Can I use clay to shampoo my hair? Episode 136

Joneen (0:00)

You're listening to The Beauty Brains, where real scientists answer your beauty questions. And now, here's Randi and Perry.

Perry Romanoski (0:19)

Hello, and welcome to show number 136

I'm your host, Perry Romanoski, and with me, as always, is Randy Shuler. How are you, Randy?

Randy Shuler (0:27)

Hello, everybody. I like to think of myself as the host, but okay.

Perry Romanoski (0:31)

That's right. Well, we are professional cosmetic chemists who are going to spend the next 30 minutes or so answering your questions, talking about beauty science stories we've read in the news, and amusing you with our regular hijinks.

Randy Shuler (0:43)

That's awfully optimistic of you.

Perry Romanoski (0:46)

Well, on today's show, you'll learn about how robots may be incorporated into your beauty routine, whether body lotion can condition your hair, if horse oil is good for your skin, and we'll learn whether you should trust some of the advice that you see on the internet about beauty products.

Randy Shuler (1:03)

I can guess that.

Perry Romanoski (1:04)

But before we get into that, we should start with some of our witty banter that we're so famous for, shouldn't we?

Randy Shuler (1:09)

Yeah, I'm sure there would be an outrage if we didn't kick off with one of Perry's personal parables.

Perry Romanoski (1:16)

Well, first, I would like to throw it to you. You got any subjects you want to talk about your life about?

Randy Shuler (1:22)

No.

Perry Romanoski (1:23)

Yeah, I thought so.

Well, I want to tell you about my planking project.

Yeah, I like to do a challenge every year. And this year, my challenge is I'm going to build up to do planks as long as I can. Now, a plank is where, essentially, you hold a push-up position, and you just stay there for as long as you can. Right. That's a plank. And some people have a hard time. It's like a minute or so.

Randy Shuler (1:53)

Some people have a hard time believing we're even talking about this. But continue.

Perry Romanoski (1:59)

But I built up. I'm up to seven minutes now. I can hold a plank for seven minutes. I could try it right now on the show, but this is an audio show.

So, I felt pretty good about myself, the seven minutes, because everyone I know, they're like, oh, that's great. And then I just saw in my Facebook feed, a guy just set a world record for doing planks. You know what the world record for a plank is?

Randy Shuler (2:26)

Oh, eight and a half minutes.

Perry Romanoski (2:29)

Eight hours.

He topped the old record, which was five hours. So eight hours, the record for planking. I guess I've got still a little more work to do.

Randy Shuler (2:43)

I can't do something that feels good for eight hours. How could you plank for that long?

Perry Romanoski (2:49)

I don't know. I mean, the guy wasn't even listening to podcasts or anything. I don't know how he does it.

All right. Well, that's that patented Witty Banner. Actually, you can't patent Witty Banner, but we do trademark it.

All right. Well, why don't we move into today's Beauty Science News Stories? Can you cue the music, Randy?

Randy Shuler (3:12)

Ta-da.

It seems like the industry is obsessed with smartphone apps that can help with your beauty routine. Man, I say screw that. I want to jump right to robots that can do my personal care tasks for me.

Perry Romanoski (3:30)

Oh, do tell.

Randy Shuler (3:31)

Well, have you seen the work of Swedish robotic pioneer Simone Geertz, I believe? And she calls herself, get this, the queen of sh**ty robots.

I love that title. So Simone has invented a robotic tooth brushing helmet. You just put this on your head, little device goes in front of your mouth, boom, brushes your teeth for you. And she has a hair washing robot that she made from a bottle of shampoo, a rubber hand, and a bunch of electronics.

Perry Romanoski (4:08)

Because it's so hard to wash your hair with your own hand?

Randy Shuler (4:11)

Think about it, you can plank while washing your hair.

Perry Romanoski (4:14)

That is a good point.

Randy Shuler (4:17)

So the author of the article I read described her inventions as, quote, hilariously futile, which is a great phrase. I mean, these, of course, are very tongue-in-cheek, but there are YouTube videos of her machines in action.

And hey, I would love to see some enterprising beauty company go seriously into robots to do personal care tasks.

Perry Romanoski (4:40)

Really? That would actually be cool. At a conference I was recently at, I heard about a company who had developed a mirror where you can pick what you want your makeup to look like, and you put your face in the mirror, and then it'll print the makeup right on your face.