Tonight I dragged myself down to a local salon and paid nearly £30 to get my hair chopped. And to be perfectly honest, I begrudged every penny.
Actually, I didn't begrudge the first £20 worth of it. Alright, I'd stretch to £22. But the rest of it feels like blood being sucked out of my body through the pores. Because I think the price of women's hairdressing these days is just obscene and it annoys the bejesus out of me.
What's even worse about tonight's expenditure, was that the final cost was minus a 50 per cent online discount. So the guy who basically gave me a significant trim usually charges £56 for the privilege. I wouldn't mind if I was having hugely complicated cuts done, with fringes and feathering and colours and highlights and Brazilian blowdrys and god knows what else. But I'm not. I'm essentially just having the ends cut off, for god's sake, so I think it's just extortionate.
In my late teens and early 20s, I was reasonably adventurous and got my hair chopped and changed every few months. But nowadays, because I know roughly the sort of style I want - low maintenance, no colouring, no reason for it to cost more than £20 to be maintained, if that - and because I'm fed up with the spiralling cost of getting some slack-jawed bimbo or himbo to do it, I've started to neglect my hair rather shamefully.
Which means that although I might look reasonably neat for a couple of weeks after the cut, for the remaining four or five months until my next appointment, I look like I've stuck my finger in a handy light socket while sucking on a damp flannel. So I really do need to start prioritising it, but I just refuse to be fleeced, both literally and metaphorically.
For the last couple of years, I've shuffled around the various salons in my home town, just choosing whichever company happens to have a discount voucher in the paper that week and never using the same one more than once. The annoying thing is that my lack of love for any one salon does not just come down to the eye-popping prices. I have also failed to find a single place that makes me feel remotely comfortable in the big black chair.
These cavernous places are always achingly cool and the moment the uber-trendy stylist approaches me, I feel roughly 68 years old and about as well groomed as Stig of the Dump. Nine times out of ten, they have absolutely nothing to say to me and seem to be entirely lacking in the warm social skills for which hairdressers always used to be renowned. And that is another damn good reason why I just don't enjoy getting the mop chopped anymore. Sadly, it doesn't look like tonight's experience will bring my eternal hunt for a satisfactory salon to an end.
Don't get me wrong, it wasn't terrible. But it didn't start off that well. As I swung in through the big glass doors, my heart sank - huge white box with pointless pictures on the wall? Check. Young, boho chic, absurdly coiffeured, slightly vacant assistants? Check. Me wanting to just put up with crap hair for the rest of my life rather than submit to an hour of humiliation at the hands of the Stepford Wives? Check.
To be fair, the assistant who washed my hair was nice enough and chatted to me a bit, even if her vigorous technique left me feeling like a crusty Labrador getting its yearly bath. It was just a shame that I couldn't make out what she was saying, due to that appalling Hollyoaks drawl that all 'youngsters' seem to adopt these days. But soon I didn't have to worry about not being able to understand her, as I could no longer hear her, thanks to the perforated eardrum I suffered when she turned on the hose. Still, at least that proved a distraction from the steady stream of lukewarm water that was soon gushing under my collar and pooling in my bra.
When I was finally plonked back in the stylist's chair and suffering that uncomfortable feeling of vulnerability I always get in that situation - having to stare at myself with my wet hair twisted up in a slipping turban and make-up running all over the place, feeling about as alluring as an Auschwitz shower cubicle - I saw my stylist looming up in the mirror behind me and thought for a moment he'd accidentally strayed away from a nearby graffiti workshop for juvenile delinquents. Either that, or I was on the set of Wackaday. Boasting 80s throw-back neon trainers, a baseball cap at a dubious angle and a little shoulder bag that was more redundant than Gordon Brown, he made an arresting sight.
To be quite fair, he was actually alright. Though clearly at the back of the queue when senses of humour were being handed out, he chatted amiably and agreed that silent, intimidating salons were really rather horrid. When he'd finished nibbling away with his scissors, I was pleased with the result. Or at least, no more disappointed than usual that a long-awaited trip to the hairdresser had once again failed to transform me into Angelina Jolie.
