Tuesday, April 14, 2009

Excuse Me Ma'am, You Can't Bring That Hairy Thing In Here..

randomtuesday

Jones received a joke book in his Easter basket this year and spent the day walking around like a comedian in a bad lounge act telling us Easter-related jokes. Some of them were really good, others stank like the egg you hid under the porch step three years ago and forgot about. Of course, predictably, one went like this:

Q: Why was the Easter Bunny too embarrassed to deliver eggs?
A: Because he was having a bad HARE day!

And that is the segue into today's edition of Random Tuesday Thoughts...what do you think? The right blend of humor and subtlety?

I have curly hair. And a lot of it. And combining that with lots of rain here on the cost often makes it even more curly and voluminous. There are lots of nice words that could be used to describe it, or even neutral words that would be o.k. The one I've been hearing a lot lately is "big". I'm not so sure that is a good sort of word for hair. Usually I'd rather hear, "You have a lot of hair," or "You have thick hair," but there's something almost unkind about "Wow, your hair is really...big." I mean, I don't go around saying to people, "That's some big ass you've got there..."

When going into a store, the general assumption is that the salesperson is there to make a sale. The best way to do so, at least from what I remember from a short retail career, is to be pleasant to the customer. Don't suck up, but try not to offend. While shopping for hair products, the salesperson was telling me about a great new thing. "I love it," she said, "and lots of the women who come in swear by it. You'd probably love it too...it's great for big frizzy hair." Oh. Crap, I better take my massive afro out of this shop so some other customers can squeeze in!

My last year in college I shared an apartment with a friend, and quite often I would wet my hair in the bathroom sink in order to give it a fresh "do" for evening plans. One weekend her parents came up and she complained to her dad that the bathroom sink was really running slow. No problem, he said, I'll take a look at it. He tinkered around with the trap, and then with a pair of pliers, and the next thing I knew he was pulling this huge wad of hair out of the drain. It looked like an enormous drowned rat. He swung it around a little and said "Well, I wonder where THIS came from?" All eyes on me and my great big hair.

When we went to that family wedding a few months ago we played "the Newlywed Game" at the rehearsal dinner. One of the questions was "When you first met, what attracted you to your wife the most?" I couldn't think of what S.P. could possibly have said. When we flipped our cards he had said "her hair". Then he was telling everyone how when he saw me walking down the street I had long thick hair and it was the most beautiful hair he'd ever seen on a girl. Wow. I never knew that.

After my last trip to the salon I had some new streaks put in the front, and they turned really blond. It was a windy day and my hair was extra wild by the time I got out to the barn to feed the horse. While holding the hay in one arm and reaching up to open the gate, I felt something tugging on my hair. The horse was trying to EAT my HAIR! Apparently in its newly blond and windblown state it looked enough like the pale grass hay that she decided it was dinner time. Luckily she spit it out when I dropped the real hay and there was no obvious damage.

Sometimes whan I go to teach the best hairdo is a loose bun, because it keeps the hair out of my face and makes me look a little more like a professional and less like the wench on a bodice-ripper novel. One day a boy noticed me pushing the pencil I'd been using into my bun and asked why I was doing that. "Well, then I always have a pencil handy when I need one." Good enough answer for him. When I got home later and took down my hair I had three pencils of different lengths stashed in there. I could probably smuggle two hershey bars and a pint of vodka in there and nobody would ever know.

Well, that's all I got. Random on a theme. It's not supposed to rain, so maybe today my hair will just be medium sized.

9 comments:

  1. I've always been jealous of your hair, especially in the 80's.

    Mine is so thin, flat and mousy. We should combine forces to get medium hair all the time.

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  2. I've clogged up my fair share of drains, too...

    Bad, cheesy jokes are good. Even better when told by a kid :)

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  3. That was funny. Who knew there was that much to say about your hair?

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  4. that joke was great thanks for sharing

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  5. Jealous, here. My hair is naturally curly, but very fine. Plus, with three crowns and the unfortunate fact that I split my head open one day when I was cleaning my shower, my hair is not 'big' at all. :-(

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  6. There was this cousin of mine who as a kid always told only this one joke for like, FIVE years.Till he grew up and got whacked by another cousin :D.

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  7. Remind me to bring you with me the next time I need to sneak some booze into a football game. Back in the day, I was the one who stuck stuff in and people would give me their flasks to hid between my boobs. TMI? Sorry.

    I'd love to have "big" curly hair. Mine is just frizzy so it doesn't curl or go straight. And awww about what attracted SP to you.

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  8. I have a LOT of hair too, and it grows super fast. I've definitely clogged my fair share of drains. Sadly mine isn't "big" or "beautiful", it's stick-straight.

    The grass (or hair) is always greener...

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  9. That salesperson clearly didn't get the memo about not offending - pehaps someone should've cc'd her.

    Great blog! I'll be back...

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