31 March - Dogs & Removals

Was just thinking...I may be a crap friend when it comes to listening or giving advice that turns out to be unappreciated or contentious but am total ace when it comes to sticking to my word and going beyond the call of blah blah, if practical help is required. So, I had a cold which was reaching full on proportions already on Saturday, but I still went to a kiddie's b'day because it was family and would have appeared rude otherwise. And I did my share of conversation. I quite liked old lady who's a dentist assistant and was in norther India for 3 weeks recently with a dentist who was doing probono work. She made me laugh when describing de-scaling people's teeth that have never once before encountered a hygienist. I had not tucked into b'day cake yet but nearly spilled my wine which wasn't tasting of anything on account of having a cold but I thought the alcohol would help me through the afternoon.

Then yesterday, Sunday, a day I could do with doing nothing, I was out of the house at 9.30 to go walk a dog on Hampstead Heath with its owner so I could learn how to do it/what the dog likes, how he behaves when it's out etc. This for future reference, for when I'll walk him on my own. This for various reasons ended up being a longer thing than anticipated and ended around 1pm. Of course the weather was sunny and it's nice to spend time with my friend but I felt tired and just wanted to sit at home and do nothing. But no, had promised to go help a friend who's packing her house for storage as she's renting it out via an agency and it all had to go. I kept to this because various other people invited to the packing party had let her down. And because she has a broken left arm due to skiing accident, even sticking some tape on a box was going to be difficult.

So I got there at 1.30 and left at 6pm. She lives on a top floor so by the time I gave a lift back to another friend who was leaving saddled with boxes and bags of toys for his daughter (discarded by friend who's leaving whose boys had a bedroom choka with games and entertainment) and we got to his house, I managed to help him put everyting into the lift but suddenly said 'I can't come up and help you take them out, I simply have to go'. That was only because I reminded myself that when you're doing favours, well, you should do what you can, it's not an exam. So... I got home at 7pm and my Sunday was gone. My day of rest. Not. And on top of that as friend who's leaving still has a lot to do, I have said I'll turn up again tonight. I still have the cold and I still feel like I want my bed and nothing else (even Toph was warned 'Don't jump my bones, cause I don't want anything'. He replied 'My god you must be really ill'.) So there.

30 March - Moon & Pigs

Has anybody seen those Moonpigs ads for the website that allows you to make customised cards? They're even on youtube and have inspired their own parodies. Must admit I ordered a Moonpig card for Valentine as a friend recommended the site.
Well, I met the man who makes the ads! Apparently that one was so successful that the client now has doubled the budget for the next one. My friend is very happy. And delighted I used the site. Told me about the composer who did the music who apparently has the easiest job as making the music for ads is less fraught than the visuals of course. Another friend was at dinner with us, son of a friend and he works in advertising, early days as fresh out of PhD. So lovely. Writes and ad world blog and is in awe of much more successful ad world blogger called Scamp or Stump or something. Was nice to talk about a world I have nothing to do with for a change. But I have looked up this Scamp blog and was astounded that everyone thinks (and hands prizes to) that the guy who did the Cadbury Gorilla Ad. Ok it was fun (I saw it on youtube, never on TV) but you know, it's a gag? What's so great about that.

28 March - Advice nobody wants

Ok it had to happen. I finally told a friend who’s overweight and self pitying about the world giving different rewards to beautiful and ugly people (not a good thought to hold even if you think it’s true), that it was time to tackle her ten year old problem of going up from size 8 to 14/16, instead of letting it ruin her self-esteem. And that as it was only a stone, stone and a half max, it was not a huge obstacle, could be done in a couple of months starting with a detox and/or a holiday in Thailand and that I was on hand to help and support and use all the tricks in the book – no booze, no bread, exercise mate, but that she probably had to commit some money to herself for the trip/some one to one training, some good stuff like powerplate or bootcamp pilates or some quick psycho or hypno-therapy to tackle the root of the problem ie. comfort eating and those vicious cycles of staying in a rut and suffering from mild depression.

