Friday 4th May

Watching the sunset from the Grand Canyon, one could almost believe the world is flat. As it slips down, it appears to disappear behind the canyon walls before it goes past the horizon, which is spectacular, if a little unnerving. Mother Hand and I observed this phenomenon on Tuesday, amid the deafening sounds of the local wildlife (expensive camera shutters clicking), and at the same time fulfilled her ambition of seeing the Grand Canyon, and my ambition of getting her to trust my driving.

We left for our road trip late on Monday morning, after having to return to the hire place with my credit card to get me put on the insurance. In spite of Father Hand's overtures of doom ("It's 9000 miles away and it might take you 56 years to get there...") we made it to the nearest town, Williams, after 5 hours of easy driving, including 2 rest stops and a change of driver. Mother Hand felt a lot calmer after I'd been driving for a while; at first she was a bit nervous and kept telling me to drive under the speed limit but she eventually gave up on that (I had a police scanner and a foreign licence - if they did manage to catch me, what could they do?!). We decided to drive up the road a bit from Williams in search of a cheaper hotel which proved to be an excellent plan, as we found a hostel for a mere $11 a night. True, it looked like the Bates motel and the shower block was a bit of a walk away but it was comfortable and clean and, of course, cheap. I wanted to sleep on the top bunk but Mother Hand insisted I might fall out and made me sleep on the lower bunk. I grumbled a lot about that because, had this been a Family Hand excursion when Sibling and I were children, I would have slept in the top bunk with Sibling underneath, but in the end I gave up and went to sleep. Well, it had been a long day.

The next morning we were up by 9am which I thought was ridiculously early, until I realised that I'd got it wrong and for some reason Arizona time is the same as Nevada time, which meant that I actually got up - of my own free will, mind - at 8am. *Shudder* Anyway, we drove off up the road and bought breakfast from the petrol station that offered a 5 cent discount per gallon if one paid cash (how quaint). I had Polish cake. It was delicious, although a bit odd eaten in a very American style diner. The Polish man serving us spoke 3 words the entire time - "What you wan'?" - and scowled authentically every time he had to get up and pour us more coffee; but his wife was a bit chattier, and told me where she was from in Poland when I went to pay. She was most excited when I told her about going to Zakopane and asked whether I spoke any Polish. Was ashamed to realise that the one word of Polish I learned had chosen that moment to disppear from my head, so had to respond "No - I only learned Russian at university" *coughcough* which is a bit of a stretch of the truth....alright, it's an out and out lie - I didn't learn any of it - but nevermind. I digress.

Mother Hand had been so impressed with my driving skills she insisted I drive us up to the entrance to the Grand Canyon National Park, which I did with relish, and we pulled into the visitor's centre to pay our entrance fee. At this point, disaster struck - I couldn't get the key out of the ignition. Mother Hand commented on me being very heavy handed with things in her "not-the-expected-daughter-of-mine-loins" tone (as mentioned often in previous entries) and suggested I had bent it, then went off to the toilet and ceased to be helpful. I coaxed and tugged and twisted and wiggled, to no avail. So, I decided to try and start the engine instead, since it was the only thing left to do. *Twist* - nothing. Not even a sputter. I broke a sweat at this point and my hands started shaking as I imagined all sorts of (probably impossible) possibilities such as flooded engines or exploded batteries at which point Mother Hand showed up again and told me to get out while she looked at it.

Three seconds after getting in, she had the car going. Now, bear in mind this is the woman who drove the car all the way home from the rental place without taking the handbrake off. I was truly shamed, and even more so when she explained that I had left the car in gear *shuffle* That's the problem with automatics - they're too easy.

Danger averted, we coughed up our $20 and drove on into the park, getting our first glimpse of the Canyon shortly after. I have to say, it literally took my breath away - it was truly one of the most amazing things I have ever seen. I clambered out onto an overhanging rock when Mother Hand wasn't within see-and-have-fits distance and wow...that's one long drop. We drove around taking pictures from various viewpoints all day long, I got very sunburned in the process but it was totally worth it - even if I have got a ridiculous white diagonal stripe across my chest from my bag. There were even traffic cones! After I explained the special significance of traffic cones to me with regards to Mr Z, she insisted we pulled over and I run out into the middle of the road to put it on my head and have my picture taken. Honestly, sometimes I think she's sillier than me. She was at least as impressed with the Canyon as I was, and didn't even complain too much when I insisted on sitting on the very edge to watch the sun go down. On the way back to the car, we saw a herd of bambis...er, fawns, even...grazing next to the car park. The next day, a coyote ran across the road in front of us and I nearly drove over two snakes sun bathing on the tarmac, so it was quite a trip for local fauna, really.

I'm getting ahead of myself...we spent the night in the same motel, me slathering aloe onto my sunburn and whimpering softly every time I had to move, Mother Hand trying to keep warm. I had no trouble staying warm, even without the sunburn, since she had brought my duvet along, knowing how fond I was of it. I say was, because sadly, the duvet has moved on. That's right - it left me. It eloped with the sheets from the motel room and decided to stay there. We didn't realise this until we arrived home, 300 miles away, so there's no going back for it - I just hope it's happy with its new owners. On the way home, we drove down Route 66 (past restaurants with names like "Roadkill Steak House") and stopped to see the Grand Canyon caverns on the way, which were quite interesting although very touristy - coloured lights everywhere n stuff. Even though they're about 50 miles away from the Canyon, they're named for it because the air in them comes from there - when they discovered the caverns, they had men down there 24 hours a day doing nothing but let red flares off to see where the smoke emerged, to no avail. Two days later, red smoke started floating out of the walls in the Grand Canyon - et voila. When they were first discovered, their owner lowered tourists down the 200 foot drop on a piece of rope, without a light. SCARY SCARY! I'm glad I live in the time of lifts.

