For some reason, my husband decided yesterday to take Moses to the barber shop with him.

Don’t ask.

Perhaps one factor may have been that the night before Moses had had a rather thorough bath, complete with shampoo and conditioner, as opposed to the daily rinse in the dog shower he usually gets to clean his feet. He smells good now, and he’s all soft and shiny, and this seemed like an opportunity to give him a good brushing. Thought for the day: Never brush a wet dog. Especially not in the house. No, not even if it’s really cold and miserable outside.

German Shepherds are a breed that have a spring molt, which is referred to as “blowing their coats”. An odd expression, I thought, in my innocence. But that was before. Now that he is four, and officially fully mature, Moses is having his first real blowing-of-the-coat, and I have come to think that whoever coined the phrase had a gift for understatement. Moses’s long black hair with its creamy roots is coming out in massive tufts which do, indeed, blow. Everywhere.  Piling up in insane quantities in the corner behind the kitchen door.  Stuck to the stamp on the Easter card I sent to my aunt.  Appearing, unexpectedly—and disturbingly— in my coffee cup at work.  But this was nothing compared to the wet dog hair that he and I, together, artfully distributed about the mud room, on the white kitchen cabinets, and on my person. There is no broom, no vacuum, no lint roller sufficient to the task. It’s like glue, and your only hope is to wait for it to dry and then wipe it off with a dry rag.

NASA ought to look into potential applications.

In any case, and for whatever reason, Moses had a trip to the barber shop. He was permitted to wander around and sniff at things, he obligingly lay on his back to have his tummy rubbed by several admirers, and when asked, he lay quietly on the floor nearby while my husband had his hair cut, all amidst the chaos of dryers, and razors,  and customers coming and going. He was, in short, a very good dog.

It would have been nice if a trip to the barber shop had resulted in a bit less dog hair, but I suppose I should just be grateful that he was shedding somewhere else for a while.