I went from cracking jokes about Jessica Simpson’s ProActiv ads to wanting to be in my own acne treatment ad basically overnight. I never had acne problems as a teen. Even buying something as simple as face wash seemed like a foreign concept to me-after all, I had perfect skin. Of course I’d have the occasional tragic zit that would drive me up the wall — but that was as far as my derma-traumas were concerned.

Until I switched my birth control.

Once I switched my birth control my hormones went completely out of whack. A few months ago, after the switch, I started breaking out ALL OF THE TIME. I felt uncomfortable going outside without makeup on. As a singer, I didn’t want to be on stage. As a model on the side, I stopped showing up to interviews. I felt gross and about as far from pretty as a girl can possibly feel without having to be a D list Hollywood drunken starlet.

I wasn’t about to give in to a bleak marriage with acne. My skin’s future needed to be free and happy, not tied down to bullsh*t anxiety.

I finally got to that breaking point where I caved and decided I would try ProActiv-or something like it. Something like it is what I went with when I saw Acne Free at the drug store. It was right there in front of me and for much less than what I hear ProActive goes for (it was $20 for the package). I rationalized with myself for a while before the purchase.

“Elizabeth…you spent $20 at a bar on drinks in an hour. You can chance it for better skin…”

And so I did. Read More »

I never had allergies when I was a kid. However, I do remember my father telling me that his allergies only developed when he was older.

This all seemed like hypochondriac nonsense to me…until I developed my own allergies. As a singer, allergies may very well be a bigger pain in the ass for me than most people. Therefore, I have recently felt the need to learn all that I can about my own symptoms so that I can effectively tell the difference between a common cold and an allergy. After all, you can’t fix something if you don’t know what’s broken, right?

Here’s the rundown of allergy symptoms versus common cold symptoms.

Both come along with a sneeze, but a sneeze from a cold is typically very loud and infrequent, coming more from the lungs than from the nose. The allergy sneeze is much more frequent and it stems from irritation in the nose.

You’ll have runny eyes with a cold, yes, but you will experience this symptom much more clearly if what you’re struggling with is actually an allergy.

The difference between the itchy nose you get when you have a cold and the one you get when you have an allergy is this: Allergies causes itches that really can’t be scratched. You feel them in the back of your nose and it makes you miserable. The cold, however, causes an itch that can typically be alleviated much more easily by, for example, blowing your nose. Read More »

There is a reason why pro-football players aren’t actors. The same reason why actors aren’t pro-football players.

There is a reason we come into this nice, little world, with…gifts. And unless you’re some SUPER HUMAN FREAK, you don’t tend to have gifts that cross into a million different categories.

So when Vanessa Minnillo, used-to-be MTV VJ and super babe girlfriend to Nick Lachey, Jessica Simpson’s former husband, announces she is making, “a film.“, I want to tell her to grab a microphone, bust out an ab-roller, do her hair, tell me what the number one video of the week is, and then-shut up.

I get that a job like VJing is, to most, a platform to a “greater success.” But when was the last time a VJ came out with an Oscar winning, or even bearable film that didn’t go straight to DVD? I don’t think ever? Or didn’t join some cheesy teen sitcom (One Tree Hill- Hilarie Burton)?

Come to think of it, its not just VJ’s who are overextending themselves, Hollywood in general is getting ridiculously greedy. Read More »

• A pair of married strippers are the latest predators to get busted on myspace.

• Scarlett Johannson ‘Waits’ till May to release new cover album.

• Be Afraid. Be Very Afraid. Tom Cruise talks about his beliefs.

• Coachella is going East Coast.

• How to land a guy in 30 days.

• Everyone hates Jessica Simpson.

• Natalie Portman loves cruelty-free shoes.

Ingrid Michaelson: The Way I Am

While the video may be a little scary (does anyone like clowns?), Ingrid’s single “The Way I Am” is cute and quirky. Like it? Get it here!

Anberlin: The Unwinding Cable Car

The Unwinding Cable Car

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Like what you see (and hear)? Get it here!

Nicole Atkins & The Sea: “The Way It Is”

“The Way It Is”

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Nicole Atkins is a supremely talented singer-songwriter with distinct vocals and enourmous promise. Check out her video and then get her CD here.

It’s Britney, y’all!

Like her new sound, the first words off of Britney Spears’s fresh single are a little hardcore. Following Timberlake and Furtado, Spears is leaving her candy pop behind and getting down and dirty with hard beats and a sexually tinged chorus.

Then again, when was our girl ever NOT tinged with sexuality?

The single, released late on Thursday night, isn’t the best thing I’ve ever heard, but it certainly doesn’t suck, and seems twice as amazing considering that as of late, Ms. Spears has appeared absolutely bat sh*t crazy. Read More »