How I Shaved my Head

I'm glad I have hair, yes. Sometimes I wish I didn't have to deal with it though. The past month or so I have spent too much time in front of the mirror fiddling with my hair, experimenting with different styles (I use the word loosely). I have been so frustrated as of late, that I have wanted to buzz it all off for quite a while.

Jessica is glad that I have hair, yes. Sometimes she wishes she didn't have to deal with me moaning about bad my hair looks though. So, she gave me permission to do what I want. This past weekend I finally decided to drop the hammer on the idea, and take out the clippers.

I first buzzed my head after losing a bet over the 2002 Stanley Cup finals. I was pleased with the results, and it has been an off-and-on favorite haircut of mine ever since. In the past, if I've made the decision to buzz my head, I will first cut it into a Mohawk. This I will sport for as many days as I can get away with, until I cut that down even more, into a Cabbage Patch Kids-esque tuft of hair in the middle of my head. I enjoy this comical quaff for a few more hours before removing that too. The end result is a nice, fuzzy 3-guard buzzed head in need of no product or time to groom it.

The first portion of the plan went exactly as planned. I sported the Mohawk to Jessica's sister Rebecca's soccer game, and then to her birthday dinner at Maggiano's. The next day, while Jessica was cooking dinner, I went into the bathroom to proceed with phase two. Jessica heard me say, "Ohhhh my God" and was too afraid to come in and look. What happened:  I was trimming my head over the toilet. As I heard a Bzzzzzzzt, I saw the plastic guard fall into the toilet, along with a large part of the Mohawk. I examined the damage in the mirror, and found it irreversible. The only thing left to do was what you see now:























After wearing a hat during dinner, I finally showed Jessica, who by now had already guessed what I had done to my head. Now, I laugh every time I see myself in the mirror. Jessica put it best, "I was okay with you buzzing your head so you would stop looking at your hair in the mirror. But now you just stare at yourself in disbelief even more than before." True. Perhaps the funniest thing to me about this is that my boss, Chicago sommelier Don Sritong bics his head. Myself and a colleague were saying how funny it would be if I slowly looked more and more like Don, and told his stories like they were my own, while teaching some of his classes and events. Well, though an accident, it looks like I've taken that first step. At least I know he can't get pissed at me though- I still have more hair than him.

Puberty II

When I was in fifth grade, they took us on a field trip to the Robert Crown center, where we learned about the upcoming changes that we could expect our bodies to undergo, better known as puberty. The nice lady explained that puberty can begin as early as ten years old, and last as long as twenty-five. Well, about a decade after going through full-blown puberty, I feel like I'm living the sequel. So many changes to my body; except these aren't the changes an adult male looks forward to. 

For one thing, I never had a bad case of acne growing up. A pimple here and there, sure. NOW I'm breaking out like a teenage fry cook. I cannot explain how embarrassing it is for a grown man to wear cover-up; especially if it is cover-up that some drunk, party girl left at his apartment in college.

I was never an overly hairy individual, and this pleased me. In fact, I had relatively no hair on my legs until I started shaving them for swimming. NOW I feel like Teenwolf. Since I've been told that men go bald if the men on their mother's said went bald, I fear that as well. I feel like every hair on my head has either put in for a transfer to currently hairless parts of my body, or are retiring altogether. It is only a matter of time before the transfers are all approved, leaving me bald as a snake, but hairy as a marmot:

"Well, I see that you've put in 25 good years atop Sam's head, and that is enough to retire. Might I suggest though going south to Sam's ass to fill a senior position we ave open there? It is wide open right now, and only getting bigger. We could use some good hairs like you down there, and in a short while we'll have a great team assembled around you. That's a promise."

 I'm still eating like a 15 year old, except the twist in Puberty II is that my metabolism is dramatically slower. Not only that, but the amount and level of exercise needed for me to feel good about myself is becoming less and less everyday. There was a time in the not-too-distant past when I would feel like an absolute panty-waist if I didn't clock 18 hours a week in either pool or gym. NOW, I spent 25 minutes reading a women's health magazine on an elliptical machine, then jump some rope and I feel like I can eat three personal pan pizzas. So, just like a teenage boy, I'm gaining weight- but not in a good way. When a man my age steps on the scale and it reads that you've gained a pound, you think, "Well, shit. I'm a big muscular dude." When he steps on that same scale and it reads that you've lost a pound, you think, "Well shit, I'm getting cut as hell." One way or another, the man feels content enough to not give a shit about his routines.

My eyes constantly look tired. When you wake up feeling completely refreshed and people look at you like you're cripplingly hungover, you have to pretend to be. Yes, that's right, I don't normally look like this (but as it turns out, I do). If it continues to get worse, I'm going to chew on costume blood capsules and tell people that I'm in an underground fight club, and "You should see the other guy.".

Everything that they (adult men) have said to me would happen, is happening. It is easy to think "Well, that won't be me; I workout, eat right, and won't let myself go to shit like you say" when you're 22. Three short years later, the responsibilities that I've acquired along the way have left me to see the prophecy unfolding in front of the mirror every morning.

