I Call This “Four Views of the Same Man in Need of a Haircut”
Posted on July 31, 2013 Posted by John Scalzi 68 Comments
Four different looks, all of which scream: Time for a trim. Yes, well.
Update, 3pm: And now, after the haircut:
What a wholesome young man! You would totally buy a life insurance policy from him!
Well now we know who to cast for Albert Einstein: THE MOVIE.
Tim H:
Or, alternately: “SCARY CREEP IN A PANEL VAN: THE MOVIE.”
This is somewhere between scary Roman emperor who will shortly invade with elephants and hobo.
The children of Bradford tell stories about the crazy man who lives outside of town.
Isn’t July your “time off from stuff?” Let it grow and play the freaky hair song from Hair. Until August. August is definately more of a buttoned down, getting back to work month.
Bottom-Left Pic: Jayne Cobb’s Dad.
You’d think a man of your maturity would know better than to stick a penny into a power outlet.
What a shocking revelation.
Photoshop is Fun, isn’t it?
No.2 is so editorial.
On the other hand, a perfect opportunity to see if panhandling is a viable alternative career.
10 o’clock: Zombified.
2 o’clock: Literafied.
4 o’clock: Celestiafied.
8 o’clock: Subcultified.
You and WilW should have a bedhead-off.
When do we send in our nominations for this year’s King of the Hobos?
Oh, and 8 o’clock is the Saint John or San Scalzi shot.
The version in lower left is cool — looks like something Ansel Adams and Stanley Kubrick could have cooked up.
I agree with Josh – John Scalzi’s hair vs. Wil Wheaton’s beard – Round 1 – ding ding ding
I would even argue that No. 2 should be your new dust jacket photo.
Bottom left: undeniable proof of john Scalzi’s service in the Cival War.
Looking forward to the Scalzi cosplay at the next Comic Con.
You know the worst is needing a haircut when you’re losing your hair, Scalzi – you feel like, “Can’t I just go bald already so I don’t have to mess with this?” As another person whose hairline has been receding steadily over the decades, I sympathize completely.
In the summer, I just get it all cut off – Hell with it, anyway.
Your new job – One man Beatles cover band – https://twitter.com/sinboy/status/362627763687014400
Needs more color contrasts
Top right: my fave. Very Andy Warhol-esque.
You need to lose the neckbeard too
So when did John become the Centauri ambassador? Does Londo know?
The scary part isn’t the pictures, it’s my gut response to them. Each one leaves me with a totally different opinion of the ‘individual’. I hate to think that my subconscious has that much control over me – since it seems to be making totally ILLOGICAL conclusions.
Why do those pictures suddenly have me humming the score from “Sweeney Todd”? (Mental note: do not accept any meat pies from John Scalzi. Ever.)
I’ll leave it to someone else to do the Warhol style tinted diptych job.
Definitely #3. … Or maybe #2.
I could be convinced either way.
Messy, but it doesn’t look so long it needs cutting.
Of course, I can sit on my hair, so I may not be the best judge of these things.
With a different facial expression, you could have totally subbed as the Ancient Aliens meme.
Hate to say it, but there is a hint of, erm, serial killer about the “after” picture. You know, the one where you see the picture on the news and everyone says “Well, he was nice, and kept to himself, before…”
Or maybe it is rabid weasel-esque. I far prefer the first four.
Man, if Rutger Hauer hadn’t already been Perfectly Cast in “Hobo With A Shotgun,” I think we’d be onto something here…
What a wholesome young man! You would totally buy a life insurance policy from him!
Dude, you look like This Week’s Temporary Guest Star in an episode of Dexter…
That last one is kind of cute.
I’m wondering if the idea of “need” a haircut and shave may have come from Krissy?
John, you’re a successful author who’s over 40. Haven’t you earned the right to look like a scruffy mess?
No go put on that sweater with elbow patches.
The after-cut makes me vaguely think of Russell Crowe as SK. Something about the eyes… and the semi-maniacal grin.
Ya know, you look a bit like Pat Morita in the bottom left.
