Happy Halloween/Goodbye October Mood: d'oh Now Playing: The Boxroom Larry's Topic: Elisabeth's Entries
Happy Halloween to One and All!!
While it's true that Halloween is a North American holiday, it is catching on more and more across the pond. However, when I wore my black wig to work, and to the YMCA, people didn't twig it was for any reason other than I've got a few screws loose. In fact, they thought it was my real hair... I had to explain that it was Halloween...talk about taking the fun out of it!
So yes, cleaned up the cafe at the YMCA...the mouldy coffee, dishes, counters etc...fun.
Maybe Stephen'll call and invite me out drinking with his work mates...
title Now Playing: Mudhoney - Under a Billion Suns Topic: Stephen Says
The dilemma: We're almost out of booze and should I make the trek to the liquor store to buy more?
Answer: Probably yes.
Me: Stress levels returning to normal after a pretty damn good weekend of doing fun things in combination with working as opposed to doing not fun things in combination with working.
So yeah, A pretty interesting weekend...
The Things Elisabeth didn't mention in her post below: Yes: We did open the door on people pissing. The dark haired guy in the pic below: Did try mercilessly to hit on Elisabeth but to no avail. What was funny: They were calling her Bjork and me Lemmy. Not bad comparisons, to be honest.
Also to be honest, those pictures don't do my wig justice, I'd just like to say. I may just wear it all the time from now on. The scary thing was, at the party, someone came up to me and started talking about going to see Motorhead play in a few weeks and was talking to me like I actually knew anything about the band. Couldn't they tell I was being ironic? Is irony dead? Apparantly so.
Halloween's tomorrow and then I'll really break out the costume. Until then, trick or treat!
Wiggin' Out Mood: celebratory Now Playing: BBC 4 Topic: Elisabeth's Entries
The weekends drawing to an end. After losing an hour of daylight, it's 6:30pm and pitch black outside.
It's been a really good weekend (at least for me as unlike Stephen, I have not had to work). Friday night Stephen & I met up with YMCA volunteers for drinking, and then I stuck around with one other guy and watched a really good cover band. Yes, and it was in Woking, what a relief to see live music close to home. The two of us chatted a lot about ideas for the YMCA and the arts in general, which was nice. Saturday the creative energy must still have been flowing because while Stephen was at work, I created/recorded two songs on the piano. Once Stephen was home we chilled out and prepared to go to a house-warming/costume party for one of Stephen's old classmates who now lives in London. The results:
and
let's have a closer look at the hairy hunk-meister:
Shame that for Stephen having hair qualifies as a costume...
***WARNING: ANOTHER SOUTH WEST TRAINS RANT***
From Woking, London is usually 45 min. by train. But of course engineering works were taking place, which diverted our train and added another 30 min. to the journey. And all at full fare prices. We could only stay at the party for 2 hours, but with the tube and walking to the apt, our total travelling time was 3 hours. But anything for a costume party right?
Except, it turns out we were the only ones dressed up. C'est la vie eh?
But we met some weird and wonderful blokes on the train home, who we had the priviledge of joking around with for the hour it took to get back to Woking. We were standing right outside the toilets, which has futuristic push-button doors. Only, if the occupant failed to lock the door from the inside, we could "accidentally" press the open door button and catch passengers mid-stream. Of course we would NEVER do that!
And our new friends assured as they were NOT gay:
And today, Sunday, well we recovered over breakfast while listening to Leonard Cohen. Read a new book on Global Warming---please anyone who does not believe it is real, leave a comment so I can present you with the evidence---we all must urgently do everything within our power to stop the carbon emissions. It's just that simple.
So that was relaxing...and then Stephen went to work, and I'm spacing out.
So is this what it's come to? Now Playing: Neurosis - The Eye of Every Storm Topic: Stephen Says
I left Elisabeth at the pub so that I could have and early night because I have to work tomorrow. My Lord, 30 is a nasty age. I'm being far too reponsible and far, far, far too boring. Since when was 8:30 my cut-off time? Bleah!
Anyway, it was my day off today so there was lots of spacing out involved along with purchasing some bits and bobs for the flat that should have been purchased YEARS ago (clothes drying rack, anyone?) and then I put together a CD/DVD rack. Fun. Again, more boring 30 year old stuff.
Anyway, looking forward to the next 7 or so days - a few Halloween parties in the days to comes, Neko Case next weekend, an awesome Asian dinner in North London with Punjabi drummers, seeing Calexico in concert, and more and more and more, etc...
And, of course, Neurosis on the 18th. How excited am I? Well, this is the kind of shit that I can expect to see and hear so... Yeeehaw!:
Anyway, 30 isn't so bad - it just brings me one year closer to my mid-life crisis. And oh, what a glorious crisis that will be!
