Erin Granolahair

    Erin Granolahair brushed her hair every morning after she woke up. She brushed her hair when she arrived at school. She brushed her hair during class, and during lunch, and during recess. She brushed her hair after school, and when she arrived home. But no matter what, she could not get the granola out of her hair.

    The sticky bits kept getting stuck in her hair, and she had no idea where they came from. Surely it wasn't genetic like her parents said? But then, that would explain why her mother, and her mother's mother, and her mother's mother's mother always had granola stuck in their hair too.

    Then one day she saw an ad in the newspaper for Granolalabs, a company that specialized in researching people with granola in their hair. They'd run experiments on volunteers, in hopes to find the cure for getting granola in your hair.

    There wasn't a cure yet, but Erin decided to volunteer. Even if she couldn't have the granola cured from getting in her hair, she could help future generations keep the granola out of their hair. So, from then on, Erin went to the granola clinic every Tuesday and had her hair washed, scrubbed, conditioned, brushed, and then experimented on in a variety of ways.

    She'd lost hope of getting the granola out of her hair, but she was at peace knowing her time spent performing these procedures would help someone someday. After weeks and weeks of undergoing these procedures every Tuesday, she noticed something. Her hair was just a little less gritty, and a little less sticky. She ran in the next Tuesday and exclaimed to the scientists what she'd noticed. The experiments they'd run didn't show any conclusive results, so they took her news with skepticism.

    After examining her hair, though, they agreed with her conclusion in astonishment. The scientists asked her to come in every day for the next two weeks to see if they could find the cause for the apparent cure. Erin agreed, and for the next two weeks she came in every day, let them wash, scrub, condition, brush, and perform experiments on her hair. And every day her hair became significantly cleaner and smoother, but the scientists returned to her more and more confused, with less and less hope of finding anything conclusive.

    The lead scientist sat her down on the final day of the two-week period and said "Ms. Granolahair, I'm happy to see results for your hair, but I'm sorry, we simply cannot find anything conclusive as to why the condition of your hair has improved. The only consistency among all the experiments is the preparation procedure, nothing different than you'd do at home. Unfortunately, we've run out of budget for this particular area of focus, and until we have more money, we won't be able to continue with our experiments. We wish you luck and hope to see you again one day!"

    Disheartened, Erin left the facility with little hope of ever understanding how to fix her hair once and for all. But wait? What did the scientist say at the end? Nothing different than what she'd do at home?

    With this thought in mind, Erin ran to the store and searched up and down for what she read on the bottles the scientists used on her. "Shampoo" and "Conditioner." Eventually she found the correct aisle, and located bottles with these words on them. She bought several. None of them looked like what the scientists used, but hopefully they'd do the same thing.

    When she returned home, she noticed the section of the bathroom that looked similar to the chamber she had to stand in at Granolalabs. She twisted the knobby thing like she saw them do, and water came out! And it was warm!

    Erin was so excited, she jumped in, then remembered to take her clothes off. She jumped out, disrobed, then jumped back in and felt the warm water on her skin. What a great feeling to do this without being prodded by a bunch of scientists! Then Erin took the shampoo, squirted a bunch in her hair, and scrubbed it like the scientists did. Amazingly, she felt it work right away!

    After rinsing the shampoo out, she performed the same procedure with the conditioner, and this time her hair began to actually feel smooth! Not a little less gritty like before, but actually smooth! It was amazing.

    Erin stepped out of the shower and noticed her silky-smooth hair in the mirror. She ran her fingers through it over and over again that she almost forgot to complete the preparation procedure. She grabbed a brush and cut it out of the packaging, then ran it through her hair, again like the scientists did. The scientists were right, something about those experiments was starting to work!

    She wasn't as smart as the scientists and had no idea what other experiments could be done, but she figured the best thing she could do until Granolalabs received more funding was to continue the preparation procedure they'd taught her. Then she could at least return to them with minimal delay in their return to the great cause.

    So, every day Erin washed, scrubbed, conditioned and brushed her hair, and every day Erin's hair grew smoother and stronger. And Erin remained eager to once again hear from the scientists at Granolalabs, in hopes of one day finally curing granola stuck in people's hair.