The Barbershop, Part 2

Many of you will remember my haircut story from the beginning of July. (See the July 12th posting in the archive) Well, here we are about 7 weeks later and time for another haircut. So I was going to go over last night, but didn't make it there on time. I rememebered that either Monday or Tuesday they stayed open later, and it turns out that Monday they close at 7pm and Tuesday they close at 8:30pm. Of course tonight, I get there too late again. We had an outing to Opus (the classy afterwork bar) for a guy who is about to retire. So I get to Sweeney Todd's at 8:15pm, run in there real quick, and the lady at the desk says, "Sorry we're closed." I said, "I thought you're open until 8:30pm." She responds with, "We are, but we're already started to pack up for the night."

What a load of bullshit. As I drove away, I'm thinking to myself, "F this, I'm going to the other barbershop." The other barbershop, which ranks very high up on the scale of sketchiness, is over in the mall, and so I knew they'd be open because they run on mall hours. No problem, had plenty of time.

So I go over to the barbershop, and as soon as I walk in this big Puerto Rican guy yells at me "Sir, would you like a haircut? Step right over here." Sounds good to me - prompt, yet intimidating, service. So I sit down in the chair and he begin to cut my hair. Now this guy was too busy talking to me (in English) and everyone else in this place (in Spanish), and I was conerned that his attention was being drawn away from the task at hand. Anyway, I'm sitting there and I look over and who is cutting a man's hair right in the chair next to me: none other than Yolanda. I can't get away from this lady. Now I didn't get the whole story as to to why she was in the barbershop rather than Sweeney Todd's, but I overheard some kind of conversation which eluded to her being there "on loan for a few weeks". Again, very sketchy. Luckily, Yolanda didn't recognize me because then I would have received the fifth degree as to why I came to this place and why I chose to sit down in this guy's chair. "Um, because the big Puerto Rican guy told me to sit down...that's why."

I think the 2 establishments are somehow colluding with each other because both of their Monday/Tuesday special rates went up from $12 to $14. I can't win. This guy cuts my hair, takes him all of 7-8 minutes, and I pay $14 + $3 tip. What a pain in my ass. This whole thing is getting out of hand. I like the old days at home when the price never changed and there weren't as many politics with getting my haircut.

In the end, 3 positive things came out of the experience:
1) I ended up with a haircut that is no better or worse than normal.
2) Neither Yolanda nor Puerto Rican man beat me up.
3) I basically gave Sweeney Todd's a big "F You" by going to the other barbershop since I got there 15 minutes before they closed and they told me they were already closed.

Expect the next phase in this story around the end of October. We'll see what happens at that time. Back on Wednesday night with more...