The Return of the (Long) Lunch Break

In times where employers cut pay by omitting bonuses, it seems that employees are getting even by cutting down on work hours and reviving a long lost treasure: The Lunch Break.

It does not take the skill of clairvoyance to figure out that come the end of this year, your annual discretionary payment will be - at the discretion of your employer - a lot smaller than it used to be.

While a lot of people came through last year's bonus season relatively unscathed, that is unlikely to happen this year where the number of banks doing well does not exceed the counting skills of a 4-year old.

And with this unfortunate outcome seemingly unavoidable, employees have drawn their own conclusions and seem to be acting accordingly.

Three years ago there was hardly a night when the trading floor was not well-manned at 9pm. It now seems difficult to find anyone around come 7pm.

Furthermore, people seem to have rediscovered socialising at lunch in order to brighten up the gloomy day-to-day proceedings.

Around St Paul's, a number of restaurants have opened in the last few weeks, and - as if the working population had only been waiting for more lunch joints - the likes of D Sum 2 and Le Pain Quotidien have been crowded from day one.

Bumping into a friend at LPQ, his only comment was: "If you look at how crowded this place is, you could wonder exactly where that recession is."

Right now, bankers sans bonus are not committed enough to spend their lunch breaks with a soggy sandwich, surfing the web at their desks. Nor are they too stretched to not be able to afford a sit-down lunch several times a week. We are after all, still speaking about suffering on a fairly high level.

Originally published on HereIsTheCity Life on 08-Sep-08. The original can be found here.

It's Raining Cabs. Not.

There are 21,000 black cabs in London.

Unless it's raining and you need one, then there are none.

Agreed, there is a recession upon us and I know we all have to tighten our belts, but every once in a while I take the liberty to take a black cab.

And most of the time, the cabbies are perfectly fine, sometimes up for a chat, sometimes not. Sometimes you end up with one monologueing about how foreigners take all our jobs (clearly not recognising that he is driving around a foreigner) and sometimes they are just too busy handling their mobiles, a bag of crisp and driving a car at the same time.

Sometimes you find the ones with the light off who agree to pick you up because it's on the way, sometimes you find those with the light on who don't pick you up because they don't like the destination.

However, it seems that once it starts raining, they all disappear. It is impossible to find a taxi in the City when it pours down. Agreed that demand probably spikes, but hey - 21,000 cabs?

Maybe it's just that when there is a prolonged period of precipitation in London, all cabbies decide to go back to their houses in sunny Florida.

If you don't believe - try it: Ask your next cab driver about his house in Florida! Chances are he'll have one and he'll happily tell you about the benefits of hibernating in warmer climes.

Because that's what he does when you are being left in the rain.

Don't Ask Me, I Just Work Here!

For some time I have been increasingly underwhelmed by the shop assistants you find in many high street stores.

What is the point of asking them if they know as much about what they are selling as you do?

From what I recall, it all started out with a visit to a electronic store because my camera (that I had bought in a store of the same chain) was not working properly. The person behind the counter clearly had neither knowledge about cameras nor any intention to help me and recommended going to Jessops. That was a surprising recommendation since I had not bought the camera there and I would have thought their inclination to help would probably be even smaller.

A similar incident occurred when buying a phone which we wanted to make sure that it could be muted. Asking the shop assistant she started reading the pack (which I had done before) and then concluded that the pack didn't say anything. I thought: "Thank you for being my reading assistant, I do have trouble with this occasionally".

I ended up asking her whether we could return the phone if it did not have the feature and simply unpacked it once I had left the store to check. If the mute button hadn't been that apparent I would have returned it right away.

It simply makes you think why anyone should not buy their goods online since the added value of buying offline seems to be fairly limited.

Then again, there are pleasant exceptions: In a standard High Street shop of all places, an employee surprised us with being helpful, knowledgable and - what seems to be very rare - feeling quite passionately about what he was trying to sell.

And you certainly don't want this rare passion to disappear simply because we all end up buying everything from Amazon.

