Fool Me Twice, Shame On Me...

Back in our young and carefree days, Reo and I planned a trip to Hawaii. Before our trip, I decided to get a pedicure. I decided to go to the place owned by a cute little Vietnamese couple that I used to frequent to get my nails done in my even younger and carefree-er days. I picked my nail polish color, settled into my pedicure chair and, despite a significant language barrier, started to have a pretty nice conversation with the woman who had the unfortunate job of touching my feet for the next hour. The subject of my upcoming vacation came up, and the woman excitedly asked if I would like a palm tree painted on my big toe. I thought, "why not, my toes could use a little pizazz!", so I agreed. She carefully painted a palm tree on one big toe. And then the other one. I was thinking "wow, this is pretty intense nail art, but I think I like it," and prepared for my top coat. Then I noticed that she was not done. She proceeded to paint a little sun on each toe. And then some sandy beach along the bottom. And THEN, as I stared down in horror, she painted two birds on each toe. Yep, you are envisioning it correctly, I had an entire nature scene painted on my big toenails. I am both shy and non-confrontational, plus the woman looked super proud of her artwork, so I thanked her, paid, and went on my merry way. (I still had fun on my vacation by the way, despite the fact that my feet looked like the cover of a National Geographic magazine).

Now, I have had several pedicures since then. Often they have offered to add some sort of artwork, which I have vehemently declined. Today, I decided to cash in a present from the Easter Bunny and get a pedicure for our upcoming vacation (getting a little deja vu?) I went to a different place this time, picked out my nail polish color, and settled into my pedicure chair. As the pedicure progressed, the woman asked if I would like a flower. Before I knew what was happening, I had agreed! I meekly added, "maybe just a little one?" After my initial panic attack due to pedicure related flashbacks, I talked myself down. This was a different person, a different place, and a different year (heck, a different decade!) Plus, this sweet woman had spared no luxury, even whipping out the champion of loofahs to scrape off some of my dead winter skin. She wouldn't let me down! And she didn't...At first. At first I started out with an itty bitty white flower, just like we agreed. Then, she started to make little white lines across the other side of my toes (stems perhaps? I am still not quite clear.) Then, out came the silver glitter, you know, for accent purposes. By now I am sitting there in such shock that I barely noticed when she added a little jewel to the center of each flower. That's right, my toes were officially Be-Dazzled.

By the time I left, my feet looked like this...

By the way, the Barbie Jeep pink nail polish was not part of the tragedy, I actually picked that AND like it, so don't judge. Seriously, I should no longer be allowed into a nail salon unsupervised.