9 January - Ennui

Am a philosopher. Check this out, came to me today ha ha ha. So the thing is that if you have a thing that doesn't work you think if you fix it everything will be fine and converely all is shit till you sort that out. But what if in reply to a friend who asks how's things in your world, you say: job safe, money in the bank, house ok, boyf loving and supportive, family near and far all healthy bar one aunt with cancer but c'est la vie, shit happens at 75plus, and .. is that all there is?

So the fact that you're not 'happy happy' means what? that we always need some drama or adventure as a distraction? where to go, what to do, what to fuck up? Is our natural default mode if we have food on the table, roof over head and love one of, you know... ennui?


I feel no immediate compulsion to go fuck anything up in my life, am sure soon enough it will happen without my initiating it, so I probably have to live off other people' dramas. Like hearing that in the home of my friend who shares it harmoniously with ex husband and his shipped over thai g/friend who now expects a baby, the following happened. Other girlfriend, the one who didn't know till last year that Thai one existed of was indeed such a close threat, goes into the house to put the stage costumes in the washing machine (me, I'd leave it to him to do this task). Sorry you don't know that they are in the same 'act' still. I mean, it's not like one would be walking away from millions with Eurythmics so why she stays in the act after all this humiliatin i don't know but people are very co-dependant. So, she rings ahead to say she'll be doing this and can thai girl pls stick to own quarters so as not to meet. However for some reason thai girl shows up in the kitchen, the other one goes into fury and attacks, thai girl goes pick up a knife and He, Mr Big in this, luckily is on hand to step in and separate. A drama I don't have.

Or I can read those terrible stories in the Saturday Guardian personal story section story like my husband left me for my daughter (his stepdaughter actually, but known her since was 12) and next time I meet them is when my other daughter gives birth and in walk ex husband and my stepdaugher because she's also about to have a baby. A drama I don't have.

Or I can read the one about Vanessa Bell's daughter (niece of Vrginia Wolfe) who married the much older guy who had been her fathers' lover and had also been rejecte by her mother. And nobody had actually bothered to spell it out to her. Blimey! A drama I don't have.

But rather than dwell on dramas, I could arrange to spice up my life in a healthy way. I should go heli-sking in Manali like some rich man I know is about to. Just looked it up on website. sounds /is amazing. What could possibly go wrong there. Apart from avalanches for which he is totally and fully equipped, he probably has one of those impact bags that I saw in a James Bond movie and turns into a balloon and you stay inside with air to breathe and roll on till you stop/they find you. James was in his with a lady of course.

I hope you appreaciate that on top of being a philosopher I also have such an imagination as to never really be alone whilst my mind roams around like this. I know, I know, you are spotting that I'm lacking a mission in life.

21 Februray - LA maybe that will do it

And lift the glum. Though I have failed to do what I often suggests to other friends down in the dumps ie. read a few pages of Candide a day and you know, get over it.
The BF has booked me a flight as I didn't sound too stable on the phone lately. To be honest I'd rather go skiing than go to LA, been there done that and much as with recent visit in NY, I don't have anything to get by going there, though of course will be super pleased to hang with bestest friend PM and maybe see San Diego friend TC, and have dinner with ex wife of best friend who's now dating talkshow owner/producer and so on but apart from a bit of warmth and the BF's supersized bed he keeps talking about, being glum in general means you don't get that excited about this trip either. I am such an ungrateful sod right now...

12 March - Acupuncture & MacLovin'

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

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

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

3 August - Blog fatigue

Having blog fatigue, which is common presumably. I’ve heard this writer on the radio talk about having a column for some Scottish newspaper and how after about six months the novelty of giving out your opinion on everything wears thin and … you have no opinion or you have a similar opinion to another opinion you already have. And you don’t get out of a short set of topics. Or if you do, and say you’re a lightweight commentator and you get asked about the war in Iraq, sure you give your opinion but why should anyone give a fuck and what does your opinion actually contribute to? To an ocean of more opinions, think about all the opinions of all the opinionated all over the world. The mind boggles.
If you were to read this blog from the beginning it would be easy to work out what I think about most of the time (like those vignettes in newspapers where thy portion out celebrities’ brains and if it’s Daniel Radcliffe, half of his thinking time is on Harry Potter and so on) as I only write about certain subjects: sex, Toph, health and fitness, a little cultural stuff sometimes books, sometimes a movie, sometimes a show, music, very little TV, fashion, my friends’ predicaments (which include sex, relationships, health, hobbies, kids, pets and so on), the kids they have and the kids I don’t have and TRAVEL. No cooking, no politics, no saving the world, not even recycling (been refusing plastic bags for years me, mate, why wake up to it now?). That’s about it, sum of my life. Is this ok? Doesn’t look like much. In fact, it’s depressing. Think I need to go do one of those ten days all silence, all inward meditation retreats and seriously come up with something better to write about.

