Flashback: Iced Tea

When I was a little kid, I used to see these at the local Asian grocery store:

I would only ever see this flavour, and I would never see these anywhere else. So, being four, I assumed it was some weird imported drink that would taste disgusting, like the Chinese medicine my grandma used to give me. 

Fast forward about 14 years, and I again encountered an Arizona beverage:

I don't know if you can see it, but there is a little 99 cent price tag printed directly on the can. My first summer job was as a cashier at the now defunct Dominion grocery store. The first evening I worked the express lane, a man in a hurry dumped 2 of them onto my register. The bar code wasn't scanning, so I told the gentleman I would need to do a price check.

"It's 99 cents." He insisted. 

"I still have to do a price check, since it's not scanning." My 17-year-old self explained, grinning smugly at how knowledgeable I was on the procedures of being a  grocery store cashier. 

"It says, right on the can." He jabbed his index finger into the little purple square on the can. "99 cents."

"I know that, sir, but that could be an American price."

"Ridiculous." He sighed in exasperation. 

The stock manager arrived. I held up the can triumphantly. "How much is this?"

The stock manager frowned. "99 cents. It says on the can."

 Needless to say, I never worked the express lane again in the 3 months that I worked there. Finally, a year later, I experienced my first actual taste of an Arizona beverage (don't worry, this is all going somewhere, not just telling random stories about tea...or maybe I am. So what, sue me.):

I am obsessed with these things. If I see a rack of them, I will buy one, whether or not I am thirsty at the moment...I will eventually get thirsty, so why not enjoy an Arizona iced tea? One day, I had a craving for them at home, my laziness keeping me from walking to the nearest store to get some. Out of that laziness, this was born:

It was also born partially due to my contempt for the overpriced nature of the newly introduced Sephora nail art tools. I would show them, recreating the manicure on the front of their brochure using nothing but a small paintbrush and some toothpicks! It shows, I know, but we need to give past me some credit...for a couple of blunt toothpicks used as nail art tools, it's not half bad, no?

The base colour was Avon's Jade, which was something I had been lemming for quite awhile after seeing it on some blogs. It serendipitously came into my possession when my mom left an Avon catalogue on the kitchen table, advertising that select shades were to go on sale for $2, including Jade! I love this colour. It's the perfect shade of jade green and goes on smoothly in 2 coats (I bet you could even do one if you were really careful). The flowers were Zoya Areej for the petals and Sally Hansen White On for the middles.

I loved this when I put it on. I might try and recreate a better version of this manicure this summer. Time will tell.