This story ranks among the top funniest Barron family tales.

It was 1977, and we were on our annual – any American family’s annual – summer vacation. Mom and Dad, Sarah Jo and Joe (known collectively as JoJoe), dragged us to see the usual boring stuff, like Civil War mansions and antique car shows, but they also knew we loved to play in the water at hotels and motels. On this trip, we stayed at one of the state-owned Oklahoma lodges. I don’t recall if it was Arrowhead Lodge or Eufala Lodge, but I will add that Arrowhead Lodge was later sold by the state and made into a drug treatment center.

For as much as we seemed to enjoy the pool, neither Dad nor I knew how to swim, so there was lots of bobbing around in the shallow end of the pool, frolicking and playing. Mom and Nicole knew how to swim. Nicole actually did swim, but Mom always refused because it would get her beauty-shop hair wet, and therefore ruined. Nicole and I kept encouraging her, and on this vacation, Dad promised that if Mom swam, he’d fix her hair as good as new.

Finally Mom capitulated, and had a great time swimming.

Back in our lodge room that evening, Dad set to work on Mom’s hair with a brush and a blow dryer, but within a few minutes it was obviously not working. It wasn’t coming out like Mom’s hair at all. It was coming out exactly like Dad’s hair. Watching this in the mirror, all four of us couldn’t help but laugh and laugh.

The next day, Mom went to the beauty shop.