My hair was orange. I know there’s a trend of hair colors like aqua green and rose gold and, well, orange; however, I didn’t turn my hair that color on purpose—it was an accident. I’m a proud DIYer, okay, and I take pride in saving money, so it made sense to save when it came to hair maintenance. I wanted to take out the caramel-colored highlights I’d gotten a year earlier and create a uniform, dark brown look. I know how to dye my own hair, so I grabbed a box of “dark brown” and went to work. 20 minutes later, my hair was the deepest shade of black I’d ever seen. Black is a deep shade in itself, and yes, this was deeper.

Now, a normal person with a hair mishap would run to the salon. If you’ve read any of my other articles, you know that I’m far from normal. I did what “only I” would do: run to YouTube. With a quick “remove hair color” search, thousands of videos promising the good-riddance of hair color surfaced. After watching four, I was a professional hair-colorist, and ran to the beauty supply for my professional items. I purchased a hair color remover kit and went back to my salon (okay…bathroom) to take out the dark shade.

Each YouTube video promised simplicity: cover the hair in the liquid, leave on for 20 minutes, wash out and the undesired color is gone. A warning did say that the hair would lighten, which made sense because I am zapping all color from my hair. I covered my hair in the liquid, left it on for twenty minutes, washed it out and…and…

My hair was orange.

No, not that coppery, tinted orange: it was bright orange…with spots of black because of course I didn’t distribute the liquid evenly. Of. Course.

I could do nothing but stare at my reflection with all the love of a bull to a matador.

“Keep calm,” I told myself. “It’s just…hair…”

After keeping calm and sobbing uncontrollably, I hid my hair under a hat and bought a new box of dye. I knew that since my hair was lighter, it would absorb the brown color, and all would be well.

I rushed back home and dyed my hair again.

I was excited because I knew that yes, my hair was orange, but this was my second chance—I would finally get the color that matched the box.

In another 20 minutes I invented the newest shade that could have totally been a trend: “Star Trek: Deep Space Nine.”

It. Was. Black. Again.

Not only was my hair black, but clumps of it sat in my hands.

I combed through and large amounts of hair gathered in the brush.

I did the only normal thing anyone with sense would do…oh, you thought I would have run to the salon at this point?

Of course not! Remember, this is me…

I went back to YouTube. When will I ever learn?

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