Sunday 3rd January 2004!!
I have to report a sad decision. I have had to make the decision to give up teaching. Yes, it's a heart breaking choice that I've had to make, but I have been left with no choice. It's either give up teaching, or give up travelling. You see, I'm currently stretched out full length in my own booth, watching my choice of movie and sipping champagne, at 35 000 feet. And, having now tasted the delights of first class travel, I realise that I can never go back to the three inches of leg room and paper cups of the pleb class.
If you want someone to blame, blame Matt Damon. It's not his fault, but blame him anyway. He was on my flight out of Vegas yesterday, which is why yesterday will always be known as "The Day Matt Damon Walked Within Two Feet Of Me And I Didn't Ask Him For An Autograph Or Anything". He was sat in the loune for ages before I noticed, and then it was only because a man walked past me on a mobile phone with his daughter on the end wanting to speak to Mr Damon. He was trying to eat a Burger King but I don't think he made it until he got on the plane because of the endless stream of autograph hunters and people with cameras. That's why I resisted. I don't quite know what I'd do with a picture of Matt Damon and me anyway, other than use it to prove how short he really is. Boy, I know celebrities can never hear that enough.
Anyway, when the flight was finally called, half an hour late, he walked right past me. I could have hugged him around the knees and begged him to be mine, but I don't fancy him, and his Latino ladyfriend might have bitch slapped me. No, it wasn't J.Lo...now that would have been worth a picture. So he passed me by, and I totally ignored all the "It's a Celebrity! Get me over there!" instincts I had and played it cool. So did the (extremely camp) ground crew member checking boarding passes. Until a colleague came over and he had to tell her and they both shrieked a little bit, but quite quietly.
Anyway, the flight was late boarding, and 20 minutes sat on the runway, which may or may not have been Matt Damon's fault - until I find out whether he controls the weather I shall consider him guilty - which meant a 51 minute late arrival at Dallas, where we had 60 minutes to make our connection. American Airlines, actively pursuing their capitalist policy of overbooking flights, refused to allocate us seats in Las Vegas for this connection, in spite of the fact we checked in 7 hours before it left and booked our tickets in June. So really, we knew we didn't have a hope in hell, but we ran for the gate anyway, only to be told that we'd never had seats on the flight in the first place. Wow, the American Airlines staff member who told me that was sorry, as I threw my toys out of the pram in style, yelling and hitting the metal bin in front of me (which actually hurt too much to be worth the amount of noise it created). Suddenly, we had had seats, but they'd been sold on. Nobody spoke to us for about five minutes then, as I swore not quite under my breath about the money making swine, so by the time the second lady had something worth saying she was as pissed off with me as I was with American Airlines. When she gave me the hotel voucher, I enquired as to meal vouchers, whereupon she informed me in no uncertain terms that American Airlines was not responsible for the weather (I blame Matt Damon) and had no obligation to put us up overnight. Mr Z bit his tongue and failed to point out that, if we had had allocated seats we would have made the flight because they would have held it for the extra three minutes we needed. I reined in the temper, envisaging a night in the airport lounge. She handed us the voucher....and two seats on the Saturday afternoon flight...2D and 2G. I was about to bitch about the seats not even being together when it hit me. The seats are next to each other, but E and F are skipped because the seats are so big there's no room for them.
SNIGGER.
She didn't look happy with our luck. Neither did we, until we were safely around the corner. We had a night in the Hyatt; so we had to pay for the food but that made no odds. We went to speak to another man about transport; he took our voucher and looked mighty concerned, which led to lots of keyboard tapping again, until we had TWO nights at the Hyatt (to accomodate the late check out we'd be needing because our flight wasn't until 5pm) and $80 worth of food vouchers. And two complimentary overnight kits, to make up for the fact our luggage was somewhere in Dallas.
This is one slight worry of mine. Our bags are supposed to be on this flight with us, but with the heightened security, I worry that perhaps they have been blown up. I'd hate to lose my Kookai bag and my spotty shoes.
But I didn't lose any sleep in my $350 hotel room, after my tasty dinner, in the bed that was bigger than our entire bedroom. Mr Z and I kept breaking out in spontaneous chants of "First class! First class!" - but only when alone, I hasten to add. There was even some entertainment in the bar, in the form of a few hicks from southeastern universities discussing history and a lawyer working the presidential campaign of "the only other liberal who has a hope in hell of challenging Bush, after Howard Dean, that's Dr Howard Dean, he's a medical doctor, and that's my candidate, General Westley Clark, he's a four star military general dove, slow to go to war...." "Woah, woah, slow down - we don't have the vote," I reminded him eventually, but he was a number of drinks down and quite smitten with my chest by that point (travelling in pyjamas is only a disadvantage in situations such as today's). I managed to get a word in to tell him that, in my opinion, the American public will lose a lot of international respect if they re-elect Bush, because nobody thinks there could be a nation stupid enough to let him run a second term. So watch out for that sound byte if General Clark gets the Democrat nomination, and remember - you heard it here first.
