Heinz hired a new ad company to launch their new deli mayo.  The company came up with a funny TV spot, but it has sparked controversy because it shows ….are you ready?…two men…aparantly married and raising children…kissing!

Not making out.  Not having sex.  Just a little “I’m heading to the office, see you later” kiss.

I always forget that there are some people that think “the gays” shouldn’t have families and can’t be “normal,” so this kind of thing always seems like a tempest in a tea pot to me.  As a hairdresser (and a theater major) I may have met a few of “the gays” in my time.  And some of them have families.  So it just doesn’t seem strange to me.  (I am always excited when kids have two parents of any gender because it is WAY HARD to do it alone.)

So, without further ado, here is the link to the silly little video.  Don’t watch it if it is going to upset you.

There.  You have been warned.  And don’t bother leaving any cranky remarks about how gays getting married will be the end of civilization as we know it.  To do so would be assuming that I thought the way things are is good and should be preserved.  Go bark up a different tree.

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This is a copy of a review I did for Gear Diary.

Vamooose!

I was twittering one night and Judie mentioned that she had this product to test. Only problem is that the product claims to remove cigarette and tobacco odors and she doesn’t know any smokers.

Lucky girl.

Much to my eternal shame, I told her that my beautiful, intelligent teenage daughter has decided she is a smoker. The really great part is that the wretched child thought it was a secret even though everything she owned absolutely reeked of cigarette odors.

At first she tried to tell me it was from hanging around friends that smoked. She thinks I am stupid. (I hear that is a common teenage malady.)

So one day I tell her, “If you think that your smoking is a secret, you are mistaken.”

Foolish me. Now that the cat is out of the bag, she no longer makes any attempt to hide it!

Every time I walk into her room and it smells (even though she never smokes in the house) I get angrier. I don’t smoke. My husband doesn’t smoke. Why should I be made to suffer with a house that smells of smoke?

Vamoose! to the rescue!

The label says it contains a revolutionary new product called Novexium® and that it permanently removes cigarette and tobacco odors.

I sprayed it on everything she owns. (I thought about spraying it on her, but the label also says it is a violation of Federal law to use this product in a manner inconsistent with its labeling and I am nothing if not a rule-follower. Hence the not smoking!)

The label also warned of an initial “odd” odor. Boy howdy, they aren’t kidding. But it passes very quickly and when it dries, the odor is gone. Really gone. I used it a week ago and I really do believe that the old odors are still gone.

I have sprayed newly polluted items as they appear and I am very satisfied with the results. The 16 ounce bottle still feels full, so I know it doesn’t take much to do the job.

Now, I no longer get irritated the second I open her bedroom door. (Now it takes until she opens her mouth and says something snippy.)

Ah, teenagers. My mother told me God makes them awful so you don’t mind when they move out.

What I liked: even my sensitive nose couldn’t smell the smoke after use.

What I didn’t like: the “odd” odor upon initial use (but it really did go away quickly)

I don’t write much about politics.  But every once in a while, I get something stuck in my craw.

Today it is campaign fund raising.

Click on over to CNN to see a chart of campaign reciepts (through March).

Now add the 31 million that Obama raised and the 22 million for Clinton in April.

Now stay away from sharp objects because if you feel anything like I do, this news will make you want to open a vein.

I have a very simple view of the world, I know.  But here’s how I see it: There are a ton of projects that we (as a country) need or would like to do if only we had the money.

But we have an extra half a billion to spend on this contest?

It just makes me sad.

The president’s daughter got married. It was an outdoor wedding. OK, so by definition, it is already less formal. Fine. But she is wearing a dress with a train. That’s formal to me.

Do you think her hair looks formal?

Oh, I hear you talking back to me, “I would totally wear this hair to my wedding. I’m not really a formal girl.” Whatever. It is still your wedding day. It is the most dressed up most women will ever be. And there are pictures. Boy howdy are there pictures, and you will look at them for the rest of your life.

Is messy hair really the image you want to remember forever? And do you really not want to look more special on your wedding day than you do in your everyday life?

