ficklish

Dancing Queen

2009-02-16T22:16:00.004Z

So, I’ve never been a dancer. Sure, I have been known to shake my not-inconsiderable arse in various adult establishments on occasion over the years, but ever in any kind of organised fashion. I was never an adorable three-year-old in a tutu, I never learned how to tap. I did do gymnastics in a fetching purple leotard, and my proudest achievement was winning the handstand competition on one memorable Saturday morning.

Given all this, I’m not entirely sure why it seemed like a good idea to sign up for a Bollywood dancing class.

I know when it happened. I was sitting in a restaurant in Brick Lane, having dinner with a jolly crew to farewell the wonderful MIA, who was on his way back to Merica. I was transfixed by the flatscreen TV in the corner, playing an endless loop of shiny happy Indian folks dancing about in an energetic and stylish manner. I thought to myself, ‘wow. That looks like fun.’

[It later became clear that I was coming down with a nasty bout of flu and was at that particular time suffering the effects of a highly elevated temperature].

Fever notwithstanding, the idea stuck and when I recovered I did a bit of googling. A suitable beginner’s workshop was found, and I rocked up to commence my experiment last Monday evening.

It was raining really hard. The venue took some finding, and I arrived bedraggled, clumsily juggling bag, scarf, iPod and glasses. This inability to coordinate my movements was to set the tone for the rest of the evening. I walked in the entrance and just past the desk was a scene just like every dance movie I’ve ever seen: a giant open room with wooden floors, mirrored walls and a large crowd of people moving in unison. Spooky, and intimidating as hell. It’s a cliché, but everyone there looked like they belonged: lithe, graceful and coordinated in a way that I know I am not. My gut went all clenchy with the nerves.

I sucked up all my courage and walked like I knew what I was doing up many flights of stairs to find the studio I was looking for, only to be told that the changing rooms were in the basement. Of course they were! I trudged all the way down again and enjoyed ten minutes of English Changing Room fun. Why, oh why, do they prance about in their underwear? I will never understand. One woman sat on a bench eating a muesli bar, watching the room, impassively surveying the nakedness as she waited for someone or something or I don’t know what. It was creepy. I scuttled out of there as fast as I could, wondering anew what the hell I was doing there.

As I stood outside the room waiting for the previous class to finish the nerves started to dissipate a little. The class was huge – a giant group of people bouncing about, having fun, making it look so very easy. I started to get a little bit excited. There was a tall, pasty white guy at the back grinning widely, flinging his windmill arms about madly, having the time of his life. I couldn’t take my eyes off him. When their class was finished and our group shuffled in, I was delighted to note that he was wearing thick dark braces with his acid wash black jeans. Spectacular!

As I took off my shoes I noticed that the room was, in fact, about half the size I had thought it was. Oh yes, that’s right. MIRRORS. If there’s one thing I loathe more than exercise it’s having to watch myself while I do it. This was not going to be pretty.

And so, the class began. It was a beginner’s lesson and there were only a handful of us and a perky instructor. She launched into some stretches, boppy ones done to blaring bhangra music. So far, so good. Then she showed us a few basic steps which formed the basis of the warmup routine. By the time the first song was over I was winded and sweating like a bastard.

The rest of the class consisted of learning chunks of choreography and then stringing them together to music. I found that I could kind of approximate the footwork, or the hand movements, but putting them together was chaos.

I had cleverly decided not to wear my glasses. As mentioned above, I tend to perspire somewhat profusely, and I figured that constantly pushing my spectacles up my face would make me look even more bumbling than I was. The advantage of this situation, though, was that I couldn’t make out the instructor’s face in the mirror very clearly. When she repeated instructions, ‘no, not like that! You’re not screwing in a lightbulb! Put your shoulder into it!’ I couldn’t tell if she was talking to me. She probably was. I’m really good at screwing in lightbulbs.

Some of the steps were tricky. She’d demonstrate, we’d follow along and repeat again and again until we mostly got the hang of it. There was one move that caused particular trouble. It was kind of a sliding step followed by sticking your butt out. “Shuffle, then hip”, she would call as we tried – and mostly failed - to copy her movements. “Shuffle, then hip.” This went on for some time until she stopped, a little exasperated, and said, "I’m obviously not explaining well. Let me see if I can make it clearer.'

[Thoughtful pause]

"It’s really kind of a shuffle, followed by a hip.”

I cracked up. Well, when you say it like that…!

Restraining the chuckles was a challenge throughout the class. I decided early on that I didn’t want to be playing the equivalent of hit-and-giggle pool – no-one likes that girl – and that I should try to demonstrate that I was taking it seriously. I really didn’t want to be ruining it for all the serious dancey-types around me.

I tried really hard. The more I stumbled, the harder it got to keep a straight face. When we strung the steps together, I’d keep up initially, then miss something (usually the shuffle/hip) and scramble to catch up, feeling more than a little ridiculous.

I had fun. I really, really sucked. Everyone else seemed to manage fine, obviously dance class veterans of long standing. Catching glimpses of my awkward, lumbering self in the mirror was unpleasant, so I kept my eyes on the instructor’s arse. The music was infectious. There were a couple of (very) brief moments where I got my hands and feet coordinated enough to actually enjoy the movement – actually dancing rather than concentrating on the pattern. I got sweaty, I jumped about. Then, when it was over, I emerged into the rain smiling and exhausted.

Snow!

2009-02-05T20:43:00.008Z

As you may have read there was some snow in London this week. Lots of snow! Okay, not that much snow by the standards of the rest of the wintry world, but the biggest snowfall here in two decades and a pretty big deal. It was spectacular.

It brought the city to its knees on Monday. There was no public transport, the business district was a ghost town. Most of my colleagues who depend on trains or buses to get to work were stranded, but I live so close to the office that I figured I had no excuse, so no snow day for me. Besides, I was keen to get out and see what it all looked like. It has only snowed a little bit on a couple of occasions since I’ve lived here and the novelty hasn't come close to wearing off. This was very exciting indeed.

The first thing I learned is that I really don’t have the right footwear for these conditions. I wrapped up as warm as I could, but shoes were a definite problem. I am, as you will be aware, really not an outdoor type and I don’t own hiking boots, or snow boots, or anything even remotely similar. I surveyed the options available in my cupboard and settled on knee socks with my trainers, rolling the cuffs of my trousers up so they wouldn’t get wet and securing them with clothespegs. I looked a treat, as you can imagine.

What is normally a half-hour walk took me over an hour – slipping and skidding my way across the icy paths with tiny little steps. I only fell on my arse once. It was tough going, but I couldn’t care – it was so beautiful! Grey, dirty London all sparkling and clean and draped with thick white blankets. Everyone out walking was in a festive mood – chatting and laughing with each other along the way. That never happens here, it was amazing. I saw a guy walking along with ski poles, everyone cheered as he went past.

Soft flakes fell constantly all day. The handful of my colleagues and I who made it into the office had a very good time – snowball fights at lunchtime, stomping about in snowdrifts like Godzilla, excellent fun.

We left the office early to try to get home before dark. I skidded my way towards home, and to my amazement happened upon a lone bus going in my direction. I waved at the driver, who stopped and let me on. I gushed my thanks effusively, it felt strange to be so grateful for something that happens on every other regular day. I smiled to myself as I then sat on the bus and heard every subsequent passenger do exactly the same thing, ‘Oh, THANK YOU! Thank you so much! This is brilliant!’, exclaiming their gratitude to the driver for saving them the long walk home. Best bus ride ever.

I know it was pathetic. We were the object of scorn from places like Moscow and Canada and I guess rightly so. But it was freaking brilliant, and I’m so glad I was here for it. As I got home to the Pickle, the guy at the wine shop downstairs was hanging outside his doorway, sprinkling table salt on the icy footpath so that customers wouldn’t slip coming into his shop. I have no idea what – if any – effect it would have had, but it was very charming and it made me smile.

I’ve been so inspired by the snow and my new-found love for stomping in it that I have invested in some genuine outdoor footwear: my first wellies! They are most excellent:

I ordered them online on Monday night and they arrived today. This photo is of me modelling them in the office. I wore them outside for a smoke break and stomped about gleefully in the last patches of melting slush. Now I'm checking the weather report obsessively, waiting for more snow to come along. I'm ready!

January: Hoxton

2009-01-31T22:49:00.003Z

Frankie and I have a project for 2009. Each month will have a theme, with corresponding activities, study and excursions planned accordingly throughout the year. The purpose is twofold: firstly, to mark the passage of time so that we don’t get to the end of another year gazing around in bewilderment, saying ‘hey! Where did that one go?’ The second goal is about experience: learning, doing things, going places we’ve never been. I’m going to record our progress here.

January is a tough month, both in terms of energy levels and finance, so we’ve started slowly. The focus this month was our local area: Hoxton.

We’ve lived at the Pickle, on Old Street, for two years now. We have plenty of favourite haunts that we visit regularly. There are plenty of gaps, though, and it’s about time they were filled in.

Hoxton/Shoreditch has a reputation as a too-cool-for-school, super-trendy area, full of bars and clubs and galleries, infested with hipsters. It’s noisy and crowded and as I lie in bed at night the drunken carousing of revellers floats through my window from the street below.

It hasn’t always been this way. Old Street, as the name suggests, has been around for a very long time. Hoxton was an industrial, poor area in the 19th century and has retained a gritty, dirty urban feel. Our balcony looks out over blackened rooftops. The northern part of the area is packed full of council housing, big grey ugly blocks of box-like flats crammed full of people.

As part of the January project, I read a book called Not Expecting Miracles, by Alice Linton. Published by a small local press, it is autobiography of a woman growing up in Hoxton in the early 20th century, telling stories about her poor, working class childhood in the years after WW1. It’s not great literature – she has the dry, no-nonsense voice of an old lady, recounting matter-of-fact memories of her parents struggling to survive, her brothers and sisters playing in the streets, making their own fun, enjoying occasional treats. It was nice to be able to walk a different way home from the bus stops and explore the streets mentioned in her story.

Frankie and I went to the Geffrye Museum one Saturday afternoon. Sir Robert Geffrye was a former Lord Mayor of London who built several almshouses in the area for the widows of former ironmongers, and the museum is housed in one of these buildings. It focuses on homes and furniture throughout the centuries, with each time period represented by a replica of a typical living room from that era. It was interesting to watch the evolution of function and style throughout history. The 21st century room contained lots of Ikea.

We spent an evening wandering around the area, having a pint in several of the bars and pubs that we had not yet visited. In the last pub, we made the acquaintance of a local who happens to be a guide with a London tour company. He was very good company and I’m hopeful he will be a useful resource for future explorations.

To round off the month, this afternoon I went to the White Cube gallery on Hoxton Square. The square is literally a block behind our house and there’s really no excuse for my not having visited the gallery before. I saw an exhibition called Texas Crude, a series of works by American artist Rosson Crow - giant, dark, dramatic paintings inspired by moments in history. I liked them a lot and would very gladly have one in my home, if, you know, the Pickle was about four times larger. Check out the link here – my favourite was ‘New York Stock Exchange After Bond Rally 1919’. The second exhibition was paintings and sculpture by German artist Andreas Golder. They were amazing and profoundly disturbing.

So, there you go. It wasn’t much – a book, a museum, a gallery, some minor exploration and a pub crawl – but better than nothing and very good fun. I’m looking forward to February already.

A Very jLo Christmas

2008-12-31T14:18:00.007Z

Here’s how to have a most excellent Christmas season, jLo style.

Step 1: Make yourself a Christmas tree outfit.

Apparently I have become something of a domestic goddess – since the mince pie endeavour chronicled in the last post, I have done MORE baking (okay, I made a cake) and then embarked upon a mission involving sewing!

I purchased myself a bright green dress, and then hand-sewed many shiny additions of the bauble and tinsel variety. A headband, a star ornament and some gaffer tape combined to make a quite striking headpiece. Adding in some brown tights (for the trunk) and some knee-high boots (for the pot), I was transformed into the most festive mascot you ever did see. There were even lights! Here is some photographic evidence (my friend Dr Evil is being the gift):

We had a Christmas party at the Pickle at which the tree outfit was a big hit. Frankie also dressed as an elf, with green tights and all – he would kill me if I put a photo of that on the Internet, but if you let me know I’ll send you the evidence privately (it was spectacular). My boss and my director were so taken by my costume that they insisted I wear it to the work Christmas party the following week. Despite some misgivings – did I really want to make that much of a spectacle of myself in front of all my colleagues? – of course I complied. The staff at my somewhat conservative workplace were a little stunned, but it certainly injected a little festive spirit into the proceedings. I met LOTS of new people, which will hopefully be helpful when work resumes in the new year. I introduced myself to a group of relatively sombre colleagues and chatted merrily with them for a few moments, and as I walked away one of them was heard to remark to her neighbour “that was the friendliest Christmas tree I’ve ever seen”. Result!

Step 2: Put yourself in charge of the department Christmas activity.

Tired of the boring lunches and realising that nights down the pub really aren’t that special when that’s what you do every week anyway, I devised the Most Awesome Team Christmas Activity Ever. Firstly, my entire department went to the Waldorf for champagne high tea, and spent a very happy afternoon cramming ourselves full of scones and cake. Mmmm, scones and cake in a fancy hotel. Then (and this was pure genius) we went to an evening concert of the Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain!

You may recall that I first encountered the UOGB during my first year in the UK, and the memory of that incredible evening has remained with me ever since. They didn’t disappoint the second time around – performing some old favourites (Candy Says, the theme from Shaft, Miss Dynamite) and adding in some great Christmas songs. The highlights for me, though, were a version of Kate Bush’s Wuthering Heights (with the audience shouting ‘Heathcliff!’ in every chorus) and an absolutely rocking ukulele interpretation of Smells Like Teen Spirit. It filled me with indescribable joy.

We were so inspired by the awesomeness of the ukuleles that after the big work Christmas party the following night a couple of colleagues and I went out to indulge our inner show ponies by singing karaoke until 4am. I performed my own version of Smells Like Teen Spirit, growling so energetically that I was literally without a voice for three days afterwards. Good times.

Step 3: Wrestle with an Aga.

A bunch of us rented a big old house in the countryside for Christmas week. It was lovely: the house was spacious and warm and had a fireplace, a piano, a Christmas tree, a ping pong table, lots of jigsaw puzzles and a bookshelf full of holiday reading. Perfect.

It also had an Aga. I’d read about such things in posh English countryside novels, but never really understood what it was. Turns out it’s giant oven that’s on all the time. Back in the day, these were used to heat the house, heat the water, and cook all the food. This house had central heating as well as a fireplace, so while the kitchen was toasty warm having the Aga on all the time seemed a bit of a waste of energy. The weird thing about it was that the temperatures are pre-set – there are two hotplates (with lids) on top, set to a high and low heat, and two oven cavities, one set to 160 degrees and the other to 220. Trying to cook a stirfry on the hotplate was amusing – not being able to adjust the temperature, you can only move the frypan off and on the plate as needed. Slow-cooking lamb shanks in the cooler of the two ovens for Christmas Eve dinner was much more successful. Deliciously successful.

The week was long and lazy – way too much food, way too much drinking, long walks in the countryside, lots of trashy novels. There was much Christmas merriment: a sound-activated Jingle Bird, many mince pies, lots of chocolate money and mulled wine. I discovered that apparently I love ping pong - who would have thought? We introduced our San Franciscan friend MIA to the honourable Australian tradition of a pantsing: any time anyone was beaten to love in a game they had to run around the table with their trousers around their knees. It was very cold but MIA threw himself into the cultural experience with admirable energy.

On Christmas Eve, we went into the tiny town square where a brass band was playing – we stood and sang Christmas carols with all the townsfolk. It was delightful.

The Secret Santa was a huge success, with an unexpected animal theme. Frankie’s gift was all about badgers, DJ Ill received several items relating to her new-found love of narwhals (based on this). I scored a stuffed koala that plays the Large Hadron Rap when you press his arm. He’s awesome – the wonderful MIA battled an epic hangover to go and make him for me at a build-a-bear workshop in Covent Garden, which delights me more than I can say. The bear’s name is King Hadron: Destroyer of Universes and I love him very much. I’ve never really had a teddy bear as a grown-up, but he’s so cuddly that I’ve been sleeping with him every night since Christmas. When I roll over in bed I accidentally set him off, and it’s very strange to be awoken by the disembodied voice of Stephen Hawking.

That is one of the more bizarre sentences I have ever written.

I hope you all had a very merry Christmas. Happy new year, and may there be many splendid adventures awaiting you in 2009.

Late edit: I now have a photo of King Hadron, and want to put it up here so you can witness his majesty:

Domestic goddess

2008-11-30T23:41:00.002Z

I have a cautionary tale to tell, of a woman who tried to fly too close to the sun. What do you get when you mix a cut-throat competitive streak with a good dash of obsessive-compulsiveness? Disaster.

One of my colleagues at work has organised a Mince Pie Competition to celebrate the festive season. Each member of the department has been allocated a date on which to bring in mince pies, which are then consumed and assessed by the rest of the staff according to taste, pastry, presentation and value for money.

Tomorrow is my day. I have spent more time than I care to admit thinking long and hard about my strategy. All participants so far have contributed store-bought pies, so baking them myself seemed a good way to grab an easy advantage in the moral highground department. Further, one of the women I work with is allergic to wheat – so I figured that if I could come up with a pie that she could eat (and therefore rate), I would automatically have access to more points than anyone else. Genius!

I neglected to consider a couple of key factors. Firstly, I don’t bake. Ever. I used to when I was a kid, but I can’t remember the last time I made a cake, let anything involving actual pastry. This should have been evident when I had to go shopping yesterday for every single implement I would need for this endeavour. I purchased many items of baking equipment that I have never owned before and am unlikely ever to use again. I did, you will be pleased to know, draw the line at a rolling pin – why on earth would I need one of those when we have so many perfectly serviceable empty wine bottles lying around?

Last night I chopped all the ingredients for the mince and left it overnight to soak up the brandy (mmm, brandy). The recipe I chose called for an apricot and hazelnut mince which sounded like a winner - friendly and familiar yet just fancy enough to be impressive. There was an incident involving orange zest at one point in which I grated a hefty chunk of thumb into the mixture – but thankfully it was retrieved in time and the mince was done. I made a practice batch of pastry, chilled it and made it into rough draft pies filled with ready-made mince from a jar. They turned out okay, so this morning I got started for real.

I don’t know whether you’ve ever worked with gluten-free flour before, but it is god-awful stuff. Dry and crumbly and with a very strange flavour. I have spent HOURS today trying to make the freaking things. Batch after batch of pastry, carefully rolled and cut and pressed the fiddly little fuckers gently into wee mini-muffin trays. It took forever. My feet and back are still aching from hunching over the bench all day. The pie shells done, I spooned in the stuffing, and topped each one with strips of pastry in the form of a cross (the bases took so long I couldn’t bear to make lids as well). They smelled good when they came out of the oven, and I eagerly tipped them out onto cooling racks and waited for the taste test.

And remembered why I don’t bake in the first place.

They’re AWFUL. The pastry is dry and crunchy, the mince tastes like cinnamony apricot gloop. All that effort, for nowt. Of course, I spent all last week loudly boasting about how my contribution was going to be home made, so now I have no choice but to take them in and make my workmates actually consume them. I’m horrified at the thought. Ambition goeth before a fall, it seems. Next year I’m definitely going straight to Waitrose.

Procrastination

2008-09-07T13:10:00.005+01:00

So, it’s Sunday and I have some work to do. That’s bad news, I know. It’s not bothering me too much, though – because I’m not actually doing the work. I made an executive decision not to go into the office (being at work on a Sunday? A bridge too far) and that I would write my briefing paper in my pyjamas at the dining room table.

Unsurprisingly, it hasn’t yet happened. My capacity for procrastination has expanded and refined since university. I now have tools at my disposal so spectacularly distracting that had they been in my life ten years ago, I would not have a degree today. Actually, it’s not that remarkable: so I’m watching TV on my laptop while surfing various interesting websites, no big deal, nothing out of the ordinary. Still, my paper is really not getting written.

Today I have spent way too much time trying to work out how to correctly pronounce the word ‘hadron’ so that I can talk about this at dinner tonight.

(It’s really nice of my friends to continue to be friends with me).

I’ve also been reading about the history of the Proms. DJ Ill and I went to a Prom last night, first time for both of us. It’s a long and well-loved tradition and has long been on my must-do list of quintessentially London activities.

They’re held at the Royal Albert Hall, another place I’d not yet visited. It’s big and round and beautifully ornate and it was all very exciting. The concert was lovely – the Royal Scottish National Orchestra playing Roussel, Thea Musgrave, Debussy, and Rachmaninov’s Piano Concerto No. 2 in C minor featuring this guy as a soloist.

The overall experience was just what I hoped for – excellent music in a beautiful setting, a crowd of prommers standing en masse in the middle of the floor and up in the gallery, soaking it up. No clapping between movements, strange chants at particular moments, everyone in high spirits, it was fabulous. That last link? Read it, seriously, it’s brilliant. Englishness at its absolute best:

"What you must never do is push in," says Trueman, a voluble twentysomething in thick glasses. "That's the sin against the Holy Spirit. That will not be forgiven. We queue.

Oh, yes you do. That whole article delights me more than I can say.

DJ Ill and I were a bit pathetic – unsure of how the whole Prom thing worked, I actually booked us seats a couple of weeks ago. While I was very happy to be able to sit in comfort and enjoy the music, I think I’m going to have to go back and try it the other way next year, to have a properly authentic Proms experience - taking my chances in the queue and frolicking with the hardcore.

Going to things like this is part of what I love most about living here. I’m reading this hilarious book at the moment, called - get this - London: The Novel and enjoying it immensely. It’s blockbusteriffic – certainly not the most literary of masterpieces, but a cracking read nonetheless. The historical content is woven into a saga-style story of several families - from Roman times to the present and all the eras in between. It’s helping to fuel the sense of delight that shivers through me as I walk through the streets of the city – knowing that this is where all kinds of fascinating things have been happening for centuries.

A friend and I went to the Tower the weekend before last – she hadn’t been for twenty years, I hadn’t been for ten. It’s been standing there for the better part of a thousand years, which is hard to wrap your head around. In the Jewel House, there are lots of sparkly shiny things that Kings and Queens have worn for centuries. I’m a Republican, for crying out loud. I don’t even believe in the monarchy. And yet, when I’m looking at the coronation spoon and hearing a helpful aide explain how it dates from the 12th century and is used to anoint each monarch with oil (which is concocted according to a special secret recipe known only to the Royal Chemist) after they’ve taken their oath, I can’t help but feel a little giddy.

There’s so much more that I haven’t even seen yet. I can’t wait to find out more. And who can think of writing a briefing paper when there are so many interesting things to read about?

Summer

2008-08-31T23:45:00.004+01:00

Everyone goes on holiday in August. It's a phenomenon, the whole city effectively shuts down.

I was told that as a result, August is a great time to get things done. It's quiet and you get a chance to catch up and get things ready for the autumn. I know now that everyone who told me that is a lying liar who lies all the time. It's been busy. I've been working a lot. I'm luckier than most in that I actually really like my job, but still - it's tiring to be there all the time. Also, there's a bar in the building which is really not very good for my liver.

(Incidentally, the event that I wrote about in my last post? Went very, very well).

So, it's boring, but that's mostly what I've been up to since last we spoke. There has been plenty of fun too, you will be pleased to know. In roughly chronological order, the highlights of July and August have included:

- Travelling to Reims for Madam Fox's birthday, where we explored the lovely town and the magnificent cathedral, ate excellent food and – most importantly – tasted lots of very delicious champagne.

- Eating dinner in the dark at Dans le Noir. It was quite a remarkable experience: imagine sitting in pitch darkness, having no idea who else is around you, identifying your friends by voice, hooking your finger over the edge of your wine glass as you pour so that you can tell when to stop. It was oppressive and freeing all at the same time.

- Enjoying visits from the lovely Marie and Mitchell and my brothers.

- Going to the Big Chill festival in Hereford, which was utterly fabulous and where I discovered that if Leonard Cohen was the leader of a cult, I would join it. Our new good friend Miles wrote a very good review of the weekend here.

- Singing my heart out at karaoke, seeing a student production of an absorbing and gruesome Greek tragedy; going to the Churchill Museum (again) and the Tower of London, celebrating the engagement of another good friend (is there something in the air at the moment?), and soaking up as much sunshine as possible.

Apparently I haven’t been spending all my time at work. That’s good to know.

Shiny New Suit

2008-07-02T06:54:00.003+01:00

So, for the last couple of months at work I’ve been busily planning a major event. It’s something fairly ambitious that the organisation has never done before, and rather alarmingly, has been mostly left up to me to arrange. It’s been an interesting process – difficult and frustrating most of the time, but I have learned a great deal and now the day is here. The champagne is ordered, the production company is briefed, a few hundred people have said they’ll attend. Everything is ready. I’m nervous, but it’s now mostly out of my control.

When I was in NYC last month I did a lot of shopping. One of my purchases was a swanky new suit. I've never owned anything quite like it, and I am very pleased with it. I haven't worn it yet - for one thing, my workplace is fairly business casual and so if I'd worn it on any old day people would have assumed I had a job interview. For another, it is so pretty I felt like it needed a suitably grand occasion. When I got it home I hung it in my wardrobe, thinking, “I know. I’ll save it for the reception. That can be its debut.” On the weekend I took a peek at it to make sure it didn’t need pressing. All was in order.

Or so I thought.

Last evening, I took it out of its bag and hung it on the outside of the wardrobe door, ready to try it on with different tops, to see which worked best. As I reached for the jacket, a fold of fabric fell open and my heart sank.

The security tag was still attached.

Oh, fuck. A giant chunk of plastic, affixed under the armpit of the jacket, hanging there like I’d shoplifted the damn thing. I sent some very uncharitable thoughts in the direction of that hapless shop assistant in New York, and then at myself for not checking earlier. Why didn’t I check? AARRRRGGGHHH!

What the hell was I going to do? Try and get another shop to take the tag off? They'll assume I stole it. Where is my receipt? I can go to a shop where they don't sell this designer. No, they'll just assume I stole it from somewhere else. Bugger! My first meeting was at 8:30am today, there wasn’t going to be time – which also meant I wasn’t going to be able to duck into anywhere to pick up something new.

[It’s probably important to note at this point that I threw out my old suit last month after a different event – tired of stapling the hems together and pretending that the jacket wasn’t almost worn through. Oh, how I longed for that old shabby suit at that moment. I would have given anything to see its friendly grey face. ]

When I caught myself wondering if I could get away with pretending I hadn't noticed it was there ("maybe if I just keep my arm jammed against my side like this..."), it was clear there was nothing else for it. I had to get the tag off. Here are the steps I took to address the situation:

1. Panic and swear. (done!)

2. Run for the toolkit. (I am a woman of the modern world, I own my own tool kit). I pulled out a screwdriver and tried to break the stupid thing by brute force. No luck.

3. I turned to Google. A quick search revealed a million stories just like my own. Responses to the plaintive cries for help included “don’t lie, you filthy shoplifter”; ‘be careful! Some of these tags have dye in them!”, “smash it with a hammer” and “try a magnet”.

The last option seemed the sanest. I then went to step 4.

4. Ask my flatmate for help.

Knock knock. “Frankie?” (Frankie had retired for the evening some time ago).

“Yes?”

“Um. Do you have a magnet?”

He came to his door. “What?”

I explained the situation.

Bless him, his first response was to ask if I had searched on the Internet (we are children of our age). When I explained the magnet suggestion, he informed me sadly that he did not have a magnet. Then his face brightened and he got excited.

“We could always try running a current through an insulated wire and…”

“Um, Frankie? That doesn’t really sound like a good idea.”

“No, I guess not. Well, let’s have a go at this then.”

Frankie assessed the situation thoughtfully. He carefully slid his library card under the tag, to protect the fabric, then took the screwdriver and started to prise around the edges of the tag. For a while, nothing happened. The tension grew. I started to panic all over again.

Then, there was some movement. As I held the jacket and braced my hand against the long part of the tag, he gently levered the pieces apart.

“What’s that cracking sound?”

“Maybe that’s the plastic giving way?”

“Actually, I think that’s my library card.”

He was right. I hope the Borough of Hackney doesn’t fine him for a new one.

He did it, you know. Frankie totally saved the day. The pin holding the two pieces together gradually became visible and he was able to reach for the pliers and pull the tag off. You couldn’t see so much as a pinhole in the fabric where the tag had been. He was brilliant. I'm going to start a criminal syndicate so that he can be the CEO.

Everyone needs a flatmate like Frankie. Now if that’s the only thing that goes wrong with this event, I’m going to be a VERY happy person this time tomorrow.

Things I Have Learned Recently

2008-06-30T21:36:00.002+01:00

New York, New York is a wonderful town.

There are few things more entertaining than sweeping dramatically into a room full of your friends and uttering the following words: "I have taken a lover."

When summer actually arrives in London, the days are so delightful that you don’t even mind the hayfever.

No matter how fascinating you are finding that Feynman biography, it is possible to bore people to actual tears if you talk about it too much.

Buying AstroTurf on eBay is really fun. Receiving said AstroTurf and laying it out in sheets all over your living room is even more fun, though it does make sitting on the couch a more itchy experience than usual.

Drinking with colleagues is fraught with the danger of extreme mortification; unless you get lucky and the person in question remembers even less of the evening than you do.

Sometimes wonderful things happen to truly deserving, lovely people.

It is possible to be so tired when you come home from work that you give serious consideration to having a big spoonful of cream cheese for dinner.

Freak

2008-05-16T01:44:00.006+01:00

(Or: 'Why Yes, I'm Still Single. Why Do You Ask?')

I’m a lurker. I derive many hours of enjoyment from the toil of others on the interweb without offering them anything in return. No thanks, no responses, no input – I simply read their words, nod to myself, and move along. I get so excited whenever anyone is kind enough to leave a comment on this blog and, I confess, a wee bit despondent when there are none, but I know I’ve no-one to blame but myself. If I was out there, putting in my two cents’ worth on other people’s pages, karma would reward me with feedback of my own.

All of this is a roundabout way of saying that I broke my lurkdom tonight for a meme. Madam Fox was chiding me gently earlier this evening about updating my blog, but I couldn’t think of anything to write about that would be sufficiently interesting. “Hi everyone, I’m happy and well but am really insanely busy at work at the moment and too brain-dead the rest of the time to string a sentence together.” “Great entry, jLo! Please, can we have some more of your amazing insight and hilarious perspective on this crazy, beautiful, mixed-up world of ours?” I think not.

Then I flicked through my blog feeds (85 at last count, I’m telling you, I’m a PROLIFIC lurker), and came across this entry by an Australian writer who goes by the name Ova Girl. I won’t go into how I found her blog in the first place (it’s a long and not particularly interesting story) but she’s a great writer and so I’ve been reading her site for a couple of years now. I’ve enjoyed her writing immensely but have never told her so.

What prompted me to respond this evening was the ‘TAKE PITY ON ME FOR THE LOVE OF GOD’ message to lurkers at the end of the piece. I thought, well, I need a blog entry, and she’s pretty much talking directly to me there. It’s like it was a SIGN. No excuses!

So I left a comment, and now I’m answering the meme.

Six Quirky Things About Me

The first thing I’ll say about this topic is that the word ‘quirky’ makes me feel self-conscious, like by describing some of my idiosyncracies I’m secretly telling you about how awesome I think I am. Oh my god, I’m so QUIRKY! Aren’t I ADORABLE?*

So, instead, I’m going to offer six signature jLo traits that are really just those things that appal, bewilder and/or annoy the crap out of everyone I meet.

* Please note, I think OG’s entry manages to avoid this entirely, I’m referring purely to my own reaction to the word.

Six Signature jLo Traits That Are Really Not At All Original Nor Unique but Definitely Appal, Bewilder And/Or Annoy the Crap Out Of Everyone I Meet.

1. Talking Between The Lines

(I have J,The to thank for this one, I had never noticed it myself until she helpfully pointed it out. I should add that she has had to do so on more than one occasion.)

I love roadtrips, and my favourite thing about roadtrips is the singing. A carefully constructed mix-CD of cheesy classics, the open highway, and a water bottle for a microphone and I’m as happy as it is possible to be. I sing very loudly and with great fervour.

I am also an enthusiastic conversationalist on occasion, as you may or may not have noticed. Road trips are an ideal opportunity for long-ranging discussions of topics both meaningful and shallow, and I enjoy both types and all those along the spectrum in between. You would think that this love for the chatter would interfere with the singalong. You would be wrong.