After checking in the next day, with an extraordinarily polite lady, we wandered up to the Admiral's Club to take advantage of the free coffee, soft beverages, apples, internet access, TVs and newspapers, and the only area inside the airport a person can actually smoke. It still seems strange to me that you get so much free stuff when, in fact, you don't need it. If you can afford to pay several thousand pounds for a first class ticket, you can surely afford three dollars for a bottomless cup of coffee? Of course, since we CAN'T afford to fly first class I was dizzy with pleasure at all the free stuff. Thirty minutes before our flight we wandered down to the scrum at the gate and breezed past them onto the plane and our cubicles. They're walled front and back, so nobody can see what I'm writing. There are two tray tables both capable of containing my laptop and an array of beverages. I've watched two movies on video on my personal TV. I've heavily moisturised myself with the free Origins skincare products in the inflight care parcel. I began my meal with a Bloody Mary, served with hot roasted nuts and crudites, continued it with smoked salmon on melba toasts with capers, red onion and sour cream, then a salad with lobster tails, a steak with a little potato stack - served on real china, mind you, with my own cruet, on a table cloth - and ice cream with hot fudge sauce, nuts and whipped cream, washed down with Pommeroy champagne and finished with a Bailey's. There are hot towels and bottles of water at every possible opportunity. After my second movie, I pressed a button which raised my foot rest, tilted my seat back and then slid it forward until I was flat out. Then I covered myself with my full sized blanket and placed my head on a soft pillow and ..... are you KIDDING?! Of course I didn't sleep! I got up again to write this!
Tuesday 27th January
Gather round, while I relate a story of horror that will curl your toes in shock. My tale is of the lesson known as "PSHE First Thing On The Worst Day Of The Fortnight With Mad Year Seven". And the thing that made this particular lesson awful was the fact that I was teaching puberty.
I don't really see how I'm more qualified to teach about puberty than anybody else; perhaps my dedicated magazine reading and being a close personal friend of an Internet agony aunt helps. Also, I don't embarrass. So talking about periods and erections and wet dreams doesn't make me blush. That's not the horror. The horror was that they all find words like penis and vagina and masturbation extremely funny and/or disgusting, being 11 years old, and it's very hard to teach when every sentence is punctuated by cries of "Eeeuuuuuwwwww!" or "HAHAHAHAHAHA!" We read the necessary passages in the book and then had "Fear in a Hat" when everybody wrote a question on a piece of paper and it went into the hat, anonymously.
Some sample questions...
School holidays have been and gone, fleetingly. I tried my hardest to write some good entries while I was off, which is why this entry is a bit bitty (and very, very long) - having a laptop is pretty cool, apart from when I can't be bothered to connect it to the network. Bring on the wireless stuff, Mr Z. I spent the last day of school decidedly drunk after the party the night before, during which I drank about 2 bottles of red wine and half a litre of gin, which I had handily concealed in my pink Kookai bustier bag. I was a bit sick. But happily, not on the bus back to Frome, where I was staying with Cath, another NQT. Having chucked half a pot of gold glitter all over her green carpet before departing, I felt I would go for the double and descrate her toilet, although happily I made it there fine. Come to think of it, I can't quite work out how I managed to get from the coach to Cath's house. She claims we got straight into a taxi, which I probably didn't pay for. I'm a crap drunk, really, all things considered.
But I digress. The party took place in a rather nice hotel in Bath. Mr Z showed up towards the beginning with the items I had neglected to pack, which prompted much admiration from everybody ("perfect boyfriend" &c. &c.) and, upon departing, observing that I was slightly the worse for wear, intoned to one of the LSAs, "I would say look after her, but you'll see for yourself anyway" and walked off cackling. I was seated at a table with said LSAs, who proceeded to eat and drink and be merry, much as I did, and my Head of Department, Ian, who seemed more than a little bemused by the goings on, although that might have just been my gin induced paranoia. Some highlights....
....Throwing myself at the front of the row for Oops Upside Your Head, which everyone claimed I led incorrectly (bah, what do they know!), and showing my knickers to half the room. The men on the opposite table quietly observed and distracted my mentor, Anne Louise, keeping her talking on some ridiculous pretxt, until she finally realised, squawked in horror and dumped and enromous pile of soiled napkins, bits of cracker and other assorted paraphernalia in my lap....
