Back at work after the long and computer-free Christmas break, and it’s so busy I’m about to pass out. Barely have time to email anyone, and haven’t even had a chance to glance at eBay!

A heart-warming tale

Yesterday I locked myself out of my flat. My keys were lying just inside the front door, on a cabinet. I realized this the moment the door slammed shut. My spare keys were in a drawer in my bedroom. I went to work, not wanting to be late on the first day back. When I got home it was dark and drizzly and I didn’t rate my chances of getting in without the help of a very expensive locksmith. I faffed about with a bit of string and a wire coathanger (it’s better if you don’t know the embarrassing details) before asking my neighbours for help. They came to my aid and spent half an hour balancing on chairs and fiddling with the coat hanger, and managed to hook the keys from the cabinet on to the hanger, and veeerrry slooowly drag them through the tiny open top window… I was so grateful I nearly cried. Going to buy them a nice thank-you gift. It’s not often strangers go out of their way to be helpful to you in this city, so I was really touched.

Things lost this week

Money: Spent Monday at home despairing and drinking. A plumber had come over to fix the cistern of my loo, and I'd anticipated the cost would be around £100. Steep, but worth it for a loo that flushes properly, I'm sure you'll agree. He estimated the job would take two hours. OK, so that's £150, expensive but I can afford it (just). When, after two hours, he announced that he had to go and drive to Shepherd's Bush to get a part, I cracked open the vodka. He was gone another two hours (traffic accident in Holland Park, don't you know), then took another hour to install the part. Total bill? £478.10. Happy Christmas! Thinking of having a party and making everyone drink loads of beer, then charging 50p to wee in the most expensive toilet in South London.

Pride: At the Actionettes Christmas club, I
a) approached a guy I thought I knew, only to have him back away with a look of fear in his eyes.
b) Played music for 45 minutes, and on my way out of the DJ booth accidentally jogged a turntable and made the record skip and then stop... It was the DJs first track and she glared at me with hatred. I hid backstage for ten minutes, and drank more.

From these experiences I can deduce two things: 1) It'd be easy for me to be an alcoholic and 2) I'd probably enjoy it a lot.

Feeling impish. Am entering corrections on-screen, and some of the sentences I have in mind would be better than what the author came up with… ‘Recent signs of affluence’ could, with a slip on the keys, become ‘recent signs of flatulence’ and a colleague suggested that a soldier ‘toasting the Queen with a tot of port’ might be more interesting if he were ‘toasting the Queen over the fire with a fork’.

Work is demoralizing and boring, even if in the fortnight before Christmas it is practically compulsory to drink every day while at my desk. Certain people are pissing me off and making me feel sad. BUT tonight the Kennington Chameleon is DJing, and on Saturday the Actionettes (weatherbeaten old hags, if you believe the Guardian Guide) are having a Christmas shindig.

Today I am very crabby, and it’s not helped by the fact that the phones are down, and the central heating is on the blink. I went for a late lunch today, at about 2.15, as I was suddenly hungry and all I wanted was soup. So I donned my coat, scarf and beret. The hat covers my ears, and I only realized my muttering was quite loud when I expressed annoyance at the chicken soup being sold out at EAT. ‘Flippin’ bollocks,’ I sighed – and the guy in front of me turned around and gave me a funny look. As EAT had nothing I wanted to EAT (£3.75 for a pie? Who do they think they are kidding?), I moseyed on over to Kastner & Ovens. I have a love-hate relationship with K&O. I love the food but I hate the bastard place. What sort of evil people take your order, spoon lots of hot cottage pie into a container, and then go ‘Oh wait, you’re having the small, aren’t you?’ and then, when you admit that yes you are having the small*, they TAKE LOADS OF THE COTTAGE PIE OUT and put it back in the serving dish. Bastards. And they never give you cutlery, napkins, or anything. As I walked out I mumbled ‘Fucking rip-off’, and they may have heard. Oopsie.