By skillfully averting my eyes from the amount while keying in my card pin number, I managed to forget - briefly - about how much I was paying this chap for delivering one of Life's more mediocre experiences. I even managed to avoid touching the hair I could feel wisping around my face as I stood there, even though both he and I knew that as soon as I was around the corner, I would be furiously running my hand through my hair to get rid of the self-conscious mannequin feeling and thus undoing all his good work.
But just as I was about to make my getaway, he asked me if I'd like to book my next appointment now, thereby saving 10 per cent on my next cut. With a cold chill I remembered that this was the £56 guy, so even with that generous discount, I'd still be expected to shell out half a ton to have about an ounce of hair removed. An amount that I was never going to pay, not in a million years. And yet, as our eyes met, I knew I couldn't refuse. It was like being asked for a second date by someone you think is okay and would be decent enough company at the cinema, say or a day trip to the zoo, but the thought of doing the horizontal tango with them makes you feel a trifle unwell.
So I booked. And of course I'm going to cancel. But that now means that I can't ever go back there to see a cheaper stylist. It would be like dating an ex's friend in their favourite pub. It would just be awkward, us glaring at each other through the multi-reflected mirrors like baleful ghosts.
So my brief encounter with that salon will have to remain just that. C'est la vie.
Wednesday, 25 August 2010
Sunday, 8 August 2010
Review: Alone in Berlin by Hans Fallada
The old saying "never judge a book by its cover" is a bit of a redundant one sometimes, I think. I realise it is supposed to apply more to people than books in the literal sense, but cover design is still pretty crucial in the publishing world. Only the classics can afford to be stacked on the shelf with just a plain cover, Penguin-style, when the title says it all.
So I can honestly say that it was the cover of Alone in Berlin that captured my attention. I had never heard of it before I spotted it in the book shop one day and I didn't buy it straightaway, but it stayed on my mind and I decided to purchase it a few weeks later.
The cover was atmospheric - a lone man almost lost in a whirl of snow amid crumbling monuments - and the font was strange. It compelled me. And the blurb on the back, promising a story about one man risking his life by daring to defy Hitler, was intriguing.
As I didn't actually bother to read the jacket notes before starting the book, I had no idea that this was not a contemporary novel. It was written in 1946, but the style and language led me to believe it might have been a 21st century creation. Learning halfway through that the story came from an author who had lived through the Second World War, rather than a modern writer who filled out the human suffering with research rather than experience, made it even more of a poignant read.
The action centres on Otto Quangel, a silent and reserved factory foreman living in 40s Berlin who has refused to join the Nazi Party, but otherwise harbours no extreme feelings towards the rise of the Third Reich. But the loss of his only son to the war and the subsequent reaction of his wife, Anna, releases something in Otto. Suddenly, this placid, self-contained man is inexpressibly angry.
His response is to start writing postcards that basically slag the Fuhrer and all he stands for, dropping them anonymously around the city. In an era when I could insult God's mother on this blog if I wanted and have the whole world see it, that might seem like a pathetic crime. But the point is that in wartime Germany, it was a crime and a capital one at that. So when Otto embarks on his quiet, gentle campaign, he is taking his life in his hands.
His aim is to start a silent revolution, envisaging his postcards being passed from hand to hand and stirring up anti-Nazi feeling that might ultimately stop the war. But the reality is very different and Otto soons finds himself the object of a slow, patient investigation by the Gestapo's creepy Inspector Esherich.
The book blurb paints Alone in Berlin as a 'cat and mouse' game between rebel and police, but although there are certainly gripping moments as Otto risks discovery, the story isn't really about that. Indeed, the novel takes some very unexpected turns and even seems to ponder on whether resistance really is futile. But particularly in the last act, Fallada manages to combine the cold realities of Nazism with a clearly unshakeable belief in the dignity and power of the individual.
The climate of fear in Germany under the Nazis is brought to life in chilling, painful detail and the reader is really made to care for these characters, making you feel a heart-stopping concern for their fate. Set against a backdrop of horrifically real fact, this fiction is an emotional yet ultimately uplifting read.