....Toasting everyone in the room EXCEPT Table One (who didn't toast us) and then, when my head of year complimented me on my loud voice (aka drunken bellow), telling her it was because I had big breasts (that's not even TRUE...)....
....Mushing up potatoes, dipping napkins in water and scooping up butter to throw at Table One (they started it, I'll swear forever)....
....Monopolising a conversation with Ian for at least an hour, during which time I'm pretty sure all I said was "I really hope you feel you picked the right person for the job" - he was evidently amused as he wrote in my Christmas card that the right person definitely got the job....
....Getting so drunk that I told Mike, also in my department, that Graham, the final member of the faculty, made me cry - that's not even true either, he just flippantly remarked that he hadn't been listening to me on a rare day I was feeling fragile. I'd forgotten that one until Ian mentioned it, who'd heard it from Mike, so Graham is bound to have heard it by now. Oh GOOOODDDDDDD....
....Telling Kate, my co-tutor, that our tutor group goggles at her thong sticking over her trousers every morning during registration (which is a mega exaggeration), volunteering to be a member of a staff dance group (?!) and then adjusting my tights in front of half the female teaching staff who were lounging in the boudoiresque toilet ante chamber....
....Destroying, under the direction of the LSAs Caroline and Kim (they started it!), the fake flower display in the toilet ante chamber, wrapping the flowers around my neck and head, and sticking them down my dress, then going out on the dance floor with Caroline and Kim similarly attired, and being spoken to stiffly by hotel personnel, who informed me the designers "would like their flower displays back", and then getting all uppity and claiming we'd spent enough money there that night (says she, who'd be necking her own gin all night) to warrant the gift of "twenty pence worth of fake flowers". I think THAT took the biscuit. The entire aisle, actually.
Then I had to try and avoid chucking up on the bus home by swallowing repeatedly and sheer willpower, it worked, amazingly. I fell asleep almost as soon as I had emptied my stomach, goodness knows where I chucked my contact lenses (I had a feeling I put one under my pillow but it wasn't there the next day so I probably drank it in my sleep). The next morning, Anne Louise told me my bag-and-shoe combination wasn't nearly as impressive as it had been the night before (bustier bag and polka dot stilettoes didn't seem quite suitable). I limped through double year ten with a video, and made it out for break duty just in time to see some year eights (the two who did that ridiculous dance in assembly last term) coming back from having a fag round the corner (so THAT'S the point of being on time for break duty) who shouted at me, "Alright Miss, we hear you were WELL PISSED last night!" In fact, that was the general consensus. I think a lot of tutors told their tutees I was the most pissed person. Ian mentioned the next night when we were out in Bath and he was drunker than me that he was usually the clown at staff parties and it was good to pass the torch on.
But he beat me on the Thursday. I was feeling just a little too delicate for heavy drinking, which made it all the more amusing as we took my life step by step from primary school to present day via discussions on the merits of Cambridge and the complexities of maths. Mike warned me that Ian gets drunk, a bit obnoxious, then deeply philosophical, then very obnoxious, and freely admits this himself. (Ian, I can't imagine you'd ever handle the technology to read this yourself but just in cae, I mean no offence...) I did follow this pattern throughout the evening until he pushed off to PoNaNa's and I pushed off home. We discussed worst case scenario department members (crying on shoulder after 2 white wine spritzers) and he told me that his one worry about employing me was that I might be a happy clappy evangelical ram-it-down-everyone's-throats Christian, which tickled me enormously. Not that I'd knock 'em, I think it's great they have the conviction to stand by their beliefs in such a public way, but I would rather not be judged and preached at by them in my workplace. I feel this has got a bit sticky now so I'm moving on.
No end to my social whirl that week, I barely had time to catch a cold before Friday night's session with Ben and Jen, but I managed to get the sore throat and sniffle part sorted just in time. I got a little bit dressed up just to go to the leisure centre bar, but we pretended we were going on elsewhere, and had just popped in to take advantage of their £1.30 a pint offer. I managed to get quite drunk, and Jen and I treated Ben to the University Revelations, which can be long and scary. He didn't seem too fazed, but Jen convinced herself that he kept looking at us in an "I know what you did last summer" way (I forget her exact words). I also had a long discussion with my circuits instructor, Karen, who turns out to be 38. So, now I go to circuits because I want to look like her when I'm 38. The woman does the Thursday step class with ankle weights, for crying out loud! It's all I can do to do it with one riser under my step. It's a bit like Kickboxing. I enjoy kick boxing, but it's hard. The only reason I go is for the instrcutor's arse. It's not even a lascivious thing - I think, if kickboxing will gives me an arse like his, it's worth every ridiculous press up I have to do with my feet suspended on a bar resting on Jen's shoulders.
