Friday, January 22, 2010

Addendum

A horrifying thought has occurred to me. When we were leaving the pub and I was asked which way I was going, I told the one who brought the pretty that I was going whichever way I'd have company, figuring that everyone was headed to the same place. Except it turned out they weren't. "He's going to Vauxhall, that would be quicker for you, wouldn't it?" came the response from the Bringer.

What if, instead of the helpful getting-me-home-quicker response it seemed to be at the time, it was actually a response to a "get-me-away-from-the-crazy-woman" look from Pretty over my head, that I just didn't notice at the time as I rifled through my vast but strangely empty brain for an excuse to head to the Northern line? What if the look that I thought was "nice to meet you" as we waved goodbye to everyone was, in actual fact, "thank god she's gone with him?"

And now we know it's a serious crush. Because the insecurity has kicked at full force in record time. Dammit. Insanity and crushes, who knew they went together so well? Oh yeah, that's right. Everyone knows. That's where the romantic comedy was born.

Uh Oh

I seem to have developed a dilemma that I'm kind of forced by circumstances to write out here. See, I made the mistake of doing Friday night drinks after work. Normally, not a problem there. In fact, quite the reverse. It's always a giggle to stand around in a pub and take my time over pints while the guys entertain me with whatever comes into their heads to talk about.



It seemed to be heading that way tonight. The guys were in rare form, discussing far ranging subjects that touched on a whole load of my interests. And then it happened. The friend of one of the guys turned up and I found myself tumbling headlong into the biggest crush I've had in a long time. The timing is a little odd, given that L woke me up during the week to tell me that she'd seen the last of my enormous crushes at the tennis in Melbourne. Maybe that set the scene. But whatever the cause, I spent most of the time trying to subtly engage him in conversation - he came in when I was about a pint down after a lunch of healthy, but definitely not stomach lining soup, so I was up for the chatty approach - but at the same time hoping that none of the guys caught onto the fact that I was head over heels with the Irishman in the white t-shirt.



I was thinking for a bit there that I didn't know much about him and, in some respects, I still don't. But at the same time, it doesn't matter. I know that he likes plays, and movies, that he's from Belfast and close to his family. He's tall and good looking and has an accent that means he says things like "fill-um" when he means film. He lives not too far from me, loves a good pub, and has been to Australia some time in the not too distant past. He ventures to Camden and doesn't like the "Primrose Hill set". He doesn't know the meaning of the word insipid, but he likes the sound of it. He didn't seem to be against engaging me in conversation, but at the same time spoke to pretty much everyone there. And he had something about him that made me look as soon as he walked in the door.



So now I will spend days thinking about him, wondering if I should say something to the guy from work whose mate he is. Thinking I should have taken the detour to walk with them to the Northern line tube instead of going with the much closer and generally more practical Victoria line and the less interesting conversational stylings of the one who was going that way. And I'll spend tonight longing for someone to be close enough for me to sit down and analyse the night, to tell me that of course he likes me - regardless of their real opinion. But instead, I'm here all but alone tonight, still slightly tipsy from beer, with a flatmate locked away in her room skyping her boyfriend on the other side of the world, and another flatmate home in Australia and incommunicado for the moment, completely unaware of my revery. So I'm blogging, and hoping that somewhere, someway, I'll get to know more about him, get to talk to him again. But figuring that it's never going to happen, because that's the way my crushes run.

Thursday, January 21, 2010

Sprung

It has long been accepted that the seasons influence moods, sanity, general well being. Generally, summer makes us happy and winter makes us miserable. There's a reason that Scandinavian countries have high suicide rates and Russia has a history of producing long and depressing literature. But today brought out a new aspect of seasonal affected disorder, something I'd witnessed before but never really traced to something specific. Until this morning, that is.

I was, as usual for anything happening before lunchtime, running late for work this morning. I was fairly motoring along as I walked to the tube, but, as I powered up the hill, my shortness of 0f breath meaning I had my own personal cloud surrounding my head thanks to the cold, I saw something that added an extra bounce to the hurried semi-trot my pencil skirt was forcing me into. About halfway up the hill, in the garden of a big Georgian white house straight out of a fairytale, a magnolia tree has gone mad. Just so we're clear here, winter is very much still with us. Last week, there was snow and ice that only disappeared with what seemed at the time for anyone caught in it to be torrential rain. But since the snowfall of last Wednesday (which brought about an official apology from the weather forecasters, in a first ever admission of all-round crapness that wasn't nearly comprehensive enough), the weather has felt decidedly mild. Gone is the run of sub-zero temperatures. In it's place, a steady flow of comparatively mild 6's, with occasional sunshine breaking up the miserable rain and fog. The mildness of last Sunday in particular has had an effect on the poor magnolia. It's been deluded into thinking that spring is on it's way and has begun to sprout buds.