Of course I said it nicely, choosing my words to express caring, not judgement. At the end of the day ‘(it’s night’, says my friend S. when she hears this cliché’) I don’t care how my friend looks, she’s my friend and her weight doesn’t affect me, but it affects her happiness and ultimately her health, and I thought she deserves to be happy and it all starts with small steps blah blah. I have several other friends of various ages who are overweight, four spring to mind immediately, but because they don’t ever express that it makes them miserable in any way (except the odd moan about not finding good clothes) I have never thought of commenting at all.

What do you think happened? She hasn’t spoken to me in nearly 3 weeks. Am still waiting. And I’ll wait. Have considered ringing to say ‘Oh come on!’ but would make it worse no doubt. Someone pointed out that as friends we’re required mostly to just listen and nod. That may be so, but it’s not and never will be my way. Or rather it is, for long periods of time and then I think ‘Let’s do something’. Shame.

A little later, work colleague announces ‘I’m so disgusted with myself, can’t fit into my clothes, that’s it, I have to lose some weight, diet next week, gym every day’. The one next to her says ‘Great, my husband is away for 2 weeks and I want to detox, I need to lose 5kg’. So I feel I have to join in as this is said towards me and I say ‘Cool by me, I can do with having healthier stuff, I need to lose 1kg round my thighs, look how tight my trousers are on my legs today’. They look at me and say ‘You don’t need it, you’re so tiny’. But I know best than to accept and agree. That would seem self-satisfied and smug, so I continue ‘Shall I just buy us a lot of fruit and veg next week, we could eat half a grapefruit before lunch to speed metabolism and bulk up on vegetables….’ One interrupts and says ‘No, I can’t do it quite so full on, I will just cut out some stuff like chocolate’, the other one says 'I can only do veggies with humous dips'. Liker er... humus doesn't contain a ton of oil and fat. I let it pass. I think it’s best if from now on I re-act the well tested man’s way which is NEVER, EVER to say anything and ignore any issues to do with food /weight as I had to stop myself there as was about to say ‘If you’re not serious about it then what’s the point?? What do you mean you won’t eat veggies and fruit by the truckload, how do you think the fat’s going to dilute and exit your body? How do you think avoiding pasta if you still have beers after work is going to make any difference?' Cleary, am hopeless. Shall stick to the blog.

26 March - More losses

Ok, remember the ring, the cashmere top, the friend? This bad week can now have the following added:
pay £100 for MOT but get told car needs new gear box, approx. £500 so no, will have to sell it. Who needs a car in London?
Then lodger rings to say my bathroom is leaking into flat below and I must sort out plumber (he's coming .. no idea how much)
Then I buy new cooker for my flat as the existing one was/is knackered , oven doesn't work blah blah - £360
Then in submitting dormant company accounts for my block of flats, get told that we never submitted 2003 accounts and we owe up to £3k. As 2 of the flats were bought after 2004, those two owners obviously will refuse to pay a fine that predates them leaving just me and one other owner to foot this bill. I just don't want to even think about this.
Then I come to work bringing in a gift I was given at xmas of £100 in John Lewis vouchers because i can sell them to a colleague who said she's buy them. Arrive here and the card/vouchers are not in my handbag. God knows where i dropped them on the way to work. Hope they were found by needy Ladbroke Grove council estate person and not, more likely, by £6m house dwelling Hollywood director's wife. (keep seeing Paul Greengrass/Mr Bourne Identity in the street).
Sure, it's only money but I'll probably develop some strange cancer out of all this rage.

