wet

It is really wet in London at the moment. This is the view I get as I walk to the office in the mornings. Utterly depressing, although I have to admit I am guilty of randomly breaking into a huge grin, because I know I am leaving soon, AND, even more exciting I'm going to Thailand next week to go diving and get some real sunshine YES!

For the moment I sit at my computer, feeling guilty because I have not written my blog for a bit, while Mr V watches a bank robber film on TV, and cooks fish pie. I just looked back at my blog and realised that I have recently over-used inverted commas, which is quite annoying to read. I shall try to avoid it in future. I have also realised that I tend to capitalise words that I think are important, and not those that actually warrant it. I'm sure you reading people don't mind. I've never won any medals for my grammar.

I met my friend HC from The Olympic City yesterday. We had some drinks in the pub and made plans to meet up once i'm settled in my new home. I'm really looking forward to it! Tonight I have to pack a suitcase to post to The City By The Sea. ( those caps are deliberate by the way)

public convenience

I've just finished my first week of work in a new job, luckily it was not too taxing. I did get to travel up north to Leicester, requiring a visit to the new St. Pancras International terminal in London. I love the St Pancras building, I think it looks like a farytale castle. I picked my way through the japanese tourists, businessmen and Disneyland bound families, and eventually found the domestic ticket office, tucked shamefully away at the far end of the station. The 'automatic' door didn't work, so I had to squeeze and wrench myself through a small gap to get in and buy my (expensive) ticket. A minor teething problem I thought, especially since parts of the concourse was clearly still under construction, with empty shop units promising all kinds of exotic retail oppourtunities 'very soon'. (although why anyone would want to buy Belgian chocolates at the Eurostar terminal in london is beyond me.. after all, as they keep reminding us, Brussels is only 1 hour and 51 minutes away)

I'll get to the point. The new station was grandly opened only last week by our very own Queen and amid much fanfare and press coverage. Why then, when I went to use the (free) public toilets, was I to find that one of the cubicles was out of order, another had no loo roll, and the next one I tried had a broken lock that didn't actually lock the door, meanwhile of the 2 attendants, one was chatting to a cleaner at the entrance and the other was squeezing her spots in the mirror (YUK!?). frankly I was astonished at the incompetence of the whole service, it just typifies the 'rubbishness' and lack of service that I have sadly come to expect from this country.

first day at work

Heaving myself out of bed this morning was not nice. the crazy thing is, that I usually get up early anyway. There is some psychcological thing about HAVING to get up, and knowing that you need to get out of the house, into the icy cold rainy morning and sit on a commuter train getting hotter and hotter, until you get off, and then jostle through the barriers at a London Terminal, across the concourse, and down into the underground, where you join a queue to go through the barrier to join another queue to get down the escalator onto the platform, gradually getting warmer and warmer in your wool coat, and there you wait for the train to come, and when it does it is too full of people, so you wait for the next one, and then it arrives and you push onto it and stand for 20 minutes with your face in someones chest/arm/back. lurching around and hoping that the sheer squash of bodies will keep you upright, because you can't reach a handrail to hold yourself steady. On arrival at the destination station, and re-emerging outdoors, the relief of fresh air is dampened by the rain and you now have to walk to the office, dodging puddles and praying that you are not sprayed by a curbing taxi or bus, or that you don't step on one of those nasty loose paving slabs that emit a jet of cold grimy water from beneath.

Aaahhhh .... London. I was welcomed back into the working world with the most horrible wet raining morning ever. I am now one of the commuter masses once again. I'm happy about the job bit, but the commuting...not such fun. I guess you can't have it all.

excuses excuses

yes, It has been a while since I put anything out here. Last time I saw DH in sausageland, she scolded me for not writing. I must say I was a little surprised, as I find it hard to believe that anybody actually reads this blog. I even forget about it half the time.

So what is my excuse? well firstly, do I need one? actually no, but you're getting one anyway, since it's a way of divulging what I have been up to in the last 6 weeks.

Mr V and I have moved back to London. We are in our own little place now, which is cute, For cute read 'small' it's a world away from the luxury appartment we had in sausageland. Moving in was a total farce, due to the vast amount of furniture and 'stuff' that we have,and we are still negotiating boxes while moving around the flat, even though a large portion of it has been put into storage.

I am today, for the first time in almost 2 years, facing an imminent re-entry to the rat race. Yes, finally I have secured myself a job, and they want me to start on Monday.. typical. I expect they will want the clothes designed yesterday as well. Listen to me! I'm already complaining.

I have only just sorted out the internet connection. We can blame the ever rubbish BT for that one. How can they send the BILL to the correct address, and then give the wrong address to the delivery company for the wirelwss box doo da. numpties. OK, that is a rant waiting to happen.....they only need to slip up one more time, and Smak! they are going to get it from me.

more soon.

rain

Today is the first time is has rained for a while. The main difference being that I am back in London now. Living in a little appartment in Spitalfields, bordering the city. How dismal. I have been woken buy a gigantic pneumatic drill, digging a hole right outside the flat. The building was literally shaking with the force of the drill. Does nothing change in England? As I speak another machine has just added to the chorus, flattening down the freshly laid tarmac from yesterdays dig. I sopose I should be grateful that there is work being done, rather than a hole and no workmen.

There is something quite exciting about being back here, and my head is alternately filled with dreams of finding a good job and a nice little house within reach of the city, OR "sticking it out" for as long as I can and then making a fast exit to a place very far away and with a less dreary climate. I think the current plan is to stick it out and see how it all feels in a few months.

One Night in London...

Well, leaving at 4am in the morning to go back to London for a night out does sound a bit drastic, but it was K's 40th birthday, so I think the occassion justified it. Besides, you can go really fast when there is no traffic on the roads here.. another good excuse. Mr V. chose to go out for drinks on friday night, so with only a few hours sleep we charged off into the dawn on Saturday and by 9am we were having tea and toast in Essex. wild. We trundled down to Southend on Sea for a spot of last minute gift shopping, and could not resist the lure of Fish and chips, by the sea, overlooking the funfair. Ah...the Great British Summertime. They even had Daddies sauce which went down very well.



It had only dawned on us as we drove over that this weekend is probably the most hectic weekend to visit london and it's congested surroundings. Wembly stadium was playing host to 90,000 Live Earth concert goers on saturday and The Tour De France was making it's first Stage on Sunday. There were the Mens and Womens Finals at Wimbeldon, Plus the date was 7.7.7. so naturally every engaged couple in the land was getting married. Oh, and there was a grand Prix, but that was outside London.

Dispite all of this excitement, we managed to get a cab to go out (a miracle) have lots of fun, and not get mown down by cyclists, showered in confetti or stuck in any train delays or traffic jams. I think we did rather well. We did get stuck in a massive traffic jam passing Bussels on the way home, but I fell asleep and ignored it.