If you know me in Real Life (as opposed to this fake, imaginary life we all have on the internets), you may want to prepare yourself for the fact that next time you meet me, I’ll be speaking a little differently.

More specifically, I’ll be speaking like a drunk person. I promise I won’t actually be drunk. Or, OK, maybe I will be drunk, who knows? But even if I’m NOT drunk, I’ll still sound like I am, and that’s because today I picked up my new Invisalign tray for my lower teeth and the first tray for my uppers.  Because obviously being me wasn’t enough of a challenge already.

I hadn’t originally intended to have Invisalign for my top teeth. They’re actually quite straight, but I do have a gap between two of them (Caused by my old nemesis The Peg Tooth), and I had assumed that I was stuck with this gap for the rest of my life, mostly because that’s what every dentist I’d ever spoken to had told me. “You’ll have this gap forvever!” they’d say cheerfully, and I accepted that this was so, and prepared to spend the rest of my life hating that freaking gap between my teeth. Then I decided to get Invisalign, and the dentist was all “We’ll have that gap closed in no time, and all it will cost you will be every penny you have!”" so naturally I said, “Sign me up for that right away, my good man!”

Today was the day designated for my teeth to begin their journey towards each other, and, me being me, I was feeling quite nonchalant about it. “Am Invisalign expert,” I thought smugly, as I settled down into the chair. “Am not even feeling like I’m going to gag when I wake up every morning now –  will be no problem!” And I continued thinking this right up until the moment when the top tray was snapped into place, and I realised that I sounded like a drunk person. GAH.

The dentist and his assistant very kindly managed to conceal their laughter until I left the surgery, as did the receptionist who relieved me of the rest of the money in my bank account. Terry, however, was not so kind, and has spent most of the morning alternating between laughing outright and trying to trick me into saying words with lots of sibilants in them. “What would you say is the best sunscreen?” he’ll ask. “SPF 66 or SPF6?”

I’m told the whole “speaking like a drunkard” thing will last for about 24 hours, after which I will apparently get used to it. So far, I have my doubts about that, and think that, knowing my luck, it’s more likely that I’ll just speak like this forever, even when the Invisalign is removed. I’m having to speak veeeerrrryyy sllllooooowwllly. Like. I’m. Talking. To. An. Idiot.  Or like I am a cyborg. I’m also drooling. Yes, drooling. Just a nice image for you to end your Friday afternoon on, there. I hope no one was eating while they read this…

* For the benefit of the people who always take everything I say literally, I am exaggerating here. The “closing the gap” thing is fairly straightforward, and therefore much less expensive than most Invisalign treatments, so it’s not quite costing me ALL my money. Just most of it.

Yesterday afternoon, after a hard morning’s shopping,  Terry I decided to go to our favourite local restaurant for lunch.

Well, we got there, sat down and the waitress took our order. Everything was just peachy. In the middle of the table, though, there was a candle, and next to the candle, there was a giant, paper flower. Both of these were directly in my line of sight, and obscuring my view of Terry, so I picked them both up and moved them to the side of the table.

And, in doing so, I set the flower on fire.

When I say “on fire”, I don’t mean, “It was smoking slightly around the edges.” No, we’re talking big, dramatic, “OMG WE ARE ALL GOING TO DIE!” flames. Terry grabbed the flower and frantically started blowing on it to put them out, and the look of sheer panic on his face, coupled with the fact that he was holding a giant, burning flower… well, people, I’m ashamed to admit that the first thought that went through my mind was, “Damn, I wish I had my camera!”

Anyway, Terry managed to get the flames out, and we continued with our (very pleasant) lunch, after which I had my first experience of removing and inserting my Invisalign in a public place. Which was… yeah.

I managed to get it out OK, by dint of ducking under the table on the pretext of getting something out of my handbag, and quickly whipping the thing out and into its case. This was fairly easy, because in the last week I’ve become quite the expert at getting the brace in and out, and as I was, um, under the table at the time, only a midget would have seen me do it.

Getting it back in, however, was not quite so easy, because before replacing the brace, both teeth and brace have to be thoroughly cleaned, and as we weren’t planning on going straight home after lunch, I knew they’d both have to be cleaned in the bathroom of the restaurant.

