Believe me, I’m one of these middle-aged guys who has gone the other way when it comes to hair loss, and I don’t need any. Not on my head and certainly not on/in my eyebrows, ears and nose, thank you very much. But clearly there is a market for the stuff, at least among the women who shop in the Arndale Market, Manchester. And there was me thinking they did it naturally — like me (last haircut, 2/10/19 and still counting).
It’s the Season of Tat, it starts some time in mid-October these days so by now I reckon this guy feels like he needs a rest. However he might also be Deliverooing at some point as he has the masked look of the typical cyclopath (I’m tired of dodging them on the streets of Manchester). The definition is low on this shot but that’s because the light’s very dim, even by 4.25pm.
Apparently “Mood” is the gender-neutral fragrance of the season, if the large stall in the Arndale Centre, exclusively devoted to tempting us to buy it, is anything to go by. But one might advise them to be a little more subtle when it comes to pumping out the scent. By the time I had walked past I was already sick of it.
I did two things today which I have not done since 21st March — 1) get on a train 2) go to Manchester.
A tabloid headline seen yesterday exhorted me to “SHOP FOR BRITAIN!” and who am I to ignore the clarion call of the redtops? There weren’t many other people who accompanied me, as evident from this shot of the epicentre of the Manchester Arndale Centre, but I guess that’s something we should approve of, at this time of doublethink.
I’m sure the guy in the sleeping bag looks forward with keen anticipation for M & S’s “lovely new Manchester store” as if it will be radically different from the present one. It’ll be unlikely to offer overnight accommodation, I assume.
After two new countries (new to the blog, at least) and several new locations over the last week and a half, the pendulum swings, and the next three weeks see me mainly at home. I can’t promise excitement but I will do my best, better than today I hope, anyway. As you can see I’m pondering a change of style. (Actually the shoes were being bought for Joe.) And more place-related trivia — the first ever weekend of the blog where both Saturday and Sunday shots were taken in Manchester.
The Arndale subsumes a huge chunk of Manchester under its architectural footprint. The third-biggest city centre shopping mall in Europe, or something like that. It’s safe to say that when it was built it wasn’t popular. My late Gran would not go in it; it was too large, too enclosed, too alien. These days it’s getting middle-aged, having been completed in 1979. But that still doesn’t make it as old as me.
The Arndale Centre, like most of the rest of Manchester city centre, is in a state of renovation; but Next is Open As Usual, so those of us passing can be reassured that living that lifestyle is still possible.
Manchester was hit by a thunderstorm this evening that dumped torrential rain on the city centre — quite exceptional (or are these events happening more and more?). Although it had mostly stopped by the time this photo was taken, I imagine these guys, like the rest of us, were just wanting to find somewhere to dry out.
If this shot illustrates anything it at least proves that I do occasionally get my lazy butt into Manchester before 9am in the morning. And that at such times there, the light can be very good.
Being 42 