Word Cloud



Courtesy of laP, via bignjuicy, a link to Wordle that has created a wordcloud of In the Aquarium. Vacation and clouds feature in big writing - perhaps its a state of mind. And then I did it again...

Red Admiral



Spotted one in the garden today - resting on the elderberries that are drooping from heavily laiden branches. Adding it to the short list visitors this year: peacock, comma and an abundance of small whites. Don't know why I get so excited by them but I do! (I've also had dragonflies.)

Vacation

Vacation is a word that always seems a bit matter of fact, business-like and as such best describes my time off from work. I am not on holiday - holidays are frivolous, exotic, trips out of your regular scenery. I have been off from work for almost a week now. Not been anywhere but the house. Which means I have been travelling less than on a regular week (which in itself is lovely - the less tube the better!) Instead I have been staying up late and watching the olympics live in the middle of the night, sleeping late, painting my hallway (it has taken me some time to figure out quite how I was going to do that - it's a stairwell and I have a fear of ladders, but with extendable poles and paint pads its not been that bad), and capturing any rays that break through the clouds. When I've finished the hall I will be able to hang some pictures which I've had hanging around for some time. Finally get rid of the last colour choice of the previous owners. Its all good!

Queen of the hill

Lady drunk sits atop a litter bin in the rain. Cheeks rouged by alcohol, hair in a pony tail, white shoes, surrounded by male courtiers drinking special brew from the can. She's screeching hey! hey! at a group of poles standing a metre or two away as they spark up cigarettes. Can I 'ave one? she asks in her best little girl flirt when she finally attracts one's attention. She has to decant from her litter bin throne in order to claim it.

Weather: changeable

• Waking up: heavy rain (listening to it through the open bedroom window without looking out)
• Awake: get up look out - sunny and raining. Craning out of the bathroom window - there is a double rainbow to the west
• Leaving for work: drizzle, grey
• Emerging from the tube: threatening clouds overhead
• 1.30pm: blue dky, occassional white clouds

2012

We've been watching quite a lot of the Olympics. Its a habit from when I was a girl. Our family wasn't particularly interested in sports but we always watched the Olympics and Wimbledon. I've periodically added other sporting events depending on friends and boyfriends - currently that means football, but has in the past included snooker, cricket and formula 1.

So far I've been watching:

• rowing - some of the races but trying to miss the meet the people in the boat segments because they aren't enhancing my experience of the sport.
• men's gymnastics - very impressive feats of strength and control, and none of the arm and hand twiddles that female gymnasts have to pepper their routines with.
• swimming - always like watching swimming, I like the under water shots, and the line of the world record going along. I'm very much rooting for Phelps, but also for anyone from outside the normal swimming-winning nations (glad that Taehwan Park from Korea won a gold in 400m freestyle). Very irritated with Sharon Davies' commentary - each time the GB swimmers don't come 1st, 2nd or 3rd (which is always) she starts off the interview with, "are you disappointed?" which really dampens their youthful excitement about being at the Olympic games swimming in competition with athletes they are in awe of.
• boxing - not sure why I watched it but I did.
• archery - its a funny sport - tense and taut with very big bows. Disappointed by our GB team - they seemed to shoot more accurately against the Chinese and then having failed to make the gold/silver contest got worse while competing against the French. Still they are clearly better than I'd ever be (very small target when its set a 70m.
• women's cycle road racing - which was very exciting at the end, a Brit in the breakaway group, who the commentator was suddenly very concerned about when she seemed to be slipping off the end of the group, only for her to come back and win it in the sprint. Her absolute jubilation at winning was a joy to see.
• 2 minutes of beach volley ball (honestly, this is clearly not about the athletes but the sport of watching the athletes - how can it be taken seriously when they wear really skimpy bikinis to play in - its ogling that is the real sport here).

