My travel schedule is out of control and I can’t get an appointment to see my hair stylist until early May. This sucks because my blonde hair is very brassy. I can’t cut the orange hue out of my hair, no matter how much Aveda Blue Malva shampoo I use.
I’m also sad to report that my brownish-gray roots look stupid and pronounced.
I was in the same predicament when I worked for Pfizer. My long blonde hair was brassy, my roots were prevalent, and I was in the middle of traveling to several different Pfizer sites to talk about a revised bonus structure. I lived in Michigan at the time but had a stylist in New York City. I was on my way to Connecticut and had a night at home in Kalamazoo.
I told my husband, “I’m running to Walgreens to get a box of hair dye. I need to color these roots.”
Ken said, “Laur, you look fine.”
That’s what he always says, though. It’s his default reaction to everything. I could wear a CHOOSE LIFE t-shirt from 1982 and a pair of acid washed jeans and he wouldn’t bat an eyelash.
So I ran to Walgreens and grabbed a box of brown hair dye. Why brown? Why not. I hadn’t colored my own hair in 10 years — something I vowed to stop doing when I got a real job with a real paycheck — but I had plenty of experience from high school and college.
I thought, “What could go wrong?”
Well, I turned my hair green.
Not just any shade of green, mind you, but an ashy shade of green. It was almost gray.
I had an instant panic attack. In the midst of my meltdown, I decided that I should go back to Walgreens and get a second box of brown dye and try to go darker. That’s right. Because all I needed to do was cover that shit up. Unfortunately, I only made my hair a darker shade of green.
In retrospect, I would call it liver-green.
I had another problem. I had a presentation to deliver in Connecticut. My flight was scheduled to depart at 6:00, the presentation was at 10:00 AM, and I didn’t own a hat. Even if I owned a hat, I wouldn’t wear it. So I did what any thoughtful HR professional would do and I called in sick.
That’s right. I lied. “Cough cough. I have the flu.” Or something stupid.
Then I hauled my ass from Kalamazoo to Chicago and spent $425 at the Mario Tricoci on Michigan Avenue to have my hair dyed a deep, deep shade of brown. Then I worked for 12 months to get it back to a decent shade of blonde.
So if you see me over the next few weeks, please indulge my silly roots. I look better as a washed-out-blonde with dark roots than I do as a woman with green hair.
{ 21 comments… read them below or add one }
Laurie, So, if it’s any consolation, when I meet you at HRevolution (and I am looking forward to that!), you’ll see me with my fine drug store brand, personally dyed hair. When I sat down last year to figure out what had to go so I could retire before I’m 80 and put a kid through 7 years of pharmacy school, I said farewell to professional hair treatments and weekly manicures. So sad. I kept the weekly chair massage at work and one really good vacation per year. A girl’s gotta have some rewards for her hard work!
Something similar happened to an ex of my brother’s… only hers turned orange. I give him credit for trying to help her fix it! What we do for love…
Okay, Ladies. Before we have any more green hair fiascos – when going from blonde to brown, you must replace the red in your hair first; then do the brown shade. Voila! No green. I speak from experience (and a stylist friend who told me what to do 35 years ago when I went from blonde back to my natural color).
That was a cool-ass, punk rock move! Excellent advice!
Spending the $425 bucks must have sucked at first, but I’m sure it was worth it in the end…
Too funny! I used to go to mario triccoci when I lived in Chicago. Way too expenssive now! I still spend too much money on my hair and have the same problem as you do but now I live in Indiana where people are move forgiving. I have learned to forgive my hair too but I still can’t part with getting my hair well cut and colored. I blame it on my natural curl that I have learned to straighten every other day. I have learned to be ok with grown out roots but now I’m starting to get silver hairs and worry that I will look like a skunk like my grandmother did when she would dye her white hair brown and when it would grow out she looked like a skunk! I promised i would never let myself get that bad and I think this is why I still make sure to spend money on the hair! I’m sure you probably aren’t nearly to that point but my grandmother was not at all punk rock either!
Oh, I feel ya. I’m in the same spot right about now.
May I suggest that old standby, Jhirmack Silver Brightening Shampoo? It’s purple!
Circa 1990 and a burning desire to have my fine and naturally straight hair enhanced with a … body wave. Right on the tail of fresh highlights. Of course my friend the professional stylist was more than happy to pull out her chemistry set in her kitchen and get to work to “add volume” to my frail little strands… the day before a big interview for a job I really wanted. My hair turned out looking like Ramen Noodles. She was dumbfounded- for some reason I didn’t wasn’t surprised by that, and I made a mad dash to a mall salon to have some damage control done. It took months for my hair to recover. I got the job and she hasn’t laid a hand on anyone’s head since.
Jitterbug!
Every time I cheap out and dye my own hair, I’m always very, very sorry.
