Pouring Rain ☂ Neutrogena Dinner at MoMo Café ♨ Dehydrated Skin?

May 23, 2011 (Monday) About a week ago, I got an email invitation to become a brandvocate *this means having the privilege to be one of the first to exclusively experience the newest revolution in skincare from Neutrogena* for Neutrogena. The blogger’s event was scheduled on a Monday, and at 6PM. I believe I woke up at around 9:45AM. I managed to blog about recent events and finish my workout before preparing for the said dinner. I performed the “My Buns Hurt Workout” and the “600 Killer Reps Workout”—both from BodyRock.tv as usual and finished at around 4:00PM. It was pouring rain outside by the time I got out of the shower… I prayed that the rain would let up just for that night.

For the said dinner I wore a fitted red dress (which I borrowed from my sister; and I believe, is from SM Department Store), black wedge boots, and a black studded chain bag. Okay, so I borrowed everything from my sister Iza. Hahaha. She has a lot of gorgeous stuff! Shoes, clothes, bags…

Have you checked out her fashion blog and her personal blog yet?

Here’s a little snapshot (see: above) I took before leaving the house. I won’t even deny it, I felt great in this dress! No worries about flabs flapping out or ugly cellulite (not that I’m against all that)—all thanks to BodyRock. I know, I know, I keep talking about how fucking amazing BodyRockTV is. I don’t think I’ll ever shut up about it…and I don’t see any point in shutting up about it, too. Freaking GPS is awesome. The iPhone 4 I won from Jenni Epperson’s blog is freaking heaven-sent! Despite the moderate-heavy traffic, I arrived at the event just in time. About 30 minutes late, but still, just in time for dinner.

MoMo Café looked very cozy. I was led upstairs where the Neutrogena dinner was going on. I was greeted by a long table full of bloggers, and the Neutrogena team. I honestly felt embarrassed since I was a little late, but I was welcomed warmly and was told that I came just in time for dinner. I shook hands and introduced myself to some of the people from the right side of the table, but I honestly freaking forgot their names right after.

Let’s talk about familiar faces!

#1 CAMILLE CO of http://itscamilleco.com/ (far left in the photo below)–she’s from the same high school that I studied in for 12 years (SJCS) She looked freaking gorgeous! I love her makeup that night. I wanted to take a photo with her, but she left early (and my sister told me that it’s because she attended the Maroon 5 Concert)#2 Donnarence Masilungan of http://mylucidintervals.blogspot.com (on the left of Camille Co in the photo above)–when I took a seat at the far end of the table and had the chance to glance at the people around me, this lady smiled at me. So I smiled and looked away. Then after 5 seconds I realized “I KNOW THAT GIRL!” Believe it or not, my brain went crazy searching for her name. I don’t know what came over me, but it took me 10 minutes to freaking remember DONNARENCE’S NAME! When I finally realized it, I looked at her and I finally sent the message that I know her! We actually study at the same university (UST). It’s my first time to meet her! And she looked beautiful! We don’t have a decent photo, though. Donna, if you’re reading this, we owe each other a great shot the next time we meet!#3 Helga Weber of http://blog.ditz-revolution.net/ –the first time I met her was during the launch of Myra’s Newest Endorser. She had red hair then and look how her hair looks now! She’s soooo freaking pretty! She can pull off anything, I swear. I think she recognized me as well, since she mentioned the Myra event when we were chatting with Czar. Czar works for Ogilvy. She’s the one who emailed me about the event. You can’t imagine how sweet she is. She’s super super nice! She’s the only person I was able to get a decent photo together with. And I’m happy I’ll be seeing her again soon!

