It’s after 5 am on Saturday.  I’ve been trolling the internet since midnight in vain, in a frantic last-ditch attempt to locate  the latest medical breakthroughs in the delicate field of multiple gerbil extractions. I stop when I see an internet banner ad for spray on hair – in the can. Do they STILL sell that?  Suddenly, the gerbils can wait.

Does anyone remember the original TV commercial for spray on hair in a can?  It seemed to just pop up overnight sometime in the 1980’s.  It was only shown on obscure channels during the wee hours when most normal folk were sleeping.  The commercial, infomercial actually, was for a hair “replacement” product called GLH9 Spray on Hair. It was an unbelievably stupid product, in my opinion. What what was more unbelievable and stupid, and yes, hysterical, was the fact that there was an infomerical  made to sell it AND real people were actually buying it!!   

That got me thinking about human vanity and what we will do to assuage it, especially when it comes our hair. Both sexes are slaves to vanity. But what about that enigma called Male Pattern Baldness, or for you non-intellectuals, “Hair Not There”? And what’s a poor guy to do for hair replacement on a budget?  Also, it seems that  treatment options in the 1980’s were limited, even if you could afford them. 

I have heard that Male pattern baldness is to most men, what saggy national geographic boobs are to ALL women: The ULTIMATE humiliation. The FIRST irreversible sign that it’s all comin’ to an end; your youth, your life as you know it, Baby. First the hair goes, the belly stays and grows, the women say hell no, and then, just like that, your’e on your way down that old Denture & Diaper Highway, my friend!   Next stop, Death….

It must be devastating the first time you notice something’s a bit different in the shower.  The fateful day you bend down to grab a dropped bar of soap only to see that the hair you THOUGHT was on your head when you got in the shower, is now swirling lazily down the drain, not a care in the world.  Then, hastily grabbing your wife’s make up mirror for a backwards look-see,  PANIC raging as you realize that most of your remaining hair is also in the process of defecting.  In fact, it seems to be crawling down south towards those warmer climes of your body - specifically staking it’s claim on your back and ass.  Now we all know those are  not the locations Mother Nature intended  for us to grow a full head of hair! CRUEL!