Haircut Awkwardo!

So, after several disappointing haircuts, I decided to try to find a new stylist. My roommate had advocated a small barbershop that is much closer to my home than the place I usually go, so I was down to give it a try.

I show up at this place and enter. There's not a soul in sight. I walk around towards the back, ready to yell for some service, when one of the stylists/barbers appears. She was about 5'4" and appeared to be in her mid-30's. Her hair was a big yuppie, soccer-mom-of-yesteryear do. It looked to me like it had been inspired by a MadTV wig worn when one of the females is playing some middle-aged lamer.

She asks if she can help me, and I explain I need a haircut (actually, "explain" might be too strong of a word since I flatly said, "I need a haircut."

We communicate enough that I *thought* she knew how I wanted my hair cut.

Awkward silence falls.

I notice she is leaving me facing toward the mirror as she does her "magic". I watch her. She doesn't seem to notice. If she did notice, she was completely devoid of all social skills. If her facial expressions were representative of her emotional state during my haircut, her demeanor seemed to randomly change between challenged, frustrated, confused, remorseful, and gassy.

I began to ponder if she and the other "stylist" that eventually emerged were really holding up the place and thought it would be easier to give me a shitty haircut and send me on my way than to try make their grand getaway with me there to witness.

I figured my theory, as entertaining as it was to me, couldn't have been true due to my stylist's just-barely-adequate skills with the shop's customer database.

"I am very tired today", she says, breaking a uncomfortable silence with something I found less comfortable (i.e. small talk).

"Yeah, me too," I reply. Ooh, that's good. I am such a people person.

"Trick-or-treat is over", she says.

"WTF?!", my internal monologue blurts. I think in reality I made some kind of guttural noise and trailed off. Like I said, people person.

"Do you have any kids?", she politely, yet awkwardly inquires.

"No", I say flatly, as I am not particularly interested in hearing about hers.

She doesn't speak to me again until it is time to pay her. So I am back watching her weirdo facial expressions.

I begin to notice a familiar annoyance of eighties music, but I am not placing it right away.

Oh, shit! Not that! It was "Hip to be Square" by Huey Lewis.

My brain was being overrun with sound bytes from David Cross's bit on "Shut Up, You Fucking Baby" about marketing companies making up products we don't need.

The example he gave was Squagels. That's right, square bagels. David's story had the Squagel commercials set to the Huey Lewis song.

It was all I could do to keep from laughing out loud and making this weird interaction several times weirder.

I manage to compose myself and weather the rest of this ordeal. I pay. I leave.

The next morning I get up for work, and during the part of my preparation ritual that involves doing something with my God forsaken hair, I realize "Yup, this sure is the shittiest haircut I have ever had." She had butchered me. It was way too short on top. She cut my cowlick short, even though I told her to be careful of it. She managed to blend my sides and the top so nicely, that I constantly look like I spent that last several hours wearing a fucking visor on my forehead. Like, low forehead. I have a fucking line circling my head about an inch underneath my hairline.

I think she was fucked up. Oklahoma does have a lot of meth labs, you know.