life on mars..
One Halloween I got drunk and decided I would attend an Irresponsibles show made up like Aladdin Zane. I knew I could copy the lightning bolt face make up OK but thought I needed some help getting the hair to look just right. I entered a hair salon at the mall and handed them a picture of Bowie and said "can you do this ". The older women dove into this new fun project with much zest. They had lots to work with, my hair being very long at the time. When all was done my hair looked very much like what you see in this video. I went back home and proceeded to paint my face just as Bowie's was on the cover of Aladdin Zane. I made it to the show. It was a blast. My new look was a hit. For Halloween night anyway.
The next morning my alarm wakes me. Hungover to all hell, I make way to the bathroom and climb into the shower and lather up some shampoo in my hair. It startled me when I saw all this red shit mixed with the water going down the drain. I kept rinsing until the water looked clear. I got out of the shower and toweled off. I looked in the mirror. "What the fuck"?
No longer bright red, my hair had taken on a purpley, auburn look. I had to be at the Big Dig in Boston in an hour for some welding inspection. Knowing the crap i would receive for my appearance I jumped back in the shower and scrubbed and scrubbed to no avail. That was it. This was my hair color. Lucky for me I was working mostly in a hard hat area for the week. So for the first day anyway. I could tell the pipefitters and ironworkers were sometimes checking out the hair that was visible with some curiousity, but not saying much. Surely most of them had hangovers themselves and probably didn't say anything, thinking they're eyes were playing tricks.
When I got back to the shop I was dead tired, it was another long day. As I entered the building, forgetting all about my hair long ago, I removed my hardhat to comb my fingers through the hair of my itchy head. Two of my bosses and the reseptionist were witness to this and. Were like 'What the fuck did you do to your hair"! I told them it was for Halloween and my kind employers informed me that Halloween was over. The dye or remnances of it lasted the next couple of weeks, with me hiding under a hard hat and dodging the unaproving glare of my higher ups.
Eventually my hair was back to being brown again. Since then I've made a couple of career moves and now find myself in radio, where I'm happy to say nobody gives two shits what my hair looks like. It's funny, a huge framed picture of Bowie hangs in the hallway here. Same hairdo and he's wearing an eye patch. Eyepatch?! Hmmm. Maybe next year. Why the fuck not?