This morning Dad and I watched his copy of the opening ceremony. Great fireworks. Really great fireworks. A male display (female - one at a time, making for a slow paced display but able to savour every explosion, male - set them all off at once for an intense but impressive display - its a theory, someone told me one bonfire night - I like male displays better, personally). All over the city. Loving the birdnest stadium. I even liked seeing the athletes parading in - bright eyed, excited by the occasion, taking pictures of the crowd who were taking pictures of them. The ceremony was impressive, although at times rather long I thought (we could fast forward the slow bits).

I'm concerned about the London Olympics. Clearly Londoners and Brits generally are less than enthusiastic about them. Being stingy is clearly not going to help us make a successful games. I'm not sure we can come up with an impressive opening ceremony, I'm not even convinced we can get the stadia finished in time (while I love it I do remember that the Millennium Wheel didn't actually get raised until sometime after the new year, and remember the issues with the Millennium Bridge?)

Everyone keeps saying we can't top the Chinese so we should do something really low key and different. I'm not sure low-key will help to get people engaged. I think we should do something like a massive fireworks display that snakes all along the Thames - a massive intense male fireworks display from Parliament all the way to the O2 or something. Less of the bah humbug. More passion. Maybe.

Recycling

In the Haringey People (my local info mag) June edition it promised that most households would get enhanced recycling by the end of the month. So I started collecting up plastic bottles and cardboard - excited that soon I would be able to not put them in the bin. End of June came and my enhanced recycling didn't materialise. So eventually I emailed and asked them when I would be getting it. Their response was that the vehicles that collected enhanced recycling were the largest in their fleet and couldn't fit down my street.

The regular dumpsters fit down my road. I just don't understand why they don't think about the size of the roads that have to be collected from - it isn't like my street is really especially narrow - this is London, some of the streets are residential, with parking on two sides. I just feel that if my neighbourhood was in the middle-class heartland over by Crouch End, Muswell Hill and Highgate it would have to have some solution provided. Pisses me off!

Waiting for Vacation

I'm feeling a distinctly low ebb in my creativity. Probably working too hard. Soon I'll be on holiday. One week to go...

Guilty pleasures. (whisper: I've been watching Big Brother. Even though I swore I wasn't going to).

Wally Road Caf

An old lady wearing a teeshirt with a seal on the front sits inside a greasy spoon cafe eating a fry-up. Her dogs are outside. 2 of them loll on the pavement. The other one sits in the pram watching her through the window.

London from a child's perspective

There's buses. Bendy ones. And double decker ones. Double decker ones are better becuase you can stand looking out the front top windows. You can see everything. Counted clocks on the way home. There were 10. We saw sculpted faces in the buildings - men, ladies, babies and sheep with horns.

One park to the next. Liked Stationers Park best - lots of climbing and balancing on tightropes to do. Liked swimming in the Serpentine - came out covered in green algae.

On the Southbank there was a water fountain - it was in squares. It kept sinking and getting tall. Lots of people were in it - all wet. The big boys had gone in with all their clothes on. Little kids were in their pants or swimmers. It was cold but exciting to run through the streams.

Trains, under and over the road. We walked through a tunnel under the river. Later we went on a boat. A fast boat but not as fast as expected. Waved at people on other boats going past and on bridges. Some of them waved back. One man driving a tug, came out of his cabin and blew a kiss.

Brewing

After the sweltering heat of the day I sit outside in the dark watching moths flicker in the garden light, listen to the clatter of my neighbour's cutlery in their washing up and the distant rumble of cars on the new road, and relish the cool on my skin. Two silent flashes of lightning. No thunder or other dramatics.

Reminds me of driving from Chicago to Madison on one of those long straight american road the whole land stretched out ahead of us, lightning flashing a third of the way up the sky way way off in the distance.

We could do with a storm. It would clear the air. Make sleeping easier again. Lighten the air.

Sunday Morning

Woke with a jolt at 8.00am convinced my alarm had not gone off and I was late for work. Convinced. Only when I was sitting upright on the edge of the bed did I realise it was Sunday. Hate that.

Paartty!