Upon our return we found Father Hand fast asleep and not feeling well, so I was permitted to drive the hire car back unsupervised, with Mother Hand following in Father Hand's car. This was very exciting. I put the stereo on as loud as it would go and sang all the way. I really have to get me one of those car things. Of course, I had to observe all speed limits to make sure Mother Hand didn't get lost (she got lost driving back from dropping Father Hand off at work, this morning, in spite of the fact that she had a map and it was a journey we'd made at least four times). But we had a couple of two-way radios to keep communication open, which was also a lot of fun. We seem to have been alternating between getting along fine and arguing, so everything's the same as always, really. Although I must admit it cut quite deep when she "suggested", as I drove us to the Hoover Dam today, that I lose weight - for about the fifth time in two weeks....
Mother Hand: You should buy another t-shirt like that (she bought me a t-shirt which is almost the same as one I had when I was 14 and loved so much I wore it to pieces) but in a smaller size, for when you're thinner
Me: (wordless grunt)
Mother Hand: Well, Sally, you really should do something, for your health, and...
Me: I know, I know (attempt to cut her off)
(Doesn't work)
Mother Hand: ...because Mr Z might like you now, but eventually he'll get fed up with you being fat and leave you
Me: (nearly crash car in shock at blatant manipulative cruelty)
Mother Hand: I mean, all your other boyfriends have
Me: THEY HAVE NOT! *ONE*!! *ONE* OF THEM! That's just SO mean...
Mother Hand: Well um..OK then, don't do it for him, do it for you
Me: Yes, but doesn't doing it for me mean that I do it when I choose and not because you nagged me into it? That was such a cruel thing to say, Mum, really...
Mother Hand: Well, I wouldn't say nagged....

*Weep*

I suppose I snipe at her my fair share, so we're probably about even. Mothers everywhere can of course get away with saying things that nobody else would even dream of saying, as can daughters I suppose - I've been teasing her almost non-stop about her current relationship status - or should I say stati - but in a good natured way. In return she offers to join me up for Slimming World in readiness for my homecoming. Give and take, I suppose (mumble)

In other news...upon hearing that Mr Z was being interrogated by the receptionists at work about his visit, I decided to fuel their curiosity still more by sending him flowers at work. Apparently this has resulted in them chasing him down corridors telling him he is wonderful - the desired effect - and has set his mother off wondering "what on earth he did while he was here". That made me cackle quite loudly, before I remembered I actually have to meet her soon. Am starting to regret the psycho postcard of the Dover cliffs ("I'm going to jump, I'm going to jump, I'm going to jump...") amongst other things, but nevermind. Other than that, I have been frantically scanning pictures trying to catch up on them before I get the Grand Canyon ones back - and have managed quite admirably, stopping just short of actually making them viewable on my web page, so you'll have to wait a bit longer to see New York a la Sally.

I was searching for my web page on search engines today and realised that it's not on any of them, which was a bit disconcerting. Worse still, I found a copy Bunnyland at members.tripod.co.uk/saliekat - which was a place I didn't even know my page was. It was the 1998 version, still pink and with my uni email address all over it. Those evil Tripodites had obviously made a copy of my page on their .co.uk pages and I only removed the one at the .com address. Fixed it up now, but spent a while searching afterwards to see if there were any other copies of my page in undisclosed locations. Surely that's not legal? I never even knew Tripod had a .co.uk thingie. Also realised that signing up for a Lycos webmail account in a moment of madness means that I cannot access my .com Tripod account, since every time I try to log in it recognises me as "sallyhand" instead of "saliekat" and nothing I do gets me round it - not even the anonymous cookie, or deleting all my temporary internet files. My life is just one endless cycle of trauma, isn't it

Thursday 10th May

You know what? You lucky, lucky people are lucky enough to be reading the diario of the luckiest, most blessed person in the world. I mean - look at the proof. Not only do I get to slope off to a city where the daytime temperatures are topping 100 degrees at the moment. Not only do I not have to work. Not only do I get to travel around and see natural wonders of America at the expense of generous Father Hand. Not only do I have the nicest boyfriend in the world. BUT! I even managed to purchase a $1600 plane ticket home for $350!

Yes, it's true. No sooner had I seen Mother Hand off at the airport, than I was in Sta travel (and I cannot promote these people enough so their name might Sta travel pop up a bit Sta travel more this entry) seeing whether that $300 one way ticket home they advertised on their website was real or just a figment. It turned out, it was. In fact, there were 3 possible options for this price - and one of them happened to be a direct flight from Vegas to London on Virgin Atlantic. So, I got my ticket at less than one quarter of the usual price, AND I get to play Super Mario Bros all the way back to England, whereupon I can fall into the waiting arms of Beccy and Zoe, drink cider, then stagger back to Portsmouth and see Mr Z. Life does not get much better than this (happy grin).

The girls in Sta travel were really happy to see me - I was the only one there - anyone who has ever been into the Sta travel in ULU will know how irregular this is ("take a ticket, wait 2 hours...") and they told me not many people in America have ever heard of them. WAKE UP AMERICA! I then had to do 4 different withdrawals to get the cash to pay for it, but by the time I left I was actually singing. A direct flight? For $350?!! It's obvious that I lead a charmed life. I was so cheerful, I walked all the way to the English bar and drank a pint of cider in one go. This is just so wrong - I need to get back to the land where pints are of the proper size and I can't down them in one.