This tree has led me astray before, so I'm trying not to get carried away here. I remember last year, noticing that there were actual leaves on the tree just days before the heaviest snowfalls to hit London in almost twenty years. It is surely the most optimistic of trees, running far ahead of its neighbours in it's rush for winter to be behind it. But I couldn't help but smile a little at the thought that, sometime in the not too distant future, spring will come. And with it will end the harshest, coldest and last of my northern hemisphere winters. I can hardly wait.

But neither, it seemed, could a couple of other people out and about today. Because, in the space of about ten minutes this afternoon, I looked from my window at work to see two more people who have clearly emerged from the depths of winter without their sanity. The first was a woman, middle aged and seemingly ordinary until you noticed that her lower half was covered by a skirt. And nothing more. She was clearly not wearing stockings. Nor was she wearing boots - footwear of choice for the sane pretty much every day so far this year - or even closed in shoes. She had summery sandals on her feet instead. And they weren't even blue.

Closely following her, a man proved that weather-induced insanity is not gender specific. Sure, Britain, and England in particular, is known for the first hint of sun bringing out the sunbathers in the parks; topless men and bikini clad women risk frostbite annually on days when I'm still debating the need for my winter woollies. But this guy? The first of the year to be exposing skin whilst sober, surely. He was wearing shorts and thongs or, for those non-Aussies who are slightly disturbed by the thought of a man walking down the street in a thong, flip-flops. He wasn't out for a run. He wasn't just popping to the shops. He was headed somewhere specific, I don't know where. But I didn't see him come back, so I'm guessing the men in the white coats caught up with him eventually and took him somewhere warm. If it's toasty enough, it's almost tempting to copy him, to be honest. But no, I'm holding out for the weekend. Apparently, it's going to reach a whole 8 degrees. Heatwave conditions. I'm not sure how I'll cope...

Sunday, January 17, 2010

Top Quality

I've been reading chick lit again. Devouring it, in fact, ever since I got back from New York. The latest conquest is the I Heart... series by Lindsey Kelk. It's thrown up a couple of questions though. Like how you can stick a disclaimer at the front of a book claiming no real or intended resemblance to any real person, then proceed to rip off reality. Sure, sounds harsh, but let me explain why I'm saying this.

The basic premise of the first book in the series is that Angela Clark, a Brit, runs away to New York when she finds her fiance cheating on her. So far, so chick lit. You just know there's going to be romance, new friends, smiles, tears and general dramas waiting for her as she gets her life together in a new city. The catch is, for me, that her first friend is a girl called Jenny Lopez. There are a load of references to the fact that she's not "that" Jenny Lopez, but still. Then she hooks up with a guy called Tyler Moore. Just like Mary Tyler Moore, but without the Mary. So naming characters is clearly not the author's strong point. The next character with a full name is Alex Reid. Hmm, I'm thinking this might have been written around about the time that Katie Price split from Peter Andre. Sensing some topical naming going on. What was she doing, sitting with a gossip mag on her lap, and an old TV show on the box while she was writing? And given the James-Blake combination in the second book of the series, well, anyone for tennis?

But whatever. What really got to me, though, was her description of Alex's 'hipster' New York born and bred band, Stills. See, this one is also remarkably close to reality. There really is a New York based band called The Stills who, just like the band in the book, had been together for nine years when it was written and met in art school. So she dropped the "The" and stuck her incarnation of the then-current squeeze of a celebrity in the front of the band instead of the real life Canadian who is really their lead singer. Wow, that makes it all totally original, I guess.

See, I don't read these books for their original plotting; there is something comforting about knowing that the girl's life is going to get totally screwed up but, by the end of the 300-odd pages (because they're almost always about 300 pages long) she will have gotten it together, whether 'it' is her love life, her career, her friends, her family, or some combination of the above. It's nice to see someone who, other than their ability to both afford and fit into designer clothes whilst eating hearty meals (because, after all, size 12 involves having an arse of monstrous proportions in that world, right?), could, theoretically, be you. If the world was a little more perfect. But come on folks. You can have a genre specific novel without ripping off EVERYTHING from somewhere else. Use a little ingenuity, please. Otherwise those of us who enjoy reading books with caricatures of beautiful women carrying loads of shopping on the covers will never be able to raise our heads on the tube for fear of meeting the eyes of anyone else in the carriage. The judgement attached to the knowledge that there is no defence for our reading choices will chatter us forever and reading chick lit, like overindulging on chocolate, will become a guilty pleasure to be hidden. And those of us who attempt to write anything at all will turn green - not necessarily with envy, more along the lines what happens when the Incredible Hulk gets angry - at the thought of what HAS been published, while knowing our own manuscripts would never make it out of the slush pile.