The boy is at home resting. He looks very forlorn and very cute with his paw all bound up in a cast. Aawww.



*Cos the large costs £1.45 more and it’s ten days til you get paid

Big news of the weekend is this: Steve’s broken his arm. He did this by running down the street, tripping, sailing gracefully through the air (so I am told) and landing on his elbow. Crunch. Ouch. But he then got the bus home, called NHS Direct, waited for them to call back, then went to bed when they didn’t. Sunday morning his arm still hurt, so he called them again. They deigned to ring back this time, and advised him to visit A&E just to get it checked out. Somehow the boy had managed to dress himself, eat, play golf on his Xbox/playstation/whatever, walk for 45 minutes to the hospital, ALL WITH A BROKEN ARM. If I get pregnant, he’s having the baby for me, as he appears to have a freakishly high tolerance for pain.

I think it’s the rubber ankles what did it. Steve has ankles that occasionally give while he’s walking, and I’ll see him fall over and straighten up really quickly out of the corner of my eye. So tonight I am at the hospital (St. George’s, my most hated hospital. Really, I hate it. I have a lot of memories of St. George’s, all of them bad). He had surgery this afternoon and gets out tomorrow, at which point we’ll have to come up with a plan for assisted living. Cross your fingers.

Today I am crabby. Co-worker is annoying me with much throat-clearing and harrumphing. Also I am sneezing and no one is saying ‘Bless you’, which for some reason is making me want to go home and sulk.

Other annoying things (today)
People who give their newborn sons old-man names. Alfred, Archibald, Wilfred. It’s probably done with the intention – conscious or not – of doing everything to prevent the kid growing up to be one of those hood-up, tracksuit bottoms, urban thugs who kick people to death and film the whole thing on their mobile phone.

I cry very easily. At songs, films, TV advertising jingles, newspaper stories about premature babies pulling through against all odds. But why in God’s name does any version of ‘Winter Wonderland’ make my eyes leak?

Speaking of leeks (sorry), I am scoffing a leek tart from my fave bakery in the world, Paul. Still crabby, though.

Star spotting: Bianca Jagger looking anxious/bored in the back of a parked Mercedes.

Weird: Last night I got off the bus and headed for Sparrows to pick up my regular fix of property porn, the Evening Standard Wednesday supplement. A woman was leaving and she stopped me with the words: ‘I recognize that face’. She looked familiar too. We exchanged a few words and established we were both from Wimbledon. Only as I was walking back to my flat did her name come to me, and I remembered that we’d gone to school together… until we were 11. Now, you’d think that a person would change a little in eighteen years, but obviously I look the same. Even wearing a hat, aged 29, in a winter coat, high heels, in the dark, I look the same. Admittedly I am now sporting the exact hairdo I had when I was 11, but whatever. Part of me is pleasantly amazed that she recognized me: it gives me an odd feeling of safety: here I am living in a city of 8 million people, and I bump into a woman I went to primary school with, in the cornershop. But it also really annoys me: like most people, I spent much of my teenage years trying to become the person I wanted to be, trying to shed my adolescent nerdiness. And nearly two decades later, an ex-schoolfriend glimpses me and knows straight away that I’m that 11-year-old she shared a tent with on a trip to the Isle of Wight.

Friday I slept through my alarm, as I tend to do every couple of weeks. My subconscious is a sneaky bugger, and likes to incorporate the alarm into my dreams, with an elaborate back story, so that by the time the screamingly loud pips go at 7.40, in my dream I am in a bath ignoring the phone, or riding the bus and someone just rang the bell. So anyway, I got up rather swiftly at 9.20, hopped about for a few minutes cursing, and after a quick shower and make-up, faced my wardrobe. Some days it’s hard to pick out what to wear: when you’ve had no coffee and have about thirty seconds to find an outfit, you don’t stand a chance. Perhaps this is why I rolled up to the Savoy for a meeting with an author at 10.30 wearing a denim skirt and green fishnets… Luckily I arrived before he did, and was seated throughout the conversation, so I don’t think he mistook me for a hooker at Halloween.