Mother Hand is back in Portsmouth, thankfully, although she nearly caused a couple of international incidents on the way back. Firstly, she asked the steward if he would remove the oxygen masks and first aid kits stowed in the locker above her seat so that she could stow her bag. Then, when he refused, she started going off on one about Americans having ridiculously large carry on luggage because they're too lazy to check it or wait for it at the other end (this is my gripe, which I had waxed lyrical on whilst waiting to see her off, on account of my "just woke up" bad mood). Unluckily for her, there was a family of 4 people - all with those big rolling suitcases - trying to stuff the overhead compartments right behind her. Oh dear. Are these the actions of a rational person? One has to wonder....(grin)

I am writing this whilst half watching "Surprise Wedding" on the Fox network. I have to say, Fox has done it again - I thought Temptation Island was sick and wrong, but Surprise Wedding?! Here's the deal - women who think they have been waiting too long for their boyfriends to propose trick them into coming to Vegas for a phony TV special, then they get all dolled up in meringues and wait onstage. The "lucky" guys are brought out one by one and proposed to, in front of a howling live studio audience of probably 1000 people, plus goodness only knows how many waddling food processors (TM) perched on their couches at home. The announcer just said it all - "The thing tonight is: 'Marry me, or else'. Think of it as a kind of cattle prod towards commitment." I should also point out that this is the second run of the show, and this time Fox guarantees "NOT EVERYONE WILL SAY YES!"

WOO HOOO! Yet again we get to watch, as a nation, as more hapless couples break their hearts in public. I mean, yknow, it's just so WRONG! How low can they sink? "Surprise Divorce"?! "Our lucky contestants will ask their spouses for a divorce, and if they say yes, they'll get divorced HERE! ON! STAGE! TONIGHT!" Well, I suppose they can just have the same contestants from this show, since a recipe for a happy marriage surely does not include "spring proposal on boyfriend and force him into deciding between whether to do something he's not comfortable with or humiliate himself and the woman he loves in front of a possible audience of 300 million people." One of these couples has only been together for five months, and the bloke had only just finalised his first divorce when they got together. What is WRONG with that woman?!

This is the whole point - not the time they've been together - but the fact that these women are proposing to men that they *know* have misgivings about getting married. Some of them want to wait until they're more finanically settled; some of them simply - by their girlfriends' own admission - do not feel they are ready for it. So, instead of taking no for an answer, or waiting, these harpies pretty much blackmail their men into doing what they want. It's this sort of behaviour that gets us women a bad name, you know (shake finger). It's just wrong. I can't wait to get home and watch comparatively decent television like Eastenders. I'm sure the characters in that are living more in the real world than the women on this damn show, anyway.

Enough ranting. Alright, it's true - I did watch it through to the end. And they did all say yes - only one of them said, "Yes, but not now because your mum's not here". How utterly sickening.

So, there goes another week. Four weeks from today, I will be back in England. Stuart said he'd call the landlords and make sure they were stocked up, har. Zoe and Beccy are meeting me at the airport, which is tradition (Zoe and I met Beccy when she came back from Cameroon) - I expect them to be at least half an hour late, because that's also part of the tradition (grin) - and apparently I'm being whisked off for "a spot of lunch and a lot of vino" in Brighton for the afternoon, all at Zoe's expense, wahey! Then I can go back to Portsmouth and sink into blissed-out girlfriend mode for the whole weekend. Then, I *suppose*, I will have to start looking for a (gag) job. Expect to see me bitching and complaining in this thing again within 6 to 8 weeks (BUT! only about work.)

Thursday 18th May

I sadly have to report that, apart from seeing The Mummy Returns and having nightmares for 2 nights afterwards, nothing of interest has happened to me this week. I have been slowly starting to prepare for my homecoming - I went to the supermarket on Sunday and stocked up on peanut butter M&Ms, Wint-o-green Lifesavers for Jen, and raspberry Crystal Light. Have become helplessly addicted to raspberry Crystal Light over the past few weeks, so I wrote to Kraft to discover if they sold it in England. They wrote back saying that they can't, because it contains colorings (sic) and preservatives which are not legal in the European Community (surely not in existence anymore? Isn't it the European Union?). This makes me wonder whether it's so healthy to drink a pitcher...sorry, jug, JUG...a day. But surely it is better than Koolaide, with its "Add half a pound of sugar per 2 pints of water" rule, in such neon colours...er, flavours...as Wildberry Surprise. What's the surprise? - diabetes, one would imagine.

Still, with these items a nice pair of red boots (absolute necessity), and a stock of Herbal Essences products unavailable in England, and a spare Banana Republic t-shirt, I will be able to cope with the culture shock of going back. As in - back to a land where there is some culture. I realised I had timed my departure to coincide with the season finales of a number of television shows, which is just as well, because American television is dire enough as it is - it must be even worse over the summer if they have no new shows to air.

Have amusing mild obsessive-compulsive anecdote to relate. The victim is to remain nameless so, for arguments sake, we shall call them Jack, after Jack Nicholson in As Good As It Gets. The scene - the Hand apartment bathroom, with two doors, and a light switch outside each door - both controlling the same interior light. For this light to be off, the two switches have to be facing opposite directions - one up, one down. The puzzle - Father Hand would return home from work nightly to discover that if he had left his light switch down in the morning, it would be up in the evening; whereas if he left it up, it would remain up (the point being, that his light switch would always be in a position to ensure that the light switch at the other end was down and the light was off). Intrigued, one night he took his screwdriver to the light switch panel at his end and switched the functions, so that for the light to be off, both switches would have to be in the same position - up or down.

