Annual appointment for a trim but it’s no beauty treatment

Ladies, picture this if you will.

It’s been a long, cold winter and along with the extra layer of insulation you’ve acquired on your body, you’ve decided, to help keep yourself warm, to instigate a self-ban on your regular beauty therapy appointments.

But the sun actually has warmth in it now.

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And very soon everyone’s going to be walking around in their next-to-nothings (undies, undies, togs, undies) so it would behove you to, well, sort yourself out.
Like, ASAP if not sooner.

Transpires a bunch of your girlfriends are in the same boat, so one day you’re hanging out for a long, lazy lunch with a bottle of rosé, that turns into two bottles (because nothing goes better with sunshine) and you start talking about how you all desperately need to make an appointment for some long-overdue, um, maintenance.

And then, just like the way Facebook can read your mind now, shouty people on motorbikes with barky dogs in tow, including one called Jess whose continually being told to ‘‘get in behind’’, herd you — LITERALLY HERD YOU — to a salon to sort you out.

But this salon’s not like your normal one.

The relaxing lavender scent has been replaced by a distinct odour, there’s no plush carpet or rugs and the background music’s barely audible over the noise of a mystery piece of machinery buzzing constantly.

The door to your waiting room suddenly swings open and one of the shouty people strides in, drags you backwards out the door and into a big, cavernous room filled with equipment hanging from the ceiling.

You’re on the ground when your head is shoved between a pair of legs and knees squeeze your neck, and you’re held in place while the mystery machine roars to life.

And for what feels like an eternity, but is actually only a couple of minutes, you’re just lying there being flipped and spun while the person holding the machine defuzzes you for summer — every now and then accidentally nicking you with what you now realise is an electric razor.

The indignity of it all!

As if that’s not enough, the person decides to give you a hair cut but doesn’t even give you a consultation to ask what style you’d like this season.

Just gives you a No 1 all over.

They’re not even bothered about whether that’s going to suit your face shape.

Or that it’s not even.

Meanwhile, another one of the shouty people, who seems much happier now, is gathering up all the hair that’s been cut off you (there’s SO MUCH HAIR!), getting rid of all the split ends and dreadlocks and then chucking it into a big bag which will eventually be sold and turned in to socks, and hats, and gloves, and jumpers and singlets, and blankets and rugs . . . and you’re dispatched down a chute to the great outdoors, dazed, confused, and, annoyingly, you look like EVERY SINGLE ONE of your friends.

And it’s right about now you all make a pact to stop giving weekly donations to your gym and actually start visiting.

A plan you’ll discuss further over another long lunch and bottle of rose, while looking over your shoulder praying the shouty people and their dogs aren’t still reading your minds and don’t round you up again just to tie you to a treadmill pre-set for full-speed ahead.