my cheap hairdresser

Actually, he's fairly expensive, but after a friend of mine treated me last summer to an appointment with him, I realized that he was worth it. For years I'd gone to either barbershops or chain store franchises because I figured that with short hair it wouldn't make much of a difference, but I was wrong. Not only does he spend almost an hour cutting as opposed to ten minutes, but the cuts also grow out well, and after almost a year I have yet to be disappointed. Yep, it certainly costs more than the $10 I'm used to, but sometimes you DO get what you pay for, and I figure that by having become a member of the "graygirl" revolution in my late twenties already, I've saved oodles of money just by never having coloured it. And I certainly don't have any intention of starting now.

So when I say that my hairdresser is cheap, I don't mean frugal cheap (which to my mind is a good thing) but stingy cheap (which is not good). Apparently he lost his wallet, but when a gentleman was nice enough to return it to the shop, he inadvertently parked in the wrong spot and got a ticket. Did my hairdresser reward him for returning the (money-packed I might add) wallet by paying for the ticket? Nope. Offered him only half. Now even I wouldn't go that far! I mean, not everyone expects a reward for returning lost property, but then to lose money by trying to do the right thing? Yikes. The worst part is that I know my hairdresser is doing well enough financially because he travels (both locally and abroad) about every six weeks. We're talking Paris, France here. But did I speak up and say anything today at my appointment after having heard about this? Did I, like the two other customers I know, decide to find another hairdresser? Nope. And does that make me just (or almost) as bad?

Comments

[Krissa]

WOW! I'd almost reconsider deciding not to go to someone else. But, I have a confession (?) to make that will show that maybe I don't know how hard it is to find a hairdresser. I am 39 years old. The last time I was at a hairdresser, I was 18 years old. Yep. My family moved to Arkansas when I was in High School. Just before the beginning of the school year in a brand new town, my mom took me to a supposedly good salon in a department store. The woman absolutely butchered my hair and almost ruined my life. I can not even explain what my hair looked like after she got done with it, but it was very, very tight curls on the top and then some weird smooth, short cut everywhere else. I had brought a photo and she absolutely did not one thing that even resembled the photo. I was crying actual tears when we left and my mom still paid for it!!!!! I did my own hair for a couple years, then gave a different place in the same town a shot. Never once since that day have I ever set foot in a hair salon again. My hair is long and straight and my mom used to trim the ends for me, then I did it myself, now Nick does it. But I will never go to a salon again. ... Anyway, your hairdresser is a piece of work! Snort!

[Krissa]

Oh, and by "weird, smooth short cut" I mean it looked like I had blindfolded myself and cut my own hair.

[think outside the piggy bank]

Yeah, a bad haircut can be pretty traumatic. You're lucky though that all you need now are your ends trimmed! As for my hairdresser, sigh, what can I say? Or more to the point, what can I say to him now as I didn't say anything the first time? It's tricky too though, because it's all hearsay, so I would have to ask for his side of the story first. Which maybe I should have done before blogging about it. Oops.

[Krissa]

LOL!

[Donna Freedman]

Your hairdresser may find out one day that karma is a bitch.

[Donna Freedman]

Oh, and an even better story: On a message board that I manage, readers were talking about yard sales. One woman was looking at a purse she wanted to buy. She found a couple of hundred dollars rolled up and tucked inside. Immediately she went to the yard sale host and said something like, "I'd like to buy this purse, but I believe that you didn't notice that there is money in it."
The host grabbed the purse, took out the money, handed the bag back and said, "That will be $2."
No good deed goes unpunished.

[think outside the piggy bank]

karma is a bitch Too funny. I'll have to remember that one.

And Donna, what a story! That's just awful. Makes me wonder how I would have reacted. Hopefully I would have had enough presence of mind to say something like, "Are you kidding me? Honey, if you've got hundreds of dollars in this here purse, you certainly don't even need to be hosting this yard sale." Most likely though, I'd be so stunned by her response that I'd just pay and walk away. How sad that people can be so mean-spirited. Thanks for sharing. And for coming by!

[Krissa]

When I was a lot younger I lived in Carmel, Indiana. A well-to-do community...and they sometimes had neighborhood sales, for lack of a better description. I myself wasn't well-off, but the typical Carmelite was and I went to some of those sales and got name-brand things very cheap. Had I found a couple hundred in a purse in that circumstance, I hate to say, I'd likely have kept it. If I was at a garage sale and it was clear that the family wasn't doing well, I couldn't keep it. I do have a conscience, it just doesn't see richies the same as the rest of us. ;) ha ha... but yeah, it does show a lack of class on the seller's part. Probably the person who gave it back didn't even expect anything, it sounds like it was just their nature to do it. Too bad that host didn't have the nature to at least show SOME kind of gratitude. Here comes that thing called Karma, eh?