Off Topic Forum...

[TheATeam 0]

Oh really? Man, back in Edmonton it was like 80 bucks for a full set of artificial nails. Here, I've seen it as low as 25 dollars in a salon and 15 at the Cosmetology Academy. As for a haircut, maybe I'm going to the wrong place, but I only paid 35 dollars for my haircut and a brow wax! I suppose it's different across the country isn't it? It depends on where you live, just like in Canada. I guess Boise is a big city with a little town feel and prices in most places!

[MissStacey 1]

I enjoy getting my hair done but no longer trust my stylist. He has given me two AWFUL (and I mean mullet-like) haircuts and one bad cut for the bf on his first visit to Vancouver.

I am desperately anxious when I walk in the salon now because the bf still gets his hair cut there (by another stylist that he loves) and I have to make small talk with my stylist who I haven't seen in a while but is probably wondering why I haven't made an appointment to see him. In fact, we're going there tomorrow night and I'm nervous.

MissStacey -- how do I deal with this awkwardness? How would you feel?

That is a tough one. I never had to deal with that- I was such a fabulous stylist that my clients always came back

I always encouraged my clients to let me know if they had any problems whatsoever with their hair. If there was anything I ever needed to re-do or fix, I never had a problem doing so. Whether it was an error on my part or just a change of heart on theirs, didn't matter. The only thing that mattered was that they were happy and spread the good word around.

There is no need for you to be nervous- you have every right to not to go back to that stylist. Just smile, say hi and focus your attention on your honey or read a magazine and wait. I guess worst case scenario would be that stylist cornering you and asking where you have been- if they actually have the gall to do that (I know a few people who would be this unprofessional) then just say it "I wasn't really happy with my last few cuts- mullets don't really work for me."

[Emancipation 2]

People on VJ in general E? Or in the Canada Forum?

I think I know what you mean. I kind of expect most people on here to think like I do, maybe it's cause we're all going through or have been through something similar. I've learned quickly that's not the case. Thus, the reason I NEVER post in OT. I occasionally read it but even then, I'm shocked and surprised at a lot of things I find in there!

hee hee.. no it's in OT.. and in the polls.. wow.. i guess there are different tolerances for different things.. and that's okay.. not saying it's not.. just there's lots of ways I wouldn't choose to live.

Oh and i'm in CT.. so it's always going to cost more here tee hee.. I'm comparing to Ch'town pricing.. so i'm probably not the best gauge at these things.

[MissStacey 1]

Oh really? Man, back in Edmonton it was like 80 bucks for a full set of artificial nails. Here, I've seen it as low as 25 dollars in a salon and 15 at the Cosmetology Academy. As for a haircut, maybe I'm going to the wrong place, but I only paid 35 dollars for my haircut and a brow wax! I suppose it's different across the country isn't it? It depends on where you live, just like in Canada. I guess Boise is a big city with a little town feel and prices in most places!

I find it much cheaper here as well. For my nails I pay between $19 and $23 for a fill. I used to pay almost $40 in Edmonton- and that was at Vo's in Bonnie Doon.

I live close to an Aveda academy here and I go there for facials and haircuts. A 90 minute facial is $50. A wonderful treat I get every few months. I pay $15 for a haircut. Colour I can do myself at home and with my Canadian Hairstyling license, I am allowed to shop at the professional Beauty Supply stores.

[Emancipation 2]

Colour I can do myself at home

I started to do this a few months back.. $10.00 in hair color and I am READY to go! Love it.

[SpiritAlight 1]

An interesting feeling you described Trailmix.

All that is coming to me is that you might have had a lot of things to do and felt out of control of your body/time for those moments with cape on and being "trapped" in a chair with sharp things coming at you. Hee, hee.

As for haircuts, I had the best haircut in my life in no less than sweet-&-tiny Portland, Maine.

It was at a spa with lots of fancy shmancy stuff goin' on.

That was in 2005!

It was such a cool style...

And so...I have beeen cutting my own hair for a looooooong time. It is straight and easy. I experiment with layers every now and then....framing.

My hair is so thin and so fine (baby hair, really), that it takes me a minute or two to do it.

I hit a hair dresser/cutter once every 5 or 10 years or so. Hahaha.

