The Stinky Path to Beauty

Just a note between deadlines. I have a few more deadlines to meet tonight, but I need a break, and this chat with you is my refreshing break!

I have a real-life-hubby-should-be-in-the-doghouse-if-it-were-not-so-funny story to share with you.

I came back from the beauty shop this morning, and Gordon and I settled down to work on some screaming paperwork deadlines. This was icky business stuff that HAD to be postmarked before 4 pm today when our little local post office closes.

We started in the studio. You already know that I use the bed as if it is an office desk or a design table. 

If it can be done with pillows stacked high supporting my back and Westies snuggled all around, then I try to accomplish my little projects propped up like a Chinese Princess, from our comfy bed. Picture Shirley Maclaine in Guarding Tess.

Gordon sat down on the edge of the bed as we discussed the deadline.  He suddenly made one of those irritated, impatient faces and mumbled something about the dogs needing to go out. 

Out they all went in a flurry of white fur and happy yippey sounds and little nails clattering against the floor.  I did not smell any puppy poots, but I was pre-occupied with the leering deadlines.

Cut to about an hour later, in the den-turned-office in the farmhouse.  Gordon and I were wheeling around in our office chairs, barely staying out of each other's way in the area of our conjoined desks. Westies were finding safe nooks under the desks to nap and be clear of the desk chair wheelies.

Gordon suddenly hopped out of his chair, muttering with definite irritation and took the dogs outside again. Westie flurries followed with the added excitement of English Shepherd stomachs to race under. 

(I still hope to catch a picture of one of the English Shepherds looking down at the white Westies as one takes a short cut under an English Shepherd tummy. I promise you, those English Shepherds have expressions that clearly say, "I'm STILL not convinced you are all dog. There has got to be some cat in there!")

But back to Gordon.  He came back in, again with an excited frenzy of 32 furry paws (eight dogs) racing to the kitchen to see who would be first at the BIG enamel pan of water. He sat down at the desk and checks the bottom of each shoe.  Gordon grumbled with a good bit more animation, but I had no brain cells to spare to even listen at that moment.

About thirty minutes later, I asked Gordon to check my math, and he wheeled over to look.  Before he picked up the calculator, he examined the bottoms of both feet again and started to get up to take the dogs out.

Then it hit me.  He was smelling my new perm, but he thought it was something the dogs had done or something he had stepped in.  I asked Gordon to confirm the source of the smell by sniffing my hair.  He emphatically declined, and we had a big hearty laugh!

Now, Gordon and I have been married over four years...sneaking up on 4 and a half years.  In that time, my hair has required something like 14 to 16 perms, about one every three or four months.

One would think that my dear sweet husband might have encountered the dreaded perm smell once or twice in the last four-and-a-half years.

More to the point, just how many times must one smell a stinky perm before that smell is embedded in one's memory banks?  More than 16 times, apparently for my geeky-intelligent husband!

Aaaahhhh, men and their short-term memories are fun to play with!  This has had me thinking of the wide range of smells in female beauty products. I may have to torture poor Gordon some more...and very soon!

When did your man learn that "natural beauty" came at an expensive, painful and smelly price?

Comments

[Mary-Frances Main]

Oh, that was a wonderful giggle! I'm trying to think, but really those two smells aren't even close! :)

[Rhonda/Doxies on My Quilts]

Penny,
You're too funny! Thanks for sending me an excerp of this post... had to jump over here to read the rest.
Wow, eight Westies! I'm sure that there's never a dull moment at your house.
My sister had a Westy a long long time ago; Princess was a cute and funny dog.

[Martha Beck]

Penny, that is hysterical! That took me back to when I too had to have perms every 3 months. What we women go through! The westies had a good run from it getting to go out several times!