The Middle Distance

I tend to let stylists go at it, but I always sort of regret it-- I have hip-length hair and the last time, the girl dumped it into the sink, swished it around, and then stuck the comb in at the crown of my head and yanked, as if that would actually work to comb tangles out.
I had to patiently explain to her what anyone who's ever had hair longer than their shoulders knows: You've got to detangle the ends first before you can brush the crown.

So it took about an hour and she finally cut off about three inches more than I'd told her to, just because she couldn't detangle it. It hurt a lot. I tipped generously but haven't been back to a hair salon since, and it was over a year ago. Next time, I'll just get a friend to trim the ends-- I have my own hair scissors now.

Having long hair is a lot less maintenance than short hair... People don't understand that, but you can just wash it twice a week or so; you don't even have to brush it every day... Mine's very fine and tangly and sticks to itself too, but cutting down on harsh shampoos and trying various of the weirdo hair-care regimens on the longhair community here has made it a lot easier to totally avoid the hairdresser.

Anyway, I bet your hair looks awesome. I've managed to cut down on the tangly with my hair by switching to sodium laureth sulfate-free shampoo and avoiding silicones (and other -cones) in my conditioner, occasionally degreasing with a dilute solution of baking soda and following up with a rinse of dilute apple-cider vinegar, and that sort of thing. It might be worth looking into-- it's made enough of a difference to me that I can actually! wear! my hair! down! sometimes.

But I didn't actually really mean to come here to preach longhair crap at you-- I just was so amused by the fact that you dated your last haircut to the administration it had taken place during.