Psycho Buildings

Caught sight of this at the Hayward Gallery Private View this evening. I want to see this.





Telegraph - series of pictures of the exhibits

Nearly

Woman with dog standing at the lights waiting to cross. Dog is very interested in the smell on the traffic light post. Cocked his leg and pee'd on it, narrowly missing owner's canvas shoes.

The Fly

I'm plagued. I'm starting to feel that this is one of those horror houses that innocent and hopeful young families move into in movies. They start out all bright and painted and slowly the house starts to show its dark side - shadows seeping out from under doorways that lead into cellars that are alive. My house had a rat living under the floor. It died when I poisoned it. It stank. Then the flies started. Big fat blue bottles, in the middle of winter. Finally it all went away and I forgot...

Until I came in from work one evening slung on the kitchen light and out of the corner of my eye saw a something slink back under the cabinets. Had to be a rat. More poison. More fretting. Called the council out. Ratman came and said I was doing everything right. Eventually it died. It didn't stink so badly. There weren't so many flies. It was all over again.

The last few days I have been plagued by flies. It started after the fruitflies started - they lay eggs in compost of house plants. I think I'm repotting stuff this weekend to deal with it. But now I have regular flies. Tonnes of them. There's no bad smells, but they are certainly eminating from somewhere. Probably something dead under the floorboards. Somewhere.

House of death.

Bake a Cake Day

Someone came up with this great scheme at work. No problem, I learned to bake when I was young and know that (as long as the oven is right and I pay proper attention in the cooking) I can make a good cake. Making the decision on the day before what exactly to bake was a bit more of a problem. Should it be something quick and easy - taste over beauty for a quick win (Amy, my sister's solution), or something complex and impressive to show off my baking prowess. Should it be something I've made before or something new. Should I please myself (i.e. chocolate) or think of the audience and do something else. Decisions decisions. Such a lot riding on it. What started out as fun-to-do, turned into a high pressure win/lose activity.

In the supermarket I still couldn't make a decision so bought the makings of rice crispy cakes, possibly making those and some other kind of cupcake, and cheesecake - in my mind it was topped with lemon curd and a drift of raspberries, and chocolate cake (couldn't decide whether it should be devil's food cake, brownies or something simpler). Got home with far too many ingredients and sat down to decide.

Started coming up with plausible excuses. Couldn't be bothered not being one of them. Kind of settled on something like I left it on the tube without realising, or someone knocked it out of my hand and it was ruined, or I was mugged.

Finally at 10.30 I stopped quibbling and baked a chocolate cake. Double sifted the flour (excellent tip for light sponge). Finally managed not to overcook something in my overly efficient fan-assisted oven (taken at least a year and a half to get used to it). Topped it with thin layer of butter icing and raspberries all over.

Next day having dragged it across London, not leaving it, not having it knocked out of my hands, put it out with the others - fortunately nobody else had baked chocolate, and nobody used fruit. So it was unique. There were marzipan rings, South African plaited donuts, Victoria sponge, cheesecake, flapjacks, banana bread, chocolate muffins, lemon cake and date and walnut loaf. My strategy was to have a very small piece of many of them. Others were going for big peices of everything. Others couldn't face it at 11.00am.

Ever had too much cake, even know that such a state existed? That's me today. Too much cake.

Parcel

I got an unable-to-deliver-parcel notice on the 12th May (day before my birthday). The only time I get parcels is when I've ordered somethig online, or an aunt or my sister sends me something. Due to the proximity to my birthday I deduced it was from my sister. I can never get to the post office collection until the weekend so I had 4 days to wait before knowing what it was. Still I felt it stretches the birthday celebrations out for longer which is always a good thing.

Saturday came, got up earlier than normal (have to get to the collection by 12.00), felt bright and breezy, and went off to get my parcel. Hoping for something exciting from someone. When I got there the lady behind the screen easily found me a little green box from British Gas which contained 4 energy efficient lightbulbs. Disappointed. Muchly. Not made any better becuase I have already changed over all my lightbulbs and have a stack of spares.

Tottenham folks

Exercising the dog (no, strike that), relieving the dog, on the local council block's scrap of grass. After the dog has done its business its back to the house - schlepping along the road in pink slippers and dressing gown.

Deer

Walking back to the office after a morning meeting discussing performance indicators (relevent, not relevent, relevent, not relevent) passed by this Stag Sculpture by Ben Long that is showing in a cleared building site where once a big block of flats stood.

B-day

I've had a suprisingly lovely day. Woke up with the sun shining in the bedroom windows and boyfiend said good morning. Love that thing of waking up face to face but not hot and bothered. Ate breakfast with the obligatory walk around the garden - inspecting yesterday's growth - what new things have appeared and how many centimetres the climbers have added on. My nephew (aged 3 and a half) left two messages on the phone singing happy birthday to you whilst bursting into giggles and not quite grasping the concept that in the middle you say dear so & so - instead we got a crescendo of happy birthdays.

Didn't tell anyone at work but felt rather upbeat ignoring the fact that I'm inching closer to the next dreaded decade. Lunchtime I bought cakes for the office. The office always shows great appreciation for afternoon chocolate fixes and so people wished me happy birthday and berated me for keeping it quiet. However I like low key, no fuss.

Anyway, I find myself in Las Iguanas waiting for dining party, sipping a mojito carefully constructed and not-too-vigorously shaken (so as not to get bits breaking off the mint and lime that can lodge in the straw and get in the throat) by a latino barman. Sun is still high over the Thames. Cool breeze. Feels like summer. And a happy birthday indeed.

