February tri-polish challenge: Hearts


Dear readers,
It's been a long time since I last participated in the Crumpet's Nail Tarts tri-polish challenge, and there's been a a rule change, along with the new name "Tri-Polish Tuesdays", so here's a quick reminder of the rules: Each month, there are three colours that you can use in your manis (but you can now use different polishes every week instead of using the same ones all month). All manis must contain at least two of these colours and one must use all three. White, black, silver, gold and glitter are also allowed. Manis are posted on Tuesdays and that's pretty much it!


This month's colours are grey, brown and pink, which makes for some very pretty combinations. I'm joining in for week two with a Valentine's day mani (I don't actually do Valentine's day, but hearts can be pretty cute).

The polishes I'm using this month (because I did this and another mani before learning about the rule change) are LynBDesigns Eloquent Dust, Boulevard de Beauté 16 and MaxFactor Coffee Brown (22).

Peace out,
Captain Spacenails






NAIL linkup challenge: Red (and giveaway winner)

Hi!
Today's post is a bit of a hodge-podge of several things: Nail art, giveaway winner and a few words about modeling contests.

I've been seriously off my game in the regular nail art department - it's either something huge and crazy or nothing at all. My last attempts at dotting and sponging turned out disgusting. That and the lack of time are the reasons I haven't been contributing to all the great challenges going around this year. But finally it's time!





Here's my contribution to the Nail Art Ideas Linkup challenge for this week: Red. This challenge is hosted by Craftynail, Brijit's Digits and Eeek! Nail polish! and there's a different theme every week.

 

I made what is apparently called a "waterfall" mani with a bunch of red polishes. It was fun and easy to make and made me feel better about my nail art. Make sure to check out the other contributions in the linky below!


Red :


Next, my giveaway winner. I drew a name early this week using the highly sophisticated method of a list (first the original post, then the reminder post, in the order of commenting) and a randomizer. The lucky winner was Alice Beerland, who has already replied to my mail and chose the beauty package. Congratulations again! I've added a few small extra surprises for you and I'll get it to the post office next week.

I hope you all enjoyed getting to know my blog (if you didn't already).

click to enlarge
click to enlarge


And now a bit of a warning: You'll be seeing more than the usual number of German posts here for the next couple of months because it's that time of the year again - Germany's Next Top Model (a knockoff of America's NTM, hosted by Heidi Klum) has started.

I know, I know, it's all staged, the model business objectifies women, detrimental to body image and exploitation of hopeful young girls. I agree completely.

Please do not watch this kind of show if you have any kind of self-esteem, body image or eating issues. If you do watch it, please remember that the body shapes demanded by the modeling business are far from the norm and that photos and videos can be manipulated, and often are. Do not starve yourself. Do not neglect everything else to become a model. Do not despair if you're not tall, or don't have gorgeous hair, or don't conform to the beauty standards set by the industry. You are beautiful. Everybody is beautiful. Who you are matters so much more than how you look. Take care of yourself (your body and your mind) and love yourself.

Honestly, I think it's awful that 10-year-olds watch these shows and want to be like the girls they see there. I think it would be a good idea to ban them, along with all the other shows and ads that can give people unhealthy ideas of what a body should look like.

However, all that said: If you are confident in your body, if you are aware it's just a show, that much of it is scripted, that we only see a selective slice of reality, and if trashy TV is your guilty pleasure, enjoy these shows. Just don't take them seriously.

So yes, it is my guilty (very guilty, as you can probably tell from the  paragraphs above) pleasure to watch these shows and to mock them relentlessly. I'm sorry, girls, but if, after so many seasons of seeing how relentlessly participants (and judges) are mocked everywhere, you decide to participate anyway, all I can do is tell you and your friends and family not to read my blog.

So anyway, back to the blogging aspect: Since this is a German-language show, it doesn't really make sense for me to write about it in English, since you won't be watching it anyway. However, there will be brief summaries at the beginning of each post, usually about the horrific and inexplicable things Heidi decided to wear in that episode (Dalek coat and hamster life vest, I'm looking at you). If you want more English snark, you might enjoy my Model House Rules (pt I, pt II and pt III).


But don't worry, this won't turn into a complete GNTM blog, I'll still be posting nail art - hopefully more frequently than so far this year.

Have a fantastic weekend!
Captain Spacenails

Hammer time!

 Dear readers,

Work's still keeping me busy, so here's a quick post with nail art I somehow neglected to post in November - my nails for Thor: The Dark World. I love me some Marvelverse!


