Geddy Lee isn't so smart after all.....

Classic tune from Rush during the period where no one really knew what to make of a power trio from Canada, "I Think I'm Going Bald." Always made me smile and now, at the personal level, it makes me wince.

Spent eight years in the US Air Force, where the popular riddle was: "How many times in his first enlistment does a good Airman need to be told he needs a haircut?" There were always a range of guesses, sometimes barracks lawyering like 'in a four or six year enlistment?' until the answer revealed itself as a universal truth: Zero times. A good Airman NEVER needs to be told he needs a haircut. Where's Reader's Digest, and Humor in Uniform, eh? That's why I joined-for the laughs.

I've had seventy-five haircuts since I got out of the USAF 24 plus years ago.What kind of person keeps tracks of haircuts? Somebody who hates getting them. Haircuts are like mowing the grass-no matter how perfect (and haircuts NEVER are) you're gonna have to do it again. Rodney Dangerfield used to joke about wanting to get a haircut that didn't look like you'd just gotten a haircut (Amen to that) and all he needed to find was a barber who didn't look like a barber.

In recent years, not just my patience has started to wear thin. I discovered, with a start, that while I've had trouble maintaining my svelte figure, I have managed to lose a not inconsiderable amount of hair from the top of my head. As the ice cap shrank and the bald spot grew, unlike Al Gore, I was unable to come up with a theory to explain it. Until just now.

I am, at 55 and a half years old, probably twice (or three times) smarter than I was as a pup of twenty. Nothing deliberate or calculated-just life's experiences sticking to me. I know so much more now than I did then. My brain has gotten bigger to store all of this hard-fought knowledge. And as a result of the expansion of my brain, my head has gotten bigger. Unfortunately, as a genetic practical joke (perhaps), my scalp can no longer cover my larger skull, creating the impression that I'm going bald. I'm getting smarter and as a result, less hirsute.
Somebody alert the Nobel Prize Committee-and next time you see Gore, take a look at his rapidly expanding scalp. He and I are looking for Rodney's barber and until then, no haircuts, no peace.
-bill kenny