Let’s talk about dinner… I was able to access UberSocial and Plixi (the net, in general) since the area has Wifi. I live-tweeted and shared the food that we were having one after the other. If you follow me on Twitter, you’d probably know about it. The ambience of MoMo Café, as I’ve said earlier, is really cozy and homey. I definitely liked the interiors and the whole setting in general. We were presented with a list of the dinner for that night. While I was live tweeting, the list made it easy for me to describe what the dishes actually consist of. (I actually brought home a copy of the list since I know I’d be needing it for blogging purposes like right this very moment…am I the only one who did?)Flavored Frozen Iced Tea for everyone. I had the Mango-flavored one, and it was like freaking huge! Could definitely be enough for 2-3 persons! Tasted muy bien, too.The MoMo! Gourmet Salad (roasted garlic shitake mushrooms, candied walnuts, fresh white cheese, sliced oranges, raspberry-balsalmic vinaigrette, arugula mixed greens, hard-boiled egg)—I don’t freaking kid when I say how much I loved this salad! I only had a slice of orange and egg for my first serving, and then the greens came next. I loved the taste of the raspberry-balsamic vinaigrette. It’s weird how I actually heard Julia in my head saying “Bon appetit!” Roasted Garlic Vongole Pizza (fresh herbs, spinach, clams, white sauce, cheese anchovies)—this pizza tasted soooo good! I’m not really into crazy toppings so this was perfect for me. One slice was enough.Creamy Baked Mac Bolognese (roasted tomatoes & spinach, cream, sourdough toast)—nothing extraordinary, I must say. Tasted good, though! Creamy Crabby Seafood Casserole (crabmeat, mixed seafood, double-smoked bacon chunks, MoMo!’s seafood cream, corn, peas & carrots, hollandaise)—since I don’t normally eat rice on a daily basis, I fucking died and gone to heaven when I tasted this. I freaking loved this. Just the thought of how creamy it was and how perfect it tasted makes me wanna go to MoMo! Café again. The rice was so soft…almost kind of melted in my mouth, too! So creamy like you wouldn’t believe.Ube Tres Leches (ube condensada & black sago pearls)—dessert! The black sago pearls were undercooked, really. But this tasted like heaven. Just the right amount of sweetness. The side was covered in some kind of sweet crumbs of whatever…tasted bien bien bien.

Now that we’re stuffed with all that food mentioned, let’s move in to what actually we came to this event for…

The Neutrogena team started with asking questions about skin, in general. Some myths were actually busted during that segment. Let me see if I can remember some of them:

1. Is it true that if you have oily skin, you can skip putting on moisturizer? FALSE!
2. Is it true that ageing skin is only caused by age? FALSE! Ageing skin can be caused by the sun, harmful products, and bad habits!
3. Is it true that drinking water will keep your skin hydrated? FALSE! Why? Well, the skin is the last organ to be distributed with water. Water passes through a lot of organs first before the skin.

So I only remembered three. Well it all boiled down to how dehydrated the skin can get…without us even knowing it. They gave us an envelope containing a list of the things (some of which you never actually thought would) that can dehydrate the skin.

Gabby, the brand manager of Neutrogena (I just have to say how weird it is, that the brand manager of Xenical is also named “Gabby”) showed us a device and explained to us how this thingamajig works. This is actually the Moist Sense—it can detect if your skin is dry, normal, or moist. We were all given the chance to try it out.How it works is basically pressing it onto your skin, and lifting it back up and see what number comes up. In here you will see that I am a 60.

According to the scale: 0-40 is dry, 41-70 is normal, and 71-99 is moistSo I’m normal—but how come my face feels so dry? The answer is because I tick almost all the boxes in that list that they showed us (things that can cause dehydration of the skin). I skimp on sleep, air conditioned rooms, stress…

With all that said, I am very happy and excited to try the new product from Neutrogena that will combat dehydrated skin. What’s even cooler is that I get to give (1) one of my readers a chance to try it out too before the product even launches and gets in the market! All you have to do is go to this link, read it!

On the way home, 14-wheeler trucks scared the hell out of me. And I just have to say this:

1. CAN’T YOU READ? RIGHT LANE MUST TURN RIGHT!!!
2. QUIT SWERVING LIKE A FUCKING ASSHOLE! STAY ON YOUR FUCKING LANE!!!

And then I saw a truck full of chickens!!! Ahhh poor little chickens…They’re all probably dead by now. (sobs)

And then I saw this billboard….I heard Julia again… “Bon appetit!”

Arrivederci!