Cartwheeling

At 34 my sister still feels the failure of not being able to do a cartwheel. This is not for want of trying. She still tries. The kids in the after-school club laugh at her because she can't do it. The problem lies, she feels, in the fact that she can't tell how it feels for her legs to go over her head. She thought she was getting it, until her husband videoed her attempts - only then did she realise her legs were barely 2 feet off the ground. She's good a somersaulting though. She said she can beat the kids at school in a somersault race down the hill. Small victories, or is it victories over the small?

Oh my god I can't believe it...

I might have just recovered from the election. Horrified that we elected Boris Johnson as our Mayor. I was stunned into silence. The full horror of it, I suspect, is yet to unfurl. Specifically I would like to know how have a tory as mayor will impact on the role of head of the London Skills Board - what will be the direction we will be driven in.

Saw a girl on the bus today wearing stretch denim jeans with anorexy embroidered on the back sitting just below the muffin top. Anorexy. What is that supposed to mean - combination of anorexia and sexy?

Ceramics Class

I haven't done much throwing - it didn't appeal that much to me - hard to make big dramatic things, lots goes wrong (just about make a nice shape and it slops off to the side or something). However, I found this foot peddled wheel that I could get more control of and found I liked it better. Threw these things. Quite liked it. Glazed them with a glaze that we mixed up last term.

Disenfranchised

My poll card hasn't arrived. I have the booklet with the candidates including a spread from the BNP which I find very offensive just by its exitence. But no poll card. So I figure I can't vote. Its made me really angry.


UPDATE: At 9:30pm I was rushing along trying to figure out where my local polling station might be. An elderly woman with a trolley and very large umbrella pointed the way and told me to run ahead so I could catch it. My name was in the list but crossed out because of having registered for a postal vote. Since the papers didn't arrive they let me vote anyway. I feel totally releaved. Didn't realise quite how upset I would be about the prospect of not being able to vote.

Massacre

Gardening close to where a honeysuckle hangs heavy over some elder I hear the feint squeaking of baby birds. Peering in through a gap in the foliage I spied 4 baby blackbirds beaks up to the sky mouths open and mother feeding them. Excited. I spoke to my neighbour about them. I resisted the urge to look through as much as possible but occassionally had a peek. Sometimes they are cheeping, sometimes their bodies just breathe heavily.

Coming back from a quite jaunt to Town on Saturday I a quick look and found the nest empty. My neighbour came out and told me there had been a ruccous an hour ago when 3 blackbirds were fighting with a magpie, they attacked him to no avail - his superior size meant he had not fear and got all four of the baby birds out of the nest and pecked three of them to death. The fourth one my neighbour rescued and put into the ivy at the back of his house but its hard to see how it may survive. 3 blackbirds against 1 marauding magpie. Perhasp thats why they call them a murder. We felt terrible.

Bus Stop Boogie

A young man practices his moves at the bus stop - later he'll be busting them down the dance floor. He likes the sandy scratching sound his trainers make against the newly laid pavement. Shoop shoop scatchscatch bo. Knees and feet speed skiiing on sand. He checks the shapes in the reflection of the glass. Then he turns it into a move that takes up space. Throws in a spin. Hikes up his customised jeans (cut at buttom seams so they hang lower down the back of the trainer, waitband cut in 3 places presumably so they slide down more) a little further up his arse - clearly the green belt around his bottom is for colour and not to hold his strides up.

Here but not here

Saturday night busy with stuff, forgot to cook dinner, ate some chilli rice crackers while watching Shawshank Redemption. Great film. Went to bed. Woke with churning stomach and had to run to get to the bathroom to throw up. And again. And again later. Spent Sunday in great agony, in bed, drifting from sleep to listening to the voices on the TV, to becoming aware of the telephone ringing and having strange disjointed conversations with people. Getting downstairs to get water felt like a test. Cold and hot. Shivers and sweats. Still hard to get up, felt pummelled inside and out. Felt bruised from the bed, couldn't find comfortable positions for my arms but couldn't stay upright for longer than five minutes. Could make more comprehensive conversation while laying down.

Finally Tuesday arrived. One last night sweat and it seemed to be over. Carefully reintroducing food. Legs felt hollow. But the delirium has gone. And the aching stomach and limbs. What a relief. There were times when it had felt never ending, day and night rolling together, endless hours, unable to get comfortable in or out of bed.

Costa Coffee Tottenham Hale

The broker gave away my 10.00 o'clock appointment at 10.00 40secs. Just after which I arrived. So I left.

Went to Tottenham Hale to buy a lawn mower. Tottenham Hale is a "shopping centre" in the loosest possible sense. Perhaps more of an arena. Anyway a recent injection of new shops (1 Boots, 1 Next) has enabled a desolate area glorify itself (new signs, new planting, new pedestrian routes with zebra crossings). It has Costa Coffee - probably the poshest cafe for a mile radius, perhaps more.

When I sit down with a tea - its just me and 4 male couples. Breakfasting, continental style. Later a turkish man and his brassy blond girlfriend come in. Her large bottom is squeezed into stretch denim with crowns embroidered on the pockets. They canoodle across the table. Her finger traces his moutache, twirling the ends. When she goes to the loo he gets out his hanky and cleans his nose and wipes his forehead. Then he brings out a walkie talkie and speaks to an operator at the other end. Maybe he's security and on his break. Perhaps he has many girlfriends - one for every break...

3 Men Talking

Somehow the only one who wants to be on the stage is the curator, David A. Ross, - obviously used to talking about art in a critique way. The artists seem to be unable to open their mouths while talking. Peter Campus does comment that when talking between themselves artists talk in one way but when talking to critics or curators they talk in a completely different way. At which point Douglas Gordon brought up the word wank. Neither american understood the word. So he defined it. When we were at college we called it art wank. That very specific type of art bullshit designed to make the art seem ever so clever but also contribute to the fact that the art isn't getting its message across clearly enough in its chosen medium.