Now, I don’t really know why this was bothering me. I knew from previous visits that these are nice, spotlessly clean bathrooms, but let’s face it, it’s still a public toilet, and, I don’t know, there’s just something a bit personal about cleaning your teeth, isn’t there? Something that makes you prefer to do it in private, rather than with the audience of a small, but curious pre-teen girl, say?

The girl was washing her hands at one of the two basins in the restroom when I entered. Knowing that children generally find me a figure of fun anyway, and that people around here tend to have a very sensitive “weirdness” detector (i.e. they think just about everything is “SOOOO weird!”, I decided not to whip out my toothbrush in front of her. “No problem,” I thought, “I’ll just quickly use the bathroom, and by the time I’m done, she’ll have finished washing her hands, and I’ll be free to clean my teeth in private.”

But no. The girl continued to wash her hands the whole time I was in the cubicle, and was still washing them when I finally emerged a few minutes later. As I took my place at the basin next to her and started to wash my hands, she quickly ducked into the cubicle I’d just vacated, and then almost instantly re-emerged to begin washing her hands all over again. Either there was some kind of OCD hand-washing thing going on there, or my appearance had instantly tripped her weirdness detector into overdrive, and she was lingering deliberately in the hope that I’d do something to entertain her.

Well, I had no choice. Time was a-wastin’, and the brace had to go back in, so I resignedly got out my toothbrush and toothpaste and did the business, while Pre-Teen watched me with undisguised curiosity throughout. I suspect this is something I’m just going to have to get used to as I continue with my Invisalign journey, for in the same way that The Others hound me through shops, all crowding into whichever small, obscure corner I’ve found to surreptitiously try on a jacket or something, I just KNOW that I’m doomed to spend the next six months cleaning my teeth in public restrooms, while all of my fellow diners crowd in behind me to watch. I’m not sure why I expected any different, to be honest.

In slightly brighter news, I took a dress to my mum’s house for alteration on Satuday, and successfully managed to bring it back home again without dropping it randomly and never seeing it again. Baby steps, people, baby steps…

A couple of people on Twitter have asked me about the Invisalign clear brace I mentioned a few weeks ago, and as yesterday was The Big Day, i.e. the day I got my first brace, I thought now was the perfect time to update about it. Yes, all I need is the encouragement of TWO PEOPLE, and off I go! Hi, both of you!

So! Yesterday I got up bright and early and headed off to the dentist to have a large lump of plastic inserted into my mouth. As Monday mornings go, I’ve had better, but I’ve also had a whole lot worse, it has to be said. The visit started off with an in-depth examination of my teeth and, bizarrely, of my chin and neck. “This is just to check for cancer!” said the dentist brightly, massaging my lymph nodes. Clearly he didn’t get the “Amber is a hypochondriac” memo, but it’s OK, I got the all clear. Phew!

Next we moved onto the insertion of the brace, and actually, it all went much more smoothly than I was expecting. I’d been a little bit worried about how easy it would be to insert and remove the Invisalign: I had images of me standing tugging at it for hours, and ending up with the thing wedged half-in/half-out of my mouth, but while it’s a little bit fiddly, and will obviously take a bit of getting used to, I managed it without too much trouble. Phew, again!

Having got the thing in, I was really impressed by how, um, invisible it is. “Where is it?” asked Terry when I got back into the car after my visit and bared my teeth at him like a vampire. “Are you not wearing it?” Which is really all the evidence you need that yes, it really is unobtrusive. You’d have to be standing really close to me to notice it, and you’d also have to be actively looking for it, so it does live up to its name and reputation in that respect. This is a very good thing, because having spent the past few weeks thinking things over while I was waiting for the brace to be made up, I decided to go ahead and have one on my upper teeth, too. Well, in for a penny and all that…

The good news is that I won’t actually need to wear it for as long as I’d initially thought: the dentist reckons six months will be enough, give or take a few weeks to allow for my three week holiday in June, plus the fact that I wasn’t able to get appointments exactly two weeks apart. (You’re supposed to get a new brace every two weeks, but it’s a really busy dental practice, so some of mine will be longer than that.)

