Life needed. Apparently.

So thanks to the bitch formerly known as Tiphane, I am now a housebound invalid, wrapped in a shawl and facing up to a Bank Holiday of fragility and self-pity, rather than the planned long weekend of lurching around behaving like I'm in my early twenties. Liv. Id.

Hours before my overpriced illness truly set in, I was lucky enough to squeeze in a quick trip to the Roundhouse last night to see the Gorillaz. In fact, I think they're just 'Gorillaz', no 'the'. I can't quite get my head round that. I feel like they need an article. Aaaaanyway. Gorillaz at Roundhouse. And, despite fantasizing in my head about cameos from Snoop and De La Soul, and a selection of surely technically impossible holograms, neither of which remotely happened, it was still a brilliant night. Damon seemed happy - but it's not Blur, that's for sure, and I don't think I'll ever see him without desperately wanting him to launch into To The End. It was just a lovely night out, standing in a crowd jumping around to good music, feeling sweat forming on my back and everyone around me smelling of beer and fags - I stood there grinning like a loon, counting the weeks to Glasto and feeling as on top of the world as it's possible to feel when you know you have a second-hand sore throat brewing and your skin doesn't even look that amazing post the facial that caused it.

The only other cloud within the silver lining went as follows. Halfway through the gig, a little over the limit on beer and a tad restless during one of the songs he didn't know, Luke got his phone out of his pocket. After a few seconds, I leaned over his shoulder to see what he was doing. He was checking football scores. It never fails to stagger me that, had that happened when we were going out, I would have felt a flood of 'OH MY GOD that is SO RUDE, he doesn't CARE about the gig we're at, he doesn't CARE about me, all he's interested in is FOOTBALL, he is such a DICK, we have to break up but god I really fancy him and he's quite nice really, what do I DOOOO? How confusing! Let's have a MASSIVE ROW and RUIN THIS OTHERWISE PERFECTLY BRILLIANT EVENING' and now I see him checking the football scores and I'm all like 'Oh, he's checking the football scores.'

Anyway, after he'd checked the football scores, I leaned over and asked him to see what had happened in the third leaders' debate, so he started loading up the news site, and this tall guy in his forties leaned over to me and shouted, "He needs to get a life." I shouted back, "It's my fault, actually - I asked him to check the news," and he said, "Well, you both need to get a life then." And I was, like, GROWL, but in real life I did nothing. And it really gave me a bad taste in my mouth. Don't get me wrong, I do understand, it's amazing when you're at a gig and you feel like everyone around you is as 100% into it as you are, and you lose yourself and it's heavenly. And your parade can definitely feel rained upon when people nearby are talking, or reading Marx, or snogging or constructing flat-pack furniture, because you want everyone to be loving it as much as you are, and a huge part of the beauty of modern music as opposed to classical is that, live, it is such an intensely emotional, shared experience between the band and the crowd. But really. At a concert where the music is deafening and every other person is holding a camera aloft, filming the whole thing for future YouTube infamy, making it easier to watch the proceedings on their tiny screen than twist your head and see the stage itself, one person looking down at their phone screen for five minutes is hardly a deathly buzzkill, is it? And what's sad is that tall-forty-something's comment to me was a bit. I found it hard to get back on my high after I'd been criticised by a complete stranger. So, 20 hours too late, I say to him, "Meh, shuddup." It's not a great put-down, I'll admit. Suggestions welcome.

Right. I'm off for more illness-related moaning and grumpiness. Wishing you all bonne weekend.

Going viral

The arc of Wednesday was, well, less an arc and more of a diagonal plummet from a chipper morning, through an uneventful mid-section, down to an absolutely disastrous evening.

The day started off well as I crossed the road outside my flat and recognised my local LibDem candidate handing out leaflets in front of the tube station. She smiled at me as she passed me her flyer, campaigning about the proposed 82-week sporadic disruption to the Northern Line (a series of works that could be done in three weeks if it was tackled all at once), and I was able to smile back and say "I've already voted for you." She looked happy and I felt extra bouncy as I ran down the escalator, late comme toujours.

The remainder of Wednesday day trundled along OK - my world was pretty unremarkable, but outside was dark and gloomy for others, as Greece, then Portugal, then Spain's ratings were all lowered by S&P and the trading floor was briefly in a panic. Guys here are saying that this is, in many ways, far worse for the international economy than the Lehman's collapse in 2008, surely something Brown can point to in order to claim that Britain is not suffering uniquely at present. But then, Brown might not have a chance to address that in tonight's final TV debate because so many people are obsessing over him muttering, under his breath, in private, in a car, that one of his supporters was a bigot. I'm obviously not pushing for a Labour win, but if this really is a decisive issue in people's voting decisions then people need to Get A Grip. As Alan Johnson pointed out on the BBC this morning, there isn't a single one of us who wouldn't regret stuff we'd said if we were permanently miked up and broadcast on Sky. Freaking Murdoch. No WAY it would have aired if it had happened to Cameron.

So at 5pm the arc curved a little upwards as I journeyed home, a post-gym spring in my step once again, excited about having seen (and not heard) my first ever Toyota Prius Hybrid whisper past me in action, and keenly anticipating a relaxing evening at my lovely flat and a bit of a treat: I'd organised for a beauty therapist to come around and give me a facial. I'd paid £10 more than I have paid in the past for facials, but in exchange for those extra thousand pennies, I would be able to clamber off the treatment table, sit directly on my sofa and not move for the rest of the evening. It was an experiment about which I was most excited, in a zen way. And so she arrived. Tiphane (pronounced - go on, guess. You'll never guess. It's Tiffany) was pretty, curvy, bubbly, short, and struggling under the weight of all her potions and the folding table. But she set up within minutes and I was soon lying on my front, relaxing under the pressure of her satisfyingly penetrative massage and looking forward to her smoothing various masks and creams into my face, which would leave me glossy, healthy and unequivocally stunning.

Then, having asked me to turn over, she said, "I'll just be one second, I have to take some aspirin." Mid-rotation, I froze.
"Why?" I asked, forcing myself to sound sympathetic. "Are you OK?"
"Oh, I'm fine," she said. "I'm just getting ill." My eyes darted around awkwardly as, half-naked, I tried to position myself on my back and look relaxed while simultaneously freaking out.
"What kind of ill?" My voice surely betrayed my panic.
"Oh, you know, headache, sore throat... nothing serious," she said, breezily, as she plopped a soluble painkiller into her glass of water - MY glass from MY kitchen - and gulped it down as though it contained urgent life or death remedies that she needed without hesitation. And with that, she began the facial.

I went into a flat spin. Facials are not something that can be done at arm's length. They are an intimate process, involving continuous and precise application of emollients, unguents and balms, as well as macro-distance squeezing of blocked pores etc. Should one open one's eyes during a facial, one would see one's therapist inches away. Were one's therapist to be in THE MOST CONTAGIOUS STAGE of illness, one would want to run away very fast indeed. Immediately, I assessed my options. Holding my breath for an hour was sadly impossible. There were only three remaining courses of action: 1) ask her to don a surgical mask; 2) ask her to leave; 3) be brave.