Some great shops I pass on the way to work

Noah’s Art. The Fishcoteque chippie. And Awe Wines, which I can’t quite work out: maybe it sounds really good slurred?

The Wild Weekend was wild. I am suffering from major holiday come-down now, and real life seems dull and bland. Probably cos – when compared to dancing at a casino for three nights, in sequined/fringed/netball costumes; staying up til four or five in the morning; having dance rehearsals on a 10th floor balcony and hearing people in the next block applaud – it is. It’s a strangely nostalgic feeling for me, and one I haven’t experienced in over a decade: I used to go to Poland every year between the ages of 13 and 16, on a summer camp for Polish kids from Poland, England and the US, and in the three weeks we were stationed in a boarding school in some no-man’s land, we created our own world. We had our own slang, in-jokes, crushes, nemeses. Gossip flew around the rooms, and a hierarchy of popular kids and nerds was established by the end of the third day. It was like high school condensed, but with midnight feasts, dawn raids, illicit drinking, and bi-lingual swearing.

If I am making it sound like loads of fun, please note this was before the fall of communism, and the food was awful.

But Benidorm was great. The town itself is ugly – like LA but with none of the cool 1930s architecture and good shops – just full of strip malls, tower blocks, and bars with names like ‘Bob and Joan’s English Pub’. There was not a hell of a lot to do during the day, which was fine by me as I wanted to sleep through most of it. The main thing in the town’s favour is that when you buy a mixed drink in Benidorm boy do you get a drink… about three/four shots in one glass, with a splash of mixer.

Am having my flat valued today. Before I bought it, the survey noted that the kitchen was dated (which is putting it politely) and that the décor could do with freshening. I can imagine how this evening’s meeting will go:

Estate agent: you bought it for how much?

Me: [mumble mumble]

Estate Agent: OK. Well, in ripping up the carpets – but not having the paint-splattered parquet flooring cleaned – and steaming the wood-chip wallpaper off – but not re-plastering the walls – you’ve done the unthinkable and knocked twenty grand off the value!

Someone just emailed round a book proposal about some dead person who did stuff ages ago and nobody’s heard of them. I guess it was unsupportive of me to skim it, sigh, and loudly say ‘bo-ring!’ to the entire office…

So I lied. There were 1 million petals, not three, and they were poppies, not roses. I got my info from the Evening Standard, so I blame them. Anyway, it wasn’t much of a spectacle, so I am sorry if you showed up and were utterly underwhelmed – I was too. The planes were pretty high up, and it was dark, and they dropped their cargo over Westminster/ the Hungerford footbridges, so everyone on Waterloo Bridge was looking downriver enviously before turning their collars up and heading home. The high point was lots of searchlights lighting up the sky, and every so often one of them would hit a red cloud of poppy petals and everyone would ooh and aah.

Boss just asked me to lunch. I can’t do today, so we’re going next week. This means I have a whole week of panicked thinking: am I getting a raise (doubtful: only been here two months), is he going to drastically change my job description (‘You know we hired you to work on books? We’d like you to clean the toilets now.’), or am I being politely fired?

Today I raised an ISBN. This gives me an incredible sense of power: see that little code on the back of a book? And on the copyright page? I chose that! I looked at my big list of ISBNs, and I wrote the title of the book next to one, and IT WAS DONE.

A woman from a literary agency just called me. This is the conversation as I remember it, 45 seconds later. ‘Hello, this is blah blah, blah blah’s assistant from Shiel Land. In October we sent Ian a manuscript by blah blah blah, called blah. We’re very keen to hear his thoughts. Can you look into it?’ Me: ‘Of course!’ Hang up. Don’t remember a freakin word except those I have transcribed above.