24 March - Future Sailors... Electronic castaways

This plan of not going abroad for Easter seemed like a good one. In fact it was. It’s quite relaxing not to have to traipse to an airport and spend half a day getting somewhere that we’re only visiting because we can, because a plane goes there. It would have been even better to totally stay at home instead of averaging the same half day to get to the North to see some relatives - 5.30 hours to do 200miles is Indian railways territory in my book. And they’re slow, but at least there’s someone on hand to sell you a cup of chai and peanuts. But we did sleep in till 11am for 3 days which has got to be savoured. What we did was not a lot… a drive to the coast, some food in a picturesque town, cheese and wine later in a posh country inn, some window shopping, the Anthony Gormley statues on the beach/in the sea, some uncontroversial conversation with the older relatives, took in a gallery, there was talk of a show. All in all a good exercise in practicing the pensioner lifestyle which awaits us.

Clubbing in town was mentioned, but was deferred and in fact altogether swapped for cocktails at 6pm in a bar with a view. However… it was a step too far to actually watch the 9pm main drama of the weekend on ITV or was it another channel? Ie. The No.1 Ladies Detective Agency. The first book of the series was given to me a few years back by the wife of a friend. She’d enjoyed it, she thought I would. How wrong can you be? But I forgive her, she means well.

I threw it away before vomiting at page 20 odd. Too quaint, too unremarkably written and mostly irrelevant to any cell of my body. But I thought I could handle the TV version. I did, just. But it left no trace, good actors, great camera work… nice to see a few fat Africans not dying of famine or hacked to death, but apart from that… I can picture being a pensioner but not watching pensioner TV.

Subsequently I made Toph do a few hours of the Mighty Boosh (he’s a virgin) and by episode 3 he was getting it. Now I’m no longer alone in chuckling at Milky Joe (my favourite episode is the castaways one) and at least on the way back we could break into song…. ‘Future Sailors… we’re future sailors, electronic castaways, digital stowaways, sidewalk seadogs…’ Right up my street, Vince should pay Visage’s heating bills at the very least. Then we watched some mild porn (whatever is free is a bit ropey) and had some fun… but I still missed going clubbing. Never happens these days… though I had a kind invitation on Thursday but predictably felt too tired to primp and go out at 11pm…

20 March - Toys R Horrid

The mum’s given us a lists of possibilities for son’s 6th b’day. Forty minutes in Toys R Us are enough to fill me with horror. Oh to be a slave to having to buy this shit because otherwise your kid will feel he’s deprived… Of course much as my clothes are made in China and the East so are the toys. Dead cheap to produce Plastic fantastic is everywhere and of course it’s sooooo expensive. Our b’day boy is receiving £50’s worth from grandparents and uncle. Will probably receive the same amount 3 or 4 other times over from other sets of grandparents (divorced so split into another subgroup) and uncles and family friends. The annual earnings of some Ethiopian shepherd no doubt. For what? Every TV programme has toys attached. Of course there are offers and discounts… but then it’s easy for the store to make it all back by selling you wrapping paper at £2.49 for a small amount.

It’s totally cloying and horrid, the way everything is displayed, the huge garden-suitable toys were grotesque, all this horror of primary colours. Probably only John Pawson’s kids have toys in muted white and cream and am sure that’s violating some kiddies human rights but you know, ban pink for girlies, ban Bratz and Barbies and ban Star Wars, Spiderman, Dr Who gear for boys. It’s just too awful to contemplate. I’m all for building kids a stash of gold. I only do jewellery. I know they don’t appreciate it… now. But it will be mighty useful for raising cash for crack in later years.

18 March - First Quarter Losses

Time to tot up 1st quarter losses. They are: a beanie hat dropped on skiing holiday, not a favourite. A ring, not a favourite either, but one that had been sought out repeatedly (my sister had bought me the wrong size) in trips to Italy, Hong Kong and finally found in Geneva. However, despite the cost, it started to tarnish almost immediately and had planned to take it back to Swatch shop in London. If I had taken it back last week (after I found where I had put the receipt) I would not have lost it a few days later by leaving it on the sink of a restaurant bathroom. What is the moral there? I hate, hate taking rings off, I never do. One good reason for buying gold ie it doesn’t tarnish or oxydise and there I go, take this one off to ‘preserve’ it and leave it behind. Not found of course.