Is everybody with me? Good.

Henceforth, his light switch would remain down, or if it had been up, would be down when he returned from work. He concluded that Jack had a mild obsession with the light switch facing tidily in the expected downwards position when the light was off, and thus, if turning the light off at his end of the bathroom left his switch up, he would instead walk through the bathroom to Father Hand's switch and turn it off there. This amused me greatly. I wonder how many other people have these mild little obsessions? Everybody, I suspect. Tina admitted to me in New Orleans that she religiously shaves her feet and toes because she thinks hair there but not on legs looks unusual - but I don't think that this is unusual because I do it too, and being obsessed with keeping oneself hairless is nothing new to me after living with Zoe and her endless tweezing sessions for nine months. However, when I told her, Andrea and Andrea's friends about my nail-clippings obsession, they looked at me like I should be committed. I picked up a book of old wives' tales in a bookshop once and flicked through it, and read a number of times that people used to be really careful with things like their nail clippings and stray hairs, because if a witch got her hands on these things, she could control you with magic. For this reason, if I break a nail while I'm out in public, I NEVER EVER throw it on the ground - I put it in my pocket and wait until I am near a rubbish bin. Actually telling someone about this made me realise how crazy it is, and so, for a while, I made a concerted effort to stop, only to find myself scrabbling on the floor of a bus for dropped piece of nail. Since I'm doing no harm with my little obsession, I don't think I will try and stop anymore. In my defence, there was a time when I wouldn't brush my hair in public places for fear that someone would get hold of some of the hairs that fell out, but I'm over that now - the desire to keep my hair relatively tidy overwhelmed it.

Rang up my old place of work today - the porn industry - to get my boss's surname for use on application form references. Robert, my old senior supervisor (the one who used to buy me McFlurries), was very chatty, as always, and told me that shortly after I stopped working there a transexual started. Apparently he physically became a she during her time there, and then brought her girlfriend to the Christmas party - also a recently created woman. Everybody was very bemused by all accounts, especially when they explained that they used plastic...um...*apparatus* now. This story is just so Virtual Universe! Then Robert told me that him and a male colleague are planning a cabaret number for this year's Christmas party to the tune of "It's Raining Men" and that just put the cherry on the sundae, so to speak. Remembered how much fun I used to have working there and how much time we spent laughing, and was for a while sad that I left, but then - the hours were a bit horrendous. My boss won't be available to give me a reference until the middle of next week apparently - he went off to Denmark to see the Eurovision Song Contest live. It just gets better, doesn't it?!

Monday 22nd May

Have been making a real effort to start keeping normal sleeping hours, so that I can get out into the sun a bit before I leave and avoid returning to England paler than I left. The sunburn from the Grand Canyon has just about stopped peeling (haven't burned that badly since Zoe, Leila and I spent 8 hours in the scorching heat of a Tenerife water park 5 years ago) so I figured it was safe to venture outside. Found that the only way to brave being seen in public in THAT swimsuit (that Mother Hand bought me, that she claims makes me look like something out of a Philadelphia advert, that Zoe and Leila teased me mercilessly about on aforementioned holiday, that I have refused to wear for 5 years, and that has survived this long only because I refused to wear it) was to keep telling myself that, no matter how bad I look, someone always looks worse. And while I try to avoid being bitchy, I was proved correct when, after half an hour of solo languishing beside the pool this morning (yes, you read correctly - MORNING!), a woman with a build not dissimilar to mine turned up, in the sort of high waisted bikini I would honestly go naked before being caught dead in. I mean....she was probably thinner than me (barely - I didn't have my glasses on) but all the same - if a truck had been stricken with a flat tyre nearby, they wouldn't have been short of a spare or five, if you see my point.

(Retract claws)

I can't help it. In a few short weeks I will go from being merely just above average sized to being fat again, through a mere migration 6000 miles east, so I figure I had better call the kettle black while I am still...um...shiny and silver.

Anyway, sleep patterns are slowly normalising again, I was up at 8.30am today, after spending most of yesterday yawning to jaw-crack point, in spite of my early night on Saturday. I was in bed by 12.30, and so knocked out that I just fell asleep immediately (well, almost *cough*) - with the lights on and everything. I was unfortunately awakened half an hour later - for the second time in a week - to the creaking and moaning sounds of my neighbour in the adjoining apartment getting laid. Banging on the wall didn't help much - the creaking and headboard-on-wall sounds stopped, but the moaning merely increased in volume. I am consoled by two things. Firstly, the noises, to date, last less than a minute so it can hardly be the most satisfying of experiences. Secondly...um..."quid pro quo"? A thin wall is a thin wall on both sides, after all. Nevertheless, I am considering buying a can of WD40 and a gag and leaving them in a bag on the adjoining apartment doorstep.

Whilst I'm on the subject of the neighbours, I don't wish to start any vicious rumours but there's definitely something suspicious about them. After being woken up on Saturday night, I didn't get back to sleep until 7am, and during those 6 hours, the shower next door was used at least 5 times. One can hear the water rushing through the pipes. This is not at all uncommon. Often, I hear the shower going 3 or 4 times during the course of the day, and as much at night - curiously, less so in the early evening. Now, conceivably, the 2-bedroom apartment can only be housing a maximum of 4 adults - and I would say only 2, since I have only been hearing the bed springs for the past week so one might surmise that it's a new relationship, thus proving the bedroom usually has a single occupant. For argument's sake, let's say 3. How could 3 adults possibly take 5-10 showers a day? I mean, what are they DOING?! Running a house of ill-repute? Not that there's anything illegal about that, in this state at least. But still...their hot water bill must be fantastic.