I was unaware until J,The brought it to my attention that I apparently undertake both activities at the same time without realising that this is what I am doing. I will carry on a conversation while the song is playing – but I will only offer my contribution in between the lyrics of the song. An illustration:

jLo and J,The On A Road Trip

J,The: The thing is, jLo, is that you overestimate the ability of conservative fiscal policy to significantly impact upon the well-being of truly endangered species such as the four-horned muskrat.”

[NB: It should be noted here that J,The would never utter such a sentence. For one thing, she would not have split that infinitive there].

jLo: Oh, the flaaaame treeeees will bliiiind a weeeeary driiiiver. “Well, since you mention it, I really do think that honeycomb and polka dots are the answer”. And theeeere’s nothing eeelse could set fiiire to this tooooown.

J,The: You’re doing it again.

2. Hypocritical Consumerism

A lot of my clothes are falling apart, I wear shoes of indifferent quality on a regular basis. I am not a great shopper, and the urge to visit Oxford Street visits me very, very rarely (given that it is the Mouth of Hell, this is actually a bonus). Most advertising bewilders me until I remember that I am (usually) not their target audience and therefore it makes sense that I don’t understand the message. I am mostly an indifferent consumer and (aside from the essentials of life, like a good computer and lots of books) don’t tend to buy a lot of things.

EXCEPT. I have an alarmingly extensive collection of the most horrifically cheesy, tacky and pointless decorative objects and souvenirs. I cannot resist the crap, I am helpless before its powers.

From where I’m sitting here on my bed, I can see on the top shelf of my bookcase a colourful seashell-mounted saint figurine that was the God of the Boat on our sailing trip in Croatia last year. There is a small gold pillbox in my handbag with a wee enamel inset on the lid depicting a cheery seaside scene and the words ‘Westward Ho!”. I keep my mints in it and enjoy watching people recoil at the ugliness when I offer them one. We have a unicorn hobby-horse in our lounge room that makes gallopy noises when you press its ear. Our dining table at the Pickle is less than a metre wide and yet I bought a cheap Ikea lazy susan for it which kept me entertained for many months (Frankie, would you like the salt? Here it comes!) until it fell apart and I am ashamed to confess that I shed actual tears as I threw it away.

Some of you have been kind enough to present me with gifts that fit into the ‘craptastic’ category, all of which bring me great joy but leave me no choice but to call you ENABLERS. You’re my friends, you’re supposed to make sure I have good taste and that I stop wasting my money on crap instead of feeding my obsession. Thanks a lot, you guys.

3. Freakish Memory

I have quite a good memory. It’s often a good thing: what academic success I managed to attain at school can be attributed directly to an ability to memorise vast quantities of information for exams. Recalling random facts is very helpful at quiz nights. I also like being able to remember people’s names and faces when meeting them for a second time.

What is less useful is the fact that I tend to hold onto random details about people - the things they say and the stories they tell me - much longer than I need to. In my experience, people find it somewhat unnerving when you meet them at a party and greet them with something like, ‘Oh, hi, Fred! Great to see you again! Wow, was it really a year ago that we met? That’s right, it was at Susie’s party, out on the balcony. You stole my beer and then we discussed utilitarianism and whether or not there is such a thing as Jewish porn. How’s your dad, by the way? I seem to remember he’d just had an operation when last we spoke.” Freak.

Thankfully, this particular trait is fading with age, it’s not quite such a problem as it once was. For one thing, I don’t retain as much of the minute detail as I used to. For another, when I do, I’m much better at keeping the knowledge of this to myself. However, my tendency to freak people out in this manner does rear its head at highly inconvenient moments.

An example: there’s this guy at my work who is really quite devastatingly attractive. I have harboured a helpless girly crush on him for six months now, and (as is the nature of such things) find new and improved ways to humiliate myself in his presence with each passing week. Just yesterday, I met him outside in the place we both go to smoke, and he complimented my shoes. Instead of thanking him and moving on with great composure and elegance to a suitably sophisticated topic of conversation, (all the better to showcase my blinding intellect and biting wit) I said the following:

‘Oh, you’ve seen these before! Remember when you were sitting out on that bench last year and I came to join you and my heels sank all the way into the grass and I got stuck and kind of fell over and you laughed at me?’

That there is a verbatim transcript, my friends. The stricken, fearful look on his (really very beautiful) face will haunt my dreams.

Moving right along…

4. Cold Leftovers

I know everyone agrees that cold leftover pizza is one of life’s greatest joys. I , however, enjoy ALL of my leftovers cold.

We don’t have a microwave at the Pickle, nor is there one at my place of work. Even if there was one in either place, however, I would very rarely use it and never to reheat leftovers. Pasta dishes, stirfries, mashed potato, rice – all of it is just as good, if not better, the next day. In fact, I usually cook more than I need to for each meal so that I can make sure there will be plenty of leftover goodness.

My workmates are frequently heard to say such things as ‘SOUP? You can’t possibly be eating cold soup for lunch?!’ To which I inevitably reply, ‘Not only am I doing just that, but it is very good. Would you like some?’ And then they slink away in fear. Especially if I add, ‘Come on, try some! You told me once that you loved spinach and garlic! Remember? That day I twisted my ankle and you were wearing your red scarf for the first time? Are you sure you don’t want some? What? Why are you looking at me like that?’ And so on.

5. The Perfect Bite

Whatever I’m eating, be it cold soup or an ice-cream cone or frozen peas (quirk #7! It didn’t make the cut!), I always have to save the best for last. I’m sure there is some deep-seated reason for this that relates to impossible expectations and delayed gratification or whatever, but the fact remains that I am absolutely compelled to finish every meal or snack with The Perfect Bite.

The Perfect Bite does exactly what it says on the tin. It is a perfectly calibrated combination of each of the ingredients/components of the dish, to ensure that the memory of the just-finished meal is preserved in that final moment. I will save small portions of each component as I eat for the Perfect Bite, and have had to learn over the years to guard particularly tasty morsels from the wandering forks of scavenging opportunists, also known as brothers.

My greatest Perfect Bite achievement occurred last year at a Wine and Cheese night at the Loft. Every attendee brought a different type of cheese, and given we had some giant water crackers handy it seemed appropriate to load one up with a small piece of each individual cheese. The result resembled one of those comedy sub sandwiches you see in cartoons – a towering pile of cheesy wonder atop a giant flaky biscuit. The photographs of my (really very unladylike) efforts to shove as much of the tower into my gob really have to be seen to be believed. The worst part is that I mostly succeeded.

6. Watching the Credits

I am unable to walk out of a movie until the credits have finished. It annoys the crap out of anyone who has to push past me to get out of the theatre, but I can’t bring myself to abandon this particular practice. The official (and utterly obnoxious) reason is that it’s an homage – I want to pay my respects to all the people who worked so hard to entertain me for two hours by reading their names. Mostly though, I want to (a) look through the names and see if there are any funny ones, (b) listen to the end-credits music, (c) have a few moments to myself to prepare my remarks about the movie so that I sound smart and/or funny and (d) feel secretly superior to all those who walked out because they were DISrespectful to the crew and cast.

I’m really not a very nice person, you know. I’ve got you all fooled but GOOD.

Anyway, so that’s the list for now. What have I forgotten?

(No seriously, tell me some others! What strange things do I do?)

Any of you would like to pick up this wee meme and run with it, please do, and let me know so I can come and read it and feel better ‘cos maybe I’m not as weird as YOU.

(Unlikely!)

The Wedding Story

2008-04-22T23:16:00.005+01:00

Once upon a time, a member of my immediate family announced the delightful news that she was engaged to her long-term partner, and they would be married in early March 2008 at a resort on the Sunshine Coast. The timing coincided neatly with my birthday and so my trip home (and the Festival celebrations) was planned so that I would be there for the happy event.

This wedding was special – not just because I was so particularly pleased for the couple in question, though that is certainly true – but because it gave me what will henceforth be known as the Most Dramatic Wedding Story Ever.

The story begins with Giant Hair. I’m not sure what it is about hairdressers, but every time I have my hair professionally blown dry, I end up several inches taller than I was before. The bride, E, had very kindly offered my mother and I the chance to have our hair and makeup done by the team of professional stylists she had engaged to come along to the resort to beautify the wedding party.

Mum and I rocked up to the bridal suite bright and early on the morning of the wedding. I’d been off playing a game of tennis with my brothers and wee nephew beforehand (am so sporty! Check me out!). While I had showered, I was still more than a bit bedraggled and the kindly hairdresser had quite a job on her hands to make me presentable.

Giant Hair was obviously the solution. Mum’s hair was finished before mine, and I swear that I have never laughed so hard at a hairdo in my life. It was positively Dynastyesque. She had a chance to return the favour soon afterwards as my finished ‘do also soared towards the heavens, much to the delight of the assembled crowd. We all bonded nicely over the Biggest Hair of All Time as we lounged about in the suite, chuckling and drinking coffee and having ourselves a lovely time as we watched E's gradual brideification. She was nervous, but happy, and we teased her good-naturedly and offered compliments and encouragement as hundreds of hairpins were pushed directly into her skull. It was about 10:30am, the wedding was scheduled for 3pm. Everything was going perfectly to plan.

All of a sudden, the happy, relaxed vibe was interrupted by a very loud noise coming from the master bedroom of the suite. It sounded like pressurised air, or as if someone had turned the shower on full power: FSSSSSHHHHHHHHHHH. Really, REALLY loud.

The dryers went off, the chatter ceased. We looked about at each other in puzzlement. Whatever could it be? One of the bridesmaids got up and trotted over towards the bedroom. She looked inside, and started screaming.

OHMYGODOHMYGODOHMYGOD

We ran over to join her. I swear to God, I have never seen anything like it before in my life. Black, foul-smelling water gushing everywhere, like a real-life special effect. Spurting fountains of filth, flooding the room at high pressure, streaming all over the bed, the floor, the walls, the suitcases. Everything.

The wedding dress was hanging in the middle of the room.

The bridesmaids ran into the geyser to grab the dress. As we stood in the hall, they carried it out, stinking and black and absolutely, utterly ruined.

Dumbstruck astonishment passed to panic in an instant. The fire alarms had gone off, and a recorded loudspeaker voice told us to evacuate. The bride was hyperventilating with distress, barely conscious from the shock. As we carried her down the fire escape, I remember thinking, ‘well, that’s it. If the hotel is on fire there can’t be a wedding’.

We got her down eight flights of stairs and out into the grounds of the hotel as the fire trucks pulled up. Bedlam descended, and the next half-hour was a blur of shouting and running about and everyone trying to work out what the fuck was going on.

As it turned out, there was no fire. The sprinklers had gone off in that one room only. A freak accident, that’s it. The water had been sitting in those pipes for decades, becoming rotten and foul - and then one single malfunction sent it spraying across the room at high pressure.

We took E. upstairs to our suite, and tried to calm her down. Kloss and the Father of the Bride (FOTB, aka my awesome stepdad) piled into a car and drove the stinking dress to the nearest town to a drycleaner. The cleaner took one look at the dress and told them that if they had 48 hours, maybe they could soak the fabric and revive it. Four hours? Not a chance.

After frenzied phone calls back and forth, the bride and bridesmaids were bundled into another car to go and meet Kloss and FOTB at a bridal shop. Kloss said later that when they swept into the shop, holding aloft the black, dead, dress, all the brides-to-be shopping with their mothers stopped and stared, hushed and shocked. He said you could see their faces fall and whiten as they thought: ‘Oh, god. That can happen?’

The people at the bridal shop were amazing. They cleared the place out, and brought out all the dresses they had in E’s size. As she tried them on, they got their seamstress to come in. She picked a dress, they fitted it and made speedy alterations, pressed and wrapped it and sent her back to the hotel. All in under three hours. The makeup artists made a second call, coming back just as we got E into the new dress, just in time for photographs.

The ceremony was only delayed by 15 minutes.

It was incredible! The most remarkable wedding-day disaster, completely solved and overcome in the space of an afternoon - from panic and mayhem to smiling guests in their finery on a beautiful sunny day. What made it all the more brilliant was that any conceivable nervousness or tension had all completely dissipated and everyone was in the most amazing good mood for the entire night. Once a crisis of that magnitude had been suffered and resolved, everything was guaranteed to be perfect.

And it was! The ceremony was lovely, the party a blast. The bride and groom were in excellent spirits (the half a Valium might have helped, man, it’s so good to have a nurse for a mother!) and the bride was breathtakingly beautiful. A fabulous time was had by all.

And here are some pictures to prove it. Firstly, here’s Mum and FOTB. Please note, the hair remained enormous:

And here are my brothers (again):

And here is the happy couple, making it official:

Craziest wedding day ever. Thankfully, they all lived happily ever after.

Festival Pictures

2008-04-19T20:04:00.016+01:00

So, in the interests of recording the Festival for posterity, I thought I'd throw a few ridiculous photographs of myself (and some others, apologies in advance) up here.

The Festival kickoff was at a lovely restaurant across the road from the Pickle. I managed to achieve a life-long dream at this dinner by getting to behave in the manner of a game show winner:

The blurriness really gives you a sense of the excitement!

I flew to Oz the next day, and soon after arriving I Officially Turned 30. Here is what I looked like on my 30th birthday:

That's Kapitan Kloss and TPC with me, they are not yet 30. Their time will come.

Here we are at a delightful family dinner hosted by my grandfather:

You'd never guess we were related. Matching chins!

The Kapitan was kind enough to throw me a birthday party the following evening (thanks, Kloss!). I drank many cocktails with lychee liqueur in them. Mmm, lychee liqueur. Once said cocktails had done their work, I insisted that we sing The Gambler:

It was important that everyone sang standing up.

The rest of my trip was utterly delightful, and included a road trip with J,The. Here is a photo of the road trip IN ACTION:

And here we are at Marulan, the Best Truck Stop In All The World:

It really is the Best Truck Stop In All The World. If you think you have one to beat it, please let me know and I will then explain to you the many ways in which you are very wrong.

While spring has (kinda sorta) arrived in London, it's still a long way from sunny here. So to drive myself crazy with the longing, here is a shot of me at Bondi:

How very pasty I have become.

The time then came to return to London. My sadness at leaving Oz was abated somewhat by a fabulous party at the Pickle the weekend after my return. My most excellent flatmate, Frankie (whoops, RVW), made me a birthday cake in the shape of a pickle:

The face was especially delicious.

And with that, we come to the Grand Finale of the Festival of jLo 2008: Westward Ho! The trip of a lifetime! I was so excited I decided to wear my best dressing gown all the way there:

This was taken in Weston-super-Mare. WHAT A TOWN.

I loved everything about Westward Ho!, but mostly the exclamation mark. It was displayed prominently in a number of places, much to my delight:

If you look closely, you will note that each of us is actually shouting 'HO!' as this picture was taken. Wouldn't you?

Our long weekend was full of rambling around the countryside, eating cream teas and sampling the local ales. We did so much of that last one that DJ Ill and I had trouble doing a simple high five:

Sadly, even the best weekends must come to an end. When we got back to London, there was snow:

What a dressing gown! What a Festival. My computer is slow these days, and this post has taken an entire large glass of wine to finish. I hope you are all having a lovely weekend.

Festival of jLo 2008

2008-03-30T23:57:00.002+01:00

I’m having causation vs. correlation issues again: we put our clocks forward this morning, and nature responded swiftly by giving us a sunny, warm, absolutely-no-doubt-about-it beautiful spring day. I wore sunglasses! And summer shoes! With no socks or tights or other foot-warming accessories that were essential until today. This time last week, it was snowing on our balcony. Tonight we had the first barbecue of the season at the Loft, and sat in the fading sunlight with fruity cocktails, toasting the advent of spring.

It feels like a new beginning kind of time – the Festival of jLo concluded last weekend, and the time has come for regular life to resume. I highly recommend the international festival approach to birthday celebrations. Two countries, six towns, visits and parties and pub sessions and and road trips – it was freaking brilliant. I’m exhausted, but very happy.

Those first few days that I gushed about in my last post set the tone for the remainder of my holiday in Oz. The weather was perfect every single day. The coffee continued to be uniformly excellent (such that it seems that I won't ever be able to shut up about it). I caught up with my family in Brisbane and my lovely wee brothers threw me an excellent birthday party in their amazing flat overlooking the river and the Story Bridge. The family wedding we attended the following weekend was very eventful (I’ll tell that story next) but ultimately a blast. Sydney was great fun, too – I swam in the ocean at Bondi numerous times and had a fantastic road trip to Our Nation’s Capital to hang out with the good folks who live there. Singing with J,The at the top of our lungs as we drove along the highway felt utterly perfect.

Sunshine and good times and lovely, lovely friends – the trip was just what I wanted. It was really hard to wrench myself away and leave all over again.

But then the Londoners did their part, reminding me what a fabulous life I have here with such excellent folks. We had a Pickle party that exceeded all expectations, and then for the Easter weekend a bunch of us bundled into a van and drove our way across the country to a charming wee cottage in a town on the Devon coast called – get this – Westward Ho! [The exclamation mark is officially part of the name of the town, and (as you would expect) is the primary reason we chose that particular destination.] It was just as delightful as I had hoped. We had fish and chips and Devonshire tea and drank local ale and rambled around the countryside looking at sheep. It was tops and I’ll be sure to post some pictures soon.

So, more than a month after it began, the Festival of jLo 2008 came to a close. I feel pretty damn good about being 30, and the Festival helped me see exactly why: I’m very, very lucky to be healthy and happy and to have a whole world full of remarkable friends. Life is good.

[Also: at my party in Brisbane, 21-year-old cousin of mine told me I was ‘glamorous’, which pleased me greatly – I have been waiting for quite some time to be in a position to be able to hoodwink people so effectively. ]

Thank you to all of you for making the Festival such an amazing time. Thank you also for your astounding (and humbling) birthday generosity. You rock my world.

Milestone

2008-02-27T06:32:00.001Z

I had a hot, strong flat white at Melbourne airport this morning. Flame Trees was playing in the café and I couldn’t stop myself from singing along as I waited for my flight.

Then we took off and I scribbled away happily as I sat and watched the muted olive, grey and brown patchwork of the landscape stretch out below me, with the clouds shining in the bright sun.

It’s really good to be home.

My four days in Melbourne were utterly wonderful. I love that town. The weather was wonderful – breezy and sunny and hot. The coffees were uniformly excellent.

I watched the sun go down on the balcony at the Espy, with jugs of cold beer. I ate a perfect steak, organic salads, gluten-free cakes and the ubiquitous chicken parma. I shopped all over town and bought three pairs of fabulous shoes. I spent long, lazy hours in the company of my favourite people in the world.

Yesterday, I drank champagne on the banks of the Yarra with Nat and Greenie, and we all marvelled at how good it felt to be in Melbourne, having come from so far away. There’s something that feels a little dangerous about that town – it is so good that it makes me question my desire to be elsewhere in a way that no other city can. I know I could be happy there.

This afternoon I’m sitting with my brothers on their balcony in the sun, looking over the Story Bridge, catching up on our lives and hurting from the laughing.

This is my 100th post on this blog.

It’s my 30th birthday.

I’m having an excellent time.

Super Tuesday

2008-02-04T22:58:00.000Z

Guess what? I get to vote in the US Presidential election primary tomorrow. There are a number of things that are remarkable about this, and not just because I am a giant nerd. Okay, mostly because I am a giant nerd. Anyway.

Firstly, that I get to participate at all is really quite amazing. As some of you know, due to a mix of peculiar circumstance and surprisingly broad citizenship laws, I am an American citizen. My parents were working in the US in the late 70s, and I happened to be born while they were there. Unlike the UK and Australia, the USA automatically confers citizenship to those born on its soil, the fact of which I was unaware until a few years ago when a routine visa enquiry turned into a surreal interview at the US Consulate (which featured detailed scrutiny of my baby photos) and then a shiny new passport with an eagle on the front.

Given that I do not identify in any way as an American, my newly-discovered status was of little relevance to my life for some time – other than as an amusing story down the pub. Then in 2004, I realised the full scope of the opportunity that had been presented to me: I could vote. What’s more, I had the chance to vote against John Howard and George Bush in the same year! This pleased me no end, futile though it turned out to be.

Almost four years later, one of them is gone and the other is on his way. All of a sudden, anything seems possible.

I do have some misgivings about participating in an electoral process for a government that is not my own. However, as has been pointed out to me on numerous occasions of late, the results of the US Presidential election affect us all in some way. Mine can be the ‘Rest of the World’ vote. I’m doing it for all of us.

The second noteworthy point is that this is no ordinary absentee ballot. I am registered to vote in the 2008 Global Presidential Primary. The Democratic Party actually allocate Convention delegates to represent the six million US citizens that live in more than 100 countries around the world. I find it intriguing that the diaspora is considered as a distinct group of voters and a mechanism is provided for them to participate in the democratic process accordingly. Actual recognition of an electorate without borders!

The Republican party do not have separate delegates allocated to overseas voters, requiring instead that each individual vote by absentee ballot in their home state.

If you’d like to read further about this, AB wrote an interesting piece a few weeks ago that is worth checking out.

Finally, the other cool thing about tomorrow’s primary is that I can vote via the interwebs. They are doing some in-person and mail voting here in the UK, but I am delighted at the prospect of casting a vote online. They’ve emailed me a login and password, and as of 1pm UK time tomorrow, I can get some hot electoral action, 21st century style. I’m hoping like hell that there aren’t any pesky hackers out there who are going to try to undermine my vote. Please note that I do not consider all hackers to be of the 'pesky' variety. I happen to know at least one who is a lovely human being, and not pesky in any way. I am referring only to those who might be tempted to break into the voting site. Please stay away, Pesky Hackers! Thank you.

As for who I’m going to vote for, well, let’s just say that the temptation to try and match a PM called Kevin with a President called Barry is just too much to resist.

Under the wire

2008-01-31T23:25:00.000Z

I am an odd creature, as many of you are more than aware. I am apparently able to blithely ignore this page for weeks at a time, but then something utterly random prompts me to post. Please don't get too excited, I don't have a funny story to tell or a point to make. No! What has got me typing furiously at 11:30pm on a Thursday evening is the thought that if I don't get something in by midnight, this will be the first month since I started this blog where I don't have any posts at all.

Yes, it's true. I'm posting to protect my post-in-every-calendar-month record. That's it. I suspect you are watching a ceremonial scraping of the very bottom of the blog barrel, right here. I couldn't be more proud.

I wrote last year about how much January sucks. I've noted that Her Excellency The Jackles has posted on the very topic today (you go, the Jackles!). This year hasn't been too bad - but that grey, broke, blah January feeling has definitely been present. And we haven't even had any snow this year, boo.

I have been really busy at work. My new job is not quite so new anymore, and I'm still enjoying it, but it has been full on and exhausting these last few weeks. Most of the time I feel like the professional facade has worn very thin and my true incompetence is only barely concealed. But then, I had an appraisal meeting last Friday where my boss took all of fifteen seconds to tick each criteria 'Excellent' and then we got on with talking about one of my projects. I've got him fooled, at least. It's a good job, and I'm glad to have it - it makes such a difference to be motivated and engaged in what I'm doing. When I think about how bored and desperate I felt three months ago, I don't feel so bad about the long days.

It is three weeks today until I jump aboard a giant flying tin can and head HOME, which is more exciting than I can possibly say. For your reference, here is my rough itinerary:

22 Feb - 27 Feb: Melbourne
27 Feb - 5 March: Brisbane
5 March - 9 March: Sydney (+ Canberra)

So I hope to be able to have a shandy with you very soon. Hooray for that! For now, it is 11:55pm and it is TIME TO POST! Phew.

Happy New Year!

2007-12-31T16:51:00.000Z

Happy new year, everybody! It’s weird – I know all my folks at home are already in 2008, while I’ve still got a few hours left with 2007. I am writing to you FROM THE PAST. I hope your celebrations were jolly.

The holidays have been lovely – I have somehow managed to consume five roast dinners in the last eight days, which is an excellent indication of my commitment to the concept of Christmas decadence. I spent Christmas Day with friends, and there was chocolate money, mulled wine, remote control helicopters and much merriment. There was also a giant ham (and I’m not just referring to myself). Secret Santa brought me an awesome giant wooden spoon:

This past weekend a bunch of us went off to a beautiful old farmhouse in the countryside just near the Welsh border. It was cold and wet outside, but I soaked up the picturesque scenery through the window as I sat all cosy on the couch with my book. We ate and drank a good deal, as is the custom on such trips, sat by the fire playing board games and building Meccano and generally having ourselves a time. I distinguished myself in several ways:

- insisting that we stop off in Abergavenny for no good reason except that I found the name ‘Abergavenny’ to be irresistibly delightful;

- performing a wee dance in honour of each type of ale we consumed (the Waggledance was good, but the Hobgoblin was exceptional); and

- spending a goodly amount of time on Saturday evening attempting to stick a cork into my ear.

It was fun.

Tonight I’m heading to Dr Evil’s lair where I expect there to be much revelry. I’d love to say that I’m planning to be hangover-free tomorrow, so that I can start the New Year as I mean to go on… but many years of experience has taught me that such noble intentions inevitably disappear with my first glass of champagne.

I’ve been feeling slightly ambivalent about bidding 2007 farewell – while I’ve had a lot of fun, it was a pretty long and frustrating one in many ways. Those first six months, where my life revolved around The Visa Question, then two months of unemployment, then adjusting to my new job – it’s been pretty full on and I’m glad that part is over. Among other things, I just haven’t felt much like writing for a while now – as this sad, neglected blog attests. I’ve only filled one notebook this whole year, and while many of the snippets recorded there are hilarious, I seem to have lost the habit of keeping my eyes and ears open for amusing stories.

I got two new notebooks for Christmas – subtle hints from those who love me – and so there will be a lot more scribbling in 2008.

A bundle of fantastic things happened this year as well: visits from so many lovely people, an excellent wedding, spending a good chunk of time with both my brothers, a fabulous sailing holiday, new friends and new places and a mad caper or three along the way. When I say that I feel like 2007 was a bit of a fizzer I think I’m feeling as though the struggly first part of the year cast something of a pall over the rest– and it’s time for that to end.

2008 is going to be great, and not only because that rhymes. I’m more sorted than I was a year ago, and I can build on my new beginnings and get a few steps closer to having my shit together for real. Getting better at my job, paying off debt, saving money, getting healthier – I’m not going to make resolutions, but I do feel like I’m in a better place to try and get some of that stuff done. Plus, I’m coming home at the end of February for a two-week visit! I’ve been more than a little holiday-homesick of late, so I’m looking forward to getting a good dose of you all to tide me through the next year. Stand by for more details of when the jLo Travelling Roadshow Extravaganza will be passing by your way.

I hope you have all had a very festive Christmas and a most excellent New Year. I miss you all something crazy and so I’m sending buckets of love across the seas.

Vote 1 AB

2007-11-21T23:45:00.000Z

This blog, neglected though it is, is the nearest thing to a public mouthpiece that I have, so I thought I might use it for a bit of a plug in this very important week.

Election week in London means voting at Australia House. They open late for the hordes of expats who want to make sure the country doesn’t go to hell in a handbasket in their absence. It was cold and wet and the queues were very long, but the atmosphere was lively and hopeful and very good fun. Australia House is a beautiful building on the Strand, right in the middle of storybook Olde Towne London. It was somewhat surreal to be standing in the drizzle, watching red buses go by and seeing St Paul’s in the skyline while lost in a sea of Aussie accents, surrounded by posters of Johnnie and Kevin and Bob (and, strangely, Mark Vaile), then being ushered inside to vote at cardboard AEC polling boxes that were so perfectly familiar.

I actually went down last night for another purpose as well: it was about time I did my (very) little bit to help out with trying to get some remarkable people of my acquaintance re-elected to the Senate. I stood in the rain with my little bunch of how-to-vote leaflets, and politely suggested to the assembled queue of soggy expatriates waiting to cast their ballots that they consider voting Democrat in the Senate.

There was plenty of good natured banter ("They still exist?!" "Sure they do! And they do a great job!"), and as the queues grew longer people were forced to stand right by me instead of rushing past. I took every opportunity to put in a good word for a top bloke I know, and I thought I might do the same again here.

For those of you not enrolled in Queensland, I apologise that the following is not particularly relevant to you. Although, Victorians? This lady is an excellent choice.

For those Queenslanders who may be reading: I highly recommend that you vote 1 for Andrew Bartlett in the Senate.

He’s been in the Senate for ten years and it would be a great shame if he was to lose his seat.

If you would like to read more about his views on particular subjects, you need go no further than his excellent blog. AB is a pioneer in terms of politician blogging in Oz - unlike all the johnnies-come-lately with their ‘oh, there’s an internet?’, he’s actually been doing it for many years now. In fact, he recently announced his 1000th post, which is pretty freaking awesome.

So, if you have a moment or three, you can read all about what he thinks in relation to refugees, indigenous issues, human rights, health, education, housing, animal welfare, the economy, and more.

One of the best things about AB is his devotion to the Senate and its role. We’ve seen what happens when the Government has a majority in the Senate, and it’s not pretty. Whatever your opinion of the decisions they have made, the Democrats have been thoughtful and constructive when it comes to the balance of power. I hope that they get the chance to continue to be thus for some time to come.

Reports of electoral death have been greatly exaggerated, too - AB is in with a fighting chance. It’s a close race for that last seat in Queensland, and it could as easily be Family First or Pauline Hanson as AB or a Green. Queenslanders, your Senate vote could not be more important. Choose wisely.

Politics aside, I think the most important thing is that we have good, talented, hardworking people representing us in Parliament. AB is all that and then some: a very good man, and a very good Senator. He is smart, thoughtful and passionate and serves with integrity and dedication. I am proud to have voted for him, and I very much hope that you consider doing the same.

I think I’m going to go down to Australia House again tomorrow night. Fingers crossed. Happy voting everyone!

Living Very Well

2007-10-23T21:56:00.000+01:00

Far out, you guys. I have no idea what has become of me. The last few weeks have been unbelievably fun, and I'm exhausted.

I can offer no reasonable explanation for why I have been so lax in posting – there has been plenty to tell you about. The stories will come, but for now here is a list of Things That Have Happened Since My Last Post. Since early September I ….

Laughed my arse off at a comedy gig at The Backyard.

Went to Cardiff to join my brothers at the Australia v Wales pool match of the rugby World Cup, and after the game cavorted madly in the streets with friendly Welsh people.

Have had visits from lovely people, including Lady Lindy, Ms Sarina, B1, the ever-fabulous Mitchell, my brothers and my GRANDPARENTS, which was awesome. I received confirmation that my grandparents DO read my blog, which was hilarious because every time I tried to tell them a story they already knew the ending. Once again, very sorry for the language, you guys. (PS. TPC? They read yours too).

Caught up with a long-lost high-school friend, who, it turns out, lives about 200m away from the Pickle. Thank you, Facebook.

Got utterly broken at Dr Evil's 30th spectacular birthday party.

Attended a job interview the morning after said party concluded.

GOT A NEW JOB (hooray!)

Had my mind blown away by a remarkable play (at the end of which I cried like a little bitch).

Signed a contract to stay at the Pickle for another year.

Played pirates for a week on a sailboat in Croatia with nine fabulous people.

Squealed like an utter girl at the news about Nat and Greenie (CONGRATULATIONS again, you guys! Best middle of the night phone call ever.)

Got my overseas electoral enrolment sorted JUST IN TIME.

Had an unspeakably awesome night out at Ronnie Scott's.

Welcomed my littlest brother back to the Pickle after his Big European Odyssey, so that he could sit on the couch and complain about London for a fortnight before heading home.

Celebrated Rip van Winkle's birthday in fine style.

Worked my butt off closing all my files and saying fond (and not-so-fond) farewells at Previous Job.

Suited up and put on my best Eager Girl face for my first day at my Shiny New Job.

and….

Vowed to get some rest. Soon.

I'm freaking exhausted. I’m two days into the Shiny New Job, and while it seems very promising, the fact that I’m still recovering from six weeks of way-too-good living means I’m not really giving them my best just yet. Much like this post, really.

I am very, very sorry to all those of you who have been kind enough to write me emails and Facebook messages – I promise I’ll write to you very soon. It's a madhouse, my life, and my brain is made of cheese. I hope you are very well. Talk to you soon.

Strike!

2007-09-05T22:42:00.000+01:00

A few years ago, I read a book called Lord of the Barnyard at the recommendation of McBec. It was one of those stories that stays in your head forever. I think of it often, and it's on my mind this week in particular.

I wouldn't want to ruin it for you in case you decided to go pick it up – but one of the plot points involves a strike by a bunch of garbage collectors that brings a town to its knees ('…with hilarious results'). I often wonder about essential public services and how long we could go without them before all hell would break loose.

