07:42 18 Feb 2003
Ah...what a beautiful day. The sun is shining, the children are laughing and playing, and a pair of scrawny magpies are fighting over a half-rotten piece of hedgehog in my backyard. An earthly slice of paradise. I clamber out of bed to my feet, naked as the day I was born, kick over a few empty beer and wine bottles on my way to the clothes rack, and toss my beloved terrycloth robe around my shoulders.Rest of the mundane routine goes off as planned (at least, the way God wanted it to go down): the toilet paper is rough, the tea scalding, the toast burnt, the milk full of curds, and the shower water a lukewarm, low-pressure soup. All those nice little annoyances that help to convince you that perfection does not really belong in the natural order.
I stand there before the mirror, unclothed again, beaming proudly at my hirsute, flipped-image doppelgänger. Just one more thing to take care of, I think to myself as I run my hand along my bristly jawline. I don't plan to take it all off, just clear-cut the timber from each sideburn to the point of my chin, and create a nice little manicured face-garden from the depths of the black forest. For you plain-speaking philistines out there, I want me one o' them goatee whisker-styles.
First come the nail scissors: annoying, but painless. Now it's time for the lather...but wait! Where is my shaving cream? Oh, that's right...I don't shave. At least, I haven't since the Christmas holidays. No matter, I'll just use hot water and some liquid hand soap. Surely that won't make a difference.
Surely.
I get about three or four strokes with the safety razor before I notice the right side of my face is sticky with the old "red red krovvy" like I've been emulating my old Vampire LARPing days. "Shit!" I mutter under my breath as I pause to rinse the blood from my face before it clots, and look around the room for anything handy to cap the crimson geyser.
There's nothing --- nobody has bothered to buy hand tissues this week for our suite bathroom. Somewhat resigned by this discovery, I make a move for my towel but slip on the wet tiles and crack my nose a good one against the edge of the sink. My descending weight takes the towel down along with its accompanying wall peg (right on the nape of my neck).
I lie there, stunned for several seconds (ears ringing!), then stand up, bracing myself against the sink. Okay, no biggie, I think. No chipped teeth, nose doesn't feel broken, just a bit br -- ! My internal monologue comes to a screeching halt as I look back in the mirror. I have a pencil-thick rivulet of blood streaming down my lip to join the other erupting volcano a half-inch above my jaw.
This morning is not turning out very well at all.
I undauntedly finish the hack job as best as I can, wiping blood with the left hand and shearing the rest of my naked bare flesh with the plastic-shielded blade in my right. Okay...I might actually survive this. Now for the throat. Hmm, seems I'm getting the hang --
"*FUCK*"
-- I whine as steel meets dermal sublayer yet again. This time, right on my Adam's apple, which doesn't seem to be clotting up very well. I am starting to look like a
dinner party for bulimic mosquitoes.
Well, I finish, so to speak, in that I've taken off as much hair as I've wanted (and enough skin in the process) The wounds finally seal up and dry, but not before my undersized bath-towel turns a nice shade of smoked salmon from all the sanguine matter pouring out of my pores and sinuses. I pull on my clothes and accessories, then notice I have about all of three minutes to rush outside and climb on the bus, unless I feel like coming in an hour later today. Which, given the prevalence of Murphy's Law in my dormitory, seems not at all a good idea.
My other roommates, not to mention our cleaning lady, are going to have a fit once they see the animal sacrifice I left on the walls. But at least it's a hell of a lot cooler (and marginally less disgusting) than leaving pubic hair in the shower drain.