[Marilyn. 340]

Colour I can do myself at home

I started to do this a few months back.. $10.00 in hair color and I am READY to go! Love it.

yeah I colour my own hair too....

as for haircuts, my hubby's cousin recommended a place.... I love it there, I always get a good cut.. it costs about 30 bucks and i get a shampoo, cut and blow dry for that.. the only problem is it is a little far.. so I only go like once or twice a year ... but now that I have wheels and a job, I might go more often

[KarenCee 3]

On the subject of friends....

When you're the one to initiate the contact...the only one to call or email...and she never wants to visit your house, always wants you to come there AND spend the night...and goes all heavy on you when you make the decision to just visit...but dang it, she's always been my friend, yanno, since we were teenagers. She has a strong personality and for so long I had a timid one. I think she rather liked being the strong one of the two of us. Especially when I found the strength and courage to leave my abusive ex. This last visit to her house...it was New Year's Eve 2007 and we had just moved into our new house. We decided on the way down to just visit and come home to ring in the New Year in our new house. She assumed we would spend the night and I was actually nervous about telling her we wouldn't be. When I did tell her, she went a little ballistic...to which I reacted a bit strongly...to the level that her husband came into the den and told ME that we needed to calm down, that he gets very little quiet in his own home. He was addressing us both but looked directly at ME. I felt very small indeed. Needless to say it just wasn't the same for the rest of the evening.

I guess now that I'm not the timid little mouse I used to be, the atmosphere has definitely changed between us. I'm not so reliant on her wisdom as before and I can actually stand on my own two feet now. I'm the one that has (for the most part) initiated the phone calls or emails 95% of the time. I'm the one (or me and Joel now) that always goes to her house. I dunno, I feel like I'm not supposed to be strong when I'm around her and when I am there, I feel like I'm years behind her in wisdom and strength...is this making sense? I think I'm at that point that I want to find a way to end this friendship. Believe me, this isn't something I've just thought about and decided in like five minutes. This is something that has been on my mind and in my heart for a couple years now. I guess I want to feel like I'm important enough for her to visit me, to call me on the phone, to email me. Do I sound like a petulant child?

I have so few friends as it is...no real friends here where we live other than hubby. The girls I work with, well...that's just work, yanno? I do have one good friend near Vidalia GA (met her on VJ!). I guess though, if I'm the one making all the effort here...it's definitely NOT something I'm happy about.

Bleh. What would you do? (I think I know, but asking anyway )

[SpiritAlight 1]

On the subject of friends....

When you're the one to initiate the contact...the only one to call or email...and she never wants to visit your house, always wants you to come there AND spend the night...and goes all heavy on you when you make the decision to just visit...but dang it, she's always been my friend, yanno, since we were teenagers. She has a strong personality and for so long I had a timid one. I think she rather liked being the strong one of the two of us. Especially when I found the strength and courage to leave my abusive ex. This last visit to her house...it was New Year's Eve 2007 and we had just moved into our new house. We decided on the way down to just visit and come home to ring in the New Year in our new house. She assumed we would spend the night and I was actually nervous about telling her we wouldn't be. When I did tell her, she went a little ballistic...to which I reacted a bit strongly...to the level that her husband came into the den and told ME that we needed to calm down, that he gets very little quiet in his own home. He was addressing us both but looked directly at ME. I felt very small indeed. Needless to say it just wasn't the same for the rest of the evening.

I guess now that I'm not the timid little mouse I used to be, the atmosphere has definitely changed between us. I'm not so reliant on her wisdom as before and I can actually stand on my own two feet now. I'm the one that has (for the most part) initiated the phone calls or emails 95% of the time. I'm the one (or me and Joel now) that always goes to her house. I dunno, I feel like I'm not supposed to be strong when I'm around her and when I am there, I feel like I'm years behind her in wisdom and strength...is this making sense? I think I'm at that point that I want to find a way to end this friendship. Believe me, this isn't something I've just thought about and decided in like five minutes. This is something that has been on my mind and in my heart for a couple years now. I guess I want to feel like I'm important enough for her to visit me, to call me on the phone, to email me. Do I sound like a petulant child?

