On Hair & Hostesses

A few days ago, my hair was awful. As in embarrassingly long roots, dead-dead-dead ends, and just blah all over. It was terrible. I have a great colourist & stylist in Edmonton, but what with a trip to Mexico before Christmas, then Christmas, then packing & moving & going-away events, getting my hair done before we left was just not an option. Then we arrived here, and it was even less of an option, as things like unpacking, getting Elizabeth over jet-lag, and finding grocery stores became more important.

So I got my hair done, finally, on Saturday. It was heavenly. Now I look like this:

It was great to sit in a room full of adults & no children for 3 hours. I chose a salon based on the fact that they use the same colour products (Loreal) as my Canadian salon, and my Canadian stylist, Toccara gave me my formula to give him. I thought that was incredibly clever of Toccara to suggest. PS It is not lost on me how saying "Canadian stylist" gives the impression that I also have an "American stylist" and a "French stylist" etc etc. :)

There were 4 other women having their hair done at the same time as me, and all four stylists were men. Two of them were older, and clearly the owners/managers of the place. And while Ryan (aka English stylist) was doing my hair, all on his own, the two old dudes each had an 'assistant' - as in, a girl who stood there and handed them the foil piece that was on the little roll-y table right beside them. I couldn't get over this, and kept almost laughing. These old dudes (as in, probably 50ish, so not old) couldn't even pick up their own foils??? I love it! And then, then, old dude #1 (who looked like Super Mario but in a purple plaid shirt) got his 'assistant' to put the pieces of foil onto this tablet thing that looks like the wooden trays they use for tapas at restaurants:

and then he painted on the dye for his lady's hair, and held it out for her to take & put another piece of foil on. It looks like a paddle. I found this whole situation with the 'assistants' pretty hilarious - especially because it seemed like all they did was look at themselves in the mirrors, primp their hair and pout their lips the whole time. They each got in trouble twice for being too slow - at handing over pieces of foil. I hope Elizabeth never turns into one of these girls.

On a separate note: I love how you can become BFFs with your hair stylist in just one cut. Ryan was really funny, and I already know so much about him - all about his ex-boyfriends, his new boyfriend, his new hair cut, his flat, his commute to work, his jean size, his exercise regime... I am probably going to go back to this salon for the duration of my stay in England, even though it is (a) too expensive for us to really afford, (2) a little bit far away from our place, and (c) full of stupid assistant girls.  I just realized why I was so drawn to these assistant girls - they make me think of the hostesses at Joey's downtown - and how it takes 4 girls in too-high-heels and headsets to get you to your table that is still full of dirty glasses.