Hello World

Yesterday I got the worst haircut in the entire history of the world, and I'm including white guy dreadlocks. The nice old asian lady (Sue) had me sit down and she asked me how I wanted my hair. I requested a little trim (my sideburns were getting bushy and generally things had just gotten a bit out of hand in the back), and before I knew it I was getting The Haircut That Knew No Shame.

First of all, I'd just like to say that the use of the electric razor has gotten absolutely out of hand. When you want a buzzcut or a really keen bowl cut, sure, bring out the Flow-Bee (tm). But when you want an actual haircut, involving more than one length of hair, please just humor me and use scissors. Because, often, when you don't, you cut my hair so close you can see my scalp (note to the dumb: this is bad). And when I say "not too short on top" I do NOT mean "don't cut the hair on top at all and just shave the hell out of the back and sides, so that I look like a 4th grader from 1992." I guess I should have said these things to Sue, but I didn't know I needed to do so until it was way too late.

So she treated my head like a lawn to be mowed, and I looked really stupid, and I had to break down and ask her to cut the hair on top, too, because otherwise I basically just had a do-it-yourself-prison-quality haircut, but without the street cred. She didn't really screw up the top, and she even used scissors a little bit, so I was pretty pumped about the way the momentum seemed to have turned in this encounter. She asked me how I usually parted my hair, and I said "I kind of comb it forward and up in the front." The end was in sight. All she had to do was get a little gel or mousse or whatever and give me a trendy "just out of bed" look and the haircut would come to a close. It had been awful, but at least it was over, right?

Wrong.

Because, you see, she had yet to bring out the HAIR SPRAY or BLOW-DRIER. Now, you know how a lot of barbershops have those hilarious old-school 80s glamour shots of pale men with makeup and wavy blow-dried flattops? Usually, that's just colorful decoration. Questionable feng shui, but sort of fun. At this place, those posters turned out to have been harbingers of haircut hell to come. Looking back on it now, it's clear that Sue cuts hair the same way a child traces--her goal was to make my hair look exactly like the hair on these kitschy, preposterous, cultural time capsules.

She pulled out the blow-drier. I thought she was just going to use it to blow the stray hairs off my face and neck, but no! she started giving me a hilarious-were-it-not-happening-to-me Zach Morris wavy, flippy, catastrophe. At this point I had given up on having a good haircut; I was just hoping to get out of there without screaming at the well-intentioned buffoon who was still messing around with that damned blow-drier and/or breaking down into desperate tears.

After several minutes of thinking it had to be almost over, I finally lied, "all right, I think that's enough blow-drying. It looks great." Sue said, "OK." She proceeded to blow-dry my hair for literally another 7 or 8 horrific minutes, until I finally just said "That's perfect, please stop."

I ran away to the bathroom in my office and looked in the mirror and for a second I swear to god I saw a flash of acid-washed jeans, slap-bracelets, and those ridiculous sunglasses with all the horizontal blinds built into the frames. I threw water all over my head and messed my hair up with my hands as best I could, but the front hair wave above my forehead would not subside. Still it stands, mocking me with its carefree, irreverent stature.

I look like a fool.


Virgil's Haircutting Studio, 614 Polk St., San Francisco. Appointments available. (415) 673-3617