that week’s fresh ingredients so as not to waste them.
Active cooking time daily and a solid freezer? Bulk meal prep organically by making extra of anything freezer-friendly, then defrost as desire.
Totally, plus how you like to spend your weekend time. Those who enjoy the process and art of cooking can easily look back fondly on a Sunday spent making Grandma’s special recipe, whereas those who dislike the time spent cooking will more often resent spending a weekend day (rather than a weeknight) on the effort.
I used a Blue Apron type service for a few months when my kids were in mid-elementary school. I had forgotten that dinner could be anything but chicken nuggets or mac-n-cheese. It was a much needed reset, expanded the kids palettes a little and kept household adults from going crazy.
Some of that is likely also determined by the family size – meal prepping for 1 or 2 doesn’t seem like it’s worth the effort. That may also play into the kit preference because then you’re not buying the 4+ servings of an item.
Personal feelings about leftovers also likely has a big impact.
It’s so true. None of the solutions you posted about are appealing to me for a bunch of reasons (I also don’t like leftovers for more than one day but have minimal freezer space, I personally don’t enjoy a lot of the stewy kinds of foods you make in a crockpot, I love to do some fancy cooking on the weekends and don’t want to use my kitchen time then to do weekend meal prep), but I’m the queen of meals you can make in 15-20 minutes max.
Explain to me like I’m stupid how my kid is getting around my refusal to allow her on social media (here, TikTok) by using YouTube instead? Do I need to ban YouTube also? She’s 13, for context.
This is some insane helicopter parenting. At thirteen I was taking the subway into the city and going on adventures with my blackberry.
How quaint.
For real
Yup.
Teach her to be safe online instead. Many kids, myself included, turn 14 a few weeks (or less!) before starting high school.
Countries are banning social media for kids under 16, but I’m the helicopter parent for banning it for my 13 year old? I also took public transportation by myself at 13 and have taught my daughter to do so. Your comparison is a false equivalence.
This is a false equivalency.
Countries are banning social media for kids under 16, but I’m the helicopter parent for banning it for my 13 year old? I also took public tr*an*portation by myself at 13 and have taught my daughter to do so. Your comparison is a false equivalence.
+1. If anything, parents are way too hands-off with social media and too overprotective for IRL experience these days.
+1
If she’s running around the city alone she’s getting into much worse shenanigans than she would on tik Tok. Though I suspect you have GPS on her phone
+2
Unfettered social media access has almost guaranteed negative effects, it’s just a question of how bad it is. (Anxiety, worse attention spans, worse coordination, worse social skills, etc.) Taking the subway has a very very slim chance of “something bad” happening.
+1 Big difference between screen time on social media and riding the subway.
My 13 yo also takes the train into the city and goes on adventures (with an analog watch and an airtag in her backpack, no phone) but we do ban youtube, tiktok, and basically everything else.
Taking the subway and texting your friends on your Blackberry didn’t do the same things to your teenage brain that social media does.
Yes, you need to ban YouTube. A lot of TikTok videos end up on YouTube.
Kids are crafty. See, e.g., https://www.theverge.com/entertainment/1001056/this-american-life-npr-kids-group-chat-comment-section
Yes, ban youtube. Kids have their private pages that they post on for their friends.
Yes. Also, the parental controls on YouTube are an absolute joke. Do NOT trust the “kids version.”
TikTok videos end up reposted to YouTube. I think you really ought to examine what you’re trying to achieve with your TikTok ban. I don’t personally use TikTok myself, so I don’t know if it’s the kind of place where you have DMs or chat groups, or if it is more like youtube where it’s just videos and comments and an algorithmic feed. If it does have that and that’s what you’re trying to avoid, YouTube does not have that so there is nothing you need to do. If you’re trying to get away from short-form video and algorithmic feeds because it rots attention spans, you’re going to need significant guard rails or a complete ban from YouTube.
My kids are still too young for this, but I feel like keeping kids off social media really deserves a collaborative approach so they don’t end up feeling like a social pariah and like you’re depriving them of something for no good reason. YouTube has so much educational content, but it’s also got a TON of biased brain rot, so I would lean towards collaborating with her on guardrails.
But they can also just develop their personality instead. They don’t have to communicate via meme. The social pariah thing is a silly thing to be worried about. Some kids don’t have cell phones, some kids aren’t smart, and some are broke. They adapt to their reality.
The social pariah fear is way overblown. I coach a high school sports team and the kids without phones are not treated any differently by their peers.
Follow up based on others’ comments:
Yeah, we know they won’t actually be social pariahs if they don’t have social media. But if your kid feels that way you should do something to address the issue. It’s a sign of social anxiety and/or bullying (the things you’re presumably trying to avoid with a social media ban) and just blowing off their concerns is going to drive them away from you and make things worse.
Yes, YouTube has a lot of the same content as tiktok, and many of the same addicting, rabbit-holing algorithm features, as well as all the trouble kids can find if you’re letting them upload videos and comment. I would not give a kid unfettered YouTube access (and especially not a smartphone with YT!)
But I think to come up with a consistent policy, you need to think through *what* you’re trying to ban/avoid with a “social media” ban – app by app is going to be whack a mole. I’d let a 13 year old watch stuff on YouTube on a computer in the living room for example (with reasonable time limits)