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

20 December - Goa

2011-12-16T05:36:00.000-08:00

made it to Goa and will post soon as I learn some russian since north goa at least has become a suburb of Moscow in terms of ratio of russian tourists vs anyone else.
happy xmas

17 December - Sleepless in Raja

2011-12-16T05:35:00.004-08:00

apologies for length...

“You’re here to see forts and palaces and have a holiday later”. So says Mohan, the nice man who organized our driver Ranjit for us. The boyf had expressed some doubt as ‘do we really want to cover all those distances in 12 days? ‘ – he was after all jet-lagged - and I’d shut him up saying yes you just have to as you absolutely have to see these places as they’re like nowhere else, they rise out of the morning mist like mirages. But for places that clearly had so impressed me 12ya – I was here almost to the day - I don’t remember them much…
So I started by musing on how memory doesn’t work… I realized in my head I couldn’t tell which city was which between the other ones on the tourist trail. with the exception of Jaisalmer which I could picture, just, Jaipur, Jodhpur, Udaipur, Pushkar, Ajmer, Bikaner etc. and yet they all are qualified by a colour: the pink one, the blue one, the sandy one etc.

I only ‘remembered’ the Amber fort in Jaipur when I approached it – this time it had ten times the amount of elephant ferrying tourists up the slope to its entrance and the bedroom of mirrors is viewable only from behind barriers, I was lucky enough then to go inside and lie on the floor staring up at the dazzling mosaic, and I only remember having been inside the palace in Udaipur when I visited it again, but what I remembered of it are a courtyard with mirrored balconies and shop where I bought a silver ring I still wear. . And I kept saying things like ‘Oh, now I remember, there’s a picture of me and /or Anita (my friend on that trip) by this window’. So without having looked at that photo a few times over the years all of this would be gone. And since we had no digital camera then, we didn’t take masses of pictures either. At the time it was so awe inspiring and wonderful but in the intervening years it’s not like I ever bothered to google these places I just wanted to see them again for real. I did know I wanted the boyf see the open air observatory though as that had been a surprise find back then. I didn’t know such a thing could exist on the other side of the world. I tend to travel reading travel books after I’ve been somewhere, stupid you may say, but I prefer to rely on encounters and what people recommend but since Anita has a lifelong passion for the stars, the open air observatory had been her suggestion. And now I recommend it to all. But Jaipur has grown sprawling into a major city and you get stuck in its traffic a lot since there’s no ring road and going through the centre is like Piccadilly down on one lane of traffic. Start early, finish early is my advice and be prepared to miss great stuff whilst your eyes get drawn to endless monkey action around you. As in , monkeys being the clowns of india.

I’d picked a fantastic heritage hotel, the Narain Niwas, with the largest garden ever where they also have a plant nursery full of stupendous plants and a proper size pool. I thought boyf deserved some style and once he got over my ill advised henna tattoo on my palm (spelling welcome chris” but since it’s done in brown colour and smudged a bit it looked more like I ahem had squeezed a turd in my hand , sigh and it took ten days for it to fade despite scrubbing it with a kitchen brillopad) we were on!. However, this being India, when we were shown the fab room and heard a noise and asked ‘is this your generator, because if it is, we want to be as far away on the other side as possible” and the manager said ‘oh no this is construction work outside the hotel’ we looked alarmed, then I volunteered, “but it’s 3pm and they’ll have to finish at sunset non? And he said yes of course, we said ok we love this room with all its past grandeur and unique furniture.

Of course the demolition work next to the hotel was to demolish with pneumatic drills the size of dinosaurs the basement of a building that had gone up without permission, soon it will be a children’s park….aaaargghhh but not soon enough. This demolition work started at 2am on the first night of my boyf jet-lag and ended at 5am. It was like having something dug below your room never mind 200 yards away.. The disheveled look of the hotel manager next morning stopped me in my tracks when I was planning to complain.. he lived through it too so I let it pass.
Never mind, there’s beautiful Jaipur to see, and going for lunch in modern café Anhoki (part of the shop of the same name which sells fab fabrics, block printed, very subtle, google them) with Italian friend of friend who has a factory supplying fabrics to world famous designers, sadly there is no time to go visit such factory but I thank Barbara for taking me to a place where I can order a thai salad of soft little green leaves which have not seen in six weeks of mountain travel. Shame another friend of a friend, an Indian lady who does quality control on accessory goods a’ la Accessories my friend manufactures here, is out of town as would have liked her perspective on a number of things but as a middle class/entrepreneurial Indian she most likely can’t answer some of my basic /rural style questions, much as I wouldn’t be able to tell a foreign tourist why they do things like this or that in the Dorset countryside.

Up not so early on day 3 and basically , every town worth seeing is at least 250km from another so call that a six or seven hour drive with hardly anything to distract you along the way. The rajasthan fiefdoms were well set apart by their warring kings who just seemed to spend their time competing for who had the most lavish court. . I also wanted to go see some towns I had not time for on previous trip and so it is that the first trip out of Jaipur is towards Bundi, a less visited town but not off the beaten track by any means, with a deserted, semi crumbling palace. The shock here was the beyond bad road from Jaipur to bundi which traumatized us, chris because he had never been on such a featureless and bad road and me because I had the shits. Yep, the fancy heritage hotel in Jaipur gave them to me. Aaargh. Six weeks of street food and all good and the frikking top hotel floors me. Toph was fine as he’s still on the luxury probiotics VS2, can’t recommend them enough but you have to keep them in the fridge so no use bringing them when on the move. The thing to know is that in what passes for villages lining roads, the locals don’t believe you may be able to use a toilet the way they do, as in some cases it does not exist so the answer is always that they don’t have one. They just mean we don’t have one for the white lady… sigh.

I think 12ya I must have travelled between these towns on buses at night as have a memory of being tossed like a salad on a seat next to some bloke or my friend Anita, but not of seeing too much road. You can also do train of course or fly but not too all these destinations. However a bus would come off sort of ok perhaps in a collision with a cow or camel on the road but a car wouldn’t so we can’t travel in the dark. I also think that the owner of the car values it far too much to risk denting it because we want to use the night time to travel so it can’t be done, and as Jaipur friend confirmed a narrow escape when her car hit a camel once, I accept the local wisdom. Thanks for the warning. Cows and camels on the road is also a daytime occurrence though, and that’s why even with a good stretch of road in front of you, the driver won’t pick up speed. The animals appear totally out of the blue from some side of the road shrubbery and you would not be able to avoid them, so, 40km per hour it is or max 60km but only briefly. The joys of speed are not to be found in India unless on motorways but the cows are there too, seen them. Picture this, an almost deserted motorway, dozens of Indian men and women are busy repainting the yellow and black or yellow and white chevrons that mark the central reservation. On it we see a man pulling a water tank watering the tender new shrubs that one day may look very pleasant when in flower. A few steps behind the water cart are various cows chomping on the leaves and trunks of the new shrubs. The man either doesn’t notice or thinks it would be futile to chase one cow off when there are dozens awaiting …
Anyway, when we get there, the old town of Bundi is super cute with a perfect ‘lake/reservation ‘ in the middle, and you can sit in beautiful gardens and watch the endless stream of lorries on the other side winding up a hill. As in Europe, goods hardly travel by train anymore, everything is moved by truck and this region is highly populated so… my driver does not believe that in italy at least, delivery trucks can only travel at certain times of the day and never at the weekend…

Bundi is quiet if you discount the usual bikes’ fest and cars that should be blocked from entering narrow old streets designed to both keep out invaders and for horse or camel drawn carts only. Maybe in years to come an Indian tourist minister will visit the centre of Florence or Rome and marvel at the pedestrianised areas, which of course met with plenty of opposition when introduced , but I don’t think anyone regrets them now.

The heritage haveli here we pick as accommodation , Braj Bushanjee, is run by some old Brahmin prince and full of his stuff and delightful until 10 pm that night when a wedding procession jolts us out of initial slumber. It is atrocious and goes on for an hour only to move on to another part of town and then return to base all organs blazing of course around midnight. It’s not music only, it’s probably the same declaration over and over and over that Rama is a good guy and how lucky Pryanka is to get him as a husband. . Sigh…

But the Ghar palace the next day is for sure unique. Despite crumbling as not used since the early 70’s , there is a room in the women’s quarters that has miraculously been spared any weathering or defacing and is full of perfectly preserved murals , they’re exquisite and worth googling.
Did I also mention that in every fort/palace etc there are guides who are not guides but merely caretakers who take you aside (for a price/tip) and show you the painting/drawing where the naughty maharajah is spying on the bath time/dress time of the maharani and her female attendants? It’s hilarious, they pull boyf aside and whisper in his ear like it’ s something my ears are too delicate for. The same happens every time there’s a Shiva lingam to see in a temple. The lingam is the penis of Shiva and in some very very ancient temples it’s a huge block of marble or granite and sometimes it’s buried deep down some steps/cave and surrounded by water.. Funnily enough it’s me who touches every single one for luck rather than the boyf. I think it’s supposed to bring luck with fertility which I certainly don’t need but I just like to possibly shock the guides, “them western brazen women…”

There is no health and safety here, all monuments, forts etc have very low parapets that reach by your knees mostly , and you have to be careful how you lean out to look bu it’s also exhilarating not to have all the ‘don’t go here, don’t go there’ that we have in our monuments. And if you want to go up some steps you shouldn’t and take life in your hands, there’s a handy guide who’ll unlock the chain for you. For a tip or a price.
In Bundi we meet an Italian, chef during the season at the President hotel in Forte dei marmi and then uses his 16 or 20 weeks holidays to travel.. the kind of person who informs you he’s been to Thailand 18 times and Vietnam 22 times.. needless to say he’s long divorced, but he’s useful as he collects precious stones and antique perfume bottles and tells me stuff about jewellery like a lot of the gold sold is silver with a dip of gold. And you’d never know.. so that confirms I should not be spellbound by trinkets no more. I simply wouldn’t know what am buying so best to leave them. According to him in Nepal it takes 21 grams of gold to marry a girl, which is not a lot, in India it must be more, the 20,000 dollars worth, a jeweler guy told me in Delhi. In days where there was/ is no divorce but women can get kicked out of a home, or your hubby dies and his bro doesn’t want you, all you had is your gold to see you through the rest of your life and your kids. So there must be a code of honour in place as my immediate thought is ‘the guy can divorce you /kick you out AND keep your jewellery also no?’

Thankfully the road out of Bundi to Udaipur is great, nobody on it and leaving early means you arrive at mid afternoon and not at sundown when you’d feel ‘spent’. Udaipur is a dream and there’s nobody here. I’ll find out later that the peak tourist season is not before and during xmas as I thought but jan to march. Our first choice hotel, Amet Haveli, has a small window on the lake and when I say ho hum this is a partial view and hum and er about it and then ask if maybe they can discount us the 10 per cent of tax and he says no, it’s out of there and we end up next door which is much nicer and half the rate, check this out Lake Pichola palace with pool and restaurant on the roof, too cold for it though and Ibiza style tented beds on it and bar. Bingo. The rooms have a bit of a seventies feel about them but I guess they’ve started with the top pool floor and will renovate as they go along. Can’t beat it for the view thought. The lake is full of water, some years it runs dry and if you come to only one place in Rajasthan, this is the one I guess. Now, where exactly did liz hurley get married, on the hotel in the middle of the lake? Must be something to arrive by water in a cortege of vessels, but I come from near Venice so beat that… from the top floor at dusk you can also see hundreds of bats heading out for a night’s feed of a huge tree next to the hotel. I felt I was in a scene of Twilight there for half an hour.. but they just went into the branches and within minutes the tree was still and you’d never had guessed it was bat hotel.
The light switch lottery in every hotel is very entertaining, btw, as there are about 20 switches in each room usually set in a panel so you have to try each one to find out which lamp it corresponds too and even then there is never a decent light to read a book after dark by. Handily there is usually a switch outside your front door that will switch everything on or off.
Am super glad to see that the or one of the mosques in town is above the super expensive Leela palace hotel, much advertised, hurrah, you pay top dollar and you can’t shut up or out the hour of allah akbar at 5am. Presumably when the mosque was built it was a bit out of the way.. but maybe the Leela Palace has great double glazing.
Udaipur has a variety of places with terraces or bay windows facing the lake so you can watch the sun rise or go down whilst in the process of eating and drinking very nice food.
As mentioned tourists are either coming next month or are in Goa we’re told so it is that I can’t stop feeling sorry for the shops and restaurants which are empty and touting for their ‘pashminas’ (naaah mate, please call them just shawls, there aren’t enough goats in the Himalayas to produce all this quite obviously synthetic stuff), and all other wares. Of course the region is well known for exquisite jewellery and amazing textiles and you can go look for those in exclusive shops but am just talking about what lines the streets, not the Bond street equivalent. Incidentally here’s a good one. Everyone constantly asks you where you’re from which of course is a way of identifying what they can sell you as a French and Italian looks for different things and different quality than a tourist from Ohio, sorry ohians. This constant asking is immensely tedious as you answer and then get pushed for more /come this way and that. So I took to saying we were polish and that shuts everyone up as they repeat ah, polish and then waste a precious – to you as you’re escaping – few seconds whilst they think of what they know about polish people which is zero as not many of those around. Am rather proud of this one. If pressed for a word of polish you say dzjinkuja barzo (not actual spelling) and that’s that, they’re stunned for a reply. The polish tourist is a mystery to them still.
My acknowledged first faux pas of the trip happens in Udaipur and it’s a huge one. I saw a very well dressed man walking up the ramp to the palace on the lake, on his hands .. he had ‘shoes /sandals’ fashioned for his hands and well, I thought, he’s made an effort to dress decently – for a beggar - and approached him to give him some notes. To my absolute mortification he gestured and mouthed “no no, no” , he’s not a beggar, aaaargghhhhh , I want to die. Chris says he’s probably a relative of the last Maharana since that one had a disability also! Jeesus wept, I am a fool.
The Palace is pretty wonderful but I can’t help thinking, there are always galleries full of elaborate daggers, guns with intricately chiseled barrels and novelty features, but where are all the others gone? The armies of these maharanas had thousands of men and they were constantly fighting this prince or that one. Where did all the other knives go? Smelted to make ashtrays? Bought by all the british raj and currently in some cabinet in rainy England? I think this stupid stuff whilst I wait for boyf to take a zillion photos. He always tells me I’ll be glad he’s taken all these photos and ‘we can always delete’…. Mmhh. My tourist habits are simple by comparison, a few photos and a few postcards and am done.
When we reach Jodhpur our chosen heritage hotel, the Pal Haveli gives us a bedroom, which is larger than my flat in London and if you factor in the ceiling height than my flat fits into this room twice. Sigh. They knew how to live the reach merchants. The terrace has a fantastic view of the fort and the water tanks below. The fort here, Mehrangahr, is mega fantastic to visit – the work of angels, fairies and giants as ruyard kipling said, and the old town, the so called ‘blue city’
is only really visible if you go into the fort, so don’t skip it if you come- by. The rest of the town though has nothing much to offer so a night and a day is enough.

We sit for tea in a corner of the vast Jodhpur market, at a busy stall and the owner chats to us and even offers us tea. The chai walla (boss) reveals he makes 20k a day. 5k of it is profit, selling tea only, nothing else. That’s in Indian rupies so divide by 75. it’s a massive amount for here. His bro sat next to him owns a textile company and does pretty well too. But owner doesn’t think his son will want to run the tea stall, too many hours a day. We watch for a while, it’s all cash, who’s his spies in the team I wonder, it would be easy to siphon some money here and there but can people be bothered? And how much does he have to give to the local police….am not going to go into Indian corruption and mafia, there are fiction and non fiction books galore on the subject and the paper talks about it every day. Boring.
On the longest stretch, the road between Jodhpur and Jaisalmer where the cows on the road gradually give way to herds of camels and we go slightly car stir crazy – not used to a driver who drops me off and picks up at every gate, I miss walking around - we meet the longest ever army convoy. Hundreds of trucks carrying or dragging rocket launchers , latrines, tanks and what not, endless soldiers’ faces peering down at us every time our car is sandwiched behind one of their trucks. See, the road is not bad as our driver told us, but try overtaking this lot.. Jaisalmer is a mere 30km from the boundary with Pakistan and here they’re very scared of Pakistan, constantly in the newspapers., small but deadly next door. I bet they rue the day they said in ’47, ‘all you lot, go over there and be happy’. Hasn’t quite turned out that way. But I also suspect the Indian government uses the Pakistan threat to make themselves look better or at least to justify the military which is so huge here that it’s the biggest employer after the railways. Around jaisalmer there are army barracks that stretch for miles and we will meet another convoy when leaving town. So that’s def not my favourite 8 hours in a car… I will also see 2 very fit Sikh turbaned soldiers in fatigues, they’re stunning. The best looking guys in india are in the north and in rajsasthan, I remember that from 12ya. They’re taller, leaner, their moustaches don’t seem so comical and they have a look that says ‘I am the lord around here, don’t ya mess with me’ which ahem is sexy , compared for example with the Goans or Keralans who sort of look meeker and, well, shorter in comparison.

I remember jaisalmer for the beautiful Patwon ki haveli outside the city walls, owned by a merchant who must have been the Medicis of this town and since he had five sons to house in the compound, there’s endless beautiful rooms to peer into, full of heritage fabrics and cabinets with all sort of intriguing collections . But wish as with all the palaces visited that you could be inside them at night and with the original lighting which would have been flickering candles reflected back by the myriad glass and mirror work of the alcoves in which they’d have stood. Instead you visit everything in museum times/daylight when that treat is not available. I bet they let Charles and Camilla come at night, lucky sods.
Our desert hotel, Jaisalgahr, has a slightly faulty towers feel about it or if you want to update that, you could be in a Kaufman movie, (the guy who did ‘Being john malkovich’ and scripted “eternal sunshine of the spotless mind” when we get to the breakfast room it’s in darkness and the poor waiter is asleep on a chair. But he scrambles up to turn on the lights in the ceiling that mirrors the sky, sweet. Eventually we’re joined by an Indian businessman who spends the entire time snorting back his own snot. Nice. I wish we’d followed my disregarded advice and stayed in accommodation inside the Golden Fort, (jaisalmer being the only town where the fort is actually inhabited, by 1000 people and probably a hundred cows who will bar your passage in the narrow alleys) but that would have meant dragging our luggage up a long ramp as 3 wheelers not allowed in anymore and I agree with that decision. Did I mention some of us have a suitcase in tow instead of the very handy backpack ? some of us don’t want to look like backpackers and you’d think that’s the girl right? Wrong.

Jaisalmer is also suffering from world recession tourist drought. We dine alone in the Tibetan restaurant we stop at because I miss eating veggie momos (Tibetan dumplings) but since they’re not that good, a simple question reveals that the last Tibetan left the kitchen here 7 years ago and his recipe has lost definition. So we chat to an extremely smart 15 year old with perfect English who is trapped here and can’t wait to get out, but he goes to a private school, maybe he will escape. We enter into a conversation about popstars and since I know the ones he mentions bar a few, we pass some sort of test. ‘What do you do when it’s hot here in the summer’ we ask, he answers go out early to play cricket and go out when sun is going down to play cricket. He adds this is pretty much all there is to do at any other time also. Since there’s nothing for the tourists to do, (how many play cricket? Thought not) I say some of us would like/could learn to dance hindi movie style moves if anyone started a course. “What ? he says, like ‘Tourists got talent?’ see I told you he was smart.

The pastimes are simple indeed. We’re on the terrace of a hotel which offers a grand view of the fort at sunset. You could spend hours here pretending to be an attacker who came all the way to take the fort and spends day and night wondering how to get in, so unassailable it seems. The terrace is a couple of storeys above a rabbit wren of terraces of regular housing. It’s near sunset and the terraces are little market place microcosms of the town. This is where all the women and the children are. The women who presumably only leave the houses to go buy food at the market and for the rest of the time are here cooking it, and washing and doing what women do. They’ re all talking across rooftops and the kids are flying kites. The kites are super simple, just small squares of paper or fabric with no tails or elaborate designs. Ranjit told us the kite festival is in mid January and we’ve seen older kids and young men flying kites from the ramparts of other forts we’ve visited. On some ad in a magazine I saw giant and elaborate kites but here it’s all basic stuff, for some reason I find it moving that they only have the wind to play with. I have not asked Ranjit what one wins for flying a kite the highest or the best and now it’s too late, maybe I’ll find info on the net, but it seems this is what kids to here more than kicking a ball around. The sun goes down and all the women and kids go inside. An hour later and the squares are thronging with …their men, drinking tea, eating a street samosa, chewing the fat. Jaisalmer is where chris follows his instincts and joins a queue for a busy street stalls and returns proclaiming he’s had the best masala dosa ever. Bear in mind that masala dosas are a southern snack not a desert one. I , in the meantime have something I could become addicted to if it wasn’t a glass of fat, ie full fat milk with saffron strands infused in it. Delicious. It’s kind of bizarre to see small crowds of men drinking flavoured milk but not many Indians go out on the razzle with alcohol.

I think I have trained myself to ignore the fact that there are never any women ever serving you (apart on market stalls selling fruit and veg or cloth items), it’s men, men and more men around so you feel odd because you know they think you’re odd sitting amongst them and drinking your tea. Am less of an oddity now that boyf is with me but they probably think they would never be like him and take their woman out for all to see. But am grateful that they don’t impose any funny tent for their woman to wear before she goes out. When you travel in rural places though all the women who are walking along the road going to fields etc, have their sari scarf well draped to cover their faces but it’s just gauze and see through
Incidentally the rajasthani dress is not a sari but the same choli/short sleeved shirt as a sari wearer but the skirt is a full skirt which of course is wonderful when they dance and it swirls around. The hem of the skirt is what tells you the status of the wearer, married women have a band of red or other colour at the bottom of the skirt. . which reminds me that in Tibetan/nepali dress, the dress is the same for both , but you add an apron to it if you’re married and the apron can be in a fabric that’s very expensive but it’s design/patterns aer always the same. Another thought on women’s clothing, when you see the brightness of the pinks and yellows and greens and reds etc, against the drab sandy landscape, you understand why they went for such extreme bursts of colours, to be seen if they’re lost in the landscape or just a way to scream ‘I exist in this harsh environment’ . and so my quest continues for some sari lengths in understated light grey which I need to turn into curtains for my flat. Grey silk plainly does not exist. Nor sand or cappuccino colour either ahem.

Unexpectedly in Pushkar despite its streets being lined with the usual shops selling shawls and hippy crap, nobody hassles you to come see my shop please. Mystery. As chris changes money in a money changer the guy explains that if they make 4 quid a day they’re fine and don’t need more. This is echoing my Hindi teacher rita in mcleod ganji who told me Indians only work to make enough to get by and are not greedy for more. Clearly this doesn’t tally with the government race to beat the Chinese at the new top of the world economy game. But it makes sense of all the people one sees doing nothing, they’re not deliberately doing nothing but there is not much to do at least in the service industry. No tourists, the recession in Europe and USA has put paid to many holidays abroad.. We’re the exception and that’s the reason some of the hotels feel so sad as empty. None more than in Jaisalmer which is so far to get to that many people won’t make it this far and all the camels will go hungry as we’re not paying for safaris. Went on one 12ya and got so bored I couldn’t wait for the 3 days 2 nights to be over, despite a canopy of stars you wouldn’t believe it, the kind to send professor Brian Cox gaga.
However Pushkar is where we get constantly approached and asked if we want drugs. Or rather, chris is, I’m a girl so presumably I’d never buy drugs and would just watch my male companion take them. I’d be curious to know the prices though… as the town is a mecca for a certain type of smoker and judging by the signs at most café’s, he’s Israeli.
But we still feel pretty safe and looked after, “This is Rajasthan, not crazy India” , says Ranjit every time boyf asks things like ‘are our bags safe in the car? ‘ (when we leave one overnight type thing). And also everyone is unfailingly courteous but things take time, there’s no such thing as American style service, my boyf gets annoyed every time as food takes a while to get to you as it’s made from scratch and they don’t keep an army of cooks in the kitchen and he refuses to accept my simple suggestion which is ‘Go for food before you’re hungry and desperate for it, so waiting half an hour won’t be filled with ‘but how long can a bowl of porridge take to make??’. Men!
Some of the streets laden with the same-same wares make me feel like I’m trapped inside Cha cha dum dum, a cavernous warehouse inside the old Kensington Market selling ‘oriental goods’ , where my best Italian mate M. had found a job as a book-keeper back in 1980. I remember that was hippy shit even then and we were punks innit? so I don’t remember ever asking her to get me a bracelet or other of their wares, it was even then really cheaply produced , I asked her recently, and sold in major volumes so feel free to disregard me anytime I call these trinkets crap as many people like it and surely anyone on their first gap year buys them, and I’m just an old snob.

So it’s snob’s punishment that I lost my very real , very beloved purple cashmere scarf whilst roaming round the lake, had to be the best /warmest scarf I brought with me I thought, not the cheap stuff I plan to abandon on some corner, but my karma must be good as a not so hopeful retrace of my steps and voila’ find it 3 hours later still on the steps of the ghats surrounding Pushkar lake. Hallelujah. Maybe I should have paid the wanna-be Brahmin priests for their puja (purification ceremony) after all, I had refused. . You get a string tied to your wrist to show you have paid your dues and thrown some marigolds in the lake. Flowers not the washing gloves though for sure there’s plastic in the lake too. And the women sweeping dust off the steps to the lake, sweep it, into the lake of course. Am sure it’s a form of devotion on their part. Btw, the brooms they use here are not brooms with a handle but a bundle of sticks that can only be used if you bend down or squat. Not ideal for these womens’ backs and rest assured that no man is ever seen sweeping anything round these parts.

So it is that the dancer ladies from Jaisalmer are surrounding chris when I get to back to him and he has agreed to buy them tea in exchange for taking photos, but once we’re stat down, it starts, we’re both hemmed in by one on each side and more. They tell us tales of woe and demand six quid, just like that. That’s a lot of chapattis and teas, so I offer two and leave them. I think chris is disappointed, he had not ‘got it’ instantly that we were the usual sugar lump in the anthill, and had been captivated by their colourful costumes. Later we saw two rajasthani ladies strutting back and forth in the same central street and approaching male tourists and well, life is hard but had not seen this display anywhere else yet.
The largest second mosque outside of Mecca is in Ajimer a mere half hour from pushkar, hurrah, and they let anyone in the walking areas though you can’t access the shrine where a finger of the this particular prophet is kept. So you go and the courtyards are full of muslim and hindus just chilling there, or washing before going into the shrine though the women have separate areas of course and they’re much smaller, maybe they’re supposed to just worship at home…. This giant mosque complex is smack bank in the middle of hindu town so if there was some religious tension you’d better leg it, but otherwise there’s no sense the two religions can’t live side by side and the streets leading up to it sell the usual tat only here it’s all green and gold coloured. in mecca colours.
The road back to Jaipur is fab motorway style so we’ll be there in a flash for one last night before the flight to Goa. The weirdest sight on it for a change is not cows but a posse of stark naked men in a slow jogging convoy. They are Jains religion followers on a pilgrimage says Ranjit’s to our stupefied faces. Our driver Ranjit’s wife has never been anywhere, lives in a village 100km from Jaipur . He returns there when not driving, as he’s a farmer for half the year, and they farm mustard plants and other vegetables. This earns him/them 2 quid a day for a few months of the year till monsoon and waiting for harvests to ripen pass. That would buy food for them for sure but to put into some perspective, a bowl of porridge with fruit and a coffee that is not made with nescafe’ would cost me more than that at any moderate establishment. No doubt all who come into contact with as tourist must think us loaded if we choose to travel to the other side of the world from our homes to blow a quid on a bowl of porridge instead of the 15p chapatti they eat for their breakfast.
I don’t know how much he earns for driving but he’s clearly happy to be in charge of a nice big car with white seat covers, air-con and a stereo. I just think it’s ironic that he’s been all over this fabled region with dozens of us tourists and his wife has never seen any of the fab views we’ve enjoyed. He’s very subtle and careful as a driver and must have been told we hate hearing the horn used constantly so he doesn’t. proof that you can drive in india w/o it. And he must also have been told that there is only so much Indian music tourists want to listen to and he keeps it low and turns it off when we ask him too, but he listens to the same 2 CDs everyday, so at a service station I buy him some more but the songs are virtually the same. Sigh. I had thought about bringing some of my own but didn’t, I regret it now. I think Ranjit needs to listen to some William Orbit or Bach for a few hours to realize why we don’t appreciate Rajasthani dance music that much, which incidentally is super similar to Moroccan music, I guess the instruments are the same….ahem. For good measure I also gift him a phone microphone thingy so he can take his various calls without taking his hands off the wheel!

