And another spooky weekend came and went as we hurtle towards one of my favorite (in theory if not always practice) holidays! That's right: NATIONAL HERMIT DAY! Wait, no Halloween. As a fanciful person who grew up with the world's most awesome dress up pile... how could I resist a holiday that has now become about make-believe. The spooky stuff is all well and good too - why hello Mr. Jung, yes my shadow self is looking very spooky ooky today and I am embracing it - and I rather enjoy the thematic candies and fetishism for a particular squash (a delicata-o-lantern probably wouldn't work quite as well, but I'm willing to try it).

Next weekend seems to have been dubbed the real Halloween weekend. I'll be in Seattle and we likely won't be doing anything. Possibly Andrew will be going to a race. So, aside from insisting on some observance at the office, this was kind of my Halloween weekend a touch early.

Your tl;d(idn't plan to)r summary: I got my hair changed and it's cute, although I wasn't a huge fan of the stylist per se, and I went to a tango event in costume and had another perfect dance to end a slightly abbreviated ending! And I included pictures through the weekend - enough to prompt the comment I'm not a narcissist, I'm just active online, which made me laugh so much that... drumroll please... I immediately reposted the comment online.

A Hairy Beginning:

As presaged by pertinent Plus posts, I got a bit of a post-LASIK 'do-over this weekend. Glasses are quite a prominent feature and their absence is equally prominent. Interestingly, people often don't pinpoint the absence explicitly, but said absence just makes one's entire mien seem as off as the hardware itself. This is because the strong lines of a pair of spectacular spectacles dictate the way others' eyes will scan one's face. Without glasses, my eyes (particularly the lids) look much larger, my face looks longer, and my forehead more prominent. Glasses also forgive some laziness. I could do a very superficial job with eye make up and nobody would ever notice that one eyebrow was twice the width of the other... things like that become far more prominent when suddenly vaulted into centerstage by facial nudity. I pretty much knew that bangs were going to be my surrogate forehead-modesty element.  So here's kind of what I make-shifted on my confirmation that bangs would be ok:

Not sure why, but I felt very ... je ne sais pas... French? in this photo

I'd show you the comparison shot, but it was far too ghastly. Admittedly the lighting of the hallway at my office was not ideal but there's only so long you can run around with one hand on your head and the other touting a live smart phone.

And, as I know from prior hair cuts, long unlayered hair has a tendency to lengthen a face. Layers draw attention back to the eyes. So, bangs plus layers plus darker (I have auburn hair naturally, but it also naturally bleaches out at the hint of uv rays, taking me to platinum and everywhere in between until I'm more or less a red roan!) Since I have no stylist at the moment, I took a chance and went to a nearby studio called Bliss. Not the cake shop where I occasionally dance tango. But the name recognition didn't hurt. And look at the results!

I jest. That's just me in my Elvis wig ready for my very Spooky Halloween Tango event on Saturday.  But I digress...

 My stylist was perfectly passable, but hardly stellar. My favorite 'do make-over manifested due to my stylist being really interested in hearing my ideas, and also giving me her knowledge to give me enough information to make a more informed choice. She talked about warm versus neutral versus cool shades of dyes and highlights. She talked about how different lengths of layers and styling would affect the look of my face and gave me sneak previews with my hair. She offered to add some coloring to my eyebrows for free and discussed the effect of shaping. And we talked about my hair texture and how I typically tend to care for my hair. It was a really personalized cut as a result.

 This stylist heard the basics and filled in the blanks for me without letting me follow up all that much. While I am happy with my style, it isn't quite as much mine as it might have been, as a result.

I'm a touch disappointed that the way she cut my bangs really does require I style them just so. I'm realizing I could never rock a short 'do without at least a bucket of elmer's glue by my side at all times; my hair's natural inclination to run amok has manifested in sheer bang-chaos this morning, the turmoil and implacability of which rivals that of the Middle East. Oh but I still look cute when I do manage to style my hair:

And insane!

TANGO SEGUE:

But it's a good month for insanity, what with Hallow's Eve around the corner. And tango!

I was Elvis. These are my BLUE SUEDE SHOES

Yes, it was that time of the month yet again! This time, I was regrettably not the dj, something I regretted a little touch more when the actual dj told me that he'd just thrown a list together in an hour. It was all music I like and much of it that I own (we definitely swapped our collections about six years ago and he relies heavily on music from around that time). Of course, since I decided this would be a Halloween themed milonga, I was a little sad not to have had a chance to play a fully saturated set of spooky tandas and thematic cortinas. There are so many lovely options. I have some maniacally eerie Cirque de Soleil alternative valses, for instance. I don't usually break them out because of the sheer oddity, but they really belong in a Halloween tanda. As would a Monster Mash cortina, maybe a Tango 'til They're Sore cortina, and some typical tango songs played in minor key. Maybe next year... Definitely Christmas again! Or Saint Patrick's Day.

The perk of holding your tango rave at an art studio is that it's kind of pre-decorated creepy for Halloween!
 EYE see you..

The advantage of not dj-ing was that we did not have to stay to the end. Not that I couldn't tango until my feet fell off, mind you, but having the option to leave is always pleasant. And Mr. (W)right no doubt also appreciated that option, since he was passing out on the bench starting at nine o'clock. We did actually exercise the option. I'm sometimes also capable of the sort of restraint that allows me to step away from a perfect evening while it's still perfect. I danced with every one I wanted to and I was actually feeling quite good. Despite wearing shoes that don't fit quite right and struggling with the unnecessary cape affixed to my Elvis costume, I was dancing well. I think I'm still on a mild tango high from my brief early October interlude with Sly and the San Francisco alt-tangoers.

And boy did I end on a high note. My partner of the perfect tanda materialized after months of painful absence. We did a vals. Far too brief, but equally infinite. Floating in permanent rubato at one before cascading through the twos and threes into our next infinite temporal ether. Hearts fluttering if they beat at all. And breath perfectly in sync as I think once again "we hear the same music!" as if such a thing were unprecedented and desperately rare.

We slipped away well before the witching hour but long after bed time, and snuggled into bed for an all to short sleep before the weekend slipped away into Sunday limbo. And further slid into Monday... and now Tuesday. And soon, it will be a mere week before the nominal day of my nominally favorite holiday. Get ready to bob for dissolution papers everybody! There's gonna have to be a party at the office!

Until then, stay off my blue suede (velvet) shoes, keep your hound dog's on leashes and stay cool: