I like to shave in the shower.

Any of you who've seen me or my face will know I'm not the kind of person that gets through razor blades too quickly but I do like to keep my face someway manicured. And one of the ways I do that is, every so often, shaving my neck. I like a clean neck. I like the feeling of it and, I'll be honest, I like the way it defines my jaw line. Without a hair/no hair division, my jaw line is too... hazy. My face and my neck seem to blend in leaving me looking a bit like a thumb. Also I look too young. Like a thumb who's barely out of his teens.

Anyway, yes, so when I do figure it's time for a shave I tend to do so in the shower. Men, if you're not shaving in the shower, you're missing out. Your pores are open, you've suds a-plenty and a constant supply of hot water. The only drawback is you're doing it blind so you've to be careful. I tend to do the body of the work without much caution and then slow down when I get to the edges. I run my hand over the area and nod at no one in particular when I'm happy with how smooth it all feels.
And, each and every time, I get out of the shower, look in the mirror and see a neck shaved in such a half arsed manner it looks like I rubbed it with a belt sander. I sigh, fill the sink with hot water and finish it off.

So there's a little story for you. I've not been updating this blog a lot recently so I'm going to try smaller, more frequent stories for a little while. Right-oh, close this tab and get back to facebook, you lot.

"Tidy it up."

I got my hair cut just under two weeks ago. I was getting a little rough looking and, for a few reasons, I wanted to appear that bit sharper. It was around about the new year and most places were closed so I went wherever was open. It was a place in the St James' shopping centre. Supercuts, I think it was called, but I might be wrong. I think it was a chain. I imagined lots of other Supercuts dotted around the country, sitting in obscure wings of shopping centres beside random travel agents and dressmakers. I stopped imagining and did a walk-by, looking in the doorway as I passed. It looked a bit... cheap but it met my requirements. Scissors, a mirror and a poster of a man. They could cut my hair, I could see what they were at and they at least tried to make men welcome there. In I went.
It was still quite early in the day and the only girl working was finishing up on the only other customer in the place, a woman in her 50s with a tight enough haircut to begin with. She'd taken her bifocals off for the haircut but what little she could see wasn't really impressing her. She suggested some things, waved her hands in various directions around her head and the girl nodded nervously. She snipped a little with her scissors, combed the woman's hair around a bit and sought a renewed opinion on the situation. Again, not impressed. The girl shifted on her feet, she really didn't look like she wanted to cut anymore.
As if sensing her apprentice's distress, a new, older and more confident girl walked into the shop with Costa cup of coffee. I can't remember how exactly it looked, but I remember she had great hair. I remember thinking how I really wanted her to cut my hair. Then I remember thinking that her having good hair didn't mean she was a good hairdresser, it meant someone else was. I remember feeling a little foolish. The original girl called her over, explained the situation and this new girl took over with a smile on her face.
The original girl approached me. I tried to keep my head buried in the year-old FHM I wasn't really reading but she asked me if I wanted to take the hotseat. I hesitated for a few seconds. This was to be my last day off for a week, there was nowhere else in the city that was open, I needed a haircut. With effort I put on a smile, put the magazine back in the rack and followed the girl over to the chair.
She wasn't that bad. She was inexperienced, okay, and a bit too talkative, but I don't demand much when I go for haircuts. My exact words every time I've had a haircut* have been "Could you just tidy it up a bit?". I'd love to be able to just hand hairdressers a card saying "Make my head look like my head did six weeks ago and I'll give you some money." and close my eyes for twenty minutes. She snipped away with the scissors, she did that thing I like where she gets my hair between two fingers and then chops at angles (They call it "texturising", I was once told), she used those scissors that has one blade like a comb so it thins your hair a bit and, most importantly, she spent ages tidying around my ears with the electtric razor.
I LOVE WOMEN TIDYING THE HAIR AROUND MY EARS WITH AN ELECTRIC RAZOR. The buzz, the humm, the strange and illogical edginess I feel, as if she's actually using a real razor and if I move I'll lose half my hearing.
All in all, it was a decent experience. I left, fifteen pounds (fourteen plus tip) and a mass of hair lighter and went looking for a mug of coffee. I was happy with my new haircut. I was happy the next day too. And the day after that. And so on and so forth... until this morning.
This morning I got out of bed and dragged my feet across the hallway for a shower. I showered. Afterwards I was drying myself off and I caught a look at myself in the mirror. My hair was still wet, but I noticed that it was a bit long at the back, down towards the bottom. I dried my hair fully and looked again. Yep, definitely just a wee bit too long at the top of my neck. The rest of my hair was fine, still just how I like it.

A mullet. The sneaky cow gave me a mullet. But, worse than that, she gave me a mullet that I'd only notice weeks down the line. She seemed inexperienced at the time, but it was all a ruse. She gave me a time-delayed mullet and I paid her an extra pound to do it.