* There is a story behind this. I worked for a city government in Odawara, Japan soon after we were married. On the 5th floor of the city hall there was a small barber shop for city employees, which employed an exceedingly cute barberette. One of my (unmarried, at the time, though he eventually married a Japanese woman and signed up at the State Department for an exciting career in diplomacy) colleagues never went more than a couple of weeks without a haircut. One could attribute that to excessive vanity, or to the fact that the expense–especially for Japan–was minimal. But neither I nor anyone else thought that was the reason he went. Jamie suggested I not adopt the same habit.

Anyway, since salons were pretty expensive, and I had no Tom Cruisian follicle aspirations, Jamie started cutting my hair. And my ears, at first, but by now she’s expert.