Annoying habits of Londoners #6: Finding people dry

Mike Pollitt | Wednesday 4 April, 2012 10:23

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I don’t know when “dry” became synonymous with “boring” in contemporary London speak. No doubt it’s dry to even ask. But by the time I pitched up in 2008 the usage was well established.

There is no greater insult on the city’s twentysomething social circuit. By all means be rude, be stupid, be selfish, be sick. Be obnoxious, uncaring, unreliable and insincere. These sins are entertaining, and so forgiven. But if you’re dry? Ugh. Do you have to come?

Dull people are dull, you might say. And who likes that?* But dryness is typically not a judgement on a person’s conversational skills, interests or manner, but on their difference from the judges. Finding people dry is a way of asserting the primacy of your tastes at the expense of other points of view. Don’t share my music/clubs/jokes/drinking habits/fashion? There must be something wrong with you – oh yeah, YOU’RE DRY.

The dry can remoisten, but only by jumping into the river of conformism. Then they swell up like a sponge and are welcomed back with open, sopping wet arms. Perhaps it’s better on the bank. You’re nice and dry there, after all.

*I accept that some people you meet really are boring. I mean really. But “finding people dry” is a more loaded phenomenon.

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