There are reasons women get “updos.” One of them is the actual art of the hair dressing. Hair that has been dressed can be both a work of art and a feat of architecture. One big reason is that an up style stays put for hours. It will do a better job of withstanding weather than down hair. And let’s not forget that an up style looks more “finished” than a down style.

There is only one time I think that “half up - half down” makes sense. If your hair is down to your waist, it is logical to not try to put it all up. (Unless you are hoping to look taller!)

For the rest of us, we have icons we can turn to to see what is considered timeless, classic and beautiful.

This is the wedding style by which all others are measured. Just say the name Grace Kelly and people instantly imagine beauty, style and glamour.

Audrey Hepburn is another icon of style and glamour.

“But, Aura, these women were from a different time. I want to look fresh and up to date. ” Fine. Here’s a couple of modern day glamour girls.

Sloppy hair, I am afraid, is a symptom of our casual society. We Americans rarely get dressed up the way our parents or grandparents did. People wear shorts to church and jeans to fancy restaurants.

Don’t get me wrong. I love casual. I wear jeans to work and sweats around town on the weekends. But if I were going to the Oscars, you can be damn sure I would dress up to the nines!

This year’s Oscars were the most casual I remember.

I can’t even begin to guess what the hell Cameron and her hairdresser were thinking. This is an adorable hair style for going to the beach, but an abomination for the Oscars (our American Royal Ball.)

Cate looks like she drove to the Oscars in a convertible and pinned it back on her way down the red carpet. (Maybe she had bobby pins hiding in that necklace.)

People Magazine raved about this hair style. It looks to me like she checked the clock and had five minutes before she had to leave and shoved a clip in the back. Again, it would be adorable anywhere else. It is not formal.

Kristin Chenowith had essentially the same style, but somehow it looks better than Jennifer’s. Must be the jeweled clip.

So, what’s the bottom line here? Are we just so casual a society that we can’t be bothered with getting all dolled up? Is it too much work? I would love to hear your thoughts.

In case you were wondering if I practice what I preach, this is how I wore my hair for my wedding in 2003.

I am the one in the dress.

And if you want a hairdresser to style your hair messy-casual for your wedding, don’t call me.

I haven’t gotten into digital music.  I don’t have an iPod and I don’t want one.

I know.  You are stunned.

How can it be that the girl who so loves technology can be so behind the times in this arena?

Here’s why:

I like the album as a concept.  I like the idea of musicians creating a complete piece of art.  Where one song leads to another and the songs together tell a bigger story.  I was never one to listen to just the “hit” song on an album.  I buy CD’s and if I want, I can copy them to my computer or my PDA.

If all we do in the future is sell individual songs, what motivation is there to create the art that is an album?  I find that sad.  I know that things change.  I know that what I want doesn’t matter and I try not to complain about it.

One thing I particularly love is cover art.  I like having a visual connection to my music.  In the world of the single song, album cover art becomes irrelevant, and that makes me sad, too.

I found an article today by an author who feels my pain but offers hope for the future.

Is Album Art Dying?

The music industry has undergone more drastic changes in the past 25 years then the previous 125 years before. In 1982, the compact disc was introduced to the public and replaced the need for LP’s and cassette tapes. With the introduction of Napster in 1999, music downloading has steadily become the recommended way to obtain music. Consumers no longer have to go to their local record store and buy music; it is now just a mouse click away. Moreover, there is no need to purchase an entire recording as you can now only purchase the tracks you want to listen to.

According to an article posted on Seeking Alpha in January of 2007, digital sales are showing a steady increase while album sales continue to decline. As this digital trend maintains momentum, will the need for album covers eventually be phased out like records were? Is visual art in music packaging dying?

Album art has long been just as important as the music on the record. Can you imagine a different cover for Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon or Nirvana’s Nevermind? The album cover evokes what is inside and you can almost hear the music simply by looking at it.

Read the rest of the article here.

I don’t see how a one inch square photo can give me the same thrill as a big LP did, but I will try to keep up with the times so that you all don’t call me an old fart.

The technology I do like is satellite radio.  We have Click! cable at the salon, I have Sirius in my car and the husband has XM in his.  I like not having commercials, and I like having someone else mix the music.  Not knowing what is coming is interesting to me.