The bad news is that it is a bit of a lifestyle adjustment. So far the brace isn’t causing me any discomfort: it feels a bit odd, sure, and it’s kinda weird to think that I’ll be wearing it 22 hours per day for the next six months (I can’t stop running my tongue over the top of it and thinking, “I wonder how long NOW until I can take it out?”), but hopefully it won’t be too long before I get used to it. No, the main issue is the coffee. Yes, coffee. You see, the Invisalign has to be removed when you eat, and when you drink anything other than water. Now, I’m not too concerned about the eating: I’m actually not much of a snacker (although, having said that, it’s amazing how often since I got it I’ve found myself thinking “Hmm, I think I’ll just eat a… oh.”), and because I work from home, it’s not too big a deal for me to remove it for my main meals and then put it back in.

But the coffee. Oh, the coffee! Coffee is a big no-no when you’re wearing Invisalign, because not only is it likely to stain the clear plastic, the hot liquid could also damage it. But I’m a bit of a caffeine addict, so giving up is going to be hard. I’m determined to do it, because I want straight teeth more than I want a cup of coffee, and also because I’m paying too much for this to not follow the instructions to the letter, but it will be hard. Luckily I don’t have to go totally cold turkey: I can still drink coffee when the brace is out, I just can’t have my usual multiple mugs of the stuff during the day. This will be good for my health, if not my sanity.

Other than that, so far, so good. Well, other  than the fact that when I was getting ready for bed last night I was so busy focusing on the important business of removing the brace (to clean my teeth) and then re-inserting it that I totally forgot that other important part of my night-time ritual: removing my contact lenses. Ouchy.

T minus six months to go…

A couple of weeks ago, I went to see the dentist. It was really awful, actually. I had to get up really early, and sit in rush hour traffic for an hour, and not even for the sake of something good, like an early flight to somewhere sunny, say, or the Harvey Nichols sale, but for the DENTIST. GOD.

Now, as I’m sure I’ve mentioned here before, I’m not actually afraid of the dentist, which is  really quite strange, because I’m scared of just about everything else. I can’t even drive past a hospital or the doctor’s office without breaking into a cold sweat, but when it comes to the dentist I’m all, “Whatever. Drill a hole right through my head if you have to, just don’t charge me for it.”

No, I’m not afraid of the dentist, but I AM afraid of being forced to spend money on something I can’t put on my feet or hang in my closet. And as it turned out, I was RIGHT to fear that, because this trip to the dentist, it was not cheap. But I’m getting ahead of myself, here. First, let me tell you what the dentist did to me on that cold and frosty morning:

1. Tied a “bib” around my neck.

2. Put a huge pair of safety goggles on my eyes.

3. Instructed me to “grin like a maniac”. OK, those weren’t his exact words, but he basically got me to pull my lips back from my teeth and do this kind of maniacal grin, with my teeth bared like I was starring in a teen horror movie. (As the horror element, I hasten to add, not the teen element.) For full effect, I also opened my eyes really wide and put on this “Hi! I’m insane!” expression, although I’m sure that wasn’t absolutely necessary.

4. Took photos of me like this. In a really high resolution. PHOTOS.

5. Put said photos onto a computer (a wide-screen computer, naturally), and blew them to their full size, so my crazed Face-of-a-Killer took up the whole screen, and then made me look at them.

From this, you will perhaps have deduced that this visit was not so much about the health of my teeth (Which are healthy! And strong! In fact, I could probably have used them to chew my own leg off, if I’d wanted to, and at that stage I kind of DID want to, if only to give myself something a little less painful to think about than the images on the screen.) but about the appearance of them. Which is… crooked. And which is why my dentist wanted to take close-up photos of my teeth and then force me to look a them. Actually, it was a cunning move on his part, because let me tell you, once you’ve seen yourself in THAT much detail, you’re going to agree to just about anything anyone suggests to make it all better.

Which is why I’m getting Invisalign. (Which is an “invisible” brace, for those of you who couldn’t be bothered clicking the link.)

That wasn’t the only thing the dentist suggested to me, of course. In fact, we had a long, long chat about all of the options, and what we finally decided was that I would basically give him all my money, and in return he would destroy the images he’d taken of me that morning give me straighter teeth. I will only need one brace, for my lower teeth, and the way this system works is that I get a new version of it every two weeks, until the job is done, which will be in about nine months time, apparently. So, basically it’s like I’m giving birth to… teeth. Which is totally the kind of thing that would happen to me, isn’t it?

And when I finally left the room? I was still wearing my “bib” and had the imprint of the safety goggles all around my eyes. Great!

