Am I getting older because my hair stylist works mornings?

My hair stylist is younger than me, and more artistic, and has great ideas for hair styles that suite her customers wonderfully, and she's recently decided that being a responsible professional who works hard on her business is a good idea.

What happened to the artistic until it hurts, party all night, get up and start work at 1pm (if they have to start so early) hair stylists? That's what I've been used to since I was a teenager... many eons ago... but now I'm dealing with serious professionals? The shop that my hair stylist rents a chair in opens at 9am and is busy at opening! All of the stylists are professionals with their own businesses who rent a chair in this salon. And they're all serious professionals!

I've followed Wendy, my hair stylist, around from salon to salon for several years now. In the beginning, she was the party-hardy typical hair stylist I was used to. Now she's older and wiser, and works mornings! Does this mean that I'm getting older too?

I am drawn to hair stylists who love their work and get great satisfaction from it. I've always envied the lifestyle of a hair stylist. Artistic and care-free. Now Wendy's not living that lifestyle either. If she's gotten older, does that mean I have too? Urgh!

Have you washed your light bulbs yet?

April is the month when you should wash all of your light bulbs – according to Martha Stewart.

While sitting in my hair stylist's chair last week I was flipping through a Martha Stewart Living magazine and found the list of what should be done in April. Along with the light bulbs, you should wash around the windows and the window coverings, air out the duvet and prepare it for storage, and bake some cupcakes.

This is the part of the Living magazine that I really love. Not that I'm going to jump up and wash those windows right now, but it would be a good time to clear away the winter blues by preparing for spring, and get some welcome fresh air into the place. That's the wonderful thing about Martha Stewart, no one could possibly do all of the things she recommends, but she always has suggestions that sound like really good ideas. Now that's something to aim for.

What was I watching?

Have you ever been watching a TV program and realized that you couldn't remember what the program was? You know you've seen at least 10 commercials in the last 5 minutes, and they were all annoying - even with the sound muted. But you can't remember what the program snippets they were showing between the commercial breaks were about.

I guess it's time to change channels. OK, actually it's time to turn off the TV, you aren't getting any younger, and this has sucked away too much of your life to begin with.

It is possible that the TV networks have found the tipping point where people will actually turn their TVs off rather than have to watch yet another commercial? The last time I gave up on whatever it was I was watching and went to read a book I was watching the Discovery Channel, I think. Yes, at least 3 of the commercials being shown were for the Discovery Channel itself, so that was probably what I was watching. Is this a ploy by some well meaning individuals at the Discovery Channel to get people to stop watching so much TV? Yeah, I doubt it too.

It is already so much more enjoyable to watch your favourite TV programs on DVD, the overwhelming number of commercials shown on regular TV could mean its demise. There are already many TV programs which have done the “straight to DVD movies” - essentially long episodes not shown on TV at all – which have sold quite well. I think it's a safe bet that TV networks are well on their way out of existence.

Well. What did I come in here for?

I came in here for a reason. I'm sure I did. Was it to get something? Hmm...

Oh yeah, I forgot to bring that in with me. I'll go get it, maybe I'll remember what I came in here for when I get it.

Now, what was it I came back out here for?


I've recently seen “What did I come in here for?” posted as a suggestion for a fun quasi-Olympic sport on my favourite writer's fan-club website. I think this could make for an interesting challenge. The prizes would be hard to award, or remember where you put them, but how many times do people find themselves getting into a room, know they are there for a reason, but they just can't remember what it is? It's not an age thing – the person who suggested it first is only 18!

So why does the change in scenery make you forget something that made you get up and move towards it?

Could this be used for good? If you were about to have a fist-fight with someone, could you distract them, tell them they forgot to bring something and get them to go back and get it, thus disarming them? They would forget what they went in there for, and stand and think about it long enough that you could escape. OK, that does sound a bit like a Monty Python sketch, but would it work?

Mint or Bachelor Buttons: Which will dominate?

April 20, 2008: After 1 week

As I started my Spring planting last Monday, I found seeds for Mint and Bachelor Buttons in my pile of unused seeds from last year. Neither of these plants grew so well last year, so I wasn't too interested in trying to grow them again this year, but I did have a pot full of soil that I wanted to plant something in, so I planted them.

