COMB OR BRUSH
I was trying to help an elderly gentleman by pulling his shopping cart to a shorter line and I wasn’t making much progress. The harder I pulled the harder he pulled back. I said “I’ve got a shorter line down here that will save you some waiting time. I was certain that this older gentleman in the straw hat with a built in green visor had heard me because he got a snarled look on his face. His shirt appeared to have been somewhat scorkeled. I had to use this word because I learned it in tonight’s game of “Balderdash” and we all “swore” to use the new words that we learned as soon as possible. But, back to the snarled look. As his face met mine he sort of barked at me “Brush or comb” I said: “excuse me” because I knew he didn’t say “brush or comb?” Again with a more vigorous tone in his voice he urgently said: “brush or comb?” I said: “are you asking me if we sell brushes or combs?” Acting insulted he said: “NO! I asked you if you brush or comb your hair”. I told him that: “I usually brush my hair about 80% of the time and comb it 20% of the time.”
Not being impressed with my obvious mathematical skills, he proceeded to rip his straw hat off. He, in a rather smug tone said: “look at this head of hair.” What I saw can only be described as a mass of hair having been weaved back and forth across the top of a head meant to cover all areas but not necessarily having its origin above the spot where it was resting. The old man rather proudly said: how’s that for a head of hair at 85 years old?” I did the usual nice thing and told him that he couldn’t be 85. At this point he gave me a smile and allowed the cart to be pulled into a shorter line. He informed me that: “this hair has never been touched by a comb!” He then imparted great knowledge to me: “don’t ever comb your hair; you’ll comb it away”. I politely thanked him for this life altering information and started to make by escape. Too easy, he stopped me in mid-step with a loud two words: “leg cramps”. I again said “excuse me” knowing that he had not just said “leg cramps.” He retorted LEG CRAMPS; do you get ‘em. I timidly told him that I get leg cramps periodically, but that they never affected my job. The old guy said, “well, I get them all the time, but I don’t suffer with the pain.” I asked him if he used a special linament or oil on his legs and he said: “h— no, and proceeded to bite below his lower lip. When he was done there was a white line where his teeth had cut into his skin. It was sure to leave a bruise. He said that the bite would take away the pain from the leg cramp. I was reminded of a 3 Stooges skit where Moe wacks Larry across the fingers with a 2×4 to make him forget the pain in his foot. I am sure it worked as I looked at the old man’s lip waiting for the blood to return back to the area where he had bitten.
I thanked the old man for the tips and told him that I really appreciated all the useful information. He told me I was welcome and that he would be bringing me a lot of tidbits of information in the future. I was thinking to myself that maybe I had been a little too attentive.
