Funnypenny

Well that was quite amusing. My boss was going to a lunch today at White's, which is an old-school members' club in London. On Tuesday he asked me to book him a cab, so I went on Google to find the address. I was expecting it to be in Mayfair or St. James', but on typing 'White's private members club London' into the searchbox, the first result that came up on Google maps was in Aldgate. Odd, I thought, but pasted the address into the Outlook calendar entry, booked the cab and forgot about it.

At 12:30 this afternoon, I got a call from my boss. He was in the taxi, outside White's Club on Leman Street, Aldgate. It turns out that members' club means different things to different people. I'd sent my boss for lunch at a strip joint.

I tried to apologise through the laughter, but annoyingly, saying sorry while cackling with uncontrollable mirth didn't communicate the sincerity I'd intended. The idea of my unbelievably clean-living, teetotal, 11% bodyfat, immaculately-dressed boss expecting a stiff-upper-lip English club and getting a lunchtime dose of fake tan, fake boobs and diamante thongs at a tacky City lapdancing venue was just too good to be true. I have since researched the establishment a little further; a review on ViewLondon by Jason1976 suggests it is just the kind of place any self-respecting man about town would hope to find himself for a business lunch on a Thursday afternoon: "Had my stag do at Club Whites this week and my first visit will definitely not be my last, as soon as we were lead to our VIP room i knew this was going to be the stag night i only dreamt of." Another reviewer, Sweeting, adds: "I tell you what, this club is rated as the best , i am never disappointed when i go , it's true that i go there pretty often but what i am saying is the truth, this club has it spot on in my opinion and i recommend highly once again, the girls , the management, could'nt be better."

When I eventually stopped laughing and was reassured that he hadn't even got out of the cab and was now safely on his way back to the office, I found the phone number of the old-school White's and tracked down the intended lunch date to apologise; thankfully, he also saw the funny side. I then emailed his PA to explain what had happened who comforted me with a tale of a friend of hers who once sent her boss to Manila instead of Milan. I guess - as ever - things could have been a little worse...

In unrelated matters, I received the below in an email yesterday and it made me laugh. There is, I'll admit, an element of recognition in my response although I SWEAR I haven't knowingly burned down a house yet. Y'know, though, never say never...

Vigilant Idiot

"Be a bit vigilant," I suggested to you all last Friday. Advice, like criticism, is clearly something I can give but not take.

The time: approximately 08:48. The date: today, Tuesday, 24 May. The place: Northern Line carriage, northbound. I am leaning against a glass partition, listening to Alexander by Alexander, and playing a game on my phone. There is not enough room for me to extract my book from my overflow bag and certainly no space to annotate. I am reading Becker's Pullitzer Prize winning The Denial of Death and it requires annotating. So iJewels it is.

At Bank, there is always an exodus, but today's is even more pronounced than usual. Out of the corner of my eye, it appears that there are four vacant seats behind me, the other side of the partition, two facing two. A woman walks towards one of them. Without pausing iJewels, I swivel around the edge of the partition and reverse into another.

It is not vacant.

I have lowered myself into someone's lap.

It is the funniest thing I HAVE EVER DONE. I squeal, leap up and turn around. My victim is a diminuitive Asian female, probably in her mid-thirties, wearing headphones. She is finding it a bit funny but not really. The rest of the carriage is giggling quite a lot. I apologise with all the sincerity I can manage, while laughing uncontrollably. She gestures to the seat next to her, which does not appear to have anyone sitting in it. I get the message and lower myself down once again, thankfully without incident. My game of iJewels is a write-off.

It is nice to laugh. The worst fall-out from The Incident has been at night - I couldn't get to sleep before 4 or 5am, and when I did doze off, I dreamed bad things. On Sunday night I woke up early due to a full-blown panic attack, my hands round my neck, unable to breathe properly for several minutes, lots of asthmatic-style wheezing. Fun fun fun! But last night (Monday) I popped a Melatonin and slept right through. Today I feel like a new woman.

The days have been largely OK - I've just kept myself busy and, if I do remember what happened, I just remind myself how much worse it could have been. I do think it's clever, though, that despite my conscious mind's failure to maintain Red Alert, my unconscious is still doing its job. I was in Paperchase on Sunday picking out a birthday card, totally focused on the task at hand: the mugging couldn't have been further from my mind. But suddenly I felt something brush past me and I leapt as if I'd been tasered. I gasped, whipped around and my potential attacker revealed herself as a four year old in an elaborate princess dress. Similar things have happened several times - a lady stood on a plastic bag yesterday on the pavement and it burst surprisingly loudly - jaded city-girl that I am, I'd normally not even reacted, but yesterday I jumped melodramatically to one side and squealed like a TOWIE cast-member receiving a BAFTA. Clearly, although I've reverted to my casual self on the surface, there's still a good bit of heightened awareness bubbling away underneath. No wonder I can't sleep without 'erbal assistance.

Anyway, the long and short of it is this: thank you all for your kind messages of support. It's meant a lot. And I feel a great deal better as a result. You don't need to worry about me, I'm alive and lap-dancing. Let normal service resume.

Gang(lions) warfare

OH I SEE. I write regularly for months, pouring my heart out, letting you in to the deepest pits of my despair, allowing you to witness my heartrending battles with the huge intellectual and philosophical questions that we all must face as part of the human condition, desperately clutching on to sanity with shredded fingertips, begging for your advice and respect, and you just sit there silently scrolling down the paragraphs, only very occasionally clicking the box at the bottom to say, 'That wasn't shit,' before returning to your normal lives and silently thanking some higher power that you don't overthink things like that nutcase on LLFF.

