Happy Pride 2k15 Vancouver!

Happy Pride, Vancouver! I might be going to the parade today and then Bard on the Beach after dinner downtown with Branden's parents. MAY also take my towel and a change of clothes and makeup down with me and dunk myself in the ocean - my first time swimming this summer. It has not been good times for me lately, man.

Anyway, y'all know pride means rainbows so here's the toolkit from left to right:

OPI Alpine Snow, Julep January, Orly Old School Orange, Essence Wanna Be Your Sunshine, Julep Leah, Julep Marisa, Essence Passion for Fashion, Cult Nails Nakizzle's Shizzle (swatch forthcoming), ILNP My Private Rainbow (not pictured), Rainbow Honey Royal Fruits topcoat.

After swatching CN Nakizzle's Shizzle and covering that with ILNP My Private Rainbow, I frenched the tips with OPI Alpine Snow, the best white ever.

Manually! Freehand! (I didn't have time to wait for the polish to dry enough to put down paper reinforcements.)

Then, just on the tips, a dab of each of those colours.

Because there was no way to get the white strip even, I used the dotting tool to give the sense of fluffy clouds.

Pre-cleanup!

Look at that glorious mess.

Post cleanup :D

I like it! It's a little bit subtle but still pays homage to Pride.

Gonna stand on my soapbox here for a second. It's pretty great that the US finally joined the rest of North America in allowing its citizens to get married, but in many states it is still perfectly legal to be fired immediately upon exercising their civil rights. On top of that, with queer visibility increasing children are coming out younger and younger which leaves them vulnerable to the wills of last-generation bigoted parents. In the US, estimates of homeless queer youth (limited to lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender in their studies) approach 40%, with an incredible overrepresentation for trans* youth. Many are driven to suicide. Pride, and visibility, is a celebration of life, a challenge to the laws and societies that oppress people based on who they love and important in the light of the terrible laws being passed in places like Uganda which allows a lifetime jail sentence just for falling in love (or for fucking, and whose business is that?). My point is Pride is important. And whatever you dis/agree with, if you ever vote to change laws to take people's rights from them, you are a piece of shit.

For the sake of visibility, I'm bi. Queer rights are human rights. Keep fighting and if you're not straight/cis and struggling, remember there's resources to keep you going until you can get out of the terrible place you're stuck in at the moment.

Resources for Canadians

Resources for US

If you have links, please comment them below so I can add them to this post!

This weekend, celebrate, have fun, exist and be safe!

NCC#2: Around the World - Russia

Well it's like a week or two later, sorry about that. I feel kind of super cool about this though, because I get to make a political statement of sorts, like I did with the TG Day of Remembrance way back when <3

As usual, I'm gonna make you guess. Your first hint is Russia.

I started with Ulta Snow White and Essie Pure Pearlfection.

The way this issue was brought to my attention was something circulating on Facebook, namely Buzzfeed's 36 Photos From Russia Everyone Needs To See.

I used China Glaze Winter Berry here, and did a rough half moon shape at the cuticle. For the drips, I put down a glorp of polish and blew so it ran down the nail a bit.

If you do a google search you find a lot of articles, including Huffington Post's assurance that Russia's anti-gay laws will be in effect for the Olympics, and an American athlete's discouragement of a boycott.

I did rings above each blood line. I used Essence Let's Get Lost, Wanna Be Your Sunshine, and Black is Back and Julep Leah and January. If you couldn't guess, these are the colours for the Olympic rings.

Next year's winter games will be steeped in LGBTQ blood, all of whom, incidentally, bleed red just like heterosexual people.

Now, I'm not a political blog or a political person, and I will not be a good source of information but I do want everything I know to be aware there's a problem.

Russia's anti-gay propaganda law allows people to be arrested and detained and then, if you're a foreigner, ejected from the country with a $3000 fine for being "pro-gay" or even suspected of being pro-gay. As opposed to the militant action you might expect, hate groups and neo-Nazis are being given a wink and a nod to intervene in stomping LGBTQ outside of the law.