I can wait til I have white hair– I’ll go all Andy Warhol on everyone–!!!
Yup. Mine was purple for all the holiday photos one year. Everyone thought I’d returned to “that phase” from my college years when I did that stuff on purpose. And if the thought ever crosses your mind, don’t wax your own eyebrows either.
I’m with Average Jane. when I do it myself I’m always sorry. When I was a kid my hair was such a bright copper color that people accused my mom of dying my hair. As I got older it became a more normal red and now it’s almost brown — except for all the totally white ones which are almost all of them. My mom’s mom turned from beautiful red to totally awesome white by the time she was 40. Talk about elegant. That, unfortunately, is not me. And since reds are so hard to maintain it’s worth paying someone big bucks to keep it looking good. Until I’m in your situation: booked with back-to-back travel and no time for a hair appointment. Honestly. What we do to ourselves!
Wait – stonewashed jeans are wrong?
Oh, I totally feel your pain. My hair is naturally brown, but I apparently have a lot of red undertones. I tried to tone down the red once with an ash brown shade – boom, green hair. Ahhhhh! After having that expensive mistake fixed, I always go for color with blue undertones so that I end up neither red nor green.
If your blonde hair (and I’ve been blonde too, and magenta, and plum, and fire-engine red) goes brassy then you’ve got red in your brown hair. When I had my hair professionally streaked blond, the bleaching solution turned red – then they foiled my hair to get it back to a natural looking golden blond.
And I’d be the woman walking around sporting two streaks of gray on either side of my forehead when I can’t get a color in…it’s a cute look paired with my really pale skin and long, dark brown hair, kinda like I’m channeling Morticia Adams. [sigh] Sometimes it’s hard being a woman.
FYI for anyone who wants to try it at home, semi perm color is WAY safer, easier, gets better results and looks more natural. But after dying my own hair a different color every month in college (even did my own highlights a couple of times…once really good, once REALLY bad), I’m practically an expert on home hair dye.
Another don’t-try-this-at-home is waxing your legs. It hurt so bad I could only do one leg.
The only bad dye job I’ve ever had was the product of a Wal-mart visit at 2am after a fight with a stupid boy. The next morning I awoke to orange highlights in my hair. I’m talking fruit kind of orange too. Thankfully that mess washed out in a week.
I would imagine that any punk rock hr professional would be very content with green hair : )
@caryn you will be lovely. cannot wait!
@amy whoa. orange is bad.
@bev Where have you been all my life? Do you know what you just saved me in time and bad hair dye experiences???
@John spending $425 was painful!
@amyjo I miss living in kalamazoo and just blogging — standards of beauty are different.
@CJ I’m going to buy that TONIGHT.
@iknowtoo OMG, hilarious.
@bruno Hahahhahaha, i knew you’d love that.
@avgjane So true. Big regrets. BIG.
@mattymat that would be awesome
@China I know, I know. The economy would really die if we didn’t spend the money on ourselves.
@KD Not in Alabama. It’s still okay.
@charleen good advice re: eyebrows!
@low you need a hair dye site, too!
@suz word
@adowling hahahhahahaha, i know those post-fight walmart trips too well.
@joseph Uh, no.
Speaking as I stylist I have to say that almost all of the advice above is correct, especially the part from Bev, about “filling” your hair with the red first to get away from the green. But that can be tricky too, depending on your natural hair color, natural undertones and condition of your hair. I can’t tell you how many color corrections I have done on people, but I find it a fun challenge, and don’t dread it like most stylists do. The hardest part is dealing with how much damage is actually done to the hair itself. Also, I have no problem with people who choose to color their own hair. Some know what they are doing and some don’t. It’s just a matter of how some people literally destroy their hair by not doing it correctly and then expect a stylist to work miracles. Other people do a fine job.
To get rid of brassiness you do need something with purple in it, like CJ suggested. ARTec used to make a really good color depositing shampoo and the white violet might be the one to try. I think it’s still out there. But you have to be careful because you could get too purple with that, depending on how much you use it. (To me, that’s never a problem.) Those toning shampoos can be a bit drying though so condition appropriately. I know some people who use a Clairol purple shampoo in a pinch but I don’t know the name of it. It might be called Shimmer Lights.
As much as your dark new growth bothers you, it probably isn’t as noticeable to others as it is to you. Hey dark roots are punk, so go with it. I know, I know…it’s not professional, but it’s what you say when you open your mouth that will make the final impression.
Caryn – beauty school. Go to the beauty school for mani/pedi. (Not for haircut, though – experience is essential for a good haircut.) The beauty school by me charges $10 for a pedicure on Tuesdays.
You’ve been quoted!
http://qoddessquotesblogs.blogspot.com/2010/05/quotes-may-7-2010.html