And then I write flippantly about a CYST and I am OVERRUN with feedback. People I've not spoken to in years, true friends, distant colleagues, an ex-lover: all have risen to this occasion and clamoured to give me their thoughts and advice on the chickpea-sized lump on my left hand. Clearly I have found your level.

The advice I've been offered has been pretty unanimously in the 'don't bash' category, which, from a dramatic point of view, I've found disappointing. And I am still hurt that it was this that inspired such a flood of correspondence. Nonetheless, I am putting aside my petty concerns and, for the benefit of all my fellow gang(lion) members, I've pasted a selection of the feedback below:

"now i had a ganglion. and it did just disappear. not much use to you that is it."
No. No it isn't. How perceptive of you, reader. I've had mine since I was about ten. If it hasn't disappeared in over two decades, sadly I don't think it's going to start disappearing now.

"My sister had one, and someone bashed it and it was *horrifically* painful and she screamed. And it didn’t work. And she ended up having surgery. Don’t do it."
Being a glutton for punishment, the pain thing didn't put me off. "And it didn't work" was pretty persuasive, but there's a part of me that thinks that maybe they just didn't get the right bashing technique...

"Use a hot tea bag and apply to it for as long as you can possibly stand it. Never drop a book on it. If it doesn't start improving in 2 days go to the doctor, could be a staph infection. Not something you want to mess with."
Ooh, this person sounds like they now what they're talking about because they use the word 'staph'. In my case, if it's a staph infection, it's a 23 year old staph infection, so I'm thinking it's probably not that. I'm going to try the teabag thing though (not a sentence I ever thought I'd type). Tesco's Online sent me lemon tea by accident about three years ago so I can use the bags for my cyst. I will report back.

"My bro had one of these so i just asked him what he did about it.. he said he had an operation to remove it.. I asked if he had ever just "bashed it".. he said he had on many occasions but it just made it worse.. helpful?"
Yes. Many thanks.

"Encyclopaedia Britannica. Or maybe War and Peace. I'd offer to do it, but I'm in the wrong country."
Excellent suggestions, both, but I think the pleasures of cyst bashing are looking increasingly unlikely. :(

"just read your blog on ganglions... join the club!! i've had one in my right wrist ever since i started working so that's err over 10y ago now... i'm sure it's 100% correlated with computer/mouse use.... mine inflates/deflates according to how much i'm working.. i had it drained once (v painful) which helped temporarily but that's it... i keep asking about other options but the surgery route as you say is not permanent.. and you get a big scar on the wrist... great! it bugs me doing stuff like yoga - am never going to be able to do a hand stand!!! and would also stop me being any good at racquet sports but other than that i live with it... think it will go once i become a lady of leisure!!!! i actually think i have bashed mine accidentally and again it helps a bit but has always come back..."
DING DING DING! We have a winner. Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, the evidence is clear: I am working too hard and my body is in revolt. If I do not resign immediately, I will never be able to do a handstand, and I'm sure we can all agree that that is not a sacrifice anyone should have to make. I am off to write a last email to my boss. Then I will go home, sit on my sofa, stroke my cyst and wonder what I have done.

A Once In A Lifetime Opportunity

I have masses to say because I'm still mental and I went to see Simon Amstell live on Tuesday night and the UK's economic crisis is being really interesting and I've watched a couple of GRIPPING TED talks but what I really want to talk about is ganglions.

I have kidded myself that mine was a bit of bone for years, but I've just read about it online and apparently, as I had feared, they really are cysts YUCK YUCK YUCK a big cyst containing THICK JELLY-LIKE MATERIAL on my HAND. And apparently it really is true and not just an old wives' tale that you can get rid of them by bashing them with a big book and I'm really really tempted. So here is today's question: Faithful - has anyone ever tried this in the past 100 years, and if so, what happened? According to the website I read, the odds of it returning don't seem to be massively different whether I bash it with a book or have a surgical procedure and as a good liberal girl, I would prefer to avoid wasting state facilities if possible.

Just so you can see exactly what we're playing with, this is a photo of my hand from above:

So far, so inoffensive, right? But here is a photo of my hand taken from the side. I have formed a clawlike grasp to maximise the visibility of the lump:

So I think something needs to be done. Now the choices begin. What book should I use? I'm thinking not The Bible (too traditional). Do I use the spine or the flat side? I am left-handed, so I think I will have to employ a cyst-basher. I will need to get very, VERY drunk first. Maybe I should sell tickets and give the proceeds to the Royal Society for the Protection of Ganglion Sufferers. Would you like a ticket? More importantly, would YOU like to bash my cyst? RSVP.

Indecent exposure

"Ummm, Janey..." said Emily, while a few of us were seated around Kate's kitchen table last night, "are you... wearing hotpants?" I winced and nodded slowly.
"I think I might be, yes," I said.

I had already been told that they looked great by Kate and Joanna, but that is not the point. Yesterday morning, I examined myself in my bedroom mirror. "I do not need to worry," I thought. "These shorts are suitable for work - they are grey wool shorts and I am wearing them over opaque black tights with high heels and a black round-neck jumper. I look preppy and efficient." Then I arrived at work and took off my coat. As is so often the case, the lighting and atmosphere in my bedroom had been somewhat different to the vibe in my office. I had a moment of Damascene clarity. I was at work. Wearing hotpants. Grey hotpants.

I was in a quandary: should I admit my fashion crisis, or attempt to persuade everyone that my choice was fine by pretending everything was exactly normal and that coming to work out of the blue wearing a pair of microshorts was a perfectly laudable decision to make on a Thursday? I considered going to the shops and buying an alternative garment for my lower half, but as soon as anyone had seen me in the shorts, this option was rendered impossible, as the logical conclusion anyone would draw having seen me change from the shorts into an alternative would be: her bum was too big for her shorts and they ripped. I had to stay in them, and I had to act confident.