I have so few friends as it is...no real friends here where we live other than hubby. The girls I work with, well...that's just work, yanno? I do have one good friend near Vidalia GA (met her on VJ!). I guess though, if I'm the one making all the effort here...it's definitely NOT something I'm happy about.

Bleh. What would you do? (I think I know, but asking anyway )

Dear KarenCee, that is a challenging one.

And yes, the EASY thing to do is break up with her.

The interesting part is this: what can you do that will keep your boundaries, let her know about them, and clean this whole thing us...meet your needs...you know?

Things left unsaid take their tolls on us.

In the end, anything one takes care of helps one grow (and learn, obviously).

Situations are presented before us for us to learn a lesson.

They will repeat if we do not catch them the first time.

Do I sound like a whack of new age-y books?

Hahaha!

I mean it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Ban Hammer 13,133]

I just find those people suck the LIFE out of you.. they are like little black holes!

had a g/f or two like that, i referred to them as "emotional vampires"

[Mephys 2]

Had a very bizarre experience last night - have an ex boyfriend on Facebook and we got to chatting last night.. strange.. anyway.. he's like fallen madly for this girl and all the things that I saw at the time (the pain, the running away, etc). you know classic bad boy stuff.. he's dealing with, she's making him deal with if he wants to be with her... she's good for him, and he apologized for the things he did to hurt me.. amazing really. and he said thanks.. thanks for being good to me. Which is really cathartic in a non-emotional way. ya know.. you don't always get chances like that to debrief. He moved not long after we broke up, so i never had those "closing' moments with him.. funny that.. I like happy endings.

Got some catching up to do here 2 days without looking at VJ

Alright, well E I must admit, this is a similar experience of mine, but backwards. My first BF in High school, we dated for almost 5 years. And I wasn't very stable emotionally back then, and me being a very strong personnality and him being more the soft kind, I guess I left him more bitter memories than good memories after we broke up. I kinda "traumatised" him. And this is something that unfortunately I realised only later after I matured and I was also dealing with my second BF, who had bipolar tendencies and was driving me off the edge a lot. It kinda served me as a lesson, and I learned a lot from it and it made me the better person I am today, able to actually enjoy life much better and have an happy relationship with Josh.

But after reconnecting with a few old friends on Facebook last year, I somewhat learned what I was fearing for a long time : that he had done everything he could to forget me and that I had left painful memories on him and he had a hard time to go on with his relationships for a while after me. I was expecting that I guess but not as bad as he did. I felt guilty, and this had been on my mind for the last 10 years so I managed the get his e-mail from a guy that was still good friends with him.

So I sent him an e-mail, some sort of apology, saying that I realized over the years how bad of a person I was as a teenager, and that I was deeply sorry he had to cope with the worst of me during those years, and that I realized how unstable I was over the years and that I had changed a lot, only to be able to face what i used to be and accept that it was behing and there was nothing I could do about it, but that I was sorry he had to deal with that and that I never meant for it to be this way.

He sent me a long e-mail saying he was unpleasantly surprised that I had asked for his e-mail but that he was curious of what I had to say, and that he was happy to read my e-mail and realized that I had changed, and all I had been through, and he accepted my apology. He did admit to me that I did hurt him a lot, but that it was his weakness of not letting me go and that he realized over time that he had a part of responsability in the length of time that we dated, that he should have been stronger and end it sooner that we did. He said he was happy we had that little conversation and I think it made us both feel better and finally turn the last page that had bothered both me and him. I wished him a lot of happiness in his love life (hes been dating a girl for 3 years now I think) and he wished me the same, happy that I got married a found my soulmate. We even both agreed that I needed a much stronger person and him a more mellow person in our lives.

So this is my stroy Sometimes old demons can haunt you for a long time, but the thing I've learned is not to be ashamed of the past because there is nothing that can be changed about it, but to accept it and walk on my pride and apologize, and it definitely made me feel better

Speaking of closure I just got rid of my "frenemy"

Frenemy.. never heard of that term before.. LOVE It..

I second that !!!!

Colour I can do myself at home

I started to do this a few months back.. $10.00 in hair color and I am READY to go! Love it.

