RIP: The 'Stache

It is finished.  I had the barber remove my mustache yesterday after my haircut.  I indeed think I look younger now.  An unexpected and unfortunate side effect is that my head looks even larger than normal (although that probably is due to the haircut, not the loss of the mustache).

Some people would say I'm touched in the head.

My friend Betty recently posted an online quiz about philosophy.  I noted that one of the other quizzes created by that person claims it will answer the question,  "What type of people do you attract?"  That's simple.  I can tell you that without taking the quiz:  fatties and old women.  Old women have found me attractive since my cute stage at a very young age.

There are worse things to be cursed with.  I could have the Midas touch, where everything I touch turns to gold.  (I'd be the first guy that Ripley's Believe It or Not would document as having a solid gold you-know-what.)

I always forget Memorial Day.

It's kind of odd to work at a place that doesn't observe some holidays and where some staff get certain days off while others don't or have to shift them around.  Today, for example, is the observance of Memorial Day, for which many Americans don't have to go to work.  This school is open, though, so we work.  We had the day after Easter off, in lieu of today.  In the meantime, the cashier at the grocery store wished me a pleasant Memorial Day weekend.  It's Memorial Day?  Oh, yeah.  What three-day weekend?

Three times don't make me no lady!

If I die this weekend (or at least become ill), you'll know it was something work-related that did me in.  (And, if I don't, it wasn't for lack of trying.)

First off, I got a faceful of water from one of our sprinklers.  You don't think that sounds so bad, but you don't know that the water comes from an untreated retention pond.  I was wearing my safety glasses, and I don't think I got any water in my nose or mouth, but who knows what malignant microbes might be scurrying through my bloodstream as I type this.

Second, I was pawing through some Liriope (locally called Monkeygrass), looking for a sprinkler we suspected was in there and being blocked by the vegetation, when the middle finger of my right hand found part of a broken beer bottle (or a broken part of a beer bottle, but the former is more poetic due to its alliteration).  I think I cut my finger very near the edge of my fingernail.  I went to the school infirmary, washed my hands, and the blood (what little of it there was) had disappeared.  The nurse applied hydrogen peroxide (which did not sting, as she warned me it might) and put on an adhesive bandage.  She suggested that soaking my finger in salty water would loosen the dirt beneath the nail, so I wouldn't have to dig with a nail file (or whatever those things are called).  I tried that after I got home from work, but it didn't seem to do a thing.  The salt water didn't sting, either, so I'm thinking that my cut must not be too deep.  Still, who knows what malignant microbes might have been on that broken bit of bottle or in the dirt on my fingers?

Third, I was heading to the facilities office so that Thing One could call in my incident report (note:  our company stupidly will not allow me to phone in a report on myself, even though I am the manager), when someone was about to run a stop sign in the crosswise direction because he was on his cell phone.  Was it a student or parent or teacher?  No, that would be too easy.  It was Officer Krupke, the head of campus security, whom you think would know better.  (Yet another reason to disparagingly refer to his staff as campus insecurity.)

I figure I can use this afternoon as a learning experience in determining what weaknesses (if any) the great hero Captain Chlorophyll (able to leap tall mushrooms in a single bound!) may have.  Besides, "Captain Chlorophyll and the Case of the Malignant Microbes" sounds like a winner.

Two More Votes "For"

One of my employees said yesterday that my mustache makes me look like Magnum, P.I.  (I think that's supposed to be a compliment.)  The athletic trainer (whom I went to see because I woke up with a sore back) said he likes the mustache but that I'm not hairy enough to be Magnum.  (How would he know that?  Have coaches from the locker room been talking about me around campus?)

I notice that everyone who has complimented the mustache has done just that.  They've complimented the 'stache, not the way it looks on me.  (Or am I just splitting hairs?)

I finally decided yesterday that I will have my barber shave it off the next time I visit him.  It was an interesting experiment, and no one ran screaming in the opposite direction, but until the hairs around the sides of my head finally give up the battle to remain brown, my ego can't cope with a gray mustache.

If I Were Evil...

I had an evil thought this afternoon.  I figure that everyone is a balance of good and bad, with varying percentages among people.  ("The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde" is a good treatment of this idea.)  I'm generally good -- not as pure as the Pope, but I'm pretty close to "as pure as the driven snow".  (No, I don't mean snow that's been driven on.)

Anyway, if I were evil, I'd go to the grocery store checkout line, and I'd have you call my cell. phone, and... my ringtone would be "Rudolph, the Red-nosed Reindeer".

I'll blame it on the 'stache.

As much as I've been whining and carrying on since my last birthday, I really didn't have cause to complain about getting "old" until this morning.

I was at work (final sprucing up before commencement today), and I couldn't find my safety glasses.  Did they fall out of my pocket when I was bending over that irrigation timer?  Nope, not around there.  Let's see, I had them on when I was using the blower.  No, they're not in the back of the utility vehicle, with the blower, nor around the floorboards.  Oh well, I'll just have to get my clear pair (the ones I misplaced were tinted) from the office.

It was at this point I scratched my head or something -- and discovered that I was wearing the durned safety glasses!

Or you can call me Ray...

There's a developmentally disabled employee in the dining hall.  He loves everybody, female or male, and tells them so.  (I worked here a year before he told me he loves me.)