I resolved to move around as little as possible, and keep my beshorted legs under my desk, so it was then inevitable that I was asked to run more errands than I'd ever been asked to run before. I was sent back and forth to the vending area, to the post tray, to get things signed, a never-ending stream of reasons meant that I had to stand up continually and show people more of my thighs than anyone would ever choose to see. Two or three people visibly double-took when I walked by them, and I can assure you, it was at my audacity, not my legs. When you are used to someone dressing relatively normally and then they turn up to work wearing an outfit that would not look out of place on Rihanna at the Manchester GMEx, it can be a bit shocking.

Today I am wearing a demure polo-necked dress that comes down to below my knees. I feel safer. As, I'm sure, do my colleagues, who don't have to fear a flash of my cellulite every time they look up from their spreadsheets. Lesson well and truly learned.

In which I am annoying

So yesterday was unendingly hilarious. I was giggling pretty much non-stop all day, until about 6pm, when I giggled even more, and then stopped for about 20 minutes, and then started giggling again. I'm still giggling, even now, at the memory of what happened. And the annoying part is - I'm not telling you what made me giggle. Nope, not you and DEFINITELY not you. Not even if you ask really nicely. The only reason I'm mentioning it at all is for my own reference, and because I think it's important for you to remember that I don't write down EVERYTHING here, and just because you read my blog regularly, it doesn't mean you, y'know, KNOW me or anything. There is more to my life. Not much, admittedly, but a bit.

Giggling incident aside, I was also able to be a good friend and listen and offer incredibly sensible and supportive advice, while drinking white wine and eating pan-fried cod in King's Cross. Today I am feeling less giggly, slightly meh about the Labour by-election win, annoyed with my hair and its slow growth and desperate to get home so the weekend can begin. There is a reporter on Sky news with a banner below her head saying TUNISIA TURMOIL. I briefly thought that was her name. That happens quite often to me. There was a guy on the other day who I momentarily believed was called PONZI VERDICT. He looked a bit Italian, it wasn't impossible.

Things I recommend without hesitation:
Mac laptops
When Harry Met Sally
Davina McCall's workout DVDs
Investing in a good pair of walking boots
Therapy
Braeburn apples
Fresh air
Regular massages
Wine
Crying
Giggling
Weekends

Hair brained

Right. I am handing control of my hair decisions to a triple panel of Sarah, Sara and Grania. They have not yet been informed of this but I think they'll be fine with it. From this day on, I am not allowed to cut, dye or even have my fringe trimmed unless all three of them have approved it. No more rash decisions. Ever.

I genuinely think I have some sort of mental condition, in addition to the other six million already detailed. Every time my hair even slightly annoys me, regardless of how innocuously it does so, I have to get it cut INSTANTLY. Based on previous nightmares (e.g. here), I now insist to myself that my hairdresser must have English as a first language, but in my desperation today I threw even that miniscule fragment of caution to the wind and accepted an appointment with Daniele, pronounced Danyellie, whose English was broken but OK, but I did that thing of sitting down in the salon opposite the mirror for my consultation and then realising that my hair looked absolutely amazing and that I didn't want him to cut it at all, but not being able to run away for fear of being rude. And now my hair is quite a bit shorter and a lot more boring and I hate it and I'm £30 poorer and less feminine and more ugly. Such a DICK.

I also am sick to death of my freaking crap memory. Last night after a glorious first-Christmas-rehearsal-of-the-year choir practice, I was walking to the pub and introduced myself to a guy who then informed me that I'd already had a fairly long conversation with him two weeks previously, concerning my new parlour game for classical music losers: The Ultimate Mass (where players compile their ultimate mass from all existing movements of all existing masses by any composer). I had no recollection of this conversation until he reminded me. I didn't recognise his face, I didn't know his name, and it wasn't until I heard his Belfast accent that I could place him at all. It is a bit like being in an even more terrible version of 50 First Dates called 50 First Rehearsals.

But it wouldn't be so terrible, except last week my attention was drawn to another, more serious, memory lapse, and I am still feeling a bit fragile about it. Lucy came to my flat for Em's hen and left a belated birthday present for me on my pillow. A couple of weeks later, she asked if I'd got her present. I had no recollection of ever seeing it. I looked all round my bed and under it. Nothing. My only idea was that Em must have found it and thought it was for her. I texted Em: "Did you by any chance take my birthday present from Luce by accident? It was apparently on my bed and wrapped in polka dot paper." "I have your present!" she replied. "We found it on your bed and thought it must be for me since there was no card. I'll give it to you next time I see you." I was relieved that I hadn't lost or thrown away the present by accident, but slightly miffed with Em. It was a bit weird of her (and whoever else 'we' was) to go into my bedroom, find a wrapped gift on my pillow and take it for herself. Still, I supposed I could understand it - she was giddy, it was her hen night...

Last week, I saw Em. I couldn't resist a small dig.
"I can't believe you just STOLE my birthday present!" I laughed. She laughed back.
"What are you talking about?" she said. "You gave it to me!" My eyes widened.
"What the actual fuck?" I said.
"Yep. You came into my room and handed it to me."
"Tell me we didn't open it."
"We did." My jaw dropped. Then the consumerism kicked in.
"Did I like it?"
"I can't remember. I'll wrap it back up and give it to you again."