Peter Campus also talked about his work not having words, ever, even when created. He then became very monosyllabic. Clearly didn't have many words at all. Both artists felt that art should be transcendental but defined it in different ways Peter say art should be more than the artist intended, Douglas that it needs to be something 'else' than the artist intended.

And so it continued. The two artists chatted amongst themselves about their dinner the previous night. The curator tried to ask questions that would provoke a discussion. Peter Campus would answer with a yes or no if it fitted. Douglas Gordon would answer his questions for him. Perhaps as the younger artist being more afraid of the possible silence... Ultimately we felt a terrible talk, largely because so little discussion was had and certainly nothing leading to any great insight into art or the use of video as a medium. And the Tate Modern projected such poor quality reproductions that the artists stopped allowing them to be shown.

Sky

Clear cloud golden edge as teh sun dips behind. Closer, a large blurry cloud hangs lower in the sky - sinking towards the street - raining not too far away in a very localised shower. Blue and pink and grey.

Elevation Technician Lingo

"Independent Lift Services, can I help you"
"I wanted to find out how much it would cost to change our lift panel - let me explain what happens - a person gets in and presses the button for their floor and the lift goes to that floor but if someone is waiting at a floor between they can't stop the lift - they have to wait until it goes back down to the bottom to start again."
"Let me put you through to a lift technician... putting you through..."
"Hello"
"Hi, we have a funny lift that will only let one button be pressed at once and we wanted to get a quote for how much it would be to change it to make it let all buttons be stopped at once."
"So, what happens exactly?"
"A person gets in and presses the button for their floor and the lift goes to that floor but if someone is waiting ... Does that make sense?" Colleagues corpse in the background, totally confused by the first and second explanations.
"Yes perfectly - that's what is known as 'single collective only' and what you want is 'full collective'."
I am astounded. There are descriptors, simple descriptors, for what I am talking about. He understands me, I can now describe our lift workings without having to resort to long complex scenario. I feel liberated and knowledgable. When I come off the phone I teach everyone my new found lingo. They all think I'm nuts.

Tube People

Purveyor of the 3 finger nose pick - something in there definitely - index finger roots around, then middle finger has a go, and finally the ring finger. No luck, index finger has another go. Also noticed that he was a muted man (colour me beautiful) wearing a black jacket (not good).

Leadership course I've been doing had a brief session with a colour me beautiful consultant. He was a short trunked, short, longer-than-average length leg. He gave me a purple wallet full of my colours. I'm a deep - its to do with the high contrast between the colour of my skin and hair/eyes. So now I can wear all the rich dark colours I knew I could wear, and need to steer clear of wearing too much pale colour all at once (never really did like the all beige or all white look on me) - which is a good job because I really wasn't going to get rid of my entire wardrobe even if it had told me I shouldn't wear black. Punk rock.

Snow

Just to remember that it happened I'm posting this image of snow. In April. Thick snow. In April.

While my guitar gently weeps

Heard this recently for the first time. Its a song that makes you wish you could play the guitar. Gut wrenching music. It fills me with the feelings I had as a younger person full of hope for life, expectant that stuff would happen, that it would be a life lived and not watched from the sidelines. I like art to have the same reaction in me - something that stirs you, rather than something to just look at and admire.

There was a time in the 70s when there was an advert on TV of 3 young people giving each other piggy-backs in front of the houses by Regent's Park to a soundtrack of old fashioned millionaire. To me as a 7 year old this was aspirational. My sister decided I would have a boyfriend with an open air car. No doubt in my mind that I would have a husband, children and a big house to live in. Times changed. I no longer have the same dreams and aspirations, but do sometimes regret not having followed that child's dreams (not sure I would be able to afford a house opposite Regent's Park even if it had been the one ambition driving me on, though).

The List

Number four: Painting the hall
Part way through - managed to clear the little room (it used to be used for hairdressing, I want it to be an office), prep the walls, paint the ceiling and coat the walls twice - I also did the ceiling and walls once in the hall outside my bedroom. Its sweetcorn yellow. Very bright (its better but not sure if its too bright yet). I'm sitting on the sofa. My arms and hands are aching - rollering takes finger muscles that I don't normally exercise. Tomorrow I need another tin of paint to do a second coat on the walls outside my bedroom.

Another butterfly

Saw another one today - a Comma Butterfly - its wings are scalloped like they've been eaten. Don't remember seeing one of these before either. I've had my eyes shut clearly!

Spring Forward

Clocks went forward. Sun is shining. Warm. Sitting in the garden drinking coffee and something flapping near the ground caught my eye. Went over thinking it was a bird and found a peacock butterfly. They're lovely - brown with irridescent blue circles on its wings.

Chaos

Left home at 12.00 to go to Finsbury Park (about 30min bus ride), traffic was terrible, it transpired there had been a stabbing in Stamford Hill and all the buses were diverted, nobody seemed to know what was going on, huge crowds at each bus stop. Took the tube one stop instead. Had lunch with boyfiend in Finsbury Park. As went to go into college was directed away from the front door round the back where we slipped in the back entrance. Boyfiend then started texting me that riot police were swarming all over the neighbourhood, some had been using a battering ram to break into a premises on Seven Sisters road next to the off licence. Students trickling into class reported police all over the place, no buses, diverted traffic, people watching from doorways. Later in the hour between the afternoon class (dropping in) and the evening class we went to a local cafe who said that the owner of the cafe opposite had been splayed over his counter and arrested, the glass over his fridge smashed and all his customers handcuffed and taken away. Police were handing out leaflets in arabic and english saying they had been working on intelligence about mobile phone theft rings that had been smashed this afternoon. All happening!

