Pwhack,

I understand where you are coming from,. After i get my unit cut in by a professional stylist, i gotta be honest, it looks semi-terrible. Hair is way too poofy, seems to have no style, or looking natural. The secret is, it really needs tweaking and settling time. After i get it 'cut in', I go home to tweak to the length i really want in different places. I put in gels or spray to hold the style i want, and then i leave it for a few days. I may tweak a little further in the following week, but after that, its pretty much all done to how i like, and i wear it for about 3 months with no more major tweaking really. I would say tweaking time within the first week,, including coloring, cutting, maybe even cutting down the base etc...would be about 3-8 hours. After that i wear with no problems really.
My personal opinion is that tweaking is SO important to get it to 'look' right.

Sam