So, in a plea to all the people who write and publish these books, some quality control, please. I know, they sell like hot cakes. But has the publishing world totally sold it's soul? Has editorial surrendered control of the presses to the marketing department? And can the next I Heart book hurry up and come out? Because I want to know how Angela's life is going to fall apart in Paris, and just how many hot men she is going to hook while dressing herself in designer clothes on a freelance writer's salary. And my own celeb-inspired novel? Well, as soon as I decide which Olsen twin to base a character on, it'll be in the mail to the nearest publisher.

Thursday, January 14, 2010

Nit Picking

I've been indulging in a little naval gazing lately, partly brought about by a dose of the flu, partly by the weather, which has made it so that I'm terrified to set foot outside the house for fear of falling on my arse, getting filmed doing it, and ending up on funniest home videos. That's led to a whole lot of examining why I'm so clumsy and why I'd rather sit inside and look at the pretty through the window than venture out and experience it first hand. Because it has been pretty. And I do love snow once I lever myself out of the chair and pull on every item of clothing I own - not just because it's cold, but also in a vain attempt to cushion as much of me as possible; given that I woke up this morning feeling like I'd managed to dislocate both hips in my sleep, I think it's a futile exercise.

But at least I think I've found the source of my inner klutz. It's a result of my innate laziness. The incident where I tripped and ploughed headfirst into the side of a train? Was because I'm too lazy ti lift my feet properly after the first hundred metres of sprinting. Being falling-down-sober in the casino and ending up with a seriously sprained ankle and a trip out of the service entrance in a wheel chair? Because I was too lazy to pay attention to just how many stairs there were. The ball flying off my own hockey stick and into my face? Product of a half-arsed attempt to tackle someone in a training drill. Doing the splits getting off a bus in Tallinn Christmas before last? Because I was too lazy to use muscles properly to step down slowly and just went flop - in more ways than I'd expected as it turned out. And my current inability to walk down the icy footpaths now that London has officially stopped gritting any non-major roads? That would be my failure to develop the stomach muscles necessary for balance.

Given half a chance, I could easily become one of those hermits who crops up in kids movies, the one who has the messy, rundown house but is never seen. The scary neighbour who, like Boo Radley, the only reason you know they're still in there is because you haven't seen someone carry them out yet. And the inevitable consequence for me of living like that would be the way they'd eventually have to get me out of the house; it would also be like something off the TV, only it would be the shows where they have to remove the wall of the house and use a crane to lower out the lard ball trapped within. My laziness is accompanied by a deep and abiding love of all things bad for me. Television, books, writing, hell, even sewing. So many things that can keep me occupied for days, weeks, months, without needing to step beyond the bounds of the living room, the kitchen, my bedroom. As long as there is something for my mind to do, I could be content. Strangely, my mind has never been lazy. It's always been rather active, in fact, mostly in search of reasons for me not to be up and moving. I guess something had to move, just to prove that I was alive.

But it turns out that I've always been lazy, right from the very beginning. When I was still rolling around on the floor, refusing to even sit under my own steam at an age when most kids were walking, I was taken to the doctor for fear that there was something seriously wrong with me. And it turned out there was. I have been medically diagnosed as stubbornly lazy. When propped on cushions, I would dig my heels in until I was once again lying on my back. I learnt to talk incredibly early so that I could order my brothers to bring me anything I wanted. I'm fairly certain that this early show of determined sloth had resulted in the lack of stomach muscle definition I am blaming for my appalling balance. My suspicions weren't contradicted by last weekend's phone call to my parents.

I seem to have been a topic of general conversation in Melbourne, where they have been wondering how I cope with the cold (refer above for the answer: I don't. I make an environment where it isn't cold and I stubbornly refuse to acknowledge any alternative). There have been news reports of people falling and breaking bones. Mum is justifiably convinced that I'm going to join the ranks of these people. Given my track record, I can understand the concern. She was trying to make sure that I had the right shoes on when I went outside, but I promised her I hadn't left the house without wearing hiking boots since Christmas, that it wasn't that I didn't have the right shoes, but rather that I didn't have the right balance. Mum's response was typical, fast and to the point.

'Yes, you were never very good at rollerskating, either, were you.'

Confirmation from an unexpected source - when your mother doesn't defend your abilities, you've really got no hope, and besides, how many other people went rollerblading and ended up getting stuck on tramlines? I was a truly terrible skater - I've cringed every time I set foot outside this week until the overnight rains washed away the last of the snow and ice. If they hadn't, I might have been forced to dig my heels in once more, but this time to avoid being flat on my back. One of these days, I'll just give up and stay inside. And on that day, you can call me Boo.