The moral maybe is I didn’t care much for either object, beanie or ring, and they were taken from me to prove this. But the thing is that I’ve thought of nothing but the ring for days. Can’t buy it again as it was discontinued line and not easy to find. And as extra punishment for being distracted, have not worn a ring on that finger since so I notice even more how bare that hand is.

Then the other night I slept at friend’s house and her dog ate a cherished diaphanous light cashmere top (Nicole Fahri) which I had left on the bed. Dog is able to jump on bed and indeed came into the bedroom wanting to play – at 6am!- and I shooshed him away. Never noticed he took the top till it was found properly mauled later. Not even my creativity with adornments can mask the huge holes though some Japanese girl probably would think it's deliberately chewed. The thing is, ever since I had that top, it had two, make it three small holes/tears, which I hid with broaches, but eventually I spent a good time on Sunday last to finally fix/repair/mend it after seeking out wool of the same pale minty green colour. What is the significance of this? Either fix it immediately and have time to enjoy it or don’t bother, it will be too late? Two days after you fix what’s broken it breaks even more? Any parallels with relationships here? Help? I need explanations.

I also seem to have lost a friend, hopefully temporarily, over an offer of help her self esteem, that didn’t go down too well. Right now I bemoan the cashmere top the most. Shallow? moi?

16 March - Farts & Odds

Told a friend who's a year younger than me, that this ageing thing is going to be very annoying. One thing I read about and seems to be progressively happening is that despite no changes in my diets, I seem to pass wind an awful lot more frequently. Thankfully it tends to be when I get up and am in the bathroom (at least I hope so, though have always had the good habit of opening bedroom windows ... I once worked as a chambermaid in a hotel one summer holiday and I think it should be obligatory for guests to open windows, though in most establishments they're bolted shut. Damn health and safety. My heart goes out to elderly homes workers, must be hell), or when I get outside the flat in the street. At certain times of the month (turn away squeamish men but menstruation just turns our insides round like a washing machine) I have to get out of rooms/cars/tube carriages as it gets a bit too awful for words. One morning I woke up and thought, best avoid visiting the BF on such days as the poor guy had to inhale deadly fumes. How embarrassing.

C. agrees and further adds that hers are noisy. Thank god for friends. A problem aired... (ahem). Instantly feel better about my volume control. They're silent and on the whole not that deadly but how would I know? Feel like printing a card to flash to those around me with an apology. Any better ideas?

14 March - Falling & Oldies

An exchange of emails with A., an old friend (met when we were 8 years old or thereabouts). She writes that her 73 year old mother who in the last two years has developed in the last an equilibrium problem and has already fallen off a bicycle and broke an arm last year and as a result now has a live in carer… has fallen again and now has broken some vertebras and has to be in bed for 3 months. I reply not with some adult sympathy, but reverting back to our 13 year olds language, full of ’f uck, shit, don’t need this, what a crashing bore for you, can’t believe it, they never leave us alone’ type of rant.

We used to have these (mostly as epistolary exchanges as we lived 200 miles apart and the phone was guarded and monitored for expense) in letters that had envelopes totally obliterated by slogans, drawings and photos of David Bowie and Mick Jagger pasted all over them. Our parents then seemed very old to us when in fact they were younger than we’re now. Much. But they were old. They had to tell us off all the time for whatever it is that teenagers do and clearly didn’t understand that Bowie was God.

Some letters were read by them (where does one hide stuff in a family home? My then diary caused mother many sleepless nights, such was the hatred that poured out of it for… just being stuck in a family and not in the desert with Crosby Stills & Nash – and Young) and the fathers were incensed to be referred to as ‘baldie’ (hers) and ‘belly’ (mine). Well that was being kind as hers was not only balding by then, but growing even uglier than he’d ever been (teeth sticking out and a speech that always worried me that he may spit on me as he spoke. Especially when old. No chance of that happening as he died of cancer now ten years ago). Of course what we wanted to say was that we wished our fathers were Marlon Brando and Marlon Brando. We were obsesssed. As it happens, it's with great relief that we're not his daugher, considering the sorry, tragic end of his kids and the fact that he was a bit of a weirdo all things considered.

