How I Roll: Personal Hygiene Edition
November 11th, 2008 by Bryan Allain | Filed under life.If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!
In August we took a narcissistic look at eating lunch at work. Today’s edition of How I Roll examines how i roll when it comes to personal hygiene.
How I Roll: Personal Hygiene
1. Let’s start with showering, how many days per month do you NOT shower?
I’d say there’s probably 1-3 days a month where I don’t shower. These are always saturdays. I’ll shower every day that I work (sometimes at home, sometimes at the gym at work), and I’ll shower on Sundays when we go to church. On saturdays, if I do anything outdoors that requires me to get dirty or sweaty, or if I just feel like I need a shower, I’ll take one. But some saturdays I just sit around the house with the kids and we play Wii and card games and go out to the mall and I never shower. I hope you are still my friend.
2. Do you shave with an electric razor or a blade? And how often?
I’m a Gillette Fusion guy. I made fun of the 5 blades until I was sent one in the mail. I tried it and loved it. Definitely the best shave I’ve ever had. I’ve tried to do electric a few times in my shaving career, but it never works. If the face hair is too long, it pulls like a bugger. And the neck, forget it. I try to stick to the same shaving schedule every week: Tuesday, Thursday, and Sunday mornings. Erica doesn’t like me looking like grizzly adams, so I usually don’t get too creative with the facial hair. At some point I may need to shave every day, but for now I can get away with every other.
3. Do you have any product loyalties with dental products?
Not really. I like to buy nice toothbrushes. Like, the ones that cost $3.99 instead of 99 cents. I figure, whenever you can go for the cadillac and it still costs less than 5 bucks, go ahead and indulge. I’m not picky about my toothpastes. I usually go with a white/blue/green mint flavor, but I’ve tried the cinnamon and orange mint flavors and didn’t mind them. I do try to floss every day. I have those floss picks in my car, and I try to do that on the way home from work. Is that gross? picking and flossing your teeth in the car? I don’t know. If it is, then I am gross.
4. Any other product loyalties?
Deodorant - I’ve been using Sure Invisible Solid, Unscented for a good 5 years now. I’m pretty loyal to that. I used Degree before that but I got major deodorant clumping in my pits. The Sure has reduced clumpage quite a bit. (OK, the clumpage talk has sealed it - I am gross.)
Soap - I use Ivory bars exclusively. All other soaps smell like flowery chunks of perfumed chalk after using Ivory.
Shampoo - anything that is a shampoo/conditioner mix. Pert plus or Fructis or whatever is on sale.
Mouthwash - Listerine hurts my mouth. I know I’m a wuss, but it just doesn’t feel good. I use it anyway though. Then we run out and don’t buy it for 3 months and then I try to kiss Erica after eating garlic triscuits and she pushes me away and then I go out and get more the next day. Or Scope. But usually Listerine.
5. The Biggie: Do you Soap or Shampoo first in the shower?
I soap first. It just feels right. Your body is more important than your hair, so you deal with that first. Get it nice and clean, then you can worry about your hair. Besides, I usually won’t even get my head wet until I’ve finished with the soap portion of the shower. If you wash your hair first, you have to get right in there and get your head wet right off the bat. No thanks.
What about you? If you’ve got a blog, post your own answers to the How I Roll: Personal Hygiene Edition. It’s ok, you can let them know it was my idea and they won’t think you’re full of yourself. (Yeah, I’m looking at you Geof, Ron, Jason, Chris.) At the very least, chime in and let me know if you also soap before you shower, the ONLY way to go.
In fact, vote in the poll over there on the top of the sidebar and let your voice be heard!
Tags: How I Roll









Shampoo first. Always.
I’d be with Ron on this one, except… I shaved my head almost 2 years ago now, which kinda eliminates the need for shampoo. When I still had hair, though, it was always shampoo first, then soap.
If you use shampoo+conditioner it makes a lot more sense to soap first. But on the other hand, if your like me, and you use a separate mix of shampoo and conditioner it makes sense to shampoo first. Conditioner is meant to stay in for a few minutes while it “conditions” your hair. In the mean time while your waiting, kill two birds with one stone and soap up; then you can rinse off and rinse your hair and your done.
SHAMPOO!!
Soap, then shower.
Also: Crap. I really have to do this on my blog? Maybe Thursday, then.
Stupid “How I Roll.” If you’re not careful, I’m gonna do a “How I Roll: Toilet Edition” and tag you, Bryan.
I am not putting this on my dang blog, Allain.
1. It’s probably 2-4, mostly Saturdays as you posit.
2. I don’t shave. I trim. I trim with an electric razor because precision is easier when you don’t have to deal with shave foam.
3&4. I have no loyalties. That would require me to remember something I consider minutiae.
5. Shampoo first. I don’t get my head wet first, either; I let my leg test the water temp from outside the shower, then jump in and move towards the shower head. But I start with the shampoo because I go through two cycles of that. So it’s shampoo, then lather up real good, then rinse, then another shampoo session. If I was feeling especially nasty before I got in the shower, I lather up a second time.
you all know that just because I tagged you doesn’t mean you need to oblige and blog it. I figure if you’re as messed up as me and actually want to post stuff like this, i give you a good excuse to do it. And if you want to pass, by all means, pass.
that being said, no product loyalty, especially to deodorant, is insane.
[...] How I Roll: Personal Hygiene Edition (tags: gfmorris_comment) [...]
Actually, I do have deodorant loyalty, now that I think about it. Right Guard gels, but I vary in the scent.
As for shampoo, well, I switch around, because dandruff shampoos lose their efficacy for me over time, so it behooves me to swap formulations. If I have brand loyalty in soap, it’s only because I buy in bulk at Sam’s Club.
[...] How I Roll: Personal Hygiene Edition (tags: cjh_comment) [...]
[...] How I Roll: Personal Hygiene Edition (tags: gfmorris_comment) [...]