15 June 2010

It's the laptop issue that's really devastating this blog. What's holding me back from making this purchase? Money probably. And time? No. Not time. I've found time to write this, haven't I? I'm not sure where the blame lies. With me, generally and ostensibly.

I'm reading a wonderfully melancholy book which Chloe sent to me for my birthday. It's Good Morning, Midnight by Jean Rhys. I enjoyed Wide Sargasso Sea when I was 18. Midnight is more devastating than Plath, I would say. Rhys has taken me through the weekend, which was a long one, on account of the fact that I took Friday and Monday off to haul myself up to Inverness for the festival there. I made a little promise to myself to take it easy last week, in the days leading up to the trip, but it wasn't to be. I've had far too many dinners out. Far too many. I felt a quiet longing the other day for someone to make me a home-cooked meal. But, with no food in the house and scant inclination on my part, I think it will be to the restaurant again tonight. Doesn't that sound like a romantic life? It's like A Moveable Feast, except that I don't live in a hotel and I don't spend my days at the horse races...

I'd love to live in a hotel for a spell, wouldn't you?

Let me tell you about the festival. It was sublime! Disregard the weather, and the Scottish, and the lack of clean ablutions and the mud. Only consider the aspect of the lake and the mountains and the sound of the music and that great feeling when you're just dancing for hours and you've had too much wine. We had a ball. I especially enjoyed, to my surprise, Fat Boy Slim, Leftfield and The Strokes.

I new that I'd enjoy Blondie. She looks fantastic and she still gives a great show. I was not quite sober during her performance. At the end of each song, I yelled "Go Debbie" with desperate glee. I don't think she heard me. Nick thought perhaps she could because she has a Debdar - a radar only found in people with the name Deborah - I acknowledge that this isn't particularly witty, but I will admit that I was the one who came up with it.

It's football mild-fever at the moment. No one's too crazy about it. I was taken to lunch today but we sat too far from the screen for me to see New Zealand's goal. I had to ask the waitress who had won. She said that "the team in white" had scored a goal in the final minutes and that it was a draw. Okay, fine. They've done well.

We watched South Korea on a screen at the Drambuie tent on Saturday. I think they're a great team to watch. Perhaps it was the Drambuie, but I was charmed.

In other news, I haven't written you any poetry, painting is looking neglected on the easel and perhaps the dust gathers so much that it will add texture to the execution. I'm here at work rather too late tonight, on account of my long lunch on the agency's credit card (some are accustomed to these perks which are not to be had in public service). I'm taking this little break now, to indulge myself in a post and ease some of the unease that has grown out of the lack of writing lately, but breaks end.

And this one ends here.

1 June 2010

Politically-themed sandwiches sounds like a great idea for Mr Mabey's sandwich cart. How could you push the limits? What about a Ghengis Khan sandwich where the meat is cooked between one's thighs... That could be a myth about Khan but it's something I read somewhere about him and his compadres. It could be true though. There was this awful scene in the latest Murakami novel that I read where some Mongolian soldiers skinned a Japanese soldier alive. It was horrific. The image still sits in my mind and it makes me shudder.

What a good writer.

He also wrote What I Talk About When I Talk About Running - or some such title - and that's been recommended to me on the basis of my running which, by the way, I'm still not doing. And I've definitely deflated. I think I'll deflate some more. I've taken up walking instead. I walk to and from work which takes me around half an hour. Today, I'm afraid that I didn't walk on account of the fact that I rubbished myself yesterday trying to pack as much fun into the long weekend as possible and I was dog-tired this morning.

Still going strong though and would do it all over again tonight if I had the chance. And the company.

The painting is taking some serious shape. It's been likened to a vase full of celery which didn't please me particularly, but at least the viewer likened it to flora of some kind. I've attached a photo of the latest. It's still at undercoat stage so the hue isn't perfect but it will get there. Yesterday I picked up some sable brushes so that I can do some teeny work on the petals. I went to Soho to Cass Art and also picked up a sketch book which was dire because I managed to start my first sketch whilst playing cards at midnight after a couple of bottles of red wine. What a nerd I must have looked, scribbling away like that.