There's a tube strike in London this week. It started Monday afternoon, and has already caused a remarkable amount of chaos.

Greater London has a population of about 7.5 million. According to this very reputable source, over 3 million passengers use the Underground each day. It's amazing, watching the city deal with a massive infrastructure issue overnight. Millions of people to move around, and all of them looking for another route home.

Everyone is late for work and it takes an age to travel anywhere. RVW reported that he went to a meeting in Canary Wharf yesterday, and it took one of the attendees four hours to reach the venue from his home in North London. The buses are crammed full to the brim, there are hordes of people crouched at each bus stop, poised and ready to hurl themselves through the doors at the first opportunity. Many buses sail by without stopping, too full to take on any more passengers, and the exasperated masses shake their heads and cluck with indignation each time.

There is anger and frustration and fisticuffs and basically, the city is falling apart at the seams.

I'm one of the lucky ones - the Pickle is close enough to my place of employment that I can walk there in about 35 minutes. I really SHOULD walk to work all the time, but am usually too lazy and running too late. Also, it rains a lot here. In any event, the strike has dovetailed nicely with the commencement of Operation: Move That Ass, and I've been walking to and from work each day this week. It means that I get to breathe lovely traffic fumes instead of the sweaty fug of the gym.

The problem is that there are many others doing the same. Even though I walk to work only once in a blue moon, I'm possessive and territorial about my footpaths. All of a sudden, they're swarming with people, which does not please me. In fact, I have been afflicted by pedestrian road-rage each morning, and I'm sick of it. It is apparently necessary for me to lay down some Rules of The Footpath According to jLo.

1. Walk at a brisk pace.

Seriously, folks, I'm no Kerry Saxby. If I'm steaming past you at a rate of knots, you're doing something very wrong. WHY ON EARTH DO PEOPLE WALK SO DAMN SLOWLY? It's 9:00am. Move your ass. People have places to go. If you do not have a place to go and are just out for a leisurely stroll, get the hell out of my way. At least keep left so that I can pass you without having to actually walk on the road in the face of oncoming traffic.

2. Walk in a straight line.

This drives me freaking crazy. What is it with the weaving all over the place? Are you completing sort of obstacle course involving witches hats only you can see? Are you DRUNK? It's 9:00am! You have a problem! A to B, people, the shortest distance between two points. Quit it with the veering from left to right, have your wheel alignment checked if it's that difficult.

Basically, it boils down to this: GET OUT OF MY WAY.

Oh, and I also have a special message for the cyclists: the little green man at the pedestrian crossing? Gives pedestrians the right of way. You are not a special class of vehicle that is exempt from the road rules. If you choose to ride on the road, obey the freaking traffic lights. Don't shoot through the crossing and just assume that the pedestrians will be too frightened to walk out in front of you. I saw a cyclist nearly get wiped out this morning by a woman who didn't see him as he sped through the lights - she put out her arms to protect herself and he was in all sorts of trouble. If I were a better person, I would not have laughed as loudly as I did.

Anyway, it's Lord of the Barnyard all over the place here, common standards of decency and efficient behaviour just falling apart everywhere you look. Anarchy is descending, I'm about to take charge and impose jLo Rule. I bet whomever is in charge of negotiating with the union is sweating like a bitch at the prospect.

UPDATE: I started writing this yesterday, but then apparently this afternoon the strike has ended. Just in time…

Getting Physical

2007-08-31T23:23:00.000+01:00

Last Monday, 27 August, marked six months to go until my 30th birthday. As my mother said on the phone last weekend, ‘OH. MY. GOD, how is that even possible? Actually, I'm not all that conflicted about it and am quite looking forward to my 30s. I have a sneaking suspicion that they are going to be fabulous.

Having said this, I'm the kind of girl who loves a milestone, and so I thought I'd try to use this one to try and see if I can't finish my 20s a bit healthier than I was when they started.

I have previously mentioned that I am a member of a local gymnasium. TPC was quite the gym bunny when he was in town, and he guilted me into accompanying him on a handful of unmemorable occasions. That soon ended, and when he left I felt absolutely no compulsion to resume my attendance. Guess how many times I went to the gym during my two months of unemployment? That’s right. A big, fat, zero (quite literally).

So, on Tuesday I commenced Operation: Move That Ass. Next time I sit on a tart, I want to be okay with showing the photographic evidence with the world.

I have been to the gym every evening this week. Not much, I’ll grant you, but it’s a start. It is a very strange experience. It stinks of stale sweat and mould, which is unpleasant. They play dreadful music, and the film clips featuring (unbelievably) scantily clad women gyrating aren’t as much of a motivation as you might expect.

Seriously, at the risk of sounding like I’m six months from 80 instead of 30, I cannot get over how little those music video dancers wear. It’s shocking and makes me want to scrub my eyes.

The biggest problem, though, is in my head. I am hopelessly unfit, I always have been. I know that it’s going to take time, that I need to do what I can and it will get better. However! I am a child of the age of instant gratification and slow, steady progress is freaking annoying. Further, it is humiliating to be going as fast as I can, all sweaty and with screaming muscles, and to be surrounded by people going three times quicker. I suspect that the reason I abstained from most physical activity from a young age has to do with the fact that I hide a mean competitive streak deep down inside and it pains me that everyone else can do it better than I can. I am attempting to develop a sense of humility about trudging along only slightly faster than a walrus while ignoring the sprinter on the next treadmill.

I have discovered that if you throw your towel over the LED display, no-one can see how fast you are going. Not that they’re looking, or that anyone gives a damn, but it makes me feel better.

Before he left, TPC designed me a mini-program for using the weight machines every other day. I get a kind of perverse pleasure out of this type of activity – it hurts like hell, but I can switch my iPod to something nice and heavy and feel all hardcore and Eye of the Tiger for a while.

The paranoia doesn’t go away, mind you – I feel guilty for taking up time on the machines when the fierce-looking beefcake types stand around tapping their feet, arms crossed, waiting for me to struggle feebly through my turn. I do realise that this is idiotic, but let’s remember that I am quite an idiot. I’m the type of person who feels the urge to apologise if I get in an elevator and press the button for a floor below that of any fellow passengers, in case they’re annoyed that I’m wasting their time. My head is a rather stupid place.

Anyway, I’m doing my best to get over this. The program TPC designed is pretty fun. I don’t know the names of the machines, so we had to invent descriptors so that I would remember which was which. Last night’s routine, for instance, included Chicken Tonight (lifting elbows out), The Big Dipper (a kind of tower on which you can do push-up thingys) and Why, Hello There (which is, um, a thigh exercise).

There’s a weird bloke who hangs out in the weights room every single evening. He hops on a machine now and then to demonstrate his prowess at various feats of strength, but mostly he just wanders about, checking out the scene, and offering to help others with their form. He mostly helps the pretty girls, I have noted, but will offer assistance to a fellow beefcake every now and again, so they can flex their guns at each other in lieu of dropping their shorts and just getting it all over with once and for all. Last night, I heard one such beefcake ask him, mid-flex, if he worked there, and he said, ‘oh no, I’m just here to fill in the gaps.’ Thanks, fella, we’re all much obliged.

I’m self-conscious enough without this guy watching me so I find his presence discomfiting and irritating. And yet (fickle creature that I am), I am a trifle insulted that he hasn’t offered to help me. Perhaps it has something to do with the death stares I shoot in his direction whenever he is nearby. Thankfully, it has reassured me to note that everyone looks like an idiot while doing the Chicken Tonight.

Once my workout (that word amuses me greatly) is done, I retreat to the changing room, where I am invariable confronted by the sight of many women prancing about without their clothes on. I am not sure what the hell is with that. I can’t help wondering if everyone got over this long ago in the locker rooms of adolescence while I was busy in the library, but I remain a furtive, towel-draped changer. Apparently, there are many who are perfectly comfortable hanging out in the nude, doing their hair and makeup and chatting on the phone and whathaveyou. Every time I go in there, I grab my stuff as quickly as I can and scurry out, with the voice of my Grade 5 teacher in my head saying ‘eyes on your own work, people’.

I was telling RVW about this the other night, and he said that it was just like he had always dreamed. Then he asked if I had a camera phone.

(I’m pretty sure he was kidding).

Anyway, humiliation and strange guys and naked women aside, I’m doing my best to stick with it. Who knows how long this health kick will last? For now, it’s like I’m tourist in the life of other people, which is curious and confronting but also kinda fun.

jLo (and) the Tart(s)

2007-08-22T21:50:00.000+01:00

This is a story from some time ago, which I had neglected to post until now. It happened while TPC was still in town, during roast season, when we would go to the Billy IV every Sunday evening with our jar of mustard, and then retire to Dr Evil’s Lair afterwards to drink wine and watch cheesy movies made in the 1980s.

On our way back to the Loft from the pub one evening, we stopped a small convenience store to lay in supplies of cheese and wine. While perusing the shelves, I came across the following:

jLo: “Ohmygod. Look! “ASS JAM TARTS!!!”

RVW: “I think that’s supposed to be “ASSORTED” jam tarts."

jLo: “But that’s not what it says. These are, quite clearly, ass jam tarts. And don't they look delicious!”

Everyone else: “…”

jLo: “We have to buy some.”

TPC: “How did I know you were going to say that?”

jLo: "At only 99p, we can't afford not to!"

I purchased the ass jam tarts, then spent the rest of the evening offering them to everyone at the slightest provocation.

Madam Fox: “Anyone for more wine?”

jLo (waving the open package): “OR AN ASS JAM TART, perhaps?! You know you want to.”

Dr Evil: “Yes to wine, no to tarts.”

jLo: “Damn”.

Later, I went out for a smoke. I came back in and blathered merrily about something as I went to sit on the futon. I threw my not-inconsiderable bulk down, just as TPC bleated frantically for me to stop. “THE TARTS!”

A pause.

jLo: “Did I just sit in the ass jam tarts?”

Everyone else: “Yes, jLo. Yes you did.”

Another pause.

jLo: “It seems as though this was inevitable.”

The others didn’t answer, they were too busy giggling as I blushed – caught between humiliation at sitting in tart and delight at the irony.

I lifted a cheek, and the room exploded with gleeful shrieks at the sight of an ass jam tart stuck fast to the pocket of my jeans. Cameras were procured and evidence recorded as I peeled the ass jam away from my actual ass. I had been waiting for Dr Evil to send me a copy of the photo so that I could post it here, but then I realised that I really didn't want to post a picture of my ass on the internet. This is one of those images that is probably best left to the imagination.

A Weekend in Paris

2007-08-07T22:20:00.000+01:00

(Do you have any idea how much fun it is to write that?)

Last weekend I had the inestimable honour of joining Le Tour de Fear 2007 for their final fling in gay Paree.

I was disproportionately excited about going: I haven’t been anywhere in ages, not least because the Home Office has had my passport for a while. The rationale for my trip was a questionable one: Le Comte had some exams he needed to sit and I was required to officiate while he did so. [ Apparently I’m sufficiently qualified and responsible a member of society to be approved to do such things. Who would have thought?] At any rate, I was on my way to Paris and that’s always good news as far as I’m concerned.

Friday

It was my first trip on the Eurostar, which was excellent fun. I booked late, and on Captain Kloss’s credit card, and so accidentally happened to be seated in a travel class above that to which I am accustomed. I was surrounded by grumpy well-dressed business people, all of whom played Sudoku for the entire trip – even while they were eating their dinner (which, by the way, was surprisingly good – I guess that’s what happens when you book Fancypants Class). My fears of being trapped in the tunnel were allayed by the lovely wee bottles of red wine that the hostess obligingly brought me at regular intervals.

After whipping myself up into a frenzy of giddy excitement before my departure and then one or three too many bottles of red on the train, my first night in Paris turned into One of Those Nights that every traveller has once in a while. As my brothers would say, it was an attack of The Fear.

The boys weren’t arriving until the following day, so I had booked a hotel for the Friday night. My hotel was surprisingly cool – with green apples instead of mints on the pillows – and after checking in I set out to roam the streets for a while.

It was late, I was tired. I was out of cigarettes. I don’t speak French.

I was reminded of how it feels to have those moments of utter and complete despair when in an unfamiliar place. It doesn’t take much, but when you’re tired and cranky and nothing’s open and you can’t ask for help, small tasks become overwhelmingly complicated. It makes me shy and hesitant and frustrated and I’M NOT HAVING FUN, DAMMIT, WHEN WILL THIS BE FUN?

I wandered the streets for an hour, aiming for bright lights and being disappointed time and again at finding nightclubs instead of supermarkets. I cursed myself for not making more of an effort to remember some French before I came. Random words from Madame Smythe’s Grade 8 French class flitted through my brain, as though they might be useful: ‘window’, ‘fish’, ‘happy birthday’, ‘left’, ‘warm’. I had to fight the temptation to ask in Spanish, as if speaking in any different language would suffice.

Eventually, I found a Holiday Inn and decided to try to impersonate one of their guests. I walk straight up to Reception and give him my one sentence: ‘I’m very sorry. I don’t speak any French.’ (it’s best when completed with a mournful, apologetic look). He directed me to the bar, where after whispering my request shyly I finally managed to exchange money for nicotine.

The tension eased somewhat, I made my way back to the hotel. In my earlier panic, I had completely failed to notice that I was staying right in the middle of deliciously clichéd storybook Paris: small dark streets lined with little bistros and dark, cosy bars, people sitting outside and smoking and looking impossibly chic. I wandered along, listening to the funky music and busy French chatter wafting through the air and then felt miserable all over again as I realised I was lonely and in no way brave enough to sit down somewhere to order a drink and try to do something about it.

I decided Conquering Paris could wait until morning (there’s a surrender monkey joke somewhere here, but I can’t quite find it). Weary and feeling sorry for myself, I found a little grocery store and went in to buy some snacks (and a beer) to take back to the hotel. I found cheese, and decided to splash out and get some salami as well – grabbing a package at random and discovering to my dismay upon my return to my hotel to discover that it was, in fact, bacon. I vowed to speak of this to no one.

My very exciting trip really wasn’t going very well so far.

Moments later, it got worse. I realised that not being able to say ‘how much is that?’ or ‘where can I buy cigarettes’ is one thing. The true depths of my language problems were made clear to me when I realised that I had absolutely no idea how to say what I needed to right at that moment:

“I’m very sorry, but I have spilled my beer all over the carpet”.

(Sob).

I didn’t even try. I mopped it up as best I could and tried to feel thankful that it wasn’t the bed.

Reasonably miserable by now (and beerless), you’ll be pleased to know that consolation was found in the form of hilarious French television, particularly an excellent show called “Splashdance”. A horde of young, scantily clad beautiful people clustered around a pool in a tropical location, bopping about to funky music. There was a raised wooden platform over the pool, and two people at a time clambered up to have – get this – a dance battle. When they were done, the crowd would vote, and the wooden platform split and tilted and the loser was dumped into the pool. It was awesome.

It happens sometimes, you know – all this excitement and adventure isn’t all fun all the time. I know it’s always worth sticking it out, though, so I sat and sniggered at the television, eating cheese and knowing it would be better in the morning.

The Rest of the Weekend

The Lads called early – they had already set up camp in a wee village outside of Paris. I hopped a train out there with minimal angst – navigating routes and timetables with relative ease. Abandoning all memories of my Friday night angst, I boarded the train and settled down with my book, feeling slightly smug as I thought, man, I’ve definitely got this travelling thing sorted.

Then I noticed that the train was going express, hurtling through each station at an alarming speed. I wet my trousers in panic, wondering where the hell I was going to end up and how on earth I was going to find my brothers. I used the last of my mobile phone credit to alert Captain Kloss of this alarming development, then cursed my trigger-happy nerves as the train slowed down and started calling at every station along the line.

Crisis averted, I was soon met by my hosts and escorted to my first encounter with the Messy Days Express. My first impression was that it was less smelly than I had feared - no small feat, given that it had housed three boys for a month. It was huge, but crowded inside with a wee kitchen and bathroom, a booth with a table, cabinets and drawers everywhere, everything neatly self-contained. The Lads had set up the card table outside the front door under an awning – it was camper’s paradise.

I’m a very responsible examination supervisor, so I checked thoroughly to make sure that there were no textbooks and no internet access, then we left Le Comte with his exam papers and headed back into town.

We weren't particularly fussed about seeing Paris sights – I’ve been there before, and the boys are coming back in September for the rugby World Cup. We ticked a box or two, wandering around the Louvre courtyard and climbing up the Arc de Triomphe, as shown here:

…but the bulk of the weekend was spent focussing on some bike race that was apparently a fairly big deal.

We found a pub just off the Champs-Élysées that was showing the penultimate stage of the Tour on television. We drank many pints, the boys regaled me with stories from their trip and I sat and scrolled through their many very entertaining photographs. There was one of TPC in red Speedos that was among the best things I have ever seen. I don’t have a copy, sadly, but perhaps if we’re all very, very lucky he’ll put it up on his blog.

We struck up a conversation with a garrulous Yank who had apparently been drinking Jagermeister all afternoon. He was highly entertaining, filled with stories of his Tour so far – he’d met everyone and scammed his way in everywhere. He was loud, but harmless and friendly, carrying packets of flower seeds from his native Texas to hand out as gifts. I made an excellent joke about yellow roses that didn’t get the love it deserved.

I tried to pay attention to the cycling, asking many questions and letting The Lads trip over each other to display the knowledge gained from three weeks on the road. As the beer flowed, my questions became louder and stupider. I recall speaking at length about my views relating to how the race could be enhanced with the addition of spokey dokeys, which I can only presume did wonders for my credibility. At one point, the Texan accused me of paying too much attention to the contents of the cyclists’ shorts as I peered intently at the screen. I told him he was right, but not in the way he thought:

jLo: “What I can’t stop imagining is the scar tissue on their arses. Imagine – years and years of professional cycling, the chafing must be unbearable. It must build up into layer upon layer of scar tissue, all along their legs and butt cheeks."

The Texan was flummoxed: “This is my fourth Tour de France. I can honestly say that has never occurred to me before.”

I told him that expanding your mind via conversation with random strangers is what travelling is all about.

We rounded out the day with champagne and a most excellent dinner. I’d tell you about what we ate, except that I know there are some vegetarians who read this blog who really don’t want to hear about it. Let me say just this: it was delicious, and I feel very bad about that.

On the train ride back out to camp, the boys taught me the card game that has kept them going for the long weeks of the Tour. It’s called 2,3,10 and I am pleased to report that I was a natural and reigned triumphant all the way home.

Camping in the Messy Days turned out to be a highly comfortable experience, not least because there was plenty of room for me after CK elected to seek solitude for an evening by finding a hotel and staying in town. The next morning, we hiked up to the train station, through the beautiful village of St Genevieve de Bois. There was a patisserie open at the station, and the boys groaned at the thought of pain au chocolat for breakfast again. For me, it was a novelty. A delicious novelty.

By the time we arrive back in the city, the Champs-Élysées was already choked full of people jostling for spots along the rail. The small streets off the main drag were beautiful and completely empty. We wandered for a while, then set up at the pub again to watch the start of the stage. The boys bought bucketloads of merchandise, because they are suckers:

(Check out TPC's hilarious beard!)

Just before the bikes arrived in town, we ventured out into the crowd that by this stage were three and four deep on the Champs-Élysées, chattering with excitement. We found a spot and TPC fetched us beers, arriving back just as the peleton flew by for the first lap. My impression of the Tour de France? Those bikes go really fast. Seriously, I can’t even describe how fast they were going. This blurry photo will have to suffice:

There were a bunch of American college students standing in front of us, making inane comments about the race. They were clearly scenesters, and The Lads scorned their superficial knowledge, bursting with self-importance at having seen (almost) Every Single Day of the Tour. It amused me enough that I joined in and did some sneering of my own - smug by association.

Eight times the pushbikes flew by, then we scurried back to the pub to watch the finish. It was jubilant and exciting, The Lads cheering the end of their odyssey. An hour, several beers and many hands of 2,3,10 later, it was time for me to head back to the station to catch the Eurostar back to Londres. I may have seen little of the city, but it was a most excellent weekend nonetheless. Next time, I’m going to have some French. I swear.

The Visa Story

2007-07-30T22:17:00.000+01:00

So, I’ve been back at work for a week, now. It’s been nice to see everybody and feel like a functioning member of society again – but something of a challenge to remember how to haul oneself out of bed at stupid o’clock (especially after a glass of wine or three the night before) and be awake and functioning during daylight hours.

Everyone has been very nice and welcoming, and full of questions about the circumstances that led to my absence in the first place. The horror of the process is fading now that is over, and so I want to write what I remember about it here for posterity.

1. So, what is this visa you’ve got, then?

It’s a Highly Skilled Migrant Visa. It’s basically a general permission to live and work in the UK for two years. I’m Highly Skilled! The Home Office said so!

[As has been noted, I can now actually say that I’ve got skillz to pay da billz and mean it…]

2. What did you have to do to get it?

It’s a points-based system, with points awarded for age, education, and earnings. I’m getting old and I don’t have a Masters, so I needed to earn more to qualify. What scraped me over the line was the fact that you get bonus points for earning your money in the UK. You also have to be able to prove that you are fluent in English.

What makes the process so overwhelming is the level of documentary evidence required by the Home Office. The Great Paper Chase of 2007 was quite the ordeal and one that I’m not keen to repeat anytime soon.

Proving my age and education was reasonably easy - although I did have to get my mother to post my original degree certificates over from Oz. Apparently this caused a crisis of conscience for Mum for a moment or two, given that she realised that if she didn’t send them, I’d have to come home. I remain very grateful that she was victorious in that particular inner struggle – thanks, Ma!

To meet the language requirement I had to get a letter from my university (which, let’s remember, is situated in Brisbane, AUSTRALIA) certifying that my degree was taught in English. My university charged me $10 for this letter, which I thought was nice of them.

Proving my earnings was the most entertaining part. Every pound of income and tax for each week of the past year had to be accounted for and corroborated with at least three forms of documentary evidence. Every single bank statement plus every single payslip plus group certificates plus a letter from each employer confirming the dates of my employment and my gross earnings. Countless phone calls, letters everywhere, sending documents back for errors to be fixed and then more phone calls to chase them again – it was a whole bucket of bureaucratic fun.

Here is the lesson I have learned: keep EVERYTHING. Neatly, in a file. You never know what you might need and when.

The best part, though, was that it wasn’t enough to just send payslips: oh, no. They could be forgeries! Even those printed on letterhead or fancy paper weren’t sufficient. Each payslip had to be stamped and signed by the issuing company to prove its veracity. I sent bundles of paper all over the countryside, crossing my fingers that they wouldn’t get lost and doing even more begging and pleading for someone to stamp and sign every sheet and return them to me.

For the record, I would like to thank my boss, who was very understanding and let me make my (very many) harassing phone calls from work on my lunch breaks.

Once the paper had been collected, I had a great deal of fun channelling all my (not inconsiderable) OCD energy into arranging said pieces of paper into a very neat and orderly folder, annotated and tagged and divided with brightly coloured cardboard. It was as if I felt as though my chances would be enhanced if the bundle looked pretty. I knew for a fact that they would not: I paid an immigration agency a LOT of money to put my application together for me. I knew the bundle would be ripped apart and put back together again in some mysterious special Home Office-approved way and handed over with a nod and a wink and a secret signal to demonstrate that THIS application was worth reading. Or so I hoped. Even so, collating everything into a super-organised package made me feel like I had some measure of control over the process. I find happiness in delusion. I’m okay with that. Shut up.

3. How much did it cost?

As stated previously, and repeated ad nauseum to all those unlucky enough to have crossed my conversational path this year: A LOT. The application is in two parts: first, you send off all your documents to see if you qualify for the Highly Skilled Migrant Program itself. They assess your evidence, work out if you have sufficient points, and send you a letter approving your application. THEN you apply for the actual visa – sending off your passport to be stamped, together with a declaration that you have, for the most part, refrained from acts of genocide. You know, the usual.

The application fees for each stage were £400 and £350 respectively, which is roughly equivalent to (AUD) $1000 each time. Just for the application fees. They charge it because they can. Grrrrr.

To make it even more fun, as mentioned above and below, I instructed an immigration lawyer to help me. My application was tricky in a couple of fundamental ways (seriously, this part is too boring even for this entry) and so I needed help to get it right. They charged me another £650 (AUD $1500 or so) for the privilege.

4. What were the immigration agents like?

Other than expensive? Somewhat entertaining. My first meeting with the agency
was reassuring, frustrating and bewildering in equal measure. My documents were okay, but their attitude was amusing. Firstly, the agent spent the first twenty minutes of our appointment complaining about England. She had a broad KathnKim accent, and apparently she hates it here. I sat there wondering (a) why she is in this line of work and (b) if she was really the person I wanted to be in charge of convincing the Home Office that I want to stay. I feared there may be a chance she would sabotage my application in some misguided effort to protect my best interests. I decided then and there that I would be checking it VERY thoroughly before it was sent.

Then she complained about how complicated my file is. I showed her my beautiful spreadsheets (they were a thing of beauty, I assure you – along with the pretty folder I spent hours preparing neatly cross-referenced spreadsheets to demonstrate very clearly where every penny of my money came from over the past 12 months) to try and show her that really, it wasn’t that bad. She continued to whinge and I grew quietly fearful – what if the Home Office thinks the same thing? Way to inspire me with confidence to pay your wages, lady.

Thankfully, I later learned that she was an assistant, and the lawyer who actually completed my application was efficient and encouraging. Also, very good at her job, as is now clear.

5. Why did you have to stop working?

Well, see this entry. Essentially, my working holiday visa allowed me to work for twelve months, and my time was up. I work in the legal sector, and people in my line of business tend to be a bit particular about you know, obeying the law and suchlike.

6. How long were you off work?

Almost eight weeks.

What made this very frustrating was that it never needed to happen. I’d planned the timing of my application very carefully, aiming to get it in a good few weeks before my visa ran out. Everything was ready to go – except one document, a group certificate from one of my employers. The financial year ended on 30 March 2007.

I didn’t get the tax document (called a P60 here) until the end of May.

AAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRGGH. It still makes me angry, just thinking about it. I called everyone at the company, chasing almost daily for over a month, but there was no way they were sending it to me in anything other than their own sweet time. No amount of pleading, begging or threatening made a difference. One piece of paper, which, if it had been sent in a timely fashion would have made all the difference. Bastards. I suspect I will remain bitter about this for some time.

7. Anyway. It’s over, you’ve got it, hooray! You must be delighted!

(Psst, that’s not a question).

Yes, I’m very happy. It’s a relief, more than anything. I’ve incurred such a massive amount of debt in the last couple of months (surviving with more than a little help from family and friends, for which I am very grateful) that I need to be earning Pounds Sterling (the capital letters seem important) if I have a hope of paying it off anytime soon. It’s good to be back at work, I can start planning for the future in a way I couldn’t before. That feels good.

Along with the relief, I feel lucky. It feels more than a little unseemly to boast about the ‘hardship’ I endured in obtaining a right only available to a privileged few. I can’t quite shake the guilt at being a ‘desirable’ immigration candidate, purely by virtue of the accident of my birth – English-speaking, well-educated, capacity to earn a good wage and pay a higher contribution of tax and, yanno, white skin. I’m not a City banker with a seven figure bonus, sure, and I only just scraped over the line in terms of fulfilling the eligibility criteria – but it doesn’t matter whether I cleared the bar by ten points or one. I got there – and now I’m here I can’t help thinking about the many who never get the chance. There are people out there more qualified than I am who are driving minicabs, there are those who have fled war zones and have nowhere to go.

Sigh. A bit more seriouslike than my usual tone on this blog – but there you go. It’s a part of what this feels like.

8. Are you EVER coming home?

[Mum, is that you?] To be honest, I have no idea. I’ve got two years and right now, this is where I want to be. Ask me again this time next year.

Guess what...

2007-07-19T22:54:00.000+01:00

My life of leisure has come to an end. The waiting is finally over: my passport has been returned with a shiny visa inside. I am, officially, a Highly Skilled Migrant.

I feel like I should write more about the process – it has been drawn-out, expensive and very, very frustrating – but not quite yet. The main thing is that it is OVER. Hoorah!

I start back at work tomorrow.

Hi, Dianne!

2007-07-04T15:56:00.000+01:00

A wee shout-out, there, to a reader I didn’t even know I had. Thanks for stopping by, Dianne, and for your kind comments. Many apologies for the infrequent updates, I’ll try to do better.

So, I’ve had my life of leisure interrupted in the most delightful way. Many of you are acquainted with the famous Poundsters, whose wedding I attended earlier this year. They have embarked upon their world tour and have spent the past few days in London.

You can read about the Poundster World Tour here. Their website address is www.poundster.com. If you have a moment, please stop by poundster dot com. For those of you who know Andrew, you may be aware that he would REALLY LIKE FOR YOU TO VISIT HIS BLOG. And comment. And click on an ad or two, if you fancy it. No pressure, no pressure, but please consider poundster for your web surfing needs.

(And while you’re at it, Veggie Friendly is a helluva read).

We have had ourselves quite a time. Kate and Andy arrived on Monday and after depositing their (very well-packed and minimal) luggage at the Pickle, we proceeded directly to hardcore touristy action. We whirlwinded through the essential sights of central London and proceeded directly to Westminster to visit the Cabinet War Rooms, where the underground offices and meeting rooms that Churchill, the Cabinet and various military commanders used during the war have been preserved just as they were left when the fighting ceased. It was excellent - if you haven’t had an opportunity to go there, I recommend that you do so immediately. There is also a Churchill museum, which was densely packed with fascinating artefacts and interactive exhibits. The particular highlight, for me, was the section devoted to Churchill’s lifestyle choices: red velvet jumpsuits, the importance of pairing good port with good stilton, the cigars. I enjoyed it immensely and will definitely return.

After the War Rooms we toddled along to the Houses of Parliament and by joining exactly the right queue at exactly the right fortuitous moment, we found ourselves in the public galleries of the Commons and Lords with surprising ease. I haven’t been in a parliamentary debating chamber for a while, you know, and it was very pleasing to gaze at the ornate decorations of the Houses and wallow in nostalgia while listening to the speeches. Good times.

Of course, given that visitors from Australia are in town, England has turned on its most stereotypically dreadful weather – it has been cold and wet the whole week thus far. Undaunted, however, yesterday we took a trip out to the countryside to visit the exceptional Mr Mackerras. He lives in a beautiful wee village that was perfectly olde worlde storybook England – hedgerows and meadows, crooked cottages and charming pubs. As well as being spectacularly good company and an excellent tour guide, Mr M also demonstrated his culinary skills by turning out a wonderful three-course meal for our enjoyment. I would be grateful if you would all send me your very best recipes immediately so that I can begin training in the hope that one day I may be able to invite him to the Pickle to return the favour.

On the subject of food, and given that our Kate is a vegetarian food reviewer of some renown, it has been imperative that she be given an opportunity to consider the best (and worst) London has to offer during their stay. Our first pub lunch on Monday was a vegetarian disaster: Kate’s lunch effectively consisted of a baked potato with a can of baked beans upended on top. To make up for this (and because I can’t let New York win), we ate at Manna on Monday night, which was remarkable, and will be visiting Carnevale this evening. You’ll read about both at Veggie Friendly soon. I’m crossing my fingers that London rates well.

It has been utterly wonderful to have the Poundsters here – the three days have flown by and my whole body is sore from all the laughing. The brilliant thing about spending time with good friends is that it feels so natural – the months spent apart dissolve away in an instant. I’ve had to take a moment, a couple of times, to shake my head in wonder at the fact that they’re actually here in LONDON, and we’re not in their flat at Bondi or hanging out in Canberra or Melbourne. It reminds me how much I miss you all.

Bon voyage, you lovely Poundsters. Thank you for coming to stay. I hope your onward journey is packed full of adventure and excitement and I will look forward to reading about it on poundster.com.

Given that I began this post with a shout-out, I'd like to finish with one, too: my most grateful thanks to Rip van Winkle, winner of the Housemate of the Year award for vacating the Pickle over the last few days so that the Poundsters could stay in his room. That was above and beyond, my friend, thank you.

(Hey, Andy, do you think there were enough plugs for your website in there? Let me know, I might be able to find a few more... :)

Kicking back...

2007-06-21T14:40:00.000+01:00

So! Warm greetings from London’s most idle and indolent lady of leisure. I am a couple of weeks into my involuntary (though not unwelcome) period of unemployment and do you know what I’ve been up to?

Absolutely nothing.

I have long suspected that my capacity for sloth approaches infinity. When I have a normal work/play schedule, I dream of having entire days at my disposal in which to accomplish the many projects and goals that live as wee fond dreams in my heart. So, then, when given just what I asked for, do you know how much I get done? Yeah.