Yay! Topic: Stephen Says
Me is so happy! Me is going to see Neurosis on the 18th of November! I can now tick off another box on my Things To Do Before I'm Dead list.
Let's hear it for pointless, narcissistic blogging!
(With lots of exclamation marks!!!) [!] . . . {!!!}
Sick Topic: Stephen Says
Crap. You know things don't bode well when you walk into work and instead of asking 'How are you?' they ask 'Are you okay?' So I'm home again with some kind of stomache bug. I honestly thought I'd be okay until I spent 5 minutes in the somking room chatting and then left feeling light headed, sweaty and spaced out (More than usual).
Last night we went out for a lovely birthday celebration in Weybridge and chose to bike home where I performed the 1st wipe out on my bike. Luckily I was wearing gloves & a leather jacket or I might have gotten a few scrapes.
I'm also quite wary of Elisabeth's cycling etiquette. While this may be a contentious point, she seems to have that strange Westberg quality where things that seem quite logical in her head are actually quite bizarre and misleading in their randomness when put into reality.
Or I might just be a reckless putz on my bike.
Our block of flats had the power cut to it this morning and someone took it upon themselves to go out to the main courtyard/ parking lot with a bullhorn and talk about peas and other frozen vegetables very calmly for about 15 minutes.
Biking home from work just now I surprised a squirrel who jumped face first into a fence and then fell back to the ground, dazed.
Nothing Now Playing: The de-humidifier Topic: Stephen Says
Don't really have anything to say. I think exercise is good for me (oddly enough...); my neck and shoulders have been footloose and fancy free and, while I had the usual degree of anomic dread (I should patent that term) prior to work, I was pretty chilled out and the fact that I desperately need time off didn't bother me so much. Or maybe it's the bizarre concept of actually relaxing (sort of) on the weekend.
Here's a canal picture that Elisabeth took on our travels. She wanted to take a whole bunch but, when you're being rained on 10 miles from home, a photo opportunity tends to be the last thing on your mind:
Oh, and in the spirit of gross egotism, this is me with a beard all decked out for a winter that's not likely to come until the spring (Thank you very much Al Gore. I blame you for global warming):
The facial hair will undergo some changes over the following days until it all gets removed on the 1st of November.
I also can't wait until our next bike trip. I'd forgotten how much I like biking around and England tends to be much more fun than Canada as it's got those funny little 'public houses' all over the place and our guide book for bicycle tours highlights them all. There's nothing like burning off a beer and then putting it back on all day long.
Mud, mud, glorious mud! Mood: happy Topic: Elisabeth's Entries
It's Monday morning, I've almost finished my mug of tea and waiting for the sun to make an appearance so that I don't feel like I'm going to work in the middle of the night. It's been quite an interesting weekend. Oh God, that's right. We tried to have a relaxing day in Guildford on Saturday. What this would involve: a 10 min. train ride, walking around the pretty cobble stoned streets and going in and out of interesting shops. Maybe buying something. Having a pub lunch, and maybe buy a good looking pastry with a coffee before heading home.
Instead, South West Trains is doing engineering works (in the complete opposite direction to Guildford I might add) and therefore suspended all but one service to Guildford an hour. So we buy a full fare ticket (what the hell are we getting for full fare anyway?) and wait. Once in Guildford, we try battling the crowds to get to the high street. We browsed in Habitat for a while, musing on all of the cool things we can buy when we actually settle down in Canada, and then decide we're hungry. But Christ, you can't get out of the store. Of course! A rally is happening in the middle of the high street and that means crowds are blocking the exits to the stores. Plus, that means you can't go where you want (i.e. further down the road), so we ducked down a side street in desperate search for a drink for my nerves.
We went to The George's King's Head which was fantastic, good beer, atmosphere and food. But by the time our cash ran out we were drained and just wanted to head home. Of course, it started raining, but that's neither here nor there.
Later that evening I left my good husband for the YMCA where a charity music event was scheduled. Some teenagers were trying to raise money for a family where the mother was terminally ill, and so six young bands were scheduled. I was in the cafe for the evening, generally chilled out, and having flashbacks as to how hard and cruel it is to be a teenager. Then one death metal band starting singing "&%@# the YMCA" and when told to tone it down he started inciting the crowd, there was some violence, and a Glaswegian volunteer came up to me and said "Call the police." Sadly, I didn't get it, and he had to shout the third time "Call the police, noow!!" So I scrambled to the front desk and then couldn't remember the number for the police. ...was it 119, 199? and do I have to dial 9 to get a line out?... but I asked someone, and now know it's 999, which is a number anyone should be embarrassed to forget. By this time the bands were cut off, and there was a mini-riot taking place with kids ripping down posters, trying to get their money back, throwing eggs... all in all it wasn't very pleasent and a lot of lessons need to be learned about properly organizing these types of events.
