I OVERHEARD a conversation that baffled me last week. Attending an all-women event, I stood in the loos listening to the females chatter on about their wonderful ‘fascinators’. My brain started to conjure up images of some sexual appliance, yet the women were indicating to their hair every time they mentioned this unusual word.
Just in case you don’t know what it is, a fascinator is a feathery do-da thingy that women wear on their head instead of a hat. Usually it consists of wire, ruffles and tulle. This colourful creation perches off the side of your noggin and looks like
a scary bird pecking at your head.
I don’t know where I was in my life when fascinators were explained to the ladies, but I must have been fascinated in my own imagination and running my fingers through George Clooney’s scalp during that lecture or deliberately blanking it all out.
Who wears these odd items and do I need to get one? Will they become the latest fashion accessory? Something pinned to my scalp fills me with dread; I can’t even keep a Kirbygrip in my hair.
Hair clips and diamante accessories for your head never really caught on with me. The BAFTA Awards in 2007 saw me attempt to wear an up-do (which is an evil practice of back-combing and pinning the hair into a twisted knot, secured by a lorry load of hair pins). I sat at the dinner table and pulled out every single nasty grip till my locks fell about my head in a bushy mangled mess. I looked insane, but at least my headache had faded.
Some women are naturally gifted at dressing and managing their hair; my daughter Ashley is an expert. She can throw her whole head upside down, twist the thick locks about, stick a big pencil into the shaggy mess, then lift up her head and reveal an amazingly sexy chignon in a matter of seconds.
Where did she learn that stuff? Not from me! The only combing and hair preparation my mother passed on to me involved a nit comb and a newspaper to catch the bugs as they fell from my scalp. I come from a generation of kids who were given homemade haircuts with blunt scissors and a pudding bowl.
To this day, the best I can manage is an elastic band to tie my unruly bush back from my face when I eat spaghetti.
It may be time for me to start learning about fascinators and chignons. I just can’t imagine how a feathery, lacy affair will look on my head as I stand on stage doing comedy. I get the feeling I will look like a scary drunken cat lady who got dressed out of a skip – at least it might be funny?
It’s all a load of rubbishI AM starting to despise the smugness of middle-class recyclers. You know the type: the sandal-flapping cardigan-wearers who stand beside the recycling bin and drop in wine bottle after vintage wine bottle and smile at their like-minded, plastic-refusing obsessed neighbours.
They can be seen nodding in approval of each other’s responsible behaviour, while shaking their heads in disgust at the locals who have refused to separate their waste.
I often wonder if they wait to see if their own kind are around before they go out to the recycling centre to put on their wee glass-smashing show. Do they have to be that condescending? Just tip your rubbish and go away, you muesli-munching, mung-bean-eating freaks.
While I am on a rant, why do M&S charge us for plastic bags yet everything they sell is covered in plastic? I want my coleslaw in recyclable bags. Go the full hog, you hypocrites!
• NEAR where I live in Glasgow, there is a long, concrete walkway with stairs and a 30-foot metal handrail leading to the Underground. Apparently it’s the perfect environment for skateboarders, stunt bikers and teenage boys on skates who love hurting their limbs. They never wear helmets or protective gear and it's worrying.
Last week I watched them attempt their gravity-defying tricks and one boy fell and gashed his head. Another broke his arm. It bent up backwards and I was so shocked I vomited over my curtains. The noise of breaking bones is not a good soundtrack at teatime.
•
www.janeygodley.co.uk