SHAVE AND A HAIRCUT--DON'T DO IT DRUNK

Now that I'm an old fart, I still have a full head of hair. And a full face of hair.

When an undergrad at Florida U. in Gainewville, there used to be a barbershop right off campus that had about a dozen barber chairs, in a row, with a row of chairs to sit in on the opposite wall.

These guys would cut your hair and shave a wide swath around your ears.

When I was in the orient, the barbers would shave your whole face, including your forehead, which I thought was a bit weird.

Nowadays, there are few actual barbershops left for men, you have to go to these salons with hoity toity sailboat sails and all, but at least it's chicks cutting your hair. I remember when I lived in L.A., the babes served wine with your haircut.

And a girlfriend who will cut your hair is always a plus.

Getting my hair cut always put me to sleep, very relaxing. But not yesterday morning.

These days I cut my own hair with these trimmers you get at Wal*Mart for about fifteen bucks. Lasts for many cuttings til the blades dull, so you save boo-koo dough. Keep your hair from a quarter inch to about an inch--Junior taught me all this,this is what he does. Course your hair always looks like hell, but who cares? I wear ball caps all the time anyway...

So about yesterday morning--I go into the bathroom for my weekly grooming, AND IT'S FRICKIN' FREEZING IN THERE so I take a belt of Yukon Jack to take the edge off and what do I find? Some hairs have grown out of my right earlobe. No problem. My left earlobe is smooth as a frumpy middle aged hot chick's Rosy Cheeks.

The older you get, the more odd places you have odd hairs sprouting out.

OK, so you know in men, I don't know about women, our earlobes never stop growing. Look at a really old guy sometime--these leathery dumbo-wings will be brushing his shoulders.

It's all cartilage I think, but it can bleed, trust me.

So you can't really grab ahold of these hairs and pull them out: too slippery. Maybe pliers would work, I don't know--but I chose the scissors... and another belt of Tennessee sippin' whisky.

So I get out the scissors. Now you may not know this but stuff is reversed in a mirror and the depth perception is all screwed up- So what did I do?

I lopped the tip of my ear lobe off!! Didn't hurt all that bad, but what a Godawful amount of blood!! Yikes. I got the bleeding stopped, more or less and took acoupla shots of whisky just to settle my nerves. Patrick is going bonkers at all this, and my yelling, I guess. So I'm looking in the mirror to access the damage and Guess What?

Now I got one earlobe shorter than the other! Well you can guess the solution to that..

So I take a couple more belts of Jack Daniels and chase it with a beer, just to fortify myself for the task ahead--big mistake.

So I'm leaning on the sink to steady myself and by now I'm feeling no pain so I go ahead and position the scissors on my other earlobe and shut my eyes (another big mistake) and grit my teeth and snip! Lots more blood!

but I know how to deal with it this time--and how to get the bleed ing to stop by squeezing my earlobe, so...

By now the bathroom looks like the crime scene in a slasher movie, and I'm getting woosie from the lack of blood I guess and all the liquor on an empty stomach before breakfast.

So I crawl into the bathtub and gratefully pass out.

I awaken at what must be several hours later. Patrick is in the tub with me barking his head off. My ears hurt something fierce, and I've got a pounding headache. There's bloody towels everywhere and an empty whiskey bottle. I'm clinging to a pair of scissors.

Hell, I've been in worse fixes, don't mean nuthin! At least nobody's laughin' at me.

Do I need to start going back to the Barber shop-- you think? Or do I need some serious caretaking. I don't want to go to the old folks home, I hate Bingo and eating off plastic compartmentalized trays--reminds me to much of that other place they committed me too in Massachusetts so long ago--but that's another story. Involving green rocking chairs on a huge front porch, barb wire, and underage wimmin... I think I'll just remove all the sharp objects from the house...

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