Cut

The other weekend, I went to get a haircut. (Admit it: You’re already riveted by this story.) It was a Saturday morning and the barbershop was packed. More than an hour went by and they still didn’t call my name. I ran out of websites to look at on my phone.

I accept that I have to wait at that time of day. The problem was that people who got there after me got haircuts before me because you can pay $5 for an appointment and skip the line. Sorry but I’d rather keep my $5. Who ever heard of paying for an appointment? They should be free. Normally I suck it up and wait but that was ridiculous.

The last straw was when a father, who got there an hour after me, paid on the spot for appointments for him and his two sons and they went ahead of me. That was three more people I was behind at that point. I got up and left.

I went to Supercuts and got a perfectly fine haircut for cheaper. (I have a simple hairstyle and just don’t need anything elaborate.) I had to wait a bit but not an hour. I had thought I would patronize a neighborhood small business but I’m not going back to that barbershop. It’s just too inconvenient. It’s not like they’re struggling and need my business, obviously, since I watched 600 people get haircuts. Anyway, I had a bunch of errands to run but my whole Saturday morning was shot while I played tiddlywinks at the barber.

My question is, was I a fool to leave the first barber? You just know I didn’t even get to my car and they were calling my name and looking around for me. Was this one of those sun cost fallacies, where we invest so much money or time in something and stick with it, even though we’re not getting results, because we don’t want to say all that money or time was for nothing?