The solstice and my raging pink scalp of doom

If I recall correctly, tomorrow, June 20th, is the summer solstice for those of us here on planet Earth.  You Beta Hydroxians only have one planetary revolution every 60 years, so I’m afraid your next solstice is roughly 23 years off.  But that’s okay, you can have a pint or six of bitter with us as long as you promise to bring a towel.  Oh, and no more abductions or cow experimentation.

Seriously, It’s kind of rude to mess up your host planet’s wildlife, especially when you’re just here for a solstice party.  If we wanted to witness that sort of bad behavior, we’d invite Lindsey Lohan to our house parties.  Trust me, I know you can be better, so no more acting like frat boys in Tijuana for the weekend.

Anyway, so the solstice is tomorrow, and not a moment too soon, if you ask me.  I mean, I know it marks the official start of summer and all, and summer isn’t really my bestest buddy among the available seasons.  But I’m totally willing to overlook that this one time, because it’s the longest day of the year.

The sun and I?  Yeah, we’ve had enough of each other already this season.  It’s like Oscar and Felix up in here and I’m really getting tired of the cigar smoke and the messes everywhere.

Well, maybe that’s a bad example.  I don’t much mind cigar smoke and make plenty of messes myself.

But still.  STILL.

Not happy with the sun.

See, it’s just now June and I’ve already gotten my requisite early-summer irresponsible burns out of the way.  Nothing really too bad, mind you, since the Puddinette sees to it that I regularly apply a reasonable coating of SPF-ery.  Nevertheless, I’ve still managed to acquire a bit of extra-pinking of the back of my neck and my forearms once or twice so far.

That doesn’t bother me.  It’s my own fault for being, well, stupid, and either not being thorough or not reapplying.  And if my mother taught me anything, it’s that if you’re gonna be stupid, be prepared to own up to it.

Which, by the way, is a tiny nugget of wisdom I think most people could probably do with applying to their own lives more regularly.  Politicians, especially, but I won’t get into that since they’re an easy target an all.

Anyway, all that said, I’ll still be plenty happy to know that the daily duration of exposure to our closest active star will be lessening day by day after tomorrow.

You know, because of the top of my head.

If you’ll recall, I spent yesterday out in the ridiculous heat playing a round of very bad, yet very entertaining golf.  Which, of course, is the only way I play 18 holes.  The problem is that when it comes to doing much of anything in the foolish heat, it’s best if you don’t cover your head lest you retain heat bodily.

Sure, putting a cap on in the dark, murky, frigid depths of January makes plenty of sense, but it when the thermometer reaches deity-forsaken “stupid” levels, not so much.

Problem is, the top of my head isn’t exactly otherwise well-protected.  My hair is…inconvenient.  I’m not exactly balding so much, but the thick, wavy locks of my youth have become somewhat, um, sparse.  In other words, my follicles block sunlight about as well as Rachel Ray’s shiny orange pasta pot holds water.

Still, though, my hair is thick enough to prevent the functional application of sunscreen.  Ever try to apply lotion to a cat?  Didn’t really get down to the skin part did it?  Well, unless you’ve got one of those creepy, wrinkly, hairless things that looks a relative of the guy from that old timey Nosferatu movie.

But I’m not that kind of cat.  Er, well, any kind of cat, but you get the idea.  Sunscreen, no matter what I do, doesn’t get down to my head.  Unless, that is, I apply enough to make it look like I left the house with mayonnaise on my head, but I think we can all agree that’s not a good look, even for “middle-aged software/writer-guy”.

I don’t want to scare the people at the coffee shop, you know.

This, then, is why I’m looking forward to the solstice: because the sun is a cruel, cruel star, nobody’s come out with an SPF-rated hair gel yet, and, thus, today I find myself with an angry pinkish scalp.  And if we learned nothing else from the PowerPuff Girls, it’s that we should avoid all things angry and pinkish.

So, uh, Suave, Pantene, or hell, white-labeled “Hair Gel”, makers, I implore you, perhaps a little help for those of us stuck in between the Beiber and the bald?

That’d be swell, thanks.

Pud’n

PS: You can’t really put aloe on a cat, either.  I’ll let you figure out how that’s relevant.