Every single one. Even though I can only manage half a one. When we were told to suspend ourselves between two bars - ankles and wrists - my helpers lifted the bars and my stomach stayed on the floor. The instructor had to come and lift me off the floor because I couldn't get out of my reverse-sloth position.
I digress. After we left the leisure centre, we decided to try Chaser's in Kingswood, in spite of all advice to the contrary (it's full of 16 year olds, I know, but I was drunk, in need of a laugh). Then we discovered it would be a fiver to get in and went and got kebabs instead. These wankers in the kebab shop were racially abusing the poor men behind the counter. I wanted to shoot them. But with rubber bullets, in the wedding tackle, to decrease their chances of reproducing. I happened to swear for some reason, and the man next to me pointed out the 10 year old child standing next to him, which did nothing to improve my mood. "Little boys should not be in kebab shops at midnight," I replied tartly. His mother instantly threw a Kingswood strop (lots of slurring about it being his Christmas Night Out - woo hoo! What a night! Watch mummy get pissed and groped and then listen and learn from a bunch of no-hoper bigots in a kebab shop) and the man made matters worse by claiming that, as I had no kids, I wasn't allowed to make such comments, even though he didn't know anybody there. I pointed him out outside the kebab shop as a stirrer, and Jen, already close to the edge, took on a new role.
Jen! Psychotic Screamer! "You can keep your fucking mouth shut!" she yelled and walked off, after some other choice phrases. He hurled abuse at her back and her extended middle finger, including, when all else failed him, "Fatty". That one nearly had me in hysterics. Jen might be mistaken for Kate Moss if she wasn't so tall. Ben and I followed stoically after her. She passed a poor unfortunate man at the bus stop who was laughing at something his friend had said (none of us heard what so it was probably innocent) and shouted at him, "And you can shut the fuck up an all!" which pretty much wiped the smile off his face. Ben and I lengthened the distance between us and her, subtly, so she didn't turn on us. The injured bus stop party shouted "Psycho bitch!" after her and she barely made it round the corner before bursting into hysterics, spilling lettuce all over the floor. Ben and I were befuddled, but she didn't seem too angry. The lesson to learn is, don't get on the wrong side of Jen, cos she can be really scary. And try and make sure she's on your side if you ever need to have a fight.
Too late for more now. Tune in soon for the next thrilling installment, including the latest from Yul and Me'Julie, the fate of the mog, adventures in Vegas, pictures of Scottish men with funny hats on and 10 ways to drink vodka without chucking up.
Thursday 29th January
The Good: "Shameless", Channel 4, Tuesdays
Deliciously black comedy drama abiut a family on the breadline in Manchester. I can't see what's going to happen in the end. Will Ian be outed to his whole family? Will Fiona end up with the cop or stay with the car thief? Can they squeeze any more kinky sex scenes in? Is it real? No! But fantastic Tuesday escapism. It's all I can do to not watch the next week's episode on E4 directly afterwards, but I have to save it up.
The Bad: "The Simple Life", E4, now finished (thank god...)
You might remember, while I was in America I wrote a few paragraphs of diatribe against Temptation Island (Sodom and Gomorrha comes to the Caribbean). Well, it's almost worse. Take Paris Hilton and Nicole Richie (she's Lionel's daughter) and force them to live in a tiny Arkansas town for 30 days without any money, and make them get jobs and drive a rubbish old truck and have a curfew. It was truly, truly awful. They acted like spoilt idiots for the whole series, lost every job they had, charged rubbish to other people's shop accounts, wandered around wearing a few gingham scrunchies, teased all the boys and ran up debts all over town. The worst was when Nicole (her afro roots extremely obvious by the penultimate day, through the blonde) threw a bottle of bleach over a pool table. Perhaps she was aiming for her hair, and missed. Then they had the cheek to say they were really proud of themselves for surviving the whole month and proving they weren't spoilt brats. Which they obviously are. Nicole acts like someone who popped their cherry about 5 minutes ago and now can't stop talking about sex, and Paris...well, with a name like that, it wasn't ever very hopeful. I wanted to beat them, with sticks. I wanted to devote my entire life to bringing down the Hilton empire so that she ends up with nothing and has to really keep a job for more than 6 hours. I wanted to go home and download all the Lionel Richie songs and make bootleg CDs and sell them, so she ends up with less money too. More than anything, I wanted to stop watching. But I couldn't. It was evilly compulsive. So, so, so bad. Oh good grief, it was so bad. They're so awful. Thank goodness it's over now.