I have done my mom's color a lot back then and did a simple color on myself a whole bunch of times. My prob is I really love highlights, and those can become expensive. So I tried that kit 2 months ago from L'Oreal, with the copper highlights, and I did it very carefully. I must admit I love the results for just 12$ instead of 70$ ++...

And I went to my stylist on Tuesday and she complimented me on it Speaking of my stylist, it's the 3rd time I go see her since I moved, and she is ok for the most part, but I still miss mine from Montreal a lot Youa re lucky E that you can go back home so often, I wish I could too!

My stylist in Montreal used to cut my hair dry with a razor blade only. I loved the results so much. And my stylist here she uses it but she doesn't seem as comfortable, and I always feel like the scissors makes my hair look too square....I have partly curly hair and they are kinda thick....

sigh

[Emancipation 2]

KarenCee wow.. that's a tough one.. I think me & my BFF are a little bit like that.. i'm the stronger one, the one who always initiates conversation and the one who always visits.. BF doesn't sound quite as "touchy" though.. *sigh.. what do you do when it's someone you have loved for so long and have so much history with? One thing I can do is tell my BF anything, so I'd probably have a long sit down and tell her how I feel.. not focus so much on what SHE's done to me, but how I feel about the relationship. Let her ask how she's contributing to the mess, and if she asks.. then you can be honest.. if she doesn't .. well.. she's so self absorbed there may not be any room in the friendship for the two of you?

:dance: Mephys :dance: You were HERE!! YIPPEE!! I've missed ya! 'nway.. I think you are a strong person for doing that.. WHOOOEEEE.. man.. good for you for taking the risk and apologizing, I'm sure it helped his self esteem too, just to know that he could let go of everything that was attached to that time. Makes me think would I have the courage to bring that kind of closure to one of my ex's.. (rummages through memories to think if there is anyone).. oh yes... when I was 13 I dated a guy who was 21(pls don't get stuck on numbers, it was something even my parents encouraged - i was emotionally mature, he was a mess) .. I broke his heart.. big time.. anyway, i was little too young for the long term relationship he wanted, and I kinda toyed with him FAR too long.. i did catch up with him on FB -he's in the CDN military now, been married for YEARS and adopted his wife's 2 kids.. great guy.. glad that he has found True love.

*sigh.. a lot of guys broke my heart.. it seemed to be more frequent than I breaking hearts.

[trailmix 77]

Good morning everyone....interesting conversation in here!

[thetreble 19]

Holy ####### there are a lot of conversations going on in here and I can't keep track!

Karen- I have a very similar situation wtih one of my best friends. Although we are both strong minded women, she uses me all the time and I never get to use her in return! she moved to NYC for 4 months to work at the UN and I let her stay with me until she found an apartment, no questions asked. When I went to Ottawa, the place we met and lived for 4 years, I stayed in a hotel because she was "too busy writing her thesis and didn't want to be interrupted". I find that through our relationship I'm only good for her when she needs me. I've tried to break up with her but I can't. I love her too much because we went through so many things in our lives together that were pivotal. It really is a hard thing to deal with.

As far as hair goes, I'm extremely particular. I'm currently growing my hair out so I'm only giving myself trims every once and awhile. I also have never let a hair stylist cut my bangs. Usually I wear them long to the side but I recently cut them to give my face a nouveau appeal. hehe. I also box dye my hair. I've been doing it for years. I think there are methods you can learn that give you just as good a job as any hair salon will do. Im a col-a-holic, really.

As far as nails go, I'm 100% au-natural. I do live in NJ though so maybe that has thrown me off from getting them done? Every girl from 5 years old to grandma has their nails done. If I'm lucky enough, they will also have a very fake tan to go along with it!

[SpiritAlight 1]

I wonder why these "demons" haunt us.

Could it be because we carry the guilt like a bruise that won't heal?

How would life be if we could truly let go of all baggage?

(Wow, I will just sit in that glorious feeling for a moment...mmmmm)

And how hard is it really to just let go ?

Funny how when I am feeling good and strong and all that, this is a simple thing to do.

And at times of stress, forget about it. HA!

Let's see...hmmm....so many of us here left our worlds to come and be with our partner in their world and that alone is HUGE.

I will carry this next thought over to the Love Thread.