warning: this is a pretty random post.

PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT: this is very important.  

Yesterday, I bought a set of new makeup brushes.  I really like them a lot.  (Sonia Kashuk at Target, if anyone's interested.)  On the back of the box, it advised that you should wash the brushes with soap and water regularly.  Hmm, I thought to myself.  That's a good idea.  So when 

I got home, I got out my old makeup brush, a cheap Wal-Mart one that I have been using for several years.  I washed it out with soap and water and laid it to dry on a paper towel on my counter.  Fast forward to late last night, right before I was about to wash my face for bed.  I was curious if the brush was dry yet, so I picked it up.  And stared at the paper towel.  On the spot where the bristles had been, the paper towel was GREEN AND SPOTTED.  I was really confused at first... I have never once used that brush for anything green.  Then the shocking realization hit me.  There was mold growing inside that thing.   I picked up the wet brush to smell... and it was possibly the most putrid thing I have ever smelled.  Yes, friends.  There was green mold growing

 inside the makeup brush I use almost every day on my face.  I ran to the trash can and threw it away.  Yuck.  Anyways, the moral of the story:  Wash your makeup brushes.  I plan on washing my new ones regularly.  And just to be on the safe side, this morning I washed out that little round thing I use to put powder on.  Mold: it's out to get you.

some other life updates:

1. I have been in a very "decorative" mood lately.  I got a new bookcase the other night as an early birthday present from Mom.  It is 6 feet tall and took me and three friends quite awhile to put together but I love it!  As a result of this purchase, I had to rearrange the furniture in my room.  I really like the way it looks now.  I moved the ugly un-matching small bookcase I used to have into my bathroom and although it's a bit cramped in there now, it's a nice shelf for towels and stuff.  Here are some pictures of the new and updated apartment 106 in all its glory:

There is only one problem.  My windows are bare.  They need curtains.  I want black and white curtains.  I am not really even that picky.  I just want some type of curtains that are black and white and have a pattern on them.  And they don't exist anywhere.  I've checked Lowe's, Bed Bath and Beyond, Wal-Mart, Target, Hobby Lobby, and a couple other places too.  I'm going to check out the mall this weekend and see if I can find any there.   

2.  I really like listening to Pandora Internet radio.  I hadn't listened to it much lately, but when I clicked on over there yesterday, I discovered possibly the coolest thing ever.  It's a "gadget" for your Windows Vista sidebar that plays your Pandora stations!  It's so cute!  It's just hanging out there, a tiny rectangle in the corner of my screen, and it does all the same things as that ENTIRE bulky webpage did!  You can even thumbs-up, thumbs-down, and skip songs just like you can on the normal site! CRAZY!

Here's baby Pandora, looking all hip and totally better than that old one that I would accidentally forget and close out of, inevitably while it was playing my favorite song.  I love you, little Pandora.  If I have children I hope they look like you.

EDIT: When I said I wanted my children to look like you, I meant the actual music-playing box of wonder, not the creepy cartoon alien on the cover of the Rogue Wave album that is currently playing.  I forgot that was even there.

(and yes, I purposely screen-captured it while it was playing a very obscure hip indie song. this is sure to give me some street cred. yessss.) 

you can download the pandora gadget here.

3.  I just finished an extremely good book: She's Come Undone by Wally Lamb. I know that probably everyone in the world has already read it, but I LOVED it. It's one of the saddest stories I have ever heard, and yet still uplifting at the same time.  I strongly recommend it, although not when you are busy because it's hard to put down. 

4.  Speaking of Pandora, mine has played the same song twice in the past fifteen minutes.  (One is a live version, so I guess it didn't know.)  But I am not complaining because a) I had never heard the live version before and b) the first time it came on, I was reminscing back to last May.  This song, "Me and Jiggs" by Josh Ritter, is the first song I ever really played on the guitar.  Well -- saying I played is kind of a stretch.  My friend Kara and I were both "kind of" learning to play and we each knew a few basic chords.  We were listening to this song a lot then, and it's just a really simple song and I looked it up and the chords were easy, so it was an obvious choice.  After a few frustrating tries apiece, we finally came to the realization that there was a much easier method to play: take turns. As in, she would strum the C chord, and while she was busy figuring out how to change fingering, I could chime in with the A minor or whatever.  After a few agonizing hours of practice, we had the song down pretty well using the alternating-chords method [(c) 2008, Allison Lott and Kara Graves, all rights reserved].  Bursting with pride at our newfound musical talent, we called our friend Hunter to come over and listen.  So he did.  And I think we sounded incredibly awful and the song was unrecognizable (not to mention he didn't know it in the first place, and we were so concentrated on the guitar that we could only mumble the words).  But he's a good sport, so he pretended we were good.  So, having proclaimed ourselves guitar geniuses, neither of us practiced again for at least a month.  (Disclaimer: I can actually play some songs by myself now.  It took a long time, and while it sounds slightly better than our dorm-room jam session, it's not nearly as entertaining.)

I think it is my bedtime.  I also think that probably no one read this far.

(P.S. in five days it is my twenty-first birthday!)