Tuesday, December 11, 2007

the faux hawk: a west coast thing?

Today at work I showed three coworkers (all of whom are east coasters) a picture and the guy in it had a faux-hawk.  The first reaction from every single one of them?  "What's with the hair?!"  Each time I said, "What?  It's a faux-hawk."  They were also all above the age of 35, so I figured they might just (dare I say it?) be too "old" to recognize the style.  The third person I showed was my boss, who turned it into a public discussion with whomever was around.  Everyone was trying to tell me how lame it was, and I couldn't get over how they felt.  A guy on my team, Chris, walked by, and I thought he could bale me out.  He's 26, cool, cute, and also from the east coast.  I said, "Hey Chris, do you know what a faux-hawk is?"  His response was, "Um....I think so....isn't it where the front of the hair swoops up?"  I was baffled.  I then came to the conclusion it must be a west coast thing.
On a different, yet similar "am I in the twilight zone?" note.....last week I was talking to two coworkers about what Mormons "can" and "can't" do.  I then mentioned "Well, we all have our agency."  This was met with, "You have what?"  I again said, "Agency."  She asked what I meant.  Confused, I said, "Um, it just means, you know, we have the freedom to choose."  My boss then walked by and he didn't recognize the use of the word either.  I then thought aloud, "Is that a Mormon word?"  Being something I've heard my whole life I thought certainly it couldn't be, and I looked it up on dictionary.com.  There wasn't anything to express what I was trying to say.  I guess it is a Mormon word??  
Readers-weigh in.....I'd like your opinion on both matters please...

4 comments:

elise said...

hmmmm... I might not be the best voice on these matters because 1. I have only lived on the west coast, and 2. Mormon all my life. BUUUT- here is what I think.

I don't think the faux-hawk is an exclusive west coast thing. I swear I have seen it in magazines that are sold across the US. But everyone I know who sports the faux-hawk is from the west coast or picked it up at BYU.

And I never thought about it, but maybe agency is a Mormon word. I have never heard it outside of church context.

brenna said...

The first time i ever saw a fauxhawk was when i lived in Europe. Every boy (and a few girls) over there had them. They seem to becoming more popular here (as shown in my blog), the west, but not coast.

Katie M said...

agency is definitely a mormon word.

and as for east coasters...i've been in the same situation many times. i brought in snickerdoodles to work they other day and all my coworkers were like, "snicker-WHAT?" they also have never heard of am/pm.

weirdos.

paintingyoupretty said...

First of all, HOT picture. I love the faux hawk. Second, I guess if I wasn't mormon, I would think of an Ad Agency of something when I thought of the word "Agency", Probably not the mormon conotation of the word.