R.I.P

Oh shit.
Ivor Cutler is dead. I’m sad.
That’s all.

Play, record

1. Blogpeople, today I felt like being ignored, so I went to Dixons, that emporium of all things technological. I urgently needed a camcorder tape, if you need to know, and that is strictly for professional use. (I haven’t broached that topic with my Special Lady Friend yet.) I love going to Dixons; the inevitable bunch of young guys with half a GCSE between them who stand around chatting always make me feel so welcome! (I’m a girl, girls have no business in Dixons, didn’t you know?) I try to take it as an exercise in self-assertion. Yes. I mentally gave myself 50 points for getting a shop assistant to the till under 3 minutes, with just a raised eyebrow and an insisting glare.
Then this afternoon, after being patronised by the bloke who lent me the camcorder, I gave myself another 50 points for not biting his head off and/or shoving his tripod up his ass, then I made a little movie with my brand new tape; that didn’t feel like the beginning of a new, more glamorous career, but it was fun nevertheless. I've always liked that word.

2. Now I am wondering what’s up with my Special lady friend; she’s not returning my random emails and she’s been sounding a bit.. a bit… something, recently. I hope it’s not me. Maybe there was no point in keeping that camcorder for the weekend after all. Better call her. Be well, all.

Mango Chutney

1. People of Blogland, my Special Lady Friend is making kedgeree and kicked me out of the kitchen, so it’s just you and me. (I was banished from the kitchen because I’m a mess around onions. I cry, and cry, and it’s not even cute.)
I poked my head round a minute ago just to check how I could make a nuisance of myself.
Say ‘Bromide’, I asked.
What can I say, I like the way she says it. It’s the way she rolls her ‘rr’. It does things to me that bromide itself definitely wouldn’t.
‘Brrrrrromide’, she complied with a smile.
‘I knew you loved me!’ I purred, and closed the door.
I reckon we should write a cookery book together. She reckons we should call it ‘Dykes’ dinners’. Do you think it would sell?
I poked my head around again; the smells are making me hungrier. She was crying: deadly onions. I opened a bottle of Sancerre. It’ll be a meal worthy of the gods, I’m telling you that much. Santé.

2. Blogpeople, my Special lady friend and I are both penniless, broke, skint, bust. I know why I am: it’s all those things I bought and/or ate in Paris, hotel bill and train tickets, on top of my general usual lavishness. (My SLF is seemingly broke because she purchased a new power drill.) So, no going out until payday, but that’s ok because it’s too cold anyway. In an attempt to bring this dismal, limp, fizzless February down on its miserable knees, the rest of today shall be spent the exact same civilised way it began: with copious amounts of good food and extremely dirty sex (if it’s not dirty it’s not done right). If I’m lucky, I’ll get a massage, too. I’m feeling very lucky.

Blogfolks, I’m starting to like Sundays.

Red Bush tea is not a stimulant

Blogpeople, have you read ‘The Number one Ladies’ detective agency’ by Alexander McCall Smith? The one with Precious Ramotswe, you know, solving adulteries and disappearances in Bostwana. Cute, simple, with endearingly candid characters. Is compulsory candidness a Bostwana thing? So candid that on a bad day I might say that he makes everyone sound slightly retarded. I reckon the book boosted the red bush tea sales so much that now even Sainsbury’s stocks it. And then yesterday my even-slower-than-usual brain demanded another easy read; so I picked up ‘44, Scotland street’. Well, in Alexander McCall Smith’s books, all the characters are…. ..endearingly candid.
(Today’s a good day.)

In other news, I have no other news. I hope you are surviving February and taking your vitamins, sleeping well at night and getting plenty of cuddles. Be well.

Bloglanders, how have you been?

1. I’m such a terrible girlfriend. I was unavailable for Valentine’s and eloped to Paris with another woman, then had a dream of wearing of gold leather hotpants. Now I’m back; broke and exhausted, and I didn’t buy any hotpants.

2. Bloglanders, my little stay in Paris with Charlie was good, and somewhat shifted my vision of my capital city. If I explain how it’ll sound like a cliché so I won’t. However, I still had the impression of being in a country whose language I speak with no accent, but whose popular culture is now foreign to me. Or the other way round.

3. Charlie is trying to be pregnant, and although her body is telling her one thing, Clearblue tells her another: nope. Therefore one night we went to the Louvre and looked at the Annunciation paintings, when angels were the Clearblue tests of yesteryear; except you didn’t have to pee on them at all! But there are only so many Virgin and babies you can take, so after a few dozen we left and had rare steak, chips and Côtes du Rhône.

4. We walked, gawked, and ate out way through Paris, so I probably wouln’t have managed any kind of hotpants anyway.

5. And now Charlie wants to go to Camden! I don’t know if she’s pregnant, but Jeeesus tap dancing Christ, does the woman have stamina.

It’s ok, I’ll rest when I go back to work next week

1. Yesterday we walked and looked at stuff, mostly. Then it was the Bermuda triangle of Topshop, and I thought I lost Charlie, but she found her way out! Phew. And today I managed half a Spanish lesson and came home for a nap.