And, since I am only forthright in type and am a wuss when it comes to confronting hairdressers and their ilk with the truth, I chose option three. For the next hour, as Tiphane smoothed and applied, I was continually caressed by her virus-riddled breath, the waves of infection landing every few seconds on my cheeks and forehead, and, during one particularly painful moment, being blown directly up my nose. All the while, I could hear her swallowing painfully. I tried to time my inhalations to fit with the rare moments while she wasn't blowing directly at me, but such coordination was often not possible. It was an unmitigated nightmare. I couldn't have made myself more likely to catch her cold if I'd spent the hour french kissing her. Far from calming, it was perhaps the most stressful experience of 2010 as I lay, prostrate and painfully aware that I'd just paid somewhere in the region of a small fortune to get ill. I was livid. LIVID I tell you.

Today I have been monitoring my health levels closely and seem to have escaped thus far, but when, as is surely inevitable, I catch her disease, there will be trouble, I tell you. Even as I've been writing this, I've become aware of a slight tiredness and back aching situation building up, but it could just be a mid-afternoon slump. Assuming the illness does set in, I don't yet know quite how I will get my revenge, but it will be something involving the SARS virus and a letterbomb. Maybe.

In other news, if you're even considering voting LibDem, please read this. Thank you.

Six days in April

Rage. I've done it again: left writing my blog for so long that I am now overwhelmed with information and feel as though I should split it up under subheadings. Maybe I will.

Cocksuckgate
Last Thursday morning I phoned my mother just before I got to the airport, to say goodbye and reassure her that I had not yet died, an almost-daily ritual for which she seems to be grateful.
"Oh, Jane, I'm glad you called," she said, solemnly. "I was just about to email you." She sounded close to tears.
"What's wrong?" I asked in a high-pitched voice that indicated my panic.
"Your... your blog, Jane..." she said. I wasn't much the wiser.
"What about it?"
"Dad and I... we're both... shocked."
"What about?"
"I can hardly say it... You used the word..." (I tried to scan my memory of what the offensive item could possibly be) "...cocksucker."
I roared with laughter.
"So?!" I asked. Mum was not reassured.
"It's awful, Jane," she said. "So vulgar. So... unfeminine."
"Really? Worse than fucking?" I asked.
"Oh god, yes," she said, emphatically. "So much worse than fucking."
I told her that I believe this is a generational difference, but she seemed so gobsmacked by my labelling the volcanic ash as something that fellates that I felt it necessary to do a straw poll on arriving in France. I asked around twenty people in their early thirties, none of whom felt that a cocksucking volcano is any worse than a fucking volcano. Of course, we all agreed that fucking and cocksucking are both vulgar and unfeminine, so mother, you are indeed correct on that point. But for any of my mother's friends, or indeed any others, who read this blog and feel that she has failed in her parenting duties as a result of my free use of profanities, I apologise. Only the good bits of me are a reflection of her, i.e. my skin that tans, my love of birds and my US citizenship. Everything else is my dad's fault.

France
So I went to France for Emily's wedding and it was one of those cominglings of beautiful people and beautiful surroundings and beautiful emotions and beautiful food that made me simultaneously joyous and painfully and continually aware that, of the youth contingent, and as a fairly normal size 14 gal, I was the fattest female there by about nine stone. I kid you not. I genuinely reckon I could have got three of the other wedding guests into each leg of my jeans. There were literally miles of smooth, slim, tanned thighs on show, and the men's eyes were, naturally, out on stalks. I could have collected the drool and irrigated southern Africa for a month.

To distract myself, I forwent my wheat ban and ate baguette, and I sunbathed and met tiny ponies. It was all going rather well until I got dressed up on Saturday afternoon for the wedding, and had one of those rare moments when I looked in the mirror and thought I had managed to make myself look momentarily bearable. To celebrate, I asked Kate to take some photographs of me outside for posterity. She snapped away for a minute or so and said she'd got some good ones. I retrieved my camera and looked at the screen. In the (approx.) six minutes since I'd put on my make-up in the bathroom mirror, the circumference of my face appeared to have inflated by around an inch. I briefly became convinced that I was the victim of a cruel pre-wedding allergic reaction but then I double-checked with Kate, who assured me that the photo was, in fact, normal and that I was looking at a picture of What I Look Like. This could not be true. Desperate for a second opinion, I showed Christianne the mutant image and was sorely disappointed at her distinct lack of horrified gasps or attempts to shield my eyes from the appalling aberration. On the contrary: it appeared that the grotesque image before me was not only fairly representative but actually flattering. Shortly afterwards, we got in the car and drove to the wedding, the other three girls chattering happily as I tried to come to terms with the realisation that I look utterly, utterly different to what I thought and that my fictional version was much prettier.

Of course, the weekend was not all about me. We had a fantastic few days in and around Mirmande, made all the more precious as the volcano had done its best to keep us away, and I made new friends and passionately loved my old ones. The bride was stunning, the groom's speech was excellent, the venue was magical, I didn't fall over on the dancefloor, the lunch the day afterwards was dreamy, my skirt didn't blow up in the wind and reveal my pants, the band were crush-worthy and best of all, I managed to get a mild tan which, as Kate continually stated, will "set us up" for the summer. Here's hoping.

Election 2010
What is weird is that I have voted. I posted it yesterday. Fortunately I haven't yet regretted my decision although I'm not denying that might happen between now and 6th May. I almost regretted my entire existence last night, however, when Sara, Rog, Grania and I sat through the most excruciating event ever at the Union Chapel. Instigate Debate was meant to be a cutting edge two-fingers-up at the mass media approaches to politics; the NME called it "the most important underground movement," which, if true, is enough to finish me off once and for all.

Invited speakers were Dame Vivienne Westwood; Deputy Leader of the Labour Party, Harriet Harman; ex-Labour MP and current Green candidate, Peter Tatchell; ex-Mayoral candidate and LibDem hotshot, Simon Hughes; and Shadow Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, Jeremy Hunt. Music was to be from the Magic Numbers, Shlomo and Rose Elinor Dougall, and we were promised comedy from The Amazing Tommy and the Weeks.

In reality, Dame Viv didn't turn up and nor did Jeremy Hunt - in their place we got the Tory candidate for Putney, a dumpy young thickie who tried admirably to compete with Tatchell, Harman and Hughes and got absolutely nowhere. The Magic Numbers turned out to be one-of-the-Magic-Numbers, which is a bit different, while Tommy and the Weeks were about as Amazing as a pavement. The host, John O'Sullivan, was a self-satisfied, shambolic, patronising blunderbus who encouraged the audience to ask questions and then ignored what they said and asked his own. He sneered at an intern who passed him a note during the evening, consistently called 'his hero' Peter Tatchell 'Thatchell', and introduced beatboxer Shlomo as 'one of the best rappers in the world'. The evening had an absurdly obvious LibDem bias which shat all over any concept that we were watching a genuine 'debate' and I was fully embarrassed to witness the politicians going through such a risible two hours. It was an unmitigated disaster. On the upside, Shlomo was great, but watching him work his magic in front of a stifled smattering of uptight politicos sitting in church pews was painful. £5 I would rather have spent on something useful, like Compeed or stamps. Meh. You win some, you lose some.

