Before, After, and Really After, with Night Circus Bonus!!!

This blog post is only going to be related to books tangentially and not at all to travel, so if that's what you're hoping for and yet you keep reading, it's your own fault--you were warned.

BEFORE

Most of you don't know me IRL (mom, that means In Real Life), but up until 48 hours ago, I had very long hair.

DURING: here's all 10-13" of my hair, all chopped off for donation

And up until 24 hours ago, the remaining hair I had was dark blonde.

AFTER

Now I'm a redhead, but not a red found in nature.  And it was for a very specific purpose.  Tonight the Night Circus came to the Odyssey Bookshop, where I work, and I got to visit with, eat dinner with, and then introduce one of the rising stars of the book world, Ms. Erin Morgenstern.

AFTER-AFTER.  The color looks a little off here, more orange than it actually was.
But my shirt here also looks more blue than black, so maybe it was the lighting.

 For those of you who haven't read the book, there is significance in this book in dressing in all black, with one token of red--a scarf, a flower, a brooch, gloves--and those are the reveurs.  Reveurs follow the circus from town to town, continent to continent.  I consider myself one of the earliest reveurs, having read and fallen in love with The Night Circus several months ago, so when we booked an author event with Erin just one week after publication, I knew I wanted to do something special: I would dress all in black, and my token of red would be my hair.  The only problem is that hair of the particular shade I had in mind is not found in nature.  It can, however, be found at Sally's. 

I kinda like this placement of the glass vis a vis the dust jacket

If I had been truly hardcore, I would have bleached my hair and then dyed it Maraschino cherry red.  But I wasn't confident that I could rock that look for the next few months, so I opted for the temporary color. My long-suffering DH helped me color it this morning, and because he's all artistic and stuff, he used two shades: a darker metallic red for the undercoat and then brighter red highlights sprayed on top.  Good times!  I've also discovered throughout the day that I'm covered in what looks like red metallic dandruff, and my ears and neck look eerily sunburned, no matter how many times I wipe them off, so I guess there's a price to pay for the glamourous look.  And do you want to know something a little gross and not-so-glamourous?  Every time I blew my nose today, the snot came out a diluted metallic pink color, even though I was breathing through a towel during the entire color application.  That's some wicked (and tenacious) stuff, man!

Here you can see my husband's artistry a little better

But it was all worth it in the end.  Erin seemed pleased with our Night Circus display in the store, which we fashioned with a budget of only $12.  Good thing I had a skull, some vases, a red-swirly martini glass, and a giant sword at home to put to use!  And I think she also liked our enthusiasm for the book, not to mention my hair, even if I did shed a little metallic dandruff on her when we hugged good-night. 

Ann Kingman, Erin Morgenstern, and Odyssey Staffers, minus Sydney, who was actually working when this photo was taken.

The Night Circus display arrives without warning...I'm kinda glad we worked both a skull and a sword in there