5 things about the baraber shop on campus

Before

1. I really like my usual barber, but because of my being without a car during the day and holiday closures I haven't been able to get over there. I suspected it was time, and that was confirmed when I went out the other night and got "Look, it's Gene Shalit!" and "Hey, somebody brought Mario with them!"
2. The barber shop at the union is convenient, cheap, and is satisfactorily manly as barber shops go. There are prices for a woman's shampoo and cut on the sign, but I cannot imagine any woman thinking this was a place where beauty is sculpted. This is a place where embarrassment is momentarily quelled.
3. The barber is practically a mute when it comes to small talk, which I like. I don't really talk sports or politics very well so unless I can come across a comparative lit doctorate who dropped out to become a barber, I'm happy with the silence. I did catch him looking up at the TV a number of times, which made me a little nervous, but mine is a simple razor cut with a wide margin for error.
4. Two amenities you don't get everywhere - straight razor shave on the neck and sideburns and a hot towel after. I heard somewhere that straight razor shaves are illegal in some places, so I hope I am not outing him to the Fuzz (as it were) . If I were implausibly more loose with my money, I would get a full shave at least once a week, for right now I can feel the vibrations of the cosmos on the back of my bare-naked neck. I can only imagine how vibrant the world would be with a full straight razor shave.
5. My favorite thing is the labyrinth one must traverse to get to the barber shop. The union is under massive reconstruction so the shop that was once off a main corridor is now deep in the bowels of the building. Here, come along with me!
   
   

After