Pinterest Revisited

So I’ve been on Pinterest for a while now and I’ve gotta admit that I’m just a little bit addicted.  The inspirational quotes!  The cool party decorations!  The clever home organizational tips!

But sometimes the pins confuse me.  I mean, someone will take a photo of a normal person with normal hair and write, “Love the hair!”  What confuses me is that the person’s hair is nothing special.  There is no style to it that I can discern.  And the color is, like, brown.  So I speculate that the pinner has perhaps thinning hair and is dreaming about having a full head of hair again someday.  Or maybe the pinner has wildly curly hair falling to her waist and is thinking that the short, relatively plain straight brown hairdo would be SO much easier to work with.  I dunno.  We tend to want what we don’t have, don’t we?

Sometimes the pins annoy me.  Like when there are 25 consecutive pins about how to decorate one’s nails with polish so that each nail is a different color. Or so that each nail has a zig-zag design.  But Pinterest is nothing if not educational.  I mean, I’ve learned that ombré nails are apparently a big thing right now if I am to believe the multitudes of pins about them.

Ombre nails. Go for it!

I’m sure there are people who enjoy all those different nail looks, but to me those manicures look like an awful lot of effort for something that would last about two seconds after I started scrubbing the bathtub.   When I was looking at photos of all those fancy fingernails to include in this blog, I came across one photo that downright scared me.  Long, pointy nails with metal decorations glued to each one.  Clearly, this is a person who never scrubs a bathtub.  Actually, I’m not sure how she  does much of anything.  And I suspect that, um, even a simple potty break would pose certain challenges for any person sporting these nails. 

Another trend I’ve noticed on Pinterest lately is that people pin all sorts of photos of white rooms.  Everyone marvels over these white rooms.  They make comments like, “Would love to live here!”  And, “I want this room!” 

Now I will admit that the photos are sometimes pretty impressive.  I look at those rooms and think, “Wow, that’s awesome!  Of course, sometimes the room is overlooking, say, the Pacific Ocean – so it wouldn’t really matter if the room was decorated with a ratty white couch and a threadbare white rug.  But sometimes the white room is just a regular ol’ room in a regular ol’ house.  And practically everything in it is white.  White walls, white ceilings, white furnishings, white knickknacks.

An all-white baby's room. With a chandelier, yet. Right.

I can’t help but think that if I were to walk into one of these houses, I wouldn’t even be sitting there for five minutes before blurting out, “You know what this room needs?  A little color…”

Nope, I'm just never going to be one of those uber-decorator types who go for certain looks that most folks simply don't "get."

One of my favorite things on Pinterest is seeing all the creative ways people have figured out how to serve food. I read pin instructions like, “Carve out a gourd and spoon in veggie dip – makes a great container and looks good on your Thanksgiving table!”   Huh.  And here I just use a plain old bowl.  Who woulda  thought?? 

And did you know that you can make your own marshmallows?  I’ve not bothered to delve further into such pins because (a) I’m not a big fan of marshmallows, and (b) if I were ever to need marshmallows, I think I would simply run to Kroger and pick up a bag.  I cannot imagine putting time and effort into making homemade marshmallows. 

Individual seven-layer dip cups. Brilliant!

Nevertheless, if I were to one day lose my mind and decide to make homemade marshmallows, I know exactly where to look to find the “how to” instructions.

The other day I actually put one of the pins to the test.  I made individual cups filled with 7-layer dip for a little gathering we had.  And my father-in-law raved about them. He thought they were a marvelous idea.  So…see?  Pinterest has improved my life already. 

And who knows?  One of these days I might invite you over for a party and might even serve you veggie dip from a hollowed-out gourd.

YIKES!

Just don’t expect any homemade marshmallows.  And definitely don’t expect me to be sporting talon-like nails with sharp metal decorations affixed to them. 

Frankly, I prefer challenge-free potty breaks.  I don’t care what Pinterest says.