Being on an airplane is a lot like being a sled dog. If you’re not right there at the front (and by front of an airplane I don’t mean seat 2A; I mean the cockpit), the view never changes. This relative lack of meaningful vista and absolute absence of any control, goes a long way towards explaining why I don’t like to fly commercially. Sorry about that, United.
Because my frequent flyer miles are so scant, it’s impossible for me to get a free flight or an upgrade or even a bag of pretzels with anything but crumbs and salt dust. What just a few thousand frequent flyer miles will get you, however, is reading material. A web site called “Mags for Miles” gives us low-end travelers an opportunity to cash in our miles for a variety of magazines.
The choices are just about what you’d expect. People magazine—-in Spanish. Wine Connoisseur. Men’s Fitness. And, of course, what used to be called “women’s magazines.” Maybe they’re still called that. No matter the nomenclature, I personally have very little interest in “Saying POW! With Pillows.” My pillows do not say “POW!” If they speak at all, my pillows say, “My thickness is measured in microns. We are looking at functionality in the rear view mirror. Retire me in the name of all that’s merciful.”
Along with pillow talk, these types of magazines are just chock-full of make-up and hair style tips.
It has long been my contention that there are two types of females: those that know about hair and make-up and those who are apparently genetically deficient in this department. Yours truly falls unadorned and messily coifed squarely into the latter camp.
Since the hints and tips are on every page, however, they’re difficult to avoid. One article that caught my eye claimed a girl (or guy, of course. We are nothing if not egalitarian.) needs only one make-up product for her whole face. Ever the optimist, I thought …” One product. Even a person such as myself, lacking the make-up gene, can probably master one product.”
There is something innately endearing about optimists. In the fact of repeated failures, disappointments, and assorted faux pas, your eternal optimist will somehow convince herself that next time — or the time after that for certain — things will be better. So this optimist took herself to the local drug store in pursuit of a magical item with the word “stick” in it. I couldn’t quite remember the name of the stuff, see? It was (something) stick. Memory stick? No, that’s a computer thing. The only thing I know less about than computers is make-up but so far I haven’t tried to insert lip gloss into a USB port. It was some sort of stick used for make-up. Wait! Wait! I had it. It was called a make-up stick.
The first fly in the night-cream ointment was that the referencing article was not adequately illustrated. So I didn’t know precisely what a make-up stick looked like. Or even imprecisely. I was able to find the make-up aisle. This aisle was filled — nay, overflowing — with an astonishing array of items whose specific use was not immediately apparent. Artfully displayed were polishes, creams, hydrators, enhancers, detractors, erasers, and highlighters which presumably polish, cream, hydrate, enhance, detract, erase, or highlight. But nothing stuck. That is, there were no sticks. Nothing remotely as plebian as a stick.
Finally, after scouring every inch of every shelf I found a small — let us say minuscule — display at the far end of one row. My stick and I left the store with visions of sculpted cheeks, lips, and eyes dancing in my head. You will be so happy to hear the results of using this miraculous product.
I look exactly the same, only poorer.