Rajasthan is ‘done’ and the morning we leave for the airport, Ranjeet brings his nearly 2 year old daughter with him. To our horror she’s sat on front seat , no seatbelt, no child seat and she’s the size of 1 year old. We can barely see her head as he approaches the hotel gate, but we see clearly that she falls clean down in the well when he brakes to reverses into a parking space. Oh dear god. So on the way to the airport, I take her and am holding her on my lap in the back seat to possibly save her life in an accident, and the little mite shifts a little and pukes on me, profusely, (the purple cashmere scarf is not having a good Indian sortie) and I stink till I get some men’s strong cologne later in the airport. Poor doll, she didn’t cry at all and under her bottoms which I take off to wipe, she’s naked , so small , so cute but what can I do. She now wants to be with daddy, not with me and after he comforts her, he plonks her again on the front seat half naked, this time belts her up and gives her his phone to play with and all drama is forgotten. Reminds me of 12ya on plenty trains I used that the Indian toddlers were the quietest I’ve ever met. They had no toys to entertain themselves with and were always quiet. Anita and I were always trying to work out how the mothers knew exactly when to spirit them away to the toilet as they wore no nappies …. It’s still a mystery.

Various other temples and forts were visited in between major towns, some of them we had to ourselves entirely, don’t miss the Kumbhalghar fort with ramparts that go for miles, wall of china style, and Shekhawati and Bikaner and the temple of rats which we didn’t go to on this trip, but I remember vividly from 12ya. You would too if you had hundreds of mice running over your bare feet. For good luck obviously. But if this goes over the equivalentof ten pages you’d want to kill me

4 December - Parvati land to Delhi

2011-12-16T05:34:00.001-08:00

(12 ya refers to 12 years ago, time of my first Indian trip)

After possibly offending my trekking guide Shiv with the following exchange on last morning whilst he was cooking breakfast and I happened to see big bags of salt and sugar by his feet :”Shiv, why did you carry so much salt and sugar for a 3 day trip?” his answer “the smallest bag available is a 1kg bag” , me “er, yes but you could have decanted half into a cup or something and not carry it unnecessarily, maybe we should throw away what’s left before we head back down?”

After that Shiv walked on without waiting for me at all… oh dear, wounded pride but ya know…. Wise up man, elemenentary physics.

After sleeping again on a bed and not freezing it was time for a 5am start, had arranged bus to a town 40km below and 2 hours of course and then shared jeep.

the shared jeep had clearly not got my message that there were 2 of us not 1 so it was overloaded but the driver who makes money from each passenger was not about to turn away Miguel.. However, we had not reckoned with the ‘pulling rank’ fat businessman who refused to allow anyone next to him on the front seat and kept his bag there. Eventually the 5 at the back, (room for 4 only), mutined at a pee stop. Michael squeezed himself at the front next to the driver who has a metal bar meant to divide him from the other passengers at the front, so he was effectively in the driver’s operating space. We were coming down mountains and clearly Mike’s hulk was an impediment to the changing of gears. . At the next stop I turfed him out to sit next to the driver on account that I’m much smaller, and would give the fat businessman evil stares, but it was not so simple, I still had to shift out of his hand/way every time he hat to change gear. Still, the businessman was impassible and even refused one of my biscuits as to take it would have meant becoming friendly. So much for having an easier ride than the usual local buses!

The other guys at the back tried to remonstrate but businessman pulled rank. God knows..i felt I was in some Chekhov short story with the government inspector. I was dying to find out both what was his job and what he carried in the precious holdhall, but I didn’t ask. As we finally hours later got to the plain and a busy town where driver had to shift gears a lot more frequently, the businessman must have realized as I did that my shifts were going to slow us down considerably and eventually suggested I sit on his side of the bar but , as a further “I’m boss” signal he told me I was to keep my coat/scarves etc on the other side of the bar. Done deal. When we got to the bus station at rishikesh he quickly exploited my dithering over whether to get out there to get the train or go to the source of the train at dehra dun and persuaded us to get the train there, thus getting the car to himself to.. dehra dun. Anyway, we made it, would have been ironic for our jeep to fall down the side of a mountain when the buses didn’t. by the way, en route, I have seen various accidents or the remains of. Not pretty. Cars under trucks, trucks fallen off the side of mountains and so on, plus there are daily reminders in the papers..

The 3 wheeler who took us on for the sort of right price, then announced he had to get another 4 passengers in order to go to Haridwar , a 15km and an hour down the road… oh dear. But the train was not for a while so… he only got two who were going in the opposite direction so he decanted us ten mins later to another driver.

Trying to imagine what haridwar looks like when millions of people converge on it for the kumb mela held once every 12 years, all these millions must be camped all around, all trying to bathe in the convergence of the various tributaries to the ganges which becomes ‘the ganges’ at haridwar..

Haridwar train station at this time of the year was manageable, got to talk to a few people and find stuff out, especially if they have accountant sisters in derby or work in the US and are here on holiday so their English is good. This particular chap worked for a huge Spanish mining company who was busy extracting coal . apparently the Spanish managing cadre like to start work earlier than their indian workforce would so that leads to a few tensions. And everyone I meet thinks I must be here for spiritual quest reasons and I have no heart to disappoint them so take all the advice about shrines to visit and ‘you must go to varanasi’ without saying er, been there , done that and what a mess of a place that was, if I fell into the ganges there I’d die instantly of a zillion lethal germs, no thanks..

I went to the window and was told at 4pm that I’d have to wait till 6pm at another window in order to perhaps be able to buy a ticket for the sleeper to delhi. Michael went off to internet and when he came back decided to double check and at the same window was told to go out and book his ticket on the internet. This was clearly a ‘lie’ as after 12pm on a Sunday no tickets are sold on internet, the system is closed. Why I was told to wait was simply because I was female/foreign and nice. Obviously. As I waited first in line for 6pm , plenty of other Indians came up to try change/get tickets and got short shrift. You may not know that when in line for a ticket window, the Indian who’s behind you will not be behind you but next to you so he can step into your place sideways as you exit. This makes for uncomfortable queuing especially if he’s with 3 family members all next to you, but just be warned.

At 6.01 I also was told ‘not possible ‘ by the same guy who’d come from the window where he’d told me to go to this one! This is part of a dance, thank god I was here 12ya. So knew not to just slink away and accept the ‘no’, so plead I did and he eventually sold me 2 sleeper first class, hurrah, tenner each to sleep till Delhi. But the train didn’t go till 11pm. Will spare you the tedium suffered till the departure time. My dreams of luxury were dampened as the first class on the Mussoorie express was like a second class sleeper train in italy but hey, I did a dance of joy as I lay on my hard couch. Didn’t notice till toilet get up at 4am that we’d slept with the door wide open as a certain idiot Oz boy had gone to the loo and forgot to lock it, but all was safe in first class. Dreams of peace were sort of shattered by the locomotive sounding its horn throughout the night presumably to get cows off the tracks but sleep did come. As the train pulled slowly into old delhi, the tracks were lined with rubbish and hundreds of men peeing alongside but thankfully facing the opposite direction or crossing them which since we know is dangerous is just freaky. Nothing changed here I thought (from my last visit 12ya, as our 3 wheeler (real price 80 after starting at 300 , sigh) made its way into the old town/bazaar area which was the usual mess of … decay.

But something has changed!! Delhi has a metro. Hurrah, it goes everywhere for a pittance and it’s an over-ground so you don’t die of heat in it.. So now I feel bad for the rickshaw drivers forlornly and gathered at the exits and waiting for a fare, why haggle with them when you can buy a token or an oyster card and whizz to your destination?.

I excitedly got on a train to Connaught square, now renamed Rajiv chowk and no longer a chic area, only to realize my mistake quickly enough, there were no women in my carriage, only men, so I remembered that the trains here all have the ladies compartment rule to keep women from being pawed and stared at by blokes, . and sure enough the front carriage of every metro is reserved for ladies and has pink speech bubbles on the floor of stations to tell you so. Ahhh, that’s baetter but does it mean that only this amount of ladies go anywhere in Delhi, since a carriage would never contain all of us women going to work etc in London….. ?

And if you can’t be bothered to run to it, as platforms are very long, the next best thing is to stand behind a married woman with her husband and /or possibly carrying a child in arms and form a sort of immediate ladies enclave.

Thanks to the metro I went to see the Qu’tab minar ancient mosque complex, which is 16km from the centre of dely and 12ya clearly I felt I couldn’t face that distance in a 3 wheeler (no money for taxis then). It’s pretty spectacular and it’s bizarre to think that this area was alternatively hindu and Islamic and back again , each building temples with the stones taken from the destruction of the enemy’s ones. I was tempted to go see the new vast area of Gurgaon, all modern housing and offices and malls, a sort of canary wharf owned by one bloke and conveniently positioned 15 mins from the airport, but I thought it may make me sick. So I didn’t.

It was bad enough a couple of days later not recognizing Delhi airport when I went to pick up chris, they had practically rebuilt it for the commonwealth games of 2 years ago and the hordes are kept out by 3 wheelers only allowed to park 2 miles away and if you are meeting someone arriving or saying goodbye to someone departing, you have to pay a whole pound to be allowed into the airport effectively keeping out the crowds that I remember 12ya. Progress! My sweet car driver takes me to get chai at the drivers’ tea stall because tea inside the airport is 4 times more. Bless. He’s already got the measure of my ‘I want to be indian’ type personality.

Later, I see a cart in the street selling coconuts and you’d think I had been granted a wish. I’ll have two and go wild on coconut water, and gorge on the pulp, why not, none of that was available in the mountains.

The papers are full of articles about the Lopkal bill, something to do with trying to rein in rampant corruption which is at Mugabe levels here, only sort of disguised by democracy. Other than that there’s the usual obsession with Pakistan and getting one ahead of china in the industrial development area. So I just turn to the gossip pages.

Tom cruise is in Delhi for the premiere of Mission Impossible 4, and the people who are waiting for him a t the airport are paid extras, so says the paper. He has flown in all his organic food and his chefs. He needs his hotel temperature at 23 degrees, I want to ask him if he can really tell the difference when it drops to 22.5 . but the thing is that here they don’t care for Tom Cruise or anyone western, only for their homegrown stars. And they like the women with a bit of flesh on them, skinny is very very bad. They also like them pale and the TV is awash with ads for skin whitening creams, this is aimed at women only, presumably the men can stay dark or are not sissy enough to use moisturizer. They are also full of ads for conditioners which is just how marketing works. The average non city woman washes her hair with handsoap, seen many at pumps or baths do so, and then they coat it in cheap coconut oil, but that would be bad for l’oreal so let’s get all the Indian women onto conditioner and we’ll clear up.

One more thought on western idols, f all the pop idols you can think of, only Michael Jackson registers, U2 don’t and Lady Gaga will soon be forgotten, it’s still rather impenetrable for our brand of stars… in my days at Sony, in fact, I don’t remember ever dealing with india and I was doing international marketing. Think there was some sort of higher decisions, like pick one who can ‘travel’ like maria carey or that Vida Loca boy and push those , but forget about , I don’t know….manic streat preachers or travis, that don’t ‘travel’.

Michael the oz is in the meantime busy monitoring texts from Pooja and Riva, poor man. It won’t happen. He met them at the conference he came here for in delhi before I run into him, conference to do with creating products that work for third world situations and more. The woman who won ‘invented’ a much cheaper version of syringes, instead of the tube we’re familiar with which is attached to the needle, she came up with a sachet, ketchup sachet style in macdonalds, which attaches to the needle and is a third of the price to produce. Well done her. Michael’s product is a lamp what works in any place set up for surgery, possibly solar, am not sure. Anyway, these two gals are mates, he likes one, the one with the boyf, but it’s the other, less attractive one who likes him and does the texting. That old chestnut, they promise they will go here and there with him in rajasthan, previously had promised to go to rishikesh but in the end he went with 3 indian boys from the conference, stoners…. but then pull out or don’t make any plans. I keep saying to him actually call Puja or Riva , don’t keep doing the text dance.. you’ll know by the tone of their voice, but I can only be mother once. In the end he agrees that with only 1 more night in delhi, and them being Indian girls, there wouldn’t be any sex following a night out in a bar drinking, they’re not that forward. And very sensibly he declares he’s actually here to further his work/career and he’ll be off to jaipur where he’s been invited by another company that deals with product design with a NGO slant. Awww, am so proud. Good call mike.

However, he worries he has no thoughts, no light bulbs going off about his work, but I tell him to relax, it all comes afterwards, when you least expect it and in the meantime people pay good money to therapists to get to the empty mind state.

Meantime, I need help with the following if anyone knows enough about re-incarnation to help me through my questions.

So, this reincarnation chain, if you’re supposed to be on the top and you do something wrong, what is the creature you’ll become? is it set according to your misdeed or is it totally random ?and what if you’re the one bad was done to, the victim., as you’re human what higher form do you go to? Some extra terrestrial bodyless intelligence? And do ETs also commit bad acts against one another and therefore get cast back down to crow form? And who’s to say you’d have any notion that your life as a grasshopper (after having been human) is a bad one, maybe you like it, don’t know any better as you only know the grasshopper reality, and how does a grasshopper have any chance to better himself till he gets back to human? Does he have to open a shelter for female grasshoppers victims of grasshopper violence or give up eating worms? For me these are all myths and more myths (bit like believing in jesus’ miracles which surely are just a story to illustrate a point) and I can’t believe people would spend years studying all this dalai lama stuff, like the young oz monk student girl met in mcleod ganji who’s on the seventh year of studying Tibetan so she can follow the Dalai discourses. I was tempted to say girl get a life but … each to their own. God knows what she’s escaping from in her own world/culture. And also , the Dalai lama, I kind of want to ask him, you know this non violence thing of his… well it’s been 50 years since the Chinese got into Tibet and clearly they’re never going to go and they’ve already essentially wiped out Tibetan language because it’s not taught in schools an with that Tibetan traditions are also going. So ya know… a bit more nelson Mandela and a few bombs would have worked back in the days but now now when to get any of that into Tibet , I have no idea how you’d manage. Every third person there is a Chinese soldier dressed as a civilian. Richard Gere where are you when I need you? You’re only good for collecting money to help tibetna refugees, but as for the other millions trapped in Tibet, they have no chance. So maybe it is good they believe in reincarnation, bit like my granny believed in heaven as that at least makes life tolerable on earth if you hope there will be better stuff to pay you back. Personally, well, I think I made it clear what I think, and I’ll shut up.

Next instalment, Rajasthan, with the addition of my own bollywood superstar, the all not singing and not dancing Toph, but he’s got good moves.

2 December - Two humans & 1 Leopard

2011-12-16T05:29:00.000-08:00

there are some posts preceding this one that will be 'filled in'

having lost 'my' older gentleman travelling companion, the oz matematician Winfred, i was pottering along alone and sunning myself in Joshimath when the younger oz product designer Michael turned up. He only got my text saying 'do not come to Joshimath, there's nothing to do, the road to Badrinath is closed, and there are no women around, let alone young and good looking ones' - he's looking - when he was already 5 hours into his 12 hour cranky bus journey to ... joshimath. That's the trouble with bus journeys which start at 5am. He arrived despairing of never being able to see the mountains close up and regretting leaving some stoners indian friends in Rishikesh where he'd been rafting.. and where there was yoga/massage and the promise of a babe or two to cultivate.
As we were having a cup of tea the following day wondering what to do (for his sake really, since i had declared that was happy to read novels for the foreseable, non-active future) , i decided to ask the cafe' owner what could the only 2 westerners in Uttarkhand do and he said 'maybe my friend Ajay of Himalayan adventures can sort out a trek for you'. and so he did.

we took the 3 days /2 nights option and decide to trek to short of 4,000m (that's 12,000 feet for you anglos) from joshimath to the kauri pass from which you get a fantastic view of Nanda Devi, second highest mountain in india, and around 12 other peaks next to it.

http://kuaripass.com/
that's a younger version of me in the photo and she's trekking in summer it looks like :)
as usual, i only bothered to look at the website above or others giving trek info, after i retured. i like suprises.

.. it wasn't that hard, i managed the uphill fine from Auli at 2,500m (8,250) though am glad that was not told that 2 hours in , there would be an hour long section on a ridge wide enough for one foot in front of the other and abyss on your left hand side. am not too steady at best of times and with a backpack you worry you'll trip, topple over even if you manage to hang on to a tuft of grass because the weight of the pack will get you! we took over 6 hours to climb up to first base camp and by then my right leg was super sore as i lead with the right and repeatedly 'stepping up or down' on it had pulled a muscle. am no girlscout but had the brilliant idea to fill one of those drinking flat packs with boilig water, place on muscle, and by next morning the ache had receded somewhat.

Set up in some woods at 3,200m area called Gorson , dinner on open fire (Shiv, the guide was cooking and washing up tk god) and sleep by 7.30pm .it was bitterly cold in the flimsy tent, but was given great sleeping bag complete with an inner tube made of fleece. the only problem was the mat, which is fine for summer but too thin for winter. Anyway, slept in all of my clothes, layered on top of each other, you sort of feel like a boil in the bag two hours later but by 5am you're a bit frozen peas . the last trek the the trekking company had done was 2 weeks ago (many mumbai and delhi people come up for those and also in summer germans/swiss and french but i guess they're all people who 've already conquered their own mountains, whereas between my trek to annapurna in nepal and now, there's been 11 years of me not walking upwards- bar something in wales).

however, the problem was i could not sleep as had a minor but constant headache. of course i thought f x ,it's altitude sickenss , but had not felt any adverse feeling when standing up or eating etc. On top of that the day before we left, (having already paid half ) some kids in a coffee shop told me a leopard had eaten a woman in a village below and that nobody goes out after 7pm ... i asked the owner of hima adventures and the guide and they both said yes, true but leopard wouldn't be at our altitude. that was fine, i believed them, but not when you are unable to sleep an entire night. I did think that Shiv having 3 small kids meant he wouldn't go endanger own life for a bunch of notes...

anyway , following morning woke up all fine, trekked up for under hour and a half to second camp at 3,500m at Galishar, which was AMAZING, circular view of many peaks i shall list another time. from here it was another 2 hours up and 2 down to the actual Kauri pass and readers.... i decided to be a reader and skip it, after the guide made the mistake of saying 'from up there you see exactly the same view, only closer'. I thought ummmhhh, i shall lie here all afternoon in the sunshine and stillness and probably manage to read most of White Tiger from page 30 onwards which is where i got to in london.

i got scared out my wits at 3pm ish by some very odd noises, and took a while to actually see the guys come through the woodland. what they were doing was rolling down huge trunks of dead trees (cedar or oak up there ) so they would hit the plane i was on and be used for fire. I again, thought leopard wouldn't be out at sun up but still. forgot to say that on way up but way down below still, it's full of indian army barracks and exercises going on but not spotted a plane or an helicopter. so you know, not exactly easy to get down if needed to in a hurry. also, forgot to say, that winfred had left me a book, one of many i hear, by jim corbett about his man eaters of Kumaon /tigers hunting so i think i know more than you about how they operate. they're alas super clever and super more powerful than anyone w/o a rifle. i did scope trees i could climb to be safe but none had branches low enough for midget me to get a leg on... I also knew the leopard would find our scent since i was uphill from the guide for a while and could smell his trainers a hundred feet behind him. so know i know how animals track us.

then we set off at 10am following morning and was all the way down and it was harder than going up. after 2 hours your legs start to wobble and you are super conscious of your feet twisting this way and that on the rocks , the path through forest, all rocks , rocks rocks so major fear of toppling over and holiday over. so i did slow them down a bunch but ... not sure about Shiv, but michael who does lead bush trekking in tasmania besides his job of product designer, was very impressed . i mean, i am twice both their ages first of all, and i weigh 8 st dead. so don't have that much spare muscle to carry all my shit. the only thing i didn't have on my back and they did was the tent. so i did well. we got down at 2.30pm and had been looking forward to the hot springs at Tapovan, 3km from end of trek. As usual with india, and have been here a month this time so i should know, you should ask for descriptions over and over to be sure they mean what you mean. you'd be expecting the springs to be like a tiny version of iceland lagoons or even the springs i went to in Manali, but oh no. the water gushes out of a rock then gets channeled to a building that houses a his and hers set of showers, 2 big spouts in each side and you have a very hot shower. no lounging about making your dead muscles come to life again. such a let down. nobody there as were the only tourists in town... as i think i said many times but can't tell you how odd it feels.

on jeep back, we had to wait while the road workers detonated part of the mountain off and then had the jcb's clear out the rocks. i kid you not. michael will give me the photos. it's hard to believe the roads are so awful, but they told us that every year the monsoon is so bad that they have to rebuild sections and support tracts that have fallen down the valley. my friend Leo filmed one of those docus on the most dangerous roads in the world blah, but eat your heart out. i 've been on 2 of those already as well.

that night am thought i'd sleep very well in the knowledge that it's the same room i left 2 nights prior and was quiet and clean and nice, and no animals want to get me. however, had reckoned w/o the electricity cut out which lead to the owners using a noisy generator and having no control over switching off the room light i had left on... sigh... mask and earplugs again.

i feel bad i didn't go up to the pass but am practical and i don't have that notch to etch on anything so happy to have done what i did .
am slightly disappointed that hima man had bad news on return. we had asked if he could book train tickets to delhi on night train, first class no objection and there aren't any seats for love or money in any class as november /december are the months of weddings here and all the world is travelling. there is a wedding everywhere you turn, it's true. so another 5am bus down the mountain (with top volume hindi songs on the stereo, but hey, anything that keeps a driver happy and then a shared car to derha dun - expect to arrive 6 to 7 hours later if not more, vs the 10 to 12 by bus (buses can't overtake trucks as roads too narrow , but jeeps can! hurrah!) and from there find a 'luxury' coach to delhi. whch will cost just a tad less than the first class would have, such a shame.

i think this was good practice for the western fjords of iceland nex year, it will take hours to go around 'fingers' of land when the proverbial crow could cover the distance in a flash.. sigh.... and i think you can safely assume i won't bother anyone with 'let's go to Everest base camp ' (a familiar mantra of mine) for a while. i can /could do it before i turn 60 , but only if am not mean enough to pay for a porter or a mule to carry my stuff and me. in fact, both the nepali himalaya sides have the advantage of a couple of airports at high altitude (Jolsom and Lukla) that significantly can reduce the trekking days ... but also, am exhilarated by the views i saw and especially the stars at 4am second morning when i had to get up and go out to pee, such a mega hassle that, but if you go to bed at 8pm , 8 hours later is the max any bladder will hold.... the stars were incredible but i was on frozen grass with no shoes so didn't gaze that long. the stream next to us had frozen over of course....but thank god it never snowed as predicted by the guide! he said when it starts to snow, they get 1 and a half foot. Can't imagine how hard to walk through fresh show. may as well join the Ibex (mountain goat) indian regiment and offer my services in protecting the border with tibet, ahem, china a few miles up.

no special insights from the stillness of the mountains, except , if anything i constantly thought about the old pilgrims who would walk to Josimath or Badrinath or Gangotri or wherever the top of the mountains are and they clearly didn't have jobs as would have taken them 3 months to cover these distances. minimum. also thought about people who are forced to leave their homes and become refugees and to get to their new country they have to carry their lives on their backs for days.. oh and they're scared, not like us doing it for kicks. other than that, no major thoughts, empty head, the best feeling i guess.
Glad am down on steady ground - having learnt to put up a simple tent , ya know, slept in one at glastonbury one time but never 'did ' any camping. and hope the calves stretch back to normal eventually.

Frodo

ps young oz revelaed in passing on last day that his cousin co-runs mywardrobe.com in UK! form a tidy line if you want a knock off price bags, actually no, he said cousin was a bit stand-offish...

25 November - Rishi& the Beatles

2011-11-27T02:56:00.000-08:00

covered lots of ground in Manali, then dharamshala/dalai lama 'house' and now in rishikesh . have spent afternoon at the old and massive ashram where the beatles came in the sixties to study with the Maharishi, remember all those photos of them garlanded up?

well the maharishi didn't pay his taxes so in 97 (but seems longer ago) the Indian government reclaimed his territory and gave it over to forestry, it's like going to angkor wat in Cambodia, what was once a thriving huge compound full of houses and halls and roads and huts and blah blah is now overgrown with trees and vegetation , a bit eerie in fact. The gate is locked but you call out and a lock keeper appears and lets you in for a fee. On the way over, the banks of the Ganges where chocka with cross legged gurus and their pupils. A blonde woman gave us a filthy look for presumably taking up her field of vision. Sorry asshole, she should have learnt by now to meditate despite distractions. Ganges very clean here, my only other comparison being seeing it down river at Varanasi. My companion who was here ten years ago claims to have found rooms that were stillf full of documents scattered about. Alas he took none and no pictures and nothing tangible remains now apart from the structures.

Rishikesh is still hippie central. very nice /chilled out place but every time i see some westerner in dreadlocks, i want to cross the road, cannot bear them. Then I remember to practice tolerance and you know, live and let live. Anyway.... great yoga classes here, ie the guruji bothers to explain poses and corrections , my experience in London is not so hands on. No sign of celebrities visiting these parts now, was expecting at least a photo of Sting embracing some tantra master who had taught him all he knows. And my hindi is coming along, by which I mean i cannot understand the locals walking around with their mobiles attached to their ear but i can amuse them with silly sentences i learn like 'i will fire bullets' . er. yes, those sentences stick in the mind, the more useful ones do not. The Beatles and the rest would have crossed the ganges by boat and arrived in what must have been paradise then, ie before ... now, when there are too many jeeps on the road and they make a racket. no stray dogs here howling in the night but been here two nights and one wedding marquee 50 ft from hotel last night and another nearby .. sigh... wouldn't mind so much if was indian music but it's the worst kind of disco music ever. but it's ok, they're not hassly here so you can wander around w/o being sold stuff .

22 november - iranians & Japanese

2011-11-27T02:51:00.000-08:00

tbc when i find a keyboard that doesn't stick or a connection that doesn't boot you out.

20 November - Rita & Dill

2011-11-20T02:43:00.000-08:00

Just a short story to illustrate how generous people are here (they are generous in lots of places elsewhere too, but never ceases to surprise me in people who have so much less than you).
so am in Mcleod ganji where the dalai lama in exile lives , ten km from Dharamshala and decided to take some Hindi lessons and do some yoga so i can approximate Toph level when he turns up.

Rita is 29 and has a toddler boy and a 3.5 year old girl and she teaches Hindi, she's good.
her husband, not sure how old he is but similar and he teaches yoga or rather at the moment he teaches people who want to achieve teacher level themselves, and one of his former students a swede called Erik teaches the classes. He's good but can't do handstand!

Rita told me she was going to Dharamshala to the market and did i want to go with as she had misunderstood that i wanted to buy a mobile phone but i didn't. . I said yes, off we went in a taxi for which she said we could share the cost, fine by me.

she was happy as finally husband had agreed she could buy a sawing machine, the machine , indian made, cost just short of 40 quid, and to put it into context the rent they pay for 1 month for the yoga studio which is nice and full of windows and the ONE room in which they live is 26 pounds. then we went to buy some fabric for a pound, for her to make pajamas for the kids or 'night suits' as she called them, she wants to practice on kids clothes before she tries on good fabric for herself. A neighbour will teach her. husband then went to buy vegetables . i said to Rita on way back that i wanted to buy something for the daughter, some trinkets as she'd been looking at my shiny watch. so we stop in a toy cum make up shop. Shagun , the daughter chooses some bracelets, and i was looking at a toy truck for Bittu, but Rita said it was too expensive, (2.50) and no, i should get him something cheaper so we settled on a plastic water bottle 'that he can use later when he will go to school' , that cost 1. and i got another wind up cheap toy and some hair bands.

