Diary of Lisa Taylor, reluctantly 42 (and a half)

Or.. 'f.ck me I'm forty.. two.. and a half', though can look 38 on a - not so deluded - good day. Or 'How to reconcile a well experienced mind trapped in a still - but for how long? – youthful body.' Don't have the 30somethings angst/problems, neither have the resigned (?) ageing baby-boomers in safe family territory outlook yet. Here's how I cope, one day all sexy women will get old... but never invisible. © Lisa Taylor 2005/6/7/8/9. Jeez.. so much for the 42 and-a-half delusion

Tuesday, October 26, 2010

23 October - Hix and Townhouses

This sort of proves my theory that food is not as important as the setting or the company. I take Toph to a well deserved thank you meal at Hix which he wanted to try. Of course we're bridge and tunnel on this occasion (was a saturday night) and they don't know us, so we get a table for 2 in ok position but really you need one that seats 4 or 6 to feel you've got a nice one. Most are filled with people not too well dressed and looking suspiciously like young bankers our for a regular meal, jeans, shirts, nothing too smart.

Food is good - if you like mallard and grouse or what Hix is famous for, room nothing to write home about. I then suggest a drink at Dean St Townhouse which Toph had yet to see. He loves it. Just the way it's done and the buzz, though of course next to us are two tourists with London guide in which it's probably already starred as a place to go to. Wonder if guides say things like 'on the site of the former AllBar One' type thing. Am sure Toph would have enjoyed (cheaper) meal here though nothing to write home about but they look after you service wise and are fast and competent in their dishes.

By now you know I'm not a foodie and don't care one way or another. My brandy was top good rounding off of a rare WE at the w/end.

22 October - Social Network

How smug we are those of us who on FB have always been another name a city that has nothing to do with us, possibly another gender, no dob and a photo of not a lot. We wish we could have given a fake email address to but then we wouldn't get the messages that a few people post.

Love the film. The notion of starting somethign for its exclusivity and then 500m people later god knows if you really believe your own bs about helping people to communicate better.

Good film I thought. But better was J, Lady N's friend just returned from Angola via St Helena and Ascenscion Island on a cargo ship. Totally enjoyed my top chinese in his company.

Friday, October 15, 2010

15 October - Art & Thieves

We go to a gallery where friend of L. is having a show. Mirrors cut and arranged in novel ways and rubber flooring. I like but can't tell you if it has any art meaning, It's in a large gallery in Bond St so am assuming they know what they do.

The after party is at the Arts Club in Dover st. I've never been, fancy that, who could I have missed it. When we arrive there's a small commotion, fire alarm, so we're kept outside waiting for a bit, and H and A go to the grocery store opposite and buy cheaper drinks there. We eventually get let in by a very rude manager who wants to know who we are etc, probably sick and tired of Frieze week, go downstairs, find other people we know - nice room - , find that someone has paid for the wine and I start to chat to one guy O. who was at uni with Toph, only different college and who is riveting (probably in small dose) and good friend of other friends so Toph gets a few mins of jealous feeling which is never a bad thing. This guy is not attractive per se but you can tell he's never had a problem getting women because he knows how to be interesting. I call Toph over when a certain mineral is mentioned that I know he has some trade in. And how wonderful to watch this guy's face when I reveal that I know what potash is. Simply brilliant, never second guess anyone in the world about what they may or may not know.

Upon exiting whilst J is retrieving his bag, I ask the greeter guy if he's Italian and he says no, Algerian, therefore a small conversation ensues during which he tells us the place is about to close for renovations, that Gwynnie Paltrow and thieves in mayfair! The Arts club, gwynnie paltrow is paying for some of it but he doesn't give a shit becasue they're all being made redundant in the meantime.

It's at this point that he gets called over by the other reception guy because our friend J.cannot find his £600 bill amberg new bag with all his life in it. He was made to check it in though there are not tickets, you just leave your bag in or on top a cupboard behind the entrance desk! G. says she was asked to leave her bag too but had refused. And you can't enforce stuff with laywers. They must have missed me but I'd have refused to enter a club with such a stupid rule. Check the contents if you want for smuggled whisky or weapons but am not leaving you anything. Nor coats on any hangers anyone can help themselves to.

J had various phones/chequebooks /house keys /receipts/passport in there. I guess even taking the keys out would have spoiled the line of his jacket. Much ado about must have been taken but one of the only other 2 members who left already, they go to try and call them but get no reply blah blah. In the end J goes home to G, next day no sign of his bag with those members. The bag has gone. We suspect major major foul play from the management since they had said nobody else had come in after us (though I guess any clever chancer thief could have sussed out what we were carrying whilst stood outside, followed us in and taken the bag as soon as J left it there and exited?????????

The lesson here is twofold, don't obey spurious rules (I wonder if they're actually posted in reception, no one is allowed a bag inside, go tell that to women) and besides everybody knows Boy George used to nick stuff from all the pockets when we was a coatcheck boy at the Blitz? and don't buy manbags that cost the same or more than women's. Maybe I wasn't asked to leave my £12 (down from £35) cheap bag because it quite clearly advertised itself as worthless and not containing any expensive wallets or expensive key rings? Ditch the designers people and you'll save more than money. All the hassle he had to go through for days after and they're still trying to deny liability. Boycott the stupid Arts Club, don't care if Pissarro stayed there a hundred years ago. And Gwinnie if you read this since you're always on the net, tell your insurers to pay out. Our J. has impeccable credentials and no need to go through a charade to claim money for no reason.

