Last call!

Here we are, late in the evening of the last night of my thirties.  When I wake up (hopefully not before 6am like I have the past several days), I'll be 40.  Egads.  I wish I could come up with something pithy or reflective or remotely meaningful to share.  I mean, I spent a bit of time reflecting on the past decade as I went about my errands and housework today.  There certainly were some big highlights - becoming a mom; becoming an aunt (several times over); milestone wedding anniversaries (10th and 15th); the passing of my last remaining living grandparent; selling our first house, buying our second and moving; rejoining the workforce after spending most of the decade as a stay-at-home mom; heck, even being on Jeopardy - but right now?  There's just one thing that is on my mind, and it is this:


I am fairly certain that we have a yeti living in our basement.  I have proof.  Proof in the vast expanses of greyish fur that amass in the collection canister of my vacuum cleaner every time I use it, like earlier this afternoon.  I mean, it just seems obvious that such insane amounts of what is clearly animal fur would come from a gigantic, highly hirsute source like this:

than from something that's smaller than a breadbox (though admittedly pretty fuzzy) like this:

Yep, that's all I've got for this evening, my yeti-in-the-cellar theory.  Clearly, old age has already begun fading away what few brain cells I have left.  (Also, it's 10pm and I spiked my milk with mudslide mix at dinner, so there's that.  Living la vida loca, for sure.)  Before I toddle off to bed, I'd like to make one last plea:


Won't you please, pretty please, with sugar and sprinkles and a cherry on top, please help me make my fortieth birthday wish come true?  You can read about it here.  (I know I've been asking with every post lately, but the good news is that tomorrow is the last day I can bug you about it...)  If you would please join me in doing 40 Good Things and leave me a comment letting me know what you did, I'll be the happiest 40 year old birthday girl ever tomorrow!  Thanks!

Relatively Wordy Wordless Wednesday... Bangin' and Bobbed

After using a lot of water, the blow dryer and approximately half a bottle of Instant Freeze hairspray this morning to camouflage Kiddo's self-inflicted hair trim results from last week, I caved in and took her for a professional repair job after school today.  The hair at one week out was already beginning to resemble one of Andy Rooney's eyebrows, right there in the middle of her head, and I couldn't do any sort of center-parted hairstyle because of it. 

Those first snips were the hardest for Mommy to watch.  I resisted the urge to save a lock or twenty, though.  (I do have the very first lock from her very first ever haircut tucked away for safekeeping, though...)

 

The downside to having bangs cut in, as far as Kiddo was concerned?  The hairstylist had to stand in front of her, thereby blocking her view of the flatscreen, hi-def TV blasting cartoons that Kiddo was trying desperately to gorge herself upon.

Once the bangs were cut in sufficient quantity as to hide the errant eyebrow bit underneath, I decided "in for a penny, in for a pound" and allowed Kiddo to get the "short" bob for which she has been begging for ages now.  This is as short as the stylist dared go, as Kiddo's hair still has a good deal of curl/wave to it and if it was any shorter, we feared it would look like Buster Brown with a bad, home perm.  Here's the finished result - Krystal and Kiddo.  Krystal was an awesome stylist and if anyone local wants a referral, I'm happy to give it!

Once we got home, Kiddo wanted to show Daddy what it looks like "just down" without the fancy ribbon, so we took it out and did a quick restyle to the way it will likely look 99% of the time (at least 99% of the time for the first five minutes after I comb it in the mornings.  I'm sure it will resemble a bird's nest of snarls by the time she gets off the bus at the end of the day...) -

And Kiddo being Kiddo, she insisted on doing a picture with her head tilted.  For some reason, she thinks this is the way that photos should all be taken.  I have no idea why.

Mostly Wordless Wednesday: Bedhead Prizewinner (over 35 division)

Don'tcha think that if there *were* a prize for Most Spectacular Bedhead, I'd have the Over 35 Division clinched this morning? I mean, I had to sleep hard to achieve such rumpletude and overall height.

(And yes, I did actually snap a photo of myself shortly after waking up this morning and post it, unadulterated, to the interwebz. This is because I know that I am *that* hot. Mmmm-hmm.)

.......drumroll please.......

Ta da!!!



Whaddya think? Chopped, highlighted and lowlighted. Woo! (I turned on all the lights in the room to try to get a good shot of the colors, but it still looks kind of dark. Trust me, it has variations in color. I tried to lighten the picture up with my lame, lame picture-wizardy skills, but alas, it was beyond the capabilities of me and my Paint Shop Pro software.)

So far, only Kiddo and her grandma have seen it. (Hubby will be home in about 15 minutes...) Grandma loved it, Kiddo's response: "Mommy, you have BOY HAIR!" Um, yeah, thanks, sweetie. Of course now she's in the tub yelling to me "Hey Mommy, my hair is TOO LONG and I want to get it CUT because, um, it's itching my back...." Not gonna happen, but at least she seems to've come around to liking the shorter 'do.

I have no regrets, except why the heck did I spend almost 16 months in Wolverine Fawcett-Van Beethoven/Carol Brady hair hell? I should've just stuck with short. Please remind me of that the next time I decide to grow out my hair..... if there is ever a next time!

So, love it? Hate it? Indifferent? Hit me with your best shot, I'm a big girl (apparently a big girl with boy hair, mind you...)

Update: By request, here's a shot of the back and also the top! Sorry, took it myself, as Hubby is busily prepping the walls in the basement for painting (something we'd always meant to do but never got around to... it's funny, now we're finally doing all the things we'd always meant to, and leaving - kinda makes us wish that we'd either done them before so we could enjoy them, or weren't moving. Well, not so much on the not moving, as we definitely want to move. If only there were a Moving Fairy...) so I did the "use the mirror in the bathroom to reflect the back o' my head" technique. Clever, clever, eh? Hee!



Oh, I can tell you now that Hubby's seen it - he likes it a lot, too! So far, the verdict's been pretty much unanimous, with Kiddo the lone "BOY HAIR!" dissenter.

A Major Crisis of Epic Proportions

HELP! It's a major crisis of epic proportions:

I might cut all my hair off again!

I'm really, really feeling strongly like I should just give up on the whole "growing it out" thing and just go back to a short(er), Mom 'do.

I want something sassy.



Something chic.



Something hip.



Something cute.



Problem is, my hair just. Doesn't. DO THAT. Not without major fussing.

And that, my friends, is the major issue. I want short, sassy, chic, hip and cute hair without having to do anything to it to get it that way. Or, not to have to spend more than, say, 5-10 minutes maximum to get it that way. AND, once I do get it that way, I'd like for it to stay that way. Because remember this hair?



Yeah, here's the thing about this particular look. Within a few hours, and despite the generous application of gobs and sprays and spritzes of hair products designed to keep follicles from frizzing or flying away or even thinking of moving, my hair was back to Wolverine Fawcett Van Beethoven.

