Okay, so I know the name of this blog is Bonkers about Perfume, not Bonkers about Lipsticks. As a matter of fact I did google that out of interest, and got my own blog (twice), right after some sponsored links for Max Factor, MAC and Clinique, haha! So you could say that it almost is Bonkers about Lipsticks in Google's eyes, and certainly that's where my head is at at the moment for some strange reason. I am frenetically reading beauty blogs (more so than perfume blogs, for the first time!) and drawing up shortlists of shades in all the high end ranges, which I plan to investigate further when I am down in London again next week.
I am still puzzling over what might have precipitated this restless quest to find the perfect lippie / gloss in each of the main shades that suit my colouring. The recession? My revolting hormones? The general insecurity of middle age? For I feel strangely driven to find "the one" or "ones" rather - it really is most peculiar. Though in fairness, I did something similar in the first year of fumeheadonism - the voracious reading, the lists, the Ebay stalking - before eventually abandoning the search and resigning myself to just settling down with my top 147 perfumes or so. So I do recognise a similar "sudden onset mania" coming upon me, more to do with lipsticks than any other category of makeup at present, but watch this space. Eyeshadows could well be next, or anything involving noticeable colour - I think colour is key.
But realistically how would it change my life if I did manage to find the optimum shade or three? Which probably won't be far off in tone from the handful I kept in my collection after ditching the 18 old or wrong 'uns in my recent cull. Lipstick is cheering, but not sooo transformative as to warrant the research I am putting into my hunt. And the evidence to date does rather point to the fact that I am still circling endlessly round the same lipstick shades in pinky-browny-nude-beige-rosewood.
I say that, because I have already made my first purchase(!) of Dior Rouge Dior Pisanelle Pink, following extensive scrutiny of my favourite blogs (links below). Blind, and on Ebay admittedly, but as blind buys go this was as good as it gets: the colour is exactly as pictured in the reviews, even on my highly pigmented lips. The only downside is the fact that it is a new tester with a generic white cap instead of the proper one - though I did only pay £15 for it including postage. So the sensory pleasure of using it is diminished by about 50% - as far as the packaging is concerned, anyway! I think it will be my last tester buy. At least with tester bottles of perfume, they may lack their box or come in a plain white one, but the bottle itself looks normal, or that is my understanding. There again, maybe some tester bottles come without a cap - not even a plain white one : - ) - perhaps someone can enlighten me on this point.
So anyway, here are a couple of pictures: one of the lipstick looking a bit odd and one of me looking a bit mad, but the lipstick is shown to good effect at least - that is exactly how it comes off (or goes on, rather) on my lips. I do have another photo where I look marginally less mad, but there is an awful lot of chin in that one, and I am sure you don't want to see that. Also, I haven't done any comparisons with the "pink probationers" in my previous post on this subject, because I figured there are only so many "lipstick line up shots" that a reader can bear! Well, partly that reason and partly the fact that I feel a bit silly for buying something in the same ballpark as what I already own... Also, dark as it may appear in the tube, Pisanelle Pink is definitely lighter than most of my current "pink nude" contingent when applied, as well as being more luxuriant and creamy in feel.
STUMPY LIPSTICK MUTANT
ME WEARING PISANELLE PINK AND LOOKING SOMEWHAT MAD
A few of my favourite beauty blogs that have helped me in my plethora-whittling efforts - the first link is to the review that clinched my purchase of Pisanelle Pink. (Also good for capturing its precise colour in the tube as well as on the model's lips, which may even be pigmentally similar to mine):
Café Makeup
The Beauty Look Book
Makeup And Beauty Blog
The Non-Blonde (of course!)
Get Lippie (of course!)
Best Things In Beauty
MyBeautyBlog (my blogger pal in Germany!)
Messy Wands
My Funny Valentine
And last but not least, the incomparably named Pink Sith
Then there are perhaps ten other blogs, including some British-based ones, which might also come up every time I google a different product, so this list is by no means exhaustive. However, it probably represents the blogs that are top of my head for me now.
In case anyone is concerned, I will be back with a perfume review in my next post. I am still Bonkers about Perfume, really - I just get sidetracked now and then... : - )
Photo of Holy Grail by Vitold Muratov via Wikimedia Commons, other photos my own