Down on Regent Street yesterday, the ipad was in the throes of its just-on-the-market celebration. I was considering getting a mac, especially because they do finance deals, but I just couldn't do it. You should have seen this place - it was rammed full of people. It was suffocating. I looked around in a confused manner for a couple of minutes, wandered up and down the great glass staircase and then left. The horror of it all.

I'm not sure about the mac idea anymore. It'll cost twice as much as a PC and I really don't use my laptop for anything but word processing and internet. I'm getting conflicting advice.

Back to that fateful day.

I turned on lappy, the trusty little guy that I've been using since 4th year university (you just can't do law school without one, I think), and up came the dreaded blue screen. I've had this problem before. It was during my professionals course, when I'd almost finished drafting my statement of case and all my notes ready to devastate opposing counsel at the mock trial, and then the blue screen tells me that I've lost all my work. Boyfriend of the day managed to restore the previous settings, but the trial notes were lost and I had to start again with time fast running out. How dramatic. Obviously it all worked out because here I am, sitting at my desk, being a lawyer. Well, no, I'm taking a lunch break and writing my blog post, but I was being a lawyer this morning. And I will be again right now if the phone rings.

I took lappy to the shop last Saturday and discussed the problem with the man behind the counter and the outcome of the conversation was that it was time to get a new laptop. He showed me an IBM. I thought about it and walked out, promising to return.

Part of the reason that it's now unsalvagable is because of that time that I was a little drunk and I knocked water all over it. Lucky for me it wasn't damaged, but for the fan which makes a terrible whirring and grinding noise every now and again.

It's a very good thing that I have the iphone. It's also a bad thing when it comes to posting random thoughts and photos on facebook. It's like making that drunken phone call but worse because your calling the world and laying your thoughts on display. Splash! All over the newsfeed. Irrevocable.

I've started this post in such an awkward place, it must be diabolical to read. Back to the beginning.

Its been a tiring couple of weeks. Fraught with the loss of lappy, amongst other things, as some of you will know. And you've offered your condolsences, which are appreciated. Some things just aren't meant to be, huh? Even with the best of intentions.

Work has been mad! But I did manage to get out to the Portrait Gallery after work on Thursday. What a great permanent collection! I only managed half, once again. I've still the third floor of the Tate and the second wing of the Tate Britian to do. It seems that I have a tendency to leave galleries half-finished. I took off to meet Nicola for a drink and she was nice enough to hop on my iphone and order Daddy's birthday present which I had been meaning to do for days and just hadn't managed to get round to because of the computer disaster. I would have much prefered to have seen the book with my own eyes and wrapped it up with the card I was yet to buy but it wasn't to be. And it will get there late. I've bought him the Bolano, 2666. Hopefully the translation isn't rubbish because it's supposedly a dense read. Nothing like the Pynchon I bought him for Christmas, of course.

I called him on Monday morning. We'd been out inordinately late the night before but I woke up early, duly, and managed to reach him as he was drinking his champagne and eating his roast chicken. Sounds like a brilliant birthday to me.

I can hradly remember what had happened the night before that. I think it involved Rock Band. Ugh. I can certainly remember the night before that though. On Saturday, it was Eurvision night. We'd decided to throw a BBQ, regardless of the fact that we have no outdoor space, save the entrance balcony, and we have no BBQ. We bought one of those instant party size disposable ones and managed to smoke the whole neighbourhood out by placing on a vinyl stool with scant insulation. The stool melted, the smoke alarm went off and there was a late night clandestine trip to dump the stool in a skip or some such receptacle.

I'm sure that it can't be healthy to eat sausages which are cooked in plastic fumes.

I was much surprised by the Eurovision voting. It's as if everyone had forgotten the world wars one night. Well, that's not strictly true because Israel didn't vote for Germany for example. But what about the Baltics. They supported their neighbours as if the devastation of the end of last century never happened.