So there we have it. After I unknowingly re-read The End of the Affair, I thought my memory had reached its nadir, but clearly not. Now I have found a present on my bed, given it to someone else, watched them open it, and have no recollection of doing so. AND I pay people to make me look worse. If that isn't a lost cause, I don't know what is. Somebody stop me.

Floating, not gloating

Given the fact that I am trundling over rather rocky terrain at present, it seemed remarkably serendipitous that last night was the night that Emily, Grania and I had chosen, weeks ago, to use our £10-for-the-price-of-a-£40-session vouchers at Floatworks, Europe's biggest floatation centre. I wasn't sure what to expect but I was pretty certain that I'd come out of the experience feeling less stressed than when I went in.

Error.

I had my shower and peered into the pod, lime green on the outside, white on the inside, noticing as I stepped in that one of the previous users had left a couple of long, dark hairs behind. My over-sensitive reflex nearly kicked in but I reminded myself that I swim merrily in the sea, which I am told has a little more unpleasant matter in it than two long hairs. I sat down. The heavily salted water was warmish and a little over a foot deep. Body temperature, I think heated through a panel in the pod's floor. The liquid felt thick with the salt, almost syrupy. I extended my legs, put in the earplugs (supplied) and pressed the button to bring the pod's lid down. There was a red light at the foot end of the pod which emitted a comforting glow. I lay back, allowing my head to be completely supported by the water, and waited for the plinky plonky music I'd been told to expect: ten minutes to start with, followed by fifty minutes of silence, followed by more music to alert you that it's time to get out and shower.

I waited.

No plinky.

No plonky.

Just silence.

I waited some more. Without the music, I wouldn't know when to get out. I would lie there, not knowing when to get out, for an hour. Or I could get out then and there, wrap the clearly insubstantial towel around my naked form, slide my feet into the rubbery sandals and schlep back to reception to check. Given that I am always pro-active, always up for an adventure and always full of beans, I continued to lie still and hope a solution presented itself.

For the first few minutes I was intensely bored. Then I realised that you can curl yourself up, stretching one side and then the other, and hear your spine clicking. That was quite fun. Then I spent some time running my fingers through my hair, which was all ballooned out and made me feel like a mermaid. Also fun. Then I lay still, and realised that the water around your body gets really warm if you don't wiggle very much. That, too, was pleasing. Then I smoothed the water over the bits of my body that weren't submerged, and realised that it felt a bit like semen. Then I remembered being in Madrid about ten years ago and interviewing one of Scooch who said that his favourite place to masturbate was on sunbeds. And then I suddenly worried that I was lying in a pod full of strange men's semen. Then I started wondering how long it was 'til my hour was up. And basically I wondered that for ages until I got bored of wondering it and actually got out, and checked the time on my phone. I'd only had about 45 minutes but I was out now and I knew I wouldn't relax if I got back in. So I got back into the shower and then went to the hairdrying area to dry my hair. There was a lot of other people's hair on the floor.

When I got back to reception, I told the lady about my lack of music. "Did you have the green pod?" she asked, unflapped. I nodded. "Ah, well that one's temperamental." She wrote out a laminated voucher for another free session and handed it over. I felt placated but not yet relaxed.

When Grania and Emily came out, they too were unconvinced, although the woman behind reception said that everyone says their second float is miles better than their first because they know the ropes. That sounds to me like marketing gold. Then the three of us went over the road to the restaurant, where I took one sip of my delicious glass of cold white wine and then knocked the rest of it all over myself, much of it pouring into my left boot. The boots are ten days old and are lined with a massively-absorbent and warm fleecy fabric. So that's good. The left one will smell of wine FOREVER.

Then I had too much to eat and we set the world to rights and then I had to wait 14 minutes for a tube, so I went back up to street level which was DEFINITELY an error, and eventually got a bus home and felt exhausted and slept quite well, and today I am knackered but I keep thinking about floating and feeling, for some unexpected reason, like I really want to do it again as a matter of some urgency.

So, in conclusion:
Floating at the time: thumbs horizontal
Cold white wine in my mouth: thumbs up
Cold white wine all over my dress and tights, and in my winter boots: thumbs down
Memory of evening: thumbs up
Floating in retrospect: thumbs at 2 and 10 o'clock

Also: Blood and Gifts is a very good play at the National. It's about the diplomatic handling of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in the early eighties and I recommend it. It's very funny and informative. A bit like me but with broader appeal.

Finally: I just found out that, due to a glitsch in the system last week, our office vending machine went through a spate of giving away Kitkats for 1p. This is what happens when I start liking Twix Fino. It is a conspiracy, I tell you. Livid.

Baseless concerns

About two months ago I received a standard heads-up email from HR saying a new guy was starting at work, and when I saw his name, I realised that I knew him. We were part of the same extended social circle a long time ago, and when I was 17 I spent an afternoon or two sunbathing around his parents' pool in south west London. How odd, I thought. It's a small world.

So when he started, I sent him an email saying 'Remember me?' His desk is only fifteen metres from my office door, but I chose to send him an email not only because I am sometimes a bit shy (100% implausible but 100% true) but also because being greeted at your desk, surrounded by new colleagues, by a girl you may or may not remember from around 15 years ago doesn't sound like my idea of fun. So I sent the email, and he replied and said 'Yes, what the hell are you doing here?' and I told him and that was it.

And then yesterday, after he'd worked here for six weeks, I finally bumped into him in the vending area while I was getting a glass of milk to drink alongside my second piece of Laura's Marks & Spencer's chocolate birthday cake. And instead of saying 'How are you getting on?' or 'What's new?', the first thing I said to a guy I hadn't seen for 15 years, a guy who I SWEAR I do not fancy (and I know this because my friend still knows him and has told me enough about him for me to know for sure) was 'Oh god, how embarrassing, you've caught me on a day when I'm not wearing any make-up.'

