Stupid Hair Coach!

I began the week with cancer and ended it with cancer.

Not my cancer; my uncle's. He has lung cancer. Monday he went down to Northwestern Hospital for a chemotherapy treatment and this morning (Friday) he went back to get hydrated.

He is doing as well as can be expected, and has a good attitude.

While he got his liquids I decided to try to get in a few agency calls. It was freezing already on Michigan Avenue.

For those of you who have never visited Chicago in the winter, I can only say-- don't! The wind cut right though me.

I don't have proper winter coat, so I was wearing a sports coat and over that a trench coat. I had my bag with brochures slung over my shoulder. When I went to switch shoulders I pulled too hard on the applet and the button that held it down went flying, bounced off a woman in a fur coat and skidded into the middle of Michigan Avenue.

Great. I was flapping from my right shoulder. Now that's professional. Why not just take out a cup and ask the Christmas shoppers for donations, it looked that bad.

Then I looked at my shoes. In my rush I tossed on a pair that really were worn. Then at my pants. Not creased.

I was a mess.

I didn't want to make any agency calls after this assessment. While I was debating whether or not to the phone rang.

It was the guy I've been trying to get one of my companies to honor for his winning ticket to fun and sun. He and his son. Well, he was in a panic. He only showed one person on the reservation.

Turned out he was looking a the reservation on a ten year old desktop computer, as his laptop was broken.

I had made the booking myself, so I knew that two were on the record. I told him so.

"What should I do?" he asked.

Well, turn off the computer and pick up the phone and call Delta to confirm things.

Brilliant!

This man probably makes $200,000 per year at his job. Why?

So by the time I finish with him I have talked myself out of stopping at any agency, looking like a pig. Then my uncle calls and says he will be finished in a little over an hour.

Okay. I duck into the Marriott and sit in the lobby to keep warm. There I take out my planner and mark in what I have to do in the next week, then mark phone numbers of agencies to call to set up training.

Then my hair coach texted.

Yes, I have a hair coach. Two of them. When my hair gets too long they nag me into getting a haircut. I hate going to get haircuts.

By the time I replied I was back at the hospital, and I told my hair coach that I was at the hospital.

I had wanted to get a haircut before leaving for Jordan, but my uncle ended up going down the ER the day prior to my leaving. I didn't get home until 4-am the next day. I was leaving for the airport in hours.

No haircut.

I explained this on the text.

It's all supposed to be a joke right? And I add that I have many more things on my mind right now over and above a haircut.

So my hair coach responds with another message about wild hair.

I explain that I'm dealing with cancer here, which this coach knows. Then another message about getting a haircut.

I'm beat from a total week of BS, and I'm getting messages about a haircut. I was starting to get pissed now.

This is not a joke.

I tried one more time, saying that I am down at this damned hospital, and it's a continuation of a twenty year nightmare that began with my father getting lung cancer, then with my mother, and with numerous trips over the last ten years with my uncle.

My family and associated insurance companies have added at least a wing to the stinking place.

Nobody in my family gets a grabber and flops over. No, they are in the hospital and ICUs and rehabs for the long haul.

It's bad enough that I am taking off work to do this. Some things are quite shaky, but then to get continuing text messages about haircuts, is, well, it's more than annoying.

A few minutes after pressing the button for the last text message and the explanation I get a text message:

"So that means you won't be getting a haircut?"