A woman I work with suspects I am planning to steal her dog. He’s a black, scruffy schnauzer, and the cutest thing in the world. He comes to the office with her and snuffles about the place, and every time I see his hind legs stretching from behind a filing cabinet, or hear him rolling about on the carpet trying to scratch his head, I am compelled to go over there and pat him and talk to him in a gruff doggy voice. And then she walks past, sees me muttering at her dog, and I have to make up some lame excuse.

I had a haircut four days ago, and already it’s grown! I trimmed my fringe this morning in the bathroom mirror, and then discovered the secret of good fringe: after washing hair, put on a knitted hat, or a hairband (hippie-style), to keep the fringe flat. Try to remember to remove it before leaving the house…

Last night after work, Steve, Agi and I made the trip to see the twins. Sabby has developed a bizarre accent, a cross between Brummie and West Country. She filled me in on the plot of Meg (‘a cat who thinks she can floooooay, but only buuuurds can floooooay’) and made me dance with her (to Hokey Cokey. She knows all the words). When Steve arrived, he sat down to read the Gruffalo to both girls: Sabby rechristened him ‘Stevealo’, before clambering onto his knees, standing on his crotch (eeeow!), hauling herself up his chest and onto his shoulders – and then farting on his head. Oh how we laughed. His expression was truly a joy to behold: a mixture of disbelief, amusement and sheer terror.

Tonight I’m heading down to the river to see the Armistice Day celebrations. Two planes (bombers? Dakotas, whatever they look like) are going to fly along the river at 6pm, starting around Tower Bridge, scattering three million rose petals, one for every serviceman and servicewoman who died during the two world wars. If you can’t make it but you’re online, try to find a London webcam and have a look.

The office is too damn cold. I am wearing a T-shirt and a thin jumper, and I am freezing. Sometimes I go to the loo just to stand under the dryer and feel warm for a bit. No wonder I’m in a permanent state of snifflyness.

Last week I went to Liberty and finally spent the gift coin Therese got me. I had to plan my outfit for Liberty, as it depresses me to shop in such a beautiful building looking like a scruff. So I donned a vintage 70s dress, black with a purple pattern, my new boots from the Fatted Calf, denim jacket, long grey crochet scarf, and a green tweedy bag with gold handles I got for a fiver in Eastbourne. Then Steve and I promenaded around the shop for a good hour. Should I blow all the money on one fabulously decadent but horribly impractical pair of dry-clean-only silk knickers? A Marc Jacobs jumper TopShop have knocked off for a fraction of the price? A new bottle of Dypthique perfume, as my current one’s running out? In the end I admitted that if I spent £25 on one item I could not live with myself. Yeah, I know. But I can’t face spending £16 on body lotion, or £8 on a tea towel, so I bought the following items:

Jasmine and Grapefruit soap: Oh. My. God. Smells amazing. Makes the bathroom smell amazing. Foams up like the richest, creamiest shower gel. After watching Fight Club, I am convinced it can only be made of human fat.

Christmas cards: it’s a fact that animals doing human things (gambling! Getting married! Throwing snowballs at each other while wearing knitted waistcoats and bobble hats!) is the funniest thing in the world, EVER. Steve expressed delighted surprise when I agreed that a framed painting of the classic of this genre, Dogs Playing Poker, would look good on the living room wall in our new flat.

Chocolate pocket-watch tree decoration: it was pretty and we scoffed it on the bus on the way home.

Candle shaped like a milk bottle: smelled like childhood, but we couldn’t quite decide how. Has a cow on it. Smells biscuity and creamy and mmmmm.

Slab of cinnamon and vanilla Mexican chocolate: has a weird crumbly, gritty texture, but once it starts to melt it’s addictive. Also very good grated into pancake or muffin batter.

Jar of £6 honey: I feel like a queen eating this. Six quid? On honey? Well you’ve got to live a little sometimes.

