Manicurist Revisited

  The Manicurist's Hand, And The Tools Of Her Trade

 

Meanwhile--back at the salon....

I went in for my manicure today and heard the usual odd snippets of conversation:

(A little girl, at age four, standing by her mother's pedicure chair,  discussing their upcoming trip to Europe)

Mother:  "...so we'll be seeing Paris."

Child: "Paris Hilton?"

Mother: (laughing) "No, not that Paris."

Child:  "What other Paris is there?"

Mother:  "Paris is in France."

Child:  "Paris Hilton is in France?"

Mother:  "No, Paris is the capital of France."

Thank God the child let it drop and didn't ask why Paris Hilton was the capital of France.

I also heard the same child say to her mother, "I'm thinking of getting highlights."  Her mother reassured her daughter, she would not be getting highlights.  Her daughter said "I think I would look good with them."  Age four.  This episode reminds me of the story my friend told me about her niece at that age.  She disappeared from her mother's view in the salon, and when her mother found her, she was at the reception desk, trying to make a hair appointment for herself, telling the receptionist "I want my hair cut just like Dora the Explorer."

Two salon employees walking by commenting on their bosses' displeasure at the tee shirts they wore today:  One shirt said "This is the only thing I had."  The other said "Blow Me," with a tiny blow dryer drawing under it.

On the subject of Father's Day:  A teenaged girl came in discussing how she didn't want to give her father a card or gift, she hated him so much.  She said,  "Well, Josie can sign her side of the card with "I love you, I love you, I love you, and cover the page, and I can add "with x, Katie, and that should be enough."  She also added "Only 403 more days left until I leave for college, and I won't have to live in the same house with him anymore."  Happy Father's Day, Guy.

Since she was, in effect, being held captive in the next chair getting her nails done, I asked her something my brother and I had been discussing the other day.  We had commented that when we were in high school, we learned keyboard skills through typing classes, and you had to focus on accuracy, speed, and knowing where the keys were.  My brother said to me (and neither of us knew, for certain) that he thought these days the kids were taught basic skills about the keyboard/computer, but that it was probably more of the hunt and peck school and that speed wasn't even an issue.  He brought this up since I type over 100 wpm.  So I asked:  "What do they teach you in high school now?"  She confirmed what my brother had correctly guessed at--they are taught very rudimentary basics (in terms of keyboarding skills), and she said 99% of her classmates used one or two fingers, they did not know the proper fingering of the keys, nor did they have speed.  So there ya go.

I brought up the subject of nicknames, and asked the women around me what some of their nicknames were.  Here is what they told me:

Larissa Lou

Suzie Q

Boober (the guy and girl both call each other that)

Pumpkin Butt

Toots

Doll

Doodlebug

Lazy Vision (Now this one was really interesting.  As a child, her mother put bells on her shoes, and she once asked her mother, "Did you do that so you would hear me if I was running away," and her mother said, "No.  You basically just sat there and never did anything.")

Footnote:  See> My Manicurist's Bruised Love Bite, 6/3