Siddity In The City

Communication Breakdown

Remember grade school recess? You'd be on the playground with your friends, making up an intricate game involving magic words (Bustarizzle means go, and hinkapoop means stop!), bizarre means of locomotion (Okay okay, now hop on one foot seven times!) and crazy safety zones (third pebble on the left is home base!). It was silly, but you would be having all kinds of fun. At least, until that kid came along and wanted to play. You know, the kid who could never follow the rules, was trying to make up some new isht on the spot so she could win, and would cry like a little bitch and ruin the game for er'body when she couldn't manipulate her way to victory. Got-dang. Didn't you hate that kid? Ever wonder what happened to her when she grew up? Yeah, well, I think I found her and others of her kind working at La.var Hair Des.ign*. A few weeks back I went to LHD to get a blowout, and found that they did a wonderful job, but were really pricey because they padded their pockets by charging separately for each service. They even have a little service "menu"--$15 for a shampoo, $15 for a conditioner (unless you want a "treatment," which will be $25), $30 for a trim, $60 for a cut, $15 for a blow, $40 for a curl or flat iron, and so on**. You pay (dearly) for each and every individual service. Say you want a haircut, which is listed as $60. If you want them to give you a shampoo and condition first (and I swear, last time I think I smelled Creme of Nature up in that mug when I was being shampooed, and that mess is only $3 a bottle) , you will pay $90. If you walk out with a wet head. If you want your naps dry, well, cha-ching, you're up to $105. So, we all together on how this works? Yes? Good. Let's move on. As I think it is absolutely straight up retarded to pay somebody $30 to shampoo my hair with some drugstore isht when I have Matrix and Terax at home, and this place is a five minute walk from my apartment, I decided to wash my hair myself. That way I would only need a trim and a blowout, and for $45, I think that's reasonable, though I think it's almost as assed up to have to even consider washing your own hair to get a reasonable salon price, but anyway. I am playing by their rules, you see, their rules. So I go in, and I have the same stylist as last time. Sweet guy, does a good job, seems to be in training, definitely speaks only a few English phrases, none of them being remotely related to hairstyling, apparently, as I literally need a translator to explain what I want done. This does not exactly put me at ease, but he's done my hair before without incident, so we press on. He dries, trims, wets me down again and redries with a blowdryer and a round brush. (Sidenote--I've opted for the round brush for two reasons: 1. I'm pretty damn handy with a blowdryer. I don't need other people to do my hair for me, really, and if I am going to become a regular with a stylist, and certainly spend the kind of money they're asking at LHD, I need to know that he can do at least as good a job as I can, in less time. 'Cause for real, I can take care of myself, start to finish, in an hour and a half if need be, two hours at a leisurely pace, and besides that I have had some fierce stylists who could have me blown out so smooth with a round brush that in 80% humidity my hair doesn't go kizzy, it just forms a really sexy wave. In under an hour, all services included, for about $50. In fact, if you're in New Haven and you need a stylist look up Jose at Panache on Chapel. If he's still there. God I miss him. But that's another story. 2. On my first visit, when I asked for a blowout, they asked me if I just wanted a blowout with a round brush or a blowout and flat iron. When I asked what the difference was, I was told the iron was more expensive, but made the hair sleeker, so I went ahead and tried it. This time, I thought I'd see what was behind door number two and save some cash. For $45, if he didn't do so great a job, I figured I wouldn't feel bad about doing it over myself. This, in case you aren't picking up on it, is called foreshadowing. Onward.) So. He does a really good job. It looks very smooth, and though it doesn't feel as smooth as when I do it and has less body (I'm big on feel, and actually like a little body, which I guess is maybe the opposite of what a lot of clients look for) I'm still very impressed. For $45, I'm happy. So I go to pay, and the receptionist checks with him to find out what services I've had (like she hasn't been sitting 7 feet away from us the whole time). He confirms a trim and a blowout. She rings these two things up, and then starts to look concerned. "I just need to check this amount," she says, plastic smile plastered on, and scampers over to a senior stylist. After some protracted whispering, she returns, rings up a new receipt, and hands me the bill, which is now $88 and some change. You read that shit right. $88. And my blow out with round brush is now being counted as a flat iron or curl service. So I