I have a haircut that I could very easily give myself if I bought my own shears, but I would feel the stare of a barber scorned everytime I walked by my regular barbershop (which I pass everyday). And I guess, with guilty conscience, I feel a loyalty to my neighborhood shops, and would feel that I am cheating if the barber saw me freshly shorn by a hand other than her own. There are two barbers, a man and a woman, and it’s the woman who has taken me as her Regular. She’s a sweet lady, shears me fine, but she drives me nuts, because as I sit on that barber chair she talks and talks incessantly to me while her shears buzz in my ears. I stare in the mirror and try to read her lips and say, “Oh yeah?” or “Hmmm?” even though I have no clue what she’s saying. Sometimes I’ll catch the end of a question, and I’ll manage an answer that might fit, something like, “I suppose so.” And in a strange way, though I never know what she is talking about, we are friends. And in a small way, I look forward to these haircuts, and these conversations in which I say almost nothing, and understand even less.
Calendar
- 2008-11-20 Fall play @ RBR - Romeo & Juliet
- 2008-11-21 Fall play @ RBR - Romeo & Juliet
- 2008-11-22 Fall play @ RBR - Romeo & Juliet
- 2008-11-23 Fall play @ RBR - Romeo & Juliet
- MSSB @ M Shanghai Den
Our monthly first Saturday gig. Awesome Schezwan food!
When: Dec 6, 2008 9:00:00 PM
Where: M Shanghai Den in Brooklyn,New York
Posted by:richardpetermorris
Watching
- Add Jim as your Netflix Friend
- Octopussy
- The Spy Who Loved Me
- Moonraker
- Licence to Kill
- The Man with the Golden Gun
- A View to a Kill
Subscribe
- Bagelturf - An Aperture Workflow Example: Selecting 6 Images From 229 - excellent aperture workflow tutorial
- All Scientific Articles, Research, Landscape and Human Health Laboratory, University of Illinois - Human Health Benefits Of Natural Landscapes
- Natural Settings Help Brain Fatigue - Well Blog - NYTimes.com - Attention restoration theory suggests that walks in nature and views of green space capture our involuntary attention, giving our directed attention a needed rest.
- Jonathan Haidt on the moral roots of liberals and conservatives | Video on TED.com - Psychologist Jonathan Haidt studies the five moral values that form the basis of our political choices, whether we're left, right or center. In this eye-opening talk, he pinpoints the moral values that liberals and conservatives tend to honor most.
- Pollan's Proposals - For the time-strapped who didn't get around to reading Pollan's recent NYT's magazine piece on food policy, here is a great overview of that article.
- Multitasking Can Make You Lose ... Um ... Focus - NYTimes.com - As our minds fill with noise ? feckless synaptic events signifying nothing ? the brain gradually loses its capacity to attend fully and gradually to anything,
- Mayor promotes traffic-calming aids - To slow traffic and to protect children who walk to school, Mayor Pasquale Menna wants to increase traffic-calming measures and pedestrian crossings on busy access streets in the borough.
- Cities rethink wisdom of 50s-era parking standards - USATODAY.com - Officials hope that offering the freedom to forgo parking will lead to denser, more walkable, transit-friendly development.
- Scott Russell Sanders - Just read "A Private History of Awe." Wonderful book that resonated on so many different levels.
- Paris-Brest-Paris randonneurs go for distance - someday.
Add Jim to your del.icio.us network
Rich,
As the devil’s advocate I have to ask, have you ever had a haircut at one of the Puerto Rican places around town? They usually top it off with a straight razor and warm shaving cream on your neck and around your ears. F-ing awesome. I’m going today. I can’t wait…
It does sound awesome! I’ve always wanted a straight razor shave. Something exhilaratingly dangerous about having a straight razor against your neck. Alas, what would my barber say? Could I bear the tears that would well in her eyes?
Only one way to find out…
when we lived in DC i went to a chinese barber for my haircuts (which, back then was just your basic shaved head, like the Nav’s). he did the straight razor, followed by a hot towel and shiatsu-like neck and shoulder massage. $6. i haven’t been able to find anything close up here in RI
My barber finishes with the warm shaving cream around the ears and neckline, straight razor and then the warm towel. It’s all very nice, but I have to close my eyes when the razor comes out and he starts shaving — I try desperately not to think of that scene in _Reservoir Dogs_ when Mike Madsen’s character (Mr. Blonde) cuts off the hostage cop’s ear with a straight razor.
ky
Just got back - delightful. I realized that the best part is that everyone in there is speaking Spanish and I am free to drift away. No conversation necessary. Rich, if you’re ever in Chelsea… it’s the New Barber on 18th St. and 9th Ave..
when i walk into a hair salon or barber shop the scissors actually become enchanted and run out of the building in terror. the barber or stylist usaully follows closely behind. i have spoken to some people in the aerospace industry and they are trying to engineer some new cutting devices that would not be threatened by my hair but have been unable too make any headway.
i still hope though. thats what keeps me going, you know.