Day 402: Wear Makeup

Stef stabbing my eyeballs

     I had a good run. Over four hundred challenges. Four hundred new challenges, experiences and lessons learned. With all of these challenges, it's actually sort of surprising that something like this hasn't happened sooner. I would've figured that I would be doing things like this -things that bring a new meaning to the word "uncomfortable"- all the time by this point in my project. Today got weird, I let Stef slather me in makeup, and I'm currently writing it up and attaching pictures to show my friends and loved ones. I'll admit that it all sounds pretty weird, but I'll also say this; experiences like this are long overdue. I started this project with a couple of things in mind. I wanted to get out and have some more fun, sure. But I also instilled this routine behavior in my daily life so I can get a clear feeling of where my boundaries are. Many of these experiences; Attend a Women's Workout Class, Take a Pregnancy Test, and Practicing Witchcraft, have done a lot more for me than get me a few strange looks from friends and concerned messages about my recent life choices over social media. These experiences helped me pinpoint exactly where my comfort zone was, specifically so I could use these experiences to step past the boundaries I had placed around myself. Sure these challenges are silly, a boy taking a pregnancy test, or dabbling in witchcraft, but I feel like there's something to be said about following through with these sort of things. Of course I knew I wasn't pregnant, and never would be, but if I never put myself in many girl's shoes, I'd never know about that small slice of their life. I, thanks to my odd behaviors, am now more relatable to women who have gone through that. I just feel like life is too beautiful and exciting to deny myself the simple pleasure of experiencing as much of it as possible. Even if that means getting a little (or according to my father, very) silly every now and then. So yeah, today I let Stef put makeup on me. Then I even put some on myself. I did it, not because I have any intention of ever doing it again, or even because I found myself remotely attractive with it. I put makeup on today, because I wouldn't have any idea what it's like if I didn't. If I didn't follow through with it, my comfort zone and experiences in life wouldn't been limited because of that decision. Enough of me defending why I do the weird things I do. On to the makeup!

Fierce

     It's safe to say that I know absolutely nothing about makeup. I figured that foundation was going to be the foundation of the process, but that's about it. I remember Stef viciously trying to poke my eye out with a black pokey stick. There were brushes and creams and even some lipstick. I felt better that I pressured Ryan to join in on the fun, and together we looked like the ugliest, sluttiest, girls in school.

Day 401: Bubble On The Tongue Trick

     Things were getting late on our Fourth of July celebrations and I still hadn't found a new thing to try (big surprise). I mentally searched through files in my memory of things that I could try (with minimal effort). One idea stuck out in particular, an idea that was suggested to me by Stef. She told me that her cousin could produce a saliva bubble on her tongue, then blow it off, like the bubbles we all used to play with back in the days of Rugrats and Choco-Tacos. I'll include a video tutorial that I watched, and that'll explain just about everything you need to know.
     I will say that I was not successful in blowing a bubble off my tongue. I'm fairly certain that I was able to produce the bubble a couple times, but I don't have the best view of my tongue so I could be wrong. I only drooled on myself once, but I definitely spat everywhere. I would say that I'm willing to try it till I master it, but this challenge (and the tongue dexteriety required) were all too similar to the frustrations I felt when I attempted to Whistle Like A Man. My tongue is really terrible at super intricate movements, it's a wonder I can even eat at all.

Day 400: Power Yoga

     I've tried yoga as a challenge before, but I was assured by Stef that Power Yoga (with Jillian Michaels) is a whole new experience, and I gotta say, I agree. It was seriously hard to do, and I'm not just saying that cause I'm a weakling. I was sweating within seconds of holding my first pose. And I was totally taking a knee a couple times when Stef couldn't see. The stupid planks to downward dogs to warrior three's to whatever else she said was too much. There was this one pose in particular that I hated most of all. She was balancing on one foot and getting her chi on. She seemed to watch me through the screen of the TV with a knowing grin as I struggled and sweat. Try it if you dare, yoga, and power yoga, just are not for me.

Day 399: Make A Blow Dart Gun

With the MEDEYUM sticker!

     This one was awesome! And I totally owe Ryan for coming up with the idea AND buying all the materials to make it happen. He picked up some pvc pipe and other tools and met at my place to tackle some major blow-dart awesomeness. We followed some instructions via YouTube video, and replicated them the best we could. The bullets were made from cone shaped sticky notes fitted to the size of the tube, and we completed the gun with some sweet camouflage duct tape. This challenge doesn't need much explanation, just this sweet video of a shot I got on film.