(I just wanted to add to this, that I spent a lot of time researching this and looking into all of the different options available, so I do know all of the pros and cons of Invisalign, and am totally aware of what I’m getting into. So please, no, “My aunt’s neighbour’s cat’s wife had Invisialign, and OMG, all of her teeth fell out and then she DIED!” stories, although obviously if you’ve had one of these braces yourself, I’d be interested to know how you found it!)

Edited to add: I should have made it clearer in this post that I actually went to the dentist to discuss ways of straightening my teeth: that was the purpose of the visist, so it wasn’t like I went in for a check-up and came out with a brace. Having re-read it, I realise that’s how it sounds, so apologies for any confusion!

When I wrote about my shoe collection earlier this week, Madeline had an interesting question for me. Well, it was interesting to me, anyway, because it was about mascara, and I find almost EVERYTHING about mascara interesting. Madeline said:

“ Now, i’ll throw a really hard question to you: how many individual tubes of mascara do you have? I know now you’ll be counting till tomorrow (i’m evil, i know )”

Oh yeah: THAT. The mascara. Oh my holy hell, the mascara:

THE MASCARA

Oh, hai, everyone! My name’s Amber, and I’m a mascara addict.  Actually, in my defence, I have to point out that at least half of the FOURTEEN TUBES OF MASCARA you see before you were sent to me as review samples, so I didn’t actually go out and buy all of them. I mean, I may be crazy, but I’m not THAT crazy. Well, not yet, anyway.

My addiction to mascara has been with me since my early teens. It began at roughly that point life when you start to become aware of your appearance, and one day you look into the mirror, and think, “Damn, who stole my eyelashes, WHO?” In my case, no one stole my eyelashes: they do exist, but, as is the case with many redheads, they’re so pale that they may as well NOT. I guess the correct term for them would be “strawberry blonde”, but mine are more blonde than strawberry, and if I wasn’t wearing mascara, and you were standing close enough to see (or rather NOT see) my lashes, you would probably think I was some kind of half human/half reptile hybrid, and you would call up Will Smith and ask him to take me down.

That would never happen, though, because there is basically NEVER a time when I’m not wearing mascara. (And also because if you ever try standing that close to me, I will cut you. I really hope you’re reading this, woman at the gym who got onto the treadmill right next to mine yesterday when there were TEN OTHER COMPLETELY EMPTY TREADMILLS AVAILABLE… ) Seriously, my mascara consumption is the stuff of legend. When I lived in halls of residence at university, the fire alarm in our building would frequently go off in the middle of the night, and we’d all have to pile outside to stand in the freezing cold until the fire brigade arrived to switch it off again. With just a few short minutes to prepare myself for this ordeal, my choice was simple: I could either throw on some clothes, or I could throw on some mascara. That’s why, every single time that fire alarm went off, I would be found standing shivering outside in my dressing gown: but by God, my eyelashes looked marvelous.

These days, of course, I dye my lashes, so I’m less likely to be mistaken for an alien, should anyone ever see me without makeup.  Dying lashes only changes the colour of them, though: it doesn’t lengthen them, or curl them, or volumise them, or do any of the other wonderful things mascara can do. This was the truth I learned as a young teenager, when I would leave for school in the morning completely bare-faced, and mysteriously manage to arrive there with half of the Cover Girl counter on my face. My plan, if my parents ever found out about this, was to claim to have been mugged by a makeup artist. Because, seriously THAT’S WHAT IT LOOKED LIKE.

That’s why, throughout my formative years, my most frequently asked question wasn’t “How many pairs of shoes do you have?” but “Are you a drag queen?”

It’s also why I have a Sephora loyalty card, even although I don’t live in a country they deliver to. GOD.

[Important Disclaimer: I wrote this post in a misguided attempt to be funny. Almost all of the posts I've ever written on this site are supposed to be entertaining. I don't actually care about the "scabby lips" comment, and I would've thought that was obvious, but judging by the first two comments on this post, apparently not, and apparently people are reading this post and thinking I'm all angst-ridden about it. I'm not. It was supposed to be light-hearted - I found these two photos at the weekend and thought they would make an amusing follow-up to my post last week. I'm a bit blown-away by the fact that people are reading it as anything other than that, to be honest, but there you go.]