Dusted with powdered sugar

Me, that is. Just scoffed two dounts in the space of a few minutes. The second one had an oniony aftertaste… think it may have been near the bagels in Sainsbury’s too long.

Saturday night was the third Actionette gig in eight days. We danced at the People’s Republic of Disco, a hot and sweaty affair at the Windmill pub in Brixton. The venue is totally unsuitable for pretty much any kind of performance, as the space has a weird dog-leg shape, with the stage at one end, hidden from everyone but the first few rows of people. As there is no doorperson at the venue, cos it’s a free night, it just gets more and more packed. So on Saturday night, a sparkle of Actionettes (the collective noun) stood swigging cava and shouting at each other over the music, the stage packed with blissfully dancing people. Who were then all asked to get off so we could perform. Equally inauspicious was the fact that we took our places to the dying notes of Metallica’s ‘Enter Sandman’. Now, I have never seen the Actionettes get a hostile reception, even when we shimmied on after a vitriolic political poet at the Dogstar, but the crowd on Saturday seemed faintly bemused as to why we were there.

Friday afternoon, and what else is there to do but eat Twirls, surreptitiously read blogs, and count the minutes until 5.30?

Some great café sites are making me sad. Sad, cos the glorious cafes they depict are slowly being wiped out at the rate of several a year. Even the stalwart New Piccadilly will next year be no more… the Classic Café’s lost cafespage made me mad I never knew about these gems before!

is another great one. Mostly has Glasgow cafes, and really makes me want to take a trip north of the border.

Walked to work today, as I do most days. Again very windy: my long scarf, hair, and the wires of my discman conspired to form a thick cable and attempt to strangle me. Got to work sweating like a Scouser in Dixons, and, as I do every day, said ‘Good morning’ to the security guards on the front desk. As usual, they responded with silence and ‘Who the fuck are you?’ faces.

Had a fab dream last night. Me, Steve, and a nameless friend of Steve’s formed a band. I think we were called Nails (look, it was a dream ok? I don’t make decisions for my subconscious), and we sounded a bit like the Cowboy Junkies, and me and Steve were both singers. Anyways, we had a gig, and before the gig loads of people were already in the venue (I think there was a buzz about us), so I had to go ask them all for £5 entry money. There was one cheeky guy who refused to pay until after the show, in case he didn’t like us. Uncharacteristically, I let him get away with this. So. We took to the stage, and we only had three songs, two of which were covers. I think it went well. After the gig I caught Steve lining up the red lace bras of all his groupies in order of preference. Like I say, it was a great dream.

I don’t know if the dream was related at all to the event we danced at last night. The Actionettes had a slot at the Stonewall Housing benefit at Heaven. But at the benefit we also only got to do three songs… Rubbernecking, Magic touch, and Love Power. It was lovely to dance on a huge stage, but it did make me feel very exposed, as did the fact that the audience were all seated at tables and not drunkenly falling over as they are at most of our shows.

A true phone conversation overheard at work.

‘He’s on his way to the Ritz. Yes, about ten minutes. He’s stuck in a cab at Trafalgar Square. Yah, do go ahead and open the champagne.’

I am pleased (relieved?) to say I wasn’t the only person with raised eyebrows…

Got back from Mallorca on Monday night… seven days of swimming, cakes, free shots after dinner (everywhere we ate in Palma gave us free shots, and sometimes free amuse-bouches, with our meal), and vintage trains. None of the places we stayed in (two nice hostels and a very swanky guest house) had TVs or phones in the room, we didn’t buy any newspapers, we called no one. And yet we still liked each other at the end of the holiday! Only sad note was when our flip-flops fulfilled their suicide pact when left to dry on a windy balcony… both right flip-flops, my Old Navy ones which have served me well for years, and Steve’s green H&M ones, leapt over the edge and we could see them, four stories below, on a roof… We mourned them with shots of Tunel, the local herb liqueur, and some nice Lindt chocolate.

