Human hair extensions Do you ever wonder how stars change their hairstyles so frequently? The answer : HAIR EXTENSIONS! Till fairly recently, hair extensions were a trade secret of stylists everywhere. Today, hair extensions are way more reasonable and hair friendly which means that you do not have to be a celeb to have a great hairstyle. For years celebrities have depended on their stylists to add length, fullness, body and even highlight using hair extensions. These days more than ever, ladies everywhere are benefiting from the suppleness that hair extensions bring to their private sense of style. Hair extensions are the most recent fashion accessory!

Hair extensions promote variety there are a number of sorts of hair extensions. Like a standard wig, hair extensions come in both natural human hair and synthetic form. Unlike traditional hair extensions, which had to be stitched in to your natural hair, Great Hair Extensions uses a fusion method to attach the extension to your hair at a molecular level making lots of today’s hair extensions are much more’hair friendly.’

Most clip in hair extensions will last anywhere from half a year up to a year, making them astonishingly cost effective.Here is a great resource for human hair extensions .

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When it comes to wigs, there is a lot to choose from. Human hair, synthetic hair, clip-ons, extensions or something to cover everything. And if you don’t want to make an appointment with an expensive specialist, it’s best to look into a place like Discount Beauty Supply on Fillmore Street, in the heart of the jazz district.

Discount Beauty supply has a little bit of everything. While they primarily sell wigs, extensions and hair pieces for women, they also have a plethora of relaxers for women and men as well as basic hair care products like shampoos and conditioners, styling tools such as curling irons and straighteners and brushes and combs of all sorts–things like three-in-one combs and military combs. They also offer fitting services and the store is fully staffed with employees eager to help.

Depending on how you like to shop, this may be a place you love or a place you hate. Either go knowing exactly what you are looking for or be prepared for a hunt. This store is literally brimming with merchandise: hair care paraphernalia is stocked from floor to ceiling and squeezed onto shelves. Neither is Discount Beauty Supply a good place for a person with a neck problem as almost all wigs are either stored or displayed near the ceiling. Unfortunately, due to the overstuffed nature, the store can be tricky to maneuver and you may face a tight squeeze if you find yourself sharing an aisle with another customer.

Oddly, the store’s official name is Beauty Supply Warehouse–their website is bswoakland.com – but the sign is clearly marked “Discount Beauty Supply”. Also, the store can be rather tricky to locate: the address is 1440 Fillmore Street, but the entrance is around the corner, just off the plaza across from Safeway.

Much has been said about hate crime victim Jorge Steven López possibly being trans, but I want to make it clear: he wasn’t. But he was very comfortable in his own skin, he loved to cross gender boundaries and he was accepted as such by his friends, his partner and his own parents. His mom, Myriam Mercado, knowing that his son used hair extensions as part of his look, even told the press in Puerto Rico, “Behind that wig and those boots, there was a human being, a very much loved son, a brother and a friend.”

He was a young gay man, who like many others, used to do drag for special occasions such as Halloween or LGBT Pride parades. It’s like many gay men who go to Fire Island to compete in drag races and do drag just for a race.

I understand the politics behind identifying a hate crime victim as trans when part of his or her expression does not conform to his or her sex, but sometimes we must bend the rules to accommodate the cultural and societal differences.

I would like to ask for respect of our cultural and societal differences from our friends in the U.S. In our Puerto Rican culture, people who are gender nonconforming, gender variant or gender queer are not considered trans. We only consider as transgender or transsexual, people who identify as such. And we respect that.

Puerto Rico is a very progressive place for trans people in terms of legislation. Since 2002, we have a hate crimes law that includes gender, sexual orientation and gender identity. Our Patient’s Bill of Rights also includes these categories. An executive order still in place bans discrimination based on gender, sexual orientation and gender identity in state government, even giving health benefits to same-sex partners of its employees.

Currently, after much pressure from LGBT and human rights organizations, Proyecto 1725 (House Bill 1725) an ENDA-sort of legislation in Puerto Rico had to be amended to include gender identity as part of the definition of sexual orientation, like they did in Oregon. It’s not the best definition, but we are working to make it fully inclusive. The good thing is that Proyecto 1725 was approved almost unanimously by the very Republican state House of Representatives. Only 6 legislators voted against it, out of 51.

I have been a staunch ally for all underrepresented communities, not only the trans community but also economically-disadvantaged communities, sex workers, seniors, people living with HIV/AIDS, immigrants and people with disabilities, among many others.

I have also advocated in the state Legislature and the public sphere for trans rights passionately and constantly. I have advocated for the birth certificate and documentation for trans people to be changed even if the person does not undergo a sex reassignment surgery. The current draft of the revision of the Civil Code includes the change of the birth certificate, but not in the broad way I’ve advocated for and will continue to do so. I have advocated for trans pathologization to end. I have advocated for the full inclusion of trans people in all aspects of our lives.

Just to give you an example, this is a video taken by Puerto Rican LGBT activist Christopher Pagán at a recent pageant in Krash Klub in Puerto Rico, in which I gave a passionate plea for acceptance and an end to our own unjust judging within our communities. Please remember that this is a speech at 4 a.m. at a local club:

But again, in this case, I would like to ask for respect for Jorge Steven’s self-identification. He identified, lived and loved as a young gay man. Let’s honor his memory by being true to who he really was.