So here I am, stuck in Puberty II- A 25 year-old man that needs to be sheered like a fat, soon to be bald sheep. I cook breakfast for my fiancee every morning, walk her to the bus stop, and try to make her laugh as much as possible. Now you know why- there are some handsome-ass dudes out there.

Pure F$%&king Michigan!

In our youth, my friends and I took many a guy trip to exotic destinations like Wisconsin, Missouri, and Tennessee (they're these whole other states). Getting away from home, and especially authority figures for a few days at a time was important to our young, adventurous spirits. Every trip was filled with memories that we still tell today, to anyone that will listen. There was however a lapse. It dawned on me when my fiance was planning a gal trip to Vegas that I had not been on a vacation without female companionship in six fucking years. How could this have happened? Careers, significant others, and overall growing apart was at fault. So, partially out of spite but more out of fear of being bored and alone that weekend, I said to a potato I was peeling: "Fuck it. I'm taking a trip too."

Galien is a tiny town in the middle of pure-fucking-Michigan nowhere. Somewhere in that nowhere is Dayton lake. Somewhere on Dayton lake is a house that some nice family rents out for nice couples retreats and other nice family vacations. It can sleep twelve grown men, has a nice yard, boat dock complete with canoe and rowboat, a nice balcony deck, pool table, big-screen color television, card table and fire pit. These features caught the attention of Joe Legions, who then inquired about renting it for our weekend. Not wanting to make an issue out of the great likelihood that they would return to a smoldering pile of ash that had once been their lovely lake home, Joe lied to these fine people, and they were happy to share their home with the four newlywed couples Joe promised them.What arrived instead were nine twenty-something men and over 300 cans of domestic beer.

Another sacrifice.

Imagine the most stereotypical man-cation possible, then intoxicate and caffeinate the man in that -cation, and you can begin to form a better understanding of the weekend. There was poker, tobacco, drinking, fishing, binge-eating, shouting, fires, bear-baiting* and all around recklessness. At some point in the weekend we were just running around and throwing things, including large pieces of lumber and stones. Everything turned into a game. Mike LaGrasse balances a beer atop his head, and lo we have William Tell football.The yard looked like some drunken field day.

Despite all of the debauchery, we all noticed some semblance of adulthood throughout the trip. For one thing, we ate regular meals together. We decided to only drink beer, although a lot of it, to avoid crippling hangovers. We were civil with one another, even while drunk. We didn't squable about money. And despite the high risk for utter destruction, the only thing ruined were a few colons. The house was trashed, make no mistake, but vacations of the past had us handing over security deposits for rented spaces that looked like Motley Cru had stayed there. When it was over, we all pitched in to clean up, and it took surprisingly little time.

And we had recycled most of it.

Calm before the storm.

Some of the highlights of the trip include:

Catching almost no fish, despite Mike claiming, "I'm gonna catch a fish so big that I'm scared of it!"

Dragging a small forest worth of timber from the "Woodmine" to feed an enormous fire.

Myself, Joe and Jim swinging on the swingset (further evidence that the house is intended for families) in an attempt to tip it over.

Joe and Mike failing over and over to row into shore before realizing that the anchor was still out.

Rosas throwing rock in a game of odds-and-evens.

"Boneshadow"- Random nick name somehow bestowed upon Rosas. We then began to sing a song to the tune of Cat Stevens' "Moonshadow" about it.

 

"That guy must have went to MITT Tech."

 

"There can be only one Thailander!"

"When I was your age you could get a gallon of homo for a dollar."

Andy's Grocery. More on this: The nearest shop was a few miles away, and almost certainly a front for a meth lab. The proprietor (I'm assuming Andy) was near toothless, and his shop was in complete disarray. It was like being in a Twilight Zone episode- Bologna over a year past expiration, homemade six packs of beer with little post-it labels on them, completley random merchandise (like a disproportionate amount of Precious Moments figureines), and all kinds of shit hoarded in the back that was overflowing into the store. In fact, it was hard to tell what Andy was trying to sell. I'm assuming that if I made him an offer on any of the many decades old Apple computers or microwaves he had, we could reach an agreement though. And of course, he only took cash. It is at Andy's that the photograph displaying milk prices at left was taken. I understand what homogenized milk is, but I would be surprised if Andy did. 


 This trip will go now as one of the best times of my life. Everything was perfect from the people to the weather. Thanks to everyone who came along (Joe, Mike, Jonathan, Rosas, Derek, Jim, Muse and Brandon). This trip feels like the end of an era. As we all get older and get closer and closer to getting women pregnant, these trips will be harder to make happen. The best advice I can give my readers (aside from not eating Buffalo Wild Wings three nights in a row) is to make an effort to make something like this happen for you and yours. Plan it out as far in advance as you need, but see it done. I'm already stoked for Cooperstown 2017.

*  There wasn't any bear-baiting.