Soap Whore Comes Clean
Warning: This Post Contains WAY Too Much Information
If you weren't uncomfortable before, you will be now.
So many people are sick right now with this month long extravaganza of phlegm and headaches and sore throats that I thought I'd send out a little hot pepper, ginger, and garlic love. Philip can't seem to get rid of it. Just when it seems to be easing up and going away he gets a fresh sore throat and I sleep in the guest bedroom. (Because I don't want to get sick and he always sleeps facing me.) I still haven't caught it but I haven't been feeling 100% either.
I've been thinking lately that I might have some slight (really slight) issues that I didn't see as issues before. With germs, for example. And the use of soaps and toothpaste. According to all of you I use an extraordinary amount of soap and toothpaste. I think I was wrong about having to buy it every two weeks but definitely I buy toothpaste once a month. Maybe every three weeks. The tubes I buy aren't very big, but never the less, at least two of my friends expressed astonishment at me going through toothpaste so quickly, indicating that perhaps I suffered from some life altering toothpaste incident as a child resulting in adult on-set toothpaste abuse.
When they revealed how little they use, my first thought was "Your mouth isn't very clean, is it?" even though neither one of them has ever given me mouth qualms. If I don't use enough toothpaste then my mouth doesn't feel fresh afterwords. Although I dislike a lot of thick foam in my mouth*, I need my mouth to feel fresh after I've cleaned it. Minty. I need minty mouth.
My toothpaste is running low right now and it has come time to make up a batch of nasty baking soda toothpaste. I will only do this in conjunction with making a super minty mouthwash for me and a super cinnamon-y mouthwash for Philip.
Then there's soap. Apparently I'm obsessed with using obscene amounts of soap. Who knew that my soap usage would ever cause eyebrows to rise? I go through a bar of soap a week. I share that bar with Philip. We both shower every single day. We both use that soap every single day. Does that really seem obsessive? I could choose (I guess) to just rinse myself down every morning, or take showers every other day. I'm starting to feel self conscious like I might be a lot more OCD than previously determined.
Body odor is not my favorite scent experience. Which is why I would have been shoved in an asylum in the fifteen hundreds when the whole world smelled funky all the time.
It isn't that I think all body odor is terrible, but I find it distracting. (Here comes another choice view into a madwoman's head). I really hate underarm odor when it's sharp and thin. I can't think when my own pits smell that way and when others smell that way I can't stop fantasizing about shoving that person into a hot soapy bath. Hair oil smell also bothers me which is why I can't let anyone else use the pillow I sleep on. It isn't a bad odor exactly but it's kind of animal and personal and if I'm right next to it I can't concentrate on anything else like getting to sleep.
But personally, what I find really distressing is the way an unwashed hoo-ha develops a riper and riper scent the longer it goes unwashed. This is also not exactly a bad scent so much as it's very personal and something I'm not keen to waft at everyone I know. I have smelt it on others (none of my friends though, so don't worry) and it's familiar yet individual. If I don't shower for one day I can smell myself when I use the bathroom. All my skin, my pits, my hoo-ha all converge into body odor that I find irritating and distracting. It is probably only me smelling me, but since I can smell everyone else too, I don't really think it's just me.
What I love best in the world is lathering up in lots of wonderful herby smelling soaps and hot water and stepping out of my shower or bath with a feeling of starting fresh and smelling like lavender rather than musky animal. I love herbal scents, natural oils, even bath products with perfume. That is my dirty secret- I actually really love perfumes. I restrict myself to all natural scents now but secretly love it when I pass by a woman wearing Clinique.
Am I a soap whore?
Don't you all feel EXACTLY the same way?
But here's what's going to shock you: I don't wash my hands every time I go to the bathroom.
So I can't be completely worried about germs. If I washed my hands every time I peed I wouldn't have any skin left on my hands. I get red flaky hands that hurt when they come in contact with water too much. I do so many dishes all day that I figure my hands are pretty flippin' squeaky. And since I shower with (apparently) profuse amounts of soap every day I really don't feel scared of my hoo-ha being particularly dirty. So there. I also never EVER use antibacterial soap. NOT EVER. It's truly evil.
