lifelong obsessions

With beauty products, even the most low maintenance of us will get wrapped up in our own personal vortex of obsessiveness with a particular issue or issues that we want to fix. For those that know me (and even those that have read my other blog www.ineedamakeupfix.blogspot.com), you know that my issues with beauty are: dark circles, darkness around my eyes, and did I mention dark circles?! Yes, overall this trait has taken over, though I could spend a little time focusing on my puny lashes, pale lips, redness on the bottom half of my face (Ugh, why?!) and nose breakouts.

When I think "Oh, I'll just throw on some mascara and gloss and run out the door", next thing I know I'm tapping on concealer under AND over my eyes, worrying about setting it so it won't crease, then knowing I'll look silly without my eyebrows done if I have on concealer. Then I may as well just do the whole kit and caboodle.

Though there are days when I enjoy the markings of my ethnic background (For those who wonder what my "nationality" is aka WHY ARE HER UNDEREYES SO DARK!, I have Ashkanazi Jewish heritage that originated in Latvia.) Those are the days that I don't touch the circles and also the ones when I end up fielding at least a dozen inquiries of "Are you sick?" or "Are you tired?" So, I cannot rest on my ethnic laurels and allow my heritage to make me look unwell. Instead, I must traverse all the products the world over, to cover these blasted things.

I recommend Clinique's All About Eyes concealer over the others since it's not drying. However, it doesn't set without a crease or twenty. The only one that does this also dries me out- Estee Lauder Double wear concealer. It really does cover AND stay put, but makes me a little dry. Tarte's eraser was a favorite for years, but it really doesn't work for more than a couple of hours (great on the face though).

What are your personal beauty achilles heels? Do you have dark circle remedies? If you say pink undertones or cucumbers, I'm really not going to dignify that with a response since we're obviously dealing with different levels of darkness!