John Gray - years ago AND John Gray - now (looking more and more like Ed Dague!)
As many of you know, John Gray has always been one of my favorites. I'd forgotten all about his columns since I no longer recieve the Saratogian in print. But today I stumbled upon it looking for an updated snowfall in the Saratoga area. I laughed and laughed!
Hard work. When you were young that’s what they told you was the secret to success. Stay in school, work hard, do the right thing and a good career would follow. They were wrong.
Apparently it’s all about hair color.
A recent study done in England concluded that blondes don’t just have more fun, they have more funds. As in blondes make more money than brunettes.
They interviewed 3,000 professional women of all shapes, sizes and hair colors and the results were eye opening. Blondes, on average, made $900 more per year than brunettes. What’s interesting is the blondes, while making more, also complained that they weren’t taken seriously at work. On the other hand, eight out of 10 brunettes say they felt very valued in the workplace. So it raises the obvious question — would you rather be respected or rich?
What’s also interesting in this study is that it doesn’t have to be your natural hair color to earn you the money or the respect. So in theory, if you were a raven-haired beauty on Friday, dyed your hair platinum blonde over the weekend, by close of business Wednesday your boss would probably call you into the office and discuss that long overdue promotion.
Are you buying any of this? I wasn’t either. That’s why I dug a little deeper and learned that the "unbiased" study was paid for by Superdrug, the UK’s second largest health and beauty retail chain. In other words, it’s in their best interest to get women with black, brown and red hair to buy blonde hair color.
This would be like the people at Krispy Kreme funding a study that concludes if you want to lose weight you can burn a lot of calories by quickly and repeatedly dunking your doughnuts in coffee. Just that up-and-down motion will not only build biceps, but it’s practically a cardio workout on par with the ridiculous (and slightly pornographic) Shake Weight.
That said, I’m all about making your life at the office go more smoothly so I thought I’d toss in some more tips. We already covered the whole "go blonde" thing, so what else should you know about the office? The thermostat on the wall is not connected to anything. You can turn it up or down but it won’t do any good. This explains why it’s either 44 or 104 degrees in your office.
The skinny girl with the always-full candy dish is mocking you all. You never see her eat the candy, but trust me, every time you reach your chubby paw in the dish she’s thinking, "Take another one my little hungry, hungry hippo."
The copy machine will always have exactly four sheets of paper left in it when you have to print a five-page document.Someone in your office thinks if you leave rotting tuna in the company fridge it will magically vanish on its own and not stink up the whole building.
The free coffee in the break room tastes like wolverine breath because it’s made from the cheapest coffee beans known to man.
When you call in sick no one believes you. When you use the phrases "FYI" and "less is more," your co-workers want to throttle you. Nobody wants to see photos from your vacation. In fact, we’re all jealous you got a vacation while we were stuck here smelling rotten tuna. The weird intern is the one who keeps stealing your pens. He also sniffs your scarf when you’re not looking.
Every time management forces you to take sensitivity training, the incidents of co-workers mocking each other and making inappropriate sexual jokes skyrockets.
And last, but certainly not least, that girl in sales who can’t spell "sales" does have naked photos of the boss as you all suspect. She’ll never be fired so stop wishing it.I hope my little tutorial helped you in some small way today. If you don’t mind, my contract is almost up at Fox and I’m thinking a little Owen Wilson hairdo might be just what the doctor ordered.
John Gray is a news anchor on WXAA-Fox TV 23. His column is published Wednesdays in The Saratogian. E-mail JohnGray@ fox23news.com.
