Your haircut cost HOW much?!

I recently got a haircut.


This is a big deal for two reasons:

1. I haven't chopped my hair off for about 10 years. And actually, its never been this short. But i felt like i needed a change, and lets face it, washing long hair on a cold winters morning really sucks.
2. I tried a new hairdresser. Even though its been a long time since i lived out in the burbs with my parents, i STILL go back there to get my hair done, just as i have been for the last 15 years. Why? Because its CHEAP. A cut, colour and blow dry for my long, long hair cost me $80, which i spent maybe every 4 months or so because I'm lazy.

Insert tangent, as i ask - why do some women love going to the hairdresser?? I HATE IT! It's a chore - i have to sit there for 2 hours in an uncomfortable chair and make stupid small talk with someone i don't know but who's pretending to know me. Where's the pleasure-factor? Its not like you're at a spa getting a massage. Maybe it's because i get bored too quickly. I can think of so many other things I'd rather be doing. And reading a Woman's Day from 1997 isn't one of them.




But back to my story. I decided it was becoming a pain to go so far away every time i wanted a haircut. Plus, Maria's been raving about her hairdresser for ages. So she made me an appointment, and off i went.




And, i had to admit, things looked good. The girls were very attentive. They served proper coffee and chilled water. I was supplied with current magazines. My head massage at the basin was superb, AND the chairs vibrated - in a totally cool, lower-back-relaxing way. My hairdresser was lovely, just the right amount of chatty, and she did a great job with my hair. She didn't torture me by prolonging the cutting - in fact, she cut half of it off in one go: "Ready! Say bye bye!" and chop! The end result looked great - shorter, neater, and with really pretty highlights. I was impressed!




Then i went to pay.




Now, maybe I'm naive. Maybe all these years I've been getting a great deal out west and i just didn't realise how much a haircut and colour cost out in the real world. But when she told me how much it cost, my jaw actually dropped. The poor girl had the decency to look sheepish when i recovered and blurted "Pardon?" Alas, i had not misheard. I'm so appalled that i don't even want to tell you how much it was, but the first number started with THREE. That's right. THREE.




WTF????




Despite the fact that i loved my new hair, i was outraged! Surely, i thought, this wasn't normal. So i polled a few of my friends. And i was shocked to discover that it wasn't as uncommon as i thought! Several of them said they had paid similar prices for their hair before, though not on a regular basis. In fact, they said, most upmarket salons in what i suppose you could call "well-to-do" areas would definitely charge that much, depending on what "work" you have done to you hair. (Work? JUST CUT IT!!)




So, there you go. I guess times have changed. And i ain't even that old. Here i am, post-cut. You can't really see the highlights or anything in this picture, but still - after what i paid, i have to show SOMETHING off.

Some pre-wedding festivities with my gal-pal

Once upon a time, there were two best friends who spent 15 years:

• consoling each other through break-ups and bad hangovers (note: it was usually me with the bad hangover)
• cheering on important achievements like successful first dates or cooking ventures
• steeling each others nerves for job interviews or exams
• learning the lines of our favourite movies in order to quote them for our amusement at a later date (Home Alone people. Watch it.)
• discussing the merits of Sex and the City, and further, how what we learn in Sex and the City can be applied to our actual, everyday lives
• calming each others ridiculous, borderline-psychotic anxieties via hurried and exasperated phone calls at work
• giving each other a good telling-off when the other goes off the rails (note: more often than you think.)
  
  

After all that drama, there was no way in the world my best friend Leah was going to miss her chance to be maid of honour at our wedding, despite moving thousands and thousands of miles away to London. Alas, she was absent for a lot of the planning (don't think she missed my bridal tantrums though - thank you, Skype) but she came back home two weeks before the big day armed with a truckload of festivities to help make our limited time together extra special.

I'll be honest. In the week before the wedding, i was stressed. Even though i told myself I'd take everything in my stride - i didn't. Sorry. I mean i don't think i turned into a bridezilla or anything, but i couldn't stop myself from worrying about...well, everything, although the torrential rain that week was a particular source of despair.

The remedy according to Leah? High tea and cocktails. Damn smart girl. So we took ourselves, our mothers, and my other favourite people - Maria and Jack - to the delightful Observatory Hotel for afternoon tea to celebrate...me! The bride! Woohoo! (Those were the days...) I've had a lot of high teas in Sydney, but i still say the Observatory does it the best. 