Well, a genteel sort of party. A house party held by someone who lives at Westminster Abbey. (!!) Different world. Fabulous old buildings, lovely gardens, Palace of Westminster poking up over the wall as a backdrop.




The lay vicars (not sure what that means exactly, apart from the fact they sing with the choir) sang a version of the Beatles' When I'm 64 (it was a 64th birthday party), in the style of Barbershop - a quintet rather than the usual quartet. The light fell over the grounds. There was a mass party saying-of-grace and then we ate. Some sixth formers (sons of the clergy) had been drafted in to be waiters and kept topping up the glasses. On the way out the halls were very quiet, we walked over gravestones embedded in the corridors, lights came on as we passed. I wouldn't have liked to have to do the walk on my own. Stepping out of the cloisters there was a bat flitting overhead. Back to the 21st century and the hubbub of the city.

Head in the sand

Clearly these days I've been going round with blinkers on - work, home, work - and have missed finding out about the London Festival of Architecture until I stumbled across these structures in Bedford Square, then saw another one pinned to the corner of the Canadian Embassy.

Talking on the phone while on the loo

Would you/could you/well you wouldn't really would you?
At home (maybe...)/at work (I don't think so)?
Flush or wait for the call to end first?

Its not nice really is it. Somehow worse at work. I went into the toilet today and someone was having a conversation on the phone in there. It puts me off being in there at the same time as someone anyway but when you think someone on the phone may be hearing you...

Eye Test

Walked over to 20/20 and found they were offering walk-ins again (some time since I've been). They made me look at the long road with the hot air balloon going in and out of focus, puffed air in my eyes (but kept warning me so I started closing my eye before it came - pavlovian responses and all that), made photos of my eyeballs to see how healthy they were, made me read lines of letters (this or this, this or this, a or b - sometimes difficult to tell the difference). Overall one eye has gotten a little worse.

I was very good afterwards and didn't buy the lovely Alain Mikli's that the salesman picked out for me - tortoise-shell and mauve and a mere £325 (the most expensive pair I tried that day - isn't it just always the same - always drawn to the dearest) for the frame alone. I think I may just get my old ones reglazed...

RainRainrainrain

It rained all day today - sort of drizzly at first wafting up under the edge of the umbrella and gradually heavier and heavier. Sky a misty grey. Reminded me of holidays at the grandparents on the West Coast of the Highlands. It could rain for a week solidly without letting up. We'd stare out of the huge picture window longing for it to stop, leaning elbows on the sills and mess with grannies knick knacks - china animals, metal bowls with the odd loose button. Watching the distance with the binoculars searching for some blue sky on the horizon which disappeared in and out of the rain haze, occasionally a boat would slip past. No where to go and nothing to do until granny got the card table out and we'd play a game of whist (she was a card demon - always had an ace that she'd play with a flourish at some deadly moment). Or we'd be made to go out in it - cagools and wellingtons - walking with the rain stinging your cheeks until you were wet through to the skin. Come home to change and spend the rest of the day washing and drying clothes. Top loading dryer made the whole house smell of hot cloth. Only Grandpa dealt with rainy days/weeks the same way as dry one - out fishing in a big sou'wester, tending vegetables in a beaten up old Barber jacket, tying up fences, bringing in coal. Coming home smelling of wet wool.

Tube Details

• One button on a pink shirt with a blue check is sewn on with yellow thread.
• Hem of a summer coat pulled up because of a lining that isn't long enough. Gathers and puckers.
• Yellow teeshirt under blue and white shirt - vague greeny hue apart from collars, cuffs and yolk.
• Smart looking in a natty lemon waterproof jacket, apart from very old shoes covered in grass clippings worn without socks.

Men's Singles Final

I woke up dreaming about my mum and my sister. We were going to a wedding that needed 6 changes of outfit. I didn't have six options and thought it was OTT so was refusing to go to all of it. My sister was upset with me and ran crying to our mother, who was dressed and ready to go in a silk shirt dress, lying down in bed with my Auntie Jennifer. She was trying to placate my sister while saying that I was allowed not to attend it all if I didn't want to...

