jamikins

Hello there!

For your hairdresser, I usually just tip the one that cuts my hair the same % I did back at home in Vancouver. I go to a small shop on Roman Road in Hackney though...not a big fancy salon so that might make a difference.

goddesstogo

Hi jamikins,
Guess what -- I was just browsing through my fodors London guide and saw a quote from you!

I'm just going to a local salon too but I don't tip my hairdresser at home because she owns the place. What % do you tip here?

sassy_cat

Here's a link to a good site for supermarket shopping in the UK. I've never heard of the fruit version of liquorice allsorts but Bassett's makes good jelly babies.

http://www.mysupermarket.co.uk/

jamikins

Really???? I never even knew I was quoted!! What is it about?? Cool!!

Well mine charges me £24 for a cut, wash and blow-dry and I give her £30 cause its so ridiculously cheap compared to other places and she does a great job. I would say 10 - 15% is fair.

goddesstogo

jami,
Your quote opens the section on Regent's Park and Hampstead. You say

"Hubby and I were just (at Hampstead Heath) and it was great...you really do feel like you are in the country and there were tons of families out and about. The views from Parliament Hill are fabulous, and there were lots of people flying kites."

If you contact fodors, they'll send you a free guide -- not just London, but any one you want. It's how I got my London guide.

So far I've also found quotes from annhig, flanneruk, PalQ, janisj, just to name some of the posters I'm familiar with. It's always a nice surprise to turn the page and see someone I 'know'!

(And thanks for the tip about tipping, and to you too, sassy_cat, for the supermarket info.)

jamikins

Woo hoo! Very cool, will contact them for sure! Thanks!

annhig

Hi GTG,

re tipping your hairdresser, I usually give the girl who washes my hair a quid, [usually an apprentice and therefore badly paid] but nothing to my hairdresser as, like yours at home, she is the owner. £2 each for the others would be appropriate, IMHO, unless you are in a very high-end establishment.

hope whatever you saw of mine in the London guide has been useful!

Regards, ann

alihutch

Can recommend stunning photography exhibition, Gnuis, by Murdo Mcleod at the Guardian's offices in Kings Cross, which we went to on Saturday morning. Not sure how long it is on, so get there soon...just amazing.....

Hairderesser tipping....a couple of ponuds for whoever washes my hair, 2/3 for colour....sometimes £5 for my hairdresser even though he is the owner

alihutch

Link for info on aforementioned exhibition.. til 28th Oct

http://www.guardian.co.uk/artanddesi...-murdo-macleod

julia_t

So you went to the hairdresser today - how did it go? I hope you are please with the result.

Go on, tell us, what did you tip her?!

goddesstogo

ali, thanks for that. I loved the 14 shots on the preview, especially the one of the rather scary 14-year-old golf twins. I'm likely to be in that area soon so I'll try to stop in.

I'm very happy with the results at the hairdresser. This is the first time I've used Aveeda products (colour, curl stuff, and probably shampoo) and I like it very much. So much, in fact, that I'm thinking of changing hairdressers at home (have been considering this for a while) and going to the Aveeda salon just around the corner. But you know how it is -- I've been going to the same hairdresser for a billion years, blah, blah, blah.

The young lady who washed my hair gave me the most fabulous scalp massage, maybe 10 minutes long, and the trip was worth it just for that alone. I checked out the prices of about 5 nearby salons and this one was £10 to £13 cheaper than any of the others and I liked the atmosphere when I stepped in to ask. So even with big tips (£5 to the colourist who also did the curl cream thing and diffusing, and £3 to the shampooist whom I would like to marry and take home) at £35 for the whole experience, it was still quite a bit cheaper than the others. I've already made an appointment for next month. The other thing I liked is that there was minimal chattiness. I got to browse my magazine in relative peace and quiet.

SO went to work at the library today so I was on my own with a goal in mind. I've been looking for a particular hair product and found it online at a place on Westbourne Grove. I knew pretty much at the start that it was a fool's errand because I'd been calling there and there was no answer so I wasn't going to be surprised to find out it was closed. It was closed.

However, Westbourne Grove itself was a nice walk and I found two surprising things there. One was that I walked past a restaurant called The Star of Bombay. Thirty-five or so years ago, last time we were in London, we were taken there by friends of friends and it was our first Indian meal ever. Nice memory. Also, remember I was looking for a health food store? Well, I found exactly what I was looking for (equivalent to the Big Carrot in Toronto). It's called Planet Organic -- nice big store, lots of choice, good bakery, and a nice ready-made/restaurant area where I had lunch. There's one in Bloomsbury too which I think is more convenient for us.

Anyway, I walked all along Westbourne Grove to Redan Place and then browsed in a small but nice mall called Whiteley's before getting on the tube at Bayswater. That's quite a lively and busy little street too.

Came home, shopped for dinner and am now about to be immersed in trashy chicklit for the evening.

annhig, I've been thumbing through the guide trying to find your quote again but I can't lay my eyes on it right now. I know I'll find it again. I'd love it if Fodors guides included a small index of quotes.

lizziea06

GTG - was it Gina Conway? I get my hair done in their Parsons Green location and love it. I really like Aveda products too and have been using Phomollient forever!

goddesstogo

(I had to google and see who or what Gina Conway was.) No, it's just a little salon called Holistic Hair & Beauty. I think it's the only one -- not a chain.