It's surprising how little I really know about our neighbours. The people downstairs are cat-abandoning bastards, obviously. The woman downstairs and across, we have never ever seen - and she gave a man a key to her apartment without him ever being inside it, a fact made obvious by him trying to use the key on the door to this apartment by mistake. In addition, her daughter, Katherine, with very short hair and a penchant for headscarves, has only appeared outside recently - we didn't see her once before last month - not even when her brother Dominic was outside. The man who lives in the apartment adjoining their's works for internal security at the casinos, making him one of the least popular men in town, is always either throwing up or listening to loud country music (wannabe cowboy with an ulcer?) when I walk past his apartment, and, we think, is having a sordid affair with Katherine's grandmother (lonely wannabe cowboy with an ulcer). His son, Jake, is rather a creepy child who likes to come around and play on Father Hand's fruit machines (but has been foiled since I've been here on account of me always being asleep in the same room as them whenever he comes over, much to Father Hand's relief I suspect). There is no love lost between Father Hand and Jake, since Jake informed him that he climbs on the bonnet of Father Hand's car to fish stuff off the covered parking roof, and since Father Hand found quantities of sticky red liquid spilled on his car. Admittedly, this might not have been Jake, but he sort of gets blamed for everything, quietly - the rocks left on the steps that nearly send us hurtling over the railings to our death, &c. When he was round here playing Playstation with Ryan the other weekend, I heard him say, quite clearly, "Ryan, I'd give my fucking teeth to Alex if he'd give me this skateboard keyring". I was too shocked to tell him off until the moment had passed.

The apartment opposite ours is empty - we think the previous tenants did a moonlit flit since there were police knocking on their door one night and the tenants were gone a couple of days later. We have vainly tried the windows to this empty apartment in the hopes that we might be able to get in and "borrow" the rack from the oven - since to get more than one, you have to apply to the landlords, fill out forms in triplicate, pass a police check and a drug test...etc etc Interestingly, Father Hand woke up one night before I was here to hear police radios crackling and people running up the stairs, and peered out just in time to see a SWAT team arresting the previous occupant of the adjoining apartment.

Father Hand is anxious to assure all readers that we do not live in a slum. He says, at least there have been no drive-by shootings yet.

I am now the proud owner of an outrageously cowboyesque pair of red boots. Finally, I have red footwear! Since I had to buy men's boots on account of my unfeasibly wide feet, and scarlet is obviously not a male boot colour of choice, they're not red-red; in fact they verge on tawny, which happily means that they don't clash too badly with jeans. They smell authentically of cow and they are pointy and embossed, and I am very happy with them. I'm sure that wearing them would make me most welcome at the White House. Must start practising my Texan twang to match. We got them from this enromous warehouse of cowboy merchandise, which was wall-to-wall with boots - I nearly fainted at the sight (I wish I had more feet) - and enough other leather goods to put any self-respecting herd of cattle into a blind panic. They were even giving away free boot cream - which I didn't pick up on the grounds that I will henceforth be an Urban Cowgirl (no more deserts and wild burros for me in a few weeks) and so will not need to clean cattle dung and acres of dust off every few days. Red boots! Happy Sally.

Friday 25th May

Friday night, and here I am smushed up on the couch flicking between "Sabrina the Teenaged Witch goes to Australia" and some Mexican soap opera featuring a woman with a powder blue wig. I wish I could understand what is being said - last week whilst flicking across the channels I noticed she had pink hair, and I'm interested to know how they explained the change. Anyway, I digress - thank goodness I will be home in two short weeks, and hopefully this situation will be rectified. Sabrina, for crying out loud?!

The reason for Sabrina is that I am currently enjoying the company of Alex, the Littlest Treasure. Father Hand has whisked Frankie off to Colorado for the Bank Holiday weekend and left one child with me and one with Heidi. I've been racking my brains for ways to amuse him; tomorrow we're going to see Shrek and I plan to bribe him with plenty of ice cream but I'm worried he's going to be bored. We spent a lot of time in the pool, and when I figured I was starting to burn we walked over and swam in the unheated pool for a while, because it's surrounded by leafy green trees so I had something to shade my English-rose-esque skin with. There hardly ever anyone there, too, so that's the one I usually go to. Today, however, we rounded the corner to see a Fabiolike character in tiny little turquoise swimwear mincing his way into the pool, and both Alex and I burst out laughing at the same time. So, he swam around, we went in, Alex got in the pool and I gracefully (har har) reclined on a lounger. Then Fabio got out, and I thought I was going to choke trying not to laugh because these trunks turned out to be a thong. Mr Z tried to suggest that I wouldn't know had I not been looking (suspiciousboyfrienditus) but I pointed out that it's kind of hard not to notice something that's practically being waved in one's face. It got even worse when he decided to sunbathe face down with his legs apart - we left shortly after that. As I have said before, I don't think I'm a prude, but "there's a time and a place" comes to mind. I mean, what was he, German or something? He had a sunburned arse, anyway. I sniggered quite a long time at that.

Oooo, Sabrina and her friend with the awful fake English accent have just discovered a merman on the beach - and waddayaknow - it's Brad from Neighbours!!! Must go - need to lie down in a darkened room with a wet flannel over my face and whimper for a while (tm)

Saturday 26th May

Too much excitement for one day. Children, children, everywhere, they're haunting me, they're after me, they're following me, clinging to me, braiding my hair, drawing me pictures...*shake* I need a pint of cider with a double vodka stirred in and some valium. And a hysterectomy.