Clip on hair extensions and clip in hair extensions is the same thing. They are a man-made synthetic hair used by women to give length volume and lift to their natural hair. Synthetic hair is different from human hair extensions because they are man-made consisting of a substance called kanekalon. It is also easier to maintain than human hair extensions.

Synthetic hair extensions come in a vast range of colors from natural like brown, black, blonde to not so natural like blue, pink, green and yellow. The choice of which hair color you opt for is up to you.

Apart from a huge range of colors that are available for clip on hair extensions they also come in different textures. You can get straight, wavy, curly and spiral hair extensions.

The main advantage of clip in hair extensions is choice. The choice to go with a long or short hair, be a blonde or a brunette, have straight hair or curly. You can change your look to suit your clothes or to copy a particular celeb.

Clip on hair extensions can be very long with lengths from shoulder length hair to a “Cher” like length that flows down the back. Whether the texture is curly, straight of waved the look is dramatic. The clip on style of hair extensions is very easy for a woman to use but these are only for temporary looks. They are as easy to use as the barrettes that children put in their hair.

Clip on hair extensions are a light weight product that do not feel like you have something pressing down on your head. They are easy to attach and not noticeable from your natural hair. With a little practise you should be able to apply the hair extensions in a matter of minutes.

Most women want to emulate the celeb they have seen on tv. or a super model on the catwalk. Believe it or not most celebs and models are not born with long luscious hair. It is the hair extensions that they use which is giving them that look, you can have that too.

The modern hair extension products are well made and the hair looks natural whether it is synthetic or natural hair. With different types of hair extension products, women are free to choose the best method for adding length and volume to their natural hair.

The smoke in the house was bitter. Isolde could smell it in her clothes, her hair as she set the tables for the morning. It was the kind of smoke that resembled fingers, clutching, pressing on your throat. It was sweet to begin with but quickly turned acrid as grave dust.

The household had been preparing for the blue moon for months. It was the time when the power of the witch was heightened to well above its maximum potential, when every spell cast could not fail. It was more potent if it occurred at the end of a decade. Lulubel had run a big marketing campaign on Facebook and Twitter, had bought ad space on Google and set up a website -Spells R Us - she had called it. So tacky.

Isolde had doubted that people would pay good money for spells they couldn’t see, wouldn’t immediately get results for. It’s not as if the power of a witch could be packed up in a box, but the campaign had proved successful. People were crazy for the occult these days, it was all Harry Potter this and Twilight that. She had even heard girls at the coffee shop discussing the hotness levels of the vampires in True Blood. I’d love to have a vampire boyfriend, said one girl as the other giggled. That’d be the ultimate in sexy.

You have no idea, Isolde thought. A real vampire would rip out your throat, dismember you, then suck on your bones as he watched television – Ellen Degeneres probably; real vampires couldn’t resist talk shows. Many of them held fantasies of storming into studios and killing the entire audience at once. A television studio with all its alarms and doors that only opened one way was like a meat market for vampires. A human meat market. The only thing more enticing was the Intensive Care Unit in a hospital. Or nap time at a Kindergarten.

Lulubel was smugger than the kitchen cat when Cook slipped him real salmon fillets. Spells R Us had attained a Google ranking of 8 out of 10. The spells were walking out the door. Lulubel had been invited to appear on the Shopping Network. She’d had hair extensions put in and had Agatha cast a glamour on her so that people couldn’t help but hand over their money when they saw her. Isolde had protested about the ethics of using a spell to sell spells, but Lulubel had waved her concerns away with the curve of a deeply manicured hand (she actually had fingernails with broomsticks on them.)

There is no place for ethics in the modern world, she said. All that crap about not using witchcraft for personal gain and being careful about what you send out because it might come back to you threefold is a load of codswallop. Ethics, schmethics. Modern witchcraft is all about the bottom line, maximising your sales potential and promoting your brand. It’s all about our share of the market, not about what flies about in the ether. Get with the program, Isolde.

Isolde knew the batshit was really going to hit the fan when Lulubel got a call from Oprah. She had bought a Think Yourself Thinner package and wanted Lulubel to appear on the show via Skype. Lulubel preened herself like a 17th century aristocrat, getting Agatha to cast another glamour so that Oprah would feel her earnestness right through the broadband. Oprah hung on every word. She wanted to be thin so badly. Isolde could see the longing in her eyes, like a puppy waiting to eat the cookies you’d left on the kitchen table when you walked out of the room. The woman had more money than King Midas, but it was still wrong.

Have you tried any of these spells? Isolde asked. How do you know they’re going to work?

I’ve got the whole coven working on them, Lulubel said. I’m not an idiot. Besides, it’s a blue moon.

The next blue moon was set for August 2012. Isolde could imagine the frenzy leading up to it if Lulubel’s spells actually worked. She’d have to move out, get a house among the trees.

She put on her coat, walked out into the garden, looked up at the sky. It could have been painted by Monet, so rich was it with purples and blues.

Isolde had a spell of her own to cast.

Save the trees, she whispered. And the creatures that need them. Give them a chance for a good life.

She heard Lulubel shouting out something about half a million sales and shook her head. Gathering her coat around her she walked. Her skin was aquamarine in the moonlight. Her boots were silver.

Isolde walked and walked, guided by the moon, blue as a Christmas bauble, on and on until Lulubel’s cries were gone and all she could hear were the leaves catching the wind in their sleep.

And the smell of the wind as it carried the clouds to morning.

*Image by StamatisGR at DeviantART.