Crazy Foreign Hairdressers

When someone has to fill out an application form when applying for a job in a hairdressers, is 'manic stare' a pre-requisite? I ask this, because it seems to be the norm in my usual hairdressers in Stourbridge. As long as the person cutting my hair is polite, chatty and does a decent job, I can forgive the stare.

But a really manic stare is something else entirely. I mean a burn-through-lead stare. No - worse. I'm talking about a stare than would have made Idi Amin turn away in fear. No-one should be able to provoke that sort of response from a fellow human being.

I hope now I've put the picture in your head of a maniac. Now please add some frothy drool to the mixture. Now think of them brandishing a pair of scissors. Make them female - we know they're deadlier than the male.

Welcome to my private hell - welcome to last Saturday. Saturday was hair cut day - usually a trouble-free experience. So, there I was, sat in the hairdressers, patiently waiting for my turn, reading the paper. I hadn't even noticed that the most evil looking woman on the planet was looking at me until I finally looked up, and she beckoned me over to the guillotine - sorry - chair.

I thought, 'my god - she's the one fate (damn you, fate) has chosen to cut my hair. And I'll have to PAY for the 'privelege''.

I was fixed with the 'Mwahahahahahaaaa!!! Another victim!' smile. The insane laughter at the start of that quote was certainly silent. But behind that grim, bored, almost tortured expression of blank nothingness I assure you she was happy about nature's selection - me - as her next unwilling piece of prey.

I sat down, and had one last look in the mirror as a live human being when she asked, "What you like, meester?"

Broken English. Broken. Like my spirit. This maniacal, evil looking woman - armed with full compliment of machetes - cannot speak my language. I cannot reason with her - I cannot plead with her for my life. This is a disaster.

"Erm - just short and neat."

The red eyes flicker. Think Sauron from Lord of the Rings. Only scarier. Sauron was just one eye. Hecate here has 2, and a body to house them. She grabbed a fistful of my hair (not gently) and barked,
"This much? Huh?"
"Erm, maybe not quite that much."
She relinquished her grip. For all of 3 seconds. Then the Fist of Doom came back and grasped not quite as much as previously, but with the same force as a Nadal backhand from the baseline.
"Now?"
You have no idea how much she sounded like Mrs Goebbels in Downfall when she said that.
"Yar. Sorry, yes." I uttered weakly.

I shall continue with the movie similies here. This time, she exhaled the sort of exhale of air you associate with Ridley Scott's Alien as she moved across my line of sight, scissors in one hand, trident in the other. I am, of course, joking about the trident. She was too busy sharpening the razor with her nails to grasp such a cumbersome object.

Ah, that gentle, reassuring, soft 'snip, snip' you hear in the quintessential barber's shops. The ones Paul McCartney sang about in Penny Lane. I now know - for sure - that any reassuring noises are soothed by your brain and transmitted as 'nice' noises.

My brain couldn't recognise 'nice' noises, merely noises ob object horror. TERRIFYING horror. Thanks to my brain, I was now listening to hacking, shearing, tearing, scraping noises - all coming from the twisted piece of metal brandished by this serial killer towering above me. I was pinned down in my chair - manacled by the invisible barrier of black cloth around my neck, cascading over my shoulders. Because you NEVER lift your hands over the black cloth. It's like a burkha for the cuttee's arms.

I dared to look back in the mirror. I tried to ignore my petrified expression and looked at my head. Half of which looked neater. The other half didn't. Christ, she'd made me into an emo!

If I could see myself now, I'd probably scream, maaaan.....

I don't know how I dared to challenge her, but I did.

"Erm, please can you take a bit off my fringe?"
"Fringe? Fringe?" This was said in the same tone of voice as Mr Bumble. from Oliver Twist. Substitute 'Fringe?' for 'More?' and you're there.
"Yes please. It looks a bit long for me."
"Not long. Good. You is look good."

I really didn't. I looked like an emo. I don't want to look like an emo. I want to look like me. And I'm not an emo. If all else failed, I could always go for the trusted grade 2 all over. But then the wife wouldn't talk to me. Which would make me all depressed and - well, for want of a better word, like an emo. I suppose feeling like an emo is better than LOOKING and feeling like an emo. I'd risk it - if this didn't work, I was going for the buzz cut. Hannah would understand - I'm sure Jill Morrell didn't like John McCarthy's 5 year stubble when he was released, but we're talking survival here. We'd work it out over time.

"No, I'd like my fringe cut short please."
A 'harumph' followed. I'm not sure how to properly type that noise, but 'harumph' will do. An angry, Eastern European noise, if you like.

Five minute of grunting, scraping, shearing noises later, and I looked human again. Sort of like Theoden after Gandalf wakes him up from his trance in The Two Towers, but with shorter hair and no beard.

Usually, the black arm burkha is out of bounds for the cuttee, but I didn't care. I flung the thing off as soon as those blades were far enough away from my jugular and made for the till. I was buying my own freedom. Why didn't McCarthy and chums think of this?

Maybe such tests are put in front of us as a reminder of why some men go bald?