My headache cure

I get tension headaches.

A lot.

One could surmise that I have a lot of tension in my life, or possibly that I have horrible posture and my spine is all out of whack causing my neck and back to always be tight and messed up and hurting my head.

Whatever the reason, I get tension headaches – the kind that starts in your shoulders, go up through your neck, and end up right behind your eyebrows.

Obviously, I try to keep ibuprofen on hand.  But I’ve also discovered another more natural – and immediate – solution for my headaches, courtesy of my local Aveda salon.

(Seriously, those people know me by my first name.  They should send me Christmas and birthday presents.)

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Cleansers for oily AND dry skin?

I love it when people ask me questions.

It makes me feel smart and better than you.  I mean, helpful.  It makes me feel helpful.

My point is – someone asked me a question.

Elizabeth asked:

“do you know of any good facial cleansers that control oily and dry spots? As in, both at the same time? My forehead is both. I have no idea how this is scientifically possible, but my old cleansers aren’t working anymore. Help!”

Allow me to pretend to be an expert in skin care.

My immediate answer is your skin is probably not actually both oily and dry.

Truly oily skin is very, very rare.  And while cosmetic companies have been talking about “combination” skin for pretty much EVER, that is also pretty rare.

And yet, you’re breaking out AND having parts of your skin flake off, right?

Been there.

In fact, I actually had black heads and zits once right not top of skin that was dry and flaking off.  I googled and googled and then finally broke down and scheduled an emergency facial.

And then I rolled around for a few minutes in the idea that I was someone that scheduled emergency facials.  I started imagining myself using terms like “the help” and “my Jimmy Choos” and “that lovely woman who does my toes.”

But back to my schizophrenic face.

As it turns out, what was actually going on was that my face was really, really, really dry.  The blackheads and zits and oiliness were a result of my skin trying to work overtime to make up for the fact that I was stripping away the moisture in my skin by trying to fight the zits.

At least, that’s what the very expensive esthetician told me.

I didn’t believe her, of course.  Because it doesn’t make sense that dry skin would have blackheads and oil slicks.  And also – maybe I made my skin more dry by trying to fight the acne, but I had to do that because the acne was there in the first place, right?

My very expensive esthetician told me to shut up and do what I was told.

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How To Manage Curly Hair: The Wet Look

In the interest of full disclosure:

That is not my wet curly hair in that picture.

Nor are those my eyelashes.  Good Lord, I wish.

Ahem.  Anyway.  I do, however, have naturally curly hair that I adore.  I have learned how to manage curly hair using product and a diffuser with my blow dryer.

But I have a confession to make:

Sometimes I am far too lazy or busy to spend the extra five minutes necessary to blow dry my hair.

Unfortunately, I have short curly hair so making use of a cute pony tail when I’m in a hurry is out of the question.  Recently,  I’ve stumbled on some great new products that allow me to very quickly tame my curls and get predictable results that I’m willing to go out in public with.

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How to Manage Curly Hair: Product. Product. Product.

I have naturally curly hair that I love.  Now.

It took me years of trial and error to get here.

I spent decades of my life walking around with a frizzy sort of kind of wave thing going on and I hated my hair.  I brushed and brushed and blow dryed and sprayed and it always just poofed.

My senior year in highschool, I discovered gel and scrunching.  Then, instead of a poofy triangular shaped fro, I had a crunchy spiral perm that always looked wet.

I’ve tried every cut, product, and gadget on the market.  From the very, very cheap to the very, very overpriced, I’ve experimented with everything in an effort to manage my curly hair.

About three years ago, I stumbled on the secret recipe.  I’ve tested it since then – trying to swap out one part of the formula or another – and time and time again I have proven to myself that this is what works on curly hair.

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