It took two hours before hair artists Jenni Gregory and Nicole Homoya at the Alchemy Art + Aesthetics salon in Fountain Square named my hair "Thanksgiving Geisha," tied a burgundy bow around my neck and stood back to admire their handiwork.

My hair was a lovely and slightly frightening sight there on the top of my head.

I was a walking sculpture. Becoming art was an unusual experience for my hair, so often left to its own wild devices.

But, on this day, my hair wasn't its normal floppy self. It was styled. It was shaped. It was sculpted. It was somebody.

My hair was so proud.

I, on the other hand, was only a little uncomfortable with flowery feathers sprouting from my shiny, oblong up-do that looked a little like something from "Edward Scissorhands."

While this was fun for pictures and a brief excursion around the neighborhood -- where funny-looking hair is not that unusual -- I wanted to be back to normal soon. And that, I would find out later, would be the biggest adventure of all for me and my hair.

Raw material

But let's start at the beginning. One of my co-workers suggested getting my hair sculpted after seeing a hair-art show at Alchemy several months ago.

So, with this in mind, I let my hair grow and grow.

Now, when I put on a baseball hat, it looks like I have an awesome mullet.

While I had a lot of hair to work with, they still needed to add some extensions to make the plan work.

Before the appointment, Homoya found a bundle of long, curly strands that perfectly matched my color. She and Gregory spent the first hour of our session gluing about 20 extensions to my scalp. Fun!

I was like Britney Spears if she needed a shave.

Once that was done, they began shaping my hair with a curling iron before setting it up and in place with 100 bobby pins and some shine spray.

While sliding through my hair, the bobby pins often pulled the extensions glued to my head.

That was fun, extra fun!

The final touch was the little centerpiece serving as a platform for the feathers. After they pinned that to my head, they stuck several tail feathers in the back of my swirly hair. All done.

My hair was magnificent.

It's his un-doing

As much as I wanted to leave it in and show off the work these artists had created, I was planning to take the kids to dinner at Ponderosa in Beech Grove.

American food buffets and hair art just don't mix.

So I asked Homoya how I'd undo my up-do. She gave me some oil to soften the glue and some shampoo to help clean up the oil. She told me to come back if I had problems.

I had problems.

By the time I went through a third of the bottle of oil, I was standing at my bathroom sink, looking like a clumsy Rastafarian who works at Jiffy Lube.

I called Homoya. She said she'd take care of me. Hair artists are so nice!

It took a good hour -- even with Gregory pitching in -- to unglue all the extensions. This involved a lot of gentle tugging and pulling. And not-so-gentle tugging and pulling.

At that point -- as a person who gets his hair cut once or twice a year -- I had spent something like four hours in the beauty shop in a single day.

I was frazzled. My head hurt. I smelled funny. But it was all for art. And it was well worth it.

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Alchemy Art + Aesthetics

Where: 1043 Virginia Ave. No. 3.
When: Various hours Tuesdays to Saturdays.
Info: (317) 634-9700, www.myspace.com/alchemysalon.>