I sleep a lot. I read, watch movies, read endless amounts of trash on the interwebs. This website doesn’t help. (A warning: don’t go there. You will lose hours. Days, even). I do lots of laundry, I cook dinner for my housemates and my friends. I become almost completely nocturnal: awake all night, sleeping during the day. The weather has been lovely and warm – and it’s light until 10pm so there are many long pleasant evenings spent sipping sangria on the balcony before retiring.

I am often asked ‘but don’t you get BORED?’. No, I don’t! That’s the whole point. I mean, maybe I will someday – but I have not yet reached that point in two solid weeks of loafing and I can’t see it happening anytime soon.

I venture out into the world at least once a day – and have discovered a whole community of people who are free to roam the streets during daylight hours. They’re friendly folks: on my walk back from the tube station last week I was chatted up twice – and only one of those was a charity worker trying to get me to sign up for a direct debit donation.

I have joined our local library. It’s just like I remember – that dry, dusty smell, the brightly coloured posters on the wall advertising community initiatives, kids chattering and elderly folk moving slowly along the aisles. I love it. I take my library bag, fill it up, head home and dive in. I feel greedy, taking too many books – and so each time so far I’ve put some back in case other people might want them. I can always go back, I’ve got time.

Apparently I am craving stimulation on some level: the other night, I decided I wanted to go out onto our balcony during a patch of heavy rain. Instead of going to fetch my umbrella, I fashioned a poncho out of a rubbish bag and used a salad bowl for protective headgear. Sadly, there is no photographic evidence of this endeavour. However, it worked a treat and provided at least ten minutes’ worth of entertainment for my fellow Pickles. And me.

Overheard in London

2007-06-10T15:46:00.000+01:00

(1)

Standing at a bus stop on Oxford Street one evening, waiting for the elusive number 55 (sighted rarely, but always worth the effort – it goes directly to the front door of the Pickle). A young fashionista Top Shop employee was chatting idly with a fellow Top Shop employee, on their way home from work:

Top Shop Girl #1: “I love the internet. I can break up with people just by changing my MySpace profile to ‘single’.

Top Shop Girl #2: “Totally”.

(2)

Walking from our building to Hoxton Square one Saturday afternoon, I noted a roped-off area to the side of the park where a film crew was busy doing film crew-y things around an appallingly large and shiny stretch-4WD-type vehicle. The people sitting sunning themselves in the square were doing their best to be nonchalant, sneaking glimpses out of the corner of their eye but doing their best to make it look like they hadn’t even noticed there was anything going on.

As I walked towards the gate of the square, I saw a parking ticket inspector stop beside a car. There was a burly paparazzo leaning out behind the front door, trying to snap some pictures of the action.

Parking Ticket Inspector Guy: “Wot’s going on ‘ere then?”

Burly Paparazzo: “Listen, mate, do I bother you when you’re working?”

PTIG: “You’re going to have to move along. You can’t stop here.”

BP: “Bugger off. I’m just taking a few photos. I’M VERY IMPORTANT.”

jLo: SNORT.

(3)

Sitting around at Dr Evil’s lair one Sunday afternoon, recovering from a very, VERY large party the evening before. A guy named Mike, friend of our new friend Senor, arrived to join us. He was looking very much the worse for wear: droopy-eyed, ashy-skinned, and with a large and sturdy-looking bandage on his right wrist.

Senor: Mike! Great to see you, mate. You don’t look so good.

Mike: I don’t feel so good.

Senor: What happened to your arm?

Mike: I took some Viagra on Friday.

(beat)

All: BWAH HAH HAH HAAAA.

Time On My Hands

2007-06-06T14:19:00.000+01:00

HI! Hello. So. I’m here, I’m alive. I am tempted to say ‘I’M BACK’, but have learned not to be too cocky about such things. I hope you are all well.

Stuff has been afoot in the world of jLo. I have much to tell! Although actually, I suspect it won’t take too long to explain.

The thing is, I lost my job.

It was great: my manager said, ‘oh, hey, jLo! How’s it going? Would you mind coming here into this office for a wee chat? Oh, and since it’s, like, an official HR chat and all, would you like to have someone come in with you? For, like, support?”

(My manager doesn’t actually speak like that. I’m not sure why it seems apt, but I’m going to go with it for now).

I declined the kind offer of moral support, and marched into the office to receive my marching orders. TERMINATED. Oh, the joy.

Now, it may be tempting to jump to one of several conclusions :

1. Oh no! jLo finally got sprung for her unhealthy Post-It stealing obsession!

2. Oh no! Someone finally worked out that jLo was calling phone sex hotlines via her desk phone on her lunchbreaks!

3. Oh no! jLo went postal on one of her stupid over-entitled clients one too many times!

Alas, the reason for my termination was nothing quite so interesting as the above. I had to stop working, because I was about to become ILLEGAL.

You see, I am a working holidaymaker here in the UK. Gone are those halcyon days enjoyed by many of you wherein the ‘two year visa/one year work’ restriction was blithely ignored by all and sundry. These days, the Home Office is apparently very serious about my being here for a holiday first, and paying my rent second. I can understand their confusion – I mean, English people are always bemused when I declare my intention to live in this city for an indefinite period – but the restriction is tres inconvenient nonetheless.

It says in my passport that my permission to work is ‘restricted to twelve months’. Among my fellow working holidaymakers, many hours of analysis and debate have been devoted to the meaning of these words. Is it 52 weeks? 365 days? What if I only work one day per week? What if I’m a contractor, and could conceivably work weekends as well? And so on.

I had devised what I thought was an eminently reasonable calculation. There were some weeks there last year where I worked only a few hours, so I aggregated them together and counted my full weeks of work. I thought, therefore, that I had a few weeks left to go and everything would be fine. Alas, ‘twas not to be.

You know how there are people out there who manage to engage in feats of daring and rule-bending and get away with it entirely? I am not one of these people. I always get caught. For six months, I’ve been hearing stories of how people ignore the work restrictions on their visas in an innocent and carefree manner, and no-one ever finds out. It’s not a big deal at all, they say. The Home Office doesn’t mind if you’re a few weeks over! Stop worrying so much!

Turns out my worry was well–founded. My employers realised this week that they had not asked any of their not-insignificant number of Antipodean staff members to confirm their visa status. Upon investigation, it was determined that what I thought was a perfectly reasonable method for calculating the number of weeks I have worked was not so reasonable after all. My time was done. So sorry, they said. We love you, but you must be sacked. The unit manager offered to escort me from the building if that would make it feel more dramatic. I thanked him, but declined.

They have very kindly offered to hold my job open for me while I attempt to change my visa status. While the job is not ideal and I’m not pining with angst to have left it, I do have a very strong interest in paying my rent in future so I’m grateful that the option is there.

So, I am unemployed. I have no income and minimal savings! I am not sure whether I can stay in this country! What fun.

The most frustrating part is that it should never have come to this. I had everything carefully worked out – and if the world would just bend to my will and do as I expect, these annoying situations need never arise. My application for my new, improved working visa has been ready since the beginning of May. I had to wait for ONE LOUSY DOCUMENT for the better part of seven weeks. It was the equivalent of a group certificate from one of my temp agencies – and they stubbornly refused to send it to me in anything other than their own sweet time. I employed the squeaky wheel approach, making a nagging phone call every day to see if I could annoy them into giving me what I wanted – but their will was strong. The piece of paper arrived the weekend before my sacking, and so I got the visa application in the same day I had to leave my job. Ahh, symmetry, how I love thee.

So, now, I’m waiting. The official timeframe for the visa application is four to six weeks. Everyone I know who has had one in this year, however, has had it back within three weeks. Basically, I’m sitting on my arse until the end of June, hoping against hope that this all works out.

On the plus side, my brother,Captain Kloss, has been visiting for the last ten days, so I have had ample time to hang out with him and show him the sights. He left last night, so now I can do some sleeping, some emailing, and maybe write here a bit more frequently. I am, officially, a lady of leisure. Let’s do lunch.

Happy Mother’s Day

2007-05-13T16:36:00.000+01:00

The People’s Champion and I got up disgracefully late today. Well, technically, TPC got up and went to the gym while I slept in, but that’s such appalling behaviour from him that I thought it best not to mention it. We slept in very late, and while we called our mother immediately upon arising we had to make do with voicemail (our mum is something of a jet-setter and was on a plane).

To make up for our dreadful lateness, I thought I would post something here to let her know what we were thinking of her.

Hey, Ma! Happy Mother’s Day! We are thinking of you!

Here is a little something for you to mark the occasion (we had this taken just for you):

Those are some crazy rocks in the background - I have no idea how they got there. My version of the tale of our trip to see said crazy rocks (among other things) is forthcoming, but for those that are unable to wait, The People’s Champion has written an excellent account of it here.

I hope you had a lovely day, Mum. We miss you. Thank you for being a most excellent mother and for being so brave in trying to pretend you’re totally cool with us being so far away. You’re awesome.

Oh, and I have recently learned that it is entirely possible that my grandmother reads this site as well: HI GRANDMA! Happy Mother’s Day to you too. I’m sorry for any bad words you may have encountered while on this page. Talk to you soon!

Love,

jLo

jLo, Champion of the World

2007-04-25T00:48:00.000+01:00

So I’ve been thinking a lot lately about the direction my life is taking – or rather, the complete and utter absence thereof. I’ve been pondering, you know, a LOT, and more often than not I am saddened at the dearth of achievement in my current existence.

I used to be a winner, you see. A shining star. People would gaze upon my glowing, smiling countenance and be inspired. Some would even rub me for luck. Or at least, that’s what they said they were doing. I didn’t mind.

To be honest, I’ve been in a rut for some time. I haven’t tasted proper glory since that happy March day in 2003 when I accepted a great honour: Canberran of the Year. It was an accolade borne of hardship and tragic circumstance, to be sure, but the recognition warmed me from within and gave my life meaning and purpose.

Having gone several years without tasting this sort of success, I grew desperate. I cast around madly for something, anything, that I could do to bring my average back up to its previously stellar level.

I found my answer a month or so back, while at the pub with my lovely friend Madam Fox, who was celebrating a great milestone. Inspired and despondent in equal measure at her achievement, I grew bold and decided to make a pronouncement. Only a grand gesture, I decided, would be sufficient to get The Celebrated Life of jLo back on track.

I announced my intention to break a world record before my thirtieth birthday.

‘She’s mad!’, they all shouted. ‘What a foolish plan!’ ‘It’s only ten months away, there’s just not enough time!’. ‘Those delusions of grandeur, I always knew they’d get our jLo in the end.’

Today, I say to those naysayers: HA! I sure showed you.

Today, my friends, I am a World Record Holder.

Oh yes. The pinnacle of human endeavour, a listing in the Guinness Book of World Records. Glory beyond the fervent, wretched dreams of most mortals on this sad earth. My achievement to be lauded through the ages, a feat accomplished by none before.

I can hear the amazed mutterings already: ‘What did she say?’ ‘A WORLD RECORD?’ ‘Surely I misheard.’ ‘Which one?’

This one.
Yesterday afternoon, sometime after 7:00pm GMT, I was a member of the World’s Largest Coconut Orchestra.

Take a moment, catch your breath. I understand. WHAT DID SHE JUST SAY?

The World’s Largest Coconut Orchestra.

Yesterday, you see, was St George’s Day, a traditional feast day to commemorate the patron saint of England. To mark the occasion, it was decreed that thousands of Londoners should converge upon Trafalgar Square, register their names, and be given a pair of coconut shells. Led by the cast of Spamalot, we clippity-clopped our coconuts in time to that happiest of tunes, ‘Always Look on the Bright Side of Life’.

It was official and everything. Instructions were given in a very serious manner, we practised hard and gave it our all. Messrs Gilliam and Jones came along to help out. The Guinness people were present to verify the attempt.

The previous record was set in March 2006 in New York, where 1789 people formed a coconut orchestra (I will NEVER tire of saying those words) in New York to mark the first anniversary of the opening of the musical. In London, yesterday, the record was thoroughly smashed: 5, 567 people. Take THAT, New York!

For posterity, this world-beating effort is described here and here and even here. There is utterly terrible footage of the feat here. [Amusingly, I think whoever took that video was standing about three feet away from where we were – I think I can hear myself whooping in victory at the end.]

Here is a photo of me with Rip van Winkle and Madam Fox, coconuts at the ready:

Flushed with success, we then adjourned to the pub to toast St George, as is the custom in these parts on that particular day. Fittingly, the pub we chose offered a selection of real ales with utterly delightful – and perfectly English – names. Let me tell you, there was no better way to cap off my first St George’s Day than to press up to a bar and ask for ‘two Spitfires and a Bishop’s Finger, please.’

A day later, my soul is peaceful. I feel the warm glow of achievement once more. It was a long, hard slog – but so worth it. I have oft looked in envy at those athletes, artists and outstanding professionals who are younger than me yet at the top of their game. Now I can stand proudly with them, knowing that I too have tasted the heady triumph of beating the world. My precious coconuts are here beside me as I type this, and I gaze upon them fondly, a souvenir of the day I reached the top once again. I’m BACK.

Right then.

2007-04-08T00:08:00.000+01:00

You know, I spend a lot of time bimbling around the Internet reading excruciatingly terrible websites. The good ones, the ones I should be reading, are largely ignored as I focus my attentions on the trainwrecks, the crazies, the mind-numbingly boring. You’d think I’d have learned by now that there are no standards on the Internet, and it shouldn’t matter what I write here, as long as I do. Having nothing to say apparently stops no-one else. I’ve got proof.

(Someday soon I’ll share some of my favourite crazy links with you all – I’ve been afraid to in case they come after me somehow– but to hell with it. The delight must be shared. Remind me.)

Anyway, so, I’ve had little to say of late. Nothing particularly exciting or amusing has been going on, I haven’t felt much like talking. I work, I drink, I read, I sleep. The End.

Except for the following, which I offer by way of Update:

You know that post I wrote a couple of weeks back, about how much I like it here and how I would dearly love to stay a while longer? Well, a couple of days after that post went up, I came this close to losing my job. I am one of many contractors at my place of employment, and the axe fell upon the vast majority of them one sunny Tuesday in March. The rest of us were told we may have as little as two weeks left.

This was mildly alarming, as you might imagine. I don’t particularly care about the job itself, but I have found that having one is reasonably important. For one thing, apparently continuing to reside at The Pickle requires the paying of rent. For another, if I haven’t earned a particular sum of money by the beginning of May, I will have to leave the country.

It was this latter point that has turned me into a Ball’O’Stress in recent weeks. As soon as I’d worked out just how much I wanted to stay, it looked like I was going to have to leave. Sigh. Cue frantic calls to recruitment agents, blowing dust off my resume, calculating and recalculating my earnings and trying to come with ways to hit that magic target in the few short weeks I had left. Fun times, let me tell you.

Thankfully, several months ago I had submitted an application for a longer-term contract position at this particular establishment, and after getting through an Interview and then an Assessment Centre evaluation (!) in late March, I was offered said longer-term contract last week. Phew. The wolf, she has retreated from the door. The contract itself has a worryingly short termination notice requirement, but I’m hoping like hell that I don’t get sacked in April. April is all I need. I’m on firmer ground now, but still feeling very shaky about it all. Cross your fingers for me.

In other news, The People’s Champion has made his residency at The Pickle official. He is no longer dossing on our couch like the giant walking cliché of a freeloading Australian backpacker that he is. Oh no. He is now paying rent for the privilege.

He’s paying rent to sleep on a couch you say? Well, why not? The Pickle is a great place, I’m telling you. It’s a good couch. He may have little personal space, but we’re all having such fun that it seemed a shame for him to go and live in a dodgy Antipodean sharehouse deep in the East End just for principle’s sake. It’s only for a few more weeks until he goes off on his travels. The Pickle won’t be the same without him.

What else? I joined a gym. I’ve even attended said gym maybe five or six times. In a month. Baby steps, you know. I’m considering getting a haircut. I read some good books, I read some trashy ones. I saw that movie Kenny (awesome). I also saw that movie Cannonball Run (double triple awesome). I've been watching as much of the cricket World Cup as possible (Go Bangladesh! Go Ireland!). I’m sure there’s more. Stand by.

Q&A

2007-03-17T18:49:00.000Z

For my birthday, my lovely brothers presented me with tickets to a play, “Underneath the Lintel” – written by Glen Berger, directed by Maria Mileaf and starring an American actor called Richard Schiff.

American actors feature in London plays reasonably frequently, and depending on their level of notoriety their presence is trumpeted proudly in posters at tube stations and discussed reverently in the street press. This was my first experience of a show featuring someone I had heard of, and it just happened to be a member of the cast of one of my favourite shows. [‘Just happened..”, yeah, right]. I felt a bit sheepish about going to see a performance just for one actor, and so I downplayed the Richard Schiff factor when discussing the play beforehand. Then I arrived at the theatre to discover that it is, in fact, a one-man show. So much for nonchalance.

It was good! ~~Toby~~ Richard Schiff played a quiet, scruffy Dutch (oh yes, there was an accent) librarian who uncovers a mystery and sets about collecting clues. It was a somewhat trite in that to solve the mystery the Librarian goes on a Journey and has Important Insights about life, love, myth and an individual’s place in the world – but I liked it nonetheless. Mr Schiff’s character was endearing, funny and vulnerable, and he was so captivating throughout that I barely noticed there was no-one else on stage. I was entertained and even a wee bit moved.

As luck would have it, when we arrived at the theatre we discovered that thanks to a visiting group of drama students, a Q&A session would be held after the performance.

Now, I have mixed feelings about the Q&A. On the one hand, it’s interesting to see the real person behind the performances or meet the creator of the piece. On the other, however, people ask really freaking dumb questions and I spend most of the time writhing in agony in my seat. Still, I usually assume that it will be amusing and I’m always right.

The most hilarious Q&A I ever saw was at the Brisbane International Film Festival: a session hosted by David Stratton in which noted documentary maker Bob Connolly spoke about his (excellent) film Facing the Music. The questions were, for the most part, very good and I learned a great deal. And then there was this guy:

Very Eager Young Guy In Crowd: “Good evening, Mr Connolly. I’d like to ask you about your other new film, ‘The Bank’…” [The VEYGIC then proceeded to ask a question in several parts about that particular film.]

There was a thick silence. Mr Connolly paused, and exchanged an uncomfortable glance with Mr Stratton.

Bob Connolly: “Um, that’s an interesting question. However, I think you would be better off asking it of Robert Connolly, the feature film maker, who directed that particular film.”

Rest of Audience: HAHAHAHAHAHA.

The VEYGIC dropped dead with the embarrassment.

I was looking forward to tonight’s session, in a slightly geeky way. Too cool to admit openly that I was excited about seeing Toby in the flesh, I adopted what I hoped passed for an urbane sneer and looked forward to the stupidity to follow.

I was not disappointed on either front. Mr Schiff was reassuringly Toby-like, mumbling, chomping on a mint and fidgeting with his spectacles while looking a touch uncomfortable. He was self-effacing and charming and told some very good jokes.

But, oh, the questions. In the break, TPC and I hastily compiled a list with which to play Q&A Bingo: What made you decide to do the play? / How did you find the transition from a TV show to the stage? / How hard was it to do the accent? / How do you find London? and What’s next for you? We only got four out of five, which disappointed me as I had been looking forward to seeing TPC stand up and shout BINGO in the middle of the theatre.

There was the predictable discussion about the craft, and inhabiting the character, which the budding young actors lapped right on up. Mr Schiff was able to keep a straight face throughout, which I guess is understandable given that he does this for a living. He made some deliciously pandering comments about how English audiences just seem to get the play more than American audiences.

Most of the questions were not particularly memorable. Some of them weren’t even questions:

“If I may, I'd like to make an observation..." [jLo: Oh, please, go right ahead! I was hoping you’d tell me what you thought. It’s not like I’m here to listen to what the guy on stage has to say anyway.]

“Oh, Richard, you were just wonderful…” [Sigh. And your question is?]

“On behalf of the Americans in the audience, I’d just like to say that we most certainly DO get it… “ [We don’t care!]

Some folk were downright impolite. One girl identified herself as a journalism student [Again: we don’t care!] and asked snottily if he would please catalogue everything about that night’s performance that was different from the night before. Unsurprisingly, Mr Schiff was less than willing to comply. Then there was the girl who asked him if he believed in God and wouldn’t take a politely non-committal rebuff for an answer. She kept at him, insistently, until I was ready to go over and shout in her face. Hey, you there? IT’S NONE OF YOUR BUSINESS! Grr. People are rude.

Anyway, what TPC and I were really waiting around for was to see if anyone would ask a West Wing question. I had giddy visions of a Comic Book Guy-style geek somewhere in the audience (other than myself, of course) asking something insanely specific. “In Episode 4 of Season 2, you made a reference to…”, etc. That’s what I wanted. TPC and I had thrown around a few pisstake examples for our own amusement in the break, but there was no way in hell we were going to actually ask them. We waited in gleeful anticipation, but I quietly readied myself for disappointment, assuming that it wouldn’t actually happen.

Then it did.

Moderator: “You sir, the gentleman in the third row.”

Guy In Audience: “Thank you. Richard! First of all, I’d just like to congratulate you on a wonderful performance.”

Richard Schiff: “Thank you, that’s very kind.”

GIA: “Now, my question is this: can you tell everyone the university from which President Bartlet received his Masters degree?”

RS: “…”

jLo and TPC: BWAH HAH HAHH! [They high five]. Then, quietly to themselves:

TPC: "Actually, I know that."

jLo: "Nerd." [a pause]. "Um, so do I."

TPC: "Shoot us both. Now."

Meanwhile, back on stage:

GIA: "Come on, now!"

RS: “I’m very sorry, sir, I can’t remember."

GIA: “Well! I’m happy to help out: it was the London School of Economics!" [He was very fond of exclamation marks, it seemed] "Now! You might not be aware, but it’s actually just down the road from this theatre! There’s a group of us from the university here tonight. We’d like to invite you to the campus for a tour!”

Good god. He’d obviously been preparing that little gag all night. By this stage I had slipped down off my seat with all the cringing and also the laughing. Mr Schiff chuckled politely and kindly told them they could leave a card.

The moral of the story, I guess, should be that if I’m going to bitch about how stupid the questions are I should prepare some good ones of my own. Of course, I’m always tempted. But then I remember that guy at the BIFF and keep my mouth firmly shut.

Anniversary

2007-03-10T20:21:00.000Z

A year ago today, I was very tired. My clothes had been drenched in Dettol, I had just purchased my first pashmina and had my first Ribena in six years. After lugging my suitcase across the world to a teeny tiny hotel room in Paddington, I spent the day wandering along Oxford Street in the wind and rain, trying to stay awake until bedtime.

Today, I woke up in my lovely warm flat, The Pickle. I had a leisurely breakfast, with coffee made just the way I like it and a very good book. I ventured out into the sunshiny afternoon and meandered down to the riverbank and across the footbridge to the Tate Modern. It was crowded and noisy, but the art was great and playing on the slides excellent fun. Tonight, I’m going to a house party and then possibly out in my neighbourhood for a lemonade or two.

I like it here.

For some reason, since I’ve been home for my whirlwind visit there have been more people than ever before asking me why I live in London. My brother says it is called the ‘Availability Heuristic’: simply put, when something’s on your mind you see it everywhere. After experiencing the warm, familiar joy of home, my decision to live almost as far away as physically possible seems hard to justify. And yet, the pull of the city remains.

When asked, I usually give a stock answer – babbling incoherently about how there’s so much going on here, and it’s such a good base for travel, blah blah. And while those are good reasons to be here, that’s not quite all of what it is for me.

My life had been characterised by movement over recent years – in each phase, I’ve been looking to the next one and working out how to get there. Here, I feel like I’ve just got started and there’s a lot left to explore. Maybe it’s a sign that I’ve found somewhere I want to stay.

Life has settled into a version of normal – I have a good flat that contains furniture I built myself. I have a great posse of excellent friends with whom I have a standing date to eat roast on Sunday evenings at a wonderful pub. I have favourite restaurants and bars and shops, galleries and markets. I had all that elsewhere too. It’s something less tangible and maybe part of the reason I know I want to be here longer is that I haven’t worked it out yet.

Days like today get me close to figuring it out – I love that gallery and the walk down past St Paul’s takes me past postcard London: beautiful old white buildings, red buses and phone boxes, black cabs and grey cobblestones. As I walked down the streets I had one of those warm, gleeful moments: I live in London! I have such affection for this place that is beyond rational expression. It feels good to be a part of it. It’s dirty, and hard to penetrate, and expensive, and old, but I feel protective when people complain about these things. I like it.

Maybe (visa-willing) in another year I’ll have used up this store of goodwill and the energy it takes to overcome the challenges. I still don’t know what I’m doing with my life, but for now getting the most out of living in this place is as much of a plan as I need.

Wedding Of The Year

2007-03-06T01:19:00.000Z

(Or, It's A Long Way To Go for a Chocolate Paddle Pop).

So, you know, it’s getting really close to being a whole year since I’ve been away (and since this blog was born). Before I get to the actual official Oh My God, Has It Been A Year Already, How Can That Be Possible? anniversary post, however, I have something of a hopelessly self-indulgent preview for you.

As you know, a couple of weeks ago I visited Sydney for four days. It’s been fun to blow the minds of the poor English folk around me with casual references to having gone ‘home for the weekend’, but it’s been hard to write about the actual trip itself. It was certainly fun, and funny – and I was, as you would expect, utterly hilarious the entire time. But for some reason I can barely remember any of the good jokes and stories – as soon as I start to write about it I descend into mush. Also, corn. (Mmm, corn mush.) I do want to have a record of it here, though, so I hope you will forgive me. I’ll find the funny again as soon as possible.

And I would also like to say to those of you that I didn’t get to see on the Whirlwind Tour 2006? I’m sorry, and I miss you. The corn mush is for everybody.

***

They day I left London, they’d salted the footpaths in anticipation of snowfall. The wheels on my suitcase crunched against the grit as I walked to the Heathrow train.

I don’t think it’s possible to have any real conception of that kind of distance covered by that flight. You walk onto the plane and sit in one place for so many tired, cramped and cranky hours that time is no longer real. Then you walk off the plane and you’re on the other side of the world.

When I emerged the air was warm and heavy and the light had that sort of metallic-edged brightness that you only get in Oz. I was filthy and stinking and had spent the last twenty minutes fretting quietly about how I was going to explain the many (many) litres of alcohol in my suitcase (happily, no-one asked). Then there were warm smiling faces in front of me and hugs so hard it was as if we were trying to cram a year’s worth of affection into one gesture. It felt good.

I’ve never felt much of an attachment to Sydney before – but the sights and smells and street signs were so comfortably familiar on the drive into town that the grin on my face was a mile wide.

The whole weekend was a heady mix of the absolutely normal and the head-spinningly surreal. I remember chatting happily to my parents and J,The as we drove to Kate and Andy’s place and being suddenly struck dumb as we came around the headland and I caught my first glimpse of Bondi spread out below me. It’s visceral and physical, my reaction to the landscape – winding me like a punch to the chest. For a girl who is as far from the outdoor type as it is possible to be, the beauty of my home geography moves me in a way that is always unexpected.

Later, sitting on the couch at Poundster HQ, I marvelled at how ordinary it felt. It could have been last weekend that I had been there, surrounded by my people. Throughout the afternoon and evening I busily catalogued the differences to myself: a fetching new hairstyle, funky new trousers, a highly promising new boyfriend, a gorgeous little boy toddling about and charming everyone. Nothing about the way we all fit together perfectly had changed even a little bit.

Every part of the wedding weekend was most excellent fun. The barbecue on Big Day Eve at Vaucluse, overlooking the harbour filled with sailboats, was quiet and lovely and tinged with anticipation. I ate salad and drank mid-strength beer (which I had totally forgotten about, by the way. Mid-strength beer!) and chatted happily with everyone as I felt my head swim with jetlag in an not-altogether-unpleasant fashion.

The next day, we descended upon Kate in her hotel room as she was getting all brided up and were, quite simply, blown away. Our Kate is always smoking hot, and on her wedding day she was breathtaking. Everything about her was just right: the dress, the hair, the shoes, the jewellery. I’ve never seen anyone look so much the best version of themselves. She glowed.

She was uncharacteristically nervous, however – so I busted out the lame wisecracks (as is my role) and opened the bottle of Agua de Valencia that I had brought with me - a little piece of Spain to share with my girlfriends who really should have been there with me (how can I possibly have had that much fun without them?). We left her to go and have her photo taken with the soon-to-be-future Mr Poundster and the rest of us got ready – with, not to put too fine a point on it, spectacular results. As soon as I get my act into gear and put the photos up you’ll be able to see what I mean.

The wedding was magnificent. There’s no other word for it. The location was stunning, with an endless view of the ocean from the balcony of the restaurant. Everywhere I turned there was a welcome face and I buzzed around the room madly soaking up as many of everyone’s stories as I could hear.

I had been quietly confident that the Poundsters were going to give good wedding ceremony and they did not disappoint. I don’t remember specifics (except who else manages to get a pointed reference to same-sex marriage into their vows?) but for the rest of my life I will remember watching Andy’s face shine with delight as he married my good friend. I may or may not have shed a wee tear myself.

It’s always hard to pinpoint exactly what makes a wedding a success – whatever it is, though, this party had in spades. The closest I can get to a description that seems to fit is that there was a current of joy positively crackling throughout the room. Kate and Andy are well loved and it felt like everyone was so happy they were perilously close to bursting. The food was outstanding, the speeches brilliant (people were even kind enough to laugh during mine. At the jokes, not at me. I think). We drank and laughed and danced like crazy people and it was the most fun of ever.

When it ended, we unstrapped our shoes and wandered down to the beach – soothing our sore feet in the sand, letting the spray hit our faces and the surf crash all over our fancy dresses. The smell of salt and the moonlit sky was the perfect end to one of the best nights of my life.

The next day was bittersweet. An early morning swim in the ocean, a flat white (oh god, so good), a surprise birthday bagel from my favourite St Kilda bakery and then the delicious post-wedding yum cha brunch with the gleeful and still-glowing newlyweds, everyone merrily swapping stories, still high on the buzz from the night before. Throughout the morning, my stomach twisted itself steadily into a sad, quiet knot.

The leaving was hard – Part I of my weekend was over almost as soon as it began. I was angry with myself for presuming that it would be enough. What on earth had I been thinking? How could I possibly leave? It got harder and harder to hold myself together and eventually I had to bolt. I hugged everyone hard, and J,The and Mazza walked me out to the street.

I’m not proud of how I handled my departure – the panic took over and I approached hysteria in a tearful and most uncool fashion. Logically I know that if the weekend proved nothing else it’s that time and space mean nothing and my friends will always be there and it will always be that good – but in that moment I felt stricken and utterly dumbfounded that I could be so stupid as to choose to live a world away.

I love you guys.

Once J,The and Mazza made their lucky escapes from the crazy woman, scurrying gratefully back down the steps back towards brunch, I pulled myself together and headed off to hang out with my family.

One of the best things about my family is the way their presence comforts me, whatever the situation. It didn't fail this time either, and we had ourselves a time, my folks and I. My brother (the famous Captain Kloss) and his girlfriend came to Sydney too, and we wandered through the city for the rest of the day – shopping and chatting and eating and arguing about which streets were no-right-turn. Later, back at the hotel, we watched the cricket and listened to the roar of the crowd watching Glenn McGrath’s last home innings waft over from the SCG.

Captain Kloss has a favourite seafood restaurant on the wharf at Woolloomooloo, and that night we dressed up and went to have an utterly spectacular meal. We toasted each other (and the absent TPC) with cocktails, bantered with our very charming waiter and debated whether or not it was actually possible to taste the difference between rock oysters from various parts of the greater Sydney region (it is). We got drunk and talked shite and solved the problems of the world and patted ourselves very heartily on the back and it was just what being with my family is always like. I was elated all over again. Later, we adjourned to a pub in Surry Hills and watched England win the one-day trophy. My presence was (not unreasonably) blamed.

CK and Leah had to leave early the next morning, and my parents and I had a long, lovely, lazy day just hanging out. We shopped some more – you'll be pleased to know I bought what can only be described as a metric fuckload of Bonds underwear (there just isn’t anything like it anywhere else). We ate and wandered aimlessly and talked. We went for a long drive along the beaches and I soaked up the sunshine and the stunning views – storing up images of home to flick through in my mind for the rest of the London winter.

That tight painful knot in my belly emerged again and before long I was hugging my parents goodbye at the airport. They are very understanding of my wanderlust, but nothing brings me undone faster than watching my mother try to be brave. I realised that I do understand what all those miles actually feel like - it’s in those moments that the vastness of the distance is absolutely real.

