Nina Lewis

Archive for March, 2009

There is a Hare Krishna temple near us.  Like about half a mile away from our house.  Once a year, they hold a Festival of Colors.  This festival represents the passing of winter into spring. Colored powder is thrown to signify the joy and colors of the arrival of spring.

Last Saturday was the Festival.  Some of our kids went to it.  Some of my student employees went to it.  My husband played chauffer as he drove these groups to the Festival and then picked them up when they were ready to leave.  (I stayed home and played with our grandson, Spencer.)

It was a beautiful spring day.  A great day to celebrate the coming of spring.  However, I think the celebration was a wee bit too early.  The day after the Festival it snowed 3 inches!  Then the day after that, it snowed 2 inches.  I think that colored powder is about all the spring color that we’ll have for a while.

In Super Granny by Sally Wendkos Olds, this site was included in the book.  During her publishing process, I took all things grandmotherly off this site and moved them over to Grandma Ideas.

Go to Grandma Ideas for lots of different ideas.  Lots!  See ya over there!

Taking our my braids.  What an experience.  I thought I’d share it in all its glory (or is it gory?) with you.  Background music is Jammin’ by Bob Marley.

FACT: Braiding hair takes less time than unbraiding it.  Latoya took a mere one and a half hours.  It took my husband and I three and a half hours to undo it.  (It’s a sign of true love when a husband spends his Saturday morning unbraiding his wife’s hair.  Thank you, Craig.)

FACT:  With arms tired of being held up for such a difficult task, watching The Pirates of the Caribbean relieved the tediousness of the activity.  Appropriate choice of movie, don’t you think?  (While getting my hair braided in Jamaica, that tediousness was broken up as I watched two arguing men almost get into a knife fight.  No boredom there!)

FACT:  Anybody interested in a slew of red and white bead from Jamaica, let me know.  I have a whole pile that I’ll mail them to you.   Free of charge.  (But then you could just go to your local craft store and get the very same beads there.  They just wouldn’t have the notoriety of being from Jamaica.  China, yes.  Jamaica, no.)

FACT:  My scalp sighed with relief when the tension from the braids was finally gone.

FACT:   According to a local beautician, 100 hairs a day will normally fall out of a person’s scalp.  Since I had my braids in for 11 days and I was unable to brush it during that time, the pile of hair that came out during the combing consisted of approximately 1,100 hairs.  That’s a big pile.  However, my hair did not come out in clumps.  No bald spots on my scalp.  Thank goodness.  (As the video clip can testify, my hair doesn’t look unusually thin either.)

FACT:  Those 1,100 hairs will grow back and all will be normal once more (what ever normal is . . .).  I just hope the sunburn on my back will recover just as nicely . . .

FACT:  It’s amazing how Vaseline (that was used in the braiding of my hair) helped me to create an ‘out standing’ hairdo (as evidenced in the video clip).  I wonder what folks on the bus or at work would say if I came to work with my hair spiked up.  Now THAT just might jeopardize my job . . .

FACT:  In the next few days, the white flakes people will see in my hair are NOT dandruff.  It’s just my scalp pealing from the sunburn.  (Now that there isn’t any tension due to the braids, the sunburned skin can finally slough off.)

FACT:  The red-and-white zigzag pattern on my scalp isn’t very noticeable– the red because of the sunburn between the braids and the white because parts of my scalp under the braids have not seen the light of day since my hair grew in when I was a toddler.

FACT:  One of my profile pictures reminded me of an Egyptian sphinx – thanks to my big honking German-sized nose and the way my hair stuck out in back.  I’m now thinking of getting a permanent . . .

FACT:  It took three times of lathering up with shampoo and rinsing out the soap to get all of the Vaseline out of my hair.

FACT: More hair came out while I washed it in the shower.  Part way through my shower, I realized I was standing in water almost up to my knees – and the drain plug was not stopped!  After removing the wad of hair covering the drain (twice!) the water obediently drained out of the tub.

FACT:  As I get ready for work in the mornings, I will miss the ease of the braided hairstyle.  With the braids in, I just floofed my bangs and was finished.  I’m thinking of getting a wash-n-go style.  I’m getting lazy in my old age.

FACT:  I love sleeping bead-free.  How soft and comfortable my head lays on my pillow.

FACT:  I love the feel of a light spring breeze through my hair instead of having the wind whiplash me with the beads.