There's a new law being discussed that will allow the government to remove children from their biological parents should they even be suspected of being "pro-gay". I'm going to be boycotting Sochi 2014. I believe it's how I have a voice in this at all. We, the masses, speak with our money and our attention. My attention is on the minor media outlets covering this, and my money is going to stay away from Russia. Don't let them get away with this. I believe the athletes telling us to not boycott are exhibiting selfish behaviour. It's one thing for them to go, and another for them to tell us we shouldn't use the only voice we have. Flooding Russia with our pro-gay love won't magically change their laws and views, or stop hate groups from acting on hate.

People are being killed, guys. Human rights are being denied. I'd be dead in Russia. That scares me a lot. This isn't a "gay issue", it's a Human Rights one, and don't let anyone convince you that a human can be less than human.

Be informed. Do something. Talk about it.

August NCC#1: Around the World - Vancouver Pride!!

I managed to finish last month's entire challenge :D Hurrah! Apparently flowers are fun! And now it's time for the August theme which is around the world which I'm kicking off with Vancouver Pride, since that was yesterday =3 Also as an excuse to do rainbows and to lead into talking about something really important (probably tomorrow).

I started with Gosh Holographic Hero. I took a picture for you because last time I swatched this I worked really hard to make it perfect and this time I just did two coats and it turned out alright =3

Alright! So there's a start, a base of rainbows =3 Now, in honour of Davie street's permanent rainbow crosswalks, I pulled out my dreaded striping tape.

Side note: What I really wish I could have done is used textured polishes to mimic the coloured concrete but alas, I don't own the Zoya Summer PixieDust collection in full (YET!)

And... (I mean, obviously)...

I used Julep January and Leah and Essences Wake Up!, Wanna Be Your Sunshine, Let's Get Lost and Passion for Fashion. I recommend actually not using the Essences for this if you're gonna try it (at least, not the old formula ones) since they got tacky and, as you can see on the thumb, didn't pull off clean. But, judging by that behaviour, they're gonna be great for sugar spun nails.

On my index finger, I put two coats of Rainbow Honey 20% Cooler.

It needed some topcoat, so that was another opportunity for more rainbows =P I used Piper Polish Spectraflair topcoat.

See there? I had to pull the tape off really carefully and make sure that the tacky bit fell on my skin rather than across all the other colours D: what a nightmare. Not as bad as I thought striping tape would be though. The hardest part was finding the end to get it all unrolling in the first place.

SUNSHINE:

 Both hands turned out pretty good apparently!

Did any of you do Pride nails?

Take a trip around the world!

Vancouver's got Pride!

Rainbow nails!

Look at that fabulous

Don't be a drag, just be a queen!

Catmobile!

Balloon fireworks!

I didn't know this existed!

WestJet

Something about immigrants being able to enter Canada in gay partnerships

Momo Sushi! (Bidwell and Robson)

Branden trying to cheer me up about being starving

Vancouver's got Pride! This isn't half the photos I took, but 3 hours of sitting on the side of the road is a LONG time. Also, the people handing out swag suck. Me and the four people I was with are screaming and holding out our hands, and they skip over us and give the people on either side of us. What do they think that means? The only reason I got my rainbow flag (FINALLY) was because the guy handing them out hesitated when he was giving it to the girl beside me and I grabbed it. SUCKIT.

I have some comments I guess. First off, the foreskin people's signs were incorrect. They were spreading propaganda to further their cause, which is wrong. There are studies that show a reduction in the risk of contracting HIV by 57% for circumcised men, so while it is genital mutilation (and I actually prefer foreskin), since it is a part of their coming of age rituals for young boys, it might as well be safely done. I was really disappointed in that false information.

My favourite part of all of  this is the drag queens/kings and crossdressers. Love it =D

There was a lot of screaming, and a lot of hot topless people, and some cool stuff like fans and flags and buttons =) We need to learn and pack lunch next time (didn't get to that sushi until four!) so we don't get crabby (I get so crabby). On our way back we found Philippe and his friend and had a cool ride home! PHEW!