Today I did something that I don't really enjoy - I went to the hairdresser. Usually when I go to the hairdresser the weather is either wet, with optional wind to restyle your hair as soon as you step outside the hairdressers, or hot and sunny and the last place that you want to be is under a hair drier. True to form the weather today was wet, but there was no wind. This is the fifth hairdresser that I have been to since we moved here, nearly five years ago. In Surrey I had been going to the same hairdresser for 15 years. I think that says a lot about the state of hairdressing in Chester.
I didn't exactly see eye to eye with the first hairdresser that I tried. I nearly had a stand up fight with her when she said that she couldn't cut my hair the way I wanted it cut. She had a lop-sided hair cut and could only really see out of one eye which probably explains the lop-sided hair cuts she gave me. The price was extortionate but I decide not to show myself up by querying it. The second hairdresser was more reasonably priced but his hair cutting was no better than the first one. The hair cut was short and shapeless and I was tempted to cover it with a brown paper bag but I decided that as I knew virtually nobody it wouldn't matter. I ventured into Chester and was horrified to notice that people were staring at my hair. It really was as bad or worse than I thought. I went home and cried. It is not really any consolation that within a few weeks he was shut. Life seemed to be one long bad hair day. When I am happy with my hair I am happy with life. For two pins I would have packed my bags and gone back to Surrey. At this point I decided that I was going to grow my hair, and by hook or crook, I was some how going to go back to my hairdresser in Surrey for her to cut my hair back into shape.
The third hairdresser cuts a friends a hair and she has been going to him for a long time. He actually cut my hair alright. He cut it three times and I had three different hair cuts which I found annoying as I like it cut the same every time. He didn't quite understand what I was asking him to do as he is a bit deaf. My friend didn't tell me this until after he had cut it for the first time. I find it difficult enough to explain to a hairdresser with good hearing what I want done so I stand no chance with one who is a bit deaf. Maybe the problem is that all hairdressers are a bit deaf. I left him and tried a young girl who had set herself up in the next village. At first she was very good but when I pointed out that my hair had lost its shape she more or less said that getting it right was the luck of the draw. I persisted with her in the hope that she would get it right again but she never did. As time went on she became more unreliable and I moved on to hairdresser number five.
It seems to have been fifth time lucky. This hairdresser has not made a mess of it, although sometimes it has been cut too short and other times not enough has been cut off making it a bit difficult to plan regular hair cuts, which I really need to be able to do, to fit into my busy schedule of the house, garden, work and anything else that comes my way. I have been going to her now for about 20 months so I think that she has the job.