the times Saturday June 11 2022Body + Soul 3
weeks ago to find one housemate scrub-
bing maniacally at the green between our
bathroom tiles with her ex-boyfriend’s
toothbrush). The cracks in the plaster, the
snapped chair legs, the broken doorbell,
the rotting window frame, the radiator off
its hinges, the oven door that doesn’t close,
and that’s just my house. The sofa offload
feels familiar too. Our landlord lives across
the Atlantic and clearly uses our house
as a place to dump all the crap he doesn’t
want. Every spare cranny or corner is
stuffed with filing cabinets, or footstools,
and one strange empty urn that looks
suspiciously like it was intended for
human remains. At Christmas, we filled it
with Lindors.Money. What money?
Maggie spends more than she earns. After
one particularly punishing night out, she
wakes up with £0.39 in her account (“I was
buying drinks for a load of people I’ll never,
ever, ever see again,” she explains mourn-
fully). This is pretty extreme for anyone
with rent to pay — even my wildest friends
are dejectedly aware of the non-negotia-
bility of their energy bills. On the other
hand, in my last job, I could almost
reach out and touch the bottom of my
overdraft by the end of each month. It kept
things interesting.
What the show gets absolutely right is
the sense of some housemates having a lot
more cash than others. In the strange,
some-might-say-screwed-up world of
graduate jobs, anyone who becomes a
banker, a corporate lawyer, or a manage-
ment consultant are almost immediately
on salaries I will reach only in my wildest
daydreams (and as a journalist, I’m not
exactly hard done-by). In our house, weT
he first episode of Love Island
signifies the onset of summer,
as well as a reminder that
some people have
unfeasibly white
teeth, pert bottoms and
taut torsos. But there is
something all British men
can learn from the Mallorca
villa’s latest intake, and that’s
the importance of a male
pedicure. To stand on one’s
own two feet in the knowledge
that, sockless, you won’t frighten
the horses or put people off their
courses is something to be noted —
as it was twice within the first
50 minutes of the new
series last week when male
and female contestants
commented that at
least Ikenna had “got his
toes done”. In his case this
allowed him to get away
with yellow pool slides as
eveningwear, and later receive a
“dare” foot massage.
Even if most men can do without
an orange tan and bulging pecs,
neatly trimmed toenails and
callus-free heels are two
things every male should
aspire to, especially as
sandal and flip-flop
season approaches. A good
pedicure should not be
viewed with suspicion but
with necessity; it’s a kindness
to yourself and to others.
Just think about it. Every summer
men’s feet get a bad press — the hairs on
our toes are mocked, the width of our
feet are compared to those of hobbits,
the uneven shape and yellow tinges to
our nails vilified, and yet with a quick
trip to the nail salon or a small
investment in some foot-care products,
there is much we could easily do to
appease the situation.
To be fair, it should be easier than it is
for a man to find a good pedicure here
in the UK. When I worked in New York,
there was a walk-in mani-pedi salon on
nearly every block. You could eat your
sandwich while your feet bubbled awayin a footbath before a genius technician
would furiously chip away at them until
you emerged 40 minutes later with
trotters that appeared pleasant enough
to go on display at the Uffizi.
The good news is that there are a
number of treatments you can use at
home that will make your heels and toes
more tenable. I regularly use Barber
Pro foot peels. You place your feet into
sock-like bags for 90 minutes and they
soften, nourish and exfoliate the skin
with ingredients such as glycolic
acid and salicylic acid that help
rid you of hard, calloused skin
(£7.95 from humanery.com).
Also worth a try is
O’Keeffe’s foot cream to
cure dry, cracked feet. Apply
the cream before bedtime
each evening and you’ll notice
your feet become far more
sandal-friendly (£13.49 from Boots).
I’d also recommend not cutting your
toenails with traditional square-
ended clippers but using toenail
scissors instead, as these will
enable you to achieve a
smoother, more attractive
shape to your nails (£23,
from tweezerman.co.uk).
A rounder toenail will
be far less likely to cause
an abrasion next time you
put up your foot for a massage
during a charming poolside game of
truth or dare.
Still not convinced? Then
cheat by wearing socks with
your sandals (an odd combo
that has found favour with
the fashion set for some
time now), or opt for
espadrilles or Birkenstock
clogs that reveal heel but
hide toe (only a bit of buffing
required). You could even choose to
distract with the application of coloured
nail varnish (celebs such as Machine
Gun Kelly and Harry Styles have
launched their own nail varnish lines).
Ultimately, Love Islander or not, you
need to head into the summer feet first.twentysomething housemates
Dear British men, it’s
time for a summer pedi
Read this before you
wear sandals, says
Jeremy Langmead
stagger the rent to reflect our incomes —
I’d never be able to live with two of them
otherwise. Thanks guys!Being naked
Alone one night, Maggie cranks up the
Seventies funk and boogies through the
house in just a thong (well, you would if
you had a body like Appleton’s). I think the
likelihood of this happening is determined
less by age and generation than tempera-
ment: I have one particular housemate
who is very, very naked — sometimes I feel
like I know her boobs better than my own
— but the others are a bit more civilised/
repressed. Still, wandering around in a
bra and pants is exceptionally normal.
Mostly because they’re not dressed yet.
Even though it’s 8.52pm. Why is no one
ever ready?Snacks: both disgusting
and sophisticated
Let’s be clear, we’re the Ottolenghi genera-
tion, we know our tahini from our turmer-
ic, we cook with za’atar and pomegranate
seeds, we are not to be patronised. But also,
our eating habits can be quite disgusting. I
felt a wave of comradeship watching Mag-
gie chow down on a block of Cathedral
City in bed or nosediving into the Nutella
(“Don’t eat that straight from the jar!” her
outraged housemate yelps). Reader, in our
house, you are positively encouraged to
eat from the jar. A hefty spoonful of peanut
butter is the perfect snack portion. Oh
wait, maybe that’s just me. If the others are
reading this, I’ll stop, I promise.
Everything I Know About Love is now on
BBC iPlayerCOVER AND BELOW: CHRIS MCANDREW FOR THE TIMES/HAIR AND MAKE-UP SARA BOWDEN USING BOBBI BROWN. BELOW: LAURA BAILEY/WORKING TITLE/BBCTrimmed toenails
and callus-free
heels are what
every male
should aspire to
The cast of the BBC adaptation of
Everything I Know About LoveJeremy
Langmeadga
truc
you
thad