As I was paying , on the counter were some displays of earrings i was picking up and looking at and Rita asked me if i liked 'these' i said yes, but they were 'expensive ' at 2.pounds (sorry no pound sign on this keyboard). they were childish shapes and colours anyway, and i was just looking because i look.....
i go sit in the car with kids and husband and she's taking her time to come out of the shop. when she does, she hands me the earrings i was looking at and said they're a gift from her.

I remonstrated and said you can't give me a gift because i got you one! but she wouldn't hear it.
I just think things like these make my day.

18 November - Movies & George

2011-11-20T02:21:00.001-08:00

have no time to edit this so from an email sent to mates.

so have not seen the dalai lama yet and doubt i will since i move on tomorrow, you have to do a certain amount of admin to go to a talk of his as some are for tibetans only and the other ones you have to sign up for it 3 days before, bringing passport etc, and then you have to bring an FM radio to tune into the translation and you know, i went to the tibetan meditation centre and library and fingered about 50 of his books with discourses and thought 'nah, me no need right now for all of this' and strangely enough there were so many youth around and in the photos of people attending meditations there etc and i thought, maybe when you 're younger you search more, right now i have no questions to ask and need no answers, it's sort of perfectly clear to me and if the meaning of life is to prepare for a good death, well, am ok there , won't mind, if far ahead in the future blah blah.

they also had a breakdown by nations and gender and ages of the participants over past few years and overwhelming majority is USA, UK and.... israel - that's a surprise since much smaller number of people there and by % all israelis have done buddhism courses so why they still want to kill the palestinians me don't know. And more women than men seeking enlightenment and so on. er, women usually more keen to find mediating solutions to anything so it figures. Practically no muslim nation seeking it. oh dear...

Was fun to see pictures of richard gere there, bless, they love him for bringing the cause to attention in the west and he's here, well not here but in bodhgaya near Varanasi in 2 weeks to celebrate the 2600th anniversary of the buddha finding eligthenment under the bodhi tree at er.. bodhgaya. of course last week posh beck, aguilera, bono , ricky martin where in udaipur to help celebrate the 80'th b'day of some millionaire indian. so sooner or later i will no doubt run into some celeb instead of strange ozzies who talk about science all the time or a lovely iranian woman who has been studying law in india for 5 years. i like that you find out lots of stuff from different people. of course could sit in a cafe' in piccadilly and button hole strangers from many countries but in london we'd both think the other super weird for that , whereas travelling you don't mind.

but enough about that. the town is awash with gap year peeps here to do some voluntary work with kids, english or clearing up rubbish, which the indians have always had a different view of. it all goes into the street to be eaten as much as possible by dogs and stray dogs, and the rest swept up at night . of course it means that in the hours it doesn't get swept up,it flies everywhere into the woods, streams etc so the gap yearers are walking around collecting tons . bless, a very worthwhile pursuit i think, whilst i just sit and read.

last night after a day that included a long chat with a delightful tibetan girl at the internet cafe' who was completing a USA visa application to go join her tibetan boyf who already lives there , and during which she told me that it took 24 days of walking to get from tibet to india and most of the tibet/nepal side of it included mountains of course (the girl is half my size) ... anyway, today she came to find me in the shop and wants to cook some vegetables for me to thank me for the visa stuff/form. so sweet. she was born in '88, sigh.

so, last night, since i found the cinema and it was showing' Drive 'i thought, must go at 8.30. The cinema is a room with a screen a decent size, 30 odd chairs and dvds of course. I was the only person there and chatted to the owner who told me he likes monsoon weather (here from mid june to september ) because his cinema is full but now obviously is not. eventually a large american bloke with a beard and indian garb turns up and we chat about the film , i said i saw ryan gosling in the Ides of March with George Clooney and he was super good. bloke says he was once an actor in LA and was in a forgotten dvd movie called Combat Academy with a young george pre-ER. must check this out. He now teaches yoga in hollywood of course - golden bridge? so i said 'i did yoga in larchmont last year ' which established i am 'cool' (he knew the place) and is about to go to italy to spend time in Assisi learning meditation with a mexican called guru dave who well, teaches in italy. go figure. bloke told me his name, but was naturally an indian name so forgot it promptly. i told him to dress warmly as it's freezing in assisi in winter. Ah he also said he had been an architect and gone to Milan for trade fairs. (have actually checked imdb now and yes, he must be the actor called Kevin who is no longer an actor). story tallies!

so it was like we had a private screening room situation and felt it was ok to talk through some of the movie, mainly to call out reference points (the debt to david lynch, the one to michael mann the one to scorsese and so on) . He was also scared of violence so had to ask me what happened after any violent scene (and there are a few). and i'm squeamish too. and i made the mistake of telling him a few seconds before ryan on screen realises he's been played by the baddies that he had. he didn't like that.... He had been eating popcorn whilst sat behind me. towards the end of the movie i heard a rustling to my right and thought 'uhm, does he still have popcorn', then i heard it again and thought no, he's behind me, and rustling to the right , must be a .... RAT?
almost at same time i hear bloke say 'did you hear that rustling? I answered yes, must be a rat or a monkey, the words were not out of my mouth that he had catervaulted (new word?) to the front chairs saying i'm scared of rats!. i said am not, and to just lift your feet to another chair. i guess all those years ago occasionally seeing rats the size of cats near my grandma's house have come to some sort of fruition. The rat is not remotely interested in you, as he goes off scavenging as he does.

movie ended and we voted EXCELLENT, so if anyone hasn't seen yet.. go see. unfortunately dvd copy had no end credits so need to check who sang the 80's inspired songs which am betting are all new songs and not of the period. thank god was not a horror movie or would have spooked myself plenty in a room with a stranger, never mind he'd met george. darn, forgot to ask about the gay/straight opinion of george.

ok this story is not so great, i guess you had to be here/there as if felt surreal to watch LA night landscape in an underground room near where the dalai lama sleeps.

apologies for typos but it's always the damned sticky keyboards, not me! honest!

8 November - Apples & Potatoes

2011-11-20T02:14:00.000-08:00

I could say I miss the office gym but …. the Himalayas kick butt more. But thank god at some point in my life I did enough lunges and squats because yesterday I walked (with a guide and another tourist) a round 22km , some of it uphill or downhill on dry riverbeds and mountain paths. I’d say the first two hours were easy-ish, through time forgotten villages, but when you get to the third and fourth hour and you have not had lunch yet, you do wish you could just go ‘Taxi!’, but then you have a second wind and you do another three and voila’ seven hours trek done. That’s on top of all the other walking , easily 6 or 8 km a day up and down to villages here and there. The other tourist, a dutch girl, has been in India for two weeks and she showed me her trousers are falling off her, and we were both marveling at the fact that we’re putting sugar in tea and coffee (never at home) and eat cakes and lots of starch and drink sprite. That’s sort of proof if we needed any that exercise burns more fat than sticking to diets. Actually the other western thing that’s missing is any alcohol. Nobody seems to drink, so the idea of a beer or a glass of wine doesn’t enter your head. Plus you don’ t snack. why go to a Spa when you can go to the himalayas heh?

Am glad boyf. is not with me initially as he would have objected to 10 hours on bumpy local buses on scary roads in the night (but that’s better than a week on the jubilee line as far as am concerned) and also to my sleeping habits, ie 12 hours a night. I could never achieve this degree of rest in London as would always have something to do and would feel guilty wasting time but since I have no master here, 12 hours it is. My next job would be one that starts at 11am I think since my ‘without alarm clock’ waking up time seems to be around 9am. er...that will never happen.

So in a day or two I will have enough energy to face another 10 or 12 hours on a scary bus on a bumpy road to go say hi to the Dalai Lama, he’s not there but his house is, in Dharamshala. then i'll do the same to go to Rishikesh and beyond . There are so called luxury Volvo coaches which are more comfortable especially if travelling at night but am here in low season so they don’t run them. Drat! Local bus it is, which resemble something you see on those documentaries about kids going to some village school in Africa, they were built the year I was born and the suspension pads never existed. And the roads get routinely washed away or the tarmac does and you're left with a muddy track. Sigh…. But a bit of yoga on arrival will sort out the achey spine.

So things you learn no. #55. The other day I stopped to buy a banana and 2 apples. The banana I know is 5 rupies, so when he asked for 30 for the apples I thought no way, this is where you GET apples, the whole region is apple orchards galore and 30 rupies is 50p which is massive for 2 apples in the apple region of india. So I left them, was in no mood to barter. Yesterday on the a 22km round trek with the guide, he was telling me that this year the crop of apples has been dismal. His father has an orchard and year before he produced 800 boxes of 20kg of apples and this year he got……………23 boxes of 20kg. so his father didn’t have apples to spare to give to him (bear in mind that they make cider from those and some other local potent brew). So me buying apples at 50p was no more than a tokyo dweller buying an orange back in the 80’s , astronomical. Guide also told me that prices are going up for Indians too. When a couple of years ago a kg of veg was 20p , now it’s edging towards a pound. I like finding out about economy. funny though as every single one has a mobile phone. and not just the cheapest nokia to talk only, approx 12 quid, but more advanced models. Which reminds me I spent a day and 8 quid to have one of my spare london handsets unlocked, doh. Except that this way I don't contribute to any child labour in a Congo mine to extract the minerals needed for mobile phone function. So there, smug or what, and i contributed to the local economy and skills practice since the guy doesn't get asked often to unlock a london phone and was chuffed he managed it.

Then we saw some massive quarry and asked ‘why/what’ . he said they’re starting construction of a 9km tunnel under massive mountains (currently it takes hours to go from 2,000m to double that where the pass is to continue on the other side and the road /pass is closed to traffic as of now because of snow/weather. ), the tunnel will take over 10 years to build. I said ‘exuse me but what do they produce in Ladak (the other side, 2 road days away). Do they have minerals? He said no, do they have oil?, he said no, gas? , he said no. So I asked what do you care then if they’re cut off for six months of the year, that was always so ….. it was kinda nice no? (all western townies long for some forgotten way of life but could only stand it themselves for a week max of course)

And the said in Ladak they produce practically all the potatoes that you eat in india!!!! But potatoes are cheap I argued, why spend zillions to make them available, when you can , I don’t know, ship them in from… Ireland? But he had no answer and thinking about it I don’t think the production of potatoes in Ireland or Italy or Poland or Germany could ever be enough to feed billions of Indians.

So now we know about apples and potatoes.

now for climate change. last year they had no snow here. No snow. that's like... scary! and the guide (born in 1980) says he has picture of the glacier when he was a teen and now and the glacier is well, considerably smaller . if you think about the fact that i rushed here from delhi because in early november they get tons of snow and therefore i would not have been able to get to the pass and instead not only is it not snowing, it's 28C during the day, you get an idea of weather patterns screwed up. However, i think Italy will destroy the world economy before we have to worry about disappearing snow. The last time the river here overflew and took out the entire road down to the valley was in 2004. now of course it's dry season still and there's a trickle of water but if no snow = no river = no er...lots of things, and no rubbish carried down to the sea also.

now for nationalities. the guide says the dutch always ask lots of questions about birds species and and nature and they love mountains presumably because their country is so flat. he didn't offer anything about other nations. he said the Israelis come here and don't want to trek. why we don't know, since er. you come here to trek or smoke. i offered that perhaps since they are obliged to do military service for 2 and a half years, when they are here they don't want to exercise but smoke and rave? he agreed. that was the end of nationalities/cliches. Apart from a story about some woman who suffered vertigo even walking on a path that was not overlooking a cliff or anything and kept crying but kept wanting to go on treks. He had to hold her hand all the time. Uhmmm...

oh , i had to laugh. we met the guy who accompanied the Himalaya/indian skiing team to the winter olympics in Turin a mere 6 years ago i think. bless. i saw the slopes here. they are er.. 1 slope in place called Solang Nallah. One slope, think a Red. ok so higher up there are others, and you can heli ski so if you're good you can be parachuted down to some glacier but no way is there the network of slopes we have in europe or america. not quite jamaican bob sleigh team but....

My guesthouse is nice but more than that seems to have the best food around. The food costs as much as the room but is worth it, and in light of the above economics of vegetables and fruit, the fact that my muesli with yogurt and fruit had the following on top is extraordinary: apples and bananas , standard, plus melon and pomegranate, exceptional. The chef makes a mean pasta arrabbiata sauce and a good pizza.

The essential thing though is that total quiet never exists anywhere. The place is full of stray dogs , all of india is since they don’t put down any creature. During the day the dogs are perfectly peaceful if manky and seeing 7 puppie at your feet when you drink tea is kind of cute, especially when a yak goes past, yes, one of those giant furry mountain bulls and the 7 puppies decide to bark at him and chase him. As if! Very funny. Then you go to bed at 9pm and w/o fail at 10 or 11 or 12, the dogs start some elaborate drama , dozens of them barking at each other or fighting since there is no human on the streets at that time. What the f? I wish I knew what sets them off. But at least am not under a canopy of trees inhabited by zillions of crow (that’s kerala and goa for you) or surrounded by hens and cockerels that cookadooodledoo at 3am (that was laos). The trusted earplugs that kept me sane from listening to ex colleague’s hour long phone conversations with her mother/sister/friends daily at work well here too. Never travel without plugs!

I have a lot more in common with the middle classes than I have with the poor despite some of my family thinking am here to seek some mother Theresa style mission. The guesthouse has a large collection of the india version of conde nast Traveller magazine which is highlighting tons of places India that are up and coming as opposed to the over-visited Rajasthans etc. plus reviews of chic hotels and restaurants up and down the country. I like, and it makes me laugh when I see a tourist board page ad for visiting…. Manchester. Check it out, it tells you could see lakes nearby, or go on a steam train or drink in fashionable bars, must be interesting if you’re a middle class Indian from Delhi looking to escape the heat there in summer.

The guest house library is also full of FHM magazines with great looking Indian guys and their six packs on the cover. The ads are super daring for these parts, ads for condoms, ads for nutritional supplements, (can’t get the six packs just with exercise don't ya know) and ads for fashion and grooming products, all correlated with half naked gorgeous Indian lady models . none of these people are to be seen on the streets, much as London is not full of Helena Christensens on the tube to work but still, how does the life of the magazine co-exist with the local women here who wear a blanket held together by broaches at the top , belted in the middle and plastic/rubber flat shoes and cardies ? necessary attire for spending hours in the woods collecting branches and grass to fill huge wicker baskets which to then carry home to store for fire or feeding cows in winter. then again some housing estate dweller in Glasgow has no thread in common with an ad in Glamour magazine so have given myself the answer already. Ain’t I clever?

But the quiet life here in the mountains is attractive up to a point. I will soon long for Mumbai and the scene. Am busy learning the names and faces of bollywood stars in case I come across them in real life. Half of them share the surname Khan, the other half are Kapoors and there are a few Chopras and one other surname i can't remember.

The gossip mags are full of them and they are more candid than our stars , they all comment negatively on the others, (example 'Goa is full of girls who look like Freida Pinto (she of Slumdog millionaire) says a MALE actor! how ungracious) but maybe that’s a bit like having Jordan calling Posh a moody cow or something so again, maybe the west is the same, long time since I read the National Enquirer.

November is the season of weddings, 20 in the past two weeks alone am told in old manali village which holds 2 or 3000 people. That’s a lot. Have seen various processions but think they were the ones to bless houses rather than seeing any brides or grooms. Thank god here they don't subscribe to the notion of dowry which is widespread in the rest of india and is themost appalling thing. Should be outlawed as far as am concerned, much as throwing yourself on the funeral pyre of your husband is outlawed since the sixties or seventies thanks to Indira Ghandi (I think)

I’ve seen various old mills to grind flour using the power of rushing mountain streams in action. I have seen similar in Italy but I guess if you were 20 years younger than me you wouldn’t have. It’s no longer done. Same for seeing various old ladies spinning wool on those spools or using machines to make carpets, I remember my gran spooling sheep's wool under her portico but don’t think any of my ‘nieces’ would have seen similar as their mothers are my friends and or mothers never did, it was already a lost skill. Same as killing and plucking a chicken. Yewwwwww. One of my grans did as lived in small town so rural habits still persisted in the sixties, and I was obliged occasionally to assist in the plucking. Double yewwwww.

anyway, back to reading a novel or two.

4 November - Travel & Mishaps

2011-11-20T01:58:00.000-08:00

Arriving in delhi at 2am and staying awake long enough to go check in for flight to Kullu (for Manali in Uttar Pradesh) and you get to the front of the messy queue only to be told all air india flights to Kullu cancelled today and so all other airlines to same place, please to go to desk over there.

Then choosing on spur of moment Chandigarh as don't fancy arriving in Jammu/Kashmir, bit risky that area on first day out of Europe. The ticket desk lady said Chandigarh near Manali, you can drive there. I said 'Umh, I don't think it's that near' but what choice did i have, had no desire to leave relative sanity of airport to go into Delhi to find a bus. So Chandigarh it is. In the meantime the first few cups of chai bring just happiness. Only here can I drink stuff full of sugar and love it. There is no internet terminals for public use so first a nice indian guy with a laptop allows me to check an email or two and later, after I make it past security and there's no internet either, 3 employees of the local Dixons go to lengths to allow me to log on to a display laptop and send the guesthouse in manali the 'hey , won't be arriving this morning after all' since I very stupidly forgot to write on paper their phone number and simply assumed no hitch would take place. Doh! Good old pen and paper, should remember that.

You land one hour later to discover that the way to Manali will take a further 10 hour on a government bus! but that's preferable to staying in Chandigarh which looks like the pits despite having been built on a le Courbuoisier type grid. the bus goes at midday, you'll be lucky to be in bed at midnight. Only good thought you can have at this point is 'thank god the boyf is not with, he'd have hated this, hated it, proof that india doesn't work. As it happens I came prepared with the trusty earplugs to block out some of the screeching engine noises and with the super versatile foamy pillow that allows you to nod off against a rattling window. At least it's cold on the night portion of the journey and am wearing all my winter clothes instead of carrying them. Fun to watch the poor local indian men sat next to me for stretches of the hours, trying not to knock their legs or other anatomy against my body. So much for the boyf thinking they all want to prey on western women. I keep telling him that apart from a small percentage who for sure thinks western women are whores or some such as they travel on their own, the vast majority has no intention of being disrespectful and since none of these men gets on board drunk ie abusive, after they register a lady, they go on to chat on their phones, eat peanuts, talk to their mate etc. I wish had not taken both a rucksack and a small wheelie as you really can't keep track of both. Wheelie btw is only full of books I intend to read and discard, the guide and a few hindi notebooks. Once i get to the heat of the south, i'll be able to discard all woollens, and the persistently unread novels, like A.'s grandad's of which am reading the last 3 books in the series and am disconcerted by the amount of characters he's following. Should have written for Eastenders or something. I also have a remaining Bolano to get through and a few more. The Kindle has to wait for next long trip.

all the way up there the batteries on the mobile are slowly dying but managed to arrange a driver pick up at a surely deserted bus station at 11pm in Manali. Vinod was there, to take me to tired but patient guest house staff (thank you Drifter's) who lugged my bags up along the impassable (to anything but a donkey ) road which was being re-built in time for the next tons of snow to dislodge it down the hill again.

All is forgotten upon waking to brilliant sunshine next morning at 10am and stepping out to march type strong sun on the slopes in france or italy. Pure joy. A good choice was made without resorting to any omens, just 'has to be done'.

31 October - Packing & Lovers

2011-10-22T15:02:00.001-07:00

Sometimes this blog has to host just stuff that i need to record to remind me of this or that since I have not kept a paper diary for decades. So if you're occasional reader don't worry if you get lost in this, it's not for ya.

hi M how are you? back tomorrow i think we'll meet up soon, am on the countdown to leaving on 3rd November
am copying here an email i sent to a g/friend or two earlier. you'll.... 'get it' since you know the main character..
======

here's a story from today.
DY comes round to say hi/bye (she's my car boot pal, known her for ages but i guess good mates in last ten years, we like her boyf (now hubby S.),been to the house a few times, dinners, spent w/end there, missed the wedding though 2 years ago, etc - she works in music biz mostly events now for commercial clients, radio shows, Olympics that kind of thing but used to manage bands , in fact still does. We talk about a lot but don't go that deep usually, you just don't these days.

She comes in and i say 'god, i have so much to do and instead of packing I've just spent twenty minutes hooking up the cassette player because i found a tape from when me and ex lover used to record our conversations after sex/during sex and so on and I just had to listen , er... did you do that too?'

she says actually no, i don't record myself having sex conversation but who's the lover?
i say an ex, from many years ago, and the name escapes my lips and as it's C. ie not your regular Paul/John/mike/David... she says...

'oh... that's another thing me and you have in common then...'

are you up from the floor yet???????????????????????

I said 'OMYG, let's check dates, i surely hope we were not on the same years'

we aren't.. she was way after me , around 8 years ago, lasted 2 years!!! and ended just before she got with St. she knew C. through work of course.

but that puts paid to thinking our C. had broken his marriage vows only with me to start with and some other after but ehm, yeah, serial ...

I'll tell you when i see you but his modus operandi seems to be the same , girl friend in crisis, who's been confiding in him about probs and the shoulder to rest on turns to sex. but D. older and wiser than me at time of affair, and not same level of passion so not as cut up as i was when it ended, but still, it so happens that i was putting away a box of his memorabilia/stuff and said hey ,but did he use to write entire diaries for you like this one here for example, or make compilation tapes for you with meaningful songs/titles, she said ha hah, CDs' darling in my years and yes, you know enough similarities of communication.

she thinks last time she had a coffee with him was 4 years ago. she's threatening to ask him to go have another soon and i should turn up. well, we won't do that but it's just too bizarre for words!!!!! and yes C's wife still has ME, which D says (clinical psychologist friend of hers told her) has some root in depression and poor jenny in the big house 3 hours from civilization with the kids, whilst he gallivants around with bands and does what he wants day in /day out, is well, yeah, she can't have been a happy bunny to start with.

it's just .. weird. but not painful of course, i ended my thing with him in 95 or 96 i think ...
what a day!
-------

reply from M.

Highly amusing reading this. What a sleazy little fellow! I remember the name DY, although I never met her. He was often talking about his 'friend' D. and he even managed to persuade me to let her have some heavily discounted studio time at my recording studio for a band she was managing. She actually turned out to be a right pain in the butt (between me and you) and ran off without even paying the heavily discounted price, which caused me problems with my studio managers. I did suspect this D. 'friend' was more than that though. Funny enough, he gave her a real slagging when she ran off without paying so without this 'breakdown' he claimed she as having coincided with the end of their affair I don't know.

So yes, I can see the pattern clearly and it certainly makes sense at the moment as there is another woman, who I've actually met a couple of times, now in the picture. She's probably late 30's - early 40's, dark, very pretty, petite and just a 'friend' who also happens to be having 'relationship troubles'. I had my doubts of course but after reading your e-mail I have none. Not sure why I should have had any doubts at all really but then again he does manage to carry out these affairs with such incredible secrecy most of the time (as you well know) and maintains air tight compartments between the different aspects of his life, so it is very hard for people in one 'container' to see into another one. He should have worked for MI5!

Poor wife doesn't even have the kids to keep her company these days as they have left home (well one has gone severely of the rails and lives in a bedsit somewhere) so it must seem a very large and empty house to be rattling around in if your husband is off gallivanting around. I had hoped he had stopped all this behaviour but sadly it seems not.

15 August - Downhill & Bans

2011-08-15T11:27:00.000-07:00

Cameron wants to mess with social networks and make twitterers and blackberriers be silent when there's riots to incite. Not sure how he'll manage since they can't do that outside of repressive regimes, but your employer certainly can put the screws on. Got to work today thinking ahhhh middle of August, quiet nothing to do time, let's really update the blog and complete all those half arsed drafted entries.
Well, I am now a victim of censorship, I now know how they felt in Russia back in the days or .. now in China or some such places, dunno, Burma? The employer has finally blocked my entry to blogger so am typing this at home where I never use a computer as always find other stuff to do.

This blog will now mirror my sex life, a few times a month, sometimes two or 3 a week, sometime less. Oh dear... I may feel like going back to dear diary on paper form. Shame. Bastards thought police! funny how they don't block the rest of my colleagues from spending practically the whole day on the Daily Mail. I feel like grassing them in spite.

4 August - Ships & Night

2011-08-15T11:08:00.000-07:00

I couuld have planned this a bit better but...it will do the boy some good. Toph is about to return from a trip to the outer edges of america, actually the opposite, some land locked state like Oklahoma, and just as he lands I will have flown to an island in the Med. Nothing like missing a lover for a few days heh and at this rate of body decay it's best if he sees me with a bit of a tan. A mild one of course, nobody goes frying anymore.
Only the other day I caught a look at the back of my thighs and despaired. So I went to have a treatment that promises to smooth out the ridges. It sort of does, but I can't work out the science yet, I simply don't believe in anything that promises to melt fat under your skin till it gets handily elmininated through your blood system, sweating or whatever. The whoman who has the machine is a chatty Asian woman who used to sell advertising for a business sort of yellow pages back in the days before internet. She's a mine of info on markteting things and sales margins. Did you know that those groupons vultures take 25% or 40% off the ultimate provider of the service? I fail to see what the provider gets if all you have is a stream of new clients but you manage to convert only one in 50 into a long term one. Her son used to be a top perfume seller for Tom Ford and she explained some of his sales tacticos which I don't have time to tell you about here but let's just say some people can be persuaded to buy a bottle for every hour of the day, all their friends and lovers and so on.
She's also developing some serum as she doesn't like being a salesman for Mourad facials and so on. Again, fascinating what the margins are on face creams.
Her premises back onto a fantastic residential complex in Islington where some uber advertising guy lives. I'll report back when i find out who he is. Am sure she's learning stuff from him and it will be my hard task to resist being sold more treatments. Though next week am seeing her 'doctor' on the premises. mmmh i have to be strong. Need my cash for trips not fillers.

18 July - Tree of Life

2011-07-21T02:44:00.001-07:00

my 'review' is that I'd have shortened by a good 40 mins. 20 mins on the origins of the planet and 20 mins at home with Pitt and his boys. But I was in a good mood and with friend H. who's going to write a blog for Huffington Post (yay!) and since am not 25 I could see what he was trying to tell us over and over again. Didn't find the message too christian, thought accepting death as part of nature is a central tenet of buddhism as well and have always had a very que sera sera attitude to it. No idea if i'd shatter into how many pieces if nearest and dearest died before acceptable time on earth, but my guess is that I'd feel what I think... there' no rhyme or reason to being born or dying so... er... it was good to know ya all.
Secondly, it never occurs to me to look up at the top of the trees or the shafts of light they let through (I don't go through forests that often) so watching it on screen is kinda cool. I actually don't look up much come to think of it. Was Toph who had to constantly draw my attention to top of spires and so on in places like Oxford/Cambridge. I do like the mountains though so maybe each to his own. Malick likes top of trees and I like Mont Blanc?

16 July - Just Murdochs

2011-07-21T02:43:00.002-07:00

I don't twitter so here's my 2p. Just LOVE IT.
Am more fascinated by repercussion on business/boards/pension funds etc than anything else. I wish I could be more indignant about phone hacking but I sort of ... don't feel it. Wish they dealt in this way with overstepping the mark businessmen and politicos and police in countries like Italy where phone interceptions were/are the norm and it's a free for all of machiavellian twists and turns for entrepreneurs, entertainment people and politicians. Berlusconi is more of a crim than Mordor Snr will ever be I think but does he get short shrift from any legal/parliament thingy? No, so there. hope my blog doesn't get taken down by saying B is a crim. Ok, not charged yet so am I libelling? who knows.
A good friend in the music biz once worked for James, remember he had a hip hop label called Rawkus and also owned the label which housed Garbage and Ash etc. I mean are thos bands supposed to say 'oh my god I'm tarnished?'
A good friend in the newspaper biz worked near Rebekah Wade.
A good friend in entertainment goes to Elisabeth's garden parties
However no good friends have crossed paths with Wendy M. Am waiting for my six degrees of separation to throw up one.
Oh and MP scourge of the M's , Louise Mensch is married to the manager of Metallica. How does that one work? He's ugly and rich and lives in NY? Oh wait they met years ago when she was working in music industry and she seems to describe their affair in one of her chick-lit novels. Sigh...I have friends who've had affairs for years and am always counselling 'If he hasn't left the wife yet for you... he never will' but sometimes they do. Wish there were proper statistics on this...