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6 October - Old & Fit

Turning into an old woman. First cackling at Hitchens article in Sun Times review about Martin Amis – couldn’t read this autobio as writing style seems very old fashioned and I don’t know…. don’t like biographies as I always think ‘You werent’ there, how do you now? ‘ or ‘So you asked 25 people who were there, but how do you know they told you the truth about what they really thought/ said/did and why’?

As for biographies, same thing. You know this blog is a sort of bio, yes, but it only holds approximately 10% of what happens daily to me, and it’s self censored in the sense that if I find myself thinking ‘Kill all rabbits and hares, yeah!’ well, I’d be a fool to admit it on the web and then have it come bite me on the ass later on. And also since made the huge mistake of telling a few mates early on of the url, I can't really write the truth of what I think of some of their sorry stories when to their face I was all sympathetic? I mean, it's worth losing friends over a published novel that uses them for characters but not over a useless blog. Darn. Oh and yes, even with the blog as aide memoire I remember not a lot of the past (I stare at old posts where I've used initials for people and I can't work out who the hell they are), so how come drug addled people who did not keep copious diaries (you Mr Richards), how the hell does he remember what happened. Though you could argue that he's only filling 500 pages out of 60 years so that's 8 pages per year on average, am sure maybe I can do that? I mean from the distance? "So, when I was 4 my sister was born - clearly I don't remember shit about it but must have been either pleased or pissed off, let's chose the latter for dramatic sake and invent an episode where I tipped her pram over, that's good anecdote, and so on".

Anyway, I then turn to a tabloid which says that it’s gossiped that both carla bruni and sarkozy are having extra marital affairs and a big laugh escapes my mouth on the crowded escalator. Clearly am mad, because when you're ageing sounds escape your mouth, though nobody turns, not like that time at the Abbey National when the noise of a fart escaped my bottom (no smell, just the noise as I shifted position in the queue) and these two 20 year olds started having fits of laughter and couldn’t stop and the more I stood still looking dead ahead pretending I knew nothing about it, the more they laughed). This is the beginning of the end. Really. Except that for this year, again, I get a totally clean bill of health from recent check up, all orifices and various organs tested though of course there are cancers or aneurysms that go undetected till they blow you off this earth.

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Friday, October 01, 2010

1 October - Forgetting & Stuff

A Boots branch, 3 times gone past it thinking "there's something I need from here" but unable to remember, then Toph buys one and leaves in bathroom. A tongue scraper. He remembered I was after one and bought one. Maybe this is why people have kids, so that when they start to lose their minds, those young ones are around to think for them?

Last night was not that hot. We had fun at M&R 's comedy night. That was super good. Recommend it for your diary end of Nov, Kilburn high rd, it’s over by 10pm and the correspondece between Napoleon's and Wellington's horses writing to each other love letters from battlefields etc is very very funny. H. came with (Portobello rd writer friend) and then 3 of us went to Momo’s because JH was djing there at Chris Sullivan's night. But , and this is typical, we get there at 11.00 and place doesn’t have a vibe as not full. Was filling up fast at 12.15 when we left. Toph had driven down from Manchester earlier and so tired but even if had not driven would have never stayed later. And at high drink prices you can’t throw money just because you need the time to stretch to 2am w/o noticing it's a school's night. Oh forget, he was driving so not drinking (2 pints earlier at comedy/tale event) so he coulnd’t /wouldn’t stay. I said you know back in the days, we’d go out at midnight , place would be jumping by 1am, good time till 2am, start to leave thereafter, home by 3am, quick sleep, off to work as usual. But all old, all boring, all no reason to stay out as not looking for mate for sex (what else) and so it’s sort of pointless to even make the effort. Nice to see JH and JR, but NB was meant to turn up ‘later’ so was not going to wait for that specifically. Of course as we walked to car, there were queues of 20 somethings outside various clubs, smoking and generally very awake. And that just compels it. We are not meant to go to clubs no more. If had known, would have practically lived in one all my 20’s and 30’s.. kind of half did but doesn’t seem ‘enough ‘ somehow. Note on NB. So, in the email invite sent by JH I had seen NB's name and wrote back to say oh my god didn't know you knew him, I dated him briefly in 1984 or some such and he dumped me for a woman I never met but she had a distinctive name I remember to this day since I had the misfortune of hearing a message he'd left on his ansafone for her when I rang and so I knew I had competition. So JH says a) I've escaped a possibly worse life than I've gone on to have and b) he was with this F woman for years and after they split up she entered a witness protection scheme as had been involved in something bad (am dying to find out what) and c) he has a grown up kid and now is dating a 20 someting. NB is older or same age as me. He offers that he's very self centred also. That's before I decide not to publicise that NB and I almost share a b'day and for sure a star sign. Fascinating! well to me at least. After we split up I grandly went into a travel agents and asked where I could go for £100 this being a grand sum back in those days but not grand enough to get me beyond Greece or Portugal. I chose Portugal because the flight was shorter. In May. Not good. Was half built and I was trapped with sort of 20 to 30 holiday club type people (this is before Ibiza and clubs). Hideous time and if I was hoping that NB would miss me he clearly didn't. Did run into him 5 /8 years back. Was uglier than I remembered but forevery mythical in the relatively small world of font designers. I really fancied the other one from Manchester, PS but never got the nod from him.

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