I debated whether to put this under the Come Here So I Can Smack You heading, but I decided it was too sad.  Like many of you, I am shaped a lot like my mother.  And I am OK with that.  It is who I am.  Thank God I am not famous enough to have paparazzi and the attention of The Daily Mail.  I always felt sorry for Sarah Ferguson.  I was once the fat daughter-in-law (my former sister-in-law was a former model and ballerina) and it was never fun to be the ugly duckling in comparison to the beautiful swan.  I thought I understood how she might have felt when she got crap for not being as perfect as Diana.

So, now, here we are, a generation later, and it is Sarah’s daughter who gets the crap.  Very sad that we can’t let people decide for themselves whether they are happy with their body.

Bea, beach bodies and the thorny problem of the Mummy gene …

By AMANDA PLATELL - More by this author » Last updated at 23:49pm on 29th April 2008

Comments (21)

Princess Beatrice emerges beaming from the Caribbean Sea beside her boyfriend, Dave Clark, and the first impression is how in love they seem.

The second thought is how comfortable this comely 19-year-old is in her own skin - so at ease with her curves that she’s happy to be photographed in a skimpy blue bikini.

Thirdly, it hits you that a young woman can run, she can hide, but there’s no escaping The Curse Of The Mummy Gene.

Scroll down for more …

Curvy: Fergie in St Tropez in 2001. Beatrice in St Barths this week

Read the rest of the article here.

We have talked before (and I have taken some guff) about my belief that the customer is NOT always right. Customers are human.

They sometimes are wrong. I know. It seems crazy and counter to everything you have read about how to succeed in business. But it is the honest truth.  You cannot please everyone.  Some people cannot be pleased no matter how hard you try!

This sign is from a shop in Beijing, China.

Today I have found an article for you (read the excerpt below, then click over to read the rest) that backs up my belief.

The article shares stories from companies large and small who have realized that not every customer is right for their business.

The customer is always right?

When the customer isn’t right - for your business

One woman who frequently flew on Southwest, was constantly disappointed with every aspect of the company’s operation. In fact, she became known as the “Pen Pal” because after every flight she wrote in with a complaint.

She didn’t like the fact that the company didn’t assign seats; she didn’t like the absence of a first-class section; she didn’t like not having a meal in flight; she didn’t like Southwest’s boarding procedure; she didn’t like the flight attendants’ sporty uniforms and the casual atmosphere.

Her last letter, reciting a litany of complaints, momentarily stumped Southwest’s customer relations people. They bumped it up to Herb’s [Kelleher, CEO of Southwest] desk, with a note: ‘This one’s yours.’

In sixty seconds, Kelleher wrote back and said, ‘Dear Mrs. Crabapple, We will miss you. Love, Herb.’”

The phrase “The customer is always right” was originally coined by Harry Gordon Selfridge, the founder of Selfridge’s department store in London in 1909, and is typically used by businesses to:

1. Convince customers that they will get good service at this company
2. Convince employees to give customers good service

Fortunately more and more businesses are abandoning this maxim - ironically because it leads to bad customer service.

Read the rest here.

I am on a roll with the wretched teenagers lately (insert diagnosis here) and thought you needed a female brat to complete your set with the wretched Australian boy (who I still want to smack.)

Why must it take so long and cost so much to campaign?

Every time I read a headline about the latest record breaking campaign fund-raising, I wonder what we could buy with all that money. The numbers have gotten so large that they are obscene, and somehow we seem to be numb to them.

I am feeling a little disheartened by my country and the priorities we have. We (the people and our companies) donate millions to get our favorite in charge and it seems a bit like gambling. There is no guarantee that the candidate that we support will vanquish all the others, but yet, the dollars flow in to try to help.

Sometimes when I have a big handbag, I put more things into it because I have the space to spare. Do you think the campaigns spend so much just because they have it to spare? More ads. More signs. And it’s still the primaries!

I just can’t help but wonder how many months of health insurance we could get for $55 million.

And don’t think for a minute that I am picking on one team more than another. I have enough malaise to spread around equally.

Feel free to explain to me why I should feel differently.