It didn't help matters much that I ignored my alarm this morning and didn't wake up until 11.30am, thus ensuring one bored Alex. To make up for it, I took him and three of the neighbourhood bra...treasures - Dominic, Katherine and Kayla, 8, 10 (and a half) and 7 respectively - to the pool for an hour or two of frolics. No sooner had I thrown myself into the deep end in a vain attempt to get away, than I was approached by Rasputin in swimming trunks. He had a long black beard, broken yellow teeth and long scraggy black hair, and I think his tits might have been bigger than mine. He told me he was from Munich but had been here for 25 years; then he told me he had family in England and they were visiting from tomorrow. Very *important* family, he whispered - the King of Montenegro, and the King of Serbia, no less.

He picked the wrong person to impress with East European royalty, in my opinion (snigger). Of course, I'm not saying it's impossible - lots of royal families who left Eastern Europe during the Second World War went to England, and their descendants would obviously still be there. But it was when he told me they'd be back in power soon that I started to wonder. I said, "I don't think they'll be very welcome back there now, surely..." but he brushed this off with a dismissive wave and snort. "Oh no," he said, "they'll be welcomed back with open arms."

It was definitely one of the weirder conversations of this year so far. It was a bit one sided because I couldn't understand much of what he was saying - he had a very thick accent (unusual for someone who's been here 25 years...hmmmm...) and whatever it was, it definitely wasn't German. He told me he'd come to Vegas from Hawaii and had three houses in Europe; he said a lot of stuff actually, and even ducking under the water didn't do much to get rid of him - he'd still be talking when I was forced to surface for air. He tried to give me his apartment number, at which point I started talking loudly about my reasons for returning to England, listing boyfriend, boyfriend and er, boyfriend first. (One boyfriend...but I said it three times...just to clarify). It shut him up briefly, but eventually I just swam off, cleverly making it look like Katherine was dragging me away by my hair (which she was braiding at the time). He tried to follow for a time, trying to get Katherine to braid *his* hair (this guy was CREEPY AS HELL) but soon gave up in the face of me swimming away every time he started speaking and started talking to a Floridian who was loudly expostulating that the pool got warmer the longer one stayed in it. I realised this was true, did a quick head count, realised there were 11 children in the pool, and vacated it. Then I took a long, long, hot shower.

Anyway, after that we went to see Shrek, and this is when I made a silly decision - I decided to drive Frankie's car there, since we were taking Dominic, Katherine and Kayla and most American children will whine if asked to walk 100 yards. This was possibly the stupidest, most irresponsible thing I have ever done. For a start, the truck keys were left with me for emergencies, and for another thing, it's a manual transmission, which I haven't driven for 3 years. I stalled five times just trying to reverse out of the parking space, for crying out loud. I was shaking and deciding it was a horrible idea and we should just walk - my mood not improved by Kayla exclaiming, "OH. MY. GOD. WE'RE ALL GOING TO DIE" regularly - but I managed to get out of the car park in the end and was starting to feel a little bit better. I made sure we took the quietest route possible, but forgot that this would involve crossing Decatur, which is busy at the best of time. I am ashamed to say I stalled about seven times, and everybody behind me was getting really pissed off and overtaking on all possible sides and leaning on their horns and making obscene gestures at me, because every time there was a gap in the traffic long enough for me to pull out (and I was waiting for a BIG gap) I managed to stall. Meanwhile, Alex had got a chant going, consisting of "We believe in you Sally! Go Sally! Go Sally!" while I was sweating like a maniac and feeling like I wanted to cry and knowing, just knowing that I'm going to hell for this.

Finally I managed to get us across, to loud cheers, and we eventually got to the Orleans in one piece, although I insisted on parking a distance away so that I didn't have to pull up near any other cars. Next problem - the damn car kept moving! I couldn't make it stop rolling. We pushed it across the street to another spot in case it had been on a slope (the children enjoyed this immensely) which attracted the attention of the Orleans security guys, who pulled over in their truck and smirked at me. I must have looked smirkable-at - red and sweating and with my hair all wild cos I'd only just washed it and on the verge of a hysterical breakdown - and offered their assistance, barely concealing their sniggers when I explained we couldn't get the car to stop moving, and worse still, I couldn't make it start. I said we'd go see the movie and figure it out afterwards and they told me not to hesitate to ask for their assistance and then drove off, no doubt to relate their humourous "stupid woman" story to all their colleagues ("Watch out for the girl in the Banana Republic shirt and clingy mauve skirt - she's definitely a blonde masquerading...."). At this helpful point, Heidi called and explained that I had to leave the truck in gear to get it to stop moving. This done, we went and watched the movie (a showing half an hour later than planned, as a result of my 20mph drive/stall transportation method and the drifting car syndrome). Shrek was pretty funny, I was quite impressed ("Ah'm makin' waffles!") although I felt an underlying sense of ickiness the whole time because I was panicking terribly about the possibility of my breaking the truck (it got so bad before the movie started that I was forced to sneak off for a quiet mental breakdown in the toilets). Sure enough, when we got out, the car would not start, for love nor money. I was forced to walk the kids back to the apartments, and they almost gave me several heart attacks by running out in front of a car in the parking lot (I almost found myself screaming, "BUDDY LINE NOOOOOOOWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW!!!" - it's like, ingrained Girl Scout training or something) but happily they all arrived back in one piece, thus ensuring that I'll avoid several law suits.