The List

Number three: paint the TV stand
When I moved in I painted the living room, got furniture, rug, lighting. What I didn't ever do was paint the stand I put the TV on. It was once dark wood - sawn off the top of a huge bookcase that was at my Dad's first London office in Bloomsbury (very high ceilings, in a georgian building - when they moved offices the bookcase had to be shortened to fit into the next place). Anyway these top bits made very good shelves for records and makes an excellent TV shelf. So its painted, and I've managed to empty two boxes - video and dvd collection is out and ready to be watched - just another 50 or so to go.

Extreme Gardening

Lull in the rain, sunshine glimmering through the clouds, raindrops hanging heavy on branches glistening. Went out to plant some summer flowering bulbs. Didn't realise how cold it was. Dug some earth. Rain started, drizzling. Then it got heavier, then the snow started, then hail. Gave up when it started to really rain hard. Nice weather for ducks.

The List

I've got two weeks off work, I'm staying at home, I set out a wish list of jobs to get done in the house.

Number one: paint the wardrobe.
New bedroom, new colour scheme. Well I say new, but I've been here for a year and 5 months now and still haven't got round to painting the wardrobe to match. Because it was a pending job I didn't bother emptying the wardrobe boxes that the contents came to the new house in. So there are two ways forward: a. paint the wardrobe and put everything into it, and b. chuck out everything that I haven't taken out of the wardrobe boxes - having not used them for a year and a half I clearly don't need them, thereby creating extra space in said wardrobe for new stuff.
Today I sanded and painted the wardrobe. Tomorrow I might chuck some stuff out (take it to the charity shop).

Number two: the ongoing battle Harriet vs Bluebottles
I thought it had subsided but they are back with a vengence the last few days. I've got more of those vapona window stickers - practically every window now. I'm tempted to put them on the glass lights they are attracted to in the evenings. I've also considerd getting one of those fly zapping things. I might need some powder or something to put through the floorboards. I don't quite feel like I'm winning yet. Its a bloody battle, if I were George Bush I'd be feeling like it was a raging success - very few casualties on my side (well none to be precise) - loads on the enemy side though.

Yellow Daffodils, Cream Daffodils

I rescued four pots of daffodils - cream ones - from Lidls today. Not in the best of shape (all weak from forced growing and underwatering) but at least the colour is certain. And at £1.49 per pot (about 6-7 bulbs in each pot) its not bad cost. I'm going to dig up the yellow interlopers and plant these instead (hopefully they'll come up better next year). So, now I'll have to find somewhere to put the yellow ones.

Morning Numbers

2 rock pigeons sitting on the fence together.
2 collared doves flying over to the cherry tree to perch.
6 magpies (6 for gold) gathering* in the top of the sycamore tree.
1 cat sitting on a shed roof craning his neck this way and that with a broad grin.

* Gathering of magpies can be referred to as a congregation, tiding or tittering. Also seen being called a gulp, a murder or a charm.

Blowy and Rainy

Its been a bit windy, spot of rain. Not as bad as on the coast mind. Nice weather for ducks. I like the look of London in theh rain - the reflective pavements, wet buildings, umbrellas.




Wind makes use of an umbrella very difficult. Better not to have a fold up one - fighting to keep them right way round, and trying to find a way to actually sheild the face from the onslaught of the rain. On the way to work clearly many people were losing their battle. More discarded umbrellas than I'd ever seen in place at one time.

Slick



Just the other day the thought struck me that I hadn't seen any oil slicks on the street for ages. Used to see them all the time - smudged across the street all irridescent rainbows brightening up the grey tarmac.

And then today at the bus stop, dreary grey day, cold and drizzling, on the way to do Saturday's chores, I looked down and there was one like a slipped eye of a peacock feather on the road.

Daffodils

The drift of cream daffodils I planted in the back of the garden has come up yellow. I can't tell you how dissapointed I am. I'm tempted to cut them for a bouquet. And I'm definitely moving them.

The Day before the Day off

Woke up early today, got up, ran a bath. Sat on the bed and watched the birds in the garden while it ran. Bathed, got dressed, ate breakfast, set off to work. Read book on the bus on the way to the tube. Stood between Seven Sisters and Highbury & Islington. Swapped onto the train platform to catch a train to Moorgate - train came in a minute later. Got a seat. Read book to Moorgate. Swapped to Northern Line. Stood from Moorgate to London Bridge. Changed onto the overground at London Bridge. Didn't mind the walk between the tube and the train station - haven't done it in a while (it's no longer my regular route to work). Bad smell of meat pies in the tunnel. Caught the 9.37 to Peckham Rye. Walked past the church of Reverend Frog Orr - his iris' were in bloom already - beautiful but seemed a little early. Walked down to Bellenden - the antiquities shop wasn't open yet (they have nice pine doors, bathtubs with feet, outdoor pots).

First meeting of day.

Came out, sun was shining. Checked the bus across the street from the meeting venue, the bus didn't stop where I needed it to. Walked up to Rye Lane. Bought a dreary sandwich in Gregs. Waited for a P12 bus. Finally it came. Sat on the bus. Concerned that it took a very winding route, lost confidence that it would take me where I needed to go. Finally past the Bonsai tree shop - closer to destination. Recognised the roundabout. Was relieved.

Second meeting of the day.

Got out early, sat in the park and ate my sandwich by the bandstand. It was painted black and white - its roof was like a hat. No band played. Sun dappled through the bare branches of the trees. People walked dogs. A scraggy yorkshire terrier sniffed my shoe. Owner calls it away. Catch a 381 to my next meeting. Arrive half an hour later.