***

Here’s what I learned: there’s a reason why one can’t do trips like that too often. It’s not the expense, or the physical impact – it’s that it is too damn good. It hurts too much to leave again.

It was nice to get home to London – I had a pang of excited affection when I saw the lights of the city, and the warm comfort of our lovely flat, The Pickle, was very welcome at the end of many hours of travel. I’ve spent the last fortnight a little bit introspective and a little bit sad, however – this jaunt has made me question why the hell I’m here, what I’m doing and why. I don’t want to move back to Australia, but the fact that the people I love are so freaking far away has never been so present in my mind.

You know what, though? It was totally worth it.

Thanks for a lovely weekend, you guys.

I’m going to write to Richard Branson this week – I have a proposition for him. I’m sure space travel is fun, but my friendly local neighbourhood billionaire entrepreneur needs to be investing resources into what we really need: a teleport. Wouldn’t that be the awesome? Anyone could pop back and forth whenever, go see their favourite band play Wembley or their newborn niece in Guatemala or go mountain-climbing or ice-skating or on a safari for the weekend. And I could have a flat white and make my friends laugh anytime I want.

Hi. Hello. Elderly. A little drunk.

2007-02-27T23:31:00.000Z

HI! IT'S MY BIRTHDAY!

(I originally typed that as 'birthda' , which I think has a certain ring to it.)

I have had a lovely day. I had breakfast with The People's Champion and Rip van Winkle, I spoke to some most excellent folks from home. I went to work, where I managed to not only meet but exceed my monthly performance target (yay, not getting sacked!). I had lunch with some work friends at a pub owned by an Australian woman with the best name of all time: Roxy Beaujolais. Rock and roll.

Tonight I went for dinner with the aforementioned TPC and RVW, together with Dr Evil and Madam Fox. When I say 'dinner', I meant 'cocktails'. I mean, we did have dinner - at an excellent Moroccan restaurant - but given that I had three mojitos before we even considered adjourning for food, my birthday had been well and truly celebrated already. The lovely Lady Thommo joined us for dinner, and we drank red wine and made Shroud of Turin jokes and had ourselves a time.

I miss you guys. I have stories to tell: the wedding was lovely and my departure from Sydney heartbreaking. The jet lag sucked in a major way, but it was worth it. Since then, there have been many amusing moments, which I will share as soon as possible. We had our housewarming on the weekend and we lit the town afire. Also, there are photos, and that's the only way to tell a story about tarts.

None of this makes any sense, but I've had a lot of wine. And mojitos. Drunky posting is fun. I will write more, I just wanted to let you know that I'm thinking of you all.

I have commenced my thirtieth year. It's going to be spectacular. And I'm thinking Shanghai for February 27, 2008. Who's up for it?

Home!

2007-02-09T22:08:00.000Z

It's a beautiful sunny morning, and I'm sitting in an apartment in Surry Hills looking over Sydney Town. It's hot but there's a lovely breeze. Yesterday, I went for a long walk along Bondi Beach and kicked around in the Pacific Ocean. I had a chocolate paddle pop which melted all over my fingers.

It's good to be home.

This is a lovely place, you guys. The flight was LONG, and I do not feel anywhere near my physical peak (wherever that is), but it's worth it. I went to a barbecue last night at Neilsen Park at Vaucluse and had a beer while looking out over Sydney Harbour.

The wedding is this evening, I'm having breakfast with my family and then heading over to Bondi to watch KPO get all brided up. More later.

Hope those of you in England are nice and warm. That it snowed in London the night I left blows my mind all over the place.

Reasons to be cheerful..

2007-02-06T00:15:00.000Z

So much for New Year’s resolutions – this poor wee blog has been as woefully neglected as ever. January has been rather tedious – as I have hinted in previous posts – and I just haven’t felt particularly chatty this year so far.

I have been working a LOT. The sacred slacker covenant of the Working Holiday has been well and truly broken – in my bid to see if just maybe they’ll let me stay in this country, I’ve been trying to secure the fickle affections of my employer through a truly shameless display of brownie-point-gathering: many hours at my desk, an increased caseload, volunteering for responsibility. I’m drowning in it at present, which is unfun. There’s an element of panic – even after slogging my guts out all month, I didn’t ‘make target’ in January. I find arbitrary numerical performance measures intensely frustrating, but they fired one of my fellow contractors this week for lack of productivity, so the threat is real.

I swore I’d never let a job become my life again. In this case, there’s a clearly defined end point (I should qualify for the visa by May) but getting there has been dragging me way on down.

I’ve been living fairly quietly in between, as well – trying to save money to pay off urgent debts is a difficult task for me in the best of circumstances. In this town, it’s almost impossible and it makes me grumpy.

It hasn’t been all gloom, of course – RVW and I are settling nicely into The Pickle (did I tell you we named our flat?) and The People’s Champion is a most entertaining houseguest. Together with Dr Evil and Madam Fox we have reinforced our commitment to the Sunday Roast Club – and after sampling many of the pubs in our immediate neighbourhood have settled on this place as the venue of choice for our weekly meetings. We saw a musical, watched the Ashes, played in some snow, and I may or may not have had my first Bundy in about 15 years in joining my little brother in his traditional observance of Our National Day.

February is going to be great. We’re only a week in, but I’ve already been reminded of how much fun there is to be had if I just get out and make the most of this city. Madam Fox and I danced our asses off at a Bloc Party gig at the Astoria on Thursday night, and on Saturday evening I saw this play, of which I give the following one-word review: ‘excellent’. I spent some quality time at the Spitalfields markets yesterday and tonight RVW and I sent out invitations for our housewarming party later in the month (conveniently scheduled to coincide with a Very Important Birthday). You should all come along…

But do you know what I'm really excited about tonight? The Wedding of The Year is taking place next Saturday afternoon. And I am going to BE THERE.

Oh yes, it is the true. Two more sleeps until I hop aboard a large plane and commence my journey southwards. As some of you are already aware, this is quite possibly the stupidest trip ever in that I am only going to be in town for a total of four days. The Great Visa Attempt precludes my taking any time off work, but I cannot resist the lure of what promises to be a most outstanding party.

I apologise most sincerely to those in Melbourne, Brisbane and Canberra - I promise I'll skip Sydney next time I head home and head straight to where you are.

I've had a haircut, packed my thongs and worried about how pasty my arms are going to look in my new blue frock. My mountain of work isn't going to magically disappear while I'm away, and there are many weeks of the cold and grey still to come - but for the moment, I'm dreaming gleefully of sunshine.

Snow!

2007-01-24T08:40:00.000Z

So I've been feeling uninspired lately, with little to say on this here page. Apparently Monday was officially the most depressing day of the year. I have been looking forward to January being done.

But then this morning I woke up to this:

Here is a photo of our balcony, with our mop and bucket, our broom and our collection of wooden planks in a pot* all covered with snow!

I'm excited. There's not much of it, but for some reason the sight of this dirty city dusted with gleaming white has lifted my spirits.

I'm going to enjoy the walk to work this morning. If my face doesn't freeze off.

* RVW is totally going to make something with those one day, absolutely, no question. So we mustn't throw them away.

Hooray for Capricorns!

2007-01-15T23:32:00.000Z

Today, January 15, is a very special day. It is John Chilembwe Day in Malawi, Korean Alphabet Day in North Korea, Martin Luther King Day in the United States and Pongal in Tamil Nadu. It is the anniversary of the day the British Museum opened in 1759 and the day that construction on the world’s largest office building, the Pentagon, was completed in 1943.

(Thank you, wiki).

It is also J,The’s birthday. HAPPY BIRTHDAY, J,The!

It’s something of a milestone birthday, this one, and when I spoke with her this morning J,The said she feels very comfortable, as though the age she has been meant to be for some time has finally arrived.

jLo: “You wear it well”.

J,The: "This is true."

And so it is.

Many of you are more than familiar with the awesomeness that is J, The. For those of you that aren't, well, cross your fingers that you will chance upon her one day. She is the most spectacular person we have ever met – and she really should take me more seriously than she does when I say things like that.

I have a collection of J,The quotes that I carry with me, and I found one this morning when I was leafing through an old notebook. I thought I’d throw it up here in case it is illuminating for anyone else as well.

It doesn’t have to be perfect to be good.

-- J, The, 2006

I hope you had a most excellent day, lovey. See you soon!

Nil desperandum?

2007-01-09T23:50:00.000Z

(Don't worry, I'm not sure what my point is either).

To celebrate my lifetime membership of the Hooray for the Bleeding Obvious Club, I will say this: the thing about uncertainty is that you just have no idea what the hell is going to happen.

Mine is an unquiet, fussing brain - I’m running scenarios and outcomes in my head in an endless loop. That tightly-wound knot of apprehension in my subconscious leaks its way, drip by festering drip, into my everyday life. All my well-intentioned resolutions fall away, the to-do list is insurmountable and I seek refuge in sleep and chocolate and cigarettes and avoidance. I am blocked and stunted and tired, goddammit – tired of wondering and worrying and of the effort it takes to ignore it all, talk like I know what I’m doing and hope for the best.

My plans are precariously balanced, you see: considered and reasonably thorough but entirely dependent on a web of variables that stubbornly refuse to resolve themselves.

Tomorrow I get some answers, thankfully. It’s been a long week.

In the meantime, I cope by taking an absurd amount of satisfaction in everyday pleasures. Our boiler broke on Sunday and was fixed this morning just as our bathroom was receiving the scrubbing it so desperately required. The hot shower I had tonight was the best thing that's happened this week so far.

Then, warm and clean and relatively becalmed, I managed to magically solve one of my problems. I’ve been fretting about my laptop, lately, among other things – it’s getting on for three years old and has started to behave in an uncharacteristically unreliable fashion. For instance: Why is the screen so dim? There must be something wrong. I can barely read this, shit, it must be giving up the ghost. Will there be room in the budget for a new one? How the hell am I going to back everything up? Why haven’t I done that already? What if I lose everything, I’ll only have myself to blame, I really should have all this more sorted than I do, callyourselfanadultwhoareyoukidding, AAAARRGGGH.

(See how this works? No wonder I'm tired.)

Then! I found the little button that you brighten the screen with. I’m now blinded by refreshingly stark white pages. Sigh. The fun thing about being my kind of stupid is that these little triumphs can change my whole mood.

(Of course now there’s no need to worry about backing up my hard drive. It’s easily ignorable once again. Hoorah!)

RVW just bounded into the living room, shouting, “I know what I forgot to do today!”

“What’s that?” I asked.

“HAVE A BEER!”

And that made me laugh.

(You know, you should be more grateful that I don’t post more often. If I sit down and make myself write something, anything, whatever is on my mind, you get more entries like this. Sucks to be you guys!)

Prague

2007-01-03T08:21:00.000Z

So, this post is long. Really freaking long. I was going to try to do one of those show/hide thingys, but it all got a bit hard and so up the whole thing goes. Make a cup of tea or somesuch, and enjoy this report of A Very Lovel(l)y Christmas.

One.

jLo and The People’s Champion, a little drunken, decide late one Saturday night a week before Christmas that it would be fun to call Captain Kloss, their other sibling in faraway BrisVegas. TPC chats for a moment, then decides the couch is calling and soon the sonorous rumble of his heavily aspirated snores fills the room. jLo takes the phone out onto the balcony so that she can hear Kloss properly. She is drunk and rambly.

jLo: So. We’re going to Prague next weekend. You should come!

CK: I should.

jLo: Absolutely. You totally will, I know it. What time will your flight arrive?

CK: 10am on Friday 22nd December.

jLo: Hahahahahaahhahahaaaa.

CK: No, seriously.

jLo: What?!

CK: I booked it six weeks ago.

jLo: WHAT?!

CK: Didn’t you just indicate that you were aware of this?

jLo: Dude. I was kidding.

CK: Well, there goes that surprise.

jLo: !!!

Two.

After many hours in endless queues, our heroes find themselves in a cab on the way from Prague airport. It is Christmas Eve Eve. jLo, having been unusually jittery all morning at the thought of missing the plane, is bouncing on her seat in excitement.

jLo: I think we need a beer. Immediately upon our arrival at the hotel. If not sooner.

TPC/RVW: Dude. It’s 10:30am. We left home at 4:00am. You have a problem.

jLo: Czech beer is excellent. We should start as we mean to go on, etc.

TPC: Why are you bouncing and jittery?

jLo: I’m VERY EXCITED. To be here, I mean. Of course. (She squirms with glee).

TPC: Simmer down. Seriously. No-one could possibly be that excited after that many hours at Heathrow.

jLo: That’s why we need that beer.

Ten minutes later, jLo drags them (under protest) into the hotel bar. TPC, casting his eyes around the room, notices something familiar about the back of the head of the gentleman in the far corner.

TPC: What the…?

CK: Why, hello.

TPC: !!!

jLo: Hoorah! (She does a little dance). It’s a Team LoveTrain Christmas!

(Two beers later)

jLo: So. Here we are in Prague. Let’s go Czech it out.

(A pause).

jLo: Get it? Get it? CZECH it out! HA!

TPC: Be quiet. Immediately.

CK: I’m going home.

Three.

Later, rested, our little trio prepares to kick it, Prague-style. They wander out from the hotel down into the main square, which is all ablaze with Christmas. They pause for a moment, gazing in wonder at the indescribable beauty of the scene: spectacularly ornate buildings and row upon row of market stalls twinkling with fairy lights, a giant Christmas tree, carols playing and the smell of wurst and gluhwein wafting through the air.

jLo spots a souvenir T-shirt shop.

jLo: Look! That t-shirt says Czech Me Out! I TOLD you it was funny.

TPC (his mood considerably improved): That Czech Mate one is better.

jLo: Let’s buy big furry hats with Communist badges on them!

TPC: Ve vill give some Hard Currency to the Comrade. Ja!

CK: Nyet. Seriously, you guys. Let’s find a pub.

jLo: First, we must eat the sausage. (She pauses). I know how you both love the sausage.

TPC/CK: jLo, glassed.

They eat the sausage. CK takes the first of his ten million photographs. He crouches down to get the perfect shot, his shutter clicking rapidly as he plays paparazzo. TPC and jLo chuckle heartily at his earnestness. And drink gluhwein.

Four.

It has taken a long time to find an open pub. They have walked for hours, trying to find somewhere reasonably central (CK is scared of the back streets) but neon-free (jLo has already used her veto for the weekend by declaring that there was no way she is setting foot inside a TGI Friday’s). TPC is very thirsty.

jLo: We should have stayed at that cool bar with all the kitschy Soviet-era souvenirs on the walls. And the yak’s head. And the awesome Euro-power-ballads playing.

TPC (very thirsty, and thus grumpy again): They put us in the back room so that we wouldn’t contaminate the place with our touristness. Also, the kitchen was closed.

jLo: FINE. How about here?

They go into a dreadful pub with a Pacific-island theme. There are wooden idol carvings on the wall, and MTV on the many flatscreens around the bar. jLo, desperate for the bathroom, excuses herself and wanders out of the main bar in that direction.

She is back a moment later.

CK: That was quick.

jLo: Yeah. Um, I decided I didn’t need to go after all.

CK: Bullshit. What just happened?

jLo: Well. There’s a security keypad. You need to type in a code. I can’t even say ‘thank you’ in Czech yet, there’s no way I can work out how to ask for the bathroom code. Besides, how on earth do you mime that?

CK and TPC both consider this, and agree that it would be somewhat embarrassing to try.

jLo: So, you know, I’ll wait until the next one.

She crosses her legs and attends to her beer. The atmosphere in this bar leaves much to be desired, so our trio get up from their table to resume their search. As they leave the bar, CK notices a sign painted above the exit:

“WC CODE: 5436”

CK and TPC turn slowly to stare at jLo. She looks sheepish.

jLo: I am an idiot.

CK/TPC: Yes. Yes, you are.

Five.

TPC: We’re going to Rocky O’Reilly’s.

jLo: No! We didn’t come all this way to go to an Irish bar.

TPC: Look. It’s Christmas. The city has closed down. The Czechs are with their families. And we are still. freaking. thirsty. This is the only place that’s open. We’re going in here.

jLo: (Sighs) A good point, well made. Let’s do it.

They traipse in, it’s exactly how you would imagine. They settle in around a curved bar overlooking, of all things, a wishing well.

TPC: Right. Absinthe!

jLo: Are you sure?

CK: Damn straight. We want to HALLUCINATE! Plus, when in Rome, etc. Or Prague.

jLo: Okay then!

They order the shots, with chasers of their now-favourite Czech lager, the amusingly named Pilsner Urquell.

CK: So, what do we do? You’re the expert, apparently.

jLo: Well. You take the spoon, like this. And you pour the sugar on, like this.

The boys follow her instructions.

jLo: And now, you wet the sugar carefully with the alcohol, like this.

They do so.

jLo: Now, you set it on fire!

It’s a beautiful sight, the three sitting at their bar, holding flaming spoonfuls of sugar above glasses of bright green rocket fuel.

jLo: Now! See how the sugar is bubbling? Now you dump it into the drink, and stir!

(Please note: jLo has forgotten a vital step – namely, extinguishing the flame).

CK/TPC: Aaargh! It’s all on fire!

jLo: Shit. We were supposed to blow it out. Blow! Blow!

They blow into their glasses frantically. jLo blows TOO frantically, and spills flame all across the table, and all along CK’s trousers.

CK: Aargh! I’m on fire!

He beats away at his trousers. His drink continues to flame.

TPC: Here, use this saucer to starve it of oxygen!

This method works. Their drinks are no longer on fire. However:

jLo: (raising her glass to her lips): AAARRGH! The glass is hot!

CK/TPC: You jackass.

jLo: I guess we’d better leave them to cool for a bit.

They sit there, looking at their drinks, jLo wearing her sheepish face again.

jLo: Next time, we should blow out the flame before we stir it in.

TPC/CK: You think?

They do their shots. The boys’ eyes roll back into their heads. They come to, and all three exchange excited glances. That was fun!

All: Again!

Waitress: How many of these have you guys had tonight?

All: Oh, that was our first one.

Waitress: Okay then. You can have another.

They do, this time with significantly less mishap.

CK/TPC: That’s enough.

jLo: (very evidently not the smartest in her family): No! One more!

The boys refuse, switching to more familiar poisons. jLo has her third absinthe.

(Ten minutes later)

jLo: I love youse guys. (She hiccups). No, really. (She bursts into tears). I really, really love youse guys. I’m so h-h-(hic!)-happy we’re all together.

TPC/CK: There, there, jLo.

TPC: Let’s get out of here.

CK: Yup.

Six.

jLo has been babbling away non-stop for the past half hour. She looks up at one point, and realises that the woman in front of her has just taken her bra off.

jLo: Holy shit! That woman just took her bra off!

CK: Well, obviously.

jLo: What the hell do you mean? Where ARE we?

TPC: We are at the Jungle Bar.

jLo: (swaying slightly) Why?

TPC: It’s open. Plus, that guy on the street gave us a discount.

jLo: Oh, okay. Where’s my beer?

CK: Right here. Now sshh.

jLo subsides for a few moments and watches the show. The acrobatics are quite remarkable. She opens her mouth to ask a question about the boy’s impressions of the politics of strip shows. CK notes the gleam in her eye.

CK: No. SSSHHH. We can chat if you like. But don’t start with that.

jLo: But I’m interested in …

CK: NO!

jLo: But what do you think of….?

TPC: NO!

jLo: I’m not judging, I promise. It’s just that….

CK/TPC: NO! Sssh. Here, drink your beer.

jLo subsides once more, then busily picks an argument with CK about something different. They bicker happily for some time, then jLo notes one of the dancers talking with TPC. She is gesturing at herself, and a similarly-unclad friend. TPC is smiling good-naturedly, but shaking his head. jLo tries to hear.

TPC: Sorry, I’m out of cash. Thanks, though.

The girl turns to CK.

Mostly Naked Lady: How about you then?

CK: No, sorry. I’m all out of cash, too. I have an Amex, but I don’t think you guys take Amex. Sorry.

jLo: (unable to control herself any longer) YOOHOO! I’VE GOT MONEY! I’VE GOT HEAPS OF CASH! LOOK!

She opens her wallet, and pulls out several thousand crowns (Czech money is hilarious). She waves it in the air excitedly.

jLo: HERE YOU GO, YOU GUYS!

CK grabs her wrist and pulls the money away. He hisses at jLo:

CK: Be quiet! Good god, put that away and shut up! We were being polite!

jLo: Oh. (A pause). I thought I was being helpful.

CK: No.

jLo: Oh. (She watches the girl walk away).

CK: You’re not very cool, are you jLo?

jLo: No. Apparently not.

TPC shakes his head in disgust.

Seven.

jLo opens her eyes. There appears to be a cluster of machetes carving an ornate calligraphic artwork inside her brain. She notes a shrill clanging on the bedside table. She picks up the phone.

CK: Are you guys alive?

jLo ponders this question for some moments.

CK: Hello?

jLo: Um.

CK: Put TPC on.

jLo sits up, with some effort, and looks around the room. TPC is slumped on a chair, apparently in the process of trying to put his boots on.

jLo: TPC, are you alive?

TPC: No.

jLo to CK: He’s no longer alive.

TPC (with a tearful note of tragedy in his voice): This is the worst hangover of my life.

jLo to CK: He says it’s the worst hangover of his life.

CK: Really? That’s saying something.

jLo: Very true.

CK: Well. I’m going to sleep some more now.

jLo: Me too.

CK: I’ll see you guys in a bit.

jLo: Okay. (She hangs up the phone).

TPC: I’m going out.

jLo: Really?

TPC: Yes. I need to pretend I don’t feel like this.

jLo: Okay.

Eight.

Some hours later, our heroes are feeling slightly more human, thanks to a combination of a day of sleep, many litres of water, some paracetamol and, in TPC’s case, repeated purgings of his digestive system.

jLo: I can’t believe you hurled!

TPC: I never hurl. This place is evil. That green stuff..

jLo: You mean abs –

TPC: DON’T SPEAK ITS NAME. Ever again. It is the elixir of Satan.

jLo: Okay.

CK: What I can’t believe is that I flew halfway around the world to spend an entire day lying in bed praying for death.

jLo: Yes, well, that was Christmas Eve.

CK: Totally missed it.

jLo: Not totally! We are alive, we’re hungry, we have a Christmas dinner to find.

They join Rip Van Winkle and Ms A, who have been having a very clean-living and pain-free Prague experience thus far. The group wanders the streets of the old town, looking for a restaurant that is open. jLo leads them to a beer-hall type place she had seen earlier. It is warm and friendly – very touristy, but with apparently authentic Czech cuisine on the menu. When they see the large beer steins and a small metal stand upon each table hung heavily with giant pretzels, they know they’ve found their place.

Nibbling on the giant pretzels as they peruse the menu, each chooses something that seems suitably Czech-ish – goulash and cabbage and dumplings galore. Except for TPC, that is, who orders a steak.

jLo: Way to experience a different culture, there, TPC.

TPC: It comes with something called ‘Cowboy Sauce’. How can I say no?

CK: The man has a good point.

jLo: I guess.

The restaurant is charming. There is a very elderly gentleman roving about playing the accordion, his wrinkled face creasing into a smile as he approaches their table signalling for requests. Determining that they are English-speakers, he plays Sinatra, the Beatles, and assorted Christmas carols. At one point, he takes Ms A’s hand and puppeteers it up and down the keyboard, her world accordion debut.

After dinner, the Old Town Square beckons. The Czechs give good Christmas Eve, and a choir is providing a heavenly soundtrack to the bright lights and warm spiced wine. They linger, soaking up the atmosphere, stamping their feet in the cold and watching their cheeks glow red with excitement. It is beautiful.

Nine.

On Christmas Day, our travellers wake early and actually make it to the hotel breakfast they had paid for each day of their stay. Santa has attended, there is chocolate and phone calls home wearing stupid red and white hats.

After breakfast, they decide that in order to maximise the touristy opportunities of their final day a trip to Prague Castle is required. They meander their way through the old town and across the delightful Charles Bridge. The view is lovely – bleak and wintry, with naked tree branches and the frosty river against a backdrop of red roofs and spires.

TPC: I wonder who these statues are of.

jLo: If we were good tourists, we’d look it up.

TPC: Oh well.

CK: clickclickclickclickclickclick x 100000000. (He’s very busy, with his camera).

They stroll through the meandering cobbled streets up the hill to the spectacular medieval castle guarded by two massive titans atop the gate. Captain Kloss indulges his inner photographer some more, again – he even gets his tripod out – and the three spend a very pleasant morning wandering about the castle. There’s a dungeon with a rusty old rack, some breathtaking churches, and (inexplicably) a toy museum featuring a Barbie exhibition. Agreeing that this is too random to miss, they hand over a fistful of crowns and go look at the creepy plastic faces.

CK: Look! Elvis Barbie!

TPC: That little one there looks like Chucky.

jLo: These dolls are officially freaking me the fuck out.

They eat Christmas lunch at a restaurant in the castle, on a balcony overlooking the city. The balcony is freezing, but the restaurant has thoughtfully provided blankets on the back of each chair to wrap around our laps. Snuggled in, we order lavishly (it’s so cheap!) and survey the scene.

TPC: It is, indeed, very beautiful.

jLo: Told you.

CK: Yeah, whatever. Just quietly, though, it’s Christmas Day and there’s no sight of the snow I was promised.

(A pause).

TPC: Yeah. Damn you, Prague, for being so pretty I don’t even care!

jLo: Aw.

After the castle, they wander back down into town and through the Jewish quarter. They try in vain to find the main synagogue, the oldest functioning synagogue in Europe, apparently – but fail. They do find, however, an excellent Kafka statue.

CK: What. The fuck.

TPC: ??

jLo: I like it.

TPC: You would.

Ten.

Later that evening, our weary band of travellers converge upon the bar in CK’s fancypants hotel, which has promised to show the first session of the Boxing Day Test. They wind down and enjoy a few final pints of Urquell as they enjoy each other’s company for a few more hours and complete their Christmas tradition, watching the cricket together.

jLo: So where are we going to go next year?

CK/TPC: Vegas.

jLo: Cool.

These final hours are bittersweet – they haven’t spent so many hours in each other’s exclusive company for as long as they can remember. It’s going to be some time before it will happen again. jLo tries to talk CK into coming back to London and staying for New Year’s Eve, but he will have none of it. Apparently, there’s some party he’s hosting that can’t be missed. Whatever.

jLo: That was a pretty good Christmas, you guys.

TPC/CK: It sure was.

jLo: Thank you for coming, CK. This was outstanding.

TPC: Yeah.

CK: No worries, you guys. It was totally worth it.

And so it was.

Happy New Year

2007-01-01T21:20:00.000Z

This was the most peaceful New Year of my life. I had a reasonably large Saturday night and had to send my apologies to the party I had planned to attend last night. The last night of 2006 was spent very quietly, and I finally achieved that elusive hangover-free New Year’s Day. It felt great.

I’ve made my resolutions, and am feeling pretty good about the prospect of a brand new year.

It was a beautiful sunny day today - cold and clear. TPC and I had a picnic in Regent’s Park, then went for a long walk through the gardens and along the canal to Camden Lock. We spent an hour in a second-hand bookstore, then came home and cooked a roast for dinner. As I write, RVW is chopping vegetables to add to the leftover chicken bones, which he is planning to simmer slowly overnight so that we may have chicken soup tomorrow. We’re drinking a bottle of lovely French wine that my boss gave me for Christmas and listening to this. Soon, it will be time to cluster around a laptop screen, as my little brother has worked out how to stream the cricket live to his PC. We’ll sit up and watch the first session, then toddle off to bed.

Days don’t come much better than that.

Happy new year, you guys, I hope you had a great one. Here’s to 2007.

Prejeme Vam Vesele Vanoce a stastny Novy Rok

2006-12-25T16:22:00.000Z

Apparently, that's how you say Merry Christmas in Czech.

Greetings from frosty Prague! I hope you have all had a wonderful Christmas day.

This is such a beautiful place. I'm having a lovely time wandering the streets, drinking hot wine in the Old Town Square, exploring the castle and some excellent churches and soaking up the festive atmosphere. The Christmas lights are breathtaking and the city is even more lovely than I remembered.

And best of all? My brothers are here.

Oh yes, I said brothers. The People's Champion and I flew in on Saturday morning with Rip van Winkle and Ms A, his lovely girlfriend. Waiting in our hotel bar was Captain Kloss, having flown all the way from Brisbane to surprise the hell out of us. Best. Christmas present. Ever.

We have had a fantastic weekend - I can't remember the last time we were together for such a concentrated period. My hands are cracked from the cold, my belly is full of lager and dumplings, my face is sore from the laughing. It's awesome.

Merry Christmas, you guys!

Hiatus

2006-12-09T13:36:00.000Z

Hello, you guys. It really is inexcusable that I haven't been around here for more than a week, especially after promising that I would mend my slack ways.

However! I have logistical issues. I am in an internet cafe right now, which does not make me very happy. Here is why: firstly, we have, as yet, no internet in our new flat. Despite it being the first thing I tried to organise, apparently we won't have it until at least the end of next week but more likely sometime the next. Guh. I am finding this very tiresome.

Secondly, my prolific November blogging has had an unforeseen and unfortunate consequence: I have been officially cautioned at work for my internet usage. I wasn't using it THAT much, but the policy is strict and I broke it. Given that I am reasonably serious about keeping this job, I am now seeking to overcompensate by refraining from net usage entirely. Again, this is very tiresome. RVW pastes news stories into emails and sends them to my work address so that I can keep up with what's going on in the world. I hope none of you have been eaten by a bushfire.

In other news, all is well. The flat is coming together, slowly but surely, and we are hosting a Christmas dinner tonight as several of our friends are about to depart for the holidays. I have tinsel and an uber-tacky Secret Santa gift, RVW is doing the roast. I'm excited.

And here's the best bit: my little brother has arrived in London! The People's Champion, as he will be known until he lets me know what he would like his pseudonym to be, landed at the crack of dawn on Wednesday to begin his working holiday adventure. It is very lovely to have him here. I am being predictably annoying with the 'and another thing you need to know about London is...', but he's taking it in his stride so far. Talk to y'all again soon.

30 Days Hath November

2006-11-30T17:48:00.000Z

... and I've felt every last one of them.

Hoorah, we made it! I wasn't sure it was possible, but with one technical exception, I have posted something every day this month.

Here is what I have learned:

- My friends are very kind.

- I thought I had very little to say before, then I found out just how right I was.

I'm glad I did this, although I must confess that I am somewhat appalled at the overall dilution of the content - my random thoughts stretched so thin they crackled. Thanks for reading them, I'm glad I had some decent stories in reserve so that it wasn't all "and today I ate bad risotto for lunch". If I have made you chuckle then I am very glad.

There's a balance to be struck here, obviously - the feeble every day effort is a bit painful to watch, but I do need to post more often than I did before. I'm on the case.

I'm weary. I believe I may just take a day or two off. See you in December!

English People Are Rather Amusing Indeed, Episode 3

2006-11-29T17:49:00.000Z

Or, My Wallet Waterloo – A Story

Idly wandering in the sun on my lunchbreak, I finished my cigarette and contemplated acquiring a sandwich. As I entered the sandwich shop and looked for my wallet I discovered to my dismay that it wasn’t in my bag. I went back into the office, traipsed up to my third-floor desk, hoping hoping hoping that it would be there, but alas, ‘twas not to be.

There was a wee moment of panic, as I thought longingly of all the useful things in my wallet - like my keycard, and my travelcard, and all those very important pieces of paper that I haven’t got around to throwing out yet. And the pennies! Annoying as they are, right then I wanted those three metric tons of copper at the bottom of my purse so badly it hurt.

Relax, I thought. I mentally retraced my steps, and remembered that I had purchased coffee this morning on my way to work, so the most recent sighting of my wallet was at one of the many coffee shops at Waterloo station. I’m tempted to take a leaf out of the book of our good friend Samuel and describe my coffee here, but I think I’ll resist for now. I would like to investigate Samuel’s opinion as to the merit of the extra shot one day though, someone remind me.

I pushed my way through the lunchtime crowds at Waterloo and back to the coffee shop where I had purchased my morning caffeine hit. I waited in the lengthy queue, as is the custom in these parts, and gazed at the gorgeous baristas, all of whom, thanks to some happy accident of EU immigration laws, have sharp Slavic cheekbones and spectacularly husky Eastern European accents.

I waited until I could speak with the barista who had attended me that morning. Thankfully, she remembered me and explained in her lusciously broken English that they had handed my wallet in to the station reception and then gave me some vague directions.