ARGH!!!!

So here are some pictures of my hair at present. Let's call these the Before Pics, mmmkay?

Front:


Back/side:


(Please also note the wall of boxes in the background of the top picture; those are the 34 boxes I collected from the friendly and accommodating liquor store earlier today. They've become our own, personal Mt. Everest for both Kiddo and Crazy Cat. I'm amazed the wall is still standing at this point...)

So, you see what my hair does when left to its own devices? See how it wings this way and that, curling at just the bottom in weird, opposing directions? This is the end result of washing, conditioning, towel-drying, anti-frizz seruming and combing, then letting it dry naturally. Not. Pretty. At. All.

*sigh*

Tomorrow, my plan is to go and get my hair cut. At the very least, I need to get it trimmed, to de-split-endify and get my bangs back in their official neighborhood (that being just north of my eyebrows). I can't get rid of my bangs entirely - my hairline at the front is weird and not pretty and I hate my forehead. So, bangs in some form shall stay. (I learned this lesson the last time I grew my hair out, when I grew out my bangs for like 2 years and when they'd FINALLY reached a length that I no longer actually had any more bangs, I promptly marched into my hair salon and had her cut them back in, breathing huge sighs of relief as she did.) If I could achieve one of the cute-n-sassy, short cuts, that wouldn't require crazy upkeep and daily maintenance, I would do it, at this point, I think... But then, there's a whole year (actually, 15 months!) of suffering through the growing-out hell hair that I've done, all down the drain in one, fell cut. Would I regret giving up after perservering for so long? Maybe...

So, dear blogosphere friends (and random strangers who happen across this post), what do you think I should do? Please keep in mind that whatever hair I come up with has to flatter (as best it can - I realize it is just hair after all, and not a full-head plastic surgery substitute nor an opaque, paper bag) my head, cheeks and chins... I'd rather not look too matronly, but it also has to be age-appropriate.

Choices are:

A) Cut it!
B) Keep the faith and keep growing it out!
C) Seriously, Heather, there are way more important things to be carrying on about than your stupid hair! I mean, have you heard about the economy? The wars? Global warming?

If you vote A, any style suggestions (links to actual photos especially) would be greatly appreciated.

If you vote B, any style suggestions for the next interminable stretch of growing it out (links to actual photos especially) would be greatly appreciated.

And if you vote C, I know. I totally know.... And yet, I obsess. I moan, I stare at myself in the mirror, I try things, then I come here and I whinge on and on. It's my blog and I'll foist my follicle crisis upon the world via this post if I want to!

Stay tuned.... I will post After pictures tomorrow of whatever winds up happening atop my crazy noggin!

Friday Foto Fun: Follicular Follies

Hello, hello world! It feels like forever since I've been here! I've been buried under a mountain of boxes and used Puffs Pluses for the past few days, as I tried to continue with Operation Declutter around the home-from-school Kiddo, who has one heckuva bad cold. I know, I know, it seems like she is always sick, but actually she's staying healthy for much longer stretches than she used to when she was younger. I don't know if it is because of the circumstances of her premature, complicated birth or what, but she does manage to pick up a lot of germs. One of these days, I'll finally get a patent for my stylish yet functional Biohazard Bubble suit and then I'll be able to retire with my wads of cash to my private, tropical isle without fear of anyone ever catching another germ again. Until that day, though, I gamely troop on, Vicksing soles and humidifying rooms, steaming congested heads in the shower and squirting saline spray up Niagara Fallsian nostrils, losing game after game of Mario Kart Wii (yes, even when under the weather, Kiddo still kicks my sorry behind at All Things Wii) and fixing bowl after bowl of chicken noodle soup.

The good news is that Kiddo was able to return to school today, and thus life returned to normal, or whatever it is that approximates normal in my life these days... So anyhow, sorry I've been a bad blogoshpere citizen and haven't been leaving loads of comments or posting merrily away, I'm still here, just a wee bit crazed of late.

Before I return once more to my Mountain of Boxes, I will give you a little piece of Friday Foto Fun. You may recall, I have had hair issues pretty much my whole life. You may further recall my ongoing struggle to grow out the Mom 'Do. (Yes, I know, my hair is pretty much always a Hair Don't no matter what I try...) Well, it seems that I've finally, finally passed the stages of Wolverine Fawcett-Von Beethoven *and* Carol Brady. (And there was much rejoicing: yay.) Here's what it looks like as of this morning:



(Yes, I slapped on a little eyeliner and tinted lip gloss prior to photographing myself. I was feeling kind of icky following this morning's torture session - I mean Zumba class - and wanted to look spiffy for y'all. That's not blusher on my cheeks, either, by the way - just a combination of leftover redfacedness from working out and then walking all the way across the Y parking lot in the stinging, windblown snow. Brrr. Oh no, wait, I mean that's just my natural, youthful, rosy glow... *snort*) (Oh, and see that blank wall right behind me? A week ago, there was a jammed-full-of-stuff bookcase in that spot. Go, Operation Declutter!)

Okay, so I no longer can lay claim to being the illegitimate love child of Wolverine, Farrah and Ludwig. (I'm not a geneticist; you figure out how 2XY+1XX = 1 ilc......) Now I seem to have mid-90s, midsize market News Anchor hair going on instead. Woot. I'm in dire need of a trim again (as evidenced by my vision-impairing bangs) and have been feeling sorely tempted to just cut it all off again. (Chorus of screams: NOOOOOOOO! Don't!!!) (Or should I? Hmmmm.) I'm hoping that it is long enough now that when I do finally get around to going to the hair stylist, she can give me something more closely resembling an actual style, because as you can see above, I still have the dreaded Mom 'Do. Oh well, at least it isn't winging out all over anymore! If anyone has any thoughts on the topic, feel free to share.....

So that's what's going on in my neck of the woods. I have like half a dozen posts in draft form about all sorts of scintillating topics like Lost, American Idol, the aforementioned Zumba class and my ongoing adventures in the ladies' locker room at the Y, but right now, I must be getting back to my boxes - I want to get another load ready to haul off to the storage unit before Kiddo gets home from school. I am going to leave with you with the following video clip, because I've got Latin music on the mind after Zumba this morning and because it's almost Valentine's Day..... Enjoy The One Semester of Spanish Spanish Love Song:



Au revoir!

That's Heather with a Z!

Liza Minelli, Lance Bass, Carol Burnett, Naomi Watts, Heidi Klum, Mylene Farmer. You might be asking, what the heck do those folks have in common? (You might also be asking "and who the hey is Mylene Farmer?" Fair question, I had no idea myself! She is a French singer of some note, according to Wikipedia.) Anyhow, what Liza, Lance, Carol, Naomi, Heidi and Mylene all have in common is..... they're supposedly my celebrity matches, at least in terms of facial resemblance.