Right. Must go hang out my whites wash.

Ash decisions

Ohgodohgodohgod, I love blogging, you know I do, but every now and then it feels like homework and I wish I could just employ some hilarious and articulate minion to write it for me so that I could get on with vital things like packing and watching American Idol, and now is definitely one of those times.

So the last you heard, I was rambling on about politics and then this FREAKING volcano started erupting, but obviously I thought it was just quite funny and cool and different, and then I realised that it might actually affect ME and suddenly it became completely unfunny and highly irritating, because I was meant to be flying to the south of France this very day to stay in the Pyrenees for two nights and then on to somewhere else to stay for two nights for Emily's wedding, and it was all going to be brilliant and a magical adventure and then the cocksucking ash started spewing and our flights were cancelled and then we had to start thinking about ferry trips and hire cars and overlong minibus journeys with strangers including other people's mothers and possibly attractive band members, and then the flights were uncancelled and the airports reopened but it was impossible to know whether the volcano was going to carry on slowing down or suddenly speed up again and we STILL DON'T KNOW and the uncertainty is GRADUALLY KILLING ME. However, I am determined to be optimistic and if I don't get on my Sleazyjet flight tomorrow morning I will laugh and be calm and everyone in the airport will be drawn to my relaxed good humour and incredible laissez-faire joie-de-vivre.

Anyway, other than that, since last Friday I have been doing billions of unparalleledly brilliant and uniquely quirky things, including taking incredible photos of London in the sun (admittedly I was poss. not the only person doing this on Saturday) and going on the fourth link of the Capital Ring walk with Kate on Sunday, where we managed to cover twelve miles from Falconwood, via Eltham Palace and... some other AMAZING places that I've completely forgotten, ending up at Crystal Palace, taking in a delicious pub lunch on the way and, critically, getting sunburned shoulders that have basically ruined my look for the wedding this weekend, as I am wearing a halterneck dress but my body clearly states I should wear something that covers my white strap marks. Once again, I live on the edge of the fashion grain and it is perilous up here, I can tell you.

I went to see Rufus Wainwright's opera, Prima Donna, at Sadler's Wells with Grania last Friday - a great evening out but not, perhaps, the best opera I've ever seen. A fantastic effort for a first go, however, and shedloads better than I could ever manage in my wildest dreams, so I am really not criticising. I'm glad I went but I'm also glad I didn't spend more than £10 on my ticket. After the show, we went to Dollar Grills in Exmouth Market, which was a cool venue and recommended, and at the table next to us was a very attractive girl in her mid-twenties, curvy, dark and sensual. I didn't have a clear view of the guy she was with and asked Grania if he was worthy of her. She nodded her assent. They were clearly a glamorous pairing. Then, about thirty minutes later, with her burger unbitten and his frankly terrifying rack of ribs undented, he grabbed his duffle coat and his rucksack and stropped out. We looked at Curvy McBuxom with sympathy. "Nightmare," I said to her, and smiled in what I hoped was a kind, unpatronising fashion. She nodded, and said, "I'm getting a bit bored of it now, though." Apparently this particular argument had been caused because he'd bought her tickets to Prima Donna and she hadn't liked it - the opera, not the gift. He, however, had taken her rejection of the opera as a personal affront. It was the kind of exhausting, pointless row I've had hundreds of times in my life, indicative of absolutely nothing on the surface and, underneath, firm evidence that the relationship is simply not meant to be. After the boy returned, tight-jawed, he sat in virtual silence, wiggling the rack of ribs disconsolately for a few minutes until the girl eventually caved and they got their food to go and stood up. We wished them luck as they left the restaurant and they laughed ruefully, and then I drunkenly told Grania how ecstatic I was to be there in Dollar Grills with her rather than stuck in the wrong relationship, and she agreed and it was lovely.

Monday I had my haircut in my usual imperceptible way, and then last night was Tuesday and Lucy came down to the smoke from t'country, and we went to Camden for a delicious dinner in a Turkish restaurant near Koko, and then to watch the Fuck Buttons (they're a band of sorts, mother. No actual fucking involved.) who were good enough for an hour or so, but we were a bit drunk from dinner, I was spinning out about something unrelated and distracted by trying to coordinate ferry bookings with very kind, very posh man who was being lovely and offering Kate and I a lift to the wedding, and it was all a bit confusing what with the fact that they were playing ridiculously loud dance music but no one was dancing, so we left after an hour and returned back to my flat to safety, cereal, mini Magnums and a last, absurdly unnecessary glass of wine. Today I thought I was leaving for France and then I wasn't, so I spent a long time in bed, threw a few unrelated items into my suitcase and passed a very pleasant two hours bathing in the wonderfully me-sized rectangle of sun that falls bang in the middle of my living room floor for about three hours every bright afternoon. I heave up the venetian blind, open the gigantic window and lie on my carpet, spreadeagled, often starkers as no one can see me but the birds and any particularly fortunate plane passengers looking down with binoculars. Tomorrow I have every hope that I'll be up there myself. A bientot et honh-he-honh.

Rubbish

LLFF has become crap.

I'm sorry. I don't know what's going on. I'll try and write tonight. But if I don't, then I probably won't write again until next week. Basic summary: very busy doing nothing, spending money, loving the city, very happy, stressed re. volcanic ash, think the Tories will win the election, grumpy about that but otherwise delicious. BRB.

Clegg-up

Anyone talking about a LibDem government is a lot more naive than I am, but I won't deny that it is fun to be a fan of the yellows today. Clegg's support has certainly rocketed up following last night's live TV debate - but only a sixth of the population watched it, and of them, only about half say they would vote for him in the election. It's hardly the sensation that it seems in this morning's media - but there's no doubt it was a great night for British politics.

I watched the first hour of the debate intently on my laptop between midnight and 1am, and watched the final thirty minutes somewhat less intently immediately after that. My hastily typed notes bring it all flooding back... It never fails to amaze me how rubbish Brown is on camera. Cameron talks clearly but still reminds me of the inflatable reserve pilot in Airplane; if we popped him, he'd crumple. I tried to concentrate on what he was saying but I was a bit the worse for wear after a raucous night at KaraUke (yup. Karaoke. Ukuleles. Amazing.) and I involuntarily started to glaze over whenever he was speaking. The only thing that woke me up was his repeated use of the bizarre, two syllable "prop'ly", which initially grated and then started to make me giggle compulsively. He mentioned meeting a "black man" as though this was some ground-breaking act of tolerance: the nation winced. The only time I warmed to him was when I noticed he is left handed, an extraordinarily insignificant fact that made me squeal with excitement. It won't make me switch my political allegiance, though. He really did seem like such a lightweight. Attacking Brown should have been complete child's play - even the least aggressive Tory could plausibly argue that we are in a far worse financial state than any other leading economy, and that it's all Gordo's fault. Whether those accusations are true or not is up to Brown to defend - but surely Cameron missed a sitting duck there. A duck who lives in a duckhouse paid on expenses. Paddling near a moat, cleaned on expenses. Then again, Cameron probably didn't go into the debate intending to kick off a nuclear cold/boiling hot war with China... A quote from my notes: "Isthe most important job of the cuntry to protect and defend uK - 'when we don't know what's got to happen with iran, we don't know what's going to happen with china...?' ARGH."