I went on to say that truly it’s too much to have to worry/look after old people when we haven’t even been to the top of Everest yet and /or want to go live in Bahia California, and it would be much better if we all had lives terminated at 75 max as even if in the minority of those healthy ones not requiring anything much till 95… what was the point? Clearly it was just a jokey railing at the passage of time which will get us too (except that as we have no children, nobody will be stuck with the problem and money is set aside for the hospice). She has not yet replied. Maybe she’s grown up and I haven’t….

Talking of old, which he is at nearly 79 (and past my above mentioned termination threshold), but my father is still vain. The belly has gone largely due to recent illness but he cares about his hair etc. So when I was home recently and he told me he pulls out any white hairs on his eyebrows, I told him he shouldn’t as they never grow back. (is this true? My friend C. says if you pluck one out, 7 grow back in its place – which old wives tale to believe?). I trimmed them anyway, as absolutely hate sticky out 2 inch eyebrow hairs on old men. And then I thought of a solution. I got a brown eyebrow pencil (my sister’s as hers are fine and I don’t need one as me and Brooke Shields in the 80’s were one and the same) and by holding my forefinger under the longish eyebrows, I just coated the white hairs with brown. And voila’. He was suddenly Humphrey Bogart. You’d think a man would tell you you’re mad and not allow you to do this. But he’s my father and he cares about how he looks. I doubt he’ll do it himself, but now he has the tools.

12 March - Acupuncture & MacLovin'

Here’s some results of my ongoing research into ways to stay young and youthful. This time it’s not cosmetic.

In persuading the BF to go see my super beloved acupuncturist N., just to tune him into some zest for work and out of a well comfortable rut he’s inhabiting lately, I’ve discovered she can make many couples happy. Check this out (as my friend Wiki 1 would say), N. must have assumed that when one is in a work rut and depressed about his prospects, he must also not feel very MacLoving and that must be the reason his girlfriend had insisted he books an appointment. Not so… have no complaints in that department. But N. clearly put the needles in the ‘increase desire’ points because when he got home, first he said he was very, very tired, but not much later he practically jumped me and using a novel technique which am not about to divulge. Let’s just say he was hungry like a wolf and ready to bite. The following week the same thing happened, from you know, just through the door kind of moment and again involving something he doesn’t ask to do normally. And no, am positive he had not also been visiting a new lover straight out of his Harley St. appointment.

So there you have it. I must ring N. and tell her ‘thanks’ and have you thought about marketing your specific technique on Viagra short guys or men of declining age and ergo desire. Maybe it works different if the guy has no drive left but if he’s normal, she’s basically cranking it up. The effect is not long lasting, but at £75 a session am happy to encourage him to go once a week and should send her many clients.
If you write me, I’ll give you her details. Not sure all acupuncturists are as brilliant as mine.

11 March - Wiki 1 & Wiki 2

Am missing the mountains and the snow, especially as all my leg muscles have come back to normal and seem more stretched than before, I can happily bend foward and rest the palms of my handds on the floor, and how nice is that?
But there's no time to go again, despite the super good offers for Easter and April. Next year it's already decided that we'll go on the TransEuropeExpress. Well, just the regular train to the Alps but we're all fans of Kraftwerk and that's what we're calling it. Geneva airport was just too awful for words, choka with people glogging every surface as it was probably built to just play transit to rich bankers and not hordes of cheap flight skiiers. Nasty.

Am also missing B. and I. who despite an age gap of maybe 20 years, were regularly trying to outshine each other by coming up with 'Did you know that... ' facts and were dubbed Wiki 1 and Wiki 2 for their fountain of knowledge style entertainment. B's 7 year old is already on the road to know most of what her dad knows (by the time she has matured to read Joyce ... ) and she was already Wiki and a half. Pretty precocious but nice with it, though I lost my patience when she was hogging up time at scrabble. Had to remember 1) child, 2) not my child and father a few steps away, not good to chastise other people's kids.

