Last night i went to a free event in London. There is a big venue that we used to use that has been shut for a year doing refurbishments and last night was their big opening party. It was possibly the most surreal event i've been to and that includes the other free event i went to with the Queen impersonator (the royal one not the band) and the fire eaters and the rope climbers.

6:00 met friends at the station. I booked 3 free places at this thing and brought 2 friends to share in the free food and drink. :-)
6:30 Arrived, put coats and bags in coat check. Started drinking the free cocktails (*think* it was vodka orange and grenadine). All 3 of us lost count how many of those we had. It was more than 6 each but after that i don't know. We also made friends with serving people so we could get the nice canapés. We acted in an almost meerkat-like way as we scouted the people with jugs to top up the cocktails and the trays handing out food.

7:30 this is the weird bit. We all (about 450 people) move into their main room and take seats. We are all well-lubricated with wine and cocktails. Female to male ratio about 3:1. Average age: 35. We are given a speech about the refurb etc and we clap politely and then....

PAUSE FOR DRAMATIC EFFECT

Journey South come onto the stage.

If you are now thinking "who?" then i applaud you. Journey South are two impossibly blonde and clean-cut brothers who were on X-factor (apparently) they appear also to have an album out.

Anyway they come on and play an acoustic set for us that last about 45 mins. Included are such stalwart favourites as "Let it be", "Wonderwall" and billy Joel's "Always a woman" interspersed with their songs that are sentimental poppy pap.

Amazingly the room is just drunk enough to be LOVING this stuff. One woman between songs shouts out "you're sexy" to the boys, another couple in the front row get up and start dancing for no reason in the middle of a song. The whole audience is singing the chorus of "Let it be". At the end the boys say we're great and that "it's always lovely to play for people who actually listen". Poor things!

After that there is more wine and food and people have gone back to discussing venue capacity and suitability for conferences/weddings/seminars. Apart from me and my friends who are discussing the food and love lives and various other subjects. At 9:30 the place is winding down and we reclaim our coats and bags and make our way out and home.

i have a picture on my phone of Journey South singing. It wasn't a complicated and elongated hallucination. Honest.

1. Scan my interest list and pick one.

2. Comment on it or ask me about it.

3. Then you post this in your journal so other people can ask you about your interests.

Some people have got really interesting things and so i thought i'd try it here. I thought I'd add an extra rule though.

4. If you know me and see a glaring omission from my interests list, let me know so i can add it/them.

1. -8C is not quite as cold as it sounds when you're all tucked up with scarves and stuff.
2. Even when snow is there all the time i don't think i'd ever lose the joy i get from walking on unbroken snow.
3. Sometimes you really can't see some things about people and it's a joyful amusing glad surprise when you find out.
4. I bought Quinoa the other day on a whim with the evangelising of my brother in my head. It purports to be "a delicious alternative to rice and pasta". I took it at its word and substituted it when I made a kind of bolognese thingummy the other day. It was...ok, but i wondered if anyone out there knew of any quinoa recipes I could try to actually see what it's like and how it can be more interesting I'd love to hear them.
5. If all the promised snow falls tonight then we have dispensation to stay home tomorrow! Here's to inches and inches of snow and a day in pyjamas.

Happy New Year everyone.

It's been a big year for me with lots of changes and i can only hope that this year will be even better.

Here are my resolutions from last year -

Things I resolve to do in the next year - resolutions if you will.
1. Find a direction - any direction, but form a Plan of some description.
2. Learn hieroglyphs. More so.
3. Learn a new dance.
4. Learn Welsh.
5. Try to be a healthier 6.
6. Read something I would never normally read.

I have achieved numbers 2, 5 and 6 definitely. Number 1 I'm still working on and should be more proactive about. Number 4 I did not even attempt - from what I remember I only put it in there for fun anyhow. Number 3 i didn't do unless you take it a lot more broadly. If you do then I have learned several new dances, ways of being, ways of acting.

Some resolutions (these are ongoing and not only for the new year but it can be useful to reiterate them.

1. Stop being self-deprecating about myself.
2. Try and get to bed at a normal time and not complain or procrastinate.
3. Continue to be open and honest with myself and others.
4. Try and improve my self-esteem and confidence.
5. Carry on reading more things I would never normally read.
6. Go to Sweden

Well this is half an update for you and half a reminder to me as to what i'm doing over Christmas.

21st Dec - Royal Albert Hall Glory of Christmas - in a box! for free!
22nd Dec - Office shuts at 12:30 Woop! and then it's staff Christmas meal and then shopping in Borough market for Christmas goodies (hopefully a small kind of gamey bird to roast for Christmas and maybe some cool cheese from the cool cheese shop), then home and evening with the brothers watching Christmas films and drinking mulled wine.
23rd Dec - Picking up Christmas packages from the post office, last minute shopping, Matthew Bourne's Swan Lake in the evening *takes a moment to regain breath after thinking of the pretty male swans and the leather trousers*
24th Dec - The Nutcracker (yes i know it's a bit balletful. I'm just in a bit of a ballet mood) and then midnight mass at Westminster cathedral.
25th Dec - sitting at home in pyjamas, eating yummy food, watching brilliantly terrible Christmas tv, opening pressies, maybe a nice Christmas walk...
26th Dec - fighting through non-existent public transport to get to my sisters, more eating of food, giving of presents, playing with nephews and neices etc.
27th Dec - at parents comforting them since i wasn't at theirs on Christmas day *sigh*
28th Dec onwards - no fixed plans apart from lolling about generally.

