The Shear Perfection Blog

It’s Indian Summer here in Southern California.  This is the time of year when the hot, dry Santa Ana winds blow in off the desert and create havoc with everything from wildfires to your disposition to your hair and skin.

There’s not much we can do about the wildfires, once they get started — except maybe pray (i.e., send our most heartfelt positive energy to the firefighters).

But even this little effort can be hard, if you’re sensitive to the effects of the positively charged ions that come with the Santa Anas. Some people get more anxious and irritable this time of year.  In case you don’t know what I’m talking about, it’s a yucky feeling — just the opposite of the way you feel basking in the balmy breezes at the beach — where the ocean produces negatively charged ions.

But not everybody’s able to rush down to the beach at the drop of a hat.  If you’re dependent on a job for your basic survival, can you picture calling in and saying, “Sorry boss, I won’t be in today. Surf’s up.”  Uh… I don’t think so.  Not in this economy.

However maybe, just maybe, there might be something we can control in this scenario: the effect of the Santa Anas on our hair and skin.

The deep conditioning treatment for the hair has long been one of my Indian summer specialties at the shop, but recently my attention has turned to remedies for the skin as well.

Just the other day a longtime client mentioned to me how allergic she is to everything lately, because she just feels itchy all over.  I know what she means.  I’m not allergic to anything, but my skin feels itchy all over too, when it’s too dry.

A little back story here — Indian summer is when I get a high proportion of people complaining about dandruff. By simple observation, I discovered it wasn’t really dandruff — not the serious kind anyway.  It was just excessively dry scalp brought on by the environmental conditions this time of year, and easily remedied by the deep conditioning treatment I developed.

So this got me thinking.   Maybe a lot of people are going around thinking they’re allergic to everything, when all it is is excessively dry skin.

Fast forward to late afternoon yesterday, when I was surfing around on the Internet and couldn’t help thinking about Indian summer, since we (by choice) don’t have air conditioning at our house.  I came across a bunch of simple testimonials which caught my attention because of the absence of hype and gimmicks in them.  It was just some real people telling the truth about the benefits they’ve gotten from a line of products made from natural ingredients.

* One woman told about her son’s eczema and how other lotions would sting when they applied it. This lotion made his skin better without the stinging.

* Another one said how her 80-year-old mother loves the products so much, she squealed like a little girl when she found out she’d be able to get them again.

* A woman in Illinois has used the soaps for several years, but her local store doesn’t carry them any more, and she thinks that’s a mistake. Her skin looks younger than her real age, and she thinks the products are better than the expensive anti-aging creams on the market.

* A Nebraska woman who has used the soaps for almost ten years no longer has a problem with eczema and wants to be notified in case the company ever decides to go out of business so she can order a lifetime supply.

* A woman in Chicago got two of the soaps as gifts and wants to order more.  She and her husband are using it to combat the dry skin that happens in winter there.

* Another woman was told she wouldn’t have to use moisturizer again after using this soap. She tried it and found out it was true.  She likes how the soap rinses off cleanly and leaves her skin feeling so soft.

* A woman with sensitive skin and rosacea has problems using most medicinal and cosmetic products and wasn’t getting results with other natural remedies she’s tried. After she started using these soaps, her skin cleared up within a few days.

* A kidney dialysis patient tells about the dry skin that is a side effect of this treatment, and how these soaps and lotions are a godsend.  She’s giving them as gifts to the nurses and staff at the clinic she goes to.

* An Oregon man who has dry skin to begin with tells how his dermatologist says his diabetes and thyroid problems contribute to the condition, and the resulting itch drives him crazy.  But one shower with the soap does him more good than all the medications/lotions he’s used in the last three years.

* Another man used the soap to shave and was surprised when his skin and beard regrowth remained soft for several hours.

* A family tells how their son has sensitive skin and commercial soaps make the skin on his hands dry, flaky, itchy, red, and cracked. When they switched to this alternative brand the issue cleared up. They love the soaps and want to try the liquid soap too.

* A man keeps the lotion on the counter in his veterinary clinic and uses it after every “patient” to keep his hands from cracking. He loves it because it isn’t greasy, yet it really does moisturize, even though you only need to use a little each time.

* Plus one that was just so unbelievable that I left it out.

After a couple of decades in the beauty business, I thought I’d seen everything.  But I’m impressed.  I think I’d like to try some, to see what it’ll do for me.  I wonder how much it costs….

Hey, if you’d like to come along while I explore the possibilities here, all you have to do is let me know how to reach you.  Just fill in your name and email address in the form below and click on the “Yes! Keep me posted!” button, and I’ll give you a blow-by-blow commentary on my findings.

We don’t like spam either.  We never share your personal information with anyone.

Lynn Fountain Campbell

We were just talking about spiders the other day, then I found this video.  Can’t believe it’s been out there for over two years, has had over a million views, and I’m just now discovering it.

Turns out I’m not alone.  The most recent comments on it are from today.  If it’s still bringing  joy to others after so much time, it’s destined to be a classic.

Lynn Fountain Campbell

During the past several days, I’ve had the pleasure of being “interviewed” via email by a young person who wants to be a hair stylist.  She asks a couple of very probing questions, which I’m happy to answer.