Toph was dubbed double phD for his efforts to keep up the fountain of knowledge, but he doesn't like the sound of his own voice as much as the other two and so ducked out of a lot of info exchange. Considering that the acoustics in the chalet were crap and all could be heard from any room on any floor, I have probably absorbed more facts than I'll never need even when I was sleeping.

9 March - Lazy, not him, me

Having berated a friend recently for his seemingly pitiful work output, I ought to register a few possible reasons why I’m a little lazy too. In fact, I’m not lazy, just overtly pragmatic.

So, there I was after Vietnam, determined for once to write a top travel article on the place, being able to draw on the differences between my first visit in 2000 and the one 8 years later and checking my facts if need be with my local friends in Hanoi etc etc. All this intended for some top magazine like Sunday Times Travel where I have some contacts. Toph could provide the accompanying artistic eye photos, as I only take regular snapshots in which I star of course. Why waste film on landscapes? But… turns out the STT pays very little for an article, a pittance in fact as it’s a prestigious title and so you know, you get kudos just for having your name there and hoping it leads to something more lucrative. This sort of reminds me of many many years ago when I loved writing about music but it was exactly that, it was done for the love, never for the money or just for the free tickets and the few compliments one received in the age before email, web and so on.

It would appear that were I to sell some crazy crap story to Love It magazine, you know, I woke up one morning and my sister had turned into one of her dogs and bizarrely enough I understand what the dog means when she says ‘yap yap yap. Yaaaap, yappy?’ I’d get paid approximately ten times more than my travel article would fetch. All in all, having sat on my arse so far and not even started the Vietnam article or completed the blog entries on that come to think of it, I’ve sort of only missed out on a hundred quid or so and many, many hours or shaping and drafting it down to the required word count.

Not writing a novel has also not earned me, er, very little in fact. Unless said novel was hotly fought over by publishers, the most I’d get is £20k for a two book deal, which would cover approx two years spent writing each one at least and I can make more than that in six month’s regular work, and without losing any sleep or going spotty from spending too much time indoors. So really, I better hang on to the day job. Fame can wait, especially as I don’t care for that. Unless we’re talking Oprah and Pulitzer (ok am not American but so what) then, why try? There’s no accounting for Oprah’s taste, and she could go for my novel but for sure sure I know it in my bones that it’s not a Pulitzer winner so… I rest my pen.

Talking of books, I can use this platform to warn you never ever to pick up and read the worst book 8 of us have tried to tackle at a recent book club meeting. Normally our categories are ‘buy, borrow or bin it’ but for ‘A Quiet Belief in Angels’ by RJ Ellory, we’ve created a special ‘Burn it’ category as we don’t want any other unsuspecting person to pick it up. The fact that this book is on Richard and Judy’s recommendations and also doing very well in some Waterstone chart, speaks volumes about the fact that you should never trust these people because it’s all marketing and favours in 90% of cases. I actually think RJ Ellory should have your hands chopped off to stop him from adding another volume to his oeuvre. It’s soooo badly written and soooo not a thriller that I’m still fuming over it and so are the other 7 victims. I have been on his website and he has another book coming out this year and we simply have to stop him/this. And god forbid I should hear someone is making a movie out of any of the previous 4 or 5 or I might spontaneously combust myself and I’d rather burn his books. I bet he’s the kind who trawls through the web for his name and he’ll probably find me and get in touch. He seemed to have spent hours reading his good reviews on Amazon. Who are these people??????????? Oh dear, time to pick up something else, ‘Your Brain on Music’ is next on the list, should enjoy that.