You see, my bloggy buddy Debbie over at Suburb Sanity put a post up this morning about her celebrity matches. In it, she bemoans the fact that several of her matches are of the male gender. I instantly knew I could make her feel better by going to the site she'd used and finding my own celebrity matches. I zipped over to the site, uploaded my most recent avatar photo and voila, here's what it said:



Naomi Watts! Woo! She's actually about a zillion times hotter than I am since I'm not even pretty and all, but I'll take King Kong's #1 Babe for sure! But then, look who is next: Thomas Klestil. (Who??) Yep, I supposedly bear a strong resemblance to a dead, Austrian diplomat. Huh. Well, at least he was President... Now, results that are sure to make Debbie feel better show that Tommy Boy isn't the only man I resemble. Nope, you'll note that I also resemble James Spader (and in his puffier, older Boston Legal stage, not his feathery, hot preppiness Pretty in Pink stage), as well as Josh Groban and Leonardo DiCaprio.

I then tried another photo. (Okay, I tried a few more photos.) I used a slightly different angle from my avatar photo shoot and this is what came up:



Ah, Mme. Farmer bumps Naomi Watts out of the top spot this time. She is my only female repeating face, too (Puffy-n-Wrinkly James Spader and Howie Dorough - wasn't he a Backstreet Boy? - also repeat). Hmmm. Number two? Der Bingle. Hee! Hey - he dueted with David Bowie (on an admittedly godawful Christmas song) so that's like some pictorial six degrees of separation then, right? And Andie McDowell snogged Hugh Grant several times on film, so that's decent in the pictorial/filmy 6 degrees way...

Here's the next one I tried - my avatar picture from earlier this summer:



Heidi Klum? Va va va voom! Now I'm pictorially six degrees from Tim Gunn, Michael Kors and Nina Garcia? Fierce! (Though again, Heidi = Major Hottie, Heather = Not So Much.) I do have several quibbles with this one, though, and not just because some of them are guys (again!). For example, my forehead is nowhere nearly as large or prominent as Christina Ricci's and while my mustache is becoming more visible as I'm aging, I don't think I'm up to Goran Visnjic (another hottie) levels of stubble. Furthermore, in case you hadn't noticed, I'm just about the whitest chick that ever was, so Martin Lawrence? Really? Not even in my darkest of tans, people.

I did another shot from earlier this summer, where I had my contacts in instead of my specs:



That's Heather with a Z people! I will confess to wearing about as much eye make-up as Liza back in the 80s, but not any time in the last decade or two. Look who else is in this one - a bunch of folks I don't recognize and can't be bothered to google, Matthew McConaughey (all right, all right, all right - another hottie I could never compete with) and some indie darlings like Leelee Sobieski (don't really see that, but okay) and Parker Posey, who always cracks me up in the various Christopher Guest films.

Speaking of the 80s, I had reminisced to Debbie about how as a 17 year old, I was twice mistaken for Bette Midler. Both times in NYC, one of them while taking a public bus. At the time, I was a wee bit "Whaaa?" not only because of the age difference between us, but because I sincerely doubt that the Divine Miss M would ride a NYC public bus. Come on, now! So, I uploaded a photo of me at 17 to see whether Bette would appear....



Lance Bass? Not even close. Oy. Oh, and hey there, Forest Whitaker, didja know we're alike? You know, you being African American, male, and a multi-talented Oscar winner and me being Caucasian, female and a multitasking stay at home mom....... Yep, we're practically twins! And look who else came up for Younger, 80s Jersey Girl Me - Anne Frank. ?!?!? Chuck Norris. ?!?!? Again, is my mustache really that noticeable? I mean, I didn't have any 'stache at all back in the 80s.... But there's Emmy Rossum, who is quite pretty, and Clara Bow too, so I was apparently a bit of an It Girl in my teenage years. Too bad nobody told me back then.

All right, time for the last picture. I was curious to see if this site would see the obvious resemblance my hair-growing-out self bears to a certain comic book movie character and/or famous, dead German composer.



Nope, no Wolverine or Beethoven. Carol Burnett - she's cool, I'll take it. Sean Lennon - again with the flipping facial hair? I'm running to the store for some Jolene Creme Bleach stat! Steven Soderbergh doesn't even HAVE hair, how the hey could my ginormous hair make me a match for him?!? (But, you know, he's worked with George Clooney several times so I'll let it slide.)

Anyhow, this is how I unproductively spent a good chunk of my morning. Overall, I bear the strongest resemblance to Liza, according to this site at least. I'm mightily resisting the temptation to load Hubby and Kiddo's faces into the site now, as well as all my other family and friends... Debbie, I hope this makes you feel better and helps you avoid the Botox, 'kay?

The morning after...

Whew. That was amazing. I felt like the most popular girl in the world yesterday - Queen for a Day!



For the record, this particular tiara that I pulled out of Kiddo's collection is the one from the infamous Princess birthday party. Fancy! Also, this enables everyone who is curious to see that (a) I have not gotten any sort of body wave/perm - yet - and (b) my hair is as Wolverine Fawcett-van Beethoven-y as ever. Clearly, I do not have any kewl photo-editing software like, say, the Photoshop Elements 7 that SITS is giving away this month (click on that link, you KNOW you want to enter! No, wait, on second thought, don't, 'cause I need that software, as is made obvious by the picture above...) Yes, if I had that software, you'd be seeing less chin(s) and blotches and more even, peachy complected, matte-finish skin, and possibly George Clooney right next to me, photoshopped in to look like he's thrilled to have my expansive behind parked on his lap.

I am still reeling from the commenty love you guys just heaped upon my blog yesterday. Really, it couldn't have been more fantabulous - this totally makes up for the time when I got a measly two Valentines in my oh-so-hopefully decorated shoebox in grade school one year. (Also why I now insist that Kiddo brings Valentines for EVERYONE in her class each V Day. Humph.) I've begun responding to each and every one of you - all 272 hits to my blog which is by far a one-day record for me! - but there were a few popular comment topics that I thought I'd address right here.

First off, the hair. Well, the picture above should handle the burning question of "Has Heather given up and shaved her head yet, or gone the other way and bought herself some of those Paris Hilton extensions they sell at the kiosk in the middle of the poshest mall in her town?" Well, no and no. For a brief, three day period a couple of weeks ago, it seemed like I'd gone past the Wolverine stage and into a more Mom-esque, feathery 'do, but it turns out my hair was just messing with me, because it is even more Wolverine-y than ever. If you want further photographic chuckles of the Heather Hair Follies, you can follow the progression to today's voluminous wonder by checking out this post from early June and this one from a few weeks later. Please note that all photographs in these posts as well as the one above were taken by me, so without benefit of great distance (my arms are long, but not nearly long enough) or fancy angles.

