April 22nd, 2020

As you can see by the above photo, my bangs are getting out of control again.  Time for a trim.  And that's no big deal.  I've done it before.  In fact, between every hair appointment I end up trimming my bangs one time.  But here's the thing.

In this Time of the Great Quarantine, hairdressers, beauty shops and the like aren't open.  My hasn't been open for quite some time now.  So this will be the second time I have trimmed my bangs since a real haircut.  And that made me realize that I have a new unit of measurement.

Y'see, I go to my hairdresser every 7 weeks.  It's a weird number but that is how it works best for me.  But I find that I need to trim my bangs around week 5.  The rest of my hair looks fine, just my bangs are in my eyes and annoying me.  So, if this is my second time around of shortening up that fringe around my eyes that would make it ten weeks.

I actually looked at my personal calendar to be sure about this.  But yup, my last official haircut was February 28th.   So like everyone else right now, I am way overdue.  No worries, I can trim my bangs and if the rest of it gets too out of control I can throw it up into a ponytail and to hell with it.  I don't worry too much about my hair anymore.  It's not like I'm in the public eye after all.  Nobody cares how I look.  I assure you that I am clean and appropriately attired.  That is sufficient.

But isn't it funny that while I could not this second tell you exactly how long the Time of the Great  Quarantine has been going on  for us, I know exactly how long it's been since I had a hair cut.  So there you go, a new unit of measurement.

The same way, if I bother to paint my toenails, the pedicure lasts 3 weeks.  So if I happen to glance at my toes and notice that the paint is a bit chipped, I don't have to wonder how long it's been since I gave myself a pedicure.  I already know.  3 weeks.  Another unit of measurement.

One of the hardest units of measurement of me to finally wrap my brain around had to do with cooking.  It is a well established fact that when I first got married I could barely boil water properly.  Honestly, I had never cooked and didn't have a clue.  Thanks to the book, "The Joy of Cooking' and a tragic amount of trial and error, I eventually became a decent cook and baker.  The hard part was planning a meal where all of the components were ready at the same time.  Yeesh.  That balance, those units of measurement took FOREVER. And even now, every once in awhile, I'm a teensy bit off and Tim ends up eating a meal in courses.  Poor man.

By the way, speaking of time and units of measurement,  as of next month it will be one full year since I stopped colouring my hair and just letting  just be what it is.  I can clearly see the line where the colour has growing out and all of the sparkle.  The weirdest part (to me) is that the hair underneath is much greyer that the hair on top!  I honestly thought it would be the other way around!

No, really, it's true!  Here I'll show you!

I kinda dig it.  When the entire "let it go" project began I was more than a little trepidatious.  Would I like it?  Would I hate it?  How grey was I?  Was it that flat blah battleship grey or a pretty sparkly silver? Was it going to be a skunk stripe down the middle or just a silvering at the temples?

In discussions with Carolyn, my amazing hairdresser, I finally came to the realization that if I really hated how it looked, I could always have her colour it again.  True!  But so far, I've been surprisingly okey dokey with my greys and silvers.  But isn't it funny that I am aware that it's been nearly a year?  Another unit of measurement.

So it seems that the Time of the Great Quarantine for us has been two bang trims and not quite 4 pedicures long.    Don't make me do the math.