The base is LynBDesigns Little Foot, and if I remember correctly, Mjolnir is LynBDesigns Eloquent Dust topped with ILNP Bottle Service, with the handle in some Essence brown. The lightning is some random white polish topped with a bit of Model's Own Indian Ocean, which gives it a nice glow (same as the arc reactor in my Iron Man mani). I had glowier photos on my phone but that died so you'll just have to trust me on that ;)

Lightning before adding the topper
Giveaway news: The giveaway has ended and I'll be drawing the winner tonight or tomorrow and contacting them by e-mail. Once they've responded, I'll announce their name on the blog. Thanks for participating!

Have a nice day - and for those of you watching the Superbowl: Enjoy the game! I'll be watching, but I still need to pick a team and re-watch Basic Football with Burt Reynolds. As you can probably tell, I'm really dedicated to this sport ;)

Captain Spacenails







Here Be Dragons - Smaug nail art (no spoilers)



Dear readers,

I.O.U. - a review of His Last Vow. But to be honest, that Sherlock season finale was filled with so many brilliant and funny and unexpected (and any combination of those) scenes that I'm still not quite sure what to think. Meaning, I need to watch it again and then I need to write about it, and that could take a while. I'm pretty busy with work at the moment, so I'll just try to get it done by the time the episode airs in the US...


In the meantime, have a dragon. No review of the Hobbit (reasons: see above), just the eye of Smaug amid his hoard of gold.



Stay safe and don't meddle in the affairs of dragons!

Captain Dragonnails








Giveaway reminder & update - win polish, books or beauty items

Hey there,

It seems my original blogiversary post got lost somewhere among all the Christmas stuff, or perhaps it was tl;dr, so here's a brief reminder. I decided to extend it to 31 January and added another prize.

Hallo meine Lieben,
mein ursprünglicher Gewinnspiel-Post scheint im ganzen Weihnachtstrubel etwas untergegangen zu sein, vielleicht war er auch zu lang zum Lesen, daher möchte ich es hier nochmals zusammenfassen. Ich habe außerdem das Einsendedatum bis zum 31. Jänner (bzw. Januar für euch Deutsche ;)) verlängert und eine zusätzliche Gewinnoption hinzugefügt.

There will be one winner who can choose one of these prizes:

PRIZE A: Books of your choice up to a value of €15 from The Book Depository as long as you live in a country where they deliver free of charge (check here) - international

PRIZE B: A $15 gift certificate to Ninja Polish - international

PRIZE C: A beauty package with nail polish, eyeshadow, perfume samples and other fun stuff and a few surprises. - EU residents only. Non-EU residents will get different things due to shipping restrictions. For details see this post.





Es wird eine/n GewinnerIn geben, die/der zwischen den folgenden Preisen wählen kann:


PREIS A: Bücher im Wert von bis zu 15 € von The Book Depository (ihr wählt aus, ich bestelle, solange ihr in einem dieser Länder wohnt) - international

PREIS B: Ein Gutschein zu US$ 15 für Ninja Polish - international

PREIS C: Ein Beautypaket mit Nagellack, Lidschatten, Duftsamples etc. sowie ein paar Überraschungen. Kann nur in EU-Länder verschickt werden - außerhalb der EU bekommt ihr ein etwas anderes Paket. Details dazu gibt's hier.


RULES:
Leave a comment on this post telling me about your favourite fandom, or - if you're not the fangirl/boy type - favourite book, TV show or movie. It doesn't have to be an essay, but I'd like to see more than just a word or two. Make an effort to write a couple of full sentences that aren't just "thanks for the giveaway".
You don't have to follow me but if you like my blog (or tumblr or twitter), I'd be delighted if you did.

Make sure I can contact you somehow (e-mail visible in Blogger profile, mail it to boldly_polish (!at) yahoo [dot] com or put it in the post but NOT IN PLAINTEXT.)

I reserve the right to delete and disqualify inappropriate comments. Anyone trying to cheat by posting multiple times will be disqualified completely.

If you win and are under 18, I will need your parents' permission for you to give me your postal address (if required for your prize of choice).

This giveaway will run until the end of 31 January 2014 (23:59 CET - that's GMT+1) I will contact the winner by e-mail and they will have 72 hours to get back to me, otherwise I'll draw another winner.

Open internationally, but some prizes are limited to certain regions.
Once I order/send you the prize, it is out of my hands and I cannot accept any responsibility or liability for its safe delivery nor warranty for the items. All  prizes are paid for by me and are not sponsored in any way. Prizes cannot be redeemed for cash.
 