30 June - Charidees & Caffeine

2011-06-29T08:08:00.000-07:00

the Angolan charity worker friend sends a picture of the exterior and interior of the container that functions as her home in the middle of nowhere. Am all for the simple life but this is ghastly viewing. She writes:
Dear all, as you may be aware when I arrive back in London I spend most of my time saying things like; 'oh running hot water' 'a flushing toilet' 'clean clothes' and the even better...SOFT TOILET ROLL . My NGO prides itself on only spending 6% of its funds on expats , thier food and accomodation-unlike Madonna who spent 3.2 million bucks of other peoples money without laying a brick in Malawi, or Bono who of the gazillions his ONE project gets spent $187,000 in Africa!!!!!!!!!!!!!! disgusting...or the UN and Oxfam who fly all expats first class-when we are down the back next to the loos.

Thought you should know when you next reach for making some donations, not that Madonna raises anything so if she wants to squander her money so be it. Eejiot

I will also bury in this post the following informationa, of which I'll have to start giving you more as the years start to impinge into my youthful period and enlarge the descent into old age one. I was recently out on a rainy sunday with some visiting friends/tourists. We stopped for lunch and as they ordered a glass of wine I did too and got a large glass of full bodied red (they always bring you large glasses, darn), Then an espresso lungo and for some reason they made that a double. Later on I went to meet a friend who was in the early stages of getting drunk in a bar naer the ROH and since I didn't want to join her cocktail hour, I asked for a fruit cocktail and an americano. This they made it seems just by adding 4 espressos into a large cup. I did clock that the fruit cocktail was made of excessive quantities of sugar but was busy chatting. It was only later when I got home and a massive dump was the first thing I had to do as I rushed throught the door that i thought back on this consumption as I lay on the sofa in the grips of headache that doesn't shift for 3 hours and 2 nurofens. The perils of clean living! Imagine if I had also said yes to .. I don't know... a line and a real cocktail? I'd have died in a most stupid way. The moral has to be talk less and register what you're given that doesn't correspond to what you've ordered.

And I should also register in defence of slowly getting drunk friend that her life has not been the greatest despite outwardly seeming so (she has fab creative job and night before was busy shagging a chef who owns some other restaurant and she's still only 30 and beautiful). I asked if she was going on holiday and she said she should head back to USA where father is dying of cancer but she doesn't feel like it on account of father having divorced her mother and left her as a young toddler... On top of that her beloved half brother died only a few years ago of a heroin overdose (a mistake, not suicide) in his college room at Uni. Then she miscarried with previous boyf who sounds like he's a nasty piece of work despite being very successful singer. The kind who constantly points out your failings. No wonder she had bulimia and a bit of anorexia. Felt like hugging her for a long time which no doubt forms part of the attraction as I seem to always say things that make perfect logical sense and are sensible to friends who somehow hanker after 'normal'. Oh dear. Poor baby B.

26 June - Glastonberry

2011-06-28T02:27:00.000-07:00

blog in disrepair! so will whiz through some entries.

Watching Glastonbury footage on TV as has become the norm. Never wishing to be there to be tediously entertained by ... Coldplay or watching live Beyonce' who's fine as it is on TV screen. Feel twinge only watching U2 as seemed heartfelt performance at least from Bonio who is there on a pilgrimage to the ley-lines as he informs his old bird Jo Whiley. Bless. I hate all the presenters for different reasons, even the new ones whose names will never penetrate my subconscious. Though that zane boy laugh when asked to comment about beyonce' was a good comedy moment.

Spent ages following day etc cyber stalking The Edge's wife who's no mere booty shaking dancer (they met on some distant tour but she was originally there to body coach Bonio who probably fancied her and then they suggested she dances along to mysterious ways. God knows how she manages to live in boring Ireland coming from LA where he dad was some film studio lawyer. She does coreograph stuff and so does her sister and bro in law. See? I told you I cyber stalked good. Found picture of edge with no hat. Oh dear! and found baby picture of bonio who was deadringer for irish husband of chum whose baby girl also resembles cherubic baby bonio. Then i got bored thinking I have no interest to cyber stalk anything to do with Chris Martin or Jay Z and that's got to be a good thing at my current age.

24 June - Professor Layton & Eccentrics

2011-06-28T02:24:00.000-07:00

Went to visit a friend last night and he made me watch as he explained how to play this game on Nintendo DS, it's riddles and puzzles to solve to move through the game.. all watched on a very small screen.

My friend is 57 years old.
I never cease to wonder.. you think I’m eccentric but I clearly come from a ‘family’ of eccentric friends….
He has also just passed his motorbike test because he rode a bike up and down Vietnam recently but had never actually learnt how to… well done him.
For some inexplicable reason I was then looking at Nintendo DS on ebay and they seemed pretty cheap and since I. had said he'd lend me the games, I ended up buying one. Bonkers! It will go the way of the 'seemed like a good idea at the time'. I just know I will never have the patience to sit there with this toy and work out solutions, I am impatient, gets easily frustrated and what seemed like a way to keep my brain ticking over is.. just not natural. Maybe I can give it to Tophs' mum? Am sure his nephew already has one no doubt. Am kicking myself now. I would have to use it at home, can't do it at work or on the underground and when am at home I can think of a zillion other ways to spend the few hours away from work that I have...

Professor Layton (レイトン教授, Reiton-kyōju?) is a puzzle video game series for the Nintendo DS developed by Level-5. The series consists of four games and one film, and at least two more games for the Nintendo 3DS and one more film are due in 2011/2012. The first three games are about Professor Hershel Layton and Luke Triton's adventures together. The next three games and the two films are prequels and are about how Luke and Layton met and their "original" adventures. Although only the first trilogy is available outside of Japan, Level-5 has stated that eventually the other games and films will be localized.
Each title is based in a series of puzzles and mysteries given by the citizens of towns that the main characters visit. It is not necessary to solve all the puzzles to progress, but some are mandatory and at certain points in the game a minimum number of puzzles must be solved before the story will continue.
The series has gone on to be one of the most successful Nintendo DS exclusive series, with the lifetime cumulative sales of Professor Layton games standing at 10 million units sold as of October 2010.[

22 June - Net & Tracking

2011-06-21T08:07:00.000-07:00

If it's true that google and the rest totally offer us searches tailormade to our profile (based on what we've searched for previously and comments left here and there by the twitterers and Fbookers) then I believe that today I must have skewered their readings of little old moi.

Sure I was listening to Soundcloud as I often do and electronic stuff, not hard rock naturellement or C&W, so there's a major feature of me they know already like... am not very introspective or lacrymose... but at the sime time as was listening I was reading stats on correction facilities in Oklahoma, that's prisons for us Brits. I opened most tabs because I couldn't believe such detail existed. Am sure that if I ever opened the page for NY state or California, the option to look up their prison and escapees info would not be on the actual home/front page. But in Oklahoma it is! Was I looking for a foreign death row penpal? No sir... no such desires, I leave those to the ones who like unfullfilled relatinships but a friend is shortly to arrive on those shores to film a docu on John Steinbeck (whose various novels /plays are set in that state or maybe I am thinking Ohio?) and I realised I don't know what the capital of Okla is (or Ohio for that matter, no wait.. with a bit of effort the Ohio one will come to me... no.. am thinking Portland, Oregon right now.. one 'O' in 3... not good. I also can't quite place those 3 on a map of the USA though think middle and west for the latter.

And did you know that Steinbeck never wrote anything else (I mean published) after he was given the Nobel prize? Poor guy was criticised so much when he won that he lost his mojo. Which reminds me was with two 40 something Americans last week, they work in creative media/film effects and the mention of Steinbeck didn't really register...One of them is from Lousiana, the other I don't recall. I explained who Steinbeck was, named some titles, said him and Faulkner blah blah. Nope. Then again, Toph is reading some famous guy (who covers some Steinbeckian themes) called Vollman and I had never ever heard of him. Quite influential I believe he is. Though at 1500 pages I don't think I can/want to know.

Doh, looked it up.. it's Oklahoma City. Bit boring, hence would have never got to it..... and wow, it's native indian country. Spent happy half hour clicking on town names that are just so exotic. Recognise Tulsa. And Route 66 goes through it. Guess if you were into americana you'd know but am curiously not interested. Real big, empty country. That would be the entry point obstacle for me. I like it busy.

21 June - Plans & Planes

2011-06-21T05:33:00.000-07:00

Booked Majorca. With only carry case, what will I do? But then noticed how many summer outfits are literally silky-no weight numbers, so a good 7 or 8 can be taken along for a 5 day trip. If only there was a way to wear severa pairs of shoes at once, that's what does me in. Maybe I can post some ahead? Same for books? M. says I'll find stuff to read there but this is my chance to mash the novels of some people I know who have written in styles that are not my thing (spy and 18th century historical) and only peace on a beach and lack of other choie will make me progresswith them. I can always stick one of them in my waist band front and one on back.... Wonder if Easyjet check in people are wise to that one? I always want to argue but why do you save weight on little me when there's people who weigh twice or three times my weight? Mind you they need bigger luggage in the hold perhaps or maybe they are fat but only use one pair of shoes on holiday? H. said there's an H&M in Palma, but the point is I have tons of accumulated summer stuff already that I want to air.. May wear bikini on top of 3 sets of underwear to leave more space in the little carry on.. but if go through customs like that they'd think am up to no good when viewed through a scanner? Could ask the colleague with partner at immigration at LHR. He must know of a few good ruses but that would open floodgates to her boring me to tears with stories and that won't do.

On another note, how serendipitious is this? Met I. (not seen in a year I don't think) for a frozen yogurt after her massage, who mentioned that my favourite dj (even Toph was able to correctly identify him when asked a' la Mr & Mrs 'Who's my favourite dj?' ) has or takes a house in Goa for the months of Dec/Jan. And what else have I done today if not bring the dream of six months in India one step closer? Bring it on! Canadian dj beware I shall drop in for cup of chai. Need to pinpoint with more accuracy where he may be in big old Goa. Promise won't stalk, but I think he should invite over second favourite djs, the Belgian collective and throw a party for me. For no reason other than I love them and I love India.

But how fickle am I? Was a time the answers would have been Armand Van Helden & FBS... sigh...

17 June - Time & Black holes

2011-06-16T06:23:00.001-07:00

I don’t know where time goes says a friend I contacted for a catch up and who gave me a few details of where he's been and where he has to travel to etc. I replied thus …

one of my theories is that in previous decades you always meet your mates in largish groups. That a) means you spend less time doing 1 to 1’s with various mates and b) because the largish group has done the same fun/activity together, it means you then have to spend less time telling your mates what you did/where/how/with whom, because they WERE THERE with you, woke up with you the day after, reminisced and processed on the train back, that sort of thing. This on the whole has got to have saved us hours on end at least on the social side of life. And now we only do 1 to 1's because nobody wants to meet in large groups and nobody shares their house with other friends anymore so each 1 to 1 requires a trip to some other part of Landaan.

On the other hand, in the current decade, I give much less time to listening to friends’ dramas. Or put it another way, friends have become older friends and they process their dramas better ie they don’t require you to stay on the phone for hours whilst they cry over the recent split or work issue and also since you’ve only kept your good and therefore few old friends, you know all the variables in the drama so you ‘save’ time in counselling. Any 25 to 39 need not apply.
You’d think these two time consuming and time savings things sort of cancel themselves out but somehow you still have no time! howzthat?

14 June - same bed, 15 years apart?

2011-06-16T03:42:00.001-07:00

Spent night at friends in son's room (son lives with mother elsewhere most of the time). His father told me said bed had received a major previous love of mine only a couple of nights before.
Could have felt a bit odd if it wasn't that 15 years have now elapsed since he was major lover so I went to bed w/o inhaling the pillow or my mind wandering back. Previously I had fallen about laughing when told said lover had been in London as part of a penny farthing bicycle race in Spitalfields. Oddest thing I've come across in years, but then this man liked dressing in tweeds and pre-war pedal pushers. It was an infrequent occurrence 15 years ago but in the intervenign ones he's gone .... 1902. The full monty, including preposterous silly moustache. I simply would not be able to approach his face with a kiss w/o thinking 'what the f?'

Still, it's a free country and he could be dressing up in nazi uniforms and ride a tank like Ace of Spades guy does, so penny farthings are quite the gentler vehicle and I don't have to avoid running him over on some country lane. In fact have to think which would I like the least, him and the stupid wobbly bike or G's husband who relentlessly trains for iron man triathlons and does I don't know how many km on his speed demon bike every week? In both cases the respective partners are total widows. Penny farthing's one probably enjoys his other passion for classic cars but was not at the finishing line of him returning from Paris I don't think? Whilst Iron man's cyclist wife so hates his blatant ignoring of family to follow own competitive streak that she'd never attend a race.
Since am so despising of these passtimes, I wonder when I'll be hit by my own boyf going eccentric with age? Toph takes up pottery? I'd have to leave him. No hesitation.

8 June - Planet & Apes

2011-06-08T08:29:00.002-07:00

The fortchoming prequel is directed by bro of friend. Only met him once but liked him and his first movie , prison drama with Jo Fiennes and Brian Cox. Very much. Shame don't know him directly so can't have observed any shift in personality from London life to USA jobbing director existance now married to american scriptwriter, and dealing with humongous budget which would make you vomit every night with fear of cocking it up.
dinner with sister but we talk about other stuff including her husbands' novels which at the moment sadly are not selling too well and those of close good friend of theirs Charles Cumming who's selling like hotcakes. I've met him at recent chess tournament Toph attended (a once in every few years occasion but he didn't lose till 3rd or 4th game and first defeated writer Alex Bellos who is very into numbers and maths). CC is quite attractive and on his website (look, I cyberstalk anyone I come into contact with, helps retain info about them if I see it written down and so can flatter them later on, who doesn't like it?) he has a short vid of him talking to Dominic West who must have been at Eton same time? Lucky for me I have no children so don't have to grapple with conscience to send them to one of the top 3 or 4 schools. Judging on my far removed from government sphere of friends, it would still appear that most of the high achievers in anything are old Etonians and the likes.

So naturally I had to order one of CC's novels as otherwise would be rude not to. I picked the one about spies in HK. The first 50 pages or so give no indication that this will be better quality than any other spy book I have tried to read over the years. I will have to take this on holiday to a beach in order to finish it. Simply doesn't come natural to me to spend time reading this style, but I undertand it's a very lucrative shelf. It seems I know more spy writers (3 in fac) than I know airline pilots (0) or doctors (1). You have to admit this is an odd spec. Ok when I say 'know' it means 'know very little', but still, how many do you know?
btw Rise of the Planet of the Apes trailer looks fab. Will go see. At least to keep up with CGI advancements now that I also know K. who does this sort of thing for one of the leading companies and worked on the first Harry Potter (no doubt together with a zillion others).

2 June - Other lives

2011-06-02T05:11:00.001-07:00

Was reading a blog of a friend of a friend who answers questions with some kind of explanation ie. absurd stuff and that led me to blog of a woman with small children, 5 and 9 I think and boy what a splurge of stuff that is. Few postings but very long and written when she's exhausted at night waiting for the washing machine to spew out school shirts and socks etc. All of it is about life with kids which makes me wonder what my daylight thinking hours are filled with since I don't spend a minute thinking about 2 kids.

And if you took the kids away from her what would she spend time thinking? I am reasonably involved in aiding and abetting friends's and their 'need someone who can do this/did I tell you about that' but what else? I do catch myself thinking how great it would be if I took of a picture that's resting on the top shelf of a bookcase (next to 3 vases) and substituted another vase and then that shelf would provide a more harmonious little vista. When this happens, I tend to think life is sucha bore if this is what it throws up (like.. who gives a f about that shelf/those vases, why do we even have them, who gave them, when did we buy, in response to which impulse).
Some other time I watch 20 hours of dvd series in batches of 3, 4 hours - ok you guessed, The Killing, unsatisfactory end etc etc. This is a novelty of the last year, only other previous dvd series watched in fast track was MadMen. Is this another sign of the end ie. ageing?

I bet mothe of 2 kids would feel as shit as I did last night though, watching a docu on the UN brazilian chief Sergio di Mello who was blown up at headquarters in baghdad in 2003, dead now together with many of his colleagues. Pretty harrowing and what a series of achievements he had gathered till then, Cambodia, East Timor, hobnobbing with Kofi and Clinton and basically died because there was no equipment to extricate him from the rubble collapsed on top of him. Another colleague next to him was rescued but only after they sawed his legs off just below his pelvis. So there I was sat on the floor watching very dignified tributes paid to this man and wondering why my head is full of mostly nothing. Not that I believe this is uncommon..

Off to the Biennale shortly... will we run into Geoff Dyer I wonder... or just crazy Courtney?

27 May - Missing Hay

2011-05-25T02:29:00.002-07:00

Well, simply can't face driving anywhere to go watch/listen to anyone. I mean, I live in London, if they're good, they'll also do whatever they do here, in the capital, so going to a festival to overdose on them is not required. Unless of course I was also going to parties and hobnobbing with esteemed writers, but what would they want to hear from me? In those situations they have to be as opportunistic as the next person and aiming higher than themselves, not lower. So I'll spare them ... me, as would be on the level of basic audience who hasn't even read their book and wouldn't buy it as can find it at the library or second hand shop. Noticed friend of friend Chris M- J described as intelligence operative ! ha! Is he? What a great description for someone who used to do checks on background /legitimacy of companies for international deals. Anyway, he has now written a spy style novel and am 99% sure I'll never read it. You'd think that by not reading thrillers/spy/legal novels, auto /biographies and historical novels, I'd have time for others but no.. the pile by the bed grows and never really gets the satisfactory consignment to a shelf mentally marked been there/done that. Where does time go?

25 May - Colonics & Rob Lowe

2011-05-25T02:29:00.001-07:00

He is just too handsome. I do like them with a sort of smooth almost girlie face. Not for me the rugby player build, a picture of Mike Tyndall can actually make me grimace in unvoluntary disgust though Shrek is a very successful film so no doubt there are fans of that look. In the distant past didn't say no to a couple of said shaped men, but they had super handsome faces, though but on the whole, give me Rob Lowe. I'd never even have noticed he was in town doing promo for an autobiography (never manage to read that genre), but turns out friend S. still treasures all his films and still has some on vhs. So she bought tix and off I went.

The talk was oversubscribed and I bet the Royal Geo society never sees such a turnout, it's not like Amundsen has just returned from his successful trip .... My foray was more exciting in terms of discovering their building than the actual RL experience. There was an exhibition of prize winnign photos in the foyer and they just make me dream of setting off every other week to one of those destinations. They also have a great magazine which had articles about things I never think about. Am writing this two weeks after the event and can't recall as single article, proof that ageing will be fine as will turn into a fish in a bowl endlessly coming across the same thing and finding it fascinating. But I loved them at the time. Back to RL. He's pretty consumate raconteur, would imagine he can memorise all his anecdotes, I mean, he was there, he knows what happened but the actual telling has to be done in a timed entertaining way and he told us that for him the best part of the West Wing was being capable of memorising long stretches of script which was filmed in one take. Which then gave him the confidence to come do theatre here in some Aaron Sorkin play which S. naturaly went to see. Unfortunately for her I still struggle to take a photo on an iphone not having one myself. So the record of her moment next to him when he signed her book is... out of focus naturally. Ah well...
The surprise was also that there were zillions of teenagers there and we couldn't figure it out.... seems they were his fans from Brothers & Sisters which I never watched. He says he left because his character was holding salad tongs too often and that was not him. Agree, we should see RL doing some sex scenes though we never did in West Wing. Was he straight or was there a hint of gay there? Been a few years, can't remember.

Colonics, what the hell did I want to say about them? I stick the titles up before I write the post...mmmhhh had one. Was er.. more interesting than the previous one, and I suspect now that am not actually dying of pancreatic cancer but simply was full of shit. Won't discuss on these pages, but just for my own memory retention. This blog is my 'cloud'.

23 May - Macbeth & Biennale

2011-05-19T05:34:00.001-07:00

I must be the only person in Europe who when booking trip back in Feb for self and a few friends to Venice (for early june) did not check about any events in the city. Safe in the knowledge that movie festival is in September and the Biennale runs Summer to September also. Ah but had not given a thought to rampant commercialism and exploitation of just about everything and guess what? Biennale acutally opens first week of June and runs to ... November. How mad is that? yes I know the scope of it has so increased that it covers 3 or 6 times the original area and they add on the other Biennale empty year and make that the architectural one, so that local food vendors ie restaurants can be kept in gold painted gondolas all year round. I didn't know. You'd think I had never gone myself in other previous years. So when I came to booking hotels I obviously left it to early May, month in advance is pretty good planning you'd agree.

Not a space, not a room, nothing! and friend's flat occupied by her musicians there for her mini festival. Never occurred to me that she'd chosen 1 June so as to be part of Biennale jambooree. At moments like this a rich russian friend with a yacht would be a welcome addition to my life.

But then the palazzo was found! The only one in Venice with private large landscaped garden . Go on a search if you like, but be smarter than I am and notice straight away that the rentable parts of it do not have balconies on the Canal Grand alas, so you can forget dreaming to play some 18th century painted dame. Never mind, will be dining in Mazzorbo. You must know have been to Venice plenty of times (including a spell in hospital there in 2003, won't go into it but they have one of the best departments for ophtalmology/transplants etc) so have to find new things to delight me.

As for Machbeth in the title, well we went to ROH and a friend took us to backstage canteen and was kind of surreal to eat a sarnie surrounded by the vast chorus. Plus I was laughing... in Verdi's world they call him Macbetto. Just too funny.

20 May - Test & Osterone

2011-05-19T04:39:00.000-07:00

It's sort of amusing in a way that one day you're considering you may have some aspect of pancreatic cancer (and for those few people who actualy know me and read this blog occasionally, please don't panic, I may be exaggerating for my own comedy purposes) and the next you're seeing a professor expert in 'pause (I will not call it with its full name which I think is just not apt) and she recommends testosterone patches /gel to bring libido back to former levels.

So you are at the chemist getting said meds and get told by the helpful assistant that it will cost £100 for 3 months. Considering that the as yet not fully diagnosed 'shadow on pancreas' is 1.5cm long and don't think they'd wheel me in surgery that fast to remove it, I am sure I'll pass the 3 months and it's worth turning into a wild sex kitten in the run up to god knows what. As a friend commented, that's a pound a day. Bargain.

Not sure radiotherapy kills libido as much as chemo does, but I read that people don't have the energy to lift a fork so imagine that if I start sickening, I wouldn't stretch to a bit of cocksucking or other. Yes give me the stuff. That way if I then need surgery and/or die, Toph can remember me up to the very last moment prior to sad hospital visits as his ever hot chick.

In a way this little conundrum is no different to when a 70 something relative needed expensive dentistry, am talking over 10k, and she was considerin how much longer she has to live vs the outlay. I advised that getting to 80 these days is relatively established and so it worked out to 3 quid a day or so to be mindful of nearerst and dearest who would like to see her smile as opposed to keeping tight lips to hide the repair work needed.

19th May - Bodies & Knowledge

2011-05-18T07:37:00.001-07:00

What we know is how our bodies function. Some people are more attuned than others to those functions/variations on normal. Clearly if you complain about getting fatter and you don't make a link to the near bottle of wine you drink everyday, you're not in tune or in fact you're in deliberate denial. Me, am one of those who doesn't rush to doctors. Or .. didn't. For most of my life I never troubled my GP from one year to the next. Until something I left unchecked beause I thought it wasn't that bad, turned really bad indeed. But even with that scare, I still struggle to act fast. However, last year there was something that wasn't right and was diagnosed as more than boring acid reflux, live with it sort of thing. It was sorted. Then this year it was back but not quite the same. Though same meds prescribed. Still not quite gone but feels different. When it's not real pain but just uncomfortable, you feel sort of wasteful of resources but hey, you pay for them so you go. Because I pay for them via insurance and am not therefore brushable offable as friends on NHS, I'm sent for an expensive scan. Result. The actual results follow swiftly. The experts coach it in non-threatening language but am not fooled. A 1.5cm sort of shadow near pancreas to me spells something bad. More scan to follow. No panic yet, just jokes involving death planning or at least surgery. I am predicting scan will also be inconclusive (I have a history of non simple things when something goes wrong with me) and some kind of extraction for further study may be required... sigh...

But oh for the satisfaction of saying 'There, I knew there was something there'. Oh and also, to the no doubt legions of sceptics out there, my beloved acupuncturist of many years, who I usually visit just for overall well being, w/o prompting had said 'There's a blockage here' and pointed to the area in question. As I've always thought though, needles don't subsititute conventional surgery so ... let's see. At least one best friend's mother is top oncologist in the world and beloved emigre' surgeon ex, is due back in six weeks and will point to relevant pitfalls.

In the meantime the new sports massage therapist I've just tried, said 'you weren 't joking' when he laid hands on my knotty shoulders. I told him it's not handbags or chairs, it's sleeping with shoulders up to my ears in subconscious overall tenseness. The body knows....

15 May - Artificial vs Real

2011-05-12T05:37:00.001-07:00

Flowers, not tits. Had a mini mad shopping spree on line as it gets tiring to wait for plants to shoot up some flowers and then they're gone and you're back to green watch.

It did provide for a funny game for a visiting 5 year old. She gingerly went up to every plant and correctly called it 'real' , 'not real'. Personally I thought they looked good from a distance but she knew.

12 May - East is Best

2011-05-12T05:37:00.000-07:00

It felt weird preparing to go out /cross London to go eat at Viajante knowing that L. was instead preparing to go to his goddaughter funeral first thing. Reason I thought of him was that he lives Stoke N way and so had previously asked if wanted to come out for a drink at the bar.

But tragedy is unique to who it befalls... so you don't feel guilty sipping your cocktail even though you think of how utterly bereft that family feels right now. Viajante and the Town Hall get top marks. Super staff, super ambiance. Shabby street outside but they probably take the long wiew on its eventual gentrification. They probably say edgy area and they do provide shuttle to civilisation ie Liverpool St or Shoreditch central.

I sort of diminished the effect by going to Passing Clouds just because it was there. Note to self, you really, really no longer belong to any clubbing night. It's gone.

9 May - Travel & Twerps

2011-05-12T05:36:00.003-07:00

This morning I caught myself thinking 'must not stand next to you, I hate you' a' propos another commuter and never thought my inner spat with this person had grown to this level.

She usually travels later than me but this morning I was late and the bus was also very late. She gets it upstream from me but can't be much as she's standing, so just a couple of stops perhasp. For some reason I find myself next to her often, this is because I realise it at last moment and often and try to step away quickly, because (and this is the reason I hate her) she hogs space by the exit door despite not needing to get off till the station where we ALL get off and I'd be usually one of the people who tries to get to the EMPTY space and often empty seats at the back of the bus, so that other people at next stop can get on the bus instead of being left kerbside because the driver thinks the bus is full becauase these wankers just bunch up at the front. And when you say 'exuse me, can I please step past you', they... glare at you. As if your suggestion was bonkers and not the fact that other people have their exit impeded by the hoggers by the door who are there simply to shave 1 min off their eventual exit.

Annoying woman is always on her BB and wears sunglasses even when no sun is out so you could think she's not seeing the obstruction she causes but hard to be that self obsessed. Though she's very short so her stance has to be that short people are entitled to their space. When she gets off she has a similar pace to mine (she's sort of knock kneeded but not as much as some japanese girls are) so have to either overtake her or stand well behind because 9 out of 10 she'll be in a similar spot to mine on the platform. So I have to register where she is in order to get on different compartment. The last thing that I want to cross is being on same coach, standing at different ends and then divying for same seat that becomes available. That would be war.
She also gets off at my stop so that's another possible escalator brush off.

No idea why I have focussed on her out of many other hoggers on the bus. Possibly because she's youngish and white and regular /short size so in the event of uttering a string of abuse at her I'd be unlikely to use stuff that can then get me to Mel Gibson level, which is when nobody has any sympathy for you even if you may be an aggrieved party.