I should also mention that despite having remembered that today's the day to start re-reading The Dark is Rising I got home and can i find my copy? grrrrr!

1. New razors are sharp. When I know I am using a new razor I should not handle it in a devil-may-care attitude for that way lies cuts and yet more cuts.
2. Moisturing after having just attacked your legs with such a razor is a BAD idea. Stinging pain of badness!
3. Even if I like someone that does not automatically mean that I will like someone that they like.
4. I need sleep and if I stay up late then I don't get as much sleep and I am tired.

Come on girl! Learn!

A couple of links for your amusement.

http://www.voco.uk.com/ - I WANT THIS!

and http://www.nextgencode.com/ - who i got an email from for some reason and it took me a while to work out if they were actually taking the piss. They are. They have to be.

I had a conversation today with a couple of people at work about our Christmas party. I tentatively suggested someone we maybe should invite. This someone is the office manager who, up until September worked here. She had been the office manager for the past 4 years, since the company started. She had become...not very well liked. I didn't really like her and she was not particularly pleasant to me but i didn't hate her. There are a couple in our office, one in particular who hate her with a passion. When she left she got a card, but no leaving present. A couple other people who left a month after her and who are well-liked, we have invited to the Christmas do. Now, i don't think that she'd accept the invitation - i don't think she'd want to come, but i put forward the idea that it might be a nice gesture seeing as she didn't even get a leaving present and she had worked here for 4 years.

I was told that i was "so middle-class" in a way that implied it was a half-insult said to a naive little girl.

The person who said it went on to explain that knowing our ex-office manager, she would not appreciate the gesture as i intended it, but would suspect that i had some kind of evil plot, some ulterior motive behind the invite and would react accordingly.

This may well be true and it was not an option i had considered, but is it "middle-class" of me to have thought the way i did? I guess if one were ascribing class to people (which i don't) then you could say that i am middle-class and that she is "working-class" but personally i would never put those kind of labels on myself or others and is it really relevant to her supposed reaction or my own outlook? Aren't they more to do with who I am and who she is than what class we may or may not belong to?

Thoughts anyone?

My friend asked me about Moses and the commandments today, asking me what a the second commandment went. I explained and googled to find out where they'd got the gold for the golden calf (their earrings fyi). Anyway I read this bit and laughed and showed him, looking at God's stroppiness.

7 Then the LORD said to Moses, "Go down, because your people, whom you brought up out of Egypt, have become corrupt. 8 They have been quick to turn away from what I commanded them and have made themselves an idol cast in the shape of a calf. They have bowed down to it and sacrificed to it and have said, 'These are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of Egypt.'

9 "I have seen these people," the LORD said to Moses, "and they are a stiff-necked people. 10 Now leave me alone so that my anger may burn against them and that I may destroy them. Then I will make you into a great nation."

11 But Moses sought the favor of the LORD his God. "O LORD," he said, "why should your anger burn against your people, whom you brought out of Egypt with great power and a mighty hand? 12 Why should the Egyptians say, 'It was with evil intent that he brought them out, to kill them in the mountains and to wipe them off the face of the earth'? Turn from your fierce anger; relent and do not bring disaster on your people. 13 Remember your servants Abraham, Isaac and Israel, to whom you swore by your own self: 'I will make your descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and I will give your descendants all this land I promised them, and it will be their inheritance forever.' " 14 Then the LORD relented and did not bring on his people the disaster he had threatened.


So then we had this conversation
me: I was laughing at God being so damn tetchy
him: ahhh
me: and Moses being all calming
me: and God giving in but he's still quite sulky about it
me(God): "but I wanted to smite them with fire!"
him (Moses): no smiting untill you've eaten your supper!
me(God): "Not fair! I was all ready to bring down disaster. I want to bring down disaster!"
me(God): "But...but"
him (Moses): no buts young mister!
me(god): *mutter*supposed to be all-powerfulnot fair*mutter*
him (Moses): and you must eat the brussel sprouts as well, don't think for a second I don't notice that you're always trying to feed them to buster!
me (God): "but I don't like them! Worst thing I ever created. They taste nasty"

Heehee!

I'm not going to China. I'd like to, but I'm not. However the CEO is going to China. A few weeks back we had some people involved in e-government from Chengdu come to visit and now they want him to go visit them. So I got an email this morning saying could I arrange flights and a visa for the week after next. Here are some of the complications.

