I decided I wanted purple hair - as below.
Despite the colour chart of possible outcomes on the box [the above being the lightest and therefore impossible on my natural hair], I instead ended up with... this.
I should probably point out that I live in Malta, a sun-blasted rock where there is no hiding brightness of any kind. Imagine a spotlight shining on that hair, and that's what my mane looked like.
With hindsight, I may have left the dye on too long.
Lesson 1: Always keep time via stopwatch or alarm, otherwise strange things may happen.
Even though that wasn't what I wanted or what I was expecting, at least it suited me and I loved it - which can't be said for what is still, to this day, the Epic Hair Fail of All Macs-Time. When I was 20, I went to a hairdresser for a cut and colour, and I wanted a drastic change. At the time, I had gone back to my natural dark brown to black, and my tresses were halfway down my back. Together, hairdresser and I decided on a colour, and feeling giddy with glee at the thought of being a coppery redhead with blonde highlights, I didn't think twice when I asked for short hair and then said 'Surprise me'. Oops.
I hoped to look like this.
I'll sketch the reality on Paint.
[5 minutes later...]
Apparently my skills on Paint are... frankly, a chimpanzee could do better, so I'll describe the horror instead. My hair was shaped into a closely cropped, face-framing... rectangle. I shit you not. No, I didn't think it was possible to shape curls into a rectangle either, but apparently you live and learn. And that wasn't the worst part! The blonde highlights came out perfectly, the copper red was beautiful and matched my eyes and complexion brilliantly. But *insert impending doom sound effects here* only 0.5mm of my roots took the colour. The rest of it remained dark brown. I looked well and truly ridiculous.
Lesson 2: Even professionals get things horribly wrong sometimes.
Fast-forward 6 years later to 2 days ago. By this time, I am addicted to having red hair, but due to time and money constraints [*cough* laziness *cough* bad budgeting sense *cough*] I put off going to a hairdresser or dyeing my hair as long as possible. This time, it took looking in the mirror and seeing my 2 inch regrowth making me look like I had clipped on a bunch of fake copper hair pieces onto near-black hair, only to have it slip down, to send me running to a pharmacy for my colour fix.
So I bought the hair dye I wanted, dyed my curls, and crossed my fingers for the processing time, hoping for a gorgeous deep red.
Instead...
Once again, I ended up with the wrong colour, but at least it's one I'm used to and which suits me. I went to work yesterday and asked my dear friend Hannah how my hair looked. I was perplexed when she said it was the same and that I still had roots showing, so I did the obvious thing and requested a photo [couldn't get hold of it for this post, alas]. Cue horror as I saw a halo of dark roots at the back of my head, easily the size of a side plate. I fixed it once I got home from work, thanks to my not quite patient but ever helpful mother, and I now have a full head of coppery hair, but I tell you I've not been so close to a full-blown panic attack since thesis time 2 years ago.
Lesson 3: Always get someone to help you when dyeing your hair to make sure you don't miss any bits and to avoid losing your sanity.
The reality is that I have as much bad luck at hairdressers as I do by my own hand, so I don't have a guarantee that crimes against my hair won't be perpetrated regardless who handles my future styles. Sometimes I think I'd be better off bald or with a pixie cut. I'd save a fortune on hair products and shower time.
Hmm... *eyes scissors thoughtfully*
I kid, I kid!
Seriously.
Sincerely, Macs
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