Third meeting of day.

Left work after the meeting. Caught a bus to Waterloo bridge. Caught a 341 to Angel. Past my old school. There's a gardens in front of it with an angel statue - wings and arms raised. The flats behind the gardens have been painted. Two carribean women behind me discussed what they were - they plumped for a Holiday Inn. A girl in my class at school lived in them. They were small inside. She had the most popular dad - he was a fireman and came on lots of our school trips because his shift pattern made him available. On top end of St John's Street we passed the row of buildings that has been redecorated. These are grand buildings, generously proportioned, large windows. I daydream that I had enough money to buy one - I get a comforting sense of coming home - my first decade was spent living here. But I wouldn't get as good a garden as I have now. Change buses at Angel. Catch a no.19 down to City & Islington College Finsbury Park Centre at bottom end of Blackstock Road.

Ceramics class.
Turned the bowl I threw at the last class. It didn't turn out too badly. Discovered a wheel with a manually operated peddle. Threw four more small pots using it - liked the control that was possible with this wheel. Had to be sort of at one with it - pumping the peddle to make the wheel spin at different speeds and controlling the clay (difficult at the best of times - I'm finding). The pots I'm making are not exactly brilliant, not even beautiful. But they are what they are. Probably improve with glazing, hopefully.

After class I buy cholla bread at the Happening Bagel Bakery and catch a 259 to Seven Sisters. I'm talking to Susanna on the phone when I get on. I've got the phone in one hand, my handbag, work bag and a bag of bread in the other. I hold on with two fingers. Behind me I find one of my neighbours is standing there. He likes to chat to me but he creeps me out a little bit. When I get off the phone we exchange pleasantries. I get off at Seven Sisters and go in the supermarket. I buy milk, yoghurt and some flowers. Flowers because its a long wekend and I'll be at home for 3 days to appreciate them. They are yellow and orange, tightly wrapped petals. I walk up to the Swan where I have a choice of two buses. As I'm walking up I miss one of them. By the time I get to the stop the timer says the other one is due in 2 minutes. The bus pulls up, I get on, we whizz past the remaining stops. I get off - they've repaved the pavement around the bus stop - its sandy and neat, larger paving stones than before.

Finally I am home again. I lock the door behind me and turn on ER. I'm exhausted. Really glad to have an extra day this weekend.

Bus Journey - a photo story






No. 35 from Walworth Road, 2 stops from Elephant and Castle, to Shoreditch. Dusk falling.

Earthquake

Well despite being substantially closer to the epicentre of last nights earthquake (being in Coventry for the last time) I felt nothing. Only one of the participants did - she had been awake at 1.00am (despite us having an 8.45am start - which seems unholy early to me, but a whole half hour later than tomorrow). Woke up this morning to Midland News interviewing all sorts of people who had felt huge shudders and heard wind whistling noises and loud bangs and ran out of their houses in their pajamas to find their chimney stacks falling or precarious.

Dad always told me that if there is an earthquake you should stand in a doorway (the mantle will protect you) - you shouldn't run out in the street - falling debris may hit you. He and mum were once in a sky scraper in the states when an earthquake hit - they said the world swung back and forth at an alarm angle but they were most upset because they hadn't realised there was a survivors party going on in the basement.

I remember the previous earthquake to hit - it was about 9 years ago - I lay in bed thinking that I was being shaken in the bed by a train going past - it just kept going and going. I rolled back and forth and then fell asleep. It was only in the morning that I found out what it had been. There had been no sound time - we must have been far from the epicentre. Its just not something that happens in Britain!

Sunset



There are pictures that a camera just can't capture. Like this one. They have to be experienced and remembered rather than snapshotted. The sky was almost entirely graduated in a deep thick orangy hue - orange verging on red with pink undertones. The colour of red grapefruit. Its gradually sank down to the horizon as the dark decended. On the bus on the way home a glimpse of the roundabout - a tower block framed perfectly against a orange sky background. No clouds. The camera can't do it justice.

Ceramics Class



This doll's head cast was freaking people out all week as it sat on the finished items shelf waiting to be collected. Slip casting isn't really like proper pottery making but it has some interesting possiblities - makes a very sharp image. Slip (runny clay) is poured into a plaster mould and left to collect sediment. After a couple of hours the wet stuff is poured away and the sediment that has settled is left behind in the form of the plaster mould. As it dries it peels away from the mould and you can bring it out. This mould was in two bits and I had to slurry them together (not a perfect fit). Glazed it in honey (v shiny and brown). A bit freaky! I'm thinking about making a set - could mount them on stakes, or perhaps stick them together in some way.

Dreaming again

Travelling round India with two girls, sort of. Washing in public bathrooms. They had a male travelling companion who was sometimes with us and sometimes off doing his own thing.

Was swimming in a pool in a hotel, but not the hotel where I was staying... A beardy friend, his girlfriend and I were walking home - they were showing me a shortcut and I was suprised to find the pool so close to our accomodation. We stopped in a restaurant/bar and sat down. They had British tea [weird blends that seemed very specialist] like Brighton Tips [this was something we knew and were suprised that a foreign country was serving it]. We decided to have pot of it. A couple of English tourists sat down at our table and we had a conversation about tea. Then Morgan Freeman and his wife came and sat at our table with their drinks (alcholoic drinks). I was saying, "now thats more like it", and he said, "yes you English people make me crazy with all your tea!".

Dream

Standing at a bus stop where Philip Lane and West Green Road converge, wearing a towel turban on my wet hair and another towel wrapped around my body. I had to keep readjusting it so it didin't drop off.

(I get concerned when I get these very vivid anxiety dreams - they're telling me something but I'm not always sure what exactly it is).

