I must confess, friends, that I have been lagging behind in a phenomenon that has been sweeping the Internet for the past 10 days.

Well, it's been sweeping the beauty blogs, at least.

This phenomenon is called The Great Mascara Hunt and its sole purpose is to corral reviews of every mascara on the planet, in the hopes that each woman will at last find her "Holy Grail" mascara.

I am going to kick off my participation in the Great Mascara Hunt not with a review, but with a rant. This is going to sound very much like one of those Andy Rooney rants at the end of 60 Minutes, but here goes...Why is it that companies always insist on putting a mini mascara into those gift-with-purchase bags, and why is it that that particular mascara is always a dud?

I don't get it. Do they think they are going to convert us with these tiny tubes of mediocre mascara, with their sparse, flimsy brushes and their poor ability to build volume and length? I have never encountered a gift-with-purchase mascara that I loved. As a teenager, I had a collection of them, because my mother would palm them off on me after deconstructung the contents of said gift bags. Now, I try to palm them off on her.

But no one wants them, these castoff stepchildren of goody bags, these runt siblings of the great mascaras.

More lip gloss in the gifts-with-purchase, I say. Lip gloss or eyeliner or sunscreen - just not mascara, a product that inspires fierce loyalties in its users, a product so polarizing that it could lead beauty addicts to battle over its efficacy (see the comments section on the Kiss Me posts, part one and two) .

What do you think? Have you ever gotten a good mascara in a gift-with-purchase, or do you just toss them in the hopes that the women's shelter you donate to is really low on eye makeup?

See what other beauty mavens are saying about mascaras during May Mascara Month:

Beautiful Makeup Search
Blend
Blogdorf Goodman
The Daily Obsession
Koneko's *Mostly* Beauty Diary
The Life of a Ladybug
MonkeyPosh
The Non Blonde
Scentzilla
She'll Be Feverish After So Much Thinking
Victoria's Own

Thanks to Katie at Scentzilla for the graphic!