So I work a lot! So what? I like my work. But I also like looking young enough to do it. The thing is I play with kids for a living. I jump around and act silly. Which would be okay except occasionally I glimpse myself in the mirror and mistake myself for a member of The Wiggles. (It’s a bunch of old people wiggling). Fortunately I am all woman so no one has ever accused me of actually being one but still… it could happen.

So I found myself at the plastic surgeons office! So what? He told me I didn’t need surgery. That was nice! I explained that kids actually respond to me better without all the ‘crinkles’ (as my daughter used to say). I explained that having the kids respond to me was a necessity if I was to guide them out of their mental stress which was the reason I was playing with them in the first place. He said, “Well I have a better idea. Fact is I’m not really a surgeon any more. Technology has changed all that. Now-a-days I just buff and puff.” He went on to suggest a very intense peel.

So I like the sound of a good catchy phrase! So what? That is why they call it a hook. To hook people into being caught by the catchy phrase. I made an appointment, handed over my savings and waited to be buffed until I looked as good as my children do. While he was passing the relatively painful apparatus over my face I got the giggles (ok I was high) and kept singing the phrase ‘buff and puff buff and puff buff and puff’ over and over again in my head: like a stoned little engine that could. Buff and Puff Buff and puff buff and puff …

Happily I was avoiding the puff and had in fact decided to just get buff mainly because it has always sound like a good idea to buff up whereas puffing up sounds like a person plump with painfully persistent flatulence refusing to flap away.

So I thought he meant buff the skin then puff it with botox which I wasn’t gonna do so I didn’t expect to puff! So what? Who hasn’t gone to the doctor only to get home and discover that they look like Margaret Cho???

Okay. Okay. Apparently when the doctor says “I buff and puff.” He means “I buff and you puff”. And apparently when you puff this much the only way to breath is to huff because your nostrils are too swollen to pass air between the passage way.

I sure do hope the kids like me better now.