The worse I could do is 'Who do you think you are? Debbie Harry or frikking Brix Smith?' she's same height as the latter and wears her handbag on crook of elbow which is what Smith would do - but not Harry. Harry is also massively more attractive than Smith and this woman is not at Harry's level, but you know, the peroxide short fluffy cut is modelled on her for sure. I have typecast her as a shop assistant or maybe manager of a few people as she's getting in earlier than others to open shop? Or is it assistants who get in early and manager gets in later? Who knows, not my area. Shop cannot be a Gucci or the like, she's more rock chick than that, so am thinking a Karen Millen though she's not wearing that and too short to project 'wag when interviewing for office job' which is what Karen Millen is.

One of these mornings I'm going to have to follow her... oh dear.

1 May - Bad & News

2011-05-11T08:13:00.002-07:00

There has to be some bad stuff in the stars or, as a friend said when I related the following bad things befalling friends, I'm the unlucky amulet they've all 'touched'.

The following news shocked me in the space of a few days from one another:

the sister in law who's not a sister in law and is not married herself has declared her relationship is finished, non-husband has moved out already and their holiday to Majorca was so they could tell the kids about the new life ahead w/o them receiving the bad news in their own home which apparently is very bad. Best to be on neutral ground. Didn't see it coming apart from reports of bickering. They've grown apart. He's too consumed by work /travels constantly. She over emphasises the kids the kids nothing but the kids. That's it, ten years. Ciao. They say noone else involved and I say well I'll eat my hat if in a month or two non husband who's not fought very hard to stay in this relationship doesn't introduce some young/free/slim new partner in his life. Funny that non wife had house massively extended/done up before seeking split. She of course remains in said house. He has to go to flat nearby.

I visit a non intimate friend by I like her an awful lot and I ask how the launch of web magazine is going. She said it's been delayed. I say oh no, technical stuff, people letting you down? She deadpans 'husband's affair didn't help there'. I fall off the proverbial stool. We recently spent 4 days with these people and not a hint, apart from small touches of tetchiness. Which couples have of course. I say what/how etc and turns out the affair was last year but she's recently foudn out he's still in touch wtih the woman and that's that. I say did you have any inkling and she replies 'his massive weight loss was a sign, but disappearing outside to make phone calls was the second /other classic'. Turns out she was very down last year and he was simply not there/understood. And bang, someone else offers non depressing alternative ... Friend seems to be holding up well. She also gets to keep the massive designer house which in these cases is a good trade. She also says when she met him years ago, she was the other woman to his longstanding relationship so she can't go all hypocrite over this. She says they're friends. I say yeah, till he parades new woman around and/or wants to move back into this house.
You may gather that I am of the school of 'exes are not friends'.

Mother of long long gone and dead ex boyfriend rings to tell me her husband has died. Stomach cancer. He was super old but a man who liked to invent stuff and travel a lot, so someone who had good energy. She's now facing all those admin things that he always took care of, like trying to get out of sky sports subscription etc. Make mental note to increase frequency of calls to her from 3 or 4 a year to .. monthly at least.

Another friend writes of her Easter lunch breakdown after cooking for 20 odd people from scratch and ... oh I won't go into it as my sympathy for this was cut short by...this:
L's goddaughter, 15, hanged herself. Had had depressive episodes in the past. Rang a friend to tell her she was going to kill herself. Friend tried to find father (who has second young family and the daughter lives with them) who was at family picnic. They rush back but it's too late. Don't know more than this and don't want to. Imagine that whatever it is is nothing that at age 18 you wouldn't find totally manageable/resolvable but at 15 just too crushing to battle it. Does anyone ever get over a suicide?

30 April - Lies & TV

2011-04-28T02:40:00.001-07:00

I like a garden b'day party which means you don't have to go to a restaurant and be stuck all lunch or dinner. These days am a bit insufferable of situations where I am trapped.
This couldn't have been nicer. Sunny day, sunny position, lovely table laden with picnic food choices and more cakes than you can want to sample. I'm partial to merengue. Glad that's made a come back. Or maybe eaton mess never went away in some parts.

The friends of b'day girl were all lovely though I tend to forget their names from one year to the next as, at more than a decade younger than me, they're not my usual circle. Noticed two couples with fresh babies. Spent a nice proportion of time discussing I's forthcoming book about lying, I already forgot the title, darn, but comes out soon, so Amazon here I come. Thanks to this subject and writer's natural wit, a lively discussion ensued on the cultural aspects to lying (you call it a lie, I call it a half truth and I only told it to protect the family/friends etc). I offered that some nationalities are forever tarnished by history as more capable of lying than others.... Italians were mentioned and people think it's to do with the war an switching sides, but I mentioned Pinocchio and the penny dropped for all. Darn its success. We internalise so much and if there's a kids' s novel out there about a lying boy from Botswana, it just hasn't been translated in all languages under the sun.

28 April - Latin & Cows

2011-04-27T07:40:00.001-07:00

Research on events you want to attend is futile sometimes. If something gets billed as a talk by Toby Young about the decline of grammar/latin in schools, you sort of imagine there will be some hilarity. So you invite a couple of friends to the Idler academy.

However, I should have paid more attention to the 'talk' word. Which can mean lecture. And it was. A lecture about why he has started a free comprehensive in Hammersmith with a short Q&A after. I care about schools but since I don't have children, I care a lot less. I imagine it's almost impossible now to reverse the damage done by handing out GCSE's by the armful to kits who can't write and am not talking about split infinitives, god knows some of those escape my watchful eye often enough when I write (they don't if I bother to edit/re-read but sometime I'm too pushed for time). But it was mildly interesting at the end when some kid from a comprehensive in Holland park called Heathcote (! a very common name in parts of Essex i think) tried to argue a point vs Mr Young and was silenced. There was also interesting input from an English teacher who had taught in France where they still do it by rote instead of encouraging 'creative thinking'. I also learnt a lot by rote and I think you should. Learn the thing/methods and smash them up later, but in the meantime you're also employable above the level of moron.

None of this however interested my friend D who had arrived for the 7pm event having done a line. This was because she was going to have a drink at 8pm with a male friend she's nervous about ie. a date situation and she had got the powder because they were going to a gig afterwards. A vodka and tonic clearly is not enough to steady nerves. And so she braved 40 mins of the 'talk' before escaping - she needed the loo. Yes, of course. D also knew that the previous week at the Idler had been a big of a wash out (Anne Pigalle). I was going to lie about it but D said that daughter of friend had attended and said it was pants. What's the chance of that? I mean, there were 8 of us total in the audience!

After the talk, Toph was meeting friends at The Cow and so was I. I never ever go there for a drink, far too crowded, but on this occasion I walk in and there is Toph and his possee, two tables away is D with her date. I go upstairs where Angolan queen is having dinner with son and they're the only table apart from one where RF, musician I worked with is on a date! I practically knew the whole pub!

Angolan queen's son works in talent in advertising. He's 28 and earns 50k which is massively more than his mother. She's proud of that. He said something very sweet about me and I quote 'I have to deal with so many mad people looking for work, some of them are old but when confronted with some mad creative woman in her 50's with blue hair and funky glasses, I can deal with her because of knowing mum's friends, like you'.

How sweet is that? Sigh.... and no, I abhor blue hair and funky advertising glasses so rest assured he just meant his mothers' mates are mad. Sigh....... I got my revenge by stirring the conversation to discussing how men often pick girlfriends who have more than one aspect in common with their own mothers. After some searching he had to agree that his long term fiancee' is similar to his mum for x, y, z reasons. There you go. Go home and have sex now. But I love him really, very proud of him too.

26 April - Media & Circus

2011-04-27T07:36:00.000-07:00

Driving in central London, saw the lookouts, green tree houses dotted outside Buck Palace on Green Park side and erected also outside Westminster but not amongst trees. How much are networks being charged? Or is it purely their own cost? What's the security there? Would be perfect place for a rogue sniper surely.

Will have assorted friends of friends either in those lookouts or in a corridor at BBC/CBS news dealing with feeding links etc. Will there be any Gaddafi news on the day or next few days or all Kate & Wills? I wonder. And poor Tim Etherington and US colleague. And trust a friend of ours who usually has nothing to do with war or photography, to be quoted in the Standard about Tim (who I doubt he knew, but may have rubbed shoulders with at a festival) . An impressive talent for self promotion, always.

25 April - Bank & Holidays

2011-04-21T08:37:00.000-07:00

Why can't all weeks be 3 day weeks? Why do I have to work 5 days a week, though am lucky it's not 6 or am sure there are also people who work 7 days a week. Why does the prospect of having to work for another 15 or 20 years be the single most depressing thought I have every day (am sure it leads to cancer, somewhere in the body there is the one formed years ago when I used to think 'why will I have to work the next 30 or 40 years, where is my mystery inheritance or good fortune winding its way to me...?'

The only good fortune was the initially resisted and then accepted, decision not to fly anywhere this break. As emails and texts from friend under the rain in Spain/France/Italy/Majorca /Ibiza and so on arrive, I feel, well, sorry for them but super toasty. I only went to Whitstable and there's not a could in the sky in my photos. Thanks to H, T, and J a great little break was had by all, they stayed longer in H's perfectly appointed beach house.

The wine was seized upon, the lamb wasn't great (do not cook huge leg of lamb on a barbecue, all the juices run off it and you're left with dry meat, not that I ate it, my bbq fish was fab) and the men were far too urbane to be annoying. Their talk included comparing sunglasses and architectural styles. Though T and J also discussed football but briefly. T was happy just left alone to his Guardian. So I was happy left alone with bits of it too. I couldn't help but notice the gender division. No man made a move to ever clear up anything off a table or wipe it or wash. The 3 of them just seemed to take any crockery on the shelves until it was all used. Normally I would not have intervened but I was a guest and so wanted to help H (who was also running washing machine and hanging sheets and towels, though grateful I cam down with own pillows and towels, why make someone go to all that trouble for a night or two if you're coming by car? I slept like a log, would have happily stayed a week, maybe next time.

I was however thwarted in my wish to go check the new Turner just opened at Margate by Toph and T. who hate Tracey Emin with a vengeance, though not as much as the Chapman Bros hate her poor woman. J. had gone and thought the building had far too much indoor light for a gallery but I applaud the construction. Maybe next time for this too.

I also completed part of a diplomatic mission to perhaps effect the reapprochement of H and my good friend L. H. drifted off a while back without really giving L an explanation, she says we don't have that much in common. That is surely true and took a year for her to really notice and feel imposed upon (one very sensitive soul and constantly dwelling on the same same themes in her life/drama, the other a let's not dwell on the negative, very well educated and booky woman). H just found it tiring to listen /offer advice that is not taken, but I pointed out that they do have things in common, same age for example, though not background, it's just the style of communication that is so different and why ditch love and support over that? I suggested she tries my approach with L which was very blunt and went along the lines of 'am happy to listen to you droning on about your issues but am afraid that after an hour I don't give a shit about anyone's problems, (borderline asperger on the empathety scales me) so let's do this more like a therapist session, I give you an hour and after that the clock says stop and we chat about lightweight stuff or...I simply go home or you go home'. She went quiet on me for a couple of days and then resurfaced. Really you have to accept criticism or lose the entire relationship over some wounded pride. Not recommended among grown ups.

H thought this was brilliant but she's too true Brit to be able to bring herself to do it. But I also told her a bit about L's background who has grown up surrounded by foster brothers and sisters who her parents were looking after. So I said imagine the need for expression and 'me, let's talk about me' that L had when she had to be heard amongst many, and the fact that it's a bit too negative... well count yourself lucky you're not marrying into a jewish family for example. The real ones, endlessly parodied by themselves first. They just like to go on. Bit like am doing now, though the rest of the time am more sage on the mountain in a cave ie. keep away from me.

Toph and I returned and after a minor altercation due to a restaurant table that he was too slow in securing by NOT following my advice, I found myself going to see the Pina Bausch film by Wim Wenders w/o him. Though had Angolan queen friend and R. with me. He missed out. Film was wonderful. Very well paced, brimming wiht great settings for the pieces and moving in the dancers' testimony about Pina. Who they all loved (well, would they say otherwise on camera? Don't think so, but then why would they have stayed with her all this time?). At times it was panful watching but such a triumph to see older men and women dancing as if they were their 20 year old selves and dancing childlike or dejected and lost like. Brilliant. Go find this movie. There will be a dance just for you in it. Just speaking to you.

22 April - Olympics & Nobody

2011-04-21T05:17:00.000-07:00

It may well be one of the greatest shows on earth but.... nobody is interested in going with me to any events next year. I have a few days to purchase a ticket, if I so wished, so have now resorted to emailing overseas friends saying 'hey, if you fancy the men's 100 mt or some fencing or some horse events or some ... anything, get in touch, I'll buy'. But doubt there will be any takers. Nobody wants to brave confusion, congestion etc. Maybe I should plan to be away/out of town by then? I think I'll buy a raft of random ones (if they assign them to me, which is not a sure thing especially when you're going for the lowest priced seats) and nearer the time I can trade, like you used to do at school with stickers or other highly collectable stuff like that. I saw someone's nephew recently and the poor boy had the familiar old problem, he was missing some stickers which were simply not produced in high enough numbers and so rare that none of his mates wanted to swap. Life teaches you how to be disappointed from a very tender age it seems. Here, here's 200 stickers but forever you will miss a crucial ten or so and the album will seem worthless without them. What a shitty realisation that is. Similar to me gazing at beloved scarves only to notice the snags on some of them.

11 April - Savings & Losses

2011-04-11T04:07:00.000-07:00

You know how they say the more you spend the less you spend? Referring to buying the good version of something so it lasts longer? A shirt in fine cotton, in colours that don't fade vs a cheap option that falls apart at the seam because they have no overlocking machines in Vietnam? A decent pair of boots vs the cheap ones that a week later the heel has gone (and costs more than the boots to repair) and oh, the 'not' leather is peeling off the back? I know that and act accordingly. Sometimes it's ok to just have throaway stuff and sometimes you want the real deal. But how about this, saving time... I bought a hair tint that promises to dye your hair in only ten minutes. Great, let's see how good it is, because frankly Superdrug own brand may be not so good. Before I report back on the coverage/durability of the dye job itself, here's what happend in saving time. The 5 mins followed by 5 mins obviously made me a bit more slapdash than usual. I have learnt long ago to execute hair dye jobs naked so I don't ruin the clothes I'm wearing but this time I ruined the ones I wasn't wearing, and the rest. After I rinsed it all off and was happily drying my hair in a black towel (obviously) I saw some marks on the nice oak wooden floor in the hallway. My fitflops had picked up some dye and trawled it around. Quick, on my knees but no joy, wood is stained. Oh well. Then I noticed flicks of purple (by this point the dark blonde dye looks purple especially on white) on walls, bath tiles and oh, on the dress I had discarded in the bath tub for washing later. Christ NOOOO!!! So then spent ages with various amounts of bleach in a basin watching any crucial developments of dye being removed. No such luck. Increas the dose but hope fabric won't get holed by burns. No.. nothing. Oh, that would be because the dress is of synthetic fabric and bleach only works on natural fabrics. Yes, that will be it. So there you go. Cost of ten minute dye job at £3.99... considerably more in time/ruined items. When will I learn? However, no idea where I am in hormonal cycle as instea of crying over own stupidity and kicking a few things around in rage I just got on with it. It really is peculiar how much depends on simple chemistry.

9 April - More & Too Much

2011-04-08T08:47:00.000-07:00

Gosh, am mad. My fear of dying is such that I fill every gap. I seem to have booked wim wenders/pina bausch film, the play with the geezer from Lost, can't even remember title of play, Fela Kuti's son's, Seun's gig, going to some stuff at the Idler Acad, and got given Kylie tix for Monday and don't want to go, and much more and all the time I say I just want to stay in!!!! aaaarggghhhhhhh Yesterday I ditched crossing London to see a friend of a friend's exhibition where other friends were going to meet, so I re-arranges seeing one of them this morning as she leaves the country this afternoon.

Then of course I got up and my suggestion of 'So I'll come to you and then will ride the tube/train to airport and chat and then I can read a novel on the way back' was changed to a phone appointment where we'll talk after you've checked in and will be sat with a glass of wine near departure lounge. Face to face is overrated right.

In the meantime we also dealt with the disappearance of friend I. who spoke to her at 5.30 making arrangements for the same exhibition and night out to follow and then never turned up or answered messages/texts. By this morning various friends were on the case (it's not like him not to just let you know he's gone and done something else instead) including a visit to knock on his door. No reply. Turned out that when the man turned up before he set off for the exhibit/party, he walked off with I's phone by mistake and left his. I's phone had little or no juice in it so it took him a while to recover it. Strange story but must be true. However, we, the friends, all confessed to each other that we had been very worried since I. drinks too much, does other stuff too much and at his age, we all thought 'Oh no, heart attack???' So, phew, no worries.

8 April - Galleries & Wine

2011-04-08T08:34:00.000-07:00

Nice weather so nice turnout for EastEnd Prints exhib on Shore High St. The oop up choir doing Ground control to major Tom was inspired. DB get well soon if it's true you're losing some battle to cancer. H. had never been to a first Thursday art crawl and loved it. We were in and out of places pulled by the curating impatience of TB who 25 years ago would have been a big wig in the scene had it existed. Bless. Architect J was not paying that much attention to Toph doing his usual 'and over here we have and over there is...' Double bless, when he's a bit older I'll enrol him for some blue badge guiding course so when he's 65 he can do a couple of hours some days a week, make £50 and have an excuse to ogle young people and it will keep him fit walking. However, I just have to start saying no to unnecessary drinking. Truly people what do you get? Moderation is fine, above moderation you don't deepen any knowledge or enjoyment but what do I know, says the girl who ate some cheese and bread at Brawn on Columbia Rd at 10.30 at night whilst various unsober friends ordered raw beef and this and that. Eating at 10.30 at night is not ideal either if you ask me. Neither is it to go to another pub till they throw you out and then you have to cross town in a cab and drop dead on your bed at 1am. But hey, we had fun. shocking news was that very good friends were on the verge of splitting up! they have not drunk since Xmas and he said that the clarity this brings made him see that the relationship is not that solid. She on the other hand had found one of his recent diaries and read some stuff she didnt' know. Oh dear, fingers very crossed! Mercury retrogade and all that.

6 April - Future & Blues

2011-04-06T06:41:00.001-07:00

Last night saw Source Code - good, could have done w/o the last five minutes but realised he had to tag them on to explain/resolve stuff that may have been too difficult to comprehend by Joe and Joanna Midwest or similar - sorry American friends. Then went to watch a gig by someone I had no clue about and was more than pleasantly surprised, an amazing blues guitairst from Essex Ramon Goose & a kora player from Mali, Diabel Cissokho at Blues Kitchen in Camden. Cue both me and Toph after parking the car in Arlington rd, telling each other we dined at the Crown & Goose and at the Cafe' Delancey zillions of times back in the days there wasn't much else and Camden was cool. Mid-80's perhaps? It helped that the Camden Palace was my main attraction in Steve Strange days and my mate I. lived for 19 years two streets away. Two or three things in a night has often been my style. At the gig we were handed a compilaton CD and one of the tracks on there is by the North Mississippi Allstars. Hi Cody and bro. And how I'd like a little road trip round your woods. Tonight have a round trip to collect some Kilye tix from a friend who can't go next week, will take the token gay friend to it, then go watch some comedy in Kilburn which I never do but this is more story telling than comedy. Tomorrow is art in Shore shores, Friday is DFW allace at Foyles. No wonder am always knackered, I run around as I did when I was 30 and for what? Gigs, talks, dance, art but what does it all add up to? Stuff that clogs my brain and that I no longer remember the feeling of after the event. In fact, since it's a slow day at work, I'll try and remember a few salient shows: The Verve somewhere up north, only because Richard Ashcroft did 2 or 3 songs (see, can't even remember how many) the other night at japan disaster benefit and it triggered the memory of that gig and one of the very few times I've fainted like a stone to the ground. Always for same reason, forgetting I don't smoke dope and doing so because...you can't always say no. On this occasion I should have known super ultra better that what F. smoked was too strong even for her (major paranoid woman that she became after spliffs). It's no fun fainting by the feet of thousand of other gig goers, but at least there was grass (ha ha ha) in the field and so didn't crack my skull. The Araki exhibition at the Barbican, because it was an early date with Toph and felt super heightened by the fact that Araki's work is highly sexualised and therefore was a way to check he wasn't a bore in bed. Not sure what he was checking... that I may be into being tied up? He didn't /hasn't tried it - yet. The first Glastonbury, quite late in life, Prodigy and Underworld headlining, where I lost W. and had his tent /car/keys all to myself whilst he was busy taking 40 E's with S. who he met there (she had the bag of drugs as she worked as promo person at a label) and married a couple of years later. And didn't that turn out well. The second Glastonbury because contrary to the first, it was rainy/muddy/miserable and have hardly been back since. Vittorio Storaro being interviewed at the NFT because of all the beautiful excerpts of his cinematography. Probably at the time of Under a Sheltering Sky? I wanted to marry him. From that movie memory springs another, Blade Runner in Leicester Sq, possibly with DB. If not him then maybe MC? But DB for sure watching Rirchard Gere in American Gigolo same place. Then walking out of Three Colours Blue, at the end of course and deciding that it had to be the end of me and C. Much before then, crying my eyes out at a french movie about a doomed love story set in a circus, which my friend K. had taken me to on NYD 1989? because she didn't know what to do with my fountain of tears (MC had left me that morning). I also remember being stunned by Diva and Betty Blue (that gives away my age so easily) and liking going to the movies with P. beause he likes directors I didn't know... like the one who did In The Mood for Love and 2026. Am sure I can come up with more movie memories. Can't think of that many exhibitions... Andres Serrano at the Barbican? Sebastiano Salgao at the same? The art bus one summer from the V&A round graffiti locations? Anish Kapoor at the Hayward? the Biennale with A. ten years ago? Jenny Holzer at Moma in NYC? was on my own i think. Some great dj gig with FBS but which one to pick? I never went to the best ones in Ibiza. Maybe the one at Brixton with Armand van Helden? the first one on the beach in Brighton? the last one at the Big Boutique? The last Stone Roses gig at Reading and the end of me and N? but after which gig did we make it back to the Langham? Must have been Wembley.... The Acacia gig with Bjork in Dublin when Bono and Edge stood behind me. that festival up north they don't do anymore and Julian Cope was playing and me and C. had a great trip as if we were a real couple and not an affair to hide? Simple Minds at Wembley when we knew them? Actually for gigs there are too many of these and should be just the first ones which come to mind like Psychedelic Furs in West Brompton or Eurythmics at the Barracuda. Plus the two I never saw by accident... Marley at the Rainbow and Nirvana at the Waterrats. The first flotation tank in LA the year Altered States came out? Have seen precious few catwalk shows and they've never held me in thrall much. Clubs, oh my god where to start/stop? The nights spying on yellow jersey at Taboo? The ones at the Wag? or Love? the first time at the MoD when it was amazing? Ok, am boring myself now so will stop. how about dance? maybe the first time I saw Michael Clarke back in his first shows at Sadlers Wells? how about theatre? have seen tons and some fab stuff but it never sticks? Juliet Stevenson in Death and the Maiden twenty years ago? various Neil La Bute? various Checkhov? how about classical? Love Esa Pekka Sanonen directing anything he chooses? how about restaurants? zillions but am not a foodie so love Petrus (the marcus wareing version), loved Brawn in Columbia Rd the other night, remember milk and honey, arbutus, a lunch at Scotts, a b'day lobster in ireland, some pasta by the sea in italy, a dinner at l'aterlier de joel robuchon, some sunday lunches at the ringside in kingsland rd, doesn't exist anymore, the first time I ate avocado puree' in LA, which bore no resemblance to the avocado at Cafe' Pacifico back in the days when that was the one and only mexican restaurant in london, some amazing chinese in HK, street food anywhere in the east, the dahl and rice on the nepal trekking, but there's lots I will never remember and frankly never anything I've cooked since I eat to live and not live to eat sadly for Toph who sees his 'let's go out for dinner' often curtly declined. Basically what happens to Tilda Swinton in I'm Love will never happen to me, I just don't think my taste buds function properly, they're marginally better at savouring wine. But see, I can never really zone in on one thing and recall it perfectly, it's more 'oh yes, that was good'. Maybe too much choice?

3 April - Motor & Mouths

2011-04-05T03:19:00.000-07:00

Our friend P. is staying fresh off the plane from USA as can't face going to her house due to some major raucus with husband who has accused her of having god knows how many affairs in the time she's been away looking after very sick mother (and before then). Funny how he can't produce any proof since there have been no affairs and it's all in his head. I blame the skunk. Honest, who does he think he is? Bob Marley? At sixty something it's time to see some sense and lead a healthier life. And before anyone says that a joint doesn't hurt anyone, these are many joints and I don't think dem police are lying when they point out to the psychosis engendered by current crops. P. talks non stop which is fine in small doses. No jetlag for her. Though I have to set boundaries for her and Toph incessant talk of the hell of modern TV making. It's too much them vs us for me. If it was always so fraught how do all these progs get made? Everyone has bad tales to tell in theatre, movies, books , the ministry of defence , the Olympics, the bank of England, whatever, it's life. We go for a pizza and her friend C. joins and for once she's sober (because tired) and very funny. Her experiences in the world of commercials /movies are priceless. This last one she did where the brief was so confusing was just the best. You know when you get asked for something old but modern, black but white, traditional but edgy and then they forget to tell you they need it for an actress and you've made it for the guy who's 6ft 6". That sort of thing. In the course of this we discover she was Jon Moss' g/friend at the time of CC formation and of course I have to call and tell my friend who was a major JM stalker back in the days. Too funny. We also discover that C's father was the lawyer who made some history by obtaining that a transgender man convicted of a crime be allowed to be sent to Holloway women's prison though can't find anything about him on the web. Must find as want to tell L. and E. for their pull the other one web magazine. Though lawyer in question is now dead so can't do interview.

3 April - Screams & Beats

2011-04-04T06:29:00.001-07:00

Unabridged from email sent to friend. Brixton was better than I thought. We arrived late so missed the Coral, saw 1 song by Weller (enough) and after that was great as you get to hear fab artists doing only a few of their hits so you don’t get bored. The surprise for me was an acoustic Kelly jones whose voice is so strong that I was blown away (and presence). Richard Ashcroft also acoustic was a bit croakier but good. The best 4 songs from the Primals, hooray, now I don’t feel bad I didn’t catch the Screamadelica gigs, with the intervening years it’s clear to see what the Primal were/are, which is the rolling stones/stooges for kids who would not have wanted to go and see the ‘old’ stones. Have fond memories of that album as was f ck soundtrack to my times with MG. His pick. My friend E/S instead has nightmares from looking after the Gillespie crew at the height of their gargantuan drug taking. Am suprised she managed to avoid a breakdown. And then…. Beady Eye. Yawn, Liam in a parka, as ever. Moving a bit more than usual, that's novel. M. can say what she wants but to me it’s a lame concept. The single came along and she leans and tells me ‘Liam wrote this himself’ and I said yes, and John Lennon did the othe75%! Then another song comes along and I had to ask ‘is this one of theirs?’ as to me it was 'Get Back', Get back to where you once belonged (am a bit unsteady on the Beatles as not my thing ever, but I think that Liam song was 75% them and 25% him! Honest! How can ayone buy this stuff? But well done him for raising 150k for tsunami victims (idea originated as he felt really bad about a Sony Japan lady who sent him moving updates on the situation) and the bill came together in 2 weeks, thanks to him rather than management and best of all nobody made any speeches! Just got on , sang, got off. There at 8.30 back by 10.30. Perfect. Always feel bad exiting a show with backstage pass in my pocket and not giving to some fan who would jump for joy but... couldn't be done.

