65 to 18 in 4 days

[anotheranon]

Degrees, that is. It was springlike Thursday, but far below what's "normal" for this area today. Shearling booties rule. Just sayin'.

Still, I felt compelled to go out into this today, for a trip to the vitamin shop and one of my periodic and usually futile trips to see if there's anything on the drugstore shelves that approximates the somewhat swanky skincare stuff (say that 5 times real fast) I unfortunately got used to in the past few years.

Can someone please tell me why I do this to myself? I always hope I'll find something that works on the cheap, and with rare exceptions (Queen Helene's Cocoa Butter body lotion, mmm!) I find myself looking at row after commercial row of snake oil :P

All I was looking for was a facial moisturizer that 1) doesn't have gunk that will make me break out and 2) isn't perfumed to within an inch of it's (shelf) life. Came up empty - neither place had the one product recommended by CosmeticsCop that looked like what I was after, and the one tube that looked somewhat promising was expensive enough that I figured it would ultimately be more sensible to spend an extra $10 and spring for my pricey fave, because I know it works and doesn't stink :P

Got back without freezing to death (thinsulate gloves + New Rock boots also rule) and am now considering how I want to spend the rest of the day.

Comments

[semmie17.livejournal.com]

I swear by Clinique.

[hadesgirl.livejournal.com]

I also swear by Clinique, thanks to Semmie's suggestion last year. I am very sensitive to fragrances and creams - have broken out with large welts on my face and around my eyes from using moisturizers that haven't agreed with my system. Clinique is fragrance-free and prides itself on being very hypo-allergenic. Here's what I use:

Moisture Surge Extra - thirsty skin relief - I use this during the day when I need moisturizing - I carry a small, sample-sized jar in my purse - it is fabulous stuff. Non-greasy and no fragrance.

Repairwear Day - SPF 15 intensive cream - my morning moisturizer put on after I wash my face.

Anti-gravity Firming Eye Lift - I use this under my eyes, where the skin has just started to get that little wrinkly look, and I've noticed a dramatic improvement.

They make quite a few products. Now, I tried the "yellow stuff" Semmie spoke of, and didn't care for it so I gave her my bottle. I preferred the Moisture Surge and Repairware.

Check it out - you should be able to get tiny little jars as samples to try it out. The products aren't cheap - but they last quite a while and are worth every penny, IMHO.

[nminusone.livejournal.com]

> Can someone please tell me why I do this to myself? I always
> hope I'll find something that works on the cheap, and with rare
> exceptions (Queen Helene's Cocoa Butter body lotion, mmm!) I
> find myself looking at row after commercial row of snake oil :P

I am so NOT going to get started on the snake oil industry that is most of the cosmetics field. It's even slightly worse than the supplement industry, which is pretty damn rife with snake oil itself.

I will say a few things though.

The cosmetic industry has access to a wide variety of ingredients. In most cases it's very well known, at least in the industry, what each ingredient does. There are very few if any secrets, in large part because you're not allowed to sell random secret glop for people to put on their skin. (The FDA regulates cosmetics as well as supplements.) I support this part of the FDA's mission: I think people should be able to tell *exactly* what they're buying simply by reading the label. Period.

A lot of the effort in cosmetics is simply finding out what *you personally* need to use, in what amounts and what combinations. Same as with supplements. However this does not jibe with the mainstream customer mentality, which is to seek the magic bullet, because thinking and experimentation are too much work for most people. Again, same for supplements. It does seem to me, though, that the cosmetics industry goes out of it's way to conceal what each ingredient actually does, or at best reveal that information in the most confusing way possible. To me it seems like an active attempt to keep consumers from figuring out what works for them. I think the supplement industry is slightly better in this area.

A lot of what's used in cosmetics comes down to what's currently popular, due to some form of marketing. I bet if you tried to sit down and list all the fad ingredients that have been popular over the last 10 years it'd take you a good long time. Same with supplements.

I think the most sensible course is to examine each ingredient in turn, and try to honestly evaluate what it does, then see if it's something you personally want to use. A useful ingredient is still just as useful once the hype dies down, same as supplements.

To me, this suggests that each person is going to have to more or less brew up what works for them personally, out of raw ingredients. If you're lucky you might find a "base" formula that's close, which you can then combine with whatever else you personally need to add. I think this is a lot easier to do with supplements, since there's no real need to mix things before taking them. Also the supplement industry is much more oriented towards selling single ingredients than the cosmetics industry is. However, there are definitely places that sell single ingredients as used in cosmetics, and one thing you will see is that most of them are CHEAP! The margins on cosmetics are just insane, many times higher than on most supplements. Even a place like www.lemelange.com , which is considered fairly expensive, is pretty damn cheap compared to premixed cosmetics.

Over time I have run into homebrew sites and forums, basically info resources for people who want to buy the ingredients they want and mix up something that's just right for them. In most cases this is no more complicated than baking. Usually the tricky part is figuring out how you personally respond to each ingredient, and what a good combination would be. I kinda wished I'd saved some of those links, but I didn't. OTOH I don't think those sites will be too hard to find.

I realize it's only a semi-rational position, but it really bugs me that the margins on cosmetics are so high. The only reason I say semi-rational is that the prevailing market attitude tends to push out lower-cost vendors (people assume cheap=bad), and that raises the prices I have to pay for some ingredients. I guess it's more that I'm offended by almost any business that uses marketing or other techniques to sell a product or service at a price so far above what it costs to produce. This exact same logic is why I'm constantly looking for supplement suppliers that offer better deals.