According to scientists, straight hair actually snarls more than curly, contrary to popular belief. Seriously, here's an excerpt from a study:

To learn which kind of hair truly is the snarliest, biophysicist Jean-Baptiste Masson at the Ecole Polytechnique in France had hairdressers count tangles for a week in the hair of 212 people-123 with straight hair and 89 with curls. Counting was conducted between 4 p.m. and 7 p.m., so that hair had a chance to snag during the day.

Who funds these people? How did they pick that magic number of 212 people?  The results, by the way, were as follows: an average of "5.3 per head of straight hair and 2.9 per head of curly hair."

Jean-Baptiste, I'm sorry, but on the curly vs. straight tangle debate, you're not convincing me. My tot has a puffed thicket of curls and hot damn if it isn't a snarly pot-scourer frizz at all times! In part it's uber-snarly because her mama has dead-straight hair and rarely brushes it, so she hasn't a clue how to handle snarl-prone curls. My hair may be badly styled and peat-colored but it has never experienced a tangle in its life, except for a year in high school when I was moussing it up into a tower of shag. Then it might have had a touch of tangle.

I've never been much bothered by tot's tangles because she's so scrumptious that it doesn't matter. Plus she has her entire life to play with her hair, so why do I have to? Not to mention the supermarket detangler I bought smelled like a Dollar store and clearly contained lead or something. So I dumped it.

However, after spotting various products out there on websites devoted to curly tot hair (yes, everyone has lots of time on their hands, it seems) I have decided to buy some specially formulated shamps for Crabtot called, curiously, Hans' Oom-Pah-Pah. With a name that absurd, naturally it must be mine. Plus, it does look like it contains some nice, nontoxic solutions to tot-frizz.

Oh what a tangled web we weave when...okay, that's not working...What's your take on tangle theory?

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