Beware! Hair... It is not Darwinian but it's certainly Machiavellian...

Why...

Is hair growth so inconsistent? Falling out. What exactly is Nature's point in letting some men go bald? Obvious answer, I suppose, is because she's a woman and it screws with men's egos! I mean baldness is not exactly Darwinian Evolution of the Species material. As someone who is lucky enough to still have a thick mop on my head, I do sympathise with my mates who now have a shiny dome where once stood a mighty forest. Can someone explain to me why? Not the medical reason but what is the evolutionary point of baldness?

...and another thing

Hairs that suddenly come to life. My wife takes a perverse pleasure in yanking out nasal hairs that have suddenly started to sprout from my schnozzle. They weren’t there a few years ago. What possible part of my body clock suddenly went:

“Right you’re fifty, time to have hirsute nostrils…..”

And then a few years later add “…Eyebrows. You’d look better if they grow kiss curls.”

Just when I get used to this new facial topiary your body gives you one more shock as you skid towards sixty. “Your ear holes. They now need to sprout as well.” For Gods sake why?

Hair that keeps on giving. Women obsessively shave their legs and pluck their eyebrows yet the damn things grow back with even more determination. But only to a certain point. Unlike hair on everyone’s scalp or indeed the hair on men’s faces, the hairs on your body know when to stop….and thank God for that!

Can you imagine having to go to the hairdresser every six weeks to stop your public hair reaching to your knees? Yet how does my body know this? The more you think about it the stranger your body hair actually is. It has its uses though. All that hair in the hairdressers is actually collected and used to soak up oil spills. So part of your new $200 hairdo will be mopping up BP’s next blunder!

...and another thing

Horsehair? It can’t all come from the mane, can it? There are whole mounds of the stuff in chairs and mattresses yet I’ve never seen a hairy horse! Are their secret farms somewhere with a strain of nags reared specifically by chair and bed manufacturers?

And badger brushes for shaving. Who decided one day badger hair was ideal for brushes to help get rid of basically the same hair on a man’s face? Why not weasel hair, or stoat. There is an endless list of weird hair use…. from pigs bristle, to hair of the dog…….and as for moleskin trousers, the mind boggles!

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2 Comments

  1. Tony says:

    Very interesting! Never really thought about hair growing seasons, fertile areas and growing schedules. Mark has a curious nature and the skills to put his thoughts to paper.
    Well done, my friend!

  2. Bette Anne says:

    Brilliant!

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