They grow so that we don’t have to

katieholmes.jpgI found out too late that this year’s Whiskerino had already started, and I was ineligible on account of being goateed at the time.

Cause I totally would’ve been up for a four-month beard-growing contest. There’s no part of that that doesn’t sound like a straight-up fun time explosion. Two or three weeks of being all itchy, followed by at least two months of not being able to wear shirts with collars or jackets with zippers. Getting hairs in your mouth. Finding stray threads, or bits of lint, or crumbs. Possibly grossest of all: beard dandruff.

And in my case: spending a few weeks looking like a werewolf in mid-transition, and then having half your face come out solid Gandalf-white before you’ve even hit 40. I usually can’t last more than three weeks before it drives me nuts and I have to get to trimming. And I think the longest I’ve gone is three months before I have to shave it all off. I spend the whole time being reminded that man evolved to use tools for a reason.

Of course, I suspect that the thing is really just an excuse for talented photographers to take wacky pictures of themselves. There’s some hilarious stuff out there; my favorites are from wiseacre photo (plus the official entries) and dubstyle (more here).

And really, isn’t it every guy’s right to make an ass of himself on the internet? Maybe next year I’ll have the stones to step up.