Male Bonding

You do not truly know someone until you fight them
The Seraph to Neo, The Matrix Reloaded

This reiterated what I was talking to IC about one lunchtime. During the bonding process boys test each other's degrees of 'hardness' by fighting. Having a good fair and tough contest leads to a strong friendship. These friendships are often sealed forever when they have to fight against 'enemies' together. They know each other's skills and therefore can put their trust in each other during testing times like street fighting.

There concludes my lesson from the streets (scary stuff). And I always thought fighting was a base reaction to provocation.

Monday's Life Class





After a very frustrating day where little was achieved and more irritatingly nobody seemed to want to reply until everything was too late, I debated about going to class. I went. It helped me forget about the traumas of the day. Ann wasn't teaching so there was no theme. We drew several 10 minute poses one of which M said we should draw hands because we did that session not so long ago. Which we both did. I felt Ann should be proud of us - remembering everything we have learned over the last few weeks without even being prompted.

After class we sat on the roof terrace of the The Castle (formerly the Pint Pot). The circular topics seemed to start with life model's looks and end with M's break up with girlfriend (lots of advice, not sure if any of it worth tuppance but hey sometimes a problem shared is halved and sometimes its just a whole lot more confusing and conflicting). I'd almost take bets on them being back together before the next time I see him.

Indecisive Saturday Nights

My mind is flitting around. Bails and I wandered through Soho today. We saw a bit of Alison Moyet on a stage in Old Compton Street (Pride celebrations) and sauntered up to Soho Square which was teaming with people - men in drag, a female incredible hulk drag (really not a good look), several men in kilts (do they keep condoms in their sporran?), one man with bottomless trousers, two men advertising a coffee shop wearing nothing but swimming trunks and their muscles. Finally met up with NB and his pals and stood on the side of the road trying to pick out appropriate matches for them (not much luck - hard for over 30yr old women to pick out the ideal partner for young gay men - we just like different things in a man). Then started feeling like a couple of fag hags - but were informed that we were actually fruit flies (not actually trying to have sex with gay men - therefore not fag hag material - I never knew thats what it meant) or perhaps the boys were our fag bangles (fashionable accessories - making a change from babies). It all involved a lot of hanging around on the street not doing very much.

Then Bails and I had a drink in Fuel (again) surrounded by dreadful and thick young men who were too young to be allowed to drink (really). Having ditched this particular drinking hole I saw a man standing by a couple of street diners while his accomplice stole her bag from under her chair, don't know why but I grabbed his arm and sharply told him to put that back at which he dropped it and they ran off. The woman hadn't even realised her bag had gone missing when I handed it back to her. I don't know why but I keep seeing this kind of attempted bag snatching.

Much roaming around feeling rather unsettled. We finally ended up having a couple in the Dragon Bar, Old Street. Familiar territory is sometimes the best.

The Walrus of Love is Dead. Long Live the Walrus!

Dear Barry we will love you forever. Thank you for your make-out music.

Death of Live Music in Pubs

And we are today mourning the demise of the great long tradition of live music in pubs. Entertainment licences required for any form of amplified live music. 90% of performances will be affected. RIP.

When is a chip not a chip?

After life drawing during the drinking session one chap ordered a bowl of chips and when they arrived HS and I looked at them and longed for some. "How much are the chips?", we asked. "They're not chips, they're fried potatoes", he said. HS and I exchanged the glance. "Whats the difference between a fried potato and a chip?" I asked. No answer was forthcoming. He didn't talk to me again all evening.

So today in recounting the story when describing the so called fried potato was told in no uncertain terms that actually it was a potato wedge. Because it had skin.

Rectangular cut long with skin = potato wedge
Rectangular cut long, no skin = chip
and in my opinion, width cut potato (in circular slices) = fried potato

So HS and I did order some CHIPs and they did come long fried and with skin. And we loved them.

A Tiny Note on Queuing

My pops read my blog the other day. And then he cut a tiny article out of the Guardian for me about queuing at Wimbledon. It was singing the praises of a properly monitored queue. In the days when queues were de rigueuer everyone strictly lined up in order of arrival and remained so even if it was a bus queue. However, times have changed and it becomes a free for all despite most people's politeness. But in those days I doubt anyone would have had to queue to get into a bar or a shoe shop. I'm not knocking queuing, just suprised at when we have to queue unexpectedly. Expected queues: at the cinema, bakery, to buy tickets, restaurants, club entrances, to use the loo. Lost queues: bus stops and train boarding.

The Number One Most Irritating Thing in the World...

