I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again…being a blogger is like being a dancing bear.  I’m on this stage moving as fast as I can to entertain you, and sometimes the pressure is amazing.  I start wishing for minor catastrophes to befall me so I can write about them.  I plan dangerous excursions for myself when I know I am a walking recipe for disaster without any help.  And when that’s not enough, I have other writers making suggestions like…

“Oh, you should give yourself a piercing!” or “What about a tattoo?” 

I came up with the idea to cut my own hair.  I needed a haircut, so why not do it myself?  It would be funny, I have no doubt.  But when I suggested the idea to my husband he just rolled his eyes at me, the way he often does, and said, “It’s one thing to suffer for your art, but it’s quite another to make the rest of us suffer too.”  I couldn’t imagine what he meant by that.  How would cutting my own hair cause him any suffering?  “I would have to look at you,” he said.  So back to the drawing board I went.  Did no one have an idea that was safe AND funny?

Apparently not.

The suggestion that I dye my hair bright pink for the day was a good one, but since I’d already done that quite accidentally once before—leaving myself with Ronald McDonald red hair for the better part of several days—I decided it wasn’t a viable solution.  In my hands, hair dye is a dangerous weapon.  And frankly, I like eating out too much to risk being grounded to the house by my husband for stepping over the invisible line from Funland into Humiliationville. 

I wouldn’t mind it so much.  I’m the same person who found the most hideous sweater known to mankind and wore it to work to see what people would say.  The same hot pink sweater I am forbidden to wear in the presence of my family even in the privacy of my own home. I would gladly wear hot pink hair for a few days just to blog about the reactions.  Unfortunately, my husband is a bit more timid in his interactions with other humans.  He doesn’t like when I say more than a few words to the waiter at a restaurant for fear of where my thoughts might take me.  He wouldn’t survive hot pink hair…not even in a drive-thru window.

Trust me on that…I’ve done embarrassing things in a drive-thru window before.  Once in particular.  And I’m surprised my husband didn’t leave the vehicle and disappear into the night rather than drive from the speaker to the window to face the hysterical laughter within.  But I was the one who was driving…so ordering my food with a ridiculous accent and then telling them I wanted my food to go was the cherry on the top of my day.  And if the reactions in the Dairy Queen window that night were any indication, I gave at least five other people a really funny story to tell when they got home. 

That’s just how I roll. 

So with all the outrageous requests for self-mutilation in the name of art, what did I come up with for my blog tonight?  I’ve decided to just say NO.  Isn’t that what I’ve been telling my kids to do for years?

Until the next time…I’ll be plotting my next move!