After ten years of growing hair nonstop, The Lion finally gave it up. Two feet of hair hit the barbershop floor and The Lion was free of hair hassles, with nary a regret in sight.
Sorry, ladies. But I’m still a charmer, with vast intelligence, untold wealth, incredible wit, and stunning good looks. Right? Right??
Jeez!
Yowsah!
Grumpy Lion 
😀 You look great, Ric! 😀
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You have good taste, youngster!
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Suave and debonair. You look good.long hair is overrated anyway. Did you donate to locks of love?
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I forgot about the LoL and by the time Billy the Barber remembered it was too late. I think he was too shocked that I was getting it done – I walk by the shop several times a week and have known these guys since high school. I got cheers from Vera the Barber, an outrageously gorgeous woman who barbers.
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Now we know why you did it – the feminine accolades!
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Well, yeah! I’m getting old. I need every edge I can get. (Yeah, like, sure.)
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Looking good. Not that you looked bad before, mind you. But, you know…
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🙂
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You must not be much of an archivist. I would have at least taken a picture of a length of the newly shorn locks next to a yardstick for scale.
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I’m not much of a hairist anymore either.
But you could go look here… http://philogate.wordpress.com/
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WOW! Did you give it to Locks of Love or anything? That is a LOT of hair!
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I try to think of it as all the gray that went away.
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You’re really cute…for a stealth militia man.
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Awww, now you gone and done it. You’re gonna give him a big head, and he’ll probably hit on you.
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Nah. She wouldn’t hit back.
But she’s right, you know. (Creeeaaaak… [sound of head swelling])
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How do you know that? It could be part of the plan so I can infiltrate the mili…nevermind.
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Yeah, see, I learn stuff about you by reading your blog and using those critical analysis skills I learned in unnamed government agencies with three initials. And your record says you flunked the infiltration course.
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Um excuse me. I did not fail, but summer school was recommended.
Seems like someone should be brushing up on their investigative skills.
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Yeah, that’s the part of the infiltration course you failed, the pre-infiltration investigative techniques sessions. They were going to bounce you, but I pulled some strings on some puppets and got you the summer school recommendation. I’m a nice guy that way. Really. Despite my lack of hair.
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Nice try. First rule of infiltration. “Earn trust.”
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Ohhh! Geez, that hurts. You don’t trust me? I’m really sorry about that whole mission with the Russian and the donkey and the two chickens, but that wasn’t my fault. You were set up, but not by me.
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So easy for you to say sorry, now. Who was in the babushka waiting for someone who never came?
Oh yeah. Me.
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Ah ha! Now I understand. I was there, but you were hiding in a scarf. No wonder I couldn’t find you. Didn’t you read the case studies? Pyongbangyangyang? An entire battalion, hiding in babushkas they’d stolen from the locals, making it impossible for the rescue mission to find them. They died gruesome deaths. Surely you read that case?
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Pyongbangyangyang does not apply in this case as it was one in a babushka. Oh yeah. Me again.
You were explicitly informed about my whereabouts. Ruski-kuski road 4th barn on the right. After that goat herder got me across the border, I find out you were in Minsk doing God knows what. So don’t tell me you were there looking for me.
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But they told me you were in Minsk. When I found out about Ruski-kuski road I rushed there right away. Apparently the goat herder got you away before I could get there, but the lying little weasel didn’t tell me that. No, Cousin Mersakovskyevitch has had it in for me since we were children playing in the Kremlin corridors and I stole Liliana Koskokosevitchana from him. For chrissake, we were six years old but he never let me forget it. I’m surprised he didn’t kill you and steal the babushka. You were very lucky, very lucky. But Cousin Mersakovskyevitch, not so much. He was rammed to death by a jealous goat last November.
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Your cousin Mersakovskyevitch did not know my whereabouts until after I was across the border. His death by goat, while tragic, has nothing to do with the fact that you didn’t get me out of there. Bottom line, the mission failed, and you have only yourself to blame.
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Your logic fails you. This is why you were recommended for remedial summer school. Cousin Mersakovskyevitch was the goatherder who took you across the border. Thus he knew your whereabouts before you crossed the border. I deduce from your statement that you were not actually in Ruski-kuski road, and thus I cannot be held responsible for your failure to be in the proper place to be rescued. Bottomless line, the mission failed, and you have only yourself and your apparent dalliance with Cousin Mersakovskyevitch to blame. Unless of course you were on a secret mission of which I was not informed for security reasons related to your safety.
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Looks like someone thinks he has it all figured out. Guess no one informed you of Cousin Mersakovskyevitch’s long lost twin who snuck me across the border. Before the tragic ramming, he told his brother about Liliana.
I’d watch my back if I were you.
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Talk about having it all figured out!! Ha!! Not only was that not his twin (who, incidentally, was found living in Iowa as a baseball field maintainer for the last thirty-five years), but that was actually Liliana herself taking you across the border. I didn’t tell you that earlier because I thought you’d be embarrassed, but apparently that’s not possible.
And on another note the twin in Iowa says he knows the location of Bugs. He’ll be in touch with you about ransom.
No need to watch my back. I live in a cave on a mountaintop formerly inhabited by a rude and smelly guru who lost his mind watching the Matrix trilogy three times a day for a decade. But he left me some nice furniture.
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If that really was Liliana, the only thing I am embarrassed about is your taste in women.
I don’t know if I trust this twin cousin. How do I really know he knows about Bugs’ whereabouts?
The funk in the furniture will keep enemies away. Well played.
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All I can say about Liliana is that she was quite fetching when she was six years old and I was six years old. She didn’t handle puberty very well, appearance-wise.
As for Bugs, the twin did show me some fur that looked Bugsy, and a photograph. Bugs has lost weight in the photo. You really ought to ransom him out of there before he wastes away. After all, what’s a mere five dollars to a wealthy aristocrat like yourself?
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Apparently, since I thought she was your male cousin’s twin.
Hardly an aristocrat, but thank God the twin is strapped for cash and is ransoming on the cheap.
Set it up, Ricski. If anything happens to Bugsy, your ass is borscht.
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I should mention, now that you’ve mentioned it, that the twin will accept five dollars worth of borscht in lieu of cash. But it’s gotta be good borscht. You got good borscht, comrade?
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Your grandmother took the recipe to her grave, remember?
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That was the Chicken Kiev recipe, if I recall correctly. And if I recall correctly it was you who was running the borscht black market.
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This is true. My black market borscht business collapsed when my lead chef defected right before the wall fell. Traitor.
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The wall probably fell from all that extra lead your chef was putting into it. A clever plan on his part, assuming he got out from under before it fell.
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That’s the theory that went around the KGB circle. I don’t know. There is a restaurant in the Ukraine known for its borscht. If it’s as good as they say it is, he got out.
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You know, there’s a little restaurant in Washington frequented only by Republican/TParty bigwigs. Maybe we could convince your old chef to bring his lead-laced borscht recipe to work for the greater good…
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I won’t speak to him. I’m still bitter. That said, I have a new chef, Michelin Star and trained in undetectable poison. He makes a tasty arsenic-laced gazpacho. I’ll set up the fundraising dinner.
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You’re my kind of agent!
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A couple more decades of groveling for Minsk, and you’ll be my kind of agent too.
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I figure if I can get a couple of Minsk coats maybe I can get a girlfriend.
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😆 Very nice.
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I always told you that you looked good with short hair. The only thing I wonder is – do your cats recognize you? Linda
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