FACT:  My hairdo won’t scare little children in the grocery store any more – at least not any more than it previously did.

FACT:  After learning that I was posting this movie on my web page, my husband entered the CIA witness protection plan.  He’s not sure that he wants to be connected to me and is counting the days until people will forget about this video clip.  (Isn’t he lucky to be married to me??)

QUESTION:  Would I ever get my hair braided like this again?

ANSWER:  Ya mon!

Dear Readers and Poll Takers,

Well, the day has arrived. All of the votes have been cast and counted. (There were no problems with chads clinging questioningly to any of the ballots. Thank you Florida voters for getting it right this time.) Here are the results.

39% voted ya mon, don’t worry
21% voted yes to prove BYU can out class the U of U
33% said that I would be lacking in wisdom to go in the flaming glory of braids (which wouldn’t be anything new– the lacking of said wisdom!)
6% were worried about my job and thought it best for me to be conservative and go with my normal ‘do’

If you add up the yes votes, that totals 60%.
The no votes add up to 39%.

Maybe I need to take remedial math. 60% + 39% = 99%. My question is: where are the other 1% of the voters? Maybe I messed up in how I set up the poll. Maybe I messed up in adding the numbers.

New math equation: Nina’s brain + using new technology = mass confusion. My children are probably rolling their eyes right now because they know the answer does not lie in me needing remedial math (which would be extremely beyond my capabilities). They know the answer lies with the new math equation . . .

Before I tell you what my final decision was, let me share with you an e-mail that I received from a dear friend who not only teaches at Springville High School where I, too, used to work, but she also share the same birthday as I. (However, we do not share the same IQ  — they are vastly different with hers being far superior to mine . . . ) Here’s what she wrote:

Nina,
How do I miss these life altering events? I didn’t even know you went to Jamaica, let alone the braids. But I wish to tell you two things. I voted, but more importantly, take the braids out right now!! This braiding of “white women’s” hair will only cause it to fall out.

There is a reason braiding trends exist among women of African descent. Their hair can tolerate this, yours cannot. One of my students went on a humanitarian trip to Kenya and got her hair braided only to lose some of it in small clumps when she took the braids out. I am hoping for the best regarding your hair and your presentation.

Priscilla

Boy howdy! This put a totally different dimension to my dilemma. Now, the dilemma is: take out the braids, have my normal hairstyle with possible clumps of hair missing. Braids or clumps of missing hair?

While I don’t mind looking weird and unusual (as is my daily normal persona) I do have my limits. Shocking, I know, but true.

Thus, I decided to keep the braids in. Bald may be beautiful (as in my husband) but patchy baldness isn’t my idea of a good time — unless I were a cancer survivor.

Brooklyn, I will take a picture of what my hair looks like when I take my braids out. However, I will NOT come to work that way. Once again, I do draw the line . . . . sometimes . . . I’ll probably post the picture here. For those of you who have incriminating evidence against me, blackmailing me with the threat of putting that picture on YouTube would definitely fill your pockets will financial remuneration. But hey. The way the economy is going, you wouldn’t get much . . .

So, I’m off to Salt Lake City — in all my braided glory.

(P.S. Yesterday, my boss limited my presentation.  To one minute.  All this angst for nothing.  No problem, mon!)

I am a very obedient employee. My boss says jump, I jump. He says do this work, I do the work.

Just moments ago, he said he had an assignment for me. I put my jumping shoes on and laced them tight.  I’m ready. I’m eager.  Bring it on.

He told me that Friday I had to attend an interstate collegiate consortium to represent our office. He told me I also had to do a presentation at said consortium.

I’m in a dilemma.  On the one hand, I’m obedient.  I want to do what my boss tells me to do.  However, on the other hand, you may recall that I do not have my normal hairstyle. My regular ‘do’ is not particularly spectacular. I do not look ravishing, fashionable, nor perky. Not even. At best, I look passable (when I’m wearing a black knit stocking cap over my head and face).

I had planned on leaving the beads in until Saturday evening. I felt that I would be getting my money’s worth if I left the braids in until then. But now I’m wondering if I ought to revert back to my run o’ the mill style.

So, I need your help.  Please take the following poll to help me decide what I should do. (NOTE: This is the first time that I have used this Wordpress plugin. Apparently, Makayla has found an error in how it was set up. Hopefully it is fixed now.)

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