Product Poetry

24 inches from crown to tip

with natural, yet deceptive and demanding, curl
this hair cannot run out the door
with a little scrunch
and a little fluff
oh no
one hour plus each day
in attention it requires
to be tamed
to be sculpted
resisting and fighting
and clinging to its will to frizz
product after product I've tried
with little variance in success
what solutions remain?
cut and simplify?
straighten and fry?
quarterly chopping offers temporary remedies
ridding hair of excessive straw-like bulk
but if long hair is to be kept
it needs something more
 

skeptical of gimmicks and shallow promises
of $20 goops and gells
on a leap of faith I found in Herbal Essences
a long term relationship
for $4 and generous applications
I have found protection and sustenance
health and longevity
and love

the time has now come
for a quarterly visit with the shears
brought only to my attention by a calendar
and, for once, not by the rebellions
of my unruly, poofy, and split-ended hair

gone are the days
of chopping dry, lifeless ends
oh yes
a long term relationship
it shall be

My Blog Report Card

I have a super secret device attached to my blog. It tracks every computer that encounters by blog, what city, what country, what time, for how long, on what day. It's not actually that super secret. It's a little program you can get through Google called Analytics. I don't do this to stalk people. I do this for self esteem purposes only. That way when people don't leave comments and I'm sad because it feels like no one reads my blog, I can see the hundreds of visits I get per month and give myself a little smile and nod in the mirror because people really do read my blog. Or at least see it. For an average of 34 seconds.

One of the perks of my little monitor is that my blog ends up in people's searches for really random stuff. I have not disabled my blog to be taken out of any search engines. I'm not too worried about people reading about my life or stealing my stuff. I'm sure it annoys people because the same thing happens to me when I'm searching for something, only wanting legitimate sites and someone's ridiculous blog clogs up the results. I am one of those such blogs. But what makes it rewarding is having Analytics set up. Analytics keeps track of what specific search terms people have used that have led them to my little internet world. What a serendipitous blessing for them.

The following are a few of my favorites:

buy emma mascarpone cheese 16oz
minus and the chocolate touch
crying in an office and performance review
i hate wearing shoes
best of color me badd (I recognize that I featured this in a post, but it's frightening to think someone was actually seeking this out)
cutest boy in chronicles of narnia?
is tyler hansbrough getting married
mom always want us to be happy. that is why
the advantages of wearing shoes
disadvantages of wearing shoes
"ny?" "that's nw"

In other exciting statistics, my blog (mainly through random searches) has appeared on the computer screen in 36 countries. How exciting is that!?! A little piece of me has reached the life of at least one person in such places as: Brazil, the UK, Italy, Spain, India, Afghanistan, Russia, Croatia, Mexico, Poland, to name just a few. If only they would leave a comment every now and then. Then we could be pen pals. And swap stories about our countries. And then maybe I could have a free place to stay when I tour the world.

As can be expected, most of my visitors are from the US. But just how many? According to Analytics, my blog has been accessed from 38 states!! That means that 76% of the United States of America has seen my blog! Well, not quite, but that sure does sound cool. I'm sure my numbers would be much lower if I took my blog out of the search engines. But that would ruin all my fun.

Project: wall clock

I get a great sense of accomplishment when I come up with an idea, execute it, and have success. Hence why I like projects. One of the things that I like to do is take normal things and use them for something else. Does that sound too much like Martha Stewart? Please say no. This has stemmed mainly from being astounded at how much inanimate objects costs.

We moved into an apartment a few months ago and, like most modern apartments, everything is slightly white. Not 100% white. I'm not even sure that exists anymore. Maybe it's morning mist or silver cloud or angel's kiss. But between the walls, ceiling, tile and carpet, it's very bland. So we need some something.

One large space in particular is in our dining area. It looks like this. I started one project to put on this wall but it ended up looking like crap so I pulled it down and started brainstorming again. One idea was a clock. I love large clocks but they tend to be expensive. So, as with most things that I think are too expensive, I try to find a way to do it myself. I did some internet researching and found a clock kit for a clock that mounts directly onto the wall. I've been looking for one of these for a very long time and finally found one big enough!

The process was as follows:

We pulled out the kit and made sure we had everything we needed. The numbers that came with it are black and boring. I decided to either paint on numbers myself or make my own. I ended up using the existing black numbers and traced them onto that scrapbook paper, cut them out and glued them onto the numbers.

After I got the numbers cut out and glued, Jericho did all the measuring to make sure it would be symmetrical and look like a clock. He is the engineering mind and I am the creative mind. It would have taken me all day to measure all those lines.

We put the numbers up first before the hands. Spacing these numbers was much harder than I thought it would be. We used the lines that we drew as general guides but ended up having to put Jericho across the room to eye-ball it.

And so, our boring, blank wall now looks like this! Yay! Now when we're eating and we need to know what time it is, we don't have to stretch to look at the clock on the stove! The best part is that it works. The clock kit was only about $20 so the mechanism isn't exactly top quality. We continue to rejoice throughout the day when we check the giant clock and the time is still correct.

The Littlest Rebel

I am a flip flop person through and through. I own numerous pairs and my two most frequently worn "work shoes" are in fact, fancified flip flops. My standard black, casual flip flops have finally reached the trashing point so last week I purchased new black flip flops. And, after much deliberation, I purchased black Rainbow sandals. That doesn't seem like a very big deal, but trust me, it was.