Here we are, dressed the part and looking totally and utterly relaxed thanks to the complimentary champagne. Now that i know the pain of paying for a wedding, I'm no longer ashamed to say that I LOVE FREE STUFF!

The Observatory Hotel has all sorts of weird and wonderful teas. I think i had white jasmine. Then again i could be completely making that up.

Jack passed on the tea and champagne, but he did enjoy a vanilla milkshake. The message in his eyes here is very clear: "This is all mine. Back off."

My page boy and I. Too bad he wasn't so gorgeous on the day, but that's another story.

My mum could not be persuaded to give up her champagne to the bride to be. Luckily, i am just as selfish when it comes to bubbly - they call that being a chip off the old block.

I wasn't as drunk as i wanted to be after high tea, so our next stop was the Blu Bar at the Shang-ri-la Hotel in the Rocks. It has quite the view of Sydney, something Leah had missed after a year of being away. As for me - well. I'm neither here nor there about views. Just pass me the cocktail list.



Even our mum's got in on the act, knocking back not one but TWO cocktails EACH. I know. Pick your jaws up off the floor, readers.

Meanwhile, Leah and I were in our element with cosmopolitans and olives and fetta cheese. These ARE a few of my favourite things.

It felt GREAT to eat, drink and be merry with someone i had really missed in the last year. It wouldn't have been the same without her with me on the day, but more than that, it was so nice to have some time to catch up and do what we've spent 15 years doing over and over again - discussing our lives to death. Would we have it any other way?



I'm writing this from home, sick and miserable on the couch, but seeing these pictures have cheered me up no end so I'll leave you with one of my favourites of me and Jack from the day. CUTE RIGHT!!!???

The culinary palate of a three year old

On Sunday, we played parents and babysat Jack.

 

 

Actually, it was a last minute thing. And I'd already promised my stomach brunch. Since I'm not one to let a small, stubborn child spoil my breakfast plans, I decided we'd just go ahead and take the kid with us. In fact, i totally got into the urban-mom thing. Here i am, decked out with the ultimate accessory - a red pram. I look cool right? But here's the thing - pushing a pram around Crows Nest is not as fun as the other mummy's make it look. Actually, its friggen hard work. I spent most of our walk pleading with Jo to swap places. "What if you just push it up this hill? Huh? Then I'll take over again, I SWEAR!"

 

 

 

Our destination was St Malo Bakery in Crows Nest, which is one of my favourite places to eat around here. I left Jo to deal with the pram (I mean shouldn't they have parking bays, like every other method of transportation in this city?????) while i took orders.

"Jack, what do you want to eat?"

He looks at the menu, as if he can actually read the choices available, before announcing (with some authority): "I want a brioche with jam and butter."

A brioche? Really?

Jo cuts in. "What's a brioche?" I realise my three year old Godson has a more advanced palate than my husband.

"I don't think they have brioches here." I say.

But Jack remains unperturbed. "Then I'll have a croissant. With jam and butter."

I ask him if he wants some juice, which he does. "What flavour?"

"Blood orange flavour."

Jo nearly falls off his chair. Brioche, croissant, blood orange juice? What can I say, the kid should have been born in France.

Here's the boys, enjoying their food...

And here's Jack enjoying his Jam, which he prefers to eat straight. No pastry necessary. Although he offered to share half of his croissant with Jo, he claimed full rights to all condiments.

 

 

 

The kid and me. We love each other really.

The (second) most anticipated wedding of the year...

...the first, of course, being...my own. Which was equally fabulous. But enough about me. Unless you've been living under a rock the last couple of weeks you'd know that Prince William, the most eligible Prince of recent times, married a commoner on Friday. What? No! I meant Kate Middleton. Slip of the tongue. Anyway, no doubt Grandma is very proud.






Being the Royal enthusiasts that we are, Maria and I decided we simply had to host a party in honour of the happy couple. Lucky for us Aussies, the wedding was streamed live from London, beginning 8pm Oz-time - a very respectable hour indeed. Perfect for popping the champagne and getting our drinking game on. But more on that later.







As i said, Maria and I love all things royal, especially royal weddings. We watched the wedding of Princess Mary to Prince Frederick of Denmark live all those years ago. (Another nobody who bagged herself a Prince! What the!? Am i hanging out at the wrong bars?!)




