The original honesty box - in a car park

And my favourite analogue nail bar

Hello! And thank you, as always, for reading The Honesty Box.

Guess what my friend Jess sent me the other day? The above photograph, which is the exact thing I named this newsletter after, and when I say ‘exact’ I actually mean it, because St Keverne, a small town in deepest south Cornwall where this honesty box is situated, is one of the places I frequented on holiday as a child and teenager and where my dad would often be seen foraging around in his pockets for car park change.

Back then, in the late 1980s to mid-1990s, there were no meters, no CCTV, no tickets, or queues, or patrol people, or apps, or downloads, codes, sign ups, online accounts, phone numbers, password resets, face ID, recorded messages, I am not a robots, artificial intelligence or instructions on how to let an organisation with a made-up name extract the cost of a small supermarket shop from your salary to park your blooming car (which would have driven my dad to distraction), just a scratchy sign attached to a brick block with a rusty metal slot in the middle.

The St Keverne Parish Council Charity Car Park Honesty Box didn’t even specify how much cash it wanted - as long as you weren’t a camper, a coach tour or someone who might set up a market stall for the day, you could park, donate, and go.

And, as much as I would love to say nothing has changed since, it clearly has, because if you look closely, you’ll see a blimmin QR code, a PayPal logo and a “CCTV and webcam in operation” notice attached to the St Kev honesty box (CCTV and a webcam?! who is going to watch the livestream broadcast of a car park?).

But despite this attempted modernisation, the essence is there: something a little bit home-made, with an expectation of honesty and generosity and general grown-upness, as well as clear boundaries (no coaches!).

Anyway, The Honesty Box newsletter is meant to show the unvarnished me, imperfect and middle-aged, and working it out and living life in a different way to how I expected, with a few attempted modernisations such as Invisalign and therapy and weight training.

Things I like

Analogue things!

I go to a nail place called Kensal Nails for a pedicure when I notice my feet are not fit to be seen by the naked eye.

This is how it works: you ring up, you make an appointment, and they write it down in their book with a pencil. Then you turn up, they do your nails, you pay and you go home.

Why do I like this? Alongside doing a great job of sorting my toes out, they don’t have a website or an app, and the technology they use includes a cheese grater for your heels and a dustpan and brush for the floor.

The service is great - they offer you a drink, help you choose between 45 shades of orange polish, and they go above and beyond without having to go on a training course. On Thursday, they leant me flipflops and I’ll post them back through their letterbox later today.

Wham!

The Wham! documentary on Netflix (released on the 40th anniversary of the band’s debut album) is a joy, with Andrew Ridgeley and George Michael narrating the story of how they got together at school, with Andrew the driving force behind George and the confident one who pushed Wham! to go further and try for a record deal.

There’s plenty of footage of their gigs and appearances on Top of the Pops (one of the only showcases of new music in the 1980s), and the odd interview with George’s father.

The programme only goes up to 1987 when George went his own way as a solo artist, which left me wanting to know more about his life after that, but it’s a fun exercise in nostalgia.

That’s your lot - happy Sunday, and happy week! And, as ever, let me know your thoughts. x