This 16 year old boy is begging for me to smack him. He had a party while his parents were on holiday and it ended very, very badly. He is unapologetic. I want to hurt him.

The latest news is that he is now planning a career as a DJ and party promoter.  I wonder if he ever apologized to his parents and neighbors.

Because of my must-learn-everything-the-hard-way son, I have had the opportunity to watch the Pierce County justice system crawl along at an unbelievably slow pace.

It seems now that I am not the only one who thinks things take longer than they should.  From the Tribune:

Pierce County Superior Court judges to target case backlog

Proposal offers solutions after audit shows delays in Superior Court system

ADAM LYNN; adam.lynn@thenewstribune.com

Published: February 28th, 2008 01:00 AM | Updated: February 28th, 2008 06:26 AM

Stung by an audit that said they move too slowly, Pierce County’s Superior Court judges are implementing changes they hope will reduce a backlog of cases clogging the county’s criminal justice system.

Click here to read the whole story.

Upside of suspects staying in county while they await trial: much of their sentence time is already served by the time they are found guilty.

Downside: over-crowded facilities and overtime for the corrections staff.

I thought you would be interested to see the time-line of my kid’s case as an example.  (Remember, we have suspects waive their right to a speedy trial because no one (prosecution or defense) is ready to deal with the case.)

For clarification, CONTINUED means that what ever was supposed to happen didn’t because someone (prosecution or defense) wasn’t ready or wasn’t available.  After 16 months, I am sure the prosecution and the defense were glad to see the end of this case!

Don’t tattoo your boyfriend’s name on your body.

Don’t tattoo your boyfriend’s name on your body.

Don’t tattoo your boyfriend’s name on your body.

A new client last week has “Matthew” on the inside of her wrist. (The photo above is not the client’s wrist. She is not that hairy!)

Problem is, Matthew is no longer the love of her life. (I know, you are stunned. This never happens.)

Laser removal of the tattoo is:

a. painful

b. expensive

c. not guaranteed

She has found a resolution that will mitigate the damages.

Under “Matthew” she will add 7:7. Biblically speaking, Matthew 7:7 reads:

Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you.

I am sure that someday the tattoo will mean that to her. But for a long time every time she looks at her wrist all she will see is a reminder of her short-sighted impetuous youth.

When will we learn that a relationship is far more likely to fade away than a tattoo?

At least the boy’s name wasn’t Fred.

We aren’t ashamed to tell you that sometimes the conversation in the salon turns to celebrity gossip.

We subscribe to a broad selection of magazines. Cooking, decorating, travel, fashion and trash. The trash is often the most read.  I guess the salon is a safe place to read a gossip rag without the shame of you having to buy it.

So, the saga of Britney Spears. This train has wrecked more times than I thought a train could wreck. Most recently she has found herself in the hospital for a mental health observation and without rights to visit her kids.  (Are we surprised by anything she does now?)

So, in walks the tough shrink. At the request of her family, he says, and wants to help.  Now the family (and mental health professionals) have complained that the doctor with the TV show talked to reporters about her health.  This surprises you?

Let me go out on a limb here and suggest that at this point, her health is more important than her privacy.

Of course she needs an intervention!  The child has gone bat-shit crazy!

Someone has to help her and the people around her have not been able to do so.  If it takes a little public embarrassment to get her some help, then so be it. She has done plenty to embarrass herself in the past few years.

How loudly does someone have to cry for help? Let’s hope she gets help while she can still afford it.  Health care, mental or physical, isn’t cheap! 

I try really hard not to talk about politics because it is nearly impossible to do so without ticking someone off. But this morning’s news story is driving me crazy. As the parent of two teenagers, perhaps I am especially touchy when it comes to adolescent behavior, so forgive if you disagree with this interpretation.

Click here to read the story.

Have you ever told a kid not to do something and not been specific enough?

Parent: Johnny, don’t swing the cat by the tail.

Johnny: OK

Next day

Parent: Johnny! The cat is bald! Didn’t I tell you to leave him alone?

Johnny: No. You told me not to swing him by the tail.

Parent: And why do you think I said that?

Johnny: I don’t know.

