My hair dryer died this afternoon. It was one of those portable machines called a “soft bonnet hair dryer,” – a facsimile of the hooded machines you see in salons.
It’s made up of a small plastic box with a vent on top, and a skinny plastic hose that connects to a soft plastic bonnet that fits over the head. Not very glamorous I know. I bought the dryer while I was in college – nearly 20 years ago. Yeah, this thing lasted two decades and never broke once. When I turned it on this afternoon to dry my curls, no air blew out of the hose. Instead, it emitted a rattling sound and then a whine. A faint, acrid odor wafted from the air vent. I knew this was the end.
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