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Hair Today---Gone Tomorrow
As many of you know, I don't have very much hair.
I tell some people that
I dyed it clear for the holidays and it just never came back.
I also found
out in South Carolina that clear is a color and that's what it now
says on
my driver's license.
When Rogaine first came out a few years ago I saw a commercial
with a guy
standing in front of a mirror saying " I don't look bad but I wouldn't
mind
looking better." That was me. So I called the toll free
number to get a
ten dollar off certificate to visit a dermatologist for a prescription.
I'm
thinking, if you have to have a prescription then this stuff must work.
So a few days later I get this plain brown envelope in the mail.
You
would think I was ordering porno or something. Yeah, like people
don't
actually know I'm losing my hair. Inside was my ten dollar
certificate and
information about Rogaine. So I made the appointment with the
dermatologist. They placed me in a chair like a dentist's
uses and in
comes the doctor and a nurse. The doctor puts on rubber cloves,
turns on a
spot light and pulls down this huge magnifying class over my head.
I think
back to when I was a little boy starting fires with a magnifying glass
and
hope that this exam won't take long. I start looking around for
a bucket of
water just in case what little hair I do have left catches on fire.
After
about a fifteen minute examination the doctor turns off the spot light,
and
takes off the rubber gloves and sits down beside me and says, " It's
evident
that you are suffering from male pattern baldness." That suffering
part
sort of bothered me. I explained to him that up until this point
I had
experienced no suffering. I am also beginning to realize that
I have just
paid a doctor fifty-five dollars to tell me I was losing my hair.
Ray
Charles could have told me that. The doctor gives me a prescription
for
Rogaine and a comb and sends me on my way to the drug store.
So off to the pharmacist I go with prescription and comb in
hand. Did I
happen to mention that Rogaine is forever? If you ever stopped
using it,
all the hair that grew back would fall out and did I also mention that
Rogaine cost fifty dollars a month, forever. That was the part
that Sandy
wasn't too excited about. I asked the pharmacist who by the way
had more
hair than any person I'd ever seen if this stuff really worked.
I think
it's a law that pharmacists can't lie to you. He told me that
I could buy a
hat and a really nice shotgun for six hundred dollars or I could come
give
him fifty dollars a month. I think he was trying to tell
me something but
I was just too blinded by all the hair in my eyes to hear him.
I left the drug store with excitement and just couldn't wait
to start
growing hair. I'd soon be going to the barber every week.
A month's
prescription was only about two ounces so there was certainly none
to waste.
There were three ways to apply this liquid that was apparently
made of
gold. There was a spray adapter, a tiny tube like the one
on a WD 40 can
of oil and then there was a sponge top like the one on a bingo dauber.
Rogaine needed to be applied twice a day.
Bright and early the next morning I awoke with great anticipation
of
growing a full head of hair and possibly starting a new career as an
Elvis
impersonator. There was excitement in the air as I stood in front
of the
mirror about to begin my first treatment. I used the spray
adapter as I
certainly wanted the best coverage. As I pushed the sprayer down
I watched
as about five dollars worth of Rogaine floated through the air and
not on my
head. I'd be broke and bald in a month using the sprayer so I
tried the
little straw next. I could certainly control it better
or so I thought.
The only thing I did with it was shoot a stream straight into my ear.
Now
I'm tilting my head trying to drain it so hair won't be growing out
of my
ear. That idea wasn't working either so all that was left was
the bingo
dauber. So there I was standing in front of a mirror in my underwear
at six
o'clock in the morning with a bingo dauber poking the top of my head
and
Rogaine running out of my ear and all I could think about was that
commercial that started this whole thing. " I don't look bad
but I wouldn't
mind looking better" Take my word for it. I did look bad.
Now I know that you're wondering if Rogaine actually worked
for me and all
I can say is that I'm now the proud owner of a really nice shotgun.
Carl