I mean.

The catalogue of things which are annoying about that statement is tragic:

a) I very rarely wear make-up at work, so I don't know who I was trying to kid.
b) I do not fancy him, so why do I care whether he thinks I'm rough or not? I could have been naked except for an immaculate Hitler moustache and I still shouldn't have been self conscious about my appearance in front of him.
c) There is absolutely no WAY that a boy would hear a girl say that and not think that she does then fancy him.
d) Even if I'd thought I might fancy him at some undisclosed point in the future, that would have been up there in the Top 10 list of things not to Tourette's-reveal on first meeting him.
e) The fact that I'm even slightly annoyed about it will make everyone who reads this convinced that, in a Gertrude protesting too much fashion, I do actually really fancy him, which I really don't.

In short: I am a dick.

What was good, however, was that last night I had a vivid, VIVID dream about being seriously, morbidly, twice-as-big-as-Vanessa-Feltz-at-her-biggest, needs-a-winch-to-get-out-of-bed fat. My mum was telling me that I was disgusting and needed to do something about it, and I was crying and saying, 'How can you be so horrible and judge me like this?' but secretly knowing she was right and hating myself. And then I woke up and got dressed and looked in the mirror and comparitively, I am like the thinnest person in the history of the world, basically like Kate Moss but fractionally facially less pretty, so I'm off to have some garlic bread with cheese.

Major hitch

Just a quick one tonight as I'm sitting in St. Pancras International, waiting for the Eurostar to speed me to gay Paris, but I wanted to have a quick pre-France rant about my wondrous new Moroccan carpet bag, thrilling in design and quite probably disgustingly over-priced, beautifully kitsch, covered in peacocks. Note to creator of such bags: you should mention on the label that this bag may look all well and good in the shop or on one's bedroom floor, but when carried along over one's shoulders with the handily-provided shoulder straps, the friction created by the rubbing of one's hips against the carpet fabric causes one's DRESS TO RIDE UP AS ONE IS WALKING ALONG, COMPLETELY unbeknownst to you, meaning that COMPLETE STRANGERS HAIL YOU as you are talking to your father on your mobile phone and say "Hey! HEY!" and then point at their ass, and you don't know what the hell they are going on about and you smile politely and keep on walking and they shout, "HEY!" again, even louder this time, and you think you must be on fire or perhaps you dropped your passport or are about to walk into a lion's den, but then you realise that the reality is in fact far worse and your dress has ridden up over your buttocks so all pretty much anyone walking behind you can see is your arse, thankfully covered in opaque black tights, but still.

The label should say that. It should be a legal requirement.

Right. Platform 10. I'm off.

Two years in the life

Yeah, OK, OK, anyone who knows me can probably guess the reason for my sluggishness to write. Stupid, stupid XY chromosomes and stupid, stupid me for being stupid enough to be optimistic.

Let's recap. My last serious relationship, i.e. where both parties were happy to call the other their 'boyfriend' or 'girlfriend', ended in August 2008. My first date after that weighed approx. 28 stone. The next one kissed me on date one and then vanished. The next one kissed me on dates one and two, said he really liked me and then said he wasn't looking for a relationship. The next one dumped me before he'd even met me, by vanishing on the day of our proposed date. I wasn't so much stood up as sat up, in that I didn't even need to leave my sofa to find out that he wouldn't be there. Then I started regularly seeing a guy whose commitment-phobe tendencies were so glaring as to make it stupid of me to even kiss him in the first place, so unlikely was I to convince him to commit. After three months or so, we called it quits. Then I didn't date because I was sad. Then I met the Glastocrush, but let's be fair, that was never going to last. And it didn't. Then I went on the ridiculous date with the guy from Clapham, just to appease my mother that at least I was trying to be open minded. Then there was the date with the Lying Dutchman, the guy whose fictitious ex-girlfriend kept updating his profile, and others so boring that they didn't deserve an anecdote. Early this year, I met another commitment-phobe, which kept me mental until late March. Then there was the weird German, the guy who designed weapons and the penis guy, all in one week, the guy who kissed me in May and sent me a text afterwards saying "Next time, let's...", inferring (I think you'll agree) that there would be another date, and who then vanished. And the magician, who also did a Houdini. And the posh guy who I went to a pub quiz with, who never texted again. And the education journalist who said he'd love to see me again and then disappeared. And the beautiful teetotaller when neither of us felt any chemistry. And the lovely OCD picnic maker. And now this guy, who asked me out for a third date by text message on Sunday night and hasn't been heard from since.

And, you know, it's fine, and I'm fun and gorgeous, but god it's hard to keep perky. I don't think I know anyone who's been knocked back as many times as I have. I feel like the world's shittest boxer. ANYWAY. What was amazing was the incredible massage I had on Monday, given by this adorable and amazingly powerful Japanese guy, and the giggles I got when I turned over and my boob popped out from under the towel and both of us tried to cover it up. When I say 'popped', it was probably more 'flopped' but this isn't the time for negative body images. Got to run.

Becoming round again

Fascinating though I am in every possible way, my weight is so cyclical that even I have started to find the pattern massively boring. Massive being the most appropriate word. I start at Bad Weight A. I feel fat, so I exercise and eat less. My thighs tone up a bit, my bingo wings shrink, and over the course of a few months, I reach Good Weight B. Good Weight B is never as low as my original goal, Unreachable Weight C, but it's OK. I fit into some thinner jeans. I get cocky.