So the police showed up, kicked everyone out, made their incident report, and then had to escort the staff out of the building as the kids had been waiting outside to show their displeasure. A very interesting experience in all. We then went to a flat to drink, and I got home around 2pmAM.
At 11am the next morning, Stephen and I set off on a 20 mile bike ride. That's right! Stephen's bought himself a bicycle (the men's version of the one I have--they match and everything ;) and we chose the perfect day- overcast and raining.
We were pretty well soaked in the first hour, and 2 pubs, 4 hours later we were at home wrapped up in hats, scarves, fleeces and ordering in pizza.
We had a really good time though...lots of slipping through mud and splashing through puddles. We will however try and cycle in better weather in the future.
Here's the fearless map-reader on the canal:
We never got lost--congrats!
I must go and straighten my hair and apply make-up for work.
Adios.
*** Stephen here, just making some edits to clarify things as Elisabeth seems to have succumbed to the problems of typos that result in early morning blogging.
Anyway, the bike ride was lovely. We started on the Basingstoke canal where a heron very nearly flew into Elisabeth (Who had to duck to avoid it.) and then followed the River Wey south.
I hadn't quite realized that there was such a large canal culture so close to us with lots of canal boats (Called 'narrow boats' in posh Surrey) and plenty of people fishing.
We then sort of went cross-country and diverted from following the Wey's tow-path which was hard going at times as things were pretty muddy, and then had a pleasant hide through various small villages (Send, Worpleston, St. John's) before re-joining the Basingstoke canal.
The pubs we stopped at were lovely. I've been told that all the best pubs are the ones that you can't reach via a train station and that's pretty much spot on. My only complaint was the very chi-chi Jolly Frmer where we stopped for lunch. After a lovely goats cheese bruschetta for starters, we both ordered the aubergine canelloni (10 ounds a pop!) which amounted to 3 slivers of eggplant and a handful of cherry tomatoes cut in half sitting in about 3mm of creamy, melted mozarella. It was something I'd pay 2.95 for as an entree but a main course? Colour me disappointed.
So we went home and ordered Dominos pizza.
In the end we did 20 miles in 5 hours (including a 1/2 hour and hour long rest [pub] stop) in mostly pouring rain and I can't wait to do it again. My ass is also bruised beyond belief and I'm not sure how I'm going to handle sitting down today.
yeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeHAW! Now Playing: Nomeansno - All Roads Lead to Ausfahrt Topic: Stephen Says
It's been a while. My stress levels have been pretty effin' high these last few weeks and I've been slightly comatose with things. I've also been fighting a cold which I've conquered like a Roman centurion.
I need time off real bad. Time off which I won't get until November and E&I have re-scheduled our bike riding plans to actually have a quiet, peaceful week together instead of booking time off and planning things which will run us down even more than what we usually get up to in Real Life(tm). You know the deal, lazy evenings in London 5-stars courtesy of lastminute.com, maybe a day trip somewhere pleasant, but mainly lots of nothing much at all, thank you very much.
So, what's been happening, you ask? Not much, I say. Other than dealing with Elisabeth getting screwed over in Waterloo station, me being (amusingly) questioned about shop lifting in a gay novelty store in London and witnessing a police car chase just outside of Ripley (believe it or not), it's been real quiet:
We've been acting like a married couple - working, coming home, eating dinner and watching DVDs (Our supplement for TV) then going to bed and doing it all over again.
But boring has worked and I now feel better. I think that today was just so hectic, hassley and stressful (pity I couldn't find another h-word [gotta love alliteration {or, in my case, illiteration}]) that my lid blew and I got to spend all day running around, being busy and official and efficient (e.g., spazzing out) that my brain has gone around the dark side of the moon and come out the other end and the pain has gotten so extreme that it's become pleasure again.
"Monday, Tuesday...happy days, Wendesday, Thursday...happy days..." and they've all gone by without 1 blog. Shame on us.
But that's because we have been desperately trying to be lazy and do as little as possible. And frankly enjoying it. But give an inch, and we'll take a mile.
Besides work, we've been at home (or in the pub, Tues. night). I've done lots of cooking...made a carrot cake, an apple/pear crumble, and some savory dishes...we've been watching Green Wing Season 2 on DVD, and reading...Stephen's bought a gambling game...oh, and Stephen's growing a massive beard.
Tomorrow I think we'll try out London again, buying the full fare tickets of course, and see if we can't have a good Fri. night out.
Otherwise, nothing doing. Maybe Stephen will blog soon?
d'oh
celebratory
happy