TEILNAHMEREGELN:

Hinterlasst mir hier einen Kommentar, in dem ihr mir von eurem liebsten Fandom erzählt – oder welches Buch, welche Fernsehsendung, welcher Film, Comic oder Schauspieler euch besonders gut gefällt. Es muss kein Aufsatz sein, aber ich wünsch mir einen Kommentar mit zumindest ein paar vollständigen Sätzen, die über „Super Gewinnspiel“ oder „Danke für die Auslosung“ hinausgehen.
Ihr müsst mir nicht folgen, aber falls euch mein Blog (oder tumblr oder twitter) gefällt, würd ich mich natürlich darüber freuen!

Hinterlasst mir eine Kontaktmöglichkeit! (E-Mail im Bloggerprofil sichtbar, per mail an boldly_polish (klammeraffe) yahoo (punkt) com oder im Kommentar - dort aber nicht ausgeschrieben, sondern so "verschlüsselt" wie meine hier.)


Ich behalte mir vor, unangebrachte Kommentare zu löschen und vom Gewinn auszuschließen. Bei Mehrfachteilnahme wird die Person disqualifiziert. 

Bei Personen unter 18 benötige ich im Gewinnfall eine schriftliche Zustimmung der Eltern zur Übermittlung eurer Wohnadresse an mich. 

Die Teilnahme ist bis 31. Jänner 2014 um 23:59 (MEZ) möglich. Die GewinnerIn wird von mir per Mail kontaktiert und hat dann 72 Stunden, um zu antworten, sonst wird neu ausgelost.

Die Auslosung ist international, allerdings gibt es einigen Gewinnen regionale Einschränkungen.
Nach dem Versand bzw. der Bestellung des Gewinns kann ich keine Verantwortung für die Lieferung übernehmen. Alle Preise wurden/werden von mir bezahlt und sind in keiner Weise gesponsert. Keine Barauszahlung und keine Gewähr.

Oh, Sherlock. (S3E2, The Sign of Three - SPOILERS)

Spoiler warning: This post contains spoilers for episodes 1 and 2 of Sherlock Season 3 (The Empty Hearse and The Sign of Three) and a minor spoiler for Doctor Who Series 1 Ep. 10 (The Doctor Dances). The nail art and screenshot contain very mild spoilers. Also, this isn't a proper review but more of a reaction post.



First of all, dear fellow BBC Sherlock fans, I’d like to apologise for punching you right in the feels. Don’t think the nail art is sad? Stay away from this post until you’ve watched the episode or you’ll be majorly spoiled. Seen the episode but still don’t have enough feels about that scene? Listen to this, but don’t say I didn’t warn you.
 I don’t know about you, but I had to take this off at the earliest opportunity because I couldn’t deal with the sadness every time I looked at my hand. 


I'm sorry. I'm so sorry.

"The Sign of Three" ©BBC One*
But wait, it’s a happy and funny episode, right? In fact, it’s the funniest Sherlock episode ever.  Best man speech! Drunk deductions! “Am I a pretty lady?”
Half a year has passed since Sherlock’s sudden reappearance, filled with cases (check out John’s blog!) and, more importantly, wedding preparations. Sherlock is the best wedding planner and maid of honour anyone could ask form throwing himself into the wedding preparations with a fervour usually only reserved for particularly interesting cases. He vets the wedding guests (Sherlock’s mini-me is just the best thing ever! Everybody’s parent!lock fics just came true). He even comes up with several napkin folding suggestions and tries to tell Mary he learned it for a case.  "I’m not John, I can tell when you’re fibbing." – "Learned it on youtube."
Yeah, Mary’s totally running her boys.

Poor Sherlock. The disbelief in his eyes as he realised John considered him his best friend was heart-wrenching. Oh Sherlock, you didn’t know?

He may not be the best best man ever, but he’s definitely the best wing man ever (at least for weeding out the bad ones).

For once, my nail art actually looked better with a glossy coat. Here's the  matte version for comparison.

Sherlock’s definitely off his game though. Twice during the wedding he makes “one more deduction than I was expecting”. The emotions he discovered during his absence and after his return are making things harder. Alone used to be what he had, “alone protects me”. But he didn’t realise he was lonely until he had had John’s companionship and then had to leave for two years (see his comment to Mycroft in the previous episode, when Mycroft says he’s not lonely: "How would you know?")
So now he deduces the sign of three (turned that title around completely, furthest departure from any A.C. Doyle titles so far, content-wise) and realises it is indeed the end of an era. But he vows to protect them, to always stick by them. It is as touching a scene as I’ve seen with the three of them. And then he sends them to dance.
Mary: "But what about you?"– John: "We can’t all three dance. There are limits." – Sherlock:  "Yes, there are."