The Ugly: "I'm a Celebrity...", ITV1 and 2, CONSTANTLY
I haven't heard of hardly any of them. Snaps to Jordan for doing it cos she looks like me at the end of term without her make up. Only with bigger breasts. And less clothes. I haven't been watching. But last night, as I lounged in my chair doing some marking, I became a victim of my own toastiness and found myself unable to shift from under my duvet to get the TV remote and was forced to watch some of it. It happened to be a live bushtucker challenge, with Peter Andre. When he had to put his head in glass cabinets full of maggots, cockroaches and snakes, I squeaked so loud that Mr Z came belting downstairs thinking I'd hurt myself. But let that be a lesson - NEVER EVER make a song like "Mysterious Girl" because fate and the British public WILL get their own back.
I should also give a special mention to "Fat Friends" (yes, I have been watching a lot of TV lately, but naturally nothing beats ER - Cath, at school, and I agreed that it just made the whole week better when the new series started), which I watch purely for the awful woman who does the weigh in. Watch just one episode, she's a total witch! "Five pounds on, ooo dear, well you get engaged and you let yourself go, be careful if you want to keep him..." Thank goodness my Slimming World consultant isn't like that. I'd have to deck her if she said something like that to me. I can't imagine any slimming club succeeding if it was led by a woman with an attitude like that. Which probably proves why everyone who goes is enormous and not getting any thinner.
My mog. I said I'd tell you about my mog. She met her fate. Last week on Thursday night I said to a number of people that I hoped to be very ill and therefore avoid the killer Friday week 1 teaching day (including the year 7 PSHE and GCSE RE), but, alas, I remained sickeningly healthy. She didn't scratch at the door when I got downstairs, but she'd been a bit under the weather so I didn't worry. I went into the living room, where she was pretending to be asleep on the couch. It's a little game we play. She pretends to be asleep and the mwows at me when I pet her in a "you woke me up!" kind of way. Awww, I thought. Then, she's not breathing. But I *always* think she's not breathing, I reminded myself, and reached out to pet her. And she was cold. And a little stiff.
So, I got my day off school, but I feel HORRIBLY guilty. We buried her in the back garden, with a piece of bacon and her favourite playing string. Bless Mr Z, he dug a hole for her, then I said it wasn't deep enough (from the comfort of the bed) and he had to go back and dig some more, and the soil seemed to be about 40% clay, so it wasn't an easy task. She was 13 and a half, and pretty unwell, but I miss her terribly. She was the most whiney cat ever, so it's really quiet without her, and I can put my laptop and magazines on my lap without her sitting on them, but she doesn't greet me at the door or try and jump on my lap while I'm sitting on the toilet anymore.
Yul and Me'Julie visited us a couple of weeks back on their way to Nat and Mole's enagement party. They seem well, Me'Julie's a grandma now! They haven't been on holiday for at least a month. Yul has been keeping me abreast of the successes and otherwise of Pompey on the Premiership pitch. The other week, in a pub in Covent Garden, I was hooked to the scrolling scoreboard for our dramatic 4-2 win against Man City, leaving us just above the relegation zone. Wow, I can really talk the talk!
One of the reasons for my fixture fixation that day was the company I was keeping. I had accompanied Jen to an Avalon meet (Avalon is an internet game, I'm not going into it, look it up!) thinking to hook up with some old friends from bulletin boards, who didn't show up, and so I spent the whole evening listen to people talk about the ultimate hero, the pool of life, prince of Springdale, running through staves, riding the ship of death (or life?) and a variety of other gamespeak. 
It was a lot of fun, though. Even though I had to get up mega early and Jen wasn't very well, I got my hair washed and blow dried at Jen's hairdresser (what luxury, I've always wanted to get that done), and I drank a lot without spending very much, which was a surprising and disturbing result, and I ended up in a dodgy flamenco club off Tottenham Court Road, after being insulted by the other half of Jen's non-relationship (gotta love those non-relationships) who told me Break for the Border was pants and the sort of place "people who hardly ever come to London would choose". Typical of a man to not even bother to get his facts straight. Just like that fellow at the Robbie concert who suggested I'd never been on a tube because I wasn't happy being shoved in the back repeatedly. And then he chose Costa Dorada! The Spanish equivalent of Break for the Border, with REAL flamenco dancers and a guy on a keyboard doing muzak Ricky Martin covers. Had some tapas, and did a bit of dancing, and then amused myself taking pointless pictures. One guy there, John, turned up in a kilt and drank heavily, which turned him from an affable and funny man to a slightly onoxious lush who fell asleep at our table. Having tussled with another guy earlier in the evening (after trying to put a tampon retrieved from my bag into his beer) it had already been revealed that there was nothing under his kilt, so I tried to get some pictures (which didn't come out) and then tied him a little hankerchief cap and took a picture of him with that.