After taking a few wrong turns, I eventually found my way to station reception, whereupon I met Ms Cranky.

Ms Cranky was very busy and important. I stood there for some time while she attended to matters far more critical than mine.

I explained my situation and she affirmed that they did indeed receive my wallet this morning. She consulted the lost property sheet, and her face darkened as she saw something that made her even crankier. Apparently, the Lost Property Office (LPO) attendant had failed to sign the transfer sheet to prove that he took receipt of my wallet.

Mindful of the time, and reassuring her that I’m just glad they had it and that it was not wandering around in someone else’s pocket right now, I asked if she could just direct me to the LPO, so I could collect the wallet anyway. She glared at me.

“You just wait there.”

I subsided obediently, stood and waited.

First she attended to her walkie talkie, trying to get hold of Paul, the hapless non-signing LPO dude. Someone reported that Paul was on lunch and she screeched at that person to get him BACK, NOW, because she had to talk to him.

Minutes ticked by, I gazed at the ceiling and hummed to myself while Ms Cranky fumed. The phone rang. She picked it up angrily and started to bawl Paul out for failing to sign the register. I stand there, wondering what on earth this has to do with me. Eventually, her wrath spent, she slammed down the phone, read me the contents of my wallet as per the inventory they took that morning, and finally, FINALLY, gave me directions to the LPO.

Again, it took me some time to find it. Waterloo is a bit of a maze, and if you take the wrong exit you’re not only heading in the wrong direction, it is so difficult to find your way back that it is as if you have stepped into another dimension of space and time (the fourth dimension, perhaps?). The LPO was right at the end of a long, dusty, smelly tunnel.

Paul, the hapless LPO attendant, was the kind of guy for whom the word ‘gormless’ was invented. Drab and grey, with a round face and huge glasses, he looked EXACTLY like the kind of guy who would get very, very attached to his stapler.

He, too, had both a walkie-talkie and a portable phone. As I joined the queue, he was in the midst of a lengthy conversation that seemed to displease him greatly. He would listen intently, then pull the phone away from his ear, gaze out at the assembled queue of people, shake his head in disbelief, and then listen again. Possibly he was receiving another bollocking from Ms Cranky, it was hard to tell.

I could SEE my wallet by this stage, it was on the desk behind the glass window.

I have another lengthy wait in this particular queue, listening, my tummy grumbling, as the woman in front of me had a detailed conversation with Mr Gormless. She painstakingly explained each phase of her morning commute, and offered various hypotheses as to where and when it could have been that she misplaced her plastic wallet filled with paper (activity sheets for her primary school class, apparently). She and Mr Gormless discussed the degree of likelihood of each possibility at some length, but alas, she went away empty handed. I thought sadly of those kiddies whose afternoon would be tragically activity-free.

At last it was my turn. I pointed at my wallet and asked for it politely. Mr Gormless picked it up and held it tantalisingly close to the hole in the window. I reached out to take it, whereupon he told me that there was a £2 recovery fee.

I laughed. Ha! Who would have thought, Mr Gormless had a sense of humour!

Only, not so much. He looked at me impassively, and my giggles subsided.

“Really?”

“Yes.”

“REALLY?”

“Yes.”

I laughed again, only this time in disbelief. “£2?” “Yes.”

“Okay then. Well, if you’ll just pass me my wallet… “

“I’m afraid I can’t do that.”

“What?”

“I can’t give you the item until you pay the fee.”

“But…whuh…how can I…” I spluttered. Surely he couldn’t be serious.

But he definitely was.

There was a tense pause.

“Well, sir. It appears we are at an impasse.” (I couldn’t resist).

“Yes, it does.” His face was expressionless, he gave away nothing.

Eventually, after some scintillating back and forth discussion, he was persuaded to push it part way through the window so that I could extract the fee. Once I had it in my hands, I don’t think I need to describe the overwhelming strength of the urge to turn and flee that washed over me.

However, despite my frustration, I thought of Ms Cranky upstairs and how this guy was obviously having a bad day already. I wouldn’t take my protest out on this hapless minion, I would pursue it with the proper authorities. I did, however, laugh loudly as I gingerly extracted £2 and pushed it through, shaking my head in disbelief.

English people are hilarious.

The End.

Shaken or stirred?

2006-11-28T23:46:00.000Z

Do I look like the kind of girl who gives a damn?

So, we went to see Bond tonight, and it was tres fun. We decided to dress up, and in the process of doing so I made a tragic discovery: my spy dream will never be realised. I can't do disguises. I couldn't handle the heels, I couldn't handle the nails ...

and I set my gloves on fire while lighting a cigarette. Twice.

One foot in the grave

2006-11-27T17:53:00.000Z

Here is a post about getting old, for The Editor on his birthday: Happy birthday, Ed!

The scene: at the pub (where else?) with my friends Ms Pistol and jPet, having a conversation about our respective ages.

MsP: “Wait, jLo. How old are you now?”

jLo: “28”.

MsP (shocked beyond belief). “Oh, GOD!” (A pause). “Sorry, jLo.”

jPet and jLo: collapse in laughter. Ms P is very embarrassed.

Later in the evening, we decide it is time to soak up some of the wine with greasy pub food.

jLo: “Cheesy wedges with chorizo. Could there BE a more perfect meal?”

jPet: “I cannot see any possible downside.”

jLo: “Other than the fact that I will die of a heart attack at age 30.”

(A beat).

“Which, you know, for me is REALLY FREAKING SOON.”

MsP: “I SAID I was sorry. GOD!”

jLo: “It’s okay, Ms P. These wedges complete me.” (Looks down at plate, makes ‘you complete me’ signs).

“That I am so close to my grave means nothing. I can die happy, knowing that I have tasted the sublime.”

jPet: “Me too. I will come here every day and fill the hole in my heart with cheesy wedges.”

jLo: “Deal”.

Stay tuned

2006-11-26T18:30:00.000Z

...normal broadcasting to resume on the morrow. I hope.

In the meantime, I have for you some haiku:

New flat on Old Street:
Unlimited potential
Once the filth is gone.

What sort of person
Leaves horrific stains, dust and
a mountain of trash?

Unashamedly
We looked through her old papers
Former beauty queen!

Decor ideas
Float endlessly through our minds
Very exciting.

Great pub across road
Made from an old sailboat, serves
Excellent beer.

And again...

2006-11-25T19:04:00.000Z

Sorry, folks, we are in a (very boring to read about) holding pattern here in London town. The flat move is ongoing, and so internet access is sporadic at best and if the truth be known, mostly stolen. I will update properly when I can.

The previous tenant in our flat apparently saw fit to leave a vast quantity of her shit behind for us to deal with. How pleasant! And, not content with merely bequeathing her belongings, she seems to think it appropriate to leave us with a really quite remarkable amount of her own personal dirt. Oh yes! The flat is filthy. We are in the process of cleaning it to a state fit for our habitation, and then on Monday the real estate agency will be instructed to send in the cavalry to scrub the walls and floors and collect the trash.

Ugh! This is a freaking pain in my arse. It will all be over soon, but in the meantime I am much displeased.

Moving Day!

2006-11-24T22:57:00.000Z

Hooray, the day has finally arrived, when Rip van Winkle and I move into our NEW FLAT! I have been waiting eagerly for this day for quite some time.

Only, you know, not so much. Real estate agents, it seems, are freaking irritating the world over. Today, when I turned up at the agency to pay them ten million trillion dollars and collect the keys, I was informed that the current tenant hasn't actually left yet. She'll be gone by 2pm tomorrow. The real estate agency doesn't open again until Monday. No condition report, no professional cleaning, take it or leave it.

The worst part is, we have no choice. We can't have it now (although I have a key! I could totally go round there and help the tenant pack!), and I need somewhere to live tomorrow. GRRR.

Deep breaths. What do we do in annoying situations such as this? We go to the pub to watch some soothing cricket. Oh yes, that's what we do. Soon it'll all be sorted.... Hope you're having a great weekend.

Hooray for Cricket and Hot Priest Action

2006-11-23T18:03:00.000Z

Good gracious, I’m weary. It’s been quite a week. After a crazily busy week at work and a series of accidentally large (but very enjoyable) evenings, sitting up to watch the cricket last night has tipped me over the edge of ordinary, everyday weariness into a pathetic whimpering zombified mess.

But it was ever so fun! There’s only a handful of pubs staying open late here to show the matches, but thankfully there was one within walking distance from Dr Evil’s lair so RVW and I toddled along there at about 11pm. I was very excited, as you can probably imagine, although I confess the wide establishing shots of the Gabba and the blue Queensland sky made me a wee bit homesick. You know you’re in trouble when you’re getting misty at the dulcet tones of Ian Healy. It didn’t help that I knew my brothers were right there, and I scanned each crowd shot carefully to see if they were making a proper spectacle of themselves – although to be honest, I didn’t need globally televised evidence to know they would be doing just that.

I had a lovely time and am very glad I sat up for it. A quiet pint or two, some friendly banter with the assembled Englishers, hilarious text conversations with folks at home, an excellent evening all round. I’m paying for it now.

In other news, my addled, sleep-deprived brain is currently distracted by a wonderful new addition to my cubicle décor here in the office. The lovely Lady K, who has spent the last few months jet-setting all over the world, stopped in today to have lunch with me and to present me with an excellent gift: a Men of the Vatican 2007 calendar. Picture it: 12 months of strapping young priesty eye-candy, all gazing soulfully at me as I sit at my computer and lust quietly after their dog collars and fancy hats. It’s exceptional. Especially Mr July.

Insurance

2006-11-22T13:11:00.000Z

Howdy kids, a slightly strange post today. My esteemed brothers have set up a website to document their adventures at the Gabba during the First Test. If you fancy a read, you can find it here.

They asked me to write a guest post for the blog, which I have done. I am posting it here firstly to serve as proof that I wrote it in time (long shot, given that last night was an accidental write-off). Secondly, I strongly suspect that Captain Kloss will be unable to resist the temptation to edit what I have written, and so I am posting the original here in all its glory, as insurance against his evil ways.

I apologise in advance, you guys don't know these people. Hopefully it's mildly amusing anyway. Hope you have fun watching the game, wherever you may be.

Tell ‘Em They’re Dreaming

A guest post from jLo, of ficklish.

I can only assume that I was asked to write this because, as a veteran of many First Day Stacks myself, I have a unique appreciation of the specific challenges involved. Of course, I always regarded The Stack as an art form – an homage, if you will – to be approached with humility and reverence rather than as a shameless, desperate vehicle for short lived, empty glory.

(Sigh). I don’t know. Kids today – they’ve got no respect.

Having said this, I have studied the analysis on these pages carefully and will be following the progress of these brave fellows with interest. I haven’t been there for the so-called ‘warm-up’ events, however I don’t regard this as a problem in terms of offering thoughts on their prospects. The Gabba Stack-A-Thon is a bit like the Melbourne Cup, in my opinion, in that past form means little in an event of this calibre. Many are called, few are chosen, and the darkest horse might just be worth a shot.

I do know the competitors. Some of them I’ve known their whole lives, others since the days they were throwing West Coast Wine Coolers down their teenage throats in a dodgy Ormiston car park. I’ve seen all of these gentlemen in action, and it’s safe to say I’m never been particularly impressed.

What I propose to do is to offer you a thought or two on each of the combatants, giving you a unique insight into their potential weaknesses and judging them according to their worth, rather than their ability.

Team LoveTrain

Captain Kloss
I find it very intriguing that glossary of this website specifically refers to a particularly significant event in both Gabba history and Lovell family lore: the day Dean Jones scored 145 on the hallowed turf. It may interest readers to know that we were all there on that memorable occasion, and Kloss slept right through it. It is his secret shame. Deep down inside, Kloss is still trying to atone for his sins against the Gabba. Guilt can be a powerful motivator, but in this case I suspect the stain will be too hard to scrub away.

Bill-A-Tron
Like the Captain, young Billatron has a lot at stake in this competition. The significance of this being his official Last Hurrah before he departs for foreign lands cannot be underestimated. I fear that, despite his form, he will try too damn hard to make this the performance of his life, rather than just letting his natural ability and excellent conditioning do the work. The choke is a real risk here. It might just be too much for him.

The ‘A’ Team

Loses points right off the bat for the name. Seriously, you guys. Glassed.

Dav Ross
Or, “Sir Pelican”, as he is known to some, namely me. His primary weakness, as far as I have been able to observe, is an apparently insurmountable vulnerability to high-quality sass. I once observed this fatal flaw during a particularly cut-throat Trivial Pursuit tournament: it was pitiful and not a little tragic to watch him disintegrate into meltdown as the mockery and piss-taking reached critical levels. I can only hope that he has worked on this aspect of his game, otherwise god help him.

Sir Rhyso
Here’s the thing about Rhys: He is a steady and reliable performer who gets the job done. He may be a FUC, but he rarely pikes and gets karma points from me because he is the only one of the whole stinking bunch who bothered to visit me when I lived in Our Nation’s Capital. Good on you, Sir Rhyso. The force will be with you, always. The only weakness I can identify is that the Gabba sun may wreak havoc upon his sensitive alabaster skin.

Team NotmuchofaChance

The Ayatollah
I don’t know about you lot, but I have always been under the impression that Ayatollahs don’t drink. It certainly looks like he’s having some sort of crisis of faith in his official team photograph, in which case let me caution the punters on the basis that such emotional and spiritual instability may be a serious liability. Further, I have observed that Mr Tunn cannot resist wading into arguments he has no chance of winning, and the other teams will be well advised to employ this tool to throw the Ayatollah off his game. A risky bet, in my opinion.

The Substitutes
They’re in Team NotmuchofaChance. Enough said.

That’s all I’ve got for now, kids. I’ll offer comments on the progress reports as they roll in. The only prediction I can make with complete confidence is that cricket (and beer) will be the winner on the day. And that’s just as it should be.

Stuff I Love Not So Much

2006-11-21T22:41:00.000Z

Following on from yesterday’s entry about chemists and nursery rhymes and Welsh people, today I will offer my list of things that drive me crazy-go-nuts about living here.

Once again, the obvious is almost too easy: the weather, the fact that English people moan all the time, the fact that London is so freaking expensive. I’ll take all that as read, although I don’t find the weather to be THAT bad, you know, and some English people are refreshingly unmoany, and London is okay once you’re earning pounds, but none of that is news to any of you.

Here is what’s left:

1. Dirt and Filth

I am unsure why, if I’m trying to avoid London clichés here, I’m choosing to include a mention of the dirt and not the weather. I suspect it is because rain bothers me less than black snot.

Apologies for being so (uncharacteristically) unladylike, but it freaks me out every time I blow my nose. Never in my young life have I had even the slightest hint of germaphobia: seriously, you don’t want to know where my hands have been. In London, neither do I.

Every time I hold a rail on the Tube I wonder at the filth of a million sweaty palms that is oozing onto my skin.

In some ways, I’m being unfair. There are few rubbish bins here, thanks to the both historical and current frolics of those pesky terrorist types. Most councils employ street sweepers – once I even saw a guy trying in vain to sandblast decades-old chewing gum from the footpaths. Try as they might, this remains a pretty dirty place.

2. Bad coffee

As I have complained elsewhere, it is far too difficult to get a decent coffee in this town.

There are approximately one million different coffee chains operating in the city, and their homogenous facades litter every street corner. They smell good, as coffee shops tend to do, but are hideously overpriced and the quality is almost universally disappointing.

I’m not after anything fancy: no flavourings or toppings, no fancy Christmas promotional drinks. All I want is a strong, hot latte* that tastes as good as the shop smells. I cannot see that this is too much to ask.

I know that I should abandon my morning fix in protest, however so far I have been unable to do so. I have taken to paying an extra 35p to have an additional shot of espresso, just so that it tastes of something. Grr.

* What I actually want is a flat white, but alas, they are not to be found in these parts.

3. WHOWTAHs

I hesitate to write about this, because there’s no way of expressing it without sounding like an arrogant snob. It’s inescapable, however, and so here I go: one of the worst things about living in London is other Australians.

I’m not ashamed of my country. Quite the opposite, in fact. However, there is a certain type of Strine in London that makes me want to flee in terror every time I hear their strident twang on the Tube. You know, those for whom Steve Irwin is a patron saint.

I’m sure they’re nice people. RVW and I have christened them WHOWTAHs, on the basis that we wouldn’t hang out with them at home, so why should we here?

I’m a terrible person, I know. However, I cannot help but shudder every time I stroll past a Walkabout pub. The fact that I’m probably going to have to attend one to watch the Test this weekend is an indication of the magnitude of my commitment to cricket. I’m bracing myself.

4. 1p and 2p pieces.

If I had to pick a single indicator of how the UK is not, in fact, superior to we colonial types (despite what they might think), it is currency. As much as I love the pound, I hate the penny with a fierce and unbridled passion.

There is no need for copper coins.

No good or service needs to be priced any more precisely than in multiples of 5. I have a tendency to overfill the straining, cracking leather of my wallet anyway, the last thing I need is 362kg of useless copper to carry around as well.
Drives me crazy.

5. Plugged-In Buskers

I quite like buskers, normally, enjoying the cheerful soundtrack as I saunter down a busy street. Covent Garden, in particular, is a delightfully buzz-inducing maelstrom of street entertainment that I love to wander about and soak up whenever I get the chance.

Of course, it would seem that the buskers provide an ideal opportunity to rid myself of those copper coins I profess to hate so much. However. There are a specific group of buskers in this city that have become the bane of my existence.

The Tube, you see, is made up of a series of tunnels. Hence the name, you see. There are tunnels for the trains and tunnels for the people to flood through in surly clumps on a weekday morning. The tunnels are made of concrete, a highly amplifying acoustic material.

Buskers in the Tube tunnels are allowed to have amplifiers. They are plugged in. They are LOUD. As the sound bounces off the concrete walls it makes my ears bleed. It makes me MAD.

The musical merit is not even an issue: I care not if this is the greatest version of the Four Seasons on kazoo I will ever hear, or if this boy’s novel interpretation of Deep Purple is of enduring artistic significance. I don’t care. There is no need for it to be so loud.

The busking spots are sponsored by a local beer, which I refuse to drink on principle.

And that's about enough ranting for today.

Stuff I Love

2006-11-20T20:55:00.000Z

As discussed, I am going to use this week to discuss some of the strengths and weaknesses of Our Glorious Motherland, as observed in my time here thus far.

Today, it’s all about the stuff I love. Hence the title, as you understand.

Some of these will be insultingly obvious, hopefully others will be less so. I am going to discuss food (specifically, cheese) separately later in the week. Here is my (incomplete, but will do for now) list of Things That Are Good About Living In England:

1. Close proximity to Europe

As discussed previously, this one needs little explanation. Weekends in Valencia, Christmas in Prague, this suits me very well indeed. I have found an excellent website that offers comparative information on insanely cheap airfares, and the continent, she is mine.

2. The Pound

I’m sure I would have a view about England switching to the Euro if I bothered to think about it, but for right now it is utterly delicious to know that I am accumulating a (very) wee pile of the world’s strongest currency. The fact that the wee pile is soon to be swallowed by rent is probably a subject for tomorrow’s entry.

3. Boots

Not the winter footwear (although I love those too), I refer to the greatest chemist the world has ever known. As I’m sure McBec would understand, I didn’t realise how much I had missed Boots until my return to England. Everything I could ever want is right there in the clean fluoro-lit aisles. So much more than merely cough medicines and prescriptions, Boots is the one-stop-shop for any and all products required for one’s toilette, at incredibly reasonable prices. There are Bootses here that are several stories high. It’s remarkable. And they sell sandwiches, and snacks, and fruit, and magazines, and home entertainment systems, and cameras, and phones, and accessories, and you name it, it will be there. I like to go there on my lunch hour and just wander about, soaking up the wonder.

4. Accents

I love that you can drive for half an hour here and people speak a different language.

Something that pleases me about my second stint in England is that I am starting to be able to pick the differences between different regional accents. I’m not terribly good with my North of England yet, having embarrassingly mistaken someone from Middlesbrough for someone from Liverpool the other day, but I can now reliably identify east London, Somerset and (of all places) Birmingham without too much difficulty.

Oh, and this is for Eleri: last time I was here I could not for the life of me hear anything different about a Welsh accent – I honestly thought people were messing with me. However! Thanks to extensive coaching from my new Welsh friend, I can hear it now without a problem. There’s a delightful sing-songy lilt there that I had just assumed was the way my friend’s voice sounded, but is apparently common to all of his countrymen. It was quite a moment the other day when I was speaking to a client in Swansea and had to refrain from informing him that he was Welsh. I assume this would not have been news to him.

5. Most Excellent Pubs

Last but not least, no list of what is great about this country is complete without a mention of its pubs. Sure, they’re not open late enough, and many of them are now owned by giant homogenous chains. But goodness me, the ones that are good are very good indeed.

I get a particular kick out of the history: drinking where Dickens did, hanging out where Sweeney Todd’s barbershop used to be. One of my favourites is on City Road, conveniently located very close to my new flat. We go there many Sunday afternoons for a roast, and have enjoyed many hours drinking excellent German lagers in the spacious beer garden. The pub is called the Eagle, and it is the very pub featured in that classic earworm of a nursery rhyme, Pop Goes the Weasel:

Up and down the City Road,
In and out The Eagle,
That’s the way the money goes,
Pop! goes the weasel.

I think that’s pretty cool.

Something else I love about the pubs here is the value for money. You might pay a few quid for a drink, but it will be worth it. In fact, that reminds me of a conversation I had the other night with a newly arrived Australian in London:

Newly Arrived Australian In London, commenting on the size of the standard drinks here: "How about these pints then? You have a couple and all of a sudden you've had several litres of beer. And the wine! You order a large glass and get half a bottle. I keep reading in the paper how they've got a drinking problem here."

jLo: "Yes, I see those articles too."

NAAIL: "Well. I've got an idea for them. STOP DRINKING OUT OF BUCKETS ALREADY."

My kind of place.

Them English

2006-11-20T08:28:00.000Z

Firstly: AARRGH! My unblemished November record, dashed and thwarted by a power blackout. Very, very annoying - but I couldn't get the modem thingy to work last night. I had written something, I just couldn't post it. I'll do two entries today to make up for it - not the same, but what else can I do?

*******

The nation from which I come is about to commence an epic battle against the nation in which I currently reside. I thought it apt, therefore, that I spend this week sharing my observations of the various strengths and weaknesses of our traditional foe.

There are many things I love about living here, the people in particular as some of the recent stories demonstrate. There are also many aspects of English life and culture that annoy the daylights out of me. I’ve been keeping a bit of a rolling list of the best and worst aspects of Britland and will discuss some of them with you over the next few days.

To stick with the sporting theme for the moment (at least to start with, I absolutely guarantee it won’t continue), something that intrigues me about English people and this Ashes series is that the public seem reasonably convinced that their team is rubbish and doomed to fail.

That in itself is no real surprise (they’re used to it by now) – but what I find interesting is how that contrasts with their general attitude about themselves as a people.

I have been conducting a wee survey, and I believe this tells everyone as much as they ever need to know about the layer of smugly nationalistic pride that runs just below the surface of many English folk. Nice as they may be – and let me assure you, plenty of them are very nice indeed, and modest, and self-deprecating, and so on – we’re still within a generation of Empire and I find it amusing and a little endearing that so many Brits still seem to believe deep down inside that the sun probably shouldn’t have set. Sometimes I feel like giving them a little hug.

When asked who would emerge victorious in a fist fight between Indiana Jones and James Bond – no gadgets, no tricks, just hand-to-hand combat – nine out of ten English people picked James Bond.

The tenth person said it would depend on the Bond.

Which I thought was a very good answer. Wrong, but quite good nonetheless.

I'm dreaming..

2006-11-18T21:50:00.000Z

…of a white Christmas! And for the first time in my life, it looks like it might just happen.

In a feat of spectacular financial timing - as in, just before I received the aforementioned tax bill - RVW and I booked fabulous last-minute travel deals to go here for Christmas. Check out the link, seriously. How good does that look? So, on 23 December, my littlest brother (who will need a proper pseudonym here before long) and I will join RVW and his lovely girlfriend in glorious, frosty Bohemia for a few days. I cannot wait.

I'll be thinking of you all as I stomp through the Old Town, soaking up the architecture and the atmosphere and warming my hands with a mug of mulled wine.

Littlest Brother, upon hearing that we will be spending Christmas Day and part of Boxing Day in one of the world's most beautiful cities, asked only one question:

"I assume there will be somewhere we can watch the Boxing Day Test?"

You would never be able to tell that we were related.

TGIF

2006-11-17T17:09:00.000Z

There is an Episode 3, but I think I need to save it in case next week is anything like this one and I need a post in reserve. I always welcome Friday with the very openest of arms, but today this is particularly true. I'm not even too bothered at the prospect of the charity concert that is about to commence, because as soon as it is done I can sleep.

It's been something of a crazy week.

I hinted in a previous post that the Home Office recently announced some intriguing changes to one of their visa programs. For the first time, I caught a wee sniff of a chance that I might be able to extend my stay here beyond next May (when my permission to work would expire). As much as I love you all (and you know that I do), I've become increasingly convinced of late that my business here will not be done by then. In fact, even though it's several months away, I was already becoming a tad bereft at the prospect of having to leave.

Anyway, long story short, I have been busily taking advice from people who know about these type of things (and who will happily charge me significantly large amounts of money in order to handle my application), doing some frantic calculations, and making swift decisions about my current pay setup and the best way to maximise my chances of being able to hit the required earnings targets in order to qualify for one of these magical visas. The way it stands now is that if a number of variables all resolve themselves in my favour AND if I manage to work every single possible day that I can between now and next May, then I might just make it. If I lose my job, I'm done for. I'm speaking cryptically, I know, and I know it's not exactly classified information. I just feel like I might be tempting fate too much to discuss it in too much detail. At any rate, all this coupled with an being insanely busy at work, planning a Christmas trip, making financial arrangements for our flat move next weekend, and trying to work out how in hell I'm going to pay the horrifically large Australian tax bill I've just received (damn you, HECS debt!) - it's been quite a week.

I wish you all the very best of weekends. I'm off to sing Waltzing Matilda in the name of needy children, then to bed. I'm going to tell you all about my Christmas trip tomorrow.

English People Are Hilarious, Episode 2

2006-11-16T17:55:00.001Z

(A wee story written in summer but only posted now).

My flatmate was building a shed, as I understand it boys do sometimes. The base was done, he was cutting sheets of prefab flooring with his brand new power saw when I got home that evening. It was still light, but deceptively late (as happens in these parts) and soon the screech of the power tool raised the similarly screechy ire of a nearby neighbour trying to get her kids to sleep.

Considerate neighbour that he is, he abandoned the flooring mission and started work putting the shed frame together. I watched for a while – I did consider offering to help, but figured it would take twice as long if I did – and then wandered back inside to sit on my arse for a while.

Dinner eaten, most of a novel devoured, I realised I hadn’t seen Mr Juicy in a while. I ventured back outside and was amazed to find a skeleton shed frame standing in our backyard. Mr Juicy was busily searching through a pile of metal sheets and a bucket of screws. Night has fallen properly by now, and he was perusing the shed assembly instructions by the light of the little blue screen of his mobile phone.

I decide to take the polite approach.

“Dude, you’re still at it?”

“Oh yeah, I’m on a roll.”

“But it’s dark!”

“Yeah, sure, but I’m managing.”

“Shall I bring my bedside lamp out here and plug it into the extension lead?”

“Oh, no, no, it’s fine.”

A pause. ‘He can’t be serious!’ I thought. ‘It’s pitch dark, he can’t possibly see what he is doing.’

“Would you like me to go and fetch the Maglite for you?”

“Oh no, this is fine. Spirit of the British Army and all that.” He launched into a mumbled monologue, lost in his own world: “Come on lads, here’s the farmhouse for the taking. We’re cold and hungry, our boots are rotten, our equipment’s shit, we’ve no light except this wad of cotton on a stick dipped in petrol, but by jove, we’ll get the job done.”

All the while, he was pacing around the backyard, looking for a missing piece by the light of his mobile phone. He looked up from monologue to see his Australian flatmate curled up on the ground, paralysed with choked laughter.

Once I could breathe again, I sat and watched him at it for a while. A few moments later, as he struggled to attach a cross beam, he muttered, half to himself, “my theory is, soon my night vision will kick in”. And I’m off again.

In the face of my hysterical laughter he did go and fetch a light source at one point - not a wussy lamp or torch, though – he chose an infrared bike light which he then held in his teeth – for a couple of moments. I then heard him cursing as he dropped a screw and asked what he’d done with the bike light. He replied, as he scrabbled in the grass for the screw, “I threw it away, disgusted with myself.”

He did it, you know. Stubborn, yes. Stupid, certainly – but still. Mr Juicy built a shed in the dark.

“And that’s how we won that old WWI”.

(Posh) English People Crack Me Up, Episode 1

2006-11-15T20:33:00.000Z

I went to the pub the other night with some folks from one of the law firms for which I did some stellar typing work earlier this year. It was great to see them, they drink like fish and thusly I fit in well. On this particular night we were graced by the presence of Lady Lawyer, one of the partners of the firm whom I greatly admired but had not yet encountered in a social environment. She is tall and thin and perfectly dressed, she tells stories about her childhood nanny and has a house in the country: the classic posh cliché. Imagine what follows in the snootiest accent you can think of and you'll know just what it was like.

At one point in the evening when we were all quite merry I rose to my feet and inquired as to the beverage preferences of my assembled comrades.

Lady Lawyer, pulling a £20 note from her purse: “No, jLo. Sit down. I’ll buy the drinks”.

jLo, winding the politeness factor up to 11: “Thank you, Lady Lawyer, you’re too kind. However, I must insist that this is my round. In my culture it is very important to be the type of person who stands one’s round. What would you like to drink?”

Lady Lawyer, harrumphing dismissively: “Now, jLo. To be perfectly frank, I don’t much care about your so-called culture. What you must understand is that I am MORE than willing to pay for everyone’s drinks all evening…”

Lawyer Colleague, in the background: “That’s true, she is.”

Lady Lawyer, continuing as if uninterrupted, still waving her £20 note in the air, carefully and loudly enunciating each word:

“…as long as I don’t have to go and stand at the bar like a common prostitute.”

The table exploded. Knowing my place, I took my cue and the £20 note and obediently fetched in the round.

For a line as good as that, Lady Lawyer, I will go to the bar on your behalf all night.

Bah, humbug.

2006-11-14T23:22:00.000Z

Given that the last post was such a long one, I'm going to just leave you with a couple of random thoughts today. I know I go on and on here about how awesome London is, and so in the interests of balance I thought I'd offer the following:

1. My colleagues and I went for a Team Lunch today at an Italian restaurant not far from where we work. We pre-ordered our meals so that our large group could be dealt with expeditiously. I went for a risotto with butternut squash (not pumpkin, please note, I speak British), pine nuts and spinach. What could go wrong?

Everything, apparently. It was truly the most execrable meal I've been served in my time here. How hard is it to screw up risotto? Apparently not hard enough. And, you know, given the proximity of London to Italy and the competitiveness of the London restaurant market generally it seems reasonable that there should be no excuse for bad Italian food. None!

2. Here's an interesting fact about this city: did you know that this disease is apparently rife here? How terrifying. I was initially smug about the fact that I was immunised against it as a small child, but the lovely B1, a medical professional, has gleefully informed me that said immunisation is now worth nowt and I'm as vulnerable as all others. And so, yanno, I had this random chest pain last week* and had managed to convince myself that I am about to die from tuberculosis. Cavities in my teeth, tuberculosis in my lungs, apparently I'm falling apart. Hoorah.

*Smoker jokes not actually necessary here.

Check out how moan-y this post is! I'm turning all English. Better stop drinking the water.

Dance dance revolution.

2006-11-13T22:36:00.000Z

So in a previous post, I made a cryptic reference to having joined a crazy mob one night a few weeks ago. Let me tell you that story…

I met my friend jPet after work for a drink. I asked where she wanted to go, and she suggested Liverpool Street Station. I thought that was a little odd – it’s out of our way, and, you know, a train station, so not exactly conducive to a festive atmosphere.

Being the agreeable type, I nevertheless agreed. We hopped an easterly Tube and were soon settled in the station pub.

“So, jPet,” I said. “Why did you want to come here?”

“Well,” she began, a little sheepishly, “I’m on this email list.”

“Yes?”

“Yeah. It’s about stuff that’s going on in London. Apparently something’s going to happen here tonight.”

“Like what?”

She paused. “Um. A bunch of people are going to dance to their iPods in the middle of the station.”

“Really? Huh. You mean like a flash mob or some such?”