Immediately after the live debate had ended, probably around the time I was on stage with Chris and Lucille singing Tiffany's I Think We're Alone Now, my other friend Chris sent me a text that read: 'Brown = Retard', and having watched the programme, I'd agree that he completely lost me. He tried really hard to use hard facts - but, as the book I'm reading now is pointing out superbly, facts and truth don't win - stories do. I wrote in my notes "oh poor gordon. it's an absolute car crash. every idea he comes out with is like 'why aren't you already doing this NOW?' they should have had a new leader." His response to the expenses scandal seemed genuinely humble - but his claim to be all up for Parliamentary reform drew derisive laughter from both Cameron and Clegg - the former rightly asking why he promises to do it now, having had 13 years, while the latter was visibly frustrated given that both main parties have voted against his reform suggestions in the recent past.

Unlike Cameron and Brown, however, Clegg was believable. He used smart analogies on tricky subjects, straightening out the debate on capping immigration by saying it would make the football transfer market difficult, and relating well to the audience, at one point saying to a questioner something along the lines of, "I know you're not allowed to ask supplementary questions, but nod if you like what I'm saying." It was a brilliant tactic to get people physically onside and showed a real comfort with talking to real people that I didn't see from either of the other two. He also was the only one to mention the metaphorical and literal bombshell that is Trident and its £100 billion price tag - you knows it makes sense. On the downside, like Cameron and Brown, he was fairly insufferable with his pally pally first names every six seconds, falling over himself to thank Jacqueline, Alan and Joel personally for their startlingly brilliant questions on the NHS, education and defence etc. etc. vom. etc.

Overall, I couldn't fail to be impressed that all three of them came out without weeping - I can't think of many modern situations that could be more intensely pressurising than a ninety minute, uninterrupted, live, national debate with two formidable opponents, and I spotted the autocue at one point - no scrolling script of course, just a huge timer counting down the number of seconds they had left to speak. Cameron rounded up with the terrifying mental image of him "being behind you" like a terrifying right wing pantomime villain or a gay car in the car/garage analogy, after which I kind of missed whatever the other two said. ITV's Alistair someone, the presenter, was laughably bad: an unusually tricky combination of camp, patronising, thick and bossy. I'm glad I watched to the end, however, as the hand shaking competition that went on as the credits rolled was hi-freaking-larious - Brown clearly broke rules to step forward and start mingling with the audience in the front row, while Clegg and Cameron stood uncertainly on the stage, wanting to get their skin touching moment in but knowing they'd agreed not to. Eventually they conferred and scuttled off the steps together, so suddenly, all three leaders were shaking pretty much every hand within reaching distance. It was a frenzy of "Love me! Love me!" to a previously-stifled audience who seemed thrilled to be allowed to do something other than hold very still. It looked like a political version of an impromptu a-Ha concert, with Clegg as Morton, Cameron as Mags and Brown as Pal. [Insert your own pun about the sun always shining on TV here]. [Or would one about hunting high and low be more appropriate?].

Anyway. Happy weekends one and all. I'm off with my PMT and my hangover to the gym, followed by a night out on the tiles with Grania where we've set ourselves wardrobe homework: neither of us is allowed to wear anything that the other has seen before. I am wearing several items that are quite odd on their own, but when teamed together are nothing short of fashion suicide. I'm going to look like I've picked my outfit for a bet. And my odds are not great.

Brief bit of politicking

A General Election update from the perspective of LLFF:

• Monday - Labour released their manifesto. It has made no impact on me whatsoever. Any good ideas they discussed have washed over me because I don't understand why they haven't been doing them for the last 13 years. I still basically like Gordon Brown even though he sold all our gold for a £10bn loss, and I still basically don't like Labour because they took us into an illegal war and I'm a pacifist.
• Tuesday - Conservative manifesto launch. There's no doubt that the Tories' campaign has been, thus far, way smoother than Lab's. That said, David Cameron's glossy forehead and his public relations background is, of course, part of his problem. The gulf between what they're talking about and what will actually happen if they win is so laughable that it makes me sick. I can't believe we're still arguing about this irrelevant rise in National Insurance. What about the fact that they're raising the level for inheritance tax? How can they be seen as progressive while still looking after the richest?
• More than that, however, are their plans for privatising state education. I am simply gobsmacked that anyone believes this is a good plan - making something that should be fair and national be even more about profit and local advantage than it is already. The gaps between good and bad will only increase, the postcode lottery will just get worse. It makes me sick to the stomach. Why should the people have to sort their schools out?! Isn't that the job of government? This is literally absurd. The state education system needs massive investment. No surprise that today, over fifty headteachers attacked the Tory plans.
• Cameron says in The Times that he wants to "put the public in the driving seat". I don't want to be in the driving seat. We pay MPs' salaries so that they can spend every moment of their working week making informed decisions on our behalf. We give them a mandate to make those choices. We do not have time to gather the information. We have families, and we are going to Glastonbury. They should make the country great - and if they fail, we won't vote for them next time. How can this concept be appealing? As the LibDems wrote in a press release following the Conservative manifesto launch, "when the Tories say we're all in this together, what they really mean is you're on your own". (Peter Mandelson then published a press release an hour later making the same observation. Then the LibDems published another press release pointing out that Mandy had nicked their line.)
• Boris Johsnson has finally admitted that one of the key election proposals he pushed forward when he was elected as London Mayor - to run tubes an hour later on Fridays and Saturdays - has been shelved. Only a twunt trusts a Tory.
• Wednesday - the Liberal Democrats manifesto is launched, and finally someone is speaking sense, but they can't win the election and suddenly I find myself getting a bit frustrated. Raising the income tax threshold to £10,000, which results in a £700 annual tax cut for 'most people'. Mansion tax of 1% on properties worth more than £2 million. Class sizes cut to 20 pupils in primary schools; catch-up places for 160 students in every secondary school. Clever students from lowest-achieving schools guaranteed a university place. Scrap ID cards and many other excellent proposals on freedom - the LibDems are the only party making any sense on liberty. And fantastic proposals on the family, including shared allocation of maternity and paternity leave, 20 hours free childcare for every child from the age of 18 months.

Obviously the LibDems won't win, but their manifesto launch, and the words written within it, are the most compelling by a country mile. I simply cannot see how any reasonable person wouldn't want policies like these to become law - and I'm writing this as someone who stands to lose several thousand pounds per year if they won. The Times polls today say that the majority of the country want a hung parliament - and from the data I'm seeing, the gap between Tory and Lab is currently too small for an outright Tory win - the Tories need to win around 40% of the vote, with around a 10% gap between them and Labour, to secure a majority. At the moment, Tories are around 38% with Labour on around 31%. However, my friend at the BBC says that a lot of people are still (understandably) ashamed of being Tory, and that there will be a lot of secret right wingers who are keeping schtum now but who will vote Cameron on the day itself. We'll see. It's definitely tight. It's definitely exciting. And if I can mobilise one or two people to a) vote when they wouldn't have otherwise, b) vote LibDem or c) just be a little bit more liberal in their thinking, I'll be one happy politicised bunny.