And then I get ill, or I go to a festival, or the snake bites, or some other event disrupts my routine, and I stop exercising. Without the threat of undoing lots of hard gym work hanging over me, I then just give up altogether and start eating normally forbidden food such as cake. And this is where the cruel part kicks in. For a blissful couple of months, I don't gain. I remain at Weight B. "This is brrrrrrrrilliant!" I think, delightedly, inwardly clapping like a seal. "I've finally done it! I've permanently altered my metabolism! I'm now one of those people who can eat Pret a Manger pizza wraps for lunch every day and never go to the gym and still remain lithe and slender like a standard lamp." For several weeks, I cruise along at Weight B in a haze of smugness, wearing skimpy clothes while knocking back Krispy Kremes with gay abandon.

But gradually, inevitably, I start to creep back towards Weight A. At first, I am in denial. "I'm not heading back to Weight A," I chuckle confidently. "That muffin top over the edge of my jeans? An optical illusion - it's my shit Ikea mirror. Fucking Swedes." Or later, "I haven't got fatter! OK, my dress is tighter - but that's because it shrunk in the wash! Yes. Even though I've washed it on the same setting a billion times, this is the one time that it's shrunk. Yup. Definitely. That's what's happened. It's all Hotpoint's fault." And then a few days or weeks later, I finally concede that I'm heading back to where I started, with 'motivation to exercise' about as high on my things to do list as 'drink Rooney's vomit' and no desire whatsoever to eat anything that isn't topped with melted cheese or mayonnaise.

No prizes for correctly identifying that I am currently reaching the nadir of Bad Weight A, tired and a bit ill after Glasto, DESPERATE to avoid the gym, unrelentingly and frantically craving deeply unhealthy food and booze from the moment I awaken to the moment I go to sleep. I'm not sure what will kickstart me onto the slope to Good Weight B, but it sure as hell better hurry up before I need to be wheeled around by a third party and have to buy two seats on aeroplanes. Hmmmm. Maybe I'll go on a gym kick as of Monday. Yes. Monday sounds plausible. And still pleasantly distant. I'm off to the vending machine.

Still not dead - but definitely closer

Sometimes I lie. Most of the time I don't plan it in advance. They just slip out, like newborn calves, all shiny and wet. Last night I was on a date, and for some reason I told the guy that I don't get hangovers. I have no idea why I would suggest such an absurd thing; it is about as rooted in the truth as Scientology and the idea that the fashion world's labelling of beige as 'nude' isn't inherently a bit racist. I think I wanted to emphasise my youthful resilience to such a curmudgeonly problem. Weird lie to tell though, and I think today's aftermath has been markedly worse as a result. The Lie Detector karmic fairy saw me coming and made sure I suffered. I have debilitating cramp in my frontal lobe and my amygdala is weeping softly. It has not been a good day for my (let's face it, never particularly impressive) productivity levels. Yesterday's nine hour date began at a pub in Mile End and ended with a brief kiss at Old Street tube station, the brevity due not to either of us wanting to cut things short, but to the fact that I was slightly inebriated, up on tiptoes with my eyes shut and lost my balance, veering off to the right and very nearly staggering barefoot into a tramp. Not my finest hour.

On Friday I had birthday massages and fun with Em, who is now 33. For dinner we went to Fakharldine or something spelled a bit like that - it's a swanky Lebanese place on Piccadilly and it was delicious but overpriced. On Saturday I went out to Colchester where my tour guide, Oliver, showed me around his neck of the woods. We went to Frinton and paddled in the sea, before we got annoyed by all the ball games so stropped off to Walton on the Naze where he found me a shark's tooth that is between 40 and 60 million years old. It's now wrapped in a New Look receipt in my wallet. Not really sure what to do with it but it's freaking cool. On Saturday night I went to see The Prophet in Bermondsey. Like Audiard's A Bout de Souffle, this was hard going. I watched about 40% of it with my hands over my eyes and was tempted to walk out at one point as it was all so stressful and razor blades and not what I felt like after my day by the seaside. But I'm glad I stayed - an amazingly dark portrait of youth and guts. Impressive how he manages to make one root for such unsavoury characters. On Sunday Kate and I did the next segment of our Capital Ring walk - Crystal Palace to Streatham and slightly too hilly for my liking. Then I went home, had a bath, went on the tube, got impossibly painful blisters from my shoes the INSTANT I reached Mile End, and shortly afterwards began my steady descent into my definitely-very-present hungover state today. I am dying. Perhaps a Kit Kat will help.

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.

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.

Near miss

Nothing like narrowly avoided humiliation to make you feel grateful for mere existence, is there? I went to the loo at work this morning, came out of the cubicle, washed my hands, pouted at myself in the mirror, mentally criticised about thirty six elements of my appearance and admired about nine, and then turned to walk out the door. As I turned, from the corner of my eye, I spotted a potential thirty seventh criticism, and reversed to look again in the mirror. And thank goodness I did. For the first time in (my) living memory, my dress was tucked into my tights. This is probably every woman's worst nightmare. Forget the Special K bitch prancing around in her boyfriend's oversized shirt, her eyes saying 'Look at me, all toned legs, unreasonably white teeth and glossy mane'; in Real Life, there is very little that is less sexy than normal woman's bare buttocks and backs of thighs below a shirt. A fully naked rear view is one thing, but like a starkers man in socks, female nudity appears to be a kind of all or nothing deal. Cover those same buttocks and thighs in tights, and tuck the shirt into the waistband, and I don't know about you, but it's not my idea of an erotic masterpiece. So you can appreciate my joy that I had managed not to stride between the ladies' loo door, the water bubbler and back to my desk with this most sensitive of areas revealed to the assembled masses. It was, in short, an excellent start to the day.