I went round to Dad's in the rain for breakfast. He made pancakes (which were exceptionally good) and we watched the men's tennis final. I wanted Nadal to win. Pops was conflicted - head wanted Federer, heart wanted Nadal. I have always found it hard to really root for Federer because of his striking resemblance to Quentin Tarantino.

I came home in a rain break which was lucky considering the fact the match didn't finish until 9.15. I vacuumed the living room while watching - kept disturbing the house spiders' routine. Then I took a chunk out of my knuckle while grating Parmesan. It bled so profusely that it came through the plaster immediately, so I had to change it. By the time I got back to my dinner it was almost cold.

Cleaning my teeth before bed I looked at myself and thought it had been a good hair day today (its a lot on the dry side these days which makes it difficult to manage) which I felt was a shame since it was Sunday and nobody would have seen it much. And then I was gong to crush it by sleeping on it.

Friday Evening

Out-of-towners are swarming around West End Theatreland. Waiting to go into overblown musical extravaganzas in garish dresses. Tourists are intermingled in their Euro-summer threads - three quarter-length sporty shorts and pale jackets, or white trousers and tans. Trying not to get run down by errant bus drivers whose vehicles lurch forward alarmingly in traffic. London workers relax after work drinking outside pubs. Mostly pale and black suits, chugging larger.

VPL

She wore her VPL proudly as she strutted along the Walworth Road, tall in wedge platforms, cool in her short tan shirt dress. A passing man turned around to watch her arse walking on by. It was going to be a glance but it turned into a stare.

Credit crunch

Reading the London Shite this evening I didn't manage to supress a giggle when I read the headline [cue cloyingly irritating breathy female voiceover] This is not just any credit crunch, this is an M&S crunch.

BBQ



After the cooking we toasted marshmallows on old twigs of elderflower. Loving that brown-on-the-outside and runny-on-the-inside tooth rotting sugar rush.

Online dating

As an observer of the ritual that is dating (we in Britain seem to have embraced it post-Sex in the City), it seems that things have changed. No longer does the chosen way to find a date involve hanging out in pubs and bars steadily getting pissed, trying to impres likely candidates with your quick wit and banter. Oh no.

All my friends are now signed up to online date sites. Maybe I need to clarify that. Most of my friends who are 30 and above are signed up. I suspect that for those in their 20s can still get away with the pissed in pubs methodology - being tipsy is only cute in that age group.

Anyway, online dating - a. its addictive, b. its nerve racking (judging by how much time I spend discussing it, even though I'm not involved), c. in the end you just have to take the plunge and meet some of the total strangers to see if they are indeed anything like their picture or half as witty as their profile would make them seem.

I'm now waiting for the fallout. There is bound to be some - dates which had to be ditched in the middle by climbing out the toilet window, people who used the picture of their good looking cousin instead of their own, and stuff. I'll report back when I get the juice...

Ceramics Class





I've been going to ceramics class. Its a little light relief from the working week. Something to look forward to, something that takes me out of the computer-based world and back into a light hearted, practical and messy environment that encourages a little bit of creativity.

For some reason I've been making pots with small bottoms. And the other thing that I wanted to do was to make some pots for my cacti.

Things that have been stopping me blogging...

Oops I've had an unintentional blogging holiday. Life outside is somehow keeping me from virtual life, partially through its crushing mundaneity.

1. Working - after spending all day with the computer at work the last thing I want to do is work on the computer at night. Also working takes up an inordinate amount of life time.
2. Euro 2008 - while I wouldn't say I am a massive fan of the football game, boyfiend is and since the games are on the box we've been staying in and watching it. Computer wifi interfers with the digital TV.
3. Longest day - I love it as the days stretch longer and longer towards the longest day - evenings outside in the garden tinkering, or sitting, or barbecuing (any excuse this year, even when it hasn't been very warm or when there aren't many people to partake - had about 6 so far).
4. Babysitting the niece and nephew - weekend spent keeping little people occupied - knackering!