Last Friday was the Greenwich Jazz and Beer Festival. We went along because Nick has an insatiable love for the Fun Loving Criminals, who were headlining that night. I don't drink beer, but I made an exception and I was plesantly surprised. Especially by the chocolate flavoured one. My word, did they make a tasty brew. It was a nice night. I was impressed by FLC. They conjure up memories of listening to 96.1 when I was thirteen or fourteen.

We happened upon a tapas bar on the way back to the tube and instead of getting home before the tubes stopped running, we bought a nice bottle of wine, ordered tapas and following it by dessert and yelled at eachother across the table in an enthusiastic manner. Nick and I carefully avoid talking about the nature of positivism. It gets ugly.

Then we passed out on the night bus and were kicked off in Russell Square.

And good times were had by all.

I'm sure there's more. I have a lot of musings that I haven't laid bare for you here because my lunch break is swiftly coming to its end.

Roll on the era of the new laptop.

4 June 2010

I have a post all ready for you. We'll have to live in the past for a while as I catch up on previous musings and we re-engage. I'm very much trying to get the new laptop organised so don't despair. We have the rest of our lives to post/read/laugh.

I'm going to try to post a photo from my iPhone in order to satiate you in the meantime...

Oh. Goodness. I can't.

Things could be worse for us.

But, boy, couldn't they be better?

16 May 2010

And I know that it was only yesterday that I posted the last, but I just feel like putting off the work that I've brought home for a teensy bit longer. And besides, I feel inspired, and surely one should seize such an opportunity.

Some of you may know and some of you will not know, that I have been running most days since the beginning of the year. Well, it transpires that I have to take a short hiatus from running because I'm actually too fit. How can one be too fit, you might ask. Just picture that woman who won the London Marathon recently. That is surely too fit, wouldn't you agree? It's definitely not sexy in any way.

No. Stop me here. That's a serious opinion statement.

I don't find that sexy, and I did ask Nick whether he would find that attractive, and he agreed that he didn't. Imagine making love to her... why, you'd just bounce right off those muscles. They gleam like shiny rubber boots. I don't find that attractive. But it's not, of course, the bounce-factor that would make one shy away from loving her physically, but the aesthetic displeasure. Having made this opinion statement, I'll qualify it with the fact that someone out there, probably a woman of similar fitness and build who can see herself when she looks at our number one runner and likes what she sees, will love her. And they'll go running together in the mornings... and at night, they'll bounce off each other...

My point, somewhere along the way, is that I don't feel particularly attractive when my rear end is solid as a rock, and believe me, it's getting that way. I had to make a decision. There'll be no more running for at least a week, whilst I try to deflate, and after that, I'll reassess the situation and maybe try for a mere two runs a week.

I'm eating a mandarin and listening to Broken Social Scene. I missed tickets by a whisker to their show tomorrow night. I probably would have bought one and gone by myself, like I did with the sonatas and the Bennett and upon reflection, I think this shows how few friends I have in London. Especially, how few I have who have the same tastes. I know you're all out there. You're all springing to mind right now. But you're not here, are you?

What on earth am I doing in this city away from you all?

Not that you're all in the same place.

I've also procrastinated today by vacuuming the house(or is it vaccumming? Oh, what does it matter in England, where it's always hoovering) followed by a mop of the floor. I don't think it's the act of cleaning that I love... I was thinking about this whilst mopping the kitchen ... I don't mind cleaning and I do it quite often, more often than most, but I think it's the result that I like the best. Therefore, surely I'd feel just as satisfied if someone else did the cleaning for me? I'll test this theory one day by hiring a cleaner. So many people in London have them. A lot of my friends who live in those flats full of ex-pats have cleaners. I prefer living with fewer people myself.