Since then, I've been running in the snow and. That's it. Last night I went to choir practice where we were being filmed by the BBC for some reason that will never be aired, and we were all a bit hysterical as a result. At one point, someone was making an announcement saying that if people were running late, they should phone someone in the choir, and that if they didn't have anyone in choir's number they... "were a total loser" I finished off, in a Green Day / surfer dude accent, to slightly lower than my usual hit rate of around 76% laughter and 24% awkward silence. Feel bad now. Then again, merely being in a choir is normally considered a fairly loserish thing to do so I guess we all need to come to terms with that at some point. Plus I'm sure they'd miss me if I never said anything at all - can't win 'em all...

Am also grumpy because I spent all morning trying to get tickets for Traviata or Aida at the opera house, except if my boss is reading, in which case I spent the morning streamlining office efficiency and upping revenue. Anyway, I couldn't get onto the ROH webpage or through to their phone line as today is the first day of booking, but a few minutes ago I finally managed to access the website and all seats under £170 are sold out on all dates. Gah. I haven't been to the opera for months and was really in the mood. But hey. I've got a fun night lined up for tonight, a fun few days ahead, I'm off to see Nic at the weekend and my skirt isn't tucked into my pants. [Double checks]. Nope. My skirt isn't tucked into my pants. Things could be worse.

I Heart My Shambolic Existence

Along with death and taxes, the one thing you can be certain about is that, like it or not, I am not the first person that will spring into your mind when I say the word 'delicate'. I'm 32 and a half and this morning I used black marker pen to colour in the scuff marks on the front of my leopard print pixie boots, and five minutes ago I went to the bathroom and noticed ladders working their way in both directions down my right leg, one starting from my shoe and travelling up my calf, and another creeping down from underneath my dress, a stalagtight (deliberate) and a stalagmite of white flesh peeping through M&S opaque blackness.

Maybe one day I'll get my act together but I doubt it. I can't wear flesh-coloured tights or stockings because I ladder any dernier under 200 before I've even left the house. On the rare occasion that my outfit demands it, I'll buy one pair of beige tights, safe in the knowledge that I'll never have to wash them as they'll go straight in the bin at the end of the evening. I'll have packed a spare pair in my handbag which will inevitably have to be put on before I've left my front door.

Buttons fall off my coats with ridiculous frequency - train journeys are spent sewing them back on with thread that laughably claims to be unbreakable. I suppose 'very slightly harder to snap than normal thread' wouldn't fit on the sticker. Or perhaps I missed the paranthetic caveat, written in font size minus six, that read 'Unbreakable (if you're a ladybird).' Aw, just had visions of a ladybird tug of war.

OK, this is a bit boring. What else can I tell you? I sang in a concert last night, I didn't embarrass myself in front of my celeb crush, I ate a lot of Harrods mini mince pies, probably a quantity equating to about four actual-sized mince pies, the boy in the flat cap has stopped writing to me for no clear reason other than his lack of a Y chromasome, but despite this I am excited about EVERYTHING and basically sickeningly perky, I'm thinking about skiing and China and Prague and singing more carols on Saturday and Rufus Wainwright and Guy Garvey and hairstyles and TV shows and other people's weddings and yoga and champagne and 2010 and god life's fantastic and I'm so, so lucky to be here.

Being @lostlooking

The speed at which my mind works is, quite frankly, impressive. And yet terrifying. A few moments ago, I tried to access the blogger.com site, in order to log in and write my next enthralling blog entry, and instead of the familiar navy and beige landing page, I was greeted with a stark, black typeface reading Error 503. In the next 4 seconds, I copied and pasted the text into Google, searched, and discovered that this particular error is generally caused by a temporary overload and is resolvable. I then tried to access blogger again and it loaded perfectly. The whole incident had lasted less time than it takes to peel a banana, yet the monologue I had in my head went something like, "Ohmygodohmygod, it's broken, why is it broken? What if ohmygod seriously though WHAT IF my work have blocked the site and I'm no longer able to blog from work?! What will I dooooooo?! My whole career and possibly my self-esteem is on the line here. Oh I know, I can write it at work and then email it to myself and upload it when I get home or I can email it to a third party and get them to upload it for me, but then help I wouldn't be able to get them to upload photographs because that's too big an ask, but then I suppose I could just upload the pictures myself at a later date and really the pictures aren't that big a deal as I don't upload them very often do, although maybe I should? But at least it's all manageable and oh thank fuck for that the page is loading now, god that would have been AWFUL."

So anyway, apologies for lack of blog yesterday - I do try to write every weekday but sometimes my life causes problems. This week has been slightly tricky for me, but I'm going to the countryside for some TLC shortly and we'll all be able to move on soon. For various reasons, I haven't been sleeping well, and last night I had the most vivid, VIVID sex dream about a guy (married, kids, not that attractive) who works in my office. It was one of those ridiculous dreams when they've been so lovely that you wake up and still slightly fancy them. I've seen him about five times today and keep on blushing. We had, no joke, flown to another planet and he was washing my hair with tea tree shampoo. There's no point pretending I'm not mental. Thankfully I have ridiculously nice friends and a lot of fun things going on so I have no complaints. See you next week. Virtually.

Surface tension

Last night I went to see Martha Wainwright sing songs by Edith Piaf at the Barbican. I've been a fan of Martha for a few years, having discovered her through my love of her brother, Rufus. Like her brother, she is classically trained, Canadian and pretty much bilingual. She's also had a pretty rocky time of it, albeit in a fairly privileged way, and where Rufus is openly gay and has written a lot about that, Martha is straight but has struggled with relationships, writing songs like Bloody Motherfucking Asshole and I Know You're Married But I've Got Feelings Too. I think she is clever and hilarious and in possession of an incredibly strong and sensual voice; I was extremely excited about last night.