That ‘Bitchy McBicherston’ post? That was all, “No scabby lips here, folks, move along now, nothing to see!”?

Yeah, you’re right: it was a clear case of The Blogger Doth Protest Too Much. I was hoping to throw you all off the scent and make you forget about my scabby lips, because it’s true, folks: I have, at various times in my life, had “like scabs”. And I’m SO TIRED OF ALL THE LIES!

Exhibit A:

Taken back when we used to live on the ranch. Man, how them prairie dogs used to howl! AOOoooOOO!

Now, you can’t really see it too well, but that? Is a Like Scab. On my lip. Yes, it’s true! This was my nursery school (kindergarten) picture, and from this point on, it just got worse. Much worse. Witness:

Exhibit 2:

(oh, shush. I was “growing into myself”.)

Aside: as well as revealing that I do, indeed, have Like Scabs on my lips, this has also been a useful excercise in proving to myself why I should never, ever get a fringe, ever again. Because I do That Thing? That Thing with the mussing of the fringe? And the creation of a Gateway Through the Fringe, a Portal to Another Dimension, perhaps? And every single time the school photographer was due to take our photos, my mother would see me off to school in the morning and she would BEG me to please brush my fringe before the photo was taken. She would BEG me. Sometimes my teachers would grab me as I exited the classroom en route to the photographer’s room, hold me down and BRUSH MY HAIR. But it was all in vain, because just as the shutter on the camera was about to close, I would reach up and I would MUSS IT ALL UP and create a Gateway. And there was absolutely nothing anyone could do about it.

Not that it really mattered, though. Not with the GIANT SCAB on my lip. The GIANT SCAB that would appear every single time we had school photographs taken, and I am not joking. Every. Single. Time.

This proud tradition of Having a Cold Sore During Every School Photograph was one I carried all the way through to university, and, indeed, to the day I graduated. Our graduation ball was the night before the ceremony itself, and I, of course, had spent many a long night or year planning what I would wear. When I was in first year at university I lived in Halls of Residence, which was where I met my friend Stephanie. They rent out rooms in these halls during the holidays, and Stephanie and I thought it would be fun to see if we could stay in our old rooms on the night of the ball. The University were happy to comply with this request, so on the day of the ball we checked in, had lunch etc, and then headed off to our respective rooms to get ready for the Big Night.

Our other friend, Morag, wasn’t going to the ball, but she decided to keep me company while I got ready, so we went up to the room and I headed off to the shower while Morag hung out in the room. I still don’t know what happened that day. I went into the shower looking normal. Well, as normal as it gets for me. The second I stepped out of the bathroom, though, Morag took one look at me and gave an almighty shriek. “WHAT’S THAT ON YOUR LIP?!” she said. And without even looking, I knew.  I knew it was “Like Scabs”. The Coldsore O’Doom. It had returned for a final fling, and I don’t know how it did it, but somehow it had managed to burst from my lip and grow to its full size WHILE I WAS IN THE SHOWER.

Which is actually quite impressive when you think about it.

Of course, there was absolutely nothing I could do to disguise the Like Scab that night, and that’s why there are no photos of me at my graduation ball. Luckily it had gone down enough by the next morning that I was able to slap some concealer on it to make sure that it didn’t make an appearance in my graduation photos. (It didn’t really matter, though, because I managed to close my eyes/look drunk in almost every single one of them.)

The only slight surprise in all of this was that it was Like Scabs that ruined my graduation ball, and not a Second Head. I had been expecting a Second Head, you see, so the Like Scab was a surprise, and not a welcome one.

In the years that have passed since then, the Second Head HAS managed to surpass the Like Scabs as the main Harbinger O’Doom in my life, so I HAD hoped my reputation as Ol’ Scabby Lips would have died out by now. But I reckoned without Lil’ Bitchy, who has OUTED me, who managed to see right through my smooth-lipped facade and see that here was a girl who had grown up with Like Scabs on her lips.

The truth will set me free.

(*Note: ha, gotchya! Of course I’m not giving up blogging about my hair! Because what else would I blog about? No, seriously?)

Well, The Internet has spoken on the important issue of What I Should Do With My Stupid Hair, and it seems the Internet is firmly in favour of me cutting it all off. Or a big chunk of it, anyway. Like, really in favour of that.

