Gone tomorrow, hair today.

I’ve decided to grow a beard – although if one was striving for complete accuracy, this is merely a hairy symptom of not shaving. It’s a little known indicator of Ebola/Flu/a minor cold that your upper lip becomes anything but stiff when serially assaulted with snot and ˜soft‘ tissues. Soft my arse or possibly soft as my arse, these barely disguised sheets of weapons grade wet’n’dry turn the under-nasal area into a no shave zone.

So on finally staggering valiantly into the office, only 90{45ac9c3234d371044e23e276755ef3a4dde8f1068375defba7d385ca3cd4deb2} of my professional associates burst into violent fits of laughter. The other 10{45ac9c3234d371044e23e276755ef3a4dde8f1068375defba7d385ca3cd4deb2} either held that laughter in long enough to make it to the bogs before collapsing in unconstrained mirth, or are so brain dead they failed to notice a wizened old rat clamped around my jaw.

Still I believe in all it’s goaty greyness it adds a certain gravitas and dignity to an otherwise undistinguished fizog. I may be tramping alone in the word of facial fashion on this one but it’s keeping me warm on cold commutes, providing a repository for emergency food and “ in extreme circumstances “ may offer a full head of hair if I can merely rotate the old spud 180 degrees.

So I think you’re all with me here; a bit of a winner all round.

Sadly the addition of a weighty facial hair and the loss of a lung to asthma in no way crimped off the competitive gland. Having been removed from the traffic biorhythms for the last week, I was out of sync with a three light set and he sneaked past without any respect for my bearded and snotty countenance. A bit of a cycling conundrum was he with a worthy but elderly race bike, a pair of fierce looking calves and bicycle clips. Had it not been for the old diorriha preventers, I’d not have raised what little game remains but honestly BICYCLE CLIPS.

Not only was he terribly confused about the acceptability of these seventies anti-icons, he also was pretty damn nifty through the traffic with his narrow bars and suicidal approach to closing gaps. I strapped on the metaphoric tortoise shell and played the long game, catching him on half remembered light sequences and sprinting past up Constitution hill having taken a lengthy draft up the mall.

He wasn’t happy. I could tell as we circled each other like wary stags waiting for release up into Hyde Park. Nobody was clipping out of pedals here but I broke first opting for a lengthy trackstand while still maintaining eye contact. I’m not sure he was impressed but I certainly was, and when the green fired off instant sprints across the traffic, an impromptu wheelie marked my determination to be first into the park.

This is my personal Mount Ventoux. Oh I can hear you mocking but put the world’s finest riders on crappy commuter bikes after a day in our offices and let them attempt to sprint past the local dogging club and suicidally black clad pedestrians, and I’m heading for a podium. So a desperate 200 seconds followed where Al just the one available lung” Leigh revved up his biggest gear and manfully resisted the strong urge to throw up.

Looking back is a sign of weakness and I had enough of those already so it wasn’t until the Bayswater road stuttered into my personal geography did I steal a glance. The perfect commuter win is when your assailant is still in sight, far enough back for it to be clear to everyone he’s a broken man but close enough that your gloating cannot be mistaken for constipation.

He was nowhere in sight. I can only assume he turned off some distance before. To say I feel aggrieved is akin to wondering if the French ever felt slightly piqued that we nicked all the best bits of Canada once they’d colonised it and named it new France. I nearly went back to find the ungrateful bugger and demand an explanation.

First bicycle clips and now this. Honestly, some people have no idea at all.

2 thoughts on “Gone tomorrow, hair today.

  1. nickc

    You work in IT, commute by bicycle and have a beard (I’ll bet you even own a pair of corduroy trousers, and a pen tidy) and you’re having a pop at a chap in bike clips?

  2. Alex

    I do have a pen tidy, that’s true. It’s called my desk but that could not, in even the most relaxed use of the word, be called tidy. I did have a pair of cords many years ago but they ended up in the cat basket after generating even more piss taking that this excuse for a beard.

    Bike Clips tho, come on, give me a break here, I need to look down on someone.

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