Saturday, March 9, 2013

It All Started With That First Hit.....

"They're gonna say what they're gonna say, you're gonna say what you're gonna say, and then we're done..."   - Jeff Van Vonderen.  Intervention.
 
I think I have a burgeoning, borderline problem.  I've been doing a lot of reading and learning about wax products.  Mostly, because I've been contemplating adding a regular element of it to my product line if I can find a free second to add it in there somewhere.  In doing so, I've made a bunch of pretty lacklaster tarts (or melts - I'm not arguing about it) that look pretty cute but didn't really have the fry-your-nosehairs-out throw I'm looking for.  Waxes make all the difference, and there are only about 45,988,575,566,354,85,7450,000 differen't ones to buy, and 655,373,645,5474,784,800,000 combinations and tweaks to work out.  Paraffin....soy....vybar....no vybar....old formulas....new formulas.  Geez louise.
 
So, in my thirst to work it all out, I've starting getting some tarts from a few of the more popular vendors and watching review videos obsessively.  I get on my treadmill in the morning - coffee cup full of high octane in the cupholder, and scroll through YouTube addict uploads on my phone plugged into my treadmill speakers. Totally weird right? 
 
That's not even the weird part. 
 
 Being a soapmaker and vendor, I have lots of  awesome customers who have "collections" of soap.  I'm talking thousands of dollars worth.  They send me photos of the piles of them they've accumulated.  Closets crammed full, shelves overflowing, and some even keep inventory on spreadsheets so they can keep track of what they have, and need to repurchase....hahaha.  I love them so much and they are so good to me.  :)  Before now, I never really understood the point of stockpiling so much.  I mean, how freaking dirty can you be?! 
 
May I present to you, Exhibit A:


 
It's totally not normal.
 
I've swapped soap for a lot of it because in addition to being psychotic, I am also a cheapass when it comes to spending lots of money on things like this.  I watch some of these videos and I just think "Do you people not have BILLS?!".  The people that collect makeup stuff are especially mind boggling to me.  A MAC mascara is like $2500 on sale, and chicks have ROOMS full of high end makeup.  The kids must be eating cat food.  Jus' saying.  Sorry about that tuition thing, Billy...
 
Anyway - to make myself feel less in need of Lithium, I'm calling this "research".  I know now what a "good" tart is and have all kinds of good ideas about formulations, and presentations, and am currently testing new waxes...........again.  As it turns out, I love them!  Each morning, I throw some in all of my warmers and it completely lifts my mood out of the winter blues funk.  There's totally something to this aromatherapy stuff.  When I get something new, I grab hubby's hand, lead him to the drawer, and make him sniff things like a crazy person and he's like "Yeah....that's....really....nice... *side eye*".   
 
Pssh. He has no vision.
 
Until my next post!