Naturally, this has given rise to several small but intense moments of paranoia today, as I’ve thought to myself. “OMG, The Internet must really, really hate my hair the way it is now, if it’s this enthusiastic about the idea of me cutting it off! Wah!” But who am I to resist The Internet? So (drumroll)…

I’ve booked an appointment with my hairdresser for this Saturday. I know! I was amazed they could fit me in that quickly too – yay for the recession and people choosing to cut their hair themselves or something! (Note: joking. Also, never cut your hair yourself, kids, that way madness lies. Trust one who knows. )

I’m still not totally sure what I’m going to have done.  I’m pretty sure the length will be considerably shorter, but, having re-examined the hair in the cold light of day (why yes, I DO spend too much time thinking about this!), new evidence has come to light, namely the fact that the layers around the front actually start at CHIN LEVEL. These are the most troublesome bits of all, so even if I go to shoulder length (NO. I WILL NOT BE GOING TO CHIN LENGTH. ABSOLUTELY NOT. UH-UH.) I will still face a mighty tussle every morning to coax these layers into submission.

Clearly, getting a fringe is out of the question. I repeat: is OUT. OF. THE. QUESTION so, well, I have no idea what I’m going to do about that. I think I’ll probably just not think about it until I’m actually sitting in the Chair O’Doom, wearing one of those huge, unflattering capes, and then ask for a fringe anyway.

(I’m kidding about the fringe.)

(Probably)

Meanwhile, Terry had lots of fun today making me look like “a mutant” (his words) with Photoshop. I’m particularly amused by the mad skillz he has employed to draw in the part of my sweater which was covered by my hair in the original photo. I promise I don’t ACTUALLY have a hunchback. Well, not so as you’d notice…

Almost 100% certain I’ll be going with the one on the bottom right…

(These all have about 5″ taken off the bottom, by the way. Except the,er, Bichon cut, obviously…)

Say you’d had a really bad haircut. A haircut so bad, in fact, that even now, months later, you’re still growing it out, and while it may not look too bad to the naked eye, only you (and now the five or so people who read your blog) know how much time you have to spend trying to wrestle it into submission every morning. (Clue: a LOT of time.)

Say you know that, at the current rate of progress, you still have quite a few months to go before your hair will return to anything like “normality”.

Would you:

a) Say, “To hell with it!”, make an appointment with the hairdresser and have it cut to shoulder length (or, OK, maybe just below that), thus getting rid of most (but not all) of the mullet-like layers in one fell swoop, but leaving your hair the shortest it’s been since you were about 14. And you’re really not sure how you’re going to feel about that…

b) Say, “To hell with it!”, leave it to continue growing out for another month (even although some mornings you’d like to rip it clean out of your head) and spend the money on shoes instead.

c) Take the sensible-but-boring approach of getting it cut, but only having a couple of inches taken off, so you will continue your progress towards normal, non-layered hair, but slowly.

d) Get a fringe.*

Your feedback on this most important of issues would be appreciated.

*Note: I’m kidding about the fringe. Probably.

One morning, back when I was a teenager, I woke up with more than the usual amount of heads.

There was my original head, of course – the one on my shoulders, that had been there when I went to sleep. But now there was another, second head, rising triumphantly out of the exact middle of my forehead, a little like an illustration of Zeus giving birth to the Goddess Athena.

Of course, I rushed immediately to the mirror, where I was only slightly reassured to discover that this was not, in fact, a second head, but merely a spot. Oh, but what a spot it was! Although resembling a head in terms of its size and general shape, it had no head of its own, which meant that it couldn’t be deflated by means of squeezing. (Not that I would do such a thing, I hasten to add, for the beauty magazines are forever telling us never to squeeze spots, and of course I do EVERYTHING the beauty magazines tell me. Ahem.)

Instead, it just rose up out of my forehead, loud and proud: it was as hard as a rock, and there was nothing – and I do mean NOTHING – I could do to disguise it. Concealer only seemed to make the spot more prominent, and although I did seriously consider just slapping on a sticking plaster and pretending I’d hurt myself (after all, people are used to me being a clumsy fool, but a second head is just plain alarming), my mum talked me out of this course of action, and so it was that I was forced to go out into the world that day, and for the two or three days that followed, looking like a genetic experiment that had gone badly wrong.

