the adlards

I might quite possibly have had the worst shower of my life today. After sailing I had so much salt in my hair that running my hands through it completely obscured my vision with a cloud of minute particles exhibiting classic Brownian motion. I dashed for the shower, pausing only to draw a bath for Josie, wash down my kit, read Josie her bedtime stories (2) and give her a reasonable period to settle down. By this stage my shorts were so stiff (with salt) that I had to shuffle along to avoid chaffing.

The shower was strong and hot, the two most fundamental requirements, but I’d forgotten my shower products. There was an innocuous-looking bar of soap that I proceeded to wash with. I immediately noticed that my hair had gone squeaky and seemed to be sticking to my hands like spiders’ web. I decided my best course of action was to leap out of the shower and pillage some conditioner from the collection others have left in the house. The only conditioner I could find was a violent blue tea tree concoction, so that’s what I used.

When I finally got out of the shower and had dried myself it was clear that my skin was in very much the same condition my hair had been. I searched for body lotion. All I could find was a rather exotic mango and peach mix, which I sniffed suspiciously and tried on my hands before applying liberally all over my body. Now I didn’t know it, but apparently it is in the nature of these things to:

1. Smell alright in the bottle, but once applied to gradually increase in strength until the assault on your sinuses is such that the only way to escape with your sanity intact is to admit defeat and get back into the shower, or to tie a cloth around your nose and mouth in an attempt to filter out the smell. I tried the latter. It doesn’t work very well.
2. Not hurt your hands when you test them, but burn the hell out of your face if, in a burst of enthusiasm, you decide to moisturise where previously only shaving balm has been allowed to go. As the burning sensation around my nose and mouth grew I knew I had to wash the stuff off my face, so reached for a bottle of baby wash (on the basis it must be gentle). It was gentle, but was also strongly orange scented, leaving me smelling like a fruit salad on steroids, even through my face-cloth.

Heather tells me there was a moisturising soap up there I could have used. She’s put it in the shower for me so that I won’t miss it next time. I’m sure when I wake up in the morning the conditioner will have turned my hair green.

This entry was posted on Monday, June 27th, 2005 at 10:23 pm by james and is filed under Ramblings. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.