Beauty Blogging in 2117
Callista picked up her Holographic Lip Projector and angrily thrust it into her overflowing bureau drawer. Even with a memory of roughly 5000 holographic lipstick shades, it seems she was already in dire need of another one. To make matters worse, her laser lashes were nowhere to be found. Callista had gone to great lengths to procure those lashes from the interplanetary black market. When placed on the lash line, the narrow strip cast a dazzling kaleidoscope of blues and greens to recreate the majestic plumage of the extinct peacock. They were her favourite pair; it's what sets me apart, she thought. None of her fellow beauty bloggers had 'peacock', although they all had 'unicorn'. Horses were genetically modified to create unicorns in 2040. Since then, unicorns have been commercially manufactured to filter through every pet store. Why, it's a rite of passage to give your son or daughter a unicorn on his or her sixteenth birthday. Callista never got one - and that's okay. She always thought they were atrociously overrated.
Unfortunately, they'd have to do for today.
She went over her curated monologue once before switching on her holotube. "Hello! Callista here. Today, I'll be hosting a Q&A to answer a few of the questions you sent me last week…" she uttered while knowing that every word, movement and gesture was being holographically transmitted to her 1.2 million subscribers instantaneously. She could pre-record it, like many of the other holotubers out there but editing a 6D representation of oneself can be such a drag sometimes. "So, Blu_Orange would like to know what my favourite makeup item is."
That's easy, Callista thought.
She was always drawn to things that caught the light, a certain magpie-like trait she'd had even as a child. She recalled her first skin enhancement surgery, an investment made with her first earnings. The process injects a synthetic gold-like liquid into the skin's surface, thus, giving it an unparalleled luminosity. Even better than strobing balms, an ointment which could absorb sunlight to adjust the radiance achieved when applied on one's cheekbones. "So, it's not so much an item, as it is an investment," intoned Callista.
"The next question is, how did you start out as a b-blogger?" It was a question Callista supposed all b-bloggers had to answer. "It's something that I've always dreamed of doing," she told them, neglecting to mention that she'd never set out to be a b-blogger. Growing up, she'd always liked makeup but as a career? She hadn't considered it. Callista opened a holotube channel on a whim, after her therapist droid, Dr. Kai8, suggested she use it as an outlet to overcome her social anxiety. It's only after her blog became a massive success did she decide to continue on. Not the inspiring answer they're seeking, she mused. Sometimes the truth was best left omitted.
"HosicoC@ would like to know what's the strangest product I've tried in recent years." Callista rummaged through her internal nanomemory and recalled a peculiar little device she'd found in her great grandmother's belongings once. It was an ancient eye shadow palette, musty and stale with age. A blush pink box with 14 powdery shadows in discoloured neutral and berry tones, meant to be applied with a brush. How inconvenient. Much easier to let her trusty face scanner do the job of scanning her eyes (or face) and imprint an eyeshadow look from a memory of roughly 20,000 customized looks. She couldn't remember the last time she consciously selected how she wanted to look. Usually, the computer did so depending on her skin texture, mood, the weather and a number of other assorted variables specific to that day.
She checked the time. It had only been 5 minutes since she began. 8 questions left. This was going to be an unusually long holocast. Callista had become such a natural at this that she barely even thought about how much she disliked people.
Mithi Chowdhury is a dog-loving-movie-watching-mediocrity-fearing normal person. Either that or a penguin. Find out at mithichy612@gmail.com
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