Saturday, June 13, 2009

The Long and Short of It

Why is it some women have this strange urge to grow their hair out? And then, just when it gets longer, we have this strange urge to cut it shorter again? It's something akin to a sport for some of us, I swear.

I had long, long hair when I was a little girl. At least I did until my brother decided to play "Barbershop" when we were staying at my grandma's house one weekend. Thankfully, he had barely started in with a pair of those little-kid safety scissors before grandma walked in the room and stopped him. Of course, that didn't change the fact that he'd already successfully hacked a big chunk out of the hair on the back of my head.

Let's just say my mother was less than amused. She washed and brushed out my hair one last time, had my dad take me to Sears for one last picture of me with my long hair (since the front still looked unscathed) and then had it all cut off in what was probably supposed to look like a Dorothy Hamill cut. Trust me, I never felt like I would be twirling on ice with that haircut. To this day, I still think of the term 'bowl haircut' when I see me with that hairdo. Ugh.

Ironically, that was the beginning of many years of growing my hair out long and then chopping it all off again. And again. And... well... again.

I always want what I don't have. Like curly hair. I got more permanent waves in my lifetime than I care to admit to. A few even made me look remarkably like Chaka Khan. Just in case you are wondering, it was not an attractive look for a short, chubby white girl.

Now, on the verge of 39, I still cannot figure out what the heck I want my hair to look like. The angst usually starts after a bad hair cut. I kind of go on strike, I guess you'd say. I decide to just grow it all back out and pull it back in a pony tail every day. Quick. Easy. Not very flattering, mind you, but efficient nonetheless.

And then I get the urge. The Urge. Like now. I have it, and bad. I want to get a style. Something that just screams SASSY! The problem is, I never know what that style is.

So, this time I hatched a plan: I took pictures of two hairstyles I couldn't choose between, and then asked a bunch of the ladies from work yesterday. I kept the running tally a secret from them until after they had voted. One girl was outright shocked that I'd actually get whichever style got the most votes. And, maybe it is a tiny bit crazy. But if you think about it, these people see me day in and day out... they should have a pretty good sense of who I am and what I could pull off. Right?

Monday is my appointment. And I'm ready! SASSY hair... here I come! Wish me luck!

Sunday, June 7, 2009

Reality Check

The following post is actually from one of the many e-mail forwards I get. E-mail forwards are a huge pet peeve of mine, especially the ones that predict doom and bad fortune if not sent to 20 people in the next 5 minutes. But, once in a blue moon or two, I actually find something entertaining or worthwhile amidst the stinkers.

This one was entitled, “To All the Kids Who Survived the 1930’s, 40’s, 50’s, 60’s and 70’s.” Kind of catchy in a run-on, incomplete sentence way, wouldn’t you say? Yeah, I didn’t think so either. Personally, I think it should be called something like this:

“Here’s a Reality Check for the Younger Generations”

First, we survived being born to mothers who smoked or drank alcohol (or both!) while they were pregnant.

They took aspirin, ate blue cheese dressing, tuna from a can and didn’t get tested for diabetes.

Then, after that unspeakable trauma, we were put to sleep on our tummies in baby cribs covered with bright colored lead-based paints with slats far enough apart for us to get our chubby arms and legs in between.

We had no childproof lids on medicine bottles, locks on doors or cabinets, and when we rode our bikes, we had baseball caps on instead of helmets on our heads.

As infants and children, we would ride in cars with no car seats, no booster seats, no seat belts, no air bags, bald tires and sometimes no brakes. (I even remember riding on my dad’s lap while he drove down the interstate… good fun.)

Riding in the back of a pickup truck on a warm day was always a special treat… sometimes even sitting on the open tailgate.

We drank water from a garden hose and not from a bottle.

We shared one soft drink with four friends from one bottle and no one actually died from it.

We ate cupcakes, white bread, real butter and bacon and we drank Kool-Aid made with real white sugar… and we weren’t overweight. Why? Because we were always outside playing!

We would leave home in the morning and play all day, as long as we were back when the streetlights came on.

No one was able to reach us all day, because we didn’t have cell phones. And we were okay.

We would spend hours building our go-carts out of scraps and then ride them down the hill, only to find out we forgot the brakes. After running into the bushes a few times, we learned to solve the problem.

We did not have video games, no 150 channels on cable, no DVDs, no surround sound or CDs, no cell phones, no personal computers, no internet or chat rooms. Instead, we had friends and we went outside and found them.

We fell out of trees, got cuts, broke bones and knocked out teeth and there were no lawsuits from these accidents.

We ate worms and mud pies made from dirt and the worms did not live in us forever.

We were given BB guns for our 10th birthdays, made up games with sticks and tennis balls and we did not put out everyone’s eyes no matter what our mothers told us.

We rode bikes or walked to a friend’s house and knocked on the door or rang the bell.

Little league had tryouts and not everyone made the team. Those who didn’t had to learn to deal with disappointment. And those who did learned that the losing teams didn’t get trophies, too.

When we got a little older, the idea of a parent bailing us out if we broke the law was unheard of. They actually sided with the law. Image that!

These generations have produced some of the best risk-takers, problem solvers and inventors ever. We had freedom, failure, success and responsibility, and we learned how to deal with it all.

If YOU are one of them… congratulations!

Kind of makes you want to run through the house with scissors, doesn’t it?

Wednesday, June 3, 2009

Slug Bug!

Tonight, as we were heading home from a nice family night together, we started talking about ways we can make our upcoming family road trip a bit more... um... 'interactive' shall we say? You know, something to make the miles fly by a little more quickly. I, for one, suggested the good old-fashioned game of 'slug bug'. DD's reply was, "What the heck is a slug bug?!" Obviously, I have not raised her right. I'm so very sorry.

Apparently the new version of the game is called 'cruiser bruiser' since there are far more PT Cruisers on the road these days than VW bugs. Ohhhhh. I am soooooo last Tuesday when it comes to car games, I guess. Pardon me.

DH chimed in and said, "What about pop-eye and ultimate pop-eye?" For those of you not in-the-know about this game, you shout "Pop-eye!" and hit the dash when you see a vehicle with one headlight out. Or, if it happens to be a police vehicle, then it counts as an 'ultimate' pop eye. Whoopie-twang!

At this point, DH and I lost ourselves talking about some of the stupid things we did with our friends back when we were first driving. Like chinese fire-drills. And having to pay a forfeit of some sort if we said 'left' or 'right' instead of 'Luigi' or 'Ralph'. My favorite was having to lift your feet off the floor and put your finger on a screw head, yelling "Peanut butter!" every time you drove over a railroad track. Obviously, as teens we were easily entertained. Not much has changed, either.

So, my question to you all is this: what car games did you play when you were younger? Or still play, for that matter. License plate poker? I-spy? Twenty questions? What did you do to make the time go by? I'd love to hear your stories...