Welcome to TueDuesday: A Weekly Series on Self Improvement (and
Self Preservation), where I'll share some of the hard-earned tips and
tricks that have made their way up my sleeve after well over a decade of living
alone in the city.
TueDuesday goes out to all
of you who have ever bravely moved into your very own apartment, only to
encounter a cockroach the size of a well-fed hamster. Barefoot.
In the middle of the night. To
all the ambitious drinkers who ever wanted to score the bartender's number (and
to the many of us who have failed, only to bravely try again). To the pasta fiends. To the Facebook lurkers. To the happy, the hopeful, and the possibly
hung-over guys and gals like me, navigating the city streets – or the country
roads – without benefit of a map or a significant other. Whether you're chronically single, newly
separated or happily coupled up and just looking for a way to make the
occasional table for one a little more fun, there's something here for you.
Like what you see? Pass
it along! Strongly disagree? Say so in the comments! (Respectfully, please; after growing up with
the last name Blewett, my ego can only take so much.) Have an idea for a future TueDuesday
post? Send it over! And keep in touch, via Twitter @LeahKBlewett and Instagram @leahkblewett.
Happy TueDuesday!
TueDuesday, April 14th, 2015
"Unexpectedly Spending the Night," or
"What Must Always Live in Your
Purse," or
"How I Learned to Stop Worrying
and Love the Morning After"
Let's dive right in, shall
we? This TueDuesday, we're taking a cue
from the Boy Scouts of America ("Be prepared!") and stocking our purses in the
sweetly hopeful spirit of spending the night and navigating the morning after.
I've talked about the morning
after before over at Shmitten Kitten,
but this post is less to do with behavior and more to do with the essentials
you'll need to preserve the precious illusion that you did, in fact, wake up
like this.
For one thing, there are certain
basics that you can expect to find in even the most slovenly bedroom buddy's
bathroom: Soap. Water. Toothpaste.
Cobbling together a face washing and a tooth brushing is almost never
impossible. Beyond that, however, you're
often on your own – meaning that I can't possibly be the only woman who has
ever groped for a towel with hand soap stinging my eyes only to settle for the
indignity of drying my face with toilet paper.
(Right??)
When considering which essentials
deserve a piece of your precious purse real estate, it's a good idea to review
which products you'd have the hardest time living without. A bout of measles-esque acne during my early
college years revealed that oil-free moisturizer is the only way to keep my
T-zone from looking like a war zone, but carrying a full bottle around at all
times is just overkill, so I thoroughly washed out a travel-sized shampoo vial
and pumped a few mornings worth of moisturizer inside. Along with tinted lip gloss (the fastest way to polish a makeup-free
face), a sample tube of mascara (the fastest
way to open up my squinty morning eyes and transform me from the
blondest-haired, bluest-eyed Asian girl you've ever seen into someone
resembling, well, me), and a tube of
unscented lotion that I blended with a few drops of my perfume (instant Girl
Smell!), that's my survival kit. Minimal
space occupied; maximum humanity achieved.
Consider your own morning routine,
and pack accordingly: Will brushing your teeth with a finger make you feel
mossy all morning long? Include a
travel-sized toothbrush. Will having his
pillow smell in your hair all day distract you?
Hairspray or body splash to spritz on your roots. Will fretting about circles under your eyes
keep you from enjoying the afterglow?
Concealer. You get the idea.
And if all else fails? There are really only two things that can
truly ruin a sleepover: STDs, and stumbling home in heels. So while mascara, moisturizer and all the
rest are nice, these two non-negotiables will neutralize any of your morning
after concerns: condoms and cab fare.
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