He was quite funny. But not as funny as Vell, not his real name, who was the youngest, and the drunkest, and got into a number of almost rows. "Those aftershocks were a bad idea, weren't they?" I asked, as he slurred yet another pointless sentence in his Gloucestershire vowels. "Oh, you noticed?! Hic!" he replied, before launching into yet another slow and pointless ramble. His friend was even scarier, who, not being a gamer, had a lot of bad stuff to say about the geeks surrounding him. "It's so fucking sad, that these people have to make up lives for themselves on the internet, I mean, why don't they just get real lives and live their own personlities, I mean it's just pathetic that they have to pretend to be someone else because their lives are so sad that they can't get out there and live like normal people!" he ranted into my dumbfounded face, as Jen's non-boyfriend made "I'm shooting myself in the mouth because he's so awful" faces behind his back. "Well," I replied, "I don't think you can really judge..." "AND DON'T EVEN GET ME STARTED ON HACKERS!" he continued. I wasn't aware I had, but perhaps it was some sort of telepathic thing. "It's just so, I mean, god, it's just so fucking....oedipal! These computer hackers, they had such fucked up childhoods that they have to crawl into the web, it's like they're trying to climb back into their mother's wombs..."
Erm....it is? It doesn't seem like that to me really. At all. What a lahuser. I just tried to listen to John doing Sean Connery James Bond impressions instead, which were much more understandable. Then his mate started getting into a row with another man called Herbie about something someone had written on the Avalon message board and they were all getting so angry-sounding, I just stood up, scooped up all the coats and yelled, "Hold these!" at Vell, and then dumped them on his head. That was quite funny, I thought. Herbie went on to buy me a drink so I think perhaps he appreciated it too. We were the only ones in Bar Mai Tai and I'd just been mugged for the ten quid entrance fee, so he bought me a drink which I then had to down immediately so we could leave because they wouldn't let the drunk Scotsman in.
And then on the way home, some evil teens were verbally abusing a poor girl, walking home and minding her own business. I nearly went and kicked their arse, but at me against the four of them the odds were too heavily stacked against them so I just scowled at them a bit instead. Then one detached and came over with the irresistable offer of a ride on his anaconda. "Not even if you paid me," I sneered, shaking him off, and he got a bit angry then and threw his can of coke at me. I suppose I was just lucky he didn't tell his mum on me. Provoking him whilst walking back to my room alone wasn't a good idea in hindsight, though. Thankfully I made it back on time, back to the dorm room, and I was the only one in it again. Proving you can get a good bed for 20 quid in central London.
That was the weekend after we'd returned from the States so I was hanging for another week. I think that was two weeks in which I just slept and slept and did no work, and by week three I was reaping what I sowed, although things have picked up again now, just in time for our party, a very late housewarming for us and a birthday party for Jen. Lots of people came and I made all the chocolates my form bought me for Christmas into flavoured vodkas. I'm not sure the parents would really approve, but oh well. We also tried blueberry jam with Absolut Kurant, which sounded yummy but nearly made me hurl, so I jut stuck to wine and then went to bed quite early, leaving my guests at the mercy of Mr Z and my ancient Sega Megadrive. Sonic until 4am, apparently.
Saturday 31st January
I finally got my kickboxing uniform yesterday, it was very exciting. Then I tried it on. It makes me feel like a munchkin, since the t-shirt is massive (good) and the trousers are a good six inches too long (quite bad). Jen is quite happy with them being that length, as she thinks they might trip me up the next time we fight and she'd be safe from my right hook. We sparred last night, for the first time. We sparred with each other, and then with some other people, including Ade (who punched me on the forehead about five times, and then on the back of the head when I turned around to find out why the really really annoying twit had bumped into me). I felt a little bit ashamed, as I was bobbing around throwing punches and leaving huge holes in my guard, it was such a pathetic parody of when the skilled people fight. One of my sparring partners got a b it frustrated and urged me to "just go for it!" but I feel like I'm so crap I'm just taking the piss.
But then we did some fighting, and the instructor pitted me against Jen. Well, Jen's really tall (if you didn't already know that) and she's got these really long legs, and so when we started fighting she scored the first point because she managed to kick me, only with my stumpy little legs I couldn't get anywhere near her. When we were at one-all, I realised she was dropping her guard from her face and went in with my right fist. It connected with her nose. Hard. That was mainly down to momentum, I hasten to add. But it made her eyes go all watery and I felt really bad and then she had to stop so I won the bout by default. It was so unlike all the little "*Tap* ohmigod are you OK, I'm really sorry!" bouts we'd had in the past. But then, I suppose it does kind of repay her for making me punch myself in the face that time.