And now I'm chewing on a teacup full of pumpkin and sunflower seeds. Gorgeous. I'm still trying this fruit diet, most of the time, so that I can see whether I really need that much sleep. I think I mentioned before that the sickness stymied the experiment? I'm still trying, although not too desperately, to see what the results of such an experiment will be. I did wake up at six this morning, having gone to bed at midnight, which might count for something? It's not a "fair test" yet. All's fair in love and war and experiments conducted upon my interior.

I'll keep you posted.

Oh, a blog pun! How fantastique!

Last night, I watched Sidney Pollack's Sketches of Franck Gehry and it was very good. I like Pollack. I like Gehry. Not everybody does. Did you know that his real name is Ephraim Owen Goldberg, but he changed it partly due to anti-semitism? I find that fascinating. Ephraim... what a name... like Finghin. A name to celebrate.

I went to see the Guggenheim in Bilbao with James. What a monstrosity. I love monstrosities. I don't think we have enough of them these days. Like the Sagrara Familia in Barcelona. Stupendous creations.

And then, can you imagine, we watched Die Hard, as it happened to be showing on Channel Four. Well, some of those lines! How undeliverable! It doesn't matter how good you are at acting when you're faced with a script like that. And then there are the gems:

"Yippe-ki-yay motherfucker".

This movie is actually based on a novel. I can imagine that it doesn't strictly adhere to the actual dialogue of the book.

And it is yet another good reason why, instead of blogging, I should be writing that action movie screen play and selling out.

15 May 2010

Sad times these are indeed. After Monday, things went progressively down hill for me. I've had an awful illness that's incapacitated me for most of the week. Tuesday was spent in bed; wholly in bed but for two hours when I managed to rouse myself to the office where certain matters were screaming for my attention. But they did not get the best of my attention, that's certain. Wednesday, again, I was in bed every moment that I wasn't at work, and again Thursday. Rubbish really. The exhaustion. It was uncanny.

But, we could imagine that my week actually went according to plan and I went to the Pie and Mash store with Andy on Thursday night for some real Eel Pie. It's down on Royal College Street and it's one of those traditional English style places where you all sit together on these stalls and demolish great plates of pie and, well, mash. And then I lifted a great wad of mash atop my spoon (because I imagine I have a spoon) and I say to Andy, "I'll ssss...mash you" or perhaps, "I'll give you the mash". And he guffaws and starts churning out a host of awful puns that wouldn't bear repeating (thank goodness, because I can't think of any - what an excellent escape from a sticky pun situation).

There's another Pie and Mash outfit that's acclaimed down on Goldhawk Road but, although I lived there for at least a year, I never tried it. Perhaps my time will come soon. Then I'll get ss...mashed.

I'm not even going to apologise for that one, even though I acknowledge how horrendous it is.

And so, Friday. Again, I managed work and Sandra made me promise her that I would take it easy this weekend. This is probably because she is sick of hearing my hacking old hag's cough ringing in her ears all day. I'm feeling much better, but for the cough. I even managed to stay awake last night long enough to use my ticket to the orchestra down at Cadogan Hall. And I'm so pleased that I did. Two very enthusiastic young men - one on the cello and one on the piano playing all the best songs written for the two instruments. Yes, they played the Chopin:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HnYYM_DMeOU

Love, Nelsova... just look at her billowing dress... But this man (Guy Johnston) was brilliant too. He actually broke a string in the Polonaise and threw up his hand to stop Mr Piano, (Finghin - what an exquisite name!) and turned to the audience with such a polite "I'm terribly sorry"... oh, the English. So refined.

And they played Mendelssohn which I adore! And the real thrill of the night happened to be, of all things, the Britten. It was very, very enjoyable to watch him plucking away whilst the piano banged a bit. Having just seen Britten (portrayed, not quite so dirty an old man as Auden, but dirty enough) in the Bennett last week, it was quite appropriate.

