Rowley the hair dresser

75.Rowley Jefferson was an average eleven-year-old boy living in a sleepy town. But one remarkable morning, everything changed. His day began like any other with a mundane visit to the loo, and he was having a massive poo but what he found was anything but normal. It was, in fact, extraordinary large fracturing his bum! His bathroom escapade became an unusual catalyst for an adventure.

In an unfortunate and unexpected turn of events, the toilet got clogged. The water level chased the brink of overflow, and without warning, the heap in question rejected its flush journey and launched itself all the way to the living room downstairs. An innocuous day was quickly turning into a messy fiasco.

Rowley’s mother had no other choice but to call the dependable Mario, the town’s plumber. In the background, as she held the phone to her ear, Rowley could hear his dad shouting “there’s just crap on tv” to which his mother suggested the simple solution of switching channels.

Mario, after hours of hard work, finally managed to fix the plumbing disaster but not without its cost. The bill came to a tidy sum of £17.76. The cost of fixing bad plumbing became Rowley's burden. His mother looked at him sternly and declared, “It is time for you to get a job, young man!”

After painstakingly combing through the local job advertisements, Rowley stumbled upon an opening at a local hair salon. Filled with trepidation but fueled by a newfound determination, he decided to give it a shot. After a brief introduction, he was thrown headfirst into the bustling hive of ongoing trims, touch-ups, and transformations.

His first client, Miss Harriet Dickens, was a bossy woman who wanted nothing more than a minor trim. In his wide-eyed nervousness, however couched by the determination to impress, Rowley gave her a drastic haircut. The salon fell silent as the magnitude of Rowley's action dawned on everyone.

To everyone's surprise, Miss Dickens didn't scream or throw a tantrum. Instead, she seethingly admonished Rowley for not keeping up with the local soap opera, Emmerdale. Rowley was taken aback but also relieved. His first venture wasn’t as bad as he thought it might be.

The next customer was none other than Rowley’s own father. Rowley concentrated, holding his breath as he took his father's long locks into his hands. His attention, however, slipped away disastrously. The hedge clippers he was using slipped from his control and made a sudden, sharp movement. The result was a ghastly scene from a horror movie, and his father's now severed head was indeed a gruesome sight. But it turned out, to his boss's joy, it entirely suited the Halloween-themed decor of the salon.

Rowley's day at the salon was gaining momentum, and soon he found himself giving a haircut to his friend Dipsy from Teletubbies. With one confident snip, Dipsy had the Afro he always wanted, and Rowley earned the seal of approval from Dipsy's foster father, Peter Griffin.

The final client to sit before Rowley that day was his other friend, Darwin—no longer a dehydrated fish, thanks to a universe mix-up. Darwin was hoping for a sophisticated cut to impress at an upcoming history presentation. However, Rowley's handiwork transformed Darwin's hair into an uncanny replica of a theme park, complete with the "Rowley rollercoaster," which amusingly accommodated resident hair lice.

Needless to say, the resulting haircut drew much teasing and laughter from Darwin’s classmates, adding yet another feather in Rowley's cap of outlandish hair styling. Nonetheless, all was not lost. At the end of the day, Rowley was paid exceeding well for his 'unique' range of services—much to his joy, he was paid in an abundance of pennies.

Once he reached home and accounted for all his earnings, he realised he had earned more than enough to pay off Mario. His mother, amused upon hearing the day's adventures from Rowley as she bathed him, admitted that this was an interesting turn of events. As the day ended, Rowley didn't seem so average anymore—he was Rowley, the Hair Dresser.

Rowley’s unusual style of hairdressing was remarkably creative, so much so that it earned its own reputation. The salon's customers, although apprehensive, started looking forward to what new 'adventure' would await them at their next appointment.