Camden Town Burning

Camden Town Fire Aftermath
Originally uploaded by Jeff Galasso

BBC news - camden town fire
Londonist - camden town fire
FLickr Camden Fire Pool

I haven't been there for a really long time but there was a time when Camden Town was a destination of choice every weekend - looking for shoes, clothes, jewellery, hair dye, music, clubs, drinking venues, boys - it was the place. There were punks, goths, weirdos, every type of alternative person you could hope to find. Definitely a place where everyone was included in rather than being excluded out. Before the lock market was as big and as commercial as it is today. There weren't any stables or catacombs. I would stroll through the clothes market closest to the tube station, through the tightly packed stalls, clothes flicking back in your face from someone ahead of you, up and down until finally released back onto the high street. Then up the street over the canal and into the canal-side market. Prince opened a shop on the high street, he ordered it to be painted purple but someone had already painted a building in Prince purple so it had to be a pinker colour - to be a little bit original. Later on the market expansion up to the stables and under the railway arches and the increasing number of tourists led to a change in the type of things being sold - less alternative clothing, more things. Second hand and antiques started coming in. A techno clothes shop with ultraviolet lamps and clothes with lights on them. I stopped going when I stopped wearing those kinds of clothes. Every once in a blue moon I got down to look at the furniture and house stuff. Last time I went I was looking for chandeliers - spent quite a bit of time in the catacombes and stables area, missed out the touristy bits altogether.

Shocking to see the flames licking into the air over the buildings on the news yesterday night. Can't quite get a handle on how much of it was engulfed.

Six Word Memoires

I think this has done the rounds before but I'd forgotten about it - someone at work reminded me of it this week. A life story in six words. What would your's say?

I'm thinking:

• sleep, communute, work, communute, sleep, commute...
• Art. Sex. Job. Career. House. Bored.

Don't think I've cracked it yet - its a bit gloomy!

Spotted

Maquita Oliver in the Grocery in Shoreditch, with pals, buying a trolley load of beer, 4 bottles of wine, a whisk, maple syrup, eggs and milk. That'll be a pancakes & beer party then. Not the traditional lemon and sugar either. Not sure maple syrup is really appropriate on pancake day, although colleagues at work were disagreeing. They were also suprising me greatly by confessing to using pancake mix. It took me 5 measily minutes to make my own batter from scratch. Not a lump in it either. Reminds me of my sister's brownie cake-making badge - they used cake mixes in her pack (really don't think that was within the rules).

Sid

Happened across the Dwyers. There are two of them. Both have photographs on their profile that couldn't be classed as 'official', in a work capacity, as it were. Most SID (staff internal directory) profile pictures are horrible head and shoulders shots against monotone grey backgrounds taken by non-photographers in very unflattering light. Makes all the subjects look like extras in the Adams Family, when in real life our staff are much more human.

Anyway I digress, back to the Dwyers. One picture has a boy dressed as spiderman and a woman dressed as Zoro on their way to a fancy dress party. The other picture is of two people either on the bath or perhaps at a foam party (I'm leaning towards the foam party) - a woman and a man, unclear whether they are wearing clothes, sticking their tongues out at the camera (her's is pierced). Party animals these Dwyers.

Out of interest looking at what other photos people were loading up - nothing to compete it has to be said but one very elegant cat, and another is a pair of scotty dogs.

Politicians of the people

Passed Parliament on the bus today - all lit up, sort of serious gothic palace. Thought about Henry Conway holding his birthday bash there - all hooray henries and henriettas gaffawing through the hallowed halls. Most inappropriate use of a government building.

Passing Downing Street - it looks like any other Georgian street on the TV - never shows the huge wrought iron gates and guards at the Whitehall end. A fortress.

Politicians are increasingly removed from their constituants and voting public. Their lives bare little resemblence to our lives. Its a closed club. They forget their accountability and get sunk into party politics. Is it any wonder that we mistrust them so much.

Big Garden Watch

Woke up to a blue sky and sun shining weakly over the garden. I sat outside drinking coffee and counted the birds in the garden. There aren't many different sorts but there is lots of activity. I saw:

• 2 blue tits
• 2 black birds (male and female)
• 6 sparrows (my neighbour says they sit under his eaves and try to peck out the morter to get into his attic)
• 2 wood pigeons
• 2 robins
• 2 collared doves
• 1 magpie

Growing things

The bulbs are poking through the bare earth. Leaves are budding - tiny, energetic. I'm excited by the second growing year of the garden. Waiting for the spring flowers. There's a yellow crocus about to open. It gets you in the mood for tidying up, pruning, watching. I belatedly moved a rather orangy red rose from where it was in too-close proximity to an elderly and huge wine red rose (colour clash) and transplanted it in the front of the house where hopefully I will be able to learn to love its multiple blooms (assuming it actually takes to its new home). Chatted with my neighbour about christmas, the roof and my deceased rat(s).

Stink

The wretched stench of death seeps up through the floorboards of the dining room. There is no mistaking it now, the bin has been emptied and bleached clean, the compost pail has been dumped in the compost bin, there's been spraying of odour eliminising sprays and burnin of incense. All to no avail. There be dead things down below. (S'pose that's what comes from putting punnets of poison down there).

Waiting at the End of the Universe

Please take a ticket and wait your turn. A number is called: three hundred and five please come to desk 4. My ticket says 333, issued at 5.40.

3 people behind the counter. Takes approximately 10 minutes to deal with each person trying to return items. Then there are five minutes in between to get the goods out back. This is an uncared-for part of the warehouse store, all the glamour and lighting kept to the bits where they are trying to pursuade you to purchase something. Here are hard benches, unflattering lighting with nothing to look at. Returners sit with their heads in their hands, unwanted, damaged, broken goods loaded on trolleys.

