Purple Locks ~ A rather long tale of hair coloring under the influence of PMS

So I was feeling a little blue on New Year's Eve during the early day and decided I needed a little pick me up in the way of beauty. Never a good time to venture into new hair color technique territory, but hey, it's never stopped me before.

Some of you may know that I am a licensed beautician. And some of you may think to yourselves, "is that right." and not in an inquisitive tone but perhaps a sarcastic one. hee hee, I might have had one of those "is that right" moments on Saturday.

I was feeling a bit sorry for myself, a little irritated, a little wistful and more than a little PMSy. So while I shoved the last of my Hershey Kisses in my mouth I headed downstairs where I keep my "beauty shop". I had enough color for a root touch up but felt like a little something more jazzy for the new year. I found some demi color in a great shade of red violet and some bleach... perfect. For those of you who don't know, demi color lasts longer than a semi permanent color but does wash out eventually.

Slopping my color on my roots I head back upstairs to suddenly decide to sweep and mop the kitchen ( I get easily distracted). So by the time I head back down to put the red violet on the rest of my hair, it was nearly time to take off my root color. Pfffft... 45 minutes is just a suggestion, right?

I go back down and add the demi color. I do this in the basement because I have 3 big splotch marks on my bathroom floor now from previous PMS moments :( (really it should stand for Passing Moments of Sanity) ooooo, the bottle looks a really pretty shade of purple I noticed as I took it upstairs after the color was on my hair.

I wash my hair out upside down in my tub and again notice oooo what a pretty shade of violet! Then it dons on me. Hmmmm.. This is not only a little purple but it's pretty dark too. Oh well. It's just hair.

So I get it all washed out and look in the mirror. Great. I now look like Dracula with a dark widow's peak on my pasty forehead. Apparently over an hour might be a tad too long for regular hair color. Oops. Dang and I don't have bangs to hide it either. Hmmm... scissors? I had enough sense at that moment to think, mmm. no. not yet. Then I notice wow, my hair is pretty dark. Where's that bleach? Back downstairs I go.

I've got this Matrix bleach given to me by my friend. She was nice enough to give me a little bag so I could sample it before I purchased a tub of it. Great - except there are no instructions. Each line of hair care use their own gimmick of ratios and I wasn't familiar with Matrix so I try to call my friend. Dang. It's New Year's Eve, I hate to bother her. I try to call the beauty supply house, closed. I looked online. The ratio or recipe if you will, is a closely guarded secret that I could not find anywhere even after registering in as a hairdresser. They weren't even civil enough to post their phone number. Bastards.

Meh... Just do it I thought. So I did. I threw the bleach powder in a bowl, added some peroxide and squeezed a big glob of the toner in. Mixed it all up and thought that looked pretty good. Great! Now I just have to try to foil my own hair. Ick. Not easy. Things would be so much easier if I could just take my head off and do it, then pop my head back on. Yeah, not happenin. 

So I managed to get it slopped on all the while forgetting to put on gloves. (Now I have sandpaper fingers.) I remember reading online that you can add heat and it would speed up the process. So I think I'm in a hurry and get under my dryer. After what I feel is 2 minutes, I get up and look in the mirror expecting to see blonde. Nope. Nothing. Get back under and turn heat all the way up. 10 minutes later get up and look again half expecting hair to come out with foil. Nope, nothing still. I figured the peroxide must be too old. So I give up and go upstairs to wash it all out and give myself a proper shower. Wow, again with the dark purple washing over me. hmmm.

After the shower I notice some high lights. No too bad I'm thinking, while not noticing my purple hair. (Hey, it was wet) I get ready and we all go to friends to play cards and have an adult beverage or two. When we get there, my friend's husband says wow, your hair. Uh. Really? Notice my husband and kid didn't say a thing to me about it. I think my hair could be on fire and Daryl wouldn't say anything about it. So I just laugh and say yeah, I colored it today and they just look at me and smile. I guess that's what one does when there really isn't something nice to say. haha

Fast forward to the next day and I finally see my hair in the daylight. Holy Shit. I've got dark Gothic purple hair with pink hi-lights. Happy Fucking New Year to me. Please excuse my language but it was a bit of a shock and I am secretly a potty mouth.

So now I look like a short fat pasty troll with blackish purple hair and pinky stained streaks around my face wearing dark red lipstick and pale white skin. I look like a garish Halloween trainwreck. Have you ever had those Aha moments when you really see something in a different light? Well this was mine. And if it weren't so dang funny I'd be crying.

It has since lightened up a little bit and I've calmed down. It's not seeming quite so purple, it's more of the dark red that I wanted in the first place. And the streaks are not so pink more coppery now, which is good. I wish I had thought to take my picture when I saw myself in the daylight for the first time. Scary. This might be my new get up for Halloween 2012.

I want to wish all of you a Happy New Year, since this is my first post of 2012. I hope this year is better for all of us and brings joy, inspiration and creativity.