Cut Down To Size

I hate getting my hair cut. It means I have to describe to the lady with the sharp implements and the "whaddayouwant?" attitude what I'd like my hair to look like in its prospective shorter state, and I'm terrible with foresight. Many times I've undergone this ritual and come out the other side looking like a girl with fashionably short hair accentuated by my naturally girlish face. Last time I asked the keeper of the scissors to just give it a bit of a trim. I quite like having fairly longish hair in an early-2000s emo kid kinda way and I expressed my desire to keep some of the length whilst keeping it trim and unruly. I even gestured towards a framed monochrome picture of a male model on the wall of the damned place, trailing off with "something sort of like that, but still with some length". The wench agreed with my request in a second, and in the subsequent second forgot it as she took an electric razor to my scalp. It took virtually a whole year to get back to how it was in the first place.

That year ended yesterday as I embraced the sun (although not literally cos that'd involve me travelling millions of miles across a vast vacuum and ultimately end in me burning to death in seconds as I attempted to hug what, in the interest of perspective, would essentially appear to be a wall of fire) by accepting that the thick shagpile rug atop my head needed to be cut down to size; plus it's started to look like a mullet and I am neither a 70s rock star, one of the cast of Grease or a part of the travelling community.

Dreading my explanation of what I wanted (essentially, make it shorter, but still make it look okay), I proceeded to ask the hair-sorceress what was the longest setting on the electric razor. She dully (that's dull-ly, a state of dullness) showed me the "number 8" from her arsenal of clipping attachments. I opted for this because it seemed the easiest to explain, and because I'm so used to having longer hair normally, this number 8 looks to me like how I'd imagine a number 3 would. So that was the back and the sides sorted. How about the front and the top? I like the front and the top; they're the first (and only) bits I see when I look in the mirror and, thus, care about. I asked her not to completely destroy them, just trim them down a bit, which she did, under the impression that I wanted to follow the latest indie fashion trend.

"They're all having it like that now, aren't they? Where it's kinda top-heavy."

As I sat there, pondering the fact that in six or seven minutes time I'd look up to the mirror and see a wannabe T4 presenter horrifically staring back, I got to thinking about the fact that many students seem to have longer hairstyles, or experiment in cutting their own. Originally, I'd naturally assumed this was because they were making some kind of statement about individuality, independence and lack of care. Now I realise that it's because they don't have any money, and that I too shun the idea of a quarterly trim in favour of letting it all grow wild and bushy until I can tame it nae longer by which time I'll have taken a pair of Crayola scissors to it and emerge with a fringe in the shape of zig-zags, or waves, or whichever fun-shaped scissors I had to hand that day.

Fortunately, my new doo doesn't make me look like a girl (much) or an indie fashionista. Instead, I look about as close to what I wanted to look like as possible without me having to physically project my mind-thoughts into the brain of someone who's able to hold a pair of scissors and not ram them, pointy-side-first, into my ear. Huzzah, I can rest in the knowledge that I at least tolerate my own appearance and will not have to worry about it again for another year and a half. This means I can keep saving money (if I had any) so that I can eventually get all the things I've been promising to get myself: certain books I'd like to read, certain musics I'd like to listen to, certain games I'd like to play and certain consoles on which to play them.

In a bout of freak coincidenceyness (or another made-up word like that), my newfound appreciation of food from McDonalds has aligned with the resurrection of their recurring Monopolopoly tie-in game promotion-type thing. So far, since they started it again, I've eaten there twice and gained a whole two stickers because of it. Both those stickers represented different train stations which, in pseudo-gameplay terms, already puts me half-way to owning a PS3. Naturally, having not eaten at McDonalds in many years, this is the first time I've played along with the Monopolopoly game and I must say I'm getting mighty swept up in it all. If there is a God, or other all-knowing sentient being that takes any interest in the happiness of human life - specifically mine - then all he, she, or indeed it needs to do is give me the other two stations in my next two visits to a McDonalds outlet and I'll be able to cross one of those items off the wish list and not piss away hundreds of pounds on it.

It'll also be especially helpful now that Gamestation's gone tits up.