If monkeys are our closest relatives in genetic terms, why are we so often the recipients of medical treatments perfected on mice. I have no idea.

Saturday morning. After sleeping late, I awakened to the weekend edition of the Today Show. Twenty-something year-old women, all trying to talk over each other with no semblance of conversation. Trump, blah-blah-blah., Ginsberg, blah-blah-blah. New cure for baldness. Ah. Something worth hearing. In my bleary eyed-and eared-state, it sounded plausible, though I missed the details. Some researcher had pasted rat stem cells on the back of a bald mouse, and it had miraculously re-grown hair. And the work had been done by scientists at Emory Polytechnic near us in Atlanta.

I was still pondering this revelation as I dressed in my Saturday flannel shirt and headed by instinct in the direction of Ball Ground and the famous  Three Brothers Barbecue where I would drown my sorrows in pork and sauce, ice tea and home-made soft-serve  ice cream. There are no dark or romantic corners. Just food, good any time of the day.

I saw Woodrow Stretcher’s Lincoln Navigator with police-style emergency lights on top as I parked, so I was not surprised to see him sitting alone and facing the door. You may remember that Woodrow is the metal detector operator at the state capitol building; and, he is an important source of leaks to the press on the doings of our state legislators. You may also recall that Woodrow is the organizer of our local chapter of the UFO Watchers of America. Last time we had lunch together, he was about to go public with his theory that dogs are aliens left behind by their ancient space-traveling ancestors to watch over humans. Woodrow watches a lot of TV.

Woodrow motioned for me to come on over and sit. I had not seen Stretcher since he had been on his all-chicken diet that had set him to clucking during pauses in the conversation.

By the time the barbecue arrived, which was not long, Woodrow had told me in a near whisper about being in a special free medical experiment at Emory Polytechnic. He heard about it on late-night TV. Men with moderate to severe baldness were asked to participate in a new treatment study.

As he mumbled on, I suddenly realized that Woodrow was not assigned to the placebo group. His hair, once an unruly heap of Irish red, had thinned remarkably in the past year or two, but—that was it!.  His hair had filled in and was now close cropped and brown! Not just brown, but a peculiar brown, with longer, darker hairs underlayed by very fine-haired, smoother, lighter … fur?

I knew then that Stretcher would never need another haircut. His fur would always remain at a genetically ordained short length; and, it would never show signs of gray. As he bit into his barbecue sandwich, he said he was not entirely pleased with the outcome of the experiment.

When he looked up from his food, I noticed other results of his treatment. Around his nostrils were long, stiff, white hairs that were mobile and telegraphed his every thought, like an actor’s face in an old silent movie.  His nose curled in a way new to me. It was crinkling and wiggling, involuntarily, and his front teeth peaked out below his drawn upper lip.  He announced that he was thinking of withdrawing from the research study for the genetic regrowth of hair. Not wishing to hurt his feelings, I withheld comment.

I vowed to stay away from the Three Brothers Barbecue for a while. Maybe, I will watch reruns of Dog Tails on Saturday mornings and eat toaster waffles instead of going out.