Spare Razor? Spare Time!

watch this film.

hey yall,
can we talk about leg hair for a sec? oh, you're sick of talking about leg hair? sry.

I don't shave my legs. Haven't shaved my lower leg for probably 2 years. I hate the process. I hate the price. I hate that it took me so long to realize that shaving cream wasn't a necessity, and neither were all the other "shaving products". I hate when it grows back THE DAY AFTER, and that I have to start the process over again. So i stopped shaving. At first it was weird; my leg hair was so dark that it was completely noticeable. if i wore a skirt, i looked like a man in a skirt (from, say, the knees down). this was some real fuckin' leg hair. but it was not a statement (other than letting my leg hair say "meh" for me). i was not expressing my womanhood or telling men that i don't have to shave to live up to society's views of beauty, which they happened to define as an unrealistic virginal pre-pubescent whore -- among other things, completely hairless. wtf? i can usually relate ideals of beauty and attraction back to our homo sapien uncles (no homo), i.e. men are attracted to women with big hips because it signifies fertility. women are attracted to men with big noses because they signify virility. so it would make sense for men to be attracted to women whose pubes are super long so that their vaginas are kept toasty and release pheromones. no?
but wait, i'm not even talking about pubes. i promise! come back!

so i stopped shaving but felt that it still looked kinda weird and i didn't feel feminine at all. and i like to feel feminine sometimes. but i like to feel it when i want to feel it. and i like to feel it for me. i guess i kinda think of it more as a time saver. like my time is more important than to be spent on hair removal, then subsequently obsessing over said hair removal. so i started waxing! i remove it when i think of it, or when i have time. or when i'm going somewhere exotic [i have a waxing appointment in half an hour that i made in time to go to NYC.] my mom has been waxing for like 30 years and she could probably count on one hand how many leg hairs she grows now. it's so awesome. expensive? yes, but so are all those venuses. painful? shit hurts so good. but it lasts longer! and eventually (as proven by my Mama Wolf) it grows back finer! also, think of the time yr saving!

in fact, here's a list of things you could do with all the time you've saved from shaving every other day (WWWTTTTTFFFFFF??!?!!111!?!??):

1. get waxed once a month (or less, depending on how little a shit you give)
2. spend your shower time deep conditioning. or masturbating.
3. write a blog post!
4. cut a pair of jeans into short shorts to show off your sometimes-smooth-sometimes-hairy-depending-on-what-your-schedule-has-been-like legs!
5. hike up yr skirt a little more (and show your world to some bro)
6. bake a zucchini bread! or, if you're shaving the whole legs, bake a yeast bread!
7. brush up on politics using wikipedia.
8. read a list! and then comment on it!

A Feminist Looks at Bourbon Street

You find yourself in this city in the south, post-Katrina and not during Mardi Gras-- a time when New Orleans goes ignored like a pet during its owner's pregnancy. But even though it is not Fat Tuesday and you plan on keeping on your bra, you go to Bourbon Street.

You turn off Canal St. toward a neon pink "Hustler" sign and get a drink from the closest bar, one called Krazy Korner (or was it Utopia?) where a woman in a bra top and booty shorts is selling "shots,"artificially colored alcohol standing upright in what looks like a syringe. You opt for a margarita, with salt, to go, and sip down quickly from your green plastic cactus-shaped cup. You are shouted at by men on 2nd and 3rd stories of short hotels and lofts and think "ugh" but as you continue down the (surprisingly short!!) street, you begin to feel slightly overdressed. Not that you're not wearing your "goin' out" clothes, but that you haven't got much skin showing and these women selling themselves to sell a bar seem so confident and you want that.

But they also seem so sad.

"Do you think her mother knows?" you ask your friend, but you don't wait long enough to realize the unfortunate reality.

For a second you envision pushing through the crowd of men swarmed around her, taking her hand, and running away; maybe to a cafe somewhere where you could talk about how repulsive those men are, whose blue eyes glaze over and morph into venomous snakes (oh, those Biblical references!). Or maybe to France, to the real vieux France. Vive la verite!

Is this a positive step for our country? That our women (girls, really, as one "barely legal" sign informs you) can stand outside with their inner thighs and cleavage, sometimes asses, exposed and not worry about genital mutilation or being sold into sex slavery (god, you're naive). They use their sexuality as a tool and means of power over the men and women who expect them to be easy based on how they're dressed, and the more you and your friends go and stare and drink and stare and spend and stare, the more praise they get from their manager--maybe a slap on the ass for being good for business. But nothing is ever what it looks like--water is not blue and money is never just money, and this is not real confidence in these women. Bourbon Street is dirty and what many would call sinful but that doesn't stop you from having what you think is fun. This is a place where you can have your tits and eat them too because that's what it is known for, and this is America, and it's not like you're doing anything wrong, right?