Don't Pretzel My Buttons

I would like to comply with this request, but really, OPI, you leave me no choice.

Are you aware that the only similarity between the word “pretzel” and the word “press” is the first three letters?  By that logic, I could writhe a sentinel like third Andorra evening shovel be apple my cleaver witness.  Ha ha, get it?  I mean, Gethsemane it?

I am also troubled by the question of whether I should inform you that under no circumstances should a pretzel ever be this color.  Frankly, if you have eaten so many godforsaken pseudo-pretzels that you consider this color to be in any way reminiscent of a pretzel, you are probably already beyond all medical help.  Although enough thiamine mononitrate in the brain pan would finally shed some long-awaited clarity on the “thought” “process” behind these names.

Miso Happy With This Color

It's nail polish names like these that really make me nostalgic for the good ol' days. You know, the ones where women were in the kitchen, African-Americans were at the back of the bus, and Asians were in internment camps.


(suggested by Avii)

This name is pretty subtle, so let me break it down for you. You see, "miso" sounds like "me so," which is what all Asian people say instead of the grammatically correct "I'm so." Man, sometimes people who grow up speaking a different language don't have a perfect grasp of English. Ha ha, I sure love to laugh at them for trying!

Google backs up my intuition that the primary association with "me so" anything is the immortal "Me so horny" scene from "Full Metal Jacket." Get it? One of Japan's primary cultural exports, which OPI is taking care to celebrate in its Japan collection, is prostitution! Of course, the character in "Full Metal Jacket" was Vietnamese, not Japanese, but that's cool. They all look the same to me, too.

Also, I love how in classic OPI style, randomly inserting the name of a soup (a soup that is not even remotely the same color as this nail polish, I feel obliged to pedantically point out) makes this a brilliant pun. Wow, that's vichyssoise hilarious, you New England clam chowder morons.

Below the Belt

There are many things below my belt. However, I would be concerned if any of them were this color:


(spotting courtesy of Drisana)

Even if we are to take this name metaphorically rather than literally, I am still dubious. Below the belt: underhanded, dirty, not allowed. I can see traffic-light red, or corrupted-soul black, but all's-clear angelic white? I don't think so.

Then again, there are people out there who make an average of $1.79 an hour to determine the sex of baby chickens by squeezing out their feces to open their anal vents and look inside for tell-tale male bumps, while somebody got paid more than ten times that to come up with this name. Talk about below the belt.

Basket Case

In honor of Independence Day, I have done my part to inculcate in today's youth one of our nation's most traditional moral values: condescension for poor nail polish naming. (Little known fact: John Hancock only signed his name so big because he didn't want to hold the quill tighter and risk smearing his manicure.) It is my privilege to introduce a guest entry written by Reuben, one of the proud vanguard of the next generation of nail polish mockery. Reuben is eight years old and enjoys marshmallow taffy, Rube Goldberg machines, and pyromania. Thanks for submitting this entry, Reuben!

Reuben's take on Orly's "Basket Case":


What a stupid name. You use it and a basket breaks. Oh, my God. A basket IS a case. Why do you need a case for a basket? And a nail polish bottle is also a case. It's only a little better than "Brunette on the Internet." Why the heck would a case be pink? It would not be a color that is bright and cheerful. It should be black. Or doorknob-yellow. Even though doorknobs aren't usually yellow.

Snow White

Well, that's nice.



It's good to see that even in this economy, the mastermind behind Raven Red still has a job.

On the downside, he may have let his medical insurance slip, because his delusion seems to have escalated. Whereas before I thought he might just have made a simple factual error about ravens, here he is not even pretending to get it right. Snow is white, he is saying to us, yes, I know that. However, I can turn it red through sheer force of will.

Or is he Jedi mind-tricking us? This nail polish is white. Yeah, like that's going to work. This nail polish is white. Some of us have more will-power than a generic cyberthug checking for illicit robots. This nail polish is white.

Anyway, I forgot what I was talking about. But nice nail polish. Lovely shade of white.

