The Oppenheimer Report - 2/15/10

As I begin writing this week’s report my father-in-law is getting his first decent haircut in perhaps sixty or seventy years. This is not to say that he has been growing his hair for that long, but for the last six decades he’s been doing it himself. The predominant flaw in his technique is that he employs the comb over, and my father-in-law is a textbook example for why the comb over does not work. The other day, the wind caught his hair and blew his six or seven strands of three foot long, woven, comb over hair into a hairstyle that would have made Cyndie Lauper blush. Finally, the other night, there was a family intervention, and the result is that he VERY reluctantly agreed to allow Shauna to cut his hair. During the haircut, he bitched so much that you’d think he was having his testicles lopped off. The mere fact that the comb over has now been removed is a remarkable improvement, and now that she has put the finishing touches on the haircut, I can see that the ridiculosity (new synonym for ridiculousness) is gone.



I watched this haircut with some satisfaction, because not long after Shauna and I were married, I agreed to let Dad Taylor give me a haircut. That was a terrible decision. I suppose I didn’t want to offend him, and thought I was being a good sport. With one sweep of his hair whiz, basically a comb with an attached razor, he hacked off a fist full of my hair, leaving a huge bald spot in my then full (if thinning) head of hair. It took a long time to fix that mistake. I now look upon the hair whiz as an instrument of terror, and to this day I have not completely forgiven him. He’s been using that thing on his own hair for years, which is somewhat akin to using a circular saw to trim one’s toenails.


Does anybody out there remember the “Flo-Bee”? That was a device that vacuumed and cut your hair at the same time. I used to love their T.V. ads, because it was just such a silly machine. There have been many crazy haircutting tools invented over the years, and I can’t think of one that really works. I still prefer the old fashioned way, and I leave my haircutting duties in the hands of a professional. Now that I am essentially bald, my haircuts are pretty simple; I keep my hair very short these days, and a haircut consists of five or six passes with the electric clippers, and then a little touch up with a pair of scissors. I could probably do that myself, with a little practice, but don’t feel like it. I’m funny enough looking to begin with, I don‘t need to compound the problem.


Friday night we watched the opening ceremonies of the Vancouver Winter Olympics, and short of a the indoor torch malfunctioning during the lighting ceremony (one of the hydraulic arms failed to lift), for all the world to see, I thought the ceremony was very entertaining. I could have done without the opera singer. K.D. Lang singing her version of Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujiah” was my favorite part of the ceremony. That is a great song, and I thought she sang it beautifully. Certainly the excitement was tempered by the tragic death of Georgian luge star Nodal Kumaritashvili, who lost control on a practice run Friday morning and was killed instantly when his body slammed against a guard rail. I was shocked to see a video of the entire accident on the news that night. They figure he was going about 87 MPH when he flew off the track. Now there are questions about whether or not the track was too fast, and they‘ve shortened the run as well as raised the crash wall. I was amused to see that the Cayman Islands has  representatives at this year’s Winter Olympics. We were wondering in which events they were participating (winter banking??), at which point Shauna piped in: “frozen assets”. Hee hee. I’d never heard of one country before, The Principality of Andorra (dubious internet fact: population 83,888), stuck in the Pyrenees Mountains between France and Spain. I could have done without the ten minute coverage of Wayne Gretzky, standing in the back of a truck, driving through the streets of Vancouver to light the outdoor torch down by the waterfront. Now for the events. As I finish this report on Sunday evening, Alexandre Bilodeau has just won gold in the Men’s Freestyle ski competition, making him the very first Canadian EVER to win gold at home. Based on the fact that Toronto absolutely erupted simply because the Leafs made the quarter or semi finals of the Stanley Cup Playoffs (years ago), I think there will be some serious partying all across Canada tonight to celebrate this momentous event ...
right on, eh!
Written by Jamie Oppenheimer c2010 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED