I believe that by growing out my facial hair, I can influence the outcome of sporting events taking place thousands of miles away. Thus, I grew out my mustache and beard during the Green Bay Packers’ postseason and vowed to not shave off the beard until the Packers were out of the playoffs. This meant keeping the beard until they won the Super Bowl. After about two weeks, it was in pretty thick and dark, and plenty of grays showed up on my chin to earn me good-natured teasing from many of my friends.
The evening after the Packers won the Super Bowl, I decided that the itchiness was getting to me. With the facial hair no longer being necessary, I cut and shaved off my beard and mustache. I won’t need it again until at least baseball season.
So far, only my wife has commented on this. I have encountered my entire social circle — professionals, freethinkers, people at work, people at play. None of them have said a word about it. Not a single comment. Not a “Oh, so you shaved off the beard! Why?” or “I thought the beard looked good on you” or “Looking good all clean-shaven there, dude.” Nothing.
Amusingly, the receptionist at work did notice that I had got a haircut. Alone of the fifty or so people with whom I interact regularly, my wife and the receptionist at the office were the only ones to notice the haircut and if my wife hadn’t seen me trimming the beard off my chin, I have to wonder if she’d have even noticed.
Methinks your wife would have noticed and said something no matter what. In my limited experience, there are few things wives hate more than beards, regardless of whether they vocalize their complaint.
What’s depressing me right now is the sudden realization that in the 10+ years I’ve known my wife, I have had exactly one opportunity to grow a playoff beard (NY Mets, 2006). The Sabres did well for a few years, too, but I’m not a big enough hockey fan for that to warrant a playoff beard.
Not a single comment. Not a “Oh, so you shaved off the beard! Why?” or “I thought the beard looked good on you” or “Looking good all clean-shaven there, dude.” Nothing.
From this portion of your post I am guessing that no one you work with has a beard.
Guys with beards tend to notice when other people “join”. And “leave”.
One guy in the firm has a mustache but no beard. One guy is clean-shaven. The rest are women, about half of whose husbands or boyfriends have facial hair of one sort or another.
I told my paralegal today that I was chagrined no one had noticed. She got the most amazed, then embarrassed, look on her face. Her story is that everyone is so busy that no one has time to look at anyone else’s faces. I wasn’t buying that.
Then she suggested that everyone is used to seeing me clean-shaven so seeing me that way is just “normal.” This seems a more likely explanation.
If the husband/boyfriend w/beard saw you with the beard, let me know if he mentions it the next time you guys see each other.
I’m betting that he will.
Well I had lunch with him 4 days out of the last 5 and he’s said nothing yet.
My mind is blown.
I thought I knew us. (Bearded folk, I mean.)
Testing…
I believe that by growing out my facial hair, I can influence the outcome of sporting events taking place thousands of miles away
Now that you’ve revealed that you hold such an anti-scientific belief, I can no longer take anything you say on any subject seriously.
Well, I decided to google “guys with beards nod at each other” (quotes and all) and found this:
abovetheorangetrees.com/journal/archives/000533.html
Which made me laugh.
And that led me to this:
youtube.com/watch?v=U1lvQda0ww8
It’s a movie called “The Winter of The Beard”. I think I want to buy it now.
Whit Sterling is the pseudonym of someone who is not an attorney in Southern California. Glad to see you gravitated to WordPress. One convert at a time.