OK. It wasn't that brief.

Rufus et moi

Don't you love the way life turns out sometimes? I bought four tickets for a Rufus Wainwright gig and then decided I wasn't sure if I'd rather go or have the money. I put them on eBay at a 55% markup to see what would happen. I sold a pair, which was fine. Then a single ticket sold, leaving me with one. I hadn't really expected that but I happily went alone last night to sit in the unsold fourth seat at Sadler's Wells, staring at the three eBay buyers to my right. And ultimately, I was very glad indeed that no one had come with me because I would have been very boring and effusive on the tube home. As it is, I have distilled my self-obsessed gig review down to the following (and yes, even I am impressed that I can make a review of a concert about me):

I usually only admire perfection. I don't often respect performers who sing out of tune or mess up their lines, or who appear paranoid, irritating or unfunny. I like people who are the best at what they do. Rufus, however, is insecure, needy, melodramatic and over-emotional. He tells bad jokes and he makes mistakes. Sound familiar? In the pros column, he wears his heart on his sleeve, he's painfully honest about his own failings and he works extremely hard at life. Basically, if I was gay, Canadian, male and a smidgen more talented, I'd be Rufus Wainwright.

Last night's gig was a perfect Rufus showcase, warts and all - the first segment was a song cycle, an uninterrupted gallop through his new album, released last week, performed while he was wearing a diamond necklace and a fantastic black dress with huge feathered shoulders and a twenty foot train. The lyrics, mostly English, a few French, were direct insights into his existence - songs about his sister, about his parents and the cities he loves. Before the performance began, a guy had come onstage and told us that Rufus requested that there be no applause in between the songs - that the whole cycle was to be seen as one performance. We dutifully sat in silence while he hammered out extraordinarily complex piano accompaniments and blasted out his vocals, gloriously pitch perfect throughout. There were mistakes though, all the more glaring because of the formality provided by the costume and the lack of audience support. More frequently it was his playing that slipped, although a couple of times he couldn't remember his lyrics and just la-ed along until he found his jist. Despite the starched atmosphere, there was also a liberating sense of witnessing him as he would practice at home - he'd make an error and, without a moment's pause, return immediately to the beginning of the phrase and try again, sometimes so fast that I am sure many audience members didn't realise there'd been a slip-up.

But then in the second half, the big performance segment over, Rufus was back in jeans and a shirt, playing our old favourites, and still making errors, even in songs like Poses that he must've played thousands of times - but now there was no magical spell so he was free to display his irritation. And show it he did, clearly frustrated when he couldn't remember chords or lyrics, making growling noises or giving up altogether on the more complex sections and singing the piano part to the audience's loving amusement.

He's an amazing performer, a great pianist, and so talented that Elton John has called him our 'greatest living songwriter'. He could have played it safe last night, taken stock between each song, mixed up the old and the new - but instead he pushed himself to his limits, playing a two hour set without a backing band or written music, and (for the first half) without the comfort and support that a burst of applause brings at the end of a number. He also sang an incredibly moving song written by his late mother on one of the rare occasions where she was getting on well with his dad. We were all in tears by the end. The whole show was difficult and brave - and I admire him for not taking the easy road. It gives me strength to keep on ploughing my own furrow. If the ticket had sold on eBay, I wouldn't have gone last night, and I wouldn't have seen him. I wouldn't have known what I missed, and I would have had an early night, so it would have been fine - but like I said at the top, I do love the way life turns out sometimes. I think this is what psychologists call synthetic happiness. It rocks.

Ehowtogetbeatenup

Still on yesterday's school reunion tip, I feel I must share with the uninitated a selection of suggestions that I stumbled across here, describing how to prepare for a high school get-together.

1. Dedicate yourself to an exercise regime. In the months leading up to the big event, tone up, burn some calories and get physically fit. You'll not only look better, but you'll feel more confident.

OK. Given that I found the site less than 24 hours before the reunion, I left it a little too late to action this. Even so, I had fortunately considered that my appearance should be at top notch on the big day, so I was thrilled when I stepped on the scales on Saturday morning and found that I'd actually gained nearly a kilogram last week. Additionally, my face had chosen to reward me for my largely spot-free teenage years by breaking out in a liberal sprinkling of zits. Excellent.

2. Splurge on a stylish outfit. Don't break the bank, but treat yourself to some flattering new duds that accentuate your assets.

Assuming that turning up to the reunion wearing a burka might be thought of as a little odd, I didn't have many options. It was far too late to buy something new so I went in an old dress from Marks and Spencer's, the only selling point of which is its low neck - normally I'd hope that my cleavage may distract from my face, but in a room full of heterosexual girls, I knew I was barking up a tree of desperation. On the upside, I gained solace from the knowledge that I am not a person who uses the word 'duds' instead of 'clothes'.

3. Pay a visit to your hairdresser. Update your look with a new cut or color. Whatever you choose, make sure it's different from the style you had in high school. If you're not ready to lop off those locks, opt for a trendy up-do.

This tip had me crying with relief that I no longer have to write crap like that for magazines. And also slightly panicking that my appointment with my beloved Japanese hairdresser isn't until next Tuesday. My roots are almost longer than the dyed portion of my hair and the style doesn't know whether it's 60s or 70s, long or short, blonde or brown. In short, it looks awful. Ah well. I reminded myself that these people knew me when I went to school, so there's little point pretending that I'm anything other than rank - they know the truth.

4. Define yourself professionally. Even if you're in-between jobs and not exactly sure of your career path, prepare an impressive response. You're likely to be asked what you do for a living more than once.

Define yourself professionally?! FFS. I've been trying to do that since the late nineties. My career path is about as easy to define as irony. At this point, the tips were making me want to skip the reunion and stay at home doing something more fun, like stabbing myself in alternate ears with skewers. Mercifully, on the day itself, the only two people who asked me about my job were two old teachers - my peers either know the truth already or didn't care, and for that I love them.

5. Count your blessings and your bragging rights. From your perfect children to that marathon you ran, recall your many accomplishments. You'll want to mention these things at the reunion.

Oh yes! Of course! Thank god you reminded me about the CHILDREN I DON'T HAVE AND THE MARATHON I HAVE NEVER RUN. I recall my many accomplishments. They include interviewing Britney Spears on the phone over a decade ago and then listening back to the tape and becoming convinced that the PR had sent a stand in, so the rest of my office were helpless with laughter that I'd actually spent half an hour on the phone talking to 'Jipney'. And there was that time I fixed my washing machine unaided in 2008. I no longer feel like doing the ear skewer thing. Suicide is clearly the only option.

In addition to the five dos, there are also a few additional pointers, including the helpful suggestion that I bring my business cards (which I don't have because I am SUCH AN UNDERACHIEVER) and a warning not to drink away my nerves. Apparently it's fine to loosen up with a couple of drinks but we should be careful not to overdo it. Lolz etc. As if I would need to be told not to overdo it! Moi, the epitome of self-control and abstinence?! In the event, I took things at my usual refined pace, only having very small, delicate sips of sparkling wine, white wine and red wine, and going to bed at the civilized hour of 3am after re-straining my right groin muscle while attempting to pole dance in the sixth form common room.

