I think I'll photograph this bar stool. Anything to delay trying to climb onto it. Sometimes the stool swivels. Sometimes the table swivels. Sometimes both refuse to budge, leaving you sandwiched in mid-air. Photo by Angela Lansbury. Copyright.
The photo above was taken on boxing day, at Marina Bay Sands which has a wonderful view over Singapore. We spend two hours in the rain arguing about where to sit. We played yo-yo from the outdoor table to the one under the umbrella. This involved arguing whether the rain was about to get worse or stop, carefully moving two tall cocktail glasses, containing paper umbrellas, and a plate of pizza, damp paper napkins, and ourselves, our bags, umbreallas, and cameras, whilst playing kiasu (get ahead) with a procession of other table-hoppers.
Problem
I want to do stand-up comedy. Right now I am sitting down. Stand-up comedy seems a lot of effort. You have to find a venue, write the stand-up, advertise, print tickets, sell tickets, get the audience, stay standing up for an hour whilst several people are sitting comfortably watching.
You could perch on a chair. I don't like perching on a chair. In order to be seen by an audience, I would need a high bar stool.
Bar Stool Mounting
To me getting on a bat stool is like getting on a horse. They were not designed with me getting on them in mind.
A horse is designed so that you get on one side and fall off the other side. Don't believe all those cowboy films. The hero ran across a field and leaps onto a horse. You believe that? He probably did it fifty times.
Or he got a stand-in. Or rather a sit-in or a sit on. Maybe I should start my comedy act by getting somebody to show me how to get on a bar stool.
Bar stools are designed by a different group of people to those who sit on a bar stool.
Toilet Cubicles
Like ladies toilet cubicles. They are all once inch too small. They are designed by thin men wearing trousers. They are not designed by small, plump ladies wearing long skirts over two petticoats nor shoppers with two shopping bags, an umbrella, and twins in a pushchair.
Going To Toilets In Pairs
Have you ever wondered why ladies get up from the table in restaurants and go to the toilets in pairs? Is it so they don't get molested by other diners on the way? Is it because bladders co-ordinate, the way menstrual cycles of women in the same house are supposed to co-ordinate.? I can tell you why women go the toilet in pairs. Is it so they don't get molested by waiters? Is it so they can toss a coin for whose boyfriend to go home with? No, it.s so that one of them can hold two bags whilst the other used the cubicle which often has no hook.
Swivelling Bar Stools
Back to bar stools. They have two design faults. Firstly they swivel. This means who you get to talk to is not your decision but is decided at random by a bar stool. If it ends up facing right - you talk to the handsome man on your right. If the bar stool swings left, you talk to the ugly man on your left. Whole marriages have been decided by bar stools. And divorces.
It's bar stool lottery. Have you ever wondered why some guys get all the girls. They are smart guys. They look at the floor of the restaurant and the way it slopes. They select the correct stool, so that the stools on either side swivel to face them.
If I were first into a bar, and the tools did not swivel, I would turn them slightly to face me.
I am the sort of person who gets the broken chair. Or the chair which is too low. That's why I always race into a restaurant. So I can swap the chairs.
I can swap tables. Somet restaurants have a person appointed to catch customers trying to stop tables and move them back. Sorry, Madam, this is a table for four. This is reserved. All the window tables are reserved. Reserved for somebody who tips me in advance.
What about the seating plan?
Wedding Seating Plans
I am smart at this sort of thing. When I go to a wedding, I look at the seating plan early.
Find my table. I am always at the back. On only one occasion was I at the top table. That was when I got married.
I had nobody to talk to except my husband and my father, both of whom I already knew. Maybe it's to stop the bride going off with another man.
Nowadays I look at the name cards. I move them. I make sure I am seated between two single men and not two married men and not two girls.
No Smoking Signs
Plan ahead. Once on a coach tour, I was seated in the front seat of the coach, so I was first into a restaurant. I sat down at a table near the window, then spotted the no smoking sign on the next table, so I moved the no smoking sign onto my table.
At the next stop, the restaurant had no table with no smoking signs. I thought, 'I wonder why?' Had they not thought of it? Had somebody stolen it?
I wrote the words no smoking on a piece of paper and placed it on the table. I was sure that the smokers would come in and say, "AHA - you wrote the non-smoking sign!". They didn't. They didn't know my handwriting. They assumed the restaurant had written the sign and I had chosen to sit there.
At the end of the meal, I waited to last and picked up my sign. Nobody knows. Except you. Please don't tell.
For twenty years I have kept this secret. It's the sort of thing you tell on your deathbed.
Author
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer.
Copyright but please share links to your favourite posts.
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