So see? I'm perfectly normal. Say it with me now: Angelina is PERFECTLY NORMAL.
Thank you.
I've been thinking lately that I might have some slight (really slight) issues that I didn't see as issues before. With germs, for example. And the use of soaps and toothpaste. According to all of you I use an extraordinary amount of soap and toothpaste. I think I was wrong about having to buy it every two weeks but definitely I buy toothpaste once a month. Maybe every three weeks. The tubes I buy aren't very big, but never the less, at least two of my friends expressed astonishment at me going through toothpaste so quickly, indicating that perhaps I suffered from some life altering toothpaste incident as a child resulting in adult on-set toothpaste abuse.
When they revealed how little they use, my first thought was "Your mouth isn't very clean, is it?" even though neither one of them has ever given me mouth qualms. If I don't use enough toothpaste then my mouth doesn't feel fresh afterwords. Although I dislike a lot of thick foam in my mouth*, I need my mouth to feel fresh after I've cleaned it. Minty. I need minty mouth.
My toothpaste is running low right now and it has come time to make up a batch of nasty baking soda toothpaste. I will only do this in conjunction with making a super minty mouthwash for me and a super cinnamon-y mouthwash for Philip.
Then there's soap. Apparently I'm obsessed with using obscene amounts of soap. Who knew that my soap usage would ever cause eyebrows to rise? I go through a bar of soap a week. I share that bar with Philip. We both shower every single day. We both use that soap every single day. Does that really seem obsessive? I could choose (I guess) to just rinse myself down every morning, or take showers every other day. I'm starting to feel self conscious like I might be a lot more OCD than previously determined.
Body odor is not my favorite scent experience. Which is why I would have been shoved in an asylum in the fifteen hundreds when the whole world smelled funky all the time.
It isn't that I think all body odor is terrible, but I find it distracting. (Here comes another choice view into a madwoman's head). I really hate underarm odor when it's sharp and thin. I can't think when my own pits smell that way and when others smell that way I can't stop fantasizing about shoving that person into a hot soapy bath. Hair oil smell also bothers me which is why I can't let anyone else use the pillow I sleep on. It isn't a bad odor exactly but it's kind of animal and personal and if I'm right next to it I can't concentrate on anything else like getting to sleep.
But personally, what I find really distressing is the way an unwashed hoo-ha develops a riper and riper scent the longer it goes unwashed. This is also not exactly a bad scent so much as it's very personal and something I'm not keen to waft at everyone I know. I have smelt it on others (none of my friends though, so don't worry) and it's familiar yet individual. If I don't shower for one day I can smell myself when I use the bathroom. All my skin, my pits, my hoo-ha all converge into body odor that I find irritating and distracting. It is probably only me smelling me, but since I can smell everyone else too, I don't really think it's just me.
What I love best in the world is lathering up in lots of wonderful herby smelling soaps and hot water and stepping out of my shower or bath with a feeling of starting fresh and smelling like lavender rather than musky animal. I love herbal scents, natural oils, even bath products with perfume. That is my dirty secret- I actually really love perfumes. I restrict myself to all natural scents now but secretly love it when I pass by a woman wearing Clinique.
Am I a soap whore?
Don't you all feel EXACTLY the same way?
But here's what's going to shock you: I don't wash my hands every time I go to the bathroom.
So I can't be completely worried about germs. If I washed my hands every time I peed I wouldn't have any skin left on my hands. I get red flaky hands that hurt when they come in contact with water too much. I do so many dishes all day that I figure my hands are pretty flippin' squeaky. And since I shower with (apparently) profuse amounts of soap every day I really don't feel scared of my hoo-ha being particularly dirty. So there. I also never EVER use antibacterial soap. NOT EVER. It's truly evil.
So see? I'm perfectly normal. Say it with me now: Angelina is PERFECTLY NORMAL.
Thank you.
*The main reason I have been using Tom's of Maine for the last twenty years is that it isn't as grossly foamy as more conventional toothpaste. Conventional toothpaste feels like dental goo in my mouth, the kind they form molds of teeth with for fitting retainers. It makes me instantly gag which is a sensation I like to avoid at all costs.