More blue sage, because I had another photo of it. This will be pretty much a blue-sage stan account from now until next November.
It's rainy, cool, and overcast, and I have lots of work to do. Feeling tired and out-of-sorts, so although I made myself an ambitious outfit plan for the week, I have resorted to a comfortable default.
Wearing:
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*Secondhand Wool& Sierra dress (S) in Washed Navy, bought November 2024, last worn May 23. Wears in 2025: 11 (I made sure to take a shot where my little visible-mend fish is actually visible)
*Secondhand Brooks Brothers merino cardigan, second year of wear
*Thrifted Crocs sandals, second year of wear
In case anyone is wondering, I do use two designations for previously owned clothing: "secondhand" and "thrifted." "Secondhand" denotes anything I've bought online, from Poshmark, Ebay, and so on. "Thrifted" means it came from an actual physical thrift store. In the case of today's Crocs, the TXgirl bought them at Texas Thrift, then passed them on to me.
This is probably a silly, hair-splitting difference, but I do like to keep at least loose track of what I've bought in physical stores (a kind of shopping I don't do much anymore) vs. what I've bought online.
Day 3 hair refreshed with Not Your Mother's Curl Talk Leave-in Conditioner. I had used this spray-on initially on Saturday, when I washed my hair in a hurry to go out to dinner, and didn't want to take the time to diffuse it dry. The routine then was shampoo bar x 2, then spritzing on this conditioner to detangle, then braid and go out with wet hair (a thing I don't do often, because too much wet scalp encourages dermatitis). When I got home I took down my still-wet braid and finger-combed and scrunched my hair, and maybe added a little more leave-in, I can't remember. It gave me nice juicy waves --- I'm not sure I've noticed this result before with this product, but I'm happy with it. I refreshed with it yesterday on hair I'd just dampened with my wet hands, and again today. Each time, my slept-on hair has re-formed into defined waves.
This conditioner is a bottle I've had for . . . a year? More? I haven't used it that regularly and so have not used it up. But I like it a lot. It's a rice-protein complex, but it also contains oils that in the winter are too much for my hair, in its finer, straighter low-humidity cold-weather aspect. In the summer humidity, however, it's great --- and I haven't used any other product or styled my hair in any effortfully way at all.
So, this is a good line of relatively affordable products, available in the drugstore. I've used their foam (gives me a bit of a buildup feel, but also a lot of shine and some nice hold), their spray-on light gel (fabulous), and this leave-in conditioner (also really good). The fragrance is pretty strong, which is the only negative for me --- I find it a bit much. For another person that might be a solid plus.
The Not Your Mother's Curl Talk leave-in makes a great detangler at night or in the morning. It adds lovely shine as well as definition. And it is pretty light. For very curly hair, or for my more oomphy summer hair, it doesn't add too much weight or moisture. It just seems to encourage it to go into thick waves and some spirals, without my doing anything special at all. This morning I just combed the tangles out, ran my wet hands over and through my hair, combed one more time, then spritzed on some conditioner and scrunched a little to encourage the waves to spring back up.
You can go to great lengths to have effortless-looking hair . . . or you can not go to great lengths and still arrive at basically the same outcome.
Not sure the rain is going to stop, so I had better put on my jacket and take the dog out in it. At least when it's raining nobody else is out walking a dog.
LUNCHTIME UPDATE
I have
*walked the dog
*finished and uploaded an essay
*eaten some leftover chicken plus Greek yogurt with blueberries for lunch
Now I think that shortly I'm going to go to Walmart to procure a curtain rod for the upstairs room --- we have brackets in place already on the big window, and the blackout curtains I bought the other day will do better on a real rod than on tension rods inside the window frames. I don't know that we'll make any more progress on that room today, but little by little it's coming together as a nicer space than it was.
So, that's the plan as it develops. I didn't think I'd work on the room today, but it's too wet outside for much gardening, and having done one essay, I think I'm finished with that kind of thing. I can do Friday's essay tomorrow, which will leave me some time to ponder Coleridge's "Dejection" ode for next Friday.
Onward . . .