Something it seems a lot of people are doing these days is giving themselves haircuts at home. After all, a lot of the salons and barbershops out there are still closed — not that our ever-growing hair cares a fig about that — so sometimes you've gotta take matters into your own hands.

However, if you're going that route, I highly advise against grabbing any old pair of scissors out of the kitchen drawer and cutting away. Generally speaking, they're simply not sharp enough to do the job without causing more damage than you were trying to fix in the first place. Instead, get yourself a pair of professional hair-cutting shears like these, which are wicked sharp and will help you get better results.

Now, I need to clear something up, because it's confused a lot of Amazon reviewers (mainly because it's not mentioned on the packaging itself): While these shears are made in China, they're comprised of Japanese 9CR stainless steel alloy, which is considered some of the best in the world.

The blades also sport a convex edge in the typical Japanese style, lending them a much finer, razor sharp edge that is more suited to hairdressing but comes with the tradeoff of being more susceptible to damage if you're not careful. And you really should be careful, because these things will cut you good if you don't watch it.

They offer a variety of models on Amazon — the differences between them are relatively minimal, to be honest — all of which cost a fraction of what you'd normally pay for professional-level shears (we're normally talking $200 and up, easily):

• B-V1 ($35)
• RB-V1 ($40)
• B-V2 ($40)
• RB-V2 ($45)
• S-V2 ($45)
• XC Combo ($20) — These are the cheapest pair because they have hard plastic handles rather than steel ones.