(What's that? Jo? Jo who?)




Now i know there are many Australians out there who believe we should become a republic, and I'm going to be controversial here and say that i really don't care either way. I don't think our daily lives will be particularly affected, no matter what happens, so a part of me thinks if it ain't broke, don't fix it. Really, i just find the history, the pomp, the tradition, (the scandal), all very fascinating. As for the rest, I'm neither here nor there.





But back to our favourite couple, Wills and Kate. Ah, what a love story. He in all his Princely glory and she in all her nothingness - but what stylish nothingness! A word on this - I've heard a lot of people say she doesn't take enough risks in fashion, but I say she's all class. I've never seen her wear something she looks bad in, and people - sometimes less is more. It works. I'm glad she's not too eccentric in the way she dresses. She's just normal. And i especially love that she shops in high street stores like all the other plebs. Hopefully she doesn't forget her roots. (I know. Doubt it.)




Here they are, looking radiant, despite William's obviously deteriorating hair follicles. Another controversial observation from me - Wills was in his prime maybe 5 years ago. But those days are over. The truth of the matter is, that hair ain't never growing back. We hoped he'd be Diana incarnate, but alas, Charles' genes have dominated. And won. I'd take Harry any day of the week. I know, he looked very handsome in the whole red suit get-up, but the fact remains - he looked better with the hat on. That is, when you couldn't really see his face. ANYWAY, i digress again! The happy couple:











Wait, one more point on Wills - he has decided he is above wearing a wedding ring. FYI Will, the entire world knows your married now, so who ya trying to fool huh? I read its because he doesn't like jewelery, and i suppose being a Prince he can do whatever he wants, but still. He could have given it a go at least.






And here are your hosts for the evening! Meanwhile, check out those blinds in the background. See those little pieces of paper pegged on there? Oh yeah. Kate and Wills pics. Courtesy of me, and the colour printer at work. (A flourishing career in party planning awaits. Am i right?)

And here's a sample of what we served. Homemade tea cake (Maria's baby, not mine), and scones presided over by HRH herself.

But don't let the scones deceive you into thinking this was a posh affair. It started off OK - people milling about being polite and so on...

...but then we passed around the rules to our Royal Wedding Drinking Game, and. Well. You can only guess how things went. The rules included, but were certainly not limited to, the following:

• Take a drink if the Queen is on screen




• If the commentator mentions Diana, take three drinks




• Any time parallels are drawn to the Diana/Charles wedding, take three drinks




• Last person to shout 'Candle in the Wind' if Elton John is on screen must take 5 drinks

Etc etc. Needless to say, we all became highly opinionated on the proceedings, but there was one thing we all agreed on - those reindeer antlers worn by Beatrice were completely and utterly hideous. WHAT, I ask you, was she THINKING?? The rest of the outfit was...OK. I mean it wasn't great, mind you. But those antlers. Honestly. And her sister Eugenie - can i ask who allowed her to leave the house in that horrible blue thing? The two sisters took out worst-dressed for me. Google their outfits. You'll see what i mean.





Also, I'm not sure if this is the fashion in the UK, but it seemed a lot of ladies worse their fascinaters right on their foreheads. Which is just weird. Posh Spice, for example - yes, she'll always be Posh Spice to me - wore some sort of mini-bowler-hat creation, and it sat practically between her eyeballs. I know she's pregnant with her gazillianth child, but that's no excuse.

So the champagne flowed, and we cooed over Wills and Kate and their little whispers and smiles and general air of happiness, and how pretty London looked all dressed up with the flags and the bunting, and how she said "Oh wow" when she first walked out on the balcony, and how they kissed twice, and how the Queen wasted no time in ushering everyone back inside after two seconds because she's a cranky old nanna...I mean see? See how happy everyone looks? (Except Turnsie, who never looks happy.) (This is his "Lord of the Manor" face by the way.) (???)

To really get the party going, we took photos of Turnsies ears. Here's one of them, in case you felt like checking out something really disgusting today.

What i'm trying to say is, the party was a hit (no surprises there because we're the hostesses with the mostesses. By that, i mean we keep champagne popped and flowing at all times.) I wish i could have been in London for the occasion, but alas, it wasn't to be. Hopefully Harry will come through for me in the next few years (little ginger scoundral that he is.)

All thats left to say is...God Bless America!

I mean.

God Bless the Queen! Yeah. That's the right one...