Well, yes, that fella on the bottom is who I’d buy the life insurance from (as long as he wasn’t the beneficiary), but the top four guys? Totally buy a book from them.
I didn’t realize that really the first step of any twelve step program should be to get a haircut so it no longer looks like you have a problem.
Also, I liked you with the beard. Post-beard you look like you’re on my doorstep offering me a copy of “The Book of Mormon”.
I got a Niiiiiikon camera, I love to take a phooootograph….
Of course, I know that, on your appearance, your wife and daughter have a bigger input. My opinion is somewhere below the rabbit’s in importance.
I hate to say it, but I agree with scorpius. You look a lot better with the beard.
Dude, don’t do that to me. Snarfing pipping hot tea hurts!
You look better without facial hair. But you can get away with it because it looks author-y. Me, I vacillate. I look good with a goatee, but I feel better clean shaven. I look good with my hair either at an inch or at about five inches, but the in-between does not suit me and, as much as my vanity enjoys long-flowing hair, it’s annoying to upkeep. Short hair is easier.
@timeliebe
I saw the writing on my genetic tree, so I started using Minoxidil when I was 30. It doesn’t grow hair back, but I’ve found it greatly retards the rate of hair loss.
I have to agree with Scorpius and Floored* (words I never thought would be in that order, together), the beard is better. However, Krissy has to live with it, so she gets the final veto.
*Bipartisanship can be achieved in the matter of Scalzi’s beard! Someone call the Capitol!
@Floored
I fear that may cause a chain reaction that would unravel the spacetime continuum and destroy the entire universe. Granted, that’s a worse case scenario.
@ Gulliver: Or it may cause holes in time, a la “Primeval”. I’m seriously hoping for that, as that would be cool.
Hmm…be on watch, everyone, don’t let Floored near any alien technology or ancient artifacts.
Oh, if that happened, I’d die about once a month and come back in the raw, just like Daniel Jackson from “Stargate: SG-1”.
Me plus one of those doomsday weapons that the Ancients just leave around the galaxy on that show…hmmm, what would happen?
The upper right shot at least gives the illusion that there’s more hair on your head. The rest of the shots, not so much.
:-)
Oh You got a haircut? I was staring at the D5100. Nice haircut
Dear Cthulhu, here I am agreeing with Scorpius… you do kinda look like a missionary now. :P
The Invasion of the Body Snatchers has started.
Your barber is a magician.
I vote for the lower left, with the nice salt-and-pepper effect in the beard. I think that alone could get you cast as the governor of [state] in Snailquake, with the facial gravitas in time of crisis.
Looks like Gary Busey’s mug shot.
“What a wholesome young man! You would totally buy a life insurance policy from him!”
Or buy into any religion he cared to create!
Indiana Floored’s mission journal. Date: Unknown, presumed August First, 2013. Location: Unknown, possibly parallel St. Louis, Missouri.
My agreeing with Scorpius on the subject of Mr. Scalzi’s hair has resulted in a tear in the space-time continuum. I ventured through this tear, and found myself in a parallel universe where the K-T event never happened. I have made first contact with a group of sentient troodontid-like animals that call themselves the Tlin’Kalli. They are extremely impressed by my hat and whip, especially when I hit myself with the whip instead of my target.
So far, I have been chased by two different large predators; a medium-sized theropod dinosaur with a kinetic lower jaw that I have dubbed a “Velocisaurian”, and a twenty-five-foot sebecosuchian that I have named a “Saberfang”. Note: Large tyrannosaurs are also present, but do not see me as prey. Medium-sized predators are not averse to snacks, though.
Note to self: TELL GULLIVER THAT HE WAS RIGHT. Agreeing with Scorpius could have shredded time itself. For the sake of humanity, I hope that I am wrong.
… You kind of remind me of my ex, there. When he wore a beard, he looked like he was in his 20’s, as he was. Without it? He didn’t look old enough to DRIVE. (You look good either way, you just look younger and more… callow? without facial hair.)
