My First NOTD: OPI DS Fantasy

It's Monday! Vacations are over, I'm starting school tomorrow...


To start the week off, I have decided to share with you my Nail of the Day (NOTD)!

As I have told you before, I am a complete nail polish addict. Everyday, I check several polish blogs, follow the Nail board on Make Up Alley (MUA) and think about what color I should wear next.

Well today, I am proud to show you a long-time lemming of mine that I finally was able to get from TransDesign (my fav etailer for everything nail polish): OPI’s DS Fantasy.


It was(is) part of OPI’s Designer Series and is a dark blue holo. Although it is not as holographic as the rest of the collection, it’s still gorgeous! This is two coats, but could easily have been one (amazing!). It went on like so easily, like buttah! You can easily see that this is blue and not black in some lights and blue-ish in others. It’s definitely blue anywhere, anytime, anyday.

Words cannot describe how much I love this polish!

Here it is in the shade:

I've heard if a city called Heaven...

I recently went to an awesome festival here in Montreal named Osheaga. It's a two-day event with lots of bands playing on 4 different stages. This year, the headliners were Coldplay, Jason Mraz, Yeah Yeah Yeahs (replaced Beastie Boys who had to cancel) and Arctic Monkeys amongst others. Needless to say, it was pretty good.

Anyways, during that weekend, I discovered a group called Beast. The groups consists of Betty Bonifassi on vocals and Jean-Phi Goncalves on instruments. Heard of their names before? Bonifassi provided the singing voices in Les Triplettes de Belleville (The Triplets of Belleville in North America and Belleville Rendez-Vous in the UK) and also sang on fellow Canadian DJ Champion's song "No Heaven". On the other hand, Goncalves has worked with Lauryn Hill and Quebecer musicians such as Pierre Lapointe and Jean-Pierre Ferland.


But enough about them.. onto the music.

The festival was my first time listening to Beast and I was quite impressed by.. everything. Stage presence, music, sound, Betty Bonifassi's voice, their rapping skills (they did a "shout out" to the Beastie Boys)...

I would describe their music as electro with a mix of rock and RnB (?). I'm not sure how to describe them actually...

Anywho, Bonifassi's voice is very strong and "in your face" (in a good way). I find that there is a lot of swagger in her style of singing, which I love. Her voice is very unique and "captivating". I've been listening to their CD for a whole week now, I still love it and will keep on listening to it. As Christian Marcius said, "Beast throbs with an anger you can dance to". Amazing. You cannot not move when you listen to their music and once you know a few words, you'll find yourself singing along to their songs!

I especially like the songs: Ashtray, Mr. Hurricane, Microcyte, City and Satan.
Ok, that's almost like half of their CD!

If you haven't heard of them already, check them out!
Website
Myspace

Later!

Oh hay second entry!

Have you ever been asked: “If you could have dinner with anyone (dead or alive), who would it be?”? Well I haven’t, but I already have an answer: James Dean.


I totally forgot to explain my blog name!! Haha ok it’s really simple.

Hotness.

I’ve read a lot about him and he seemed like such a troubled, mysterious guy which is what intrigued me most. I have this infatuation (ok perhaps it’s a strong word but I don’t know how else to say it) for James Dean. I have 3 Jimmy Dean posters in my room, 2 books about him and even made myself a James Dean shirt.

Everything he says is so profound it’s just... wow. So anyways... I stumbled upon this J.Dean quote one day and it just stuck with me:

"There is no way to be truly great in this world. We are all impaled on the crook of conditioning. A fish that is in the water has no choice that he is. Genius would have it that we swim in sand. We are fish and we drown."

Love it. So, I had to put it as my name. What do you guys think?!

He has many more awesome quotes, but I think I like this one best. It just says so much, you know?

See ya next time!

X

P.S. I’ve been thinking about having this tattooed on my left side (ribs)... what do you guys think?!

Hmmm.. hello!!

I’ve spent several hours (ok..minutes) now wondering what I should write about for my first ever blog entry. Should I introduce myself? Should I tell you about myself? Should I explain my blog’s name? I guess... first things first right?!

Ok. Here goes:

Well, my name is Xuan-An (aka X-One, Xuani, Tina, T to the I.N.A) and I’m 19 years old. I currently live with my parents in Dollard-des-Ormeaux, which is a small town on the wonderful island of Montreal (that’s in Canada, by the way).

I have an older sister and a little brother whom I adore! I will be going to University this fall (well actually, we’re starting Tuesday) and will be doing a major in Marketing and a minor in Communication. My goal is to work in the music industry. I speak Vietnamese, French and English. (English is my 3rd language so please excuse any mistakes :) )

I love everything cute and cheesy. I love watching reality shows, whether they are good or bad. I loved Passions (and was probably the only one). I like to use “...” as much as I can, even if it doesn’t make sense.

I am a nail polish addict as well as music junkie. I love to discover new sounds and colours and spend way too much time on my laptop looking for new stuff.

I just finished working at DDO’s city hall for a second summer in a row, which means: no more regular income!!!!!!!! I didn’t really have a title, but let’s just say I was “administrative assistant”. Basically, all I would do was spend 8hrs playing Freecell on the computer and sometimes, very rarely, print labels for my boss.

I’ve decided to start a blog because I thought it’ll be cool to share with all of you the things that I’ve discovered!

Those who know me quite well might think that it is very unlike me to start a blog because in real life, I’m quite shy: it takes me time to warm up to people and to open up. So I guess you people are special! (Thanks to my friend Kelly who kept encouraging me to write a blog. Kelly, I love you!)

My blog will have music reviews, nail polish swatches and much more!!! Hope you like it! I will try to update regularly! And don't hesitate to follow! :)

Xuan-An

P.S. Also, my name is pronounced like “Sw-Anne” almost like swan... the bird.