Month: July 2016

Happy National Lipstick Day!

National Lipstick Day is held on July 29. This is a day to celebrate the joy of lipstick.

Lipstick has a very colorful history. Early in the Greek empire, wearing lipstick was a sign that you were a prostitute. In the Roman era, lipstick was worn by both sexes and indicated social rank. In 1770, British Parliament banned lipstick, believing that it was a way to trick men into marriage. In America, George Washington sometimes wore lipstick along with his powdered wig. (Source)

How to write about National Lipstick Day:

  • Do you like to wear lipstick? If so, what is your favorite shade?
  • How do you choose a flattering shade of lipstick?
  • Who is your favorite manufacturer of lipstick? What makes their lipstick the best?
  • Do you worry about additives to lipstick? Is there a brand that you feel safe using?
  • Does testing cosmetics on animals influence which brand of lipstick you purchase? Why or why not?

My childhood toys are collectibles!

My daughter and I spent the weekend in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. Although the primary purpose of our trip was to visit fabric outlets, we ended up browsing through several antique and collectable stores.

Here’s where this article gets hard to write. Many of my childhood toys are now collectibles! The exact dolls, toys and board games that I remember playing with!. Also for sale were many of the items that my mom still uses every day – including her casserole dishes and Betty Crocker Cookbook.

It turns out that antiques are valuable items that are more than 100 years old. Collectibles, on the other hand, are valuable items that were made less than 100 years ago. That means that items from my childhood in the 1960’s clearly qualify as collectibles. Ouch.

Today, write about something from your childhood that would qualify as collectible.

Reviewed – The Charm Bracelet: A Novel

Since I’m still on vacation, I’m reviewing another fiction book. If this book hadn’t been selected by my book club, I would not have considered it. This novel tells the story of four generations of women, through the charms on their bracelets.

Over Memorial Day, the flamboyant grandmother (Dolly) is visited by her daughter (Arden) and granddaughter (Lauren). Sadly, Dolly is in the early stages of dementia. Arden has always been embarrassed by her mother’s big personality, which is put to good use during Dolly’s hourly performances outside the town’s ice cream parlor.

As the story unfolds, Arden and Lauren learn about their family history and grow to appreciate Dolly, as well as the small Michigan town where she lives. Overall, the book turned out to be a very sweet story that would be especially enjoyed by women with aging parents. The Charm Bracelet also invoked a lot of memories within my group about our own family charm bracelets.

 

What is “Dumb as a door knob?”

Originally, this expression meant that something was silent (a synonym for “dumb”). At some point, the expression transitioned to refer to someone who was stupid. There seems to be no reason why a door knob was more or less stupid (or silent) than any other object, except that the alliteration in “dumb as a door knob” sounds good. (Source)