Of Barbershops and Nodding Dogs

I pass a barbershop on my journey each day called ‘The Men’s Room’. It look’s the business, it even has one of those red and white striped twirly things out front, which are there, incidentally, because back in the day the barber would sharpen his razor on a rotating cylinder of stone with a spiral of velvet wound up it so that the blade would be sharpened and polished alternately. (I might have made that up. If you have any idea why that spiral thing is there, do let me know.) Anyway, what I was going to say was, would you really want to have your hair cut in a place that shares its name with a public toilet? Perhaps they have a row of urinals up against the back wall, and, I suppose, it wouldn’t be too much of a problem if they did, because with name like ‘The Men’s Room’ you can be sure there won’t be any women around.

After I’d been thinking about this I looked down at the car next to us. There was a nodding dog on the dashboard, except given the particular vibrations and movements of the car it wasn’t nodding at all, just shaking its head side to side. The occupants of the car were trying to decide which way to go, holding a map and pointing fingers, and the dog just kept on shaking its head. Like a perpetual pessimist it sat there, forever pronouncing negative judgement on their every decision. You can bet I’ll never have a nodding dog at the front of my car.