Week Four: The Modified Fu

Pre-Week: This week's winner, submitted by Burt (my college roommate during Freshman year at Providence) is the Modified Fu-Manchu. OK, so technically, Burt wanted the traditional Fu, but I took the liberty to exercise my creative facial rights, thinking ahead to the malleability of options this look might spawn. The stout handlebars and the thick center stripe...think about what you could have me do for week 5. Voting opens now, and carries forth until Sunday, October 3rd, at 4 PM.

Week In Review: Other than the odd comment about how I shaved again, or questions about my recent haircut--you'd be amazed at how much a little facial hair change throws people off--there was very little bluster about this week. Perhaps it is still too early in the going, or the Fu Manchu, even in this modified state is not enough to incite crowd rioting over changes in jaw looks. So sad. American Chopper I was not....

Week Three: The Shaggy

Pre-Week: I now present this week's winner...The Shaggy!

I briefly considered amending this beard to make it the Sleazy Shaggy (just mustache and thick central-chin patch) or Shaggy, the Later Years (patchy in general, possibly with some scorch marks in it from "various adventures."


But, in order to remain true to the spirit of Beard Democracy, I felt justified in keeping with the suggestion submitted by Laura (whose husband Chuck submitted the Week One winner--the first husband and wife team to score in this facial hair lottery--kudos!) This one already has the kids talking, but that will wait for another day.

Get in on the action, and the exciting, edge-of-your razor voting. You can create the next facial design as long as you submit your comment on this blog site, or e-mail me by Sunday, September 26th at 4 PM. Happy Bearding!

Week in Review: Well, the kids in my class enjoyed the "pointiness" of this beard model, though are likely too young to even recognize it as a Shaggy-inspired chin-coif. (They were all born after 2002, after all....) They also wondered, often, why I left that patch in the middle so much longer than the rest. Once they saw me fingering it and twisting it whenever listening or thinking, I think they figured that one out.

The manly scruff by the end of the week came in handy as I was once again cast in the role of evil king and old dragon, at the mercy of our daughters in our weekend reprisal of "swording." I have to enjoy that they take almost anything we do and turn it into a verb. Of course, I comply by buying them a couple of foam swords in the dollar section, maybe just to hear them continue with their swording rituals. Maybe I should be sacred that, while our older daughter plays somewhat nicely, lightly stabbing my heart and slashing at my arms to chop them off, our younger daughter attacks with a ferocity befitting her Scottish ancestry. I half expect her to whip up her makeshift kilt and taunt me before heading into battle. She orders me to the couch and then tells me to fight, only to charge through my defense and hack at my neck and face. No amount of poking with my lowly cardboard dagger is enough to ward off her onslaught. She is merciless, as she swipes at my eyes and head, slices at my neck and happily announces that she has chopped my head off. Score one for imagination, I suppose.

Week Two: Eight Ball, Corner Pockets

Pre-Week: Hardly a splurge of voting--yes, even beard-dom has its fifteen minutes, especially now in Mayfly attention span society--but the strongest of the entries this week came from within my own household. Most people assume I do these things against my wife's wishes--perhaps this speaks to my nature as a person who does things to rile people, antagonize people, or otherwise go against their wishes for me--but I can assure you that Laura is just as much a part of this scheme as I am. Many of the things I have done over the years, especially things involving hair and facial hair, have come after hilarious discussions with her. So, this week's entry comes straight from her cranium to my jawline: Eight Ball (chin circle, or as close as I could get it) and Corner Pockets (jawline beneath ears, semi-triangular in shape.) I give her credit for building from last week's design and having a vision even I did not have.

Now it's your turn: sculpt my face, or at least my facial hair. Use this week as your base and think ahead to a normal week's growth. Next week, you could attain beard infamy! Voting closes on Sunday, September 19th at 4 PM.

Week In Review: For whatever reason, my current crop of students are remarkably observant about all things facial hair. Maybe it is because they are always looking up at it, framing my face, from under my chin, and things of that nature. But now we seem to start each week with an update about their weekends, and their updated musings on my beard.

