I'M ALMOST READY FOR MY CLOSEUP MR. DEVILLE

Really there's six steps. First learn Japanese. Then wash your face. Somewhere in the middle you need to study the strip you just peeled off your nose for all the gunk it pulled out of your pores. #tonymoly

5 Likes, 1 Comments - Cindy Maddera (@elephant_soap) on Instagram: "Really there's six steps. First learn Japanese. Then wash your face. Somewhere in the middle you..."

I have a knew obsession. As if I need one more thing to obsess over, but I do. I really really do! This knew obsession is my pores. I might be lying about this being a 'new' obsession. Let's just say it is a new to you guys obsession. When I look at my nose in the mirror, I am often reminded of my dad's nose, even though I don't have his nose. I have the distinctive McCool nose, but I still think of my dad's nose because right smack in the middle of it, he had this huge gaping pore. Sometimes I would be so surprised by the size of it, that I would take a step back when he'd come too close. I often wondered in a very grotesque way what would happen if that pore was squeezed. It's a scientific curiosity. 

I'm sorry Dad. I love you, but you had giant pores on your nose. 

Now that I think about, Dad's giant pore could have been skin cancer. I never saw my dad ever put sunscreen on his body and he had some seriously suspicious looking moles on his arms. Any way, I'll look at my nose in the mirror and wonder if or when I'm going to wake up some morning soon with a giant hole in my nose. Sort of how I sometimes wake up and wonder if this will be the day my brain starts to break. Genetics is an asshole. I will say that I have seen a huge improvement in my skin since I've been diligent in washing it every evening with ground flax seeds and tea tree oil. God, I swear I am not as hippy as that last sentence makes me out to be.

Along with the face washing thing, I've been using a Biore pore strip on my nose once a week. I had run out of those recently and it had been a few weeks since I had last used one. I was thinking about that when we walked past Ulta yesterday on our way to Trader Joe's. I dragged Michael into the store with me and we looked at the many many options they had available for sucking gross things out of your pores. Michael picked up a three step packet from TonyMoly . I said "I don't know....it's a one time thing." He replied "So what? We're getting it. I'll get one for myself too. Let's just go." Can you tell that shopping at Ulta is his favorite thing ever? I said "fine" but also grabbed a box of regular pore strips to have on hand. If I were the kind of blogger that did sponsored posts or reviews of stuff, I'd totally write a good review for the TonyMoly packet. It worked well without making my face break out in an allergic reaction. That's a win with any face care product in my book. Also, TonyMoly is just fun to say. TONYMOLY!

The best part of peeling any of those strip thingies off your nose is looking at the strip to see what it pulled out of your face. I study them in the same way a witch studies tea leaves in the bottom of a cup to predict a future. You see that row of gunk there that came out of the crease of my nose? That means I'm going to live a long, clean life. Gasp! That boulder looking like thing there? That means you're destined to have giant pores. I haven't pulled out any boulders lately, so maybe I'm starting to change my destiny. Actually I feel like I'm lucky that I haven't turned complete crazy and started washing my face with a brillo pad.

I bet those things exfoliate the fuck out of your skin. 

IT SEES YOU WHEN YOU'RE SLEEPING

I'm dressed like a third grade ballet teacher.

elephant_soap's photo on Instagram

I know Thursday posts are usually devoted to love, but I didn't really have anything for today. It's snowing here and there was/is a soft white layer of powder coating everything when I got out of bed this morning. Which made me want to crawl back in bed and pull the covers up over my head. Except I couldn't because my new fancy bracelet kept buzzing on my wrist. Way back in November, I mentioned to Michael that maybe we should get each other some sort of FitBit like thing for each other for Christmas. It was during one of those particularly bad moments where I'd eaten a whole pizza by myself (this is not true, but it felt like I'd eaten a whole pizza and looked like it too). Both of us have plans to get healthy and lose some weigh in 2015. I thought maybe getting some sort of activity tracker would be good motivation. 

The more research we started putting into what tracker device we would want, the more enthusiastic Michael got. Meanwhile, I was starting to have some regrets. I tend to obsess over things (I know right?). When I found out plastic causes cancer, I threw out all of our plastic. I have  broken down in tears in a convenient store because I couldn't find a healthy organic snack. I used to wear a watch, but after one too many panic attacks about the possibility of being late, I took it off. I was starting to suspect that if I could see the number of steps I hadn't walked flashing on my wrist, I'd probably start stressing about those lost steps. Because I wouldn't see that number on my wrist as an achievement of steps taken that day, I'd see disappointment that the number wasn't larger. Here's what happens to my body when I stress about losing weight. It holds on to every pound and refuses to let go. 

That's why I picked the Jawbone Up24. It just looks like a bracelet. There's no read out for me to obsess over and it nudges me when I've been sitting too long at my desk. This is what I really needed. A nudge. It showed up in the mail yesterday and Michael had it out of the box and charging at my computer before I could blink. When it was done charging, I put it on and downloaded the phone app. I enabled all of the things. When I got to the part where I had to enter my weight, I moaned something about not knowing. Michael made me get up and step on the scale. Before I did, I made a guess and said "174." If we'd been at the fair I would have won a Cupie doll. I know this weight well. This is what I assumed was my "normal" weight for years. I had been that weight for so long, I just thought that was what I was supposed to weigh and maybe it is, but after Chris died, I lost ten pounds. I was pretty happy with being 164. Forget the camera lens. Men and relationships make me ten pounds heavier. 

The Jawbone tracks other things like food and water and sleep as well as how many steps you've walked. I put it on last night and set the sleep setting just before I went to bed. I thought it would be nice to start off my health stats with something I know I excel at. I went to bed thinking "I'll show you NudgyBones (that's my bracelet's name). I am so good at sleeping, I will blow your mind." And then I didn't sleep. My stomach gurgled from eating too much saag paneer at lunch. I was hot. I was cold. I felt a pea under the mattress. This side of the bed was weird. The middle of the bed was wrong. I had to get up and use the bathroom. I needed a drink of water. Eventually I did go to sleep, but when the alarm started chiming at 5:50 am, I squinted at it and whimpered. When I looked at the numbers that NudgyBones collected over the night, my shoulders slumped. NudgyBones says that I slept about three hours last night with four hours of restless sleep, meaning I was tossing and turning. I'm not as good at sleeping as I thought. 

Now I know why there's a "power nap" timer on NudgyBones.