Now look what’s happened. John gets a haircut and shaves and we’ve lost a commenter through a rift in spacetime.
If someone gets eaten by medium-sized dinosaurs, we know who to sue.
Indiana Floored’s mission journal. Date: Unknown. Location: Unknown.
Well, damnit, I just had to go and agree with another part-time troll. Now I’m in the middle of a desert running from f*cking sand worms! Unfortunately, the negative space wedgie seems to have deposited me in yet another parallel Earth, instead of in a Frank Herbert novel, which sucks. These sand worms are actually amphisbaenian lizards, about forty feet long, which like to nab their prey from below the sand like breaching sharks. I am currently on a tiny, pointy piece of rock writing this in my own blood (because it’s a macho Indy Ploy kind of thing to do). I just hope that the sandworms and hunting monitors don’t get me.
Indiana Floored’s mission journal. Date: August 2nd, 2001. Location: Alien planet P-something-something–something-something-something.
OK, this is getting somewhere. The continuing spatiotemporal ripples resulting from my agreeing with the troll Scorpius have left me on an alien mothership with the cast of “Stargate: SG-1”. Not the actors, the characters. Jackson is dead, having been shot in the face by a Jaffa. The others are acting rather blasé about this.
I have devised a genre-savvy escape plan, acting on the knowledge that the Goa’uld Apophis, who is currently holding us captive in this tiny, dirty cell while Major Carter gets to enjoy a harem with cushions (seriously, why do the women always get what the guys want, and vice versa?), plays all of the typical sci-fi villain tropes ridiculously straight.
I have therefore developed what I call “Operation: Doctor Doom”, which involves a purloined staff weapon and some hot-wiring. I will attempt to get us into a situation where hot-wiring the weapon is the only way for the main characters to survive; by John Scalzi’s “Redshirts” principle, this should make anything possible. Let’s just hope that the Jaffa still fight like idiots.
Have you considered a pencil thin mustache?
Indiana Floored’s mission journal. Time: August 3rd, 2001. Location: Earth. Inside a freaking mountain.
So, wormholes. Stargates. Goa’uld. Yep, I am inside a TV show. No, I have not become a Gary Stu–the 16 zat and fire staff scars on my legs, arms, and back are enough of a mark of that. Fortunately, Jackson is the only one who dies–three times in the past twelve hours. Every time, the others just find a “sarcophagus” and put him in, and he comes out good as new. He is currently dead again, having been shot in the face by a space laser fire staff literally seconds after being revived.
Operation: Doctor Doom was successful, and Mr. Scalzi’s “Redshirts Principle” (named after the acclaimed author’s titanic work of literature, “Redshirts”, which will surely go down in history as the “Starship Troopers” of its era) worked like a charm. The Jaffa, like all bargain-basement mooks, can’t shoot (unless I am the target), and so they’ve gone down like bowling pins.
We eventually rescued Carter from the harem (she was insulted that we were thrown into a cell like dangerous people, while she, the actually dangerous one, was chained to a wall in a skimpy outfit like some prostitute), killed the local boss monster (he said “KNEEL BEFORE YOUR–” and then I shot him in the face, because I am fortunately small enough and plot-noncritical enough that the Jaffa apparently never thought to take my hot-wired fire staff), and used a conveniently located Stargate to beam back to the Earth of the show.
The others apparently have never watched a sci-fi show in their lives, so I had to instruct them on how to ensure that an evil alien parasite never returns after you kill his host. After taking down what turned out to be Apophis’s mooks (Jackson got his neck broken completely by accident) and torching the plot-critical villain’s corpse, we spent a few hours searching for the Stargate, which we eventually found and activated after Jackson died for the third time. Now I am facing down a large number of hulking men with guns while lugging Jackson’s heavy ass down a ramp with Carter’s help, because the two surviving men of SG-1 apparently decided that the haul of hotwired fire staffs that I insisted on bringing (seriously, talk about genre-blind characters) was more manly to carry than Jackson’s stinking corpse. Fortunately, women are smarter than men, and this rule holds true in sci-fi shows in addition to real life.
