Condition

British men have such fabulous hair. Perhaps I'm just a tad envious. I lived in the UK most of last year, and a common question asked of me was: well, what did you think of those English girls? And I'd have to admit... imagining back to nights strolling the streets of Bath and watching gaggles of inebriated spandex parrots chirping their way back to the bus stop and stopping to heave frothy anchor into the gutter... that my impression was not such a positive one. Saucy mingers, I'd mutter. And this was at 10:30- half an hour before the pubs closed. But the guys- I gotta admit- they were a darn good-looking bunch of blokes. I would love someday to be the subject of the show 'Brit Eye for the Yank Guy'. I've got the Burberry coat. Cost me ten quid, it did. Down at the charity shop. But it doesn't fool anybody- because I don't have the hair. I've never seen such effective use- and abuse- of hair product as I did in Britain. The feathering, the bed-head, the messy-boy... and the faux-hawk. Some cultures are just clearly superior in certain respects to others; you've got to give credit where it's due. The Brits do 'secret agent' better than anyone; and 'pompous aristocrat', and 'cheeky cad', and they practically invented the 'unflappable explorer'. And they do great man-hair. Need I remind you of Rod Stewart. I was thinking all of this today as I was riding in the back of a Toyota Land Cruiser. I got the Rumsfeld treatment today; our provincial meeting had a two-star and some State Dept reps up from Baghdad and a couple of us ended up with our own security detachment of private contractors; all ex-British military. Let me tell you: nobody does 'ex-British military private security contractor' like the Brits. They project such a sense of jovial lethality. 'Right then-- if anything looks dodgy, we'll snatch you up in two ticks- and off we go. Not to worry, we'll eliminate any disturbances if they should arise.' They clear a room, and screen for snipers, and mark egress routes, all with such... savoir-faire. They were exceedingly professional and remarkably polite, and yet made it clear that they were seriously dangerous. They all had these matching polo shirts with the company logo on the sleeve, and black armor vests with a big velcro Union Jack on the front. And they don't have to wear helmets- so their hair is just smashing.