Parent: Damn it! You know good and well I meant not to torture or torment the cat at all.

Johnny: Yeah. Well. That’s not what you said.

Eventually the parent learns to be crystal clear in their communication with the child.

Perhaps the people keeping a check on things in government haven’t learned that lesson.

It was cold (for Tacoma) and I had unloaded my groceries.  I began the walk to return my cart to the corral and I spotted a shopper on her way in.  How nice, I thought, I can give her this cart.  (It’s a good one.  No wobbly wheels, no squeaks.)  I felt flush with good will and kindness.

Smiling, I asked if she needed a cart.   She replied, “No.  But I will take it in for you.”

I was momentarily crushed.  My good intentions didn’t quite pan out!  Now she was doing me a favor! I comforted myself with the thought that I (we) had still saved the courtesy clerk the chore.

Which brings me to my big point.

I know that we Americans are fat and lazy, but are we really too lazy to put the carts back in their corrals?  Am I the only one who gets irritated when carts are helter-skelter, hither and yon throughout the parking lot?  No good comes of this!

1. The courtesy clerks (making minimum wage, one assumes) have to round up the carts like cattle on the trail, bringing up the stragglers to the rest of  the herd.

2. Carts block otherwise perfectly good parking spots (when they aren’t rolling on their own into someone’s car.)

I know that I am a little more OCD than the rest of the populace, but I will take the time to straighten the carts in the corral so that more can be stacked efficiently and they won’t stick out in the driving areas.

If we all do things in a logical manner, the world runs more smoothly and everyone is inconvenienced less.  Being lazy just makes everyone else’s life more difficult.  Take 30 freaking seconds to make the world a better place.  Or just park close to the cart corral in the first place!

And don’t even get me started on proper freeway merging protocol.  Oy!

OK.  I’m done now.

I don’t know what it is about me that has to be contrary. It happened first with the movie Mrs. Doubtfire. Everyone I knew saw it before I did and RAVED about how funny it was. When I finally got to the theatre to see it, my response was much less enthusiastic. It wasn’t a bad movie, I just didn’t get the same excitement that the crowd before me got.

So I have heard all the ruckus about Eat Pray Love. Many of my friends LOVED it. Some even said it changed their lives! I decided to read it also, and while I loved the section on Rome (because I love Rome), I just didn’t get infected with enthusiasm for the book the way my friends had.

In case you haven’t read it, let me give you a very brief synopsis:

Our author goes through a horrible divorce followed closely by a turbulent rebound relationship. In an effort to find herself and God, she takes a year and travels to three exotic locations (Italy, India and Indonesia) to search.

I have no complaints about the quality of the writing, about the way the story progresses, about the character development, or anything like that.

I came away from the book with two stories in mind:

The Wizard of Oz and The Blue Bird of Happiness.

I guess I just don’t understand why you need to search the whole world over to find God, yourself, or happiness.

Travel because you enjoy it, because you want to learn about different cultures, or because you want an adventure.

If you want to find God, yourself, or happiness, perhaps you could start looking in your own backyard.

Success - Hard Work - Laziness

October 5th, 2007 in Money & Personal Dev

As a guy who speaks to over a hundred thousand people per year about success, I get asked this question a lot. Rarely are the people pleased with my answer: Work. Yep, that’s it. Work. It’s not attitude or passion or loving what you do. Those things help, but they aren’t the key. It’s good old-fashioned word. How do you know you are working? When you are breaking a sweat, either mentally or physically.

Now don’t automatically think that working hard will make you successful. It won’t. I know lots of people who work very hard, much harder than I do, and don’t really find any financial success. On the other hand, I don’t know of anyone who has experienced real financial success who hasn’t worked hard to achieve it. And don’t offer me lottery winners or people who have inherited their money – they don’t count. I’m talking about regular people like you and me. For us, it takes work.

“But Larry, I go to work every day and work hard!” I doubt it. Most studies say that workers waste at least two hours a day goofing off. They admit to doing less than their best on the job and less than their best for the customer. Work is just that place where you dress slightly better than you do at home. And those people you work with – they aren’t co-workers, they are only co-goers.

