Vegas, Baby!

A couple of weeks ago, my girlfriends and I took our first annual girls' trip to... Viva! Las Vegas!

I had not been to Vegas for quite a while; it'd been almost 5 years?
There were a couple of note-worthy events:

1. My first Blackjack experience!
I'd have to dedicate this life-changing experience to my gamble-guru, Meredith.

She pep-rallied before we left for the trip, constantly reminded us the importance of finding a reasonable blackjack table during the trip, and cheerfully escorted us out of posh Venetian resort where we were staying into the wilderness of TI.

After several (...okay, many) rounds of frustrating rookie mistakes, I finally got a hang of it, and it was very fun! It really got intellectually challenging once I got a couple of Cape Cods down somehow. Weird.

2. I became Brazilian!
I had to. After such an awesome night at SushiSamba Strip, I willfully surrendered my Japanese citizenship and started claiming my inner Brazilian-ness. Okay, I need to practice that a bit more.


But seriously, everything we had there was beyond fabulous, ranging from simple Miso Soup to robata-grilled sea bass. (Although I wonder if it really was sea bass--I heard many restaurants are serving white fish as Chilean sea bass everywhere... However, being a proud Brazilian that I am, I'm sure Brazilians would know the difference!)

For those of you who are on the east coast, they have a couple of them in NY as well as one in Miami. I believe their original location is in Chicago. Click here for more information.

3. We met a couple of cool entrepreneurs, with the emphasis on cool.
Hem Jeans
At the blackjack table in TI, we met Amy (aka: our bad luck!) who co-owns a tiny specialty-jean store with her sister in Austin, TX.

If you are a jean enthusiast, like me, Hem is like a mecca of all awesome jeans. What I didn't know is that they do in-store alterations right there, which is sooooo important for a little person, again, like me.

If you live in the area, or if you are traveling to the area, or if you just want to visit the store, check it out at the corner of 12th and Shoal Creek.

Claudio Riaz
Last but not the least, I cannot end this post without mentioning our awesome find: Claudio Riaz brushes!


These are way better than any other brushes I've tried so far.
Claudio mentioned that these are imported from an art-brush maker in Tokyo.

I purchased his concealer brush. It is kind of wide, but pointed in the middle, which makes it very easy to apply concealer right up to the lash line precisely. Because it's wide, it blends in no time as well. It works much better than the Bobby Brown brush, which I used to think was so awesome.

Michelle bought the angled gel liner brush, which I'm kicking myself for not getting. It had very good firmness to it, but at $65/brush, I didn't feel that it was unique enough. Wrong! Apparently, from Michelle's rave review, it performs above and beyond. She loves it, and she's a pretty tough critic.

Here's our before & after pic:

The man in the suit is Claudio himself. Isn't he the most gorgeous man alive? ...Well, beside my Sweetie, of course.

For those of you who are interested, you can purchase any of his brushes from Barney's New York. He mentioned that he was going on a promotional tour to Tokyo--I'm not sure if his stuff is in Barney's there yet. If any of you happen to see those, definitely try them out and send me your review!

Tchau!
Keiko