Leaving tomorrow at oh fuck me it’s four am in the morning to go to Spain with Stu and Ollie. We are flying into Seville, renting a car and making our way to Barcelona where we drop it off.
Will be back in a week!
Off To Spain
Posted on August 25, 2007 @ 8:53 pm
If I had a million dollars. . .
Posted on August 23, 2007 @ 7:32 pm
Because one of my favourite past times is driving myself crazy, I like to look at houses I can’t afford and imagine that I can afford them. I’ve done this for years. Here it is worse because even the houses I can afford are out of reach because Stuart doesn’t want to buy. He says that I can buy a place and charge him rent. I may very well do that. I will have a house with a 1950’s diner style kitchen before I die. I will have a red Smeg fridge.
This is the house that I would buy today if I had a spare million pounds. It’s in a fantastic location. Right near Wandsworth Common, walking distance (I think. Stuart would disagree) to Balham, Wandsworth and Clapham Junction stations. Near Northcote Road.
While I love this house on paper (or Website) for its four bedrooms, for the garden and the cellar and the period features. . . what I really love about it is one of the bathrooms. . .
I would spend entire weekends in that bathtub reading. My skin would be perma pruned from lounging in the tub.
I want that house. Hey, we could do it. It’s only £5,400 a month for the mortgage.
Sigh.
Note to self. Buy a lottery ticket.
Up to the sunny North
Posted on @ 2:18 pm
I have proof that the end of the world is neigh. Yesterday I went up north to introduce Paulo to the folks at the agency I used to manage. The weather in London was windy, rainy, grey and miserable. Up in Warrington a hop skip and a jump from Liverpool and Manchester the weather was bright blue warm skies.
The world is Topsy-Turvy! What happened to the grim north?
Was a really good meeting- they are all lovely people. Came back on the train to the wind and the rain and the grey and the miserable.
Met up with Al for a drink and we tried to go to the Mexican at the place that Jen reccommended but it was an hour wait so we went to another one up the road on Maiden Lane and had a few margaritas (for me) and mojitos (for al) and then moved on to The Coal Hole and kvetched until closing.
Today the weather is once again a big pile of doo-doo. I am very happy to be working at home huddled on the sofa, although I haven’t eaten yet today and there is no food in the house so I will need to wander out soon since it is nearly 3:30.
Four more days to Spain with Stuart and Ollie. Four days, four days. . .
Why I love working for my company
Posted on August 20, 2007 @ 11:04 pm
Those that read this know that there are many things that are good about my company mostly around nights where they pick up the bar tab.
I now have a new reason to love them. My visa. A couple of people at work said that I should contact HR and find out if they will take care of things for me which seemed daft to me. From my POV they hired me understanding that I had a visa. Why should they sort things out for me now when it is about to expire? That should be my problem, yes?
Apparently I was wrong. The Company is going to help me.
I still need to take the Life in the UK test and get all my docs together:
Your original Passport
Your spouse’s original UK passport
Two (2) Passport Photos with your full name written on the back of each photograph
One (1) Passport Photos of your British spouse with the full name of your spouse written on the back of the photograph
One (1) signed Application Form SET(M) (XXXXXXX will provide you with this document)
“Life in the UK test” pass notification letter
Your original Marriage Certificate
Original Pay Slips for the 3 months (July, August, September) preceding the Application for Indefinite Leave to Remain (originals, stamped and signed by XXXXXXX)
One (1) original signed Power of Attorney (XXXXXXXl will provide you with this document)
Original 20 letters and/or other documents from at least five different sources addressed to you and your partner at the same address in the UK over the past 2 years (i.e. utility bills, mortgage agreements, bank statements, tenancy agreements, loan/credit card statements, insurance policies, etc.)
I give this pile to them and THEY SUBMIT IT FOR ME.
And something tells me that Rich Uncle will be be paying the fee which my darlings is not a small chunk of change.
I may need to do some actual work tomorrow as a thank you.
How To Be A Footballer’s Wife
Posted on @ 6:30 pm
My mate Doug works for videojug in LA. Is a great site where hours of work time can be filled up.
This is one of my favourites. . .
What Season Is It?
Posted on August 19, 2007 @ 10:26 am
I made the mistake this morning of plucking Nigel Slater’s The Kitchen Diaries off the shelf and opening it to August. I had thought of him because when we were at Claire and Dan’s this weekend I was thumbing through one of his old cookbooks and had said that I would need to get a copy of it and she had graciously given it to me since she had planned to drop it off at a charity shop.