By 6.30 we are onto number 325. The last couple of people have been at the counters for 15 minutes. The 3rd staff member has wandered off. There seems to be an inverse proportion between the length of time it takes to serve someone and the closeness of your number.

My advice is this: make your choices carefully in Ikea. Do not go in there and buy on whims, don't buy on the spur of the moment. You do not want to have to return anything.

Ludicrous claims by tube train drivers

On a crowded morning train, sorry actually packed liked sardines, the tube driver asked us to please stand away from the doors because proximity to the doors was affecting the motion of the train. Two things went through my mind as my face pressed into the mac of a man in front of me, the angular handbag of a woman dug into my lower back and people to either side held me up - a. how exactly, and b. since when (first time I've ever heard that one in about 20 years of travelling by tube).

Blue sky yonder

 

the black thunder cloud is passing over and in the distance the blue sky is growing up from the horizon. A plane flies into the clear sky. The pink edge inches towards our office. Perhaps it will be dry by going home time after all.

And suddenly the rain started, then lightning, hail pounded, car alarms went off and thunder clapped. Its nearly time to go home and I didn't bring an umbrella to work today. Sigh.

January Blues



Its the longest month of the year (psychologically speaking), dark, damp, nothing to look forward to. Weeks of endless drudgery stretch out ahead of us. Work is mundane. Nobody is going out. Little things are keeping a glimmer of optimism alive - like the sunrise, like the hyacinths coming into bloom in the kitchen, the daffodil tips poking through the sodden soil, ER back on tv and ceramics class starting up again.

Urban Fox

(Or two, or three). Woke up yesterday, looked out of the window, as the light rose saw a fox sitting around in the garden without a care in the world. Later joined by a mate. Today there were three - two went one way and the other went down the side of the house.




They're young - haven't started making those horrible screeches yet. Just playing. Its going to be really stinky when they grow up if they don't move away when they grow up.

Attack of the Blue Bottles

Sitting watching CIS (repeats) a big blue bottle flew into the room, was dim wittedly attracted to the light whereupon I swatted him. Two minutes later another one appeared. I checked the other corpse was there thinking perhaps I had only stunned him and he had secretly come back to life and snuck up on me again like baddies in horror films. It wasn't him. Fly 2 was faster, less dozy. I had to chase him. Finally flapped him in the air.

Later I turned to find two more blue bottle baddies sharing some space on the standard lamp. Tricksy. Wouldn't be able to get both in one swipe. First one went down fast. Other one required some careful sneaking and sudden pouncing action before he too went down.

Phew. Cleared the air.

In flies another one. Flies about, hangs around the light on the shelf. Shoots across the room. Crawls over the light by the stereo. Makes a dash for the standard lamp, does one round, crosses the room. I'm after him flapping and swatting at his tail all the way. But he's crafty and gets between the back of the light and the wall. (He's the one that got away - like in all good horror you have to be left with the uneasy feeling that it isn't over yet). The next one will be called The Revenge of the Blue Bottles, or something.

Still hasn't snowed yet.

Still waiting... its cold enough to snow but it feels a bit damp in the air - might come a bit slushy.

We were promised snow. Thick snow. We're still waiting.

2008

Woohoo. Its a new year.

I hate the celebrations of a new year - always disappointing - either you are out with lots of pissed people stuck in a venue determined to have a good time (never easy to have an enforced good time), or choose to be at home, sometimes alone which starts off ok but by the countdown you end up feeling extraodinarily lonely and bahumbug about the whole thing.

I haven't made resolutions. But I do want to try to crack what it is that I really want to do. Over the last year work has seemed more and more dissatisfying - its not providing enough time for the self (not that work is really about that par se). Working for money is no longer enough...

I wish you all a good one.

return journey blogging from my phone on the free wifi provided by gner, sorry, National express (train crew keep making this mistake as wall) - so its taking a damn long time to text all this in - phone has a very limited vocabulary as well - it doesn't even know the word vocabulary. I also wish they would invent a system that would recognise punctation usage (like fact there is a good probability that the next punctation i will need is a close bracket). The train is half an hour late. On a 5 and a half hour journey thats getting to beyond most people's threshold of being able to handle it. They had double booked some seats. Some people have been standing. There's a man who seems slightly asbergers sitting behind the girl across the table from me - he has one of those evil laughs that make him seen ever so slightly deranged - shoulders shake mouth laughs eyes look like they could kill. He's a figet i'd hate to be sitting next to him. I dropped off somewhere near darlington and woke up to find a man had eased himself into the seat opposite around my sprawled out legs - i was very apologetic - likely very unladylike - i just hope i didn't do any of those snorty snores that slumped in seat sleeping can make happen. . ,

Toy Cars



Joseph played with his toy cars, a lot. He liked them to be in traffic jams and move them on in lines very carefully, one moving from the front to the back so each one had an opportunity to be first. Being first is terribly important in a 3 year old psyche.




I didn't know that most toy cars are now made foreign - of all the cars the only ones which were right hand drives were these old fashioned looking ones from Corgi.

Happy Christmas Everyone

Having a breather - been cooking up a storm all day, niece and nephew have had all the expected highs and lows when Santa has been, too much chocolate has been consumed and lots of presents have been opened, admired and discarded. Our cracker jokes were expectedly rubbish:

Q. Where should a dressmaker build her house?
A. On the outskirts of town. (groan)

Q. What did the beaver say to the tree?
A. Nice gnawing you. (not even worth a groan)

Q. Why didn't the skeleton go to the New Year's Eve party?
A. He nad no body to go with. (groan again)

Q. What has a bed but does not sleep and a mouth but does not speak?
A. A river (hardly a joke at all)

Q. How did the human cannonball lose his job?
A. He got fired (this was guessed)

Q. What does minimum mean?
A. A very small mother (groan).

How were yours?

