29-03-2020, 10:01 PM
15941
Re: Leisurely Scribbles (part 5)
Very funny that pair.
Thank you for that info and those encouraging words Solo.
Singeing, that reminded me of old Harry the barber.
When I worked in a shop in Temple Bar in the 60’s there was an old barber shop next door, Harry the owner was a decent old skin but he wasn’t great at spelling, he had painstakingly made a colourful sign and placed it in the window, it said “Singing Promotes the Growth your Hair” Nobody had the heart to correct him.
I was working away at my bench one Saturday early afternoon when the air was filled with the tune “I’m gonna wash that man right outta my hair” when I opened the window and looked down there were these two bald lads singing and laughing to the top of their voices, they were Welsh Rugby fans and had just come out of the pub to head over to Lansdowne Road for the match and had seen Harry's sign.
Harry also had, presumably as a back up if the singeing didn’t work, a small back room where men were discretly fitted for wigs.
“A singe is a treatment available at a barber's.[1] A lit taper (candle) or other device is used to lightly burn and shrivel the hair. The practice of singeing was popular approximately a century ago; it was believed that hair had "fluid" in it and singeing would trap the fluid in. Singeing is supposed to have beneficial effects – sealing cut ends, closing up the follicles, preventing the hair from bleeding (a belief that has since been debunked)[2] and encouraging it to grow.[3] Singeing is still sometimes used to bond natural hair to hair extensions.[4]
Primitive cultures have also used singeing as a means to trim scalp or body hair, as a part of normal grooming or during ritual activity.[5][6]
Sir Francis Drake was famously said to have figuratively "singed the King of Spain's beard" when he raided Cadiz and burnt the Spanish fleet” Wiki.