1 April - Friends & Culture

2011-04-01T08:07:00.000-07:00

Love friends, I should really just stop trying to keep up with the sunday papers and just rely on mates for all I need in life. paulette g., new acquaintance from art show, and her mention of Paula Rego so an hour spent on Saatchi website and with the help of the illustrative text , I 'get' the paintings, whilst previously had not liked her at all. Ansuman sending the tagore festival link and reading the lovely words of this poet. Which one forgets from one year to the next. http://www.tagorefestival.com/pages/taste.html M. telling me he's mastered his new album which triggers listening to old catalogue. Then meeting his friend J. again, in town from NY and therefore checking him out again as he's now a big cheese in the concrete music movement, see Ether Festival on South Bank etc. Going to the Japanese pianist benefit at Kings Place with colleagues and finding out music by japanese composer I didnt' know, hearing a beethoven I didn't know or remember and discovering that David Bailey is also a sculptor in metals and I like most of his objects. Who knew? T. from San Diego describing her trial and errors with synthetic hormones to find some relief from her migraines and menop which I can use info I have now read about on net for next time I see GP. trying to persuade S in venice who's putting on her first mini festival that she should start the pop up restaurants movement there.. .but I know I'll be told italians do this all the time w/o charging , they won't get it that it's strangers that come to your house and you also get to know them, we shall see. Oh just checked with other friend who says health and safety and 'finanza' ie fiscal people making it impossible. Such a shame, and I thought it was a quasi anarchic type of country where they'd let these kind of things pass.

forget the www, how about wide reaching friends?

31 March - Blogs & Boring

2011-03-30T05:43:00.000-07:00

Forgot to say that on the Swiss excursion I brought with me a 50p charity shop copy of Petite Anglaise. For a while back in the heyday of blogs I wished I were writing a wildly checked one, leading to collation into book form and giving a few interviews and pocketing some cash. But having now read a few books originating this way I am relieved I never had anything remarkable enough to pulp a few trees for. Ok, Belle 1 is the exception.

I skipped back and forth on PA and could not find a single redeeming thing about it. Of course did not read all the words as that would have been a waste of my precious reading time. But it was dire. Maybe in small installment form it had a different bearing on a reader, but in one sitting or two, it was dire. Comment on dit 'dire' en francais je me demande...

Then again maybe am just in impatient/uncharitable moon phase or other. Since I bougth a £5 hardcopy of Margaret Attwood's 'After the Flood', read 30 pages and thought Maggie, you're back on Oryx and Craske territory and indeed she makes no bones about it but it feels a bit like a rehash. With her however I have learnt she has good surprises up her sleeves, so will persevere another 100 or so before giving up if indeed that's what I'll do. Which reminds me, Franzen's Freedom is not even half way through and I like it a lot. It's just impossible to find the time what with bits of TV, lots of going out and the general attention span decline that's befallen me.

30 March - Europa & Women

2011-03-30T05:37:00.000-07:00

(unedited) It starts with crossing the road in front of Westminster and there's our maire on his bicycle, cunningly wearing a black beanie from which only a few white locks were escaping but unmistakably sort of misshapen and various other people turned at the same time. Dear boris you don't know how many letters never sent I have composed to you when am mad about the buses, the tube, the trains and the traffic! exh in smith square. gorgeous, never been here before. in support of european baccalaureat small gathering so too many canapes and too much wine great (or great at the time conversations) that remind you of a bunch of things that only central europeans care about and not the inhabitants of an island that has refused the Euro. picked up lots of literature, speeches etc on european union roll on Lebanon when I'll go visit CK whos moved there because lebanese husband had had enough of low level racism he faced in Austria. told P. the sculptor/writer that my male friends can't stand Tracey Emin and I on the contrary feel for her and her struggles and totally get her. And I like Margate. But have never met her and certainly not prior to her sobering up a bit, she must have been 11 on a scale of obnoxious. art, I like collages , I like found stuff put together but not video. too much wine. tbc

25 March - Office bitching & W & Ivy

2011-03-25T09:57:00.001-07:00

Office bitching wasa alive and well yesterday and today. Yesterday someone had enough and marched over to the desk of someone higher in the pecking order to say 'I won't be talked to/at like this'. Then off for tears (yes it was a lady). Today I was asked by the higher pecking order how he could change lower pecking order person and have myself tend to his sphere of work. I said it's not done at your level (sorry to burst bubbles of importance) plus how popular would that make me? then I proceded to suggest to each that the other really wanted to apologise and therefore the olive branch was forthcoming. If you flatter someone that they other thinks they made a huge mistake in offending blah blah , it gets sorted. Calm restored. I was about to write to the foreign office and offer some mediation with Gaddafi/Qaddafi/Gheddafi (I mean who's reaching out to him now heh? Who's forgetting which park they gave him to pitch his tent of the 40 female bodyguards heh?) but then I had a meltdown of my own and called HR to ask how best act in order to get a logorrhoic (spelling?) colleague to stop talking on the phone to her family various time a day , every day and then insist on telling me the contents of the conversation I've just heard! About washing machine repairs or health issues or orange phone bills addressed to the wrong recipient or haircuts of only an inch taken off all around etc. It should be simple, you get up and declare 'you bore me to tears you fool, shut the fuck or go use a phone in another level/building /town, oh go home and visit in fact'. But you can't do that. I should suggest she starts a blog and gets her mother/father/washing machine man to read it. 'And I said... and he said... then I said.. and he said...' Or I could ask to be sat opposite Bill Gates, he must have some good stories to tell his ma? So enough of all that, will go check the W bar tomorrow and then the club at the Ivy, just because you can't let all the new or relatively new places pass you by.

24 March - Peruvian art & top photographers

2011-03-25T07:00:00.000-07:00

We go to the gallery owned by alexander dellal, space courtesy of property king father in a corner of Hoxton sq. En route I look at estate agent porn as usual. Quite fancy a large flat on the top floor of a building next to the White Cube Gallery. Nice views of the square though as squares go it's not that lush. 700k for under 100sqm. Not quite Kensington but getting there.
Remember the days when this corner of london was dark due to nobody living here, no shops apart from crummy corner shops and the only bars were the bricklayers and barley mow. Someone I knew was busy buying rotting buildigns. Oh how he must be laughing now, though at some point in the early 90's he nearly went under due to shifts in rates and the fact he wasn't able to rent /use any of this.. yet. Wonder where he's now.

So, the gallery has a show by Peruvian artists and for some reason Mario Testino brought them to you. We were to stalk him but as I said to Toph, MT would probably arrive only with ten mins to closing time to shake a few hands and then the inner circle would go to dinner. We arrived mistakenly too early and after a beer and some art that's not inspiring all you can do is go for another beer at some other opening and so to 30a redchurch st , possibly the smallest 'gallery' ever though it has a long name I forget. Only one item on show which I won't mention as was pretty dismal and curated by the daughter of Mick Jones from the Clash who you'd think should know better as she must be 30 something. The public was outside having a fag as the music for the piece was (deliberately) deafening. If had had the energy would have retired to Conran's terrace, must be open by now, but a swift viet was calling and then off home.

Am sure at some point when I was circa 24 all this would have been riveting and scored by dozens of hellos to/from people I knew. Alas..

21 March - Norwegian & Wood

2011-03-23T05:26:00.000-07:00

Subtitle should have been 'It would have been good to talk!'

Honest.. long time since have avoided Bergman movies and here was one. I guess I would recommend it only to young people who would find the nexus of it close to their lives perhaps though maybe not in these permissive days. But it tired me out. Good acting, good camera work. Don't go see if you're taking antidepressants, may set you back.

Later on I found myself listening for an hour to friend L. who goes round in circles a lot over the same same issues all the time. I managed. She thought I was very good for once, less impatient and a good listener. I was merely thinking wouldn't want to be in her head. And that if I gave her a full hour, it would count towards not offering to listen for the entire the next week, bar a few emails. Calculating, moi? But if you think about it, you sort of find yourself remembering decades of endless discussions whilst with friends trying to sort out our lives but you want to say 'Christ, surely you have to have a grip by now on your issues?' (unless someone died, you lost your job, your home, you live near a nuclear reactor...).

Is there a more attractive word than 'grumpy' I could use?

20 March - Freerunning & Parcour

2011-03-22T05:44:00.001-07:00

After tea in gt ormond st with the gay friends who are now residents of one of the best little areas of london (pedestrianised, quiet etc) and who'll get super fit on account of being on a 4th or 5th floor (couldn't afford the lower ones at twice the amount), we wandered off to see some young'uns and hear not a note that wasn't hip hop/rap.

24 competitors... to be whittled down to 12 in the RedBull competition for freerunning by the NT. Clearly toph wasn't that keen on this outing, but was swept along by the refrain 'I want to see/do someething different, we always do the same shit'. Loved it, though was disappointed no skull cracked open and spewed blood everywhere as they went about jumping off walls and landing on concrete.

Earlier in the day we had followed the east eruopean hippy babes to a small park behind Trellik tower and that was a novelty since must have gone past it zillion of times but never noticed (see above for 'we always do the same shit ie. stop when we get to the Oporto).

The EEBabes were met by chance at Coffee Plant when one of them spotted that Sergei was russian as herself. But Sergei is not that forthcoming with words so dontcha now, Toph kept up the chatter. I think this was second or third time they met in CPlant and again Anna was trying to invite Sergei to some tango dancing display and to Passing Clouds but he was being his usual reticent self. Toph just couldn't fathom why but Sergei told him he doesn't fancy Anna and clearly he's not the type who'll just shag anyone just because they're there and available. Plust this makes Anna chase all the more as Sergei to date is an enigma to her, though he's been to Cuba and the girls are going to Cuba so information was offered.

We left them to it. I don't have much interest in how it pans out but Toph is sublimating the fact he's not able to spend time with young EEBabes any more. The other one Dorotha, is the one he'd like the most and I like the least on account that it wasn't that hot but since there was a ray of sunshine at 2pm of course she had to go and wear the kind of ickle dress with straps that fall and you have no bra on which I should wait for a Glastonbury day before I give it an outing.

Toph says 'But she has a boyfriend!' as some kind of iron maiden lock she may also wear. Oh how some days he forgets I'm older and wiser than him...

18 March - Apres Neige

2011-03-22T05:41:00.000-07:00

It always seems silly as you wake up at 4.30am to trek to an airport to get on a flight to get on a train to get to ski for 3 days max and then spend another half day in reverse, but fortunately your brain overrules the knee jerk reaction of why bother and reminds you that when you're there you're on TOP OF MOUNTAINS and you go dowwwwnnnnnnnnnnnnnn, yipppieeeeeee. All fab. Including making the following classic mistake on morning of second day (tk got you'd already got your ski legs on day 1) 'Hey, look if we get off where A. gets off (A. who's been training for 5 years with Olympic ski instructor and very recently has become his equal, sort of) in order to go off piste, see here, there is a short blue run that connects and then we can come down'. I was well aware that I do all sorts of dyslexic shit these days with words and places but to do it with colours is a first. I saw blue but it was red. Red next to black. Paralysing red, since it's always the first bit of the descent that makes the piste a red, or the narrowness. I stayed upbeat, there was hardly anyone on the pistes and the snow was fresh, you can just come down sort of side ways and slowly non? So off I go and in mere minutes am below the hard bit. But Toph is still up there adjusting his sunnies (can't see with/can't see without he shouts as visibility is suddenly disappearing in a sea of white). Houston we have a problem I thought but was well aware that you don't just take your skis off and trudge up to hold hands with boyf in funny moment mode. He's not a girl and you have to respect male pride. Since the only way is down, he did come down and after that, there were no obstacles. This is sort of my philosphy with most things. Do the hard bit first and the remaining will seem easier. Start with the easy and the hard seems looming larger. For this reason I'll always put my hand up first/fast. Watching all the others take their turn before you is excruciating. But we're all different. Coming home and tearing up your insurance documents is always a favourite moment. Before that we woke up to stunnign 180 degrees of the best view ever (wasn't that sunny but am prepared to forget that) in a wonderful house. Company and food and wine was excellent. Am sure that coming here with a large group of friends instead of 6 would be even better and am currently sitting here wondering why I left it to mid March to go skiing, with no time to sort out another w/end before all the snow melts. We had in fact to chase some in nearby Italy as the Swiss slopes were in dire need. It was good to catch up on the news of A's work, L's about to be launched web magazine for non straight-forward people (I like her idea of a tab for those who will find it objectionable, you click here and voila' it takes you to the Daily Mail. It was also great to chat to the son who was formerly the daughter and is now a man in the process. And his g/friend is super smart and likeable, I would say the first Greek I've ever met. Is that possible? How have I managed a London life all these years and never met a Greek? She had yoga and acrobatics in common with Toph, well, acrobatics he wishes.... We were just wondering if you were a couple of lesbians and then one of you becomes a man, are you then in a hetero relationship then? Questions questiosn, I guess I should read some alternative stuff, forgot the name for these non-norm lives. One small word of warning. There was a reason why I have never gone to Switzerland for le ski, and stuck to Italy /France. The reason became very obvious when I paid £18 for a pizza (not on top of the slopes I add but village level below) and £20 for a chicken faijita or £50 for a bottle of local red or £ for a swiss for crying out loud bar of chocolate. Oh the irony of the swiss chocolate. Then I got back and a little graph caught my eye in the Economist. In 2008 you got 2.4 swiss francs to the pounds. In 2011 you get 1.3. for some reason I had failed to check what a franc would buy. Apprx a third of a regular 125gms chocolate bar it seems. Of course the Swiss don't want undesirables non rich in their midst, that's well known. Plus this is good news for my Brit friends marooned in Portugal where their new life has not taken the turn they hoped for when they moved 3 years ago. Buy 2 properties, live in 1 and rent the other 1 out. As for work.. eh, er, mmmh. Finally a Swiss investor (dontcha know) is about to sweep both up and free them from the debt.

11 March - La Neige & le trans

2011-03-11T08:33:00.001-08:00

Time flyes and this blog is neglected, mired in 'drafted posts' languishing w/o the benefit of a little editing. So this is just to say am either dying of some rare cancer (ok only symptom is rapid weight loss which normally may be welcome but not a dress size in two weeks w/o trying, that's got to spell something wrong right? Though my best friend has all the symptoms of ovarian cancer and we sort of exchanged our worries on the same day so that's probably like falling in line with your periods or something.
I will get checked out, next Friday GP booked. Won't take chances as have known people diagnosed in September (and too late) and dead in mid Feb. But in the meantime la neige m'appelle and going skiing in Swizerland courtesy of good friends with lovely house near Villars.
The surprise of the week is that (since good friends can be friends you don't talk to for half a year) is that Mme head is working on a postive sex website. Not sure what this means as can't access it yet, not launched. But she sounded super excited by it and that was infectious enough. Second surprise is that her daughter will also be on the skii trip but am instructed to call her now by a boy name, since she's changed it by deed poll and is in first stages of transgender op. Makes sense knowing her/him and happy for him. Hope not to say anything wrong in trying to be uber liberal.

Again, bad things are happening in the world, if it's not a war or an insurrection, it's a natural disaster and very sorry for all my Japanese friends out there. They are not directly affected but still, when a bad thing happens in a country, the whole country feels awful, not just the immedidate victims.

Willt this stop me crashing into bed early for my 5am cab to airport... not really, life goes on this far away. But sad, very sad today.

oh and if at work I hear again one of our most overused sentences 'Is it me or is it too hot here today', I think I'll scream.

6 march - Escaping from Angola

2011-03-04T08:14:00.001-08:00

Sent this email to a friend. Am glad I live in the democratic northern sphere of the world. This below is my friend D. who works for de-mining organization xx based outside Huambo in Angola. She’s due back on a break end of April. Am not going to get too worried yet, but uprisings in Africa (or Greece for that matter) have a way to turn violent. I draw your attention to third paragraph below. Am just trying to be practical and think of help should he be needed. Do you in your travels have any government/media or military contacts in nearby Namibia which is where she would try to get to if needs to escape? See her route below. Of course you’d think xx people who largely ex military will know how to look after her, but... I don't trust men. Of course if you could scramble the google plane and have Bono on board that would be even better. Lemme know. On another note we have pro-government demos here on Friday and anti-government demos on Monday 7th. Being co-ordinated by Unita in Switzerland. they say they will also march in London and New York on same day. Police and army will be out in force on the streets here as this is Unita terrirory (where Savimbi lived) have just been told by my staff that most still have guns from the war-and that all will be well so long as the government don't kill anyone. if not a possible uprising. as all comms will be shut down by government (internet/mobile) just want to let you know my plan is to escape ( if necessary) south via Namibia as Luanda is 10 hours away and could be much more violent. The route is Menongue to Katwitwi (about 10 hours) the border crossing shuts at 5pm so would leave Huambo around 6am to arrive 4pm. then cross to Namibian side of border called Nkurekuru. Which is about 5/6 hours from Windheok, but there are good places to stay on that side of the border after crossing and would be able to make a call to let all know am ok.

5 March - Sheph Bush & LA art galleries

2011-03-04T04:26:00.000-08:00

Going for dinner with old uni friends of Toph somewhere local to them in Sheph Bush. Regular thai place not that special food wise. He doesn't say much but he's nice, a good listener, though I can't rememer what he does, maybe writes for school type magazines? She's more interesting, does legal work with/for refugees so knows about foster parents and that gives somethign to talk about. They ahve a few kids, but the youngest at 7ish turned up just when they were ready to feel freer and now they're stuck for a few more years. So it's camping hols rather than freewheeling in Bali for them. Their daughter who doesn't want to go to uni. It's ok lots of people didn't but they are then the ones I know know who will somehow mention 'I left school at 15, I didn't go to uni' - subtext, but don't think you can patronise me as have since educated myself at the university of youtube etc. I mention anotehr friend who doesn't want hers to go to Uni for financial reasons/burden but it's hardly easier to come by a job and daughter wants gap year too, paid for by mother. I say let her go, maybe she'll find a job in Colombia or some such, see what happens, refuse to fund the trip beyond paying for half of it, if she really wants to go, she'll go sweep hairdresser floor for a year to get the money. for anyone with younger kids/babies/toddlers, I'd recommned reading the idle parent manifesto on the Idler Academy website. Great fun and I agree.

Back to the dinner above, wish I could meet her sister.. she runs an incredibly beautiful gallery in Santa Monica, the Louver? great pun on words. Took a look on the net and though how fab, spend the day with this art (all top notch) and wait for brangelina to drop by once in a while and get 2 of these and 2 of those and hey presto, that's your healthy lunch and juice paid for on the beach before you go to a yoga class at that great place P. took me too years ago before London had anything remotely comparable. They still don't.

4 March - Alcohol & Poisoning

2011-03-03T03:36:00.000-08:00

Well known side effects or damage of growing older is intolerance to alcohol, then again I have never before made the mistake of drinking on an empty stomach, am much too practical for that, me and my banana or me and my piece of bread. But meeting D&R at Bohemia evil cocktail den under the pavement near Liverpool st led to spectacular downfall ending with £35 cross city cab at 1opm when the central line would have been fine.

So, don't mix grains (first cocktail was brandy based, second one vodka based), plus don't taste all the other 3 your friends are having. Thirdly, don't order second one the minute you've finished the first one as that dose of alcohol has not fully penetrated your blood stream yet so you don't realise you're a bit drunk already till you get up the stairs after the second drink.

You will then cross the road to go eat at Pizza East (not a favourite but needs must) and miss the dinner because you spent it sat on the (very clean, I was impressed) floor of one of the toilets, as you try to regain composure, go upstairs, sit down and look at your pizza only to excuse yourself again. You will also marvel at how your friends who have had the same mixture and have now finished a bottle of red are managing and conclude that the age difference is the only variant here.

Just as well we had chatted plenty and quickly before hand, at time of first cocktail though I don't remember much. Or actually I do, so I was not drunk, merely unwell as the spirits fought it out inside my veins.

D. admitting his foray into his own production company had done nothing but suck his own money for a year and he was back freelancing for others. R. enjoying living together - 8 months and counting - and perfectly placed to understand his struggles with cheesy TV as she had booked talent or some such for that CH4 gross bodies or teenage sex or whatever it was called prog. She confirms that the fat sex therapist of whom Toph very unkindly thought 'when's the last time she's had a relationship' simply because he would not find a size 16 to 18 sexy, is the sister of James Corden, so the fat runs in the family but look at half the country fancying Smithy.

A brief post mortem of Outcasts was conducted (friends are involved and Hermione Norris takes at least one kid to a school near my home) and revealed I was the only one who had seen more than 2 episodes (if 3 and a bit counts). D. thought it was good for the relationship of our friends that super successful one in the couple would now have to cope with this critical failure, as may re-balance the power lines. Mmmmhhh I just said no, she'll be depressed and p issed off that good cast and good writer turned out a turkey and he will be upset for her. We urged D & R to watc the Insider Job docu on the robbing and incestuous banks (which revealed to me that top tier Uni professors are also in the pockets of whoever pays for them to write papers for them and they plays stupid as pretending that the exchange of 100k here or there does not colour what they say. At this point I'd say don't send your kids to Harvard for Economics degrees. It's all bent.

29 January - Tall Tales Night

2011-01-28T06:32:00.000-08:00

Laughter at M’s night, much needed. Just make up a likely story that fits with your character and people will believe it's actaully true. Very inventive, and am impressed it's all done with no notes, like a monologue which I could never ever do w/o ending up round the houses, up a hill, across the sea etc. Jealous or Mr rethoric who cites 'Socratic irony' among his interest when I check him on the web. It sort of helps that his father was a politician and gave the kids weird Welsh names and probably made them discuss socratic irony round the dinner table when they were aged 5.
The Belgian Waffle woman performed too. On a previous occasion she once read one of her pieces and couldn’t stop giggling at own wit, together with the audience. Contagious, if not a bit juvenile. She's funny on blog but not that funny. Then again, I'm less funny than she is, so can't really complain about her much. Surprised to find out she's a mother, she seemed like a student to me, not that the two are esclusive.

Met the writer Naomi Alderman, and though have not read her at least I knew who she was, Toph was clueless. She has written a Dr Who book and Disobedience and new novel The Lessons. Quick wiki check and she’s a games writer. That’s why she knew so much about who does which voiceover on games! Must admit did a very uncharitable mental connection between her body shape (fat and unstylish) and her interests (games) and thought fat geek, it figures. Am sorry.... but am still vain. Would rather not have successful books published and be my shape than other way round. Well, that's my excuse then for lack of creative production. My pact with the devil....

28 January - Face & Mood

2011-01-28T06:20:00.000-08:00

The year has started badly. This now feels like the real age downhill.

1) I can no longer leave the house w/o prior conducting some face damage limitation, concelaer is essential and foundation pretty much also. I guess I had it good till now which is no small consolation.
2) I wake up every morning with pillow creases etched on my face which take a good hour to fully disappear. This can only be because some cushioning layer of collagen has been depleted from my face and the skin is more creasable? Nothing else has changed, not the pillows nor the pillowcases. Go figure
3) My eyesight has taken a total dip for the worse. Last year went to get vari-focals which I was only using for small print, now quite suddenly everything has gone really blurry
4) The mood is dark. Just as well have been to Egypt already or would think twice about going to the civil unrest fest
5) I read a poster offering relationship advice and their tag line is ‘Would you go out with you? (or would you marry you?) We can help etc.'a nd I think no, right now I wouldn’t go out with me as I have nothing whatsoever to add to anyone’s life. Or my own.

A quick trip to ski down a mountain would restore some cheerfulness but no such thing exists in this country. Maybe it’s time I relocated to central Europe where the mountains are that much nearer.

20 January - Drugs & Sides

2011-01-20T08:48:00.000-08:00

Friend J. who was looking for HRT, goes to GP and gets recommended anti dep of the Prozac family, small dosage 'try one month' sort of thing.

Checking it out online, you read the list of possible side effects and you could just faint at the thought. Ok they give you percentages of the sample and the likelihood is small enought, but still. There's a side effect for everything. You know, cure your suicidal thougths but give yourself anxiety and sleeplessness why won't you? Aren't you already anxious and sleepless if you have suicidal thoughts? Who knows. Just as well that the GP told her to ignore the side effect for decreased libido since that was one of the reasons she was keen to get on HRT in the first place - that and the sudden rages.

She's aske me to keep an eye on her in case I notice anything out of character.

19 January - Win & Lose

2011-01-19T04:51:00.001-08:00

We all have our own battles, some are big and some are much smaller but if the smaller ones are very frequent, weekly for example, they assume a larger role. You could say 'You stress over that??? You're mad!' , but scratch anyone and find a long list of their own idiosyncrasies.

These battles can go on for years before you find a solution and the solution is always there for you to find, but you simply cannot see it. Perhaps if you had discussed the problem with a friend they'd have suggested a solution or told you it was a losing battle and saved you time?

Problem #1. The hard water in London or the washing machine or more likely my refusal to wash at 90c all the time (for eco reasons) and the result is that my white sheets are never as white as I want them. From time to time I leave them steeped in boiling water, or in bleach but they never come out as white as I want them. And yet I have a dim memory of a grandmother boiling them or I saw it in some upstairs downstairs movie and it worked? or perhaps it was an illusion due to the fact that in those movies or memories the sheets were then hanging out to dry in brilliant sunshine so they would be white rather than when I observe mine in London light. And if it was a movie that gives me this memory, how do I know that the sheets hanging to dry are actually the ones that were washed in the previous scene? They could be brand new? No, it was grandma's ones. Must have been. If by now you have thought of solution #1 'Buy new sheets', you don't know me well. Yes I can buy new ones but I would have the same problem and it just bugs me. So I carry on with this mini drama. But recently another grandma - not mine - told me 'Once they've gone grey, you don't get the white back'. This was not what I expected but effectively it means I can terminate my efforts. So I went one further and bought into men's mentality (bachelors of course) and bought brown sheets (could have chosen blue I guess). I thought I'd hate them becasue they are not white, but surprisingly they seem inviting to sleep. Sure I'll change them as often as before, if I had to rely on visual to tell me, months could go by (again, see bachelors we used to know). It may take a while however to fully convert to dark sheets. I still hanker for brilliant white but no longer believe washing powder ads.

Problem #2 was orchid envy. I'd visit shops, beauty parlours, other houses and everyone has blooming orchids which are a bit too ubiquitous these days but still a lovely indoor plant. Everyone has their own suggestions as to the care for these flowers and their position and have tried them all. My orchids die. Or rather, the flower stem does. You could argue that I never bought £40 plants to start with and it's possible that the expensive ones are bred to be stronger and more durable plants, but how to trust that I could have one of those survive if 3 (so far) of the tenner variety have wilted and 'died'? I also don't know if the orchids I see in other places are always the same plant or if in fact they have died and been substituted. If you owned a shop, you would get new ones all the time surely. But I wanted to see mine flower again, but so far no luck. The other day I was in Selfridges and in the basement they have an area of plastic flowers and plants for sale. Fab, though expensive. So I bought a white orchid large flower stem and plonked it into one of my vases (leaves are ok) and voila', I will never have to worry about the orchids again. In Poundland by contrast they sold small flower plastic stems (alas in pink), and I got one of those too for the other vase. Can you tell the difference from real plant? No doubt, but not at a distance so am happy.

Having solved these 2 persistent nags (perhaps problem is not the right word), I must move on to something else. I know... the tree that cuts out all my light /sunshine in the garden. Next project.

18 January - Stuff Owns Me

2011-01-18T02:36:00.000-08:00

Those articles on decluttering alwasy ask you if you own stuff or if stuff owns you. I'd say the latter. Am already panicking about a possible move I'll do later in the year. Something I really want and look forward to but feel utterly deflated when I think about packing up and storing ALLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL/TOOOOOO MUCH.

Just as I feel all of this weighing on me and start to plan how to consolidate, but I know I'll throw away only 5% of what I have, Angolan queen's email hits my inbox. She's one who's always been on the move and travels light. Not for her to hang on to a duvet between moves, she'll buy a new one and she's absolutely right. Since she's been in Africa she's had the use for her returns of a friends' large house and they've stored for her a few boxes of her belongings, like 6 in total?
These friends are now also moving and will have less space so Angolan queen is asking me to go visit and take out of these boxes a few things like:

1 black dress with birds on, 1 red handbag (that K. gave me for xmas last year) 1 DVD drive for computer with cable
from suitcase the quilt my mum made me
from laundry basket the two pairs of boots
1 x box photos/albums and framed photos
Sigur Ros dvd/book/cd's- (about 4 things)
from another suitcase (I think) 1 pair purple suede m and s high heels and a pair of flat lizard skin sandals both in shoe bags

fill just one suitcase with them and the rest can go.

I have read this email many times now. I could cry with envy.

