Hair Affair

There are two places in town that you can get a haircut that doesn't cost you a ridiculous fortune.

Normally I go to Terry's. Old man Terry has been cutting hair longer than I've been alive. Man's cut. No bull. No product. You sit, he cuts. Simple. Just clippers and scissors. Problem is that Terry is slow. The problem is compounded when it's crowded, which Terry's often is.

There's another shop, more like a butcher shop, that I go to sometimes. I'll not mention the name here, let's just say it rhymes with Fantastic Sams. Oops. They're bad, but cheap.

Terry's busy today, lot's of cars in the parking lot, waiting room full. So, Fantastic Sams it is. I sit down while the lady, whom I've never met, starts peppering me with questions. Clippers? Clippers and scissors? Just scissors? What guard? How high do you want your neck line? Leave the sideburns, or square them under the ear? Good gracious. I've had final exams in college that weren't this rigorous.

Then this lady breaks every convention known to man-hair cutting laws of the universe. She has the unmitigated gall to ask me "do you want me to cut your bangs, or leave them?" Needle scratching off the record, car breaks screeching, angry cat caught in a fence, and a mournful baby cries in the distance-then crickets and silence. I'm sorry, did you just ask me how I want my bangs?

First off, when I sit in the chair in Terry's, no verbal barrage is unleashed. He has three cuts: trim, medium, and summer scalp-it. He doesn't need to ask me, he knows by the time of year. He doesn't ask me about guards or side burns or anything. I sit. He cuts. Simple.

We may exchange three or four word sentences about vacations, football, or the weather. Maybe. Frankly, you can read your paper or magazine if you want to. You sit. He cuts. Simple.

There's no "would you like some gel" or can "I shampoo you" There would never be "You know you should try some volumizing spritz. More importantly, under no circumstances, not in a million years, not even under gun point and threat of death, would Terry utter "how would you like your bangs." Just putting Terry's name in the same sentence with bangs violates six or seven laws as it is.

My fundamental opposition to not paying more than $10 bucks for a haircut may have to be controverted in order to never, ever have to discuss the treatment of my bangs again. I will wait in the lobby in Terry's for an interminable length of time before I will ever, ever, subject myself to that.

Bangs. You've got to be kidding me.