And today I went to work. Yes! Saturday at the office! Damn this illness which stymies my attempts to stay on top of my inbox - which, by the way, I always am. More than ten items in my inbox sends me into a panic. Upon reflection, and with a positive outlook in mind, I think that the illness was just the knock I needed. You know when you just keep on pushing yourself until you burst? And then one is forced to recoil for a spell to right oneself again. What is right. I don't know. But, it's been a week sans wine, I haven't fallen over once or made any silly decisions and I think I might just try to lay off it for a while. Again. Wish me luck, Lord knows, I'll need it.

I'm listening to Siouxsie and the Banshees singing The Beatles.

And, with such an uneventful week as this has been, and unless I set out the details of my feverish dreams that I had in my mammoth sleeping sessions - none of which are particularly interesting, but all of which were set in my parent's backyard for some reason - I really can't see that this post should go on any longer.

Why don't you set me a topic to muse about. Like cabbages. Why cabbages? Well, have you read Mrs Dalloway? Only the best of writers can use the phrase "musing amongst the cabbages" on the first page of their novel and still sound sonorous.

Long live Virginia in a posthumous manner!

10 May 2010

I've been duly admonished for not posting a blog of late. Thank you, Tom. It's nice to know that someone out there minds enough to mention it.

Today is a Monday, but I'm not at work. I've got remote access which is wonderful and means that I can email and draft in my slippers which is just a hoot. At the moment, I'm listening to the Magnetic Fields... another hoot. Just call me an owl...

Or don't, because I'll probably forget that I said that and it will perplex me.

Last week I picked up the easel! I took Friday afternoon off to bus myself up to Seven Sisters and actually finally managed to drop that amplifier back to Andy. It was heavy and awkward and I'm just so glad to be rid of it. The easel, on the other hand, was heavy and awkward and I love it to pieces. Andy found it at an antiques store once in the distant past. It has a little cardboard note dangling from it which says "Lady Bonham Carter with grateful thanks for the loan". Another hoot. Who knows whether it's a truthful representation as to the easel's past, but doesn't it touch up a nice story so well.

So, where are we at. I've sanded my pre-stretched canvas and I've applied two coats of gesso. Then, I managed to lay my first undercoat. This morning, now that the paint is mildly dry, I've sketched a charcoal of the vase and flowers which are my subject and then I mixed up the colour of one of the stripes on the vase but the undercoat wasn't dry and I had to abandon it. I can reuse the paint that I've mixed, so it's no matter. But I think that I've mixed the paint too thick and with too much oil. We'll see. I don't want the layers to come away from each other.

When will it dry? I hope soon. As with any of these hobbies, I need to start fast and enthusiastically. If the past is anything to judge by, as my enthusiasm wanes the hobby becomes a memory, an interesting talking point and another string on a rather useless bow.

Yesterday I started my "fruit diet". I'm interested to prove the theory that one need only sleep four hours a night on such a diet. I'll keep you updated on my progress. I would assume that it will take a few weeks to settle in and I'd base this assumption on the fact that I slept for nine hours last night. I had ruined myself with wine for the days running up to the diet so there's little more to be expected.

On Thursday I went to see The Habit of Art as I've mentioned. Oh... it was so good! Thomas has a couple of tickets for us so that I can go see it again in the extended season. Very, very enjoyable. I think I'll be purchasing a copy so that Daddy can have a read. Not the same as seeing Mr Griffiths in the flesh, but probably a fine enough way to experience it. I experienced Stoppard for the first time on the page, not to mention Wilde, and I don't feel any worse for it. I love them both. Even when Raymond Hawthorne stomps all over it with his direction. Yes, I'm referring to Rosencrantz at the Maidment all those years ago.

Back home from the lonely theatre, the election results were running up a storm. In fact, yesterday I lazed about, waiting for paint to dry, and watched the BBC, waiting for people to emerge from their respective houses. That's right... all-day door-watching and reports of people opening and closing them. Very boring. Everyone is so excited about forming a majority government. We do this all the time in New Zealand and we're fine. No riots. Sometimes it can take a couple of weeks to settle the numbers, ministers and such. MMP is the most democratic way, of course, and much more civilised.