Asphalt

I've heard of streets paved with gold, but please tell me where the asphalt roads look like this:


(photo courtesy of Scrangie)

The Magic Sparkle Cupcake Kingdom? Did a bus full of fairy princesses get T-boned by a troll driving his Hummer (I know what you are thinking, environmentalists, but don't worry--it's powered by wishes) to the Bridge-Dwellers Tenement Union? They try frantically to swerve out of the way, but Peter Pan is hovering outside talking on his cell 'phone. In a tragic Icarian flip-flop, he is just too low for safety. He smashes against the windshield, his body desecrated by a last futile effort of the wipers before the blinded bus smashes into Timmy, the Talking Tree. Tinkerbell floats on in a solitary haze. Tears and fairy dust drift slowly to the ground and settle upon the asphalt.

Frugalista; Look Rich, Be Cheap

I'm sorry? You want to name your EIGHTEEN DOLLAR nail polish "Frugalista"?


Who writes the names for this company--Bill Gates? If this counts as frugal for you, Bill, I've got some other great deals you might want to look into. For instance, I will let you finish my bag of jelly beans for a mere twenty dollars. And the shirt off my back can be yours for a mere C-note. Actually, I know you're a fan of this blog. And I'll tell you what. You can hire me as your personal columnist, to write about whatever you want, for the outrageous bargain of four million dollars a year. Let me know.

Honestly, I love this color, but this is just a ridiculous price for some glitter soaked in chemicals. If you feel like spending eighteen dollars today, here are some things you could get instead. You could purchase two and two thirds tuning keys for your autoharp (autoharp not included). You could send a child in India to school for a year. You could disguise yourself as a hipster and wreak havoc on unsuspecting boys in girls' pants. Or you could buy the album AND the buttons of the new supergroup involving some guys from Cheap Trick, Fountains of Wayne, the guitarist from Smashing Pumpkins/A Perfect Circle, and one of the Hansen Brothers. And you would still have enough money left over for a coathanger to puncture your eardrums!

And while we're at it, Rescue Beauty Lounge: spending eighteen bucks to put THIS on your nails will make you Look Rich and Be Cheap?


Sorry, honey. As the immortal Willy Wonka would say: strike that, reverse it.

Brunette on the Internet

As a brunette on the internet myself, one would think that this nail polish is perfectly named to appeal to me. By "one would think" I mean it doesn't.



(photo taken from Blogdorf Goodman)

Now, you might interpret the name of this nail polish as indicating its potential clientele. And you would be correct.

However, I hope that none of you made the amateur mistake of assuming that our hypothetical nail polish-buyer is a brunette who wears this polish while she uses the internet. As we all know, brunettes are the most practical of the hair colors and would never coordinate their nails to an activity that begins and ends as frequently as internet-usage does. "Oh, shoot, I accidentally alt-tabbed to my Word document, I guess I have to change my nail polish again." I think not.

Here is who would wear this: someone who is a brunette only when she is on the internet. By "she" I mean "he" and by "on the internet" I mean "in his mother's basement, lurking in an AOL teen chat room under the name XoXCutieMuffin12XoX."

I imagine the logs read something like this--

Soccerfan2005: its about time is totaly the best jonas brothers album

XoXCutieMuffin12XoX: i agree, u want 2 cybar?

Soccerfan2005: um, ok, send a pic

[File transfer from XoXCutieMuffin12XoX initiated]

[File deliasbikini2.jpg received]

Soccerfan2005: omg that's u???

XoXCutieMuffin12XoX: u like what u see?

Soccerfan2005: wait, is that a photo from the delia's website

XoXCutieMuffin12XoX: no way, my name is delia

XoXCutieMuffin12XoX: and i model 4 them. if u saw it there that is why

Soccerfan2005: oh ok

Soccerfan2005: u r hott, i luv brunettes

[XoXCutieMuffin12XoX's bald head glows softly in the light of the computer monitor. He begins to slowly unbutton his shirt, his Brunette on the Internet-painted fingertips shimmering alluringly.]

XoXCutieMuffin12XoX: thx. now tell me more about that fantasy u had where the jonas brothers get miley cyrus alone at the vmas.

Sphinx Purple

What is applied on four nails in the morning, two nails at noon, and three nails in the evening?



The answer, of course, is Sphinx Purple.

