Mr. Ujest cannot fathom why I would add a nice smelly oil to my bath water.
“Because I want to smell purty.”
“When you smell purty, it turns me on.” He replies.
“Apparently, me having a pulse turns you on.” I mutter under my breath.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
I can hear him slide into the tub,muttering on how slick the tub is and how likely he is to break a leg or his neck. Where he would probably drown in the scalding water I ran for him and I would allow him to drown because I am online and absorbed in my happy little world. " Why do you put oil into tub?"
“Be-cau-se…” I elaborate, " My skin is dry."
“How can you skin be dry?”
“It’s fall. Change of season. The WEATHER?” Hello? Anyone home? How many years have we been married?
“You get migraines when we have a change of weather.” He reasons this out for himself, “You get migraines when it rains. You get migraines when I’m horny. YOu get migraines if you eat the wrong food. NOW you are telling me your skin is dry? I don’t get it.”
This coming from a man who uses Lava soap to wash his face. Patiently, through the wall that separates us: me in my office: him in the tub I explain the situation.
" As a women gets older her estogen drops and when the estrogen drops, our skin gets dry."
You have to understand: most men are fundamentally incapable of understanding the moisturization needs of a woman. It’s so completely alien to us, when you talk about the various lotions and unguents that are necessary to keep you from becoming completely dessicated, you might as well be saying that you live off silicon. See Mike Nelson’s Mind Over Matters for more info, in particular the article “Moist as I Wanna Be.”
But doesn’t it sometimes seem like that wall follows him (or you) around?
I know my sweet, loyal, cosiderate, big dumb bird, carries one around.
Its convienient for not hearing when I say its trash night, or its your turn to clean the litter box.
But it also seems useful for not seeing the dishes on his desk or the socks under the bed.
It stays his hand from replacing the toilet paper, and keeps him from putting water in the glass he drank chocolate milk from in the night.
But if I stand on my tiptoes I can see over it, and get his attention. He puts it down when I really need him too.
I know its why he always looks a little last and confused when I talk about girl things. He really trys to listen, and understand, but, there’s that wall.
“See, I am in bed, long sleeved t-shirt on, comforter pulled up to my neck…”
“Then your mom (that’d be me, low-estrogen-smartini) comes out of the bathroom after doing all that night time stuff, fans herself by tugging those little straps of her nightgown (he does a mean imitation of this) and says…is it HOT in here to you?” and flips on the overhead fan!! :eek: :eek: :eek:
He smiles during this conversation with said daughter and I just smile at both of them…he’s a keeper too!
This is good to know, because last winter, when SkipMagic got all oogy about my putting lotion on my face, I tried to explain the (apparently alien) concept of winter-dry skin by pointing out the scaly flaky condition of my forehead and cheeks. He insisted that it was not dry skin causing the flakes, but (quote) “all that makeup clogging up [my] pores.”
Huh?
(This year I haven’t worn makeup since May, but the flakes, they are a-comin’ . . . )
And he wonders why I can’t just drink water to moisturize my lips.
But now I understand.
What I don’t understand is how come men don’t ever have these issues . . . ?
How come they can wash their faces with Lava soap and not end up looking like a molting reptile?
How come they can wash their hair with Irish Spring, skip conditioner, and still have supple, silky locks?
How come they can ski or make out (or both–though that would be difficult simultaneously) for eight days straight without the benefit of chapstick and still have the lips of Angelina Jolie?
I for one do have dry skin and my sweetheart is always putting moisturizer on my face and ears. It doesn’t matter what soap I use it just starts to peel away.
BUT MORE IMPORTANTLY!!!
How do you know how soft the lips of Angelina Jolie are???
Invisible walls the keep them from getting the point of " Oooh, look shoe sale!" or “Clearance Sale…I .must.go.check.it.out” and " Dinner is mac and cheese again…is that a problem?"
The same wall exists around us female types.
Whilst on vacation I allowed my husband to use our digital camera. This is after I made him tell me what it was for, the subject matter and swearing up and down I would not have 600 pictures of the same freaking thing from three different angles. I am not kidding. Before digital he took an entire roll of film of his grandmother’s gravestone. 24 pictures from three angles. It’s not like the gravestone is going to blink or move. Me not happy. Me not happy at all when I developed the pictures and I had gotten doubles. So I had 48 pictures of the same freaking thing.
Anywhooo, he takes the picture to a construction site where his cousin was working and takes buttloads of pictures of electrical, plumbing stuff. Stuff that puts me to sleep . He makes the comment aloud that looking at pictures of construction stuff is like looking at pictures of naked women. Every guy with him agreed.
However, I took pictures of the cool bicycles over there and every guy was like, why? I am going to have them all framed to hang as art.
And sports. Yeah, I might care once a season to pay attention for an entire game, but do I care who made the spectacular tackle that forced a turn over in the third inning of the Stanley Cup play offs which sent the Chicago Cubs on to the Superbowl for the first time since they won the America’s Cup in 1942?
Because when I found out I’d lost the part of Lara Croft (by just a hair, mind you–it all came down to which one of us could do the best rendition of Kate Smith singing “Lithium”), I slammed down the phone and yelled, “Angelina Jolie got the part? Angelina JOLIE? That b@!$&# can KISS MY A$$!”
What I did not realize was that I was still on speaker phone with the movie director. So he sent her over to do just that.
The polaroids will cost you at least a grand apiece.
Not to be a guy or anything, but don’t all of the of the creams/makeup/soaps that women do multiple times a day REMOVE the natural oil from the skin, causing the dryness to begin with?
(sneaks back into corner until my woman allows me to speak again.)
Not to be a girl but doesn’t constant watching of sports, tit shows and pron cause slowness in reflexes, monosylablistic answers and DunLaps Disease?
:dubious:
No. Would have typed back more soon but did not know what is Dunlaps Disease.
So I was careful to point out that most guys don’t get the whole skin product/moisturization thing. Your guy is an exception. Apparently, so is mine*, as he recently pointed out that I have patches of dry skin on my face and “should start using lotion unless you want to be all wrinkled up by the time you’re 40.”
This concerns me greatly, not that I’d be all wrinkled up by 40, and not dating a guy who notices dry skin, and not even the prospect of using some kind of apricot lotion moisturizing aloe-based facial scrub. It’s the prospect of having to buy such a product. I already dread having to get more shampoo or deodorant or shaving cream because it always leaves me just standing in the aisle staring, open-mouthed, wondering what the hell it is I’m supposed to be getting, anyway. It’s bad enough with the shampoo, and I know what that’s supposed to do – clean my hair and prevent dandruff. But all this other stuff – do I want or need to be smelling like apples and/or peaches?
Yeah…and if you get caught looking at construction websites at 1:am you might be misunderstood as a budding home remodel hero as opposed to…whatever it would be if you were caught looking at pictures of nekkid ladies 'cuz it’s never happened to ME no way nu-uh.
And your grasp of sport sounds about like mine. So you can’t lump us all together on that point
Yeah, but nobody’s debating that! And they’re certainly not activities that a guy would claim that doing more helps to solve the problem! Not if he knew what was good for him, anyway…
I’m feeling mighty outnumbered here. If anybody wants me I’ll be at the gentleman’s club watching the game between the legs of a pole dancer.
