Under the Skin

The other day, I was thinking about how we treasure things; or, if the case may be, how we don't treasure them.  And I started to think about how sometimes we treasure things more if we feel like we lost out on something.  In Behavioral Economics, this phenomenon is called the Endowment Effect--people resent losing something less if they never felt like it was really theirs to begin with. However, even if that person didn't really want the item, losing it is more painful if they felt like it was theirs, because they feel like there was something that they could have obtained, had they been allowed to keep that item.  Historians use a much more poetic term than economists, as historians usually do.  They call it the Camelot Phenomenon.  This is in reference to a song in the musical, Camelot--more like a mantra in the musical. The musical outlines King Arthur's desire to make a land where right will rule over might, and a person's status will have no effect where ...

In the world of feminine consumable items, I do not use things very quickly.  I have had the same brush since I was eleven-years-old.  It is my firm belief that if they really intended for you to get new mascara every six months (or year--whatever the current thinking is), they wouldn't put so much goop in one tube.  Let's just say that I probably use things way beyond their utility or their recommended use-by date.  The exception being, if it's growing things, I will NOT do the cut around the mold on the cheese. One of my roommates keeps a moldy block in the fridge and just cuts around it, not even bothering to throw away what she cut around.  More power to her, she probably saves money in the cheese department, but I will not do it. However, there is one thing which I go through faster than most any woman I know.  Razors. Perhaps part of it is that I cannot go more than a day without shaving my legs and underarms.  I don't really know why, as I don...