Day 398: Online Dating

     Oddly enough, this one was suggested to me by my girlfriend. She wanted me to get a Tinder account (probably just cause there's juicy gossip on there I hear). I scrapped the Tinder idea though, I felt like things would've just gotten too weird. I wanted to experience the online dating sensation, but I didn't want to get an actual date. So I downloaded an app that sounded a little more wholesome, Plenty Of Fish. To my knowledge, the two apps are pretty similar. There's a fair amount of swiping and chatting. And if things go right, there would be that awkward meet up and forced small talk between the two of you. Thankfully, I have Stef, so I didn't have to worry about any of that happening. So with her approval (she didn't care at all), I began my very short lived online dating life. I filled out my profile and picked a username that I felt would suite my mature taste, DeezeNuts420Blaze. And I filled in the blanks for my occupation: Carnival Worker. With my profile looking strong, it was time to hit the flirt game. I won't go into detail, rather, I'll post a screen-cap of what my 5 minutes of online dating summed up to be. Probably not my thing, but who knows, there's plenty of fish in the sea.

Day 397: 1 Second Party

     So today, June 30th, is kind of a special day. Today, there is a leap second added onto the day to counter balance the Earth as it's rotation slows down ever so slightly. Kind of like a leap year, where we get an extra day, a leap second just makes sure that our calendars and our cosmic orientation are both aligned as the Earth slows. This was all explained to me by Ryan, so if I'm incorrect in any way, blame him.

     Since it's such a special day, and more importantly, such a special second, we decided to celebrate. We wanted to express our excitement for the extra second with a party...a one second party! We got silly string and little TNT poppers and drove to Danny's house to commemorate the occasion. We were never totally sure which second we should be celebrating, so we figured that any second would do. Check out our video of the party, sorry you missed the invite!

Day 396: Olive Oil Hair Treatment

     This one is another one that comes from the strange inventory found at my local grocery store. Hidden deep in the hair care section, is a packet, of olive oil. It's a treatment, or maybe a conditioner. Whatever it is, it's a dollar, and that's good enough for me. I bought it and ripped it open to test out during my shower. Unfortunately, it wasn't real olive oil. I was a pretty regular looking conditioner that used olive oil in it's recipe.  I was hoping that it would be strait up olive oil that I could use to cook with once I was all squeaky clean. So it wasn't exactly what I was looking for, but I must say, I was pleasantly surprise with how nice my ratty hair looked all day afterwards. It was silky (ish) and looked more kept than it normally does. I didn't get any complements though :/

Day 395 :Lactose-Free Cheese

     The night was getting late, and- as I so often do- I found myself sniffing through the isles of a grocery store determined to find something new and novel. I checked the usual hot spots that I knew of, the super organic hippie section is one of my faves. But to my surprise, I had already tried just about everything they had to offer. Devastating news to receive at 10:00 at night. I kept hunting till I found something that would work. Lactose-free cheese. The name was a complete turn off, but (being a vegetarian for almost three years and exposing myself to my fair share of gross meat alternatives) I decided to give it a try anyways. I bought it and returned home to make a sandwich with the cheese before bed. A snack and a challenge completed sounds good to me.
     Unfortunately, I knew that I was going to hate this even before I bit into the cheese. The smell that it gave off as I opened the single slice was ungodly. A repulsive mixture of actually fart and what I can only assume to be year old cheese hit my senses. It smelled so bad, like a lactose-intolerant mummy just farted or something. Anyways, I tried not to let the smell discourage me and I took a bite. Awful, just so bad. It tasted so bad that I can't even come up with a witty way to tell you how bad it was. It just sucked. I took one last bite for good measure, but that was another mistake, then I threw away the rest of it cause it was so gross. Never again impostor
cheese, never again.

Day 394: Baking From Scratch

The best part

     Cupcakes! Ryan, Stef and I made cupcakes! We didn't buy that boxed crap either. We got good, wholesome (sarcasm) ingredients, like sugar, powdered sugar, and heavy cream, and mixed em together. We made quite the mess, and we started baking them before all the ingredients were actually mixed together. Aside from the minor hick ups, the cupcakes turned out pretty OK. There was an overwhelming flour aftertaste, but I could still dig em. The clean up was the worst part. That powdered sugar can end up in the darnedest places. Whatevs, I figure that after yesterday's BaconFest, I need to  re-introduce myself into the healthy eating  community (I use that term loosely) slowly. I figure I'll be back to normal with my oatmeal and quinoa in 3 to 6 months.