17 January - Rocks & Stones

2011-01-17T09:07:00.000-08:00

Man, I keep reading what women want, what they don't want etc and how to get ahead and so on but for my empirical observations, they want conflicting things so what's new. I work with high achievers under incredible stress every day but they're here to make money. There are enough women though of course not 'high up'. The ones in the 20 to 30 category are of course getting married, having children etc. Not sure how they will maitain the career upon return.
But it's telling how we chat about nothing much and when discussing god knows what she says 'have you seen the ring H Hefner gave his 24 year old g/friend, it's huge, star shaped'. I say no, so she calls me to her computer and there it is. Not as awful as I imagined. I say go get it Y. but don't sell anything of yourself to get one. But it's kind of sad that she aims for that.

I wish we just woke up one day to the news that diamonds and gold and platinum are no longer worth anything at all, they're practically like silver plated swarovski stuff. Pretty, creative, unique, but worth just a few manageable quid. I'd really like that, instantly wiping out this house of cards that someone created about gold and diamonds. Sure people back in egyptian, roman, whatever times, wanted something that lasts, and gold does last, we're still finding what they hid here and there, but it's absurd the value that's attributed to these things. And sure also, it's immense skill and creativity that some jeweller have employed to create beautiful things to hold, but can they do that with crystal stones and not the diamonds? Can a little polished wood carving now be the perfect gift for valentine? It will wane over time but you won't be here to know it.

Jewels are just things, you can't take them with you, they may buy you a bit of safe passage should the big wars start but not for long. They're not worth more than books etc.

5 January - Gloom & Doom

2011-01-05T08:55:00.000-08:00

Yep, it's here. There's a reason why I try not to be in London in early Jan usually, it's because coming back mid Jan avoids some of this... gloom.
Notwithsdtanding N's invite to join her in Chennai end of Jan (I can't), the skiing in March at L&A, India in april /may, Italy in jJune with M/H and I., late Summer in Puglia or some such, am not thinking it's enough. It really isn't. Need more.

Even reading that Mick Larn died at 52 and with not much money. and Gerry Rafferty died with cash galore in comparison, doesn't put anything into perspective. I want more.

I remember back in the days some of my early friendships beign crazy Japan fans and being their driver as they stalked Mick or Steve Jansen in their flats in Bassett rd. though I remember meeting Mick in a flat in Gloucester rd? Any other memories are gone. Apart from the memory of how amazingly different their sound seemed in those early shows at that venue in Victoria. What was it called? Ah, the Venue in fact. I write the news to another mate from back school days and she says she has bought Gentlemen Take Polaroids about 3 times in all these years having worn it out on vinyl. 1980 seems like the moon to me now.

3 January - Walks and Talks

2011-01-04T02:34:00.000-08:00

Not often in the country at Xmas/New Year and doing it once in a while reminds me of why I should always be away. Too many days with not enough to do in a city that's so large that the thought of going to visit friends etc. is too tiring and you're trying to avoid shops and their sale temptations of products you don't need so you stay in and get more fidgety /bored as there's only so many pages of a book you can read in one go and TV/movies don't take your fancy.

However I should record that a nice walk was had in wet Hampsted with the lapsed lawyer who's now a fresh judge and his g/friend and two kids, the friend with the chocolate dog and the friend of hers with the ten year old and Toph. Due to all the others having lunch first at the old pub, the walk was not that long and for once I could have really gone round the park. Instead we took a long route to get back to the car and marvelled about the massive houses and who lives in them. It's such a mystery. What do they do with all the space? Including the space that's concealed from view? It's not like they can have 20 servants and 12 kids each and at any one time 8 guests staying? Or maybe they do? For sure it's a life lived with a limo driver whisking you away to wherever any time you step out of the door, but I don't know, never really liked it up here... never coveted it.

On another day with friend with dog, Toph and his mother we followed around Maida Vale the friend who's become a city guide and this was her practice tour of the area where she lives. And very interesting it was too, tough slightly too long at 2 hours (will come down to 90 mins eventually) when it's bitterly cold out there. Also, she did not make it clear that the rules of the course say that you have to have your group stood somewhere at any one time before you tell them the history/info ie. walking and talking is forbidden. It's kind of obvious as that way all the group can hear, maybe rest a little if they're not young etc. So for someone with my kind of manic energy it was super hard and not knowing the rule I kept breaking off ahead with friend with dog and then urging Toph and mother to walk faster. The one thing I took away from this walk, apart for more respect for my friend as there's soooo much work gone into devising it, is that we all matter as much as a grain of sand. She told us about all manner of well known figures who had lived in the area and with the exception of Paul McCartney, Billy Fury, Vivian Leigh and Alma Tadema and Oskar Kokolska (spelling?) the others I can't remember. And had we had a 15 year old on the walk, she'd have known NONE. Sure I sort of knew some of the names but truly in their time they may have been a famous artist, entrepreneur, philosopher or engineer or soldier but it's all lost in mist and an in 50 years McCartney will be remembered but not Billy Fury (why anyway?) so you really are insignificant despite your achievements in your lifetime. Good one to remember if I ever get depressed about the lack of mine.

I also had a fab little dinner at Dishoom with the departing Angolan queen and Vindaloo Vic and his family (and Toph). Only 2 out of the 3 daughters and a rare appeareance of the youngest one who is praeternaturally beautiful and only 14 but 5'11" and budding model. The 20 year old was beautiful too but in a different not so captivating way. Vic and wife thanked us for chatting for a longtime to the daughters but it was no chore. They are perfecly formed in social situations. Clever, smart and when not knowledgeable, still interested. I think I performed a parents' good deed by persuading the 14 year old that if she wants to follow a career in fashion she should not drop out of expensive private school to go work in Topshop. Sure you can work your way up and enough people have done it but why not wait to find out if Philip Green's daughter is in they year above yours and cultivate that friendship whilst you're studying. And if you can get a masters in business you can run the shop, no need to re-fold jumpers. Ok you get my drift, I think she did too. And by all means start with the summer job and see how you do.

Dishoom food very good. Toph was finally able to clear one of his puzzles of old. He's always thought VV was odd, his energy, his mannerism and frankness and Angolan Queen revealed he has mild Asperger and so unable to read signs and talking too directly and moving on too fast or overpowering your wishes when ordering in a restaurant, a little like manic child. But that's probably also what makes him a successfull company owner. If you have little empathy and you tell everyone to moves swiftly along then maybe enough people like you for that? I mean, they get their answers straight away? Didn't much help his wife when they had some earlier tragedy in their life and a child was lost to incurable illness but they seem a happy enough family apart from the daughters mild anorexia.

However all of the above filled 2 days out of the long holiday so you know, I still think it's best to be awayyyyyyyyyyyyyy.

28 December - Tower Bridge & Date

2010-12-23T06:47:00.002-08:00

Friend was working at operations centre of a Christmas charity and another volunteer asked her out. She was a bit shocked but said yes. The guy is possibly a professional volunteer ie one that gets paid some salary as he seemed to go round the world doing this here and there and also was working longer hours. She didn't fancy him but nobody asks you out anymore so why not.
He asked her to meet him on the crack of Tower Bridge at 6pm. She was there a bit earlier and had to keep moving as tourists were taking pictures, thus giving him the line 'You're not on the crack!' when he arrived. They moved to it, she said let's go for a drink and he said have one here. Pulling out of rucksack a bottle, some plastic glasses, two of which swiftly blew into the river, and one of those candles in glass holder to fight the wind. He also had an ipod and speakers. The wine was drank and then they moved to a pizza express where they left at 12ish with my friend thinking it was 10pm ie time flew. She still didn't fancy but warmed to him for his inventivness.

Am actually writing this in mid January to post and so it is that I know that he's not got in touch since. Men... he was due to leave the country in a few days so perhaps he thought not worth pursuing or maybe because she didn't go home for coffee with him or whatever. Who knows. She is not that cut up about it as these things, well they happen. I think it's a great sign of progress that one day you're old enough no longer to think 'oh my god he didn't ring, has he been runover by a bus?' My friend cherishes her copy of 'He's just not that into you'. Great book. Solves all the mysteries.
Maybe he always has dates on the crack of TB. Who knows...

23 December - Death & Parties

2010-12-23T02:36:00.001-08:00

Nobody died but nobody I know goes to parties. Our only invite this year was from the lovely and hospitable C and his family over in Shep Bush. We see them once a year. So apart from him, his brother, his wife and his lovely tall, tall kids we didn't speak to no one else. How could we? Why would we? It used to be someone caught your eye or you were told so and so would be interesting for you or vice versa and off you went. But when faced with two roomfuls of ageing middle class peeps and some of their teenage children (bribed as staff to dish out the canapes) the effort seems too much. You're not interested in who/what/why they are and neither are they. There's no one you fancy (the other big pull to talk to someone) or can fancy. Verboten. And because you knew how it would be, same as last year, you don't even make much of an effort with a super outfit. No, a middle boring will do. Why stand out?

In fact at some point Toph engaged said kids. He was talking to the youngest daughter who is tall and therefore he thought she was 15 or so but we discovered she was only 13. Clearly one talks as benevolent uncle, but you also feel a bit silly. So two hours later you escape. In the streets you see other revellers all much younger and therefore having tons of fan going out at the time you're getting into the car to go home. Where did it all go? I could cry.

21 December - Work & Gifts

2010-12-23T02:35:00.000-08:00

C. friend with great job in fashion takes me to leaving do for colleagues who're escaping to go design shoes somewhere else. I do vaguely remember the 30 decade as one where it still made sense to me to try and get a better all around situation or one where I could make may mark. I don't know why these people are leaving? Want more money? More power? Fewer artistic restrictions? A faster path to the top? Who knows, but can't be much else. It's all very lively but am astonished that they are all women bar a few gay men. Never worked in that kind of gender mix myself.

C. has been ill and therefore down with the flu which she gets when she stops the manic work travelling. She's asking me how to break away and move into doing my boring kind of job as all she meets is gay men (ie no straight possible partner) and suffer way too much stress because of deadlines etc. wow! A while back she told me she aimed for a more exclusive fashion brand and I applauded but I guess her window of wanting the top job vs quality of life is diminishing year on.
Didn't really manage to give any constructive advice.

As for gifts, I am intolerable of stuff now. Only like what i want not what other people want to give me and very unchristmassy style am inclined to want to say give me the cash I'll get it.
Nobody likes that but as I also go round trying to buy a few well aimed gifts I cannot help but think that if they just told me what they want it would be so much simpler. This is not so much my fault but consumerism. Everyone has everything. I keep saying give it to charity give mine to charity but nobody wants to do that much. But truly it's a great way. Help someone else. that's what we should be doing or am I mad? It should be kept simple.. books, music, things like that. Nobody should want all the novelty shit that comes out, or the handbag they can buy themselves... Any suggestions? You all know by now that I hate bath products being given to me.

20 December - Bolano & Franzen

2010-12-23T02:33:00.001-08:00

Would my time have been better spent reading 4 other interesting books in the time it took to read 1 Bolano? Granted 2666 will stay with me but largerly only for reason of marvelling at skill of writer at pulling such a monumental feat and for some resonant thoughts expressed here and there by various characters, but certainly not for any of the characters as such (don't care for any except mabye all the dead women in Santa Theresa who are not characters as such). Only the other day I was telling a friend who has yet to tackle the book past page 40 that she should start with the 4th part, and in so doing 'Start with 4, then 5 and then 1 and 2 and 3' . I realisedt that I no longer remembered who /what was in art 2 and 3 read ages ago. So you know, it's hard to recommend a novel you've read in the past 2 years and forgotten so much of it.

As for Franzen I already agree with (the UK) reviewers, great but not all that after all. In other words not a masterpiece. Though Toph asked what do I consider a masterpiece and I couldn't name one, simply because nothing stays with you for long and you'd end up just naming some universally approved book on some top 100 of the western world (always feel have to clarify that the gaps in one's reading are so wide despite reading a lot, that you know entire countries' outputs are missing, some far (never read a south korean writer) and some cose by (never read a greek modern writer apart fro 1 poet, Cavaby).

So, Franzen, well for such an accomplished writer, Patty's voice is not true to the character. It just sounds like Franzen. And that in writing is school boy error non? Both Katz and Walter think she's brilliant /beautiful but why the f ????????? You'd be hard pressed to think that in reading what she has to say. it's only interesting because it's Franzen's voice, Patty wouldn't think half of those thoughts. Then Toph said it's like J. blinded by how brilliant G. is and nobody else can see it. And funnily enough he pursues G. not the other way round so G. is the Patty who maybe one day turns around and thinks 'you'll do' . Though maybe this is normal in all relationships. To think the best of the other otherwise what would you be doing with him/her? and for your friends to largely think nothing of the sort because if they did they'd all be after your partner and that would be well messy?

But yes, very funny novel and very apt for baby boomers, though have not read more than 200 pages (but I am known to skip ahead and read paragraphs /pages here and there, just to check which way the wind blows ahead of my reading).

What I can't get over is this guys' s best friend, David Foster Wallace, one of my other favourite writers though a lot more hard going than Franzen, killing himself. Now my opinions on the killing oneself are variable, alternating between we should all consider doing it at some point and save time/hassle/pain etc or ... we're here for a reason even if that reason is not clear to ourselves and we alll have value even tough we could be said to have hardly any.

But I gather Foster Wallace did it because when he was on medication to feel better against his depression, he could no longer write what he thought was good to write and if he couldn't do that then he was not a writer and therefore did not want to live.

But in Bolano I read the best 2 pages on why sometimes it's best not to bother being a writer of largely minor works which abound whereas the masterpieces are few and far between and i can't currently name you one that seems valid today (sure you know, when it came out War & Peace must have been the best/hardest novel ever) though if all thougth that, then what would I be left reading, this being my one and only favourite passtime and always will be? (noticed I hardly noticed in writing this sentence that I have displaced sex from beinga #1 passtime, when did this happen? bloody hormones gone forever...)
It's all on pages xx and xx (don't have the book at hand, past the misway of part 5 I recollect).

Another thought no school master will ever act upon is , if you wonder how to entice many non readers to read books that appear daunting or have difficult opening pages, slice them in half or in more than 2 parts and select the best bit (someone will have done this for you) and read backwards or forwards, after all our brain can handle it and often the narrative is structured like that deliberately and movies do that now so we're more used to it.

It's true that about 300 pages of count of montecristo right past the middle are totally missable, or chunks of the middle of famished road are equally not advancing the story and could be excised. Not forever but you can tell the reader, go back when you have time to these bits, in the meantime don't just chuck the book out of a window. That way you don't lose readers. Though whose opinion would I trust? And would this be done just for the good books or the skilfully written but pointless stuff I see people reading on the tube? Who am I to banish the jodi picoult?

But my argument doesn't stand. people are not scared of large books like I am. Their heart does not sink when they see 800 pages plus. Otherwise who'd have read all those harry potters, twilight and you name it? But those are 'easy' prose right? Page turners... Bolano certainly isn't, so my argument is only for literary books but Bolano is hard going (you know re-read sentences, work out if they make sense or not) but not literary per se. Ok, am tied up in knots, I don't care, I now simply have to read Savage Detectives though, can't be harder than 2666. I 'll give myself a year for this one....

18 December - Egypt & Dead

2010-12-23T02:31:00.000-08:00

Hey back from egypt and avoided lots of airport snow chaos. Lucky for once.

It was pretty darn interesting there, I recommend it, but you can save it for when you're a pensioner as doesn't require any stress to visit what Luxor/Aswan/Abu Simbel have to offer. Though somehow I never feel totally comfortable in countries where they don't drink. Now, as you know, I hardly do (hence lack of great stories from mad nights out), so am not actually missing the alcohol itself, but I miss the easy going nature of bars and people who are out having fun. In muslim countries even when the locals are nice to you (and they were in Egypt), very smiley and soooo good looking some of the men, you just feel an edge. I can't describe it, but the fact that you don't see a woman drive a car (no way, remember we were not in Cairo) or a woman serving you in a shop, and conversely all you see is tons of blokes milling about and all they do for recreation is smoke a pipe in a café' where only men are milling about having a pipe ... I don't know... It makes you walk past fast, because you feell like a gawker if you linger and look, whereas in any other place you'd stop, have a coffee, chill and mingle with them but clearly it's not encouraged in muslim countries so you feel conspicuous for being johnny foreigner and as a girl you think 'what do you think of me? Should I be at home where your wife is?' and you can't kiss your boyfriend in the street as it would seem rubbing it in somehow so you feel... circumspect at all times. You end up missing advertising billboards even!

Been to precious few places like this, Zanzibar comes to mind or Morocco, but Toph tells me how much he hated being in Saudi Arabia for work once. There the difference you feel in the air is to the max. Egypt is quite liberal by comparison but maybe more so in Cairo. In sleepy Luxor and Aswan is a bit like Greece or Sicily in 1935 I guess, blokes out and about and women at home with the kitchen/kids. No feminism evident at all, though am sure there are women doctors and so on. But they'd make more money by selling drinks to the locals via levy/taxes and could plow it back since it seems still a pretty poor country. It would take a few decades before it turns in to a problem and you get girls falling about in the street or kids knifing each other in housing estates no?

But the history/architecture is amazing - I loved that most old temples have roofs - in seismic Italy nothing is left with a roof fore example - though there's an element of spare/spartan theme park. What's real and what is not? It all kind of looks like Vegas in a sense. I kept touching surfaces of temples and thinking ok this is 4,000 years old that I'm touching. But you don't feel any connections. What it must be like for the locals I don't know. If you're in Rome, in a temple or a catacomb or other, there's still a link to a current religion, whereas here, none of the current Egyptians can link to people who believed in gods with bird heads or that the sun went under the flat earth west of the Nile and came back out of the flat earth east of the Nile.

Anyway, apparently we missed Camilla visiting lady Mubarak the day before and we missed Naomi Campbell's wedding to russian billionaire at the nearby Hilton though quick internet search reveals nothing of the latter nuptials.

Hotel good, heated outdoor pool definitely the winning trick there since sun is only warm 10 to 3pm. Only one minor celeb spied and he's not really, Dr Brian Cox who does those science programs on TV. Yeah ok, that's not much.

One recommendation: don't pick interconnecting rooms in a hotel if on holiday with boyf and his mother. Means boyf thinks his mother can hear every word and sound so er... yeah.. get my drift...? Though I had as stinking cold throughout and he should have just worried my nose sounds were going to disturb her and not much else.

14 December - Off to Egypt

2010-12-23T02:30:00.002-08:00

Forever linked to that wonderful 80's Joanism Riverism... (I think it's her, the river connection) 'Denial ain't just a river in Egypt'.

So yes, no warning words needed re. sharks etc as not going near Red Sea at all, Luxor and Aswan for us. The mother in law is coming as suprise advance xmas gift from caring son (she's had a shit few years past stuck in this country to look after ailing relatives, so she deserves a break). I don't think of her as a shark at all, but will she sink me somehow? Have been told my sniping at Toph is fine when it's just me and him, but am to refrain from bossying him about in front of his ma. Mmmmhhh, ingrained habit am afraid, justified by the fact that withough a bit of bossying of jollying along, Toph is a dreamy kid and drives you mad. Though he can also organise stuff and will want to be his mother's best guide ever.

Never mind, it's going to be warmer than here and not work so rejoice for me.

10 December - More Marmite & Memories

2010-12-23T02:30:00.001-08:00

I didn't go to a dinner, didn't have the balls. But went to Ms Marmite's xmas market at her flat. Was pretty glorious. Love the flat, 's huge and huge garden, and was just choka with people selling and buying. Got to admire self promotion. Recognised many of the b/w prints round the living room, from her old portfolio. Was pleased to see in the front garden a caravan/taxi branded in the livery of GMT beer which friends of mine own. Woo hooo, this is the second time in a week that I see them sponsoring events and for all I know they were at all the Summer festivals I no longer attend.

Anyway, bought a few bits, thought about how much work has had to go into this (and the subsequent clear out of all 'stuff'), tried to calculate earnings from visitors and stall holders, as you do), saw KR rushing about and she's not changed a bit, just a bit larger but hey she's a cook so stands to reason. Didn't feel wanted to talk to her after all and was not the place anyway but at some point as I was standing on some steps by the kitchen entrance, I saw her looking my way and take a picture or two in my direction. Maybe she saw me and wondered (I also have not changed much since those days apart from hair colour perhaps), also because if she goes through the email list of who bought tickets, there, that's my name indeed. Funny thing the past.

4 December - Doctor & Advice

2010-12-23T02:29:00.000-08:00

I meet an ex lover before who has relocated to some small town near Brisbane and is in town briefly to collect partner and child and bring them to the large house on stilts surrounded by nature ie insects and snakes but he won't care, he'll be at some nerve centre of a hospital directing helicopters into the bush and so on.

I talk about some recent loss of libido as you do, he's a doctor, and the fact that I believe that if you stop having sex at a fairly frequent pace, you may as well watch your relationship die. Doctor reminds me that men are visual creatures, you just have to wear blah and blah happens. Which is not what my GP had said, he was more along the lines of us being ahead of our actual evolution and having to do stuff when in fact a mere few hundred years ago we'd be dead and buried at the age this starts to happen. Thanks!

S. mentions 'the little tartan skirt' I wore on occasions of our trysts and gets an erection! We're in a 'soup for you' type cafe, so he just smiles and says Down boy down as they say so I start asking him about crocs in rivers and we move on. But he's right. Never admit to the possible problem rearing its head, just go out and buy the usual mini club dance outfit for Toph and make him happy. Happy to share.

2 December - Marmite & Memories

2010-12-03T07:18:00.000-08:00

So, the other day I picked up a British Airways/Standard sponsored magazine which featured the 100 most influential people in London in arts/media/finance you know the type. As Toph says ‘You read every page, no wonder it takes you so long to read Sunday papers etc’. and my stock answer is always ‘That’s why I know so much more stuff than you do’. So am reading most of these peeps, and in the food section which is not that relevant to me as I don’t chase around the latest restaurant usually, it says that Ms Marmite Lover is ‘a guerrilla cook who pioneered the underground/pop up restaurant scene from her flat in Kilburn.. blah blah former rock photographer KR.’ Fell off my chair!

Back in the mid 80’s I was a good friend of Kerstin, she was a photographer covering music and her best friend was Clare Muller, another photographer and sister of the soon to be more famous Sophie Muller who did plenty of vids for Eurythmics and practically all of Sade’s up to the most recent output of the not so prolific singer. Try as I May, and I’ve exchanged emails with other friends of that period and nobody remembers introducing me to KR or knowing her though they remember me mentioning her. Maybe it was through my dead ex M. or maybe CM who did some work for Euryth when I knew them? and then Kerstin? My mind is simply not throwing up the info at all. Incidentally a friend now in Switzerland asked me in return if I remembered her gay friend N. who helped out at most/all her parties. Not, a, clue. I said was he tall? She said no, very short. Not, a, clue. She said he was at all her parties and so was I, and they were meals or Sunday lunches or bbqs in the garden, not a druggy crowd and pouf! No, this friend did not leave a trace in my memory.

Anyway I was in and out of her tiny flat in Kentish Town and have various pictures of KR including at a b’day dinner at Pollo in Old Compton St with her in a sari having recently returned from a trek in India/Nepal where she had met her husband to be, the lovely but not quite as frantic as she was, Alain. KB had a horrible relationship with her parents. Dad owned a famous agency and had cash and she was always feeling a) not as good as he was and b) that of course he would be the one to give her work when there was none and therefore resented him/mother. Think she also a had better (according to the parents) behaved sister. So her role was quite rightly the rebel daughter. She was fun and an aquarian but also very outspoken/direct/mouthy (clearly between her and HP and FS I must have been the quiet friend? Is that possible? I am direct but those 3 could kill you). Part of the reason may have been that KR was /is shorter than me by a bit and as they say small people sometime develop this bully behaviour to be heard /stand out. She also had the biggest tits ever for that height and I seem to remember she had a breast reduction. Anyway.. I have no idea exactly why we fell out, not the dimmest. All I remember is going to visit after she had her daughter and bringing a gift. She was then staying at her parents who had a gigantic open plan amazing flat in one of the wharves near the Times /Tower Bridge. Daughter had a suitably hippy name like Saffron but not Saffron, maybe Sienna and things were not looking well with A. who could never get a decent paying job (can’t remember what he did? Chef??). And that’s that. Back in the days one had so many friends that forgetting a few for decades didn’t seem to leave you missing them that much.

So have been reading bits and bobs from KRs blogs, and it would appear that she's doing very well indeed which is nice, she was/is involved with various anarchist/protest movements, (makes perfect sense) but that she is also a great cook and has a book coming out based on her blog and am always jealous of people who manage to monetise their blogs since mine is reasonably crap and not worth a book. She seems to be mentioned even in the Daily Beast etc. which just goes to show how media stories can now really travel round the globe. I bet as we speak there are north Koreans wondering if they can go find/eat at her flat. She appears to still have a confrontational outlook on life, which now, on paper, makes me laugh. Fight on sister.

However, despite being majorly interested in catching up in tons of years of someone I used to know, and there being a blog to help me, I found that I just couldn’t go through it all and dipped in and out. Which must mean that my long cherished thought that when I die, Toph can finally read all about me/us here or some other friend will want to do the same, well it just won’t happen. You’d have to be mad!!It seems all the restaurant/soirees etc are hosted in her flat in Kilburn (which has a yurt in the garden occasionally) so am toying with the idea of dropping into one (have to buy ticket first) and see reaction from there.

Am slightly puzzled as to the daughter (there’s plenty of mention of KR being a single mother so Alain er. .. went) but daughter is 16 or so and that cannot be right. The latest she could have had her was 1990 and so either she’s a few years out or I am memory wise. Got to be me. So if we did fall out in 1994… instead of 1990 it means I was already not going out with M. he was dead by then and I don’t remember KR being someone who was there to support me through the pain? And I vaguely remember where I was working but why didn’t we stay friends? Only thing I can imagine is that maybe she moved out of London for a few years? This being prior to email/ easy link? Or that she as a new mother and me still gallivanting to clubs and wine bars maybe I was no longer well placed to be a good mate? This is going to puzzle me for some time.

1 December - Shops & Snow

2010-12-03T07:15:00.001-08:00

Some days I seem to deal with children at work. The amount of questions posed in a 'mummy now, now, I want to know now' tone I get are so many I just have to go to the loo and do my silent screams. Wish we were near a high speed train line and I'd go out scream for real at top of lungs. In the meantime I watch Brett from the Conchords on youtube doing his 'angry dance, in a very 80's style.

But could be worse. I could be working in a shop where I'd have aural torture for a month with all those crappy xmas tunes on a loop. Would send me postal in no time.

Ah, see, what a great start of the month.

18 November - RCA & much choice

2010-11-19T08:57:00.000-08:00

I think I tried this a few years back but had wiped the memory? Which is why I spent a few hours looking through 6000 pictures of the RCA Secret collection, identified the ones I'd like to buy (too many but am assuming by the time I go in most of my selection will have gone to others) and printed a sheet with the favourites and gone to stand outside the RCA at 10.30am on the day. Fat chance. There's a queue sneaking round various buildings and evident detritus from people who must have queued here the night (discarded duvets). Which means that probably only 1 out of my 30 selections remains. And we don't know which one. So a mere 30 minutes see me despatched from this queue and reading saturday magazines at the Wholefoods down the road.

Must remember never to come to this again. When reading about it, must think 'Would eventual little postcard of drawing /painting etc make me happy?'. Answer is no, postcard size is far too small to hang anywhere and granted there are smaller things like miniatures, cameos etc or small canalettos but.. not for me thanks.

I would like the RCA to actually publish a picture of people holding the card they got. that would be fun. Or put up a webcam inside so I can actually see what goes on. That's all I ask for. Keep your cards, even the ones which were easy to attribute and may be valuable, are not that amazing after all. Mr Grayson Perry, Ms Yoko Ono, I mean you for example. Would that stuff get you accepted on a foundation course even?

6 November - Mad therapists

2010-11-11T04:37:00.000-08:00

There I was thiking that ageing is changing the geography of my reactions/thoughts pretty comprehensively and that I'm a boring nasty bitch compared to self a mere ten years ago, but hey, am not that bad at all!!! Oh no, am not.