1. You cannot apply for a visa by post or fax, you have to turn up at the embassy and queue. The opening hours appear to be 9-12 in the morning. So I can either turn up there in person or get a travel agent to do it for me.

2. We have to arrange a return flight to Beijing and a flight from Beijing to Guangzhou. (I have NO idea where that is). The return flight to Beijing is easily organised. The other one is proving tricky.

3. At no point has he specified whether he needs accomodation for any of this. I assume he does, but for all I know, the Chinese delegates who invited him are sorting it out for him.

4. He's not in the office today so I can't ask him about any of this.

5. He's supposed to be going 2 weeks today so there's a bit of a deadline!

So, to deal with all of this, essentially I want to ring a travel agent to sort all this out, except I can't until I know about accomodation which will have to wait.

Oh and the form for the Chinese visa is complicated. And I need to get him to get a passport photo.

So, on Sat I met my brother at 6am (yes, 6am) or thereabouts and proceeded to sit next to him on a step for 4 hours.

"Why?", I hear you cry, "Why would you do such a thing? Are you on drugs? Have you gone mad? What could drive to this insanity?"

But worry not. I had a good reason. Because after 4 hours of sitting and waiting. I was rewarded with front row tickets for Wicked! It's still in previews and opens properly on Wednesday so our tickets were £10 off. I have been singing the songs all day and those of you who know me well can rightly predict that I will be singing them all for the foreseeable future.

( Read more... )

I'm going to stop gushing now, but if you can get to see it do and if possible before January so you can catch Idina Menzel in the role while she's still here.

*wanders off humming as I go*

I am happy today :-) Yesterday was kinda crappy, but today is good.

Outside it's pelting it down with rain and is cold and miserable. I'm fiddling about with some stupid html at work. I have a pain in my stomach. It's all irrelevant, because today I'm having a good day.

*dances around*

Almost forgot.

Yarr me old sea dogs! Don't ye be forgettin' that it be Talk like a Pirate Day.

Savvy?

As of last night I am moved into my new flat. It is clean and shiny and beautiful. It has a pretty view out the window. Last night I was lacking in food and other essentials so I need to go and get some tonight. I "forgot" to have dinner last night. I wasn't hungry. Bloke 4 was not happy with that. He told me to have a big breakfast to make up for it. Well, first he told me to eat last night, but there was no food in the house and I was in my pyjamas and wasn't hungry anyway. I don't think he's going to be happy with the 3 cups of tea and a biscuit at the event this morning that I had. I'm hungry now though, but then it is lunchtime.

I now feel like I can get stuff sorted properly. Now I'm in my own place, and I have my own space and am not camping at someone else's I feel much better.

Talks with a capital T carry on apace. Some of it good, some hard, but all the better for being said.

I also went out after work yesterday for our Greek intern's leaving drink and got caught there for a bit. Since I went to bed at *cough*quartertofour*cough* on Monday night/Tues morning and at 1:00 on Tuesday night, I was supposed to be going to bed at 10 last night. This is made complicated by the sleeping on the sofa reality. However I managed to get in at 9:45 (cutting it fine, I know) and was in bed (read on the sofa wearing pyjamas) by 10.

Also my brother's computer somehow signed me in to Windows Messenger when he was on it last night. I think I checked hotmail once on there and now it thinks it's being clever. The upshot of that was that he kept getting messages from Bloke no. 4 who thought I was online but ignoring him. *sigh* This is all sorted now with Bloke no. 4 understanding that if I'm online and don't answer, I'm not there, not just ignoring him, and with brother understanding that if it happens again, it takes but 2 seconds to either reply saying "Sorry it's not Caroline" or *shockhorror* signing me out. In the meantime I've made it so his computer won't automatically sign me in when he turns it on.

1. I was made happy this morning seeing a father complete with suit and tie pushing a pushchair with a 6-8 month old baby in it. It was a girl(I'm pretty sure) and when she started to cry, the train not being an interesting enough place for her, no doubt, her older brother (stnading next to the pushchair in school uniform, about 7/8 yrs old), started singing If you're happy and you know it . Watching and listening to that little scene made me riidiculously happy. I'm so easily pleased.

2. I don't like Talks. Well I do, or at least I'm generally glad that they happen. I don't like how emotionally draining they are.

3. I like chocolate and I can't have any. Not until Monday anyway. It should not be a hard thing to go without chocolate for a couple of weeks.

4. Work is busy. Very busy. I've been staying late a lot. I think I'm making my boss feel guilty. Which makes me feel guilty because it's not as if i spend every second working once they're all gone. The intawebs is a fun place to play.

5. Some people in the world are complete and utter shits. I don't like the fact that one of my friends this past week broke up with her boyfriend who proceeded to beat her up with a crowbar, breaking her ribs, then got arrested, then got out on bail, then went to her house with a loaded firearm threatening her, then got arrested again. I don't know him, but he's a wanker and it makes me very very angry.

6. I like knowing that I have an appartment to move into. I will be happier when the current inhabitants bugger off so I can actually move in.