It was a mistake to read the August chapter of the diary because he is going on and on about how lovely and warm the weather is and all of the meals he makes are appropriate to hot weather when today is a bangers and mash day. Rain, rain and more rain. And it’s cold to top it off. Are there really two weeks left of August? I feel like we have landed in a Dr. Who time warp and the date is really November 19th, which is lovely. . . WHEN IT IS NOVEMBER!
Last Wednesday night when we all went out drinking and I consumed all of my alcohol units for the year, I failed to mention that I was wearing wool. A long wool skirt, a long sleeved dress shirt and a wool v-neck jumper. Shoes were long black boots. I was wearing WOOL in August and I wasn’t uncomfortable.
Last weekend the weather was delicious. Warm but not oppressive, lots of big happy sun. When the sun is out in London the world feels like a perfect place. Stuart took me to the zoo because retards love the zoo*. We had read that owl babies had been born so we wanted to see the owl babies.
We got off at Regent’s Park, walked through the park stopping first at a café in the middle for a tasty sausage roll with lots of spicy English mustard. Once we got through the initial queue it didn’t feel too crowded, but there were lots of families. I warned Stuart about this.
“Honey, you know how we are going to the zoo?”
“Yes Thomas?”
“There’s going to be a lot of kids there.”
“Oh no. . .”
I have decided it is not children that I hate, but their parents, but I will save that for another post.
Not long were we there when Stuart said we should bring Emily our niece.
“But then we would be like all the people that you hate.”
“No. It’s different.”
“Because she’s ours?”
“Exactly.”
We weren’t able to see the baby frog mouthed owls (we did see their parents) but didn’t take a picture.
Stuart did however get a great picture of this sleeping barned owl.
We loved that he was balancing on one leg.
The Toucans were lovely as well.
What you can’t see in the picture is how bright blue their eyes are.
The exhibit for the sidewinder annoyed me.
Why is it necessary to show that this snake lives in the southwest of the United States by including a crumbled pack of cigarettes and an empty bottle of Bud?
After a few hours we were zooed out. We still need to see the lions and the bughouse and the gorillas were napping so there will be lots of things to see when we go back with Emily.
As I said, the entire reason I said we went was to see the baby owls which if you read the hyperlink article were only born because of all the rain and crap weather we have been having so I guess I can’t complain too much the weather is wooly. For every season, turn turn turn. . . there is a reason for the crap rubbish weather. Baby owls.
I suppose I am not too grumpy because in addition to crap weather bringing baby owls, in one week, at this moment I will be in Spain. We land in Seville and will be renting a car and winding our way over to Barcelona.
I am dreaming of flamenco, olives and wine. And sun. I am dreaming of sun.
*Rocky Reference. “Take her to the zoo! Retards love the zoo!”
Why I am about to go to bed at 9PM on a Thursday
Posted on August 16, 2007 @ 8:35 pm
Had a work do big celebration thingy last night. Went to see The Comedy Store Players- Fanflippingtastic Improv group. Seriously some the best improv I have seen ever.
It’s funny how now there are nuances to British humour that I get now that I wouldn’t have before. Like one of the actors putting on a Geordie accent and giving fatherly advice to his daughters, “Dondt fawuk any blokes!”
After, someone had the bright idea to go to Tiger Tiger. If you have never been to Tiger Tiger, think of the worst meat market you have ever been to and it is 500 times worse than that. It’s a terrible place. I understand why the terrorists tried to bomb it.
That said when you are there with a large group of your mates, you’re all drunk off your tits and dancing, it’s fantastic. At one point Rav was shaking her bootie so I gave her a quick spanking.
For some reason we turn into lesbians when we are drunk.
I got home by 3:30.
I’m too old for this shit.
Had a 9AM meeting that I had to attend and I couldn’t look too rough either. 7:30 comes really early when you got home at 3:30 and you drank (over the entire evening from 5pm to 3am) two glasses of red, five pints of Fosters, three (or was it four) rum and cokes and oh god, I just remembered the shot of Jägermeister.
What I didn’t know because I was howling at the moon was that Stuart was also out in Balham with a mate and got a lock in at a new bar where they were giving him free drinks because he sorted their wireless and only got in a half hour before me.
