One-Off Challenges 8 & 19: Dye My Hair And March In Pride
Two challenges for the price of one! Now that's the sort of efficiency this whole debacle needs if I'm going to get through all forty before April Fools' Day 2019! (As an aside, Firefox's spell checker doesn't know the word "debacle" nor, indeed, the name Firefox. Debacle isn't that odd a word, is it? Anyway, back to it!)
Challenge accepted.
The other challenge, marching in Pride, ties in to John again, on the fairly straightforward basis that he's gay. I hope I've always been supportive of him, but I've never done Pride. Plus, in recent weeks, it's become a more pressing topic, with the big kids reaching the age where being said to be gay is an insult. It's time to roll up my sleeves, educate the kids and support equality. (Poor Nash got a massive lecture about this last weekend when she mentioned that her class had learnt the Gay Gordons and had been teasing her teacher, Ms Gordon, by saying that she was gay. 10 minutes later, Nash had a look on her face that said "Well, that escalated quickly!")
Challenge accepted.
Pride is a colourful thing, full of rainbows, glitter and life, so if ever there was a time to dye my hair, it's now. Of course, I still have to go to work on Monday, so I opted for temporary dye via hair chalk. (Hair chalk, if you're as up to date on hair colouring technology as I was one week ago, is what you use these days instead of those spray-on-wash-out cans of hair dye.) Of course, I'm disorganised, so the only option was Amazon prime one-day delivery. 24 hours and five minutes later, I'm the proud owner of a set of extremely cheap hair chalks.
My hair is dark brown, verging on black these days. Advice from the internet suggests using some white chalk as a base to make the colours pop a bit better on dark hair. I pick out an attractive (and primary school correct) 6 colour rainbow and a stick of white.
They look a bit like a xylophone. They are also an absolute magnate for the toddlers, who have to be prevented from consuming them all while our backs are turned for a split second.
The white does pretty much fuck all. I used the entire stick and the end result was that I looked slightly greyer than I do normally. Oh well.
The actual colours are rather more successful. The end result isn't quite as eye-wateringly vibrant as I hoped, but it'll do. Renae and I end up with spectacularly colourful fingers, though.
Getting to Pride proves slightly challenging with a double buggy in the pouring rain. Brolly plus buggy plus Edinburgh old town narrow pavements equals several awkward traffic jams. At one point, Renae narrowly avoids another Pride bound buggy whose occupant is clad in most excellent rainbow tights and baby-grow. Our two, in their blue rainsuits, look rather drab by comparison.
Locating John at the march proves much more challenging. There's a LOT of people and the Edinburgh Pride march is an unusually tall crowd. It's a rare occasion where I can't just stand on tip-toes and see over everyone, but apparently the LBGTQI scene grows them big! Eventually John is located and various mulit-coloured bits of tat are purchased and the toddlers decorated. We then proceed to get in the way for a while as we try and find a bit of the march to join. Somehow, I singularly fail to spot the Scottish Government contingent until they're just too far in front of ahead of us to catch up to. Eventually, we just decide "fuck it" and start off in the midst of the Midlothian Council group. As it turns out, Xavi isn't as fast as the average Pride marcher, and we get passed by pretty much everyone as we make our way up the Royal Mile. The toddlers acquire a ton of rainbow tat (for free this time) and get coo-ed over appreciatively. Xavi points out every rainbow he sees. He's quite busy.
In the end, we only make it a fraction of the march distance before it's all too much for the little ones. We don't make it to the speeches and we certainly don't make it to the end, but I'm calling this a success none the less.
Throughout the march, my overwhelming sense is one of happiness and acceptance. I'm inclined towards inclusivity by nature, but I find it hard to imagine looking at the thousands of people at Pride and the sheer joy of just being they exude there and thinking they should be shunned, tormented or forced back into the closet. I'm glad I live in a time when Pride can be a joyous celebration, not a bloodied and battered insistence that LGBTQI people deserve human rights too.
