The Survivor Makeup Bag:

 

What One Makeup Item Would You Wrestle a Rat For? PART ONE

 

 

Day 1: I can hardly believe I am here. Me, Mindy Lovegrove, administrative assistant to a busy neurologist. Halfway across the world from my hometown of Wannabee Falls, Minnesota. On Uneeda Island, competing with 15 other normal Americans for a million dollars. I am on Survivor!

 

I am writing this on some really big palm leaves with my Precious Rose Luscious Lipliner. It will serve as a chronicle of my 39 days on this island. My journey to wealth and fame.

 

Just getting here was an adventure. After being flown to the port of Burgoo, we were divided into two tribes and taken by boat to the island. We had to swim ashore through shark-infested waters, towing our gear with a rope between our teeth. A few people were stung by jellyfish and twitched uncontrollably for a while, but that didn't stop them from being obnoxious.

 

Day 2: My tribe is called Chi Hua Hua. We are the young, fun tribe, except for this guy Malburn who looks about 40. The other tribe is called Hai Karate.

 

They are the old fogeys. As soon as they got ashore they started building a shelter, if you can imagine. We, on the other hand, ate most of our rations and danced and slept on the beach.

 

Day 3: I got off to a good start with my tribe by using the high-gloss polish on my fingernails to reflect sunlight so we could start a fire. Fire is our friend in the wilderness.

 

Today we won the first immunity challenge. That is where the tribes compete and the losing tribe has to vote one of its members off the island. The winning tribe gets immunity from having to vote somebody off.

 

It was a grueling battle in which we shot rubber bands and blew straw wrappers at each other. We heard later that Hai Karates voted off a Bobblehead marketer named Cherrie from Guttersnipe, Texas. One down and 14 to go.

 

Day 4: People say you need a strategy to win on Survivor. Mine is my makeup. Each of us could bring one luxury item. My makeup bag is mine. It speaks of innumerable afternoons at makeup counters in upscale department stores, trying, discarding, and trying again. Of questions burned into my soul:

 

 

How could I live without my long, luscious lashes or barely-there lip gloss?

 

I must have a foundation with sunscreen for my combination complexion.

 

What makeup looks best by tiki torchlight?

 

 

The look I chose is sexy but competent. Minimalist but ravishing. But I will be adaptable. That is a key to winning on Survivor.

 

Day 5: Let me describe my tribe members to you. Malburn raises hogs in Tussleruff, West Virginia. Vendetta is a big woman from Washington, D.C., who works in a life insurance office. Chaz is a lifeguard from Los Angeles, a real hottie. Serendipity has taken a semester off from channeling and radio psychic school in Zenobia, Wisconsin. Lafe is a rodeo clown from Twin Peaks.

 

Sylvia is a tall, slim woman with gorgeous dark hair from Boca Raton. She sells designer wrapping paper and napkins. Fabian is a failed e-commerce guru who sells fondue from a street cart in New York City. He is attempting to make himself indispensable by cooking all our meals. Coconut fondue, taro root fondue, seaweed fondue.

 

Day 6: Today's immunity challenge was a scavenger hunt through a toxic waste dump left by retreating American soldiers. It was another easy win for Chi Hua Hua. The Hai Karates got all het up and some of them even refused to enter the dump.

 

We learned later that the HKs booted a designer of toys for children's fast-food meals. I thought it would be the Author. His luxury item is a tattered copy of some book called The Sun Also Rises by Vernon (?) Hemingway. He says he got it from his father on his deathbed and has treasured it all his life and that it was his inspiration for becoming a writer. He is always spouting off quotes from this guy Hemingway. I can tell he is alienating his tribe, even though he's very good at killing stuff.

 

Day 6: Today's immunity challenge was a scavenger hunt through a toxic waste dump left by retreating American soldiers. It was another easy win for Chi Hua Hua. The Hai Karates got all het up and some of them even refused to enter the dump.

 

We learned later that the HKs booted a designer of toys for children's fast-food meals. I thought it would be the Author. His luxury item is a tattered copy of some book called The Sun Also Rises by Vernon (?) Hemingway. He says he got it from his father on his deathbed and has treasured it all his life and that it was his inspiration for becoming a writer. He is always spouting off quotes from this guy Hemingway. I can tell he is alienating his tribe, even though he's very good at killing stuff.

 

Day 7: The other tribe is doing this Swiss Family Robinson thing and building what looks like a condo in the treetops, under the direction of a guy I call the Professor. They have rooms with thatched roofs, bamboo pipes for running water, and a pulley system for hauling up supplies. I hear they also have a smoking latrine.

 

Day 8: Our tribe was getting a little tired of partying and sleeping on the beach and was ready to dig in and build a shelter. Again I was able to be of some help by tactfully putting it in the guys' heads that we should build a lean-to and then showing them how to do it and letting them think it was their idea. I remembered it from a Golden Book I had about Smokey the Bear.