Tonight we pigged out on a nice stodgy pizza and are now going to go to bed like old people. . . cuddle, snuggle, snore. . .
Artichokes
Posted on August 13, 2007 @ 10:05 pm
“What are you making for dinner?’
“Chicken Picatta.”
“What?”
“Lemon chicken.”
“That sounds nice.”
Would you like some?
“Sure.”
I looked to the skies for the coming apocalypse. “Okay. . . I’ll make couscous too.”
“Ooo! Yes.”
Stuart loves couscous. And he’s been marginally better about eating actual carbon based food lately.
I went into Trinity Stores to pick up the couscous and they had the elusive vegetable I have been looking for in Sainsbury’s for months and months. . . artichokes. I grabbed one for me, and then I thought. . . maybe Stuart will like one. Maybe he likes artichokes and he doesn’t KNOW he likes artichokes. I grabbed two.
He walked in the kitchen while I was mincing garlic. I had already chopped off the stems, the top part of the thistle and trimmed the outer leaves and rubbed a cut lemon over all the edges.
“What’s that?” He said with a touch of horror in his voice.
“That. Is an artichoke.” I stuffed the garlic between the leaves, popped them into a pot with a few inches of water and drizzled olive oil on top.
“A. . . waa?”
“Artichoke. And you will be trying one.”
“What?”
“You don’t have to eat the entire thing, but you have to try it.” I sounded like a mother but I didn’t care.
He did a guppy impression.
An hour and a half later we sat down at the table. I had strained the sauce so he didn’t have ‘bits’ (capers and parsley) on his chicken. Fluffy couscous was on his plate. He stared at his artichoke. I plucked a leaf and deftly scraped the tender meat with my bottom teeth. He copied me and made a face.
“It doesn’t taste like anything.”
“Try another one.”
He did.
“It tastes like peas.”
“That’s a lie.” I don’t like peas. I know artichokes don’t taste like peas.
“I don’t like it.”
“Okay. Thank you for trying.”
He ate all of his chicken and had two helpings of couscous.
“Thank you for making dinner honey. It was really good.”
“Yeah?”
“Yes. Just don’t make me eat an artichoke again.”
“I won’t make you eat an artichoke again.”
Okay. Now I know he doesn’t like artichokes. He did like my couscous. I of course didn’t tell him that the shallots and garlic had been sautéed in a mushroom infused oil, (never mind that it included shallots and garlic at all). I certainly didn’t tell him about the tablespoon of truffle oil I added at the end.
Drinken’ A Guinness In Dublin
Posted on August 6, 2007 @ 4:37 pm
Been working all day in a hotel lobby. In Dublin. Nursing a Guinness as we speak which does a lot to lift the spirits when you are working in a hotel lobby in Dublin and it would be much more interesting to be outside seeing the sights of Dublin.
Friday was Khaled’s last day and my last official day in the old job. I love my work mates. They wrote each of us a silly little poem and presented it along with a slide show of embarrassing pictures of each of us with funny comment cartoon bubbles. Was cute and silly and terribly creative.
That night we had drinks and it was the perfect mixture of fun without too many crazed scenes. Well. Other than a few moments that I would speak of if this was une blog avec nom de plume. It all ended well however. Late night Chinese with Ross, Tim and Al. Went back to Al’s place in West Hampstead for one final drink (Jack and Diet Coke), crashed in his spare room around 2ish and was up by 8 to fetch my ‘puter from work, and was back home by 9:30 to have breakfast with Young.
Things are going to be a bit crazed. I get back Wednesday from this biz trip, work drinks Thursday, Friday we are going to see Claire (she lives near Henley), if I can reschedule my yearly review I’m going to Liverpool on the 15th, going up north for the day to introduce Paulo to my (ungrateful) agency (that didn’t even say boo when I told them I was moving into a new job) on the 22nd, road trip in Spain 26th to Sept 2, conference and company meeting in Seattle Sept 4-8, Cologne 11-13. . .
Somewhere in here I need to study for and pass my life in the UK test and sort the appointment for my right to remain visa as the current slip of paper in my passport expires November 4th.
Two years ago it felt like forever before I would have to deal with this paperwork.
I also need to discover what my new job is in the upcoming days. . . If I am light on the blog front in the next month it is probably because my head has exploded.