25 July - Another problem I don't have

I thought I’d use wisely the time to myself provided by Toph’s absence and so it was out with the wine, out with the sugar, out with the bread, out with the dairy, out with the caffeine. And in with the 3 day detox beverage which somehow has extended to 4 days and could go on for longer as you get sort of addicted to your goody-goodyness. It’s all ok, it just gives you this knot of anxiety in your throat/neck/solar plexus/stomach. Well the stomach is clearly wondering where those nice sugary bits that it usually gets fed are, oh and some of that salt too and that little bit of lovely wine. The stomach has too much time to idle when it’s just digesting fruit, veg and some grilled/raw fish for protein.

I only had a smidgen of a headache on first day, as I don’t have that much to detox from to be honest, but the knot is persistent. If I were into analysis I’d say it’s probably telling me there’s something else apart from food to process and the entry from a couple of days ago is explanatory enough. However, I ring D. to ask how the ‘Save our marriage/let’s hope we can agree to go forward’ holiday with kids and estranged (verging on the autistic) husband in Norway went. I’m greeted with ‘I’m a bit busy right now, with all this stuff to pack’. ‘Where are you going? Back to Poland?’ (where she hails from and has a couple of flats - as mooted before if things didn’t work out). She says yes, on Saturday, it’s final, she’s off, goodbye West Hampstead and the schools for the kids had already been looked at/booked in Krakow.

We make a hasty arrangement to meet tomorow for a goodbye drink with other girlfriends and save the talk for then. I put the phone down and burst into tears. Shall I blame it on the detox? I can’t believe I’m losing her. I love her. And I know it’s only Europe but….. Last night I was out with a mutual male friend who said a propos this husband who’s about to have to plan the next few years round the times he can see his kids ‘He’s a fool to choose work over family’. But is he? There’s a dream he’s been chasing for a while, come very close to and he could almost grab it now. Something of his will either be very successful come September (depends whether you believe a certain Canadian singer who kissed Carrie in SATC is due for a return to #1's) or not. But what a shame to spend it on alimony.

This time there’s the added factor X in the shape of 20 years younger collaborator. He’s smitten with her, because she looks up to him with admiration and veneration (in fact I could cynically say because she needs him for her fledgling career). But he can’t see that, he just sees someone who makes him feel centre of the universe, doesn't laugh at the hair dye (he's 47 and yes, I laughed and his wife cried when she found how much he's now spending at the beauty salon!) and doesn’t ask him for any boring stuff to do with the kids, the house, the bills etc. and just leaves him alone to 'create'. Same old story really.

14 May - Depression & Happy pills

Walking around solves so many problems. Not that I had any, but 48 hours in Lisbon saw me covering miles and not thinking about any downer thought for a second. Apart from 'There's nothing to buy in this town? How is that possible? I haven't come here to get someting from Zara...' So it’s not really big news reading in the papers that people here get over-prescribed antidepressants (or demand them and the sick and tired doctors just dish them out) when in fact, DOH, sending a few people to do some work on a farm or getting them out of the house for along walk seems to work out well in Holland or some other country and reduce the numbers of depressives. Of course they could have plenty of sex instead which banishes many a negative thought/self esteem problem but wanting sex is an apparent contradiction when you’re depressed and you can’t be forced to have it, (though am sure there's some anti depression clinic in Holland where that's part of the cure), whereas you can be forced to go for a walk in exchange for your next prescription of happy pills. As a matter of fact, I'm probably paying for some of your pills, so get on a bike ye who complain of darkness and no end in sight. Unless you've been recently bereaved, I have very little sympathy.

As an example they interview this woman who says she went to the doctor because she was depressed (ie in her case she was actually worn out) by working a 13 hour day, it doesn’t say which kind of job. She gets the pills and then changes job to another 13 hour day type scenario, which if you add in travel time etc, must have left her time to go home and sleep and start the whole sorry thing all over again. I’m sure she was depressed or … just very, very tired and sick of living because her job was robbing her of any pleasure in life? Why is it all so f king obvious?
Someone gave me a book called How to Be Free. Whilst I don’t think I’ll subscribe to many of the writer’s suggestions (can’t see me playing the ukulele or joining into singsongs for a start… or moving to the country), he, and a bunch of other writers of current non fictional stuff seem to advocate the same basic things like not watching TV and not reading the papers. These totally have nothing much too say most of the time. When there’s no news there’s ten days of missing three year old in the Algarve. Sure a personal tragedy to her family, but you know, hardly news, call me cold hearted and all that. Shit happens. It will be hard to kick the papers, but it has to be done. Though it all plays into getting old and caring less – although it should be more, and for some it is, hence my director of communications quitting next week to go spend a year with a charity working with children in Mexico (she’s 48or 49). So there are those kind of exodus/es to more meaningful ways to ‘do something’ balanced by a lot of ‘couldn’t care less, let’s hide in cottage in the country’. Which is easy, though making your own compost isn’t, nor is weeding. The problem is how to handle ‘couldn’t care less’ whilst living in the city. Guess in the country you have to make an effort to go purchase a newspaper whereas here they are abandoned on the underground and you just pick them up. I can see am rambling so shall stop.