Home Manicure

I gave myself a French manicure at home the other day in preparation for my first residency interview. It's done with one of those kits containing plastic nails and superglue. There are also kits with nail polishes and tape strips for you to do French manicure on your own nails. I found out from experience, however, that I'd never have enough bilateral hand coordination to master the art of the latter method.

I have always admired the women I see in clinics, usually nurses, secretaries and most definitely all the drug reps, who have perfect French manicured nails. They also wear heavy but attractive make-up and a strong but often pleasant scent of perfume. You know, the type of women who always remember to reapply their lipstick after lunch and their hair never seem to be out of place. So anyways, I'm not transforming my flat-heeled, hair-in-ponytail self into one of them, but I did want to have those perfectly fake yet none-the-less perfect-looking nails. I have, on a few special occasions, gone to a nail place to have a manicure and/or pedicure done. Afterwards, I could not stop looking at my own nails. They are too cute to be my own nails! I feel simply dainty! Then inevitably, the polish chip, piece by piece, until I have no choice but to wipe it all off with polish remover. The bittersweet feeling of loosing my perfected nails is like seeing a fresh bouquet of flowers fade until the day it has to be thrown into the trash. Despite the superficial joy of going to a nail salon, I doubt I will indulge again anytime soon. It's not just the high cost of keeping up the habit of white-tipped nails, it more of the fear of contracting ugly and disfiguring skin infections. I've seen cases in the clinics and it's not pretty! So, until the health department imposes some industry standards on nail salons like sterile tools and anti-septic foot basins, I'm stuck with my own self-service. Here I was, attempting to recreate beauty with plastics and glue.

The result. Not perfect, and a little messy. It must take a ambidextrous persone to get it right. I got glue on my finger pads and had to dab and soak it with acetone on Q-tips to get it off. Takes a day to get use to these long nails as my "own." Typing becomes a little harder, too