Regarding the splintery badness, Kiddo's hand did recover fully within a few weeks, even with the doctor leaving over a dozen shards of playground still stuck in her hand. Today, there's not even a scar left on her palm, yay polysporin! (Her knees, on the other hand, are a topographical map of Places Kiddo Has Wiped Out scars. Her record for not falling over the past year is 12 days. We need one of those signs like they post for workplace injuries in factories for how many days we've gone without Kiddo skinning, scraping, slicing or otherwise banging up her knees...) And Kiddo's line about not being done with her tears yet? I'm so not making that up - she says that EVERY time she's crying, usually when we're trying to dab at the snot running full-tilt from her nose with a tissue as she sobs. Hubby and I will be all "But we just want the snot, you can KEEP your tears...." but there's no drying or wiping allowed until she is good and ready to be done. At that point, she usually lets us know by coming over and wiping her gooey, tear-spattered face all over our clothes...

As for Jeopardy, yep, I was on there. You should realize that since my name is "Heather" and not "Ken Jennings" that I didn't win big. Actually, I didn't win at all. I came in second. This was back in 2003, well, the episode taped in November of 2002 and aired in March of 2003. I'll tell you all about the whole experience if you're interested, just say the word. In the meantime, I'll always have this:



(the original of this shot is sitting in its Official Jeopardy Glass Frame on the Shelf of Honor in one of our living room bookcases, right next to the pictures of me with Eddie Izzard and Penn and Teller...)

I was extra pleased to meet a couple of other SITStas who are either adopted or are parents through adoption, just like me and just like me, and some other moms of kids with SPD, too!

Oh, and I thought I would share the Posts That Almost Were Featured, in case you wanted to check them out instead of wandering aimlessly through the miles of words I've posted here since I began blogging earlier this year. I had a hard time picking three posts, and these were other strong contenders:

Wherein I discover that Hubby and I aren't exactly on the same page: Oh, erm, that wasn't exactly what I had in mind

Why I don't work out as often as I should: If you're reading this in the buff, I don't want to know...

Because I am so shy and retiring as well as being an intensely private person: My most embarrassing moments

In which I am almost done in by the Peppercorn of Death: Company social event

There isn't enough spandex and lycra in the world....: Thar she blows!

And if that isn't enough for you and you're just dying to know even more about yours truly, you can check out my 100 Things for my 100th post or any one of the memes I've done (I love me some memes - either doing them or reading them on other folks' blogs) by clicking on the "meme" label over on the left.

Okay, before I wrap this up, I have to say something that has been weighing heavily upon me. (No, I am not referring to the bag of Cheez Doodles I inhaled during my last bout of PMS, either.) There is just one thing that bummed me out majorly about my big Featured SITS Blogger day. I know, I know - she's complaining?! Really?!? Well, it must be said. I'm extremely disappointed that out of all of you who visited and left me comments yesterday, not a single one of you gave me George Clooney's email address or phone number. Come on, now, we're all within six degrees of separation from each other, right? Heck, even six degrees of Kevin Bacon from each other would get me to George..... (George was in The Thin Red Line with Sean Penn, who was in Mystic River with Kevin Bacon, so that's two degrees.) Someone has got to at least know someone who knows The Man Himself... really, no one could hook me up? How about Alan Rickman? Eddie Izzard? Not even an email? No? Nothing? Phooey. Oh, I know - you're saving it for my birthday, right? You looked on my profile, saw I'm a December baby and thought "George's (or Alan's or Eddie's) phone number would make the PERFECT 37th birthday present for Heather!" Yep, that's what I'm going with - I never said I didn't live in the land of delusion! I'll just bide my time until mid-December, and by then I'll be so wonked out on Christmas stuff I'll have forgotten all about this egregious slight.

In all seriousness though, I want to give a heartfelt THANK YOU for making my big day so utterly amazing! I hope you will stop by again sometime, and I promise I'll be stopping by all of your wonderful blogs in the coming days, too. SITS rocks!

Miscellany: Sweet 16, The Silence of the Voles, Google hilarity

Sixteen years ago tonight was my first date with Hubby! He picked me up at my apartment in his teeny-tiny Ford Festiva and we went to Pizzeria Uno for dinner, then to see Last of the Mohicans (its opening night). After the movie, we went to Friendly's for dessert, where I was impressed by Hubby managing to put away an entire Jim Dandy sundae -



- that's FIVE scoops of ice cream, y'all! (I should point out Hubby was only a 19 year old college student at the time, and hasn't eaten a sundae half as large in over a decade...) We sat and talked 'til the restaurant closed. Then, we headed back to my apartment where Hubby came up (oh hush now, I'm not like that on a first date) and we watched Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, because I was horrified that Hubby had never seen it. (That's a movie that we still quote to each other on practically a daily basis, and it's a good thing Hubby liked it as much as I do, as that was part of my future-husband-material litmus test.) After that, we talked some more and he left my apartment around 4:15 in the morning. And that was the Great Beginning, sixteen years ago today...

***

So, yesterday I mowed the lawn. It was far overdue for a mowing, and the back yard was especially jungle-y. When I got to the back, I dragged Kiddo's playhouse up onto the deck, as is customary, and shook my head when I saw the obvious signs that some of our community of voles had set up an outpost - vacation home perhaps? - underneath the playhouse - vole poop, little trails, two voles scurrying away and under the fence, etc. We never put any rat poison underneath the deck this summer, where their primary metropolis exists, and I've seen evidence as always that they were utilizing both my food garden and planting beds as their own personal salad bar, so I wasn't surprised to see that they'd been under the playhouse. I began the mowing, iPod on and my Aerosmith playlist cranked up so I could hear it over our loud, old, gas-powered push mower. As I was going over the area where the playhouse had been, I mowed over a largish tuft of dead grass that I had figured was the voles' vacation bed. Coincidentally, as the front edge of the mower hit this tuft, the song I'd been listening to ended and there was a moment of silence just long enough for me to hear some hideous squeaking as the mower blades momentarily caught on something in the grass. I immediately stopped the engine, but it was too late - what I'd just run over with the Grassy Blades of Death was not an abandoned pile of grass for bedding, but a nest containing several small and now quite diced and dead baby voles.

I felt just horrible about it, as I hadn't intended to slaughter an entire nest of helpless babies, rodents or otherwise. I fetched a shovel from the garage, scooped up the gooey, gory remains and carried them ceremoniously down to the pond, where I gave them a burial at sea. (I figured the fish or herons or other pond-area wildlife would appreciate some Vole Tartar.) I mean, as much as I hate the stupid voles and do intentionally try to off them in their adult form (via the rat poison under the deck), I didn't mean to kill a whole passel of babies. To paraphrase Hannibal Lecter, now it will be some time before the voles stop screaming............... It also will be some time before I offhandedly mow any lumps of grass, as well. I imagine those baby voles are now sitting up there in animal heaven, alongside the squirrel I ran over when I was 17 and the bird that flew into my car earlier this summer, leaving grisly bits embedded in the front grill, and they're all waiting for their turn to cast their judgement upon me, the careless machinery operator who sent them to their doom...

