Until now, I have never stuck with growing a beard past the “scruffy + 2 days” stage. I’m not sure why – my nickname is Fuzz and I’m half Croatian – growing hair is seemingly what I do best. A large portion of the other half of me, however, is Irish, so even though I have blondish/brownish hair, my face turns red like a Leprechaun whenever my beard gets longer than about an 1/8 inch.

Recently, however, the beard-growing planets aligned. The air turned cooler and the Brewers made it to the playoffs. Fate brought my beard and me together.

My wife hates it.

The other

day, she asked, “When are you going to shave off your beard?” My answer was, naturally, “Don’t taunt the beard. The beard has no timeline.” Her response, “Well, are you going to at least shave it off before church?” to which I responded, “Jesus has a beard. When he shaves his, I’ll shave mine.”

Yesterday, she pondered, “I hope the Brewers lose. Maybe then you’ll shave off your beard.” Dems fightin’ words.

I have been telling her that if she really wants me to shave it off, I will, but I will shave it ALL off. (I usually have a goatee.) The response to that is usually a shudder.

So…for now…the beard stays. For how long, I don’t know, I just hope it doesn’t mysteriously get removed in my sleep.