My hair needed cutting, and, since, my regular stylist was out of town, I was forced to go somewhere else.

OK, who am I kidding?

I have some serious gray hair, (not even a "nice" gray, but, a "man, you really need to do something to your hair" kind of gray), and, it was seriously shaggy.

I've also been toying around with the idea of cheating on my stylist, but, have been too chicken to do it, so things had really gotten out of hand on my head.

Oh, sure, I've dallied around, even gone as far as making an appointment with someone else, but, in the end, I just couldn't go through with it.

However, I reached a crisis point yesterday, and, decided to just go for it, and, accept that it was to be just a fling, and, that whoever cut my hair wouldn't mean anything to me.

A new hair place just opened near my house. I took it as a sign from God given to me through the neighborhood newspaper.

I gathered my courage, and, made an appointment.

It was a nice little place, and, always wary of change, I was on high alert as I gazed around the room for signs that I had come to a "good" place to get my hair done.

The shampoo tech/stylist assistant soon called me back to wash my hair.

Perhaps 10-12 years older than I, she seemed a little hesitant, but, we got the washing of the hair underway.

I think she was impersonating a shampoo tech.

You know, like the occasional news report where some guy treats people in the hospital for years, and, then they discover he's not a doctor?

Or, somebody writes about their kids and other nonsense on a blog, and, then you discover they're not really a writer?

Anyway...

She wrapped a towel around my neck, but, didn't secure it with a clippy thing or whatever they use. A small thing you don't really notice until you don't have one.

As I held my towel around my neck, she began to wash my hair, or, at least I think that's what she was doing.

Her touch was so light, it was annoying. She was fondling my hair rather than washing it, I think.

I didn't say anything as I kept thinking she would get to the washing part eventually.

She continued to do whatever it was that she was doing, after turning the water on and off eleventy-million times, I think to get the temperature right.

Then, suddenly, we were done, but, only after the left side of my body had been soaked.

I don't think that's ever happened to me before, but, I just used the towel to dry off, and, I figured I wouldn't see her again.

The stylist cut my hair, and, was nice enough to work me in for color, too, since I had originally had to make 2 separate appointments because they were full when I called.

Well, guess who was assigned to put my color on after the stylist mixed it?

Thinking the whole wash thing was just a fluke, I sat down to let her get started.

She began putting the color on, and, it seemed to go better than the wash until she was about 5 minutes into it, and, said:

"Oh. Do they usually put the color on your roots first"?

Thats what she was already doing, and, to my limited knowledge, that's what you're supposed to do.

I just told her that I was sure that whatever she was doing was fine.

"Maybe she's a new grad", I thought to myself, trying to give her the benefit of the doubt, but, when she made reference to all her "years doing hair", I was a bit taken aback.

My opinion of fraud was sealed when I heard the stylist give her very specific instructions to put some kind of mousse in "the silver can" in my hair, and, she returned to me with some sort of gel in a blue container.

All ended well, the color came out nicely, the cut is not quite what I thought it'd be, but, everyone else seems ve-ry emphatic about liking it, which indicates I either looked really, really bad before, or, I have no sense of style.

Likely a little from column A, and, a little from column B.