***

So, from time to time I read posts other folks have written about the weird Google searches that brought people to their blog. Well, I certainly have my fair share of those too, and now's as good a time as any to share them with you. Here goes with a sampling from the past week's searches:

goldfish getting fat

Perhaps installing a tiny treadmill in the tank would help?

coke-bottle glasses thick

Yep, that's me. I could start fires in seconds by holding my glasses up to the sun. Seriously.

kids gotta pee

Yes, they do. True story.

how to make a loud burp without soda

I'm a bit sad that I didn't have any actual answers for this person on my blog...

the mom haircut
and
Mrs. Brady hair

These both appeared several times from different places. Who knew so many folks out there are interested in either mom hair or the mother of all moms, Mrs. Brady's hair?

neti pot hurt eardrum

Well, I told you I don't ever want to use one of those things, and here's just one more reason why.

why is my child barfing all over the bed

Um, I'm not sure, but sorry - perhaps a throw-up bucket would be a good idea?

funk

In which regard: bringing it, smelling it, or listening to it?

How to look like Angelina Jolie

Sorry, I certainly can't help you there. Getting Brad Pitt as arm candy might help, though.

apple bread more with less

This one just doesn't make sense. Anyone? Anyone? Bueller?

food getting stuck in teeth all the time

Have you tried flossing?

moms in jeopardy

I don't know what you were looking for, but I was on Jeopardy and I am now a mom...

How to remove very big splinter from childs skin without screaming

Well, I certainly would also love the answer to that one!

Boobs in a swimming pool

Yes, there frequently are.

Now, I have had many search hits every week for things like "naked locker room" or "embarrassing public nudity" thanks to some of my older posts, but I'm guessing that the people doing those searches aren't getting the results they were hoping for when they stumble upon my little blog. Hee!

Okay, I could keep rambling on, but I have a list of errands to do and I'm burning daylight here. Hope everyone is having a great day out there in the blogosphere!

Update round-up

First of all, we opted to stay home instead of going out in the pouring down, thundery weather to attend the Jimmy Sturr concert, so no polkatastic good time for us. I mean, had Noah floated his ark by us (or alternatively, Steve Carell - boy was that not a good movie, and Hubby and I both love Steve Carell) we might've hopped on board, but only if the ark had a lightning rod on top. Honestly, we figured there was no way the concert was still happening, Hubby's golf outing was cancelled, after all... I learned today, however, that the concert did happen and was extremely well attended (from the pictures I saw online, by a rather large bunch of quite hardy oldsters) so shoot, no rain date and we missed the fun. Maybe there'll be a repeat performance next summer...

The AC on my beloved Sienna is still not fixed. This last time (#5) that we brought it in, they ultimately determined that it is something to do with the evaporator, which is yet another crazy expensive part that requires ordering. To be fair, our dealership is going above and beyond at this point in terms of the neverending problems with the AC, and we very much appreciate all they've done. With any luck, the new part will be in tomorrow and then Hubby can drop the van off either Wednesday or Thursday, whereupon they'll have to take apart the entire dashboard area to replace this one bit. Hopefully they can dig out those fossilized Goldfish crackers, Cheerios and raisins that the kiddo hurled up into the air vents about three years back while they're in there. To be rid of that occasional rattling wouldn't be a bad thing! (No, I don't think her thrown-for-distance from the back seat snacks are the cause of all the problems. That's definitely a coincidence, right?)

The finches have long departed the petunia basket nest, and for that matter, the petunia baskets themselves are now departed. The heat and wind did them in faster than I could keep them watered, alas, and so I replaced them with some hot pink begonias for the remainder of the summer. All the perennials have been going crazy, especially my Russian sage and English daisies, both of which are almost as tall as the top of my head! The butterfly bushes are blooming and beginning to attract quite a few butterflies, which ties in to my later summer obsession of getting a cool and arty photo of them, something that's hard to do with my point-and-shoot camera.

Oh, and while we don't have the finches in the nest, they're still hanging about the house, either chilling out in our lilac bushes in front or perching on the deck and fence in back. Hubby is starting to grumble ominously about not restocking the feeders, as the amount of bird poop on the deck, fence and porch is getting a bit out of control. I've promised not to buy another bag of birdseed when the current bag (that I just bought) runs out, and I'm only refilling the feeders every second or third day now (they empty in about 12 hours). I am still keeping the hummingbird feeder full and fresh - love those hummingbirds!

The finches aren't the only birds chilling in our lilac bushes. This summer, we've had a mama duck and her five ducklings hanging out there, too! They bathe in the downspout runoff when it rains, eat the birdseed scattered off the edge of the porch by the finches, and sleep underneath the largest lilac. Then they march on down to the pond for a swim (and/or to bother the kiddo when she's fishing back there - they loooove to go after her bobber!) and we'll see them heading back up to our yard again when they're done at the pond. There's no nest under there and the ducklings are now almost as big as Mama, but they're still cute and I will confess to giving the kiddo the heels of the bread loaves to feed them. The ducklings come within mere inches of her feet, whereas Mama Duck is a bit more dubious and hangs back a bit further, though she will gobble up any bread bits that get close enough to her.

We've been reaping the fruits of our labors in the food garden and berry patch. Hubby actually ate some of the strawberries and proclaimed them tasty, but I've been leaving them for the birds in exchange for leaving the other berry plants alone. We've picked maybe a half pint of raspberries and almost a pint of blueberries so far, all delicious! The blackberry bush didn't take to the transplanting and doesn't look like it will bear fruit this summer, but there's a lot of new growth so I'm hopeful for next year. We've also had sugar snap peas coming out our ears, which is awesome because we all love them and last year's crop stunk. Speaking of ears, after being cautiously optimistic about the 6 corn seedlings we put in as they grew to about 2 feet high, our hopes were dashed as 2 feet seems to be the maximum and they've not gotten any taller. Not sure if the stalks are tall enough to actually produce any ears, but you never know!

What else? Oh, a splintery badness update - true to the doctor's word, the kiddo's hand has completely healed, without infection or further medical intervention necessary. So, WHEW for that!!

In other medically related news, I've pretty much been wearing my glasses exclusively, as my eyes have been crazy itchy and I definitely do NOT want a recurrence of the Eye Ick from Hell! Even in the pool, I rock my Jackie O-ish, crazy Magoo thick, prescription sunglasses. At least this way, I'll have more pairs of contacts to use up on our vacay to Disney World next month! (Hubby and the kiddo made a paper chain to count down the days, and while it seems really long, I know we're just over a month now which is bad news for my "amazing weight loss and getting fit and toned" plan. Oh well, I can still tone in the next monthish, anyhow...)

