Not So Luck of the Irish

Like any high school girl, I enjoyed experimenting with grocery store hair dye. I didn't go platinum or purple. I stuck to tone-on- tone coloring - more along the lines of increasing the depth of my brunette hues. Boring? Sure. Safe? Well, I thought so until I bought a box of Ash Brown dye on March 16, 1993 and proceeded to follow the directions on the box. It didn't look all that bad after the initial wash and dry. But by the next morning, my hair was a lovely shade of green just in time for St. Patrick's Day.

My parents weren't the type who would find a hair emergency a legitimate reason to stay home from school. I think if I had accidentally blinded myself with the tip of the dye bottle, they wouldn't have considered even this the type of unfortunate accident with Miss Clairol stay-home worthy. So, I put on a green sweatshirt (a bad choice since it only emphasized the shade of my hair) and braved the unforgiving hallways of Northside High School. After being asked more than 100 times, "Did you mean to do that?" and "Will that come out?" I realized that I better figure out a way to fix this green-do issue and fast.

Now, if I had made this mistake in 2008, I could have found out how to correct my beauty school drop out boo boo online. But in 1993, I had to call my hairdresser, who proceeded to strip my hair using a concoction of powdered Tide laundry detergent and Palmolive liquid dish soap. After five washings, that seemed to burn off more of my scalp than remove any of the green we turned to the only solution - red hair dye. So, for the next two years, I spent my days as a foe Irish lass and I loved it.

This past Saturday we were supposed to participate in the 150th St. Patrick's Day parade through downtown Atlanta. Well, Mother Nature had other plans, and a tornado touched down on Friday evening around 9:45 p.m. just as I was putting the finishing touches on the girl's hats. UNLUCKY! Kev thinks that Seka and Roxy called in a favor to the gods of nature to do something about their pending stroll of shame down Peachtree Street (which is different than the walk of shame btw) all decked out in totally adorable hats and festive scarves and actually caused the tornado to occur. How else can you explain such a freak event?

But I say, what's the point of owning these regal creatures if you can't humiliate, I mean, show them off? I went to all the trouble to get everything ready and since today is actually St. Patty's Day I figure I could force them to wear their adorable parade gear for 10 minutes. Kind of like the gift your great aunt sends you on your birthday that your mom makes you wear so she can take a picture and then you never let that itchy sweater with the embroidered cats on it see the light of day ever again? So today, for 6.5 minutes, they humored me - even if it was just in the backyard.

While shopping for the celebratory supplies for the parade, I actually contemplated purchasing a green bob wig to wear for the festivities. Going with my better judgment, I decided to go with the green boa instead. Oh well, maybe next year the girls and I will get to live it up with the Irish in the big city. I'll be the one with brown hair and two embarrassed greyhounds.