8 February - Le ski c'est chic

Especially if you can people watch in Meribel and Courcheval (colonised by russian oligarchs complete with own magazine in Russian featuring lots of ads for bodyguards, helicopters, diamonds and furs). But seriously, am now the proud owner of not one but two pairs of fabulous apres-ski boots, with various furry bits that delight me every time I stroke them (one is fake fur and the other one is er.. real, but it's only trimmings darlings, don't hold it against me, it's none of the precious ones anyway... not fox, not mink etc). And they were a serious bargain as in the sale and when I said 'Est que ce vous pouvez me donner un bon prix pour le deux?', the madame said 'Cent euros?' and I said 'Done' , as previous prix was 3 times as much. Happy as larry and faith in the bloody French was restored. That being the night also that the restaurant owner in St Martin gave us all a free lift five or seven miles down the road instead of calling joe le taxi. On previous holidays we've had to walk or beg after discovering that rich local taxi drivers down tools at ten pm or so having no need to put in the extra hours for more fares.

But I digress from the main subject. Yes, I can now do red runs happily (in good visibility that is) and so next time I'll be able to avail myself of the full complement of 600km of slopes (not for nothing is Trois Valles the largest resort in the world blah blah blah). Glorious. And no falls and no fallings out with the other 11 on the trip and especially pleased that Toph took to the slopes greedily too. His previous sorties had been in the minus 20 degrees offered by north American slopes in January and as such a totally not enjoyable trip or two fending off nose frost bite. He's not good enough to appreciate that the weather may be shit ie no blue skies and freezing, but that the snow is generally better over there. But he's with me now on the 'never in deepest winter'. I made a note several years ago to refuse any trips prior to March. Sorry, life's too short to be cold and eating indoors. Vive le sun which burnt my face despite lashings of factor 25 (I was too mean to go purchase total protection, but I know when I spot new lines I will regret it).
And another good news is that despite eating like a pig (for my standards that is, I have to note that I declined the dessert on offer every afternoon and night except for the creme brulee), my ass is apparently very much tightened, so said the BF on more than one occasion as I paraded around the sauna, and I didn't compare too badly with the 29 year old Polish beauty in the jacuzzy with us (G's girlfriend).

Phew, more when I get back the full use of my limbs, which of course are still throbbing a bit and that includes the arms, am not in the flush of youth anymore and it shows in muscle fibres taking some time to reform. Darn that it's awful grey and rainy here as usual...

I should also record a James Bond little feat performed by Toph. It happened like this. I had booked a much needed and difficult to obtain as they're super busy/booked up, one to one lesson with a ski instructor. For 3.45pm on Day 4. At 2.45 pm we go down (there's 4 of us) and at a crucial meeting of pistes, Toph insists that the best way back is via Piste 2. I disagree. And as we descend it's obvious we've gone the wrong way and will end up at a ski lift that we will have to take back up to the top where we've just come from and descend the way I thought we should in the first place. Bear in mind that this is possibly the 3rd time Toph ignorres my superior sense of direction and takes us down the wrong way.

And so it is that we start the queue for the skilift wiht lots of other people. None of whom is in the same foul mood as me, thinking, great, I'll miss the lesson, it's not the money, but there are no more to be booked and even if there were I don't want one on Day 5 just before my holiday ends, I need it NOW. On the gondola Toph is still arguing that we can make it... I say no we won't as it's now 3.15 and we have to go up and come down and for me it's almost the end of the day and I know full well accidents happen mostly when you're tired and my legs are tired.

Poor D. is on the gondola with us and has to listen to couple's spat. He stays out of it, especially when Toph suggest that as D. is the fastest/black run skier, he could ski down very fast and reach instructor and salvage part of my lesson. D. ,er, stays out of it. So we get of at the top and Toph who's not a great skier, takes off at major speed. I do worry for him but, I stick to my end of the day speed. And also because I'm enjoying my strop. As I turn at the last bend before the final slope into 'town', I see Toph and instructor below waiting for me. Instructor is not bothered though he points out that it's gone 4pm and by the time we take a lift up and come down, my lesson will be reduced to 30mins as he has another client after me.

But I take it, and tell Toph he can join. It's kind of useless but I appreciate the Milk Tray effort. Friends again. Ten years ago I'd have stormed off nevertheless, but I've grown up.