“Something like that. I think.”

I was uninspired, but indifferent. I figured it would be a handful of crazy types, running into the station, dancing for a moment and running away again.

“Well, we’re here, we may as well check it out.”

“Cool.”

“When is it?”

“Around now.”

We walked out of the pub and turned into the main station concourse. I couldn’t see any crazies, and thought maybe we’d missed it. Then, out of the corner of my eye, I saw it.

“Holy SHIT.”

“Where?” She turned and followed my pointed finger. “Oh. My. God.”

It was huge. Hundreds and hundreds of people, entirely filling one end of the massive station floor. We wandered down to get a closer look.

Just as advertised, it was a crowd of people, all with headphones on, dancing like there was no tomorrow. So many people. Old and young and travellers and workers, a sweaty, jumping, seething, hollering mass, everyone in their own little bubble going absolutely mental.

“This is so freaking cool.”

“I know!”

A pause. “Are we just going to stand here?”

“I don’t think we can NOT join in.”

That was it. We strapped on our iPods and dove into the fray.

It was one of the best nights I’ve ever had.

It felt fantastic – total abandon in the unlikeliest place. The harsh fluorescent lights, the crowds of elderly tourist spectators lining the mezzanine, the police watching silently from the stairs. There was sheer joy on every face, everyone utterly exhilarated and grinning deliriously at the randomness of it all, revelling in the instant camaraderie of the crowd. It was like the best dance party you’ve ever been to: every song is your favourite. It was the straightest high of my life.

At one point I turned to jPet and said:

“I have no idea what we’re doing, but I know it’s fucking fun.”

Many people had obviously had more warning of the event than I – they turned up in crazy costumes and plentiful supplies of beer and snacks. Others had obviously stumbled across the spectacle by accident, and were dancing away in their business attire. One guy had his tie wrapped around his head. There were those with the show pony moves, others swaying gently in one spot.

At one point I took my earbuds out: the sound was amazing – stomping feet, raucous cheering and gleeful laughter – but no music. jPet said later that it occurred to her that this event was a perfect metaphor for our generation: there was a sense of community and shared experience but it was an essentially selfish, totally individual activity. We were so connected, but everyone was alone.

I learned that my iPod doesn’t have nearly enough excellent dance music. The Kaiser Chiefs worked well, so did the Go Team. I did some Curtis Mayfield, some Kool & the Gang, some Run DMC. Next time I'll make a playlist.

Everyone was moving to a different beat, hard as I tried to work out if anyone could possibly be dancing to the same song as I was, it was impossible to tell. At one stage, jPet and I couldn’t resist dancing to the same song at once. We cued it up, pressed play and then went off into our own little worlds, knowing that at least one other person was having exactly the same experience.

Cameras flashed left and right, my boogying arse is in a thousand photos (like this one here). In fact, both jPet and I featured in a Where’s Wally-type shot in the papers the following evening. I cut out a copy of the photo and have filed it away with a bundle of other souvenirs of this crazy, random place.

I have so often wanted to do exactly this so often – I’ll be walking to work in the mornings and can’t resist jauntifying my stride at a particularly catchy tune. I never actually stop and dance, though, and this made me wish I did it all the time. It was like living out a fantasy. There were plenty of people joining in without earphones – the mood of the crowd was irresistibly infectious.

Adding to the overall surreality was the fact that every time I looked up, I could see a giant TV news screen broadcasting the days’ headlines. I’d dance a little, look up and notice that a plane had crashed into a building in New York. More dancing, Madonna has adopted a baby. More dancing, some football scores. If I turned in the other direction my gaze would follow the huge train timetable screen: dance dance dance, there goes the train to Lowestuft.

Holy hell, it was fun. I’ve never been part of such an ecstatically delirious crowd before – everybody going wildly crazy and grinning at each other in sheer, unadulterated delight.

After about an hour, dripping with sweat, elated and exhilarated beyond belief, we withdrew and returned to the pub. Good gracious, it was awesome. I love this city.

Sweet Dreams (are made of this)

2006-11-12T15:53:00.000Z

So this whole posting-every-day thing is quite fun – although it has become clear that I need to do engage in some more interesting activities so as to have something to write about. I’ve got to the point where I’m not sure where each day’s topic will come from (and I’m sure that is reasonably obvious to you all).

Yesterday was no exception. I was discussing this dilemma of mine with RVW as we cruised around looking for frypans and crockery and teatowels (we didn’t find an example of the latter that we could agree on. Teatowels! I know! We did, however, find an excellent butter dish).

We had stumbled across some great markets in East London, and were having a fine time soaking up the atmosphere. Rip suggested that the markets would make a good topic. I agreed, but couldn’t think about how I could make them particularly interesting and/or funny. They were big, and sold lots of stuff. They smelled good, and bad. There was music, and lots of people. The end.

What I didn’t realise is that the most remarkable point of my day was yet to come. I introduced RVW to a good friend of mine, PT, over dinner at an excellent Moroccan restaurant. I was a bit apprehensive, as I often am when bringing different spheres of my world together. The thought of people I rate highly not getting along is an alarming one – mostly because I am lazy and selfish and the more I can have my friends all hang out together, the easier my life becomes.

I needn’t have worried. RVW and PT got on like a house on fire. So well, in fact, that after several bottles of red wine we had adjourned to PT’s nearby flat, whereupon the two of them stood up in her living room and performed the greatest hits of the Eurythmics (all of them. I’m serious) in a highly entertaining fashion.

I contributed some backing vocals now and again, but the show was theirs. It was a side of both of them I’d not seen before, but greatly enjoyed. A beautiful sight: two of my good friends, bonding in no uncertain terms as they shouted a very energetic rendition of Thorn in My Side. I knew I’d found the moment I wanted to record here. I’m still aching from the laughing.

And I really, really wish I could get the song out of my head.

Apparently it was exhausting work: Rip van Winkle did his signature trick not long afterwards, falling asleep on PT’s couch. I tried to wake him when I left, but to no avail. PT assured me he was more than welcome, so I left him snoozing and trundled home.

(I did send him a text message telling him where he was and how to get home, as a reference for when he woke up the next morning. It’s all part of the service I provide.)

When I reached my own home I discovered that the night was not over, in terms of karaoke performances of questionable quality. Mr Juicy and Madam Juicy had invested in a new toy: a SingStar game.

Tired and drunky, I was not permitted to retire for the evening until I had belted out a classic or two in our own living room. And so, bowing to the inevitability of my own humiliation, I began.

My results? Heaven is a Place on Earth? Nailed it (god help me). Perfect by Fairground Attraction? A confident attempt, mostly successful except for that insanely high note at the end. Eye of the Tiger? Really freaking hard. It’s a good thing I’m moving out of this flat soon, I’m not sure the neighbours will ever forgive me.

And I think that’s perhaps enough karaoke for the time being.

I have a way with cardboard.

2006-11-11T12:07:00.000Z

I need to rush out the door to go and meet Rip van Winkle for a homewares-shopping expedition (life in the fast lane, kids). Before I do, however, Dr Evil has sent some pictures from last Sunday's Guy Fawkes party, and I wanted to share with you my greatest craft creation of the year (not really very many contenders for that title, to be sure):

The campest little Guy you ever did see. We decided his name was actually pronounced Ghee, darlings. Behold his happy grin.

While my friends were delighted with my paper-plate craft stylings, the English people at the party were somewhat confounded.

English people: "What is that hanging in the window?"

jLo: "That's Guy!"

English people: "....What?"

jLo: "You know, traditional, effigy-type thing, for burning purposes."

English people: "That's not a Guy."

jLo: "Sure it is!"

English people: "But it's not... that's not... it doesn't... ARR@#$%! (insert sounds of spluttery frustration here)."

jLo: "Why not? What do you mean? He's an effigy. We're going to burn him."

English people: (wander away, shaking heads in bewilderment).

jLo: Excellent.

Looking forward to my hoverbike

2006-11-10T18:09:00.000Z

I am a child of my age: I conduct a significant proportion of my life online and have seventy billion passwords guarding all facets of my official existence. I have conversations with my friends across the other side of the world by talking into my computer, I carry all my music around in a little white box.

However, I am not a particularly savvy nor up-to-date consumer of technology and am hopelessly behind in many ways. Far from this being a source of concern, I tend to enjoy it - my cluelessness often allows me to be delightfully surprised now and again when I discover a new wonder of the modern world.

I had just such an experience last night, in the supermarket, when I decided on a whim to test drive one of the new-fangled self-serve checkouts.

It was ever so fun! It’s harder than it looks, you know - an unacknowledged art form. Finding the barcode, holding it at just the right angle – my progress through my basket was slow and laboured. I enjoyed myself, however, and found it very satisfying indeed. I packed my shopping bag carefully and deliberately for optimum carryability, then swiped my own debit card and took my own receipt. It was great.

The only human contact I had throughout the entire process was with the security guard who was openly laughing at the expression of delight on my face. Apparently I was having too much fun.

Another recent example of my hopelessly slow self being startled with technology happened at a party. I was having a conversation with a boy which had reached that happy point where you realise that you might like to communicate again at some future date. No scribbled number on a scrap of paper at this party – oh no. He whipped a shiny silver PDA-thingy out of his pocket (and he wasn’t some banker-wanker type, either – just a techie nerd with an appreciation for fine gadgetry). He tapped my name and number onto the screen with a wee plastic pencil, then said “hold still” as he raised the silver pod up to my face. I stepped back, startled, as he took my photograph, then blinked in amazement as he busily tapped away at the screen again to complete my profile.

It was weird, but strangely delightful. It’s not that I am unfamiliar with camera phones, or number swapping. It was the sheer efficiency of the transaction that surprised me as I realised that such things will be the norm sooner rather than later.

They're not earth-shattering, these examples, but they were news to me. There is much that is excellent and remarkable about the times in which we live - and I'm not sure that I ever want to stop finding it enchanting.

There is a downside, of course to the fact that the future has apparently arrived: the boy never called. I can only assume that he consulted the deer-in-headlights photograph the next day and recoiled in horror. In such circumstances perhaps a scrap of paper would have worked better for me.

Straya Fair

2006-11-09T22:10:00.000Z

We Strayans are offered visas on the basis that we sing for our supper when required. What's the point of having such a deeply entrenched international identity if one's hosts cannot demand a display of it every now and again?

The organisation I work for has recently employed a significantly large number of Australians (myself included) (obviously). We have been instructed to perform something 'authentically Australian' at a benefit concert for a children's charity to be hosted by our organisation in two weeks' time. While I realise that it does seem as though ‘unapologetic showpony’ is my default setting I am not, in fact, particularly enthusiastic about performing humiliatingly lame acts at work functions. However, because this is a charity concert, one must join in or one is accused of hating the children. And I don't hate the children.

The Australian staff contingent assembled at lunchtime today for a brainstorming session, and it became clear alarmingly quickly that next Friday evening I will be wearing my Australian flag socks, singing Waltzing Matilda and making various Dad-jokes about shrimp and barbies and flamin' galahs in front of a crowd of bemused English people. I'm not ashamed of my country. I AM frustrated and uninspired by the inevitability of the ideas that are thrown around in such circumstances, but given that I have no desire to take charge and actually commit myself to making this into something better I've none but myself to blame.

The last thing the English need is for all their stereotypes to be reinforced, but by crikey, it's what they'll get. I am cringing on the inside, but I understand that this is the price I must pay for my tenure here: ‘ooh, look at the colonials do their funny little dance!’

(Screw you, English person.)

I'm actually not as grinch-like as I might seem. My chief contribution will be to hand out a plate of lamingtons. Also, one of my Australian workmates has offered to dress as Steve Irwin and dance a passionate, heart-wrenching pas de deux with a stingray, to the tune of a yet-to-be-determined-but-obviously-cheesy Ozrock ballad. Now THAT I’m looking forward to.

Typing just as fast as I can....

2006-11-08T23:52:00.000Z

A close call, this evening - the problem I always knew I'd have with something like nablopomo is the fact that my schedule is all over the place and I haven't yet worked out how to update my blog directly from my brain.

It started so innocently, as always: 6pm, I'm finishing work and thinking, 'oh, I'll just stay a while and write something, no problem!'. Then someone says those fatal words. "Anyone fancy a quiet one?"

And I protest. Honestly I do. But these are good people, my work folk, and I haven't made enough of an effort to befriend them. So I think, 'oh, a quiet one. No problem, I'll be home soon and can write then.'

Long story short, I had a lovely evening with excellent ladies. But now I've got mere moments to spare to get an entry in. And this is the kind of quality you get. Sorry, folks. Wine is very tasty.

Here are the topics that sprang to mind just now, desperately trying to think of something I could write about: the wonders of SMASH, the problems of living with a newly-minted couple who alternate nights of schmooping all over each other with horrific arguments that make my skin prickle, and changes to the UK skilled migrants program announced today which make me nervous and will continue to do so until I have a chance to read about them further.

But! I cannot expand upon these subjects, because I have to hit that little post button below. Forgive me. Arbitrarily self-imposed time limits are stupid.

But tipsy posting is sometimes funny. I'll do better. I hope you all had an excellent day.

How's it going, China?

2006-11-07T18:56:00.000Z

I learned to my delight today* that apparently this website cannot be accessed from China. I realise that it is entirely possible that all blogger sites are blocked universally - and, let's be honest, would that really be such a significant loss? Would you miss blogger if it disappeared tomorrow?

I choose to believe, however, that it is the tale of endless Western consumerist decadence chronicled on this specific page that has aroused the ire of Chinese censors. It was imperative that they block ficklish in order to protect the revolution. I mourn for the Chinese folk googling frantically about what life is like for an Australian woman in London who will never find the answers they seek.

I realise, of course, that I should make a very serious point about the evils of censorship here, and the importance of FREEDOM, so here it is: censorship is BAD and freedom to read pointless websites about people who drink too much and gallivant about contributing little to society is GOOD. The end.

*Special thanks to AZ who, for reasons I will never understand, is wasting precious moments of his adventure of a lifetime in China in order to try to access my blog. Step AWAY from the computer, dude - according to all available intelligence, the internet will still exist when you get home. But thanks for letting me know, you've made my day.

Remember, remember

2006-11-06T23:16:00.000Z

Dr Evil gives good Guy Fawkes: 39 kilograms of Category 4 explosives. They were big, they were loud, and they were very, very pretty.

The night was clear and cold, and thunderclaps echoed around the neighbourhood as the sun set and everybody got in on the fireworksy action. The horizon was dotted with sparkly light and the air was heavy with gunpowder and ash. Terribly wasteful and very environmentally unfriendly ... but damn good fun.

We stood on the balcony with our beers and oohed appropriately as Dr Evil put on his show. He had everything – from rockets and roman candles and wee fountain-y type ones set off from the roof to giant sky-fillers that required a trip to the park next door. We watched from the landing as Dr Evil and Rip van Winkle scurried about in the darkness, mostly invisible until the spark of each wick was lit, whereupon we yelled ‘run, you bastards’ as they scampered to safety.

The evening was thankfully incident-free: so long as you don’t count my own very special brand of clumsy. While letting off only the second firework of my life from our homemade rocket launcher (a hollow broom handle), I very stupidly neglected to shut my eyes and my fool mouth. As the rocket shot off, I copped a face and throat full of fuel and fumes. It was undelicious, but apparently my spluttering was very entertaining to behold.

My homemade Guy was a delightful success: the campest little effigy you ever did see. Given that I had been charged with the mission of crafting our Guy at only 7pm the previous evening, the materials at my disposal were what we could find at the local grocery store: some paper plates, drinking straws, sticky tape and a witches hat left over from Halloween. My challenge was to make him flammable, but not toxically so. I’ll post photos when I can, but let me just say that he looked a treat hanging from a wee noose, then burned most excellently atop a fountain firework. When his head fell off, we mounted it upon a rocket and shot it off into the wilds of East London. Good times.

To Do

2006-11-05T14:23:00.000Z

My list of tasks for today:

- Shower

- Write something for blog*

- Construct a suitably amusing human figure out of everyday household items for the purposes of conducting a ritual burning at Dr Evil’s Guy Fawkes party tonight.

- Attend said party, drink a not-insignficant amount of alcohol and play with fireworks, as I understand is the custom in these parts on this particular day.

Good list, no?

I’m very much looking forward to the party. Dr Evil is has an endearing streak of pyromania, and has ordered vast quantities of fireworks for our entertainment this evening. I’m a little apprehensive about the combination of alcohol and explosives – but, you know, it’s a cultural experience. Or that's what I'll tell the hospital staff in the event of disaster.

******

* As Ed has shrewdly noticed in the comments to my last update, there has been a somewhat dramatic upswing in my posting regularity over recent days. I’m attempting this (mostly because I’m not yet woman enough for this).

Five days down, twenty-five to go. I was too gutless to actually officially sign up to the nablopomo site, because I fear commitment and remain convinced that I will fail. However! I feel it is a sufficiently noble goal at which to have a decent crack, so stay tuned for many rambly posts about very little.

(Business as usual, then, just more frequent).

******

And because I told her I was going to, I would like to share the following exchange from a conversation I had with J, The today:

J,The: So, I was mentioning to a friend tonight that I think it might be nice to have a love affair sometime soon.

jLo: Oh, nice one! I’ve been thinking along the same lines lately.

J,The: Yeah! And you know what my friend said? She said: “Man or woman?”

jLo: How polite!

J,The: Totally! And so I said, “Thanks for asking! A man, I think. (beat). It would have to be a pretty special woman.”

jLo: Yeah. One with a penis.

Paradise: Redux

2006-11-04T18:27:00.000Z

Given that winter has now arrived, I am having trouble believing that just a couple of weekends ago I was here:

(Just quietly, I'm considering petitioning DFAT to see if this can become my passport photo).

Ahhh, Valencia. It was magnificent, as expected. I discovered that it is truly comforting to know that there are places in the world where you feel better just being there, that make you smile as soon as you arrive, where you know that your expectations will be met and exceeded every single time you visit.

I did everything I wanted: I walked my favourite streets for hours, gazed at buildings, bathed in sunshine. I visited the Holy Grail and the magic fountain, which was as spectacular as ever. I spent time with good mates, drank deliciously industrial-strength Spanish coffee (good god the cafes of London have a lot to answer for), ate paella, made myself sick at the world's greatest gelateria, shopped too much and drank too much and had a fabulous time.

There were new experiences, too - preparations for next year's America's Cup have come a long way since I was last in town and it was fun to explore the shiny new port and marina complex, which is beautiful and bustling with new life. I spent many hours drinking with boaty-type people asking them stupid questions about sails and keels and generally demonstrating an embarrassing lack of knowledge about the ridiculously well-heeled world of yacht racing.

A particular highlight of this trip was the cruise on a catamaran around Valencia's harbour and out into the Med (please note picture above). It was spectacular: a crazy crew who performed an impromptu flamenco in between hoisting mainsails and suchlike, sangria and sunshine and salty spray everywhere as I reclined blissfully at the back of the boat.

I loved being there - I feel so peaceful and happy in that town. I had a tinge of nostalgic sadness as well, though - it was familiar and beautiful but I missed last time. It was hard to go back to a place where I had such amazing fun with such excellent people who are no longer there. The new experiences are good in their own way, but for those of you who were there before? It just wasn't the same without you.

Oh, and I brought the Holy Grail back with me. Rip van Winkle was quite taken with it:

As was Dr Evil, who very conveniently happened to have just the right outfit handy:

How awesome is that halo?!

Bon voyage

2006-11-03T19:23:00.000Z

I note that England's Test squad is boarding a plane this evening bound for the Land of Oz.

Talented cricketers they may be, somehow I doubt that any individual member of the England squad is worthy of an attempt on Boonie's record for the flight over.

At any rate: it begins.

I am VERY excited.

Rip van Winkle and I have already held extensive discussions regarding the planning for our First Test party on 23 November 2006. Invitations have been extended only to a carefully chosen few. There will be beer, and singing, and RvW has indicated that he wants to get hold of a sun lamp of some sort so that I can obtain my customary First Day, First Test Sunburn (FDFTS). Apparently it just won't be the same having a beer with me in the lunch break unless I am already glowing pink.

Bon voyage, chaps. In the unlikely event that you manage to defy my expectations and there is actually some cause for celebration upon your return I hereby undertake to attend your victory parade clad only in the Union Jack and post photographic evidence on this public forum.

Falling Back

2006-11-02T23:00:00.000Z

I have a question about daylight saving. As a loyal Queenslander, I am more than aware of its cow-confusing, curtain-fading and, as I have recently been informed, cancer-causing abilities. What I had not realised, however, is that daylight saving actually controls nature with its evil iron fist. It has the power, it seems, to change seasons.

We've had a very mild autumn here so far. The trees have held onto their still-green leaves, my summer-weight duvet has been doing its job more than adequately. People have remarked to each other as they stroll down the street what a lovely balmy October we are having. It's almost as if those doomsaying global warming folk have a point. I wore flip-flops (please note: not thongs) all day on Saturday.

Early Sunday morning, we fell back to ye olde GMT. I very much enjoyed my extra hour of Sunday loafing, but the prospect of actual winter was far from my mind.

Until yesterday, when it officially arrived.

I've never been able to pinpoint a season with such remarkable accuracy. Has this ever been investigated? An irrefutable link between human-imposed time contructs and the ravages of Mother Nature? I wouldn't have believed it, but the evidence seems too clear to ignore: we changed the clocks, a mere 72 hours later the season was different. Apparently winter has been lurking in the sidelines just waiting for the ritual to be over and done with so it could burst forth and catch us underwears.

Good gracious, but it got cold here this week. The skin on my hands is cracking after just one day, the pashmina has come out of its hidey hole and apparently I need to go shopping for new boots and a pair of gloves as a matter of some urgency. I went out for a cigarette at 4:30pm this afternoon and the planes were criss-crossing lovely thin pink lines of jet stream in the already-twilit sky.

Brrrrrr.

Smile and Give Me All Your Money

2006-11-01T01:52:00.000Z

So, today I actioned item number #4352 on the Great Long List of Things That Other Grown-Ups Do Without Having To Be Told, And If I Ever Want To Be One Of Their Number, I Should Really Get Onto It: I went to the dentist.

I shan’t be confessing here just how many years (that’s years in the significant plural) it has been since I last took a positive step to protect my oral health. Suffice it to say that it appals me enough, it would appal my mother even more. (And let me assure you, this blog appals her more than adequately already: “jLo, dear, why don’t you tell some nice stories instead of just writing post after post about how sick or hung over you are?” “Sure thing, Mum.” “And while you’re at it, get some decent jokes, why don’t you? And learn to write proper sentences.” “OKAY, Ma. Geez.”)

Where was I? Anyway, it’s been some time. Of all the places to break the dentist drought, I pick England, a nation renowned for the quality of its citizen’s teeth. I elected to eschew my reciprocal right as an Australian to treatment under the beleaguered National Health System (although aren’t you impressed that dental work is covered here?) and booked myself in as a privately paying patient for a check up and a long-overdue clean. I was hopeful that I still had teeth in there somewhere, lurking beneath the years of accumulated crap.

People had warned me about the dentists in the UK. In fact, I’ve spent the last couple of weeks (ever since the day my gums hurt and I got panicky about how long it’s been since my last appointment) revelling in the dentist horror stories of everyone I know in London. The overwhelming consensus from the anecdotes I have collected is that the NHS dentists won’t bother fixing anything and the private dentists will inevitably insist upon such a large bundle of essential (and coincidentally very expensive) treatments that you’ll wonder how you’ve been managing to chew your food and smile without scaring small children all this time.

Armed with my trusty stereotyped prejudices, therefore, I fronted the surgery this morning determined to resist the hard sell. My dentist was a very friendly lady who complimented me on my teeth.

“Nice teeth!”
“Uh, thanks”.

It was an underwhelming and somewhat uncomfortable experience, which I had expected. I did not expect, however, that the door to the examination room would be open, so that folks walking through the hallway could watch me flailing madly as strange, sharp implements were poked inquisitively into my gums.

They also got a fabulous view of the moment I nearly drowned: the dentist’s assistant seemed a tad preoccupied and was apparently unable to aim her little vacuum thingy anywhere near where it was required. I had to call a halt to proceedings at one point with a strangled yelp so that I could sit up to cough and splutter in a most dignified and graceful fashion.

I was also given a lesson in the proper way to brush my teeth – apparently I’ve been doing it wrong all this time. The dentist handed me a toothbrush and a model mouth and demonstrated a fun flicky motion that I was quite taken by. Glad to no longer have a mouthful of icky polishing paste and a fear of choking as the blissfully inattentive assistant failed in her suctioning responsibilities; I got quite into the practising and sat contentedly for some moments, flicking away at the fake teeth, lost in my own little world.

The dentist had to wrench them away from me, with a gentle but firm “that’ll do now”. I felt approximately two years old.

I have always been very proud of my record at the dentist: no fillings, no braces, no nasty procedures of any kind whatsoever. My secret fear, however, was that one day my clear run would end and I would know that I only have myself to blame, given the cavalier disregard I have demonstrated in recent years.

Today, those fears were realised. Apparently, for the first time in my life, I have cavities. Not big ones, not serious – a couple of wee little cavities that require filling for what I am told is primarily a precautionary purpose. I am disappointed.

To complicate matters, however, I’m also not sure whether to take it seriously or what to do next. The requirement for fillings was mentioned in almost the same breath as a necessity for several x-rays and a recommendation for an extremely expensive whitening treatment. My nostrils prickled at the smell of a sales pitch: the kind where they give you a long and exorbitant list in the in the safe knowledge that you will feel that you have to agree to at least the most basic item. It was slickly done, I was impressed. She looked in my mouth, counted my teeth, then sat down and wrote me a price list.

Since when did taking care of one’s health become an exercise in cynical consumerism? How much of my scepticism is based on the horror stories I had been told? Do I get a second opinion? Am I overthinking this? Will I get to play with the model mouth again? They’re only fillings, goddammit, just get them done already.

I suspect that the idea of losing my record is a disproportionately large factor here: it seems likely that I’m resisting necessary treatment out of stupid pride. And thus, I present another indication that adulthood eludes me yet: that I will consider not getting fillings just because I want to be able to continue to say that I don’t have any.

(Also, I am scared of the drilling).

Home Sweet Homewares

2006-10-26T08:50:00.000+01:00

So, Rip van Winkle and I have found a flat. The annoying paperwork is almost complete and so subject only to the payment of a significantly large sum of money it will be ours on the last weekend of November.

I’m excited: it’s in a great part of town, close to excellent pubs and restaurants, within walking distance from work, a major metropolitan railway station and some markets, and (both delightfully and alarmingly) just down the road from Dr Evil’s place.

Finding a great sharehouse is a lottery. My accommodation history to date has been a celebration of the (mostly) random that has worked out spectacularly well in some cases (and you know who you are) and horrifically bad in others. The fact that they have been random, governed mostly by chance and circumstance, has meant that I’ve never put much thought into what each house will be like before I move in.

Until tonight.

I had been a bit wary of sharing a flat with a good mate – I’ve done it before and it has worked well, but you never know what might wreck an otherwise perfectly good friendship. Rip van Winkle and I have discussed this, however, and have been very honest about our living styles and what we want: namely, our own space and the ability to sit for an evening with a book and a cup of tea (or glass of port, in Rip’s case) and to not have to talk too much. I think it’s going to work well.

So, we’ve covered some of the big questions already. We’ve agreed no to a television, but yes to a wireless modem. Yes to a cleaner, and yes to smoking outside. Rip van Winkle suggested that we meet at the pub tonight to plan what practical stuff we’ll need for the flat. I thought this was a great idea – it’s only ‘part’ furnished and neither of us have the years of accumulated house junk we lug around at home. I also thought this would be a good chance for us to continue to be frank about what we wanted the flat to be like – you know, open, honest conversation early to avoid misunderstandings and simmering resentment later on.

I was right. It was just like that. But oh, so much more.

Rip van Winkle, you see, is a planner – not merely by nature, but by profession as well. He fills his days thinking about design, and function, and ‘optimal use of space’.

In my mind, I had prepared for this conversation by thinking: ‘a good couch, a book shelf, the right kind of coffee maker. Those are the non-negotiables’. I figured RVW would have a similar list, we’d hammer it out over a pint or two and find common ground.

But Rip was prepared. He brought a list, and we spent a good hour and a half going through the elements of the theory of the planning and design process.

Here they are:

- Site analysis
- Opportunities and constraints
- List required/desired uses
- Develop themes
- Develop floor plans
- Appraisal
- Detailed development.

The list was a thing of beauty. I argued that it was missing an ‘evaluation and review’ phase, but apparently that’s all part of ‘detailed development’.

You know what? It was awesome. For a non-spatially aware person such as myself who also tends to lurk down the obsessive end of the spectrum, this was a very pleasing experience. I got to listen to a good friend talk about a subject he loves, and though I gave him shit about the list (as you do) I actually enjoyed thinking about what I want from my home in a very specific way.

And it’s amazing how much detail you can get into when you’re apparently just talking theory. We didn’t actually MAKE any real decisions. We certainly did not do a floor plan, or decide about whether we need a couch, an armchair AND a dining table in the living room, or where they’ll go, or what colour they should be.

We did, however, discover that we are in complete agreement about just about everything, including such important topics as:

- The superfluity of microwaves.
- The importance, if one must have Teflon, of using non-metal (preferably wooden) utensils.
- Knives.
- Drinking glasses.
- Dinnerware.
- Plants.
- Pets.
- Side tables versus coffee tables.
- Clothes-drying racks.
- Thin-handled cutlery.
- Wine storage.
- The minimum number of saucepans required for every purpose, from making soup to heating milk.

It was fantastic. There was no topic on which we couldn’t find at least broadly principled, if not energetically enthusiastic agreement. I had no idea that I had such strong opinions about household paraphernalia.

Dr Evil had very kindly offered to cook us dinner, so we adjourned to his flat, still lost in our conversation, continuing our journey of mutual appreciation of various everyday items.

“Good noodle bowls. The deep ones with steep sides, heavy ceramic.”
“Yes! And an excellent garlic press.”
“Oh, absolutely.”

Both of us so were wrapped up in expressing the secret utensil and cookware desires of our innermost hearts that we didn’t care how ridiculous we sounded.

Until we heard Dr Evil wheezing with hysterical laughter.

At the time, Rip van Winkle was showing me the glass lemon squeezer he’d found at an op shop the other day – it was absolutely perfect, just how I’d described the one I wanted twenty minutes before in the pub.

Dr Evil: You know, you should rent out fly-on-the-wall camera access in your flat. You two are freaking hilarious.

At one point, RVW proposed an elaborate scheme for streamlining dishwashing processes, whereby we would each have ‘our’ designated plate, mug and bowl (he did mention the phrase ‘with our name on it’), for use solely by that person and to the exclusion of all other crockery and glassware, thereby ensuring minimal pileup of dirty dishes.

By this stage I was weeping with laughter too. I could see his point (and endorse it), but holy hell, we’re a freak show. I love it. This is going to be fun.

jLo: You know, when we started this conversation I had no idea that we would agree so closely on so many things.

RVW: I know! We are so symmetrically anal.

(A pause).

jLo: You know, there are gay men out there who never find that.

Too Drunk To Blog

2006-10-22T18:58:00.000+01:00

Okay, so it's not Monday. And as much as I don't want to be the girl who starts every blog post with 'oh, sorry you guys, it's been so long' etc, it's the truth. I am sorry. I'm just weak.

I have these friends, you see. And they corrupt me in ways that I cannot justify. For some reason, I seem to spend an inordinate amount of time away from my home, enjoying many dissipated and unproductive hours away from my computer and failing to communicate with those I love from afar.

First, there's the friend formerly known as Mr F, because I couldn't think of anything better to call him. We've finally come up with a name, and it suits him perfectly. He loves the pub almost as much as I do, but he has a disconcerting (and hilarious) habit of falling asleep as soon as we get home. So from now on, he will be called Rip Van Winkle. He's awake now, but not for much longer.

Then there's Dr Evil. He lives in a fabulous flat, a huge warehouse studio just outside of central London where we have spent countless hours drinking, talking and dancing the night away. He is known as Dr Evil because he is the single most corrupting influence in my life at present. An innocent afternoon at a local pub, having a wholesome Sunday roast, becomes a night of debauched revelry whereupon I find myself catching the tube home at 7am to shower and change for work, simply because I am unable to resist his entreaties to stay: "jLo! You can't go home now! We're going to watch movies and have pizza at my house!" Oh, okay, Dr Evil. Lead the way.

My arm isn't rubber, it's jelly.

And there's Madam Fox. She is hella foxy, funny and smart and a most excellent dancer. I wish you could all meet her. She's the awesome.

