Beware the perils of drunking text-messaging

This here is my friend, Mad Irish Julie (wearing a very fetching string vest and thongs that she won during a game of pass the parcel at my birthday party in Switzerland).

I received text messages from her last night, which I feel honour-bound to publish so that we can all learn a valuable lesson from Julie's mistakes.

First message reads:

"Evil twin made me drink wine, dance on stage at gay club and text ex-boss, who hasn't come out to me, to ask him to marry gay friend Barry! Sent beautiful description of Barry to him. Bad, bad evil twin!"

Second message contains the text that she sent to afore-mentioned ex-boss (who, it transpired, had an interview the next day, which probably made him all the more grateful for Julie's 1.15 am text message):

"Good luck in interview! Now, stop reading if I'm speaking out of turn! But think you should marry my friend Barry. He's a sweetheart and kind, funny and smart. Aware sending text from George prob not best guide to sobriety but I've always thought it. So can I give you his no? And would you meet him? Ok, he's phd in development, has worked in Latin America and has fluent Spanish. He's lovely, funny and great. Did this cross line?!"a' "

Hurrah for Julie! She is SO cut out for a career in the Diplomatic Service. And living proof that impending home-0wnership, mortgage etc does not mean that there is any need whatsoever to grow up! Julie, I know you're suffering from ILA right now, but this will all soon be a dim and distant memory, that you will smile at - just like the cough mixture dinner party in Berne!

Marathon Training Days Are Here Again

The real marathon training started today, with my first official long run. For the record (as I never remember to keep a running log), I did 10 km in 51: 28. And I haven't stopped eating since. James is afraid - very afraid!

Girls Just Wanna Get Trousered

My girliefriends came to visit this weekend. We spent the evening eating curry, drinking copious amounts of white wine and catching up: since the last time we all got together, Nicki and Louise have had children, Nic has travelled the world and my nose has grown just a tad prettier.

Here is a photo of Nicola "Front Bottom Kietz", winner of the "who can drink the most and not get a hangover" competition.

And here's one of Louise, winner of the Vomiting Veronica bravery award:

Little Nicki won the competition for having the most pert breasts (but was later disqualified when it was discovered that she had cheated by stuffing the pom-poms from her jacket down her top). She also won the competition for the best opening line of a conversation. It went something like this:

Nicki to Nic: "I'm so sorry it didn't work out for you and Toby"

Nic: "Who's Toby?"

Nicki: "Oh fuck, he was MY ex-boyfriend, wasn't he? I meant Andy"

Nice to see I'm not the only one suffering from the eary onset of senile dimentia.

And what competition did Becky win, I'm sure you are all wondering. I think it would have to be the "who has the biggest bottom" competition:

Pretty impressive, huh?

Dontcha Just Miss the Cold War?

I spent a lovely day with James at the National Archive in Kew today. We were researching Foreign Office and "other" documents concerning the visit of a certain East German playwright to the UK in the 1950s. It made very interesting reading. Included in the file was a letter from the Master of Eton to someone in the Foreign Office (ah! the good old boys' network!) saying that he had heard of the suggested visit, and had seen one of the plays performed: he said he found it "one of the finest" he had ever seen and then stated that, under no circumstances, should it therefore be allowed to be performed at the Edinburgh Festival. Apparently, the Master could be trusted to watch the play and not develop Communist tendancies, but the rest of the general theatre-going public could not.

I miss the Cold War. The world of diplomacy is a duller place without it!

Trial by Combat

... it's James's new way of settling domestic disagreements. We fight to the death and allow God to decide which of us is is right. The upshot of this is that, so far, everything I was previously willing to argue about now seems far too trivial. It also means that James is generally agreed to be right all the time. I'm wrong - at least this way, I get to live.