And then she walked on stage, and I gasped: she was pregnant. Very pregnant. Last I'd heard, she was singing about being a mistress, and now she was having someone's baby and wearing a wedding ring. I was thrilled for her, genuinely thrilled, but then, through all the beautiful Piaf songs, I couldn't stop thinking about it. I wanted to focus on the music, I wanted her pregnancy and marriage to be irrelevant, but the mental image I'd had of her had always been of a battler, and now she was happy. I think I'd feel the same if I'd seen Gordon Brown with a suntan or Jesus doing a 100m sprint - it was incongrous and, shame on me, I found it distracting. Her clothes got me as well. Her leggings in the first half were too tight, her top was unflattering. And after the interval, she came back on stage wearing a black silk dress over a strapless bra that squashed her boobs into a flat plank, making them look like a little shelf. The dress needed to be ironed and the hem was irregular but not in a way that made me think it was a deliberate design choice.

And so this gorgeous, hair-raisingly beautiful music is being performed by fantastically talented singers and players, including a seriously hot pianist, and all I can think about is the fact that Martha's going to have a baby but her bra is a disaster, and whether they have ironing facilities in the dressing rooms at the Barbican. What is wrong with me?! Why can't I pierce the outermost layer and get stuck in to what's really important? I'm like the worst bits of Trinny, Suzannah and a magpie, distracted by anything sparkly, or, in my case, helplessly drawn to unsightly bulges.

It doesn't matter who's talking or what extraordinary life changing information they're imparting - a stray facial hair or a sweat patch will render me entirely unable to hear anything other than the voice in my head that's going 'Should I tell them? I probably should. I'd want someone to tell me. But then, what can they do about it? Maybe I should tell that other person to tell them...' and on to infinity. Some people just don't even see these things. They are the people who walk around with unplucked eyebrows and VPLs, the hanger loops dangling out of their waistlines, labels sticking out of their neck, whose dyed hair looks perfect from the front but a wreck from the back, who are happily talking to a boy they fancy with red wine encrusted into the cracks on their lips, and they don't give a damn. They're blissfully ignorant and god they're lucky. I want to be like them. Maybe if I stopped wearing glasses I wouldn't see as many flaws, but my new frames are too cool for school. Hmmm.

Social Hurl

You know things are desperate when the first thing you Google of a morning is 'Burger King'.

Last night was interesting. Kate and her brother had a party in their 12th floor flat to watch the various fireworks displays around London. It was extremely, violently fun. I had a lot to eat and a lot to drink. Then I went to the bathroom and was extremely, violently sick. I mean violently. I haven't been sick from alcohol misuse for 11 years. But my god, I made up for lost time. I was so sick that I saw food that I last ate in July. Tears and sweat streamed down my face. It was awful. To add insult to injury, while I was vomiting, I remembered that someone once told me that bulimics have to vomit within 45 minutes of eating otherwise the fat in the food is already being stored by their body, and I'd eaten way more than 45 minutes previously, so I wasn't even avoiding weightgain. Livid.

There was not a chance that I could go back into the party to say goodbye. I turned right out of the bathroom, grabbed my bag, left the flat and soon found myself on the Embankment near Lots Road. I remember thinking that my footwear was unsuitable, so changed out of my boots into my trainers. Then I lurched off in the direction of my flat. I couldn't even remotely walk in a straight line. I was staggering, hair everywhere, still sweating, still wondering if I might be sick again, desperate to get home but uncertain whether getting in to a moving vehicle was sensible. I jolted east for god knows how long, spitting occasionally (yup), and eventually realised that I was really quite far from home. So finally I got in a cab. £4.20 later I had to ask him to let me out as the sickness was imminent. I stumbled the rest of the way home, a good couple of miles, made it to my bathroom, and then was sick again.

I woke up this morning at 09.31, precisely 31 minutes after I should have been seated at my desk. I texted my boss and told him I'd forgotten to set my alarm (true) and then rushed to work, although I had to get off the tube at Borough for a rest from the swaying carriage, which was taking my nausea levels from 'dangerous' to 'red alert'.

I had a Coke at 10am, which helped, and a gargantuan McDonald's at 12, which was fantastic. I feel much better now but despite drinking a litre of water, a can of coke and then a large coke with my McDonald's and a chocolate milkshake, I haven't had a wee since 09:32, which gives me some indication of quite how worryingly dehydrated I am. I still feel somewhat weak and feeble, and am perhaps over-emotional, given that I saw the headline 'Which minature animals make good pets?' on the Guardian website and was so excited by the concept alone, I welled up. I would question the idea that there is anyone alive who wants a Pygmy goat more than I do.

I certainly did have too much to drink last night, but, I'm afraid to admit, no more than normal, and I was wondering if my reaction was disproportionate, until I found out that someone else at the party was sick too, having drunk a lot less than I did. I now am convinced that we both had a reaction to something we ate. Sure, I was drunk, drunk enough to think it was acceptable to take back the slab of Hotel Chocolat deliciousness that I'd given to Kate, but I wasn't that drunk. I am never sick. This was odd. Anyway, the good news is that I had a really fun time at the party, from what I can remember (Kate kindly texted me today saying that I had been on 'brilliant form'), and I have £12.50-worth of chocolate in my fridge. I'm slightly surprised I wasn't arrested on the way home, but other than that, it was a splendid night.