(After two or three days, the Second Head deflated slightly, leaving me merely looking like Buddha, with a red dot in the exact centre of my forehead.)

As traumatic as my time with two heads was, I comforted myself with the knowledge that it was unlikely to happen again. Obviously, though, I was wrong about that, and from that day forth, every time I had a special event of some kind to attend, I could absolutely guarantee that the Second Head would return to attend the event with me, always appearing in the same position in the middle of my forehead, and each time looking even larger and more alarming than the last. The most notable occurrence of the Second Head: my first day in my new job as a journalist, when I was introduced to my future colleges looking like there were two of me.

(Strangely, my method of dealing with these situations has always been the same: I point out the Second Head to people before they have an opportunity to notice it for themselves.  And, I mean, I would HOPE no one would actually be insensitive enough to mention it, but on the occasion of me starting my new job, the Second Head was SO prominent and bizarre looking that I felt I had to go around introducing myself to everyone with the words, “Hello, I’m Amber, and no, I’m not deformed, that’s just a massive spot on my forehead. Horrible, isn’t it?”)

Anyway, so birthdays, parties, dates, holidays – all have been marked by me having more than the usual number of heads. In fact, there are some people I only ever see socially who probably think I was born like that, such is the reliability of the Head. Lately, though, a powerful new player has entered into the game I like to think of as “Let’s Spoil Amber’s Fun In Any Way We Can”, and if you’ve been reading this site for the last couple of months, you’ll probably know of what I speak. No, it’s not the Haircut O’ Doom, (although that’s fairly reliable too), it’s the fact that I am guaranteed to get the cold or flu the day before any event I’m expecting to enjoy. See “Our Honeymoon“, “Christmas” and “That Time We Went to Tenerife and I Thought I Had Pneumonia” for evidence of this.

Lucky, I am not.  At least, not when it comes to getting through supposedly happy occasions without either feeling like hell or looking like hell.

This Saturday, then, Terry and I had decided to throw a little party for some of our friends.  We were both looking forward to seeing everyone, so naturally, as the day approached the main question occupying my mind was this: what would it be this time? Would I be either:

a) horribly disfigured by the coming of a Second Head?

or

b) almost totally incapacitated by the cold/flu/other illness?

Can you guess which one it was, folks? That’s right: IT WAS BOTH OF THEM! A double-whammy! Not only did I wake up on Friday morning with a raspy throat and runny nose, I woke up on Saturday morning with my old friend The Second Head in its customary place in the middle of my forehead! AAAAAARRRRGGHHHH!

I was fairly lucky in that the cold didn’t really get into its stride until yesterday, the day after the party (and I think the wine probably helped to numb my senses a little), but as for the Second Head… well, I can only hope our guests were distracted by the fact that all the heating downstairs decided to break a few minutes before the first of them arrived. Hopefully the Arctic temperatures helped distract everyone from the state of my forehead and if not that, well, surely the fact that we were giving them triple shots of vodka for every inch of mixer would’ve done it. I hope so, anyway.

Luckily Terry did manage to fix the heating halfway through the night, and my Second Head packed its bags the next day, meaning that I’ve now entered the “Looking a Bit Like Buddha” phase of my affliction.

I’ve still got that cold, though…

So, yesterday I went to the hairdresser and had a big ol’ chunk cut off my hair.

Now, I know what you’re thinking, but don’t worry, this isn’t going to be one of those entries, where I end up screaming and crying that OMG, it’s SO UNFAIR, and I HATE MY LIFE. No, this is actually a good hairdressing story – or as good as a hairdressing story can get for me considering I’m still growing out a MULLET, obviously.

Anyway, as you know, after my last brush with hairdressing hell, I had sworn to never let a pair of scissors near my head again, and to just let it grow until it got so long I had to employ a team of small children to walk behind me at all times, carrying it. I believe the name “Rapunzel” was mentioned. And the thing is, I totally intended to stick to this plan, but a few weeks ago I suddenly realised the plan was fatally flawed, because while it is true  that the front part of my hair has, indeed, been growing, SO HAS THE BACK. At the same speed. So if I just let it grow I would basically never be free of the Mullet. I’d just have a super-long mullet instead. Yeah.