The really really annoying twit (RRAT) is only about 4 feet 10 tall, but what he lacks in height, he makes up for in annoyingness. Last week, when our instructor gave a girl 30 push ups for being late he ran over and did them for her, just to prove how manly he is. Then he was roundhousing a pad I was holding, only he was kicking it really hard and flinging himself around like a right twerp and almost falling over, and because he wasn't controlling the kick I was afriad he would miss the pad and kick me, so I yelled "IT'S STYLE NOT POWER!" at him, and he looked a little bit peeved but calmed down somewhat. Then we had to do this warm up where you run part way across the room, do a squat, run back backards, so a squat, then run to the next marker, do a squat...etc etc. He was on Jen's team. He wasn't doing the squat in an effort to be the fastest, what a plonker. So the instructor made them start again three times, until he actually got what he was supposed to be doing. If he'd been on my team I'd have kicked him in the face. If I could kick that low.
That was the week when I ran so fast I nearly passed out. We had to sprint for a minute, and my motivational partner on the other side of the room kept yelling, "Come on, doing brillinatly! You're the fastest girl! Keep going!" and I so wanted to continue being the fastest girl that I pushed myself way too hard, and by the last ten seconds my limbs had a leaden quality and when I stopped, the world spun a bit and little glittery fireworks started going off in my eyes. Then I felt really stupid for nearly running myself to death just because some guy who doesn't even know my name told me I was doing the best. It served a purpose, though. The next day, during my personal training session (one has a personal trainer now, you know. He cancels one's appointments and never calls one back, but still...) Pete, the errant trainer, told me I needed to work out how hard I was working on a scale of one to ten and aim for around five. So now I know what it feels like to be working out at ten.
Last night the RRAT was even more annoying. When we were warming up we had to run across the room and do 20 punches, and as he was doing them Jen says he kept yelling, "COME ON! COME ON!" at himself. Then he put his own stamp on another warm up where you had to hold your partners hands and shunt your arms back and forth as quickly as possible. RRAT thought he was cool and crossed his arms. The instructor did not think it was cool. In fact, I think he pisses the instructor off almost as much as he pisses me off. Which is why I found it very funny in the next move, when we had to hold our partner's right leg up while they held ours and balance until everyone had counted to five. I found that alright, cos my balance is pretty good (lots of pilates and stomach work, you see). But he fell over! It was so funny. I would have laughed out loud if he hadn't nearly sent me flying. Then he had to fight against Daniel-son, who is quite slow in the warm ups (he has Downs Syndrome) but is a really good fighter. RRAT was flinging himself around in the guard position, while Danny just stood there staring at him. Then he kicked RRAT and sent him flying. It was the coolest thing ever. I nearly cheered loudly, until I remember RRAT was on my team and it might look a bit unusual.
I have decided on the perfect body. I've built it from other people. I mentioned my kickboxing instructor's arse a few entries ago; I would now like to add: my Step instructor's legs; my pilates instructor's stomach; the feet of someone with normal sized feet, but with my own toes; and my own chest, arms, shoulders and face, because I'm relatively happy with all those. Although, when I'm at target weight, ask me again if I'm happy with the size of my breasts because I expect them to have shrunken to gnat bites by then.
The personal trainer might help me achieve those things (although I think my Step instructor's legs are longer than mine so I might have to settle for ¾-length size), if he ever bothers to ring me back to arrange the last two sessions I have paid him for. He's a very earnest chap, and I attended some seminars on weight loss management with him too, which were quite cool, although I think he was a bit weirded out by the fact I didn't have any questions, and I don't think he agrees with diets in any shape or form, so he wasn't overly impressed with me being at Slimming World. He was even less impressed when I bounded in a few days after our first gym session to tell him I'd lost seven pounds in a week (that's the Christmas weight gone). He did try to look happy for me, but then pointed out later that it was only safe to lose one to two pounds a week. Hey, I don't know how I did it. I don't think it could have been a correct reading, I'd eaten loads that week. But I had also been to the gym every day. But seven pounds, that's like...24,500 calories consumed less than the amount I burnt. I burn about 80 calories in 20 minutes on the treadmill. The maths doesn't work. I mean, I went to the gym every day. But nopt for 22 hours a day.