 

Day 9: Today our immunity challenge was to decorate a coconut like the face of a loved one and care for it. Like Tom Hanks with his volleyball in Castaway.

 

At the end of the day, the tribe with the best coconuts would win.

 

One of the Hai Karates was so hungry that she punched a hole in her coconut, which she had decorated to look like her daughter, drank the milk, and plugged the hole with mud. It really sickened me. Like the giant bug sucking out Zander's brains in Starship Troopers. Jeff Probst, the host of Survivor, found out, however, and the HKs lost again. Of course, they voted her off the island.

 

Day 10: Our tribe is so together. You wouldn't think it would be possible for eight total strangers competing for a million dollars to become so close in such a short time, but it is true. We start every morning with a group hug. Then we spend some time massaging each other's feet and doing social grooming, which we're learning from the island monkeys. After breakfast, we swim. Then we sit around and tan and talk about food.

 

Day 11: Something is up with Sylvia or, as I call her, the Ice Princess. There is a lot of whispering going on between her and Fabian. I think she is gunning for me as she perceives me as easy prey. Lucky I've been brushing up on my backstabbing.

 

Day 12: I put a little of my mousse into the rice Fabian was preparing this morning. Just a tad. All the other members of the tribe got sick and I pretended to be sick, too, but really I just ate from the part of the pot that didn't have the mousse. We jumped on Fabian like a pack of rabid wolverines and, after we lost the paper-clip challenge, we voted him off.

 

Day 13: We have pretty much eaten all our food. There are fish but we have nothing to catch them in. Malburn brought us a bucket of centipedes, beetles, and worms that he had gathered from under fallen logs. He told us, "When I was a child, we used to go down to the woods and eat all kindsa berries and nuts and creepie-crawlies and I don't know what-all and we never suffered a lick for it." It's good that I prepared myself for things like this by eating sushi and sticking my hands in pots of cold spaghetti.

 

 

Day 14: Found a moment alone today with the Ice Princess. Mentioned how it was too bad I didn't have any retinol in my bag, as she could certainly use some. She went berserk. Hitting, spitting, vituperation. The camerapersons came running and got it all.

 

Day 15: I am seriously tired of bugs. Today I just had to vomit. I quickly put on some cover-up and fooled those ghoulish camerapersons long enough to get away and throw up privately. Blowing chow on camera is suicide.

 

We lost our second immunity challenge (a pogo-stick race around the island) and voted Malburn off. We were getting tired of him telling us how he used to eat dog biscuits and dirt.

 

Day 16: Made good use of an opportunity to slam Serendipity. I offered her my Manipulé Blush in Prurient Plum, which she declined. Then I got in a little private time with the camera: "I offered Serendipity my blush, but she refused it. Sharing makeup is a way for people to get to know each other. I don't know what's wrong with her. She looks so pasty and peevish. She's probably ill or out of sorts. I have to question whether she can continue to be a good tribe member."

 

Day 17: I'm so hungry, even my makeup bag is starting to look good. So I'm cutting off little pieces with my manicure scissors and dipping them in seawater and slowly chewing them up. It used to be part of a cow, right?

 

Tomorrow will be our last immunity challenge before the two tribes are combined. Today we held a meeting to consider our strategy. We swore to vote together to eliminate all the Hai Karates from the island. If we're to continue to outnumber them, we have to win tomorrow.

 

Day 18: This was a day that I will never forget. We had to draw straws to face a combined immunity and reward challenge. I drew the short straw for Chi Hua Hua, and the Author did for Hai Karate.

 

The challenge was that they would take one of our most treasured possessions, and we had to get it back. For the Author it was his copy of The Sun Also Rises. He was supposed to climb a really high coconut tree to get it. But he refused. "I could break my neck," he said. "I'll just hit a Borders on the way home and get another one."

 

What had they taken from me? My heart pounded as Jeff ripped a tarp off a large pet cage. Inside was my super-soft eyeliner pencil. Clutched in the paws of a huge black rat.

 

I needed that pencil. It is what I use to give myself that look of haunted innocence at tribal council that drives men wild and causes them not to vote me off no matter what bonehead thing I did that day.

 

Suddenly it came to me. This was my moment. It is true what Gildor says to Frodo in The Fellowship of the Ring: "Courage is found in unlikely places." I crawled into the cage and we wrestled. He was fighting like a cornered rat, biting, slashing me with his claws. Finally I did this move like Jackie Chan in The Tuxedo and flipped him over and wrested my pencil from him. He fled squeaking into the jungle.

 

My tribe cheered. They hoisted me on their shoulders and did a victory parade. They made garlands for me and held a feast in my honor (we got pizzas and beer for the reward challenge). I am confident that I can cover the bites and scratches with my concealer. I think Chaz spoke for Lafe as well as himself when he said, "If only she'd take off her top, dude."

 

We are riding high. The Author was voted off.

 

PART TWO IN THE NEXT ISSUE OF HW