The Traffic Warden From Heaven

I always thought traffic wardens are supposed to write tickets and not point out to you that you shouldn't park where you park but that there is space on the other side of the street.

Who knew how wrong I could be?

Last Sunday, after a pub lunch out of town, we went into Kensington to meet a friend in the afternoon. After navigating our way through a maze of one-way streets, we finally found our destination and a parking spot right across the street from it.

Whilst we were still packing our things and our baby, a traffic warden walked past, but from our side there was no cause for concern since I thought I had legitimately parked the car.

Whilst walking past us he said: "I don't suppose you have a resident's permit, but let's assume I haven't seen that. However, if you want peace of mind, why don't you just pull your car over to the other side where there is a single yellow line which means it is allowed to park there this time of the day?"

From previous experiences, traffic wardens are usually fairly un-approachable and not susceptible to common sense at all.

Whether it was the fact that we were in the middle of getting our baby out of the car (which usually gets young a "young family" bonus) or he was just having a good day, I don't know .

And it doesn't matter, it's the result that counts.

And the fact that he played a role in rounding off a very pleasant Sunday afternoon.

Effortlessly.

Mirror, Mirror on the Wall

A recent re-connect with a friend, the lack of quality drinking locations in the City and general depression brought us to grab a pint at "The Bolt Hole" off Cannon Street which turned into a after-work horror trip.

While the price of £6.40 for two 275ml bottles of Beck's (that being probably the worst beer that Germany could come up with) is already quite shocking, a more frightening experience occurred when visiting the gents'.

Looking into the bathroom mirror, suddenly an image appeared on that mirror announcing the release of the movie "Mirrors". I was surprised and intrigued about how nifty the projection on the mirror worked but what was being shown was fairly standard "Mirrors - In Theatres October 08" fare and therefore unremarkable.

Continuing to go about my business I turned my head away, and the next time I looked back towards the mirror, I was shell-shocked.

A rather distressed woman was seemingly behind the mirror, pressing her hands against it and screaming, eager to break through.

The announcement had changed to "There is evil on the other side."

And on this side, I was left wondering how small bottles of bad beer can cause such a trip.

Feel Free to Comment on My Life

Where did this come from? Initially we liked Facebook because we could post pictures and connect with friends we had lost touch with (apart from the fact that it was probably ok to lose touch with them).

Then we all felt compelled to update our online status whereever we were and whatever we did (well, probably not to that extent, but it felt as if people were giving away a lot of information about their whereabouts and whatabouts).

And at some point, probably when Facebook updated themselves to a new version, they introduced that people could comment on your status.

So, when doing innocuous little updates such as

"[mdtb] is at the gym."

you suddenly find people leaving comments like

"What are you doing this for, Fatboy?"

That's when I realised you're not only putting up your life, you're actually putting it up for debate.

So you better have a good reason for it.

Random Thought #4: Look Up!

Dogs can't do it, but you can. And in a very "Dead Poet's Society" way, it does in fact open up a new perspective.

As I recently walked through St. Katherine's Dock, a location I pass through with quite some regularity, I found myself waiting in a queue at the ATM, killing time, leaning backwards and spotting some artefact on a wall I hadn't seen before since I had never looked up there.

It turned out (as indicated by a plaque) that the artefact, a block of clear perspex showing a picture of a crown (more on it here) was planned to be featured in the Stanley Kubrick movie 2001: A Space Odyssey but was then replaced by the very well-known monolith.

I was fairly surprised that such a thing had escaped my attention for all the times I had walked past but felt that it simply confirms common sense.

Most of the time we only pay attention to what is clear view, usually at eye level and below. This is why supermarkets put whatever they want to sell you right there and not at a height of 7 feet. You wouldn't simply notice things up there (and you wouldn't be able to reach them but that's secondary).

On occasions it is great fun to walk through London and force yourself to pay attention to everything higher than let's say 10 feet.

You will be surprised about the amount of Gargoyles and statues you will find, as much as you will be simply putting a new angle on buildings that you might have walked past hundreds of times.

It beats reading the METRO hands down.

And by the way, dogs can look up as well but I thought it would make for a good opener.