Pete did get me hooked on the rowing machines again, though, which is quite good. They were always my favourites. I spent 17 minutes on one this week, but that was mainly because the woman rowing next to me looked very familiar and I didn't want to start talking to her until she'd stopped rowing, so I had to row for as long as she did (it was secretary at a place I used to temp - the bitchy financial advisers. "Have you got a permanent job yet?" she asked, suprciliously. "Yes!" I replied, "and it's better than yours!" I thought.) Anyway, it was a good day for rowing, because the rowing machines are by the enormous windows, and there was a blizzard going on. It was mad, there was thunder and lightening and snow just hurling itself out of the sky and being whipped around by the violent winds. Then it stopped, and thawed a bit, and then froze solid, which made driving to work the next day REALLY fun.
It snowed while we were in Vegas, too. Typical, I thought it would be a bit warmer, but it stayed just above freezing for most of the week. It didn't feel so cold though, because it was so dry. We had a good relaxing week in Vegas. We watched a lot of movies, I read a lot of books and we did quite a lot of shopping for American staples (peanut butter M&Ms, Herbal Essences shower gel and so on). Mr Z remarked that it seemed like a long way to go to do nothing, especially since we had so much trouble with the flights. On the way out they questioned us on how long we'd been a couple for crying out loud (although I had a pair of school scissors in my carry-on bag which remained undetected all the way there, and all the way back - not deliberately, I forgot to take them out - and yet they take away tweezers! Sure. Their security is very tight). He may have a point, but I miss the point of going out there for a holiday because it's primarily to see Father Hand. So next time it'll be tourists all the way. We did go for an extremely expensive dinner in the Bellagio (prequelled by a few extremely expensive drinks in the martini bar - tiramisu martini with accompanying biscotti for 15 dollars, anyone?), with steaks and lobster and so on, on Father Hand and Frankie (who gave us a gift certificate). I think they were slightly taken aback by the fact that we spent 165 dollars on one dinner, but then, when are we ever going to be able to do that again?
Sibling Hand was also present, and working extremely hard on his physcis stuff for university. We did manage to tear him away for a night at the Crown and Anchor; he drank Guiness, I drank diet coke and Mr Z drank Stella and ended up falling asleep on the back seat of the car while Sib and I went into Roberto's Taco shack for greasy Mexican food (Vegas equivalent of a kebab - winner of a Las Vegas heartburn award). Poor Mr Z, he got really bored as Sib and I reminisced for hours. On New Year's Eve we went for dinner at a wonderfully tacky off-Strip casino and then watched the fireworks from the bridge. I was adamant I'd go to the Strip until right up to the last few hours, when we were coming out of the casino and were passed by hundreds of drunks toting six-packs and hollering to each other. At that point I decided it was too cold, they were too scary and I was too much of a wuss. So we watched the fireworks from a bridge and then went home and watched Pirates of the Caribbean and drank coffee laced with Cointreau. Again, I think Mr Z would have preferred to go the Strip. But I have promised him next time that we'll do Death Valley and the Hoover Dam and all those other good things. But next time, we'll have to go for three weeks or soemthing.
Being in Vegas made me miss it. Driving around in Father Hand's enormous car that you could drive even if you'd had a stroke (automatic, and it moves without you having to put your foot on the acclerator, very scary) I realised how well I remembered the city and felt quite nostalgic. I think it's probably because I had it so easy there. I think I'd probably love anywhere as long as I could spend all my time sleeping, eating, watching movies and talking to my friends on the Internet. Because much as I enjoy the place and could probably live ther, I can't ignore the fact that it's in America. And I wouldn't really want to live in America, it's just too dodgy.
Exhibit A - the profusion of corn syrup. They put corn syrup into pretty much everything; this I already knew, as Father Hand used to check labels for it constantly, as, being diabetic, he should really avoid extremely sugary substances. Corn syrup is something akin to pure glucose, very bad for you, but extremely cheap, and there's a lot of it around, and the farmers who sell it have quite high lobbying power. So it's in pretty much everything - not just candy and fizzy drinks, but bread and cooking sauces and all manner of other stuff. It's extremely difficult to avoid. Then I was watching Victoria Wood's Big Fat Documentary the other week, and she was reporting for the States, with a woman who specialises in obesity in children.
Well, she said that a few years ago she started noticing more instances of a very rare form of hepatitis in overweight children. Basically their livers were getting fatty. The corn syrup is such a simple carbohydrate that you digest it first, and because it provides so much energy, once you've digested it you often don't need many more calories, so everything else gets stored as fat. And then you get fat, and then you get fat building up around your organs, and you end up with fatty liver, and this causes unusual diseases. Then she pointed out that the goose is force fed corn mush to make its liver grow huge and fatty and then it's killed and the liver is used to make foie gras. So Americans are pretty much force feeding their children corn syrup and their livers are getting huge and fatty ....for what? kiddie foie gras?
It's just enough to make me grateful we don't have corn syrup in so many forms over here. Yet.