Old Friends

Posted by Jules Ritter on May 17th, 2008

Am I getting old and thus pernickety and stubborn, or are standards in general slipping?  I booked myself into Vidal Sassoon in Seven Dials, Covent Garden for a blow dry and was given a blow dry using a paddle brush (!) - which is the equivalent of trying to cross the channel with one oar – and instead of separating the hair into layers and individually blow drying each layer, all the hair is brushed forwards from the root.  The result is something I could have done in the hotel bathroom myself.  I saw it coming and warned young Daniel that my hair will not lie flat with “suggestion” or “teasing”  and that it has to be pulled into submission.  He replied that this is the Sassoon way (!).  End result is something dire.  I ask to speak to manager as I am paying £42.00 for a frizz job.  Manager is French so we converse in French which does not soften him one iota, of course.  I insist on a salon finish and he suggests straightening irons at the additonal cost of …a tenner …further suggesting that the less than perfect result is because I have a lot of colour in my hair. Er….dah.. I put up a polite fight and get the straighteners for free but it was a pissy way to start the day. 

Eschewing the Starbucks experience, I breakfast at The Fountain Restaurant at Fortnam and Masons which restores my hope in humanity before going along to the White Cube in Duke Street to see a photographic exhibition of small town America by  Gregory Crewdson see www.whitecube.com.

I have been loving my “alone in London experience” up until now. (In case you were wondering my mother was busy doing a Thelma and Louise with a girlfriend this weekend, I personally cannot wait for my seventies).  There was no-one with whom to share these wonderful haunting photographs of everday America  and that was a little sad.  No-one to say, God that is so contrived or I love the light in that.  So I ended up following this old biddy American couple around and listening to their comments.  A couple lying on a mattress in post-coital lassitude illicites a silence then, moving closer to the photograph “Is that mattress dirty? ” A homeless woman washing her clothes in the river ”What’s she doing? fishing?”  I love the yanks, especially those of the war baby era,  they are so refreshing.

In the afternoon I bought a ticket to see God of Carnage by Yasmin Reza whom I have loved since seeing ART.  Ralph Fiennes was the eye candy.  I sat next to an elderly lady in her seventies and we had a nice chat about the O2 versus the Albert Hall as a venue centre and her son, before the curtain went up.  Now this would never, ever have happened in Switzerland where any small talk with strangers is regarded with suspicion. 

Tonight, Saturday, I met up with my oldest friend, Sally.  Sally and I first met when we played netball on opposing teams back in 1971. Jeeze…We then lay on each others beds from 1971-1979 moaning about unrequited love inbetween Saturday afternoons spent boy-spotting in town and the Friday night disco where, if we were lucky, we were asked to dance to Free Bird an entrancing 11 minute smooze.

It’s a little like marriage, an old friendship, with its requisite amount of non-dites and subjects that are just not worth bringing up.  For example I know that she thinks this blog of mine is utter crap because she never mentions it.  And I have my suspicions about what she wrote in the Branding Exercise.  But, BUT I still love her for her fiddle playing and her kids who are all sports mad, musically talented, original individuals and for the fact that she probably knows me better than anyone else. 

Back in the hotel room I have ordered all the Sunday Papers and managed to work out the A/C because London at night is getting as noisy as New York with a constant woooooahhhhhh of police sirens, so windows are best kept shut.

Copyright Jules Ritter May and cold 2008

Travels 13 Comments

Martin said,

May 18, 2008 @ 11:20 am

Hi Jules. No – standards are not slipping – it’s just that back in “good old blighty” you’re suffering from “Rip Off Britain”. £42 for a frizz and £16.50 for muesli just sums it all up. There’s just no service anymore in GB where the customer is always wrong – I could regale my recent experiences with “alleged” International Banking out of the UK as compared to UBS – but that’s another story for another time. Let’s just say that, despite all the recent troubles, UBS makes UK banking look pre-Dickensian.

John Norris said,

May 18, 2008 @ 1:56 pm

Making do

“Am I getting old and thus pernickety and stubborn, or are standards in general slipping? ….”

