Monday, October 31, 2005

The grand shampoo escape

Today (actually more like yesterday morning) marks the midway point in The Great Experiment for me. It goes something like this. Eons ago I heard that if you didnt wash your hair for some extended period of time like 3 months that it would return to its natural happy hair sorta state of mind. Three months seems like a heck of a long time but the idea bounces and rolls around in my head pretty frequently. Me and Kl talked about it at length at least once. It makes yah wonder what they did in the days before shampoo right? I mean kids usta wash their hair with mayonaise or eggs or all kinds of wierd stuff.

I don't know why it came up again in earnest but it did. (Around the time I was debating the blue hair, which I still am but its on hold for this experiment) It probably had something to do with the fact that 2 in our house shower at random intervals, shave less frequently and at least one rarely wears deoderant. Basically we are greaseballs with what would appear to be crunchy hippy tendencies except thats not the ultimate goal. Lazy is a better lable, or maybe cheap but we do not in fact resemble nasty gross middle schoolers. We still look like normal, well adjusted types. And we have conversations in our house about this all the time about how we dont actually NEED these things even though the talking box and popular culture seem to think so.

So I did a google search. I found just about nothing related to anything I wanted to search for which made me urninated. (Apparently about no one does this or at least no one is willing to admit to it) So I kept searching. I have no clue how or where I found them but there are 2 sites and maybe only 2 sites in the whole wide googleable world. One is some living ethically do I buy locally grown produce to support local small business farmers or organic imported fair trade to support less pesticides and fair treatment of other cultures type of news letter and the other is some random guys web site that mentions a daytime tv talk show with a similar experiment coming up during a bar conversation. Both come back with the same ideas 1) if you don't wash your hair eventually it will go back to the way it usta was after an initial grease period 2) upon completion you will swear you never want to use shampoo again and 3) the grease period lasts about 6 weeks.

So you have me the conscious scientist/ impulsive college student pondering this. I say to myself- self I say, neither of these is a very reliable source and they should not be trusted. Yes, I reply , but no one and I mean no one is doing it that means that you should do it. I mean think about it- you could free yourself from the social constructs of shampoo, you would be one step closer to living off the land, you would be dumping fewer chemicals into the world every day, you would be saving money and time... is any of this appealing to you? Clearly not enough...Um...you could supply the missing information in some logical and scientific manner and be famous in your own mind. Do it in the name of truth, of exploring, of finding new things. Well, I suppose so. And 6 weeks isnt that terribly long especially when I already have a 3 day head start from you deciding to sleep in and not to shower.

And so the experiment comenced on Sunday the 9th of October in the year of our Lord 2005, for dubious and sundry reasons. As far as quasi-scientific information goes my hair got progressivly greasier for about a week and a half and is holding pretty steady at it's current level. All signs point to a success with the experiment reaching completion the weekend before Thanksgiving. I have already decided to hold out for at least 8 weeks just incase 6 doesnt do it. My fellow partner in crime in the house is about a week and a half behind me and is reporting the same conditions.

Based on unscientific polls and random surveys most people are facinated (albeit slightly sketched out) with our experiment and are eagerly awaiting our results. A few are very disturbed by us and no one is particularly surprised. We are of the opinion that this generally means that even if our attempt is successful, people will be glad to know it can be done but would never actually try it.

If anything happens worth noting I will be sure to inform you. Otherwise I will write a lengthy scientific diatribe with statistics and graphs included when we come to the end.

So there you have it, whether you wanted it or not- Jn

3 comments:

Ramblin' Ed said...

Good. I was so afraid you wouldn't be able to keep yourself busy there.

Dare I say it? Yes, I think I will.

Take it easy, greasy.

Red Queen said...

Damn that Ed always did know how to turn a rhyme. Thanks for the info, I was wondering if and how it goes but always forgot to ask. The better part of this all is perhaps not the results as it is the effects on those who hear about it.

Anonymous said...

Wish I could see you at the end of those 6 weeks. And hear the PS comments.