All of the seeds in one pot – roughly one half Mint, the other half Bachelor Buttons.

Mint has the reputation of taking over gardens, and Bachelor Buttons also grow like weeds in the right conditions, so I figure both plants have the potential to take over the pot. The question of the summer will be... which plants will dominate the pot?

The 2008 epic battle of my balcony:
Mint or Bachelor Buttons – which will dominate?
Stay tuned for occasional updates!

Does hair grow faster when your hair stylist is on vacation?

So you're going along fine, your hair may be needing some attention in the near future, and then wham! You decide to book an appointment with your hair stylist, and she's on vacation!

From that fateful moment on, your hair goes wild.

Your locks that were not too bad - a bit unruly but manageable with some effort - now become a lion's mane of tangles, and you roar like a lion when your brush gets stuck in a mass of hair that really needs to be brushed but is too long and unruly to tame.

Is it just a matter of perception? Has the decision to get your hair done biased you towards watching it grow, as your hair stylist sips fruity drinks on a beach somewhere? Does it become an obsession, making you think about it constantly, making it seem longer than it is? Or does the hair actually get stimulation from you thinking about it? Does this stimulation encourage more hair growth?

After many years of hair maintenance, and many hair stylists, I think hair does grow faster when your hair stylist is on vacation.

Why are there email lists?

This morning I started my day with at least 50 emails from an email list that I have been meaning to remove myself from, but haven't gotten around to it yet. At least 40 of the emails were from other people pleading to be removed from the list. Thankfully, I only had to go through 3 out of 50 of these emails before I found one hinting at the removal method we needed to go through. It wasn't by a well-meaning, helpful soul, it was by a bloody rude, spelling-challenged individual who had 3 paragraphs of venting before he gave the hint (no, not the instructions, just a hint of where to find the instructions to remove ourselves from this email hell).

The irony of it all is that the email list was one run by the Society for Technical Communications (STC). All these people are supposed to be communications experts and the one simple explanation of how to remove yourself from the email list was not “simple” it did not, in effect, “communicate”. And the one email that I found, that only hinted at the process, was bloody rude about it!

Why do email lists exist at all? Why have we all signed up for these in-box bombing lists, invariably regretting it, but not being bothered enough to find out how to remove ourselves from them?

Most of the lists I'm regrettably attached to are run by Lyris. Why does the Lyris mail manager exist? The Lyris company is a Marketing company! Of course the instructions on how to remove yourself from the lists are murky and badly worded, they don't want to stop bothering you, it's their business! The process of removal has instructions that would top a “world's worst use of English” list. The instructions were written by a technical communicator, but they just don't want to communicate the process of leaving their list! They want to annoy you forever!

Join an email list? NEVER AGAIN!

Are children of crime scene investigators compulsive cleaners?

Sherlock Holmes was arguably the first crime scene investigator who paid as much attention to detail as the people on the current TV shows glorifying the crime scene investigator. And he was fictional, as are the people being played by actors on the TV shows. But there are real life crime scene investigators, who are real people. So there are likely real children of the real life crime scene investigators. So are these real children compulsively neat?

Humans go through a variety of stages as they grow up. One of the typical stages is becoming contrary to their parents. Having different ideas, beliefs, goals, and ways of looking at the world is a way young humans find their own path in life. Some call this rebelling.

So if a young human is rebelling against their parents, and his or her parents are crime scene investigators, do they do everything they can to make sure their parents don't know what they're doing? Are these children compulsive cleaners who try to remove any trace of their actions, so their parents would have to work really hard to figure out what they've been doing?

Or are these children really messy? Do they effectively dare their parents to figure out what they are up to by leaving massive amounts of clues, some intentionally misleading, for their parents to find?

Sir Author Conan Doyle, who wrote the Sherlock Holmes mysteries, had his characters living in a set of rooms that were cleaned by their land-lady, Mrs. Hudson. In several stories she was miffed by the mess that Sherlock made of his rooms before he went out and left her to clean them. So this fictional character was not always fastidious himself, not worried that others would figure out what he was doing by examining the details of his life. But was this a reaction a rebellion by the author against all the attention to detail? Was the author making a mess in the story to push away from all that detailed examination of everything, even the smallest shred of evidence?

