Something I Am Really Bad At: Feminine Rituals
My eyebrow region currently feels like a swarm of angry fire ants have taken up residence above my eyeballs. Seriously, who the fuck decided it was a good idea to rip out their hair one goddamn piece at a time?
Oh yes, this sounds like a pleasant way to spend my Saturday, Olga- yanking out all the hair on my body, one little strand at a time. Yes, Olga, literally ripping each hair from it’s cozy follicular nest. Doesn’t that sound wonderful? All the men about the village are sure to love me after this!
I really, really hate plucking my eyebrows. And thick, unmanageable brows run in the Hederman family. Those stereotypical caterpillar brows? Yeah… I could totally have that if I let myself go for a month or two.
Of course, I’m a super vain individual, so that’s not gonna happen.
I know that I could wax instead, but… When I was in the eighth grade, I bought a home eyebrow waxing kit. It seemed simple enough. You affixed one of the papery brow guides over your eyebrow (to get the desired shape), heated the wax up in the microwave, then applied it to the region surrounding the paper guide. Put stupid cloth over wax, rip off, and presto! You have perfectly sculpted brows.
Of course, because it seemed so simple, it didn’t go as planned.
The guides were made of the world’s flimsiest paper. It was hard to get them to stay where you wanted, and they really didn’t do much to keep the wax out from under them. The wax itself was also really runny (it only had two phases- brick and soup), so it seeped under the little guides.
The only part that worked the way it was supposed to was the actual ripping. Oh yeah, that worked (and took off a little skin with it). It worked a bit too well. I was left with two dot-like-patch-things for eyebrows.
So hot.
I spent weeks drawing those puppies on so as not to look like a Babylon 5 reject. Needless to say, I tend to avoid waxing (home or professional) now. Which means I have to pluck them in order to prevent this:
Though if the über-brow came with her artistic ability, I might reconsider.
Now that my eyebrows have stopped stinging, I’ll tell you about my second female failure today.
While in Powell, doing a hand washing test (more on that in a bit), the nurse I was with looked down at my hands and said, “Oh, wow, look at your cuticles.” *condescending laugh* “Yours are even worse than my daughter’s. She’s 9.”
Fuck me. Lady, I did not come here for you to insult me. I don’t have dainty lady-hands. You don’t need to rub it in.
Then she proceeded to quote something from Sex and the City at me, which I had to pretend to understand, because I loathe that show. LOATHE. IT.
Something I Am Really Good At: Moderate Germaphobia
So, I went to Powell today to have the hospital read my TB test and for me to fill out a form I’d already filled out once, but that they’d fucked up and now I had to redo.
Huzzah. A two-hour round-trip that I’m not getting paid for… to be in their offices for less than fifteen minutes.
After the nurse “reads” my TB test (otherwise known as looking at my arm and ascertaining there is not a lump there from a reaction to the PPD tuberculin they injected me with on Friday), she tells me that she also has to give me training on proper hand washing technique.
Which makes sense- most people don’t know how long to wash their hands or how to do it properly.
So first, she squirts this Glitter Bug lotion on my hands and tells me to rub it all over them, as if I were using hand sanitizer. Then, she turns out the lights and flips on a black light. Because the lotion is black light sensitive and will show the spots you missed. Like this:
I passed the crap out of that, because I have an insane love for hand sanitizer and use it all the time.
Then, it was time for the actual hand washing. There was even a little diagram above the sink showing the most frequently missed areas. I ignored it. I know how to wash my goddamn hands. So, I did so.
And then it was back to the black light. To see what I’d missed.
Yeah… this nurse was super surprised at how thorough I had been. She wouldn’t have been, though, if she knew of my obsession with hygiene.
I love washing my hands. I do so a lot (not, like, obsessive compulsive “a lot,” but a higher-than-average amount… which isn’t saying much, really). Because I hate germs. When I was little, I always used to imagine germs were like invisible bugs. And I have a serious phobia of insects. So, I’ve been scrubbing the crap out of my skin for years and years now.
As an aside, I always imagine the greatest germ death scene ever when washing my hands (skip to 5:16 of the video).
So, I totally passed their basic hygiene test. Aren’t you proud, galleons?
BE PROUD OF ME! This is all I accomplished today.
Unemployment is really boring…
***
I wore this rather recently acquired striped bra today. And all day, it kept making me think about candy and gum. And I couldn’t for the life of me figure out why.
Until right now, when I realized it looks like fucking FRUIT STRIPE GUM:
Guess what my new favorite bra is?
Epistula Rasa 