Back to Friday afternoon, Andy and I had a greasy spoon. Actually, it wasn't greasy spoon breakfast but lunch, and we had lasagne and chips. My inside's are so terribly unhappy with me. I had tapas and cake for dinner that night at Raj's birthday and followed it on Saturday morning with Bloody Mary's and G&T's at the Hawley Arms. I chased it up with dinner at Satuma with Nicola. I love that place but you can see why the fruit diet is called for.

Poor little body.

And, really, that's why I haven't been blogging. Busy, busy, busy... as Vonnegut says. But, he refers to coincidences on a universal scale rather than the fact that I've been running helter skelter around the city falling, dancing, falling again... The dancing took place at Notting Hill Arts Club on Friday night after the tapas. It wasn't quite the same as our last visit. The live band was finishing up and the crowd was messy. I fought off an attempted rape by some drunken man whilst trying to get to Raj to say goodnight.

I've uploaded a photo because there's no reason to believe me without evidence. Not of the attempted rape which I could never prove because I'm using hyperbole in the first place, but of the painting. Hopefully you can make out the beginnings of an attempt at shading. I've used yellow ochre and cadmium yellow mixed with a large amount of titanium white and mineral spirits. Then I added some more of both colours to the palette to make the corners and shadows ready for the figure. I think I'll add some grey hue to the recesses because I can see some grey in the line of the walls meeting.

Incidentally, this is atop our heating unit - there is a boiler underneath it. Nick purchased the spoon that graces our wall whilst he was travelling in South America. Why did he buy a large spoon and cart it around South America with him? I'm still unsure.

Until the next riveting instalment of my life and times, adieu.

2 May 2010

My love affair with the pavement continued this week. This time, I was on Oxford Street marching quickly to keep up with others. And there were these road works. Well, I caught my foot on a bollard, didn't I, and as I was none too steady on my stiletto, down I went. Face down. Ha! Hilarious.

I'm sporting a pretty little bruise on my chin, and some large grazes on my knee and hands. Oh, and I bemoan the loss of another pair of stockings! Life is such a struggle between trying to stay upright and laying oneself out flat. Next time I might actually do myself a mischief. It's almost reason not to venture out of the house at all. It's like the man who said that he would no longer own Siamese cats because, although he loved them dearly, the heartache was too much when they died. Who was he? I don't remember.

But, we must keep on! Taking care not to throw ourselves into the road as we hazard the world.

In other news, last night we all had tapas on Holloway Road. It was scrumptious! I am definitely going back there. Raj pretended that it was my birthday by striking up a song and the whole place started singing along. Isn't it nice when that happens? It's like living in a musical. I'd prefer it if everyone burst into Like a Prayer the way they did in the most recent episode of Glee.

I was flicking channels not watching it. I don't mind if you don't believe me.

And then we played foosball. Argh! I have to admit it. I've been to the local twice in as many days. I love that place. I need to take two wine glasses back to them though. If only people wouldn't insist on leaving when I haven't finished my drink, then I wouldn't have to borrow them.

In some ways, my birthday has been a little spread out this year. Yesterday Nicola gave me a present and it was David Foster Wallace. It's so brilliant! I can't wait to read it just as soon as I've finished the Muriel Spark that Chloe posted. I've been meaning to read Infinite Jest for so long now. Have you read it? Is it just as amazing as I imagine it is?

Stephen's present also arrived, having been delayed by the volcanic ash cloud, no doubt. He sent me the two Nudie Suits albums and by this point I was completely overcome. I'm blessed to have the best presents ever this year.

Tomorrow is a bank holiday. I think the plan is to sit inside tonight, watching the rain and the two DVDs that arrived in the post. Quiet and nice. And fair enough because this week will prove quite active. I had better watch my step lest I fall again. I've got two tickets to The Habit of Art and no one to go with. So, I'll take a big bag. Does anyone want to join me? Bag won't mind if you do.