Life-changing hair

The difference between male/female attitudes to hairstyles is vast. Women will spend inexcusable sums of money and are deeply concerned with the final result (last time I got my hair cut I spent the evening at a friend's house in Acton crying and drinking wine to blot out how much I hated it). Men tend just to have the same haircut but shorter.

Last year I had hair extensions - although it took two people more than five hours to put in and cost me more than my first car* did, I loved them. Now that I have better** things to spend my money on (such as a mortgage, and if the insurance doesn't cough up soon, a new car) I can't justify the spend and so it was with glee that I found someone who lived and worked in Chiswick as a hairdresser specialising in just that area - and she was so much cheaper it would have been rude not to have taken her up on the offer. She worked for a reputable hairdresser chain - and said if I wasn't happy she would give me a refund.

So, I went down the hair extension route (no pun intended), which was somewhat different - it only took the one girl an hour and half and I don't remember the smell of burning hair / glue when I had them done before.

Final result: I would do better with a handfull of dog hair and a few jars of Copydex. She said it was okay and although she was away for a few days we could sort it out 'when she got back'.

She never did - the hairdresser-from-hell has skipped the country. No-one (including her employers) know where she is.

So, I got what I wanted and had a hairstyle that changed my life - I have spent evenings pulling lumps of hair out, washed my hair in almost boiiling water to melt the glue (doesn't work) and had people point at my hair saying things like 'oh, you've got something stuck there' (one person asked me if it was chewing gum).

So yesterday I had to take the plunge and get them cut off. It's just nice to have a night's sleep without the lumps of glue. A lesson learnt about cheap deals though.

* Mini metro. Metallic blue. 400 quid. Had never gone above 25mph or further than the church in the village before I owned it (bought it off Mrs Harris, an elderly church goer who lived next door to my parents)

** I use that word in the loosest sense

Postman splat

Not the best of days today. At lunch following a tough meeting when an ashen-faced bearer-of-bad-news came to tell me that there had been a slight accident with my car (my beloved Smart Car, which was parked outside work).

Turns out a very large post van had managed to 'bump' into it. It's trashed - the door on one side is knackered, the windows on both sides are smashed (the van somehow managed to push the car into the wall so damaging both sides). Someone else who was on hand kindly helped seal it up from the elements with bubble wrap and brown tape (we could have just posted it to the insurance company) and some of the posties* sheepishly helped me to move it into the nearby sorting office garage.

* After one of them asked how I managed to park in such a tight parking space. Response: "Er, because my mother taught me to reverse" (which is more than I can say for the post driver).

Pop goes the rabbit

I have a piece of a popcorn skin stuck in my mouth. Well, not in my mouth as such - it seems to be travelling. So far it has reached what I think is a tonsil / salivary gland (she says, trying to remember basic human physiology). It's really, really painful. Perhaps it's trying to make it's way to my heart and I will be remembered in the Darwin Awards. Hey ho.

Apart from that I have been working. And trying to starve myself on K's recommended starvation diet*. Yes, it's all true - it's been nothing but fun here in my hutch. Did go out to the wilds yesterday (okay, Herfordshire) to visit friends - which involved a six-mile walk > lunch (I felt not-so-strangely light-headed on the former while avoiding the latter). Also spent Saturday clearing up the hutch, which considering its size seemed to be in a right state ever since I got back from Detroit.

Finally, I have to admit that I have been in a bad mood. I have been so distracted by work that I have missed the deadline for the Edinburgh Fringe, which I wanted to perform in (I did it the year before last and although it was one of the most terrifying things I have ever done, I really want to do it again - this was at the top of my New Year resolutions). Have simmered over it and think I have found an alternative. Fingers crossed.

* Which means I can't go out as I am totally incapabable of doing anything social that doesn't involve vast quantities of food and drink. I was allowed a small amount of popcorn as a 'treat' and instead it's going to kill me. Typical.

The Great Lake state / Motown

Well, I’m in Detroit. Home of Ford. And Eminen (Eight Mile etc etc) - and, of course Motown ("Motor Town > Motown"). Oh, and hosts of last year’s Superbowl (so several people have told me, I see no reason why they should lie).

A fairly tortuous trip due to a connecting flight in Canada (Toronto) – getting me and my suitcase (full of Cadbury’s chocolate, earl grey teabags and bourbon biscuits*) through Canadian/US customs was like getting through Checkpoint Charlie. Not as straightforward as I had imagined.

Then, (after several unannounced and unexplained delays) I got to go on the world’s smallest aircraft. Was almost in shock as I stepped aboard, luckily I had a chance to down my emergency miniature vodka that lives in the bottom of my handbag before we took off. Flight over the lakes in the tiny aircraft was made all the more enjoyable by chatting to a really friendly girl called Lorna. Swopped addresses and I have promised to send her something from Cardiff, (where her grandparents were from). Must not Welsh on the deal, so to speak.

Am currently in West Bloomfield, staying in a house that makes Southfork look like a small terraced house. Very healthy living - in this particular house, that is (last year Michigan state was the fattest state in the US, this year they have slipped to second place). Yesterday morning I went for a run, a cycle and a quick Nordic ski (all in the gym in the basement) before meeting everyone else for smoothies for breakfast. Plan to return as half the woman I was, or at least substantially less. Shame there’s so much Cadbury’s chocolate kicking around here though…

* Not for personal consumption. Though I got some very ‘yeah we can see how you got your figure’ looks in Tescos when I was lugging a basket that was overflowing with chocolate.