We have become a nation of spectators. It’s easier to watch Friends on TV than it is to be a friend in real life. It’s easier to watch people lose weight on TV than it is to get off our huge butts and lose it ourselves. It’s certainly easier to watch people paint a room or clean out their closets than to do it ourselves. And it’s even easier to watch someone else correct their out-of -control children that to discipline our own. I find this sad.

Most people settle for much less than they have to because they are just too lazy to work for what they really want. They do a half-assed job when they are on the job and then put little effort into living their dream when they go home. Life, happiness, prosperity and success all take effort. If it feels easy, you are going the wrong direction. Remember: It’s called work for a reason.

We had a customer service incident today.

I answered a phone call from someone who had not yet been into our salon and was very irritated that she had received her reminder email only to learn that we thought her appointment was for Saturday and she thought it was for today. I asked her if she had gotten the email confirmation that is sent when the appointment is first made and she said she got it but didn’t read it.

I offered her a time today and she was unable to take it. I told her I would have the stylist call her and see what could be done to get the time she preferred. When the stylist arrived, he/she (I have been asked not to give too much info so as to not hurt any feelings, so I have adjusted gender) called the client and left a voice-mail in which she/he made a point to remind the client of the conversation and how she must have asked for a Saturday appointment.

An hour later, I got this email from the client:

I am cancelling my appointment on Saturday, 10/6 @ 4:30.

I have a funeral all day Saturday, why would I make an appt. that day?????? I don’t appreciate (X’s) claiming (she/he) specifically remembers me telling (him/her) Saturday, because I did not. It’s pretty funny too, (she/he) started off by saying, “I talked to you a couple days ago”… nope, just yesterday. I think (he/she’s) a little off on (his/her) days. Ever heard ‘the customer is always right’? I’ll be giving someone else my business.

Thanks,

When I spoke to the stylist about this, there were raised voices and hurt feelings. I was not irritated about the scheduling error. Things happen. Life is like that. What irritated me was the way it was handled. Once the confusion occurs, it makes no sense to fight over who was right. The question isn’t who was right, the question is, can the client be accommodated? I think they were both more interested in being right than they were about getting her hair done.

I tried to explain to the stylist that this lesson needed to be learned not just to be a successful service provider, but to live a happy life.

It hardly ever matters who was right. Really. I promise.

As to the “customer is always right” philosophy, our regular clients know that we don’t necessarily subscribe. We aren’t here to be doormats, and while I wish this incident could have been handled differently, I am not going to try to woo this client into giving us another chance.

I did reply to her email with an apology for being unable to solve her problem, a list of four salons that might be able to help her today, and our best wishes.

Feel free to discuss similar incidents and other solutions!

Many of you know that my teenage son has found himself in a bit of trouble. Going through it all has disillusioned me on a few things.

Speedy Trial - Like many Americans who have had no interaction with the world of criminal justice, I thought that we had a right to a speedy trial. I have been told “no one in Pierce County gets a speedy trial.” (Seems like we either need more courts or fewer proceedings.) My son was involved in an incident in June 2006 when he was 16. There are seven co-defendants. The original trial date was October 2006. It has been continued and continued and the next theoretical date is October 2007. I also thought that a minor child would be detained in the youth facility. Alas, since the County has chosen to try him as an adult, the boy sits in (adult) County Jail, awaiting trial.

No Child Left Behind - So if we have a child sitting in jail (a captive audience, if ever there was one!) I would have thought that there would be some sort of school required for him to attend. That is not the case. An attorney familiar with the system sums it up thusly: “We are not in the business of rehabilitation, we are in the business of punishment.” I see that as another example of my country’s short-sightedness. Never having been much of “an eye for and eye” kind of gal, my belief system is a little different. I think our jails and prisons should be places we put people from whom society needs protecting.

If we believe that each child has a right to “a free and appropriate education” enough to enact laws to support that, why then do we not apply it across the board? Who needs a basic education more than a kid who is already at risk? The irony is that during the time he spends with the inmates in County Jail, he is getting an education whether we like it or not. He is learning how to be a better criminal.

Perhaps this weekend I will write to my congress people and ask their opinions.