Gradually, then, the unwelcome truth became evident: if I ever wanted to hold my head up in public again, I would have to just bite the bullet and submit to having large chunks cut off the back of my hair every few weeks, so that eventually the front and back would meet in the middle, so to speak, and I would have “normal” hair again. Maybe.

Well, for the last few weeks, each day I have faced an almighty battle not to just pick up a pair of scissors and hack it all off myself. It is THAT BAD. And yesterday morning I woke up, looked in the mirror and realised that I could not tolerate it ONE DAY LONGER, and that if I couldn’t get it cut right that very day, I would be doing it myself. Given that I am the clumsiest woman alive, the second option didn’t sound good even to me, and so it was that I found myself in the car and driving towards the only salon I knew might be able to squeeze me in on a Saturday afternoon, repeating the mantra, “I will not ask for a fringe, I will NOT ask for a fringe” over and over again.  In fact, I repeated that mantra so many times I’m actually amazed I didn’t just walk into the salon and shout “NO FRINGE!” at them.

I didn’t, though. And they told me, yes, they could fit me in, so, with fast-beating heart, I sat myself down with the stylist and told her the tale of The Mullet, after which she moved in for a closer look at the offending hair.

“OH MY GOD!” shouted the stylist, jumping back as if stung. “This is… this is a MESS!”

Now, I have to admit, I felt ever so slightly smug about this reaction. The thing is, no one has ever really believed me about how bad this haircut was. For the past two months, I’ve mostly tied it back, cunningly trying to disguise the fact that I now looked a lot like Billy Ray Cyrus, when viewed in a certain light. And, you know, there is the fact that I’m a known drama queen, and I just know most people have listened to my tale of woe and thought, “yeah right, whatever. Bet it looks exactly the same.” But it was NOT the same. And this New Stylist had instantly seen it for what it was.

“There’s a really big difference between the length at the front and the length at the back,” she said, staring at the hair as if it might bite her. “It’s almost like…”

“Like a mullet,” I said. “Yes, I know: you can say it.”

“Yeah,” said the hairdresser, warming to her theme, “But the thing is, I bet even YOU don’t realise how bad this is. I mean, you can’t see the back of your head. Seriously, YOU SHOULD SEE THE BACK OF YOUR HEAD!”

I just nodded at this, as if I hadn’t spent hours in the bathroom over the past few weeks, holding up my little Sephora mirror to try and view the back of my head. And then weeping. And drinking.

“I mean, I’d have hated to have seen this when it was first done,” continued the stylist, who was actually starting to enjoy herself just a little bit too much at this point, really. ”That must’ve looked TERRIBLE.”

Then she tried to persuade me to let her cut it to shoulder length. “It won’t fix it,” she said, “But it’ll make it look less like a … well, you know.”

Readers, I held firm. I know she was right, but I was nervous enough about being back in The Chair (“You must be terrified!” said the hairdresser cheerfully as she started snipping. “I would be!”) without adding the pressure of a Dramatic Change into the mix. So we compromised, and she cut it to just a couple of inches under my shoulders.  This actually still feels like a Dramatic Change to me (when I brush it I get that horrible sinking feeling when the brush suddenly encounters air and I’m all, “OMG WHERE IS MY HAIR?!”), but I realised a long time ago that when you have long hair,  no one ever notices the fact that you suddenly have four inches less of it than you used to. This theory was proven last night when we went to visit my parents and neither of them noticed, even when I swished my head around ostentatiously. They just thought I was having a fit or something.

Anyway, it’s still going to take months to grow out the mullet completely, but the point is, I have at last had a haircut that didn’t make me cry afterwards, and I think this could be a turning point in the career of my hair. I feel like maybe the ancient curse has been broken, and there is new hope that the mullet may one day be defeated. And I was going to blow-dry it and style it all nice, then get Terry to take a picture of it, but then I thought, “Why do that when I can just sit around on my ass letting it dry naturally and get all frizzy first?” So I did. Then I remembered that when Terry takes photos of me, they generally end up looking something like this:

windy!

He took this while we were out walking the dog today. “Take a picture of my hair,” I said. “Try not to make me look like a lunatic,” I said. Gah. So it looks like this is about as good as it’s going to get in terms of photos of The Hair:

There were others, but I swear to God, I had my eyes closed and was frowning in every. single. one.  So, um, yeah.

Maybe I’ll ask for a fringe next time?*

(*joking!)