Challenges complete.
The hair? Sure. After all, it was a box of 24 pieses and I've only used 7...
Long-term updates
These challenges are courtesy of...
Andy Law (hair dye) and Juliet Swann (Pride).The challenges
Oddly, both of these challenges appeal to me because of my dad, John. On a rather prosaic level, he's never had much hair in the time I've known him. Granted, he wasn't young when I was born, but he's the reason I always assumed I'd be shaving my head by the age of 21. As it turns out, I'm threatening 40 and still sporting a pretty decent head of hair. (In fairness, my cousin John (we're economising on names) is a good chunk older than I am and still fully be-haired. Clearly the hair genes from the Caldwell side of the family are strong.) So, I've got hair I didn't expect to have at this stage, I might as well have fun with it and colour it.Challenge accepted.
The other challenge, marching in Pride, ties in to John again, on the fairly straightforward basis that he's gay. I hope I've always been supportive of him, but I've never done Pride. Plus, in recent weeks, it's become a more pressing topic, with the big kids reaching the age where being said to be gay is an insult. It's time to roll up my sleeves, educate the kids and support equality. (Poor Nash got a massive lecture about this last weekend when she mentioned that her class had learnt the Gay Gordons and had been teasing her teacher, Ms Gordon, by saying that she was gay. 10 minutes later, Nash had a look on her face that said "Well, that escalated quickly!")
Challenge accepted.
Pride is a colourful thing, full of rainbows, glitter and life, so if ever there was a time to dye my hair, it's now. Of course, I still have to go to work on Monday, so I opted for temporary dye via hair chalk. (Hair chalk, if you're as up to date on hair colouring technology as I was one week ago, is what you use these days instead of those spray-on-wash-out cans of hair dye.) Of course, I'm disorganised, so the only option was Amazon prime one-day delivery. 24 hours and five minutes later, I'm the proud owner of a set of extremely cheap hair chalks.
 |
| 24 "Pieses" of chalk. "Not toxic", too, so that's nice. |
 |
| Colourful. |
The white does pretty much fuck all. I used the entire stick and the end result was that I looked slightly greyer than I do normally. Oh well.
The actual colours are rather more successful. The end result isn't quite as eye-wateringly vibrant as I hoped, but it'll do. Renae and I end up with spectacularly colourful fingers, though.
 |
| Rainbow hair. Not as good as other people's rainbow hair, but OK as a first shot with dark hair. |
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| John and the toddlers are not quite as colourful as the average Pride marcher. |
 |
| Sephie shows off some multi-national Pride themed tat. (The flag reads "Flamin' Proud", incidentally.) |
In the end, we only make it a fraction of the march distance before it's all too much for the little ones. We don't make it to the speeches and we certainly don't make it to the end, but I'm calling this a success none the less.
Throughout the march, my overwhelming sense is one of happiness and acceptance. I'm inclined towards inclusivity by nature, but I find it hard to imagine looking at the thousands of people at Pride and the sheer joy of just being they exude there and thinking they should be shunned, tormented or forced back into the closet. I'm glad I live in a time when Pride can be a joyous celebration, not a bloodied and battered insistence that LGBTQI people deserve human rights too.
Challenges complete.
Will I be doing it again?
Pride, yes. We didn't have the big kids today, so they're getting taken to next year's march. They've got a lot of gay relatives and probably a better than average chance of falling somewhere in the LGBTQI spectrum themselves.The hair? Sure. After all, it was a box of 24 pieses and I've only used 7...
Long-term updates
French words "learned" (according to the memrise app):356
"Cheat" days on food since last week: None.
"Cheat" days on exercise: Don't look at me! Don't look at me!
Favourite drawing:I've been working on a sketch of a bit of the garden at my grandparents' old house, South Flisk. As it's a big drawing, it's the only one I've been doing this week. I'm not sure it's working, though, so I might stop it and move on to something else next week.
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