My first thought when I hear "Sphinx" is that big ol' fellow sitting out in Giza, which does such a good job of blending into the desert because it is sand-colored, not purple. But there are a wide variety of sphinxes in various cultural histories, and I am sure the nail polish namers have a very good reason for associating it with purple.

Now, the traditional portrayal of the Sphinx is a human head (some shade between peach and brown) on the body of a lion (golden). But in Egypt the head can sometimes also be a falcon's (brown, white, or gray), a hawk's (same), or a ram's (same plus black).

Hmm, no purple yet. Let's move onto other cultures. If we're going Greek, a sphinx can also have the wings of an eagle (black) and the tail of a serpent (green, yellow, red, brown, black, orange). And there's a Thai sphinx variant who might have the lower body of a deer (brown).

Still nothing? I could be looking at this too narrowly. Maybe we should consider the materials out of which a sphinx might be carved. They have been made out of all kinds of things, like limestone (sandy), granite (black, white, gray), and alabaster (uh...white).

That's it, I give up. There is a way to tie the concept of a sphinx to every conceivable color EXCEPT purple.

Wait! Wait, I've got it. The word sphinx comes from the Greek Σφίγξ, apparently from the verb σφίγγω (sphíngō), meaning "to strangle". (Thanks, Wikipedia!) So maybe this is the color that the Sphinx's victims turned after they failed at Elementary Riddles 101. Just what I always wanted to paint my nails.

Phallic

Oh, god.

(photo taken from Vampy Varnish)

I have three questions:

1) WHAT?

2) WHY?

3) BLUE???

Frosted Ice Calypso

I'm not angry. I'm just...confused.

No, that's a lie. I'm angry. I only got this stupid nail polish because it was the closest thing I could find in color to my favorite toenail polish, Blue For My Baby, which suddenly vanished from all drug stores the same week and I have never been able to find again. The least they could do is replace it with something with an awesome name.

But no. Now it's just me, my toes, and Frosted Ice Calypso.

I would be less angry if any ONE of these words applied to this:



Frosted? Ice? Unless somebody tripped in your snowy yard with a barrel of hazardous waste, I am pretty sure that neither of these words should apply to what is, essentially, turquoise. Ice is clear, white, or MAYBE light blue. I am being generous here. Don't push me.

So that leaves us with...calypso. Is that the Afro-Caribbean style of music originating in Trinidad and Tobago? Because I really don't think that is a color. I am looking up the flag of Trinidad and Tobago to make extra-sure they didn't slip a clever reference in here. Nope. It's black, red, and white.

So it's not that kind of calypso. Please tell me they aren't talking about the nymph who imprisoned Odysseus on her island for seven years. I admit it, I only kind of skimmed the Odyssey, but I think I would have stopped and paid more attention if it mentioned that she was a vibrant blue-green. Also, I feel like that story didn't end so well for her. Maybe I should stop using this nail polish before Zeus steps in to make my baby daddy leave me for his wife.

Raven Red

You know, I totally see where they were going with the name here. Ravens are mysterious, elegant. They make me think of Poe. Xenu knows that with the vampire fad going on these days, anything with "raven" in the name should sell like gothcakes.

And I understand affirmative action. I think it's great that a well-respected cosmetics company like Revlon is willing to take a stand and provide much-needed jobs to those with disabilities.

Just one small problem:


RAVENS AREN'T RED.

Next time, assign the color-blind employees to something not requiring them to differentiate between this:



and this:

Huckle Buckle

Before you scroll down, try to imagine what color Huckle Buckle is.

It could be the color of a buckle, right? Perhaps a brassy gold, or even silver.

Or it could be the color of a huckleberry. I don't know what color huckleberries are, but in my head they are deep blue. Or purple. Or black. I guess they could be red. Berry tones, right?

Nope.

This is Huckle Buckle:


Looks harmless, doesn't it? Almost genteel. How is it that this nail polish has a name that makes me want to drawl "Cletus! Is ol' Bessie ready for the milkin' yet? We need somethin' to feed them chillens besides the squirrel you shot on Old Man Rafferty's land while you were gettin' your Stars 'n' Bars ready for the Skynryd concert!"