Never Run with Scissors

Hair cuts remain one of those nebulous areas that is just so hard to get right. You can walk in with a picture of something you think will look great and walk out looking like Albert Einstein. Here are some tips and tools that I hope will make your next haircut a success. Believe me, a seriously bad hair experience takes time to fix.

Take my last hair fiasco. I have really fine hair, and to compound the problem, I hate spending time fixing it every morning. After a lot of consideration, I decided a body perm was the answer to my problem. It would save me a lot of time in the mornings. I would no longer have to even blow dry my hair, never mind, anything else. In my idiocy, I refused to wait until my regular stylist could do it. Instead, I went to a friend of a friend and made it quite clear I only wanted a little volume by adding a few large loose curls. I exited looking like a poodle. Since then, I have spent copious amounts of money slowly cutting off my icky (and exceedingly curly) hair.

I made a last ditch effort to keep some length a month ago. It looked great when I left. All my hair was magically straight and silky. Of course, even when I was willing to expend the effort to straighten my hair the humidity kinked it back up in record time. I tried, tried, tried, tried, tried, again and again to get my hair to stay straight and finally had to admit defeat. The end result after a year of being terrorized by my hair was the short haircut I had long avoided.

Now, while you have zero control over your hairstylist, you do have some control over what you request. That's not to say whoever you end up with can do what you like. I highly recommend shopping around until you find someone who does your hair well and then stick to them like glue. That usually requires good tipping, but you really don't want to screw over someone who uses sharp objects on your head anyway. Just make sure once you find 'the one', you dn't go to someone you've never met. That's what got me into trouble. I will never cheat on my hairstylist again.

I discovered a couple sites that let you scan in your picture and try on various haircuts and hairdye. My favorite is a site which allows you to experiment with celebrities haircuts as well as makeup and other accessories. You can see how sunglasses and hats would look with the new haircut you choose. This is convenient because you can save the money you might have to spend on new accessories if they all clashed with your new do. The second site displays haircuts and you can also scan in your own photo but it lacks any extras. Whichever you choose, it moves the possibility of a good haircut further into the realm of possibility.