When I was in high school and just starting to shave, Bobby Poole enlightened me as to the nature of whiskers. They don't grow at a constant rate he told me, but rather they have two phases of rapid growth, the first phase beginning right after they've been cut, and then a second phase just before they're cut again.

(who was I to question a friend?)

And I confess that I have often wondered during all these intervening years just how many really stupid life decisions I might have avoided had I been only half as smart as Bobby Poole's whiskers.