Why I Let My Hair Grow Out Read Online Free Page A

in a band, then?”
    His stream of chatter had been relentless, and I’d only half-listened since I was busy checking him out, but this seemed to require a response. “No,” I said, after a moment’s thought.
    â€œAll the girls I know with bald heads are in bands. What’s that about, eh? If you want to be bald, be bald. No need to sing about it!” He laughed, thoroughly pleased by his own observation. “Have you got any tattoos, then?”
    Well, I did not. But how would Colin ever find that out?
    â€œYes,” I said. And then, thinking it sounded more provocative, I said, “Two.”
    Colin let out a low whistle. “You’re a pistol, I can tell, Mor,” he said. “I almost got a tattoo once, at the end of a long night of too much drink. Praise the Lord I hadna enough money on me! Me mates’d convinced me to get the ‘Emerald Cycles’ advert branded on me bum. What a life of regret and remorse that would been the start of, eh?”
    â€œDon’t you like leprechauns?” I asked, sounding snarky. It has wheels. No. Yes. Two. Don’t you like leprechauns? I could still hold my end of our entire conversational history in the palm of my hand, but I suspected that this form of entertainment might soon reach an end.
    â€œLeprechauns!” Colin snorted so hard I thought a booger would fly out of his nose. He floored the gas pedal. “Is that why you’ve come to Ireland, lass? To see the wee folk? Silly Mor!” Colin laughed harder and drove faster, but the laughter sounded forced. “Take it from your old pal Colin—there’s no such thing as leprechauns!”

four
    Why is it that anytime you do anything new that involves a group of people, the first thing that happens is “orientation”? Are human beings in such constant danger of becoming disoriented that we have to keep stopping and orienting ourselves? Up, down, inside, outside, moss growing on the shady side of trees. Like it matters.
    I had crossed an ocean and I was tired and I just wanted to crash in my room and channel surf Irish TV. Instead I was squeezed onto a deep, squishy sofa between a pair of very tall blond people, listening to a sturdy freckle-faced woman spew enthusiasm.
    â€œWelcome to orientation! The Emerald Cycle Bike Tour Company welcomes you to our fair country.” The freckle-faced woman was wearing a name sticker on her right boob. It read, “Mrs. Patricia Finneran-O’Hennessey.” Good thing she had big boobs.
    â€œWe hope you’re all settled in and snug as bugs in your rooms by now. Isn’t the inn lovely? It’s lovely, isn’t it? Nearly four hundred years old, can you believe it?” Mrs. Finneran-O’Hennessey-Boob clapped her doughy white fingers together politely, without making any real noise, while smiling and nodding at an elderly couple who were standing in the back of the room. The innkeepers, no doubt. They seemed about the same age as the house.
    Mrs. Boob’s symbolic finger clapping was joined immediately by some really loud, vigorous, whack-your-hands-together clapping. Source of sound: the two tall blond people on the sofa with me, one male and one female, though it was hard to tell which was which because they were both totally buff and sat up straight as mannequins and were wearing identical bike outfits.
    Bike outfits? I thought. Hello, this is orientation , we’re in the living room of Ye Olde Quaint Charming Irish Inn, gathered quaintly around ye olde fireplace, so easy on the spandex, there.
    â€œ Wunderbar!” cried the clapping girl. Her name sticker read Heidi. She was sitting pretty close to the fire, which made me wonder if spandex was flammable. Sure would be a bummer to get incinerated on the first night, especially after spending so many Euros on all that fancy bikewear.
    â€œTake a look around the room at your fellow travelers. You’ll be getting to know each