Train Journey

Outside the frost clings to the fields and trees, white, stiff, outlining detail. Thick fog.

There's a weird screeching from the table seats behind me. What I thought was a miniature puppet show that a woman was attending to with great concern turns out to be some kind of bird in a cage with a specially made quilted silver fabric cover.

A portly man in a grey suit ahead of me plays with the underneath strip of his tie, twirling it as if it were a stripper's tassel. He has a missing front tooth and ate his lunch with great haste. Crisps, but he doesn't seem like a regular crisp eater. Bit like my grandad when he ate crisps. Reminded me of spitting image depiction of Roy Hattersley - all lisping and spitting and large bubbery lips.

Tables are awash with laptops - I'm wondering what the plug-ettiquette is when there is only one between four. If you're the first there and plug in, is it acceptable for someone else to want a shot at some electrical input?

Angel of the North high on a hill - all heavy metal solid and earthbound.

And then Newcastle - a city which looks interesting every time I pass through - its a testamont to industrialisation and modernisation and tradition - bridges, levels, warehouse rennovations, steeples of churches and turrets.

Weak winter sun tries to break through the mist and haze. Bright across the hazy landscape - it hasn't the strength to melt the ice layered on patches of water in the fields.

And then the sea, grey against a grey beach. Sandy coloured houses with red roofs pushed up against the hillside. The clouds out to sea rise up like mountains in the distance. the train flashes over a glassy river with arched brick bridge reflecting and a heron on the water's edge.

The bird lady is wearing a pale blue sweatshirt with a janty parrot emblem.

After five and a half hours I'm losing the will to live. Finally getting off the train and standing in the icy Dundee wind, face pink and burning, breathing deeply. Relief to be outside.

End of Term Ceramics Class Roundup

Over for another term, spent more time experimenting. Experiments don't always work out - sometimes they end up ugly!



Slabs painted with coloured slip and allowed to harden, then formed around a tube and slurry glued together. Colours come out stronger after glazing.



Long necked vessel made with extruded coils.



The stack of donuts pot, also made with extruded coils - big fat ones. Probably the least successful pot after glazing. Didn't quite look how I wanted it to...

Christmas is coming

Been to the Montpelier with work. Encouraged to drink one too many baileys (nice at this time of year - xmas and everything), now beginning to regret it as they wash around my belly on the bouncy bus on the way home. Pissed bloke is ranting incomprehensibly in the corner. He starts making a noise that is somewhere between growling and retching. "Easy," commands some man from the back of the bus. I get off at Newington Green. There's a man with a christmas cracker hat perched at the obligatory jaunty angle. Can't quite figure out whether he remembers he's wearing it or not.

Gilded Lilies

73 bounces along Albion Road, over humps, through traffic with frosty exhausts.

A girl in a red jacket has wide open stare-y eyes, her iris' flicker manically across the eyeballs.

I'm sitting next to a man with a similarity to Alan Rickman. He leans forward as a girl opposite him brings out a black eye lining pencil and warns her that she'll have her eye out putting that on as the bus lurches up Albion Road. She points out that she's an expert so he needn't worry. He persists, albeit on a different tack - you don't need it anyway, gilding the lily.

Content

To make up for the lack of content recently I'm going to paste this in from an email a colleague sent me (it made me laugh at the time).

The Washington Post has published the winning submissions to its yearly contest, in which readers are asked to supply alternate meanings for common words.

My favourites of the winners were:

1. Coffee (n.), the person upon whom one coughs.


2. Flabbergasted (adj.), appalled over how much weight you have gained.


3. Abdicate (v.), to give up all hope of ever having a flat stomach.


4. Esplanade (v.), to attempt an explanation while drunk.


5. Willy-nilly (adj.), impotent.


6. Negligent (adj.), describes a condition in which you absentmindedly answer the door in your nightgown.


7. Lymph (v.), to walk with a lisp.


8. Gargoyle (n.), olive-flavored mouthwash.


9. Flatulence (n.), emergency vehicle that picks you up after you are run over by a steamroller.


10. Balderdash (n.), a rapidly receding hairline.


11. Testicle (n.), a humorous question on an exam.

John said, "I remember having something to look forward to," droll, semi-ironic. Me too I pipe up and at that moment I really mean it. My shoulders slump. Outside I buy a coke to drink with my lunch hoping the bubbles will pick me up.

Maybe its the time of year, maybe I'm in need of a holiday, maybe.

Jump Around

Christmas lights along minor high streets signify the real start of the festive season (as opposed to the first sign of season-specific goods in the shops). These are not the big overblown artistic displays from Regent Street (supposedly pulsing colours according to street traffic) - just a few yellowy lamp post decorations, the repetativeness along the street adding up to quite a dramatic effect, well, not really and they're only working on one side of the road. There's nothing else christmassy going on in the road yet - no trees or wreaths for sale, no foil decorations.

A man gets on the bus with some shopping bags. He's heavy with gold - chains thick enough to secure a motorbike with.

A year after moving into my house I'm still not sure it feels like home (too many unpacked boxes and chaos). Doesn't even fully feel like mine (far too much of it is owned by the bank!) I feel like I'm pretending. There's still much to be done to help transform it further into mine. Small steps.

I've got a cold that is manifesting itself in my teeth and gums. Roof of my mouth is itchy. Teeth feel numb and gums keep feeling like there is tomato skin stuck on them. Strange feeling.

So anyway, Christmas is coming.