Purple Hair

As promised, I tried to take pictures of the steps while dying my dark brown hair purple.

A little background - I have dyed my hair shades of red for a long time and purple has been my favorite color for longer. I realized that the darker red shades (purple-toned instead of orangey-toned) complimented my skin tone. So I decided to go all the way and make my hair a pretty purple color.

Pre-wedding, I didn't want to mess around with bleach. I had bought Splat in Lusty Lavender and used the purple on my dark brown hair. It didn't show up much, especially indoors. So now, post-wedding, I was ready to play with the bleach.

The Splat kit includes bleaching products, so I still had that since I previously only used the color. I also bought a darker shade of purple color because I figured it would suit me better (and I liked the color more). Punky Colour in plum (the purple shade is too pink-toned for me)

Before:

I used the splat bleach for the longest recommended time (afraid to do it any longer for fear of damaging my hair). Parts of my hair were bleached very light, but most of it turned a brown-redish shade. Still, it was lighter than my natural hair, so I figured it would still show the purple color better than not bleaching.

After Bleach:

After Purple:

(I will try to get better pictures of the finished result. My camera essentially died so I only have my cell phone camera.)

If I do this again, I might get my hair professionally bleached to get it light enough without worrying that I might screw up. Also, of a salon has a permanent purple color, I might prefer that to this wash-out variety which is making a bit of a mess on my towels and pillow.

I do still have more of the splat lusty lavender color and plan to use that to touch-up the color when this has faded from washing out.

I do like being a purple-head. :)

Audrey Gone Wrong

Watching The Children's Hour (from 1961) and very much disliking it.

Audrey Hepburn and Shirley MacLaine, two of my favorite people, how could this go wrong?... If only I didn't ask.

They made a girl's school and there is this really creepy student (this girl is going to give me nightmares, they like to do closeups of her eyes...) who is a compulsive liar (and there's a kleptomaniac). The liar hates the school and wants her grandma to un-enroll her, so she tells her grandmother that the head ladies are lesbian lovers.

Don't get too excited, boys. Even with super-creepy-girl, this premise could have been understanding and heartwarming, or even a premise for an okay comedy, but no.

Spoilers (because you should not watch this): They lose everything because all the parents take their kids out of school, Audrey who is planned to be married calls it off, Shirley's character realizes she does love Audrey that way so she commits suicide, and maybe there was a lesson of understanding or not lying or not trusting kids with creepy eyes, but I just see it as the feel-bad movie of the century.

Great cast, big fail.

Build Your own Yogurt

I had an urge to try one of those trendy new yogurt shops, so I tried Yogoya in Timonium, Maryland.  It was fun! Make-your-own, any flavors (they had chocolate, vanilla, original, raspberry, mango, peach, banana, and taro), any toppings (fruits, cereals, candy, syrups). It is priced by weight, so you have to be careful, but for just over $8 for mine and the hubby's, I think we made out pretty well.


Mine, natural sweetness:

Some vanilla on the bottom, then raspberry, mango, banana, and a little bit of natural (like unflavored yogurt, a bit tart). Topped with strawberries, mango, kiwi, blueberries, coconut, a sprinkle of granola, and flavored mochi bits (because I wanted to try the flavors).


His, sweet and surprising:

Chocolate and taro yogurt (wasn't expecting him to like the taro enough to put it in his yogurt creation), reeses cup bits on the bottom, more on the top, chocolate chips, chocolate sauce, peanut butter sauce, and caramel sauce.


Plus, it can't hurt that they have self-serve sample cups, so you get to try as many flavors as you want before making your creation. ;)

The not-so-Skinny on Top Model

I had called this 'the skinny' but I wrote waaaay more than I expected...

Where it started: US Top Model Season 1 was pretty good. Raw, fresh, honest. They included lots of parts that are cut out of most of the versions - weigh-ins, exercise, counseling, body waxing (a staple in pretty much all the first seasons - pretty sure it still happens, but it isn't shown anymore). And Tyra hadn't taken over yet - she was present as a person, but not an overwhelming, attention-seeking presence.

As the seasons progress, it becomes more about Tyra. It just gets annoying. 'Everyone look at me, Everyone worship me, Everyone try to be me....' She was fine as a normal person in the show, but it got clear that she wanted to be treated as more than a normal person, more like a godess. UGH. If you want to worship Tyra, you watch her talk show (where even the interviews end up being about her), not a modeling competition.

Though they have tried to redeem the show recently in other ways. The challenges and photo shoots had been getting unrealistic and didn't seem to teach useful modeling talents or build any skills. Now that the goal is high fashion (the prize is a spread in Italian Vogue - that's a damn good modeling prize!), the photo shoots have gotten better and the big name photographers have gotten bigger. So it looks like they are trying.

Top Model Canada - pretty good, especially the season when Jay Manuel hosts, but there are not many seasons.

Top Model Australia - it starts a little rough - the production quality was low, the interview staging looked really cheap, but it did get the point across. The first two seasons or so where all about sexy photo shoots, not much about versatility, with no high fashion or editorial (seems their editorial means less staged photos, not the rough, raw, and different that I have grown to expect from editorial, like Vogue). And you'll find quickly that Australia (and New Zealand) do not blur boobs or bleep words, so the first few season sexy shoots = lots of Boobage.

