break the chain... just for fun... but i'm not kidding...

There once was a little girl who loved to read. She read everything – twice! She read cereal boxes when she ate breakfast. She read the nutrition information on the back of her lunch. She read the newspaper over dinner. She read herself to sleep each night. It was more than an affinity; it was a compulsion. She literally could not stop herself. One day, the girl checked her email and had a message about another young girl with the same problem. The girl in the email had come to a bitter end. Her compulsion to read was so strong that she never blinked. Eventually, her eyes dried up and she went blind. So then she learned to read Braille. She read so much Braille that she rubbed her fingerprints off. One particularly noisy day, the girl went to the store. She tried to cross the street and, because she could not hear the sound of the approaching horn, was hit by a bus. It knocked all of her teeth out, and she died. Without fingerprints or dental records for identification, the girl had a pauper’s funeral…

That story was not true, but I'm sure you knew that. This is an anti-chain letter. It will not bring you luck or misfortune. It does not ask you to send money or say a prayer. It does not try to cheer you up or make you look on the bright side. It is simply a statement of malice for chain letters and their propagators. (Okay, malice is a bit much… How about disapproval?) Have you any idea how annoying it is to receive these things? Do you know how big of a let down it is to see a message from one of your cool folks just to open it up and find out that they’re trying to get a free gift certificate from Applebee’s? It is not amusing. Countless seconds and metacarpal strength are lost everyday deleting chain letter emails. You wouldn’t spend the postage to send such messages out to people for real, so why send pointless mass emails? Enough is enough already. Cut it out. Seriously.

If you send this message to 4 people – nothing will happen.
If you send it to 8 people – NOTHING WILL HAPPEN.
If you send it to everyone in your address book –Something may happen…but it won’t be because of this dang blasted message.
If I get this message back – [dude] you were so not listening.

;)

the ranting eyebrow thread...

It’s kind of sad that after all this time I return to my blog with a post about eyebrow maintenance. But when I develop slight anxiety at the thought of trying to find a suitable aesthetician in this city of fountains; and when every time I go home, I visit my old spot like they’re family; and when I actually consider working 2 or 3 annual trips home into my budget for the sake of my eyebrows, it’s serious.

I am a diehard advocate of the threading technique. Since my sister turned me on to it about 5 years ago, I’ve been hooked. (Cue background music…) Sure I’ve gone back to waxing once or twice when I was desperate, but I’ve always come back. What threading and I share is too strong. (Stop music.) Generally, I don’t wear makeup, and the proper eyebrow means that I don’t really have to (not to mention that my allergies cause such intense eye rubbing that I’d look like the only raccoon 10 minutes into my day). I thought that I didn’t like a dramatic eyebrow; this is not true. It just has to be the right kind of drama, and threading does it every time.

How perfect is threading in general (and my aesthetician in particular)? She remembers me when I go, and I never have to specify what I want. It’s exactly as it should be EVERY SINGLE TIME. Both times when I’ve tried to come out of my comfort zone and go to someone recommended by a friend or coworker I’ve experienced a range of emotion, from unsatisfied to down right disappointment. I give explicit direction, but to no avail. The first time I went to someone out here, I was so disappointed that I felt like I was making a donation when I left. “I can’t be compensating for services rendered,” I think to myself, “she hasn’t done anything!” The second time, I will admit, the outcome was decent. But I’m not used to decent; I’m used to the best.

So what have I decided to do? I am going to try to learn the threading technique because even though I could never thread my own eyebrows, far be it from me to deprive these Midwest women of a different (better?) way. (And for a fraction of the ridiculous price that others are charging.) In the meantime, I will search for an Indian population in the city of fountains, and my tweezers and I will continue to fight the good fight as we try to maintain the shape given to us the last time I was on the East coast.

(IOU: a substantive post)