Indiana Floored’s mission journal. Location: THE COMMAND BRIDGE ON THE FREAKING ENTERPRISE-E!!!!! Time: I haven’t yet asked. Sometime in the 24th century.
So, the very first time I went out on an official mission with SG-1 to try to get my plot-disrupting ass home, something went wrong with the space-time thingy on the magic Stargate thing, and we ended up on Qo’noS, falling out of the sky right in front of Chancellor Martok during a strategy discussion about the aftermath of the destruction of Romulus. I landed on Data, which hurt. Jackson landed on some Klingon’s bat’leth, which means that he is now in sickbay being treated by a sexy Andorian for no plot-critical reason whatsoever. Lucky bastard.
I am currently sitting in Riker’s chair (since I have memorized the Enterprise’s statistics and the official way it works from various Star Trek books and promotional materials, and because Riker himself is being treated for a sexually transmitted disease that he picked up after being seduced by an Orion chick who turned out to be a spy working for the Tal Shiar and Empress Sela of the Romulans), right next to Captain Picard. Yes, he looks and sounds just like Patrick Stewart. This is totally awesome.
Of course, it would be more awesome if we were not being attacked by Hirogen raiders from the Delta Quadrant, who are for some reason working with the Tal Shiar. Hirogen have boarded the ship, and so Worf is kicking the crap out of them while I try desperately to figure out whether I should annihilate the Hirogen ships with photon torpedoes or conserve weapons and use the phaser banks.
On the plus side, the shields are holding.
Captain Picard has promised to get me home, provided that I explain to him the secrets of the Star Trek Encyclopedia (on my miraculously intact Kindle). I am attempting to explain the concept of redshirts to the Captain, using Mr. Scalzi’s epic awesome sauce.
Oh, crap, Hirogen on the bridge. Gotta go. I still haven’t learned to use this sweet phaser.
Indiana Floored’s mission journal. Location: A cornfield, possibly in Kansas. Time: Well, I sure hope that it’s August 5th, 2013, because that was the target date.
Wow, that was a weird month. My genre savvy proved useful, as the Enterprise would’ve been captured or destroyed about seventeen times during the Borg and Species 8472 invasions if it weren’t for the Star Trek Encyclopedia and the TVTropes.org Universal Genre Savvy Guide (which, thankfully, exists in the Star Trek universe as a joke). With a little help from Q (I threatened to tell the galaxy about how he got depowered, stripped naked, and stabbed with a fork by Guinian in one episode), we totally trashed both invasion fleets with nothing but the Enterprise. These new quantum torpedoes are just AWESOME; they can take down a Borg cube with one shot!!!
Captain Picard died when he flew a shuttle packed with enough explosives to destroy a planet into a Species 8472 mothership, but I blackmailed Q into bringing him back and sending me home, which had the unforseen side effect of the Sovereign-class battle cruiser that is resting in the cornfield behind me being transported back with me.
Q informed us that the Klingons have posthumously bestowed their highest honors upon Captain Picard, and that we all (even the redshirts and me) have giant statues in the Hall of Heroes on Qo’noS. Which is cool.
Q says that I’m pretty smart for a plot-noncritical character, which leads me to think that he is genre savvy as well. He says that he has fixed the space-time thingy that resulted from my agreeing with a troll in the real world about a month of subjective time ago, so I won’t be shifting universes at random anymore. Unfortunately, this means that two sets of plot-critical TV show characters and the Starfleet flagship are now stuck here, permanently.
Oh, and Jackson’s dead again. He bashed his head on a Jeffries tube during our crash-landing courtesy of Q. He’s in sickbay again, with Crusher’s new sexy andorian assistant looking over him. Lucky bastard.
There’s a beat-up pickup truck coming this way now, probably the farmer whose field we just destroyed. he has a rather disturbingly large gun. Well, let’s hope that he will listen to reason. I’ll upload this journal to my favorite blog for the benefit of others as soon as I can. Indiana Floored, signing off.