2. Bloglanders, I’m still being a granny, and that’s not going to change, you know. Some people love me anyway. I think. Perhaps on making new acquaintances all parties should sign some sort of a contract; mine would include:
· Y needs her sleep, and lots of it, beauty or otherwise. 9 hours is standard, 10 preferable, 12 ideal. Do not interfere, or expect her to engage in anything where active participation is required on less than 7 hours’ sleep. In fact, Y’s motto is ‘All wakefulness is sleep deprivation’, which is a notion abundantly illustrated in the Bible of sleep.
· Do not expect Y to function on an empty stomach. Symptoms of subsequent severe malfunction will include snapping and monosyllabic responses as well as a total lack of interest in anything. Don’t risk it.
· On no account will Y ever do any of the following things willingly: go clubbing; enter a fast food establishment; listen to hip hop; wear a velour tracksuit or white trainers; wear lipstick; kiss anyone wearing lipstick; wait for a night bus in the winter months; watch a football match; gush over how cute babies are; eat pickled beetroot.
· Y is physically lazy. That’s the way it is. Now sign here and love her anyway. She's an ace cuddler, you know, and she can cook.

3. Ok. I need to pack, we’re going to Paris tomorrow, you know.

I’m a wimp.

My lovely friend Charlie finally landed on Friday afternoon after an 11-hour flight; after a two-minute nap she was full of beans again and insisted on dragging my sorry ass out to the pub. I hadn’t been out on a Friday night since 1996! Yesterday was spent running up and down Portobello market, and only the mulled wine got me through. This morning I’m haggard, a hollow shell of a girl, and when she rises she’ll be ready to take on the world, whereas I’m seriously considering doing some class A with my breakfast cereal.
I’d like to pretend that my sense of empathy is so overdeveloped that I take on people’s jetlag for them, but really I’m just a wimp; in a couple days this wimp is going to Paris for a while. I wonder if I can just sleep in a café while Charlie is running around with bright eyes and a perfect complexion?

Oh well

1. At 7am this morning as I was striding along Hammersmith road, my head still full of dreams of Frida Khalo (deep green and reds), I heard a horse neighing. A horse, in Hammersmith, I thought, shaking off the remains of the dream and looking around. But then I realised it must have been somebody’s ring tone; that was rather sad.

2. The rest of the day was spent trying to cram a week’s work into 11 hours, and having no time to pee. As I put my coat on to leave at 7pm, I did wonder if this was what life is all about; dreams of vivid colours, disappointment, and water retention.

3. Got home, got a cuddle out of the cutest kitten in the whole world, a glass of wine out of a bottle of rioja; good night, blogfolks. Do have colourful dreams. I know I will.

Sigh

1. Blogfolks, do you know what my problem is? I don’t like asking anybody for anything.

2. I blame my grandmother, who at 86 years of age chops up her own logs with an axe for fire, and forbids anyone to wind up her clock, even though winding up the clock involves standing on a chair, which itself has to be placed on the kitchen table. Every other day. We tried giving her one with batteries in it, but she gave it away for the village’s summer raffle.

3. I think all I want to say is, thank you Special Lady Friend for looking after me when I was ill, bringing me food and making me tea and bullying me into steaming my face at regular intervals. In exchange I’d like to wind up your clock, or something…yes.

4. Blogfolks, February is fizzless and lumpy and cold, even when you tango. Fortunately, an impending holiday complete with an imported friend, my SLF and my Spanish homework are keeping me afloat. (I like doing my homework.) Still, I can’t wait for Spring, can you? Thank you for stopping by, and be well.

That which we call a rose
By any other name would smell as sweet.

-Actually, I thought my name was Spam until I was 6. That was my dad’s favourite food, so that’s what he called me.
I look at my SLF in shocked disbelief.
-He what?
-Yep. Well, I didn’t know what my name was ‘til I went to school, she adds. When they took registration on the first day of school, I didn’t know what I was called.
-Right…. What do your parents call you now?
- No-one calls me by my full name; it’s usually Bren.
- Oh. You know, I found out the other day that ‘bren’ is an old French word for shit. Sorry. I shouldn't have said that. oops. That’s rather unfortunate.
--…..or it’s ‘B’. But from the age of 16 onwards people called me ‘Con’.
… and you realise that in French that means ‘cunt’, right?
-Perfect. ____________________________________________________________________________________

I don’t think it’s possible to beat that

1.Blogfolks, I was still thrashing under the clawed foot of the Dreaded Lurgy this weekend; various parts of me were hurting, aching or even exploding. Nasty.

2.Well, do you want to know what love is, blogpeople?

3. It’s when your special lady friend offers to rub your belly even though she has been (graphically, extensively) warned about the fact that such a thing will make you fart like there’s not tomorrow.

4. And she does it anyway, and she doesn’t even care, and she doesn’t even kick you out of bed.