I think that catches me up on everything, except for the ongoing Hair Follies. I'm utterly depressed at how long it is taking my hair to grow out, but happy that most days now, it doesn't get too Wolverine, Farrah or Carol Brady-esque even when I only do a minimum of hair fussing. So I guess that is something!

Anyhow, that's what's been going on in my neck of the woods, how are you doing? Having a good summer so far? Hot enough for ya? Doing anything exciting, going anywhere exotic or enjoying a "staycation" instead? Do tell!

Channeling Carol Brady...

While chatting online with a dear friend who was raised in the UK and is presently living Down Under, I discovered that there apparently is a whole section of the world who might not get my Carol Brady hair reference. (Seriously, I thought the Brady Bunch was universal, how could it not be? What's next - folks who've never seen Gilligan's Island or Happy Days?)

In the interest of international diplomacy, therefore, I scurried about on Google and came up with the following photographic examples of Mrs. Brady's hair. I may not be all the way to the full-on Carol Brady Flip just yet, but I bet I can get there in a matter of weeks. In the meantime, my hair seems perfectly content to channel other Mrs. Brady hairstyles, so I'm planning on stringing up some beads in the kiddo's bedroom doorway and calling her Johnny Bravo and trading in my Sienna for a groovy station wagon, preferably with wood paneling down the sides.

Forthwith, pictures of my present hair don't icon, Carol Brady.

My hair can definitely do this already, without much styling required. My lips likewise are well suited to sucking down milkshakes, though I don't know that I would be so inclined to share any decent milkshake with my hubby...


Here's the full-on flip. Now my hair has a goal to which to aspire, woo!



I hope this provides assistance and clarification for my friends from abroad, those poor, sad souls who grew up without knowing the story of a lovely lady, who was bringing up three very lovely girls.....

Wolverine Fawcett-van Beethoven has left the building, but my hair still has multiple personality disorder

In the ongoing attempts to grow out my hair, I headed to the hair salon today. The Wolverine Fawcett-van Beethoven was getting way out of control. My bangs were long enough to get tangled in my lower eyelashes (really irritating, to say the least), the crown was just flopping around in a "no mousse or wax or spray gel will move me" sort of bird's nest, and the bottoms were winging out all crazy. Even more worrying, the back seems to've grown at a faster rate than the sides and front, and was beginning to look suspiciously mullet-esque. Egads! I may be from Jersey, but I will *not* walk around with a mullet, or even a faux-mullet. So, off to the salon I went, clutching the latest batch of "oh I'd love my hair to look like this" pictures I'd printed off the 'net and with half a mind to just chop it all off again. The thing is, it's getting soooo close to being out of the heinous, growing-out stage that I wanted to stay strong and not cave in to the chop-it-all-off-again impulse.

I didn't cave in, as it turns out. My willpower was strong, along with some help from the stylist, who was quite encouraging and proclaimed that my hair could be as long as her between chin-length and shoulder-length bob by October, especially if I take Vitamin D supplements, which make hair grow, dontcha know. I'll get right on that... Anyhow, she told me she'd bring the back up a bit so that it lost the appearance of a faux-mullet and would "clean up" the rest and trim my bangs. Sounded like a plan, so off we went.

Now, being as ridiculously nearsighted as I am, I couldn't see a thing as she was cutting my hair, since I had to remove my specs and had them safely secured under the cape. It felt like she was cutting a lot, and I could see bits of hair falling past my face and into my lap. She blitzed through a styling monologue as she squirted and sprayed various products into my hair, including "root booster" and "volumizer" (my blood pressure spiked at that, 'cause dagnabit, I don't NEED any extra volume, hello, I was trying to exorcise Wolverine Fawcett van-Beethoven after all!) and different "styling spritzes" as she aimed a hair dryer set to "jet engine" at my skull. She kept repeating "and then you just finger dry it and make it piece-y" as she worked, and, being unable to see anything and going by feel as I was, I just nodded along.

When she pronounced me finished, I whipped out my glasses and stuck them back on. True enough, W F-van B was gone. Alas, my hair now seemed like it was trying to be Rue McClanahan, circa the Golden Girls. EEEK!



I had a feeling that once I got home and washed all the root booster, styling spritzers and that godforsaken volumizer out, it would not be nearly so bad. Stylists always seem to want to go ka-razy with my hair, no matter the length. It's like I'm one of those giant Barbie make-up heads come to life in their chair or something. Usually I can de-overstyle it with a wash or comb-through, so I wasn't too concerned. Out in the car, I tried to bring it down a bit on top and de-piece it a bit, and when I got home, I hopped in the shower. (The picture above actually was post-me-messing with it in the car and pre-shampooing, for proper chronological identification.)

I'd just finished combing my now de-producted hair when the kiddo needed my assistance. I headed off with a wet head and it was mostly dry all of its own accord, with nary a styling aid, when I made it back upstairs to see what I could do. Imagine my shock when I realized that my hair was no longer channeling Blanche Devereaux, but instead had morphed into this:



Anton Chigurh? Dorothy Hamill on a particularly bad hair day? A wannabe member of Beatlemania? Buster Brown? Hmmmm. The stylist did say that my hair was close to "being able to style into a bob" so perhaps this is what she meant.

I wet it down and started anew, with a few styling aids and the dryer. It seems that this:



is what my hair wants to do right now. A modified Carol Brady (I can't manage to photograph the back of my head on my own, but I've got the Carol Brady flippy-curl up thing going on pretty solidly) but definitely better than the Wolverine Fawcett-van Beethoven or the Anton Chigurh. I think.

Stay tuned for continuing lengths of the saga, friendos............................

Hot mess

As most people living in the northeast of the US are already aware, we're in the midst of a hot spell. I'm not sure how many days it takes of consecutive hot days to officially constitute a heat wave, but we've been above normal - way above normal - since late last week. Looking at the 10 day forecast on the Weather Channel's site, it doesn't look like we'll be back to more seasonably warm-but-not-roasting temperatures 'til early next week. That means several more days of "oh my goodness, have we moved to the face of the Sun?" type heat to get through.

And, yes it is a cliché, but it is true: it's not the heat, it's the humidity. I don't mind heat, so long as it's a dry heat. I've happily hung out outdoors in Vegas when it was over 110 in the shade. I'm talking Vegas in July and August, with nary a complaint. The humidity, though, that's the thing that I abhor - when you walk outside and the air touching your skin has the feeling of a large dog's tongue licking you, if that large dog had just run a marathon then drunk warm chocolate syrup. That is what makes air conditioning so delightful, no?

