On the subject of facial hair trimming (or clipping)

Sydney, New South Wales.

I don't know if you've ever trimmed your beard with scissors, but if you have perhaps you've found it - like me - to be a little tedious but fundamentally All Right. Particularly if you have - like me - used those small, fine scissors usually reserved for nails. The sort that can often be found in a woman's vanity kit or washbag.


Today though, as I believe I have already mentioned, I am away from the McSnaffle house without access to such familiar tools. Instead, I have access to a pair of Wiltshire Kitchen Scissors.


Now, I don't know if you've ever trimmed your beard with a pair of Wiltshire Kitchen Scissors, but if you have perhaps you've found it - like me - to be simply terrifying.

Let me say at once that I suspect the terror is not limited to the Wiltshire brand - I imagine that it is similar to the task with any brand of kitchen scissors. They are, as a rule, fairly large and hefty - ideal for opening packets of bacon, or removing the skin from chicken. They're also ideal at present-wrapping time, for tackling particularly large pieces of paper. Or even, preparing olives and sundried tomatoes for a tuna-gnocchi-cream bake (a la SzB). In short, they are robust and practical tools for the kitchen and not something you would choose to be waving around near your face. Especially not near your lips, or those sensitive bits of nose around your nostrils.


So it is that I have just trimmed (or clipped) my facial tangle in the most careful, most attentive manner - the slowest, clumsiest manner ever. My beard is tattered, my skin covered with nicks and near misses, and my heart is racing.

Most of all, my appreciation for the easy genius of clippers (or trimmers) is greatly magnified.