Funny thing about shampoo, for the better part of the last 23 years, I rarely used Shampoo and I NEVER used Conditioner. This was a marked change from my high school years of wash / rinse / repeat (why should hair be washed TWICE each shampooing!?!) and this change began the moment my college pal Flibby Thurstein recommended to me in 1987, while we lived in Barrington Hall -- that I wash my hair less frequently, in order to retain my head hair longer. 

Flibby’s theory was that washing one’s hair frequently causes rapid hair loss.  For that, I never once bought or used shampoo for the next 23 years. Still, I haven’t bought shampoo or conditioner once in over two decades. I still have a full head of thin hair.

You see, I’m only 5ft6in tall and the fact that my hair is thin and straight and the top has wide scalp-showing parts, means that most of my Berkeley friends towered over me – Flibby is 6’4’’ tall. As a result, not infrequently did my pals rib me, “Yer gonna be bald by the time yer 23” when I was 19 and “Yer gonna be bald by the time you’re 30, when I was 23, the year I left Berkeley for LA in 1991.  

I can either be thankful to Flibby or chalk it up to coincidence. Perhaps my hair could have been clean all these years and still be attached to my head!?!  We’ll never know.     

I remember when I, at the age of 36, moved to Pusan in Summer 2004; in my new apt, the former tenants had left behind a large bottle of Vidal Sassoon Shampoo in the bathroom almost completely full. I moved out July 2006 and I didn’t even finish the bottle!

Nowadays I wash my hair 3-4 times a week, but for years, once or twice a month, if that.   My hair is thin; it doesn’t collect an obscene amount of dirt. I never got the nickname, pigpen. Be that as it may, when I first arrived in my mom’s West LA condo in November 2009, there was a big bottle of shampoo in the shower.  Yesterday, November 4, 2010, I finally finished off the shampoo bottle.  It took only one year!

The reason for such excessive use is that I ran out of soap 3 months ago, and have not bought any new soap; which means I’ve basically been using the shampoo as soap since August! That’s why today, I went to the market and bought Irish Spring soap – my favorite soap. I also bought Isopropyl alcohol and sleeping pills, so I won't drink at night.  I did not buy any shampoo. 

It was funny in the market. I asked a box boy where to buy soap.

-- Where can I find soap?   (pause)
-- What kind of soap do you want?
-- Bar Soap?
-- Oh. (longer pause)
-- Dude, soap. You know, soap? What’s the deal?
-- Yeah (pause) I’m sorry. (laugh)  Follow me!

The awkwardness was on account of ‘soap’. Both the Latino box boy and I shared a lot a unspoken subtext and even a laugh. Our conversation might have sounded like this.

-- Where can I find soap?
-- What kind of soap?
-- Bar soap. Regular soap. The kind of soap you use to wash yourself.
-- We have body wash, foaming cleanser, liquid soap...
-- Dude, soap. I want soap.
-- Hand soap? Face soap?
-- Soap, mutherfucker soap! I’m a man.
-- Yeah, I’m sorry, it’s not you. It’s all these West LA people. Nobody ever wants just ‘soap’ anymore.
-- Yeah, I've noticed.  What the hell happened to the modern man?

TODAY and this week begins NOVEMBER 2010. This is significant to me because in November 2009, I returned to the United States after being away for 13.5 years. Oh, I’d visited the States over the decade plus, but I had not resided Stateside, nor had I worked on US soil, nor had I paid any taxes to the IRS (legally, mind you), nor had I had any real involvement with the USA from 1996 till November 2009 when suddenly, I WAS BACK for good! 

And more than just being back, I had no plans to go anywhere, not for travel, not for work, not for anything. I was back in LA to make it as a writer. Nearly 12 months ago, one calendar year, I arrived in the US; and with the exception of two overnight trips with my family, one to Vegas, one to Modesto, I’ve spent every night of the last 11+ months in my bed or on my brother’s sofa.  I love LA / hate LA.

Boy, how things have changed in the last 13.5 years. Here’s a short list of things ubiquitous NOW in 2010 MMX, that weren’t here BEFORE I left the US in 1996.

Transfats
Supermarket shelves full of soap-like products
Universal and Ubiquitous Internet
A cell phone in the hand of every other driver
A cell phone in the hand of every pedestrian
Handheld video playing devices
Dot com attached to everything
Pharmaceutical drugs advertised on TV
Reality Programming replacing dramas&sitcoms
So Many TV Networks!
Kim Kardashian and Paris Hilton
Original Cable Programming / Movie stars doing TV
The Animation Domination of Simpsons / KingoftheHill / Family Guy / Futurama / Cleveland Show / Metalocalypse / Spongebob Squarepants etc.
Traffic Lights with digital timers
Traffic Cameras
Cannabis Dispensaries
Pot references on TV