At the back of the book, there is some fascinating background detail about Hans Fallada, who by the time he was 20 had already been involved in a suicide pact. Rather obviously, he failed to die but his friend didn't and so already Fallada's life was off to a dodgy start. Although Alone in Berlin drips with venom towards the Nazis, it is interesting to read about his precarious relationship with the Third Reich as he continued to live and work in Berlin during the war and the way he explored this in his fiction.
So I can honestly say that it was the cover of Alone in Berlin that captured my attention. I had never heard of it before I spotted it in the book shop one day and I didn't buy it straightaway, but it stayed on my mind and I decided to purchase it a few weeks later.
The cover was atmospheric - a lone man almost lost in a whirl of snow amid crumbling monuments - and the font was strange. It compelled me. And the blurb on the back, promising a story about one man risking his life by daring to defy Hitler, was intriguing.
As I didn't actually bother to read the jacket notes before starting the book, I had no idea that this was not a contemporary novel. It was written in 1946, but the style and language led me to believe it might have been a 21st century creation. Learning halfway through that the story came from an author who had lived through the Second World War, rather than a modern writer who filled out the human suffering with research rather than experience, made it even more of a poignant read.
The action centres on Otto Quangel, a silent and reserved factory foreman living in 40s Berlin who has refused to join the Nazi Party, but otherwise harbours no extreme feelings towards the rise of the Third Reich. But the loss of his only son to the war and the subsequent reaction of his wife, Anna, releases something in Otto. Suddenly, this placid, self-contained man is inexpressibly angry.
His response is to start writing postcards that basically slag the Fuhrer and all he stands for, dropping them anonymously around the city. In an era when I could insult God's mother on this blog if I wanted and have the whole world see it, that might seem like a pathetic crime. But the point is that in wartime Germany, it was a crime and a capital one at that. So when Otto embarks on his quiet, gentle campaign, he is taking his life in his hands.
His aim is to start a silent revolution, envisaging his postcards being passed from hand to hand and stirring up anti-Nazi feeling that might ultimately stop the war. But the reality is very different and Otto soons finds himself the object of a slow, patient investigation by the Gestapo's creepy Inspector Esherich.
The book blurb paints Alone in Berlin as a 'cat and mouse' game between rebel and police, but although there are certainly gripping moments as Otto risks discovery, the story isn't really about that. Indeed, the novel takes some very unexpected turns and even seems to ponder on whether resistance really is futile. But particularly in the last act, Fallada manages to combine the cold realities of Nazism with a clearly unshakeable belief in the dignity and power of the individual.
The climate of fear in Germany under the Nazis is brought to life in chilling, painful detail and the reader is really made to care for these characters, making you feel a heart-stopping concern for their fate. Set against a backdrop of horrifically real fact, this fiction is an emotional yet ultimately uplifting read.
At the back of the book, there is some fascinating background detail about Hans Fallada, who by the time he was 20 had already been involved in a suicide pact. Rather obviously, he failed to die but his friend didn't and so already Fallada's life was off to a dodgy start. Although Alone in Berlin drips with venom towards the Nazis, it is interesting to read about his precarious relationship with the Third Reich as he continued to live and work in Berlin during the war and the way he explored this in his fiction.
Wednesday, 4 August 2010
Information Overload
It might sound like a strange criticism, but if there's one thing that annoys me about me (well, there are many things but we'll go with this one for now) it's the fact that I am just interested in too many things.
I blame my relatively late start in journalism on wanting to try out all these different career options. Although in a way I regret not going to university, I've no idea how I would have picked one subject to study. These days I could probably choose - history, since you ask - but at 18, the choices were just too mind-boggling to cope with.
I've had mad ideas about being a scientist, a horticulturalist, a zoo keeper, an administrator, and so on. And that was just as an adult. While at school, my serious career ambitions included vet, author, film director and teacher. At 15 I was dead set on being an archaeologist - by the time I actually left school just months later, I was heading for a career in TV production. I seriously flirted with applying for the police force before landing a job in animal care. Basically, I'm an annoying, flighty twat.