One girl likes to begin by pointing out the changes since our last (Monday) meeting, though she provides almost daily commentary on the ever-changing status of the beard. I sincerely hope she does not think this will get her in my good graces. This week, I couldn't even get in my usual post-weekend inquiry, "How was everyone's weekend?" Upon inhaling to ask that, as everyone settled into spots near the front of the room, she looked, sighed and said, "...AND you shaved!" in that Michael Buffer style that squared-circle pundits have come to love and lament as a sign of the commercialization of their gym-bound sport.

Luckily, my sport--that of extreme facial hair growth and change--is never out of style because, much like the mullet, it was never really in style. It is all a matter of what you are willing to strap on your chin and jaw and flaunt around town for the week.

Of course, unlike the lone girl who chronicles my beard adventures nearly as well as I do, there are others who have little to no idea it is going on. One boy noticed on Wednesday, as he said, "Hey, that's cool how you have like those little patches on the sides...it's like you have the chin, and then you have the sideburns." Yet another fit well into the "no idea" category, as I scanned the crowd many a day and saw him with BOTH of his nostrils filled with fingers (up to the bridge) simultaneously. Now that is talent to which we can all aspire.

Week One: The D-Chinstrap

Pre-week:

Introducing...the D-Chinstrap. So suggested by a man who knows his beards--Chuck--who really wants me to call it the Douchy Chinstrap.

This is week one's winner. Keep this look in mind and project forward to imagine what I might be able to grow, and what you would like the look to be next week. Only five voting days remaining...all beard polls close at 4 PM on Sunday, September 12th!

Week in Review: With the D-Chinstrap in place, it was only down to the reactions from the various factions I encounter each week.

First, there were the students: they shared about their weekends on Monday morning and at the end, I tried to skate by with nary a word about my personal life (all the better for keeping up the mysterious Batman-like visage) but one girl exposed me by asking, "And what did you do?" When I brushed her off with some non-descript replies about "much of the usual" she countered by saying, "Well, that's not true, you shaved!" Suddenly, my facial hair became the topic of the moment. They ogled it and cooed over it, wondering how I could shave it, why I shave it and any and every other question to avoid the fact that I was just about to ask them to work. Nice try. The rest of the week, they asked me sporadic and spontaneous questions about my facial hair: why it was reddish; why it was several different colors; and why there were some white streaks in it. The last of those I reassured them it was probably just blonde.

My own children, having survived my face in all its permutations both charged me at the door Tuesday afternoon and claimed they liked my new "chinstrap." Have to love your own kids even more when they recognize the motif without you naming it. I take that to mean we possess a very advanced three year-old; I don't know about you.

As for adults, well, not surprisingly, no one said a word about it. But, in the category of yet another thing I probably should have thought through a bit more before doing it (which most people would argue is all of the things I do) I did capture this D-Chinstrap forever in school photos on Picture Day (to be proudly displayed in the yearbook as the Second Grade teacher most kids want to forget....) Good plan.

Beard Democracy: Humble Beginnings

And away we go with this year's beard challenge...

For this year's Beard Blog, I have decided that I will open up the beard-dom to any faithful followers (all one of you) who would like to influence my weekly facial hair motifs. My original plan was to teach my new Second Grade students (yes, I have moved down a few grade levels) all about good citizenship and voting by having them vote on weekly beard designs. But, I thought better of it, and not least of which because I am likely to get some grief about hogging the learning airspace with my beard fanaticism.

So, for those of you who would like to participate, here are the ground rules:

(1) You must post a suggestion in my comments section or you may e-mail me with your suggestion for the following week's beard theme.

(2) All beard suggestions must meet the deadline posted with each new beard.

(3) Each new beard must be built using the raw materials from the previous week--I cannot work facial hair miracles here, folks. (See the current facial sporting above.)

(4) All beards must be clean, and you know what I mean--keeping in mind, again, that I teach at an elementary school.

Other than that, have at it. I will take suggestions for Week One's beard until 4 PM on Monday, September 6th. I will choose the weekly winner. Don't be discouraged if yours is not selected, there are many beards ahead!

So, have at it. Come on, let's be realistic, how many times will you get the chance to tell me what to do and I might actually listen?