So, thanks to ehow for telling me that I should turn up in precisely the opposite state to that in which I managed to arrive, and then behave in a manner absolutely not like my own character, while handing out BUSINESS CARDS.

LLFF's tips for a reunion are as follows:

1. Don't bother getting too dressed up, losing loads of weight or doing an 'ornate up do' because you'll look like a wanker. Plus, everyone will know you never normally look like that - we've all seen you on Facebook.
2. Don't worry about your job or your achievements - no one worth your time gives a flying fuck what you do between nine to five, they just want to see that you're happy and healthy.
3. Take business cards and hand them out. If you truly are that much of a dick, this is a helpful way of identifying yourself to the people who aren't over-formal nightmares.
4. Drink as much booze as you can possibly pour down your gullet. You've paid for it, you may as well enjoy it.
5. Finally, never ever rely on the internet for tips about anything. The content is written exclusively by morons. Oh.

School daze

I don't get paid to write this blog, and it's meant to be a personal record, so I don't tend to take the writing process too seriously. But this weekend I went back to my old boarding school for a fifteen year reunion, and I have lots to say. I want to write about it well. But I am so dead with exhaustion, I don't know how it will come out. I'll start it now, and if I have to abandon ship half way through, I apologise. It's possibly not the writing technique Charlie Brooker would use, but then I'm not Charlie Brooker and this isn't a weekly column for a national newspaper. As far as I'm aware.

I sent the first email about the reunion last August, to the school, to see what they thought about a group of us coming to spend a night there sometime in 2010. Eight months and hundreds of communiques later, 30 old girls and a clutch of older teachers returned to our even older school, drank tea and then, once the teachers had left, had a tour and a lot of good food and wine, and not enough sleep. The school buildings have changed a fair bit, but everything is basically the same in all the good ways, just a bit more modern: totally recognisable to me, and still familiar.

But what was personally surprising was how little emotion I felt. I had the very potent sense of being a completely different person to the girl I was at school - not just the expected progression of feeling older and wiser, but absolutely and unbreachably separate from that other Jane, a distant relative with whom I have no desire to be friends or penpals. My school days were immensely happy in part and I made some friends for life, of that there is no doubt. But I was also miserable at times, like any child, and there is much of that period that I have happily left behind forever; it's not locked away or festering in a pit of denial, it's just... it's gone and I grieve it not. I am infinitely happier now than I ever was in my teens - even at my most miserable these days, I am markedly better off - and I think I enjoyed the reunion as a fun gathering of people whose company I enjoy in the present, rather than an opportunity to nostalge about the past.

The other oddity was seeing the school as part of a group of parents. Of the 30 of us there on Saturday, many are now mothers, and the conversation inevitably turned to whether we plan to educate our children privately or not. In helping us to organise the reunion, the school is, I'm sure, hoping that several of our number choose to send their daughters there in a few years, but even if the desire is genuine, the reality may make it impossible for all but the wealthiest. With fees now around £28k per annum, plus extras, this means that, for every girl they send to the school, a parent needs to be earning around £55k before tax. If you have, say, two kids at private boarding schools with no scholarships, that's around £110k per year on school fees alone - no mortgage, no holidays, no debt repayment, no theatre tickets. I just cannot imagine ever being able to afford that - but many people I know will find the money somehow.

Fortunately for my bank balance, I still don't see myself sending my fictional child to private school. Of course, my opinions will all change the moment I give birth, but right now, I still have a problem with it. Looking round the school over the weekend, I was shocked at the difference in experiences a girl would have there vs. a state-run comprehensive. The facilities are exceptional - a vast fitness centre with a dance studio, a massive theatre and drama department, an incredible music block with an inspirational young head at the helm, and some of the best academic records in the country. Going to that school for seven years would be amazing. But... it's an amazing bubble. As longtime LLFF readers will know, I left school without any grasp of general knowledge. I'd been spoonfed to get top grades in my exams - but I couldn't have told you what communism was, nor defined the major differences between the political parties. I knew a bit about WWII, but nothing about WWI. I knew something about Shakespeare, but I wouldn't have been able to tell you who was on the throne at the time he was writing. My knowledge was a collection of essays, pre-written in my head. The only stuff outside those topics was Take That and outrage that my friend's brother appeared to find my pale skin, under-developed facial features and deep-seated insecurities eminently resistable.

I left school aged 17 with three good A levels and the unearned social self-confidence that is both part of the appeal and one of the biggest flaws of private education. Would I have been happier if I'd gone to a local state school? Who can say. Given that I have depression and believe that I definitely was a sufferer while I was at school, the chances are I would have found those years a struggle anywhere. As it was, I got good results, developed a lifelong love of choral singing which I'd hate to have missed out on, and made fantastic friends. I consider myself lucky to have gone there. But god it was a bubble. I was a naive dickhead when I left - I knew jack shit about the real world and, fifteen years later, I still feel like I'm playing a game of catch-up. Do I really want to spend £55k p.a. (plus at least 15 years' inflation) to turn my kids into naive dickheads with great A level results?

More than just a debate about my own kids elect, there's the bigger discussion about the UK and humanity. On a broad political level, I believe passionately in equality of opportunity - and there's no doubt that the continued existence of private school is about as much of a two fingers up at fairness as you can get. These days I rarely feel as though I am in an environment where the majority of people are ridiculously wealthy and privileged, so Saturday was an odd sensation for me, as we all chatted and laughed while being served canapes and glasses of sparkling wine by a wonderful team of caterers who live in the local town. I was deeply uncomfortable with a strong sense of them and us - not that we're bad people and not that they hated us, but just that it's not FAIR and, although I know life isn't fair, surely we should all do our bit not to perpetuate systems with which we wholeheartedly disagree?

If I were Prime Minister, it would be my number one priority to bring state school standards up to those of the private ones, with the explicit and stated intention of closing down all private schools within a certain number of years. But that's a fantasy - the reality is that state schools are very hit and miss, some excellent, some rubbish, and depending on where you live, the options can be free and great or terrifyingly bad. Until state education is a lot better, I wouldn't want to deny wealthy parents the opportunity of paying for private. But I'd like to get to a point where the richest don't have the need nor the desire to segregate their own from the hoi polloi, where we can all happily grow up together as equals, free from this apartheid that still feeds the old British class divides. What sounds like utopia to me probably sounds like a nightmare to others, but that's what I was thinking about on the journey back to London yesterday. And it's SO lucky that I have my opinions on this all sorted out, given that I am unattached and about as likely to get pregnant as my own mother. PHEW.

Ill Behaviour

Sometimes something happens in front of me, and although it is fascinating and extraordinary at the time, the thought that pops into my head is not 'Ohmygod, that's fascinating and extraordinary,' but 'Ohmygod I can't WAIT to write about this.'

That happened this morning.