Anyway, all this is a very long-winded way of saying that I find an awful lot of diverse things fascinating. And normally I struggle to indulge them. Because I have been denied the chance to study my areas of interest in any formal way (though I have an Open University history course on the shelf to study at my leisure, just as soon as I finish writing that book - see, more twattery in action) I often find it difficult to even remember all the things I wanted to find out more about, let alone actually do it.
But for the last couple of weeks, I have had an opportunity. Being alone in the house has presented me with a rather unexpected source of joy and excitement. The television.
Usually, I have a mixed relationship with the television. Not only does it literally belong to my husband (I thought the one we had already was perfectly fine, but he wanted to splash out loads of money on a new one, creating an eternal rift between me and the hardware, like a fancy new dog and it's owner's partner who have never successfully bonded due to residual jealousy on both sides) but 99 per cent of the time, it is also under his minute control. The remote buttons reside in his hand and his hand alone, even when he is asleep.
Like a spoilt child presenting endless shit paintings to its doting dad, the TV throws out hour after hour, day after day of absolute crap and he swallows it whole. Dreadful American sitcoms, tedious police camera compilations, Identikit glossy US crime dramas, even high volume children's television that just makes me want to gnaw my own face off. And I increasingly walk away.
Maybe once or twice a week, I wrestle control of the remote and insist on watching an hour or two of telly, a show that I have specifically ear-marked as being of interest. But on the rare occasions when even his tolerance for utter televisual bilge has been exhausted and I am handed the remote, there is usually absolutely nothing on and I give up anyway. But on those occasions, when I am sharing sofa space with the male of the household, there is one category on the TV guide which very rarely gets a look-in unless things are desperate or I can argue a case for one particular programme - the documentaries.
For my other half has a natural disinclination towards the factual. Unless it involves real footage of a drunk clubber getting his head torn off by a police dog or gruesome images of bowel surgery, documentaries generally get the thumbs down.
But over the last fortnight, I have made a discovery. If you just turn the telly on and stick it on the History Channel all night, or National Geographic, you can have a jolly fine time. You learn stuff. You learn stuff about things you've heard of and were previously interested in. You learn stuff about things you've never heard of in your life. You learn stuff about things you'd heard of and would have considered eye-shreddingly boring, only to discover they're really rather compelling.
Just this last week, I have finally found out what became of Henry VIII's six wives. (If you've not heard, I won't spoil the surprise, but suffice to say he wasn't the catch you might imagine.) I've learned about the methods and attitude of Britain's former head executioner, Albert Pierrepoint and how long it took him from hand shake to neck break.
I've found out the theories behind the Bermuda Triangle conundrum. One of which is utter bollocks, but you'd be disappointed if a documentary about a famous mystery didn't include at least one delusional crack pot. I've learned the possible location of Hitler's bunker and heard about the moral dilemmas of his bodyguards.
I've learned about the origins and downfall of the legendary Knights Templar; I've chuntered at some smug fat git who's bagged himself 24 wives and 121 kids, all in the name of religion; I've heard about the lost pyramids of China and all the poor bastards who had to build them.
Still on the planner of recorded shows, I have two documentaries that I'm too scared to watch on my own - one about the Witch Finder's Bible and one about weird occult happenings in Mexico and Greece. Right now, I'm watching something impenetrable about Tudor tennis.
Basically what I'm saying is, when given free rein to really watch what appeals to me, I've found the telly to be far more than the steaming pile of plastic turning out stinky turds than I used to think it was.
But I fear it will not last. In a few days time, it will be back to Neighbours and Police Camera Action and CSI: Miami. Sigh. But at least me and the telly will always know that we finally bonded in secret. When the cat was away, the ultra square mice well and truly played - in educational style.
I blame my relatively late start in journalism on wanting to try out all these different career options. Although in a way I regret not going to university, I've no idea how I would have picked one subject to study. These days I could probably choose - history, since you ask - but at 18, the choices were just too mind-boggling to cope with.
