Column: Race you for a chair at barber's shops to tackle lockdown hair

I pity the person waiting after me in the queue at the hairdresser.

They might as well bring a picnic and something to read as it’s going to be a mighty long wait while someone tackles my lockdown hair.

Right now, I could probably pass for the bass player in a 1970s rock band. All I need is a pair of flares …

My fringe now hangs lower than the tip of my nose, and there are frizzy bits sticking oot on either side of my ears. The last time my hair was this long was when I was a teenager into heavy rock and such as Deep Purple and Rainbow.

Come to think of it, almost 40 years on, band t-shirts and combat breeks have become my standard attire. I fear getting back into office-mode is going to be a challenge.

In a breeze, I look like one of those dogs which sticks its head out the back window of a car. It is, to be blunt, a dreadful look. If you thought David Torrance MSP went all prog rock with his long hair, well, you ain’t seen nothing yet.

To complete the picture, my beard looks as though I stole it off a homeless man while he sat outside Poundland. I’m pretty sure folk have done a double take before deciding who to give their spare change to while I hang around outside our local supermarket …

That is partly due to lockdown, and partly due to my other half confiscating my razor to prevent me from apparently howking great lumps out of it, leaving holes everywhere.

It’s also down to my hair growing like wildfire – a gene I share with my dad.

One minute the old barnet is near and tidy. The next it looks as though I’ve just rubbed a balloon across my head as every follicle flies in a different direction. The utter shame of having hair worse than Boris Johnson.

I did toy with simply razoring the whole lot off, but it’s been a good decade or so since I last had a number two crop.

I recall the barber driving the razor right across the top of my head and then saying “you sure about this” as if he could stick it back on with Blu-Tac if I changed my mind.

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Feeling brave, or foolish, I did once go for a number one crop, figuring there really couldn’t be much difference from a two. Boy, was I wrong.

I have a scar on the back of my head from one of those “don’t walk into the bar placed across the gate” childhood duh-moments where I did indeed walk into the bar, smack back on to the path and end up with blood, snot and three stitches.

Thanks to the number one crop, it was revealed in all its glory some 40 years later. Tempted though I was to shave it down to the bone, I remembered it also made me look like a bouncer.

So, we’re now something like three and a half months in without so much as a click of the scissors – and it’s beginning to itch and irritate.

It’s long enough to let me headbang once more to those great, loud albums of yore. Then I remember I’m 56, not 17 any more.

Once an rocker always a rocker, but even us old rockers tend to nod rather than go the whole hog in the moshpit these days. It’s one thing getting down with the kids, but another if you can’t actually get back up again…

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