Buckethead: Water-Wise & Thoroughly Undignified

Your Galley Wench soaking her head in a bucket.

My hair sucks… shampoo.  That is not a good thing for a-couple-gallon-a-day – total -- water miser cruisers like us.

Wayne, with his fine, straight and slightly sparse hair does not have this problem.  For him, just a few seconds of drizzle in the shower to wet, then again to shampoo, then again to rinse and it’s good to go.  One quart or less and he has clean, soft hair that’s dry within 15 minutes of his shampoo,

Rinsing.  Yes, this is as awkward and uncomfortable as it looks.

But my kinky, overly prolific, snarly, graying and formerly color-treated not-so-crowning-glory always takes its sweet time to get fully wet, shampooed, rinsed and dry.

The solution?  Wash less often, usually after a swim so I get a head start on at least wetting my hair.  Pony tail my unruly hairy mess more often between shampooing. 

When I do shampoo, for me, the only water-wise solution is to be a buckethead.  I hate it.  Wayne loves it.  These are the photos I can show he took, exploiting his vantage point.

Why?

1. The easiest place to do it is in our cockpit, buck naked.  Score one for Wayne.
2. Since I’m buck naked in the cockpit, it’s often breezy and / or a little more public than I’d like.  So I generally place the bucket on the cockpit floor, get on my hands and knees, and dunk and rinse away. Score another for Wayne.
3. As a result of the dunking, I naturally to rear my rear up and down, too.  Score another one for Wayne.

These days, a  good hair day like this only happens

after enduring the buckethead routine.

Bottom line?  It’s a pain in the a-- (and knees), and takes way too long.  But it does get my hair clean, using gallons less of our water than any other method, except using someone else’s shower.

Anyone willing to volunteer an ample supply of fresh water in the form of a hot shower with great water pressure? Wayne won’t be as happy….

Tough luck, Wayne.