Problematic, and not

I've tried two things lately that were problematic: the Essie magnetics, and the Revlon Neon nail wand. I poked around and found other people making the same complaints I did in both cases. With the neon thing, it was just really hard to get even coverage. I finally gave up and just went with sort of an ombre effect where the tips were a lot darker than the rest, and it ended up looking okay. I really like the color (Ultra Violet), but getting it even is a bitch. With the magnetic, I couldn't get it even in a different way: I couldn't get the magnet to work right. I only got the all-over effect on one nail, although I eventually got a distribution of patterns that looked okay, and I ran with that. I loved the color (Crocadilly, a very crocodile-ish gray-green) so it's not a total waste even if I never get the magnet to work right. I know some of that may be a learning curve but it seemed like some of it might be the magnet, too.

I bought my first-ever Rimmel London polishes the other day because they had a package deal where you buy the Lasting Finish Pro nail polish and get the base coat/top coat for free. They claim it lasts up to 10 days, and I'm not going to make it even a week, but still, for me that's pretty good. I've had it on since Thursday, I think, and it's Tuesday now and it's just now starting to chip. So not bad at all. The color choice was not fabulous, but I picked up English Rose, which is what you would expect, an old-style (to my mind) rose-colored cream - but old-style is not necessarily a bad thing. I liked it, on the whole. It's more coral-leaning than some rose colors.

The other thing I've worn in the interim is another color from my last Walgreen's haul, the SH Xtreme Wear Pacific Blue. It's an odd color, because it does look very periwinkle in some lights, but not so much in others. So it shifts from a purple-leaning blue to a more pure cyan-ish blue depending on the light. But I liked it. And it's very pigmented, a near one-coater, although I ended up using two. The texture of the wet polish really felt more like paint to me than like lacquer.

ADDED: Pictures of the Rimmel and the Essie in the next entry - here.