I was on a fairly packed commuter tube northbound, standing in the central atrium bit, leaning against the glass partition that separates the standing section from the seats. Despite the high density of people, I'd managed to angle myself so that I could read my book, the brilliant River of Time by Jon Swain, tales of 1970s Cambodia and Vietnam so potent and engrossing that I momentarily forgot where I was. But suddenly, across the width of the carriage, by the opposite doors, someone sneezed - a strange, cracking noise that jerked my attention. I looked up from my book. There, a metre or so away, was a young man who, from the mouth down, was completely covered in opaque white vomit. It had clearly taken him utterly by surprise. Several people around him had been splattered by the force of the eruption. It was all over him, down his chin, his shirt, over his suit jacket which he'd draped over one arm; thick, smooth emissions like emulsion paint, but with small yellow items flecked within. I'm guessing he'd had something like the world's largest ever bowl of Ricicles for breakfast. A matter of seconds later, we pulled in to a station and he exited. The remaining people looked around, some horrified, some smiling, all silently listening to their own world, white headphones snaking into their ears. It was British tolerance at its best.

The space vacated by the puker stood empty for a couple of stops, and in that time, I was able to secure a seat, three away from the vomit-covered partition on the same side. The girl sitting next to the partition had a good half pint of vomit sliding down the other side of the glass to her left, but she appeared to be calm. Then a man boarded the train, saw the rare area of space, pushed through to stand in it and then leant on the partition, covering his dark jacket in another man's sick before 9am. Disappointing. When another passenger alerted him to his nightmare, he dealt with it well, blushing and giggling rather than getting angry, and later helpfully pointed out the offending matter to another young man who had been about to make a similar mistake. It was all rather cheery. And a tube first for me.

It brought to mind my old hairdresser, Helen, who told me that when she had been pregnant she'd suffered really badly from morning sickness, and was always ill on the train to work every morning. At first, she'd held it in until a station, and then got off and been sick into a bin, and got back on the next train, but eventually she just took a plastic bag on board with her every morning and was quietly sick into it without even getting up from her seat. I was fairly disgusted at the time but if I'm ever pregnant, maybe I'll understand. Somehow I don't think morning sickness was the cause of the sneeze-chunder explosion I witnessed this morning, though. Unless science has moved on very quickly in the last week without my knowledge.

On an unrelated subject, last night I went to see Trash City at the Roundhouse. It was a weird cabaret spectacle with a fantastic set and bizarre performances including a vast black man dressed head to toe in white tulle singing a terrible version of Fix You by Coldplay, several strange transvestite geishas doing dance routines to what Chris described as nineties-influenced big beat, whipped cream, Alice Cooper, an hilarious song called something like 'Everyone's Fucking But Me', weird acrobatics, pole-dancing robots, nude women smeared in something resembling Marmite and then eating fire, heart-shaped balloons, feathers, and a vast dinosaur made out of reclaimed metal and a motorbike engine that thudded its way through the crowd as a finale. I love things like that. I don't really understand them, I don't have a clue what motivates people to put them together, but it's good to be out of the usual headspace, a bit like a legal LSD trip without the comedown or the panic about violent flashbacks which clearly never really happen but which we were warned about so persuasively at school that I have never done acid - something about a woman who was driving her kids down the motorway twenty years after she took a tab, and started seeing huge insects flying towards her and swerved to avoid them and wrote off her car, killing herself and her kids. And then another girl who stabbed herself to death in the bath with nail scissors, which, in retrospect, I'm not sure is even possible. Still, the horror stories worked. And Trash City is cool.

A lot.

Action items for today:

1. Last night
2. Digital economy bill outrage
3. Boys are MENTAL

Last night, I went to see comedian slash activist slash smug man Mark Thomas present his people's manifesto at the National Theatre. He's been touring the country compiling audience suggestions for a real manifesto - and the results have been fairly funny. Last night we decided (among other ideas) that a) if it pisses with rain on a Bank Holiday, it will be considered a rollover and b) people who complain that there are too many immigrants will be banned from restaurants serving anything other than British food. We also voted in favour of invading Jersey, on the basis that they have around one billion UK tax pounds there, and that a maximum wage should be announced. I'd thought about that previously, and had concluded that no one could reasonably argue that they need to earn more than £250,000 a year. Mark Thomas had spoken to a Marxist accountant, who said that you could never cap it at a set figure, but rather at a multiple of the national average wage - say, ten times. Coincidentally, our national average wage is £25k, so I was pretty much on the money with that one. And, as the Marxist accountant pointed out, if you wanted to raise your own income above £250,000, the only way to do it would be to raise the national average wage. Brilliant.

Other suggestions that got my vote were the idea that all models for fashion/photography/film/TV should have to be selected at random from the electoral roll, and that all 4x4 vehicles should be required to drive at least 50% of every journey they make 'off road'. Everyone seemed to agree without question that drugs should be legalised, a Tobin tax should be introduced asap, and that newspaper retractions should be printed in the same font size and on the same page as the offending article.

It was an interesting night, not really realistic (sadly), but still good to get your thinking cap on and think about how you would change things if you had the power - and thus realise how powerless we all actually feel. There was a painful irony when Mark announced they were fielding a candidate in Bristol West to represent these issues and there was a woop of delight from the audience - four weeks today, there will be hundreds of candidates standing all over the UK, and they're all supposed to represent us. We shouldn't be wooping - we should be taking it for granted. But no one feels represented and everyone's furious...

...which leads me nicely on to the OUTRAGE that is the Digital Economy Bill, which a nasty group of Labour and Tory MPs shimmied through Parliament late last night. Apologies to any people with their finger on the pulse, but this is a deeply complex issue, where the wording of the Bill has been revised three times, based on the objections of any sane person who cares anything for the internet and freedom of speech, but it's finally been pushed through in a deeply suspect fashion, meaning that the secretary of state for business can now legally order the blocking of "a location on the internet which the court is satisfied has been, is being or is likely to be used for or in connection with an activity that infringes copyright", an absurd catch-all definition that could easily be applied to hundreds of sites, including the vital Wikileaks resource (which I last linked to when they published the BNP membership lists in 2008) and even Google. The web community is fuming with Labour, furious with Mandelson and livid with the Tories (see the comments here for a taster) - the only party who has consistently argued that examination of the Bill be held off until after the election is the LibDems. Either way, this is two fingers up at democracy and a fatal stabbing for freedom of expression, and it's mighty depressing.

Finally, on to boys - and a shift from the usual 'bad things come in threes' to a slightly tweaked 'odd things come in threes'. I was emailing a random German guy, and we were all set to fix a date to meet, but then he sent me a very curious email, which I couldn't quite understand. It had, for example, included the phrase 'Why do I have to think of a ferret and a bathtub, now?!' I wrote back asking him what he had meant by certain things and he said it was time to surrender, that it had been an attempt to be dadaistic. Riiiiiight. I asked him to clarify further, and he said 'Sorry for playing this the pathetic way, but I needed to find out how you'd respond. Afraid, I'm not up to your personality.' Hmmmm. So he's dumping me before he's even met me. He was too short anyway. And it wouldn't have been that remarkable, but I was simultaneously emailing a guy who reluctantly revealed yesterday that he makes missiles. Missiles. Apparently he'd met people who work for British Tobacco who are appalled and people from the liberal left who think it's fine. I said I thought it was pretty disgusting to spend your nine to five designing weapons that kill innocent people, but then I also think working for a bank is pretty questionable, and I've been doing that for three years. It pays the rent. He said,
"Well, obviously I don't think that weapons are great or that blowing people up is really cool, but then I don't think what I do is disgusting or inherently immoral either. If I did think that way then I wouldn't do it. Personally I think I would have more of a problem with someone who continues to do something which they feel to be morally wrong just to pay the rent rather than someone who makes moral judgements which I disagree with (up to a point obviously)." I think he is trying to say that he'd rather I worked for a bank and loved it than worked for a bank and hated it. I can't see how if you a) think that weapons are not great and b) think that blowing people up is really uncool, you can c) think that designing weapons is not inherently immoral. I haven't replied yet, but I'll keep you posted. And then this afternoon, there was the guy who sent me a photo of his erect penis, while I was sitting at my desk booking aeroplane tickets for my boss. Insania.

