Looking Like Your Mother

Diaz Blond Again

I told you Cameron Diaz would be blond again after her break up with Justin.

Shear Genius

I miss Project Runway. I get it, I can predict.

Shear Genius, Bravo's most recent designer competition is way harder for me.

I have a lot to learn from Sally Herschberger. (She also has her own skin care line out of LA. And at least Jaclyn Smith got her fine well-preserved self out K-Mart on back on the small screen where I can maniacally try to figure out whether she has the best genes e-v-e-r or that she has had a masterfully performed cheek implants, botox and a lower lid bleph.)  As for the subject matter of the show itself, I can't tell a good bird's nest from a bad frizz bowl, a well-placed feather from an inappropriately hung piece of fruit, or whether two colors is too much, but three isn't enough.

I'm not talking about figuring out what is pretty. Anyone of us can see a certain hairstyle and have the transformation take our breathe away. Those are easy. It's the daring ones I have trouble with. At what point has it gone too far, at what point, as one of the judges said, did it go from edgy to ugly and how much time do you have to spend in the chemical fumes of hair bond benders and color stippers before you just know, you know? Well, if it were easy, there wouldn't be a show.

But to give the win to the guy that came up with the hard to balance, talking treasure chest on the head, and dump the guy with the French accent? You can't dump the guy with the French accent on the second show. He must have insulted the producer's assistant or something. Ok, so he works in West Hollywood, really, and he made the model look like a confused puppy from 101 Dalmatians (too much time in Hollywood, maybe), but still, I think there is a Rule somewhere about people with French blood in them always getting past the first-round series.

And a talking box for a hat? What, did Theodore's great, great, great, great grandfather invent the corset and a distant Chinese relative the binding shoe? I'm routing for him to get tossed. That practically guarantees he will win the entire competition.

Hmmm, maybe I am going to like this show after all.

Beach Blonde

My guess is three months before Cameron Diaz goes blonde again.

Does it Come with a Genie Named Hairdresser Andrew?

These hair blowers are supposed to be revolutionary. The T3 Tourmaline Evolution costs $300 and is available at Nordstroms.

How does it work, I wonder.  Nordstrom's answers:  "T3 Tourmaline Ionic Blow Dryers are the most advanced professional dryers available today. Use of 100% crushed Tourmaline components makes them the most ionic and infrared. They deliver unbelievable results that you truly have to see to believe."

How does it work, I still wonder.

T3 Micro explains that tourmaline generates" unlimited amounts of frizz-fighting negative ions and damp-dispersing far infrared heat," banishing static, locking in hair's natural moisture, and smoothing the hair cuticle.

That's gotta be one busy gemstone.

But wait, there is also a flat iron. I just received this press release: "T3 Micro, the hair technology company of tomorrow, has come up with another remarkable invention – the high-tech T3 Bespoke Labs Duality Iron. . . . Up until today, traditional linear, analog or digital irons took their time to warm up, produced uneven heat and rarely kept a consistent temperature for extended periods of time. Hair was often heat damaged or unevenly styled . . .  T3’s discovery . . . is a patented, specially programmed, microchip system that works in nanoseconds to manage all of the iron’s multiple components simultaneously[,] protecting the hair from thermal damage. "

A professional at one salon told me that she has tried the flat iron, but did not notice any difference between that and a less expensive ceramic iron from Chi.

My life does not depend upon this type of equipment, but if I did rely on such a device to help get me out of the house in the morning or ready for an event, I would be pretty particular. I can't speak firsthand of the company's product line, but read more about their pr from the Oscar de la Renta shows, Derek Lam, and Proenza runway shows. Let me know what you think.

Sally Hershberger, Hair I am!

The next time I have and extra $600 lying about I am going straight to her salon and getting shagged.

Yeah, baby.

I keep meaning to start a catalogue of the truly horrendous beauty parlor names.  I don't mean the barely passable, such as Mane Attrraction.  No, go lower.  Yesterday I drove by "Million Hair".   Eww.   Then there was the "Hair Today, Gone Tomorrow".  Swear. 

Hello? Anyone In There?

And the award for this year's "Insipid Responses to the Ecosystem's Degradation by Redoubling Demands Upon It, under $100" may I nominate the aerosole spray designed to protect you hair color from increased levels of UVA and UVB rays?   Redken's Color Veil. 

Wow.  Who's in charge here. 

Quoted phrase inspired by Jonathan Franzen, "My Bird Problem," New Yorker, August 8.  That's exactly what I was thinking but had no idea how to capture it in words, short of "If you bought a goddamn hat and quit depleting the ozone with aerosole sprays, you would have less of a problem with the sun."  Too common, don't you think?

Just a little off the sides . . .

I am pretty clueless about eyebrows. I have two. Each starts and ends at about the same place on their respective sides of my face. Who hasn't read about the pencil test (who remembers what it is, is another thing altogether)?  One day, there I was, staring at my face in the mirror, wondering.  This is where most of my troubles start, and that day was no exception.  I wondered that if I put a little more separation between the brows if I would look a little less serious, a tad less cross.  I mean, think about it. When you get angry, your eyebrows knit closer together. So if you space them out a little bit, then wouldn't they help their owner have a calm and rested look?

And what if they were thinned out just a little at that starting point. I mean, why not try that just once. Change the shape just a little, just for a change. 

And don't forget to take your glasses off so you can actually get to the eyebrows. Don't worry about your ability to see.

Does anyone know how long it takes for eyebrow hair to grow back? 

Need Assistance

I need information on hair extensions.  I want to guinea pig with my fine blonde, thinning hair and I need some recommendations on salons in NYC or Toronto or LA. If anyone knows . . . I have a tentative with Bumble & Bumble and will get some inside info hanging with a young friend of a young friend who does it on herself and others - but as mine is not the typical head or the typical hair for this treatment, I will listen to all advice.

See, this gets me kind of excited.  A few years back, clip on hair became widely available.  I was working with a few young African American women, who would leave work on Friday with short hair, and come in on Monday with heads adorned with long braids pulled up and looking totally together.  It blew me away.   Of course the thought of me in a head full of braids made me imagine myself less a sex kitten and more a toothless Bo Derek on the beach brandishing a walker.  But there were these clip ons . . .

I bought a few: a cheap short one, a cheap ponytail, and a more expensive mid length version.  I put one on and asked my husband how much he liked it.  He said, "Not only is it not a turn on, it is an actual turn off."  You would think I had put on a hat of tarantulas or something.  No sense of adventure. No sense of humor. Certainly no sense of style.  Anyway, nothing gets me going more than a challenge and to this day I have wanted to somehow, in some way, add some hair without him realizing it.  I don't know if it is possible, but I cannot resist finding out.

So I will be using this space as my notepad for the next few weeks.  It will be jumbled and disjointed and certainly not well-writ, but I must get to it.  Feel free to jump in, any resource, any city.  In the meantime, I will stick the ponytail on my 4 year old and ask her to go show Daddy how cute she looks. 

In The Round

Picture yourself in a hairstyle, 3-D.  I never even got around to sticking my one-dimensional face into hairstyle software.  Now I can make myself almost as icky as my Virtual Model.  Or pick someone else's face to use and abuse, here at Stellure.