...is when you KNOW you have something but you CAN'T FIND IT. I have 2 books on pattern cutting that I haven't used for perhaps 4 years that I have been looking for for 3 nights and I JUST CAN'T FIND THEM. And do you think this is pissing me off? Of course it is. Times like these I want to turn my room upside down, throw things, strew the contents of drawers out and crash around. But I don't. And I can feel it all raging around inside. I need more space. I need more shelves. I need to have filing cabinets at home so I can keep things in the way I do at work (I'm so organised there). I need an admin assistant more at home than I do at the office.

All my staff think that the answer to their over-workedness is an admin assistant. If each one of them had one they would be able to meet all their deadlines, apply for more funding grants, do more organising and planning, achieve more and be less stressed. I think having an admin assistant would be like doing the job twice - once explain it to the worker, go through all the systems, tell them how it should be presented and what a thorough piece of work would look like, then let them do the work, and second to check that they have done it to your own exacting standards. After which if they haven't done it right you either go through it all again or do it over yourself. So if you haven't got time for that its best to have the correct systems in place that enable you to do the work in the first place with the least amount of effort. Haven't managed to persuade them of this yet.

Arsenal Bag Hat



Rain showers were pouring on and off, peopled queued to sit on Henman Hill, Henman was struggling. Everything was normal in the British summer. And I found another example of English headgear. Not as common as the knotted hankerchief but worth a mention all the same - in a nation where sudden showers are fairly frequent (although not as regular as I remember them when I was growing up) there are plenty of people who will make do with a plastic bag over the head for protection (don't try this at home kids...). Stylish? Not when its a Sainsbury's crinkly carrier but an Arsenal bag -- now you're talking!

Monday's Life Class





I moved to a different part of the room today - closer to the traditional 'front'. Ann was on holiday so we didn't have a theme this week. Mostly M was made to stand up to draw, and the russian girl was helped to avoid crying, but only just.

Monday Night's art class is brought to you by the Candid Arts Trust: open access sessions and more formal taught courses in both life drawing and painting. Behind Angel tube, Islington - first left down City Road. Contact: The Candid Arts Trust, 3 Torrens Street, London EC1V 1NQ, Tel: 020 78374237.

After class HS and I had a Mai Tai and a Toblerone cocktail each in Nics on Islington Green -- they were made by a wide-mouthed blond boy who should've been a metal rock singer and served by a very tall waitress with long black hair and an ultra-short fringe who wouldn't have looked out of place in a rubber catsuit and incredibly high-heeled shoes. While the art class told stories around us HS and I talked about her new found flat.

BS by BS Monday Morning

Fundamental differences in language between the Brits and the Americans mean we will always be talking a different language. When they call their bum their fanny, their trousers pants and bodywarmers vests (as a starting point) is it any wonder we have problems understanding each other?

Things that Harriet Did

This afternoon I mostly queued outside Birkenstock shoe shop in Neal Street (well for a good half an hour anyway) in order to buy some sandals. Shouting out to the chap in front who was buying shoes for his 3 year old daughter and the couple behind in search of pink open toes. Hope you love your purchases as much as I do. However, I am concerned about this reintroduction of the queuing thing in London - we used to queue for buses (in the 70s) and still do if you are outside Canon Street Thameslink or at the W7 bus stop in Finsbury Park - but we now queue to get into pubs. I once swore I'd never be so sad as to queue to get into a bar and I now find myself queueing to get into a SHOE SHOP!! The chap in front and I were trying to be inconspicuous in a queue that was the centre of much indignant staring from the passing crowd, as you could imagine.

Lake District Relatives

I think I had a passing comment about having tea but not being able to sit back on the sofa for fear of denting it, at which point they extracted a story about my relatives in the Lake District from me.

My mother used to take my sister and me up to the Highlands of Scotland every half term, summer and easter holiday to visit her parents. It was a very long drive and on route we would stay with her Auntie Lizzie in Ulverston.

Auntie Lizzie was very ancient. I can't recall her husbands name (he died when I was very young) -- my only recollection of him was sitting in his armchair by the fire with a broken ankle in a cast drinking tea out of the saucer. Auntie Lizzie lived in a house with a black door that had an oval window in it at the top, her front garden had a steep slope and concrete steps with an old persons tubular handrail. When we stayed here we usually had to do a tour of the relatives living in the vicinity.

Cousin Betty lived on a farm, died her hair black and wore a black bra under a lemon yellow twinset. Her bussom was enormous and encased in an industrial strength brassiere - everything pointed outwards and in total control. She clattered around the farmyard in black stillettos, calfs clenched. She held the speed record for making sandwiches - this was a twice daily activity for the farmhands' breaks - she could butter a whole sliced white loaf with one knifeful of margarine in twenty seconds and slice tomatoes so they were see-through (the trick was to dampen the bread but only just).

Then we would pop in on Cousin John and Margerie's farm and would have to listen to the competitive bitching (much rivalry between the two). She once showed us round her eldest son's new farmhouse (wedding present from them) that they'd built a silage pit right next to so the winter feeding would be very convenient (just drive the cows right up into it) - not sure how the smell would be in the summer, however.