say, "Um, it's a curl because he used the brush?" And I'm half joking. She, however, is not, and looks me dead in my face and says, yup, because he used the brush. An extra $40. Because he used the brush. BECAUSE HE USED THE MOTHERF-CKING BRUSH. (Sidenote #2: Now hang on one ass-biting minute. This wasn't a goddamn $200 Mason Pearson, or even a $55 Caswell Massey brush, children. This was some Duane Reade-style Goody isht, okay. Like, they ain't rollin' like that up in there. Last time I was there brotherman detangled me with a hot pink plastic vent brush and I brought my own damn comb this time and detangled myself in the bathroom to be sure I wouldn't have to suffer that particular humiliation again. And I have just told you that a) I could do a better or comparable job, and my own brushes are better too, BTW, and that b) these fools told me the week before last that the blow service with round brush was cheaper and different from the goddamn flat iron or curl service.) So you may be asking yourself, as I asked myself, how in the hell the $15 blow with round brush suddenly became one with the $40 iron/curl deal. Uh-huh. I'll tell you how. THESE ARE THOSE CHEATIN' GRADE SCHOOL HEIFERS, THAT'S HOW! They decided, on the spot, that they weren't making enough off my shit and changed the rules, that's how. Now all this raises a few questions. Did the senior stylist (not owner La.var) just forget what she told me the week before last? Did she think I forgot? Have they lost their goddamned minds? Does the "blow" service mean they charge you $15 for somebody to just, I dunno, aim a hairdryer in the general direction of your wet head? Seriously. Who's ever heard of a blowout that didn't involve a brush? Please. Besides, blowouts that don't involve brushes are called diffusing (unless they have some assed up, only-used-at-LHD definition for that, too, which isn't implausible, under the circumstances), and they charge $25 for that m-f. In case you can't tell, I'm mildly pissed. I mean, I just told you I have vats of Matrix and Terax in my bathroom, so clearly I'm not all that squeamish about spending money on my hair. I talk a good game about being cheap, but I'll cough up some money for the good isht. This includes stylists. What I don't like-nay, cannot stand, to the point where my teeth ache from the jaw grinding bitterness--is being cheated. Because that's exactly what this was. An autobody shop-style scam. I mean, I realize my hair is long, and takes some extra time. If they had said they were adding on for length, I could maybe have understood that. And the stylist, I thought at the time, had done a really good job, he'd worked quite hard, and spent an hour and a half on my hair. I respected that, and planned to tip him $20, which I had thought at the time would be something like 40%, because he clearly wanted to do a good job. And if you want to be considered a top salon and charge top salon prices, then just do that. Say a trim and a blowout and a shampoo and whatever will cost this much, thanks, and I'll accept it, or not. But don't make rules about how fees are calculated, then straight up lie about what service I had, and how that shit is decided once I join the game because you think you're losing. That, my dears, is naughty. Insufferably naughty. They may be chillin' in prime real estate on the UWS, but they defninitely got some project hustle. I don't know, maybe they're having a hard time making rent in this neighborhood. Whatever. I paid them. I considered not tipping, but it wasn't my stylist's fault, so I tipped him, too, which brought my should-have-been-$45 bill to $108 and change. On the way home, as I marveled over the sheer stones it must take to look somebody in the eye and con them that way (I'm shooting for some zen shit here, like, "If it is so important to you to screw me like this over $40, fine, I hope you're happy, karma's a bitch," but I'm failing by writing this true, but vengeful, little review) I wondered whether I'd ever be desperate enough to go back again, since the stylist was pretty good, and I thought maybe I shouldn't sever all ties. Then I got home, looked in the mirror, and noticed the back was already going kizzy, on a cool sunny day. Oh, hell no! As I stood in front of my bathroom mirror, blowing my hair out (again) with my own dryer and brush (my hair felt much better afterward) I thought to myself: I ain't playin with these fools no more. *X--I. Know. I. Should. Have. Listened. But I had already made the appointment and wanted to see what they could do. I'm an assmonkey that way. I really have learned my lesson this time ;p) **These prices are often considerably higher, apparently, if you need services on a weave, which seems extra wrong for the beweaved. I mean, why should you have to pay for the hair, and then pay extra money to have the hair you paid for styled? And, OMFG, did you know a weave costs, like, $500? That shit is crazy. My ass would sho'nuff be on the Star Jones hair plan.

posted by Sid @ 10/12/2004 01:58:00 PM