all I want for Christmas...

are hats and scarves. I've pretty much got everything else I could want, but after losing quite a bit of hair to an inexperienced hairdresser, my own bathroom floor and a super adept stylist - well, there's just not much of it left!

When I came home for Thanksgiving, even *my brother* commented on how cool my hair was. First I have to thank Mom and Dad for great hair genes, but I also pay plenty to keep it looking good... more on that in another blog. ;) Anyhow for the past few years while in Atlanta, I have been a product of the magic of Spencer Malay, whom we all call Edward Spencerhands. It takes him about 15 minutes of scissor-flying fury for you to walk away looking fantastic. It's amazing. But since I moved to Denver, I needed to find someone new to cut my hair. For whatever reason, I took Noodles suggestion to try the Aveda Institute in Denver.

Qualifier: Noodles is a gay man who had been there for his own hair preening, and he really liked the outcome. Gay men know their hair and quite often know women's hair, too. Plus, I trust Noodles with my life, which after this weekend might have been proven to be actually less important to me than my hair.

So On Friday, off to Aveda I went. The girl was a "senior student", graduating in February. Or so she says.... she pretty much did the exact opposite of what I wanted. And it looked kinda choppy and too soccer-mom-ish. But it was late and I was tired so whatever.

Well, in the morning when I woke up, "whatever" became HORROR when I looked in the mirror. I officially hated the haircut and decided there was no way I could walk out in public looking like that. So I did what any well educated, totally hungover woman would do - I broke out my sewing scissors and - I kid you not - tried to fix it myself.

Truly, what I did was probably no worse looking than what Little Miss Aveda had done, but it certainly was no better! I was in the kitchen, contemplating exactly how I was going to go home to my family with this mess on my head after coming home last time with The Best Liz Hair Ever. I had quite the look of disgust on my face, for Noodles walked in right then and stopped in his tracks. Well, it was either the look or the hair that stopped him - neither was good.

"WHAT am I going to DO with this? I can't go out like this! I am flying HOME! I have great hair! I have had great hair for years and now I have THIS!!!!!" I was getting near tears and Noodles was melting into the floor as the pitch of my voice increased one octave with each word. I think I still had the scissors in my hand.

As soon as I stopped, Noodles blinked and said to me "GO across the street." Huh? I thought... "GO. Now. I will call them. There is a salon and they will fix you. Go get dressed."

"Noodles, it is Saturday before CHRISTMAS!" (Again with the shrieking.) "They are not going to have an opening and if I go over there they will look at me and be like "who are you?" and laugh as they send me out the door!!"

And Noodles calmly replied "Liz, they are going to take one look at you and TRUST ME someone will take pity on you and fix you. Clearly you can't handle this - and I can't handle you, so you are going over there."

So I did as I was told. And this lovely girl who worked at the salon had had a cancellation so was able to turn the straw pile on my head into something resembling Posh Spice's latest haircut. It's quite cool but VERY short - and there are gaps due to the first girl's mistakes (not to mention my attempted correction). Super Stylist Girl (she really is a hero to me) told me she couldn't get me what I wanted but that it would grow and fill in and we'd work on it. She did a great job with what she had to work with.

And there it is. So I have learned:
* If you pay $12 for a haircut, that's what you are gonna get.
* If you don't like the result of the $12 haircut, you shouldn't try to fix it.
* There is such a thing as hair karma, and for whatever reason it's my turn on the Wheel of Bad Hair.
* Hair will grow, but until it does, you will be miserable unless your brother and the rest of your family keeps you laughing about it.
* When you pay $12 for the haircut, you can take that other $50 that should have gone toward it to buy hats and scarves.
* It's actually fun to wear hats and scarves - thank goodness I did this in wintertime!
* It's not about the hair. They love me here anyways. I already knew this, but it's nice to be reminded. Plus we've been having a great time with hair jokes and hat play. Ah... yay, family and friends. :)

Merry Christmas, everyone. I hope you received everything your heart desires!

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Again, mad kudos to Spencer Malay. If you live in Atlanta or are travelling through, I recommend him any day to anyone. He is incredible!