Then we would visit Great Auntie Winnie's - huge old house in an orchard - and look at the apples in the attic.

And finally if we were really unlucky we'd have tea with Great Auntie Dorothy (don't know why but I can't remember any of these women's husbands). They lived in an old peoples estate, new build bungalows, characterless houses and gardens with grass and paving stones that were mowed for them. There was nothing to do but sit very still on the perfect settee without leaning back so as not to dent it. She had anti-macassars on all the chairs and protective arm-coverings. She would bring tea in china cups and saucers out to the sitting room on a tray with brass detail around the raised edge and handles on two sides. She walked very slowly and everything on the tray would rattle in that china teacup way. We would all sit round the coffee table talking, a little. Her husband slurping at his tea. Eventually it would seem that hours had passed and every tick of the carriage clock sitting on the mantlepiece would hit you on the head. With every passing 5 minutes you lost a day of your life. And the only animated thing in the whole house were the four balls twisting back and forth on the pendulum of that clock...

It was always such a relief to get back to Auntie Lizzie's so we could use her eiderdown quilts to slide down the stairs (sit on the top step, at the end of the quilt, fold it over your feet, hold both corners and launch yourself over the edge). She always chastised my mother for not getting us a house with stairs in it.

JD's House

HS and I popped in on JD after we'd eaten, he lives in a studio flat in a huge house with multitude of others, many of them nutters by the sound of it. He'd lost his soul to the launderette on a Friday evening (criminal) so wouldn't come out for a drink. Recent occurences in bedsit land have been: crazy woman with the scotty dog upstairs stopped shouting suddenly and after a week of being very quiet was discovered to have died; and drunkard next door had been on a binge and fallen asleep while smoking setting the place on fire (properly on fire - fire engines, smoke filled rooms) - later he was evicted - new neighbour wears madman trousers (too short - when standing too much sock shows). All of which leads to hermit-like behaviour.

Friday Night in Muswell Hill

The haircut of choice in The Village, Muswell Hill, was that one where you look like your hair has been growing in the direction of the prevailing wind - it is close to the forehead and the spikes get taller the further back you get. Other popular choices were asymmetrical ridges of sticky up hair and just got out of bed messy. Lots of grease and ultra strong gel necessary. High maintenance boys looking to pull. We went there early for a cheap cocktail, but its the kind of place that requires four bouncers for the degree of intimidation necessary even on a Friday evening at 7.00pm when the place is half empty. Average age - younger than us, average dress - returned from Ibiza holiday great tan backless tops, stiletto backbreaker heels. Don't really know WHAT we were doing there.

TGIF

Its the end of the week - waited for a bus to take me to a meeting in Archway for 30 mintues, consequently I was late, didn't have the number of the person I was meeting with (absolutely the WORST planning), nobody in my office was in at 9.50 to give me the number. However since it wasn't a high powered meeting once I had arrived and overcome the fear-of-being-late-thing (always the thought is worse than the actuality - in my field of work anyway) everything seemed to be ok.

On getting back to my office discovered (in the frighteningly mirrored lift) that I was also having a bad hair day - probably due to rushing out of the house with damp hair and running hand through it angrily waiting for the bus - wild untamable hair needs not to be ruffled when wet (causes it to curl and be flat in weird places).

So its hardly even lunchtime and I'm thinking about how nice it would be to have a cocktail on the roof terrace of the Fuel Bar in Covent Garden, watch the street performers and wave at the Punch & Judy clientele crammed onto their balcony. Sigh.

A Day Trip to London

The boyfiend and I had a day off yesterday and went on a jolly round the Thames like tourists. The day was loverly and we took a circular boat trip from Embankment to St Katherine's Pier. Had lunch in St Katherine's Dock, pretended we were on the French Riviera looking out over the marina at the yachts.

Circular cruises are run by a right motley bunch of cockneys who have prepared some tourist guide spiel on the way back (don't actually think all the tourists could understand them but it was interesting enough for those atuned to the accent, even though it wasn't much more than - this is... and this is....). But we got a huge discount because we were londoners (I think thats why) and you could travel around the route as many times as you liked (all day if you pleased although they weren't advertising this fact). Oh and it was hot, so it reminded me of all the island hopping boat journeys I did in Thailand with HS. Longing to be somewhere, away from work for longer than a day.



I didn't know it but Hankyman still exists - its remarkable to me that in most other countries folks invented some kind of headgear with a large brim made out of straw or something but we just made use of our hankies. I've never seen this version before -- although you can't tell from the picture he was using the 3-knot, as opposed to the more regular 4-knot style. The advantage of the 3-knot is that you can fold back the fourth corner in such as way as to give yourself a small visor (apart from when the wind blows it back over your eye).