So, right now, when I had planned to be at home, having had my delightful roast lunch, updating my blog and answering email, I am instead at the lair of Dr Evil, where I spend too many nights per week to even mention. I walked in, he handed me a beer. When I said I felt like writing, he handed me a laptop and told me to go for it. This is as close to heaven as I have right now.

It's been a good day, you know. I really do have a lot to tell you. Valencia was great fun (I'll post photos soon), I'm moving into a new flat (with Rip van Winkle, just down the road from Dr Evil), the feather-hat-macaroni thing is right there on the wikipedia once you have the motivation to look. Today I spent the morning chatting with the lovely J, The on the skype, then adjourned to a fantastic pub, now I'm sitting on the floor in a cool studio, about to head out to the balcony to watch the London skyline at dusk.

This is a great town, and I really like it here. I wish I wrote to you all more often, but there's not much more than that to say.

Escape

2006-10-13T14:11:00.000+01:00

Goodness, I've so much to tell you. This week: the flat situation looks like being resolved in an unexpected but delightful way, I joined a crazy dancing mob and got my photo in the paper, we celebrated Mr F's birthday in spectacular style and I finally learned what 'stuck a feather in his hat and called it macaroni' means.

These stories (and more) have to wait, however. I am about to make good use of the number one reason why living here is freaking awesome, that is, the ability to jet off to exotic European locations for the weekend. Many would say that this opportunity should be used to make sure that one visits as many different places as possible, I say when you're on to a good thing stick to it.

Oh yes, my friends. It's time for jLo and Valencia: The Return. I can't freaking wait. Talk to you Monday!

GRRR.

2006-10-04T23:20:00.000+01:00

As you all know, I'm a pretty easygoing person. I don't get angry very often. Some folks froth and bubble and seethe at the slightest of inconveniences, I tend to take things in my stride and don't really get upset if there's nothing that can be done. This approach works both for me and against me: it means I'm more often contented than not, but it also means I miss out on things because I don't feel like making a fuss in order to get them.

Having said this, I am REALLY FREAKING ANGRY today. So angry that I’m going to type in ALL CAPS and runmywordstogether, even more than usual.

And it's not for a great reason. And there's nothing I can do about it. I'm just really, really disappointed and angry that someone else's failure becomes my problem.

I'll start with the blog post I should have written two weeks ago. It was all there, in my head. Here is how it would have gone:

Guess what, you guys? I've found a new house! Hooray! And it's in a GREAT location! Seriously. A half-hour walk from work, right in the heart of a very funky area of town. Around the corner from one friend's house, a hopskipjump away from another. Close to shops, a gym, fabulous pubs and restaurants, buses to everywhere. The people are lovely, and the price is good, and .. get this… I found it on only my second day of looking! There were dozens of applicants for this house, but I very quickly recognised its potential and promptly set my awesomeness beams to stun; dazzling my way past the other hapless hopefuls, triumphantly prevailing over a bottle of wine and sparkling conversation with my new housemates.

It's all organised, I'm moving in mid-October. I've given notice on my flat, Mr Juicy is searching for my replacement. I am very, VERY, reallyalotohmygodit'sgoingtobesogood excited - I've shared my glee not only with my friends and colleagues, but have surprised several random strangers by stopping them in the street to share the good news. I am dizzy with possibility. It really feels like London life is falling into place: a good job, a great flat, a great posse of playmates - in fact, I am starting to preemptively mourn the fact that my time here is limited. It's time to get serious about looking into my visa options. I can really settle here!

Ah, the blog post that never was. So giddy and hopeful, I was - the mere thought of my new digs was enough to have me tapping a happy little dance along the street. I planned my décor, mapped out the route to work, and daydreamed happily of the weekends to come in my excellent new neighbourhood.

I felt like the Gods of the Househunt had decided that I suffered enough last time and it was time for me to catch a break. I knew they would strike me on down if I wasn't properly appreciative of the fact that I'd struck such gold with such apparent ease, and so I made my grateful thanks and bequeathed as many of my future progeny as they should ever require.

But, you know, maybe I didn't go far enough. Maybe, just maybe, I got a little smug. Another friend was looking for a flat and I confess that I may have given in to the temptation to boast of my success. "I've paid my dues", I said. "It was my time. Yours will come! It was so easy!" In fact, I suspected it was almost too easy.

And I was right.

I got a call tonight from the girl whose room I'm supposed to be taking. "Oh, I'm having trouble finding somewhere else. I think I might stay."

AAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!

“I’m really sorry to do this to you, you seem so lovely and you’ve been so accommodating!”

(She didn’t even ask me to pardon her terrible pun).

Listen, sweetie, let me tell you plainly:

You SUCK.

Seriously. I hate your guts right now.

Why on earth would you advertise your room as available when you haven't found anywhere else? I don't want to freaking hear about the places you saw, and how they 'really just weren't very nice'. FFS, YOU are the one being an asshole here and yet it is ME who is homeless. I'M the one who has to find somewhere else, to go through the freaking heartache of looking at one dingy flat after another, my will being progressively beaten down until I just take whatever I have to in order to have a roof over my head. And winter is coming.

BITCH.

And the worst part is, ain't nowt I can do about it. I can rant here, but she's in the room and on the lease and I am not. I can hope that she gets a festering karmic bee sting on her arse, but that's about all.

Ugh.

Those Gods of the Househunt are vengeful, malicious fuckers: pretending to grant me my heart’s desire only to cruelly snatch it away. They’re laughing their guts out right now, I’m sure of it.

I know it will pass, that lalala of course it wasn't THAT good, I can find something better, et cetera whatever rationalisation bollocks. But for now? I am really, royally, incontrovertibly, steamingswearingwantingtopunchsomething PISSED OFF.

Rant end.

For Steve

2006-09-29T01:58:00.000+01:00

A mate of mine is going through a rough time at the moment, and on the weekend he came too close to doing something really freaking stupid.

I want to write and tell you about him. He's awesome. Apologies for length and rennet content.

**********

We hurtle through Valencia in his rickety old van, chain smoking out the windows, our elbows baking red in the sun. He drums constantly on the steering wheel, in perfect time with the tinny rock seeping from the cracked plastic radio.

He is constantly distracted by his keen appreciation of natural beauty (especially in bikinis near the beach). He has been known to follow natural beauty for several blocks out of his way – he’s often late, that's always why.

I glance in the back, it's a veritable Tardis of useful crap. There’s nothing he hasn’t got in there. And I know, because I’ve asked for everything I can think of. I decide to try one last time:

“Steve, I need a bale of fencing wire, two onions and a clown makeup kit.”

He looks thoughtful for a moment. "Two out of three, I reckon."

"The clown makeup?"

"The onions".

Ha!

We’re on our way to the airport, it’s time for me to go.

***

I met Steve mere moments after arriving at my hostel in Valencia. Seeing him triggered a strange memory: when we were in primary school, we were asked to draw 'a typical Australian'. My friend Rachel, who is much smarter than I am, drew a woman in a business suit. I drew Steve, which was very odd, for two reasons. Firstly, I wasn’t going to meet him for another 20 years. Secondly, he’s from Newcastle.

[That’s home of the Brown Ale, not home of the silverchair, just to be clear.]

His hair is blond and long, his skin tanned and leathery from decades in the sun. Surf shirts and ripped jeans and sunglasses with neon-blue mirrors. Thick silver earrings hang in a row from each ear; his neck, wrists and ankles are heavy with shell jewellery and rope bracelets plaited in such a way that they have no beginning and no end.

How do you go from being a Newcastle boy to out-ockering the lot of us? You leave home at 16 and flee to the dockyards, where you sweet-talk your way onto a boat and work your passage across to New Zealand (it occurs to me that the phrase 'work your passage' is very multilayered). You spend the next 20 years in NZ and Oz, go everywhere, do everything. You become that guy.

That first night I arrived he welcomed me with open arms and bawdy jokes. I steeled myself, responding to the cliche, preparing to be bored, yet again, by the stereotype of my countrymen.

Except I couldn’t have been more wrong. He cracked my shit up right away.

***

We’ve got plenty of time, so we stop for a moment to pick up some stuff he needs for the job he’s doing later at the hostel. We run into Ben, this young guy Steve met last week. Ben's a Northerner, like Steve, recently arrived and wanting to set up his own business. Steve has driven him round, got flyers printed, taken Ben to meet his mate at the job centre who will give him a few leads. Ben's accent makes me laugh, and I like him even more for the genuine, unaffected gratitude on his face as he shakes Steve’s hand.

I’ve never met anyone with a bigger heart, a greater willingness to reach out and help others. He’s all bluster and bravado on the surface, but the soft streak is an inch deep and a mile wide.

He is so free of bullshit that when you talk things through with him everything is far simpler than you’d worried it into being. He talked me down from the edge of a meltdown after knowing me for two days. He convinced me to wear a toga on the streets when I was sickly, shaky-desperate for coffee and all my clothes were in the wash. He convulsed with laughter as we walked down the street, but stopped me and solicitously adjusted it to protect what was left of my dignity before we went in.

As we get back in the van, Ben asks ‘so what did you lot get up to last night then?’. I look over at Steve and there’s no sign on his face of the hangover that I know for a fact must be kicking his arse.

***

Last night was just like many others we’ve spent here – a pattern established as soon as I arrived and repeated over a blurry month of endless fun.

Steve cooked us dinner early – while Ville’s the chef, Steve has a signature dish that is inevitably a hodgepodge taste sensation known as 'Rolf', as in 'can you guess what it is yet?'

As had become our custom, we then adjourn upstairs to take our reserved places in the centre of the lounge, in two zebra-skin wing chairs that have become known as ‘the thrones’. Once settled, we chain smoke, and drink the deliciously light sixty-cent local red we’ve discovered, enthusiastically greeting newcomers and bidding them join our circle. Together with Ville, our comrade-in-arms, we are a three-person comedy act, ruling the conversation and keeping everyone in fits of delighted laughter.

There’s a cheeky glint in Steve’s eyes as if he’s lit from within by mischief, his laugh is one part filthy snigger, four parts delighted shout. When I ambush him with an excellent punchline he laughs with his whole body, hunched and wheezing in a disturbingly Muttley-esque fashion.

His stories are remarkable, and there’s a never-ending supply. We had a challenge amongst ourselves to bring up random topics to see what he would come up with. He never disappointed. The ones I remember best involved mass destruction: drowning his ute off Stradbroke; totalling a mint 1970 BMW moments after buying it cheap off a clueless old lady; that time an employee of his left the crane arm of the truck extended and took out 17 telegraph poles before he noticed; getting in with a mad crew as a kid in Newcastle, driving a truck through the doors of the local M&S to kick off a looting spree.

At first, I tried to match him, but soon I realised the folly of any such attempt. No matter how crazy my story, he can always top it. I told him about the time I interviewed the Tea Party, he told me about the time he drummed for Green Day onstage at the Sydney Entertainment Centre. Maybe I need some crazier stories, maybe he's just had a remarkable life. Probably both.

And I’ve only ever heard him repeat a story once. I didn't even care, because it was really freaking good one (involving a justifiably enraged dolphin).

As it gets later, Valencia awakens and we head out to greet the night. At our favourite club, our new mate John is DJing, and he takes all our requests. Steve asks for Pearl Jam for me, because it cracks him up to watch me lose it like a teenager. I ask for the Cult for him, ‘She Sells Sanctuary’, the song he’s always whistling as he wanders about the world, as I want to see him air drum as he bounces up and down.

He dances like a pogoing dervish, with a flailing, manic energy that is highly contagious. I'm still carrying a leg injury sustained on one such night.

He offers me his jacket at one point in the evening and I decline, too warm from the dancing to want fleece anywhere near me. It won’t until I get home later that night that I realise I’ve torn my jeans all the way up the arse, and he was merely trying to make my wildly abandoned dancing a little less of a spectacle.

He warns me, again, against the Agua de Valencia.

“That shit will fuck you up.”

I ignore him and drink it anyway, and he’s there to wander along beside me as I stumble home.

***

He and Ville are the reason I’ve stayed so long. Driving to the airport, I can’t actually believe that I’m leaving. Together the three of us have come up with a dozen crazy plans for how we’ll all stay, how we’ll make it work.

As he drops me off outside the terminal, I remember the day that we went to check out a catamaran, Steve full of the idea of starting a charter day out for backpackers. He’ll be the Skipper, he wants me to be the Cruise Director.

"You'd be great, jLo!"

I smile to myself, other plans in mind. But his enthusiasm is infectious; and with Steve, it seems possible.

***********

I’m very glad to know you, my friend. You’re one of the reasons I’m here.

Let me say this as clearly as I can: I know it’s there. You know I know it’s there. You can’t fool us. You won’t let us help you, so know this: you are loved.

Stick around dude. I mean it. Don’t scare me like that. I want more stories.

And as for the rest of you? I love you very much and miss you every day.

Just so you know.

Sick

2006-09-28T00:25:00.000+01:00

I am reaping the consequences of my lifestyle this week, folks, in the shape of a nasty illness that has rendered me bed-bound for two days. I haven’t felt this bad in a really long time. I’m a contractor, dammit, I can’t afford to be sick! Am very cranky, both at the illness itself and the fact that (a) I never got off my arse long enough to register with an NHS doctor, so my only options are insanely expensive private drop-in clinics and (b) I am so disorganised that my travel insurance expired last week. Grr. I am officially an idiot. Look after your health, kids!

As some of you are aware, a good friend of mine, Mr F (I would make up a better pseudonym, but my brain is too fuzzed), moved to London last week. His welcome weekend coincided with the birthday of another friend I can’t think of a good pseudonym for right now, and the ensuing festivities comprised a very unhealthy few days.

It was really, really fun, but holy hell I’m paying for it now.

Welcome to town, Mr F, you live in London, hooray! I’m really glad you’re here. I look forward to many activities of a very clean-living variety, with the high teas and museums and picnics and whatnot. Certainly not crazy parties that last until I stagger home to shower and change on Monday morning before heading to work. Not at all.

Am off to have another mug of Rooibos with honey and lemon. That’ll show you, angry red tonsils!

I hope you are all well.

Milestone

2006-09-15T01:47:00.000+01:00

The dog ate my blog posts.

Actually, that’s not true – I have, in fact, written a couple of entries, but they’re not yet good enough to post.

“What’s that”, I hear you exclaim in surprise. “She actually cares about quality? I would never have guessed.”

Fair point. Most of the blather on here (this included) is posted when the guilt just won’t let me go another day without updating. I know how my people need me. Sooner or later I’ll knock the other stories into shape.

Anyway. This post is a belated commemoration. Last weekend (9 September) marked a whole six months since I departed the fair shores of my homeland. I should, really, compose a very meaningful post about, you know, my journey and all the things I’ve learned thus far. Whether I woke up alone and all my wounds were clean, etc (that was for you, Kloss. If you can’t work it out you are dead to me).

But no! Instead, I choose to mark this milestone with a sweet but faintly disturbing story that I believe illustrates all I need to say about my travels thus far.

(Or perhaps I just think it’s funny. You decide).

Picture it: London, 2006. A very hungover jLo wanders slowly along Camden High Street. It’s late Saturday morning, but our heroine is still on her way home from the night before. She is quite ill, the rigours of the previous evening’s debauchery (including, very ill-advisedly, numerous rounds of cocktails) inscribed across her pale, clammy face. She is not looking her best: her hair is so frizzy it frames her skull in a pathetic whitegirl 'fro (seriously you guys: since when is my hair super-curly? Since London is when. It’s too weird). She smells pretty bad, she is limping along in stupid boots.

She lumbers slowly to the bus stop and comes to a halt, lighting a cigarette that her raw scratchy throat really doesn’t need. An elderly Italian gentleman approaches her.

EIG: You are very beautiful.

jLo (smiling wanly through the pain, wondering yet again why she is such a magnet for the crazy): Thanks.

EIG: Are you Italian?

jLo: No, no I am not.

EIG: Oh. (a pause). Do you have a boyfriend?

jLo: No, I don’t.

EIG: That is very surprising.

jLo: Yes, I find it quite surprising myself. (Lie #1)

The EIG does not respond, he turns around and starts to scrabble around with something jLo can’t quite see. Oh well, she thinks. That was that.

But she was wrong.

The EIG turned back, a scrap of paper in his hand. He thrusts it towards her.

EIG: Here. This is my phone number. I am Alfonso.

jLo: Thanks, Alfonso.

Alfonso: What is your number?

jLo: Oh, I don’t have a phone. (Lie #2)

Alfonso: Okay. You call me. We will be friends.

(Dramatic pause)

Alfonso: And then one day? I shall make you my wife.

Elderly Woman Behind A Computer Screen in a Small Bedroom

2006-09-01T02:09:00.000+01:00

I am officially old.

I had a fantastic time, don’t get me wrong. It was an excellent weekend. The binbag-train-platform memories have been well and truly banished. It ROCKED.

However, I am now suffering.

It has taken me all week to recover, and I’m not there yet. In addition to exhaustion, a hangover, digestive issues caused by excessively bad festival food and a nasty virus of some kind, I can barely freaking walk. A random drunken-dancing-related-injury (DDRI) acquired in Spain has flared up again and now I’m hobbling around the house moaning like an English person. It’s a bit sad when a weekend of ROCK requires a follow-up physiotherapist appointment.

It would, perhaps, be easier to justify if I’d gone particularly hard. You know, OH MAN, IT WAS SO FULL ON I WAS DRUNK AND TRIPPING FOR THREE DAYS AND MOSHED LIKE A MOFO AND RAN ABOUT NAKED BUT FOR MY NEON PINK DREADLOCKS AND WAS CROWNED SUPREME CHAMPION OF THE SHOPPING TROLLEY CHICKEN WARS AND SET MY SHOELACES ON FIRE and so on.

But no! I was mostly very well-behaved. Lots of standing and nodding, some clapping, a not-excessive amount of dancing about in glee. You know, your usual. It just takes more of a toll these days than it did before.

It was a very good time. I joined two of my good mates from Exeter days, DJDJK and Keith and a posse of their excellent friends and we had ourselves a blast.

The Conditions

As many of you know, I am not the world’s greatest camper. Nor do I even particularly enjoy the outdoors, especially when sharing said outdoors with many tens of thousands of drunken teenagers (OLD!). I therefore owe a great debt for my overall enjoyment of the weekend to the friends of DJDJK, seasoned veterans of the camping festival circuit who have their setup refined to a degree of luxury that made me weep with joy. Camp Blah, named thusly for reasons never actually explained, consisted of three tents (two of which were so big we each had our own wing to sleep in), a gazebo, an eyecatching flag (very useful when trying to navigate amongst acres and acres of brightly-coloured canvas) and – this was the best part – outstandingly comfortable camping chairs for everyone. It didn’t rain much, but when it did we dragged our armchairs inside the most giant of the tents and sat in comfort, listening contentedly to the plaintive cries of soggy anguish outside.

Alan, Chief Camp Stuff Dude, had even thought to organise for a set of walkie-talkies so that we could all stay in touch when meandering around the site and organise rendesvouses throughout each day. We had callsigns and everything, which was the awesome. They didn’t work brilliantly inside the arena, but did provide hours of fun late each evening, shouting random comments into the ether on various channels to see whom we could bewilder.

Safe and comfortable in our cosy little world, I only had to venture out into the rest of the campsite each evening to laugh at the antics of the kiddies (OLD!) playing chicken in shopping trolleys, wandering in drunken, chanting mobs and setting things alight…

… and to use the facilities, the thought of which make me shudder even now, days later. Imagine thousands of revellers, drinking themselves into stuporous sickness and eating truckloads of processed takeaway food all day, camping in the one place for a long weekend. Imagine a set of long-drop pit toilets. Oh god, the horror. As one of my Camp Blah fellows put it, “the smell just peels the skin right off your face.” The sooner I can block that particular memory, the better.

The Crowd

For all my moaning about the youngsters (OLD!), in fact they didn’t bug me too much throughout the weekend. Each day we would venture into the main arena from camp and wander from paddock to tent watching bands. In between, I would indulge in the endlessly pleasurable freakwatching that is one of my favourite aspects of mass public gatherings. Boys in tutus, girls in head-to-toe PVC despite the heat, makeup and hairdos and slogans and so much EFFORT - the uniforms of each social group clearly defining identity and creed.

I struck up conversations with a few of them. My favourite was the boy who couldn’t have been any older than fourteen, waiting patiently at the bar with a tenner in his hand. He gave his order, then turned to me and said, “Wow. Beers are expensive.”

I nodded my agreement.

“These are the first ones we’ve paid for all day, though,” he continued proudly.

“That’s some nice work,” I replied. There was a friendly pause.

“We’re honest people, though, really!” he insisted.

“Oh, I’m sure of it,” I replied. Another friendly pause, during which I looked down at his bare arm and smiled. “Where’s your wristband?”

Without missing a beat, he shot back: “Oh, SHIT! It must have fallen off when I was climbing the fence!”

In spite of such amusing encounters, crowd behaviour at concerts inevitably provides plenty of irritation. The pushing and shoving, the smug sense of entitlement of the girl sitting on her boyfriend’s shoulders, blocking everyone else’s view. The fact that everyone is so freaking TALL and they insist on standing right in front of me.

English people apparently also seem to think it is particularly hilarious to hoik their plastic cups still full of perfectly good beer as far as they can into the crowd in front of them. I sat for a while in the main paddock and watched the drinks fly from one side of the crowd to the other. No wonder they don’t serve decent beer at festivals, if no-one is actually bothering to drink it.

Most bewildering of all: the first set on the first day began at 12:05pm. The first clap-along? 12:11pm. Every single set, the whole weekend, there was the clap-along – at least once, more often five or six times. No matter how thrashy or hardcore the band, or how seriously the fans seem to take themselves, they love the fucking clap-along. It never fails to make me feel like I’ve stumbled into a cult.

The Music

Thankfully, the music made it all worthwhile. I saw many, many bands, most of whom I’d never heard of before (OLD!). I always swore I’d never lose touch – but it appears that has already happened when I wasn’t watching (you’ve changed, man). It’s a wee bit depressing.

However, I had great fun wandering from set to set, soaking up the new and exciting, revelling in that raw, tingling buzz you only get from live music loud.

I have noted that when it comes to band names, exclamation marks are in fashion: Panic! at the Disco, You Say Party! We Say Die!, ¡Forward Russia!, Captain Everything!, Against Me!. Conversations about which band to see next were unusually! animated!

Rather than review each set, I present the following non-exhaustive list:

- Bands my friend DJDJK recommended who I quite enjoyed: Giant Drag, The Metric.

- Bands who were absolutely crazy and cracked my shit up: Spank Rock, ¡Forward Russia!

- Bands who gave me a warm patriotic glow, especially while watching a sea of fists punch high into the air (ROCK!): Wolfmother

- Bands who were so much fun I couldn’t quite believe my ears: Kaiser Chiefs, The Automatic.

- Bands I had been eagerly anticipating who did not fail to impress: Primal Scream, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, Broken Social Scene

- Bands I went to see because I thought I should and who were okay but not particularly memorable: Arctic Monkeys

- Bands I saw by accident and who confirmed my lack of interest in them: The Streets

- Bands I saw by accident and whose album I shall purchase this week: The Spinto Band

- Bands I saw years ago in our tiny university bar in Exeter who have become an astonishingly colossal live act: Muse

- Long-beloved bands who rocked my world anew and confirmed that the world is All About jLo by including my all-time favourite of their songs in their setlist: Belle and Sebastian (Le Pastie de la Bourgeoisie), Pearl Jam (Yellow Ledbetter).

Aside from the (mighty) Pearl Jams, I think Muse will probably be my most lasting memory of the festival. It was, quite simply, a thrilling and overpowering show. I had intended to watch a song or two for old times’ sake and head off to watch Nouvelle Vague, but I couldn’t tear myself away. They were remarkable.

The End

On the last afternoon, I hit my festival wall and just couldn’t face another band. I skipped Placebo (which I know will horrify Adam Z even more than my admission in the last post that I missed Pulp last time, sorry dude!) and retired to Camp Blah to revive for a while and renew my acquaintance with Comrade Vodka. My new friend Julia and I managed to beat Comrade Vodka thoroughly about the head while solving the many problems of the world, with the result that by the time we retired back to the arena for the Pearl Jams we (well, I) was nicely toasted.

I then proceeded to cavort with abandon, shouting with delight and singing very loudly, much to the amusement of the teenaged onlookers around me.

After the spontaneous combustion of a climax recorded elsewhere, I celebrated my successful texting of the word ‘spontaneous’ while drunken by behaving very poorly back at Camp Blah, irritating (possibly even offending) as many people as possible for several hours before being kindly pointed in the direction of the South Wing and my waiting sleeping bag. Covering myself in glory, yet again.

And thus, I learned that despite appearances to the contrary, apparently when it comes to certain behaviour patterns, I’m not yet old enough.

Reading

2006-08-24T01:08:00.000+01:00

Last time I went to Reading, I slept for a night on a train platform with a garbage bag for a blanket.

I hear it’s a lovely town, not that we saw much of it. We caught the train up from London that morning, our one-day tickets to the festival clutched in our fists, arguing merrily about the inevitable lineup and multiple-stage-scheduling issues we were about to face.

Upon arrival, we discovered to our dismay that the grey London weather had followed us and that though our backpacks were crammed full of useful items, not one of us had thought to pack any sort of waterproof or rain-repellent device. And so, before we could make our way to the festival grounds, we took a detour through the bustling metropolis of Reading to see what we could find to make our day less damp.

The pickings, they were bleak. There were a LOT of people in Reading that weekend, and all the ponchos were apparently already on the backs of other, more organised and punctual folks. Undaunted and demonstrating the kind of buoyancy of spirit that made me such an inspirational Girl Guide back in the day, I led our little posse into Tesco and held aloft the solution to our problem: a value-pack of jumbo bin liner bags.

“With a hole in the top, and two for our arms, we’ll be sweet!”

“But we’ll look like utter idiots.”

“No! We’ll look creative. And, more importantly, DRY.”

My irrefutable logic won them over, and my friends were thusly convinced to don their bin bag ponchos as we followed the sounds of wafting bass up the hill towards the festival.

Whereupon, of course, it stopped raining.

I remember very little about the day itself. I remember the feel of it – a young crowd, a bit corporate and shiny, more BDO than Livid. I remember that it rained just enough to make everything nicely muddy but not enough to encourage McBec and Lindy to model their rocking binbag ponchos for the assembled crowd.

I remember that I was wearing my very friendly “Do Not Start With Me: You Will Not Win” t-shirt, which came in handy when pushy teenyboppers with no manners got in my way and tried to impose their feckless will upon me.

My recollection of the music is similarly vague. Gomez were cool, as was Beck. I remember feeling vaguely lustful watching Elastica (and coveting Justine’s pink visor) and taking a gamble by skipping Pulp to watch Embrace, much to McBec’s shock and derision. Embrace were excellent – though I can no longer describe why – I remember it only as one of those sets that remind me why I like festivals in the first place: amongst the dirt and the assholes lurk delightful surprises.

What I do remember very clearly is leaving the festival grounds late that evening with McBec and Lindy, ears ringing, giddy and elated in that tired way that you just want to bask in for as long as it lasts. We followed the long snake of crowd ahead of us, deep in conversation, reliving our favourite moments even though they’d happened only hours before.

All of a sudden, we were on our own. Somehow we had managed to take a wrong turn along the way and the crowd had disappeared.

It took us a long time to find the station. The post-festival elation started to dissipate as we frantically turned random corners, trying not to panic as we nervously reminded each other that the timetable we’d checked earlier that day had the last train leaving really, uncomfortably close to RIGHT NOW.

As the station loomed into sight, we made a run for it. Bags and jumpers and sunglasses flying, we thundered down the stairs and skidded to a frozen halt as we gazed, dumbstruck, at the sight of the brightly-lit arse-end of the Last Train Back to London, picking up speed as it pulled away from the platform. So freaking close.

We were initially undaunted. There had to be other options, right? There was checking of timetables, conversations with a smug policeman, brainstorming of ideas. Surely we couldn’t be stuck here for the night?

Except, we were.

Gradually accepting our fate, the first hours passed reasonably well, even cheerfully. Laughing at our idiocy, we explored the general vicinity of the station, found a dodgy 7-11 and spent an unfeasibly long time choosing snacks and magazines before settling in for an impromptu slumber party.

It was the longest night of my life.

For one thing, we weren’t alone. Others in the same situation also found spots on the concourse and huddled down for the night. Hell is, of course, other people – and with the assembled mob as miserable and frustrated as we were, it didn’t make for a happy evening. They were loud, they were drunk and smelly and dirty and sick, there were arguments and tears. There were even creepy seduction attempts: at one point a young gentleman took it a step too far and decided to come sit by McBec’s head and watch her as she tried to sleep. I remember trying to calculate just how much it would cost to split a cab back to London, how long it would really take us to walk, whether now was the time to lose my hitchhiker virginity (I finally felt ready, you know?). The hours passed very, very slowly.

It was extremely cold. It was technically still summer, but the night was frosty and the chilled concrete surrounds didn’t help. We sat and shivered with every scrap of fabric we had on us plastered to our bodies. I wore my sunhat all night long.

Thank god for the binbags. Seriously. Thanks to the sheer number of them that we had in our possession (our reward for buying the VALUE pack), we were able to get creative about making a nest for ourselves on the cold cement of the station floor. A binbag for a mattress, a binbag for a doona, a bundle of binbags for a pillow. I adapted the poncho concept from earlier in the day and matched it with a fetching binbag sack for my legs – a cocoon of crackly black plastic in which to lie and quiver miserably upon the concrete, unable to sleep, aching and cramped, wanting to just freaking die so that I wouldn’t have to lie there any longer. At least, I reflected in a dark moment, my corpse would already be neatly wrapped for easy disposal.

By the time the first train to London left the next morning, we had all lost power of speech. Numb and teary and sore, we chose separate seats and rode back to town in silence. It was many days before we could speak of it again.

Years later, the pain and misery have all but faded.

Or so I thought.

The festival is on again this weekend. A friend of mine called on Monday night to ask if I would like to take his spare ticket. I paused for a moment and let the desolate wretchedness of that night flood through me. Good god, not again.

Then I figured – hey, what better way to exorcise those memories once and for all? And so, on Friday morning jLo and Reading: The Rematch will commence. I’m ready.

In fact, I’m even getting pretty excited: these guys, and these guys, and these guys are all going to be there. I might even check out these good-looking young fellows. And who knows who or what else will surprise the hell out of me?

I’m going for the whole three days, camping and all. On the plus side, at least if I get stuck at the train station I’ll have a sleeping bag at my disposal this time.

On the not-so-plus side: it’s raining, a LOT, and there’s no end in sight.

I’ve packed lots of binbags, just in case.

Guess What?

2006-08-21T01:19:00.000+01:00

I have a job! Finally!

A proper one, I mean, as opposed to these ever-so-enriching temp gigs with the typing and whatnot.

A job!

I start next week. It’s still a fixed term contract, but it pays much better than typing and I don’t have to, you know, type all day. Also! I will get to listen to endless fascinating stories of how members of the public have been wronged, very wronged, and won’t you please fix it?

Sure, Member of the Public. Allow me.

It might suck, of course. I do so love to listen to people whinge all day (some of you may remember jLo Summer Job 2005/6: Attack of Those Who Like To Educate Their Children At Home And How Dare You Try To Stomp All Over Our Way Of Life, You Fascist Whore!). On the other hand, it might be quite cool, we shall see. It’s a job, at any rate. And the idea of being free from job applications, even if only for a few months, is making me quietly giddy.

Hoorah!

Cricket

2006-08-10T22:35:00.000+01:00

One

Quick, no googling: what are the 11 ways to get out in cricket?

Two

jLo and JBT - A Conversation with Thoughtful Pauses:

jLo: Hey, JBT. You know about English words and cricket: is Simon Jones a chav?

JBT: No, jLo. Why would you think that?

jLo: It was a topic of conversation during the Ashes last year. It was the first time I’d heard the term, and it has oft made me wonder.

JBT: Well, no. Simon Jones is not a chav.

(Thoughtful pause)

JBT: In fact, he is Welsh.

jLo: Oh.

JBT: He won us the Ashes, you know.

jLo: I thought so too.

(Thoughtful pause)

jLo: He won’t do it again, though.

JBT: You’re probably right.

(Not a thoughtful pause, just a lull in the conversation)

jLo: I was the subject of much heckling when I confessed that I thought he was quite hot.

JBT: Really? I think he’s a good looking fellow. Not that I’m gay or owt.

(Thoughtful pause)

JBT: Sort of like a cross between Skeletor and a greyhound.