Asakusa in April

Sensoji is undergoing renovations at the moment, so you get this nice dragon to look at instead. Rather more fun, I think.

There's this home-made vegetable and fruit-flavored ice cream place in the Asakusa neighborhood. I tried the wasabi (yum!) and the tomato (boring; tasted like cream; no tomato flavor); very refreshing. Studmuffin tried the strawberry and the vanilla. Vanilla! I guess sometimes you just want to have vanilla.

Okinawa

So the rally held in Okinawa over the weekend is big news all over Japan right now. I wonder what will happen to the Futenma base.

There are a ton of bases in Okinawa though!

materialism: used it up, and purchases

I used up my Shiseido Water-in-Lip Hokkaido lip balm today. Woohoo! 2+ years of usage, I think.

Went to Asakusa yesterday for a little and picked up some interesting incenses. I hope they're nice; the last box I got was rather quiet and boring. The incenses I get tend to be a bit quiet or too overpowering.
I should put up some of my pictures from Asakusa. The weather was lovely and there was good sunlight.

I also bought a bunch of stuff from cosmetic-candy's blog sale; mostly lip products and a few blushes. I'm rather excited, as it's a bunch of brands that I've never tried before. I did buy rather a big haul though. I probably don't need half of what I ordered, if any! I was very good about not getting lip glosses though.
* Shiseido OR418 Perfect Rouge
* Laura Mercier Tunisian Moon H16
* Trish McEvoy Glaze Lip Color Sheer Iced Mocha
* Maybelline Superstay Gloss 630 Nude Glaze
* RMK P-04 Shiny Natural Beige Blusher
* Nars Skin Body Lotion Ginger Grapefruit 200ml
* Biotherm Aquatic Shine 515 Lipstick
* Arbonne Sheer Shine Lip Gloss Bare
* Bobbi Brown Powder Blush Sand Pink No. 1
* Becca Sheer Lip Tint in Lelina

Restaurant Review: Aagra アグラ インドレストラン & バー

Hakusan holds one of my favorite Indian restaurants in Tokyo.
The chef and staff are actually Nepalese, but the Indian curry they make is fantastic.

The butter chicken is one of my favorites, but the regular chicken curry is pretty great too.
They can do it pretty spicy here. The menu lets you choose between mild, medium, and hot, but you can get it twice as hot if that's the way you roll. I tend to go for mild or medium if I want a bit of spice.

The naan here is pretty fluffy and tasty.
The Indian restaurant in Hamadayama may have slightly tastier naan, but the naan here is nothing to be ashamed of.

They have a nice selection of appetizers and other dishes, and there is a daily curry special - the chicken and eggplant curry appears regularly and is highly recommended, but you can't go wrong with their other curries.

If only they'd add kheer (rice porridge-like sweet dessert) to the menu, it'd be perfect.

For now, I'll keep going to Nataraj in Ginza for my kheer fix.

Nirvanam in Kamiyacho is another of my favorite Indian places.

東京都文京区白山1-31-5 セントヒルズ白山　1F
都営三田線・白山駅より234m
営業時間: 11:00～23:00
ランチ営業
03-3813-2766

lol; a letter to timbaland

If this isn't funny, what is?
letter to timbaland

magazine extras

It's become ridiculously popular for brands to do collaborations with magazines and put out extras included with each magazine purchase.

Recently Spur magazine had a Kitson insulated green lunch bag. The bag is super cute, but it's pretty terrible quality. Fortunately, the magazine itself is pretty interesting. I hope the bag falls apart quickly so that i can throw it away, but ironically it's only the pretty green covering that is terrible quality - the insulation portion seems a bit more solid. It's going to look pretty terrible soon!

In better news, the Gelato Pique mook has a really high quality cosmetics/travel bag included. Well worth the 1500 yen or so.

Recently Sweet just went on sale with a Gelato Pique summer tote - polyester and plastic with mesh sides - perfect for the beach or the local bath house. I can't wait to use it. Sadly, Sweet itself is pretty unsuited to my tastes and I don't like a lot of the models.

Prom Night in Mississippi

I want to see this documentary from last year!
Morgan Freeman Pays For Integrated Prom In New Documentary

That and Chris Rock's "Good Hair" are top on my list of to-see films.

i love lauryn hill

Her work with the Fugees and her solo work are just classics. As relevant today as when they were first released.

food, beauty, music

* Wow, I'm liking Kelis's new song 22nd Century. She's sounding great live.

* I need to pick up more copies of Tina's maxi single (or is it a mini album?) Pride. Looking forward to seeing her live on the 24th! It's going to be awesome.

* Vacation planning takes a lot of time. I always end up spending too much money because of time constraints. Darn you Tokyo airports with limited flights!

* Drugstores are total time sinks for me. I step into one, and bam! I lose 1/2 an hour to an hour instantly. Ugh, infinitely entertaining.

* Tried Frijotles in Azabu-Juban, a burrito place. Nice and relaxing. I thought the fajita burritos were okay. They looked better than they tasted. The chile-corn salsa could have been more flavorful. They make the salsa chips on the premises, so they're great! But the guacamole is a bit bland. They're pretty generous with the chunks of avocado though.

* Tried a sample of Kanebo Doltier Selective Fluid in Ochre-C. I believe Doltier is one of Kanebo's older brands. The foundation seems light but I can feel that I'm wearing it. The coverage seems light-medium but you can layer it a bit. It covers my redness up somewhat - good around my nose but not so effective around my cheeks. The finish is very natural - not matte, not dewy, just very nice and natural. Not much seeping into wrinkles or dry spots so far.
I'm half-heartedly looking for a good liquid foundation, but powder foundation is pretty effective for me so I'm not in much of a hurry. I'll just finish all my samples and my existing foundations first. &Face has a very nice cream-to-powder foundation, but I'm not convinced that there aren't cheaper alternatives for me. It has good coverage though.

* I've started using my Ecotools portable brush set; so far I quite like it! The quality seems a bit more reliable than Essence of Beauty, although my Essence of Beauty taklon brushes are quite nice and soft. The Ecotools eyeshadow brushes are good for applying my shimmery summer shadows lightly.