OF MARMALADE, HAIRDRESSERS AND AN END TO GIVING IN

Let’s start with the “Mar...” word. Marmite and marmalade both evoke mixed reactions. For years sales of marmalade have been in decline despite some daft strategists in advertising who floated the idea of renaming the product “orange jam”.

Now there’s a worldwide competition attracting 3000 entries from 30 countries at Penrith in Cumbria. Marmalade is on the map again with especial interest coming from Japan. Along with British jams, tea and biscuits marmalade has been described as being at the heart of Britain’s desperate post Brexit trade negotiations.

The word in the corridors of marmalade-power is the trend is towards eating it with savoury food. Try it mixed 60:40 with English mustard. It’s a unique taste sensation.

The hairdressing industry meanwhile is growing and is seen as one of the key sectors for entrepreneurs. This £6.5 billion market sees salons increasing at 10% + year-on-year and employing 35,000+ people (about the same as in energy or agriculture).

Hairdressers are amongst the most trusted people in society according to recent surveys and throughout the UK new salons with bizarre names keep on emerging. Here are some of the most adventurous

• Barber Streisand
• Curl up and Dye
• The God Barber
• The Second Combing
• Barber Black Sheep
• Ben Hair
• Shylocks
• Streaks Ahead
• Hair-vens Above
• Hair Port

As we drive around Britain it’s the lamentable taste of barbers that dominates our impression of the high street. How great to see names like Robert Dyas and Rymans … names that suggest seriousness. (I think I shall open one called “Whoops… Sorry!”)

And so to the stricken expression of a friend recently, one that Sisyphus might have had as the rock he was pushing careered down the hill yet again. It had been provoked by my saying his working life - he’d just retired - was actually only half over or put another way he had to do the same all over again.

This was inspired by Hokusai the Japanese artist whose woodcut “The Wave” is so famous. Here’s his take on age:-

“At seventy-three years I partly understood the structure of animals, birds, insects and fishes, and the life of grasses and plants. And so, at eighty-six I shall progress further; at ninety I shall even further penetrate their meaning…”

At the time you retire recognise the best is still to come if you work at it. That’s great advice.

The election continues to frustrate me.  “Strong and stable” is a joke. The rhetoric is impoverished and mean.   But salute Andy Burnham the new Manchester Mayor, transformed from being yet another Westminster politician into an impressive political voice. He gave me hope again following the Manchester outrage.

We need more like him - kind, thoughtful and putting the outrage into perspective:
“…the man who committed this atrocity no more represents the Muslim community than the individual who murdered my friend Jo Cox represents the white, Christian community.”