Sobriety = Not all it's cracked up to be

It was a strange sensation waking up this morning. No pulsating headache, no feeling that all my blood had been replaced by dirty dishwater, no sore throat from smoking Turkish cigarettes bought in desparation from the kebab-van-man - wait a minute: NO HANGOVER! And it was a Sunday - imagine! Not normal at all. Maybe the alien abduction on Thursday night made me wary of alcohol, or maybe the drive to stop my constant social smoking by cutting down on alcohol consumption is finally starting to work. James, too, was hangover-free. I have to say it doesn't seem to agree with him - he has been decidedly surly - and somewhat confused - all day. I think I shall have to feed him beer this evening, bless.

I dreamt about complex wavelets last night. Damn Ryan and his PhD work - how can I dream about something that I don't even remotely understand? I plan to get him back by making him dream about my dissertation work - Felicia Hemans and ideals of femininity. He'll love it!

Ouch Ouch Ouch Ouch Ouch

It is 4 pm and I have just had breakfast. James and I have been involved in some kind of Kenny vs Spenny competition (google it - it's a great programme, and Canadian to boot!) to see who can stay in bed the longest. I won, but only because James got up to make me breakfast in bed.

Alcohol is evil. Just say no, kids.

Oh I do like to be beside the seaside!

James and I went to visit Nicola "Front Bottom" Kietz this weekend. She is now living in a goooorgeous flat in Brighton, all high ceilings and wooden floors and complete with sea view from the bedroom window. And to top it all off, she lives above A PUB! I'm jealous! It's only a short walk from her flat along the sea-front to the pier, where you can takes bags of 2 pence pieces and put them into various machines! James and I shot vampires. What's not to love?

Had a lovely time catching up with Nic and ended up spending Sunday afternoon in a backpackers' pub drinking London Pride and playing shit-face (addictive card game) for hours on end. As much as I wish Nic lived nearby so that I could see more of her, I'm very happy she has decided to live by the sea - I think after all the travelling she has done, she needs to live somewhere a bit different and with something of a holiday atmosphere, and it also gives me somewhere to have fantastic mini holidays!

I've come back to strong demands for evidence of my dissertation work from both my dissertation supervisor and my Director of Studies. Looks like I've got a busy couple of days ahead of me. It's been so long since I did any serious work on it, I'm going to have to do most of the reading all over again (which will not be easy given that I've returned most of the books to the library and can't remember which ones I read in the first place). I often wonder how I ever managed to organise Ambassadors.

Halloween Fancy Dress - Jason was the best! 

Wolfson's Most Normal Couple 

Wolfson's Newest Couple! 

Halloween Dinner 

What I've Been Up To...

Haven't blogged for over a week - how time flies when you're not doing very much! We had the Halloween formal hall on Friday (photos to follow, once the Finn gets his arse into gear and e-mails them to me!), and apart from that ... well... not a lot has been going on really!

On the marathon front, have decided to abandon idea of doing London marathon and am instead planning to do one with a smaller field in the hope of getting a faster time. Possibilities so far are Lochaber, Paris and Geneva. All are around the same time as the London marathon so I can join the training runs with the Hares and Hounds here. As far as fund-raising for a breast cancer charity goes, I also plan to do the Moonwalk - I think it's the week after the London marathon, same route but walked at night in a brightly coloured bra. Sounds like a typical London night out to me!

On the home front, things are as bizarre as ever. Ever since we moved in, it terrifies me 9 times out of 10 when James walks into a room. The poor bloke - there I am, doing the washing up in the kitchen, for example, having a conversation with him somewhere else in the flat; he comes into the kitchen to continue the conversation and I jump 10 foot in the air and scream. I thought it was just because I had got so used to living on my own and it would stop after a week or two, but if anything it has got worse. Example - Friday evening, we were getting ready for formal hall, chatting as we moved from room to room. I went into the bedroom to get my hairbrush. He was in there, getting dressed. I jumped 10 foot in the air and screamed the place down. Poor, poor James. I do realise I must be hell to live with. And I don't know what I can do to make it better. I did suggest to J that he deliberately hide, jump out of places, yell at me etc to try to desensitise me but it only made me more paranoid. It's really not easy being as mad as a cut snake!