At the risk sounding a little sharp on limited acquaintance, I simply would not know. I live on an ill-health pension of £10k, retired after a career in the public sector. I could not afford to spend £42 on a hair do, far less £16.50 for breakfast, good or bad. My hair and beard is more like £10k plus up to £5 tip – depending on how many weeks I have left it!

The recent inflation in household bills and the end of the 10% starting income tax rate are my concerns. The actual inflation rate for people in my own position is significantly more than the 3-4% currently claimed. However, I do not pretend I am particularly badly off. Gordon Brown stinging the lowest paid was a nasty turn, only half recovered now the Labour MPs have woken up to see it, but it is bearable. Some people are a lot worse off than I.

You will forgive me if I seem somewhat less than shocked by your experiences at Vidal Sassoon and Fortnum & Mason. I cannot afford to shop there, nor can most people I know. I am sympathetic, but I’d suggest using somewhere that gives better value on a budget. I know plenty of local traders here in York who give good value with a smile. Yes, we do have some ‘rip-off artistes’, but they are the exception for tourists, rather than the rule for hoi polloi. Frankly, if I went into Vidal Sasson near Soho or Fortnum & Mason, I would expect to be charged at a premium rate, or even, I’m afraid, ripped off. But, pace Martin and his justified criticism of international banking, I do not think that is yet the common experience elsewhere.

John Norris

John Norris said,

May 18, 2008 @ 2:07 pm

Oops! That second “£10k” should of course be £10. Not even Cherie Blair managed to blow £10k on her hair during the last General Election! Her campaign hairdressing bill, as I recall, but “only” £7k. And she wonders why so many Labour supporters came to detest her.

John Norris

Jules Ritter said,

May 18, 2008 @ 5:19 pm

Hi Martin and a belated thank you for the eggs and dog food! I thought the ones with feathers on were exceptionally tasty. John ,I wasn’t shopping in F & M I was eating breakfast which was, compared to the hotel, great value for money with lovely old fashioned silver service and where the customer is king. Please don’t think I am a hoi polloi type I live very simply back in Switzerland as Martin my egg sharing neighbour can attest to, but that doesn’t mean to say I can’t appreciate the good things in live now and again.

Graham said,

May 18, 2008 @ 5:39 pm

How do they do it?

How can people afford to live in London? How can people afford to visit London? And the inevitable question, why visit London or anywhere else in the UK?

Yes, I know London is theatre, art galleries and fashion. But why is that always used as an excuse for putting up with shoddy service, exorbitant prices, monolingual Poles, rudeness, bad food, unreliable transport, bloodsucking hoteliers, beggars, incompetent terminal 5, dirt, grime, litter, vomit, stabbings, muggings, binge drinking, football hooligans and Gordon Brown?

I loved your story about Vidal’s barbershop and could see you arguing the toss, in French, with the Parisian crimper. You may have won, but I bet he had a field day telling his pals about the woman with the Vaudois accent. You should have reminded him of Sassoon’s slogan – “If you don’t look good, we don’t look good”.

On my last trip to London, I paid 55 quid for a cab to town, 7 quid for two cold coffees in Knightsbridge and £50 for two miserable full English breakfasts at Harrods Veranda. I’d only been in London for 30 minutes and bang went a hundred quid.
Soon finding myself low on cash, I stopped off at Barclays Bank. The cashier wobbled over to the counter carrying, and drinking, a can of Tizer. On the desk behind him was a copy of the Sun and a sandwich. His knuckles spelled out LOVE and HAT. His little finger was missing.

The taxi driver was a card and when he finally turned down the Shirley Bassey tape, we could hear what he was saying about the bloody foreigners, mini cab drivers and how he had had that Pope Benedict XVl in the back of the cab last week. One small consolation, London seems to be the only town in the UK where Gujarati is not the language of cab drivers.

I am a Londoner, but no longer a proud Londoner. There are a thousand wonderful cities in this world where you don’t have to put up with the tawdry, garish and extortionate treatment that London has come to epitomize.

Diana said,

May 18, 2008 @ 6:13 pm

Small talk would never, ever happen in Switzerland?? Good grief – where on earth do you live? The Swiss I know and love have great senses of humour, chat with anyone and are delighted to meet new people – especially those with an interest in them and their country.

