This morning, I have a polish to show you that I've been waiting to use for several weeks. What I've been waiting for is confirmation that I was sent the right color - YSL polishes are labelled on the box, not the bottle, and I questioned if this was the right bottle in the box. This morning, I was able to find one of those "swatches" that's a cartoon-y image of a smeared drop that confirmed it's the right color. Since I couldn't easily find other images online, I thought I'd show you this one today.
So, Yves Saint Laurent Extreme Purple... Sounds right up my alley, no? I bought it after I'd moved here, to the middle of a cornfield, where there are no Nordstroms to go look at things in person first. I do not miss living in River North on the whole, but when I think of having three Ultas within two miles, a Nordies, a Sephora, and a Chanel boutique all within one mile, I admit there's a little pang of longing! Anyhow, I ordered it, it arrived, and I discovered I had a deep brownish blood red creme nail polish.
For a moment, let's move on the the positives of this one, so this isn't a big complaintfest. It has a great shine. Name set aside, it is a lovely color. I'm trying to think of more... The overcap on the bottle is pretty? I'm really trying!!!
As for the application, I applied it over my usual base of Nu Nails. Last Fall, I believe it was, I developed a crush on YSL with their Fall and Winter releases - great colors and application. The application of Extreme Purple was not difficult, it went on well, but it took four (yes, four) coats to be opaque and even. After two, I was a little bent out of shape, yet still willing to put up with a third, but when I'd applied the third and still had uneven and bald patches on several nails, that was ridiculous. For a high end, mucho $$$ polish, I expect it to be good in two coats. That was part of my rave about the Chanels this week - good in one, the second coat was optional to make them look like vinyl. Also, since four coats is so much nail polish, I had to wait a couple minutes before applying coats three and four (and waiting is like punishment to me), and since it's early I don't have my glasses or contacts. I'm near sighted, so I can see my nails and my computer monitor just fine, but I couldn't see the clock across the room, so I sat there in nail polish purgatory for what seemed like an eternity!
One other oddity I noticed in application immediately was that the nail polish had a very strange smell. I have an unusually acute sense of smell - I can immediately tell with a pretty high degree of accuracy when polish is Big Three Free as soon as I open it, and smell is also how I tell when my nail polish has completely cured, like well enough to go wash my hair. This one was off enough to make me read the ingredients. It is three free, it just has an strong chemical smell to it.
My last complaint, which is evidenced in the pictures, is about expensive and somewhat deceptive packaging. A standard nail polish bottle is 15 ml, or 0.5 oz. This one is 10 ml, or 0.33 oz, only 2/3 the volume of a regular one, for a significantly higher price than most polishes (these are up there in the Rescue Beauty Lounge & Chanel range, although those are both only 0.4 oz). However, look at the size of the bottle! Now, my hands are smaller than average, but I have a hard time taking a picture with YSL bottles. Perhaps if less went into the gargantuan bottles, they could afford to give us the remaining 1/3 bottle of polish.
Wow, when I was thinking all of that earlier, it seemed like a lot less ranting! I also thought I had more positives, and have been trying to think of more, but good color and shine are still the only two I can think of. I guess I'm still a little bent out of shape - I wanted and Extreme Purple that was an extreme purple, and in the formula that I had a crush on last year!
Here is the finished manicure, four coats with a base and topped with SpaRitual Tout de Suite (I'm saving the Diamont I have for Konad bases, since I'm low), under artificial light.
Yves Saint Laurent Extreme Purple #40 Nail Polish, Four Coats
Even though this post is already long (I'm still working on the caffeine that will make me edit myself!), I'm going to repost all of the details of the WowSoCool giveaway. If you've read it already, please just skip to your goodbye. My assumption is that not everyone reads every post, so I'm going to repost the details every few posts or so, in order to make it clear to everyone. Regulars, thank you for being patient with that!
Here goes:
For two weeks (12 more days), I'll be taking entries, one per person, for a giveaway that WowSoCool is sponsoring to thank you for your business (everyone, worldwide). There will be two winners, one wins a Gold Deluxe Kit (that's a link to the page - it's a few down for the full description, the $94.99 one, or the full description's on a tab on the entry form). Here's a tiny picture of it if you just want an idea - it's a bunch of plates, polishes, stamper, and scraper...The second winner gets a $50 gift certificate to WSC.It's very simply a Thank You gift. I don't get anything here, I'm just hosting the entry form so you can have it. I've used the service for this random drawing form many times now, and your email won't get used for anything other than to let you know you've won, and in this case, I will pass it on to WowSoCool for the owner to get in touch with you for shipping info. I will not collect your mailing address at all myself if you're the winner, since I won't be mailing you anything. Basically, I'll pass the whole thing over to WSC once a winner is drawn, and the lady there will mail out your prizes.The last details are that your name will show up on the list of entries as you enter it, but there is no need to enter your full name (you can take care of that later if you win), and the biggie is that this is open to everybody, all readers worldwide. So if you're reading this and have not entered, have at it! If you still have a question, please ask it in the Comments below, as I'm sure someone else is wondering the same thing.
Until next time, Dear Reader, love and nail polish to you! 
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