Here (with very little editing) is the result:

Question:  …any tips to make my hair grow faster?

Answer:  Lots of people ask me this question, so I put an answer to it on my website.  Here’s the link.

Also, when I was a teenager, I used to go to the library a lot and read the hair and fashion magazines.  I really really liked this subject.  And then when I got old enough to pick what I wanted to do in life, I went to beauty school (where I learned how to pass the State Board Exam), took the test, got my license, and went to work.

If there’s a community college system where you are, the training doesn’t have to be expensive at all.

Question:  Thanks.  So where does your inspiration come from?  I mean, you have helped so many people discover their true beauty….  How do you do it?

Answer:  Thank you.  :-D  I discovered a few years ago that I’d get terribly confused when people would ask me for a price quote over the phone because, not having seen the hair, I wouldn’t know what I’d have to do to get it looking beautiful.

But when someone was in my chair, and I could run my hands through their hair, then some kind of connection would happen and I’d just “know.”  This is not magic though.  It can be learned, if you have an affinity for hair as a medium of artistic expression.

Look at you!  You have charmed information out of me that I didn’t even know was there.  You probably also have high aptitude as an interviewer or something (Barbara Walters?).

Question:  No, I wish.  =)  I think being an interviewer would be cool, but I would rather be a hair stylist.  It really seems like a wonderful job to have.  What made you discover about that hair growing faster technique?

Answer:  I remember a silly realization I had in beauty school once.  My haircutting teacher was teaching a technique, and then he said, “Then you step back and look at it.”

“Oh!” I thought.  “You LOOK at the hair.” 

Before that, I was so fixated on learning the technique that the obvious escaped me.

So after looking at a lot of heads of hair, and thinking and dreaming about them, one comes up with solutions to things.  Putting your whole self into your work, with the intention of getting really really good at it adds a “spiritual” dimension to it.  That part does border on the magical, but that can be learned too.

I think it starts by developing your intuition.  And that starts with knowing who you are and being comfortable in your own skin.  Then you can be authentic with people, and can stand by your own decisions without being falsely stubborn about it.

Doesn’t she ask some deep questions?  Don’t you think she’s a great interviewer?  No reason she can’t be both an interviewer and a stylist, IMHO.

Lynn Fountain Campbell

Last night when I got home from the salon, I checked my Twitter account and found I had 587 followers.  I wanted to see how this compared with enturbulation’s followers.  He had 538 last time I checked.

“Enturbulation” was making incendiary tweets based on lies and directing people to his blog — which was that special type of yellow-journalistic drivel the cult seems to thrive on — telling twisted untruths about Anonymous.

Several people have commented negatively to him about it.  But does he listen?  Oh, no.  He’s “creating an effect” — another cult ideal.

His latest ploy was to publish specific personal data — dropping dox — on individual Anons.  One person gently took him to task for it in a tweet and pointed out that it was against Twitter’s Terms of Service.  (Go to twitter.com and search for Macam2 @enturbulation.)

I tweeted back that “enturbulation doesn’t know any better.  He’s a scientologist.  That’s what they do.”  (Search hair101 @Macam2.)

I don’t know if anyone specifically complained to Twitter about it, but when I tried to check on enturbulation last night, I got that screen with the birdie saying the account has been suspended due to strange activity.

Enturbulation seems to be gone.

A small thing perhaps, but indicative of the PR disaster scientology has become.  It only took a few tweets to shut this guy down.

I wonder if scientology will learn anything from that.  Or will they continue publishing lies about their imagined “suppressive persons” who are everywhere and out to get them.

I’ll be watching.

Lynn Fountain Campbell

As much as I’d like to spend all day at the beach, it’s time for me to get back to work.

These days, I seem to have two jobs. The first is the one I’ve chosen for myself — cosmetologist — one who’s into the care and beautification of skin, hair, and nails. I mostly do hair — both men’s and women’s.

The other “job” has been thrust upon me — defending myself against the scientology organization. I got myself into this position after many years of being one of their most devoted members, simply by leaving the group and speaking out about it.

They don’t like it when you talk about it.

But since I do, I’m subject to their “fair game” policy (which they say doesn’t exist). The purpose of “fair-gaming” people is to make them, in Hubbard’s words, “shudder into silence.”

You may very well ask why they’d want former members to stay silent.

The short version is that if the whole truth were known, their “PR image” would get messed up. Then they wouldn’t be able to (1) rope in new recruits and (2) charge exorbitant rates for their esoteric (and bogus, IMHO) “upper levels.”

Some people might even go to jail. It’s happened before. (Google “Operation Snow White.”)

The long version? Well, maybe later….

So my other job is free speech activist. I don’t think it’s right for people to have to shut up so a greedy few can line their pockets.

And if you really dig into the meaning of the word “cosmetologist,” you’ll find it’s derived from the “Greek kosmeticos, skilled in arranging, from kosmetos, well-ordered, from kosmein, to arrange, order, from kosmos, order, COSMOS.”

So this is just my little way of creating order in the universe.

Lynn Fountain Campbell

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