I wonder what other uses are there for hankies apart from blowing one's nose and decorating one's breast pocket?

Monday's Life Class





The usual room we draw in is in the basement - it was flooded some how this week and was under 2 inches of water. So instead we were using the banqueting room. Candid Arts has all sorts of space - the cafe is great, then we had to go out the back way onto the fire escape, past the toilet with an on-suite bath into a room with plush curtains and candlesticks. So, the theme (the sessions seem to always carry a theme these days) was to get some of the room in because it was very atmostpheric and the light was very dramatic.

Monday Night's art class is brought to you by the Candid Arts Trust: open access sessions and more formal taught courses in both life drawing and painting. Behind Angel tube, Islington - first left down City Road. Contact: The Candid Arts Trust, 3 Torrens Street, London EC1V 1NQ, Tel: 020 78374237.

Getting the Best Out of Your Photograph Booth Picture

So the girls and I were having a pizza (bails and HS) and somehow came to be discussing the dreaded photograph booth photo (photocards for travel, passport pictures, student applications to uni, gym membership cards etc).

I have managed to keep the same photocard since I was 18 - which they both thought was anal to begin with, but also felt that the picture in it was good due to its youthfulness (they know how I feel about being over 30, sob). I was begging to differ because I knew it was good because it had been carefully orchestrated to be good (personnally I feel very certain that you can't leave these things to chance if you want to have a decent photo -- which I do -- because you may be stuck with it for a damn long time -- passport comes to mind). So when I need a photo from a photograph booth I do not want to fall into it with no preparation because I will not be happy to look half asleep, with my eyes closed and a big zit on my nose (far far far too vain for that, I have actually done the photos all over again if none of the four were up to scratch -- yes yes I know I'm beginning to sound freakish).

The girls thought I could sell pamphlets to students about this (I know they were taking the piss). So, in the interests of public imformation I present to you:

Harriet's Tips for Top Passport Photos
OR - Harriet's Top Tips for Passport Photos

• Be prepared -- never do this on the spur of the moment. Always plan to use a photobooth, always do it first thing in the morning - preferably the first thing you do after leaving the house. You need to be clean, bright, non-sweaty, and if you are female recently made-up (make-up is fantastic for smoothing out the skin - very imporant in a photo - the camera never lies).


• Think about your neckline -- if you are wearing a heavy coat, bulky scarf, thick polo-neck sweater take them off. Its good to see some skin, girls.


• The background -- in the old fashioned machines you had a choice of three backgrounds - orange or blue curtain, or white background. White background may make you look washed out or very dark (depending on your skin tone), if choosing the curtain think about the best colour ranges for you (colour theory - bet you didn't think this came into a passport photo did you?). If you opt for a curtain go with orange if you are a reds person or the blue if you are a greens/blues person. You will have to cope with the fact that there will be pleats all down the background. I have in the past brought a backing cloth of my own - I used to use a red chiffon scarf to tie up against the white background - highly preferable although highly anal.


• The stool -- you need to position yourself so that your whole head and shoulders are in the frame - you may need to wind the stool up or down - keep trying the level, you may need to wind it for a while. Always sit forward on the stool, never lean back against the booth, always sit up straight. Tilt your chin slightly downwards. Be aware of your double chins.


• Your face -- compose yourself - smile but make sure it is realistic, twinkle your eyes, show some teeth if you feel it is appropriate. Look slightly off centre of the frame - you don't want to be staring into the flash because you will look shocked. Always opt for four individual shots if possible so that you can choose the best of the four. Inbetween shots recompose yourself in order to not look forced.


• Instructions -- like with exams - read all the instructions before you put the money in - you don't want to be caught unawares.


• Get to know your photobooth -- if you had a particularly good result from one photobooth, use it again - they are not all the same.

With these simple instructions your photobooth pictures should dramatically improve, so you don't have to live with those drunkard, shocked, eyes-half-closed, mouth open shots for the rest of your life.

So after all this discussion they still challenged me to come up with a recent photo which is as smiling and happy as my 18 year old photocard picture - damn it I'll have to prove it. I'll keep you posted of the relative success.

Oh and I'd also like to share with you a history of my passport pictures up until about age 24 (real job - had to dispense with pink hair) and although you may think I look like a freakshow, some of the photographs aren't too bad for a photobooth - apologies the quality of these images is poor cos I photo'ed them from an album.

He's Hot!



So picture the scenario, you work outside all day, the sun is beating down, you forgot to bring your suntan cream. Later meeting the boys for lots of beers. Your neck is burning, your clothes are abrasive against the raw skin. Once you've had a skinful you'll get really sick - mixture of the alcohol and the sunstroke. But Mate, it was a great night though, wasn't it?!

It looks so classy, the typical British tan - Friday was so hot, saw lots like him but none quite so good.