This is adorable and sad at the same time all by itself, but if you’d like to add some subtext, remember how Moffat used "dancing" as a euphemism for sex in Doctor Who? Yeah. Also, want some more crazy talk about nebulous hidden references? That episode, The Doctor Dances, is the one in which “just this once, everybody lives“. As does everybody in this episode. (Though to be fair, nobody died in The Empty Hearse either. Told you it was nebulous. It’s most likely just a coincidence (even if the universe rarely is that lazy), but it’s a pretty one.)

But Sherlock doesn’t get to dance, does he. Not even with head bridesmaid 'it’s a shame you’re...whatever you are' Janine. Even though he loves to dance so much...
Instead, he leaves the wedding early. Alone used to be what protected him. But it doesn’t anymore. If ever there was a danger night, this is it.

Poor Sherlock...

I was going to add a lot of gratuitous speculation on His Last Vow, which airs tomorrow, but I’m so nervous about it that it’s taken me this long to even get a coherent post about The Sign of Three written. I’m embarrassed to admit this, but I haven’t been able to think about anything else all week. I don’t remember a TV show ever getting into my head like this. It’s a testament to the writing skills of Moffat, Gatiss and team and the acting skills of the entire cast that they have managed to captivate me like this. Whatever the ending, I know it will be brilliant. I’ve already heard it’s unexpected, which gives me hope, as all the endings I’m imagining are devastating. So perhaps, just this once, everybody lives.

Captain Spacenails, full of admiration for Moffat & team

*Disclaimer: To the best of my understanding, the BBC Terms of Use (for personal use) permit me to use BBC content on this blog when correctly credited. Should this not be the case, I will be happy to take the screenshot down, just please let me know by mailing me at boldly_polish (!ät) yahoo[dot]com or contacting me via one of my social media accounts in the right sidebar.

Happy birthday, Sherlock Holmes!



6 January is generally assumed to be Sherlock Holmes' birthday, so let's wish the immortal sleuth a happy birthday! Not that he would have cared much for such a thing, I believe, but sometimes birthdays are more of an opportunity for other people to celebrate the life (even if it's fictional) of someone they love. 

Considering his was the first fandom, with people mourning him in public, wearing black armbands and accosting Arthur Conan Doyle on the streets when he killed off Holmes at the Reichenbach Falls in The Final Problem, I'd say he's pretty well loved. (I can only imagine the mobs of London shaking their fists and screaming "Doooooooyle!" in much the same way that our current generation of Sherlock fans screams "Moffaaaaaat!")

But he doesn't die, does he? He comes back. He always comes back. #Sherlocklives. And that is why we're here today (well, I am, I don't know about the rest of you), to celebrate his life. 




Let me close with a lovely poem by Vincent Starrett, journalist, writer and Sherlockian (learn more about him at this great blog).

221b

Here dwell together still two men of note
Who never lived and so can never die:
How very near they seem, yet how remote
That age before the world went all awry.

But still the game’s afoot for those with ears
Attuned to catch the distant view-halloo:
England is England yet, for all our fears—
Only those things the heart believes are true.

A yellow fog swirls past the window-pane
As night descends upon this fabled street:
A lonely hansom splashes through the rain,
The ghostly gas lamps fail at twenty feet.

Here, though the world explode, these two survive,
And it is always eighteen ninety-five.

-- Vincent Starrett (1886-1974)
1895 began about 7 months after Holmes' return from the dead. BBC Sherlock has returned and is now celebrating his best friend's wedding nine months later. For Sherlock and John, right now, it is their 1895.

I love those closing lines. Starrett wrote this poem in 1942, during World War 2. But it is just as true today: Sherlock Holmes and Dr. John Watson are still alive, 126 years after A Study in Scarlet was first published. They have lived on in countless incarnations, on radio, in movies and on TV, in Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's books and in the thousands of stories written by Holmes aficionados (the Sherlock Holmes fandom: Producing fanfic since 1893.)
Their faces may change, but somewhere, those two will always sit in their chairs by the fire, smoking their pipes (or applying nicotine patches or experimenting with eyeballs to deal with quitting smoking), reading the papers, and Sherlock Holmes will explain his deductions to his adoring John Watson.

Happy birthday, Mr Holmes.

Captain Spacenails Sherlocked


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