got burned
Wrapping up the fiasco that was The Great Sideburn Experiment of 2005, I will make the following comments.
After the subsequent replies/comments, I feel I should address a few points. Charlie commented that it was as if I was taking on a new personality with the look. I understand how that might be assumed or expected from such a change of facial hair appropriation; however, I can assure you that I simply wanted to do something different. And if you recall from my initial post, someone dared me to try them out. I took the dare, regardless of the possible outcomes. I didn’t mind a few weeks of rubbing my chin as if I was in constant, serious thought.
Rianna noted that my chin structure at least demanded the evaluation period. While it didn’t last 30 days, I would agree that it was worth a shot. Yet, as Abigail pointed out, they could easily make my face look chubby.
Well, I shaved them off. Actually, I trimmed them as close as I could, then shaved; in fear of slicing my skin like deli meat. That day at work, I looked in the mirror and noticed how small my face looked. So, there is some buttress to Abigail’s side.
But, really, I was starting to realize that if the burns were going to work, I would have to take care of them. And thinking of the same distress I endure while mowing a lawn, I concluded the chops had to go. You may possibly not think of mowing a lawn as an agonizing task, but remember that I was a groundskeeper last summer; and when I think of mowing the lawn, it brings to me memories of care-taking on macro and micro levels. And to that I shiver. Yeah, no more burns.
From the beginning, this was just an experiment. Maybe an experiment gone wrong. But many experiments go wrong, and sometimes they produce unlikely products. I had no such good fortune. Maybe I should have listened to Adam’s advice earlier on:
the stubble was hot
chops are not really so much
this haiku says so
May 20th, 2005 at 10:18 pm
Ryan, Ryan, Ryan,
As surely as you have listened to all of these weak sisters and chopped off your incipient manly muttonchops, just as surely have you hunkered down and chopped off your own balls.
May 20th, 2005 at 10:45 pm
Ayn - I must refute you and not to be correct, well, yes to be correct, but more so because if I didn’t then I could be viewed as either indifferent to your response or fearful of a wrong reply.
Honestly, the chops weren’t working for me. I’ve never been a person with a wealth of facial hair and conventional sideburns have usually been my physical limit. The chops were coming in very unevenly and were honestly not as pleasant as I had hoped. But, more than that, I really wasn’t like them that much.
I didn’t shave them off because people had entreated me to. And I didn’t refuse their comments on the basis to retain some clutched inner dignity that I might have. To have given in and shaved them could have been a sign of weakness of personal character or “identity”. To have refused shaving them would be a sign of belligerent pride in light of other’s opinions. I shaved them off without any regard to the thoughts of others, although I appreciated their sentiments on both sides.
Further, I actually shaved them off Thursday morning.
The date on my most recent webcam shot is yesterday evening when I arrived back from work. I was truly aggravated with them and went ahead and took the razor to them that morning. A clean and honorable end, I would say.
BTW, I am reading The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand. You should change your last name to “Rand” because then you would be the greatest author of the 1940s.
May 21st, 2005 at 12:48 am
Ah, beautiful, pretty skin again!