I have been having an internal battle with whether or not to purchase Rainbows for some time. At least 3 years. The history of my affection for Rainbows started roughly 15 years ago when I saw numerous hunky hunky surfers at the beach wearing them. But, at the young age of 12, I did not have the money to purchase $40 flip flops. As time went on, I left for Idaho for college and came back to NC four years later to realize the actual current trends, since we all know ID is not exactly at the cusp of fashion, and saw that EVERYONE, including children that could barely walk, were wearing the coveted Rainbows.

At this point, I began to hate Rainbows. They had changed from beachy cool surfer dude shoes to "mommy I have to have them because everyone else does, including you" shoes. To me, they represented everything I hated about conformity, or more appropriately, expensive conformity. This distaste for label-driven, overpriced fashion was probably rooted in me around middle school when I became acutely aware of everything I wore and possessed down to what brand of backpack I used and therefore felt I was being ruthlessly judged as such. And since we really are all seventh graders deep inside, the current Rainbows fad has become the Abercrombie and Fitch from high school or the Converse shoes from middle school. As I matured, I realized one of the reasons I hated these trends so much was because secretly, I liked them, but was too proud to admit that I was just like everyone else so I rebelled.

Up until last week, this rebellion toward the Rainbows continued. I realized that openly refusing to buy them solely on the basis that they were a fad was just as bad as buying them because they were a fad. Does that make any sense? I couldn't win, so therefore I figured I do need new black flip flops, I would like a pair that will last a while, I am a collector of flip flops, the Rainbow company is by no means taking a personal offense to my rebellion, and I can still maintain some of my rebellion by getting black instead of the standard brown.

So there you have it. I rescinded my rebellion. As I'm sure my mother already assumes, I still maintain other little rebellions. The one that I hold to firmly and probably will for some time is the iPhone. And maybe Macs in general. I haven't totally decided on that one yet. I like the product just fine but there are definitely "Mac people". I think they make you join a secret club and have secret handshakes once you buy a Mac. But alas, I digress and should save the Mac people judgments for another time.*

My question to my readers, is what rebellions do you have? They can be big or small, trivial, purposeful, or, like mine, affect no one but yourself. I think the overall objective of a rebellion, whatever it may be, is it gives us a sense of individual passions. Even if no one else in the world knows of said passion, we know that there are pieces of us that make us different and that in itself is empowering. I may have sacrificed a piece of my individuality by buying Rainbows but I think that 15 years is long enough to deprive myself of really cool flip flops.


*Mother, I formed these opinions before you purchased a Mac. These comments are not directed at you.

Life is SO hard!

I have never considered myself a lazy person. I have also never considered myself an exceptionally ambitious and productive person. I am probably like most people and fall somewhere in the middle of the resourceful scale. Assuming that I am in no way being a hypocrite by making these statements, I would like to take a moment to ream on the American people, or rather the American patrons of Target and other such grocery-cart-wielding establishments.

Jericho and I were at Target last night doing some food shopping. We saw some open parking spots from afar as we pulled into the lot. As we approached we realized why they were open - people had left their carts in the middle of an empty spot. We were forced to park in the next spot over which was not a big deal. But not only were the carts filling one spot, but there were at least another half a dozen carts on the little grassy section between rows. Ladies and gentlemen, would you like to take a guess at how far away we were from the front door or any cart returns? Less than 10 spaces from the door and one row over on either side from a cart return. As we pulled up, we even saw one lady walk her cart over to the masses, like it was some make-shift cart return for the lazy, walk back to her car and there was a cart return ON HER ROW! In her defense, it was only one sided and it was facing the other direction from her car. You can see how this would throw her senses out of whack.

Is this how lazy we are? Or are we so consumed with our own self-importance and "I'm so much busier than you could possibly imagine" attitudes that we can't walk 20 feet to 1 of 3 possible ways to return a cart to its proper place? You have 3 options all within a very reasonable distance from where you're standing. What else do you need, princess? A cart valet? Directional arrows?

This is not the first time I have seen this, as I'm sure most of you have also encountered similar experiences. Once at Wal-Mart someone left their cart in the FIRST spot therefore preventing anyone else from parking there, which at Wal-Mart is only second to shoplifting. The FIRST sticking spot! (Not a handicap spot though. I'm not that unforgiving.) They could probably have given the cart a good solid push and it could have rolled right back in the store. I try to be an open-minded citizen and give people the benefit of the doubt but I do wonder what could be going on in someone's life at that moment that is so important that it prevents them from having enough consideration for other shoppers as well as the employees to put their frikkin cart back.

I think Aldi is on the right track with their cart method. You have to deposit a quarter in a little slot to release the cart and then when you click it back in when you're done, you get your quarter back. Now a quarter really isn't that big of a deal, but I'm sure the uber-lazy have walked their groceries out to the car and subsequently had a serious internal debate on whether or not walking 20 feet was worth getting your 25 cent piece back. Really, life is not that hard. 20 feet will not kill you or mess up your shoes or make you late to your mani-pedi. We're all in this little world together. And Karma is real.