Burberry Eat Your Heart Out

With my hair nicely trimmed, I realized that I was starting to look a little less Jennifer Aniston circa 2002 and a little more Emma Watson Burberry 2010. Of course, it really does me no good whatsoever going around comparing myself to stunning 17 year olds, but I was surprised by the similarities in our dos. Now although we are both rocking the same hair colour and roots, of course Emma's steamy brown eyes, team of photgraphers and stylists somewhat out-does my home-based version.





Eric also pointed out that I should have had a fan! And I'm sure an actual Burberry outfit probably would have helped. Next time, I'll try for a little more pout in my smile....



And yes ... this means I have far too much time on my hands!!!

Makeover Madness

While Eric diligently plugged away at doing the taxes this morning, I thought it might be a good idea to give myself a makeover - and I think after seeing this upcoming "before" photo, you too will agree!

BEFORE


And so off I went to the hair-stylist. If you weren't able to guess it already, I am currently having a bit of a battle with my hair. After a decade of processing it, well ... it is quite crispy (go figure!), but at the same time, I am trying to grow my hair into long beautiful locks - therein lies the trouble. If I cut it, well it gets shorter, which goes against my goals; but if I let it grow, it just gets more dead and crispy. So I resigned myself to the fact that in order to get longer more beautiful hair, it needed to get cut. I'm also trying to figure out what to do color-wise. Again, after a decade of dying it, I'm starting to think that my hair might be better off with a little less peroxide - however, I just had it died deep brown-red which promptly faded away to the color you see in the previous "before" picture. Talking this over with my stylist, he claims that lighter colours hold better than darker colours for my hair type, so I should consider highlights over low-lights, especially over the summer. But today, I decided not to conquer that battle.

And so here is my "after" make-over pic. Much better. Bouncy, fresh looking hair. I decided I would have the stylist try to bring out the natural curl since I almost always get it straightened. I'm pretty happy with the results.

AFTER


Tomorrow I am going to try the Emma Watson in the Burberry ads looks (yes, despite just recently ranting about being mistaken for looking too young, I am going to copy a 17 year old's hairdo ... I am well aware that I am just perpetuating the problem!)

Life on the road ....

This week I'm kicking off round II of my big market research - so today I am in Baltimore prepping for a long week ahead.

Now often when I mention to people that I travel for my job, they tilt their head and in a melodic voice say "Oh that's too bad." or "Oh that must be tough." But as my husband would like to point out, I'm not staying in a tent in bush camps, I'm staying at the Hilton (well actually right now I'm at the Sheraton, but that's a minor point).

In fact I kind of like the travel, it has many benefits:
1. It gets me out of the office - mixes it up a bit, so that things are a little less humdrum.
2. I get frequent flyer and hotel points which I'm hoping to bank for super fun vacations.
3. My husband appreciates me more when I return. My cooking is always far superior (or at least perceived that way) when I get back!
4. I get to visit people on my way - this leg of research, I got to come see Kristen and Jason's new place, and on the next leg I'm visiting Tracey in Indiana.

And so although I find myself stuck in a hotel room watching Anne Hathaway movies this evening, I'm sure I would probably be doing the same thing back in Boston but would be many more Starwood points away from the future vacation of my dreams (yes the vacation of my dreams involves me not having to pay for anything!)

Battling the 30s

My understanding was that at each milestone birthday a person should sit back and reflect on times past, and ultimately realize that they are growing old - very old. And so, when I turned 30, of course I started to feel the weight of years long-since-past press upon me. The youth of my 20s was behind me, I had entered the decade of corporate climbing, mortgages, and child bearing. It didn't help of course that I was surrounded by 22 year olds at work, and that the "really old people" in the office were only 34. I had resigned myself to the fact that I was no longer young. (I do appreciate that if I think 30 is old, then what about 40, and I can't even imagine 80 at this point).

And then I moved to America .....

I'm not sure what happened, but all of a sudden, I am having a "young" crisis. People everywhere seem to think that I am almost a decade younger than I actually am.

Yes - I got carded at the Cheesecake Factory. I know, seriously - the Cheesecake Factory. And even though I recognize that the legal drinking age is 21 in the US, I'm a good decade above that. In shock, I reached for my id slack-jawed, muttering "but I'm old?!?!?"

And this comes on the heels of a couple of recent client experiences of a similar nature. I recently mentioned to a client that I had played on an ultimate frisbee team - to which the client (with the same name as me) retorted "Why you're just like a younger version of me!" To which I responded - "what do you mean younger?" because from my impression we were the same age (in fact I might be a year or two older than her). "How old do you think I am?" I asked. 24. Yes. She thought I was 24. Appauled, I gasped and blurted out "I'm 31!" At which my whole team was shocked - apparently they too thought I was more like 25-26. Seriously? And then another client just last week asked me and my much younger counter-part if we would ever consider doing an MBA in the future. At which point, I had to tell her about my years building the space station, my gluttony for collecting degrees, and that I had finished my MBA two years ago. (Now of course she is probably 50-ish, so I felt a little better that she saw me as "younger")

But all this to say, it is giving me a weird complex. Some have said it's my positive-Canadian attitude that makes me younger, but I don't really know what to think. I should love it - because what woman doesn't want to be told she looks years younger. But the 30s is an awkward time in a career where you're trying to establish yourself and climb the corporate ladder, and that's difficult if everyone thinks 21 (or 24!) I know I'm probably not gaining a lot of sympathy on this one, but it's weird and unsettling. And frankly, if I'm going to be 24 again, I want a cooler wardrobe!

And we're back!

Cancun was great! There is nothing better than leaving all your projects in the throws of delivery to clients to go lay on a beach and do nothing but drink marguaritas, nap, make new friends, visit with old friends, snorkle, and do a little adventure spelunking!

Of course, a mere two hours into Monday morning, all this lovely relaxation had quickly dissipated .... and 12 hours later when I was still at work, feeding off of the office's lunch pizza left-overs and still cranking out slides, I could literally feel my nice tan sneaking away and replacing itself with the oh-so-lovely whiteness of my computer glow. It is a shame that the punishment for taking vacation is that you get to do two weeks of work all in one.

On the plus side, we presented the market research results from my travels two weeks ago to the client - and they loved it! Yay me (and my team of course)!

With no future vacations in sight, our next big adventure will be house hunting (or as Eric would like to put it, floor hunting - you see in Cambridge, even with over a million dollars you will only get a floor or two of a house with an outdoor parking spot - eek!). Nevertheless, we are eager to exit the renter's market and become a property investor.

On the postcard challenge front, things are coming along nicely. We are 33% of the way there, so keep those postcards rolling. Thanks for all the kind wishes for my dad!