No hair advice, but "dirty orangutan" is cracking me up. I can just picture it.

Courage, rmless. I'm sure L'Oreal will be able to fix it for you.

I really like orangutans but that's a far cry from light gold brown.

Have you any Prell?

G'luck!

Don't worry. First of all, I'm sure it's not as bad as you think. It may not be the best colour for you, and it's a big change from your point of view, but I bet most people will think you looks charming as usual.

L'Oreal will fix it. Sending good hair juju.

L'Oreal will probably send some male orangutans to help grooming. You won't stay dirty long.

I love the fact that Tangerine likes the dirty orangutan colour, is that Eponysterical??

Ook.

The good news is that you are so good looking that a mere off color of your hair is a slight deduction, as most. . .

I like shaving other people's heads! Just putting that out there :)

Specklet's right, though. The change looks huge and horrible to you, particularly freshly dyed, but it won't be as noticeable to nearly everyone else (both people who like it and people who don't) and L'oreal will be able to help.

Also, with home dyes, there's a huge difference between how it looks freshly dyed and post-first-wash. I am sure it will look better in the morning.

Shampoo 3x for the first few days and conditon losts. If the discoloration is concentrated on the ends of your hair, you could consider a trim. Good luck, sorry.

hmm, gaspode- that's always been something I've thought of. I might take you up on it if this doesnt get fixed.

I will look into Prell, I am not sure it would work for this since now my hair is lighter than before and stripping the color out might change it from Dirty Orangutan to Old Dishwater. We shall see.

The good (maybe) news is that since my original hair color is darker than this, maybe I can just get a dark brown dye and cover it. Sigh.

Thanks for the words of reassurance and encouragement! I guess since I haven't been really paying attention to anything but work recently, this is more funny than disastrous to me. I spent like 5 min in the morning today just laughing in the mirror.

No one at work has said anything yet (covering most with a beret), but then again everyone is just as busy/miserable as I am so they probably haven't even looked at me today.

It's funny because in the store I was deciding between this golden brown color and an ashy blond and I chose this one because it seemed like it was going to be less of a change, but I think I would have been better off with the cooler color (do you think it would have been less red that way?).

Is it wrong to want to see pictures? I do.

Words of support! Specklet and others are exactly right: this looks far more noticeable and disastrous to you than it will to anyone else. You probably look quite charming, except to yourself.

You're right that it's iffy to strip dark color from lightened hair; you're the best judge of that. If you decide to try it and you can't find Prell, any clarifying shampoo should do pretty well to remove color. Do be sure you do an intensive conditioning treatment afterwards. The process is very drying.

this is more funny than disastrous to me. I spent like 5 min in the morning today just laughing in the mirror.

This is a well-adjusted person. Yay, you!

Oh, I've been there. I have very dark brown hair and I tried dying it black once. It was a disaster. I missed parts of my hair, plus the black just looked awful. I put it in a bun and went to work, then went for an emergency salon appointment at lunch where they stripped my hair (which turned it bright orange!) and then dyed it back to its natural color. Went back to work after that and no one was the wiser.

Any talk of people becoming orangutans makes me think of the Librarian (the fictional one, not Jessamyn!) and "ook ook." I wouldn't have mentioned it until you said you've found it amusing.

You can strip it with dish soap and then redye, particularly if you're going for a darker color. You do need to strip it first though, because otherwise the two dyes are going to react against each other and then you can really really be in trouble. Or, leave the orangutan dye in and try dying big fat chunky streaks of your hair a different color. I think that always looks cool and it takes away from the allover orange look that is currently alarming you.

Testimonial! MGL has been dying her hair for so long that she no longer remembers the original color and has endured just about every product known from henna to manic panic and back again.

Speaking of hair color, my regular has been discontinued (100% color), and I've yet to find a replacement I like.
I tried natural instincts. It came out closer to reddish-black than auburn, and the gray is still there. Not thrilled.

Kelly, I like those new 10-minute colours that came on the market about a year ago - L'Oreal do one and there's also another leading brand that I can't recall the name of. I've found they give great coverage. My hair is so porous that if I don't want to end up dark, dark brown, I have to choose one that says 'light golden brown' on the box, and then it comes out a sort of mid-dark brown colour.

ps "warm" is code for "reddish", yeah. My other tip is the first time you use a product, leave it in for less than the suggested time. From a half to a third of the time. That may be my baby fine hair talking, ymmv.

Oh noes poor rmless2!

Been home dyeing for years and it's usually turned out pretty good. Don't have any suggestions except take pics so we can all join in the fun!

I've tried all those home remedies to remove my mistakes before, none of them worked. The only tried and true thing I found was Color Oops color remover. It always takes it back to the color I started with, has never failed me yet and it does little damage to your hair. I always do a long olive oil treatment after I use the color remover. I find it at Walgreens or CVS

Oh for tomo, make sure you pick out a Green Hat!

Ahh, warm=red, I should have known that.
It looks a little less red today, and both my coworkers and my friends at dinner actually liked it, so I think I am going to leave it for the week until my sister and bf get back and take their votes as the final word.

Here's a pic:
≡ Click to see image ≡

This morning, despite being more ok with the overall look, I just found a patch in back behind my left ear that looks like it didn't get much dye. Hahaha, this is hilarious.

The actual color is lighter than the picture, especially in front where I have a natural blonde streak that didn;t change with the dye.