THE PRINTER’S ROAR
Today was to have been a very busy day – Lynnie had given me a list to add to my own.
Haircut: She wants me to get it done properly this time. I have been going to see Domenic, a Cambridge institution for the last twenty five years. I feel I know his family intimately and he mine; though I have never met his and he has only cut the hair of my two boys when they were in short trousers. We have shared family strife and sorrows for a quarter of a century together. It’s a personal thing, having your thinning hair looked after, and so the thought of taking it somewhere else for some Tracey or Cheryl to pick through fills me with dread. However I have been reliably informed that whenever I come back from his wonderfully masculine emporium, the women in my household all fall about laughing and ask me if they have just ‘let me out’ from a long stretch. My haircut ages me ten years apparently and the grey beard likewise.
I have promised faithfully that I will organise a professional haircut somewhere in Cambridge that does not use a blunt pair of shears & clippers and whose staff all have diplomas on the wall and twenty-twenty vision.
This is all very hurtful and I feel like I will be betraying an old friend.
The next item on her list was Bill. Bill is our chimney sweep: He rebuilt the chimney (important as we have a thatched roof.) Bill was due late morning and I was not to forget to tell him how badly it smoked last year and get him to sort it out – oh and could I pay him too and did I have any change for the station car park?
I also had to send her Christmas Cards to all her friends & relations (not forgetting ‘Smallest of All’) so I might as well get all the stamps from the post office in the next village at the same time. She is way ahead of me on this Christmas thing – I do all my shopping a few days before the day and send book tokens with a note to all my nieces and nephews (under the age of 18, or I would go bankrupt) saying that they are to buy a good book with the money and that I want to know which book they buy in their thank-you letter. No ‘thank you’ means no book-token next year (Ooh I’m heartless!)
I won’t bore you with my own list (I can feel you sliding off your chair already) but it was huge and far too ambitious even for a day with a clear run at things, let alone one choked with domestic bliss.
Needless to say – the haircut didn’t get booked. The Chimney sweeping didn’t happen. The stamps were not purchased.
I blame my printer.
Len (for that is my colour LaserJet 4500N’s name), is a handsome but noisome beast. He has been roaring away next to my right ear all day (that’s my good ear; the left was a bit buggered when I was fourteen at a ‘Status Quo’ concert at Bracknell Sports Stadium (or it might have been the Hawkwind concert a few days later)
Suffice it to say, I waited and waited for Bill to arrive, and when he finally hadn’t by 4:15pm, I rang Mrs Bill only to find that Bill had almost broken the front door down trying to attract my attention, had stuck his card with tape on the back door saying he had tried to get in, had telephoned me and heard the phone ringing in the dining room and upstairs, so assumed, quite naturally, that I was out. He cannot now fit me in until after Christmas.
I am a Dead Man.
Having left it that late it was probably too late to go buying stamps (what time do shops shut?) I did manage to post her cards – I raided my work stamp collection and drove the 300 yards to the post box to get a shoe-full of water as I stepped out of the car – they still haven’t fixed that drain.
I did manage to print out quite a few A4 pages of the Pennine Way at 1:50k though – so not a bad day really. I am now ‘at’ Alston.
I won’t blame Len for the haircut thing – I just forgot – Honest!
Today was to have been a very busy day – Lynnie had given me a list to add to my own.
Haircut: She wants me to get it done properly this time. I have been going to see Domenic, a Cambridge institution for the last twenty five years. I feel I know his family intimately and he mine; though I have never met his and he has only cut the hair of my two boys when they were in short trousers. We have shared family strife and sorrows for a quarter of a century together. It’s a personal thing, having your thinning hair looked after, and so the thought of taking it somewhere else for some Tracey or Cheryl to pick through fills me with dread. However I have been reliably informed that whenever I come back from his wonderfully masculine emporium, the women in my household all fall about laughing and ask me if they have just ‘let me out’ from a long stretch. My haircut ages me ten years apparently and the grey beard likewise.
I have promised faithfully that I will organise a professional haircut somewhere in Cambridge that does not use a blunt pair of shears & clippers and whose staff all have diplomas on the wall and twenty-twenty vision.
This is all very hurtful and I feel like I will be betraying an old friend.
The next item on her list was Bill. Bill is our chimney sweep: He rebuilt the chimney (important as we have a thatched roof.) Bill was due late morning and I was not to forget to tell him how badly it smoked last year and get him to sort it out – oh and could I pay him too and did I have any change for the station car park?
I also had to send her Christmas Cards to all her friends & relations (not forgetting ‘Smallest of All’) so I might as well get all the stamps from the post office in the next village at the same time. She is way ahead of me on this Christmas thing – I do all my shopping a few days before the day and send book tokens with a note to all my nieces and nephews (under the age of 18, or I would go bankrupt) saying that they are to buy a good book with the money and that I want to know which book they buy in their thank-you letter. No ‘thank you’ means no book-token next year (Ooh I’m heartless!)
I won’t bore you with my own list (I can feel you sliding off your chair already) but it was huge and far too ambitious even for a day with a clear run at things, let alone one choked with domestic bliss.
Needless to say – the haircut didn’t get booked. The Chimney sweeping didn’t happen. The stamps were not purchased.
I blame my printer.
Len (for that is my colour LaserJet 4500N’s name), is a handsome but noisome beast. He has been roaring away next to my right ear all day (that’s my good ear; the left was a bit buggered when I was fourteen at a ‘Status Quo’ concert at Bracknell Sports Stadium (or it might have been the Hawkwind concert a few days later)
Suffice it to say, I waited and waited for Bill to arrive, and when he finally hadn’t by 4:15pm, I rang Mrs Bill only to find that Bill had almost broken the front door down trying to attract my attention, had stuck his card with tape on the back door saying he had tried to get in, had telephoned me and heard the phone ringing in the dining room and upstairs, so assumed, quite naturally, that I was out. He cannot now fit me in until after Christmas.
I am a Dead Man.
Having left it that late it was probably too late to go buying stamps (what time do shops shut?) I did manage to post her cards – I raided my work stamp collection and drove the 300 yards to the post box to get a shoe-full of water as I stepped out of the car – they still haven’t fixed that drain.
I did manage to print out quite a few A4 pages of the Pennine Way at 1:50k though – so not a bad day really. I am now ‘at’ Alston.
I won’t blame Len for the haircut thing – I just forgot – Honest!
That haircut thing was a bit harsh. I now wait with bated breath to see whether there will be any further mention of the barber as your blog progresses.
ReplyDeleteHave I mentioned that I like your hair, and little 'beard'? I think I have *g* That includes the colour. Any colour would do, incidentally, though some of the more irridescent shades might be a little challenging.
Onwards and upwards...