Gold Medal Knee Goatee

This is probably the single best picture of me ever
taken.  I might be doing my pouty face because I
haven't been able to fully develop my Vulcan
forehead ridge, which is a major fail in life.

I was probably a little negligent about grooming during the Great Cottage Get-Away of 2012.  My go-to hairstyle was a mom ponytail with an elastic headband, which had the duel benefit of making my infrequently showered hair stay a greasy mass on top of my head much prettier and keeping it out of my eyes while the slight breeze kept me cool while I was lazing on a chaise lounge chair at the beach.

The infrequent showering was solely the result of the fine bathing accommodations inside our cottage. Don't get me wrong.  I love, love, love the cottages we stay in. They are a part of my childhood with many good memories attached.  But I wouldn't be exaggerating if I implied that someone flushing a toilet three counties away turned my refreshingly tepid shower into a Scalding Waterfall from Hell.  Without warning.  In about .13 seconds.  Every few minutes.

Once you get used to this little idiosyncrasy you can anticipate it, which makes showering that much more suspenseful.  And that is fantastic, if you like excitement.  (And who doesn't like an exciting shower?  Anyone staying at the Bates Motel.)

The biggest problem with this acute temperature change is that when it occurs, there is nowhere in which to escape, because the shower stall was designed for garden gnomes to be a compact cottage-at-the-beach shower.  There is simply no place to run from the volcanic spew spouting from the shower head.  The most common avoidance technique is to stand on your tip toes in the corner, sucking in your gut like your yoga instructor frequently reminds you personally, praying "Dear God, make it end," as the splatter from the shower spray catches your feet and also maybe the slightly larger bumps in your belly that might stick out a tad (because you're a mother/ate too many cheetos/don't wear spanx in the shower)(also you are naked and vulnerable and possibly being boiled alive here, so stop dwelling on your belly, dude.)

You might consider beating the system by turning the hot water all the way off but this is apparently a magical shower that defies all laws of physics (or possibly just the laws of plumbing, I don't know much about either set of laws) and will persist with it's lava-like flow using only the cold pipes (until it becomes bored with the personal torment, abruptly ends the sauna treatment, and leaves you with an arctic blast to fully cement a lesson in contrast.)(This is now a shower with a personality.  And malicious intent.)

All this is to explain why I have a rockin' knee goatee.  When showering is that complex shaving your legs becomes a luxury, and you might try to shave a little at a time over the span of a few showers (because you are at the beach and as a courtesy to those you love you will want to attempt to not be a hairy beast)(unless that's how you normally roll, do your thang, girl).  It is after these few showers that you will discover you consistently miss the same patch of hair on your left knee.  That missed patch will leave you with an endearing little knee goatee that you totally get away with because it's south of your knee cap, looking like a shadow from a few feet away.  (But up close it's a soul patch that could rival Apolo Anton Ohno's.  In fact, in the spirit of the Olympic games, I bet your knee goatee could slightly edge out Apolo Anton Ohno in the Cute Little Patches of Hair Olympics, which I'm betting some of you just made dirty in your minds, pervs, earning a gold medal for unexpected patch existence.)

I'm pretty sure this can all be summed up as Poor Grooming = Gold Medal.  Or maybe not. Because, Ryan Lochte.