Let the games begin

So in all the excitement about the non-bomber and the sex and the cars yesterday, I didn't have time to mention the big news in the Real World, which is that Gordon Brown finally announced that the next General Election will be on 6th May. And although I secretly do think the Tories will probably still win, I am allowing myself the opportunity to get excited about it because otherwise it is all just too depressing.

It does seem that most of the election is being fought on the economy, which is just freaking boring and pointless, since even if we made every single cut that is being proposed by all the parties, we'd still be up shit creek, heading towards Angel Falls with no paddle and no Paul Daniels. Meanwhile, no one is saying much about how they're going to handle immigration, which seems to be the biggest concern for voters, and the whole thing will probably be decided on the back of the TV debates happening over the next month.

I am still hoping for a hung parliament, not because I think that anything dramatically massive will come from it, but just because it's a bit more interesting than either Labour or Conservative winning outright. [As usual, I struggled not to type Conservatory, for when I was young and illogical, I thought that Tory was an abbreviation, and that the right wing was represented by a party fond of glazed home extensions]. My clever friend Sara says that we are in an economic crisis and that this is not the time for the indecisive governance that would result from a hung parliament, but a) it would still be interesting to see what happens, b) if we're screwed anyway, what have we got to lose - we may as well have something other than the same two parties we've had for the last 65 years, and c) I deny that only confused leadership could result from a hung parliament - I think that, just maybe, lasting change could be made. And what if the LibDems refused to form a coalition government except on certain conditions? Well, then they'd have a real opportunity to make lasting change to our political system - and even the long-dreamed-for proportional representation could be a vague possibility. Like I said, as long as you block out the knowledge that the Tories are leading in every single opinion poll, this is shaping up to be quite an exciting four weeks.

Sex, cars, clothes and self-hatred

Just before the long weekend, I was having an interesting email discussion with a guy in my office about fast cars. He casually mentioned that driving his was better than sex. I said he's obviously not doing it right. He said he is doing it right, but that the thrill of driving the car beats sex every time. I asked him to choose: either a) your choice of incredible car for the rest of your life, but only bad sex or b) fantastic sex with your dream woman and a lifetime behind the wheel of a Ford Focus or similar. He said he would choose a) without hesitation. I found this extraordinary and shallow, and slightly went off him (platonically speaking).

Later that evening, I was talking about clothes with my friend Alex, and we both agreed that we have a slight problem with how much we love buying new items. And quietly, in the rear left corner of my brain, an alarm bell rang. I relayed my conversation re. bad sex vs. fast cars to Alex, and we replaced the car with clothes, i.e. a) fantastic clothes and bad sex for the rest of your life, or b) fantastic sex but terrible clothes. This time the choice was unapologetic and instantaneous. There is no way in heaven and earth that I could only wear rank clothes for the rest of my life - at least, not living in society as I know it. Bad, three minute sex would be a delight if it meant I was guaranteed to have a permanently great wardrobe. I grudgingly have to accept that the guy at work isn't as wrong as I'd thought.

I've had a lovely four day break - repainted my bedroom, reorganised things in an impressive fashion, single-handedly rehung my mammoth bookshelf, ate three times my own bodyweight over Saturday eve and Sunday when I was staying with my parents', and watched the Coen brothers' A Simple Man at The Roxy last night. It was goodish. Today was back to business as usual. After a couple of stops on the tube, I was standing in the middle corridor of the carriage with a row of seated people facing me on either side. Directly to my right was a small, wizened old lady with a prominent nose, wearing a headscarf and dull, practical clothes without ornament. Her chestnut skin was weatherbeaten to a matt eggshell finish and when the train was stationary I could actually hear her epidermis crying out for Oil of Olay. She looked like a National Geographic portrait of an Afghan war widow, utterly out of place on the tube. I was trying to figure out if I could take her photograph without causing a ruckus, but then I noticed her flicking something rhythmically in her hand. I looked closer. She appeared to be holding a small metal counting device, which, I believe, is called a 'clicker'. Every two or three seconds, she clicked it. I didn't know if she was conducting an experiment or whether she was suffering from unusually regular palsy. Then I thought it: perhaps it's a bomb detonator. I swore violently at myself. I hated myself fully. My cheeks flooded with angry blush. A little old lady looks out of place on the tube, and you think she might be a wannabe mass murderer? God I hate the media for infecting me with such far-fetched bollocks, and my own tendency towards narrow-mindedness for not fighting the infection hard enough. If I can't even stamp it out in my own mind, what hope do we have? Yuck, yuck and yuck.

Perky Maundy

Oooh I'm in a good mood today. London looked fantastic on my run; I listened to Justice, a French act that Chris described as 'dirty house' and that I found to be exceptionally positive and upbeat; I sweated profusely but my new make-up stayed put: thank you, Max Factor, for being half as expensive yet three times as good as your rivals. After thirty minutes or so I jogged down the ramp into the Tate Modern shop on Level 1, picked up my Richard Tipping sign as agreed with Daisy in customer services, and jogged on to London Bridge. It was all very smooth and well-organised. Isn't it lovely when things just work out?

News: I'm pregnant. It's a boy. We're calling it Nugget.*

Item number 769 on the list of things that are slightly weird about me is as follows: my waste management is utterly moronic. While I am extremely uncautious about the amount of shower gel I use, cavalier when it comes to spending money on gig and theatre tickets and downright evil in terms of leaving lights on and flying places rather than staycationing, I am meanwhile ridiculously over-zealous about waste in other areas. When I eat lunch at my desk, something that happens about four times a week, I have a supply of salt and pepper sachets in my top drawer. I use them fairly sparingly and, at my meal's end, instead of throwing any remaining salt grains or pepper granules into the bin, I fold over the edge of the sachet and replace it in my drawer. I am similarly zealous about recycling paperclips. And Jiffy bags, for some reason - I hoard them like a crazy old lady who's expecting a run on padded envelopes at Ryman's. I can't explain it, but that's how it is. Bon weekend.

*April Fool's. Hoping the shock didn't actually kill my parents. That would be unideal, especially as I need my dad to come round as planned on Saturday and drill holes in my wall. And then I need my mum to cook us the delicious steaks she's told me about. Don't die, parents. I'm not really pregnant. I'm basically celibate. Aaaaaaaaaand stop.