Saturday night is party night. Oh yeah. Never mind that the dresses don’t quite cover our bums… The pictures will be interesting. Or, if you can make it, come along and see Real Live (nearly) Nude Girls!

Yesterday I found the holy grail: a shop selling boots which fit my legs. Every winter I go through the same thing: trawling the high street, cramming myself into boots that zip up to the ankle and no further… it’s demoralising and depressing. But at Wow Retro (yeah, I know) the shelves are lined with eighties boots, the sort of boot I love and that you can buy nowhere: wide, buckety calf (sadly I think they’re supposed to slouch and bag around the ankle: mine cling like limpets), softly rounded but pointy toe, chunky 1.5”-2” heel. And they’re all under £45. I realise they were most likely bought in charity shops for a fiver, but as a working lady sadly I do not have the time to search every Oxfam in southern England. But the Fatted Calf (TM Steve) on Mercer Street has the perfect boots.

Last night I dreamed Jeff Buckley came over to my house to do a gig. The sleeping mind cares not that Buckley Jr. is dead, only that he is hott. In the dream Jeff wasn’t very impressed that the show I’d booked for him was taking place in my living room and would be watched by under a dozen people.

First day of my new job, and it’s pretty scary! I walked to work though, which took under half an hour, and although I nearly got blown off Waterloo Bridge and arrived looking like Little Richard, at least I get my daily exercise. I entered the building and told the security guards I was starting work today. One asked ‘How long for?’ While his interest in my long-term career plans was touching, the question came as quite a surprise. ‘A year or two?’ I replied. ‘Oh, sorry, I thought you were a temp.’ Great. Note to self: wear power suit tomorrow.

Oh well that's annoying. I just posted the same thing twice. Blogger is being very naughty...

Clothing dilemmas

Still trying to find vaguely professional garments that don’t make me look like a counter clerk at Barclays’ bank. Over the years I have learned that short, curvy women do not look good in trouser suits. In fact, I’d go so far as to say that short women do not look good in trouser suits, full stop. We either look like little boys or circus dwarves. I have never in all my shopping years come across a trouser suit that makes me look good and feel good: any place that does a ‘petites’ range seems to think that women under 5’ 5" just don’t give a shit about what they wear and are so damn grateful for clothing that does not drag on the ground when they walk that they will gladly buy 100% polyester trousers which give you thrush as soon as you put them on and produce enough static to see you home on a dark night.

Guilty of this are Topshop and Dorothy Perkins: Topshop petites section consists of the aforementioned poly trousers, invariably black and boot-cut, boring cotton tops, and one style of jeans. Meanwhile, taller gals get to run riot with fifteen styles of jean and a salmagundi of fashionable slacks. It’s enough to make you consider having that surgery where they break your legs, insert something to make them longer, then put them back together and you’re taller (and possibly crippled) afterwards. Sigh.

Clothing dilemmas

Still trying to find vaguely professional garments that don’t make me look like a counter clerk at Barclays’ bank. Over the years I have learned that short, curvy women do not look good in trouser suits. In fact, I’d go so far as to say that short women do not look good in trouser suits, full stop. We either look like little boys or circus dwarves. I have never in all my shopping years come across a trouser suit that makes me look good and feel good: any place that does a ‘petites’ range seems to think that women under 5’ 5" just don’t give a shit about what they wear and are so damn grateful for clothing that does not drag on the ground when they walk that they will gladly buy 100% polyester trousers which give you thrush as soon as you put them on and produce enough static to see you home on a dark night.

Guilty of this are Topshop and Dorothy Perkins: Topshop petites section consists of the aforementioned poly trousers, invariably black and boot-cut, boring cotton tops, and one style of jeans. Meanwhile, taller gals get to run riot with fifteen styles of jean and a salmagundi of fashionable slacks. It’s enough to make you consider having that surgery where they break your legs, insert something to make them longer, then put them back together and you’re taller (and possibly crippled) afterwards. Sigh.