Chris Saul's Blog

Tuesday November 07, 2006

The curse of Russell and Bromley

When my sister and I were small, our mother would buy us shoes from Russell and Bromley in Kingston. I used to like having my feet measured with the 'Startrite' foot measurer. My feet were always quite broad, which meant I always needed shoes that were a bit too long for me. Being told I had 'broad feet' made me feel rather proud for some reason, as if I had some useful physical attribute that had been denied lesser children.

The kids' section was on the first floor, which meant walking up a small flight of stairs. The banister was metal and the carpet made of something synthetic, which meant I'd always get a static electricity shock when I touched it. This could be quite painful, although it did make going upstairs more exciting. Should I touch the banister or not? Would it give me a shock or would it spare me this time? I can remember standing at the bottom gathering up the courage to touch the banister, holding my finger out and then snatching it back at the last before flesh touched the torturous hand rail.

To this day, I'm still slightly nervous of getting an electric shock from metal door handles or banister rails. Standing in the Sun Vienna office this afternoon I found myself sticking my hand out to touch the door and then clutching it back at the last minute. The curse of Russell and Bromley lives on.

Since I'm not 6 years old any more, I suppose I really out to be a bit more gutsy about this kind of things.

The Kingston store is still there, according to their website. I wonder if the Banister of Doom is still electrocuting small children, 25 plus years on?

Offroad in Lebanon

Not me offroading, but DiscoDino from ME4x4 who's now back home before flying off to the States.

Cool pics on the ME4x4 site.

Lots of mud to deal with at this time of year in Lebanon it seems. One of the nice things about offroading in the desert is coming back home with a clean car. It's a funny feeling to be driving to the shops in a pristine white Wrangler despite having spent the afternoon whizzing up and down something a lot more challenging than a speed bump.