Thursday, January 07, 2010

Feeling for Snow

It's been snowing in London. It's been bitterly cold with it. I've been lucky, in some respects, because a dose of the flu has kept me at home - although L believes that I shouldn't have stayed home when my sinuses felt like golf balls were lodged underneath my eyes, but should rather have gone to work and saved my sick leave for something more serious; I'm guessing she expects me to have an accident bad enough to require amputation one of these days. But it has meant that I haven't been forced to venture out since the snow started falling, which in my world can only be a good thing. I'm well enough this morning to have to go out though, and I'm not looking forward to it. Because last night, listening to the cars on the street skidding into each other at low speeds - or in the case of one unfortunate ambulance, higher speeds, it occurred to me that there are things you don't know about snow if your only contact with it while you're growing up comes through the television. So here is my later life list of lessons about snow.

First up, while it's falling, it's basically rain. In movies, it always looks so pretty, giving everything a nice white dusting. And when you're watching it falling through a window, the prettiness holds. When you're caught out in it without an umbrella, on the other hand, you will come in looking like a drowned rat. Just a little colder than the usual and in some cases, a drowned rat with dandruff until the flakes finish melting.

Snow makes sounds while it's falling, but also somehow seems to deaden some sounds at the same time as it makes others travel further. The soft rushing noise of it's falling always alerts me to the need to look out the window. If it's falling to softly for the noise to reach me, the absence of other sounds at home let me know that there's something going on. The traffic noise seems to disappear into the mush. But at work, it's the ability to hear the bells of the church near the tube. On normal days, they can't be heard over the noise of traffic. On snow days, it's like being next door to the steeple.

Walking through fresh snow also makes a lovely crunching noise as your boots break the surface tension. It's a crisp sound, lovely to hear the first time, until you realise that everybody who's out to make that sound is really just compressing the snow. It's then that you learn that your life in a sunny climate has in no way equipped you for life in a cold one. You can't skate, you can't ski, and you damned sure can't walk on the skating rink that snowy footpaths become as more and more people flatten the snow into ice. Because crushed snow, the kind that you find on footpaths, for example, is not the pretty crunchy stuff that fresh snow is. It is hard packed ice that the inexperienced have to shuffle along, like the cars on the road with wheels spinning but no traction. Until the men with their shovels and grit make it to work and start clearing safe pathways, footpaths become dangerous territory. And there's no escape.

For all that, though, it is really beautiful. The novelty of seeing London covered in a soft snowy blanket makes up for the days of stomach clenching misery that follow as I negotiate my way to work.

Ooh, work...damn, late again. Oh well. The other thing about snow: it makes a convenient excuse for tardiness.

Sunday, January 03, 2010

Forfeits

I got back from my annual Christmas/New Year trip to pretend that I'm not an orphan yesterday. Flatmate L and I were in New York. First impression is that I can't really give a first impression of a place that seems to familiar; after seeing it in so many TV shows, movies, clips, books, the geography of the place is so familiar, the accents, the lifestyle, everything about it seemed like I'd been there before. It was a great trip. And now, I have to pay the price of that.

The most obvious cost is that I'm jet lagged. Not nearly as badly as the last time I went home - I feel like I could be awake until at least 3 pm. But the tiredness isn't the true cost of the jet lag. It's a little more complicated than that. See, L is, in some ways at least, superhuman. She doesn't need to sleep, or that's what she's convinced herself. So, she doesn't. All during the trip, I experienced the joy of being woken up when she decided it was time. And today, she felt that I had slept enough, deciding to try the subtle method of turning on the TV, which is right over my bedroom. Except she turned it onto a music video channel - her favourite viewing selection, if Friends isn't available - and now we will have Lady Gaga running on high repeat for the rest of the afternoon. Now don't get me wrong, I like a good music video as much as the next person. Unless the next person is L, because she has something of an obsession with them. But after the first hour, the repetition drives me insane. And I was proud that I managed to get through our trip away without killing her, so I'd like to keep that record intact. Not likely when Gaga is telling me that he can't read her poker face.

Of course, the other penalty is that I have to head back to work tomorrow to pay for it all. And for the first time since August, I won't be on reduced hours. Welcome to 2010. There's a whole month of working full weeks until the almost full pay kicks back in. And I'm so excited about the full pay that it was easy to forget about the extra time at work. Not that we work so hard in the first place - it's still a lighter load than any full time job I did back in Australia. But the first week back after a break is always tough. It feels like a month. And that's when it's a short week. The tricks of the calendar make this a full week. Joy. Well, I guess I did spend nearly every penny I earned - and a few that I didn't, thanks to the wonders of credit cards - so here we are, back with me needing to work.

But then I think back to being in New York. To sitting on a distinctly lopsided boat while fireworks went off next to the Statue of Liberty for midnight, and it suddenly seems worth it. Because at the end of the day, I'll still pay almost any penalty in order to travel. I just reserve the right to bitch about it when I get back.