House of Wax

Twins. I never bothered much with my eyebrows until years ago when I read that un-groomed brows are wasted potential. Not wanting to let the potential of my only facial hair go to waste, I made an appointment at a local salon.

“Your eyebrows grow in two different directions,” I was informed by the beautician, “don’t worry, eyebrows aren’t twins, they’re sisters.” So she waxed and tweezed away, taking a bit too much delight in her sadism-disguised-as-beautifying.

“Take a look.” She presented me the kind of round mirror with a long handle that you only see in salons or on Snow White.

“Oh,” I gasped at her handiwork. “This one looks like it was adopted.”


Bikini Beach. On a Caribbean holiday, Cheri and I adventurously bought some Green Aussie Wax which had packaging that let us know it was “As Seen on TV”.

Cheri went first, heating up the wax and applying the long plastic-backed strip for the prescribed amount of time. When she peeled it off, we expected to see a Chia-pet-like miracle on the strip and a patch of smooth skin on her inner thigh.

“This wax isn’t coming off!”

“What? Try again with the plastic.”

Nothing.

“I’ve got wax stuck to my legs!”

“Hmm, let me see that box. You must have done something wrong.” (After all, I had seen this on TV.) Defiantly, I warmed up my wax – five seconds longer than Cheri had, as I was sure that would make the difference.

When I attempted to rip off the wax strip, it hurt so much that I instinctively smacked my hand on the wax-covered area to diminish the stinging.

Ninety minutes and two showers each later, we both still had bikini lines that could qualify for Mme Tussauds. My hand was just as bad (by the way, have you ever tried washing your hair with just one hand?). As we walked to the beachfront café, our shorts increasingly stuck to our legs with every stride.

I thought if I could meet the people behind this scam-of-a-product right now, I’d love to shake their hands.