Is the desire to make a mess, and dare the overly detailed oriented people to figure out what you've been doing, a natural human desire? Or is the desire to be very clean to hide your movements, so no one can tell what you've been doing, a more natural response?

What do children of crime scene investigators do?

Do Nurses Enjoy Needlework?

As I sit here and stare at the bruise from the needle I had yesterday to extract some of my blood for tests, I wonder if nurses and other medical professionals enjoy doing needlework in their spare time. Needlework being the arts & crafts type of activity where you sew thread into a piece of fabric or other substance to relax and make pretty designs.

I remember a while ago having to listen to one nurse talk about needles. She was a diabetic who had to give herself injections and they obviously unnerved her. She described invisible barriers; people who couldn't give themselves injections because they didn't leave the needle in the skin long enough; and other expressions of mental horrors at the thought of injections. Does she ever do needlework to relax in her spare time?

The lab worker nurse I had removing blood from my arm yesterday was not in a good mood. She had just had an argument about the types of shipping containers she was supposed to use with the man who picked up the containers. At this point I was worried. I had already taken a number, waited for the other lab worker to go over my lab work requisition, and been told to sit down again and wait to be called. It was too late to escape. If I had just come a bit later I could have done the “Oh, look at the time, I must run” gesture and legged it. But I was committed to getting an angry woman to stick me with a needle.

It's not easy to find blood in my arm, I keep it well hidden, so there is no way to really feel it, you just have to stick the needle in where you expect there to be a vein and hope. And then dig around with the needle to find blood. Been there, done that oh, so many times. So I was trying to be encouraging by nodding when she thought she might have something because that is where I can remember it usually being. She wasn't impressed. Oh good, make her angrier, that's a smart move.

She did finally stick the needle in and found a vein with only a limited amount of digging, but I still have a bruise. I have had people, confident and happy people, who have just stuck the needle in, got blood out, and finished up. There are just not enough confident, happy people in the world.

So does that nurse lab worker do needlework in her spare time to relax? If she does, what types of patterns does she do? I don't remember ever seeing a shark needlework pattern, or an abstract design with reds and blacks all over, that's what I think of when I think of her doing needlework. And the other nurse, the one who was the diabetic, she should do needlework to take her mind off sticking needles into flesh, but I doubt that she does.

I recommend needlework to help you relax, but I don't know if a nurse could do it without getting stressed out. That's the opposite of what should happen, but I don't think they could avoid it. This seems to be an occupational hazard.

Why does that 3pm dip in energy always get you?

It's gotten a bit cold.

This isn't as interesting as it used to be.

I want to have a nap.

Sound familiar? It means it's about 3 in the afternoon, and your energy is dipping to a familiar low. Why is it that so many people have a lull of energy in the middle of the afternoon? So many people have this happen that I think it's actually just normal.

Why does the regular working day ignore this human lull and carry on as if non-human workers are doing the work? How many people try to ignore their body and push on through like "dedicated" workers and end up doing work they will need to do again in the future because work done during this low energy period will inevitably suck? See that sentence back there, yep, the last one? It's a badly composed sentence that really needs editing, but it's that time of the afternoon when I don't feel like editing it.

I think it's important to listen to your body. If you don't feel like doing something that you have no problems with at other times, and you are listening to your body, you should stop. The work that you produce at low energy times is not your best work.

That's my advice for improving the world. If you are feeling low in energy, don't do your normal work, take a break. If everyone did this, the overall quality of the world's work would rise, and everyone would be happier. So take a break, already.

Why do my neighbors wash the dirt from their balconies onto my windows?

Why is it called a "loo?" 

The British word for toilet, "loo", derives from the French "garde a l'eau!" In medieval Europe people had little conception of hygiene and threw the contents of their chamber pots out the window into the street below. In France the practice was preceded by shouting "garde a l'eau!" ("Watch out for the water!"). In England, this phrase was Anglicised, first to "gardy-loo!", then just "loo", and eventually came to mean the toilet/lavatory itself.

 Some of the residents of my appartment building seem to believe they are in medieval Europe. Throwing dirty water off your balcony or letting it drip out through the drainage holes and onto the windows of your neighbours below is NOT ACCEPTABLE in modern North American society. It is dirty and disgusting.

Do these people not know how much money the building pays to have the windows washed twice a year?