Unfortunately, this week's heat coincides with the AC in our minivan failing. This in and of itself is a bad thing, but it is compounded by the fact that this isn't the first time the AC has gone kaput. It isn't even the second time. No, this is the fourth time within a 13 month period that it's died on us. The first time was last May, when it was warm but not crazy hot. We took it in, had it repaired, paid the bill and thought that was that. When it conked out a little over a month later, we were in the midst of a six-hours-each-way road trip for a family wedding. It was significantly hotter that weekend and driving home especially was most unpleasant. We called the dealership from the road and made arrangements to have it re-fixed. We were a bit less thrilled with the bill the second time around, but we really thought that was that. Which it was, until May rolled around this year and it died for a third time. This time, Hubby called the dealership with a good deal of righteous indignation. We certainly didn't feel like forking over several hundred dollars for something they'd supposedly fixed twice already. Well, whaddya know - this time, the problem was in an entirely different part of the AC system, and a more expensive, extensive repair-required part to boot. Crapola. Several hours and over a grand later, the van was cool once again, until this past weekend, when the AC once more gave up the ghost.

Now, we have a Toyota. We love Toyotas. We've driven nothing but Toyotas since we bought a Tercel back when we were newlyweds. That Tercel lasted through 14 years of bad upstate NY and northern New England winters, driving from NY to Florida and back, driving between NY and NH through the mountains and mud season for over a year - it was a great car. We had the most minimal maintenance/repair expenses over its hard-driven 14 years and it was just ridiculously reliable. Our Tercel had close to 200,000 miles on it when we traded it in for a new Camry last summer. We also had a Corolla for a few years on a lease, that we turned in for the Sienna back in 2000. We've been hoping that the Sienna will last us another couple of years, which doesn't seem too far-fetched, and we certainly don't want a second car payment added into the budget. I don't think we've had two simultaneous car payments in ten years, back when gas was less than a buck a gallon. But then again, we're not keen on dropping a thousand dollars every other month to get the AC working again either.

So, we are taking the van in on Wednesday to find out what's broken this time and how much it's going to cost us. With our luck, it will be a new problem so not something they'll graciously fix for free. The forecasted high for tomorrow is 85, with thunderstorms. That'll be one toasty drive to preschool. At least today, we could drive with the windows open. (Which, by the by, doesn't do the Wolverine Fawcett-Van Beethoven 'do any favors. "Windswept" isn't exactly the adjective one wants to add to "ginormous, Jersey hair" you know. It literally becomes one hot mess of hair. I could hairspray the heck out of my hair - I'm talking Sally Field in Steel Magnolias levels of helmet-head - and the wind pattern through the van with both windows rolled down would still kill it. Egad.) That would be one advantage if it does wind up being more cost-effective to replace the Sienna instead of repairing the AC again - the new models have back windows that roll down. That might come in handy some day...

So, hopefully the current AC issue is easily, quickly, cheaply and permanently resolved. If not, hopefully there are some really excellent deals to be had both on trading in an 8 year old Sienna with a bum AC system and buying a new Sienna with functioning AC...

Slip 'n Sliding away

It was hot here today. Really, really hot. Also really, really humid. These two factors combine to affect the Smith Chicks' hair in very different ways. When it is the least bit humid out, the kiddo's hair goes into these ringlet curls - the same curls I have actually paid hair stylists to put in for fancy updo styles, you know, those delicate, curly tendrils that frame one's face oh-so-romantically - and it is absolutely adorable on her. Me, on the other hand? All the humidity and heat do to my Wolverine van Beethoven (now slightly longer but still very, very layered and not nearly long enough to be out of the awkward stage) is make it even larger and more feathered. I guess it is now less Wolverine van Beethoven than Wolverine Fawcett, because it is trying like heck to feather itself all over my head.


Proof right here: (and kindly ignore the glistening and pink cheeks; it was hot and I'd just come in from the gym...)



Yes, you can take the girl out of Jersey, but you'll never take the Jersey out of her hair! I spent a good 20 minutes after my post-gym shower wielding spray gel, "texturizing" spray, anti-frizz goop and hairspray to get the volume to come down on top of my head. Also to get it to come in somewhat on the sides. A daunting task - it made me actually ponder buying a flat iron, but my forehead and ears remember all too well the burns left upon them back in the Scary Curling Iron days of my youth (when you'd fill the barrels with water, then push the end as you were curling so steam would come out, remember? Water + electricity + very close proximity to one's head = brilliant plan...) and so I think I'm going to tough it out a little longer. It can't stay this length forever, right?


So anyhow, it was hot today. The kiddo is mostly recovered from her pneumonia (we saw the doctor this afternoon, who said her lungs are sounding pretty good. Go Zithromax! Woot!) and was feeling antsy after spending most of the week in a very low-key, recovering-from-pneumonia manner. It seemed a fitting time, therefore, to break out one of her recently received birthday presents - a Slip 'n Slide. Now, when I was a kid, we never had a Slip 'n Slide. I didn't even have any friends who owned a Slip 'n Slide, so I never in my life have slipped 'n slid. It was always something that looked like sooooo much fun that I think a little piece of me always felt like my summers were never complete for not having had the Slip 'n Slide experience. Hubby reports the same, sad childhood tale of being utterly deprived of ever having played on a Slip 'n Slide, so the kiddo is the first member of our immediate family to be lucky enough to do so, and on one of her very own to boot! She was begging both of us to go with her, but the very scary warning printed right at the start of the plastic convinced any part of me that was still longing to try it, even just once, that I'm about 30 years too late (and several pounds too heavy) for that. Bummer.


Now, it seems from our (admittedly hazy) recollections from back in the day that the Slip 'n Slide engineering has greatly improved over the decades. What Hubby and I recall was little more than a long strip of plastic that those fortunate children who owned one would complain about tearing and getting punctured very easily. Now, it has a bumper-surrounded catching area at the end, as well as a row of pretty serious sprinklers down the side (which we didn't remember being a feature back in the 70s, but may've in fact been. Like I said, we were both deprived. I seem to remember it just being wet by the hose, but no arcing sprinkler action.)

While I was inside liberally slathering sunscreen on the kiddo, Hubby set up the Slip 'n Slide, angling it along the natural slope of our back yard and checking the underside area for sharp and/or pointy things. As our grass is presently in need of a trim, I think there was more cushioning than there otherwise might've been between the plastic and our hard, hard clay soil, so not a bad thing. Having it head downhill also helped improve the kiddo's sliding potential, of course. She couldn't wait to get sliding. Unfortunately, she really didn't want to attempt a running leap-belly flop combination (as we remember from the TV commercials of our youth), so she mostly just got a running start several yards back on the lawn, then continued running once she reached the plastic until she lost her footing and then slid the rest of the way on her behind/back. This was rather hilarious to watch (as evidenced by my giggling and inability to speak in a normal tone of voice from said giggling while trying out our new video camera) and didn't deter her from repeatedly doing the "run until she fell" maneuver, despite a few rather hard landings. I have a feeling she's going to have a sore behind in the morning...


