It was time to re-dye my hair, and I was completely over turquoise.
Not totally true. I still love my turquoise hair. Adore it. I call it my mermaid hair. But I was not in love with having it this time of year, because much of my winter clothes are also turquoise. I don’t like doing the matchy-matchy thing, partially because I feel like wearing the same color as my hair turns me into a monochromatic blob, but also because, as previously discussed, if I wear something even remotely close to the same color as my hair, fifty-thousand assholes who think they’re clever will point out that I match. Don’t think I’m serious? I hate the matching comments so much that I will no longer buy clothes in anything resembling turquoise or purple, just in case. So while I was still thoroughly enamored with my mermaid hair, I have winter dresses that I’d like to wear again someday.
The turquoise had to go.
Originally my plan was to go back to purple. I still love my turquoise, I love my purple, I just wanted to them to be on my head during opposite seasons. But then Kyle, being ever the contrarian, suggested blue. And predictably, I immediately latched onto the idea. I can’t help myself, I’ll always be attracted to a 
newer and shinier color. Not that blue is an entirely brand new color; I’ve been blue before. But it had been almost two years since I’d seen my blue-headed self, which was much longer ago than the mere four months since I’d been purple. Besides, I liked being blue during the winter; the way that it faded into icy blues and silvers made me feel like a snow queen!
And so I set my heart on blue. Unfortunately, I found my previous shade of blue (After Midnight) to be no easier to source than my purple was! I probably should have just given up and ordered it straight from Manic Panic just like I do my purple, but when you’re tired and pissed off and standing in the middle of a Hot Topic surrounded by teenage emo “scene” kids, sometimes you make rash decisions. Staring at a bottle of Rockabilly Blue, I vaguely remembered when Manic Panic developed that color and hearing them tout that it was their most potent blue ever. Well, as someone who is all about saturated colors, that couldn’t be bad, right? That just meant that my hair would be even blue-er, right? Seemed reasonable enough.
Time to try this new blue.
The first mildly red flag was during the dye process. Kyle mentioned that the consistency of the dye was much thinner than any of the other dyes we’ve used. This is not necessarily bad; after all, each color has a little different level of viscosity. It just surprised me, considering this was supposed to be their “most saturated blue ever.” But no matter. Blue-ward, ho!
Six hours later, we completed the dying ritual as we always do. I stood in the shower, bent backwards with eyes screwed shut, while Kyle poured diluted vinegar on my head. He turned the water on for me, as always, and I kept my eyes tightly closed, since despite his careful pour, vinegar has a way of creeping into my eyes and hurting like a motherfucker. A couple of minutes vigorously rubbing my scalp and squeezing my hair, and I was finally confident that my eyeballs were safe. I opened them for the first time. And screamed.
It was like someone stabbed a motherfucking smurf. And then used a chainsaw to dismember the smurfy little corpse.
Blue. Everything was blue. Now, I’m used to a certain amount of splash; it’s kinda the nature of the beast to see whatever color is going on my head also speckled on the walls and swirling in the tub. It cleans up pretty quickly, no big. But this was not the normal amount of splash. Blue on the walls, the tub, the shower curtain, my hands, my chest, running down the side of my legs and staining my toes. My hands were purple, for shit’s sake! Everywhere I looked, I saw blue.
Luckily, the tub and walls cleaned up easily. (Because otherwise, I’m pretty sure Kyle would have actually murdered me.) And despite the shocking amount of staining in the shower, it’s actually not entirely outside the realm of normality for there to be some leaching immediately after dying. After all, last time I went blue it was not uncommon to see a slight tinge of blue on my fingernails for a week or so after first dye. No big deal, I just made sure that whatever nail polish I wore looked nice with blue. Look, now they’re just ombre! I mean, sure, my hands were purple for what felt like a little longer than usual. And the fact that my neck remained stubbornly azure for a solid week was…not my usual experience. But even though the blue-splosion was pretty shocking and the cerulean stack of evidence was piling up, I still wasn’t totally convinced that there was any reason to panic. It’s just a really potent blue, right?
That’s what I thought. Until I started seeing blue everywhere. Slight tinges of pale blue so faint that at first you almost think that it’s the light playing tricks on your eyes. Until you realize that it’s e-ver-ry-where.
On my sunglasses…
my earbuds…
the fur of my coat.
And then, on places that don’t even come into contact with my hair!
My phone…
and the handle of my toothbrush!
Luckily the blue-bleeding hasn’t ruined anything that I really care about. (In that the things it’s probably ruined I don’t really care about, and the things that I care about it hasn’t really ruined.) So far it’s stabilized at a humorous levels of bluing up my world, but there’s no longer any denying that there is definitely something up with Rockabilly Blue. A perusal of the interwebs has informed me that this is a thing, that many other people have had the same issues that I have, so at least I know that it’s not just bad luck or poor dye technique. And I really do like the finished color on my head.
I just wish it would stay there!