For the past few months, he had been calling me by Skippy's name.  However, when I walked in with Skippy a couple weeks ago, he obviously couldn't call me "Skippy", so I became "Chris".  He called me that again today.

Actually, I'd be kind of flattered if you called me Johnson.

Goo Goo G'joob

I took this picture yesterday.  It's about 3-1/2 weeks into my mustache, without any trimming.  I showered and prettied myself up for you.  I obscured part of my face, to protect my anonymity.  (While you're imagining how devastatingly handsome I am, please also imagine a lush head of dark hair on my head.)

I got one compliment on Tuesday and one at bowling last night.  That's two votes for, zero votes against, and innumerable abstentions.  What do you think?

My latest thought is that I look like a middle-age walrus.

Before You Get that Other Song Stuck in Your Head

(You know, the one I referenced in my previous post today.)  This one was stuck in my head when I woke up this morning.



Actually, the rendition he did on A Prairie Home Companion is the one I prefer.  If you want to listen to that one, go here and sit through a couple of other songs from the show before you get to this one.

No, we didn't dance the "Monster Mash".

I have a habit of doing things and forgetting to blog about them, so I ought to tell you about the Mustache Bash before I forget everything.

Ostensibly, it was to celebrate the St. Bernard's 40th birthday, but that happened a month ago.  The party took place at his parents' house, but how it was remodeled and redecorated obviously was done by the St. Bernard and his wife, who probably expect to inherit it (but not for a long time, of course).  Food was provided by dining hall staff, and it was yummy.  (Do calories count if you take home leftovers?)  The party was attended by several administrators and teachers, along with their spouses and rug rats.  There was one of those "moon bounce" jumpy things in the backyard to entertain the children.  The St. Bernard's father latched on to me right after I arrived, since I was one of the few guests he knew (he works for me) and felt comfortable with.  (Ditto, back atcha.)  We both eased up when the number of guests diminished, and when I and the head accountant were the only guests remaining, the St. Bernard's wife and mother both latched onto me and said they were glad to have the opportunity to get to know me.  (I had never met either one of them before, but both knew my name and both said they saw me walking around campus.)  I think the leftovers they pressed on me (and which I stopped politely declining once I saw how much food hadn't even made it to the buffet line yet) will cover my dinners all this week.

What I took away from the visit was how much of a "real" person the St. Bernard is and how easy he is to get along with.  Skippy likes to keep all flow of information through himself and tells the rest of us that we're not to speak to the St. Bernard or various administrators on campus.  (So, when they e-mail, phone, or text us directly, I comply with their wishes and respond, but I don't initiate contact.)  It was a pleasure to have a chance to speak with him for a while.  (Skippy had left already.)

No, I already knew that everyone's mother loves me.  (The wife feeling so also was a bonus.)

Is that a stick of dynamite in your pants, or are you just happy to see me?

I wonder what the Transportation and Security Administration will come up with to foil plots like this.  Will we have to strip off completely at airports?  (Oh, but I like to leave my socks on!)  Seriously.  The next time I need to take a trip, I might as well walk.

My mustache will have about as long a shelf life as that song did.

At lunch today, one of the cafeteria workers gestured to my mustache and said, "You're looking more rico suave every day."  Now I'm stuck, trying to figure out which would be a bigger compliment:  looking like Gerardo (who didn't have a mustache) or looking like this.

An Adult Imponderable

Does a courteous hooker provide receipts that read, "Thank you.  Please come again."?

This looks like a job for Captain Chlorophyll!

The superhero, that is, not me.

We discovered on Friday that some of the plants my crew planted outside the school's main entrance on Tuesday had been stolen.  (That's less than three days.)  By my estimate, about 200 baby plants had been yanked mercilessly from the ground.  The irrigation system had run since the theft, so the footprints left in the soft flowerbed had been muddled enough that we couldn't tell any tread.

So far, all I want (besides getting the plants back) is to bury the miscreant up to his/her neck in the soil and stick little blue flowers in his/her head.

There's something on your face.

That's what the wag (or so he thinks of himself) on my crew said to me about my mustache.  The jokes which the people at bowling told me didn't even make sense.  The good news is that my barber said he can get rid of it for me when I'm done with it.

At two weeks after beginning, the hairs in my mustache are now kind of soft, rather than bristly.  Still, it's weird, trying to scratch an itch and realizing there's something between my finger and my face, or drinking and feeling the outermost hairs rubbing against the curve of the glass.

The other day, I looked in the mirror and thought I might pass for Dr. Watson.  The next day, I resembled a stock, English, ex-military man, kind of like the customer in Are You Being Served? who said, "It's a pity they discontinued national service" (not Captain Peacock, whom the cafeteria manager once described as "the uppity one with the moth-eaten 'tache").

Yes, I know Betty requested pictures.  I do have my anonymity to protect, though.  I suppose I could stand in front of a mirror and use the camera itself to block the upper half of my face.  Or maybe I can use whatever image-altering software is on my computer to crop out everything but my mustache.  First, I have to convince myself to do it.  After all, if the camera adds ten pounds to my weight, and if the mustache adds ten years to my age, do I really want all of you seeing me like that?