By the time we got back, however, I was a total gibbering wreck and I'd managed to convince myself that I'd failed to leave the car in gear and, on top off all the visions I was having of Frankie and Father Hand stringing me up from the nearest tree, and all that horrible "You're so irresponsible, what were we thinking?!!" yelling stuff, I was also having visions of the truck rolling around all over the parking lot, and the security guards having the smash the windows in to stop it. So, I hopped on my bike and dashed down there so fast I barely even heard the whistles and ribaldry from the homeless blokes outside Walgreen's. I opened the car up to find I *had* left it in gear, but I thought I might as well try it one last time.

You know what? The damn thing started first time.

I think this whole episode was like, God trying to tell me that I really shouldn't be doing something like borrowing the car for something as trivial as going to the pictures, that I was displaying unforgivable arrogance in thinking that nobody would mind, and that I must be punished for my irresponsibility. I'm only glad that I managed to get home safely - and I only stalled once!! - because getting into a crash might have been a bit more punishment than I could cope with. I'd already figured out which garage to call for assistance, and I even opened the bonnet and peered inside for a while, trying to look like I knew what I was doing. Once I'd found that the fanbelt was intact, I was a bit stuck though, because fanbelts are about the extent of my knowledge about the internal workings of cars. Happily it all worked out alright in the end. I'm pretty sure I'll still be in trouble but I suppose that will only serve to cement the lesson more firmly in my mind.

The little stall/"Go Sally!" scene is making me laugh as I read back over it. It was another one of those really surreal moments. I'm 22 years old and I had 4 children in the back seat: it was a scary glimpse of an alternative reality (grin). I'm not sure why kids and weirdoes gravitate towards me with such alarming regularity, but I must do something about it. Uninstall my "kids and weirdoes" beacon or something. The kids I can cope with *mumble* theyarekindasweetsometimesreally but the weirdoes have got to go. King of Serbia? I'm so amused. I'm going to email my old tutor Peter just to tell him.

Monday 28th May

*Slump* The Treasures have gone. I have been left with a residual popularity among the neighbourhood treasures - Katherine going so far today as to tell me she wished I was her "mom". I told her I wasn't old enough to have a daughter her age, and she said it didn't matter - I never said I wanted to sell her, like her real "mom". What can one say in the face of that? I become more and more depressed the more I hang out with these kids - and not because I've been unoffically elected by them as "pool chaperone" - but because I'm leaving in less than 2 weeks and they're all going to be condemned to a long, hot, pooless summer of neglect. Katherine told me yesterday that her dad was in California but he'd rung her mum up and told her that as far as he was concerned, he had no daughter, and he'd left when Katherine was 3 months old "in her mommy's tummy". Meanwhile, Kayla turned 8 years old today and was looking all miserable in the passageway when I went out to buy shampoo because her dad had gone out with "that hag" and failed to show up for her party. It breaks my heart, honestly. I took a shampoo-shopping detour to the dollar store to try and find some nice cheap presents for her and Katherine, but in the end I put everything back because I think if I'm too nice they'll be more unhappy when I leave.

I saw a bit of this at camp but kids on camp are outside of their natural surroundings and so one doesn't really get the full impact. I mean, if it was just one or two unhappy kids in the area I probably wouldn't think anything of it - but it appears to be ALL of the ones I've met. They all get shut out of their apartments to play in the sun all day; they all want to come with me when I go to the pool because their parents won't take them; they all respond with such euphoria when I display the smallest of kindnesses (I thought Katherine was going to explode when I offloaded my toy labrador on her on Saturday - I've been trying to get rid of it for ages, too) that it makes me ache that there's not more I can do. Kayla and Katherine...actually it's Catherine, as I discovered when she made me a big card framing a picture of Mr Z and me she had asked for and with "Girls Rock!" and "Angle" (sic) scribbled all around the borders...came around this morning in search of something to do and looked so forlorn when I said I was busy that I let them in, where they eagerly pressed me to read the BBC news online to them out loud (a sure sign of a bored child?) Kayla responded to something I said in the most convincing English accent I have heard out of the mouth of an American without a voice coach, and then looked surprised when I called her on it - she hadn't even realised she was doing it. I'm trying to think of little ways I can amuse them in the days before I leave; even if I'm not going to be an official Program Director this summer, it looks like I'm going to be filling in here for a while. Maybe by doing so I will shame all the parents round here into being more attentive, even if it's only temporarily. At the very least I'll be cheering the kids up.

I'm angry. I don't think people should have kids until they're ready to sacrifice a large portion of their spare time to spend with them. It's reminding me of the plethora of youngsters at the Mardi Gras parades with their parents - the parents want to go, but cannot leave the kids with anyone, and so just decide to take them - some so young and small they are able to squeeze through the bars of the barriers cordonning the pavement off from the parade routes - into an environment filled with broken glass, ankle deep trash, breasts and drunk frat boys. It really annoyed me, especially since there are special parades for the kids in the suburbs and therefore there's no need for them to go to the adult parades. It's just the adults selfishly refusing to give up their own freedoms for the sake of their offspring. Get the feeling I feel passionate about this? You don't know the half of it...

