Hairy scary

I've noticed that I've tended to mark important moments in my life with a new hairstyle. I'm not talking about popping to the hairdresser's for a bit of a trim or a couple of highlights - I'm talking major image change.

When I was 18, on the day of my last-but-one high school exam, I had my hair cropped very short. This was a mistake as during my last exam I spent the entire three hours trying to push the fringe out of my eyes. Also, it looked shit.

After my year out, before I went to uni, I went blonde. Properly blonde. This was a mistake as I was too poor to get my highlights re-done every six weeks, so looked two-tonal for most of my first year.

At the end of my three years at uni, before I started my new job, once again I went for an inadvisedly short hairstyle. I was even conned into buying "hair gum". Which I never used.

And, Ploggers, I've done it again. After six years with the same company and not too many utterly disastrous hairstyles, I rashly decided to go back to being my natural brunette. It would save me cash and time on the highlights, and my hair's always much shinier when it's brown. Brunette I went. Except it would seem that I judged my "natural" colour to be three shades darker than it actually is. Meaning my hair is very very very very dark brown.

And, as TheBloke (TM) so sympathetically put it on seeing the result, "Jesus Christ, you look like a witch." Later on, when I talked about getting a kitten, he suggested I might want to go for a black cat. And asked if I wanted a pointy hat to go with my new hair colour. I said I would be car shopping at the weekend. He suggested a broomstick. The humour is overwhelming.

And of course, with a new job comes the inevitable time-capsule that is your security pass. However you look on your first day at work is captured by a poorly-positioned webcam and printed off for you to carry round your neck for time immemorial. You'd have thought I'd have considered this prior to any major hair decisions.

You see, starting a new job is a bit like starting at a new school. You hope you get on with the other kids, that the food isn't too bad and that you keep out of the way of bullies. Except it's different this time. With the amount of dye I'd like to get rid of from my hair, this time I'll be begging them to flush my head down the toilet. Repeatedly.

I'll keep you posted.