When I was 13, I went through a punk phase, which has never really ended . . . at least not internally. While I'm no longer shopping at Hot Topic, I still mosh with the best of them at a Buzzcocks show. Back in my punk prime, however, I had the entire look down: Doc Martens, plaid skirts, and band patches on my hoodie. The one thing that I was missing — the one thing that I so desperately wanted — was rainbow dyed hair.
I remember perusing Slacker, a subculture boutique on the South Side in my hometown of Pittsburgh, and coveting the extreme hair dyes in every color. My favorite color was Manic Panic's Shocking Blue shade ($12), which, despite stern warnings from my parents, I purchased one day to complete my rocker look. But there was one major obstacle I had to tackle first: I had to bleach my hair in order to dye it that vibrant shade of blue. The following account tells what might be the most hairbrained scheme in history.
Instead of going to a professional, I used a combination of hydrogen peroxide and Sally Hansen Creme Hair Bleach For Face to lighten my locks. I thought, "Hey, if it works on female mustaches, it should work on hair, right?" Not so much. The combination did lighten my hair, but the mixture was not strong enough to actually bleach it, nor did I have enough of it. What I ended up with was an uneven swath of orange-tinged hair. It was not cute. But I had already come this far, and I was not going to give up my dream of having (partially) blue hair.
So I pressed on with dying my hair with Manic Panic's Shocking Blue, and I'm sure you can guess what happened next. Because science doesn't make exceptions for people, no matter how hopeful they are, the orange color of my hair mixed with the royal blue dye to create a muddy green shade. If this color had a name, it could have been dubbed Oscar the Grouch. Despite the epic failure of a dye job, I wore that green swatch of hair with pride for a few weeks until it washed out.