One last thing before I put the soapbox away - I think the apartment complex should cough up for a lifeguard at one of their 5 pools so that there is somewhere kids can swim without being accompanied by an adult. Well...I suppose it is a parental responsibility, really, but still. I can't remember that kids in England are ignored as much as this, but then, I haven't had too much experience with kids in England so I'm probably speaking too soon. Mind you - there's less "ADD" there. One of these days I'll put my carefully researched and written (read: one weekend of manic cramming) sociology paper on ADD and its links with neglect on here, so that you can all be dazzled by my amazing controversial insights (grin)

I have been following the race riots in Oldham with some interest, since one of my friends, who shall remain nameless, resides there. Nameless told me about it himself online today, saying that...*rummage for exact words* "its exploding around here :) sooner the better i say...cos at the moment white people can't go in certain areas...". He, in Oldham, is voting for the British National Party, after attending a few of their rallies. He said it was like the Wild West there - BNPers everywhere. He also said that "all this racist crap is just a way to put the white down." I suppose it's quite easy to lump the BNP in with the people who throw bricks through the windows of Bengalis, but somehow I feel that being anti-ethnic because one thinks white people are getting a rough deal is more sinister than being a racist in the truer sense of the word. It's like, a new breed or something. It's quite one thing to say, "All blacks are stupid and lazy" (not at all my opinion, just an example..grovel grovel), but quite another to say, "Blacks shouldn't fight for their rights because that's oppressive to white people". Maybe I'm seeing it too black and white (groooaaaaannnnn).

It's a much bigger issue here, of course, what with the likes of Jesse Jackson, whose pet rants include the one claiming that blacks are discriminated against because they outnumber whites on death row three to one. This is pretty heinous until you also consider that for every murder a white commits, 12 are committed by blacks - so is it that the whites are being discriminated against, because the figures for death row aren't twelve to one? Generally, a white man who commits a murder will get the death penalty, state laws allowing; whereas a black man who commits a murder is much more likely to get the death penalty if his victim was white, black victims inviting more leniency. Does this mean that, subtly, the law values a white life above a black life? Oh, what a tangled web we weave.

Enough dabbling in things I don't understand properly - I'm just regurgitating. Anyway, hearing that Nameless is voting BNP has made me quite pleased I sent my proxy form off last week, so I get a vote against his, even if it's not in the same constituency. Happily, Portsmouth South has a very worthy LibDem MP by the name of Mike Hancock so I am spared having to decide between Labour and Conservative, although it might actually have been an easier decision for me, sequestered as I am from canvassing hopefuls bearing "Save the pound" balloons (Masa..I read this in your diary and was very amused!) and endless party political broadcasts. From here, I can read what I please, and avoid the hundreds of leaflets Mother Hand tells me the Conservatives have been slaying rainforests for in the hopes they will sway me. I see Thatcher has been out baying for blood again: when I read that she'd *actually said* "You knew I was coming back..I saw a billboard saying 'The Mummy Returns' on the way here" I was forced to print the article out *and* save it into my archives for future giggling at. I can't mention her name in this apartment without inviting a stream of obscenities (Father Hand totally blames the folding of his business on her) but I saw her speak when I was in the Sixth Form and I was quite impressed - she can at least hold an audience, and keeps her name about with little stunts like the hankie-over-the-BA-plane-exhibit. And, when Zoe and I went up against our rabid Thatcherite history teacher in a sixth form debate about whether Major was better than her, we lost 24 votes to nothing (3 abstainers - all loyal friends of ours). We could see it coming of course - but anything to wind Mr Vale up. He told Beccy and I that we would burn in hell for all eternity when I was in his second year RS class (what we did to deserve it is anybody's guess, although with hindsight updating the crucifiction to involve an electric chair was slightly blasphemous). But he had a touch of humour about him when he said it, and commented that when he was up in heaven he'd look down and wonder where he went wrong.

Speaking of school, I have been invited to attend the Higher Education evening, where old girl success stories such as myself (phleurgh) are invited to brainwash the lower sixth and make sure they all apply to university like good little Girls' Public Day School Trust girls. Mrs Spender suggested it on the grounds that I'd done Camp America and that was a bit out of the ordinary, and since I just hit her for another job reference I felt sort of obliged. I also have my own agenda. I'd bet my life savings (eight pounds and forty pence) that they haven't allowed another year book after the one I edited (sent the chemistry teacher into floods of tears, so I heard, and nearly got me sued for libel, but that's another story) - in fact, I bet all the copies I left to the school libraries were summarily burned and the matter was never mentioned again. Since the 1996 leavers' year book was the only one ever seen through to the printing stage, I am the alumn..(alumnus, alumne, alumnum...?)...*cough* "old girl" best placed to advise next year's upper sixth of their rights and ensure that this is something which becomes a tradition. And with a new headmistress in place, probably unknowing of the past horrors, their efforts won't be crushed at the first sign of a questionaire (damn word..questionnairre..questionairre..questionnaire..I never get it right) (I'm feeling very correctenglishy tonight). *Cackle cackle* poor Mrs Lovering, I hope her classroom manner has improved and she's stopped describing chemical precipitations as "red-blue" because if she hasn't and my evil plan succeeds she might be needing the tissues again. (I had no time for Mrs Lovering and she had less for me so I'm rubbing my hands together a that at that prospect)

This is much better. Have been feeling for some time that my thoughts were sort of tapering off and my entries were becoming more sporadic, and was starting to worry that this old diario would just peter out and become no more. Maybe it's an inertia brought on by America, or by not working, or by too much corn syrup-laden products. Whatever it is, maybe it is passing, as a result of my imminent return. I make that four entries in the space of a week! And to my boundless joy, when I checked it today my hits counter has tipped over 7000! I don't do badly, really. Especially considering that probably the majority of the regular readers of this access it directly and bypass the counter. I have new ideas in the woodwork, as always, but in the meantime all but a few of my trip pictures are here now, including the Grand Canyon ones. Thank you for your continued support, and please vote Bunnyland on June 7th - you know we make sense. Occasionally.