piercing question ... for the ladies

[Fudi]

I'm just gathering a little data ... wondering ... do you have pierced ears? (Looking for responses only from women, please.)

[oddcouple]

Whew! Glad you specified it was for the ears!

[kahvecowgirl]

They were pierced, but closed due to neglect. Metal allergies. I could probably wear pure gold or silver, but...pfft.

What are your plans for these data, if I may ask?

[LLapp]

I got my ears pierced in my early 30s only because my daughter at age 7 or 8 wanted to get hers pierced. I said we would do it together. I went first and she watched the whole thing. The piercing did hurt and I cried a little. When her turn came, she said she changed her mind. After that, I wore the studs for a while and cleaned the wound every day but got an infection anyway. Eventually I just let the skin grow back. The end.

[Deanna48]

Similar story. I had mine pierced as a kid and haven't worn any earrings in at least 20 years.

[Lurker]

My mom tried to have my ears pierced at the mall when I was very young. I cried and threw a fit after the first one, so she let it grow over. A few years later, a neighbor who was a doctor did it. I don't wear earrings very often, which is probably good because the holes haven't stretched. Never got extra piercings when they were trendy.

[Eureka]

No piercings for me.

[munchlet]

They were pierced, but closed due to neglect. Metal allergies. I could probably wear pure gold or silver, but...pfft.

Same here... almost. Got my ears pierced, late 20s, after a coworker observed (correctly) that clipped-on earrings pinch. But then came the metal allergies. Every so often I'll put in a pair of earrings just to keep the holes open. I actually like small earrings, but cannot afford pure gold/silver. Hey, maybe the next "stimulus" check....

What are your plans for these data, if I may ask?

Yes, inquiring minds want to know. Thanks.

[Fudi]

I am always curious about the shared qualities/experiences of my fellow cryptogrammers. I also have no piercings. And I think that's sort of an oddity for a woman in society at large. I had a hunch that probably many in this community were similarly unholy. And just wanted to see if my theory would pan out. And so it has. So far, anyway. Not a single woman here has written above saying - "yeah, I have pierced ears and wear earrings most or all of the time. What of it?" (If that is the case for you, please don't be shy ... I'm just curious about this ... and there are no wrong answers here.)

Let me take this further. Makeup? (I'm thinking, eye/lip makeup? I, myself, don't wear any, ever. I don't own any and haven't owned or worn any, in my whole life, except for during a brief experimental phase when I was 13 or so. Well, and a little stage makeup when I was in a few plays as a teenager.)

So, again, just curious ... and this question is only for the women here.

[mistyswiss]

Very interesting. I have both ears pierced, but I usually just wear earrings on special occasions, or for appointments, date night with my hubby, etc.

Make-up? I wish I knew how to wear it! Again, usually on date night, I'll make the effort with eyeshadow/liner/mascara. NEVER lipstick (yuck!) NEVER foundation.
If I'm taking the kids to an appointment I'll put on eyeliner/mascara. My kids are always suspicious that something is up if I have on mascara.

[Deanna48]

I don't wear makeup either. My brief experimental phase was when I was 22. After a fellow college student told me I looked better without it one day when I forgot to put it on, I decided to ditch it.

[kahvecowgirl]

To use make-up as the name implies, i.e., to make up for some deficiency, seems to me like a very uncool idea (and this point I could get into the whole gender thing of why are women's faces supposed to be deficient when men's are just fine as they are, but I suppose that's all been said many times elsewhere). I don't so much mind the idea of using it to achieve a particular effect, where it's obviously decoration and not a correction. Of course, that's just my opinion about make-up, which was not what you asked about. The answer is actually no, I haven't used it either way in a long time.

But since people are sharing stories about getting their ears pierced...Am I the only one who pierced my own ears as a teenager, using a needle, in a room lighted only by the candle I'd just used to sterilize the needle?

[Fudi]

Whoa kahvecowgirl ... that sounds very ... scary? ... brave? You were a bad-ass (pardon my fronch!) I'm impressed.

I took my daughter to get her ears pierced when she was 10 because it was all she dreamed about (which, believe me, nearly broke my feminist heart ... but she was 10 ... and I figured she'd get over trying to be decorative eventually ... and she did). But, anyway, she was on a sports team at the time and I mentioned to one of the other moms that I was taking her, soon, to get her ears pierced ... and this other mom (whose name was Hellene and was, well, rather a bad-ass too), said that she'd pierced both of her daughters' ears herself and that she'd do it for my daughter too, if I wanted. She said that for her dauaghters, she did it in the middle of the night, while they were asleep. I used to tease my daughter that maybe, instead of going to the mall, like we'd discussed, I'd have Hellene, the Ear-Piercing Fairy come while she was asleep. My daughter told me later that she used to have nightmares about that happening.

My daughter's mall piercing went like Llapp described her experience. She cried when it was done and then, though she was diligent about the antiseptic care and all, she still ended up with pain, we guessed, from an ear infection and after a month, when she was supposed to take them out and put a new set in, she was so traumatized by the whole ordeal, that by the time she got the studs from the piercings out, she never wanted to think about earrings again. So the holes closed up ... and now, at 22, she's a proper feminist too.

[Fudi]

The moral of the story, I think, is something I heard Rosanne Barr say in one of her early stand-up routines once, in her own inimitable droll style: Beauty is pain.

[Eureka]

I wear makeup on special occasions, which are few and far between. Maybe every few years. I don't wear it when I play cryptograms. Sorry, Puzzle Baron!