And Peppered Was His Hair (2/2) By Kenton Hall

(1/2), (2/2)

They start working that lather around and pressing their surprisingly firm fingers against your scalp and your career, your wife, your kids, your dog, your moral compass and your collection of original hard-bound Hardy Boys novels all vanish in a puff of ooohh, baby... It doesn't even matter if you find them attractive or not. You suddenly want to run away with them to some beach-infested destination, where you shall lay beneath the palms and conceive pre-tanned babies who, in turn, shall frolic in the surf before you, chirping and laughing pure sunshine from their slender throats, as you grow yet older and more content, sipping a drink made from mango and smoking a deathless cigarette.

And then it ends. And you are shuffled to a chair to be poked at and prodded, and quizzed endlessly about your plans for the future. If it isn't a relationship, it's a damned fine metaphor for one.

2. Scissors are the work of the Devil. If you can stomach it, watch a hairdresser's hands as they hold a pair of scissors. It's grotesque. Unnatural shapes are formed, as they twist and undulate these noir-ish murder blades around your head in a vain attempt to get one side to correspond even remotely with the other. With Sweeney Todd and a straight-edge razor, you knew what you were risking. It was good honest butchery. But scissors? They simply are not right. The concept of them cutting anything thicker than a water molecule with any accuracy is laughable, they cripple the hands of their wielders into graceless hooves and, god damn it, they are magnetically attracted to ears - and I can prove it scientifically.

They should be banned, and I will be starting a petition shortly.

3. Model is just another word for victim As a professional musician, I earn approximately 0.001 a year in new money and yet I am expected to image-up on a regular basis. So, from time to time, I turn down the dangerous boulevard of being a stylist's model - a practice dummy for some new style or technique they wish to learn. It's always cheaper and, at times, even free, a word which produces approximately the same hysteria when whispered to a musician as whispering "Pork Rind" to an American. However, being a model means hearing the phrase "I can't do this" whispered to a supervisor after an hour of alternating between extreme boredom and extreme panic.

I try to avoid any activity which, after an hour's fumbling, results in someone saying "I can't do this."

4. Learn the power structure. Always suck up to the receptionist. They are the ones in charge and they are the ones who, if disrespected, will watch your transformation from dowdy duckling to triumphant head wound with a slight smirk on their face as if to say, "Is that the best you can look?" Tip them. Never mind the Nazi who did this to you, tip the receptionist. They are the ones who will let get out alive. And those are just four points out of - oh so many - tens of others. And one day, I will share further on the subject.

But, for now, I need to go out and buy hair gel - or possibly a hat.

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