I like the curl cream she used. Most of them make my hair 'crunchy', if you know what I mean. This one left the curls soft. The product I'm looking to find is called Twisted Sista 30 Second Curl Spray, which is great. It makes immediate curls which last more than a day and you can just wet your hair and they spring back. Plus there's no crunchiness.

If any of you ladies know where I can buy Twisted Sista 30 Second Curl Spray, would you please let me know? I'd buy a bunch of bottles to take home. They supposedly sold it at the (now missing) Urban Therapy store on Westbourne Grove. There's another UT store, I think, but on the south bank. I'm going to call there tomorrow. If I can't find it, though, I'll go with whatever the Aveda product is that she used today.

I know this isn't exactly riveting conversation but hey, if you find a hair product you love, you gotta go after it, right?

ElendilPickle

Some of my curly friends swear by Boots Curl Creme. It's not available in the States, so they got together and placed a bulk order.

Lee Ann

goddesstogo

Hmmm...maybe I'll give that one a try while I'm here. Wouldn't it be nice if they came in small or trial-sized packages?

goddesstogo

Very nice and interesting day today. SO went off to the library in the morning and I went off to St. Martin-in-the-Fields. First of all, I sat in the sanctuary and looked at the church. In comparison to the churches I've been seeing lately in Lisbon and Paris, this is quite a nice change. It's a nice, normal size (e.g. you can't park the Queen Mary in its nave) and quite simple and elegant in its decor and design. They must have recently decorated for a harvest festival because about every third pew had a sheaf of wheat tied at the end and in the entranceway there was a big Union Jack made out of red, white and blue fruits and vegetables.

I was very interested in the window (if you haven't seen it, here it is: http://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/1072810). I know it's not meant to, but to me it looks like a cannonball has been shot through it. That doesn't mean I don't like it -- I actually do like it very much.

After that, I went downstairs to do a brass rubbing but got distracted by the Crypt, the art show, the mausoleum stones (in particular, the stone that went on and on about "here lies So-and-So" and about who he was and what he did, etc. and at the bottom it said essentially, "oh, and his wife, Mrs. So-and-So is buried around here somewhere"),the gift shop, and the models of contenders for the fourth plinth. I bought tickets for a candlelit concert on Friday (as a surprise for SO, so don't mention it) and then finally got around to looking at the brasses for rubbing. I was originally going to do two pieces from the Book of Kells, a rectangle and a circle, but after I finished the smaller piece, the circle, that was it for me. It takes quite a long time, especially since I was more or less doing it twice because I wanted to layer two colours. I put down a layer of gold first and then topped it with a layer of copper so that the gold underlay made the copper a little more luminous. I'm pretty pleased with how it came out. After I finished with that, I ate the world's most boring bowl of soup in the Crypt. It was cauliflower and corn, both of which I like, but I don't think there was a grain of salt or spice or pepper anywhere in it. I put in two packets of black pepper and it barely perked it up at all.

SO and I had arranged to meet at the Portrait Gallery at 2 and I had an hour to spare so I had a nice walk on The Strand because by that time the weather had turn beautiful and sunny. I stopped to look at a you-are-here notice board on the street and it indicated a circle of places that were a five-minute walk and one of a fifteen-minute walk from where I was standing. One of the things that surprises me is how close together many of the historical and tourist attractions are. For example, the other day when we meandered away from Covent Garden Market, within a few minutes we found ourselves at Trafalger Square.

Met SO at the Portrait Gallery and we saw the whole 2nd floor before we needed a break. I was so interested in the Bloomsbury group and in the portraits of the poets and of Dickens. Everyone looks so much younger than they were in my mind's eye! It occurs to me now that I didn't see the portrait of Jane Austen -- darn it! I would have liked to see that.

We took a coffee break in the top floor restaurant because by that time we were exhausted and what a beautiful view there is from that room! We could see down to the Parliament Buildings and over to the London Eye and all the beautiful domes and rooftops. Fortified by coffee, tea, and a sit-down, we then went down to the first floor and saw a small but very interesting show of photos of British ex-pats living in NYC. I think the photographer was named Joshua Bell but I might be getting him mixed up with the musician.

And that's it for today, my lovelies. We're very much looking forward to tomorrow night's GTG and to meeting new London friends.

Morningglory47

I wondered what was up with St. Martin's window, too.

Mathieu

Thanks for sharing GTG. I too, like the window. So unique and unexpected from all the 'rose' type windows one sees in churches like that, yet still as spiritual (or not) as one wants it to be. Apart from the design, I like the simplicity of the uncoloured, yet intricately feathered glass.

Have fun at your GTG tomorrow. Envious again, as there will be several long-time posters present that I'd like to meet too, but will have to settle for hearing all about it instead.

M

WHampstead

I _think_ (and I have something on this somewhere, so will do some digging later if I get the chance) that you are actually right about the canonball. I seem to recall the church was badly bombed in the war and they chose the simpler window design - and indeed it is meant to represent something exploding. Or I could be making this all up - but definitely rings a bell. May come this evening with more info!

annhig

GTG - i think it's about the Temple. trying looking for that in the index.