There are some awesome girls from the Australian versions, and also some you'll really hate (especially when they win or get to second place). And the judges are great, especially with a real big Australian designer on the panel since day 1. The seasons with Napoleon Perdis are interesting, but I felt it got better (variety in challenges and photos) after he left.

A big difference in Australia - the live finales. They can get a little long and redundant, but it is nice to see the contestants that had been eliminated and it is fantastic that they have (in theory) gone completely to call-in votes to pick the winner. With the previous season where there was speculation that the voting lines were cut when the producers/invested parties had the results they wanted (the season where they announced the wrong winner 'because the voting was so close'), it doesn't quite feel like the public got to chose the winner. But it is still trying to get somewhere that none of the other countries' versions have.

Top Model New Zealand - the dynamic is a little different with a strong trio of coaches/judges (maybe like the US was trying to do before Tyra proclaimed no one could upstage her...). But there are only two seasons. I loved season two, but I have a bias because I really liked the winner.

Top Model Britain - I generally like this (currently watching season 4 and have seen season 6, just not yet 5) but there is too much attempt at drama for me. There is so much focus on the fights between the girls, and there seem to be so many more fights (but maybe that is in the editing and what they chose to show or blow out of proportion). I look forward to the photos at the end but can do without a lot of the filler. I like Lisa Snowdon as a non-overwhelming, friendly model/judge/mentor and I think (recent seasons) Elle Macpherson is filling the role well, also.

Live Finale! Britain also started doing a live finale (with the previous, 6th season) and the public got to vote for the winner. It at least seems that they have figured out the system for people voting for the winner (seems they were trying to be careful since this took place after the Australia wrong-winner SNAFU). Also, they filled the time with more live performances and stuff that was a little less redundant than the clip shows they like to show on the Australian finales. Not to give too much away, but I didn't quite agree with the recent winner. She was nice and all, but I really wanted the runner-up and Britain has had only white winners (though I guess that makes sense with their 90-some-percent white population vs the US's 70-some-percent).

Other notes
I like the brutally honest, previous model judge dynamic that Australia has (Charlotte Dawson) and Britain had (loved Paula Hamilton as a judge). I guess that is the equivalent of the US version when we had Janice Dickinson, but Janice was a bit too much for me...

What other English-speaking top model versions are out there? I am running out.... I might have to start watching in other languages even though I will probably only understand the runway and photo portions.

From what I have seen, my rating of the different versions:
#1 Australia
#2 New Zealand (but maybe it is a saving-grace that they have only a few seasons)
#3 Canada (also only a few seasons)
#4 tied Britain (season 4 is boring me a bit, haven't seen 5, but generally 1,2,&6 were entertaining, 3 was okay (to me, Paula was the best part) but generally too much drama that I don't care about) and USA (good initially and shows some attempts at getting better, now if only they could replace Tyra then it might be more bearable and less her-ego-centric)

Lots of babble for probably no one to read, but I wanted to compose  my thoughts on the seasons I have watched so far.

What I'm Watching

I downloaded a bunch of Audrey Hepburn movies. I love her, and love what I have seen, but I don't remember seeing much. I do remember My Fair Lady - I almost have that one memorized. And I recall parts of Sabrina, but I don't think I have ever seen all of the original movie. I may not have seen Roman Holiday before...

My first reaction: She's so Young! (24 when it came out? She looks younger than that, but she always did look pretty young.)

She's just perfect. Audrey plays innocent and childish so convincingly, then she learns some lessons, matures, and is fantastic at portraying that, too. Plus, she looks fantastic even when acting drugged by sleep medicines. And it's a cute story.

But Damn, that girl is teeeeeny tiny.


And somehow I'm in a Top Model phase, which I think came from my Project Runway phase. (If you like the top model premise at all, I definitely recommend Australia's and New Zealand's over the pitiful US version, but thoughts for another time.) I am currently watching Britain's 4th season, though I have already seen the 6th by download before I realized the rest were on youtube.

I am not a Top Model expert or anything, since I tend to have these on in the background while I work - I can't recall most of the contestants, but it is still some mindless fun and pretty pictures (I could do without the cat-fights). But I have to admit, I do enjoy when contestants throw a fit over the hair or posing nude... they knew what they were signing up for.

This is sad, Audrey in the same post as Top Model, but that is what I am currently watching.

Easy Lemonade (Made my day)

Yes, this is how I'm starting. I said it would be random.

Baltimore was HOT today (heat index above 100F) and I had the perfect idea with the ingredients I tend to keep around - frozen berries, crystal light powder, water.

Empty bottle + frozen raspberries and blueberries + lemonade powder + COLD water = most refreshing drink on a hot day. (Shake it up, maybe leave in the freezer a bit to cool down.)

The raspberries float and are in most of the sips/gulps, the blueberries are on the bottom at the end of the drink.

So that was the perfect start to a gross and hot day. Try it with what fruit and drink powder/juice you have around for some cooling and fun drink mixes for these hot days.