Picture this. Prior to wonderfully scatty genius girl Ms Heap's show at RAH, had arranged to meet D. g/friend I seldom see who had re-located to Krakow and doesn't pass these shores that often. She was also meeting her long time friend J. who I have met several times over the years but always in party situation and do not know well. I arrive at dinner for 3 and as I sit down remark of D. that she looks amazing (42? 43?) as she usually wears jeans and a t-shirt and tonight she's channeling Chanel in a sort of Natalie Portman outfit. She has same flawless skin and alert look. J. cuts me shorts saying no time for pleasantries as our dinner before the show is limited to an hour and we should discuss weightier topics such as.... ta ra.... her absolutely dreadful time on menopause (she's 54?).
So off we go... frightening me a little and D. probably an awful lot. I figure D. knows her well so I go along. She talks about how she was suicidal, with thoughts of absolute worthlessness and other physical symtoms galore. When I try and say that perhaps it doesn't strike everyone the same, she counters that it's like giving birth and most women go along thinking 'ha, the awful experience won't be mine, I'll have the nice one pls' and then wham. strike you down.

She does offer that she refused to use anything but natural remedies and there's me mentally filing away 'You total idiot, take the goddam drugs', you can deal with possible addiction to those as a separate issue later on. She riffs and riffs on this and I say 'Must have been hard on you to keep it steady for your girls (10 and 12? 11 and 13?) if you were feeling so awful' . She replies that no, they know full well about the ghastliness of it all, she believes in letting it all hang out. Jeesus. Yeah my mother is mad. Great to have that. Husband is still around, after 30 years together I guess he could weather this one. I tried to make a bit light weight of it by saying 'hey we were supposed to be dead and buried by 50 so clearly bodies go wild in trying to cope with all this, evolution has not caught up with medical advances' but she was determined to share her experience.

Later when we exit and are talking about a friend's website and I say how she obsessed for days/weeks about the right kind of shade of mauve for her brochure and I lost my patience and told her clients probably care for content/pricing of her services not the frikking shade of mauve that's in her head and printers can't match, J. pipes up that she's a bit like that. She's wondering how much info about herself to put on her website. Forgot to tell you: she's a psychotherapist! She leads workshops! Clearly any mad person is very suitable to give advice to other shaky people. She wasn't alwasy one, had a successful fashion busienss but hit 40 something and change career into caring but lucrative profession, why not.

I say 'Er, the less the better'. Clients will project all sort of shit on you anyway, that if they knew you kind of lost it for a year or two on this menopause stuff they'd run a mile and if they're male they don't care anyway. Christ! Later on we meet further friend L. and I tell her about the dinner talk. She says -and I sort of agree - that such stuff probably highlights aspects of who you are already. She says 'J. is super intense isn't she?' And there you have it. Am not, ergo I won't be attacked by suicidal thoughts. Though some powerlessness and anger related to that plus f uck, only 30 /40 years to DEATH, will leave me pretty pissed off.

I nearly said at interval when J. went out for cigarette 'Er.. I read that if you smoke you make it worse, the sweats you have etc? and er by the way how much wine do you drink?' But I didn't want her to hate me so much.

Gig was great btw... first half with symphony orchestra conducted by Immi to original score. Get that woman a TV show. Rest of gig was her playing the top songs requested by her fans. Nice varied bunch. She has mikes embedded in her wrists. How cool is that? She does however keep up a constant stream of talking to herself throughout. Charming but also... batty. Wonde what her menop. will be like?

5 november - Diwali

2010-11-05T09:44:00.001-07:00

Happy Diwali for any readers who are indian or love India. Mera kutta kala hai. Ok not relevant but the only sentence in hindi that I'm able to recollect easily. A g/friend of 24 said recently she wants to study French. I told her get tee to the class tout de suite parce que when you get to 40 odd you can learn but it doesn't stick. I go to hindi classes and makes perfect sense when there, the grammar is dead easy and am certainly not learning devanagiri script yet, but the total surprise for me (and speak 3 languages plus know a 4th I never use (German) and because of 2 of those good other ones (French/Italian), I get a 5th and am not scared of being alone in Mexicoooooooo), is that I can't memorise shit/mierda/cacca/merde/sheise. I walk around counting 1 to 10 in hindi or repeating the names of the week and there are always gaps. The same gaps. number 4 or ... tuesday. WTF? There is a small voice that says 'It doesn't matter, you just concentrate on how the grammar works and then when you'll be there, you'll get the missing words easily, plus you know you say 3 plus one or the day after monday and before wednesday. Think laterally. Draw it on the sand. So I imagine my brain is saying it's overloadeda and please leave it alone, and they all speak English anyway, sort of... But it still bugs me that memory doesn't work. A summer ago I asked the niece of a friend (bored at a family party) to tell me no. 1 to 10 in her jewish language. Must have repeated them several times and even at the time I couldn't retain one. Zero. Why this decay? I know they sell supplements for memory but am increasing of the opinion that the vast vast supplements market is a massive con.

It's like the lovely Ulla, facial therapist at .... who tells it like it is and totally does not believe any cream engineers any collagen production in your face. End of. She believes a bit of IPL laser helps but that's that. You can't make it by ingesting anything or by trying to make it penetrate your own skin. No Jose'. No se puede. Ji nahi.

3 November - Old Age

2010-11-05T09:36:00.000-07:00

will not be pretty chez Taylor. Today I gave Toph irritated answers. Goes like this. We all have very precisely shaped characters/personalities/skills. I am one of those who tell you once, expect you've heard me/understood me. You tell me once, and I got it, filed it, acted on it or diarised it to act on it etc. That's why it's super hard to deal with people who repeat or check stuff. By all means, check once but not twice. So whenever a certain friend for example texts me or calls me to double check if I'll be round hers at 6pm as previously arranged... I get the hackles up instantly. Why check? When have I not ever been where I told you I'll be at the right time unless I've given you notice that I can't be etc etc.?
So, poor Toph knows I'll be out at a show with some friends which most likely will end at 10.30 unless I go backstage in which case I'll let him know that I'll be back at whatever time. Himself will be home at 8ish as he has already informed me. So why call me and tell me again?
You can say why get annoyed over such small things but ... I do , you do, we all do.
Perhaps I should be more in a hurry to see him since he's been away for 5/6 days? Perhaps.... But am really looking forward to the show and the friends. Mainly because they're a more rare occasion and with him we're now on year 5. That's the way it goes. Had always read about it and it's true. You just can't keep the same level of excitedness about the routine in your life. Don't want anything else but neither can I treat this like it's more special than it is... So it must mean that going forward ten years I'll be unapprocheable in terms of irritable levels and I'll care not a lot for my relationship. It's possible...

I think Stephen Fry is wrong to say that women want sex less than men, I think they want the same amount but not as they get older... unless women are on HRT or other, then they want it less or they want it renewed that's why people go off with younger lovers all around no? and in some cultures there's an old wife and a few younger models to service the man. One always feels the older wife is to be pitied but I don't think necessarily. She lives in the same nice house, she is who she is, she just doesn't need to have sex just to service him, since she probably doesn't get as much pleasure out of it as she did in her twenties or thirties. Anyone out there with an opinion? Mr Fry also forgets that women can't very well run off to hampsted heath to have it off with strangers, much as they may like to, as the social restrictions on us are much more monumentally crushing than they are on men. Gay or otherwise. Wasn't that long ago we were mere chattels and still are in various parts of the world.

2 November - Woolens

2010-11-02T07:52:00.001-07:00

Maybe nobody has as many jumpers, cardigans, polo necks, vests , heartwarmers, as I have but I border on the sick with all the boxes of them (and you know that's a calling card for the moths). But I enjoy sorting them out at the beginning of winter and be reminded of all the brown ones, all the blacks, all the stripey, all the pale ones etc etc.
Only thing is, I work in environments where it's never that cold and go out wearing some only to then think what have I done, am boiling hot now! so when will I wear all of these? and yet I keep acquiring more here and there. Sometimes I buy some heavy ones, like soft chunky cashmere and think 'Will wear round the house, save on the heating - not for money reasons but for eco reasons' but not even my home gets cold, it's well insulated. I'd rather wear those than dressing gowns or some such... never had one and find them somehow offputting, like they belong in some old film. Apart from the fact that everyone gets attached to their 'old' one and so they look yeuuuuu.
I also have some cashmere trackie and never cold enough to wear them. In my head I waft around like a Ralph Lauren girl in her house in Aspen at Xmas but in reality.... no such thing.

23 October - Hix and Townhouses

2010-10-26T06:41:00.000-07:00

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

2010-10-26T06:37:00.000-07:00

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.

15 October - Art & Thieves

2010-10-15T08:31:00.000-07:00

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.

6 October - Old & Fit

2010-10-15T08:12:00.001-07:00

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.

1 October - Forgetting & Stuff

2010-10-01T02:40:00.001-07:00

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.

13 September - Egadi

2010-09-13T00:10:00.001-07:00

In the Egadi Islands. Just so you know this blog is still going ... but with the usual 37 posts half baked and not really ready to be aired.

9 September - Windy Island

2010-09-13T00:03:00.002-07:00

Somehwere in the Met there's a bunch of islands off the coast of Sicily which Toph glimpsed from the top of the mountain-hill at Erice one year and said "We must go there!". And here we are, arriving in windy Favignana w/o jackets. I did say, "Let's bring some, my mother warned me" but he didn't want to and boy do we need them. Arriving the day after the biggest downpour they've had in years blah blah.

cue is in the title, island of the winds. I think this is my first experience of the scirocco wind, now the fact that half the housing is below ground, or at least the gardens are, in the space carved out of the quarries, makes sense, the wind can't get at you down there and someone landing at one spot and not bothering to rekke the whole island may have, in times past, just got on his boat again and cleared off thinking nothing much grows here or nobody lives here. Then after he'd left the inhabitants would come out and have a party 'fooled the invader again, hurrah!'.

But when the wind abates, it's brilliant, give me a bicycle anytime and I'm happy pedalling everywhere. Toph is too. And all the beaches are down dirt tracks which seem to lead nowhere till you wander further down some rocks and find the coves. It must be like Oxford St here in August abut not in September. Brilliant. Love this place. Would happily come off season, just to hunker down and feel isolated - on a couple of days we can't take the ferry out of here anyway and it doesn't even look that bad in the distance but clearly it is. To be in Europe and be cut off/far away sounds great to me.

You do have to track down the right restaurants though. Not that I can blame the locals for trying to make money in the short window of holidaymakers visiting but it goes against my religion to pay €15 for some basic spaghetti with some sauce especially if it's fish sauce and we're in the Med!

However, I don't think I'll ever eat tuna ever again after visiting the splendidly restored old tonnara of the Florio family and watching old reels of tuna catches. Thank god they're in b/w. In colour I'd have had to run away fast. Such great fish. No way they don't have some kind of brain like their dolphin cousins. Ok, you'd say pretty stupid not to have worked out that every year when they moved around following the same pattern, they'd be intercepted by the fishermen and clubbed to death. But that migration patter had probably been there for thousands of years and until a couple of hundred years ago the tuna were probably largely left alone, or at least until the invention of proper canning methods. After that... gone. Massacred. So yes, I may only be one person but if I don't eat tuna neither does Toph so maybe in a few years of not eating tuna we'll have spared one creature? Who knows. Toph is trying to persuade me that if I do this with tuna I'd have to extend to swordfish and so on. Not ready to banish all fish yet.

6 September - Cosi' Fan

2010-09-13T00:03:00.001-07:00

We're at a morning dress rehearsa. We can hear whispering by the control desk. Jonathan Miller looking pensive-worried next to us. B. looks enraptured. I sort of envy the fact she loves her work, which she fell into by accident one may say, but she's totally immersed herself into.

1 september - Carnival

2010-09-13T00:02:00.000-07:00

May as well be in a bar in ibiza, not that I have been, since the only music I like at carnival is... Sancho Panza. Decide that next year I'll go out at 12, dance till 2/3pm latest, then return home. Next year also I'd like to dispense with the open house offer. Basically you wait all day for some friends to turn up but they hardly come to carnival anymore, it's not a novelty when you're over 40 and then they may just stay for a beer, in other words there's no party sense of occasion or worse turn up at 8pm when you're tired of it all and would rather not play host any more.

Old and moody moi?

24 August - movies?

2010-08-25T08:26:00.000-07:00

Don't go to the cimema much. Wish I went more often as it does kill time nicely but never find the time. Just for the record saw Inception and I know you're meant to want to go twice but no thanks. Ginsburg, yeah funny but shame about the music, really frenchies you can say what ou want it doesn't stand up. Baaria, as they all said far too long but beautiful to watch and quite fancied the lead. Toph wondered what you'd make of it if you didn't know much about the local politics. Have no idea since i do get hat history. The Leopard, just because of restored print and about to go to Sicily and Toph had never seen it. Yes too long as I remembered but brilliant.

20 August - Holidays are for ....

2010-08-20T06:52:00.000-07:00

Last night L. was saying how in ayurveda, summer is for holidays, you should not work, you should enjoy life, recuperate some energy to store up for winter when we work/don't go out as much. I had to ask if ayurveda was a system for the rich or a system for people who are governed by monsoons and the like so that really in summer they don't work simply because of rains or impractical conditions and not just you know for idleness' sake. Bonkers.

Then I rang a friend in Italy who was on holiday at her flat by the seaside but of course all her summers since eldest daughter started going to school (she's 18 now), have been blighted by the fact that said daughter is a dunce and so all holidays have been subjugated to 'A. has to revise for 1, 2, 3 subjects on which she did not achieve a pass'. That's on top of sorry autumns/spring/winters where every day is /was a battle with school work and results. Honest.. she's had years of this. So A. has exams to catch up next week. I wish her luck but would probably be best to repeat the year, she doesn't seem to find that so shameful.

I refrained from highlighting to her mother the pictures of various mildly wild bbqs by the pool with a large bunch of friends which her daughter has posted on FB and which don't seem to tally with any restrictions applied in the 'You have to study, or....' regime. I suspect there is no such regime, there never was, just a gigantic co-dependency parents/daughter (one is bad cop/dad, one is good cop/mum). The other daughter is also set back this year, in Latin, but she's got more of a brain (and pride) and should rise to the challenge. They excitedly tell me that mum is taking them to the Maldives at Xmas. It's mum's 50th so it's her gift to herself. And another proof that she's always undermining the tough 'You've got to study' stance she tries to project. I could say something about middle class parents, or rich parents where it's a given that the kids don't have to try so hard because a job for them will always be found through contacts, but I won't... or I just did....

19 August - Air & weather

2010-08-19T07:33:00.003-07:00

It's time to wave goodbye finally to the wretched canary wharf commute that has sucked so much of my time in the past however long. I was thinking about what I shall miss and could only come up with the following: as an ageing lady I find the temperature on the underground a degree or two too much. But when you emerge from CW station you're always met by a breeze, bit like around Centrepoint. I will miss that breeze.

18 August - Dating & Mating

2010-08-19T07:33:00.001-07:00

By some route found myself on Indians abroad website. Fascinating. Lots of advice re. finding a wife/husband and tons of ads. The mind boggles if I had to search these sites for wltm. But more to the point how do you keep track of all this info if you have dual heritage? It's bad enough to be from UK trying to find UK husband. But you're from UK but brought up in Indian traditions and trying to find Indian husband brought up always over there, how much do you really have in common aside from mother's cooking?

On another note went to meet the kind of ex colleague I meet 2 or 3 times a year, sometimes only 1. Meaning I don't know much about their inner life despite having once been in their work proximity for months or ears. So, stone me, when I hear that this (in my mind) confirmed bachelorette of 49 who holidays with 70 something mother had had a relationship drama. She commutes in from 90 mins away (how people move themselves to small towns to buy a house and then have to live alone, spend hours on trains, spend tons on trains and parking for car at statione etc, I'll never know. On said commute she met train friend, let's call him John, a banker at Jp Morgan, who had first been based in london ,then abu dhabi then Brussels. The friendship was chaste on her side though she liked him and had escalated though to coffee at some other station till the day he stole a kiss and threw her in turmoil since the reason why she'd been single all the time I knew her, was to safeguard heart from being trampled on. Maybe some cutting old experience. So what to do? The heart as we know grows back and she was plunged into desire and hopefulness. Till one of her pretty innocent texts (but they never are) was read by his wife on surprise visit to Brussels. Ah yes, the wife. There was one. Since then he's written to say best to go quiet for a while and has gone totally silent. So far so good. I argued that unless you're a serial well versed cad in which case you can come up with fast and furious excuses for anything (Don Draper anyone?) and are instead the kind who finally got drawn into acting on fancying someone other than the wife, when this happens you get totally scared out of your wits at the thought of losing the house/the kids etc so of course you cut contact.

But would you believe it, my friend/acquaintance has been sick over this for months and is on anti depressants! For a non consumed or hardly consumed non-relationship! I've always thought you have to stay available to the knocks of relationships because if you hide from them, a simple story book one can come bite you on the ass this badly at 49! I had to make an effort not to laugh which is so wrong as I do care for her and I know how real that pain is even if to me hearing the story it sounds like an over-reaction. That man would be horrified if he knew he unleashed this much grief. As far as he's concerned he was only toying with her. Ok, nobody needs my advice but don't you go talking to strangers on trains, it ends in tears.

Baaria and more proms.

14 August - S & P - partial

2010-08-19T07:31:00.000-07:00

from now on anything that says 'partial' means that I haven't finished writing it but that if I sit on it forever, you'll think this blog is defunct so am publishing and later on will amend.

Somewhere by Harrods we've gone to meet S. who is in town with the second woman with whom he's having a baby and has announced it this time by forwarding an article from the New Yorker about said woman (a docu director, daughter of famous american lawyer). He has a habit of doing this (I should link to the post a couple of years or is it 3 ago when at xmas we were introduced to the mother of first child, that was never a relationship but this one is).

The thing is that at some point at dinner he says to me that his mother is finding it very hard to come round the idea (of new relationship/new baby). I said well, would she find it so hard if you got married? He says I don't want to get married for my mother. Fair enough, though am sure that mother (and father) fund him to a high degree since his own oeuvre has not made him any money I'm sure. But then he mentions that his grandma gave him an engagement ring to give to the one and he can't just give it to anyone. It has to be right. That sort of sentiment. I think I looked up to lovely E. with the 6 months bump and thought 'Oh... if it’s not good enough for current soon to be mother of his second child (not to be confused with babymother #1) you have to wonder what does this guy feel heart wise. But I didn't say. Have to say though that I had noticed that apart from showing courtesy and proection to her, he hadn't made any gestures that spelt 'We're in love'. Granted, they were off a plane from NY that morning but still... Where's a bit of jubilation? Especially as he told me he'd met her a few years ago when her mother had held a fundraiser for him and wanted to go out with her but she was with someone else and now .. tara'! she was free to be his.

M. the laywer and hubby D the musician. She is a force of nature, my god! the work she's done prosecuting war criminals, puts me too shame. I don't right any wrongs. They were very well matched to meet E. as could talk about defending the undefendables. D. and I instead discovered some mutual music past figures and we were off. Who names their kid Sheherezade though? Would she be Shazza at school? or Shezzie?

Next evening was for a b'day. P. who's been out with various g/friends drinking all afternoon turned them into Francis Bacon figures. That may be too unkind but drink will make you ugly past the age of 40. As in obscene ugly, your face just deforms and blotches up. Being fat and boringly dressed doesn’t help either.

Toph waking up thinking I don’t want to spend time anymore with people I don’t like and you have to say but we didn’t know it would turn into a diatribe over tapas re. the muslims outside Regent's Park's mosque with N. the shrieking J. american going blah blah ‘I speak Hebrew and so I understand Arabic and I know they were dissing me'. They may well have been but you know, move a hundred yards, the park is quite large.

Poor N. got the brunt of it (friend of Toph, single, stunningly handsome, clearly thinking who are these harpies?) who grew up in a commune and his father died at 30 when N. was 5 of a heart attack due to cocaine abuse! Mother was with someone else for a while who left her to have baby with younger woman eventually. Whenever I hear this plot, I instantly get mad, mad, mad. I hate men for it. I have always hated men for it. E. from the night before, her father had done similar thing, left family #1 when he was nearly 60 and had E. and sister S. with a 30 year old he'd got to know whilst working with her. By all accounts a happy second family but what about the first wife. Women can't just frikking go out get a young stud and start again when they've been left in their dishrag years. I hate nature. I want it reversed, I want the shoe on the other foot. If Toph ever dares do this to me he'll be dead and I'll be in prison. Like you often read these stories of madness but each to their own boiling points. I swear to god. He'd (unfortunately) be punished for all the other assholes who simply switch life midway and get fresh pussy when old women simply can't get fresh cock.

J. and her food weirdness, has to be cubed and from M&S meals! I didn't know so kept proffering my patatas bravas, my pimientos del padron and saying 'But you're not eating anything, please take some'. No wonder she’s fat with all the butter/salt/sugar in ready meals and she eats alone. Clearly it's an illness so I have to understand but it seems to me that psychosomatic illnessess can be cured perhaps by some good therapy, some hypnosis and off you go. Why let food ruin your life to this extent?

13 August - 35 & 49 & 65 - partial

2010-08-13T07:51:00.000-07:00

from now on anything that says 'partial' means that I haven't finished writing it but that if I sit on it forever, you'll think this blog is defunct so am publishing and later on will amend.

Somewhere in Covent Garden
separated, ciliac, helicobacter. various double whammys for giada. Sounds like the marriage went ahead with various close players doubting these two had much in common.

carla who must have said 6 times 'menopause has robbed me of any energy' . Each time I've looked at her boyf , 65 , and he didn't seem to react. I wonder if he's had to hear it a zillion times and is resigned? still, she's sexy and 14 years younger than him... they only met 3 years ago. Do all italian men of a certain age who've rightly accepted the white hair, have to compensate by wearing those blue tinted glasses that Briatore sports?

Am not used to having my praises sang. It's nice but peculiar. C. keeps saying to partner/step daughter 'Isn't she great, what had I told you', a' propos of moi and I want to hide. I sort of don't know if I can reciprocate. C. seems nice and normal to me. We met when we were 20 or 21, don't particularly keep in touch. It's just one of those things.

11 August - Dinner/rain - partial

2010-08-11T06:31:00.000-07:00

from now on anything that says 'partial' means that I haven't finished writing it but that if I sit on it forever, you'll think this blog is defunct so am publishing and later on will amend .

Somewhere in Chiswick near where Independiente used to have office, now long since gone.
Table next to ours with 15 or more assorted 20/21 years old. Loud, happy to see each other, lots of hugging of girls in short dresses/skirts which rose up in getting hugged. They all look like they have parents who foot their bills. Regulation english preppy look for the boys (by which I mean Prince Harry) and wannabe posh wagsies.
Our dinner spent with 3 people reminiscing about trips/work/people they knew. Small percentage known to me and only 2 well enough to care. Much 'have you heard from...?' and surprise that someone who may have been best friend in your thirties has not returned your call since Jan/Feb. Not out of malice you think but they're busy. The reality is that nobody needs friends that much anymore. You sort out own shit by and large without burdening anyone with it. If you do, you actually lose friends who may be having a decent time and don't feel like having to cheer you up or mask own good time so as not to upset you by comparison.

wake up next day with memories of inxs since M. had asked me if I knew someone whose name was familiar but not quite. 8 hours later my subconscious throws up the name of inxs manager who is not the person M. meant and who I didn't know apart from in passing anyway and when I go look things up as usual they're much further back in time than i thought. ie early 80's.

10 August - New Yorker g/friends

2010-08-10T01:28:00.000-07:00

An evening to go meet the TV friend who lives in NY and who has a habit of sending emails out of the blue about going to meet some new g/friend who's about to have his child. Ok this is only the second time he springs this one but it's always done with some news event sort of slant. New g/friend comes preceded by a profile of hers in the New Yorker since she's also a film maker and daughter of a very famous and controverial lawyer who defended some people nobody wanted to defend (Black Panthers that sort of stuff).

E. is very very nice, and her boyf has invited his top friend the Amnesty lawyer as a sort of proof he has friends who totally understand the cause. The two women happily chat. I chat with woman's husband D. who has a career in ad music (they all do after the pop careers end) and knows some people I know. I like the lawyer a lot, MP -I have to start really using people's initials as sometimes I read back and have no idea what anyone is called) . Wish she was my friend but have nothing to offer in her field. I read her CV online and am scared about the high achievments there to which i have none to compare. And she's manage to have two young dauthers as well. Where do these people find the time? I bet she also manages to write a legal blog every day. She was totally young when she was involved in a major trial for crimes against humanity. Was not Pinochet or Saddam, the other one. Bastard died before they reached the end so I gather all gets dropped. Shame.

Anyway, chances are we won't hear from friend till the next child with the next woman may come along? For some reason their body language did not spell love to me but merely, this happend and we're happy about it. Or maybe they were just jet lagged. I did try and caution against them using both surnames as they plan to do. They're an incredible mouthful and do not alliterate or sound good whichever order you put them in. First son already has a name that is
constantly misheard, misunderstood. Some americans think his kid is called Awsome. I rest my case.

He did say an extraordinary thing re the ring his grandma gave him. If it’s not good enough for current soon to be mother of his second child (not to be confused with babymother #1) you have to wonder what does this guy feel heart wise.

9 August - Iraqi proms

2010-08-10T01:26:00.001-07:00

Fee sad for a lot of people a lot of the time. This is one such occasion. A room full of Iraquis, a large room since it's the RAH, and they're listenign to a mixture of old /traditional songs and some new arrangemetns born of a collaboration between the established star and a protegee. The songs sound sad, the people are nicely dressed, probably your longterm London Iraqui and maybe not just the ones who had to leave and can't go back. By now they probably can go back but who would want to since it universally looks like hell and you could die in some mistake cross fire etc etc.
Anyway, I feel sad for anyone who has songs that mean nothing to someone else like me. Not my culture though it's very reminiscent of many others, certainly in melody style or singing style.

7 August - More English coastline - partial

2010-08-10T01:25:00.000-07:00

from now on anything that says 'partial' means that I haven't finished writing it but that if I sit on it forever, you'll think this blog is defunct so am publishing and later on will amend.

somewhere near rye
J s-p story.

the shore house on sea. also seen west/east london people in dorset. then again had been Camp Bestival w/end. food is almost london prices so not sure how often people can have it (during the week it can't be as packed as on a sunday?) but will the proles just bring thermos flasks and sandwhiches?

Around Camber Sands it looked a bit more downmarket.

Dungeness/the cottages bunched together. with all that space, why build right up next to another i wonder? Toph goes exploring the mini pampas towards the sea and reports on architetural designed houses. i stay in the car reading whatever i find, old Douglas Coupland. had enough of barren empty spaces in iceland.

disussingn boys' names. talk about I's one and the fall out with mother in law Eden vs Keanu/Jay sounds required by spiritual guide?

Windy on the front, sheltered down below. sunny when london was dark. Peaceful night sleep.

Little boy repeats all the words. very charming. mummy gorgeous is reading scripts.

We stop to buy guinea fowl but when Toph discovers it's from last season's deep frieze he changes his mind. Dressed crab it is.

6 August - Old PR peeps - partial

2010-08-06T04:09:00.000-07:00

from now on anything that says 'partial' means that I haven't finished writing it but that if I sit on it forever, you'll think this blog is defunct so am publishing and later on will amend

dog noodle, cinema polish rebel songs from under communism era, buddhism LF but talk of synagogues etc. Was a time I'd have killed to get a job with her.

H.'s book on berlioz

C. at bbk /distinction. those were the days.

M's 2 /3rds rewrite. I'd kill myself

Still toothless jerry dammers but now very fat , with hat and bad suit looks like a troll out of lord of the rings. benevolent look. is he high or on medication. must remember people who are fat may be on steroids or anti cancer or anti depression cures so can't really just go yeeewww.

2 August - Marketing & over 50 - partial

2010-08-06T04:07:00.000-07:00

from now on anything that says 'partial' means that I haven't finished writing it but that if I sit on it forever, you'll think this blog is defunct so am publishing and later on will amend .

Friend turend 50. A month later she gets the offers of insurance /save per month etc to build up a pot. Helpfully illustrated with a graph asking 'do you know the costs of funerals across UK'?

Personally iIthink we should be thrown into an unmarked grave and left to rot. £4k is the average cost since you ask. And cremation half of that.