So there we go, those are the excuses, if you'll have them.

Marmalade

Bails and I met for a late breakfast at a cafe near my house that I wanted to try. Its the first place I've discovered in the year and half that I've owned the house that actually seemed like a place I really want to go. It was small, run by a couple, had unmatching wooden tables. They did an English breakfast or a continental. Coffee like it comes in France (as opposed to in Starbucks where you can have big, bigger or biggest) - a moderate cup, with a saucer. We sat outside. The sun shone. People went past on the way to and from Bruce Castle Park - walking dogs, playing tennis, walking for fitness, going home from shopping. There was a constant stream of customers, but we still managed to stay for a continental breakfast with fried eggs extra with coffee and then a further pot of tea. I love finding a cafe like this in Tottenham - a 5 minute walk from home.

Bails came and looked at houses with me sometimes - we saw some really pokey ones, with bathrooms cut out of kitchens on the ground floor, dark corridors, in areas where people left junk on the street and disaffected youth hanging on street corners. When we saw what has become my house I had a sign of relief - it had space, interesting layout, light and large hallway and an upstairs bathroom (which had become important luxuries during the search). I could see myself there. Bails was very nervous that I couldn't move fast enough to get it (although she didn't say so at the time, only later). I'm probably almost starting to feel at home here. I've gotten used to its location - it isn't as far off the beaten track as people who don't live here think. The only negative is that there isn't really anywhere to go that's nearby. Apart from this cafe (woo hoo). Now all we need is some decent restaurants and a nice bar.

Hypothesis

a. Birds like cherries. (Cherry tree at end of garden is hosting a huge number of feasting feathered beasties.)
b. I like cherries. (I can eat a whole bag of cherries in one sitting.)
c. I am an bird.

Springwatch

My overwhelming thought watching this is that the natural world is a cruel and dangerous place. We've had chicks dropped out of the nest by unfamiliar males, weasles jumping into the nest and eating the last remaining baby, fledglings jumping out of the nest to their deaths, mothers abandoning the young, attacks by competing birds. More like a thriller.

I like to ride my bicycle

Tottenham Green Fair. Cycle London had brought an odd assortment of cycles (not all of them bi) that kids, generally, were having a great time riding. Some were difficult to balance on, hard to steer and odd looking. We laughed.

The Nun and the Lift

The blue nun (as in colour of her habit, not the wine) was uncharacteristically pushy - launching herself through the closing lift doors all elbows and outreached hands, nearly grabbing the woman ahead of her's right breast in her eagerness to get into the lift carriage. Its not the behaviour one expects of someone in her vocation. Perhaps I'm being prejudiced - I only have past experience of one other blue nun to draw on. Perhaps there are many pushy nuns out there, but I doubt it.

Diary

I have a very North London diary apparently. Its from Paperchase, week to view, with a stripy cover. Very North London?! What does that mean? Kooky? Quirky? Alternative? Whatever.

Thought

Today, while washing up I thought it would be excellent if you could blog by thinking. You could do a real stream of consciousness. You could blog while you worked. It would be great. I'd blog a lot more I reckon.

Office Toilet Traumas

3 cubicles. My preferred stall is on the left against the wall. This stall was occupied. My second choice stall would be on the right - while this is closest to the door it is farthest from the other occupant. Unfortunately the seat in this cubicle is lose on one side and therefore subjects the sitter to alarming slippage at inopportune moments. So the only other choice, or rather option, was in the middle, next to the other occupant. I hate peeing right next to someone. Their noises put me off. Actually I would rather they make noises than be silent, when I imagine them sitting there silently waiting for me to begin and finish before they dare to relax, listening...

Around the Garden - a tour of the blooms

Gardening jobs

Trimmed the tree
Trimmed the hedge
Mowed the lawn
Did some weeding

Amazing how much interest doing some yard work in the front garden can raise. Many offers of help (men's perception that women need help), lots of discussion about the good job being done, discussion of the tools being used.

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.