The biggest downside to any water-related activity in our back yard is the lack of hot water capability. I suppose we could run the hose into the house through the window above the kitchen sink and hook it up to some warmer water courtesy of the kitchen tap, but we never have. Every pool, sprinkler and now Slip 'n Slide we've done has featured icy cold water straight from the outside faucet. This means that despite the great amounts of fun one is having and the incredible heat one may be outdoors in at the time, one's teeth eventually start chattering and one's Mean Mommy pulls the plug on the activity in favor of drying off and warming up. This is especially the case when one is recovering from pneumonia, so the Slip 'n Sliding was cut shorter than the kiddo may've liked. Good thing we're heading to the water park tomorrow, which is set to be another scorchingly hot and humid day!


(Oh, a quick petunia basket nest update: Mama Finch is still sitting on the nest, which still features 6 unhatched eggs, which as of this morning's plant watering were all standing on end. Do eggs turn upright as the baby is getting ready to hatch all on their own? Does the mama bird turn them? Will we have baby birdies soon? Stay tuned......)

(Oh, and a PPS - don't know if anyone noticed or not, but I'm not wearing my glasses in the picture above because I was wearing contacts today. Woo! Contacts! My "one month per eye" supply came in yesterday, and now I'm going to have to begin seriously exercising the restraint I promised myself I would in order to make that "one month" stretch out to three or four months, at least. It is too darn expensive to wear contacts every day at the price I have to pay for these. Though I will wear them tomorrow, since we're going to the amusement park......)

(Last PS for this post, I swear. I just spellchecked, as I somehow have a mental block on how to spell the word exercise - oh, the irony - and the spell check indicated that "scorchingly" is not a word. It gave me the option of "scorching" instead, which has me wondering - why isn't "scorchingly" a word? Is it a word and blogger spell check just doesn't get it? Hmmm.)

Hair-raising matters...

I've never had good hair. Well, I guess when I was really little, it wasn't too bad...

But as I exited toddlerhood and headed into little kid-hood, my hair became, at best, a nuisance. It was curly enough to achieve the "bed head" look without much effort, but not curly enough to look cute. Also, I hated having my hair touched, especially with a comb or a brush. (My, poor, sainted mother, who had to deal with my screaming fits whenever she'd approach me with any hair styling implements...) This didn't help matters, and there were many days when I cheerfully went about looking like this:

On those very infrequent days when I would consent to stand still long enough (still producing many an OW! or STOP IT!), my mom managed to get my hair into some semblance of neatness. Usually these days coincided with some Big, Important Event, like the first day of Brownies for example...

My mom never really knew what to do with my hair. It was the complete opposite of my younger sister's hair, which was stick-straight and fine. Her hair looked cute no matter how it was styled - pigtails, pony tail, barrettes, all looked great on her and with a minimum of effort. Mom's ultimate solution was just to keep my hair on the shorter side, so that it couldn't get too crazy.

As time went on, things went downhill for me in the looks department. By seventh grade, I was sporting braces to go along with my ginormous glasses and was hideously unfashionable in any and all clothing choices. I mean, this was the late 70s and early 80s, so it isn't like "fashion" was really all that great anyhow, but I was definitely not cool. So, the only hair solution for my entire look, of course, was a perm. A very, very tight perm.

Yeah. I rocked this look, or a variation thereof, throughout most of junior high and high school. The only difference, really, being the size of my hair and the color. I availed myself of some camomile soap with which I periodically turned my hair a rather odd shade of orangey-red. (As if any more evidence of my bookworm nerdiness was needed, I got the camomile soap tip from some novel or another, and by "novel" I don't mean anything popular. While I don't recall which book I read to glean this kernel of arcane beauty wisdom, it was undoubtedly some Victorian author's work that gave me this brilliant inspiration. Sad, I know.) Apparently my hairstyle icons were Ronald McDonald and Little Orphan Annie...

By senior prom, my hair was huge, as befit a teenage girl in New Jersey in the late 80s.

College, while not in NJ, didn't help much in the "get away from the large, permed hair look" department.
If anything, having the freedom to go get my hair styled however I wanted was worse than the Jersey Perm. I think the worst it ever got was when I tried going blonde (with professional help, mind you - I didn't attempt bleaching it on my own):

That was the zenith - or was it the nadir? - of my hair follies. After that, I went back to something more closely resembling my natural color (though still dyed) and started growing my hair out. In a few years' time, it went from this:

to winding up looking something like this by the mid-90s:

As you can see, medium-long wasn't any better for me, as my hair resolutely clung to its Jersey roots and tried to be big no matter what. Eventually, it got long enough that I could do things with it. Alas, it turned out that having had shorter hair my whole life, I missed out on crucial hair-styling experience. My long hair style repetoire consisted of a ponytail, braids (referred to by my coworkers as my "Pippi Longstocking" look), a faux-French twist using a massive butterfly clip, a barrette at the back of the crown of my head, or just plain down. I would try to blow it out straight sometimes, but it wouldn't last thanks to its natural curl. Occasionally, I'd implore a friend of mine (who insisted that I was ridiculously tender-headed, *humph*) to French braid my hair for me, and when she did it always looked nice. She couldn't be persuaded on a daily basis, however, so usually I wound up in the barrette or scrunchie. I stuck with the long hair -

- until the kiddo was born and developed a passion for wrapping my hair around her itty-bitty wrists and yanking with all her baby might. By the time she was 8 months old, my tender-headed scalp had endured quite enough of that, and I marched into my hair stylist and asked her to cut it all off. This led to the next phase, that I think of as "the Mom 'do" era -




Throughout this latest phase, I've felt, at best, ambivalent about my hair. I like that I broke my decades-long dyeing habit and have gone au naturel, color-wise (and my bank account likes that as well). I liked the concept that having it short enough meant I wouldn't have to worry about it, but even at its shortest, it isn't ever truly "wash and go" - that was more the case when it was longer. It still has just enough curl to be problematic and require more fussing than I care to deal with, and even when fussed with, the end result is still Mom Hair. So, I decided about 6 months ago that I was going to grow it out again. Apparently I suffer from some sort of amnesia regarding exactly how painful it is to grow out one's hair. I've been stuck in that awkward "in between" phase since practically the day I decided to grow it out. As it has gotten longer, my hair has taken on a life of its own. It defies styling attempts - no mousse, gel, or spray can tame it. My current style is best described as "Wolverine Van Beethoven" as you can see here:
So, what to do? It's like my hair is trying to be six years old again, albeit with several more (coarse, wiry) gray strands than I had back in the day.
I know it's reaching a crisis state because lately, I've been considering (and I can't believe I'm going to type these words) getting it permed again. Not the crazy perm of my youth, but a light wave just to give it some style as it gets longer. I'm thinking if I could regress my hair from age 6 back to age 3, I'd be all set...

In the meantime, I'm just glad my kiddo has good hair. It is curly but not crazy, relatively easy to style and looks good more than not. Whew!!