I've had mad ideas about being a scientist, a horticulturalist, a zoo keeper, an administrator, and so on. And that was just as an adult. While at school, my serious career ambitions included vet, author, film director and teacher. At 15 I was dead set on being an archaeologist - by the time I actually left school just months later, I was heading for a career in TV production. I seriously flirted with applying for the police force before landing a job in animal care. Basically, I'm an annoying, flighty twat.
Anyway, all this is a very long-winded way of saying that I find an awful lot of diverse things fascinating. And normally I struggle to indulge them. Because I have been denied the chance to study my areas of interest in any formal way (though I have an Open University history course on the shelf to study at my leisure, just as soon as I finish writing that book - see, more twattery in action) I often find it difficult to even remember all the things I wanted to find out more about, let alone actually do it.
But for the last couple of weeks, I have had an opportunity. Being alone in the house has presented me with a rather unexpected source of joy and excitement. The television.
Usually, I have a mixed relationship with the television. Not only does it literally belong to my husband (I thought the one we had already was perfectly fine, but he wanted to splash out loads of money on a new one, creating an eternal rift between me and the hardware, like a fancy new dog and it's owner's partner who have never successfully bonded due to residual jealousy on both sides) but 99 per cent of the time, it is also under his minute control. The remote buttons reside in his hand and his hand alone, even when he is asleep.
Like a spoilt child presenting endless shit paintings to its doting dad, the TV throws out hour after hour, day after day of absolute crap and he swallows it whole. Dreadful American sitcoms, tedious police camera compilations, Identikit glossy US crime dramas, even high volume children's television that just makes me want to gnaw my own face off. And I increasingly walk away.
Maybe once or twice a week, I wrestle control of the remote and insist on watching an hour or two of telly, a show that I have specifically ear-marked as being of interest. But on the rare occasions when even his tolerance for utter televisual bilge has been exhausted and I am handed the remote, there is usually absolutely nothing on and I give up anyway. But on those occasions, when I am sharing sofa space with the male of the household, there is one category on the TV guide which very rarely gets a look-in unless things are desperate or I can argue a case for one particular programme - the documentaries.
For my other half has a natural disinclination towards the factual. Unless it involves real footage of a drunk clubber getting his head torn off by a police dog or gruesome images of bowel surgery, documentaries generally get the thumbs down.
But over the last fortnight, I have made a discovery. If you just turn the telly on and stick it on the History Channel all night, or National Geographic, you can have a jolly fine time. You learn stuff. You learn stuff about things you've heard of and were previously interested in. You learn stuff about things you've never heard of in your life. You learn stuff about things you'd heard of and would have considered eye-shreddingly boring, only to discover they're really rather compelling.
Just this last week, I have finally found out what became of Henry VIII's six wives. (If you've not heard, I won't spoil the surprise, but suffice to say he wasn't the catch you might imagine.) I've learned about the methods and attitude of Britain's former head executioner, Albert Pierrepoint and how long it took him from hand shake to neck break.
I've found out the theories behind the Bermuda Triangle conundrum. One of which is utter bollocks, but you'd be disappointed if a documentary about a famous mystery didn't include at least one delusional crack pot. I've learned the possible location of Hitler's bunker and heard about the moral dilemmas of his bodyguards.
I've learned about the origins and downfall of the legendary Knights Templar; I've chuntered at some smug fat git who's bagged himself 24 wives and 121 kids, all in the name of religion; I've heard about the lost pyramids of China and all the poor bastards who had to build them.
Still on the planner of recorded shows, I have two documentaries that I'm too scared to watch on my own - one about the Witch Finder's Bible and one about weird occult happenings in Mexico and Greece. Right now, I'm watching something impenetrable about Tudor tennis.
Basically what I'm saying is, when given free rein to really watch what appeals to me, I've found the telly to be far more than the steaming pile of plastic turning out stinky turds than I used to think it was.
But I fear it will not last. In a few days time, it will be back to Neighbours and Police Camera Action and CSI: Miami. Sigh. But at least me and the telly will always know that we finally bonded in secret. When the cat was away, the ultra square mice well and truly played - in educational style.
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