Martin said,

May 19, 2008 @ 5:38 am

I believe that I can sum things up nicely … during a recent visit by my mother-in-law, she asked my teenage daughter if she would like to return to the UK. After a thoughtful 5+ seconds, the reply was “Why?”.

But are we “hoi polloi”? Well, I suppose that strictly speaking, we are as a literal translation would mean “the many” – and, in our village at least, the expats of all nationalities are a significant percentage of the population …..

Jules Ritter said,

May 19, 2008 @ 6:09 am

Hi Diana. I went back and changed that to “small talk with stangers” but maybe you read the posting before this. Yes the Swiss are lovely but chance encounters on buses, next to people in the theatre, walking the dog, do not lead to spontaneous conversation and for that you have to agree the English are king!

Diana said,

May 19, 2008 @ 6:25 am

Yes, Martin, that does sum things up nicely. My parents moved to Switzerland when I was a child and I grew up in the Geneva ex-pat community – private schools and very little contact with the Swiss.

Nearly 40 (aargh!!!) years down the road, I have now lived in a town in the Jura mountains for over 20 years with Swiss husband and 3 children. Yes, there is a melting pot of ex-pats of all nationalities but the majority of people living here are Swiss. There are no private schools so all the children go to the local schools and mingle and the language is French. The people live and work in the area and there is a great community spirit and I for one was welcomed with open arms when I arrived. This, for me, is Switzerland and these are the true Swiss people.

Diana said,

May 19, 2008 @ 6:40 am

Sorry Jules but where I live all those chance encounters do indeed lead to spontaneous conversation and even friendship. Especially when dogs or children are involved.

Nadia said,

May 20, 2008 @ 5:52 am

Especially dogs. Great ice-breaker! When I lived in Champel in Geneva (very hoity-toity neighborhood) I knew the names of all the dogs we met in the park. So okay, no human names, but it was contact! :D

Adam said,

June 6, 2008 @ 7:05 pm

Okay, so at the risk of being laughed off the side of the earth (it is flat, isn’t it?), I happen to think that the external environment is merely a manifestation of the internal thought process. So, if you think happy, neighbourly thoughts…you get a happy, neighbourly life etc. It has worked for me every time…well, the two times I gathered up the guts to risk communication with strangers without the benefit of children and dogs as props.

So if that is true about the internal and the external, why do I keep getting emails that say “looking for really effective non surgical penis enlargement?” Or “want to make the girls happy?” I mean I have spent 40 years in a love/hate relationship with my body and whilst the traction device sounds as though it could be somewhat comforting on a rainy friday night, I am rather afraid of admitting to my own feelings of personal inadequacy. By the way, do women get similar emails? I just deleted one that I assumed was on the same wavelength: “Improve your men’s health with WonderCum.” It sounds promising. I haven’t seen any about enlarging my breasts with 100% safe non-surgical methods but I have stopped running and this seems to be happening all on its own. Maybe that is why I don’t get those emails…

Talking of which, can we talk about sex again? Surely Jules you can bring something back from Italy on the subject. What about the loving couple at Pompeii, for example? A hot night for them, obviously. I cast my memory back to our Australian correspondent’s marvelous contribution to the subject at the beginning of the year, and remember the feelings of puritanical self-hatred he roused in so many of us.

Loved your comment about the americans in the art gallery! I wish I had been able to join you that day. Looking forward to catching up. I just love your writing…it is funny, witty and it frequently makes me laugh out loud. Not a bad tonic for whenever I am feeling old sad and lonely. Keep it up, Jules!

Adam said,

June 6, 2008 @ 7:14 pm

PS the americans in the gallery emind me of my father’s response to emotional moments in film. Let’s say someone’s sister dies in the movies: “Don’t worry, you’ve got another one.” A tender moment of love might be greeted with “disgusting! Totally gratuitous!” Or a relationship that splits up “Don’t worry, there’s plenty more fish in the sea!” I suppose the overriding philosophy is don’t dwell on your problems, you only make them worse. Perhaps he is right…

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